Aurica Nestmile

"I want to be with you, forever. Even with my past, body and being a reyvateil...If I knew I had to choose all of those to meet you, I wouldn't hesitate. Thank you. I've been meaning to tell you that for a long time."

- Aurica

Aurica Nestmile (オリカ・ネストミール, Orika Nesutomīru) is one of the heroines of the first Ar tonelico game, Melody of Elemia.

She is a very shy girl, who is very depressed and has a strong distrust of people as a result of a horrible event in her childhood, for which she blames herself. She is the daughter of a human and a Reyvateil

and hails from a small village on the Wings of Horus. Her abilities as a Reyvateil are poor, thus earning her the lowly title of “D-class”. Her self confidence is very low making her feel as though she is useless, and she is often looking to her stuffed bear called “Don Leon” for support - to such a degree that he became her Mind Guardian. She is emotionally dependent and deathly afraid of being hurt emotionally. In short, she is a tortured soul.

Aurica is obsessed with the Trio of Elemia, and religious elements can be found in her songs as a result. This obsession and her only friend Claire are the only things keeping her going. That is until she finally gets a partner. The dense minded, but formidable fighter and Knight of Elemia, Lyner.

Origins and the Elemia Church
Aurica was born in Skuwat Village in the 3753 AD year, daughter of a human father and a Reyvateil mother. As a child, she was cheerful and happy. At the age of 11, her hometown was tragically destroyed during a battle between Tenba & the Teru Tribe. Her parents were killed and her home destroyed - she lost everything and was then alone in the world. Aurica and her childhood friend, Claire, are the only two survivors from Skuwat.

As a result, she blamed herself for what happened, because she was out of town when the fight happened and believed she could have saved them. She became very distrusting of people, depressed and withdrawn. Her future abilities as a Reyvateil suffered greatly as well, thus placing her in the ‘D-class’ of Reyvateils. This made her easy to victimize when she joined the Elemia Church three years later with the hopes of becoming the new Holy Maiden and a chance to meet with the Goddesses.

Because she is a 3rd generation Reyvateil, she cannot live beyond the approximate age of 15 to 20 without receiving a life extending agent called Diquility. There are only two organizations in the world that have it: Tenba and the Elemia Church. Obviously, Aurica chose to join the Church.

No sooner was she in the door of the church, when Bishop Falss came up with the idea to use her as the new vessel of Mir. Aurica was kept partner-less for three years until Lyner arrived. She was partnered with him as a part of Falss’ plan.

Fated Meeting
Aurica first appeared saving Lyner's life with her Life Warmth Song Magic, since Lyner was almost dead from the impact when he crashed his airship in Viola Forest. She dropped her handkerchief when she left, and when Lyner later tried to return it to her, she feigned not knowing him. A little later, in the city of Nemo, she was saved from the infected A.B.R. Alpha guardian thanks to Jack and Lyner, where, thanks to Lyner's ability to raise a Reyvateil's power using Harmonics, she began to grow stronger.

She was soon after captured by Bourd and subsequently freed when Misha selflessly surrendered herself in Aurica’s place after Bourd threatened to kill his captive. Regardless of Misha's actions, Bourd threw her out of the airship and Lyner ended falling with her when he tried to save her. Luckily, they were saved by Krusche, who happened to be flying her airship nearby. It ended up crashing in a floating island called the Falcon's Claw, but they survived, and found the ruins of a temple dedicated to goddess Tyria of the Trio of Elemia. A little later, they were rescued by Radolf.

Aurica also assisted Lyner in the search for the Hymn Crystal Purger in the Singing Hill ruin, where, when the ruin collapsed during the search, she crafted the Song Magic Thunder Guard to save Lyner from falling in the Sea of Death. Both Krusche and Radolf were astonished by this fact, since it's very rare for a Reyvateil to craft a Song outside of the Cosmosphere. Afterwards, while searching for Lyner, she was cornered by the A.B.R. Gamma guardian, who was infected by viruses, and was saved by Lyner and Jack.

Ascension
Later on, Aurica and the others accompanied Lyner in his ascension through the tower, and she again helped Lyner when she was paired with him for the Ordeal of the Moon, the trial that they had to pass so the Teru Tribe would open the Pheyna Gate for them. In there, Aurica explained to Lyner about the Reyvateil class system. Additionally, she gave the silly name "Kitty Bowl" to the Circula Teleporter they needed to pass the Frozen Eye.

Aurica is a dreamer. Blinded by this and Lyner’s faith in her, she took on the responsibility of singing the hymn Purger to help destroy the virus ELMA-DS. Halfway through the fight, Aurica’s mind was severely damaged when ELMA-DS forcibly ripped a hole in her Cosmosphere and ran rampant inside. The attack nearly killed her. Lyner and his friends entered Aurica’s Cosmosphere to duke it out with ELMA-DS. In the end, the virus was driven out and Aurica recovers.

Aurica also tried to repair the Musical Corridor to stop the storm that was plaguing Nemo and Firefly Alley, but a virus appeared from inside her, and Shurelia and Ayatane had to intervene. Shurelia explained that Aurica had a hole in her mind and that Lyner had to help her close it. Aurica didn't like this statement, and became depressed thinking that she was defective.

Discovery
A little later, Aurica began to have high fever, and it was discovered that it was because the Diquility that she was given shortly before wasn't making effect. Before she could get another dose in her, Aurica threw a tantrum and ran off angry. With the help of Misha, Lyner and the others found her in the fallen Hexagonal Plate and brought her back to Nemo, where Lyner gave to her the dose of Diquility. They then discovered that Aurica was the supposed reincarnation of goddess Tyria.

Again they went to the temple in Falcon's Claw, where after some obstacles and puzzles, they found the Hymn Crystal Linker hidden in its depths. Aurica was overjoyed, since she had found the crystal that no one in the church could find. However, that was only one step for an evil scheme.

Buying into the scheme, Aurica sung Linker in the Altar of Apostles under false pretences, and Mir tried to forcibly possess her. This happened because Mir exploited an error in the Tower's systems that gave her hymn code to Aurica, allowing her to sing the Extract type hymns, but also making her vulnerable to Mir's posession, and letting the viruses materialize from her Cosmosphere. Mir successfully possessed Aurica and attacked Falss before turning her attention to Lyner and the others. The process was stopped abruptly, when Misha began singing the Chronicle Key, which drove Mir back into the binary field, thus saving Aurica’s life.

Upon recovering her strength, Aurica joined Lyner at the Altar of Apostles to put an end to Bishop Falss’ charade once and for all. After a long hard fight, Falss fell to the floor dead at Aurica’s feet. Slaughtered by the one for whom, he had caused incomprehensible pain for so long.

To the Top of the Tower
A short while later, Shurelia was taken over by Mir with Ayatane’s help. It was once again time for Aurica to enter the fray of battle beside Lyner to save the world. A little before passing the Blastline to save Shurelia, she went to her hometown with Lyner to find some materials to fix the airship. There, Aurica showed Lyner her old home, and revealed to him that she kept on sending letters to her deceased parents, and that she also left Don Leon at her old house.

After they passed the Blastline, Aurica helped Lyner obtain the FFT Divider, while rescuing his father from the SPU, and used it to sever Mir’s hold over Shurelia. It was shortly before this battle that Lyner first showed indications that he truly has deep feelings for Aurica. She thanked him for everything he had done for her so far, including giving her a life worth living.

Aurica showed how much she had changed her personality when she decided that she would sing the Re=Nation hymn to reactivate the tower and awaken Shurelia.

Strength
Eventually, Lyner had dived all the way to level E with Aurica and she attained tremendous power. So much power that she became the strongest 3rd generation Reyvateil ever as well as presumably the first 3rd generation Reyvateil to survive singing an ‘extract’ type hymn. Based on what occurs in game, it is also strongly hinted that Aurica had become just as strong as Misha. Using her new-found power, she helped her friends to defeat Mir, and makes her understand that not all humans are evil.

Also, at that point, Aurica had regained some of her cheerful personality and even began to show a joker side, as Lyner had helped her to overcome her fears and psychological torture. However, she was still a bit shy and her joker side catches Lyner by surprise. She had regained her confidence and it showed greatly in her battle quotes, such as boldly saying “Lyner! Let’s do this!”, instead of asking “Can I do this?”. Her trust in Lyner was sky high, as indicated by her line right before the final showdown with Mir when she put her life solely in Lyner’s hands.

After the battle with Mir, she, together with Misha and Shurelia, sang the Phantasmagoria hymn, with contained the wishes of everyone for a everlasting peace to come to Sol Ciel.

After everyone said their goodbyes to go on with their lives, Aurica uses music boxes as a method of proposing to Lyner. Presumably, he accepts, as they go to Karulu Village, take over the inn there and start selling music boxes powered by song stones there - Lyner makes them, Aurica sells them. Aurica seems very happy in the end and even rags on Shurelia’s lack of direction one last time for good measure.

Note: Many parts of this article assume that the player is going through Aurica's route.

Role in Ar Tonelico II


She appears as the leader of the Syndicate inside of Frelia's Cosmosphere, where she tries to abduct Fururu so she and her cohorts, Misha and Leila, can coax Kuroaki into returning to the Syndicate to continue developing weapons for them.. She even uses her Don Leon costume to (comically) raise her powers.

In the real world, she, together with Misha and Shurelia, sings Phantasmagoria to help Jacqli in her quest in the second tower.

Hymns
EXEC_PURGER/.#Aurica extracting - Disconnects and interrupts a program or song executed in the Tower by cutting off the energy flow to it.

EXEC_LINKER/. - Links a Reyvateil to the Tower both physically and mentally, thus turning her in the new Administrator.

EXEC_RE=NATION/. - Reboots the Tower while it is in Standby mode.

EXEC_PHANTASMAGORIA/. (together with Misha and Shurelia) - Makes peace between all the living beings in Sol Ciel, though it is more like a prayer for peace.

Trivia

 * Aurica also makes an appearance in the crossover game, Cross Edge, alongside with Lyner, Ayatane, Misha, Shurelia and Bourd. She brings her odd cooking habit with her and has a rivalry with Misha; whenever she levels up she states "I can't let Misha beat me"
 * She loves cats. To the point that she sleeps like them.
 * Her "weak point" is noted to be around her neck area.
 * She loves music boxes and dream of making a living out of it with the man he loves (presumably Lyner).
 * Her install point is located at the back of her neck.