Abnaxus is the Venar ambassador to the Ayrede Council, and keeper of their piece of the Stone Disk. Like all Venar, Abnaxus sees all times as one, but he holds his rank as ambassador because he, alone among his people, is trained to focus on one particular moment and therefore talk with people who "flow with time".
Abnaxus is voiced by Jeff Meller.
Background
Abnaxus has a wife named Abyanda, and three daughters: Abratha, Abelexe and Abpalmana. While his true home is north of the Border Mountains, during his time in Marcuria, Abnaxus lives in the City Green of Marcuria in an interesting house. According to Book Four of Dreamfall Chapters, he carved it out of a petrified tree with his very own hands.
Appearances in Games
The Longest Journey
- "The word, in my tongue, is Kan-ang-la. Literally translated it means "the small seed who grew to a tall tree"."
- ―Abnaxus[src]
April Ryan first meets Abnaxus in the Journeyman Inn during a celebration of the Feast of the Balance. He initiates an quite confusing conversation with her, during which he does not exactly invite her to visit him in the morning, because according to him, she already accepted the invitation a while ago. Puzzled by the strange event, April decides to pay him a visit the next day.
During the visit, Abnaxus uses his ability to focus to lead a somewhat normal conversation with April. He explains to April that even the Venar are nervous about the times ahead, because Chaos has put a veil on their ability to see all of time. He also tells her about the book "The Silver Spear of Gorimon", giving her a clue to were to look for the God that fell from the sky.
Later, as Marcuria is threatened by the invasion of the Tyren, April meets with Abnaxus, who is one of the only remaining people in the city. He explains that he stayed behind because her return marked the exact moment he should pass the Venar Stone to her, which he then does. With his task complete, he states that he cannot tell what will further happen as the veil now completely masks the future. He then bids April goodbye and good luck and prepares to leave the city, wishing to be with his family in these dark times.
When meeting up with Crow in the Guardian's Realm, April asks him about Abnaxus' further fate, and he confirms that Abnaxus made it safely out of Marcuria.
Dreamfall
Although Abnaxus was originally set to return in some capacity in Dreamfall, his appearance was dropped from the final version of the manuscript.
Dreamfall Chapters
He appears the first time in Book Two, where he contacts Zoe via dream vision to show her the Oular and Lux the first dreamer. Zoe is disturbed by the dreams, but eventually revisits them in Book Three, which is when Abnaxus re-introduces her to Crow. In Book Four, Zoe finally reaches the purple mountains, where he is currently living.
The old website for The Longest Journey had Abnaxus describe the Venar, the veil and the coming of the Kan-ang-la:
"No, friend, I am not. For she will come."
"I am Abnaxus of the Venar. I am an ambassador to the land of Ayrede, and the city of Marcuria has been my home now for…a time. How long? I do not know, friend. My people do not know of time. We do not live in the now. We live in the always."
"Farewell."
"No, do not be confused. To speak to you is oftentimes a difficult task for me, for I may answer questions not yet asked, or questions asked a time ago. To even make myself understood demands greatly of me, and it is a skill acquired by study. I am the only one of my people to speak with outsiders. For the others it is too difficult, and they may reveal your future yet to be, or a future that will never be, or a past hidden by chance or choice. To speak with my people is to enter the true mind of the Venar, and for outsiders, that may not be a pleasant experience."
"There is a veil in our path, however; a veil I cannot see past. We exist to that point, and at all points previous, but not beyond. For us, this sense of the unknown is like losing our sight. We are blinded. But we know of one person who is to lead us through the veil, to the other side. The Lady will one day unite the worlds, she will be the mother of a new world -- but first, she will lead us through the veil. "
"Am I afraid?"
"We are of trees, friend, and trees are of us. We plant the trees, and we care for them, and the trees care for us in return. A tree grows over time, yet it has always been there, and it always will be. And any moment is an eternity. Any moment is a lifetime. Do we die? I am dead, in this moment. I am born, in this moment. Any moment is all moments."
"You wish to go?"
"No, friend, I am not. For she will come."
Trivia
- It is likely the character of Abnaxus was also heavily influenced by Treebeard in The Lord of The Rings, a sentient tree who has trouble adjusting to the short attention span of mortals.
- According to Ragnar Tornquist, Abnaxus was originally intended to reappear in Dreamfall, "left in a very bewildered and tragic state following the events of TLJ [...] Dreamfall was always a darker and more tragic story, and there were few happy endings". Concept art and even an in-game model were created for him, but his role in Dreamfall's events was eventually cut as they would better fit another game. In the concept art Abnaxus can be clearly seen wearing an amulet that strongly resembles the Talisman of the Balance.
- Abnaxus' story, that was intended to be told in Dreamfall , will finally be told in Dreamfall Chapters (Ragnar Tornquist, ~3:17:30 in the Dreamfall Playthrough: "Abnaxus’ story, the story we had hoped to tell in Dreamfall: The Longest Journey, we will now be able to tell")
- Ragnar once joked about a possible cook book by Abnaxus: ‘Through the Veil: Cooking With Hindsight, or I’ll Never Burn Another Dish Again’.
Bookshelf
Abnaxus also has quite an eclectic collection of books, including:
- Ruminations on the Chaos Principle, by Ror Agastanja
- The Death of a Venar, by Ge'le
- A Brief History of the Northlands, by Minstrum Lenyer
- The Psychology of Stickmen, by G. Godager
- Principles of Waging a Winning War Against Superior Forces, by General Hen Solber
- Surviving the Border Mountains, by Tomi Strande, and even
- The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien.