Grandia has a rich and complex story, so large and intricate that it is very difficult to get through the game in less than 50 or 60 hours. Those hours are, in my opinion, well worth it, but if you've never played the game or need a quick refresher, here's a basic summary of the story. But before you continue, be warned—this will spoil the entire game for you if you haven't played it! So I strongly suggest you play the game before reading if that is at all possible; it really is best experienced that way, and it's a ton of fun. But if for one reason or another you can't get a hold of the game or can't afford it or don't have the time to play it, please read this before you consider applying for the game, so you'll know a bit about the backstory involved.

Our main character is Justin, a 14-year-old redhead who dearly wants to be an adventurer. His father, once a famous adventurer but now deceased, left him a strange artifact that he claimed was the legendary Spirit Stone, a magical stone from the ancient civilization of Angelou, symbolizing the bond between Spirits and humans. Justin attempts to find out if it really is the Spirit Stone, and while exploring the Sult Ruins some distance from his hometown of Parm with his young friend, Sue, he discovers that the Stone opens doors and gives him access to ancient rooms, untouched for thousands of years. Inside, they see the illusionary form of a young woman who calls herself Liete. She tells Justin that if he wants to know the secrets of the Spirit Stone and of the civilization of Angelou, he must go on a long journey to the east, searching for a place called Alent.

Justin's search leads him on an ocean voyage across the sea to the new continent of Elencia. Sue tags along, and on their journey they run into Feena, a girl known as the most famous and talented adventurer in Elencia. After gaining her friendship, Justin and Sue convince her to come along with them on their search for Alent. The Garlyle Forces, a military group with an unusual interest in archaeology, and several of its officers, are always running into Justin. Herr Mullen (son of General Baal, leader of the Forces) and the quiet Lt. Leen continually find Justin appearing just about wherever they are, and they tell him to stay out of their way and out of the strange ruins they are investigating. Finally, in the long-lost village of Luc in the unexplored Misty Forest, a Garlyle airship appears and tries to steal a strange idol from the villagers. Leen reveals in this confrontation that she is Feena's twin sister who had joined the military, and also that the idol contains a piece of Spirit Stone. The Garlyle Forces disappear after taking the Stone from the idol.

Justin's search must lead him across the End of the World, a gigantic wall so high that one can only see its top from many miles away. Most people believe that the wall marks the world's edge and that there is nothing beyond it, but the people of Luc say that the ancients built it to keep out some strange evil power. Against their advice, Justin, Sue, and Feena climb the wall. After a climb that seems as if it may last forever, they reach the top and look out across the land beyond...then are picked up by strange machines and dropped over the edge! Fortunately, our heroes somehow survive the fall. After landing in the Flying Dragon Valley, they meet a warrior named Gadwin. After they aid him in saving his village from a cursed tower, Gadwin befriends them and helps guide them to the Twin Towers, more ruins of Angelou that may hold some clues. Justin meets up with Leen inside and learns that she has joined the Forces because there is something she must do, but her resolve to obtain Justin's Spirit Stone wavers, and she lets him keep it for the time being, struck by his determination and optimism. Feena meets up with Mullen and learns that he resents his father and that he is half humanoid, like the beastmen across the wall. She also learns more about the Icarians, ancient creatures with beautiful wings who were said to be keepers of the Spirit Stone and intercessors between Spirits and humans. Another device allows Justin to talk with Liete, who points him across the eastern Sea of Mermaids.

Sue falls ill, and Gadwin's friend Dr. Alma tells Justin and Feena that she is too young to continue on dangerous adventures. A mysterious teleportation orb that can be used only once allows them to send Sue home. Justin and Feena continue on across the perilous Sea of Mermaids, narrowly escaping the deceptive mermaids' grasp, and we also learn that there is a little romance in the air between them. Once on the shores of the continent across the sea, the two meet up with Rapp, a young beastman who accepts their offer of help in saving his village from the cursed Tower of Doom, which turned many of the villagers to stone. Deep in the tower, Justin and his friends learn that the tower is run by the Garlyle Forces, who are raising a strange and terrible creature called Gaia. Justin attempts to sabotage the machinery keeping Gaia alive, instead setting it free. Gaia turns several fleeing soldiers to stone, but Justin's Spirit Stone forms a protective shield around him and his friends. They destroy Gaia and take the remaining Gaia sprout back to the village to investigate.

That night, Rapp's village is invaded by the Garlyle Forces. Leen comes after the sprout, and as Justin and his friends are trying to keep her from taking it, it suddenly grows and attacks. Leen defeats Gaia by spreading glowing red wings from her back and rendering it harmless in a flash of magical power, then takes the sprout and leaves with the airship. Everyone is stunned to realize that Leen is an Icarian, but they decide to continue their journey. Milda, a barbarian woman they encountered attacking the Tower of Doom, says her husband may know something of Alent, so they travel to Laine and speak to the Three Wise Men. There Justin learns that the Medal of Wisdom, which Liete gave to him in the Twin Towers, will unlock the Shrine of Wisdom, where he will find the Medal of Knowledge, key to Alent. Guido, the elder of the Mogay people, leads Justin, Feena, and Rapp into the shrine. After obtaining the medal, on the way out they see General Baal, Herr Mullen, Lt. Leen, and several Garylyle Forces troops, all looking for Justin in order to take the piece of Spirit Stone he holds. They take a detour to avoid the military forces, but they later run into Mullen in the hall of ancient golems. General Baal uses Leen's Icarian power to bring the golems to life and attack Justin and his friends; while trying to escape the huge creatures, Feena falls to her knees and yells in pain. A green light spreads outward from her, and all the golems stop in their tracks. Much damage has been done, however, and several walkways collapse, separating the heroes and killing many soldiers.

Justin later awakes in a lower level of the ruins of the shrine. After making his way back up, he encounters Mullen, who hides him as soldiers approach, then goes off with those soldiers to confront Baal about his careless sacrifice of troops. Justin follows discreetly and sees Baal boarding his airship, the Grandeur...with the unconscious Feena being carried aboard. He tells off Mullen, who leaves in anger to board his own airship, the Lyonlot, while Baal gloats about having gained another Icarian. When everyone is aboard, the Grandeur takes off, Justin running after it as it flies off into the distance. He stops, frustrated, and suddenly Rapp and Guido appear, riding a flying manta. They chase down the airship and jump aboard, fighting their way through the ship to the control room where they defeat Sgts. Nana, Saki, and Mio. Examining the main computer in an effort to try to turn the ship around, Rapp punches some wrong buttons and starts the self-destruct sequence (don't they always). The ship starts to break apart as they run toward the bridge, and a collapsing walkway separates Justin from the others. He continues on, bursting in on Baal, who has Feena with him. He tells Justin he will let her go in exchange for the Spirit Stone; Feena tells Justin not to believe him, but Justin agrees to the exchange anyway, tossing the Stone to Baal...who then triggers a trapdoor beneath Justin. Saw that one coming, didn't you? Baal takes Feena and the Spirit Stone and runs for the escape pods outside; Justin catches hold of a rope and climbs out of the trap, following him. He attempts to attack Baal and rescue Feena, but Baal throws aside his cloak to reveal a huge, plantlike, clawed tentacle where his right arm should have been. He snatches up Feena with it and taunts Justin, who charges; Baal knocks him off the side of the Grandeur into the blackness of the night. Feena screams; a bright green light tears through the tentacle holding her, and she jumps down, runs to the edge, and throws herself after Justin.

Justin catches Feena in midair and throws his arms around her, just before she faints. Just when he thinks they're both going to die, however, Feena begins to glow with a bright green light, and green wings unfurl from her back. The wings hold them aloft and light the sky so Guido and Rapp can come pick them up on the flying manta. Three days later, Feena awakes in Guido's tent, pitched at the base of the Brinan mountains. Feena is very confused about who and what she is, but after some discussion, everyone agrees that their questions about Icarians, Angelou, Gaia, and the Garlyle Forces' plans will be best answered in Alent. They have the Medal of Knowledge, and with the permission of the Three Wise Men, they climb Rainbow Mountain. Once there, Justin throws the medal into the Rainbow Spring, and a glowing pillar of light appears. Guido says good bye, and Justin, Feena, and Rapp step in. Encased in a sphere of light, they zoom upward through the atmosphere, landing on a floating city in the stars. They make their way through the deserted, windswept roads to the peaceful shrine, where illusions that look like Liete welcome them and tell them of the history of Angelou and the Icarians and the origin of Gaia. Finally they enter the inner sanctuary, where the real Liete waits to meet them.

Liete tells them that she is one of many Lietes who have lived since Angelou was destroyed, and she has inherited all their memories and their knowledge of the ancient civilization and its destruction. She is the keeper of this knowledge—that Angelou was destroyed when its people became greedy and corrupt, the blackness in their hearts creating the creature called Gaia when the people tried to take and use for themselves the Spirit Stone's power, which the Spirits had entrusted to the Icarians. Gaia, a creature whose heart was the resulting corrupted Spirit Stone, fed on Spirit energy and sucked the life from the land. The only thing that saved the world from complete corruption and death was the Icarians, who sacrificed themselves to destroy Gaia. The Spirit Stone was split in seven pieces and scattered throughout the world. Icarians, Liete told them, were always twin girls, and were always born to human parents when the Spirit Stone was whole. When General Baal began collecting pieces of the Spirit Stone to try to unite it and revive Gaia with it, Feena and Leen were born. While Justin thought Baal had died when the Grandeur crashed, Liete says that Baal is alive, and that Gaia is now closer than ever to being revived. They decide they must do something, and Justin convinces Liete to come with them.

After journeying back to earth, they head for the Garlyle Forces' J Base, but when they arrive, they find a mutiny underway—Mullen is attempting to wrest power over the military from his father and prevent him from reviving Gaia. It turns out that all this time, Mullen was trying to get the pieces of Spirit Stone before his father could get to them, but he failed. Now Baal has escaped into the ancient ruins on which J Base is built, leaving an injured Mullen behind with a worried Leen standing over him. Justin and his friends hurry after Baal, finally catching up with him in the chamber where Gaia's cocoon sleeps, and a battle ensues. The heroes manage to kill Baal, but not before he reunites the Spirit Stone, revives Gaia, and his remaing life force is sucked into Gaia, which immediately grows and begins to spread outward from J Base at a frighteningly rapid rate.

Later, aboard the Lyonlot, soldiers tell Feena she has been granted the rank of corporal. Justin and his friends angrily head into a temporary camp in the Luzet Mountains to demand Mullen tell them what that's all about. Apparently, now that Gaia has been revived, the only way to stop it is to use Feena and Leen's Icarian powers—which could very well mean their death in the process, as well. While arguing about this, they hear that Gaia is reaching for the large desert city of Zil Padon, spreading its shoots rapidly through the desert, searching for food from the large amount of life in the city. Mullen says they don't have time to aid the citizens of Zil Padon if they are to prepare to launch their attack the next morning; Justin, Feena, Rapp, and Liete refuse to listen and go to Zil Padon to help. They arrive just as Gaia does, turning about half the city's people to stone and smashing through buildings, bringing frightening monsters with it. Justin and his friends fight the monsters and do what they can to aid survivors; Feena and Justin lament the senseless loss of life that happened because Mullen would not risk the success of his mission. They agree that if they do not protect those are in trouble, what on earth are they trying to save the world for? With this realization, a strange power takes out the monsters and engulfs Gaia's tentacles, rendering them motionless and harmless. Leen, who had followed them in order to try to convince Feena to join their attack the next morning, is stunned; she realizes that Justin and Feena have tapped into another power that could possibly be even greater than Icarian power alone.

That evening, when preparations for the morning's attack are well underway, Gaia begins to move, to evolve into another form. Suddenly, all of J Base's systems go offline. Leen appears on the viewscreens and announces that she has used her Icarian powers to take control of the systems; she says she is going to buy Justin and Feena enough time to learn to use and develop the new power they are just beginning to tap. She says good bye, then goes up to the steam cannons that are aimed at Gaia, ready to be used in the attack the next morning. Justin races to the roof to try to stop her, but he is just in time to see Leen standing atop a huge cannon, using her Icarian powers to fire it at the advancing, insectoid maw of Gaia. The creature does not halt, however, clamping its deformed jaws over Leen and the end of the cannon; there is a final red flash from Leen's Icarian power, and the cannon fires again. Seriously wounded, Gaia is still, and Leen is gone.

The next morning, Feena is in deep distress and confusion. Mullen tries to convince her to help him, saying she is the last hope to save the world now that her sister is gone. Justin tries to intercede, but when he can't explain what power Leen was talking about or think of another idea, the distraught Feena refuses to listen to him. She leaves with Mullen, and when Justin tries to follow her onto the Lyonlot, she uses her Icarian magic to knock him backward. She and Mullen board the airship and take off, and Justin goes back to Rapp and Liete, who seem to think he should have done more to stop her. Disgusted, they leave; Justin returns to the camp just as it begins to rain, in time to watch all the military packing up and evacuating before the final attack. He heads for Zil Padon; out in the Savanna, he trips and falls on his face in a puddle. While in the depths of despair, wondering what he's doing there and why he can't even save the girl he loves, a Spirit appears, a green sphere of light floating through the air toward Zil Padon. Justin follows and finds the city already being rebuilt; the terror and despair of the people attacked only yesterday has been replaced with hope and determination. Justin asks Guido if he can help rebuild, but Guido tells him he has his own job to do.

Suddenly, all of Justin's friends appear—not just Liete and Rapp, but also Gadwin, Milda, and Sue. They encourage him and tell him that he can save Feena and the world, but only if he realizes he can't do it alone, and he must ask for help—that of his friends, and that of the Spirits. With renewed determination, Justin vows to do just that, and then a swirl of Spirits float through the air, and a strange door appears out of nowhere. Justin, Rapp, and Liete enter the legendary Spirit Sanctuary, a holy place that is everywhere and nowhere, and whose door has been unopenable ever since Spirits first gave the Spirit Stone to humans. Justin enters the innermost sanctuary, where he is given a new Spirit Stone, which then takes the shape of a sword. Exiting the Spirit Sanctuary with the Spirit Sword in hand and Rapp and Liete in tow, Justin comes out at the entrance to J Base. They head through the ruins of the Icarian City below J Base, finally reaching an ancient round platform that rises up to the roof. In its center stand Feena and Mullen, surrounded by Gaia monsters. Feena is using her power to hold them off, but she can't hold out much longer. Justin dispatches them with a single stroke of his sword. Feena marvels at its power, but Mullen will not believe. Justin defeats him in combat, and Mullen is forced to admit that perhaps he does have the power to save the world after all.

Outside on the roof, they see Nana, Saki, and Mio leading the remnants of troops who refused to evacuate in an air attack against Gaia. Guido and the rest of Justin's friends ride the flying manta, giving aid. Mullen stays to command the outside attacking force, while Justin, Feena, Rapp, and Liete enter Gaia's body to destroy it from the inside. Finally reaching the corrupted Spirit Stone after defeating both the absorbed monstrous form of Baal and the very Core of Gaia, Justin and Feena use the combined powers of the Spirit Sword and Icarian wings to destroy the original, corrupted Spirit Stone. Rapp and Liete make a run for safety just in time, as Gaia is destroyed from the inside and out, its insectoid body turning into bark and its great wings into leafy branches. When it is all over, the sun has fully risen, and Gaia has become a gigantic tree, standing atop the ruins of J Base. Feena and Justin awake on a nearby hillside and watch the celebrations going on at Gaia's base. Mullen also watches from a different hillside, brooding, and then decides to walk off alone before anyone can see him. His tragic hero act is interrupted, however, by the entrance of several Spirits. They coalesce into a bright light, and as Mullen runs forward, Leen drops to the ground in front of him, on her knees and staring in confusion and wonder. They run to embrace each other, and Feena and Justin clasp hands, watching at a distance with tears of joy in their eyes.

The epilogue shows a strangely familiar, purple-haired young woman in a pink dress, leaving the Seagull Restaurant and saying good bye to Justin's mother, Lily. It's Sue, ten years later. She muses on how the world has changed, and she talks about how excited she is because Justin and Feena are coming home for their first visit in ten years, having been adventuring together all that time. To her surprise, she is greeted by five small children running off the steamer at the docks, three boys and two girls who look oddly familiar. The kids tell her that their parents are still aboard the steamer. Then Sue sees Justin and Feena, and the story ends with her waving excitedly to her friends.

However, this is only the very beginning of our story. The world of Grandia has much in store for us yet, as we will see...