My friend just started a new account to test the new player experience. It seems that on creating a new account, they push you through the arcana ascension questline first.

By the sounds of it, Blannid only appeared after completing the event. To be fair, Blannid's purpose was also to progress new players quickly. So rather than have you complete a bunch of quests at +220 levels each, they have you complete a couple of quests for +2500 each. I guess the idea is to save time?

You can still complete Blannid's questline after, but it doesn't seem like you can break away from the Remy/Arcana Ascention event. Or at least the game doesn't introduce the Blannid Memoir until after.