Part 24: Cathedral of Flesh
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I'm glad you all voted the way you did. It makes this part a lot easier for me.
We've got to head to the church we passed by earlier.
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3.. 2.. 1.. Happy New Year!
Before we head into the church, I've bought some new equipment and restocked on supplies.
We've got to head around the back. This door can't be interacted with.
Vicissitude posted:
Ah, the Cathedral of Flesh. It was just that. It wasn't a place where the Tzimisce fleshcrafted. It WAS a place that Tzimisce fleshcrafted. So many mortal souls went into its crafting. Bone buttresses, tattooed walls, things like that. And then one day, it disappeared. Nobody knows what happened to it, but I have a theory. I think it literally got up and walked away.
Ramc posted:
Here is a blurb from clan splatbook about the actual Cathedral:
Clanbook Tzimisce posted:
It was magnificent. Thick stalagmites and stalactites formed the pillars, with bone trusses over which limestone grew and formed an osseous mix of liquid architecture. Either skulls - with their eyes and surrounding musculature intact -or cartilage - thin enough to behold the sea of viscera and floating organs comprised the walls; scores of ghouls moistened the eyes so they could blink properly. Even more revenants conducted the ritual tattooing by drawing charcoal-dusted threads through their victims skin with bone needles. Late, Yorak and his childer would carefully slough the flesh from their screaming sacrifices, treat the fresh canvas in a preservative and stretch it over the windows like a mosaic. The cathedral had so many wonders, like the blood pool lined with sitting victims whom you could use as chairs, the pillars of grafted bodies, the walls of mouths that sang a wailing chorus as you passed them or the open gallery where corpses remained impaled on stalactites.
Such wonders. It's a pity the modern nights could not support such beauty openly. Truthfully, nobody knows where the Cathedral of Flesh is anymore; it's apparently vanished. Where once it stood, I'm told, rests naught but a gaping hole.
Did it walk away like Vicissitude poses? Probably.
There are all the enemies in the factory here, minus the Ventrue.
We'll give it to Wilhem, even though there's no fucking point.
In the next room, we come across two locked doors to other areas.
Well.. this one isn't actually locked. It's just got a giant circle blocking it. We've got to do something else in a different room to clear the way. No, not pull a lever, thankfully.
We've got to kill this Vozhd.
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It's not any easier than the Vozhd back at Vysehrad Castle, especially when you forget to cheese it. It turns out that Wilhem can survive the lift-you-up-and-eat-you move, but none of the other party members can.
Christof entered torpor before we could use Prison of Ice, so we've got to go without.
Uh.. why is Lily standing up while in torpor?
Now she's fading away..?
God, those naked Tzimisce are fucking creepy.
Now we can progress.
Celerity doesn't affect ranged weapon attack speed at all.
For some reason, our fire-bolts from the crossbow can hurt things we summon.
Oh hey, it's Libussa. Remember her from Vysehrad Castle?
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Now she can't be interacted with at all. Not even selected.
We've got a new enemy, but they're not anything special.
Aww, that's so cute. Look at them try new things.
Another one?
Watch the fight
With Prison of Ice, this Vozhd is no sweat.
Uh-oh.
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Oh shit, it's Vukodlak! And Anezka's with him!
So why is the ancient vampire using 'you' as a pronoun instead of 'thee' or something?
OAquinas posted:
High levels of Auspex (6+) allows a vampire--even in Torpor--to watch over the world and even communicate with others. Between that and dominate it's likely how he was able to channel through Libussa. So Vuk could actually stay far more current than Christof since he'd have the advantage of keeping up with language evolution...if he was so inclined, anyway.
Of course, having the ability "Shitty Dialogue Author 8" doesn't hurt either.
What? Don't you remember what happened, Christof? You acted creepy around Anezka and a pillar fell on top of you! I'd hardly say you caused Vukodlak's fall.
I hate this game.
I somehow put this together without letting anyone know!
What's odd is that he doesn't mention Samuel. I think I know why. In part 4 of the Redemption design log hosted at IGN, our friend Moongod says:
Moongod posted:
So what are we working on now, story-wise? Basically putting on the spit and polish, and wrapping up all the loose ends that can occur with a story of this size. Things like this can be heard around the office recently:
“Isn’t Samuel supposed to be dead at this point?”
I think that they originally had Samuel die before this point, but for whatever reason they cut that out and didn't bother to change the following dialogue.
It sounds like we might get a choice.
But we don't. I'll explain later.
Boss fight!
Vukodlak is actually a pretty hard boss.
It's almost required to case Prison of Ice, because he like to use powerful powers on our coeterie members.
Like Call Lightning.
The formula is cast Prison of Ice, then attack Vukodlak until POI wears off, then repeat. It might seem easy from these screenshots, but it can very easily get out of hand. Anezka just stands there in the corner the whole time.
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Oh man, that's so deep. Using Anezka's words from like 15 hours ago - so awesome. Remember that amulet of St. Jude? That doesn't come into play, and hasn't been mentioned since Pink wanted to sell it.
The floor opens up and the coeterie falls through.
We've got one more floor to go through.
After clearing that room...
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I am the Wall of Memory. I contain the secret thoughts of Anezka.
This is the most fucked up part of the game. Not because of what Anezka says, though. You'll see.
There are 8 of these Diary Speakers we have to talk to in order to progress.
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oh my god
that fucking noise
Whoever put this in the game, you're fucking disgusting.
That noise kind of reminds me of this, but way more disturbing.
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Why even bother with a dialogue choice? Nothing changes.
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Again, nothing changes.
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As disturbing as that was, I wish more of the game had been that way instead of a boring dungeon crawler.
Libussa somehow made it down here before we did.
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We can say no..
..but there's no point. We are required to say yes in order to progress.
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The only way to dissolve that wall behind Libussa is to say yes.
So the Cathedral of Flesh 3 was actually the Cathedral Bowels. You might think we need to head back to where Vukodlack was, but you'd be wrong. We certainly can go there, but the place is abandoned.
We actually have to talk to Vukodlak back around where we first entered the Cathedral.
Here we go.
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'Young Crusader'? That was 800 years ago.
I'm sorry, but that looks like some shitty halloween mask you could buy from the dollar store.
Christof: Nooooo!
Final boss fight!
Like the underprince fight, we can just sit here forever.
Zulo is, appropriately, the hardest fight in the game.
Vicissitude posted:
As for the big bad, it's not so much Zulo form as much as Chiropteran Marauder. Zulo Form is the level 4 Vicissitude power, the Marauder is the upgraded version. Zulo makes you a giant hideous monster, adding 3 to your physical stats while dropping your appearance to 0. The Marauder allows you to grow giant bat wings and, with extra blood, bone spurs on your wings to do Str+2 Aggravated damage.
He starts out by using Beckoning to summon a Szlachta. I really don't know why.
It's mandatory to use Prison of Ice. It's still a really tough fight even with it. He's got an immense amount of health.
Even in the second or so between being frozen by Prison of Ice, he'll manage to use some powerful power or melee attack. In this case, he caused Christof to frenzy, which throws off our gameplan.
We can still recover, however.
I'm not sure why, but the game wouldn't let me use Blood Healing for two attempts.
This fight is where Summon Elemental especially comes in handy.
For some reason, he just decided to stop fighting back and accept death or something.
Oh, were you expecting a death animation? Too bad! We're Nihistic Software!
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Lily: Go to her, Christof.
Now we're suddenly back where we first encountered Anezla and Vukodlak.
Anezka: Now that the fiend is no more, my unnatural power dissolves.
Anezka: I fear for my soul after my defilement.
Anezka: After all that I have done.
Anezka: But I rejoice that my last sight shall be thee.
Anezka: I only pray that one day I may attain thy forgiveness.
Christof: I grant all forgiveness, though thou art blameless and pure in mine eyes.
Anezka: Then death finds me in joy and rapture.
Christof: Anezka, my accursed soul trembles to utter these selfish, blasphemous words,
Christof: but thou need not die, if thou wouldst endure.
Anezka: Thou would still have me, Christof? I scarcely dared hope.
Christof: Thy love has redeemed me across a thousand years.
Christof: I would that I could offer salvation in return, but I have none to give
Christof: - only damnation.
Anezka: Damnation with thee would be as sweet as salvation. Let thy love cast me down, and raise me up forever.
Anezka: Take me, my love.
Bonus!
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Huh?
We would have lost 10 humanity from that, but we won't know what the effect of that is until the next part.
citybeatnik posted:
Man this is Christof we're talking about. His mind basically works like this:
10 ENCOUNTER X
20 IF X = ANEZKA GOTO 70
30 IF X = NOT ANEZKA GOTO 40
40 PRINT "WHERE IS ANEZKA" GOTO 50
50 SMASH GO TO 60
60 GO TO 10
70 BE A CREEP
Next time, alternate endings!