Part 18: The Trinity Pit

Update 18 - The Trinity Pit

Welcome back. Last time we fought our way through the ruins of the Old Trade Sector in order to reach Trinity’s HQ. Now that we’re here and Nina is being treated we are free to do some exploring.

Music: Trinity Pit









The Trinity Pit is a fairly small area, about the same size as MidSector Mall.





There’s a Telecorder just outside the treatment room, and Jaju and Leo can be found in a little side room off the main hall.



: Lin comes back, and then there’s that commotion…it freaked me out.

There are also a number of Trinity operatives we can talk to for some flavour text.







:…rebuilt it into a ridable model!

So this is where Lin’s Cyclops came from. Wish you’d had the time to make it a bit more docile while you were at it, buddy.





There’s also an area set aside for cultivating more Genics for food and labour.







Electrical power is clearly an issue. Tapping Sheldar’s mains probably isn’t a great idea, but the Old Trade Sector’s generators can’t be too reliable after being submerged in water for who knows how long.





: Security on the upper levels is so strict we need this kind of backdoor just to get in.

Despite appearances Trinity aren’t just a rag-tag group of rebels and anarchists. They’re an organised force with access to the upper echelons of the sanctuary.





To actually progress the plot we need to visit a small room near the power unit. A cutscene plays as soon as we enter.





: I’ve heard a lot about you.





:…the rebel organisation Trinity. A wanted man.



This is a pretty interesting revelation. Trinity has an overall leader, and what’s more his D-Ratio is 1/4, one of the highest ratios it’s possible for a human to have. Having a D-Ratio that high would have guaranteed Mebeth a seat on the council of Regents, but he went rogue and threw it all away.



: Indeed, you have fought bravely.





:…in this polluted air.



:…that can help her.



:…I take her to the outside - to where the sky is?





:…on such a fable?



:…there is like making her walk on shards of broken glass.



: Of course, I would welcome it if you chose to stay here with us and protect her.





The scene ends and we find ourselves back outside. The question is, what do we do now? Mebeth’s offer isn’t going to help Ryu achieve his goal, but from a strictly practical perspective it’s also a lot more reasonable. There’s no guarantee that the world above has recovered from whatever cataclysm ruined it in the past, and Trinity clearly have the facilities and connections to at least prevent Nina’s condition from getting any worse.







The trigger to advance the plot is to rest in Trinity’s barracks, but we aren’t quite ready to sleep on Mebeth’s offer just yet.



: Wanna come with me down to the Old Trade Sector?



Going back to where Nina is and talking to Lin gives us the option of going on a little sidequest. There’s nothing to indicate that you need to talk to Lin about anything, making it very easy to miss. This is unfortunate since skipping it means missing out on a couple of nice rewards including a very useful skill for Ryu.





If we return to the door to the genic habitat we discover that the sign blocking access has been removed.





Descending the ladder takes us into another part of the Old Trade Sector.

Music: Old Trade Sector



This little side area is a bit more complicated than anything we’ve been through for a fair while. It isn’t hideously convoluted, but enough that I feel the need to step back and provide maps of the three floors we’ll need to traverse in order to fully complete everything.







We begin in the bottom left hand corner of Old Trade Sector 2. The medicine we’re after is on the third floor down, in Old Trade Sector D, but actually getting down there is a bit more complicated.



For one, there are a lot of hallways, and they all look the same. The minimap mitigates this, but you need to progress through a room or corridor before it’ll show up on your main map.



For another, some passages are blocked by rubble or heavy crates. There’s no quick route to the medicine, despite what the maps might imply.







As a Genic breeding ground this part of the Old Trade Sector also plays host to a number of enemies we’ve seen before - GarPikes, FroGressors and Petrophages all haunt its corridors.



There’s also the Old Trade Sector standby of putting Zombies everywhere while tucking their Brokenhearts away in obnoxious corners.



There’s also a new enemy, the Gigantis.







Gigantises are carbon copies of the Cyclops, just with twice the HP and beefed up stats.



We’re also challenged by the fact that we’re only playing with Ryu and Lin for this section. We can’t cheese encounters with overlapping trap runes or roast Zombies with her fire spells. We’re going to have to fight through this sub-area the hard way.



This can get pretty tricky in areas like the chest room in Old Trade Sector C, where four Worm-Men are waiting to ruin your day.







Fighting four enemies who can attack twice, have powerful area of effect attacks and can’t be easily separated is not a pleasant endeavour.



The treasure chest itself contains Enfeeble, a skill for Nina that reduces enemy magic power.





Another treasure chest lies at the very bottom of Old Trade Sector D, in a room crawling with FroGressors, Gigantises and, if you didn’t kill the hidden Brokenhearts, a handful of Zombies.





Discharge is an amazing skill, and the real prize for undertaking this quest. It deals back all the damage Ryu has taken in a battle in one massive strike. If he takes three attacks worth 40 damage each, using Discharge will deal 120 damage to one enemy. You can do a lot of damage with this skill, since Ryu is nearly always the lead attacker and so will be taking most of the damage from enemies.

Music: Imminent Crisis



Eventually the player will make it to this little room in Old Trade Sector C. It’s a Danger Room full of GarPikes and GarSnipers.







Even with only Ryu and Lin they’re barely a challenge. After the room is cleared a cutscene plays.

Music: Trinity Pit



A gunshot rings out.









: This is the same stuff we’re giving Nina.





Ryu shakes his head, seemingly dissatisfied about something.



: I know.



: No place in this world does.

Ryu walks off.





: So there won’t be any more Ninas.









The scene ends here. We found the medicine, but as Ryu pointed out, in the end it’s a stopgap solution at best. All it does is delay the inevitable. As reasonable as Mebeth sounded earlier, taking Nina up to the surface really is the better option.



There are a few more things to do in this little sub-area before we head back. The clinic we found the medicine in has a bunch of crates full of Trauma kits to loot, and there are several other crates dotted around the levels that contain generic goodies and consumables.



There’s a Wonder Box in a room on the north-western side of Old Trade Sector C. If you missed out on getting Lin’s ‘Keep at it’ skill you’ve got another chance to snag it here.



A lot of enemies down here also carry skill items, so if you missed out on Thrust, Blow up, Explosion, or a couple of others you can get them here instead.





Once you’ve done everything there’s nothing else to do except head back, do some inventory management, then talk to the man in the barracks to advance the plot.



Ryu sits quietly on his bed. A door opens nearby, and Lin strides into the room.









Ryu shakes his head emphatically.



:…that power, aren’t you?



:…consuming me…sucking away my life…





:…to do something. But what?





I like this scene a lot, because it emphasises how different this version of Ryu is from his predecessors. This one didn’t inherit his powers from an ancient and storied bloodline, but from an enormous rotting corpse whose sole instruction was an injunction to reach the sky. His abilities aren’t benign or easy to control, and are slowly killing him even when he refrains from using them. He’s caused tremendous damage in his quest to help Nina, with the worst example probably being his annihilation of the Rangers’ command structure - for all their faults, the Rangers were certainly a stabilising force in Sheldar.

After having such power forced upon him, and experiencing everything he has up to this point, it makes sense that Ryu would want to sit down for a while and reflect on why he’s doing what he’s doing. Unlike the other this one isn’t a silent protagonist, and it’s nice that we get to hear him muse about what it’s like to be a force of raw annihilation.



Unfortunately his contemplation is short lived, because a shrill scream erupts from somewhere nearby.









Over in the medical wing, Nina is being menaced by two Trinity operatives.





Ryu and Lin arrive and leap into action, triggering a battle.

Music: Formidable Foe



As soon as we enter battle we’re greeted with this screen. The instructions are self-explanatory; keep Nina alive or you get a game over.



Nina herself begins on the other side of the area, pinned between a Trinity Mage and a Trinity Swordsman. She’s also automatically inflicted with the Lock status effect, preventing her from attacking. This might seem like a tricky situation, but it really isn’t.



As the party member with by far the biggest movement range, Nina can simply run away and be halfway to safety on her first turn.



Both enemies will focus their attacks on Nina, but she should only be in their attack range for the first turn so it doesn’t matter all that much.





Neither enemy is particularly tough, being virtual reskins of the Mage and Battler Captains we fought back in Storage.





If you have Unlock or some Multimeds you can cure Nina’s status, allowing you to take the enemies down even more quickly.











After three turns two more enemies appear in the hallway outside. Both are a fair bit tougher than the ones in the medical ward.





The woman can use Bloat to amp her movement range up to absurd levels, while the man has both powerful physical attacks and the ability to somehow peg Nina with fire spells even when there’s a wall in the way.



The best strategy is to have Ryu stand in the doorway. There isn’t enough space for two character models to move past one another, and none of the enemies on the map have a knockback ability.





Ryu will take a lot of hits, but that just gives him more fuel for his shiny new Discharge skill.







Using the skill resets the damage counter, but you can really put the hurt on some of the tougher bosses if you use it correctly.



Overall this fight isn’t too tough. Just keep Nina out of trouble and everything falls into place.

Music: Remaining Traces





:…What?





The shutter at the end of the hall begins to open. Lin quickly runs across so that she can get a bead on whoever comes through.





That person happens to be none other than the head honcho himself.









: Were you going to kidnap her and blame it on the Rangers?



: Is that what you were thinking?



: Then yes.

So it turns out that Mebeth is an ‘ends justify the means’ type of person. Just because he opposes the Regents doesn’t make him the good guy. The enemy of my enemy isn’t necessarily my friend.



Needless to say, Lin isn’t happy to hear this. She’s had her moments of cynicism, but it’s pretty clear that she’s still an idealist at heart.





:…must be served.



: I…we…are going.







: Ryu…





Mebeth tosses the strange object to Ryu.





: If you truly wish to see the sky…



:…I believe you can do it. Now, go.





We gain a new key item, and the cutscene ends. Mebeth and Trinity weren’t all Ryu and Lin hoped they’d be, but with this key in our possession we’re another step closer to reaching the surface.

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Bonus Art: Mebeth


Bonus Art: Trinity Soldiers