Part 13: Chapter XIII: Kids Are Assholes

You know how the last update ended with Fou-Lu?

Total cocktease. We won't be actually playing as him again for a little while longer.



: "No worries. Be careful and all that. The entrance to the passageway is up that road there."





And he walks directly into a trap hole while the hole-digging girl giggles.



Damn you, Cray.



Here's the actual tunnel to Synesta. We get a surprising number of new enemies in here for such a straight shot.



These are tadpoles. Like the bio says, they can only use Snooze and Devour. Snooze is like Rest, only it heals more HP and AP but you get hit with a Sleep effect for three turns. Devour drains HP from the target and gives it to the user, if it hits.



Nina will find this very handy for combo chaining.



Bats. I hate bats. They're fast, evasive, and while they have practically no HP, they always get critical hits and are stupid accurate.



Cadavers are tougher zombies that don't start the fight confused, and love to spam Feint on you. Feint is an attack that, if it hits, confuses you.



Yoink.



Nina also gets Rejuvenate, which is still pretty overkill at this level but is very handy in emergencies.



At the very end of the tunnel, we break into the bottom of a well. Let's climb the ladder!



One of the greatest songs in the game starts playing when we emerge.





: "This town took the brunt of the fighting during the war."

: "They told us that, like Chamba, it had been contaminated by a hex during the war. It's certainly a lot livelier than Chamba, though..."

: "Yeah...it's also where Elina disappeared."

: "Don't worry, Cray. I'm sure we'll find something here that will help us find her."

Well, there's a building right next to us. Let's duck in.



Looks like an orphanage! Looting inspecting the place shows that the only things that are valuable interesting are just children's clothes and toys in chests marked with the Wyndian royal seal. Hey, maybe this is where Elina went! Talking to the nun nearby gets us this:

: "Hello there. I'll be glad to talk to you, but first I have to see to the children's meals."

Also, the children all whine how one of the kids is missing and they can't eat until he shows up. I'm sure that's not going to come into play in about three seconds.



Well color me surprised.







She trips!



She faceplants. That's got to be uncomfortable.





Poor woman. Let's talk to the little brat.



"No way! I'm the fastest! No one can catch me!"



And with that, the little bastard runs off at top speed. We're expected to go chase after him, but fuck that noise. There's a town to explore.



Well now, who is this shining paragon of muscles and manliness?





Fair enough. Let's go shopping!



Oh God, yes. You see that little "+1 Hit" in the corner? That means we attack twice with this sword, which rolls over to Hybrid form punches and several physical skills. Even though this is a little weaker than our current sword, it will actually deal absurdly more damage in the long run.



This means more AP regeneration for Nina. Yoink.



More power = more squishing. Cray will take this too.



Very unsuspicious.



Alright, I guess we need to chase Chino now. He runs around the area at random, running away from you if he sees you. He moves as fast as you do at a run, meaning you have to either corner him, catch him around a blind corner, or just hope his pathfinding goofs up and you can nab him when he takes a less efficient path across an area.



: "All right, all right...I'll go home with the Sister!"

Like so. Let's go, brat.



: "Yes, Sister Lyta. These people here were kind enough to help me find him."

: "Well...thank you very much for your help. All right, children. Now that everyone's here, let's eat! Now then, why don't we go upstairs and talk?"







: "She was very kind to the children, who as you know lost their parents during the war. She left them many gifts of clothing and other things. I was very impressed with her compassion and generosity."

: "What then? Where did Elina and the people with her go when they left?"

: "Well...I'm terribly sorry, but..."

: "Please - we'd be grateful if you could tell us anything!"

Suddenly, Chino dashes up the stairs and peeks out.

: "I know!"

: "Chino..."



: "Where the Princess went when she left here?"

: "You bet I do! But I won't tell you! You caught me when we play tag before. This time, you have to play hide and seek with us! If you can find all of us, I'll tell you where she went!"

: "Hey, everyone! Hide and seek!"

Oh you little shit.





The kids all dash out of the orphanage laughing and cheering, and the poor assistant nun faceplants again.



: "I didn't intend for you to have to..."

: "It's all right, Sister. Besides, if Chino does know what happened to my sister, I'll do whatever I have to get him to tell me!"

Yeah, so will I. Especially if it involves wringing it out of his miserable little neck.



: "...All right, I'll tell you where to find Rudd. He said he'd hide under the eastern wall."

Here's our first kid. He's a complete idiot who does not know hide and seek usually involves getting away from the seeker.



: "I don't play hide and seek...that's for kids."

Aww, little miss grown up.



Man, these kids suck at hiding. This is right outside the orphanage.



: "...All right, I'll tell you where Goete is. I saw him go off towards the gate."



They're not even trying!



: "If you're looking for Nahma, she said she was going to go hide on the stairs."



On the way to the stairs, we find this kid.



: "From here, walk six steps south, then sixteen steps west, then north one step. After that, you have to walk west three steps, then south three steps, then west another four steps - that's where Konoko is!"

I...what? Fuck you, kid! That's stupid! You're stupid!



Now the kid on the stairs. She's actually impossible to see from any normal camera angle, you have to hold the change angles button and tilt it slightly from here to see her.



: "...You probably won't be able to find Modo so easy though! You probably can't see him, not even from the top of the bridge in the center of town!"

That's the frog kid. We already found him. Let's go back to the orphanage and see if he can't repeat that stupid list of steps again.



I hate this game sometimes. It's never offensively stupid, it just enjoys trolling the player a little too much in these minigames.

Wait, the INN? That's cheating! There's no going inside during hide and seek! That's against the rules!

Oh, yeah, I actually found this out a little while ago. Apparently, in the Japanese version, if you line the names of the children up correctly, you get the sentence "Kono kotachi no namae tsunagatteru n da yoon", which roughly translates to "I'm lining up these kids' names." Puntastic!



: "Have you found everyone yet? If you're not sure, you should go back and count how many of us you've found."

Cheater. Well, next time, we'll go back to the orphanage and do a head count. I'm sure they're all there. I hope.

Where's Chino?