Part 52: What a Strange Game...

After the ominous save prompt, we are simply walking out of the arena.











You mean, somebody even stronger than the Agent...
But anyway, we killed that death cockroach. And our skills are growin' at an unnatural speed.
At this rate, we just might be able to take care of that Agent, eventually.
Let's hurry back to our family. We have to make sure they're safe before we do anythin' else.
I agree.
It's quiet, isn't it? Too quiet... Maybe Ayuta's match isn't over yet...

Before going to the bedroom, we can get a short comment from Piu-Piu:



You might be wondering now, why did we get that save prompt since we are right now free to walk around and use the normal save function if we like? In fact that save prompt is an incredible show of mercy from the game developers as you will see in just a moment.



Let's go see the family.



Um, that doesn't look right. Could you please scroll to the right a bit, I want to see what happened over there where the bed is?













Uh-oh. What happened here.









You know what, it must be that Agent guy! Let's deal with him!





But he seems completely unaware of the situation in the bedroom...











I'm so tempted to make a dead parrot joke here... but I'll refrain due to the seriousness of the situation!









Well, I guess we are fighting him. And finally, this is the reason for that save prompt. Once you enter the bedroom, there's no way to back out of this boss fight any more... and it can be pretty tough. Hence the subtle suggestion from Olgar at the beginning to go and level up a bit--you really should as otherwise you may not survive this fight (more on this in a moment, there is a cutscene wanting to happen first).









And finally we go into the fight proper. He has a few different attacks dealing about 500-1000 HP to one or both characters; this is pretty standard and not a huge issue to deal with (more or less same as the Executioner). Unfortunately, in addition to that, he will also counter any attack dealing about 500 HP worth of damage to the attacking character. This means that if you forego pair attacks he will generally hit one character for 1000-1500 HP damage in one round, which is really not good.

One way of dealing with this is to level up, so you have some breathing room. Another way is... to remember that you have a few Stressors, which are items that take off 15% of target's current HP. This is quite a lot of damage, and guess what--HE DOESN'T COUNTER ITEM USAGE! So the way forward is clear, we'll use stressors for a couple of turns and then finish him off with normal attacks. We actually only need to take of half of his HP before this battle ends, so about 3-4000 HP or so.

Eventually the battle stops and then this happens:





After a blinding flash of light, the gruesome duo appears on the scene:















He's not going to attack the Agent, is he?











He did!











This line from the Agent is actually somewhat interesting. What is translated as "you" is in the original Japanese dialogue 貴様ら (kisamara). Nowadays, this word would definitely translate into something very impolite, along the lines of "you bastards". On the other hand, a couple of centuries ago, this USED to be a very polite/formal way of addressing people, especially your enemies. Since the Agent is clearly using very polite/archaic language, I'm thinking that in the Japanese version it may have been intended to be ambiguous in this manner. But obviously there is not really a good way for this to translate into English.







And just like that the Agent is gone!

This whole sequence is quite cinematic and I highly recommend watching the video version linked below:

VIDEO: Cyllis and Yorath "dealing" with the Agent! (make sure to switch it to 720px HD for much better quality!)

Also if you watch the video, you will notice that Yorath is not actually called Yorath in Japanese version but Yuta (ユタ). It's still just as annoying as ever to hear one name in voiced dialogue and see a different one in the subtitles...















Oh, there are Vahti and Ohm!







I am only interested in Ohm. He is such an attractive sample. Since this boy was born, I moved the schedule forward a bit.
As for Vahti, Yorath insisted on having her.
...Are ya the one who killed Rachel?
Rachel?
I asked her to give Ohm to me, but she attacked me.
It was all so sudden... and so I attacked back.
But it was self-defence. I had no intention of killing her before that. But once I started, it was so much fun, I could not stop myself.
Perhaps I went a little too far?
She was he wife of a warrior. She knew what she was signin' up for.
And I was prepared for this, too.
But still, the one responsible for her death is here in front of my eyes. I have to settle the score.







But Yorath puts up some kind of force-field barrier!



























Looks like Vieg and Olgar have been denied this time.

















Don't worry. It's NOT going to be NEARLY that simple!





















* * *

In a bit of a dark humour, the scenario screen shows you which characters are no longer alive, like so:



You can also see here that we still have a fair bit of story to go through, we're only at 35% right now.


So, then, please join me in saying goodbye to Rachel...



^{CLICK ON PICTURE TO EMBIGGEN.}