Part 97: Episode LXXIII: In Which... Wait Didn't We Already Do This Thing...?

Episode LXXIII: In Which... Wait Didn't We Already Do This Thing...?



Verse 2: Four

We open the second mission of Branch D back in Four's Citadel. Gone are the artillery arrays and dozens upon dozens of soldiers defending the fortress to cover Lady Four's escape. Indeed, gone is everyone from the fortress this time around. Well... almost everyone.



Zero!
...Four.



Oh, sweet Zero... I've realized something. We don't have to be scared of this world.



Because once I destroy it... there won't be a world to be scared of anymore!



Four proceeds to leap up onto the edge of the fortress wall and go into a giggle fit while twirling and skipping about. She seems to be having a fun time of it.



The flower's taken her over.



This entire world will sing for me!



Eh... Ha ha ha! Zophiel, come to me! Tee hee hee.



<crazy pants laughter>



<crazy pants laughter and twirling>



Let's just be honest here for a moment: portals are just bad fucking news. Period. Full stop. At no point in the history of fiction has something emerged from a magical gate of energy linking two points and brought along with it a goddamn thing anyone on the destination side wanted any part of at all. Even if the protagonists of the story are using a portal for their own devices, this still holds true. The bad guys don't want to see their dumbasses come storming through either! A bad day is had for some party. Always.



New Music: Prevolt - Zophiel



Case in point: Look at what just came out of this portal! A boss fight that is not just plain Four. Zero is not having any part of a good time fighting err—wait... haven't we met...?



A dragon!?









Four uses her Intoner Cutscene power to the fullest to give gravity the finger and leaps on board her summon for a good old fashion drag-on dragoon throw down. Not that there have been a lot of dragon rider matches in the series. There was umm... Inuart and Black Dragon/Legna and... That was pretty much it.



So in case you were wondering, this neon green tinted daemon dragon is not Gabriel/Gabriella sporting a new look. This is Zophiel: Four's off-brand Chinese knock off sold at K-Mart of Gabriel.




No, it's different. How did Four manage to summon a daemon dragon!?
Intoners can't normally do that?
No. Not without losing their minds, they can't. One was the only sister with the power to pull it off.
But you can call me, Zero. And you're okay. Or maybe you were already bonkers from the start?
Right...
.....
No, dummy! You're not a daemon. Plus, I'm... special, okay? I'm different.



So Zophiel is essentially just a palette swapped Gabriel in much less shitty boss arena. Four's Citadel courtyard is cordoned off by a circle of magic Drakengard/NIER magic. But it's got about twice as much height as One's Cathedral arena and NO FUCKING PILLARS!



As with the Gabriel of old timelines, getting that mofo on the ground and stomping about with Mikhail barfing fire all over as long as his stamina can hold out is the best method of damage output.



Though Zophiel is slightly more proactive recovering by immediately performing a tail spin upon stun wake-up every single time. Annoyingly, the buttrock dragon of Four's has like 2-3 tiers of stunned length time so there's basically no way to know when to bug out safely during this like five minute boss fight. I want to say how high it is knocked from the air is a factor. But I've got like 3 recordings of this fight (and every other one) and if Drakengard 3 bosses have a consistency, I've never seen it.





Attack wise, Zophiel is nearly identical to Gabriel. Just tinted neon green and—I honestly do not know if this asshole is stronger or weaker than the real deal given every dragon boss battle has a set level and HP for Mikhail. Zophiel is at the point in the game you should just plain have 3 of each (max) heal potion and be using them accordingly because there is absolutely no penalty for doing so and a lot of fights have some heavy bullshit the latter half of the game.



For instance, attack wise Zophiel has Gabriel's scatter attack. Just with neon green rings instead of neon yellow laser swords. Can you guess how to avoid them? If you didn't pick: dodging 'round this exact moment and hoping the i-frames hold out? Guess what? You just lost a fifth of your health bar! Congrats!





One nice factor of this battle is Zophiel is evidently just lousy with blood and every third of its health bar is enough to get near full on Intoner Mode while riding Mikhail. I may have been a bit quick to judgment on this bootleg Gabriel, but the thing objectively is weaker to Intoner Mode as just hanging out near the buttrock dragon will harm it and its armor does not entirely defend against Mikhail's fireballs. Intoner Mode or not. Tick damage to the latter. But still... There's a bouncing fireball animation but it's still taking a little bit of a hit.





Like Gabriel, Zophiel's big bad laser beam attack out of its maw is damaging as hell (about 1/6th of Mikhail's HP) but also Zophiel's face open at any point is when it takes the most damage.





Additionally, Zophiel seems far more prone to belly flops out of the air. Which come with a big shockwave, but the dumb pirated daemon dragon has a good 20 second running around around recovery time to punish. So that's nice.



Look at you, murdering your kin to claim their powers!
I don't want your power, Sis. But I will kill you. All of you. ...Sorry about that.
You aren't sorry. Oh, you aren't sorry at all. Tee hehe.



Ah ha! Hee hee hee hee ha ha ha!





Okay. I think we can just go ahead and assume Level 1 Mikhail wrecking Zophiel in a single shot puts it at full poor mini-boss status, eh?







So ends the whole five minute reign of Four's daemon dragon summon via the still ambiguous Flower corruption.






Were you distracted by that somewhat uncommon definition?



Cuz we're not done here. This is the final Branch. The Intoner Sisters might not being clocking out quite so soon this time around. LALALALALALALALALALALALALALAAAAAA~!









Branch D Verse 2 Highlight Reel #1



Zophiel Concept Art - Dammit, Four. Nobody likes a copy cat!