Part 28: Chapter Four, Part Seven: THE DICK MOVE

Part 27: THE DICK MOVE

Welcome back to Let's Play Fire Emblem Gaiden and its last update for this year. Since I'm leaving tomorrow to spend the holidays in seclusion, away from the baleful influence of The Internet, I may be able to finish some updates then and give another update soon after New Year.

In the game, our first order of business is to revive Claire and to grind Teeta up to level 7, where she learns her version of the Illusion spell.



Without Claire around to massacre the enemy, even though she is so much less durable than Catria, the way to the revival shrine becomes a bit complicated.



The grinding is done at the Thief Shrine, back around the beginning of the game, since the thiefs have a chance to randomly drop an Angel Ring and are pathetic enough that they are almost unable to hurt Teeta. I also grind Force to level 10 and promote him to Knight, even though he won't see much use in coming battles. Cleive also gets promoted to Paladin and Claire to Falcon Knight, because of the title of this update.



Now, it is finally time for the main battle of this update. Since we have Teeta on our side, it should be an easy fight in more sense than one.

Rigel Plains
Alm, 13 units, 664 power
vs.
Zeke+Jerome, 20 units, 775 power


All troops, engage Jerome's men!



Yes, Zeke is probably the only one Fire Emblem character who, upon seeing their loved one is on the battlefield, just switches sides, instead of mindlessly attacking until they're given a talking to. To be fair, he does have an army under his command.

With Zeke's help, there's not much to this battle. In terms of units, we outnumber the enemy two to one, and in terms of power, we outnumber them three to one. They don't stand a chance. The only difficulty in this fight is keeping Zeke alive, but Teeta knows an unlimited range healing spell, so even this is an non-issue.



I'm skipping this battle, but just for illustration, here's the result of the first round of combat. Despite Jerome having the first strike, both groups have suffered equal casualties.



Dyute one-shots a freshly healed Jerome by virtue of being an absolute killing machine with her Aura spell.

After this, it is time to explore the town (city?) of Rigel and loot it of all that is valuable.



There's quite a lot of people here. Let's see what they have to say.

Upper row, brown hair:Just ahead is Dragon Mountain. The zombie dragons there'll tear you apart!

It is worth noting that up until this point, Alm has never actually fought against a zombie dragon. His scenario is much more geared toward fighting human opponents rather than monsters.

Upper row, blue hair: General Zeke has no memories of his past. Lady Teeta found him washed ashore with an awful wound and nursed him back to health.

This is still more backstory than most characters in this game get. Ah, the times of space limitations, when game storylines were simple.

Lower row, bluish hair: General Jerome was a cruel man. Even this village was sacked until Lord Zeke came.

The capital of the kingdom that spans half the continent is actually a village. Given that characters from the first Fire Emblem game make an appearance, I think it might be good to assume that Valencia is actually just a small island near Akaneia. At least, it explains the extremely sparse population.

Lower row, purplish hair: You guys saved General Zeke, eh? Though I hate Sofians, I must thank you guys.


Curiously, Teeta does not seem to react when you try to recruit her after Zeke's death.


Thank you kindly.
Alm: General Zeke, you oppose this war, correct? Please, join our cause.
Zeke: I cannot. I only helped you fight Jerome because he made my people suffer greatly. Besides... I don't know who I am. All I can remember is that I washed up on Rigel's shore. To my pitiful self, His Majesty Rudolf gave me a new life. I will not betray him.
Alm: I understand... Apologies for my rudeness.
Zeke: No, not at all.. Hm!? Alm, what's that mark on your right arm?
Alm: Mark? Ah, I've always had this birthmark. What does it...?
Zeke: I see... His Majesty Rudolf once told me: "Zeke, if you find the one with a cross-shaped birthmark on his right arm, you must dedicate yourself to that person. He will certainly become the savior of all of Valencia... If this is His Majesty's will, then so be it! Alm, I shall fight with you!

Gold Knight Zeke joined you!



Zeke is not bad at all. Gold Knight is Paladin's promotion and Zeke is stronger than Cleive, our weakest Paladin right now, so he gets both his Steel Lance and spot on roster.

And now, it's finally time for the main attraction of this update. Let's just head north to fight the advertised dragon zombies, shall we?



Okay, we expected that.



So yeah, after entering the Dragon Mountain, Alm is force into a battle with five zombie dragons that, as attackers, get the first move. Apart from benchwarmers on the left dying, it does not seem too bad.

Okay, so they do not die, because Silk can cast Dear and just wipe out four of the five dragons. But we're still not at the end.




Okay, this is bad. To put this simply, every time a "turn" passes on the world map, Alm gets attacked by dragon zombies (seven this time) and he can't escape. I have an easy time here only because I knew what to expect and have Silk at high levels and Celica's part of the story almost done. But if anybody headed here without doing Celica's part first, recruiting Teeta and promoting Claire, this would be a complete death trap. And no, there is no warning from the game that you'd be unable to escape the Dragon Mountains after entering it.

However, since I came here prepared, it is only an annoyance.

Since Alm is now trapped, we can only move forward with Celica's party and that means I should end this update. Anyway, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year, I'll see you in 2011.

Python - Level 4 (+3) - Defence +3
Alm - Level 19 (+4) - Power +2, Defence +2, HP +1, Skill +2, Speed +1
Teeta - Level 7 (+6) - Defence +3, Luck +2, HP +1, learned Fortify, Illusion
Silk - Level 9 (+3) - Magic +2, Speed +1, HP +1
Cliff - Level 3 (+2) - Power +1, Defence +1, Skill +1, HP +2
Matilda - Level 7 (+2) - Speed +2
Force - Level 10 (+3) - Power +1, HP +3
Cleive - Level 11 (+1) - Skill +1, HP +1
Dyute - Level 12 (+1) - Magic +1

Claire promoted to Falcon Knight - Defence +5, HP +15
Cleive promoted to Paladin - HP +1
Force promoted to Knight - Power +3, Defence +5, HP +1

Fortify costs 12 HP and is an army wide healing spell that also affects summoned units and allies.
I'll show off Teeta's Illusion spell in Alm's final battle in chapter Four.

Next time: