Part 8: Chapter 2 Part 3: Anphony-Mackily

Chapter 2 Part 3: Anphony-Mackily



Ok so last time we took Anphony after a bit of trouble, Levin and Sylvia killed some bandits, and my foot units formed a defense against Mackily which we are now of course attacking. Oh and Shagaal sent Fury to attack us. So basically Fury and her squad will fly towards Evans every turn, eventually taking it and causing a Game Over if we don't stop them, seeing as Arden's out and the castle is unguarded. Of course they're looking for Levin, right? So maybe we just send Levin on over there to talk to her. Though that would take a while going on foot, so…



We move Levin and Ethlin together so Ethlin can use her Return staff to get him back to Evans quickly.



Now then Sylvia will be needing some money fairly soon, so she's gonna be looting these villages.



That's a nice sentiment strange woman, but Sylvia's only loved one at this point is Levin, and he's about to be half way across the country from her. And everyone else is busy fighting this war! If they went to their loved ones the war would be over and there'd be no need to return to their loved ones! But I digress.



So if you recall I sent the Social Knights back to help out against Mackily (for whatever help that's worth). Of course they're pretty damaged so Aideen will need to heal them.



And we form a defensive line that looks like this. We have our more dodgy, durable units at the front to hopefully not die a horrible death, and to hopefully draw the enemy a bit closer.



So there are a few different squads that together. One is that diamond in the south, and another is that group of five above them.





And a third is the Fury Squad which slowly moves towards Evans. I guess they try to give you time in case you don't have Warp/Return available to send Levin back.



So this part is tricky. Nobody takes too many hits, but everybody's pretty damaged. Those ballistae have some range on them, so they can attack our frailer units from there. Off screen Ethlin Returns Levin and starts moving towards Mackily.



Lachesis heals Lex for some EXP.



And people move south more. They're around here in case you forgot. Back at the front line…







We retreat a bit and heal up. Again, Holyn and Aira make a wall, this time accompanied by Noish. Midir also moves up to gain some love points with Aideen. On Enemy Phase those squads continue south, but they're not close enough to be a threat quite yet. So let's cut to, say, Levin doing the arena.



Ok so this shouldn't be too bad. Levin's a fairly dodgy guy and he's a powerful enough mage (well, Bard technically, but you get what I mean). Let's see how far we can--



Oh. Uh, that was pretty easy. So Levin kind of kills the arena with no trouble.



So he moves outside to meet Fury when she eventually gets to him.





Why else would King Shagaal have him put away? Please, I beg of you... Save King Eltshan!

Yea we're working on it. These things take time, lady who's eerily identical to that other lady.



Now this fight is one of the hardest parts of the chapter.



We have a lot of frail and/or mediocre units attacking a pretty sizable army with some ballistae and a miniboss with a sleep staff at the castle if we get too close.



So we do some hit and runs with our mounted units and have are unmounted ones try to avoid counterattacks.



Unfortunately neither Ethlin nor Lachesis have made it here to help with the healing yet, so Aideen's trying to manage everything by herself. It's not working too well, but it'll have to do.



So that healing Aira just got is pretty much about to be undone. Oh well, not much you can do about that.



And hey, Midir gets a kill. I feel like I've been neglecting him recently, so I'm trying to get him some extra EXP here.



And Jamka finished off the archer. We really want to minimize two ranged enemy combatants here so that we can start using our mages without fearing punishment on enemy phase. Especially for Azel, who I also feel like I've been neglecting.





And one way to do that is to have Deirdre silence enemy Mages. Plus she gets a level up every time she does that, and the staff isn't all that great later on, so there's no worry about breaking it.



The square I'm targeting here marks the edge of the enemy ballistae's range. So I'm hesitant to move Azel any closer.



The first enemy squad is now an imminent threat and will be attacking us next turn. So that'll be annoying. Fury also moves further south.



Our mounted units are finally starting to arrive as reinforcements. Beowulf and possibly Cuan should be joining the battle next turn.





So Azel and Midir pick up some easy kills, allowing our one range units to press up against the enemy a bit further, and scoring some EXP for themselves.



And Aira's become strong enough to kill an archer on her own without relying on skill activation. Hoo-rah.



And Jamka finishes off the last Sword Fighter, leaving behind the mages and the knights.



Aideen brings Holyn back from the brink of death.



And either Alec or Noish (I forget which and they have identical sprites) kills off one of the mages, leaving only one that's not silenced. Things are looking a bit better. Of course we still have those ballistae, and the first knight squad, and the second knight squad after that… Then again we should have reinforcements pretty soon.



Anyway we end up like this.



And on Enemy Phase the Clement, the castle guard/miniboss, puts Sylvia to sleep. That'll slow down her loot gathering, but she should be able to finish by the end of the chapter.



So pretty luckily the mages move up and block the knights from attacking us.

















So the above screens are pretty self-explanatory. Not much to say there.



The rest of the team moves to more defensive positions. Note that Sigurd and Cuan are now ready to join the fray. Oh and Beowulf actually just waits next to that knight there. He'll take too much damage from a counterattack if he attacks now.



The second group of knights has now reached us, and Fury's squad is still moving south.





Aideen heals Sigurd up so that he can charge in and start kicking some ass.



And look at that, even Dew manage to grab a kill.







Again, pretty self-explanatory. I'm a bit annoyed that I couldn't get Midir to reach the spot next to Aideen, but oh well, not a huge problem. Now with Sigurd and Cuan as our defenders things should go a bit more smoothly. Nothing of note happens on Enemy Phase.



Lachesis and Fin finally catch up to the group (they've been moving at Lachesis' movement speed so that they can get some love points). Which is great, because now we have a second healer here.



And Ethlin catches up to Fin and Lachesis so she can heal the NPC Paladins.



And on the subject of healing, Aideen gives Jamka a hand so he doesn't keel over on the spot with that 1 HP.



Now we finish up our offensive and clear out the rest of this squad.





Lex puts his Hand Axe to good use and weakens that armor knight so someone else can finish it off.



Continue activates to get rid of the last remaining mobile threat.



And Levin's been slowly moving north to meet the Fury Squad, which he does on Enemy Phase when one of the squad members throws a Javelin at him…



And nails him with a 2% hit chance. Oh that bitch is gonna pay for that.



Sylvia awakes from her slumber and continues visiting villages.



That son of his, Prince Shagaal, is bound t'ruin the country before too long. Ahh... if only King Eltshan could've succeeded Agustria's throne somehow.

Yea nobody seems to like Shagaal much, and for good reason. I mean just look at that face.



How is it anything but despicably evil? That smug bastard!





Anyway, we do some cleanup healing before we siege the castle. It's a shame that Lachesis and Fin didn't get to see any action in that battle, but I'm sure they'll be a part of the next one.





So Lex and Sigurd take down Clement like the pair of badasses that they are.



Yea that seems unlikely that anyone will remember you. I don't think you're even in the manga for more than a page or two at most.



Uh, though I guess you'll be in our thoughts whenever we put someone to sleep with this Sleep staff (though that's still not very often, if ever that we'll use the staff).



And we put another castle under the authority or Grandbell.



So take extra precaution!

Yeah, you're right. Just what is our boy Shagaal up to...



Yup, that's the whole cutscene for taking Mackily. It's really not an important castle, despite the trouble we had in that battle. It's kind of just a stepping stone to reach the final castle.



We heal and move forward. At this point everybody's all caught up, except obviously Sylvia and Levin.



Speaking of Levin, he's gonna get his revenge on that bitch who Javelin'd him in the eye. Of course I'm sure that by now you've figured out that Levin talking to Fury will recruit her, but she's blocked so I can't talk to her this turn anyway. When you do recruit her, her squad becomes allied units (or possibly they just leave the battlefield, I forget which), so it's kind of smart, if cold-hearted, to attack them first for some EXP. Anyway, on Enemy Phase...







You! Manfloy!! Y... You're the one who told us what to do and it's all backfired! How are you going to fix this!?

I merely advised the removal of the king. He was getting in the way. I believe the rest is your doing. Wouldn't you agree?

Damn. I just never imagined Sigurd's army would be this strong. Manfloy, help me... What should I do?

There's still hope. If necessary we can make use of that rascal you're holding in the dungeon... Eltshan. Sigurd will listen to anything Eltshan's got to say. Now go and give him a formal apology.

Er... okay. Yeah. I'll do that. Let's put him to some use.







I'll say. That's, uh, that's pretty damn not good at all. Of course I'm sure this won't have any major ramifications about anything Fiat said earlier in the chapter, like various sects of political influence in Grandbell. Nope. None of that at all. Also that random dark mage looks a lot like Sandima.

Only one descendant remains of our old foe Narga, and he will die before long. Then all that's left is the revival of our Dark Lord. Then the world will be ours!

Note the game says "he" will die before long, so he can't be talking about Deirdre here. At first I thought this was a typo or a mistranslation, but then he's probably talking about Kurth. Then I realized he just explained that Kurth is already dead. So I really have no idea what that line is about. Then some people in the thread pointed out that he's probably talking about King Azumar, who has such a minor role in the plot that I'd completely forgotten about him.

Has Alvis consented to your proposal?

Of course he did. He's got Loputousu's blood flowing in his veins. And if that ever got out, they would burn him at the stake for being of Loptian descent. I just wonder if someone as arrogant as Alvis can keep quiet.

So Loputousu's blood is sort of like unholy blood since he was the big bad that the holy crusaders fought against. His blood was in fact what that purple dot in the center of his holy blood wheel back in the prologue was (Part 2 for reference). But wait, didn't Deirdre have one of those too?

Alright. Next we betray the king and once you become emperor...

There's a bit more to it than that. To resurrect Lord Loputousu, we'll need not only Alvis but also that woman's daughter.

Alright, now just to summarize so that we're all on the same page here: Back in Chapter 1 (Part 4 I believe), Manfloy was looking for Sigyn's daughter. A villager later told us that descendents of Loputousu all fled to a village in the Spirit Forest to avoid persecution (Part 5). He also told us that Sigyn formerly resided there, but grew bored and decided to leave the village and start sleeping around. Naturally she came back pregnant and gave birth to yet another Loptian descendant, who would be "around 17 or 18" by now (i.e. Deirdre). Then just after taking Anphony (Part 7), Fiat informed us of a certain duchess named Sigyn who was married to the Duke of Velthomer (Alvis' father).

Now if you don't remember, the Duke was a womanizer who slept around, yadda yadda, and Prince Kurth sympathized with the Duchess, eventually falling in love with her and having an affair with her. The Duke killed himself out of despair and the Duchess "disappeared without a trace." Fiat then explicitly says that the Duchess, Sigyn, is Alvis' mother. So basically you have Sigyn and the Duke having one child, Alvis, with Major Fala and Minor Lopt blood, and then Sigyn and Kurth having another child, Deirdre, with Major Narga and Minor Lopt blood. Now if you think back to where I explained the lover/generation system, I mentioned that if two people with the same type of minor blood have a child, their child will have that type of major blood.

Starting to see the picture now? Manfloy intends to have Alvis and Deirdre, two half-siblings, have a child that will be Loputousu incarnate. Yes, one of the main plot points of this game involves an evil child born out of half-sibling incest. Anyway, back to the cutscene.



Something kind of interesting: In the manga of this game, Zyne actually has a large background and subplot about him being the only general who's kind to the people of Agustria. Of course in game he has about four lines of dialogue, consisting of the two lines we've seen, a battle quote, and a death quote.



And Fury stupidly flies right past the prince that she's looking for. We'll have to talk to her next time though, because that's all for this part!