Part 125: Virgin Forest 3

Welcome back!

Last time, there was a hot-headed young, adventuresome guy with a much younger friend who set out for the local dungeon. While there, they met an accomplished warrior and his totally-not-girlfriend, seeking knowledge and artifacts of the ancient Angelou civilization. The two proceeded to interrogate and threaten them, before the guy and his young friend escaped and ran into a boss that was made of a solid material, given an animate, animal form.

... If we have to help Rapp get a pass for a boat, I'm outta here.





Usually, this line comes off as more sincere. Given Justin and Feena's performance in that battle, though, I can't help but read this as sarcasm.

: Well, everyone makes mistakes, right? Can we just say I owe you one?

: Nicky, you thank 'em, too.

: Uh, yeah....

: Thank you for helping me! I'm sorry about earlier on. I made a mistake. My name is Nicky. I'm Rapp's number one apprentice!

: I'm Justin and this is Feena. We're on an adventure journey.

: Pleased to meet you, Rapp and Nicky.

: Good. Nicky, you go back first, and let everyone in the village know. I'll bring the guests over.

: Yes sir, Rapp sir!

Rapp, no! That's exactly what led to the boss fight last time!



: Oh that? We can ask the details from Grandpa.

Yep. Five party members in, and we're 9 for 10 on dead parents.

: Well, let's go. My Village of Cafu is right over there.

First things first...



Patching everyone up, then looking at Rapp's status.



Rapp's stats might not be that impressive at first glance, but the only one that would have gotten any signficant boost from his stat levels is strength. Which, admittedly, is already underwhelming, but that vitality is on par with Justin's. Justin, who's been macing things like it's going out of style. His natural wit is good, too, considering that his fire and sword levels are way lower than they should be for early disc 2.



And yes, based on his equipment, Rapp is this game's equivalent of a ninja.



Too bad for him, Justin is faster and hits harder.

Anyway, this is your first chance to re-equip Rapp. Had I thought ahead, I'd've brought the Angel Darts we looted from the Twin Towers revisit.



And yes, by "right over there" he means "though another section of this godforsaken forest".



Oh, good, palette-swaps.

Their technique is called "dizzy gas", so presumably it confuses you?



Feena makes up for a poor showing in the boss fight with one of her trademark good levels.

And yes, now the ninja is the slowest and weakest member of the party. Go figure.



Y'know, instead of voting for each stat booster, I think I'll just have one vote for who gets to eat them all.



Feena hits Earth 13 here, learning Speedy. Remember all the comments I made when Justin learned Cold, about how wit debuffs were probably the nastiest thing to hit your enemies with?

Yeah, Speedy is the buff version of Cold. Dropping one or two of these on your heavy hitters can swing a battle around right quick.



Aha! Caught you, you tricky bastards!



Chameleons are a rare encounter. They only spawn in one specific grotto in this section of the woods, and they run off at high speed the instant they see you.

Furthermore, they are very resistant to most elements, have a crazy-high agility, and can hit harder than they strictly should.



So, Thor's Fury. A 120-power lightning-elemental attack. What makes that worth using over the more damaging ones we've had access to previously?



It doesn't cast Zap!. It casts Zap All.

It deals about 50 damage to the enemies, which is still more than Justin could do otherwise, what with his Fire Mace negating his attacks.

Now, why would I go through the trouble of showing off a terrible random encounter? Aside from completionism's sake.



Because they drop crazy amounts of gold. True, not very much compared to the cost of equipment, but quite a bit compared to other random encounters.



So, here's something I forgot to show off in the first area. These big red flowers aren't traps.



Instead, they shoot you out like a cannon off to some other part of the map.



Oh hey, here's our reward for beating Wood Man last update.



Whew. Finally, we're out of that hellhole of a forest, and can explore the hidden ninja village of Cafu.

See you next time! ^{_{Oh god, I have to get all the NPC portraits and start doing NPC chatter again.}}

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