Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days Part #46 - Day 174-176: Action, Reaction

Part 46: Day 174-176: Action, Reaction

MAKE SURE YOU BRING AERIAL RECOVERY!!! I can't stress that enough. You'll see why later.

Now that we're done with the distractions, we're finally going to the final world. Neverland's gimmick is easily the worst, even including Beast's Castle's and Wonderland's (spoilers) stealth section.

New Music: Secret of Neverland
New Music: Crossing to Neverland

~~The names might look like (just like the name of all original tracks here)~~, but the musics themselves are actually pretty good. These ones don't appear in any other game.

Edit: People reading this from the future might not know what I'm talking about, since I changed the tracks to the Days/BBS/Re:Coded OST. The names from there don't sound like anymore.

What was that Heartless I'm looking for called again? A Wavecrest? It's gotta be around here somewhere.

Just move forward a few steps and we see some familiar faces. Oh, and if you're wondering, you can't fall to the sea because there's invisible walls around the island.

Smee is constantly digging here.

There's no mistaking it this time! The treasure's most certainly here!

That would be a nice change from the last dozen places, eh, Captain?

And with the luck you had finding all those treasure maps at once, we'll be rich in no time!

Heh heh heh... Some poor fool must be cursing himself now for losing 'em.

(Treasure maps?)

Enough blabbering, Mr. Smee! Get that shovel digging!

Aye, aye, sir!

*Smee stops digging*

Oh!?

*Smee opens the box*

Blast! Another dead end!

Now, now, don't you worry, Captain. We still got a whole pile of other maps to follow.

Confound it... If we don't find the right one soon, someone else could walk off with me treasure.

Which is why Roxas is going to take whatever is inside that box

C-Captain, sir?

Run, Smee!

Yikes! Aye, aye, sir!

Good. Now's my chance to take out those Heartless.

So we do. The recolor of the elemental Heartless is called Turquoise March while the recolor of the Aerial Master is called Air Battler.

I'll talk more about them later. I'll just say now that you'll learn to hate them, especially Turquoise Marches.

Was this "treasure" some kind of trap? Or did something else cause them to show up? Something about that guy did seem a little...off.

Um... Did nobody notice the darkness emanating from Hook?

With nothing else to do, we approach the ship.

Where to, Captain?

To wherever the next map says the treasure is! I'm not giving up till I've struck gold! You'll find me that treasure, Smee, even if it means digging up every inch of this island!

*Tinkerbell leaves, only to meet...*

It seems that Tinkerbell got a better memory than Hercules or Phil.

Umm...can I help you?

*points to the ship*

You...want me to go to that ship? But how? It's too far. I can't just sprout wings and fly there.

*thinks, then flies around Roxas

*points to the ship*

Y-you want me to jump!?

*nods*

Wait...

Are you... Are you saying I can fly?

*nods*

Well...all right... I believe you.

That was quick.

We can fly! (No, that's not the wrong smilie)

I-I did it! I can fly! But...was it just that stuff you sprinkled on me?

*nods, then runs off*

Um...good-bye. So, now what? Should I go to the ship? ...... No, I'm here to take out that Heartless. I feel bad not helping her, but I can't risk being spotted. The mission comes first.

Don't worry. I'm sure Tinkerbell will be fine

We can fly now. The Y button is now used to fly, which means that now we can't block. Or dodge roll. Or air slide. Great.

First of all, 93% of the fights here are in the air, so hope your Keyblade has good air combo! 2-hit combo will make this a total slog. Nimble Gear+ has long combos, but Phantom Gear is better in stats and has the standard 3-hit combo, so I went with that.

Turquoise Marches only have one attack: Lobbing water orbs that have surprisingly long range. Remember that water attacks can drain your HP instead of just reducing it. And you can't block or dodge roll or air slide. So the only way of avoiding it is to keep moving. The water orbs explode into a water pillar, but it doesn't actually matter when we're flying.

You might have noticed that there's no treasure chests here. That's because the boxes (that Hook and Smee dug up but for some reason didn't open) acted effectively like a treasure chests. You have to examine it and then defeat the Heartless that come out before being able to get the prize inside.

There's just one problem: Unlike chests, we can't examine this when there's enemies around. And there's plenty of Turquoise Marches (and some Air Battlers) around. I know that KH1 is like this all the time, which is why I never finished that game.

Speaking of Air Battlers, they have 2 attacks: An air barrier just like Antlion's that dissipates over time and it also shoots out the same crescent things just like Aerial Masters. And they're immune to Aero.

Oh, and this ~~chest~~ box has a Panacea.

2 Turquoise Marches were fought to get to this box with a Potion inside. Worth noting is that we only have to fight the Heartless that shows up in the cutscene after opening the box (that I didn't show). So if the cutscene only shows an Air Battler but then two Turquoise Marches show up, the Turquoise Marches will disappear after defeating the Air Battler.

No Heartless were fought to get to this box with a Frost Gem. Don't count on it to happen often.

I forgot to mention that if we get hit while flying, we have to use Aerial Recovery or we'll fall all the way to the ground, not able do to anything while falling and with the possibility of getting stunlocked. I can't stress this enough: MAKE SURE TO BRING AERIAL RECOVERY EVERY TIME YOU GO TO NEVERLAND!!!

8 Turquoise Marches and 1 Air Battler were fought to get to this box with a Panacea. Yes, I'm going to count the number of Heartless I met on the way. At least Limits still work pretty well.

This one is actually the box Hook opened earlier, so we don't have to fight the Heartless inside anymore. It has a Gust Shard.

4 Turquoise Marches and 1 Air Battler were fought to get to this final box. The problem here is that Neverland is a world with 4 completely different maps. 3 out of those 4 maps (including this one) only have 1 wide open area, so the Heartless can (and will) chase Roxas everywhere. They aren't tough, but they are a nuisance.

Music: Tension Rising

The Wavecrest is this box's Heartless. By the way, this is the cutscene of the Heartless spawning I mentioned earlier.

The wavecrest itself is simple. It has a water attack to go with the Tailbunker's fire and Avalanche's ice attacks.

It can also do a backflip (just like the others).

Finally, it can also charge (just like the others). It can't land and create shockwaves, though.

The box has a Lightning Shard.

Music: Secret of Neverland

Maybe I should have gone with her... Saix wouldn't like it if I got mixed up in anything unrelated to the mission. But then again, without her I never would've found the target. I wonder why she picked me. It's like...

It's like she knew I would believe her-that I could fly.

Funny... I almost feel like I've done it before.

You've done this once. Twice if you count Ven.

Music: At Dusk, I Will Think of You...

Twilight Station Tower: 38
Sea-Salt Ice Cream: 69

Yup.

*Axel sits down*

Axel, you're not gonna believe this.

I flew today.

Flew?

Yeah, like a bird! Well, sort of. It's hard to explain...

Just say that you flew like a fairy.

I can imagine.

There's just no way to describe it. I've been waiting all day to tell you and Xion!

Really? You were surprised only for the first 5 seconds.

Right...

Axel:

Flying felt so natural-like I'd done it before. Weird, huh?

I wish Xion would wake up so I could tell her all about it.

To be fair, this is the sort of thing you would brag about to your friends.

Music: Crossing the Finish Line

The only notable thing here is Glide. Luck Tech is just another synthesis item to add to the pile.

This is the reward mission from Axel.

Music: This is Halloween
Music: Spooks of Halloween Town

Same business as always.

The bombs still explode on the second hit, though. Yes, Demyx can be frozen. It's less ridiculous than Axel being ignited. The chest just has a Gust Shard.

Music: Tension Rising

The Dual Blade can be found on the next area. It's way easier to deal with than Zip Slasher, even though it's much bigger.

There's also a Rare Vendor, which is an upgraded form of Bulky Vendors. Don't know why they need a recolor, but whatever. It doesn't matter since it escapes before I can kill it.

The Dual Blade has the usual combo. You can also see Demyx triggering and failing to do his limit.

The Dual Blade also has a charging attack, which is done after it charges. _{I'm sorry} It can cause Air-Toss.

Also, looks like Demyx manages to actually do his limit, which is good since we haven't seen it before. Sadly, none of the Organization members' limit is the same as their KH2 desperation moves. It's also sad that limits don't make us invincible.

It can also use Aerora, which can be blocked pretty easily. Also, there's always a Minute Bomb that respawns if we kill it. Just ignore them and deal with the Dual Blade exclusively.

Finally, it has the armor Heartless' jump high and create shockwave attack.

Have I mentioned that I love LV 5 Cure? Especially the innate Leaf Bracer ability?

We can block its charging attack to knock it down.

Like I said; it's much easier to deal with than Zip Slasher.

Music: This is Halloween

The Ordeal Blazon might look like it's too high to reach, but there's a stairs just out of frame that we can use to reach it. The chest has an A. Recovery LV+. I have no idea what Aerial Recovery levels do.

Music: Crossing the Finish Line

Music: Sacred Moon

Our final mission is emblem collecting. Before we go there, we need to do some preparation first.

The most important thing to do is to add Glide. I also changed Dodge Roll and Aerial Recovery to their linked versions. I'm also changing Thunder to Fira because... I honestly don't remember why.

I know I might be in the minority here, but I actually like this puzzle aspect of the panel system. It feels great to make every linked panels fit.

Anyway, the mission. We need Glide to collect all of these. The ring starts shrinking after we drink the shrink drink.

We need to do this one from the top right and then clockwise. We need to glide from the top right emblem location to get the bottom right one. And you need to leave the top left one for last. The chest has a Fire Recipe, but I didn't actually pick it up until I collected all of the emblems.

We need to pick the emblem by the exit last because there's two emblems in the next area. This area has no enemies, so you need to have the ring ready when you enter.

We don't actually need Glide to pick up the emblem in the middle of the room, we can just use air slide. Glide does make grabbing it easier, though. And I need to fight the Heartless here to replenish the rings for the next room. Yeah, this time the emblems are in many areas.

There's plenty of emblems here. The right exit is the one we came from. A, B, and C all goes back to the Bizarre Room while D will go to the Tea Party Garden.

We need to drop down to grab these two. The chest has a Cure Recipe. Like before, I grabbed it after I fully completed the mission.

It's not that hard as long as you have Glide and save killing the Heartless for only when needed.

If you don't bring Glide, then I guess you're kinda fucked. You'll have to retry the mission later, I guess.

The chest has an A. Recovery LV+. I'm referring to the chest on the balcony in the previous picture, not the one in this picture. We can access it by entering from the D exit from the bottom right in the map above instead of the left one.

This chest just has a Tricky Monkey, which is just a resized version of Cymbal Monkey. Like Rare Vendor, I don't know why they felt the need to recolor a unique enemy.

The rest of this mission is just fighting the Heartless we passed by earlier.

Have I mentioned that I hate Sapphire Elegies? Because I do. Shit like this is what makes fighting the Heartless longer than the actual emblem collecting.