Part 16: Osaka's Best Dressed

Osaka's Best Dressed

[Music: Exploration]



Before we worry about anything actually important, we're going to spend an awful lot of time fusing some new demons. 3 new demons, in fact.



We'll begin by picking up a Toubyou. He's not that great, and I mostly just want Evil Wave because it comes in pretty handy on Monday. He's going into Io's team.



Next, I'm picking up a Heqet. I kind of have a soft spot for these things after one was required to get Thor in Survivor 1 (I loved me DeSu1 Thor for how good he was and how early he came). She's not great, but I'm mostly interested in her racial skill.

Switch is a distinctly bleh skill that is almost always completely worthless outside of helping bail out someone who's getting their ass handed to them. Its uses are absurdly niche at best to put it simply. And the very next fight is sped up monumentally by using it because of course it is. She's going into Daichi's team.



And lastly we have Jambavan. He's Tam Lin but with the ability to hit bigger numbers and you can have more than one of them. Because of the things I used to make him, he has Multi-Hit which is a good physical skill but it relies on the user's agility stat and Jambavan only has 4. Hibiki gets to lay claim to this one.



To help alleviate the issue from before (namely "getting my ass thoroughly kicked") I'm going to do a couple of free battles to bring Io and Joe up to the same level as Hibiki and Daichi. I'm also going to pick up every skill I can crack and then proceed to never use most of them. The most obvious examples of which being Watchful, Moneybags and Amrita.



Oh, and I picked up Elec Dance between fusing Toubyou and Heqet. I was honestly not expecting that so easily, but I'm not complaining by any means.



Those all done, we can now continue onwards. Surprisingly enough, Daichi was able to finally get an event. By one whole vote. First past the post at its finest right here, folks.





What's wrong?
Huh? Oh, it's you... Don't scare me like that.

[Music: Silence]

Daichi seems downhearted...

Something wrong?

[Music: Elegy]

Oh, sorry... I was trying to think of how to tell you this.
Well... JP's gave me an escort and we tried to go see my place.

Oh, jeez, we already know roughly where this is going. Not entirely sure why this scene is still even available at this point. Kinda expected it to be removed once we got to Osaka, but nope!



We could only go part of the way there, and like... I didn't even get to see my house.
And since we're from the same neighborhood, um, your house is probably also...

A heavy silence falls between you two...

...Ugh, gimme a break! Why am I making this more depressing than it already is!?



So we'll eventually see them again, right!?

It seems Daichi still hasn't sorted out his feelings...

Right.
Th-That's what I thought! I'm sure they'll be fine! Hahaha...!
All right! No more moping around! Let's just keep at it!

It seems Daichi has cheered up somewhat...

You say your farewells to Daichi before leaving...



By actually opting for a second scene here, time gets pretty tight for a little while. It still works out, but it's also about to get very dicey.

[Music: Exploration]







The mascot of Osaka... Uhh... Milliken?
She was taking all these pictures of it, saying, "Oh, Joe, Milliken's so cute!"
I don't see what's so cute about that creepy thing. Women are weird, right?
Hey! What're you going on about!?

An irate woman stomps over...

[Music: Silence]



[Music: A Moment of Rest]

It's YOU, dolt! You were just talking about Milliken! Guess what?



Huh? Billiken? Like, with a B? Oh... that sounds right.
Yeah! And don't you forget it!
Milliken, Billiken, it's close enough, right?
No, it is not! You're going to get yourself cursed if you keep that up!
What? Why should I get a curse because of some statue?



That thing's a god? Ahaha, it sure doesn't look like one!
Y-You did it again! Get out of Osaka! You're not welcome here anymore!

The woman walks away...



I think my girlfriend got mad at me too because I kept calling it the wrong name.
...Your girlfriend?
Haha, getting personal there! She is what she is. I'll tell you about her another time.
Crap, we missed the chane to ask that lady about the place in the death clip.
...Well, we gotta keep on moving, right?

You and Joe leave...

[Music: Exploration]



Now we're railroaded into this event. This is probably for the best, because if we missed it now we outright would be unable to save Keita. It's still possible to let him die, but for the first one you can save they're relatively forgiving with it.





Ebisu Bridge, huh...? Nothing out of the ordinary... other than it being empty.
Urgh, we'll never figure out where that death clip was set at this rate.
Let's keep trying.
Sure, yeah. Panicking won't help us find anything.
We just gotta be patient and keep looking.

[Music: Silence]



You hear screams from ahead...

[Music: Countdown]

Wh-What was that? Did someone just say "monsters"...!?
Maybe demons showed up.
Y-Yeah... If they're under attack, we should help them...



Oh, I-I'm sorr-- Eek!

The stranger pushes Io aside and takes off in the direction of the scream...

Are you okay?
Um, yes... Thanks. But...



Dude, that's dangerous. She's probably up against demons, after all.
Let's go help!
Wh-Whoa! We're going too...!?







Aaaah! You're a human, and you use demons...!?
Relax! I'm on your side. Leave those demons to me!
R-Really...? How can I trust you...?



Does she really need our help...? Maybe we can just let her deal with this...

Jeez, Daichi. That's kind of dickish!

No way!



We can fight!
Huh? Are you demon tamers, too?



Oh thank God, someone finally gave us their name before a fight.

You go it, lady.
Y-Yeah...! We have to save those people...!



Let's save them all! The people fleeing and the woman trying to save them...!
Awwwww yeeeeeeeeah!
All right!
We're going to save everyone! Don't let a single person die!
O-Okay! But it's dangerous to fight alone, so we should work together-- Hey, you listening?

[Music: Desperate Situation]



This is our first real escort mission, and unlike Joe's it's actually possible to fail this one. Hinako dying is possible but rather unlikely (she can handle herself so long as she doesn't get swarmed), us dying would be absurd because the fight from the Valgate is much harder in a straight up battle. No, the civvies here are the problem; they can die pretty quickly if left to their own devices and are incapable of fighting back.



Thanks to my minor cracking spree earlier, we don't have any new skills to worry about. This is pretty handy since it means we can focus on just murderising everything.



We're positioned rather well in that respect; Joe and Hibiki are handling the top side of the bridge, whereas Io and Daichi are going to rush the bottom. Hibiki's main priority is the Hare of Inaba hiding just onscreen, and there's another just to the south of it too. Io's most likely to handle that one, but we'll see how things play out.



Right out the gate, Hibiki warps to the Hare and drops an Elec Dance on it.



Elec Dance is great. All dance skills are great. Their only problems are their relatively high MP costs and hitting random targets. In this case, it wasn't really a problem but it can lead to accidentally killing the party leader pre-emptively depending on how the dice land.



In a way, that would be fine here. The Hare being low on HP is equally fine albeit for different reasons; we only really want it so that it can't use Devil Speed and bumrush the helpless NPCs. Because it has Dia and has low HP it's more likely to heal and attack Hibiki than run away.



Speaking of Devil Speed, Io uses that to immediately blitz past the Salarymen. This puts her 3 spaces away from the second Hare even though it looks like it should be 2.



Daichi's turn is switching places with the women. You might not think this would be doable, but they count as allies even though they're considered a third faction. It's weird, but it helps us get her far away from that Gagyson and Bilwis which is good. She's the most likely unit to die here in my experience, because those 2 can gang up on her very easily.



Most of the enemy units spend their turns moving a bit closer. The Itsumade, conversely, decides to try and attack Joe.



It gets its shit wrecked for its trouble. You'd think the Gagyson being poisoned would be a problem. It matters in exactly 0 ways.



Ah! More demons!

Since we took out a unit, a second Itsumade spawns in. Oh no, whatever shall we do now?



Hinako uses her own Devil Speed, and attacks the Gagyson. I'd normally be annoyed that she's trying to deprive us of EXP but her demons are Itsumade and Hare of Inaba. She ain't getting in the way very much with those.



Like, she couldn't even kill a Kikimora and those things are fragiler than antique china being waved by a matador.



Speaking of weak things, the Hare of Inaba tries to attack Hibiki after healing. It, uh, it gets absolutely destroyed by Jambavan.



Now that we're done with that, Daichi can pop in and smack the Gagyson around a bit.



And by "a bit" I mean finish clearing it all out. Hinako helped with that by weakening them all, sure, but I think he'd be fine either way.



We'll let the Bilwis party demonstrate that, since it's so willing to die.



It could've gone a mite better, but they're pretty safely done for come anyone's next turn anyway so it's just a tad slower.



You might think that this is seeming a bit too easy at this point. It's been all of maybe 2 turns and we're nearly finished.



You would be right. So long as the demons stay away from the NPCs on the bridge, this fight is a complete joke. There's no curveballs, no surprise new demons, not even any really difficult enemy formations.



The hardest part was probably deciding whether or not I want to take out the Bilwis or Hare of Inaba.



I knew Io could absolutely massacre the Bilwis party, so I picked those.



This mightn't be the "right" choice, since the Hare then used its Devil Speed to poke the Salarymen a bit but that's all that happened out of it.



Hinako helped weaken them a bit, by taking out the leftmost Hare and weakening the Knocker. Even if she didn't, I think we could manage to handle this thing easily enough.



None of those demons are exactly resilient or strong, after all.



And just like that, Daichi finishes them off and we're done. Yes, really.





We got so little bonus EXP, absolutely nothing levelled up. Oh well!

[Music: Silence]

Am I saved...? Oh, thank you, thank you! You saved my life!
The demons are gone...? So you WERE on our side! Thanks!

[Music: Over the Brink of Death]



Heeeey, you guys!

Hinako runs over to your group...



You guys are tamers, right? Do you know the people in yellow who are fighting demons?
Huh? Yellow?
That's JP's.
Oh... Yeah, them! They had this logo saying "JP's" on their uniforms!
Ohh, okay. Well, I guess we're part of JP's... or more like, we know people who are.



You're not sure what to say to this...

Y-You say you want to join, but... we're not official JP's members either...
What? You're not...? Then what are you guys?
We're helping them out.
Yeah, what he said. We're just ordinary guys who came along with the Chief of JP's.



Well, sure, I guess that wouldn't be a problem... Wait, what!? Him!?
Why not? I can use demons. I'd be a huge help!
Uhhh... Hm. What do you think, Hibiki...?
It'll be fine.
Oh, really!? Geez, you've got a pretty open mind about this stuff! You're sure...?



Show us around...? Oh, hey! Since you mention it...
Hinako, right? You know any huge stairs around? Ones where people could fall and die...?
Huh...? Huge stairs? Big enough to kill a guy?
Exactly! J-Just gimme a sec, I'll show you something...!



Where's this kid now!? He could die if you don't hurry! There's no time for chitchat!
Um... C-Calm down. That's why we were asking you if you knew where they were...
Oh... Okay. Sorry for flipping out like that...



Yesss...! Now we know where to go! This might actually work out somehow...
Wait, Bickman!? That's where we're meeting him! So this must happen around 14:30!
Meeting him...? Oh, so this kid's a friend of yours.



We were meeting up so he could show us the way to the main branch of JP's...
JP's main branch? Talk about relevant to my interests! We gotta save this kid!
What...!? Does tat mean you're coming with us after all?
Haha, well, okay. Anyhow, we know where to go. So let's get moving!
You're right... We need to hurry and tell him about this!
Yeah, let's get to Bickman then! Gotta hurry and find this Keita kid...!



Hinako is absolutely fantastic, and is the poster child for how good physical skills can be. Str/Agi is a very viable build and Hinako rocks that shit super well.

You leave the area with Hinako leading the way...



So, this is the absolute last minute we can still stand a chance to save Keita. Based on the results so far, we're going to pull that off, but... that also means this is the absolute last chance to vote if you haven't done so yet.