Shin Megami Tensei II

Part 41

Update Number 40: Binah, and Cliffhangering in Chokmah.

In the COrridor, there are some interesting things to be found. Yes, interesting.

For example, A TITAN!

Wikipedia posted:

In Greek mythology, the Titans (Greek: Τιτάν Titan; plural: Τιτάνες Titanes) were a race of powerful deities that ruled during the legendary Golden Age. The Titans were twelve from their first literary appearance, in Hesiod, Theogony; pseudo-Apollodorus, in Bibliotheke, adds a thirteenth Titan Dione, a double of Theia, aka Medusa. The six male Titans are known as the Titanes, and the female as the Titanides ("Titanesses"). The Titans were associated with various primal concepts, some of which are simply extrapolated from their names: ocean and fruitful earth, sun and moon, memory and natural law. The twelve first-generation Titans were led by the youngest, Cronus, who overthrew their father, Uranus ('Heaven'), at the urgings of their mother, Gaia ('Earth').

The Titans later gave birth to other Titans, notably the children of Hyperion (Helios, Eos, and Selene), the daughters of Coeus (Leto and Asteria), and the sons of Iapetus — Prometheus, Epimetheus, Atlas, and Menoetius; all of these descendants in the second generation are also known as "Titans".

The Titans preceded the Twelve Olympians, who, led by Zeus, eventually overthrew them in the Titanomachy ('War of the Titans'). The Titans were then imprisoned in Tartarus, the depths of the underworld, with the exception of a few.

Their MP is useless! USELESS!

Oh, the aromatic smoky thing that increases magical skill. Always nice to find more.

The middle set of stairs leads to Geburah. Obviously, there is no need to go there at the moment.
Lower one goes to Chokmah, but that's for later. The exit (red dot) goes to Binah, and that is the current target.

Pretty blue color.

The sea!

Wait what?
Their bodies grow in the sea?

THEY ARE HARVESTED? WHAT?

That sounds like a bad thing for the Abyss.

Aww.

Then Chokmah TOwer shall be visited. Later.

Oblivion.

Time to go inside.

GRAY.

Yes!

Meh, it's not like money makes any difference.

Oooh. That is VERY useful. Aleph and Hiroko would be able to give good use to that contraption.

Another place added to the list.

I bet that Morte Rictusgrin would have a nice time chatting with that skeleton guy.
I DON'T want to know what they would like to do with female zombies or that nymph, respectively. Or how.
No. Mental image. Bad.

EUROPEAN CAR FUGLY

Megaten Wiki posted:

Demonic sexual goddess of witchcraft, represents the ancient mother Goddess belief which was widely spread in Europe. Because many of the old earth mother Goddesses had liked bloodshed, sacrifice was attached to their cult. In addition, because it was thought, that in the ceremony of Yutaka 穣 prayer sex itself cultivates favoring the ground, it was done greatly. Volvo is goddess of the name remainder of such earth mother Goddess belief.

She is the primitive goddess of the moon, her uterus is the earth itself. Because the fact that it has owed such role in Greece as [hekate], it is called of Volvo = [hekate] hence both were merged. When it is the cruel area mother God which seeks blood simultaneously, it is the character which unites the love that wraps entirely. The witches were devoted to the mother God worship, Volvo was the highest queen of the witches.

She is gruesome.

OH GOD TAKE HER AWAY FROM MY SCREEN.

Not bad, but she is the definition of DO NOT WANT.

... I retract myself. Rangda probably is the definition of Do Not Want. Bah, BOTH are.

Wikipedia posted:

Rangda is the demon queen of the leyaks in Bali, according to traditional Balinese mythology. Terrifying to behold, the child-eating Rangda leads an army of evil witches against the leader of the forces of good - Barong.

It is suggested that Rangda may be derived from the 11th century Javan queen Mahendradatta who was exiled by the king, Dharmodayana, for allegedly practising witchcraft against his second wife. The tale surrounding this is that she proceeded to take her revenge by killing off half the kingdom, which by then belonged to her and Dharmodayana's son Erlangga, with plague before being overcome by a holy man. The name Rangda means "widow".

Rangda is important in Balinese culture, and performances depicting her struggles with Barong or with Erlangga in that tale are popular tourist attractions as well as tradition. She is depicted as a mostly nude old woman, with long and unkempt hair, pendulous breasts, and claws. Her face is traditionally a horrifying fanged and goggle-eyed mask, with a long, protruding tongue.

Bali is a Hindu island, and it is suggested that Rangda may also be associated with Durga, the Hindu mother warrior goddess, and Kali, the black mother goddess of destruction, transformation and protection in Hinduism. While Rangda is seen as fearsome and by many as the personification of evil, she is also nevertheless considered a protective force in certain parts of Bali, much like Kali is seen as a benevolent mother goddess in the Indian states of West Bengal, Assam and Kerala. The colors associated with her - white, black and red - are identical with those associated with Kali. Her iconography is similar to that of both Kali and Chamunda, who are closely related.

Got one. Why? Future fusion with Barong. Might show something interesting.

In the very center of the area...

YES.

DEFUSION.

TWO!

Might do that at a later date.

And yet, she doesn't join. Filled party

Coming back:

Aww.
End result of this subquest: 1 point upgrade in everything for both humans. Mother and Son.

No you aren't. You will ALWAYS be a stinking poltergeist.

Or not. I have no idea how demonic life cycles work.

Glad to hear it.

The Abyss is saved. No longer will the demonic population get lower with time (thanks to asshats such as Aleph), now the demons can rise their numbers and survive!

Oh don't be so gloom. Nonexistence can't be that bad.

To disrobe or not to disrobe the Fury?

Fuck, how is that even a question? Artificial Oedipal Messiahs need their alignment masking garments. GIMME.

Bwaha.

That curve is where the Fury is.

To Chokmah!

Yay!

Blaargh.

Hooray!

Damned convoluted corridors.

Blue and red, eh?

Tezcatlipoca! Even if he looks more like Huitzilopochtli there.

Wikipedia posted:

Tezcatlipoca ([teskatɬiˈpoːka][1]) was an important deity in Aztec religion, associated with a wide range of concepts including; the night, the north, the earth, obsidian, enmity, discord, rulership, divination, temptation, sorcery, beauty, war and strife. His name is Nahuatl for "Smoking Mirror" alluded to his connection to obsidian, the material from which mirrors where made in Mesoamerica and which was used for shamanistic rituals.

He had many epithets which alluded to different aspects of his deity: Titlacauan ("We are his Slaves"), Ipalnemoani ("He by whom we live"), Necocyaotl ("Enemy of Both Sides"), Tloque Nahuaque ("Lord of the Near and the Nigh") and Yohualli Èecatl (Night, Wind), Ome acatl[2]("Two Reed"), Ilhuicahua Tlalticpaque "Possessor of the Sky and Earth".

When depicted he was usually drawn with a black and a yellow stripe painted across his face. He is often shown with his right foot replaced with an obsidian mirror or a snake - an allusion to the creation myth in which he loses his foot battling with the Earth Monster. Sometimes the mirror was shown on his chest, and sometimes smoke would emanate from the mirror. Tezcatlipocas Nagual, his animal counterpart, was the Jaguar and his Jaguar aspect was the deity Tepeyollotl "Mountainheart". In the Aztec ritual calendar the Tonalpohualli Tezcalipoca ruled the "trecena" 1 Ocelotl - "1 Jaguar" - He was also patron of the days with the name Acatl "reed".[3]

The Tezcatlipoca figure goes back to earlier Mesoamerican deities worshipped by the Olmec and Maya. Similarities exist with the patron deity of the K'iche' Maya as described in the Popol Vuh. A central figure of the Popol Vuh was the god Tohil whose name means "obsidian" and who was associated with sacrifice. Also the Classic Maya god of rulership and thunder known to modern Mayanists as "God K", or the "Manikin Scepter" and to the classic Maya as K'awil was depicted with a smoking obsidian knife in his forehead and one leg replaced with a snake[4]

Tezcaltlipoca was often described as a rival of another important god of the Aztecs, the culture hero, Quetzalcoatl. In one version of the Aztec creation account[5] the myth of the Five Suns, The first creation, "The sun of the Earth" was ruled by Tezcatlipoca but destroyed by Quetzalcoatl when he struck down Tezcatlipoca who then transformed into a jaguar. Quetzalcoatl became the ruler of the subsequent creation "Sun of Water", and Tezcatlipoca destroyed the third creation "The Sun of Wind" by striking down Quetzalcoatl.

Tezcatlipoca depicted in the codex Rios in the aspect of a Jaguar - in this form he was called Tepeyollotl.

In later myths, the four gods who created the world, Tezcatlipoca, Quetzalcoatl, Huitzilopochtli and Xipe Totec were referred to respectively as the Black, the White, the Blue and the Red Tezcatlipoca. The four Tezcatlipocas were the sons of Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl, lord and lady of the duality, and were the creators of all the other gods, as well as the world and man.

The rivalry between Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca is also recounted in the legends of Tollan where Tezcatlipoca deceives Quetzalcoatl who was the ruler of the legendary city and forces him into exile. But it is interesting to note that Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca both collaborated in the creation of the different creations and that both of them were seen as instrumental in the creation of life. Karl Taube and Mary Miller, specialists in Mesoamerican religion, writes that "More than anything Tezcatlipoca appears to be the embodiment of change through conflict"[6]Tezcatlipoca appears on the first page of the Codex Borgia carrying the 20 day signs of the calendar; in the Codex Cospi he is shown as a spirit of darkness, as well as in the Codex Laud and the Dresden Codex. His cult was associated with royalty, and was the subject of the most lengthy and reverent prayers in the rites of kingship, as well as being mentioned frequently in coronation speeches.The temple of Tezcatlipoca was in the Great Precinct of Tenochtitlan.