Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey Part #12

Part 12: Morality Pet

Prayer

Back on the ship again, so we can take this chance to see what the crew has to say about Zelenin et al.

"Hey, at least we managed to save one life," or "We were only able to save one life"?

Dammit... The more I think about it, the less sure I am...!

Kato, please. Don't be such a pessimist!

Think of the predicament she was in... It was definitely a narrow escape for her.

She's been through a lot. Her brainwaves are unstable, as are her REM cycles.

Not that I blame her... they put her through hell out there.

I mean... when this ship crashed, I got kidnapped by demons too.

I thought that was it for me. When I saw your face, you were like a knight in a shining Demonica.

I can't say that he feels the same way I do, though.

I mean... she's so experienced. It's probably different for her than for a recruit like me...

Requisite reminder that everyone on this ship is the best of the best in their personal field. The game wants you to forget that at this point, despite reminding you repeatedly at the start. Unfortunately for it, I didn't forget!

Oh and we don't have anything new in the Lab right now. This shouldn't be a surprise, really. The only thing it could've realistically been is the Enemy Search and we already got that.

Go bring me some damn forma!

I'm gonna sink everything I got into development... That's the only way I can get payback!

Keep your successes in mind as you go about your missions, not your failures.

That'll help bring your confidence up, which might mean the difference in saving others.

Well, it was Norris' weakness, a gun and three demons. Also magic. Lots of magic.

Besides... grieving won't bring him back. We have our own necks to worry about.

Palace of Pleasure

Right back into the Palace we go. Random encounters are back now as well.

Probably should've gone to Antlia for its Enemy Search stuff first, but for some reason I got it in my head that I needed to do something else before ES Demons would even spawn.

The 2nd floor proves me wrong pretty promptly, but we're already here so let's keep going.

They work pretty much exactly like Forma. They pop-up on the map as a pink circle when our giant cross that searches for things passes over an appropriate square.

They also work like normal demons in that most of them are Unknown when we first encounter them. Most Enemy Search demons also have to be beaten at least once before we can fuse them, so we can't get around that the easy way.

Both Antlia and Bootes only have 2 ES Demons, and they share one of them. This thing we ran into first hits really hard with its basic attack, so I know from that alone what this thing is and that this is the one in both Antlia and Bootes.

So, before we run into another one (now that he's no longer Unknown)? I'm taking a random Melchom and Lilim and fusing them to make Azumi. Adding Harpy's source exclusively for Marin Karin. Azumi is a weird choice for this, yes, but that 112 damage from a basic attack on Hitonari was on Neutral resistance. It also was a basic attack. He can hit much, much harder.

But only with physical attacks.

An Honor Befitting That Name

So, hey, say hello to Take-Minakata. From Enemy Search A, he has a 50% chance of spawning in Bootes. That's combined from a 30% chance of spawning solo or a 20% chance of spawning with an Ippon-Datara ally. He also appears in Antlia with a 25% spawn-rate, but there he's always solo.

He's also really strong and probably the most dangerous thing we've fought so far. Low bar to cross, yes.

So we're going to do this. He's neutral to all ailments but Charm is Charm, and Charm is the best that we can use. He's also weak to Electric damage, but resists... a lot. He resists Phys, Ice, Wind, Expel and Curse. Yeesh.

Skill-wise, he has Garula which isn't that great for him personally (and his Source has Garudyne!) and Zan-Ei which is insanely scary. For reference, it has a base power of 200 which makes it the tied 4th strongest Phys skill and it increases to 300 on a New Moon. 300 is a very big number, yes; it's not quite the biggest base power, but it's the biggest you can get for a long, long time.

Combining this, his wonderful resistance loadout, that he has a base 23 Strength (and an 18% chance of it increasing on level up) and Preparedness makes him a VERY GOOD demon for a Chaos MC. Preparedness is a passive skill that makes Co-Ops that he's part of deal increased damage. Preparedness is only on 3 demons by default and only one Source. Sadly, that Source is not Takeminakata's.

Oh and finally, look at those drops. Look at them twice for good measure. Dis-Charm is his "uncommon" drop. ES Demons have a few quirks when it comes to battle rewards. First, they have a modified drop-table so they don't drop Life Stones. Instead they drop a variety of either recovery or offensive items. Second their Forma and (for some ES Demons) uncommon items are guaranteed drops and sell for at minimum 2000 Macca. Third, most ES Demons give zero EXP and none of the ones that do are in Antlia or Bootes. The allies they can appear with still give EXP, though.

So, uh, yes. Now that we have Enemy Search we have easy, infinite money without getting overlevelled in the process. There is zero excuse for having money problems from this point onwards.

The only other normal ES Demon in Bootes is Chupacabra (ES A gives a 25% chance to appear solo or a 25% chance to have a Pyro Jack partner). Being a UMA, Chupacabra is Neutral-Neutral but being an ES Demon we cannot negotiate with him. Also UMA is a race added to SJ from the Devil Summoner spinoffs (not the Raidou games, the Devil Summoner games) and then renamed to Food in IV because IV is confusing and stupid.

Anyway, here we can only see enemy UMAs as part of Enemy Searches. We also cannot fuse any right now, regardless of whether we kick the shit out of them or not.

...Oh and Chupacabra is much, much worse than Takeminakata. He's weak to Fire and Mute - not ailments, just a 300% modifier to Mute. He resists Expel and Curse and that's it. For skills, he has Giant Slice (ugh), Fog Breath (double Sukunda and thus ugh) and Life Drain (it's okay but not great).

Palace of Pleasure

En route back towards where we can probably make some progress, gonna make a Moh Shuvuu. Normally, she's kind of eh but I think she's pretty great for this stage, really. Adding the Principality source just gives better healing and Zionga. Mainly wanting that Zionga.

Back on the fourth floor, pure luck nets a random DF Bootite II. Sure, I'm okay with that.

And then as we get to the experiment rooms we were in before, for the third time...

Nooow... Go ahead... I'll graaab you from behind!

You probably noticed the ES Demon on the map. We're gonna scan that one immediately.

Even if you caaaaaaaan see me, it doesn't matterrrrrrrrrr! You can't beat meeeee!

Nooooow! Time to experimennnnnnt!

Hyahahaaaa...!

An Honor Befitting That Name

Okay, real quick Fomorians are a race of Irish-Celtic giants. They were the second to live in Ireland and some even married into the Tuatha de Danann. It might seem weird how Fomor is a general demon that looks nothing like the named ones that also appear in the series (Balor being the easiest go-to example) but, y'know. Whatever.

Here, our formerly invisible goatman is weak to Wind. Like Macabre, he's a slightly hardier version of a normal, random demon. Unlike Macabre, you can fight Fomorians before the miniboss version. The only real difference is that he has way more HP and he's immune to Expel and Curse. Normal Fomors have no resistances at all.

He might have a lot of HP (in the region of 750-755), but he still gets trashed in like 2 rounds. Honestly, even Norris is technically more of a threat. Good job, Fomor.

Palace of Pleasure

I don't get it! Whyyyyyy!? Arrrrrrgh!!

Well, now we can finally make progress on the 4th floor and beyond!

Immediately to the right, this thing stands out. It's apparently a switch, somehow. I'm not sure how, but there's no reason to ignore it so let's flip it!

...Yeah, that was definitely the right move to make. Now we can shortcut back up if/when we need to.

Meanwhile, over on the left-hand side we get a hole dammit.

This one doesn't even lead anywhere! It's just a stupid trap designed to make you waste time walking back over those damage tiles. This alcove exists solely for this. Augh.

Walking back to the 4th floor, since it's not that far, we'll go back to the switch and follow the tiny linear path. This brings us to stairs leading... down? Guess we gotta go down to go up.

At first glance, this brings us to a dead-end... but we have a gate search right here! Gonna use that then.

And it brings us to a wide-open area. We have a single path leading forward we can take without issue but the rest of it is gated off. Not by any gates or anything, but by a pond of damage tiles.

We'll ignore that part of the floor for now. Instead, let's talk to this lady.

I've stopped dining on humans, so I have no business with you.

Farewell, my past self, who drowned in the joy of gluttony...

...Hohoh.

Yeah, see, this is actually really clever. Hariti's here to reference her actual myth, rather than just being weird.

But, hey, we also know that demons get really aggressive during a full moon and it's nearly one now. Just gotta walk a few steps...

Crisis

M... meat... I want meat... Human meat...!

......! *pant* *pant* You have the most dreadful luck, passing by at such an inopportune moment...

I... I am Lady Hariti.

I apologize for being so abrupt, but you must leave this place.

I grow violent when the moon is full... and I cannot control urges when I see a human.

If you stay, I will most assuredly eat you...

Hariti is a Buddhist Rakshasa. She had hundreds of children and fed herself and them with human children. Needless to say, the mothers of said children got super pissed off and asked Buddha himself to do something about it. He kidnapped Hariti's youngest son (or daughter, in some versions) and hid them under his rice bowl. Hariti searched the entire universe, couldn't find her child and asked Buddha for help. He pointed out her hypocrisy in this matter and she admitted that the parents of the children she kidnapped must be suffering worse than she did. As a result of this, she became a protector deity of children and childbirth. She then decided to feed herself and her children on pomegranates instead of the flesh of children.

If I feed on that instead, my hunger for humans should be abated.

Please... won't you?

Yes.

What a dear! Thank you ever so.

I shall entrust you with this.

Now we just need to find a Pomegranate...

Palace of Pleasure

Not going to do very many skill changes, but Azumi doesn't need Charmdi so I took the risk. Fang Breaker is definitely an interesting trade-off. It's fairly ehh for an ST Phys skill but it also functions as an ST Tarunda at the same time. It's pretty nice for fights against minibosses or bosses, since it's cheaper than Tarunda (by 2MP, which doesn't sound like much but for Phys demons it matters a lot!) AND deals damage at the same time. It won't be seeing much use on my end, though.

Over the damage tile pond, we have a random Hamsa just chillin' out. Let's see what he has to say.

I welcome you... as my dinner!

Eh? Hariti told you to bring a Pomegranate to her?

I see. Pomegranate does have a bit of a human flavor, it's true.

It's a shame I haven't any on me.

She's on one of the floors above, though I've never met her myself...

She's always hiding.

A demon on the higher floor might have a Pomegranate. Well, at least it's a start. Thanks, Hamsa.

We'll go up the stairs here back to the fourth floor in just a moment. Just gotta finish mapping out this area now so I never have to come back here again, save for giving the thing to Hari--

god fucking dammit

And now we're in a new section of the 2nd floor. I swear, if this ends up dropping us down to the first!

It's a pretty straight-forward area, thankfully. It only has 2 spots of note; an easy to miss fixed Forma that gives 2 AC Bootite.

But the Sleep Harpe is the real reason to bother with this area. It's a new weapon; a harpe is a type of sword, that has a small sickle-esque protrusion coming off the blade.

It's a decent upgrade for damage, but it's only a single-hit on a single foe... but it also has a chance to inflict Sleep. Sleep isn't Charm so it's not the best, but Sleep is probably the 2nd best (or maybe 3rd) so I'm definitely going to be using this.

And once we go through the one-way door that drops us off by the terminal, we're done with the 2nd floor entirely! Yep, that's the entire floor mapped out now.

This also puts us close to the elevator regardless of which way we go. So, we'll just take it back up to the 4th floor. Should get us back where we were pretty quickly.

Silence

...Oh wait, hang on right. The elevator wasn't over there. This is an entirely new part of the Palace.

You...! You...!

Hey, Tadano! You hear it too!?

Sounds like someone's taking a beating! Where though!?

...I'm picking up a reading from over here!

Let's help him out, Tadano! Follow me in!

Crisis

Oh, hi Bifrons. He's a different Bifrons to the one from earlier, though.

Thought you could escape? Thought you could get away from me, huh!?

I'll make it so you never... eh?

Who're you!?

It's go time, Tadano!

An Honor Befitting That Name

Okay, so Miniboss Bifrons gets the first strike and... is fought by Jimenez?! Hey wait...

Bring it on, you bastard!

So, now Jimenez is stepping up to do what Gore did before with Orias. The fight is part of the cutscene but it lets us know that Jimenez is Chaos aligned and is at least level 12.

...Why yes, I care about these things.

Sadly, Jimenez is not as good at this as Gore was. Which is weird when you remember Jimenez is explicitly a soldier and is on the Strike team. Gore was not; he was an engineer.

Ghh... you're pretty good, heh! (

)

...This isn't fair! There's so many of you!

You think you can kill me with that!?

Quit babbling! You gotta be better at fighitng than that! Get real!

Hah! Say goodnight, ugly!

Silence

Hmm... Buh!? What the hell!?

Fear

Booooooooooo...!

Tch... What the hell is this? That's a demon!

What a waste of time!

Although... how come he was getting smacked around by another demon?

> The demon is wary of you...

Once again, this is just "do you be a giant dick for no reason or not." Once again, we're going to pick the Reasonable Option.

> You tried talking to the demon.

Boooooooooo...! Boo...?

Boo... Booooo...!

...Whoa. He's a nervous little guy.