Part 41: Hope in Haruna

Well then, new characters are up, and that means we have some preparations to make.



The Rose Crest shows up as equipment again, but this time it just seems to grant +2 DEF. Shit.



Karl comes with some interesting gear - in particular, note the description on the vest there. This is actually very nice for anyone who uses attacks that unbalance the user, though not everyone can use it. Of particular interest, all our male claw users are able to wear it, while Wendel and Mizuki can not. Because of whatever passes as JRPG logic.

However, as good as his initial gear may be, Karl has a bit of a problem when it comes to upgrades - he can't wear anything out of Chiepoo's store. Also while we're on the subject of upgrades, it turns out Reinbach and Charles can't use the Viper Rune, which is a problem for Charles but not so much Reinbach because of reasons.



The first time you point to Haruna and hit "OK", a brief scene plays. It's short and not worth its own video, so it's part of the intro for Haruna.

But he wasn't on good terms with the people in charge, and eventually he got chased out of the country.

I didn't know that...

You don't know anything about anything, Kyril. How is this a surprise by now?

Well, he probably thought he'd return to Scarlet Moon with you guys someday.

Whatever he thought, I'm pretty sure he never imagined what actually ended up happening.

Maybe that's why he was so determined to track down those Rune Cannons...

Hm... Could be.

Then the travel menu pops up as usual.



Moving to Haruna doesn't immediately trigger a scene, so I'm going to wait around for the day to change to water. (This does things now that we have someone with a Chameleon Rune, if you'll recall.)



This gives our cat people time to talk about their cat business.

Heard what?

About Mr. Chiepoo, or at least his business. They say that he's achieved world domination!

They say a lot of things.

I wonder if they'd say something else if we'd decided to fuck Chiepoo over, an option that is beginning to look more tempting the more I think about it.

Wh-Wh-What?!

Amazing, isn't it??

Amazing how he's managed to profit off all our hard work, you mean.

Yeah... But I wouldn't expect anything less from the great hero of Nay Island.
We can't give up now, Champo! We gotta try even harder now!

But no matter how much of a greedy fuck Chiepoo is, these two always cheer me up.

Okay!

We're gonna--



Cat people.



Okay, it's the right day now, so let's get moving.



Oh, look, a guy with a portrait and unique model!



I could make a portrait for this guy and transcribe, but fuck that shit sideways, so you get cropped dialogue boxes.

(SIMEON DOT PNG) I cannot lend my support unless I know what the cause is.



Then answer me this: Why do you seek my help?



I have a feeling they could keep at this for hours with only slight variation.



The party has also been peeking at my file names.

If they take him away, we won't be able to talk to him. Let's hurry!

Yes, let's all have our priorities in order.



That sure took a long ass time to get to. Does anyone even remember this by now?


(It was back in part five by the way.)



And wouldn't you know it, it's one of those maps! You can see Simeon with the green shadow down on the right. He starts out in a lower area with three Kooluk units, while we're up on the roofs.



As usual, we can't trust an NPC to do anything right, so Lazlo gets to sniping this caster from the ledge where we started. Spoiler: he succeeds. The enemy drops a Mega Medicine we probably don't need.

Meanwhile, Flare gets started on the enemies we're supposed to be fighting. She can't finish it, but...



...Karl is up to the task.

Karl comes with the White Tiger Rune, and is the only person in the group who can use it. As usual, it comes with three skills. Gather Strength doubles his power for the next attack. Steel Curtain increases his defence by 50% until the next turn, but I'm pretty sure it disables counters. Finally, Air Shot deals double damage with a three tile AoE and I've never seen it because Karl is kind of shit.



Also his level is ridiculously high for this map, so he only just barely gets any EXP at all.

In fact, almost our entire party suffers from this problem, which is going to make things rather difficult if we want the S-rank item. And we do want the S-rank item because it is basically the last really good one.



One thing at a time though, and Simeon's turn is coming up. I wonder what the useless NPC is going to come up with!



...



okay maybe he doesn't need so much babysitting after all.



That was Suikoden Tactics' version of Silent Lake.

Yes? Well, if it isn't Lord Charlemagne!

Silent Lake has an absurdly,

Ah, to meet foes on the battlefield with you, as brothers in arms! What a magnificent honor!

preposterously,

Let us fight remorselessly, to the full extent of our abilities!

ludicrously huge area of effect.

But of course!

And they get Good Will, which is nice but I was hoping for maybe a unite or something.



Meanwhile, the Kooluk do what they can, which is to say they attack Simeon physically. This fight is set up so it's basically impossible to lose Simeon unless you really, truly, absolutely suck at everything, in which case how the fuck did you even make it here in the first place?

Okay, send for me again!

I'm using Cedric to deliver a payload of...



...exactly one (1) Mitsuba right in these guys' faces.

Sadly she can't kill either of them because I didn't want to spend all the SP I had saved up through those side quests outfitting people for a single fight they're all horribly overpowered for anyway. I spent over a hundred thousand Potch just getting their equipment from Chiepoo's new stock.



Not to say it wasn't worth it, of course. Because those are two ones, not an 11, and he's stabbing Mitsuba in the back.



Karl can't hit anything because his movement range is meh and he has no ranged attacks, so he just walks up and uses Gather Strength, hoping maybe someone will wander into his range on the next turn.



Meanwhile, Corselia does dumb shit.

Flare...

Yes?

Flare, you're a princess of the Kingdom of Obel, right?

Yes.

God fucking damn it do all the characters have to have the princess conversation with Flare? Well, at least Lazlo was just like, "Yo. Everything going ok? Great, me too. Later."

Won't they be mad at you for joining us in battle?

Oh, please... Everyone's worried about that, but it'll be fine.

Having Flare call attention to it doesn't really help, either.

Are you sure?

Yes, we are sure! New topic please! (blah blah good will blah no unite)



For being a moron, Corselia gets an arrow in the back of the head.



wait

no

simeon

what are you doing



Holy fuck, you actually put an enemy to sleep and not me! But now Charlemagne is on wind terrain and Charlemagne does not like wind terrain. What is it with the AI and Wind of Sleep?



"Hey," I thought, "since Corselia got shot and I have no enemies within range, I should have Reinbach heal her!" Well as it turned out, I somehow forgot to equip him.



So he stands here instead. Doing nothing useful whatsoever.



At least Mitsuba gets to kill things. She only gets 30 EXP for it though, so it's a bit of a waste.


Corselia, freshly medicated by Lazlo, takes revenge on the guy who shot her earlier. At least her level is low enough to get EXP from these guys.



Fuck, this could be problematic. Not only is the spear guy hitting Simeon from off the water terrain as if he actually had a brain or something, but now the silence has worn off! Maybe I should get someone down there and help him out.



Probably not Karl though, because that would take all day. Still, this is pretty impressive for a physical attacker. Just a pity it takes two rounds to set it up.



Oh yeah, and pity it causes reinforcements to spawn in, too.



A whole damn lot of reinforcements.



By the way, Reinbach has his own personal rune, the Red Rose Rune. (He had it back in IV as well.) Red Rose Etude hits one adjacent enemy for 1x damage and may inflict sleep. Red Rose Minuet inflicts sleep on all units within two tiles, and Red Rose Rondo deals 0.8x damage and inflicts sleep over the same AoE. The latter is shown above. Not too shabby, and it means Reinbach doesn't need a Viper Rune - though Charles is shit out of luck.



Unnecessary, but fun.



You can't see what the fuck is going on here, but believe me when I say Simeon just nuked the two Kooluk that were attacking him with Breath of Ice.



Can't let him hog all the glory, though, so let's get our own AoE nukes on! Here's another neat thing about Suikotactics (which I've neglected to show off for far too long): if you target an attack where it'll hit an ally, they tend to have a little comment about it. These range from just "!" to stuff like "Did you mean to do that?" and, in Andarc's case, the quote from the intro - "Don't mind me. Go for it!"

At any rate, hitting an ally causes bad mood status (can't talk or use unites) and, in Lazlo's case, would most definitely reduce Mitsuba to a fine red mist so let's target this one tile further up the roof on that building and just kill the Kooluk dudes.



And so we did.



Speaking of killing Kooluks, I fed one to Charles. The last little hit there on the end with the flower petals is narcissism activating. Not huge, but, eh, I guess it might help... occasionally.



Ugh, stupid reinforcements. They had to go and bring a caster.



And we still have dudes to mop up down here! One less now, though.



And now there's one less up on the roof, too. Someone seems to be having fun!



Oh wait, I can reach you from here.



Kyril stops the casting and gets a level. A pretty good one, too.



Almost done...



FUCK'S SAKE SIMEON



...this is me going "wait shit I can't get up on that roof because none of my characters have 3 JMP FUCK ME."



So Kyril just runs down again and takes the long way around. Karl gets zapped by the mage, but it leaves him on lightning terrain so he regenerates over half of it just a couple of seconds later. AI

Flare makes sure it doesn't get a chance to do better by taking out the mage on her next turn.



Meanwhile, Mitsuba is eager to convince us we made a good choice bringing her along. She takes 2 damage from the enemy on the next turn, so I think I'm starting to believe her.



All right, almost there.



Lazlo deals 871 points of damage to that archer. And opens the chest for a Ninja Garb.



And I was hoping my fighters would be able to take out the last guy but apparently Lazlo has to nuke him too. This is what that looks like. And we're done! Were our efforts enough to net us that exquisite S-rank item?



Well, no. Too many high level characters killing shit for little to no EXP. But we'll have one more shot at this. Better make that one count.



Once we've killed everything, someone interrupts the battle... that we just won.



Yep, certainly looks like her.

Soldiers, sheathe your swords!

So apparently they do, because it fades to black and



the next time we see them they don't have their swords out any more.

Aunt Ornela... I'm sorry we had to do this to your soldiers.

I'm not! They had it coming for being creepy and eyeless.

Don't worry. They'll be fine.

Like fuck they will! Did you even see that? I hit a guy for four digit damage! FOUR DIGITS! I'm surprised the house is still standing after that!

Now, come along with me.



Don't wanna!

Corselia, what's wrong?

I'd rather you just pretend you never saw me.

Well you're kind of easy to overlook on account of being so short, so I don't think anyone would question it.

What?

Kyril and his friends are good people. Please don't worry. Plus, there's still something I need to see with my own two eyes. Can't you just trust me?

But...

"Of course not! You're eleven years old."



But anyway this dude shows up before anything interesting can happen.



Apparently he whispers his report or something because we don't get to hear it.

Messenger: The other military officers have also been ordered to hurry there.

I'm not making a portrait for him either.

We can't just leave our posts unattended...

Messenger: We've been instructed to take over from here.

Sounds serious... Very well.

She turns to Kyril's group.

You'll pay dearly if anything happens to her.
Just this once, Corselia.

And then they all run off to do mysterious things we'll never find out about except this is still a JRPG so that was a lie.



Simeon is hanging out below.

You're Simeon, right? There's something we wanted to ask you!

Yes, I'm Simeon. Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but I don't recall ever meeting you before...

Oh, sorry. My name's Corselia.



Gasp! However will I express my emotions at this sudden and unexpected revela



...that works.

(I'm wondering if maybe I shouldn't have revealed how the Flare/Corselia unite is called "Princess Attack." Oh well!)

Wh-What?!

Predictably,

!

...our party is somewhat taken aback by it. Because they can't read the second post and find out about these things.

I see... So you're conspiring with those soldiers who tried to take me away just now.

No! Let me just explain. Please!

Oh boy, this ought to be good.



...

Indeed.



Fortunately, we are spared the rest of the explanation of stuff we already know.

I've witnessed it myself a few times. I don't know if it's magic or not, but people do turn into monsters. I know that much is true.
But I've never seen the monsters turn back into people...
What do you think? Could there be a way to change them back?



That's a lot of weird stuff to digest. And I'm not just talking about the bonitos fermenting in Kyril's backpack.

Without proper research, I can't be certain, but based on what you've said, it may well be impossible...

Oh, no...

Hmm... If I went with you, could I see this phenomenon for myself?

We're tracking down Rune Cannons. I think that Evil Eyes are probably used for their muzzles. If that's the case, I'd say it's highly likely.

Then I shall join you. Don't worry. I will not be a burden.

Simeon is basically "Corselia but worse" for the most part.

Really? You'll join us?

Physically, he's even weaker than her, second only to Pablo. He's just as squishy, but lacks Corselia's stellar evasion, and he doesn't seem to make up for it in other stats.

Until I actually witness it for myself, I won't be able to find a solution. Plus, if I stay here, the soldiers will return before long. The townspeople suffer each time the soldiers come after me. It is best that I leave.

Finally, he comes with 1 JMP and can not learn the Jump skill, which means there are some places where his mobility will be limited by the terrain.



Anyway, someone shouts from off screen.



Fuck, there's more of them!



Indeed, and so we do.



Just in time.

Young Man: Guess we're too late.

Man: No... Princess! Oh, princess, please... We don't want fancy clothes or ritzy places to live. My son... He cries... He cries because he's hungry! All we ask is for a bite to eat...

Wah, wah, wah, all you do is whine. Look, if Chiepoo can abuse the quest system to become world famous, it certainly shouldn't be a problem for you. Get cracking! I'm sure I'll be enough of a sucker to sell you prime gold ore for a fraction of the market value as well, you ass.



Jesus fuck what, we're not done yet? Oh yeah, and this is part of the video for this part, but if you didn't see the rest of it you should watch this part.

Keep it down, you idiot!

S-Sorry.

I can see how he gets along with Andarc.

You heard what she said. She's the Emperor's granddaughter! If we held her hostage, can you imagine the possibilities?

I can imagine the possibility of Kyril ramming his swallow up your ass sideways.

Please give it a try

B-But... as soon as word got out, our countries would go to war!

Oh yeah, there's that, too.

I thought our mission was just to investigate the Rune Cannons. We should wait for orders from--

Oh, come on! Don't be such a coward! Seriously, you're absolutely hopeless!

*rustle*



Guess who heard every word you just said!



Huh?!

Good evening.

Oh. Uh, yeah...

Aaaawkward.

Good evening...



Quick, come up with a subject to lighten the

So are you two going to kidnap me?

well fuck.

Wha...?! Uh, n-no, of course not!

They call him Mr. Smooth, too.

Did you overhear us?

Heinz is also smooth. And I think he might be sugar-free, depending.

A little bird told me...

Hmph.

Heinz...

Coop does a pretty good "don't do anything I'll regret or so help me I will stab you" voice here.

Then let's make this short and sweet. Be a good little girl and come with us.



"what did I say about stabbings"

Are you gonna stop me?

Yes.
If you try to go through with this, I'll... I'll do everything I can to stop you!

He doesn't even have to do everything he can. He's got a huge-ass sword and Heinz is an NPC.

Hmp. Relax. It was just a joke.

Heinz gets it.

Joke or not, cut it out, please. I don't have time to fool around, and neither does my country.
Besides, I already told Kyril and the others to contact the Imperial City if anything happens to me.

Huh. Have you considered getting into politics?

You little baby...

If you leave me alone, I'll keep quiet about this.
That'd be best for us all, don't you think?

Heinz.

"She learned fourth level magic in the last battle. Just FYI."



Heinz makes a wise decision.

...

It's about time we hit the hay.

Yes, sir...

Good night, young lady.

Good night.



Heinz and Coop walk off,



and Corselia drops like a sack of potatoes. I think I might respect her slightly more now!



With that, the chapter draws to a close, and boy, doesn't that sound ominous?

Speaking of ominous, we have an oddly, uh, odd number of characters for the next fight. Give me five people from the list. (The usual terms and conditions apply.)




Artwork for Mitsuba (one of the few returning characters to get proper artwork for Tactics) and Simeon.