Part 49: Ruins of Obel (V)

Ah, the Ruins of Obel. It has been a long time since we were here last. (Update 25, to be precise.)



First though, it's time to outfit all our people. That dress seems handy! Wendel has a bit of a problem with the defensive gear and the fact that she can't use the Master's Vest makes her probably less useful than the cats at this point. But, she's still ludicrously fast and that counts for a lot.



Graska also has new music and it sounds kind of... imperial, I guess.



More importantly however, it has a smith who sharpens to level 7, one level below the maximum for Tactics. Something tells me we're going to have to do something stupid to get stuff up to max level.

Because we always do.


Like that amazing man they called "Child of the Sea God." Everyone wanted to be like him.
Now? Ohh, the Imperial Faction is... Eh, I shouldn't say any more. Never know who might be listening.

There's also our last set of gossip for the game. Bah, sea god indeed. This is what I think of your sea god.


If you happen to visit Merseto, please look for him, okay? Please?

We are going to tell this girl the last thing we heard was that he found a good job with a merchant.


But they can't rise to the Imperial Faction's level no matter how important they become. They aren't of imperial blood...
I bet they resent it, though.

Yeah, I think you may be right.



From one thing to another, and from one town to another, after the scene with Simeon, this new quest pops up in Middleport. It requires 45 SKL and 30 SPD, which is pretty tough to fill - we do have Kika who is a complete skill monster, but she can't be sent on quests because she's considered plot relevant.

I'll take care of it in no time, you'll see.

Fortunately, we do have a disposable ninja. (Unlike the other two who cannot be sent on missions, but would probably fuck it up even if they could because their levels are too low.)

Hm... Let me think...

Less thinking, more action.



Our reward for this, in addition to 7000 Potch and 1000 Skill Points, is the Alger Doll. Shockingly simple! The other item on Simeon's shopping list is not going to be quite that easy to obtain, however.



The first step is to get our behinds to Obel on an Earth day, and only an Earth day.

The next step is to prepare a little.



Suddenly I'm reminded of a song I heard recently. It went something like "This is what we've waited for, this is it, boys, this is war..."



Then, it's time to ruin it up.



Our party for the day. And night. And next day. Because this shit is going to take a long time.



Fortunately, our party has things to talk about.

I joined up with Kyril's group, just as you commanded.

I see. Help him out in any way you can.

Oh, you don't even know half of it. Lazlo.

Understood.

They get Good Will. You'd think Lazlo would be acting more casual with Lino after all this time...



Also, our wizards.

...

At least they kept the other half of Maxine's personality, being grumpy.

Huh? Did I get it wrong? Max--

I heard you.

Ah, okay...

They get Good Will for this. Don't ask me how or why; they just do.



Feel free to ask me how or why this happened, though. It's because it's goddamn Kika you're looking at.



Damn it Maxine, I upvoted you so hard this time. Put that MAG growth to good use, or you're out again!



Get used to seeing this. Wendel's some 5-6 levels behind, so she gets a lot of EXP even from the skeletons.



Lazlo, not so much, but he kills so much shit he gets levels anyway.



Hmph.

In addition to the levels, we pick up a Thunder God's Garb from a chest (it's shit at this point) and a Porcupine Cape from a dig spot (it's also shit). Moving on!



Hey, look what someone managed to pick up when he gained his last level! I'll be putting it to use at some point. It's too slow to use right now, though.



I am so mad that Wendel will not break triple digit natural SPD by level 50. So mad.



Yes way! Now get out; I need to waste time by having Rene do nothing useful whatsoever.

Every repeatable area has several variations of enemy formations and treasure; typically three, maybe occasionally four. This happens to be the same one we got on the last trip, so we've already dug up the single item that was buried here and opened the treasure boxes too.



Roget shows off The Shredding. Try Wind of Sleeping me now, asshole bats.



Everything else is pretty unremarkable.



We do pick up a unite, though!

Just leave the fighting to me!

It's Water Dragon, formerly the elemental unite spell between water and wind. This makes no sense as Maxine is not and has never been a water type, but eh, I'll take it.



It's not terribly powerful, but it has some of the best range we've seen so far, and a nice area of effect too.



Nice range indeed!

Somehow, I S-rank this map and get the extremely useless "Ruins - Level 2" item for it. Yay me.



Let's just continue on.



There was supposed to be two buried treasures on this map, but for some reason I only managed to find one, and that was just a Wing Shield. I'm sure the other one wouldn't have been any more impressive. (Also, there was a chest with a godspeed anklet which I'm sure I'd have appreciated the first time but can buy in stores now.)



Oh joy, reinforcements!



Lino gets good mileage out of that Unicorn Rune. His SKL is kind of shit so he doesn't have that many uses of it, but range is always good, and the Master's Vest blocks the unbalance you'd normally get from using it. Good combo! Not quite as good as Everlasting Mercy, though.



Here's a video of how it looks this time around. And this time it's not terrible! Nice damage, great healing, and it even affects Lazlo now! And it differs from Shining Wind in that it's a regular AoE, while Shining Wind heals all allies and damages all enemies on wind terrain (making it a whole damn lot better than the other spells that hit things on specific terrain).

Anyway, we S-rank this one too and this time I don't even get anything for it because I already managed to do it the first time we were here. Next level!



Yes, yes, very good. Annoyingly this, too, is the same map as last time so there's nothing interesting left, just a lot of skeletons and goddamn bats.



Still, we can profit from it a little.



Wendel kills shit, news at 11.



Lazlo is feeling unusually talkative today!

Yeah?

How are things at the Nest of Pirates?

It's a good question. We should go and check, except we wouldn't get anything for it because the NPCs are still staying the same things.

Well... there's no point in worrying about that now. The Rune Cannons were stolen by those Kooluk jerks... I plan on heading back right after we take care of this situation.

Somehow, it feels like this conversation should have taken place earlier.

Yeah... We'd better take care of those Rune Cannons first.

Yeah, let's get back to it.

But hell, I'm not about to complain if my most ridiculous shitkickers want to get even more Good Will.



Oh joy, another S-rank I can't do anything with!



However! It leads us to something that's actually interesting... sort of.



If you'll remember from last time, we couldn't proceed further, but the purple whatever-it-was drained after we left, revealing a new exit.



That is our exit to the sixth and deepest level of the Obel Ruins. Oh, and some loot, too.

I mentioned how each map has three variations. This is probably the most boring of the ones we could have got for this level - just skeletons and bats and a couple of elemental spirits. We don't even get to try out Lazlo's Wizard Rune against the golems this time. Sad.



Oh, and skeletons can't be instakilled. Because they're skeletons. An Add Efct of 0% obviously means this will never work, so Lazlo just blasts it instead. That works.



This, too.



As boring as they are, though, these enemies are powerful and Mitsuba has been taking quite a beating. She got her revenge, however. And all the HP back.



The platforms mean it's hard for short range attackers to kill things here. Ranged ones, on the other hand, don't have quite the same problem.



corselialevel.jpg



And here's a shot of Water Dragon. It seems to involve ice crystals or something.



Roget is maybe ten points of MAG behind the other good mages, but he's also about ten points ahead of them in SPD. However, I realized that I misrepresented him before: he does not have 2 natural JMP, but 1. Thus, he can't even reach the lower floor, because even the stairs require you to move two layers down. I'll bring Jump next time.

(And there will be a next time.)

Lino also had that problem because he was on a kangacorn when the map started, but they seem to be doing okay over there, so whatever.



Grump, grump, grump.



Mitsuba takes even more damage! This is the chick who has been taking like one point of damage from most attacks in the previous maps, so it should be a good indication of just how strong these things are.



She takes revenge (again) by dealing 758 points to the spirit and actually gains SKL this time!



Of course, they have to hit you to do damage.



We're better at hitting things.



Nothing too impressive in any of these. The second has Prime Gold Ore, and the third a Giant Crab Shell, none of which we have much use for any more. Disappointing.



But Lazlo got a level from zapping the chests, so I guess it's okay.

One round of waiting later, Rene gets up and digs up the Ancient Ring from the map's sole dig spot, and then...



...we just have to run up to the exit.



Only one acceptable choice!



And this is new!



This is the final level.



It's guarded by two new types of enemies. First there are the bugs, which don't seem to be either spiders or beetles, but what's important here is that they hurt like a motherfucker.



Oh, and the Mother Earth Dragon. We have our work cut out for us!



On the plus side, these things are not immune to instant death, and they may drop diamonds when killed. I need one of those, so



yoink!



The beetles have a wide cone-shaped AoE breath attack. Look at that damage! And that's on native terrain!



It's really huge and unpleasant, but at least it doesn't change the terrain. By the way, all that sand? Is earth terrain. All the bugs are earth elemental.







But at least Mitsuba is happy.



The bugs explode most satisfyingly when killed.



But as long as they're on earth terrain, killing them is easier said than done.



It's easy to forget that Corselia can heal as well as kill things!



And profit from it as well.



Wendel tries out her Magic Sword. She's one of the best users of this rune in the game, due to her ridiculous MAG.



Still can't kill the bug, though.



I think I've grown soft fighting all those lesser enemies. Time to get aggressive!



Yeah!



Roget got reduced to critical health and got the magic berserk effect, and if it had stuck around he'd have one-shotted the dragon with this. Sadly, it ends after the character's next turn ends, and this was a spell with charge time.



Lazlo helps him finish it.



That is one extremely dead dragon!

Dragons can drop four different items: dragon fins, dragon scales, *element* dragon meat, and the high tier elemental runes. I got this one to drop the first three in one go, which is all I can ask for - we already have a Mother Earth crystal and I still haven't been tempted to use it.



With all the dangerous enemies gone, it's time to treasure hunt. This is really all we need, but there's no point in coming all the way here without having Rene dig up the rest, so have at it!



Meanwhile, I'll be casting Wind of Sleep on this bat until I'm out of MP. How do you like it, you little fucker?



We need this for a quest. Rene also finds an Ancient Vestment, a diamond, and another chunk of prime gold ore.



Damn that's a lot of loot! And an A rank, but who even gives a shit?



Next: a gate to another world.