The Let's Play Archive

The Age of Decadence

by rudecyrus

Part 17: Return of the worst NPC

Part XVII: Return of the worst NPC



It's time to explore the Slums. As you'd expect, it's full of ruined buildings, homeless beggars and armed thugs. There are also some ball-crushingly hard fights, so step lightly.



Right, we'll talk to the filthy man. Not much else to do.



: Easy money is my specialty, friend.







Eh, why not.

: Believe it or not, I don't have anything better to do at the moment.











We head left.





No regrets. Off to the other passage.



Yes, you can drown. Thankfully, our stats are high enough.



This time, we go right.



Yoink.







We survived!



whoops, low poly boobs



That's better. Blue Steel is the second-highest crafting material you can get.

Let's examine the strange doorway.



Well, I have no idea what it's for.





The cut off bit says "power of the sun." Some kind of power source?



We don't have any power tubes, so this thing will remain a mystery for now.









Sky Metal is the highest tier of metals for crafting and requires a whopping 10 levels to use.

Let's look at the strongbox.





Unfortunately, the power tubes we picked up won't work with the strange device. What was that about a respirator?



This is, in fact, the same kind of relic the prospector back at the beginning of the game tried to sell to us. This is why we didn't buy it.

Nothing else here, so it's time to go back.







Heck, he can have the money. We have a much cooler partially digested ruby.





The Abyss is on the other side of the wreckage, but you'll notice the gang blocking our way. We'll try the other direction.



oh NO



Sigh.

He does owe us, so I guess we'll save his ass. Again.

: He owes me money. It will be harder to collect if he's dead.





: If Levir wanted to get paid first, he should have sent more men.





Time to chuck some bombs.











Got lucky with my critical strikes.











I swear to fucking god, Miltiades...





I'm going to regret this.

: Yes. Let's go.





: And what do you get out of it?



Fuck it.









It turns out a bunch of soft nobles are easy to kill.



2104 imperials? Maybe you're alright, Miltiades.

: You lied to me.







On that ominous note, it's back to the arena to face Sarpedon.



I don't like Sarpedon. He's a spear user, for one. He'll try to cripple you and bypass your armor with torso strikes, so be prepared for that. He'll also start the fight by throwing a pilum at you, which, remember, can bypass armor as well. Add in the fact he's got a tower shield and Sarpedon is an all-around dick.





He goes down after three tries.

Death Count: 27





Later. I need to lick my wounds.



It's time to snoop around Darius's tomb and find his special helmet.







They seem friendly enough.

: Would you mind if I take a look?





Doesn't look like there's anything left.



Shit. I don't like the idea of telling Gaelius the helmet is under a ton of rock.





FINE I won't touch your stuff

On the way back to the entrance...



There's a variety of options, but the simplest one is to ask the raiders for help.





What a gentleman!



Jackpot.









Let's grab this thing and get out.



...

: The gold is in these two chests.



Let's end this.









Slightly disconcerting. We're not returning to Maadoran just yet.



We also pick up Darius's armor, arguably one of the best sets.



I'll admit, I expected something fancier.



We loot their stash before heading out. I upgraded the lore skill, so I made a trip back to Saross to see if those weird tablets could be translated.



Dire warnings. Goody.

Next Time: A startling discovery