Part 5: Ballroom Blitz

Featured in this chapter: murder, depression, classism, violence, skullduggery, abandonment issues, more murder, and Kevin Bacon.

Not featured in this chapter: kick-ass guitar solos.


CUTSCENE: The Wine Delivery
CUTSCENE MUSIC: “Watching the Permenance Band” (Disc 1, Track 9)

We return to the action in the midst of the ‘circus’. The ‘Marcus Revellers’ are putting on a show for the crowds outside the castle.


And for the most part, they seem to be enjoying it. Then again, these people would probably have this reaction to a public beheading. Also note the impractical and just flat-out weird design of the portcullis in the background.

How does that even work?

Oh, hey, there’s our ‘heroes’ too.


Yulie seems enthralled with it, at the very least. Leonard and Orren? Not so much.

Yulie: Look! Something’s going on.
Leonard & Orren: Seen it.


Raus: Ooh! I just love festivities!
Orren: I seem to recall saying something about you not talking.


Leonard: “Wonders aplenty and sights unlike any”...


Leonard: Sorry folks, the castle delivery comes first.

Well at least he’s being responsible for a change. That’s something.


Yulie: Sonofa—


Wow, she is really disappointed by this whole ‘not getting to see the murder circus thing.’ Either that or she’s resigning herself to the fact that she just can’t get the hell away from Leonard, even for a moment.


The wine wagon finally saunters up to the castle gates, well into what I’m assuming is the next morning at this point.


I’m sure the guards are going to be very patient and—


Look at that face, you know exactly what their reaction is going to be. Look, even Orren can see how screwed they are. He’s not even bothering to fake a smile like Yulie at least is.

Leonard, meanwhile, is legitimately pleased as punch that he actually made it to the castle.

Again, we also see the wonky character rendering in effect. Orren is 6’1” and Leonard only comes up to his chin. Leonard is the same height as Yulie. All three of these characters are 18 years old (the Avatar can be any age you want, but for the sake of the LP, let’s just say Orren is about 18-20 because that was how I designed him to look.) You would think Leonard would be at least taller than a girl his own age, but nope.

This is where designing a tall Avatar has its disadvantages. At this point in the story where Orren is a semi-prominent ‘character’ (read: prop), he sticks out because he’s a frickin giant compared to Yulie and Leonard, yet from here on out the only reason you’re going to notice him in scenes at all is because he is so tall he actually appears over other characters’ shoulders enough to be visible.

Oh yeah, there’s story to be done…

Castleguardsman #1: Who are you then?


Leonard: Rapacci Wines, sir.

Here to guarantee Rapacci goes bankrupt by the end of the month by bad word-of-mouth.

Castleguardsman #1: I thought we ordered Domino’s?


Leonard: We’re here to deliver tonight’s wine.
Castleguardsman #1: Oh, the booze.


Castleguardsman #1: Alright, we’ve been expecting you.


Castleguardsman #1: …though you were supposed to be here hours ago.
Orren: Hah. Tell me about it…
Castleguardsman #2: Where the hell have you been? Merchants shouldn’t keep the castle waiting!
Orren: Yeah, nice dig at the working class there, champ. We can turn around and leave if you want.
Castleguardsman #1: Fantasy-Jesus, Garreth, calm down.
Castleguardsman #2: Hey! You know what they call a party without alcohol, Donnel? A crappy party.


Leonard tries to explain the situation in his own ‘special way’…

Leonard: Well, you see, we were attacked by a monster on the way to the warehouse and…
Orren: You dumbass, that’s not what happened. We ran into a troll on Balastor Plain and we kicked its ass. Probably took a minute to kill, tops. Go check, I’m pretty sure its corpse is still out there blocking the path to Parma. We were late because this goober—
Raus: Is that my cue?
Orren: Shut it! We were late because this goober drives his wagon like a snail runs a marathon.


Our angry bourgeoisie-bootlicking guardsman doesn’t care and yells at Leonard to do his job properly. Note: this guy is only a dick because he’s a snob, otherwise he’s 100% in the right to be pissed off at Leonard right now.

Castleguardsman #2: Stuff the excuses and get that wine inside, now!



Castleguardsman #2: Don’t make me shove this spear up your ass!


Yulie handles the situation with some rather uncharacteristic dignity and poise, however.

Yulie: Yes sir. We at Rapacci Wines look forward to serving you again!





And we’re walking…


Yulie: Humph. Jerks. Have a heart! Sure, I’ll serve them again. If it’s a boot in the face!

Ah, there’s the Yulie I know and love.


Hopefully the actual staff will be a little pleasanter to deal with.

Leonard: Good evening, ma’am. Here’s your wine order.
Castle Stewardess: Thank you, lad. This will do fine.




Leonard: Right. We’ll be off then…




"CUTSCENE MUSIC": “Quest Complete” (Unreleased Track)

Job’s done. Let’s go home.

























































Nah! I’m screwing with you. This is White Knight Chronicles…


We’ve got mountains of stupid ahead of us. Look at that face. Something stupid is brewing as we speak.



Leonard, being a nosy idiot, just wanders right up to the front gate of the castle and peeks his head in to try and get a glimpse of how the other 1% live.


Yulie: Woah! What are you doing?! You can’t go in there!


Leonard: What’s wrong with one quick peek?
Orren: If we’re lucky, detention and summary execution.
Yulie: That’s a little morbid.
Orren: And while you’re chewing me out, Leonard’s already snuck inside the castle.
Yulie: Oh, son of a WHORE! I’m gonna kill him!


Finally, however, something good happens. Stare long and hard at this image, folks. This is the last we see of Raus. Ever. Look at him standing there all confused and alone and comically tiny in the moonlight.

Good night, sweet prick. May flights of assholes sing thee to thy—you know what, you’re not even worth using a joke I stole from the goddamn Nostalgia Critic for on.

Just, go away…

Raus: Oh dear. Miss Yulie, Chief…
Raus: Angry tall foreign guy…


Raus: Ooh. What am I luggage?

Moments later, the wagon beast ate him.




CUTSCENE: The Royal Ball ~ Leonard Remembers
CUTSCENE MUSIC: “The Royal Dance” (Disc 1, Track 10)

Meanwhile, in the lap of luxury…

Leonard: Woah. Cool.
Orren: (Somewhat impressed.)
Yulie: Seriously though, why haven’t we been stopped by anyone yet?

I want to pause to examine this point for a moment. Valtos and the men serving under him are really bad at this whole ‘security’ thing.

In the brief time we’ve known them, they have let into their city a blatantly obvious mind-rapey old wizard, and an uncredentialed circus that no one has ever heard of before full of soldiers in disguise on nothing more than the word of some schmuck in a suit of armor that they wanted to perform for Cisna’s birthday celebration.

And now they have let three teenage commoners of unknown backgrounds and affiliations just walk right into the single biggest cultural and diplomatic event for Balandor as a nation in the last 50-some years. Sure, we know them from being stuck with them for the last two chapters, but nobody here does. They could be assassins for all anyone knows, here to murder King Valtos and Princess Cisna, or Archduke Dalam and any of the 5,000 Farians he’s brought with him in his entourage, or maybe they’re here to kill one of these nobles or just cause havoc in general. Maybe they’re aggrieved war victims so opposed to the idea of peace with Faria that they’re willing to kill someone—anyone—to prevent it from happening? Who knows?

It’s a plot contrivance. Leonard has to be inside the castle for Reasons, so we’ll just have him sneak in and not get caught or questioned by anyone. Yet it just goes to further cement Balandor as a generally idealistic Disney kingdom of good guys that’s steeped in naivety. I’m pretty sure this party at the castle is by invite only. There aren’t any other commoners here at this ball, only our three player characters, and I’m pretty sure “No, it’s cool, we’re the guys who brought your wine tonight” is not a valid enough excuse to give for why you’ve been found in the middle of a formal ball you’re not supposed to be at. Then again, it’s bad on the Castleguard for letting them get this far.

We are witnessing a total systematic failure to security on the part of the Kingdom of Balandor as personified at this moment by Leonard, Yulie, and Orren.

I’m going to be blunt here: Balandor deserves everything that is about to happen to it in the next twenty minutes.

The king who doesn’t know how do internal security doesn’t get to stay king for long.

Anyway…


Inside the grand ballroom, the orchestra is playing a waltz, the nobles are dancing…


And dancing…


And dancing…


And—JESUS! What is this, Final Fantasy VIII?




Pictured: A visual summation of the Avatar’s role in White Knight Chronicles I & II


Oh, hey, there’s the King.

King Valtos: I have to pee…

Fuck the King.


His gaze is caught by something. The smile that crosses his face suggests that Princes Cisna is making her grand entrance.


Princess Cisna is making her grand entrance. She’s flanked by two members of her elite Queensguard, women warriors trained in the art of killing and loyal to their monarch-in-waiting to the death. Here they are disguised as a pair of handmaidens.

The time of Cisna’s decapitation strike draws near…

Princess Cisna: (First thing’s first: I am melting down that stupid crown. My crown needs to be WAY more terrifying to look at.)


Pictured: The look of a man enraptured in fatherly love, and incapable of perceiving patricidal/regicidal intent.

(I am of course kidding about Cisna being a power-mad tyrant-in-waiting, but this joke is just too amusing to let go of—plus, Kari Walhgren has played some rather batshit crazy power-mad characters before in her career, so I’m technically within my rights here as LP Maestro.)


The nobles begin to catch sight of their future autocrat descending the staircase to stand by her father’s side.

The guy in centerframe looks like he just smelled a fart or something. Probably the lady in the yellow dress’s fart.


The princess presents herself to the gathering of the nation’s nobility.

Princess Cisna: (Drink it in, mortals. Week One: We celebrate the beginning of my reign. Week Two: We’re invading Greede. I’m gonna make the hippie guy my bitch, or something.)


The crowd stands in awe and horror before their new goddess.


Leonard: Hey… That’s her, the Princess!


Um, Leonard? There’s something wrong with your eyes. I think you might…


Oh, never mind. He just had a stroke.

LP’s over folks! Go home.

I’m nine-gear crow, and on behalf of Blind Sally, I’d just like to say thank you for suffering through White Knight Chronicles with me, and—












SONOFATITCRUSHINGMOTHERFUCKINGHORSEJERKING—



Oh.



The game continues.



Wonderful.


CUTSCENE MUSIC: “Recollection”

Leonard flashes back to his childhood at the sight of our fair Princess Cisna, Long May She Reign. Somehow, he’s at Balandor Castle, looking in the fountain at his reflection, and probably wondering how life is going for the upside-down kid inside the water.








I really don’t have anything snide to say about this part. I actually think it’s sweet and it does show that Rapacci’s actually a) got a soft side, and b) has been taking care of Leonard (and Yulie, for that matter) for quite some time.

I have no idea what Rapacci was doing at the castle, nor why he felt the need to bring Leonard along with him, however.

Actually, I do know why he had to bring Leonard along with him. The kid is 18, and he still needs adult supervision.


Kid Leonard: Can we get ice cream?
Rapacci: You’ll get nothing and like it.


At the exact same time, young Princess Cisna comes along, flanked again by her Queensguard, I mean handmaidens.


I seriously feel like Zelda’s Lullaby should be playing right now. We’ve got a pair of kids, a royal and a commoner, in a castle garden, doing (or about to do) things they’re not supposed to. There’s a potentially violent guy with green skin in the periphery, and a handmaiden (two, actually) lurking about. I’m getting Ocarina of Time flashbacks like nobody’s business.




Cisna catches sight of Leonard. Seriously, I think she’s about to send him off to go meet with the Gorons on Death Mountain.


A look of utter confusion. Par for the course for Leonard.

Also, I love how he’s wearing essentially a child-sized version of his present-day wardrobe. It’s like it grew with him or something.

Also something to point out: If you equip different armours, the characters’ appearances change to reflect what they’re equipped with, and that carries over to all the live-rendered cutscenes. I’d like to imagine if you had some type of armour set on Leonard right now, he’d be wearing a child-sized version of that armour in this flashback. But alas, no one at Level-5 was either that creative, or that funny.


Kid Cisna: Yay! New vassals!


Kid Cisna: Come here! I want to you go kill a dragon for me!
Handmaiden: Oh gods! Hurry! Stop her!

But alas, they just kind of give up the chase as soon as she gets out the door because it’s not actually their job to keep the sole heir to the throne of Balandor out of danger or anything.

Eh, they don’t tell the King and Queen shit anyway, so why start now.


Kid Cisna: What’s your name? Never mind, I’m going to call you Melvin. Melvin-2, actually. Melvin-1 kind of died… when I had him thrown in the Iron Maiden.
Kid Leonard: I want my Mommy!


Cisna laughs playfully.


Oh god! She’s going in for the kill!


Oh, never mind. She’s just reaching for a butterfly. To kill it.

King Silas: Did I ever tell you the story about when I became King? I was standing in a meadow, and that’s when they came. I felt a shadow above me. I looked up and saw a great swarm of butterflies. And they circled around me, like leaves in a storm. Floating. Soft. Landing upon my head like a crown—a living crown! God’s signal… to begin!

Seriously, go watch Kings. It’s up on Netflix and Hulu and it was a beautiful poetic series that NBC didn’t know what to do with so they murdered it.

Go watch it. Ian McShane will thank you for it. (Probably not, but it’s the thought that counts—and it’s still infinitely better than White Knight Chronicles).


The butterfly takes off to the sky and towards freedom, leaving Leonard and Cisna alone in their now-ruined moment.


Kid Leonard: Well that was kind of—
Kid Cisna: Bored now. Bye.



Cut to white, aaaaaaand…


We’re back to the present.

And there’s your setup for this game’s non-love story: Leonard met Cisna 10 years ago for about five seconds and fell in love-from-afar with her, while in those five seconds she was more infatuated with a butterfly than him.

This one moment of misread intent is going to be the genesis of so much pain and frustration for everyone involved in this story in short order.

This game has the biggest case of “She’s Just Not That Into You” male/female chemistry since the 2008 Prince of Persia reboot (where the female ‘romantic’ lead also happened to be voiced by Kari Walhgren ).

Because Leonard is an impulsive idiot.


Yulie comes right out of nowhere and dogpiles on Leonard, knocking his dumb ass to the ground. Almost, at least.

Leonard: Woah!
Yulie: Heh heh. Leonard. What are you doing?


She looks up to see what held the boy’s gaze so attentively.


And she no-likeee. A new challenger appears!

Yulie: Hrmm. It’s rude to stare at royalty, you know.
Orren: How about jumping on other people’s backs for no good reason?
Yulie: I punched out three barons just getting over here, you want some too?
Orren: …Maybe?
Yulie: Ew.


CUTSCENE: It's Showtime!
CUTSCENE MUSIC: “Watching the Permenance Band” (Disc 1, Track 9)

Let’s see what’s going on outside, shall we?


Again, these guys are up to no good, but my god if they aren’t talented sons of guns.


They’ve even got fire-jugglers!


And their beasts do tricks too!


They’ve even got a midget act—oh wait, it’s just Belcitane.

Someone Who Is Definitely NOT Belcitane: Heh heh heh.


Snidely Whiplash, ladies and gentlemen. This is a man confident enough in his character alignment to twirl his mustache with gusto. You see what I mean about why I love Belcitane? The man enjoys the fuck out of being an evil prick.

Someone Who Is Definitely NOT Belcitane: Chaotic Evil For Life.
Crowd: Bring back that hot dancing chick!


Someone Who Is Definitely NOT Belcitane: Time to blow them away.


Someone Who Is Definitely NOT Belcitane: See how subtle I’m being?
Someone Who Is Definitely NOT Belcitane: Enough of this charade!


This circus has everything. Acrobats, jugglers, fire-dancers, trained beasts, and a quick-change artist. Don’t believe me?


Belcitane throws his maestro’s robe and top hat into the air, aaaand…


He’s changed into his normal attire before they even hit the ground.


Someone Who Definitely IS Belcitane: It’s showtime!


Hot DAMN! …I don’t think that was supposed to happen, actually. I think Belcy’s had a pyrotechnics malfunction and just blew his ass straight to hell.

(Actually you can see him jump off the barge before it goes up in the video)


CUTSCENE MUSIC: “A Worthy Opponent Draws Near”

The explosion sends debris flying in all direction and smoke fills the town square.


The peasantry begin to panic, sensing this might not have been a part of the show…




Crowd: Are we getting an encore, or what?


A giant flame-spewing monster with a weird helmet-like contraption and a giant cannon on its back lumbers out of the wreckage of the parade barge.

How they managed to keep this thing concealed, I don’t know, but I’m kind of impressed. Then again, like I just finished ranting about, Balandor security is kind of wonting.


The beast begins to lumber forward, towards the castle.










RUN AWAY!


RUN AWAY!






The side panels on the other wagons burst open and soldiers and black armour come pouring out.


They start dispersing through the crowd, killing anyone in their path.


This dirty bastard just left his wife and kids to die. He’s looking back one last time as they scream for him before they’re crushed to death before the giant walking tankbeast.


As Pansyass runs away from the slaughter, our old friend the hooded man makes his return, slowly shuffling toward the chaos, dragging his giant wrapped Im100%positiveitsnotaswordoranything.


Hooded Man: What’s this?
Hooded Man: No, seriously. I’ve just been wandering around town this whole time. C.C.! Niles! What the hell is going on here?


A soldier spots him and readies to attack.


Come on, Maxwell, show us some more cool wizard crap.




Well, I guess that’s kind of magic. I mean, you did just break the laws of spatial reality to whip that robe off, but okay. And for your next trick?

I love how the hood maintains its exact form as it flies off of him. It’s almost like they didn’t care to animate in any way resembling how a piece of normal clothing would react in this scene because, well, they just didn’t care.

Also, oh hey, it’s that guy from the 2006 Tokyo Game Show con-job trailer.

‘Sup, man?





Hey, a sword is not magic, asshole!


The unidentified soldier collapses at dead at his feet. Still, one-hit kill. That’s something, right?


Shit.


Just.


Got.


REAL.


Mysterious Man: So they’ve found it, too.

Um, question! Who are they, and what have they found?


Or you can just run off towards the castle. Eh, whatever, something tells me we’re gonna need a little more badass real soon.




Meanwhile, back with Unwitting Victims Anonymous.

CUTSCENE: The Attack on Balandor Castle

King Valtos: My noble friends. I thank you all for coming here to celebrate this special day with my daughter.

King Valtos: I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.


King Valtos: How proud the late Queen would be. It has been ten years since my beloved wife was lost to me.
Noble Crowd: We know…
Sarvain: Oh, get over it already.


King Valtos: Now where was I? Oh yes… FLORAAAAAAAINE!


Cisna: (Don’t worry, you’ll see here again real soon, father.)
King Valtos: Today, the daughter the she gave me, my dearest Cisna, celebrates her eighteenth birthday.
King Valtos: And to my continued surprise, she is somehow not married yet. Do I have any volunteers from the crowd, while we’re at it? Anyone? Moving on…


Sarvain: (I don’t know what’s worse, having to sit through this speech again, or the fact that I have to piss like a racehor—)
King Valtos: The kindness you have shown her has made this day possible.
King Valtos: I mean it, thank you for not pointing and laughing at her every time you see her. I mean, so what if she’s mute, mutes have done some great things in the past. Why, I’ve been told that one of the merchants who supplied today’s wine was a mute boy.
Orren: WHY DOES EVERYONE THINK I CAN’T TALK?!


King Valtos: For that you have my deepest gratitude. Please enjoy tonight’s festivities.


King Valtos: Glory to Balandor!


Noble Crowd: Glory to…
Noble Crowd: What’s this place called again? Oh yeah!


Noble Crowd: Balandor!

No, seriously, in the video there is like a two second pause where it sounds like they need a moment to remember where the hell they are.

And like half the people here are wearing the same dresses and suits. I don’t know if there’s a fantasy anime equivalent to Joan Rivers in this world, but she’s probably died of a stroke by now. [2015 crow: ...oddly prescient on my part, I know .]

…Or was killed by the evil circus army. Pick your poison.


CUTSCENE MUSIC: “The Royal Dance”)

And the peasants nobles rejoiced.


Back to more dancing. Oh joy.




King Valtos: Ha ha hah.


Cisna: (Okay, enough already, after this waltz, I give the signal and its showtime.)


Leonard: That’s weird.

Yeah, you haven’t been kicked out or thrown in the dungeon yet or anything.

I just can’t get over it. Seriously.


Leonard: Doesn’t she look kind of sad to you?


Yulie: You think so?


Yulie: Well, you know… They say she hasn’t spoken for ten whole years. Not since the Queen was killed. You know, when Faria attacked the castle.
King Valtos: FLORAAAAAAINE!
Yulie: He seriously needs to get over that.


Leonard: Cisna saw that?

Bitch, Cisna probably planned that.


The doors suddenly burst wide open. Because, let’s face it, anyone can just wander into the middle of this event at this point now that Leonard, Yulie, and Orren have successfully infiltrated it.


A lone soldier staggers through a side door and the music quickly dies down to silence.


Okay, this is a pretty cool shot, this first-person POV of a wounded, winded soldier stumbling through a crowd of apathetic nobility, miffed that he’s interrupted their dancing.


Again, it’s more of these brief touches of artistry present in the game. They’re fleeting, but you appreciate them all the more when they actually do show up.

Also, in the video you can just barely pick out how everyone immediately parts way for the guard to stagger through, yet there’s one or two really oblivious nobles near the back who just keep on dancing. Again, nice touch.




Soldier: Must. Make. Entrance. More. Blatant.


He collapses before the throne.

Soldier: Urgh! Your Grace! A message!
King Valtos: From Batman?

Dickbutt jokes, getcha Dickbutt jokes!


King Valtos: This is a celebration! What the devil is it?

I love how a guard comes bursting into the room in an utter panic, and Valtos is pissed off that he’s interrupting his party.


Soldier: The town! A terrible monster has attacked, killing…!


King Valtos: A monster?!
King Valtos: We’re not insured for that!


CUTSCENE MUSIC: “Attack” (Disc 1, Track 11)

Well, ask and you shall receive. The front end of the castle bursts open and the giant beast charges in.


Yeah, watch out for that one.






Knock knock.


I just love the design of this thing. It’s been hidden in shadows and smoke for the most part, but we’re gonna get some better angles of it real soon. It’s basically like a cross between a Balrog and a tank.


And it’s about to ruin some highborn asses.




See what I mean about these boss subtitles? We don’t even get to fight this thing for like another half an hour, in-game time.


The enemy soldiers come pouring into the castle through the giant gaping hole Pyredaemos just burst through the front wall.

“Tank wins every time,” – Troy Baker, Saints Row the Third


Kill ‘em all!


King Valtos: What’s this?

Wrong reaction to be having there, buddy.


Cyrus: Oh, shit, I’m in the scene.


Cisna: (Okay, who jumped the gun—Wait, these aren’t my soldiers. WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING?)


Leonard and Yulie hear faint rumblings of the commotion, even though it’s taking place like two hundred feet away from them.

Seriously, we get to walk around the throne room for reals in White Knight Chronicles II¸ and once you know the actual layout of this place, this scene just get even more ridiculous based on the camera trickery and plot contrivances they use to make everything work.




Anyway, Leonard nearly gets knocked out by Oancitizen here in a mad rush to escape.




Leonard: Hey, what the…?!


He rushes off to go see what’s happening. Yulie, meanwhile, holds on to that cake slice like a champ. She isn’t letting something as small as an unprovoked act of terrorism against the crown come between her and her sorbet.

Yulie: Huh? What’s going on?






Again, more cool cinematography, and our first clear shot of Pyredaemos, too.

Leonard: No way… A monster?!


Leonard: How did that get inside the castle?!

Leonard clearly missed the giant gaping hole in the front wall directly behind Pyredaemos.

Leonard is dumb.


Cyrus: Don’t let them any closer to the King!


Cyrus: Attack!
Castleguard: RAAAAAAAH!

Time for an action scene!








“And in the script it just says ‘they fight’. It saves a lot of time that way…” – George Lucas








Again, credit where it’s due, Level-5 mo-capped the hell out of this scene. It’s about the only scene they did to any actual motion capture work on. Or at least the only one where it really shows through in the animation.




Cyrus sweeps into the fray.






Cyrus: Out of the way, bitch. I’m Nolan North!






















I apologize for the number of screenshots without captions. This is, I’m fairly certain, the only big close-quarters combat scene in the duology, and for what it’s worth, it’s choreographed rather well. So I’m indulging the game. It wants to show off, so I’m going to let it. Because it won’t for the most part, from here out.




[WILHELM SCREAM]






Cyrus: Troy Baker ain’t got SHIT on me!


Cyrus: …Also, King Kong.


I just like this screenshot because, again, it’s emblematic of the moments of subtle artistic talent hidden in this game. In the midst of this giant, badass, anime-style one-man-army beatdown, Cyrus’s sword gets stuck in this guy’s torso, and he has to yank on it a little bit to dislodge it, throwing him off balance. It’s nice little touch, and something I only noticed when doing the prep work for the LP, because it goes by so fast otherwise.





Cyrus: Not today mother—


Cyrus: FUCKER!




So yeah, Cyrus is pretty badass. I can’t wait for him to join the party and be all sorts of awes—

Why is the game laughing at me?


Cyrus: No! Stand your ground! Your King and castle need you!

Why are you saying that to me? I’m not a part of this.