Part 16: Glimmering Emblem

Update 16: All that glimmers is not gella...

MUSIC - Migratory Birds--Wandering Bird-Scoundrels

Our defeat in the Sand Canal has brought us out the other side a little worse for wear. While we're at full health, our VIT is all gone, which means no more after-battle healing.



But Little Rock is nearby, just in the shadow of those cliffs ahead of us, right? What's the problem?

Well, on the way we might meet these things.



These little things are deceptively dangerous!



Their "insect breath" attack might not sound like much, but it reduces a character's HP to 1. Coupled with your complete lack of VIT this can make for very hard times as you try to find Little Rock. The sole consolation is these things have an ice weakness and are even slower than Doc, so killing them before they attack is plausible.



Cursed Corpses also appear in this area - nowhere near as bad, but they can hit hard and have a paralysis attack.

If you can, battles in this area really are better off skipped.



Little Rock is just by these cliffs.



MUSIC - Scenery Called Everyday

A once thriving mining town, this place has seen better days but still retains a sense of relative peace and unity, unlike Little Twister. This is the place where Pike Namingway lived, and Billy's intro occurred near here.

Oh, I've heard about you! You're friends with Namingway, right? Any friend of his is a friend of mine. You're always welcome here.

Friends is maybe pushing it, but good to know.

This town got started when they found a gem the size of a kid's fist. That's where we got our name. After that, we were known as a prosperous mining town. But that was a long time ago...



There are plenty of small caves around town, which have a few useful items if you want to search. Rummaging about I found a Dragon Fossil, a Heal Berry, a Duplicator and a Name Tag.

Hmm... Barrels of wine... I'd hate to be the one who has to lug these all the way to the saloon.



There's also an ARMsmith in another cave. I took this opportunity to upgrade Doc and Billy's ARMs a little bit. Doc took a shot and crit upgrade, (now 3 SHT, 2 BLT and 3 CRT) and Billy got a shot upgrade. (Now 1 SHT, 1 HIT and 1 CRT)

They said the jewels they used to mine here were formed from the guardians' energy through the leylines nearby. Even when I was a kid, they used to mine gems like that... Once in a while.



There's a small surprise in the saloon - Martina, the little runaway from Claiborne, is still yet to be eaten by a monster.

I finally reach this place, and my mother has already moved on... But I'm happy. I'm happy I know she's all right. And I have the strength to go on.

Behind the bar...

Welcome to the Rolling Stone. We provide evenings filled with beautiful music.

Stay
Listen
Chat

Oh, Mileux? Yeah, she's quite a fox. If Gaspar had a partner as cute as her, then I bet he'd work twenty times harder.
When I let Von take over this place, I did a little remodelin'. We closed the shop for that, but Mileux said she wanted to pay back the loan as soon as possible. So, I found her a job at a saloon owned by a friend of mine. Never thought I'd get to meet her daughter...

So I guess Mileux is the name of Martina's mother then? Either way, she's not here, so the small child shall be forced to wander the desert some more because Gaspar doesn't tell her who and where the friend is. Ass.
You can choose to listen to Von's music if you wish. This just takes the form of a sound test.



It's limited to the music we've already heard so far, so no listening to the final boss themes just yet.

So, you're the kid who saved Namingway, huh? I've <<heard>> about you.
<<Heard>>
He said a lot about his memories of you as he packed his things. I won't bore you with the details. But, man... I wouldn't be caught dead saying the things he does.

On that, we have agreement.

This is a great time to rest, considering our low VIT. In the room where we sleep we'll have a chance to spy on someone's diary.


Strangely over-optimistic, considering the oceans have been brown sand for as long as living memory lasts.

Enough socialising. There's a guardian shrine around here somewhere. Anyone know anything?

As run-down as this town is, the shrine to the north is even worse off. I'm not sure which got run-down first, and quite frankly, I don't care. We have to do something about our town, even if it' something little. I consider that my job.

Bingo.

The ride north to the shrine - Glimmering Emblem - is reasonably short. Just head north and then a little north-west until we're above Little Rock on the map.

MUSIC - This Chest, and Echoes of the World's Heartbeat



Well...? Do you sense anything?
No, not I... I do not feel the sense of discomfort brought on by Janus, or the sense of exhaustion when the guardian energy is depleted.
Maybe we're the first ones here?
No, I don't think so...
You sensed something?



No, no... I don't sense anything... That's the problem... The sensation we're supposed to feel when the guardian's life force energy flows...
You mean to say they have already done their deed here?
I dunno... I hope not...
Let's go. We have to find out what happened here.

This dungeon is all about symmetry. There are three exits from the first room - left, right and centre. Taking the centre one...



brings us to a room with a pair of what are either Chupa Chups or arcade sticks. Honestly, "magic crystal" would not be my first assumption. The sign in the middle says...



A dead end for now. We'll backtrack and try out some of the other routes - left first.



The switch in the middle opens the door.



Easy as using the Steady Doll to move one block, and having Billy hit it with the boomerang.



The next room is also simplistic, though it acts as practice for a new mechanic. We need to build a path along the back of this room by dragging these blocks into place. The odd thing is, each block is linked to another - pulling one left moves the other right.
In this case both sides of the room are symmetrical, but that won't be the case later.



This brings us out on a higher level of the central room. There's a treasure chest with three Gella Cards behind us.
From here, we can use Boone's Freezer Doll...



... to clean the window and let light shine on the gem.
What, you've not heard of freeze-cleaning before? It's remarkably effective... apparently.

Now we jump down, head back to the junction and take the right hand route.

MUSIC - Whirlwind Blowing Against Death (plays when ambushed by enemies)



On our way through we're encountering a lot of these guys. They're faster than Billy, pump out Light element spells frequently, and while they do have a Dark elemental weakness we don't have a source of dark damage.
But on the plus side, they have so little HP that almost anything can kill them in one hit. Not a terrible opportunity to farm for gems.



They also have a skip-turn move, but the meaning of that move name is completely lost on me.



Gobs return too! They're still real easy, with inaccurate moves and not much health, but they do more damage and have a new and cruel trick.



"Go Gob-to-Gob!" sets the target's HP to the same as the Hobgob's current HP. Since a Hobgobs max HP is 160, this can do a ton of damage if it hits.



Ha ha!

On the other route, the first room drops 4200 Gella in our laps and the second is one of the better puzzle types in this dungeon.



Two sets of torches on either side of a pane of glass. Light them in the "reflected" pattern to unlock the door.
But the door is on the other side of the glass? How do you get to it?



Yeah, bombs'll work.



The next room drops some free stuff in our laps too - two Heal Berries and a Mini Carrot.



And that's path two. Both gems are lit, and the door grinds open. Beyond...



... a central chamber with three exits. Heading down the central path brings us to a dead end.
Yeah, we gotta do it again.

We get to grab a pair of Lucky Cards on the way to the left path.



Remember the room with the linked blocks? This is the same. There are two pits, and we need to build bridges over them.



First, arrange blocks and cross over to the middle section.



We only need two blocks to cross over to the other side, but the door is still locked and the button to open it is in the first pit, not the second.



But since the blocks are linked, we can move the one in the second pit into the right place and the block on the other side will hit the switch.



We've seen this sort of thing earlier, but the bricks are in the wrong place now.



But we can use the Steady Doll to knock the blocks down to ground level and both get the treasure (a Growth Egg, given to Pearl) and cross over to the exit.



Hitting a switch in the next room lowers a wall in the central chamber. Three down, one to go.
Back to the right-hand path.



This one may not be obvious at first, as the block on the high platform is a bit tucked away, but this is another pair of linked blocks.



Man this is a lot of block puzzles.



This looks like a repeat of the reflection room, but merely lighting the torches is not enough to proceed here.



Instead you need to prematurely break the glass and head up to the back of the room, where you can see a block pattern.



Mirroring the pattern with these crates will let you proceed.



The game gifts us a Duplicator and a Gimel Coin and lets us through to lower the other wall. Boss time!



MUSIC - Soaked Through With Fear

It appears we are too late... Everything is in shambles.
Why would they do this? What do those people plan to do with the guardian energy? What do they mean by transforming the planet!?
Don't worry...There must be something we can do.



Boone reaches out his hand, and blobs of green energy are gathered there. Well, I guess taking what little that remains of the guardian's power for ourselves is a start.
This gets us the Flash Hit medium, a medium themed around the Light.

Arcana
Spectre - Light elemental damage VS one enemy.
Clearance - removes all status ailments from one ally. This means things like Poison and Paralysis, not things like Decelerate and Fragile.
Reflect - All arcana attacks on the target will bounce back at the caster.
Valiant - Increases ATT based on how much HP the character has lost.

Personal Skills
Light Ward - Reduces or nullifies light damage.
SOS Invisible - At low health, turns user invisible. Enemies won't be able to target them.
Initiative - Increases the chances of getting a first attack on an enemy.

I gave this Medium to Pearl.

This guardian must have mustered its last strength and left this medium for us. The situation might be bad, but... the guardian wanted us to have this. We gotta do something.



MUSIC - Blood, Tears, and the Dried-Up Wasteland

An alarm appears to go off somewhere, and the room starts flashing various colours.

Looks like there's another surprise in store for us.
What, to keep us company? Gimme a break...

BOSS BATTLE: MONO-EYE TITAN



Now that's one ugly...

This is fairly straightforward. He's weak to light damage, you just got light damage, use light damage.
Unlike most bosses he has a weakness to Grav, but at only a 25% chance of success I'd say it's not worth your time trying.



It's hard to get a good screenshot of Spectra, but I like it in motion. Lots of fast lasers and flashy impacts.



His physical attack is a full-on flying headbutt. He also has a Dark arcana attack, Dark Matter.



The victim is encased in a sphere of dark matter and cooked until it's jusssst right. Overall it's about as damaging as his headbutt though.



All you need to do is pile on the damage here though, and he'll fall. We get a Dark Ring for our troubles. The main use for this is equipping on a medium to teach it the Dark Ward PS, but Pearl can also Mystic it to make one ally do Dark Elemental damage with their ARM. Good in a pinch I think, but it consumes the ring.

In the next room, we find something we've seen before elsewhere.



What's this big thingamajig? I've seen it before.
It's a stigma of Filgaia.
Could this be the control device called the [chock]!?



Hey, not bad! You really are an archeologist.
A stigma? And what's a chock?
It's kinda like a symbol of sin - the sin committed by mankind.
A long time ago, humans used the guardian energy to stop the world from decaying. This lost prehistoric culture viewed the guardians as living bio-plants and sealed them in rural locales of the world. The world is feeding off this guardian life force... and continues to survive.



No, that can't be true...
Those bio-plants of the time, exist today as guardian shrines. And we the people of Baskar are the descendants of the plant protectors.
However, even with the power of the guardian shrines, we were unable to stop the world from decaying. We all know that much too well.
'The power that sustains the world'...These words directly signify the existence of guardians. The guardians help maintain world balance, while acting as a [pillar], preserving the planet itself.



This thing is like the original sin we continue to carry on our backs...
Living on this planet means carrying a burden of sin... I know it sounds crazy, but... that just gives us more reason to live. We can't let the guardian's support go to waste.
Yes, I know... That's why we have to protect the guardians...
Yeah, I hear ya... It's gotta be us. It's gotta be...

And on that bombshell, the drifters return to the previous hall. The alarm immediately goes off again...



What now!?
I believe they are trying to buy some more time.
Well, we don't have the time to adjust to their schedule!

BOSS - HECTO-EYE TITAN



He's back! One one hand, this is a retread. On the other hand we need to completely change our tactics.



For a start, he can now use Dark Matter against the whole party, and he'll use the single-target version to counterattack all ARM damage too, making it much more difficult to build FP without taking loads of damage.

He's also lost his Light weakness, and gained a Dark one. And we have no easy source of Dark damage. We COULD Mystic that Dark Ring onto Doc and have him attack, but I consider that wasteful. There's a much more elegant and fun solution to the problem.

He's a source of dark damage. Cast reflect on an ally. Counter his counterattack.



With Reflect on them, Billy and Doc can safely shoot the boss and provoke his counterattack, reflecting it back at him.



With Boone having already cast Feeble Mind on him, he's doing much more damage to himself then we are to him. This is also making us safer when he attacks - two characters are reflecting, one has Dark Ward, and Pearl has high enough FP to mitigate the damage. I could have made all of them nigh-invulnerable if I'd given her that Dark Ring.



This guy is meant to be harder than the previous version, but with the right tactic he's a joke. He died too quickly, I didn't have a chance to Mystic a Lucky Card for bonus XP. Ah well.

Here's a video of the latter Eye Titan battle, if you wish to see it kill itself.

VIDEO - Hecto-Eye Titan

What does this have to do with transforming Filgaia!?
Are we strong enough to carry this burden...?

You beat that guy in three turns, so yes, yes you are.

Meanwhile...

It's technononsense time!

MUSIC - A Needle in the Heart, Broken and Washed Away



Program Heart possession complete. Current sequence stability at 168h/f Mark and rising. Continuing to monitor measurement. Gemini circuit function normal. Recording peripheral phenomenon. Stand by for analogism expansion auto-level OS. Camouflage at 95% completion. Shifting limiter level green to yellow. 318s/f until energy cycle defaults to 70.



Everything is clear. Codename: [Divine Fortress], ready on command.
The fortress created by the gods... The legacy of wisdom will finally take shape and activate. One of our goals is achieved. Come before us, Divine Fortress. Asgard shall be your given name, and you are to shield us as our aegis! The Golem Asgard, created from the wisdom of Hyades... The hidden sparkle in your arm shall become a barrier, capable of withstanding mighty force. Your enemy shall be everyone who stands in our way. Crush all enemies to pieces! Now, come before us!

God these guys love their dramatic speeches.



Melody and an extremely tall newcomer teleport into the room. Janus does not seem impressed. He raps the thing on its chest.

Huh? This piece of junk? Can this thing really fight?
It's been programmed for tactical mode. All related options are in place. See to it that Asgard regards this place as a battleground.



Like all right-thinking creatures, Asgard immediately attempts to beat the shit out of Janus Cascade.

Wh-What the...!?



A contra-annihilation barrier. Asgard's main arm -- hence the name, Divine Fortress.



That's not what I wanted to know! Why is this clunker attacking me all of a sudden? Can't it distinguish who the enemy is?
It's still fresh, so its behavioral parameters may still be a little unstable. It needs more work.

Unstable nothing, this guy knows what's what.

He drops the barrier anyway.

Tch... Looks like we got off on the wrong foot. Me and him don't seem to get along. Sorry, but I'll pass on the workshop class... Later!

Janus leaves, apparently not realising he may have just been replaced.

So it's the Auto-Defender System we need to work on...
Yes... It's been programmed to attack those with a certain level of fighting spirit at its own discretion.
This will be of great use to us. How marvelous...
There are two types of people in this world. Those who use, and those who are used. Janus Cascade... Which might you be? And us?
Heh heh heh heh heh...

I do not think "heh heh heh" is a powerful enough laugh for that avatar. It's more of a "bwa ha ha ha ha!"

OK, I confess I misremembered at the end of the last update. Next time we go back to the start for Billy, and crack the worst security ever.

But meanwhile...

Today is October 8, Dragon Day. A dragon's mouth smells like sulphur because it breathes fire. Once, and old lady mistook the smell for a hot spring, and dove into the dragon's mouth. Luckily for her, the dragon had a kind heart. He gave her warmth with his breath and let her go unharmed. How's that for a dragon heart?

Today is October 9, Mountain Day. There once was a master dowsing rodder who could strike water and dig wells. One day, he left for the mountains to hit the big one. True to his words, he found his prize. He struck an underground magma flow, activating a volcano that later became a grand mountain range.

Today is October 10, Chocolate Day. Chocolate is a cute sounding name for food. It whets my appetite just by the ring of it. Thank god it wasn't named choanoflagellate or something. Look the name up in an encyclopedia. You're not gonna like what you see.

Today is October 11, Cool Day. If you can declare yourself cool with a straight face at the movie theater, you'll get a discount today. Try it. It's harder than you think.

Today is October 13, Build Your Own Shelf Day. I went to my local home furnishings store and bought a shelf kit. The only instructions on the box said, 'Assemble yourshelf.'