Xenogears Part #126 - Episode CXXIII: The Awakening

Part 126: Episode CXXIII: The Awakening

Episode CXXIII: The Awakening

Music: Omen

Wow. Elhaym has put on some weight in the last half-month...

Oh... Or she’s just crucified in front of the giant...thing... That makes a bit more sense. Carry on.

”Why did you go raiding Miang’s closet...?”
“The defunct Gebler uniform was getting a bit passé, don’t you think?”
“It was that way like two months ago.”

"I would have liked to have been able to commend you for making it here... But your efforts were all in vain. The resurrection of -Deus- is imminent. Sacrificing this girl will bring about the awakening of 'god'."

"What are you talking about!? Why does Elly have to be sacrificed!?"

”And Deus... Didn’t we already kill that thing?”
“It got better! As for the rest...”

"There's no need for you to know. For all of you, it will all end here..."

Did somebody order a giant fuck-off snake Gear?

Meet Opiomorph, Miang’s Omnigear. Well, technically we already met it. Remember the gigantic Gear back in Krelian's Lab on Solaris? This is it. This thing can be kind of tricky if you don’t know what you are doing. Doubly so considering if you lose here, you get knocked back before the previous Ramsus fight and need to do that battle, and the eight minutes of cutscenes surrounding it, all over again. But in ye olden days before skipping cutscenes was an option. Not a fun prospect by any stretch of the imagination.

You may notice Xenogears has pulled the dick move of not letting us heal between major boss battles. So our party is a tad bit in sorry shape to begin with. But don’t fret. No need to even turn on Boosters yet.

Our first order of business in this battle is to heal everybody up with some Frame HP abilities. I like to have everyone at over 10,000 HP. 8,000 HP should be the bare minimum. So one Fix Frame HP for everyone should do the trick. No rush here really. The biggest mistake in this fight is to immediately go on the offensive like...well...most every other boss battle in the entire game.

Opiomorph has only one solitary attack: Wave #4. Unlike Amphysvena’s Wave #3, which knocked everyone to a single hit point, Wave #4 is tied to Opiomorph’s current Ether attack level. But Miang’s Omnigear is a gimmicky boss. Every time it is attacked, its Defense and Ether Attack levels increases by a multiple of however many times its been attacked. But the thing is, that multiple starts at 0.

So, as long as we don’t attack Opiomorph at the beginning of the fight, it does absolutely no damage. Ever. So we’ve given sufficient patience, we’ve got literally all the time in world to heal up, charge up Fuel supplies, all the while Miang just wastes turns unleashing an attack that does 0 damage. Kind of a handy trick.

Anyhow, when we do decide to go on the offensive, we want to do it in a specific manner. Miang’s Ether Attack (which Wave #4 is) and Defense raises with each attack against her. But, Wave #4 resets that counter. She’ll use her signature attack every three turns or so for all members of our party. Give or take a couple. So what we want to do is to just use some light attacks with Billy and Bart to build ‘em up to Attack Level 3. At that point, everyone can just start Charging and hoping for Hyper Mode to kick in. Fei can sit out for a while.

Given sufficient Ether protection like I send we ought to have, this will cause Opiomorph to only do around 4000-5000 HP of damage. This will knock everyone’s health down fairly low. But at the same time, the chance of Hyper Mode triggering gets upped and Opiomorph’s defenses are down.

At this point, Weltall-2 ought to flip on System Id and go to town. If we’ve got at least one other character in Hyper Mode then we’re golden. Opiomorph only has 25000 HP and five rounds of Attack Level Infinite deathblows is more than enough to take her down before she does another Wave #4. Anyone that doesn’t have Hypermode can chip in with Level 3 Deathblows. All out attack!

And there we go. One beaten smug sidekick lady and her snake giant robot.

After the battle... Opiomorph springs right back up.

“You think you can beat me this time?"

"What the...!? I thought I defeated you...!?"

"Unless you can decompose her atomic structure, you don't stand much of a chance. Normal attacks are futile against one who has the ability to regenerate using nanomachines."

”But the narration script said we beat a bunch of nanomachine generating enemies to even get in here!”
“What a shame.”

The rest of this scene likes to blip into seizure inducing flashes and loud uncomfortable buzzing noises. Deus has a really annoying alarm clock.

“M, my body... It feels like it’s bein’ torn apart!!”

"Argh...!? I'm getting torn apart!?"

”Argh! My stomach feels almost as bad as when I found out where Solaris meat comes from...”
*vomits all over cockpit* “Not helping!”

"That thing... That thing is trying... to eat us all!?"

"Damn, what's going on!? Huh!? Hey... Is that...!?"

“Is that... our Anima Relics!?"

"Is it trying to detach the Anima Relics from our Omnigears!?"

”Hey! No takey-backsies!”

The ~~poorly animated Omnigear sprites~~ Anima Relics proceed to no-clip into the giant err...mummy dome...?

"What's going on? My Omnigear... It's not moving. I think it's dead..."

”Dead? Don’t imply they’re living things. We’re already getting into weird religious territory. Don’t invoke Evangelion, Barry!”

“To attain their respective -Animus- and return to the -Persona-. The Anima Relics are really one set of parts that make up -Deus-, the physical manifestation of god. They regain their original powers or functions by aligning themselves with their destined partner... An Omnigear that has lost its respective Anima Relic, is but a puppet. It becomes a mere vessel or container in which there are no contents."

"And this girl too was destined to become one with god... You see... Elhaym is really one of the parts of god as well..."

”Wait! Just a sec! Where’s that notepad?!”

"Put simply, you served to help bring all the parts of god together, here, for me. You're a bunch of stupid fools. It's as if you're all clowns..."

"You believed the legend of how our world and the universe was created... But the Ministry and I fabricated that very myth a long time ago to suit our purposes."

"That's a lie!! How can that be true...?"

”What? You’re a few centuries old now too? Is every other person on this planet secretly older than dirt?”

"I think you'll find that your friends' Omnigears are all dead too... I'm talking about your friends who split up and took a different path than you into this place... They were all parts of god that were disassembled in the past, but once again, are all gathered here."

"Yes. It is indeed the time for the resurrection of god."

“W, what was it all for...Everything that I have done up until now...”

Ramsus shows up. What, did you think being in a Gear that exploded so violently it took out a nanomachine generated super fortress’ wall would be enough to kill him? Pfft. NOTHING kills Ramsus...

"Hmph... It's just you..."

"What are you doing here, Kahr?"

*walks toward Krelian and Miang* "What about me...? My existence... What was its purpose?"

”Well, I suppose we may as well get all the exposition out of the way at once, hmm?”
*nods*

“Cain's will had become too much like that of 'humans'. He was too concerned about them. He had forgotten his mission to revive god. That is why you were created. You were only made to remove our main hindrance... Cain. But, as the original living being, Cain had absolute power. To make you turn on Cain, it was necessary to focus your mind on a single point. However, being an artificial life form, you were mentally unstable. That is why...we used Fei's existence. Resentment... That is the source of your strength. And you have excelled superbly at fulfilling our expectations of you. But... we no longer have any more use for you. Haven't you realized that yet? You're a piece of trash. And being the reject that you are, why don't you just leave? Hah hah hah."

*drops to knees* "I... I... What was I born for? What was I living for?"

"A pathetic excuse for a life. Why, you aren't even human! Kahaha... Hah hahaha...!"

*turns back to the others* "Now, what to do with the lot of you... Well, I can't just kill you all... seeing as you have served me so well. So, as a reward, I'll allow you to be sacrificed too... To be assimilated into Deus along with this girl..."

*twitch*

So it turns out that insulting a mentally unstable guy with a large sword may have panned out when the hagglers are a bunch of floating old computer men speaking via hologram. Much less so when you’re two feet away from him and very weak to large pointy objects being inserted into your spine...

Miang drops to the floor...

“I am fated so as not to be able to kill myself... Now... all... my... wishes have... come... true. Thanks... to... you...!"

”Arrf.” *dies*

"...Miang..."

”Well, that was somewhat unexpected...”

”...”
“...”
*raises eyebrow* “Though I suppose the follow-up act is somewhat predictable...”

"Uh, uhaaaaaaaahhhhh!!"

And down goes Krelian. Huh... You know, I think Ramsus’ super power is he’s useless in battles. But stick the guy in a proper cutscene and tell give him reason to get his murder on and he’s suddenly the most effective killer in the game. Hell, he managed to put Fei in a coma for an entire act via cutscene. I think we’re on to something here.

Ramsus puts away his sword and returns to Miang’s side... A short time later...

”Ergh...wow... You all were busy. Is that...Krelian face down in a pool of blood?”
“Yup.”
“Neat.”

“Anyway, let’s hurry up and save Elly!”

*nods* "Yes, I know!"

”Hey. Give me a hand getting her down, Billy.”
“For the last time, it’s BIL—wait, what?“
“Help me get her down, Billy. We gotta do it at once. We don’t want her dangling around on one arm up there.”
“Ergh...r-right.”