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Tower 8: No seriously why don't you love FE6's level design?
This is it. We've climbed the entire tower, and are now face to face with its final challenge. This is a preview for endgame and the ruins; there are no unpromoted enemies here, and they're all jacked to hell and back.
The boss is, as usual, a complete joke in comparison to the rest of the stage. I will take a free Wind Sword, though.
Let's meet one of his compatriots.
Now we're talking. They're tough as nails, hit like a train, and are suprisingly speedy for such a big guy. And occasionally they come with Devil Axes. Like this very one. 
Next up, we have the Gorgon. For those keeping track at home, that's a 42 Mt, ~120 Hit Shadowshot running off 22 AS. And when we encounter "real" Gorgons, they'll be packing a 40 Mt, ~130 Hit Demon Surge with no AS penalty. Now imagine there being like 10 of them, because that's just how Endgame and the Lagdou Ruins roll. 
Oh, and with the lack of anything unpromoted, these are the grunts of the stage.
And we've got a few other goodies to pick up while we're at it.
Marisa serves as a fantastic demonstration of what the stage has in store for us. She opens with a crit that does 30 damage and does not double the cyclops.
Note this cyclops's range. His buddy standing right next to him has my Brave Sword and a higher priority in the movement queue, so I have to snipe the Wight from outside his range.
With a little help from L'Arachel and a third round of combat, the cyclops finally goes down, and Marisa picks up an excellent level for the trouble.
And surprise, we're facing yet another gimmick pulled straight from FE6. This time, it's the level design and gimmick of 16x, where anyone hit by the arrow will lose 10 HP. This is completely inconsequential given the enemies having ~50 HP at minimum.
A few stragglers try to sneak behind us, but we give them a warm welcome.
Yes, thank you, you guys are great.
Huh. I'm...disappointed, really. I was expecting more out of a Devil Axe.
But at any rate, that's not why we're here.
Innes may only do 2 damage with his longbow, but it's just enough to set up Tana and get him a great level on the side.
And she gladly takes advantage of her brother's generosity.
Tana had full health before that, to put the gorgon's power in perspective.
Bah.
So here's where things could have gone really wrong. That guy is using a Horseslayer, which does ~30 damage to L'Arachel. The gorgon moves last in the enemy turn queue, so she gets to snipe after all the damage has been done.
Like so. 
Oh, and Amelia's poisoned. Did I mention that?
In the meantime, we've been doing a little sneaking around of our own. Guy and Lyn move in on the left, and Marisa/Innes take the right side.
The steel axe weighs him down just enough for Guy to double, and he rolls a Silencer on the second hit.
And the gorgon is now out of Shadowshot. She won't move, so we can make our way up the side passages in relative peace.
A combined effort from L'Arachel, Innes, Tana, and Marisa brings down the cyclops on the right side.
With the bottom completely cleared out, it's time to head up north.
Ewan clears out the Wight waiting for us at the top for a shitty level.
The right side has to deal with this fine gentleman, who is holding my Killer Lance. Unfortunately, his range extends to the point where the only safe spot is where L'Arachel is attacking from. So they're going to have to eat 10 damage. Do try and hold back your tears at this tragedy.
...Or L'Arachel can crit the guy. But Innes and Marisa are still going to eat a hit anyway because they don't have enough movement to get to a safe spot.
This guy is the biggest problem here. He has first priority among the Wights, and he's packing a Killer Bow. A previous run was lost when he shot down Tana with a crit, so we're treading lightly here.
Ewan bit the bullet this time around, so Amelia puts our Killer Bow friend to the sword.
Tana acts as the bait on the other side, and kills a sword Wight for a level.
Down to the final four, as Marisa and Amelia bait out the last of the cyclopes. Amelia gets the honor of taking on a Devil Axe one.
I even gave him a freebie with Amelia having the Bright Lance equipped and he still missed. Useless Cyclops... At least Amelia got a sweet level out of the deal.
Marisa is on snake extermination duty. She's happy to oblige with a crit.
Which she immediately follows up with a Silencer on the Cyclops.
And then she caps Strength because why the fuck not. 
And our grand prize is a fixed 5000 Gold. Why did I throw away a chest key for this?
Awful Emblem IRC posted:
<ddinkins112> Your sanity took hold.
<ddinkins112> And rejected the rules of Crossover
<SCBracer> Muscle memory one presumes
<Shiny777> From games where Chest Keys are not made of solid diamond-encrusted platinum that turns everything it touches to cancer-curing gold cocaine?
<SCBracer> or that
So yeah, the boss is substantially less impressive than all of his buddies. L'Arachel Shines him down to 1 HP, and gets up to Light-A.
And Innes comes for the kill.
Next time: We finally get around to retaking Renais Castle! The wondertwins promote! Level design not cribbed from FE6!