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Part 7: Oh, Goodness Me!
VIDEO: Entering the Trick Mansion
This is the chief's mansion.
So here lies the source of this strife. I believe you should all punish him.
You sure are bossy for a little kid.
I'm still a god. I deserve to boss you around. It's my duty, in fact.
Good thing we've got a god on our side!
Well, since this is your problem, I won't help you at all.
Gero? You're really gonna do that to us?
Decides to be useless at the worst possible time.
Ku ku ku... that's a god for ya.
That's fine with me. I won't ask for your help, Mountain God. It's my village, and we'll put an end to this problem ourselves.
Well said, Oyuki! Spoken like a true ninja!
The mansion has a lot of hidden passages and tricks inside. If you find anything that looks odd, you should check it out. Now let's go!
Here, the game lets us know that anything that causes the A button symbol to appear in the lower-right corner can be interacted with. As shown since Part 1, this is often the only clue you'll get for triggering many skits.
The Trick Mansion has one of my favorite dungeon themes in the game.
It's full of revolving doors, and in case the player hasn't caught on and looted the entire village yet, the first important one is made obvious by the chests placed on either side.
The recolors here are appropriately ninja-themed in their names, like the Ninja Hound here. The accompanying Slippery Spirits aren't so much ninja-themed as they are annoying-themed, though.
Here's Keroro's Ice Dust in action. It's quick, works in midair, and does 3 hits at a time.
We got ninjas too, of course. Joining the Shabby Shinobi is the Ninja Soldier.
Here's a general idea of enemy strength in the game so far on Hard. Single non-critical hits still do less than 100 at this point, so multi-hit moves are the way to go. At this difficulty, it would be kind of a slog without the CC-boosting weapons.
Ambushed by ninjas. Thematic!
A big empty room. If this were another RPG, half of those tatami mats would be invisible pit traps.
Instead, it's just a short delay before more treasure.
The chest contains a flintlock Fowling Gun, one of the weapons sold in the shop here. And it's still inferior to the DG-X. I like this trend.
The other revolving door in this room has a bit of a different secret.
These rooms are not so separate.
All that wall-weaving gets us the Zaku R-1 Guardian. It comes with two new skills, Guard and Counter. Guard further reduces the damage taken when guarding, and Counter increases damage done to enemies hit during their attack animations.
The revolving doors are really pretty obvious. But who the hell wants to do a pixel search?
Not every secret passage gets you closer to the goal, but they make every corner worth exploring anyway.
That's good enough for this RPG klepto. 
Naturally, the obvious secrets aren't the only things I'm searching for.
Trick Mansion Keparrow List:
Bandit Eyedrops
Antidote x2
Better Herb
Deluxe Curry Spice
Silver Crystal (meant for selling to shops for quick money; worth 3,800)
Wait... I remember this hallway.
Without needing to check the Keparrow map, I know there's a treasure right... about...
Here!
Say hello to the Ball. We're gonna be best friends from now on.
The Ball is one of the best early-game rewards obtainable for painstakingly poking in the Keparrow codes. It has three skills: Learning II, Happiness, and Grading. Without even finding something with Learning, we jump straight to II and get a 1.5 multiplier for experience. With Giroro field-leading (.05) and the difficulty set to Hard (1.1), equipping the Ball gets us 165% experience. Happiness and Grading increases Gold and Grade Points gained by 20%.
There are two catches: one, the Ball's skills won't work unless worn by someone participating in battle.
Two, its stats are abysmal. Its skills are useful throughout the game, but the stat drop for whoever has Ball duty gets worse as the Guardians you switch it out for get better.
At one point I score a 25-hit combo while chopping up dogs.
That unlocks the Combo Beginner codename. This is a codename for every party member...
...But it's completely useless. There are two upgrades to this at 50 and 100 hits each. Guess which one doesn't suck.
A room with no tricks, and no Keparrow. Just burglary.
One of the chests contains Tsuchigumo, a sword for Dororo that adds earth resistance. As far as I can gather, it's a reference to Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan, a Shonen Jump series about Japanese demon yakuza. Tsuchigumo is a six-armed demon character in it.
Rekki-maru is still better.
The other chests contain a Defense Berry, 200 Gold, and another bottle of Bandit Eyedrops to add to the pile.
Eventually we get to a save point outside the innermost room.
The new ninja chief awaits.
VIDEO: Oh, Goodness Me! (this covers the rest of the update!)
So you're the new chief!
That's right. I am your new...
You broke the agreement!
Aack!
Some chief. He jumps when a teenager yells at him.
We agreed not to hurt anyone when we went after the sacred treasure! How could you do such a terrible thing?! I won't let you get away with this!
Eee! Eeyaaagh! B-but... those were just the old chief's rules...
No buts, mister! Give us back the treasure! Right! NOW!
Aaagh!
A grown man cracks under the pressure of... hey who's that?
Oh, goodness me! We have visitors? Welcome, everyone!
Ahh! Good timing, Miss Alea! The... the treasure! They came to take the sacred treasure back!
Oh, goodness me, that's just awful.
...Eh? I mean, they're about to take it away from us...
Oh, goodness me, that's just awful.
I mean you need to stop them! We'll lose the treasure at this rate!
Ahh, is that so? Then you should have told me sooner...
I think she's a boss, but she seems kinda off.
Hmph... the first to act wins the battle! You're mi--
THWACK.
What the hell?! Why'd a washtub fall from the ceiling?!
Oh, goodness me, I suppose a washtub trap just happened to be there.
He gets clobbered by three more.
What the-! There were MORE?!
Oh, goodness me, I suppose three more washtub traps just happened to be there.
"Just happened to be" my FOOT!
Hmm... it appears this girl can control her luck at will. There's no telling what could happen. How troublesome...
That's why we could really use your help, Mountain God!
The mountain god can't hear you through all his popcorn-munching, Mr. Narrator.
It takes more than a lucky duck to scare off my platoon!
That's my Sarge! You're so cool!
Keroro Platoon, chaaarge!
The first major boss battle begins with a special transition, and some awesome special boss music.
Oh, goodness me! It seems I have to fight you.
Alea is a skilled magician. That means we want to shut her down as soon as possible. This is best achieved through rapidfire beatdown.
And she doesn't make it easy. One touch of her staff knocks out anyone it hits.
With Keroro and Dororo down, Alea can cast spells without trouble.
She uses some of our Artes against us, like Wind Shot.
Then she gets stunned and juggled around the battlefield.
She tries to start casting again here, but if you hit her enough she gets interrupted. The CC-boost Keparrow loot makes this easy to do, even at the start of the game.
Also, she's weak against getting set on fire.
Here's about where I noticed how much damage Alea's Flare Bullet was doing: almost four hundred. 
Welcome to Hard mode. Let your guard down, and this children's game will destroy you.
Speaking of, I failed to notice Dororo had 26 HP left, because he'd taken 500+ damage from another Flare Bullet.
So the next time Alea does her staff move, he goes down.
Good thing everything stops while I open the menu! You can heal allies, change equipment, redo AI setups, allocate different moves, and switch control to another in-battle party member anytime here.
Anyone assigned to use an item by the player takes that as their next action. This can be delayed by getting hit, taking other actions like attacking or doing moves, or getting killed before the item has a chance to go off. Keroro barely managed to use the Revival Orb here.
It's possible to use a revive item, have everyone get killed right after it's used and before it activates, and come back like one frame from a game over. I've only had this happen once, and not during a recording.
Alea escapes to the edge of the screen to cast something small but flashy. Shine is a spell unique to Alea, and Keroro gets a faceful of it.
Then Dororo deals the finishing blow, depleting the last of Alea's Hard-mode 11,895 HP.
Oh, my goodness! Whatever shall I do?
You might recognize the reference in this victory skit. Actually, I should've left Dororo dead for a more interesting one... maybe later. But we got another Curry Spice! 
Got Alea's Bracelet!
So we beat her up and stole her jewelry. We're heroes!
Oh, goodness me, I've lost the battle.
Don't you "I've lost the battle" at ME!
Give it up, girl. We're not letting you off easy!
Oh, goodness me, a sudden gust of wind! Ohhh myyy!
She fortuitously flees further frog fury.
Wait, Miss Alea! Please don't leave me!
You're not going anywhere! Now give us the treasure!
Aaah! I was just led astray by that girl's luck-controlling powers! I'm sorry! I'll give the treasure back! Here, take it!
Got one of the 3 Legendary Armaments, Heracles!
Finally! 
So this is a Legendary Armament? I wanna try it on!
Tamama equipped Heracles!
I... I just heard some creepy music...
Looks like if someone incompatible tries to equip it...
It drops a curse on 'em. Wonder what's gonna happen next? Ku ku kuuu...
Kururu, ya gotta tell me stuff like that sooner!
Sergeant Major Kururu, you knew and kept quiet on purpose, didn't you?
Surprise, I've secretly been playing Dragon Quest Frogs this whole time. Now I have to walk all the way to a priest to get this removed. 
What a hopeless person. Well then, I shall lift the curse for you.
Ah... my apologies. I just deepened the curse.
HUH?! WHAT THE HELL'S WRONG WITH YOU?!
I was only joking. Can't handle a little teasing, I suppose. Here, you're fine now.
Tamama's curse was lifted!
Now, I believe that's enough excitement for today. Let's depart, shall we?
Thank you so much, everyone!
We're going to assist in rebuilding Whitesnow Village, with the mountain god's help!
Take the sacred treasure with you. I do not believe you'll use it for any evil purpose. And if you ever try such a foolish thing...
Know that you would be unable to escape my divine wrath, even if you fled to the ends of the earth.
Even so, I'm not too keen on carrying a cursed item around...
Then I'll make it unequippable. That way none of us will put it on by mistake.
Kururu hacks game items, while in the game itself.
Here's something I'd like to give as thanks, too.
Got the Talisman from Oyuki!
But to receive so many rewards...
Not like that's a bad thing, right? I'll eventually make it into somethin' useful.
Right then, let's get going!
Looks like we can't go much further on land, so it's time to find a way to cross the ocean. There's a seaside village to the southeast. We can probably get a boat there.
The ocean? Sounds like fun! C'mon Sarge, let's go there now!
We have another errand or two to complete before going on a cruise. But I'll save that for later.
Artes/Skills learned this update:
Tamama
Clearance: Tamama's first spell. It heals one ally's status ailment.
Giroro
Snipe End: Giroro pulls out a ridiculously huge sniper rifle and fires a piercing laser shot.
Kururu
Maximum Voice: Kururu laughs into a megaphone, and the syllables damage the enemies. If you've heard him laugh, you'll know why this works.
Bless Force: A buff spell to raise one ally's attack.
Dororo
Wind Shot: A wind elemental spell. Same as Kururu's, but costs 2 CC instead of 3.
Next time, Keroro and co. infiltrate a huge freakin' fortress!
Alea, a mysterious young woman.