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Update 21: Arietta
Stella. Are you sure this is a good idea!?
Out of all the people to put in charge, you chose her.
Oh don’t you worry! I promise I’ll take good care of them all! Provided no “unfortunate” accidents happen.
Heh, I’m sure this’ll be fun!
I’m having second thoughts about this arrangement.
I trust Nila to keep them safe. You have to admit, she does a lot of the heavy lifting for us.
Like, did you see how she tore into that Imperial Dragon!?
I’m looking forward to seeing her in action myself! And you need not worry about harm coming to her as long as I’m around!
She’s not who we’re worried about...
Meet the team that was voted in for the next part of the game. It’s pretty heavy on offenses, though support is a little on the weaker side. Let’s take a look at the at the 3 swap ins after their catch-up training regimen.
Are ya happy now, gramps!?
I’ve maxed out Act Natural, which now multiplies Ark’s total ATK by a whopping 140%! Ark is officially a monster now. 
And I’m buffing up her POW even more, because why not?
Haru has maxed out Thunder, which now deals 150% damage. It’ll be a great alternative damage option for whenever something resists Downstroke, or if something is just weak to Lightning damage.
With Katana Art maxed out, Haru now gets a 130% multiplier applied to his Katana’s ATK.
More power to assist others is fine by me.
With all of his important skills maxed out, it’s now time to beef up his stats.
Buront now has Shieldbearer maxed out, which applies a 130% multiplier to his Shield’s DEF stat. Yeah not a great deal, but it unlocked a bunch of skills for him to take.
Behold! The ultimate impenetrable defense!
Really now? It doesn’t seem to hold up against raw magical power, and that’s not even getting in getting into hazards like poisons and the such.
Um. Erm. It’ll be fine, I’m sure of it!
Ultima Guard is a really good pickup for Buront to support the party defensively even further.
I shall steel myself for the heaviest of blows!
I’ve had Buront pick up Heavy Heart, as it’s a prerequisite to another skill I want. What it does is that it places a resistance buff on him, reducing the amount of physical and magical damage he takes for 3 turns. It has a speed modifier of 80% and costs 3 Mana to use. At level 1 it multiplies damage taken by 90%, and at level 3 it multiplies damage taken by 88%. Basically a single target version of Ultima Guard.
I also went ahead and unlocked some more equipment by selling some monster parts. That Katana is gonna be a big boost to Haru’s offenses.
Nila is the same as ever.
Ark has now equipped the Bow we got as a reward from the Santa quest. I also went and gave her that medal we got from... BIRD FEATHERS as well to boost her attack even further to sky high levels. Her 74 ATK Bow gets boosted up to 113 thanks to Bow Mastery, and her total ATK gets boosted even further up to a whopping 233 thanks to Act Casual. Because of that passive, Rogue + Samurai is one of the strongest damage dealing combinations in the entire game! And would you believe me that we haven’t even seen the true extent of Ark’s potential? That she can go even further beyond? Ark is a complete beast now, and you better be ready for it.
Not to say that Haru isn’t any less of a monster himself. He currently has 180 ATK, which will get boosted up to 234 with Zanbato Arts active. These 3 are gonna dish out a world of hurt.
But where would these attackers be without some support? Oh yeah, everyone is wearing Heavy Armor, which comes with a 3% damage reduction for physical damage to boost their defenses.
Hey boss lady. Have ya decided on what ya want us to get started with?
Mmhmm. I think we should focus on tracking down Flame Eater again. We don’t really know for sure if it’s at Doma Volcano or not.
Ohoho! I was hoping you’d say that, Stella! I’ve got some unfinished business with him!
So we should finish him off while he still licks his wounds, or at least find out if he’s truly there.
That’s fine by me as well. Let’s get going at once.
Are you all gonna be okay with me staying behind?
Oh Stella, you’ve been working so hard before! You really shouldn’t overwork yourself, and take a well deserved rest while we’re gone. I’ve told you before, I’ll take good care of these 3 for you!
Oh, the bartender in Nevanplace? We have!
Wait who was she again?
She's my sister. How's she doing?
She looked pretty busy when we met with her. A lot of customers were at that bar. All singing and drinking, heh heh.
Oh, she's busy? She always works too hard.
It seems to be at the behest of Pleroma.
It's not as if there's much of interest over there, but... It does restrict travel by land.
The game will start providing hints on what requirements you’ll have to fulfill and how to reach the places these Imperial Dragons are at.
It seems there's a nation where only women live. Wouldn't that be trouble?
Eh. As long as it works out for them, it shouldn’t be trouble.
She’s pointing you towards the Marlleaire Islands if you haven’t found it yet.
It'd be best for a buyer to show up. Won't you buy it?
Perhaps we should consider a career in merchantry once this is all over. I’m sure I’d make quite the salesman!
I... don’t believe any of us are really qualified for that sort of business.
I tried that gig once. But all of my products kept exploding in the customers’ faces.
Just what were you trying to sell!?
For example, the Rogue's Act Natural only works with a Samurai.
Funny you should mention that, heh heh heh...
Way ahead of you on that one game. Though yeah, compared to something like Etrian Odyssey, this game has a bigger emphasis on team synergy, which does make it stand out from it, I suppose.
But I can't open the gate on the way. Judging by the tech, Pleroma must be involved, I think...
Another hint on how to progress in one of the missions.
If we go to the right side of town...
Genbu... Oh, I'm all right. Just worried, is all.
Small wonder. Nestor has been driving himself too hard.
No one can handle everything by himself.
But I can't do much to make it easier. I want to do whatever I can, at least...
.........
Gah! Busted!
Oh dear. I do hope that guild will be alright.
That was the next event in the Kingsblade sub-event, but we won’t be able to progress it for a long while, as that was the only step we can do after the Flame Eater mission is over.
Meh.
Or a Knight with Walk Safe.
If you don't have one... Following the left or right wall might work.
Most of the time there will be a map nearby or there’s one you can pick up beforehand, but sometimes you’ll be left flailing around for a while.
Oh, Johnny. About that favor you asked us to do. Here’s what he had to say...
But a guy like that can't take me down!
Check around everywhere!
Like we saw in the last update, quests can even be found in dungeons. Unfortunately you don’t really get an indication of when a quest is available other than checking all the places you’ve been. Fortunately there aren’t too many gotchas, and only 5 quests are missable in the entire game.
Would you say Faro from Pleroma is a cute kid?
How the hell am I supposed to know? I haven’t met her.
Is that so? Hm. I need to verify it myself.
His answer is the same either way.
They want to start a new one with him. He's confused, huh? Ahahaha.
Only 2 people? I wish you luck.
I’m sure with enough experience, they can manage just fine!
Hey, it’s actually possible. In fact, someone has already completed a solo run of this game. If you’re curious how, the class used was the Mage.
Heh. Never thought I’d ever get my own fanbase someday.
Don’t let it get to your head.
Oh I’m sure it can’t hurt to let her indulge just a tiny bit.
And after leaving the guild menu screen...
I don't like it now, and I'm afraid it'll be worse tomorrow... honestly.
Unfortunately, like I said earlier, it will be a long while before we can progress this sub-event.
If you're in a jam, I'd listen to them.
Pleroma will basically serve as our information hub from here on out.
If I were strong enough, I'd beat the Imperial. Aren't you guys in a hurry to get this done?
But if you take out the small ones, can you get enough experience?
This pessimistic soldier got mistranslated a bit. What he’s actually saying in the first sentence is that you shouldn’t force yourself to challenge the Imperial Dragons if you’re not ready for them. Not that it’s actually impossible to kill one right now, which is far from true.
At any rate these two soldiers have some nice advice in that if you can’t kill an Imperial, grind on the small fry dragons instead! Not that it’s remotely necessary with this party. Also a better skill build goes a much longer way than just level grinding.
You'll only become less efficient if you don't.
Sound advice indeed!
It may seem impossible, but I'll always support you!
Many thanks for your gift. This will certainly come in handy.
Always nice to get more Silver Waters. (Also another slight translation nitpick, she said she had something she wanted to give in the right place instead of just suddenly springing that item onto us.)
We'll do the things that you can't.
You won’t have to worry too much. I’m sure Stella and the others can take care of any emergencies that pop up here.
And they have a Guard Cow on their side!
Ahahahaha! Are the dragons that afraid of us!?
Considering that you somehow managed to cause an Imperial Dragon to flee in terror, I’m not surprised to hear that the rest of them fear you that much.
I wish I could have seen that Flame Eater dragon running away like a scaredy-cat. That sounds like it would have been hilarious to watch.
It’ll be extra hilarious the next time we meet. I’m sure that Flame Eater will find all the wonderful ways I can finish him off laughworthy as well!
In order to track down the Imperial Dragon, we need Pleroma. With the aim of destroying all Dragons around the world, keep on fighting!
Menas here will keep track of the dragon count, and comment on your progress as you get closer to 333 dead dragons. Here are his other lines for those instances.
It looks like the Dragons are terrorizing the world! Keep it together, Odyssey!
The Dragons' numbers are gradually dropping.
The Dragons' numbers are dwindling. Keep it up!
Kazan has nothing more for us at this time. At this point I recommend heading to Zeza, as there’s something important to pick up there now.
In Basho, Sierra and Jake are looking into the cause.
The body must react before the mind does!
Good thing this is a turn based RPG.
H-How morbid.
The Bloom has been bad for business I see.
Pretty much every place in the world got hit pretty bad by it. Some harder than others. Tch, wonder how that side of the empire is holding up right now.
But the Bloom gives it an eerie cast.
Please don’t tell me we’re gonna have to trample an entire mountain.
Depending on what Stella decides, you might not have to.
And even if you do, I can protect you from the worst of it!
Oh hey I missed this guy in my last visit to this place. Here’s what he said before:
The Bloom is spreading. We'll die if it gets here...
Gloomy indeed.
It's a good idea to clean up the Bloom too.
Sort of? The problem with this statement is that cleaning up the Bloom in the overworld doesn’t directly make killing dragons easier. And deliberately clearing out the Bloom in dungeons is rather pointless since it regrows when you leave a screen. If anything this statement should be the other way around. (No, it’s not a translation mistake.)
There's a hut deep inside, but I've never seen anyone there.
Ooh! Something to check out later!
The Dragon is somewhere in the vicinity!
...Thanks.
Best of luck with that search.
Okay, now for what we really came here for.
This NPC shows up once we’ve completed the first Flame Eater mission. It’s absolutely in your best interest to pick this skill up as well, as like Southsea, it’s required for progression as well.
The northern sea is dangerous, so watch it.
This man is right. We have every navigation skill in the game, so now we have access to most of the world map now. That being said, there are still some areas blocked off to us, so we don’t truly have free reign of the world.
Now we can finally sail on the dark areas of the sea, and they contain the toughest random encounters of the bunch. So if you’re underleveled due to how open this game is at this point, feel free to use encounter reduction skills or just avoid these places as much as you can.
If you want to pick up the 2nd Flame Eater mission, you’ll have to pick up this skill, as it’s required to access the area he’s in.
Oh crap. This was really what I was hoping wouldn’t happen.
To think I was just taken down in an instant...
Running into really strong enemies comes with the territory of playing basically an open world game. It’s great, and it’s been a while since random encounters were truly a threat in this game.
We can escape through here! Quickly!
However I’m not really interested in fighting things right now.
The landmass east of Gouga Thicket is where our destination lies.
There’s a portal over here for easy access to this portion of the continent.
Finally filled out that 3rd slot in the portal list.
And up to the northeast of the portal is our next destination.
Right now, the Dragon has drained 5 degrees of heat... it's awful!
Hahaha! Looks like he’s here after all!
Now that we’ve confirmed that, I wonder what we should do now.
Why not have a look around? We could also relax a bit while we’re here.
Huh. Looks like it’s trying to lead us someplace.
That dog reveals a secret path in the trees. I’ll investigate it later. Let’s check out the inside of the inn.
...Come to think of it, where's Arietta? Still cleaning the garden?
(They all say Nigirio Inn.)
Over here we have a rather special shop.
We finally get access to purchasable Miracle Medicines and Somanels! Though the former is rather pricey. Paro Medicines will suffice for now, as our Life pools aren’t that high yet.
Hey what kind of scam you running here?
And uh, this thing. It heals half as much as Paro Medicine and is 50% more more expensive. Don’t buy them.
No thank you. We have some business to attend to.
Tch, windowshoppers.
She seemed oddly nervous to perform her job.
Something about this place gives me stinky vibes, and I don’t like it!
It's very inconvenient now, but usually it's directly connected to Aizhen.
Yes, him... right over there out in the open. Want to know more?
Is that so? Tell us more!
We’ll pay your price. Now spill!
This will let you know enough to get things done. Back channels and grey-market goods... finding them takes skill! Heh heh. Black markets are hard to find, so you're lucky you ran into me.
This skill lets us access some special shops that weren’t available to us before. It’s not a vital skill to have as it’s not needed for progression, but it opens up some quests we couldn’t complete before. Oh and this is the only place to purchase this skill, so if you aren’t willing to explore out of your comfort zone, you’re going to be waiting quite a long time since this place is considered a pretty late-game area.
I stumbled into here... But, I found who I was looking for. Lucky me!
Come to think of it, I heard something was going to cool the lava. I wonder if that's going to turn off the heat? That'd be the pits!
That’s quite the fragrance this inn is using.
Let’s go upstairs.
The volcano might end up dying down.
If you knew that, why didn't you kill the Dragon and then come back?!
B, but I was just doing reconnaissance... I would have surely died.
What an excuse! You good-for-nothing! Get out of my sight!
I'm sorry...
The rushed Rushe leaves.
I can already tell this guy’s gonna be a reaaaaaal piece of work.
...Oh, you're all dirty. I don't care about shabby sorts like you. Shoo.
Excuse me? Wanna say that to my face again?
Ark, let’s not provoke him even further. Ahem. We’re not here to use your services. We’re the Odyssey Guild.
Hm? What? Odyssey? So what?! Wait, where have I heard... That's right! You're that guild with the hero complexes!
What the-!?
“Hero complexes!?”
Now listen here you rude little man-
No, don't say anything. It won't work on me. Recently, a hell of a Dragon settled on the volcano nearby my Inn... At this rate, the volcano will die, and so will my precious hot spring. What a pain!
Oh no. A true tragedy indeed.
The amount of damns I give about this is pretty much zero.
So go kill that Flame Eater or whatever, guys! Well? What is it? Are you just going to let it get away? Didn't you come here to take care of it?! That's all I have to say! Hurry up and kill it! It's your job! Your duty!
First, go accept the contract so you can't weasel out of it!
Rrrrghh...
I have a better idea, how about we break his stupid vase?
Ark, that’s a completely inappropriate thing to do. We should light his room on fire, then break his vase!
...Let’s just get away from this man as far as possible. Any longer near him and I fear I may fall under the same temptations that those two are feeling right now.
What a jerk.
Going back outside...
Let’s investigate that secret path the dog showed us.
If we go to the right, we can reach the back of the inn area.
And go in the back of the inn itself for a quick laugh.
And now we'll be worked until we die. I'm sorry I came!
Ugh, I knew this place was rotten.
They do seem rough, but room and board is an okay deal.
It can heal itself forever by absorbing the lava around it. It's reckless to fight against such a foe!
It seems like he picked up some new tricks since you last fought it.
New tricks or not, nothing will stop me from finishing the job once we get to him!
Now if we actually go north in the trees...
What the? Hey! There’s someone over there!
Fade to black as our party goes to help her up.
Oh thank goodness. She doesn’t look too injured.
She must’ve just collapsed. Come on there, up you go!
The Rushe girl looks around.
The Rushe girl quivers then flees through the trees back to the inn.
Huh. Must be shy.
Should we check up on her?
Can’t hurt to do so. Especially considering what kinda place this is.
I wonder why that kid is scared. He still angry?
I don’t think she’s going to open up to us anytime soon.
We might as well rest at this inn while we’re here. Maybe she’ll be more willing to talk to us tomorrow.
We have to sleep til the next day to get this girl to open up.
Please, take it easy!
Let’s check in on that Rushe girl again.
I ran away, I'm sorry. ...Are you angry?
No! Why would we be angry?
Hey, don’t worry about it, err... what’s your name?
I was so tired before, that I... fell trying to clean the garden...
The work's awfully hot. Many collapse. But no one escapes, because there's no safe place to go. We can't complain... we can only work.
You don't seem like bad people or liars... I'd be happy to serve you all!
I suppose we could have an extra helping hand taking care of Cowabunga if we really needed to.
I don’t think that will be necessary. The others seem to be taking care of her just fine.
Um, thanks for the offer, but I don’t think we really need a maid right now.
Besides, I’m not sure if all those other workers will just let us walk out of here with you. Some of them are giving us the stink-eye...
And now we’ve started the Arietta... well the game doesn’t actually consider this a sub-event, but it’s pretty similar to one. We can’t progress this mini sub-event until we’ve killed Flame Eater for real, and that won’t be happening for quite a while. Completing it is a prerequisite to unlocking a quest later on, so if you want to get everything done, it’s in your best interest to do this.
But they're all busy with the Dragon, so it's okay for now...
Pssst... you heard from Arietta, right? What kind of place this is?
Yeah, she told us.
This inn seems to be built on rotten foundations, so to speak.
How do you know Arietta anyways?
Arietta helped me out, so I'm trying to return the favor. More to come!
Hrm, now what do we do?
We might as well do the job we came here to do in the first place. Maybe then things will calm down at this inn.
Are you sure we should be doing this without going through the proper channels first?
Ahahahaha! Oh Haru. If I let any bureaucratic nonsense get in my way during the entire time I’ve lived my life, I’d never get anything done!
If you still want in, go ask at Nigirio Inn. Be polite about it!
...Are you kidding me. There’s an Imperial Dragon on the loose here. And you’re just gonna stop us from doing our jobs because of what some crotchety old man said.
Oh dear. I suppose we should get the paperwork started back in Kazan.
Ugh. Let’s just get this over with.
WHAT THE HELL IS THIS CRAPPY REWARD!?
What a miserly fellow! I’ve really had enough of him!
Well. That inn can burn for all I care. I suppose old man Jen is about to learn the meaning of the phrase “you get what you pay for.”
Hold on for one second! You all can’t be serious. As unfortunate as this all is, are we really just going to let the Flame Eater put all those people in danger over there?
Eh. If he was gonna do anything, he’d have probably done it by now.
The most he seems to be doing at the moment is inconveniencing a hot spring and spa. One that feeds off of the blood of its workers if I may add. Besides, there may be other dragons that are a higher priority to deal with.
If the Flame Eater actually tries something over there, then we’ll step in. Until then, let that innkeeper squirm. I’m sure Stella will understand!
And this is how we unlock the mission with the Flame Eater. Though that won’t be the mission we’ll be tackling just yet, as this was how the votes turned out:quote:
Invisible: 12
Mystery Dragon: 8
Flame Eater: 4
Dreadnought: 2
Small Fry: 3
So the first Imperial Dragon we’ll be tackling is Invisible, then the Mystery Dragon, Flame Eater, and finally Dreadnought. Though we won’t necessarily be tackling those right away, as there’s a lot of sidestuff we can be doing in this game. Which I’ll be sprinkling throughout as we take down these Imperials one by one.