Steve realizes thatbeing aronud Meredith and Kashiwa is nice, but will hardly be enough for him to make his name known. He holds his though and uses some of the remaining artifacts to generate four more characters - magicians Astral and Morrigan, Io the thief, and Nabiki the merchant.
"The only Overlord I trust is Zetta," Steve continues. "He gave me life, and also the power to grant life. I can use my powers to get some more allies from us, easily."
"Are you sure that's not going to hurt you?" asks Kashiwa. "Creating another life from scratch is a hard thing to do."
"Maybe for you," Zetta interjects, "but for an Overlord like me, it's a piece of cake. I gave a bit of my power to your 'leader' there just for this purpose. It won't cost you anything at first, but if you want more powerful minions, you'll need to fight hard and get more Mana."
Meredith sits down in front of the doghouse, sharpening her dagger and pretending not to be interested. "All right, 'leader'," she murmurs. "Go ahead and do your thing. I'll be over here...sleeping."
Steve walks over to the other flower and hums a spell. A bright light washes over the flower, and after a few seconds it disappears, leaving an old bearded man in its place.
"Hmm...?" the man grumbles. "How did I get here? And who are you?"
Steve extends his hand as a gesture of welcome, but the old man ignores it. "I'm Steve", he says. "You're in the Overlord's castle now."
"Overlord? Hmph...I'll show that Overlord a thing or two about what it means to use magic!"
"Hey!" shouts Zetta. "I'm standing right here, you know."
A few minutes later, Steve uses the same spell on the other palm tree, and out pops a girl with pink hair and matching robes.
"Hiya! I'm Morrigan!" she says, grinning from ear to ear. "Nice to meetcha!"
He then does the same with the two weeds, creating a boy in a suspicious-looking hat and a girl in a baggy blue outfit and a pouch hanging off her left hip.
"...Io," says the boy.
Steve waves to him. "'Yo' to you, too."
"Not 'yo'...'Io'. That's my name. EYE-oh. Got it?"
Io walks up to Steve and tries to palm a few HL from him, but fails.
"Yeah, I got it," says Meredith. "By the way...your technique needs work."
Kashiwa walks up to the other girl, who is unpacking weapons and other assorted goods and laying them out in front of the shop. "And who might you be, young lady?"
"Name's Nabiki," she says. "If you've come to buy something, I'm the girl to ask."
"Since Steve brought you into this world, that officially makes you part of the team, right? So...what exactly is going to happen with all of the money we spend?"
"It goes right into research and development, of course. You get to research my development as I get stronger when you spend money."
"That doesn't make any sense," says Io.
"Neither does being born from weeds or flowers, but hey," says Meredith. "It's a weird universe, this Netherworld..."
Io takes the Rapier lying on the ground and puts it in his pocket. Steve purchases a pair of books for Astral and Morrigan, and spends a little bit on Nabiki to buy her some Nunchaku.
"I've got some armor, too, if you want it!"
Sadly, Steve doesn't have enough HL to purchase any just yet, so he orders everyone to come with him to the next area.
Stage 1-2: Micky's Celebration
Another tutorial, this time on lifting and throwing. Zetta notes that everyone can take items with them if they're holding them once they complete the mission. He also teaches the gang about extension maps, which will pop up if an object or enemy is thrown out of bounds.
The army's opponents this time are the same as on the first map, but there appears to be an extension map to the east. (The main map is worth only 100 points, but the extension carries 300, which will be necessary to complete the map satisfactorily.) Zetta summons everyone into battle, leaving not one person behind.
"You guys again?" says Steve. "This time, we've got a numbers advantage, so you'd better watch out!"
The team begins an all-out assault on the bodyguards. Steve, Meredith and Nabiki easily take out one, but Io and Kashiwa have trouble disposing the other. Astral and Morrigan use wind and fire magic on the samurai before he gets a chance to attack. While they think they've won, a new map springs up to the east, populated with three pumpkinheads, who move forward to attempt to attack. Kashiwa treats her wounds, and Astral takes out the other bodyguard before he can hit her again. Io spots a nice-looking flower on the east side of their starter map and runs over and takes it.
"Ooh! That looks so cute," says Morrigan. "Can I have it?"
"Sorry," says Io. "Finders keepers!"
"Aww, you're no fun."
She, Nabiki and Meredith team up on one of the pumpkinheads, who attempt to fight back, but turn out not to be quite as dangerous as their freakish appearance leads them to be. While Astral practices his magic on an unsightly rock, everyone else gangs up on the two pumpkinheads. They come away with a small flower, a weed, and a mysterious item called a "Gency Tonic" for their troubles.
Meanwhile, Pram and Valvoga are watching the battle on celestial television. Pram and Ophelia are mildly amused by the carnage taking place on Micky's netherworld. Micky is again mocked for being too soft on Zetta, and he retaliates with a Lame Comeback about him having seniority over Pram, who promptly shows him up by demonstrating a Battle Aura capable of cowing him into subservience.
Author's Note: The flower Io picked up on this map had four stars next to its name. When used to create a new character, it provides a boost to the character's starting stats depending on how many stars are displayed (and also allows for more allocation of skill points). It's a good idea to pick up these items when you see them.
Also, defeating the pumpkinheads in battle has added it to the list of creatable characters. It can use daggers, rifles, flamethrowers, and wrenches. Since we don't have any firearms in the shop yet, pumpkinhead's utility is going to be quite limited early on.
