Would have made his survival a bit more likely. Regardless, he flies towards those who seek vengeance against him for his crimes.
Noting how dangerous he and his forces are, most of the party moves towards the mountains where he is coming from to assist in stopping him, while Fee encounters the swordsmen near the villages. Hanibal then decides to join in all the fun, so I now have to deal with two groups coming in to try to kill me.
As much as I don't want to use him as a crutch, Sety moves over to the forests near Hanibal to take down the vast majority of his men, while Lana, Shanan, Aless, Oifaye, Lakche, and Scathach head over there to assist in the cleanup. Lester also runs over there, since he can't reach the mountains and thus his bow is relatively useless against the wyvern knights.
After a couple turns, Trabant arrives and he faces down Leaf. They chat for a bit, with Leaf happy that now he can carry out his wish of killing Trabant with his own two hands (heh, sorry champ, but that seems kind of unlikely), while Trabant promises to do to him what he did to Cuan (so hide behind all your mooks, slaughter a bunch of his defenseless friends, and then use his infant daughter to force him to disarm himself? Joke's on you then, cause he doesn't have defenseless friends or an infant daughter!). Trabant then barely doesn't kill Leaf, who is also surrounded by wyvern knights. Lana puts Hanibal to sleep to keep him out of the fight for now, while numerous people slay wyvern knights to weaken Trabants forces. Trabant himself escapes unharmed, but many of his men are defeated, and all wounds have been healed.
Though that doesn't matter, because one of Hanibal's men puts Aless to sleep with his sword, and then the rest kill him. Reset Counter: 20, if I remember right.
Proper revenge be damned, Fin and Leaf will have to take solace in knowing Trabant got a quick, unceremonious death. Fin takes a whack at Trabant with his javelin, and they just have a typical revenge talk before Fin hits and moves out of the way. Faval then runs up and plants a couple of Ichival shots in Trabants skull (though I'm confused as to why neither shot was a critical...), as Trabant laments the fate of his kingdom. With Trabant dead, more forces could focus on Hanibal's men, so hopefully this turns out well.
Come Thracia phase (no one died to Kapathogian forces), Arion asks if Altenna is alright, and she awakens from her supposed murder. Arion says he had to knock her unconscious lest Trabant suspect something, and she asks where Trabant is. Arion says that he has received word that the king has died in battle, and she asks what she should do now. Arion says that Prince Leaf awaits her return, and she asks what that means for the two of them. Arion says they are fated to face each other, but Altenna disagrees, saying that now that Trabant is gone, they can call a truce. Arion says he'd have agreed had it not been for Trabant's parting words, and then he yells at Altenna to go.
Oh my god, really? After Altenna leaves, all of the wyvern knights go for Aless, and they kill him. Reset Counter: 21.
Alright, the third go around yielded survival and more foes defeated. Let's hope nothing catastrophic happens. All of the remaining foes are defeated on the following turn, and Oifaye, Serlis, Aless, Shanan, Leen, and Sety head down towards Luthecia as well, hoping to help Fee and conquer it as quickly as possible, while everyone save Lester runs away from the unconscious general, Lester remaining so as to distract him until Corple is saved. Altenna flies over to where Serlis is heading, so she is likely aiming to speak with him.
Hanibal finally awakens as Fee takes her first shot as Disler, and while she can beat him, she risks death, so she flies away and allows Aless to take him down. Hanibal actually begins heading south, Lester and Nanna having stepped out of his way to see what he will do, and Altenna speaks with Serlis. She discusses the odd circumstances of her epiphany to join us, and after that is done, she asks Serlis to spare Arion. Serlis agrees that he will if possible, but isn't sure if he will agree to their terms, and Altenna wishes to give it one more try.
Aless strikes down Disler, claiming his return ring, and Serlis runs down to conquer the castle and free Corple. Altenna flies around Hanibal's path, and she (as well as Nanna, who is now level 20 and can promote) heads towards Mease, preparing to test her mettle against the arena. Serlis captures Luthecia just as Hanibal reenters Kapathogia (oh no), and he is informed by Levin of a captured child in the dungeon. Serlis asks who the boy is, and he says that he is General Hanibal's son, and was used as a hostage to force his father to fight against his will. He begs Serlis to take him to his father to allow him to convince him to stop fighting. Corple is a level 1 priest (seriously? at this point in the game?) with okay bases, the Valkyrie staff, a fortify and physic staff, 5521 gold, the miracle and adept skills, and Major Blagi holy blood.
Worried about what Hanibal might be doing, I send the party members at Mease down the trail a bit, hoping to use the forests to fend him off should he bring more men, and Sety, Aless, Shanan, Serlis, and Oifaye also begin heading north, protecting Corple as they make their way over to Hanibal.
Oh jeez! Hanibal brings out an even larger looking force than before. Sety equips the Holsety and prepares to take down as many as possible, while Faval speaks with Patty. He criticizes her thieving, and she points out that they are in dire need of the money to take care of the army. Faval is still a bit miffed, and Patty says she doesn't care what others say about them or their family, since they know how good their parents were, thanks to Levin. They both decide to go look for their mother once this is all finished, as well as find out who their father is. This gives Patty plus 1 luck, which is nice, I suppose.
Getting Corple over to Hanibal is going to be tough, given that he's surrounded by powerful soldiers and all. Nanna promotes to Paladin (that wouldn't have been my first guess as to what she promotes to), gains some nice bonuses, but nothing else. She rejoins the waiting party, hoping that Serlis's group will be able to distract Hanibal down south towards Corple. Sety kills Kanatz, and I hope that this allows Serlis to capture it and remove the enemy units from the field (although I worry that this may also remove Hanibal). Everyone backs off, as Serlis nears Kapathogia, and I sincerely hope Hanibal remains even after this is captured.
Sety being the awesome dude he is, takes down all of Hanibals men before the dude even reaches Mease, so I decide against capturing Kapathogia, for risk of killing Hanibal. Corple continues heading towards his father, and I hope that Hanibal turns around to try to get some more soldiers. He does so, and Corple soon speaks with him, while the rest of the party follows behind him as they head towards Luthecia, as well as the following castles, in preparation for whatever comes next. Corple talks his father into joining us, and so the level 20 general Hanibal joins us. He has a silver blade and wing clipper, pretty nice bases, 5000 gold, the great shield, adept, and vantage skills, and no holy blood. This recruitment also causes Kapathogia to be recruited onto our side. Soon, the dude in charge of Grutia notices Kapathogia's fall. He fortifies his defenses, and then commands his men to await reinforcements. A group of knights rides in from the north, near the villages, and they begin charging forth to attack us.
They are a highly mixed group, led by a mage knight named Musar (who has a droppable Tornado tome!), and they look pretty damn dangerous. Lana warps Arthur to Luthecia, the first of many to get warped, while Serlis's group (That is, Serlis, Sety, Oifaye, Aless, Hanibal, Shanan, and Leen) charge down as fast as they can, while Fee flies down as well to assist them. Altenna runs through the arena, making it all the way through with relative ease, and then rejoining the battle. I notice how much evasion Arthur on the castle, and thus decide to leave everyone back just a bit, allowing him to deal with the initial wave while Lana warps Tinny over there and she joins Serlis as they wait in the wings.
After a bit more traveling and waiting, the knights arrive, and Arthur fends them off fairly well. The rest of the party joins in soon after, and they deal a hefty blow to the foes, but are unable to take down over half of them. Most of them go for Arthur again, and he avoids them all easily enough. The rest of the foes are slain, but Musar proved too tough for most of the party, and so Shanan struck him down, claiming his tornado tome, which shall be passed on to Tinny once she promotes.
After all that, I think I'll be signing off here today, and we will pick up next week with the capture of Grutia!
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