Barhara lies nearby, but knowing that Julius resides there, I doubt it will be available yet. That leaves the castles of Velthomer and Freege to conquer before the dark prince, and thus Loptous, will reveal themselves.
At Freege, Hilda is enraged at Dozel's loss to the liberation army, and decides to take matters into her own hands. She believes she can slay us just by drawing us a bit north, and also mentions needing to contact Scorpio, believing that once the Gelben ritter draw us in, the Beige ritter can flank and destroy us all.
Hilda steps out with the Gelben ritter, and army of Barons armed with Thoron and Silver lances, some with Fortify and silver lances, and herself armed with Bolganone and Fortify. She also apparently has major Dain blood, for whatever reason. Yet again, a Lopt priest is left to guard the castle, armed with Fenrir and Jormungand, this one named Baran. He also has a group of sleep staff users to the north.
Though I know of her little trap, the party starts moving out anyways, waiting on the forests near Dozel for a bit to see if the Beige ritter will show up and allow the party the chance to finish them first. As this goes on, I test a little theory of mine, sending a second magic ring to Levin to see if that would give him +10 magic instead of +5, but alas, their effects do not stack. Ah well, no putting Julius to sleep to make slaying him easier. Drat.
Judging from Hilda's words, I suspect the Beige ritter won't come until we provoke her and her troops, so I have Altenna fly over to scout. She eats a Thoron spell, but the expected effect happened, and the Beige ritter appeared. Scorpio laughs at us for "falling for the trap" and prepares to attack us from behind, not knowing we are waiting to ambush him in the forest. Fee, likely useless against the bow using Beige ritter (especially since they all have Brave bows no less), flies over the mountains and prepares to distract Freege with her wind sword, slowly whittling them down.
Leaf, Faval, and Lester act as the welcoming committee for the fashionably late Beige ritter, being fairly sturdy ranged fighters themselves. Faval takes the first few, greeting his estranged brother Scorpio as the son of Brigid, eliciting surprise from the knight. He finds this fortuitous, deciding that now he can kill "that traitors" child here and now, and Faval says that that honor belongs to him. Faval is unable to hit Scorpio despite using the Ichival, and Scorpio uses makes use of Duel, giving him a second attack and hurting Faval pretty bad, but not getting a critical with his killer bow. Everyone backs off, and the rest of the Beige ritter is allowed to come near, just out of range to reach anyone.
Getting tired of Fee's antics, Hilda takes matters into her own hands and attacks Fee herself, wounding her badly and forcing her to back off for healing before she was able to take down more than two of the mooks. After the Beige ritter have been drawn in with two turns of effort, Lester takes his own shot at Scorpio, and they exchange basically the exact lines Faval did, replacing Brigid with Aideen. He gets a critical, and Patty deals just a bit more damage, before Faval steps in and snaps off the final rotten branch from Jungby's family tree.
With the Beige ritter slain, only the Gelben ritter remained, and so Tinny and Arthur head to face them, wind magic ready to combat their foes thunder. I notice that Lakche can speak with Johalva, Lana to Serlis, and Nanna to Leaf. Seeing as Johalva is on the other side of the map, he'll be catching up a bit later, and so I begin with Serlis and Lana. Lana notes how close they are to ending this, and Serlis agrees, thanking her for staying with him all this time. They reminisce a bit about their childhood before the war, as Lana is amazed at how things turned out between them. She then gains 3 magic defense. Next up is Nanna and Leaf. She asks when Leaf thinks they will finally be through fighting, and Leaf says he's unsure, though he thinks victory is close at hand. Nanna asks if they will return to Lenster after this, and Leaf says that's his goal, so as to finish his father's dream of bringing peace to the Thracia peninsula. She says she will help him as much she can, and then Leaf gains 3 defense. Johalva begins trekking up to the party to talk with Lakche, and Tinny and Arthur begin fighting the Gelben ritter, the rest of the party waiting nearby in case of catastrophic danger.
Nothing of the sort happens, and they deal a healthy dent to the Gelben Ritter, but most of them seem unwilling, so the siblings advance. They take down all the main fighters foes, leaving only the healers and Hilda to deal with. Hilda attacks Arthur, noting that she recognizes him as Tiltyu's son. She asks if he came to avenge his mothers death, and he says he simply didn't want Tinny to have to deal with her. She hits him, activating wrath, and allowing him to finish her off, thus granting both of Tiltyu's children their vengeance against Hilda.
Johalva finally caught up over the course of that battle, and so Lakche speaks with him. She checks up on him to see if he's okay, and he admits the battle has been rather tough (I'll ignore that he's been on the bench for the whole chapter up until now), and he thanks her for worrying. He prepares to re-enter battle, and Lakche tells him to stay safe, since he needs to rebuild Dozel. He agrees, saying that he won't be able to get over his father and brothers deaths if he leaves it as it is now. He asks if she is willing to help him with this, and she says that she still needs to repay him for joining them so long ago, and this gives Johalva +3 strength.
Eh, since he's here, why not keep him with us? Everyone continues towards Freege, and Serlis, with the Tyrfing in hand, easily slays Baran and captures Freege, removing the sleep staff dark mages from behind the castle.
Serlis wonders how the children at Barhara are holding up, and Levin says that there is someone here to see him about just that. Palmark's identical twin Felipe introduces himself as a previous attendant to Emperor Alvis, saying that he had secret orders from his majesty to protect the kidnapped children. Serlis is amazed at this fantastic news, and Felipe says they are all safe and sound at the monastery in town. Serlis congratulates him on keeping them all hidden from Queen Hilda, and Felipe says that Princess Ishtar helped them in that regard, as none of the soldiers ever came near the monastery for fear of Ishtar's retribution. Serlis is confused by that, and Felipe says that Ishtar is actually very kind (could have fooled me, what with the whole "race to kill someone" she had with Julius, but I guess peer pressure from a dark lord is fairly tough to ignore), and was the first one to help the children escape the royal palace. Serlis thanks Felipe for all he's done, and Levin is happy that all of their toil has finally begun paying off. Serlis wonders where Julia is, and Levin notes that only Velthomer and Barhara remain for her to be hidden in, narrowing down their choices. They both agree they need Julia before they go to Barhara, since Julius is there, and without her power, they can't possibly defeat him (again, says you Levin). Serlis wonders if she'd be willing to face Julius, her own brother, and Levin decides Serlis just needs to convince her.
Turns out, the dark mages didn't disappear, since they are affiliated with Barhara, not Freege. Fee prepares to fly over and defeat them, since she can reach them and won't be put to sleep. Everyone else just sort of sidles up and waits for them to be taken out.
Ishtar tells Julius she wants to take the Weissen Ritter out to fortify the palaces defenses, but Julius wonders why she wants to join the battle all of a sudden, and notes that we can't possibly beat him, so she should just stay put. Ishtar says that she wishes to avenge her family, but Julius muses that she either has a death wish or wants to avoid him if she decides to go out there to face us. She swears she loves him, and Julius finally agrees to let her leave, as she calls in the mage triplets Meng, Bleg, and Maybell. After she leaves, Julius decides to send in Arion's mercenaries after us, and then also decides to let loose his "Dark Warlords", wishing to erase us from the face of Jugdral. Now in Velthomer, Manfloy tells Julia to go and destroy all who oppose the empire, and she calls him "your eminence" thus showing that she's likely been mind-wiped... just like with Dierdre.
With Julius sending every last one of his soldiers at us, we leave off today, preparing for the final showdown between the liberation army and the imperial forces. See you all then!
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