We're greeted with a familiar sight upon accessing the Underground: a downed Net Policeman who gives us some Soul Weapons to install before checking out. The evil spirit puzzle from Circusman's scenario is back, and the two areas of the Underground are designed around it. There are a lot of gaps in the floor and singular conveyor panels, so there's definitely an emphasis on attacking the spirits from behind in order to get through the puzzle quickly and with minimal damage. I did a lot better on the first area than the second, going from obtaining five Bug Frags from my leftover Soul Weapons to only one.
The Underground introduces one final new panel type, volcano panels. Anyone can stand on these panels, but intermittently they'll erupt, the lava plume dealing fifty points of Fire damage to whoever's standing on one. Like lava panels in the other games, Aqua attacks can remove them.
After the spirits in Underground 2 are cleared out we're allowed to head up a long ramp to a giant platform at the back of the area. There's no skull mark here, but it's time to save the game and those following along might want to pull up a chair since we're in for another long round of cutscenes. In the midst of a giant crater is Megaman. He simply utters “Please...delete me!!” and transforms into his Beast Out form, once again being taken over by Gregar. Lan finally decides that trying to get through to him is useless, and decides to finally use force to stop him.
Gregar Megaman
HP: 900
Element: Normal
Attacks:
- Gregar Buster – Megaman fires a rapid volley of buster shots that deal 5 damage apiece.
- Gregar Claw – Megaman slashes the target with Wide Sword and Long Sword-ranged slashes for a total of 120 damage.
- Stun Claw – Megaman slashes a two-panel-long range for 40 Sword damage and paralysis.
- Thunder – Megaman shoots a ball of electricity that tracks the target, paralyzing it and dealing 30 Elec damage.
It's odd that paralysis is the name of Megaman's game here, but it's certainly effective. Whenever he manages to stun his opponent he'll immediately follow up with Gregar Buster, which is just as fast as it is during normal gameplay. Chargeman turned out to not be a very good choice for this battle, since he's slow and it's hard to hit Megaman with his charge attack. Megaman's moveset is at least rather basic, so his speed is the main thing he has going for him.
And he has the Air Shoes ability for some reason.
Megaman lets out one last roar before turning back to normal and collapsing. Chargeman says that he's fine, so Lan goes to jack his Navi out...only for Circusman to jack in, thanking Chargeman for weakening Megaman. He's about to attack Chargeman and steal Megaman again when the cloaked Navi from before jacks in and slices through him. Protoman
◊ throws off his disguise (a paper-thin one, I might add, since his sword's been visible the whole time) and Circusman decides that it would be better to retreat.
With the clown gone, Protoman heals Megaman and he realizes that he had to be rescued again and apologizes for all the trouble he's causing. Protoman tells him to save that for later and all three Navis sense something powerful coming their way. Colonel appears and cuts down Chargeman, forcing Lan to immediately jack him out. Colonel's here to retrieve Megaman himself, and this time even Baryl's watching. Protoman says that he'll handle Colonel since he fought him before in the Judge Tree, but a fight between the two leaders of Battle Network 5 is forestalled by Megaman insisting that he wants to try talking him down instead.
Megaman insists that there must be a reason why Colonel's joined the WWW, but his former leader takes the line that there is no reason, he's just doing this for himself. Megaman calls him a liar and asks why he held back just now. If he was truly evil like he claims he would've deleted Chargeman, but he didn't, he hesitated. Colonel has enough and attacks him, but Protoman takes the blow instead (couldn't he parry, or block, or something? He can turn his arm into a sword too). Both Chaud and Protoman insist that Lan and Megaman need to get rid of their kindness because Baryl and Colonel are no longer the people they once knew. It's the same argument they made during the Bubbleman scenario in Battle Network 3. Being good and righteous is admirable and all, but you'd think that Lan and Megaman would've been hardened just a smidgen after all they've been through.
It's then Lan's turn to ask Baryl why they have to fight each other, and his response is simply that he's in the way of their mission. Both parties finally agree on the futility of words, and Megaman squares off against his former commander. Idealism vs. Pragmatism!
Colonel
HP: 1200
Element: Normal
Attacks:
- Screen Divide – Colonel swings his sword, projecting a diagonal or <-shaped slash onto Megaman's side of the field for 80 Sword damage.
- Induct Missile – Colonel fires a series of missiles that hit and crack random panels for 50 Fire damage.
- Colonel Army – A soldier will appear on the field and fire a machine gun for 30 damage per hit.
Like Megaman, Colonel's also gotten a new battle sprite. He's a bit easier right now than he was in Battle Network 5 since Screen Divide isn't as fast and his other attacks don't have quite as much bite until his later forms. Right now his main game is to corner Megaman with Induct Missile's broken panels, so if Megaman had Float Shoes installed at the time of his kidnapping they work well here. Colonel being weaker here than before does nicely tie into the theme of him holding himself back because he's not truly evil like he claims.
Winning gives us 6000z.
Megaman tries reasoning with Colonel again after the fight, but Baryl says that it's just their destiny to fight. Lan says that he's finally figured things out and tells Baryl that he's doing all of this for no reason at all. He explains that he wanted to know if Baryl's will was truly to join WWW and fight him, but no matter what he keeps saying that it's fate instead. He's focused so much on destiny that he's thrown his will away. Baryl finally admits that Lan is right, but he remains loyal to WWW, saying that there's a favor that he needs to return. With that, Colonel disappears into the shadows.
We fade to black as the narration mentions Cyber City being rocked by the mayor's arrest. The scene goes back to the Seaside Town, where the remaining three ex-WWW agents try to salvage something after messing up at every turn. They still want to get one of the Cybeasts, but this time Vic suggests that they ignore Gregar and steal Falzar from the WWW instead. Yuika says that Baryl and Colonel are too strong for them, but Vic has an idea. When he was stealing the Force Program, he explains, Colonel stopped trying to attack Lan when Iris showed up. He figures that she's their weakness somehow, so if they catch her, she can be used as bait to draw out Baryl and capture the remaining Cybeast.
So the scene goes back to Cyber Academy, where Mick and Tab are asking Lan whether or not he knows why Mr. Mach hasn't been showing up to teach class lately. Since he can't tell his friends that their teacher was a WWW agent, he just vaguely says that he must be dealing with some problem of his own. They hear a crash, and the three look up to see Yuika, Ito, and Vic standing behind the teacher's desk.
Well, given that this school is apparently some kind of WWW nexus, I'm not even surprised anymore.
They claim to be their own criminal organization now, called either Yuika's Lovelies, the Justice Club, or the Cloudy Bombers depending on who you ask. How about just Mud? After some bickering over the name and who's leader (while Lan and co. watch in incredulous silence) they demand that Lan tell them where Iris is. He refuses to tell them (and doesn't know anyway) so Ito has Judgeman pull in a bunch of security robots from Green Town, the kind with the taser arms, to shock Lan into telling the truth. This fails too, so they decide to just steal Megaman again. Mick and Tab try to defend their fallen friend, but are naturally no match in the face of the robots.
It is then that a voice says to stop and the camera pans to show that Iris has mysteriously appeared in the classroom as she is wont to do. Yuika tell the robots to get her, but Iris just speaks a word and they step aside. Team Mud has a moment of collective confusion over this display of technopathy, but hey, their target is giving herself up, so who cares?
They're all gone when Lan regains consciousness. Mick and Tab don't have any idea where the group took Iris, but Tab ends up suggesting Lan look at the BBS on the Undernet to see if there's any info to be found there. Even though I've read it before, the characters all act like they've never seen it before. So Undernet 2 is our next destination, but on the way I'm going to swing by the Underground again because Colonel EX is located on the same platform where he was fought before. He's given two notable new attacks – first is Neo Screen Divide, a Z-shaped Screen Divide that in practice hits an I-shaped section of the field thus leaving only two safe panels, and the second is Aspire Break, where Colonel throws his cape over Megaman and then slices through him. This attack is an instant kill if Megaman isn't equipped with Undershirt. His Navi chip attack is Neo Screen Divide.
There are a whole bunch of Punk Navis looking to pick a fight with us barring the way to the BBS once we do reach the Undernet. They're not allied with the WWW or anything, they're just random thugs looking to start shit. When we do reach the BBS one of the posts does indeed have what we're looking for – Team Mud's been seen at Sky Town, so off we go again.
It's at the helipad where our group of bickerers happens to be. Their plan to draw out Baryl appears to have been successful, because he's shown lying on the ground after being beaten up by the men. Iris appears to be unconscious. Lan runs up but there's nothing that he can really do as the other prepare to dump Baryl into the sea.
But help does arrive sometimes, a voice says. Mr. Mach drops down from above and, since he's no longer playing the fool, finally gets to show off his martial arts and kicks Ito's and Vic's asses. They all beat a retreat, leaving their hostages behind. Mr. Mach's glad that Lan still thinks of him as a teacher, but he's still beating himself up over being a WWW agent. Lan says that there has to be a reason why he's doing what he is, so it's time for our teacher to spill his backstory.
It's pretty simple, really. He explains that his daughter had a life-threatening illness, but since the operation to treat it was expensive they didn't go for it. Afterwards it looked like she was going to get better, but she suffered a relapse. This time Wily stepped in and paid for the operation in exchange for Mr. Mach joining his organization. Wily doesn't have very much screentime in this game, but he does come off as a lot less maniacal than he did before. Perhaps the failure of his Alpha scheme humbled him somewhat? Or this game's writing is just more nuanced, but I digress. Mr. Mach's role was to keep tabs on Cain. In fact, the incident with Blastman at the start of the game actually came about because he was trying to hack Cain's computer. Since Mr. Mach and Blastman's personalities are the polar opposites of each other, I imagine that he received his Navi from Wily directly instead of programming Blastman himself. Anyway, he thanks Lan for thwarting that scheme since it placed his students in danger.
So, on to how he knows Baryl. The tale for this one is an even simpler matter. He joined the Netopian national karate team some time in the past, and looked up to Baryl, who was team captain. He says that he's sure that Baryl has his own reasons for joining the WWW, but we won't learn why exactly Baryl owes Wily a favor until the end of the game. If it wasn't clear before, it's obvious now that Baryl putting together Team Colonel and taking down Nebula was something he did for Wily.
Mr. Mach finishes his tale by saying that he wanted to be at school to see his students graduate, but things were going to inevitably turn out this way when he joined Wily. He says farewell to Lan again, and leaves with Baryl. Our hero his very saddened to see his teacher go, and wonders if he would be able to do something to make a difference were he older.
Very glum stuff all around, that's all I can say in closing.
Virus Listing
- Earth Dragon
- Our final virus family of the game consists of Chinese dragons that inhabit vases. They prefix their attacks with a roar, and then slither down one column and up the next.
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