6th Day - Friday’s Partings
Like Day 5, Day 6 starts out with Hibiki being woken up at 6:30 in the morning by people coming to see him. Daichi and Io visit him to deliver the news that, probably thanks to a certain blabbermouth who shall remain nameless, Ronaldo has caught wind of Yamato’s meritocracy plan and has officially declared that he intends to use Polaris to create a world of true equality, ruled by the principals of egalitarianism, as well as reaffirming his desire to defeat Yamato. This declaration has widened the rift in the party that Yamato opened last night, but for now Daichi and Io say that they feel that both men are too extreme for them. For now they’ll think about how to meet the “will of the species” requirement before all the Septentriones are beaten and they can meet Polaris.
All of the events that start the day off pair two characters together to talk about their reactions to last night’s revelation and their plans for what to do next. Starting from the top of the list and working our way down, the first event involves Yamato and Io at the JP’s Tokyo branch, where Io’s asking him why he said those things last night when he knew it would cause a schism. Yamato explains his thinking that the world rotted because people are too used to the status quo, and takes the very cynical view that “the dregs” of society are only in it for themselves, civility only being a cover, and that no one takes the long view anymore. After he scares the girl off with this sort of talk he tells Hibiki that only his new world is worthy, and that he’s gladly sacrifice all of the dregs that do not agree to achieve it. This rather open display of honesty raises his Fate up to Stage 3 and unlocks Mithra for fusion.
The second event in Tokyo is between Makoto and Joe over by Tokyo Station. Joe’s asking Makoto if she’s going to keep following JP’s or decide to follow something else, though he speculates that she’s not the type to break ties with the organization, even if she thinks otherwise. When Makoto asks if he’s going to stay, he says he’d probably be one of the first to go in Yamato’s meritocracy, and it seems that he’s wavering towards Ronaldo’s side, as the idea of a world where everyone helps each other seems much more appealing to him. Makoto points out though that in such a world there would be no drive for anyone to succeed and no recognition for being selfless, leading to the possibility of people just sponging off of each other, not unlike some instances in current world, before the disaster. Joe admits that’s true and wanders off as Hibiki steps into the picture, and Makoto admits to him that she’s feeling very conflicted over this and the possibility of having to fight her former comrades.
Next we head to one of the Osaka train stations to speak with Daichi and Keita, where the latter is basically accusing Daichi of being a wishy-washy coward who can’t come up with an alternative of his own if he won’t take a side. Which admittedly isn’t too far off the mark. Also, oddly enough in order to score Fate points with Daichi during this scene you have to pick the dialogue option that makes Hibiki come off as an indifferent asshole. After that we get a call from Yamato where he claims that something’s come up at the Festival Gate that he wants us to deal with. He’s incredibly vague about what it is exactly, but it’s safe to put it off until we see all of these events.
Speeding things up a bit, the second Osaka pairing scene is between Otome and Hinako at JP’s HQ, where we learn that unsurprisingly Otome’s on board with Ronaldo’s plan, viewing the world of egalitarianism with rosy, idealist eyes, while Hinako is a bit more cynical about it, claiming that while she’d gladly help a friend, she wouldn’t so blindly help a stranger...which kinda runs counter to her character during the vast majority of the game... Anyway, she feels that neither side is right, and that this is no time for everyone to be at each others’ throats.
Finally, the two Nagoya pairings. The first has Jungo trying to offer Ronaldo a cup of chawanmushi as a peace offering, and while the insurgent leader appreciates the gesture, he’s still very much determined to stop Yamato and meet Polaris, saddening the young chef. The final one, between Fumi and Airi, has the latter complaining that the meritocracy is just an excuse to bully the weak while Fumi says that she has no problem with it. She says that her experiences growing up have taught her that if you want something, then you should work hard for it. Basically, Fumi follows the “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” philosophy.
With those out of the way, we can now tackle that problem that Yamato called us about. It’s actually another optional battle like the Ghost Q one at the start of Day 3, only more manageable since we don’t have to do it solo. Once we arrive at the Festival Gate we see that Yamato’s also called out Hinako, Airi, and Joe, and when we do inside we see that, perhaps because it got pissed off due to people like Joe constantly mispronouncing its name, the Billiken statue from the Tsuutenkaku has come to life. And it’s apparently a loan shark too, for it immediately sets upon a group of hapless demons and fatally shakes them down for every cent of macca they have. Then it notices us, so time to step in.
Mission 29: God of Luck
- All demons must be defeated
- The whole party cannot die
So, this is pretty much a gimmick fight. While you’re trying to defeat the demons, so will Billiken, and he can really move around the map since he’s got two Vidofnirs with him, both possessing Winged Flight, which adds an extra panel to Flight’s + 1 obstacle-ignoring movement boost. He’s scripted to always attack (and one-shot) a Pazuzu, which is bad news if you’d hoped to crack Holy Dance off of it. There are a few ways to reach it on the other side of the map before Billiken does through combining certain Racial Skills but eh, it’s not really worth it at the moment I feel. The other demons are mostly stuff from late yesterday like Legions and Gui Xians.
Billiken (Lv. 50)
HP/MP
- ???/???
- Resists Fire, Ice, Elec, and Force; Nulls Curse
- Life Drain - An Almighty-based attack that absorbs some HP from one target; the amount absorbed greatly increases if the user has low HP.
- Steal Macca - Steals 1000 macca.
- Barrage Strike - A Strength-based attack that deals heavy Almighty damage to entire enemy team once they have no more macca.
- Moneybags - Obtains 20% more macca after a battle.
- Endure - Survive an otherwise lethal attack with 1 HP.
- Life Aid - Recovers 10% max HP at the end of battle.
- Uncanny Form - Sacrifices some MP to immediately act again.
- Vidofnir x 2
As long as you have a healthy amount of macca and/or did some free battling beforehand to beef up your wallet like I did you will never, at any point, be in any danger from Billiken. He will simply use Steal Macca over and over again until you run out, and since it steals a flat rate instead of a percentage like the notorious Macca Beam and Wastrel Beam spells do, it’s very easy to wall him. You’ll even get the money he stole back once you beat him, and the other demons on the map are fairly loaded too. A breather of a bonus mission, really.
Completing the mission earns us 2000 EXP and 5100 macca.
Airi and Hinako are pretty angry after the battle, believing Yamato was trolling them, but I’m not complaining since we got a decent amount of scratch without much effort. Naturally Billiken is unlocked for fusion. He’s the third Fiend (the second one can only be unlocked on New Game+) and his special fusion combo is Mothman and Silky. Afterwards we have time for another free event before the plot kicks in, so I’m going to go talk to Io, since it’s been a while. Continuing the plot thread from earlier, she’s thinking that demons must be made of information just like people and other living things. But then, where is their information coming from?
The first mandatory event of the day pops up at 10:30, where Hibiki meets Ronaldo outside of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building in Shinjuku, where he says he’s come to investigate a strange space beneath the building he discovered on some blueprints that were stolen from JP’s Nagoya the other day. The two are able to just waltz right on in and discover a giant chamber that has a giant lens projecting an equally enormous pentagram on the floor, decorated with all sorts of arcane symbols and sigils. Ronaldo exclaims that this pattern fits that of a magic circle the Hotsuin family is known for using, and since they’re also known for demon summoning, this must be to facilitate the summoning of something really massive. But what?
We’ll get that answer shortly. For now another story mission calls, and we head to Ikebukuro where we find a flustered Hinako and a significantly more calm Fumi, Apparently today’s Septentrione was spotted in the area, so off we go to the Sunset Boulevard map, one of the few from the first game that we haven’t revisited yet. Keita’s already there fighting the Septentrione, named Mizar, and it’s a huge purple, spherical blob-like thing with segmented tentacles. Naturally when Keita sees us coming he refuses to accept any help, but once he punches one of the tentacle segments it just pops off and forms two mini-Mizar. It quickly becomes apparent that this one’s gimmick is to replicate in this manner, and once several of its spawn are on the field the main body retreats, demolishing the adjacent highway overpass as it vanishes. Time to fight, and even Keita begrudging accepts our help now.
Mission 30: Under Attack
- All enemies must be defeated
- The whole party cannot die
Before talking about the Mizar clones, there are two demon teams at the bottom-right side of the map to fight and crack skills off of. The one led by an Aniel isn’t really notable, but the one led by the Nue is. The Nue has the upgraded version of Animal Leg, Free Leap, which gives the team the option to actually flee battle on an extra turn. And it will be getting extra turns, since the Nisrocs accompanying it love to spam Shield All. Their team has three of the four newly-available skills to crack, so Hibiki kinda has to be the one to fight them.
Now, the mini-Mizars. All of the Septentriones so far have specialized in a certain element (Dubhe Fire, Phecda Elec, Megrez Force, etc.), and Mizar is no exception. It’s emphasis is Physical, and as such its little clones come with Multi-Hit, which can be rather problematic given how many hits they can land. Fortunately though there are a number of demons currently available, like Ixtab and Aniel, that resist Physical, and I’ve also got the Tyrant Balor with me, who is outright immune to it. These things also have an attack range of two panels.
However, eventually they’ll start using a Field Skill called Quick Growth where they will go straight and start trembling. After a turn of not moving, they will grow larger. These larger clones naturally have a higher level, one of its three weakness will be covered, Multi-Hit upgrades to Multi-Strike, which can really put the hurt on your team, and their attack range doubles. When beaten, they’ll split up into two smaller clones which’ll then try to repeat the process.
Since Multi-Strike is a real bitch when used against us, go in heavy with Fire and Ice to destroy the clones before they can grow. Fortunately the smaller clones don’t have much in the way of Magic, so concentrated attacks from the mages will wreck them, and since they’re weak to Curse using Petra Eyes and then trying to one-hit-kill them is viable. They give out a decent amount of experience and macca to boot.
Completing the mission earns us 2200 EXP and 5500 macca.
A JP’s member arrives after the fight to give the bad news from HQ: Mizar’s gimmick is to naturally split and replicate over time, with no limit. Basically, try as we might, eventually we will be overwhelmed by sheer numbers, and Fumi’s outlook is grim: by tomorrow they’ll be overrun by Mizar. Keita and Hinako suggest finding a demon tailor-made for this situation like Shiva and Kama, but are told that if JP’s had a demon like that it would’ve been used already. So here’s where we have Hibiki bring up the magic circle beneath the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building. Fumi doesn’t show any surprise that we know about it, but says that it’s under Yamato’s direct control, so we’ll have to ask him about it. Hinako and Keita are pretty confident that that’ll work though, since they’ve caught on to the fact that Yamato seems to adore Hibiki. Is there anything he can’t do?
Compendium
- Mithra
◊
- A figure in Zoroastrian lore who represents covenants and oaths. He was created by the supreme god Ahura Mazda to destroy demonkind and later became one of the three judges of the dead. The Romans later adopted Mithra as the centerpiece of their Mithraic Mysteries underground cult.
- Billiken◊
- Billiken is a statue of an elf-like being originally created by American illustrator Florence Pretz. Originally serving as the mascot for the University of Saint Louis's athletic department, in 1912 a copy was displayed in Osaka's Luna Park, before being lost upon the park's closure and a replica being enshrined at the Tsuutenkaku in 1980. The Japanese believe Billiken to be a lucky figure, and that rubbing his feet and leaving donations brings good fortune.
- Silky◊
- A house spirit from the United Kingdom, Silkies carry out housework while the family is asleep. If anyone tries to cause harm to her family, the Silky will kill them without remorse.
- Chernobog◊
- An ancient Slavic god whose name means "black god". Aside from that not much is known about him, as historical accounts regarding him are mostly Christian and paint him as an evil pagan god and little else.
- Take-Mikazuchi◊
- Take-Mikazuchi is the son of the Japanese fire god Kagutsuchi, born from his blood when he was slain by Izanagi. He is a god of both war and thunder, and his most famous accomplishment was besting the son of the creator god Okuninushi, Take-Minakata, in a sumo match, proving his strength.
- Aniel◊
- One of the seven archangels in Jewish lore. Another way of reading his name is "Haniel", which is derived from the Hebrew word for joy and pleasure, hana'ah. As such he his sometimes called the angel of beauty and is associated with Venus.
- Ym (NSFW)◊
- A dragon that rules the ocean and seas in Semitic tradition. The floods he causes makes him mortal enemies with Baal, the god of agriculture and fertility.
- Nisroc◊
- Originating as an obscure Mesopotamian god, in demonology Nisroc is held to be a fallen angel who is said to be the personal chef for the various princes of Hell. I suppose even in Hell its rulers would want fine cuisine.
- Nue◊
- In Japanese mythology a Nue is a creature that has the face of a monkey, the body of a tanuki, the tail of a snake, and a cry similar to that of a bird. Its cries in particular where said to herald misfortune, so whenever an emperor would hear it he would quickly start praying. Emperor Nijo was so fearful of it that an associate took it upon himself to slay the beast, leading to many local legends on what exactly happened to its corpse.
- Lham Dearg◊
- Also known as Ly Erg, Lham Dearges are Scottish ghosts who challenge passing men to battle. Even if victorious, the challenger will always die within the next few days. Lham dearg means "red hand", referring to them holding out their bloodied hands to stop travelers.
- Ixtab◊
- The Mayan goddess of suicide, Ixtab's name translates to "rope woman", referencing suicide-by-hanging. Hanging was seen my the Mayans as an honorable way to die, and Ixtab would guide the dead to paradise, where they would be joined by other dead souls who had died unnatural deaths.
- Mizar◊
- The middle star of the Big Dipper's "handle". Mizar is unique among the other Big Dipper stars for actually being part of a system of six stars in total, with most of the other binaries being too dim to make out with the naked eye. Its name comes from the Arabic word for "waistband".
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