After that interlude with Alice the time has finally come to settle things with the Naoya faction, who we encounter at Shiba Park. Ronaldo, Joe, and the remaining insurgents are there, Ronaldo apologizing for using underhanded tactics to draw us out but if we won’t agree with him he won’t hesitate to fight us. Daichi calls out to Joe asking if he’s okay with this, and Joe actually has a much more nuanced response than his friend. He asks Daichi if he’s ever considered the viewpoint of the weak and when Daichi starts going “yeah, well, I’m dumb, not good-looking, etc.” Joe clarifies that he’s referring to people who are poor, sick, or discriminated against. Those are the kinds of people that he thinks Ronaldo’s world will bring happiness to, the sorts of people who can’t just “wait” for the world to get better, which cuts short Daichi’s argument for just that. Daichi and Hinako can’t concede their views either, so to battle we go.
Daichi Mission 4: Dream’s End
- Ronaldo and Joe must be defeated
- The whole party cannot die
This mission can be short or long depending on how you choose to go about. You can just shotgun right over to Ronaldo and Joe if you don’t feel like fighting the mooks, but I have to because there’s a Salaryman here with Ban Force, the last of the Ban Element Auto Skill series that I need.
Joe (Lv. 55)
HP/MP
- 520/358
- None
- Multi-Strike - Deals multiple Physicals hits to entire enemy party; number of hits dependent on user’s Agility.
- Petra Eyes - Attempts to petrify enemy party.
- Death Call - Instantly kills enemies afflicted with a status ailment.
- + Paralyze - Physical attacks may paralyze enemies.
- Grimoire - Greater chance of inflicting ailments.
- Dodge - Raises chance of evading Physical attacks.
- Debilitate - Reduces enemy party’s defense and hit/evasion rate by 25%.
- Abaddon, Anzu
Ronaldo (Lv. 57)
HP/MP
- 839/234
- Resists Fire, Ice, Elec, Force, and Curse
- Drain - An Almighty-based attack that absorbs some HP and MP from one target.
- Hassohappa - Deals heavy Physical damage to entire enemy party.
- Mediarahan - Fully restores entire party’s HP.
- Pierce - Physical attacks bypass Physical resistance, absorption, and nullification.
- Anti-Most - Grants resistance to all elements other than Physical and Almighty.
- Dual Shadow - 25% chance of repeating last action.
- Wall - Protects each team member with a barrier that reflects the next Physical attack.
- Seiryuu, Osiris
Surprise, surprise, Joe’s the one with the Vile + Avian demon combo this time around. The strategy he’s using looks a little unorthodox for him on the surface, as Strength is not his forte, but it’s an effective one that can still be dangerous to high-leveled teams if they don’t have good Curse protection. Even aside from Death Call his Anzu knows both Hassohappa and Mazandyne, making it a big threat towards people who get petrified. Ronaldo on the other hand has the same kinds of moves he’s had since we first encountered him on Day 3, and since he no longer has the advantage of range he’s a bit less dangerous now.
Completing the mission earns us 3900 EXP and 9500 macca.
Recruitment time. Joe’s at the Nagoya Electric Museum being a pretty good sport about the fact that we just beat him. He says that he really wanted to protect Nagoya and as long as we assure him that his feelings weren’t wrong, fighting his friends was, he’ll joined the group once again, saying that he’ll go get something to eat with Daichi like he never even left. Ronaldo, over by the parking garage, is kinda wallowing in angst over losing, and so helping him reach the same conclusion he does at the end of his character arc is what brings him into the fold. Afterward I did some minor Fate events, including the resolution to Jungo’s subplot where we find him back at the Aoyama Cemetery, watching Jungo the cat from afar. Jungo’s glad that his feline friend seems to be doing well and even says that he’s grateful to Polaris because otherwise he would not have met Jungo. We can suggest he adopt him, and the chef admits that that would be nice, when everything is over and peaceful once again. After seeing that scene the clock hits 3:30PM and we’re railroaded into confronting Yamato at the Tsuutenkaku again. The introduction plays out pretty much the same as it did on Ronaldo’s route, with the only real change being Yamato saying that it’s too much of a bother to talk to people without a vision, so he’ll just kill us all.
Daichi Mission 5: Strong Breaker
- Yamato must be defeated
- The whole party cannot die
Despite the fact that this mission has a different name it plays out exactly the same way as it did in the last route, Yamato’s ludicrous Speed buff and all. Despite having a twenty level advantage over him this time his offensive power is still quite high and as long as he has his Arioch available he can still easily defeat your guys. Once he starts attacking your guys he needs to be taken out fast, so I had a Garuda on hand so that I could just jump directly to him.
Completing the mission earns us 4300 EXP and 10000 macca.
No death sequence featuring the collapsing Tsuutenkaku this time, Yamato just expresses disbelief that he lost and slinks away from the battlefield like every other defeated demon tamer. Yamato’s recruitment scene is different from all the others in two ways. The first is that Hibiki isn’t the one who does all of the talking (as much as he can talk, anyway), Ronaldo actually participates too, wanting to know the JP’s Chief’s motives; why did he try to enact a meritocracy rather than protect the world? Yamato decides to answer since he lost the battle, so he gets on his soapbox to give a Motive Rant that is quite similar to something Naoya espoused during Atsuro’s route in the previous game, that the current state of Japan, the country his family has sacrificed so much to serve, is full of benighted, complacent fools who are content to stagnate and let the country and world fall apart. Ronaldo says that his methods of enacting change were abominable, that someone like Hibiki could change things, bringing us to the second difference in this recruitment scene: since I didn’t really spend any time on Yamato’s subplot during this playthrough his Fate is only at Stage 1, therefore he doesn’t join, saying that he’ll simply watch if that’s the case, and when Hibiki finally despairs of the world he’ll welcome him with open arms.
So on that cheery note now we have to do the stuff with Trumpeter. That proceeds the same way it did before too, the only difference being the characters who find the documents and the ones who accompany Hibiki and Fumi to Hibiya Park. Afterward there’s still a little time for one last event before we have to fight Benetnasch, so I’m going ahead and seeing the next scene of Io’s subplot. It’s in Ikebukuro where she tells Hibiki that her parents used to tell her to speak out more, but it wasn’t until she stopped the boy from killing himself earlier in her event sequence that she really saw the value in that, in the ability to change someone’s mind for the better So she thanks Hibiki for getting her to this point and starts to ask something of him when everything’s over but backpedals and walks away instead (three guesses as to what...). The stage is now set for the battle with the final (not really) Septentrione.
Daichi Mission 6: Seven Down
- Benetnasch must be defeated
- The whole party cannot die
No differences here. Moving on.
Completing the mission earns us 4600 EXP and 10500 macca.
The party takes their victory over Benetnasch as proof that they should all be fighting together (helped along by members outside of the initial Tokyo faction getting lines throughout the scene). After the usual back-patting and advice to be on the lookout for any changes now that all the Septentriones have been beaten we’re turned loose on the overworld for the remainder of the day. Only assorted Fate scenes left, and I’m just going to bring up a few of them this time. The first is the finale to Io’s Fate subplot, where Hinako and Airi are once again arguing over something, this time over whether Osaka or Nagoya should be the new capital of Japan once the world’s restored. They ask Io to weigh in, and after some ellipses and “Uhhhhh...”s she decides that neither should in order to preserve the regional quirks that give the two cities their identities. Hinako complements her for stating her opinion (a contrary one at that!)...and then she and Airi turn things right around on Io by going into full Shipper on Deck mode, and as is the usual standard for Megami Tensei silent protagonists in this sort of situation you can have Hibiki either brush it off or play along, leading to even more distress for poor, shy Io.
The other scene is with Yamato at Osaka’s Ebisu Bridge, since apparently we can still see this one scene with him even though he’s not part of our party. It’s pretty simple, showing him talking to a dying man, who seems to in some ways agree with Yamato’s philosophy of social Darwinism, figuring that he deserves this fate for being such a screw-up in life. Because he has nothing left to do, he gives the unusually somber JP’s chief a piece of candy he originally wanted to save for his daughter, and after he dies Yamato wonders if he really deserves to have it. Whatever you respond, he wonders if there is any worth in understanding how normal civilians think...
Some other scenes that appear for Ronaldo and Joe now are ones I’ve never seen before, probably because I didn’t see key scenes of theirs’ earlier. They’re pretty minor overall, Ronaldo revealing that he got into law enforcement because when he was a kid he was enthralled by a cop show, and Joe basically going on about how things will all work out in the end except when they don’t. At bedtime we get the four emails from our fellow faction members since we did all of their events: Daichi’s has him muttering that moving Hinako’s stuff was really hard and that she sent him a picture of some sort of shachihoko (the fish gargoyles you see on castles, such as the ones on the museum at End City in Megaman Battle Network 5) mascot as thanks, Io’s grateful to Hibiki for bringing an end to all the infighting, Hinako expresses her amusement at Airi’s hapless dance lesson, and Jungo says that he and Hibiki should visit Jungo once things are better again.
Time to go to bed. Tomorrow we shall once again seek an audience with Polaris and...uh...do, um...something...
Compendium
- Ananta
◊
- One of the primal Hindu beings of creation, Ananta can hold all the worlds in the universe on the back of its many, many hoods, and at the end of each kalpa it will destroy all of creation. In more mundane roles, Vishnu uses the serpent as a bed.
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