When we last left our intrepid hero, he had finally powered through the tutorial, and so was free to do what he wanted. So what does Minato immediately do? Grind like his life depends on it. Which, funnily enough, it will. But first, the men's restroom to get our Tiredness status up to great. By talking to Mitsuru, we can check each party member's status, including their current equipment and tiredness levels. As both Junpei and Yukari are doing pretty good in terms of tiredness, we're all clear to go grind the heck out of Tartarus. So, without further ado, let's jump in!
As we enter, Mitsuru informs us about these special blocks that exist throughout the tower. Seems they prevent us from getting further up the Tower until... well, let's not kid ourselves here, they're there to keep us from getting ahead of the story. As we enter Tartarus proper, she also informs us of a "great power" a few floors above us. I smell boss fight! Anyway, going through the first floor we find a variety of new enemies, such as some strange hand thing with a mask on and a creature that looks like a tentacled tiara. On this tiara thing, I get pretty lucky and get my first two critical hits of the game, leading to an All-Out Attack which takes care of them handily. In our next fight we aren't so lucky, completely missing against a Merciless Maya, but thankfully Junpei picks up the slack by ont-shotting the Shadow with his Persona. Good job, dude!
Thanks to a lucky Shuffle Time card, the Wand Arcana gives us enough EXP to level up to 4. Sadly, it seems that Pixie is going to take rather longer to reach level 3. How irritating. Ah well, such is life in the wacky world of Personas that can eat Shadows by becoming other Personas. The first floor doesn't prove too troubling, all in all, especially with a chest containing 5,000 yen helping to bolster our weapons fund.
The second floor proves to be more bountiful than the first, giving me both a new Persona (Apsaras level 3) and a level up for both Junpei and Yukari. Fun times! With the next battle we're introduced to Fusion Spells, which use the power of two Personas to create a more powerful attack. In this case, using Orpheus and Apsaras together gives us Cadenza, which heals the whole party for 50% while raising their evasion. Handy! But since our party is doing good for health and we're only up against a single Merciless Maya, I decide to just Bufu the poor thing instead. Turns out this was a good job, since MM is weak to Ice. Sadly, Junpei chooses this moment to get fatigued. Rassenfrassen party members getting tired... I have everyone split up to go find the access point, but this proves to be a poor decision, since poor Yukari gets attacked by a Shadow and I am forced to go in to help her out. One merciless beatdown later, the Shadows are dispatched and we're free to continue. Unfortunately, I get smacked around by some unruly Shadows while looking for the exit, so I'm forced to flee from battle. Live to fight another day and all that. With that streak of bad luck, Yukari and Junpei head off to the dorm, and I choose to cut my losses and join them. Maybe we'll have better luck tomorrow.
Outside school we're accosted by Kenji, who is surprised about us being by ourselves. He still won't let go of the "Minato/Yukari" rumour. Good lord, game, it's up to the commenters who I romance, not you! I tell the guy it is what it is in the hopes that he'll get the point and buzz off. Sadly, he keeps chatting, saying that we've been unlucky since we got here. He does not know the half of it. Seems people have been hearing voices, though, which is interesting... In class, sadly, we find that Kenji still won't leave us alone. Shoo, you nosy boy, shoo! Asking why he wants us to come with him results in him saying that he has nothing to do later. Man, some of us have man-eating Shadows to save the world from here! Seems he won't give up giving eerie foreshadowing and romance talk, though. Le sigh. I guess we have no choice, since we aren't given the option to decline his offer. I swear to god, Igor, all this talk of Social Links making me stronger had better be right!
We head on over to the ramen place after school, where Kenji surprises nobody by showing us that he eats like a particularly noisy pig. Joy. And it seems Kenji is a food geek, since he goes rambling on about how great the ramen is before catching himself. We can tell him to shut up and eat, but let's be nice for the time being. Minato may not like strange people much, but at the very least he's polite. By agreeing with him he gets surprised and declares that we "don't like like the type of guy he'd normally hang around with". Books, covers. Learn not to judge by. After that, he STILL won't let go of the "Minato and Yukari sitting in a tree" thing. Once I'm done with this whole Shadow business, I'm coming back to have Orpheus eat this guy. He also apparently has a secret plan, but eh. Ah well, at least we get another Social Link thrust upon us.
Now let us never speak to this man again.
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