Moreso in the game than in on my cousin
Timmy's old sketch comedy show, but I figure I may as well make the
reference since he did me a good turn and mentioned this on his
gaming stream when I was in the chat on the 22nd.
Gotta say, I think I could really get into Final Fantasy XV, between
what I've seen in that stream and the Let's
Play of it CLG's
RekiWylls is doing.
But going back a half dozen games to
Final Fantasy 9, we left off with Zidane having a look-see at what's
going on around the village of Cleyra. There's some good stuff to
find that I'd forgotten about. I would only have bought one Thunder
Glove had I remembered one was available for free.
There's also one last Active Time Event
where one of the Burmecian soldiers is understandably yet
unfortunately teaching his kids to be racist when he and his family
corners Vivi at the Inn and calls him a bastard, mistakenly thinking
that he was involved with Alexandria's taking a big, giant crap on
Burmecia just because he's a Black Mage. The innkeeper breaks it up
before things can get physically violent, which gives Vivi a chance
to at least say he wasn't involved, even if it doesn't really get him
anywhere.
From there, all that's really left is
going to the temple, where the priests tell Zidane that Freya's going
to be there awhile, so he should just go to the Inn and wait there
for her. When he gets there, Burmecian Soldier Dan shows up,
freaking out about how the Antlion is going nuts and trying to eat
some kid. The only option is to follow him down to the monster's den
and try to kick its ass. Dan gets there just ahead of Zidane, but
won't go in with him to actually fight the damned monster. On the
one hand, the guy does have a family to think of, but at the same
time, he was eager to fight the monster until it came time to
actually fight the monster. Fortunately, Freya, Vivi and Quina show
back up to help instead.
Turns out the kid the Antlion is trying
to snack on is that Puck guy Vivi was hanging out with at the
beginning of the game. And better yet, Puck is actually the crown
prince of Burmecia. I guess it explains why he's kind of a punk.
Somehow, Freya recognizes the guy when the soldiers don't seem to.
The Antlion has a gold helm and some
mythril armor that will be useful later, and one Annoyntment, which
cures the Trouble status, which also comes in handy, since the
Antilon causes that as well. It's easy enough to get it all and then
wail away on the monster.
After the battle, the party goes to the
temple, where the priests ask Freya to join them in the ritual dance
to strengthen the storm protecting the settlement. It's certainly an
enchanting dance to watch, even if it does ultimately go wrong.
After the dance is completed, the strings on the harp used to provide
the music pop, and the harpist says it's a bad omen. Bad is kind of
an understatement, as the storm stops, revealing what would otherwise
be a very lovely day in the area around this particular Mana Tree.
When the storm stops, the scene shifts
back to Alexandria Castle, where Steiner and Marcus are locked up in
a cage suspended in the middle of a rather large room being guarded
by Beatrix's soldiers. The pair is arguing about who's to blame for
their being in the fix they're in. Meanwhile, Dagger's under guard
in her room, deciding that she's going to be frank and forward with
her mother about what's actually going on. Zorn and Thorn show up to
take her to speak to her mother, though for other reasons entirely.
Dagger asks her question about what the deal with Burmecia was, and
Bhrane says it was because Burmecia had actually intended to hit
Alexandria, so she decided to act first to keep that from happening.
We're given a choice to either take the queen at her word or call her
on it. I went with calling her on it, simply because I do believe
it's mostly a shorter route. Either way, eventually, Kuja shows up
and puts Dagger under so that Zorn and Thorn can do a ritual of their
own to pull the summons, officially called eidolons for the first
time, from Dagger. For some reason, they had to wait until she was
sixteen to do it. I know a lot of these mystical things like this
have weird age restrictions, so I guess it makes sense.
With that ritual underway, we get back
to Cleyra, where Zidane and Freya discuss what they're going to do
now that Cleyra's at as much risk as Burmecia was. The decision is
made to do something about it. Zidane's dialog options include
agreeing with Freya about what's going on, wondering who Kuja is, and
being most worried about Dagger. I went with wondering about Kuja,
because I actually kind of do. With that, Zidane goes to get the
others while Freya gets to look around before meeting up with the
others at the entrance to town.
This is where I'm going to save and
take it a rest. Things are going to get interesting for a bit here
soon, but we'll get more into that next time. Until then, stay safe,
keep gaming, have fun, and DFTBA!
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