That's right, folks, Squall's got a
graduation party to go to! Now, I'm not much of a partier myself,
but hey, it's one of those things where the school's paying for
drinks and decent food for a change, so why the hell not, right?
Zell wants to talk to Squall a bit, and Squall just blows him off.
Granted, I don't think I'd be able to take much of Zell either, but
at least I could give him a little chit-chat at a company event,
since we'd be coworkers and all. Selphie wants Squall to join the
Garden Festival committee. At least we're given the chance to do
that. Might as well say yes so we can have one or two good marks on
Squall's resume', right?
And then there's this chick in a white
dress who wants to dance with Squall because she thinks he's cute.
We'll later find out that this is Rinoa, but that's going to be next
issue. I suppose she's not bad looking, for a young Asian woman.
Nothing against them or anything, mind you, it's just not an
aesthetic I care for. Personal preference, you understand. So, when
Squall tells her he doesn't want to dance, I can understand why he
wouldn't want to. Plus, there's the fact that he says, quite
truthfully, that he can't dance. I get that, too. I can't dance for
shit, either, though I might be slightly better at it than Squall.
Luckily, he does get his crap together for the second half of the
dance. There's even a couple bottle rockets fired off at the end of
the dance. It's just too bad that all of this came as a result of
Rinoa not taking no for an answer when she was asking Squall to a
dance. I actually kind of like women who are a little more
assertive, so long as they know when to cool it.
After the fireworks, Rinoa sees someone
and runs off. Squall steps out on a balcony for some air. Quistis
comes out to have a word with him. Turns out, Squall's slightly
worse at carrying on a conversation than I was at that same relative
age, and that's saying something. Quistis has come to give Squall
one last order, after commenting on his dance earlier. I might not
be much of a conversationalist, but at least I know how to take a
damned compliment with some grace.
Anyway, Quistis's order is for Squall
to change back into his street clothes and meet her at the Garden's
training center. I don't think I mentioned that area of the Garden
before. It's full of monsters so we can learn how the various
controls and stuff work. By now, we've got a Guardian Force that has
the “Status Junction” ability, so we get a tutorial on that.
Essentially, the goal is to put sleep magic on Squall's attack and
use it as an advantage against a monster in the training center
called T-Rexaur.
This is a prime example of a few of the
negatives I was talking about before. Because I'd not yet run into
any enemies with sleep magic, I had to get some from somewhere. The
good news is that there's a plant monster in the gym hat has some, so
I stocked up to have 100 to give to Squall and bind to his attack.
Yeah, it's a tedious thing to do, but a necessary thing, in this
case.
It's necessary because, well, as I was
saying last time, the monsters in this game level with Squall, and
some of them can be damn near impossible to beat if his level is too
high. The T-Rexaur is one of them. The son of a bitch I ran into
right after the plant monsters was only at level ten and had damn
near 15,000 life points and really high defense. I tried to keep it
asleep as much as I could while spamming Shiva and what few other
strong attacks I had available, and the damned thing still wound up
killing Squall. Would have been nice if I could have finished it
off, especially since I was pretty close. Actually finishing the job
bumps Squall's salary up to the next notch in the schedule, and trust
me, the couple thousand extra gold per paycheck really comes in
handy.
Our destination this time is a secret
area in the training center where students and SeeD members go to
have private discussions in company after-hours. Basically, Quistis
wants to confide in Squall after having pretty much getting fired as
an instructor. At least she has the composure to explain herself
without being asked, because Squall couldn't be bothered to do that.
As I said earlier, I may not be much of a conversationalist, but at
least my social skills are slightly better than his. Guess I do have
a few things to thank my parents for after all, because I'd at least
have heard her out without being a dick about it. And my wrap-up
would be that I didn't know how to help her, but if she wanted me to
try, to come find me.
The good news, though, is that she's
now just a regular member of the SeeD organization. She'll be
dealing with some doubt issues over having gotten sacked from her
teaching job, but that was as much the company as it was her. After
all, one would think a for-profit organization like SeeD might know
better than to make a 17-year-old a teacher, regardless of their
other hiring practices.
On the way out, we hear a scream by the
entrance and see the chick who talked to Squall in the school's
medical bay. She's being attacked by a bee
monster who has three minions with it. This foursome has Blind,
Shell, and Protect magic, all of which I need to stock up on, even if
it's hard to draw. I don't have much of it, but then, I never really
use it, either. The strategy I use is to take out the three minion
beasts first and then the big bee thing.
Once the fight's over, a pair of garden
workers come and escort the nicely dressed lady out. We still don't
know who she is, how she knows the characters, or what she's doing at
Balam Garden. But we do know she knows who the other characters
are..
This is one of those things where I
really do have to agree with Spoony's review of the game, from back
in 2007. Here's this mercenary organization who's got this training
center full of wild, man-eating beasts to fight, and anybody, be they
student, staff member, or client, can just wander on in there,
regardless of if they're armed or experienced in combat. More
evidence that SeeD must just like getting people killed for the hell
of it, I guess.
After the fight, Squall contends that
everybody should just be able to take care of themselves all the
time. Quistis says that's not true. And she's right. Or at least,
I would think so, because even an unsociable guy like me knows that
he needs people around to help him sometimes.
But for now, Quistis and Squall part
ways, with Squall going back to his quarters. Along the way, Zell
shows up to tell Squall that they've all got their own rooms in the
dorm now, and Sqall's is right across the hall from his old place.
And it looks like somebody already moved all his stuff for him, too.
After getting a little sleep, Squall
wakes up to hear a knock on his door and a voice telling him it's
time to get their first mission. He's to get his gear and report to
the front gates.
And that's where we'll pick up next
time. Until then, stay safe, have
fun, keep gaming, and DFTBA.
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