I'm going to have to disappoint everyone expecting a challenge, since this is the chapter where my party reaches the peak of it's power, and the first few squads of enemies are peons not even worth mentioning. I will anyway though.
Upon chapter start, we're greeted by this guy galloping across the map muttering something about getting the Tyrfing to Sigurd.
Oh, so that's Lord Byron, Sigurd's dad! The Tyrfing is his family's holy weapon!
See that Tyrfing... that's really something. Well, it's broken right now, so it doesn't have any special properties at the moment. For a level 30 character, his stats are pretty mediocre. Anyway, we can't allow this guy to die, because if he does, he's taking the Tyrfing with him.
Let's take a look at the map.
This is our home castle, Zaxon. It's around the top of the map.
To the east, is Castle Lubeck. If you're wondering why my units are hanging around there, this is because I took these pictures after my units are already screamed across the map.
To the south of Lubeck, there's the Yiad Desert, which is a whole lot of nothing except sand and plateaus.
In the middle of all that nothing though, there's Phinora Castle.
Then, finally, on the far west side of the map surrounded by cliffs, is Velthomer Castle.
Now, let's get down to business:
Disregard safety! Give me only the fastest units, as I intend to throw myself into harms way to get that damn Tyrfing! Byron is surrounded by enemies, and so we need to break through this group of armours to get him out of danger!
We zoom to Castle Velthomer:
Here we have Lord Alvis assuaging the King of Grandbell, who is not aware of the fact that Alvis has been masterminding the entire plot against Sigurd thus far.
Oh, so this is where Deirdre's gone! Apparently, she has no memory of Sigurd, and is currently engaged to Alvis. King Barhara approves this heartily, as she has the mark of Narga, the most holy of all the 12 crusaders, and thus their child would be the rightful heir to Kingship of all of Grandbell.
Now, I've been tiptoeing around this subject for the last 5 chapters, but look at these Holy blood screens that I took earlier in the game:
Now, you see, Alvis has major Fala blood. Deirdre has major Narga. Now, the major Narga blood means that any progeny she produces is going to be the rightful heir to the throne. This is why Alvis wants her, because as their son grows, he'll be the impromptu King instead of a lowly general.
However, look very closely. Notice that they both have a small purple dot in the middle of their Holy Blood chart. This means that both Alvis and Deirdre are descended from Dark Lord Loptousou, the dark sorcerer that had summoned the dark dragon so many generations ago and rained terror upon the land, necessitating the creation of the other 12 crusaders to stop him.
Now, because they're both descended from Loptousou, this is why Manfloy, the very obviously evil guy that's been pulling strings from behind the scenes, has been assisting Alvis. You see, when a minor blood carrier and another minor blood carrier have a child, those minor bloods combine to be a major blood, and this is what Manfloy wants. He wants the child to be the next Dark Lord Loptousou, so the Dark Sect that worships the Dark Dragon will the be most dominant force in the entire world once again.
Now, this is where the terrible incest thing comes in. You see, if you've been reading all the little snippets of the story from all the villages like I have (but have simply not been showing because there's so fucking many of them, and they're all mostly boring), then you'd know that a woman named Sigyn, who was one of the original descendants of Lord Loptousou, gave birth to Alvis. Then, later in her life, she was remarried and gave birth to Deirdre before dying. This means that Alvis and Deirdre are half-brother and half-sister. Alvis knows all of this, and he knows full well that he's going to be marrying and having a child with his sister. Deirdre doesn't know anything on the other hand, as she's been brainwashed by Manfloy. Alvis just simply doesn't care, and only wants the Kingship.
So that's a summary of Lord Alvis' and Manfloy's plot to take over the Kingdom.
Let us continue:
After barreling through the small squad of armours, we've made a clear path for Lord Byron to get to Sigurd.
Lord Byron tells his son that that Duke Langbart and Reptor have nearly killed him and his entire personal guard. He let's him know that he was trying to stop the conspiracy within the royal family, but simply couldn't. He hands the broken Holy Tyrfing to his son before passing away.
So...
The Holy Tyrfing isn't doing anything special right now since it's broken, so how do we fix it?
Simple, just teleport Sigurd back to the castle, and have him pour a whole lot of money into repairing the sucker.
That's 10+ skill, 10+ speed, and 20+ Magic defense (the other 5+ is from the barrier ring he's carrying), and the sword has the prayer skill attached to it as well. The Holy Tyrfing is THE anti-magic weapon, since the huge boost in magic defense renders Sigurd incredibly resistant to all forms of magic, and practically immune to all forms to status ailment magics.
Now, there's a small squad of armours and mages that are approaching castle Zaxon from the west. I have Sigurd sent out to murderize them with his newfound relic of ultimate power:
I can't help but imagine him screaming "DIE ASSHOLES! THINE TYRFING'S THIRST CAN ONLY BE SATED WITH YOUR BLOOD!".
and then I look really dumb when they run right past him, since they're AI says "Attack castle" and not "Attack units". They all still die, but they just ignore Sigurd as he does it.
Back to everyone else:
Oh look, some AxeKnights!
Haha. Moving along.
Oh look, some ArchKnights!
prepare to be singlehandedly beaten to death by Brigid alone:
It seems really silly that they all rush and engage Brigid, since she's the only unit in attacking range, and they she winds up killing 3/4 of their entire squad.
I have her engage their named leader, Andre, who's significance in the story ends at being Brigid and Aideen's little brother.
He really is a peon. Now with all the enemy squads out of the way, there's only Lord Langbart left, guarding the castle.
He's the holder of the Holy Swanchika, the only legendary axe in the game. Langbart is also special in that he's Lex's father, and he's been helping mastermind the framing of Sigurd for the assassination of Prince Kurth. What I really don't like about him is that the Swanchika is one of the few Holy weapons that your party will NEVER get to use, which is a real shame because it's such an awesome weapon.
I mean, look at that! He has 41 defense, and 20 magic defense! How the hell could we ever hope to kill him?
If you said "One-shot his ass with Brigid" then you're absolutely correct. An Ichival critical will kill anything, anywhere.
Now, I have to make a confession here. This is the first time I've ever actually used Brigid in this fashion. In all my previous playthroughs of the game, Brigid always got left out of the fun due to being slower than the mounted units, but this time I went "You know what? I'll give her the Leg and Knight rings, I'll pump up her Ichival to 50 kills, and put real work into making her a good character and see how she pans out" and the results were a million times better than I had ever hoped. There is nothing that can stand in her way.
Take note that he calls out to his other son, Dannan, before he dies, but it's going to be awhile before he gets any screentime whatsoever.
It takes me six turns to capture Lubeck, that's fast.
I spend the next 20 or so turns building up the intimacy between my remaining two couples, Alec!Fury and Holyn!Brigid. They're both successfully implanted into their relationships, and I then finally capture the castle.
We then get this touching scene where Sigurd asks his effeminate man-servant Oifaye to take his son Celice and flee the country and hide out in the outskirts of Isaac. Shanan interjects though, as Deirdre explicitly asked him to watch after Celice, and he notes that the Isaacian people aren't too fond of Grandbellians to begin with, and so offers to escort Oifaye and Celice himself. Sigurd agrees, since having the Prince of Isaac with them will allow them to befriend the citizens, and get around Isaac safely, and so the three of them leave the battlefield together.
Also take note, that Shanan says that he'll get stronger to protect Oifaye and Celice. This is foreshadowing, he's going to get ALOT stronger. Heh heh heh...
Oh man, the plot is thickening thicker than something that's really thick! What'll happen next?
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Topic: Let's Play Fire Emblem 4: Genealogy of the Holy War! [COMPLETED!] (Read 69162 times)