Yeah... that was a bummer.
We need to figure out some way to do something about that. We've taken the Daein capital, but have given Daein something that can't even charitably be called a bloody nose.
Well, next time. We still have investigations to run!
Yeah, having a man in such a prominent position as Nasir be your betrayer stings like hell.
GOOD NEWS, EVERYONE!
This chapter title got hit a little bit by the translation, but mostly by the English language. The Japanese title for this chapter, 一人、歌う, means "one person sings"- or, more to the point, that the word "Solo" is referring to a solo musical performance. "Solo" is the correct word for this in English, but divorced of context and with the relevance being tangential, the title doesn't make much sense.
Begnion reinforcements! This is the good news referenced by the opening narration.
Not that Ike was informed ahead of time.
But they must be the real deal!
General Zelgius, earl of Kadohl. Or Cador, Zelgius's lands are so remote I think they only come up twice. I'd make a short, candid description of the man relevant to how relevant he is to the story right now (slight spoilers, not very), but Fire Emblem Heroes has done a very effective job of opening the lid on what it is that makes this man deserve a name and a face.
Ike can only say he came out of nowhere.
Which is to be expected: From the point of view of Begnion's house of card politics, it was just as surprising.
"You lend a hand in facilitating an apology for Begnion's genocide and help mend the bridge between beorc and laguz and all you get is a battalion or two."
Sephiran poked the Senate in the rump.
The Prime Minister, to be precise. He is also the youngest member of the Senate, so the remainder resent his power, but it is true that Sephiran gets the last word- and he's loyal to Sanaki directly.
Sephiran gets crap done.
Less than half a day... don't underestimate this guy!
Well, that's good to hear. I was worried Tanith might decide to leave us out to dry.
Yeah, uh, sorry about that.
He's making himself helpful.
Thanks, Sanaki!
All out of the goodness of their...
...
...Sephiran, what's your angle?
Titania is starting to sass Soren about his pessimism.
Well... that sounds...
Yeah, we don't have a ton of Crimeans. Lore-wise, we're now how much Begnion?
Openly Begnion?
I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader. Well, I can't, you probably scrolled down already.
I mean, how is Crimea supposed to stop this from happening? They don't have much of a military, after all, they had to rely on these reinforcements in the first place.
And, of course, we won't get the credit. I feel like at this point this is just a footnote in a "this is a Very Bad Thing we should try to avoid" kind of argument.
Sanaki would never!
Again, you can hear the silent giggles of the devs as they write the characters saying things like this.
Titania asks whether this is an instance of this kind of ill intent being applied to an innocent case. She has a solid argument, considering how helpful Sanaki is.
It sounds a lot better when we haven't just discovered a spy that we have been allowing access to the inner circle of our intelligence network.
The Soren sass. There's a parallel to Three Houses with this argument that I'm sure many people might react to with the same disbelief as Titania and Elincia did: Claude trying to bring in Almyrans to reinforce the Fodlan effort. Until he kills Edelgard and gets the Hubert letter, he is actively planning to subvert Fodlan's government, remember.
If we do not treat Soren's concerns as valid, we could be ignoring a genuine problem that comes back to bite us in the butt later.
What do you reckon? They don't actually answer this on screen, I don't think.
The person who charged in to the main area ahead of time got the MVP. Also, that Spent Gold tab represents a costly Shiharam Forged axe.
We're not seeing any Supports today, but we have a conversation with a youth and a Youth to see.
Jorge wants to talk to us. This is basically Jorge's one on one conversation to show off who he is. Yeah, no one wanted this guy in Heroes by merit.
Another hint for the upcoming mission!
Ike is less inclined to help. After helping Daniel, he felt his time was a little wasted.
To be fair to Jorge, what Ike taught Daniel in Chapter 13 was very general. If the map is not flat terrain like Chapter 4, you can probably use chokepoint management to your advantage. I can see how Daniel became so much better than Jorge with that hint.
Also Daniel is just smarter than Jorge. I do not doubt.
This isn't exactly strange. Often, players become better at games than developers, because they're more open to trying strategies the developers didn't intend. It's obvious when you say it like that.
Ike irritably asks whether Jorge can lend a hand on the battlefield. I'd consider going "hey, another Sniper", but for the main file, having a ponytail doesn't count as being a woman.
"Unless botters put in a lot of effort to put us in a mobile game for the amusement and vitriol of thousands of people."
On one hand, kind of a jerkish behaviour. On the other hand, mood.
You signed up for this, what did you expect?
This advice is usable everywhere, but especially useful in Chapter 22. "You don't want to kill the enemy" is the rare part. If it does happen, Shoving is usually the last thing you want to do- if you can Shove them, they're close enough to attack you and risk their own death.
Jorge and Ike sorta awkwardly come to a bit of a conclusion over their irritability.
Neat conflict resolution, I guess. That's Jorge for you.
Sothe gets another conversation here. Anyone who's played Radiant Dawn has a fairly solid idea why.
Ike's not fussed about titles, they change on him every week.
So has Sothe found that person he was looking for?
No. No he has not. Has anyone drawn this person in Path of Radiance's artstyle? I don't think any of the Radiant Dawn characters have been backdesigned.
Sothe's fine with waiting for things to cool down before he continues searching.
She's not in Begnion, that's all he knows. Ashera only knows what would've happened if some of the Begnion characters found her.
So what's gotten Sothe into his funk now?
I don't think this was explicit before now, but yes, Sothe is Daein born.
Here's where Nevassa gets mentioned, apparently. Welcome to being a peasant.
One might be inclined to assume this is Edward, Leonardo and Nolan (we'll meet them in RD), but all five of them explicitly met one another during the three year timeskip. I wonder what happens to these friends of Sothe.
Yeah... what money do they have to go move someplace else?
Honestly, this is very true.
You never really know what it is you have until it's gone.
Ashnard's only criteria for his generals is "good in a fight." Class does not matter. This is the only chance 90% of Daein has had for promotions.
That's not even limited to Daein. Has King Crimea ever done that for his people? Empress Begnion?
In Radiant Dawn, Sothe looks up to Ike. Man, where is that Sothe in this conversation? His friend would be proud of him here.
Both Crimea and Daein's suffering is worth thinking about.
Ike keeps getting heavy facts dropped on him. He's probably had a more thorough political education than any other Lord, and he's not even a proper noble.
Everyone other Nephenee capped a stat here. Marcia got Speed, Ilyana got Magic, Mia got Strength and Astrid got Speed.
Regardless of whether we're accepting the Begnion help, not for this mission.
Zelgius will keep our seat warm.
Yeah, uh, honestly, I wouldn't trust her with Zelgius if he was exactly who he claimed to be.
Zelgius asks if Ike wants more people.
Ike isn't a people person.
I wonder if there's an particular purpose for this.
How admirable. And yet his superiors are nothing of the sort.
Well, we're here. Now why are we here?
How will we know for sure, anyway?
Why would Nasir serve Daein, anyway? What possible reason could he have?
And an unrelated question, who is the dragon he was so keen on helping?
This would be a pretty damning piece of evidence (although I don't remember seeing Mist show Nasir the medallion on screen), but Daein knew pretty well where it was, the Worm would figure it out on his own.
But still, Mist is seeing a huge breach of trust.
Let's figure out what he wanted to tell us and then hash things out. Honestly, this could be a trap for all Nasir's words are worth.
This scene is actually bonus content especially for this playthrough. I'm just kidding, if you want to see this scene, just refuse to recruit Reyson.
Told you we'd be the only ones to see it naturally.
You see, it is very important that Reyson be present to talk to us about the reveal at the end of this chapter, and having him in Phoenicis is very inconvenient for that.
So what got him to change his mind in universe?
This isn't particularly explained, but it isn't exactly the only time this happens. I think.
Who, or what, wants Reyson here really wants Reyson here.
And with Ike here, there's definitely something in it for him.
...He just waltzed into Daein on his own, didn't he?
Don't tell me bringing Leanne would make you safer. I don't want the Black Knight spawning on this map.
It's still Daein. You know, the country that declared independence from Begnion because Begnion, the genocide doers, weren't racist enough?
Yeah, like the Daeins for Crimea, we haven't gotten around to every corner of Daein and stuck our flag in it.
You have massive white wings!
Yeah, I'm not sure which of them will notice first, but they might actually just keep flying into each other to try and get here before Reyson gets into any harm.
He probably will, he's not that kinda fella.
Well, as long as you don't fight- oh right, herons can't fight.
Good, you can do that in the corner and Mist can deal with the actual battle.
Here's our boss for the day. Schaeffer is a nice generic bandit- well, Warrior- for us to take a bit of a breather with.
We also have a named bishop character, Tomenami.
Schaeffer's first reaction to the Crimean Army's arrival is "we're about to be arrested or killed". Probably killed.
Tomenami is not actually an accomplice to Schaeffer, by the way. Schaeffer and his mercenaries are squatting in Tomenami's temple. That'll be important coming up.
"...Actually, they're all women, apart from the general. And possibly the heron, I can't tell."
"Gahar har"? I... do not understand how one makes this laugh with their mouth.
Probably easier than stealing candy from the baby, but still harder than the expression requires.
Schaeffer, despite his appearance, has a cunning plan.
That cunning plan being "HOSTAGES!"
Oh come on, it's not that hard to do this kind of trap movement. Not pleasant, but not hard.
This guy is more popular than his screentime suggests. Honestly, probably the best disposable chapter boss in PoR.
I'm sure we can arrange for them to meet the goddess early.
Welcome to Palmeni's interior. Tomenami is to Ike's right. Also pictured, five people riding mounts in a religious building.
One of these rooms has gotta have what we came here for.
"And this is the nice door. And this is the sweaty column."
Tomenami is a bad liar.
And cracks under the slightest of pressure.
Not Nasir's doing, incidentally. Although I don't imagine that's how it looks to Ike.
Don't worry, buddy, I don't hurt the religious... unless they're making the lives of the whole continent miserable... yeah, that's not you.
Sure you did, Ike.
Big words from a man who's about to get his ass handed to him by a little girl.
Oh yeah, the whole "breather chapter" thing.
Schaeffer realises he needs leverage to make this somewhat close to even.
Unhand that holy man!
Enemies from nowhere! That is a lot of Priests.
Slightly over half of them don't have any staves at all.
Also they're innocent people and the sanctity of the church and this is a war crime of the highest order, that too.
The goddess helps those who help themselves.
They turned red when they joined your faction. Oh, right, this is post-GBA, design colour is separate from faction colour.
There are 19 of them and you have 35 weapon uses on your person.
...Wait a second. Starts counting on fingers.
No no, that's quite all right. You couldn't hurt a fly.
We have an Objective! And unlike last time, an incentive a good chance of completing it!
One thing I've seen asked, and would like to highlight here, is that, if Schaeffer did not react to Ike's arrival by declaring "nobody leaves alive" and using hostages... would Ike have killed him before going on his way?
It was a hard choice, but Jill will be sitting out this time. She's finished her Supports, we need every infantry unit we can bring, and having a Bow is very nice on this map.
Here's the map. Which of these units are Army and which are Priest isn't explicit, but the important thing is that Army moves and Priests don't. The Thief is in the bottom left and will try to steal things, as is normal. Our victory condition is "Defeat Boss"- we win when Schaeffer dies.
This is Schaeffer. He's come to crit you no matter which range you're attacking from, but he can only do so from one range at a time, which is perfect. It will be the Killer Bow that drops, but if you've trained your Thief, you can bait him into using the Killer Bow and steal his Axe. It's beautiful.
Colossus, the Mastery Skill of Warriors, has a Skill% (16%) chance of multiplying his Strength by 1.25x (+4 damage) for the hit if and only if his Con is higher than his target's (13 is a fairly high Con and he can proc it on anyone except transformed Lethe in our party). It is a candidate for the worst Mastery Skill in the game and you should never bother using it on Boyd. If you do, it's probably the best use of those two Statue Fragments you may or may not have grabbed, other than selling them for 4000G. (To add insult to injury, Boyd is lighter than Schaeffer).
Titania brings a spare Chest Key I happen to still possess. No room for Sothe here.
Mist can't oneround this guy with a normal weapon, so breaks out the magic. I want this man dead.
This is Astrid's odds of just murdering Tomenami on the spot. Let's never have a character who can attack Tomenami in his range at the correct distance.
Remember when I said Astrid having bows was invaluable?
We didn't want this guy using this. Both to preserve the uses on it and because it would make Ike's life very interesting.
Astrid makes sure to continue standing in melee range to Tomenami.
Astrid comes up, and Shoves this guy for kicks. Only infantry units can Shove, and if we want to get past that Priest wall in front of Astrid without sinning, someone is going to have to Shove a guy out of the way. This chapter is basically "you can Shove enemies, the gimmick".
Speaking of, we need access to this room and the priests are in an annoying arrangement. Let's kill the non-priests.
I knew this thing would come in handy!
Marcia stands here like she's blocking a chokepoint. Reminder that the Army units can walk through Priests.
There's only one way into this room, and that involves this guy dying.
So Mia can Shove this Priest out of the door.
Titania kills this myrmidon.
Now Ike has a safer place to stand!
Tomenami, of course, will not pose a danger to your units. But he will attack, because why wouldn't he?
Damn you and your Longbows.
This guy does not have a Longbow.
These Warriors have Bows, too. And Astrid is right up in their face.
Astrid, you had one job.
So a swordmaster just walked up to Calill and stabbed her. Calill sets him on fire.
Oh no, a staff that I might never use. Probably should consider it, for some enemies up ahead...
The difference between gameplay and story: Tanith is supposed to be Marcia's boss. Also, I don't think they're at B Rank yet, but if they were, Tanith would have the Support and Marcia wouldn't.
Calill stands here, because I didn't have anything better to do. In hindsight, maybe I should've had her Shove a Priest so it was easier for Tanith to get in here. Unlike the enemy, she had to go all the way around.
Titania continues to frustrate with what she cannot do.
Ilyana presumably killed the guy so Mia could come in and start attacking these enemies. This guy never moves, in my experience.
This guy, Titania can handle.
She can even Sol him for health!
Ideally, I'd rather get Mia the EXP. She's more likely to use it. But Titania also has WTA.
Nephenee pushes Tomenami over.
Mist can deal with this guy in melee!
Astrid shoots this guy over Tomenami before baiting down the mages.
I have no idea who this archer is. Mist and Astrid clearly had a 100% chance of killing their archers. Also, this guy has a Physic staff, despite still using it at melee.
It is debatable whether Tomenami would have contributed if he had hit.
There were multiple good reasons to not get hit by this. First being "Venin", second being "Bow."
The Swordmaster crit in the GBA era was amazing, but credit where credit is due for the PoR one.
Titania wound up attracting the attention of the other guy. Which, considering WTA vs WTD, says a lot about both Titania and Mia.
Enemy reinforcements! Those laguz are Feral Ones- apart from Chapter 24, they will now be a regular inclusion in the enemy ranks. No special dialogue from any laguz for them, though- probably for the best, those portraits are terrifying.
Ilyana continues to not care that they're weak to Fire.
Annoyingly, this archer takes two hits with the physical sword, but he's not worth a Sonic.
Astrid and Nephenee decide there's nothing more to do up north and come down to see what's to be done in the south.
Mia picked up a Chest Key from one of her targets and starts looting. Bolganone is the A Rank Fire tome and will find itself in Calill's possession at some point.
This is definitely going to Astrid or no one. Still requires A Bows from Astrid.
Calill correctly applies Fire to the beast tribe. She's a lot less magically potent than Ilyana right now, and this is also a Tiger.
I think the only thing better than an enemy with 0 Might having a crit chance is an enemy with 1 Might having a crit chance. Well, assuming I'm at more than 3 HP.
Tanith covers for the archer.
And Lethe does the swordmaster I feel should've attacked us already but couldn't figure out the room arrangements. I honestly don't like dealing with the way the priests are set up on this side.
Lethe also crits him. I get the best still frames.
The two bishops in front of Schaeffer also have Light tomes. I consciously left Mist in range of one because of the 1 EXP from chip. Why did I do that?
Mia is missed by this Sniper.
So Turn 4, we're close to opening all the chests, and the only Army units left are that Sniper and Schaeffer.
Here's another one of these. We don't have a ton of axemen, huh? This is either Jill's spare, Titania's or Astrid's if she finagles the axe rank for it.
Ooh, cash!
Magic stat up!
Well, this guy is dead.
Mist says hi to the boss.
In addition to the Physic priest, there is also a Mend priest to his other side.
That's a big scratch. And Mist gets another hit!
Did they call this chapter a breather? Because my sides are too busy hurting from laughing too hard.
Schaeffer has the standard complement of quotes- Ike, Tauroneo, beasts, birds, and Reyson. Sadly, he's not that funny in most of them.
Schaeffer: Bah! So you’ve made it this far, have you? Tell me, how many pathetic priests did you have to kill to get here? Come on, five? More? They’re pretty scrawny… You could probably take ten or so without breakin’ a sweat.
Ike: Cowardly cur! Time to stop hiding and fight like a man!
The "how many priests did you have to kill" line is good, at least.
Schaeffer: I’m pretty sure you herons don’t know how to fight. Lucky me! I’m gonna kill ya, stuff ya, and mount ya in my den!
Schaeffer: Heh heh heh. Now here’s a familiar face! It’s one of Daein’s old generals! Look, I’m a coward, and you’re a traitor! Let’s be friends! Whattya say?
Reyson and Tauroneo, respectively.
Well then. Something about 1 EXP chip, come to think of it?
We acquire the Killer Bow. May Astrid crit some more at some point. Also, why did I bring that Silence staff again? Tomenami? Not that Restore would be too useful- two of the priests have Silence staves, but they did not fire them at all.
Mist declares herself the new high priestess.
I don't fancy your odds of being rescued by soldiers from a friendly one much better. Wonder what other mercenary holdouts we're not dealing with because Nasir told us about them.
"Not while we get BEXP for it."
I will never feel fully comfortable with the tradition of calling priests "Father". Elincia has a dad, he's Crimea's best King, and sadly mostly by default.
"Now, we're here to search your temple for something we don't know about."
Well, fair, I guess, I mean-
...Oh, sure, I guess there's no real reason to keep this one secret anymore. Cat's out of the bag.
I mean, even this random priest knows now!
Just as there are many who are happy for the employment opportunity.
"This" is only for us if we spared every last one of the Priests. You still get partial BEXP for a partial save, but you need to spare them all to get this one.
The Ashera Staff is the S Rank Staff. It fully restores the HP and status conditions of every friendly unit on the map. Not only that, but it's good for 100 EXP no matter what level you are! You get three uses.
Obviously, a staff named "Ashera" does not appear outside the Tellius duology. Surprisingly, "full heal to everybody" only appears in Binding Blade (Saint's Staff/Holy Maiden) and Sacred Stones (Latona).
"I search the room."
Elincia asks if she can help. Ike's happy for it.
Well, that was quick.
Oh crap, already? Did we not get all the mercs?
Oh, different kind of trouble.
The walls are very interesting!
Well, by "interesting", I mean "some person has written their life story on it."
Not that Ike and Elincia know what they're looking at.
This is the Ancient Language that Reyson and Leanne speak.
Soren uses the language to cast spells, but he doesn't know enough of the language to read the walls himself.
Well, nowadays it's the Serenes language. There are some exceptions lying around between the couch cushions.
Imagine having to do this. How do you even know what order everything should be read in?
Yeah, uh... take all the time you need.
Soren has figured out the gist of it, though, and gives a good guess as to what the story is.
He doesn't know enough for that detail.
...But he does have other clues. We don't see what "this" is.
Reyson's done reading. How long this took, we have no idea, but we either checked the rest of the temple to be sure or know this is what we came for.
I think Reyson isn't "actually sick", just kinda bothered by what he saw.
So that's what Soren found.
...Yeah, that ought to shock most people.
"Had" an older sister, it sounds.
"Will you" suggests Reyson does have the option of staying silent.
But it's important we hear this story.
Surprisingly, the ambiguity is used in Radiant Dawn, although I question whether this is the correct description of her kidnapper. It was probably very confusing for her, especially since the Serenes Massacre was going on and the Chaos of that would be muddling with the senses of the Order-filled Herons.
"Revive the thing sealed inside it" ought to be sending your mind in one direction in particular. I'm chewing on the phrase "thrust a clan treasure at her".
Lillia literally Cannot do what she was asked. Not "will not", can't.
...This isn't even a translation thing, this is in the original JP too, but uh... do you even know about the Medallion right now, Elincia? I don't remember Ike sharing that yet.
Herons are really, really delicate.
Even Mist is brought to tears.
Blue eyes is fairly standard, but blue hair?
This line gives me some pause about where this plot point goes. The Japanese line does not use 正, so this is not "Order", but this is why her heart being unusually pure is important.
Mist looks up in interest.
Lillia entrusted the woman with a goal.
Take the treasure and a song and run the hell away.
Ike figured out the same thing as Mist and possibly you.
So yeah, hope you were paying attention to Titania/Mist and knew who this woman is.
And this would be how Greil came to be in possession of Lehran's Medallion.
...Even in anime world, wouldn't blue hair still be the rarer note?
Only at this point in the conversation does Ike realise what Reyson is calling a clan treasure is the same thing as Lehran's Medallion. Even if Elincia knew about the Medallion, she shouldn't have connected it to the dark god earlier.
Reyson doesn't quite realise what's going on immediately.
But we know exactly where this unusually Order-aligned woman went.
Unfortunately for Reyson, though...
We found out too late.
I think the people on the run have the highest odds of being entangled in a plot like this. Especially since the Black Knight looking for the medallion and Petrine looking for the princess tripped over each other.
And everyone starts having fun assembling the "puzzle" that is these overlapping goals.
Mist puts the plot on pause briefly to sing the song that Lillia entrusted to Elena.
It is similar because both are heron galdrar, but that's a bit of a generalisation, isn't it?
When the song is sung before the Medallion, the dark god will awaken.
Well, wouldn't it be fun to explain to the world if that worked, huh?
This is why Lillia couldn't do what was asked of her. She legitimately did not have the power.
Where and when is this person? It'd be the mother of all coincidences if she was here as well as Elena's kids. (She's not.)
One question Path of Radiance doesn't linger on too long here is "why are we bringing the galdr of release to Altina?". I mean, don't we not want the dark god to awaken? Why did I build that sentence in a way that would only lead to confusing triple negatives?
Another bit of coincidence here is that Elena, random priestess of Palmeni Temple, was married to one of the Four Riders. I wonder if the "these two characters team up and flee Daein" happened before the marriage.
This is when Ike tells everyone other than himself about the nature of Lehran's Medallion.
Although Titania might have been let on the secret by Greil sometime after Elena died but before the plot started. Possibly when Greil started having a good idea about how dead he was.
This is incredibly convenient. It's important to note that Ike and Reyson have no actual hard evidence for this, just a lot of circumstantial evidence that points in that direction. It certainly isn't the worst guess...
...You mean to say Titania doesn't know who killed Greil? Caineghis brought up the Black Knight while she was in the room in Chapter 9, right?
...I'm really confused about where this take comes from.
...How the hell does Ike not mention it's the guy they saw scaring Petrine away? Or the guy that met them in Toha?
Or Titania might genuinely be irrational right now. When it comes down to "the identity of the Black Knight" as in "who he is under the helmet", well, no one in this room knows that, but the Black Knight is a fairly recognisable character in and of himself.
Soren tells Titania to clear this up later. Titania meekly apologises for overreacting.
So far, the only reason we're fighting Ashnard is for Crimea.
And, even though we now care about these things, we can still solve these problems by fighting Daein. How convenient!
Coincidence, or narrative structure?
Daein does multiple bad things! Could it all be coincidence? Especially since all three of these things contribute to the same goal.
The meaning, maybe, but does that really matter to us?
Oh, we're blaming Ashnard for killing Misaha now? I can believe him starting the Serenes Massacre rumour, maybe, but if he declares war on Crimea to start conflict because Begnion is too powerful, why the hell are we believing he could assassinate a foreign power two years before he became King in the first place? I feel like we're being invited to take this sentence as true, but damn now I think on it, it's just far too unrealistic a guess.
Take solace in the fact that doesn't help them at all.
And that's the story of how not recruiting Reyson doesn't change the plot at all.
You don't get him as a playable character still, though. We made our choice.
And that's a hefty BEXP packet for keeping the Priests alive- unlike with the Laguz Emancipators, there's no extra bonus for sparing them all, we already got the Ashera Staff for that. It is turn 12 where you have to finish before they start penalising you on turns, though.
Next time: We examine some Fire Emblem pitfalls.
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