Chapter One: On the Job Training

We finished the training last night, so let's finish this chapter and figure out where all the zombies are coming from.

Before the first real fight starts, Colette and Alouette remind Prier that she's in charge. She shouldn't be in charge, but she's the main character, so she gets to be in charge. They suggest heading back to town to stock up on new items, as well as to heal. I'm a wuss and have been doing this the whole time, though.

Our first fight is in the Hall of Justice. It's a narrow hallway with the usual assortment of bats and a zombie.
The second fight takes place in the Birdcage. It's a wide open area that once served as an entrance foyer. There is a new enemy here that I managed to convince to join the team. The Will o Wisp is a sentient flame. Its attack doesn't seem high, but it has good fire magic. Don't kill everyone just yet. Behind the wisp is an event point. Sending anyone, even allied monsters, onto it will trigger a new scene. The three humans notice a heavily locked door that they can't open. Prier wonders about treasure, but Alouette senses sorrow behind it. Alouette believes if they work together, they can beat down the withered door. Prier bemoans needing to do manual labor, but she joins in with no negotiation. Colette throws himself into the door but is unable to nudge it. His big sister, being the full frontal assault that she is, performs one swift kick that utterly destroys the wall. There's no treasure inside, to Prier's chagrin, but there are two skeletons holding each other. Alouette prays to the Goddess, Poitreen, and the souls of the two skeletons will appear before them. Their names are incredibly French, so I've already forgotten them, but they've been trapped in this safe room for over 400 years. Long ago, before the Kingdom of Paprika, there was another country that was at war. The invaders breached the estate, so the Count of Montblanc protected his family here. The doors never opened again, though, and the lead lining made it impossible for even ghosts to travel through. But now they're free. Prier begins to feel sad at the skeleton's predicament as one was a young boy who never got to grow up. We return to the battle and finish it to advance.
The third fight is the Hall of Courage. It's another standard affair, but there are two exits we can take.
Battle four should be the Hall of Truth. It's a room filled with six bats that I accidentally killed. There's another event square here. The orphaned kids have come here to make sure Prier was doing her job. I thought Alouette had that role, but okay. They also found a secret passageway to another room. Alouette calls the Church to pick up the children, and we explore further in. Inside is a lone skeleton and his dairy. The diary tells of the writer being in love with his brother's wife. He was jealous of him, so he poisoned everyone's food. But he made sure the wife and child were in the safe room. All he wanted was his "caged songbird," which is as creepy as it sounds. Prier is visibly upset at the whole affair, and I dig the voice work her VA did for this scene. We finish the battle after this.
The fifth and final fight is in the Throne Room. Before anything happens, we see a large bull demon spirit enter the room. It calls us invaders and threatens to kill us before the two spirits we saved earlier show up. The demon turns in the Count, and the family sees each other for the first time in 400 years. But we're not done yet. A second demon, brother Oseille, appears, and it's the guy who killed and trapped everyone. This is our first boss fight in the game, but it's pretty easy. Take out the bats and purify all the portals to make sure we get him alone. Oseille doesn't have much attack power, and even my weak Bat Bit survived multiple attacks. Each human character has a unique dialogue before the one-on-one/many attack phase, but I only saw Alouette's. She feels no remorse for what she's about to do, and I'm behind that. He's harder than anything else we've killed but isn't too challenging. When the dust settles, Oseille reiterates that's he's jealous of his brother and claims he took his true love. Prier isn't having any of that and goes off on him. She calls him a lot of names before giving a patented thrust kick. Oseille disappears into nothing. Colette thinks his sister was too harsh, but Alouette says nothing. The Montblanc family gather together, finally at peace, and Alouette says a prayer to Poitreen. They all head to, presumably, heaven or whatever the afterlife is here.

This is the end of Chapter One, and I got the good ending. had I not seen both of those extra scenes, I'd have, presumably, fought the Count and gotten the bad ending. Being moral gets you an additional 1600 gold.

I am not good with foreign names. I can't spell, remember, or pronounce the abundant French in the game. Fortunately, the random monsters we get have stupid names that don't mean anything. "Legendary Bones" on a basic zombie... What do I hate more? I tried to do something with the item fusion, and I got lost. I might end up ignoring that. Also, fun fact, the goddess' name translates into chest/breast. Isn't that fun? Praying to boobs?