LogFAQs > #940281635

Agreed.

In the meantime, I've made some progress in the Crossbell field trip.

- Pleasantly surprised by Juna's demeanour here. I was expecting her to sulk and be aggressive the whole trip, and instead she's forcibly cheerful & putting on a brave face. I like it.
- Kurt & Altina low-key sneer down at Crossbell City as soon as they get in - pretty insensitive, guys! I feel for Juna. (Though these are completely in-character for self-absorbed Kurt and asocial/blunt Altina, so no concerns here.)
- We make our way to Orchis Tower. Juna: "Though the tower has tons of empty, unused floors." Heh.
- Rufus is headquartered on the 20th floor, apparently? Makes sense if you're trying to protect yourself from both an attack from the roof and from the ground floor, I guess.
- We meet Rufus, who's his same old self (though interestingly, he hasn't talked to Jusis since CS2). He mentions a 'wanted man' who took care of the Cryptid up north, and I wrongly assume he was referring to Arios. Apparently, Lloyd is wanted, too.
- Awww, Juno really idolizes Lloyd. That's a nice moment there.

- Back in the city! Is that Reinford I spy where the IBC building used to be? Oh, apparently the IBC has downsized and now only occupies a few floors of the building. Interesting - I was wondering what was going to happen with the bank after Ao.
- Meanwhile, Heiyue has basically moved down the street. One of my main takeaways from the Crossbell games is essentially that we never saw or hear Heiyue actually do anything wrong. They tried and failed to buy a building... that's it. And yet they're depicted as this huge underworld threat to peace and security.
- I go into Crossbell News Service, and I still can't go up the 2nd floor. What do you mean, I can't send military officers to terrorize a newsroom? This is an outrage.
- Rean's handling the Crossbell trip very smoothly so far - giving the spotlight to Juna to boost her confidence while softly supporting/encouraging her. I like Rean as an instructor - much better than as a generic high school student.
- Whoa, East Street is looking good in glorious 3D! I go into Neinvalli and promptly get roasted by Ashleigh "There's this one sucker who spends all his free time doing everything anyone asks him to"... ouch.
- Aaaaaaaand I proceed to meticulously spend every penny I have buying useless accessories for trading later. I might have to file for bankruptcy, and resort to selling food to pay for every Mishy accessory (there's gotta be something for collecting them all, right? I hope so).
- I go and visit Juna's family. Her siblings mention 'that one guy from the Empire' she told stories about... huh. Could that be... Rean? I'm not sure, but if it is, that's a completely different dynamic than the one I thought they had.
- I head back to Reinford to meet the chief of the foundation, expecting Roberts. Oh, it's Tio! Figures. I'm not sure I like her voice actress, but otherwise good to see her. Altina's getting benched at the first opportunity.
- Over to the Geofront for a fairly straightforward dungeon. One thing I noticed: no Monster Chests anymore! Shame, I was always looking forward to seeing what reward they would give. I'm not going to complain about the lack of trial chests, though! Eventually, I face a boss and get sorta bailed out by Alisa & Sharon. Huh, apparently Rean/Alisa was canon.

- After a quick interlude at camp, we're off to Ursula Byroad to hunt a Cryptid. I take Sharon with me (benched again, Altina!). Kurt magically guesses she's an Ouroboros Enforcer through some ludicrous reasoning ("Oh, a fighting style I haven't seen before... MUST BE OUROBOROS.").
- Sharon is excellent in combat and brings back all the Delay abuse that Rean is no longer able to do well.
- Ouch! Tough Cryptid fight, though I didn't do myself any favours by bringing exactly zero Freeze-resistant equipment. Early fight goes well, but when it buffs himself, I start having major problems. Hmmm... I'll have to start conserving my S-crafts until later.
- Red Pleroma Grass, huh? Guess that's where the Red Gnosis in Zero came from.
- McBurn is spying on us, and mentions that he'll need to focus on 'the target', who is neither Rean nor Sharon. Has to be one the VIPs.
- Sharon backstory! That was sudden. ...am I the only one who thinks the 'Order of the Moonlight Horse' is a strange name for an assassin order? Unless of course it's a reference to real world history I'm not aware of. Either way, she goes over her childhood, and mentions back then Ouroboros was still in its early years. What? I thought for sure the society was way older, judging by Arianrhod and Campanella's respective age. Apparently not! Interesting. At least this explains why they only started getting active in the last few years.
- Huh she's responsible for Alisa's father's death? Huh. Though I note that the game does some figure-skating around the issue and never actually says she killed him. I wonder what happened there.

- Back at camp again, and we finally find out who the VIP delegation is: Carl Regnitz, Irina Reinford + the two decent Imperials. .....huuuuuuuuh that's actually bad news. I thought we'd have one Osborne crony in there to give the Imperial faction some motivation to protect them (I guess Carl technically is, but he's more of an ally of circumstance than a pawn), but they're all good guys. Do Rufus/Osborne actually have any vested interest in protecting them? We see Claire & Lechter nodding in the distance... ambiguous, but I feel Claire would not probably not go along with complete foul play. Guess we'll have to wait and see.
- Oh hey, Vita is around too. There's a free spot available in my party if you have the time - I sure as hell could use an OP magic user.
- Some mysterious white-haired man is observing the proceedings from the top of the SSS. Hmmmmm... not sure who they are, but my money on a character previously thought to be dead (e.g. Crow), because no one ever dies in that series.

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When you have nothing to say, quote yourself ~ Solfadore