Legend of Legaia - Part 6 - The Man Who Accepted the Seru

 

Welcome back to more Legend of Legaia.  Last time, we entered Biron Monastery, met up with Maya, and found our new party member, Gala.  Now… we head back to Biron Monastery to check out an explosion that happened here!

 

As we enter Biron Monastery, we find the fan and door mechanism to be broken.  Well, this is already a bad sign.

 

Gala looks to his shock the destruction that occurred in here.  He goes off ahead of us, and we are left to explore ourselves.  Noa notices that the seru are here, so expect some enemy encounters.

The enemies we’ll find here are Gimard and Theeder lvl 2.  I don’t think I need to go over them again, as we’ve seen them in the Ancient Wind Cave.  Capture them if you haven’t yet.

 

We check in Zopu’s room, and find it’s empty.  Let’s continue searching.

 

One Biron monk, barely alive, tells us that Songi was responsible for the attack.  I mean, from the previous part, it was pretty clear that Songi was up to something.  Unfortunately, speaking to the other monks get us no response; they seem to be dead.

that must be one sturdy door

 

The middle door in the second floor seems to be closed.  Vahn knocks the door, and we hear a voice from inside.  Looks like there are survivors!  They let Vahn and Noa in.

 

Zopu greets us as we enter, and learns of the dead Genesis Tree in the west forest.  He then explains that Songi has led an attack on Biron Monastery with the seru.  He also noticed that a seru was attached to Songi’s arm, and believes that he is being possessed by it.  Gala learned of Songi’s actions, and left with a fit of rage.

 

While here, we can talk to this guy to the left – Kin – and he’ll teach Vahn, Noa, and Gala (if he’s in your party) new arts.  He can teach Hurricane for Vahn, Dolphin Attack for Noa, and Battering Ram for Gala.

 

In the next room, this lady here can get you some food to fully restore HP and MP.  The resting room is kinda broken down, so this is here for your full heal.  Another lady tell us some bad news: Maya was left in the other room.

 

We rush into the room where Maya stayed and find to our heroes’ shock that Maya is taken over by a Seru.  Noa tries to pull the seru off Maya, but Terra urges her to stop.

 

As Maya and the seru are fused into one being, tearing off the seru this way would kill her.  The only way to remove the seru is – as you’d expect – to revive the Genesis Tree in East Voz Forest.

But before we leave, let’s check out this room a bit.

 

There’s a Guardian Water in the urn to the right, so pick that up.  In the middle of the room, there’s a letter written by Maya.  I’m sure she won’t mind reading this, so let’s check it out.

 

To avoid filling the next part with just screenshots of text, I’ll just transcribe the letter here:

“To my daughter, Mei: Today Vahn came to Biron and told me about Juno.  I was so shocked and I shed many tears.  When I think of how lonely you must be, my heart breaks with grief.  When you were still young, I left you and came to Biron.  I left because of the Mist.  Please forgive me for leaving you in Rim Elm.  Vahn says I can return with him, but there is something that keeps me here at the Biron Monastery a little longer.  Please forgive me.  There are two orphans here, Songi and Gala.  They are about your age, and they are like sons to me.  My obligations here compel me to stay.  You must think that I don’t care for you, but that is not true.  I know that the people of the village are supporting you.  Please forgive “

The letter ends here, unfinished.

Kinda mean that Maya left her daughter here, but at the same time, I feel we don’t really have the full story here.  I do like the detail that the letter remains incomplete, as it implies that the attack happened as she was writing this letter.

One other detail I like to point out: when going back to the first floor (the room with the Biron statue), we can get into an enemy encounter with a unique background.

BIRON IS SILENTLY JUDGING YOU

 

This background has the statue there!  It’s not present if we fight anywhere else.  We actually don’t need to come down here at all, but that’s some cool extra stuff they did there.

We head back to the exit to East Voz Forest, but Gala catches us before we leave.

 

Gala is in disbelief that Songi is responsible for this attack, and so he wants to go to East Voz Forest, as he feels that Songi is there.  But since Vahn and Noa are on the way as well, Gala asks them if he could join our party.

 

Humbled by our fighting prowess (and totally not because he would get his butt kicked should he go alone), he asks for our help, and we agree to help him.  And with that, Gala joins our party for real!

A quick note: remember that Ra-seru egg we found back at West Voz Forest?  Well, we can actually use that as an accessory!

An accessory key item?  Oh man

 

This will raise lightning resistance.  There’s not much elec based enemies in the next area, but it’s gonna come in real handy in an upcoming boss fight.  I’ll give this one to Gala.

 

We exit out of the monastery and reach the overworld once again.  And with that: new monsters!

A palette swap and a BEEEEEEE

 

We’ve got Gomboo, a totally-not palette swap of the Gobu Gobu from the beginning.  Just like said monster, this one can steal your item, so make sure to take it down before it runs off with it.  Otherwise, it’s the same monster, just beefed up a bit.

We’ve also got a freaking Hornet.  While its regular attacks aren’t particularly strong, it’s poison sting attack can cast venom status on you.  Its block rate is also generally higher than the usual monsters, so it’s kinda hard to land some good hits.  Again, as a flying monster, low attacks will do nothing.

A claw monster and a BEEEEEEE

 

Another monster we can encounter here is a Twin Tomb.  This enemy can land multiple hits, and they can stack up to do quite a bit of damage (around 80HP).  Otherwise just hit it with your best moves.

Now entering: East Voz Forest

 

Now, our next destination is north of here… so let’s go straight there!  No detours this time – not much places here to sightsee.  Let’s head right into East Voz Forest.

Gala don't need no scouter to detect Songi's whereabouts

Yeah, I'm sure that will go well

 

As we enter the forest, Gala stops us for a second.  He notices Songi’s presence here.  He asks Vahn and Noa to leave Songi to him.  Again, you started off at level 1, I’m not sure you really have much say here…

 One detail I wanna mention here: notice how green the East Voz forest is?  Compare it to West Voz Forest, where the flora is more gray.

The western forest is more lifeless than the eastern one, and it makes sense, as the west side is much closer to the misty valleys.  It also explains why the Genesis Tree we found there had died by the time we reached there.  This gives us hope that the Genesis Tree on the Eastern side may still be alive!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As for monsters, we’ll meet the Nighto and Twin Tomb monsters we’ve met before.  But, we’ll also meet a new seru: Gizam.

Gizam questions why it's placed in an area with no water

 

This seru is on the slow side, but it can do pretty strong damage if left unchecked.  Vahn and Noa should outspeed it and be able to KO it by themselves.  By capturing this seru, you’ll get a pretty good magic out of it.  It’ll be your first access to an all-attacking move.  The damage it does is pretty strong for an all-attacker, and it can poison enemies!  The poison damage isn’t particularly good, but this is still a good magic to get, nonetheless.

you definitely don't wanna eat this mushroom

 

Speaking of poison, we got a Mushrin here.  This enemy likes to use an attack that can cast venom on one party member, so it’s kinda annoying to deal with.  Upper attacks will do no damage to it (yet Vahn’s up attack can hit it…?)

As we journey into the forest, we’ll be finding these glass looking grass blocking our way.

you know, we could just walk to the right of them...

 

We can’t do anything about them for now, so let’s find another path.

 

Upon reaching a fork in the road, head right.  Follow the linear path to find a chest containing the WEED HAMMER.  Gala says that we can use this to break those crystal grass blocking our way.

 

By the way, can I just stop for a moment and talk about the Weed Hammer?  There are some words or phrases that I just find inherently funny, and I think Weed Hammer is one of them.  I can’t exactly explain why, I don’t think it has anything to do with the actual weed.  But I get a little chuckle every time I say Weed Hammer.  Good job, Weed Hammer; you shall sit on the list of inherently funny phrases, along with “Jesus has a Stand”, and “equally distributing the Kingdom Hearts.”

 

We can bash the crystal grass right next to the Weed Hammer chest to find another chest containing a Magic Leaf.  We can also bash the crystal grass near the beginning of the area to find another chest containing Guardian Water.

Back to the fork, let’s head north.  Let’s bash some more crystal grass blocking our way.  (side note: I keep typing out crystal glass instead of grass… it’s kinda annoying)

 

Following one tunnel, we’ll find a Cure Amulet, an accessory that protects you from venom.  With those Mushrins roaming this area, this could be a pretty useful accessory to equip.

 

Another chest here contains a Survival Club.  Finally, a new weapon for Gala!  Also, you may notice that Gala can equip other weapons like Vahn’s survival knife or Noa’s nail glove.  There’s a catch, and this applies to any other party member: Gala is not proficient with these other weapons.  What that means in gameplay is that Gala’s arm command when attacking is doubled in length.  It is absolutely NOT worth equipping other weapons that you can’t properly use.  Whenever you have a weapon that anyone can equip, it will list who’s proficient with that weapon first, and that weapon should go to that character.

 

At the far north of this area, there’s another chest containing an Azure Jewel, an accessory that raises lower defense by 20%.  I haven’t mentioned this before, have I?  Defense is split between 2 stats: upper and lower defense.  Upper defense determines how much damage you take from upper attacks, and lower defense from lower attacks.  I feel it doesn’t make too much of a difference – you could get through the whole game without paying much attention to the differences of these 2 stats.  But let’s try to be a bit more mindful of these stats in this playthrough.  I’ll give them to Gala, as his lower defense is quite lacking.

As we head deeper, we’ll find a save point up ahead.

Save your jame

 

Save your game, and let’s see what’s awaiting us.

And not transparent!

 

We find the Genesis Tree up ahead, and what’s even better: it’s alive and healthy!  Surely this one will push the mist away from Biron Monastery.

We approach the Genesis Tree, only to be halted by a voice.  Lo and behold, it’s Songi!

 

He has thrown away the friendly façade we’ve seen when we first met him, and has revealed his true colors.  As he effortlessly jumps down the cliffs, he taunts our heroes, showing off his new seru on his arm.  However, unlike the others, Songi had not been possessed by the seru – he attacked Biron Monastery to his own volition!

 

Gala, rightfully pissed off at Songi, tries to fight him down, but he can’t even lay a finger on him.  Songi proves himself too fast and too strong for Gala.

Photos taken before disaster

 

Songi taunts him again, saying how he’s not even worth the time to fight, and decides to leave us to his seru minions.

it's boss time

 

From behind us, Songi summons new seru monsters, and we engage in a boss fight!

 

 

Songi has given us 2 Viguros for our heroes to fight against, a much higher leveled seru monster than we’ve seen before.  And this fight can get pretty ugly if you come in unprepared.

As mentioned before, you can use the Ra-seru Egg as an accessory to reduce lightning damage, and it’s gonna be real helpful in this fight; Viguro has Thunder Break, a lightning attack that can do almost 200HP damage.

ouchie ouch

 

As for other equipment, aside from putting on your best gear, I suggest equipping the Ivory Book on Vahn or Noa.  These 2 bosses can actually be captured!  But, the catch rate is ridiculously low, so if you wanna get this one, equip an Ivory Book.  Don’t worry if you didn’t catch this one right now; much like other seru, there’s going to be another opportunity to get this one.

As for the fight itself, focus all your attacks on one Viguro.  The sooner you take down one, the more manageable this fight will get.  Don’t worry, it won’t do something weird like make the other Viguro stronger by defeating one of them or something like that.  Gala, unfortunately, isn’t gonna be very useful in this fight, as his attacks are a bit too weak to do decent damage to them, and he’ll be easily outsped by them.

Gizam magic can do pretty good damage on both of them, so if you have the MP to spare, use it to your advantage.  I tried using Gimard on this fight to see if I can debuff their attacks, but turns out: they count as bosses, and therefore the debuff didn’t land.  Still did pretty decent damage here.

Their regular attacks can easily do quite a bit of damage (especially to Noa), so having them gang up on one party member is not a fun time.  Noa can easily outspeed them, so you can use her as an emergency healing with Vera or even a Healing Bloom (if the damage is spread out).

Have your party members spirit up, then unleash with your best arts.  Remember: these are floating enemies, so low attacks won’t do anything.  As soon as one goes down, the fight should go much more smoothly from there.

 

 

Once you defeat the 2 Viguros, Songi taunts Gala once again.  He leaves our heroes and jumps back into the mountains.

What a butt

 

Now’s our chance – let’s revive the Genesis Tree!  Vahn and Noa call out to the tree, and we see it glow its radiant light.

OH MAN HERE WE GO AGAIN

 

From the overworld, we see the tree dispel the mist from the surroundings, but something unexpected happens: we see the Genesis Trees from Rim Elm and Mt. Rikuroa resonating with the tree from East Voz Forest!

THE RADIATING TREES ARE RESONATING

 

Their auras combined, they corner the mist back to the misty valleys, and dissipate the mist there, finally revealing the supposed source of the mist.

 

The Ra-seru egg hatches, and a blue Ra-seru appears before Gala.

 

Gala hesitates for a second, but asks the Ra-seru for its strength, in order to defeat Songi.  The Ra-seru introduces himself as Ozma, and reassures Gala that he will not take his mind, but rather assist him on his journey.

Still not completely sure what this levelup does

 

Our heroes return to Biron Monastery and find that everyone is free from the mist.  Zopu commends our heroes for awakening the Genesis Tree and saving the people in the Monastery.  However, Zopu is less pleased with Gala.

 

By putting on a seru, Gala has defied the primary teaching of Biron, and is therefore excommunicated from the Monastery.  Gala accepts this banishment (with a surprising amount of dignity, might I add), despite Noa’s protesting.

 

Maya interrupts the conversation and tells our heroes that the Genesis Trees have caused the mist coming from the valleys to thin out.  A castle is revealed past the valley, and it seems that the mist is coming from there.  It seems we have our next destination… perhaps we can finally rid this land of mist once and for all!

also: almost missed this item here

 

And with that, let’s end things here for now.  Next time: we explore the mysterious castle and see if we can do something about the dreaded mist!

 

 

 

 

herp derp don't mind Noa clipping through the tree