WLC 5.6: Baba, You're Going Down!

WLC 3.A: A Fishy Ending

Outside of the tower, Ling begins praying, "I humbly call upon ya, OH GREAT DAGEXTAN!" The others chant the name behind her. "Bless this land to feed this world, guard this land from those beyond death, and," Ling points at the wormsworn, "Accept this offering!"

The ground rumbles, harder and faster than the worms and spells had made it prior. It bursts open under the what remains of the undead pests. The massive fish-headed avatar of the agricultural god devours the monsters in one sucking bite.

"Return to Samsara, ya wiggly b*****ds," yells Ling.

The avatar leaps out of the ground, flailing his elven-looking limbs as he dives back into the ground. His splash is a healing wave across the battle-scarred land.

"We are so lucky that worked," says Oighrig, finally landing, "Your divine connections have saved us all."

"No worries," says Ling, "'Sides, ya'll did most of the work."

"I would never have thought to use the corpses themselves as the runes, Your Darkness," says Oighrig, "A most impressive display."

"Thank you," Melandria says with a bow.

"That's nice," says Ling walking into the tower, "But I got to check on my kid. Gash, you're still responsible."

Before Ling can get to far, Melandria's shadow hand stops her. "I know a faster way," she says. She pulls the group into the shadows and to just outside Gank's room.

Gash opens the door without knocking. Inside the room, Jevoi lies asleep on Gank's bed, with the charda sitting on the floor reading her tome. She shushes the adults as they enter.

"See, nothing to worry about," whispers Gash.

"Ya're lucky," whispers Ling, "Ya got a responsy kid here." She walks up to the bed. "Good on'ya, kid," she says to Gank, before picking up Jevoi, "And time to get ya back to bed."

L: I'd take it back, but... G: It's funny, now.

"Can I hold her?" asks Melandria, "No, I'm sorry. Ignore me."

"Go ahead, Mel," says Ling holding Jevoi up for the Shadow Queen to grab, "Sorry, I was... acting like that down there."

Melandria gently scoops Jevoi from her mother's arms and rocks her slowly. "You've nothing to apologize for Ling. The circumstances were... difficult."

"Struth, that was a stressful five minutes," says Ling, "Just glad she's okay. I was ready to end one of ya."

J: You did not say that. L: Yeah, I did. G: Was there, can confirm: she did. J: Your memory's wrong. G: Ghosts have perfect memory; I can't forget even if I try. L: I'm a wizard; I don't forget anything I don't want to.

"Mom, stop," says Gank, swatting one claw at Gish who is rubbing her head.

"Gank, was it?" asks Ling, "How'd you like a little job?"

G: One of the worst decisions of your life, right? L: Not even top ten.

While all the other demons and angels chose to work with humans, Satan said, "I'm getting a dog."

Pekomaru and Satan from Daemon Bride

Execution

In the first game, surrender leaves you open to attack and ends the fight after a set time, but in the sequel, it's a cutscene.

Here's that bloodstained versus Mikado accepting her fate.

And so, the bandaged story Mikado cannot outlive herself.

This location, by the way, is a story scene exclusive: outside the Tatara Shrine. (Not the Tatara Shrine Path stage.) You normally cannot fight here.

Is this what the kids call "drip"?

Pretty excited for tomorrow's The Gaslight District pilot episode :DD

Loving the crown hat!

Mario Kart World Rosalina ✨🩵

WLC 2.D: The Shadow Queen

A few hours after having entered the tower, Ling realizes that her split party never established an exit strategy, nor a means of communication. For a wizard, this is an embarrassing oversight.

Getting her things together, Ling attempts to sneak through the dark halls, but is quickly grabbed by a shadow and dragged into a new location.

Ling now stands in a decently decorated throne room. Crystal sconces and chandelier shine faint light. A lovely carpet stretches from the large door behind her to the cushioned throne ahead. Barely visible to Ling, sits the Shadow Queen; an usually pale busty elf-like being in a black slit dress with opera gloves. Her long curly hair is intricately woven.

"G'day," says Ling, "Mind giving a light?"

"Why are you in my house?" ask the Shadow Queen as the darkness in the room thickens, "Explain yourself."

"Ya got it," says Ling, leaning her body slightly, "I'm a scholar and I came to propose a business venture to ya."

"And you came alone?"

"...No," says Ling, "Had a friend, a priestess of Vanessa."

"Just one?" The Shadow Queen rocks back and forth, "Don't lie to me."

"I'm not lying."

Claws take form amongst the darkness and lunge at Ling. She skitters away. She rolls and hops about away from the constant barrage. Ling pulls rock from her bag and charms it to shine brightly. The shadows recede and the Shadow Queen growls.

J: We know her name's Melandria; stop calling her the Shadow Queen.

"You think that parlor trick will save you," she yells as the shadow limbs long steel polearms and bows and arrows. The solid weapons are unimpeded by Ling's light and force her to continue dodging.

As she dodges, Ling gets a better look at the elf-esque being. Her ears are small and round. If her hair wasn't black, Ling would assume she was albino.

"Who does your hair?" asks Ling, skittering up the wall desperately avoiding arrows... or at least, looking desperate. "Is it dyed?"

L: Obviously, I cast a wind shield as soon as I had seen the bows.

"What? Yes, but- No one, I d-" Melandria stops herself, "Stop talking to me, you, weird lizard."

"Gecko, actually," says Ling jumping into Melandria's face, "So what are you?"

The woman on the throne pauses, as do her weapons. The gecko's eyes are fixated on something just under her eyes. "What are you doing?"

"Got to be blunt, mate," Ling shakes her head, "You look sick."

"It's a skin condition," says Melandria, "I'm al-"

"Albino, I figured," says Ling, "But that's not it. Ya're malnourished, starving even." She grabs Melandria's hand. "What have ya been eating?"

Melandria pulls her hand away and conjures a piece of bread. "I have plenty of food. I'm strong enough to feed myself."

Ling pulls a potato out from her pouch. "Eat this."

Melandria balks at the tuber.

"I'm a doctor," says Ling before Melandria can speak, "If ya've only been eating mana manna, ya're going to rot away inside out."

Melandria warms the potato and rips it open. With a conjured fork, she begins eating.

"First saw this back at wiz school during the Great War," says Ling, "Spellies eating their own mana's no healthier than eating their own skin. And that's true even for one's that know healthy eating." Ling watches Melandria shovel food into her mouth. "Which most don't."

"Name's Melandria and I'm human," she says in between bites of food, "Since you asked."

"From the surface, eh?" Ling smiles. "My mum's from there."

WLC 3.7: Gish Gets to Do Something Cool

Gash opens a portal to the edge of the cave and Gish helps him drag the trolley of salt through.

L: Once they crossed over, I had to have faith in them. That's all I could do.

"Now what?" he asks, "Do we drag it around the cave? You think there's enough salt to go the whole way."

"Probably not if we're just pouring it," says his sister, "But I've got an idea." The worms nearest to them begin oozing in their direction. "You protect the salt; I'll make the circle."

Gish draws her scimitar and channels energy through the blade. She reverses her grip and runs, dragging the blade through the ground behind her. As she races around the edge, the worms from the mass launch their bile from the sky. Gish deflects the few in her path with a small energy shield and keeps moving.

Ahead of her, more worms crawl forth to block her path with mouths wide open. Gish channels energy through her gauntlet and punches blasts of energy right into the open maws. "Get!" Fire. "Out!" Acid. "Of!" Ice. "My!" Lightning. "Way!" Sound. The energy attacks stream out from her fist and explode inside of each target, disorienting them.

L: Gish once taught me her 'Five Fist Power Punch'. D: What's that have to do with the salt? L: I just mean, I knew she could defend herself.

As she continues to run, she thinks hard. What does she have that could draw attention away from herself? ...Herself? That could be it. She reaches into her shadow, faint as it is in the dim cave, and rips it out of the wall. In an instant, her shadow multiplies and scatter about; each 'her' racing off in a different direction, leading most worms away.

The majority of the undead horde's attention remains on the tower and its defenders, witnessing the desperate flinging of spells infuriates the tallgoblin. She has to work faster, she has to BE faster. She channels more energy into her legs, Stomping up a storm, ripping through the ground, leaving a trail of flame behind her, Gish pushes herself as far as she can.

She can see her brother's position again. He swings his axe, launching cleaving waves through the cretins approaching him. More crawl over their writhing split open brothers and some attempt to burrow under them; the latter being stopped by the metal plating that has covered the ground in Gash's location. There's still enough room behind it for Gash to complete the almost-circle.

As she approaches, another worm lunges for her. She pulls a pillar of earth up into it, the force flinging it head over tail back where it came from.

Gish keeps running, dragging her blade to complete the loop. As her blade reconnects with its starting point, she stumbles, trips, and rolls along the ground.

"Gish!" yells her brother, "Are-"

"DO IT NOW!" yells Gish.

Gash stabs open the bag of salt and as the salt pours into the crack in the ground, he enchants it into a two-headed snake. The senseless salt serpents separate and slither through the scar, spreading symmetrically around the circumference. As it flows, Gash screams a forceful wail at the worms still attempting to navigate the still-living (unliving?) wall, pushing them back off.

Gish stands and opens a portal back to the tower. The duo fling themselves back through and yell, "Circle's ready, Boss!"

L: I don't how they did it, but they ran like the clappers to get it done.

Game Manual

Here are some some details and pictures from the games' official manuals.

Mikado and her Shainto counterpart Kaun face off.

The manual pairs her with Jo as speed-type. The stats the ladies have are similar with the four swords, but the polearms are a different story. The Shainto spear is Jo's worst weapon, but the Narukagami naginata is Mikado's best. Mikado and Kaun have the maximum speed and power with the big pointy sticks!

Mikado's stats with each weapon, if you're curious are:

Weapon-----Power----Speed

Naginata----22/22----15/15 Same as Kaun with Yari (Jo is 15 and 12)

Broadsword-15/22-----12/15 Same as Jo

Katana-------12/22-----14/15 Slower than Jo

Nodachi-----15/22-----13/15 Much weaker than Jo (18)

Longsword--10/22----14/15 Slower than Jo (Tied for the weakest Char/Weapon combo in the game.)

Notes: The lowest normal power is 10 and speed is 12. NPCs and the secret duo are above the limit. Mikado is weaker and slower than Kaun with all swords except being as fast with the katana.

In the original game, Mikado and Black Lotus (aka Kokuren, aka James, aka Highwayman) are the medium characters. Sadly, I haven't found the character stats in BB1 yet.

Also, that codename: Gate of the God's Descent. That's even cooler than my nickname for her: the Empress.

Mikado and Tatsumi face off, back when she was balance and he was speed.

These scans came from Archive.org, so that's why the text is scrunched like that.

The final set of Vs sprites. We've got Tsubame and Katze, Nightstalker and Tony, Sazanka and Highwayman, and the secret characters. This first pair is actually unused in-game because Tsubame and Katze can only be selected in Vs mode (and Group Battle mode, which uses no sprites).

The secret duo, Otomaru and Ohomaru, are also only in Vs.

Character Select Face

On the right here, is the game's Story mode icon, which itself is a frame from the game's intro movie. Left to right: Gengoro, Jo, Kaun, Tatsumi, Mikado, Kannuki. Below are the Vs sprites for those five.

Due to a few characters' asymmetrical designs, they get two different vs screen sprites.

WLC 3.4: Up to Gank

Gash leads Jevoi up the stairs to the safest part of the tower, behind the shell of the Tarasque. Feeling her bitterness of being led away, he asks, "Who is your 'nana'?"

"You really want to know?" Jevoi's voice is sudden and loud. "Nana Ning's the coolest. She's super-fast and has all of the knives."

"Is that so?" asks Gash, looking over his shoulder, "What can she do with them?"

"She's a super sneaky acrobat and kills bad guys," says Jevoi running ahead of Gash, "I want to be just like her!" She turns back toward him. "But Mum hates Nana, she'll never let me."

"Yeah, I get it," says Gash, "My ma was against me learning magic." He manifests and twirls a knife before banishing it.

"But you did anyway?" asks Jevoi looking up into his eyes, "How did ya do it?"

Gash hesitates, but decides to answer, "My sister and I ran away from home."

L: I'ma kill him.

"But you shouldn't."

"Why not?" whines Jevoi.

"Your ma's a wizard; she'll catch you," he leans down and whispers, "So you should study all her tricks first; that way she can't catch you." He stands up and continues on as roaring and explosions occur in the distance.

L: Death threat rescinded.

Jevoi gasps, "You're really smart, Mr. Gash!"

Gash laughs, "That's why Boss Mel trusts me. Now right through here is Gank."

"Who's she?" asks Jevoi, as further explosions sound from outside.

"Why don't you ask her yourself?" He opens a door, and says, "Hey, Gank, got someone for you to meet."

The bedroom's walls are decorated with stars and crescents. The plum bed is almost as big as Ling's. Lying on the bed, idly kicking her feet and reading a large tome is a teenage reptilian with a spiky armored body and four clawed arms. She's wearing a black wig with a magenta stripe in its bangs and tiny black trunks.

D: Is that why you wear that wig? J: It looks great, right?

Jevoi hides behind Gash's leg, too nervous to approach.

"What d'ya want, old man?" asks Gank. She looks up from her book. "Need me to babysit for ya?"