The party gathers themselves and heads to the old orphanage site to try to find more clue's into why Edea went bad. They get to the old crumbling orphanage building and detect a large presence there. We walk outside and see the looming Galbadia Garden poised to attack our Balamb Garden. Seifer and Edea are aboard. The party comes to the final showdown with the evil (or not so evil?) Sorceress Edea. Galbadia Garden puts itself into full throttle and sets a collision course with Balamb Garden.
It's an all out onslaught with rocket propelled motorcycle militia, mech warrior flying soldiers, guys coming in on ropes, rushing by ground - they're all over the place.
And they're better. Most of Balamb Garden's soldier are still students, while Galbadia has seasoned veterans. It's not looking good. Our party splits into many group and one group with Zell and Cysra try to head off one of the fronts of attack, but in the process Cysra almost falls to her death as Galbadia Garden again rams Balamb. She hangs by a thin pipe dozens of feet below Zell and there's nothing he can do. He runs back for help. At least she's not like holding her breath again. Holding onto a pipe for an hour while Rhek comes to get her is a LITTLE more realistic I guess.
Eventually! Rhek comes to the rescue on one of the mech fliers and we land amidst a raging land battle with hundreds of soldiers. This entire battle sequence was just littered with so many cuts. They did a very good job overall. It was a long battle and fun to play and watch.
After we get everyone back together, we realize we're going to lose this battle, they're just better. It's time to take an offensive approach and cut the head off the snake. We get a party together and board their ship. After a bunch of running around we finally reach Seifer and the Sorceress. Final showdown!
We kick the crap outta Seifer again - when's that guy gonna learn he's on the losing side? After he goes down, all confused at losing AGAIN, the Sorceress tries to flee. We give chase and find her in the auditorium to the tune of some very ominous latin (not latino) orchestra music. She puts up a good fight but I think I've found my favorite kill method with Rhek on berserk and haste. Since the game has the R1 trigger critical strike mechanic, I can pretty much crit every time for decent damage even with my crappy level 1 gunblade. She went down quietly but not before handing over the Alexander summon. Nice! After Edea is defeated, we experience another little event. The Sorceress dematerializes and then the party is frozen in animation. Cysra's limp body floats up to where Seifer is. She bends down like a puppet and does something to him. He gets up and walks away from her, and her body collapses, the party is released. When we get to her though, she's cold as ice and non-responsive.
We take her back to Balamb Garden and then go visit Edea's orphanage, where she and Cid are waiting. Finally we get the big picture. You ready? So in the future there exists a very powerful Sorceress named Ultimecia. This Sorceress is very fearful of her mortality and she has sent her will into the past to manipulate the Sorceress Edea in an effort to hunt down Ellone. Ultimecia wants to use Ellone's power to control the past to go even further back and trigger a time compression. Where the past, present, and future all exist at the same time - that doesn't sound good... Anyway, long ago Edea knew that this was a possibility, she could already feel Ultimecia trying to influence her will. So she and Cid created Garden to train SeeDs for the purpose of defeating herself should Ultimecia ever gain full control of Edea. She also created a special group of SeeDs called the White SeeDs, who's task would be to track down Ellone and keep her safe.
This is why Ellone went with those guys even though they'd been sent by Edea (which was very confusing at the time). It also explains why Edea (Ultimecia) and Galbadia were then still looking for Ellone after she'd gone with the White SeeDs. And it explains why Cid is married to this evil woman (not really so evil) and why she would help create something to kill herself later. Everything is clear. But not over.
The problem is that Ultimecia may still be able to possess Edea at any given time. So the SeeDs must still be ready at any moment to strike her down. In addition to this, there used to be a much older and powerful Sorceress named Adel way back in the day. In fact, when Edea came, the people actually thought that it was Adel as she was the old tyrannical Sorceress way back when. When Sorceresses die, their power is passed onto a new child. They thought Edea was this child, but she confesses that she came into her power when she was 5, and Adel was still alive back then. Does this imply there's another Sorceress which died then, whom she gained her power from...?
Anyway, Edea fears that Ultimecia will now try to possess Adel to complete her plans. Meanwhile, Cysra is still in a coma and Rhek (having lost her) now realizes that he desperately needs her. His mindset and attitude make a 180 and now he's the desperate man trying to bring back his love. But there's not really anything he can do. Enter - the dream world once more.
As Laguna again, Ellone shows Rhek another little snippet of Laguna's life where he is acting in a film for some movie off in the northern mountains. This is not really important and the whole sequence is a little puzzling as far as plot goes. But at the very end, we catch two things. Laguna sees a shining light off in the distance and Laguna has a little flash back of his own where he's at the orphanage demanding Ellone from Edea. However Edea tells Laguna that Ellone was taken away by soldiers of Esthar not too long ago.
When Rhek wakes up, he mentally hears Ellone's voice telling him what her true intentions have been all along. Laguna went on a search for Ellone, and while he was gone Raine died in child birth. She wanted to change that path so that Laguna would be there for Raine, but now she realizes that she can't change that. Rhek seems to miss that last part cuz now he has an idea. He's going to find Ellone and make her let him go into the past to the moment before Cysra went into her coma to stop it from happening. He mentally pleas with Ellone to do this but there's no response.
Rhek sets a course to find the White SeeD ship. After we find it though, we discover that Ellone is not aboard. The ship had been sailing along when they were set upon by the Galbadia fleet. While running away, the Esthar fleet showed up and engaged the Galbadia fleet. The Esthar soldiers then asked for the White SeeDs to hand over Ellone but they refused, the soldiers began to leave the ship. But before the Esthar ship could break away, Ellone ran and jumped onto the Esthar ship and they all bailed. So it's off to Esthar.
Rhek tries to leave carrying Cysra on his back all alone but quickly finds the rest of his party waiting for him on the road. Included is Edea who is now part of my party. She's level 26, Rhek is like 33, and the rest of my party is level 17. Fucking lopsided. Stupid 1k leveling system...
Anyway, Edea wants to come because there is a Dr. Odine in Esthar who she believes can exorcise Ultimecia from her permanently. We set out into an icy wasteland and we simply can't find Esthar. We can't find Esthar, because it's invisible. What?? Yeah... We eventually stumble upon a glitching invisible door and enter the city.
Now... I know I played this game even though I don't remember much AT ALL because what I do remember crystal clear is that whole orphanage scene and the part where Edea is at her house again where she's good now. So I know I played up to there, but this - this is completely new, I'm pretty sure I never played beyond that house scene.
I enter into a technological marvel of a city that looks like it's from a true sci-fi world. Floating lifts and elevators and magical things abound. A massive complex, invisible, super city.
As we enter the city, we're unsure what our welcome will be since this was Adel's domain before but we quickly pass out and drop into another dream world adventure. Somehow, someway, Laguna found Esthar city and I guess he was captured because when Rhek wakes in Laguna, he's like slave labor in some facility under soldier guard. We find out that the facility is in fact Dr. Odine's research laboratory. We overhear them talking about a massive Lunar gun of some kind and a Lunar base. Uhhh, moon man villian again...? But this is just side info for now, as Dr. Odine has a new pet project, a powerful girl named Ellone. Laguna eventually breaks free, meets up with Kiros and Ward, and makes Dr. Odine take us to Ellone. We break into the cell and get Elone and start to leave. But we're approached by a faction who is resistant to the rule of the Sorceress Adel. And they want Laguna to be their leader to help over throw Adel. Rhek wakes up. So... is Laguna the president here in Esthar then...?
We awake to soldiers who escort us to the President's Palace where Dr. Odine himself greets us. Rhek asks him to help Cysra and he comments, "So this is what happens when you do that." Weird. Edea also enlists his help to exorcize her of Ultimecia, which he agrees to do. The party leaves the Doctor to do his thing and is told to meet at the Lunar Gate.
Some side notes: I found several copies of weapon magazines but of course I have no parts. I'm an idiot and having discovered Item Refining via GFs, I went ahead and refined tons of magic from items. Of course, now I see all those unique items I only had like one of are needed to build new weapons. Great. Also, I think I'm way behind in levels. At least most of the rest of the party is. I also finally reached -aga level spells on draws so I did a good bit of grinding on that. Junctioning those to strength really boosted Rhek's damage though. He's critting for like 1,700 now instead of like 700 which is really nice. But looks like more grinding ahead. Not sure if I'm going to even bother looking for better weapons at this point. We'll see. Also, I have all but 5 summons now but these last few look REALLY tough. Hopefully not as bad as it look
Until next time!
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