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I don't remember why I took this screenshot... Maybe because of its ellipses? It seems like Claude is talking to his imaginary friend.

I've got a better question for the lady yet: how did you get HERE? It didn't look like the personnel at the Home was kind enough to let anyone use the teleporter Claude and the others have used, so did she sneak her way in? I also believe Artis relocked it after they came through (although, because I know who the stalker is and her capabilities, it might have been possible for her to unlock it somehow).

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Did the two extra 'ow' really warrant a scrolling dialog box? Sure, it's not as bad as others I've seen, both in this game and in older ones, but this one made me chuckle.

Running around the crystal cave in frantic search of the Synard, and happily slaying opposing monsters while they're at it, our heroes see the red-haired stalker once again, this time unseen (wonder how she didn't notice eight people running by). Her entrance this time is one of the most spectacular: she's running out of that passage on the right, when she suddenly trips and falls flat on her face ('Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow...'; yes, this definitely needs at least 5 'ow's to be well-conveyed). But the best part has yet to come! After swiftly getting up, looking around thinking aloud about how embarrassing it was and hoping nobody saw her, she runs back through the passages she just came out of! Not to mention she drops her ID card in the process.

You'd think our friends would simply laugh off at that performance, but Claude can't help but point out that this girl is running around the very same, violent-monster-filled cave they're in, by herself, and she doesn't seem to have suffered a single scratch (well, aside from those she just got while tripping). That noted, the player can choose to pick up the ID card the stalker dropped (it's a long walk and it usually means 4 or 5 extra random battle encounters), in order to give it back to her next time they meet (Claude is a gentleman after all).

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As bright and acute as always, Ensign Kenni! Fortunately he doesn't add anything after that, and they just move on.

Noel accompanies the group through the natural reserve, a lush forest on a small island very far from North City; there's also a natural cave which Noel says is the Synard's nest. This cave is really colourful: I imagine it's because of the many enchanted purple crystals scattered all around that there's so much light in here. Unfortunately the atmosphere is marred by a murderous scent in the air. Noel desumes that something has made the animals around here violent (possibly the presence of the Ten Wise Men), but that's par for the course: you wouldn't have expected a peaceful walk through the caves up to the Synard's nest, would you?

This cave is very large and with a confusing layout, but it's not hard to navigate, it's just that with all the forks, and the long walks combined with a fairly high battle encounter rate, the experience is none of the best. The violent animals are also quite tough. This is more of a test of endurance, make sure you get your hands on all the treasure you find, it might help.

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I know they're trying to put some poetry in the game, but must they always resort to the old 'Be pure of heart, conquer your inner fears' cliché?

To the utter astonishment of Claude and the two Tetragenes, Noel reveals the plan he imagines Artis had in mind: retrieve a wild Synard! I sincerely have no words left to comment on the complete idiocy of the situation, so I'll just move on. It also turns out that, to make matters worse, there's probably only one of those beasts in the wild, and in order to tame it, our heroes must beat it in combat (and demonstrate the superiority of their heart as well!). Noel happens to be a sort of warden to a wildlife reserve, and he's quite disheartened by the current turn of events, having to capture the last wild Synard; but he also gives up fairly quickly, stating that it's a matter of survival, and that any animal brought to the brink of extinction was surely just another victim of natural selection.

Regardless of the group's intentions, Noel offers to accompany everyone to the Synard's nest, located in a cave nearby. You can also put him in your fighting party if you want, he's a quite unique fighter: mainly an attack spellcaster, he's also gifted with some healing magic (he's a Nedian after all), so he sports a good variety of spells, at the cost of their overall effectiveness. He wouldn't be so bad of a choice in combat, however, if it weren't for the complete lack of any good strategy for his healing magic: he basically shares the tactics of other Heraldry spellcasters (Rena has her own tactics based on healing), which makes him very hard to instruct with regard to assisting strategies. Noel's attack magic is mainly earth and wind-based, and its power is limited. In the end, you'll surely excuse me if I don't get him in my party, won't you? He doesn't even have any interesting Private Action anyway.

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This begs for two questions. Does it mean that Noel fought alongside or against the Ten Wise men? How old is Noel? Unfortunately, as usual, this subject is never questioned or discussed about by anybody for the rest of the game! Noel is such an underdeveloped character, almost on par with Ernest.

Our heroes try to explain the reason why they're here, even though they aren't so sure themselves; Noel somehow understands the situation (although he's still puzzled at how nobody has explained it to them), and gets somewhat gloomy about it. He seems to be a peculiar guy, with much experience on various things, sort of like a more refined version of Bowman (except Noel's not married, nor does he show any interest on anything that's not a wild beast... I didn't mean it that way though).

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This isn't a very good first impression you're giving, Noel.

While refusing to fully explain the reason behind the Synard's sudden attack, Artis profusely apologizes to our heroes, and also tries to justify their actions; he and Narl are certainly hiding something, I'm sure, since the situation seems almost too quiet for it being the greatest crisis they've faced since the Ten Wise Men's first attack. Well, that also menas they've got no time to lose, and a few 'sacrifices' are to be expected during war, so Artis tells the group to walk into a teleporter they've got in there, as they will know what is to be done as soon as they arrive to its destination.

After being beamed Tria knows where, Claude, Rena and the others end up walking into a house, whose proprietor was just about to enter: so they bump into this weird-looking but seemingly very polite guy, and already have to make quick excuses for the sudden intrusion, as puzzled as he is about this meeting. His Name is Noel Chandler, and he's got those strange-looking things on his head, resembling animal ears (nobody really questions this, just like for our little Fellpool); coincidentally, his name is 'Leon' spelled backwards.

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It's her again! It might not be Fatal Attraction, but she surely is some crazy woman...

...jumping off and miserably falling like this. Does she even carry a camera with her? Maybe on Nede there's more sophisticated ways to take shots, possibly with the aid of a magical fairy or elf.

Artis is mortified and tries to cope with the situation as best as he can: he leads the party into his room to briefly illustrate one of the alternatives to getting a Synard (Not-Precis: couldn't we have a regular airship instead?). Meanwhile, it seems our favorite Nedian stalker has showed up again, only a little late. By listening to her thinking aloud, we can guess she's a reporter (our friends aren't here, so they don't know yet), so she's probably just covering the story of the heroes fighting against the Ten Wise Men (pretty uninteresting story so far, if you ask me). We also learn that, other than being clumsy, this lady is also quite tough, what with falling off the top floor and recovering almost immediately.

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Something went wrong, we killed the Synard, and now we have to share the blame. At least now they'll think about more sensible options for transportation, right? Right!?

While inputting Claude and Rena's data onto the Synard, the beast suddenly went berserk: it was about to destroy the whole research facility, so our heroes had to fight it. A battle with no winners...

At least now Claude has the chance to try his newly-built weapon, the almighty Eternal Sphere... too bad that its 'sparkling' fatures don't work for aerial attacks, and the Synard flies all the time! We now discover that this heraldic beast is also a powerful creature, but no matter: we've got the best anti-air unit available, that is Opera and her trusty Kaleidoscope. You must know that, while she uses her cannon as a melee weapon on the ground, she'll use it as a proper firearm against flying or jumping foes; moreover, this long range attack is also very fast and has almost no recoil, which means Opera can stun-lock about any opponent in the air. With her in your party, no matter the level, the Synard is as good as dead.

The other two, green-haired researches are now mad at Artis and the group for wasting a Synard, which apparently is very costly for them; if only they had told us sooner about their concerns on the 'inputting', I'm sure Claude would have cooperated, and maybe they would have opted for ANY MEANS OF TRAVEL OTHER THAN A MAGICAL BEAST! Sorry if I insist so much on the subject, but the brain-pain you have to go through during this part of the story is unbearable for me.

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Rena: It's not my fault if you're too quick, Claude.

Seeing as everyone is done with their stroll about North City, our friends meet up at the Home: the researched named Artis welcomes them and briefly explains the situation. The Home is a sort of biological research facility where they 'produce' Synards; this makes it easier to use them as transportation, since you only need to input genetic data of the owner into them to make them obey unconditionally... What the... Couldn't this have been more complicated? Aside from the ethical issues concerning this kind of artificial procedure (which Claude doesn't fail to notice), do we have to resort to this stuff on one of the most advanced planets in the universe? Can't we use a private jet or something? This is too stupid to be true...

Anyway, at least the 'inputting' process isn't hard or painful, as Claude and Rena only need to stand in a room and relax for mere seconds. Incidentally, the other characters don't need to do that, probably because they're optional for the party (remember you can go through the game with just the main couple), and they didn't bother thinking about a fitting cutscene mechanic.

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I have no idea what's being shown on that screen. Nedians...

Everyone is still wandering around North City, so Claude decides to have a look at the place Narl wanted them to go to (yeah, we sort of have a mission here, don't you remember?): this place looks more like a biolab than a Synard ranch, whatever a ranch for those animals looks like. It's called ' The Home', however, which is comforting; let's see what they have in store...

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I suppose this episode would be morally unacceptable, and exposure to children could be bad, so at least they put in this little disclaimer. But since there's no narration in the whole game, this line sounds really out of place.

In the end, Rena went on and 'initialized all data'; regardless of the odd wording, you can guess what happened. The funny part is that, while the library database was being wiped out, you could hear all sorts of bleeping and exploding sound effects, like those of a pinball table gone crazy (I wonder who programmed it). Of course Rena didn't realize what she'd done, but she could tell something was wrong: seeing as the accessing program wouldn't 'go back', she paniched and silently ran off before the librarian found out what had happened. You would have done the exact same thing, wouldn't you have? After all, technically, it wasn't really Rena's fault that she could access such a dangerous function of a freely accessible program.


Now Claude is a witness of the whole scene, but he decides not to reveal anything and runs away. Later on, he finds Rena at the inn, still a little flustered by the incident. The library database won't be available for a while (I think we now know why the database terminal was used only by the librarian).

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Nedians are so civilized and have such an advanced technology that even Rena can access the administrator functions of the library database and erase everything! That, or Rena's a real h4x0r.

Since Opera wasn't impressed by Claude's sword, he's thinking of showing it to Rena... Wait, this sounds wrong... Anyway, it seems our little healer is trying her hand at some Nedian technology right now, so this isn't the right time. I guess a lot of people might have watched similar scenes on Earth, about at the end of the 20th century or beyond, when computer programs had very little protection agains human error, and no real disaster recovery elements.

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You mean... Nanomachines! Oh, disregard that, I just wanted you to see how they had the guts to actually put a character that far away from the camera (in this case Opera); would it have killed the game if they had split North City into two separate screens?

Claude has just created the exceptionally broken Eternal Sphere, and can't wait to show it to everyone; he's a little disappointed by the fact that nobody really seems interested in it though. I guess Claude's attitude for combat isn't what his friends like of him the most. Whatever, it's nice to see Opera hanging outside, instead of spending her time drinking at a tavern or making bets with the locals. I think she and Ernest are quite impressed by this place: products of human arts and technology seamlessly melding with the natural environment, it's certainly not something you see often on the planet of Tetragenes (you can have a small glimpse of that planet if you manage to get the Claude-Opera ending).

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It doesn't just sound ridiculously overpowered, it is!

Once you get to Energy Nede, there's lots of new things you can find around, either in shops or as items relinquished by defeated enemies; regarding the former, you can buy new musical instruments, while regarding the latter, you can get Mythril ore. When you combine these items with some musical talent, dexterity and originality, and add up one sharp edge, what is it that you obtain? That's right, the Ethernal Sphere!

Let's delve into the details of the procedure for a bit, shall we? First of all, you must know that getting all the necessary items for this can be accomplished on Expel as well, but you need to test your luck a lot (and possibly waste a lot of time); in particular, the musical stuff is not necessary at all, but it really helps. The main ingredient you're after is two chunks of Mythril and the Sharp Edge: do you remember the fine sword grandpa Gamjee gave Claude after the Tournament of Arms in Lacour? Well, I hope you followed my suggestion from before and didn't get rid of it. The rest is simply a matter of talent and skill.

You may already know there's a specialty called 'Customize', which allows a character to modify one of their weapons using some material; other than investing enough Skill Points into it for Claude, you should make sure he also has the 'Originality' (and I think the 'Dexterity') talent(s). Also, if you've bought enough musical instruments (buy more in North City) and composed enough songs, learn the Super Specialty 'Orchestra', which improves the chances of success of any Specialty while you're playing music. Warning: the lack of any of the non-mandatory parts will cause additional reloads.

By successfully using Customize on the Sharp Edge with Mythril, you'll obtain the 'Minus Sword', which seems like a cursed weapon and isn't very powerful. If you know better (and who knows how in the world people managed to find it out), you'll use Customize again on this sword, again with Mythril, and upon success you shall obtain one of the best weapons Claude can use. Why is it so good? It's not because of its attack power, which is great but not exceptional; it's partly because of its magic powers, which raise Claude's attributes and some magic resistances; but mainly it's because each time you hit an enemy with this sword, it will shoot forward several blue sparkles, each doing some damage, with a high chance of stunning your opponent for long enough to quickly land another hit. An additional merit is its availability, at the very beginning of the second game disc (if not earlier); the only other item which has a similar effect is the Angel Armband (another really cheap item), but you can only get it in the extra 'dungeon'.

In short, get the Eternal Sphere and most of the game will be a breeze: you won't need Claude to use his Killer Moves ever again.

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I've got the feeling that even on Nede Celine is considered 'old'; it must be her silver hair...

So it was true, there's a fortune teller in town, with purple cloak, glowing crystal ball and all. Claude walks into the inn to find Celine with this clairvoyant, who has apparently just finished his (her? I honestly can't tell anymore in this game) 'reading'. Our Healdic sorceress wouldn't reveal her fortune to Claude, but suggests him to try and get a reading too: despite being generally skeptic about fortune-telling, he accepts the proposal (since it's for free after all). As the player, you can choose what kind of fortune to ask for, including Claude's compatibility with Celine; I think it's embarrassing to do that in front of the other person unless you're already close enough, but if you want to improve their relationship, this is the way to go.

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Man, I'm learning more and more new words thanks to this game! Although I wonder why this town is giving such an impression: it certainly looks better than Arlia. The capital b makes me thing of another meaning though.

Precis seems so uninterested by this town that she'd rather run around a streetlight, with Bobot following; you could watch her running for hours and she'd never get tired of it. Not that it's an unusual thing, mind you: even in other towns on Expel you'd find Precis and Bobot playing on the rooftops. She certainly had no problems adapting to this new planet (well, who wouldn't, given that, apart from teleporters, there's hardly any significant difference from other planets), but remember that, like the other Expellians, she doesn't know about what happened to their planet yet.

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Maybe it's not as noticeable as when played on the Playstation console, but this is one of the few places where your character can move very close to the camera, causing the filtering effect not to work on him/her anymore: the result here is a very "pixelated" Claude.

Librarian: Excuse me, may I ask what you are doing standing right across the entrance please?
Claude: Um... Well, I though there was more light here so I could read better...
Librarian: But you are not carrying any books with you, am I mistaken?
Claude: Oh, that's right... Ehm... Where did I put that book...?
Librarian: I will have to kindly ask you to move aside, sir, you're blocking the entrance to the library

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I'm telling you, this Energy Nede is getting less and less impressive. The funniest thing is that you can ask that guy for a topic and he'll run to the terminal to find it, and then he'll come back to you and say it aloud. Wait! I get it now! This guy is an android! Wow, how high-tech!

Once our heroes split up for the usual Private Action, the first place Claude visits is the library, of course. Here you can find a lot of information about the planet and the history of the Nedian civilization; little is found about the Ten Wise Men though, as noted by some bookworms inside the library, who find it funny that most information about them is in fairy tales. I'd say it's not that surprising, since it happened so long ago, but it's probably worth investigating because, other than the Ten Wise Men's imprisonment, there's no historical event of note reported in the archive after that (must have been pretty boring).

Claude gathers as much information about Nede as he can, and plans to do some extra research once they get to the University,which is located on another island. For now it's enough, as there are more pressing matters to attend to, like saving the universe. Hey, is that Leon over there? Figures that we'd find him in a library, strutting as usual (I'm sure his lab in Lacour is more high tech than the facilities in this town).

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Wheeere's Claude? Part 3 is now up! Seriously, whoever thought it would be a good idea to have characters go that far must have been drinking too much. It's a pain even just moving over there, it takes so long and yet Claude looks almost stationary.

We should be here to get a Synard and get on with the mission, but everyone is mesmerized by the appearance of this town; even to the Expellians in the group this looks like a rustic backwater village. But there's plenty to do here: there's a very well-furnished shop which also sells tools of all kinds, a very large library, and Claude just got wind that a famous fortune teller is in town and is resting at the inn.

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Our heroes bump into that mysterious girl once again; despite her remark, I don't think them just walking by to be 'clever'. And what about Claude's reference to that movie? I didn't know it was regarded as culturally relevant in 2400 AD.

Setting foot outside Central City, Claude, Rena take a good look at the landscape, made up mostly of small islands in a large ocean; this is probably the reason finding means of transportation is so hard (but not ride-a-magical-beast hard!). What certainly stands out on Energy Nede is the red-glowing barrier that surrounds most of the planetoid. The rest is just green plains and forests, snowy mountains, and... wait a minute! An island floating in the sky? Whatever, it's magic (or Heraldry).

To the utmost joy of the hard-boiled level grinder, out heroes find out (to their expenses) that evil creatures roam the lands even here: new entries in the bestiary we've compiled on Expel include disc-shaped tentacular machines and old sorcerers with phasing magic. Luckily the path to North City is very short, so our party gets there immediately to see what kind of battle equipment it has to offer (since Central City wasn't great in that department).

To their great surprise, North City looks very different from the previous town: at first sight it resembles a normal rural town, not unlike the countryside towns found on Expel, but on closer inspection (performed by yours truly Claude C. Kenni, Opera Vectra and Ernest Raviede), it appears that all sorts of modern commodities are well-hidden behind covers or underground.

During their first tour of the town, the party again stumbles upon that red-headed girl they had met in Central City; once she realizes she's been found, she runs away through the wilderness surrounding the town, but Claude can faintly hear the sound of her tripping and falling to the ground. This won't be the last we see of her, and the game will make sure we know that she's quite a clumsy lady, by making her trip face to the ground the next two times we meet her, just to get the point across better. It's now clear our friends are being followed, but that doesn't seem to be a problem yet, so we can keep on moving towards our next objective in tranquility.

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Well, it's nice that even Claude noticed that. You could see it another way though: Claude thinks Rena's a freak, but he hides behind the 'you're our friend' lines.

It seems Rena is alright for now, but who knows what their journey will bring them? Enough wandering around the city, it's time to leave! Do you remember our next objective? Go to North City and get a convenient means of transportation to explore Energy Nede: a flying heraldic beast! Are you still convinced you want to follow our heroes' story? Well then, stay tuned!

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Claude didn't look that point to me, but if Rena says so...

Seeing Rena in such a state, Claude can't help but try and make her feel better by sharing his point of view, that is, she is their friend first and a Nedian second. If you recall, they've already had a discussion about how Rena was 'different' from the other people on Expel: you'd think this one here is the last one we get, but you'd be proven wrong towards the end of the game (and each time she feels worse).

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When Rena tells Claude about her confusion and doubts regarding her Nedian origins ('Just... who am I?'), you have the option of making Claude answer in one of the most tactless ways you could think of; it turns out however that it's one of the best answers, because Claude manages to get to the right point somehow.

Claude goes upstairs to check on Rena, and finds her deeply troubled. She looked so determined and strong when the group came on Nede, it's painful to watch her act like this now. Maybe it's what Narl told her before, that made her fully realize her situation. As the player you are given three choices for Claude's reaction: act dumb (see above), say some cheesy lines, or stay vague. The latter choice has the worst outcome, go figure... Maybe it's just me, but at times you can't really tell where Claude is going with the dialogue by the first sentence you're given: it makes me feel it's more of a guesswork and less roleplay, but whatever, I could be horribly wrong.

When Claude meets Rena you actually have the option of ignoring her, and then to chase after her afterwards; in this case it's obvious that just leaving her alone is the worst choice in terms of relationship.