More Ayesha. I think I'm about halfway through now. Sitting at 12 hours and the game is said to be 24~25 or so.
To start things off, I hate Ranun still. His song is annoying and his personality is that of a half-wet napkin hung daintily on the side of a pungent dumpster in a particularly hot yet breezy summer day.
Moving onto people who are actually interesting - I managed to make the Madder Iron for Wilbell. She had a scheme to show it to her teacher (and great-great-grandmother) and claim it as her own to pass some sort of test. It didn't turn out how she expected. She was scolded quite harshly and fell into a deep depression for roughly 41 seconds, but eventually thought up another scheme without learning much about how she was wrong.
Ayesha had some flashbacks of her little sister Nio. It was interesting to see what kind of person Nio was. She seemed pretty kind and helpful. After losing everyone in her family, I start to wonder just how much depression Ayesha carries herself. Being an apothecary seems like an escape. Something to keep herself distracted form being alone. At least, it seemed that way until she found her sisters 'ghost' of sorts.
Homonculi are interesting in the Dusk world of Atelier. One was looking for shiny jewels and had a ton of money. It was roaming around the shop that Harry owns. Harry doesn't like them because he "doesn't know how they think". Seems a little bigoted to me but I figure he'll have some kind of turn to where he gets over it.
The Love Triangle? Is it really a love triangle if it's all completely unrequited? Marietta is into old guys like Keith (specifically Keith). Keith ignores her completely to a degree that she doesn't really exist to him it seems. Fred at the bakery has a huge crush on Marietta. She thinks he's scary and that his shop will fail. This is because he tenses up and gets embarrassed when she's around. Ayesha was the one to drop that bomb on him and unintentionally crush his romantic aspirations under her heel like a bug. Poor guy. I'm not sure if anyone is crushing on Fred but we'll see where things end up. I guess the good thing is: no one likes Ranun.
I've been finding a ton of equipment lately and managed to make some items that will appraise/reveal them. Linca got a nice new huge sword. Everyone got new weapons and armor and I managed to push Ayesha and Linca's defense pretty high. Ayesha has very high resistance to status ailments, which will come in handy. I did some exploring along new areas, some of which have huge ruins scattered about them. I really like seeing the giant remnants of dead civilizations.
Wilbell thinks she can hit it rich by roaming through ruins. She has her eyes set on becoming a millionaire. The first plan of attack is the glass factory, where she thinks she'll find something worth a million cole. Linca, on the other hand, is learning to cook. Slowly and clumsily, but its a work in progress.
Instead of going to the glass factory to murder stuff and try to get rich (or die tryin), I wanted to go south past the ghost village. There was rumor of some giant estate that houses tons of books. As this info came from Harry, it was probably bullshit. Lo and behold, that weirdo pulled though. There's a huge library with over eighty million books stored from all over the world across many eras and ages. I really loved this area, especially the dim grey run-up to the front door. It's so eerie to just have this bastion of knowledge hidden away. It's run by a creation (robot?) named Odelia. She's pretty helpful and pretty nice to boot. She was able to help Ayesha find a book on the flowers she's been studying in hopes to find her missing sister.
I uh...also took roughly 50 bombs with me as I didn't really know what to expect. I've also been running out of explosives in my dungeon dives, so I packed
thirty one too many. I found my basket full after a few fights in the library, as the monsters dropped tons of equipment. Each battle was dropping five to seven pieces of armor or weapons, along with items I can synthesize with. They hit kinda hard but they gave a ton of exp. It was the perfect place to get items, make some money, and level up a little bit. I got some new moves as well. Naturally, Linca's wipes out pretty much an entire group of enemies in one hit. Wilbell's basic back attacks are hitting pretty hard too. Along with her very high MP, she's an offensive powerhouse but still a bit of a glass cannon.
I quite like the aesthetic of the library. It's sprawling and massive and it seems to go on forever. Deeper and deeper and deeper into the world. There were a ton of enemies that Odelia said were malfunctioning, so there was no worries about crushing them into a fine powder. Keith was there, surprisingly. Ayesha's longest conversation with him so far occurred. While he seemed very annoyed by her presence (and was a jerk the whole time), it seemed like he was trying to help her indirectly. I'm not sure why he cares, but he does. He pointed her to the book she'll need to study, then told her to go away. I guess I'm just glad he didn't bury my party in a completely one-sided fight like he did the last time.
Afterwards, I returned home to unload all the equipment and materials and get started on reading the books I bought and borrowed. The book on flowers helped Ayesha narrow down some areas of interest that might help lead to her sister. Additionally, I bought a book that spoke to my very soul: Useful Bombs.
I have a few things to take care on the next session. Raiding the glass factory again should be lucrative. At least, I hope it's lucrative because I have a ton of books to buy and I may or may not have spent all my money cleaning out shops to raise their levels. I have some more random exploring to do, and I've also gotten better items for alchemy alongside some skills that will help push the quality and effects of my creations up. My main personal goal is to build a better bomb. I'm curious what kind of horrific effects I can add to this tier of explosives...
