Seventeenth session of The Abyss: War! Huh, yeah! What is it good for?
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After landing in Yulia City, the team goes to talk with the governor. Apparently, now is bad that pieces of continents are falling to the depths of the planet, as supposed to before, when it was okay before the Score said so. After a long bit of exposition and technobabble (I don't get the magic stuff in this game, sol let's move on) they decide to go check some places where they think Van has done something to weaken the pillars and sink the continents. First, they go to Shurrey Hill, a place beneath the surface of the planet, full of trees that apparently don't need the Sun to survive (how can it be everything so greenish underground). After a couple of easy puzzles, we enter a secret place. It's full of hellish monsters that were surprisingly easy to defeat. The team needed to reverse some of the actions of Van, and for that, they need to break some seals. I was thinking all the time that it was a trap, that once all the seals were broken, Van would storm the building and so something evil. But no, Van had entered before, and Luke and Tear manage to repair what was broken.
They exit the underground by using the power of the sephiroth, and once they are on the surface again... war.
We get a cutscene showing hordes and horders of Malkuth and Kimlaska-Lavandier fighting each other, apparently thousands. I love the fact that the infantry looks like roman soldiers, with swords, spears and shields, but the vehicles are laser-powered. The cannons can blow up infantry units like if they were nothing, why do they even have them in open field? This is fighting tanks with 16th century infantry, the same effect. Save soldiers and make more landboats. Also, they have flamethrowers. And meanwhile, the team is lookin at this from the planecopter.
When did the war start? They were only gone for a couple of hours at least, and now the continent is full of thousands of deployed troops? So sudden. But more importantly, the pillars that held that continent are gone, and in any moment that land might fall to the bottom of the planet, killing thousands -or even millions- of soldiers and civilians alike. And nobody can organize an evac because they are too busy with the war! Luke says all this is insane, and I agree, Van is a lunatic! He's mad with power, he's crazy, he's insane, he's coco for cocopuffs! They decide to split up the team. Luke, Tear and Jade will go to Engeve to save the civilian population, while Guy, Alice and Natalia try to organize a truce to stop the fighting.
Team 1 goes to Engeve to evacuate the citzens. They decide that, because the Gran Chokmah is completely closed and turned into a fortress during wartime, they need to bring the people to a neutral place: Chessedonia. They have to cross the battlefield with a lot of civilians, risking to be attacked at any moment. After a couple of fights with both armies, they reach Chessedonia.Team 2 goes to Malkuth to try stop the fighting, but they find general Cecille. She says Maestro Mohs, the one with the authority of stopping the war went to Chessedonia. That's not suspicious at all. While going there, the team is also ambushed by some Oracle Knight soldiers, but they are quickly dispatched. Both teams reunite in Chessedonia and try to find someone who can stop the war. They find both Mohs and Commander Almandine. Natalia and Luke offer themselves to explain all the misunderstandings and try to put an end to the war, but Mohs won't have any of it. He says Natalia is not really the Princess of Kimlasca-Lavandier, that apparently an attendant switched babies and Natalia isn't really blood related to the king. His argument is also based on the fact that the queen's hair was black and the king's is red, but Natalia is blonde. He then says that if she goes backto her kingdom, she will be punished as a traitor. This makes Natalia go into shock, but I don't believe it. That man is obviously evil and wants nothing more than to continue the war. Also, even if she wasn't the biological daughter, where would the original princess be? This looks really suspicious. The team goes to talk to Waluigi to ask him to take care of the refugees of the war, and Waluigi accepts. But the team quickl discovers that Chessedonia is sinking too! They can't catch a break! They go to the Zao Ruins to fix it, but first Luke receives a message from Asch to meet him at the oasis. He asks Luke if he's been getting memories from other people recently. Oh, no, now Asch is the one that needs an exorcism. Asch says that they can try to recover some of te pillars remotely, and then he goes away, saying heneeds to spy on Van's activities more. They go to the Zao Ruin, they defeat a giant hybrid of scorpion, dinosaur and skeleton, and repair whatever Van altered, but Chessedonia still ended up falling down.
They go back to Chessedonia to pick up the planecopter (I love the reaction of the guy in charge of the dock, he just apologises due to the inconiniences of not being able to go on a boat, when there is no ocean). They go to Daath to recover Ion. They overhear a conversation between Mohs and Dist, and discover a couple of useful thins: Dist and Mohs have their own agenda aside of Van, and they need Ion to restart the war. They find Ion and they read the Score to see what possible things is Van going to do, and they realize one thing: Luke doesn't apear on the Score at all! They are detected by the soldiers and they run, but Mohs and Dist use the planecopter's pilot as a hostage. They got captured and brought to Baticul, and separate them. Luke and Natalia are met by some soldiers, and offered poison to kill themselves, becase they have been sentenced to death. But Tear rescues them, thanks to Asch's help. The team confronts Mohs and the king on the throne room. Mohs acuses Natalia of being a traitor due to the ressentment of not being the real princes. And the king buys it! Seriously, how can he believe it? That's her daughter, and Mohs wants to execute her, even if she's not your biological daughter, you wouldn't want to let her be killed! What is going on? Suddenly, Asch appears and tells the team to run, he'll cover them. More game other day.
