WLC 4.3: Queen Of Swords

WLC 2.7: Here We Glow

In total darkness, Ling drops Kalyani's bag and skitters off. "Hold on," she says, "I know it's around here." There's a tapping and creak. A dull light enters the chamber. Ling now stands by a small open door filled with glowing stones. "Great to see ya, again."

Maraja rolls her eyes, then turns her attention elsewhere. The chamber opens into three tunnels, but the small stone structure Ling stands beside has several metal pods attached to its sides. "What is that?"

"Just my current experiment," says Ling, "These pods contain different crops and the paneling shifts over time like the sun." She skitters up onto the building to a valve. "By turning this once a week, it keeps going 'round."

"Are thhosse dangerouss?" asks Kalyani, slithering away and roots through her bag.

"Defo!" says Ling, "With too many, anyway. Like standing in the sun." As Kalyani pulls a torch from her bag and lights it, Ling shuts her door and joins the duo in the center of the chamber. "So, who knows the way to go?"

"Her loving eyes will guide us," say Maraja. She fall to her knees and prays, "Dearest Vanessa, please, show us, on what path did Kirono head?"

A flaming eye suddenly appears in a tunnel and vanishes further in.

J: The gods did something? Hah. L: Two of her followers asked on a quest she assigned one to. J: ... L: We can talk about Vanessa later, Jevoi.

Ling licks her eyes. "South, toward Vrow territory."

"Oh, great," Kalyani shakes her head and takes out a staff, "The worshhiperss of Lmaoth." She conjures a new floating disc.

"Don't jinx it, mate," says Ling, hoisting the bag back on to it.

J: Can you just skip to the castle? L: What? But the purple-stuffed worm- and the tuning fork. D: I want to hear about the worm! J: Fine, just the interesting parts of spelunk. L: I'll do.

"She will protect us," says Maraja, standing, "She will protect us. Let us go forth!" She marches into the tunnel.

WLC 2.E: Only Human

"Never met a human before," says Ling, "Did ya come down here yourself?"

Melandria nods, still eating.

"Why'd ya do it? How'd ya do it?"

Melandria finishes the potato. "I needed to get away," she says, opening her arms wide, "As you can see, I'm a freak."

"I don't see it," says Ling, "I just see a woman tired of being treated like s***e. Not particularly uncommon."

"Darkness flows through me," says Melandria as the distant shadows over the room flare up, "I belong to the depths, unfettered by the physical world."

L: Or would that flare down?

J: Don't overthink it, Mum.

"Don't cut yourself on that edge, mate," says Ling, walking about to inspect the throne, "'Sides, ya're a queen; ya've got people that like ya."

"Three people," says Melandria, somberly, then her voice picks back up, "Maybe four?"

"Three?" Ling turns suddenly. "How are you a queen with only three subjects?"

"I'm not," says Melandria, "The Shadow Queen is just a cool title. I control literal darkness; I am the queen of shadows. No one lives in this underground sandpit."

Ling throws her arms into the air. "Brilliant," she says, "B****y brilliant." She begins walking toward the door.

"Wait," says Melandria, "I still want to know about this business idea you had."

Ling turns back to the not-actually-a-queen. "I'm researching how to grow food in the Underdank, but-"

Melandria's red eyes light up. "Then I would love to help!" She sways to the side and mutters to herself, "A chance to prove I'm not a monster."

"Ya're not a monster," says Ling, "Your body doesn't define ya."

"You don't know what they called me on the surface."

"And ya don't know what they called me at school."

D: What did they call you at school?

L: Ya don't need to know that.

"Still," says Melandria, racing over to Ling, "I won't take 'no' for an answer." She puffs out her chest. "My appearance is how I'm judged down here too; I had to work myself back up to monster. The orcs, the Vrow, I'm an object to them."

Ling nods. "I may not look it," she says, licking her eyes, "But I have a similar rep. 'DuMb LiZaRd BrAiN.'"

"Was that your school name?" Melandria opens the door into the foyer and leads out.

"I worked myself up to the bad one," smugly says Ling, following, "How'd ya think I got in here? Speaking of: ya've got two tallgoblins working for ya, so who's the third?"

"An extremely encouraging young woman," says Melandria with a smile, "Named Kirono."

WLC 6.3: Clueless

"I assume ya've checked with the few dwarves in town already?" asks Ling, pulling a pair of chairs out of the ground.

"Yeah," says Tanglepork, "None of them were hiring kobold kids for anything." She sits down. "So, it doesn't help."

"It does," says Ling, "At minimum, this dwarf comes near town every couple days. Likely lives nearby."

"That could still mean anything," says Tanglepork, annoyed, "Woodsman, hunter, bandit, merchant."

"So who'd hire a pair of schoolgirls?" asks Ling, "And for what?"

"Why are you so focused on this one?"

"If we know where this dwarf is, then we have a direction to start looking," says Ling, rubbing her temples, "Those two are the only clue ya've given me."

"We can't even confirm if this dwarf is real, Ling," says the deputy, shaking her head, "We've narrowed it down to only one possibility: the kids walked out of town. No magic residue, no un-alibi-ed adults, no signs of violence, nothing."

A: What's the point of this? If the wolf was killing kids, just say that. L: Who said she did? J: The story of us meeting on an eldritch cruise started with me doing a drug deal in the woods; give her a chance to set this up right.

"So why'ren't ya searching the bush then," asks Ling, "Why is the most secure exit being blamed? Something magical obvy happened to those kids, we just need to find where."

"We've already asked all of the parents," says Tanglepork as she sets her notes aside, "And none of the other kids are saying anything either. The only thing we could do is search blindly."

The two sit in silence for a moment.

"What if the culprit came to us?" asks Ling. As Tanglepork's eyebrow raises, Ling asks, "Any other kids leave town on the regular?"

"Tanglepork flips through her notes. "There's a little lycan who visits her grandmother every week," she says, "But we've told her parents not to let her while we're investigating."

J: Why would the sheriff bother if you're being blamed? L: Because if she went missing in the woods, that would mean... J: Understood, not the Underdank. Town would force the sheriff's hand. L: Town would've the sheriff's head.

"Does Nana Lycan know?"

"...no..."

"Then I've an idea."

That smartphone is too weak for him. Get that man a Nokia.

Elena... what is Based?

Mikado Story (Injured)

In both games, getting hit in Story mode will give the player character battle damage in future scenes. These are the four limbs and either the head (BB1) or torso (BB2).

Here's those Mikado scenes from the first game, but this time both Mikado and the other playable characters are fully damage. I only recently discovered you could even apply the damage effects to NPCs. It's an exploit anyone can do: using the secret P2 option in Story mode (R1+R2+L1+L2+Start+Select almost anytime on P2's controller while in Story mode), any NPC in P1's story that is defeated while controlled by P2 will be fully damaged when they reappear. No gameshark codes or other data manipulation required at all.

SPINNING WITH A BIG SWORD

Whether you're a dark knight...

Or a pretty princess...

This feeling is unmatched.

FROGS

Chihiro is troublesome little boy. He likes to throw frogs at people.

POV: The enemy leader is afraid of your pet frog.

Mikado, Red Shadow (also known as Hotarubi), Jo, and Hongou all react to this frog in this over-dramatic way. This behavior is tied to their movelist, so any character can be made to react this way.

POV: A grown woman, who is also a samurai assassin (and might be able to hear the dead), is afraid of your pet frog.

POV: You found the only ninja that doesn't like frogs.

POV: That one girl in class thinks she's so cool.

POV: You found the guy that's bullying your brother.

POV: That girl came back! She's friends with the bully!

In their defense, it's a big frog. It also continues to move around the stage and can jump off ledges. It is a pain to pick back up in first person mode.

Further, nothing is stopping any character from picking the frog up and throwing back into Chihiro's face.

As a big fan of Bushido Blade (1 and 2), how is it that I only found out about the secret Versus mode inside of the Story mode today?

Violence in the Tatara Shrine

This stage is the Tatara Shrine, where the Last Descendant of the Kagami Family, Kagami Izuna, is kept, hidden away from the Shainto who seek to kill her. (Izuna is not to be confused with the young priestess Suzuka, who gives the players their weapons in the first game. Common misconception on the English net.)

While this is the final boss stage for the Shainto, it is also the stage you'd fight Mikado in the Vs CPU gauntlet mode. You normally cannot select the stage, but I'm a dirty little hacker.

Normal jumping while your opponent is down automatically does an attack in BB2.

Multiple attacks can connect at once. Getting hit in the legs is far less dangerous in the second game, since it only slows you down instead of breaking your leg (which makes combat nigh impossible).

Notice how her legs are shaking in her victory pose, that's because she got hit.

Mikado Endings

I mentioned earlier that the original Bushido Blade has a secret tenth fight. Beating that gives the second (actually canon) ending.

Here are the two endings for Mikado. Her Japanese VA in both games was Michiyo Yanagisawa.