Curate of Curiosities

Previously, we found out that an entire town has apparently been conusmed by some eldritch nether dimension.

When it comes right down to it, the vast majority of RPG Maker games play the exact same way. In order to stand out gameplay-wise, if feels you need to have some sort of gimmick. So, what does this game have to offer.

On the top right corner of the screen, there is a meter that slowly goes up as you walk around. When it fills up, you get in a random encounter. However, there are these glowing orbs that you can pick up which lower the meter. Furthermore, if you fight enough battles in a particular area, the meter will turn yellow and go up more slowly.

Our new objective is to meet up with Farudon, an associate of Elothu. I'm not sure how a second eldritch god will be able to help us, or even if they can be relied upon, but it's worth a try, isn't it?

She's not here to rescue any relatives or anything like that, just to get the hell out of Dodge. Though she's still willing to help find Dottie, even though it's doubtful whether she's even alive. She also wants to meet up with one Viola, a friend of hers who runs a clinic.

Now, Miriam doesn't have any eldritch gods bonded to her, but she does have a gun, and that should be good enough right?

You have her normal shot, which is effective against certain types of enemies, but a surprisingly high amount of them resist it. In that case, you'll need to pull out the hollow-point and armor piercing rounds, which are in limited supply.

With our new partner by our side, we trudge through this abandoned town, until we come across this abandoned house.

There is a way to translate this Cthulhu-speech, but we won't get it until much, much later.

Also, who's this "he" that the graffiti's mentioning? This creature? Or someone else entirely?

Inside this warped pocket dimension, we find something called a Fool's Key.

You know how in a lot of RPGs, you can buy abilities with skill points? The same is true here, except the game has its own dedicated map for this purpose (I guess the creator couldn't program a branching skill menu), and the skill points you use are not only earned through battle, but also found in the overworld.

A boss warning? Never really seen these outside of shmups.

In the very next area, you see a monster suddenly devour a man in cold blood. We are informed that what just happened was a form of unholy sacrifice. The creature then turns to our party...

It's a good thing that this man-eating creature who engages in Faustian pacts with humans is weak against ordinary firearms.

Not long after, we end up in another Fool's Key zone. While this area is still rather small, it's a lot larger than the single room from last time. No, I don't know what the Pokeball on the plaque is supposed to signify.

Here's Viola. She's a doctor.

And here's Erick. He's a collector.

And here's Sadie. She's also here.

The three of them get the same song and dance that Miriam did regarding Alicia's niece, and they tell us that the middle school she attends is east of here, past the back door of the clinic.

We took quite a bit of a beating on the way here, supporting ourselves with the occasional pools of suspicious liquid in pocket dimensions and whatever healing items we could scavenge, so having a healing provider is a welcome sight.

Since in this game, "collector" appears synonymous with "merchant", we now have an opportunity to update our equipment.

As you can see from the meter, the back side of the clinic is crawling with monsters.

These are mostly the same monsters we've encountered before, but there's also a new enemy that seems to be a possessed computer mouse.

Plus a mini-boss called Indigestion. Not sure why it's called that, other than it being something that can be treated at a clinic.

The most interesting thing about this dungeon is that there are two safes that are unlocked with a four-digit code. However, the code that unlocks each safe is on the wall of the room with the other safe. I can assure you, the puzzles in this game get more complex later on.

I'm sure that they also get longer as well.

We interrupt your dungeon crawling to bring you another flashback.

Alicia's helping Dottie with a bullying problem.

And all I'm saying is, if I looked like her, I'd think twice about picking on anyone.

No, I don't think I have.

It's the same as the boss warning, but worded a bit differently.

Fortunately, there's no boss here. Just a portal that suddenly pops up and drags away Miriam.

...Oh wait, that might be worse.

Could this other Evocation be this Farudon that he mentioned earlier?

You go through another dungeon, filled with the creatures from the tutorial area, but far more docile.

Anyway, here's another flashback, just ten minutes after the last one. And one that takes place in the ritual room seen in the intro, no less.

It looks like the mayor, Miriam's employer, sacrificed the whole town to the Evocations. Yeah, typical RPG stuff, the villain makes a deal with en evil force in exchange for power. What are the odds he'll end up violently murdered right when we confront him later on?

We find Miriam in a room that looks almost exactly like the one we met Elothu in.

It looks like even eldritch beings are vulnerable to parasitic infections.

But it looks like we're barely able to scratch the thing!

Once again, it's Elothu to the rescue, as he separates the parasite from Farudon.

The newly freed Evocation bonds with Miriam, granting her a similar type of psychic power to Alicia. But while Elothu specialized in enhancing Alicia's already existing abilities, Farudon uses what Elothu calls "poison of the mind" in the form of a defense-ignoring, damage over time attack.

As a side note, this seems to be paralleled in their respective demeanors. Elothu is eloquent and well spoken, while Farudon is terse and violent.

The creature goes down in no time at all.

The culprit behind this is, as expected, another Evocation, specifically one known as Phritotch of the Inner Evocations. It seems that they're responsible for the state that Daybreak is in.

So now our party consisits of two people who have been empowered by the psychic entities that have some relation to the town's current predicament.

Next stop, the middle school.