I’m finally getting time to write this post! May was a crazy month powering through the last of my part translating CCC and preparing a cosplay for Fanime. Now dead from the convention on a quiet holiday morning, it’s time to finally write up the next Emmyrea section! I, uh, played immediately after the last post, which was a tad more than a month ago, so here’s hoping I remember everything well enough. I take a lot of screenshots, so hopefully they’ll jog my memory enough. Without further ado, let’s try to remember what the hell was happening!
Our heroes wake up the next morning from their cave sleep, only to be surrounded by impenetrable fog. Elina and Bitch try to wake up Marian, only to find she’s an absolute disaster first thing in the morning:
Stuck in the thick fog in an unknown forest, our heroes had no choice but to shake the tiny mage girl awake.
“Earth to Marian? I hate to admit this, but we need you and your magic right now!”
“Ahh… sorry… Mistress Calkram… Five more minutes…”
“You’re supposed to be guiding us to that Calkram, not being woken up by her!”
Once again she openly hints at being close to the evil witch, but our characters can’t see the plot through all the fog. Either way, once she’s woken up enough to focus her eyes and fix her hair, she lets the party know her plan.
“We just gotta use this Magic Compass, and we’ll reach Mistress Calkram, no problem!”
“All mages make a pilgrimage to visit Mistress Calkram once in their lives.”
Bitch and Elina hadn’t heard of this fact before since they’re removed from magic as warriors, but it sounds like it’s not a tradition for their kingdom at least, considering no one has entered her forest alive. To them, Calkram is known as the Grand Mage who protects them. Until the whole princess thing of course.
“…ah! Ta-da! This is my Magic Compass, Paa-kun!”
“…can I cut this girl, Bitch?”
These two screenshots were taken 20 minutes apart, so presumably they weren’t connected, but they just fit too well not to juxtapose.
(I’m falling asleep at like 2pm due to con fatigue x _x. I have coffee now, hopefully that’ll carry me through this~)
I’m tired enough I just realized “Paa-kun” is because of compass… I guess we could call it Rose for compass rose or something like that, though that’s not really cute enough. Rosey maybe? Or Compy like the tiny dinosaur. We’ll punt that issue for now.
Marian leads us into a not-dark cave, to which Bitch and Elina express their surprise at the incredible luminescence. Elina is weirdly confused.
“Ehh? It’s common sense? What do you mean it’s common sense that caves are dark!?”
The cave should lead to where Calkram lives and Paa-kun can guide them down paths without monsters. Marian boasts that everything will be a-okay!
Marian:
“It’ll be great, just leave it to me! You can both just rest in peace!”
Elina:
“S-she means rest easy, right…?”
However, Paa-kun seems to be having issues and isn’t getting a signal. Apparently the compass has a feature where if the guest isn’t invited, it won’t show their house on Magic Maps. Damn that’s useful. Since the party will have to fight through monsters now, Elina and Bitch have reservations about bringing Marian along. Not so much that she’ll cause problems, but that they don’t want her to risk her life for a cause no one’s even bothered talking about yet. Of course, she protests this:
“If Bitch is here by my side, then I can pull through, no matter how dangerous or scary it gets!”
“I know I could be killed! But it’s safer for me by Bitch’s side instead of returning to the forest, right!?”
“If I end up dying, I’ll only haunt you a little bit!!”
Surprisingly, the decision is left up to the player.
“Er, I understand you’d be worried about being alone, but…”
“But we should part ways here.”
> “We need her if we’re going to rescue the princess.”
Of course we bring her along! Almost certainly a bad ending if not, but I’m a bit curious.
“T-thank you so much, Bitch!!”
Elina argues with you, to which Marian calls her an old hag. Elina shouts back that she’s barely twenty, to which Marian retaliates with bad Japanese puns:
“I-I’m barely twenty you know!!”
Marian:
“…could you read this kanji for me please?”
＝＞「鯖」
Elina:
“Saba”
Marian:
“I rest my case.”
Reading saba. Basically, she’s trying to say “you’re lying about your age, aren’t you?”
It took me a minute to puzzle this one out, but 鯖を読む (reading saba) is an expression that means “to manipulate figures to one’s advantage; to count wrongly on purpose; to inflate or deflate one’s age.” So by asking her to read “saba,” aka the word for mackerel (not to mention breaking the fourth wall by having her read a floating kanji), she’s making her admit to lying about her age. How I would actually translate this, I have no freaking clue. I need way more coffee for that…
Remember that gasoline tanks don’t exist in this world, but just ignore that, neither do convenience stores.
“I-I will fucking end you!!”
Some liberties with that line, but only so many times I can translate ふざけないで as “don’t fuck with me!”
Anyway, they finally get started on their dungeon exploration adventures. This section took a while, so I’ll probably paraphrase it a bit. You’re given options on where to go without any basis for your decision.
“Let’s go straight.”
“Let’s try left”
Various different events happen, such as finding monsters:
Or having Elina and Bitch fall into a trap:
“AHH! Watch where you’re touching, Bitch! Ugh there’s something slimy on my leg! I told you to watch where you were going!”
One of the traps drops a washbasin on you in the classic anime trope, complete with the perfect sound effect. It’s a weird tone mix.
“Hahha… y-yess… I-I’m glad you’re… *pfffff*… Elina, you… shouldn’t laugh… hahahahhaa”
If you take the wrong way, it’ll actually just loop you back to the start, so I ended up just saving before decisions and time traveling.
When you’re far enough on the correct path, Marian asks a silly little question that’s on her mind:
“Um, I’ve been wondering this for a while now, but you’re not magicians, right? Why do you want to meet Mistress Calkram anyway?”
FINALLY. Like, this conversation should have happened hours ago!! Bitch and Elina look at each other awkwardly before telling the truth about Calkram:
“I’ll never forgive her. To kidnap the innocent princess and curse the king… I’ll never forgive Calkram!!”
To no surprise, Marian is in a bind for her love for Calkram and for her friends.
“Just as we swore loyalty to the King, she must respect Calkram the same way as a mage.”
Oh don’t think too hard about this, it’s time to punt the problem down the road again with monsters!
This monster’s different though since it’s a magical beast! The only way to kill it is to break the gem that gives it life. So they do that and poof.
However, the next room is rather dicey:
The weird bug things are scared of the rock lizard guy, so they’re just watching from the distance. You’re given the option of either fighting the rock lizard while the others are at bay, or running past the stunned copy-paste eyeball monsters. I chose to fight the lizard.
It immediately fucked me up.
“Let go of Bitch!!”
That was rather bleak and dark, not to mention sudden.
Time travel back five seconds, instead we fight our way through the bug guys. Marian nods and says she’ll help us, preparing a grand magic attack…
…that ends up being a nabe pan falling from the ceiling and bonking a monster with the perfect sound effect.
“Whaaaat~, that’s not right~”
With much better luck than the rock snake, the party manages to make it out of the cave alive!
But not without unwanted attention:
I’m not exactly sure what her orb communicator is held up by, but the sub balls are held by chicken feet, which means the center is… Anyway, evil-looking character!
“…hmm, I didn’t expect Mary to be frolicking with the enemy. I’ll be sure to punish her thoroughly after this.”
With that threatening interlude over as fast as it appeared, the party reaches their destination.
Before they can soak in the sights, Redrick appears out of the literal blue with his warm glass of Ballnog:
“Oh my, you sure have been working hard haven’t you, Miss Elina.”
Marian’s a bit confused, having never seen this trash— person before, so he politely introduces himself.
“Remember the name, Redrick! Sharp, handsome, and the man who everyone gossips about being the next in line for the throne!”
“God, he’s saying all that nonsense while dressed like an idiot. And his laugh is just awful! He’s scaring me~”
“I’ve never seen a narcissist as self-absorbed as you before. If I was your friend, I’d be absolutely embarrassed just being around you.”
“Oh right, a weirdo like you couldn’t possibly have friends to begin with.”
“Marian, please be more careful. If you get close, you’ll catch his stupid.”
I’m glad the party collectively knows how to deal with Redrick, especially with Marian’s savage support.
Redrick, responds with whatever this face is:
and takes his warm Ballnog with him out of your sight! Apparently they followed in your wake and probably will be tailing you again, but for now they’re gone, allowing you to enter the castle.
Into the dark and cold castle we go. What horrors lie in this seemingly empty hell where our princess lies trapped?
“Oh, Marian, you’re rather late. …who are these people you’re with?”
We get a rather warm reception waltzing into enemy territory. She notices Elina is wounded and tends to her without hesitation.
Elina smiled back at the kind gesture, but her eyes showed no laughter, only the cold sharpness of a blade.
Marian on the other hand, is realizing the gravity of the situation.
“Did… I betray Mistress Calkram…?”
“To tell you the truth… I’m actually Calkram’s disciple.”
Not that this is particularly shocking, though the most striking part is that she’s a grand mage’s disciple while sucking at magic very badly.
She introduces the maid as Lulu, who takes care of Calkram.
“Calkram said that anyone from the castle is a bad person and should not be allowed here. What will she say when she finds out?”
“I might be Calkram’s disciple, but I didn’t intend to fool you guys or catch you in a trap!”
You try to explain how you’re not the bad guys and that Calkram is the bad one, but Lulu isn’t going to believe you that easily.
“Cut them down.”
“Only forgive Lulu.”
> “Forgive them both.”
Like really, why would you ever pick the first two options? To be fair, 切り捨てる can also just mean “cut off and abandon,” in addition to “cut someone down or slay.” I don’t fully remember the previous line, so it might not be as threatening, but the “as ordered by the King” part implies a heavier toll. But yeah, looks at those two tiny adorable faces and tell me you could cut them down ; _;
“Stop apologizing already, okay? It’s not my style to make girl’s cry. I’ll believe you.”
“I knew you’d forgive those two with how gentle you are with girls, hehe.”
Elina seems to be in agreement with us, which means she might have stopped us if we tried to do anything bad.
For now, Marian decides to stick with us:
“I’ve… decided. I’m going to confront Calkram myself and hear it from her!”
Lulu still doesn’t believe Calkram could do wrong, so she runs off on her own. However, the mysterious dark elf has something else in mind:
“Just hang out here for a while and wait for your friends to arrive. Okay, Lulu…?”
Somehow all this happened in front of our party as they went forward as they run into the room with Gilma.
“You’ve finally arrived.”
Things have taken an oddly sexy turn with a dominatrix elf with a latex-like top, a collar, and a whip with a captive maid trussed up to the dungeon wall.
“Mistress Gilma, please… forgive me…”
Gilma:
“You girls have all been very bad. Girls like you need a strict punishing.”
This was a porn game, you’ve got to remember. I can feel the threatening eyes of the Playstation rating board glaring daggers from just outside. So Gilma does what she can while keeping an eye on the game authorities.
The rating board nods in approval as she explains the whip is not really a whip, just an obedience motivator.
Around that time, a magical beast rears its head and snarls at the heroes.
“Gilma’s always been Mistress Calkram’s beast tamer assistant!”
“GRWAAAAWAAWA!”
Oh hey, copy paste monster! Now just remember everyone, you’ve got to break the crystals or the beast will just keep coming back!
No that’s not right, Elina, good try. Marian is a gem, but not the right one~
Bitch confronts Gilma, cutting down the magical beast just to watch it come back.
“Both me and my beasts hate men, so you won’t get any mercy from us!”
Bitch quickly scans the room, noting several possible gems. Without much to go off of, you’re forced to make a decision!
“Blue orb on the pedestal.”
> “Head for the wall.”
You break a few on the wall, but then she screams at you to stop at a certain one. The evil villain yells at you not to do something, so of course you do it!
“I even told you not to crush that one… It’s your own fault, blame your own stupidity.”
Apparently that one was a paralyzing poison for some reason.
>///<
Okay so time travel back, we don’t break the orb that kills us and instead break the one that kills the beast. Now without her fangs, Gilma escapes from the room. Before we give chase, we take a minute to free Lulu from her shackles and head out.
However, the party hears a bloodcurdling screen just outside the door. As they look out, they see the shadow of someone running away.
“Was that Ballnog!?”
Bitch didn’t get a good look, so he can’t say for sure. But it’s possible Ballnog is tailing them and finished her off for reasons unknown. However, something strange happens with her body:
“Gilma… She’s returned to her original form… She was a being created with magic by Mistress Calkram. Now that she’s dead, she’s returned to what she was.”
So you’re telling me Calkram specifically turned a flower into a sadistic woman that ties up girls and has her way— slaps them in an age-appropriate way until they’re good again? I feel like we’ve learned more about Calkram here than anywhere else in the game to be honest. Good for her, good for her.
Anyway, you find Emmyrea.
Oh the princess? Oh yeah, she’s just in that room eating cake.
We find Princess Emmyrea happily relaxing in a weirdly nice room with a sunlight window despite being in a cave. We run up to her, tears in our eyes, but she’s utterly confused. Elina tries to explain to her what happened at the castle.
“I don’t believe any of it, it can’t be. Calkram has been nothing but a gentle host. She said that my father was aware of all of this and she just wanted to startle me by transporting me here suddenly with magic. There’s no way he was cursed by her!”
Something is definitely going on here, but who knows what at this point… After seeing the grave look on Elina and Bitch’s face, she begins to have some doubts that maybe the kidnapper isn’t the good person?
“I’ll go talk to her at once!”
We try to tell her it’s dangerous, but she stubbornly refuses to wait in the room as we confront the witch.
As they walk further in the castle to Calkram’s room, Emmyrea keeps looking around curiously at things in the room. At one point, she spies a painting on the wall that for some reason she just has to touch. This triggers a trap that drops a rock on her, but Bitch manages to pull her away just in time.
“Y-yes, I’m fine. Just a little startled, is all. You really are our country’s top knight, aren’t you Bitch?”
After Elina scolds the princess, the party keeps walking, only for Emmyrea to once again be curious about a vase. You’re given the option to intervene or not.
If you don’t intervene, you keep walking only to hear the sound of it shattering on the ground. Elina comes stomping back and yells a storm at the princess.
If you do intervene, she goes full princess on you:
“Your job as a knight is to protect me in the event that anything happens and that’s it. Voicing your opinion is not part of your duty.”
Comedic scenes aside, we’re at Calkram! That was oddly quick, I think?
Calkram felt more like a mother confronting her children than an evil witch at this point. Most of this scene is this single portrait, so I’ll just translate them under one picture.
“I’m not mad at you, Lulu. I’ve been watching you from here this entire time. I know you tried to follow what I asked all the way until the end.”
“Marian, what a troublesome child you are. Sneaking out of my sight to go bathing in the lake like that…”
“I’ll forgive you, even after all this, if you come back to me.”
“As for you knights, I do apologize, but I can’t have you leave now. I don’t plan on killing you if I don’t have to. You may have killed my precious Gilma, but that was her mistake.”
“That detestable king’s life will end in just a few more days. You’ll remain in this castle until then. After which, you’ll be free to go. Well, except for Emmyrea.”
Suddenly, the doors come crashing down and your party is trapped in the room.
“Emmyrea. I’ll tell you everything once this is over. Once you know the truth, you’ll wish to stay here with me, I’m certain.”
Emmyrea:
“…you tricked me, didn’t you Calkram!? You were so kind to me, told me unimaginable tales, showed me brilliant jewels… Was that all a lie!?”
Naaaah, it was a friendly kidnapping! A surprise roadtrip!
“I did not lie to you, but… you wouldn’t understand, no matter what I say here.”
“I’ll at least say, that man committed a grave crime. Crime deserves punishment, so I laid a curse on him.”
“That man was a villain who used others as a stepping stone and threw them away after. I wished for that cold-blooded human to taste the anguish and despair those people felt.”
Elina, unmoved by her words, charges Calkram with her sword. However she repels the sword with magic, sending it clashing on the floor.
“Y-you’re the one whose evil, Calkram… My father is the most gentle, kind man I’ve ever met. Your slander against him is nothing but lies…”
Man, Emmyrea comes through in a pinch. For a character who eats cake and breaks pots, she took that flash of anger and used it. However, Calkram defiantly stood up for her actions.
“He had years to reflect on his actions and atone for his sins. Instead he just lived on like nothing happened. I do not plan on releasing the curse on someone like that. But if you kill me, you can undo the curse that way.”
“…well then. Come at me, Bitch! My life is yours to take.”
…why won’t she just tell us what happened?
She wants me to kill her to dispel the curse while this web of mysteries still hangs over everything. Just what should I do…?
This tense scene gets more tense with the option on how to act. It seems pretty clear there’s some truth here. I’m not certain killing her would end the curse, or that she’s even evil. So I had Bitch stay his hand.
“If you want to die that badly, I’ll kill you myself! Bitch, give me your sword!”
Elina steps forward during your hesitation, unwilling to doubt her king. She looks at you, demanding you hand over your weapon.
Second chance, once against I refuse to relinquish my sword. When suddenly…!
Lulu:
“Master Bitch and everyone else, I’m sorry, but I won’t let you kill this person!!”
A secret exit opens up and Lulu ushers Calkram to safety. The party tries to follow, but you end up back outside the cave and in the forest. Calkram is nowhere to be seen, but Lulu for some reason stays behind. It’s dark, so you head back to the cave where this blog post started for the night.
As everyone was eating, Lulu decided it was time to speak up.
“I’ll tell all of you the truth.”
“…everything started 10 years ago. At the time, the royal family had one young prince. He fell in love with a noble woman who would frequent the castle. But the king would not permit the prince’s love, so he forced them apart. The prince was then set to marry a foreign princess, and the girl a separate noble family. That prince is the current king. He married the princess, but no kids were born to him. However, he learned the woman he once loved had given birth to two kids. He asked his wife to let him adopt one of the daughters from her. Of course, his wife was bewildered at the proposition. The woman was happily married and loved her child.”
“The older sister Philia, who loved her baby sister very much cried in protest at the idea of handing her over. But she reasoned that her sister would be raised to be queen and that she’d be happy that way. In the end, she gave in and let her sister go. A few days later… her family’s mansion was attacked at night.”
“The ones who attacked were the country’s knights. They killed not only her parents, but all the servants as well, before burning the mansion to the ground.”
“It was proclaimed by the king as an execution for treason. She knew her parents did nothing of the sort. It was obvious, even for a child. In short, the king had betrayed them. Her parents were dead, her house was burnt to the ground, and the country blamed it on them. That day, Philia lost everything. She continued on without any life behind her eyes, like she was constantly sleepwalking.”
“And thus, she wandered into the Devil’s Forest. The forest was full of danger, but that didn’t matter to her. She was as good as dead, anyway. But, someone was there to save her. That was the previous Great Mage Calkram.”
“That’s about all of it. Philia trained under the previous Calkram, then when she passed on, Philia succeeded her title. And Emmyrea, you are that sister of hers… Mistress Calkram– no, Mistress Philia had to pull her precious sister from the king’s vile hands.”
My god this whole scene was so serious and captivating I had to capture it in full without jokes. This is where I left off like, more than a month ago and I wrote this whole blog post in several hours just so I can finally get back. I’m assuming this is the truth and that’s how the game will go, but I will lose my shit if it turns into another lie and the king’s actually got his own side of the equation.
AND WHAT’S UP WITH REDRICK AND HIS WARM BALLNOG!? I have to know!
If you’ve stuck around to the end of this, thank you for reading! I hope I can make your second-hand playthrough of Emmyrea worthwhile, for I’m invested at this point! I think I’ve been writing this for like, six hours, so I’m gonna face plant~
Kusoge Coffeehouse 