When God’s heart moves, my heart also moves.
When my heart moves, does God’s heart also move?
✦ ✦ ✦
Huh? My phone’s saying: “The number you have dialed is out of reach. Please try again.” Whuh? You dare mock me, phone?!
Hey guys, it’s PotatoStarch.
What’s going on here? Whoa, my VoIP phone isn’t working either. Whenever I try to post on a message board, horror movie-like things occur, and all my emails spit back errors like they’re possessed by a demon. Ahhh, I’m stranded in a corner of the city!
Oh, but I can order a pizza online with a few clicks. See? Done. No problem, then... Yeah, right. This isn’t funny! I can’t even click the stop recording button for this video. Once I do, they’ll see it. They might even be watching right now. I should be scared out of my mind (and I am kinda scared) but I guess that, as a streamer, I’m used to this. Weird... I even have enough presence of mind to remember parts that I want to edit in the video later.
Having said that, I’m still uneasy. One of the best ways to calm down is to do something you’re used to, so... click click. I’ve been having Kuroi do high-speed lateral jumps. While that’s been going on, I’ve also been observing a certain character... what is going on?
“Ugh, so weird... What are those movements? A ritual? Trying to curse someone?”
She’s a beautiful woman in dark clothes. Thanks to the lanterns lighting her up from all sides, I have a really good view of her. That dynamite body, the underground cell setting, the handcuffs... I’m getting major immoral vibes here.
Hmm... The line from her waist to her butt is wonderful; beautiful and erotic.
“Guh... This crazy presence... The Demon God!” She is disgusted.
This is the named unit we took prisoner in the last battle. Tamika, I think her name was? The first unusual thing about her is her race. What’s a dhampir? A web search tells me they’re half-vampire, half-human hybrids. But that doesn’t make sense. The vampires in DDR can’t have children; they’re all artificial creatures made with test tubes and cultivation pods. The Demon Castle’s Birthing Factory is basically like Dr. Frankenstein’s laboratory. Sci-fi and horror combined; it’s a real mash-up of genres.
“I-I’ve given you enough info, haven’t I? What else do you want me to tell you?”
“...About your mixed blood,” asks Kuroi.
“H-How... How do you...?”
“I just do.”
“You ‘just do’? That’s... impossible!”
Her stats are weird, too. Her Demon God faith is zero. Instead, it says ‘Spirit Believer.’ See? Right there. And, probably related, her magic is ‘dark magic.’ What the heck? That’s so... edgy. There’s Shadow Vision, Sinking Shadow, and Shadow Swallow. What a variety. She has lots of tricks up her sleeves, kinda like a ninja.
“Dark and... shadow?” Kuroi is slightly confused.
“Well, that explains this jail set-up; fire magic seals my shadows...”
I do recall finding her curled up behind a shield on the battlefield. The minimap radar made her position painfully obvious, though, so a few pokes with my sword were enough for her to pop right out.
“A life hidden in the shadows,” observes Kuroi.
“Yes, that’s right. I live in the world’s shadows; I’m of mixed blood. My father was a vampire reproduction test subject, and my mother was an incubator candidate given to him... basically food.”
That must be new content from the DX version. It’s similar to the relation between elves and dark elves, if you consider the “dark” aspect.
“That experiment was just a way for the Demon God to kill time; after less than a hundred years she grew bored and abandoned it. Years later, from the darkness where no stars can be seen, I was born. It was a cursed, miraculous birth.”
“Cursed and miraculous?”
“You wouldn’t understand. You were born a human, and you were raised as a human among other humans. How could you understand the pain of watching your mother suffer over having to eat her own kind, and then being forced to eat them yourself?!”
Hmm... Now, this definitely isn’t just because she’s pretty, but I genuinely sympathize with her—with Tamika. DDR sure has a way of tugging at your heartstrings; making you unable to ignore fictitious backstories. Even now, there’s a stinging sadness spreading in my chest.
“I never knew my parents. My home was flooded. I lived as a slave.”
“I... Well, you’re still an Apostle, aren’t you?” Tamika counters.
“I gave everything I had to fight.”
“You can say whatever you want; the Apostles I know don’t even have real names.”
“God gave me my current name.”
“Is that so...? Well.”
In my mind, I know this isn’t the time to be doing this. I have IRL dangers to face, and in-game I should be focusing on humanity’s army instead of getting lost in some NPC’s backstory. The Apostle markers on my minimap tell a really horrible story. This position, this movement... Crumbling Mountain is heading for the palace.
“Are you sure you have the time to be here talking to me?”
“I don’t fight alone.”
“Heh... You’re their only target, though.”
“Just me?”
“More accurately, you and the treasure. But as far as human targets, yes, you’re the only one.”
“Treasure?”
“Don’t humans have one too? A treasure with a spirit sealed inside it? It should be the symbol of your race.”
“...Fire?”
“Yeah. The Primal Ash. The human king has it, doesn’t he?”
In other words, if the palace falls, humanity’s defeat is basically guaranteed; our fire magic would become incredibly weak. At least, that’s how it worked in my elf playthrough of the regular DDR. The elemental symbols of wind and water, the Ancestral Tree and Tide Jewel, were stolen, and we became unable to wield magic. Eventually, that forced me to give up on a counterattack.
“The vampires have two of these, too: the Source Crystal, which they stole from the dwarves, and the Heaven’s Candle, which they took from the insectors. Each of these treasures contains a powerful spirit sealed within,” Tamika explains.
“Spirits...”
“They’re the source of magic in this world, and governors of the laws of nature. When it comes to magic, even the Divine Blessings only serve to amplify the spirits’ powers. The gods are just invalid masters.”
“Invalid?”
“Don’t you get it? In this world, there were originally no such things as ‘gods.’ The spirits were worshiped through their treasures, until the Demon God appeared and twisted the world.”
All the more reason for me to stop Crumbling Mountain.
“Once Crumbling Mountain secures the treasure, he’ll come after you, the Devil God’s Apostle.”
Could I still make it? No, I’d never make it. I’m not being defeatist, it’s a simple matter of distance. A horse couldn’t travel that distance fast enough, and neither could an elven flier. There’s nothing I can do.
“The finishing touch to humanity’s destruction is you. Apostles are focuses for elemental magic. The fire magic that the Devil God controls takes form via your own life... and after She’s taken you and the treasure, the Demon God will have a third power. Once that happens, then all is lost.”
“Thunder, earth... fire.”
“Fire can resist water. It’ll be no time at all before She’s got water and wind under her control as well. In that sense, your death could start the end of the world.”
“The end of the world?”
“Everything will die and turn to ash, I’m sure of it.”
No. I’ve come so far; I don’t want it to be game over yet. I don’t want to see the Demon God laughing again. All that hard work the people of the Frontier did, belittled... And then, they’ll all die, every last one of them...
“Th-This heat... What are you thinking of doing?” Tamika asks nervously.
Kuroi dying? No. No! I won’t let it happen!
“Ahhh! It’s hot! The lanterns are exploding! My shadows! Even the shadows in my sleeves are cowering... Is the dark spirit afraid?!”
It’s fine. I don’t have to make it in time. Who cares if I can’t use fire magic anymore? I am PotatoStarch, the most dexterous clicker in all the land.
“Huh? Yuck! Oh, save me! I knew you were doing some kind of ritual!”
Behold! I’m dancing in a circle only using lateral jumps! It’s almost like I’ve got shadow clones!
There’s nothing to worry about; all we have to do is defeat Crumbling Mountain with Kuroi’s massive stats and my expert player skills. No fire magic? Bring it on! Handicaps are a true gamer’s wheelhouse. I can do this... I will do it! I’ll crush Crumbling Mountain magnificently and recover the Primal Ash; that’ll solve everything!
“Lady Kuroi! If you don’t stop, the prisoner is going to die!” shouts a male voice.
Hm? When did the hot knight get here? What’s the matter? Mmh? Tamika’s fainted, too. What did I miss?
“What intense fire! No, is this a revelation from God?” he wonders.
Oh, hey. If I stick with the hot knight and his boys, I won’t have to worry about anything I come across on the road slowing me down. You’ll still need to eat, drink, and sleep on a never-ending march.
“I bring good news: Father Felipo has formed a temporary military pact with the elves. They shall intercept the army of thirty thousand vampires coming from the north. Ten Thousand Bells and Deep Sea will be there as well; this is a good chance to eliminate Thunderstorm. That means we can march our entire army south.”
Well, if we’re going, then the first order of business is to move as fast as possible towards the fort. Take the shortest route!
By the way, how is Sira doing down there?
Huh? Huh?! Why is my sweet Sira wearing armor?! She’s gonna go to battle against the vampire army to the south!