Alright, after taking a little pause to mourn the death of my zombie trainer friend (and to refresh myself from the game a bit), it's now time to resume my journey. After this ordeal, my resolve to help Kuro end the curse of the Dragon's Heritage is stronger than ever. What if i myself end up like Hanbei? This has to end once and for all.
My first stop is the Sculptor, who sadly has still nothing to say, but somehow this asshole does:
Is that sarcasm i detect? You better watch your tongue when you talk about my friend buddy, lest i cut it off and shove it down your throat.
I go check if Isshin has something to say about this, and i find him muttering to himself:
I can only imagine he is talking about Genichiro. I'm pretty sure he was wielding a black blade already when i first fought him. Anyway, talking to him reveals nothing new, so i guess i can leave.
I now go check if my racoon buddy returned to Ashina. Unsurprisingly, he is nowhere to be seen:
Why am i getting the feeling i'm gonna get locked out of that skill text for the rest of the game? This kinda sucks to be honest all i had to do is farm guards for a bit more and i could have got it right there on the spot along with the umbrella prosthetic, but how the hell was i supposed to know? I know FromSoft likes to get cryptic sometimes but this was a bit out of the left field. Whatever, i guess there's always NG+.
I now move forward towards those shinto
torii i stopped short of crossing earlier:
I see something skulking in the grass and i wonder if it's a new enemy, turns out it's just monkeys lol. A little further ahead, i come across a dead Interior Ministry ninja. Tengu must be around:
Sure enough, he was just a little further ahead:
Now, the first time he called me Sekiro and i saw the Tengu costume hanging on the wall, i instantly thought that Tengu was just Isshin, but it just seemed a bit out there so i went with what seemed like a more reasonable explanation, that Tengu was just working for Isshin. Something about the way that conversation went though was bugging me, as it REALLY felt like a reveal moment for Isshin, that he was in fact Tengu. When i went to Tengu's previous position, he wasn't there anymore so i couldn't be sure as i never took a good look at him the first time i met him. Now that i got him in my sights again, i take a much closer look and sure enough, this guy is definitely Isshin lol:
Check out the old codger, killing ninjas despite supposedly being too sick to move.
I now approach him, and he greets me in his usual energetic way:
Is he actually sick or was that a ruse? Those ninjas are no joke and he seems able to just mow through them as if it was nothing. He must have noticed i was looking at the dead ninjas:
And you seem to be doing a fine job at that, my Lord.
I... think? Not sure what he means.
Yes sir, i'll be right on it sir!
I go look at my skills to check what exactly it is that he is talking about. I can only assume he means those special skills at the end of each tree. They are very expensive but i suppose eventually i would have had to pick one. I chose the one in the first tree since i'm basically there already. There's only one skill i need to pick on the way and it looks like it may actually be a useful one:
I now approach Tengu/Isshin, and yep, that's what he was asking for. After praising my abilitiy for killing, he rewards me with this:
Is this the last one? I hope so as i'm already swarmed in skills lmao. Before leaving, he tries to tell me something:
So he is sick after all. I can only imagine how strong he must have been in his youth if he can still kill those Interior Ministry ninjas as a sick old man. Whatever it was he wanted to say to me, it seems it will have to wait for another time, as he now bids me to leave:
Before moving on, i take a look at the skill text he just gave me:
So it's a book of further "secret" techniques upgrades. I guess this was the final skill tree after all. Can't imagine what else can there be after this. Anyway, at this point, i just remembered i had to go check on that wierd jar guy i haven't talked to in literally ages. While i'm there, i decided to finally pick something and chose the mask fragment:
Not sure if that means i locked myself out of that combat art now like i may have with the one the racoon was selling but to be honest i got too many of them already and i want to play around with the ones i have first. If i have to wait for NG+ for those other skills, so be it. I already had a mask fragment i bought from a merchant and while i have no clue whatsoever what this thing is it feels important. Buying the mask opens up a bit of new dialog:
Look, i know everybody in this world is obsessed with immortality, but a fish? That's your big plan? Wonder if he already tried and ended up becoming some kind of monster instead. Or maybe he just some strange creature that wanted to join the general obsession for immortality everybody else seems to have here.
Now that some time has passed, i go back to the Ashina Castle to see if Isshin has actually something to say after my second encounter with him as Tengu, but nope, still nothing. Since i'm there, i go see if either Emma or Kuro have new dialog, and i actually catch Kuro sleeping:
I'm not even mad. Divine Heir or not, he is still just a kid. Unfortunatly, we have a job to do so i wake him up:
Alright, it's now time to make my way to the Sunken Valley. Right off the bat, i see some Shinto structure:
The loot consists of a total of three of those Eel Liver consumables. Since this is the land of Tomoe i already assumed i was going to face that lighting attack again and this all but confirms it. I hope i'll get a chance to learn how to do that lighting reversal thing once and for all.
On my left, i see a Sculptor's Idol:
On my right, i see two guards with what appears to be rifles. One of them is patrolling up and down:
Are those the famed Okami women? Man are they ugly:
I drop down to activate the Sculptor's Idol but then i turn around and decide to take care of those two guards first and see what's beyond. I see now the game offers me a way to get there without being seen:
Normally i'm at a point in this game where i could probably just face stomp everything in sight without breaking a sweat but with the Demon Bell on even regular mooks pack a punch and while i do have an excess of Healing Gourds i don't know how long a stretch it's going to be until the next Sculptor's Idol so i decide to use some stealth. I can only track the guard's movements using sound alone, but i succeed in flanking "her":
This alerts the one sitting down and during the battle i realize those are dudes hahaha:
I guess the Okami amazon wimmin are special troops i'll meet later.
I now jump on a ledge i spot on my left, and after creeping my way across another one i find myself in an opening that definitely looks familiar:
I drop down and find one of them is sleeping on the job:
I take a look around but there doesn't seem to be another one so i'm going to use this one to try that new skill i got earlier:
No bad. It looks cool at least. Took a few tries before i could manage to get a couple of viable screenshots but i did it in the end, heh.
I now look ahead and this feels like a boss area to me:
I crawl around, picking up the loot as i inch my way towards that cave, and find a Prayer Bead and a Pacifying Agent. This definitely doesn't bode well. But once i get there, apparently there's nothing:
Time to leave i guess. I take one look to make sure this is the place i had spotted way back, which it is:
Guess this was it then, nothing to do but port back and move forward.
Going past the Scultor's Idol, i end up alerting this guard, who starts taking shots at me:
I'm now thinking from this point on i'm going to have to rope around constantly with enemies taking shots at me left and right, but all i end up seeing after i kill this guy is more patrols i can easily sneak up to:
I'm now faced with two choices, a path on the right that wounds up around a cliff, and a ledge on my left:
I pick the ledge on the left and i'm confronted with two more guards that are easy to sneak to:
Too easy so far i have a feeling i'm gonna get a nasty surprise soom. After hoisting myself up another ledge i find myself in an empy shack where i find a Gourd Seed:
On my left, i see this path keeps going on this side but i'm not sure if i can make it over there from here:
No harm in trying thought, right?
On my way down i suddenly realize that's the way i came in where the Sculptor's Idol was. Shit. I now make it back to the other path, injured and feeling like an idiot:
I make my way around, killing some stupid lizard on the way, and i emerge in an area that just says "big battle" all over:
In the distance, i see an easy target, so i take it:
Of course, to take that stupid screenshot i actually manage to fail to land my deathblow and it's now a frikking disaster. I kill the guy in a hurry but some fucking asshole comes out of nowhere with a big cannon and blasts my face off, taking a huge chunk of health. After healing, i try to take him out but he doesn't go down easy and while i'm sparring i get shot in the back buy a second shooter i hadn't seen. I take out the fucker with extreme prejudice:
You and me now buddy:
He is not so tough by himself and i quickly dispatch him. I forget to take a screenshot of the deathblow to post here to cap this progress narrative with a cool finale but no matter, no point in redoing it just for that.
After activating and resting in a Sculptor's Idol, i finally come face to face with what i expected to find here in the first place:
100% the second i make the first jump i'm getting drilled with bullets:
On my right, i find one of those rat guys who appears to be dying:
The last line seems a bit absurd with that "it takes me back" but i guess this is another translation issue. The sense is clear anyway. After this, he does his best impression of a dying motion. I leave him to his little sharade and make my charge. Onward!
Or not lol:
Every hit of their bullets takes out around 40% of my health, which is brutal. I'm now stating to feel this Demon Bell curse, but i'm not about to chicken out just yet! I resurrect and make it to the next ledge, but as soon as i climb up i'm now faced with a boss battle out of nowhere (i finally get to meet one of those famed Okami warrior wombyn). I haven't died a single time since Genichiro, not a true death anyway, and i don't want to lose that streak just yet. So i turn tail and make my way back to the second platform, where apparently it's safe enough for me to use the Homward Idol to make my way back. While i'm porting, i can actually see the shitshow that is waiting for me up ahead lmao:
Upon porting back to the idol, i find this guy was just pretending to die and is likely just doing this whole act to get pity out of people:
Guess i'm not going anywhere until i kill the boss first, so let there be battle!