OK, here's the unified story post. Unfortunately, the post won't fit the whole thing, so it has to come in 2 parts. The first part contains everything from the beginning to the breaking point.
I made a few storyline changes of my own accord in here in order to get stuff to fit. Take a look, see what you think, and offer any objections, death threats, or accusations of me having a swollen head that you will, and we'll see what we can do about it. Here's a list of the changes, which really aren't that numerous:
~Renault, Roget, and Luther now inhabit 602 A.D. with Glenn instead of 1002 A.D. But oh well; every game needs its Singing Mountain, I suppose.
~A few details of Sorin's ultimate fate have been changed; he still dies, but he is no longer banished to the Tesseract. Consequently, Lavos does not consume him; he does find redemption on the deathbed, after a fashion anyway.
~Belthasar and the party now have a short discussion when they first meet him about how awkward it is to only find out about someone's role in saving you after they've already done it.
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Starting Characters: All characters begin at level 65 with associated dual and triple techs. This is intended to give the player a feel for the game’s differences from CT with the relative reassurance of controlling an insanely powerful group of chosen ones, as well as to help the plot. At a certain point, Crono, Marle, and Lucca will be stripped of most of their power, allowing for the required growth element without which a lot of RPGs would be pointless.
Crono – Heaven
Equipment
Weapon – Rainbow Sword
Armor – Moon Armor
Headgear – Safe Helm
Accessory – Power Seal
Techs
Cyclone
Spincut
Lightning
Lightning 2
Luminaire
Marle – Cold
Equipment
Weapon - Valkerye
Armor – Prism Dress
Headgear – Prism Helm
Accessory – Pendant
Techs
Aura
Charm
Ice
Ice 2
Quantum State (massive HP drain, Marle takes 20%)
Lucca - Fire
Equipment
Weapon – WonderShot
Armor – Prism Dress
Headgear – Prism Helm
Accessory – Green Dream
Techs
Hypno Wave
Sniper Shot
Fire
Fire 2
Flare
Scenario 1 – Prologue: Council of Fate
The year is 1002 A.D. Crono and Marle are married, though they're still innocent and mostly the same. Life hasn't changed much; things are peaceful. Marle wakes Crono up in the expanded house, and informs them that he, as chief knight, must attend a diplomatic meeting between King Guardia and two Porre diplomats. Crono must first run some errands. Lucca arrives at the house after he’s finished with them, and they run off to Guardia Castle. At the meeting, one of the Porre servants begins to feel sick and excuses himself, followed by his friend. The Trio is suspicious, and Crono gets up and follows them alone. When he does, he finds that their suspicions were correct - the man is not ill at all, but rather is plotting against Guardia, specifically to kill the representative if 2 out of 3 conditions were not met, but one of the agents has compunctions against killing King Guardia, having preferred to "ice the Chancellor." The Trio overhears this and jumps out from hiding and confronts them. Crono easily dispatches one of them. The other one, however, is much more slippery – he can transform into an uber ninja and kill stuff. He flees very quickly, and the Trio runs after him toward Zenan Bridge, where a fight with him takes place. He runs away after a few thousand damage has been dealt to him, spewing a bunch of stuff about purpose and how it's his destiny to triumph over them. He then runs off toward the Denadoro Mountains, where Crono and company follow. Once they get there, the agent is nowhere to be found, but Porre begins shelling the mountain with napalm, an invention Lucca hasn't even released yet, and they retreat to the Masamune cave. Its remaining magical aura will allow Lucca to use an incomplete Time Egg to free the party from their present situation. Masa and Mune exchange some dialogue with each other, before a massive Gate much like the one in Magus' Castle in CT appears to the Manoria Cathedral theme and swallows the party whole, mere seconds before the cave collapses.
Cut to Magus in 11,998 B.C…
Characters Obtained: Characters are at some much lower level now.
Crono – Heaven
Equipment
Weapon – future-ish sword
Armor – Cammo
Headgear – Cammo Helm
Accessory – Power Glove
Techs
Cyclone
Lightning
Marle – Cold
Equipment
Weapon - Fail-Not
Armor – Kevlar Suit
Headgear – Uh, something...
Accessory – Pendant
Techs
Aura
Ice
Lucca - Fire
Equipment
Weapon – Magnum
Armor – Taban Suit
Headgear – Lode Helm
Accessory – Green Dream
Techs
Hypno Wave
Fire
Scenario 2 – The New Future
Like I was saying before the mandatory character power descriptions so rudely interrupted, cut to 11,998 B.C. Magus is stumbling along a high mountain range, in a fierce blizzard. He recalls the words of the Elder of the Last Village..."Indeed, the sea level has dropped, and a new mountain range has emerged on the horizon. However, it is very dangerous, as while the rest of the world is warming, these mountains still suffer terrible weather." Magus coughs a few times, and finally falls to the icy ground, cursing and calling for Schala before he finally faints. No new characters are obtained at this point.
Cut back to Crono, Marle, and Lucca…in 2302 A.D. The Time Egg apparently threw them into the new Lavos-free future to escape Porre’s bombardment. They wake up in a medical facility, being tended to by a medical droid. Eventually they are released and are told to report to the central command chamber, where they find none other than Belthasar. They're happy to see him, and he's confused, but then he figures that he must have been in a much worse state in the original timeline, but thanks to them he's not, so he thanks them heartily anyway! This Belthasar is a far cry from the deranged Belthasar of the original game’s 2300 A.D. In fact, he’s quite happy with what he’s built – thanks to government funding, he’s been able to construct an entire city in the middle of the ocean. This is known as Chronopolis, the Fortress of Time. It is a military research station that was named for two reasons: one, to signify the eternal peace Belthasar dreams of, and two, to have a double meaning at the fact that Belthasar is in fact doing research on time and temporal mechanics rather than conventional military research, as the public at large believes. If they knew the truth about what Belthasar was building, even with his highly respected status, the governments of the world never would have supplied the funds. Hence, Belthasar believes that it would not be a good idea for the Trio to leave Chronopolis. Belthasar just happened to be testing his Temporal Catch machine at the time that Crono, Marle, and Lucca appeared – a perfect receiver for their trip through time. However, their best weapons and equipment have curiously been lost in the time distortion – even their magical powers have ebbed back to their most basic levels. They are given free run of the facility for a short while in Belthasar’s effort to help them recover. Chronopolis contains many rooms – the Medical Facility, the Temporal Catch, the Chrono Compendium, the Dispatch Chamber (in which lies a convenient Save Point), the Observatory, the Reactor Core, the Auxiliary Power Station, the Training Room, the Armory (in which Melchior hangs out later), the Hangar, the Research Lab, the Secondary Research Lab, and the Concourse, in which Nadia’s Bell is proudly displayed. Due to Belthasar’s warnings of the politics of the time, that is all of 2302 A.D. that is available for the player to access, and so the World Map display shows a map of Chronopolis.
Robo now works in Chronopolis, as well, alongside Atropos. She is Belthasar’s top assistant, while Robo has two functions. In addition to aiding in Belthasar’s research, he also commands the mostly robotic Chronopolis Defense Force as the Chief of Security. The droids in the facility act autonomously but are capable of being overridden at any time by a master control code accessible only to Atropos, Robo, or Belthasar. Mother Brain also exists in the facility, and oversees the fortress’s internal network and information handling. The party can visit with all these characters and resupply their weapons at Chronopolis. Until then, the party simply takes what they’re offered. When they’re finished talking to Robo, they are summoned to the observatory, which functions as the central command for Chronopolis. They immediately ask Belthasar how the rest of the situation with Porre in their time goes. Belthasar assures them that it will all pan out, and that this was but an unfortunate accident. Though his Dispatch Chamber is not quite finished, he tells them that it will afford them a one-way trip back to 1002 A.D. They take the trip, only to find Guardia under attack. Oops.
Scenario 3 – Darkness Ascendant
The Porre navy has completely forgone Zenan Bridge and is launching an attack on the kingdom. They have taken control of Truce, and are pushing across the continent toward the castle. The Trio decides that getting rid of their forward base will drive them back for now, and Truce is said base, so that gives the Trio a home turf advantage. They go there and attempts to repel the attackers via stealth (read: stealing Porre uniforms and weapons), to a remix of the Ocean Palace theme. Eventually, after they’ve successfully obtained a copy of the enemy’s battle plan and killed half the base, they use the Porre communications HQ at the base to send a telegraph to the Chancellor and inform him and the King of their little rogue squadron’s operations, provoking them to send an army down on Truce. As the Guardian army approaches, the Trio decides to go kill the offending general leading the attack, a guy named General Montcrief, who has no moral fiber whatsoever. William Ishito, who is also serving in the attack under Montcrief’s command, mutters something about it being regrettable that it came to this, and then he leaves CM&L to fight Montcrief’s tank. When the tank is defeated, Montcrief yells out “Sorin!” and the assassin appears. Montcrief directs him to kill the party before the tank explodes and kills him. In obedience to Montcrief’s order, Sorin arms himself. The party enters battle, but even as it begins Sorin executes a Dragon Strike, his own more powerful version of Crono and Ayla’s Falcon Hit dual Tech. It instantly fells Crono, Marle, and Lucca. However, as soon as this occurs, the surroundings begin distorting, and the screen goes white. When the white glare ceases, the Trio is perfectly all right and Sorin is nowhere in sight. A quick “did I miss something?” quip from Lucca serves as the prelude to a much larger dilemma. Either Sorin was connected to them in some way, or he has caused a temporal disturbance of some sort in their time. Either way, they have to get to Belthasar to be able to do anything about it.
Scenario 4 – Ephemeral Time
They immediately decide that they’ve got to dig out the Epoch again, but there’s just one problem – they hid it extraordinarily well, in a crypt guarded by all manner of enemies natural and not, so as to hide it from the use of those with evil intentions. These enemies were tough, but not so tough that a fully powered-up party could not make short work of them. However, they’ve been drastically reduced in power, leading Crono and the gang to wonder if they’ll survive the endeavor. But it is decided that they have no choice but to make the attempt. The crypt is on Manoria Cathedral Sub-Level 3. The doors to both 2 and 3 are guarded by Zealian pendant doors made by Melchior at the Trio’s request. On Sub-Level 2, there are a whole bunch of enemies to stay the hand of any who would wrongly attempt to access the time machine. Once they arrive on Sub-Level 3, however, they find the Epoch – and the crypt – gone, with a massive mutant creature in its place, along with a background that looks like the Ocean Palace, but distorted with a time bubble. The creature has been outfitted with machinery to increase its magic power – this isn’t going to be an easy fight. In destroying it, they break the magical seal that was holding the Epoch in dimensional flux and receive one good armor set and a better weapon for CM&L from the treasure chests in the Epoch crypt. Alarmed at what the creature's presence portends, the Trio puts the keys in the ignition and heads to 2302 A.D., only to find Chronopolis encircled in thunderstorms that reek of temporal energy. Belthasar explains that history has been fundamentally altered by catastrophic errors in time, but he is unable to pinpoint their source. Melchior is there now; when this started, Belthasar brought the Guru of Life out of 1002 A.D. to see if he could help. The only thing keeping them there to observe this deterioration is a time bubble – the same kind Lavos created that allowed him to observe any time period but remaining impervious to any historical changes made between 65,000,000 B.C. and 1999 A.D., as he was removed from linear time during that period. Belthasar and Melchior basically cobbled it together, though, and they weren't certain about its power usage. Unless the team activates the secondary generator, the machine will not hold and Chronopolis will soon be cast into the Tesseract AKA the Darkness Beyond Time. At this point, you can choose Robo to accompany you and replace one of the primary characters in your fighting party. Whichever character gets left behind will attempt to help Belthasar and Melchior stabilize Chronopolis from the command center. Random fluctuations in the space-time continuum produce various enemies at random points on the path to the auxiliary power station, including everything from malevolent spirits to murderous machines. One of them injures Atropos severely. In the generator room, the player fights a boss battle with a resurrected and more powerful Guardian robot that appears out of one of the fluctuations in time. After defeating it, the player gets some good stuff as usual, and flips on the secondary generator, stabilizing Chronopolis in a time bubble…for now. Belthasar admonishes the party members that are present to recruit the rest of the old team to launch a counteroffensive against…whatever the hell’s doing this. Robo becomes a permanent party member at this point and takes Atropos’ Ribbon with him.
Character Acquired
Robo – no innate element
Notes: If it’s able to be implemented, Robo has a new feature in CE – the Servo Module, an attachment perfected by Belthasar. It can be used in place of an arm to hard-wire various types of beam weapons directly into Robo’s fusion generator. This allows Robo to mimic all types of magic damage, though with varying potency depending on the type of attack. As a rule, the beam weapons Robo acquires are less powerful than character Techs, though some of the most powerful ones acquired near the end of the game can match or exceed magic Tech skills. In addition, Robo has some beam cannons that provide highly unique effects which few if any Techs are equipped to match. Several of these are geared towards brutally damaging or disabling a specific type of enemy. Of course, if the player does not wish to bother with beam attachments, most of Robo’s arms are available for use as well.
Starting Equipment
Weapon – Stone Arm, Laser Gun
Armor – Titan Vest
Headgear – Steel Helm
Accessory – Atropos’ Ribbon
Techs
Cure Beam
Rocket Punch
Chronopolis also becomes the new End of Time/waiting area where you can swap party members, replenish your health, and save your game. Melchior makes some character-specific gear for each of your team members before you leave, including the Servo Module for Robo. Belthasar gives you the Comlink, which opens a temporal disturbance that allows you to communicate with Chronopolis no matter what time period you’re in. First, Belthasar suggests traveling to 11,998 B.C. He’s sure that Magus is still there, searching for Schala – his sheer ass-kicking power will come in handy. The player selects which three party members they want to use, and then utilizes the Dispatch Chamber to zap them off to the ruins of the ancient Land of Magic.
Scenario 5 – Wind of Ruin
They come to Last Village, where Alfador still chills with the villagers and whatnot. The Elder tells them to search the new mountain range to the West, far on the horizon. So they get there, and immediately they're fighting some pretty big baddies. After CML or Robo get past the first area of the mountain, the game cuts to Magus on the ground. He says..."The wind...I will...never..." Then bang, flashbacks begin. Some attendants show Janus Zeal his room. He runs in a little, and then runs back to his mother, saying "Mommy!" The attendants laugh. Next, we see Queen Zeal and attendants in the hall of the Mammon Machine; she pushes Janus back and tells him to get away and go play somewhere. Then we go back to the gang, who fight some more baddies. We see a young Magus in his teens, surrounded by Mystics and Flea. Flea taunts Magus excessively, but the teenage Magus suddenly arcs a lightning bolt at him. He's about to punish Magus, but Ozzie walks in and says "Heh, it’s a good thing he's gettin’ better."
The next cutscene shows Magus on a pedestal, with Ozzie. Magus doesn't actually speak, just faces the crowd, a ton of freaking Mystics all saluting. Ozzie says "It is the will of the Magus that we blockade Porre and Dorino! Go! We must capture the continent!" Meanwhile, we see a short pan of Denadoro Mountains and the cave, and cut back to the army cutscene, to imply Magus is only doing this for the Masamune. He doesn't care about the Mystic War, just having them do his dirty work. Cut back to Crono owning people. And the very last cutscene shows Magus, alone in the darkness. Frog fades in next to him, in his mind..."Is that all thou hath?" He then sees a sparkle, and Schala's face. Fade back to the party. They finally find Magus, but he's only on his knees on the ground, sort of almost gone crazy. He implores Crono and his team to run, but you know it, a boss battle. This boss is going to be "one of the ancient ones," a beast or pagan god passed down in legend to the modern day (whose name we STILL haven't figured out). So they fight this idiot and bring Magus back. Magus is just totally out of it. So they leave him to recuperate in Chronopolis. Belthasar then notifies the party that he has an increasing concern for Ayla, now that the blizzards have begun.
Scenario 6 – Shadows of the Entity
They go to 64,999,998 B.C. and they find the villages completely deserted, save for some robust, foolhardy people who continue to try and live topside. They know nothing about Ayla, and speak in spite about her. There are still Reptites and other creatures alive. But they're dying out rapidly, so they're attacking like all hell to try and get access to the shelters the humans have secured. The lava fields cooled, and humans swooped into the warm caves. These creatures repeatedly try to break into these shelters, and are relentless in their attacks. Crono has to fight a few before he can get into Ioka. They learn that Kino met a warrior's end. Regardless, everyone in Ioka tells the party that Ayla has gone on some magnificent spiritual journey to save everyone by finding an artifact of ancient legends. No one can really tell the party what exactly they're doing. Belthasar radios in with some rumors about the legends she's following, but nothing's confirmed. He advises the party to check the Lost Village, the village that sat below Singing Mountain in the Prerelease. So they go there, finding some pretty bad mutations and stuff, but eventually they nail it -- stone tablets.
They pick up these tablets, and Robo (or if he's not around, Belthasar) translates them. They speak of a high artifact of the ancient world, a power source of near-limitless potential that could easily function has a heat source, and is also believed by the Reptites to have strong spiritual powers. The Reptites kept this treasure deep within their stronghold inside Singing Mountain, but eventually they died anyway. The artifact’s called the Dragon Tooth, and it is indeed guarded by something resembling a dragon, not to mention other monsters that will kick your ass. Now the Iokans explained that Ayla was doing this to try and stop the cold weather and save her people. CM&L are like "omfg, Ayla's gonna get her ass kicked" cause the kicker is, Ayla's pregnant. So they pursue her into Singing Mountain and fight some baddies. Eventually they find Ayla, but she passed out just before reaching the Tooth. Just like Magus, she tells them to run the hell away, and just like with Magus, they don’t listen.
Boss battle? Boss battle. Kitchen? Kitchen.
This boss looks sort of like Nizbel, but not quite. He has none of the intelligent speech of Nizbel. However, he does have a will to destroy, and he looks semi-alien, but at the same time not. After the battle, the massive-ass extremely Nizbel-ish guardian dude says some stuff about the planet’s dreams and about how the Dragon Tooth is a key to the gates of power over life and death. The team’s like wow, that’s f-ing heavy. So they take Ayla back to the Ioka village with the Dragon Tooth, which they can fortunately lift. Ayla is sad that she’s unable to join the party, but they reassure her that she needs to have those babies to ensure humanity’s future. A bit of reflection by Ayla on the power of the Dragon Tooth, the nature of fate, and evolution occurs – this is meant to both shock the veteran player and expand on the storyline. The party loads the Dragon Tooth into the Epoch and takes it back off to Chronopolis’ Pocket Dimension to be analyzed by Belthasar’s team.
Scenario 7 – Blood Summoning
However, the Dragon Tooth causes yet more problems by interacting strangely with the temporal void, boosting its power to catastrophic levels. The Epoch is damaged in the very attempt to get back to Chronopolis, requiring a repair crew as soon as it docks. A force field is quickly drawn around the artifact, but not fast enough to avoid awakening Magus. Fortunately, he doesn’t go psychotic on them. Magus relates that the artifact’s power must have called him back from the edge of death – apparently, the legends about the Dragon Tooth possessing powers of life and spiritual energies were true. After a "go figure" moment that makes fun of the prevalence of such occurrences in RPGs in general, Magus wants to be filled in on what the hell’s going on, so Belthasar obliges him. From CM&L’s abnormal experience with Sorin and the extreme disturbances surrounding the Dragon Tooth, Belthasar has determined that certain individuals in key time periods serve as the catalysts for whatever darkness threatens Earth this five minutes. They are, in a sense, Chrono Triggers in their own right, as their very presence affects time abnormally. As the team is both protected under Time Traveler’s Immunity and empowered by magic, they can sense the temporal disturbances and resolve them, a feat few others can claim to be able to accomplish. Before anything else happens, though, Belthasar urges the team to seek out Glenn in 602 A.D., the last remaining member of their old party that is still able to join them. However, Magus intervenes loudly, declaring that while in near-perfect harmony with the Black Wind brought on by his coma, he felt Schala’s presence. Everyone’s like wtf, mate. Magus basically drags them into the Dispatch Chamber to head for 11,998 B.C. Melchior promises to conduct further analysis on the Dragon Tooth to see if any more can be gleaned from it, and Magus becomes a full-fledged member of Crono’s Temporal Wrecking Crew once again.
Character Acquired
Magus – Shadow
Starting Equipment
Weapon – Blood Scythe
Headgear – Skull Totem
Armor – Dark Mail
Accessory – Amulet
Techs
Lightning 2
Ice 2
Fire 2
Dark Bomb
Chant (area of effect spell, inflicts Chaos)
The party arrives in 11,998 B.C. and, through the magic (not really) of the Dispatch Chamber, they arrive in the entrance of the Black Omen, or what used to be the Black Omen anyway. Magus notes that even considering the destruction, some of the defense points are noticeably lacking in functionality – this place has already been ransacked by someone, probably someone looking to get rid of the Crew. They face surprisingly little physical resistance as they wind their way through the Omen, though there’s a lot of creepy atmospheric stuff that happens. At the end, however, they find resistance that is quite real – a functioning Mammon Machine that's pumping out energy to a line of machinery in another room, sustained by the life force powering it, Schala Zeal. *gasp* After everyone’s finished being shocked, a security alarm sounds and another weird-ass creature materializes and says something about being the guardian of his master's holy place; this one more resembles a Lavos Spawn, but with a certain Gothic/demonic edge to its spikes, making it almost resemble an angry dragon (modified FF6 sprites, anyone?) It has a number of mutations on it and is extremely difficult to defeat. Once they do, the creature explodes and its shrapnel hits the Mammon Machine, breaking it open; Schala has fallen to the floor, completely drained of her energy. Without Schala's balancing life force, the Mammon Machine goes haywire and gates start opening and closing all over the place, so they grab Schala and start heading for the exit. The Mammon Machine's temporal distortions are preventing Belthasar from doing any kind of extraction from that time and place. Just as they reach the exit, a totally black figure appears. He says "This was not supposed to be..." Magus volunteers to hold this idiot off if the others save his sister. So you fight him for awhile, and Magus's theme plays. When Magus inflicts sufficient damage on the assailant, you get a message that the party’s about to leave. So Magus does some badass teleportation move and makes it out just in time. Well, a big explosion happens beneath the Ocean, and a light shines to the sky. They get back to Chronopolis, and Belthasar notes that he's been somewhat able to bring his own time period into control – the Mammon Machine was obviously affecting it. Belthasar relates his suspicions that whoever reactivated the Mammon Machine was likely targeting them specifically – the time distortion was too precisely targeted to have been mere accident. Not only that, it would take a being of exceptional skill and resource to even be able to make it there in the first place, let alone to set up the Mammon Machine and make it work again. Schala and Magus need some time alone to discuss things, so they retire to a room there. This emotional discussion is viewed by the player in a cutscene. After that, Belthasar gets a new set of orders for the team – recruit Glenn, the final member still able to join the party. Schala hangs out in Chronopolis for a while to recuperate while the team goes on their mission.
Scenario 8 – The Vanguard
After you get Schala, the party members of your choice hop in the repaired Epoch and head to 602 A.D. Lots of plot development to be done here. When they get there, they begin to discover not only the roots of the current war with Porre, but the source of the darkness they’re fighting against. It’s relatively peaceful in 602 A.D. They immediately start searching for Glenn – the word all around Guardia is that he is the Master Knight of the kingdom, and has been specially called in to deal with the threat. He has formed a bloc of fighters called the Vanguard, a group of Guardian Navy SEAL equivalents personally trained by Glenn for special, extremely difficult missions crucial to preserving the rule of law. But Glenn seems to have gone missing. The heroes know that he wouldn’t disappear for no reason – he’s too great of a hero for that. So they set about finding him themselves.
They are forced to become detectives, following a trail of evidence in Truce as to Glenn’s whereabouts. It eventually leads to the Denadoro Mountains and San Dorino. The party arrives in town and travels to a local bar to get some information about Glenn. However, things go bad immediately. A bar fight ensues once someone sees Crono – a Mystic calls out his quite well-known name and attempts to slit his throat. The party easily dispatches the attacker, but six or seven other Mystics train heavily damaging muskets on the party – it’s a tough fight, obviously. It quickly dissolves into chaos, with the humans fighting the Mystics. The party barely manages to slip out. After the fight, a random party member remarks “wtf they got guns!” The party wisely decides to flee – a buttload of Mystics have been mobilized and are seizing the town. Fortunately, a random person from the bar manages to fight his way out and offers to lead them to safety, saying that they’ll find refuge in his comrades’ hospitality. When they get to the hideout, said comrades are revealed to be elite Guardian Knights, and their guide drops his disguise – it was Glenn the entire time. The party shares a happy reunion, but there is little time for pleasantries. Crono’s presence in Dorino was not a fortuitous turn of events, it turns out. A band of Mystics were organizing a revolt the entire time – someone had given them the tools to fight Guardia. Normal Guardian knights of this era aren’t exactly equipped to fight firearms – luckily, Glenn has trained the Vanguard for just this sort of unexpected situation. He’s also trained them to use some magical techniques and to use magic to enhance their normal fighting skills. And now, all that training is about to get a workout – Glenn and his three top knights, Renault, Luther, and Roget, are the only ones close enough to respond to the threat with any degree of immediacy. Thus, Crono’s arrival is nevertheless quite handy, as he’s known to be an excellent fighter. The party offers to help, and Glenn is thus gained as a permanent member of the team once again.
Character Acquired
Glenn – Cold
Note: As Glenn is no longer a frog, he has lost all techniques related to that form. However, he has new Techs to make up for it, and he still retains several Cold-type powers.
Starting Equipment
Weapon—Something Daniel made up.
Armor—Aeon Suit
Headgear—Rock Helm
Accessory—Hero’s Medal
Techs
Cure
Water
Poison Dart (shoots poison dart from gauntlet)
Leap Slash
Water 2
A battle sequence then occurs, much like the one in Truce. Glenn’s knights put up a full frontal assault against the Mystics while Crono’s party is sent to infiltrate the mayor’s manor, which has been forcibly converted into the Mystic headquarters. They do a good job of this, and make it all the way up to the top level. There, of course, they encounter the resistance leader, Serran. After he introduces himself, he pulls a trap door on both parties. They land in a hangar in the rear of the building, while Serran descends onto his battle tank. It’s a more powerful version of the one General Montcrief used in the first boss battle, despite being 400 years in the past; the design is suspiciously similar, which gets the team to wondering. When Serran is defeated, he predictably runs away. Glenn rushes in, having secured the rest of the town. At that point, he collapses, having been severely wounded. The team takes him to the inn to rest and recuperate. When he finally awakens, he is able to reveal some information surrounding the uprising. Serran used to be one of Magus’ commanders during the Mystic War, and in fact was one of the ones who helped train the warlock. According to the dossier the Vanguard kept on him, he was a fanatic who believed that Magus was the Mystics’ destined Savior. When Magus was defeated at his castle in Chrono Trigger, Serran quite simply went mad with messianic delusions – the current discord is a fruit of that madness. Glenn pauses to reflect on that course of action; Magus does his own little bit of reflection if he’s there. The threat is clear now – Glenn and party go to Glenn’s special hiding place inside Guardia Castle to retrieve the Masamune to beat Serran. However, when they get there, it’s already gone, and in its place is another weird-ass boss enemy that the party has to fight. A party member checks for traces of the sword – no footprints, equipment fibers, or forensic evidence of any kind of enemy presence is there. The only thing Magus can sense is the taint of shadow magic in the area – given the taint’s strength and the lack of other evidence, someone likely teleported the sword out, circumventing all security systems. Serran is the likely culprit – they make haste to his Underground Evil Fortress of Doom (TM) in the Ruined Desert to defeat him. They don’t find it, however – they find a past version of Robo critically wounded. He gives them directions to the fortress, and they hurry along to the headquarters and fight Serran. Again, special dialogue occurs if Magus is there. The party beats him, but he then retreats into…the ruined Epoch. It completely slipped the party members’ minds that they got involved in a freaking war – the Mystics had likely ransacked the Epoch for parts and given the crucial stuff to Serran.
Serran triggers it, and escapes. Though intrigued, Belthasar must stop his curiosity in time to devise an escape plan for the party. Serran has shut down the transport machinery that leads back to the planet's surface; Belthasar provides the party with a series of natural gas vents; these are populated with gas-borne enemies. While fire spells instantly kill them, they are a double-edged sword in this environment. Eventually, the party makes it back topside and finds an inn, but cannot rest, as Porre vigilantes have set out en masse to slaughter the Mystics. Glenn does not let the party go with him to stop the fight, insisting that it is his fight and that they've helped enough already. To that end, he brings Renault, Roget, and Luther with him and attempts to stop the revolt. The Vanguard is condemned by both sides, as each one now wants to fight. They offer him a choice – Porre accuses Guardia of being weak and ineffectual, and declares that Glenn has the chance to prove his kingdom’s worth by vanquishing the Mystics. The Mystics, on the other hand, state that by siding with the mob, Glenn would be promoting tyranny and validating everything the Mystic War was founded on. Depending on which option he takes, he will have different dialogue when his friends realize he is gone and rush after him, and the choice will also affect a later scenario. But, in the more immediate “future” the choice you make will force you to fight one of four sets of enemies, ranging from a few elite units to entire armies to none at all. Renault, Roget, and Luther each have differing opinions on the issue. Renault urges you to side with Porre against the Mystics, Luther believes that Glenn should side with the Mystics against Porre, and Roget states that they should not get involved, but should instead let them deal with their own problems. There is a fourth option, which is attempting to make peace.
Option 1: Siding with Porre
This option will show Glenn giving into his distaste for the Mystics and gaining favor with Renault. You will fight a Mystic warleader named Ral with the assistance of two of his tough minions. These guys have powerful magic and a devastating Shadow-type triple tech. When you beat these guys, Porre gives you thanks for helping them and sends a favorable message to King Guardia about Glenn. They also give you some sort of magic reward. However, after the scenario is finished, if you try to use Mystic-operated stores in 1002 A.D., you will encounter substantial price hikes and occasionally an outright fight – these are only the more immediate results. If you go to Porre, though, tensions will have backed down somewhat between the two governments, as there will be more civilians who oppose the war against Guardia, and thus the Porre administration will have a difficult time getting things done. The Masamune will then gain a damage bonus against magical enemies.
Option 2: Siding with the Mystics
Porre will express incredulity at this course of action and will send forth their captain and two minions, just like with Porre. Glenn will win Luther’s favor with this course of action. Be warned – these guys have guns. Their magical abilities are limited, but they possess heavy artillery to compensate. The Mystics will thank you if you beat them, give you a magical charm, and cease their revolt against Guardia. The surviving Mystics will turn themselves in. When you go to the future, however, you will find Porre to be much more hostile to you. All Porrean enemies will be more difficult to defeat. The Masamune will gain a damage bonus against non-magical enemies.
Option 3: Declaring Neutrality
This provokes a dismissive reaction from both sides and curries favor with Roget. An absolute bloodbath then occurs as Glenn and his men observe from cover. When it’s over, the opposing armies will have been eradicated to the last man. The corpses are available for looting, and thus you obtain far more items than you would with either of the first two options. When the party arrives, they are shocked at what appears to be Glenn’s handiwork, but none moreso than Magus. The party knew Glenn was a powerful fighter, but death on this scale seems beyond him. A flashback to Glenn’s conversation with Cyrus on Zenan Bridge occurs. Post-that, the Masamune itself is slightly altered to reflect the more sinister form it takes on in Chrono Cross, though it isn't all the way there yet. The Masamune gains slight damage bonuses to all enemies – smaller than that of either individual bonus above.
Option 4: Attempt to Make Peace
Select this if you wish to go it alone; it achieves no favor with any of your knights and fails horribly, to boot. It results in the same bloodbath as option 3, as Glenn’s calls for peace are ignored. This time, however, Glenn will have to fight a boatload of enemies instead of merely observing. When the party finds Glenn, he will be weeping in the center of the battlefield at the unnecessary loss of life. He will have different dialogue than if you simply did nothing, though. This option will have an effect on the other Vanguard-related scenarios – it will set a precedent for the Vanguard’s functions. This will also lend healing powers to the Masamune – simply holding it will heal the party members by a certain amount every turn. The amount is based on Glenn’s character level. The items from Option 3 will also be there for you to loot.
When you defeat Serran, you retrieve the Masamune from his grasp. It serves an important plot function in this game, too; using dreams to warn Glenn of a cataclysmic occurrence that will later be revealed to be the Time Crash. However, its offensive power has been diluted from being in the hands of Serran. It’s still a good weapon, though. Glenn does acquire others, but in the endgame the Masamune is restored to its former power, but not without a heavy cost.
Once one of these four scenarios has been completed, Belthasar opens up a Gate so the party can leave. However, just before they do, the party spots Sorin. He dives into a Gate of his own, and the party is like OMFGZOR!! Fortunately, he was apparently wounded and leaves a rather large blood sample behind for analysis.
Scenario 9 – The Emissary
This scenario is nearing the halfway point in the game, and Belthasar’s cooked up something special for it. By analyzing the Dragon Tooth’s inscriptions, he has been able to figure out how to incorporate it into his temporal search capabilities. It doesn't just have intense life energy radiating from it -- it actually serves as a data collector for that energy. Belthasar manages to figure out a way to process its data through his computer and give a readout. By reading a particular life force and determining its unique spectral signature, he can locate all occurrences of that life force throughout known history. The party wants to use it to locate Sorin, and upon doing so they find an occurrence of him in 11,998 B.C. Not only is he skulking out in the middle of the ocean, he’s apparently several hundred feet below the surface. By this time, the player has gained some heavier equipment, so the difficulty level increases noticeably at this point. To compensate for that, Schala expresses a desire to join their fight against evil. She is now rendered playable, and her magic comes in quite handy. While her brother specializes in destructive magic, she is far more useful for either bolstering your own party or inflicting debilitating status effects on the enemy – and unlike in conventional RPGs where status spells never work for you but always work for your enemy, Schala can pave the way for some major damage with them. For this scenario, Magus and Schala request to be the ones chosen to come along. Your entire party is set for this mission, at least up to a point.
Character Acquired
Schala – Heaven
Note: Schala’s weapon is not any kind of melee device but a pendant instead. Depending on the pendant type, it fires a magical beam with varying damage and effects.
Starting Equipment
Starting Equipment
Weapon—Dream Shard
Armor—Mist Robe
Headgear—Prism Helm
Accessory—Amulet
Techs
Cure
Cure 2
Uh...someone care to make something else up?
With this accomplished, Crono, Magus, and Schala head to 11,998 B.C. on Sorin’s tail. However, as soon as they warp in from the Temporal Catch, they find something unbelievable; an immense city under the waves whose architecture is clearly that of Zeal. It’s a highly advanced city akin to Atlantis. When the party contacts Belthasar and Melchior about its existence, they find it hard to believe that it even still exists. According to Belthasar, this was ancient Zeal; the people that raised a continent into the sky to form the kingdom of Zeal were from this place. He then enlightens them as to the nature of the Zealian Schism. The Zeal we see floating in the sky in the original Chrono Trigger was a relatively new place, and not everyone wanted to risk it. Those that didn’t stayed behind in this city, which was eventually overtaken by a flood and presumed lost. They are instructed to immediately talk to whoever’s in charge about their mission and inform them that there’s a dangerous assassin in their midst. Upon reaching the palace, they are greeted by none other than King Zeal, long thought dead. Schala is understandably excited at seeing the siblings’ father alive, and he is overjoyed to have them back. Magus, however, is a tad bit more reserved than his sister, for he senses something dark. King Zeal grants them all free room and board for the duration of their stay. Crono gets a discount to buy awesome Zeal gear, and in general it all goes well. For a while, Crono is split from the Zeal siblings to explore the city and gain insights as to its nature. While wandering the city, Crono hears of some mystical ruins that have been sealed off ever since the flying Zeal fell; they all have Norse names. They are rumored to contain both powerful treasures and an Oracle that can tell the future. The townspeople say that the last time the ruins were visited was before the fall of “the insurgent Zeal” and that the Oracle warned them to prepare for it. They fulfill the role of “water dungeon” except that unlike the Ocean Palace this one actually has water. Levels are raised and lowered, etc. Some knowledge of fluid mechanics and thermodynamics is required to make it through, though it’s pretty much all common sense stuff. Crono radios Belthasar and gets to call 2 more party members to help him. After they finish exploring the dungeons (really one huge dungeon with multiple entrances/exits, much like the Skull Woods from A Link to the Past) they find the Oracle, who tells them that the city of Calasperan is the specter of Lavos. Alarmed, they race back and bust into the palace.
Meanwhile, Magus and Schala are spending time with their father. Janus is a major focus here. He talks to his father about various issues in his life, including his past, his sister, and his mother. These conversations, “fireside chats” if you will, are intended to provoke and numb the player’s senses at the same time; each one is triggered at various points in the city and the ruins. At the end of these quests, King Zeal will offer Janus the chance to join with him, along with a special guest…a revitalized Queen Zeal! The King claims that they can all be a family again, and that the holy artifact, the Frozen Flame, has made it possible. Janus can sense Lavos’ power all over it; he realizes it’s bullshit and tries to make a break for it, but gets trapped in the throne room with Schala.
At this point, Crono has found his way into the research wing of the palace, where he finds all kinds of wack-ass biomechanical and magical/alchemical experiments, similar to the Weapons in Final Fantasy, save that there are more varieties of weird stuff here than the Empire has TIE variants. (<-- hyperbole yo) Among this number are engineered creatures with various odd, specialized abilities that are nevertheless very effective. Of course, Crono has to fight a boss to gain entry to the research core. In this case, it's a bioengineered dragonlike cyborg with special skin that softens and hardens selectively. Fortunately, as a prototype, it ain't the sharpest tool in the shed. Once that's accomplished, Crono gains access to the core, where instead of some giant uber-Weapon he finds Sorin as the centerpiece of the whole thing. Sorin is convalescing from terrible wounds he took by accident in the battle at Dorino. He’s too weak to get up and fight Crono, and so they talk for a bit. Sorin reveals a bit of his backstory here, but indirectly; he’s not even sure who he is aside from his name. He babbles on and on about how everyone left him, and while we’re sure it’s all very tragic Crono doesn’t exactly have time to listen. He frees a woman named Dyasavah from an experiment chamber. She explains that she was Zeal’s chief research scientist and that the King is mad, and once she figured it out he ordered that she would be a victim of her own tests. She possesses a Gate generator, which Crono uses to call forth the rest of his party members from Chronopolis to help. She shows the party a secret passageway up to the throne room, which is where King Zeal and the Frozen Flame have taken Janus and Schala hostage. Crono busts in on the throne room, shortly followed by the rest of his allies. King Zeal expresses glee that they’re all there, and then the Frozen Flame begins to speak. Whatever comes out of his “mouth” is going to be uber-frightening and awesome, but after that he spirits the party away to various time periods, amidst cries of “oh noes!!1!” and “dammit, not this shit again.”
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Look for the second post in...oh, a few minutes.
