Nox Part 24: A Familiar Frog

Описание: After finishing with Loproc, I head out to explore Brin. It’s a good deal smaller than the city of Galava, but there are still buildings we can search for loot. I head over to the garden where I killed the last Ogress, but there’s nothing notable there—only apples and a steak, both of which we’re maxed out on already. I then recheck the side rooms near the front gate, and there’s a small chest that I missed earlier. It has some gold in it, which I happily collect before heading back into town. Next are two houses, one of which has some gold and the other of which has a pair of boots. Notably, one of them has a fire blocking the front door—the Ogre assault has left several fires burning throughout Brin, but there are plenty of water buckets around that can put out the fires if we wish. For this house, I push one of these water buckets towards the fire and extinguish it before going inside to collect our loot. Finally, we visit the Inn of the Urchin’s Ear and talk to the merchant inside. He doesn’t have much for sale, but I decide to buy two bottles of cider. Cider restores health just like apples or meat, but it has the side effect of disorienting the player for a bit.

With that done, I go past Loproc and into another private house, where we get a somewhat surprising sidequest. The frantic owner explains that the house is on fire and his beloved pet frog Lewis is trapped in the next room. Yes, it’s the same Lewis that we “helped” turn into a frog way back in Mission 2. He’s somehow made his way to Brin to become this man’s pet, so he’s clearly had an adventure of his own. Regardless, he’s in big trouble now and his owner wants us to save him. We can decline, but it’s definitely best to accept—we’ll get 250 gold for successfully rescuing Lewis, and it’s not particularly difficult. I accept the man’s request, and then start moving water buckets to the various flames in the house to put them out. I consider it important to put out as much of the flames as possible because even if a path to Lewis is cleared, he hops around quite a bit after he’s rescued and sometimes he’ll accidentally hop over an open fire. That’ll both kill him and cause the game to freeze up, so I don’t want to take chances. I put out most of the fires in the house, and then talk to Lewis to trigger him following me to the owner. The owner’s thrilled to have his pet safe, and pays us 250 gold. We also gain some experience for our trouble.

With that sidequest done, I continue down the path and head out of Brin. We exit near an open area where enemies are still lurking, and as I advance out we find ourselves getting chased by three Ogresses and a White Wolf. This seems like a pretty bad situation, but this section of the Brin walls are manned by archers that can cut down enemy forces pretty easily. I retreat to the safety of the walls and the killing zone there makes short work of the enemy despite their superior numbers; I use Lightning to help out and earn some experience for the kills as well. With our victory in this skirmish, I start collecting the dropped axes and take them to Loproc to sell them. It takes two trips because there are quite a few items to sell, including a sword and shield looted from a dead human soldier. Regardless, we get them all collected and sold, earning us enough gold that I decide to buy Loproc’s third spellbook. This gives us access to the spell Shock, which lets us charge ourselves with electricity and give a nasty surprise to any enemy that tries to touch us. From there, I leave Brin once again and head north into the unexplored open area. This is the path leading to Grok Torr, and at the end of a long path the game switches us to a new map. Grok Torr is still some distance away, but we’re now on the right map and it’s time to begin our counteroffensive.