With Goro off to build his porno set bath house back at Buttfuck, Frodo continues on his journey toward home. First, though, he returns to Ass Castle to hand the deer antlers over to a delighted Scott. The price on the ornament was something like 900 potch, but Frodo manages to bilk the not-savvy Scott out of 2500 potch for his trouble. Scott further shows how dumb he is by giving Frodo this piece of hot advice as thanks: “[Buttfuck] is renting out space to businesses. Good idea, eh?” Frodo’s all, “Yeah, it’s the best fucking idea ever, you better believe it.” And when Frodo says he’s got an in with the Buttfuck crowd, Scott and Waurenhyte are off in a flash to check it out. Even though Scott never said he was for sure going to open a shop, the Pokéball GO!!! sound informs us that he has joined the 108 Stars. So we can assume there will be a trading shop with the latest gay porno mags available when Frodo returns to Buttfuck. Hooray!
Iksay, like V. del Sexay, is simply crawling with Buttfuck hopefuls. The first person to leap to the eye is a woman standing next to the inn. True, she sticks out thanks to her bright turquoise dress and hot pink hair bow, but what’s more noticeable is the grotesque puppet on her right arm. It looks like Felix the Cat with rabies. The girl introduces herself as Mel. Frodo guesses that she’s a street performer, given the puppet, but she insists that she’s not, and then introduces Frodo to Branky. …The puppet. “Introduce yourself, Branky,” she asks. Branky obliges, and we get a close-up on his terrifying visage. “Hee hee hee!” he rasps. “Branky’s my name, and smiling’s my game! What are you doing talking to my Mel?” Mel tells Branky not to be so rude, and tells Frodo that the puppet “needs to have his mouth washed out.” Oooooookay. And I was thinking she was a weirdo just for having the puppet. Tip of the iceberg.
When Branky says something else smart-assed to Mel, she replies in kind by beating him–you know, beating the puppet that’s on her arm–into the wall of the inn. Sparks fly for some reason. Finally, Branky begs her to stop. Is animal abuse still a crime when the animal in question is a furry puppet on your arm? Is Mel a furry? A masochist? A plain ol’ crazy bitch? A little of everything? These are the important questions.
Branky is the expert on this.
Anyway, Mel asks what Frodo wants with her. After blanking for a moment–I would too, after watching a teenage girl bash her imaginary friend against a wall–he remembers to ask her to come to Buttfuck Castle. I’m not really sure why. She just said she’s not a performer. She’s a lunatic with a strange fetish. Yeah, yeah, I know she’s one of the Stars of Destiny, and that she is a great character in battle, but in terms of Frodo’s mission to bring commerce to Buttfuck…she doesn’t do anything. Not that it matters–Mel asks Branky what he thinks, Branky says something rude again, Mel slams his brains into the concrete, and they both consent to come to the castle. Well, maybe I’m being too limited in my view of things. I guess Mel could find something to do within her abilities.
Loading ...While Frodo’s here anyway, he enters the inn. On the second floor he walks in on a sick woman being treated by a nurse and doctor. The nurse, named Mio, is a pretty-yet-tomboyish type in your typical naughty nurse outfit. The doctor is quite a handsome fell–holy shit, the doctor is Tuta. Not only does he no longer look like a girl, but his eyeballs have decreased in size roughly 5000 percent. Tuta and Mio are all smiles with each other over saving this person’s life. And he’s very obviously in love with her…maybe he thinks Mio’s a man? I don’t know. I’m still not over Tuta being hot now.
What the hell?
After Tuta and Mio have a short conversation about calling Tuta “Doctor” when he’s still in training, Tuta says to the Suikoclone he just cured that they’re going around the area making house calls for people. Frodo speaks up at this point to ask the insightful question, “Are you people doctors?” God. Tuta answers that the two of them are from the nation of Yaoi. Hee. One Black Screen of Exposition later, Frodo has told Tuta and Mio of his need for skilled professionals such as themselves around Buttfuck Castle. Tuta’s all, “What, am I a Star of Destiny again?” and says that right now he’s too busy to come hang out with the other studs at Buttfuck. But he does send Mio along to keep his seat warm until he’s ready to settle down there. Mio’s all worried that he might get killed by monsters if he’s traveling alone, but Tuta knows what to say to ease her mind: “Not to worry. I’m tougher than I look. I fought in the [Yaoi] Army, you know.” Let me say from my first-hand experience that Tuta did no such thing. Unless licking Dr. Huan’s ass around the clock counts as “fighting.” Mio doesn’t believe this bald-faced lie either, but lets him go off without her so she can tend to Buttfuck’s ill people. Again, it’d be better if she weren’t an icky girl, but she is one of the best support characters in the game thanks to her healing skills, so I’m not about to leave her out in the cold.
The next recruit is hiding out in between buildings on the other side of Iksay’s main road. His name is Watari, and he’s a ninja. I know this because of his Japanese name, his face mask, and his brooding angst. His skunk-stripe hair also matches his gi, and that kind of camouflage has to be a nice perk for a ninja.
Watari asks what the hell Frodo wants, because he’s busy staring at this wall and writing poetry about the black rain clouds over his soul. So Frodo gets to the point and asks if he’ll join the party. “Join you?” Watari asks. “Don’t you mean you’ll hire me?” He says he’ll consider Frodo’s offer–that is, if Frodo’s offer is 100,000 potch for his services. Well, he must be the best ninja ever.
I implied back in part 4 that I would be using Chris and her piles of money to recruit Watari, but that was before I remembered I could take advantage of the lottery, and therefore I wasn’t expecting Frodo to have sufficient funds to make the payoff himself. So Chris will have to go without her bishounen ninja. Like she doesn’t have enough bishounen to deal with anyway. When Frodo shows Watari the stone cold cash, Watari agrees right away, but he’s not precisely sure what he’s agreeing to. “Well, you could be a bouncer at the castle gate,” Frodo answers jokingly. Hey, at least he attempted to make up something for Watari to do, even if it would put Samwise out of a job. The writers are trying to make this less contrived.
Finally, Frodo enters Iksay’s item shop. Gordon, the shop’s proprietor, looks like he probably puts a full tin of pomade on his hair every day. Like Augustine, he’s wearing a ruffly white blouse, but his is cloaked in a rich red velvet overcoat. In Sam’s Imaginary Suikoden III Voice Cast, he is played by Antonio Banderas. As soon as Frodo walks in, Gordon looks him over seductively and says, “Very sophisticated. You’ve got a gentlemanly air about you.” Frodo looks himself over, capri pants, shaggy hair, hairy feet, and all, and inevitably decides he has no clue what Gordon means. Gordon does not elaborate on what makes Frodo so dapper, but insists that “the sharpness of a fine gentleman can be dulled by the company he keeps,” which translates to, “Samwise, Juan, and Piccolo are all extraordinarily low-class companions.” Obviously, to recruit Gordon, Frodo must find someone who will suit Gordon’s palate, but since he knows nothing but badly dressed hobos right now, he settles for buying a “Rose Brooch” and going on his way. See, “broach” as an acceptable alternate spelling wouldn’t bother me so much if they’d just stick with one spelling or the other. But no. That would be smart and easy.
Now armed with the Rose Brooch/Broach, Frodo returns to Vinay del Sexay (stopping on the way to kill a piddly treasure boss in the North Cavern). Augustine hasn’t moved an inch, and is still mourning his lost piece of costume jewelry. When Frodo hands over the replacement, Augustine holds it aloft, and it looks like an actual, long-stemmed rose. How would he wear something like that? Also, it’s not nearly glittery enough. Each rose petal should be carpeted in faux-rubies.
‘Yeah. I didn’t buy one just like it from a pawn shop for 10 potch or anything.’
Augustine has his precious tacky brooch back, so now he remembers that Frodo was randomly talking to him for some reason, and asks what that reason was. Frodo answers, “I’m putting a group together.” No, you’re not. You’re recruiting small business owners to be indentured servants at your dump of a mansion. Shut up, Frodo. But Augustine hears none of my objections and immediately agrees to be Frodo’s very special friend. He even says that people are attracted to him all the time, so it’s no surprise that Frodo can’t live without him. “No matter how I try to hide it,” he sighs, “my precious aura shines through like a glowing rainbow…” I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried. Augustine goes on, “The way I stand, the way I walk, perfection from head to toe, with not a single wasted move… You must agree, I just have an unbearably clean and artistic deportment.” I’m not even sure which hammer I’m being smacked with at this point, the Holy Fuck He’s So Gay Hammer or the Use Him to Recruit Gordon You Idiot Hammer. Either way, holy snaps. He even whips out his rapier and does a little sword dance for Frodo. I’m surprised Augustine’s pheromones haven’t attracted every gay male from here to the Island Nations by now.
Long story short, Frodo has excellent taste in gay men and Augustine happily joins his cause. Not that Frodo even has a cause at this point. In terms of the sensible recruiting Frodo’s supposed to be doing, Augustine does have a purpose, but again, he himself does nothing except leech resources. I guess he’ll run up his credit cards at Buttfuck, though, so it’s not a total loss. Before Augustine walks off, he remembers to introduce himself, since he never actually gave Frodo his name before. “My special features are my mustache, my rose broach–and, of course, my aura,” he lisps, winking. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Wow. Wow.
I bet you have.
When Frodo gets back to his abode, Augustine is indeed there, giving out rainbow aura blowjobs for a nominal fee. Well, probably–he has to be doing something off-camera. But his many customers can wait–in the party he goes, and back to Iksay he and Frodo travel.
Now that I have Augustine in the party, I notice his little character bio says that he is of “unknown sex.” I thought that this was maybe a typo of some kind, and maybe it meant he was of unknown sexuality, but checking other official sources told me that Augustine is, indeed, a question mark in the gender category. I find this slightly odd–of the “Narcissist” type characters in the series, he is actually the most masculine looking, thanks to his mustache, but he is listed as unknown sex? I would think that of any of them, Augustine would be the one that was definitely a man. Feel free to fanwank this one to your heart’s content, because I’m stumped.