Lake Jannenia

Hidden Cities - 1
Treasures - 1

This is a break of sorts from the Pogrom Forest. Less hidden stuff and a much simpler map make for a relaxing stage. The boss fight has a little twist to it, but nothing you can't handle.

Send three units northeast across the river. Leave one in Antalya, the city nearest to you. Send one east around the southern edge of the lake to find a city called Allephal. (Going east in a straight line from Allephal will net you a hidden Roshfallian Temple, where you will get a Rune Axe, made just for killing Undead.) Send the third unit northeast of Antalya, across the river, into G'Jiande.

In the cities, you'll meet a guy named Sirius who keeps telling you to come to the castle to meet his boss. You'll also hear rumors of an evil, inhuman murderer in the vicinity. Well, that's Sirius, the boss of the stage. Pay him no attention for now.

The enemy will come at you around now, but they won't come anywhere near your base since you've plugged up their only routes of advance with units. They're nothing special (no Undead). The hardest unit you may face contains a Doll Master, but the Leader tactic and some magic will end his days rather quickly. Now send a high-flying, fast unit (like Canopus) around the map, liberating the two cities and Roshfallian Temple west of G'Jiande and finding the treasure far to the northeast (just west of the mountains on that island).

That's it. Like I said, it's an easy stage. Now march into Elsrum, the enemy base. Read the details on the boss first, though, since they'll help you decide when to do this.

Boss: Sirius
HP: 112 | STR: 91 | AGI: 92 | INT:70 | CHA:70 | ALI: 48 | LUK: 49
P: 71 | F: 71 | I: 77 | E: 78 | B: 92 | W: 11

The difficulty of this fight depends entirely on when you attack. If it's during the day, you'll fight a slightly above-average Fighter and some Amazons. No big deal, especially since the leader is in the front rank. Spell, spell, hack, hack, he's dead. If you have trouble with him, you're hurtin'. Use a Lovers card to make the Amazons shoot him, or a Fool to make them disappear in that case.

Approach him at night, however, and you'll fight a Werewolf and some Amazons. This is a different thing entirely. As a Werewolf, he has an unrivaled defense power. Lovers would be more useful in this case than Fool, as it will make him get hurt from his own side as well as from yours. Magic is the key to trouncing his sorry arse.

However, there's something you can do with Sirius the Werewolf besides just trouncing his sorry arse. Get a unit with some Fighters in it. Yes, crappy Fighters, the kind with the little knife that does about 20 damage. Now put them in the front rank, where they're vulnerable, and watch Sirius kill them. After the fight (since you'll probably lose), resurrect them and they'll become Werewolves too: Fighters by day, Werewolves by night. This would be good if not for the fact that Werewolves suck. They're only strong at night and they have low ALI, meaning if you want to use units like these you can kiss the best ending of the game goodbye. You don't want to be dependent on the time of day in the later stages, so just kill Sirius by daylight.