Monarchs (Dead Lands)

*This is about Kingdom Two Crowns.*
*For the regular player characters, see: Monarch.*

## Monarchs in Dead Lands

Queen Miriam as 1st and 2nd player in co-op

In Dead Lands players are not only able to change which mount they roam around on but they’re also able to switch between four different Monarchs, each with a unique abilities.

## Cage

### Location

Forest on 2nd, 3rd and 4th islands in Dead Lands

### Use cost

12

Players start the campaign with Queen Miriam (blue clothes for the first player, and green for the second). Throughout their progression, they'll be able to find, unlock and use other three alternative Monarchs.

Each alternative Monarch is found on a different island deep inside the forest trapped in a hanging cage. Paying twelve coins at the cage, puts a red flag on it and an archer will rush over to shoot the rope and open the cage.

 If the cage is located beyond a small portal the archer won't accept the order.
Once the portal has been destroyed, the archer will be able to reach the cage.

## Rescued

Rescued Monarchs will remain sat on the cage area until they're used for the first time, which can be done by paying extra three coins at them.

The previous Monarch (for example, Miriam) will disappear in a puff of smoke.

## Ruler Shrine

### Use cost

5

The **Ruler Shrine** is a beautiful stained glass mural used to switch between the rescued Monarchs.

For the Ruler Shrine to appear on an island, it requires the Kingdom to reach the Stone Age and to have expanded the stone walls to the opposite side of the scythe shop.

Initially, it only shows Miriam's portrait.
Once a rescued Monarch is used at least once, his portrait will be included on the portraits cycle at the Shrine, making that character available to be reused on all islands of that campaign.
Only releasing the new character from the cage without embodying him, won't make his portrait available at the glass panel.

To use the Shrine and switch to another character, the Ruler should approach the alternating mosaics, wait for the portrait of the desired character to appear, and make an offering of five coins at the mural.

The portraits of all characters embodied at least once, including Miriam, appear on the cycling panel, but only the art of the characters that are not being used, accept coins.
This is also valid on cooperative mode: each alternative character can only be used by one player.
This means that once a player has switched to Gebel, for example, the Gebel's art on the mural will no longer have coin slots.

The mural here shows the portraits in the following order: Miriam, Gebel, Alfred, and Zangetsu.

## Abilities

The table aboveon the right shows how to use the Monarch's abilities. *For other actions, see Controls.*

And the sections bellow details each of their abilities.

### Miriam

Miriam has
**“***a whip lash that sends out a powerful wave which freezes the Greed and stops their movement for a short duration.***”**

As she's the starter ruler, not requiring to be unlocked, and being available from the very beginning, her ability may be useful for safely exploring the land and fast expanding the walls in the early campaign.

The Gamigin is a good fitting mount for Miriam, as they can deploy a combo of freezing and obliterating small groups of greed.

### Gebel

#Bat

Gebel can take the form of a bat which allow him to fly faster than all existing mounts.
The ability lasts roughly fifteen seconds unless interrupted manually (which can be done by using the same key/button) and requires a short time to recharge.
It can be used anywhere on the land (plains, forest and inside the cave), no matter the season, the weather, and if it's day or night.

The Greed can't attack Gebel while in bat shape, and he can fly past them with no worry, however:

* any hermit taking a ride with him will get off immediately
* the dog is carried over, but can be captured by greedlings during the flight if the bat gets too close to them
* the greed can identify him nonetheless and will keep pursuing him, even during the shapeshifting.

While riding the stag, all deer that may be following it after having been "seduced", will stop following it if Gebel take the bat form.

### Alfred

#Clone  #Decoy

Alfred
**“***conjures a duplicate of himself and his steed that doubles his powers. The duplicate doesn’t take damage by the Greed or other hostile forest creatures.***”**

Alfred can create a clone or a decoy of himself a few steps in front of him.
The decoy can serve two purposes:

* duplicating the ability of the mount being ridden
When playing as Alfred with his clone active, the abilities of a mount he rides will be doubled as well. For example, using the beetle's ability to spawn two traps, the golem's for double walls, the lizard's for double patches of fire, or the unicorn's for double coins production.
* distracting the enemies that would try to attack the decoy, instead of going for the ruler.
Note that each greed will only be fooled twice by the decoy before focusing on the real Alfred, and only if the clone is between the actual Monarch and the Greed.

The clone is blue and slightly transparent, making it appear as a spirit.

### Zangetsu

Raising his katana, Zangetsu rallies the nearby archers, pikemen, knights and catapults to increase their attack speed for a short time.

## History

 2020-04-28
 Introduced with the release of Dead Lands.

## References

1. ↑ As announced by Gordon on *Reddit*, 24 April 2020.
2. ↑ Stained glass on *Wikipedia*.
3. ↑ Miriam on *Bloodstained Wiki*.
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Meet the monarchs of Kingdom Two Crowns: Dead Lands. *Raw Fury* on 24 April 2020.
5. ↑ Gebel on *Bloodstained Wiki*.
6. ↑ Game director Gordon on *Steam*, 30 April 2020.
7. ↑ Alfred on *Bloodstained Wiki*.
8. ↑ Zangetsu on *Bloodstained Wiki*.