The Melter

> HA HA HAAAAAAa... What was that?
>
> The Melter

**The Melter** is a character in Inscryption. It serves a minor role in Act II.

## Background

The Melter is one of P03's factory workers. It operates the machinery in the smelting room, although it's unclear why it does so, as it has no control over the way the machine works and is not needed for it to function. The Melter has the decapitated, but still sentient, head of James Cobb trapped inside of its body.

## Personality

The Melter is focused on its work and wishes for the player to leave it alone. However due to a desire to hide the fact James is trapped inside of it, it agrees to engage in card battles. James periodically interrupts its dialogue by yelling for help, and any real personality is masked by his apparent hatred or potentially fear towards The Melter.

## Relationships with other Characters

The Melter is never directly seen interacting with any other characters besides James, but similar to The Inspector, The Melter is immediately willing to sacrifice itself for P03, much to James's terror, showing a large amount of devotion to its boss. It appears P03 cares for it even less than its other workers, as The Melter is absent from Botopia.

## Act II

The Melter appears in the smelting room of P03's Factory, blocking the path to the dredging room. When spoken to, it will engage in dialogue before initiating battle.

### Battle

The Melter's deck consists of Buff Conduits, Factory Conduits, L33pB0ts, and Energy Conduits. The Melter's primary strategy is to set up conduits in order to buff its L33pB0ts.

#### Strategy

Taking out The Melter's conduit is top priority, as they provide many beneficial effects for it. Sentry Spore is an exceptionally powerful card against its deck, as simply placing it in an empty lane, especially the leftmost and rightmost ones will immediately destroy any card that will be played there. This will allow the player as long as they need to set up a proper board presence.

### Post-Battle

After defeating it, it gives the player a Techno card pack and throws itself onto the assembly line, allowing the player to pass.

The Melter is later seen during the fight against P03, as a card with a similar name.

## Trivia

* After throwing itself onto the assembly line and being melted by the smelting machine, the skull of James Cobb can be seen.
* The Melter is one of the two characters from Act II that never reappears after their debut. The other is Sawyer Patel.
* In languages with grammatical gender, like French or German, The Inspector and The Melter have their names gendered as female, while The Dredger is grammatically gendered as male. This is also shown in languages with distinct masculine and feminine speech patterns, like Japanese.

## Quotes

* Initiating a battle with the player:
	+ **James:** "**LET ME OUT**"
	**The Melter:** "HA HA HAAAAAAa... What was that? We are- I am The Melter. They send me raw materials and I- well, you can see how it works."
	**James:** "**LET ME OUT**"
	**The Melter:** "Not another WORD out of you! We must have a card battle."
	+ **James:** "**LET ME O-**"
	**The Melter:** "Yes, yes, again!"
	+ **The Melter:** "Are we almost done? You'll keep trying?"
	**James:** "**LET ME O-**"
	**The Melter:** "Yes, very well."
	+ (player fixed their deck) "That's better. Back to our battle!"

* Player's deck is invalid:
	+ "You... don't have enough cards in your deck. You need 20."
	+ "Hmm. Your deck isn't right. You did add enough cards to it, right? 20 should do."
	+ "Oh. Looks like we can't battle now. You're going to need to get that deck fixed."

* Player loses the battle:
	+ **James:** "**HELP M-**"
	**The Melter:** "Oh, too bad! You lost!"
	**James:** "**PLEASE HELP**"
	**The Melter:** Now please, leave us- leave me to my work.
	+ **James:** "**LET ME O-**"
	**The Melter:** "Too bad, so sad. Off with you now."
	+ "Off with you now. I have work to attend to."

* Player wins the battle:
	+ **James:** "**HELP ME**"
	**The Melter:** "Excellent battle. Now, with that aside, what did you come to tell me? P03 wishes for better bots for his scanner... That is difficult. You see... I melt the metal. But I cannot reprogram the stamping machine."
	**James:** "**NO**"
	**The Melter:** "...there is a way to send at least one new bot down the line."
	**James:** "**NO NO NO NO**"
	**The Melter:** "HAHAHA! YES! FOR P03!" The "card"