Should You Pull? Ultra Festival: Immovable Demon's Gate

Yes. The Scarlet Devil Mansion gatekeeper from the E-Type Universe is one of the more unique Ultra Festival Friends. Beyond being a fantastic Friend when it comes to dealing damage, she mainly serves as an incredible tank that absorbs damage and even uses plenty of partywide defensive buffs to assist her allies as well. She fundamentally has no flaws to her gameplan and is a benefit to whichever team she is on, especially on Yin-based ones.

The main competition for E1 Meiling would be L80 Remilia Scarlet, but the mistress’ gatekeeper has a trick up her sleeve. While Remilia will be leaving on August 5th, Meiling’s Prayer remains until August 19th, giving players much more time to attempt pulling for her. She definitely is better than any A-Type Universe Prayer currently ongoing, as well as R2 Yuyuko Saigyouji, who even then has a very limited runtime unlike Meiling. 

It’s been a while since the last new Ultra Festival Friend, but remember that Ultra Festivals will cost 250 Exchange Points to exchange for a copy of. She will require duplicates of herself or Divine Paper Dolls in order to Limit Break.

+ 0P Earth and Metal on basic shots
+ Last Word packs a punch with Gensokyo-Killer and Hard scaling
+ Insane defensive utility for self and allies
+ Burn anomaly breaks at 1P of first spell, which also inflicts them
- Rainbow-spread of elements hinders specific elemental utility

Hong Meiling is the youkai gatekeeper of the Scarlet Devil Mansion, whose only job is to…guard the gate. She is only really seen around or within the Scarlet Devil Mansion, either doing (or sleeping on…) her job or gardening around the mansion. While it is unclear what type of youkai she is, she is a proud master of Chinese martial arts and can manipulate qi to get an advantage while physically fighting. In the past, she has failed in her duties by either being defeated on the job or just being too laid-back and careless. That was regarding L1 Meiling though, as E1 Meiling seems to be almost entirely serious and prepared to never surrender. Do you think she still takes breaks to read manga, though?

A master in tai chi, Meiling fronts a very aggressive offense. Off the bat, she has utility in Earth and Metal breaks due to having the elements at 0P on her basic shots for spamming breaks. Although the rest of the elements on her spells are very scattered and difficult to take advantage of, outside of Star, they highlight many good reasons to rely on Meiling. Her first spell, Flower Sign: Colorful Light Lotus Flower Palm, raises her own Yang DEF and Accuracy by 3 levels (3T) and, more importantly, applies 2 layers of Burn to all foes. If Boosted to be 1P, she can even break these anomalies immediately, along with any other Burn anomalies applied. Her second spell, Colorful Chinese Flower: Rainbow Tai Chi Chuan, is a very defensive spell, boosting the party’s Yin DEF by 3 levels (3T) upon starting the attack, followed by healing Meiling for 40% of her HP and even granting the party 1 layer of Barrier. Closing the Scarlet Devil Mansion Gate is Meiling’s Last Word, providing plenty of buffs to herself for a great closing move. 4 levels of Yin ATK UP (2T) to increase the spell’s Yin damage, 3 levels of CRIT ATK UP (2T) to take advantage of the Gensokyo-Killer and Youkai-Killer critical hits, 3 levels of Yin DEF UP (3T) for more defense and to increase damage via Hard scaling, and 3 levels of Focus UP (3T) to soak up more damage aimed at the whole team. All of these spells are not only powerful, but they provide very valuable defensive utility for herself and her allies, which greatly comes in handy for difficult fights, allowing for stalling or general safety.

Meiling’s skills are more of the same, but that doesn’t make them bad whatsoever. Her first skill, Security Guard, is more offense-oriented, although it still has a great 4 levels of Focus UP (4T) so that she takes in a lot of All-target damage. When raising their Focus, most defensive Friends face the issue of either not having enough defense to endure the higher damage they take from All-target attacks or just not having enough barriers to protect them from the former. With her very high defensive stats and heavy defensive buffs, Meiling can easily solve this problem all by herself. Offense-wise, Security Guard also gives Meiling 1.25 Spirit Power and even a teamwide Yin ATK buff by 3 levels (3T). Getting back into defense is Meiling’s second skill, Blue Dragon, which is an astounding 75% HP heal for herself along with 3 levels of partywide Yang DEF and Yin DEF UP (3T). Mysterious Qigong, her third and final skill, is somewhat similar, but instead of pure defense buffs, she buffs the party’s resistance to Energy Bullets and Slash Bullets by 90% (2T). This is somewhat situational if the enemy uses neither bullet type, ironically enough being very effective against the head maid of the Scarlet Devil Mansion, Sakuya Izayoi. Is the skill “bad” then? If you think that restoring 2 layers of the party’s Barrier is good, then no, it isn’t.

Meiling’s purpose in a fight is very clear: be the defensive end that denies any heavy damage or casualties from occurring on her own side. Being able to raise her own Focus via Grazing and her spells and skills, as well as plenty of defensive buffs, makes her one of the best Friends for this job. Even then, she still has a great edge in countering with high damage numbers thanks to her Killer bullets and Hard scaling, even being able to do some immediate barrier breaks via her first spell’s Burn anomalies. Shockingly, a Meiling who doesn’t sleep on her gatekeeping duties is almost unstoppable! Maybe the L1 version should start taking notes…