Combat in Beast of Reincarnation gets far more forgiving once you spend your first Skill Points wisely. Emma and her Malefact companion Koo each have their own Skill Tree, and the smartest early picks blend raw damage with survival tools so you can actually land the big hits.
Quick answer: For Emma, unlock Helm Splitter, Expand Entanglement Gauge, and Roll. For Koo, unlock Sakura: Javelin, Taunt, and either Higanbana: Bloom or Mod: Status Effect Amp. Level Strength and Florescence for Emma, and Florescence for Koo, so you meet the attribute gates.
How the Skill Trees and attributes work
Each character’s tree is split into two halves. The upper branches unlock and upgrade activatable abilities, called Blade Arts for Emma and Bloom Arts for Koo. The lower roots hold smaller passive nodes, and each root gates its higher skills behind a specific attribute.
Emma’s three roots are Tracking Shot, Hair, and Entanglement Overdrive. Koo’s three roots are Incantation, Guard, and Pounce. To reach deeper skills in a root, you have to keep pouring points into the matching attribute, so plan which stat to raise before you spend.
Strength raises Emma’s Attack and Defense. Florescence raises both HP and Skill Power, which drives how hard your Nushi abilities hit. Vitality only raises HP. Because you lean on Nushi skills constantly, Strength and Florescence do more for Emma than Vitality, and Florescence matters most for Koo since it boosts the power of every Bloom Art he casts.
Early skill requirements at a listing
| Skill | Character | How to unlock |
|---|---|---|
| Helm Splitter | Emma | Hair Lvl 2 (12 Vitality) |
| Expand Entanglement Gauge | Emma | Entanglement Overdrive Lvl 1 (9 Strength) |
| Roll | Emma | Tracking Shot Lvl 2 (12 Florescence) |
| Sakura: Javelin | Koo | Defeat Rangifer Nushi in Chapter 1 |
| Taunt | Koo | Pounce Lvl 2 (12 Strength) |
| Higanbana: Bloom | Koo | Unlocked from the start |
Best early skills for Emma
Helm Splitter
Helm Splitter sits in the Hair root and is one of the most reliable damage tools you can pick up early. Leap into the air, then hold attack to drive your katana into the ground and hit everything nearby. It clears grouped smaller enemies and chips down boss health bars just as well.
It is easy to slot into combos, which is why it stays useful for the whole game. Once you max it, you can ease off the Hair root and move points elsewhere.
Expand Entanglement Gauge
The Entanglement Gauge fills as you attack and parry. Each bar lets you fire off another Blade Art, and clicking both thumbsticks spends the gauge to trigger Entanglement Overdrive, which slows time for a short window.
Every rank of Expand Entanglement Gauge adds another bar, up to a total of seven. More bars means more back-to-back Blade Arts and a longer Overdrive, whether you use that slowed time to pile on hits or to dash away and heal. This is the strongest long-term investment Emma can make early.
Roll
Roll lives in the Tracking Shot root and turns your evade into a longer movement option. Press the evade button twice in quick succession and Emma covers roughly double the distance of a standard dodge.
Many bosses and elites lean on aggressive melee swings, so the extra distance is often the difference between clearing an attack and eating it. It also buys you the space to heal safely, which makes it worth grabbing as soon as your Florescence allows.
Best early skills for Koo
Sakura: Javelin
You unlock this Bloom Art the first time you defeat Rangifer Nushi in Chapter 1, and it stays strong deep into the later chapters. Its in-game description reads:
Unleash a sakura branch javelin to skewer a target. A pierced target can be jumped to.
It deals high single-target damage and stays cheap to cast as long as you leave it unmodded. The best part is the follow-up: after a target is pierced, Emma latches onto it for an aerial strike that flows straight into Helm Splitter.
Taunt
Taunt comes from Koo’s Pounce root and makes him howl to pull nearby enemies onto himself. Slot it into Koo’s autonomous skills and he will often open a fight by grabbing aggro from a whole group at once.
Those few seconds let Emma attack distracted enemies, heal, or reposition before they turn back to her. Against a new boss, it also frees you up to watch and learn attack patterns so you can start parrying with confidence.
Higanbana: Bloom and Mod: Status Effect Amp
Higanbana: Bloom is available from the very start and deals the highest single-target damage of Koo’s opening Bloom Arts. A few early upgrades turn it into a heavy hitter you can fire from a safe distance to open or finish a fight, and each bloom raises a tall plant Emma can latch onto for a Helm Splitter combo, much like Javelin.
If you prefer to lean on elements, Mod: Status Effect Amp from the Incantation root doubles status buildup on enemies. Fire arrows, poison bolts, and other elemental Bloom Arts all trigger their effects far faster with it attached. Pair it with a low-cost Bloom Art so you can keep that faster buildup running through longer fights.
The early combo these skills set up
The reason these picks work together is a single repeatable chain that can drop an elite in one go:
- Hit a target with Sakura: Javelin.
- Latch on for the aerial follow-up.
- Chain into Helm Splitter without touching the ground.
- Finish with a Blade Art such as Asagao once it unlocks mid-game.
Taunt keeps enemies off you while you set this up, Roll resets your spacing if it goes wrong, and an expanded Entanglement Gauge lets you cash in more Blade Arts during the slowed-time window. Prioritize these six unlocks, keep Strength and Florescence climbing, and both Emma and Koo will feel noticeably tougher long before the mid-game.
