Part 8: Pits and Mazes and Not Much Else

Our first steps onto the 7th floor take us into everybody's favorite gameplay mechanic: the teleport maze. Between various pillars are teleport squares, all of which will drop us right back here at the beginning of the maze. It's mostly a matter of trial, error, and memorizing which squares not to step on… and just as tedious as you might imagine.



More to the point, there are also some special pits scattered throughout the maze that we're going to be looking out for. This one drops us down a level..



Back to the sixth floor. If you're thinking this area doesn't look at all familiar from the last update, you'd be quite correct.



We're actually right next to the weapon shop at the end of the 6th floor, on one of the alternate pathways we could have taken with that key. This gives us a chance to go ahead and loot it, as well as completing our map. The treasure to our left, by the way, was a Gold Bar.



The enemies aren't anything we haven't seen before, and the treasure is mostly salable items. Our next treasure is a set of Gold Bars, with an interesting configuration.



"Wait…how in the hell?"

Just as a note, you can completely jump over chests… that's actually an illusionary wall,



The treasure isn't that spectacular, but I'll take it. More to the point, that area off to the right...



I don't even know how to go about getting to that treasure. It's possible there's another pit trap we can take somewhere else in the floor above that would drop us there, but you really can't get out at that point. This one is going to have to wait for some Warp Magic.



"Spike trap right in front of the door? Well that's just not friendly at all."



Eventually we'll reach a door that just won't open. A check on the map reveals that we're actually all the way at the end of the corridor, but it looks like we've missed something...



Closer investigation reveals a breakable wall, with about 300 gold in the chest. With that we're finished with this route, which means a trip up the stairs and down another pit.



Through sheer luck, the second pit I found took me right down to the end of the final pathway. Directly below us is a concealed pressure plate, and in the room up and left of is is some more H. Potion.



"Whoever placed this had a low opinion of people's intelligence."



This door won't open from this side, and doesn't have a keyhole. We're going to have to find another way to access this particular door. Down the hall there's also a Saber, a Gold Bar, an extra Leather Shield, a Rapier, and 600 more gold pieces to be found in this area.



With that we're finally done with the 6th floor, except for that one pesky door that you can see in the upper lefthand corner.



Returning to the 7th floor and navigating through the teleport maze we exit near one of the bandits that we've heard so much about. Since he didn't intend to move and was just standing there, I never got a chance to see what he might have done before he burned to death. I think these guys are meant to trick people by staying in place and acting like something you would talk to, then steal your stuff and run off with it.




Following a long walk through a narrow and uneventful corridor we come to the stairs up, but as you can see that leaves a MASSIVE amount of the floor unexplored. We definitely can't let that stand.



North of the stairway is an illusionary wall leading us into a series of additional rooms, many of which are inordinately fond of pit traps. The first few treasures, before we stumble across anything interesting, include 200 gold pieces and some M.Poison.



Occasionally you'll see things like this, where you've got treasure hidden just on the other side of illusionary walls. I can't remember if this was a chest or a bag, but I suspect a chest as I had to stop and open it to figure out what was going on.



Too quick to catch I suddenly found myself in this room, with a not-so-friendly gargoyle and some Gold Bars for company. This is actually the room we couldn't get into previously, which is only accessible from above.



Making my way back, this is the pit I fell into. It was concealed by perspective when I walked into the room, with predictable results.



You'd think that one of the switches here would be important to open that door, but you'd be wrong. Instead, all three switches are linked to arrow slots in the wall. The door opens with a simple touch.



Enemies interact with illusionary walls in strange ways. Most of the time they won't pass through them, but it can look downright weird when they do. Especially when it's the larger enemy types. Behind that illusionary wall are a Saber and some M. Potion for the taking.



Another difficult to get item. I have no ideas, since you can't even use a warp spell to get to a nearby square. There are also no illusionary walls on the side to allow access.



This chest, on the other hand, is one that you pretty much have to suffer to obtain. The prize inside is a stack of Gold Bars.



Our eventual goal is this teleport square, which takes us to the final linked set of rooms for the floor.



The end of the path is a tiny room with two pits and two very large enemies, one of whom has a Skull Key.



The key opens the treasure chest, as a method of ensuring that you actually fight the enemies rather than just taking the treasure and running. Our prize is a Shipal, which is one of the shield upgrades we could have gotten back on the 6th floor. You can see why I don't bother to spend money on anything but spells.



With that we're done with the floor, which is pretty much the first we've seen that was absolutely packed with no unused space.



Climbing up onto the 8th floor we enter a series of cross/circular rooms that are linked in a row.



"An open chest…? There's only one person who'd be enough of a dick to do this."

Although the box is open, there's actually some M. Poison inside of it.

"Thanks Alex. You shouldn't have. Really."



This looks like a similar case to the wall we saw earlier, but the difference is that when you pick up a bagged item (in this case some H. Potion) it disappears.



We've got to use the hammer to get in, and the treasure is underwhelming now that we have a freeze spell. At least we can sell it!



The final linked room has a side door off into this area, which has this giant linked mass of pits that we'll have to navigate. That'll have to wait a bit, however, because...



A wild magic shop appeared!



"Blond girl? About yay high? Threatening to murder people?"

"That reminds me. My last customer must have been asking about you…"



"She'd be a lot prettier if she'd just stop trying to arrest me. Although y'know, you're…"

"Do you have any idea who she is?"

"Unfortunately, I do. At least I know she's not behind me now."



Right next to the magic shop is a series of switches which will help us make it to the next floor. The open treasure chest you can see there hard yet more Gold Bars in it, by the way.



Triggering that switch opens up a few pathways through the pits, leading to yet more switches.



In addition to 1000 gold pieces, the next switch room has you bracketed by archers with a few pits to navigate around.



The switch opens up yet more pathways, making this a fairly simple maze to traverse.



One of the revealed pathways leads to the Garnet Key, which leads to the Gold Key, which leads to a teleport square to get us here:



This switch opens the final door we need to access on this floor...



Which has some giant spiders patrolling on the other side of a line of pits. Easy enough to pick them off with fire and then hit the final switch.



We kind of have to go all the way around, but it's not a real issue since the game does the small mercy of not having enemies trying to shoot you while you're moving.



With that we're at the exit, although there's a door we can't access from here as well. More on that very shortly…. or not, since this is quite long enough for an update.



The completed map for Level 8. No stat summary, because I forgot and because we're about to get one anyway. That's because…

Next Update: Alexis again, new Bosses, and finally escaping the Tower.