Part 39: Family Reunion?

"Why are we here again?"

"There's something we need here.. and it's going to require us to do some gambling."

"Ooh! I've got it taken care of, just let me at the table."

"NO."



"That's a good enough starting place.."



"I find this amazing, but.. I can't help but feel like we're doing something wrong."

"Ragnar has never seen a casino dealer cry before."



"Spoilsport.. I can't believe he made us start over."

"It was probably necessary since they had to go get a wheelbarrow for the tokens."



"I think that's probably enough now. Well.. maybe a bit more than we need, but it's hard to hit a target dead on when you're doing double or nothing."



"Three more of those, please."

"Wow.. it's light enough that even I can use it."

"With that, let's go check out that shrine thing."



"Rather peculiar decorations here."

"Seems a bit small for the pathway to Zenithia."



"Ragnar is for to be making the music with this manliest of instruments."



"Rather thoughtful of them to put in an elevator."

"That was nice, but.. I'm beginning to think that this isn't the road to Zenithia."



"This is biggest metal slime Ragnar has ever seen. It even has crown!"

"I've got this."


dragon.

"...okay, that's a thing that happened."

"Raaaaar!"



"Ragnar does not blame you, big slime."



"Okay, I'm convinced..this HAS to be the way to Zenithia."

"We've got confidence in you.. also, this looks a lot more like a tower than the last place."

"Ragnar blames the town people for not giving direction when talking about towers."

"They could certainly have been more exact than "Somewhere on this island."



"What the hell? We've got all the Zenithian equipment."

"Maybe one person has to be carrying it?"



"That's arbitrary as anything.. okay, let's try this now."



"You've got to be kidding me. I'm going to have to put this crap on?"



"If it makes you feel better, there are pink lions as a consolation prize."



"Stupid magical doorways...the shield and helm are great, but can I take the rest of this crap off when we get through the doorway?"

"Probably. The spell only seems to be active on that one door."



"Ahh, much bett.. huh. More pink monsters. This is definitely a girly tower."

"Pink is not a girly color!"



"At least the masks aren't pink. I don't think I'd be able to keep a straight face if they were."



"This place is very odd.. I feel a bit uneasy stepping out on this ramp thing."



"At least we can see most of the treasure from a distance.. we just have to figure out how to get to it."



"Yeah, although I don't understand what was up with these statues around the treasure chest."

"Something about it gave me a vision of tentacle faced monsters and I don't know why."



"Sometimes I have dreams like that too. They make things like these snakes a relief."

"I'm just relieved that they're purple for a change."



"Another one of these damn things? I don't want to have to climb down and back up the tower to turn it in.."



"Maybe I can teleport us once I've been there... and does anybody have a non-creepy reason a bunch of monsters might have a pink leotard?"

"I've got nothing."



"There's actually a lot of women's clothing in this tower. I'm not sure what that says about Zenithia."



"Bah. Dragon Shield is so last season."



"Maybe the little grey guys like to look pretty sometimes?"



"The pink one with the horn certainly looks fabulous."



"Crap. Wrong turn. Why can't any of us squeeze through these columns?"



"Is this it?"

"Only one way to find out. Everybody on to the cloud!"



"Zenithia is much smaller than expected."

"Maybe it's bigger on the inside, like that statue?"



"You certainly don't make it easy to get up here."



"No thanks, we've already got some.

Note: He only gives you Dew if you don't have any in your inventory anyway.



"They soon had a child.

"I think I've heard this story before.. you could say I'm intimately familiar with it."




"MOM?! Is that you?"

"What? Oh, no no I couldn't be. Sob.. Sob.. I'm just so happy and moved by the story."

"You know what? We'll deal with this later after I've saved the world. Also, I prefer to be called Lamarck."

"And I thought our family life was strange."



"And I'm taking this just because it's here."



"to stop him, the barriers must be broken. Good luck, Lama!"

"LA-MARCK. Like the name Mark with a la on the front."

"Thanks for the advice about the barriers."



"Tame dragons! Zenithia is best place ever!"

"Those could also be Master Dragon's children."



"Huh.. that's probably going to come in handy at some point."



"Undulation? Are you absolutely sure that's the word you want to use?"

"I think the important point is that this spot is directly above where Necrosaro has been doing his evolving."



"Screw you guys too. You know, so far the people in this castle are kind of a bag of cocks."

"Well, it's not like they get out much."



"The Secret of Evolution is a method to distort the natural evolutionary processes."

"Through the use of this method, unnatural beings may be created."

"The Secret of Evolution is the source of all evil things."



"Ha! I knew that they were completely wrong about this secret being actual evolution!"

"That whole burying it underground has worked out wonderfully, hasn't it?"



"So the monsters were created using the secret and knowing this made them want to dig it up again?"



"Long ago, Esturk, the Ruler of Evil, created a terrible thing, the Secret of Evolution."

"Esturk used it to evolve into a super being."

"Upon discovering this, the Zenithians, joined by Master Dragon, fought against Esturk."



"We went near him, but we did not wake him up while we were killing him so it is all okay."

"You.. you did WHAT? Umm.. okay, moving on.."

"Later it was found that Esturk's Secret of Evolution had been imperfect."

"It didn't incorporate the Golden Bracelet, an amplifier of the evil undulation."

"I guess they really did mean to use undulation. It was in the book and everything."



"He's certainly impressive."

"Ragnar can believe he fought Esturk when Esturk was awake."



"It appears that Master Dragon has always cared about Lama."

"Lamar..ah, screw it. Funny way Master Dragon has of showing that he cares."



"So.. are we going to talk to him?"

"Not me!"

"Alright, just give me a second.."




"I'm not as omnipotent as you might expect."

"by the way, humans are curious creatures."

"Inherently weak humans can do miraculous things at times."

"I'll place my hope in you!"

"You know, it's REALLY hard to stay mad at you when you openly admit that you're not all powerful and say you're going to trust us."

"I am well aware of that fact, yes."



"I bestow upon you the power of my hope!"



Note: It's very difficult to show an experience boost. I'm not sure if it was enough to even get me up a level.

"Um.. thanks, I guess?"



"Beneath this Castle is the entrance to the world of darkness."

"That Zenithian Sword will be a tremendous help to you."

"I'm much more moved by you strengthening my sword. We'll handle it from here."

End of Update Snapshot




With the upgrade of the Zenithian Sword, Lamarck now has the most powerful weapon in the game and is pretty well set to be a jack of all trades and master of all. She's got the best healing spell, great damage spells, and is a solid front line fighter. There's still a few more to come as well.



Ragnar's living up to his potential, nearing 400 HP as of now and with the highest attack power out of anybody in the group. His defense has also improved nicely with a few additions.




Nara has picked up the final high level wind damage spell and is starting to get some staying power for fights. She's got good defense now, and the hatt of happiness goes a long way in helping keep MP up.




Mara's also picked up a good bit of defense lately, and is still the sturdiest mage we have. She's got more ways to hurt an enemy magically than just about anyone else, and most of them even work fairly well on strong enemies. BeDragon, which I showed off a bit earlier, also allows her to turn into a dragon and either attack or breath fire on enemies.



Alena looks deceptively weak on paper, but she's at least got decent HP. The Stilleto earrings allow her to attack twice in a single round, so she does more damage than that 175 attack would suggest. She's also more likely than just about anyone else to get a critical hit.




Cristo has also improved substantially with a new sword and shield. He's still better off as a healer than as a fighter, but he has a chance now. I just wish I could shut off his death magic.



Taloon has also benefited substantially from new equipment. He's a better fighter than Cristo is, although a bit weaker on defense, and still has all of his weird tricks at hand.




Brey is finally not made of tissue paper, although you can really tell the difference between him and Mara when it comes to MP. He's just about finished filling out his spell list, though, so at this point he's ready to keep rolling through the endgame.