Part 37: Part A - The Monk's Trial

Each character has an area of the Lunar Ruins that can only be entered if they were in the party when you defeat Zeromus.



This means that the personification of hate/evil/bad cooking has to go down one more time. You only need to bring one of the twins, so Porom comes along for her healing.



Some of the pre-Zeromus dialogue changes depending on who you bring. Cid covers Edge's smack-talking, for example.




The original final four party members fill in for their absent counterparts.

The fight is a little longer with team MELEE, but not hard. Edward's too weak to survive Big Bang but with the rest of the group exuding testosterone and Curajas Zeromus bites it again.



The face on the moon is no longer covering the entrance to the bonus dungeon. I'm pretty sure that head was there as decoration in the original, so it's a nice touch (there's something like it under the sea in FFV as well if I'm remembering right).



Oh boy, more Generic Moon Dungeon. But wait!



These are the Lunar Ruins, the forgotten dungeon of old.



Funnily enough, this is an outright lie for most of our characters. This is pretty true for Kain, Rosa, Edward, and Rydia, but this isn't really true for the others. The other sick bastards enjoy it.

You must reach the deepest depths by overcoming tremendous trials. You must conquer each trial and gather nine tomes. Only when the last one is claimed, can you overcome the last trial.

"Nine tomes" is code for "having to reenter this labyrinthian deathtrap three or four times".



This is the group for the first run of the Lunar Ruins.

The Lunar Ruins has 50 floors. The floors are semi-random- they'll show up in a different order each time, but the floors themselves don't change. Every fifth floor is a Trial that you can only enter with the appropriate character.



The first few areas all look like the Lunar Subterrane/Bahamut's Cave.



Great Marlboros - because regular ones aren't terrible enough. The chests in this areas are all restoratives of some kind and really not exciting at all.



Every fifth floor looks like this. Save Point to the left, Emergency Exit to the right, the Trial up top, and the staircase to the next floor back behind the Trial.

Yang's up first.



Yang...

I feel something... A strong energy...



!

I am the Lunar Titan. You must show me your strength! I shall test your powers!



Yang's Trial is about punching things.



Lots of things. I have no idea if these are supposed to be the men he lead in battle but died or what but holy crap there's a lot of them.

Like the Octopus boss earlier, baby monks disappear as you deal damage to them (there are eight distinct monsters here).



They take a beating, but don't like fire/dragons. That wasn't so-



Uh oh.



UH OH



These guys hit harder. That's it.



It's just wave after wave of dead people (well, they will be after the group is done with them anyways).



Lord knows how many fights later...

That is enough. You are the first to come all this way...



I shall lend you my powers... if you can prove yourself!



SPAAAAAAACE Titan's pretty easy. His primary attack against the group is Earthquake.



Problem solved. He can still hit people hard though, and will use Crush like the Demon Wall if not dealt with fast enough.



Our reward? A Space Book.



You were also a worthy opponent!

This armlet shall be yours.

Th-This is...!



It doesn't increase strength per se... but it does replace his Focus Command with Deadly when equipped.

What's the difference? It now triples his attack power instead of doubling it. It's time to party like it's 9999.

Farewell...

Lunar Titan...

On to the next!

For some reason Cecil blurting this out of nowhere is hilarious.

Next Time: