Final Fantasy IV Part #13 - Cecil Murders the King

Part 13: Cecil Murders the King

Chapter 13 - Cecil Murders the King

Woo, we got Yang back! He's kinda bare, though, though at least I kept his claws safe for him.

We can't simply enter Baron, as those two guards would simply be too much for our five-person team to handle. That, or Cecil has immense compassion for those two random guards. Who knows, maybe they were his drinking buddies from his Red Wings days.

Now that we have the Baron Key, we can enter the two places in the town we lacked access to earlier.

The first is a mere weapons/armor shop which sells upgrades for our current team.

The weapons aren't that spectacular. Cure and Thunder's effects are pretty obvious. I pick up Yang a Thunder Claw since the next dungeon will have a lot of enemies weak to lightning.

There's also some nice armor for Yang here so he can get his defenses up a bit. He has a load of HP, but he's a bit more fragile than Cecil, so this doesn't hurt.

You've got to be kidding me.

This second door actually leads to our next dungeon.

There's a secret chest with some cash in it, which everyone probably knows about by now.

The Baron Waterway is pretty average length, and for the most part straight-forward.

There's some new enemies here, though these guys are unremarkable.

It's great to give Yang Thunder and Ice claws in this place, as this area is full of monsters weak to one of the two.

It's also great to have two people capable of Black Magic to nuke random encounters.

ElecFish absorb lightning, so they're a bit of a pain to fight.

So it's a good thing Tellah knows Virus (aka Bio), one of the best offensive spells in the game. It's 20MP, the cast time is instant (at least as instant as this game's screwed-up ATB system can be), it's non-elemental, it's strong, and as a bonus it inflicts Sap, which slowly lowers an enemy's HP. Very useful spell.

AquaWorms love to spam Wave over and over, plus they have a decent chunk of HP.

The second floor is a bit of a maze. You can simply go right and bypass all of the bullshit, but then you'll miss out on getting a couple crappy consumables you'll never use!

Crocdiles (as the game's eight-letter enemy name limit states) are an upgraded form of Aligators, still hitting twice yet hitting much harder. They can be a pain to deal with unless you quickly kill them off with Ice.

Everyone gained a level from that battle, with Porom picking up Bersk, another status spell I'll never use.

I love Virus.

Cecil picks up Cure2, which is actually useful for this stage of the game. It gives a bit of relief from Porom, who's been healing the party during this dungeon.

Finally, there's Hydras, which I guess can Entangle you or something? They don't really do anything.

More dungeon.

Sweet, the twins pick up two useful spells. Having another Virus user is awesome, especially since it's Palom's strongest spell at this point, while Exit is useful in exiting a dungeon without backtracking or to instantly escape a battle. Pretty nice spell.

The Ancient sword is hidden to the right of a save point. This sword is actually weaker than the Legend Sword, but it can inflict Curse, a status which lowers an enemy's physical damage. Good for trivializing strong brawlers, but it really isn't that useful for this part of the game, considering the dungeon's almost done and all.

In fact, we are done and have made it back to Baron Castle.

The castle is almost completely empty. There's nobody around besides those two guards.

You can rest in Cecil's bed and recover your party. It's a bit shorter than the last save point, plus you won't have to waste a Tent.

Looks like Royal Ass-kisser Baigan has caught up with us.

No way! I am the Captain of the Guards. My loyalty to the state is unwavering!

I see. Then come with us! You can be of great help!

Yes, sir!

Wow, that was probably the quickest we ever recruited someone. And now we're up to six people!

...Wait a minute.

What's wrong?

...It smells!

Like a monster!

Something's fishy!

Can't you act a bit better?

What?!

Oh my! Baigan betrayed us? That fiend!

Baigan's power is to turn into some weird-ass creature with snake arms.

His arms are separate entities from Baigan. They're a bit fragile, as one spell should take them out.

Baigan's gimmick to respond to magical attacks with Wall. Wall (aka Reflect) will bounce off most spells back to the party. Thus we can't simply spam our strongest spells on him constantly.

Of course, we can play the same game by bouncing spells off Cecil. Wall only reflects once, so if we hit Cecil first, the spell will hurt Baigan regardless.

The problem being, of course, that you don't have control on where the spell gets reflected.

To further complicate things, once both of Baigan's arms are gone, they regenerate. Because of this, I never really managed to bounce a spell upon Baigan himself.

There's also the little problem of this game not actually giving visual cues of when Wall wears off. I believe you can go to the item menu, pretend to give an item to someone, and check their status that way, which I obviously forgot to do.

At least if Cecil's Wall is gone, that means Baigan's is gone as well, giving me a free magic shot at him.

The Right Arm will use Vampire, which inflicts Sap.

Thankfully, Cecil and Yang's attacks are enough to wear down Baigan.

Baigan's arms will still live after the body dies, at which point they simply explode. Yeah. That makes perfect sense. Why fucking not?

Anyway, Baigan is defeated. After we heal up in Cecil's chambers, let's explore the castle.

They give no fucks.

With nobody around, we can now loot the shit out of Baron.

Too bad every single item is a crappy consumable.

This tower is full of treasure. They're all still consumables.

Alright, this isn't so crappy.

If we try to enter here, we are bounced back. Guess we'll try later.

At least in the other versions, you get a larger variety of consumables you'll never use. Maybe even get lucky and snag a Spider's Silk or Hourglass.

The only thing left to do is deal with the king, who is somehow the only person in the castle.

I see you've become Paladin. But I do not like that. That's not good, Cecil.

...King Baron?

Oh, yes! And I took his place! Ha-hah-hah!

You!!

Wanna see the King? Don't worry! You'll see him soon enough. I'm not like Milon, see? I'm surprised that he made it as one of the Four Fiends of Elements!

Then you are...

Indeed! I am the Fiend of Water Kainazzo!

So the King of Baron that raised Cecil since he was a kid? He's dead. Kainazzo was actually the one leading Baron. That's right, a giant fucking water turtle has been disguised as the King of Baron. Don't ask me how the hell they managed to pull it off, or how Golbez turned Baigan into some weird-ass monster man with snake arms that nobody managed to notice. It's not nearly the level of batshit that most jRPGs reach, but it's still a tad farfetched.

Anyway, Kainazzo (a pretty weird translation choice for Cagnazzo) still serves Golbez, so Golbez actually managed to assassinate the old king, put his water turtle power in a fancy disguise to pretend to be the king, and used that power to order Baron's military to gather the crystals. Once Cecil stopped cooperating, Golbez took advantage of the situation by essentially making himself captain of the Red Wings, giving him the military might to take the crystals himself. All in all, a pretty good plan that actually went off quite well.

Of course, this means we're going to have to murder the king.

As a fiend, Kainazzo gets the awesome Dreadful Fight, music.

Kainazzo will often gather water around himself.

During this part, he'll be especially weak to lightning attacks, which will also eliminate his water.

Let him keep his water for too long, and he'll send a wave at your team, dealing pretty big damage for a multi-target attack.

I think if you deal enough damage, he'll hide in his shell for awhile, where attacks won't do much to him.

I don't know for sure, because Tellah fucking kills him immediately. I don't think whoever did this fight accounted for Tellah having a fucking L3 spell that would obliterate Kainazzo's weakness. I knew Tellah would trivialize the fight, but even I didn't expect Kainazzo to die this fast. It's pretty embarrassing, to the point where sometimes I'd actively not use Lit3 just so the fight wouldn't be a joke.

Seriously, this fight is a complete joke with Lit3, and I'm glad they overhauled the fight in the DS version to make Cagnazzo an actual threat. This is just pathetic. Baigan is much tougher than this.