Final Fantasy Legend Part #12

Part 12: Brigadoon!

Merry belated Christmas, thread! I got you an update! I hope you like it, because I didn't keep the receipt.

Chapter 9: Brigadoon!

Hey! Our gear!

They dumped it two cells down from us?

I suspect they never planned on our escape.

Or they're just lazy.

Please. No one's that stupid.

Two hours earlier...

quote:

I dunno, Hank. The boss said to put it under lock and key.

Ehn, screw it. Let's dump it in that cell and go get drinks.

Drinks?! I love drinks!

Well, at least they didn't let us keep it.

Is agreeing. Who would do such thing?

Due to lack of programming space, laziness, and/or guard incompetence, your party is actually left with all their equipment when they're thrown into their cell. I'm not sure what kind of operation Byak-Ko is running here, but he deserves what he's going to get.

So, to answer any lingering questions, no. That sword behind the bars isn't really our gear. Instead...

Looks like all of it. Pretty nice of them to leave it just inside the bars!

I don't remember this sword, though.

Nor I. It's far too large to be one of Rezen's, and you and Trog don't use them.

Holy crap it's a talking sword

That's amazing! How are you doing that?

When I was alive as a proud warrior, I was slain by my own weapon. My soul entered this blade, and I've been trapped ever since.

Wow. Seriously?

Nah, I'm just fuckin' with ya. Some wizard put an enchantment on me right after I was forged.

Demon sword! Keep back! Will not be taking Trog's soul!

Sorry about that. He's a little superstitious.

Whatever. Look, dollface. I need a wielder, and you need a weapon. Howzabout we hook up?

That... doesn't mean what you think it means.

Doesn't it?

...

Hmm. You... probably shouldn't be outside your cells.

So much for the element of surprise.

I'm kinda done with the element of surprise. It hasn't done us any favors today.

Well, in that case... Trog, will you do the honors?

Is thinking friends never ask.

Way is clear now. We go?

Ayup.

Man, this is the life. Adventure, fights, cold hard cash...

I dunno why you're so hell-bent on having me lug you around. I'm awful with swords.

Those peashooters of yours ain't gonna get us out of here by themselves, toots. Trust me, you need an edged weapon, and I'm your sword.

I guess?

Also, you got an ass I could bounce a quarter off of.

You knock that off right now, or I swear to God, I'll have Trog snap you in half.

Can do and is wanting.

Wow. A'ight, have it your way.

If you're quite done with your vulgarities, we have an escape to attend to.

Seriously. We need to get out of here before someone sees door treasure gimme now

Arggggggggh

What, is she some kinda kleptomaniac?

I am amazed you even know that word means.

Oh, this one girl that used to wield me, you couldn't leave her alone in a room if shit wasn't nailed down. One time, she smuggled an entire chandelier out, bulbs and all. I still don't know how she did it, and I was right there with her.

Huh.

She also had this great big set of—

What? I was gonna say arm muscles!

Given that you're a sword, I'm not entirely sure that makes it any better.

Alert. Alert. Security breach in sector 12.

Here they come!

Hey. Hey! Try me out! Go on!

We've been over this. Unless you want to flail around and bounce off walls, you'll stay in your scabbard.

Nah, we got this. Just draw me and wait. I'll handle the rest.

I cannot possibly advise against what you're doing any more strongly.

He's sticking around whether we want him to or not. We might as well see what he's got.

That's the spirit! Okay. First, get into a battle stance.

Like this?

Perfect. Now, just wait for the good stuff.

Uh. They're... getting kind of close. Should we be—

I got this, sweetheart. Just watch.

Ow! What the hell!

Now!

...

Huh? Huh? What'd I tell ya?

Oh my God you are the absolute worst.

Revenge is... certainly different. If you talk to it as you go past, it foists itself upon you. When used, it starts a skin attack. Anyone who hits that character will take twice as damage as they dealt out.

In spite of this, Revenge has the biggest turnaround of awesome-to-bad in all of videogames. First of all, it doesn't actually prevent damage. Your guy's sitting there like a moron, ready to take a full-force punch in the face. Not only that, it doesn't fire unless someone actually hits you, making it entirely possible to waste one use of a unique weapon. And not only that, but in order to deal out any appreciable amount of damage against heavy hitters, you essentially have to take enough damage to kill you.

Revenge is awful. It's a waste of an equipment slot. Don't use it.

I'm tellin' ya, babe, you're missing out.

Shut it. And stop calling me "babe!"

Sure thing, sugar-tits.

*twitch*

Is snapping time?

We have... a bit of a problem to attend to first.

Here's a fun riddle. What's smaller than me, burns well, and is tasty?

Trog gives up. What?

Everything.

Trog is not getting it.

Remember when I said Dragon armor had another feature? Here's the feature: It's completely fireproof. The mere act of wearing it gives your guy O-Fire, which means nothing fire-based damages them. At all.

Now, this doesn't mean we can bust into a den of dragons and go to town, cool as that may be. Dragons are also armed with very powerful physical strikes. But, with Rez's spellcasting and agility, if they waste a turn breathing fire, it's their last.

Well, that was surprisingly easy.

That's what happens when you get into a fight wearing asbestos.

Is that what this armor's made out of?

It seems the only reasonable explanation.

Fantastic. Just what I've always wanted: mesothelioma.

Elly is confused. Age of stone over.

...What?

_{Shh! Guards!}

_{We mustn't alert them to our presence.}

_{But is already alerted?}

You guys hear that?

Yeah, that alarm is always going off. Last week, all it took was a mosquito.

It wasn't my fault! That thing is right at ankle level!

Anyway, I'm sure as hell not ending my break to go check on a false alarm.

_{The break room. Of course we found the break room.}

_{This ain't the first time you guys've cocked things up, is it?}

_{We're pretty much experts by now.}

_{How shall we handle this? We can sneak past if we remain in the shadows...}

Dente, if there's one thing I've learned from all this, it's that we're lousy at subtlety.

Hey, who are you guys?

That's who.

Violent, but effective.

The guard fight isn't tough—it's a bunch of imps, and we've been killing those things since we first walked into the tower. However, unlike other rooms, the guards stay murdered. This means you'll have to fight them to get...

Sweet. Now we can get out of here.

I ever tell you how much I dig crazy chicks?

The very first thing I'm doing when we get out of here is throwing you overboard.

Wait wait wait wait.

Yeah! I might be valuable later!

No, not that.

That's a key, right? And we found a locked door earlier.

Rez, I don't think that's going to work.

But we have to try!

*click*

They tie all the door locks to one particular key? That seems... unwise.

Their dumb is our gain, that's what I always say.

Have never heard friend Rezen say. Ever.

I say it all the time, Trog. It's just on the inside.

You found them, Rez, so you get to open them.

Hells yeah! Let's get lootin'!

What's this flashlight do?

Dunno. Try the button on the back.

*beep*

Nifty. Beats an E-Whip any day.

So it's a sword made of plasma. Big deal.

Jealous, are we?

Pffft.

Woot! New spells!

Woah. There is some serious bad mojo coming off that book.

Rezen's shown an impressive mastery of the magical arts thus far. I'm sure she'll be fine.

Friend Dente has said many times. Is right yet?

Sadly, no.

This is a room you can easily miss on your first run through. You're in the middle of a jailbreak, Byak-Ko may be moments away from Jeanne, and you've just found the key to the front door! If you run out the exit instead of backtracking, you'll miss a haul of really good stuff—an L-Saber, some Giant gauntlets, various high-end potions, and a Death spellbook.

The L-Saber is exactly what you think it is. It replaces Rezen's E-Whip as her main weapon and hits hard, even if it doesn't bind. Giant gauntlets are better than our Silver gauntlets and, as you might expect, boost the target's Strength.

And Death?

Let me tell you a little something about Death.

I'm back, you jerks! And this time, I brought friends!

Man, you guys are just begging me to use the new spell. Alright, let me open the cover and...

...

...uh.

R... Rez? Are you alright?

I was reading the first page and then kind of zoned out. What happened?

Your eyes rolled up your head, you started babbling in some weird language, and the two topless chicks dropped dead.

Woah.

By the way, have I ever told you how much I dig crazy chicks?

Nope!

Well, I do.

Great!

... just... just thought I'd mention it.

Indeed.

Due to limited programming space (you're going to hear that a lot), FFL1 had to reuse certain status immunity bits. If you don't know much about the battle engine, you won't know that the bit for death immunity is "Para/Poi(son)." Guess which are the only enemies that have that bit set on a regular basis? If you guessed undead, you'd be right!

Unlike other RPGs where Death is a dicey proposition, you can murder your way through the entire game with a 99 mana spellcaster and a steady supply of Death books. (Stone, too, although to a lesser extent.) I don't know if it works on bosses. I'm guessing most of them have Para/Poi immunity since it would be incredibly dumb for them not to. I will test this out behind the scenes and let you guys know, but it's not leaking into the main story either way.

Other than that, if Rezen is first on the draw (and she is—for now), you can wipe out an entire group of enemies with a snap of your fingers. No questions asked.

Alright, if everyone's happy now...

Yep!

I'm good.

Trog need restroom.

Shush.

...I'd like to actually escape from prison.

These look way nicer than the one we had.

Yeah. These must be the high end models.

You kiddin' me? Those guards were scrubs. This is as bare-bones as it gets.

I suspect the glider we received from Byak-Ko was not of the highest quality.

Figures. The grunts are flying around in style, and we get one held together by chewing gum and rubber bands.

Is not making them like used to. In Trog's time, gliders were strong. Then factory shutting down. Many jobs are lost.

That's really sad, Trog.

Is recession economy. What can do?

beep

What's this thing?

Uh, it's a RADAR. What, were you raised in a barn?

Weren't you going to throw him overboard, Elly?

Huh?

_{Okay, okay. Sorry.}

That's better.

But yeah, the RADAR's how you detect things you can't see for yourself. It uses sound waves or some shit, I don't know. I'm a sword, not a scientist.

BEEP BEEP BEEP

What's the big blip here? A big thing we can't see?

Yup, you got it.

Are you sure it's not broken? I don't see anything down there.

It might be the cloud cover. I'll take her down to ground level, we'll see what we can find.

The heck?

There's a dock here! And a bridge! Are these guys with the Resistence?

Hullo! Welcome to Secret Town!

Oh, Trog understands. Because is hiding!

Hmm? Oh, no. We just make it our business to collect secrets.

Really.

Indeed. We travel the universe to barter for the rarest mystical items—solely for research purposes, you understand.

Come now. There's no shame in making coin from science.

Indeed not! Science is our business, and vice versa.

We need to get you guys hooked up with what's left of the Resistance. A little arms deal on the side, and they could really clean Byak-Ko's clock.

Byak-Ko? Oh dear. When are we again?

Come again?

Ah. Let me explain. To prevent our cache from falling into the wrong hands, our town has a tendency to... wander. We're never sure where or when we're going next.

That sounds like it'd make holidays confusing.

You get used to it. At any rate, we can't interfere with other timelines. We don't know what kind of effect it may have downstream.

Nah, you're thinking about this all wrong. What you need to do is buy a really cheap sword, travel back in time, and sell it to yourself for a boatload of gold. Just keep on doing that, and you can retire a billionaire.

And also splinter all of space and time with the resulting paradoxes.

It's win-win, baby!

Hmm. You said you guys deal in arcane goods, right?

Indeed!

Where's the weapon shop?

Welcome to Secret Town! Congrats on finding the place, not many people do.

Thanks! Whatcha got?

Good lord. I don't even know what half these things do.

Hey! You've got more of my knife!

You have a Psi Knife? Wow, great find. Most of them went down with Atlantis. We salvaged what we could.

An Esper wielding Esper weaponry. No wonder it's so devastating.

Can I get some more? Please please pleeeeeeeease

As much as I'd like to fill up our backpacks with this stuff, I don't think we can afford it.

How much you got?

Is nearly 13,000 gold.

Pretty sweet, huh?

That's it?

...

Actually, I may have something to sweeten the deal. You collect rare weapons, right?

Yyyyes?

Well, congratulations. Christmas has come early.

Oh, now this is a fine specimen. Heavily runed, mithril... probably made by the skaalds that colonized this world.

Shopkeeper having the eyes for quality. Is helping price go lower?

Sure does. Why's it got this gag tied around it, though?

_{Mmf hmmf hmmf pfffm!}

No reason whatsoever. Just load up this sack with whatever we can afford and we'll be on our way.

Looks like a new gun, two Giant gloves, and that's it.

It may not look like much, but this equipment is of rare quality. Add in the temporal abnormalities, and we're lucky we were able to afford it at all.

Trog is worry. Spent muchly?

...

quote:

She was in an awful hurry... Well, whatever. I'll just remove this gag, and...

Gah! Thanks, chief. I can't believe that bitch sold me out.

...

Say. You got any daughters that do fencing?

Honestly, I think we got the better end of the deal.

Secret Town is another one you can miss if you don't go looking for it. It's literally in the middle of nowhere, and you have to fly over a very specific spot to visit. The shop prices are bonkers, but you can buy pretty much any spell in the game, plus a shitload of weapons you have no business owning right now. Want a Flare spellbook? Some extra P-Knives? A freaking bazooka? Come on down to Crazy Carl's House of Secrets! All weapons of mass destruction must go!

Much as it pains me, I only pick up new heavy ordnance for Elly and blow the rest on armor. I learned a long time ago that armor is always the first upgrade. Always. Doubly so for Final Fantasy Legend.

Not pictured is that Revenge sells for a measly 1.4k. This is barely more than a Battle sword (a far lower tiered weapon) for what is the only Revenge sword in the game. RIP Revenge. You died as you lived—completely awful in every way.

The castle! They must be looking for Jeanne! What are we going to do?

I'll tell you what we're going to do. We're going to use RADAR to locate Byak-Ko in that stupid flying rock of his, and then I'm going to ram this glider straight up his ass for putting us through all of this.

Could get messy.

Let's... let's just land at the castle and take it from there.

So, what's our play?

Look alive, assholes, Judgement Day is here

Perhaps friend Elly learn too well.

Bazookas, as you might expect, are a notable upgrade to grenades. Whereas grenades top out at around 80, bazookas will drop 150 like it ain't no thang. This puts it about a tier-and-a-half behind Rezen's spells, which is pretty much the gold standard in damage dealing. Not bad considering it's "only" 4k gold.

It's worth noting that Elly has picked up some serious swag by now. She's wearing armor made out of dragon scales, dual-wielding muskets, and has a bazooka slung over her shoulder in case of emergencies. Think about that image. Go on, savor it.

Now, repeat after me: SaGa is awesome.

Byak-Ko! Your moment of punishment is—

...dammit.

Is thing of monologue. Enemy sometimes is not where expect. Can be embarassing.

Well, if he's not here, there's only one other place he could be...

Byak-Ko! Your moment of...

Son of a bitch

Hey, guys! Check out this view!

It's pretty nice, yeah.

Er. Has anyone else noticed the most important detail here?

What is?

The view is moving.

Was moving. Looks like we're slowing down.

...

Elly?

Didn't Mileille say Jeanne would've taken a tunnel to the old base?

...

Oh shit

Byak-Ko! Moment of punishment is here!

God dammit that was my line

You again! I am utterly, thoroughly amazed you've made it this far.

As are we, quite frankly.

And yet, you've still failed. As the prophecy predicted, the White Sphere will appear when the twins are united. With its power, I will be nigh unstoppable!

Then the matter is settled. Where is my payment?

Ah, yes. About that. You served your purpose...

Begone.

Mileille!

...

Now?

*nods*

Byak-Ko. Are you prepared? It's time.

...witness the power of the sphere!

Boss music!

This plays when fighting fiends. It's baller as heck and captures the craziness of a major boss fight perfectly.

Impressive. My turn.

_{Gkk. It's always me. Always.}

Will be leaving friend Elly alone now. Hyah!

Surprise! A few chapters back, I picked up X-Kick without telling anyone. It's either a jumpkick or a roundhouse kick, depending on how awesome you want it to be. Like all martial arts, it's not very impressive until levelled up. That's the neat thing about higher-level martial arts skills; they come with limited uses, so you level them up much faster. Stuff like this honestly makes me believe the one-use trick was intentional.

Pitiful. Take your reward!

What now, mighty Trog? What now, Climber of Towers? Your legend ends here. White Sphere! Show me your power! Smite these fools!

Eh? What... what's going on?

Is reward of deception. Legend not end, Byak-Ko.

YAAAAAH

_{Hhkkkgkkkgkgk}

Legend never end.

...and don't you ever hurt my friends again.

Jeanne! Jeanne, it's Elly. Stay with us, now. Stay with us!

Sister! Forgive me...

A sad song. (Listen to it while reading this next part, trust me)

...happen. Byak-Ko, he is the Corrupter. His influence is gone, thanks to Trog and his friends. Tu peux penser clairement maintenant. You are yourself once again.

It changes nothing! Nothing!

...the White sphere.

Even under Byak-Ko's influence, you gave him a false sphere. That is why I saved you.

Sister! Ne me quittes pas!

It is alright... I am... happy.

...

Mileille, I...

Go.

Okay. I'm sorry.

Non. You misunderstand. Take that sphere. Chase your dreams.

Allez-y-en!

Just to twist the knife a bit more, the sad song follows you all the way back to the overworld and stays until the next time you enter the tower or a town. It even plays over fights.

...

Nothing on RADAR. Looks like Secret Town's moved on.

I can't help but wonder sometimes. Do we leave things worse in our wake?

No. I can't believe that. I won't!

Rezen...

Byak-Ko would've killed everyone! He's gone now. Mileille's better. She'll help this world rebuild.

Trog agrees. His world, it sees tyrants come and go. Is strong like cloud. We endure.

R&R time, troop. Meet back at the tower in four hours.

Should I talk to the townspeople, or...?

Do whatever you want, Rez. You guys've earned a break from me barking orders at you.

Very well. I'll be sampling the local cuisine. I hear the seafood is amazing.

_{Trog. Over here.}

Eh?

Back when we were fighting Byak-Ko. You pulled that jumpkick.

Not knowing what friend saying.

You distracted Byak-Ko for Rezen.

Yes?

You tricked him.

Friend Elly learn much things here. Trog learn, too?

Heh. Go get some rest, Trog. Enjoy your homecoming. It's been an honor.

Hey. I need a place to crash for an hour or two.

I saw you talking to Trog earlier. Friend of his?

Yeah.

Then it's on the house.

Guess he really is a legend around here, huh?

Definitely. I remember when he entered the tower five years ago...

...wait, what?!

Oh yes! Things were different back then. Byak-Ko moved in with a blitzkreig and seized power shortly after. I imagine Trog's homecoming was quite a shock.

Let me get this straight. It's only been five years since he entered the tower? He is from here, right?

Mmm-hmm. Born and raised in Cloud Town. Couldn't be prouder of him.

But then... But why does he...

As far as I know, he's always talked like that.