Part 9: Page 9

Yeah, this is what I picked. If you don't like it, the door's over there, next to the fucking harp.

Meanwhile, back in the Cleft of Dimensions...

Looks like Exdeath's got himself a few goons! He sends a few after me, but no doubt I'll be able to rough them up something awful.

I fly over to Mua Village, where I stumble into a shed and through a rather tangled forest where I finally confront the killer!

So I kill him, but it turns out he's actually me and I'm actually the killer and I want to have hot lesbian sex with my best friend.

Fuck, man, I suck at this.

This strange fellow tells me that I should choose the box on the left if I'm brave, or the box on the right if I'm a coward. Part of me wants to pick the left chest while simultaneously kicking the winning field goal and having sex with twin supermodels, but I ultimately decide to pick the one on the right because it does more damage.


Fuck, that guy's creepy. Not that I'm scared, of course. Well, uh, I mean I am scared, because I'm suuuch a coward. Aaaaah. I'm soooo scaaaared.

So I'm wandering through this forest when RANDOM ENCOUNTER

A random encounter with a town! Holy fuck! Okay, Butz casts Fire3 Sword and uses X-Fight while F... okay, it's not an enemy, it's a town. A town that was trapped in the Cleft of Dimensions back when the worlds were divided, and now it's back and it has all sorts of crazy shit to buy. You can get all the best storebought weapons and armor here, as well as the highest level black, white, and dimension magic (except for Flare, Holy, and Meteo, of course).

Not to mention...

A piano?!?! I've almost mastered the piano! I must find the last one!!!


FUCK YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hop on the bandwagon, because the masters of music have arrived, and they're going on tour


And I find the black chocobo. Which is cool and all, don't get me wrong, but I just mastered the piano, and how do you top that? Besides, I have to talk to somebody.


Yeah, okay. Except the black chocobo doesn't count, because that's cheating. Okay, fine.


I hop on Boco and get ready for a very loooooong journey.


I decide to stop by the pirate's cove for... wait, my character has no reason to do this. Well, crap, I have to roleplay here! Okay, uh, let's say Butz just remembered in a dream his vow to find the legendary Sword of Fendrick which was broken into four pieces a hundred years ago and could very well be the key to defeating Exdeath, and one of the pieces is "with the one who bears the Pendant of Time," and that's kind of like Flava Flav, who sometimes wears a viking helmet, and vikings are known for pillaging and plundering just like... pirates! To the pirate's cove!

So I stop for a spell.

Or rather a summon Now I can summon Syldra, which is oddly enough a wind-elemental summon, and it also does fairly good damage (about 3800 when boosted with the Air Lancet). Also, Cara is creepy as fuck.

I also stop by this waterfall.

Well, it's not a secret passage, but then, I'm on top of the waterfall, not really behind it. Oh, and the Magic Lamp is an item you use in battle that uses a summon. The first time you use it, it casts Bahamut, then Leviathan, then Odin, and it goes on down the list each time until you get to Chocobo, where it stays until you take it back here to recharge it. Nifty, but I'm not sure how useful it is since everybody has mastered Summoner.


Alrighty then, time to get my reward!


This guy obviously doesn't know me. Anyway, this Mirage Vest has pretty crappy defense, but it lets you avoid one physical attack, guaranteed. Which really isn't much, so I guess it's kind of worthless. But I mean it could be good if you were wandering through a dungeon where you always encountered one enemy who used one physical attack and then did nothing else for the rest of the battle. I guess. Maybe? No, it sucks.

I bring my black chocobo over to this desert... So?!?!?!?

I've got a bone to pick with this Bahamut fellow, and he said he's hanging out on North Mountain, so here I am. The enemies here are the same as they were when I first went here. I get to the top with only one problem, that problem being that all the enemies are too fucking weak.


Okay, this guy pisses me off. Not because he's hard, because he isn't, but because I equipped everyone with Wall Rings expecting him to use Mega Flare on me and have it bounced back to him for 9999 damage, and he didn't use it once! Motherfucker! It would've been a good strategy if I weren't so horribly strong, but I did so much damage to him he totally skipped it and went to casting stupid shit like Maelstrom and Aqua Rake. And then I killed him. What the fuck, Bahamut?! Not even one use of your trademark attack?! Fuck you!


Yeah yeah what the fuck ever. Syldra does as much damage as him when I have an Air Lancet, and I'll bet Leviathan does more when I get him and a Wizard Rod.

So I head over to this shrine, which used to be on an island surrounded by mountains. Well, it still is, but now it has a big-ass bridge cutting through it. Unfortunately this means I can't enter the bridge and listen to Gilgamesh's awesome theme.


I'm accosted by Gargoyles again. Break Sword, X-Fight, moving on.


Another page of the large print edition of the Sealed Book flies up and catches on fire, and I'm in.


Interesting note: If you run away from a monster-in-a-box, you won't get any treasure from the box and the monster will still be there. If you check it again, it makes a noise like you get an item, which I thought meant I could get infinite items from it, but you don't actually get the item until you defeat the monster. However, what this does mean is that I can just set A on turbo and use Escape over and over until my Chicken Knife is fully powered up.


Technically has a lower attack power than the fully-powered Brave Blade, but it uses both Strength and Agility for its attack power, which means it basically does twice as much damage as it honestly should. And it does about 2400 per hit with X-Fight. Just for reference, the Excalibur does around 1300.


I'm about to get the tablet, when I'm attacked by Stoker. Or Stalker. Whatever, I guess it's not really that important. Anyway, this guy's fight is supposed to be really gimmicky. He has four copies, and only one can take damage at a time, and once one of them takes damage it becomes invulnerable and another one becomes vulnerable. Except I think I might have broken him, because I found out he's vulnerable to sleep, so I put all four copies to sleep and had Butz go crazy with Sleep Sword, and one after another they all died. Some of them I never even really hit because they were invincible, but they still died. Weird.


Three more weapons

But what's this??!?!?!?!?

Looks like the single twin tower is open for business


Is that a threat?


So, here I am again, gotta pick six more legendary weapons. I was thinking about getting Sasuke's Katana, the Rune Axe (surprisingly not worthless), and the Wizard Rod. Or should I get the Sage Staff? I'm about to get Holy, after all. But that Wizard Rod will go really well with my summons.

Three more weapons and I'm ready to roll.


I decide to check out all this hubbub about the Fork Tower, and wouldn't you know it, the thing popped up right on top of my airship dock.


Mid was in Crescent trying to master the piano when it showed up, but Cid was still in the dock, and now he's trapped! Well, maybe I'll just have to explode this tower after all!


The Fork Tower is in fact one tower, but it gets its name from the fact that it has two smaller towers sticking out of what I would assume is a larger but shorter base tower. Butz and company plan a two-pronged assault, with Butz spearheading the march up the power tower and Lenna, Cara, and Faris branching out through the magic tower.


In the Magic Tower, you can still use physical attacks, but if you do, your enemies will basically kill you. Thus you generally have to stick to using magic attacks. But on my way up the tower I encounter only one enemy, who I turn into a frog so I can hit him with physical attacks anyway


Bravo Company arrives at the top of the magic tower and awaits further orders.


In the Power Tower, you can't use magic attacks at all. It basically just treats you like you're silenced. Not that it matters, since I only get in like one encounter, and it's with three Goblins


Alpha Company arrives at the top of the power tower and both teams prepare to enter.


Both companies are prepared to retrieve their respective magicks. Butz goes first. Wait, 'we?' Okay, Butz and his imaginary friend Balz go first. I don't know, man.


He goes solo against Minotaurus, who has a cunning strategy of hitting me a lot. Well, give him a break, it's not like he can use magic. Anyway, I defeat him by, uh, hitting him a lot. Not a lot of options here.

But he has one ace up his sleeve!!!!!!!!!!

No magic in the power tower! Which begs the question: just why am I getting a magic spell from a place where no one can use magic spells? Dude, I just blew my mind.

Flash back to one fight ago!

Lenna, Cara, and Faris prepare to get the ultimate black magic Flare, but they're attacked as well.


By this guy. Omniscient is a magic man, and all he does is cast a whole lot of different magic. Unlike the other enemies in the magic tower, if you hit him he does not instantly kill you, but he does cast Reset to start the battle over. Like MagiMaster from FF6, another magic guy at the top of a tower where you can only use magic, he can be Berserked, but unlike MagiMaster, he's really fucking powerful and hits for like 1000 damage! Also, you can steal a Corna Jar from him, but it's a rare steal. Luckily if you nab a Potion you can just smack him and he'll start the battle over. For some reason he's weak to wind, so I blast him with Aero 3 and Syldra. He pulls out the ace up his sleeve and casts Flare, and unlike his buddy in the power tower, he actually pulls it off and Lenna takes fairly substantial damage, but she doesn't die.


Not listed: Holy

BUT WAIT

A PLANE HAS STRUCK THE SECOND TOWER


Well, okay, it didn't explode, it just faded away, like all cowboys do. And towers. Having just obtained the most powerful black and white magic spells, the party prepares to get the ultimate dimension magic spell from the Pentagon.

So I bring my airship into Catapult (that's what this place is called apparently).


Cid is caught in the teeth of a terrible monster!


We get him out of his grind right before Mid comes to check on him. He must be a good swimmer.


Cid reveals he's found an ancient technology that will let him build some kind of contraption to go underwater. Except that I already had one. What the hell happened to my submarine, anyway? The airship and the black chocobo and both Hiryuus are here, so dude, where's my submarine?


Then they do this again. Fuck, now I'm dizzy.

But what's this???

Cara and Mid get to talking. I'm assuming that's a typo in the third screenshot (not to mention an unnecessary line break). Cid's kind of a bitch


We can go underwater again!


It looks like Cara and Mid have taken a liking to each other. Aww, how cute.


Of course, my first order of business submarining is to go to the sunken Walz Tower.


And unlike most other underwater areas, this one is actually filled with water. Seven minutes? That seems to be an awfully precise estimate for something like how long you can hold your breath without dying. It's almost as though Butz knows from experience... hmmmmm...


All the monsters here are exactly the same as some of the monsters from areas in the first two worlds I no longer have access to, except for some reason they're all palette swapped to mysterious black and brown figures, and their names aren't shown. They all use at least one Blue Magic spell, which is most likely why they're here.


Hey, what's this? The piece of of the water crystal I couldn't get to before! Oh, uh, by the way, there was a piece of the water crystal I couldn't get to before. How it got all the way down to the first floor I do not know.


What? Who is this fag? Whoever he is, he's going down.


Okay, this guy is Gogo. He has a long-winded introduction, after which he indicates that you're going to have to play follow the leader with him or something. Except that he never actually does anything, so all you do is stand there for a few minutes. If you look at the quickly depleting timer and panic and hit him, he counters by raping you to death.


After this amazing display of mimicry, he gives everybody a bachelor's degree in Mimicry Sciences courtesy of the Sunken Walz Tower State University, and then exiles himself to the Cleft of Dimensions.

Or, at least, that's how it's supposed to go down. But fuck this guy.

I reload a state back in the submarine, give everybody but Butz Combine, and come back down. Butz gets three Dragon Powers (Potion + Dragon Fang) to increase his attack power by about 250%, while Butz himself casts Flare Sword, basically doubling his damage, then uses X-Fight, hitting this mime bastard for about 60,000 damage total. Normally after taking about 15,000 damage, he flips out and spends all his turns blasting everybody with three powerful magic attacks at a time, but he only has about 50,000 hit points, so the clown is down. Yeah, that's right. Go back to France, fucker, and take your glass box with you


For those of you who don't know, Mimic is basically identical to the Bare class, except it can't equip as many weapons, and the only command it has by default is Mimic, which lets you use the last action performed by one of your team members for free. That gives you three slots with which you may do whatever you wish (you can put Fight and Item in there if you want). Oh, and it has a cape, which is pretty awesome.


That out of the way, I decide to do something I should've done a long time ago. I head into Jacole Cave for a spell. Or rather, a summon, except I already used this joke.


This hole used to lead to a pointless little hole in some mountains on the world map, but now it brings me behind the locked door in the basement of Bal Castle! Sweet.

But then I encounter an aloof and quite frankly surly summon!

This guy's kind of a douchebag. I agree to his terms and get ready to quickly destroy him.


You only get a minute to fight Odin, so he doesn't really have enough time to be a threat. You can steal a Guard Ring from him, but it's a rare steal, and fuck that. He can be petrified, but he's got annoyingly high magic evasion, so I have Butz use Break Sword on him to quickly end the battle. He's also vulnerable to sleep, but that doesn't stop him from giving you a game over once the timer runs out.


Odin has a fairly good chance of using True Edge, inflicting instant death on all your enemies when he's summoned. The same thing can be done with Slash, but this version always works. Of course, Slash doesn't have an 80% chance of not being used (which changes depending on the enemy's level compared to yours), so it kind of evens out. Well, it's probably tipped more in Odin's favor, because if he doesn't instantly kill everybody, he'll use Gungnir, a powerful physical attack on one enemy (it uses your Magic Power stat, but it's based on the enemy's physical defense). Also note that if any of his targets is immune to True Edge, he'll always use Gungnir. But mostly I just want the instant death
Say, this is interesting. I just found a glitch.


You can walk through these walls down here and walk around in the black area around the room. There's nothing actually in it, but if you go back to the door to the submarine and go in, you'll be in the submarine with the timer still going.


Should the timer run out, Butz will choke on air, with humorous but tragic results.

Pointless, and not particularly worth sharing, but whatever.

Well, there's the falls, but I can't land my airship in the desert. Hmmm...


Aha! Install submarine mode, problem solved.


Okay, so where's the dungeon? Wait... it had better not


Oh goddamnit!


I decide to kill these guys with Doom and a Death Potion just for variety.


It couldn't have been under a lake or on an iceberg or something. No, it had to be behind a waterfall.


While I'm here, I steal a Man Eater from this scantily clad lady. It's a spear that looks like a dagger. Seriously, it does double damage with Jump and Magic Sword doesn't work on it. It also boosts all your stats by 2, and true to its name, it does double damage to human opponents. It may not seem that useful, but the game has a fairly broad definition of "human." It can only be equipped by Dancers (and Bares and Mimes), which is why it's so screwed up.


For the most part this dungeon was just hitting monsters with swords and shit, so I guess I'll just talk about weird items I found here. This Aegis Shield, for example, gives you a 1 out of 3 chance of blocking most magic attacks. And it makes you immune to Stone. Way to know your mythology, Square. I give it to Faris, since she isn't really going to be attacking anyway.


I find myself at a dead end, with no apparent way of progressing except these two holes in the ground, which turn out to lead me straight to the tablet. (I had to put something here)


First I get three tablets and label them 1, 2, and 4...

But what's this?!??

One of Exdeath's minions shows up and we get ready to rumble. And then there's rumbling. But it's not our rumbling...





That's right, the king of the sea himself has shown up to help us out, but first he's got to test our mettle by destroying us.


So, Leviathan. He hits you and throws Tidal Waves at you, and I assume he'd be fairly challenging were I not fighting him with four walking H-bombs (one of them wearing a cape). He's weak to lightning, so I hit him with Bolt 3 and Bolt 3 Sword and he's down for the count.


oh god what have i done


Leviathan is the most powerful summon. You heard me. Bahamut's a fucking cheater. Yeah, that's right! Where's the equipment that boosts water damage, huh?! It doesn't exist! It's a conspiracy! Dragons control the media! The Drakocaust never happened! Tiamat shot Kennedy!