Part 15: Inside Mordack's Castle

King's Quest V - Jailed and Rescued

Hello everyone and welcome back to King's Quest V. This looks pretty grim. We're locked in a cell with no way out, and at least one other person has already died in here.

ceiling

: Above him, Graham can see a damp, rusty grate leading to...who knows where?

Being captured by the blue alien was actually something that needed to happen. Do you see that tiny mouse hole in the background? Well, when you first get thrown into the cell, a rat scurries into it. That's your only clue that you can do something with it.



mouse hole



: Graham can see a small, moldy piece of cheese just inside the mousehole.

cheese

: Graham finds that his hand is too large to reach very far into the mousehole.
: Graham can't reach into the mousehole far enough to retrieve the piece of cheese.
: Graham can ALMOST reach the piece of cheese inside the mousehole... but finds his hand too large to reach very far.

Hint. Hint. Hint. Hint. Hint. This cheese is another "fuck you" item from the developers. We'll need this in just a short while, but we have no apparent way of getting it. Do you remember the last pixel hunt we went on a couple of updates ago?

cheese

: There! Got it! The fishhook did the trick in retrieving the piece of cheese from the mousehole.

: The bag is full of round, dried peas.
: Green mold covers the small piece of cheese.

Now that we're carrying around moldy cheese, we can just chill for a bit.



: Hello.
: What? Princess Cassima! Where did you come from?!
: From the labyrinth. I spend a lot of time down here, you know... with my friends.
: Friends?
: Yes. Like Dink... and Sam. I don't know if you ever saw Sam or not. Anyway, I found this loose stone once that led here... to this cell. Now come on! You'd better get out of here!

Now you know why I said that failing to get the locket would fuck you over. You need that cheese for a later puzzle. While I believe it is possible to get to Mordack's lab without befriending Cassima, you would still fail on the same puzzle as the cheese. So that's why I believe the locket is the longest DMW in the game, just for how long it takes to terminate and how far back you have to go just to set the situation right.

hole



We step out of the oubliette and into the maze, but Cassima is nice enough to lead us back to the door.



In this one situation, Cassima is our personal Spider Man. That is to say, she'll only save our ass once.



Let's return to the dining room. We have to lay a trap for an asshole.



We only saw this briefly in the gif last time, but this is the second screen of the dining room. The blue alien will typically ambush you here.



But first, what happens if you get caught twice?



loose stone

: The stone can't be budged anymore.

loose stone

: It looks like someone replaced and mortared the loose stone.

We're pretty well boned here, guys. After a little less than a minute of waiting...

: After observing no discernible escape route from the small cell, Graham sinks to the floor in despair, knowing he will never see the light of day again.





: Too bad! So close, yet so far away.



Our current big problem is the blue alien creature. He's pretty aggressive and shows up regularly, so to have any peace of mind we need to stop him. How?

Remember when I complained about the devs watching too many cartoons? Just...

blue alien



I want you to imagine the sound effect it's making while tripping on the peas. The prior sentence about cartoons is related. You're probably right with your first guess.

blue alien

: A large beast lies stunned on the floor.

west



I need a specific character to show up on this screen, so I just have to pace back and forth until it shows up.



Do you see it in the middle of the screen? It's a mass of black pixels.

pixels

: You! How did you get here?
: I have journeyed far; over land and sea...
: Never mind! Your journey is now over!



: Graham, that was Manannan. He kidnapped your son and enslaved him for the better part of two decades.
: Wait, what? Aw, crap...



: Goodbye, King Graham of Daventry! Heheheheh.



We saw this death last time, so let's just rewind to before Merovingian got away.



So how do we deal with Mxyzptlk if he runs away when he catches sight of Graham? Well, let's look at our inventory.



That's new. Looks like the bag of peas is now just a burlap sack. I'm getting an idea...

: Graham carries a large empty bag once occupied by dried peas.

I bet Manny is hungry.









: Meeoooorrrrwww!!
: Let me out! Mordack will hear of this!
: You must be Manannan. Alexander told me all about you. Don't go anywhere. After I deal with your brother, we're going to have a nice, long talk.
: Contrary to his usual jovial nature, Graham's voice is icy and full of barely-suppressed rage.

sack

: The cat struggles in vain inside the bag.

upstairs



So, there's some good news. The upstairs hallway marks the beginning of the end! We just have six puzzles between us and the end of the game, and four of them make up the final confrontation with Mordack.

east



This must be Mordack's laboratory. He seems to be, among other things, into metalworking because that's a forge on the right side of the screen. This is actually a pretty nice lab if you ignore the vein-like tree roots covering most of the surfaces. Most importantly, there's a glass jar in the foreground that looks awfully familiar.

jar

: Tears come to Graham's eyes as he sees his beloved family and castle held captive inside a large glass bottle.

There's actually nothing we can do in here right yet, so let's leave for now.

west x2



Mordack's bedroom is pretty creepy. It doesn't look very homey or inviting at all.

bed

: A large, grotesque bed occupies one corner of Mordack's bedroom.

It doesn't look like it, but there's an exit to the south.

south



bookshelves

: Many books and scrolls line the shelves of Mordack's library. As Graham looks them over, however, he finds them mostly unintelligible.

Looking at this gigantic library, I wonder just how many books in it Mordack has read. That's actually something I wonder about most large private libraraies. Anyway, there's an open book in the foreground that looks like decoration. We can click on it for some valuable information.

book

: A large tome lying upon a corner desk attracts Graham's curiosity.

book



: Hmmmm, this looks interesting. Graham wonders what the symbols mean.

The points jingle happens when you click on the book, but the particular points guide I'm using doesn't have it listed. It still has 260/260 points, so...

For what it's worth, a guide on GameFAQs says there's +3 from reading the spellbook. I'm gonna stick with the one from SierraHelp.com that I've been using for most of the LP. It's the first result on Google and is, for the most part, comprehensive.

Anyway, this particular image will let us actually win the game. It appears to show someone turning into various animals, as well as a sweaty butt.



08:41

The video file for the update has been running for 8 minutes and 41 seconds as of this screenshot. More importantly, you all know what a bolded timecode means...



09:41



10:41



11:51



If you're standing in plain view when Mordack teleports in, I seem to remember him killing you for it. So here I was trying to show off this death I vaguely remembered, but it didn't quite work out. I guess he was tired as hell.


north





: Mordack lies asleep on his huge, horrendous bed.



: This would not be a good time to bother Mordack.

It would be so easy to kill him here. All Graham would have to do is wrap his hands extremely tight around Mordack's neck and not let go. But nope... can't do things the easy way.



: Graham wisely decides to keep his mouth shut.

Can't even show off funny deaths. Anyway, there's something laying on the bedside table. Let's steal it.

object on table

: Mordack's wand lies temptingly upon the small table near his bed.

wand

: Mordack's wand glows brightly with restrained power.

east x2

That's a good stopping point for now.

NEXT TIME: The end of King's Quest V

List of Points

+4 - Retrieved cheese
+3 - Cartoon pratfall
+3 - Tempted the cat
+2 - Captured Manannan
+3 - Stole Mordack's wand

Total

227/260

Register of Deaths

Captured twice
Mannfred told on Graham