Part 51: The God of Darkness

Chapter 44: The God of Darkness


All right everyone, Zophar's asskicking is way over due, so let's jump to it!



: Lucia!
: Ah... No... Hiro! Run away...run away!
: Ha, ha, ha! What's the matter with you, Lucia?


: Turning our special guests away without a proper reception? That's so... impolite. I would have thought you at least would had the manners to at least show them around.


: Ah, now then, what brings you to my inner sanctum?


: Have you come to beg for mercy or perhaps to halt my glorious plans? Go ahead, it doesn't matter; you haven't the slightest chance of stopping me now. My new age of supreme darkness has begun! You're too late! Watch now as I mold this world to my taste! Ha ha ha!



: Which should be about three minutes, by my count. Ha ha ha ha ha ha! I see the foolish resolve in your blank stares... You don't have any idea what you're up against, do you? Let me lay it out for you in the simplest possible terms. Now that I control Althena's power, you are condemned to death. But if you wish to amuse me with an embarrassingly weak assault, that is your choice. It will not affect the outcome. If that is your wish, step forth and taste the eternal sting of my kiss...

Uh... I've seen your face, and, uh... no thanks.



: Zophar, your twisted words don't scare us.


: We will not allow you to pervert this world with your evil. Your game's up!

Yeah, this fight always starts with an ambush. Fun! The attack he did there, Bad Dream, is honestly more annoying that anything. Fortunately, Zophar has plenty of other nasty attacks!

Oh, and about the music; for one reason or another reason, Lunarnet doesn't a version of this track without the voice acting. If you wanna listen to the track without it, here's a youtube link. Also, I forgot, but apparently this boss only gets generic boss fight music in the remake? Fucking lame.

Anyway, back to boss fighting.



When he has two little golden lights flashing around him, he does the closest thing he has to a regular attack. Thankfully, it hit my highest defense characters, but if it had hit Lemina she would have just died. I actually did have Hiro use Rest Litany, but the spell sucks in his hands. (Apparently it doesn't actually run off wisdom? Or something else is going on? I'm not sure.) Zophar's faster than Ronfar, sadly. Honestly, it may not be a bad idea to have put the Shiro Tail along with the Snake Ring on Ronfar, as this boss doesn't use status attacks, but I didn't think to do it. (Or I could have put some Angel Rings on instead of the Tri-Rings and made my life easier but I also didn't do that! I'm smart!)



You'll definitely need it for this attack. Ultra Vortex su- erm, is bad. Not only does it do butt tons of damage, Zophar will always dispel all your buffs beforehand, so you can't use White Dragon Protect against it. Thankfully Magic Shield works on different rules, so it will work, but I didn't have it up. Although it does do one nice thing. It drags your party together, so it helps facilitate Magic Shield. Thanks Zophar! (Also, if they're already together, it won't really mess with your positioning, which is kind of important to know.)



As expensive as they made Tranquil Litany, you really, really need it. Hell, that brought Lemina to full!



Pain Pulse is kind of a weird attack. Zophar can fail to grab a character, and if he does, the attack will hit your entire party instead.



It does slightly less if it hits your whole party, it seems. I'm not sure what causes him to fail, maybe Magic Shield itself does. Which would reduce damage anyway. Then again, he also likes to dispel your buffs right before using this spell too, so fun!



Zophar is immune to all magic, by the way. So you can't Pressure Cooker him, and you can't steal MP (he has none to steal anyway.) Although, frankly, I wouldn't bother being careful with MP. I put all of my Silverlights in my characters' inventories; each of them has about four or so. I ended up using three for this battle; one on Ronfar, one on Jean, and one for Lemina.

So, what is the best strategy against him?



Jean on Blue Dragon Vigor is... okay. It does decent enough damage. Honestly, though your best plan is to play super conservatively. You want Jean to stay in formation, so just have her along with everyone else use their Poe Sword variant. Lemina should always Magic Shield, and Ronfar heal. Just never deviate from that. Since the only attack where Zophar messes with your party position brings your party together, it's pretty much foolproof. You just have to make sure to restore Ronfar or Lemina's MP when they need it. Zophar has over 9000 HP, so it'll be boring and drawn out, but you'll win.

_{(Besides, we have a better use for Blue Dragon Vigor)}



Even with my desperate flailing about, the battle wasn't too bad.


: I... I think we're still alive! Did we defeat Zophar?
: Yep! We laid the big kahuna to waste! I almost can't believe it myself!
: Ha! What were we afraid of? He wasn't that hard! I mean, Borgan was way tougher, don't you think?
: ...
: I've got a bad feeling about this. It's almost as if he let us win... We'd better keep on our guard until we get out of here.
: I agree. We mustn't let our guard down for an instant!

I do like how the party is at least being careful rather than being blindsided by the inevitable final boss second form.

: Wait! Listen...

And of course there's a second form. Don't even act surprised.


: Uh, Hiro? I know you're not going to believe this, but... uh... he's baaack!
: Your power is undeniable, but what is the source? Wait! Don't answer that.

I'm glad Zophar's sick of the power of humanity speeches too.

: Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha... it doesn't matter. Whatever power you hold will fail before the supreme master of treachery! I hold the winning hand, and the time has come to play my trump card.


: Aaaaah!



Oh, uh, hi new Zophar. At least he has eyebrows now.

: Mwha, ha, ha, ha, ha!

Wait, wait. Sorry. Hold up. Gotta change his portrait.

: Mwha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Now that I have seized the power of Althena, my return is complete! I am the absolute ruler of the universe! You're all doomed.

There, that's better.

: Althena's power or not, you can't win this, Zophar. We'll stop you and save Lucia using the power you can't fathom!




So, this battle is... something. At the beginning of every round, Lucia will speak.

: Hiro...in the face of defeat, why do you rise up? What... gives you the power?


: It must be... the power. Your belief in each other.

So we cannot hurt Zophar in any way.


: I... I should have known, I should have believed in you.

Zophar, in turn, casts Lucia's magic. (And when he does, she'll shake her head, which is a neat touch.) It doesn't do that much damage.


: Ronfar, your passion... Jean, your dreams for a better world...

All we need to do is survive.


: Lemina, your kind heart... Leo, your piercing insight...

I spent the battle buffing, despite the fact that it's pointless. But why not?


: Ruby, your quick wit...and Hiro, your bravery and love.

Even if Ronfar is out of MP, Hiro and Lemina should have enough to keep you going. It won't be too long until...


: I've known this all along, and yet it becomes clear. The power of the world lies in the human spirit.



: I believe Hiro, I finally believe!




: Your belief in each other is grievously misguided. The time has come to wipe your miserable souls from existence. You don't have a prayer.
: Hiro!
: Hiro!
: Hiro!
: Hiro!

...Hiro?

: Heh-heh, time to roll the bones.
: Mega-showdown time!
: This fight will be ours...
: If we only believe.
: Hiro, it's true. Humanity's power is the key.




: This is not possible! It cannot be!
: Zophar, you are blind to the truth. This world is one of light and hope. You have no place here. Your power can never extinguish the light within the hearts and minds of every single human. The power to love, trust, and hope will always conquer the lure of evil. I finally believe that.
: You're speaking in circles, sweet Lucia! You know in your heart that I'll never be defeated.


: Ronfar.


: Jean.


: Lemina.


: Leo.


: Ruby.


: And Hiro. The time has come. Believe in yourself, and take back this world for humanity... I believe in you! Never give up!


: Zophar, it's time to die!
: Yes, and you will be the first to go.

That wasn't your best comeback, Zophar.




And now, we're finally in the boss fight proper. One nice things the game does for us is it gives us a full heal beforehand. We'll be needing it. (And obviously any buffs are gone.) Omni-Zophar is a piece of work; there are three targets: the face and the two hands. Each round, at least two of those will attack.

And let's look at those attacks.



Cosmic Burn is pretty run of the mill. It's telegraphed by a red glowy ball.



Ow. This is Metal Shot, and it's significantly nastier. Also before he uses it, he'll, you guess, dispel your buffs! Although at least it's AoE rather than the whole party, as good as that does you. This one is telegraphed by a white orb on the head.



The blueish orb is Plasma Cannon, a medium damage single target spell.



Ultra Ray is telegraphed with a green orb, and it's stat reducer. It looks like... magic endurance. As you might have started to guess, what really hurts you in this fight isn't each spell individually, but the fact that he'll usually use two of these each round, sometimes three. The damage builds, and Magic Shield and White Dragon Protect only go so far. So a spell like Ultra Ray is actually pretty nasty in this fight.



But this, this is Zophar's worst attack. Do you see the black circle? Get away from the black circle.



This is Hellwave. Anyone caught in its path is dead. (It actually does a surprisingly low amount of damage to Leo. Still one hit kill, though.) Since you can't actually choose where your party members go when you select defend, it's sometimes harder than you think to get them out of the way. And to top it off Zophar will dispel your ass before he does it, so you can't White Dragon Protect past it.

(Oh, also its range is bullshit; Leo was nowhere near it! Bullshit.)



Oh, and if the face isn't attacking (or there's no Hellwave) it sends out hands that do miniscule damage.

All right, that's what Zophar can do. What can we do? Well, first off, good news! For some reason Omni-Zophar is really slow. Everyone's faster, even Lemina. So it's pretty easy to keep on top of things, if nothing else.



Unlike Zophar's first form, you can Pressure Cooker this form.



And you really should. Unlike the Fiends this won't drop Zophar to uselessness, but it will make him more vulnerable to Poe Sword and Hiro's attack in general. Also you should Pressure Cooker the arms to decrease the damage they do. Again, it won't decrease it that much, but any bit helps.

Speaking of the arms, in this version, don't bother attacking them. They have as much HP as the face, and it's just not worth the time. However, the remake plays a mean little trick on you if you've played the original. First off, Zophar has four arms instead of two, and you know that first part where we couldn't hit Zophar and where just waiting for the battle proper to start? In the remake you can and are expected to attack the arms. You pretty much have to take at least one of them out or you just can't keep up with the damage. Weirdly, this fight's a lot harder in the remake.



And this fight's no cakewalk either!

Magic Shield is useful in this fight, but unfortunately Hellwave is going to disturb your plans. White Dragon Protect isn't a bad idea, but do be mindful of which attacks will dispel buffs. Still, we're faster than Zophar and armed to the gills with Silverlights. Honestly, what's going to kill you is Hellwave, especially it takes out Ronfar. Thankfully, I was able to avoid that.



Weirdly, chronic underachiever Leo again gets the final blow. Glory hog.

Now, before we move on, there's one thing I need to mention.



Now, Jean using Blue Dragon Vigor here was okay, she's guaranteed to do at least 1000 damage, and Omni-Zophar does have a little less than 9000, but we can do better.



Hiro on Blue Dragon Vigor. If you set things up correctly, that is, equip Hiro with the Blue Dragon Crest and Wind Pendant, Pressure Cooker the face, and have Jean buff his attack with Power Drive, you can lay down some serious hurt. That damage you see in that screenshot? That's a regular attack. A critical is 700. And yes, I have video evidence. If you don't watch the video, just know he does over 5000 damage with that. If you do all this, the boss doesn't last more than four rounds.

Blue Dragon Vigor. The spell that keeps on giving.

So, we won, right?




: Lucia!
: Hiro...
: Curse you, Lucia! You and your trained monkeys are through interfering with my plans!

No, of course we're not done! If I have to fight this boss through the stages of evolution I'm outta here.


: This world doesn't deserve to be recreated. I've decided to destroy it forever starting right here with you! Nothing can save you now!
: Hiro...
: Lucia, we can beat him! We just have to work together!



Oh, hey Zophar, buddy... You're not looking too good.

: Lie down before me and await your destruction. There is nothing left to save you now.
: Zophar, you have made a fatal miscalculation. Humanity's power is stronger than any power you can seize. Your end is now!
: Mwha Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha... I am Zophar, Lord of Darkness. The time has come to put an end to everything!

Yeah, sure it is, sweetie.

So, despite my earlier joke, this isn't really boss fight.



Yeah.

Just Poe Sword his ass until the game stops letting you beat him up.



: Zophar, it's over! Lucia, get ready... Now!








: No...no! This is not possible! I cannot be defeated! NEVER!
: The power of darkness and hate will never overcome the power of light, Zophar. Never.
: The power..of humanity should not have been this strong... this real...
: But it is! And it has dealt you a fatal blow. Fade to a twisted memory, Zophar. The world will not mourn your passing.
: I AM ZOPHAR! Architect of Anarchy, Lord of Darkness, and the Master of Mayhem! I will never be completely defeated... never!



He says while being defeated. Completely.

One more cutscene to take us out.


: Hiro!


: Lucia...

Riveting.


: We did it!
: Zophar is no more!



Next time, the rest of the ending!