Tales of Phantasia Part #19

Part 19: Treant Escape

Minor recap since it's been a while: we need to obtain Luna to defeat Dhaos. Sounds easy enough, right? So, we went through the giant-ass Moria Mine to get the pact ring that we might need to obtain her. We got Maxwell there as well as two pact rings... only they're broken. We need to find some way to fix them, so we spent way too long in the desert hunting Basilisks for their scales. This ended up being a waste of time as we could've solved the problem faster by going to the Elven village in the Ymir forest. We found this out after the fact, as we ended up going there after Edward D. Morrison told us that it might be possible to fix the rings. Lundgrom never told us about this, despite being an elf himself, because. Half-elves, and most humans, aren't allowed into the village (because elves are racist dickholes) so we had to leave Arche behind and now we're going to get the rings fixed and one of them MIGHT be the one we need. No guarantees. Also we don't even know where Luna is, so even if one of them is the right ring we still need to find her.

...Did we even have a backup plan for if one of the many things that could go wrong here, do go wrong? No?

: The land beyond here is the sacred forest of the Elves, Heimdall. Within it is a jet black slate. That is our destination.

: What's so special about this slate?

: I'll explain more about the slate when we arrive. To that end, the creatures of this forest will be your guides. I'll go on ahead and wait for you there.

Let me just make one thing clear now: this dungeon sucks. It's a painful maze and getting everything without a guide, and not getting lost for ages in the process, is bloody difficult. Damn near every screen looks exactly the same as every other screen and there's a ton of things to find too. Most of them aren't worth it, though there's a few that are. I'd recommend stocking up on some food items since this dungeon is an even bigger pain if you're not cooking for some insane reason.

Although, the cost of a melon kind of makes it sorta justifiable? Maybe? I mean, hell, I buy 15 of every food item and I still wouldn't stock up on these things.

As for the Treant Forest, if you really want to see it, in its overly long, tedious, full self I did record it though I'll spare you from it unless you really want to see me walk around a giant forest maze for a little under 15 minutes.

The cliff notes version is as follows:

Cless gained this. It's kinda nice for the relatively low TP cost but I don't prioritise it since it's not part of any arcane artes.

Mint gained this. It makes Panacea Bottles useless, lets me disable Antidote and it's almost good enough to make me not want to ever use a Liqueur Bottle when necessary. Which is, er, only when I can't even use Mint anyway. So never mind that last one.

There's some really nice accessories to be found. I don't use Black Onyx's since the HP boost isn't something particularly interesting and there's better accessories I could use in its place.

Like this one. I vastly prefer Moon Crystals since I'm kind of a magic whore like that.

Remember how a while back I pointed out you could buy these things for 100,00 Gald? Yeah, that's kind of a waste since the game gives you enough for free anyway. The first being in the forest. Holy Symbols are great and this one isn't coming off Cless for a long while.

There's a couple of other things you can find too, like a Stun Charm...

... or Stone Check...

...but they're not very good. Stun Check is sorta useful since it reduces the amount of time you stay stunned but that's a non-issue 99% of the time anyway. Stone Check outright prevents you being turned to stone if its equipped but that's just a waste of an accessory slot since there's so many other ways to prevent it that it's pointless. Good news is they sell for a fair bit (the Stone Check especially) so they make great cash if you need some in a hurry.

Imagine a random encounter every other sentence there and you have the good version of the forest! Let's just skip to the bit that's easy to follow without a map, a quarter of an hour to kill and many, many fights.

: The name of this forst is Ymir, which means <<Origin of All Things>>. It is said that the Spirit of Creation himself, Origin, dwells here. He is known as the King of the Spirits. The war that brought an end to the Ancient Civilizations... we Elves call it Ragnarok. That is the only time his appearance in this world has been documented. As to when those events became tied to this slate, I can't say for certain. This slate has long been known to have the power to restore objects to their original form.

: I never knew Origin's power could be manifested like that.

Until this scene, it's pretty likely Klaus didn't know Origin was even a spirit. None of his books mentioned it, and you'd think the spirit that CREATED EVERYTHING would be more powerful than the spirit of the moon...

: I expect thata as the ancients discovered the slate's miraculous power, it was naturally tied to Origin.

: In that case, if you don't mind...

: Please, stand back.

: It's finished.

: I never imagined they were such magnificent rings.

: All right, next we have to form the pact with the Spirit of the Moon, Luna.

: After that, we can join up with Morrison.

: I've heard that a Spirit can be found there. Although I'm not sure of which Spirit it is, I'm certain that if you can form a Summoning Pact, you'll gain considerable power.

: I understand, thank you.

: I'll be returning to the village ahead of you, so if you'll excuse me.

The Topaz reduces damage from Light elemental attacks, which would make it obvious who it belongs to if we knew who the Spirit of Light was. The Moonstone raises Klaus's HP and even though the effect doesn't make it apparent which spirit it's for, I'd imagine the name does.

With the rings fixed, at last, we get to walk all the way back out of the forest. At least the way out is easier and quicker...

: A human trespasser?
Elf: No, that is, it was a Half-Elf...

: What!?

: Come on! Let me go!

: Hey! You've got some pretty good looking guys here!

: Man, just let me go already!

: That voice is...

: After everything you said about waiting, here you are...

: But... Anyway, hurry up and help me out!

: I'm not into this kind of weird fetish!

: Is she one of your companions?

: Please, we beg you, let her go!
Elf: My lord, making exceptions to our laws will only invite future incidents!

: Half-Elven trespassers are to be executed without exception.

???: Please, just this one time, I beg you to overlook this incident! If you must have an execution, take me in her place! So please... I beg you!

: ...I understand. Remove the ropes.
Elf: But...

: That's an order.
Elf: Understood...
???: I'm sorry, Arche. Please forgive me...

: Huh? What exactly are you sorry for?

Have you figured it out yet? Arche hasn't... and doesn't until just after the last possible moment for her to do anything about it.

...Yeah, that's kinda depressing and outta nowhere. More depressing, however is that...

Arche never gained a single EXP during her short time out of the party. That's a good four levels she missed out on apparently. This shouldn't bug me that much, but it does.

Skit: The Spirit in the Tower

: With these, I should be able to form the pact with Luna.

: Speaking of which, where is Luna?

: I don't know if it's Luna, but we know there's a Spirit in the Tower of the Zodiac.

: Then that's the first place we should look.

Skit: Parental Woes

: Cheer up, I'm sure sooner or later the Elves will realize the error of their ways.

: Please cheer up or you'll give your mother more of a reason to worry about you.

: No, no! I want to see her! I want to see her!

: Would you cut it out!? You're not the only one suffering! Think about those two...

: Oh... I'm sorry, I...

: It's all right. The important thing is that your mother is alive. You must be so happy to know that, right?

: Y, yeah!

So, we need to walk essentially all the way back to Midgard. Again. Let's stop in at Olive Village first since it's on the way.

Remember how we need 230,000 to get everything decent in the item store? Let's do that! By selling a bunch of crap we don't need any more, stuff we'll never use, a spare Fight Symbol and the three "valuables" I've picked up along the way we can easily break 230k.

This door is bloody hard to find. If you don't know it's there, you'll never be able to get to the four items back here. And for good measure, you can only enter this part of the store once.

Whilst that's nice advice, let's ignore it and get everything!

The gloves cost 50,000 and the ?Cloth (same as the two we got at the end of Moria Mine) costs 55,000.

The ?Sword costs 60,000 and the Mithril Plate costs 65,000. These two are probably worth picking up over the other two if you can't afford everything. You don't need to pay for them to get them to count toward the Collector's Encyclopaedia either so I'd grab the gloves just for that if nothing else.

The Pretty Mittens are a nice glove upgrade for Arche. They boost defence by 15 and reduce damage from Fire elemental attacks. That would be nice if it weren't for the fact that we can stick two Princess Shawls on her if need be and make her outright immune to fire.

The Mithril Plate is an armour upgrade that's long overdue. Boosts defence by 28 and reduces damage from Light elemental attacks.

The ?Sword is the Moon Falx which is a very nice sword we wouldn't get for a long while if we didn't buy it here. Its one downside is that it is a Light elemental weapon and Cless has a fair few Light attacks in his Artes as is.

The ?Cloth is a Mithril Mesh which is basically the Mithril Plate only not as good. It boosts defence by 18 and reduces damage from Light elemental attacks.

Skit: A Day in the Life

: Demonic Blade!

: Get it! Ice Needle!

: I'll finish it!

: Go! Efreet!

: All right!

: Yeah!

: It was only a cockroach. I think that may have been a little much...

The tower in the middle of the desert... isn't the one we want. We still can't get to it, and this is also going to annoy me more than it should.

This is the Tower of the Zodiac and it has a terrible gimmick. It's a nice dungeon and all, but the gimmick is awful.

Skit: Tower of the Zodiac

: We're going to the Tower of the Zodiac.

: That's the name of the tower between Freyland and Midgard.

: Now that we've repaired the rings, we can form a pact with the Spirit there.

: Oh...

We're working under the assumption here that whatever Spirit is in this place needs either the Topaz or Moonstone ring I see.

Have a video of this dungeon!

The Tower of the Zodiac... I said that this place has a dumb gimmick outside, and it does. It's also one that doesn't convey well into screenshots. The way it works, is that you can't go to a higher floor until you play the right musical track from the OST. How do you know which is the right one? There's a slate on every floor that gives you a very vague hint as to which one it is. The problem? Unless you've memorised every track you've heard thus far, as well as where it played, when and what its significance is this dungeon is a goddamn pain. The only notable treasures include a second Holy Symbol (in case you missed the one in Treant presumable) and two Basilisk Scales.

There's also a weapon upgrade for Klaus. It's been ages since he got a new tome, and we've been using the Liber Ivonis since just after Demeter. The Cthaat Aquadingen is, as the name implies, water elemental for what little that matters.

Once you make it to the stairs just before the top floor, you hit some kind of barrier and this guy turns up.

At least we know now that Luna is here after all.

: You can't just walk in!!

: W, what?

: I'm Luna's loyal fairy attendant, Artemis!

: You're a fairy!?

: Like the ones in legends...

: Weren't the supernatural beings known as fairies driven to extinction during the final years of the Ancient Civilizations?

: I never imagined that there was still a survivor.

: Weirdo! Like we would all die out so easily! In any case, you won't be getting by me.

: You won't let us pass no matter what?

: Let's see... Then, maybe is this pink-haired girl gives somebody a kiss, I'd be willing to you pass. You could kis me too, of course.

: B, but...

: Do you really hate me that much?

: That's not really the problem...

: Why not?

: A k, kiss is... It's not something you should take so lightly.

: Then we can't meet with Luna.

: N, no matter what the reason, you mustn't!

: Okay...

: Who was that?
???: Artemis, please offer them that book.

: Miss, you're a Sorceress, right? You can have this.

: Isn't this a Spellbook?

Ray's a pretty nice Light elemental spell that will come in handy pretty soon. It's also somewhat powerful for a mid-level spell which is nice too.

: Luna is waiting in her room upstairs. Sorry... bye-bye.

: That kid looked so lonely just now...

: Don't you think it's fair to assume that he's the last of the fairies? The last of his kind?

Possibly, but Luna is just up those stairs apparently. I think that takes precedence over worrying about some kind of voyeuristic fairy.

: Did you have some business with me?

: In order to defeat Dhaos, your power is essential. I wish to form a Summoning Pact with you.

: ...

: If you want,

: we are willing to prove our worth.

: It matters not to me who your opponent is, I have no desire to take part in any battle. However, if, in order to save this world, you say that it is necessary...

: Really!?

: Thank you, Luna.

: Then, the pact... Cless, you guys, stand back.

: Artemis, you can hear me, correct? I must leave this place for some time. I know it may be painful, but you must not succumb to loneliness. Now, upon the Moonstone Ring...

Hell yes, Luna! Someone described Maxwell as number porn but he doesn't even come close to Luna in that aspect. She hits the enemy multiple times with giant Light elemental lasers and it is glorious.

Now we just have to walk out of the tower which is easier than getting in since there's no musical gimmick to worry about when descending.

Skit: A Large But Empty Head