Part 18: Update XVII - The Hour Of Power In The Tower

Update XVII - The Hour Of Power In The Tower



♪ BGM: A Truth Revealed - WraithTouch.mid ♫

Alright, so we have our marching orders. We're to head south and find some sort of tower containing some sort of mage that can maybe give us a de-petrification spell that can help us save Alaine (and Valnar too, I guess...). Off we go!



The tower isn't that hard to find. We just head a slight bit south and bam, there we go.



♪ BGM: Silence ♫



Not sure why there's a map here that has absolutely fuck-all going on. It doesn't even have the obligatory pan up the tower to show its size, like Abraxas's tower did.

...oh Christ, I just remembered Abraxas's tower. Let's hope this isn't as much of a pain in the ass.



I decide to burn a save stone here. This will turn out to have been a very good decision (recall that the last time got a save was when Nyria was on the run from Jayna and the Elras), as you'll see in a bit. Now, let's head inside.



Oh, what the hell. I don't care...



MEANWHILE, AT THE HALL OF ELRAS...



♪ BGM: Scheming Elras - Cave01.mid ♫

ROAAAAAAAAR! That wretched woman!
Who was that, anyway?
HOW SHOULD I KNOW? AAAAAARRRRR!
Calm down, Ghadar! She's no threat, after all! We have the castle!
...fine...
Somehow, she did seem familiar to me. Or I should say to my little host body here. Well, whatever, I'm sure we're going to find her eventually. Then we will make her suffer.
We should now take care of the stone tablet piece. And then, we'll find the next castle!
Good. It must be hidden underneath the castle here. Let's get it!

MEANWHILE, AT THE TOWER OF PLOT PROGRESSION...



♪ BGM: Alyda's Tower - gmawefoe.mid ♫

If only I had my full powers back!



Alright, so here we are on the first floor of Alyda's tower. Note the three events in the top left corner, which are to make the whole "party follows you around" thing work. Of course, since we're just one guy here, this doesn't come into play.



We find some more useful healing items - can never have too little of those.



Now, let's get into some combat and see how strong these enemies are.



...uh-oh. I'll be honest here, I damn near shit myself when this error popped up, because here's the thing: This error probably doesn't come from the game itself, but from a combination of the game and my system. If this happens more often, or is reproducible by a fairly common event like, say, fighting any enemy in this area, we're in real trouble, because I wouldn't know how to fix this. Access violations could be anything. So let's hope this doesn't become a pattern.

Also, good thing I saved.



Thankfully, we don't see the error again (or in the remaining 4 hours of footage), so now let's really get into this tower, and start by fighting some guys.



This was the guy we were supposed to be facing earlier until that pesky crash got in our way. The enemies here are kind of annoying, because they've got a fair bit more HP. This variant of enemy has a healing spell on top of attacking regularly, and it heals 25% of the time. When they attack, they currently deal damage going on the double digits - so about around 9 to 11 - and we need a fair amount of attacks to put them down too, somewhere around 3 to 4, more if they heal. So there's a lot more attrition going on here than in the previous area.



Did I point out before that secrets are random? I think I did, but in case I didn't, I'll do it again: Secrets in this game are randomly generated. There's a list for small, medium and large secrets, and the game just randomly picks from the list every time you find a secret. In this case, we get something very nice - a big fat lump of Filar!



This dungeon also has traps. You can see where they're placed by the green squares on the map that aren't next to secret passages (which are the squares that go outside the main map area). These traps do a flat 5 HP damage to every party member (in this case just the one). You can trigger them multiple times, too.





There's also these blue bastards for us to fight. These mainly differ from the other guys in that they can't heal, but instead use ice bolts to attack 25% of the time. They also have less Defense than the other ones, which is welcome.



Also, by "ice bolts", I mean "Hadokens".





We find some welcome equipment in a chest - more Defense is always useful. Next, we're on to the second floor.



All things considered, these floors aren't all that different.



Some very useful chests around here.



I'm pretty sure I run into every single trap around here.



While fighting on the second floor, Asgar levels up for the first time. It's nothing major, but much like with the equipment, every stat point is welcomed.





Asgar ended up gaining 9 HP, 2 BP, 2 Attack, 2 Defense, 1 Intelligence and 1 Agility.



Still perfect on the traps. I'm not trying for this, I swear! On to the third floor.



As you can tell, this floor is split up between two areas you reach from different staircases. I made sure to go up the dead end first by taking the staircase on the right, and what do I get for it?





Well, more Defense, for once! Every bit means less HP damage taken, which means less healing items used, which means more to sell, which means more money! We also find like five blood vials and an acid potion here, which is just as welcome. We then take a trip back to level two to go up the other staircase, but there's nothing really interesting there, so let's move on to level four!





...yep.



...YEP. Nothing much else on this floor, time to head to the final one, the fifth floor.





We are picking up a lot of loot, it's just that most of it is more of the same healing items.





And there we go. Ran into every single god damn fucking trap by accident.



We heal up and save to get ready for the boss fight, because I'm pretty sure I'm underleveled for this.



Oh, good, you're awake!
I haven't been sleeping for years now!
(You sure look like it...)
What's with the cheeky grin? Tell me what you're doing here already!
Well, my name is Asgar, and I have been told you could help me.
Even if that's the case, why should I help you of all people?
Because I'm such a nice guy?
Listen, guy! I haven't completed my long training just so I can offer my help to some random men running up to me.
You have confidence! I like it!
But I don't like you! So get lost!
Listen, just give me the spell that allows me to undo petrification!
HAHAHA! Now you're making demands, too!
You seem a little annoyed to me...
I don't like uninivited guests! Especially not in the middle of the night, got that?
Oh, relax already!



I have killed demons! And some stupid guy walks over MY table!
Girl, you should calm down, and give me the spell!
And why shouldn't I simply just kill you right here!?
Told you already! Because I'm such a nice guy!
GET OUT RIGHT NOW!
Only after I get the spell!
AAAAAAAHHHHHH! HERE! TAKE IT AND GET LOST!
Depetrification Spell received!
Thanks... why cause so much trouble!?
I'M ABOUT TO LOSE MYSELF!
Don't! That wouldn't go well with the bags under your eyes!
This is just too much! GO AWAY!
And I simply have to recite the spell, and all is fine and dandy?
HRMPH... NO, OF COURSE NOT! You'll need a strong soul for that! I hope you're familiar with things like these!? But unfortunately, you won't find any monster here that has a strong soul!
Oho, spells you need a soul for. How scary...
HARHAR! Now you have the spell, but you will never get a strong soul! What a tragedy!
Where did you get this spell? Very unusual that you need SOULS for it.
Well, my teacher found it in an abandoned temple. And now leave, and cry about the fact that you'll never be able to use it! HARHARHAR!
Oh, I already know where I can get that soul from...
Oh yeah!?
Come a little closer!



♪ BGM: Stronger Enemies - VD2Kampf3.mid ♫

Alright, time for our first boss fight!

Alyda:

Recommended level: N/A

HP: 500
BP: 60
Attack: 40
Intelligence: 40
Defense: 30
Agility: 25

Attacks:

- Normal attack (4 in 7 chance)
- Fireball spell (2 in 7 chance)
- 80% chance to inflict Silence, which means no casting spells (1 in 7 chance)

So, what do we have with Alyda? Well, we have a big blob of HP that's going to take quite some time to wear down. We definitely have the resources to make losing this fight impossible unless I fall asleep at the wheel, but we don't want to use many items because of The Secret Plan.



We start out by casting a lot of Ice Crystal, since that does around 43 HP in damage. Alyda casts Fireball a lot, which quickly drags down our HP as well, doing about 12 HP in damage to us. Her regular attacks do closer to 7 damage.



I decide that there's no time like the present to be using some more powerful healing items, so I burn a Healing Phial to heal 53 HP instead of the other item's 25 - that saves me one round of healing.



Thankfully, Alyda has a copious blood pool - as a reminder, only very few enemy skills actually require BP, so an enemy's BP pool is less their magic power and more the blood we can suck from them - and we can regain a lot of BP to continue casting spells. Alas, we don't proc what should be an 80% chance to inflict Bleeding, which would have helped, since it does 4% damage to HP every turn.

This motif continues for a while - Asgar casts Ice Crystal, Alyda usually casts Fireball (that 2 in 7 sure is hitting a lot) and occasionally we heal with a Healing Phial and recover BP by sucking blood.



Alyda tries to cast Silence on us, but thankfully, it misses.



We suck blood from her for the third and final time, and this time, the Bleeding effect procs, so now we're going to see her losing 20 HP every time anyone takes an action, which basically means that we're doing double damage now.



She doesn't last long after that.



♪ BGM: Alyda's Tower - gmawefoe.mid ♫

Thank you very much...
Hm!?



Hehe... there you go! Looks like your years long training wasn't of all too much use after all, hehehe... and now, back to Alaine and that wimp Valnar!



I'm really liking getting all these savestones. I'm certain I'll be begging for them at some point. And the chest has three Healing Phials and one Blood Phial too! Now, time to head out.





♪ BGM: The Cave You Think It Is - horror46.mid ♫

We cut back to Valnar and Alaine, and some guy seems to be walking along the cave.





I bet they're worth lots of thousands of Filar! Astonishingly realistic! These sublime and detailed facial expressions... truly perfect! I'll take them with me!



He proceeds to do some weird dance that I think is supposed to be him trying to push or pull the statue.

Damn, they are heavy! I can't transport them like this! Hm, all right... looks like I have to disassemble them into pieces and reassemble them later! Now, I'll just quickly get my pickaxe and start! I'll be back in a few minutes...



♪ BGM: Alyda's Tower - gmawefoe.mid ♫

Uh-oh.