Part 36: The End
Update 34 - The End
It's time to climb our way to the Bell Tower and meet with the Dream King again. We've got the Earthsong almost in its entirety... we just need his piece and we can save the world! But if he dies before we get it... that's The End... for all of existence. So y'know, there's no pressure!
VIDEO: Confronting the Dream King
(Video will cover the whole update if you'd prefer that.)
Last time we made this climb, the Dream Fairy was chasing us and trying to prevent us from waking the Dream King... it's somewhat hard to comprehend what's happened since then.
That uh... doesn't look good... at ALL.
MUSIC: The Dream King
Ugh......
How, uh... how ya doin?
Faaaaaantastic. Definitely not... deteriorating at an alarming rate... still got my winning personality and charm. See? Mr. Dream King... we really gotta talk!!!MUSIC: Out of Order
Oh boy. Great. The Hero is on her way here right now!!! And you're the very last Overseer! If she kills you... that's the end of the world!!! Ohhhhhh. Wow, really? Thanks. Didn't know that.
SFX: Miriam Angry
GRAARGH, enough with the sass!!! We need the Earthsong from you! BEFORE you're dead!
Give Bard the last piece now!!! Okay, sure. YOU WILL???
You know, it almost makes me sad... realizing you will NEVER get it. 
Because you won't give it! I don't mean the Earthsong. I mean...
You've travelled all over the world now. You must have seen yourself... everything is falling apart. Everyone's losing hope.
It's inevitable. Collecting song pieces doesn't matter, and clinging onto the Earthsong... as some kind of easy answer... for all our problems... that's what's sad. This world was over before you even started.
... That's it? You want to just give up? On the Earthsong? It's impossible. Everyone and everything are moving apart... always have been. Ever since the universe started. Expanding. Decaying. If the whole world could still act together as one... The End wouldn't have come in the first place.
Look. I don't want it to be over either. I did everything I could to delay it. I broke the rules. But that made everything worse. The world outside turned ugly while I stalled. People are suffering. Making the world go on longer... just isn't natural.
WELP! FUCK!
That was easy!
That's the end then, right? Credits roll! "Thanks for playing!"SFX: Miriam Angry
YOU!!!!!...... I can't believe you did that, Audrey... Quit acting so surprised. You both did a great job... getting in my way at every step! But in the long run it was pointless!
You losers never stood a chance. Feels good, to be honest! I almost wish it wasn't this easy... Eyala told me... about what happened between you. She didn't lie to you. Did she? She believed in us! If you had just waited... we could have saved the Dream King. She told you that, huh? Okay! It's true. In the end, even Eyala turned on me. That's why I ditched her. Because she was WRONG.
*Sounds of ground rumbling*
VIDEO: It's Happening
MUSIC: The Nightmare
A REAL final boss! You're insane. That means... WE STILL HAVE A CHANCE!!! We have to stop her from killing the Dream King!!! I know that! One last chance. You, me, and a giant evil boss monster... against one lone hero. Pretty good odds, right?
The Dream King still lives! We have to protect him no matter what happens! The world will literally end the moment he dies, and we're the only ones who can stop Audrey... so... no pressure!!!
MUSIC: Nightmare King 
So this boss fight... As you know, the gameplay for this game has never been very stellar. It can still be fun, but the game's main focus has been its story and characters. The last boss fight did a bit more with the gameplay and made it pretty fun because of that! So how does this fight compare?
It'd probably rank as one of my favorite gameplay sections from any game, honestly. I thoroughly enjoyed the living heck out of this fight. So what makes it so good? We'll get to that soon... but first, we need to know what our goal is, beyond keeping the Dream King alive.
Audrey will begin charging her sword up, and she will charge it much faster than in the King of Hearts fight. Miriam will launch a spell at her to try and get her to stop, but this will usually fail.
The Dream King will try to attack Audrey by raining down the stars on top of us. We can maneuver these stars by singing in the direction we want them to go. We have to be close to take hold of them, however. Which could mean they land on top of us, if we aren't careful.
Take too long to prevent her from charging up, and she attacks the Dream King. The bar over his head reveals itself as a health bar... and he's already lost a bit of it now.
We can't protect the Dream King forever! Eventually... she's just gonna win!
... Steal her sword. She can't do anything without it! Steal her SWORD??? That's RIDICULOUS!!! But okay!!! You focus on distracting her. I'll go for the sword!
Our goal is now to take Audrey's sword away as quickly as we can! The longer we take, the more likely she'll be able to kill the Dream King. So how do we go about distracting her?
As before, the Dream King will send a star down from on high. We need to take this star, and have it hit Audrey.
...Take too long to hit her and she's able to get off her bursts. Audrey does not hold back in this fight! And we need to be prepared to do anything we can to take her down.
We managed to hit her, but also ourselves! Bard takes no damage, like with the rest of the game. But it does take up precious time if he gets hurt. Time for Audrey to continue charging and attacking. If we hit Audrey, it doesn't hurt her, she just has to shield herself from the attack, which lowers her sword.
Get too close to Audrey, and she will just straight up kick Bard. This may seem bad (and to Bard it probably really sucks) but it also counts as a distraction that causes Audrey to lower her guard! So if she's charging too quickly, running into her so she kicks Bard is an absolutely viable strat! If we can distract Audrey for just long enough...
GAH! Almost...
She uh... didn't like that we tried to take her sword away.
Despite being shocked, the Dream King was able to get off his alternate attack - the Dream Roots. They'll grow under him and come up at a certain point, but if we instead start singing, we can take control of them and have them come up whenever we want them to!
If we manage to hit Audrey with them, she'll be stunned and forced to stop charging an attack.
Like with the King of Hearts, Audrey does not have perfect aim and will miss on occasion. I didn't have this happen to me my first playthrough, so it might be just a random chance to happen.
If we're not careful (and spoilers I'm super not careful in this fight), then we can also get hurt by the roots. Just about everything in this fight can hurt Bard too. Poor guy is gonna be sore tomorrow...! If there is a tomorrow...
With less than half his health left, the Dream King begins attacking near constantly, sending down a wave of stars or roots right after each other. Making it a little bit easier to hit Audrey.
Audrey attacked, then did a perfect dodge from the roots. If we were playing as the Hero... that would have been really cool! Instead this is super frustrating and I hate her... stop trying to destroy the world!!
With the Dream King getting lower on health, I start to rely on the kick strat quite heavily to keep Audrey from continuing to attack. Until we can get the sword from her, the world could end at literally any moment!
Gah!! We can't keep doing this for much longer!!
And I do mean that in the very literal sense!
From this point on, Audrey ups her game by reflecting the stars right back at Bard! These reflected stars can still be controlled, but are much more weighty and even make broken sounds. The stars themselves will no longer work on Audrey, we have to hit her with a broken one to stun her now.
As a broken one will shatter upon being smashed, and will stun her in return.
Of course, we can always let her lower her guard by getting Bard kicked! Bard is literally sacrificing his body for the sake of the universe here.
It's at this point, the fight enters its most chaotic phase. Where roots and stars are coming at a near constant state, and the problem becomes choosing which weapon would be easier to hit Audrey with. As the roots only need to be done once, but are more easily dodged by her. This is my absolute favorite part of the fight as it just becomes a giant clusterfuck in trying to keep the dream king, and the universe, alive for as long as we can.
Bard's pain is everyone else's gain.
If there's no stars or roots and she's charging... Bard gulps as he knows what must come next.
Bard takes an absolute beating in this fight, mostly because of how chaotic everything falling down is, but also because it's usually better to stay where you're going to get hurt if it means getting an attack off on Audrey. If she wins, we all lose.
MUSIC: The End?
Don't move!
You... Audrey... 
You LOSERS!!! Ruining everything!!! And I actually mean ruining everything! This is my quest! This is MY STORY! EVERYTHING THAT EXISTS is at stake! How DARE you try to take that for yourself! How DARE you... try to make it about YOU!!! IT ISN'T! Audrey!
Uhhhhhh??? Bard, now is NOT the time to try and win her over! Just throw the sword away and talk to the Dream King... Nightmare King... just get the damn piece of song, okay???
What? I said, you're special! Even if you weren't the Hero, I mean! Audrey, you're super strong... and super smart, and really great at everything you do. I get why you were picked to be the Hero! You deserve it! But... that doesn't mean you have to do it!
...Okay Miriam, listen, just keep the sword away from her, okay? Please... stop staring at Bard...
Being the Hero... is just a title! You can do whatever you want!
I really mean it! Let's stop fighting. If you just give up on doing it your way... maybe you wouldn't be The Hero... but I could learn the Earthsong from the Dream King! And stop the world from ending! We could ACTUALLY save the world! Everyone would be okay!
Did... did it work?
Oh shit... MIRIAM!
MUSIC: End of the World
