RGR009 - Erdrick, Hero of Aliahan

With our new strategy firmly in place, we marched through Zoma's castle, making short work of most of the normal enemies, and when we reached the bottom level, we hadn't used any magic, and had nearly full HP. The three henchmen gave us little trouble as well, so when it was time to fight Zoma, we were ready this time. Since Theron's magic was useless at this point, we gave him the Sphere of Light and the Sage's Stone. With the extreme speed he gained from the Meteorite Armband, he was able to use the sphere right away, and would be able to start each turn by immediately healing us with the stone. The fight still took some time, and Viron had to help out with the healing every now and then, but we finally destroyed Zoma.

Zoma's got DISCO FEVER!

Yeah, only a week later.

Once Zoma was destroyed, we found we couldn't use magic to escape the castle, so we began to walk back toward the stairs when suddenly, the castle began to shake and pieces started collapsing. Suddenly, a hole opened up right where I was standing, and we all fell in. The next thing we knew, we had just been spit back out by the pit at the bottom of the cave northwest of Tantegel Castle.

There were no enemies in the cave, so we calmly walked back toward the exit, and as we did, portions of the cave collapsed, blocking the entrance Zoma originally used to get to Alefgard. Once we exited the cave, we heard a sound in the sky that we recognized as the Great Pit of Giaga sealing itself, and then everything started to become bright. It looked like we were never going to be able to leave Alefgard, but at least light had returned. Indeed, when I tried to cast Return, I found we could only return to locations in Alefgard.

You're talking about the first game,
aren't you?

Everybody hold on... ACK!!!

Hey, light takes time.

Well, she owes me one regardless.

One by one, we visited all the locations we'd been to on our journey, and everyone was extremely thankful to us for bringing back the light. Even the horses and cats were celebrating in their own way.

I hope you're immortal, then.

Yeah, pretty much.

It was a team effort.

But my eyes were adjusted to the darkness.

He'll get beaten up in school.

And now you'll regret living in a desert.

Are you all done sneezing then?

Cute.

How do you know?

Um, this isn't your home.

Should we wake him?

Yeah, come up and check out the light!

Wait... so we can never go home?

Now you get both light AND not eaten!

Hasn't it been for a while now?

Good thing we got out of there.

When we returned to Brecconary, we were welcomed as heroes, with everyone showering us with praise, though saying the same things as everyone else. So we headed to the castle, where we dropped off the Stones of Sunlight with the guy in the room where they'll be found in Dragon Warrior, talked to a few more people, and then went straight up to the throne room to see the king.

The guys behind me helped too, you know.

We were just following the trail of bad guys.

No, that's okay.

Let's go get our heroes' welcome!

That's only because we killed him.

Just so you know, I like tacos.

I see what you did there.

Now don't lose them, okay?

When we entered the throne room, the guards were all lined up and ready for a fanfare. There were so many of them that it caused sprite flicker! The king congratulated us on our victory and thanked us for, you know, freeing the world from evil and bringing light back. Then he essentially knighted me, bestowing upon me the Royal Order of Erdrick, the highest honor in the land.

In time, the details would become foggier and foggier as legends were passed down, and many generations from now, I'll be known only as Erdrick, the hero who destroyed the darkness and returned light to the land of Alefgard.

Ooh, I smell a fanfare!

I knew it!

Aww, a victory montage!

Well, I had to vanish to become a legend.

Epic.

Complimentary staff roll with purchase!

Indeed.

And this marks the end of the third game in the Dragon Warrior series, as well as the ninth game on the blog. I'll be getting started on a new game next week, and I've got it narrowed down to two, one of which is for a new system.

TO BE CONTINUED
IN RETRO GAMER RYAN