RGR009 - Raid on Baramos' Castle

As promised, we first stopped at the Great Pit of Giaga, whence all misfortunes are said to emanate. Well, that's what that one skeleton said anyway. The pit has full-time guards and a nice big wall that surrounds it completely, but I think anything that might have the power to get through the wall would have no trouble with the guards, so there's some redundancy there. I guess it's not time to do anything here, though, so we hopped over to Baramos' castle to... well, to see how long we could survive, really.

Baramos' castle looks to have belonged to some other king in the past, as we found a corpse still sitting in the original throne. Paths through the castle tend to weave among three floors, and the only way to get to Baramos' lair is a convoluted path that changes floors nine times. The enemy encounter rate seems lower here than elsewhere, but with free-roaming Stone Hulks and Evil Mages, it was still a challenge.

Thanks for the vote of confidence.

Well, there's also this giant wall.

Everyone put on your brave faces...

So he died on the throne?

Baramos' lair was an open room underground, with nothing but an altar on which Baramos himself stood, surrounded by damage floors. We had Theron cast StepGuard to protect us from the floor, and valiantly rushed forth to face the Archfiend, who had plenty to say before the fight started.

But I'm rather attached to my innards.

This won't end well.

As tends to be the case with fights like this, we got whooped. Baramos is able to cast Explodet, which does around 80 damage to each of us, has flaming breath which is just about as powerful, and gets two attacks per turn. We did all we could, but it wasn't nearly enough. We gave it another try shortly thereafter, and didn't fare much better.

Since my map of the castle was still incomplete, and we knew there was treasure left to be had, we decided to spend more time exploring the castle, and eventually gained access to Baramos' treasure room, where we found the Demon Axe, another Wizard's Ring, and the Unlucky Helmet. Those Wizard's Rings are sure to come in handy, but I'm afraid of the other items; they're most likely cursed.

Ooh, I like the sound of the first two!

He breathes anti-fire.

All we can do now is continue leveling up, and keep trying to defeat Baramos. We'll get him one of these days.

RGR009 - Rebirth of the Phoenix

We finally found it. After rifling through all of my previous screenshots, I spotted a shot in this post, when we first visited Tedanki and found it lifeless in the morning. We weren't originally able to get into the cell at night, since we didn't have the Final key, so we swung by at night and paid the prisoner a visit. He was eager to give us the Green Orb, though I'm not sure exactly why.

With the final orb in our hands, we made a beeline for Liamland and placed it on its altar. The elf girls did their creepy alternating speech thing, and then the egg hatched to reveal the newborn phoenix, Ramia. He was actually pretty cute, though a bit small for a vehicle. Then again, the boat looks awfully small, and it works just fine for us. After getting his bearings, Ramia flew a lap around the shrine, and then flew away. Fortunately, he didn't fly far, and was waiting for us to hop on outside the shrine!

We've actually been waiting a while too.

Four on four's a fair fight, right?

That's all of them; what's my prize?

Ooh, it's nice and warm now.

What did I say about talking
over one another?

How are we all going to fit on there?

Oh. That, uh, might be a problem.

YEEEEAH BOOOOOOOYYYY!!!

Seems to me we might just about be ready to take a shot at Baramos himself, as soon as we check out a couple of secluded places on the map. I suppose we'll find out soon enough if Baramos is really in charge.

My guess is still no.

RGR009 - Welcome to the Necrogond

Once we finally got around to venturing into the Necrogond, we realized something: although we knew we had to use the Sword of Gaia in the crater of a volcano, we didn't actually know where the volcano was. Forced to use a map, I remembered someone saying you could reach the volcano from Portoga by sailing around the southwest continent, and sure enough, the map showed the volcano's location, south of Assaram and west of Baharata. So we warped to Assaram, hopped on board the ship, and sailed into a small river that ended near the volcano.

The animation below doesn't do the volcano's eruption justice. When I thrust the Sword of Gaia into the volcano, the earth began to shake as flames appeared in the crater. Then everything began to flash bright white, and flaming rocks shot out of the volcano. Finally, a stream of lava poured down the side of the volcano, flowing along the river next to it and cooling to form a platform of rock where the river once blocked our path. It was still 8-bit, but it was pretty awesome.

The path to the Necrogond Cave was long and riddled with much stronger enemies than we were used to dealing with. The cave itself was worse: five increasingly large and confusing levels, full of difficult enemies. I lost count of how many times we either died or had to flee the cave before we finally found all the treasure and reached the other side, although the Thunder Sword and Swordedge Armor almost made it all worth it. Almost.

When we emerged inside the Necrogond, we could see a castle on a small island directly to the north, completely surrounded by mountains, and we found a small shrine nearby. When we entered the shrine, we found a surprisingly peaceful-looking man who was very happy to see us. He expressed his confidence in our ability to destroy Baramos, and handed over the Silver Orb. With five orbs down and nothing else to do here right now, all that's left is to resume our search for the final orb, which I'm guessing is green.

YOWZA!!!

Ooh, fancy weaponry!

And fancy armor!

Phew...

This looks important.

Yay! One more!

It's pretty sad that we went through so much trouble to get here, and now that we've got the orb, we're leaving. But I have a feeling it'll be much easier to get back here soon enough.

I'm talking about flying, you know.

RGR009 - The Sphere of Light

Our first stop once we had our phoenix was a castle in the north, surrounded by formerly impassable mountains. Inside, a pair of horses welcomed us to the Castle of the Dragon Queen. The Dragon Queen was very ill and near death, but she was going to lay a single egg before she died, creating a sort of circle of life. It took some time to find the relatively secret passage leading to the Dragon Queen's chamber, but we found her still alive, and she gave us the Sphere of Light, which I guess will help us defeat the Archfiend in some way.

Isn't it a bit late for new castles?

Yeah, the air's pretty thin up here.

Oh, so that's how babby is formed.

We barely knew her.

It's kind of odd that they'd suddenly throw an item at us that we've never heard of before, but I'm sure it'll become plenty important soon enough.

After all, we're headed back to the Necrogond to check out what I assume is the Pit of Giaga, and then we're going to see how long we last inside Baramos' castle, so the end is nigh if you believe that sort of thing.

RGR009 - The Echoing Flute

One of the places we wanted to revisit before attempting to reach the Necrogond was a tower we had found earlier while sailing toward Soo. When we last checked it out, we were quickly destroyed by the monsters there. But we were stronger now, so we were confident we'd be okay this time. The tower had five floors, but they were fairly simple and small, so we had no trouble at all making our way to the top. We could see a platform in the middle of a pit on the third floor with no way to get there, so we knew we'd have to drop down from above, and the opportunity came on the fifth floor, where a series of interconnected ropes formed the majority of the walkways. We positioned ourselves on a rope near the center of the floor and jumped, landing successfully on the platform below. Inside one of the chests, we finally found the Echoing Flute!

We just knew the flute would come in handy right away, so we began searching areas where we suspected an orb might be, and remembered one of the pirates saying an orb was among the spoils of one of their raids. So we sailed straight to the pirates' den, and when we used the flute there, it echoed. This was obviously good news, but we had no idea exactly where in the den the orb might be. The flute only echoes when we're near the orb, but doesn't tell us what direction or distance we are from it.

After searching for an embarrassingly long time, we remembered seeing a boulder in a clearing on the east side of the pirate house. We pushed it aside and searched beneath it, and found a stairway. The small treasure room at the bottom of the stairs held exactly what we were looking for: the Red Orb!

All right, let's try to survive this time.

Ooh, this stuff must be valuable.

Valuable indeed!

Golly gee!

Three down, three to go!

I didn't know she was so conceited.

Next on our search was the town Gabriela was building, since we had seen growth in the town each time we visited earlier. This time, we were welcomed by a woman who called the place Gabrielaville. We were taken aback a little at the fact that Gabriela would name the town after herself, but I guess that's her prerogative. The people didn't seem too happy about the way they were being treated these days in the name of progress, but Gabriela herself was really enjoying being in charge.

We tried out the Echoing Flute, but there was unfortunately no echo, so we figured we'd leave and continue our search. But we wanted to see if coming back immediately would result in more changes, and they did. When we reentered the town, there was a guard in place of the woman who welcomed us before, and he said the town wasn't just Gabriela's town anymore. As it turned out, the people had finally had enough of the way they were treated, and rebelled against Gabriela, throwing her in jail.

We also learned someone had recently arrived in town trying to sell a Yellow Orb, so we quickly tried out the Echoing Flute. This time, there was indeed an echo, so we continued investigating, and found Gabriela in her cell. She didn't seem too upset about being imprisoned, and wished us luck in our quest. She also suggested we search behind her throne. When we did, we found the Yellow Orb hidden there!

Yeah, we'll be headed there soon enough.

Couldn't keep her in check, could you?

Really, a throne?

She is looking manly these days.

Something seems different...

What, you think you know us?

We're listening...

She's not dead, you know.

You could just write that on a sign.

At least you're still nice to me.

So who's in charge now?

That makes four!

We've only got two orbs left to find, and we know one is in the Necrogond, but I can't for the life of me think of where the other might be.

I suppose we've put this off long enough. See you in the Necrogond!

RGR009 - The Ballad of Errol and Olivia

We left Greenlad with the Sailor's Thigh Bone, slipped Theron something to calm his nerves, and prepared to start our hunt for the Phantom Ship. When we held up the bone, it spun around and then stopped, pointing to a spot in the southwest. We determined this to be somewhere in the lake near Romaly and Assaram, and immediately warped to Romaly. Luckily, our boat warps with us.

We used the bone a few more times to zero in on the Phantom Ship's position, and finally pulled up next to and boarded it. The Phantom Ship was pretty straightforward, with an upper and lower deck, both of which were mostly open. The enemies were nothing we hadn't seen before, so we took our time and explored the entire ship. The lower deck was staffed with the spirits of the slaves and criminals who rowed the ship before it originally sank, and among these was Errol.

*shivers*

At least it worked...

Should we bother him?

You realize you're dead, right?

It'd be funnier if you weren't weak.

Yep, and we're more important than you.

AND INVISIBLE MEN!!!

So is saving the world, so zip it.

That's deep, man.

No, it actually never rains here.

If you'll recall, Errol and Olivia were lovers when Errol was taken on board the ship. When the ship sank, Olivia was so distraught that she threw herself into the sea, and has been haunting passing ships ever since. And that, of course, is why we're here in the first place: we're looking for something that connects the two of them in order to break the curse on the Promontory of Olivia.

Where's the enthusiasm?

Sorry, we're not Olivia.

We lost count of our kills weeks ago.

I don't have the heart to tell him.

In a room on the southern end of the ship (I can't tell which way the ship is facing, so I don't know what term to use), we found a single treasure chest in a room. Inside was the Locket of Love, which was pretty obviously just the item we needed. So we quickly warped back to Aliahan and began sailing southward toward the rivers that lead to the Promontory of Olivia. When we reached the promontory, as expected, the curse began to pull us back, but we quickly used the Locket of Love, which allowed the souls of Errol and Olivia to be joined again. With their spirits at peace, the curse was broken, and we were finally able to sail inward to the tiny island shrine.

Inside the shrine, everything was in ruin. The shrine was originally built as a jail akin to Alcatraz. But the jail had been abandoned, and now everyone inside, including Simon, the warrior who last held the Sword of Gaia, was dead. Fortunately, his spirit still wandered the halls and cells, so he was able to suggest to us that we search near his corpse. We did, and right next to the bed where he died, we found the Sword of Gaia! An old man in Luzami said I would thrust this sword into a volcano's crater, and see my path unfold before my eyes. I've got to admit, that sounds pretty cool.

I think this is what we're looking for.
Maybe.

How romantic... but they're still dead.

Yep, looks pretty desolate.

Which one's yours? They all look the same.

I missed the opportunity to get a screenshot when we actually found the sword, but rest assured we did find it. There are a couple of places we need to check out to see if we can't find a couple more orbs, and then it's on to the Necrogond!

I'm not looking forward to the enemies in a place with death in its name.