We keep fighting our way up towards the top of the Crystal Tower. In many ways this feels culminating, as if we heading toward the climax of the story. Resistance continues to be heavy. We go up what must be another half dozen levels, when we finally reach what appears to be a top of the tower. We check either side and get ready to go through what may be a final door. Just before we can do so, a red dragon attacks us.

Oh, crap. Our lightly armored ninja drops almost immediately. Our Dragoon takes a heavy hit. We all get blasted with a spell. Stupidly, I forget that our Devout has an instant revival/full-heal spell. Instead of casting that, I use a Raise spell, which brings our ninja back with just a few hundred hit points. We immediately all get hammered with more damage, which of course takes our ninja down again. We’re putting some damage on the dragon, but will it be enough?

Then our dragoon falls. I get everyone back up by the end of a round, but we are all below 500 hit points. I set up our Devout to cast a powerful heal for everyone in the party, but the dragon attacks us first and wipes us out.

What a dummy I was. I panicked.

Status: Death by Red Dragon, Was Level 58, now Level 56

We return to the Crystal Tower, fight our way through the exterior maze, and head inside the main structure. Instead of going straight to Eureka, we head to the left and pass through the door on the left side. We enter an area that visually is the same as the outer area of the Tower. This must be the main column of the Crystal Tower.

This place goes on forever. We fight our way through a half dozen levels of heavy opposition. Battles are frequent yet manageable. We generally are putting down opponents in the second round, and are taking a couple of hits per fight. We have a ton of potions, and our Devout has incredible healing potential, so I think we’re good in here for a while. We are racking up the experience.

Status: Killing Stuff with a Purpose, Level 57

Before I head back to the left side of the Crystal Tower, I want to explore one more area that I stumbled onto while looking for clues to the broken pendant. This time we explore the Lake of Leviathan.

This location is much like the Cave of Bahamut in that it’s short, gives great experience, and provides us with yet another summoning spell that I already have. We kill the serpentine boss Leviathan at the end, and are granted another copy of the Level 7 Summoning spell that allows us to cast Tidalwave.

About halfway through this place our Dragoon hits Job Level 99, which ends his growth. Just for fun, I switch him to a Black Knight, which makes him able to wield the powerful Ragnarok sword we picked up in Eureka. His damage output falls substantially, however.

Tomorrow, I want to head through the door in the left side of the Crystal Tower. Time to see what’s in there. I feel pretty good about our skills now. Even with our low skill Black Knight, we can hit for 15,000-20,000 points per round with our three offensive characters.

Status: Killing Stuff with a Purpose, Just shy of Level 56

Image: Final Fantasy Compendium

Well, we once again wander around looking for a clue how to fix this stupid broken pendant. After about ten minutes I am no further along than I was before, and I’m starting to get frustrated again. Then it dawned on me: What am I doing? I’m supposed to be saving the world, restoring the balance of light and dark, and bringing peace to the planet. Instead, I’m running around trying to fix a silly broken pendant? Where are my priorities?

I give up on the silly pendant. Let the woman buy another one.

Instead, we head off to a cave I stumbled onto on the floating continent a few days ago. We head inside and explore. We are assaulted by the usual cast of enemies, but these are a cut above the usual fodder we’ve found on this continent. We pick up good experience in a short run through the dungeon. After a while we reach the end. Bahamut, a huge dragon, immediately attacks us.

The fight is relatively controlled. Our new summoning spells rock, our ninja is hitting for nearly 8,000 points/turn, and our devout can keep us healthy. This is a good combination at the moment. After a few rounds, Bahamut topples over. We get the Level 8 Summoning Spell as a reward. Ooops. We just bought this one yesterday.

Status: Killing Stuff with a Purpose, Level 55

We once again drive back into Final Fantasy Three’s Forbidden Land of Eureka. After a while, we pass the empty pedestals that held the Excalibur and Masamune swords. Shortly, we come upon two more daises, the last in the dungeon, we assume. We pick the left one, that looks to be holding a green lumpy thing.

Humm, on closer inspection this turns out to be a big green slimy sledgehammer. Before we can equip it, we are attacked by a nasty, six-headed dog-like creature.

The fight starts out badly. The dog creature casts a vicious flay spell that kills our summoner in one shot. For a second there, I thought we were done for, but fortunately, the creature never goes back to that spell. After a few rounds he falls. We pick up the slimy hammer, which our Devout can equip for some added damage.

We slide over to the right dais and grab the sword there. This turns out to be Ragnarok, who transforms into a huge warrior and starts to beat on us. Of the four bosses, however, he is the weakest. We slam him with some massive damage and kill him before the second round of combat is over. With that, we get the Ragnarok sword, which none of us can equip at the moment.

With that behind us, we head over to the transporter to be sent back to the entrance. Aha! Tricked. Instead we are sent to a small area where we can buy some spells! Even better, we can buy the Level Six, Seven, and Eight summoning spells. Nice. They cost a ton, but we have more money than I know what to do with, so it really doesn’t matter. We quickly have our summoner learn the spells. We also pick up some Level Eight spells for our Devout. With that out of the way, we transport back to the main area of the dungeon, then teleport out.

Before I check out the left down in the Crystal Tower, I want to see if anything has happened with the side quests, and maybe check out a couple of caves that I noticed in random wandering over the past couple of weeks.

Status: Killing Stuff with a Purpose, Level 54