Cecil and his two rent-a-wizards try again to climb Mt. Ordeals. This time, before we begin climbing, we spend a good thirty minutes wandering around the low lands beating up on the local fauna. This jacks Palom and Porom’s levels up to 15, which also has the benefit of one of them learning the second level fire spell—always handy against undead.

Thus strengthened, Cecil begins the climb again. This time things go much better. The stronger fire spell is wreaking havoc among the zombies and vampires. We reach Tellah, drive higher up the mountain, and reach a saving point. Yes! We save our game, rest in a tent to replenish magic points, and get ready for a final assault on the summit or Mt. Ordeal.

As we reach the peak, we are ambushed by Scarmiglione, who is a powerful wizard-creature sent by Golbez. There are two tough fights here, but our two strong fire-casting wizards overwhelm the enemy. We win both fights with little stress.

With that, the approach to the summit is clear. There is a small stone structure on the top of the mountain. We’ll open this up tomorrow.

Status: Killing Stuff with a Purpose

Two rent-a-wizards, called Palom and Porom, join up with Cecil to help him on this trip to Mt. Ordeals. We head east out of Mysidia and after a bit of wandering end up at the foot of Mt. Ordeals. We start climbing.

The fighting gets hard fast. There are lots of undead, and Cecil’s sword is useless against them. The two rent-a-wizards are relative weaklings, and take a heavy beating as we climb. We barely survive one tricky fight, and I am about ready to abandon this trip when we suddenly and fortunately run into Tellah, who is up here looking for something called Meteo to help in his upcoming battle against Golbez.

He agrees to join our party, so I think we are safe with his added spell power. How wrong I was! The very next battle saw a swarm of undead hit us. They literally overpowered us, and I couldn’t seem to escape. Within a few rounds, our party was dead. Ack.

Status: Dead

In a comment on the Leviathan Lunch post, astute reader Big D just wondered what happened to Prince Edward.

That’s a great question. I seemed to have lost him. I played some of these past few sections much later and much sleepier than I usually do, so I’m wondering if I just missed a point where he disappeared. Did he fall off the ship? I don’t remember him being on the ship, but that doesn’t mean much. Maybe he disappeared during the attack on Fabul?

Humm…anyone know what I might have done with him?

Oops. I thought things were in disarray yesterday, but I was wrong. Comparatively, they were pretty good yesterday. It just goes to show that Final Fantasy is just like life: Things can always get worse, even if you think you’ve hit the bottom.

You see, we were sailing merrily towards Baron to exact our revenge upon the evil Golbez, when we noticed a small whirlpool in the water. Next thing we know, a mighty Leviathan rises out of the water and starts tearing our ship to ribbons. Yang goes flying off, as does Rydia. Cecil stays with the ship, but the ship is dragged under the ocean.

Cecil wakes up alone on an unknown shore. He has concluded that both Rydia and Yang are dead (but I bet he’s wrong!). Nearby is the village of Mysidia, which Cecil enters. Inside, he gets talking to the powers that be about his plan to get revenge on Golbez. They tell him that he’ll never be able to do it as a Dark Knight. Instead, he should become a Paladin. Cecil decides to follow this plan, which will involve traveling east, to Mt. Ordeals and doing something that I didn’t understand, but I’m sure will become clear once I get there.

We’ll set out for Mt. Ordeals tomorrow. For the Paladins!

Status: Total Disarray

This story just keeps on sweeping us along. Shortly after we enter Fabul, Baron’s forces attack the castle. We valiantly defend, but the enemy is too strong and too numerous. It’s a total catastrophe for us. The next crystal gets taken. Rosa gets captured. Kain deserts and attacks us.

Near the end of the battle, someone called Golbez showed up. I’m a bit confused as to whether this guy is the King of Baron, or that Golbez is some ancient evil that has taken over the King’s body, or that Golbez is kind of an evil pinch hitter for the King. In any case, that’s probably not so important at the moment. What is important is that this guy is the ultimate badass powerful wizard. He rolled over us and was the one that ended up grabbing Rosa.

What a mess.

After the fight, I was pretty much half asleep, and I missed a lot of the Japanese conversation. I know we decided we needed to sneak into Baron in order to talk to Cid about the flying ship. But I’m not sure why we need to do this, whether it’s to take on Golbez or try to rescue Rosa. In any case, the good people of Fabul present us with a boat that we can use to sneak into Baron to see Cid. In the morning, Yang, Rydia, and Cecil will set sail for Baron.

Ooops. I almost forgot one other thing. Somewhere back here Cecil got a sword called Death Bringer. It’s about twice as powerful as his previous sword, and totally rocks. Not that it helped us with our battle in Fabul, mind you, but it rips apart everything else.

Status: In Disarray.