Sorry for the sudden quiet, but I’m going to be away again for a little more than a week. I’ll be back posting again on August 3.

If things are less hectic than expected, I may be able to sneak in a post or two, but in either case, this should be the last trip for a while!

We race to exit the castle, but it’s not that simple. Along the way there are numerous detours that lead to unopened treasure chests, and I’d like to get the contents of as many of these as I can. We fly through rooms, battling monsters almost every time we open a chest. The fights aren’t difficult, but they slow us down considerably. Most of the time we only find elixirs in the chests, but I noticed a shuriken as well as a few other interesting items that I didn’t stop to identify.

With 56 seconds left, we exit the castle, and I think I managed to open the majority of the chests, including one that took a trek through about six rooms to get to. Just as we exit, the Castle Karnak disintegrates in a massive fireball. There is nothing left. After this, shards from the fire crystal float out to us. Similar to the other crystals, these crystals attach to us, or go inside us, and magically open up new job paths to us. We now can become ninjas, red mages, and geomancers. Ninjas have always seemed like a good choice for a job, so we change Faris from a monk into a ninja. The remaining three party members stay the same.

With that done, we head back into town to heal and rest. There we learn that the queen survived, but she apparently is all messed up in the head. She’s lying in bed on the second floor of the inn, babbling something about keeping the darkness away from her.

We also hear that the wall surrounding the library to the south was destroyed in the blast that took down the castle. I’m guessing that’s the direction we’ll need to head next. But first we’ll head off to see Cid at his Fireship, which rumor tells us is no longer working because of there is no fire crystal to power it. There is also a apparently yet another town, further to the south of the library, but for some reason the path there is blocked. Somehow, it would seem that Cid, the library, this southern town, and the Earth Crystal are connected. Time will tell, but I’m guessing that south is our next direction.

Status: Killing Stuff with a Purpose.

We get to the Fire Crystal Room in time! The crystal is safe! However, as we stand there admiring the thing, a werewolf walks into the room from and door on the right. Ruh roh! But surprises never end. The werewolf knows Galuf, and apparently the two are friends. This bums Galuf, who we all remember is suffering from amnesia. Galuf apparently has drawn the conclusion that he is aligned with the forces of evil.

But before this situation can straighten itself out, a guard in a blue uniform enters the crystal room from a different door, walks over to the north wall, snickers malevolently, and pulls a switch. This action sets in motion a sequence that will shatter the crystal, as large pipes start to extend from the walls toward the crystal in the middle of the room.

Our plot twists again, as the werewolf tells us to flee while he tries to slow down the process enough to allow for our escape. As a final request, he asks us to protect the Earth Crystal, which is the last remaining crystal. We try to come to his rescue, but the floor breaks apart under our feet and we tumble into the depths of the castle.

We run back upstairs to the crystal room, but it is too late. The crystal has shattered in a mighty explosion. The werewolf is gone, apparently consumed in the blast. Even worse, without the power of the crystal, the castle is doomed to a similar fate. In ten minutes, the entire structure will come down in a pile of rubble. We have only that much time to make our escape. The clock starts running…

Status: Running.

Our newly revamped Final Fantasy V party heads for Cid’s Fireship, which is just south of the castle. Once there, Cid asks us to turn off the engine to the ship, as it is sucking the life out of the fire crystal. This sounds easy, I think, but just as we enter Cid warns us that there are some monsters inside the ship. Still, how hard could this be, right? It’s just a little ship after all.

Wrong. The inside of the ship, which looks small from the outside, is actually a huge maze of at least five different levels. There are venting systems to climb down, slides to slide down, ramps and levers to play with, and all sorts of monsters attempting to end our existence. The battles themselves aren’t difficult, but we only have 99 potions in our pack, and there are so many nooks and crannies to explore that within a short while we find ourselves with a dwindling supply of drinks.

After a bit, however, we come upon a save spot. We camp and save, which helps a lot. One maze later and we find ourselves in the engine room of the ship. We’re in for a surprise, however, as there on the floor in front of us is none other than the queen! Only she doesn’t look to be in the best shape. She’s glowing, and not in that “I’ve just had sex” kind of glow, but more like “My head can spin in 360 degrees because I am Beezlebub” kind of glow. A bad glow, if you get what I mean.

Sure enough, as we approach a big fireball washes over us and we stand facing this massive fire guy thing. And he plays hardball. We’re dealing damage as fast as we can, but this guy is tossing around the big hurt. Fortunately, I did one smart thing, which was to have Galuf use his newly purchased Blizzard spell, which hits for over 700 points of damage. We get hit with a massive fire attack that knocks out Bartz, but a well-timed heal by Lenna, followed by yet another Blizzard spell from Galuf is enough to win the day for us. Fireman does the purple vanishing thing and is no more.

We check out the Queen, who is alive and well enough to tell us to get to the Crystal Room, which is apparently connected to the ship through a long pipe just in front of us. With no hesitation, we head into the pipe to save the crystal…

Status: Killing Stuff with a Purpose

After grinding for about 20 minutes, we have enough money to buy all the new spells available in Karnak. With these spells in our hands, this makes a perfect time to take a look at our party setup and post some impressions on the Final Fantasy V jobs. Overall, I’m really starting to like this system. A few years ago, I had a chance to play Final Fantasy Tactics (in English) for a couple of hours, and in many ways this system reminds me of the job system in that game.

At this point in the game (just arrived in Karnak), my party looked like this:

Bartz: Level 14
Job: Level 4 Knight

Lenna: Level 14
Job: Level 5 White Mage

Galuf: Level 14
Job: Level 3 Summoner (also knows Black Mage to Level 3)

Faris: Level 14
Job: Level 5 Thief

I’m very happy with Bartz as a Knight. He hits with a lot of power, and in many ways our party relied on him to get us to Karnak. Lenna, our White Mage, is also doing nice work as a healer. Galuf, as a summoner, is weak at the moment (we don’t know many spells yet), but his ability to use black magic as well makes him a potent member of our party. Faris, however, is another story. For the most part, she’s baggage. She hits with little damage, and doesn’t really bring much to the party in terms of special abilities.

I want to experiment a bit with jobs, so I’m doing two things. First, I’m going to switch Faris to a monk, just to see if that helps up her damage at all. Second, I like the looks of some of the spells in the Time Mage line, so I’m going to switch Lenna to that job. She can still use her White Magic at the same time, so we don’t really lose anything in terms of healing power at the moment.

To test this, we head out of town and seek out a few random battles. First impressions are good. Faris does a ton more damage as a Level 0 Monk than she did as a Level 5 Thief, so this is good. Lenna doesn’t really add much to our party as a Time Mage, but I want to let her level up a bit more before drawing any conclusions. For the time being, I’m going to stick with this setup and see how it goes.

And now, with our party beefed up with weapons, armor, spells, and new jobs, it’s time to get this story moving along. We’ll seek out Cid tomorrow and see if we can advance the story some.

Status: Dressed for Destruction
Photo Credit: Christopher Chan