If Final Fantasy V gave frequent flier miles for distances covered while riding a Chocobo, I’d be set for life. Basically, I’m trying get the story moving again, but I’m having no success. I’ve got Bartz and Krile in my party at the moment. But the other two characters, Faris and Lenna, are endlessly dancing at some celebratory ball in the Castle of Tycoon. Every time I try to approach them, other dancers bump me out of the way. Very funny, Final Fantasy V.

I’ve explored every inch of the castle for a clue. Nothing. I’ve ridden the yellow Chocobo everywhere I can take it. Miles and miles and miles of ground covered by Chocobo, but nothing seems to matter. Lenna and Faris just keep on dancing and the world stays the same. One of the guests at the castle mentioned that the dance will go on for three days, so I went to an inn and rested three times. Didn’t make a difference. Those damn wenches are still dancing. On the Chocobo, I even found another small town and checked that out. No clue found there either.

And then I tried everything again. Still nothing.

Status: How Long Can They Dance?

We drive on toward the top of Exdeath’s seemingly never-ending castle. Frustratingly, the Excalibur sword that Bartz is using seems to be even more lame than the Blood Sword that always misses. Excalibur seems to hit often, but when it does it’s doing either no damage or exactly one point of damage. What gives with these crappy high-powered swords in Final Fantasy Five? I’ll stick with Excalibur for a bit, as maybe it’s just struggling against this type of enemies.

We don’t have to wait long to run into the massive Exdeath, former tree. After a relatively short conversation, our showdown with this myrmidon of evil gets underway. Excalibur has no better luck against Exdeath, but fortunately Fairis and Krile pour on the damage to Exdeath. Once we switch out Bartz’s Excalibur for a better weapon, we’re hitting for upwards of 5,000 points per turn. I have no idea how tough Exdeath is, but I doubt he can withstand this punch too long. His attacks do significant damage to us, but Lenna can handle everything he tosses at us. We keep pouring on the damage for a few more turns, and then suddenly Exdeath is done for! A relatively easy victory for us.

After the victory, the crystals in the room shatter, and we find ourselves right outside of the Castle of Tycoon, back on Bartz’s World. Humm. What gives with this? Everyone in the castle congratulates us for a job well done, and then Fairis and Lenna, the two daughters of the King, start a dance in the castle. Bartz and Krile opt not to dance, and this sets in motion a series of relatively minor events that end up with only Bartz and Krile in our party, our long lost friend the Chocobo available for riding, and Lenna and Fairis still dancing. All this begs the question: What do I do now?

I have to confess, I did see references to a Third World when I was looking at some Final Fantasy V maps, so I know something’s coming up. Also, one of the random people in Tycoon is making comments that the sky looks funny over the castle, and things don’t seem quite right. So I’m guessing something bad is going to happen. But what is going to happen and how I make that happen are mysteries at the moment.

I’m going to keep talking to people in the castle and see if I can figure out what to do to get the game to move forward.

Status: Exdeath Down. In limbo.

Determined to avenge our loss to the Blue Dragon yesterday, we make several more excursions beyond the seventh floor of Exdeath’s castle. We manage to avoid the blue dragons for the time being, and manage to stumble onto a chest that gives Fairis an awesome double-striking ninja weapon. Nice. As I explore this area, I’m returning now and then to the save point on the 7th floor just in case we have equally bad luck with a Blue Dragon again. While this is good strategy in one sense, it means more travel, and more travel costs us mana and/or potions to heal.

As we are returning to the save point during these wanderings, we once again come upon a Blue Dragon. This time, however, we rule. I equipped Bartz as a Knight, with a his Samurai Master Level attack as this second ability. This turns out to be a good move, as I try that on the Blue Dragon and Bartz kills the thing in one shot. Sweet! Take that, Blue Dragon! Har!

After a bit more wandering around, I figure out how to move past this area. Shortly after we do, we run into our old friend Gilgamesh! This will make the fourth time he’s attacked us in this game! We get right down to the business of mashing on each other. Although Gilgamesh does some massive damage on us, we’ve got the upper hand in this fight. Lenna can heal us all for over 1,000 points each. Fairis is hitting for about 1,500 points with her weapons. Krile can put 1,500 points or more on him. This is just too much damage for Gilgamesh to take over the long run. After a few turns, Exdeath calls him from the battle and once again we’ve beaten Final Fantasy Five’s Gilgamesh!

Even better, this time he drops the kick-ass sword Excalibur, which Bartz immediately equips. Very nice.

We’ll drive on more tomorrow!

Status: Nearing Exdeath!

After yet another frustrating experience with those damn dragons in the castle with the ultimate weapons, we turn our sights on Exdeath for some revenge. We head south and shortly arrive at his castle. At this point, our party is all Level 37, which I’m hoping is plenty strong enough to mash the fearsome Exdeath. I’m expecting a tough fight, so I put what I think is our strongest job combinations together: Knight (Master); Geomancer/White Mage (Master); Black Mage/Summoner; Ninja (Master). Ideally I’d like to pick up more job experience in here, but I’m concerned that some random boss will jump us and destroy us if we’ve got a party full of inexperienced job classes. Once our preparations are set, we make our way inside.

I expected the castle to be the same size as when we first fought in here so long ago, but apparently that is not the case. This place appears to go on forever. The battles on the lower floors are manageable, but they do eat up our high potions along the way. By the time we get to the 7th floor, I’m out of regular potions and down to less than 50 high potions. I’m hoping this place doesn’t go on for too much more, and the 7th floor has a badly needed Save Point that allows us to recharge our mana points. Shortly after this however, we come to a winding floor that forks in several directions. The enemies are suddenly much tougher up here, and we running into a suprisingly dangerous pair of dragons who almost take us down. There appears to be some sort of a puzzle to figure out how to continue on up the castle, as I can see the way up but can’t get there.

As we wander around to figure this out, a blue dragon jumps us. Crap this thing hits hard! To top it off, he confuses our party members and forces them to attack themselves. Although we start out strong, with Fairis landing good damage, Bartz’s fire sword is healing the damn dragon! Bah. Then, before I know it, both Lenna and Fairis are on the dragon’s side. Crud, without Lenna our healing powers are severely limited. Argh. I switch Bartz’s sword out, but he’s only doing minimal damage to the dragon. Frustrated and dying fast, I unleash Krile with her most powerful black magic spells…which promptly heal the blue dragon for over 2,500 points. Ah, balls.

Shortly, Lenna, Fairis, and Krile lie dead on the floor. Bartz is catching some breaks here, as the dragon occasionally casts some sort of a spell that is healing Bartz instead of hurting him, but Bartz just doesn’t have enough punch to beat the creature. After a few more rounds, he crumples to the ground dead.

Fortunately, our save point is not far behind us. We’ll try this section again tomorrow.

Station: Dragon Blues

Before heading off to Exdeath’s castle for what may be the final showdown, I wanted to travel once again to the castle that held the 12 ultimate weapons. If you recall, the first time I tried to make it through this place, I was able to get to the final room with the weapons. Nothing happened once I got there, however, and on the way out I got mauled by a massive dragon. I’m hoping that this time I can both beat the dragon and figure out how to free up the weapons.

We fly on Hiryuu to the castle entrance and quickly make our way inside. We get lucky again, as we are able to make a straight beeline to the final room without running into one of those massive dragons. Once in the last room, however, I am once again unable to figure out how to obtain any of the weapons. I thought perhaps because I’ve got some Master level members in my party, that they could get a weapon that fit with their job class, but this was not the case. No matter what I tried, I can’t free any of the weapons. There is a sparkling square near the entrance to the room, but nothing I do on that square seems to matter either.

Disgruntled, we attempt to exit the castle, but on the way out we get waylaid by that massive dragon again. I have much better luck against the creature this time, but eventually the beast confuses so many of my party or turns them to stone so fast that I can’t overcome it. After a long battle, we fall to the beast.

I go back to the saved game, readjust some jobs, and give the place one more try. This time the battle against the dragon goes even worse. We get flattened fairly quickly.

I do think I can beat this creature, but at this point I’m not sure why I need to, since I can’t get the weapons in the room behind it. I suppose the dragon could be the guardian of the weapons, and if I beat the guardian I will get the weapons, but I think this is more likely not the case. So rather than spend a lot of time trying to beat this creature at the moment, I turn around and leave. We’ll set our sights on Exdeath’s castle, where I hope we’ll have better fortune.

Status: Downed by Dragons
Photo Credit: wiseacre