Final Fantasy: Lost in Japanese

We point our bow south and leave Karnak behind us. Our goal is the Earth crystal, but we have little idea where to find it. Looking at our map, we can see what looks like two points of interest on this lower half of the world. We aim for those and drive on. After a few days, we locate both an entrance to a cave and further south, a town. We decide to check out the town first. It actually takes us a while to get there, as we have to leave our ship on a beach then walk down a narrow valley for quite a ways to gain access to the town.

Just as we are about to enter the town, we are ambushed by a couple of huge Bio Soldiers, who come precariously close to wiping us out with their Bios spells. We barely survive the attack, and limp into town with our confidence shattered. At this point I’m wondering if I’m in a place well above my level.

The town is Jacohl, and things here are friendly enough. The inhabitants don’t specifically mention the Earth Crystal, which strikes me as odd, but they do a lot of talking about a cave to the northeast. A cave sounds like a likely location for the Earth Crystal, so we’ll head there next. Before we set out, we buy some new weapons and armor, which I’m hoping will help a bit if any more of those Bio Soldiers show up.

After a bit, we set out again. The Bio Soldiers do show up again, several times, as we make our way to the cave entrance. We dispatch them a bit more easily, but their Bios spells do some significant damage on our party. We burn up quite a few of our healing potions before we even make it to the cave entrance. Once there, however, we immediately head inside.

And here is where it gets interesting. As we work our way inside, several groups of brown squirrels attack us. That’s right: brown squirrels! Ha, I’m thinking. Brown squirrels? This is cake. Sure enough, the furry critters have no chance against us. Yet wave after wave of them try to wipe us off the earth. We butcher them with our massive weapons, and they barely scratch us. Yet they keep coming. And then suddenly, we find ourselves facing a solitary grey squirrel. Har! What a joke! “Here cute little squirrel!” Suddenly—Wham! The thing hits us for over 1,500 damage and takes Bartz out with one shot. What!?!?! Before we can react, the squirrel flees. What on earth was that? We get Bartz back on his feet and continue on.

And then again. Another grey squirrel! Wham! This time Faris gets taken out. Bartz unloads on the thing with all his might, and does…zero damage? Argh! What the hell are these things? We quickly turn to magic. Galuf summons Ifrit, who unleases her fiery fury. Surely that will end the fight.

Or not! Zero damage again! And wait. Oh my, that attack suddenly caused the sole squirrel to mutate into seven grey squirrels. Who wipe our party out in three more attacks. What is going on? What demons are these?

Status: Totally Messed Up by Killer Squirrels.