So it turns out I forgot how super-busy I tend to be when I'm home over the weekend. Every free hour is usually spent with the family, but I thought I'd have a bit of time free to go do chapter 42. It turned out that THIS WEEKEND happened to be the one that my family prepared the house for the upcoming move (ie. making it look nice for potential buyers), and I helped out, not wanting to seem like the good-for-nothing son that lives off his parents nickel without a word of thanks.... and so on.
Deeply sorry about the lack of two promised updates. Next one WILL be on time.
P.S. Sorry as well about the lack of coherency, I'm still kinda tired from return-travel and the aforementioned intense cleaning.
EDIT: Photobucket's bulk uploader is a piece of utter shit that almost NEVER uploads all the files you select... but the regular uploader only lets you do 50 at a time. I guess what I'm saying is that Photobucket is ass.
Chapter 42
No relation to any ultimate answer to anything.
Okay, that's enough levelling up. I think we've finally got enough magic to take on the FANATICS' TOWER.
And if I don't, then I never will, because Bitch literally knows every spell it is possible for my party to learn at this point.
Let's prepare before we go in.
First, everyone needs a Reflect Ring so they bounce almost every spell back. That will make a magic-only level pretty easy.
Second, everyone needs a Ribbon because some of the only spells that aren't bounced are status spells. Also, Eunuch is still holding that damn Cursed Shield.
Third, everyone needs whatever equipment will give them the best spellcasting power. That means Magus Rod, Enhancer... whatever you can get.
And then we're ready... hopefully.
Let's climb that staircase!
.......and those 50 other ones.
Oh man, it's FF7 all over again.
Plus there are random encounters all around. Normally I skip through them by holding A, but in this case it just makes me cast Cure on a random enemy because Reflect bounces it off of Bitch.
But Firaga bounces off just as well, and as an added bonus a reflected spell is not affected by an opponent's Reflect.
So that's pretty much it for the tower ascent.
Except for a few super-rare, super-powerful treasures and/or tools for Eunuch.
And a Holy Dragon.
HOSNAP IT'S A HOLY DRAGON.
You know, this whole time I had been using Ethers to replenish my MP. I forgot I had this little gem that takes the enemy's MP and gives it to you. So now I'm pretty much unstoppable.
This is how the fight goes:
Holy dragon casts Dispel to get rid of Reflect.
It fails because Reflect is an item effect.
Holy Dragon casts Holy.
Long cat casts Long.
It bounces back and heals Holy Dragon.
Repeat. Somewhere in there Eunuch gets killed by Doom and then revived with a Phoenix Down, and we're casting Firaga/Osmose in between.
I dunno, maybe I was expecting a little more damage than ZERO. Especially considering that it's a giant dragon.
We get a lance I'll never use...
An immersion-breaking message...
And an item with a name that makes me think Thou or Silly could use it.
Then monotony.
Finally, the top! It had better be worth this damn climb.
Ohoho, and it is. The Soul of Thamasa is a relic that gives you Dualcast - the ability to cast two spells per turn. Combine this with the Quick spell, which allows you to take an extra action, and you have a seriously broken item. Ultima/Quick, then Ultima/Ultima and Ultima/Ultima (because casting Quick as another Quick action automatically fails) adds up to 5 awesome spells in a single turn.
And hey, now that we're done here, we can switch our equipment back to normal. Cocke has the Lightbringer and Ultima Weapon as well as the above relics, which means he gets 8 attacks with incredibly strong weapons. Woohoo!
Now time to teleport out of here!
...Damn.
Oh, DAMN.
Oh, heheh, this treasure? W-well, Kefka's a god, he doesn't need Dualcast, right? I mean, the fact that it's at the top of these billion fucking staircases means he probably doesn't need it that much-
...So you're saying that if we dual this ghost to the death, then we can keep the treasure? Fine by us!
How intimidating.
Lucky for me, Cocke is the only one with a moveset that's any different from normal.
But now he's optimized for attack commands... gee, how do I fix that?
Answer: I don't need to.
^Times four.
Normally the Magic Master is pretty hard to beat. He uses Barrier Shift to change his weakness constantly and he only uses spells that he is immune to (and thus is immune to reflections) so you have to either cast Libra a whole bunch or use non-elemental spells.
Or do what I did there.
Just gotta use Osmose a few times to restore my MP, then cast a few choice spells on Cocke (including Haste and Reflect), and I'm pretty much invulnerable for the rest of the fight. Now to sit back and watch the Cocke sword-chuck his way to victory.
But the Magic Master has one final trick up his sleeve...
OH SHIT!
He casts Ultima upon death.
OH FUCK IT BREAKS THROUGH BARRIERS
...
...Jesus FUCK that was close.
Hah, just kidding, it wasn't at all. Reraise was one of the spells I cast on Cocke earlier.
Hurray for the survivors!
NOW to teleport out of here.
....
ARE. YOU. FUCKING. KIDDING ME.
*sigh*
At least we have Dualcast this time around, and the aforementioned broken combo.
...etc.
*half an hour later*
Ugh. I fucking hate that tower and its staircases and its magic-only-ness and that STUPID CHEERY YELLOW AND PURPLE COLOUR SCHEME.
Hey guys, since I killed your leader, I guess that makes me the new boss, doesn't it?
Guys?
...Screw you guys, I'm never coming here again.
One last item of business.
Hmm. No giant monster here.
Did you see a giant monster recently? No? I didn't think so.
Maybe she should name it Humbaba because there is no one alive right now with that name.
Yeah, you'll be okay because there is no massive green monster threatening you.
HUMBABA IS DEAD, AND WE HAVE KILLED HIM.
NOW STOP SUGGESTING I GO KILL HIM. FUCKIN' SERIOUSLY.
...I guess it's the Hidon quest next, right?