Two sparkly circles appear to reward Punk for offing Ozzie, one that is really a save point and one which transports the party to a descending staircase lined with several bats that chase the party as they make a crazed dash for the door at the bottom of the stairs. The party makes it through the door before the bats catch them though, so no battles ensue. Score!
As soon as the Trio steps through the door, they appear in a room that’s completely dark, and they hear some strange chanting (“Neuga, ziena, zieber, zom…”). I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that we’ve reached Magus’ chambers, so here’s where we’re going to stop the Current Monster Tally, which, as you all remember, topped out at 46. Not even half the amount of monsters Ozzie promised at the beginning of this little quest. So eat it, bitch.
As the party sprints cautiously proceeds down the pathway leading to Magus, blue flames flare to life on either side of the aisle. The chanting continues (“Now the chosen time has come…”) as the party makes their way down the aisle, and when the chanting reaches, “Exchange this world for…” the screen fades to black and we’re served a fresh from the kitchen portion of Anime!, piping hot and slathered with melted butter.
Time WAKS OFF 2 MUCH, methinks…
Frog hesitantly takes a step forward through the mist and darkness, Masamune drawn and at the ready, and two blue flames sprout up on either side of him. He cautiously takes a few more steps, sparking more flames, and eventually meanders to the circle at the end of the path, where the blue flames sprout up on their own about the circle’s perimeter. In the eerie light cast by the multitude of blue flames, we can see the cloaked figure of Magus floating in the middle of the circle. Frog grasps his blade tighter and scowls.
Back in Sprite! mode, when the Trio reaches the circle at the end of the path, blue flames once more erupt around the perimeter of the circle, casting enough light to fill the room, and Magus reveals himself. “Magus!!” Frog yells. Magus asks Frog if he’s kissed any Princesses lately. Heh. Frog takes the high road by thanking Magus for his warty green bod, and unsheathes the Masamune. Using his Mystical Powers, Magus deduces without turning around that Frog does indeed come packing heat. He non sequiturs that “the black wind begins to blow…” and does some smoke-and-mirrors bit to zip further back in the room, in front of a strange altar. The Trio dashes forward and into their battle positions, and with a flourishing string of ominous music, battle begins.
Frog spends his first few turns attacking Magus with the Masamune, which has the added bonus of decreasing Magus’ Magic Defense, while Punk attacks and Rosie heals the party from Magus’ spells. After he suffers a little bit of damage, Magus performs a “Barrier Change” where only Water Magic damages, and simultaneously casts Ice 2 on the party. Frog takes a reprieve from attacking to blast Magus with his own aqueous snot-bubbles, until Magus makes a Barrier Change to Fire Magic, simultaneously roasting the party with Fire 2. In case you hadn’t yet realized, Rosie’s got the Fire magic, so she torches Magus while Frog attacks with the Masamune and Punk heals. It’s a very specific system, so the battle is kind of fun. Like the early battles in FFX where each character is more effective against a certain type of monster. And no, I’m not being sarcastic. I know, it’s a strange sensation for me, too.
Besides use it to tear you a new one?
After the party whittles away Magus’ 6666 HP (OMG REFERENCE TO SATIN!!!), the blue flames all extinguish and Magus drops to the floor, spent. “W…what have you done to the Masamune…?” he stammers, and before Frog can pipe up that he’s used it to direct his unrequited love and pent up angst, a huge shockwave shudders across the screen. Rosie, channeling M!Sue all the way from the Lugubrious Veranda of Intersecting Space-Time Continuums, screeches, “What’s happening?” and Frog, channeling Rosie, wonders if it could be Lavos. Even though Frog has no idea what Lavos is because he wasn’t with us in the Future when we learned about the End of the World, but this game is ass, so whatever.
Magus whips around and pleads with the altar to “not wake up on [him] now,” and Rosie’s all, “Wake up?! Didn’t you create it?” and Magus responds that, duh, he didn’t create Lavos, he just summoned it. Then, a simply enormous BBP appears, sucks up Magus and the party, and snaps shut again. Well, at least we won’t have trek backward through the Castle now, right?
“Punk……” a disembodied voice whispers, “Punk! Wake up, Punk!” M!Sue crosses Punk’s room to his bed, where our favorite spiky redhead shakes his crimson locks, most likely wishing an anvil would fall from the sky and smite M!Sue. Instead, M!Sue walks over to Punk’s window and throws the curtains open, commenting on how beautiful Lenne’s Bell sounds. …And it’s official. Punk is officially having Mommy Issues and ew, I feel like this game just gave me crabs. But I will trudge onward through the dirtiness, because I have no self respect love you guys.
M!Sue whines that, God help me, I can barely say it, she and Punk can’t keep sponging off of King Guardia forever, so Punk needs to go out and get a job. If a Mini!Punk or Mini!M!Sue dashes onscreen, I swear to God I’m going to vomit all over my computer.
That doesn’t happen, thankfully, as M!Sue just screeches “Punk! Punk! Punk! Punk!” over and over until Punk bolts into consciousness inside of Babs’ prehistoric hut. Babs, bless her little Neanderthal brain, manages to string together an entire set of words that convey that Babs had a strange dream and went to the Mystic Mountains, where she found Rosie, Frog, and Punk. She saw that they were all wounded and carried them back to Ioka, where their wounds magically healed overnight, because that’s what happens when you get a good night’s sleep, you know?
Frog leaps into the air and shouts Magus’ name, but Babs acts like she’s just seen him for the first time. “Yummy frog!” she tells Punk, “For Babs eat?” Babs, honey, if you thought Frog would make a nice entrée, why on Earth did you carry him back to your house and nurse him back to health along with Rosie and Punk? I mean, we already knew you weren’t the brightest bulb in the box, but day-um, girl, exercise some common sense!
Frog tells her that she can’t eat him, denying hundreds of Fanfic writers around the world a particularly juicy bestiality opportunity, and demands to know if Babs saw Magus when she was snooping around for dead bodies on the Mystic Mountains. Babs tells Frog that she didn’t find anybody else, and as Rosie tries to figure out what all this stuff has to do with Lavos, Babs tells the party to sleep more, because they were hurt really bad. During the night, and Rosie and Frog switch beds for no apparent reason. Bamp-bamp-chicka-wow.
The next morning, Kino waltzes into Babs’ hut to tell Punk that Babs is out looking for the Laruba village, a nation of cowardly cave people, so that the Ioka and the Laruba can combine forces and smite the Reptites. Before Punk can say, “Okay that’s great for you but if you don’t mind, we’re going to go back to our own Time Period and look for Magus now,” a random Ioka tribesman dashes to Kino’s side and screeches that the “north wood burning!!!” Dammit. Why does the bad stuff always have to happen before we get a chance to leave?
Punk follows Kino northward to a previously un-explored region of forest, which has now been cleared out by the fastest forest fire in history and is home to the now-exposed Laruba village. Inside the village, a small Laruba child rushes forward to tell the party that the Reptites not only laid waste to the Laruba people, but kidnapped Kino too. I have no idea why this random kid would take it upon himself to stand at the entrance to the village and tell everybody that some random guy from another tribe got kidnapped, but it’s convenient enough for us, I guess. At the northern edge of the smoky village, the Trio overhears a conversation between the Babs and the Chief of the Laruba, who is an old man.
The Old Man tells Babs that the ruin the Laruba have suffered is all her fault because she makes the Reptites mad, but Babs tells Old Man that if they give up and let the Reptites have their way, it’s the same as if they rolled over and died of their own accord. “Old Man breathe, but dead on inside,” Babs intones. Hmph. I know the feeling.
It’s like she’s trying to speak to me, I know it!
Anyway, long story short, Babs tells the Old Man that in order to save Kino and slay the Reptites, she needs to use the Dactyls to get to the Tyrano Lair. Old Man tells her that if she goes to the Dactyl’s Nest, the “keeper” will let her use the Dactyls. With the Old Man’s blessing, Babs dashes southward out of the frame, not even giving the party a second of her time as she goes. Love you too, bitch!
The Trio follows Babs out of the Laruba ruins and heads over to a little mountain path called “Dactyl Nest.” Along the path are a few monsters from the Reptite Lair from the beginning of the recap, but the trip is pretty sparse and uneventful. When the Trio clamors up the last of the ladders and reaches the summit of the mountain, the camera pans over to Babs, who lets loose a mighty screech. We’re given a few minutes to notice the bright red, glowing star in the sky that I’m sure will play no part in the next recap whatsoever before a giant winged dinosaur alights on the mountain.
Just as Babs is about to hop on the Dactyl and zoom off to the Tyrano Lair, Rosie jumps forward and tells Babs that going it alone is about the stupidest thing she’s ever heard of. And Rosie knows a little bit about stupid things. She’s been trekking with Punk and M!Sue for some time now. Babs argues that the Tyrano Lair is dangerous, and that she doesn’t want Punk et. al. to get hurt, but Rosie maintains that the party needs to help — after all, they owe Babs for saving their lives. Babs is moved by Rosie’s sentiment and lets loose another monstrous scream, summoning two more Dactyls to the mountaintop. A screen pops up prompting me to pick a third character to accompany Punk and Babs to the Tyrano Lair, and because it’s so dangerous and there’s a chance people might die, I pick M!Sue to come along. It’s certainly not because she has the best healing spells that I’ll need for the dungeon.
Hi-ho, Silver, away!!
In the third and final Anime! mode of the recap, Babs and Punk climb up to a mountainous outcropping, where three Dactyls just happen to be waiting, and Babs pets her Dactyl behind the horn on its head, which I guess is the Dactyl’s signal to take to the air. Babs and Punk race their Dactyls against each other as the third character’s Dactyl flies very far away from the camera, the better to obscure the rider’s identity. Then, in case we didn’t notice it in Sprite! mode, the camera pans upward to give the Glowing Red Star some much-deserved screen time.
Well, that blatant point of foreshadowing is as good a time as any to end this puppy, I guess, but don’t be sad! Next time, Babs, Punk, and M!Sue get to go all ninja-spy like and infiltrate the Reptite HQ, and then they get to witness the Armageddon! I just hope they packed enough popcorn…
See you in Part 6!