In a last-ditch effort to get Alex to at least think about staying in Vein, Fellatio hands over the application form. “It is heartening to know that, even as the Vile Tribe [*thwack*] moves closer to our borders, there are brave heroes such as yourself willing to protect us.” Yeah, Fellatio had to get in on the foreshadowing, too. She is the boss around here, after all.
Their meeting with Fellatio ends and the kids turn to leave. But if you thought we were going to escape without yet another recognition of Gams’s mad karaoke skillz, you thought wrong. “Excuse me…” Fellatio adds, “[Gams], was it? I’m told that your singing is absolutely wonderful. There’s nothing the Goddess loves more than a beautiful song… You must return and sing for me someday soon.” Gams thinks caterwauling her “la la la” crap for Fellatio sounds peachy keen, and promises to sing her little heart out for the priestess soon. This, too, is foreshadowing. God, get me out of here.
Now, Alex, Gams, and Squeak can finally get into Vein. OR CAN THEY? Upon returning to the Spring of Transmission, they hand over the application to the snooty old guy, only to find out what the catch is. Nash is prompted by the old man to tell Alex and Gams all about the Cave of Trial. “It’s basically an entrance exam to keep magic-fearing peasants and vaginas out of [Vein].” Yeah, they’re not snobs or anything. When Nash turns to go, Squeak wonders why he’s not coming with. Nash, of course, isn’t going to be with us for the Cave of Trial, as he’s got things to see and people to do. (Yeah, right.) And I don’t see why they would expect him to come along: a) why would a resident of Vein be allowed to help said “magic-fearing peasants” get into the city? And b) Nash doesn’t like helping people. Fucking duh, Squeak. Nash promises to meet them at the Magic Guild and disappears through the teleporter.
I had completely forgotten these details. Thanks, Gams!
Once the kids have stepped onto the teleportation pad, they are warped to a dark cave. Random Text God makes his first appearance in this game to tell me about the Cave of Trial. “This labyrinth is a sacred place for testing your magical strength. Thus, the use of healing or other items in the Cave is forbidden. You must survive using nothing but your own abilities. When you have defeated enough monsters and exited the other side, the Trial is concluded.” Well, it’s a good thing I just happen to have a healer in the party. I wonder how someone like Nash–who has no healing magic–got through here. Another old man right by the entrance eschews Cave of Trial policy and agrees to heal Alex and Gams as many times as they’d like. So basically, this place is a cake walk. Okay, then.
The game designers risk confusing me as to what dungeon this is, as there are monsters that could be either cave or forest monsters, such as insects and mushrooms. And they don’t even include any bats to make sure I get the hint. Whew, good thing I can tell it’s a cave from looking at the place. On each level of the cave, there is another old man who will heal Alex and Gams, but unlike our homie up front, they’ll only do it once. They’re just slaves to their corporate protocol. Live a little, guys!
Phallus Beam Power!
Somewhere in the middle of the cave, there is a level which is free of monsters, and is instead crawling with NPCs. Everyone down here is also attempting to get out of the Cave of Trial, with varying degrees of success. One guy, so help me God, talks like Austin Powers, and that’s not dated at all. Shit, that was dated back when this game was new. Consider this game a cautionary tale for not littering your RPG with contemporary pop culture references. Most of the folks on this floor are probably not going to make it out, garnering Gams’s sympathy. Not mine, though, because this dungeon is easy as all get out and they must just be lame. Losers. They’re not ultra-1337 like me.
Back to the monsters. One creature in this place does make me think “cave”: a little albino doggie called…an Ice Mongrel. Well, shit. Don’t mind me, I’m just looking for the ice in here. At any rate, the Ice Mongrels are worth primo experience points if you can kill them. Unfortunately, they have a fondness for running away from Alex and his pointy sword. The strategy guide offers me some advice on these buggers: “The Mongrel will escape in the second round if you don’t kill it right away; sometimes, it even ditches in the first round.” Except in my case, “sometimes” means “every single fucking time,” so poor Alex is denied any opportunity to slay these cute little devils.
After chatting up one rogue NPC on the final level, a chap who has given up on ever getting out and is now living comfortably in the cave, Alex, Gams and Squeak trot a few yards away from him and to the boss. Maybe he’s tried in the past to beat the monster and has failed, but my guess is he just has no idea the exit is ten feet from his bedroll. Not that Alex is going to tell him and have the dumbshit steal his own thunder when he triumphantly exits this place.
Through one tiny passageway the party finds the exit, blocked by the boss, a giant electric mushroom–which totally makes sense–called the Truffle Troubler. Mushroom. Truffle. Ah, I get it! Very clever! And the alliteration! So many levels.
Even without the use of items, this boss is not a difficult one, especially when you’re slightly over-leveled. That is not to say that the boss was easy for me. You see, before I get to the boss itself, I remember that there is a handy-dandy Healing Ring on the other side of the Truffle Troubler. I say to myself, “Self, perhaps you could skirt this troublesome mushroom fellow, nip up there and grab the Healing Ring, equip it to Alex, and make this boss fight even easier!” Not so fast, self. A good distance away from the boss, Alex and Gams are automatically sucked into the boss fight, leaving me sans Healing Ring. Worse still, stupid Alex, in my his haste to get said ring, forgot to get a dose of healing from one of the old guys and, more importantly, to save the game. Due to all these very stupid oversights, Alex and Gams enter the boss fight with almost no magic points. They are thusly bitchsmacked by the Truffle Troubler. Way to go, me Alex.
Well, after going through the Cave of Trial a second time–feel free to point and laugh at me–Alex remembers to heal up and save this time before taking on the big shroom. The Truffle has a particularly appropriate attack, called Mad Spark, in which it burrows underground and sticks several of its phallic electric mushroom tentacles–again with all the sense-making–up through the surface and into Alex and Gams. What happened to fighting harpies and chimeras and other sensible creatures?
Ow.
This time, despite the electrified tentacle rape, Alex has plenty of MP with which to Sword Dance to his heart’s content, and soon enough the Truffle Troubler is a thing of the hallucinogenic past. Now, young Alex, now you can go fetch your Healing Ring. Gams and Squeak exposit over the Truffle’s corpse. “Did we…pass the trial?” Gams wonders. No, to pass the trial you have to run through the Eliminator. It begins with the hand bike, then the cargo net, then a ride down the zip line to the gauntlet, where Nitro, Diamond, and Gemini are waiting. Stupid.
The last level is free of monsters and NPCs, except for one last old man, who graciously welcomes our hero and heroine to beautiful and scenic Vein. They step outside into the sunshine. Squeak reminds the group that Nash is waiting for them at the Magic Guild. I’m guessing that the Guild might just be near the pointy penis spires.
But Nash will just have to wait, because it’s time for a round of Talk to Everyone and Look at Everything. The houses in Vein are full of boarding families who relocated to Vein so their kids could have the magickal education their parents never got. To my enormous surprise, it turns out the kids don’t want to be there but their folks are insisting it’s in their best interest. Parents living vicariously through their children? Never!
…To get laid?
The only other thing of interest in town is the Magic Guild Library, which does for random exposition what the Shrine of Foreshadowing did for, uh, foreshadowing. Inside the Magic Exposition Library Alex can read a wide range of books, some of them “funny,” one with ten silver inside, but most of them with miscellaneous tidbits of information on Althena, the Dragonmaster, the Dragons, and all that other bullshit. One new tidbit is some background on the Vile Tribe mentioned earlier by Fellatio. “The Vile Tribe was a band of foul creatures which knew only of hate and destruction.” Hey, maybe they would have been a little nicer if they hadn’t been dubbed the Vile Tribe. The passage continues, “Without the intervention of the Goddess, they would have had their wicked way with our world…” Another book finishes the story. “When our world was newborn, an evil force called the Vile Tribe tried to conquer it. They were banished by the Goddess to the faraway Frontier at the edge of our world. The Vile Tribe has not been seen since, leading many to conclude that they have died out…” Hey, maybe they have. Maybe they won’t figure into the larger plot at all. And maybe I’ll get a letter from Hogwarts and get to be Harry Potter’s sassy, American, cradle-robbing girlfriend.
Alex is sick of looking through books and listening to Gams and Squeak chattering behind him like a couple of chipmunks on LSD, so the party heads toward the center of town and the Magic Guild. They know it’s the right place because a young mage bowls past them, screeching about being late for class. Alex ignores him and goes inside, where Nash is waiting impatiently. He offers to let them sit in the parlor and wait, because Ghaleon is currently jackin’ it busy, but Alex and Squeak elect to explore the building. Gams, on the other hand, has had a long day of looking angsty and depressed, so she takes up Nash on his offer. Nash leers at her and says, “Then I’ll just have to give you a private tour of the Magic Guild sometime, [Gams]…” I’m sure she expects Alex to jump Nash’s shit like a horny kangaroo, but Alex says nothing. Hey, maybe she’ll decide she wants a new boyfriend, leaving Alex free to go back to Burg, grab a shovel and dig, dig! for true love.
…Too easy.
We leave Alex and Squeak for the moment and stick with Nash and Gams, now in the second-floor parlor of the Magic Guild. Nash leaves her alone, but immediately Gams hears a familiar song–it’s the song Alex normally plays on his gay little ocarina, but played on a string instrument. “That song…it’s…Alex?” she says, and goes out the back door. Yeah, because Alex snuck outside without you seeing him, and suddenly knows how to play a whole new instrument. Sweet Jesus, she’s a dumbass.
Loading ...Obviously, Alex is not outside. Gams sees a young man with silver-white hair sitting poolside, playing a weird string instrument. He stops playing when he sees Gams gawking at him. So we can look at his pretty self better, it’s anime time!