The island suddenly appeared in the sky. Let's Play Lufia & the Fortress of Doom!

It was a harrowing quest, but we've found the motherlode. There's some useful items to be found here.



Uhhh... This is a shield for women, so I'm going to go ahead and assume that was a badly mangled translation of “Bracelet.” Other bracelets in the game avoid the character limit on items by using “Wrist” instead of “Bracelet” so I'm not sure what went wrong here.



Also note that “Bronze” is shortened to “Brone,” which is also likely due to the game's character limit, or perhaps suggesting that Lufia predicted the MLP craze eighteen years in advance, and there's a side to Medi that we haven't seen yet....



Man, what am I supposed to do with this?



This Broad Sword may look like a pretty impressive attack upgrade, but don't be fooled; it's cursed and is actually worthless. The only way to get it uncursed is to visit a cleric, and they'll require a significant “donation” before they'll help you. Best to not bother equipping it at all.



Spike Shoes raise attack for men. A useful upgrade. All shoes upgrade defense at least some, but they can also raise speed or attack. Generally, the attack shoes are preferable, since speed is fickle.



The Water Ring raises the potency of Water Spells. Lufia will be getting a lot of mileage out of water magic in the next dungeon, so she'll be wearing this for a while.



Here's the floor's main treasure; the Silver Wick. We're done here for now.



Stupid frogs and their stupid magic! I hope we don't run into mega versions of these very frogs later in the game who can full heal themselves. That would suck.



Lufia learns the “Deflect” spell which can silence an enemy. Any time Lufia can be casting status magic, she's usually better off just nuking the enemy from orbit, so it's not worth bothering with.


Shopping

Back in Grenoble, we put the Broad Sword to its best possible use and sell it for gold.



Interestingly, we can also sell the Silver Wick... for more money than the Spring Basement is offering to give us for it. What kind of ripoff artists are we dealing with here?!


Village

I still give it to the Old Cave office for completion's sake, but man!

Field

Have I mentioned I really like the main world theme to this game? It starts off energetic but ends up getting pretty melancholy towards the end. It's no mystery why the game's theme of sorrow is essentially an echo of this main theme.

The same general tune would go on to be the overworld theme in Lufia II although there the theme was modified and became a bit more uplifting. Despite how Maxim's tale ended, his story was generally one of heroism and travail against overwhelming odds, and there was never a challenge presented to him that he couldn't overcome.

The overwhelming theme of Maxim's journey was one of always succeeding against the opposition. Maxim never really faced any hardships he couldn't deal with. Again, we already knew he was going to win. It was preordained. We already saw it happen.

This game's themes are going to become more...complex as we get into the end game. It's not nearly as simple and straightforward as Maxim's quest was. I'll talk more about this later, probably.

What were we doing, again? Oh yeah, Artea! The only clue we have now is to head south and cross the desert. So south we go.



A short detour north, however, reveals another shrine.


Shrine

As before, it leads us to the warp shrine of the mysterious all-knowing old man. The game is nice enough to offer you multiple access points to his instant helpline.



He assures us that heading south is the thing to do. It's not really like there's anywhere else we CAN go.


Field

A little further south, we encounter a small peasant village and a creepy-looking cave.



The country side around here is full of ghouls and cannibalistic plantlife. We seem to have wandered into Estpolis' Transylvanian region. Even though the tint on the world map never changes, I always felt like it seemed darker in this region.


Village

Seems like a peaceful enough village though. As long as they don't turn into werewolves and vampires at night, should be okay.



Psh, there's no such thing as ghosts. Obviously, there's some treasure hidden in that cave and someone started a rumor that there were ghosts to scare everyone away and find the treasure themselves. Everyone knows that's how it works!



It looks like the local item shop is shutting down for a while due to an illness in the family. That's a shame. I wonder what's going on?



Inside, we see a little girl sick in bed, and a young boy diligently standing by her side.



Their names are Mark and Reyna. Reyna's attitude towards this illness she has is pretty depressing.

I'll use this little conversation to point out something cute that I like about Lufia's sound effects. When a character speaks, each letter that appears in their text box is accompanied by a little sound blip that corresponds with the octave of the voice of the speaker. Children like Mark and Reyna have a fairly high pitched voice, young women like Lufia have the next octave, young men like Medi the octave after that. The next deepest octave is used by Aguro and knights, the deepest is used by old men and women. It makes for a nice variance in most conversations.

This detail will be used to somewhat creepy effect later in this update.



Even though no medicine can help Reyna, Mark has another idea. The nearby kingdom of Medan has a magical gem called the “Hope Ruby” that can grant wishes. Maybe it can help Reyna! That certainly sounds like a good use for it.



Yes, the king would have to be a heartless bastard indeed to not use his kingdom's treasure to cure a sick little girl.



Excited, Mark dashes off to his hometown.

We learn here that Mark is Reyna's boyfriend, and that he is very sweet and doting. Lufia practically falls over herself fawning over the kid. I bet she wishes she had someone who was sweet and attentive to her!



I assume the implication here is that Reyna fears she will die before Mark returns, but Lufia's response is to a statement nobody made. Instead, it sounds like she's saying she'll never see Mark again and must get well on her own. There are very few little translation gaffs in the script, so they stand out.



Apparently she's been sick for quite some time, and nothing has worked for her.



Yet this old woman would still trade places with the terminally ill little girl. Also, Mark and Reyna certainly don't talk like ten year-olds.


Field

Outside Kirof, we meet this poor guy who apparently drew the short straw in town job assignments, and has to stand outside this creepy cave all by himself all day.



Still, seems like a pretty important job. You just keep on doing your thing, man!




This must be the kingdom of Medan.



Which we have absolutely no interest in! We've got to find Artea! I'm sure Mark and his magic ruby will take care of Reyna, so let's just keep pressing forward on towards Elfrea.


Cave

The border to the next region is through this cave. A couple soldiers stand guard, but I'm sure they'll let us through if we explain the severity of our situation!



What, really? That's your excuse? Monsters?

To be fair, we will learn in the next update that the next town over, Belgen, has, in fact, had a serious problem with monsters lately. But this whole scenario is bogus.

I mentioned last update that there were two points where progress was arbitrarily blocked. The first was in the Old Cave, where Lufia wouldn't enter the “Ladies only” room if Aguro wasn't with you. The other is right here. There's no logical reason for these soldiers to be giving us a hard time.

In pretty much every other situation where progress is caged in this game, there's at least a passable reason. We need a key to a door, or we need a ship, or something. Here, the game just stops us until we solve the local problem, at which point we're allowed to proceed.

This scenario would unfortunately become the norm in Lufia II, where you'd never be able to progress from one town to the other without solving some inane problem first. Like, the greedy king demands you find some lost treasure for him before he'll let you pass, or a local little kid threw an important key into a cave, or the princess left her favorite rock at the top of a monster infested tower. (This is a thing that happened.)

But whatever, clearly we can't advance until we find out what's wrong in Medan and solve it.


Field


A bit further north, we encounter another cave.


Cave

Seems Medan was once rich in gemstones, but not anymore. Few RPGs actually bother to delve into the economics of how a country survives, or what they export. It's an interesting bit of trivia, and one that will be important later in the game.



Inside, we meet an old man who has been mining here for many years.



He tells us about the Hope Ruby, Medan's great treasure, which he found long ago.



Aha! See? Greedy old man hoarding treasures. Obviously, this is the guy who started the rumor about ghosts over in that other cave.

Mystery solved, gang.

Town

Time to see what's going on in Medan.



Once upon a time, Medan's main industry was gemstone mining. Now, apparently their main industries are tourism and wish-granting.


Shopping

Medan offers a new set of equipment which is a significant upgrade over what we bought in Lorbenia. If you were really having trouble with the Apprentice, the gear from here and the Old Cave's second floor should be more than enough to give you an edge.



It's really unfortunate that none of Lufia's weapons increase INT.



This is apparently the shop where Reyna and her father used to live. Which explains why Mark is always running off to visit her despite living in separate towns.



This is Mark's father, who is apparently totally okay with his ten year-old son running around alone in the haunted forest filled with zombies that is the Medan countryside.



Time to see this Hope Ruby for ourselves.






There's Mark. Let's see how his little mission went.



Looks like the King isn't about to give his kingdom's most priceless treasure to a random kid. Who would have thought?



Mark runs off, devastated. I guess there's no hope for poor Reyna now.


Castle

As you can see from Medan Castle's banners, they obviously got last pick for heraldic colors.



A quick trip to the castle garden nets us a secret item.



Let's see what the fuss is about.



Uh, you could just go to Lorbenia and get one, you know. They're like, 10 GP.



Okay, that's a reasonably practical wish, but again, there are better ways to do this.



One of you is obviously a liar.

Jeez, these people sure use this incredibly potent artifact for frivolous things. At least Mark is trying to cure his dying, incurable girlfriend with it. That's a wish worth making. But I guess the king would rather let the commoners wish for ponies on it instead.

Pretty much everyone in Medan talks about nothing but this Ruby. They rely on it not only as the crutch of their tourism industry, but also in their personal lives. They'd likely be lost without it.

So, let's see it for ourselves.



Ah, so it's like a wishing well. Nobody mentioned the part about throwing money in though....



Go for it.





I know what Lufia wished for, but I'm not telling.



Here in Castle Medan's eye-searing throne room, we hear something quite disturbing! It seems there's a rumor that Amon has returned! And everyone knows rumors in video games are always true.

Except this one. We will learn later that Amon has definitely not been revived yet. I'm unclear if the original translation meant to reference Gades here, or if it really is just an untrue rumor. Still, it does remind us that the Sinistrals are still a looming threat. One wonders what Gades has been up to since Sheran though. We certainly haven't seen him.



What a cryptic thing to say! I'm sure I don't know where “there” is.



Let's check out this completely unrelated suspicious stairwell.



Guess we know where the princess is. But what IS this place?





And thus is Medan's dirty little secret revealed. The whole “Hope Ruby” thing is a scam! It seems that without the gemstone trade, Medan is desperately broke, and even the pocket change people throw into the wishing well is necessary to help keep the government running. I can't imagine it's a particularly lucrative scam, honestly.



The princess, however, obviously can't stand the staggering dishonesty of it all.



Very poor choice of words...

Well, anyway, now we know way too much about Medan's secrets and we'll have to go into hiding before the king puts out a hit on us.


Town

Oh hey, there goes Mark again.



Getting chased by a knight. Huh.



Okay, what's going on?



Oh.

Let's review:

Monsters invading neighboring country that is within walking distance: No military response.

Finding out that four gods of old have returned to ravage the living: No military response.

Ten year-old steals worthless trinket: GET 'EM



You're right, obviously the little kid who said he'd bring his dying girlfriend the Hope Ruby no matter what didn't decide to bring her the Hope Ruby no matter what.



Still, the evidence is mounting... Maybe we should go check.

The people of Medan are fairly beside themselves at the idea of the ruby being gone. It's pretty much the lynch pin of their entire economy.


Battle

Oh, now I remember why Spike Newts are annoying! They can paralyze you! Hahaha.


Village

We arrive back in Kirof, where Mark is waiting for us.



Unfortunately, it seems that as soon as Mark made a felon of himself to save his girlfriend, she decided to skip town. Women!



Mark is distraught, and begs us to help him find her. Lufia, of course, volunteers us to help out. She orders Mark to stay out of trouble.



I sense a scolding in the future.



Lufia breaks the sad truth to Mark, but it doesn't diminish his determination. I doubt that worthless piece of crap he's holding can cure Reyna, but I 100% believe that Mark can.



Medi, however, remembers that it wasn't so long ago that he himself was a little trouble-making rapscallion, and offers to let the boy accompany them as long as he's prepared.

Mark will follow us around from this point on, but doesn't participate in battles.

Time to find out where Reyna went.

Her father has no idea where she went, so let's ask around town.



Oh, well, that's okay. There's a guy guarding the entrance whose whole job it is to make sure kids don't go inside. I'm sure he'll stop her.


Field

Oh, come on, man! You had one job to do!


Looks like we're going in after her.


Cave

The Ghost Cave is a complex maze of tunnels and passageways that branch and connect at multiple points. Until you learn the reference points, you'll probably feel like you're going in circles, because you probably are.




Battle

Crazy Pots are magic-wielding enemies that aren't too tough. They frequently drop Magic Jars, which are great for keeping Lufia's MP charged.



This is sort of “central hub” of the Ghost Cave which branch in multiple directions. It contains some helpful healing tiles, which is good because we'll be circling through here a few times.



As you might expect, the Ghost Cave is filled with ghosts. Ghost Mail are fairly standard enemies that look pretty damn cool. The biggest pains here are the yellow Will-O-The-Wisps. They have extremely high defense and use dangerous magic. Fortunately, one shot from one of Lufia's spells will bring them down.



Sword Spooks are animated swords that attack you. Not too dangerous, but they do have a “Jolt” attack that can deal a lot of damage.



Lots of treasure to be found down here; the Ghost Cave is very large.



Flamespooks can cast Spark, making them fairly dangerous. They are weak to water, though, so Lufia's Dew spell can drop them easily.



In fact, thanks to the Water Ring, Lufia's Dew spell can demolish most enemies in this dungeon.



Going down deep enough reveals the dungeon changes color. This hints to us that going down is the right way to go.



There are no passages out of this chamber, though, so we have to look for another way down from above.



Argh!



Plenty of chests, but no stairs.

Cave

Here's the most valuable treasure in the cave: The Ghost Ring. It raises the effectiveness of the wearer's attacks against Ghosts.



Giving it to Aguro will give him an enormous damage boost against the enemies here.



We also find the Monster Ring. Wearing this greatly increases the encounter rate. This could have uses if you're grinding, but the game offers no description of the item. I imagine many players found this ring, equipped it, and then wondered why they got into a fight every step.



Dragon Eggs: 2/8



Lufia learns the “Bang” spell, her first blast spell. Blast magic is non-elemental and always hits everything, making it extremely potent. As long as she has the MP, Lufia can make short work of most encounters with this magic. Down here though, she'll get more mileage from her Water Ring-boosted Dew spell, though.



All the passages in the Ghost Cave can lead you in circles easily.



Ghost Mail will occasionally drop “Light Armor” which is extremely powerful gear for this point in the game.



That may not look like that much defense, but it's two tiers of equipment beyond what we're wearing now.



The solution to escaping the Ghost Cave's maze is to descend to the third level, and then keep bearing to the south-east.



Eventually you'll reach this room, which is the set of staircases leading down to the red-colored fourth level.



The left side leads us to this branching hallway.



This branch will take us even deeper down, to a room filled with rickety bridges.



Unfortunately, the bridge collapse from under us if we try to cross. Maybe the other side will work.



The other side holds an identical bridge, unfortunately, it too collapses from under us.



Alright game, you asked for it!



I know how this game works.



Damnit!



The middle branch just takes us to an empty ledge with no bridge at all. How are we supposed to get across?

Well, this stupid cave is broken, no use trying anymore. Let's go home.



Wait, let's not give up so easily! There's still this second staircase we haven't tried yet.



It leads to a treasure trove of stat potions. Spell Potions are an interesting case. Giving them to Medi is viable as he has the lowest MP growth, but our fourth character tends to eat through a lot of MP faster than Medi ever does. I personally end up splitting a lot of them between Medi and the fourth character.

Great Potions I give to Aguro. The dude only has one thing to do, hit people, and the harder he hits, the better.



The other room down here hides some poor dude who apparently got lost worse than we did. Man, that guard at the entrance really sucks at his job.



Medi gives this guy a shot of healing magic to get him back on his feet.



He tries to offer us some thanks by telling us the secret of the cave. Unfortunately, the secret is useless.

“Things aren't as they appear to be.” Psh. What does that even mean?



What it means, of course, is that the bridge room was all misdirection. The two bridges can't be crossed.

Your eyes can deceive you. Don't trust them.



The real solution is the middle ledge, which appears to have nothing, but is the actual passageway across the ravine.





In the final room of the cave, we finally track down Reyna!



She seems dazed though, as if in a trance. She doesn't even seem to hear Mark.


Wave of Evil

Alright, it's time to reveal the culprit behind this caper. Obviously, it was the old man in the mines. He wanted his Hope Ruby back, so he kidnapped Reyna to lure Mark down here with the Ruby, and used the story of the ghosts in the cave to scare everyone else away! Good work, gang!



Or maybe it's an actual ghost. I guess that's possible too.



Seems I was half right, though. The Hope Ruby does indeed seem to be what he wanted. Note that the text box is coming from Reyna here. Remember how I pointed out that children have a specific sound effect associated with their speech? The 'voice' coming from Reyna is not her own, which is pretty creepy for adorable sixteen bit sprites.



Aguro takes issue with the phantom using a child for his own ends. Really, this is probably because Aguro hasn't said anything in a while; this is his first line since he joined us in Lorbenia. He'll get more talkative once our final party member joins the mix.



Anyway, the phantom isn't about to let a bunch of meddling kids get in the way of him claiming his treasure. It's boss time!

Boss

The Phantasm is the first “for real” boss battle in the game, with a unique battler and an elaborate death animation and everything. He's way more powerful than anything we've fought before, though I wouldn't consider him particularly hard.



Bosses tend to have very high magic defense, so Lufia will shift into a supportive role for these fights. Her first move is to drain the Phantasm's defense.



She'll spend much of the rest of the fight casting Shield on the party to raise their magic defense, and healing when necessary.





The Phantasm has powerful magic. His spark spell can hack off a large chunk of everyone's HP, and his Confuse spell is just annoying.



The star of this fight is Aguro with the Ghost Ring. The Phantasm is considered a Ghost, so his attacks clear 60 damage per round, which is quite a lot. Sadly, this is really the only boss whose weakness we can ever exploit in this manner.



Eventually, the Phantasm will collapse. It's really just an attrition battle, as aside from his confusion spell, he can't do a whole lot to really shut down your offense. Later bosses get better at this.




Cave

Once the Phantasm has been banished back to hell, Reyna seems to snap out of it.



In the end, of course, we didn't need the ruby at all to help Reyna. It never had any power to begin with.

It's now clear that Reyna wasn't actually sick at all, but possessed. As much as I hate to admit it, a cleric could probably have helped her.



Of course, since it wasn't a ruby at all, but a glass piece of crap, it's now broken.

Players of Lufia II probably recognize that a similar plot point has been lifted entirely from here.



Mark seems to think that as long as they're really, really sorry, the king will forgive them for stealing their kingdom's most valuable treasure, and not have them beheaded.



Lufia offers some helpful advice, recognizing that the princess might, in fact, be happy to learn that the Hope Ruby was destroyed.



We can now leave this cave behind.

Village

Back in Kirof, we bid farewell to our new friends. It's a shame Mark isn't a few years older. I'd have happily welcomed that kid into the party, and I'm sure he'd be useful too.



As we'll learn later, Elfrea is kind of a local legend ,and many people have searched for it in the past. Mark breaks the fourth wall here to tell us we need an elf in our party to proceed. Fortunately, he has a lead for us.





Mark tells us of the time his father met an elf in Belgen. If we need the help of an elf to reach Elfrea, Belgen sounds like a good next stop.



Reyna's father is very grateful to us for saving his daughter, and gives us a reward. Power Potions are always welcome, but at this point I'm saving them.



Looks like things in Kirof have returned to normal. But what will happen to Medan now? Can they survive now that their priceless treasure is gone?

Parting



The princess of Medan is now forced to take up the very unpleasant task of telling her subjects that she and her father have been scamming them for decades.



At first, they're elated to learn that the broken ruby wasn't real. Unfortunately, their theory that the real ruby is in a closet somewhere doesn't come to pass.



Dude, get over it.





The princess recognizes that fraud and deceit are no way to run a country, she resolves that the only way for Medan to become great again is through hard work.






The people are speechless for a moment... and then...





Though at first, the people are shocked, they slowly begin to realize that they too relied too much on the ruby's magic, hoping they could get what they wanted through wishing instead of working.

They're surprisingly open-minded about the whole “we stole your money for years” part of the plan, which sort of gets swept under the rug.



And thus did everyone learn an important lesson! This will be a recurring theme for the next few towns, our heroic deeds finally inspiring these apathetic people who have just been riding the wave of prosperity brought on a hundred years ago to rise to the challenge and be a great people again.



And that's how committing a horrible felony saved Medan.

Town


More importantly, the princess thanks us for our deeds and orders the way to Belgen be opened for us.



A quick chat with Mark's father reveals that while he did meet an elf woman in Belgen, there was something strange about her, like she wasn't quite 100% an elf. But that's silly, what would you call that? Part-elf?




Cave

Having no more unrelated problems for us to solve, the guardsmen let us pass. Man, looking at this screenshot, they could have at least used the excuse of having the bridge be out or something. I guess that doesn't make sense though. Letting the bridge on the only thoroughfare between two towns fall into such utter disrepair like that? That's ridiculous and surely no one would be foolish enough to let something like that happen.


Field

Time now to leave Medan and Kirof behind, armed with the new knowledge that they can make their own dreams come true without relying on magic and wishing.

We must now continue our journey to find Elfrea. Hopefully, the elf woman in Belgen will be able to help us!

Next time: Like a virgin (sacrifice)

Or maybe it's breastplate (or breath).

So it was old man Old Man all along!

Everyone knows that RPG protagonists are usually the only competent people in the entire world. Well... Except for shopkeepers, innkeepers and the guy (or gal) in whatever the save/revival/uncurse place is.

Yes. There's nothing like that in sword and sorcery fantasy worlds. Nothing at all...

I was inspired by this LP to replay the game, and I'm running a bit ahead of you. It's been years, and I had completely forgotten a lot of stuff, including this puzzle. I did this exact sequence of trying both sides of both bridges, then casting Float, then giving up and going down the other stairs and healing the dude, then finally figuring out there was an invisible bridge.

I'm also playing with the Lufia: Decensored patch, which I've discovered totally isn't worth your time.

My plan is working.

Oh, I finished this whole run a while ago. I've been circling back with save files to get pictures of things I forgot, if you ever see discrepancies in equipment/money/levels it's probably because I did that area twice.

I remembered the puzzle to the Ghost Cave but didn't remember what a maze it was to get there. Another place that gave me a ton of trouble was the Arus Cave. Until I remembered that place had four entrances, I was going in circles for an hour.

I think the implication is that the old woman would like to be sick in place of the girl, since she is old and the girl is young.

Don't be silly. Breath isn't even close to the right word, and a breastplate would make a Bad Bracelet.

Field

Chapter 5: The Half-Elf

Last time, we finished out a blatant filler chapter where our main party basically did nothing. There are some obvious bits of filler in this game, but most at least pretend to have to do with the main plot. No such courtesy from the Medan chapter!

Fortunately, we're past that portion of the game now, and can focus on important things that matter.



Things like the Old Cave! Medi is level 15 now, which means level 4 is now open to us. There's some stuff here that will really help us out in the next section of our quest.


Cave

We meet some of the new enemies we'll be facing, too, like these tough Orks, who are much hardier than other enemies we've see so far.



Miracles start to become a fairly common treasure from here on out. You can never buy miracles, and there are only so many in the game, but they're common enough that we should never worry about needing to use one.



Like the Broad Sword, the Broad Rod is cursed. Leave it alone.



Getting Lufia to level 15 nets her the “Stronger” spell. It's like the “strong” spell, but, well, stronger....




This is the room that will get us up to speed for our next series of adventures, however.





Just look at all that great stuff!

Another Brone Helmet and Light Armor. The Light Robe is a great defense boost for Lufia. The Buckler is a very good shield. The Long Sword is a monumental damage boost for one of our fighters. The Wind Heels will raise Lufia's AGI, which is much better for her than raising attack power.

The Flame Ring, however, is useless to us. Lufia doesn't know Fire magic, and neither did Artea, so I'm not sure what the point of it could possibly be!



Last but not least is the Crown, which is the flagship treasure of this floor.


Village

We'll go ahead and turn that in at the office.



And revel in our sweet new upgrades. Seriously though, look how damn much that Long Sword boosted Medi's attack power. That's a 50% boost. That's crazy.

This can serve as a general barometer of my team's progress. Aguro probably doesn't look that impressive right now. Since Medi has a much better weapon than him, his attack power is lacking in comparison. They also have the same HP totals, though Aguro is one level behind. You probably do notice, however, that Aguro has a significant strength advantage over Medi, and his HP and Strength are only going to fly further ahead.

Meanwhile, Lufia has completely eclipsed the boys in MP, INT, and MGR. They can have their silly swords and axes, and HPs, she doesn't need them. She can demolish her foes with a mere wave of her hand, annihilated in a wave of pure, tea-powered fury.

Field

Okay, interlude over, on to Belgen. Hopefully, we can get a hold of some of the elves who live here and ask them if they can help us find Elfrea!


Village





Well, I never! Apparently these snooty elves think we're not good enough for their village.



But as it turns out, these aren't elves at all. They're just very paranoid because the local monsters have been harassing them lately. Seems this village needs some help, so let's ask around while we look for the elves.



This is what happens when you have to censor an RPG in the nineties. The villagers talk about the custom of offering “ransoms” of “young women” to the monsters, in order to keep them happy, while our party decries what a primitive and abhorrent custom it is. If we replace “ransom” with “sacrifice” and “young women” with “virgins” then we can appreciate this scenario for the cliché it is!

Anyway, seems the latest sacrifice was a woman named Jerin. Lufia, naturally, won't sit still for such nonsense.



Lufia isn't actually supposed to learn her “Scolding” spell until level 41. It was mistakenly translated as “Thunder.”



Up at the town hall, a pitched debate seems to be in session. No one in town has the balls to fight the monsters, so while some are repulsed at the horror of continuing such a wretched practice, most of the people in town, including the town elder, have agreed that sacrificing Jerin was the only option the town had.



Jerin was taken to a dais to the west, and the door was locked to keep her from escaping. But leaving a damsel-in-distress in...well, distress doesn't seem like a very heroic thing to do. Maybe we can find a way to help her.

Still no sign of any elves, either. Let's keep searching the town.



Uh... is this where the town keeps its virgins?



These maidens are relieved that Jerin will get eaten by monsters instead of them. But one of them seems to feel differently...



This young lady was supposed to get sacrificed this time. Jerin took the bullet for her, since they're old friends.



But she has since realized that it was a mistake to let her make this sacrifice in her place. Friends don't let friends be virgin sacrifices. She asks if we'll rescue her.

The game pretends you have a choice here, but you don't! But we're heroes, saving helpless maidens is part of what we do. Even Lufia is all for this.



Once we agree, the girl tells us where we can find the key, and what to tell the guard. We'll have to go through a few mini-dungeons before this chapter's actual dungeon appears.

No signs of any elves in the whole village though. Nobody even mentions them! Maybe the humans fed the elves to the monsters first? Maybe humans are the real jerks in this setting...


Field

We'll definitely go help Jerin, but there wasn't much in the way of equipment in Belgen. There's another town nearby where we'll find some better weapons.

We'll cross the desert that the apprentice told us about ages ago. We're actually getting close to Elfrea now, but we can't get there yet. As Mark mentioned, we'll need the help of an elf to continue.


Village

Surinagal is a small town at the far end of the desert. You don't have to come here for anything, but there's some useful information to be found here regarding local geography, how to reach the next island, and why we need the help of elves. But for now, let's check out the shop.



Surinagal has the best shop. It's all run by one guy who runs back and forth to each counter as you approach.



There's only one thing we need to buy here. This Axe is a major upgrade to Aguro's attack. He won't lag behind Medi so badly anymore. In fact, if not for Medi's attack boosting ring, they'd be pretty dead even. There are a few weapons exclusive to Aguro that give enormous attack power, but those don't come until much later in the game.


Field

We'll check out the rest of Surinagal later. It's time to find that key, rescue Jerin, and then let Lufia give the whole town of Belgen a sound scolding. It'll be a good time for everyone.

Cave

The theme of this cave is a variety of winding passages stacked on top of each other. The key is down at the bottom level, along with some treasures.



AND GIANT BEES.

Well, I mean, those don't really look like bees at all, but they can sting you. We have better armor than what would normally be for sale in this region, so not much can actually hurt us, though.




Power Potions and Spell Potions are getting stashed away, for now.



Mummies! I'm not sure why mummies would be in a cave like this, but I guess that's the wrong question to ask. It's not like anyone ever talks about Estpolis' burial rites for the dead. With our weapons, they're not very tough anyway.



A lot of monsters in this cave use poison. Look how miserable Lufia looks. =(



The bottom level of the cave consists of four radiating hallways, one holds the key. The rest hold some useful treasures.



This pool of poison holds a Scimitar, but we have better weapons than this.



Again, our Light Armor is nicer than this stuff, the shield is a nice perk though.



The Fly Ring raises effective of attacks vs. flying monsters. Flying monsters aren't very common so there's not much use to this ring. Even bosses that look like they're flying don't get affected by it, so sadly this ring is effectively worthless.





Here, we find the key's guardian, who was apparently expecting us. Seems he knew his sister would pull something like this. He gives over the key to the dais without much fuss.




No doubt the town would be furious with him, but he recognizes that rescuing Jerin is the most important thing we can do right now. Also, there's probably at least a small part of him that wants to get back at the town for electing him to guard a key to a door no one opens in the depths of a smelly, monster-infested cave.





I don't feel like walking out, so I use an Escape item.

Now that we have the key, it's time to find the dais and rescue the latest sacrificial offering before she becomes monster food. Reaching the dais will require us to go through yet another cave.


Cave



A pile of useful stat potions is never a bad treasure, though!



Once we unlock the door, we've still got a few rooms to clear. This isn't a long cave, but the monsters are only going to get meaner as we get closer to the dais.





Somebody got a critical hit there, or something.



Most of the monsters here aren't anything we haven't seen before, but there is one exception...



Mimicks aren't very dangerous, but they have absurd defense and drop a lot of experience and gold if you manage to kill one before it runs.



Magic doesn't work on them, but the Drain spell can make them more vulnerable to physical attacks.



There are poisonous rats in this area too. But Lufia's Bang spell makes short work of weak enemies like that.
.




Field

After a short jaunt, we've reached the other side. Somewhere nearby is the stronghold of the monsters who have been harassing Belgen, so we better be careful on this island.



Our we WOULD have to be careful, if anything here was really a threat. Poison rats, and a man made out of sand! Either Medi or Aguro can smash most enemies with a single blow right now, and Lufia's magic attacks generally take care of the rest. Things will heat up a lot in the next region, but this area is pretty straight forward and the enemies here are woefully outmatched compared to the gear we found in the Old Cave.



This must be the dais where Jerin is being held. Time to do our heroing thing!

Ruins

The 'dais,' of course, is a euphemism for “sacrificial altar” where the poor maidens are kept waiting until the monsters come and eat them.

I really like the musical theme for this area. It's a shame it isn't used more often, as it's really tense and unsettling.

Time to see what we're dealing with.



Here we get our first glimpse of the sacrificial maiden of Belgen. The first thing we notice is she has a unique sprite, and unique sprites are at a premium in this game. Aside from playable characters and Sinistrals, the only people in the game so far with a unique sprite were Roman and Lou. I'm pretty sure there's only one more person with one after this in the whole game!

So what makes Jerin so special?




At first, Lufia mistakes Jerin for a child, but Aguro sees the truth of the matter.



Jerin is a half-elf. Even though she was childhood friends with a grown woman, Jerin herself still looks very young, due to her elven heritage. We might also infer that the elf Mark's father met, the one with not quite pointy-enough ears, was Jerin. Looks like we've found the elf woman of Belgen!

Her unique racial attributes likely account for her unique sprite as well.



The team runs down their options. Not only is Jerin in danger, but it's possible she's the only person who can help us find Elfrea. Getting her out of this mess is a high priority.



Lufia's solution is always “violence.”



Medi, however, recognizes that just saving Jerin isn't enough, and we have to put a stop to this whole “sacrifice” nonsense once and for all.

Unfortunately, he doesn't offer us any alternatives.



You can't actually beat these guys up, either. They just warn us to get lost.



Apparently there's a cleric on hand to give Jerin her last rites. Apparently he's content with watching an innocent young woman be murdered right in front of him.

You can also heal yourself with the pots located at the sides of the dais.

Basically, we can't actually save Jerin, so our great heroes decide the only thing to do is leave her there on the altar without doing anything for her and go back to Belgen to try to reason with the panicked mob who sold Jerin to the monsters in the first place.

I predict that this is a great plan with no negative consequences.


Wave of Evil

OH NO I WAS WRONG.



All eyes are transfixed on Jerin. What's happening?!



A horrible monster descends from the sky!



AMBER ALERT





Our heroes race forward, just in time to be too late!



If only we had done something instead of standing around like fools!



The monster was at least kind enough to merely kidnap Jerin, as opposed to devouring her right there in front of us.

After seeing a horrifying demon swoop out of the sky and carry the screaming Jerin away, the dais guards understandably flip out and realize they are messing with forces they don't understand. They point us to the North Tower, where the local monsters hang out, and suspect that's where Jerin has been taken.



Onward!

Tower

The theme of the North Tower is teleporter mazes. Fortunately, it's a pretty straight forward one. The tower itself is very short, nowhere near as complex as the tower we met the apprentice in.


Battle

The enemies here are a substantial step up from what we've fought so far. Those pumpkin-headed enemies can use an attack called “Yodel” to inflict status ailments on your party members.



To be fair, confusion is a pretty reasonable reaction to a pumpkin yodeling at you. These aren't even the worst enemies in the tower, though.



No, the worst enemies are these archers. What can they do, you might ask?



Remember those Arrow items I've been talking about? They can use them on you. To do a ton of damage to your whole team. Ouch. What's worse is they often come in packs. These guys can demolish you in a horrifyingly short amount of time, so always take them seriously.



There's one very, very important treasure in the North Tower, though.



The Flash Ring is a very, very powerful piece of equipment for Lufia. It increases the potency of all Thunder magic. Remember how Selan wore one? When she was fighitng the Sinistrals? It's that good.

This will be Lufia's ring for our end-game too. But right now, her only Lightning magic is the Flash spell, which has kind of seen it's day. We'll set this aside for now, but trust me, we'll make good use of it later. I'm sure there are players who are going to say this isn't Lufia's best ring though. And those players certainly have a good case.



We'll also meet a fellow adventurer who warns us that one of the warp tiles on the top floor is a trap. That's nice of him!



We've reached the top floor, where apparently the monster who kidnapped Jerin is saving her for a midnight snack later. Our goal now is to figure out which warp point will lead us to her.



Another level for Medi. You may notice Aguro has started to fall behind in levels. This isn't because he's missed out on experience or anything, he just has a much slower curve than Medi or Lufia. The next few updates will see all kinds of weirdness going on with the level curves, but trust me when I say it's normal.




These straw men hang out in this tower and practice terrible debate techniques with each other. Killing them occasionally nets an item called a “Long Nail” which can be combined with an item called a “Straw Doll.” The enemy that drops the Straw Doll is called a “Nail Man.” Because that makes sense.



There are many warp points on the roof of the tower, only a few go anywhere, though.





A bit of sidetracking nets us a pair of Miracles. They're the only treasures on this floor.



The path to Jerin is fairly simple. Just take the rightmost warp tile.



Then go up.



And up again.



And we find ourselves at the monster's lair!



Even though this monster has wings and is obviously flying, the Fly Ring is NOT effective against him. This isn't the last time these Monster-killing rings will let us down. In fact, they'll never really be useful again!

Anyway, any doubt as to the real nature of the ransom/kidnapping plot melts away here, as the slimy creature as good as confesses that he's planning to sacrifice Jerin in a bid to bring the Sinistral Amon back to life.

Lufia II players may recall that this whole “virgin sacrifice” bit was also recycled in that game. Upon arrival in one town, recurring villain Idura uses a spell to lure all the young women in the city to the aptly named “Tower of Sacrifice.” Fonts of wisdom Guy and Dekar speculate why the spell didn't affect Selan, who just rolls her eyes.



Medi, of course, isn't the least bit pleased to learn that this creature is planning to bring more Sinistrals back to life. One is bad enough!



Here, we see the first instance of the localization error that mistakenly labeled Amon as the Sinistral of Terror. Though really, it's not an unreasonable mistake for a character to make, I guess. Lufia's not a history buff like Medi, it's not like she has any compelling reason to have any in-depth knowledge about the Sinistrals or their titles.



Turns out the monster isn't picky about his virgins, and will happily sacrifice all four of us.


Boss

The Follower is much more powerful than the Phantasm we fought a while ago. Among other reasons, the ring that should have hit his weakpoint doesn't work.



He has two main methods of attack.



His Drowsy spell will incapacitate your party. This might be the only time Lufia's Waken spell might be useful, except she's the one who fell asleep!



He also has the Frost spell, which hacks a healthy chunk off of our HP totals.



With these spells he can keep up a pretty formidable offense against your party. Characters who are asleep can't fight or heal. As before, the Follower is pretty resistant to magic, so Lufia's best options here are the drain spell and her Stronger spell to stave off some of the damage he's throwing around.



Unlike the Phantasm, the Follower has another ace up his sleeve; his attack pattern changes as his HP gets lower. When he starts to get low on HP, he'll start casting the deadly “Bolt” spell, which can really wreck your day. 59 damage is a lot! As we continue through the game, bosses will start to change their pattern more often as they take damage, usually becoming increasingly dangerous as the battle continues.



The Follower will also heal himself when he's near death. 92 HP isn't too bad, considering our damage output, though.





It can be a pretty rough battle, but Lufia's Stronger spell should be able to outpace even the damage on Bolt, as long as she's awake enough to cast it.


Tower

Our party finally meets Jerin face-to-face. She is, naturally, ecstatic to learn that she will not be murdered, eaten, and sacrificed for the revival of a dark god.



Jerin doesn't seem to be hurt, so let's return her to Belgen. With that monster gone, hopefully the town will be able to return to its normal, non-maiden-sacrificing ways.

Belgen is safe, Amon wasn't revived and nobody got eaten. I'm prepared to call that a victory!

Village

We see Jerin back to the Belgen inn. Apparently, the people of the town kind of feel bad that they tried to murder her, so the least they can do is offer her a free room for a while.



Jerin's a little unhappy to see us go, though. We can gather she's a bit of an outcast in this village, likely due to her race, and doesn't have many friends.





As it turns out, she isn't too keen on staying in a village where they democratically decided the correct course of action was to feed her to monsters. She practically begs us to take here somewhere, anywhere else.



Medi, of course, isn't about to let a girl come along and put herself in danger for the sake of his quest. He wouldn't even have let Lufia come if he had any choice in the matter.



Jerin tries a guilt trip, but Medi isn't about to fall for that one again. He simply notes that he didn't save Jerin's life to watch her lose it later.



As a reward for saving her, Jerin gives us a Miracle. This would be a nice token, but unfortunately I'm pretty sure no Miracle actually gets added to your inventory here.



Well, thanks for clearing that up!



After bidding farewell to Jerin, we check out the rest of the town.



Now that we've made an example of the monsters, the people of Belgen have learned to stand and fight for themselves. They've resolved to never surrender another virgin for the rest of their days!



Other popular topics include fearing that awkward moment when they pass Jerin on the street.

“Oh, hey, sorry about that whole, you know, trying to murder you thing. Friends?”



Anyway, we're done in this town, and the town of Surinagal has some important clues as to how to continue our journey. So let us continue!

Battle


The creatures in the desert are dangerous, which can make the early trip to Surinagal I made unappealing to some. Lufia's water magic makes short work of these Mud Men though.


Village

In Surinagal, a woman tells us about the “Lost Forest” which only elves can pass through. It's on the way to Elfrea, which is one of the reasons only elves can get there.



Uh, not really I guess?



An old man also tells us about a strange island to the north called “Forfeit Island” where everything that's ever been sold somehow ends up. We can check out Forfeit Island later, but it's not possible to reach it without a ship.


Field

South of the desert, an expansive forest lays before us.



This is the Lost Forest, which supposedly only elves can pass through. But I see no reason why that should stop us!




Lost Woods

I mean, obviously the direction we want to go is south, so that's exactly what we'll do....

Wait, that music sounds familiar...


Field

Damnit.



Looks like we're stuck. Let's check out that little village over there and ask for directions, or maybe see if they have any elves for sale.


Village

This isn't actually a village at all, but a guide station. Apparently, they keep elven volunteers on hand to help travelers pass through the forest. Neat!







Child labor can never stand in the way of world-saving! Bring them on, and let's get moving.

You didn't really think Jerin wasn't going to end up being our final party member, did you?



Turns out Jerin is craftier than she looks, and the reason she didn't kick up more of a fuss at Belgen was that she knew she'd be able to force her way into our group here.



Medi tries to protest, but it turns out the guide station is fresh out of elves.



Lufia tries to suggest we try it ourselves, but that didn't work out so well for us last time.



I'm not sure if Lufia is actually trying to insult Jerin here, or merely stating the obvious. Interestingly, Jerin doesn't seem to be bothered by the fact that she's a half-elf, or at least never vocalizes anything to that extent. Lufia certainly seems hostile to the idea of Jerin coming with us, though!



Medi recognizes that there's little other choice, so reluctantly agrees to let Jerin tag along.



He does, however, want to know why Jerin is willing to put her life on the line for a bunch of people she just met.



But maybe it's just because a bunch of people she didn't know put their lives on the line for her. Awwww... (This is totally not the reason.)



After some formalities out of the way, Jerin joins the team!



She's so excited she gives Medi an affectionate peck.

Lufia did not like that. Not one bit. Aguro tries to reason with her, arguing that Jerin doesn't know any better, but Lufia is most definitely not buying Jerin's “cutesy” act.

Incidentally, I'm pretty sure this is the only time Aguro and Lufia actually exchange lines in the entire game.





Too bad, it's three to one, you lose!



Lufia, of course, isn't prepared to admit the real reason she's hostile to Jerin's presence, so just stammers some nonsense instead. Medi calls her on it, and considers the discussion over.





Did it just get really cold in here?












Medi's response to Jerin's question is pretty much the most telling answer he could possibly give.