The Mog Episode

I had planned to get one more story in tonight, but the Serpent’s Trench is a questionable mechanic.

As I said I would last night, I started out getting Mog. I went to the wrong place at first, walking up to him instead of the way that works. In Narshe, there’s a house that’s filled with treasures. I looted the place a few days ago, save for the one you can’t open. Go back into the house now, and we find the notorious thief Lone Wolf, the only wolfman in the game. He’s managed to open the un-unlockable chest and runs off. We give chase, with him yelling at us the whole time, until we corner him in front of Trytoch. He’s somehow taken a Moogle hostage. Lone Wolf says if we move, he’ll kill the pompomed creature but doesn’t if we disregard his threat. After what feels like forever, staring romantically into each other eyes, the Moogle begins to stir. The Moogle knocks Lone Wolf off the cliff, but he manages to hold on to the edge. Unfortunately, the Moogle has gotten himself in the same predicament. We now have a choice here: save the Moogle, or save Lone Wolf. The obvious answer is to save the Moogle. To everyone’s surprise, the Moogle starts talking and introduces himself as Mog. Lone Wolf then jumps off the edge, presumably, to his death. Had we saved the wolfman, we’d have gotten the Gold Hairpin, an item that reduces magic attacks to 1 MP. We'd have also lost Mog and a secret character forever, so, honestly, great trade. This means we’d have to use the rapist, so I win twice! Instead, we get a new character, who informs us Ramah came to him in a dream and asked him to join us. Mog goes to the airship, and I try to make him useful.

Mog’s special skill is Dance. Dance allows him to attack with a biome specific attack that has four separate attacks within. If you dance in the wrong biome, you have a 50% chance of failing. If you succeed, Mog becomes uncontrollable for the duration of the battle and will use one of the four attacks. He has eight total dances, and I go off to learn the seven I can. To learn a Dance, Mog must do battle in those biomes. He starts with one from the Terra defense mission, but we travel around the world for the rest of them. Find generic plains, deserts, mountains (Kolts back entrance), cities (Zozo), caves, forests, and snow regions. There aren’t any snow regions yet, so skip that go to the eighth biome, underwater. This one sucks. The only underwater area is the Serpent’s Trench and the only way to get to, or from, is to follow Sabin’s path from earlier. Land the airship near Crescent Cave and jump into the trench. Take it to Nikeah, then walk ALL THE WAY back. This alone took half-an-hour. I was able to get some plot in, so let’s get to it.

We land on the eastern edge of the Vector continent and find an abandoned army base. The party is confused why an army base is empty but accepts the empty path as a blessing. Beyond the base is the Cave to the Esper World. It’s filled with lava and a massive amount of undead. There are also a few ninjas looking for the Atma Weapon. Atma is short for Ultima, and I managed to snag it! It’s, sadly, mediocre, but it is a Lightsaber that, as per the JCC rules, can only be equipped to Terra and Celes. What’s more fun, though, is we found a Genji Glove, meaning Sabin can now punch with both of his hands, doubling his damage and making Blitz leas viable! He’s halfway to full power.

After trekking through the cave, we come to a long bridge before a massive door. Beyond is the Esper World. The party asks Terra to talk to them, and she walks forward. Before she can, we hear the wretched laugh of a mad clown! Kefka appears behind us and says the plan worked. All he had to do was follow us, and we’d open the door. That's why the base was empty: to lure us in! Cyan, Edgar, and Sabin distract him while Terra goes Esper to talk to her fellow magical creatures. The battle isn’t really a thing, and it ends quickly when Espers come storming out of the gate. They attack Kefka, taking him somewhere and leaving us alone. We return to the airship.

As we leave the army base, Locke stops us and says Vector is in trouble. We skip to the Blackjack as it’s over the city, and we get caught up in the attack. The Espers fly off, and their energy damages the ship. Setzer loses control, and we crash land in the southwest corner of the continent.

This is where we’ll pick up tomorrow!

Why did I go through all that trouble for a character I won’t use much? Because he’s on the box art and is, therefore, the main character! I’m just now realizing, despite how slowly I feel I’m making my way through this, I’m two updates (hopefully) from “disk 2” and the big twist. This may be shorter than I thought. As for my thoughts tonight, how did Madonna accidentally reach the Esper World? That's not a place a normal human can get lost and wind up in. Terra's backstory is gonna need some rewrites if the game is ever remade.