The Desch Chronicles

Dear, Diary,
 
"On behalf of Salina, we're going to go looking for her runaway boyfriend, Desch. There's something about this young, sick girl that makes me feel like I should help her. Salina's mom told us Desch went to Dragon's Peak.

While there, we climbed the winding mountain trail and killed off a fair few birds. It's a veritable bird sanctuary! As we got into the think of things, though, something terrifying happened. A dragon attacked us! Can you believe it? You'd think we know of such a beast living near several settlements, but this guy just appeared from nowhere. Or maybe it was a girl who appeared from nowhere? You see, it didn't kill us, obviously. Instead, it took us to its nest at the top of the mountain. There were a few eggs about, some cracked, some with babies in it, one was a person! That person was Desch. After speaking for a while, we all decided we should do something a bit more worthwhile. Getting away from an angry dragon just seems wise. We tried to leave via the path, but guess who didn't let us? We followed the womanizer's advice and ran away. Fighting a dragon, even as warriors of light, is probably a bad idea. Drew and Triton were willing, though. We managed to jump off the peak and somehow landed across the bay, far away from Cannon.

Slightly safer than before, Desch told us he has no memories of before a while ago. Even still, he feels something tugging at him like he's forgetting something very important. He then told us about a village of gnomes nearby and taught me the spell Mini, the only way to get to said city. Along the way, we found a spring with another gnome who told us the same thing. She gave us another copy of Mini, which was nice of her. Casting the spell near a forest takes us to the village of Tozus. Desch joined the party, but he doesn't do much. Occasionally, he'll cast Thundara, which is nice. His sword attacks are less exciting, however.

The inhabitants of Tozus are a bit funny. Some of them rhyme, and some don't, but they all seemed like nice people. The doctor, though, was having a rough time. Doctor Shelco has an odd habit of tasting wild berries in the woods. One such poisoned the poor man. An antidote brought him back from the brink, but why didn't anyone in the village try that sooner? The item shop even sells them! Regardless, as thanks for saving his life, Shelco opened up a secret passage to the tunnel underneath the western mountain range. Desch told us that our physical powers don't really exist as Minis, so it's my time to shine! Or we could just run a lot... Maybe it's for the best? My hat is cool, but it doesn't grant me a lot of magical stamina. For some reason, no one else wanted to try their hands at magic. Xander just kept trying to steal things while Triton tried to swing his sword. No clue was Drew was trying to do...

On the otherside was a great plain! I unMinied us, and we found another cave. But this was inhabitant by Vikings! I expected Vikings to be a bit more terrifying, but they were chill with us. Sadly, they were down on their luck. An earthquake recently hit this area, and it caused a great sea serpent to awaken. It attacked their fleet, leaving them with only one boat. But the leader promised we could have it should we take care of the sea serpent. Heading out to see, we quickly came under fire...

When next we woke up, it's like we went back in time. The Vikings acted as they've never seen us before, and even the stuff we stole from them was back in place. Weird? Trying a new tactic this time, we went to the Nepto Sea Temple. There is only one room, but in it was a great statue of the sea dragon! There was a single shining gem in its eye, and there was another socket for the other one that was empty. Oddly, it had an esophagus we could go down if we were Mini again.

So guess what we did? And guess what exact same strategy we did this time? The inside of the dragon statue is a well created hallway with a few pitfalls, leading to treasure and several enemies. We couldn't fight a lot of mobs because, well, I trust you're smart, Diary. Instead, we ran away a lot. Good thing Xander is so good at it. At the end of the road was a giant, gross, purple rat. It somehow got the gem out of the statue's socket and brought it back here to sleep next to. How and why? Regardless, we killed a varmint.

We should have bought more potions! Always buy more potions! I cast Blizzard as much as I could, but I could only cast so much! It was a long, drawn out battle. Xander used antidotes to treat the poison the rat used. Triton used up the last of our potions, and Drew...well, Drew tried. I didn't pay attention to who, but someone used our last Arctic Wind. Through trial and tribulation, we won. We took a quick break to recharge, and boy did we need it? We exited the statue, replaced the eye, and then we heard a voice.

The Nepto Dragon spoke to us. It thanked us for retorting the statue because it's what keeps its physical form in this world controllable. I don't know what that means, but it scares me. Is there a true form out there, somewhere? It gave us its scales and went back to sleep. The Vikings kept their promise, so we can now sail across the whole of the inner sea on the Enterprise.

Around the bay is the small town of Tokkul. Two old men ran away from us as we approached, so there's a red flag if I've ever seen one. Exploring the desolate village, we found a woman who asked us not to harm her only child. When we promised not to do so, she said knights from Argus Castle invaded the town and took any able bodied person to their tree castle. The sentient Tree is in the desert, which just makes sense, but it wouldn't stop moving long enough for us to get on.
On the otherside of the desert, though, is the Town of Ancients. It's filled with people who allude to stuff that happened in the past. I wasn't really paying attention. I was grilling Desch because he said this village feels familiar. We took a chocobo back to our ship and kept exploring around.
We found the Living Woods next, and it was filled with fairies. A resident of Tokkul told us about this place. Sadly, they told us nothing good. The Living Tree that has been rooted here for aeons was possessed by people from Argus Castle. Without the Tree, the entire forest will wither.
We wanted to double check all this new information, so we went to Argus next. It was deserted. No one was here. So we took about 10000 Gil from the coffers. They're evil and deserved it. Fight me!
We next stumbled upon the Gulgan Gulch. It's a small cave that houses blind men who can see the future. Many of the inhabitants told us more about the crystal. This universe is filled with two worlds, Light and Darkness. When one world begins to overtake the other, the defending world will summon four people to save it. The leader got a sense from Desch that his destiny is at the Tower of Owen. Owen holds up our continent from the greater world below, apparently. So we're not the entire planet? Desch solemnly believed what the old man was saying and asked us to go there. The blind leader gave us access to the Toad Spell, which is how we get in. Ewwwww!

To the Tower of Owen we went, and into frogs we turned. We don't need to remain a frog for long, but the Tower is something, alright. It's filled with mechanical machinations. It's also filled with someone who likes to yell at us. From the moment we entered the Tower, we could all hear a voice try to put us down. She kept telling us she was going to kill us. But every time we heard it, Desch seemed to regain some memory. He was an Ancient created long ago to watch over the Tower and keep it safe. It had been so long since he needed to do that, that his brain got fried and wound up in Cannon. Should Desch fail in this mission, our continent would come crashing down onto whatever is below.

We fought our way up past surprisingly weak enemies. The Carmello boys are really taking to take to this adventuring thing. But they'd be nothing without a good healer, yeah? Triton was there too... At the top was the voice yelling at us the whole time, Madusa. She told us her goal was to destroy the Tower for her master, Xande. We have to stop that.

Her attacks were relentless, twice a turn. It was all I could do to keep my allies alive. I did no damage here, but I was able to outheal almost everything she threw at us. Her magic, though, was devastating. But that isn't all. As her name would suggest, she can petrify a target. It only hit us once, and that was at the very end. At one point, it was just Triton and me. We had enough Phoenix Downs to revive the twins, and I had just enough magic power to keep them alive. Through the fire, lighting, and rock of our opponent, we managed to save the Tower. Triton, sadly, was unable to enjoy the spoils as he was the one turned to stone. I'm sad but deep down, I like that I'm the only one who's seen all that this party has gone through. Like the good chronicler I am!

But the boiler in the Tower was still broken! Medusa must have done quite a number on it. This was when Deshe jumped into action. All of his memories came back, and he knew how to fix it. But at an incredible personal cost. The only way to save the world was for him to jump into the lava! I tried to talk him out of it, for Sardia's sake, but we both know this was for the best. I'm glad we were able to return to Cannon when we got our boat for one last farewell. He told us he senses a great fire in the land of the Dwarves to the northwest and bid us safe passage. And that's the last we've seen of him.

We somehow wound up back on the Enterprise. We surmised that was Deshe's final action on us. To the side of the ship, we could see the whirlpool that blocked our passage dissolve. We can now reach the outer sea, to where our lost friend suggested we go.

To the Fire Crystal..."