Fire

Perfect. 

Tick tock, mess with the clock, and then you will see that all is …black and white? What? This chapter starts off in a world without color. People in the first town, Keepinsign, tell us how disappointing this is, as the sunset used to be a tourist attraction. One of the houses is home to a scientist named Edison, but it’s mostly empty when we enter it. Minus the heart, which I’m sure you can figure out the goal here. While you’re back at church, pick up the other figurine, too. Spoiler, you’re gonna need it in a moment. Reviving Edison doesn’t do much now, but he’ll probably be useful down the line. For now, though, he tells us about his rival, Einstein. 

Other citizens tell us about a protection racket through Snowpass, the mountain north, run by a man named Capone. We can talk to Capone at the fort at the mountain’s foot, and he assumes we have no money. I have 30000 gold, but okay. Instead of paying, he’ll ask us to bring him golden wine. So now we have to be barmaids at the tavern in town. Our reward will be 40G, and the wife lets us take home the wine. Giving it to Capone has him dropping us into a bottomless pit…

Since there is no color in this world, he couldn’t see the wine and assumed we tricked him. There are rumors about his receptionist fleecing people, but I’m thinking the boss is in on the take, too. But now we’re in a dungeon. Use the Arks of Power and Wisdom to revive two party members. Yes, two! We’re finally a full team. I’m running with the monk girl, Reeshine, and the white mage, Meisea. The black mage and Lux seem cool, too. And I haven’t used the other two. I tried Tokio once, but he died in chapter one… But this dungeon is no joke, and you’ll need all three. Play time is over this chapter! 

Make your way through the cave, and don’t forget to find the heart. This is Graham, and his parents in the armor shop miss him. Soon you’ll reach a door. This returns us to the fort, where everyone is shocked that we survived. Capone apologizes, and, rather than get revenge for attempted murder, we accept it. Not only that, but he asks us to find his daughter, Roma. Her heart is discovered in her room, and she’s the last figurine. Capone is thrilled and gives us brandy that takes up our inventory. He also lets us through Snowpass without guards. 

This is a lengthy dungeon with too many mobs. They’re definitely starting to reuse sprites now. But we eventually reach the peak, where things get weird. Color returns to the world, but now there is only silence. No music is played down the mountain. We’ll reach a town, Diplo, but we can’t speak to anyone. There is only silence. The innkeeper somehow tells us to go north. In the northmost house is a woman who can write. Rather than use pencil and paper for daily life in the last year since sound vanished, people have learned sign language. And Felys masters it in three seconds! We can now talk to the villagers. The armorer in the northwest is the most prescient, and they tell us about their sappy hobby of collecting tree sap. There’s also a fella in the bar who tells us about Paulo, an artist who went south to draw the bells. Warp back to Graham’s, talk to everyone, and then go find the bells south of silent town. Paulo will boss us around until he finds the perfect portrait. Or until he falls into a hole. Give chase, and you’ll find a path to the third city, Ratwood. 

Nothing seems too strange here. The colors work, and there’s sound. Lotta elderly folks around, though. Find Einstein and talk to him a few times before pilfering his stuff. You’ll find a note to Edison. Give Ed the note, and he’ll join Al in town. Edison will carry on Einstein’s work! It involves a giant machine in the center of town. Edison fixes what he can, but he needs some sap and metal. Find the sap northwest of the quiet town. The armor there was replaced by Graham while they did their yearly hobby. There is a lot of sap, so they let you take a bottle full of it. You’ll need two, by the way, as the weapon shop can mix it with Black Rock from the cat chapter, if you found the second one. You’ll get the sword at the end of the chapter. You’ll also need metal, which is from the red bell by Paulo.

But Edison repairs it as best he can, which rouses Einstein out of his deathbed. They do more, but we power up the machine with an Ark. The elevator now works, and it takes us to a poisoned room. Everyone leaves in fear, so rest at an inn to get the poison off. For reasons, we can go back down, and the poison doesn’t affect us. Just south of the elevator is a fourth town, Metalimo. 

Everyone here is dying. They have to work on machines, which pollute the air and wreak the body. And they’re low on food and bedding. Give everyone a healing item, and the leader tells us how to navigate this area. We also figure out that this world is powered by the machine that is down here. It’s also powered by an Ark… 

So we make our way down, a very long way, doing one row sudoko puzzles to open locks. It was shocking fun! We reach the bottom and find someone waiting for us. Specifically, us. The demon knows who Felys is and what she’s looking for. He doesn’t fight us, but sends his lackeys after us, and they’re finally a difficult battle! 

There are three black knights who do massive damage every turn. They tend to go at a similar speed, so it’s possible they can do 180 damage. They also possess Insta death spells. Felys and the white mage have Deathward that works, and they’ll also be healing a lot. The left knight is weak to the monk’s Kick attack, so spam that. It worked every time in this battle for some reason. I won’t complain! Getting one down is of utmost importance. They also heal a lot, so expect to swear. 

But we’re not done yet! One of the terminals in the room will upgrade your Open Card, which will grant you access to the Hydra Sector of the area. It’s to the northeast of the town. The Hydra area has Sylph Co arrow floors, but they didn’t automatically push me around. I don’t know if this helped or hindered the encounter rate. I pretended like they worked, and it helped me find the correct way to go. I got lost aimlessly walking around. Finding the correct path brings us to a four way fork. The northeast room contains the Ark of Fire. Removing that somehow makes the malfunctioning underground chill out and start working as normal. using the Ark kicked it into overdrive. But color and sound return, while all the old people return to their proper age. Edison and Einstein will continue to repair the underground, and more people from above chip in to help support working the machines. The Eternal Machine (?) is very important to this world’s existence, which makes me wonder how it worked before everyone’s ancestors built it. But, with the Ark obtained, I grab Felys’ new sword and return to the church. I’ll figure out what’s next…

…tomorrow! 

I don’t understand what all this meant, but I enjoyed this chapter the most. It has the least amount of awful backtracking, and it kept us moving onwards. It felt like a traditional RPG. We’re about halfway done, which is good. Not sure how much more I can take, and I’m hoping I get some thorp sink my teeth into soon.