Paladin's Quest, Part 6: Zaygos

He may be the lord of destruction, but this makes him sound like an unkempt hippie.




For previous episodes of Paladin's Quest, check out: http://www.coronajumper.com/search/label/Paladin%27s%20Quest

When we last left off, our heroes were setting out to stop Noi Gren, Zaygos's death machine and stuff. Luckily for them...

...there's a festival starting, and Zaygos will be there. The plan is to sneak in via the parade and take him out. Then they can all go back to Naskout and enjoy Gubo Burgers while the world returns to normalcy. But first, more dungeons!

This part of Saskout looks different from any terrain we've seen so far. The pallette is switched up!

This demanding character isn't exactly worth recruiting. She's painfully average at best, and the hair ornament in question costs like 30,000 G.

A look at some of my growing spell collection. Blowup is probably the most powerful of my attack spells at this point, and it looks cool too.

With the shrine of storms far in the rearview mirror, the next area our heroes pass through is the shrine of water. Keeping with the tradition of enemies attacking en masse in water areas...

...the enemies attack en masse here. Luckily, they all attack pretty quickly. It isn't like Fire Emblem or some SRPGs where you spend several minutes watching enemy units move. Those crab things in the middle are particularly nasty as they get multiple attacks.

The next boss is Eagle... who looks nothing like an eagle, for the record. Wouldn't Eagle of Wind be a more appropriate boss? It's unfortunate that the other three elements aren't represented by a boss in this game, but I guess that would be predictable.

Eagle is basically a stronger Garana in this game. Funny thing is, for most of the few years between my first and second playthroughs of this game (1997 and 2004, I believe), I thought that Eagle was before Garana and the weaker of the two. Not so. His main attack is a rapid-fire physical attack, just like Garana.

He can also make it rain... make it rain on them hoes.

Dammit Gunny!

Parade folk are like theater folk. They take themselves pretty seriously as they flit to and fro backstage.

And now, the parade begins, with Chezni walking in front. We need appropriate music for this. We need "Walk" by Pantera.

"RE! SPECT! WALK!"

"RE! SPECT! WALK!"

The parade marches right up to Zaygos'... whatever that is. A tower? A group of towers?

"AREYOUTALKINGTOMAAAE!"

"RE! SPE-" whoa, it's Zaygos. In his first non-intro appearance of the game. The Big Bad, if you will.

Our heroes walk right up to Zaygos... and he ID's them right away. ONE DOES NOT SIMPLY WALK INTO MORDOR!

He knows their names, too. This doesn't bode well for our assassination attempt... or whatever this was supposed to be.

He makes a classic villain mistake. Instead of just killing our heroes, he throws them into jail and lets his goon rough them up a bit.

I'll say this... his dialogue is pretty good. Given the limitations of this game, Zaygos' megalomania comes through.

The goon arrives. Note that Chezni and Midia are now alone, as Gunny and Bean just sorta disappeared. Thanks, guys. Thanks a lot.

Here's Lokiarn, Zaygos' strongest goon. He's a bizarre creature, but he completely dwarfs the previous few bosses in power.

He proceeds to completely beat the shite out of our heroes. Well, that didn't go well...

Our heroes wake up in a cell with no weapons... and a couple of weirdoes standing around.

Behold, Fiery. She's pretty weird-ass.

And this guy... I don't even know what his deal is. Who considers you the genius of Lennus, asshole? He's like the Kanye West of Paladin's Quest.

With that, our newly full party stages a daring escape. No word on the fates of Gunny and Bean. I suspect they're being tortured somewhere by Zaygos.

Chezni starts getting his equipment back at this point.

While we're here, we might as well take out Zaygos' machine, too. Why he let our heroes live is absolutely beyond me.

Lokiarn...speaks?

It's the rematch! Now more powerful and with a full party, can our heroes stop this guy?

My God! Did he just sprout more arms?

His attacks are so big that they strike multiple people in one swipe. He's a formidable foe, to be sure.

The good guys scrape by, and this epic battle is concluded.

Unfortunately, the battle comes with a price, as Chezni loses his all-star weapon.

Zaygos walks in (with a random Alornso in tow, apparently... this one is never seen again to my knowledge) and he isn't thrilled with this turn of events.

NO! FIERY! NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Our heroes escape, landing in an underground lab that seems more like an advanced spaceship. I think it's safe to infer that Fiery didn't succeed in her destruction of Zaygos. Luckily, we still have Blades, and he's The Genius of Lennus.

This underground techno-labyrinth features some sort of advanced subway that shuttles our heroes between the various areas.

At this point, our heroes run into what may be the #3 or #4 mercenary in the entire game, and is -the best- non-hidden mercenary...

...Mouth. What's going on with his face?

He comes with a strong assortment of spells and elemental levels. Coincidentally, "Mouth" was Midia's nickname in college.

He comes equipped with Natrec, a powerful black hole attack. Not bad at all.

And here's a character who also might be one of the top four mercenaries in the game, an ancient robot.

He's more powerful than Mouth and has more HP than anyone else in the game by far, but he has limitations. For one thing, he can't be healed in any way shape or form. He can, however, drain HP from enemies... like 80 at a time. If one takes the time to upkeep this guy - which requires lots of tedious stopping to regenerate him - he could well be with you until the final battle (where he's quite the help). Otherwise, he'll get junked long before that. As a result, he could be the best mercenary in the game or a mere #3 or #4, depending on how he's used. Since there are two more offensively powerful hidden mercenaries later on, I tend to not bother keeping Nails all the way to the end.

For now, though... step aside, Blades. Go have some fish sticks or something.

For further episodes of Paladin's Quest... http://www.coronajumper.com/search/label/Paladin%27s%20Quest