Earthbound – Day 46

–Day 46–

It looks like we have quite the challenge ahead of us as we try to fight the Kraken. Short of power leveling for hours, there isn’t really much we can do to prepare for this battle. We took the Flame Pendant out of storage for a bit of protection against its Flame Breath attack, but other than that we already have the best equipment we can buy at the moment.

With really nothing else to prepare, we head out onto the boat once again. The journey was identical to the first time, even the quick break where our captain complained of sea sickness. As the Kraken approaches the boat yet again, all we can really hope for is that we’ve learned something from the last encounter.

This time things turned out a bit different. It didn’t open the fight with its Fire Breath like it did last time. In fact it was several turns before we saw that again. Instead it used a “Crashing Boom Bang” attack which did only moderate damage to both Ness and Paula. It then followed this up by wasting a turn emitting a pale green light which reset any PK effects on the party, of which there were none.

When the Kraken finally did use its Flame Breath attack again, it was just as damaging to the entire party as it was last time. It actually did mortal damage to everyone other than Ness who was wearing the Flame Pendant. However, luck was on our side this time. Just as everyone’s HP counters were about to roll over to 0, Ness managed to defeat it with a powerful PK Gaming β attack. It looks like we’ll get to continue the game after all.

Having safely arrived in Scarabia, it’s time to start exploring this new region. From the looks of the map, the town itself is rather small with only a few buildings. Most of the area seems to be taken up by the vast stretch of desert to the south where the pyramids are.

It’s not long after we arrive that we start to find signs that Porky was already here before us. It would seem the little fatty either couldn’t find a restroom, or simply didn’t care and simply took a squat on the ground at the edge of town. That’s gross, and I think I might have stepped in some of it. Hopefully the sand will help scrape it off the bottom of our shoes as we continue exploring.

Just next to that mess is a man sitting on top of a building. This on its own is quite unusual, so I thought it would be nice to see what his whole deal was. Turns out he’s an acquaintance of our old friend Brick Road. It would seem he has accomplished his dream of becoming a true “Dungeon Man” instead of just a dungeon maker. This man offers to introduce us to him, but unfortunately he has lost the key to enter him. It’s an odd choice of words, but I guess we’re going to have to keep an eye out for a missing key now.

The only other real attraction here in town seems to be the market in the southeast corner. They sure do have some weird things for sale. For example, there are only six different vendors in the Market, but two of them are selling live snakes for some reason. Why would we need live snakes? There must be a reason, but for now I think I’d rather keep my pockets snake free, thank you very much.

In the end, we don’t really buy much from the market today. But I’m sure we’ll be back later for something. Even so, the Photographer shows up once again to take our picture here in the new town. Say “Fuzzy Pickles” everyone!

We don’t have a whole lot of time left to play today, but I thought it would be worth it to at least check out the desert. Wouldn’t you believe our luck when we stepped outside of town and immediately spot one of those worms we saw back in Dusty Dunes! This red variant is pretty quick, and we chased it literally to the other end of the desert before we caught him, but boy oh boy did it give us a TON of experience for the trouble. Nearly everyone leveled up from this.

Anyway, like I said, we don’t have a lot of time left, so I’m going to ignore the Pyramids for now and just check out the other areas of the desert, you know, looking for presents and perhaps that lost key. The desert ends up being surprisingly small, and thankfully the enemies aren’t very strong. Most of them are just Pallet swaps of the enemies we’ve already seen back in Dusty Dunes.

So I guess that’s it for today. Join us next time as we start exploring the pyramids and see how mad we can make Giygas by messing with his plans.