On day 16 of my Final Fantasy Marathon, I obtained the battleship, the Invincible. Today, I’m on my way to the town of Falgabard.

Falgabard is the home of the Dark Knights. It contains five items and no chests. I find an old man in a cave behind a waterfall who challenges me to find out if I’m worthy of the Kiku-Ichimonji, a Dark Knight weapon.

He morphs into a Shinobi and attacks. I defeat him easily and he gives me the sword.

I also find some other Dark Knight gear lying about town. There is a cave at the back of the town that is full of monsters that multiply when attacked with normal blades. To counter this, I change Perrin and Matt to the Dark Knight job.

Falgabard Cave

Falgabard Cave contains four chests and no items. All the chests contain pieces of Dark Knight equipment, which I give to Matt.

The Cave of Shadows

The Cave of Shadows contains nine chests and two items. To reach it, I must use the Invincible to hop over a maze of mountains.

Inside, I find a Dark Knight who warns me that the creatures in the cave multiply when struck by normal blades. I meet a second Dark Knight who says he was wrong in thinking he had mastered the dark blade, and then gives me his sword.

I find some Genji Gloves in a chest, which I give to Matt. The Kiku-Ichimonji also goes to Matt.

Perrin gets the Genji Shield, Genji Armor, and Genji Helm. At the end of the cave, we find the Fang of Earth.

When I interact with it, a very ripped looking dude named Hecatoncheir attacks. I defeat him easily and receive the Fang and then warp out of the cave using an ottershroom.

Third time’s the charm

I return to the Nautilus and go back to the catacombs for another shot at Odin. This time I defeat him and receive the Catastro summon for Egwene.

Lake Dohr

Since I was finally able to defeat Odin, I decide to take a crack at the other hidden Summons. I go back to get the Invincible and fly it to the floating continent.

Once there, I hop a mountain to get to Lake Dohr where I see a large sea creature swimming. I get in my canoe and let the sea creature pull me down.

There are 19 chests and one item in Lake Dohr. The chests mostly contain items. I find Leviathan at the end of the dungeon.

Like Odin, Leviathan challenges me to see if I’m worthy of his power. I defeat him with Egwene’s Spark summon doing the bulk of the damage.

I receive the Leviath summon for Egwene. Then, I ottershroom my way out of the lake.

Bahamut’s Lair

I hop another mountain and enter Bahamut’s Lair. It contains 13 chests and one item. Like the previous dungeon, most of the chests hold items.

When I exit the lair, Bahamut flies down and snatches me up to the mountain where he tests me like the others. I don’t pass this test.

After a couple attempts, I decide to try this one again later. I ottershroom out and fly the Invincible back to the waterworld.

Doga’s Grotto

I go back to get the Nautilus and fly it to Doga’s Manor. Once inside, Doga says he and Unei have been preparing for us and Doga warps us to his grotto.

The Grotto contains six chests and two items. The chests mostly hold items, including some valuable shining curtains that can reflect magic back at the caster.

I find Doga and Unei. Doga tells me they are about to complete the Eureka Key, but I must defeat them both in battle first.

When I ask why, he explains that long ago, mankind had weapons they decided were too powerful, so they sealed them in Eureka. However, now we need them.

Doga and Unei can only generate the massive amount of energy needed to make the Eureka key in battle. I still protest, but Doga attacks.

I defeat him easily, with some help from the Catastro summon, which sometimes casts a reflect spell on your party. Unei attacks next, after assuring us that even when their bodies are destroyed, their spirits will live on.

She also goes down easily, with Matt and Egwene doing the bulk of the damage. Doga gives me the Eureka Key and tells me to go to Syrcus Tower.

Unei gives me the key to Syrcus Tower. She tells us that she and Doga will continue to watch over us as we attempt to stop Xande.

Bahamut part two

I return to Bahamut’s lair to make another attempt, and this time I succeed. The key to winning was to toss some Bacchus’ wine at Matt to speed up his attacks and then let him wail away with his air knife and orichalcum combo, doing up to 4,000+ damage per turn, while also absorbing up to 1100 HP, allowing him to stay alive while doing damage during the Megaflare barrage.

Ancients’ Maze part one

After adding the Bahamur summon to Egwene’s arsenal, I head for the Syrcus Tower. First, I must get past the statues.

I have to hop out of my ship and walk through each pair to destroy them with the elemental fangs I’ve been collecting. Bit tedious.

Once I’m past the statues, I must navigate the Ancient’s Maze to get to the tower. The maze contains 15 chests and no items.

Directly in front of the entrance is a door to a room where I find the Earth Crystal. As I approach it, Titan attacks.

He’s basically a differently colored Hecatoncheir who casts the Quake spell a lot. I don’t have to do anything special to take him out, just keep plugging away with my best attacks.

The final crystal awards me the Magus, Devout, and Summoner jobs. Since there are three new jobs, and four party members, I decide to let Matt keep his thief job, since he’s been my strongest physical attacker of this group.

I make Perrin a Devout, Rand a Magus, and Egwene a Summoner. The Earth Crystal tells me that Xande plans to amplify the power of the cyrstals to summon the Cloud of Darkness.

Ancient’s Maze part two

I pop outside the maze to save the game and then head back in. Most of the treasure boxes have items or equipment that my current party can’t use.

Some of it will get some use in the end game. The exception is the Omnirod, which I give to Rand and the Protect Ring, which goes to Egwene.

Eureka

Eureka is an optional dungeon that contains two more job classes, plus the most powerful weapons, armor, and magic in the game. Loot goblin that I am, of course, I’m not passing that up.

I use the Eureka Key to open the door and go inside. There are 19 chests and five items.

Some of the chests hold magic items, elixirs, and shurikens. One has a Ribbon.

The first of the forbidden weapons I find is the Moonring Blade. I have to battle Amon for it.

I guess they were running out of ideas or storage space for bosses by this point, because he is basically a differently colored Hein, complete with his barrier shift trick. I don’t have the Libra spell or a scholar, so I ignore that and use attacks like Bio that seem to work decently regardless of his barrier.

My current party can’t equip any of the forbidden weapons, except maybe the Elder Staff, so collecting them is mostly for the experience and endgame.

Masamune

Masamune is next. To win it, I must defeat Kunoichi. I don’t employ any special strategy here. I just hit her with the best attacks I’ve got and heal the party with Perrin’s magic.

Excalibur

To win Excalibur, I must defeat the General. Again, no special strategy.

The Elder Staff

Finally, something my mages might be able to use! To get the Elder Staff and the game’s final two jobs, I must defeat Scylla.

Scylla’s most annoying trait is that she can heal herself at 4,000+ HP a pop, which drags the battle out some. She also casts some powerful spells that can take some party members all the way down from full health.

However, I keep plugging away and healing as needed, and eventually win the fight. Since Matt was approaching job level 99 as a thief, I considered keeping him in that job, but that would prevent him from using any of the forbidden weapons, so I decided to just go the traditional route of using two Ninjas and two Sages.

Ninjas can use any weapons and armor, and Sages can use any kind of magic. I make Matt and Perrin Ninjas and equip them with the best gear I have.

I make Rand and Egwene Sages and I give Rand most of the black magic and summon magic I possess, while giving Egwene the white magic and the leftover summon magic. I made this choice primarily based on who had the highest intelligence stat.

Ragnarok

Finally, the battle for the best weapon in the game, Ragnarok. To win this sword, I must defeat the Guardian. This battle is pretty anticlimatic.

With my ninjas outfitted with two forbidden weapons each, and Rand summoning Bahamut, I win the battle pretty fast. Perrin gets Ragnarok, since Matt already has Masamune and Excalibur.

Eureka Mall

The final room in Eureka contains four chests, which have shurikens and elixirs in them. It also has three vendors.

They sell the most powerful magic, plus some Crystal Gear and shurikens. I buy all the magic I don’t already possess and give it to Rand and Egwene.

I buy a set of Crystal gear for Perrin and then spend the rest of my money on shurikens. I then teleport out of Eureka, save, and quit the game at 13 hours and 20 minutes in.