Day 5

Game - Final Fantasy, Day 5
Hours Played/Hours Total - 5 hrs / 18-1/2 hrs
Starting Point - Outside the Cavern of Ice.
Current Goal - Find and defeat the remaining Fiends. Figure out what to do next.
What Happened - 5 hours of gameplay but I feel like I didn't accomplish anything!
     So, I began today's journey outside the Cavern of Ice with the feeling of "WHERE DO I GO!?" This feeling continued on for quite a while until I finally sneaked a peak at a guide trying to figure out where I needed to go. Turns out I went by it several times and never realized it. I had to head south of Crescent Lake along the river to find a desert. (I looked up and found out the name is Ryukahn Desert.) It was the resting place of the airship (Wooo!). After a small and simple cutscene, I was rewarded with my very own airship. I immediately took it for a spin around the world. So glad that I can finally get anywhere I want without having to worry about ocean, but now I get the NEW problem. The airship can only land in flat fields of just grass. I realize that's fairly realistic to how you'd have to land just about any aircraft, but it really brought me down to realize the airship just did what other items did...opened up slightly more options.
     Still, with the ship in hand, my exploration of the rest of the world began! I flew to all the continents and was very discouraged when I initially found no way to land. However, I finally found one new town I could get to. Although it took some time to find, it was pretty easy and only required my having the airship. It was a town in the middle of some mountains called Gaia. Really not a lot do do here...or any town for that matter. The weapon shop only had a weapon called Cat's Claw. Thankfully, the armor shop seemed much more fruitful. I bought Ruby Armlet's for most and Protect Ring's for all. The Protect Ring...protects from death, which should prove useful against jerks with the Death/Kill spell. All the magic shops only contained spells I couldn't learn yet, so that's all I had shopping-wise for the moment. Some guy mentioned a rumor about needing a fairy to collect something called Oxyale. Having no idea for the moment how that'd be useful, I went ahead and left Gaia for now.
     From some prior experience, I already knew I was needing to locate the dragon king Bahamut to get class upgrades for everybody. I guess I just barely missed the island locations with their holes when exploring. Upon my re-searching of everything, I spotted the islands and started exploration! Each island had like 1-2 holes on it leading to more dragon communities. After several hole investigations, I finally happened upon the one that lead me to Bahamut. (The others had stuff, but most of it wasn't that great.) Upon approaching Bahamut, he tells you that he will grant you a great power if you go and complete the trial at the Citadel of Trials. I already know what the great power is, and boy am I ready for it! I took off towards the location of what I believed to be the Citadel. Unfortunately for me, I couldn't get up there with my airship. I had to return back to the port near Crescent Lake to get my boat and then have the pleasure of backtracking all the way back there. One long round trip later, I am arriving at the Citadel.
     You arrive at the Citadel and are greeted by an old man who says something I don't really recall. Yeah, I know that's not very descriptive, but it wasn't really very important. Simply put, he just told me to sit on the throne in the corner when I was ready to take the trial. The throne transports you to the second floor of the Citadel, and so the trial begins...Turns out that a "trial" means running around a bunch of rooms hitting random teleporters.  If you hit the wrong one, you go back a room or return to the start. It can be very frustrating if you forget which one you hit or just plain hit the wrong one every time (couple spots have more than two ways). Several stupid mistakes on my part later, I managed to get through the second floor of the Citadel. Good thing for me, the 3rd floor is just a small walk about until you hit a grouping of chests. You find the final chest by another throne, and it contains the great and powerful...rat tail. You go all this way for a rat tail. Regardless, I left the citadel and returned to Bahamut. He takes the rat tail (claiming it is a representation of your bravery and power) and grants your group some awesome class changes.
     For my group this did the following...

• Fighter -> Knight (Gains more awesomeness and ability to cast some white magic)
• Black Mage -> Black Wizard (Opens up some more spells for him, mostly just a costume change outside of that)
• Thief -> Ninja (Probably the greatest change look-wise but also allows him to use black magic and opens up all the weapons for him to use)
• Red Mage -> Red Wizard (Opens up more weapons, armor, and spells for him to use. Doesn't open up everything but it is still a better selection.)

The class change also gave everybody some form of a new look, and the new looks are generally pretty awesome. That aside, I was very glad to have my new character classes so I began a trip to all the old cities. Why? It wasn't to show them off obviously. I just had to backtrack to all of them so I could get my characters with new magic abilities their spells as well as replacing old spells that were previously unavailable to my mages. Of course, this whole trip dried my rather large gil account (I had over 200,000 gil at one point). With my shopping trip all done, I started again towards my quest of saving the world, but of course, I was again stuck with a question of what to do. With some luck, I found another city I could get access to and headed for that.
     The newest city I found was the seaside town of Onrac. Talked to everybody there with very little idea of what to go with. One guy mentioned something about a jewel that would translate stuff. One girl mentioned a caravan in the nearby desert. Those proved useless for the moment, but a couple people down by the water finally gave me something to work with. Mentioned something about a hidden cave underneath a nearby waterfall. Canoe time once again! A small trip up the river later...and we're in the Waterfall Cave! Not too much going on here, there is really only monsters located here. Some time later, I entered a room containing 4 chests and...a robot. The chests didn't really contain anything new, but the robot was glad to finally meet you. Claimed he had been waiting for you and was to give you THIS (this being something called Warp Cube). With the Warp Cube in hand, he mentioned an ancient flying city and something else.After telling you this, he immediately becomes fried or something. He just wizzzs and brrrs after that. With my new Teleport spell, I didn't have to do a bunch of backtracking out of the cave. I simply magic-ed out.
     With the Warp Cube in hand, I returned to Onrac to discover that...it does nothing for me. Disappointing in myself, I decided to check out the desert caravan thing. Once I reached the desert on this continent, I became clueless of where to go. She mentioned something about a forest, but I didn't find squat there. I broke my rule of guide-looking again to find out...I should have walked over some squares that were like a few spots away from where I checked. You walk into the caravan and talk to the guy (turns out it's a shop) who offers to sell you a bottled fairy for 40,000 gil. Seriously, that is a very steep price point. Luckily I had just enough on hand to buy it up. Hmmmm, fairy in a bottle...fairies get you Oxyale...I don't know what that does, but I suppose I will need it. Went to Onrac with the bottled fairy and....nothing, so I tried the same at Gaia (considering that's where I had the rumor). That turned out to be the correct choice. As soon as you walk in, your characters release the fairy, and the fairy flies off...Whaaat? Not 100% sure of what to do, I looked around town and found a backwards crazy path that led to the fairy nearby a spring. It thanks you for releasing it and gets some Oxyale for you.
     After handing over the Oxyale, the fairy tells you all about how Oxyale will provide oxygen while in water. Putting this and several other facts together, I immediately set air-sail for Onrac again. Upon arrive in Onrac, I go over to the seaside spot to talk to the person though. Upon seeing the Oxyale I have on hand, she tells me to jump in the barrel thing she has so she can take you to the underwater shrine. I believe she was a mermaid...Moving on. One underwater travel cutscene later, you are getting out of the barrel into the sunken shrine. Considering the five hours I put in, I decided to save here and call it quits for the day.

Ending Point - Inside the Sunken Shrine.
Levels Achieved - 5 levels earned. Currently level 38.

Goals Accomplished -Obtained an airship. Found the Dragon King Bahamut. Completed the Citadel of Trials and obtained the Rat Tail. Gave the Rat Tail to Bahamut and was rewarded upgraded classes. Found the city of Onrac. Traveled to the Waterfall Cavern and received the Warp Cube from a robot. Purchased a fairy in a bottle from a guy in the desert (..kinda strange). Freed the fairy who got me some Oxyale. Used the Oxyale to travel to the bottom of the ocean to the Sunken Shrine.
Next Goals - Explore the Sunken Shrine and defeat the Fiend that is located there. Find the final Fiend and dungeon after that.

~Side Note~
I apologize for the long-windedness of my posts. Final Fantasy 1 is pretty straightforward. Even if you only play a while, as long as you know where to go, you can accomplish quite a bit every time. Hope to get some more game for it in on Thursday.

~May the Crystals Guide Me~