Dark Souls Return to Lordran: Volume 3
Apr. 1, 2017Dark Souls Return to Lordran: Volume 3
As we approach what we all expect will be the grand finale of the Dark Souls franchise, I return to the roots of the series after a hiatus of several years. Our hero has decided to seek Reah after Petrus “lost” her and just finished gearing up for the task. If you’re ready for the1880’s equivalentof a “Let’s Play” video, then let’s go!
After holifying his Broadsword at Andre’s Hardware and Various Sundries Emporium, DJ Jazzy Jeff sets forth in his search of Reah of Thorolund. Jeff thinks “it all seems so unreal” as he heads for the catacombs beneath the cemetery (gates…by Pantera).
Where he’s immediately assaulted by skeletons. Of course. It seems everyone has a hard time staying “dead” ’round these parts. Spying an incredibly large headstone, Jeff moves closer to see what grand person deserves such a monument. Sadly he discovers that compared to the being buried beneath this stone, it’s actually pretty normal sized. Giant skeletons…grrrrrrrreeeeeeat…
He descends a set of stairs into the darkness. He spies another skeleton and what appears to be a blood red head on fire (by Big Dumb Face) floating near the narrow walk. Nearing the head, it looks into Jeff’s eyes and makes its awful sound. DJ Jazzy Jeff backs away and watches as it explodes, destroying anything foolish enough to be in its way. He proceeds cautiously and the dispatching of skeletons becomes a routine task. He finds a small gentleman in ragged clothes swinging a lantern made from a skull. He launches fireballs at Jeff and is skewered by a holy blade for his insolence. Coulda been friends man. Coulda been friends…
DJ Jazzy Jeff is invaded by a Dark Spirit (dude, if you’re seeing this…awesome handle to come across while playing a From game). Despite the disconcerting red aura of this person, he helps DJ Jazzy Jeff navigate by blocking enemies as they approach. All is well until Jeff hits R1 once more than necessary. He plummets down a hole onto what appears to be a rooftop of a small building buried far beneath the earth. Despite the exhilirating high, Jeff doesn’t have time to study the architecture as he meets the high speed dirt (by Megadeth).
Take 2: DJ Jazzy Jeff restores his humanity and continues his exploration. He finds all sorts ofneat thingsand makes his way down to the rooftop on which he died earlier. A small gap in the roof allows entry into the chamber below. A large, angry looking skeleton with a pickax and sweet beard marches up. Then, as politely as it can, smashes a wall down and asks our hero to leave. DJ Jazzy Jeff bugs him anyway. It turns out he was ablacksmithin life and continues his art in the afterlife. He helps make the holy sword even more holy before Jeff becomes acquainted withbonewheel skeletons. The lunatic undead roll toward him with dizzying speed. Then smash into walls where they’re easily dispatched. At one point, several of them corner him and he narrowly escapes death.
Heading back up to explore further, Jeff finds a series of ledges to drop down onto. He spies the glowing chalk that says a happy helper is ready to go. Noting the person’s claim to be aPaladin, he calls for backup. Spying a Black Knight like those found wandering elsewhere, Jeff and the Paladin (Leeroy by name) elect to fight this formidable foe. Leeroy turns him into paste, because that’s what Leeroy does. Continuing on, the duo jump into what appears to be a giant stone coffin. Inside they find astrange creaturein the middle of some dark rite. As men of the cloth, both Jeff and Leeroy charge. It soon become several creatures, some of which turn out to be decoys. Jeff is steadily whooping the thing’s ass while Leeroy is busy being tricked by the decoys. Finally, Leeroy finds the right one, and this too is turned into paste. Because that’s what Leeroy does.
As DJ Jazzy Jeff moves on, he is greeted with a darkness creeping toward absolute. Oh yeah, askull lanternhad dropped earlier and DJ Jazzy Jeff used it. Speaking of dropping, despite the lantern and knowing the way I still fell off the first coffin slide. WEEEEEEEEEE!!!
Running past giant skeletons (because “DJ Jazzy Jeff” was getting sleepy), Jeff found a bonfire to recoup at. Continuing his search for Reah, he comes across anodd gentlemanwho asks if he’s a cleric. Jeff responds “yes,” because he feels that he is. The odd gentleman invites him to peer at some treasure in a pit below and then boots Jeff’s rear end, making him fall in. This turns out to be alright as we anticlimactically find Reah. She is despondent and warns that her retainers have hollowed. Seeking to protect the maiden fair from further tragedy (by Coal Chamber), Jeff bravely walks into the darkness, skull lantern aloft. He spies the retainers, who rush at him like jealous and thoughtless lunatics. Going for a more “ironic” way to kill them, DJ Jazzy Jeff uses Force to shove them off a cliff. The miracle hits them like a big truck (alsoby Coal Chamber) and it’s hard not to giggle as they are repeatedly blasted to the ground, only to rise and be pushed back again. Despite their best efforts, the miracle is too fast, (they) don’t realize until too late that gravity has taken hold of them. Reah is grateful that their misery has ended, and shown them my mercy (stillCoal Chamber). And when she cries, (Jeff) will cry with her.
Then, for some reason, Jeff just leave her there expecting her to find her own damn way out.
DJ Jazzy Jeff makes his way back to Firelink after a brief encounter; in which he tried to use force on those skellie towers and they did that spinning pimp slap thing right back at him and maybe killed him. And of course we got even with Patches first. Which worked out great because he dropped theCrescent Axewhich is a holy relic of Thorolund. You can bet your sweet rear end that DJ Jazzy Jeff was pretty amped up after finding that (but can’t use it yet).
Petrus seems unaffected by the news of locating Reah. Hoping to see the maiden again, DJ Jazzy Jeff finds her right away in the Undead Parish. Wow, what “luck!” Jeff buys all of her miracles and hopes to someday soon be able to recite Wrath of the Gods. Reah departs without a word. Despite some sadness, Jeff is content with the knowledge he helped her gain a new faith (by Slayer). Her parting message ringing in his ears, “Holy man open up your eyes, to the ways of the world you’ve been so blind.” Realizing what she meant (along with some context clues in her dialogue) it occurs to Jeff that Petrus deliberately abandoned Reah in the Tomb of Giants.
With his next appointment scheduled, Jeff sets off again toward Firelink. Details aren’t necessary, but that **** got gruesome real quick.
With one quest in the books, DJ Jazzy Jeff needs another. Because that’s what holy knights do I suppose. May as well get back to that business with the bells.
That guy at the fire said something about a bell below. Having gone sorta below already to get a green shard, DJ Jazzy Jeff’s “intuition” tells him to continue going that way. As he travels even further down, he is confronted with a maze of tunnels.Slimesare but one resident of this filthy place. It’s not long before DJ finds anROUS. Then many more. And eventually an ROUS to rule them all. Not having any jets of flame from the Fire Swamp handy, these creatures are dispatched with divine steel instead. A group of these rodents are accompanied by afancy dancing man, like the one in the Parish. This foe does his best impression of the original Billy Badass and runs right up to DJ. He is mercilessly slaughtered. The nearby rodents are given insufficient time to mourn his passing.
Further still, are lizard likecreatureswith what appear to be giant eyeballs. They breathe a toxic fog that makes DJ feel all tingly inside but are killed easily enough. Years from now, the second hand smoke from this encounter might cause him health problems, but for today DJ presses on mostly unimpeded.
Finally figuring out this labyrinth of waste (no thanks toHoggle), our hero reaches a walkway overlooking a cavernous room. “Let’s go check out that place” he says to himself. He spies a familiar glowing sign on the floor. Soon thereafter, DJ is greeted by his ol’ buddy Solaire. They perform a sacred high five and traverse the white light they naturally find…since that’s where all the summon signs seem to be.
A gigantic reptilian creature emerges. It’s innards exposed in a gruesome recreation of a mouth that stretches the length of the beast’s body. Are those teeth or ribs? Either way, they look like they’d hurt. It’s health bar identifies it as theGaping Dragon.
The hellish thing turns toward Solaire and bowls him over. And sorta just keeps doing that…
DJ Jazy Jeff cuts off his tail, which turns into anaxfor some reason. Solaire is essentially worthless here. He’s repeatedly knocked around and receiving large chunks of damage. I mean really, he’s ****ing awful in this fight. He dies quickly. Mourning his friend’s death, and also getting greedy, DJ Jazzy Jeff gets stepped on one time more than he shoulda. He ventures to the dragon again, this time saying “the hell with Solaire” and defeats the beast pretty easily.
With surging strength, he recalls that he had the holy relic Crescent Axe from Thorolund in his suspiciously spacious armor pockets. He pulls it out and gives it a few test swings. It feels good. A quick run to the blacksmith (and to a certainkrowfriend for more twinkling titanite) and he now has a fully upgraded Crescent Ax.
Damn. That’s crazy if you think about it. I’m not even to the second bell, I’m following what’s basically a pretty standard path and here I am with maxed out faith weapon already. Disclaimer: Things kinda get silly for awhile after this…
With essentially a perfect weapon for this quest, DJ Jeff finds himself focusing on developing his faith. Through murder and soul absorbing of course. AKA “The foundation of many religions.” I kid, I kid…maybe…
One more aside: Seriously. A maxed out faith weapon, decent armor, well on my way to being able to use Wrath of the Gods. Yeah…
Blighttown should go quick I bet. And yes, I did have a gravity death (two to be precise). With his new found weapon oflegend, he bravely ventures forth. He finds a polite guy withweird armorselling crystalized weapons. He’s pretty inconsequential for this character so whatevs for now.
Entering a place called “Blighttown”via some rough looking ladders, DJ finds a group oflarge, foul smelling beingsthat may have been human at one point. They are helpless under the weight of DJ’s ax. Same goes for thesmaller guysthat like to run up into your face, then stand there and yell. That’s not super effective guys. The “town” is revealed to be little more than a series of rickety scaffolding. Fire breathing dogs appear for some reason. Guys in armor meant to look liketree stumps(terrible camouflage in this “not a forest” location), shoot toxic darts which really suck. They have really good aim and range and harass our hero pretty much all the time. There’s also a uniquewormy thingattached to a hole in the wall. It has almost zero way to harm a player who isn’t reckless. That’s fine I guess.
Finding the bottom of the scaffolding, DJ is ankle deep in poisonous sludge. Large mosquitoes threaten to convince the valiant knight to step awkwardly off ledges. Other bugs lurk below and breathe fire. Giant Slugs show off some mad jumping skills.
The Crescent Axe is as ludicrously overpowered as expected the whole time.
Finding a fire to rest at, DJ continues increasing his belief in the divine. Which is rewarded with his ax becoming even more overpowered. A half naked lady with abag on her headinvades his world and is comically bad at “living.” Spying a way up, DJ finds a large wheel powered entirely by a running fire dog. Weird. Naturally, he found all the good treasure like the fire keeper’s soul and s***. Coming to the top of the structure, DJ once again spies daylight. Narrow ledges lead to a gate that Jeff opens (which is why he went this way first). The other way has azombie dragonthat pukes poison. Well, HALF of a zombie dragon that pukes poison. It’s put out of its misery.
Heading back down to find that bell, a large hill is seen. It appears as if coated by ages of accumulated spider webs. That’sgottabe a good sign!
A glowing sign is naturally right before a gate of white light. It’s the sack woman from before. Assuming this is an apology for attacking earlier, DJ summons her and they enter the light.
Confronting them is…nothing. Then of course a giant enemy that’s half spider andhalf naked ladyshows up and burps lava at them. The sack woman (Mildred) is far more resilient than Solaire was earlier in the chapter. Don’t get me wrong, she gets bowled over repeatedly and offers very little in the way of actual help, but she’s tough as nails. Way to nonchalantly stand in lava there Mildred.
The overhead swing of the Crescent Axe seems to stun the spider woman. So of course DJ Jazzy Jeff spams R2 every chance he gets. Long story short, this fight was…not difficult.
And oh yeah with the souls from all of this, he’s now ready to use Wrath of the Gods.
As the sun sets on another grand quest, we can’t help but wonder…what’s the f’n deal with the damn worms from the eggheads? They hit harder than Quelaag did.
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