6:18PM
I made a terrible mistake.
After defeating Artorias, I thought it might be better to speak to Elizabeth to get more details on the storyline, especially now that an important character had been put down. I found someone praying for him, and gave her his soul. I got her dex weapons! Ah, but that was momentary bliss… for I accidentally hit her afterward.
But at least she’s alive, right? She didn’t turn aggressive either.
After killing some hounds and looting some bodies, I speak with our suspicious friend from earlier, who sounds very amused by the turn of events. How peculiar. I continue my journey back to Elizabeth. I level up at the bonfire, and speak to her. She began to tell me of someone who, like me, arrived into the past. I suspected she was referring to that suspicious man. I took a screenshot…
And then I accidentally killed her.
Halfway through her dialogue.
If only you could see my face right now.
I’ve been double-facepalming at this for the past few minutes and nothing else.
My character is sitting over at the bonfire contemplating her grave error.
They really just let the heavy attack button work during dialogue. I was trying to take a screenshot of what she was saying! AAAAAAAAAH
Damn. Damn, damn, damn! Where am I going to get my lore from now!? And she was so kind… I guess I’ll just have to continue onward, completely direction-less, with no clear ally in sight. Is anyone even going to notice that she’s dead? Oh man, we’re really in uncharted territory now.
Go on. It’s okay. You can laugh.
7:11PM
Checked out the Oolacile Township. The enemies here… well, are more zombie-types, but a little faster, more aggressive. There’s a mage type that shoots a dark orb that deals physical damage, apparently, and it almost feels like cheating since the thing is basically a homing attack. It really hurts. Died a couple times already. I’ve managed to activate an elevator that takes me back to the bonfire for the area, so I took the opportunity to level and such.
Still can’t believe I killed the one mushroom I liked… This is probably why they all hate me, huh?
The next day, 6:19PM…
Manus… Manus…
MANUSSSSSSSSSSS
Okay. Okay. Okay.
As I wrote earlier, I started exploring the Oolacile Township. I came to really, really hate the mages. Along the way I discovered a help prompt next to a wall, mentioning ‘light’. I assume I’m meant to use a spell or something that creates a light source – my video game senses are telling me it’s probably one of the few, if not only, spots in the game where creating light actually causes a path to appear. I’ll come back to this later, I guess, because I’ve got nothing on me.
Venturing deeper, I discovered the Chasm of the Abyss. Giant place with enemies that straight up appear to be Humanities, and… yeah, it’s not hard to figure out this place was designed as a giant humanity grind spot. I’m not going to complain, because I hate dealing with rats. The bigger they are, the worse it is. The Humanities can hurt a lot, but with careful movement, they’re basically harmless. I slapped on that drop rate ring every time I passed by them.
At some point I fell, and a giant ghost cat thing started leading me around. I assume it helped break my fall. I eventually lost sight of it, and found a nice shortcut elevator back up to the surface. I went back down to the chasm, and found the fog gate leading to the DLC’s final boss… Him. Manus is a colossal prick. Yeah, I imagine it’s possible to no damage him. I’m sure there are ways to avoid every attack of his. But this dude was no Artorias. And I don’t mean his difficulty.
Artorias felt like a beautiful work of art. Manus… speaking personally, I found him NO fun to fight whatsoever. I got thrashed, thrashed, and thrashed – but more frustrating than losing, and even more frustrating than the run back to his arena, was just… what the fight was like on its own. I really can’t find the words for my feelings here. I don’t feel like trying today. I’ll also mention the Elizabeth mushroom and its health regen effect felt equally useless for how short it lasted against him.
I’m no quitter, though. I love to overcome insurmountable odds. I can beat Manus, even if I accessed this DLC as soon as it became available. This isn’t even a question, I know what kind of player I am. The real enemy here is my frustration with the fight itself, and that’s easily sorted out by… you know… taking breaks.
So I took one. I also left the arena, because I realised something…
Utsu mentioned NPC Sif, but I hadn’t seen Sif anywhere. There was also a giant dragon flying all over the damn place. Manus is apparently the final boss of this DLC. I was missing something. I neglected to mention this earlier, but throughout my entire trip through the Oolacile Township, I found two weird head carvings apparently made by a ‘Gough’ that would say specific phrases upon being thrown. Bizarre stuff, but I eventually found a key that would lead me to Gough himself, someone who once fought alongside Artorias as one of Gwyn’s knights.
I returned to Gough, but not before realising there was a fake wall in the chasm, and I discovered Sif. I rescued the doggo from the Humanities, and… she just disappeared. I tried searching for her summon sign for ages, but to no avail. I learnt Artorias was her master. Oof. I left to go pay another visit to our giant friend.
For some reason, he finally takes this opportunity to actually talk to me about the damn dragon. I wish he’d done it earlier! He shoots the thing down for me… and it was my job to go over to it and finish the job. And so I did.
I didn’t record the Kalameet fight. I don’t know what to really say about it. I did the fight over until the dragon died. Pretty standard, though the winning battle was a close shave. Gough congratulates me, and gives me… his Greatbow, that is several times larger than me, but somehow becomes much smaller in my own hands?
I finally return to the Manus fight and… oh, the summon sign is in the actual fight arena, oh okay, sure, whatever, okay! Feeling refreshed, I take another couple shots at Manus. As much as I love her, Sif was almost useless. Manus would kick her around a bit and then focus on me for the rest of the damn fight. What the hell, man?
I eventually won, of course. Through a combination of Manus doing whatever Manus wants, Sif sometimes drawing aggro, and me desperately trying to figure out the dodges, I eventually put him down. And you bet I immediately used the ‘Well, What Is It?’ emote. After the fight, I turn around. I see Dusk of Oolacile on the ground. She’s sobbing, or something. I can’t actually talk to her. I get confused. What am I supposed to do now? This is awkward.
I find a bonfire, and warp out, and then warp back in. She’s gone. Gough doesn’t even mention her, just that I have prevailed, or something. That one suspicious dude also had absolutely no new dialogue to share. The knight grieving for Artorias is nowhere to be found. Elizabeth is of course, dead, at the hands of a failed screenshot attempt. I did hear some interesting things from some of the NPCs throughout the quest, but I’ll write about that later instead.
This update ends not with a bang, but a silent bonfire warp out.
