Avalon Journal Days 6 and 7 and New Poll

Writing From: Lake Shore, Deep Water, Catacombs, and Ghost Avalon; Avalon

My next step in Avalon was the Lake Shore. In this beautiful new location, a tower stood high over the lake. A Friar from below the hill that the location begins on called out to us. He was on the verge of Death, and begged to be saved by a healing fountain in one form or another that was close by. The fountain, naturally, was dry, and we needed to collect some sort of magic stones from some mobs to reactivate it.

After we'd healing the Friar, and done a few other small quests, we headed through a cave to another Abbey, that was being smoked out. After dousing the flames, another Friar came forth to instruct us on our next path. After a few more minor quests, we'd gathered a special horn from the edge of the lake. For the second time in Avalon, I sounded a horn.

With this, a magic path appeared across the lake. It lead to an odd looking hut... with legs. Inside, I began my challenge against Black Annie to collect her Iron key to the tower.

I made short work of her, located the Black Crow inside, and made my way to the tower, where the guardian seraph signaled me to go in.

Inside, the Lady of the Lake told me that I needed to become a full knight to face the Pendragon, and needed to wield the Sword of Kings to be able to slay him. She showed me a Stone. With a hum of energy, and a swirl of mana, my name appeared on it... I was to save Avalon. The first Shrine was close... the other, not so much. Right outside at the shore, I needed to defeat two types of mobs to gather the sword and shield of the shrine, where I'd meditate shortly after. Now for the final shrine...

The Lady of the Lake opened a pathway to go down into Deep Water. There, I needed to face four bosses for four portal pieces. The direct approach to the final Shrine would require facing the Pendragon, where I'd surely die without the Sword of Kings, and so we needed to sneak in from below.

After defeating the four bosses, I assembled the portal, and teleported in to the Catacombs. This solved one of the location mysteries. I still wasn't clear on the final instance, though. I knew the names Keep of Ganelon, Crystal Caves, and Ghost Avalon, but had no idea which was the final instance.

The catacombs was populated with Deep Dark Goblins and Death Seraphs. Only two creatures meant minimal "street" battles. The Deep Dark Goblins were first... defeating them meant finding the key to a room with the final shrine and King Artorius's body.

After collecting the key, I found the shrine in ruins, the body gone, and the entire tomb destroyed.

In that case, we had a few setbacks. We would need to travel to the other side, through a magic well of Death. The Lady of the Lake had me free and recruit a local soldier in one of the cages here. He instructed me to collect a silver ladle from the Death Seraphs to drink deeply from the Well of Annwn. I did just that, and found a misty pathway around the corner.

In drinking from the well, the mist cleared, and I passed through the tunnel to the Other Side, where I met with the knight, Sir Patrick, once again.

I needed to create a distraction by defeating six little wyrms in this location... they weren't fun battles. Anyway, I then cut a root from a magic tree that I chewed on to keep me from fading off completely. The Other Side solved another part of the puzzle... it was the Crystal Caves, which weren't an instance at all.

I went to meet Sir Patrick further into the caves, and found a tower, spiraling upward a very long ways. I was met with four statues, each of which spit out various lines from their past... King Artorius, telling about Sir Malory's betrayal... Morganthe, a student of Merle's (I predicted this in one of my pre-Avalon posts), defiling Malory's Armor, and attempting to learn an evil spell.... Ambrose, discovering the pathway to various world of the Spiral, and planning to create his own school... And of the very princess that we'd discovered in Dun Dara.

I needed to light a few lanterns to lead our way, and collect four embers from more mobs surrounding the area. After doing this, I visited an Owl overlook, and transformed in Gamma!

I conveniently met two other people ready to tackle the next part of our journey... Ghost Avalon!

Inside, we witnessed the bending and distorting of the King's Armor in a deliberate attempt to ruin him, bit by bit. When they heard the owl(s) outside, they summoned four Disloyal Knights to defeat us. Tough as they were, we won. We reported the problem to the King, and Sir Malory's wrongdoing.

A Knight then arrived at the castle to challenge the King to a duel, but his armor, now ruined, made him unable to fight. Naturally, this unnamed knight was ours to defeat... along with more Disloyal Knights. We humbled him quickly, and earned him his name... Sir Pike Del Lago - the crab who had begun our Avalon journey.

We needed to figure out where Sir Malory was, and learn more about this whole incident. Merle Ambrose was our guy. In his observatory, he has a Spiral map. He recommended that we locate his assistant in his tower to help us. However, his assistant, Young Morganthe, had other plans. 

She was attempting to learn a certain dark spell. The four of us started the battle, where Young Morganthe, having 15,400 health, would have some real fun with us. She's mammoth almost randomly. According to some guides, things like healing, shielding, attacking without killing, and other things, would all trigger mammoths. The thing was, healing sometimes wouldn't trigger anything, some AoEs wouldn't trigger anything, other AoEs would trigger a Mana Burn, Earthquake that hit her, too, as Fire damage, a Power Nova, or a Mammoth... and she loved to use combinations, too, like three mammoths in a row for no apparent reason, or a Mana Burn, Earthquake, Power Nova combo, or sometimes she liked Mammoth, mammoth, Earthquake, Nova, and so on an so forth. It really was quite a mystery. 

We all died at least once, maybe twice, but the battle never stopped. We would flee and walk back every time. Eventually, while one person was still gone, we defeated her. Fortunately, defeating her wasn't part of the main quest. Merle told Morganthe how disappointed he was in her, and instructed us to quickly find and stop Malory. The King knew exactly where he was. He moved aside his throne, revealing a secret passage that led right to him.

After defeating him, the Lady of the Lake appeared as we meditated at the final shrine in the corner of the room. She dubbed us Knights of the Silver Rose, earning us our final Avalon rank. We met her through a portal back to the tower in the Lake Shore. And with that, she told us how to claim the Sword of Kings and defeat the Pendragon... and instructed us to enter the Keep on Ganelon!

In other news, I've put up a new poll! I hope that, in addition to answering, you'll post a comment with suggestions as well!

Thanks for reading, and see you in the Spiral!