Dalamar, Paladin Paragon

It's

Garlaige Citadel wasn't as bad as you'd think.

a shame more quests for artifact armor don't go as quickly as Dalamar's. Yesterday's key farming was painless, with everything dropping fast. The scariest bit came when we got the Garliage Citadel coffer key and I accidentally lotted it instead of passing it. My lot was higher than Dalamar's, but Neyla hadn't passed it yet and I had time to correct my mistake. Farming an extra key would've been grounds for suicide.

Nanunanoo came out to help us get through the Banishing Gates. While Dalamar ran around getting cutscenes, we watched XP parties fight bats and beetles while we debated the various incarnations of Batman. Nan stood firmly on the side of Adam West being the best, while I lavished praise on Batman: The Animated Series. Dalamar eventually joined us, and we started our exploration. We had to go through both sets of gates, which meant clearing out the Explosure mobs floating around one of the switches so Dalamar could safely trigger it.

The key hunt I dread most, Beadeaux, was decent enough. The quadav are notoriously stingy about giving up the goods, but we managed to get a key off the first group of mobs clustered around The Mute.

Even Castle Zvahl managed to be a non-pain. It took a little while to locate the chest, and then we were entranced by the idea of taking down Grand Duke Batym. We'd never fought him before and didn't know what we were in for, but it turned out he's a weak-sauce Summoner who died very quickly. I think he used Astral Flow, but we shrugged it off.

I

Dalamar gets a cutscene at the well in Davoi.

was tired from all the world travels, so I humbly suggested we save the orc fight in Davoi for later. Dalamar had limited time today, but it was enough to create a little carnage. He switched over to Black Mage and tried to Sneak-pop the two NMs, but we forgot to tell him to run out of the way as quickly as possible and they both attacked.

The strategy was for me to fight the Paladin because I could use Formless Strikes to get around his Invincible, while Neyla fought the Ranger because his Invincible could take care of its Eagle Eye Shot. There were a few scary moments, but I ground my enemy into powder and waded in to kill the other.

Neyla and I celebrated our victory by jumping into some Campaign battles.

Campaign Excitement! /sleep

Yes,

Neyla and I fight in the mountains again and again and again.

it's sheer excitement in Vana'diel as my Campaign meriting continues for the past week or so. I log on, team up with Neyla to defend dear old Windurst from the Shadow Lord's evil minions, and then log out and do other stuff.

Windurst continues to be the only nation on Quetzalcoatl to keep territory. We lost control of West Sarutabaruta [S] and Fort Karugo-Narugo, but we managed to retake Sauromugue and Meriphatuad. The Sauromugue one surprised me, since I never do fights there and blindly assumed nobody else did. Certainly not in the numbers required to fight off the yagudo advance, anyway.

Some of those Fort battles have been epic. There was one the other day that seemed to go on forever. I cashed in my tags between waves, and it added up to over 10k by the time it was finished. I really couldn't complain about that!

I finally went for an evaluation and earned my Mythril Wings of Service. One more evaluation and I'll have maxed out my Campaign ranking. Beyond that, the only other productive things I've done was take my Puppetmaster out to West Sarutabaruta to bomb the tower as part of the Slaughterhouse III op. It brought me halfway to 23.

Dalamar has been partying his tarutaru butt off. Neyla and I are going to help him get his Paladin AF tomorrow.