Bloodnight Castle

We set foot in the castle, moving beyond the colossal doors and towards a little stump-like object that rested next to a regular door at the end of the front room.

As we got closer, I could see that something was written on it in big, black ink. The writing only consisted of two words.

They read: ‘Bloodnight Castle’.

There was nothing else it could have meant. That was obviously the name of the castle and, hence, the name of the final mission.

Having read that name, I felt quite satisfied for the very first time with the game and its naming of missions. Though the name itself was quite simple — ‘Blood’, simply meaning that we should expect bloody battles and ‘Night’ implying that it is dark and always night-time up here — it sounded quite cool when it was all put together.

The game had evidently saved itself with this name. If it had failed here, it would have gone on a perfect run of bad names.

As I looked down at it, admiring the name some more, Ren abruptly picked it up and hoisted it over his shoulder, pushing the door open shortly after.

“What are you doing, Ren?”

“Don’t worry. We’ll need to use it for something shortly. You’ll see.”

I wish Ren had just told me what he was going to use it for, but then again, that wasn’t something he liked to do on this entire journey. He seemed to prefer to reveal things only whenever he thought it was necessary.

I followed Ren into the next room, and was immediately met with his hand stopping me from moving further forwards.

“Wait here. Don’t move unless I say so, okay?”

I nodded in response and remained as still as possible. Ren, sign still over his shoulder, began taking very slow and heavy steps forward, counting them as he progressed. “One…two…five…eight…nine…heeeuhhhh!” The sign flew from Ren’s hands as he thrust it forwards into the open space that filled most of the rectangular room.

Without a moment to process what I had just witnessed, any questions I had were answered.

The walls at the side of the room instantly opened, and huge, pointed javelins bolted out from them and began clashing against one another, crushing the air between them. Their collisions exerted pinging noises around the room, forcing me to squint at the eeriness of the sounds.

It all happened in one quick flash; it was hard to understand how one could have survived if they were caught in between that attack.

The firing round was finally over, prompting me to approach Ren and ask what that was all about. But as I stepped forwards, uttering only the first letter of Ren’s name, he held out his hand. “Stop. Stay back there. The flames might catch you if you step any closer.”

My head jolted to the side. “Flames? What fla—”

The large javelins had been replaced by monstrous rays of fire that rose magnificently as the different coloured flames of each side pushed against one another.

The flames continued to rage — for about a whole minute to be exact — before at last subsiding and giving Ren the confidence to inform me that I could advance forward.

If there was one thing this had proved it was that the evil Overlord was certainly doing whatever it could to stop me and Ren from saving Izumi’s sister.

It really wanted to marry her, it seemed.

We passed through the room and came across two doors.

“It’s the left one,” Ren confidently said. I followed him through, and we were met with yet another long room shaped like a rectangle.

The path stretched out before us, two tiles wide, seven tiles long, looking deceptively ordinary. My heart thumped harder with every step Ren took, his calmness only making me more uneasy. I wanted to ask more questions, but I was sure that he would simply tell me to trust him. Yet I couldn’t quite contain my worries.

“What if the trap patterns are different? You know, like the game has been at times.”

Ren glanced back at me, grinning, and said, “Just follow me, and all will be fine. Trust me.”

I forced myself to nod, though my palms were already sweating.

“Just to show you there’s nothing to be afraid of, I’ll always go first, so you have no reason to worry about potentially dying.”

I gave him an uneasy look and, after analysing the situation some more, I guessed what the ‘trap’ consisted of.

I soon realised that my prediction was correct — that being if you stepped on the wrong tile to move forwards, something would drop onto you and kill you.

“Watch,” Ren said, remaining cheerful. The moment his foot pressed against the first tile, a deafening crash rang out — a huge slab of metal plummeted from above, slamming straight onto him.

“Ren!” I screamed, my legs jolting forward before I could even think. My stomach twisted; my chest felt like it had caved in. For a split second, I thought it was over.

Then, the slab shuddered and split open, like paper against a blade. Ren stepped through it, perfectly unharmed and as smiley as ever. He dusted himself off and childishly smiled at me. “Got you,” he chuckled.

“That wasn’t funny,” I snapped, regaining my composure but still trembling slightly.

“Worth it,” Ren said smugly. “The first one’s only a warning. At level forty, there’s no way it could hurt me. Maybe it would've been at level thirty-three, so count yourself lucky.”

“You can be a real bastard sometimes, you know that Ren,” I said as I followed Ren, hopping along the different tiles and eventually making it to the other side.

We then came across three doors, and Ren pretended to think for a second. I thought he had dropped his jokey-attitude, but clearly he hadn’t just yet.

“It’s the left one. Lead the way, Taro,” Ren said with a strikingly straight face.

I took that as a kind of passing of leadership. Of course, I didn’t reject it, so I approached the door. Before I opened it, however, Ren slapped his knee and bellowed. “Whoops. I meant your other left.”

My face dropped, partially enjoying his joking but also being annoyed at his lack of seriousness given the situation. “Isn’t that one of the most tired jokes of all time? I didn’t know someone like you would stoop so low and use it.”

Ren flicked a tear from his eye. “Sorry, I saw my opportunity and took it. I promise I’ll harden up.”

“Alright, let’s just get on with it,” I said.

“Right. This should be the last one. It’s quite simple, in fact. But I want you to do it. I trust you to have remembered our journey so far?”

“What do you mean, Ren? What do I have to do?”

A board lay in front of me, with pictures of different environments laid on a table to its side.

“Look, can’t you tell?”

I could, but I told Ren to explain it to me anyway.

“You basically just have to put these environments in order of the missions we had to do — from beginning to end. I’ll give you a hint, this place is the last one.” Ren giggled again as I shook my head in disapproval.

I walked over to the board and started placing each environment in the correct order. About half-way through, Ren interrupted me, not realising how much he was playing with our lives at that moment. “Make sure not to mess it up. If you do, we’ll die.”

It annoyed me that he was so calm. But then again, his playful calmness was something I took as a compliment. It told me that he was more than certain I was able to recount these events and therefore complete the puzzle flawlessly.

Looking at the pictures reminded me of how much I had changed in such a short amount of time. How I had gone from a fragile, scared weakling to someone who wasn’t afraid to fight and go toe-to-toe with whatever stood in his way.

At the end of it all, at least I could say I was proud of what I had accomplished so far.

Only a small amount of time passed before I completed it.

Without a moment’s thought, the platform we stood on began to rise up, the roof above us opening outwards and letting us through.

“What’s going on, Ren? Where is it taking us?”

“To the final boss’s room, of course.” Ren stretched a little, readjusted his posture and pulled out his sword. “We have two Pink Strawberries left…but we won’t be using them just yet. Remember, this monster is only here to lower our guard and make us think nothing follows.”

Ren stuck out his hand, motioning me to fist bump him. “We can do this, Taro.”

I returned the gesture, repeating his words in the process. “Yeah…we can do this.”

The platform stopped with a roaring crash, leading us to be met with what was sitting in a throne, at least fifty times the size of any I had seen on television.

There sat the so-called final boss.

It was grotesque, drooping with sickly golds of flesh, saliva dripping endlessly from its jagged mouth, while its twisting tail remained still and eyes shut. I wondered if they would ever open, or if sight was unnecessary to the thing that watched us.

It reminded me of a hamster, but I wasn’t quite sure why. The only reason I compared it to a hamster was because of its stubby orange limbs; beyond that, it was impossible to link to anything else I’d ever seen.

The real final boss’s deception was more obvious than I had imagined. As its words sprawled across the room, the monster’s mouth lagged behind.

The final boss made proclamations of undying love, of marriage, how even Izumi’s sister had supposedly confessed her feelings for him and didn’t want saving. The final boss flipped the tale, declaring us as the evil that were trying to strip Izumi’s sister of her happiness.

I tightened my grip on my sword, stopping his pitiful words from continuing. “We’re not believing that for even a second.”

Ren and I stepped forwards, blades igniting brilliantly — my fire bursting, his lightning sparking.

Ren glanced at me, resolved sharper than ever.

“Let’s do this, Taro…for Junpei…and for Izumi.