The Dark Souls Nature Trail

Last time, on Diners, Drive-ins, and Dark Souls, we got taken someplace a long, long time ago, in a land far, far away.  Oolacile.  What I know as Lost Oolacile.  A fallen land that no longer exists, because, much like me, it is just too pretty for my blighted world.  Whatever happened to pull me here must have somehow yanked me across time, too.  I’ve followed Dusk to her home.

Look at that.  Sunlight streaming through the trees onto a sacred copse in the woods.  Anor Londo, Firelink Shrine, and the Undead Burg all have some direct sunlight, but it just feels different here.

 

A bunch of humanoid statues that are, admittedly, creepy as all blazes, but hey.  At least these people have some art and culture in them.  That’s beautiful on its own.

And of course, the giant mushroom man, well renowned for its wait WHAT?!

I’ve been pounded by these guys too many times.  Wary, I raise my shield and approach.  The mushroom does nothing.  In fact it doesn’t even have limbs.  Slowly, I lower my guard.  Then it… she… speaks.

If blood and sewage and whatever Frampt’s been eating smells like human to you, I’m not sure I want to see who you hang around with.  Also, how do you tell that when YOU DON’T HAVE A FREAKIN’ NOSE?!

Oh, wait, Dusk’s been talking about me?  She, uh, say anything good?  Like how gorgeous and powerful and totally dating material I am?

“…snatched away by that horrifying primeval human.” she says.  Yeah, she was kidnapped the last time I saw her, too.  Can that girl keep out of distress?  I get that she’s a princess, and getting kidnapped is like, what they do, but that still seems excessive.

Oh fair knight, canst thou pleasest saveth our princess and smiteth the evil dragonst Generica plaguing our landst and liveth literally every classic Heroic Romance ever?  Let me guess.  The princess will be set up to be sacrificed to fuel or satisfy some greater monster.  A false hero will appear, who will seem cooler than me in every way, but ultimately fail in his endeavors.  Then it will be up to me to save the day in which I need to slay the dragon and dispel some lie the princess believes and then she’ll fall in love with me and I’ll hang up my sword and buy a farm.  Eh.  I’ll think about it.

Dicking Around in Dark Souls

Last time, on Aether Plays Dark Souls… you know what? Let’s not talk about last time. That way lies memories I don’t really want to re-live. We’re forward-thinking, here at Lost to the Aether. It’s all about the future! And in my future lies… fighting against a list of possibly-innocent supreme badasses in order to harvest their souls. Erm. Don’t think I’m ready for that just yet. What say we procrastinate a bit, eh?  We’re going to spend this entire entry cleaning up loose ends and doing nothing the ‘main plotline’ wants you to do!  We’re fighting the man on this one!  And not like the actual physical man that we kill all the time but the metaphorical one… you know what?  Forget it.  Let’s go!

Hey, you remember way back in Sen’s Fortress, when I rescued that hat? Well, he’s made his way back to Firelink Shrine! Griggs’s so excited to have his old teacher back! He says the hat master wants to talk to me. I’m popular! This chosen one gig is finally working out in my favor!

The hat offers to teach me sorcery, but then tells me I can’t learn any. Even though Griggs managed to teach me. Are you saying you’re a worse instructor than your own student? You know what? Whatever. Pyromancy’s working out much better for me anyways. No needing to adjust my stats, no worries about education, I just make things burn.

Speaking of burning, I take a warp through the newly restored Firelink bonfire. I’ve still got business in Anor Londo.

I start by chatting up the Firekeeper there. She congratulates me on utterly dominating the City of Lords, as everyone should, and prays that I’ll be able to fulfill Gwynevere’s wish. Then she starts chatting about Seath the Scaleless, one of the beings on my fate-imposed hit list. The dragon born without the scales of immortality who turned against his kind during their war with man. After Geezer Zeus got all sweet on him, Seath retreated to the Duke’s Archives way up in the mountains to research how he might be able to grow those scales. As everyone knows, you can’t do science without going completely mad, and Seath is no exception. His experiments turned wicked, and now nobody who goes to the Archives ever returns. The knightess finishes by warning me against ever going there.

You know what? That actually makes me feel a bit better. Sure, he’s camped out in some evil library from which none are ever seen again, but I guarantee none of those disappeared people were the Best Chosen One. They were probably more like the diet soda version of chosen ones. They look the part, but they’ve got half the substance and they don’t make nearly as good of cocktails. And if I’m going to have to kill someone, I’d much rather kill someone who’s already gone killcrazy. At least that way it’s not technically murder, and my morals survive intact.

Anyways! Two things we came to Anor Londo for. For the first, we head up to the top floor of that big entry hall in front of where Ornstein and Smough were painting the walls in my blood. I head through this broken window, which lets me walk along a decorative outcropping on the outside of this grand structure. I follow the outcropping beyond a fence below, drop down, and…

You remember those giant bows the silver knights used? The ones that fired arrows the size of lances? We’ve got the same artillery, now.

Dark Souls Has Finally Gotten Me

Last time, on A Life of Pain in Dark Souls, we slew the dragon and rescued the damsel, thus proving ourselves every bit the hero we always knew ourselves to be. Seriously, though, three minibosses slain? Only twenty minutes max of shameful weeping? I think I’m actually starting to get good at this game. Can we follow up that rousing success in this next segment? Read on and see.

 

Our next destination is right up this waterfall. That’s right, we’re going to gird our wills, brave the elements, and climb… the nice convenient ladder that’s hidden from this view. But we’re going to do it with great determination! It will be almost as badass as climbing up the waterfall itself!

With the help of a few ladders and bridges, man-made structures sticking out in this otherwise desolate location, we arrive in another portion of the Darkroot Gardens. We’ve got a few choices of directions to go from here; I opt to head deeper into the forest.

 

Nearly immediately, I’m beset by ents. I assume I’ve got this covered, after all, I slaughtered them by the bunch on the way up here. That state of mind persists, up until the first one gives me a bit of a surprise. I hit him, and he doesn’t die! Now, you have to understand, up until now, these guys have been folding like paper. I’ve been killing these guys just by breathing on them. I’m pretty sure I killed one with a stern look once. Yet now I’ve gotten a clean hit on one and he’s still standing? I’m not sure how to process this. These guys have leveled up.

And it’s not just their defense that’s gotten a boost. Their attack power’s a lot more significant as well. In fact, they’re strong enough that their grab move can kill a man outright. Err… not that I’d know that. That happened to a friend of mine.

The ents are all over this forest too, and seem to have a significantly increased zone of awareness, too. I… my friend… has to be very careful about how much attention she’s drawing. She can handle about two at a time reliably, but any more than that, and they can easily overwhelm me. I mean him.