Riding the Rapids
With a renewed sense of purpose, we're ready for some amphibious adventuring. I might have skipped over it in my relief of finally finding my purpose last time, but the Sages told us to head to Mount Gulg, which I believe is in the centre of the easter part of the continent we're on. Accessible only by canoe.
We get in and loop around to the north, and it turns out you can fight in a canoe too! New enemies, three Red Piranhas and a White Croc greet us. This is definitely that next step up in toughness - if not difficulty - because even with one of the Piranhas running away, we still get 2,092 gil and 2,982 EXP. Levelling up should be easy peasy round here.
That is if we survive.
Three Crocodiles and four Hydras greet us next, and they hit pretty hard. I decide to take manual control initially and not even a Blizzara from Glitz is enough to take them out, so we know we've got some tougher cookies here. I decide the Blizzara will have softened them up, so we go for the standard attacking route, and we're rewarded with 3,300 gil and a whopping 6,108 EXP.
I'm thinking that maybe a little bit of grinding here might go in well, as we're nearly at the next level already. I decide to aim for Level 30, and along the way I realise we're getting complacent. Some of these enemies are hitting our squishier party members for nearly 100 damage, and Glitz still only has 296 max HP.
Kaili seems to be taking the brunt of the damage though, and before long they're at critical HP. Before their lead on the death counter goes up, Clair digs into the giant stash of Hi-Potions we now have and keeps them healthy.
With everyone at Level 29, Glitz is next on the chopping block as a White Croc hits him for 144 damage, followed by a Piranha hitting him for another 46, dropping him immediately into critical. Fortunately the fight is over soon after, but we need to be topping up HP regularly round here, despite our sick gains.
We have some more hairy moments, but nothing we can't manage and we reach Level 30 just outside of Mount Gulg. I save and we head towards its base.