Remember the new cave on the Beast Plain? Let's go there. "The Phantom Forest" plays throughout. Shortly after entering, a dog walks up. Interceptor?

So follow the dog, but be careful of the monsters.

On that note, there's not much variety here, just the Toecutter in packs of one or two, and rarely a Gorchimera. The Toecutter is weak against Flame and Wind, while the Gorchimera has no weakness but can be easily neutralized by its vulnerabilities to 'slow', 'sleep', and 'stop'. Gau should Rage Magna Roaders (the brown type, found near the botton of the Rage list) for Level 4 Flare, since both enemies are level 36, or Sprinter or Marchosias (Harpiai) for Aeroga against Toecutters.

A group of thieves makes camp in here. They have some potentially interesting information.

恐竜 (kyouryuu), Japanese for "dinosaur", literally means "fearsome dragon", so the mistranslation is understandable to some extent, but it's particularly unfortunate due to the Eight Dragons being a Thing of Some Importance. And also consider that "dinosaur" itself literally means "fearsome lizard", so yeah. Though that still doesn't explain where the last sentence came from.

There's a Fury Ring for Umaro nearby that boosts his strength, adds some more elemental defenses, and lets him use his allies as weapons, somehow without hurting them in the process. Search around in some unseen passages to find... a chest with a monster inside.

As the name suggests, Death Penalty loves to use instant death attacks, but ironically has no protection against them, or against petrification. Use Break for a quick win, and the Atomic Ray spam that comes if the battle drags on will never become a problem. That's a very good thing, considering that Death Penalty has the highest magic power (55) of any enemy in the game. Sketching or (more often than not) confusing it will yield its normally unused special attack, Dead End, killing it just as dead and making Sketch quite useful for a change. Stealing isn't worth the Potion (common) or High Potion (rare) that it nets, but Death Penalty will always drop the Tiger Fangs, Mash's best general-use weapon.

Thanks to a semi-infamous mixup, this battle uses the incorrect monster formation. This has two effects worthy of note. The immediate one is that you won't earn an LP for winning. The more important one is that this formation cannot appear on the Beast Plain, so you'll never get the Rage for Death Penalty even though it exists, and you can't get potentially unlimited Tiger Fangs by fighting it repeatedly. The Rage is nothing special, though, and you can always steal more Tiger Fangs from Grand Behemoths in the final dungeon if you want, so it's not a total loss.

Find the Ichigeki Blade further in, then see Interceptor standing guard over a familiar wounded figure. If Shadow survived the Mystic Continent, then he's the one here, otherwise Relm is here instead. Use the save point, then continue on for a closer look.

Unfortunately, a large monster takes advantage of the distraction to attack. Honestly, they should have seen that coming. King Behemoth mostly attacks with Blizzara, Blizzaga, and Holy, with Meteor (enemy spell) thrown into the mix at lower health. Meteor is also used as a counter to Holy or Flare, with a glitch causing the next attack after that to provoke a second Meteor counter, so don't cast those spells. Its weaknesses are Flame and Poison, and it absorbs Ice.

There are some interesting odds and ends in the combat script. When afflicted with 'kappa' status, it uses doubled-up (full-power and auto-critical) normal attacks for three rounds, then casts Kappa to cure itself, unless also affected with 'reflect' at that time. Combine 'kappa' on the monster with invisibility on the party to avoid damage, and you're set, especially if you also take advantage of its vulnerabilities to 'slow' and 'stop'.

King Behemoth doesn't like efforts to use 'reflect' status, and will attack with Devilish Claws to remove it.

It won't use that more often than once every three or four turns, but that still means less magic flying at you. It's also incapable of removing 'reflect' from a Reflect Ring, which could prove useful.

Eventually, King Behemoth will fall, but the battle isn't over yet.

More literally, 気配 (kehai) is generally used as a (possibly vague) feeling that someone or something is there, or signs of such presence, sometimes in a sixth sense sort of way. In a situation like this, it could be noises or smells coming from the monster that tip them off to its presence.

A second King Behemoth comes up from behind, this one brown where the first was gray. It's also undead and much more of a physical fighter, and is weak against Flame and Holy, but absorbs Poison. Note the shared weakness if fighting with a Rage. However, this one also has a glaring vulnerability to insteat death attacks, at least the ones that work against undead monsters. Use something like Dejon or the Air Anchor (or just revive it) to end this quickly.

Otherwise, look out for lots of physical attacks, plus some Death, Meteor, and the 'sleep'-inducing Sleeping Gas attack. If someone falls asleep, King Behemoth will follow up on its next turn with a series of four attacks in one turn.

Steal a Murasame (rare) from the gray one. The brown one has nothing to steal, but will drop a Behemoth Suit. The gray one will also drop an item, but it's glitched and will have different possibilities depending on which version of the game you're playing.

The game data indicates that both of them drop a Behemoth Suit, which would give you two, except for the glitch. Basically, the game switches the enemies by switching formations, and has the two monsters in different slots so that you'll get drops from both. The problem is that when it goes to find the items for the gray one, that slot is blank in the current formation, but the game does the lookup anyway using the code for "blank" instead of an actual monster ID, so it gets data from a meaningless (but at least nonrandom) memory location instead of from the correct monster data. The NA SNES versions end up using a Thunder Blade (ThunderBlade) as the common drop and a Jewel Ring as the rare drop. The Japanese SFC version instead gets a Valiant Knife (which was supposed to be unique) as the common drop and a Shinobi Garb as the rare drop. This bug is reportedly fixed in the Playstation and GBA versions.

Also, if you abuse Vanish/Dejon or something similar to kill the gray one in a way that breaks the combat script, the brown one will never appear, which means it won't appear on the Beast Plain, you can't get its Rage, and your source of unlimited Behemoth Suits is gone. However, since this avoids changing the formation, you will at least get the intended Behemoth Suit drop in this case. Funny how one glitch can circumvent another.

And so the party takes Shadow or Relm elsewhere to recover.

Did Shadow have a run-in with Rule 63? No, this is just one of the better-known translation gaffes, thanks in part to how well Japanese (and how poorly English) avoids pronouns where they aren't really necessary. The GBA version apparently does something similar to what I did here, rewording the sentences to avoid directly referring to the wounded person.

Congratulations, Shadow or Relm is now safe from the big bad behemoth and in bed recovering. It's not a peaceful rest, though. Each has a dream of the past...

Note that this line is in present (not past) progressive tense, is said before we see the dream (not after the character wakes), and is made as an undirected remark (not spoken to the character). "You" and "were having" are both wrong here.

"The girl" can also translate as "my daughter" here.

He runs the rest of the way. The dog hesitates, then follows after a last look back.

Stragus looks down, but doesn't answer. The dog gives one last look back, then runs out of the house.

Is it just me, or are those the same event from different viewpoints?

Either way, Interceptor stays by the bed after the dream ends. The others decide to leave.

Come back after a bit for a little more of a response if she's the one injured. Shadow, however, recovers consciousness immediately.

Either way, Interceptor steps forward and barks a few times as if to give reassurance. Head out and come back later, and the patient may have recovered and left.

Interceptor has also left.

Also, Interceptor will be wandering around outside.

One more thing before leaving town.

If only Stragus were here to hear about that...

2-12 "Johnny C Bad" plays here. The Coliseum gets its own section later on with related dialog and useful wagers to make.

Shadow joins, permanently this time, with Interceptor helping protect him as long as the glitchy effects of the Ripple enemy spell don't get to him.

On second thought, one relevant line before leaving:

In addition to the dream after his rescue, Shadow can have four other dreams. These appear in order, one at a time, with a random 50% chance, by resting in nearly any bed at any point with him in the active party. This includes the brief times that he may join the party back in the World of Balance, but seeing any then is unlikely unless recruiting him in Kohlingen, as normal beds are rarely available when he's required.

Anyway, the first dream starts with a black screen, a man in a brown cape, and strange noises. No, the game isn't glitching out. After a few seconds, with more strange sounds, another man appears, this one with spiky hair and an eyepatch. He approaches the first man, who steps back.

Since he's evidently dead, this amounts to telling Clyde to die too. Someone's feeling guilty.

Billy vanishes, leaving Cylde to step forward and look around in confusion. He also disappears, though the noises continue as the dream lasts several seconds longer.

The more coherent second dream takes place in a dark forest with a train in the background.

Billy vanishes, and everything but Clyde fades out. He walks to the middle of the screen. A high-pitched sound plays.

And the dream ends.

Third dream. With the background a blank black screen, the barely visible outline of Clyde approaches another barely visible outline lying on the ground.

The scene lightens enough to show that they're on a riverbank.

Clyde starts to leave, but a high-pitched sound plays as Billy stops him.

Billy (Baram) is the one shaking, not Clyde.

Clyde starts to run away, but a high-pitched sound plays as Billy shouts him to a halt.

A strange noise plays as Clyde runs off, Billy yelling at him.

Remember when Edgar said Shadow was capable of killing his best friend? Looks like he wasn't quite right about that.

Fourth dream. Clyde staggers into a blurry village. A familiar town square comes into focus as he collapses under a tree. A dog comes up to him, then runs off to fetch a woman.

It seems he wasn't coherent enough to quite catch the name of the village, or maybe she was hesistant to say it clearly, but we know where he is, right?

And that's Shadow's backstory, or at least all of it that the game reveals.

3-10 "The Magic House" now plays in town, a track that combines aristocratic with spooky. Once Relm recovers after being saved from the Beast Plain Cave, or immediately upon reaching the World of Ruin if Shadow was in the cave instead, she ends up here, so let's try asking around.

I think we know who that is. Head to the mansion to find the lights off and the staircase to the art gallery actively refusing entry. (Assuming Relm is here now. If she's still in the cave, or was there and has not yet recovered, then the lights will be on and nothing unusual will happen.)

Odd. Maybe this conveniently open book will have some answers.

That sounds ominous, but regardless, a quick check of the lamp turns the lights back on and makes the staircase behave itself. There seems to be nothing but paintings here. Some, though, are more than they appear. Let's start with the portrait of the emperor.

The artist mentioned selling it to Auzer, and also talked about putting something in it. The soldier at the coliseum spoke of talking to the emperor twice. It turns out that the portrait is hiding a letter, found by examining it a second time.

Isn't that what Lock was searching for? Sounds like something worth investigating later on. But let's look at some other paintings.

That's nice, but... wait, how are they attacking? Bring lots of MEvd and kill them with fire. Quickly, or face the horror of Temptation.

Temptation causes 'charmed' status, which resembles 'confused', but with a few important differences. There's no way to have immunity to it, there's no way to cure it, and affected characters (monsters too) appear normal, other than acting suicidally. The Rage for these gets Temptation, too, making Roflesh Meadow the single most abusable one in the game. Fight and kill them before finishing the area, or the battle won't be available.

That was unexpected. Are all the pictures of pretty things hazardous?

Apparently so. Fortunately, the pair of Misty isn't nearly as dangerous as the trio of flowers, and winning reveals a doorway. Enter to find a small but strange dungeon. Most enemies, including the two above, have some kind of animal suit to steal (for Stragus and Relm).

Be especially wary of the Nation Rhythm, which throws pointy objects for massive damage every turn. Hit them with 'confuse', 'sleep', or 'stop' (or 'berserk' if you have nothing more debilitating) to prevent this. Alternately, just give everyone 'transparent' status and try to avoid leaving a Mine Ball or Coeurl Cat alone at any time, since they're the only things in random encounters here that have magic-based attacks, and only use those when no other monsters are alive.

Passing directly in front of the painting of a chair will suck the party in for a forced battle, but only the first time.

The only interesting chest contents in the area are a Moogle Suit (through the left door) and a Ring of the Dead (in an obvious passage behind one wall). The suit makes Stragus or Relm appear as a Moogle in combat as a fun side effect, while the ring has the unusual property of making its wearer effectively undead.

Navigate past the door maze (pick left) and the monster-trapped floating chests, then fight Naracamicie, fairly unremarkable except for its Death Sentence counterattack, in yet another haunted painting to open the way onward.

Interesting how the painting of Maria keeps changing which way she's facing.

Save if desired, then take the righthand door to finally find Auzer (the left door just dumps you out a few rooms earlier). Relm is here too, working on a painting.

The screen flashes.

Battle ensues. You start off facing the painting itself rather than the spirit possessing it.

In the NA release, she's one of several censored enemies, given a thicker and less skillfully drawn extra layer of mist. Even the original showed less than an average bikini, though, so I'm not sure what the big deal was. Apparently, the Playstation port lacks the added mist but it's back again in the GBA port.

As Auzer said, rule #1 of this battle is Do Not Attack The Painting. It does no good (she just comes back to life even if her HP are depleted), and will often provoke a counterattack, which may be the unique Poltergeist attack. Poltergeist sets a special status effect on all characters that resembles 'slip', but seems to inflict damage significantly more often (or maybe repeated uses just stack), is completely unpreventable and incurable, and removes 'regenerate' status even if granted by an accessory. It also has a special casting message:

Instead of attacking, wait, and the evil spirit will switch in. Bring protection against Thunder to better survive its attacks, and also against Ice or Water for Flash Rain later into the battle. Attack with Flame or Holy for best results. The monster and goddess will keep switching places with little warning, so try to make sure not to input an attack unless it's certain to hit the right target. This should go without saying, but avoid anything that makes a character uncontrollable (Umaro, Rage, or Dance) or has a significant delay before striking (Jump or Quetzal's Sonic Dive).

More concretely, the demon hides and exposes the goddess every four times it's attacked (not reset if the goddess appears due to the timer), or whenever the elapsed time since the start of combat reaches a multiple of 40 seconds (unfortunately, this does not mean 40 seconds since it most recently appeared, and it's not unusual for it to show itself and then immediately hide again because of the timer). The demon comes out of hiding after the goddess takes a certain number of turns. At the beginning of combat or after the demon hides in response to attacks, the goddess gets one turn, which has a 33% chance of being Temptation—fortunately, 'charmed' status goes away when the demon comes back out—but will more often just be a normal attack. If the demon hid because of the timer, the goddess instead gets three turns. The first one is again Temptation (33%) or a normal attack (67%), the second may be a normal attack or Kiss of Death (physical, sets 'death sentence') or Lullaby (attempts to set 'sleep' on all characters), and the third may be Kiss of Death (33%) or just a normal attack (67%). Bring Ribbons and Safety Bits if you want.

The demon's actions mix normal attacks with Thundara and Thundaga. After taking 14,640 damage, it changes patterns, cutting back on normal attacks and abandoning Thundara in favor of using Flash Rain almost half the time. It may counter with Thundara during either attack pattern.

You can also kill Chadarnook by draining its magic points, but with 7,600 MP compared to only 30,000 HP, it's not worth the bother. A more interesting unorthodox strategy combines Reflect Rings with Edgar's Weakmaker to give it a weakness against it's own Thunder spells, but Temptation could still cause problems.

Nothing dropped and no items to steal, so just try to kill it quickly and cleanly.

The following unused line might have been intended to appear if the painting ran out of health before the spirit.

It's gone. That's better. And the lights are back on now, too.

It never really came through in the translation how snarky Relm can be.

The following unused line makes me wonder what else you might have gotten here.

Relm refuses to let the others leave without the stone.

So go ahead and take it.

The following lines go unused.

Maybe he came across as a bit too creepy... although he doesn't really seem interested in her except as an artist.

Stick Relm in the party and land the airship next to the tower built on the Serpent's Way near Nikaea.

The (spoilerific thanks to showing the World of Ruin to begin with) map provided with the game documentation calls this the "Fanatics' Tower." However, it has no in-game name, and the word "fanatics" never once appears in the NA version of the game, which calls them the "Cult of Kefka" instead.

3-12 "Fanatics" plays at and inside of the tower. The line of fanatics pacing around the tower includes Stragus, but Relm will have none of that.

Stragus leaps out of formation to land next to Relm, and the music fades out.

Relm seems a bit overwhelmed, but quickly regains her composure. "Relm" starts playing.

Stragus looks shocked. Relm just laughs.

Stragus springs over to the others.

And so Stragus rejoins. I'll cover the tower itself later, after recruiting the final character and collecting more equipment.

If you're not ready to tackle the tower yet but take Mog up with Moruru's Charm to loot treasures, avoid the room at the very top. Approaching the chest there results in a boss battle on the roof that you'll want to be well-prepared for. Contacting the dragon roaming one room will also result in a boss fight.

Before we leave, one of the thieves here has (expensive) information that may prove useful.

The cultists never bother to fill in the gap Stragus left in their line. It's also amusing to try talking to them repeatedly. They won't respond, but will (very) briefly stop moving if disturbed at the right moment. Especially with a turbo controller, it's possible to foul them up quite a bit.