Chapter 17: Mesa Island, Autumn Hills and Songshroom Marsh

Checklist

Landing on Mesa Island

1. Sail northeast to Mesa Island and dock on its south shore. There’s only one place to go; walk to it and continue northwest to trigger the scenes. The giant stone face eventually lets you onto the island.
2. Climb the cliff to reach the island’s world map.

3. Your first destination is Autumn Hills.

Autumn Hills

1. Skip the tree trunk at first and pick up the Honey and Berries nearby. Then return and use the trees and your Graplou to reach the first fight.

2. Tocks roll straight into you — easy to block. When they charge, they fire quills at each party member one by one, so block each hit separately.
3. Head right. Before following the main route, try the lower path: it stops short at a chest holding Oaken Armor, which suits Valere or Zale.
4. Back on the main path, cross the platforms and keep going right past the trees and rocks. The Grassassin jabs with its leaves; its charged move hits the whole party, again one block per character.
5. At the next stump, grapple across to the one after it. Drop down for two pots of Honey, then grapple back via the first stump and continue right to a light puzzle.
6. The light puzzle:
   1. Blow the leaves away to uncover two moon and two sun symbols.
   2. You only get two matches before it vanishes, so pair the moons first, then the suns.
   3. Reward: Arcane Moons, a new combo for Valere and Resh’an.
7. Press the switch to cross, beat the mixed group of Tocks and Grassassins, and go into the cave. A merchant is waiting at the bottom.

The stumps and the big tree

1. Climb the tree to leave the cave and drop to the lower ground. Grab the Honey, win the fight ahead and look around: a chest sits to the south, and a movable wooden stump sits to the northeast.
2. Use the Mistral Bracelet to push that stump south, then left. It sets up the route to the chest.
3. Reaching chest 2:
   1. Return west and get up on the stump.
   2. Grapple right, then southeast, and knock the ladder down for later.
   3. Cross on the stump you pushed and open the chest: Maple Cork, a weapon for Resh’an.
4. Hop down and shove the stump into the centre; standing on it gets you over to the east side. Up the ladder, collect the Honey along the way and begin scaling the tall tree.
5. Grapple left, then grapple upwards from the next tree — don’t just walk off the edge. Take the upper climbing route to a half-hidden chest with a Rainbow Conch, then come down and continue right.

The whirlpools and the clifftop

1. Through the wide cave mouth is a large fight with several Grassassins and Tocks. Heal first; Serai’s turn delays or any hit-all skills thin the group quickly.
2. Dive down the whirlpool for Prawns and follow the underwater path. You can’t miss the chest in the next room: Recipe: Parfait.
3. Keep riding the currents until the path climbs. Just before you leave the water you can collect three Prawns in a row. To the left, kick down a ladder — it turns that long detour into a shortcut.
4. Carry on east over platforms and through a fight; Berries wait after it and again at the far end. Then scale the pole in the middle, leap off on its west side, hook back east with the Graplou and walk out through the wide cave mouth.
5. The cave only goes one way. Beat the three Tocks on the way and exit on the right.
6. Clear the enemies on this screen as you go right and start climbing the cliff. At the top there’s a camp and a save point, plus Berries to the right. Rest and save before the door.
7. After an odd messenger, blow the loose leaves into one pile and advance time to midnight. When the pile glows, the boss wakes up.

Boss: Leaf Monster

1. While it wears its leaves the Leaf Monster takes little or no damage, so don’t waste big skills on it then.
2. Use the covered turns to heal and build combo points. As soon as Throw Leaves strips it, spend your strongest skills and your best combo.
3. Those are its only two moves and neither hits the whole party, so steady healing is all the defence you need.
4. After the fight the party leaves on its own; someone is watching from the shadows. A long run of backstory scenes follows.

Lake Turquoise (fishing)

1. Past Autumn Hills, Lake Turquoise is a fishing spot and nothing else: no merchant and no produce.
2. Its fish are the Clockwork Crab, Fluorescent Piranha, Swordfish and Ninja Starfish. None of them puts up much of a fight. The fishing page tracks every fish in the game.

Bamboo Creek

1. Before the marsh, visit Bamboo Creek to the northeast. It’s a single small screen with two chests: the Bamboo Slicer, which Zale should equip at once, and a Rainbow Conch in the water.

2. Leave and head south into Songshroom Marsh.

Songshroom Marsh

1. Go south first for three Bell Peppers, then come back and head right. A short detour north leads to a save point and a camp.
2. Follow the marsh path south. The patch on the left has Mushrooms; the first fight is to the right.
3. Fungtoises either toss a bomb that goes off a moment after it lands or ram you with their shell. Both blocks need slightly late timing.
4. Continue right along the walkways. Where the path breaks, a ring lets you grapple over the gap.
5. The next fight brings the Shroomy Shroomy Knight. Its sword swing is easy to read. Its charged move sends a line of mushrooms under one character, and one bursts after a short wait — block at the burst.
6. Keep heading east, then use a grapple ring going north; that branch stops at a chest holding a Leaf Cape.
7. Continue right, shimmy over to the wooden platform and go down. Head south onto new ground, ride the platform right and win the small fight.
8. The rotating post:
   1. Press the switch to the northeast to raise a grappling post.
   2. Hook onto it and it carries you clockwise round the area.
   3. When the block to the south is in reach, push it with the Mistral Bracelet, drop onto it and continue right.
9. Collect the three Lettuces growing a little further north, then walk east to the house.

The guards’ house

1. A guard bolts as you walk in. Take Maple Syrup x6 from the picnic basket and follow the guard.

2. In the big room, attack the guard: you fight four of them, good experience.
3. Hook onto the post on the west side and climb up; a chest up there holds Obsidian Ore x3.
4. The exit east is still shut. Climb back down and drop through the hole on the east side.
5. The basement:
   1. Ropes on the wall lead back up, but first head south and bounce across on the mushrooms (note the chest you pass).
   2. Blow both blocks on the right out of the way to uncover a switch, press it, then climb back up the ropes.
   3. Go left and jump into the pit without grappling. You land beside the chest with the Spirit of Ninja.
6. Climb back up and grapple higher to the last switch, which unlocks the exit. Leave the house.

The time mushrooms

1. The next area has a time glyph and odd blue mushrooms. First follow the southeast path for Mushrooms, then come back and set the time to midnight: the mushrooms turn into bounce pads. Bounce your way right.
2. After the fight the path splits. The gap on the right is too wide for now, so go southwest.
3. The sun-and-moon mushroom puzzle:
   1. Switch to day so the sun mushrooms open.
   2. Use the light to raise or lower each one so you can hop from mushroom to mushroom.
   3. At the end, make it night and launch yourself left off a moon mushroom.
4. Follow the path south. Climb down the vines first for Mushrooms, then come back up and grapple right — the landing drops you straight into a fight.
5. Go south/southeast to the vines that lead out (more Mushrooms to the right). The switch to the north extends the path overhead; reach it with the Graplou and the ladder beside it, then carry on right.
6. You pass a gate to the south that won’t open yet. Keep going north until you reach a house and meet Yomara.

Yomara’s house

1. After the scenes Yomara invites you in. Her house has a save point and a fire, she runs a shop, and she gives you Yomara’s Key.

2. Outside, walk clockwise round the house for a chest with a Rainbow Conch. The grounds also give four Onions, two Potatoes, three Grains and two Berries.
3. Go back south and open the locked gate with Yomara’s Key.

To the fort

1. Clear the fight south of the gate, then walk due east: a chest there has Question Pack #5.

2. Continue south to a plant that lifts you up. From there climb north up a couple of vine walls, go right and kick down a ladder.
3. Descend and duck into the northwest cave. Once its enemies are down, gather the Mushrooms on the west side; the chest on the east side holds Shroomy Shivs, a weapon for Serai.
4. Back outside, kick down another ladder as you go south. You reach a beam you balance across, where the path forks.
5. Take the right branch first. It ends in a cave with a fight; at the back is a scroll, and Garl and Resh’an learn Venom Bomb.
6. Back at the fork, go north — daylight raises the mushroom there. Inside the next cave, step onto the east platform and change the light so the mushrooms rise and sink, lifting you step by step to the exit up top.
7. There are no fights for a while. Follow the linear path right to a huge cave with a fort inside.
8. Ignore the big staircase. From the lower right, grapple up and beat the soldiers training in the middle. Then use the switch to the northwest and the one to the northeast to extend the stair walkway, and leave on the right.
9. Past the fort stands a castle full of gears and cogs; it’s covered in Chapter 18.