Final Fantasy VI Walkthrough
Written by Djibriel
Contributor
2.28: Through the Secret Door
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Enemies: Coeurl Cat, Crusher, Blade Dancer, Caladruis
Party: Optional: Terra, Cyan, Shadow, Edgar, Sabin, Celes, Setzer, Mog, Gau, Umaro
Tabby Suit steal, and they attack physically. Due to a bug, they may use Fire Ball when alone (this was never the intention; Fire Ball was supposed to be a rare counter). Normally it just attacks with Battle and !Pounce. Its name might ring bells of that nasty Fidor Special, but Coeurl Cat's !Pounce is insignificant (Battle * 1.5) and shouldn't be feared.Crushers look unassuming. Fact of the matter is, they're really kind of not. 2095 HP isn't that unassuming, !Direct Hit (Battle * 5) isn't very unassuming, and the Lifeshaver attack it uses when alone certainly isn't unassuming. It has a common Super Ball steal which makes it the only random encounter enemy here that doesn't have an animal suit for stealing. Kill it with fire; if you brought Gau, his Rage (
Lv. 4 Flare) can really put a dent in their hides.Blade Dancer is supposed to be a magician of some kind; with a stellar (for monsters) Magic Power of 30 and up to three spells in its Control menu (
Drain, 
Osmose, and Fira) it seems likely that she will also attack magically, right? Wrong. She attacks with Throwing Dirks. You may still remember the last time you met an opponent with this ability; it was Dadaluma, who was obscenely strong. You should survive the weaker Dirks, but the stronger ones (the strongest one being the 
Assassin's Dagger) can do up to 1750 worth of damage, and remember that most throwing items employ non-elemental (Air Knife is Wind-elemental so 
Thunder Shield wearers and Minerva Bustier wearers take no damage from it), barrier-piercing, Row-ignoring, and unblockable damage. The Image status doesn't help, and 
Golem can't catch the flying blades; only the Clear status can allow you to avoid the attacks of Blade Dancer. In the first round, she'll throw a Dagger or Mythril Knife, followed by a Mythril Knife or Main Gauche, then a Air Knife or Thief's Knife, and finally a Thief's Knife or Assassin's Dagger. Should she still be living, the cycle will then repeat. Also, she counters any damage done to her with !Red Dance, which drains very little HP. She has a rare Moogle Suit steal too. Ways to cripple her include Berserk, Confuse, Sleep, and Stop. and Cait Sith's Cat Rain help tremendously.Caladruis are the strongest of all small birds. With only 885 HP and a boring petrification attack (!Beak) to their name, Caladruis are pretty worthless. If for some reason you have trouble killing them in one shot, Fire is their weakness (as it is of all small birds). They have a rare
Chocobo Suit steal, befitting of their feathered nature.Overall strategy here is simple yet again: have everybody under the influence of Clear, and don't leave Coeurl Cat and Crusher enemies alone. Invincibility is nice.
As soon as you've descended the stairs, you will find more paintings. That's just great. These don't seem so threatening though; how could you be attacked by a painting of a door or a chair? But the joke's on you... If you get too close to the painting of the chair, the painting will suck you in, onto the chair, where you'll be attacked by a previously absent old lady. The old lady turns out to be a Blade Dancer accompanied by her four cats. How's that for a stereotype? If you smack her around, she'll take her place on the chair and leave you alone. If you leave and re-enter the room, it'll just be a harmless painting of a chair again.
Two doors await you upon continuing forward. The left one leads to a chest containing a
Moogle Suit! The Moogle Suit is just another animal suit, stronger than the Chocobo Suit but weaker than the Nutkin Suit. It nullifies Poison though, and gives a nice +5 on Magic Power. The best part, however, is the fact that it changes the in-battle sprite of the wearer into that of a Moogle, which is totally sweet.The right door takes you to...three more doors. Nice. First, make sure you go around the doors and grab the hidden
Lich Ring that lies there. The Lich Ring is a Relic that makes its wearer undead. This basically means that healing spells will hurt and the Death spells and the eventual effect of the Doom status will restore HP back to full. It can make for a nice combo if the equipped also has a weapon with X-type Instant Death; he or she can always restore his/her own HP back to full with one swing of a blade. Anyway, among the three doors, you'll want to pick the far left one. If you enter one of the others, you'll find yourself being thrown out of the door painting you saw earlier. If you've completed this dungeon, you won't even be able to enter the other two doors; they'll just be locked.Just continue from this point, and don't wonder where you are. It doesn't make sense. When you enter a door, you'll suddenly find yourself in a new area with...floating chests. If you stand on the shadow of the floating chests, they'll come down and you'll be attacked; in every instance, it'll be a single Blade Dancer and four Coeurl Cats. What you actually receive from these chests after the battle will be different from what the game says:
What it says: 2000 GP, Hi-Potion, Hi-Ether, Remedy
What it is: 293 GP, Potion, Ether, Gold Needle
If you're done toying around with the floating chests and gawking at the painting of Maria that appears to change every time you look at it, go examine the picture of the battle armor; it will be another battle, with a creature called Still Life. Still Life pretends to be a semi-boss, but is not. It looks very weird, which is pretty much the most it's got going for itself; it appears to be a cloud of smoke with green lips that comes from behind a painting. It has four attacks up its proverbial sleeve: Battle, !Bane Kiss (sets Poison), Lullaby (a multi-target Sleep-inducing attack that's admittedly annoying), and
Doom, which Still Life uses to counter every blow he takes. Go all out with strong attacks against him; Phantom Rush, 
Flame Scrolls, Tri-Dazer, you know what hurts. He has a rare Steal, the Relic that turns Relm's Sketch ability into Control. You'll be able to meet Still Life on the Veldt, so you'll be able to Steal one later if you want to. Just pound him now, he doesn't have enough HP to make Doom a nuisance.Once Still Life has been defeated, a door will appear. The door, as you've become accustomed to by now, leads to more doors. Use the Save Point to your advantage and take the door to the right; the door to the left will throw you out of a door somewhere in a wall you saw earlier.
You've finally found Owzer now, but he's changed quite a bit; he's changed from your average aristocratic pretty boy into a coughing blob of a man who looks surprisingly similar to Jabba the Hutt. Or any other Hutt, I guess they're all alike.
Another theory states that the scholar-type guy you meet in the WoB isn't Owzer at all, and that Owzer always was a generally inhuman fat blob with a frogface for no apparant reason. Who apparantly lives somewhere in his house where other people can't reach him and despite his wheezing, sickly appearance went out of the house on a fairly regular basis to locate artists. It's not my theory, so I may sound slightly subjective here...then again, it is a silly theory.
When Owzer came across another piece of Magicite in the Auction House, he bought it and felt the irresistible urge to obtain a painting of the Esper therein contained. The large painting of the Esper
Lakshmi created by Relm came alive, like all of her artwork, but with an added problem this time; the demon Chadarnook (Phantasm) arrived, enticed by the magic of the Magicite and the painting. He possessed the living Starlet painting and started to exert an evil influence over all of Relm's paintings, the reality within Owzer's Mansion and finally Owzer himself.Relm, by the way, is still painting the painting; it's not quite done yet, as you'll learn later. Regardless, it's time to remove the evil demon Chadarnook (Phantasm) from the living Starlet painting to save the life of Owzer so you can take Relm with you. Owzer begs you to keep the Starlet painting intact. Whatever.
Before you talk to him, equip
Thunder Shields on as many characters as possible. Characters without the Minerva Bustier take priority, as the Minerva Bustier bustier nullifies the Lightning element (the one that concerns us here). The Force Shield and Force Armor both halve damage done by this element, and Umaro's Berserker Ring nullifies it entirely, even though that furry muscle package is quite useless in this battle. Protection from Water and Ice is also nice, as Flash Rain may appear in the next battle, although Lightning protection should take priority. The Tortoise Shield, 
Saucer, Reed Cloak, and Snow Scarf allow you to absorb the attack in question, while the Minerva Bustier bustier also nullifies it. It's a real dang shame Umaro's uncontrollable nature is, in fact, uncontrollable by nature, as the combination of his inherent Snow Scarf and the Berserker Ring really really would've taken care of the majority of the opponents' attacks.Chadarnook (Goddess) .png "Chadarnook (Goddess)") Bestiary #319 |
Type |
Level |
HP |
MP |
Gil |
EXP |
None | 41 | 30000 | 7600 | 0 | 0 | |
Strength |
Magic Atk. |
Evasion |
Defense |
Mag. Def. |
Mag. Evade |
|
18 | 10 | 0 | 135 | 130 | 0 | |
Stolen Items |
Dropped Items |
|||||
None | None | |||||
Status Immunities | Elemental Immunities | |||||
         | None | |||||
Elemental Absorb | Elemental Weakness | |||||
 |   | |||||
Lores | Command Immunities | |||||
None | Control | |||||
Chadarnook (Phantasm) .png "Chadarnook (Phantasm)") Bestiary #319 |
Type |
Level |
HP |
MP |
Gil |
EXP |
None | 37 | 56000 | 9400 | 0 | 0 | |
Strength |
Magic Atk. |
Evasion |
Defense |
Mag. Def. |
Mag. Evade |
|
13 | 10 | 0 | 140 | 150 | 0 | |
Stolen Items |
Dropped Items |
|||||
None | None | |||||
Status Immunities | Elemental Immunities | |||||
| None | |||||
Elemental Absorb | Elemental Weakness | |||||
 | | |||||
Lores | Command Immunities | |||||
None | Control | |||||
Strategy | ||||||
Interesting trivia: the Japanese game showed much more skin on the Chadarnook (Goddess) image. Nothing horrifying and ungodly like any kind of ladyparts, but still, more skin. Anyway, here's an odd encounter. It's a living painting of the Esper Lakshmi, possessed by the demon Chadarnook. You already knew that. Even if you don't care about art in general or Owzer's pathetic pleas, there really isn't any point to damaging the painting; as soon as Chadarnook (Phantasm) is exorcized, it won't be a threat anymore. So, the strategy is clear to us; wait until Chadarnook (Phantasm) shows its face, and hurt it until it dies. We've been doing an awful lot of hurting so far, so we should be well prepared. You'll start out facing the Goddess painting. It'll use either Battle or the dreaded, blasted Entice attack. Fortunately, the effects of Entice are undone whenever your opponent changes, so it's not as much a bother as it could have been in this specific case. After that first turn, the demon will reveal itself.Chadarnook attacks with Lightning-elemental spells ( Thundara and Thundaga) and the confusing Flash Rain; sparkly as it may look, Flash Rain is actually Ice- and Water- elemental and has nothing to do with Lightning. The demon won't use Flash Rain until it starts getting weaker though: when it hits 15360 HP (after taking 14640 HP worth of damage, in other words), to be precise. The demon Chadarnook will always hide when he has been damaged five times, as well as after 40 seconds. Unfortunately, (and possibly unintentionally), it seems that the painting's timer is also used when Chadarnook checks his 40 seconds, so if you faced Chadarnook for 35 seconds and the monster changes, Chadarnook will only be there for five seconds before returning. This is particularly frustrating, especially if you'd just finished putting in all your commands as soon as Chadarnook appeared, leaving you to attack the Goddess a few times in a row. Speaking of which, attacking the Goddess is bad news. Not only is it pointless (as soon as you deplete her HP, she'll just regenerate - she's immortal), it's rather dangerous, as she has a mean counter. 33% Battle, 33% not doing anything, and 33% Poltergeist.Poltergeist is a multi-target attack that sets the super-duper-special HP Leak status on a target, which can only be seen in this battle. It's the same as Seizure, only it's much more dangerous because it isn't Seizure. This means you can't protect from it with Relics, you can't override it by setting Regen, and you can't cure it in any way. As soon as HP Leak is set, any current Regen status (even if it's from a Angel Ring or Miracle Shoes) will be removed. Trying to set the Regen status on a character with the  Regen spell or Kirin's Life Guard attack will accomplish nothing. All in all, the constantly dropping HP gets annoying quickly, even dangerous if you don't watch your party's HP. Don't be afraid to spend some turns healing even when it isn't immediately necessary. Chadarnook (Goddess), by the way, will also attack normally after her first appearance; her arsenal consists of Battle, !Last Kiss (sets Doom), the dreaded Entice, and the surprisingly crippling Lullaby, which (as you know) sets Sleep on all characters.So what to do? You should be covered in equipment that protects against the Phantasm's Lightning-elemental spells and possibly against that Flash Rain attack too. Patiently wait out the first turn against the Chadarnook (Goddess) picture, then quickly throw whatever you have when the demon appears. The monster is extremely weak to Fire-elemental and Holy-elemental spells, as it has both a weakness to the element and a Magic Defense that really isn't all that stellar. Terra and Celes's Fira and (preferably) Firaga spells will really hurt Chadarnook (Phantasm) (Firaga takes priority over Holy, too), but keep in mind that, because Chadarnook (Phantasm) absorbs Lightning-elemental spells, Valigarmanda's Tri-Disaster will be absorbed. Shadow's Flame Scrolls should be boosted by Hero's Rings and Earring to ensure a lot of damage, although it should be noted that the much more expensive  Flametongues will hurt considerably more. Setzer should throw his  Fixed Dice around if possible; if not, Fira, Holy, and Firaga take priority over the Heiji's Jitte-induced GP Rain. Sabin should stick to Phantom Rush regardless of his spell selection, whereas Edgar is probably better off sticking to  Drill unless you're really sure that when he lands from a Dragon Horn Jump, he'll be landing on the demon (in which case, with the  Holy Lance, he'll be doing a massive amount of damage). The same really goes for Mog: his Dances are useless, as he will also attack the Chadarnook (Goddess) painting when he's in a trance. Stick to spells if you don't want to risk Jump attacks (or just plain don't have the right equipment). Cyan is horrible in this scenario (as often before), as his charge times mean you would have to waste a lot of time in a battle where speed is top priority. Gau and Umaro (while certainly hard to take down) suffer from the uncontrollable nature. Gau, if used, should stick to his Magic spells if possible, while Umaro should be... Yeah, killing him in the middle of battle seems a little harsh, so you might be better off setting Stop on him if you for some reason defied me and brought him here.You can't do anything when Entice connects, and you can't do anything when Poltergeist connects. Fenrir/Golem will help against the physicals (especially !Last Kiss can be a pain), while the Hastega spell is an asset as always. If you have a few characters unprotected from Chadarnook (Phantasm)'s attacks, Zona Seeker's Wall attack can help. Basically, throw up your barriers when the demon is hidden and go all-out on the offensive when the demon is around while making sure your HP stays in the four digits at all times wherever possible. Expand Full Strategy | ||||||
After you've defeated the demon, all will return to normal. You'll learn that Chadarnook was probably enticed by the 'weird stone' Owzer bought at the Auction House, and he asks you to take it. It's on the right part of the shelf. With
Lakshmi, you finally gain access to the Curaga spell! Relm also follows you out, permanently rejoining the team.
Caves of Narshe: Final Fantasy VI
Version 6
©1997–2025 Josh Alvies (Rangers51)
All fanfiction and fanart (including original artwork in forum avatars) is property of the original authors. Some graphics property of Square Enix.
Version 6
©1997–2025 Josh Alvies (Rangers51)
All fanfiction and fanart (including original artwork in forum avatars) is property of the original authors. Some graphics property of Square Enix.