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Clive was always going to make his way to Dhalmekia’s Mothercrystal, Drake’s Fang, eventually, but the stunt that Hugo pulled as Rosalith gave him an even greater reason to go: revenge.Final Fantasy 16really brings the tension to this story stage, giving you all the motivation you’ll need to press on.
RELATED:Final Fantasy 16: FAQ Guide
This is one of the longer stages that the game has to offer, not least of all due to the extremely long boss fight at the end of it. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves - there are new enemy types and multiple mini-bosses to get through before you’re able to consider this stage complete.
Exploring Drake’s Fang Mines
After the cutscenes that play out at the beginning of this stage,you’ll start this stage in Drake’s Fang itself. It’s a mine-type area, just like the one in Drake’s Breath.
Head forward, and you’ll eventually be confronted with your first fight of the stage against someOrcs. These are easily beaten, as they only havebasic melee attacks. Continue on by crouching underneath the crates nearby anddefeat the next group of orcs, who are backed up by hound-type enemies calledBlack Mastiffs.
Press on bypulling the leverto open the gate. In the next room, you’ll face someOrcish Mesmerisers, which are this enemy type’s spellcasters. They’re particularly aggressive, so make them priorities when they show up in future fights of mixed enemies.
Squeeze through the gapin the doors ahead to continue.
In the next room, there are lots of enemies to take down. There areOrcish Mesmerisers stationed atop tall towers- if you have strong ranged attacks equipped, use them to take these out before they prove too annoying.
To progress,pull the nearby lever and head through the opened gate. When Clive mentions that he won’t be going further this way,turn to the rightand open themetal doorshere.
Head up the stairs here, defeat the Orcs, and press on until you reach the first proper elite enemy of the stage, theOrcish Warlord.
How To Beat The Orcish Warlord
Of all the faction-specific elite enemies, theOrcish Warlordis one of the most difficult to face. It has the ability toteleport around the battlefieldto disorient you and has some very highly-damaging attacks.
Description
Dark Bolt
The Orcish Warlock points his staff at you and releases a cluster of red projectiles. They will track Clive strongly.
Deal with this as you would any other magical ranged attack. You can dodge through these quite easily, but if you’re locked onto the Orcish Warlord and he teleports elsewhere, the camera might prove difficult to work with.
Dark Fires
The Warlord casts a spell that summons a swirl of darkness around you that shortly creates a small burst. This happens twice in succession.
Move out of the darkness swirls as they appear, but beware of the enemy’s movements - he will often follow this attack up with a Dark Bolt spell, making both attacks more difficult to avoid.
Staff Smash
The Orcish Warlock simply smashes at you with his staff. He will often use this directly following a teleport towards you.
Stay alert to the Warlord’s teleports, and you should have no problem reacting to this attack.
Staff Swing
This is very similar to the previous attack but is instead a horizontal swing with a large attack arc.
Dodging right into this attack is a good way to reliably get Precision Dodges.
Dark Puddles
The Orcish Warlord summons a handful of circular puddles of dark energy around your location. These will persist for a while after the attack is used, making it more difficult to evade the next few attacks.
Dark Explosion
After taking in a large amount of energy, the Orcish Warlord causes an explosion centered on himself.
The windup for this attack is rather obvious, so you should be able to tell when to get away.
The Orcish Warlord will only useDark Puddles and Dark Explosionafter being Staggered at least once.
Thanks to his penchant for teleportation, it’s important to keep a close eye on the Orcish Warlord at all times. These enemies love to use attacks right out of a teleportation, making them difficult to predict.
Thanks to their prodigious size, however, Orcish Warlords are given aweak spot - their heads. Use Eikonic abilities to exploit this vulnerability, such asRising Phoenix, Wicked Wheel, and Judgement Bolt. These will deal more damage when they hit the enemy’s head.
After defeating the Orcish Warlord, open the nearby gate via a lever and, after the cutscene, proceed toward the courtyard ahead. After opening the next gate, you’ll face another boss.
How To Beat The Undertaker
The fight against the Undertaker isn’t too tough if you know what you’re doing.
To read our complete guide to this boss fight, click here.
Castle Dazbog
After beating the Undertaker, you’ll be insideCastle Dazbog. Proceed through the castle, climbing the stairs in front of you and defeating theWraiths, Revenants, and Spectersas you head through the doors ahead.
Eventually, after climbing some stairs, you’ll face aLich.If you need a refresher on dealing with Liches, click here.
After dealing with the Lich and its lackeys, take the large double doors on the side of the corridor toproceed to Hugo’s bedroomand a breathtaking view of Drake’s Fang.
In Hugo’s bedroom, be sure toopen the chestto getThe Favor of Earth (Upheaval)accessory. This improves Upheaval’s damage by eight percent, which is a decent amount but is probably negligible for superior accessories.
Leave Hugo’s bedroom through the double doors to reachThe Inner Sanctum. Continue on, and you’ll fight an encounter of someWraiths and Specters. After defeating them, enter the Sanctum through the doors ahead, and you’ll face the final boss of this stage: Hugo in his massive Titan form.
How To Beat Titan
The fight against Titan is a long and arduous one.
For our complete guide to this clash, including all five phases of it, click here.
After beating Titan, you’ll have completed Into the Darkness and can continue with the story, unburdened by Hugo Kupka and his machinations.
