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Rock the Omni-Blue Mage - Part 10: Galaxy
Last update, Rock scored some Dragon Grass. This update,
Lenna gets poisoned
Exdeath vandalizes a turtle hermit's island
Rock mooches off his friend's status
Plans are made to raid Castle Exdeath
and the raid party boat gets crashed.
Can you imagine Gilgamesh as the head of a frat house? I wonder what name of the house would be.
In either case, Rock's 3-Point plan for Gilgamesh is as follows:
1. Steal the Genji Gloves because yoink!
2. Halve Gil's level
3. Blast him with Level 5 Death
Now Rock has some sweet gear and doesn't have to deal with some flying, healing beastman. 
BOSS DEATHS: 0
Onwards to Barrier Tower!
And finally, Rock finds his first new !Blue spell of World 2 - Time Slip - which is used by Travelers. Only problem is that, since he's got Bone Mail on, he's not affected by it.
So off it goes for a short while.
Really, for solo runs, Bone Mail is a godsend, and Blue Mages are able to exploit it to the fullest.
We'll finally see why this update.
Time Slip is a neat little spell - it inflicts Sleep and Old simultaneously. It's not exactly boss fight material due to the Heavy flag, but against some tougher random mobs it's rather nice. Especially since most, if not all, !Blue spells don't remove sleep.
With the Bone Mail back on, Rock sees an opportunity to really bolster his defenses. He knows things outside of just Learning - Reflect Knights drop valuable Reflect Rings. He also knows that it's going to be a while before one of those knights actually drops their prize. More on that later.
There's 2 Monster-in-a-box chests in Barrier Tower, and they'll contain either 2 Yellow Dragons or 1 Red Dragon. Yellow Dragons are easy enough - blast them with Death Claw or Missile, follow up with a few volleys of 1000 Needles. This fight yields the Blood Sword, which will be limited in use for Rock.
Continuing on in the tower, Rock finds Level Trickers. Typically they'll just use Level 4 Graviga, which would be the main way of getting it if you're not up spending time trying to find Ghidras in the Ronka Ruins. It's also possible to !Control them to use Level 2 Old or Level 5 Death, but since those spells always target enemies, it's impossible to Learn from them without a Chemist to apply Reflect.
Speaking of which, most Blue spells will ignore Reflect. This is extremely useful for fighting Reflect Knights, as that allows for the use of 1000 Needles, Missile, Aqua Breath, Time Slip, etc.
TOP SCORE.
With this, Rock can plunder the other monster-in-a-box with no fear from the Red Dragon within.
See, Red Dragons can be right bastards without some proper setup and learning about their characteristics.
This is why Rock wants that Reflect Ring. Bone Armor adds a ton of defensive bonuses, but it also makes him extremely weak to Fire and Holy attacks. The ring covers his ass quite nicely, as Dark Spark allows him to outpace the healing Red Dragon gets from reflected Atomic Rays.
??? is great here if you're looking to save a bit on MP over using 1000 Needles.Just don't try using Vampire with low HP because Red Dragon is undead leading to a DEATH: 30 or even a DEATH: 31 if you slip up and use a Hi Potion while wearing Bone Mail.
By the way, 
White Wind ignores Reflect and Undead.
There's a rather deliberate reason why Rock bothered with grinding for a Reflect Ring just to fight the Red Dragon.
THIS.
!Blue spells can be rather costly. With this, Rock instantly increases his overall combat effectiveness to the point where he can practically keep himself going indefinitely with !Lance. There's only 2 more pieces missing from this equipment set before he hits full 
In the steps leading to the top of the tower, it's possible to come across Ziggurat Gigases to pick up some Aero family spells in case you missed them. They can also cast Maelstrom which can cause another DEATH: 32 when Vampire starts failing for some odd reason.
Past them and up at the top of the stairs is Atomos.
Atomos is level 41. Dark Spark halves that to 20. Level 5 Death takes care of the rest. Reflect Ring protects against random Gravity attacks while Atomos is busy sucking people in with Wormhole.
BOSS DEATHS: 0 
TOTAL BOSS DEATHS: 5
ENDING LEVEL: 37
Next Time: Hickory Smoked Meat Castles