Lands of Lore Part 55: The Sum Must Be Correct

I’ve played this game enough times that when I check the minimap at the start of the video, I can tell right away I’m close to the southeast area of the map. That’s roughly where the final figurine we need is, and so I decide to get it. First, I head down a nearby corridor that leads to a closed door. I open it and continue down the corridor, ultimately coming to a dead end. At the dead end, however, there’s a sign on the wall that says “the sum must be correct”. It seems a bit bizarre at this point, but it’s a key clue and what it means is going to become very obvious in just a moment. I backtrack out of the corridor and head towards the southwest. There’s a very large open area in this part of Floor 3, with numerous structures forming obstacles we have to move around. Inconveniently, there are numerous continually-firing traps at various points between these structures, but I brave these traps to thoroughly explore this area. We take plenty of damage from these traps, almost getting wiped out at one point, but Heal spells and rest are always able to get us back to full strength. Luckily, there aren’t any enemies roaming this area-the only enemy we do face at this point is revealed when I press a switch on a nearby wall. A Toadulus monster is revealed and fights us, giving us a bit of a tough scrape-Baccata’s health is reduced to red-but we still defeat him and rest our way back to full health afterwards.
Once I finish exploring the south area, the minimap reveals that the obstacles are designed to resemble a math equation from a bird’s eye view, and according to the map the equation reads “1 + 1 = 3”. Obviously, that’s an incorrect equation, and according to the hint from earlier we need to make it correct. The way to do this is to head to the “3” and press a switch on it. I do so, and it causes a section of the 3 to move forward a space. Going up and pressing the switch again causes it to move forward again, causing the 3 to resemble a 2. The equation now indeed is correct, and the map reveals that a wall near the sign from earlier is now gone. We can head back and get the last figurine now, and I retrace our steps through the corridor, past the sign, and into a new dead end. There are two switches in this room, and pressing the one to the west causes a niche with the Humanoid Figurine inside to open. I head over to pick it up, but as I do the entrance seals shut again, trapping us inside. As long as the niche is empty, we’ll be unable to leave, so the player needs to put a different item in the niche to escape. I put a Salve in and then press the eastern switch; doing so causes the niche to close and the wall to retract so we can escape. We now have all four figurines, and there’s also a pit near the “2” of the puzzle that’ll take us back to the second floor. If we wish, we could head back for Richard right now. But I decide to explore the entirety of Floor 3 first. There’s some great loot lying around that’ll be very helpful downstairs.
I head west, going past the math equation obstacles and open a door on the far southwestern end of the map. Inside is a new puzzle we have to solve, with not one but four signs that have to be followed. The room has four distinct cul-de-sacs, each of which has a sign in it saying to leave something there. We’re supposed to do what the signs say and leave a specific type of item in each cul-de-sac. The first one says “leave armor here”, so I remove Michael’s breastplate and drop it below the sign. The cul-de-sac opposite that one says “leave weapons here”, and I drop the Halberd Widow from our inventory. The next sign says “leave medicines here”, so I put a Salve by this one. Finally, the last sign says “leave jewelry here”, so I remove Michael’s Amber Ring and drop that. With all four items dropped, a niche opens containing the Dull Key. It may seem unusual for us to go to this much trouble just for a key, but the Dull Key opens something very important. I put it in our inventory, and also make sure to recollect the four items we dropped earlier. From there, I head back in the direction of the equation structures, then head north into a corridor. Opening a door leads to two ornate locks with a switch in between them, and pressing the switch reveals another door. This is the way to Scotia-we’ll have to unlock both of the ornate locks to open this door, but we do NOT want to do that until we free King Richard. He has something that we need to defeat Scotia, and taking her on before that is only going to get us killed. So I backtrack and enter a secret passage that leads to a treasure chest. Michael lockpicks it open and it turns out to be a real boon. There’s the Arbalest Eternity and some money, neither of which I’m interested in, but it also has the Bastion Plate Mail. The Bastion has stats equivalent to Dwarven Plate Mail, so I equip it to Paulson to boost his defense.