I mapped the entirety of this game after seeing ZoeVermilion run it at Frost Fatales, and then thought I'd had a go at routing Dragon Nursery without using Fiera's Ring, because who doesn't love bonking in a speedrun?

Maps of the route in and out: https:/​/​imgur.​com/​a/​RZjoOu1
Video:
In the video, I made a few mistakes, but it's still faster than doing it with the ring!

It turned out very similar to the route Oxknifer takes in their video. Some of the segments can optimized by relying on timing/muscle memory a little more, but I think this is a good and relatively safe starting point, and already saves a little bit of time even in its current state.

Unfortunately, you still have to play the matching game to obtain Fiera's Ring just to be able to activate the lamp, there's no routing that out. Doing the nursery in the dark is therefore only a minor time save, and the riskiness means it might not be worth going for. Looks hella neat though!

(Also, my (labelled) maps of this game are on VGMaps, perhaps they'll be of use to anyone who wants to route 100%!)

@eishiyaeishiya this is really great! Maybe you can embed these pictures into a guide on this leaderboard?

Also yeah, dark dragon nursery was my favorite find while routing any%. It just looks awesome even though the time save is questionable. I believe ZoeVermilion's run is faster even while using the ring.

I hope you plan on running the game! If you find an emulator that could work for the community (I've lost the link I used to play at), please share :))

I'll see about making a guide!

The dark Nursery in my and your videos are both a little faster than ZoeVermillion's, I believe, especially if you include the time loss of switching rings (~2s each time).

I don't plan to run this game, alas, as I barely have time for my existing speedgames ): Plus, the emulator (VBA) I like to use use isn't accurate and has graphical issues with some of the minigames and slows down during the non-dark Nursery, but VBA-M hates my controller and I dislike it overall. VBA-M emulates this game well, though.

Thanks for making a guide!
Alas, hopefully you will find time later on :))