WARNING: This will be a a fairly in-depth guide in some sections. Erring on the side of too much information as opposed to too little. This is a guide, not a route outline. I don't recommend trying to read through this while doing a run. I recommend watching runs as a way of learning the route.

This is one of two routes. The other one manages combo throughout FoA to avoid doing the death abuse and is faster RTA but has slower IGT.

This route will be much easier to understand if you either have one of Bemels's maps open (in #resources in the discord) or play along. It's very hard to detail the exact locations of the secrets in text, so if you don't know where they are, watch a run that follows this route.

Forest of Awakening: Gate 1: Hit the first switch. Go up, right, and down through the spikes. Watch your health: you don't want to be at 2hp at this gate. Gate 2: Go back to the spikes and go up-right. There's a nice piece of diagonal movement here from the spikes up to a block you have to push that's really rewarding to do with the dpad. Push the block, kill any wasps that spawned to the immediate left of your current position, and hit the switch. Go left, kill most or all of the wasps, and open the chest. Ideally, you're now at either 95 or 100+ SP after getting this orb (this is why to kill the wasps). Carry the orb back to the central area and place it in the right pedestal. Go left, down-left, and up to find the second gate -- DON'T ACTIVATE IT YET. Go north through the line of bushes and hit the switch. Then go activate the gate. Throughout this whole section, you need to manage your health. You need to activate the second gate with only 1hp remaining. I typically take two damage on the way to gate 1 and take the third from the enemies that spawn around gate 2 on my way north to the switch. If the bushes on the way to the switch drop health, take an extra damage before activating the switch so that the invincibility frames have some time to blink while you're moving to/from the gate. Gate 3: IMMEDIATELY DIE. This is to refill hp and SP. Then go down, right, and up to the chest. Open it and carry the key left, up, up-right, up to the door. This section's easier if you know how the enemies will all react to you: The green ones initially run away from you the first time you get close to them. If you're close enough for enough time, they will shoot at you, but this should never happen in a speedrun. The block guys just don't care about you and move randomly. The wasps move in short bursts, targeting you if you're close. After opening the door, go up through the bushes and up-left through the bushes to the gate. Gate 4: Go down-right, down, left back to the door you opened with the switch above the second gate. Go up through the bushes here and then left, down, right to a chest. Note: there are two enemies that spawn during the segment of left movement -- I tend to kill them because you'll have to carry an orb back through here. Open the chest and go left, up, right, down, right back to the orb pedestals and place the orb. Go up. Just before the boss teleporter, there's a narrow gap where four mushroom enemies spawn -- kill at least the three blue ones just to make movement easier. Get the secret (watch a run for the specific block it's hidden in) and go up, right, down-right, down, left through the bushes to the gate. Exit: Go down-left to the switch. Go left, up to the teleporter. This part of movement is why to kill the mushroom guys earlier: hp can get tight here. Boss: If you're really scared of this boss, you can get the hp upgrade. I don't recommend it, but it is a safety strat if you're looking for safeties. You want to minimize this boss's movement. I recommend watching Repent's analysis of this boss: for a full guide. I'm not going to describe all the movement because it's in that tutorial. Orb 1: Boss shoots five orbs -- last one is real. Kill enemies while waiting to fill SP. Orb 2: Boss shoots seven orbs -- last one is real. Kill enemies while waiting to fill SP. Orb 3: Boss shoots nine orbs -- last one is real. Kill enemies while waiting to fill SP. You want to end the level with 200 SP.

Sunken Relics: Safety strat: if you're at 1hp after FoA, immediately go down-left to the pot and get 1hp for safety. Gate 1: Go left, up, left (slash through the enemies), down (dodge or slash through the enemies), right to the gate. Gate 2: Go right, hit the switch. Open the chest. Carry the orb up to the start of the level and go right, down, down-left to the switch. Go up through the teleporter, place the orb. After the cutscene, go back through the teleporter and go back to the start of the level. Kill some enemies here and go up -- stay on the leftmost side of this walkway to avoid causing enemies to spawn. Go left and then up: break all the bushes on the way to where the bridge will spawn. Go down, right, down to the switch. Go back up, left, up and kill the enemies in the bottom area (this is for SP and so they'll be out of your way during bridge skip). Go up to the gate. Gate 3: Go left, up to the switch. Perform bridge skip: . Repent uses an audio cue for this, I use muscle memory. Find a way that works for you. Note that it's faster to just do the bridge normally than to fail bridge skip. After the skip, go right, down (kill enemies that are directly in your way but nothing else). Push the block once, kill the blue enemies, push the block again. Hit the switch, kill most of the enemies (killing the frog is slow -- only kill it if you need the SP), go up to the other switch, come back down to the teleporter. After going through the teleporter, go up-right, up to the gate. If you're low on SP, you should be at a high combo now, so just kill the three weak enemies right by the gate. You want to be at 150 SP before hitting the gate (or 50 SP after hitting the gate). Gate 4: Go back down, down-left to the teleporter. Go back up-right, up, left to the chest and open it. Carry the key down to the teleporter, right to the other teleporter, and down-right to the key door. Note: there is a group of enemies that spawns right around the key door. Don't let them make you drop the key. After opening the door, get the secret and go right to the gate. Exit: Go back left, up, left, up to the exit. Remember to stay on the far left on the long stretch of vertical movement to avoid the enemy spawn. Boss: Orb 1: Immediately move to the top right area. The boss will move diagonally down-right; the orb will be in a random segment. Orb 2: Stay on the right side and kite the boss head to stall time. The orb will move to the left teleporter after a certain amount of time -- once it's close enough to the teleporter to hit, take the teleporter and mash Y/A (facing up). Orb 3: Stay on the left side and kite the boss head to stall time. The orb will move diagonally down-left after a certain amount of time. Once you learn the timing, you can find a time to just stand to the immediate left of where the orb will appear and mash Y/A (facing right).

Scorching Labyrinth: This level introduces fence cutscene skips (as seen in this video: ). Basically, pause right after killing the last enemy in a cage fight and you'll still be able to move during the cutscene. Assume that you're supposed to do this for every cage fight in the run going forwards. Gate 1: This first section is fairly linear -- you physically can't go the wrong way until the first chest. Open the chest, go left to the orb pedestals. Go up-right through the cage fight. Go right, open the SP door (50 SP), and open the chest. IMMEDIATELY DROP THE KEY. The chest is opened now for SP management -- you'll come back for the key later. Go down, right to the switch (through the blocks). Go up to the gate. There is a way to do movement to dodge the fireballs, but it's faster just to run through and take damage. If you need health before going up through them, get it from the pots above the switch.

Safety strat: if you're REALLY concerned about getting back to the chest without dying, die right after activating the gate. Then skip the secret in the next section (dying will give you the same refill the secret would).

Gate 2: Go down, left, up to the secret. Go up to the chest, get the key. Go down, right, down, left to the key door. Go left to the gate.
Gate 3: Manage your health during this section: you want to activate this gate at 1hp. Go back right, up-right. Go up-left, up to the four pots and break them (DON'T COLLECT THE HEALTH -- it's for refilling your health on the way to the boss). Go left to the block, push it. Go around, break all the small blocks, then come back and push the block down and the other block left. Go left to the switch, left to the gate.
Gate 4: Go down (past the chest), hit the switch. Safety strat: kill the enemies. Open the chest, carry the orb down to the other orb pedestal. Go down and around to the gate (I recommend killing the group of 3 green enemies that spawn to make the next section's movement safer).
Exit: Go back straight up to gate 3, right to the health you got out of the pots earlier (so you don't need to worry about health in this section), and then down to the exit.

Boss: In my opinion, this boss fight gets easier as it goes on. Orb 1: The boss will drop five enemies: kill them all and then dodge the flying particles. Repeat twice: the boss will drop the orb after the enemies the third time. Orb 2: Almost exactly the same as last phase -- you need to kill all the enemies to progress the fight. The third time, one of the two will drop the orb (it's random). Orb 3: Move to the far left and charge a spin. Once either four or five enemies have dropped (watch your combo!), release it and spin through to kill them all. Repeat twice, making sure to watch for the orb on the third time. MAKE SURE TO END WITH 200 SP.

Ruins of Yamataikoku: This is the hardest level. Don't give up! As of the time of writing, even the 2nd place run drops a key in this level. Also, I'm going to detail less of the SP route in this level -- just notice that there are a lot of enemies so it shouldn't be too hard to refill if you find yourself short. SP is particularly easy during the Gate 2 segment because of the cage fight. Safety strat: if you're at 1hp, feel free to go immediately down-left to the pots for a refill. If you ever feel low on hp during this level, there are pots everywhere. Don't feel like it's wasting time to get health -- going out of your way for a refill is usually much faster than dying. Gate 1: Go up, left. Go up and left to the bushes: break a path through (you'll have to carry a key through here later). Note: you can also try to kill exactly one of the green enemies (if you kill both they'll respawn when you come back). Go back right, down to the switch and hit it. Kill most of the enemies here (to make it safe to carry something through). Go down to the switch. Go down, left, up to the chest. Carry the orb back to the orb pedestals (down, right, up, right). After placing the orb, go back left and hit the first switch again. Go right, down, up-left to the teleporter. Carry the key to the key door: down (from the teleporter), up, left, up (through the spikes -- watch out), left, up. This key carrying is possibly the hardest part of the game. After opening the door, go up to the gate. Gate 2: Go back down, right, down through the spikes and go back right to the central area (with the bus). Go right through here, taking the bottom route through the bushes (this is to clear the way for carrying an orb through here later). Go up, right, down to the cage fight. Go down from the fight, open the chest, and immediately drop the orb. Go right to the switch (hit it) and back up to the cage fight. Go up-right through the block puzzle to the second gate. There's an enemy spawn you can avoid when going through the area immediately up-right of the cage fight (the part with the stairs). In my experience, just hugging a wall works. Gate 3: Go all the way back down to the fight and then go back down to the switch (hit it). Go left to the chest (get the orb) and down-left to the switch. Go left, up, and around the bus to the second orb pedestal. Go up, left, up-left to the door and then up to the gate. Gate 4: Go back down to just before the exit panel, but instead go down farther to the switch. Go to and through the teleporter this switch activates (up, right, down, down-left) to another switch. This switch allows you to go north from the exit panel. Hit it, go back through the teleporter, and go up-right, up to another cage fight. Charge an attack going into this fight so that you can just sweep through all the enemies. Grab the secret (preferably while the fence cutscene is still playing so that you can move during the secret collection) and go down-right, up to the door and then up to the gate. Exit: Go back down, left, up to the cage fight. After the fight, go back down to the exit panel. Boss: THIS BOSS HAS TEXT BOXES AT THE START OF THE FIGHT. Also, all the orbs on this boss take 3 SEPARATE hits -- you can't hit an orb more than once at a time. Orb 1: Go up-right and sit in the corner next to the boss. The orb will appear here all 3 times, so mash/wait for it (facing left or up, both work) and avoid the slow attacks. Orb 2: There's no trick to this orb. Run around and avoid the spike attacks and wait for the orb to appear. The orb will stay still for a short amount of time before moving again and can move to an unreachable position (causing you to have to wait). Orb 3: This orb is easiest to hit from the corners closest to the boss. It alternates from appearing at the right and left corners (starting at the right corner) and if you miss it it starts to spin around and is really hard to hit. Alternate between being at the right corner by the boss mashing/waiting for the orb and the left corner by the boss mashing/waiting for the orb. If you stay in the corners while the boss's attacks are going, you will pretty much never get hit.

Final Boss: The "orb" for this boss is located in its chest and is behind a shield that takes a combo attack to bring down. What this means for you is that whenever the shield isn't exposed for you to attack, you need to be building SP off the enemies here so that you're ready to combo attack it when it does pop up. Orb 1: Immediately combo the shield and hit the orb 3 times. Orb 2: The boss will do an attack resembling the first boss. It's easy enough to avoid. After a certain amount of time, the shielded orb will reappear. Orb 3: The boss will do an attack resembling the second boss. Right up in front of where the orb will be is a safe spot. After a certain amount of time, the shielded orb will reappear. Orb 4: The boss will do an attack inspired by the third boss. Dodge it, build SP, and wait for the shielded orb. Orb 5: There are three main attacks the boss cycles through in this phase: a giant spreading laser, swords that come up from the bottom of the screen (between the swords is safe), fire, more swords from the bottom of the screen, giant crusher things from the side of the screen (the very middle is safe), and back to the laser. The shielded orb will reappear just before the second laser. THERE ARE TEXT BOXES AFTER KILLING THE BOSS.

Mash through that text, wait, and run up to the final gate. Timing ends on activation of this gate.