Chapter 6: Shaman of the Glitz
"No way! The original is good, but Cheer is so much better," Mack exclaims to Bowyer as the two along with Insanee, now collectively known as The Things Nightmares Are Made Of, sit aboard the just-departing train for Mt. Rugged.
"Nyah! Proves it does bad your taste is when prefer you do a spinoff," Bowyer answers, drawing a sigh from Insanee as she shakes her head.
"First of all, the two of you are robots. Why would you have any interest whatsoever in entertainment, in this case webcomics? Secondly, this is not exactly a conversation to have while en route to conquering three dimensions with one stone... and a diamond necklace, a Magic Lamp, a Starman, and a Crescent Moon. Third, for reference when the two of you decide to mess up somehow and divulge our plan, there's this little thing called ‘nonchalance'. You should try it out."
The flower girl sighs once more and raises her arms, placing them behind her head. "And besides, everyone knows Moperville is way more interesting than Tandy."
Now it is Mack's turn to sigh. "I'm drowning in irony over here."
"Well, either way," Insanee changes the subject, "explain to me what you know of this plan. I can tell you two aren't in charge, so tell me what I need to know."
"Well, we work for a pair of magic users. This guy named Sharm we know from working with Cackletta led us to his sister's pocket dimension after that plan failed. Though he's a Shaman, his sister is a Koopa. She was adopted or something. Anyway, all we know of the plan is that we're supposed to gather these five items to make some sort of magical hat that grants wishes."
"Huh. Why should you bother returning it to her then? You have much more to gain from casting the spell yourself than you do if you go along with their plans."
"Betrayal for later are we saving."
Mack adds in, "Exactly. If we need to turn by them backstabbing us, we have our trump card."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sharm steps into the Glitz Pit, his blue robe dragging on the floor behind him. Inside, he immediately sees that the lobby is packed full of spectators, all anxiously awaiting the next battle to take place.
"This isn't going to be as easy as I thought," Sharm mumbles as he stands awaiting the opportunity to get through. "When I heard the plan, it sounded rather simple. Get in, don't teleport while in front of others, break into his locker room, and steal what I need. But this throws a wrench in things..." Sharm sighs, then begins to rock back and forth impatiently, eagerly looking forward to the next fight to commence so that he can get on with the plan.
Maybe just one little time-altering spell... But of course, he can't do that either; Kaguya had very specifically told him not to mess with the time stream, as the slightest mishap could mess up her later plans, so that's a no-go. Just as Sharm is about to do something he'll regret, a bell rings signifying that the next battle is starting, causing the crowd to rush out of the lobby and into the arena. The Shaman immediately turns his attention to the door to the side leading to the locker rooms.
"You need special clearance to enter the locker rooms, si-"
Sharm interrupts by waving his right hand in front of the guard's face, a green light emerging from the hand as he speaks. "You don't mind me entering, do you?"
"Go right ahead, sir," the guard replies, stepping out of the way. Sharm snickers and pushes the door open, entering the backstage area and immediately heading over to the locker room belonging to the Glitz Pit Champion, the Yoshi named Eggo who's better known as Gonzalez Jr. Seeing that the door is not guarded, Sharm uses a spell that picks locks. Upon doing so, Sharm opens the door, being sure to lock it again behind him.
Once inside, Sharm heads over to the nearest cabinet and begins to throw out books left and right, looking at the titles of each before throwing them. In the midst of piles of books such as History of Glitz, the Super Luigi series, and Wario Wicked: Money-Back Mountain, and magazines such as Glitz Weekly, Fruits of the Tropic, and Solid Snake Is In It Why...?, Sharm finds what he's looking for, a yearly magazine covering the strengths and weaknesses of the Glitz Pit fighters. He shifts to the page he needs and rips it out, then lies down on the bed in the corner after casting a memorization spell on himself so he can remember this for future reference.
Fighter: The Great
Gonzalez, Jr.
Species: Yoshi
Accolades: Current
Glitz Pit Champion, two-time X-champion, at the time of his debut the youngest
Glitz Pit competitor of all time
Height: 4'3"
Weight: 126 lbs
Common Attacks:
Egg Throw: Gonzalez
Jr. lays and throws an egg at his opponent. Not the most powerful move
in his arsenal, but it is fast and can be devastating against an opponent
charging up an attack.
Stomp: Oftentimes
Gonzalez Jr. will resort to jumping onto his opponent. This is more powerful,
but often leaves the Yoshi wide-open for an attack from his opponent.
Triangle Choke:
The move that won Gonzalez Jr. the Glitz Pit Championship, this move entails
Gonzalez jumping onto his opponent's shoulders and wrapping his arms and
legs around their neck in an attempt to choke out his opponent. The move
is powerful and hard to escape from, but it takes Gonzalez a few seconds
to get it locked in.
Strengths: Gonzalez
Jr. is a much faster competitor than most of those in his division. His
speed often allows him to dodge maneuvers that would be almost inescapable
for someone twice his size. His attacks are both fast and smart, often
keeping the larger opponents trying in a futile attempt to match his natural
speed.
Weaknesses: Gonzalez
Jr. may be an intelligent fighter, but his size is his ultimate weakness.
Often Gonzalez will be caught while attempting to use his Stomp, and when
caught or knocked down Gonzalez Jr. often finds himself dominated. Another
disadvantage is when Eggo is matched against someone larger than him who
is capable of matching his speed. Take the recent King K battle Gonzalez
competed in- despite King K being relatively low on the pecking order,
Gonzalez struggled to find a way to defeat an opponent who not only possessed
his main weakness but took away his main strength as well.
"Nice to know," Sharm remarks as he tucks the paper into the pocket of his robe. The Shaman casts a clean-up spell to take care of the mess, and teleports out of the room after the spell is finished.
Sharm reappears in a bathroom stall in the mall behind the Glitz Pit, as it's the safest bet for not being spotted. After doing this, the Shaman reaches into his pocket and withdraws from it a cell phone. He holds down the 1 button until the phone starts to dial, then gets to waiting for an answer.
"Sharm, did you get it?" Kaguya asks on the other end, whispering so as to keep from being discovered.
"Of course I did, Shwerm. You think I would call you if I didn't have it?"
"Did you follow my orders?"
"Exactly. The only spell I cast was a short-term obedience spell on a security guard. He'll forget it ever happened."
"Good. Who are you looking into next?"
"Well, I'm planning on going to Twilight Town and looking into a certain shadow girl. So, are you in position?"
"Exactly," she
answers. "I'm right outside the bedroom window now. I just have to wait
for the precise moment. I've cast a nightmare spell on a certain person
in the house, so she'll be forced to get up in a few moments to take care
of it. At that time, I strike."
Chapter 7: Diamonds Are Forever
The crying. Definitely Goombella's least favorite part of parenting. Goombella sighs as she pulls herself out of bed, and she finds herself wishing her husband hadn't rushed off on business a few days earlier.
"At least he'll back by Christmas," she mumbles as she looks at the calendar, seeing it's the 19th, before rushing out of the room and toward that of her daughter. As she rushes that way, however, she is interrupted by a very unsuspected occurrence, as her door flies off its hinges and a young Koopa girl wearing a very... unique, outfit enters. She is wearing a forest green vest over top of a sleeveless, red, silk shirt that has two metallic plates over each arm, covering the limbs completely except for around an inch in between them. Over her hands are white gloves, and the outfit is tied together with blue jeans and a long flowing cape of red velvet. Atop her head is a pinkish-purple metallic helmet through which long, blue hair sticks up and falls over, resembling to some degree a palm tree or perhaps a shrunken head.
Goombella, without giving it a second thought, jumps in for a Headbonk. Immediately after jumping, Goombella finds herself at the receiving end of a stiff uppercut, which is followed by a brutal jumping kick.
"I want you," Kaguya says while continuing to slaughter the Goomba, "to send a message to your friends. All they are doing by coming after me is digging their own graves."
"Who are you?" Goombella asks receiving a shot in the mouth as an answer.
"My name is Kaguya. Your little friends are getting involved in my business. I figured I might as well use you to change their minds about doing that." As the in-name-only fight rages onward, the screaming from Goombella's daughter grows louder. Goombella tries for a desperate kick, but is leveled on the way so quickly that it's almost as though Kaguya knew what was going to happen before she had jumped.
"So what do you say?" the Koopa asks as she kicks Goombella like a soccer ball, causing her to crash into the wall with a thud. "You'll let them know I stopped by, won't you?" And with that, Kaguya takes her leave.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At around 8 AM Vivian, Ms. Mowz, Eggo, Koops, and Deathnify walk through Elephant Valley, eyeing the barren landscape whilst walking. Deathnify suddenly stops moving, and motions for the others to do the same.
"What is it?" Eggo asks, still a bit wary of trusting Deathnify.
"The Soul Shaker's here. Just give it a..." but the demon is cut off in mid-sentence by a large skull falling from the sky and landing on the ground in front of them. The skull looks to be like a Koopa skull that's twice its usual size, but the jaw is more rounded.
"I suggest those of us who can enter the Shadows immediately do so," Deathnify says before ducking into the ground. Vivian grabs the other three and pulls them with her. And it's right on time too, as the skull shoots into the air once more immediately after they submerge. The skull begins to spin, and as it does other bones begin to fly off of the top of the canyon walls at an incredible speed, surely injuring anyone who would happen to be in the way, and spin with the skull, forming a gigantic skeleton that begins to glow before a green veil falls over its face and what looks like maracas made of bone appear in its hands. After around two minutes, Deathnify comes back up to the surface and this prompts the others to do the same.
Deathnify immediately leaps forward, only to be smacked away with the back of the creature's right hand. The Soul Shaker then slams the two instruments together, causing a mudslide of sorts. The demonic skeleton leaps onto the canyon wall, overlooking its five opponents as Vivian and Deathnify pull the other three into the Shadows. They reemerge on the cliff with the Soul Shaker.
"Let's see how you like this!" Eggo shouts before tossing an egg, only for the projectile to be crushed between the two maracas. This also causes lightning to strike the Yoshi, blowing him into the air and into the canyon below. The Yoshi lands on his back, but is still.
Koops and Ms. Mowz both charge forward, getting leveled for their troubles by an explosion from the maracas. This causes both to fly off in opposite directions with Ms. Mowz landing behind the skeleton while Koops lands in the canyon, both managing to stay awake after the impact. Following this Deathnify shoots forward once more, only to be punted like a football into the air, landing in a crumpled heap but conscious.
Vivian takes the opportunity to strike, throwing a pair of fireballs before being thrust into the air by a shot from both maracas, landing on the ground in front of the monster head-first, drawing a gasp from all but Deathnify. The Shadow Siren, strangely, immediately rises off the ground while a blue glow surrounds her. A grin spreads across the girl's face, and she begins to shout in not one but two voices.
"Foolish pest. You've just dug your own grave!" the two voices shout as Vivian's hands rise and point forward, one glowing red while the other is blue. The Soul Shaker is about to strike once more, but Vivian's hands begin to twirl rapidly, causing blasts of both fire and ice to begin to strike the skeleton, causing bones to fall left and right. Deathnify kicks up, seeing his opportunity, and begins to rush forward while withdrawing a black sword from asheath on his side. Once the sword has been withdrawn, Deathnify jumps and digs it into the first opening he can find on the skeleton, its left eye socket. The creature, all while being pelted with fire and ice, begins to change shape, shrinking while hunching over to resemble some sort of cat-person and growing flesh whilst turning red. Deathnify grabs the two maracas and crushes one between his hands, causing a jewel to burst from within it. The demon grabs it and throws it to the closest person, Ms. Mowz.
Once Vivian's assault stops, she collapses as though she wasn't awake at all. While all but Deathnify wonder what just happened, the demon keeps his mouth shut, preferring not to say anything more than telling the Fallen to, "Go to the palace with the rest."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"So when we arrive it should be..." Bow wonders aloud as her, Kooper, and Goombario all sit aboard a plane, Kooper next to the window with Bow in the middle and Goombario on the end.
"About 6 PM. Should be the perfect time to bait out Deathnify, since he'd have it easiest finding this Toadles guy then. I hear his gang strikes Anne-Onyx every night after sunrise," Kooper responds.
"Wouldn't it be easier to find him when, you know, the town isn't in total chaos?" Goombario questions of the Koopa, drawing a shake of the head.
"Not quite. From what I know of this gang, they do everything they can to keep themselves hidden in the daylight, and strike at sundown. We should get from Neon City to Anne-Onyx in around half an hour by foot, so we'll need to be on guard."
"You know," Bow sighs, "it really is inconvenient traveling with you two. I can go anywhere fast as can be, but I always have to travel slow for you to keep up."
"I'm sure it's a common problem," Kooper answers. "We're better off traveling as a group anyway. Much safer."
"So why are we confronting him in Neon City now instead of getting the mask first?" Goombario asks. "We'll have to deal with him sooner rather than later anyway, so we might as well be able to do something once we do meet with him."
"From the way Mahout described things, this guy's rather weak physically. Way I see it, if we don't give him time to cast magic or shapeshift strategically, we'll take this battle easily. If we do fail to catch him here, though, we might as well go grab that mask afterwards and then see if we can find out where to go to launch a counterstrike."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Boys, here we are!" Insanee announces as she leads Mack and Bowyer off of the train platform and onto the rocky soil of the base of Mt. Rugged.
"Do you have to do that everywhere we go?" Mack questions, drawing one reaction from Insanee.
"Duh!" Insanee answers sarcastically, flipping her two bottom petals with her left hand in the process.
"Nyah! Starting to see am I the star of pop thing," Bowyer snickers, drawing a death glare from the flower.
"You're still on parole for the anti-wrinkle
cream remark," Dayzee tells the bow. "Now come on. I want to get in and
out of the desert as soon as possible."
Chapter 8: Fire & Ice
"In I come, out I go..." Sharm mumbles as he pulls himself out of the warp pipe to Twilight Town and looks around, observing the territory and making note of the familiar locale.
"Not sure why, but coming here always reminds me of that day..." the Shaman mumbles as he begins to walk through the streets, heading for a particular house in the area.
I remember... I was on a regular excursion with a few of sis's minions, looking for some spell components. It was sunrise, and there were two there. Two bodies, or what I thought were two bodies. I left the small one, who later turned out to be alive, and took Cackletta's with me. Attached the soul to a wall, and hatched an agreement to find someone to fetch the gems. I found that girl...
Sharm shakes his head, preferring to think about future successes rather than past failures, and reaches his destination, a townhouse... with a "For Sale" sign in front of it?
"What?!" the Shaman snaps before turning to the nearest Twilighter.
"Can you tell me what happened to the occupants of this house?" the Shaman asks, confused as to where they could be.
"They moved around two years ago," the Twilighter replies. "I think they moved into an apartment in Diamond City."
"Diamond City?! Err..." I know she said not to teleport, but maybe if I put something else on this yokel's mind...
Sharm snickers as he considers the possibilities, then snaps his fingers and says the words, "Masculunus feminare nocrum unum."
The spell results in the male Twilighter turning into a woman, causing a scream to erupt from him/her. As the Twilighter runs off in a panic, Sharm shouts, "Don't blame me. Blame Bowyer for showing me that comic," before teleporting out of the town.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"And here I am," Sharm scoffs as he appears on a rooftop in Diamond City. The Shaman looks down at the city ahead, eyeing several key attractions: the famous bakery Torte & Such, the Diamond City Chamber of Commerce, and the town's most famous attraction, the W Games, formerly WarioWare, main headquarters.
"Hmm... all I need to do's find the right person... and I'd recognize her type of magic anywhere," the Shaman chuckles as he waves both hands in front of him before saying, "Firefly." This causes a green light to appear before the Shaman. The light goes to a building across from the one the Shaman is atop, and disappears once it hits a window on the twelfth floor.
"Good," the Shaman laughs before disappearing once again.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I'm still not sure we can trust him," Eggo says as he, Koops, and Ms. Mowz walk through Elephant Valley around 4 that evening, looking for food. Deathnify is behind with the still unconscious Vivian.
"I know," Koops replies, "but we know he can't kill, and we were told and saw for ourselves against that Dry Bones we ran into that the Fallen thing can only be done once a day, so what can he do?"
Ms. Mowz adds in her two-cents, "I can't help but get the feeling that he wants us to go after Kaguya for a reason though... besides the whole wiping out everyone but her allies thing."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Why didn't you tell them?" the pair of voices from Vivian asks of Deathnify as he lies on a log, his shoes off with his feet near the slowly dying fire.
"What did I have to gain out of it?" the demon answers with a question of his own. "I'm not out to kill them, yet, but I don't have any reason to protect them from what you're doing either."
"So you're apathetic about the idea?"
"Well, that's one way to put it. It really doesn't matter anyway. You should know my plans. It's only a matter of time before I am all that exists."
"For one thing, you are an ignorant fool. That stone in powerful, but it won't be able to hold back the destruction of all that exists, you included. Though I need not worry; the prophecies suggest, and I quote: ‘The end of life on Plit shalt come when a daisy brings rise to an era of machinery that will overtake all in its path until non-automated life ceases to exist.' There's nothing you can do, Dante, to stop that."
"Don't call me that, and don't bring up those worthless prophecies. They're just words, and mean nothing."
"Such a well-studied magic user and you still deny such a thing?" the two voices scoff. "You make me sick that I ever wasted my time helping you so many years ago. Or fighting you and taking that jewel two years ago, for that matter. Girl was never worth bringing back in the first place anyway."
"Well, Bel, your problem is that you live in the past. Not surprising; you're over 1,000 after all. But me, I've been around for close to 150 years, and I change to fit the times. Most modern magical experts deny the validity of these so-called ‘prophecies', and I agree with them. You've been doing this wander and hide thing for years. I integrate. I've got a very modern palace, complete with a large television and the latest gaming and musical technologies. I carry around an iPod even! So that's just proof of what I'm saying: I live and adjust with the times, changing my opinions based on what new information is found, while you stick to believing what you wish to believe."
"Please. I've forgotten more about magic than you'll ever know. Compared to me, you are nothing."
"Tell me this then: why is it that I, not you, have been successful in my past exploits?"
"Let's see. Your past exploits include killing four unsuspecting victims, only one of whom fought back, being buddies with a Boo who's powerful by their standards, which doesn't say much, and hanging out in an abandoned pocket dimension inside a giant sword," Beldam-Vivian answers, before moving on. "I, on the other hand, have done five main things: 1), help the Shadow Queen overtake a great civilization in a single night- successful. 2), resurrect the Shadow Queen- successful. 3), lead Mario to his demise- successful. 4), resurrect a dead witch- successful. 5), kill my sister and her friends- mission in progress. Sure, my goals have failed, but that's due to the work of others; I always do my part perfectly."
"Whatever. You'll never complete that last mission. You're too soft."
"Too soft? So says he who pulled the ‘I won't kill my parents' thing. Anyone with half a brain would have done it in the same situation."
"Exactly. Anyone with half a brain. What can I say, I have morals. Granted, those morals involve sparing children, animals, and my parents, but, hey, nobody ever said they weren't loose morals," Deathnify answers, starting to get annoyed with the witch.
"I might as well go kill them now," Beldam-Vivian remarks suddenly before turning her back. "Anything else you want to add?"
"Sure. Awakenos!" the demon shouts out in casting an awakening spell, knowing Beldam will only be in control of the body when Vivian is asleep. As the blue glow around Vivian fades away and she awakens, Deathnify grabs his shoes and pulls into the Shadows, leaving to fulfill a prior engagement.