Long ago the Gods decided to leave this world and they left a treasure behind for the humans, the treasure was passed down the ancient civilizations, and a seal protected them from any threat, each God left an artifact behind, and by gathering them all, one would be able to break the seal and take the treasure, it was long forgotten come present day, and only a few people knew about it, a chosen person was sent a message to hunt the treasure, because a powerful evil force was determined to find it, and they must be stopped.

Alexander was woken in the middle of the night, a strange voice was calling him, Alex's eyes couldn't open up, he started to panic, but could make out the whispers he heard now, "Alexander, don't be afraid, when you wake up, I've left you a map, please, I need you to find each of the treasures marked on it, but first thing after you must go to the seal, I give you what little strength I carry now so that you may fight... I don't really have a weapon for you, so uh... use this really cool stick I found outside I guess, it's like magically enchanted so it won't break... yeah I don't know how to make that sound fancy, but just do all of that stuff okay?" That was really odd, Alex thought, I mean at least give me a cool laser or something instead of a stick from outside. When Alex woke up, he saw the cool stick and the map, he picked both up, he noticed on the back of the map it said "PS~ if you screw this up you're dead!" Alex walked out of his bedroom door and flew down the stairs in a great speed "WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR BREAKFAST?!" his mother yelled, even though Alex was literally standing right in front of her, "uh can I skip breakfast? I've got to be at my friend's place" his mom sat there for a minute and stared at him completely shocked "you... want to skip... breakfast?!?" She then inhaled a gigantic breath, which Alex thought was her preparing for the loudest scream he ever heard, at the end of the large breath, his mom calmly said "alright sure whatever" "thanks mom!" He ran out of the door and continued to the seal that was marked on the map, it was the only thing on it... on his way there, he was suddenly stopped by a strange woman.

"Halt! Where do you think you're going kid?" Said the strange woman, who was wearing a lab coat for some reason, "none of your business!" Alex said, this wasn't at all what the woman wanted to hear, it infuriated her so much that she began to give a speech, "meek child! You have no business here, but I can tell by that powerful stick you wield and that crumbled up paper, that can only mean one thing! It means you are too searching for the ancient treasure! How do I know? Well... Shut up! I have my ways of knowing things, you know? Like how that trash can over there has a knife dumped in it from a murder that I totally wasn't involved in... uh anyway I'm gonna get on with this, uh I'm the super cool evil scientist person, Doctor X if you will now let me express my grand power of science and knowledge in this battle!" Doctor X then jumped all the way on top of a building, then leaped towards Alex, causing a freeze frame with a totally cool pose, this confused Alex, but in this time he went to grab the knife from the trash can "man that chick really does know stuff, I'll have to ask her where I can find a girlfriend next" he then slowly walked back to where he was previously, causing Doctor X to finally drop from her freeze frame pose, from out of her sleeve her hand was revealed, and a blaster was on it, it shot electronic orbs and lasers! Alex quickly drew the stick and deflected them, why he didn't use the knife you might ask? Because real heroes don't apply basic logic in fights, and because this stick was cool! The night stranger said so! The deflection of the orbs made the doctor gasp, "simply astonishing! That stick is beyond anything I've seen before! Not even the greatest shields could handle my blasters!" She then charged forward and went for a punch, Alex dodged it easily and then smacked her in the back of the head, causing her to be launched back for a really long distance, this was nothing though, because her boots were modified with extreme jumping mods, and she once again jumped into the sky and rained many shots onto the ground, only a few hit Alex, but they weren't nearly as powerful as expected, in fact they only tickled!

The pair stopped fighting for a second while Alex burst out laughing from the tingling sensations, "pretty cool right?! Best invention ever created by yours truly" Doctor X said with a gigantic smirk, while Doctor X was distracted in self confidence, Alex swung the stick which shot out a beam that blew up on the doctor, she got up and fell to her knees, "how... I failed, only because of that blasted stick! Rule number one of fighting... Never take someone on when they have a magic stick gifted by a stranger in the middle of the night... You! You may think this is over, but this is only the beginning, I promise you this, I will fight you as many times as it takes to destroy you and everything you love!" that was a little harsh if I do say so myself, "oh hey I actually meant to ask this, since you know where to find things can you help me find a girlfriend?" Alex asked, the doctor quickly rose from her kneeling position, "on one condition, you give me that stick and I'll tell you..." the stick was already in doctor's hands by the time she finished the sentence, "deal" Alex said without a second thought, "wow really? You're just gonna like actually give it to me? I could easily just leave without telling you... Well I guess that's just plain rude, and well I may be an evil scientist, I'm not THAT evil, you'll find yourself a girlfriend naturally along this journey, but remember, she loves my special brand of official Doctor X cake, it's her absolute favorite, we can like even make it for her together some time!" this was odd, were they planning to hang out after trying to destroy each other "alright" Alex said without any thought, he sure was an impulse thinker…

After his continued walking, he finally reached the destination on his map, there was a sign on a door that says "do not enter! Ancient treasure IS NOT beyond this door" this was definitely not where Alex was supposed to be, I mean when did a sign ever lie? As Alex turned away, the door broke open and an old man with a really long dirty beard came out "Hero! You've made it, come, come, you need to follow me to the seal" this man clearly hasn't showered in years, "hey man when's the last time you cleaned up?" The old man turned around and said "I bathe every day in my tears, anyway, this is the seal! Bask in its glory child!" A giant stone room with a stage in the middle, a giant magical barrier blocked much of the room, nothing but darkness was behind it, "this is the seal?" Alex said, the old man said "yes I made that quite obvious if you would actually listen but anyway, step onto the stage!" Alex hesitantly stepped onto the stage, which made all of the strange symbols begin to glow in all of the different colors, shining brighter and brighter until the entire room glowed a magnificent white color, the map rose out of his pockets and all of the light surrounded the map and exploded like a star, the map fell back into Alex's hands, and it revealed a new spot in the lower left corner, it looked like an oasis in a desert, "my child, go to the oasis marked on your map, there you will find the first artifact, with every artifact you will gain a magnificent power related to the god that once held it" the man said, Alex curiously said "so who's the god and what's the power?" The man scratched his head "well I don't know the power that comes with it, but the goddess that held it is Oriah, goddess of the great desert" Alex stared at the old dirty man and then said "so who are you?" the man said "hey shut up! I gave you your stupid quest so go on and do it!" Alex then set out to the desert, he booked a painful flight that cost way more than it should have, I mean it is pretty convenient to fly out to the middle of nowhere, and I got a quest discount, mom would be proud!

On the flight Alex sat back in his seat, he was greeted by the person sitting next to him "hey kid!" Alex looked over and saw that it was Doctor X, "what are you doing?" Alex asked, "uh I'm going to the desert, you know the boss says I can't go, but well I can't pass the opportunity to spread my amazing skills and stuff, I don't care about the artifact, so like stop by my setup later k?" Alex squinted in confusion and said "setup?" she replied "yeah! I'm opening a store to sell some of my cool gadgets, and lemon-ades" she then pulled a random glass of lemonade out of her bag, it looked normal at first, but then Alex realized the lemon was actually a grenade, "the flavor is simply explosive! Try it!" said the Doctor, Alex drank it and immediately felt refreshed, it was a surprise Alex was still alive after doing such stupid things, he felt extremely energetic, the lemon-ade was the real boost in it "that's actually really good! How'd you make this?" Alex asked, she blushed and said "oh please, I just made an artificial lemon with people that we blew up testing weapons, I blended it together and put a dash of children's crushed dreams into it so that it stays super sweet, and the most important part is the lemonade on top, which gives it a most explosive flavor! Everybody that knows anything about weight loss, knows that to put the die in diet, you have to have explosives!" Alex replied with "gee this flight sure is taking a while" and then groaned with impatience, the doctor laughed and said "but we've been at the desert for an hour, they called the cops and we were taken to town, let's just say that we both have a warrant on us for arrest, good luck finding that artifact!" Alex figured he might as well follow the weird lady into town before the cops caught him for whatever the Doctor did, he looked up at the large town as he approached, all of it was within eyesight but it was still pretty big, many stores were lined up and in one of the little booths, the doctor was fully set up, "I'm glad you came to my little store! Do buy something nice for yourself and maybe even that girlfriend you'll find, I hear girls are crazy for my special cake, extra boom in it just for you darling!" Alex wasn't even close to the store, but he walked up and bought a cake, he had a 200% friend's discount, and was also given a weird pouch as a gift, "that right there is stasis void! Store absolutely anything and everything and when it comes out it won't have changed one bit! Isn't it just simply the best thing ever?!" the doctor was very excited for no obvious reason, but Alex didn't care since he was paid to take a cake and endless storage device, I mean, you should always trust a sketchy scientist that attempted to destroy you for no apparent reason.

Alex jumped out of the hotel window randomly, causing a big scene in the streets, Alex didn’t need to do it, but it felt necessary, with the entire crowd staring at him it was in great silence, then everything returned back to normal as if it never even happened, it’s not like he was carrying various explosive foods and drinks or anything, and if he was, it’s totally legal! Alex went on the unnecessarily curvy path out into the desert before he heard a cry for help, “get off me you punks!” a woman cried out, Alex rushed over to the sound to see a woman fighting a pair of men in strange suits, they were yellow with a black X over the chest, Alex drew his trash can knife on the men and they both jumped back, “you dare try and fight the angels sent here to free the world? Lord Icarus won’t be happy to hear that some stupid kids are getting in the way, this guy must be the dude Doctor X was talking about” the men muttered, the woman said “let’s kick these guy’s heads off!” she then charged at them at full speed, giving Alex no choice but to join in, the angels pulled out laser weapons, with a few failed attempts at stabbing them due to the mini shields projected off of their arms, the girl quickly circled around and swept one of the men off of his feet and then she body slammed him into the ground, taking his laser gun she then shot the other man’s arm to take his shield away, Alex then rushed towards him and sliced the front of his armor which electrocuted the man shortly before frying him up, he cried out for mercy and they both backed up “you just wait until the captain gets a hold of you!” They cried, “the captain?” Alex wondered, the men both laughed in pain and fled the scene of attack.

“Thanks man, my name’s Lucy, I’m surprised you helped me although you don’t look like you’ve lived here long, what brings you here?” Lucy asked, “I’m hunting down a treasure and those guys are too I think” Alex answered, Lucy’s jaw dropped “no way! I’m looking for a treasure too, I was gonna take it and sell it whatever it was, and rumors have been spreading about it being right in the oasis not too far from here!” Alex then asked “why wouldn’t I help you by the way?” Lucy blushed and said “well I’m actually a thief, my reputation isn’t that good for my looting habit, yeah nobody really likes me, but since you’re looking for that treasure and you helped me, I guess I could help you for a little while, I got no better plans!” Lucy said, Alex accepted her request to join the journey, probably thinking that Lucy was going to be his girlfriend, Lucy then guided Alex out further into the desert to find the oasis, it took hours of walking and running from living cacti, you thought cacti couldn’t move? Cacti are actually the deadliest hunters in the wild, proven fact dude, or at least that’s what a hippie told me after I bought a suspicious flower from him.

All of the sudden in the calm desert, a strong gust kicked up, and the sand began to raise and create a small sandstorm, after a few seconds the storm revealed a golden vizor and a shadowy figure came forward to the pair of heroes, “what’s your business here?” Asked the figure, it was wielding a massive hammer almost twice the size of the 7 ft beast lurking in front of the heroes, “what’s it to you weirdo?” Lucy said, the figure laughed and then it leaped into the sky and slammed in front of the pair once again knocking the storm away, “you have no business being in MY desert, go back to where you came or I’ll make you into a sweet and syrupy pancake treat!” The heroes looked at each other for a moment and then back to the midnight purple armored figure, looking back and forth it waited for a response or some sort of action, but then the heroes stopped and yelled “RUN!” Before jolting away, the figure chased after them with incredible speed and swung her hammer after them in desperate hope to land a hit, the swift heroes were fast enough to dodge the hammer though, and this angered the warrior, they once again leaped into the sky with a loud roar and crashed down with a powerful wave of fire erupting from their war hammer, when they missed, they lost sight of our heroes and ran around looking for them. “That was a close one!” said Lucy, who became visible out of nowhere along with Alex “what just happened?!” He asked, “oh right, I’m a master of stealth, it’s a thief thing you know? Like becoming transparent, or is that just me and the weird radioactive muffins I ate on that field trip one time?” Lucy answered “let’s get out of here before that crazy dude comes back” said Alex, after turning around they noticed trees out in the distance, they looked like palm trees, it must be the oasis!

After a quick run towards the trees they encountered a large body of sparkling pure water with a giant statue of a beautiful woman carrying buckets of water with many actual human sized statues surrounding her presence, bowing and kneeling to it. There was something written on the plaque, “to gain the power of Oriah you must prove your strength in a trial, touch the plaque to go to your trial” Alex read aloud, he then touched the plaque without second thought, streams of water jumped up and out of the oasis and formed into a hand that grasped an air bubble, it was very convenient to walk into, like an ancient elevator! The pair went into the bubble and arm retracted back into the water, a woman’s voice called out “I grant you my power temporarily so that you may pass my trials, at the end you will face my bravest and most loyal knight, Sariah, guard of the oasis, I wish you luck” the ceiling began to leak a sparkling water which gave the pair a rush of power, Alex could now make it rain and blast powerful bubbles of water wherever he wanted, neat! It was a straightforward path and only one room to go in, the room was empty of a floor and only had the walls and 2 doors, “uh I don’t think we can make a jump like that” Lucy said remarking about the 50 feet in between the doors, with the bottomless pit splitting them apart, Alex looked at the ceiling to inspect the room closely, he noticed that there was a path of light in it, he made the room rain with his trial power, and with the rain along the path of light left a streak of a path in between the doors following the pattern, the light that fell down reflected on the path, making a clear path to follow, they followed it of course and entered the next room “very well, ” the voice called out, this room was much smaller, but there were lines along the floor and a gate locked in the middle of the room, many wire looking paths were leading to an eye above the door on the other side, they examined every detail and Alex tried shooting the eye with water bubbles to no avail, he shot at the paths for nothing, he made it rain for nothing, they looked at the wall where they just came, there was a hole in the wall that looked like it could fit a knife, Alex stabbed it slowly but nothing happened, Lucy then tried and the a few tiles popped open on the roof, Alex shot a bubble into it and it drained throughout the small paths and flowed into the eye, a teardrop began to form and it fell into the dents of all the tiles, causing the entire room to glow and the gate to disappear. “This place is weird huh?” Lucy said, “not the weirdest thing I’ve seen” Alex replied, they then walked into a a blank room, with only a statue, immediately, it began to crack and broke open and exploded to show Sariah, the tall guard of this sacred temple, she stretched and pulled out a whip of water, “let us duel 1 on 1, hero” Lucy was then cast to the side unwillingly, immediately Sariah charged and threw her whip at a great speed, Alex shot a bubble to the ground on instinct and shot up into the air a little bit and threw a bubble as he landed towards the guard, “you’ve already got the hang of that skill, but your foes won’t go down that easily, you must prove all of your strength to me before I let you win!” During her monologue Alex was already rushing forward with his knife and he took 3 swift slices, each blocked, he was swept off his feet and slammed into the ground with an effortless hit, a whip flew at him and he shockingly caught it, and pulled it back to himself, he then whipped at her and knocked her back with a great force, this was no ordinary whip!

This was Alex’s time to strike, he lunged forward and jabbed the knife into her chest, he stabbed it into her shoulder as she reacted too slow to deflect the hit, Alex shot a bubble into her stomach and tried again with the knife, Sariah kicked him away and she fell to her knees, “you’re much stronger than I had anticipated, and I’m much weaker than I had thought... this will do, you pass the trial... I could hardly even fight-” before finishing the roof broke open and out came the shadowy figure from earlier “nice to meet you again, hero, I see you’ve handled this fight for me” Sariah lunged herself towards them and they had an equal force of power within them, neither side would budge with the pushing and many attacks, a beam of light shot up from the center of the room, and the heroes were cast into it, on the way out a pair of tear shaped earrings were equipped onto Alex, they glowed and said “these earrings are the artifact! Go before this beast gets-” she was cut off with a painful groan and a loud crash, then from the same area the figure shot up out of the water with its large hammer, its helm was gone, revealing long hair that was slicked back into a ponytail, long dark purple hair flowed alongside her armor, when her eyes met theirs they glowed a golden light, she drew her finger across her neck, but before she realized, a bubble of water shot into her face, and it caught her off guard, this gave heroes time to run again, although this time they had bubbles of water to shoot constantly to move much quicker.

Once in the town they stopped by the Doctor’s shop, but it was closed and absent with the mentally insane doctor, the heroes decided to catch their flight back home, Lucy deciding it best to leave this place considering how awful she felt it was, and she was angry that the treasure was just earrings, she hoped to find goodies somewhere along the journey, on the flight Lucy dug through her bag and noticed something very peculiar, it looked like a tape, it said “Warning: requires communicator to properly play” Alex then remembered the device the doctor had given him “I didn’t pick this up... you know what it is?” Alex took the tape and put it in the device, it was labeled “Data log X-1” on a new menu that appeared, the pair listened to it and it had a lot of rustling, but soon a voice came to play, but what it said was very unexpected…

“Hello people of the world, if you’re watching this, than that means a few things, you found my collection of logs and are watching them before the impending doom of the fall of your universe, or... we failed... it’s still an early plan in the process but- but Lord Icarus says that we can achieve this goal if we all do our part, I mean nobody even knows about the treasures, and well I’m only recording these logs to have a record of this event for history, maybe I’ll get to bring them into the new world, maybe we’ll... change our minds, I’m not entirely sure if this is the right thing to do... but really, what is right anymore? I... I don’t think anyone can give me a satisfying answer for that, but with what Lord Icarus promises, there won’t be any pain anymore if we succeed, we’ll be free from this misery that the gods abandoned us with, and to me that chance is something I have to take to make sure that nobody has to suffer anymore. With my extensive knowledge in everything science I can track the energy from each artifact, even though most of them are hidden I’ll be able to calibrate it and hopefully find them all before other people start looking, I can make weapons and tools to assist in our search, I’ll help guide everyone into the perfect new world just as promised, everything will be over soon, but I still can’t help but wonder if this is what I should do... Anyway, boss ordered me to go survey the seal, so I guess I finally get to do something besides sit around all day! Data log X-1 out” the device cut off and left the pair of heroes confused, they’d have to hear the other logs to hear the full story, and it was clear that they weren’t all together, how inconvenient…

~At the base of the Angels~

The Captain walked into the base completely drenched which left everyone in the perfect positions for her report, what would she tell her Lord, that she failed to retrieve an artifact to KIDS?! God how embarrassing that would be for the best Captain of the Angels, she furiously walked through the long hallways into the final corridor, where the guards asked sheepishly “what do you need Captain ABs?” They said quivering, she was fuming with anger and said “I need to see Lord Icarus for my report!”

They made haste in letting her in, she walked in calming herself down, the Lord wouldn’t tolerate her “childish” behavior of being angry, “Captain, tell me that you retrieved the artifact” he said with a bone chillingly calm but creepy voice, “N-no my Lord, I... I failed to get it, there were other hunters, and they got it before I did, forgive me my Lord” he turned around and looked the Captain in the eyes from his elevated desk, he walked down the steps and he said “don’t worry about it, your weapon, it needs an upgrade is all, go see the Doctor and have an improvement done on all your equipment, it’s only 1 artifact, there’s still 6 more out there, and these children simply cannot win against us” she was completely shocked that she received no punishment, she threw her arms to form an X over her chest as a salute and said “yes my Lord, I’ll take them down on their next hunt!” She said eagerly, hoping to redeem her embarrassment, “no need, I already have someone on it, hurry along now” this confused her, but she walked towards the warp pad into the hallway with great haste as she wanted to get her upgrades to crush the heroes for humiliating her in front of everybody, and putting her shame of first defeat in front of Lord Icarus of all people, as she walked into the lab doors she was greeted by a very excited doctor “are you ready for girl’s night?!?” said the doctor, the captain replied with “I need you to make my gear better, so I can destroy those ‘heroes’ with no problem!” the doctor examined the weapons quickly and they discussed the encounters, she knew the perfect upgrades, and the Captain loved it, they then had their girl’s night and afterward the doctor jumped up and said “I have a surprise for you!” they both got up and rushed over to the testing area, “behold, this is what I’m going to use to beat those heroes” as they both gazed upon the beautiful creation before them, it was truly unstoppable... Or so they thought.

Our heroes had just made it back to Alex’s home, his mother didn’t question Lucy’s stay and thought Alex finally got a girlfriend, she thought he would be single forever! They sat down at the dinner table, “hey mom, when’s your next fight?” he asked, his mother was a top fighter in the Leagues and was fighting to become Champion, “I’m gonna win championship tomorrow, nothing’s gonna stop me!” she was very enthusiastic and excited to beat that jerk Janice who currently held championship, she was actually a really nice lady, but Alex’s mom couldn’t stand her for some reason. The heroes decided it was best to get some rest before they set out for the next artifact, they wondered what was next,when in bed, the device went off on Alex, “Attention my most favorite fans! My shows must be put on hold tomorrow night! I’ve been sent on an important mission by yours truly Lord Icarus, I also have a date, maybe I’ll finally have that dreamy lab assistant I’ve been aching for!~ your favoritest Doctor X!” Apparently Doctor X only gave Alex an angel brand phone, still pretty nice.

In the morning the heroes snuck off with the mom being left very suspicious, and jealous of her son’s beautiful earrings! The heroes went on to the seal, Alex remembered that there was something else in that trash can with the knife that the doctor pointed out, it was a locked case, he kept it in his phone because he wanted to open it somehow, there was no keyhole so it couldn’t be picked, but an electronic lock was on it instead, it screamed something to do with the abnormal scientist, they then both proceeded down to the seal through the dark path, it was now lit with torches, down onto the stage Alex walked, his earrings glowed a bright teal color, and on the seal a teardrop symbol appeared on a circle, the map once again exploded with light and revealed a colorless forest, they would be able to get to it by taking a bus oddly enough, so they got onto the bus and stopped at a fancy town just before the forest, a great big pale tree was the most noticeable feature, and probably where they had to go, the heroes decided to look around town for a little bit before heading off “ooh let’s go to this restaurant I’m starving!” said Lucy, Alex agreed, they went in and noticed that it was quite an average restaurant, they were guided to an empty table, the room was very empty, only a few other people were here, the heroes ordered their food and gazed around the room, after a few minutes of listening and talking, they noticed a familiar voice chatting, they looked over to the women in the sparkly pink dress, her hair was a dark chocolate brown, much like the... Doctor X? What was she doing here? Lucy then said “that announcement on your phone! She’s on a date!” she began to laugh and then said,” let’s mess it up for her!” “what! No don’t do that!” it was too late, Lucy was already over at their table “Hey Doctor! How’s your date going?” the man sitting across from her was very confused, she blushed and said “Uh... Who are you?” she said, “oh right! We haven’t met, but that’s my buddy Alex over there and I’m Lucy!” the doctor looked at her and then at Alex, she cleared her throat and said “I’m on a date, now please leave us alone” Lucy then mocked her by saying “aww you wanna make him your lovely lab assistant so you can smooch it up?” in a high pitched voice, the man looked very shocked and said “I’m gonna go...” “no please, stay!” as he ran out of the doors, the heroes stared at the doctor’s back, everyone was staring at her, she began to shake and turned around with a very angry look “you... You took away... My last chance- at happiness” her eyes began to tear up before she wiped them away, she jumped onto the table and ripped her dress off, revealing her usual attire, she shot Lucy with a beam of focused electricity, which knocked her out instantly, the doctor looked at Alex and said “it’s on” before she lept out of the ceiling.

~A few minutes later~ “Why did you do that Lucy?!” Alex asked, “she’s an evil doctor man, she deserves it” his phone rang and an announcement came up “those ‘heroes’ ruined my date, and any chance I had at love! This... This is just a reminder of why I fight for our cause! To erase all pain in the perfect world we’ll create, I’ll do everything I can to make sure that we win tonight!” the heroes stared at the phone “ooh I’m so scared of miss lab coat, what’s she gonna do? Post another announcement while she cries in her lab?” Lucy was right, as the narrator, I can confirm she is in fact crying right now, yeesh that’s an ugly cry face. On their way out due to the disruption in the restaurant, they headed for the forest that they were supposed to go to, before that old guy came to nag at them for doing a side quest or something, what? Can’t I break the 4th wall every now and then, I don’t get paid enough to stick to the script, Alex looked at me and said “dude! Shut up and read already!” They wonder why us narrators want to quit. Anyway, as they walked through the forest they noticed a very colorless surrounding, leaves were pure white, the bark was black, the light that shone through the leaves was white as well, they both jumped because out of nowhere along the trail, a dog with sunglasses popped out towards the heroes, it seemed to be tame, “hey dudes” it said, the heroes looked in shock at the dog, “did you just talk?!” they asked, “I don’t know man, did you just talk? I’m here to tell you that you need a key to get in that big tree, and I just happen to know how to get that key” the cool dog said, “alright then... How do we get the key?” the dog laughed, “well like it’s super easy to tell you’re on a quest, so like let me go with you and I’ll like... give it to you... Like” the dog said, “ok sure whatever” Alex said, Lucy shrugged as she was still confused as to what was happening, “great, by the way, my name’s Dawg, not dog, there’s a big difference you know” He said, Lucy responded with, “you just said the same thing” Lucy said, “no, I said Dawg, not dog, we literally just went over this” they both shrugged again, Dawg stuck his tongue out and a key came with it, then a tape to go with it, we could probably listen to it later, it was labeled “Data log A-1” that was peculiar, the last one was X-1, there might be a lot more than we had anticipated...

Approaching the big tree, a weird door was in the trunk, Dawg levitated off the ground and somehow had the key again, he punched the lock with it and it opened, nobody questioned his levitation, because we all know that dogs levitate, upon entering the tree it barely looked like they expected, when walking in they were approached by a flower, “Hiya! Welcome to the forest of Flora! Here we have... IT’S THE DOG AGAIN!” many small flowers rushed around the group and we’re mumbling a lot of gossip about Dawg, “what do *you* people want here?” the flower said, Dawg replied “come on dude, we’re all on a quest or something and I won’t pee in the gardens again...” the flower stared at the group for a moment and said “alright welcome to the tree blah blah blah, do my side quest, blah blah blah, get out, never come back” that was very kind of her to say, Alex asked her about her side quest that she mentioned “oh I’m glad you asked, can you take these extremely heavy bags of fertilizer to Penny?” “what’s the reward?” Lucy asked, “another side quest” the flower said, Alex promptly said, “How about no” the flower grumbled “your loss man...” this wasn’t the time for sidequests, the heroes needed to get the artifact and get out before any trouble showed up, they walked through the tree on a convenient path, this tree was much smaller on the outside, the gang was jumped by a bunch of spiders, they shot silky spitballs at them because they were just plain rude, Dawg caught one by barking a powerful sound wave at it, which redirected its force back at the spider, Dawg then floated over and buried the others alive, “uh, good job?” They said, “oh I should probably mention that when I bury them they go to Hawt Dawg paradise, my own reality” they all sat there in silence, and continued without another word, as if nothing was even said, they ran into a shop ran by another flower, “want to buy something?” There was nothing but fertilizer on the shelves, and a ‘super top secret mystery box!’ “What’s in the box?” Alex asked, the flower sat there and stared at Alex, Dawg said “uh... it’s a secret, it literally says it on the box, you guys are really stupid you know?” Nobody cared about what Dawg said, because it was true, and they respected that he wasn’t a liar, they bought the box and opened it up, it was another... another box? Is this some kind of joke? They opened this box, inside was another box... they continued to open box after box, and they even looked in the previous ones to find even more boxes, Alex turned one of them upside down to open it, revealing a grand treasure! Another box! He said “last one...” with the opening there were many golden bars!

He reached in to take it, but alas, the golden bars were fakes, they were just fancier boxes, Alex took the time to throw all 3,739 boxes at the flower and said “that’s the worst thing you could ever do to somebody” and stormed away in anger, “what are we even looking for dudes?” Said Dawg, “you know that old guy didn’t really show up randomly to tell us, I guess we’ll find out” Dawg joked, “what if it was that box and the power was to make more boxes?” Alex turned around to give a furious shake, “no,” he said, Lucy said “shut up guys look!” She pointed up at the opening in the top, and the very dry plants below them, “Alex, make it rain!” He did as told and the plants greatly appreciated it, but a giant root shot up and out of the ground, many others followed, and a disgustingly hideous plant crawled out and screeched at the heroes, but it didn’t last long because out of nowhere a gigantic robot dropped on top of it and then blasted it with a giant kitten grenade, it ticked very quickly, the heroes jumped away to avoid the explosion, a loud “meowch” played with the explosion, the monstrous plant was blown to pieces, and down Doctor X, her face was staring at the ground with a much darker look than usual, she definitely wasn’t filled the joy and enthusiasm as she always was, it was worrying, Lucy said “what do you want freak?” Alex hit Lucy lightly signaling her to back off, Doctor X looked up and she began to laugh very creepily, she raised her arm which had a blaster attached to it, before anyone could react she shot a light blue beam at Lucy, the beam surrounded her as it made contact, she fell over onto the ground, the Doctor rushed forward and punched Alex back, she then picked up Lucy’s body that was completely unresponsive, “this little brat is gonna pay for what she did tonight, then I’ll be back!” Dawg tried to bark a powerful sound wave to save Lucy but the Doctor protected herself with a reflective barrier, she waved goodbye and jumped away with Lucy. What would she do to her the heroes wondered? She surely wouldn’t really hurt her, Alex never witnessed the Doctor truly hurt someone.

After the heroes witnessed the kidnapping of their friend they took a break to calm down, at least they didn’t have to deal with the plant monster thing, but it was horrifying to witness such a thing, the Doctor’s never acted like this, she was so friendly and never really meant harm, it was best not to think of what they would do to her, but they hoped it wasn’t too bad.

They decided to stop dwelling on it, what would the doctor really do to her? She would probably forgive her and... hopefully not do anything... The heroes began to walk through the tree some more, where was the artifact? They’d been searching for a while now, after a little bit more searching, they found a sign that said “faded grove” in beautiful cursive letters, a long hallway with statues of a woman holding bouquets of roses, walking through the path the leaves that covered the floor grew crunchier and shone a brighter silver as it went deeper in, entering a big room, a large crystal flower stood tall in the center, the leaves almost looked like glass, the light was blinding all around, the heroes went up to it, and found a necklace on a stem, at the bottom of the necklace was a flower much like the one above, it shone a rainbow color in the light, Alex donned it, and felt the power rush through his body, vines ripped through the glassy leaves on the floor to his control, he could summon a glassy sunflower shaped shield, it was absolutely beautiful!

The leaves in the back revealed a beautiful crystal like waterfall... this lady sure did like that style, the heroes ventured back through the tree to head home, they reached the entrance where all the flowers gathered up, they were congregated again and shaking, the same annoying flower came up from earlier... most likely to complain we didn’t do her stupid side quest, “you! Explain why there’s a giant piece of junk outside of our tree!” She said with fear, “piece of junk?” The pair walked outside to see what the commotion was about, and they walked out to see a giant robot made out of recycled tissue boxes... this was the work of- “Hold on! Is that a dog with shades?! Where’d you get him!?” Said the Doctor loaded into the giant robotic machine, “uh... found him in the woods” Alex said, Dawg said “uh no actually, I found YOU in the woods, don’t take credit for MY work, so like what’d you do to the girl you psycho?” Dawg asked, “well... that doesn’t matter, she’s getting what she deserves! And now I’m here to crush you! Not talk about some worthless brat! Also uh I have to say this line I wrote down to break the 4th wall... uh I made this recycled robot out of tissue paper... no it was ’I’m going green to keep the world clean? Whatever, just fight me!” Her machine began to bounce to a song that she was playing in her robot, a glass dome protected her, Dawg blasted sound waves at her, this caused her to fall over, but she caught herself and jumped back up in a drilling motion towards Alex, he blocked it with the flower shield and the shield broke and deflected her attack, “how strong, X-bot is simply stronger though!” As she said this many water orbs were shot into her chest, it caused her to be knocked into the tree, she got back up and rose her hand, a grenade launching canon was now on her hand, it shot the grenades from before, they had a nice kitten design and exploded with a “meowch” just like before, it was almost triggering to hear that so soon after witnessing Lucy’s kidnapping after hearing this sound, they tried not to think about it, Alex used this pain and grew vines from the ground, he pulled the arm cannon towards the robot while she was firing many off, it blew a big chunk off, it was surprisingly resistant to the explosions, but it caused the machine to wobble in its soggy and unstable stance, this was nothing to her though, she was still determined to win this fight, she armed herself again with her cannon, this time it was a tear blaster, “with this weapon you’ll feel the pain and misery that we’ve endured! For what we’ve survived our entire lives with!” She shot a powerful stream of the salty tears, being hit by it launched the heroes down, Alex threw his new shield at her and sliced the arm cannon off, “how! What? You just get more and more annoying!”

The vines from before began to break the glass on the dome, she finally jumped out of the machine as it was destroyed before her eyes, “no! My beautiful X-bot! Destroyed... you think you can get away with this?! Destroying my beautiful machine? Well, no matter, I have something MUCH better lined up for you later! Just you wait and see! The true potential of X!” As she laughed she received a ball of water to the face along with a supersonic bark, “wow... I was always a cat person anyway... at least they don’t beat me up! Well since you beat me it’s only fair that I leave something behind for no apparent reason... uh did you eat that cake? Like I can give you some more lemonades or something like that, maybe some heels to go with those... Tear-rings? Well I just gave you a cool name for your earrings so like, good enough right? I gotta get going now” said the awkward doctor, Dawg said “well I’m not a doctor person!” In a petty voice, jealous much?

After beating the Doctor she jumped away... as per usual, she had a way of doing everything really dramatic, probably because she was so pathetic. “Hey, that’s just rude man” Dawg said, well I mean, we all know it, “can we get a new narrator, this is like the 5th time he’s broken the fourth wall and other stupid things, like really fire this guy” Jeez, fine! I quit! I can’t take this job anymore, good luck finding a new narrator... “wow that was easy” uh hey, I’m the new narrator, is this gag over yet? Okay well anyway back, uh where were we, oh yes. The heroes left the forest and made their way back to town, this sure was a long eventful trip, Alex’s mom was preparing for the championship and she noticed the lack of Lucy, “she didn’t work out huh? Oh well I expected it anyway, you guys coming to the fight tomorrow?!” Dawg said “sho’ thang sweet thang” Alex’s mom stared at Dawg with her blank stare, she began to violently shake as if she was about to explode, “great, can’t wait to see you both there!” His mom was a very open minded and lovely woman, according to Dawg at least, we all knew that she was actually just crazy.

In the morning they had to go to reveal the next artifact at the seal, going to the stage as usual he opened the next spot with a very similar process, glowing, explosions, stuff, and the new spot was revealed... it was the SCFA! The super cool fighting arena were Alex’s mom was fighting today! The heroes ran home to catch her before she left they made it just in time, “Mom! Wait! We have to explain something to you!” She opened the car doors and said “chat in the car I’ve gotta kick her butt today!” They got in the car as she requested, “so mom... you should know that we’ve been searching for artifacts to get an ancient treasure-” this caused her to bust out laughing, “oh you still have that imagination!” She interrupted, “well... no we’ve really been finding them, these Tear-rings, this necklace, and at the SCFA there’s another! Her face grew more serious, almost concerned, “really now? What do these artifacts do exactly?” Alex answered her confused by her sudden interest, “well they each have different powers, this necklace is nature, tear-rings are like water based” she looked more confused “what does this one do?” She asked, Alex said with uncertainty “we don’t know until we get it, I’m sorry, why do you want to know?” She hesitated for a moment, “some fighters have gone... missing, some have really changed, it’s weird, you don’t think it was that artifact right?” She said almost scared, “I don’t know, I don’t think they’ll hurt us...” she became silent and then said “well then you need an adult to go with you, you can’t just go out there alone, and you need a good fighter to teach you a thing or two!” She said excited to go on the journey, “I guess you can come, but you should know that it’s actually kind of dangerous, Lucy... Lucy was kidnapped actually, there’s a whole other group looking for it, this woman calls herself Doctor X, there’s a Captain too, it’s weird mom. But it would only get more weird, there was another log to listen to, Alex played it in the car.

“Data log A-1, it’s been one hell of a day... first day back with other people and it goes like this, this isn’t at all what I expected... Lord Icarus ordered me to go to the desert to find the first artifact, I was given a bunch of stupid trainees to come with, they’d better not screw this up for me... everyone’s counting on me right now and I can’t fail them, I just can’t afford to do that anymore, I don’t even know why I’m recording this, it’s not like I’m gonna care about these stupid records in the next world, boss says we should all do them so we can remember what we fought for, I say we should just leave the past behind, today was one of my reasons to let go of the past... Data log A-1 out”

X had just failed her mission, she was on her way to return to base immediately, she now understood why Abigail was so mad, but for some reason she still wasn’t angry at the heroes, she was just... confused, she never understood ‘normal people’ probably because she never could talk with anyone, aside from anyone that was an angel, they were all different... Doctor X slowly approached Lord Icarus’s room to inform him of her failure, she really couldn’t bear anymore failure than what she’d already caused, she reached the doors with her hung head, she slowly looked at the guards, who let her in, she took a heavy breath and walked towards the center of the eerie room, and she fell to her knees “my lord, I’ve... failed you, failed everyone-” “ENOUGH! I don’t care that you failed, I expected it with that silly robot, that has to be the most ridiculous stunt you’ve ever pulled, and you dare to bring a random girl back?! I can’t believe this, I can forgive a failure when there’s room for correction, but you go on a date, you bring this- this child back?! Explain this to me!” She looked up from her shameful position, “I... I got distracted from the real goal, my selfish desires for happiness put everyone else’s at risk... the girl- that girl! I brought her back because she ruined it! She’s one of the hero’s friends too, I brought her back so now they aren’t as strong” Lord Icarus paused for a moment, “well... no matter, I don’t care what you do with her, but don’t let her roam around, I don’t want to see that stupid brat, you need to get your act together and fast, I’m sick of these... episodes from you, one second you’re very capable, the next you’re a joke, and then the next you sit in front of me like a baby, now get up and do something!” he said with his cold voice.

Doctor X rose with her eyes shining with tears on the verge of breaking through her eyes, she left silently, and returned to her lab, there was an unconscious girl laying there, restrained, X looked at her, and back to the floor, “what am I doing anymore? Who am I now?” The girl said “you’re a freak! That’s what!” Apparently she was faking her unconsciousness, “you know, you aren’t really that far off, and you don’t even know what I’ve done, you aren’t really that different from me you know, we’re both the same thing, monsters, disgusting, neither of us deserve the luxury of happiness, no matter how much anyone tells you that you do, I heard from the people in your little town that you used to steal from everyone, elderly, sick, children, all for your pathetic self, I almost feel bad for you-” “shut up, at least I’m not some weirdo that kidnaps people, you don’t even know who I am or what I’ve gone through” X cut her off with a small chuckle, and it grew into a dark laugh, “what- what you’ve gone through?! You really are funny, well, what if I told you I can make your pathetic life better? Once we get into the new world, you won’t be so pathetic and miserable, you might even feel joy, as if you deserve it though” a scream rang out from the lab and it quickly stopped, X probably finally broke into insanity, could

anyone blame her? Probably.

After listening to the odd note, the heroes finally approached the fighting arena, they walked in and noticed many posters for famous fighters and legends that passed through, as they walked in they were greeted by a flamingo with the name tag that said “Bob” a pineapple fell on top of him, it then said “howdy there new fighters I assume, Donna you sure know how to pick em I see great potential in... the Dog already!” Alex stared at the jerk of a pineapple, “uh we’d both like to register to fight” Dawg said, “oh, well like, alright sure whatever you can play as a team, but like, you’d need to play as a team, and for no reason that also means that Donna joins you because I said so” Donna yelled, “WHAT?!? What do you mean I have to join them, that would mean I go back to the bottom!” The pineapple said “well it’s decided! You’re officially with them good luck bye, name’s Larry, this is Bob my pet flamingo okay bye!” As he walked away, the heroes threw insults around directed towards him, Donna kicked at the ground, “guess I’m a noob again” “mom it’s okay, you got up to the championships how hard can it be when we’re a team?” She looked at him and then smiled, “well let’s go kick some butt then” she said raising her fist in excitement, the heroes went in to the Newbie area where they gathered around, it was absolutely filthy, everyone greeted her, everybody knew her “What’s Demolition Donna doing in the Newbie area?” said one of the fighters, the crowd all wondered the same thing, “I’m joining this team and they bumped me down back to this, it’s nice to be back though, can’t wait to kick your butts all over again” as she cracked her knuckles, “well why don’t we warm up here?” a woman said pushing through the crowd, it was Janice, you could tell by the painfully disgusting grimace Donna wore, “what are you doing in the Newbie lounge, Janice” She said in a mocking voice, “this!” Janice said, throwing punches faster than bullets, Donna deflected each and gave her a kick in the stomach to knock her back, the crowd went to the sides to give the women room to fight, now standing at opposite sides of the room, they both charged at each other with a powerful force, Donna quickly spun right before crashing into a painful impact, and then she did a swift slamming kick to knock Janice into the ground, she then did her signature cannonball blast, where she jumped up, formed into a cannonball as the name suggests, and pounces onto the person with all of her force, it was always an easy finishing move considering she was a big woman, she then stomped on Janice’s back and flexed her victory pose, “guess I would’ve won that championship and completely embarrassed you with THAT performance!” The group cheered “Demo! Demo! Demo!” Janice got up shaking in pain, she fell over and said “I don’t know what happened... I’m stronger than this!” She then passed out, the group stopped for a moment and gathered around her instead “she’s faking it” Donna said, Dawg went up to her and said “she’s not breathing!” He then ordered some of the fighters to take her to medical, where the group was questioned as to what happened, they were sent to Larry’s office, “Demmie D... I know you were eager to be the champ, and I know you might’ve been angry that you were knocked to Newbie again, but you can’t go around and kill Janitor Janice like that! “Kill?! I didn’t kill her! She’s a fighter she should know how to take a few hits! And she was up in the champ league and I hardly even touched her! C’mon Bob you know that’s not true!” The awkward flamingo stood still not batting an eye, “well Don, it doesn’t matter she’s in good hands, just go tear through the ranks like you did back in the day! I believe in you!” The heroes were sent back to the Newbie area to prepare for their first fight.

Upon arrival, the crowd was split around gossiping and giving looks to the heroes, much of the gossip was related to the missing people and confusion, “Janitor Janice wouldn’t go down that easy, she was a champ and fought like a rookie!” “You think she’s dead?” “Why am I even here?” The heroes prepared for their first fight together, they went to a touchpad screen to look for an available fight, “only 2 fighters at a time, any other friends can switch out!” All of the rules were skipped since they didn’t really matter, Donna set the first fight up, and the heroes all went to the stage for the first battle of many, it was very informal, not even an announcement or anything, just straight into the fight, Donna sat this one out, since this team wasn’t anything strong, apparently weapons were allowed, this place really was cool, they only had small pocket knives, pathetic. Alex drew his much bigger knife, and Dawg... well Dawg doesn’t really have a weapon, he just barks man, but the opposing team rushed straight towards Alex, a rookie move, Dawg barked once and their knives were knocked away, and they were heavily knocked back, with anger they found the energy to throw many slow punches and kicks, they were all easily dodged, and countered with such a light punch just to mock them, they lost miserably, and the heroes won with no sweat, returning with little victory money they sat in the Newbie Area on a break, they overheard a conversation, “hey man, you seen Janitor Janice?” “you mean the champ that got creamed right here?” “yeah how’d she even get here?” “she lost man, she did so poorly she was kicked down here, lucky she wasn’t banned for letting all of her fans down” “you seen after she went to medical?” “Nah, maybe she quit, these missing fighters are just bogus!” “well 8 good ones don’t just disappear man” “they do when they fail” “something’s not right” they then began talking about an up and coming new fighter that would be a champ by tonight, as if…

The heroes had to constantly fight their way through the ranks, many fights later they reached bronze league, only silver, gold, then champ, the champion’s belt had to be the artifact, otherwise this would be a complete waste of time. Nobody had seen Janice since her embarrassing defeat, her family didn’t see her either, she was effectively a new missing fighter, hopefully the last. The heroes left the fighting area to get some food from the pure exhaustion of never-ending fights, on their way out they noticed a poster for the fighter mentioned earlier, “murderous mech!” her name was, her style was very cool with a futuristic outfit, they’d be fighting her soon! Out in the crowds of the food court, they noticed a familiar woman, one that was never too far from the heroes, total stalker even, none other than the brilliant Doctor X, she was complaining how the food lacked the explosive flavor she craved, she looked over at the here and her jaw dropped, “EEEHH! DEMO DONNA I’M LIKE YOUR BIGGEST FAN! SIGN MY MEOWNADE PACK!” she was very giddy with excitement, not even caring that the other heroes were literally in her face, Donna signed the Meownade package as requested, and Doctor X adored it, she then said “oh hey guys, whatcha doing here” only just now acknowledging their existence, “what are you doing here? You better not be up to anything” Alex said, X laughed and said, “nah I’m not much of a fighter... As you can tell, but when you’re working to destroy the world it’s not everyday you get to see a fight like you do here, I should sell some weapons huh?” she then looked at Alex’s knife, “you definitely need something new, that thing’s just not you, unless you’re the type to use trash knives” Dawg didn’t appreciate how he wasn’t offered a new weapon, so he bit on the bottom of X’s lab coat, when a piece came off it self repaired perfectly, “bad dog!” she said, slamming her heel into the ground, it was a big piece of fabric, she stormed away in anger, leaving behind her coat, Alex took it away and from the pocket was dropped a tape, “X-2″ it read, Alex began to play it. It was bone-chilling to say the least.

“Finally, I get to do something other than sit in my lab all day, Lord Icarus has sent me to survey the seal, of course, I’ll do it, but it’s been so long since I’ve been with ‘normal’ people, maybe I can actually meet people, make friends for once... Maybe I can- see my family, yeah... Why would I ever want to do that! So I can hear them say ‘you won’t ever do anything, you won’t get anywhere, you think you’re really capable of all these great things, wake up, all of your ambitions, hopes, and dreams are all just a lie’ they weren’t even that wrong, I’m just a loser with a bunch of pipe dreams… No, I am successful, everybody looks up to me, people need me, and these goals aren’t pipe dreams! Everyone back home is just too stupid to see everything great I can do, too busy calling me a failure to see what I really am! No parent should ever put their kid down like they have, and I’ll show them that they’re wrong! They don’t even deserve the new world, they don’t deserve love, happiness, or anything! Well, I’m here, better go pay them a visit, Data log X-2 out”

After finishing the strange message, the heroes worried about what it meant, was it true? It was slightly creepy, it was certainly X, she couldn’t really feel that way right? They continued their snacks and returned to the silver league to prepare for another fight, they talked around to everyone else, gossiping more about how Janice was nowhere to be seen, it was kind of odd to see the missing fighter case in action, they went out for their next fight to avoid the awkwardness of inadvertently causing her disappearance, they were put up against a pair of twins, Donna and Dawg were put up against them, they were extremely swift, and were very adept at karate, Donna blocked every hit and caught every punch, they were a joke to her, Dawg just levitated and watched as they both swarmed Donna with attacks, but it was extremely pointless due to her perfect reflexes, she finally saw the opportunity to deflect both attacks, jumping over them she spun into a cannonball and kicked their heads with a sweep, she then fell onto the floor and caught herself to do a swift flip, she looked up with a smirk as she watched them in their daze, she rose up and swept them off their feet with a swift kick, she won it single handed, Dawg floated around in his victory poses, the fight was simply amazing, nothing would stop the heroes at this rate, 3 hours later they were 1 fight away to the next league, they were pumped to get it over with, they went out immediately to win their easy victory, walking out onto the stage, Alex and Donna were set up to fight, boasting that their team hasn’t lost a single fight yet, they flashed many confident poses for the crowd as they screamed and cheered them on, their opponents came in, a familiar figure leaped into the stage, a 7ft tall woman with her giant hammer... the captain? When did she become a fighter here?! Another person came up, walking the path confidently and slowly, a new figure stuck herself onto the stage, stomping her feet out, she had slick black heels that reflected the lights beautifully, she was only slightly shorter than Abigail, inhumanly tall. Her waist was extremely tight with a metallic look, a fancy L was placed onto her chest, her arms donned beautiful gloves that were a dark purple, looking up to her face, it was a maniacal smirk from... Lucy?! “Lucy what are you doing?” Alex asked, her smirk grew wider, “Lucy? How do you know my name? Just shut up and fight you brat!” the fight began, Abigail swung her hammer, Donna confidently lunged forward and flipped to dodge the swing, she landed many attacks that were nothing to her, the Captain knew with how fast she was, she wouldn’t get a single hit on anyone with her hammer, she spun the handle and casted it into the air, it disappeared instantly and she deflected Donna’s new attacks with ease, she gave one uppercut and launched Donna off the floor, she landed with a flip, still confident as always, Alex took a turn for attack, he swung his knife at the Captain, but his arm was grabbed by Lucy and he was slammed into the ground, he passed out, Donna jumped the captain and ripped her helmet off, her purple hair flew out, she quickly headbutted Donna in retaliation, then raised her body off the ground “the name’s Abigail, you tell that to your pathetic little friends, champ” she was then dropped onto the ground, Abigail and Lucy waved to the crowd in their victory.

Our heroes awoke in the medical area, their first loss was humiliating, they didn’t even stand a chance to them, they probably couldn’t even take Abigail on alone, but... what happened to Lucy?! She’s gotten much stronger, much... Colder, she didn’t even remember them, but she met all of them, it didn’t make sense. With mysteries out of the way, the heroes decided to try and form a plan of attack, before in the desert against Abigail the water was about all they could use on her to buy some time, they did have a new power to take advantage of though, they called up a new fight once fully rested, Dawg and Alex would show them what’s up!

Walking up to the stage, the crowd was a lot less excited, and thought it was a joke that they wanted a rematch, the maniacal pair strutted up and the crowd roared with excitement, Lucy stood on 1 foot and balanced on the tips of her toes and spun into an elegant pose like a swan, Abigail rolled her eyes and she swung her hammer back onto her shoulder, boasting its incredible weight, she smirked at the puny pair and said “back to get crushed again?” as she took the huge weight off of her hammer, she was learning that she wouldn’t land a hit with such a slow attack, with the weight gone it looked like a halberd, the fight began, Alex started with a shot of water into her face, but she learned this attack from last time “oh that’s cute, I’m not stupid kid!” she said as she swung her agile blade to repel the water, she quickly swung it and tripped Alex, Dawg barked sound waves at her to knock her back, she braced the attack to lessen the effect, but she still fell to the ground, Lucy came up this time and she swung her legs out like a lunatic! She waved her arms out in attempt to smack either of them, but they avoided the hit, Abigail threw her sharp blade at Lucy and she caught it with ease, she stabbed a part of her outfit, and it shot out a big pink blade, she swung it quickly, the heroes just kept dodging as the crowd watched their agility in awe, Alex shot a few more water orbs at Lucy, she laughed and blocked them, “that doesn’t work idiot” she boasted, but to her surprise her blade was caught by vines as she let herself open, her legs became entangled, then she got a powerful blast in the face, with a bark that formed a fist, Abigail jumped up and rained many attacks as fast as she could, Dawg floated up above the stage, and he barked sound waves down onto it, Alex raised his floral shield up to defend, Abigail lost her footing and fell on her face, when she looked up she got smacked by the flower and she grabbed Alex by his neck with a sharp, seriously pissed off look, she jumped up and spun in the air, dunking Alex onto the stage, Dawg soared back down and caught Alex, the gigantic woman landed on her feet with a weak look, that quickly turned into a stare of hatred “I won’t lose to you brats again!” she ran forward and leaped over both of them, took her new sword from the fallen Lucy, and she braced herself for a challenge, her breathing was very heavy, her eyes shifted to a golden color, and she gritted her teeth in frustration, her knees started to shake, she fell over, the heroes were declared winners, Abigail couldn’t accept it, “no! I demand a rematch right here, right now!” she yelled, “uh we like, can’t do that...” the sassy pineapple said, “I DON’T CARE, WHAT ARE YOU?! CHICKEN?!” the angry beast yelled, she rose up and her eyes burned like embers, her mouth shifted to a smile, sweat formed all over her face as she gave her all to keep up the fight, she lunged forward, but Donna intervened, she punched her back “fight’s over, don’t be a sore loser” she said, Abigail scratched the stage she landed on, and she looked up at her with pure anger, her pupils looked like a cat’s, with sharp ovals expressing her anger, and they twitched, security escorted both of the women out, and the heroes celebrated in front of the completely shocked crowd.

“Nice special effects guys” Larry said, the heroes went into their new league, they were very close to becoming champions. Remembering that X mentioned selling weapons, they figured they’d go see if she kept true to her word, they noticed a new shop out by the food stands, the heroes approached awkwardly after their last encounter, last time they received an awkward tape... “heeeyyyy guyyyys” she said overly enthusiastic, she laid out a few items to sell, “so whatcha looking for? New knives, dog outfits, explosives? By the way, I totally loved that fight with you guys and the Captain, that was another thing they wanted to avoid, “what did you do to Lucy?” Alex asked, her face was void of any kind of expression, “I... I erased her memory, and I gave her a fighting suit, now she’ll be put to use, instead of being a little brat like before, I did her a favor actually” she said awkwardly, “yeah... Sure” Alex said, Donna brushed Alex out of the way so she could buy some things, “I’ll take some of those... Uh meow-nades? Is that what they’re called? And this little knife, Alex can lose that trash one... And I think I’ll take a doggy outfit!” Dawg interrupted, “you won’t fit in it, and I ain’t wearing THAT!” she rolled her eyes and removed the purchase, he would’ve looked cute in the rainbow kitty costume, but oh well. “I’ll swap that knife for this one if you want to save a literal dollar” X said, Donna looked aghast, “A WHOLE DOLLAR?!?! WHAT A STEAL! Give the nice nerd the knife sweetie” typical mom behavior to go nuts for any deal, Alex hesitated, “what’s better about this one than mine?” he asked, “ugh can’t you see that the... erm, the blade, can’t you see that it’s completely bent right here, ” she pointed at a spot, but it looked perfect, “no, it’s just fine” Alex said, “well try this knife and compare it!” Dawg levitated and coughed up a tackling dummy that was somehow able to fit in there, probably that magic dimensional storage thing, Alex swung his knife first, cut it in half with no resistance, another one was displayed, he used the new knife, no difference whatsoever, X started sweating “see? This knife is way better! You saved a whole second of time with that new one” that was impossible because it only took a second to slice through it, “did you make both of these?” her eyes widened, “I’m insulted that you believe that crusty little thing is my work! I’ll have you know that I’d never create something so bland, there’s no style, I mean, look at the handle, I’d have included a drawing there, like on the new one” she said as she crossed her arms, Alex denied the trade, and kept his. He knew that she created both, but he was confused as to why she lied about it, and why she wanted it back so badly, he began to think of the possibilities. There weren’t many good reasons he could think of.

Alex was sitting on a bench while the others trained, “whatcha thinking about?” Dawg asked, “X, and how she wanted this knife so badly... I don’t understand why she lied about it, she clearly made it, and when I first got it she knew where it was, it was in a trash can with this box thing that we can’t open, I remember what she first said about the knife, something about ‘like how there’s a knife in that trash can from a murder I totally wasn’t involved in’ I didn’t think of it much at the time, but looking back after listening to these tapes, that last one... You don’t think she actually did anything right?” Alex asked in a worried tone, “you’re looking way too much into it, she’s a cool gal, she’s just crazy and like evil, but we’ve all been there.” Alex brushed off all of these thoughts, his mind got the better of him, he only had a few more fights before the championship, and he heard that Lucy and Abigail were kicked out for medical reasons, apparently Abigail had some disease that flared up recently, and they didn’t know about it before, I don’t know why they’d ban someone for that. He just wanted to find this artifact and move on, he was sick of these fights and already exhausted from these people, just 3 more fights...

After a long day of fighting and perseverance they won the championship, but when they received that special belt, it sadly wasn’t the artifact, they knew because they couldn’t feel the energy radiating off of it like the others, what a waste of time all of this was, after this discovery, the trio walked into Larry’s office, “whatcha need friends? Congrats on that championship by the by!” Alex felt off about the conversation, Donna intervened and said “we have to go, we’ve been looking for a treasure and we were hoping it was the belt, but it isn’t so we’re out of here I guess” she said ignorantly, “treasure eh? I’ll have you know that belt is quite the treasure indeed! None like it! Now what kinda treasure’s better than that?” Larry asked, “well we still have to leave,” Alex said, “no... I don’t think you understand kids, you see, in life you don’t get many opportunities, y’all are good fighters, real young, real strong, y’all got lots of potential to do great things... But since you want to leave so badly, I ought to give you a goodbye you deserve for your fans, don’t you think that’s what they deserve?” he said, “alright then...” Alex said uneasily, Larry guided them out to the stage, this room was oddly eerie with how empty it was “what are we doing here?” Dawg asked, “heh, you kids think y’all can do whatever you want when you want, if you’re searching for a treasure, I bet I know just what you’re looking for” he said as he began to sparkle, the lights came on and shined on him, electricity circulated around him, “You’re looking for the easy way to get strong ain’t ya?” his body formed into a tall, dapper man, who looked absolutely beautiful and full of youth, he donned fighting bracers that definitely gave him this power, the heroes were a little uneasy, he lunged forward at an inhumane speed, Donna caught his punch and asked what he was doing, “observe” he held her hand tightly and the energy from her body was absorbed, everything she had was drained and his body exploded with power, he twisted her around easily and threw her across the room, she slammed into the wall and passed out, “wanna know what happened to the others?” he said with a wicked smile, Larry lunged forward again, to be blocked by a floral shield, “I recognize that strength boy, those little earrings, that little necklace, that’s the only reason you made it this far, strength from those gods! Those artifacts give you all the power you need to make it big! Without them you’re nothing! Alex used his vines to slow him down, but he just ripped them off with pure strength, he unleashed a roar of power, it gave everyone a rush of slight power, but it made him burst like an ember with immense strength, he slammed into the ground and a wave of energy pulsed with it, Dawg barked to knock him down, but he was too strong for it to have any kind of real effect, Donna came out of nowhere and slammed him into the ground with her signature move, when getting up, Larry said, “you are pretty strong but that’s nothing” energy flowed around him and healed his wounds, making her attacks useless, they all knew he was too strong for any of their attacks, Donna came up with an idea though, she picked up Alex and asked him to launch them into the air with a bubble, he did as asked and she waited briefly before saying, “now make it rain with bubbles and toss me a shield!” she commanded, Alex defied gravity with the amount he shot, she dived into the ground, and she was caught by a resisting bark to slow her fast descent, she took cover behind the shield with Dawg and held it stable, with a flurry of attacks like that there’s no way he’d still stand, Alex fell down and caught himself, Larry was laying on the ground, “pathetic!” he said, before he healed the damage once again, he ran towards the group and tried his attacks once again, but he was slower and easy to counter, Donna easily hit him each time, she probably broke a few of his bones, the team ganged up on him and creamed him! He attempted to heal again, but his strength was gone, “what?! My power? How?!” he asked, “that’s called a crash, there’s no easy way to get strong, you need perseverance, determination, everything that you lack!” His body began to dissipate, leaving behind a small belt with stars on it, it shined a bright light and it projected out onto the stage, every fighter that had went missing formed out of nowhere, still weak, Donna went up to the belt, and put it on, she unleashed a roar and everyone felt a surge of energy awaken inside of them, each of the fighters looked confused, Janice looked up at Donna and reluctantly approached her, “hey... thanks for the help Demmie... none of us were strong enough for that guy... he’s been draining our energy over time with that stupid belt, he trapped us in there so he could keep our power, he’s been doing it for years apparently, ever hear of the legendary Heroic Henry? He didn’t quit... but thanks for the help, and uh... good luck finding the rest of those things hon, in the wrong hands those things ain’t safe, but you guys seem pretty alright to me, you guys should come back when you finish all that and then we’ll *really* have that rematch” she said sincerely, Donna hugged her and waved goodbye to all of the returned fighters.

From the doors of the grand stadium came that angry flamingo, it charged at Donna, she was ready to fight it, but instead, it stopped in its tracks and it banged its head against one of the stars, it transformed from a flamingo into a man, he hugged Donna and said “oh thanks miss, you don’t know how long I’ve waited for this!” he jumped away in excitement. What a weirdo. With the artifact in hand, they could finally leave, almost never wanting to return, the heroes packed into the car, and drove back to the seal, “I wonder what’s next” Said Dawg, “I bet it’s gonna be the moon, because these things are just in the most tedious places, and that would just top it off” Alex joked, Donna stepped onto the stage awkwardly and jumped at the lights, it was all the same, but this time a strange mirror appeared on the opposite side of the seal, “uh is that supposed to be there?” Donna asked, the heroes approached it, and the mysterious night man appeared from thin air, “ah heroes, 3 down eh? Not bad for a couple of fools, as you may have noticed the obvious mirror over here, well lucky for you, you don’t have to go far for the next artifact” Alex sighed a breath of relief, interrupting the old man, “oh... Okay then, well anyway as I was saying you’re going into the mirror now, rude boy, I remember you asked who I was a while before... I didn’t answer you because well... I’m kinda not real! I’m actually just a manifestation of energy crafted by the power of the next artifact, you’ll be entering the spirit realm, and you’ll come find me to take the artifact, because well... I’m a little stuck here with just this one, with those other 3 you’ll be able to break the walls between our dimensions, freeing our spirits, and uh, you can have the stupid artifact, I’m sick of it!” the heroes all approached the mirror, “so like, how do we go through it?” Dawg said, “like this!” the man said, he rose his arms up and the room exploded with a blinding white flash.

With a bright flash, the heroes adjusted their eyes to the new surroundings, they were standing in a glassy looking puddle of water, the blades of grass were orange, this place looked like Halloween, with the black trees, and miserable looking green people, walking towards some strangers, they were greeted like so, “wow look, it’s been a long time since any idiots like you guys came to town, get ready to stay forever, you won’t ever get to leave” the woman said with a monotone voice, “well hey look, they’ve got a few of the other junk, maybe they can actually break the wall” another woman said, “yeah, I’ll come back to life when that happens, literally” “so uh... Where do you guys keep your artifacts?” Alex asked, the pair of women started laughing in a monotonous voice, they weren’t really laughing, more like just saying “ha ha ha” with a second of a pause between each one, how annoying! “Well, you ought to know the last fool like you to come here’s been stuck in this realm for how long now? 200 years? She’s long dead now, right where she belongs, she found that rubbish and never was able to leave, couldn’t free any of us, pretty funny if you ask me, as if you could just come straight here and leave with just something in here” she gave another annoying laugh, “so who is she, where is she?” Alex asked, “well ever since she died, her name’s Spook, where she is, well go have a look up that little mountain” she pointed her boney arm towards the view, a little tower shot up out of the ground, “uh thanks” the group said, the pair waved them off and laughed because they were surely doomed, the way to the tower wasn’t even hard to get through, just a crazy bridge ghost or 2 and you were right there, knocking on the doors of the tower, the door creaked open, they walked up the long set of stairs, at the top of the tower, they encountered a purple blob, it turned around, “so glad you lovelies made it!” she strangely didn’t have that same annoying voice, but was awfully cheery, “uh howdy” the heroes said, the blob took on a more human form, but was still purple, odd considering everyone else looked at least somewhat human, “soooo, about that artifact” Alex said awkwardly, “yeah about that, I kinda can’t give it to you, because well, only one of us can really leave, so I’m just gonna kill you guys and take your artifacts, then take your bodies and escape into the mortal world!” Donna rolled her eyes “If that’s what you want sweetie” and they prepared for a fight, Spook took on another form, but this time she molded into X and shot orbs from her fake blaster, Alex blocked them and attempted to slice at her with his knife, Spook caught his arm and transformed into Abigail, “aww that’s cute” she said, before throwing him out of the tower window, she extended her body out to match her hammer, there was hardly any room to move, Donna hoped her new strength would be enough to counter it, she braced her body and attempted to catch the mighty hammer, she was blasted to the bottom floor, Dawg floated out of the way and his bark disrupted this blob’s form, the gelatin-like spirit reformed into the original purple blob and cast a fireball at him, it engulfed the entire room, Dawg made a quick getaway by flying out of the shattered window, everyone met back at the entrance in their defeat, “well that sucked” Alex said, “well guess we go back to town” Donna said, as the heroes made their way to town, they noticed that everything began to shift around them, every building was erased, everyone disappeared, the area became completely clear besides the tall tower, it was quite an odd sight, a clear path formed among the abyss of trees, the heroes decided to go through it since that was the only other place to go, they encountered more bridge ghosts, what’s with these things and their stupid puzzles? The forest struck a resemblance to the silver one previously traveled, Dawg pointed out the spot he would’ve come from, it was like this place was a part of that forest, just made of different colors, the heroes stumbled upon the sight of yet another tower, and another town just like the one before, did they go in a circle? Approaching the town they were greeted by extremely enthusiastic spirits, “our saviors have come at last!” one of them spoke, it was one of the women from earlier, “uh... How do we know this isn’t some trick?” Alex asked, the pair looked at each other and said “oh, you already met CopyCat, yeah he’s kind of a jerk, he stole the artifact from us a little bit ago, and ran off into the forest with it, he’s been using it to watch us and create all these weird things, and he’s constantly shapeshifting into other people to stir up trouble around here, it’d be really nice if you could stop him” “how do we do that? We just fought him and we kinda got creamed” the spirits looked at each other quietly, then busted out saying, “L-O-L-! you actually tried to fight him? Obviously living things like you can’t fight powerful spirits like us, our bodies don’t work like yours, you need a spirit to hurt a spirit, and well... We have the right gal for you... SPOOK GET YOUR UGLY TAIL DOWN HERE!!!” the spirit said, “SHUT UP MAPLE I’M TRYING TO WATCH TV! WHAT DO YOU WANT- oh” Spook said, she floated down from her tower and greeted the heroes, “uh Maple go get me my spellbook, I don’t have time to waste!” she said, “can’t you just summon it like the rest of us?” Maple said, “yeah like I’m gonna pay $5.99 every 10 years for premium Maple, you’re horrible at finances,” Spook said, she then continued with, “anyway, uh I’m Spook as you obviously heard, I’m gonna join you whether you like it or not, and I’m gonna help you take down that stupid CopyCat” the heroes were standing here in silence the whole time, this world was hardly different than the strange world they inhabited.

With a new friend in the group, the heroes decided to venture back to the false town that was created for them, Spook explained a few things to the heroes due to their ignorance of how spiritual things work, “you guys should know that while you can hurt spirits, it’s kinda impossible for you guys to really put us out, when a spirit ‘dies’ it comes back later, we don’t have physical bodies obviously, so in order for you guys to actually be able to hurt spirits, they need a form or to possess something, so I can hold him into a form and we can hurt him then, I’m kinda new to magic so we’ll just have to hope for the best I guess” she said with little confidence, “so how’d you even get stuck here?” Alex wondered, “didn’t you hear? I was just like you guys once, I started looking for these things forever ago and the first thing I knew about was the mirror, it was magical, so I assumed it was an artifact, little did I know it was just a little trap...” Dawg sighed and said “yeah, kinda best not to mess with magical things you don’t know about, haven’t you ever heard of Violet’s story?” Spook turned around, “how did you know her name?” she wondered, “I get around,” he said, “so tell us about Violet’s story” Spook said, “well basically there was this kid with the stupid mirror and she was weird because she liked ghosts or something like that, and the mirror made this world and spirits became trapped forever, right?” he said, “that’s... that’s right, I thought you were kidding, that’s at least kinda how the story goes” Donna raised her hand to signal a stop, “there’s the tower, you guys ready?” they all said yes, when they approached the tower, a tree came alive before them to attack “back for some more play? You shouldn’t run this time... I need those little artifacts of yours! Oh, I see you brought a friend! Hey there me!” CopyCat said through the tree, Spook didn’t waste any time in throwing a whip of fire around the tree with a tight grip, “Oh how strong! Little Spook can actually put up a fight?” the tree said, she pulled the whip back and threw it into the tower, causing it to break, “oh it’s a shame that didn’t do anything, come on Spook, try it again!” he said as the purple blob that was his form molded up in front of the group, “with pleasure!” Spook said, she waved her hand and pink sparkles appeared all around the blob, he quickly shaped into Alex, and became stuck in this form, “aww, you’ve learned so much since the last play date” he said, “shut up and fight idiot!” Spook said, with him now in a physical form the heroes charged at him, Dawg shot Donna into the air so she could charge her power and slam back into him, Alex rushed towards him with many swift slices, it was all countered perfectly and Alex was knocked back, he tied the freak down with vines so he couldn’t dodge, and he was struck with a powerful hit that felt like an anvil crashing upon the earth, he came back up like a spring, and he inhaled a big breath, and released a powerful chilly blizzard, it was countered by a magical fireball that kept the heroes from freezing, once the air cleaned up, Copycat was met with a shocking sight, Alex now wielded Dawg as if he was a gun, and he shot the meownades they’ve been saving up, with an attempt to dodge, he was cut short because his legs were caught by a fire whip, and he was heavily wounded by the meownades, Alex then took the opportunity to shoot a focused bark at him, it pierced through his body and he split apart into billions of pieces, “what? We actually did it?! I thought this was gonna be impossible!” Spook said, “well we’re kinda pretty strong you know,” Donna said, crushing a piece of Copycat with her foot, “so where’s the artifact?” Alex asked, Spook, manifested all of the tiny blobs and drained a part out with her magic, a soul formed, “right here” she said, Alex grasped it and his eyes rolled to the back of his head. Dizziness ran through him as he felt the entire universe for a single moment, he felt that his soul become invigorated! “now let me take you somewhere special!” Spook said.

She led the heroes to a cliff just outside of town, the spirits rejoiced as they were about to be free! Without a moment of hesitation, the cliff became a bridge that led into a fog, it rushed to the side and up above revealed a glassy ceiling, you could see the seal from here, “the entire bridge is kinda out, bit with all this power you just made half of it, so we can reach the real world once the bridge is up!” the bridge then slowly rose to the ceiling, and a staircase appeared that altered gravity so you could walk normally on the bridge, what brilliant creation! X would be so jelly, so Alex took a video to show her later. Everyone crossed the bridge into the familiar room, and they celebrated when they finally reached the normal world, Donna asked “where did they all go?” everyone else was confused, “she can’t see or hear us because we’re back here, we kinda don’t exist here” Spook said, Alex spoke for her, “try your new power on us though” Spook requested, with a burst of energy, the room lit up and every spirit became real in this world, Donna smiled as they all appeared in front of her again, “that was kinda cool” she said, Alex’s map glowed with a new spot, apparently the room sensed the new power, an island appeared on the map, “Ooh I can finally get that tan I’ve wanted” Dawg said.

The heroes decided to rest up before setting sail to the island, pretty soon they’d have every artifact!

~At the Angel’s base as the heroes are in the mirror~

“So what are you gonna do on the island since we have so much time,” X asked, Abigail responded, “I’m gonna search, I’m not wasting a second of this valuable time for fun crap!” “well look on the bright side, there are 2 artifacts right there, so like, we’re definitely gonna find at least one on the island, we just have to hope neither are underwater!” X said, as she was packing her clothes, “isn’t there a volcano on that island? Is it active?” Abigail asked, “well it’s heavily active, but we’ll be fine, I have solutions for this kind of stuff” X responded confidently, Lord Icarus’s loud footsteps approached the lab, he walked in to see X packing her things and Abigail wasting time, “what are the pair of you doing? Where’s the stupid child robot toy? Are you ready?” he asked “uh I’m packing for the island, Abigail’s making sure we’re prepared, and uh, the hunk of junk should be training until we get back” X said confidently, “well make haste, you won’t waste a single moment out there, do you understand? No tomfoolery, you go out, and you do your job, you do not stray from your task, you most certainly do NOT help those brats, don’t waste your time on them, X, that goes double for you, if I even hear a breath of you interacting with them I’ll have no choice but to punish you for it” she nodded, Icarus left.

Abigail looked at the bag and pulled out one of the meownades, “why do you make stuff like this?” X responded, “it gives me something to do, something to think about I guess” “why do you need all of that though?” Abigail wondered, “if I’m doing all this stuff, I’m not thinking about things that are bad, like how I’m kinda the biggest failure ever, how I can’t really do anything right, and how I can’t really be happy you know?” she said depressingly, “well you’re pretty great to me, X, without you we wouldn’t be anywhere right now, I mean just look at this little kitty’s face, he looks like he could blow up the whole moon, and without you I wouldn’t have the actual best weapon ever, not just anyone can make things like these X, I’d say you’re probably the most important person of all of us, you’re the main reason we’re even this close to finally reaching this goal, so what if you aren’t perfect, those gods didn’t care enough about us to make us perfect, and without you, I wouldn’t be nearly as strong!” Abigail said, “that was hardly a success...” X said depressingly, “oh come on! What’s a few bubbles gonna do?” Abigail said reassuringly, “It could’ve killed you, could’ve ended up like... Like-” X was interrupted, “Don’t worry about things like that, that’s just a mistake that you couldn’t control! Come on let’s get back to picking outfits, this one would look good on you, you’d get to show off that cool tattoo, and I guess since we aren’t kicking those kid’s asses we have plenty of time to hang out!” Abigail said cheerfully, “alright... You really think my tattoo’s cool? I thought it was kinda lame” X said, “well go try on the outfit and we’ll see”

After a few minutes of dilly-dallying, X and Abigail both came out with beach outfits, Abigail wore a blue bikini outfit that boasted her ripped body, and she carelessly showed the bubbles on the side of her stomach, X couldn’t help but stare at it and feel bad, but she came out in a light pink swimsuit that was opened in the back, boasting her tattoo of rainbow angel wings, she always said when she felt free she would get more tattoos, she wouldn’t know what to get though, these wings symbolized her desire for freedom and her loyalty to the angels, and so they finished packing, and made their way to the island in confidence.