Dark days

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!