Chapter Text
Susie didn't quite understand this place. Any of it. Not a lick of it.
Destiny and prophecies and Fountains...
Not that it really mattered in the long run, this was a weird, one-off adventure. She liked this place, she dared to think that she may have adored it, but nice things like this usually didn't last long.
Besides, acting a hero was a tough act to keep up with. Somehow being a saviour of the world didn't sit right in Susie's stomach.
Such thoughts provoked such a visceral reaction from the pink skinned lady, once again, she was totally misplaced in her surroundings once more.
That was another thing. Scales stained pink instead of her unnatural purple hues.
Hell, Kris was tan in Hometown and now here they were straight up blue. Susie leaned over the human's shoulder as they led her and Ralsei down twisting corridors.
This is was the final stop, Card Castle, the lair of Lancer's father. The Chaos King.
The halls were flooded with guards. Kris held out their arm in warning.
"Do we gotta sneak around constantly?" Susie asked, her usual easy-going smirk replaced with a expression that dabbled in concern. "We need to find Lancer, pronto."
Kris replied swiftly to her, they argued that if they didn't dodge as many guards as possible, the time battling them would be better spent to find their oval-shaped, blue ally.
Susie grimaced but acquiesced their request, very begrudgingly.
"Fine, keep leading on blue, uh," she stammered, wanting to say 'blue boy' but quickly remembering that Kris wasn't strictly that, and Lancer fit that description more succinctly, "...you blue dork..."
Kris hummed quietly in reply. Susie hoped that they didn't mind her near blunder.
"Dork.", they repeated softly, dispelling any possible ill will to the dragon.
It was quite quaint to hear Kris be so verbal, their voice surprisingly...it wasn't just smooth, Susie thought, a word like silk or velvet was much apt.
Their tone as soft as an arpeggio but hoarse, like worn out piano keys.
Ralsei chimed in quietly. "Well, let's hope Lancer keeps his dad occupied, we still have quite a lot of work to do, right Kris?"
Kris nodded, holding out a fixed key.
"...Not to be pushy, but do we have to run errands at a time like this?" Susie asked, recollecting how a stall vendor talked of a keeping an eye on a prisoner.
A key split in three segments, locked away by three keys of their own. A friend's guilt, a land without stars and a path hidden amongst the leaves.
Everything about this was setting off so many red flags to the reluctant dragoness.
"Can we even trust that cat guy?" Susie asked.
Ralsei put a finger to his mouth in thought, "Why would they lie? Darkners live to serve Lightners like you and Kris, I really don't believe that Seam would guide us on a wild goose chase."
Susie nodded slowly. "Well, if thing's goes tits up, I guess I'll havta drag you two outta it, huh..."
Ralsei blushed at Susie's words and he gawked at her inappropriate language, "S-Susie!! You can't talk like that, it's impolite!"
"Didn't ask." Susie answered back with a snap, "You don't got tits, so pipe it down."
Ralsei sputtered, his face tinged rosey red across his shadowy visage. "I suppose it's important to, uhm, express yourself..." He said in a bashful tone. Susie could've sworn Kris snickered at that.
"Now you're getting with the program, nerd!" She grinned, wrapping an arm around Ralsei's scarfed neck and giving him the world's most powerful noogie, brusing her knuckles as they made contact with Ralsei's horns.
"Cut it out Susie!" He whined in return.
"You keep whining and I'll keep doing it, loser!" She warned.
Hathy's and Ruddins scoured the hallways, the Lightners and their Darkner ally dodging and diving to and fro, dancing stick figures spiralling as Susie, Kris and Ralsei stumbled into a room.
Spikes shuttered into place, blocking the way they came in.
"Geh-hah-hah, the worms have finally decideth to come hither and play..." a snobbish voice sang.
"Who goes there? S-show yourself!" Ralsei demanded.
"Geh-hah-hah, thoust fools!" A beam of light swelled, the black bare box of a room cast in a shimmering, heavenly afterglow.
A svelte twink of a man, appeared from the light, body adorned in what could only be considered some form of royal regalia, a suit of dark blue with military fatigues.
Hair pure white, like raw pearls from a shucked clam. Smiling plastered across his thin features, a low strand of flesh binding his upper and lip together across his sparkling teeth.
"It is I, the Duke of Puzzles, Rouxls Kaard! Thou greatest adversary!" He laughed with obnoxious anti-charisma. "Prepare thou selves for a-!"
"Who?" Susie asked.
Rouxls stammered before coughing into his hand. "Let's us, taketh it frome the top, shall we? I am thou greatest adversary! The Lord of Scrambling Thou Weak Minds! I am-!"
"Ralsei, who is this? What's this bozo's deal?" Susie asked with a wave of her hand.
"SHUTETH YON UPETH!" Rouxls Kaard screeched, clawing at the air, his stance bowing with anger.
"Um, I think he scribbled out the instructions on one of the puzzles? Signed with 'R.K' ?" Ralsei answered quickly.
"That's sorta lame." Susie said with apathy. "So, we're not gonna fight then?"
"We fight with oure wits!" Rouxls Kaard beckoned maniacally, hands splayed out pompously. "You may have wriggled thou selves from minest past conundrums, but now thou're at my mercy!"
A spotlight shone to the middle of the room, the ground rumbling as the floor spun around revealling a puzzle of great magnitude. A switch and a singular tile.
"Toil, WORMS!" Rouxls Kaard decreed with vainglorious laughter, head tilted away as he basked in his pathetic glory.
Susie snorted. "Looks real difficult." She shook her head, grinning. The purple dragon turned around, passing through the spikes as if they were mere mist.
" Susie, what are you..." Ralsei tried to speak as she walked through the trap with ease, "...doing?"
The goat let out a relieved sigh, holding the fabric of his cloak tight around his chest. "She...walked through them before, of course." He recollected, adjusting his glasses atop his round muzzle.
"Struggling? Neede my assistance? Too bad'th! Ga-ha-ha!" Rouxls Kaard guffawed, taking no notice of Susie's departure.
"Youre fate hath always been foredained! I shall crush thou beneath my heels of magnitude!" He presented his fashionable boots, showcasing how he would stomp out the Lightners' spirits.
Kris kicked the tile into place.
Rouxls' face froze then went slack. His jaw tightened. "GOD, DAMN IT!"
♥️♣️♦️
Down the elevator they all went. The floor labeled with a trio of question marks. The machine thrummed as the Lightners and lone Darkner descended.
Susie wondered why a castle would even have an elevator.
Walking furthur downwards, a staircase led to a singular jail cell. A door of steel containing a peculiar creature, organ music swelling like splutters of fog accompanying the descent to madness.
Fingers curled around the bars of the cell, yellow eyes gleaming through the darkness. "Boo-hoo, boo-hoo...!" The voice cackled with mocking tears. "Woe is me, me! No-one to set the world free, free!"
"The four kings saw my fun to be a trouble and I was to be imprisoned...!" The figure announced behind the bars, his gloved hand waving off any such worries to their plight,
"But I was fast, fast! Clever, clever! In their haste, they locked up their entire race and now I'm the only one free!"
Susie flinched as Kris walked towards the door, completed key in hand. "Smart, smart! You've come so far, far...do the stars burn your heart, heart or are you left in the chill of the manor, manor...?"
Kris stiffened.
Susie could tell that something awful stirred in the human's head, she reached out her hand only for Ralsei to gently pull it down, the wizard's face sweating anxiously.
A finger wagged from within the cell. "Too late, too late! This game must begin, begin!"
The hand lunged between the bars, Kris recoiling with gritted teeth, dropping the key to the ground. The key spawned a door that twisted into shape out of the bars of steel. The door opened, swinging ajar as a horrid wind howled through it.
"Kris...we don't havta do this." Susie started, her palms clammy and slick.
Kris peered at her, their heart thundering. They looked forward. Their head dipped and stepped into the cell.
"This feels off. This ain't just me, right?" Susie exchanged a look with Ralsei.
"Well...Kris will probably needs us. Let's just wait and see." Ralsei said softly, rubbing around his neck. Susie and Ralsei entered the jail cell with a shuffle.
"Welcome to the outside, outside!" The creature beckoned. The three heroes were now facing a jester.
Eyes black and his head tilting at a jaunty angle. His smile permanently etched onto his pale face.
The joker was crowned with a jingling hat and his neck was surrounded with a ruffle.
His gaze unpleasantly whimsical as faded paint cried from his eyes.
"Vee hee hee! A marvelous thing it is to be, being as free as me!" The prisoner wrung his hands.
Ralsei, the reliable medic and kind hearted Prince of Darkness smiled most graciously taking a bow, despite the growing tension in his chest.
"Its ever so lovely to finally meet you mister!" the shadowy magician answered with a bleat, his pink eyes a shine behind his green rimmed spectacles.
Susie took one good glance at this room, if it could even be called that, and crossed her arms. Her posture exuded disappointment.
With a cocked brow she spat at the prisoner, "So, uh, how you do fun stuff in here...? Staring at the walls is giving me an aneurysm." She remarked.
The walls were coloured in a paint that was so dull and lifeless, merely looking upon it made your eyes buzz.
Kris gave a reassuring shake of their hand, implying to Susie that this may have been a minor misunderstanding. Susie, as usual, was skeptical.
Ralsei coughed into his balled up paw and Susie and Kris quietened in order for him to tackle negotiations.
The prince was lacking in regards to his compliments to the decor of the cell, his words fumbling as he struggled to make a decent first impression.. "I..I'm sure we'll be quite good friends, Mr...?"
The prisoner answered with a grin. "Jevil."
"...And yes, yes! I do believe so too!" The jester's smile grew wider as his pointed, impish ears swooped back as he took a few steps forwards.
"I must say the game we'll play will be absolutely spectacular! The rules will be simple, yes they must be...if you can beat me, well...let's let us see!"
"Well Mister Jevil, we'll gladly keep you company." Ralsei answered warmly. "What game are we going to be playing exactly...?", the young prince piped up.
"Survival!" Jevil yelled in maniac uproar as scythes hurtled to the ground, Ralsei being yanked backwards by Kris at the last second with a terrified yelp.
"A simple numbers game it shall be! The aim of it will be simple you see, when your life is depleted, you will be defeated!"
"That's it!" Susie shouted "If you wanna fight us, you gotta know that you're dealing with a couple of sharks!" she gnashed her teeth drawing her axe.
"Va-ha-haha! From shark to shark, I'd have it no other way! Now let the games commence!" Jevil announced eagerly.
The battle began, the walls shifting to a foggy mass of swirling shapes, contorted and bastardised carousel components as merry-go-round horses hopped and bopped along.
Kris jumped atop the plastic equestrians and ran towards Jevil, their arms rising above their head before swinging an orange blade at the jester.
Jevil cried out in riddles and rhymes as he brought on a tidal wave of card symbols into the unwavering heroes.
"My heart goes out to all you sinners!" Jevil fought with a frightening delight as he cackled with a craving for anarchy as spades, clubs, diamonds, and hearts flew from his palm.
"CHAOS, CHAOS!"
The jester's body jittered and quadrupled in a fast dance of shadows that swarmed around him, his head lunging on a spring with those makeup-shaped voids with yellow pinprick pupils.
His black cloak bounced with his swiftness as bells jingled from his shoes and hat as he cried out.
"I CAN DO ANYTHING!"
The Lightners spun, defended and healed with all their might.
The jester was standing stooped, his hand limp beside him as his pupils faded as he hovered, "You boisengirls have really tired me out..."
Another wave of flying card symbols was sent spiralling across the entire room as Jevil began dancing, hands waving as he jumped from side to side.
"Just kidding! Va-ha-ha!" The room turned black as scythes fell from the sky in white beams that sliced through the darkness. Pillars of light burst as the scythes crashed to the ground.
Susie skidded, Ralsei pulled at her the back of her jacket and Kris ran between the spotlights as the blades of death spun past.
The last swing of the orange blade swiped across Jevil's torso.
He tumbled backwards before prevailing to his feet with a hop and a round of applause to his combatants.
"My, my you three kept up!" he congratulated, smiling, his lips slipping into a lopsided grin as his ears twitched and he held his hands together.
Jevil's grin crept furthur his face, his cheeks crumpling to accommodate his sinister sneer. "Think you can survive my final chaos?"
He snapped his fingers, the deafening click cursed the three heroes with an explosion of clubs and spades decking them in their faces and torsos.
Jevil leapt into the sky, his small body twisting into a horrific construction of metal. His body forming a scythe the size of an apartment complex, billowing downwards like a meteor on a crash course.
The trio of heroes stared upwards at certain doom.
Kris ground their teeth. Sprinting, the sword in their hand melded, melted and ran up their arm as it took shape into a shield.
"Kris you're gonna get yourself killed!" Susie yelled with frightened eyes. Ralsei watched on, his body quaked.
Thrumming with renewed vigour, the Red Soul phased through Kris' chest and then spiralled around their finger tips. "Dodge better or I will evict you."
With an almost affirmed glow in reply, the Red Soul glided past their hand, shooting past the running knight.
The spinning jail cell cast furthur into darkness as the scythe ebbed with blazing, white light.
Susie and Ralsei stared upwards in horrified awe. "K..Kris will fix this." Ralsei muttered, "Everything is going to be fine, it has to be fine!"
Susie growled, "To the hell with this!" She grabbed Ralsei and holstered him under her arm and dashed towards Kris.
"SUSIE! Put me down!!" He yelped, flapping his arms like a demented penguin.
"I ain't trusting that runt to not get over their head, get back here you moron!" Susie shouted, yanking her axe from behind her, "We're doing this together!"
Kris turned, their faded crimson field of view widening as Susie caught up, Ralsei in tow. "You're not supposed to be doing this." They pleaded.
"Oh yeah? You got any better ideas?!" Susie retorted, plotting Ralsei on the ground as the world spun into a blurring nightmare.
Ralsei's pink scarf un-wound and grabbed Susie and Kris by their shoulders and necks, holding onto them tightly.
"We're in this, together, no matter w-what!" The lowly prince prayed that they'd be anything left to heal by the end of the battle.
Susie wrapped her arms around the pair of them and craned her neck away. "...Here's hoping we make it outta this mess."
Kris' chest hammered.
The Red Soul persevered against the gigantic blade edging towards cellular annihilation.
The floating heart that flickered with a bloodied luster batted the Devil Knifes like a baseball bat.
The impact caused the entirety of the room to tremor and the spinning carousel floor to slant, sending the three heroes flying, all three of them tumbling on the manic and tumbling closer to the exit.
Jevil cried out, head spinning. The absolute earthquake of an impact blew the mad jester into the sky like a shooting star before he came crashing down to the floor, his face taking the brunt of the whallop straight to his imperfect teeth.
It was quiet. The red soul soaring back into Kris chest before anyone had a chance to witness it.
Jevil grimaced, laughing gleefully as if he had made himself merry.
"Vee-hee-hee! Stars spiralling, spiralling...!" He stood up, stepping around like a drunkard before smashing into the ground like a pie to a clowns face.
Susie was the first to stir. Cradling her jaw as she laid stooped on the angled ground, she took a glance at the defeated foe with a skewed posture.
"...We won?" She laughed. Kris clucthed their chest-plate, then their head in pain. "Holy hell, we won!" She picked up Kris by their armpits like a loosely strung doll and guffawed.
Kris managed back a laugh, wrapping their arms around her waist with a hoop of exhilaration for the brief moments that Susie didn't burst into a violent rage.
"What were ya bloody thinking running head first like that! Didja want to be cut into ribbons you moron!?" Susie yelled, rattling the lanky human in her hands like loose change in a piggy-bank.
Kris grimaced and pulled themselves from her grasp, dusting off their forearms, brushing off any injuries they sustained. "It seemed like a fair idea in the moment."
Susie stomped the ground, eyes emblazoned with fury. "Well, it was stupid!" She retorted clumsily.
Kris fidgeted with their pastel cape draped around their neck and shoulder pauldron, a expression of neutrality diffused across their features.
"Vee-hee-hee! Va-haha!" Jevil cackled happily.
Susie's neck cracked to the side as her face was plastered with a snarling glower, foaming at the mouth at the shit-headed gremlin for still giggling.
Ready to charge into combat once more, the only thing that kept her from choking out the aggravating clown with gothic make-up was Kris interference as they held out at their arm in front of her.
They mumbled to her in a hushed tone. "We barely fought him once, do we really want to push our luck?"
Willingly, she took a step back. "You've got a point." she relented.
"Hahaha, what fun!!! You're fast, fast, stronger and stronger! Alas, this is only a taste of what else you may face in the future!" Jevil warned wagging his gloved finger.
"The hand of the Knight is drifting forward. Soon, the 'Queen' returns, and Hell's roar bubbles from the depths...Lightners, can you stop it?" He questioned with a cryptid, coy smile.
"Uee Hee Heee! Either way, a mischief-mischief, a chaos-chaos...! Lightners! From inside your little cell!! Take me and do your strongest!" He clapped his hands together excitedly.
"What does that even mean?" Susie turned to Kris in an angry, confused mutter.
"You will achieve whatever your heart desires...I am now one of you!" The jester hummed with white light below twirling and contorting into shape.
The DevilsKnife was thrown into Kris's hands catching them off balance as they held it with a grimace.
Rings jingled from the serrated metal like festive bells.
"Oh hell no." Susie said incredulously with wide eyes. "We're gonna throw that thing down a cliff or something, I swear-"
The cell door creaked askew as Kris's hand pushed it away, the DevilKnife's in their other hand, utterly ignoring Susie's complaints.
Kris, a mere human who was thrust into this world become the defacto leader of the Lightners, simply due to being the only one responsible enough to act sensible in a crisis.
Susie followed behind Kris, dusting off her forearms with flared nostrils and a pissed off leer.
"We should have left 'em to his own devices." she complained, "He said he was fine enough being 'free', now we're stuck with the stupid thing and we're no closer to finding Lancer either!"
She was prickly, that was a definitive certainty, but she did make an effort to be more patient than she had been.
She crushed the bridge of her snout with her fingertips and sighed. "I need some damn food, and some headspace. That funky jail cell did my head in..."
Ralsei exited the cell last, taking one last disturbed glance into the jail that had previously held the insane demon who tried to destroy them with a series of merry go round horses.
Ralsei turning back to his allies and followed them, trying to keep up the pace.
"Well, it didn't hurt to try and make a new friend!" the optimistic prince yammered to the dismay of Susie.
" We would have been toast if it weren't for Kris! At least they got their head screwed on right!" Susie snapped back at the hat shrouded goat before grinding her teeth.
Kris remained silent during the whole debacle as they usually did to Susie's annoyance.
"I'm telling ya Kris, this kid is gonna get us killed one of these days!" she snarled as she reached the start of the staircase and began to storm up steep purple hill of cobbled bricks.
"I swear to God, if I see that jester jerk again, I'm calling it quits!"
"S-Susie! We're meant to stay together! Wait--Susie!" Ralsei stuttered before clasping his hat and running up the stairs after her.
Kris was left to contemplate Susie's words.
They held the jester's powerful form, Jevil's visage shone in the reflective surface of the silver scythe. He giggled. He cackled. He faded.
The human traced the spiralled colored handle, reaching the tassels that dangled from the bottom of the hilt.
Kris pulled one of the tassels and the scythe whizzed and compacted into the handle. They pocketed it.
Maybe Jevil would be helpful for another day.
Kris stared into their palm holding a black bar with white text hovering above it whilst something else shimmered in their other hand, glistening like a puddle. A Shadow Crystal.
They didn't like how they able to see it and how everyone else could not. If only someone else where to see it...
Kris stared at the glowing star hovering near the cell. They saved, they slumped and they walked away, eyes watering.
It was all foredained, after all.