Lucky Rabbit

Pandy waited at the top of the steps, helping each child and elemental up as they reached the mezzanine. Possibly due to the fact that the last few steps consisted of the ‘arms’ of the statue, they were quite narrow, and it would have been easy for someone to fall. For that reason, Augustus remained just underneath them, ready to catch anyone who slipped.

Eventually, however, they were all standing on the third floor, looking down at the statues and the hard stone floor fifteen feet below. In Gacha Love, the floor would have risen up beneath Clara and the others, providing them with a firm, flat surface from which to work. Here, there wasn’t even a railing, just a four-foot wide ledge protruding from the inner wall of the tower. It made Pandy Very Nervous. Fortunately, this was probably the easiest level, as well as the cutest.

“Is that a tea set?” Geraldine asked, staring at the tiny table set with five miniature chairs. In each chair was a stuffed animal, each one staring at the plate of tasty treats displayed in the middle of the table. Beside the cookies sat a flowered teapot, steam rising gently from the spout.

Pandy nodded. “All you have to do is serve tea.”

Thaniel almost looked disappointed. “But that’s easy.”

“Is it?” she asked, tilting her head as she looked around. “Where are the cups and plates? Where are the napkins and cutlery?”

All three children looked at the table again, seeing that while the adorable plush animals had food, they did not, in fact, have anything to eat it on or with. That led to examining the table – no, the missing items weren’t hidden there – and then staring all around their precarious-seeming platform with fresh eyes.

“There!” Thaniel said, pointing to what looked like a small picnic basket tucked up against the far wall. Pandy wasn’t feeling quite as confident about the idea that this place wasn’t dangerous, and watched the children carefully as they circled around. If one of them started to fall, or the basket turned out to be a mimic, she would launch herself into the air and-

Abbington reached the basket first, throwing open the wicker lid to reveal a cheerful red lining and neatly stacked porcelain. Thaniel and Geraldine crowded around, with the girl – always excited about anything adorable – exclaiming as she examined the dishes.

“This one has little fires all over it,” she said, holding a plate out so Miss Cupcakes could sniff it.

“This one has a sun in the middle,” Thaniel said, holding up a particularly bright white cup so Pandy and Augustus could see the golden sun painted at the bottom.

Abbington remained wary, watching his friends but not reaching into the basket himself. Instead, he glanced at Pandy and said, “What d’we do?”

Aware that her time was ticking away, and that there was definitely more going on here than there was supposed to be, Pandy gave them another hint. “There are five animals and five sets of dishes. What goes where?”

The children all turned to examine the tea table and its occupants with more interested eyes, as did Augustus. It was set up exactly like the puzzle in the game, so Pandy kept her eyes on the children as they gathered dishes into their arms and came back to her.

In the game, the plush animals were the sort of vague, soft creatures preferred by very young children, for whom their snuggle quotient was far more important than appearance. They were also wearing tiny clothes that concealed some of their distinguishing characteristics, so really they could have been anything. In the real world, however, each one was markedly different.

“They’re our elementals!” Geraldine exclaimed, crouching down beside a plushie with small triangular ears and whiskers that nearly vanished in its long gray fluff. It wore a dress with layers of skirts and tiny puffed sleeves, and miniature boots tied with ribbons graced its lower paws. Geraldine gently lifted the stuffed cat, showing it to her kitten. “It’s you, Miss Cupcakes!”

The very real elemental cat gave her the kind of look that said, You are deeply wrong in so many ways I’m not even going to bother to correct you, and stalked away, tail held high.

There was a soft brown plushie with small round ears and a square nose that definitely could have been a capybara. Beside it sat what was almost certainly a turtle, its brown shell decorated with sparkling yellow gems. After that came the empty chair that had been occupied by the cat, and then a soft and well-loved dog with ears that trailed down to the floor, wearing a top hat, monocle, and tuxedo. The final position, however, was occupied by a bird, not a bunny.

“You’re not here,” Thaniel said to Pandy, frowning. She had noticed that as well. How and why it had happened that these five animals in particular were represented here, she had no idea, but given that the role of the rabbit was meant to be played by Ascyra the Demon Queen, it actually did make sense that the scene lacked lagomorphs.

With a shrug, she said, “It’s all right. Now, which of them gets which set of dishes and which treats?”

All around them, small clues were hidden. A figure in a dress, surrounded by flames, was etched into a stone. The chair in which the dog sat was carved with vines. Thaniel, Abbington, and Geraldine didn’t need those clues, however. They unerringly placed the plate and cup with fiery designs in front of the cat, the one with blue patterns reminiscent of water in front of the capybara, and so on, until all they had left was a white set with lilac clouds ringing the outside, which simple process of elimination told them had to go in front of the bird.

The next set of clues were in the basket, tucked between the lining and the wicker. They held obscure statements like, “The one in the dress enjoys chocolate”, and “The one wearing a hat likes mint”. Pandy was curious if she’d have to tip off the trio to the presence of the clues, but after a brief consultation, they set out all of the goodies as well.

“Tempest only likes veggies,” Thaniel said, putting a cookie shaped like a lettuce leaf in front of the turtle.

“Chocolate gives Lord Winston gas,” Geraldine muttered, wrinkling her nose, then looked between the remaining options and placed a cupcake with thick orange frosting in front of the kitten. “Miss Cupcakes got her name because she ate the chocolate cupcake my mama brought me after I burned my hands,” she told them conspiratorially.

Abbington looked at the options and plucked out a delicately iced sugar cookie. The design on it was a simple blue swirl with two black dots in the middle. “Brook lookslike ’at whensh’s underwat’r,” he said, and placed it in front of the capybara. That left the dog and the bird, and everyone hesitated over some shiny yellow nuggets and a wafer-thin rolled cookie.

“That’s bird food,” Thaniel said, pointing to the nuggets.

“It’s dog kibble,” Geraldine insisted, reaching to put it in front of the dapper dog.

“Could be any’n,” Abbington said, then looked up at Pandy. “What ‘appens iffn we get’t wrong?”

Pandy shrugged. “Everything will reset. It takes time,” and Stamina, at least in Gacha Love, “to put it all back.”

He nodded, then pointed at the rolled cookie. “Dog bone?”

Thaniel and Geraldine looked at each other, shrugged, and nodded. The delicate cookie was placed in front of the dog, and the yellow nuggets were piled on the bird’s plate. Everyone waited. And waited. Finally Pandy nudged, “Tea?”

Three children did their own version of a facepalm before tea was poured into each small cup. As Abbington sat the empty pot back on the table, the floor that should have been there all along finally shimmered into being. Five little stuffed paws reached for cups or treats, and the tea party began as the central floor lifted pets, children, and adults up to the fourth level.

Here, they found themselves faced with what were very clearly practice dummies, just like the ones the children regularly attacked with wooden weapons on the training grounds at Falconet. There was nothing special about them. They were just rough straw figures, tied into shape with twine, arrayed around the walls every ten feet or so.

Thaniel and Abbington were both in Combat Training, so they almost immediately did what they would have in class – walked over to a rack of weapons, selected one, and began to beat on the nearest dummies. It took Geraldine a few seconds longer, and then she grinned and grabbed a wooden sword almost as tall as she was and began to whack the stuffing out of yet another dummy. There were five in all, so there was no lack of ‘opponents’ to face.

Not surprisingly, the taller, stronger Valley boy managed to decimate his enemy first, but even as the hay hit the ground, he was moving on to the next. Thaniel managed to beat his dummy to bits not long after that, and Abbington was well on his way to destroying his second target when Geraldine just thrust her sword into her opponent’s midsection and pulled out chunks as if she was using a pitchfork to clean her horse’s stall.

Soon, all three children were whacking the final practice dummy together, and when it fell apart, they all stopped, panting but grinning in triumph. That was, the grinned until a powerful wind swept through, making Thaniel stumble, nearly lifting Miss Cupcakes from her paws, and gathering all of the straw back into the same dummies they’d just faced, except that somehow there were now six of them.

“Not fair!” Thaniel exclaimed, and Pandy looked at the time remaining on Shifting Faces and had to admit he was right. It would probably only take one more try for them to figure it out, but they’d already been in the tower for almost an hour, which meant she only had one to two more hours remaining before some very dangerous Dark elementals might very well show up to kill her.

“We have to destroy all of them at the same time,” she told the kids. “Since they’re so far apart, it’s hard to hit them all with one Area of Effect spell, but we can-”

“Area of… Effect?” Augustus said, speaking up for the first time in a while. He seemed to be enjoying watching the children work through the puzzles as much as Pandy was, though she hadn’t missed the fact that he was still holding his sword and his eyes never stopped scanning their surroundings, looking for threats.

“Spells that,” Pandy mimed an explosion, “affect a large area? Like a fireball or a big blast of wind.” Everyone nodded, and Pandy mentally patted herself on the back. Look at her, actually giving coherent explanations! “So, if we each work on one, and finish at the same time, we can advance to the final level.” She pointed up, where the last ring of walkway extended away from the wall, blocking their view of whatever might be waiting for them.

“But there’s five of us, and now there are six dummies,” Thaniel pointed out, causing Miss Cupcakes to hiss at him. In Gacha Love, Clara and the boys all had elementals as well, and depending on how many times the player failed to finish the puzzle correctly, they had to burn more and more Stamina to get those elementals to destroy the extra dummies.

Geraldine shifted to stand closer to her kitten, sounding a bit defiant as she said, “No, there are six,” Brook looked at her, and she coughed, then said, “seven of us. This will be easy.”

It was not, in fact, easy. First Miss Cupcakes decided to prove how effective she was by burning her dummy to the ground, and then they discovered that while Brook was the seventh member of their party, she didn’t have a particularly effective way to tear apart a straw dummy. Hers became a sodden mess and finally fell from its post in wet, heavy chunks, but by then it was too late. With each failure, another dummy was added, and soon they were up to ten, and the children were obviously exhausted.

Pandy chewed on her lip. She hadn’t actually expected the simplest of the levels to be the one they couldn’t defeat. But of course Clara and the boys all had weapons of their own, and most of their elementals also had an attack spell that could also take out a dummy in one round. This level was really about whittling down the player’s available Stamina so they would run out when they faced the boss.

“I can get them all at once,” Pandy said, “but it may be just a little risky.”

“How little?” Augustus asked. The children were sitting down, backs against the wall, while they examined their palms. Pandy had healed the blisters that were forming there, but that didn’t make them any less tired of swinging their wooden weapons.

She grimaced. “I’ll make a shield around you all, but the spell will have to strike the whole room at once. It’s not a lethal spell, but it could cause bruises. Nothing I can’t heal, but-”

He nodded, and she knew he understood. They had both decided before they came here that the most important thing was that the children stay safe. This was a specifically non-lethal dungeon, only here for the player to learn how this aspect of the game worked, but it was always possible that something could go wrong. Augustus promised he had a way to send for help, if needed, and he and Pandy would both do whatever it took to make sure nothing happened to their young charges.

“Your shield will protect them?” Augustus said.

“If it starts to fail, I’ll cancel the attack spell.” Pandy nodded, and the chancellor called the children over. They came reluctantly. This had been an exciting adventure to begin with, but they’d each broken apart at least five dummies by now, and they were definitely tired of it. It had also been time consuming, and Pandy had less than twenty minutes left before she would have to turn back into Bunny at least until they reentered Knightmere.

Looking around, Pandy pointed to a bare patch of wall near the weapon rack. No dummies stood there, since the rack was in the way. Everyone obediently trooped to the spot, and she thought, <Cast Shield of Darkness on Augustus.> He should have the highest health, which would allow the shield to absorb more damage before breaking.

The shadows seemed to pull up around the small group, with Geraldine and Abbington shrinking away from the bubble as it formed. Thaniel had seen this before, so he at least had some idea what was happening, but Pandy probably should have warned the others. She was tired, too, even if it wasn’t physical for her.

Shield of Darkness successful.

Fifteen uses to level 14.

Shield of Darkness definitely wasn’t meant to contain so many people, even if only one of them was a full-grown adult. She could just make out the occupants shifting inside, though they were more shadow than reality. Before one of them could accidentally damage the shield, she thrust out her hand, thinking, <Cast Air of Superiority. Be gentle.>

Air of Superiority successful.

Air of Superiority is now level 2.

+1 Charm

The air stirred. Her shirt shifted in a breeze that shouldn’t have reached inside the stone tower. Stalks of straw lifted and whirled lazily through the air. Then everything blew apart. A sudden roar of wind ripped at Pandy’s clothing, gluing pants and shirt against her body and lifting her necklace until it whipped around her throat, the chain sawing at her skin.

Weapons blew off the rack just before the heavy wooden frame of the rack itself scraped across the floor and toppled over. A wooden sword barely missed Pandy’s face, but she was watching the shield, which flickered every time something struck it, those within becoming gradually more visible. The air filled with straw and weaponry, an axe ricocheted off the shield, followed by a mace, and it cracked like an eggshell, revealing Augustus crouched with his arms protectively encircling children and animals alike.

“End Air of Superiority!” Pandy shouted over the roar of what sounded like an airplane taking off, and everything ceased, wooden staffs and swords clattering to the ground. Pandy hurried toward Augustus and the children, already casting Minor Heal on them all, but it only worked on Augustus, healing a few points of health. Everyone else was fine. They were fine, and the dummies were very definitely destroyed.

Thaniel was grinning wildly, Abbington looked stoic, but Geraldine was a bit pale as she straightened, looking around at the destruction. Beside her, Miss Cupcakes began to lick her fur back into place. The windstorm hadn’t ruffled it, but Geraldine had been clutching the kitten for dear life.

“Well,” Augustus said, brows rising as he finally satisfied himself that the children were all fine and turned his attention to their surroundings. One corner of his mouth hitched up, and when he looked at Pandy, the gray eyes were distinctly approving. Did this madman like women who could probably kill him with a single spell? Apparently so. Which was frankly a relief, because Pandy had been avoiding showing anything close to her full power in front of him, just in case it made him rethink his infatuation.

In the center of the floor, five stones lit up, just as they had on the ground level. Everyone moved toward the light, not a single one of them hesitating to approach Pandy. She felt something inside of her relax. Augustus wasn’t the only one she’d feared might reject her.

Once they were all standing on the square stones that matched the color of their elemental magic, the floor began to rise, carrying them toward the final boss of Squawkward Spire.

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