They say that true friendship can break through all boundaries and overcome all obstacles.
They say that there's no greater light than the aid of a friend, bringing light into your journey and guiding you back onto the right path whenever you wander astray.
But sometimes, something evil comes in between you and the friend that you love so dearly.
An evil that consumes his entire mind and body with darkness, leaving him a mere puppet to control for evil deeds.
No conscious, no will-power and no rational awareness...can result for even the greatest friend to turn against you and potentially hurt you.
How do you help your friend to see the light again, when nothing but pure darkness is controlling his body and manipulating his thoughts? How can you find the right words to make him snap out of it?
How can you stop him from blindly attacking you?
How can you save him?
But most importantly...how can you get him to remember you?
Cylindria was about to find the answers the hard way...
The Netherworld was very dark, almost darker than usual. The black, smokey clouds hung heavily in the air, and got even thicker the closer it got to the tower of Betrayus's castle.
Far away from the castle, standing on a cliff overlooking Betrayus's domain, stood Cyli.
A hot and dry breeze drifted through the air past her and slightly blew at her hair. It gave her an unpleasant feeling, almost as if the wind was taunting her. Knots twisted and turned in her stomach as she stared at the castle, surrounded by the lake of lava. Billions of bats swarmed around the very top of the castle, with a few ghosts, cyclops and dragons flying here and there.
Cyli had ventured through the Netherworld hundreds of times with Pac and Spiral, and she never even once considered the place scary.
But now, knowing that she was alone and might never return to the surface of Pacworld ever again, the castle suddenly seemed very daunting...
Cyli closed her eyes tightly, remembering the horrible events that took place yesterday.
It's hard to imagine how drastically everything could've changed within 24 hours...
It all started out fine and normal, Cyli and her two best buds were called on duty again to fight an invasion of ghosts. Everything went as it normally did, Pac chomping down all the ghosts while Cyli and Spiral aided him in capturing some ghosts with their PSC's. Everything was perfectly fine.
But at some point in the invasion, something strange had caught Cyli's eye...
A red and black fog of dust seemed to have hovered and swirled among the ghosts. It was barely noticeable and might've been a trick of the light, so Cyli had ignored it.
But now she was deeply regretting the mistake she had made.
The red fog had turned smaller until it was cloud-shaped. Then as if it was magnetically drawn to him, it shot at Pac and disappeared into his body.
At first, nothing happened to him. He merely blinked in confusion and afterwards, happily carried on in gulping down the ghosts. It was only after the invasion that Cyli noticed something was different...
Pac had a scowl on his face, as if he was mad at something...yet he didn't tell. In fact, he had been awfully quiet on their way to Sir Cumference's lab.
Throughout their visit, Pac had not uttered a word while they discussed the ghost invasions.
As the minutes ticked on, Pac just kept scowling and even showed signs of impatience. Everyone had been confused and baffled on this new side of him. But it only got worse…
Pac went from scowling to glaring, and when Cyli had attempted to calm him down, he had aggressively yelled her off.
A pang of hurt gripped Cyli's heart as she remembered that moment...
Pac had never raised his voice at her like that, let alone glare so furiously at her. He and she were so close...and she couldn't understand why he had suddenly yelled at her like that…
She remembered how Spiral and Sir C had stepped closer to prevent any further aggression and to try to get Pac to calm down. She remembered the strange red glow in his eyes as he glared at every single one of them...
...No one saw it coming.
Pac had suddenly screamed as if he was in pain, and he had gripped his head in his hands. Before anyone could react, Pac was covered in a black and red light, shining brighter and brighter.
When the light had faded…they faced a living nightmare.
Pac was no longer the golden Yellow Orb of legend. He was no longer the sweet and brave little Pacworlder that they had called their dear friend, no longer the loyal protector of Pacworld…
Instead of his once-yellow appearance, Pac's skin had turned to orange, and a crown resembling flames rested on his head. Heat radiated off from his body and surrounded him in a cloud of red, burning hot air. He looked just like his Fire form…but his eyes were nowhere nearthe same. The part of his eyes that was supposed to be white had turned crimson red, his irises went from blue to the glaring colour of the sun, and his pupils went from black to white…
Everyone had been too shocked to move, much less utter a word. Pac had breathed so deeply and heavily, as if this new form was making him feel powerful like never before.
The next thing everyone knew, Pac's eyes flashed sharply and flames surrounded his body. The lab itself had begun shaking uncontrollably. Where Pac had stood, a mass of flames erupted and an explosion occurred, throwing the entire lab into a void of white and red flashes.
Then everything had gone black…
It was only hours later that Sir C, Spiral and Cyli woke up under the rubble and debris from the destroyed lab. Like an impossible miracle, none of them had gotten any life-threatening injuries. Only Spiral had a mildly twisted arm, Sir C's leg got slightly burned, and Cyli was lucky enough to have gotten out with only a few scratches.
The lab was in complete ruins, but through all the rubble, they discovered an enormous hole that tunnelled through the roof to the surface. Only Pac could've made that hole…
Cyli opened her eyes after remembering that fateful event, and found herself staring at Betrayus's castle yet again.
Pac was in there…he had to be.
It had to be Betrayus and Dr. Buttocks who did this to Pac…to her Pac…
The wind whistled past Cyli and she shivered. She looked behind her, back towards the entrance where she had entered the Nether-realm…
Sir C had tried stopping her to come here, saying that it was too dangerous. Even Spiral had held her back, trying to convince her that Pac isn't the same anymore, and that he could hurt her...
But she had refused to listen.
During the night, while Sir C and Spiral tried figuring out how to fix this mess, Cyli lied that she was going to bed to rest up in preparation for the next day. No one even noticed that she had sneaked out, leaving for the Netherworld.
And now here she was.
Cyli turned to look at the mission in front of her again, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. As she exhaled, her eyes opened and she started running down towards the castle with only one thought in mind,
'Please be okay, Pac…I'm coming for you.'
