It had been a close call after what had happened at Diet Cola Mountain, but somehow he had survived. Not unscathed, of course, but alive at least. The reset of the game had helped to heal a few of the more severe injuries and wiped out the code for his King Candy avatar so he no longer glitched back and forth between forms. However, the reset had not fixed one rather large issue.
He was still trapped in the form of a giant cybug. Though now he stood only about ten feet tall.
It was an issue he could think about at a later time. For now there were wounds to tend to. Turbo didn't know much about how to patch himself up in his current form though. There were small chips missing from his left arm and spots on his back and one of his back legs had a long jagged crack running up the side. Would the hard candy shell repair itself, he wondered? At least it didn't seem to hinder him too much when he limped about. Limped, yes, because that crack in his leg did hurt if he put too much weight on it.
With a bit of exploring the cybrid learned that he had somehow wound up in a large open cavern under the mountain itself with a steeply sloped tunnel leading to the outside. At least it was out of sight of the broiling hot cola. Turbo wasn't sure if he would be tempted to jump into the bright source of death if he saw it.
Carefully he made his way up the sloped tunnel, staying just inside once he reached the mouth and listening closely for any sign of anyone nearby. Hearing only a scuffling sound too quiet for any kart Turbo peeked his head out and looked around. A few chocolate bunnies startled and hopped away, but other than them there were no signs of movement anywhere. The sight of the bunnies seemed to trigger something in Turbo- his stomach suddenly giving out a loud grumble.
Deciding not to bother chasing the quick chocolate creatures lest he do more damage to his cracked leg, Turbo squeezed himself out of the tunnel and approached the nearest marshmallow tree. One by one the soft treats were plucked from the branches and swallowed down greedily, Turbo barely registering the taste in his rush to devour as much as he could. When he had stripped the tree bare he simply broke off a branch and began munching on that. Just about everything in Sugar Rush was edible after all and it all tasted rather pleasant.
With his stomach no longer growling, Turbo glanced around. There were no tracks in sight, though now the distant sound of racing karts caught his attention. For now he decided to return underground. If the racers happened to find him there was no telling what could happen. And Turbo wasn't so sure that his code was still connected to the game after the reset which meant the threat of a game over loomed over him now. Better to stay hidden and not take the chance.
The only problem with being underground, as the cybrid soon discovered, was that it grew incredibly boring incredibly fast.
"If only I could still race…" he mumbled to himself. "Oh if I ever get my hands on that little glitch again I'll-" A sudden spike of pain in his stomach cut off his train of thought and had Turbo curling in on himself. As quickly as it came the pain faded thankfully and the former racer let out a sigh of relief. What had even brought that up? He couldn't have been hungry again, could he? Of course now with the cybug's code infused with his own he may have developed their own insatiable hunger. Suddenly the idea of trying to hunt down those chocolate bunnies didn't seem quite so bad.
But, no. He couldn't risk further injuring his leg. Maybe he could figure out a way to create a few traps instead. He would have to scavenge around for supplies if that was even to become a possibility. That meant going out in the open and trying to stay hidden from the inhabitants of the game. The safer option would be to continue eating the marshmallow trees of the forest and wait for his leg to heal. What if it didn't heal itself though? Sooner or later, depending on his new appetite, someone would begin to notice the forest slowly shrinking.
Maybe he should find a new place to stay too. Being so close to the same place that wretched glitch had called her home for so long could spell disaster if she ever decided to visit again. Turbo was sure that she wouldn't ever stop by since she had his palace now, but the paranoia behind the idea made moving somewhere else seem much better.
So now he had to move and find supplies for himself. Not to mention staying hidden at all times.
"Alright, Turbo, you can do this. Keep hidden, find a new place to live, and gather enough supplies to make your life a little easier. Easy as pie. Ugh… And find something to stop these stomach aches…"