Hey, guys. Here is Chapter 7, and I got nothing more to say about it…

Enjoy!


"How long does this take you?" Nico impatiently asked his robot via earpiece.

"He is giving us some serious trouble, but we are progressing. We just need some time," Nicbot answered.

"They are closing in, we don´t have much time left," Nico replied.

"I´d suggest we follow 'Plan N.2' for this part", Nicbot told him.

"I was going to do that. Call me when you are done," Nico said, and ended the conversation. "You have to do something yourself if you want it to be good…" he thought, and looked from the balcony of Bowser´s Castle.


The four of them quickly passed through Bumpsy Plains and entered Bowser Path. They tried to use the secret pipe to Bowser´s Castle first, but discovered that it has been destroyed. They had no choice but to go the long way. There were no guards in the first part, so they made it to the second part, which was surrounded by lava, quite fast.

They immediately noticed something when they got there. The lava level was significantly lower. When they looked at Bowser´s Castle, they could see new pipes coming from it, which led into the lava. And the Bowser statue on the castle now wore round glasses.

"He is pumping the lava into the castle?" Luigi asked.

"He has a reason for doing that. We just don´t know what that reason is," Dreambert responded.

"How about we go there, find out what his plans are and then beat him up?" Mario suggested.

"I´d like to beat him up before he tells us his plans…" Starlow said.

They continued their path and were about to reach the castle, when two robots with bats and a robot with a ray gun landed in front of them. The ones with bats jumped forward and tried to hit them into the lava, but Mario and Luigi were not interested in that. They counterattacked, while Starlow and Dreambert dealt with the other robot. The brothers were proven to be the better melee fighters, and kicked their opponents into the lava themselves.

They continued, and arrived at the castle. They stood in front of it and tried to find a way in, when the gate suddenly opened. Nobody was in sight.

"I don´t know about you guys, but this looks like a trap to me," Starlow said.

"Do we have a choice?" Dreambert asked.

They heard thrusters behind them. They turned around, and saw ten robots with ray guns landing behind them.

"I think we have, but I don´t like the second one," Luigi said, and together they ran into the castle.

Right after they entered it, the gate closed behind them. They looked around. Nico didn´t change the interior of the castle like Fawful did, with the exception of the Bowser statues being covered up, and the Bowser symbols were removed.

Only one door was open, so they went through it, always looking for traps. The path created for them led them upstairs, where the Throne Room was located. They entered it, and saw that it looked completely different. Monitors and computers were standing everywhere. This had to be Nico´s new Control Room.

In front of Bowser´s throne stood a computer with several monitors. This computer was the most important one. It was Nico´s own. On the throne sat none other than the leader himself. When they entered the room, he stood up and walked towards them. The four of them prepared for battle.

"My my, always up for a fight, aren´t we? You are guests in my new home, it isn´t very polite that you want to fight me," Nico said when was a few feet away from them.

"Give up, Nico. We went through your robots and Marius with ease. You won´t win a fight against us," Starlow replied.

"You are one confident Star Sprite, Starlow. But I think you forgot who you are up against. I won´t give up, and now that you made it here, I´ll have to take care of you myself. I didn´t plan it this way, but we will be successful either way," he told them, and activated the thrusters on his "Jetback".

Mario and Luigi charged at him with their hammers ready. Nico created two light blue spheres in his right hand and threw them at the brothers. They dodged them, but Nico formed his hand into a fist. The spheres turned back, and were about to hit Mario and Luigi.

"Guys! Behind you!" Dreambert yelled.

They looked back and saw the threat. They jumped over the spheres, and the projectiles were going to hit Nico. He simply opened his hand again, and they stopped in it. Starlow and Dreambert fired a love beam at him, but he created a blue shield in front of him with his other hand. Their love seemed to be stronger, though. Cracks started to appear on the shield, which Nico noticed.

"I´m interested: what kind of magic is that? I´ve never seen something like that before…" he asked them.

He then threw the spheres at the couple, and they had to stop the beam in order to dodge them. Mario and Luigi tried to strike him with their hammers, but he flew out of their range. He pointed his left hand at them, and they remembered what he did with it. They rolled out of the way, just before lightning bolts struck where they had been standing.

"How long does it take them…they have ONE job!" he angrily said.

Starlow and Dreambert got ready to fire another beam at him, but he noticed this. He quickly sent lightning strikes at them, which they narrowly evaded. He then created two purple spheres in his hands.

"Have fun with these!" he said with a grin, and threw them at the couple.

They flew out of line of fire, but the spheres changed their course as well. It was then that they realised that these were homing spheres. They had no choice but to keep flying around until they found a way to get rid of them.

Nico on the other hand lowered his altitude again and activated his own energy blade. He fought against both brothers at the same time by keeping his attack on one brother up, while he dodged the attacks from the other one. If one of them was getting too close to him, he fired a sphere at the one. Their friends finally had an idea. They flew into the direction of each other, and narrowly missed each other when their paths crossed. The spheres collided and exploded, allowing them to participate in the battle again.

As they fired a beam at him, his thrusters boosted him up into the air again. He had turned his back towards them, there was no way he could have seen that coming…or did he? What they didn´t know: his Jetback was equipped with sensors, and if any threat tried to catch him off guard, it would perform evasive manoeuvres.

"Nice try, but I thought ahead of things like that," he said and flew above his computer, so he could see all of them.

He deactivated his blade again. Nico raised both of his hands, and eight blue spheres appeared around him. They flew at the heroes all at once, which made it difficult to avoid them. While they dodged the spheres, he landed in front of his computer and charged at the heroes again. He activated his blade and sent more lightning bolts at his enemies while running towards them.

He attacked Luigi, who was barely able to keep up with the barrage of blows Nico sent at him. Mario tried to help and attacked Nico himself, but the human stepped back and threw another sphere at him. He noticed Starlow and Dreambert preparing another strike, so he created a purple sphere again. It was only one this time, and he threw it at Dreambert.

The Pi'illo Prince kept flying away from it, but they needed a plan to stop a single sphere. Nico kept attacking Luigi, but Mario was able to run towards Dreambert. When he flew past the plumber, Mario hammered the sphere into the ground, where it exploded. Luigi was about to lose the fight against Nico, but Mario took a red shell out and kicked it towards their foe.

He always had an eye on what happened around him, so he stepped back and let the shell pass him. This allowed Luigi to pull back and regroup with the others. It was then that Nico created a shield around him. He activated his earpiece.

"You better say something I want to hear, Nicbot," he warned his robot, who he was talking to. After a short break, a grin crossed his face. "Finally. I´ll deal with them and then come over," he said and ended the conversation.

Starlow and Dreambert fired another beam at the shield, and everyone knew that it wouldn´t last forever. They didn´t like the confident look on Nico´s face after Nicbot called him. Whatever he said, it seemed to please Nico.

"Well guys, this was fun. But now I need to go somewhere, and this castle comes with me. Do you even know why you are here? I wanted to keep you busy, so my troops could take over Peach´s Castle. And now that they gained control over it…" he told them, and created a circle of spheres around them.

The spheres weren´t the problem, however. As they looked around to find a way to escape the circle, Nico stunned them with four quick lightning bolts.

"I originally planned to let the castle fly away just as you were about to enter it, so your entire journey would have turned out to be pointless. But this is even better. You thought you could beat me, and now I defeated you. You failed, and now I can continue my plan," he continued.

He pointed his hands at them, and they were levitated onto the balcony.

"Another one of my abilities: I can levitate everything that is affected by my magic. And here is another one. I call it my 'Knockback Beam'. The name says everything, because this thing can throw you pretty far away," he said, and created a large blue ball of energy between his hands. "Don´t try to stop me, or I´ll destroy you. Enjoy your stay at Plack Beach," he said, and the ball sent out a beam.

They got knocked away at great velocity. The last thing they saw from Bowser´s Castle was the castle itself flying up, which meant that he kept this invention from Fawful. Plack Peach was closing in very fast, and the last thing Mario, Luigi, Starlow and Dreambert thought was "Great, now I´ll have to get that sand out of my clothes…and we need to stop Nico". They crash-landed, and passed out because of the impact.

"Hey!"

"Hey!"

"Wake up, guys!"

Starlow felt a rush of new energy inside her. She woke up, and saw Kamek standing in front of her. Looking around, she saw that her friends weren´t awake yet.

"At least you woke up. What in the world happened to you? I have tried to wake you up for at least ten minutes," the Magikoopa said when he saw her opening her eyes.

"Ugh…my head…" she was able to say, "Nico threw us out of Bowser´s Castle, and then we landed here," she explained to him.

"He threw you out? Strange, that some sort of reminds me of King Bowser´s adventure with you guys…what happened at the castle?" Kamek asked her.

"We arrived there and battled Nico. It turned out that he just bought himself some time with that, while his troops would…take over…Peach´s Castle…" she said, but then realised something. "Kamek? Did…he take it over?"

"Sadly, yes. I did everything I could, but there were too many robots, as well as his friends and Nicbot. I managed to bring a few people out, like the princess, Toadsworth, Toadbert, Toadiko, Dr. Toadley and King Bowser. The Elite Trio has been defeated by the humans, and almost every Toad and minion is now held captive," he told her.

"He…he hasn´t won yet! We will defeat him somehow!" she yelled, confident.

"It looked like Bowser´s Castle flew towards Peach´s Castle. Is he using both as his base now?" Kamek wondered.

"Well…he needs Bowser´s Castle for something. He has been pumping the lava that surrounded it into the castle," she said.

"Am I seeing something bad? Indeed I do," she heard someone behind Kamek say. He stepped to the side, and revealed Dr. Toadley looking into his crystal ball.

"What is it?" Kamek wanted to know.

"Have his robots built thrusters under Peach´s Castle as well? I think they have. Are both castles now flying in the air? Indeed they are. Pipes are being connected to Peach´s Castle, and bridges now connect both castles. Is that all? No it isn´t. A black shield is being created around them. Is this fortress invulnerable? For now it is," Toadley said while he gazed into the ball.

Starlow felt her hopes shrink to a minimum size. If Nico had a fortress that they couldn´t invade, what were the chances that they could stop him? It looked like he had won. And they couldn´t do anything about it. Nico was right. They would fail.


Nico has bested them in battle. Peach´s Castle is now under his control as well. Both castles are unreachable for them. Is there a way to stop him now? And what are his plans?

Have the first question answered in the next chapter, and the other one…when Nico feels like revealing his plans.

Until then: Review if you want to, and stay tuned for the next chapter!