Far above the snowy Kong Mountains, a long purple light passed by travelling a million miles an hour. Whipping snow into the air, it passed over the western Kong ocean before reaching the shores of the Koopahari, but by then it was too late. It hit a large energy shield in its path and dissipated, but not before rocking the area with its blast.
"Negative spell converted into system." announced Erzembar. "They are testing the waters."
In the middle of the room sitting upon a chair was King Iggy Koopa, constantly shifting his eyes across the battlefield that was now a good chunk of the world. They were testing his meddle all right, and while it was clear they knew Erzembar, they still didn't know who was at the helm. But before he could do anything, another blast rocked the complex and the hologram flickered for a moment before returning to normal.
"They have intensified their original attack." said Erzembar.
"I know, they want this place destroyed." said Iggy. "But that's not going to happen. Too bad for them! Let's give them a simple one."
Erzembar charged up, the pylons glowing outside. The crystal at the top of Erzembar glowed brightly and with a flash, there was a large boom and a small beam of light shot towards the Koopa Kingdom.
Reaching its destination, it hit the UmNaru faster than they could counter it. Many of their robes burnt in seconds and their skin smoked and burned as they fell to the ground, crying in agony. Even the stone beneath them seemed to melt and contort under their feet. At the sight of all this, the head priest frowned.
"This is no novice." he said. "Surely it must be one of Bowser's gifted. Men! It is time for the Infinite Return!"
While under the constant assault from Erzembar, the UmNaru managed to create a shield about themselves and start to cast much more powerful spell. After some time, a deep blackness enveloped the air above their heads and when the time was right, they let loose a blackness that countered the light that followed the trajectory all the way back to the source.
"Infinite Return detected." said Erzembar. "The spell contains a Halving Circuit that gradually breaks down all matter into its infinitesimal parts of darkness. It is dangerous."
"White encasement, level radial." commanded Iggy. The complex became surrounded in a white cone of light, so that when the darkness spell arrived, it was forced to halt in place, too busy converting all of the white energy around it. Thus, the Infinite Return, rather than reaching its target had formed a ball inside of the white encasement spell Iggy had set up. Nevertheless, this still had side effects and that included rocking the earth considerably as all types of matter, mostly sand was sucked into the vortex.
With his hands, Iggy began to transform the ball of darkness into a new shape. He was going to use their own spell against them, with a little bit of physics thrown in as a personal touch. The dark ball morphed into the shape of a torus and a white energy gathered within its center. The torus seemed to convert the dark energy to light energy, as well as build up in intensity.
"Hm? He's moulding the Infinite Return into a cosmic loop?" the head priest murmured to himself. "That means..."
"You have encased the Infinite Return into a toroidal loop and are now converting to the positive." said Erzembar. "The UmNaru must maintain their spell or suffer a positive feedback wave upon themselves."
Iggy grinned. "As you can see, I'm not easily controlled!" While he still strained under their spell, he was still able to cast his next spell. Within orbit, ancient satellites triangulated their trajectory to Erzembar itself. Taking the energy in the center of the torus, the satellites looped the white energy between themselves before returning it to the source. This made the white magic grow in potency and increasingly shine brighter. In the meantime, the pylons charged up again with various colours, with white magic flowing from them to the capstone of Erzembar.
"You are the ones who are going to lose!" shouted Iggy. A wave of light shot out of Erzembar along the Infinite Return and flew towards Bowser's Castle. The UmNaru only had a moment before there was a flash of light and a wave of whiteness slammed into them, rocking all the land about them.
"All low to medium level black spectrum vibrations are being transmuted to the white spectrum." said Erzembar. "The high class UmNaru remain. Currently, they seem to be plotting your overthrow using the wand of Telxin to control your genetics, and hence your actions."
Indeed, the head priest had unveiled the Wand of Telxin, grasped in his hand and glowing a dull purple. From what Iggy knew of the wand, it could control all of the descendants of Telxin, or most of the known descendants of the Earth Kings, including Bowser's children. The UmNaru probably wanted to try to control Iggy's actions and try to break the stalemate he had forced upon them by interlocking the Infinite Return spell.
Despite struggling against the white "wind" that blew in towards the Koopa Kingdom, the head priest and a number of others managed to stand their ground and maintain their positions. Forming barriers around themselves, they managed to ward off the immediate effects of the white magic. The head priest himself lifted up the Wand of Telxin and with a chant, shot a beam towards Iggy.
"People like you cannot live." said the head priest.
Wincing, Iggy struggled against following the commands of the wand. "There is no way a single spectrum of magic can conquer the entire world!" Iggy managed to say.
"Your ignorance is striking for a Spirit King. Tell me, once you destroy us, what will you do with them?" asked the head priest.
Suddenly, Iggy's holographic radar started buzzing. Creatures were seen crawling out of the ground across the Koopa Kingdom. More UmNaru followed them, and they began to march out of the Koopa Kingdom via sea and air towards Erzembar, like flies to a light.
Iggy, already having his spell weakened by the head priest, could not stop the coming onslaught without interrupting his engagement spell and suffering the negative force feedback against him. He need help and he needed it fast. The UmNaru headed toward him began to cast spells against Iggy, and while none of them had any serious effect due to the overwhelming defence of Erzembar, he nevertheless was becoming worn down from their constant assaults. Even Erzembar was feeling the brunt as Iggy's holograms showed, trying to keep the white encasement spell cast in order to sustain the catch 22 situation Iggy put himself into while defending everywhere else.
"We will soon require assistance." said Erzembar, repeating Iggy's thoughts.
"I know, I'm working on it." said Iggy as he tried to think of a solution amidst holding off the enemy. He looked through his family's thought complex and saw Ludwig duelling Wendy for the Earth Wand. Thinking about the whole picture, he got an idea. He just hoped he would know how to communicate with him.
"Ludwig, use a cleansing spell." Iggy said telepathically.
There was no answer for several moments as their duel became heated. But after a magical explosion, there was a small lull.
"I've thought about it, but it may be too dangerous for her mental stability given her current situation." said Ludwig.
"It may be bad for her mind, but the spell will affect more than just her." replied Iggy. Ludwig, while not able to see the entire situation, knew enough about what was happening to expand upon the idea. Using the Wand of Marthos, he casted a white cleansing spell directed towards Wendy. However, as Wendy was under the control of the Wand of Telxin, this spell had the consequence of spreading towards every descendant of Telxin that still lived. This had major consequences, but the first was Wendy suddenly screaming aloud and clutching her head, and staggering about while trying to retain her sanity. But unknown to Ludwig was the sudden flash caused by the Wand of the Blood, which lay upon the chest of King Larry Koopa. And when his body became enveloped in that light, he suddenly regained consciousness before the light died as quickly as it came. His healing had accelerated, and though he was not quite fully healed, he had enough energy to return to the waking world. Upon seeing the struggles that were happening with his family, he struggled to get up and managed to get up onto his feet. Though he felt weak and wobbly, he managed to stumble across his room and headed towards his outer balcony to see the battle in action.
As for Iggy, the spell sent a surge throughout his body, revitalizing him enough to be able to help strengthen the white encasement spell against the other UmNaru. But he knew the current situation couldn't last forever and he needed to find a way to end it quickly.
It seemed the head priest had something similar in mind as well. "All patriarchs! Each cast the Infinite Return and direct it towards Telxin's Wand. We will break the stalemate!" The patriarchs, heads of the various branches under the line of Marthos all began to cast Infinite Return and when completed, sent beams of darkness to the head priest. He molded the spells into a black monstrosity and prepared to fire it towards Iggy, with absolute destruction in mind.
"Warning: negative singularity detected. Shield breach imminent." announced Erzembar. The source of the threat zoomed in on the holographic display to the Koopa Kingdom, where the head priest finalized his preparations to unleash the spell and finally break the stalemate.
But before he was given the chance to do so, another beam of white magic hit the head priest, and he growled in response to the increased load. The monstrous black spell seemed to hold in place, but now the UmNaru's attention turned to the new contender, who lay to their south-east across the sea. Larry had managed to drag himself out of bed and now hung over the edge of Genlic with his wand pointed directly at the UmNaru, clearly trying to do the best he could.
"As head of the family, I command you to step down and surrender all of your forces, Dac'Leon!" Larry commanded.
Dac'Leon said nothing, but many of his minions ceased their spells at the threat, with some being of the line of Marthos and fearful of retaliation. However, the demand did nothing for the ground forces which mostly comprised of creatures of the deep, and many of them still headed towards Erzembar. They seemed to be mostly unaffected by the magic currently being thrown around, save for the masters who controlled them.
Thinking about his next moves, Dac'Leon suddenly heard a cracking noise below him. He looked and furrowed his brows. "It's too soon for that!" The Wand of Telxin was slowly cracking under stress from the two wands that now pummelled it. The spell that he had moulded was beginning to destabilize, but getting out his own personal wand, he managed to maintain everything in place while he tried to find a solution to this mess.
Looking at the bigger picture, Iggy knew that he had to find a quick solution to this mess himself. He knew he had the top dogs in a tangle, but unless their numbers were held in check then he would be overrun, which looked increasingly likely.
An idea came to his mind from his days reading Kamek's old spell tomes, notably the supposed
"forbidden" ones. The spell was legendary and was said to be extremely dangerous, and it seemed Erzembar read his mind.
"Most spells are transmuted through the casters body according to his ability to receive a particular vibration." said Erzembar. "But this one-"
"I know, but it's the only way to kill them all right now and balance all of the spectrum's." said Iggy.
"God's Wrath is deadly." continued Erzembar. "It is said that only 4 individuals throughout known history have successfully cast the spell and survived. Most casters perish as untrained vessels are unable to handle the potency of pure white magic. While the spell would exterminate every UmNaru across the globe, the risk is too high."
"You forget Erzembar. I died once already, and I don't think I'll die from this."
"Many have said that. While your family will be granted victory, it may come at a price." eluded Erzembar.
But Iggy scoffed. "I am not that price! If I cannot cast it and live, then no one in my family can. It must be done now." Iggy summoned an opening in the wall which led to the outside, and he jumped off of his chair to walk towards it. "I am not the price of victory! This is nature working in its never ending dualistic cycle, and the next is about to begin!"
"...so be it." said Erzembar, and Iggy manifested the Spirit Wand from his arm and his arms began to glow white in preparation of the God's Wrath spell.
Meanwhile, Junior had been awakened by the cleansing spell casted earlier by Ludwig. After waiting for the right moment, he got up and casted a spell towards Ludwig. The spell hit his suit, but it didn't seem to have any effect. Ludwig raised the Wand of Marthos and cast another cleansing spell, causing Junior to fall to the ground in pain once again. Wendy screamed in agony, dropping the Earth Wand on the ground to clutch her throbbing head. Thinking quickly, Ludwig ran and took the wand from the ground with his free hand, beating Junior's attempt to nab it by only a few moments. Ludwig used the Earth Wand to raise Junior off of the ground, then used the Wand of Marthos to shoot a white magic spell at him before tossing him to the other side of the cavern.
Ludwig looked at Wendy, who was now in tears and was having a hard time handling the duality of the magic that attempted to free her and control her at the same time. Junior, despite taking heavy beatings, was still struggling to get up.
"As long as your consciousness is open to them, they will retain control over you." explained Ludwig. "And such black magic is easily countered by the white. In short, this dual is over."
"I must avenge myself!" said Junior.
"As I stated, you will remain under their control without proper protection." said Ludwig. Suddenly, Junior got up and lunged for the wand again, but Ludwig blocked his movement further with the Earth Wand before slamming Junior's back into the ground. He did not appear to move afterwards.
Ludwig nodded to himself, impressed by his feats with using white magic. Having grown up within a black magic environment, he had a acute reaction when first touching the Wand of Marthos, even with his suit on. However, after some time he was starting to get used to the spectrum.
Leaving Wendy to her fate, Ludwig stepped onto the platform and walked into the pocket dimension. Inside, the previous Earth Kings stared down at him, many looking surprised and contemplative. There was silence for a long time, and Ludwig decided to take the initiative.
"As you can see, I am the champion." began Ludwig. "Do you require my visual identity at the risk of signature exposure to the UmNaru, and will your judgement be impartial?"
"Despite our upbringing by the UmNaru, we still retain our own part of consciousness." said Richard.
"The fact that my wand can be wielded by yourself, protection or no, is a sign of great changes for the Koopa Kingdom." said Marthos.
"But you must expose your identity." said Valerian
"This is required to complete the challenge." said Morton.
With no other choice, Ludwig unlocked and removed his helmet. Immediately, Bowser could be seen laughing to himself.
"I should have known!" he said. "I had chosen you to be the next king long before they got to me."
"That is due to their spell of forgetfulness." stated Valerian.
"Even so, I chose him for a reason and my reason is now justified." said Bowser. "I choose him to be the next King of the Earth."
Most of the heads surrounding Ludwig nodded in agreement, although a few had sceptical looks on their faces, especially those kings who were heavily corrupted by the UmNaru. Sensing this, Ludwig spoke.
"We are entering a new era, where the Spirit King and the Blood King have returned, and the UmNaru lose control after centuries of living under their rule. As a result, it is no longer the sole responsibility of the Earth King to lead the race of Koopa, but the responsibility of all 3 kings. This is how we will survive as a species in the future."
"These were indeed the days of old, when the Trinity was in full effect." said Beneth.
"The problem is not your ability." said Wolfgang. "But why your challenge ended up being so...lackluster. You did not finish off the other contenders."
"That law was created by the UmNaru." said Morton.
"It still applies." insisted Wolfgang. "If he cannot kill them, then he is not worthy to become the next king."
"All the rules of initiation were created by us, not the UmNaru." said Richard. "And as far as I am concerned, the rule no longer applies to the times."
The kings argued amongst themselves over rules they had set in the past while under the influence of the UmNaru, and it was clear that some of the kings never fully realized their actions. After some time, Ludwig's patience grew thin.
"I will not let the UmNaru claim victory due to some petty issues that were not intentionally created by yourselves. This is the chance to wrestle the mantle of the world from them, and I will go as far as attempting to initiate myself if no consensus is reached."
"I agree." said Morton. "This is the best time to claim victory over them. I support your initiation."
"As do I." said Richard.
The kings then voted amongst each other and it seemed to Ludwig that he heard more support than the opposite.
"The majority have it," said Wolfgang. "Though I do not like it, the votes are in favour of you becoming the King of the Earth."
"We will now begin the initiation." said Morton, and lightning shot out of the orange clouds surrounding Ludwig, hitting him from every direction. Because of his suit however, he did not feel a sudden shock like his siblings had, but nevertheless his body began to transform.
The horizon in front of Dac'Leon suddenly shined brightly, a light that seemed to encircle the whole of Erzembar.
"What?" he thought to himself for a moment. "Is that...no!" It was the legendary God's Wrath spell and he knew it. Even if it was a desperate measure and the Spirit King did not survive, it was still devastating and he had to find a way to stop it.
In the Koopahari, Erzembar was indeed clothed in a brilliant white light. Inside of the complex was Iggy Koopa, whose whole body was now completely covered in white light. He was mere steps away from achieving the final culmination of the spell.
"Spell 89% complete." said Erzembar.
Iggy laughed, delighted his self discipline was enough to make the spell work thus far. "It is time to re-balance the spectrum! UmNaru! You will pay for your crimes!"
"I am hardly finished yet." claimed Dac'Leon, and he summoned a spell using his own wand. A type of black shield, it seemed to protect him from the current stalemate with the Spirit King. Building the shield into a more powerful defense, he hoped he could use it to dodge the inevitable feedback he would have to face before handling the far worse spell behind it.
But before he could make his shield more potent, the ground had begun to rumble underneath him. Cracks appeared around Bowser's Castle until there was a large explosion of rock all around the castle. With rock hurled into the air, DacLeon thought he saw something flying in the air also, something with a long silver wand. But his magic signature came up immediately: It was Ludwig Von Koopa, now King of the Earth.
With his wands now tied up to different spells, it was all Dac'Leon could do before the beast landed with a slam next to him. Ludwig's suit was gone, torn apart by his sudden growth that now rivaled his fathers. With horns pointing out of his lengthy blue hair, his authority was undeniable. Dac'Leon hoped that with his current position, the new king might try to gloat and buy him some time.
But Ludwig had no such intention. Taking the Wand of the Earth, he held it firmly in front of him and stared down his enemy. "Since you insist upon being so eloquently delinquent to our majesties, I will relieve you myself. I do appreciate keeping your...wrists open to my presence." And he chuckled.
"Your kind will never be free!" said Dac'Leon and he attempted to move his own wand to try to bend his shield towards Ludwig's direction, but instead Ludwig darted to the side and swinging the Wand of the Earth, slammed the Wand of Telxin with it. With the combined force of the three wands against it, there was a stab of white light before the dark wand shattered into a million pieces. A moment passed, then there was a large explosion of purple flame which sent the two enemies flying in separate directions. Iggy's white encasement spell then immediately feed-backed upon the Infinite Return, shooting a white beam of light that caught Dac'Leon in mid air as he was flying. A loud scream was heard across the northwestern Koopa Kingdom until it died out amongst the crags.
Only a minute later, and a great wave of light travelled across the sea. It reached the Koopa Kingdom like the light from heaven and it incinerated the UmNaru, burning their skin rapidly until their skeletons crumbled to the ground. They disintegrated in the brightness like the wind over the sand and the people below them screamed and cried, terrified for their lives. The creatures that came from the deep roared at the pain and most tried to flee the oncoming wave of light, but they quickly disintegrated before it into skeletons, and even those turned to dust in mere moments. Some people, much like the UmNaru fell over with their skin burning and crying out for help. However, it seemed most people were unaffected by this plague and most stood still before the light, too scared to try and do anything else. They cowered before it, trying to look away and yet too much in awe to try and run from it.
The Wand of Koopa suddenly shined brilliantly, and a beam of light shot from its belly into the ground with Lemmy nearly falling over backwards before Morton managed to catch him. The light didn't nearly affect him as it seemed to affect Roy. Then again, he was never the sadistic type. Wait, was that the Spirit King's intention? Wipe out all the negative people?
A circle of light quickly grew on the ground below Lemmy's feet and expanded outwards, encompassing what could be seen of the city ahead of him and spreading to the mountains that surrounded the Koopa Kingdom. The spiral-like structures that the UmNaru had summoned were disintegrating from the base, with the spires soon crumbling into dust.
Purple lights randomly shot out of the ground, affecting the UmNaru far below ground. The Earth shook in response and Lemmy wondered how stable the ground below his feet was. But his thought did not last long: one of the purple lights hit Lemmy and Morton directly, and they were knocked into unconsciousness.