A/N: This might be the last chapter I post for a couple of weeks, just because finals are coming up soon and yeah. It all depends on how bored I am and if I get enough reviews...so if you want more, you know what to do!

Chapter 21: In Which the Forces of Good Face the Most Evil of All Evils

"DAMN YOU, AMMY!" Link shouted, his voice echoing eerily throughout the cavernous belly of the Water Dragon.

"Shut up, you're going to wake it up!" Ammy hissed. "And besides, you've coerced me into plenty of worse things."

"Like what, digging matches?" Link snorted.

"Remember that time with the Cutters? Yeah," said Ammy as Link shivered at the memory. "Yeah. This makes up for that in full, I think."

"Fine, debt paid," said Link. "But that doesn't make this place any less creepy. I wanna get outta here ASAP, got it? I don't know about you, Furbrain, but I don't exactly enjoy this whole 'being eaten' experience. And it's been happening too often."

Ammy ignored him and concentrated on making the jump from their side of the cliff to a flattened stalagmite rising high above what appeared to be a river running down below. Now, why the entire insides of the Water Dragon appeared to be once huge cave with a pretty little river running through, Ammy did not, and honestly did not care, to know.

"What is that thing, a stalactite?" Link said, looking back as they jumped safely to the other side.

"Stalagmite," said Ammy.

"Whatever. No one knows the difference anyway," Link mumbled. They ran down the path, but at the end they were forced to turn around because the way was blocked by a demon lock.

"Damn demon locks," Ammy muttered. "I think this is the first time I've come across one without finding the key first. Arrogant asshole. WAAGH!" She had slipped and the both of them fell all the way down into the river. Ammy swam to the nearest path of flattened stalagmites and was pleasantly surprised to find an exorcising arrow there. "How convenient," she thought, and made a water pillar rise up to take them back to the demon lock.

Ammy chuckled darkly. "Not so full of yourself now, are you, lock? THAT'S RIGHT, WRITHE IN AGONY, WRITHE—"

Link snatched the arrow from her and chucked it into the lock himself, causing the demon to burst apart and open the door.

"Can we keep moving now?"

"…Right."

Ammy and Link walked into the next cavern, where they discovered the source of evil embedded deep within the belly of the Water Dragon.

"What the…a strip mall?" said Link, aghast with horror.

The strip mall consisted of nine horribly evil chain stores, including a Wal-Mart, a Barnes and Noble, a Burger King, a Hollister straight across from its rival, Abercrombie and Fitch, an Apple store, a Nike's, and a Jamba Juice, which was snuggled right up against the most evil of all evils: a Starbucks. Situated in the center of the strip mall was a strange sculpture that had indigo colored muscles forming a spider web pattern around a blue glass ball hanging in the middle.

"What terrible evil," Ammy shuddered. "I can see why the Water Dragon went into a rampage, if he had this set up in his stomach."

They tried skirting the evil chain stores to go into the next room, but just as they had almost made it and thought they were safe, a lady popped her head through the door of Wal-Mart, wearing a blue shawl and an outrageously wide smile on her thin face.

"Welcome to Wal-Mart!" she said, flashing her overly bright smile. "Saving the world with our low prices!"

The nearby Starbucks' door thrust open and another lady with a poison green shawl called out, "First customer of the day gets a free grande mocha cappuccino! There's no better way to start your morning!"

"Back away, you fiends!" Link shouted at them, slashing his wand in a protective circle around him, knocking away the grasping fingers of the Wal-Mart greeter, who hissed. "You're not saving the world, you're brainwashing it! I won't be sucked into your evil plans, no matter how hard you try!"

"Now now, don't be shy! Come along, customer!" said the poison green shawled woman, beckoning sweetly. As she said it, a fleshy indigo substance wrapped itself around Link's leg, dragging him closer to the store's entrance.

"AMMY, I'VE BEEN CAUGHT!" he screamed.

"NO! DON'T GET SUCKED IN, LINK!" she yelled, running after him. Her jaws snapped closed on empty air as Link's boot disappeared into the depths of the Starbucks. "LINK!" she called, but didn't hear anything except the echoes of a sinister giggle. "Link, I'll come back and save you, I promise!" Ammy said, and rushed off down the next corridor before she too could be caught.

The passage opened up into a dead-ended room with an irritated red colored fleshy sac bulging like a welt out of the ceiling. It was dripping red fluid slowly, and Ammy saw that two stalagmites were already filled with the dangerously smoking red liquid.

Ammy looked at the dripping sac and power slashed it to see what happened. It wiggled and dripped a little faster, but besides that didn't do much. The muscle was too strong even for her powered up brush strokes.

"Argh, what am I supposed to do, then?" she thought impatiently. Link was probably already being brainwashed into buying a grande mocha cappuccino, which would soon become the habit of his every morning. She had to stop them before that happened.

"Die, muscle thing!" she cried, using Waterspout to attack the sac with the red liquid. To her amazement it worked, and she continued doing that until the muscular substance completely disintegrated and gushed out red liquid. "Success!" Ammy said, leaping down into the liquid, forgetting too late that it was a flesh-disintegrating substance similar in properties to stomach acid.

"Ouch, shit, ouch ouch," she cringed, at last being forced to draw a water lily before her health ran out. Surprisingly, the lily pad didn't disintegrate, even though the liquid was potent enough to tear muscle and destroy animal tissue alive. Maybe it was because plants are magical organisms and therefore not perceptible to the laws of logic.

She arrived at last into the cavern with the strip mall and commenced attacking all the buildings with dangerous red liquid. She didn't notice that her attacks were destroying the sculpture, too, and before she had done a nearly sufficient amount of damage the blue orb fell into the liquid and cleansed it away with its healing powers. The managers of each store appeared fluidly in the square, each one wearing a different colored shawl and glowing purple.

"Foolish god," they said in one voice, cackling. Then, right before Ammy's eyes, they changed into lithe orange foxes and leaped into the air at her, jaws snapping.

"I knew you were up to no good, you sly bringer of evil!" she cried, preparing to give them her worst. They put up a tough fight (Ammy having to start with half health due to her stupidity in swimming through stomach acid didn't help much), but Ammy prevailed in the end, as good always does over evil. After being defeated, the purple glow from the foxes went into each store and turned the strip mall into a strange, multi-colored instrument that looked like a pipe. Ammy stuffed that into her bag along with the glass orb thing.

Link groaned. "Oh man, thanks for saving me there, Ammy," he said. "I thought I was a goner."

"I may be mean and pick on you sometimes, but I wouldn't leave you alone to face evil like that," Ammy replied, swinging him onto her back in his rightful place.

Suddenly, the cave shuddered and they remembered about being in the stomach of the Water Dragon.

"OH SHITZ, Ammy, we've gotta get out of here!" said Link.

"I'm on it!" said Ammy, running as fast as she could back through the cave and across stalagmites in order to avoid the giant drops of red liquid that were falling all around them. Ammy used her matrix power to slow down the drops, and they busted out of the Water Dragon's mouth just in time. They hovered in the water, gazing down at the Dragon as it fell into the depths of the sea.

"Is it…dead?" Link asked.

"I think so," Ammy said quietly.

"Oh." Link stared down after it, a sorrowful expression on his face. Ammy thought he was showing some tact and respect for once and mourning the poor deceased Water Dragon, but the next thing that came out of his mouth proved her wrong. "Wait, so then how the hell are we supposed get to Oni Island? All Himiko's work gone to waste! Freaking Water Dragon, dying on us when we needed it the most."

"Yeah, so insensitive of it," Ammy remarked dryly.

A light suddenly flashed before their eyes, and they found themselves no longer floating in water, but standing on the yellow, misty plains so indicative of brush gods.

"What the—am I getting a new power or something?" Ammy said, confused but pleasantly surpirsed.

"Amaterasu, origin of all that is good and mother to us all, I'm afraid I don't have much longer in this world. But I must thank you." The man who spoke was rather large and had a glorious mustache (with matching beard). He wore a royal beaded headdress over his face and was dressed in vibrant blue and purple colors.

"Damn," sighed Ammy. "I guess it's not a brush god."

"No," said the man with the glorious mustache. "I am King Wada, the 27th king of the Dragonians."

"KING WAKA!" Link shouted, instinctively reaching for his wand.

"No, King Wada. WA—DA. I do not know this Waka, though very often I have been mistaken for him." King Wada sighed grievously. "In any case, thank you, for freeing me of my pain, Amaterasu. I waged battle against the Dark Lord and consumed the dark instrument he wielded, the Fox Rods, as you may know them. I was then driven into madness, and, I'm afraid, caused many people great suffering."

"Hold up, you mean you were the Water Dragon?" Link said. Ammy whacked him.

"Idiot," she snorted.

"Water Dragon, god of the sea, king of the Dragonians…whichever you would prefer," King Wada shrugged. "The Fox Rods are the key to the Dark Lord's power. Even now, his minions are searching for them. However, I can rest easy knowing they are in your hands, Amaterasu. I also ask that you give my wife the Dragon Orb. It is the heart of a dragon, and will protect my people. She would know what to do with it." The Dragon Orb floated down to Ammy, and she took it. "Alas, my end is near," King Wada continued. "I have slain many innocents in my madness. I pray they may find peace within these watery depths, as I know I will."

"Well yeah, you're a fish," said Link.

King Wada smiled. "All of Ryoshima Coast loves these deep blue waters," he retorted. "Alas, farewell Amaterasu."

The water surrounded them once more, and King Wada's spirit sank to the bottom of the ocean to meet his body.

"Ammy, things are getting pretty serious, aren't they?" Link said, his face grave. "I don't know how I feel about that."

"I miss the fun times, too, Link," Ammy said, gritting her teeth. "That's why we've gotta defeat the damn Kyuubi. After the Kyuubi's defeated, I'll have the smiting power and the world will be perfect and we can hang out with Himiko in Sei-An."

"Sounds like a plan!" said Link. "Let's go kick some Kyuubi ass!"

He barely finished when he caught sight of someone watching them and froze in place with his wand thrust into the air in a strange pose. Ammy looked up and saw Rao, who appeared to be slightly flustered and impatient. She was fingering the red beads around her neck, glancing from side to side in a very nervous manner. Link gaped at her and said, "B-Busty babe?"

A/N: Awww yeah. I even left you guys a little cliffhanger this time. Tell me what you thought if this chapter, some suggestions you may have for me, or anything else you can think of! Just press that little review button and you're good to go!