While sailing, they had quickly identified themselves as being in the Northern Kremisphere, close to Dark Land. They had found an island, which Luigi checked out on the charts. "There's a fresh water spring on this island where we can resupply," he suggested. They needed it, during his stay at Ghost Island, Mario had emptied the water and rum barrels. He did get thirsty after all.

"Good, you guys go out and I'll maintain the ship," Mario offered.

"I'm not leaving the ship in your command!" Donkey Kong refuted.

"I'm hell as sure not leaving it in your command!" Mario shot back.

"Then you both go and leave it in my command!" Luigi claimed. It seemed a fair enough deal and Mario, Donkey Kong, Larry and Lemmy boarded the island and inspected it. There they were met by a horrifying and gruesome sight, the dead Puftoss. From what Mario could tell, it had been abandoned, it's purpose served, Rool no longer needed it. Maybe he got another one? Unlikely, Mario figured, but he did not doubt that it was not beyond Rool's ability to conjure another one up. After all, teleportation and massive strength seemed to be the least of the kremling's abilities.

Mario stared into the eye of the beast and his reflection stared back. He noticed Kong come up from behind him. "When you won my father and I in that gambling game, it was shortly after the girl got her neck-scar, right?" Kong asked and Mario turned to face him. "You profited off of us, sending us to TV deals and all. You made so much money off of us, yet all I remember is being sold because my father could not handle being mistreated. You should've treated us better, Mario."

"I should've, but what happened with the girl sent me to a dark place," Mario told him. "I get it, I didn't treat you well but I sure as Hell never abused you."

"Yeah, but you gave us away to an abusive slave owner God knows where and sent us off by boat during the middle of a storm, I'd say you were wanting us dead," Kong claimed. "The world used to be a bigger place and I used to have a smaller mind. Getting teleported here during that vortex and coming across Candy was the best thing that ever happened to me."

"I just want to go home," Mario sighed.

"How many years have passed?" Kong asked. "You look a man forty, so I would say about three or four since that storm sucked me up."

"That's sad commentary, in and of itself," was all Mario could say. "So this Lockjaw Court claims we have coins that'll prove us as lords? I've got a lucky penny on me."

"And so do I," Kong claimed. "I stole it from you before we went off. This court's meeting in Dark Land, where Bowser is from. Maybe you'll finally hail yourself some answers." They made their way to the spring where they found a dead body inside, Kong dipped a banana in the water to see if it burned. "Venomous water... I suspect your brother may have betrayed us again."

"What?" Mario asked. Kong only pointed to the waters, where the Starshroom Enterprise was right next to the Empress, Il Piantissimo's fighting ship. As expected Piantissimo's men, guns loaded, made their way to the crew on the island and brought them back up to the ships. The landing party climbed back on the ship only to see Piantissimo's men having had taken over, two pirates held Daisy by the arms. Kong quickly recognized Piantissimo. "Well, well, mate," he greeted the pirate. "Meeting you here is a remarkable, if I do say myself, coincidence."

"Fortune smiles upon me," Piantissimo replied.

Luigi strode up to see Daisy held by the men. "She isn't part of this bargain, release her," he ordered, allowing his brother to see his deception.

"What bargain is that?" Mario growled.

"You heard him, release her," Piantissimo told his men.

"What happened?" Mario asked Toad.

"Your brother led a mutiny against you," was the response.

"Why didn't you tell me you were planning this?" Daisy asked.

"It was my burden to bear," Luigi smirked. "I'm sorry, Daisy. As well as it may have seemed the first time round, this second trip has told me one thing, we would never work, you and I." Daisy was astonished, in a single line, Luigi just broke up with her. It was all right to her, though, she had betrayed him and broken his heart. She got over it in an instant. "I need the Starshroom Enterprise," Luigi told Piantissimo, who made his way over to Mario.

"Well, plumber, there's a man who wants to meet with you," Piantissimo informed him and grabbed Mario's arm. "Let's see if you survive."

Then a third ship, the Endeavor, made it's way forth. Piantissimo had his men have Mario board that ship, separating him from the pack. Escorted into a fancy room, fancier than Mario himself had ever seen before, he was brought forth before the giant of man, Lord Crump. "Remarkable," Crump noted Mario. "You inherited a heavy debt. I'll assume it's paid and tell you the heart isn't here. Toadsworth the Steward bears a brand on his hand, when we went to war with the Toed Sthuuls, I and he were soldiers. I branded him with a bullet and he did the same. It's what started the chain of events that led you to I here."

"I don't know how I held a debt to Rool, but it's settled, however I had it," Mario affirmed.

"That debt was to be settled with your death, but you my friend, are alive," Crump informed. "My people, Mario, are Kremlings. We descended from crocodiles but we come from the Arctic Abyss. It is the coldest and most desolate place in this world ever imaginable. Kind of like your world's Antarctica. My people love spices, linen and cottons... only so long as it arrives on time. My people are content to be figures in a ledger, a delivery order. You know I am right, Mario. So I have a proposition for you, in exchange for a shine sprite to let you back to Brooklyn, tell me all about the Lockjaw Court."

"I think I'd prefer to maintain my monopoly on that status," Mario tried to gain equal footing. If it was revealed that he knew nothing, he knew that this Crump would toss him off the ship.

"Would you like to enjoy a bullet to the head?" Crump asked him. To that, Mario opened up his palm to reveal the fireball he had just conjured.

"Or how abut this," Mario suggested. "You deliver me to the Lockjaw Court?"