Special thanks to Planeshunter and Kujo for the beta read~ Hope you have fun!


Chen and I retreated to the Dimensional Hub's Lone House for lunch after following through with Mami Tomoe's request. Upon checking the fridge I discover a fish meal meant for Chen placed on top of my salisbury steak leftovers. I pop both dishes in the oven and decide to spend time with Hata no Kokoro, who has yet to be returned to her rightful domain. I hope they didn't forget about her!

Roughly half an hour later, Chen and I return to the hub's center. I take a seat on one of the adjacent benches after remembering that I have yet to set a new destination. Chen takes a seat next to me and we re-read the forms together.

Title: Something's Wrong with the Puzzle!

Difficulty: ****

Details: How annoying! I just finished a joyous venture up Candy Mountain and found a cool puzzle at the end. It took me a minute but I solved the puzzle.. but all that happened was a bunch of loud noises that scared me away. And so my journey reached a bitter end. Someone should fix that puzzle so others can feel rewarded for making it that far!

Signed: Scarfy the Treasure Hunter

I wind up gravitating towards the more mysterious of the two requests.

"This letter looks like it's referring to a place I've been to before."

Chen leans on my shoulder before replying. "Maybe, nya. There's all kinds of strange creatures in the world this letter came from. I remember the writer looking pretty weird too!"

The stamped logo at the bottom-right of the letter is a simple star shape. It is safe to assume that whoever wrote this letter is from Dreamland.

"I'm guessing that this is talking about Candy Mountain. I think I know what puzzle..." A black and white figure hovers past my side and startles me. I look beside me and blame the floating broomstick for not producing any sound. "Oh hey Marisa. What's up?"

"Oh hey..!" I seem to have startled Marisa too. "I was just going to go back to that place where the little gnome lives."

"Little gnome? You mean Lulu?"

Marisa decides to sit next to me as I pull out and cycle through my deck of cards. It takes a second cycle before I find the card in question.

"Yeah, that's her. I stumbled upon her place the other day." Marisa nods several times confirming my guess. "That place is like a goldmine for all kinds of rare herbs! And the mushrooms. Holy cow, the mushrooms that grow there are outta this world!"

"Hey Marisa, the mushrooms around Lulu might be poisonous!"

Marisa gives me a worried expression for a moment then grins. "Oh I know. I didn't eat 'em raw or anything crazy like that. I just took some to my place to analyze them. The toxins they produce are really good for making explosives. Once you extract all that stuff, you can meld the rest and make a wicked vapor out of it. Wanna take a whiff?"

Marisa then pulls out a glass tube sealed with a cork and pushes it towards me.

"Ah, no thanks."

"Aw maan~ You're missing out!" Marisa pops the cork and takes a deep breath. She then exhales a fair amount of the cloudy purple vapor through her nose. "Aw yeah!"

Chen smirks at the sight. "Marisa's acting like I do when I have catnip, nya."

Well now I know how Teemo can just chill out through an entire teamfight...

"Anyways what're you up to, ze?"

"I'm about to go back to Candy Mount'n!" I thought about flapping my arms about but the Gensokyo natives on each side of me are obstructing my area. That's not a complaint by the way!

"Oh, can I go too?" Marisa replies. "I'm getting kinda hungry, and that place has plenty of food to spare!

Huh. I was thinking about going to see what Patchouli is up to but adding Marisa would make her the third person instead. Normally there would be no problem with trying to bring both of them along, but then there's that problem my deck has.

"Three's a crowd, four's company; more than that is far too many!"

My options for self-defense will be limited when I have too many people following me around. I still don't get the point of that rule...

[x] Accept Marisa
[_] Decline Marisa

"Fate has spoken. Let's do this!"

I thought that Marisa would try to avoid crossing paths with Kirby after what happened before. But again, I have no objections!

{Candy Mountain: Upper Area}

[BGM~YhdNjzX4waA "Liberation of Gracemeria" (Ace Combat 6)]

"Okay so we just have to work our way up this mountain range and meet up with our client. Hopefully whoever wrote the letter will be there." I turn towards Chen who is facing the ground with an ominous expression. Her fingernails have greatly increased in length and shines with an intense ruby aura. "Something wrong, Chen..?

"..Anyone who tries to sneak up behind me will regret it." As soon as she says the, a shadowy figure darts up behind her and strikes. "Nya!"

Chen rises her flaring fingernails in one swift motion. The same flare engulfs the shadow. That shadow lands in front of Marisa and I. Our eyes identify a small Bio Spark ninja creature. It glares at us with a look of peril for a solid moment before the life in its eyes flicker out. Chen's fingernails revert to normal and the creature collapses. I guess this means that with Chen around, we can face forward without any regrets.


Killing Time on the Road: The Incredible Chen

LOUIS: Chen, did I ever tell you that you're awesome?

CHEN: Nyeeh..! Only about a dozen times!

LOUIS: That's all? Man, I'm slacking!

CHEN: Nyaa-ah stop it! I'm not used to compliments!

MARISA: You must get impressed easily.

LOUIS: I never fully understood my friend Xavier's thing for catgirls until now. Maybe I should tell him that I seen the light some time.

CHEN: Oh! You know someone that likes someone like me? Do you think he'd pet me!?

LOUIS: The G-Rated answer is that he'd pet you and feed you and call you George.

CHEN: But my name is Chen!

MARISA: G-Rated..?


Eventually the lot of us reach the large room with jewel shards decorating the area and the large door sealed with a numerical puzzle supposedly stopped working some time after we solved it. Come to think of it, what can we do if the puzzle really is broken? Search for a customer service number? Either way, there really is someone waiting for us; a floating orange head with small pointy ears sticking out of a fitting yellow miner welcomes our approach with friendly eyes.

"Hey. Is your name Scarfy?"

"That's me. Why do you ask?" It takes a moment to look at Chen. He seems to recognize her. "Huh, I get it now. This is about the letter I wrote. Did you make this puzzle?"

"Not me, no."

Scarfy sighs and turns to the door. "Look at this amazing door. A design like this was just made to be opened. And yet it doesn't. I finally figure it out after forever and all I got from it was eardrum damage. What an elaborate trick. If I find the people came up with this stupid prank..."

Scarfy faces us again; this time, bearing an ominous cyclops eye and sharp teeth that could easily gnaw through bone.

"I'll chew their faces clean off!"

"Wooah, calm down, ze!" Marisa shouts in a slurred voice.

"It's not just a prank. We solved this puzzle just the other day." Scarfy eventually calms down and reverts to its cutesy self. "Let's do it now and see what's wrong."

There's a chance that Scarfy got the wrong solution, but it sounds like he got punished much harder than we did. The only way to find out is to solve the scale code all over again.

- Number (6) grabbed!
- Number (6) placed on left scale!
- The scale is now imbalanced.
- Number (9) grabbed!
- Number (9) placed on right scale!
- The scale is now balanced! .
- Number (1) grabbed!

"Hey wait a minute," Scarfy calls out of concern.

"What's wrong?"

- Number (1) placed inside the center latch.
- The door reacts with a rumble!

"It's opening."

Scarfy chuckles before replying. "Oi, that's embarrassing. All this time, I was using the wrong centerpiece. Ha, talk about not having my head on straight!"

"There has to be a saying that suits you better, nya."

{Candy Mountain: Summit}

[BGM~d6FOCsgdLG8 "Anistar City" (Pokemon X/Y)]

Here lies the same mountain ledge where a living thunder cloud once opposed us. The area is peaceful now, and looks about the same as we left it.

"There's no treasure up here but this view," says Scarfy. "Maybe If I come back at sunset, I'll know how I feel about this."

"I can sympathize with ya, ze. Nothing beats a physical trophy of your efforts!"

"To be fair, the room before this looks like the real treasure room."

A moment of silence follows my comment. Scarfy is the first to break it. "I feel like I wasted everyone's time. It's not much but here's a little something for your troubles."

Scary performs a 360 degree turn and faces us again with three lollipop sticks in its mouth. Three big swirly lollipops are unexpected rewards for the three of us! Sweet(s)!

"It's no trouble at all."

[Quest Clear!]

Scarfy leaves the area satisfied and the three of us walk back inside the mountain with our tasty prizes. Chen compares her candy to the size of her head.

"Food must be a pretty big deal over here, nya!"

"You can say this whole world is Kirby's dinner table."

Chen whips around and faces the scale lock. "How does anyone get this puzzle wrong anyway, nya? It's super easy!"

Marisa frowns. "Like you could've figured it out on your own ya fleabrain!"

Come to think of it, what went wrong..?

"All this time, I was using the wrong centerpiece."

"Hmm..."

...

- Number (6) grabbed!
- Number (6) placed on left scale!
- The scale is now imbalanced.
- Number (9) grabbed!
- Number (9) placed on right scale!
- The scale is now balanced! .
- Number (7) grabbed!
- Number (7) placed inside the center latch.
- The mechanism seems to be having difficulty...

EEEEE..!

[Fade BGM]

"Ow!" The noise caught me off-guard because it happened much later than I anticipated. "That must have been the noise Scarfy was talking about..."

Marisa holds her head and staggers about. "Maan.. I'd be pissed too if that was my reward for-"

WRYYYY!

Another loud screech interrupted Marisa's speech followed by an eerie feeling. The winds above us stirred about. The lot of us felt something was up and a loud thud confirmed all of our suspicions.

"What was that crash?"

"There's only one way to find out, but first we have to get past the door!"

As I say this, I start to swap out the incorrect key with the correct one. While doing this I catch Marisa inhaling her bottled vapor again. Should I be concerned..?

{Candy Mountain: Summit}

Sure enough, a large creature really was waiting for us outside. Its large talons grapple the surface as if it is boasting ownership of the area. Then it spreads its multicolored wings while showing off a metallic armor that guards them. There's no doubt that this giant bird facing the sun was the one who made that noise! This is a rare encounter with the legendary bird Dynablade! Ah, I have to think of a way to make this moment last before it decides to fly a-

*Hiss* "You don't scare me you overgrown fruit loop!"

"Wait Chen, Dynablade is neutral!"

Marisa's handheld hakkero catches my eye. It glows in her palm with a mysterious power.

"The candy can wait. I'm in the mood for roast all of a sudden!"

Dynablade hears the commotion and rotates to face us. The bird spreads its wings and answers with a caw that distorts the air surrounding the area.

[BGM~Y1nsp5CnvVQ "Random Encounter (FF10)"]

"Well this works too I guess..."

{Opposition: Dynablade - Dreamland's Mother Bird}

Dynablade begins our meeting by hopping off the ground and flapping wind at our direction. The motion manipulates the air current in its favor. Chen darts forward, braving the winds with her fingers set to an offensive length. Then she swipes her arms about, sending various streams of red danmaku needles at Dynablade. A fair amount of the attacks connect and Dynablade struggle for balance. Marisa takes the opportunity to fire a medium-sized laser from her hakkero. Dynablade takes note of the light and leaps out of its range. Then it lunges forward and snatches Chen from the ground. Its grip is tight enough to where she cannot break free on her own; and she's in no position to fight back. My response is a staff kata that produces several curveball danmaku that pitch themselves at Dynablade. The tailwind causes less of the shots to connect than I wanted, but enough of them land to where the bird loses its grip on Chen. She escapes immediately.

Once Chen distances herself from Dynablade I conjure a much larger projectile by channeling my staff to the ground. I launch my Passionate Gale and Dynablade matches it with an equal-sized fireball from its mouth. The attacks cancel each other out. Before the debris clears up, the ground beneath me rises up. My standing area somehow became a pillar almost as tall as the mountain's peak. Suddenly Dynablade rises from the debris cloud and somersaults towards me with incredible velocity!

~Dyna Dive~

CHTHUNK!

That one hurt. A lot. But I have to get up right away. It's so dark though.. which way is up? Damn it...

"Upsy daisy, nya!"

Chen's speech quirk..? Nevermind that, my vision is back. I come to facing the normal ground and surrounded by several soft, majestic feathers. I look to Chen who puts an similar feather back into her bag. She then waves at me with both arms.

"Yay, welcome back!"

"WRYYYY!" Dynablade screeches away whatever response I had developed. Looks like we gotta get back into it!

Dynablade really means business if it's going this far huh? In that case, I too will follow suit by dowsing. I tap my staff to the ground and scan the area for traces of loose mana. Something over a dozen orbs develop. From here, I have two offensive options: I can converge all the orbs into one Blissful Cosmic Collision or use each individual orb one-at-a-time in the form of directional rays. The latter option seems more appropriate in this case, so I shoot my projectiles at the orbs to trigger refraction rays. Several of them wind up clean hits and now Dynablade looks worried.

"Nice! Let me borrow some of these, ze!"

Marisa shoots some danmaku at the mana orbs triggering more directional rays. Dynablade decides to retreat towards the right ledge. Chen manages to cut off its takeoff path and prepare an attack on all fours. But Dynablade stretches its neck out and headbutts Chen out of the way. It flies away from the summit and starts to U-Turn.

"That bird's way too fast!" Chen cries.

"It's trying to ram us!" Shouts Marisa. "What now?"

Marisa may not have enough time to fire a laser large enough to stop the charge. I could converge the remaining orbs together for a defensive maneuver but our most recent friend has given us a better option!

"We eat."

Upon saying this, I pull out the large gift lollipop and start licking it.

"Okay!" Chen immediately follows suit.

"H-Hey you guys..." Marisa looks worried.

"Quick, Marisa! Take your lunch break before it's too late!"

Once Marisa notices a glittery phenomenon coming from our candy and tongues, she reluctantly copies both of us. Once Marisa takes a lick, glitter emits from the candy and quickly surrounds her like it did for the rest of us. Dynablade continues to charge us like expected. We hold our ground as Dynablade blazes from one side of the summit to the other. Our area becomes the centerpoint of a massive shockwave and tons of flying rocks and vicious winds...

Yet not a single care was given this turn. The only effect the attack had on us was the particles around us scattering in the wind. Thanks Scarfy!

"Good call, nya!" As Chen cheers, Dynablade calls up another tailwind that nearly blows the girls' hats off.

"Not the hats! You're crossing the line big bird!" Even if I say that, the wind is yet again becoming an obstacle. There must be some way around this!

...

Suddenly, a second wind blows from behind us. What's this?

"Well this is interesting..."

A familiar face waltzes in on the lot of us. Ninon Beart approaches us in her fancy black outfit and two-tone dyed hair. Trails of wind follow her footsteps to set out to contest Dynablade's offense.

"Ninon?" Of all the possible Maidens to show up on their own...

"Consider yourself lucky." Ninon says this as if she understands my surprise. "I just happened to be in the mood to bail you out. What are you doing anyways?"

"Oh, just fighting a creature of fathomless grace. Wanna stick around for a bit?"

"If I must."

A mild vortex starts to develop at the center of the clashing winds and Ninon walks toward the center of it. Dynablade shoots an impromptu fireball at Ninon who responds with a thunder orb. The two projectiles collide causing sparks and cinders to splash out of the vanishing vortex. The bird then swoops toward Ninon in an attempt to neutralize the new threat. Unfortunately for it, the rest of us were given enough time to prepare moves on our own...

In my case, I activate the remaining mana orbs I dowsed earlier as ammo to attack Dynablade with refractor rays. A couple of the rays connect, and one of them wound up being a direct hit to the strange blue gem decorating Dynablade's chest. The impact makes Dynablade sink to ground level, cancelling its swooping attempt.

"Child Sign: Dharmapala Rampage!"

In Chen's case, she gets on all fours and activates the Spell Card in her mouth. Then she darts off in multiple directions, leaving several waves of danmaku behind her. Each time she stops, Dynablade stretches its neck to try to take a bite out of her, but Chen darts off before it comes close. From my experiences, the opportunity to attack this type of Spell Card is limited to the end of the user's flight pattern. And unfortunately for Dynablade, it has lost too much stamina from the Spell Card's waves to counterattack at the right moment. That's great news for Marisa and her glowing hakkero though!

"Your goose is cooked." Before I could beg Marisa to reconsider, her spell had already reached its declaration phase. "Magicannon: Final Spark!"

A thin laser shoots from the hakkero and expands rapidly. Dynablade's wings twitch in an attempt to escape, but the previous attacks must have sapped away the energy it needed...

VRRRN!

[Fade BGM]

The Master Spark becomes wide enough to cover the poor bird's entire body. After a long moment, the laser completes and reveals a greatly scuffed bird that lost the will to fight. This battle was a total victory, but...

"Catch, nya!"

Chen tosses me a fish-shaped pastry just as I started to gather my thoughts. Sometimes I feel that Chen can read the mood just as well as my True Sign allows me to. I walk up to Dynablade with the pastry in hand and offer it to her. She accepts reluctantly.

"It's been an honor, Dynablade."

Dynablade manages to pull itself to its feet, caw softly, then take off towards the sun. In retrospect, this series of events may have been the most that could have come from this encounter. As I realize this, I turn around to discover that Ninon is the most astonished out of my allies.

"This is just a simulation, right..?"

... I'll have to fill her in eventually...


[BGM~rO2x1OqvOog "Melody of Profits"]

MARISA: That was a close one. How many times is this place gonna be in danger anyways?

LOUIS: Dreamland wasn't in danger. I tried to tell you guys that Dynablade was neutral!

MARISA: Huh..?

LOUIS: This is probably the mountain where Dynablade lives. Also we're the ones that called it here with that loud noise.

CHEN: Nyow that I think about it, Scarfy's request didn't say anything about fighting that bird. He only wanted to nyo why the puzzle wasn't working!

MARISA: Oh yeah! Wow. So you're telling me that there was no point to any of that..?

LOUIS: It's okay guys. We got feathers in the end!

(Louis displays two different feathers that were dropped from Dynablade as it took off.)

CHEN: A silver feather and a rainbow feather? They both look pretty, nya!

LOUIS: ... When you say it like that, I feel like I should try not to lose these.

MARISA: What do you mean?

LOUIS: Ask again later!