Kooper shook his head in fear and confusion. In one moment he was on Madoso, and in the next, he's inside a crude canvas tent. He studied the tent's beige interior—reminiscent of the ones he slept in on the Scholar expeditions. His panting continued, but as his breathing slowed, he noticed multiple voices from outside fill the tent. They were from all tones and pitches, from a bold, lightly-accented voice, to the bold voices of his collective team—

The team!

Kooper lunged towards the door and peered out. Outside the tent, Goombella, Frankly, and Kolorado sat in a circle with Ludwig von Koopa and Mona, all engrossed in a conversation about the Complex. Kooper rubbed his eyes: his team was okay. They huddled beneath layers of clothing and blankets, but they're alive.

"Wait," Kooper interrupted the others from within the tent. They all quieted down and smiled at him, "What did I miss?"

"Well," Ludwig signaled Kooper to sit with them, to which he obliged, "Make yourself comfortable. We have quite the agenda to converse about."

Kooper nodded, "First off, where are we? Second, why are you here?"

"Ahh, the double hitter I was expecting," Ludwig smiled, "This is the Valley of Bowser. Yoshi planned on converting this into a refugee shelter, but when the Sages took over every operation, Mona and I converted this into a hideout. And yes, that's precisely why Mona and I are here—I knew these happenings would occur. That's why I didn't want any of my siblings involved, but unfortunately, Morton thought he could outsmart the Wand of Light. The synopsis? You can never outsmart the universal source of knowledge."

"Right. Light always wins, so how can we stop the Sages?" Goomella questioned.

"Truth always wins," Ludwig corrected, "Truth is a vital component in Light magic—it's what makes Light magic powerful. No matter how much effort you put into it, you cannot contain the truth in a box of lies. The box will shatter the moment the truth decides to be free," Ludwig traced a line through the crumbling brick's sand, "Morton's learning that the hard way. Combine that with his philosophy of the ends justifying the means, and we'll get more chaos than even he can control. He brought you and your team here for that reason, I believe."

"Wow…" Kooper sat speechless as he considered the conspiracy's plan. Everything lined up, as if they planned these events decades ago, "I figured Council was corrupt, but not like that."

Ludwig nodded, "Oh, yes. Corruption ran rampant in Council. We do have the Ethics Committee who can subpoena Council members, but the Ethics Committee and the Judiciary Committee were both filled with the same cronies who needed to be subpoenaed. If I could change the system, I'd at least make that portion of government electable, but my desire for political reformation may be why I was never considered in any leadership position after my short stint as vice chair. I actually cared for the people."

"It'll work out," Kooper hoped.

"Indeed," Ludwig studied Kooper, "For your awareness, I confiscated my brother's wand from you. I do not intend for that to sour any working relationship or alliance here, but I must study the power within Lawrence's wand if we are to have any shred of hope."

"Oh yeah…" Memories of the raid filled his mind. He remembered the rooms, the conspirators—all piling on his haunting memories of Larry's carnage.

"Great idea," Frankly nodded, "When I was researching the ancient Light empires, they used the power to expand their knowledge not only on the universe around them, but every stage in its temporal existence."

"Yes, yes. I'm quite familiar with the manuscripts' power," Ludwig said, "We always used them with Morton and my father to learn from Tenebris. However, I'm pleased that your journey only confirmed my desires. I have ideas on when and where to go, but I will let that be known in the future. Did Scholar uncover any other information pertaining to the Wands that neither me nor the rest of Council know?"

"None here, other than the cultures behind the Wands in the Dark Ages," Kooper shook his head. He then remembered Frankly explaining a riddle-poem of some sort. Its iambic rhythm swirled in his head, but the koopa couldn't remember any words, "Wait. Frankly, you remember the poem, right?"

Ludwig's eyes lit up, "A poem, you say? Interpreting that riddle could turn the tables in our favour. Mind you repeat it, Professor?"

Frankly rubbed his chin, "Right, right. Koopa told me a poem about the Wands' weaknesses. It went like this: Knowledge knows threats to its welfare, but not an uncontrolled weapon. Water, fire, earth and air—the Forces' victims of aggression. But everything we see and know; a mere shred to a divine plan. And revelation governs the ghast, in the future or the past. All are weak, all are strong, but none will ever fail. But to seize control or maintain balance, you must find each holy grail."

Ludwig stared at the ground, pondering over the riddle.

"But to seize control or maintain balance, you must find each holy grail…" he repeated, "This is new information for me. I admit, Frankly, I don't have an answer on what that riddle means. However, the last line tells me that if we follow the Magikoopa Assembly's plan to a tee, we could also seize back the Wands' powers. The Assembly's plans indicate a basic understanding of the Wands' convoluted relationships and this riddle's subtle meaning."

"Great idea! That means we'll let them do the work!" Goombella said, "But while we're here, what should we do?"

"For now?" Ludwig pondered, "The predicament isn't as easy as choosing sides. I've received knowledge of the refuge in Desert Land being the closest area to how we should operate. That very shelter's the one Morton and I worked on, and Toadette showed fascination towards. We cannot allow either Junior or the Magikoopa Assembly to overrun Desert Land, lest their abuse become legitimate. As of how: that's an ambiguous topic I must study," the koopaling stood up and stretched, "I must further explore this predicament. As for the rest of you: I recommend studying any manuscripts or scrolls you might have. But hold tight on any major plans."

"You got it," Kooper said. The other Scholar members nodded.

But Mona clasped her hand around Ludwig's, "Are you sure about this, Lud?"

"Of course, Mona!" Annoyance peppered Ludwig's voice. The koopaling cleared his throat and spoke in a calmer voice, "I have three siblings trapped in some strange mystical situation involving the Wands, and I have three siblings driven purely on seeking revenge from betrayal. Only Lemmy and I are neutral, and Lemmy's sitting in the direct crosshairs of both sides. As their eldest brother, it's my duty to assure their safety, and as both a former king and a denizen of the world, it's my responsibility to keep our global society safe. That requires me to do this."

Mona sighed, "You're right. I just don't wanna see any of you be hasty out there."

"We won't, I promise," Ludwig smiled as he squeezed Mona's hand, to which she returned, "I will alert all of you on any newfound knowledge I might receive."

After his departing words, Ludwig walked from the group and towards Larry's castle, with his head held high—like the team's hopes.

Iggy gulped his coffee-spiked energy drink as his bloodshot eyes remained fixed on the Darklandian Intelligence Agency's surveillance cameras. The cameras covered every hectare of the land not plagued by volcanoes—and drones hovered high above the areas where no mounted cameras stood. All-nighters and overtime's nothing new for the inventor, but Iggy never felt as dead then as he did now. He knew the kingdom and its military depended on his spy drones, because he knew the Assembly's forces would invade. He just didn't know when.

"Iggy," Wendy entered the throne room, "It's morning. Did you stay up again?"

"I told you, Wendy…" he replied.

Wendy eyed her brother in concern after his debilitated tone. He should be energetic, and even insane after any dose of caffeine, but now, she couldn't decipher him from a zombie.

"You really should sleep. Let the military handle it."

Iggy scowled, "But the military can't even use drones without accidentally shooting them down with our surface-to-air missiles!"

"That was from a cadet who couldn't tell the letter S from the number 5…"

"A vital distinction when you're dealing with coordinates, Sis!" Iggy said, "And why are fresh-out-of-school teens put in charge of our defenses? Shouldn't that be a lieutenant's job?"

"Ask King Dad. He's the one that wanted an overstaffed military," Wendy shook her head, "But nevermind that. How's the defense looking?"

"No armies spotted in our controlled territory or in Desert Land," Iggy reported, "The Conspiracy's armies are still trying to stabilize Grass Land. The most concerning thing is once they have Grass Land under control, they can take over Desert Land."

Wendy gasped, "Oh boy…"

"We have to protect Desert Land as soon as we can. Desert Land will show Junior's true strength. Both we and the conspirators threatened retaliation if the other side took Desert Land. It's neutral territory with lots of energy and business, meaning it's something we cannot survive without."

"I'll tell Junior about this, Iggy. I think he has a meeting with the generals in a couple hours. But it's time for you to sleep. The forces are actually trained under Junior. He and our generals improved our standing by a ton the past few months."

The inventor sighed, "I guess I need to give up control, especially when the empire grows. I'll allow them access to the drones once I'm off for the day. Or the two days."

Wendy smiled before she left the room, leaving Iggy to explore Dark Land's northern reaches. He zoned in and out from the screen as the drone scanned the barren wasteland, but he shot up in attention when the drone spotted a lone koopa in the Darklandian boneyard.

"Huh?! Who ventures off to the boneyard?" Iggy shivered. He remembered the spooky stories about the massive boneyard, and how the spirits who guarded the bones were vicious because of their genocidal deaths decades ago. As a scientist, he's more skeptical about supernatural claims, but as a practitioner of magikoopa-styled magic, he also knew about the immortal anima that even science can't manipulate. He always played the spooky legends safe rather than outright deny them.

But the same couldn't be said about the figure. The koopa knew what they were doing—Iggy wasn't sure whether to be frightened or fascinated at that. The scientist zoomed in on the koopa and gasped as the screen showed the koopa's purple shell, pink head, and red shades.

"Oh no…"

A scream interrupted his thoughts, and the hall thundered as Wendy dashed back to the throne room, gasping for breath. Too winded to talk, she furiously pointed to the ceiling and mouthed a word salad at him.

"Wendy?"

She ran back into the hallway, and Iggy chased after her. They exited the main castle and bursted into Junior's tower.

"Wendy, what's going on?" Iggy asked as the duo impatiently waited for Junior's elevator.

"It's with Junior!" Wendy cried, "We could be there already, but the stupid stairway had to be locked!"

"Is he sick or something?" Iggy continued.

"It's something you need to see to believe."

"Then he needs to get better or we need to help him with, because we need him to lead more than ever."

Wendy drawled, "Wait… I know that tone. Iggy… What happened?"

"Roy's in Dark Land."

Wendy gaped, unable to utter any words even as the elevator arrived at the ground floor. As the elevator passed the second story, she broke the stunned silence.

"He is?! Then why isn't he captured?!"

"He's in the boneyard, and he doesn't have an army. Our armies are all fending the eastern borders against the Conspiracy."

"Junior could send a special envoy to arrest Roy," Wendy said, "But you see, that's the thing with Junior…"

Wendy led Iggy into Junior's chambers and pointed to the king's bed. Iggy's droopy eyes widened as a large white crystal surrounded the bed and imprisoned the young king, who rested as if he were dead.

"Oh no…" Iggy sighed, still too shocked to recoil at the sight or wonder about the crystals, "Wendy… If this is what I think it is, we need to run that envoy, pronto."

Kylie lay shell-up on her cot. She met with Toadette, Lemmy, the Mario Crew, and several other shelter members she never met before. Each asked her about her experiences, about Roy, about Kammy—everything. She tried explaining everything to them like she did on the ostro ride with Dixie, but her sickness crept up until it overcame her.

Toadette assigned a room to her on F32, deep in the ground. The desert's heat couldn't warm the bare concrete walls, leaving them gelid to the touch. She didn't mind, as her returning illness made her uncomfortably hot—nonetheless, the shelter's ancient, plain, sub-par conditions made her miss Madoso's futuristic, cosmopolitan complex.

She stared at the ceiling, unsure whether vertigo plagued her or if F33 was a little kid's jump away from a collapse. Either way, she'd rather be taken out by one than survive both—she snickered as her dark humor returned with a vengeance.

"You're brave for escaping from us, I'll at least give you that."

Kylie shot up as the voice filled her mind. She didn't know whether to feel relieved or horrified at his statement, or his method of communication.

"Roy?" Kylie thought, "What are you even doing?"

"Just sittin' here, camping at the ol' Boneyard. The volcanoes make the sunset look so nice… So much pink and red. It was like that one night at Madoso, or the many nights before that. It made me miss being with you," Roy said, "Who woulda thought a pile of genocided bones could be so romantic?"

"What has even gotten into you, Roy?" Kylie asked, "You just suddenly became so creepy."

"Hey, I'm only being considerate! It's been awhile since we had time alone. I'm no perv!"

"I didn't mean that!" Kylie groaned, "I'm talking about your sudden fascination with death!"

"Like you weren't thinking of dying from a collapsed ceiling."

"If you were sick every day for the past two months, you'd think that too!" Kylie said, "But no, I mean about you lately. The yoshnors, the boneyard… You're literally getting people killed! What has gotten into you?"

"It's Spirit magic at work," Roy's tough demeanor broke and he let out a sigh, "I didn't want you to leave because you would only put yourself in danger. Kammy will get Desert Land, and nothing will stop her. Nothing will stop me from helping her, because nothing can. Even me."

"Even you?" she repeated, "And even me too?"

"Kylie…" Roy admitted, "This is a Wand function. Something bigger than you or me."

"No!" Kylie almost screamed through gritted teeth, "This is not a Wand function! This is YOU abusing your power! The Wand should've killed you by now!"

"Don't act like you know how Spirit magic works!" Roy's voice snapped, "It was being abused when we were sacrificing magikoopas! That's what we're ending!"

"I saw what you were doing! You were murdering people just to give life to yoshnors, who will do nothing but kill! One even tried to attack ME when I left! How could you just brush that off?! Unless I mean nothing to you?!"

"Kylie, you need to understand. Sometimes we have to do questionable things to keep the universe balanced-"

"Balanced?! You're not creating balance! You're overwhelming the world with spirits! And how DARE you try to make yourself look like the virtuous one, and make me look like a devilish fool!" Kylie practically screamed, "But you know what?! You're right, because I was a fool for trusting you again! I'm done hearing your stupid excuses for evil! Get out of my head, you insane monster! And get out of my life!"

Silence filled the room—she desired it over him at that moment, but silence only allowed her bitter feelings to fester. She wanted to release them by screaming, maybe inside her pillow to mask the sound from the other tenants. But her heavy breathing prevented her from unleashing anything more than pathetic gasps.

A knock broke her cascading thoughts, but she ignored it until she heard Dixie's voice.

"Kylie? Can we talk a bit more?"

Kylie wiped her distressed tears from her eyes, "Come in, it should be unlocked."

The door opened, and Dixie, Toadette, Peach, and Daisy filed in. Kylie looked up at the women, who all returned sympathetic stares.

"You okay, girl? We heard you shouting," Daisy questioned. The others all nodded. Kylie looked down and realized her clenched hands.

"I'm just so frustrated at everything," Kylie seethed, "How is using all this magic right?!"

"It's not. The Sages are abusing power," Peach shook her head.

"Exactly! I was saying that to Roy, but he only treated me like I'm the bad guy!" the koopa troopa groaned, "Like, what sense does this make?!"

Peach, Daisy, and Dixie shrugged, while Toadette gave Kylie a small smile.

"Maybe he thinks he's doing good-"

"He's literally killing people, Toadette," Kylie interrupted, "And I don't mean dictators or evil people. He's killing regular, powerless people for power."

"I didn't mean it like that," Toadette said in an apologetic tone, "But remember when you mentioned when you got captured? Maybe something happened then?"

Kylie sighed, "I hope something did, and he didn't choose this path on his own. He was always rough, but he couldn't ever stomach actually killing someone, let alone massacring people."

Peach clasped her hands together, "Remember when the X-Nauts got the Shadow Queen to possess me? Do you know what broke her immunity? Love and hope did. I was able to feel enough of it to fight against her."

Kylie raised a brow, "And how does that relate to now?"

Peach smiled, "Something tells me that Roy's the same case."

Kylie only shrugged, speechless at either Peach's naivety or her wisdom. But before she could accept or decline the princess's words, a tremor knocked the five females over. Alarms filled the shelter and the residents all stampeded down the halls. The girls all fumbled, disoriented yet afraid from the sudden, until the door burst open and Lemmy stood, panting.

"Guys..." Lemmy gasped, "We're in trouble!"

"What was that?" Toadette questioned, "Did those flying things come back?"

Lemmy shook his head, "Worse."

"What could be worse than those things?" the mushroomer continued.

Lemmy closed his eyes, "Larry."