A green-bearded Soldier, Din Gior, led them to the gates of the Emerald City. The gatekeeper took off all their glasses and put them in his bag.
– Are you leaving us already?" – What is it? " he asked politely.
"Yes, we have to go," Ellie said sadly. – Where does the road to the Purple Country start?
"There is no road there," Faramant said. – No one willingly goes to the land of the evil Bastinda.
– How do we find her?" Toto asked.
"You won't have to worry about that," the Gatekeeper exclaimed. "When you come to the Purple Land, Bastinda will find you and take you as slaves.
– Maybe we can take away her magic power." Kaggi-Carr asked.
"Ah, you want to defeat Bastinda?" So much the worse for you! No one has ever tried to fight it, except Goodwin, and even he "– the Gatekeeper lowered his voice - " has failed. She will try to capture you before you can do anything about it. Be careful! Bastinda is a very evil and skilled sorceress, and it is very difficult to cope with her. Go to the place where the sun rises, and you will come to her country! I wish you success!
They said goodbye to Faramant, and he closed the gates of the Emerald City behind them. Ellie turned east, and the others followed. Everyone was sad, knowing what a difficult task they were going to face. Only the careless Toto ran merrily about the field and chased the big mottled butterflies: he believed in the power of the Cowardly Lion, the Elemental Tiger, the Tin Woodman, and Nikita, and hoped for the ingenuity of the Scarecrow.
Ellie looked at the dog and the crow and gave a little cry of surprise as the ribbons turned from green to white.
– What does that mean?" – What is it? " she asked her friends.
They all looked at each other, and the Scarecrow said thoughtfully::
"Sorcery!"
For lack of any other explanation, they all agreed and moved on. The Emerald City was disappearing into the distance. The country was becoming desolate as they approached Bastinda's domain.
Until noon, the sun shone in their eyes, blinding them, but they were walking on a rocky plateau, and there was not a single tree to hide in the shade. By evening, Ellie was tired, and the Lion had hurt his paw and was limping.
They stopped for the night. The Scarecrow, Good, Tiger, and Nikita stood guard, and the others fell asleep.
Although the evil Bastinda had only one eye, she could see with it so that there was no corner in the Purple Land that escaped her sharp gaze.
Going out to sit on the porch in the evening, Bastinda looked around her domain and shuddered with rage: far away, on the border of her domain, she saw the little sleeping hateful Ellie and her friends.
The sorceress blew her whistle. A pack of huge wolves with angry yellow eyes and large fangs made of iron protruding from their gaping mouths ran noisily towards Bastinda's palace. The wolves crouched on their hind legs and stared at Bastinda, panting.
"Run west!" There you will find a little girl who has brazenly entered my country, and with them her companions. Tear them all to shreds!
– Why don't you take them as slaves?" the pack leader asked.
– The girl is weak. Her companions can't work: one is stuffed with straw, the other is made of iron, a strange black animal, a crow, a mouse and a boy. And with them a Lion and a Tiger, which also do not expect any good.
That's how Bastinda saw with her one eye!
The wolves raced.
"To pieces! To pieces! the sorceress screamed after him.
But the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, the Tiger, and Nikita were not asleep. They saw the wolves coming just in time.
"It's the Irontooth of Bastinda!" We need to wake up the Lion – " said the Elemental Tiger.
"No need, – said the Tin Woodman. – It's my job to handle the wolves. I'll give them a good meeting!
"Goode, whether you like it or not, I'll help you!" Nikita said and, turning the Omnitrix wheel, selected the silhouette of the Heatblast and hit the core. But instead of stones and fire, the young man's body was covered with gray fur, a long flowing mane and a large bushy tail with three sharp claws on each arm and leg appeared, and the inside of his mouth turned green. He was wearing a green jumpsuit with black stripes and an Omnitrix symbol on his lower abdomen.
- Wow! the alien said. - A new alien! Of course, I wanted to become a Heatblast, but this one will do. Well, let's see what you can do. And the alien took up a fighting stance.
The Woodman stepped forward. When the leader ran up to the Tin Woodman, his red mouth wide open, the Woodman swung his sharp-honed axe – the wolf's head flew off. The wolves ran in a line; as soon as the next one charged at the Woodman, he was ready with his axe raised, and the wolf's head fell to the ground. Nikita, in the form of an alien, cut the throats of two wolves, and killed three more with an ultrasound that escaped from his mouth when he howled at the enemies.
Bastinda had forty fierce wolves, and twenty times the Tin Woodman raised his axe. And when he picked it up for the twenty-first time, not a single wolf was left alive: all lay at the feet of the Woodman and Nikita.
- A beautiful battle!" said the Scarecrow.
"It's harder to cut down trees," Goode said modestly. "How do you call yhis alien?" he asked the alien.
"I think... Blitzwolfer!
Blitzwolfer turned back into Nikita and the friends waited for the morning. When Ellie woke up and saw a bunch of dead wolves, she was scared. The Scarecrow told her about the night's battle, and the girl thanked the Tin Woodman and Nikita heartily. After breakfast, the whole party boldly set out for the Purple Palace.
Old Bastinda liked to bask in bed. She got up late and went out on the porch to ask the wolves how they had killed the impudent travelers.
What was her anger when she saw that the travelers continued to walk, and her faithful wolves lay dead!
Bastinda whistled twice, and a flock of iron-beaked crows that had survived the loss on the field swirled through the air. The sorceress shouted:
"Fly west. There are strangers there! Bite them to death! Hurry up! Hurry up!
Crows cawed as they raced toward them. Ellie was startled when she saw them. But the Scarecrow said:
"It's my business to handle these!" It's not for nothing that I'm a crow scarecrow! Get behind me! And he put his hat on his head, spread his arms wide, and assumed the air of a common scarecrow. Nikita wanted to turn into a Stinkfly, but the Omnitrix gave out another newly unlocked alien. The new hero looked like an Egyptian mummy. His eyes and the gaps between his bandages glowed green. He wore the black and gold headdress of a pharaoh, as well as green bracers and greaves, and the Omnitrix symbol was on his left shoulder. After examining his new uniform, Nikita mentally dubbed it the Snare-oh and, remembering the abilities of mummies from the movies, turned into a pile of bandages.
The crows were confused and whirled in disarray in the air. But the pack leader croaked hoarsely:
"Afraid of what?" The scarecrow is stuffed with straw, and we are not afraid of these bandages! Here I will ask them!
And the leader wanted to sit on the Scarecrow's head, but the Scarecrow caught him and broke his neck. Snare-oh immediately took shape and strangled two more with the ribbons released from its fingers. Forty crows with iron beaks were at Bastinda's, and all were wrung by the brave Scarecrow and the Snare-oh and thrown into a heap.
The travelers thanked the Scarecrow and Nikita for their resourcefulness, and again set off to the east.
When Bastinda saw that her faithful crows were lying in a dead heap on the ground, and the travelers were moving forward fearlessly, she was seized with anger and fear.
"How?" Would all my magic skills not be enough to detain the impudent girl and her companions?!
Bastinda stamped her feet and blew her whistle three times. At her call, a cloud of fierce black bees flew down, their bites deadly.
"Fly west!" the sorceress snarled. "Find the strangers there and pinch them to death!" Hurry up! Hurry up!
And the bees, with a deafening buzz, flew to meet the travelers. The Tin Woodman and the Scarecrow saw them from afar. The Scarecrow knew what to do in an instant.
"Pull the straw out of me!" He shouted to Gud and Nikita. - Throw the rest, and the bees will not get to them!
The straw man quickly unbuttoned his coat, and a whole heap of straw fell out of it. Everyone threw themselves on the ground. The woodcutter and Nikita hastily threw straw at them and straightened up to their full height, and Nikita wanted to turn into a Diamondhead, but the clock again gave out the newly unlocked alien, already the third for today. It looked like a picture of Victor Frankenstein's monster. He had a muscular body with a human nose, dark grayish-yellow skin, a black mullet hairstyle with brown at the end, sideburns, green eyes, and two tower-shaped conductor coils on his back, similar to Tesla conductors. He was dressed in green and blue trousers with lines on them, with a triangular dash in the middle that glowed green. He had stitch lines on his hands (right hand: half shoulder and left hand: half glove). He was wearing brown gloves with his fingers exposed, as well as three black and green bolts on his chest and one black bolt on each side of his neck, with all the bolts having a green line on them, white lines on his waist that connected to the Omnitrix symbol that he wore on his waist like a belt buckle. Nikita called him Frankenstrike to himself, because of his resemblance to the monster he knew.
A cloud of bees buzzed furiously at Goode and Frankenstrike. The Woodman smiled: the bees broke their stings on the iron and died, for a bee cannot live without a sting. They fell, and others swooped in to take their place, and they also tried to sink their stingers into Goode's iron body. The bees were also flying at Frankenstrike, but they couldn't kill him. Those bees that bit Frankenstrike were electrified and died, scattering. Realizing what this alien's ability was, Frankenstrike began to release green electric charges from his body, which killed the remaining bees that did not have time to break their stingers on the Woodcutter's body.
As a result, all the bees either lay dead on the ground, like a pile of black embers, or turned into dust. They all crawled out from under the straw, gathered it up, and refilled the Scarecrow. The friends set off again.
The evil Bastinda was extremely angry and frightened, seeing that her faithful bees were also killed, and the travelers were going on and on. She tore her hair, gnashed her teeth, and for a long time could not utter a word.
Finally, the sorceress came to her senses and called her servants – Winkies. Bastinda ordered the Winkies to arm themselves and destroy the daring travelers. The Winkies were not very brave – they blinked piteously, and tears rolled from their eyes, but they did not dare to disobey the order of their mistress and began to look for weapons. But since they had never had to fight (this was the first time Bastinda had asked them for help), they had no weapons, and they were armed with a pot, a frying pan, a flower pot, and some of them were clapping children's crackers loudly.
When the Lion and the Tiger saw the Winkies approach cautiously, hiding behind each other, pushing each other from behind, and blinking and squinting fearfully, they burst out laughing:
– With these, the battle won't be long!"
They stepped forward, opened their huge mouths, and barked so loudly that the Winkies dropped their pots, pans, and firecrackers and scattered.
The evil Bastinda turned green with fear, seeing that the travelers were going on and on, and were already approaching her palace.
She had to use the last magic tool she had left. In the secret bottom of the chest, Bastinda kept a Golden Cap. The owner of the Cap could summon a tribe of Flying Monkeys at any time and force them to do any order. But the Cap could only be used three times, and Bastinda had already summoned the Flying Monkeys twice before. The first time, she used them to get rid of a careless servant, and the second time, she repulsed the troops of Goodwin the Great and Terrible, who was trying to free the Purple Country from her power.
That's why Goodwin was afraid of the evil Bastinda and sent Ellie and Nikita to her, hoping for the power of their artifacts.
Bastinda didn't want to use the Hat a third time, because if she did, her magic power would disappear. But the witch had no more wolves, no more crows, no more bees, and the Winkies were bad warriors and could not be counted on.
So Bastinda took out a Hat, put it on her head, and began to conjure. She stamped her foot and shouted the magic words loudly:
- Bambara, chufara, loriki, yeriki, pikapu, trikapu, skoriki, moriki! Come before me, Flying Monkeys!
And the sky was darkened by a flock of Flying Monkeys that were rushing towards Bastinda's palace on their powerful wings. The leader of the pack named Warra flew up to Bastinda and said:
– You called us for the third and last time!" What do you want?"
"Attack the insolent strangers who have invaded my country, and destroy all but the Lion and the Tiger!" I will harness them to my carriage!
"It will be done!" the leader replied, and the pack flew noisily to the west.