[D&$ a#$&r?!=k+$&n?!$#e$#?s #$s]
[[]]
Ruby stepped back into the mansion and admittedly sighed, the key she had led to a door all the way back at the third floor of the mansion so it was a long trek to the next floor.
Plus she wanted to visit that plant in the garden, just to see how it was doing considering how fast it's been growing.
Her plan decided, Ruby went back to the backyard to check on the plant.
[]
"WHOA!" Ruby cried out as she looked at the plant, even the nearby Water Elemental was looking at the plant in confusion.
It was no longer a flower, but now a massive yellow orb on a green stem.
Ruby grabbed the nearby bucket and slowly started to pour water on the plant until it began to shudder. Ruby dropped the bucket and stepped back as the orb appeared to rear back before swinging forward and splitting open.
With Lien exploding out of the opened orb.
"What the-" Ruby started before the lien knocked her down with the force it came out of the plant with.
"I thought you can't grow Lien?" Ruby muttered as she laid on the ground, slowly she picked herself back up and looked around and her eyes widened in surprise.
Sitting in the middle of all the Lien (And gold bars) was a diamond the size of Ruby's head, the jewel itself holding a golden color to it.
"Whoa…" Ruby said as she vacuumed up all her treasures before smiling and returning to the kitchen.
[Luigi's Mansion: Gameboy Horror}
"Eep!' Ruby cried out in surprise, not expecting the Dustboy Horror to go off.
Answering it Ruby found herself staring at Weiss, who was holding the Gold Diamond with an unreadable expression on her face.
"Ruby Rose." Weiss said calmly, a tone that Ruby always associated with Weiss getting extremely prissy, "Where did you get this?"
"Um… The backyard?" Ruby said carefully.
"Ah, well before I get too far heated with this-" Weiss said pointing at the Gold Diamond, "The Professor wanted you to know he detected a Boo you missed in the laundry room when you were there earlier.
Ruby facepalmed as she realized this, she was too distracted from finding Blake's Bow she forgot to check the room for Boo's.
"Thank you Weiss." Ruby said
"Now as for why I called you…" Weiss said, raising the diamond, "DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THIS IS!?"
Ruby jumped in surprise at the volume at which Weiss was shouting. "I-" She started to say.
"A GOLD DIAMOND OF THIS SIZE COULD BUY THE ENTIRETY OF THE SDC! TWICE OVER!" Weiss shouted.
Ruby's brain cut out as Weiss said that, "Wha…" Ruby breathed as Weiss took a deep breath.
"Ruby, you found this, in your mansion." Weiss said, "Not even counting EVERYTHING else you've found in that mansion, you are officially considered one of the richest people in Remnant."
Ruby couldn't believe what she was hearing Weiss say, 'Where the heck could I even trade that in!?' Ruby thought to herself.
"Ruby." Weiss said, "When you rescue your mother, we are going to talk about how much this is worth."
"How much is it worth?" Ruby heard Blake said, only for Weiss to hold out a sheet of paper to the side. "Whoa…"
"That… That is a LOT of zeroes." Ruby heard Yang say.
"I'm… I'll get back to Ghost Catching." Ruby said hanging up.
[Ost end]
Shaking her head clear of thoughts, she made her way to the Laundry Room and found the Boo hiding in the same dryer… Whom immediately began dancing, despite his lack of limbs.
"Yow! Get down! I'm Boogie!" The Boo said, only to be easily vacuumed up in a split second.
"Okay." Ruby muttered, "Time to get back to the balcony."
[]
Upon arriving at the Balcony, Ruby couldn't help herself but to use the Poltergust to water all the plants on the Balcony. There must have been some ghost energy in those plants because they spat out money toward Ruby as she watered them, as well as a blood red diamond that gave off an eerie vibe when Ruby vacuumed it up.
Once that was done Ruby walked up to the door to unlock, which was covered in thorny vines (Something Ruby really didn't feel was necessary considering this was where she fought Boolossus.)
However as the vines vanished the entire house shuddered as a bolt of lightning struck near the house.
"Oh no." Ruby said, as another bolt struck, "Please no."
Alas, a third bolt hit the top of the mansion, causing a power surge throughout the entire mansion.
Ruby looked at the lights on the balcony railing, electricity surging through them before cutting out.
"Oh no." Ruby said in horror.
"RRAGGAAAW!" "BWAGA -AW!" "RRAGGAAAW!" "WOOOOOH!" "BWAGA-AW!"
Ruby's fight or flight instincts kicked in as the sheer number of various Ghost's started to pop up in the room, yellow, pink, blue (First time she actually saw what color that ghost in the safari room was meant to be.)
All in all, Ruby hastily unlocked the door she was at before rushing in and slamming the door shut, breathing heavily.
Ruby looked to her sides and saw she was in another hallway, a ghost mouse on the wall next to her just staring at her.
Seeing as the spiritual rodent was the only ghost in the hall Ruby took a moment to catch her breath.
*Riiiiiiiing*
Ruby jumped a full foot in the air as she heard the sound of a really old fashion phone ring, coming from her left side, considering she had her back to the door she was just in.
Following the wall on her left, and keeping a fair distance from the false door she spotted based on the lack of doormat, she entered the real door on the left side and soon found herself in a room with three Telephones. With the middle one ringing.
There weren't any ghosts in the room at that time so Ruby walked up to the telephone and raised it to her ear.
"Hello?" Ruby asked.
"I-Is this-a Ruby Rose?" A rather timid male voice on the other end of the line said.
"Yes?" Ruby asked.
"Oh thank goodness." The man said, "My name is Luigi, I am, er… was, one of Professor E. Gadd's assistants in researching ghosts."
"Oh. Um… Nice to speak with you then." Ruby said.
"Y-yeah." Luigi said, "A-anyway, Professor E. Gadd called me and asked me to give you some information on a Portrait Ghost I caught while E. Gadd was recovering from a, well, lack of sleep. The Ghost's name was Uncle Grimmly. The fact he gave me a number to the Mansion's phone might just be one of his jokes."
'Well that explains why he's using the phone.' Ruby thought.
"Th-the thing is, you might need to cause a blackout to get him to come out." Luigi said, "He likes it as dark as you can get, as in only a Faunus could be comfortable with how dark it is."
"Um… Nature is way ahead of you." Ruby muttered.
"Oh dear. Well, I'll try to make this fast then." Luigi said, "You need to find a mirror, problem is he's picky about mirrors."
"What kind of mirrors do I need." Ruby asked, running through a list of mirrors she saw in the mansion.
"The kind you'd use to see how some clothes would look on you." Luigi said, "Like the ones you see in clothing stores. He doesn't like it if the mirrors are too big however."
Ruby's eyes lit up, the Wardrobe Room had a mirror like that.
"I think I know where to find him." Ruby said smiling.
"Good, oh ,and do you have any salt?" Luigi asked, "Ghost's are repelled by pure substances, like salt or pure iron."
"Ah… No." Ruby said, "I didn't bring any and I'd doubt the ghost's would bring any."
"O-oh." Luigi said, "W-well at least you know now. Anyway, good luck."
With that, Luigi hung up on his end of the line, Ruby following suit.
Ruby also quickly left the room before the Ghost's could find her… As well as make a mental note to keep salt on hand at all times.
Ruby took a deep breath as she used her semblance, moving at top speed, slowing down only to open the doors of the mansion, trying her hardest not to listen to the dozens upon dozens of ghost's crying out to scare her until she finally reached the Foyer of the mansion.
It was there that Ruby took a moment to catch her breath, as she noticed no ghost's had actually hung around the Foyer (And the only one that did, left as soon as it saw her back when she didn't have the Poltergust.)
Once she caught her breath she sprinted up the stairs and back to the Wardrobe Room she had visited oh so long ago, where she found Uncle Grimmly.
The ghost was that of an old man, a bald spot atop his head and wrinkles on his cheeks, a brown suit was all that adorned his pale blue body, outside of that his face was adorned by an owl's beak.
Furthermore he paid absolutely no attention to Ruby, just staring into the mirror in front of him.
Ruby also noticed he had a key in his hand.
"Okay, so how do I catch you?" Ruby whispered.
"Whoooo…" Grimmly moaned halfheartedly, suddenly raising his arms up. It looked to Ruby as if he was practicing his scaring, but couldn't really motivate himself into actually trying.
So while he was distracted Ruby turned on her flashlight, causing the ghost to lock up in surprise.
Seeing as he couldn't move, Ruby switched to the Poltergust and began to suck up the Portrait Ghost, whom didn't give much resistance to the Poltergust at all.
The ghost was sucked away quickly, the key falling out of his hands as it happened and landing in front of Ruby.
Ruby smiled as she grabbed the key and checked the Dustboy, and found it unlocked one of the doors in the Basement.
With the key in hand Ruby dashed through the hallways and toward the only door on the first floor she never opened, the one leading to the basement.
Thankfully the door to the basement itself wasn't locked, so Ruby ran through it and upon reaching the bottom of the stair, unlocked the one door she could and saw it was a rather empty room, save for a bench and a few barrels.
And the Power Breaker's switch, to which Ruby smiled and grabbed the lever and slowly (due to the weight of the lever fighting her) flipped it back into it's 'On' position.
Thus turned on the lights in the basement, making Ruby let out a relieved sigh, at the same time a chest appeared in the room and the Boo Radar began to beep.
Grabbing the key from the chest, Ruby found that it led to the door directly opposite of the Breaker Room.
"Convenient, but now I've got two sets of rooms unlocked." Ruby muttered as she looked around the room to find the Boo, which naturally was hiding in one of the barrels, not like it had much choice for places to hide really.
"I'm Boo B. Hatch! I'm nuts!" The Boo shouted, much to Ruby's ire.
As Ruby was catching the Boo, she found herself VERY thankful the Boo's were now sealed in the rooms they were being found in, as this Boo had twice the stamina of the Portrait Ghosts and would have likely fled through several rooms before Ruby could catch it, if the ghost still had the potential to.
"Okay, one less Boo to worry about." Ruby muttered as she looked at the Dustboy's map, "Hmmm.." She hummed as she began to ponder if she should search through the Basement as far as she can or go back up to the Third Floor.
[[]]
Okay, Area 4 of the Mansion is admittedly my least favorite part of the game.
Between the fact the Boo's now have more health than the Portrait Ghost's and the fact Area 4 is split between the Third Floor and Basement, this part of the game felt excessively padded.
Nice start though I admit, and when I first played this game I saw the blackout and went, 'Oh powers out, forward march.' And ever since I just kept going into the telephone room for the novelty of E. Gadd calling me on an old ass telephone… And scaring the shit out of a Toad by telling him 'It's Bowser' When the Toad asks who he's calling. Also I'm thankful E. Gadd tells me there is a Portrait Ghost out and about during the Blackout otherwise I would have been lost as all hell.
Although I will admit I do NOT stay in any room other than the Telephone Room and Foyer for any amount of time longer than it takes for me to reach the next door.
Also quick shout out to EmperorWolfgang for catching onto the fact I missed a Boo in the Laundry Room. Seems like no one else noticed it, not even me.
Although next time Wolfgang, I'd appreciate it if you told me where the Boo I missed was so I would have to skim over several chapters trying to find a scene I missed a Boo, if there is a Boo that was meant to be in that room.
Oh and speaking of the Boo's… Considering their rather… Minimal presence in Luigi's Mansion 2, and their status as 'Collectable' in Luigi's Mansion 3, I'm wondering what I should do with them, especially in LM3 where they don't even serve a purpose as to why they are there in the first place.
Anyway I'll see you all next time.