Chapter 72: Search Speedup

Arle's POV

Snow remained to be an issue for me and Carby. I wasn't really one who shovels out snow and Carby couldn't hold a shovel for the life of him. Therefore, we usually would just dig out whatever we could with our hands and toss it away from the door to our house. For days now, it has been like this… our hands would get cold so quickly from the blowing wind. Thankfully, careful use of my Fireball spell would help them warm up and it was never too bad. This most recent day had presented us with a good amount of snow, which we were only able to remove some. I could've used Fireball to melt the snow, but that would've only created ice after leaving what's melted alone. Anyway, something came up later on in the day that I wasn't expecting. The Tetra flew near my house and landed, then out came my friends. "A-Amitie? Ringo? What are you all doing here? ... And who's this other girl?" I asked. "Um... Arle, about that last question… … ..." Ringo told me. I couldn't believe what she was telling me. It sounded crazy, but it seemed to be the case. "Seriously…? What the hell? Dave's a girl?" I sighed. "Ecolo thinks that a Yog that escaped to Ringo's world caused me to turn into a girl, Arle. And... that gets us into why we came here. We want you to come with us to try and find this Yog. We also got Sig…" Dave said before pointing to. "Hi, Arle." Sig said without much thought. "... and we're going to get Schezo as well to help." Dave finished.

They're gonna get Schezo too, huh? Well, I know a little bit of Ringo's world... so this might not be too bad. "Okay. But first... can someone please clear out the snow leading to my house's door? I would do it myself with my Fireball spell, but I know that's a bad idea…" I nodded before requesting. "Well, if it's snow you need to be cleared… then as the Tetra's engineer, I think I may have something that can do just that inside the ship. Please wait for a moment, would you?" Ai suddenly came by, then got back into the ship. "What is he getting from there? Surely, it can't just be a typical snow shovel… right?" Ringo wondered. "Oh, just watch. This will be interesting to see, to say the least." Ex told her. It'll most likely be something that I have no idea what it is. When I looked inside the Tetra around five years ago… many things inside it were stuff that were a complete mystery to me. It'll be one of those kinds of things, I'm pretty sure of it. But while Ai's getting that… … What will Schezo think of Dave as he is now? Dave's a girl… like Amitie and Ringo. I dunno if Schezo's gonna be angry at this, or if he's gonna think that Dave's cute…

Dave's POV

Ai came back out with something, alright... "Here it is: The Tetra's state-of-the-art snow vacuum pack. This will suck up any bits of snow near the nozzle... like this." He demonstrated. The vacuum seemed to do its job, as it should. "That seems convenient…" I observed. "Oh yes, it is. This comes in handy whenever we land in places that are essentially pools of snow. And when the pack is full, it converts the collected snow into clean water. After that, the water is automatically sent to the Tetra's backup water supply via teleportation." He explained. "That's incredible...! You must be rather intelligent to have made something like this." Klug was impressed. "Oh-hoho! Thank you, this is the kind of value that I provide to the crew. Enough of that though, I should clear the rest of this snow up to that lady's door and have us hurry with what we are supposed to be doing. So if you would excuse me, please stand back." Ai smiled, then proceeded to vacuum. So, this is what the Tetra's engineer is capable of... It's no wonder how the ship manages to stay afloat. This dog's a smart one, alright.

It didn't take long for Ai to vacuum up all of the snow leading up to Arle's front door. It ended up becoming a clear path and Arle was happy with the result. "Now, we should get a move on. We still need to get Schezo to come with us." Ex said. We all nodded and entered back inside the ship before taking off into the air. It didn't take too long to see Schezo training outside his cave. We landed the ship and came out of it. "Arle? Rulue? ... Actually, what are you all doing here? … … Am I mistaken? There seems to be a distinct absence of Dave… …? Who's this girl here?" Schezo wondered before noticing. "Schezo... I'm not sure how you're gonna react to this… Dave's... … ..." Arle hesitantly said before whispering to him. "... What...? ... Are you kid-?" Schezo suddenly stopped. "Um... Schezo…?" I spoke. "... Dave is a... Dave is a... ... ... This is so conflicting to me. My heart wants me to adore what I'm looking at here, but now that my mind knows that this girl is actually Dave... I can't bring myself to call him adorable, because of my jealousy towards him. If anything, this whole thing intensifies my jealousy of him. But I'm not going to let that get to me... Anyway, it seems like you all need me for something. What is it?" He said before asking us.

Ex decided to step up to the plate and tell him. "You see... … …" He told him. "Hm... So a Yog attacked you all while you were in this "farthest edge of spacetime" place, which happened after Ecolo was attacked by a different Yog... And now you want me to help search for the Yog that has apparently fled to this girl's world?" Schezo summarized. "That's pretty much it…" Ex reaffirmed. "Hmph. Very well, I'll take part in the search. I did say that I would take down the Yogs for myself, so this is finally a good opportunity for me to do just that. Remember that I'm not doing this for any of your guys' safety." Schezo reminded us. "Yeah, yeah... We get it, Schezo. Go at it with the Yogs alone if you want, you'll need some good luck on your side." I said. "Heh. I don't NEED luck now that I have had time to train with this new sword. I have obtained and adjusted to new light-based powers, which I'll use reluctantly. I'm still a dark mage at the core, just letting you know that for later. I'm not some "chaos mage" or whatever." He insisted.

We'll see about that, Schezo. Sooner or later... you'll be fully accustomed to that blade, just like the Sword of Darkness. And maybe there'll be some light in you to counteract the darkness that once plagued you... "At any rate, let's get in the Tetra and go see Ecolo. We don't have all day to search, you know…" Ex said. We all entered the ship and it took off with Ess still piloting. We got to the farthest edge of spacetime by Ex making a big portal, allowing the ship to go through it. This drained him, but he seemed to know that he would recover by the time we would arrive there. And so, we came out of the portal and stopped at the pathway leading up to where Ecolo was supposed to be. The Tetra crew, barring Ex and Tee, stayed behind to look after the ship. This included Yui as well, so she didn't come with us to see the current keeper. While we were walking through the pathway, we met up with Satan. "I see that all of you are going to Ecolo... I will join you, naturally." He said. We all rolled with it and continued to make our way to Ecolo. And then, there he was... laying down, still in pain. "Ecolo! ... You'll feel a lot better after I heal you." Arle ran up to him. "Arle...? ... E-everyone...!" He noticed.

He doesn't look much better than when we last saw him... poor guy. "We came to see how you were doing, Ecolo…" Ex told him. "I... can see that, Ex… … Thank you for coming to heal me... I'm sorry though, I don't know where that Yog could be at in Ringo's world... I haven't been looking in on it, considering my pain." Ecolo said. "... It can't be helped, Ecolo... Pain sometimes hurts too much to ignore." I said to him. "Heh... Of course, that's obvious." He smiled briefly. "Don't worry, Ecolo… when we find this Yog, we'll show it that one should never mess with the Keeper of Dimensions like this, whoever that may be. In this case, it's you. After all, I was the keeper before you were and I would know." Ex softly placed a hand on Ecolo's head. "Well, as soon as Arle's done healing me... find it, then knock it silly." The current keeper made a slow punch-like motion. "We will." Ex nodded. Some time passed and Ecolo was back in business. "Woo-hoo! I'm raring to go again!" Ecolo floated with joy. "Nice." I smiled.

At least something good has happened today..."It's great to see that you're in good shape now. Honestly, I'm rather shocked that the Puyo Puyo and Tetris dimensions didn't merge at all while you were down." Ex told the current keeper. "I'm surprised as well. I thought for sure the two dimensions would've merged at least a little without my influence getting in the way, but I guess we got lucky." Ecolo said. At this point, I was already caught up with learning about the time that those two dimensions merged and caused Ringo to meet Tee for the first time. So, I was also surprised the two dimensions didn't merge then and there. "So... we would've been bombarded by Puyos and Tetriminos had the two dimensions merged?" I guessed. "Most likely. Many of us dealt with that sort of thing in the past, so it wouldn't have been the end of the world." Tee told me. "Oh-! Dave, you never dealt with Tetriminos before, have you?" Ex assumed. "Nope, but I'm guessing they're similar to Puyos, except they're hard." I shook my head. "I guess you can say that... I will admit that they're more dangerous than Puyos BECAUSE of the fact that they're hard and heavy. You'll be crushed to death by them if you aren't careful." He said.

I'm sure that it doesn't feel good to be crushed by a Tetrimino of all things... "With that being said though... How about we get a move on? We still have a search to expand, so that we can find that Yog." Satan suggested. "Yeah." The rest of us nodded. "Well, good luck, guys! You're gonna need it." Ecolo drooled. "Alright, see you." I looked at him briefly before walking away. The others followed me back to the ship as we entered. Soon, we left the farthest edge of spacetime to travel to Ringo's world. It took some time, but we arrived just fine. We decided that we would look around the wilderness surrounding Suzuran first. Most of us got out of the ship and separated into groups. Ex made the groups, since he was the one to bring us all here. I ended up being Ringo, Schezo, and Amitie. Ex had himself stick with Tee, Jay, Elle, and Ess. Ai opted to stay behind and look after the Tetra, for he was apparently still somewhat afraid of going out into Ringo's world. I didn't know what that was all about, but I didn't question it. And everyone else was in their own little groups. After the groups were formed, we all went to different areas to search.

Minutes upon minutes breezed by as we carefully looked at the snow-covered wilderness... but we didn't find anything out of the ordinary. More time passed as we continued to find absolutely nothing on our end. I decided to text Ex to see if his group found anything. In the end though, his group didn't find anything off either. And so, he texted me that he would head back to the ship and wait for everyone else. "... Ex hasn't found anything either… He said that he's gonna head back to the ship." I relayed to my group. "... This seems to have been a wasted effort." Schezo said. "Not exactly, this is just one bit of our search. We still have a lot of other places to explore; we're in it for the long haul here." I told him. "Tch. ... Well, there's not much I can do to get away from this now... I've already agreed to do this with you." He sighed. "Then let's go back to the ship to have a break, it's cold." Amitie shivered. "Already ahead of you there, Amitie." Ringo started walking back. We came back to the ship where Ex was waiting for us.

Yep... Ex doesn't really look happy. "Dave, I couldn't even find much of anything up in the air... It's okay though, we still have this whole world to look around. And... I've noticed that the school day is over. Did you look at the time?" He said before asking me. "N-no, I didn't, actually… Let's see... ... Woah, okay... It's a little past 3:15. ... Maaan, Feli and Lemres are gonna be wondering where me and Ringo are at." I checked, then sighed. As I said that, a portal opened up and out came Feli and Lemres. "F-Feli?! Lemres?!" I was the first to notice them appearing. "Comet Warlock?!" Schezo noticed almost immediately after me. "How did you guys find us?!" I came up to them. "Well... Satan actually got into contact with us about fifteen minutes ago. He didn't come to us, but he told us that you guys were out searchin' in this world for the escaped Yog. He figured that we could lend you guys an extra hand and brought us to wherever that ship stopped at with a portal." Lemres explained. "This is great! Everyone's pretty much with us for the search!" Ringo smiled. "This is amazing for us... When everyone returns, I'll state the next course of action." Ex smiled as well.

About forty minutes passed and everyone else returned, finding nothing. After reuniting, we all entered the Tetra once more. The others were surprised to see Lemres and Feli here with us, but they were happy as well. "Okay everyone… Since Feli and Lemres have joined us, here's what we'll do: Even though the school day is over, we'll keep searching around Ringo's world until it's late. Thankfully, the SS Tetra is capable of flying at great speeds. So getting from one landmass to another won't take that long. And there's a reason why we brought along Arle, Schezo, and Sig as well. They know this world a little more than most of us. So, where do you guys think we should go next? I have data for a digital map downloaded into the Tetra's systems thanks to Ai's hard work, so choose. Ringo, you can decide on this too since this is your world." Ex said to everyone before speaking to the four. So... Europe, Africa, Australia, Antarctica, and Asia actually all seem to be here in Ringo's world. But of course, no North or South America… So wait... What's THIS continent if it's not North America? Ringo never really told me what the name of it is...

While I was thinking, Sig suggested that we would look around places in Europe. "Hm... I'm not against the idea... It can also lead us to Asia, should we happen to not find anything in Europe. Do you guys agree with this?" Ringo nodded slowly before asking us. I don't think I have any objections to that choice… it seems like a good one to me. We all nodded to her question after she asked it. "Then it looks like it's settled; we'll head for Europe and search through its countries." She said. "Now the question is: Which European country will we go to first?" I presented everyone with. "... That's a good one… Any ideas, guys?" Ex asked around. "Perhaps we should start with… England." Schezo voted. "Why England? It's separated from the other countries, Schezo." I raised an eyebrow. "Heh. Come now, Dave, I thought you were smart enough to figure out the reasoning behind my choice." He smirked. "... … …! Oh… I get you. If the Yog wanted to hide here, then it most likely wanted to do so in a country like England. It's BECAUSE it's isolated from the rest of the continent. … Then again, it could've also hid itself away in any of the other European countries just as easily." I understood, then said. "Well… from what is known from their behavior, Yogs prefer to be in isolated places if at all possible. So, England COULD prove to be some place where it's currently residing." Satan told us. "Then we should get going then. We don't have all of the rest of the day that we have." Ex said.

With that, Ess immediately had the Tetra make its way over to England at fast speeds. I never got to go to England in my world before, so this should be neat; I used to always think about wanting to go there. Before long, we arrived in England and we landed in a remote area filled with snow. Most of us immediately got out to search. The ones who opted to stay in the ship were Ess, Ai, and O. I and everyone else who came out followed Ex a bit. "Okay, who here knows England's landmarks well?" He asked. "I roughly know some places here. Hm… … It looks like we're somewhere up north." Klug said and guessed. "... That would explain why it's even more chilly than back in Primp Town and Suzuran. Brrrgh! I'm going into my bulky armor." I said before engaging it. "Me too, it's very cold here…" Ex did the same. "So, where exactly do we start looking if this is where you assumed we currently are at?" Raffina turned to face Klug. "W-well… … Follow me." Klug walked on ahead. And so... we traversed through thick snow, as everyone aside from me and Ex fought off the cold.

We kept walking for some time before we stopped suddenly. "Oh, what the hell is this crap?" I complained. "... Damn, it looks like our path is blocked by an avalanche…" Klug sighed. "Yeah, a crazy amount of snow is in our way... How can we possibly get through this?" Feli wondered. "We can always just find a way around the titanic snow mound. This is just a minor annoyance to us at the most… nothing more, nothing less." Ex said. "Uh, I don't think that will be possible, Captain Ex... look to the right and left of us." Tee pointed out. "...!" Ex was nearly speechless. What...? What is this…?! All of us were now seeing what Tee was looking at and we were left unsure about what to do next. To our right was an insane number of trees, many of which were almost completely buried in snow. That probably came from the supposed avalanche that happened before we came. There was simply no way that we would've been able to navigate through that maze of trees properly.

On our left was a veeery steep hill, and many of us would not be able to stay up on it. The only people out of us that were able to bypass the areas directly left and right to us were me, Ex, and Satan, since we can fly on our own. Though, that wouldn't have done us any good to go past the snow mound by flying over it because we would be leaving everyone else behind. "Now what do we do? There's nowhere that we can go through to progress…" Ringo frowned. "Hold on, there might still be somethin' that we can try. Lemme see how solid that snow is..." Lemres said. He approached the snow mound and applied some pressure to it with his hand. "Uh... what are you doing, Lemres?" I asked. "Hmm... ... ... Dave, what I'm about to miiight be a little messy... but it'll be worth it." He felt the snow, then turned to me. "W-wait! Don't tell me you're gonna-!" Feli stopped herself. "It'll be fine, Feli... trust me." Lemres assured her. The rest of us waited to see what the comet warlock would do. He took a few steps back, ate a couple pieces of candy, then paused briefly. "... ... ... Jawbreaker Cannon!" Lemres suddenly fired.

We witnessed him launch a pretty big jawbreaker at the mound of snow. The jawbreaker itself had enough force to go through the whole thing and reach the other side. The rest of us were shocked at what Lemres just did. Shit, I'm surprised that the entire snow mound didn't collapse to an even worse state. That looks like a pretty clean hole, all things considered. "Are you mad?! That could have caused another avalanche to come down, and WE would have been buried in it!" Schezo yelled at him. "Hey, hey, hey... Look man, we were lucky that the snow there wasn't too soft. Had it been, THAT would've caused trouble for us." Lemres said to him. "Comet Warlock, it concerns me that even you would do something so idiotic and risky…" Schezo sighed. "Who cares about him doing something arguably stupid just now, Schezo? As long as he found a possible path for us to safely go through, then it was worth the risk." Rulue spoke in response.

Schezo stood silent for a few seconds after that, then said this: "Tch. So the end justifies the means, then? Very well... I just want to teach that Yog a thing or two, and if this means that we get closer to it by doing something like this... so be it. Intelligent decisions be damned in this case." He digressed. "Then let's go through the hole I just made, guys." Lemres began walking up to the hole. "It's like a mysterious tunnel of fun! *giggle*" Amitie ran inside like a little kid. "Geez, that's Amitie for you…" Ringo commented. "Yeah…" I nodded to her. The rest of us went through the hole and made it to the other side. "And that has been another great feat performed by the great Lemres!" Klug praised him. "Shucks… It wasn't THAT impressive, ya know." Lemres was flattered by the praise he received. "So, this means we can continue following you, right?" I faced Klug. "Yes. Now that there's nothing blocking our path, we can move forward!" He began to lead us once more.

After more time was spent walking, Klug stopped himself and us. "Ah, here we are... roughly, anyway." He said. "Uh... roughly?" Amitie questioned. "Well, I DID say that I roughly know some places here in England, Amitie." Klug reminded her. "O-oh yeah, how can I forget that bit already?" She laughed awkwardly. "So where are we exactly, Klug?" Raffina asked him. "If I'm correct, then… … *gasp* ...we're just outside the city of York, one of the oldest cities in all of England!" He came to realize. "York, huh? This will be interesting to see…" Ringo said. "As interesting as that would be, we're not here to sightsee." Ex told her. "I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't see smoke anywhere around us." Schezo bought up. "Hey, you're right, Schezo... I don't see any smoke here." Arle looked around. "That tells us either one of two things... One: The Yog is not anywhere near us. Or two: It hasn't placed a wicked seed down yet." Satan said.

One of those two things as possibilities... "... But how likely is the latter of the two to happen? I feel like the Yog would've already placed a wicked seed around its hiding area by now. It's been days since it attacked Ecolo and fled from the farthest edge of spacetime. ... I just don't think it's likely that it's just biding its own time. These things are up for creating chaos quickly, that seems to be how the first three Yogs did things. They didn't waste much time placing their wicked seeds... and I guess "wicked algae" in the case of the first one." Ex thought out loud. "Hmm... That does seem to be a trend with these Yogs. They don't really waste time before placing down a wicked seed." I crossed my arms. "Then we can only assume that the Yog is somewhere else in either other places in England, or in an entirely different country." Accord said. "Probably... *sigh* This is difficult… We'll definitely need multiple days to search around Ringo's world to possibly find the Yog by chance. Remember, we might not even find it anywhere in this world. The Yog could've just slipped back into a dimensional rift without any of us knowing, including Ecolo." Ex became somewhat frustrated.

All of us were at a bit of a loss here, not knowing where to take the search from here. "... It can't be helped, we have to end the search for today. These kids have to go back home… all of them." Accord frowned. "Then let's return to the ship before it gets too dark to see where we're going. Tomorrow, we'll continue this search together." Satan followed along with this. We all walked back to the Tetra just before the sky became pitch black. I looked at the time on my phone when we were about to go inside. It's almost six… "I'll take my leave for today; I need to head back to the Puyo Underworld." Satan told us. "Okay." A good number of us said. He left with a portal he made for himself, leaving us with one less person there. "Hey. Dave, Ringo… Since you two are the only ones out of all of us that live in this world, do you want me to send you back to Suzuran?" Ex came to us. "Yeah, that would be nice. It'll allow you to focus on bringing everyone else back to Primp." Ringo nodded. "Yes, it would. Anyway, here's a portal for you two. As for everyone else… Come with me into the Tetra, so that I may bring you all home." Ex made it before walking over to the others. "Let's go, Dave. Dinner can't wait forever now, can it?" Ringo grabbed my hand. "Nope, it certainly can't. I'm famished." I said. We jumped in that portal and appeared in front of our home not too long after. We had our stuff with us, so we had nothing to worry about forgetting.

As we came inside we were greeted by Ms. Ando. We updated Ms. Ando on what's been happening while eating. "So, you weren't able to find anything…" She frowned. "Yeah, it sucked... but we have to keep going with the search whenever all of us have the chance to be together." I sighed. "But once we do find that eyeball and defeat it, there's a good chance that Dave will turn back into a guy." Ringo added. "It's not guaranteed?" Serilly looked at her. "We still don't know for sure that Dave will turn back by defeating the Yog." Ringo told her. "... Dave, even though I think you look quite cute as a girl... I hope that you can change back into the boy I once met in the ocean." Serilly came up to me and held my hands with hers. "... Serilly... ... ... Don't worry, I'll make sure that I turn back into a guy. I'm already trying as hard as I can with the others to have that be the case." I paused before finishing my statement. "That's right. We won't quit until Dave's back to normal." Ringo nodded.

Me and Ringo finished eating and we bathed for a bit before relaxing at the couch with Serilly. Then, we went off to bed a couple of hours later. As I laid on my bed alone, I began to think about what could happen to me if I weren't going to change back into a guy. I thought about it for a while until I fell asleep. My thoughts had carried over to my dreamscape and because of that, I had a nightmare within my dream. This nightmare thrusted me into a hellish experience on a level that only my fears could create. Safe to say, it wasn't pretty and would make me remember it for a while after. What did this nightmare do to me though? Well… far more than what I could've possibly anticipated.

Author's Notes: The group started to travel around Ringo's world in search of the Yog that attacked Ecolo, and they hoped that they would find it. Unfortunately, they ended up not finding it on this first day and that forced them to stop the search until the next day. When Ringo and Dave came back home in Suzuran, they had Ms. Ando catch up on the most recent things happening. As Dave eventually went to bed for the night... he pondered on what could happen to him, should he end up not transforming back into a guy. While these thoughts were in his head, he fell asleep. Before he knew it, he was getting thrown into a hellish nightmare. What does this nightmare have in store for Dave? How will it affect him, mentally speaking? Next chapter, Chapter 73: Dave's Nightmarish Premonition.