"Where'd Pepperjack go?" Said Steve as he, Talia, Strickler and Nomura searched through the woods by Main Street.

But Talia had a feeling and hoped that she's wrong, "I think I know only one place where he might've gone. And I think he's going to get himself killed.

About Fifty feet ahead of them, Eli bounded through the trees, keeping NotEnrique in a headlock. The little Changeling squirmed and said, "Oi! If you don't lemme go, I swear-"

"Do not swear by the moon, for she changes constantly!" Eli quoted before flipping gracefully over a fallen log and sticking the landing.

Reaching the opposite end of the woods, Eli kicked on his Zip-Slippers. He skated down the Arcadia dry canal and wheeled to a suave stop in front of a concrete wall.

. . .

Talia, Steve, Strickler, and Nomura reached the canal in time to see Eli drag NotEnriqe's face in a straight line across the wall. Eli's glasses reflected with blue light as the line glowed. He quickly sketched two more lines with the Horngazel protruding from NotEnrique's lips, creating the rectangular outline of a human door. He paused to admire his work.

"Eli! Don't!" Talia shouted.

"I told you - call me Romeo!" Eli said.

The Horngazel doorway crumbled inward, and NotEnrique spat out the crystal key like a petulant baby. Over the grinding of the stones floating around the otherworldly tunnel, Nomura warned, "Don't go in kid! You have no idea of the monster waiting on the other side!"

"These violent delights have violent ends!" Eli quoted again before before blowing a kiss and diving headfirst into the swirling corridor with NotEnrique.

Hurrying down the angled canal wall, Talia, Strickler, Nomura, and Steve jumped into the tunnel after them. Remembering something, Steve stepped back out and retrieved the crystal key.

"Gross!" Said Steve, wiping NotEnrique's drool onto his pant leg.

Talia's arm reached out of the Horngazel tunnel and yanked Steve back inside before it closed completely.

"Dude. Did you just helped me from being dismembered by the portal?" Steve confused coming from such an act from the very girl that hates him.

"Don't get used to it," she said. "I'm just only doing my job to keep everyone -." She got a quick glance at the place at what once was a beautiful city filled with bright colorful lights now in ruins and overrun by Gumm-Gumm's. And the Heartstone; a giant crystal that glowed with a bright, warm, amber brilliant light now all cold and dark. "Oh, no. What have they done to this place?" All of this destruction. How could they have done something so horrible? As if losing Draal and Vendel weren't enough this would be it.

"Talia!" Strickler snapped her back in reality. "The race has not finished just yet. We need to find Eli and NotEnrinque."

"Right!" She agreed. "I'll go check the Hero's Forge. You guys on ahead." She morphed into her feral state and ran with swift speed.

. . .

Talia managed to slip into the arena undetected and spotted him in the center of the Hero's Forge. "Eli," she was about to get him. Talia looked up and spotted three familiar trolls above the stadium. She quickly hide hoped that they did not notice her. Thankfully their eyes were only focused on Eli. She saw Dictatious this six-eyed troll all blind and Usurna the wicked queen of the Krubera's, and. . .Gunmar sitting upon his new throne. He did not looked the same when she'd last saw him. The Skullcrusher was bigger and his veins were all gold. She wondered how or what could've turned him into this. Until she'd remembered the dying Heartstone outside in the city. He must've been leeching it's life force to make him stronger.

"Is one of you Gunmar?" Eli asked the three trolls.

"How dare you address our Dark Underlord?" Demanded Dictatious. "I'd throttle you myself. . . If I could see you."

"Another human, here in Trollmarket?" Said Queen Usurna in an insulted voice.

The Gumm-Gumm king silenced Dictatious and Usurna and announced, "I am he who you foolishly seek. I am Gunmar the Gold. Tell me your name, whelp, before I grind your organs into paste."

Talia raised an eyebrow unamused by his over inflated ego, 'New look and he gives himself a new mantra?'

"I am Romeo," said Eli, standing akimbo. "And the only thing turning to paste around here is you, Dumb-mar!"

Talia smirked by the sound of the insulting nickname,"Nice."

Gunmar's eye narrowed at the interloper before him. "You certainly have gronk-nuts, flesh-bag. I'll give you that"

Eli stopped mooning Gunmar long enough to say, "That's to all I'e got, sucka! Back on the surface, there's an entire army of Trolls itching for a fight!"

"Oh,no." Talia feeling in a dead-panned. What can she do to prevent him from giving away the trolls location? Without risking herself?

"Where? Tell me where the Trollhunter, his pet Silver Lion, and his rabble hide from my vengeance? Gunmar pounded his golden fist against his throne, breaking off a piece of it.

Desperate to silence Eli, Talia needed to act quick there was no time for thinking. Before she can jump into the arena, "I'll tell you where," right when Eli was about to give away their location. Talia's sensitive hearing caught a sound of a whistle and Eli stopped talking and acted all dizzy. Talia looked at the other side and saw Strickler in his changeling form, Nomura, NotEnrique, with an unconscious Steve. Realizing that was his handy work. Strickler had just saved the trolls.

But there was still Eli in danger, "I said 'Where are they?!" Gunmar roared demanding an answer from the small boy. Eli quivered as he slowly backed away. The Gumm-Gumm was growing impatient and jumped into the Hero's Forge.

"Oh, great," Talia sighed.

"Who?" Eli frightened by the Troll's appearance advancing towards him. Talia then had enough and made her move.

. . .

A gust of wind covered the arena with dust like a sandstorm blinding everyone around. Gunmar peeked his remaining over his arm before the wind died down and finds someone that he was not expecting. Talia Sturges standing before him between the frail boy. Even Usurna was surprised herself that the girl would show up in a time like this. Dictatious growing impatient with the silent treatment he demanded to know, "I can't see! What is happening? What was that breeze?!" Gunmar faces turns to an evil grin as he's ever so pleased to see one of his arch enemies revealing herself to him.

"Talia! What's happening? How did I get here?!" Said Eli.

"So, you've finally decided to come out from hiding? I was hopeing to find you and take that sweet delicious energy of yours," Gunmar vulgarly said licking his lips making her feel disgusted.

She shook off his negative vibes and said," Don't you think you've enough? Because judging by your sized you looked liked you gained a lot of weight."

Usurna and Dictatious jaws dropped dumbfounded and speechless, Strickler as well, but Nomura and NotEnrique. Nomura covered her mouth trying to hide her smile and keep herself from laughing. "Whoah, ho, oh. Burn!"

"And I didn't come here to fight I came to get my friend here and take him home, now if you don't mind we'll take our leave. Try to send your troops all you want, but you'll never catch me." She went over to Eli, grabbed his shoulder, and started pushing him towards the bridge crossing over the dark pit towards the exit.

Gunmar did not act and commanded his new army to seize the human children with a snap of a finger. He watched them taking a walk towards the bridge and stood there in disappointment, "Shame. I was expecting that you would take satisfaction of claiming vengeance all for yourself. After everything I've done taking everything you have ever loved." Talia did not listen to the Gumm-Gumm King's words of temptation and kept on moving forward. "It is no wonder that you're the last of your kind. Why there aren't any of you left." Then his face slowly turned into a malicious grin, "Like how your mother and father were killed."

Talia halted in her tracks hearing him mentioning her parents. Strickler, Nomura, and NotEnrique cringed fearing that he is getting under her skin and into her head. "No, kid. Don't listen! Just get out of there!" NotEnrique implored her.

She turned around and faced Gunmar with his arms crossed and sinisterly smile as he pulls out a tiny small object in his two big finger claws, "Look familiar?"

She used her feline instincts to sharpen her eyes to get a closer look at whatever is in the palm of his hands. It was a small, round, silver ring, with a pale blue diamond attached, but what really caught her eye was the engraving on the inside of it titled, Dandelion. That's when it hit her when she'd realized what it was and knew that was no piece of jewelry. Her face grew pale remembering it to be her late mother's wedding ring.

Gunmar admired the expression on upon her face he looked at the shiny ring, paced himself with one hand behind his back toying with it. "Bular, always did enjoy collecting the remains of his victims. I was informed during my time in the Janus Order of the tragic tale of the warrior Adam Sturges and his beloved with Beatrice. How he carelessly brought his family out in open. Leaving himself invulnerable choking on Grave-sand, letting his wife die by the hands of my son, and leaving you all alone an orphan. But he's not the only one to fail his loved one's isn't he?" Talia clenched her fists shaking in rage. "Putting your guardian in danger, risking the lives of those children in the Darklands, leaving Skarlagk to die by my hands, your friend you call Draal now one of my pawns, and Vendel. You didn't even warn him in time." He cruelly laughed. Talia grasped clenching her head trying to keep her emotions under control, but the pressure was too much. She recalled watching Bular kill her parents surrounded by the fire. Talia tried to shake it off. She remembered seeing Skarlagk making her last stand sacrificing herself to let her and Jim escape. And Vendel. . . Giving them his final words helping them reveal the enemy traitor, Usurna, before he was killed. The Silver Lion's aura burned bright like an uncontrollable flame, fur grew from her skin, her nails and teeth turned into claws and fangs, her eyes turned ice-cold blue, her round ears turned into lion shaped ears, and tail grew from her spine. Her breaking heart had finally snapped, the grieving lion came charging into the arena with a battle cry.