Two days after being attacked by the con rit and leaving the aspidochelone, the Troop flew to a large crater where there were rock formations that look like large amounts of coral without water, a long stream rushing towards the ocean, and giant crystals.
"This place is beautiful," Kirby said, taking a few shots out the window.
"Want to take a closer look at it? Zeon asked.
"Sure," Jake said.
They landed the vehicle behind one of the coral-like rock formations and crept towards an opening.
"Ow!" Hayley cried.
"You okay?" Cadence asked as she turned around.
"I just hit my arm on the tip of one of these crystals," she said.
"The tips aren't even sharp," Kirby said from behind her.
"It hit me on where the con rit bit me," she said.
"Oh, okay fair enough," Jake said.
"Hey, what's that forest up there?" Hayley asked pointing towards a cliff with black spooky-looking trees, a murky thick mist, and dark clouds rolling around a mountain in the distance.
"Those are the darklands," Zeon said. "The entire area is like a warzone combined with a bunch of death traps."
"There are small fire geysers, thorned bushes, and even trees that can devour a daring monster."
"Once you walk into those treacherous lands, there's no way out."
"That's…quite a tale," Kirby said.
"While we're here; I'm going to take one of these crystals back as a souvenir," Jake said.
"I don't think that's a good idea," Zeon said.
"Well, I do." Jake said even though he knew he'd made a mistake like that once before.
He tried to break off one of the crystals, but they were too strong.
He pushed and pulled as hard as he can until the crystal broke off.
The other crystals around them began to shake like there was an earthquake.
They made a loud chiming sound, but they then slowly stopped.
"Well, that wasn't so bad," Jake said.
Just then, a bunch of roars came from a couple of caves around the crater.
A bunch of winged monsters came out, and they blasted fire into the air.
"Monster 351, Dragons," Zeon said. "This must be their homelands."
"But why didn't we see them out of those caves when we first came here?" Kirby asked.
"Dragons would go underground to mate and hibernate every eighty years," Zeon said.
"Looks like you gave them a wake-up call Jake," Cadence said.
"Let's just get out of here before they see us," Jake said. But when they turned around, there was another dragon standing there.
The dragon gave them a whack with its tail and threw them into the open.
The other dragons turned to see them and came towards them.
"What now?" Kirby asked. "I'm open to ideas."
"Could you just transform, Cadence?" Hayley asked.
"Even if I did, I would be no match for all of them," she said.
The dragons were about to attack, but another dragon roared from behind the others.
The dragons cleared out of the way to let the dragon through; it had longer spines running down its back, big eye-like patterns on its wings, and dark green stripes.
It stopped in front of the Troop.
"That must be the alpha dragon," Zeon said.
"Why did it tell the other dragons to stop?" Hayley asked.
Jake then looked closely into the dragon's eyes.
"It's Sam," he said.
"That's Sam," Hayley said.
"Who's Sam?" the others said at the same time.
"Sam was a baby dragon that my sister made friends with, who then rapidly grew and was released to the monster dimension," Jake said. "I'm surprised that he remembers us."
"Dragons do have strong intelligence, so therefore they have strong memories," Zeon said.
"But I don't remember Sam having those new looks," Hayley said.
"Because if a dragon wins in a battle for the alpha title with the previous alpha dragon, it will gain those characteristics," Zeon said.
Sam then rose up and shot out a blast of fire into the air.
The other dragons then left, but Sam nudged the Troop towards the caves.
"I think he wants us to go with them," Jake said.
"Sure, let's do it," Kirby said getting his camera ready.
They walked into the cave where they found a large tunnel that was leading down.
The tunnel almost looked like a large staircase.
"Did the dragons carve these?" Kirby asked.
"No, their intelligence isn't that strong," Zeon said. "Something else must've carved them."
They came to a large cavern with what looked like domes made of rock with windows and dragons flying around the place.
They saw big, furry monsters with bushy tails, horns, and big noses walking around the cavern.
"Monster 704, Trolls," Zeon said. "They were the ones who carved those stairs."
"But why are they down here with dragons?" Jake asked.
"Trolls live underground to avoid the sunlight because their bodies can't handle vitamin D so if they're in the sunlight, their bodies will calcify and turn to stone."
"The dragons are probably down here because of all the fine living spaces for hibernation," Zeon said.
"Hey!" A grunting voice shouted from behind them.
They turned to find a troll with bigger horns and holding a staff. "How did you humans enter down here?"
"We were let down here by this dragon," Kirby said shakily.
"Why would you let these humans down here, alpha?" the troll furiously asked Sam.
Sam gave a bunch of growls.
"So, they returned you home then?" the troll confirmed.
"You can understand what he's saying?" Cadence asked.
"Yes, you should understand him too, blood thrasher," the troll said.
"I never learned to speak monster," Cadence said.
"Hold on, grand troll," Zeon said. "These humans don't come here as threats; they come here as friends."
"Friend or foe, they are still trespassers in this world," The grand troll said. "And they must pay in a trial."
"I've got a bad feeling about this," Jake said.
Trolls gathered around a cage with the Troop inside while Cadence and Zeon we held back by a bunch of other trolls since they weren't humans.
The grand troll then came out to a stand.
"These humans have trespassed into our home without proper authorization and must therefore pay for this crime," the grand troll said.
"A crime just for being here and for being human," Jake said. "That's insane."
"Silence!" the grand troll shouted. "For your punishment, you will be scraping parasites off the dragons while they hibernate."
Moments later, the three of them were chained to a rock and busy scraping barnacle-like parasites of a dragon's wings.
The parasites were really stuck on the scales, and it took several minutes of scraping to get them off.
"I can't believe that I'm saying this, but this makes doing laundry much more fun," Jake said.
"I think this one blinked at me," Kirby said in disgust.
"Just keep it up guys," Zeon said walking in with Cadence. "Until we negotiate with the grand troll, you're going to have to get use to this."
One of the parasites then spat a thick, slushy, green goo at Jake's face.
"Can this get any worse?" Jake complained, spitting out the goo. Just then, a rumble came from above the ceiling.
The trolls and the dragons rushed out to the exit to see what was happening.
Cadence then formed her claws and broke the lock on the chains.
They came out of the cave to see that it was already nighttime. The dragons were fighting against a flock of giant monsters with the heads and wings of crows, a long tail, four arms, two legs, and pale skin.
"Those are Monster 011, Ornithodracons," Zeon said. "They live in the darklands, but they don't often attack unless they are commanded or forced too."
Just then, a black mist came out from the darklands and formed into these grewsome monsters with fanged faces, big bulging red eyes, sharp claws, black skin, spiky tails, and ragged clothes.
"Monster 761, Boogeymen," Zeon said.
"Why did you come here again?" the grand troll roared.
"You know why we came here," a boogeyman with long, thin spines on his head said with a cackling voice. "We've come to steal your crystals and possess their power,"
"Possess their power?" Jake asked.
"I see you have some human friends," the boogeyman said.
"We will stop you, like we always do," the grand troll said. "You will never get our crystals."
"We will this time since we made a deal with these ornithodracons," the boogeyman said. "Once we have your crystals, they will get a free lunch from your remains."
"Not going to happen," the grand troll said. "Attack!" The trolls and dragons charged.
"Attack!" Shouted the boogeyman. The rest of the boogeymen and ornithodracons charged too.
The dragons blasted fire at the enemy monsters while most of the boogeymen evaded the trolls by turning to mist.
"We better get out of here," Zeon said.
They ran back to the path they came from, but one of the boogeymen rose out of the ground like a ghost ready to attack.
"Going somewhere?" the boogeyman cackled.
"Say cheese," Zeon said, grabbing Kirby's camera.
The camera flashed, and the boogeyman suddenly disintegrated.
"What happened?" Hayley asked.
"The boogeyman's main weakness is light," Zeon said.
"So, let's stop the fight with light," Jake said.
"How?" they all said.
"Watch and learn," he said pulling out a flashlight. He ran towards one of the crystals.
"Hey, everyone," he shouted. "Let's party." He shined the flashlight into the crystal which caused rays of light to shine everywhere.
The boogeymen cried and yelled as they tried to escape, but not a single one of them made past the light show as they disintegrated.
The ornithodracons then retreated back into the darklands.
"Smart thinking, Jake," Kirby said.
"You saved us all," the grand troll came walking up to them. "We will forever honor you, and we hope that you can forgive us."
"Of course," Kirby said. "Let me just take a few photos, and we'll be on our way."
"Very well," the grand troll said.
Before Kirby pulled out his camera, he saw a dark figure with glowing red eyes standing on the edge of the darkland cliff; it then turned and vanished.
After half an hour of taking photos of the dragons, trolls, and their cavern homes, the Troop then flew off in their vehicle as the trolls, Sam, and the other dragons roared for them.
"That was pretty cool," Jake said. "Being honored by monsters."
"That was something that you don't see very often," Hayley agreed.
Please review. Next chapter coming next week.