/When we last left our heroes, they had traveled to the home of the Great Sage Crest, Balance Valley. There they learned more about the talismans they would have to find to restore the powers of a goddess. They also learned that several of Griffon's most trusted demons each had a talisman and had blocked away all contact from the region they ruled over. Then, Gaspard attacked and released an army of monsters. The battle continues.../
Chapter 7:
The Time Spirit Coronya!
Several hundreds of monsters charged towards Cain all at the same time. His fists glowed black and his face had a confident smile. "Ya wanna make some fun?" The monsters all surrounded him. "You got it! HAH!!!" Cain knocked out every one of the monsters that tried to attack, him one by one.
Monica soon dealt with a giant armored monster the wielded a huge sword. He used her own sword to block its slashes and thrusts. Just when she was near the edge, she flipped over its head and swung her sword at it, slicing its head off. The body fell limp and dropped over the edge down the endless fall. Before she could take a breather, several different Gemrons flew towards her shooting fire, ice, and thunder at her. She dove out of the way and used her wind magic to blow them towards Max. "Head's up, Max!"
Max heard her, and saw the Gemrons fly at him. He used his gun to shoot them down and crush them with his hammer. A trio of Yo-Yo Barrels rolled towards him at great speed. He got the Ridepod Steve ready for combat. "Let's go Steve!"
"I'm gonna get these guys!" Steve's voice box roared out as it fired several blasts at the enemy Ridepods. Steve rushed ahead and grabbed another Ridepod and swung it around. He let go and sent it flying at a golem. The Ridepod simply bounced off the golem's body, but it hit with enough force to knock it off the edge. "Get the lead out!" Steve switched to his samurai swords and sliced every monster that was unfortunate enough to get near.
Cain continued taking on the monsters, until he was able to get through them and head towards the ship. "Ladies and gentlemen... Cain had arrived!!!" With one giant leap, he jumped over the gap that separated the airship and the platforms and boarded the deck. He spin kicked and punched his way through a crowd of monsters and made it to Gaspard. "You're dead!!!" He threw a punch at the unflinching Gaspard, but a sword blocked his fist. "Huh?" He looked and saw that it was Natsumi's sword that stopped his attack. She had a stern face as she drew back her weapon.
"Leave this one to me, Gaspard..." She said calmly. "This man I can kill with no trouble."
"This ain't cause I saw ya in your tight... tight panties, is it?" Cain asked with a smile.
Natsumi blushed, but was angry. "This is business!"
"Glad it is... cause back then, it was pleasure..." Cain said suavely as he remembered seeing her in her underwear. "It was pleasure..."
"Grrrrrr..." Natsumi growled.
"Do want you wish with him." Gaspard said as he walked away. "We're not getting paid to kill him." He walked back into the captain's room.
Cain and Natsumi stood there, staring each other down. "Why don't you start, sexy lady..." Cain said.
"You'll call me Natsumi!" She shouted as she hit Cain in the face, knocking him down to the ground. "Not so smug now, are you?"
"Oh...baby..." Cain got up and wiped the blood off his mouth. "Thank you ma'am! May I have another, ma'am?" Natsumi growled again as she kicked him in the stomach. "Ohhh... that hurts good... and I didn't even have to pay..." Natsumi became frustrated and began kicked him repeatedly. "More! More!"
"You bastard! Take this fight seriously!" She screamed in anger.
Cain got up and smiled. "You should too. Your hits aren't even hurting me. In fact... they feel kinda good..."
Natsumi pulled out her sword and swung it at his face, cutting his cheek. "Now what do you say?!"
"You're VERY sexy in pink my dear..." Cain winked at her.
Natsumi was flushed and furious. "HOW DARE YOU!!!" She swung her sword wildly while Cain kept dodging.
"HAH!!!" Monica shouted as she slashes the chest of an attacking Priest of Rama. She then did an impressive back flip and dove her sword into the abdomen of a Spider Lady. Max, meanwhile, had changed his weapon from a hammer to a wrench. A knife wielding Smiling Fairy tried to stab his knife at Max, but the blade got caught in the vice of the wrench. Max smiled as he tightened the vice and pulled away the enemy's knife. With one powerful smash, the monster was destroyed.
Crest was standing in front of the Moon Crystal with the Talisman and cane in hand. She bashed enemies away with her cane, but was soon overcome and had the Talisman snatched away from her by a Skeleton Soldier. He held it up in victory, until a flying fireball hit him in the hand and burned it away. He screamed as the Talisman fell from the highest platform to the lowest bridge, where Max was fighting.
"Max!" Crest shouted as loud as she could, despite her hoarse voice. "The Talisman! Get the Talisman!"
Max heard her and saw the object Crest was yelling about. He smashed and shot his way through a crowd of monsters until he reached it. In one last-ditch effort, a charging ram knocked both Max and himself off the bridge. Max's foot hit the Talisman and it fell as well. Max yelled as he began falling into the long abyss that was the canyon.
Monica heard his voice and turned towards the cliff he fell off of. "MAX!!!" She screamed before a hard hit in the head by an Ivanoff knocked her to the ground.
Cain and Natsumi's fight was still going on. She was growing tired from swing her sword around, but Cain, who did nothing but dodge, was still well energized. Cain noticed this and grew even more arrogant.
"What's the matter, baby?" He said smugly. "We haven't even gotten to the fun stuff and you're already beat."
"You... bas..." She breathed out before making another struggled slash of her sword. Cain was able to dodge this and quickly ran behind her. She yelped when she felt both of Cain's hands squeezed her behind tightly.
"Nice and firm..." Cain admired. "You could bounce a gilda coin off this ass!"
"Oh...no...he..." Natsumi turned around angrily and held her sword over her head. "DIDN'T!!!" She brought the sword down at Cain, but he grabbed the blade with his hand and held it away from him.
"All ya needed was a jump start." Cain smiled. "Besides...you enjoyed that... didn't ya?"
Natsumi gritted her teeth and was about to strike again, when a flash of blue light brightened the skies. She turned towards it. "What the hell is this?!"
Max, who fortunately had caught the falling Talisman, had a tight grip on the glowing blue light that appeared in his hand.
"What's happening to the Talisman?" Max wondered, nearly forgetting he was free falling. Suddenly, a heavy whoosh of air lifted him higher up and gently set him back down on the platform. "How did I?" His thoughts were interrupted when someone called his name.
"Max!" Monica ran to him and helped him up. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah..." He suddenly felt the Talisman jerk out of his hand and float towards the sky. "Monica... look..." A bright light shone out of it as it spun in the air.
"What is that??" Monica said just before a bright, blinding blue light.
The sight of the light caused every monster near to scream in horror. Most tried to escape the valley while others fell into the endless chasm. Soon, the entire valley was rid of all the monsters.
The light's shine slowly faded and a small blue flicker was left. It flew around the area while Max and Monica watched.
"It's the power that the Talisman has sealed." Crest said to them while approaching.
"You mean Max released it?" Monica asked with a smile.
Crest nodded. "Now it will help rid the area of any and all monsters..."
Cain and Natsumi were continuing their battle, until the blue flicker crashed into Cain and knocked him down.
"Hey!" He shouted at it until the light wrapped around his leg and lifted him off the ship. "The hell is this?!" Cain floated back to the platforms of Balance Valley. "LEMME GO!!!" The light loosened its grip and dropped him on his head. "Ow!"
Gaspard watched from the deck as his monster army retreated. "Gah! Worthless!" He then shouted towards the control room. "Take us back to Elysiun!"
The Death Ark made a wide turn in the other direction and, with a blast from the engines, flew full-speed away from the valley.
"Wait up!" Cain lifted his arm and formed a large ball of energy over his head. "Here's a little parting gift! AHH!!!" He threw the ball towards the ship, but it slowly faded away since it was too far away already. "Damn!" He started to walk away, when his face crashed into the blue shimmer. "Huh?" He swatted it away. "Anyone wanna tell me what the hell this is?"
"That came from the Talisman." Max said while pointing at the light.
Cain looks at it with confusion. "This little speck made a battalion of monsters piss themselves and run away?
"Sure did!" A little voice came from the shimmer, causing Cain to fall back in shock.
"It spoke?!" He shouted at it.
"Well of course I can... wait a minute, please..." The little flick began to sparkle until it slowly vanished.
"Where'd it go?" Monica asked.
"Dunno..." Cain got up, but then a suddenly pop knocked him back down.
With a pop and a blast of blue smoke, the three heroes were in the presence of an unusual creature, a flying blue fox. The critter was only a foot tall and was covered in blue fur. She wore a long white dress and had a gold crowd onto her head. She even held a little star wand like a pixie. She cutely twitched her black fox nose and smiled. "Hi!"
"Uh..." Max and Monica were speechless.
The fox wiggled her blue ears. "Are you two the ones chosen by the Atlamillias?" Again, Max and Monica couldn't say anything. "Hmm?"
"Yes they are..." Sage Crest walked over slowly. "And you must be the Time Goddess's servant, yes?"
"Yep!" The blue fox fairy did a flip in the air while giggling. "I'm Coronya! The Doorman... uh... Woman... uh Fox! Doorfox to the Gates of Time!"
"Gates of Time!?" Cain jumped to his feet. "How's a little runt like you know about opening Time Gates?!"
"Sorry..." Coronya disappeared and reappeared on Cain's head. "But that's a secret..."
Cain got annoyed. "God, help ya if you ain't toilet trained..." He tried to swat the fox away, but she flew away in time in front of his face. She stuck her tongue out at him. "Why you..." Cain tired to grab her, but she flew over his head and kicked him in the back. "Ouch!" He quickly turned around but she was gone. She reappeared behind him and bashed his head with her wand.
Coronya giggled. "This guy is fun!" She continued to hit his head until Monica spoke up.
"Uh... Coronya."
"Hmm?" She floated from Cain and flew in front of Monica's face. "Yes?"
"Are you really a Time Spirit?"
"Uh-huh!" Coronya nodded her head.
"Then you can help us travel back and forth and time?" Max asked.
Coronya giggled again. "Silly! I can't do it all the time!"
"You can't?" Max replied.
"Nope. You gotta say please!" She smiled.
"Oh!" Monica smiled. "Could you please help us?"
"Sure!" Coronya flew all around the area. "I wanna help my Goddess friend get her powers back! Let's kick up the bad guy's booty!"
"You sure about that, furball?" Cain asked. "It's Griffon..."
Coronya stopped for a second and scratched her chin. "Then..." She starting flying around again. "Let's kick up Griffon's booty! Yay!!!"
Gaspard and Natsumi both found themselves in the chambers of Griffon's Castle. Griffon, still in the form of Rota, stood before them with great anger.
"You have failed me yet again, Gaspard!" He shouted to the two of them. Gaspard took a step back in fear, while Natsumi stood her ground fearlessly.
"Listen, my lord.": Gaspard explained. "It was those bastard monsters! There couldn't handle it and just ran..."
"No excuses!" Rota slammed his fist down the armrest of the throne he sat on. "I warned you what would happen... now!" Rota's hand started glow black. Gaspard prepared for the worst, while Natsumi stood forth.
"Listen, Rota." She spoke in a calm voice. "Understand that we were up against more than we bargained for. That fossil Crest gave them the Talisman, and they had the help of a Dark Priest. We couldn't help but fail. Now, the two Chosen are no trouble, but now that they have the Time Spirit with them, they can freely go back and forth in time. Now the way I work depends on how much I get paid..." Rota was curious about what she was saying. "I only used a third of my skills. Perhaps if you gave me a more respectable profit..."
"How dare you demand more money from Lord Griffon!" Gaspard shouted at her.
"Quiet Gaspard!" Rota looked at her. "What did you have in mind?"
She smiled wickedly. "I mean I can get you an army of mercenaries, assassins, and spies. I can bring my most powerful weapons of destruction. All for a small increase in my salary. Plus, I can do away with that Dark Priest for free. All I need is a total of 500,000,000 Gilda..."
"Extortion!" Gaspard shouted.
"Silence! Is this what it will cost to kill them?" Rota asked.
"It will be worth it. I'll even hunt for the Talismans that they didn't find yet."
"Agreed..." Rota got up and extended her hand towards her. "Let's shake on it to make it official."
"I knew you'd see it my way..." She shook his hand, not noticing the evil smile that had crossed his lips.
"We're going on a airship!" Coronya sang as she playfully nuzzled Cain's neck. "We're going on a..."
"Knock it off!" Cain shouted at her. "This is no time to be so freakin' happy! This is serious!" Cain quickly ran up the gangplank of the Transportation Air Ship. "Bring on the wine, Moogles!!!"
Max and Monica both groaned at the same time. "Ohhh... nooo..."
As they made their way up the plank, Max pulled out the Talisman they received and thought to himself. "One down... 11 to go..."
/Max and Monica have freed the Time Spirit Coronya and are now heading back to Palm Brinks to begin their adventure. But with the Mercenary Natsumi after them, it won't be an easy quest. And what other uncharted dangers await them? Only time will tell.../
START TEASER:
Max: The first Talisman is found! Now we're heading back to the Palm Brinks of my time and gonna fix the Black Ore Railroad and Train. Our next stop, the mysterious wooded land known as Selceta Forest.
Cain: It's filled with ghosts!
Max: But that's not all... when we run into a dangerous thief and his pet wolf, more than our lives will be on the line.
Cain: Hey! That crook stole our Talisman!
Max: See? Next Chapter...
The Forest of Ghosts
Cain: Happy Halloween!
Max: That's not for another mouth...
Cain: Yeah, odds are the chap won't be done 'til winter...
NOTE: Chapter WILL be done before winter.