The two walked down the dank hallway, unsure of what would come. Eerie whistling from the wind broke the silence here and there, other than that, things were very quiet.
"So uh... who's this Klonoa guy you were talking about?" the king asked, trying to start a conversation "A boyfriend or something?"
"Boyfriend?" Marie said " Yuck, that's gross. Klonoa's my brother!"
"Oh... sorry" he said, slightly embarassed "Anyway..."
"Shush!" Marie said, pressing herself against the wall "Quick, hide!"
The dumbfounded king did so, rather surprised at this sudden change of atmosphere. Marie gestered to be quiet, then peered over in the next corridor. She ducked back into the hallway, as a beam just cleared her shoulder.
"Awe, great" Marie said "Lemme handle this!"
She clenched her fist, forming a quivering ball of energy, that pulsed a blue light. the energy in her palm suddenly grew, and manifested itself into a sword. The same thing happened with her other hand, as she ran out into the room, dashing from side-to-side to avoid enemy fire. She jumped up in front of the enemy, another doppleganger of some sort, and slashed with both swords at blinding speed, then slashed several more times before it could get back up. She paused to see the thing turn into a puddle of dark goo and seep into the ground.
"Ya better run away!" she said, shaking her fist at the puddle " Okay, it's safe to come out now."
The king once again stared at her, wide-eyed in great disbelief, his jaw dropped slightly.
"What is it now?" Marie asked.
"You fight really well..." he said.
"And your point is?" Marie said.
"You're a kid, I didn't expect that out of a little girl." he said.
Marie started to steam about, ready to blow her top.
"WHY CAN'T KIDS BE FIGHTERS TOO?" she stormed onto him, as he withdrew.
"Oh... it's nothing" he said " Just uncommon, my apologies, miss..."
"Well... okay, I just get that a lot, but you didn't know that." she said, suddenly calming down "Just don't do it again..."
She frowned a bit, knowing she had a little problem with stereotypes, then again, it was stereotypes that ruined her life and caused a lot of pain. She despised people being judged by their age or species, or even gender for that matter, but she knew he didn't know better. Shrugging it off, she focused on the stone floor, staring down as she walked ahead.
Meanwhile, not too far off, her brother Klonoa engaged in the battle of his life. As nimble as he was on his feet, this mysterious fox person seemed to be stronger, faster, besting him in every aspect of combat. If Klonoa dodged to the right, he would see it coming, and counter with a brutal slam from his dark energy. Catching Klonoa off gaurd, he grabbed him by the wrist, and flung him into the wall. His body slid down slowly, not giving him anytime to react to another hit, another blow. Even so, Klonoa managed to get off the ground, and spat out some blood.
"What's your problem?" Klonoa asked "I did nothing to you."
"You have something I want!" he simply remarked.
"The ring?" Klonoa automatically thought, looking down to his hand.
"No, not that, baka!" he said "The orb!"
"Orb? What orb?" he asked.
"Don't play dumb with me, I know you have it!" he said, giving him a swift punch in the stomach. Klonoa's eyes dialated as he fell to the floor in pain.
"Hey! Stop that!" a familiar voice said, firing a blast of energy at the fox. The blast kicked up excessive ammounts of dust, clouding his sight as the girl ran to Klonoa. Quickly inspecting his wounds, she gave him a vial from her shawl telling him "Drink this potion, I'll take care of him."
"Oh, feeling confident, little girl?" he said, holding someone by the neck, Popka "You'll give me the orb, or your little friend will suffer!"
"Popka!" Klonoa yelled "Damn you!"
"Orb?" Marie said "You mean this?"
From her shawl, she produced a pendent with a bright red sphere, pulsing with energy. She gestered to it, thinking this is what he had in mind.
"That's it!" he said, advancing to Marie, but she stepped to the side, catching him off guard.
"First, drop him" she said, pointing to Popka. The king caught glimpse of the orb, and stared at in fixiation, but soon snapped back into reality.
"No! You can't give that to him!" he yelled, trying to runover, but he was too late. The exchange took place as she placed the pendent on the ground, the fox man tossed Popka to the side, and picked up the orb, greedily staring into it.
"Finnaly, the ultimate power is mine!" he said insanely "Time for all of you to die!"
He held out the pendent as it pulsed brightly, almost blinding everyone. Everything began to shake, then he disappeared.
"What? An earthquake?" Marie said, trying to keep balance, but suddenly losing energy. Darkness seemed to surround her, choking her as well as Klonoa, but the King and Popka were unaffected.
"He started the chaos!" Popka said to the king, nearly tripping from all the shaking.
"Yes, we must leave, those two won't last long here." he said, holding up his scepter, it glowwed brighter than ever, and transported them all to the gates of Joiliante, where they all witnessed a terrible sight. The earthquake shook the park to its foundation, causing the entire park to fall into disrepair, and sink into the ground.
"My Kingdom!" the king yelled, slamming his fist into the ground "He took my kingdom, he shall pay!"
Marie and Lolo sat by Klonoa, trying to wake him up. Mumbling, he heard those calls and woke up, feeling sore all over. He took a glance at Marie, and gasped.
"Hey, since when did you have wings?" he said.
"Ummmmmmmm a couple of hours ago" she paused "but this really isn't the time, what was that thing about the orb?"
She turned to the King of Joy, expecting an answer. He looked away, like as if he wanted to avoid it altogether.
"Spit it out already!" Popka yelled at him "We know you know something!"
"Well..." he paused "How to explain this... long ago, there was a parallel world to Lunatea, a mirror world. All positive energies in the universe vented out from Lunatea, and all negative energies, evil, greed, despair, vented from the dark world. The people of the dark world envied the people from Lunatea, and tried to steal and plunder the villages in Lunatea. At one point, there was a war between the two worlds, and Lunatea came out victorious..."
He looked down at the ground, not wanting to tell the rest.
"Continue!" Marie commanded.
"Well, prophecy has it that the dark world would one day get its revenge on Lunatea. They created an orb of destruction that unleashed the power of chaos, to destroy our world. We couldn't destroy the orb, so we transported it to the farest corner of the universe... ironically, you came across it..." he said.
"And now he has the power to destroy Lunatea..." Marie said, looking down.
"Not yet!" he said "It takes awhile to unlock its full potential, but the destruction of Lunatea can cause a huge chain reaction... and destroy a large fragment of the universe..."
"There must be a way to stop it!" Klonoa said.
"Actually, there might be a way, if anyone would know, it would be the Queen of Tranquility." he explained "She has done a lot of research on the orb."
"Where do we find her?" Marie asked.
Klonoa smacked her on the head saying, "In her kingdom of course, La La Kooska!"
"Well sorry I didn't know that!" she said, rubbing her head "I AM a little new here..."
"Nevermind!" the king said "You four must hurry! We don't have much time!"
"Awe, don't worry!" she said "Let's go!"
Lolo quickly returned to Klonoa's ring as the group hastely headed towards a giant tower towards the northeast.