Sorry I took so long with this chapter. I didn't like the way it was going at first so I kinda froze up, debating on whether to scrap it or try to adapt it. One of the Ninji in this chapter was a parody of Ninja the YouTuber but I couldn't find a way to make that work. Urrgh anyway it's done now so lets hope it does well.
Soaring ever higher, Mario sprang from tree to tree. His feet tapped each tree before bouncing off with his patented Wall Jump technique. He danced around, not even bothering to land on the branches until he reached the top of a tree. Mario gazed down, and beneath him were his two new comrades, going through the wooded hills and collecting Power Moons. They had collected 8 between the two of them, and Mario himself had 7. They would have a steady power supply in no time.
Enough about that though. Mario had to focus on his current objective. He stared up at the tallest tree, with two Power Moons floating right above. The tree was too high to wall jump up, and he didn't want to exert too much of his power leaping up directly. What could he do?
The plumber walked around the top of his tree looking for options, feeling the crinkle of the leaves under his boots. He saw a tree next to him going up slightly higher, with vines hanging off the tallest branch. Mario knew what he had to do and leapt into the vine. The speed of his leap shot the vine back that way with Mario on it. Keeping his momentum, he swung around the tree until he found the perfect angle.
SWISH!
Mario let go of the surprisingly sturdy vine, flying above the tallest tree. Just like he predicted, he landed right on the top. He collected the two moons and leaped down the tree, landing perfectly on his feet next to Goombarry and Kooplin.
"Nice landing." Goombarry said.
"Yes, we all see that." said Kooplin sarcastically.
"You wanna go?"
"Now now," Mario quickly said. "Let's not get all tangled up fighting each other. We have quite the journey ahead of us, and you're going to have to learn how to work together."
"Ok, fine." Goombarry said begrudgingly.
"You got it." Kooplin said with much more positivity.
"Now, what do you two have to say to each other?"
"S-Sorry," said Goombarry through gritted teeth.
"I forgive you." Kooplin said, smirking.
"You too, Kooplin."
"Ok, I'm sorry too. Wanna have a hug?" Kooplin said mockingly.
"No!" Goombarry yelled, though he didn't react any further. Mario figured this was as close as he could get to forgiveness between the two of them right now. The plumber had had to deal with rowdy teammates before. When he went on his quest in Rogueport he had to calm Turbo down near-constantly. Every time Goombella made an academic observation or said something in a way Turbo didn't understand he got frustrated.
Actually, speaking of Goombella, she would be a great ally to help on this quest. Her expert research skills would come in handy for gauging opponents and figuring out the areas. She would definitely be a vital ally to have right away.
"Alright, so now that that's done, I got 2 more Moons."
"We found 3, that means we got 20 in total. I think that means we're close to setting off." Goombarry said excitedly.
"For the record, I found all three." Kooplin said. Goombarry, for once, didn't respond by yelling or getting annoyed.
Suddenly, Mario heard the swish of a projectile whizzing behind him. He sidestepped to the right, dodging it before even looking. As it flew by him, he saw it was a black-and-white shuriken, which stuck into a tree several meters away.
"What was that?" Goombarry asked, only to get struck by another shuriken. "Okay, who's asking for a beating now?" The Goomba looked around haphazardly as he focused his energy.
"Ninji!" Kooplin said as he got on guard, surveying the area for any more attacks thrown around. "I can't believe I forgot the Ninji tribes here." Three more shuriken were thrown at Kooplin from behind cover, but he deftly dodged all three. Goombarry blasted a few away, sending them careening into some trees. A few Ninji dropped out of the trees, struck by a combination of Goombarry's energy and their own ninja stars.
The trio ran for cover as more shuriken rained through, stopping a few dozen meters away to see if they could find where the Ninji were.
Mario looked around him, there were trees and plants in many directions, all in darker shades, a hill and a spring nearby, a cutout of a bush, a log of a fallen tree.
Wait, cutout of a bush?
"Hmm, I wonder where any Ninji could be." Mario said teasingly as he walked toward the obvious cutout. "For all I know, these guys could be anywhere."
"Yeah, these guys are so skilled at stealth, I can't imagine ever finding them." Kooplin said, his voice dripping with even more sarcasm than usual.
"Guys, what are you talking about? There's obviously one right there?"
Mario and Kooplin sighed as the Ninji quickly sped out of its cover. Mario wondered how those stubby little legs could run so fast, but no matter. Another volley of shuriken sped out from the trees. The trio ran through more bushes and around more trees. Mario picked up another Power Moon on the way, kicking away two Ninji that were guarding it. Then he somersaulted over another barrage of attacks.
Eventually, the crew came across an old gray building, standing on a layer of concrete. It was three stories tall, made of metal and covered in vines. The windows were broken, the paint was chipped, and it looked like no one had been there in years. Ninji were all over it, standing guard on the roof but also clinging to the walls and peeking out the window holes. It was very strange, why would there be this industrial-looking building smack-dab in the middle of the forest? The Ninji certainly didn't seem able to build something like this. They must have ransacked it.
"We're not gonna lose 'em easily." Kooplin said, bringing Mario back into the fight.
"Well then, enough running." Mario said, slowing to a stop. Kooplin and Goombarry quickly stopped as well. "These guys may know Ninjitsu, but we're about to… win-jitsu." Goombarry and Kooplin glared at Mario.
"Yeah, that was a pretty bad one." Mario admitted, scratching his head at his horrible pun.
Several shuriken launched toward the plumber, which he flipped out of the way of. Another, much larger shuriken whizzed at Kooplin, but he sidestepped easily. The shuriken then unfolded to become a Ninji itself.
Oh, I forgot they could do that.
Kooplin punched the Ninji away before dodging another Ninji swinging from a vine. Goombarry launched waves of red energy through the trees, tumbling some trees down and sending the enemies out. Dodging another projectile, Mario instinctually prepared a fireball before quickly dispelling it. He didn't want to burn the whole forest down after all. Some more Ninji began to swing toward him on vines, seemingly out of projectiles to throw. A few of them had katanas, which they swung with reckless abandon.
Swinging down from the vines, the Ninji clan continued assaulting the party, who narrowly avoided getting cut by the blades. As the plumber dodged another Ninji, he noticed it accidentally cut a vine another one was using with its katana. The other Ninji fell onto the ground, with Kooplin swiftly kicking out down. That gave Mario an idea. He took out a Boomerang Flower, absorbing it to become Boomerang Mario. Now with boomerangs in hand, he unleashed a barrage of them all over the vines, cutting them all up and sending his foes tumbling to the ground. Normally one could only throw one boomerang at a time with this powerup, but the plumber had trained himself to throw many of them at once, seemingly from nowhere. Goombarry and Kooplin seemed shocked by the storm of boomerangs slashing at the vines.
"Now, guys!" The trio went on the offensive, defeating most of the Ninji before they could recover from being knocked to the ground. The rest of them quickly scurried toward the building as Mario shifted back into normal form.
"Alright, they've retreated back." said Kooplin, dusting off his hands. "I'm surprised the clan sent that many guys after us."
"Maybe this is their base." Goombarry said, motioning toward the dilapidated building.
"Maybe," Mario said, "but…" The plumber noticed something on the building. Even with a vine obstructing it and some of the paint chipped off, the plumber noticed a familiar logo; a basic red Mushroom with three golden rings surrounding it, each ring enclosing another.
"Zenith Industries!" Mario exclaimed.
"The power-up company? What are they doing here?" Kooplin asked.
"I don't know, but these Ninji must have ransacked the place. We gotta see if there's anything still left." said Mario.
"Hey, don't we have kickin' Vel'Zar's butt to do? We can't let those nerds waste our time!" Goombarry said.
"Look bud," Mario said. "In all of my adventures, exploring old buildings seemingly out-of-the-way has never let me down." Goombarry and Kooplin looked quizzically at him. "I have a hunch there's something useful about this building, maybe even some way we could help Zenith."
"I don't care about any of them." Goombarry said, rolling his eyes. "We just need to get more Moons and get outta here!"
"Goombarry, please." Mario said, looking down earnestly at the Goomba. "I can just tell something good is in there. Call it Hero's Intuition."
"50 Coins says there isn't."
"I have hundreds of thousands of coins with me right now, how many do you have?"
"Uh… 35?"
"Yeah I'm not gonna run you dry for this."
"Sounds to me like you're scared." Goombarry said as Mario sighed.
"Yes, yes, you're both very smart." Kooplin said. Mario chuckled at this, but Goombarry grunted and bared his teeth. "But we better decide quickly. Those Ninji are preparing another attack."
"I can take another round of 'em any day." Goombarry said confidently. If he had fingers, he'd probably point his thumb to himself.
"Then it should be easy to infiltrate the building." Mario said. "Unless you're the one who is scared." Goombarry was about to respond, but held back his words. He was caught by his own words and wouldn't back out of a challenge now that it would make him look weak.
"Al-alright fine, I'll go." he said grumpily.
"Also Kooplin?" Mario asked.
"Yeah."
"I figure you deserve to know what it's like to roll and plow into enemies like other Koopas, and I've got just the power-up for the job." The hero took out a Rock Mushroom from his inventory. "I got this baby from another galaxy." Mario said. "I gave samples to Zenith so they could replicate it, but so far this is one of the few on the planet." His allies' eyes widened. "If you use it, you can turn into a living boulder and roll over all your enemies."
"Wow, that's amazing!"
"Wait, how come I don't get one?" Goombarry asked.
"Because you don't need one, do you?" Mario responded.
"No, no, I can do this myself."
"Then let's do this!" Mario said, handing the Rock Mushroom to Kooplin, who immediately transformed. There was no obvious difference in looks, but Mario could tell it worked. Pumping his fist up as the Ninji began to regroup, Mario stanced himself for battle. The Ninji began forming a blockade around the entrance, holding up any metal they could find in front of them. A few had katanas. Both sides held firm as they waited for the other side to make a move.
Surprisingly, Kooplin was the first to strike. He must have been really excited to try the new power-up out. He summoned a rocky sphere surrounding his body, yelling almost like Goombarry as he launched toward the Ninji blockade. The Ninji were knocked down like bowling pins as Kooplin quickly came to a stop right before the wall.
"Wow," Kooplin said, amazed. "That, felt so right!"
"I'm impressed." Mario said. "I didn't have nearly that much control when I first used that mushroom." He remembered the many times he had failed to stop his roll on time and careened into a wall. Perhaps his Koopa instincts made this more natural.
"Mario, enough focusing on him. We gotta engage too." Goombarry said, motioning up to some Ninji in the windows who were getting red Bill Blasters.
"Right." Mario said as he charged in alongside the Goomba. The Ninji began firing Missile Bills at the duo, while others clinging on the walls threw shurikens. Goombarry blasted a few with his energy, while Mario jumped onto a Missile Bill, guiding his course so that he landed on another. It wasn't hard, as the Missile Bills followed him, and he could bounce off of nearly any enemy. The plumber landed on the roof, kicking a Ninji with a pow and knocking it off. A few of them threw their stars at him, but the plumber did a spinning backflip, dodging all the projectiles. A few Ninji were hit by each other's shuriken.
The plumber heard bowling pin sounds in the distance as he landed a punch on a Ninji that approached him. He evaded another kick attack, quickly grabbing the attacker and throwing it into the others. Other Ninji came up onto the roof, but the hero was ready. Like a blur, he stormed through the reinforcements. Each strike was true, each blow decisive. No Ninji came close to landing a blow. One moment, they were fighting. The next, they weren't.
Mario advanced into the building, riding on the rails of a stairwell as he slid down and kicked every Ninji in his way. Now on the first floor, he noticed the walls were white, like a doctor's office, but he could scarcely tell in some places as the paint was chipped. The floor was in a better state, made of alternating white and red marble. Tattered patches of carpet adorned the floors, and Scaredy Rats scurried around. One of them shot toward Mario at the trademark Scaredy Rat speed, but it got it with a quick backhand, his fist meeting no resistance as it obliterated the rat.
The plumber raced through a doorway, staggering back as a rock rolled right toward him from the right. He braced for impact, but the rock dissipated inches from his face, replaced with an excited Kooplin.
"You reacted fast Kooplin. Good job." Mario said.
"Thanks, and I gotta say, this powerup is awesome!" Kooplin responded. Mario was surprised he didn't come up with a sarcastic response like "Wow I didn't notice." Turning around, the duo saw a Ninji fly into a wall, blasted by Goombarry's energy. Goombarry himself appeared afterward, pulsating with power.
"Guys, I found a restricted room, and I don't think those dorks got in."
The trio looked at the large metal door. It was mostly undamaged, though it had a few scratches from the Ninjis' shuriken. In big red letters, it read "Restricted Access". Next to the door was a standard black keycard slot with a red light. Mario looked at the others.
"I think we need to break in." Mario said.
"How?" Kooplin said. "That door looks as thick as the bark of an ironwood tree."
"Well I got this." Goombarry said, holding up a blue keycard with a red edge and a mushroom symbol. "Maybe this could open the door."
"Goombarry, where did you find that?" Mario asked, surprised that the Goomba would stop and look for things like that.
"One of those Ninji losers threw it at me. They must have thought it was a ninja star."
"Hmm, well let's put it in and see." Mario said.
Goombarry somehow swiped the keycard despite his lack of arms. The red light on the sensor turned to green, and with a push, the door opened. Inside was a lab about the size of a school classroom. The walls were dark grey and metallic, a few tables stood, with some empty vials and clipboards. A desk sat at the far-right corner of the room, with a stack of folders assembled. A few shelves on the walls contained lab equipment, and one near the desk held a bunch of power-ups.
"Alright guys, let's start searching."
"For what?" Goombarry asked.
"For anything the company may have lost here."
"I'm not exactly a searcher." Goombarry said.
"Well, you're going to be." said Kooplin.
The trio began scavenging around, opening drawers and looking through binders. Goombarry roughly tossed stuff out, while Kooplin and Mario were a lot more careful.
"Hey, Mario." Kooplin said. "I found something weird."
"Yeah?"
"This chart says it investigates the effect of a Fire Flower power-up on health and power over three years." That couldn't be right. Fire Flowers only lasted a maximum of about 2 hours.
"You must have read it wrong. Let me see." Kooplin showed him the chart, and sure enough, the effect was measured over years, and they put "continuous usage" on the other info section. That must have meant that one Fire Flower lasted at least three years without a break. Had they found a way to increase the duration to that extent? That seemed impossible to him.
"So, what's the part I read wrong?" Kooplin said sarcastically. "Was it the year part or the Fire Flower part or the Tanooki Leaf part… wait what?" Kooplin did a double take after noticing that. Mario rechecked and saw another part of the graph, saying "Fire Flower + Tanooki Leaf".
"What in the world?" Goombarry said, coming up to the duo. "Did they… combine powerups?"
"I have seen that before," Mario said, thinking about Tayce T. and her combining items with her masterful cooking. "but I didn't think it was possible to combine those, or to make them last that long."
"I'm surprised they could do that at all," Goombarry said.
The trio continued searching through the room, finding more powerup combinations and looking through their data. Goombarry swiped a few Super 'Shrooms and denied it. Mario would have given him a disapproving look, but given how many times he'd taken healing items from random places, he didn't have high ground to stand on.
"Hey guys, I think I found something." Kooplin said, taking a sheet of paper out of the desk. Mario and Goombarry quickly came up to look. It was yellow and scrawled in barely legible handwriting. On the top right it read "Chief Researcher Ulysses Reeka". This must have been his desk. On the paper was what seemed to be his personal notes. For a second, Mario felt bad for looking through this, but his curious adventure side won out.
A lot of the paper was just research notes, but there were a few other things Mario noticed. One of the notes read "Get Mason's daughter". Mario didn't know any Masons or their daughters and he didn't know what 'get' meant here. Right below that read "Remove side effects" presumably meaning either to fix them or remove them from the list as they were already fixed. Finally at the bottom, a note said "HQ Lab passcode: PickleReeka"
"Bit of a strange password," Goombarry said. "I mean what, is the turning himself into a pickle? That would be the funniest thing I've ever seen."
"I guess." Kooplin responded. "Anyway, this seems like something we should keep."
"Good instincts Kooplin." said Mario. "Stuff like this has always helped in my journeys one way or another. Why don't you do the honors of keeping it?"
"Me?" Kooplin asked, surprised. "You sure I should be handling it?"
"Oh you'll do fine." Mario said. "Besides, you were the one to find it. Finders keepers." Kooplin paused for a few moments, clearly nervous handling something Mario entrusted him with. It really showed in spite of the Koopa's dry sarcasm, he valued being a part of Mario's team. Slowly, the Koopa put the paper in his inventory.
"Alright, I think that's it." Mario said, having searched the whole room. "We've checked this place out, now let's-a-go get more Moons!"
"Ugh, finally." Goombarry said.
"Wow, we did all this just for a sheet of paper." Goombarry said, walking back through the forest. "That is the most pathetic reward I've ever heard of."
"Come on Goombarry." Mario said. "I slogged through a creepy castle just to get the letter 'p', and it ended up being vital."
"… You're joking right?"
"You'd be surprised at how strange my adventures can get." Mario responded, stepping on a twig and hearing a satisfying crunch.
"Mario! Kooplin!" someone in the distance yelled frantically with a croaking voice. It was a large green-shelled Koopa running toward the group. The trio ran to meet the Koopa, who was sweating and panting. Hopefully Goombarry would ignore his own name not being called.
"What… what is it?" Mario asked once he was close, caught by the Koopa's urgency. The Koopa stopped and did a long sigh, breathing heavily for several seconds and clutching his knees.
"Come on, what's going on?!" Kooplin yelled impatiently.
"Urgh…" he panted. "Grolia… is under attack."