Chapter 14: The Second Trial, Part III: A Temple of Fire and Ice, Part II

Peach, Daisy, and Luigi had finally completed their day at the Mushroom City Mall. Peach and Daisy had managed to set up cell phone plans for themselves, Luigi, Mario, Toadsworth, Link, and Rosalina. Since the bills associated with each device would be charged to Princess Peach, members included in the plan that were not being charged did not need to be present for activation.

Peach was apprehensive about the idea of granting Toadsworth a cell phone, for obvious reasons. In the end, she had decided that it would be in her best interest to have the ability to ease his anxiety with a single text message, even if it did grant him the ability to bombard her with text messages. She did also of course feel that it would be harsh to not give him a cell phone, even though he was originally quite critical of the idea.

Daisy, Peach, and Luigi were standing outside of the mall alongside their respective parked vespas.

"Phew! I'm beat." Daisy sighed, wiping the sweat from her brow with her wrist, since both hands were holding shopping bags. "I'm always so surprised by how tired shopping makes me."

"Is that so, Daisy?" Peach recognized, turning to her friend. She giggled softly. "Hmhmhm~, not me. I can not seem to get enough of it!"

"That's for sure!" Daisy concurred, orange hash lines of enthusiasm blinking by her head. "You're the shopping pro! I don't know how you do it!"

"Yes, well." Peach started, slightly raising one of the bunches of shopping bags she was holding. "I do hope Rosalina enjoys the clothes that I have bought for her..."

"Knowing Rosalina, she'll make some sort of complaint but accept them anyway." Daisy hypothesized, looking slightly downward. She looked up and faced her friends. "Anyway, are you guys ready to go for a ride around town, or what?!"

"Yeah, about that..." Luigi started, rubbing the back of his head. He was somewhat somber.

"What is it, Luigi?" Peach asked, a stationary pink question mark above her head. It slowly faded out of existence, the two girls facing him now.

"I know that I said I would go and ride around town with you guys, but..." Luigi paused briefly, sitting on his bike. "There's something else that I would like to do now, instead."

"Really? But what else could you possibly be wanting to do?" Daisy inquired, her arms folded.

"Uhh, I'll explain later." Luigi dodged, not making eye contact as a blue sweat drop sank behind his head. He started up his vespa. "I'll catch up with you guys, okay? L-Later!"

"Okay Luigi." Peach softly smiled. "Goodbye, and drive safely!"

"Hey!" Daisy barked, watching as Luigi drove off with her fists against her hips. Peach waved happily to their fleeing friend, her eyes closed. "What's his deal?"

"I am sure he has his reasons, Daisy." Peach assured, turning to face Daisy. "Let us leave him be."

"Well, whatever." Daisy surrendered, not really understanding his behaviour. As nosy as she was to understand, curiously enough she was as equally willing to forget about it. "Let's go, Peach! It's so nice out, I wanna ride around!"

"Hmhmhm~..." Peach softly giggled. "Well alright then."

/

Back within the temple, the Guardian was surveying the area with a single blue eye. Mario looked at the creature in stunned awe, his mouth hung open. In the reflection of Mario's eyes, it could be seen that the Guardians single eye suddenly had turned a deep red, and was now marching towards him. Link was overwhelmed with a sudden sense of dismay.

"Oh non, un Gardien!" Link firmly announced, his eyes narrowing.

"Un Guardian?" Rosalina acknowledged, averting her attention from the curious creature to Link.

Using its long mechanical white legs, it climbed down the wall from the second level to the main level where Mario, Link, and Rosalina were located.

"Rapidement!" Link ordered while vigorously waving his hand to follow, rushing into a doorless corridor located on the right side of the lower level.

Rosalina, still able to understand French but not speak it, followed Link into the room. She turned towards Mario, who was still gawking at the incoming creature. "Mario!"

A red laser was focused on Mario's face, the guardian rapidly approaching with its sights on the flabbergasted hero. He snapped out of it as he heard his name from within the open corridor to his right. He turned and saw Rosalina waving him to follow as she ran into the corridor.

The Guardian was now on ground level, about 50 meters away from Mario. The beeping associated with its targeting system was now occurring at increased intervals, which indicated that it was about to fire.

Time appeared to be in slow motion as Mario started to run towards Rosalina and Link, the red dot slowly trailing off of his face. The eye of the guardian lit up in a blinding flash, from which a blue laser was fired at lightning speed. While running, the blue laser zipped right past Mario's head. It in fact grazed his fleeing cheek, which caused a perfectly straight, ultra thin cut to appear. Mario's eyes widened as he noticed that some blood had been drawn.

An explosion occurred on the back wall to the left of the main entrance, which caused time to be smacked back into normal speed. By the skin of his teeth, Mario continued to run away from the Guardian practically unscathed.

(An explosion?) Mario thought to himself while looking over his shoulder, discovering the nature of the Guardians attack. He faced back forward and continued to run down the open corridor that Rosalina and Link had escaped too.

As soon as he arrived in the room at the end of the corridor, he noticed that both Rosalina and Link had their backs flat against the walls that bordered the doorless entrance to the room. Rosalina was on the left, Link to the right. Mario joined Rosalina's side.

"Mario!" Link exclaimed, relieved to see he made it.

"What the heck is that?!" Mario cried.

"Un Gardien." Link informed. "Je les ai rencontres a Hyrule."

"Well, I understand the Hyrule part." Mario replied, catching his breath. "I take it you know its weakness?"

"Oui." Link nodded. He then pointed to his eye.

"The eye, huh?" Mario gathered, with a grin. "Gotcha. I'll go kick its ass right now then!"

"Non, non!" Link declined, signalling no with both hands. "C'est impossible. Nous n'avons pas les moyens de la vaincre."

Mario turned to Rosalina, hoping for some sort of translation. Knowing that she could not speak Spanish to Mario, she paused for a moment. She then punched her open palm twice, then signalled no with both hands. She then slid a finger across her neck to signal death.

Mario peeked down the hallway, and saw the Guardian was on patrol. It then stopped in place, surveyed its surroundings for a brief moment, then continued to march forward. Detecting no threat, its lights were blue.

"Well, what exactly do you suppose we do then?" Mario challenged, unimpressed.

"Hmm..." Link paused, taking a moment to think.

Only then did it occur to the three of them to take a moment to survey their surroundings. They were in a new room now, but it was rather plain. Hexagonal in shape, it had a very tall ceiling with a square vent in the centre of the floor. The vent was currently inactive. Most importantly though, there was something sleeping on the vent which almost covered it entirely.

The massive creature could be described as a hybrid of an ogre and a cyclops. Snoring soundly while on its back, its rough skin was mostly blue. It was two-toed, with gnarly off-white nails on its toes and fingers. It had a single horn on its head, and long white hair that cradled its face but failed to conceal its large, pointy ears.

"C'est un Hinox!" Link informed, in a harsh whisper. "Shhhhhh!"

"Un Hinox?" Rosalina barked.

"Shhh!" Link hissed, finger over his mouth.

"A Hinox, huh... That thing looks tough." Mario thought to himself in a whisper. "But if we start to fight it, I'll bet we'll attract that Guardian over there."

Link nodded in agreement. After seeing this, Mario averted his attention from Link and looked down at the floor. A single bead of sweat went down the side of his head, mildly stinging his laser cut.

"Puedo sentirme cada vez mas caliente." Rosalina complained, fanning herself with her hands.

"Nous n'avons pas beaucoup de temps..." Link thought to himself, his eyes narrowing in thought.

(Think...) Mario thought to himself, feeling the pressure. He closed his eyes harshly. They opened in realization. "That's it!"

Rosalina and Link turned to Mario, anticipating his next words.

"The explosion!" Mario recalled, his voice loud. "That Guardians attack causes explosions. With my Fire Star, I should be able to use that explosion to my advantage. Just like with the Stone Talus!"

Links eyes widened as he recalled the battle.

{"Catch, jump, and don't be alarmed!" Link ordered, tossing the blue square bomb at Mario. Mario indeed caught it, and then he jumped. Link raised his Shiekah Slate, and the bomb detonated while the midair Mario was holding it.

"WHOA!" Mario cried, as his form absorbed the explosion without an issue. His belly was now fat, and the updraft from the explosion sent his balloon-like form slowly soaring higher. The grass was on fire below, which helped preserve an updraft which was keeping balloon Mario afloat.}

"I'll use the explosion power myself up, just like last time." Mario grinned while in a fighting stance, his fists clenched with confidence. "And I'll beat that thing. You just watch!"

"Gruh?" The Hinox barked, opening its single eye. The eye was a deep orange with a blue pupil, the white of the eyes tainted with a sickly yellow colour.

"Le Hinox!" Link barked, alarmed that it had woken up. He waved an arm to Mario signalling him to go. "Rapidement!"

Mario gave a weak nod of uncertainty, but regardless he proceeded to run down the open corridor back to the main area of the Temple.

"Hace calor..." Rosalina complained, fanning herself. She was exhausted and sweaty.

Link, still fine, got the message and quickly tossed Rosalina the last Chilly Potion he had. She had barely caught it, fumbling it like a football and almost wasting it. She did not seem to be bothered by the rising Hinox before them as she uncorked the Chilly Potion and drank it.

Link was facing the now upright Hinox, his left hand grasping the hilt of the Eightfold blade that was sheathed on his back. He raised it a few inches, the blades steel gleaming.

(Mario...) Link thought to himself, his expression full of resignation.

Mario was running down the open corridor, back towards the patrolling guardian with an expression of upmost determination.

(Don't die.) Link concluded with closed eyes, his teeth clenched.

/

"Hey! Guardian!" Mario barked, racing lines accompanying his determined expression as he ran full speed towards the main entrance.

The Guardian behind him stopped in place and proceeded to survey the area. As it detected Mario, its blue eye went red. With its long mechanical legs, it proceeded to run towards Mario. It had its red laser sights focusing on the back of Mario's fleeing head.

Arriving at a wall, Mario turned around with a grunt. The temple entrance was just to his left. His teeth were clenched as he kept his focus, the laser dot hovering between his eyes.

"You're not so tough..." Mario thought out loud, eyebrows harsh. The speed of the beeping increased, as the guardian was about to fire. Mario closed his eyes.

A blinding flash emerged from the eye of the guardian as it launched its laser attack. Time appeared to be in slow motion as Mario performed a backflip at the perfect moment. His body arced backwards, dodging the laser below that was determined to slice right through him at lightning speed. The projectile zoomed into the wall behind the backflipping Mario, exploding on impact. Mario was close enough to the explosion that it submerged him completely. For the moment, the relentless Guardian could not detect Mario through the fire and smoke, and so could not yet focused its sights on him once again.

Just like the last time Mario absorbed an explosion, his body inflated such that he appeared rounded like a balloon. This time however, as he redistributed the obtained fire, he did not use them to make his arms bigger. Instead, he redistributed the fire such that it was spread out equally all throughout him. The effect was that Mario appeared to be his normal size, except now he was surrounded by an aura of fire. This is to be defined as Mario's "charged" state. The more "charged" Mario is with fire, that is to say, the more fire he absorbs, the bigger and hotter the flames burn around him.

Now charged, Mario stood there with orange flames burning around him. The Guardian could now detect him, and proceeded to focus another laser on him. Mario brought his hands together, and a ball of fire formed between the palms. He brought his wrists together as he thrusted his arms forward, his knuckles from each hand facing to the left and right.

"SUPER FIRE BLAST!" Mario cried, unleashing a devastating fire blast that was bright red in colour.

This fire blast was twice as powerful as the fire blast that Mario had used against Bowser, back when his Goddess Power first awakened. The Guardian was completely submerged within the massive fire blast that had sliced through the air towards it at a tremendous velocity. The sight focused on Mario disappeared as the Guardian could no longer target him. Mario stood there in position as he continued unleashing the powerful attack. After a few more seconds, the attack had concluded.

The Guardian now stood farther back, completely unharmed as it surveyed the area with a calm blue light in its eyes. The force of the attack had caused it to be pushed quite a bit backwards, but left it unscathed.

"What?!" Mario barked, shocked that his attack had no effect. His widened eyes of surprise narrowed in determination once again. "Heh, so fire attacks won't work on you, huh?"

Detecting Mario once again, it's eye turned bright red as it marched towards Mario with its long mechanical legs.

/

"Reculer!" Link warned, knowing Rosalina could understand him.

Back in the hexagonal shaped room with the blue Hinox, Rosalina was keeping off to the sidelines in hopes that she would not capture its attention. Link was facing it head on, Rosalina watching with some angst as the Hinox went to grab him with a vicious arm swing that pierced the air.

"Ah!" Rosalina barked, covering her eyes for a brief moment.

She eventually peeked to see that Link was fine, dashing between the legs of the massive creature with the Eightfold blade in his left hand. The Hinox was disorientated, unsure of where Link had went. Link turned and directed his attention to the back of the Hinoxs large belt made from animal hides. His eyes narrowed in determination as he noticed there was a wooden soldiers bow hanging there, as well as a quiver with some arrows.

(Just as I'd thought.) Link thought with a grin, making a break for the equipment.

Using his sword, he cut the wooden rope that was attaching the Bow to the belt. It fell to the ground.

"Roo?" The Hinox growled, its large discoloured eye blinking twice as it focused on Rosalina.

Link claimed the bow.

"U-Uh, Link?" Rosalina summoned, realizing she had been spotted.

Link said nothing, using his sword to cut the quiver free. He claimed the arrows just before the Hinox proceeded to take a large stomp forward.

"U-Uh, L-Link?" Rosalina beckoned, now smothered in shadow.

Backed up against the wall, Rosalina's legs were frozen with fear. She couldn't run. She simply stared, shielding herself with her quaking arms and flinching as the Hinox charged up a fist.

/

"A-wa-wa-wa-wah-wah-wah!" Mario cried, sprinting forward so fast he almost fell flat onto his face. He used one hand to push himself back up, and the other to adjust his hat which had nearly fallen off of his head from the force of the explosion behind him.

The Guardian had missed once again, but was pursuing him relentlessly with its indefatigable mechanical legs. Already the Guardian had its sights on Mario's back, the red laser dot steady on his shoulders. While running, Mario partially turned his face to see that the Guardian was indeed pursuing him.

"I can't run forever... I gotta think of something, quick!" Mario thought to himself, surveying the area with angst. His eyes widened as the flaming pillars caught his attention. "That's it!"

/

Racing lines accompanied the fist of the Hinox as it soared towards Rosalina. Then suddenly, sharp, distinct whistling of a certain melody could be heard from behind. The Hinox paused its fist mere inches before Rosalina, who stood there cowering behind her frail arms.

"Roo?" The Hinox barked. This type of whistle apparently attracted a Hinox, which Link had discovered during his adventures in Hyrule.

With its single big eye, the Hinox saw only one thing: Link holding its bow with an arrow at the ready. Link launched the arrow at its eye with deadly accuracy. The Hinox experienced an overwhelming, flooding sensation of pain. Holding onto its eye, it started to stumble backwards.

"Je demenagerais si j'etais toi." Link calmly warned.

"Eh?" Rosalina softly barked, opening her eyes and looking up. She lowered her arms, and saw the Hinox was stumbling backwards, about to fall on her. Coming back to her senses, she dashed to her right.

The Hinox crashed down onto its rear, Rosalina managing to escape being caught beneath its descent. Breathing heavily, she stepped backwards and away from it, a ring of dust and smoke launching from the impact point.

/

The beeping rate of the Guardians attack increased. Mario made a dive for the nearby fire pillar, which caused the Guardian to lose sight of its target. It approached the base of the flame pillar, investigating thoroughly for any sign of Mario. However, its efforts were fruitless. Its lights returned to a serene blue, and the relentless killing machine continued to scout the area for any other signs of life.

Within the fire pillar were little wisps of motion, climbing and spiralling upwards towards the ceiling. These wisps were in fact, Mario. Utilizing the power of the Fire Star, Mario had the ability to swim through channels of fire by becoming one with them. The phenomenon was somewhat akin to salmon swimming up a waterfall. With this clever maneuver, Mario was able to get above the top floor of the Temple of Fire and Ice, disembarking on what appeared to be a steel grate.

The steel grate was even higher than the highest floor (which was the third floor) of the Temple of Fire and Ice. This large, steel grate essentially took the shaped of a semi squashed X, with a hole where the lines intersect. The radius diameter of the whole was small enough to still access each part of the X without needing to jump over it. The X shaped steel grate was as large as the main floor itself. Each of the four fire pillars at ground level launched flames up to the four points of the X shaped steel grate at regular intervals.

In the absent centre of the steel grate was a stone pillar that peaked down through the darkness from the above ceiling. Attached to the bottom of this stone pillar, was a glowing red diamond. It appeared to be a mechanism of sorts. Mario, now all charged up from the ride up the flame pillar, looked down at the patrolling guardian from above. Orange flames burned all around him.

"Alright." Mario grinned, cracking his knuckles. "This time, I'm gonna take you out."

/

Link proceeded to dash towards the downed Hinox, which has holding its eye in agony. Link then jumped high enough to land boots first onto the belly of the Hinox, squatting down as he landed. Link then launched himself up in an flash, and time appeared to be in slow motion as Link removed the eightfold blade from the sheath on his back. At the same time, the Hinox was removing its hands from its eye, its mouth gapping wide from the sight of the soaring hero.

/

Mario had some angst in his step as he danced at the edge of the steel grate while looking down at the main floor. Watching the movements of the Guardian, he was anticipating an exact moment. When it had finally arrived, he jumped off of the steel grate and initiated his descent towards the main level far below. Oranges flames flickered vigorously around his body as he descended.

/

Time resumed speed as Link stabbed the Eightfold blade into the eye of the Hinox. Link removed both of his hands from the hilt of the now submerged blade and then performed a backflip to escape from the imminent flails of the large Hinox. Rosalina watched in awe as Link flipped through the air and landed on his feet.

Standing up straight with his shoulders back, he watched the Hinox flail weaker and weaker. Eventually, the arms of the Hinox fell limp to its sides, the large beast falling to its knees. Its entire form was devoid of light as it faced the heavens. The defeated Hinox then disintegrated before their very eyes.

/

The flames surrounding him disappeared as Mario, in midair, concentrated the fire to his right leg. Filled with burning fire, his right leg and foot inflated into a giant size.

"GIANT," Mario cried, racing lines accompanying his intense expression as he accelerated downward.

Submerged in shadow, the Guardian stopped its patrol and surveyed upward with its blue eye of light. Its eye turned red as it examined the impending massive boot up above.

The scene was completely dark, but the sounds of technical crushing and flying sparks could be heard. "STOMP!"