For a second, Mario wondered where Luvbi had gone, locked herself away in the airship. Then he realized that it was in a room. "What are you doing in there?" he asked. "Listen I know how it feels. You should talk to me." She did not answer, going to the navigation controls, Mario set the course for Dinohattan and from behind him, he heard the door open. Turning around, he noticed her in a new dark dress with shades of yellow and cut hair. She looked like his Daisy. "Luvbi?" he asked.
"This is all they had," she answered, in regard to the dress.
"Listen."
"How do you do it?"
"Do what?"
"Forget. Wash away the things you've done?"
"You don't. You just learn to live with it."
"So, the moment of truth between us," Luvbi sighed. "Bowser's Castle... or Dinohattan?" In a second, they would realize that neither choice really made much of a difference. There was a faint whirring behind them, that if Mario paid attention, he would have recognized as roaring. A dark form swished past the airship, causing a blur. It was that same dragon thing that guarded the Statue of Kamek! It had to be! "No, no, no, no, no!" screamed Luvbi.
"Shit!" swore Mario. "C'mon, we gotta find a way to make this thing go faster!" It was a desperate plea, there was no way to outrace this dragon in the sky and he knew it.
"There's got to be some sort of throttle or accelerator or something!" Luvbi tried to rationalize.
"Do you know what that looks like?" panicked Mario.
"I don't know!"
"Help me find it!" It did not matter, as in a second, the dark, gloomy dragon dove face first into the airship. Grabbing the front, Mario stared it in the face before turning to Luvbi. "Hang on to something!" It twisted the airship around and for a second, Mario got a chance to examine its face. Yellow spikes on its back, red yes full of hatred, a dark violet underbelly and a nearly all black reptilian face, he did not want to see this dragon's teeth. The immense velocity pushed them high up in the air for a second... and then they came crashing down... and everything went black.
When he came to, Mario heard sounds of Luvbi struggling, those two... Iggy and Wendy were arguing outside! They were playing on a piano? Yeah, they were hitting some chords. Luvbi sounded desperate, begging them to stop. Getting up, Mario saw that she was trying to pull a door open. Motioning her backwards, Mario easily ripped the metal door the Koopa Copter with his enhanced strength. Iggy was on the piano, hitting random notes and Wendy was either agreeing with what he was playing or disagreeing. Desperate, Luvbi ran up to them and shouted out, "Stop it! Stop it, you don't know what you're doing!" Iggy kept playing the piano though.
It seemed as if he must have hit the right set of notes, as Luvbi stepped back and gasped out, "You've done it now. He's... he's coming back!" Wait, did music control the dragon? Did these two morons stop them from leaving?
"The notes were correct," sighed Iggy.
"The instrument was not," determined Wendy.
Turning to Luvbi, Iggy, straight faced, told her, "One needs both to get his attention. If you know how to sing to him, he will take you where you need to go." Handing Mario a piece of paper, Iggy simply nodded to the Plumber. Taking a second to observe the paper, Mario and Luvbi hardly noticed Iggy and Wendy start to walk away. On it was a series of musical notes, the ones used to control the dragon?
"So, Bowser uses these notes. Are there others we can use?" Mario asked as Iggy opened a door. "Something to keep the dragon off our back?"
"Why don't you ask the maestro himself?" suggested Iggy, and he left. His sister was nowhere to be seen either. Pushing the piano out of their way, Mario and Luvbi passed through an archway to come up on a bend. In front of them was a ledge, heading to it, Luvbi pointed at a black castle in the sky.
"There's Bowser's Castle," she told him. "If we're going to find him, we better head there." At the small dock by the ledge, Mario noticed an entire squadron of cops fill up a gondola. From what he could hear, they were afraid of the Shy Squad and were fleeing their post. Of course, they were scared, the Pianta Syndicate was dead. The entire police force behind the police force had been oblitered and Don Pianta was likely dead, gutted behind an ally by some Shy Guy. What more reason did they have to stay here?
Mario looked at Luvbi, it seemed that even though Mowz was gone the Shy Guys were still continuing their rampage. Maybe they had already found a new leader? That Heronicus preacher man seemed likely. Where were they going, wherever the Shy Guys were not Mario supposed. Another barge came up behind the old one, it was floating. A man was begging for his wife to jump there to him, the captain was begging men to throw down their belongings. In the bright of day though, the chaos did not seem too bad.
Heading up a set of stairs, Mario was actually kind of thankful that this entire district of people was leaving. It made the streets less crowded and ultimately less dangerous. There was a small garden on display, a bridge to cross the makeshift artificial waterfall. It was a good display, Mario knew. Quickly noticing some Shy Guys in the path up ahead, Mario cut around the corner and followed the flight of stairs up, cutting past the revolutionaries without them even noticing. This place was quite beautiful, Mario took a second to notice. It was almost like Versailles, or Paris... the garden, the makeshift boulders. It had a truly majestic or royal feel to it, words really could do it no honours. Up ahead was the Port Prosperity Station, with red banners waving up above it and it's own regal feel making Mario feel small, he knew that it was the only way they could go. Any other way and well they would have to answer to the Shy Squad. Opening the door to the Propserity Station manually would require the use of a large gear, that would draw unwanted attention. Thankfully, Luvbi was opening up a portal.
"So, what's about that song that calls the dragon?" asked Mario.
"I don't know, it just does," she told him while working around with the crystal. "I used to be excited when I heard it."
"Excited?"
"He was all I had," Luvbi answered. "He fed me. He brought me books. He was my friend."
"Friend?"
"Until I wizened up," Luvbi told him. "Then I hated him. He was my warden, but he's just Bowser's pet, isn't he? Just like me. Ready." The portal opened, and they entered the building. It truly was a sight to behold, bodies were strewn everywhere, the lights were barely functioning. The statues of Bowser, Lena and the Koopalings were crumbling over the ground. One of the set of stairs had a massive hole through it. This place was the opposite of prosperous. "Look at all this?" Luvbi gasped. "Mowz… she really was no better than Bleck? Was she?"
"Once people get their blood up, it isn't easy to settle it down again," said Mario.
"This is on our hands, isn't it?" asked Luvbi, but it seemed more like silent contemplation. Walking through the station, Mario noticed how the place still looked glamorous even though it was all broken. The quiet, probably, gave it that allure - it was haunting sure, but like a siren. Scary but it kept drawing him in.
Passing through a corridor, they exited the station and were back outside. There was a bridge taking them to the next place to go. That was when Luvbi asked him, "This prophecy business, you don't think Bowser can really see the future, do you?" Mario thought about that for a second, Bowser had known things he should not have been able to know. Then again, Bowser did know Kamek and then there were the circumstances of his birth. There was Mario's vision, though...
"I saw something once, when I first got here," Mario told her. "It was New York City, but everything, as If I was looking at it from above... it was burning."
"I hope no more of Bowser's magic is rubbing off on you," said Luvbi. Quickly pulling Luvbi, down, Mario ducked her underneath a sign. He had noticed a barge full of Shy Guys leaving. If they noticed them, the Shy Squad would stay and pursue. There was a spare Gondola, though, sneaking in and getting in there, Mario worked up the controls. This Gondola would take them straight to the Crystal Palace, the last stop before Bowser's Castle. "I just realized what Iggy and Wendy did," snapped Luvbi. "They, well at least Wendy, invented the technology that allows the city to float."
"Giant balloons?" joked Mario.
"Quantum particles," she responded. "Suspended in space-time at a fixed height."
"So... not giant balloons?
"The thing is... my books said that Iggy and Wendy disappeared years ago," said Luvbi. "Something tells me they're not exactly what they appear. They seem to want to help."
"They seem to be out of their minds."
As their Gondola made it closer and closer to the Crystal Palace, Mario and Luvbi noticed both Iggy and Wendy at several different billboards. At each one they were doing something different. On the first, playing a piano. On the second, dancing. On the third, arguing about something mathematical. On the fourth, burning an effigy of their Uncle Spike. "How do you suppose they manage that?" asked Luvbi. Their constant teleportation? Mario honestly had no clue.
"I'll get back to you after I figure out the floating city bit," responded Mario. The Gondola just about made it to a stop, stationing itself at the mouth of the Crystal Palace dock. "Come on, Bowser's Castle is just up ahead." As they exited, Luvbi noticed a billboard. It was similar to the statue Mario had seen earlier, where Lena, holding a baby, stood before a bowing Luvbi. Instead it was Bowser who held the child and at his feet was Luvbi, holding her crystal aflame.
"The return of the king will sit down the throne and return the glory of the old world, drown in flames the glory of the human," recited Luvbi. "He was grooming me, wasn't he?"
"Bowser? Yeah, I think so."
"Then why lock me up both times?"
"I'm guessing you wouldn't want to be groomed," said Mario. "He probably was cooking something up to make you agreeable."
"Like what?"
"Let's try to not find out."
There were dead cops here. Clearly the Shy Guys had made it here before they did and were already wreaking havoc. Thankfully there were none in sight, or else there would be quite a bit of trouble. The next bit of the Crystal Palace was similarly abandoned, looking through the store rooms there was nothing there either. Heading past a Crystal Palace restaurant, Mario noticed some Shy Guys were there looting the abandoned supplies. Heading the other way, they soon came up to a large foyer with huge support beams and a very Greek feel. Past that they must have made it to the front, there was a docking schedule written in chalk and more bodies strewn around by it. Finally, they had made it to the exit. "Those turnstiles are one way," Luvbi noticed. "Should we check out the bookstore before we leave?"
"Why not?" accepted Mario. Heading in, Mario noticed there was not much in there the way of weaponry. However, amidst all of the books there that Luvbi had started to look at there was audio film. There was a voxophone nearby wasn't there? Heading downstairs, sure enough, Mario found one. The label marked it to be by... Wendy Koopa. Picking it up, Mario turned it on.
"The Koopa Field entangled my quantum atom with waves of light, allowing for safe measurement. Sound familiar, Iggy? That's because you were doing the same thing down in the Koopahari Desert. We used Sarasaland as a telegraph. Switching the field on or off became dots and dashes. Dreadfully slow, but now you and I could whisper through the wall. Iggy, what father failed to understand is that our contraption is not a window into prophecy, but probability. But his connection to Kamek means the Koopa Field could become the Koopa Tear - a window between worlds. A window which will return you to your family. You will be transfused Iggy, into a new castle. Your body will reject the cognitive dissonance through confusion and hemorrhage. But we will be together, and I will mend you. For what will separate us then, but power itself? We can trap the atom in mid air. Colleagues will call my Koopa Field 'Quantum Levitation', but in fact it will be nothing of the sort. Magicians levitate. My atom will simply fail to fall. If an atom can be suspended indefinitely, why not an apple, and if an apple can, why not a city? I remember that Lena seemed to believe her child would be the result of some divine blessing by Kamek. I told my poor step-mother the truth: the child is a product of blood. I think she found that less believable than her delusion. Father was made more powerful simply by touching the power in the Koopa Field. A theory: just as insanity can emphasize the traits of a person, so goes the effect of teleportation on our own. Traits emphasize, until they dissipate or become unrecognizable entirely."
Then there was another one by it. This one seemed more recent, when he tried to pick it up, Mario's hand passed through it. That was odd, lighting his hand ablaze, Mario found himself able to pick it up. Hitting the switch, he heard Wendy's voice again. This time, though, it was eerie and ethereal - almost ghostly.
"Bleck sabotaged our contraption, under orders from our own father... yet, we can still continue on in death, as Boos. A theory, we are scattered amongst space. Yet Iggy and I are together, so I am content. He is not, though. The business with Daisy… I mean Luvbi… it lies unresolved. Perhaps there is one Mario who can finish the job for us? However, Iggy presented me with an ultimatum. Either we tell Luvbi the truth, or we party ways. He is my brother though, so I shall play my part knowing it will all end in tears. Our contraption shows us that the girl is the flame who will ignite both worlds. She is an avatar of Queen Jaydes and thus, is her daughter. Iggy says we must undo what has been done. Time is more an ocean than a river. Why bring in a tide that will only go out?"
So, they were dead. That left none of the living Koopalings loyal to Bowser. Mario remembered the Boos, small rotund ghosts. The closer they got to the afterlife, the ghostlier they got. The further they stayed away, the more human and present they seemed. It appeared that whatever their contraption was, it had allowed Iggy and Wendy to stave off being shipped to the afterlife by Luigi. There was a third voxophone, it seemed older but still probably trusty. Turning it on, Mario heard the words he feared the most.
"Morton Koopa, father, is dying. He may have returned from the dead, but the metastasis has aged him so quickly. Why does King Morton Koopa decay, while Bowser grows more and more fit? If genetics are destiny, what accounts for the difference? Perhaps exposure to the contraption? It warrants further study."
So, Bowser was dying. This was his last plan. He may have had countless plans to fulfill the prophecy, but he was pursuing the one that would not require him to be alive. King Koopa had lost his family. His eldest son, Ludwig, had died fighting Rool. He had killed his Roy, Iggy and Wendy himself. Larry and Lemmy wanted nothing to do with him. Morton Jr was trying to ill him. Bowser had finally lost his connections as a man and truly become a monster. He really was Kamek's Avatar.
Nodding to Luvbi, they headed out of the bookstore, into the exit corridor and passed through the turnstiles. "These will lock when we pass through, we won't be able to return," said Luvbi. Mario only grunted in response.
It was a short hallway to the elevator. As the neared the lift though, Luvbi grabbed Mario's hand and put her finger to her lips. Suddenly a steam statue began to play some music, from pipes. Looking out the window, suddenly dust fell down from the roof and on their heads. Ducking down below a desk, Mario heard a thunderous roar, flapping of wings, a crash - peeking up, he saw the dragon's hideous face looking into the hallway. Pushing its head through the window, the dragon tried to get a better look. When it did not see either Mario or Luvbi, it pulled its head out and flew away. They were safe, for now. Luvbi rushed for the elevator and hit the call button and turned around when Mario came back. "Promise me," she said.
"I will stop him."
"That's not enough," she took his hands and put them on her neck. "Promise me that you will not let him take me back." Quickly pulling his hands away, all Mario could do was promise.
"It will never come to that."
Getting in the elevator, Mario hit the button and they began to descend. From their view, they could see Shy Guys firing on two or three barges full of the cops. "The Shy Guys are tearing this place apart," remarked Luvbi. Suddenly, a volley from one the cop's barges hit the lines just above the elevator. For one second, their lift came to a startling halt. Then it hung precariously.
The Shy Guys aimed at them now began to fire their way. Getting down, Mario and Luvbi were prone for a second as the bullets flew overhead them. Smashing a hole through the elevator floor, Mario saw a cable below. Grabbing Luvbi and heating his hand, he rode on the cable to get away from the gunfire. Making their way past the Shy Guys and the cops, Mario and Luvbi landed swiftly under them. They were all crowded on the balcony shooting at the cops' barges, allowing them to make their way up a set of stairs and through a door to safety. Thankfully, the Shy Guys had already forgotten about them and were in another firefight with the cops.
The building they were now in was just another branch of the massive Crystal Palace. Unlike the main palace though it was not broken, wrecked or damaged. There were no internal signs of battle. It was dark though, it had clearly lost power. The carpets were blue and seemed darker without any light. "We need to go back outside to get to Bower's Castle, Mario," said Luvbi.
"Wait, what you said back before the elevator," Mario grabbed her arm.
"Let's not discuss it," she suggested.
"No," said Mario. "What did that dragon do to you?"
"If it were to take me back... that's death," decided Luvbi. "Or something so like it I can't tell the difference." They waited for a little bit, there were some explosions and the fighting seemed to die down. As they heard the Shy Guys enter the Crystal Palace from the balcony, they knew who had won. Walking to the exit, Mario pushed open the gates and the two made their way out of the Crystal Palace. The street was abandoned, wagons, bottles and papers flooded the street. No Koopa or Pianta was left. There were some distinct red banners all over the place though. "Look at those, seems like the Shy Squad have chosen their favorite colour."
"Seems about right."
"What a waste," spat Luvbi as they entered an open city square. There was another small dock, more and more winding stairs, stores and roads to homes. There was one sign that would take them to Bowser's Castle: downtown. "How's the city going to come back from this?"
"Maybe it shouldn't."
Heading up the stairs, the two went to downtown Delfino Isle - one step closer to Bowser's Castle. Downtown was in worse condition than the rest of Delfino Isle, the stores were all looted, innocents were cowering in fear behind their blinds... it was horrible. "You know," started Luvbi, "I keep thinkin of that dream you had. The one with New York City on fire... there's something about it..." No idea what to say, Mario just stayed silent. Soon they were at a block called the 'King Koopa Victory Square' where in the middle was a giant statue of Bowser in his dinosaur form. Up a huge set of stairs was a wall and a gate. "Beyond that gate lies Bowser's Castle." By Bowser's statue were some candles and a sigil to Lena. By the gate there was a robot, which took one look at Luvbi and then spoke.
"Ah! Lady Lena, how lovely to make your acquaintance!" the robot said. Lena? What? Luvbi didn't even look like her. "Wonderful of you to make the journey, especially considering your painful death twelve years ago!"
"Lena?" asked Mario.
Turning around, Luvbi told him, "This dress, the robot identified it as belonging to her. It's mistaking me for that witch." Putting her hands on the fingerprint scanner, Luvbi quickly realized that it would not work.
"Your fingerprints aren't working, are you unwell Lady Lena?"
"This won't work," sighed Luvbi.
"Lena's been dead for twelve years," reminded Mario.
"Time to go pay our respects," instructed Luvbi. "Let's head to where she's buried. There's a graveyard where she's buried, not far from here." One of the houses that they passed was completely obliterated, as if the dragon had taken its frustrations out on it. Passing through a stone archway, they entered the graveyard and Luvbi pointed to a crypt. "It's in there!"
"Where are you going?"
"Come on!"
"What are we looking for?"
"It's over there!" shouted Luvbi. The gate to the crypt had no lock, they could just open it.
"It's Lena's grave," Mario sighed.
"They have her preserved in an airtight chamber, her fingerprints will get us in," insisted Luvbi.
"She was skewered."
"Then collected by the Koopalings."
"Take a moment and think about this," suggested Mario, but she did not. Pushing the door open, they both entered and there in the center lay Lena. Mario remembered her, she was like a wild beast. Wild, fierce and provocative. Quite opposite to what he remembered of Bowser. Mario grabbed Luvbi's shoulder, still not wanting to desecrate the dead. Her body, it was not destroyed like Mario had heard it had been. The Koopalings must have found a surgeon who must have patched her back together.
"How are you in there, Lena?" mocked Luvbi. "All locked up, it looks like we finally have some common ground."
"Let me do it," suggested Mario.
"No."
"Let me do it," Mario insisted. As he went to open the coffin though, all the lights in the crypt turned off, leaving a strange red glow come from the entrance. Dust fell from the ceiling. Mario felt something strange run through the air.
"You see, child?" asked Bowser's voice over the speakers. "You follow the Plumber and he has led you astray!" Suddenly, immaterial lights - where did they come from? These lights began to flow in from all directions into Luvbi. Writhing in pain, Luvbi's screams barely let Mario hear Bowser over the intercoms. "What I do, I do for love! What Queen Jaydes has given me will let the lion see the cub in pain!"
"Make it stop!" screamed Luvbi. "Mario! Make it stop!" He wanted to, but he had no idea how to.
"If you will not listen to me," sighed Bowser. "Perhaps you will listen to Lena." Suddenly all the light left Luvbi in a ball, went and floated over Lena's corpse and exploded. When light returned to his vision, Mario saw flying corpse above Luvbi on her knees. Just like in the statue. Then the ghost, some strange Boo figured Mario, just disappeared.
"Luvbi?" Mario grabbed her shoulder. "What kind of Boo is Lena?"
"One powered by the crystal! He used my powers to reanimate her!" croaked Luvbi.
Walking out of the crypt, they were stopped dead in their tracks by the phantom of Lena, which had several other ghostly soldiers with her. All these Boos would go to Luigi, decided Mario. Fireballs in hands, Mario kept on spraying at Lena's ghostly henchmen, but they kept coming back! He had to deal with her directly. The ghost thugs kept getting in the way though! In his rage, Mario launched a massive fireball through the soldiers and directly at Lena. Stunned, she wobbled back and forth. Here was his chance! Jumping towards her, he lit his hand ablaze and punched through her throat - dropping the ghost.
Looking to his side, there were Iggy and Wendy digging two graves. It was their own Mario realized, walking over to them he saw their coffins peak out.
"What was she?" Luvbi asked.
"Why do you always ask what?" Iggy asked Luvbi.
"You should ask why," suggested Wendy. "The only difference between shadow and light is... semantics."
"If we could perceive father as he truly is," shrugged Iggy. "What reason would we have had to assist you?" Hearing a scurrying behind him, Mario looked to see the body of Lena was gone, it had run off somewhere!
"We have to find her!" said Luvbi. "Convince her to open the gate!" For once, Iggy and Wendy followed the two. They were Boos themselves, and only when their traitorous father was dead would they have rest. As they approached the gate to get out, Iggy and Wendy blocked their way.
"It's a shame you need her help," Iggy sighed.
"She doesn't seem cooperative," agreed Wendy.
"Maybe you can reason her with truths? Truths which Bowser has destroyed... if only one of you can reach through time," sighed Iggy and they disappeared as ghosts are to do.
They had no idea what to make of that, but they just followed the ghostly footprints. The first one led them through the marketplace and to a small mansion. Pushing open the lobby door, Mario noticed some sort of contraption in the back rom of the mansion. Making their way there, they were stunned by a giant electrical machine. Still operating through all this chaos, it must have had a backup generator. Wires went all around the house and such. There were also pictures of all the Koopalings together, of all of them happy and alive. On a shelf was a letter of marque, Ludwig's letter. This was Wendy's home.
"I can open a tear in time there, a portal to the... past I think," said Luvbi. Nodding, Mario watched as she pointed her crystal at the middle of the machine. They could get a brief glimpse of a scene that occurred in the past.
The long distant past, this had to be what? So many years ago, to say the least. From the scene, Mario could tell it was in Dinohattan. There Lena entered the room, and Wendy was there too... she was young in it, a teenager. The scene ended with Lena slapping Wendy. "So, she was always a cruel bitch."
Leaving the long-deceased Wendy's mansion home, Mario and Luvbi were back on the streets, following more footprints. A photography studio seemed to be their next destination, almost right away Luvbi identified where she could dig up the history lesson from. There was the photographer in the memory and in entered two Boos, not dissimilar to the ones they had seen when leaving Ghost Island. In a stunning display, they morphed into Iggy and Wendy. "I don't think that this is the real... Lena. I think this ghost, this strange Boo, is a combination of herself and my feelings towards her," said Luvbi.
"What do you mean?"
"I'm just so angry at her and Bowser," explained Luvbi, "I think she's her, but also partly me. I'm not sure I even understand it myself." Walking back out, they continued to follow the ghostly footprints, which took them right into the financial district. The largest building there? The Bank of Bowser. "What could this place have to do with Lena?" Luvbi thought aloud. Suddenly, it seemed as if the plants in the bank grew a little bit, but when Mario looked at them he realized they were all the same. There were four dead men in a hallway, the lights in it were flickering. Practically out of a horror movie. Walking in to the bank's main hall, there were a few Shy Guys there. Only about four, so it was no problem, not all hard for Mario to take out.
Most of the lights in the bank were fused or shot, but there were some red and green ones still active. Likely by a backup generator. Heading into the safety deposit boxes, they found the footprints again, taking them into the bankers' offices. This led them straight to what seemed to be a worship room: there were three statues, with flames in her crystal was Luvbi, behind her was Bowser and behind Bowser an Emperor Palpatine-looking hooded man: Kamek. In front of them Luvbi identified to Mario the location of the third and final memory. Final? How did she know it was the final one? This memory was of... Bleck and Bowser, the latter explaining to his right-hand man how his own children had betrayed him, how he needed them dead... all for the child? Who was the child. Then the memory closed.
So that was that, then. With an acute silence and understanding of the situation they were in, of the world they were in, the two turned around. Walking back, Mario and Luvbi began to head out of the bank. There were no more Shy Guys, they had probably moved their assault elsewhere. Motioning Luvbi to follow, Mario headed back there. He swore he could hear Boo Lena shouting 'Junior' or something. "He killed them... Roy, Iggy and Wendy," said Luvbi. "Three of his own children and me... just a specimen to be prodded."
"No... you're not," said Mario. "Luvbi listen to me. What you've been through, nobody in any world deserves that. No version of you has ever deserved what you've had to live through."
"Mario..."
"Look, I am getting you out of here," said Mario. "You're never going to have look back."
Nowhere else to go, Mario quickly traversed back to the gates to Bowser's Castle. By Bowser's statue, where a memorial to Lena was set up, there was a picture of the witch as well. In anger, Luvbi picked it up and started to yell at it. "You ruined my life! You ruined their lives, yet he killed all of you! You hate me for being his obsession, I hate you for only furthering it!" She must have said something right, after all, the wind picked up, leaves began flying and the Boo of Lena howled into the sky before taking another corporeal form in front of Luvbi.
Pouncing on Luvbi, Lena probably would have killed her right there had Mario not unleashed a fireball with the power of a cannonball. That must have damaged Lena's ghost because she began to swirl around the statue of Bowser in a demented fashion. "I owe you an apology," said Luvbi. "Bowser used me to bring you back... but I brought back a version of you from my own head. He pretended to love you, like he pretended to love his children. I am not Bowser's tool, I am his victim! My days of victimhood are done, we must forgive each other!"
That must have resonated with Lena, in a resounding scream the Boo aimed for the gate and blew it up. His eyes widened, Mario was left speechless.
Nodding at Luvbi, here they were... the moment of truth. On to Bowser's Castle. Passing through the archway, Mario noticed the massive bridge to get to the castle, black storm clouds were passing through it. What the clouds did not obscure was only illuminated by the frequent thunder and lightning. In between it all, Mario swore he could hear somebody playing music. He shrugged it off.
From beyond the bridge Mario could see the black gated entrance to Bowser's Castle, giant statuesque faces - normal Bowser on the left, the hooded Kamek in the middle and lizard Bowser on the right. Walking forward, Mario noticed two giant and thick cables descending down and a lever right in front of him. No way he could ascend up those, they were too big and there was no way he could get the momentum. Yet there it was in front of him, a lever to raise the components of the bridge up to the cables. To let them walk up to their destiny. Just as he pulled the lever for the bridge, the dragon swooped up from above and before he could react, it had Mario pinned down to the ground. "Mario!" screamed Luvbi.
"Run Luvbi!" ordered Mario. The dragon peered at him curiously for a second, then its look turned to malice. The scaly reptile grabbed him and through him backwards above the archway and straight into a window.
Everything went black.