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Chapter 14: The giant's return
After a lot of walking, Bowser finds more of those special flowers next to some sort of giant propeller on the water.
"Huh? A propeller…in the water… Wait, propellers fly! If that water thing can fly, I'll be in the forest like THAT!" he spoke to himself.
He approaches the flowers and sniffs them. But you all know what happened after that…
"AAH! BAAH! AAAAAACHOOOOOO!" Bowser sneezed.
His powerful sneeze was enough to make the propeller spin. With that, a strange-looking tower rose up from the water. It looked huge…
"Weird! It got dark! I feel like this sort of thing happened before… And then…" Bowser remarked once a large shadow appeared under him. What he didn't know was that it was the tower's foot that was right above him. Before he could even finish, he was eventually crushed by the tower's foot.
Inside Bowser…
"Did I just hear a loud thud or am I just going crazy?" Luigi wondered.
"It did. Looks like Bowser is in critical condition again." Mario replied. "To the Rump Command!"
They all hurried back to the Rump Command in order to revive Bowser with adrenaline once again. Once they completed the minigame with the boats of revival, the whole place begins to shake.
"Here we go agaaaaain!" Luigi exclaimed.
Back outside…
Bowser, who just became giant once again, successfully hurls the tower away a few feet from him. The tower, called the Tower of Yikk, steps towards Giant Bowser a bit, face-to-face with each other.
"The lake…" Giant Bowser noticed that the lake behind the tower was close. However, the lake was also close to Bowser from behind too. "Back here, too!"
He knew that he must send the Tower of Yikk into the lake, so he approaches and punches it as hard as he could to make it fall into the lake. On the other hand, the tower suffered no damage at all.
"Man… What's this guy's body made of?" Giant Bowser grumbled. Then, the tower retreats its legs and takes off into the sky. "Aw, you wanna fly away?! Tough luck, sucker!" Giant Bowser teased.
He approaches the tower and does a series of punches on its chest, causing it to fall back into the water. But still, no damage was taken. "Attacking this dude's body seems useless… Maybe that head?" Giant Bowser guessed. Then, he noticed that the tower was sinking in the water. "Nice! He's sinking! Now I can whale on his head!"
With that, he does a punch on the Tower of Yikk's head, and finally it took damage and its head started to show cracks.
"Now we're talking!" Giant Bowser smirked.
The tower tries to take off again, but Giant Bowser prevented that by punching its body repeatedly. Soon, the tower flies back on the land, ready to launch its attack. Three Mawful Moles come out and make their way to the head to try to fix it. Giant Bowser prevented them for doing so by breathing fire at them.
Next, the Tower of Yikk's door opens, revealing three Crawfuls carrying a huge Fawful Bomb and tosses it at Giant Bowser. Giant Bowser countered it with his punch, but the tower's head counters it back. This volley continued until the bomb blew at the tower, causing it to slide backwards, reaching the lake's edge, giving the chance for Giant Bowser to Slide Punch it, and sending it into the water again.
He does another punch at the tower's head before it took off out of the water again. This time, it flew back much further away from the lake than before, and Giant Bowser noticed that the lake behind him was very close.
"Oh, crud! If I get sent back, I'll nearly fall into the water!" Giant Bowser flinched.
When the three Mawful Moles showed up to fit the tower's head, Giant Bowser breathed fire at them again. The three Crawfuls showed up again and the same Fawful Bomb volley started. Unfortunately, Giant Bowser's timing was the one who went off this time, and he slid backwards. Now he was the one reaching the lake's edge.
"T-This isn't good!" Giant Bowser stuttered as he saw the Tower of Yikk coming at him.
Then, all of a sudden, a golden aura appeared around Giant Bowser's body!
"Huh?! What the?" Giant Bowser didn't see that coming. "Suddenly, I feel… Stronger!"
He then grabs hold of the tower's body once it was close enough, and manages to push it back.
"Hm, I guess I AM stronger! Let's test this out!" Giant Bowser smirked as he approaches the tower and prepares to do a punch.
To his surprise, thanks to the aura's power, he punched the tower so hard that he sent it flying all the way to the water; something that a normal punch couldn't do.
"Whoa! That was AWESOME!" Giant Bowser was surprised as the golden aura disappears. "Alright, time to end this!"
He quickly rushes to the tower on the water and does one last punch at its face. With that, the Tower of Yikk deactivates and falls down on the ground, motionless. Bowser then returns to normal size and falls down to where he was crushed.
"BWAHAHA!" he laughed in glory. "Not sure what that aura was, but, castle, tower, whatever! I'll pummel anything!"
"Glad that this helped you out on finishing it." Melissa spoke.
"Eh? What do you mean? Are you that Princess Melissa that those chumps kept talking about?"
"I am. But for my and the kingdom's safety, please don't tell anyone that I'm inside you. I'll tell you what happened if you keep this promise, okay?"
"Alright, it's a deal. So, what is it?"
"You see, I was having that feeling that you wouldn't win this fight, so I gave my blessing to you in order to release the power of the Magical Star resting inside your heart."
"Wait, Melissa! Are you telling us that Bowser…" Mario couldn't finish.
"Yes, Bowser is also a Star Child, just like Peach."
"Are you serious?!"
"I'm a Star Child? What?"
"A Star Child is an individual who possesses an extraordinary amount of power, which can only be activated when either I or a Star Sprite offers our blessing to said individual. There are seven of them in total, and they are what the Dark Star is after. So far, my friends know that Peach and now you are two of said Star Children."
"Really? Well, that amount of power I received felt GREAT! Do it again, and Fawful's done for!"
"Sorry, but giving blessings takes a lot of my power. Same goes to a Star Sprite. So we shouldn't give blessings too often, just in danger situations."
"Just like when I grow giant? Weak. AGAIN." Bowser sighed. "Whatever. What's in that tower I just fought, anyway?"
The interior of the Tower of Yikk wasn't as vast as we thought. The walls and floor were made of steel and there were moving gears carved in the walls. Bowser moved forward and rode an elevator, taking him to a floor filled with large pink switches that couldn't be pressed on.
He then finds a room filled with books in a large bookcase implanted on the walls and there was a strange Boo-like machine at the left corner. Bowser saw an open book on a desk and walks to it. But once he picked up the book and looked at its pages, all of them were blank!
"What's with this book? It's totally blank…" he queried, looking through more pages.
Suddenly, the lights in the room went off, and a wall rose at the exit. But that's not all; a light suddenly flashed from the book at Bowser's face, causing him to drop the book in a startle. The book closes and wanders by itself, until it opened again revealing a hologram of a person that looks identical to the tower's design.
"Who has awakened me from my eternal slumber?" he asked.
"Who are you, bub?! You LIVE in there?!" Bowser questioned.
"I am called Yikk." The person named Yikk answered. "Master creator. Bonded genius. Inventor of the Tower of Yikk. And you are?"
"What? You don't know me? ME?!"
"My physical body no longer treads the paths of this world. My soul slumbers in this book, my entire existence distilled into a patchwork of dreams… But you are not of dreams. You are no ordinary being, are you?"
"You got THAT right, buddy! I'm Bowser, the Koopa king!"
"I see… And…are you one tormented by the ageless riddle of Boo?"
"Boo?"
"Yes… Boo…"
Yikk makes the book close and move to the right before opening up again and continuing:
"That which disappears even as one think it appears…"
The book moves again.
"That which appears even as one think it disappears…"
The book moves again, now stopping in front of Bowser.
"A mirage, ephemeral, like the gulf betwixt dreams and waking. I am tormented by the riddle of the Boo. In this place, I have researched their ways. And the result is…"
The book moves closer to the strange machine.
"This Boo-ray Machine!"
"Boo-ray what?"
"The machine's light renders the insides of one's body visible! My proprietary laser emits Boo transparency waves, giving the light its special properties. If you wish to see, stand upon the marked platform before it."
Bowser then does as he was told and stands on the marked part of the floor right in front of the Boo-ray Machine. Yikk then moves the book towards the machine and says:
"Good. Now you must hit the machine's switch."
Bowser hits the red switch on the machine, causing its laser to activate, and illuminating Bowser's chest in an X-ray vision-like.
"Behold! Your body is transparent!"
"Whoa! It's like a spotlight for my gut!"
"In layman's terms, yes. Well? Amazing, isn't it? Makes one feel like saying, 'Wow, that Yikk!' Right? This marks the first usage of the Boo-ray on a living being… I consider the trial a success. Now, to sleep and dream again. Use it all you wish."
The book closes and flies back to the desk.
Back inside Bowser…
"What's with this light?" Wario asked, shielding his eyes a bit.
"I think… There might be some activity back at that area! Let's go check it out!" Starlow said.
Ironically, they were back at the Energy Hold. In an instant, the strange Boo blocks that were blocking the path up ahead vanished with the light.
"Wow! WOW!" Starlow exclaimed. "The barrier that bug escaped under just disappeared!"
"So the light from outside changes this place, huh?" Donkey Kong remarked.
"Now we can resume the chase! C'mon! Let's go!"
Everyone nodded and moved on.
Outside, at Blubble Lake…
"Hmm… Still no sign of the princess…" Viverna surveyed the lake from above, finding no trace of Melissa. "I guess I should keep looking. I don't want to disappoint Lord Fawful."
Then, something came on her mind when she was about to leave:
"But… How come I have no memory of my past at all? Ever since Fawful saved me and I joined him, my memory was all blank before that happened… Who was I? What's my origin?" after pondering for a bit, she decides to shake it off: "No. I better focus on the most important thing right now. I can't distract. I'll search for Princess Melissa first." She flies off. "And hope I can find out who I really am…"
To be continued…
What could be Viverna's past? Will Mario and Co. locate the first sage? Find out next time! Please review.
