You guys must really be wondering. How can I write two chapters so fast? Well, originally, I previously wrote in around 10,000+ words for a chapter, but I thought that it might be too long for a chapter. So I divided that chapter into three chapters. So, yeah. Just so you know. Anyways, here it is. The second chapter.

Prologue 2 : The Radiant World

It was dawn. The background shows a mountain path. As the camera hovers from place to place, it caught a glimpse of something. It was a pink-haired girl in a red dress with a mini-skirt, walking up the mountain path. She seems to be around 14-17 years old, judging by her size. But what is a girl like her doing in the dangerous part of these mountain paths? Guess we'll find out soon enough.

"I can't believe they let me out to hunt them this early. The polwiggles don't even come out until 7:30, or at least when the sun is visible enough. Now who would need their skins and jelly-outer so bad this early in the morning? I mean, it's only 6:18. Guess I'll just have to search elsewhere then." said the pink-haired girl. Apparently, she's hunting some monsters. But I guess the monsters don't come out until said times.

She then climbed higher up the mountain paths. 15 minutes or so have passed and still not even the said monster appeared. "So far, only Bees and Beak Axes. No polwiggles." She continued climbing up the mountain path until she reached what appears to be the top of the mountain. Wow, I never thought a mountain can be this low. But look around you. There are lots of connecting mountains in this area. I guess this place is a mountain biome then. As she reached the top, still not a single polwiggle appeared. She was really disappointed.

"Still no polwiggles? Oh come on... I'm hungry..." She was already tired as she still hadn't had her breakfast yet.

As she was sitting down to rest, she saw a flare up in the sky. When she looked up, she saw a rather small meteor. Upon closer inspection, the meteor is actually heading her direction.

"A meteor? Oh my, it's heading my direction!" With just moments to spare, she barely managed to escape the meteor. Yes, she was knocked back by the impact caused by the meteor and passed out for a while. Hence, the word 'barely'. But I must say, for a small meteor, the crater it created was quite big. Around 10 meters in diameter to be exact.

After the dust have cleared out, in the middle of the crater was a little girl with purple hair with 2 D-pad accessories on her hair. Yep, that's Neptune all right. But something seems different about her. It must be her new clothes. Instead of her usual white hoodies with USB strings, her purple and white stockings and her purple shoes, she's now wearing a white-and-purple suit(which look like a one-piece swimsuit) with a mini-skirt attached to it, a small purple jacket with white stripes at the sides, purple gloves, purple bracelets, white shoes and white stockings with purple stripes on it. Now that's a lot more purple than before. But still, she's still recognizable.(I'll leave Neptune's new outfit to your imaginations)

Upon recovering, the pink-haired girl(God, when will we get to know her name?) ran over to the crater and found Neptune laying down at the center of the crater, still unconscious. "Oh my god! Sh-sh-she-... Did she just fell down from the sky?" she screamed in terror.

"Oh no! She must have hurt herself really bad! I hope she's not dead. Please don't be dead. Wait, what am I doing? I got to save her! Hang on!" she, uh..., reminded herself(?). And so, she went down the crater, pulled Neptune out of the crater and began treating her wounds. Oh you know, cleaning her cuts/bruises/etc., wrapping bandages... Seeing she's still not recovering, she began to cast a healing spell on her. "O' healing power. First Aid!" was what she chanted to cast said spell.

Well, after casting 'First Aid' on her, she's still unconscious. Fearing any monster might sneak-attack them, she wanted the girl(Neptune) to wake up as fast as possible. So, she tried to wake her up herself. "Hey, wake up. You're not dead, are you? Come on, wake up!" She shook her body slowly, then harder, then vigorously. But Neptune still hasn't wake up. She began to worry. She feared she might have healed her a bit too late. After a short while, she thought she saw Neptune's eyes move. So she continued shaking her body like mad. Finally after a few minutes, Neptune wakes up.

"Thank goodness you're alright. Hey, are you okay there, kid? You've had quite a fall just now. You're seriously not dead, are you? Please tell me you're alright." the pink-haired girl asked Neptune. Neptune, who just woke up, got up and took a look around her until she finally noticed the pink-haired girl sitting beside her. Surprisingly, she just stood up like nothing has happened. It looks like she wasn't hurt at all. I know, the pink-haired girl was just as surprised as we were. The pink-haired girl then stood up and walked towards Neptune.

"Wow, you sure recover fast." the girl said. Neptune looked behind to see the girl standing behind her and asked, "Hey, pinkie. What's your name? Do you know where we are now? What's your favorite cookie?" The girl looked surprised at her mountain of questions. But with a giggle, she answered, "Well firstly, my name is Kanonno. Kanonno Grassvalley. Just call me Kanonno if you want. And we are currently at Mt. Rhubarb. What's your name?" "Neptune. Say, you haven't even answered my last question yet."Neptune replied. (Do I really have to answer that?)Kanonno could feel a drop of sweat forming at the back of her head at that thought. But she answered anyways. "My favorite cookie? Well, chocolate chip cookies then, I guess." While showing a thumbs-up to her with a "XD" expression on her face, she replied, "You seriously answered that? Man, you sure are a worrywart." And there she laughed her butt off while Kanonno facepalmed behind her with an "Oh God, why?" expression.

"So, anyways Kan- uhh... I'll just call you Kanonno. Can't think of a better nickname for you. So, anyways Kanonno, what kind of place is this actually? What world, I mean. Cause this looks like nothing from where I came from. And how did I even get here?" Neptune asked Kanonno about her whereabouts. "You don't remember?" Kanonno asked. "Nope, doesn't ring a bell to me. The only tning I remember is I was following this...floating light-thingy into the depths of Virtua Forest. And then it circulated around me, and some light shone upon me. And the next thing I knew is, I was here. With you. I don't know what actually happened."

"Well, just now I saw you falling from the sky, and landed head-first. You really had quite a fall just now. Oh, so no wonder you don't remember much. You might have lost some memories upon landing here. Now that makes sense. But a floating light-thingy you said? Hmm... A-Anyways, the world we are in right now is called Luminasia. So where are you from, Neptune?" "Oh, I'm from Gamindustri. I bet you have never heard of it because I've never heard of this world too." Neptune claimed. "Gamindustri, huh? Weird name. Not insulting your world, really. Just... it sounds weird to me." "Yeah, Luminasia kinda sounds weird to me too." Neptune said with a chuckle. "Guess whatever that's foreign to us is always weird, huh?"

"Wait, you did say I had "quite a fall", right? What do you actually mean by that?" Kanonno wondered for a while to find the right answer. But she just answered the best she could. "Well, you see. Just now, when I reached the top, I saw a small meteor. It was heading my direction. And I was nearly got hit by it too. But it turns out that you are the meteor. And you were badly hurt too. I guess you landed head first, but surprisingly you didn't suffer any head or brain damage, which is good. And-"

"Okay, okay. I've heard enough." Neptune cut her off. "So you're saying I fell from the sky. Like a shooting star?" "Yes, but shooting star? I guess?" Kanonno was unsure what to answer. "Wow, that makes this the third time then." said Neptune while she scratched her head.

"Third...time? What do you mean?" Kanonno asked. "Well, to put it simple, the first time is when I was banished from Celestia, into Gamindustri after a fight with the other Goddesses.. That's also when I lost my memories which I've recovered months after. The second one is when my sister was made the Goddess of Planeptune. I was pushed of off Celestia this time, but accidentally brought along the other Goddesses with me, which resulted in all of us falling down to Gamindustri. I guess I really must have a thing with falling from great heights." And then, they both laughed over what they've talked about just now.

Looking at her surroundings, Kanonno felt that it is not safe for Neptune to be here. "Hey, this place'll get dangerous if we wait here too long. How about if I bring you back to our Van Eltia? You can stay there until we find a way to your home. Don't worry, you'll love it there."

"Our?" Neptune asked with a giant question mark on her head. "Oh yeah. The Van Eltia is a ship. A big one. That's where my home and where our guild "Ad Libitum" are. There are lots of people there or rather, were. Most of them have left for reasons I don't know of." Kanonno explained to Neptune.

"So, basically, this Van Eltia is kind of like a moving house that houses many other people and a guild, huh?" Then she smacked her hand as if she got a brilliant idea. "Sweet! That sure sounds super amazing. Surely there are other people in the guild, right? And it must be a big one, is it? Is it?"

"Yeah, it is. Well, I don't want to waste my time explaining the Van Eltia to you, so I'll just show it to you myself. Besides, I have a quest that I need to complete."

"What kind of quest? Ooh, ooh. Is it a hunting quest?" Before Neptune could continue asking any further, Kanonno replied, "Yeah, a looting quest, actually. I'm looking out for some polwiggles but you probably don't know what a polwiggle is, so I'll show it to you if I'll ever find one at this time of the day... *sigh* I've been searching for them for an hour now and still none showed up yet." Kanonno seems so down and disappointed and looked like she was about to cry anytime. And Neptune just knows how to cheer Kanonno up.

"Aw, don't you worry, pinkie. We'll find them eventually. The- the Ball-wiggles" "Polwiggles" Kanonno corrected her. "Yeah, the all-wiggles. I'll even help you find them, 'kay, Kanonno?" Kanonno felt like crying, for some reason, but managed to hide her feelings.

"Thanks, Neptune. It's funny 'cause I'm getting help from someone I just met a few minutes ago. You're really kind, Neptune." Neptune just blushes prior to receiving the compliment form Kanonno.

"Really? 'Cause I always get the opposite, you know. I mean, I've been such a nuisance back at my home and the last thing I did there was having a quarrel with one of my best friends and ran away from home."

"Don't worry. I'm sure they'll accept you when you return." But Neptune still has other things to say. "Hey, I've been causing trouble for them for a long time. For my friends, my family and my guild. Hey, it's not like I have regrets anyways. It's Iffy's fault. Why does she always have to turn small problems into bigger problems anyways? She can't tell me what to do. Hey, it's my life. I do what I want, when I want and where I want it to be. Just because I didn't do much work nowadays doesn't mean she has the right to be bossy towards me. And they always tried to make me sleep outside. And by outside, I mean literally. Outside the Basilicom, where I live. I don't think they'll forgive me that easily. And I don't think my disappearance will be missed anyways... Except for my sister, maybe... Just so you know."

Kanonno somehow managed to understand the pains in Neptune's life. Being forced around and such. But Neptune, you know her. She is good at changing the subjects in conversations. "Anyways, you know you can always call me by other nicknames like Nepty, Neppie, Neptuna, Nep-Nep, Neppermint, Neppersnapper or whatever that suits you." Kanonno's answer was simple, "Just Neptune is fine." Neptune doesn't seem to care much anyways. "Fine by me."

And so, Kanonno brought Neptune down the mountain paths until they went to a place where a bridge was not supposed to be drawn up, closing their path. "What the? Who drew up this bridge? There's nobody else but me here." Neptune clears her throat. "Before I met you, of course. But what could have drawn this bridge?"

Being a care-free person she is, Neptune calmly answered, "Oh. Who cares? Let's just bust this bridge open. Oh hey look, a switch!" She ran to a switch located nearby and pressed it without a delay, worrying Kanonno at the same time. "Be careful, you might not know what that switch does." And shortly after, the bridge came down, opening their path. "Woah, lucky." Kanonno said to herself quietly. "All right, then. March forward!" And so, Neptune began marching like a scout in the while singsong "Le~t's go! Le~t's go! Le~t's le~t's go~!". The way she's acting kinda reminds me of a certain girl with kitty-ears who carries a black cat on her shoulders that goes around the world searching for mysteries to be solved.

Then they continued down the paths until they encountered a round-shaped creature which look like a hybrid of a legless squirrel and a legless cat. Looks cute enough.

"Oh, finally one appeared!" Kanonno was excited about the appearance of what seems to be a Polwiggle. "Sweet! After this one, there should be five more to hunt."

"Aw. Isn't this the cutest thing ever? So cute I don't think I can bring myself to hurt 'im. But why are you hunting this thing? Don't you like cutie-wutie things?" Neptune asked with her big "puppy" eyes staring at Kanonno.

"No, no. Of course I like cute things. But this one is, um..., different. This one is actually dangerous." Kanonno was trying her best to convince Neptune that Polwiggles are actually dangerous. "How dangerous?"

"Well, they usually attack stealthily. But this one seems like a scout, so it shouldn't be that much of a problem. But the good thing about Polwiggles is that they don't attack unless provoked. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. They can be tamed if you give it some sweet stuff, but if you don't they'll get angry and will attack you aggressively to their deaths, which means they'll continue attacking until either you or the Polwiggles are dead." Kanonno explained a bit about Polwiggles.

"Well, I don't know about you, but this one seems provoked already." Neptune told her as the Polwiggle slowly approach them. "Already? But what could've set it- Oh no! When I said "Sweet" just now, it probably thought I have some sweet stuff to give to it. Now it's really angry for not getting that sweet stuff." Seeing the polwiggle is already close to them, Kanonno warned Neptune. "Well then, it looks like it's battle time, Neptune." "Yeah, let's beat them into the grounds and then finish your quest." Neptune raised her right hand high in the sky and let out a "YEAH!" to lift the mood(I think).

*entering battle mode[The Sword Sparks BGM from TOW:RM3 starts playing in the background]*

"All right, Neptune. Stay back. You don't have a weapon so that means you can't fight."warned Kanonno. "Who says I can't fight? I have defeated a former goddess in the past, just so you know. I can fight pretty well. It's not like YOU have a weapon either."replied Neptune. "Oh, I have one all right. Watch."she said as she drew her red-crimson broadsword which has white-colored edges and two wings on the handle that magically appeared in her hands and she let it rest to her right, entering her battle stance. "Cool-eos! I can do that too!" exclaimed Neptune as she too drew her broadsword that also magically appeared in her hands and she raised it to her front, slightly above waist level, also entering her battle stance. "Oh, so you have a weapon. All right, let's go!" Not wanting to waste any more time, they engage into battle with the Polwiggle.

Without a delay, Neptune charged right towards the Polwiggle which just rolled out of the way, leading Neptune to a miss. But our little Neptune here has other plans. You see, she planned that if she did missed(like she participated), she'll stop her motion, turn around, draw her gun that, again, magically appeared in her left hand and then aim at the Polwiggle, which is what she will do now. She managed to carry out her plan and managed to get three shots at the Polwiggle with her supposed-to-be finishing shot totally missed her target by a few inches. By now the Polwiggle is weakened but that didn't stop it from attacking. And from behind, Kanonno finishes off that Polwiggle with her [Tiger Blade], a upward, vertical, jumping slash that throw the enemy slightly up into the air followed by a downward slash that brings the skill-user and the enemy back to the ground, and thus, getting her the kill.

"Aw, no fair! You totally, like, KS'ed me there. If I hadn't missed there, I would've gotten the kill. Aw, crackers." Neptune, with a "DX" face, complained. "Well, it's not my fault you missed. And what's a "KS"? I swear, wherever you're from, there are probably a lot of words and terms that I won't understand. And you're starting to get on my nerves too." Kanonno was surely annoyed by Neptune's current behavior. "Oh. "KS" means "Kill Steal". It's when you steal someone else's kill. Or kills. But that's okay, there's probably a lot more that we have to slay, right? So I'll let you off this time. LOL." Neptune calmed herself. (Wow, she's calmed down already? Wow, she must really have bad memory space.) Kanonno, again, felt a large drop of sweat moved down the back of her head.

Shortly after, when they just began continuing down the mountain paths, another Polwiggle appeared. But this one, after seeing the previous polwiggle been killed by them, it attacked them the same instant it met them. But the action taken by this Polwiggle didn't take them out by surprise. They barely managed to dodge it. Seeing the Polwiggle failed to land the first hit, Neptune strikes the Polwiggle by using her [Dual Edge] attack, an upward slash followed by a midair, horizontal single-spin slash, which throws the Polwiggle backwards, stunning it at the same time. In the meantime, Kanonno started to cast a spell. "Step aside, Neptune." Kanonno warned as she was about to cast. "Take this. [Lightning]!" No sooner as she said that, a lightning strikes the Polwiggle from above. But amazingly, the Polwiggle is still alive. What a fail there. Neptune, not wanting to miss any chances, took out her gun and shot the Polwiggle. It only took a shot to kill the already-weakened Polwiggle. At least she got her "payback".

"Payback, Kanonno. Hah! Now it is ME who got the kill. Hahaha..." "Gee, Neptune. Do I really have to remind you that this is not some kind of game. This is teamwork. It doesn't matter who gets the kill." scolded Kanonno. "Yeah, yeah. I know. I'm just joking about now and before. Geez..."

*later*

As they went down the mountain, they came across more and more polwiggles until it was just enough to complete Kanonno's quest. "All right, that's the last of it. Our quest is finished. Let's head down and wait for my crew to pick me up." said Kanonno. "Pick you up? Do you travel by ship?" asked Neptune. "I told you before. The Van Eltia is a ship and a home for the guild, "Ad Libitum.". So the Van Eltia will be picking me up.. Actually, the Van Eltia is my home. I live in that ship." told Kanonno. "Yeah, cool. Awesomesauce."

While they were walking, they heard a loud growl. "What was that?" both asked. And then they heard the loud growl again. And again, getting louder each time. "Be careful, there could be a Garm Wolf nearby." "Garm wolf? Is it strong?" Neptune was probably scared by now. And so as Kanonno. "Yes. Really strong. And if it attacks in groups, that's a dead end for us." Kanonno explained. "*gulp* Now that's scary..." And after a while, the growling is not heard of anymore. But just when they thought it's safe, another loud growl is heard. But it is so loud that it started to sound like a roar instead. "This looks like a big problem..." By now, they have readied their swords in their hands and were standing back-to-back, holding their defensive stances. Kanonno was shaking like crazy while Neptune was... Shaking and looking rather weak. And then the moment of truth came out.

"Hey, can we get something to eat? I'm hungry..." Neptune asked weakly. "Not now. We need to defend ourselves for this upcoming attack." Kanonno replied. "I... I-I actually found out what made these growls." "Really?" Well, what do you know, she can be useful at times. "Yeah," As she started explaining, Neptune was already blushing. Her face was crimson red. "I-I-It was me. My stomach did this." And she hold her stomach which seems to growl really loudly. "It was already nighttime at my world before I was transported here. And I haven't even had lunch that time. Man, I'm starving to death here... I usually need at least 6 meals a day..."

*~growl~*

"Please don't say that. I'm hungry too, you know..." A soft growl is heard. Yeah, Kanonno was hungry too. But our little Neptune here is starving. "Please, I need food."

"Sorry, Neptune, but I didn't bring any food myself too... Don't worry, it's almost picking time. So once we're at the Van Eltia, you can eat as much as you want. That is, as long as you don't eat a ton of food like Reid does. His idea of a meal is like a week's worth of food." Kanonno said. "Stop it. No more talks about food. Let's just get there already..." Neptune said weakly.

Then they continued their way down the mountain, until... *~AWOOOOOOO!~* A loud howl was heard from a distance. The instant the girls heard that, they got into their battle stances. They stood back-to-back, looking around to spot whatever that's gonna be attacking them soon. And after a short while later, a rather large wolf appeared in front of them. And this one sure looks hungry, judging from its eyes. "A wolf?! There aren't supposed to be wolves here." Kanonno exclaimed in surprise. Like she said, wolves aren't supposed to be here. "Do you think it's a stray one?" Neptune asked. "I don't think so." She looked around for a little bit. "But seeing that this is the only wolf around here, we might stand a chance on this one. So let's take it down." "Now, that's my girl." Neptune said as she patted Kanonno's head, somehow, seeing that Neptune's height only reached Kanonno's ears. (I'm not a little girl, you know. I'm older than you.) thought Kanonno while another cliched sweat form at the side of her head and felt an annoyance as a cross-shaped blood veins formed at her head with her eyes closed shut, making an angry expression while gritting her teeth and forcefully made her mouth smile.

*boss battle[Tide on Edge BGM from TOW:RM3 starts playing in the background]*

The girls are already in their battle stances, parrying, ready to block any attack the wolf will use on them. Kanonno then began explaining their strategy. "All right. From what I've heard from other people, Wolves usually start with a pounce, followed by a few claw slashes and then their attack patterns will randomize. Or so I've heard."

"So, after those two starting attacks, we just do what we can, right?" Neptune asked, just to make sure. "I don't know. I mean I've heard them, but things like that can be unreliable, you know?" "Okay, missy. Let's beat it down." After analyzing the girls for a while, the wolf began to pounce them, but missed them by a little bit as they have anticipated for what the wolf was about to do. But instead of a flurry of claw slashes, the wolf shot out a few puffs of air out of its mouth towards the two girls. They were surprised by the sudden change of tactics and got hit by them.

In Neptune's vision, in the top-left corner of her vision, she can see her health had just dropped into the yellow zone, which is below 40% while Kanonno's just above 50%. But next to her(Kanonno's) health bar(which is green in colour), she saw numbers that may represent HP. She saw Kanonno had 214/395 HP while Neptune has 201/512 HP. (So that means Kanonno must be a support-type.) she thought. Then she saw a blue bar below the HP bar, which she hasn't noticed yet. Had it, "TP". Beside it are numbers that represent that value. Kanonno had 32/127 TP while Neptune has a mere 31/67 TP.

"What am I doing? This isn't the time to be fooling around. We'll be its breakfast if we don't kill it. Speaking of which, I'm hungry... Why did I reminded myself of it?" said Neptune in a low voice. She was going to help Kanonno who was still blocking the wolf's attacks. But due to her intensive hunger, she couldn't do much.

But then she saw the enemy's parameters. Had it, -?-. LVL 40. HP : 3209/3219. TP : 25/25. (Wow, that's an unusually high level for a beginner's dungeon) Neptune thought and while looking at their levels. What a shock that meets Neptune's eyes as she saw that both Kanonno and her are only at LVL 3. And here she thought everything is over when suddenly, an idea struck her head. Well, this isn't like Neptune at all. But who cares! Whatever her idea was, she needs it to get her and Kanonno to safety.

Well, anyways, she came up with a plan and began sharing it with Kanonno. "Kanonno, I need you to distract 'im. Think you can do that?" Kanonno, surprised to see that the bubbly girl Neptune actually has a plan, began hearing her out. "Okay. What are you going to do? Are you going to pull off some strong attack?" Kanonno asked curiously.

"Yes, though this may take a while to charge. Until I give the signal, you move out of the way. Understand?" Neptune said in a serious tone that Kanonno obeyed her with no objection. You'll know shit will get super serious when a happy-go-lucky, bubbly and rather careless girl turns serious for once. (I hope my body is strong enough to use that attack though...) thought Neptune.

She realizes that she might be risking herself in this, but seeing that no other options are available, she had to do it. "All right, I'm gonna charge my energy now. Try to keep it away from me as long as possible." "Got you loud and clear, Neptune." Kanonno said with a confident look on her face. "Alright, be careful." Neptune said to Kanonno. After giving her a nod as an answer, she proceeds to distract the wolf.

Neptune stands on the ground where she's at, with her hands clasped together to her front at waist level, she began to gather energy. Now mind you, this one is a high-leveled attack she's about to unleash. With her current level, it may kill her. But she's decided to do it anyways. There she was, gathering her energy to the max(if that's how you put it). When the attack's about ready, she called out "Kanonno!" upon hearing Neptune's signal she backed away from the wolf. "All right, here I go! {32-Caliber X-Blade}!"(Note: Still waiting for the English release of HDN Victory, so the skill names(like this one) may not be right as of now. This attack is only available in HDN Victory.) Then, the sky suddenly darkened and in the sky, a large blade appeared and flew straight towards the wolf, hitting it and killing it instantly while causing a medium-sized explosion.

"Wow, cool!" Kanonno said when saw what Neptune did to the wolf. After the explosion, Kanonno ran up to Neptune, only to find her lying on the ground, face down. She was unconscious, or was she? "Oh no. Neptune! Please, hang in there Neptune! I'm here to save you." Seeing no response from Neptune, she continued to try to wake her up. Still not waking up, she began healing her. Neptune, who was barely conscious, barely heard the few last words that came out from Kanonno's mouth before blacking out. "Neptune! Please, stay with me! ...tune! Pl... don't die ... Live! Live! ... NEPTUNE!"

/What has actually happened to Neptune? is she still alive? Or is it the end of Neptune? Will she really be able to survive? And what are Neptune's friends back at Gamindustri probably doing right now? Find out on the next episode of ToN:HDM.

{Next time on ToN:HDM, Prologue 3 : A Newcomer from Planeptune.}

Ooh... The first cliffhanger. So, did you like it? Hey, don't forget I'm trying my best here, you know.

To tell you the truth though, writing a fanfic is not as easy as it sounds. Yeah, I first thought this was easy, but nope. It's harder than I thought.