Chapter Two: The Dream fights back

Surrounded on all sides by the armies of the evil King Wart, Mario and his friends braced themselves for the end. Clawgrip motioned a claw forward, and a bob-omb slowly marched towards the two plumbers, Princess Toadstool, and her footman as the wick on the bomb's head lit. Then, in a moment of desperation,Toad lunged forward, grabbed the bob-omb and threw it back at the attacking army. The explosion vaporized several shyguys with a loud 'BOMB!' sound effect. Upon seeing this, Mario exclaimed;

"Hey, we can't hurt these big palookas, but they can hurt each other!" Mario exclaimed, rushing towards a snifit, dodging his bullets, and picking him up over his head, and throwing him at a shyguy, destroying both of them in a puff of smoke upon contact. "Use them against each other!"

The other three smiled, and they all rushed forward, and picked up their startled foes, throwing them back at the rest of their attackers. The monsters all rushed forward, ready to attack the quartet of heroes. But they were hit by a barrage of their own allies, as a barrage of shyguys, snifits and bob-ombs flew towards them. Each then began chucking their foes at each other, destroy wave after wave of the evil monsters.

And as they fought, exposure to the invaders caused the quartet to be charged with the energies of Subcon, enhancing their abilities. The princess leapt high into the air, and found she could float in the air for several minutes, instead of just using her dress to glide to the ground. She used her ability to levitate from albatoss to albatoss, grabbing the bombs from the red birds, and reigning the explosives down on the subrosian forces. Toad found his strength had increased greatly, and rushed forward to grab the shyguys off the backs of their ostro mounts, and hurl both beast and rider back at their foes. And Luigi found he could leap far higher than the others, his feet fluttering in the air like a ballerina as he came back down onto the enemies.

"Mama mia, look what I'm doing!" Luigi exclaimed, as he soared up and down. "I'm jumping around like a jackrabbit!"

"Something happened to us, I could never fly like this before!" The Princess exclaimed, gabbing a snifit off the ground, and floating up on use it to knock the last albatoss out of the air. "We've never been able to do things like this before!"

"Hey guys, look at how strong I am now!" Toad exclaimed with glee, picking up an autobomb in each hand, and tossing them at the other autobombs, causing a huge explosion that wiped out the rolling canons. "I could be my own hero!"

"Huh, nothing's changed for me." Mario noted, dodging several snifit bullets, before tossing a bob-omb at the shuguy-like monsters who were shooting at him. "Eh, it doesn't matter, I'll still kick their keesters in!"

After discovering their new powers, the four finally finished off most of the invading army, leaving only the giant crab-like commander. The four of them surrounded Clawgrip, who took an angry fighting stance.

"Nyarrr, we may have finished off me forces, but ye'll nevar defeat me!" The crustacean roared, digging into the soil with his claws, and digging out massive rocks out of the ground. "I'll send all of ye landlubbers ta Davey Jones's locker!"

Calwgrip started hurling the oversized boulders at Mario and the others, who dodged every which way to avoid all of the oversized projectiles. The princess jumped in, trying to punch at the giant crab's tough shell, but was caught in it's giant pincer.

"Ugh, this is tighter than a girdle!" Toadstool groaned, as the pincer squeezed her waist, trying to break her in half. "Let me go, your overgrown lobster!"

"Arrr, I be crab, not a lobster!" Clawgrip roared in anger, squeezing tighter. "I don't care if ye are a princess! I'll crush ye into seafood, ye scurvy scaliwag!"

It was then that Toad grabbed one of the hurled boulders, and tossed it back at the oversized crab. Clawgrip howled in pain, dropping Princess Toadstool to the ground.

"His own rocks hurt him... Peach, see if you can keep him distracted!" Mario exclaimed, as the princess jumped out of the way. "Okay everybody! Let's make this oversized seafood entree into crab cakes!"

Princess Toadstool nodded, jumping into the air over Clawgrip's head, and floating around back and forth to keep his claws snapping at the air. Luigi and Toad then began hurling boulders at the giant crustacean, smashing into it's body, and slowly cracking it's shell open.

"Nyarr! This be it!" The giant crab wailed, as a final boulder completely shattered it's shell. "Time fer me ta walk the plank!"

Mario then leunged towards Clawgrip's now-exposed innards with a mighty punch, destroying the creature in a puff of Subcon dream smoke. The four heroes were then left in the badly damaged marketplace of Toad Town, looking around, and wondering what had happened.

"Whoa, what was that all about?" Luigi asked, surveying the damage. "Who were those guys, and where did they come from?"

"Oh no, my poor people!" Peach exclaimed, helping up several mushroom folk who hadn't been able to flee during the battle, and had been knocked down in the melee. "As if they haven't suffered enough during Bowser's attacks, and now we have this!"

"The monster mentioned Wart, the king of nightmares from the old mushroom folk legends." Toad added, picking up rubble with his super strength to free some trapped mushroom people. "He's the one who terrorizes the people of our world with nightmares, I guess he must be real after all."

"Then he must be responsible for this attack." Mario added, gently picking up a downed brick wall to free a mushroom child. "After we help these mushroom people and clean up Toad Town, we need to get back to the castle, and figure out our next move."

...

Meanwhile... far, far away from the Mushroom Kingdom, far to the east beyond the desert, stood the vast empire of Sarasaland. The largest nation of the Mushroom world, it is a federation comprised of four kingdoms. First is the Chai Kingdom, resembling earth's ancient china, and inhabited by the blue-skinned humanoid pionpi, Then the aquatic realm of Muda, inhabited by the sentient seahorse-like Yurarin. Also is the Polynesian-resembling Easton kingdom, inhabited by the moai-like tokotoko race of living stone. And the egyptian-esque Birabuto kingdom, home to the Sphinx-like gao. These four lands, all bordering on each other, lived in perfect harmony, under the authority of one imperial sovereign.

At the center where the four kingdoms meet, stood the royal palace of Sarasaland. Composed of the architectural styles of the four lands, the structure had pagoda drum towers standing side-by-side with glistening pyramids. On the palace's balcony stood a beautiful young woman, looking out over the landscape. The blue eyed, brown-haired maiden looked greatly resembled Princess Peach, except for her deeply tanned skin and slightly more athletic build. She was wearing a yellow bedlah belly dancing outfit, with baggy see-though pant leggings, a low cut halter top, and a translucent veil and golden crown.

This was the princess of Sarasaland, adopted daughter of the late emperor, whose royal guards had found her as a toddler crawling out of a warp pipe. She had been raised in the ways of her adopted lands; such as the fighting martial arts of Chai, and the exotic belly dancing of Birabuto. Her sports and combat training kept her far more fit than most princesses of this world, and added to her ever growing reputation as a tomboy.

As the princess gazed out at the open sky, two buzzbees- the anthropomorphic bees who wielded twin spears, and served as the princess's royal guards- landed on the balcony behind her, and bowed.

"Princess Daisy, we have received word from the merchants caravans to Mushroom Kingdom." One of the buzzbees informed her. "As you predicted, Princess Toadstool and her plumber guardians managed to drive them back."

"Then things are going just as my dreams had predicted." The princess replied, turning to face them. "Tell my servants to prepare some guest rooms, I suspect we will have some foreign visitors soon."

"Yes, princess Daisy, as you wish." The buzzbees bowed again, and took back off into patrols in the skies around Sarasaland.

Walking back into her royal bedchambers, Princess Daisy considered everything that was happening. For the past year, Daisy had been having dreams about this mysterious princess from the west who eerily resembled her. She had actually felt Princess Toadstool's fear through the dreams when she was dealing with that Koopa King. Daisy had tried to send the western princess her courage through her dreams, turning her into a 'girl boss' for a brief time, and giving her the courage to help the Marios defeat Bowser and his army. The 'girl boss' attitude had since faded away, and Peach had now returned to her former girly self. Daisy suspected That King Wart was somehow responsible for her being able to give Princess Toadstool that courage through dreams, but she would have to talk with this 'Peach' in person first to be certain.

Now, those same dreams now told her that the western princess would soon be coming to her part of the world, and they would have to work together to overcome Wart. The princess of Sarasaland smiled, looking down at herself. She would have to tell her ladies in waiting to prepare her yellow western-style princess gown; she could just imagine how Peach would react if she met Daisy dressed in a see-though harem outfit and a thong. Stifling a small laugh over cultural differences, Daisy opened her wardrobe, and began planning her next move.

To be continued...