Luigi and Ridley made their way from the castle back into Toad Town. Ridley had no idea where they were going, so he just followed Luigi as they walked along the brick road leading into town. They passed by the post office on their way to the eastern entrance of town when they heard someone call out to them.
"Hello, Mario Brothers! May I have a word with you before you go?"
Ridley turned to see an old man in a purple cloak with a massive bushy white mustache standing outside a blue house with a strange, spinning roof. The man's face was obscured by his hood so that the only thing visible other than his giant mustache was his glowing yellow eyes.
"Oh, hi-a Merlon." Luigi seemed to know who the man was but was confused that he was speaking to them. "What-a do you want to talk to-a us about?"
"Well you see," Merlon started, "Last night as I was dreaming my ancestor, Madame Merlar, visited me in the dream and told me that the princess would be kidnapped."
"If-a you came to warn us, then you're-a too late. Bowser's-a already taken her again." Luigi replied. Ridley noticed from his body language that Luigi seemed oddly eager not to get into a conversation with Merlon.
"Oh, I know. My ancestor told me that nothing could be done to stop it from happening, otherwise I would have already tried to prevent the Princess from getting kidnapped."
"Well-a, we really need to-a go and rescue Princess Peach now." Luigi started to back away from Merlon cautiously.
"Wait!" Merlon called out to him. "I'm not done yet. You see, after my ancestor told me that the Princess would be kidnapped she told me that you, the Mario Bros., would go and rescue her like you always do. But she said that you will end up facing some harder challenges than you have ever faced before and that you will need help on your journey."
"Then what-a do we need to do?" Luigi asked.
"Well, you see, it all started a long time ago when my ancestor, Madame Merlar, was just a young girl. It had been prophesied that she would one day be a great messenger of the stars one day but before that happened she had to go on a long, grueling quest to defeat a monster called the Blizzaurus which had started causing problems for her village.
You see, back then whole villages would work together to grow crops needed to sustain them. But my ancestor, Madame Merlar, and her people lived up in the north where it was so cold and icy that almost nothing could grow. They were able to grow enough food to survive up there but then Blizzaurus showed up one day and started eating their crops before they could be harvested. This meant that the people would eventually starve unless they could do something to stop Blizzaurus. So the people of the village drew lots to decide who would have to stop Blizzaurus from eating their crops. You see, back then people would draw lots to make these kinds of decisions when no one wanted to be the person who had to do something but someone had to do it and of course no one wanted to be the one to have to face Blizzaurus as it was a giant dragon that could freeze things with its breath. So, the people of the village drew lots and my ancestor, Madam Merlar, drew the short stick. Literally, as that's how drawing lots actually works. Everyone grabs a stick and whoever ends up with the stick that's shorter than the others is the one who ends up having to do the thing that no one wants to do but someone still has to.
Now my ancestor, Madame Merlar, knew that there was no way that she would be able to defeat Bilzzaurus on her own so she set out to find help. She traveled all around the land, which we now call the Mushroom Kingdom, in search of anyone who would aid her in her quest to defeat Blizzaurus. Unfortunately, no one at the time had ever managed to defeat a monster that powerful before so no one was willing to even try. Eventually, however, she came to a small village where she met a young man whose name known as Merthur, who also happens to be one of my ancestors. Merlthur agreed to help my ancestor, Madame Merlar, but even with the two of them, they wouldn't be enough to stop Blizzaurus. So they needed to find some way of actually being able to defeat a dragon."
Luigi had already fallen asleep while trying to listen to Merlon's story and Ridley found it hard to stay focused on what the old man was saying. He would have preferred to cut the old man's story short by simply devouring the miserable storyteller but he really didn't want to see what exactly Rosalina would do to him if he gave in to his instincts like that. He was able to pay attention to the full thing and after several hours had passed he finally reached the end of the story.
"And so my ancestors, Madame Merlar and Merlthur completed the twentieth and final task given to them so that they were allowed to return to the village with their new powers before Blizzaurus could eat the next year's crops. They waited for the dragon to arrive and as soon as they did they were able to ambush him and defeat Blizzaurus once and for all. They saved the village from starvation and were able to live the rest of their lives together happily, eventually having a son who had a daughter who had a daughter who had a son who had a son who had a daughter who had a son who had a son who had a daughter who had a daughter who had a son who had a daughter who had a son who had a son who had a son who had a daughter who had a daughter who had a daughter who had a son who had a son who is me. So, do you see what you must do now?"
"Actually I fail to see how any of that relates to what we're doing." Ridley replied as Luigi finally woke up. "Also, I'm a bit confused about the part where Merlthur died during the 13th task where they had to through the evil ring into the volcano and Merlar was able to bring him back from the afterlife as the 14th task. Didn't the gods already have all twenty tasks picked out for them from the beginning? Does that mean that they already knew that Merlthur was going to die? Because if they did then that would imply that they already knew that the two would be able to complete all of the tasks successfully and if that's the case then what was the point of even having them go through all of the tasks in the first place?"
"I believe it was so that they would be able to develop the strength of character needed to be able to defeat Blizzaurus." Merlon answered.
"But one of the tasks involved stopping a war and other required them to kill an immortal sorcerer. Even just fighting through all of those guardians protecting the palace where they were given the tasks seemed like an even more impressive feat than actually stopping the dragon at the end."
"I suppose you do have a point." Merlon agreed. "But that's not really the issue here."
"What-a were we even supposed to have-a learned from that story?" Luigi asked, pretending that he had any idea what Merlon and Ridley were talking about.
"What? Oh, right." Merlon paused for a moment. "I don't actually remember. I was so busy telling the story that I forgot why I was supposed to tell it to you."
Luigi sighed. "Well, then-a I guess we-a really should be going. We-a do still need to-a save Princess Peach after all."
"Right, right." Merlon nodded. "I don't want to take up any more of your time. Good luck!"
"Thank-a you." Luigi nodded and turned away, taking several steps before running the rest of the way out of town so that they wouldn't have any more interruptions on the way. Ridley was able to keep up with him easily. "Okey-dokey. Let's-a go for real this-a time. No-a more distractions."
"Yes." Ridley agreed. "I don't think that I could handle another story like that."
"Still, it-a would have been-a nice if he-a could have-a told us would we-a were actually supposed to-a do."
"I doubt it was anything important." Ridley said. "I don't buy into all of that psychic nonsense."
"Really?" Luigi was surprised to hear this from the giant space dragon that he believed to be his now-deceased brother. "But-a Merlon's fortunes have-a never been-a wrong before."
"It's all just a scam. I'm sure he probably sets things up so that it seems like he can tell the future just so that he can get people's money. I've seen the same trick countless times."
"Really? Where?"
"Um…" Ridley suddenly remembered that he was supposed to be masquerading as 'the Mario'. "Oh, you know. Around."
"I-a suppose you have-a been all over the place." Luigi said wistfully. "I wish-a I could travel as-a much as you-a do."
"Perhaps you could come with me the next time I travel." Ridley lied, hoping to Luigi to shut up.
"Really? That-a would be great!"
"Sure, why not." Ridley was seriously considering risking the space-witch's wrath and running Luigi through with his tail if the green-clad plumber was going to go on like this the whole way.
