Chapter Twenty-Two:

In The Halls of a Corrupted Castle

Mario, Meggy and SMG3 landed face first upon the floor, reeling with temporary dizziness from the throw. It took them a bit to pull themselves together and they stood up, seeing they were in the foyer of the castle. The place was half-dark with very little light, however, their eyes adjusted enough so they could see clearly.

"We're back where we started." SMG3 groaned.

Mario whipped out a board with a manic smile on his face. "But not with... New Super Funky Mario." He quipped.

Nobody laughed, Meggy and SMG3 dismissed Mario's little funk moment.

"Where's all the creepy, goopy stuff from before?" Mario then commented.

They looked around the room, seeing there were no signs of the strange demonic goop anywhere. The door closed behind them and Mario headed up the stairs as Meggy and SMG3 looked around, wondering what else was going on right now in the castle.

"We should find SMG4..." Meggy suggested, "I'm sure that if we get him out of here, all of this will stop."

SMG3 looked at her with shock. "What?!" He demanded, "Whoa, whoa, whoa! What do you mean "find SMG4"? We just escaped from him and now we want to find him again?!"

"Three, SMG4 is our friend. I know he's tried to save us in the past no matter what, he and the others didn't hesitate when I was kidnapped by Francis and neither did you and SMG4 hesitate when Mario was in Zero's clutches. And with the exception of Axol, SMG4 has succeeded in saving us. We can't just leave him to whatever that terrible thing is."

"Yo, I'm all for saving the idiot..." SMG3 argued, "But you saw what he did before..."

Suddenly, both Meggy and SMG3 heard shrieking. They ran up the stairs and headed towards the doorway to the Secret Slide Room, where they heard Mario's shriek. They barged inside before they heard Mario yelping again.

"Mario! Get away from that..." Meggy started, "…Room?"

The former Inkling and SMG4's former nemesis looked around, almost bewildered by what was going on. When they were last in the room, SMG4 had been here at the desk and creepy goop stuff had come out. Now, there seemed to be no trace of the weird goopy demonic thing anywhere. Something really creepy was happening.

"What the...?" SMG3 quipped, "Everything's back to normal?! Why the hell did you scream then, Mario?"

"Because..." Mario whimpered, pointing to a computer, "…Mario has to read!"

SMG3 pinched his face with annoyance before he and Meggy walked towards the desk where SMG4's computer was. They saw a window open, it was Notepad, they looked at the screen and saw words written on the white space.

"'I just want to make everyone happy.'" Meggy read aloud.

"Well, what the hell is that supposed to mean?" SMG3 quipped sarcastically.

Just then, the lights in the room went out and Mario yelped in terror. The group wondered what was next, then, the lights came back on and they found themselves surrounded by the horrifying demonic goop with the creepy eyes. Mario remarked that it didn't seem so bad, but just then, a tentacle held up a sign that read; 'Boo!'

"AHHHH, READING!"

Mario, Meggy and SMG3 retreated from the room, back into the foyer, all wondering what was next. Mario then yelped again, looking down the stairs. The others looked down, seeing what their friend had seen. Right by the wall, in his usual place, was Toad. But he looked so frozen and half-buried in the ground.

"Its just Toad, what's he going to do?" SMG3 asked, "You think he's gonna turn into a T-posing zombie and try to turn us into T-posers like him or start firing missiles at us?"

He walked down the stairs and approached Toad. "Yo, Toad man." He said, "Do you know where SMG4 is?"

Silence.

"SMG3..." Mario quipped, "Allow me."

SMG3 rolled his eyes. "Oh sure, be my guest, go ahead and annoy Toad until he talks if you think that works."

The ex-villain stepped aside and Mario made his move, he smacked Toad, trying to get him to respond. Mario then started talking rapidly; "Toad, old buddy, old pal. Where is SMG4?"

Just then, the ground rumbled and the trio heard a voice that sounded a lot like Toad, but the walking fungus hadn't moved his mouth.

"Guys, I don't feel so good..." The Toad-sounding voice said.

Without warning, a light filled the room and a shadow loomed over Mario, Meggy and SMG3. They looked up, seeing that Toad had just grown to gigantic proportions. Except, he hadn't taken a Mega Mushroom. Toad's body had grown, but his little feet had vanished, becoming replaced with big human legs.

"Do you like my design?" Toad then asked.

"Oh no, it seems SMG4's been experimenting with redesigning more characters!" SMG3 groaned, "As if Meggy changing from an Inkling, Melony becoming a human with the Fierce Deity Mask, Old Man Hobo getting a new look, Saiko's appearance getting an upgrade and me, SMG4, Bob and Boopkins changing all weren't enough!"

Toad leaped into the air and came down upon the group, almost crushing them, but the trio evaded. Mario called Toad a stupid defective Toadie and ran up to him, he kicked him in the shin, only for that action to accomplish nothing. Toad kicked Mario, knocking him into a wall. Toad stomped around, seemingly trying to crush both SMG3, Meggy and a still-alive Mario.

Mario couldn't remember the last time he'd fought Toad, even though it was known that Toad had disliked Mario for years due to the plumber's crazy antics. But at this point, there was no other way. To find SMG4, they had to fight a giant 'redesigned' Toad and not get crushed...