Gabriel's Wish Dragon
"So, what exactly are you?" Gabriel asked.
The dragon gave a big grin before flaring out his arms dramatically. "I am Long Zhou. Now, I know what you're thinking: "An all-powerful wish dragon? Is this for real? Is magic real?" And the answer is…" He spun around to lean on Gabriel's shoulder. "Yes!"
"You do know that I'm a mage, right?" Gabriel raised an eyebrow, holding out his hand to produce some magic sparks.
Long frowned a bit. "Well, there go some potential wishes. I mean, you aren't a human so that gets rid of a few as well, but still, way to kill the mood." He backed up and conjured up a throne for Gabriel to sit on. "But if I don't have to explain magic to you, then we can get to the fun part sooner. So then, what'll it be?"
"Are there any rules I should be aware of? I want to know what I'm fully getting into here," Gabriel asked. For as surreal as a wish-granting dragon was, it honestly didn't even hit the raven's top ten of weirdest things to happen to him.
"The basics are that, as the owner of this magic teapot, I can grant you three wishes," Long explained, holding up three fingers before putting one down. "Of course, you already used up one wish already, so you really only have two."
"And I'm guessing you're not going to give a freebie for that one?" Gabriel questioned.
"Nope! You say "I wish" and I grant it…" He paused as a rumble of thunder suddenly came out of nowhere. "Actually… my boss had been breathing down my neck about not confirming all wishes with my previous masters, so I'll let you have the "freebie" as you call it." Long straightened out before smiling again. "Also, just to get this out of the way, I can't do time travel, I can't kill people, and I can't make people fall in love."
"Like a genie," Gabriel said.
"Wish. Dragon," Long corrected before sighing. "I swear that you're just messing with me at this point…"
"Kind of," Gabriel shrugged. He then hummed before snapping his fingers. "Wait, I just realized that I recognize you from somewhere! You were in that Netflix movie "Wish Dragon", right?"
"At least someone recognizes me," Long mused. "And yes I am, though technically I also count as a Sony character since they were the ones that produced the movie. Netflix just has streaming rights to it as a "Netflix Original."
"Right, and if I remember correctly, you ended the movie going off to serve another ten masters after you learned a lesson in humility and went back to Earth to help Din," Gabriel said.
"Close enough," Long shrugged. "But now it is time once again! I have served nine new masters across the multiverse, and that makes you my tenth and final master before I can return to the heavens. Oh, and don't feel the need to rush your wishes for my sake. Take all the time you need…"
"At least you've kept your character development of being less selfish from the movie," Gabriel chuckled. "So, three wishes all to myself, huh…?"
"Anything you want, granted you follow the three rules I said earlier," Long said.
"Then I think I'll start with this one…" Gabriel said, before whispering to the wish dragon his first wish.
Long raised an eyebrow. "Seriously? You're wasting your first wish on food you could easily buy at the store?"
"It's not just any food, Long, it's the best food ever," Gabriel said. "Besides, I remember you having an obsession with a certain kind of shrimp-flavored chip."
The wish dragon rolled his eyes. "Fine, fair point. Just say your wish out loud and I'll make it so."
"I wish to have a bag of infinite Doritos Late Night All Nighter Cheeseburger!" Gabriel stated. Long snapped his tail like a hand, making a bag of the chips appear in the raven's hands. Gabriel grinned like a school kid getting out for summer vacation as he opened up the bag and pulled out a handful of chips, eating them up and moaning at the flavor. "Oh yeah, these are just as good as I remember them…"
"And you don't have to worry about running out since the bag is bottomless," Long said. "But seriously, why these chips of all things to use for a wish?"
"When I was a kid, my mom bought a bag of these and they were amazing," Gabriel explained as he continued eating the Doritos. "They taste exactly like a cheeseburger, right down to tasting the individual ingredients. Seriously, it should be a crime for how accurate these chips are to the cheeseburger flavor. Anyways, turns out it was a limited-time flavor, and I was never able to find them again. It ruined every other flavor of Doritos for me."
"They can't be that good," Long said, reaching his hand into the bag and trying a few. The dragon's eyes went wide as he tasted them, before grabbing the bag from Gabriel and opening his mouth wide to pour a whole bunch of them into his mouth in comical fashion. "Oh, wow, you weren't kidding about these tasting exactly like a cheeseburger. Not a bit fan of American food myself, but yeah these are good."
"I know right?" Gabriel said with amusement.
Long swallowed before giving the chips back to Gabriel. "Okay then, that's one wish down, two to go."
"And I'll save those for when I think of something good," Gabriel said. The raven then got a thoughtful look before turning to Long. "Say, what if I give you my last wish?"
"Me? What could a wish dragon need?" Long questioned.
"I dunno, but I really have all I could want right now: family, friends, endless adventures… I'd be nice to pay it forward to the guy that's giving me these wishes," Gabriel replied. "Or I just have "Aladdin" on the brain, either one."
"Just don't expect me to break out into a musical number or make pop culture references," Long said.
"Don't worry, leave that stuff to me and my friends," Gabriel laughed. He then held out a hand to Long. "I think this cruise just got a bit more magical, Long."
"I'm sure it will be with my wishes, master," Long replied, shaking the raven's hand.
[***]
Ray's Guide to Guild Events
The Dimensional Cruise soon made it to their next stop, which was in another part of Ray's dimension, this time being the world of Pokémon. The cruise guests were all excited to meet the many strange and fantastic creatures, though due to the rules of the trip they weren't allowed to keep any of them, but there were Pokémon Trainers brought on the ship to let guests safely interact with the creatures if they wanted to. At this moment, Ray was hanging out with Gabriel, Jasiri, Chomper, and Morgana as he showed them some of the Pokémon in the area.
"I didn't get into Pokémon until middle school, but I try to keep up with the new ones as they come out," Ray explained as he pointed out a Pidgey nesting in a nearby tree. "Look, there's a Pidgey over there!"
"It looks just like a normal bird," Jasiri said.
"Well, some Pokémon do just look like animals, but each of them have a great power living inside of them," Ray said.
"Do you have any Pokémon, Ray?" Gabriel asked.
"I do, but I left them back at my Guild," Ray replied.
"You've mentioned your Guild before, but I'd like to know more about what Guilds are," Jasiri said.
"Oh, let me explain it!" Morgana said, jumping in front of a team. "Users- that's what we call people from the real world- can create Guilds by recruiting characters from the different Gamesphere worlds to their team. Currently, Ray has me, Mineru, and Mym on his team, along with a few Pokémon that mostly protect our base and act as companions when we just want to hang around at home."
"Don't forget that we just recruited Roxanne Wolf to the team a week ago," Ray reminded him.
Morgana nodded. "Right. So, after a guild is created, Users can then compete in Quests, which can be anything from Guild Battles, Boss Raids, to exploration-based Treasure Hunts. I really like doing those and getting all that juicy treasure…"
"Mona really has a knack for finding rare and shiny objects," Ray chuckled. The cat then paused as he watch started beeping, followed by a HUD display appearing in front of him. "Hey, it looks like a Quest is happening nearby! Why don't we go check it out?"
"Sounds good to me," Gabriel nodded.
"Oh, a quest! What kind of quest is it?" Chomper asked, his tail wagging with excitement.
"Looks to be an… oh boy," Ray said with worry. "There's one type of Quest we didn't mention before: Invasions."
"That's what happens whenever another world leaks into a different one," Morgana explained. "It usually happens because one of the villains wants to take over a world, or a glitch in the system causes two worlds to briefly cross over. When that happens, Guilds step in to stop the invasion. What are we dealing with this time?"
"It looks to be something from the "Pikmin" universe," Ray said, looking at the details. "It's calling for three Guilds, with two already being on the scene. This could be a bit dangerous… are you sure you guys want to come?"
"Sure! We can help you and Morgana out. Plus I'd like to see you in action, Ray," Gabriel said.
"…I'll try not to let you down," Ray nodded, before guiding the group to where the Invasion was happening. The team ended up at a cave, where the two other guilds were waiting outside the cave. The first team consisted of a posh young man with silver hair wearing knight's armor with a large sword strapped to his back, standing next to what looked to be one of Mineru's construct robots. The other team was a solo guild, consisting of one Zorua, a foxlike Pokémon with the power of illusion.
"Oh boy, I know these guilds…" Ray sighed.
The Zorua turned around and gasped, giving a wave to the cat. "Ray, hey! I didn't expect you to be here. I thought you went on vacation!"
"The cruise ship stopped here in this world. I'm showing some of my new friends how Guild Quests work," Ray explained. "Everyone, this is Neo, leader of the Team Explorer Guild. Neo, this is Gabriel- one of my dimensional counterparts, his girlfriend Jasiri, and that's Chomper."
"Hm… Neo reminds me of Toren in my world," Gabriel mused.
"Does Toren have a mysterious past where he was reincarnated to permanently live in the Magical World, or equivalent of?" Ray questioned.
"Yes, exactly that," Jasiri nodded.
"Well, Neo here was reincarnated as a Zorua by Arceus, but in the process they lost all their memories," Ray said. "Also just so you know, Neo is non-binary, so they use they/them."
"But you can use any pronoun that's most comfortable to you! I cool with whatever!" Neo laughed. The Zorua paused as they noticed that Morgana was here, the cat trying his best to not be noticed. "Oh… H-Hey, Morgana. I expected Mineru or Mym to be here, not you…"
"Well, I am here," Morgana said, crossing his arms.
"So, did you think about-" Neo tried to say.
"How about we focus on the mission instead of your love life?" the armored man said, his voice an odd mix of a Spanish and British accent.
"Wait a minute… Silver!?" Gabriel gasped. "But you're so… big and muscley!"
"My name is Sir Sterling, leader of the Fair Maidens Guild," the young man, Sterling, replied. He gave Ray a stern look. "And I don't need backup for either of your guilds. This Invasion should be enough for me to handle."
"Wow, this version of Silver seems to be kind of a jerk," Jasiri muttered.
"What's his story?" Gabriel asked.
"Sterling is the leader of the Fair Maidens Guild, which is a Guild made up of only princess or princess-adjacent characters," Ray explained with a sigh. "He's one of the top-ranking Guilds in the Gamesphere but is also known to be a huge jerk!"
"I am not a "jerk" as you say. I'm just straightforward in my approach," Sterling corrected. "At least I am in the top percentage of players, unlike you, Ray."
"You're just jealous that I recruited Mineru to my team before you did," Ray shot back.
"Ah, but I have her now!" Sterling said, pointing to his Construct companion.
Chomper looked confused at the robot. "But Mineru is the bunny dragon lady, not a robot?"
"…Oh right, we never explained that quirk of the Gamesphere," Ray realized. He clapped his hands, making a screen appear in front of himself. "You see, since the Gamepshere acts like a massive MMO- Massive Multiplayer Online game- the creator of the Gamesphere wanted to make sure that each User could have their own unique experience and craft their own stories. As such, while each world in the Gamesphere has the "canon" versions of each character living within it, recruiting a character to your guild turns that character into their own unique instance exclusive to your guild."
"You lost me a bit there…" Jasiri sighed.
Gabriel hummed. "So, to give an example, you could recruit Mario to your guild, but then another User can also have Mario in their guild. And each of those versions of Mario are different from the Mario that lives in the "Super Mario" Gamesphere world. Is that right?"
"You got it in one," Ray nodded. "And on top of that, one person could have a Mario that only uses classic power ups, while a different Mario can use the Cap-ture mechanic from Odyssey. It leads to a lot of unique teams for sure."
"Yep! Our Guild Leaders help delegate which skills we learn, leading to different playstyles between different versions of the same characters," Morgana nodded. He pointed back to Sterling. "As you can see, Sterling's Mineru is still in her Construct body, while our Mineru back on the ship had her real Zonai body restored."
"And I will get you tell me how you did that," Sterling said with a frown. "How am I going to have the perfect group of maidens when one of them isn't in her true, beautiful form!"
Gabriel and Jasiri looked weirded out by that statement. "Uh… is he talking about what I think he's talking about?" Jasiri asked cautiously.
"You mean that fact that Sterling has a harem of princesses? Yeah, he does," Neo confirmed.
"What's a harem?" Chomper asked.
"Something you don't need to know about, Chomper," Gabriel said quickly. "And it's not even that fact that's weird, it's more the fact that a version of Silver is expressing interest in girls romantically at all."
"What?" Sterling said in shock. "Are you saying that a version of myself out there doesn't enjoy the affection of women?"
"And the other versions of you aren't pompous jerks either," Jasiri said. "You've been acting all rude towards Ray the moment we met."
"I mean, there's probably at least one version of us out there in all the multiverse that likes boys," Ray mused. "But I can see why you're so shocked to meet the version of your friend that's not my friend, but more of a… rival, I guess is the best word."
"Or a big bully," Chomper said with a frown.
"I did meet an evil version of Silver once, but we dealt with him and he was far more tolerable," Gabriel recalled. "Man, it's true when they say jerks are worse than villains."
"I don't need to hear this…" Sterling huffed, pulling out his sword and entering the cave. "Come Mineru, we've got an invading force to fight. We don't need these other teams to hold us back…"
Construct Mineru gave the group and apologetic shrug before going into the cave with her guild leader, leaving Ray and the others outside. "So… You want to team up?" Neo asked. "I've learned some new skills since we last met."
"Sure, let's do it," Ray nodded. "Do you have any team members with you?"
Neo looked sheepish. "I actually gave my team the day off, so it's just me."
"Luckily you have the rest of us for backup," Gabriel said, Jasiri and Chomper nodding in agreement.
The five of them soon entered the cave, looking out for any signs of trouble. It was cold and dark inside, with Gabriel casting a light spell to illuminate the path ahead. "This place should have Pokémon inside," Neo said with worry. "At least Zubats should be flying around here."
"It eliminates random encounters at least," Ray said. "Normally Invasions are pretty troublesome to deal with, so having to face this world's creatures would make it worse."
"You said the Invasion comes from the "Pikmin" world, yes?" Jasiri recalled. "What's that game about?"
"In "Pikmin" you play as a tiny astronaut that uses plant-like creatures called Pikmin to collect treasures and spaceship parts to get back home," Ray explained. "It's a game all about managing your time and Pikmin to make sure you get things done efficiently."
"But if you play as a little guy, won't the monster that's in here be tiny too?" Chomper asked.
"You'd think that, but anything that comes from that world gets scaled up in proportion to humans," Neo said.
"Great, giant carnivorous animals running only on instinct. Just what we needed…" Gabriel sighed.
The group stopped as something made the cave rumble, followed by the sound of armor clinking together as Sterling came running down the path. "Nope, nope, nope, nope! I am not dealing with that! Who cares if it'll give me a lot of points, I don't want it! Screw you guys, I'm going home!"
As the knight ran off with Construct Mineru in tow, the gang turned towards where he'd come from to see what had made Sterling so scared. Rolling towards them was a see-through humanoid creature with stone rollers attached to its hands and feet. "Oh ****!" Ray cursed.
"Language!" everyone else shouted, Jasiri covering Chomper's ears in shock.
"We're getting out of here!" Ray said, making a mad dash for the exit. "They report could have said it was the Waterwraith!"
"What the heck's a Waterwraith!?" Jasiri asked.
"The deadliest of "Pikmin" enemies! It can't be hurt or killed, just stunned by the shockwaves of Purple Pikmin!" Neo explained. "And it won't stop chasing us until we get out of here!"
"I lost so many Pikmin when I first encountered it as a kid…" Ray shuttered.
"But we have to get rid of it, or else it'll keep terrorizing this cave and messing up the ecosystem," Gabriel pointed out.
"Well then, do you have a way of making a shockwave strong enough to disrupt it's ectoplasm body!?" Ray shouted.
"Maybe I could help!" Chomper said. "I've been working on making big stomping noises to scare off bad sharptooths."
"And Neo is a Zorua, so maybe you could disguise yourself as a Purple Pikmin!" Gabriel suggested.
"You know… that's crazy enough that it just might work!" Ray said, stopping his run and turning to face the Waterwraith. "let's try it, at least!"
Chomper stepped forward as the enemy rolled at them, the little T-Rex holding up his foot before stomping down as hard as he could. The cavern walls shook as he did so, the Waterwraith shuttering as its body turned back and the monster ducked down in fear at the noise.
"That means it's vulnerable!" Ray shouted. "Attack it while we can!"
Ray, Gabriel, and Morgana started firing out magic attacks, while Jasiri kept Neo and Chomper safe from the Waterwraith by using her animal spirits as distractions. Whenever they got a chance the two smallest team members would shake the ground and make the monster vulnerable for the boys to take care of. Eventually the wheels of the Waterwraith broke, leaving it without and weapon and causing the monster to run away in fear.
"There we go! Now we just have to finish it off!" Neo cheered.
Chomper jumped in front of the Waterwraith and stomped down, making it vulnerable once more. "Gabriel, I want to try something," Ray said. "Whenever I build up enough Groove- that's the energy I generate whenever I battle- I can unleash a Fusion attack with one of my allies. Wanna try it out?"
"Let's do it," Gabriel nodded. Ray focused his power before holding a hand out to Gabriel, creating a white light that linked the two together before they both rushed at the stunned Waterwraith, Gabriel attacking with magic bolts while Ray slashed it with energy claws.
"Energy Beat-Down!" the shouted, before delivering a duo uppercut that slammed into the monster, making its body fade away into nothingness.
"Great job, you two! A stylish victory!" Morgana cheered, holding up a thumb's up.
"That's mission complete!" Neo added, giving a wink.
Ray nodded, holding out his hand to show that the Quest was now marked as completed on his HUD. "Looks like that got us some good experience as well… while Sterling didn't get anything."
"Serves him right for thinking he could do this alone," Neo laughed. As the group exited the cave, they found Sterling and Construct Mineru comically hiding behind some rocks. "Hey knight boy! Guess who just got a ton of EXP beating the Waterwraith? These guys!"
"Then that means we did it," Sterling said.
"Uh, you didn't do anything," Jasiri raised an eyebrow. "You just rank away like a coward. Are you sure you're really one of the top Guilds in your world?"
"I do very well, thank you very much!" Sterling shouted. "I didn't put hundreds of hours into "Elden Ring" just to have my skills questioned."
"Ah, there's his problem," Gabriel said. "Elden Ring is all about slow combat where you have to memorize attack patterns to read your opponents and win. Pikmin is a Real-Time Strategy game, so Sterling doesn't do well against opponents that are faster than him that he can't properly read and counter."
"Him being into Elden Ring also explains his obsession with maidens…" Ray mused.
"No, every other Silver we've met is also really into princesses," Jasiri shook her head. "This one is just more romantically into them than the others."
"Whatever! I'll get one over on you next time, Dragalia Guild!" Sterling said, before running off.
"There he goes…" Ray sighed. "Man, why couldn't I have a cooler rival?"
"Hey, maybe you will whenever you meet your world's version of Rachel or Logan?" Gabriel assured him. "For now, let's all get back to the ship. It's been a long day and I'd like to enjoy some time with Pokémon and not running for my life from crazy ectoplasm monsters."
Once they all got back to the Disney Wish, Neo pulled Morgana, Ray, and Gabriel over to the side, the Zorua wanting to say something. "Morgana… can we talk about… what I said before you left on the cruise?"
"You guys did have some tension before I left," Ray recalled. "What was that all about?"
"Neo confessed that they had feelings for me," Morgana explained.
"I just think you're super cool, Morgana, and you're my favorite Persona 5 character!" Neo said. "I didn't mean to cause so much tension between us… and I understand if you don't feel the same way…" the Zorua turned away, tears in their eyes.
"Neo…" Morgana sighed. He smiled and took Neo's paw in his hands. "I'll admit that I don't feel the same way about you, but that doesn't mean we can't still be friends. You've always been willing to help Ray out on Quests, and I think you're pretty cool too."
"Morgana…" Neo blushed, before returning the smile. "Yeah, of course we can still be friends! I do have to ask, though: are you still pining after Lady Ann?"
Now it was Morgana's turn to blush. "Well, Ray helped me move on from my feelings for Lady Ann, even if I still have a bit of a crush on her… I'm actually thinking of asking Lady Lavenza out next time we meet."
"Huh, I never thought of that pairing," Neo admitted. "But she is the only other girl that you call "Lady", so I guess that makes sense."
"Say Neo, if you like Morgana so much, why don't you recruit your own Morgana to your guild?" Ray suggested. "I bet you'd be able to bond with Morgana in the way you want instead of trying to be with my Morgana."
"You guys are lucky in that sense," Gabriel said. "In my world we have to abide by canon relationships, while the Gamesphere gives you the chance to be with whoever you want."
Neo looked away sheepishly. "I mean, if I could recruit my own Morgana I would, but… I'm not old enough to go to the Persona universe."
"Wait, what?" Gabriel questioned.
"Each world of the Gamesphere is bond to whatever rating the game has in real life," Ray explained. "Since Persona 5 is rated "M" you have to be seventeen or older to go to that world."
"And I'm still sixteen," Neo sighed. "I just have to wait one more year, and then I'll recruit Morgana to my guild! Team Explorers forever!"
"Your world is certainly interesting, Ray," Gabriel laughed, the others joining in soon after.
Author's Note
Gabriel formally meets his wish dragon, the character Long Zhou from the Netflix/Sony Animation film "Wish Dragon"! This movie was a sleeper hit from back in 2021, being a fun modern day take on a story like "Aladdin" where the genie character is the one that has to learn a lesson. Long is a really fun character and I like how Gabriel acts super casual around this powerful wish-granter. Also the incident with the Doritos is something that happened to me in real life. Bring back the burger flavor of Doritos, they were so good!
In the second story, Ray explains how Guilds work while also letting Gabriel meet the Gamesphere versions of Toren and Silver, being Neo and Sterling. Neo was created by AvalorianJaquin and their crush on Morgana is an interesting plot that I wanted to follow up on. I also wanted to use this chapter to explain a big difference between the Magical World and the Gamesphere, being that the "you can't break up canon couples" rule doesn't apply to Ray's world since it's a big MMO where each guild has unique versions of characters.
As for Sterling, I thought it'd be fun to have one of the Dream Defenders be more of a jerk rival for Ray rather than a friend. Silver's counterpart being the jerk rival was a lot of fun, and his love of princesses being more romantic in nature was fun twist as well. I imagine that Sterling is a lot like Prince Charming in the "Shrek" movies, where he's handsome and charming to woo the ladies but he's also a jerk that can be cowardly whenever he has to actually be a hero.
The Waterwraith is one of the most infamous enemies from the "Pikmin" games and was a good way to show how Invasions work in the Gamesphere. Plus I've been playing "Pikmin 4" lately and when the Waterwraith came back I freaked out like Ray did. The video game worlds in Ray's dimension still live separately unlike the Magical World or Epic Universe, so most of the crossovers happen between Guilds, during special Event Quests, and whenever one game invades another.
I'm still open to more ideas for the cruise if you have any!
Next Time: Azrael gets a surprise visit from his adopted family, while Lop and Mei Ling help a little lost pup find his mom!