Episode:
19: The Great Monsoon, Part 1

The forces of the light face off against the forces of darkness. The Great Monsoon begins with the Cloud Kingdom.

A great silence washed over the crypt. One could hear the penny drop to the dusty stone floor, if there were any pennies. Shifty eyes flickered between their opposites, searching out for any evidence of movement. Fingers trembled in anticipation; feet shifted into attack positions. Not yet. Who would dare to make the first move?

'I am tired of waiting.'

Adam blinked. It had been Negative Rhombulus to speak first, his snakes hissing in agreement with him.

'Me too!' cried Rhombulus, clenching his fists. 'I'm excited to see how my fist will look in your face!'

'Oh, yeah?!' his counterpart exclaimed. 'Try this on for size!'

Negative Rhombulus raised his snake arms. Their vicious jaws snapped open, and a dark beam of crystalline energy shot out the end. Rhombulus was just as fast, aiming his own beam of energy directly at him. Everyone watched as the split-second where two beams struck one another.

A loud crash of noise echoed throughout the room, followed by an even greater explosion of light. Half the people in the room were sent every which way, thrown into disarray by the immense feedback the two Rhombulus's crystal magic had caused. The other half remained more vigilant, protecting themselves from the explosion with forcefields or other magical means, but were nevertheless forced to stumble back a few yards.

Adam was somewhere in between. He was fast enough to generate a forcefield around himself, but the immense explosion easily smashed through it. He groaned as he rose from the rubble.

Bright jets of purple flames shot towards him. His eyes widened. Negative Hekapoo's fire!

Adam quickly raised his hands. A glittering golden portal opened in front of them, narrowly blocking the fire from touching him. He watched in horror as the shimmering golden light was burnt away by the flames, tearing the portal apart right before his eyes. He leapt to his feet.

'Hekapoo!' he cried. 'Focus on evil-you! Her fire…it's cursed. You're the only one here who can manage that!'

Hekapoo smirked and cracked her knuckles. 'Sounds good to me.'

Unimpressed, Negative Hekapoo tossed two violet fireballs at him. Hekapoo jumped in the way and swung her arm through them. The fire was snuffed instantly, with nothing to indicate it had ever even existed.

'Oh, no fair!' Negative Hekapoo whined. 'The Mark doesn't work on you!'

'As if I'd ever let myself die to someone wearing that!' she mocked, gesturing in disgust at her outfit. 'All that purple makes me want to vomit.'

'You're just jealous cuz my fire is way cooler than those lame orange sparks!'

Negative Hekapoo punctuated her point by projecting a torrent of flames towards her. Hekapoo acted instantly, spitting an orange inferno out her palms. Their two jets of fire met halfway, neither quite being capable of overcoming the other. A stalemate was soon met between their opposing flames.

'Y'know, I'm feeling really glad I didn't accept that gift from Arybailos now!' Hekapoo jeered.

'Oh yeah?' Negative Hekapoo hollered back, flying overheard with a burst of wind. 'And why's that?!'

Hekapoo flew upwards to level with her. 'Because you really let yourself go! Our…myself? Ourselves? Whatever!'

'Alright, that's it!' The streams of fire between them ceased, and Negative Hekapoo tackled her in mid-air. Hekapoo pulled against her arm as it sealed around her head.

'Get off!'

'You get off!'

Meanwhile, Adam felt a sudden lurch in his stomach, warning him that he was in danger. He ducked, just barely avoiding a crimson red fireball as it smashed into the stone wall behind him. He looked up. Tom – Dark Tom – was trudging towards him, two fireballs in hand.

'I've been looking forward to this.'

'Me too. Can't wait to kick the "King" of the Underworld's teeth in!'

Growling, Dark Tom threw his fireballs at him. They moved much faster than Adam had expected, but fortunately, the so-called demon king was too lazy to avoid telegraphing his own attacks.

He threw his hands forward, and a great sheet of ice shot out, trapping him and snuffing out his flames. Dark Tom increased his aura tenfold, shattering the ice entirely. The demon lifted his arms, and a green aura surrounded the icy splinters, freezing them in mid-air. He smirked as the sharp daggers shot towards his opponent at breakneck speed.

Adam raised his hands, forming a wide forcefield in front of him just in time. He shuddered slightly as the dozens of sharp ice shards struck the barrier. He clasped his hands together, and the forcefield turned into a ruby cube that completely entrapped Dark Tom. He separated his hands, creating a great distance between them, and slowly brought them together. The Barrier Force cube began to shrink around the demon, as he continually produced demonic swords and fiery blasts to attempt to break his way out.

Dark Tom cocked his arm back. A swirling dark aura lit up around his limbs, as he put all his force into a single punch on the side of the cube. Adam's Barrier Force shattered nearly instantly.

Before the demon could do anything, though, a series of sharp crystals shot out the ground beneath him. He was ill-prepared as the crystals pierced him in a dozen places, riddling him with stab wounds. Blood dripped from the pointed ends of the crystals, forming dark pools on the ground. He gagged on his own blood. Not exactly easy to breathe around a crystal in your throat.

Unfortunately, it was never this easy. Dark Tom cracked his neck and snapped off the crystal in his throat. He casually dislodged the crystals in his brain, chest and abdomen before taking a deep breath. All his injuries were quickly rectified with a flash of demonic fire.

Adam cursed to himself. Permanently harming a demon was never that easy, and he wished he was capable of that.

'That HURT, you know.' He patted himself down. 'But you're not holding back. I can respect that.'

Dozens of demonic battle-axes spawned from fire, floating in the air around Dark Tom. He swiped his hands at Adam, and one by one they sped towards him.

Adam initially began blocking them with multiple Solarian Blasts to incinerate them but keeping up with each individual axe became difficult. He resorted to blocking them with his forcefields, though they cracked it immediately. He was trying to get them in range to transmute them. They disintegrated into ash before he could manipulate them. He began opening portals to redirect the axes onto his opponent, but they could reach him before disintegrating.

All the while, Dark Tom was watching him, studying his technique. There seemed to be some repetition. He produced a series of daggers and hurled them towards Adam in a split-second.

Naturally, Adam opened a portal in front of him. Dark Tom turned around, perfectly predicting where the portal would open. Sure enough, the knives he had thrown shot towards him out the golden gateway. Dark Tom repossessed the knives, sending them back through the portal, followed by a spinning battle-axe.

Adam reacted just in time, instinctively conjuring an array of metal shields around himself. The knives clanged against the shields and bounced off. A loud bang struck his shield, and before he knew it, a sharp pain arose in his shoulder. The axe managed to dig lightly into his shoulder blade. He staggered back, pulling the axe out of his shoulder.

The warlock sent an uncoordinated vortex of wind at Dark Tom. From then on, Adam quickly lost his balance, hitting the stone wall with a thud. A bright white light caught his attention.

The fracture. It was still active, he realised. His spell…it was half-way complete! If he could, in some way, complete the ritual, perhaps he had a chance here. Except, on just his own, he could only distribute its energies across Mewni, rather than the whole multiverse. Maybe…maybe he could work with that.

'Take this!'

He looked up. Dark Tom was standing a few feet away. A bright aura of the Immortal Flame encased his body. The demon grabbed his head and casually detached it from his neck. He threw it at him.

Adam groaned from his injuries, as he cocked his head back. As the head came flying towards him, encapsulated with a dark fiery aura, he swung forward and headbutted it as hard as he could. The head floated away for a moment, giving him enough time to get up and fight.

In a crack of thunder, Adam reached forward and conjured a quartet of ropes that raced toward his headless body. They wrapped around Dark Tom's body in an instant, before pulling it his way. Adam kicked Dark Tom's head backwards and, as the body sped past him, he conjured an ethereal sword in his right hand.

With one clean swing, Adam sliced cleanly through his entire body.

'You'll pay for that!' snapped Dark Tom's floating head. Irritated, Adam tossed his sword toward him. The mystical sword impaled the King of the Underworld's head onto the wall of the crypt with little effort.

'Try healing through that, asshole.'

With his battle complete, Adam staggered backwards. His eyes darted about the room.

Everything was in chaos. The whole crypt had become a warzone.

Omnitraxus was lying unconscious, embedded in the wall. His Negative counterpart, who no doubt had been the culprit, was standing motionless next to him, waiting obediently for his next directive.

Moon was running herself ragged fighting the Red Queen, throwing quite possibly everything she had at her. Hekapoo, having overwhelmed her evil counterpart, was helping her take her down. Unfortunately, the Red Queen's command of undead soldiers, combined with her immense magical aptitude, was making it extremely difficult for them.

Rhombulus and Negative Rhombulus both managed to imprison the other in their respective crystals, whilst Eclipsa was lying unconscious between oversized matchsticks. Dark Star remained standing, as did Star herself. They were still fighting, both putting everything they had into each attack. Star had just been thrown into the stone corridor outside, ensnared by Dark Star's Rotary Cord Blast. She managed to get up and produce a tsunami of honey onto Dark Star, which she then hardened with magic to trap her in place.

Adam noticed a dark figure next to Eclipsa, shifting upwards. Negative Lekmet was slowly recovering from the smackdown that Eclipsa had handed to him. He produced a bright yellow light with his hands, and his injuries began to heal. If allowed to proliferate, he would certainly accelerate Dark Tom's healing, too.

Of course, the Mewman realised. They have a healer; we don't. Need to level the playing field.

Permanently.

Negative Lekmet, like his Positive counterpart, was gifted with extraordinary Restoration magic. He could heal demons and other magical entities from far beyond the point of physical death, accelerating their recovery time. There was, however, one major downside to this ability: such powers drained his own life force, which meant one thing and one thing only.

He was mortal.

Adam opened a portal and slipped through it. He appeared behind Lekmet, who had gone completely still in concentration. Breathless, he reached around and snapped his neck.

The sheepman slumped instantly, falling to the ground with a loud thud. There was silence about the crypt once more. Everybody seemed to notice the deed; nobody could ignore the dead body on the ground. Adam looked around at everyone, waiting to see if anybody would make a move against him.

'Adam!'

It had been Moon to warn him. He turned in time to see Dark Star in his peripherals, racing towards him with a crystalline dagger in hand. Adam narrowly dodged it, although the edge of the blade skimmed the side of his face, giving him a shallow cut on the cheek.

He briefly glanced at Star. She was lying in a small crater at the back, beaten to a bloody pulp. She was just barely breathing. If Adam hadn't distracted Dark Star by killing Negative Lekmet, she more than likely would have delivered the killing blow.

'You killed Lekmet!' she screeched. 'You'll pay for that!'

She clenched her fists, hurling scorching bolts of energy towards him. Adam cast Shield Block Lock for a second time and sent all the shields towards her, tanking the energy blasts she fired. Adam fired a Solarian Blast at her, but Dark Star dodged it, so he moved his shields into place so that the beam ricocheted off them and bounced back towards her. The Solarian Blast hit her square on the back, but a yellow rune appeared on her body. She had cast a magic protection spell on herself to avoid being disintegrated.

Dark Star growled. She stomped the ground with all her might, generating a powerful tremor. It ripped through the ground, knocking Adam off his feet. He shifted upwards in time to see her fire dozens of razor-sharp Narwhals in his direction.

Adam barely had enough time to react. The warlock just managed to open a portal beneath him, causing him to fall into it.

He looked up. The Red Queen was staring down at him, mid-casting, while Moon and Hekapoo were staring at him, themselves poised to attack.

'Uh.' He smiled nervously. 'Hi.'

'Out of my way!'

A blond-haired bullet barrelled through Dark Moon, sending her flying off to the side. She was about to attack Adam, but the Red Queen, now in her burning orange Full Butterfly form, flew in front of her.

'Star!' she scolded, wagging a finger. 'What did I tell you about getting in my way, young lady!'

'It was his fault!' whined Dark Star, pointing at where Adam had been. Only to find that Adam had disappeared. She frowned. 'Huh…?'

Hekapoo attempted to take advantage of the distraction, flinging a fireball at Dark Moon.

Dark Moon spun around and instantly reflected it back at her. Hekapoo stumbled back, before being wrapped in powerful, unbreakable Lacquered Shackles from neck to toe. She was forcefully raised into the air.

'You need to learn some discipline,' said the Red Queen, lazily waving her hand aside. The chains around Hekapoo moved her, forcefully slamming her into the wall and sealing her against a small crater.

Moon glared at her evil counterpart, instantly casting the Light Sword Spell and swinging the blade down at her. The speed she displayed was impressive to say the least, but not fast enough. Dark Moon produced a blood-orange Instinctive barrier to block the strike. There wasn't even a scratch on the portal. As if just to show off, Dark Moon punched through her own forcefield, shattering it, and sent Moon flying backwards into the wall.

The Red Queen raised her palms, and two circular portals drew themselves in the ground. Out from them rose two small, bony dragons, flapping their wings with a mighty boom.

Archdragons. Creatures Dark Moon had devised, amongst the whole host of other things she had produced in her experiments.

The archdragons soared towards Moon. She raised her fingers, and five orbs of blue energy appeared in front of them. Bright beams of energy shot out from the glowing spheres, striking the archdragons but only momentarily fazing them. One of them managed to sink their sharp teeth into her arm, drawing blood. Moon gasped, but realised she had to act. Her trapped arm lit up with a scorching white light, burning the inside of the archdragon's jaws. The creature howled in pain, releasing her from its grip.

Moon immediately transformed back into her Full Butterfly form. She grabbed the other archdragon and spun it several times, hurling it at Dark Moon. The Red Queen simply telekinetically swiped it aside. Dissatisfied, she disintegrated her archdragon, right as Moon finished up incinerating the other one.

Dark Moon clasped her hands together. A pair of enlarged skeletal hands shot out the ground. They grasped Moon in place, trapping her between in the giant bony palms.

'Listen, plague-bearer,' said the evil queen, floating up to face her. 'I am trying to incapacitate you only because I desire information from you. Consider yourself lucky for that, heretic. It would be wise for you to surrender.'

Moon only glared at her. 'A queen of Mewni never surrenders!' She flexed her six limbs and pushed against the bones with all her might. Dark Moon was shamefully surprised to see her bony trap crack down the middle, before shattering entirely. Wordless, Moon launched a massive Omega Blast at Dark Moon. It hit her straight on, shattering her protection spells. She was propelled backwards instantly, hitting Negative Omnitraxus so hard he was knocked unconscious.

Dark Moon rose painfully from the rubble. Smoke rose from the hissing burn in her chest, revealed by her now singed corset.

'That was a lucky shot,' she growled, glowering intensely at her. She conjured glowing energy axeblades above her hands. 'I won't let you infect me, diseased infirmity!' She began throwing them towards Moon. 'I will purge all creation of your pestilent filth!'

Meanwhile, Dark Star was looking around the crypt with an eagle eye. She took out her wand and used it as a flashlight, shining it around the crypt.

'A-dam!' she called, sounding like how an owner would speak to their dog. 'Come out, come out, wherever you are…you know you can't hide from me forever. This will never work, you know! I'm going to kill you, then I'm going to take control of your puny home and rule it as my own!' She caught the flicker of a silhouette. 'Aha!' She fired a Solarian Blast at one of the statues, obliterating it in an instant. 'Surprise~!'

As the rubble cleared, however, there was nobody there. No skeleton, or even a few stray limbs, aside from the rubble of statuesque body parts on the ground. She raised an eyebrow.

There's no way he could've avoided that…no way! It isn't possible!

'Stop hiding, fucking maggot!' she cried. 'You can't win!'

'AAAAAAAAAAAAA!'

Dark Star immediately heard the yelling and acted instantly. She turned in the direction of the battle cry and watched with a smirk as Adam leapt out from the shadows. She seized him by the throat, surceasing his momentum in an instant.

'Honestly, what were you thinking?' teased the princess, flicking some of her hair behind her shoulders. 'You had the element of surprise, and you threw it away by yelling!'

Adam gurgled in pain as she crushed his throat. Dark Star merely tutted when she snapped his neck with one hand. She dumped his corpse onto the ground with little concern.

Now that nobody was watching, Dark Star stumbled backwards and took several exhausted gulps for air. As her adrenaline began to drain away, and her mana reserves slowly began to refill, she noticed something.

The maggot's corpse on the ground seemed…off. She couldn't quite put her finger on it, but there seemed to be some odd twinkle. Her eyes missed it for a moment, but she staggered over to it. Tentatively, she reached down to touch it. It was, in fact, completely physical.

So, it's not a Glamour…? No, I better check.

Tiredly, she pointed her wand at the body.

'Inversion…Dispersion…'

Glittery orbs of energy surrounded the body, and its very fabric shifted and waved. Adam's supposedly dead corpse faded away and became nothingness.

A PHYSICAL illusion? How the HELL did a maggot like him manage to create a PHYSICAL Glamour?!

She looked around desperately for him. Adam – the real Adam – was standing before the space-time fracture, in the midst of casting a spell. Her eyes widened. He was manipulating its energies, just as her mom had. What was he doing?

'It's not fair!' She stomped her foot on the ground. 'You stole my trick!'

Pulling together all the strength that remained within her, Dark Star opened a lavender-coloured portal in front of her. It led to a few feet above Adam, allowing her time to conjure a diamond dagger. She let out a primal shriek as he descended upon him.

Adam spun around, his hands glowing with mysterious white energy. He threw out his arms, and a bright wave of intermultiversal energy emitted from them. White ripples of magic cascaded throughout the entire crypt, washing over everyone.

Dark Star screamed. Just as she was about to reach Adam, she disappeared, overwhelmed by the magic Adam was sending.

Right as the Red Queen was about to land another hit on Moon, the wave caught up with her too. She faded away despite her utmost resistance. Soon thereafter, the Dark Magic High Commission faded away, along with Dark Tom (who was still reconstituting himself). Finally, the fracture behind Adam faded away with a closing burst of energy.

Adam fell to his knees, panting for breath. A prickling sensation ebbed in his chest. He peered down at his torso, suddenly remembering the laceration that Dark Tom's axe had given him.

'Star!'

He looked up. Moon rushed over to Star's beaten, unconscious body at the back of the crypt. Adam groaned, rising to his feet. The warlock rushed over to her, collapsing beside her. He narrowly managed to catch his breath.

Adam looked over Star's form. She was barely breathing, but she was alive. It was grotesque, listening to the wheezes escaping her bloody throat. Moon was trying not to hyperventilate, as her hands began to glow with a blue aura. Only, this time, the spell seemed slightly inchoate.

'It's not working!' Moon cried desperately. 'It isn't enough.'

Adam nodded hastily. 'Let me help.'

He stood up. Magical wind kicked up the dust around him, as the Seal of Arybailos appeared on his brow. Moon gasped as she felt a wealth of power explode within her. The Seal formed on her brow, too.

Adam kneeled down and shared a nod with her. The pair of them activated their Restoration magic, creating a bright cyan aura that wrapped around Star's injured body. Steadily, Star's throat opened, her bones began to repair, her torn muscles and open cuts sealed themselves up, and her lungs filled with air once more. By the time they were finished, Star was breathing a lot more healthily.

'She'll be okay.' His voice quivered a little. 'Right?'

'Even with our combined, enhanced magic, she will still need a while to recover,' replied Moon. 'Restoration magic cannot fix everything. Star pushed herself to the very limit.'

'She isn't the only one,' said Adam. He glanced at Eclipsa, who was still trapped beneath Dark Star's Captive Matchsticks.

The Mewman staggered over to her, reaching down to pry the oversized matchsticks off her. If his mana reserves had not been completely depleted, he would have moved them telekinetically. Fortunately, his Mewman strength made things a little easier for him.

'Eclipsa?' he called, shaking her awake. She moaned in pain, before opening her eyes. Adam squeezed out the tiny ounces of his mana that had regenerated to heal her with Restoration magic. He coughed painfully but ignored the sharp pain in his chest. 'Are you okay?'

'Don't you worry about me, dear…' she reassured, shifting upright. She squeezed her eyes shut, clutching her brow. 'I happen to have an awful headache, however.'

Adam stomached a smile. 'I expected that.'

Something warm trickled down his nostrils. He wiped his nose and gasped at the sight of his own blood. Eclipsa frowned in concern.

'Are you alri–?'

Adam inadvertently interrupted her when he began uncontrollably vomiting up blood. Eclipsa jerked forward, putting her arms around him to hold him steady. Once he was gone vomiting, she patted him lightly on the back.

'I think you might have overexerted yourself.'

'Yeah…' he said. 'That last Multiversal spell…really took a lot out of me.'

Eclipsa raised an eyebrow.

'What did you do, exactly?'

'Well, uh –'

'Hey! We could do with some help over here!'

Adam frowned, turning around and standing back up. Rhombulus remained rooted to the spot at the back of the room. Curiously, however, while he was almost entirely encased in his alternative counterpart's crystals, an emphasis had to be put on "almost". Fortunately for him, one of his snake arms had managed to avoid being crystalised. The same snake that now cried for help.

'I'm sorry, but I dunno how to break Rhombulus's crystals,' Adam admitted, walking over to him. 'That stuff's indestructible.'

'Not to Rhombulus,' hollered Moon, as she was freeing Hekapoo from the Red Queen's Lacquered Shackles.

'You can use his power!' the snake agreed, nodding.

'Why can't you do that? To free yourself?'

'Oh sure, like I could be able to aim that. I'm only a snake, you know!'

Adam rolled his eyes. 'Alright, fine. How do I do this?'

'Press down on the top centre of my head.'

He nodded. Of course, that was where a snake's brain was. It seemed Rhombulus's crystal manipulation powers were not only magic-related, but a physical part of his biology, too.

Adam took tentative hold of the snake's head and turned it back to point at Rhombulus's crystallised body.

One firm press on the snake's head, and sure enough, a powerful beam of energy erupted from its mouth. Adam struggled to control it at first, but he steadily focused the beam. The crystal-entrapped Rhombulus soon melted away, freeing its prisoner from its eternal clutches.

Rhombulus let out a loud gulp for air, followed by a series of sputters and coughs. He straightened his back.

'Well now I know what that feels like,' he remarked to himself, before noticing Adam next to him. 'Hey! Wannabe Butterfly!' He leaned forward and prodded him on the chest. 'I still don't trust you!'

'Rhombulus,' Moon scolded.

'Oh, um.' He cleared his throat. 'But…thank you. Or something.'

Adam rolled his eyes, muttering, 'Don't mention it.' He looked around the crypt with concern. 'Is everyone alright?'

There seemed to be vague agreement about the room that everybody was, more or less, okay. Omnitraxus had just returned to consciousness behind him, Eclipsa was shakily getting to her feet, Hekapoo was recuperating from the intense mana she had expunged, Rhombulus was arguing quietly with his two snake arms, and Star was being looked over by Moon, who herself had seemingly recovered. Most of the crypt was covered in rubble or riddled with holes and craters that were far beyond reasonable repair.

'Good.' His voice turned dark. 'Because…would someone mind telling me WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED?!'

His voice was so loud and booming, that even Hekapoo was intimidated. He looked between the parties involved, a hard glare on his face.

'Moon?' She gave no answer. 'The Red Queen…she said this was your fault! She got here because of YOU!'

'Now is not the time for this, Adam,' she deflected, setting Star down by her side.

'I want an answer now!'

'We have more important things at hand!'

'Oh, just come out with it, Moon!' snapped Eclipsa, catching the queen off-guard. She hadn't heard Eclipsa sound so angry before. 'He deserves to know. It is your fault we are in this mess. Show some graciousness for once in your life and admit what you did!'

Moon sighed. She hated it when Eclipsa was right.

'Fine,' she acquiesced, looking up at Adam. 'I stole your spellbook, Adam. I stole it, so that the Commission and I could create a Multiversal spell. One that would seal the fracture, once and for all.'

'You did WHAT?!' he screeched, stomping towards her. 'You went behind my back and did the ONE THING I told you not to do?! You said I was the one who understands this magic the most, but instead of TRUSTING ME, you just thought you could FIX IT YOURSELF? Are you fucking kidding me?!'

'The fracture demonstrated a major threat,' she argued, standing her ground despite how much he towered over him. 'I could not simply allow such a dangerous presence to remain here, no matter how much you thought it should!'

'Keeping it there would have been safer!' he snapped back. 'Every time I tried, it backfired. I WARNED YOU IT WOULD BACKFIRE! And now? Now, they know how Multiversal magic works! I'm not the only one who can make these stable portals now. Dark Moon can do it too! Because of you. You and your PATHETIC PRIDE!'

'It was inevitable!' reasoned Hekapoo, standing up. 'That fracture connected our two multiverses. Sooner or later, these "Dark Butterflies" were going to use it as backdoor behind enemy lines! At least now that it's gone, we're safer now.'

'It's not gone,' Adam revealed, folding his arms. 'It was dispersed. The only reason any of you are alive right now, is because of ME.'

'What…do you mean?' asked Star, still resting against the crypt wall.

'I cast a spell to distribute the fracture throughout Mewni,' he elaborated. 'I managed to create some kind of limitation-stabilisation field around the Butterfly Kingdom. The Dark Butterflies might be able to open intermultiversal and dimensional portals, but not to anywhere in the kingdom. Or anywhere around it for a good few miles. The downside to that is…well, the same field now exists in the same location on Negative Mewni. The Empire can't come here, but equally…we won't be able to go to the Capitol.'

'A stalemate, then,' Eclipsa surmised, prompting a nod from him.

'A temporary one.' He clenched his jaw. 'They can go anywhere else in our multiverse. Or on Mewni. I expect…it won't be long before they invade, probably a few days. My guess is they'll go straight for the Butterfly Kingdom. It is the heart of our operations.'

'We'll need to mount our defences,' said Moon, earning a glare from Adam. 'If you what you say is true –'

'Unlike you, I don't lie about important things.'

She rolled her eyes. 'If what you say is true, we should expect the Butterfly Empire to attack first.'

'Then why don't we attack first?' suggested Star, a layer of pain in her voice.

'Fighting the Empire on our own turf would be better,' Eclipsa said. 'From what Adam has told me, the Empire has a lot more firepower than we do. So…if we could lure them onto our Mewni, we would have the home advantage. Whilst the Empire would be forced to spend time transporting their resources, we would be able to send them straight away.'

'We can't exactly go straight for the Capitol City, either,' Hekapoo added. 'We need time to recover, to fortify our defences. We'd lose if we tried a full-on attack on their headquarters.' She groaned. 'We'll have to, ugh, go on the defensive. That sucks.'

'It's your fault this war is happening in the first place,' snapped Adam. 'Keep your mouth shut.'

'H–'

'If the next sentence that comes out of your mouth involves you blaming someone else, then I invite you to remember that you helped make the spell that caused all this mess!'

Hekapoo instantly fell silent. Adam mulled over his own words for a second, before frowning.

'Wait a minute.' He looked frantically about the room. 'Where's my spellbook?'

'Uh…' stuttered Moon.

'Moon! Where did you put it?!'

'Uh, I…I don't know!' she confessed. 'I had it with me when we were casting the spell…but I lost track of it after the earthquake!'

'Crap.' He glanced towards the immense pile of debris taking up half of the room. The rest of the crypt was inaccessible, and there was nothing he could do about it. 'My spellbook…it must be in there!'

Adam leaped forward, desperately searching through the rubble for it. He threw aside as many rocks and stone pieces as he could, but nothing came up.

'Adam –' Eclipsa called. But he didn't listen. He stepped back and raised his hands, casting Levitato on the rocks. Yet, even with the Seal of Arybailos, there was simply too much rubble, and he was far too exhausted, to lift it all. 'Adam…give it a rest. You are searching for a needle in a haystack. A needle, when you already have a thousand needles.'

He frowned. 'What?'

'That book contained everything you knew, didn't it?' Eclipsa reminded him. Adam nodded. 'Then you already have a second copy.' She tapped his forehead. 'In here.'

'Right,' he agreed. 'Right…' He took a deep breath. 'Come on. Let's get the hell out of here.'

Two days later, Adam found himself groaning in frustration.

'I'm telling you Janna, it's not safe!'

Janna snorted. 'You can't just expect me to up and leave when we're right on the cusp of war! I'm not gonna abandon everyone!'

'I can't just keep you here. Not when it's too dangerous.'

The two of them were walking briskly through the hallways of the Butterfly Castle. Each exasperated step taken by Janna was punctuated by a door being shoved open. Or the carpet being kicked up, much to the later annoyance of Manfred. The sun shone in through the ornate windows, the birds chirped concordantly on distant tree branches, and a light breeze wafted through the air.

'And whaddaya think sending me away is going to do?' she argued. 'I'll just find my way back. Just like I did the last time!' She then muttered, much more quietly, 'Even if I don't remember how…'

Adam stopped and looked her in the eye. 'What's the alternative, Janna? Me standing over your grave?' The cords in his throat turned rigid. 'I've seen that. And I never want to see it again.'

'And what about Marco?' she challenged. Adam hesitated, only irritating her more. 'Aren't you gonna send him home, too?'

'That's not really my decision to make,' he claimed. 'Star won't let me. Anyway, Marco's proven himself capable.'

'And I haven't?!' Janna snapped. 'What makes you think you're responsible for me, huh? I can be useful. I can do stealth!'

'When I met your parents, I made them a promise to always keep you safe. And that's exactly what I'm doing. I'm not gonna have your blood on my hands, Jan. Not again.'

Janna sighed, looking away.

'Adam…I'm not her.'

'I know.' He pinched his lips. 'But I've seen enough people die to know that I can't risk putting anybody else in danger.' Adam put a hand on her shoulder, before pulling her into a hug. 'Go home, Janna. Get to know your parents; you never know when they'll be gone for good. At least, if we lose, chances are the Empire won't target Earth. You can pick up your life where you left off.'

'You can't seriously expect me to just go on like nothing happened! To live my life without y–'

She never got to finish her sentence, as a massive earthquake rumbled beneath their feet. Adam grabbed her by the hand, keeping her steady, although he struggled to remain balanced himself. Alarmed, he stumbled towards the nearest balcony door and shoved his way through.

Adam and Janna looked on in horror from the balcony below. It was the Cloud Kingdom, standing obstinate in the sky far above. A giant, wispy-white intermultiversal portal hung next to it, releasing waves of Multiversal magic. The earthquakes it generated soon subsided, but the loud booming noise of the portal remained.

Several bright white flashes echoed across the portal. A small fleet of Butterfly warships appeared in the sky above the Cloud Kingdom. Instantly, they mounted their cannons, and began firing mortar shells down onto the city. They struck an invisible dome around it, as the other, smaller ships lowered down to bypass the forcefield.

Adam let go of the breath he was holding.

'It's started.'

It begins.

The first chapter of the final arc. Looking at it, this finale is gonna be a long one, with about 16 chapters across 7 episodes. Admittedly, this chapter is quite short, but it was mainly concluding the cliffhanger of the previous episode and setting up the next one. As well as peppering in a few things to set up future chapters.

Writing the fight scene at the start was actually quite difficult. There were a lot of characters to keep track of, so I didn't describe each one. I mainly focussed on the main characters of Star and Adam, but I also put a focus on Negative Hekapoo because her Mark of Hekapoo is effectively a nigh-unbeatable trump card. So I had to show her being taken out ASAP, and Adam would naturally realise she was a danger. I also didn't want this battle to seemingly have no consequences, so Negative Lekmet was killed, and also this battle leads to the effective stalemate between the two multiverses that prompted the Empire to attack elsewhere. That and Dark Tom gets skewered, but he's immortal, so it's really more of a minor roadblock.

And Adam had to send Janna away. He knew he would have to, but she just refuses to leave. It makes a lot of sense to me that he would want her as far away from the conflict as possible, given that Negative Janna was murdered by Dark Star. He would never let her die again. His judgement regarding Marco is really because Star doesn't want him to leave, anyway, because she's a bit selfish like that. Though I doubt she would want him to take part in many of the conflicts since he's only a human.

I suppose a question arises: why did the Empire decide to attack the Cloud Kingdom, instead of the Butterfly Kingdom? Well, obviously, you'll find out in the proceeding chapters. Dark Moon is a clever one, though, so she isn't doing this out of frivolity.

As always, thank you very much for reading and supporting!