Author Note: I make a reference to The Rotating Circus in this chapter (three actually, since I mention the main villainess twice and the circus once) and I promise that I'll start working on that story again. I just need to finish up the plot. (I have the details down, but have no idea what to do for half of the circus. I only have a maze and house of mirrors so far; along with the main stage.) I know it's just a side story, but it still has a bit of relevance to the plot (like Shi being able to use the CHE's abilities, and Shi's identity crisis...)

I just wanted to mention that before the chapter so you won't be confused when it comes up. Starsha is the villainess from TRC, and the circus's name was Rotating Circus so...(Also, Princess Shroob is supposed to do the Family Guy death pose at some point during the next chapter, to go along with my drawing of Fawful I did of him doing that for my sister. Unimportant, but still funny.)

Team Pasta, and Team Future! We've got this!

(I also started playing PMtTYD on Tuesday, and I love it so far despite the fact I only just got into the woods to the second Crystal Star. [Vivian needs a better eldest sister man...{slay, you trans queen, you!}])

Darethend smacked Peter with his staff from behind. Peter tumbled, and tried to trip Dareth with his own staff, but the king just jumped over it. Olly went in front of Grape and Dimentio, sword out.

"Don't move, Dareth. You're outnumbered. Just give up now, and we won't have to fight any longer."

"Move out of the way, brat. I need her power."

"Then you have to go through me, Fawful, Olive, Mimi, Peach, Daisy, Rosalina, Peter, El, King Boo, Antasma, Davidonell, Dimentio, and Grape herself. But good luck with that, because Bowser's coming this way, and when he gets mad..." He chuckled. "Let's just say I had a first hand taste of his rage before. Trust me, you don't want to be on the attacking end of Bowser's rage."

"Give up. My magic is much more powerful than all of yours."

"In your dreams, old man. Speaking of which, how have you been alive so long? I remember some demon wives telling me that you tortured their son? That was over a hundred years ago. You should be dead!"

"I used a demon's curse to keep myself alive. There was no way I was going to leave behind my kingdom."

"Elaborate?"

"Basically I get to live forever, but my death will be 'the most painful punishment that could ever befall you.' But it's not like I'm going to die anyways."

David stepped in front of Olly. "Let me fight him. He's caused so much pain for my family for so long, and I won't let him do that anymore."

He held up his hand, and snapped. His shadow rose like tentacles and grabbed at Dareth. Dareth fought them off with his staff, then charged David.

"I've been waiting a long time for this, David!"

"Olly! I have to deal with this alone! Help the other survivors who fell from the castle!"

Olly nodded once. "R-right."

Dareth held his staff out behind him, then swiped it forwards to summon a Chinese Dragon. David grabbed his own staff out of his shadows and stabbed it through the dragon's head. He twirled the staff around, reducing the dragon to a cloud of mist. He charged it into a black orb, and fired it back at Dareth. He responded by hitting it back, and David killed it with his hand. Dareth shot him in the knee, causing David to fall.

Dareth walked over and crouched to his level. "You're pathetic, David. You gave up your magic, for her. Your powerless second wife, so how do you still even use it? Hm?"

"I used a demon spell too, Dareth...But it was a blessing, unlike yours...I became a Shadowmancer to protect, you became a King so you could hurt. You and I are not the same."

He rose to his full height and kicked David in the head. "What a fool you are. There's a thing you don't know about my magic, David. I can do whatever I want, so if I want to destroy this world myself..." He aimed his staff at Grape. "I can just combine with it. I can just take her powers this way."

The staff began to glow. Out of panic, David forced himself to his feet, despite his injured leg, and shoved Dareth over. The beam missed Grape, who flinched away from the blast, and hit the ruin of the castle. Darethend vanished in a puff of smoke.

Olly looked back at David. "What was that...?"

Grape looked at her hand. "He almost shot me with that."

A piece of the rubble fell down a bit, breaking into smaller pieces as it did. David limped over, Dimentio letting David lean on him for stability.

Olly faced David. "Are you okay? Here, let me use this." He tore off his sleeve and started tying it around his wound.

Dimentio looked at the castle. "Dark magic...Powerful dark magic." He grabbed David's shoulder. "Wh-what was that beam he shot? Did he say?"

David winched. "He mentioned...combining? He was going to use it on Grape...I couldn't let her get hurt."

"Combining?" Mimi asked. "Like, fusion? What did he hit with it?"

"I don't know...I didn't see."

Olive smiled. "Then let's give him a taste of his own medicine! Dimentio, I'm sure Shi can beat this guy! Remember when we took out Starsha together?"

"Yes, I remember. The Rotating Circus. But I need to be here for David. Plus, Star wasn't evil, she was just hurt and felt forgotten."

The castle wall nearest to them shifted a bit, falling to the ground.

"Fawful can take him!" Fawful came over to Dimentio's side. "Give him to Fawful!"

Dimentio let go of David, who fell onto Fawful. "But are you sure this is a good idea? I mean, Shi hasn't really been...themself lately. I think they know that they're not exactly real."

"Since when have you cared about Shi?" Olive teased. "But I'm sure it'll be fine. We finally go the hang of it, and if he wants to use fusion t beat us, then we just have to fight fire with fire." He held out his hand. "Plus, them using the CHE's power was pretty cool. I mean..." He giggled awkwardly.

"Can we even still do it anymore? I mean, the corruption in you is gone, and mine as well."

"Just shut up and get on with this!"

Dimentio sighed and accepted his hand. Olive pulled him in close.

"Remember what Izuku said once? How'd it go?"

Dimentio laughed. "Plus Ultra!"

They both glew blue and purple, which combined into a dark, pale purple. Shi laughed, then the glow died down.

"Olly! It's been a spell!"

Olly waved awkwardly. "H-hi Shi..."

"What in the great theater is that?" Grape asked, pointing at Shi.

Shi pointed a thumb at themself. "A special power called fusion! You should try it sometime!"

The castle shifted again, this time an arm forming from the rubble. A second arm appeared and lifted the rest of the ruined castle from the ground. The castle messily took the shape of Darethend, who didn't seem to mind his new form much.

"Not what I had in mind, but this works just fine!" He grabbed Grape.

"Let me go!" She squirmed in his grasp.

He opened what looked like a cage on his chest and tossed her inside. "Enjoy the dungeon!" He looked down at Shi. "Who is that? Some terrifying hybrid of your jester and fancy child?"

They did a small twirl, which ended in a bow. "Our name is Shi! And we're here to stop your reign of terror once and for all!"

"Good luck with that. I'm a giant, what are you going to do about it? My castle is nearly indestructible. But good luck trying to get inside it!"

Bowser stormed over to the rest of the group, and looked up at the castle king. "Hey! I did it first, and better!"

"Castle Darethend!" Olivia said cheerfully. "I can see that name. Or Castle Dareth, to make it shorter? That sounds better."

"You will call me nothing!" He slammed his hand into the ground, then swiped it at the group.

Peter protected them, which Rosalina reinforced with her magic. Dareth's hand broke apart on their forcefield. It rebuilt itself.

"Haha! I told you, I'm indestructible! I should have done this from the start! And with Gwendolyn's magic in me, I can rebuild myself better, STRONGER!"

"Her name is Grape!" Shi flew up to his eye level. "Get it right!"

They used their robotic gun arm they inherited from Olive to try and destroy his face, but Castle Dareth smacked them down instead. They crashed into the ground.

"Shi!" Olly cried. "I won't let you hurt them! They only thing they wanted to do was make people happy! But you? You don't deserve to be happy."

Olly tapped into his beast form again and grabbed onto Castle Dareth's arm with his claws. Castle Dareth grabbed Olly by the tail and flicked him aside.

"I'll save you!" Olivia flew after him, still in her beast form. They crashed into each other.

Castle Dareth laughed. "See what happens when you defy me? I wonder what else Gwendolyn's magic can do..."

Princess Shroob said something in her alien speech, then pulled out what looked like the blaster she'd let Fawful have earlier. She dropped to one knee and pulled the front and back apart from each other. It morphed into some sort of bazooka or rocket launcher. She said something, the only audible word being Fawful's name. she fired it, nearly falling over. The fire hit Castle Dareth in the right side of his face.

He fixed his face again, and Olly saw Grape looked exhausted. "Stop that! You're hurting her!"

"So what? You thought I cared for her? I only wanted her regeneration ability, fool! I could care less if she died!"

"Alright, you asked for this!" Shi threatened. "You're going to make us use our secret weapon!"

"What? Is it your hand? Are you going to try and friendship me to death?"

Shi looked defeated. "That...was it yeah. We were going to 'friendship you to death.'" They tapped their pointer fingers together. "But you ruined that, didn't you?"

"You're a pathetic man."

"W-we're not..."

He grabbed Shi by the ruff and held them up to eye level. He turned them around in his hands.

"Look at those details, it really does look like a mixture of their two outfits. What did you say you were? A fusion? So Dimitri knows a combination spell as well, hm?"

"Let us go!" They tried to pry his finger off their ruff. "And his name is Dimentio!"

"I think you mean your name is 'Dimentio.'"

"No, our name is Shi! We're a real person, just like Grape is!"

"No you're not. You're just Dimitri's body with the child's mind. You're so immature. And why do you keep saying 'we' and 'us?' Are you really trying that hard to be different?"

"We can't help that! That's just how we talk! We were a forced fusion, so things are all imperfect, but we know for a fact that-"

"This is fusion!" He tossed Shi into the air. "This is how you do a proper fusion! You're pathetic, Shi. Really. I've never seen such a sorry excuse for a fusion before."

"You're the pathetic one. Fusing yourself with a castle? Of course you aren't like us, you're the only one with a mind here. Although, if the castle did have a brain, it'd be smarter than you." They stuck their forked tounge out at him.

He looked slightly annoyed. "That was an insult? Really?"

"Yep! Bye bye!"

They summoned the Chaos Heart Entity's other pair of arms and tore themself out of Castle Dareth's hand. He repaired his hand again. They landed on their feet, but then lost balance and fell on their face.

"I've had enough of all of you, especially him!" He pointed at Shi.

"We're not a 'him!' We haven't decided what we wanna be yet! Also, we're not a jester! We're a clown! There's a difference!"

"Would you shut UP?!"

The gun from before emerged from his crown, aimed right at the group. It began to charge.

"Yoo-hoo! We thought you hated us! Did you change your mind?"

Castle Dareth winched. "Stop talking. Your voice...it's so annoying."

"Annoying?" They teleported up to his shoulder. "How so? Personally speaking, we could be a singer for a band! And not to mention, Dimentio's voice only sounds like that because he's insane! He does it on purpose to tick people off. We're glad it's working." They winked.

He flicked them off his shoulder, then stomped on them when they hit the floor. "Say goodnight, David."

The cracks in his body began to glow purple, the same color as Grape's magic. His body began to shudder.

"What's going on? What did you do to me?!"

David flinched.

The gun stopped powering up and fell off. Castle Dareth broke into smaller pieces, looking like a wooden puppet. His face fell off, a masquerade mask in its place. It changed form to look like Grape. Purple mist drifted from the bottom of her dress.