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[h2][color=FD0000]Bowser the Koopa King[/color][/h2]
[b][color=FD0000]Wordcount:[/color][/b] 1237 (+2)
[b][color=FD0000]Bowser: Level 7 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=FD0000]/////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color]////////////////////// (68/80)
[b][color=FD0000]Location:[/color][/b] The Dead Zone - Hell-bent City
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[color=FD0000]”Yeah it worked out in the end,”[/color] Bowser agreed with Blazermate’s assessment of the fight and freeing of two of the demon hunters by her and him. If Dante turned out to be even half as dangerous on their side as she had as an enemy she’d be quite the asset. Bowser hadn’t tussled with the slayer, so he’d have to wait and see how the man shaped up in comparison. Probably fairly well, the dead zone demanded toughness from those who wanted to last more than a few minutes. 

[color=FD0000]”Took a little something out of me to do it though. Not sure what. You felt it too right?”[/color] he noted, unable to put an exact claw on the price he’d had to pay to free another but knowing something had been given up nonetheless. 

[color=FD0000]”Also I was never cute! I’m a big bad boss and don’t you forget it!”[/color] the king then insisted when Blazer commented on his loss in cuteness [color=FD0000]”I can put them away anyway”[/color] he added, nestling the tendrils away in their shell apertures for a moment before re-deploying them, [color=FD0000]”Just don’t wanna while we’re still in this place. Feels like nowhere is safe”[/color] 

The king’s words might have been true, but the rest of their trip towards the root’s housing managed to be the closest to safe they’d had in the zone with how uneventful it was. Oh there where foes to be crushed, but compared to the initial gauntlet they were smallfry. The Flood would roll over them before too long, just as the Red team where now. It was still tense, there was always the worry that the next block might reveal some new actually dangerous monstrosity or another, but in the end they reached the library into which the roots of the great tree were burrowing into without any notable opposition.

[color=FD0000]”THIS IT, HUH? ALRIGHT, LET’S GET STARTED!”[/color] Bowser declared, advancing on the doors at the head of the group and dramatically kicking them open to find a very nondescript and surprisingly empty library within. [color=FD0000]”RAAAA-huh?”[/color] The king had had his claws and tentacles barred as he entered, ready for whatever gauntlet was going to stand between them and the mini boss, but he was understandably confused by the emptiness of the library

[color=FD0000]”There’s... nothing?”[/color] he took a look about, but found nothing. No demonic warriors. No alien locusts. Not even the ubiquitous zombies were found within, which should have been suspicious, and likely was of the wiser members of the party. Bowser, however, simply mentally declared victory and started stomping through the room towards the closest staircase. He got about four meters before he got attacked by a black thing that had, as far as the king was concerned, come out of nowhere.

The four legged spindly mass of ooze or darkness or something that had been pretending to be a coffee cup grappled his face, and tried to stab out his eyes. The king shut his eyes reflexively and his scaled eyelids prevented the loss of his ocular orbs, but in his resulting blind panic he stumbled backwards, smashing ass backwards into a bookcase and got swarmed by book disguised mimics. Faced with an unfamiliar shaped foe covered in heavy natural armor, the mimics were just a moment too slow to find the king’s new vulnerable ears that the tentacruel tentacles could get to work. Engaging in tentacle vs tentacle combat the larger and venomous cruel tentacles rapidly prevailed and cleared the king’s face, stabbing, crushing and grappling the mimics in a flurry of action. They were going to get to work on the rest when the remaining mimics scattered, scampering way into the carnage the king had kicked up in his blind panic and rage. They almost immediately vanished from sight, masked by the small fires Bbowser had lit when he’d used firebreath to stop one of the mimics from stabbing him in the mouth. The Mimics hadn't given up, even if endless aggression had not been in their nature like all but the free never could. They were still out there in the mess, along with likely countless more their kind. Watching. Waiting. Ready it strike at a moment of weakness.

[color=FD0000]”WHAT WAS THAT!”[/color] Bowser roared, glancing around in agitated alarm at the suddenly empty seeming room, his nerves frayed and his body royally scratched up.

After the shock had worn off, the situation had been explained and Bowser had been told that no, they couldn't just burn the building down and hope that dealt with the situation, the king begrudgingly took point on the cleansing of the building. Flame breath incinerated countless volumes, an act that many would consider a travesty, along with masses of stationary and other library supplies as Bowser cleared out rooms and then used his shoulder mounted water cannons to douse the flames. It was slow and monotonous work, made even slower by having to wait out the smoke clouds it created, but it cleared safe zones for those who didn't feel up to risking it in the prop hunt nightmare alone to stay safely inside, and provided launching off points for those who dared to face up to the challenge of hunting for the last miniboss.   

After what seemed like an eternity someone found a hidden way down and Bowser gladly abandoned the latest room he was slashing and burning to join the team as they descended into the dark. Down and down and further down still they descended following the roots of the great vile tree even as its own tendrils met and interwoven with veins of neon blue liquid stretching up out of the depths. 

At the source of the glowing pipes and at the end of the roots, in a chamber filled with skulls who’s eyes glowed with undeath and surrounded by accursed power they found her. She was a  monster, a lich, a mockery of life, an instrument of ruin and entropy. She was also a cursed little girl.

[color=FD0000]”What happened to you kid?”[/color] Bowser asked with unusual softness, but even he could piece together the basics from the Skullgirl and Nadia’s brief back and forth. The Skull heart had happened to her and, whatever it was, Nadia had come to claim it.

[color=FD0000]”We are not killing a kid,”[/color] Bowser growled at Nadia and then with his mind ticking in overdrive, he tried to convince them as to why they wouldn't need to [color=FD0000]”She said she’s going to “clean up” the root, WHICH IS ONE OF THOSE MET-A-FOR THINGS RIGHT? WHEN YOU SAID 'CLEAN UP' YOU MEAN DESTROY RIGHT? LIKE ITS A MAID JOKE OR THEME THING NOT A ‘I’M GOING TO DUST THE DEMON ROOTS AND MAKE THEM NICE AND CLEAN’ THING”[/color] he shouted the question before going back to loudly whispering to the red team 

[color=FD0000]”Which means we don't have to kill her to get the boss. Plus, we’ve got Kamek and the Master of Masters and a bunch of other people who are smart at magic on our side out there and Peach can do this spirit manipulation thing now so if you really want this skullheart thing we can get it out of her somehow. I’ve had plenty of evil artifacts in me, heroes always find a way to get them out,”[/color] He insisted, a lifetime of being thwarted being turned to hopeless optimism in the dark pit they found themselves.