[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/6W7bqko.png[/img]
[h2][color=FD0000]The Koopa Troop[/color][/h2]
[b][color=FD0000]wordcount:[/color][/b] 1,640  (+3) 
[b][color=FD0000]Bowser: Level 12 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=FD0000]//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color] (130/120)
[b][color=SpringGreen]Bowser Jr: Level 12 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=SpringGreen]/////////////////////[/color]/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (20/120)
[b][color=DeepSkyBlue]Kamek: Level 12 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=DeepSkyBlue]///////////////////[/color]///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (19/120)
[b][color=Aqua]Rika: Level 6 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=Aqua]////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color] (62/60)
[b][color=FD0000]Location:[/color][/b] The Under - The Ruins - Dripstone Cave
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[hider=level up]
Bowser:
Shell Smash (Blastoise): Bowser smashes his shell with a fist, creating fiery glowing cracks across its surface. This reduces his defensive stats to 66% of their base (i.e. reducing them by a third, but also modifies his movement speed, and all offensive stats up to 200% of their base (i.e. doubling them).

The effect lasts until the end of a battle, or until either half of the effect of it is dispelled (removing the debuff removes the buff, and vice versa)
[/hider]

There was no need for Rika to dance with little blobby death, as the seeker’s strategies worked like a charm before the light seeds could even try and charge her. The shields kept the silly Migospel from being infected, while Jr,Dazzle and Rika’s range attacks popped blobs left and right. The most effective strike came from Rubic however, his bouncing spell chaining kill after kill in quick succession and making short work of a swath of their foes. 

[color=DeepSkyBlue]”Is everyone alright?”[/color] Kamek enquired as he swooped over, to which he got a pair of affirmation from the two youngsters of the troop. Bowser caught up a little later just in time for Barnabee to fill them in more on what they had just stopped, namely some kind of zombie plague.

[color=FD0000]”urgh, yeah, good job troop. Those things remind me way too much of these little things from the dead zone. Just glowy instead of fleshy.”[/color] the king commented, relieved they were all right, and just a little annoyed that he had been too slow to help [color=FD0000]”That place was the worst… or maybe the maw was the worst. Whatever. Still bad”[/color]

The other three nodded at that assessment, though Rika had no context for the first place he'd mentioned, while the koopas had all been in the dead zone at one point or other, however briefly, and got the jist of what he meant even if they hadn’t all seen the flood.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]”Let us hope that this one being ‘close to the surface’ as you say, is just a coincidence. I think we could all do without another run of that wasteland”[/color] Kamek said, putting word to their shared sentiment about that place.

There was only one way to find out if his hopes would turn out true however, and that was to descend deeper. Fortunately, Primrose had managed to find a way and so, after a bit of spirit plundering of mosquitoes and light seeds and the stuffing of them into increasingly full jars, the troop followed her lead to the secret exit to the cave.

Once within, on top of sussing out the second hidden wall they had missed, she also pointed out something else obvious to her and not to them, and that was there was no way that the others had come this way.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]”That is … concerning”[/color] Kamek noted before theorizing that [color=DeepSkyBlue]”maybe we missed a warp pipe? Or another hidden wall? I worry they’ll go try and find us by going the other way, and get very lost doing so”[/color] 

[color=SpringGreen]”If we did, that map guy’ll point them after us if they try to go back right? So we should keep marking the way we went, and hope they catch up I guess?”[/color] Jr suggested, before expanding on Prim’s idea of marking the walls as they went, and doing some graffiti on the walls to point out both the secret walls and adding a tag to confirm that it was 100% him that had done said marking, and that they had gone this way.

Then all that was left to do was, well, keep moving forwards and hoping that Primrose’s idea that this was a shortcut to where the others where was the correct one.

Or, to be more specific, to keep moving downwards. 

It went without saying that the troop, moving together, were a lot less stealthy than Primrose, particularly because they had to take rather specific routes that would let Bowser get down, instead of being able to squeeze through any which way. That said, they didn’t just walk either.

Jr and Kamek could fly, of course, while Rika got her Cocatrice swapped out for a hunting spider once again and used it to hop, climb and web build her way down. That left the big man himself, who equipped a bell to his spiked collar, and used his Meowser claws to slide down the side of the tree where he could, and also occasionally stopping to use [url=https://imgur.com/TLnbVW1]Scissorman’s Shears[/url] he had acquired way back when for their actual intended purpose, namely pruning plants, which he did to help to clear his way down.

It also got used to prune other things, such as the fungus men who stood simply no chance against the grouped up troop, their reliance on punching attacks meaning that most of them that tried to fight them didn't even manage to get close before blasted by one of the fliers

It was the basilisk that where the bigger problem, and the troop’s first encounter with them was the roughest:

[color=SpringGreen]”Oh hey look! I see something shiny over there”[/color] Jr called over the sound of claws scraping through bark being caused by his papa cat scratching down the side of the central tree [color=SpringGreen]”I’m going to check it out!”[/color]

Then he promptly flew off, dragging everyone but Bowser in his wake, where they promptly got ambushed by an equal number of basilisks.

Numerous eyes [url=https://runescape.wiki/images/Basilisk_gaze.png?9e5aa]flashed[/url] from the shadows of a grand branch, causing armor negating damage to take a good chunk off of the trio’s health.

Several cries of pain were followed by a battle cry from jr as he pivoted to charge the oversized lizards, only to find his movements sluggish, and his machine diving forth without support. Rika and Kamek both found practically every stat of theirs greatly reduced by the basilisk's gaze from their strength to their magic, which caused both broom and spider construct to lose potency and to drop both of them to the ground unceremoniously.

Or rather it dropped Rika to the ground and Kamek out of the air. The mage cried out in alarm as he fell, plummeting towards the distant floor, only to find Rika dropping after him. Having lunged after him on instinct, the ship girl wrapped gauntleted arms around him, and then fired her maneuvering thrusters, blasting them forwards so that she hit a far less distant branch, the ship girl grunting in pain as she rolled the landing.

After a moment, she rose stiffly, only to find herself face to face with a grove of mushroom men, made suddenly dangerous by the basilisk's debuffing of them and her being alone and having to protect a stunned Kamek. 

Up above, jr found himself alone vs three of the giant lizards, which turned to focus their gaze on him

[color=SpringGreen]”Oh no you don’t. Minions! Get them!”[/color] Jr cried out weakly, proceeding to hurl wave after wave of striker squads at the great beasts while he pulled back and tried to remedy himself. A battle of self healing being crippled and undone by basilisk gazes ensued, while the monsters themselves were chipped away at by minion wave attacks.

Then, a roar broke through the grindfest of a fight as Bowser, having ascended back up to to reunite with his son riding on the back of his trowlon striker, arrived on the scene 

[color=FD0000]”You lizards are cooked now that the king of cat-astrophe is here!”[/color] he roared as he stepped off the lifting friend and changed … only to be promptly blasted by basilisk gazes that slowed that charge to a crawl. 

He snarled and waved a fist angrily at them as he slogged on forwards towards the lizards, who were in the midst of cowing though the last of Jr’s goomba strikers and directed their focus onto the boy in full. Furious at being too slow yet again, the king hammered his chest once, twice and then on the third hit there was a flash of inspiration in the kings and all might crack from his shell. 

Glowing lines of energy split his shell like a river delta of magma … and then he sped up once again, faster now than he had been before, but not, he somehow knew, as fast as he would go with this power un obstructed.

Another basalt hit him, but his lowered defenses ment naught when the shots were bypassing it anyway, and the debuff did not stack, shell smash continuing to counteract it. Then he hit the lizard pack, fits and claws smashing and slashing, and his own summoned strikers adding to his furious assault, hammers, bombs and bones flying. 

This gave Jr time and space to [color=SpringGreen]”Esuna!”[/color] himself clear of the buff. Then he turned the cure spell on his dad and promptly removed both the basilisk's debuff, and, unintentionally, his dad’s own effect, the glowing lines sealing shut as he was returned to normal.

It didn’t matter, the king was upon his foe already, and he dealt out brutal vengeance, and soon enough the basilisks were dust.

Down below, a panting Rika drove ripped her chainsaw bayonet down one final time, slashing the final mushroom monster from throat to gutt, just in time for the debuff to wear off upon the death of its caster. After checking that Kamek was recovering (he was), and calling up to see if Bowser and Jr where ok (they where) she moved to inspect a small treasure stash that had presumably belonged to the mushroom creatures in some shape or form. 

[hider=for Rika]
[b][url=https://i.imgur.com/4eb3dE6.png]Mithril Stone Spirit[/url][/b] x2
[i]When mining mithril ore, the spirit will be consumed to grant an extra ore[/i]
[b][url=https://i.imgur.com/RxxycFr.png]Burnt Pan[/url][/b]
[i]Well-aimed hits in quick succession increase damage dealt up to four times, resetting on block or miss. While equipped, consumables heal a little more[/i]
[b][url=https://i.imgur.com/UDNQaoq.png]Earth Talisman[/url][/b]
[i]An artifact that allows owners to enter the earth altar. It can be combined with a tiara to make an earth tiara at the earth altar. Both the tiara and the talisman allow owners to use the Runecrafting skill[/i]
[/hider]

[color=Aqua]”Huh, neat”[/color] she commented as she pocketed the items, right in time for a cry of [color=SpringGreen]”Oh come on!”[/color] to descend from the branch above Jr found out that the shiny thing he had seen that had caused this whole mess was a mere shard of glass.

That discovery, plus the unpleasant encounter with the basilisks, put a damper on any other wandering off, and so the troop stuck together and took as direct a path as they could down, using Kamek’s whisps to scout out any threats and doing their best to nuke them down as quickly as possible when they spotted.

By the time they reached the bottom they had acquired a small collection of spirits, and a dire need for a rest, the troop parking themselves at the base of the tree, and taking a load off as they waited for everyone to regroup down there, lighting a little fire to roast some marshmallows over while they did so as a quick little pick me up.