Chapter 33
A Horrible Place
Julius Bluestone flew out of his chair and yelled out in horror. "NO!"
He had been watching Lily through a big crystal ball in his office right up until she disappeared in a flash of blue light.
The parrot who had been watching everything unfold from the school director's shoulder squawked, "What happened? Why did she vanish? Where did she go?"
"I don't know!" cried Bluestone.
"Well, find her!"
Bluestone snapped, "I'm trying! But I can't find her anywhere. She must have been taken somewhere I can't see."
"That's impossible!" said the parrot. "There should be nowhere in this school you cannot see. Unless . . ."
"No, I'm certain she is still somewhere in the school at least," said Bluestone. "Blast it all! There must still be areas of the property I haven't gotten under my control!"
"An area not under your control!?" The parrot squawked in dismay. "Anywhere of the Bluestone family not under your control is about as safe as a cave full of starving bears! Such a place is sure to have lots of curses and other magical defenses against intruders. And if there is one thing the Bluestone family was not known for, it is being merciful to intruders. She's lost in a literal death trap!"
*********
Lily stared ahead and blinked. Around her were walls of rough, dark stone illuminated by torch fire. But even with the crackling flames, the air chilled Lily to the bone and made her shiver. And whether she looked left and right, there was just endless darkness ahead.
"Where is this?" she wondered aloud. "How'd I get here?"
She remembered running away from her uncle and then everything got covered in bright, blue light. Next thing she knew, she was in a hallway straight out of a movie about Medieval Europe.
After taking in her surroundings, she pressed her back against the wall, sank down to the floor and let out a long sigh.
"Worst. Halloween. Ever!" she grumbled to herself while looking aimlessly up at the ceiling. First, she gets turned into a baby. And then she finds out her uncle had been working for the enemy, helping the Schemer with his cruel, evil escapades. Now, she's lost in some random hallway with major creep vibes worse than an empty school hallway covered in fake spiderwebs. She didn't even have any idea how she got here in the first place. "Well, at least I got away from Uncle Viceroy."
After a brief rest, she stood back up and stretched a little. She was reluctant to go back, but she didn't want to worry the others more than they probably already were.
Lily rolled back her sleeve. Even if she didn't know where she was, she could just use the magic of the bracelet to get out of here.
"Alright, bracelet. Take me home."
Light flashed from the bracelet's jewels and then a piece of paper popped out. Lily snatched it out of the air to read, "Impossible. Magical defenses detected. Cannot break through."
"So I'm trapped here!?" Lily cried in dismay. She took a few deep breaths. "Don't panic, Lily. So what if you can't beam yourself home? That just means you have to find the way out the old-fashioned way. But . . ."
She looked left and right again.
"Which way do I go? I don't suppose you can tell me, bracelet?"
Light flashed from the bracelet again, and another piece of paper popped out, which read, "Locator spells cannot be used."
Lily rolled her eyes and sighed. "Of course. I guess I got no choice except to just pick a side and hope for the best."
But just as she was about to start walking -
"AH HAHAHAHAHA!"
A cackling laugh suddenly filled the hallway and startled Lily out of her skin.
She whirled around and shouted, "Who's there?" But she did not get an answer back. The hallway was once more dead silent. She really didn't like that one bit. "Hello?"
Still nothing.
"Ugh!" she groaned. "As if things weren't bad enough! This can't possibly get any worse."
And then all the lights went out and Lily was plunged into complete darkness. A word left her lips that ought never be written in a book for children.
Clunk-jingle, clunk-jangle, clunk-jingle, clunk-jangle, clunk-jingle . . .
Noise filled the hallway again, coming from both ends and getting louder and louder. It sounded like lots of boots were marching towards Lily in rhythm, accompanied by the jingle-jangle of something made of metal. The sounds bounced off the walls and made her head throb with each beat. She cupped her hands over her ears to try and block it all out.
While hunched over, she screamed, "Just what is happening?"
Her question got an answer when light flashed from her bracelet and exposed a suit of rusted armor standing right in front of her with a sword raised over its head. The sword came down in the blink of an eye, too fast for Lily to get away in time. But before the straight blade could split her in half -
CHING!
- a wall of blue glass appeared over the young girl and stopped the sword in its tracks.
"Eek!"
With a frightened shriek, Lily turned to flee and quickly ducked down when she spotted a glint of metal out of the corner of her eye. A blade from a second moving suit of armor flew over her head, narrowly missing by a hair's breadth. She swerved around and raised her hand as a third armor approached. Light flashed from her bracelet and Armor #3 went flying into Armor #4. Armor #5 tripped over #3 and #4.
Lily ran past them, chased after by Armor #2. After shattering the glass wall with a second blow, Armor #1 joined Armor #2 along with dozens more.
Up ahead, she spotted a fork and turned right. That turned out to be a mistake, because there, the floor crumbled beneath her feet. She had stepped on a pitfall trap that sent her plunging into a dark abyss. Light from the bracelet showed Lily that down below, there were ten-foot long, thin, pointed spikes waiting to impale anyone unlucky enough to fall in. Unlucky like Lily herself.
But once again, the bracelet came to her rescue. The first time, it had created a blue glass wall to shield her from the armor's sword. This time, it pulled out a flying broomstick that looped into her jacket and stopped her from falling further. Her hands and feet dangled as she floated just an inch over the needle-sharp points.
While staring at one point that aimed dead center between her eyes, she heard marching footsteps and looked up. To her horror, suits of armor came falling down with their swords pointing at her.
"Seriously!? Do you guys really want to kill me that badly!?"
The broomstick quickly swung Lily right and left, and suits of armor dropped past her to be skewered by the spikes below. She tried not to look down at the grisly sight as the broom lifted her out of the pit and right in the path of a huge block of stone that swung down from the ceiling.
A split second before the block hit Lily, blue elastic poured out of the bracelet and wrapped itself around her. It absorbed most of the impact, but it and Lily went flinging down the corridor. After bouncing off the floor once, the bubble popped. Lily hit the floor next and went rolling a couple of feet before stopping, covered from head to toe in agonizing pain.
She laid still for a moment and then let out a sob.
What did I do to deserve this? She wondered. I didn't ask for these magic powers. I didn't ask to be chosen to be a magical superhero. And I definitely didn't ask to be dumped into this place full of deadly traps and living armor.
She was literally sick and tired of it all. But she would be given no more time to rest. She could hear a chorus of footsteps marching getting louder and louder. It wouldn't be long before those homicidal suits of armor showed up again.
"I need to get out of here," she muttered aloud. "I need to . . . GET UP! NOW!"
She gritted her teeth and mustered just enough strength to sluggishly rise. A bit of stumbling later, she was running again. And then -
SPLAT!
"OH, COME ON!"
Her feet sank into a puddle of quicksand. And she knew it was quicksand because what else could it be?
She twisted left and right, trying to tear herself out of the quicksand. But that, of course, didn't help. Instead, she sunk even faster. Her knees and then her waist were submerged in a matter of seconds.
I need something to pull myself up! As soon as that thought left Lily's mind, the broomstick appeared flying to her rescue. She grabbed hold of the blue handle as soon as she saw it and clung tight with a bear hug as it pulled and pulled, and pulled. Both Lily and the broomstick pulled with all their heart and soul, but their efforts bore no fruit and Lily continued to sink further and further, deeper and deeper.
And then she noticed something unusual while trying, and failing, to climb out of the pool of quicksand. The hallway had suddenly gotten quiet.
Slowly, and reluctantly, she turned her head. No surprise, there was a crowd of sword-wielding suits of armor behind her. Mixed in the group were spear-carrying skeletons with glowing red eyes. Their jaw bones rattled as if they were laughing at her.
The armor suits raised their swords, and the skeletons raised their spears. Sharp blades dropped down and then -
BOOM!
A section of the wall to Lily's right burst and from the hole, piles of rock clumped together into the shape of a man jumped in. It threw a punch that, although didn't reach, unleashed a gust of wind so strong, it reduced all the armor suits and skeletons to scattered pieces.
It was the Stone Man, Lily recognized, the same one no less that saved her twice before.
The Stone Man gave the floor a strong, thunderous stomp and the quicksand spat Lily out, sending her flying into his arms. He gently let the young girl down and then handed her a sheet of paper along with a firm command spoken in a low, rumbling voice. "Stay here."
Lily gave the sheet of paper a glance, noting the red Chinese writing on it. And then she looked up at the Stone Man, thinking he was a lot smaller than last time.
After the young girl gave him a nod, the Stone Man turned away to face a wall of enemies approaching them. Light flashed from his dark eye sockets and he let out a low, guttural growl. He said to the oncoming crowd of skeletons and suits of armor, "Weapons. Do. Not. Belong. In. A. SCHOOL!"
And then he went charging straight at the crowd. And he mowed them all down with a combination of palm strikes and elbows so lightning fast that none of the skeletons or suits of armor had a chance to even lift up their weapons before they exploded into pieces of bone and metal. Sometimes, he'd add a twirling kick that send enemies flying against the walls.
As Lily watched, she wondered, Is that Kung Fu? The Stone Man knows Kung Fu?
A trio of skeletons suddenly appeared behind her and attacked with their spears. But before the blades reached her, the paper in her hand flashed red and the skeletons, weapons and all, turned to dust. She never noticed.
Before long, the army of metal and bone had been completely wiped out. The Stone Man took one look around at the trail of destruction he had made and then walked back up to Lily, purposely crushing pieces further beneath his feet on the way.
Behind him, a huge block swung down from the ceiling, but he turned and stopped it with a punch. There was a loud bang and then silence. A few seconds later, both the ceiling block and the Stone Man crackled all over.
Lily was, at first, dismayed, thinking that the Stone Man had gotten hurt or worse. But as pieces of the Stone Man crumbled down with the pieces of the ceiling block, she realized that it was only his armor that got damaged and underneath all that rock was a human like herself. He had black hair like herself and wore a blue coat-like robe. On his head was a cap with a piece of paper stuck to the side, identical to the one that Lily had been given.
Wait a minute, she thought. I know that costume.
Slowly, the man turned around and revealed his face.
Lily's jaw dropped.
"Uncle Viceroy?"
Viceroy Kevin Lin glanced at the bracelet shining blue around Lily's arm alongside the red glow of the paper charm in her hand and then he said to her, "You and I need to have a word."
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