Blu, Blossom, and the elderly man rushed across the tunnel system in a desperate attempt to catch up with Kevin and Gerald, whose powers had completely disappeared from their minds. At the exact moment when Kevin broke the skull, they heard the loud shatter from nearby, instantly changing their direction. "Let's just hope he hasn't been captured!" Blu said to Blossom, who rolled her eyes in reply. "Kevin's a bold kid. The last thing that would happen to him is getting kidnapped, and we can bet on it!"
The Man of Stone jumped right in front of the twins, and his fist turned from a pale, white color to a gray, stone color. A split second later, another explosion came raging through the hallways of the tunnel. "Why am I feeling an unimaginable amount of firepower!?" he asked Blu and Blossom, who innocently shrugged.
"The skull deep in the cave is like a monitor!" the orange tattooed man informed Xavier. "If you destroy it, the kid is going to transform into Pyron, The Fire Sovereign!" It was at that exact moment where an even stronger explosion than before, followed by a roar, raged throughout the tunnel. "Anyone who messes with LUO will face eternal suffering!"
Volume 13, Chapter 14 - Thinking Fast
The skull deep in the cave had been destroyed by Kevin, lifting a curse that granted immense pain to his head. Now that it has been broken, Team Pyron is in a race against time to find the location of the kid to prevent him from converting into Pyron, The Fire Sovereign - and this forces them to think fast.
In a distant part of the cave, an invisible forcefield made of firepower shielded the young boy from any external threats, creating unfathomable wind currents that blew everyone across the cave. "The power is multiplying by the second!" the man with the blue tattoo screamed, battling the wind currents in an attempt to seize his power for himself. "The hypothesis has been deemed true - he really is a miniature version of the pristine entity!" Now unbothered by the intense wind currents, he jolted his hand right towards the child's forehead. "Now, you're going to help me destroy this ENTIRE CIT-"
Yakasa (the Man of Stone) arrived just in time alongside Blu and Blossom, punching the blue tattooed man straight in the face away from the child. "You're not going to do anything to that innocent child as long as I'm here!" he declared. Blu and Blossom charged straight towards the child, but were blown back by the violent winds encouraged by its immense power. "A legend like you, coming out of retirement to save the next generation?" the man with the blue tattoo joked, brushing the rubble straight off of his white cloak and emerging from the dirt. "First of all, I'm still in retirement - I was just roped in!" he clarified, "and second, don't think I'll let you do anything to my hometown - no matter how powerful you are, I will fight for the Land of Stone!"
Yakasa pointed straight to the child. "You guys, deal with the freakish child-entity thing! I'll deal with this guy, and we'll go from there!"
Blu and Blossom nodded, their fists turning into stone alongside Yakasa. "Seems like we're going to have to make do until backup arrives!" Blossom joked, colliding with the forcefield that divided the child and the battle.
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Forrest and Stephanie drove through the dark cave that had been illuminated by the Great Armor's headlights. "You're telling me Xavier and Itama are back at the entrance, Kevin and Gerald are nowhere to be found, and Blu, Blossom, and Yakasa went to save the child?"
"Yep," Forrest replied. "Firepower levels have spiked in the directions everyone has taken. Since you're not doing anything, you don't get to witness the fights!"
Stephanie angrily slammed her hands on the dashboard, sinking back into her seat. "You were the one that forced me to join this mission, so it's your fault that I'm here!" Dumbfounded, Forrest looked Stephanie right in the eyes. "You're the one who thought we were going on vacation," he clapped back. "If anything, it's your fault you decided to join us!"
Stephanie angrily rolled her eyes, but her expression rapidly shifted after she noticed something in the road. "YOU'RE SUCH A BAD DRIVER!" she criticized, forcing the wheel in the opposite direction. Less than a second later, the Great Armor was now driving through another universe - instead of the intense, eerie setting of the cave, they were now flying in a vibrant universe. "Where the hell… are we?" Forrest asked, softly taking his hands off the wheel to admire the colors. A second later, he was completely braindead.
"Does this girl not have a brain?" a man with a glowing, green tattoo thought out loud. "I succeeded in shutting the driver's brain down, but nobody's ever withstood a power like mine…"
Now that Stephanie had overheard his thoughts, everything finally made sense - they were in a dimension where the vibrant colors could completely stop minds, and she was the only one who was immune to the power. In Forrest's mind, a vision including Sayeo and Cameron was playing inside his head - they were back in Diamond City as if nothing had ever happened, and a peaceful tune was repeating inside the vision. "What's happening to me…" Forrest thought to himself, placing his hand on Sayeo's shoulder. "I thought you were… dead…" Sayeo slowly turned his head towards Forrest, his warm, reassuring smile beaming across his face for the first time in years. "I'm not dead," Sayeo said. "Relax, Forrest - achieve inner peace within your body."
Stephanie was now facing the man who had trapped them in the alternative dimension. His eyes had been closed for a few minutes, but his breath and heartbeat were rather steady. She punched the man right in the face, breaking the hold the dimension had over the both of them and reverting them back to the present. "Guess it's time for us to fight!" Stephanie informed Forrest, who was recovering from his dream.