The Sorcerer was playing a different kind of game tonight. Apart from a group that he had brought to his castle together, he had also brought a number of others, but scattered into groups of their own. Some had landed in safe havens. Some had landed where they would meet others. Some were alone. Some had landed in trapped rooms.
Most were strangers. Most of them would not get far. None of them would leave. Some of them would leave themselves behind as part of his collection, others would leave their rubble in a pile.
However, tonight's group was one of two. Another group was playing the game normally, while the second collection of scattered girls was there for one reason.
The Sorcerer had some empty space he felt needed filling.
***
Serenity Wheeler groaned as she awoke. Before her, four others lay there. A brunette in a pink dress, a blonde in white, another brunette in a green and white school uniform, and a long haired woman who wore a t-shirt and jeans.
The room itself was just a small dining room, as if for workers rather than guests, with an odd looking chandelier hanging down. It looked like an upside down christmas tree made of rings, with a steel orb at the end.
"What... Where am I?" She wondered as she stood.
Normally, there would be some kind of warning. Something to let the five know the score, what they were here for.
However, there wasn't any warning except for the hum from the upside down tree, as it glowed with energy. A shot of lighting burst forth, striking her. She barely had much time to react, and was almost immediately frozen in place, confused, surprised, and shocked in more ways than one. In that instant, she had been transformed into stone.
Her expression could, if anything, be described as "not again", though this would be the last time for her to be petrified. It had happened to her once before, oddly.
The other four women however, had not fully awoken until the blast. They stared for a second, and then the confusion snapped. The girl in the uniform shrieked and ran off. The long haired girl fled. As Kazumi Yoshida ran, and Rachel Stanley beat a more orderly retreat, the other two regarded the "tree"
"What... That thing just..." Namine blinked.
It then hummed and glowed again.
"Come on! We had better go!" Kairi shouted, yanking Namine away, only just dodging a bolt of the lightning as the door closed behind them.
***
In another room, things had gone better. A pink haired girl mostly in black, a blonde in green, and a similar-looking grey haired girl in darker green had awoken beside a white-haired girl in a pink and white dress, plus a brunette girl in yellow.
Of the five, though, Selphie Tilmitt had established herself as a leader of sorts quite fast.
"Okay, so... What were your names again? Alkaid, Atoli, Shino, and you were?"
"Azmaria..." The girl in pink and white said.
"Okay. I've no idea why we're all here, but I should scout ahead. I move into a room, you guys wait one behind..."
"Wait, why do you take the lead?" Alkaid asked. Selphie grinned.
"I'm kind of a mercenary, so I'm more experienced at fighting I bet..."
"A mercenary?! Damn, this event is weird. I hope she doesn't charge us."
"...Event?" Azmaria pondered, but Selphie was already gone, leaving her with the three who seemed to group together, and ignore her...
***
Selphie had found herself in the next room, a hallway that overlooked the gardens. She noticed some movement - Robotic knights, patrolling the grounds, and in a small clearing filled with other statues, there was a girl moving. Selphie watched as the girl hid behind a statue, and her trained eyes did not fail to see the girl and the statue looked similar, almost like twins...
Down below, though, Meer Campbell was alarmed. She had suddenly found herself in this place, with a road that she never seemed to be able to travel down - no matter how far she went, she was still right beside the gates the moment she turned around to look.
And now there were robots chasing her.
"Wait.. Look out behind you!" Selphie hissed. The girl below did not hear. A figure in green had sneaked up behind her, and attacked. Selphie hissed in surprise as the girl was instantly petrified, now the exact twin of the statue she was peering around...
"Damn it... I'm up against petrify attacks..." She groaned. She hated that kind of trick so much... And without any GFs or weapons, she knew the robots would be trouble.
"Nothing I can do for her up here... I need to keep going..." Selphie told herself, moving on.
The other three behind never noticed the statues below, nor did they notice that the door that closed behind them had sealed Azmaria in the other room.
"Eh?! Hey, this door just locked! Hello?!
***
Kairi and Namine stopped for breath in another room. Each room they had entered had smaller versions of the "trees" on the ceilings. Neither wished to risk letting them charge, and now, this room was empty.
Except for one thing. A statue of a girl, in a tight shirt and shorts, with a half-skirt around the back, and with detached sleeves. Straps formed an X across her chest, and she wore thigh-high socks. This strange statue stood with her back to a mirror, eyes wide open, arms raised, as if staring at something.
But there was nothing there for Aqua to stare at. Kairi made the connection.
"Whatever got her..." She began, when Namine grabbed her hand. Both girls then spoke together.
"Um, what are you do..."
They trailed off, as they turned to face each other, and now grabbed their other hands.
"I'm not doing this! Are you moving yourself?!" Namine panicked.
"No! Something's controlling me!" Kairi said, alarmed.
The pair stared at each other, and then heard a noise. Like something crackling. They looked down.
Their feet were turning grey.
"...Whatever got her, got us..." Kairi said, resigned.
Behind the mirror, the sorcerer Zauberer grinned.
"Clever little puppet..."
***
Selphie had come face to face with another mirror of sorts.
"...What the hell is this?" She asked, observing... herself.
It was her, no doubt about it. But younger. The dress of the stone mini-Selphie was similar to the one the older Selphie wore, but the statue held a jump rope.
"This is weird..." She muttered, poking the nose of the statue experimentally.
"Is this some kind of time paradox? I don't remember ever owning a dress like this one when I was that small..."
Selphie glanced around, making sure no one saw what she did next. She knelt down, grabbed the paper-thin material of the statue's skirt, and pulled.
It should have shattered away, but it was like inch thick steel. It gave no sign of being remotely fragile at all.
"Okay, so, it's indestructible..." She muttered, very confused.
And very distracted.
The knight that had petrified Meer Campbell had followed her in silence, and with one shot, a puzzled older Selphie stared at her own self from another world.
And elsewhere, a friend of the mini-Selphie was joining her.
***
Their knees and below were stone, and the girls could only speak, and stare at each other.
"I can't even feel the parts that are stone now..." Namine said, horrified.
Up to their waists, now hard grey rock.
"We just need to stay calm. We won't be concious I wouldn't imagine but I'm sure this won't be permanent. Someone can help us..."
Halfway up their chests.
"And if this is permanent?"
Their armpits. The wave flowed down their arms, and then their faces locked into smiles. Through their teeth they managed to just about speak.
"Then I hope... We really... aren't... aware..." Kairi managed to say, as her throat then petrified.
Muted, the pair could only watch, as their arms finished turning to stone, and then the wave froze their grins, and for them finally, their eyes. Left for a few seconds unable to see, both girls remained somewhat aware. Their last thoughts before they petrified were fear that they would be trapped inside the statues, blind, deaf, and without sensation, nothing but a mind in blackness.
The resulting statues, staring at each other, did not even have minds any more.
***
As this happened, a black-haired girl in black robes entered the room, seeing the last portions of the girls petrify.
"No!" She cried out, and Xion almost ran over and touched the familiar pair before stopping.
"Wait... that girl in the gardens I saw petrified. She crumbled to bits when someone touched her... but there were other statues that looked like they had been people too... maybe they solidify?"
She resolved to defend these two until she was sure they would not become dust. She took a stance beside them, and then heard a noise.
"Who's ther-"
She never finished. Zauberer had decided to petrify her right away from behind the mirror. Now, Aqua's statue stared at two others, staring at each other, and at the back of the head of a fourth, in a combat pose, as if defending the other three.
***
The three players who thought they were still in The World had found Selphie.
"This is one weird event... Who started it?" Alkaid pondered, as Shino neared the stone Selphies.
"Wait! It might be a trap!" Altoli protested.
Instead of an ambush, though, a door opened, as Shino touched the smaller Selphie.
"Huh. Hey, where'd that other NPC go? I hope she wasn't mission critical..."
"Let's climb these stairs first. I think that's where we're heading..." Alkaid said, heading up. It led to a door, which opened into...
"What the hell..."
Sitting there, were three girls hooked up to computers. On each screen before them, the three avatars.
"That's... me..." Alkaid said, moving over to her own body. She touched her own face, and was startled to actually feel both her face below her fingers, and fingers on her face...
"Look out! It was a trap! You're turning to stone!"
"Huh?!" Alkaid felt it. Her legs were petrifying, on avatar and on the body before her. It was swift, and left behind a startled statue, staring at an almost sleeping petrified player.
"This one is really weird. Why do these look exactly like our real selves?" Shino wondered.
Atoli stared at Alkaid's screen,
"Um... I think... I think it really is us..."
The screen did not show Alkaid the avatar. It showed the stone form of Chika Kuramoto, but with open eyes, staring from the screen at both statues of herself, wide eyed and shocked.
And then the other two suddenly felt strange, and reached out to their own selves.
"What the... I'm being controlled!"
"Me too!" Shino said, as the two touched their real selves.
Moments later, the screens changed. Shino Nanao's startled face stared at her statues, while Chigusa Kusaka mirrored the action from her own screen.
***
Azmaria meanwhile had found another way. On her route, she had not encountered danger, but did find many statues.
And she was well aware they were real people.
"This is really creepy..." She said to herself, and then yelped as she fell down a pit.
"Ow... I need to pay more attention..."
She looked up to find a way out, but instead stared at a shocked, familiar, statue.
"Rosette!" She cried out, seeing the form of the stone woman.
"Wait... Maybe I can revert her..."
She took a breath, and began to sing, eyes closed, and expecting to open her eyes and see Rosette back to normal.
The pit filled with the gas, silencing and petrifying her in a flash.
***
Kazumi, meanwhile, had kept on running. And running. Past statue after statue, petrified victim after victim, and then... down a pit.
"Argh!"
She blinked, sat up, and saw she was down the hole.
"Aah! I fell down a pit!"
After stating the obvious, she noticed the shape beside her. It was a curious re-enactment of a similar scene happening mere seconds before.
"Shana?! Oh no! How can you be..."
The gas cut her off, leaving the worried girl staring at her friend's statue.
***
In another room, two others had found themselves awakening.
One, however, had not even bothered to speak to the other. Azula had ignored Nunally, leaving the wheelchair-bound blind girl behind. Somehow, despite the traps and roaming knights, Nunally had made her way to a corridor where there were a handful of damaged statues. Of course, she had no idea of this, carefully moving forward, reaching out with one hand to not hit anything, when one of the wheels hit something. There was an explosion, small but enough to throw her from the chair.
And in the process, she opened her eyes and was very surprised to see.
"...I can see?!"
She then looked back at her chair. Some distance away.
"Great..."
She reached up to one of the broken statues, and was then surprised by something else. Her leg almost reflexively moved below her, and before she knew it, she was standing.
"What... I can walk?!"
She jumped in the air, a cry of joy...
...cut short by an explosion. With eyes wide in shock, she fell backwards into her chair again. She had petrified sitting down before she even noticed the petrifying mine had petrified and shattered her lower legs in the same instant.
***
Another two had stuck together, for they were sisters. Hinata and Hanabi Hyuga, checking the rooms in advance at first with their bloodline ability to see through walls. It was shortly after seeing the first startled looking statues, the younger of the two realised something.
"...Hinata, is it me or does it seem like a really bad idea to be using our eyes?"
The elder sister frowned.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, there was this legend of a woman who had eyes that turned people to stone if they looked at them... These statues all have chakra around them. Either they're some kind of trap, or they were..."
"Alive once.. You're right. We need to be careful." Hinata agreed.
The pair had decided to then scout a room at a time, with regular vision. One went ahead, the other covered the rear of the now-clear room in case the statues were indeed a threat, or, if there was some other thing out there that had unfriendly intentions.
However, Hinata then began to act strangely.
"Hinata? Where are you going? We've been that way..."
"Naruto?" Hinata said, wandering back.
Hanabi blinked. She hadn't saw or heard anything.
"Sis, what do you mean? I never heard..."
But Hinata was running now. Hanabi dashed to keep up, only for two robot knights to leap out in front of her.
Unfortunately for them, she was a Ninja. She dodged their clumsy swings, and tried a small lighting jutsu on one far away. It exploded in a cloud, and a quick and careful check with her Byakugan showed something alarming, The cloud was full of chakra, and Hanabi was confident it was bad news to be in that cloud.
"What is it with our family and troublesome clouds... Gha! I sound like a Nara!"
The other one was safely destroyed, but Hanabi had been slowed down. She raced ahead to try and catch up.
***
Rachel Stanley meanwhile, was having the time of her life. She had been fighting the knights, and through sheer luck, had not detonated one right beside her. She remained unaware of how deadly they were, until she made a mistake.
She had been trying to make a show of the fights, and she had decided to try a diving kick on one knight now. With a thump, the knight exploded, and as she hit the ground, she was barely even given time to realise it, as she was petrified.
***
Hinata had heard Naruto calling to her, and she thought she had found him. She thought he had asked for a kiss, and somehow not fainting, she had agreed.
Hanabi had no idea of this as she saw what had really happened. Her sister now stood, solid stone, posed as if kissing an invisible suitor.
"W...What? Hinata!" She cried out, not aware that her own legs had began to turn to stone.
It was not very long after, when a startled statue stared at the kissing girl.
***
Some of those brought in were alone, by design, or by choice. Azula had chosen her solo action. She had also fallen for the same false illusion as Hinata, hearing her father call for her assistance.
She hadn't even had a chance to think much about it as she had followed her illusory father. She had walked into the path of a waiting knight, and without ever seeing it, had been petrified by a touch.
***
Another loner, by design, had been Hecate, a Crimson Lord and an enemy of the now-petrified Shana. She had found herself engaged in pitched battle right away, streams of knights charging her. But the sheer numbers of them had caused the air in the hall she fought them in to become saturated in petrifying gasses, and even as she fought, she was slowly petrifying. She was unaware of it as she slowed, more and more of her stone, until she was turned to a statue in the midst of a combat pose.
***
Another lone girl had been put in a place where her fate was inevitable. Starfire had awoken beside a knight, and the alien girl had barely even asked the knight what was going on before she had been petrified. Her stone form now radiated innocent curiosity, her mouth still open as she had asked the knight her question.
It was not very elaborate compared to some, but she had been picked not for those things, but for the naivete that was now frozen on her stone face
***
A short haired statue had stood in a room, to the left of a dispenser. The dispenser was green, had a Cartoon Medusa, and a slogan.
"Medusa Candy - The Ultimate Rock Candy"
For Chikage Kushinada, practically in full blown child mode just seeing the word candy, nothing else had mattered. She was alone, yes. The statue looked suspiciously like Honoka, yes. But the statue in question seemed to be enjoying the candy...
Two smiling statues now stood, advertising the candy to the next unfortunate with a sweet tooth...
***
Miu Furinji and Renka Ma, however, had not been so foolish as their comrades.
"It... It's them! This candy must have petrified them!" Renka noted.
"Yeah... We just need to find whatever sicko owns this place then, and get him to change them back."
Zauberer smiled, watching them with his power. He had no intentions of letting them even know he existed.
Three knights had attacked, each firing small, slow, green beams, as well as swinging swords. The pair had dodged the attacks, but the knights had dodged their own counters.
Until Mia dodged a beam that hit another knight. The robot petrified, and with a kick, Renka shattered it.
"Ha! Easy when you get hit by those little beams!"
The other knight was kicked by Mia, into the path of another beam. It petrified, but before they could shatter it, the last knight hit it with a red beam. It turned back.
Too late for it, though, as it had its head kicked clean off.
The last knight fled.
"After it! That beam cures the statues!"
The chase was on. Led through the castle to a hallway, they had the knight cornered, both kicking it at once...
...only for it to vanish.
"What?! Some kind of illusion?!"
"Yeah... But I don't think this corridor is an illusion." Mia realised. Two gates slammed shut, sealing them in as a green bar of light began to swing towards them.
"Jump over it!" They agreed. It was too low to dive under.
They did this for some time, one beam at a time, easy to dodge. They landed, feeling very pleased.
"I could do this forever! This is one dumb trap..." Mia grinned.
"We just need to figure out an exit though. Forever is way too long for a dumb game." Renka added.
They had little choice though. Awaiting the oncoming beam, they missed the one coming from behind. It swept through them, petrifying them as two confident statues, poised to jump over an oncoming, and now no longer present, beam.
***
"Hm. Some fine new little decorations... But I think a little rearrangement is in order." Zauberer thought.
With a snap, the trio of Shana, Kazumi, and Hecate were on the same pedestal, in one of the entry halls. Kazumi was cowering behind Shana now, who was apparently protecting her from Hecate. Of course, none of them had actually saw each other, but their poses worked for this statue.
Another pedestal was now occupied by Rosette and Azmaria. Azmaria's singing, it seemed, rather startled the petrified Rosette... Or so the poses now seemed to indicate.
Lastly, Nunally, and her chair, wound up in a hall, with the shards that had been her legs forming a circle around the petrified girl and wheelchair. The shards formed a circle, and Nunally was now another trap for the next group.
"Busy, busy... There's that last eight to deal with too..." He chuckled, knowing full well what was meant to happen.
***
A group of ten had formed. Yuna, Saber, Arisu Ariusagawa, Karura, Maya Orihara, Eri Sawachika, Teana Lanster, Raven, Rini and Hotaru. Ten women, entering the throne room...
...to find a green haired woman waited for them.
"Who are you?" Raven challenged.
CC shook her head.
"That's not important. There's a way out of here. If you don't follow me, there's no other way out."
"And why should we trust you?" Yuna asked.
"I can't make you trust me. But if you don't, you'll never leave."
Reluctantly, the ten conceded, and followed.
"So, what is this way out?" Teana asked. The ten barely trusted each other, and now this woman claimed to have a way out, the only way. It felt like a trap.
"It's a narrow passageway. Only one person can fit at a time, so we need to hang back and wait for everyone to get in..."
It, of course, was a trap. CC however was not part of it. The room containing the passageway now also held two statues, three other women, and one Sorcerer.
"Hello, CC. Thank you for falling right into my little ambush..." He grinned.
"Who are they?" Rini wondered, looking at the three..."
"Oh, this is Toph, Shigure, and..."
"Terra..." Raven hissed.
"I see you are acquainted. I knew that, of course. The statues are Meer Campbell and Lacus Clyne. Toph caught one of them for me. But anyway, good luck to my three ladies. The winner gets her reward...
Shigure had been gifted with a petrifying touch. Her attack, a kick, went straight for Rini. Hotaru, however, shoved her friend to safety.
"Hotaru!" Rini had cried, only for Terra to then grab her, and in an instant, claim her own victim.
The Sorcerer himself entered the fray, personally petrifying Teana even as Terra claimed Eri, and squared off with Raven. The Teen Titan clash ended fast - Terra's boosted powers left Raven as a statue in seconds.
Yuna, however, had fought Toph. She had not lasted long at all. She had been petrified, and shattered into fragments before the earth-bender had then petrified most of the others. In the end, only CC remained, surrounded by the four.
"I'll deal with you later, little immortal, but for now, I think it's time for rewards. Shigure, I'm afraid Terra and Toph each managed to petrify three... You, however, got two. I got two myself, but I have to release you from my service...
Shigure blinked, and then realised what had happened.
"You... You mind controlled me!"
Zauberer shook his head.
"No, not at all. I petrified you."
Toph and Terra, under control themselves, did not object as their erstwhile ally became an object herself.
"And now... Toph, Terra... To see who wins the ultimate prize..."
This battle was swift, and the victor emerged triumphant. The loser became just another statue, released from control in the last few seconds before she would be a statue for eternity.
Terra didn't have much of a chance to protest it. Toph was smug, and flashed her victory sign.
"So, what do I win?"
"Oh, you win a wonderful trophy as the winner, Toph... an absolutely wonderful trophy..."
***
The Sorcerer chuckled to himself, patting his latest statue on the head.
"Yes, a trophy in your honour, Toph. Of course, you are the trophy... But beggars can't be choosers. And of course, no one ever really has a choice here anyway..."
He left his new statue behind, and went off to plan his next group of visitors to add to his collection...