//------------------------------//
// Diana... 
// Story: The Adventure Continues 
// by Dragon Shimmer 
//------------------------------//

The team continues their journey to the Lava Cave. Anne looks around the cavern entrance before going inside. Steam is coming out of the opening. Suddenly a large red flower appears and blocks the entrance to the cave. Anna cautiously pokes at the plant but nothing happens. Then she turns to the team and is going to asks someone to use a fire spell to remove it. Abruptly, Nolegs pops up from Sunset’s back and hisses at the flower. Shaking its leaves, the plant opens its eyes and attempts to eat the archer. Lance shoots a "Flame shot" at the monster making it jerk back. The now maddened plant roars at the team. 


       
 


 



“Look out! It’s a Rafflesia!” Cries Natalie. 

Tentacles emerge from the plant as it rises from the ground. The Rafflesia opens its large fang-filled mouth for another roar before beginning its attack. An earthquake puts the team on alert and they jump back. Cracks appear in the ground as spikes rapidly emerge from the earth. Numerous thorn-headed plants shoot up to threaten the team but Sunset breathes fire at them and they burn off.  Nolegs attack the smaller creeper vines. Reacting to the assaults, the plant monster shakes itself to release its leaves. After the fire attack dies down, Rafflesia flings the sharp-edged foliage at the team. Natalie quickly creates a barrier wall to stop the "Leaf Razor" attack. 

Matt charges at the plant but the monster hastily creates a vine wall to stop him. The swordsman quickly covers his sword with a fire aura to slash the plants. Rafflesia turns its crimson top to bloom at the attacker. Stinging pollen shoots from the flower into Matt’s eyes. Matt cries out in pain and covers his eyes. Lance and Anna grab the incapacitated Matt. Meanwhile, Natalie and Sunset create a combined attack. Vivid molten fireballs shaped like a dragon and a phoenix hurl toward the monster. Rafflesia uses "Leaf Shield" to block them but the duo’s flame attack pierces through the shield and strikes directly at the monster. 

Rafflesia howls in pain at the fire attack but is still active. The monster plant opens its large fanged jaws menacingly at the team. Acidic saliva drips from its mouth as the monster lunges toward the archer and the gunner. A streak of color moved across the cave’s entrance. Suddenly an obstacle appears in the Rafflesia’s mouth. After another blue blur travels across the monster’s mouth it could no longer close its jaws. Two branches inside Rafflesia’s jaws now kept it wedged open.  Expertly, Anna and Lance lob explosive charges down the monster's exposed throat. 

With a loud wail, Rafflesia tilts its head back as flames shoot out of its mouth. The monster plant stops moving and smoke comes out of its mouth. Lance takes this opportunity to charge at the plant and shoot several more rounds into it. Rafflesia is now on fire. Sunset slams her staff to the ground and a large magic circle illuminates at the monster's spot, the fire pillar rises from the magic circle and destroys the monster completely.  

Natalie sighs in relief as she is walking toward Matt, who keeps rubbing his eyes furiously. Natalie casts a water spell to wash Matt's eyes. Matt stops rolling and stands up; he rubs his head and feels embarrassed.  

Matt points at the cave entrance, "Let’s get moving. After this adventure, it’s going to be a while before I want a salad again."



Many lava rivers are flowing inside the cave. Matt throws a stick to check if it is fake lava or not. The stick immediately catches on fire and sinks into the lava. The mage casts a protection spell on the rest of the team.

Matt asks Anna, "Now what will we do? We can't pass these lava rivers by ourselves." When he turns to look at the archer she is standing in the corner waving the team over.  Anna takes out a rope and everyone helps pull the object out of the wall. It was a chest. Matt rubs his head but he decides to open the chest. Many pairs of red boots with fire symbols are inside. Matt continues to ask Anna, "Okay, what are these boots for?"

Anna answers cheerfully, "We can pass through the lava with these boots. It allows the wearer to walk on the lava but... "Anna points to the embroidered symbol, "They are not very insulated, so.... you have to pass it quickly as fast as possible."

Natalie nods, "Sounds like a good artifact. But we can ride our dragon right? Speaking of the dragon...." Natalie turns her head to see Sunset but she is not there anymore. Looking around, she sees Sunset happily swimming in the lava. Anna's mouth hangs there while Natalie yells at Sunset, "Hey, get back here."

Sunset yells back, "No. I won't let you ride me again. This is the best hot bath I’ve had in a while." 

The others sigh and they start wearing the boots. The humans look at each other as they take a deep breath. When Matt counts to three, the humans run to Sunset's spot while they are yelling because of the heat of the lava. When humans manage to arrive where Sunset was, they glare at the smug dragon. But Sunset just ignores their dirty looks and she casually walks out of the cave. The others sigh in defeat as they follow the dragon to the exit.










Suddenly, the ground shakes. The team attempts to keep their balance. A dark cat with a red aura emerges from the ground and stares at the team. Due to the experience from the last Godcat, the team is not scared at all. The feline waves its hand and all of them are teleported outside. Matt and his team are preparing to fight against the Godcat. 

The black cat waves its paw and many dark balls appear in the sky, "Wretched human-lings. Your determination to live is pitiful." The black orbs fly toward the team. Matt slams the sword to raise the earth while Sunset changes into her new form and deflects all of the dark balls at the cat, but her claws are hurt after deflecting the dark balls. The black cat looks at the dragon and yells at her angrily, "You-ling... how do you have Amelia's power?"

"None in your business," Sunset waves her staff and three big circles appear in front of her. The dragon spins her staff and the magic rings whirl as they bombard light arrows at the Godcat. The cat raises its paw to deflect the numerous light arrows. However, the strain is too much for the dark cat so she changes tactics and charges at Sunset. After much difficulty dodging the dragon's light arrows, the dark cat succeeds in getting close to the dragon. Godcat quickly uses a levitation spell on her foe. Trapped by the spell, Sunset throws the staff at the cat, but it has no effect. 

“Now Dragon-ling, I will return the power you stole from Amelia.” Godcat starts draining the dragon's power as the team tries to shoot at the cat. "You human-lings think you can stop me. I am Diana! The great Godcat of Death!”  Raising her paws again, a vortex appears about the team, freezing them in place. Diana smirks as she watches the team struggle. Suddenly the Godcat feels different and turns around to face the dragon. Sunset’s body is still illuminated by a magic circle however the dragon is draining power from her! “Ah! Stupid Dragon-Ling.” With a howl of frustration, Diana throws the dragon at the team. 

Despite being under the vortex’s influence, Matt manages to catch the dragon as Diana flies off in a huff. As the Godcat flies away she is confronted by the sudden appearance of Nolegs. Diana is shocked when the blue cat angrily meows and hisses at her. Reaching up to her cheek, the Godcat feels strange wetness. Nolegs has slashed Diana’s face. The dark cat is trying to fly away but Nolegs appears near her, making her surprised, then she receives a slash into the cheek. Diana looks at Nolegs as she is very angry and wants to destroy this betrayal cat but Amelia calls her by a community spell so she has to go away from the Team. She thinks, ’Next time, they won't escape,' and teleports away. The vortex is gone as all members of the Team are lying to each other. 


Matt gets up and rubs his head, "Ouch, this is harder than I thought." then he looks around and sees the familiar place, "Hey, this is Ashwood Forest,"


Anna gets up immediately, "What? We got teleported way out there?" 

In the meanwhile, Sunset is in pain but she tries to ignore it so as not to worry her friends. "This is the second time I got drained. Do the Godcats like to aim at me or something?"

Natalie looks concerned as her dragon friend is sweating. She asks Sunset, "Sun are you ok? You don’t look so good since that catfight."

"I'm fine. Just...." Sunset lies, rubbing her head, "We have to go back to the Lankywood Forest." Turning to Natalie she adds, "Oh and her name is Diana by the way." 

"No problem!" Announces Lance as he takes out a gemstone, "This crystal will teleport us back to the Lankyrood Forest. Ye set another crystal before ya got teleported." 

Anna hugs Lance, "Thank you! Let's go."

Lance's face reddens as he activates the crystal. A flash of light heralds the team's return to the Lankywood Forest River. Since it is now evening, the Team decides to set up camp near the river. 





"Welcome back big sis!" Cheers, Amelia joyfully. The blue cat and her sibling Diana share an embrace. Then Amelia notices that her sister has a wound on her cheek. "You got slashed by some-ling?" She remarks in astonishment. The wound is healing rapidly, however, the blue feline is amazed anything got close enough to attack her invincible older sister.


"Not something, it was some …cat." Replies Diana rubbing her cheek, "One of our fellow cat-things yelled and attacked me… I was very surprised. Even more so when he struck me"

"Was that cat part of a group of humans-things and a dragon-thing?" Asked Amelia curiously.

"Yeah, that one," Diana looks at her little sister, "Wait, don't tell me you got drained by that dragon- thing too. When fighting those things I saw your power inside of the orange lizard-thing." 

Amelia sighs, "Yes. When I tried to drain the power of the dragon-thing, I ended up the one with my power stolen. It appears she is a preparation dragon-thing.”  Looking at her big sister she adds, "And that kind of snare-trap did not even exist in our era." 

Diana nods in agreement, "That trap looks like a reserve spell. But the dragon-thing did not activate it when she got attacked so..." Diana rubs her chin, "Also this group battled me, a great Godcat, without any fear.” 

Amelia retorts, "That's because they have encountered me before you did." Amelia hugs her sister, "Hey big sis, those machines are nearly complete. We can destroy the planet without our interference." 

Diana nods, "I see." The dark feline looks at the apparatuses, "These artifacts must have been completed 200 years ago. But..." Diana punches at the ruined pole, "That white dragon ruins everything."

Amelia tries to comfort her sister by placing a paw on her shoulder, "I know." Then she glances up at the sky. "Soon our loyal subjects will bring the third crystal here. Then we can recover our full power."

Diana hugs her sister again as she gazes up to the heavens. Amelia closes her eyes and falls asleep in her sister's embrace. The blue cat remembers the last battle against a white dragon. 

Explosions rock the local countryside as powerful creatures fight for the world’s future. An intricate gold machine and a large monster skeleton battle against an elusive white dragon. The skeleton monster   unsuccessfully attempts to bite the dragon with its massive fanged jaws while the golden drone fires lasers. Looping around a rock to confuse the machine, the dragon cast a whirlwind spell on the drone to launch it at the skeleton. With the monster distracted, the white dragon takes out an impressive silver sword and thrusts through the skeleton. With both aggressors defeated, the dragon turns his attention to the leader.  

"You can't win this fight, Whitty” yells Diana angrily. “The God Cat will destroy the world with all of the ugly-things on it. To save the realm, you will need to destroy me and you can never do that.” 

Whitty points his sword at Diana, "Who says I need destroy you to save the world?" The dragon waves his weapon around to distract his former friend while he takes out an iridescent red jewel. Suddenly Diana attacks the white dragon but Whitty is ready. 

As the red feline flies towards the white dragon, the jewel activates and begins to drink up her power. All of Diana’s attacks are absorbed into Whitty’s stone and soon so is the Godcat herself. Diana struggles against the spell but is soon sealed into the jewel. 

"Sister!" Amelia cries out in alarm.  She commands her machine to shoot rockets at the white dragon, then dashes to attack her foe. Whitty tries to keep ahold of the red jewel but he is hit by a rocket. "Release her now or you will die." Hisses the blue cat as she lunges at the dragon. Amelia uses her void spell to squeeze and compact his body. 

Grunting as he is beginning to be crushed by the spell, Whitty uses his tail to get out a red jewel. When Amelia flies closer to the dragon, he slings the stone at Amelia. The glowing blue jewel adheres itself to the feline body. Activated by proximity to the Godcats power, the sapphire charm begins to absorb Amelia’s power. Soon the void spell weakens to the point Whitty can break free. Despite being injured due to the attack, the dragon manages to shoot a fireball at the weakened cat, pounding her into the ground. 

 
Amelia stagers up onto her paws and looks on in horror as her sister Diana is completely swallowed up into the red jewel. 

"NOoooo..." Screams Amelia as she glares furiously at Whitty. With renewed rage, the Godcat slams the white dragon to a pole. The blue cat shrieks again before continuing her tirade. "Why? Why are you on their side and not mine? Those humans-things are nothing but worms, fit only to be stamped out."

"Then... I will be one of those worms." Says Whitty sadly. The dragon picks up the red jewel and slowly takes out a green crystal to show Amelia. “I’m sorry. This is the end as there cannot be another way.”

Amelia gasps when she sees the green jewel. It means she is the last Godcat. Despite her struggles, the blue jewel has sealed almost all of her strength and power. Amelia lies helpless on the ground as Whitty completes the spell.  The cat gasps “Why?”

Whitty kneels down in front of his former friend. Tears fall from his eyes as he softly speaks. "Because I love this world, and all of the life upon it." Whitty takes the red jewel and grabs the green jewel in front of Amelia, "I don't know why... Even if I seal you to save everything, no one will remember me. No one will ever know and I will be all alone." Whitty begins to sob in earnest. "What a foolish dragon I am!”

Amelia tries to say something to him but it's too late. Whitty puts the two crystals on Amelia's chest as she faded. After successfully sealing the Godcat, Whitty hides the jewels in different spots so they would not escape to threaten the world again. Then the dragon finally goes into hiding to heal his injuries after the long battle. He sadly brings out a pendant and looks at the sky, his mission is completed but his heart is forever broken.