Aru Shah and the Soul Trident

The Palace is the Ultimate Shipper

A/N: This chapter is a bit long, but enjoy!

The walls started to shake, and Aru clutched onto a nearby pillar.

"Palace! It's us! We're the Pandavas!" She yelped, then added, "Well, most of us anyways!"

As quickly as it had begun to tremble, it stopped just as fast. One by one, lamps began to light up, illuminating the inside of the palace. Unlike when she had first come to the palace, the tiles were all shiny and seemed to be freshly mopped. She couldn't even spot a single speck of dust.

"Pandavas?" boomed a familiar voice. "You came back?"

Mini patted the wall. "Yep!" Then, she looked around. "Wow, this place is in really good shape! You really did polish the floors."

The tiles shone brightly for a second, and the whole palace shook in delight. "I knew you would come back!" Then, it paused. "Who are the other three?" it asked suspiciously.

Aiden, Brynne, and Rudy had frightened expressions on their faces.

"Shah," murmured Rudy. "What's going on?"

Ignoring him, Aru nudged Brynne and Aiden. "Introduce yourselves," she hissed.

Brynne gulped and said, "Hi...Palace? Uh, I'm Brynne, the reincarnation of Bhima. It's um, good to see you again?"

The ceiling suddenly started to sink in a particular shape, like...a smiley face? "Bhima! You came back too?" Suddenly, a mirage of the same stadium they had seen when they had first come to the palace appeared. Dummies, targets, and even a huge array of various weapons shimmered into view. The tiled floor started to shift, and instead of tiles, the floor was now...laddoos? Golden-brown, tiny balls of sweetness were packed on the ground in a criss-cross pattern. Brynne's eyes gleamed, and she greedily bent down to pick one up, only to have her hand grasp at nothing as the illusion disappeared.

"It is you!" the palace cried out. "Laddoos were the second-eldest Pandava's favorite! Only he would try to eat the sweets off the ground!"

Brynne scowled. "That's a cruel trick."

Mini elbowed her, but the palace laughed in delight. "You've even got his temper!"

Aru felt a little offended. It seemed a little discriminatory that she had to literally face fireflies that were actually made of fire while Brynne basically got a free pass. She sighed. Life is so unfair.

Then, the tiles rattled and the walls seemed to shift towards Aiden. A huge spotlight shone on him, and he squinted in the sudden light. "Who is this?"

Aiden suddenly focused his eyes on an interesting invisible speck of lint on the ground. "I...um..." He mumbled something ineligible.

"What's that, Wifey?" Brynne said, cupping her hand over her ears. Her eyes sparkled with amusement. "Couldn't quite catch that."

Aiden scowled at her. "I'm...Draupadi," he admitted, clearly embarrassed.

The palace went silent for a good five seconds. All of a sudden, huge droplets began to fall from the ceiling, as if the palace was crying.

"No!" it wailed, as Aru and her friends tried to dodge the tears. "It can't be!"

"What's wrong, Palace?" Mini asked, petting the walls as she tried to console it.

The ceiling rose up and down, then cried, "How can that be? Draupadi is a man in this life? That cannot be possible!"

Biting her lip to suppress her laughter, Aru said, "It's true, Palace. Kamadeva himself confirmed it."