Episode 2: Reality

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"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA—"

The leader of the bandits screams as he falls for what feels like forever; eventually he smacks into a teapot just to bounce off and land into another. This repeats about 3 more times.

"OOOH, NO!!!" He wails closing into the ground below him. He roughly lands on a black and blue tiled floor. Actually the whole area was mostly black and blue. Nice and creepy.

He stands back up to his feet with a loud grunt. "Lads?" He calls out to his mates and his voice echos down the long corridor. He starts to walk while looking around.

"Hello?"

"Anyone?"

He walks for a while until he stumbles upon many figures standing in a line like dolls to be played with. He gets closer to get better view of what he was witnessing. It was..the princess? And his mates? Everyone he had come in contact with recently! And..himself?

"Huh?" He walks up closer to the one that looked exactly like himself. Everything about it was exactly the same to each little detail of his features. He didn't just look like him. It WAS him.

As he was having a derealization crisis Pomni decided to drop in after she fell from one of the teapots. She groans getting up but comes to a hold when taking in her surroundings.
"-Where are we? W-What's all this?" The bandits ask panicked.

"-I-I don't know. W-We're somewhere under the map. I think." Pomni guesses best to her ability.
"-"Map?"" The bandit was confused. "Why aren't you or any of your crew up here?"

"I-I'm not sure. Because we are not. Uh. NPCs?"

""NPCs?" What are you on about?" He stresses starting to get frustrated. "What are you people? What am I?" He looks back up to all the figures and has a sickening realization. "Where's mum?"
"-Y-You have a mom?" Pomni stutters.
"-Shouldn't she be here with everyone else?" He ignores her question. "I can't even remember her face. Does she even have a face?" His voice quivers.

"Was anything ever real?"

"Okay, w-w-wait. Don't—Don't think about that. I-I-I think there...must be a way to launch ourselves back up. Right?" Pomni tries to reassure him but he starts hyperventilating. "I want you to tell me exactly what I am-"

"JAXXXXX!!" A loud scream makes both of them flinch and look towards the direction it came from.
"T-That was y/n!" Pomni exclaims worriedly and runs off to find you.

You were breathing heavily running down one of the halls eyes glancing around frantically. "JAX! WHERE ARE YOU! W-HEre are you-! Please.." you turned a corner and you felt something crash into your chest making you fall backwards. You blink the tears out of your eyes to see Pomni in front of you.

"Pomni! H-Have you seen Jax? I need to find him-" you cry helplessly gripping onto her shoulders. You were starting to have a panic attack. "P-Please. I need him!"

"W-W-Woah! Y/n, calm down!! I promise we'll get out of here- just calm down!" Pomni yells trying to pull your hard grip off her shoulders. You let go and cover your face with your hands while mumbling how you needed Jax.

Pomni sat there completely speechless. Sure, this whole situation freaked her out HECK- this whole world freaked her out, but she wasn't reacting THIS badly. Y/n's been here longer than her so shouldn't she be used to all of this? She pulled y/n's hands from their face and into her lap.
"I think I have an idea on how to get out of here. Come with me."

.

.

.

A big bubble builds up on top of the fudge-like water. As it pops the truck along with the survivors emerges from the chocolate.
"-Is everybody okay?" Ragatha groans.

"No..." Gangle whines as she lays limps across the maple syrup tank.

"Oh man. Poor Pomni. I hope she's alright." Ragatha sighs in concern. Jax springs up suddenly anger acrossing his face.
"Poor Pomni"? How about poor y/n?! They got thrown to god knows where and I need to find them, but it looks like we're one tanker away from being Augustus Glooped!" Jax ranted until he ran out of breath he caved over having to take a few deep breaths to calm down.

The fudge starts to slosh around and two giant eyes make their way to the surface. A chocolate monster meets them face-to-face. "Oh, what's that? Do my eyes deceive me? A delicious gift from within the kingdom gates? Don't mind if I do." He picks up the truck lifting it towards his giant mouth with sharp candy corn teeth.

"-Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, buddy! We're not food! We're not candy! We're none of that! You don't wanna eat us." Ragatha yells waving her hands frantically.

"-Wh— you're not candy? How am I expected to eat something that's not made out of candy? I'm sorry." The monster kindly sets them back down.

"Pomni always seems to miss the big, gloopy monsters." Kinger notices. Jax sits back against the hood of the truck in defeat. "Tch, y/n would get a kick outta this." He quietly said as his ears went down a sign that he was distressed. "Who are you, anyway?"

"I am the Fudge." The monster says proudly. "I used to live within the kingdom walls. But I was banished by that rotten princess after I ate too many of the delicious townsfolk. Oh, they were so delicious. Sometimes I can hear them... calling to me." The sounds of panic and screaming of the townsfolk but the monster in a weird trance.

"Oh, God." Ragatha said concerned she put a hand to her chest. "That just sounds like murder." 

"-is it really murder if it's delicious? Answer me that." The monster retorted.

"You and y/n would get along." Kinger says shivering again.

"You make a great point." Jax smirks.
"-Uh, no, bad point!" Ragatha shouts at him.
"Why don't you leave this to me before I start thinking your hair looks like licorice?" Jax snaps back not in the mood to deal with her whining. Not when Y/n was waiting for him somewhere.

"Jax!" Ragatha grabs her hair startled.

"Oh, wow, it kind of does." Kinger agrees.

"-Stop!"

"-Well, Mr.Fudge, you seem like an upstanding guy with real noble goals." Jax shrugs at the monster but it chuckles darkly.
"-Oh, I'm not. If you knew what I did in my free time— oh, you'd be SICKENED!" He screeches. Jax clears his throat. "As I was saying. I happen to know a way into the kingdom walls...if you'd be willing to help us out in return." He pulls the key that was in trusted to Ragatha out of his pocket and spins it on the top of his finger.

"Hey, when did you-"

"-Shut up, licorice hair." He cuts her off.

Kinger pops up from the truck with a bucket. "Here, hide it with this." He puts the bucket over her head.

"-Oh, you must be some kind of master of unlocking things, come to free me from my outdoor prison." The monster point up to the sky as if reaching out to it.
"That's me. All we need you to do is help us bring some dirty bandits to justice." Jax says smugly.

Said bandits came crashing down into the river not a moment later.
"I saw the reaper wink at me..."

"Wait, w-w-what just happened?" Ragatha couldn't see because of the bucket.

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