The Land Ruins

Once upon a time in the land of Atheria, there was a Princess Nea and a Princess Lulu and they went on the most amazing adventures. Princess Nea and Lulu had figured out that the three dwarfs from the Mining Caves could make the brown Terrainian Crystal glow and that Jo the Botanist could make the green crystal glow. With Jo’s help the adventurers were on their way to finding the next Temple Ruins. 

“So where exactly are we going?” asked Nea.

“The Land Ruins is past the Dokani Jungle.” 

They set out on the long a long, long journey to the jungle. Now that Darius’s harness was fixed he could safely ride on Rose and he wasn’t going to miss this adventure.

As they traveled, they reached a fork in the path - they could either go through Echo Valley and past the Ogre city of Gozdur or around the Scattered Woods and Boxley Wild. Now to go past Gozdur would for sure be faster but going around the Scattered Woods would be safer. Although they hadn’t had trouble with King Bealock of the Gozdur in some time, they weren’t sure if he would cause trouble again. They had heard that the ogres were still very much upset. They also only had enough magic ogre cloaks for two of them. 

“We need to go through Gozdur and the swamps, the fast way.” said Nea.

“I think we should be safe. We need to go around the forest and Boxley Wild!” argued Lulu. 

“We don’t have time, Lulu.”

“Yes we do, Nea. We don’t have time to deal with the ogres, get captured, or have them come after Sparland again!”

The two girls stood there, arguing in front of Jo, Darius, Rose, Elifonia, Potifonia and Jacob until finally they got so mad at each other they both stormed off in different directions.

Since Jo liked the idea of staying safe, she ended up going with Lulu while the dwarfs were never afraid of a little conflict, went with Nea. 

Darius, though, just sat there on Rose and didn’t know what to do. To be honest, he thought it was silly they were arguing in the first place. In the end, he decided to stick with the dwarfs. 

So the party split up, Nea headed over to Echo Valley with the dwarfs and Darius and Rose. They stopped for lunch. After a few bites, Nea was realizing that maybe she was a little hungry and began to feel better. 

“What do you guys think?” Nea asked the dwarfs, Darius and Rose.

“You two need a drink!” said Jacob and handed Nea some water.

“Yeah, cool down a little.” said Elifonia. 

“I love being on this adventure with you two,” said Darius, “but it’s much more fun when you two aren’t fighting.”

Rose nodded.

As Nea sat there, decided that maybe she was being too stubborn about her way. 

***

Meanwhile, Lulu was so frustrated about going past Gozdur when they didn’t need to. 

“Why put us all at risk? We don’t have a dragon this time to help us scare the ogres.” She said to Jo.

Jo turned to her and looked her in the eyes. 

“You might be right, Lulu. But aren’t you two sisters? What do you think Tuck or Ryla would have you two do?”

“Well, they would probably just tell us where to go.” 

Jo smiled.

“Sometimes, but sometimes they don’t. Sometimes we have to work it out ourselves.”

So Jo and Lulu decided that they would give Nea’s way a shot.

When they reached Echo Valley, the party was just finishing up there meal. But before Lulu could say anything, Nea walked up to her and said, “Lulu, we should go your way!”

Darius, Rose and the dwarfs looked up, surprised. 

“I was just coming to say we could go your way!” Lulu said, smiling. “Thank you, Nea!”

And the two sisters hugged. 

“Is everybody okay with that?” Nea asked turning to the dwarfs and Darius.

They all nodded. So the party headed back up around and through the Scattered Woods. As they traveled they shared with Jo and dwarfs about the Hummingwood, how they’d met Flix and how O’Lah had given them the Titan Mask from Rakta’s Cave so they could see fairies and the hidden village. 

They decided it would be good to stop in to see Flix. When they got there though, Flix and Fiamma were both gone. They had found the Orgrown Wood for Tuck only to have started another adventure involving a giant and some leaves. 
 
When the travelers got to the edge of the forest and into Boxley Wild, they didn’t know that the last time they were in the wild the tricky elf had set a number of traps. And there was a very dangerous one right on their way. 

Lulu was leading the way and because of that, she was the first person to hit the trap and fall down a very, very tall pit. The tricky elf had covered this deep pit with a bunch of leaves so nobody could see it. Lulu wasn’t looking and didn’t see any of the usual signs that would signal a trap ahead. But right behind her, the dwarfs were having such a good time laughing and joking with each other that they didn’t see the pit coming either and once Jacob started falling he grabbed on to Elifonia who then grabbed Potifonia. But Potifonia was too quick and jumped back with a giggle. 

“Ha!” he said. “You can’t get me!” 

He didn’t realize they were falling. To him it was a game.

“Ah!” shouted Lulu from the pit. “Help!” 

“You really should be more careful and look where you’re going, Lulu.” Said Nea into the pit. 

“Nea!” Lulu screamed. “Stop it. Help us out of here! Please!”

Nea and Darius found a number of large branches and started to feed them down the pit so that Lulu, Jacob and Elifonia could climb their way up them and out of the pit. Potifonia just watched.

Once out, Lulu dusted herself off while Nea gave her a warm smile. 

“Are you okay?” Nea asked.

“Yes.” She huffed, feeling better. 

Realizing that everyone really meant well (they weren’t trying to be mean), Lulu apologized. 

“Sorry I got us into that mess.” 

“It’s okay.” Answered Nea.

“Yeah, what fun is an adventure without a few hiccups.” Potifonia replied, poking his brothers. 

Once they made it around the backside of the Boxley Wild and the Morewit Swamps, they found themselves in the Dokani Jungle. Over here, the air they breathed was heavier and it was humid. That means the air was kind of wet and damp. 

There were all sorts of different plants here, brighter flowers with bigger leaves, wider trees with trunks that were lighter brown. And all the plants were just more colorful, they had ribbons of other colors within colors. Like yellow within purple and lime green within blue. The princesses had been to Dokani Jungle before but it had a been a long time and all they remembered back then was how rainy it was. 

Speaking of rain, almost like clockwork, a huge lightning bolt flashed and thunder rolled in the sky. Then the gushing of rain poured down heavy.

“Rain!” sang the dwarfs who immediately danced around. 

Rose just covered her head for a minute while Darius laughed. Jo looked up to the sky and smiled as the rain hit her face. 

Nea and Lulu shrugged. It was all part of the adventure. 

Compared to the Ocean Ruins and the Cloud Ruins, getting to this one wasn’t as difficult. It wasn’t under the sea or up some high cloud mountain. Other than the rain, it was pretty straight forward. 

Until Jo remembered something. They walked up to the Land Ruins but something was wrong. They stood before it and two large stone doors were closed in front of them, immovable.  

“The leaves are missing.” Jo said pointing at entry way to the ruins. 

“What do you mean?” asked Elifonia. “There are leaves all around us.” 

“You see those etchings around the entrance?” Jo asked. “This temple is protected by magic unless leaves sit in those spots. I don’t know how I forgot until now.”

Jo paused for a moment, trying to remember something. Unfortunately, her memory was fading and she had a lot on her mind lately between Hickory and Clara and her health. Things she knew from long ago were slowly starting to drift away. 

That’s when they heard a familiar sound. Or really heard a few familiar sounds - like flies buzzing around the woods. 

“Quick, Lulu. Where’s the mask?” Nea asked. 

“Nea, you don’t need a mask today!” said the invisible fairy. Then slowly he revealed himself. 

“Flix!” Lulu said. “What are you doing here?”

“Well,” and he looked over to his left into thin air, “I’m helping an old friend help an old friend!”

“Are you quite sure?” came another voice to his left.

“You can trust them, Springle.” He said. “They are finding the Keepers.”

Upon hearing the word “keepers” she started to slowly appear, fixating on Jo. 

“Jo Lynn?” she asked buzzing over to the botanist. 

Jo smiled a familiar smile. 

“It has been quite some time.” She said fluttering around Jo’s head. This fairy had a beautiful purple tail, that like all fairies, sparkled. 

“Brimrock is sick. But I know where the leaves are, he hid them around the jungle and told me to wait here for the Keepers. But when I heard that all the fairies were forgetting things, I had to go back to Hummingwood and see for myself. After I found Flix, Ryla told us to hurry back to the Land Ruins for the time of the keepers was coming.”

“It has been ages, old friend.” Jo responded. “I can’t believe how long it’s been. One can only hope that the warriors are getting ready. It’s only a matter of time, I supposed.”

“Oh yes!” answered Springle. “Tuck is hard at work with them. They will definitely need training, but they are being gathered, as we speak.”

“We all have a part to play,” Jo said, remembering her past adventures. “To save Atheria.”

“The leaves should be around here somewhere, they are being hidden with magic.” 

“Use the mask!” Flix prodded. 

Springle then explained to the party where a couple of them were hidden and if they used their magic mask - the Titan Mask - they could look around and find the others. For they were special leaves that were invisible to the naked eye but sparkled ever so slightly once you had something that allowed you to see magically hidden objects.

When they had collected all of the leaves and put them into place, the ground began to shake and rumble. The large stone doors opened and they all rushed inside. In the center of this temple, there was a symbol on the ground just like they had seen underwater and just like they had seen up in the sky. But this was a symbol for earth with a spot for the keepers of the crystals to stand. On every wall there were other symbols - of other elements - just like the other temples. And even some other symbols they didn’t recognize yet.  

Jo walked up, surrounded by the three dwarfs, and stood in the middled. As the three dwarfs walked up the center platform grew to make space for all three dwarfs. They pulled out their crystals, which started to glow even brighter than before. They began to warm up and float away, right in front of them. 

A burst of green and brown light shot out from the base of the ruins and out the top of it into the sky. Big beautiful beams of green and brown. When this happened, an overgrowth of plants surrounded the temple and started brighter and more vibrant - flowers blossomed and the ivy sprung to life. The walls of the temple began to get thicker, cracks went away, the overgrown plants and dead foliage disappeared and you could see that all the engravings around the temple were ornate and beautiful.

Princess Nea & Lulu had found the Terrainian Keepers and returned them to the Land Ruins, restoring the temple.

The end.