Before I even have a chance to take in my new surroundings, I feel a searingly painful electric current run through my entire body. For a few seconds, there is only agony. Then, it stops, and I simply fall flat on my face.

I hear footsteps close by, then some unseen thing flips me onto my back. Hovering over me now is what appears to be some person with a black mask, a helmet, and a billowing green cape that they hold in front of them like a vampire. This doesn’t look good. Where in the hell did Ted go?

The masked figure just looks over me, staring at me as though examining me closely. They’re still holding a massive gun, which I assume is what just electrocuted me a few seconds ago. In the background, I see something glowing…

After about a minute of this, the masked figure speaks in a deep, slightly robotic voice.

“Tell me the names of everyone in your party.”

“And why should I?” I retort.

“Because, you don’t want to die a painful death,” they say simply. Mask Person lifts up a boot and sets it on my shoulder.

“Well, joke’s on you. I’ve wanted to die for the past three years. Bring it.”

It’s hard to tell, but I think I might have annoyed them.

“Tell me; what is your mother’s maiden name?”

“Really? You want to access my bank account or something?”

For that, they lift their foot from me, and I get another round of electrocution. They hold this one out noticeably longer than the first time.

“You see? I’m not someone who you can sass,” they say. “Answer my questions. Where did you acquire the pink gem in your breastplate?”

“Fuck off.”

They make to fire it again, but then a gunshot sounds, and Mask Person stumbles backwards. I glance to my right and see that it’s Ted. He must have snuck off after we were teleported here and evaded detection.

I take this opportunity to get to my feet and draw my sword. Mask Person must’ve had a bulletproof vest on or something, because they’re not dead, though being shot definitely threw them off. Now that I’m on my feet, I also am finally able to see where we are, and… We’re back at the entrance outside the Palace!

“Okay, now it’s my turn to ask the questions,” I say. “Why the fuck am I here? And who exactly are you supposed to be? I know that you’re not Pavia, you’re way too thin.”

“Don’t you get it? You were tricked, dumbass,” they reply tauntingly. “My master thought it would be most efficient to get the strongest members of your team out of the way first.”

“And you thought that you’d be able to easily kill us with the element of surprise, huh?” I speculate. “Well then. You’re going to take me and my trusty animal sidekick in a fair fight now. En guarde.”

I make to swing at them, but Mask Person releases some sort of electric pulse. It’s not the same attack as before; it doesn’t hurt, but it does immobilize both me and Ted in our tracks, making us stand in place like idiots.

“Actually… I have places to be right now. You are your little friends better not ever come back here. The Metaverse is our turf, and we don’t like other people messing around here. Goodbye.”

And with that, they reach to the barrel of the electric shock gun, and put their hands on a small green gem that is embedded into the weapon. Then, they teleport away.

As soon as they’re gone, Ted and I’s paralysis is released. Even though I know it’s not going to help, I finish the sword swing, striking the ground with a loud clatter that almost jams my arm.

“God damn it!” I growl. “What a load of fucking bullshit this is!”

I take a deep breath, release it, and then turn to Ted. “I really am a dumbass,” I admit to him. “I can’t believe I let that Sarah woman charm me into falling for that.”

“I did try to warn you,” Ted says, slightly sternly. “It seems to me as if the people in this palace aren’t who they claim to be.”

I’m not entirely sure what he means by that. But we can talk about it later, as we have more important things to do right now. “Come on. Let’s get back into the Palace and find out what happened to the other two.”

“Right behind you,” he agrees.

And so, I start running the opposite direction, with Anja running beside me and panting. Before we even reach the football field, however, some type of weird sludge rains down in front of us and forms a puddle in the end zone.

“Uh… Fuck! To the left!” Anja calls out. She sprints leftward, yanking my arm along with her in the process. We got a ways around the puddle before it happens again and blocks the leftward path we were about to run through.

“Okay… I take it back now!” She says, doing a 180 and pulling me the other way. While we’re turning around, I try to catch a brief glimpse of what we’re actually running from. There’s something emerging from that tunnel…

“Watch your step!” Anja shouts. I look in front of me and see that the sludge is spreading, so we hop over it and sprint off of the field and behind the bleachers.

We get to behind where the concessions usually would be. Anja falls down onto the ground, trying to catch her breath and twitching nervously. Now that I’m outside of the stadium, it strikes me how eerie this place is. Behind the bleachers, there is nothing- just a generic green field as far as the eye can see. It feels a lot like we used an out-of-bounds cheat code in a video game and got somewhere that we’re not supposed to see.

“Wow. Okay.” Anja finally says, after about ten seconds. “What the fuck.”

I try to see what’s going on through the gaps in the bleachers. I don’t see the… whatever it is, but I can still hear rumbling coming from the other side.

“Why did we run away?” I ask her. “We came here to fight.”

“Yeah, well, the two of us aren’t going to be able to kill that by ourselves.”

“What even was that?” I press her. “I never saw it.”

“It was… the most horrifying thing I’ve ever seen. I don’t even know if words can do it justice…”

“And where did Ashley and Ted go?”

Then, a familiar voice sounds from right behind me; “Oh, they’ll be long gone by now.”

I jump to the side instinctively, and whirl around to find Sarah or whatever her name was giving me that weird, twisted smile again.

“What do you mean, long gone?” Anja asks, confused.

“Hey, what are you playing at?” I ask Sarah aggressively. “You said that you made that monster? How the hell did you pull that off?”

“I most certainly did,” she answers, speaking in a cold tone of voice that she didn’t have before. “When I learned that he was being targeted, I had him reveal his monstrous shadow form. And it was weak. Too weak to fight a well-trained bunch such as yourselves.”

“Uh… we’re not really that well trained,” I admit. “I literally just got my Persona thing yesterday.”

“Oh, please. I know that Lucy wasn’t going to let you lot in blind.”

“Wait, so you know about Lucy?” Anja asks curiously.

“Of course I do. She’s been a thorn in my side for decades, after all.”

“Wait… that doesn’t make any sense!” Anja replies, drawing her weapon and pointing it at Sarah. “Who are you, actually?”

“Hmm… maybe she didn’t explain everything to you after all,” Sarah replies. “How disappointing.”

Sarah whistles very loudly, so loudly that I have to cover my ears again. Then, she teleports away, cheekily giving us a finger wave as her body fades out.

Almost immediately, we hear the rumbling sound get closer, and then loud clanging sounds coming from the stands in front of us. Then, from above the railing, I see a large, red head poke- with a horrible frowning face- and I see spindly legs claw over towards us…

“Okay, time to move! Go go go!” Anja shouts, pushing me from behind.

“Let’s get to the Monsters Inc. door!” I shout, as I break into a run. “Then maybe we can… think about this.”

“Right behind you!”

After a surprisingly long trek, we make it back to the Palace, through the first chamber, and then through the hall back into the courtroom. When we get there, however, Anja and Nova are already there, just sitting on the floor near the front. Both of them are panting like they just ran a mile.

“What are you doing back here?” I ask them.

“Well, Ashley… it turns out that the boss was in that football stadium place the whole time,” Anja explains.

“Oh, I see. It does make sense to regroup as a party before fighting it,” I say.

And then, without warning, the entire room starts shaking, like there’s an earthquake. Anja bolts upright, terror in her eyes. Nova hastily starts getting to his feet and says, “Oh no… did that thing follow us here?”

“Who? You mean Pavia?” I question them.

“Uh… well, sort of, but he’s been turned into this horrifying, red… thing,” Anja explains. “I don’t even know how to describe it.”

“Yeah, he’s like a Cthulhu monster,” Nova says, shuddering slightly. “Someone did something weird to him.”

I look around the room for a sign of where he would be entering, but I don’t see any cracks in the wall or anything. However, over time, the rumbling slowly seemed to become more and more distant, moving towards where I entered the room and then past the door. Then, after a while, it stops.

“Phew… that’s a relief,” Anja comments.

“Don’t you hang up your hat just yet,” Ted interjects, causing the three of us to turn to him. “He is not gone… he is waiting for us.”

“Where? You mean outside the Palace?” Nova asks, the irises in his eyes tiny with apprehension.

“No… I think he will strike when we re-enter the first chamber.”

“When? Who said anything about when?” Anja asks frantically.

“It’s not like there’s another way out,” I reason.

“Yeah, that stadium place was in the middle of nowhere,” Nova commented.

“Alright, then,” I say. “Does everyone feel relatively refreshed?”

I get shaky nods all around. So, we begin moving back into the front chamber.

Sure enough, as soon as we step foot into the front chamber, the rumbling sound begins. I feel someone cling onto me from behind.

“Ashley… I don’t wanna do this…” Anja says.

“Don’t be a coward,” I tell her. “We’re finishing this now.”

Then, I see it.

Through the window on the ceiling, the scenery changes. The day turns to night. The clouds turn to blood red. An unnaturally large moon hangs in the sky. And then, two spindly spider legs smash through the ceiling, making glass rain down on us. Even inside the chamber, things change- the gold seems to lose its glimmer. Blood pours out of the mouths of all of the creepy statues. (Which, if you ask me, is kind of extra, but oh well.) But only when the monster enters the room do I really understand why Anja is acting so afraid.

It had an uneven head with a horrible, frowning face, which it sticks into the room first. If that wasn’t enough, its eyes glow bright white, with fury. It then drops down, landing on the floor in front of us on a pair of spindly back legs just like the front one. Other than its head and legs, its body seems to be mechanical. Its thorax is what looks like a huge, round generator, which is as large as my living room and arcing electricity at random. It also has two short robot arms, and two huge cannons mounted near its neck.

Okay, I admit it. I’m a little scared now. But I try not to show it. I simply draw my sword, and prepare for the fight of my life.