The Tightwad Conjurer: Queen of Seafood (The Crustacean Empire)

(Last major area before the final two dungeons of the world! Woot! Zafaria or BUST! ^_^)

Me and Mindy entered the Empire and, obviously, it was underwater. We found crab guards patrolling the area and worked to sneak around them...

"Hold, stranger!"

"Eep!" said Mindy. "Busted!"

The old crab, though, wasn't threatening. "We assure you, we have no ill intentions," I said.

"I will be your ally if you can help us," said Nestor. "Our allies, the Pisceans and Lophians, have betrayed us for some new dark ally. Could you defeat a few of them? That will send the message that things must change!"

"Gladly," I said. "Come on, Min, let's..."

"Back," said a voice. It was Christina. "Sorry I took so long."

"You didn't take very long at all, Chris," I said, smiling. "What did Alhazred want?"

"He told me I was ready to summon a new creature, the Chimera. It's an epitome of Balance." Christina looked at me funny. "What's the big deal?"

(No credit for this picture, I Googled it.)

"The Chimera..." If I had learned one thing from all my research under Professor Drake's thumb, it was that you need to know your mythical beasts, and the Chimera was one such beast! With the heads of a lion, a goat and a dragon, the body of a goat and wings of a dragon and the tail of a scorpion, this was one monster you didn't want to get angry!

"Al sent me to Dr. Purreau, you know, the guy who you hatched eggs with a while back?" said Christina. "Strangely enough, nobody was in the building - I don't know if Purreau closed the hatchery for our conversation or what not, but it was usually hopping! He told me not to bother with the Chimera, he said nobody could control it."

"You should have proven him wrong!" sneered Mindy. "That's just..."

"It's okay," said Christina. "Al told me that he had hidden his notes for creating the summoning spell in Dragonspyre because it was very dangerous, so I talked with old Milos and he told me that the notes were stolen by a thief called the Hoarder. I would go after him but he told me that the..." She went silent all of a sudden. "It's okay, let's just get that Sun of Celestia."

I was suspicious - Chris was hiding something from me but I knew it was not good. The Hoarder had something dark about him that I would learn later...

We took out some sharks and creatures which I faintly recognized as Angler-men. The sharks were tough as they were myth but we perserved. (The bane of two Conjurers is no more apparent than here. The only Pisceans in this area are Centurions, which are Myth. Expect TONS of EQ. The Anglers come in all flavors. The Ruffians are Death, the Gladiators are Fire and there are also a couple of Balance ones too but they are usually in boss fights.)

"Nice to know," I said.

"My people lived in peace with the Pisceans and Lophians for years," said Nestor. "I remember when I was young and they were living together. But now we're in danger from them. They began by raiding our armory and taking from us all of our weapons. Without them, we can't defend ourselves!"

"We'll get back your weapons, Sailor's honor," Mindy said, smiling.

It DID take a bit of parkour, though, as the sharks were viciously guarding their caches of stolen goods. But we got them all. (I had to switch realms a few times so all the girls got the weapons.)

We returned the weapons but Nestor had something else for us to do. "The gold isn't important," he said. "But the Lophians stole one of the most important jewels of our treasure - Neptune's Seal. Our emperors have worn it for years as a sign of their authority. Without it, we are lost as a people. Can you interrogate the Lophians and find out which one has taken the Seal?"

No problemo! ^_^

Turns out the last guy who dropped had the ring. I took it and headed back to Nestor. (100% drop after one battle with very little damage taken! I love that kind of battle! ^_^)

"Sure thing," I said. "Glad to help."

"Can you help us further?" asked Nestor. "The Lophians are led by a thug called Nuncio. Some of the Lophians want peace back but they can't be heard unless Nuncio is made to listen to reason. We tried to make peace with the Lophians but Nuncio and his thugs attacked us! Can you go to his cave and ask him to listen to reason?"

I highly doubted that. Oh well, you know what they say... if at first you don't succeed...

KILL THE PROBLEM. B) (Sadly, Sierra got hit with Death Ninjas so she got weakened but Mindy finished Nuncio off with Quake. You can farm this guy for Sunstones and Unstoppable Treasure Cards for your Celestial Observatory project.)

"Sorry," I said. "We had no choice."

"It is okay," said Nestor. "You three are a true ally to the Empire. Your friend, Thurston Plunkett..."

"He's here!" I said. "Tell me, where is he? We need to speak with him."

"Yes, he is with our emperor," said Nestor. "Go up the stairs and into the palace."

I can see why Halston was a colleague, but I kept civil. "Sir Thurston," I said. "We heard your distress call and are here to help, but we can't enter the Solarium Portal. We fixed it but..."

"There's no time for that!" said Thurston without warning. "I fear Morganthe has returned."

"There's that name again," said Christina. "Who IS she anyways?"

"A Wizard much like you girls," he said. "She came to this world years ago to try to study Astral Magic but was turned away, so now she's trying to take it by force... and I fear we've aided her in that respect. You must get to the bottom of this revolt! I believe the Pisceans and Lophians are her dupes. If you can sneak into the city and find out who's behind the revolt, we can do some good. Go speak to Emperor Pontus over there, make him feel all important."

I can see what he meant - the Emperor was arrogant to a fault. But I endured him as he asked us to speak to Senator Xanthus in the Senatorial building. Once we destroyed the leaders of this revolt, we could get some answers about Morganthe. Little did I know that this was only the beginning of a great epic adventure to save the Spiral from a fate worse than destruction, but I didn't know it yet.

Senator Xanthus had a few screws loose himself. First he sent us to get sea-mold which said would make us super-strong if we ate it. UGH!

Then we had to beat up more sharks to get shell horns which could hopefully frighten the Lophians. Needless to say, I was getting sick and tired of fighting sharks. :(

We then headed into the Senate chamber...

What's that smell, Glauco? ME VOMITING INTO THE OCEAN. I am never eating sea mold again.

Needless to say, he put up a good fight, if only because he was Myth-elemental and we forgot to put in our prisms. Go us. X_X

(I had to have Mindy flee once after the mooks were dead as she couldn't do jack s*** with Earthquake on Glauco and Christina had to flee TWICE - once because she was nearly dead due to the mooks ganging her and again when I realized I had changed her to the "anti-Balance" deck which packs Hydra. Head hugs desk. :( Hilda Brewer got a LOT of business today. :( Make sure you have Myth Prisms in your boss deck at all times - never know when you'll run into a Mythie. And never have more than one Myth Wizard in your group for this fight - if it wasn't for story reasons, I would have gone through all of Celestia with Grace instead of Mindy as Storm boosts on Myth - one Levi and Glauco would have died instantly.)

"You've got the wrong-a guy!" cried Glauco as Christina put her blade to his neck. "I was-a set up by the Shadow Weavers, honest!"

As much as I wanted to cook and roast him, I sighed and shook my head and Christina gave him the treatment - knocking him out and tying him up.

Plunkett was disturbed at what he had heard. "If the Lophians are working with the Shadow Weavers, that means Morganthe can't be far behind them!"

"I wanna meet this witch," said Mindy. "She doesn't sound so..."

I silenced her with a glare. "You were asking about the portal in the Grand Plaza," said Thurston. "What you ran into was a broken portal. It fired before it was fixed!"

"We didn't fix it?" I asked. "But I thought..."

"In the Barbican, the capital of the Empire," said Plunkett. "The Pisceans have a piece of the portal stone. I had no idea why the portal activated when it wasn't fixed yet... but you can't use it until you get that remaining portal stone piece. You need to get it before the Pisceans use it to open the portal to the Solarium. If they do so, Morganthe won't be far behind! You need to prevent her from getting the Sun of Celestia or all is lost!"

"We'll do our best to get the Sun of Celestia before she does," I said firmly. "How can we get into the Barbican?"

"I don't know, the Crustaceans haven't let me in there," he said. "Maybe Nestor will tell you how to get in and get past the Pisceans."

Nestor indeed had a solution to the problem... beat up more sharks. UGH. I have enough shark teeth to start my own business. :(

I HATE THOSE SHARKS. (Yeah, better get more blades out if you go first as they'll likely Quake you to death. Luckily, Christina has a Waterworks hat which boosts her Balance damage enough to nearly kill these Piscean Centurions without a blade.)

"Please, mercy!" said one of the sharks.

"Tell us how to get into the Barbican," growled Christina.

"We were chased out ourselves by undead pirates!" said the shark.

Great, more enemies to deal with. I hate undead.

(Luckily, we didn't run into Big Bort, the bloated fat pirate. He's a Wandering Boss like the Fairy Queen and has 7040 health, so you DO NOT WANT TO FIGHT HIM!)

We found the captain of the undead crew. "We be good friends of ye if ye oppose the Pisceans and their lackeys, the Lophians!" I said.

"From the looks of ye," said the captain. "Ye look like ye be seeking a way into the Barbican, am I right?"

"Yaaar," I said, nodding.

"I be Lieutenant Dafoe, of the good ship Calypso," said the undead pirate. "A pirate ship in its heyday and a good vessel nonetheless. If ye be friendly, can ye help us out with a spot? The Pisceans and their Lophian lackeys have been giving a spot of trouble lately. Can you collect some power motes from deactivated Stellar Protectors? We have need of them!"

"Yaaar," I said, nodding.

Seriously? There was one no more than ten feet from you, Dafoe! We gathered the power motes and delivered them to Dafoe, who told us that their treasure had been stolen by the Crustaceans.

"I hate to refer to him," muttered Christina. "But Senator Xanthus might know about this."

He did - the Lophians stole it from them and the map to it was given to the Anglers.

So we had to kill more fish. Ugh. I could start a seafood franchise with all the meat I was getting!

"Sure, who's stolen it?" I said, stating the obvious.

"A foul Piscean commander called Acastus Hexfin," said Dafoe. "He is usually hanging out around the area nearby."

Not here...

"Not here!" said Mindy.

Christina smirked. "I succinctly smell the stench of compass from that door..."

"You know what, buddy..."

"I am sick..."

"Of you..."

"SHARKS!!!!" *snarl* (Yeah, don't worry, this is the first time two Myth Wizards are excellent - Acastus and his Piscean Soldier goons are all Ice, which die to Myth. :p)

I ripped the compass from the dead shark's hand and stormed out.

"Thanks, now you can get to your treasure," I said.

"While you were away, I had a talk with our queen Calypso. Yes, she shares the name of our ship, he he he." I failed to see Dafoe's humor. "She says she'll be willing to help ye, but only if you can prove yer mettle in battle. So you must cross swords... er, wands, with Queen Calypso herself!"

"Okay, a friendly duel," said Christina. "How hard could a female undead pirate be?"

Christina, shut your big mouth. O_O

Yeah, I was shocked to see that Queen Calypso was actually a ship figurehead! But I didn't let that creep me out for long - battle had to be joined! En garde!

Better you than me, Christina.

Game, set and match.

"Okay, I'll farm the Waterworks again and again! Just stop attacking meeeee!!!!" (I feel bad for Christina, but she's the one with the highest health and so she's relegated to tank. I need the rest of the Waterworks gear for her to be useful. Don't worry, Christina. You're close to Level Immature Number and one more level after that, you unlock Atlantea!)

(I had lost connection with all my accounts for some reason. I think Wizard101's servers are buggy at midnight. Anyways... about this battle. It's not too hard.)

Mindy: "What does this do?"

Christina: "No! Don't!"

Mindy: "Oopsies. Sorry, Sierra!" ^_^

Mindy was kind enough to take notes on the Serpent Zodiac tome while I was fighting off more undead pirates. :( (Don't touch that lever unless you want to rematch Calypso as that will cause her to respawn as an enemy. Also, I fought the pirates with Sierra solo as they would pull us into battle while I was chatting with the queen.)

"Thanks," said Mindy. "We are pretty..."

I interrupted again. "Can we rely on your aid?"

"Of course!" said Calypso. "For years the Crustaceans feared our intervention! The time has come!" She pointed at the map we had assembled. "This map points straight to the Treasury. Only the Lophians would be fools enough to hide the treasure in the Treasury which they took it from. Get it, bring it back, and we shall lend you our blades!"

But... I... seriously?!?

Sierra, don't question it. Just go with the flow and get the dang treasure back to the nice undead pirates before your mind implodes.

Call off your dang crew, Calypso! AUGH! (Yeah, for some reason the Sea Booters respawned and pulled us into battle. We defeated them but it was annoying.)

"It's good to see you too, Wizard."

"Yeah, whatever," I said. "Can we parley now?"

"Of course," she said. She took the treasure box and handed a key to me. "This is the key to the Barbican, good fortune the Lophians didn't find it. In the Barbican is the ruler of the Pisceans, a shark called Praetor Mako. Use this key to enter the Barbican and strike a blow at the revolution!"

"Time to skin one final shark," I said with glee. "But first, I have to go home and drop off all of this junk I am accumulating... and I know who would love to have it..."

Dear Sierra:

Thank you for giving me all of your Celestian gear. It's useless to me but I know who would love to have it, Elik Silvermane. I dropped everything, returned to WC and headed to the Bazaar.

With all of that crud, I was able to afford my first house... and I knew just what houses I plan to buy. I bought the Myth House to remind me of you. Since you created your Grizzleheim home, I am going to save money to buy the Dragon's Fjord, and when you create your Celestial Observatory, I'll buy the Island Getaway because it represents the Floating Land. I hope to see Celestia myself someday!

Your pen pal - Chris Jadehaven, Magus Theurgist ^_^

PS: Is Christina single? Just asking! ;)

(Yes, I finally got around to helping out the other wizards get rich - now that Christina's getting valuable gear and her backpack is bursting, I thought it was high time to help out my other wizards on her file, and Jadehaven is the fourth-highest level wizard I have next to Amber, Chris Storycrafter(who is still in Stormriven) and Sierra. The weakest are Chris Sundancer(Fire Wizard) and Chris Dragonwhisper(another Storm Wizard). I decided to get the Myth House, Dragon's Fjord and Island Getaway because [1] Sierra is never buying her school house, all of her houses will be crafted, so someone had to buy the Myth house on this file. [2] The other houses are counterpoint to Sierra's crafted houses - the Dragon's Fjord is the purchasable Grizzleheim theme house and the Island Getaway could be a house that is themed after the Floating Land in Celestia to counterpart the Celestial Observatory. I don't know any house to counterpart the Wyrd House but that's a bridge we'll cross once Sierra hits Avalon. ^_^)

I was thinking about the good stuff Chris Jadehaven would get with the money he got from the Bazaar so I wasn't paying attention to Praetor Mako. You know what, forget you, shark boy. I am sick of fighting you sharks.

(Yes, he criticaled and Christina failed to block, but it was only a Nature's Wrath which is pathetic. He's Life and has 7330 HP, so you want to be careful. Luckily, I was able to avoid fighting all the Centurions and booked it after the battle so we didn't fight the other Centurions.)

(Ha, predicted you, Centurion! I KNEW you would Quake so I didn't blade! :p)

First order of business - destroy that freaking Centurion before he Quakes again! Judgement did the job nicely. Once he was gone, we freely bladed up...

Game...

Set...

CHECK. MATE. :p (And yes, I didn't enchant the Ninja Pigs - for some reason I couldn't find my enchants. That's the risk you take - the card you want most isn't in your hand! But I was able to take him out with the traps and blades.)

I pulled the portal stone piece from his pouch. "We can finally fix the Sun Portal now," I declared. "Let's go back to Plunkett and report our success."

"A natural-born leader," whispered Christina to Mindy.

Plunkett was pleased. "You should go fix the portal now," he said. "Don't let me stop you. Be on your way. Oh, and if you see old Halston, tell me hi for me, will you?"

"We will," I said.

Mindy sighed. "Sierra, a word..."

"I've been recalled back to HQ," she said. "I was contacted by my superior. She'll meet you at the base camp to help with the Solarium. She said I'm still a bit too green and a second Myth Wizard spoils the pot. I... am sorry for what I did back in the Science Center to get the Quicksilver. I..."

"It's okay." I put a hand on her shoulder. "You were a hassle, but your quirks kept me on my toes. Good luck protecting the Spiral with your Sailor Wizard girlfriends."

She smiled and struck a pose. "Sailor Venus, the Sailor of Love and Justice, OUT!" She swam off.

I sighed as we headed back to Base Camp.

"Time to fully fix this," said Christina. She plunked the piece in and the portal stabilized. "Now we can go to the Chancel."

"Let's check up with Edith first," I said.