[center][h3]Minigame Roulette[/h3]
Level 13 Ms Fortune (160/130) Level 8 Goldlewis (90/80) Level 7 Sandalphon (51/70)
Roland, Sectonia, and the Robot Girls’ [@Archmage MC], Midna and the Koopa Troop’s [@DracoLunaris], Geralt and Zenkichi’s [@Multi_Media_Man], Pit and the Octopath Travelers’ [@Yankee], Roxas and Ganondorf’s [@Double], Juri’s [@Zoey Boey]
[b]Word Count:[/b] 1035 (Goldlewis) 1191 (Ms Fortune)[/center]

After putting Nadia and her spectacular wreck in his rear-view mirror, Goldlewis tried to pick up the pace. The timer in his cab’s dashboard marched ever closer to zero, after all, and if he meant to win he couldn’t afford to waste any time. So far his strategy had been a blend of speed and control, reasoning that any crashes or spin outs that resulted from an overabundance of haste would cost him a lot more time on the clock than caution. He didn’t overdo it like Sandalphon, but he still got outpaced by the likes of Captain Falcon and even Zenkichi. Now, though, he knew that he would need to pick up the pace to stay in the running. A little more familiar now with the city layout and the overall shape of its streets, he cranked up the music in his radio player and began to drive a little more recklessly. He flew off hills, skidded around sharp corners, and even took out small objects. 

Goldlewis reached Payback Square, dropped off his current passenger, and drifted to a stop in a red zone just narrowly missing his next customer. “Southpaw Junction, and step on it!” the female NPC demanded. The veteran obliged, slamming his pedal to the metal to the sound of screeching tires. His arrow pointed him back toward Grapital Central, but while he knew he could weave through those twisting streets, the broader southbound avenue offered more room for acceleration. It featured one other bonus, too: ramp trucks. As long as he didn’t soar straight into the elevated railway, Goldlewis knew he could use those strategically-placed stunt vehicles to perform tricks, which he’d avoided in favor of solid fundamentals until now. “Better buckle up, ma’am!” he grinned, still not familiar with the concept of a non-player character. “I’m gonna take you for a ride!”

Now, with his engine roaring as the cab sped down the roadway, Goldlewis could really feel the wind in his hair. His heart pumped with exhilaration, and he couldn’t suppress a smile. Suppressing his common sense, he steered his taxi toward the first ramp truck he saw, and a second later he was in the air. “Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeehaaaaaaaaaaw!” he hollered, easily drowning out the screaming of the passenger in the back. All too soon the vehicle touched back down, with a quick rightward veer necessary to avoid a collision with a building. Just after getting the vehicle back under control, though, Goldlewis saw another ramp, and deftly drifted over to fly off it as well.

He reached Southpaw Junction ahead of schedule, his passenger shaken but still in the vehicle. “Thank ya kindly!” After snatching his cash from her shaking hands, he rounded up another customer that requested a quick trip to Jobber Flats, back where he last spotted Sandalphon. Goldlewis got there on the double, a little shaken by several near misses and a run-in with Junior’s paint hazard but satisfied with the extra dough. He didn’t see any sign of Sandalphon and reasoned that she must have barely left the area with the time she had left, though overall he had noticed fewer and fewer competitors around. Those with less driving skill, especially the few inclined to sabotage others instead of trying to win for themselves, were all getting eliminated. Already the relentless decline of the timers had thinned the herd by half or more. Those last two trips had bolstered his own time somewhat, so if Goldlewis could last just a little longer, a top spot could be his. Unfortunately, the saboteurs only got more dangerous once eliminated, using their own abilities to wreck havoc rather than their vehicles.

Unwilling to waste time hunting down a red, he settled for a yellow, only to find that the customer demanded a trip over Grapital City’s connecting bridge to Low Key Key. With Half-Nelson Highway a hotspot for saboteur activity, and too much of a detour anyway, he opted to go for the much narrower, much trickier southern bridge instead. He managed to avoid a drop into the drink, but he felt anxious to make up for the time spent on his cautious crossing, and after turning south Goldlewis entered the little town where he dropped his passenger off at a poolside. He spotted a red fare up the street, picked the NPC up, then had to pull off a three-point turn to head south again to get to the giant ice cream come. Unfortunately, this particular customer’s timer turned out to be incredibly strict, and just moments before Goldlewis reached the monument his passenger bailed. “You gotta be kiddin’ me. It’s right there!” He got no response, of course, and the veteran had to swallow his pride in order to find someone else.

Thanks to that incident, his timer suffered a blow that he never recovered from, even after two back-to-back yellow trips in Low Key Key (during which he saw, and waved to, Primrose and Therion in the latter’s parked car). His hesitation to attempt more reds ended up spelling his doom. Just as he drew near the tropical island’s lavish southeastern hotel, his taxi cab began to give up the ghost. “Gaghhhh, don’t you quit on me now, you stinkin’ clunker! Just a hundred more feet, c’mon, c’mon!” Unfortunately, his timer read zero-zero-zero, and no amount of coaxing would add more seconds to that fateful number. With a final sputtering cough, the car ground to a halt. “Awww, hell.” He smacked the steering wheel with the bottom of his fist in disappointment, only for the airbag to explosively deploy and flatten Goldlewis against the seat. “MMMPH!”

It took him a few moments to extricate himself, after which the veteran heaved a heavy sigh, shook his head, and moseyed down the road toward the hotel. While he waited for the game to wrap up, he could at least see if the drinks in this wonderworld were real enough to taste. Fortunately, he didn’t have long to wait; even if Falcon had the others beat by a country mile, only the person in second needed to run out of time for the game to reach its end. The moment Goldlewis reached for a mimosa, the tropical paradise around him began to collapse.

[hr]

The moment Nadia got warped back into the giant roulette table that served as the Seekers’ minigame lobby, the feral looked around. All of her fellow competitors from Kooky Cabbies had reappeared alongside her, their positions seemingly random, but right now she cared about just one unfriendly face in particular. With almost everyone more or less relaxed after their taxi cabs stopped moving, it took only a second to identify her target by movement alone, given the warp-induced disorientation that led to directionless aggression. Now that Juri and Nadia were back in the real world -or a more real one than Grapital City, at least- they could give their feud a proper conclusion, and the feral planned to keep her word by showing the bully how dangerous a serious Ms. Fortune could be.

“Okay, let’s do this right,” Nadia muttered, drawing her dagger Athame from her belt with one hand as she sprayed blood on the floor from the other. When she hopped onto it, she could deploy her rigging, the mechanical arms unfolding from her backpack to swivel their cannon batteries in Juri’s direction. “I won’t miss you!” She fired missiles of condensed hydro energy like watery corkscrews, two salvos at once, and as all four shots homed in on Juri’s position Nadia transformed her legs with Fluffy Soft and sprinted after the missiles in an animalistic burst of speed.

Juri’s good reactions meant that she could turn and block the missiles the moment she spotted them, but burnout prolonged her blockstun long enough for Nadia to pounce. She lashed out with her tiger legs, first with a [url=https://i.imgur.com/Tkz3eoX.png]scratch[/url] and then with a [url=https://i.imgur.com/RTr039g.png]knee[/url]. “Saved the beast for last!” A high guard reduced the empowered blows to chip damage, but the Marks they applied reduced Juri’s defense by a combined ten percent, which spiked to 40% when Nadia followed up with a wicked slice from Athame, even when blocked. “Knife knowing ya!” Finally, Nadia used her dramatic tension to unleash her classic blockbuster, Cat Scratch Fever. “Furserker Purrage!” She advanced with a relentless series of slashes, dishing out remarkable chip damage as she pushed Juri back. The final hit caused the martial artist’s back to slam into the roulette table’s central tower, stunning her. As Juri reeled and Nadia’s teammates looked on, either alarmed or just curious, the feral stepped forward with a Friend Heart in her hand.

“Haah,” she gasped, grinning. “You’ve had quite the slumber party. But it’s time to wake up!”

She drove the Friend Heart into Juri’s head, setting the vagabond free in a burst of light.

In just seconds the commotion was over, thanks to Nadia’s underhanded strategy. As Juri recovered, fully healed but also fully possessed of her memories, her attacker waved the others away with fingers crossed behind her back. “Nothin’ to worry about guys, just freeing my [i]friend[/i] here.” Once she’d assuaged the others’ concerns, Nadia turned back to Juri. She didn’t bother insulting her with an offered hand to help her up. “Welcome to what I’ve been dealing with,” she told her old rival. Would the truth inspire her to rethink her ways and fight for the future, or sink her into a depression? Maybe it wouldn’t change much of anything. Regardless, the choice was Juri’s to make. “...Enjoy.”

By that time, Balan and Ballyhoo had appeared. “What an incredible, action-packed ADVENTURE!” Seemingly ignoring the violent confrontation, the gamemaster looked more animated than ever. “Good work transporting those travelers, everyone, but alas! There can be only one winner! And then several RUNNERS-UP!” His associate Balan provided a drumroll as Ballyhoo snapped his fingers, summoning a cloud of wallets with all the competitor’s pictures on them that contained their collective earnings. Cash poured out of them -though in a couple cases, a single butterfly fluttered out of them- and one by one they quickly ran out until only three remained. “In third place, Goldlewis Dickinson! In second place, Zenkichi Hasegawa! And in first place, Carnival Town’s very own CAPTAIN FALCON! CONGRATULATIONS!”

Though getting third took Goldlewis by surprise, it did lift his spirits. In the end, his focus on the objective had given him the edge over Bowser, who'd committed a bit too much to chaos.

Ballyhoo held out his empty palms, then turned up his hands, revealing rift tokens between gloved fingers. He hurled them like throwing knives, five at Falcon and four at Zenkichi, then did a backflip before launching the last three at Goldlewis. Finally, he took off his hat and threw it, which whirled through the air above the crowd dispensing consolation tokens to everyone else. Sandalphon received hers with a nod of approval. Now even those who had yet to place in any of the minigames could reach that slot machine's much-lauded ‘pity’ and get what should be a valuable spirit. The games weren’t over just yet, however, so everyone had one more chance to earn a real payout.

For the fourth time, Balan and Ballyhoo spun the roulette wheel. When the boo ball finally stopped, it lay in pocket number thirty-four. “GASP!” The gamemaster cried, using the word itself instead of the actual sound. “Could it be? The fourth and final minigame in your collective free trial session before we start charging you is none other than WITCH ONE!” He declared it with such bravado that it echoed through the lobby, though as it petered out the rising sense of anticlimax forced Ballyhoo to clear his throat. “...Ahem! It’s a fun new twist on an old classic, a favorite among gamers of all ages, time periods, and IQ levels! So listen up!” After landing and leaning on his cane in a saucy pose, Ballyhoo began his exposition. “The rules are simple. You will be divided into two teams. Four of you will be seekers…”

“Aren’t we all Seekers?” Nadia muttered.

“...And the rest will be hiders! The hiders will have ninety seconds to find somewhere to hole up in our quaint little town. When that time is up, the seekers’ hunt begins! They must find all the hiders within six minutes to win, and if they fail, the hiders will be victorious! How to find someone, you ask? Simple! Just poke ‘em with your very own unicorn horn! Just don’t poke something that isn’t a hider ten times, or you’ll eliminate yourself. And be aware: the hiders have a trick up their sleeves! The MIMIC VEIL!” Ballyhoo opened wide and coughed out a classic witch hat with a [url=https://i.imgur.com/xmIUvNl.png]veil of cloth[/url] wound around it. “Snap your fingers while wearing it, and you’ll create an illusion of the nearest valid object around yourself to hide inside! You can adjust it a little, but too much movement will break the illusion! Use it to hide yourself in plain sight! Especially because we’re disabling all abilities that would RUIN THE GAME by making yourself unfindable! And the seekers will get faster the longer they chase someone, so you can’t run forever! AHAHAHAHA!”

Nadia couldn’t help but smile. “So it’s just hide and seek, huh? ‘Find’ by me!”

The terrible pun earned her a look from Sandalphon, her pupils briefly in the form of targeting reticles.

Goldlewis, meanwhile, rubbed his head. “There ain’t much I can fit inside, I reckon,” he muttered. “Maybe a wardrobe, or somethin’...?” Well, after unexpectedly placing in the last minigame, he couldn’t complain too much.

“Get ready to hide and/or seek then, gamers!” Ballyhoo exclaimed. “Let the minigame begin!”

[hr]

[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/hJN64vw.png[/img][/center]

Once immersed in Balan’s new wonderworld, those designated as ‘hiders’ found themselves wearing witch hats in a whimsical old town of cobblestone streets and wooden cottages at nighttime, decorated thoroughly in the pumpkins, hay bales, candles, and props of Halloween. The flickering flames inside oil lamps and jack-o-lanterns illuminated crimson leaves, orange grasses, and colorful candies nestled inside bowls on the cottages’ doorsteps. All these buildings, however, featured fully accessible interiors, furnished with a selection of small and large objects. Which ones counted as ‘valid’ turned out to be based on the size of those who used their Mimic Veils; a valid object was whichever one could completely encapsulate the user in his or her current configuration, which ruled out the small props for just about everyone.

Still, this own offered plenty of places to hide. The Potter’s House, full of ceramic pots and jars of all shapes and sizes as well as ovens and bushels of coal for firing them. The Weaver’s House, full of quilts, blankets, and tapestries hung all over the walls and furniture that filled the abode with ghosts of cloth. The Mason’s House, full of statues of various people and creatures plus slabs of uncut stone. The Botanist’s House, an overgrown dwelling with plant pots and pantries full of magical flora and fragrant incense. The Ironworks, with all sorts of cauldrons and safes on display. The Tavern, laid out for a feast, with its many barrels and cloth-draped tables bowing beneath the weight of giant fruits, vegetables, meat slabs, and pies. The Stables, where sacks of feed and storage crates surrounded pens where fake animals lay. The Barracks on the bottom floor of the tower, with various suits of armor and crates of ammunition. And in the center of town, the two-story Library, its bookshelves towering over sprawling study tables.

Meanwhile, the four seekers wound up in a waiting room to hang tight while their opponents hid themselves. This took the form of the otherwise inaccessible [url=https://www.roadtovr.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/waltz-of-the-wizard1.jpg]potion laboratory[/url] at the top of the town’s tower. It featured a large brewing table with a cauldron and wealth of magical ingredients that could be processed and combined to all sorts of amusing effects, as well as a talking skull that could offer explanation or advice when prompted–or scream when hurled out of the window. Each prospective seeker also got a rainbow-striped shank, evidently their ‘unicorn horns’. And if none of that tickled their fancy, the four soon-to-be-seekers could just talk with one another, though given who’d been selected -Pit, Ganondorf, Geralt, and Rika- any chat between the four of them was bound to be interesting.

[center][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec51scS2zTc[/youtube][/center]