With Mario leading the way, Brother Jue and Xiao Tan hurried through a big room that looked like a warehouse.
Along the way, there would be a lit table lamp at a fixed distance.
Lifting their heads, they could see many other toys standing on the racks. It looked like the Classic Camp was quite large, and in a way, could be counted as an army.
When Feng Bujue opened the shoe box, he thought that above them was a dark sky, but now he realized he was wrong. Above them was naturally the ceiling of the supermarket. But since… he and Xiao Tan had been shrunk to the size of about seven cm, and the light from the lamps was slanted, when they looked up, they could not see the ceiling that was so ’far away’ but a slate of darkness.
Several minutes later, Mario led them to a huge door. Of course, the size was relative…
“Erm… is this the way to go out?” Feng Bujue asked while standing behind Mario, “There’s no gap for us to squeeze through and you can’t expect us to push open the door, right?” Even though he still had no idea how strong the toys in this scenario were, he doubted the five cm tall Mario toy before him could push open a door meant for a normal-sized human. Xiao Tan chose this moment to give an unrealistic guess. “Perhaps there’s a mouse hole nearby?”
“Looks like you two really aren’t spies.” Mario held his cap. “But two idiots who don’t know anything.” He said as he walked to the edge of the door. He took out a wrench from his pocket and knocked on the door thrice. He waited for two seconds and knocked twice. Then Mario took two steps back as if waiting for something. Soon, a strange shadow squeezed through the gap. The shadow looked more like a sticker and from the side, it was only a line, but from the front, it was a black cut out of a man with a big nose.
“Mr. Game and Watch?” Feng Bujue managed to recognize this 2D character immediately.
“Who are these two? Newcomers?” Mr. Game and Watch ignored Feng Bujue and chatted with Mario like this was normal.
“Optimus Prime’s order is for them to scout ahead of the assault team tonight,” Mario replied.
“Ha…” Mr. Game and Watch laughed drily. “Good luck, then.” He slipped back through the gap. About one minute later, a commotion came from the top. It sounded like the doorknob being turned. At the same time, someone could be heard calling from the other side, “The turning is ready, you can push now!”
“Stand back, newbie.” Mario ordered for the players to move back.
As the door axle turned, the giant door slowly opened toward Brother Jue’s side. Feng Bujue and Xiao Tan both tilted their head to look through the gap to try to see what was pushing the door from the other side. In their mind, it would have to be a giant toy taller than fifty cm and heavier than three thousand grams. But to their surprise, what appeared before them was a plastic product less than ten cm.
“Look at how small they are.” Bowser (The first antagonist in the history of gaming, Mario’s nemesis) stopped pushing the door and stood there to comment, “With their size, I can blow them away with a fart.”
Feng Bujue didn’t mind how brash Bowser’s choice of words was. He only asked, “How did you manage to push the door open?”
“Using my claws, and a clever manipulation of the strength around the waist and legs,” Bowser answered in his thick voice, “But you two better not try to mimic me.”
“That’s enough. Perhaps you might not see them after tonight.” Mario interrupted Bowser and waved for the players to follow. Feng Bujue looked at Xiao Tan and shrugged. The two followed Mario and walked through the door Bowser pushed open (it was only pushed open a gap, but it was large them for them to squeeze through).
“Alright, from this spot onward, it’s the neutral zone,” Mario explained to the players. “The territory of our forces is mainly on the southern east side. The aisles for sports equipment, kitchen utensils, and half of the food items are under our control.” He raised his finger to point. “Tonight’s skirmish will continue at the frozen food aisle.” The players looked down the direction Mario was pointing, it looked like… a dark valley. They could only see dark huge outlines; they had no idea what was waiting for them.
“As you can see, in this area that is much larger, we can’t place too many lighting equipment.” Mario said, “The night patrol will do their round once every three hours. If we move too many lights, and we don’t have the time to close all of them, it might cause great trouble. Therefore, the fight will normally be selected at the frozen food aisle which will have lighting twenty-four hours.” He suddenly turned around. “Do you have any glowing parts on you?”
Xiao Tan hesitated before he switched on the light on the miner’s hat. Feng Bujue took out his flashlight. Mario walked over to take a closer look. “You have such intricate parts…” He studied the two suspiciously. “What is the mechanism behind them? Wheels? Cogs? Or there’s a battery in your stomach?”
“Erm… Solar power…” Feng Bujue’s ability to lie on the spot was proven once more. “Our external shell is made from a special material that can gather energy when standing under direct sunlight.”
“Oh, I know. It’s just like that GBA game, Boktai. The sun is in your hand. (A famous Nintendo game that requires you to play under direct sunlight to enable the characters in the game to reload their ammo).” Mario nodded.
“Yes, just like that.” Feng Bujue agreed with the assessment.
“So, it’s not as intricate as I thought.” Mario seemed to believe him. He turned around and continued to lead the way. After walking through a stretch of darkness, they came to an area that was surrounded on three sides by big boxes. There was a Nintendo Mat on the game (another weird game accessory, could be seen as the forefather of the dance dance revolution dancing mat). A lit flashlight of normal size was left at the corner and on the mat stood twenty to thirty characters that were related to Nintendo. Most of them were plastic toys and a few had electronic and metallic parts on them.
“Who-are-these-two?” The one who spoke was a robot toy. His voice had this one flat tone.
“Oh? You’re Wall-E (A Pixar movie character)?” Xiao Tan looked at him and asked. Indeed, the robot looked like Wall-E, but he had a gray and white color scheme and not yellow and black; the other difference was, Wall-E had two caterpillar tires at his base but this robot’s base only allowed him to ’stand upright’.
“Go-To-Hell!” The robot suddenly exploded in anger. The toy that did not have any moving parts jumped into the air and took out something that looked like a spinning top and tossed it at Xiao Tan. The robot was slightly bigger than the players, so the top was about the size of an umbrella from Xiao Tan’s perspective. But the plastic top was spinning very fast. The circular saw rapidly approached its target and Xiao Tan appeared like he was about to be sheared into half at his waist.
Tsk—Put—
Two strange noises later, a large shadow leaped forward to grab the top by one hand and blocked before the two players.
“Oh ho, oh ho…” Donkey Kong (A gorilla that first appeared in the street arcade game of the same name in 1981) blocked the attack on Xiao Tan’s behalf. He pulled on the red tie around his neck and his other hand gestured something before finally pounding on his chest with both hands. “Grrr… Roar… Golu…”
Feng Bujue looked at this with a pained expression and he thought. Well at least, he appears to know more syllables than Ultraman…
“Listen, kid, since you don’t know the rule, you’ll be forgiven this time.” A humanoid toy with golden armor, an orange-red helmet, and a cannon on her right arm told Xiao Tan, “Rthe open beta hates to be reminded of that name so you better remember that.” The voice that came under the helmet was female. The one who was addressing was the legendary bounty hunter Samus Aran (The protagonist of the Metroid series, the earlier female character in the gaming world).
“Ha… haha… I’m so sorry.” As the Terror Point slowly dropped in the game menu, Xiao Tan apologized profusely with cold sweat. Even though he did not technically know what he did wrong.
“So that’s R.O.B. (Another Nintendo toy accessory, it is as the same level of infamy as the Speedboard)…” Feng Bujue’s lips twitched twice. “No wonder he looks so familiar.”
“Alright, just ignore the two newbies,” Mario said, “They still haven’t acquired the trust of Optimus Prime and might not even return from tonight’s skirmish alive.” He said loudly, “We better return to the main topic and assign each of our tactical mission.”
…
On the other side, at the camp of Novel. Inside a ’fort’ built using parts of laptop and machinery, hundreds of… well-made omakes, well-constructed models, remote-controlled pets, and so on were lined up in a war formation.
Saber (Real name: Artoria Pendragon), Bayonetta (in leather battlesuit), and Busujima Saeko (In school uniform and armed with a sword) stood at the stage that was in the middle of the fort. Behind them stood a giant figurine that thirty centimeters tall…
He sat on a circular throne with skeletal decoration that was surrounded by a frozen icy wave. His body was covered in onyx-colored armor, and the armor was glowing with an eerie blue light. He was the limited-edition figurine that was sold for a price as high as 350 US dollars—The Lich King, Arthas.
“Travellers from another world…” The voice that came from under the mask was like that of death. His pair of glowing eyes stared right at Laughing Soul and Passing Rain below the stage. “I hand my army temporarily to you. I hope… you won’t disappoint me.”