Well, here we go!
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Stage One / Environment : Moonrock Islands
"I'm stuck with you two again?" Aries deadpanned. She stared at her two companions, who happened to be Taurus and Aquarius. (we'll start with these guys since they're my favorite trio)
"You don't have to sound that annoyed," Aquarius said, looking around at their environment. Taurus was too busy in awe, hardly believing that they were really in a virtual world to pay attention. They were in a place that apparently was made up of several floating rock islands. They were on one of the floating rocky islands standing in a grassy plain.
"You guys basically stayed the same," Aries noted, giving them a once-over. "Though I note that Taurus has cut his bangs slightly, good boy!" She gave them a second look. "Oh boy, they're even more innocent than I remembered!"
Aquarius gave Taurus a dazzling smile. "It'll be hard to resist you anything now."
Taurus hid his face in embarrassment. Ah, this was exactly the reason why I let my hair grow so long in the first place...
"So what are we supposed to do?" Aries asked. "I mean, is somebody gonna tell us our quest or...?"
As if on cue Ursa's voice rang out from a small revolving golden ball floating near them. "Hi! Can you hear me?" She waited until they said 'yes' before continuing. "Welcome to Virtual World. You three are currently in the 'Moonrock Islands' part of the world. Your quest will appear soon-until then, just wander around and enjoy the scenery! Also, when you do a quest only one of you can quest at a time, as Level One is the easiest. And you may also have to defeat other creatures before you can get to the 'Big Boss'.
"Your gifts should have also appeared by now, though I won't be providing any explanation, apologies. Your Arms Inventory should have also appeared. Good luck and don't die!"
The golden ball vanished.
"Soooooooooo," Aries broke the silence. "I guess this is real. And we should definitely try and find our gifts. They should be awesome... I hope."
They looked in their Arms Inventory and found their gifts.
Aries held up a small, round, bloodred item. It was kind of like a sphere just slightly flatter. "What the heck is this thing?" She bounced it around in her palms. "A bomb?"
Aquarius drew out a knife. It was very pretty and suited him, with a marbled silver handle and a sharp and slender blade marbled light blue-gray, and white and also glowing white slightly. "And why'd she give me another knife? Not that this one isn't beautifully suited for me, but I already have one and can copy them easily." He turned to Taurus. "What'd you get?"
Taurus was also confused. In between his palms circled a small, animalistic thing. When he tried to catch it darted away and to his surprise lengthed and grew into... what was it exactly? It looked like it was mainly made out of grey smoke, with bloodred claws and spine.
"Taurus?"
Unknowest to Taurus, both of his companions couldn't see the creature, so basically it looked like Taurus was looking up into thin air. "What are you?" Its face seemingly split into a fanged smile before it faded away.
"Oi, buddy, what's up?"
Taurus jolted back to reality as Aries's brash voice cut in. They were both looking at him-one with confusion and impatience, the other with also confusion and repressed concern. "Ah, sorry..."
Aries grinned. "S'okay. So, what's your 'gift'? Hopefully it'll be easier to understand than ours are."
"I don't know," Taurus admitted. "It vanished."
"It was already invisi-" Aquarius shushed her quickly, a furrow between his brow. "That's odd. Well, maybe whatever you got has an 'invisible mode', like our Arms Inventories. Anyway, let's move. Maybe we can figure out yours and our gifts as we go along."
The trio started walking-well, actually, the correct word was moonwalking.
Literally.
They took one step and to their surprise launched into the air like a rabbit and floated there for a few seconds before going down. Then again, the fact that they kept on flailing around before they could land didn't really help. "Wah wah wah wah waaaaahh!!"
"What the hell's going on?! Why are we moonwalking like we're in space?!" Aries yelled, letting out a stream of impressive curses when she tried to take a step and inside did an extremely clumsy cartwheel and a flip midair before landing on her head.
"Maybe it's because these islands are so far connected," Aquarius suggested, landing and jumping again. "But why do I get the feeling that Ursa just wants to see us tumbling-!!"
"Oh that is SO not fair you little cheater!" Aries yelled at Taurus, who was standing on his Blue Disk.
"Ah, wait for me!" Aquarius hopped into the air and managed to land on the disk. "C'mon, gain your balance already and come up, oh great second-in-command."
"Shut up!" Aries wobbled a little more. "I'm just not used to having no gravity when we walk!" Eventually she managed to jump onto the disk, nearly knocking Taurus off.
The little golden ball appeared again. "Oh, so you cleared the first test that quickly? Congratulations. I didn't even think of that when I gave Taurus those tapes to watch."
"This was a test?!" Aries demanded indignantly. "We literally just got here!"
"So?" Ursa asked, and they could practically hear her smirking, "What does that matter? Anyway, come on back to the ground. Usually the inhabitants here only use this partial-gravity trick to jump from island to island. I just fixed it a tad bit for you guys, but it's back to normal now."
True to her word when they touched the ground again they could walk like normal people. "Okay, bye now, I got some other zodiacs to take care of! See ya, don't die! Oh, and also, I was lying about it being the first test, I just wanted to see your reactions!"
She disappeared right as Aries's sword pierced the air where it'd been a second before. "THAT GODDAMN BEAR-!!"
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Stage One / Environment : Sugar Sweets Castle
"OH. MY. GOSH. Guys, TELL ME THAT ISN'T A CASTLE MADE OF SWEETS." Right in front of them was a castle made of all sorts of sweet things. (Leave it up to your imagination)
Virgo sighed, reached over, closed Leo's jaw, then wiped off his drool. "It is."
"IT'S HEAVEN!!!"
"You'll get fat."
"Wait-" Leo seemed to realize who he was talking too and yelped, jumping back. "Holy shi-Is that you, Virgo?!"
Virgo sighed heavily. "Yes, it is. And, unfortunately for us, our third companion is currently sleeping."
They both turned to look at Libra, who was snoozing away on her floating pillow. "We'll worry about her later. Besides, I'm pretty sure she can defend herself. Anyway, back to the point of subject-WHY THE HECK DO YOU LOOK LIKE THAT?!"
"So dramatic," Virgo sighed. "It's just my avatar, Leo. I'll still look the same in the end."
"Oh." Leo paused, then did a double take at Libra. "UHHHHH WHAT HAPPENED TO HER-?!"
"Delayed reaction much?"
As Libra had not been paying much attention with she was choosing her outfit and such, she now had long pink hair, pink bunny pajamas, and floating on a pink bunny pillow. She blinked her eyes open and they were also pink. "Eh? Where are we... oh, there's a castle made of sweets. Not on me if you guys overeat. Bye."
Leo rushed to shake her awake. "Woah woah woah there sleepyhead! Where do you think you're falling off asleep too! You could get attacked! And also, what's up with the pink color scheme?!"
He winced when her voice blared angrily into his head. I WAS CLICKING RANDOM THINGS OKAY NOT MY FAULT I ENDED UP BEING PINK SO SHUT IT THAT JOURNEY HERE GOT ME TIRED!!!
"He-llooooo, my zodiacs!" The golden ball appeared again. "I take it things are going well? Oh, by the way, nice getup, Libra."
"Thanks..."
"Okay, back to the point." A sound like she was pressing a button ensued. "So, welcome to Virtual World! You three are currently in the 'Sugar Sweets Castle' part of the world. Your quest will appear soon-until then, just wander around and enjoy the scenery! Also, when you do a quest only one of you can quest at a time, as Level One is the easiest. And you may also have to defeat other creatures before you can get to the 'Big Boss'.
"Your gifts should have also appeared by now, though I won't be providing any explanation, apologies. Your Arms Inventory should have also appeared. Good luck and don't die!" (she was using a recorder and changed some things. Uses this method for the rules 'cause she doesn't like repeating herself.)
The golden ball disappeared.
"So, I guess we should check out inventories," Virgo tried. One by one they opened their inventories-Libra even woke up for this-but, just like the previous group, they were also confused.
Virgo got a strange-looking device that strongly resembled a cube. Probably because it was one. A simple, glowing green cube that fit in his palm. "Uhhhh... what the heck am I supposed to do with this...?"
Leo frowned at his gift, which was a pair of round gold-rimmed glasses with slight gold-tinted eyepieces. "And I got glasses...? What the f*** man, I don't even have that bad of a vision-OW!" At the same time Libra shouted into his head, CUT THE CURSING OR I SWEAR I WILL WAKE UP FULLY AND MURDER YOU!!! I'M YOUNG AND INNOCENT HERE! Yeesh. This is the second time already I've been annoyed enough to actually yell. It's so annoying!
"Got it, got it," Leo mumbled. He turned to Libra. "What super-mysterious gift did you get?"
For once Libra was actually awake. She was staring at a small creature that was perched on her pillow. The creature was about the size of a small cat and resembled it, with a tail and body, except that its mouth was always in a round circle and it had beady red eyes. The entire thing was pure white. "What... is this?"
"To hell if I know," Leo grumbled. He turned to shout into space. "Oi, Ursa! What's up with these weird so-called 'gifts'?! Can't you even give us some sort of explanation? A small guidebook, maybe?"
"Shut. Up," Libra said, her tone extremely dangerous. "You're being too loud again. If you were paying attention earlier you would've also heard that she's not gonna give us any information. We've gotta figure it out on our own."
"You're a lot more perceptive than I had thought," Virgo noted. "Interesting. Anyway, she's right. I guess we just have to figure it out as we go along."
The strange creature hopped onto Libra's shoulder. She yawned. "Great, so where should we go?"
"To the Castle of Sweets~!" Leo drooled once again at the thought of all that candy. "Where I shall become king~!"
Virgo bonked him on the head, startling him out of his daydream. "Snap out of it, Leo, we've still gotta look out for the monsters and the 'Big Boss.' We've still got to complete the quest if we wanna level up."
"Hai, hai." Leo turned to look at Libra, who was half-asleep, doubtfully. "Ah, but is there anything we can do to keep her awake? At this point she'll be a burden if she's constantly sleeping and defenseless-AHHHHHH!"
A sword made out of darkness, deadly sharp and cold, had just situated itself at Leo's neck. Libra had her arm outstretched, eyes glowing red dangerously. "I'm three-fourths fully awake, Leo... if you say another offensive thing next time that sword will cut your pretty little head off."
He gulped. "I surrender, I surrender."
"Good. Now shut up and let me sleep." The sword dissipated and Libra started to snooze.
Leo rubbed his neck nervously. "Damn, that's one dangerous chick!"
"Yeah..." Virgo said. "It's definitely time to go. C'mon, guys, let's head to the castle."
"To the Castle of Sweets~!"
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Stage One / Environment : Sea of Infinity
"Oh, sweet! We're on an island?" Cancer looked around excitedly at the towering palm trees and the rioting blue-green-gray sea off the sandy beaches surrounding them. They could make out other islands near them.
"Aw, come on, I upgraded my appearance and I get him?" Pisces complained, disappointed. It was all for nothing, then... I was hoping I'd be able to be paired with him and win his heart, but oh well.
"Excuse me?" Cancer asked, extremely offended. "I was thinking you guys looked a little better, but not when you just insulted me like that!"
"Ah, so yet another vain girl, huh?" Scorpio mused. "You sure changed your appearance. In fact-" her eyes twinkled- "-If I didn't know any better I'd think you were trying to impress someone."
Pisces flushed half-angrily and half-embarrassingly. "W-well, you changed your appearance too!"
"Yes, I suppose that's true," Scorpio mused, tracing a hand down her locks of hair. "But not as much as you did."
"Ladies, ladies, let's not fight," Cancer tried. "You're both pretty nice, okay? Okay." He looked around. "Did Ursa not even give us any instructions?"
Right on cue, the little golden ball popped up. "Hi hi! You can all hear me, right?" They all said 'yes'. "Oh, good, I was worried that the sound of the sea would drown out my voice, but whatever." A sound like a button clicked, then recording Ursa spoke. "So, welcome to Virtual World! You three are currently in the 'Sea of Infinity' part of the world. Your quest will appear soon-until then, just wander around and enjoy the scenery! Also, when you do a quest only one of you can quest at a time, as Level One is the easiest. And you may also have to defeat other creatures before you can get to the 'Big Boss'.
"Your gifts should have also appeared by now, though I won't be providing any explanation, apologies. Your Arms Inventory should have also appeared. Good luck and don't die!"
The ball popped out.
Silence... (punctuated by crashing waves, obviously)
"Let's try checking our inventories?" Cancer meekly tried. The two girls were still radiating a tense atmosphere. Oh man, I wish Libra was here! I'm not that good at resolving arguments!
"Fine by me," Pisces said. She pulled out... "Wait a minute, is this a satchel? How is this supposed to be useful?!" In her hands was a plain brown leather satchel. (Flynn Rider Style Satchel, for those of you who have watched Tangled)
"And I got... a crown? Huh?" Scorpio quizically looked down at the twisty silver crown in her hands. A blue stone shone from within it. "I mean sure it's kinda pretty, but pretty sure crowns aren't my thing... they make my hair bunch up annoyingly..."
"Oh!" Cancer looked delighted as a small furry thing started ticking his nose. "What's this? A cat?"
It was, in fact, not a cat but something that was just about unidentifiable thanks to the masses of red fur.
"So, we got... a satchel, a crown, and a weird little pet," Pisces clarified. "That's just spectacular."
"Well, she did tell us that we had to figure it out on our own," Cancer contemplated. "Aw, but my little pet is so cute!"
"So what should we do now?" Scorpio asked. "Should we like, explore the island or something?"
"No," Pisces argued. "We might get lost. It's a huge island, I can't even see half of it."
"Well, what do you think we should do?"
"Hey, what's up with that tone?!"
"What do you mean, I talk naturally like this to you."
"Why-!"
Cancer sighed heavily as they started squabbling loudly. "Why did I have to be stuck with them and not Libra? Somebody help..."
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Stage One / Environment : Warriors' Town
"Why are we in a hotel room?" Gemini demanded.
Capricorn was looking around amazed. "Wow! It's really solid!"
"Of course it is, you idiot," Gemini snapped. "But why in a hotel room? This is below me."
"Oh, cut the 'rich princess' act, would you?"
They were sitting in a square room on separate three beds with a table in the middle of the room and two windows. Very simple.
"Wait a minute, is that really you?!" Sagittarius exclaimed, staring at Gemini. Gemini winked and flipped back one long blonde ponytail. "Of course it is, darling. My voice is the same, isn't it?"
"Yes, but you're blonde! With pigtails! I've never seen you that way!"
"Ahhhh this is amazing..." Capricorn was practically drooling and he patted down everything. "It's all technology with a dash of magic too... ahhh..."
Gemini bonked him hard on the head. "Snap out of it, Cappy! We can have time to geek out later! What's our quest?"
The golden ball popped up again. "Testing, testing, hello! Hello, zodiacs." The button clicked her and her recording started playing. "Welcome to Virtual World! You three are currently in the 'Warriors' Town' part of the world. Your quest will appear soon-until then, just wander around and enjoy the scenery! Also, when you do a quest only one of you can quest at a time, as Level One is the easiest. And you may also have to defeat other creatures before you can get to the 'Big Boss'.
"Your gifts should have also appeared by now, though I won't be providing any explanation, apologies. Your Arms Inventory should have also appeared. Good luck and don't die!"
And it popped out.
At the exact same time, the three of them pounced on their Arms Inventory. (this group is by far the most excited)
Sagittarius pulled out a hat. "Oh, cool! A hat!" she frowned at it. "Aw, it's not a witch hat...whatever." It was an old, worn, and clearly well-loved normal cap kind of hat with a patch on it.
"Hey, I got earrings!" Gemini excitedly held up her earrings. They were gold drops with a pink stone embedded in each of them. She fixed them to her ears immediately. "Looks like she knows what our new appearances look like, cool-io!"
Capricorn held up a necklace. Hanging from the delicate golden chain was a golden hourglass filled with fine golden sand. "Oh, a necklace... well even if I'm not really a necklace person it's very pretty! We can use it to measure time! Somehow!"
"These are pretty nice gifts," Sagittarius said, trying on her hat. It fit perfectly over her head. "Ah, and she even got my head size right! Sweet!"
"So, should we leave?" Gemini asked, already getting up and smoothing out her skirt.
The other two stood up as well.
"Lets."
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Yes, I realize that this is a super short chapter and maybe not my best and I feel like I'm stalling, so APOLOGIES!!!
And I realize that you guys are probably confused on the whole 'Arms Inventories' thing. They're like small pieces of a void where the zodiacs and etc. store weapons. They can also take the form of a curved rack for the weapons as well.
See you in the next chapter! Any guesses on what the 'gifts' may be able to do?
-A.A.C.