This time The Beasties take their measures into the Danger Zone. In this episode, our dear Maeye was getting married to one of generals in the Military Agency, Aradeth a.k.a. Fire-Slayer. Josh was quite sorry for Herbert because she had always thought that Maeye and Herbert was a couple, and she could see that Herbert does have a crush on Maeye. Fresco was the only one happy because she had never approved Maeye playing two-timing with Herbert.
Funnily, Fresco also had a problem to face: Timoteo the galley boy who works in the school cafeteria (in Beastich, ‘galley’ means cafeteria). She owed him a favour because he helped bail her out for shop-lifting. Timoteo always had a crush on Fresco, so to repay the favour, Fresco had to become his girlfriend. Yet Fresco couldn’t stand him, so after a date, she dumped him, which was not approved by the rest of The Beasties. Not that Fresco cared.
Soon, Maeye and Aradeth got married in winter and had their wedding dinner at their home. The ultimately beautiful Mayor, Jeryl a.k.a. Form-Taker did a dance for them. The Beasties (except Fresco and Macques) were surprised to know that this beautiful dancer was actually a man. But not a gay, just beautiful.
Fresco introduced him to her gang and Jeryl offered his hand to Josh to shake on it. And through that handshake, Jeryl seemed to have sent a strange message—a vision of a pair of twins who had two totally different characteristics.
That night, Josh sort of had the same vision emitting out of her hand that she shook with Jeryl. Josh told her experience to her fellow Beasties the next morning but it didn’t do much help because it was too much a mystery. Later, a Messenger came to deliver a message from the Mayor. The Mayor has announced a contest would be held in summer at an age-old, full-of-history hill. It’s called ‘Treasure Hunt’ and the game is to go through loads of obstacles and using codes and riddles to get to the treasure: the Cyprine Crystals. Whoever wins the contest would gain access to serve in the Military Agency and fight for their planet and even get exemptions from school.
The Beasties, as expected, were eager to join. To add to their determination, they have come across Timoteo’s little rouge gang called The Gen-X Nekos. The leader of the team, Clash, told them that the contest was merely a way to bid goodbye to the old hill as his father was going to build a theme park. Eolian was so angry with his obnoxious attitude that she made a bet out of anger with The Gen-X Nekos on winning the contest. The deal? If The Beasties win, Clash has to tell his dad to call off the construction, and if The Nekos win, The Beasties will have to become the team’s girlfriends for the whole summer. Yikes!
That’s when Josh came across this mystery guy in the team who calls himself Zack. He seemed to know Josh and he was inclining of taking her away from Macques. When Josh told him about Zack, Macques told her that Zack came with Herbert to Earth to help him monitor The Beasties during the School of the Different era.
When The Beasties got back home to ask for Maeye’s permission, they were in for a disappointment. No matter how they begged, Maeye wouldn’t hear of them entering the contest. They all ended up in the love room of Josh and Macques complaining about it. Macques tried to cheer them up by telling them the legend of the Cyprine Crystals.
It was about the days during the planet’s development, it was still prone to external dangers, like people from other planets or dimensions. It was said that when a group of Rabbit Beasties bandits came to rob a village, they were mistaken for the Rabbit Knights to save the village from disaster by the beings from the 10th dimension. They did think of running away but they changed their minds by the Mayor’s daughter. It was a really hectic fight. Never before has Planet Beasts fought an opponent ten times their size. Finally, after the bloody war, the villagers tried to find the bandits but they were nowhere to be seen. Some say they have been taken away by the legendary Stallion of Reincarnation to be reborn. But one thing’s for sure—they left behind the crystals which was said to be the weapons used to battle the beings from the 10th dimension.
Well, that didn’t exactly cheer The Beasties up though. That only made them want to enter the contest more. Macques learnt about the bet and he was jealous. He knew all along since the School of the Different era that Zack had a crush on Josh and has always been competing with Macques to get her. He was so jealous that…well…their usual making love ‘session’ was a little bit aggressive… Anyway, after ‘all said and done’, Josh wanted to get something to drink and has discovered in the process a really deep secret about the relationship between Herbert and Maeye.
As soon as she found out about it, she was determined to use it on Maeye that day. She announced the good news to her fellow Beasties (but didn’t tell them what she saw yet) and ours truly immediately rushed to Jeryl’s home to apply for the contest. Meanwhile Macques went and confront Zack. Zack was still determined to make Josh his wife just like he asked her to during the SotD (School of the Different) era, and that has angered Macques. But still, Zack was still stronger than Macques, and his determination was stronger than Macques’ determination to stop him. Macques was pretty devastated and didn’t know what to do. Although Josh reassured him later that he should trust her, he couldn’t help feeling crushed about Zack’s whole deal.
Soon, throughout the whole spring, The Beasties began to train themselves physically and mentally for the Treasure Hunt challenge. Those were more into action trained physically (Josh, Eolian, Laurel & Fresco mostly) and those more into the codes and riddles trained mentally (Hydro, Journey and Kale). Flashbacks were frequent in this part, like Eolian’s memory and promise to a guy on Earth who defeated her that she would be stronger the next time they meet, and also Fresco’s memory of her big brother who tried to kill her in her sleep. Yeeks!
All and all, there came summer and the long awaited Treasure Hunt. The Beasties were exceptionally enthusiastic about it. After making sure that Maeye was well away from the house, The Beasties sneaked out and entered the contest. There were a lot of groups entering the contest: The Pirates, Beast Raiders, Human Beasts, Angel Beasts, Kitsune Voyagers, Cyber Usagies, The Bow-Wows and, as expected, The Gen-X Nekos. The Beasties confirmed their vows before departing for a little light breakfast served by the sponsors.
That was when they came across Maeye. They were shocked to know that she was one of the judges involved in this contest. Of course, Josh was ready. She threatened her that if she didn’t let them enter the contest, they will tell the whole Military Agency that Aradeth was actually Herbert too! Herbert was a changeling (cross-bred by a monkey mom and a lion dad) and could switch between a Lion Beastie and a Monkey Beastie. Only Jeryl knew about his identity as everyone else thought that Aradeth was two different types of people. In this planet, it was offensive to have a changeling in the Military Agency and also not liked to have two jobs at once. Needless to say, Maeye had to comply with their wishes to shut them up.
The contest was soon officiated. There were no boundaries in this contest, as long as the opponents don’t try to get at each other’s throats to get the treasure. This game could go on for a few days, so everyone was equipped with their camping materials. They were given Clue Fairies that can be used only 3 times to give them hints for the riddles and codes of the game.
The contest began. Many were desperate to get the codes or riddles right and move to find the treasure. The Beasties were of no exception. They toiled hard to go through the obstacles set out and to figure out the codes and riddles. They also had to collide with other players, including The Gen-X Nekos, once in a while and compete to get the next code first. The camping nights were pretty much interesting, with the occasional snooping from other teams to find out the answer to the clue. Luckily The Beasties had some fellow members who were only too willing to kick the ass out of the opponents (like Laurel and Eolian, for example).
After gathering much clues for about 3 days now, The Beasties were sure that they would reach the treasure soon enough. Soon the sky was dark and it was time to settle down to rest and hit the hay. Coincidentally, they have to share their camping spot with The Gen-X Nekos. The atmosphere was pretty hostile, but they had to compromise just this once. There, The Beasties started to get to know a little about The Gen-X Nekos, especially about Clash who admitted that he never wanted his dad to build the theme park on the hill because it had given him too many memories. This scene also depicted Zack’s attempt to seduce Josh to his side, which was quite a close call.
Finally, after days of persistence and hard work, and a little bit of collaboration from The Gen-X Nekos, they’ve finally reached the top of the hill, where the treasure was laid hidden in a really dense bush. The Gen-X Nekos were willing to let The Beasties have it.
With bated breath, The Beasties opened the treasure box, and lo and behold! There it was, the Cyprine Crystals, in its weapon form. One by one, The Beasties took them randomly, 7 of them, and the Crystals seemed to choose them. Laurel got the Gun from the Sky Crystal, Kale got the Whip from the Forest Crystal, Journey got the Staff from the Tree Crystal, Fresco got the Sword from the Day Crystal, Eolian got the Axe from the Leaf Crystal, Hydro got the Bombs from the Horizon Crystal and Josh got the Bow from the Night Crystal.
As soon as they took out the weapons, they slowly changed back into the crystals they were. It was a pretty magnificent sight to behold. But their happiness was short-lived. Minutes after they took out the weapons, the hill started to shake. It was as if there is a correctional of the hill as soon as their job of taking care of the Crystals was done. The Gen-X Nekos almost fell off the hill but The Beasties managed to save them and get all of them to safety.
As soon as they reached safer ground, everyone rejoiced and cheered as they saw who the victors of the contest were. Then they also found out that a lot of people have been betting on The Beasties to win the contest to save the hill. They all gathered around Clash’s dad, who was one of the sponsors, to call off the construction. That was when they found out that he has been using Clash as a rumour-spreader to spread the rumour about the construction to test if the people really cared about the hill. The whole construction thing was all a hoax! Clash was really pissed off for being used that way.
Anyway, all’s well ends well. The victors were announced, the permits of eligibility to the Military Agency and the certificates of exemptions from school have been given out and good food was served. Zack took Josh’s arm, brought her to Macques and shoved her to him, making Macques promise to take good care of her and he himself took Josh’s hand and kissed it as his pledge to be her faithful guardian. Interesting!
Wonder what changed his mind…?
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To read the actual comic, go here: http://thebeastieschronicles.blogspot.com/
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