Amitie and the Mysterious Egg Chapter 8 - Trial Tower

The White Bird lives at the top of the tower, which is at the grassy outskirts of Primp. I kinda wronged Arle and Ringo yesterday, so I talked about how I decided to take Tama to the tower to meet the white bird. The two of them, right then and there, laughed it off like it was nothing.

---

“Of course we’ll go with you! Right, Carby?”
“Gu guu!”
“I, too, shall accompany you...By the way, what is that tower? Do you know anything, Amitie?”
“Y-Yep... That tower is known as Trial Tower.”
“Trial Tower!?”

Arle's eyes went wide when she heard my answer. "Trial Tower" is a tower known only to the students of the Magic School. No one else knows what it's called. It's stony, circular like a su~per tall cylinder, and for a building in Primp, the inside is extraordinarily tall and old. No one knows who built it, how it was given a crazy name like "Trial Tower", or why it's near the Magic School. They're all widespread rumors. From hearing some creepy voices, to the light coming from the windows... Yet, somehow it feels like something is drawing near, even if there's no one in there. After listening to my explanation, Arle mumbled "Uh~m." with her finger raised up to her cheek.

"Trials huh...Trials you say..."
"What'cha thinking, Arle?"
"Thinking about it is a little scary. If we enter the tower, gigantic monsters might jump out!"
"Eek!?"
"Gugu!?"
"I-I was considering that too."

Now Ringo showed up right beside us.

"The monsters in there seem terrifying..."

Gulp...We had to catch our breath.

"No one else will solve this complex and mysterious mathematical problem! Ah, so frightening...!"

Guh. Everyone's shoulders dropped. Ringo, it's not that scary... Nope. How come they find it scary when I don't see why? Still, it's kinda dangerous. I can't shake that off. For now, we faced Trial Tower and headed inside.

"Kyu kyu kyu~"

Of course, Tama's coming along. It thinks we're going to play something different, no? It eagerly, tottered right in. Ahh, it looks so carefree~. It looks like it's going to be goodbye soon...

---

Looking around, Trial Tower always looked really big from a distance. It must've been built with big bricks. The walls look old, but it feels pretty sturdy. You couldn't tell it was rock-hard from a quick glance. Arle and Carbuncle seem excited.

"Hnnn, memories of travelling are stirring. Our adventurous spirit is getting psyched up! Right, Carby?"
"Gu gugu~♪"

R-Really now? My heart can barely sit still... I mean, I'm so nervous... There's a front door, at least. It looks like the two iron doors can be pushed open. Arle and Ringo stood in front of it, side by side, and then called out "And now!" Will it open up? Is there a key for it? It seems old and rusted up shut though... That's my main worry...until it creaked open with ease. Somehow.

"Wh- What the!?"

I unintentionally shouted out loud. Inside the first floor of the tower is... well, the first floor. Uh, on the other side of the big, round room are stairs that lead to the second floor. There's no way the goal is right there, but it's there. But then the room started to fill up with Puyo of all sorts of colors!

“If we don’t clear these, we won’t advance right? Wait, don’t tell me this is a trial!?”

Surprisingly, my words matched Arle and Ringo’s thoughts, kicking them into shape.

"Okay, so it's a Puyo Trial then. Alrighty, let's go at it, Carby!"
"Gu guu!"
"You're getting pretty dangerolossal there!"
"Of course, we may not be able to finish off the terrifying monsters, but for us..."
"Popping Puyo is easy-peasy!"

With that, we charged in. The two of them began rapidly clearing the Puyo before them.

"Carby, let's go!"
"Guguu!"

Arle's signature move piled on up with Carbuncle's cooperation. On Arle's cue, Carbuncle grabbed a Puyo with his long tongue and splendidly stacked them.

"Carby, now over here!"
"Gu gu~~~♪"
"Alrighty, here we go...Ice Storm!"

Yup, I can see they're in perfect sync and enjoying it too. That's how partners are! As they say. As for Ringo...

“Not yet...With this...The next one is the Green Puyo! Ah~ha, gotta keep going!”

The studious Ringo is al~ways thinking on her toes and loves to stack it up. She gets it real, real, high at near the Puyo's breaking point. And then, she steadily whittles it down? That's what it seems...

"Yes, just as planned! It's getting me psyched... Tangent!"

And the Puyo pile from before popped. And because of that, the Puyo riding on top fell off their place. And then those Puyo popped, and more fell down... Continuing to chain like this, loads and loads of Puyo were gone in one swoop!

"Perfect..."

Ringo challenged a difficult task, but felt good suddenly overcoming it. Amazing, but I wonder what I can do?

"Okay, my turn!"

Everyone's trying so hard, it's making me excited! Eyes on the Puyo in front of me, I began stacking them up.  Puyo, Puyo, Puyo, Puyo... The Puyo are squishy to the touch, and they make a squishy sound as I stack them. Once they're all connected, I began to pop them. As I keep at it with the Puyo, it's like I'm in a Puyo trance, my head being filled up with the Puyo. My mind is feeling the Puyo. I love it! Today is also the usual tempo for stacking Puyo.

"Kyukyuuu♪"

Tama's watching from behind, cheering me on. Then it hit me. I suddenly realized I'll probably have to say goodbye to Tama.

"Aaahh!"

My concentration got tripped up. I thought I was gonna pop the next Red Puyo, but my grip slipped up and dropped the Red Puyo up on top. What am I going to do with a Red Puyo I can't see or pop!?

"Uh, uh, uh..."

I lost and hurried myself, trying to find a good idea. Umm, umm, stay calm... If I pop that Blue Puyo, then at Red Puyo in there should... Aah! I messed up! The Yellow Puyo next to the Blue one fell~! If I keep panicking, my mountain of Puyo will get even taller...

"Eeek...EEEEEK!"

*CRA~SH!*

And then, it lost its balance and toppled down. Loads and loads of Puyo came raining down on me.

"Kyuuuu!?"
"A-Amitiiiie!!"

The end result? Crushed and knocked out~ In my current condition, Arle and Ringo had to pop the tons of Puyo lying all over me. At least the Puyo more or less were cleaned up, and can go on to the second floor. I'm still a bit shaky, but I took Arle and Ringo's hands and went up the stairs to the second floor.

---

The first floor was covered with Puyo, so what does the second floor have? I wonder...

"This floor is a little quiet..."

Ringo mumbled to herself. I stretched out both of my arms around the space of this pathway, round and round, back and forth. After that, it's now the third floor. It was really narrow floor, barely able to move around the walls. I don't even see any windows. Still, the stony walls, floor, and ceiling don't look too dangerous. Without any windows or lamps, it was really dark. Is there some sort of mysterious magic that can brighten this place up? Yet, there were some reddish-brown stones sticking out on the floor, and several white ones here and there in some kind of pattern.

"Goody~, but I think the Puyo are still filling up!"

With that, let's get going! But I think we should go one step at a time.

"Amitie, wait up!"

Arle suddenly grabbed my shoulder.

"Fweh...?"

I still kept moving forward, then someone said something...

*clop!*

"Ugyahh!?

Some weird voice startled me! Because of that, I quickly stepped over the reddish-brown stones on the ground. I looked at the door-looking thing and it opened up! I was confused, returning to where I was standing. Arle grabbed my shoulder again, but that made me totally fall over~!

"I see. There appears to be a pit here..."

I peered into the hole as Ringo mentioned. I timidly looked deeper down the hole...and there it was. In the hole, there were a ton of Puyo cramped together. In other words, it's a Puyo Pool! If I fell down there, I might get buried with no hopes of getting out. But then everyone was confused when the floor went quiet. There's some pattern here with the door closing and the hole shutting itself, and I didn't see any other way. D-Don't tell me the path is down this hole!?

"Wh-what do we do? We can't pass through here~..."

I was close to tears. Ringo's eyebrows closed in as she began to ponder. Arle, though, thought differently.

"Guys, got a moment? I've been thinking."
"Eh?"
"What do we do?"
"Heh heh heh... Have a look! Here!"
"Eh!? Arle!?"

Ringo and I shouted at the same time. Arle seriously thought there's a path down the hole, and she cheerfully jumped down! Ah, Arle went down the Puyo Pool! I suddenly shut my eyes without much thought...

"Yahoo!♪ I knew it!"

Then I opened my eyes when I heard Arle's energetic voice. The path Arle took from earlier wasn't from the reddish-brown stones, but the standing white stones. My hands were shaking.

"Wh-what do you mean?"

Ringo was also staring blankly.

"Dungeons usually have a bunch of traps. The floors undergo various changes depending on where you step, so don’t get stuck in the pit and move on!"
"Understood~!"

Ringo and I were both fascinated by that. That's amazing, Arle! As expected from someone that travels a lot!

"Okay everyone, let's go! Carby's coming along with me."

Arle jumped again, but back out. After, she took up Carbuncle in her arms.

"Gu gu♪ Gu gu♪"

Carbuncle's happily in Arle's arms. O~kay, the right path isn't as scary as I thought. With no delay, everyone went to step over the white stones...

"....Ah. Hang on..."

I suddenly realized something and turned around. Oh yeah, everyone's going to be alright, but what about Tama?

"Kyuu?"

Tama tilted its head, looking like it doesn't know a thing. Ohh, while this is cute, if fell into the Puyo Pool, it might be too miserable for it...

"Uh, heya Tama? If you step on those white stones, we can go up the path with stairways! Can you do it?"
"Kyukyu?"
"Earlier, Arle went and..."
"Kyuu!"
"Eh!? Tama!"

Midway during my explanation, Tama went and jumped in! Watch out! ...or so I thought.

"Kyu kyu kyu♪"

Tama flapped about, taking charge and lightly hopped on the white stones, in which the side stairway showed itself.

"Kyukyu."

Then it stood tall, feeling proud of itself. Did it think it was some new game?

"That's amazing, Tama! Okay, my turn!"

The next one to hop across is Arle. As expected, she's used to it. With Carbuncle in her arms, she quickly skipped across the white stones.

"Okay, I'll have at it!"

Then the third up was Ringo. She held her arms out for balance...

"Whoa...whoopsie, upsy-daisy...whoah-ho-hoh!"

Whew, she made it safely across. And lastly, I'm next. Hmm, looking at it, it's kinda like playing "Takaoni" or "Hopscotch." I triumphantly hopped across one stone after another.

"Hah! Yup!"

...or so I said...this one stone is surprisingly tiny~. Whoopsie-daisy. I ended up losing my balance a bit. Fear even went down my spine.

"Kyukyu!?"

Watching this, it began to worry for me.

"No need to worry, Tama. Come on come on, peace!"

To put Tama at ease, I smiled and put up the V-Sign. Slowly but surely, I made my way to the stairs!

"Kyuuuu♪"

Looking at my V-Sign, Tama was relieved. It happily hopped to me... uh? W-wait a minute!

"T-T-T-Tama! Stay away! Both of us standing on the same white stone is a bad idea right now!"

But my panicked shout was too late.

"A-Amitiiiie!"

Arle and Ringo shouted to us, not knowing what to do.

"Kyuuuu♪"
"AAAAAAH!"

Eventually... Tama was happily flapping its wings, as I fall off the white stone and land on my backside... I made a pretty big ka-THUMP sound when I hit the ground. Then Arle and Ringo reached out to pull me up, tired and covered in Puyo. I made a spectacular jump to reach out and escape, Tama leaving a cheery "Kyu~!" on the way up.

---

Now I know exactly why this tower is called "Trial Tower".  Each floor has some strange "trial". On this floor, there was some kind of slope, like something you'd see on a hillside. Tons of Puyo came rolling down like a trap, piling itself into a kind of wall. The linked Puyo extended itself like a big round bridge. With our power combined, we ascended up the tower. ...Or rather, I had to rely on Arle and Ringo. The thing is, I can't help but be concerned about Tama, tripping my concentration, and making me all clumsy. I wonder if I'm being clumsy as usual~, or if today is a just really bad day. On top of that, thinking about saying goodbye to Tama as I climb the tower, I had stay cheerful as usual, just leaving a sigh...

---

“Are we close to the roof?”

Arle asked, while climbing the stairs.

"That's right. Hang on just a little longer!"

Ringo raised her arm overhead.

"..."

Everyone willingly climbed the stairs, with me accompanied with Tama. Saying goodbye to Tama continues to bother me, and it's making me down in the dumps~. I don't think I'm useless though, I'm going to see today through with these two. Now's not the time to get mopey. With that mindset as I move on, it's suddenly the next floor. Everyone, familiar with the tower, have an alert "I wonder what it is this time..." face. Before long, something out of the ordinary surprised us! That's what I thought. Yeah, we were surprised. It was three times Tama's size...we looked way up, and it turned out to be a titanic Nuisance Puyo, standing in front of the stairway!

"A-Ahahahaha..."

All of us laughed hesitantly. Although this one is a special kind, Nuisance Puyo can't pop like normal and just stick around. Instead, we pop the other Puyo right next to it to get rid of it. It's a strange thing. With the regular size of a Nuisance Puyo, it usually takes one to pop one. But with this huge one, how much Puyo does it take to pop this one? We climbed all the way up here and now everyone's exhausted~!

"W-We have no choice... Everyone, have at it! Got it, Carby?"
"Gugugu!"

With that, Arle was the one to start. Out of everyone, Arle's got to be the bravest of all, never backing down on a trial. Along with Carbuncle, she began gathering the surrounding Puyo and started popping them.

"We need to try out which angle of attack is the best and most efficient. Alright, here we go!"

Ringo jumped in and continued on. Out of everyone, Ringo is the most calm, able to calm herself and see through her actions. She began to pile the Puyo, trying to find the best way to pop that giant Nuisance Puyo. Okay, now it's my turn!

"Watch me now, Tama! Before long, we'll get rid of that Nuisance Puyo!"
"Kyukyuu!"

Those two aren't going down anytime soon. As for little ol' me, I faced the gigantic Nuisance Puyo and charged at it. If it gets popped, we can get to the top of the tower! On top of that, we can finally meet that white bird and tell it that Tama needs a place to live freely... But is it even on good terms with Tama? Does it need a friend? What do I do about Tama being spoiled? Urrgh, I really want to be with Tama forever, but from tomorrow on, Tama might be long, long gone. And then I'll......h-huh? My power isn't working for some reason. I was able to pop Puyo just now and today, but now my ideas are drawing blanks. I even piled up slowly, and now I can't even chain with this mountain of Puyo. It wasn't long until it lost its balance...

"Ah..."

It's no good. It collapsed on me. I couldn't do a thing, and I was done for~!

"Kyukyuuuu!"

Crying out didn't do any good upon noticing the danger. The chaotically stacked mountain of Puyo was leaning in my direction... and I shut my eyes tightly, prepared for the worst.

"Braindumed!"
"Tangent!"

Before my eyes, two voices immediately showed up. They were Arle and Ringo's voices. They had their backs to me when I opened my eyes. They protected me, casting spells in an instant to pop away the Puyo!

"Onwards with me, Carby!"
"Gu gugu~!"
"And this is payback!"

Puyo, Puyo, Puyo. I stared in awe, the two of them popping Puyo one after another. Watching their style like this, it's making me...

"Sorry...Arle, Ringo..."

I whispered, becoming a little teary-eyed and sounding a bit nasally. Those two always come to my rescue. Not just today, but also finding Tama, finding snacks to feed to Tama, playing with Tama, and they went in this tower with a determined smile. As for me, I don't know what I'm good for because I just get in the way. Are they angry at me and just don't care? Yet, these two have not once felt annoyed. I- I can't think of them as bad people at all! It was at that time my tears were falling.

"It's okay, Amitie!"

Arle and Ringo turned around, talking in unison.

"Don't worry about it. We know how you're feeling, Amitie."
"I know you feel lonely about Tama, and it's become an emotional burden, which isn't quite like you!"
"And it kept making you restless, so you wanted to get stronger..."
"And that is quite normal to us!"

They alternated their sentences, without stopping their Puyo picking. They just continued to pop them one after another, and I continued to blankly watch them from behind.

"Is that it, Amitie? You always give it everything for your friends' sake."
"Even you're not open to saying it, we're in high spirits today all for your sake. Just leave it all to us!"
"..."

Arle, Ringo. After hearing your voices, my completely cloudy mind finally cleared up completely. For fighting with everything you got, you're definitely the best friends of them all. You don't even think I'm some annoyance either. You naturally do it for your friends, you say. You're doing it for me. You're actually doing it for me! That...that makes me really, really happy!

"Kyuu?"

Tama turned around, looking really worried. Ah, I suddenly looked all anxious now. Even if I feel lonely, I don't stop thinking about my friends. I'll feel lonely letting Tama go, and everyone will too, and I think even Tama will feel totally lonely too. Why am I noticing this just now? I need to smile. I'm going to give my everything for everyone and Tama! Somehow, my thinking is clear. Arle and Ringo by my sides, noticing me take the front.

"Amitie? Are you alright?"
"You can leave it to us, Amitie...."

Their worries left their mouths, but I smiled and shook my head. They didn't have anymore to say.  Besides, ehehe... I feel great!

"Ringo! Tell us what to do! A good place to put the Puyo!"
"Huh!? M-me, tell you!?"
"Arle, Carbuncle! Stack the Puyo with me!"
"Uhm...G-Got it!"
"Gugu!"

Arle and Carbuncle went and especially stacked the Puyo really quickly. As for me...

"I’ll handle the unnecessary Puyo. With everyone's power combined, we can make a huge chain!"

I threw my fist up in the air as I said that.

"...!"

Arle and Ringo exchanged looks. Then they looked at me, giving an assuring nod.

---

“Over there, Arle!”
“Okay! Carby, over here!”
“Gu guguu!”

On Ringo’s cue, Arle and Carbuncle did their big combination role.

"I'll leave that to you, Amitie!"
"Gotcha...Flame!"

I went to pop the unneeded Puyo, and the chain continued to take form. Just now, that Nuisance Puyo looked gigantic, but with everyone here, there's nothing to fear!

"Okay, now! Go and pop that Red Puyo!"

At last, Ringo gave the green light. The Red Puyo to be popped is key... Ah! It happened right before my eyes! I took hold of the moment, and Arle faced it to let loose.

"Have at it, Arle!"
"Leave it to me, Amitie!"
"Here we go~! This is all of our powers combined..."

B-B-B-Bayoe~n!

Arle and I unleashed our super spell, "Bayoe~n". Lots of Puyo had to be stacked up to pull off this really hard spell. Arle and I using the same technique, Ringo's directions, and Arle and Carbuncle's teamwork did it! With an explosion from the spell, all the Puyo on the floor were gone. That goes for the gigantic Nuisance Puyo too.

“W-we did it...”

My shoulders went limp and I dropped myself, and Arle and Ringo held their hand out.

"That was really good, Amitie."
"You did great, Amitie!"
"Eeh?"

Did I hear what I think I heard!?"

"B-But I couldn't have done it without you!"

I waved my hands out in a panic, but they shook back at me.

"Remember how you went out and took the lead for us? That was so cool, Amitie~!"
"You also followed directions like instinct. Even if you are a little more scatter-brained compared to everyone, your ability to draw out everyone's power and follow through as planned is impeccable. Be proud of that!"

The two of them faced me and I watched them pose a thumbs up. T-this is such a big deal to me. I'm so, so, so happy! My face turned all rosy, and Arle and Ringo smiled with me.

“That’s good~. You’re laughing again, Amitie.”
"Eh?"
"You haven't chuckled one bit today, and we were concerned about you."
"Good to see you smiling like you always do!"

You two... you even noticed that about me. Alright, I've decided! I'll see Tama off, but I'll keep on smiling. It'll be for Tama...and it'll be for everyone! Onwards to the top of the tower. Okay, let's get going! We absolutely have to get to the top. And no more tears. Everyone will worry if they saw me crying. Smiles will go 'round with everyone!