"Haaaah! … Yawn!" Shelly stretched her hands in the air, yawning loudly.
Putting away her journal, she leaned against the travel bag, using it as a pillow. Her eyelids became too heavy and within seconds she drifted off into sleep.
"."
Shelly felt her body lie flat on some grassy dirt. Opening her eyes, she saw the full moon beaming on her face.
"W-where… am I?" Shelly pushed herself off the soil. Her body felt heavy and sluggish.
Looking at the ground she recently rested on, there was a pool of blood. It soaked her chest and clothes.
"Th-this blood… it's mine… bu-but how?" Shelly checked herself for injuries. There was a hole in her clothes where the Ice-Magician stabbed her that time. "Wait a second! Didn't this… already happen?"
Shelly frantically scanned her surroundings. She was in the same spot she almost died, then met Maou.
"Maou! Where are you?!" Shelly shouted out to the open air, but no response returned.
She wandered by the trees, but somehow the path she walked felt strangely familiar. It was as if she'd been here before. The feeling of uneasiness kept twirling in her head.
Distracted by her fogged mind, she tripped against a tree root and fell face first.
"Ow! Ow! That hurts!" Shelly stood back up, rubbing her forehead. "Stupid trees and their dumb roots!"
"Shelly! Are you okay?" A familiar voice called out to her.
"I-I-Impossible!" Shelly slowly looked up to see someone she never expected to see again. "Kenny?!"
"Here, let me help you up." Kenny gently lifted Shelly to her feet.
"Kenny…. I-is this… you?" Shelly asked, her face frozen with pure disbelief.
She spread her fingers across his torso, feeling his muscles. Shelly's eyes traced her fingers upward movement to his neck until both hands were positioned on the sides of his face.
"Hey, um… Shelly… are you okay?" Kenny's face was blushing cherry red. "Did that fall hurt your-"
Before he could finish his sentence, Shelly unexpectedly pulled Kenny's face close and kissed him. Locking her soft lips with his and using her warm tongue to twirl with his. Shelly's fingers charmingly ran through his wild hair. Her hands slowly glided down the back of his neck until it reached his back. Shelly's palms seductively caressed his broad and manly back.
"STOP!!!" Jenny, in an uncontrollable rage, yanked them apart. She then grabbed Shelly by the hair. "What The F*CK!!! Are You Doing?!"
"I knew it. I just KNEW it!" Jenny looked at Shelly dead in the eyes with disgust and resentment. "You just couldn't hold back. Huh?! Those pent up feelings for Kenny!"
Shelly just stared wonderingly at the angrily fuming Jenny. This felt unbelievable but real at the same time. Could it really be them?
"G-guys…. Don't fight… please." Timothy nervously stretched out his hand, beckoning for them to calm down.
"Yup! He's out for good". Charles waved his hands in front of the overwhelmed Kenny. "Wow! In all my years of life I would have NEVER expected that. Now I can't blame Jenny for being jealous all the time. Damn! I would be too."
Everyone looked at Kenny. Steam rose from the top of his head and red coloured his face. His brain was fried and his body frozen. All he did was stare into the moon and ramble to himself.
"You damn SLUT!!!" Jenny looked back to Shelly keen to slap her. "How could you?!"
Jenny's angry palm flew across the side of Shelly's face, turning it to the side and a short moment of silence followed.
"Hehehe! Hehe!"
Shelly started giggling to herself. Her hand-stretched across her face, while she flung her head back with uncontrollable laughter.
"Hahaha!!! HAHAHA!!!"
"The hell's wrong with you!?" Jenny was bewildered by Shelly's strange behaviour, taking a step back.
Shelly's laughter abruptly stopped and her hand fell to her side. As Shelly brought her head down, looking at all her friends in front of her, she smiled. It was them. Be it a dream or not. IT. WAS. THEM.
"I missed you all so much." Shelly opened her arms stepping forward. "Give me all your hugs and kisses."
"Yuck! Don't touch me, you slut!" Jenny quickly backed away, harshly rejecting the approaching Shelly. "And stay away from me!"
"Don't be shy, Jenny… I know you want to." Shelly had a yandere grin as she neared the creeped out Jenny. "I miss you the most my PRECIOUS darling, Jen."
Her words sent shivers down Jenny's spine and she turned around to run away from the crazed Shelly, but she was too late. Shelly threw herself on Jenny, making them both fall to the ground. Jenny was already caught before she knew it.
"HELP!! Help!! Timmy, Charles, Get this crazy girl off me." Jenny begged for help. The two guys in amusement just stood and watch as Jenny was eaten alive by Shelly's hug.
"I got you, my sweet potato darling. Let me hug you forever!" Shelly wrapped her arms around the terrified Jenny. She snuggled her face alongside Jenny's and fondled her side.
"Aha! Aha! Shelly Stop! Aha! Wait! That tickles!" Jenny was at Shelly's mercy. The tickling made her cry tears while laughing. "Ahaha! Ahaha! Stop! I surrender! I SURRENDER!!!"
Jenny soon passed out on the floor from Shelly's aggressive hug, her body slightly twitching.
"Timmy! Charles! I missed you both so much." Shelly looked to the two while getting off Jenny. "Hug me!"
"Shelly, wait! Don't kill us too!" Charles took a step back but they were both caught in her hug.
"You two! So good to see you again." Shelly squeezed both their cheeks on hers.
Timothy was the only one who willingly hugged Shelly, despite her weird attitude.
"Kenny! What's up!" Shelly smacked him on the back, grinning. "Why are you just standing there? Say something."
"S-shelly! A-Ah! Umm! W-well! Y-you, look pretty t-today." Kenny finally snapped back to reality, mumbling and stuttering at almost every word.
"I'll give you some time to yourself." Shelly patted him on the back and shot him a wink.
"What's with the sudden cheerfulness?" Charles asked.
"Exactly! The hell's wrong with you." Jenny pushed herself off the ground, forcing her trembling legs to stand.
"I actually quite like it." Timothy smiled.
"Nothing much, really. I just had the weirdest dream ever." Shelly sighed then shrugged her shoulders. "I dreamt that I went on some kind of adventure with a boy that had a dumb name like 'Maou', and some rich noble kid named 'Arthur', and I nearly died three times in less than a day."
(Shelly doesn't know about the Old lady Sycorax who almost killed her, making her near-death experiences four so far.)
"Ahaha! Can you guys believe that!? Me… adventuring with a bug-eating scarlet-eyed boy. Ahaha!" Shelly was bent over laughing hysterically and gripping her stomach. "And! And! Wait till you hear this part, okay! You won't believe it… trust me. Ahaha! Some sexy looking Ice-magician killed us all. Ahaha! Like what!? I must've been drunk."
Shelly's laughing soon turned into bitter sobbing and her voice trembled.
"So tell me, why… why does it feel so real? That scarlet-eyed boy who carried a boar ten times his size. That… that same boy who's too naive and carefree for his own good." Shelly dropped to her knees, hands flat on the ground. Tears wheeled down her quivering face. "That same silly boy cried, and cried, AND CRIED on my chest that night!! His little hands clutching me so tight, scared to death over losing me."
"So tell me… if it's all just some make-believe fantasy in my head… why? Why?! WHY DOES IT HURT SO MUCH!!?" Shelly shouted at the ground, gripping her painfully aching chest. The very air felt suffocating to her. "Us dying! Maou! The old lady! Chelsea! Amari! Arthur! EVERYTHING!!! If it's all a damn fantasy, why does it hurt so much thinking about it?"
"That's because it's real," Kenny answered in a cold and bitter tone. "The magician freezing us all while you ran away, selfishly leaving us behind to a fate worse than death. It's all real, Shelly. Very! Much! Real!"
"Selfishly?! I wasn't being selfish. You told me to-"
Shelly looked up to see her friends frozen, and the second carriage from that day suddenly appearing.
"Run? Was that what you were about to say? How happy that must've made you feel. Huh? A reason to justify your coward actions and betrayal."
Just then, the second carriage started to shake. Something… or someone was inside. Who else could it be other than him?
"Let's see what you do now, Shelly. Will you run? Or die with us as you should have?" Kenny smirked.
"Kenny, what's going on?!" Shelly got to her feet confused at what she saw.
"What should have happened a long time ago." Charles frozen head spoke.
"You dying with us, HERE!!" Jenny growled, a piece of her face cracking.
"We're your friends, right Shelly?" Timothy's head mumbled right before it fell to the ground and shattered.
"Then die with us, like a true friend." Kenny grinned at Shelly. "Like the love of my life would."
"No! No! PLEASE!!! Make this stop! Not again. I-I-I can't take anymore!" Shelly closed her eyes, gripping and shaking her head.
"Slam! Slam! SLAM!!!"
Something banged hard against the insides of the carriage, jerking it wildly, determined to break out.
"Shelly, I'd think fast if I were you! But the answer is so, so, so obvious! Even the blind could see it! Ahaha! Hahaha!" Kelly's face became disfigured in an outburst of sinister laughter.
"CRASH!!!"
The door of the carriage came flying off. It smashed into Shelly, knocking her backwards, putting her flat on the ground nearer to the forest. It was just like last time.
Looking inside the carriage, it was all black… pitch black. Then suddenly, a face broke through the door of the carriage. That face… was his… the cause of this hellish nightmare. It was the Ice magician's monstrous and hideous face. His head stretched out like a snake and crushed the still laughing Kenny. Its long, deformed, jagged teeth punctured Kenny's neck and impaled his chest.
In its savagery, it tore Kenny's upper half from the ice and flung his maimed body in the air, making Kenny fall into its nightmarish and horrific jaws. The crunching sounds of his bones being crushed, organs popping and blood leaking out the monster's mouth was petrifying to Shelly's ears and eyes. The immense drowning fear she felt made her lips shudder uncontrollably, her hair stand on edge, her face became ugly and pale, her skin cold as if all blood left her body aeons ago and her voice… could only do one thing…
"AAHHHH!!!"
…. Scream in horror.