Book 3 - The Merchant from the Depths: Chapter 32; Moment of Realization

The screen turns on as the chapter title plays "Chapter - 32; Moment of Realization".

It sticks with Coral Sea as a bright flash is suddenly seen across the screen.

The characters also experience this as Jack shouts "What was that flash?!" in a slight panic/worry.

Ace regains his bearings as the first thing he sees is Deuce he shouts "Hey! Deuce, your sea anemone's gone!" Deuce immediately brings his hands to his head to feel for the anemone as he shouts "Whoa! You're right!" Grim also feels above his head as he shouts "So's mine! Yours too, Ace!"

Grim then cheers shouting "Sweet! Leona and Ruggie pulled through!"

Both Floyd and Jade are shocked by this turn of events, although Jade is more of the normal surprised while Floyd is more of the aggressive surprised.

As Jade says "Wait. Come again?" with wide eyes. But Floyd grabs his shoulder, rather ruthlessly and asks with narrowed eyes "What's goin' on here?"

Grim smugly explains to them "We cut a deal with Leona and Ruggie to get them in on our plan."

Floyd takes the equivalent of a step back as he exclaims "Say what? The guy's basically a sea lion, sleepin' his days away. He's never lift a finger to help you guys." Jade is more curious as he asks them "I was under the impression he had no interest in creating disputes with his fellow housewarden, Azul. How did you bend him to your will?"

Grim is still smug as he explains to them "See, Yuu made this offer… If Leona helped us take back Ramshackle Dorm, we'd leave his room tomorrow without a fuss. But if he didn't help, we'd keep raisin' a racket outside his room all night, every night. Then we gave him a…"live demo," I'll call it, to show him how annoying it'd be. We basically yowled our lungs out until daybreak, and now we're super sleep-deprived."

Both Jade and Floyd say "Whoa…" at that explanation.

Deuce helpfully comments "No wonder you were so hoarse this morning, Grim."

Floyd pointed a finger at Yuu and Grim as he told them "That sounds less like a deal and more like a threat to me."

But Jack defends them saying "You know what they say: one bad turn deserves another."

Ace appears to have practiced a small spell as he tells them excitedly "My wind magic's back, too! It's time to turn the tables here!"

Deuce also attempts the magic he put up, shouting "I summon thee, cauldron!" And a cauldron actually falls this time making him happily cheer "Sweet, it worked!"

But Grim isn't able to use his still as he pouts, shouting complaints "Myaaah! I can't even tell if I got my fire magic back or not in all this water! That ain't fair!"

Ace teases Grim "Somehow I think we'll manage without your parlor tricks."

Jade looks over to Floyd telling him "We'd best be getting back, Floyd. If the anemones are gone from their heads…" Floyd nods as ha says frowning back "Yeah, I got a real back feelin' about this."

Yuu was about to tell the others to just let them go as currently, there is most likely only one more time she's brought back to that shadowy dusty gray-purple flat background, and that's when the overblot will happen even.

But Deuce punches his fist as he shouts out at the tweels "Not so fast. Where do you think you're going now that we're finally in fighting shape?" Ace also teases "Where's the fun in turning tail now? Stick around and play with us."

This agitates Floyd as he swims closer threatening them "You small-fry pipsqueaks… I'll have you cryin' before you know it."

Jade calls out to him "Floyd, ignore them!"

But is too late as Floyd has already swam up to battle them, leaving Yuu and Jade alone next to each other as Jade complains "Ugh. Too late." Before swimming up to join Floyd in this fight to make it go by faster.

Most of the fight is skipped, as the tweels doge another cauldron Deuce summons as Floyd shouts, complaining "Nnngh, for cryin' out loud! These guys are getting on my nerves!"

But Jade then grabs Floyd's shoulder as he tells him "We need to go, now, Floyd. I don't think we have the luxury of toying with them any longer."

Floyd clicks his tongue as he agrees telling Jade "Fine. Let's move."

The two swim off leaving most of the first-years to cheer.

Grim cheers "Yesss! They're headin' for the hills! Er, do they have hills underwater? Whatever!"

Jack is really on point and notices Yuu getting antsy as well, as he tells the others "We'd better get back to school ourselves. Let's shove this photo in Azul's face and spoon-feed him the bitter taste of defeat!"

The screen then fades to black as "To be continued" plays before it fully turns off.

…

!Bonus! Alternate timeline of sorts(?)

Although Leona claims that he only let them annoy him all the way until morning, that isn't the entire truth. As he had forced them out of his room as they continued their yelling.

When he heard Yuu tell Grim "Let me try something a little different, it might work even better as well."

It was quiet for a little bit and he thought that just maybe they had just given up and decided to leave him alone so that he could sleep.

But suddenly Yuu's voice is heard stating in a rather deadpan voice "According to all known laws of aviation there is no way that a bee should be able to fly. Its wings are too small to get its fat little body off the ground. The bee of course – flies anyway because bees don't care what humans think is impossible."

Yuu then starts to state a couple of similar facts, slowly.

Making Leona stay awake on his own just thinking about them.

Well that was until he had enough and just lets them and told them that he'll help as long as they stop doing that and let him sleep.

Which of course is a win on their side, and they got more sleep.

Well mainly Yuu as both Leona and Grim had a hard time falling asleep with all those facts suddenly running amok in their heads.

!END OF BONUS!