After yet another day being witness to a potential murder and 'sus-y' activity, Mina decided the perfect remedy was to binge takeout food and her favorite kid-dult animated show. Red Panda Express combined with Ninja Kitty was a delightful match made in East Asia. Feeling too lazy to pick up the food herself, she ordered Dine-And-Dash and had the delicious orange chicken, box of rice, and steamed broccoli delivered to her apartment. She was so hungry and exhausted, mentally and physically, she didn't even feel the need to change out of her day clothes. She just pulled up a nightstand and gobbled down the MSG overload disguised as Chinese food.

After a few bowls of rice and a bunch of fashionable but mindless Japanese animation, she found herself overwhelmed by a food coma. She didn't even try to fight it. "Watching a famous musician in a robot suit explode sure takes a lot out of you," Mina sighed. "Luckily, I had Dr. Kung Pow for food therapy!"

With those words, Mina drifted into slumber and troubled dreams provoked by a full stomach…or were they?

Mina awoke the next day with a peculiar tug on her neck. She looked down and saw her butterfly necklace was glowing and…flapping. "What in the…huh? Mina exclaimed. "Necklace are you trying to get me to choke up my pork fried rice?!"

Without warning, the necklace broke the chain around her neck and began to fly around with room, glowing with a mysterious purple aura. "It's either I'm dreaming…" Mina remarked. "Or someone spiked my egg drop soup!"

The window of her apartment was open, and the necklace flapped out of it into the night sky. The purple glow still charging the jewelry. Mina immediately rushed to the door. "I gotta get that back. Trudy gave it to me!"

She found herself on the streets of Business Park. She quickly bailed a can. "Taxi! Taxi!"

Much to her relief, D. Vito pulled up, but something was off about him. He wore a sparkling black tuxedo. "Hey kid, just got back from the Slickest Slicker convention in da Bronx. Where to?"

"Would you believe me if I told that my necklace broke the chain around my neck and is flying over the city?!"

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"Well…" D. Vito said, chuckling. "It's your dream, pally! Anything is possible!"

"So can you help me get it back?" Mina begged. She did not take a token of her best friend's friendship lightly.

"Well sure!" D. Vito remarked. "Don't got anyting to do in dis here, so climb aboard dis dream taxi!"

She climbed into the dream taxi and found herself soaring into the darkened sky. "You can fly?!"

"Dis ting is powered on the stardust of your dreams, kiddo!" D. Vito exclaimed It will take us right to where ya need to be!"

Mina watched with the city lights twinkling in her eyes as they weaved in between sky scrapers, leaving the ordinary cars and trucks stuck in night traffic. The necklace was still flying like a pink and blue monarch butterfly doused in purple flames. It shone like a beacon and flew down towards a tiny store, causing D. Vito to exclaim, "Next stop…Thrifty Thrifts!"

"That's the place Trudy bought the necklace for me!" Mina said, her face pressed to the glass.

The vehicle zoomed downwards and parked next to a shop with a poorly painted sign and frosted glass windows. "Well well," D. Vito said. "Time to disembark. I wish ya all da best in your hopes and dreams…literally! Let's hope dis dream doesn't become a nightmare!"

"I hope that too," Mina remarked. "I just want to get my bauble and skedaddle!"

She bid farewell to her good taxi driver friend and stepped in front of the store. It was renowned for having some of the most curious curios in the whole city. And now it was home to her mysterious flapping necklace.

She headed the door open, causing the bells to jingle and was immediately enveloped in darkness. "Hellooooo!" Mina hollered into the endlessly blackness.

Her voice echoed into the depths where it reverberated and distorted itself. Soon, her own voice came back in a deep garbled form. "BEWARE THE AURA!"

"The Aura?" Mina muttered. "Like the criminal organization?"

"No…their AURA!"

Several figures illuminated before her…and even more surprisingly, she recognized all of them. Bunting Dupree with his blonde cowlick and vampiric grin, Nick Beard with his fuzzy neck and pizza pocket stained flannel, Richard Lord sporting his oversized pink carnation, Charlotte O'Scara, now dressed outside of her Georgia Peach getup with a Gothic black dress of lace and ribbons and Ariel Headly, her eyes no longer squinting but a dark sneer on im her eyes.

The bodies abruptly burst into flames…or rather a firey red aura. They began to walk towards her with fixed expressions of cruelty and malice. Mina gasped. She recognized this red haze from her last trial. Ariel had it encircling her body for a brief second.

They all moved in with their arms outstretched. Mina stumbled backwards and drowned in the her screams of horror.

"Intent stains us all!" her voice echoed through deep darkness. It was the last words she heard before everything went red.