Dreamworks Rise of the Guardians x Winx Club Crossover

Chapter 41: Changed The Game Rules

In a shadowy virtual cell, Marzia found herself ensnared by a suffocating darkness. The environment around her felt alien, pixelated shadows flickering and warping like the remnants of a broken memory. It was designed to be a place of personal challenge, a solitary confinement where she could confront herself, but now it had been twisted into a realm of chaos by Zammeria, her dark reflection.

"Crimson Collapse!" the hijacking foe cast out.
A powerful burst of dark red energy erupted from Zamma, radiating outward and sending tremors through the digital fabric of the cell. The ground beneath Marzia seemed to rupture, sending her to her hands and knees. Each tremor echoed with Zamma's laughter, a chilling sound that pierced through the haze of confusion enveloping her.

"Thought you could be enlightened? What a hopeless thought!" Zamma taunted, her voice dripping with malice. The mockery weighed heavily on Marzia as she struggled to regain her breath, the vibrant energy constricting her movements.

"Marzia—stop!" urged her current self, the plea tinged with desperation and an underlying sense of purpose, yet it felt all but futile in the face of Zamma's power.

"I don't answer to your name anymore," Zamma retorted, her voice filled with prideful defiance. "I constructed a new one for myself—one that means I am proud of my past, not one I want to reject. It is Zammeria or Zamma for short." The words hung in the air like a challenge, igniting a conflict deep inside Marzia.

"This wasn't part of Stella's exercise," Marzia tried to reason, her voice strained as she fought to make sense of the chaos. This journey was meant to be individual; she had anticipated facing her own challenges, reflecting on her past—not battling a manifestation of her darkest fears while her friends were locked away in their own separate virtual tests.

"Clever, true, it wasn't; but I'm the one setting the rules now," Zamma sneered her confidence palpable. "Fear of commitment is a very boring test exercise." The room pulsed with Zamma's energy, as if the digital walls themselves echoed her arrogance.

Desperate for answers, Marzia gasped, "Where did you come from?" The question hung heavily in the air, a desperate plea for an explanation that could bridge the chasm between her past and present.

"Who else but the Queen of Marsayalaw, Aella herself?!" Zamma declared, a sinister smile playing on her lips. "How about we check in on your friends? You haven't told them anything about your past world, have you?" The sinister laughter that followed sent shivers down Marzia's spine.

The very mention of her teammates sent a pang of panic surging through her. Each one of them was enduring their own trials in separate cells, battling their demons, but now Zamma had hijacked the magic enabling her dark spells to reach across those barriers. She could send her crimson red fatalistic magic through to their individual tests without leaving Marzia's side, and that realization terrified her.

"Oh, so you haven't told them yet!" Zamma continued, her voice dripping with malicious glee. "You are still clinging to our insensitivity—the root cause of your inflexibility! It shackles your committed effort to this new lifestyle those goody-two-shoe fairies want you to live." The realization that Zamma could exploit her deepest insecurities intensified the darkness swirling around her.

Zamma seized the moment, her cruel smile widening. "There is one word for all those things," she taunted, relishing Marzia's turmoil. "Do you know what it is called?!"

Marzia stood motionless as the horror of her silence lay bare before her. Her voice faltered, overwhelmed by a cascade of emotions—fear, shame, regret. The suffocating weight of silence pressed hard against her chest, leaving her gasping for breath. It felt as if her entire being was split in two—one side yearning for acceptance, the other shackled to the pain of her past.