Keep On: Cassandra's Tangled Journey

Cassandra pulled herself up from the ground and sprinted down the hill. The oversized fruit was chasing after her with the velocity of a boulder in an avalanche. With no time to check how far behind the illusion was, Cassandra's feet pounded against the ground with her black leather boots. She looked around as a gap in the path came into view. Distracted for a second, Cassandra tripped and landed face-first in the dirty path. She bashed her nose rather badly, but she didn't have time to cry about it. She just needed to shake it off. She scrambled to her feet ad kept running. She had no idea how close the apple was, and she didn't want to know, for all she needed in this moment was to get to the other side, and be free from this purgatory. 

As the hill she was running down suddenly got a lot steeper, Cassandra kept her mind focused as she neared the edge. The time was coming for her to jump. As the adrenaline levels raised, Cassandra stretched her legs out further with evert step, until she finally lifted herself off the ground and reached out as she flew towards the other side. She just about managed to grab the edge of the track, crumbs of dirt falling around her, as she looked over her shoulder and saw the apple fall into the emptiness below. She pulled herself up onto the path and took a few seconds to catch her breath. Out of nowhere, Cassandra burst into a fit of laughter. What had just happened? All of this was absurd. But somehow she actually found that she was having fun. With everything she had been through in the last 30 minutes, Cassandra now felt like she was ready for anything and everything that could possibly happen in the Castle of Illusion. 

With this newfound courage, Cassandra strutted down the path with pride. After everything she'd been through, it felt nice to have more of this self-confidence that she had working hard to build up after everything that happened with Zhan Tiri. But suddenly she heard a chilling sound. It sounded like her dad whenever she used to hide his captain helmet when she was a kid. Cassandra slowly looked up at the newest disturbance. The time had come for her to face the first guardian. 

Cassandra wasn't sure if this grumpy old oak tree was under Sabrina's control, or whether he was autonomous, because he was acting pretty violently. More violently than Sabrina ever implied. Cassandra reached behind her back, and then remembered that she no longer was in possession of a weapon. How on earth did the witch expect her to be able to fight this thing? Was she supposed to annoy him into giving her the ruby? Because simply asking for it clearly would not do the trick here. 

The old log flopped to his side like a book, and started rolling towards Cassandra. She times her jump so that she wouldn't be flattened by the cylindrical figure, and watched as he picked himself up and bounced towards her, causing the ground to shake as he did so. Cassandra managed to avoid falling, but she immediately needed to duck as he launched himself towards her. Missing Casandra, he spun back to his throne, making himself dizzy in the process. Cassandra used this as a chance to fight back. She charged towards the lump of wood, and roundhouse kicked him in the face. He did not appreciate that. He roared at her so hard that the force almost knocked her to the ground. He tried once again to do what had failed before, rolling along the path and trying to trip her up in any way that he could, but he just ended up making himself even more disoriented. Cassandra once again took this opportunity, and jumped and landed right on the top of his head. Cassandra was filled with even more confidence as she wondered if the other masters would also be this gullible. The shiny red gem finally lowered down from the sky. With the old oak tree still defeated on the ground, Cassandra snatched the diamond without a second thought. 

"Thank you," she smirked as the tree looked on helplessly with a frown. An open door appeared in the clearing, and Cassandra sprinted into it. And sure enough, there was the castle hallway, for real this time. 

One gem collected, six to go.