Chapter 222 - Chaos

"Anyways, what brought you here, Petunia?" Gem asked with a cheery tone, something that Petunia found questionable when she was supposed to be mourning for her two systems that just suddenly disappeared. 

But at the same time, her cheerful reaction was kind of justified by the comfortable and playful atmosphere between her and Von which just made Petunia shrug it off and went straight to the point.

"I need your Energy slimes," Petunia briefly said, stopping in front of Gem with her arms crossed after walking around the room earlier while observing the unnatural peaceful atmosphere between her and Von earlier.

"Okayy," Gem said and quickly prepared herself for another power release.

But instead of the cyan healing slimes that she released earlier, this time Gem needed to release a more golden shade of slimeball from her veins, which was a harder task compared to the healing slimes, but she still did it without complaints.

"Here you go," Gem cheerfully said and was about to give Petunia the slime ball when she suddenly remembered to ask what it was for.

"Wait, why do you need Energy slimes though?" Gem said, pausing her action in front of Petunia's empty vial waiting to be filled with the golden energy slimes.

"Oh, Lei and I are currently making the flight potion down the basement," Petunia answered and shrugged while waiting for Gem to continue.

But because of the shock, Gem was only able to cover her mouth and enlargen her eyes by the excitement of hearing what Petunia and Lei were currently at with the flight potion.

"Really!?! You're really making the flight potions now?!"

"As I've said, we're on it now. That's why I need your Energy slimes," Petunia said and raised the bottle to Gem's eye level to urge her to continue but Gem only pushed the bottle aside, making Petunia almost lose her patience because of it.

But instead of shouting to the ever-enthusiastic Gem, Petunia just took a deep breath and tried to say her intentions calmly this time, "Give me the energy slimes now so I can go back and continue with the potion already," Petunia said and opened her eyes with a matching fake smile to convince her to hold her patience longer.

"Can I join you guys?" Gem said with sparkling eyes which also made Von look concerned.

"But aren't we studying about the tournament just now?" Von asked after moving out of his blanket.

"This is more important," Gem said with an indifferent expression to him before looking back at Petunia with the same sparkly eyes.

"F-Fine, let's just get on with it already," Petunia said and shoved the bottle in Gem's hands before flying towards the windows.

"Come on," Petunia said while looking back at them which woke Gem up from daydreaming about being able to fly by herself soon.

"Oh, right!" Gem said and quickly transferred the floating ball of energy slimes to the bottle and started pestering Von to wake up and come with them too.

"What?! I don't want to. I can already fly, what's the point of learning about the flight potion anymore?"

"Tch, I thought you were now a different Von than your lazy prince self?"

"I am! I just don't see the point in doing this!"

"Then just join us! It wouldn't hurt to have one more person there, right?" Gem said while looking at Petunia who just pouted and shrugged at her as if saying 'I guess so'.

"Please?!" Gem said and was about to stop pestering Von already with her last attempt, but thankfully, Von just suddenly stood up and rolled his eyes at her.

"Fine. But I'm only doing this because I want to go back down there, alright?" Von said and was about to go straight to the door where Gem was also heading to earlier when Petunia just suddenly stopped them.

"Don't go there. Just carry Gem and follow me. I know a faster way to go down there," Petunia said and almost decided to darg the two down the windows if they would stand longer in front of the door while looking curiously at each other.

"Come on! Lei's waiting," Petunia said and immediately flew away which pressured Von into carrying Gem who just let him carry her with no words for convenience.

"This may be the last time you'll get to carry me like this. Next time, I'll carry you instead if you're up to it!" Gem said with a very smiley face that even if her words were definitely insulting, Von just easily let it go while thinking that it was just a joke even though Gem was really serious about it.

"Ohh? You don't believe me?" Gem said and crossed her eyebrows cutely which only made Von shake his head in disbelief.

"As if I'd let you do that," Von said and kicked his speed faster to catch up to Petunia who was mysteriously heading down to the cliffs where a lot of horrifying memories happened between him and Gem starting with the free-fall thing.

"Why are we heading here?" Von asked despite the pressure in the air to Petunia who was just silent the whole time.

He even tightened his hold on Gem in case something horrifying happens again, although there was no way he'd let that happen again.

"I swear the laboratory was just over here," Petunia said while hovering over the rocky walls of the island, two levels below the ground.

"There! Is that Lei?" Gem said while pointing at a very small piercing on the walls which was the same window that Petunia went through earlier, which was also very unnoticeable because of the lack of difference in the materials that were used to carve the walls and the original rocks of the island.

"Right! Nice eye!" Petunia said and took the lead back to the laboratory where she left Lei at.

"Oh hey! You're back," Lei said while scratching the back of his head because of the mess he accidentally made.

"What have you done?!" Petunia said before sneaking inside from the window and suddenly getting showered by an artificial rain that was developed by the clouds in the bottle that was now obviously outside of the bottle and covering the entirety of the ceiling with its heavy gray color.

"Oh my gosh! I'm so sorry! I really didn't mean it! I thought the cloud was spilling out of the bottle so I tried opening it to push it back but then they just suddenly flew outside and went out of control! I could barely even keep them from escaping through the window and the doors which was a hard task, mind you because I had nothing in me that could contain these huge chunks of clouds that are now just suddenly angry!" Lei said, obviously panicking about the whole situation especially after seeing Petunia's annoyed face.

"Get. Away. From. Me," Petunia said while slowly pushing his hands away with the towel that he was trying to use to help dry Petunia from that specific rain shower that the angry cloud purposely sprayed on her.

"O-Okay," Lei said with a very low volume which he then followed with receding footsteps from Petunia who seemed to have been preparing for a big fight against this angry ass cloud that was making whirls and thunders inside the not so big laboratory room.

"Whoa! What's happening here?!" Gem said while hesitating to go inside of the room due to the very damp floor and the obvious bad weather inside, which she only disregarded when she heard Von asking her to go ahead inside the room.

"Gem! Von!" Lei said and quickly crept up behind them, afraid that Petunia would change her mind and throw her anger at him instead of the grumbling cloud which she was now getting prepared to face.

"What is that?!" Von whispered with much confusion to Gem who only answered "A cloud?" before taking a closer look and finally realizing that it was a familiar kind of cloud to her after all.

"Wait- is this the same cloud from the wastelands?! The toxic one?" Gem asked Lei who only looked at her with innocent eyes before nodding hesitantly.

"What?! How did this get here?! What are we still doing here?! Go outside now! Quickly! This cloud shits acid and other dangerous stuff! How are you still alive?!" Gem freaked out and was totally ready to carry Von and Lei outside the door if needed but then Lei held her hand and stopped her immediately.

"Wait! I think Petunia said something about filtering it or making it less dangerous, or something," Lei said with deteriorating confidence about what he was talking about since he was the one who started the chaos in the first place.

"What?! I can't hear you!" Gem said as the gushing of the wind started getting louder inside the room where Petunia was trying to capture the cloud again inside the bottle.

"Why tf did you shower it with water?!" Petunia suddenly shouted in their direction which made the three of them cower in fear of her dominant angry voice.

"I- I didn't! It just suddenly went to the tree sink and sucked the water out of the faucet!" Lei tried to reason even though Petunia was obviously not listening to him anymore.

"Let's get out of here!" Gem suggested to the two boys who only nodded at her while still watching Petunia deal with the angry cloud on her own.

"Ahh, this is chaos!" Gem said after shielding herself from a piece of flying equipment on their way to the door.