The Secret of Coltzan's Shrine

First, I had to convince my neopets Nightfox, Cloverstone, and Kayla to come with a stake out at night in the Lost Desert. Of course, used to a cozy bed in a nicely furnished neohome, they were more than reluctant to come. Kayla wouldn’t go for she hated bugs, Cloverstone wouldn’t come because she was afraid of the 1000 Tombs, since she was once turned to a pile of sand, and Nightfox plain didn’t want to go and miss out on skateboarding. They all had their reasons, and now I need to find all the answers…..

After a lot of well, forceful pushing, I finally coaxed them (more like literally dragging them against their will to the Lost Desert) and we got to the Lost Desert. Of course, Sakhmet was gone from Jazan’s curse so we were all alone in the desert, with no places to run if danger found us.

Cloverstone whined about being scared, for the Lost Desert was a bad place to be when no one was around. I was scared as well; bandits wandered the Lost Desert and the last thing I wanted was for one of my neopets to get hurt. Quickly, I tried to lure them away from where Sakhmet used to be, so we could start our hike, and hopefully get to the shrine before dark, for dark is when the bandits came out.

After a brutal and back breaking hike through the desert, we got to Coltzan’s Shrine, right as the sun began to set on the dusty sand dunes, turning the world around us into a cascading blanket of darkness called night.

With us all tired and hungry, I looked at Kayla and asked her what she had brought for us to eat, for she was in charge of packing the food. The mutant Ixi just smiled dumbly; she had forgotten to pack the food! Great! Now we were camping in the middle of the desert with no food and no water! Luckily, my neopets found some wild tchea fruit trees and we ate our fill of the sweet and tangy fruit, but yet it had a gross and chalky flavor to it. Could it be? Rotten? Suddenly, we began spitting the fruit on the ground, groaning and feeling plain sick. We were eating wild, rotten, tchea fruit. The grossest of all fruits.

It was about 9:30 when Nightfox began whimpering and complaining about being tired and how he was still a child and needed his rest. I’ll make sure to save THAT one for when he wants to stay up late again. Yet, I didn’t let him sleep; he needed to stay up like the rest of us. He cried unhappily when I told him he couldn’t sleep, even though he was tired and weary from the hiking.

Cloverstone managed to make a small fire, and we sat around it to protect ourselves from the cold desert night. I stared at my Christmas Zafara, Zafara, and mutant Ixi and began wondering if it was really a good idea to do this, I could tell they were having a horrible time, so I pulled out a flute and began playing a small song; the one Cloverstone liked the most. Than using her heavenly voice, she sang along, leading my three beloved neopets into a good autumn song.

It was now 10:00, and things weren’t looking to be so good. Kayla and Nightfox began fighting because they wanted to go home, and I had the worst headache of my life. It’s probably from that gross wild tchea fruit. Yuck!

It was now 11:00. My neopets were tired from singing and Nightfox had already fallen asleep, poor little guy. I looked over to Cloverstone, who was sitting by the fire, humming and poking the blazing timbers with a stick she found. It was almost time for the whole reason we came here, to get rich… but was money what this was all about?

Seriously, I pulled my neopets out of their everyday lives and basically forced them to sleep in the cold desert. Was I being a tad too cruel? Was I just filling my own desires? Was money all I cared about? These thoughts swarmed my mind like a hive of buzzes. I finally came to a decision.

I woke my neopets up, it was 11:55. They tiredly followed me, whining about their aching feet. Little did they know, I wasn’t leading them to Coltzan’s Shrine. Instead, we came to a large building, with the word ‘neolodge’ on it in big bold leaders.

My neopets were so happy to get away from the neohome for a couple of days, and NOT in a desert. Instead of being stuck in the middle of nowhere, they were spending it in comfort and luxury.

Nightfox ended up beating his record at Meepit Juice Break that day, and Cloverstone ended up finding a thousand neopoints on the floor. Wow, so I guess we got a lot more out of not going to Coltzan’s Shrine than if we would’ve become millionaires; we got the wealth of friendship.

Sure, I gave up the possible chance to be a millionaire, but heck. If I let money rule my life, my neopets would probably hate me. So take some time to play with your neopets, believe me, they’ll enjoy it. And next time you think about going somewhere overnight, remember to bring food, I think those tchea fruits had something wrong with them! YUCK! Anyways, take my advice, BELIEVE me, it’ll come in handy. Bye.