We took a step, and the world blinded us with the white of an enormous room. This wasn't just a food pantry. It was some kind of gastronomic madhouse. Right in front of us towered a tree, with talking watermelons hanging from its branches. As soon as the tree noticed us, it mournfully rustled its leaves: "Kill me... Please..."

  Further down the corridor, baguettes were marching, crossing the road in an organized manner. And a giant Strawberry, suspiciously resembling a manticore, was chasing a flock of terrified raspberries.

  "My favorite room!" Alastia spun around happily. "It gets a little dangerous here, but we have you, Greg!"

  "Dangerous?" I thought, and my stomach responded enthusiastically.

  I didn't think long. My hand darted out on its own toward a passing raspberry and that strawberry-manticore. I started eating them on the go, tasting pure sugar and magic. The other raspberries, seeing this genocide, scattered with squeals.

  I went into a frenzy. A grape army, forming up in an infantry square nearby, became my next target.

  "GREG, DON'T DO THAT!" Alastia screamed, trying to block my path. "The more you eat them, the more hostile the room becomes! It will start defending itself! It will want to kill us!"

  "Oh yeah?" I smirked predatorily, wiping juice from my chin. "THIS IS PARADISE! Let them attack!"

  As if in response to my challenge, a knight emerged from behind a massive sponge-cake hill. Made entirely of chocolate. In his hands was a caramel sword.

  I didn't hesitate for a second. A quick dash—and I was already straddling this sweet dummy. With one motion, I ripped off his head, and hot white chocolate poured from his "neck" in a thick stream.

  "YES! I WILL EAT EVERYONE HERE!" I roared, feeling something wild waking up inside me.

  Alastia whispered something to Zevlud in terror, pointing a finger into the distance. There, emerging from the sugar fog, was an entire squad of chocolate knights.

  "OH YEAH! COME AT ME!"

  I charged at them. This wasn't a battle; it was a culinary massacre. I ripped off heads, broke limbs, smashed wafer shields. White, dark, and milk chocolate flooded the floor. I was everywhere.

  "GREG! YOU STILL HAVEN'T EATEN A SINGLE KNIGHT!" the girl's voice broke through the noise.

  I froze, breathing heavily. Looked around. Mountains of "corpses" were piled up around me. Severed chocolate heads, broken caramel spears... She was right. I was smashing them, but not eating them. My arms were elbow-deep in frosting, but my stomach remained empty.

  What is wrong with me?

  A caramel arrow whistled past my ear. Then another. A hail of hard candy rained down from above. The fury flared up with renewed vigor. I rushed at my attackers, tearing them to shreds.

  "GREG!" Alastia cried out.

  A massive marzipan elephant was moving toward me. A shortbread manticore flanked from the left. And from the ceiling, breaking from its orbit, flew a giant rock... no, it was a piece of a meteorite cupcake.

  I shattered the cupcake into dust mid-jump. Landing, I broke the marzipan elephant's leg with a single strike and effortlessly decapitated the manticore with a flick of my hand.

  "GREG!" This was no longer a shout, but a plea.

  I turned around. Alastia and Zevlud were pressed against the wall. There was genuine, unchildlike terror in their eyes. They were no longer looking at their "funny friend," but at a monster who had just destroyed the room's ecosystem purely for fun.

  I looked at my hands. Looked at the destruction. The fury vanished just as quickly as it had come, leaving behind only the bitter aftertaste of sugar on my tongue.

  "Oh god..." I wiped my face, smearing chocolate across my cheeks. "What am I doing?"

  I took a deep breath, trying to calm the trembling in my fingers. "I'm sorry..." I muttered, avoiding the children's eyes. "Looks like it really is time for me to get out of here. Before I eat this entire house."

  I walked over to the kids, trying to look as peaceful as possible (as much as one can when elbow-deep in someone else's chocolate).

  "Umm..." Zevlud looked around. "Where is the door? You know, the one we came through?"

  Alastia sighed heavily and spread her hands. "Ugh... It ran away again."

  "WHAT?!" I froze. "What do you mean 'ran away'? Doors don't run. They stand in place and creak on their hinges. That is their purpose!"

  "Not here," the girl frowned. "Looks like it got scared of you. Everything is alive here, even the exits."

  I was about to protest, but the sky above our heads suddenly grew dark. Heavy, dark drops began falling from the ceiling, which served as the firmament here.

  "Ow!" Zevlud yelped when a drop hit his shoulder. "This is hot chocolate!" "Look out!" Alastia covered her head with her hands. "Now here comes the caramel! It's hot!"

  The situation was rapidly turning from a sweet fairy tale into a sticky trap. If we got flooded with caramel right now, we'd be turned into lollipops before we even found the exit.

  We bolted for the nearest structure. I simply barged the door down with my shoulder on the run, and we burst inside.

  Judging by the decor, it was a tavern. But, of course, the local flavor was off the charts: tables made of hard cookies, chandeliers made of candied fruit. A bartender stood behind the counter. He waved to us amicably with his plump marshmallow hand.

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  I instantly started drooling. My stomach, which had only been grumbling before, now howled at the top of its lungs. I took a step toward the counter, calculating what this guy tasted like...

  "STOP!" Alastia and Zevlud grabbed my arms from both sides.

  "Greg, you can't!" the girl looked at me with terrifying seriousness. "Did you forget? You cannot eat the inhabitants!"

  "But he's... made of marshmallow..." I muttered, unable to take my eyes off the bartender. "Just look at that texture. He melts in the mouth, I guarantee it!"

  I tried to jerk forward, but the kids held on tight.

  "NO, GREG! YOU CAN'T!" Zevlud yelled. "You'll make the room angry again!"

  Alastia, realizing that logic wasn't working on me, simply swung her fist and punched the wall of the tavern with all her might. A decent-sized chunk of something gray and dry broke off. Without a second thought, she shoved the fragment right into my mouth.

  "Mmph..." I started chewing. "Hey! It's hard! Like a shoe sole!" I swallowed the piece of "wall" with great difficulty. "That marshmallow guy or the chocolate knight would have definitely been a hundred times tastier. Why do I have to gnaw on the interior decor when there's dessert walking around the room?"

  The kids just sighed in unison.

  I made an attempt. A very careful and almost imperceptible attempt to nip the marshmallow bartender's elbow. But the guy was sharp—he deftly yanked his arm back, as if dodging hungry mouths was all he had done his entire life.

  "Tsk, tsk, tsk!" the marshmallow spoke, his voice sounding surprisingly calm. "That's not very nice, young man. I am a person, actually, not a snack."

  The bartender pulled a mug from under the counter and filled it with thick, aromatic chocolate. "Here, put out the fire in your stomach."

  I grabbed the mug with both hands and latched onto it like a tick. The kids, exhaling in relief, sat down nearby. I kept drilling the marshmallow with my gaze over the rim of the cup, calculating whether a piece of him would fall off if he waved his hand too hard.

  "So, Alastia, lost the door again?" the bartender wiped the counter with a waffle towel. "Yeah..." the girl sadly picked at the table with her finger.

  "I saw it recently. Most likely, it bolted for that Kingdom again. Hiding from your... ahem... 'cannibalistic' friend." He cast a sideways glance at me. I was just trying to lick the bottom of the mug at that moment.

  "Anyway, you should leave quickly," the marshmallow advised. "Before this kid eats my regulars. Otherwise, I'll have no one to pour drinks for."

  We stepped outside. The caramel rain had almost stopped, leaving behind sticky puddles and a cloying scent. I kept looking back at the tavern, feeling like I had been shortchanged on my portion of marshmallow.

  "What Kingdom?" Zevlud adjusted his collar.

  "Oh, just a little place," Alastia frowned. "The problem is, they don't let living people in there. At all. To them, we are a threat."

  "Or we could just kill everyone in there," I suggested, cracking my knuckles. "No witnesses—no problems. And there'd be plenty of food."

  "Oh, come on, Greg!" Alastia stomped her foot. "If you start a massacre in there, the room will be permanently offended. It will stop giving us cakes and just turn into one giant broccoli warehouse! Is that what you want?"

  I froze. The prospect of a world, a life without sweets, was more terrifying than any curse. "Alright. What's your plan?"

  "We need to camouflage ourselves," Alastia marched resolutely toward the nearest puddle of hot chocolate. "We need to smear ourselves in chocolate, stick marshmallows to ourselves, and generally cover ourselves in something sweet. That way they won't be able to tell us apart from the locals. That's exactly how I got out of here last time."

  I looked at my white suit. Looked at the sticky brown sludge under my feet. "Well, that's it," I sighed, rolling up my sleeves. "Goodbye, aristocracy. Hello, diabetes."

  We smeared ourselves with everything we could find. Now I resembled a walking chocolate bar that had suddenly sprouted legs.

  "Greg!" Alastia hissed when I tried to lick my own shoulder for the umpteenth time. "Stop licking the camouflage! You're going to eat it all and blow our cover!" "Yeah, yeah..." I mumbled, feeling divine dark chocolate melting on my tongue. "It's hard to stay incognito when you are your own dessert."

  We moved through the mini-city. The local inhabitants—gingerbread houses and jelly citizens—followed us with suspicious glances, but the chocolate crust on our faces did its job. We were locals. Almost.

  We were just steps away from the exit when two figures blocked our path. A Sugar Skeleton and a Cookie Guard. The latter was the size of a solid wardrobe and smelled so good that circles started swimming before my eyes.

  They let Zevlud and Alastia pass without any extra questions—they looked like ordinary pieces of marshmallow. But the guards froze when they looked at me. The Sugar Skeleton stared into my black eyes for a long time through its layer of frosting. The cookie giant cracked its shoulder threateningly.

  God, I wanted to take a bite out of him so badly. Just a little one. Purely for science. I could already imagine that baked crust snapping between my teeth...

  But Alastia's glare, which promised me an eternal diet of celery, forced me to hold back. The skeleton finally nodded, and they stepped aside.

  We approached the Door. Zevlud, wasting no time, yanked the handle. Nothing.

  "Hey!" the Door creaked, the outlines of a terrified face appearing on its surface. "You scared me half to death! My tender wooden heart almost burst from what that... that monster did in the knights' hall!"

  The Door was clearly hinting at me. It seems rumors of the chocolate massacre spread faster here than caramel rain.

  "Please, sweet Door, let us pass," Alastia stepped right up and affectionately stroked the doorframe. "I promise he won't touch anyone else. He is on a diet today."

  The Door cast a suspicious sideways glance at me, then at the girl.

  "Fine," it sighed, slowly turning its deadbolt. "But only because YOU are asking, Alastia. And let that glutton leave first!"

  The panel swung open, revealing the path to the normal, inedible world. I stepped through the opening, managing to sneak a quick lick of the door handle right at the very end.

  What? It was made of white chocolate. It would have been a shame to leave such beauty behind.

  The moment we crossed the threshold, Alastia stated briskly: "Alright, we urgently need to wash up. We look like desserts someone dropped on the road."

  And, without waiting for an answer, she simply ran off into the darkness of the corridor. And beneath our feet... that's right, the floor disappeared yet again.

  WHOOSH. We started falling. Gravity in this house is a fickle thing, much like my memory. We plopped down rather softly this time, right onto some kind of shaggy rug.

  We started wandering through the halls, trying to figure out which part of this architectural madness we had landed in. And then Alexia stepped out from around the corner. She froze, her red eyes slowly going wide, her face locked in an expression of "Wha-a-at?".

  "Greg?" she exhaled, looking me up and down. "What happened? Why do you look like you were bathed in a vat of frosting?"

  I unperturbedly licked a drop of chocolate off my upper lip. "Oh, you know. Fell in a puddle. A very large and very sweet puddle. It happens."

  But Zevlud was unstoppable. The great bard had awakened within the twelve-year-old elf. He straightened his posture and began delivering The Speech, waving his arms: "Oh, Princess, you have no idea what we've been through! We fought the chocolate legions! We braved the caramel storm and negotiated with the marshmallow king! We broke through the..."

  "UGH!" a shrill voice suddenly shrieked right under our feet.

  I jumped. The rug we were standing on began to actively squirm and wrinkle.

  "Your chocolate is melting!" the pile yelled. "You're ruining my beautiful patterns with your sticky sludge! Leave! Get out immediately, you filthy sweet-tooths!"

  "Oh," Zevlud faltered. "Sorry, wood... I mean, rag."

  We hastily retreated before the rug decided to smoke us out or roll itself into a tube with us inside. I wandered off toward the bathroom.

  Closing the door behind me, I got straight down to business. Washing such wealth down the drain would be a crime against my taste buds. I methodically "ate" the chocolate off my hands and sleeves—after all, the camouflage was top quality.

  When the licking was finished, I simply snapped my fingers.

  ZING. A thin film of mana washed over my body, instantly evaporating the remaining stickiness and dirt. The suit became blindingly white again, my hair—perfectly clean.

  I stepped out into the corridor, looking like a model aristocrat once again. Only the faint smell of cocoa, which now seemed permanently absorbed into my skin, served as a reminder that just ten minutes ago I was every confectioner's dream.