SO!!! It starts out with Simon Smoke (the leader of the Nightmare Critters in the AU) kidnapping CraftyCorn. The rest of the Smiling Critters go to save her, but most of them except DogDay and CatNap are captured by the rest of the Nightmare Critters. Eventually, DogDay and CatNap free CraftyCorn and confront Simon, and it turns out he was trying to harvest her unique natural magic powers to reawaken this dark ancient eldritch monster thingamajig I haven't named yet.

Now, of course, DogDay and CatNap can't just let this slide, so they try to stop him, and whatever Simon is using to summon the main villain starts glowing and stuff, so he freaks out and tries to stop it, BUT!!! A mysterious silhouette who snuck in sometime earlier pushes Simon to the ground and uses some sort of magic to brainwash him, and he suddenly changes. All of a sudden, he's WAY more excited about this... thing's reawakening, and just way more creepy and insane in general.

So anyway, the villain appears, and upon seeing it, Simon snaps out of it and looks for the silhouette, but whoever it is vanished as suddenly as they appeared. The villain attacks, knocking out Simon, DogDay, and CatNap. It's later revealed that it attacked the other Smiling/Nightmare Critters too and scattered them across the land.

When our heroes awaken, they're in someone's house in a humble little village nearby. They soon find out that a young girl from the village named Poppy found them unconscious, and, with the help of her brother Jack, nursed them back to health. These two help the critters throughout their journey, and play a major role in the story later.

Oh, and I forgot to mention: Simon's brainwashing wore out pretty soon, so he was more similar to his old self, but still followed the main villain.

So yeah, insert DogDay and CatNap travelling across the land, saving the other Smiling Critters, also running into the Nightmare Critters, etc. Eventually, they've gathered the whole crew and are strong enough to face the villain, so they report back to Poppy and Jack, but guess what? JACK WAS SECRETLY BEING CONTROLLED BY THE VILLAIN THE WHOLE TIME!!! He was being used as its vessel to carry out its wishes, and manipulated the Nightmare Critters into freeing it. He was also the one who-

-attacked Simon Smoke earlier on.

Anywho, something happens (I'm making this up as I go along lol sorry :sob:) that causes it to jump from Jack's body to CatNap's. While under the villain's control, CatNap attacks DogDay, cutting off his legs and rendering him unable to battle for some time. (Bubba eventually makes him some prosthetics tho so that's nice) Oh, and I forgot to mention, the Smiling Critters eventually have to team up with the Nightmare Critters to defeat the villain :p

ooh nice idea

I'm getting too lazy to explain all this shih, so here's some (but not all) stuff that happens next:
-Poppy gets mortally wounded trying to fight the villain (sistory channel you're like 1 foot tall and made of porcelain what do you think you're gonna do :sob: :pray: :wilted_flower:)
-The villain also kılls Simon for snapping out of it and refusing to obey him
-DogDay comes back just in time for the final battle

so anyway they beat the villain together and actually *GASP* are friends/frenemies with the Nightmare Critters the end okay byeeeeee ignore the crappy writinggggggg

I CAME UP WITH SOME NEW WORLDBUILDING/LORE STUFF!!!

So in the AU, the pendants worn by the Smiling and Nightmare Critters give their wearers magical powers (CraftyCorn and Simon, however, are special because they were born with powers, so their pendants amplify the powers they have instead). These pendants also have magical "bonds" with their owner, so they can only be used by their rightful owners.

I'll have to make a post talking about where/how they all got their pendants :p

Anyway, it's revealed that if combined, the pendants will form one big pendant with FAR stronger magic than all the others combined, and that pendant is the only thing that can defeat the villain. So, the Smiling and Nightmare Critters are supposed to team up because this monstrosity running around can only be kılled by the power of :sparkles:fRiEnDsHiP:sparkles: