A Covid-19 Battle in a Magic Land

Once Upon a Time… We asked students to come up with their own Beijing adaptation of their favorite childhood fairy tales. Thank you to all the students who have submitted their work. We’ll be publishing them online and selecting the best story that fits all the criteria to be included in the upcoming issue of Jingkids.

The COVID-19 Battle in a Magic Land
By Jacqueline Sun

Once upon a time, in a magic land far away from the human world, there was a beautiful kingdom in which lived millions of unimaginable species. However, when a place is full of magic, the supernatural also exists at the same time. In the center of the kingdom, there was a huge castle surrounded by magnificent and splendid plants. This fantastic castle belonged to King Alex and Queen Alecia. Unfortunately, Queen Alecia died just after their third princess was born. The couple didn’t have any princes to succeed to the Crown. The King had no choice but to give the crown to his brother, a wicked wizard named Lukas who wanted to rule this kingdom with his devilish supernatural powers. The wizard prepared for days and nights to implement his horrible plan, step by step, until King Alex’s youngest daughter Olivia found out and told her dad. Alex was stunned. He immediately changed his mind about giving the crown to Lukas. However, nobody noticed that the black eagle, Lukas’s devil pet, was hatching a plan for them in the darkness. When Lukas heard back from his black eagle, he controlled his indignation and shut himself in his room, and started to invent something evil and very harmful.

The next morning, after experimenting for the whole night, Lukas stretched himself out with a crafty smile on his face. Then, he gently spread a powder around the kingdom, corner by corner. Days later, a terrible, unknown virus spread around the whole kingdom. Soon, about a thousand people were sick, and 50 people had died. Scientists started to research, however, according to their results, no other place had ever caught this kind of virus, so they gave this virus an unusual name: Covid-19. The kingdom’s predictor said, “In the human world, people will encounter the same disaster in the year 2019.”

Scientists and doctors had been working extra hard since the coronavirus had spread around the kingdom. Nevertheless, no matter how hard they tried, the virus would not stop infecting the kingdom. Alex and Olivia asked Lukas if he was the one who caused the virus to attack. Lukas laughed coldly as he said, “Olivia, my clever darling princess, yes, I am the one who created this virus, and also the only one with the antidote. So, exchange your crown for the antidote, my princess. Prove that you love your people more than anything else!” Olivia was furious and disappointed. “Never! I will not let your evil force win!” Lukas burned in anger as he threw the last bit of powder at her.

Seconds later, Olivia started to cough and gasp. She could not catch her breath. When King Alex saw this, he immediately sent her to her fairy godmother.  Olivia had caught Covid-19! The whole kingdom started to panic when they heard this sad news. The King immediately sent a soldier to arrest Lukas but only found an empty house with nobody inside. Lukas had fled. According to a scientist’s results, the virus would grow stronger in cold areas. This is where Lukas would hide, the fairy godmother speculated as she replied, “The only freezing site in the kingdom is a place called Snowy Mountain, which is behind the monster cave where all the monsters live. The only way to the mountain is to go through the cave.” No one in the kingdom volunteered to go and find the evil wizard. After a few days, one million people had died because of the virus, including Princess Cindy, the second daughter of King Alex. When Olivia heard that her sister had died, she immediately volunteered to go and fight Lukas. She was the only hope to save the kingdom. She started her journey the next day…

On her way to the shelter, she bought some potions and a wand at a witch’s store. The only things she could rely on were a compass and a map to find the direction to the snowy mountain. Even though the journey was very hard, Olivia still did not flinch since she knew that everyone’s lives would only be saved if she found Lukas. After many long days of walking, she finally arrived at the cave of monsters. She immediately sped in without thinking. Inside the cave, many eyes watched her suspiciously in the dark. Wait, there were never any monsters in that cave, but only shy, lovely fairies! Olivia saw them clearly and kept walking until she arrived at the exit. There was a fantastic sight: an enormous mountain that had a rainbow’s color at the bottom but was very snowy at the top. She used her wand and a pair of wings appeared, and she got to the top of the mountain quickly. Once on the mountain top, she started to search for Lukas. The mountain top was a very gloomy place. No one had ever lived on this mountain top before. Looking around, the only living things were some arctic animals that were camouflaged in the snow. Just when Olivia was amazed by the snow on the mountain, a sudden moan startled her. She thought to herself, “It’s Lukas!”

She hurried over as she screamed, “Uncle! Stop what you are doing now and give me the antidote for the virus! If not, let’s use magic to battle!” “What? You, a little worm, want to battle me? Trust me, you will give up right away!” As they start the battle, Olivia stuffed all the potions she had bought into her pocket and grabbed her wand. She had heard that the only potion Lukas was frightened of was the shrink potion that could shrink him down to an ant’s size. However, that potion would only appear by the secret potions, and the probability of getting it was 0.01%. Olivia had only bought three secret potions! She threw the first one at Lukas. However, it was a spiky land potion that could only make the ground spiky. She didn’t want to give up yet, so she threw the second potion at Lukas. This time, it was a little more helpful because the brew could weaken the wizard’s powers by 50%. The wizard cried, “Still, you’re not even as powerful as half of my powers!” Olivia just ignored his words as she threw the last secret potion towards him. This time, as the brew landed on Lukas, there was a green light as Lukas shrank to the size of an ant. “Yes! It’s the shrink potion!” Olivia thought. She pointed to the wizard with her wand and cried, “Amino!” Suddenly, the ant-wizard was gone, leaving Olivia with the antidote for the virus. “I just battled the wizard! Hooray!” Olivia exclaimed.

Finally, she returned to the kingdom with the antidote. The people of the kingdom were overjoyed at the news that Olivia had returned safely. Olivia supplied the medicine to all of the people and saved everyone from Covid-19. King Alex immediately decided that she would be the Crown’s successor, which meant she would be the future queen. Everyone agreed. Olivia’s special brew of potions to battle the wizard was kept inside the newly built museum inside the kingdom. As for Lukas the evil wizard, he has never been seen again since the day he disappeared on the snowy mountain.

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