Hooktail Castle

Hooktail Castle (Japanese ゴンババ城 Gonbaba Shiro) is a location that is found during the events of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door. It is the castle where Hooktail, the dragon who is terrorizing Petalburg, resides. Mario, and his partners &mdash; Goombella and Koops &mdash; travel here to defeat Hooktail and collect the Diamond Star.

Mario and his partners must enter Hooktail via a pipe that leads them into the background where the castle is structured. Upon first entering the castle, they will find a Recovery Block and a spring that will lead them to an Airplane Panel. Below the Airplane Panel is a broken bridge that hovers above a moat &mdash; at the end of this moat, they can also collect an HP Plus badge. As they soar across the moat, they reach a tall set of pink doors that lead them into the heart of the castle.

Immediately after entering this part of the castle, they encounter many Koopa Troopas and Koopa Paratroopas that are ready to attack. They can also find the Power Bounce badge within a red ? Block here. In the next room, they find many skeletons of Koopas that fell victim to Hooktail along their travels. It is in this very room that they find the skeleton of Kolorado's Father. His corpse is found clutching a note addressed to his son as a warning about Hooktail and her weaknesses. The note contains his last words, as he wrote it while dying. In this note, Mario and his partner discover that they need to find something that begins with a 'cr' and ends with an 'icket' in order to defeat Hooktail.

At the far end of the room, they find a brightly-colored skeleton guarding the doorway to the next room. As they awaken in, the room quickly becomes flooded with countless Dull Bones that are pushing Mario and his partner away from the door. After Mario uses his hammer to whack his way to the Red Bones, they engage in battle. Mario eventually wins, gaining access to the next room.

Through the next few rooms, Mario and his partner encounter many Dull Bones in their path. After some travel, they eventually reach a room with a mysterious black chest. They quickly move to the room to the right and collect the Black Key. But as they attempt to make their way back, the entire floor becomes protruding with sharp spikes that form a maze throughout the room. To Mario and his partners' dismay, the ceiling, too, is covered in sharp spikes and is lowering quickly towards the ground. Just within time, Mario and his partners escape the treacherous room and insert the black key into the chest. At this moment, Mario becomes cursed by the demon that resides in the chest; Mario can now turn paper thin, being able to squeeze into even the narrowest of spaces. Mario and his partners makes their way back, collecting a red badge called Attack FX R. It is with this badge that Mario may have a chance at defeating Hooktail.

As Mario progressed farther and farther up the castle, he eventually entered a room and encountered a mysterious thief. The small mouse had come to the castle to steal rare badges, but was off before long. In that same room, Mario and his partners found they key to the room across the way. They unlocked the door and progressed furthermore up the castle. After going up many flights of stairs and traveling through many rooms, Mario and his partners eventually reached a long bridge high in the air. This bridge was infested Koopas of different sorts along the way to an extremely high tower. At the top of this tower, Mario and his partners encountered a Save Block, Recovery Block, and an enormous pair of doors that led into a large circular dormitory.

Through these doors, Mario and his partners encountered the red behemoth known as Hooktail. The dragon was prepared to eat them, but first planned on toying with them. After a long battle, the dragon had been bested and fell flat on her back. At this time, she regurgitated Koopley, Koops's long lost father. After a touching reunion, Koopley gave Mario the Diamond Star, something he had found in Hooktail's belly and had kept as a souvenir.

After Chapter 5, Merlon will be awaiting for Mario outside his shop in Rogueport. He tells Mario and his partners of a fortune he had received; this fortune told of a room hidden in Hooktail Castle. If Mario and his partners return to the room with the spikes and head to the far right of the room, they will discover a large crack in the wall. With the help of Admiral Bobbery, the wall was blasted way. In the secret room, they discovered the Up Arrow, an item that helped Merlon be able to power up Mario's partners even more.