After defeating King Bob-Omb, the explosion caused by his defeat was so grand that it sent his battleship flying all across the ocean, until you and his ship crashed into an iceberg far from the tropical waters of Rosa. This is the Sherberto Sea.

The sun begins to set after you crash into the Sherberto iceberg. Nighttime is approaching.

The sea gets its name from the giant, sentient sherbet cones that dot the semi-arctic landscape. Sherberto’s waters are mostly frozen solid, allowing the cones to sit still along the ice. The inhabitants can very easily walk across the sea’s surface without fear of it breaking, too. It is indeed very cold here. Swimming is not recommended.

But, many oddly familiar inhabitants have made residence along the frozen sea. You might have seen them in your dreams before, but perhaps not in reality.

Jr also makes an ambitious return from his Fontana sewer hideout, ordering his small Sherberto army to construct Fort Snowball, a military base along Sherberto’s icy coast. It may be a lot more convoluted to take him down this time.

4-1 Sherberto’s Conical Caps

By the time you get here, the sun is already completely gone, leaving nothing but a cloudless sky of ice blue stars. The rest of your journey will be under the veil of night. And, beware, for it only gets darker from here.

Sherberto’s icy surface is home to many different flavors of giant sherbet cones: mainly lime, cherry, lemon, and blue raspberry. Each cone is covered with a layer of frost from the sheer coldness of Sherberto, especially at night, so, hopefully, you don’t get your shoes too sticky.

But, of course, you’re not the only one in this frozen field of cones. Goombas’ shoes experience little traction on icy surfaces, so many of them have congregated along the ice, as well as the native snow pokeys. Just like their desert counterparts, snow pokeys love to be lifted up and down, which you may need to do as well in order to vault over the mass of tall cones.

You may notice several snowballs scattered about. Perhaps they may help with dealing with both enemies.

4-2 A Whale of a Throwback

Cachalot whales have broken the ice along the surface of Sherberto, coming up to gather whatever oxygen they can in the bitter coldness of the night. Their blowholes are quite impressive, being able to form spouts that you can walk on top of, or be crushed by if you’re not careful. Their tails are also quite… bouncy.

However, the influx of cachalots breaching has softened the ice, making it slightly more liquid. Don’t step on the sea’s surface, or you may just fall in and start to freeze.

The cachalots are mostly congregating at some islands nearby Sherberto. These islands are mostly frozen, but are just fertile enough to grow icy turnips, and perhaps some other things. The flurries, the speedy snowmen that you could’ve sworn that you only saw in your subconscious are also here, but now, they’re a bit more jumpy and hard to hit.

You should be able to traverse this area through magic vases scattered about. Doesn’t this all just seem like a dream?

4-3 Trouter Temperature Shuffle

Sherberto’s waters are not warm enough for cheep cheeps, but they do seem warm enough for the fairly similar trouters. Near the surface, they like to jump out of the water, forming little gaps where the sea is liquid. But, below water, they prefer to swim in a curved pattern, perhaps to maximize their oxygen intake from the cold water. It would seem that, just like cheep cheeps, they also come in red and green. I wonder if the green ones are partial to hiding spots, too.

Unfortunately, much of their habitat has been taken up by plumbing beneath the icy surface, meant to deliver hot and cold water to the local burger joint Bringing Easy, Edible Food, or BEEF for short. This has created quite the perfect paradox. Normally, the waters of Sherberto are quite choppy with mounds of ice, being rather unfriendly to swim through. But, within the bounds of the BEEF plumbing, the hot water pipes create enough heat to produce hot bouts of steam, and the cold water pipes are so cold that icicles hang freely off them… until you get too close.

This creates a rather interesting mix of hot and cold for you to traverse through. Surely, no one has thought of this brilliant idea, and used it in their own work to appear creative and original.

But, before you even think about getting yourself a burger, beware of how different your dreams may be from reality, for Birdo has made their long overdue comeback as a villain. Is this as far as you’ll go?

4-WH Breaching Fort Snowball

You’ve made it to Jr’s Sherberto military base. Breaking and entering may not be as hard as he might have thought it would be.

This part of Fort Snowball consists of a mess of watchtowers guarded mostly by goombas and goombrats. Some of these fungal soldiers are equipped with autobombs, tall cannons that shoot fireballs. Another weirdly familiar obstacle.

Jr has ordered the construction of many warehouses in Fort Snowball to store equipment such as the autobombs, as well as power ups for his clumsy soldiers to use if they need to. Unfortunately, he was too apathetic to consider installing heating of any kind, leaving these warehouses with dank interiors that are invaded by frozen walls and ceilings, as well as melty icicles.

Some of the base’s defenses are quite high off the ground, so you’ll have to take an icy snake block to get across. Be careful not to get bumped off by the flurries that have also been employed as soldiers.

Of course, waiting for you at the outside of the last warehouse is none other than Jr himself. He’s upped the ante this time, forcing you and him to duke it out by air while avoiding the charged electrical wires on the side. But, maybe you can bump him into them instead.

4-MB Jr. Employs Zedd & Zaptista

Although you managed to defeat Jr again, he came up with a rather elaborate backup plan. He ordered a great deal more of Fort Snowball to be built beyond what you’ve made your way through so far.

In this part of the base, he’s ordered some stronger soldiers to take you down. A fire Birdo greets you almost immediately at the entrance.

Upon traveling inside one of the icy barracks, you’ll immediately be greeted to a blocked off wall, as well as many snow spikes. If you wish to find your way out, you’ll have to find a key, and you may have to face some hammer bros, too. They do not yield.

But, while the simple green mechakoopas dotted all over the most secure stretches of Fort Snowball may not prove to be much of a threat, Jr spent his time creating two other extra powerful ones.

If you wish to escape the base alive, you’ll have to face Zaptista, the small blue mechakoopa who was designed to shoot harmful laser beams. Perhaps you can redirect their beams to eventually summon their larger, red missile shooting companion, Zedd. Don’t get too distracted by their arena’s colorful floor and ceiling.