As usual, they had a lot of heavy work to do. Lava Gormitis showing their nasty faces at the park, another plan for conquest here, some fighting there. You know, Wednesday afternoons.

Except this time, they had unwanted onlookers. The worst kind they could ever have: the entire town.

A huge picnic was organized by the mayor and almost everyone from Venture Falls was invited to take a bite. The four of them, of course, had "homework" to do.

Sure would've helped if they asked where it took place, because had they known about it, they would've done something to evacuate the place or at least be more careful. As soon as they turned around, they were met with many faces, some of them including their parents and classmates.

This was bad.

Their latest victory was ruined by a lack of awareness about their location, now almost everyone they knew saw them in Gormiti forms. Fighting off Obscurio and Magor's troops. With their Gormiti powers leaving a mess no amount of "It was all special effects!" could let it slide.

From the looks of it, everyone had witnessed the battle. They could only hope they didn't hear anything too sensitive…

What they also didn't expect was the huge amount of cheers they were receiving.

"That was incredible!"

"You fought off those monsters like they do it in the movies! But what are they? And what are you?!"

"Where did they come from? How did you do all of that?!"

"You all look so strong, you must train very hard for that! Can you tell us how you did you learn to do all of this?"

The four Lords stayed silent as the townspeople pelted them with questions. Old Sage would not like this at all.

"Who are you four?"

They all exchanged a look. They shouldn't reveal the existence of Gormitis, but if they had to, might as well make everyone know they were the good guys.

Lucas stepped forward, getting everyone's attention. This would be so weird to deal with later.

"We… are superheroes!"

A bunch of "Oooooh!"'s followed, bystanders with a piqued curiosity listening to him closely.

"Those monsters you saw want to destroy the world, and we're here to put a stop to it."

"We travel between this world and ours to look for anyone threatening it, and we use our powers to protect everyone from the creatures you saw." explained Nick.

"What's your name, Mr. Rock Guy?"

Nick hesitated. Giving out their real names would be dangerous, they were lucky enough not to have dropped any during the battle. Then, he had an idea.

Good thing he had encouraged them to study the Gorm's history of previous Lords, otherwise they wouldn't come up with anything believable or not too stupid-sounding quickly enough.

"I am Kolossus, Lord of Earth. And this," he waved to Toby, "is my brother Carrapax, Lord of the Sea. We may not look like it, but we really are family."

"I'm... Barbatus" said Lucas, recalling his predecessor's name. "Yeah, that's it, and I'm Lord of the Forest."

"And, uh, you may call me Helios, Lord of Air." said Jessica. "It's just a title though, I'm still a girl." she precised.

People started to mutter things around them, clearly wondering what those names and titles meant. Lords? Like nobility? And they controlled elements like that kid with arrow tattoos and those five girls with that pink amulet did? Though the fire monsters didn't seem on their side…

"But what's your team name then?" asked one kid.

Again, they needed to find a name. Team Gorm? Gormiteam? Gormiti Squad? Surprisingly (or not), Toby came up with the most obvious and easiest choice.

"Er… we're the… We're the Lords of Nature!" he announced confidently.

His friends stared at him for a second, then realizing people were eating it up, they understood they had to take advantage.

"Yeah, with the power of nature on our side, you can count on us to protect your world and save you, young humans!"

Soon after, the cheers came back and the townspeople were thanking them for fighting off Magor's gang again, asking for autographs and another series of questions they wouldn't be allowed to answer.

Among those people, all four Lords recognized their parents, and thanked their luck that they didn't blow up their cover. Or at least, not completely. No one knew who they really were, didn't stop that Old Sage wouldn't like to hear about any of this.

In the middle of the crowd, a young brunette was observing the scene silently. A smirk matched a devious glint in her blue eyes, she knew this was her time to shine.

"So what do we do now?" asked Lucas.

"You mean, besides wait for the paparazzi to kick our doors down and spy on us while the government attempts to capture us for some kind of weird experiment?" asked Nick. "Let's face it, we messed up."

"You sure you're not overreacting?" said Jessica, raising a brow. "Everyone thinks we're some kind of superheroes, they don't know who we really are. At least if we ever need to go on mission, we could just sneak out and transform, then evacuate the place to make an excuse."

"Perhaps, but Old Sage isn't going to like what we did. He kept the existence of the Gorm secret for who knows how long, and we messed up big time! He's gonna be so mad at us…"

"Chillax, Nick." said Toby. "We're the first Lords of Nature on Earth, we're the only ones who ever had to hide our double lives because we were the only ones to have any. Old Sage can't be mad at us for something we didn't prepare for."

"Toby's right." added Jessica. "Even if he's not one to talk about doing something he never prepared for, like studying, everybody makes mistakes. Besides, what else would we do if Magor ever went directly into town?"

"Gee, thanks, Jess…" deadpanned the blonde Lord.

They heard a key turn inside the lock of the house's door, and Nick and Toby's parents rushed into the living room with excitement in their eyes.

"Kids, you'll never believe it!" shouted Mick, the boys' father. "We went to the town's annual picnic and something absolutely extraordinary happened!"

"What? You found a golden tooth inside a piece of pie and we're now rich?" snarked Toby, fully aware of what his dad was talking about.

"Not even close! We heard some noise and we went to check what was happening. It turns out superheroes came in town to save us from giant monsters!"

"Uh, Dad? You sure you haven't gotten a sunburn? You just described the plot of every sci-fi or superhero comic book ever." asked Nick, feigning ignorance. "Mom, please don't tell me that really happened."

"Sorry, Nick, but your father is telling the truth." confirmed Karen. "Weird golems with nature powers came into the park and fought off fire creatures that were about to attack us! They called themselves the Lords of Nature, or something like that."

"We now have city protectors!"

"Don't we already have cops, Mr. Tripp?" asked Jessica.

"We do, Jessica, but not all cops can send a tornado flying towards criminals. And besides, the police doesn't seem like it'd be enough to stop those fire monsters."

"Your little friend Paula also wanted to pay you a visit." said Karen.

"PAULA?!"

The young brunette walked into the living room, a smug smirk on her face. They all gulped, realizing their "You had a weird dream" excuse wouldn't be useful this time. She knew what they had done, they wouldn't get away with it so easily.

"What's up? Ike forgot to do his book report for tomorrow, just wanted to make sure you guys weren't slacking off either."

The four kids were confused. How did she not bust them yet? They decided to play along anyway.

"Oh, that. We're done, we were so busy working on it we didn't even hear about those… nature guys." said Toby. "Sounds like a bunch of performance artists or something."

"We have to bring out some of our stuff out of the car, make yourself comfortable, Paula." said Karen.

"Thanks, Mrs. Tripp." chirpily said Paula, waving at the couple before turning back to the four kids. "Sooooooo, crazy thing happened at the park today, riiiiiiiiight?"

They gulped. If she didn't tell the Tripp siblings' parents, who did she tell? Ike? Someone at school? The police?

"That sounds like total bogus." said Lucas. "I've heard better lies from that show where kids go into a virtual world with a big computer. Who would ever believe this kind of stuff?"

"Nice try, but I still remember what you freakos looked like when I almost drowned inside that volcano and that Lavion guy was following me around. You're not fooling me this time, I heard about online recovery tools, and-"

"PLEASE DON'T TELL ANYBODY!"

She almost stepped back when the four middle-schoolers ran up to her, getting super close while begging her. Were these the same guys that saved Venture Falls from those Lava Carrottis (or whatever their name was) earlier?

She sighed, wondering if everyone was bound to be dumb at her brother's age. "Why would I? It's not like I'm dumb enough to put people in danger." She rolled her eyes as the four preteens stared at her in disbelief.

"Wait, what about your reporting career?" asked Toby.

"Yeah, don't you always say you want to prove to the entire world we're weird?" added Lucas.

"I do, but you guys just proved you existed to everyone else, I don't need to tell them more than what they need." said Paula. "Those lava guys are dangerous, and if I told everyone who you were, they'd find you and hunt you and your families down."

"So you're not gonna follow us around as much as before?" asked Nick.

"I didn't say that." said Paula, making the Lords of Nature face-vault into the ground. "Now that you guys are public knowledge, I can film you and post info about you. Nothing too sensitive, just enough to start a good career as a reporter."

"And what makes you think we'd comply?" asked Jessica.

"I don't know, I could just film you transforming and share it around the web. It'll spread like, oh look, wildfire! Ha!"

She knew her pun wasn't the best, but before they could retort, the doorbell rang. She opened the door, ending up face to face with her older brother.

"There you are!" exclaimed Ike, his irritated expression somehow shifting into excitement as he spoke. "Don't tell me you're stalking the Tripps to prove they're weirdos again. Because you should be stalking those super cool dudes at the park instead!"

"Nah, they just invited me to hang out after the picnic. Isn't that right, guys?"

Ike didn't know why they were all nodding so furiously, but brushed it off. He took his sister by the arm and dragged her out of the house.

"You didn't take Mom's camera this time again, did you?"

"Nope, settled for the old tape recorder instead." she said, pulling out the device and pressing a button to stop the recording. "Really useful when you want to keep what someone said in check, don'tcha think?"

"Whatever."

As they looked at both siblings leaving, the four Lords of Nature recapped the situation.

Their existence was out in the open, Paula wouldn't share it around like candy but wouldn't refrain from talking about them, and they were pretty sure she just got blackmail material from them.

She really had changed from the little curious snitch she was, or at least, she was more clever at it than before. She knew what they could do, she'd better keep her word.

Later, a new website was put online, with almost everyone from school receiving a link to it. In big letters and with many pictures taken by amateurs, the new blog for the Lords of Nature was all ready and up-to-date.