Luther stopped, eyes wide at what he saw. Tango hadn't taken his blow, but had lost all the same. It took him a moment to process what happened. Luther looked at the three arrows piercing through various places in Tango's body and then over to Melus. He was interrupted by a cloud of flames enveloping him, though they didn't burn him. Instead they were...Inviting. They acknowledged him as their master. They coiled together and entered his body through his chest. He felt...warmer. There was now another element inhabiting his body. One which he could utilize as he saw fit. Still, he looked down at the defeated Tango. This wasn't what he wanted. He didn't want to win because Melus had helped him cheat. The man in the black coat offered his hand to Tango. "Ignicio De La Vega, you have been spared. Had I won that fairly, it would be a different story, but there is no honor in such a battle. Live here, and challenge me once again to reclaim your stolen fire. Then, we will truly have a battle which history will remember." Luther said, indicating that he was actually letting Tango go. From what he said earlier, apparently the winner of the final fantasy had the right to spare or kill the defeated.
Beuce chuckled as Aislinn said that he seemed to be holding up perfectly. "Yeah, well, this isn't my first rodeo. Though from the looks of things it definitely might be the biggest." He said, looking at the horde still to come. They hadn't even crossed the halfway point yet, but Beuce wasn't discouraged in the least. The words Stratos had said to him at the beginning kept echoing in his head. "Yeah yeah I know, keep a faster pace." He muttered to himself, readying his keyblade and Scouter Disc in much a similar stance to the one that he'd seen Rinzler use with his scouting disc up near his head, trained to throw and his keyblade stretched outward for melee combat. "So...Aislinn right? I don't think I ever actually caught this but how exactly did you end up in the realm of darkness in Mizrabel's castle? Doesn't strike me as a particularly great tourist location, but you saved us there so I never really thought about it much." He went forward, ready to defeat the last remaining bunch of heartlss in the wave. They'd almost finished, and then they were to move on to the next battle. Between them, this had been far less harrowing than the last time they'd been forced to battle an incredible horde of heartless, despite the fact there were even more of them this time. Maybe that spoke volumes as to how much stronger they'd become. There were only four remaining darkballs in all the wave. They, at least comparatively, were incredibly non-threatening. Aislinn had even injured one of them already for him. Still, despite the overwhelming odds against them, they just simply snapped their enormous jaw at him like they always had. His data form apparently gave him enhanced mental capacity. Something about processing power? In any case, he managed to counter it with ease. He knocked the spherical heartless back with his keyblade and threw the scouting disc forward, sending it straight through the black ball like creature and derezzing it like he had with all the others. He wasn't particularly why they did that, or even what "derezzing" was. He didn't know anything about computers. Until recently, he didn't even know they existed. He batted the injured one aside and brought down the scounting disc as it returned to his hand, taking out the second one. He flicked his wrist and sent another virus out, the coding draining into the darkball and slowly eating away at its health, though this time it appeared to be stronger due to the upgrades. With only one last to go, he brought down another pillar of light to decimate the final one. Once it was gone, the virus claimed the last. "Well, that about wraps that up. We've got that out of the way. I'd say we're a little under halfway done." He said to the two girls nearby. They seemed to be having a conversation about Luna being a princess. He was honestly kind of interested. She talked about protecting her people. She said that was her duty. "Yeah, I can understand that. Maybe not in the same way you look at it, but I can definitely sympathize with you there." He thought back to his homeworld, and wondered when he'd get a chance to reclaim it. He was still alive, so the King's Gambit was still in play. He'd be willing to bet Sorenia wasn't as weak as he remembered, either. Total Words: 614 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 900 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 450 Heartless Defeated: 4 darkballs Heartless remaining: Wave cleared
"Sorry, but i'm afraid the one who's going to walk away with both elements is me!" Luther yelled out. He flexed his illusion powers to their maximum heights to direct Tango's attention to where he wanted it. It didn't even extend to only Tango, but Melus as well. The force of his killing intent was amplified by thousands. No matter what, it would set off the fight or flight instinct of anyone who laid eyes on him. He directed as much attention to himself as he possibly could, and charged at Tango. If he got burned, so what? A little bit of fire wouldn't kill him immediately, and as long as he could pull this off, he'd win. With blinding speed, he closed the distance between him and Tango. It wasn't that the flames weren't affecting him as he pressed through them. With his blade trained to kill and the bloodlust behind it amplified to such an incredible extent, there was no way tango would be able to resist training his eyes on it. In fact, the more skilled he was, the more his every instinct would scream at him to block that strike, and right before the strike was delivered or knocked aside, the weapon slipped from Luther's fingers and his hands reached toward Tango's face. A loud and boisterous clap resounded through the air. No one could keep their guard up after being so violently ripped out of such incredible focus. It wouldn't take him but a moment to regain it, but a moment was all that was needed.
Beuce had all but cleared out the remaining heartless in the immediate area of him, but there were sounds of battle all around, and he hadn't the time to relax. The last few neoshadows nearby rose from the ground. Not nearly as many as had tried to encircle him before, four in total. These ones seemed to acknowledge that there was no way they were going to be able to beat him with pack tactics like the others had tried with their slim numbers. However, blood was running down the right side of Beuce's face, obscuring his vision a great deal. He'd closed his right eye at this point, and would heal it when he got a minute to breathe, but right now it was pretty debilitating. The neoshadows threatened to pounce on him at any second, so he did something none of the heartless expected him to do. He ran away. More specifically, he turned around and dove forward, a bike materializing underneath him. The engine whirred loudly as he sped away, faster than the neoshadows could hope to catch. In fact, they ran after him, only to be caught by the ribbon of light and immediately destroyed in much the same fashion as the one who had been struck by the disc. Only one managed to evade this, to which Beuce simply turned his head and waved a hand at it. A malevolent looking purple string of code surfaced around it and infected its body. It wasn't instantaneous, but over the course of the next few minutes, it would wither away from the virus and eventually meet the same fate as the others who had tried to face him. His job in this area done and now in a perfect position to go help elsewhere, he steered his bike toward the closest face he could find, being Luna and Aislinn. His turns were incredibly sharp, all at exactly 90 degree angles, and the ribbon of light seemed to trail his movements exactly. He sped by and intercepted a neoshadow that had its sights set on Luna. Whether or not she could've dealt with it on her own didn't really matter. It wouldn't get the chance to find out as the moment it tried, it crashed into a bright blue wall. "Hey princess! Don't get cozy now! We're almost done with this bunch but i doubt we're even close to finishing the whole thing." He dismounted his light cycle which then faded away into cubes of light. Beuce ran along with the ground to try and disperse some of the inertia carrying him forward. "Need any help? I just finished the bit over there. Wait..." He looked over as the final neoshadow succumbed to the virus and became derezzed like its brethren. "Okay now i finished over there." He threw his scouting disc at another neoshadow, causing it to ricochet off and hit a regular shadow, then return to him. He brought up the console once again and began to punch in another random string of letters and numbers. Evidently, he was either really lucky, or coding was incredibly easy. He once again felt another boost in power as all his abilities, as well as his basic parameters increased in power. "You two holding up alright over here?" He asked the two women. Luna he knew fairly well, and Aislinn...Well he hadn't interacted much with her. She hadn't made a good first impression, but that wasn't everything. Total Words: 617 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 840 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 420 Heartless Defeated: 10 neoshadows 2 shadows Enemies Reserved: Neoshadow (Rydia) Invisible (Rubicante) Heartless Remaining: 116 Shadows 54 Darkballs 56 Neoshadows (1 Reserved) 1 Invisible (Reserved)
This leg of the battle seemed to be drawing to a close. He hadn't done much to participate in it, though his Thundagolem seemed to aid Stratos greatly in his battle against the darkside, but he was going to make sure he at least helped finish it and hopefully he would be more proactive in the next portion of it. Now that the darkballs in the immediate area were over and dealt with, neoshadows began to perform their same old tactic of encircling him as pack hunters. However, this time there was no delay to size up their opponent. They simply went straight for the kill. Having little time to react, Beuce swung his blade at a nearby neoshadow. The heartless spun forward in midair and landed on the blade, running along it and getting in close. It swiped at his face, managing to get in a good swipe that left a mark along the right side of it. Beuce gasped in pain as the claws tore through his skin. He could feel the claw pass over eye, just narrowly avoiding blinding him. He wondered if the Shedim Lords would be so charitable as to give him another. While he was amused by the thought, he didn't waste any time breaking away from the heartless. If he'd been there any longer, they would've torn him apart. He reverted to his regular attire in a light burst, removing himself from the soldier job. It was far too slow to combat neoshadows and was almost certain to get him killed. Not to mention, the claw marks across his face were stinging pretty badly, and blood was beginning to cover his vision. He called upon a power that he had forgotten about for a while. Honestly, he wasn't even sure why he could still do it. His clothes darkened to a solid black, and gradually the lining of it began to glow with a neon blue light. He felt...different on the whole. Perhaps because he was no longer made of solid matter, so much as a collection of data. It was a strange experience to have the whole of your being transformed into a completely different substance. Well, he wasn't even really sure substance was the right word for it. Nevertheless, he reached onto his back and produced his frisby like weapon, his identity disc. With a quick flick of his wrist, the light went from its normal blue to a bright white, the perfect element for combating creatures of darkness. He tossed the disc straight at the neoshadow who had clawed his face and it went straight through the thing's chest. Unlike when they normally exploded into a black smokey substance, this time it seemed to shatter in a very computerized looking fashion, jagged bits of it laying on the ground before finally buzzing and fading from existence. So that was what they meant by "Derezzed". The disc came back to him, having bounced off some sort of surface and returning to his hands. He put it down, parallel to the ground and it floated, bringing up a user interface complete with a holographic keyboard. Punching in various random entries that he assumed to be strings of code, he suddenly felt quite a bit stronger. Apparently, whatever he had done, it gave him and all of his abilities quite the upgrade kek dan mating call. Total Words: 602 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 780 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 390 Heartless Defeated: 10 neoshadows 3 shadows Enemies Reserved: Neoshadow (Rydia) Invisible (Rubicante) Heartless Remaining: 118 Shadows 54 Darkballs 66 Neoshadows (1 Reserved) 1 Invisible (Reserved)
Beuce looked to the next set of enemies to be defeated and ran over to face them. A cluster of the floating spherical heartless known as Darkballs. Since they seemed to be far slower than his previous adversaries, he decided that it wouldn't be such a terrible idea to do something that packs a bit more of a punch. As usual when he shifted jobs, his body became enveloped in a red and blue light. As the energy spread out over his body, the red began to overcome and drown out the blue, indicating the dominance of power in this form. When finally the light faded, Beuce's clothing was made of far heavier fabric, largely comprised of red with a black trim around it. His arm felt like it was nearly torn from his shoulder at the sudden increase in weight from the object in his grip. The large grey steel double ended great sword plunged itself into the sand from its sheer weight. For a moment, he began to think Soldier may not have been such a fantastic idea as he'd forgotten just 'how' heavy the thing was. Then, an idea struck him square in the head. He had something that made maneuvering swords much easier. Focusing inward, he called upon his blade aura. An eerie silvery glow began to wrap around his silhouette, and his senses were immediately sharpened to a supernatural level. With the assist of the almost auto pilot like instincts granted to him by the aura, he managed to lift the massive blade from the ground to actually be wielded. It wasn't so much that it weighed less or that he had gotten stronger, but his grip and muscle movements were all far more efficient than they would've been without the aura, allowing him to do more than singular swings with the beast of a weapon. One of the darkballs evaporated into smoke and floated down toward him, expanding and biting at him. However, it was met with an explosive swing, instantly destroyed by the massive force of his cross slash. Spinning in a circle, he picked up more and more momentum, and eventually let the blade go, spiraling out and crashing through several of the darkballs before changing direction midair and coming back to its master. Beuce slid backwards, leaving deep heel prints in the sand as he caught the great sword. It was only due to the enhanced strength soldier that he was able to stop the blade. It was certainly a difficult weapon to use, but the power it packed was worth the effort. Readying himself into a stance, cherry blossoms fluttered through the air, indicating the command he was about to use. Once his Zantetsuken was fully prepared, he dashed forward with uncharacteristic speed and cleaved most of the darkballs remaining in half. One by one they exploded in a puff of black smoke, followed by a glowing red heart floating off into the sky to who knows where. No sooner than he'd finished the command, three darkballs charged through the air, rapidly gnashing its teeth in an attempt to bite down onto who had begun tearing through their ranks. Coating his blade in ice, he jumped into the air and slashed downward at the first, instantly destroying it. Still full of energy and his blade still empowered, he jumped up and repeated the process for the second of his assailants. Finally, the third one got the worst of it with the strongest blow, given that it was an aerial enemy. Also some shadows died. Total Words: 632 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 720 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 360 Heartless Defeated: 17 darkballs 1 shadow Enemies Reserved: Neoshadow (Rydia) Invisible (Rubicante) Heartless Remaining: 171 Shadows 55 Darkballs 77 Neoshadows (1 Reserved) 1 Invisible (Reserved)
Beuce began channeling his mana into the circle once again. To be honest, part of him wished that he hadn't sent his thundagolem away from him to help Stratos with the darkside as it could've defended him from the oncoming heartless. However, the heartless finally started to thin down, and there weren't as many left to prevent him from summoning. His limit had long since run out, and he'd only managed to get the Thundagolem out in its empowered state. He may use it again later, but for now, he just had to finish these things off as quickly as he could. He'd been a little bit inconsequential in this fight, but he wasn't thinking about that right this second. He reverted back to his base form and picked up his keyblade. He'd call on his golems later, but right now he figured it was better to get into the thick of things. For now, it looked like what he'd be fighting was mostly neoshadows. Lovely... The heartless darted around him with speed far exceeding his own. They encircled him in some kind of pack hunter mentality. He'd figured out a way out of this before, but there was no guarantee that the same tactic would always work every time. The keyblade master extended his keyblade and shot forth a burst of lightning from it at one of the Neoshadows threatening him. It electrocuted it, causing it to convulse on the ground and eventually explode. This, however, prompted the others to actually begin their assault. Beuce rushed forward in a shoulder charge, surrounded by barriers on all sides made of hard light. While it didn't stop their assault entirely, it protected him from the most immediate damage and managed to get him out from the middle of them. It even managed to take a few out as he went. Quickly redirected their focus, one managed to scratch him on the back, leaving a large claw mark on it as blood began to run down his back. The cuts weren't very deep, but they still made Beuce wince in pain. He spun around and grabbed the heartless by its face, using the darkness to drain out its life force and repair his wounds. It didn't quite fix the whole of them, but he could certainly deal with them and fix them later. As for the rest of them, he balled his hand into a fist. Light shone through his fingertips as though it were cupped around some bright source of energy, and he swung his fist downward. With it, four pillars of bright white energy crashed down from the sky onto the heartless attacking him. Unable to dodge the faith spell in time, several more neoshadows fell to it. Following it up, Beuce took a stance, and cherry blossoms floated down from seemingly nowhere, filling the air. With one blindingly fast cut that not even the neoshadows could every hope to see coming, let alone evade. In an instant, the rest of the neoshadows who had attempted to swarm him were destroyed, along with a couple of their lesser cousins. The horde was certainly beginning to thin itself out, but he knew that this was far from the end. They'd only fought two of the large enemies, and there was no way that they were the toughest of them. With the behemoths it was Arma. With the bloticles it was Timothy...Well, actually he was the strongest because he was also Arma. Would there be another Arma in this fight...? That would certainly be a rain on his parade. He glanced down to his left arm and gulped. Total Words: 626 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 660 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 330 Heartless Defeated: 10 Neoshadows 2 shadows Enemies Reserved: Neoshadow (Rydia) Invisible (Rubicante) Heartless Remaining: 175 Shadows 89 Darkballs 78 Neoshadows (1 Reserved) 1 Invisible (Reserved)
Luther looked on as Tango seemed to be wildly upset about the fact that the first round had been over so quickly. Luther was slightly confused at this, as it was largely his fault for not being able to keep up with him. Still, he did have a point. If it didn't last very long, there was no point in doing it. He wanted to draw out this feeling of adrenaline as long as he could. When the second round started, Tango summoned forth an enormous flaming dragon. If he'd had his illusory powers, then he may have been able to defend against it by misdirecting it and evading it. However, he had no such luck. While he didn't want round two to be over quite so quickly, he had little choice. The dragon struck him head on and incinerated him. It was only by the rules of the final fantasy that he survived it to go to the third round. "Well, You may have had a point with it being over too quickly, but I believe this is where the fun begins. Now neither of us are shackled by any constraints. Come at me with everything you've got!" Luther began to control the battlefield as his power came surging back into him. While Tango had access to that dragon, approaching would be a difficult task, and now that he was wise to his tactics, even hitting him once he'd gotten close would be an ordeal. To be honest, he wasn't even sure he could beat Tango at all. If that dragon so much as clipped him, the burns may well count as a fatal blow. Luther laughed to himself, he'd have it no other way. This was what he lived for. With renewed vigor, having seen his opponent's full power, he ran forward, creating a barrage of split second illusions to misdirect.
Beuce gazed up at the towering figured above them, clearly the most threatening of the heartless they'd encountered. Stratos appeared to be going toe to toe with one, barely managing to hold on with a barrage of spells. "Hey! Hold it off for a sec, I got an idea!" Now nevermind the fact that Stratos was clearly already doing that, but whatever. This was going to be cool. A light enveloped Beuce, indicating a change in job. It was a job he'd been using fairly frequently lately. His cape had been replaced by flowing streamers wrapping around his arms and seemingly animated of their own accord. That combined with his primarily blue outfit indicated that he was now in his summoner state. "Well...I've never actually tried this before, but it worked for everything else, so here goes nothing!" He twirled his keyblade around and eventually locked it in place parallel to the ground, his arms outstretched. His flesh arm gripped the keyblade, while the glass one had its palm flat against the back of that one. "Two sides of the mirror, power of the warrior and power of the mystic, transcend the barrier and become a force to reach out and take hold of the very heavens themselves!" The two blades of his keyblade instantly began to shimmer with an energy of the corresponding color. Gradually, they seemed to transmit their power down the keychain toward the other blade. With rapid pulses of power, the lights began to merge together into one blinding force. "Resound throughout all creation! Dichromatic Resonance!" The keyblade now let off an aura with a consistency similar to that of steam. Some of it was red, and some of it was blue, but where one ended and the other began was impossible to tell. Beuce meanwhile, seemed to radiate with a light to a similar effect, outlining his form. He stabbed the keyblade into the ground and placed his hands on either side of it, channeling magic into it as quickly as he could. "Awaken, Thundagolem!" The ley lines that formed the sigil with the keyblade in the center began to crackle with a yellow electricity, as they had any previous times he'd summoned the same creature. However, this time was different. With that keyblade specifically exercising its full power to merge the realms of might and magic, the lines trembled and shook the ground as they were filled with physical might. Finally, The summoning seemed to be complete as an enormous column of lightning channeled upward out of the summoning circle and into the sky, leaving a silhouette of an enormous figure, easily rivaling the darkside in sheer stature. Normally, the golems were just amorphous, vaguely humanoid embodiments of their elements, but this one in addition to being larger, was much more solid. It had a physical body, in addition to being made of electricity. It seemed outright solid, and the crackling energy that formed its body curved and bent into what appeared to be ever-shifting muscles. It stood from a crouching position and rolled its shoulders, before menacingly tilting its head and staring daggers at the darkside, who seemed to now notice this newfound threat. Though, it wasn't until the Thundagolem made its move that the darkside truly realized the depth of things. With blinding speed entirely unbecoming of its massive form, It leaped an incredible distance into the air and propelled itself downward at the darkside striking like roiling thunder from the sky, crashing into the ground with explosive force and electrocuting the heartless. Debris plumed into the air as it collided with the ground. The golem stood tall and looked to Stratos with a nod, acknowledging him as the ally of its summoner. With a flex, it invited challenge from the darkside which had by now recovered from the attack. It seemed in addition to a body, it had been given some level of self awareness as opposed to it just being an autonomous construct of magic designed to cast its spells until it was completely out of power, at which point it evaporated. Perhaps it had something to do with now being directly linked to the embodiment of Beuce's heart, his keyblade. It gave Beuce a fair bit of pause. If that was what it turned his golems into by being linked to his heart...What did that say about him? He mimicked the thundagolem's pose as several encroaching heartless and had never felt so empowered in his life. Turns out, this was the best idea he'd ever had. Total Words: 773 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 600 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 300 Heartless Defeated: 0 Heartless Injured: Darkside 1: 521/1500 Darkside 2: 1262/1500 Invisible: 22/50 Enemies Remaining: 1559 Shadows 349 Darkballs 386 Neoshadows (3 Reserved) 20 Invisibles 2 Darksides
'Two?!' Luther thought to himself. He wasn't sure why, given that he knew well ahead of time that Tango used multiple keyblades. It didn't matter much though. For this first round of combat, neither of them had any sort of supernatural powers. It was a duel of skill, and nothing else. "Seems like we're cut from the same cloth then!" Luther lunged forward, getting in close to Tango. Even without his Illusion powers, Luther was an expert at defensive swordplay. He would evade, parry, and riposte until there was a gap in their defenses somewhere. It might take longer the more skilled the opponent, but eventually he would slip up. Luther ducked and rolled, maneuvering to try and get behind tango so as to be in a position much harder to strike. Luther was quick on his feet. He brought up his bare hand to block a strike from Tango that came down on him during his movements, which harmlessly clanged off his skin. It seemed the Final Fantasy really did conform things to the rules he'd set. Nowhere but a fatal blow would have any impact. Luther continued to try and encircle and outflank Tango. He likely wouldn't win in a full frontal confrontation, so he needed to outmaneuver his opponent.
This set of neoshadows seemed to have witnessed and learned from what had happened to the last one. They approached cautiously. Each time he tried to strike at them, they fled into the ground to avoid being hit by his blade. Scurrying beneath the earth, safe from harm, they repositioned themselves and attempted to strike at him once again. Given their increasingly infuriating tactics, Beuce was starting to get a little annoyed with the things. One jumped out of the ground and raked its claws at him, but he simply brought up his glass arm to intercept it. Try as it might, the heartless was hopelessly outdone in terms of its offensive power against the hardness of the arm. A blizzara spell to its chest was all that was needed to quickly dispatch it. Still, these things were going to be a problem if he couldn't find a way to get around their hit and run strategy. Not to mention, cautious as they were, they weren't exactly giving him room to think. He had basically been reduced to parrying their claws, with the occasional strike against them. He looked down as one rose from the ground beneath him and struck at his legs. His eyes widened as a thought struck him. The attack from beneath him had reminded him of something. He raised up the magical end of his keyblade and five clusters of explosive force formed in front of him. "Seeker Mine!" With another wave of the weapon, he sent them out searching for prey to detonate on. They scanned the ground aimlessly for a bit, leaving the white haired master with baited breath. Finally, the seemed to "lock on" to the various neoshadows beneath the ground, and hover over them for the duration of their time beneath the ground. While they didn't detonate, the shadows couldn't safely come up without triggering the spell and being destroyed. It appeared there was a limited amount of time they could stay under the ground, as eventually they were forced to exit, and the mines instantaneously exploded in a blast of force that launched them into the air. It didn't quite finish them off, but it certainly created enough of an opening. Wasting no time on the joy that his plan had succeeded in forcing them out of the ground long on to attack, he threw a strike raid toward one of the heartless and dashed with all his might to get in the way of another so that the return trip would take it out. He managed to just barely succeed, and two of the obnoxious heartless were destroyed. With one last effort, he fired a firaga at another that managed to connect right before it landed and presumably vanished into the ground once again. With three of them destroyed by his move, his mana reserves were running a little low. Thankfully, the remaining neoshadows seemed to realize that going underground wasn't going to save them anymore, now that Beuce had figured out a way to effectively hurt them while they were in it, so a head on assault was their only option. They ran forward with frightening speed and spun into a wheel of a claw slash. Beuce managed to smack one of them into the air and follow it up with a splattercombo. The second one was a little bit more difficult. They managed to evade one another's attacks, but with its far superior speed, it was going to win in a battle of evasion, so Beuce broke away from it, throwing another strike raid to finish it off. It seemed like most of the neoshadows in the general area were dealt with, so he ran to help Stratos with the more round and hopefully less obnoxious ones. Total Words: 656 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 480 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 240 Heartless Defeated 5 neoshadows 1 shadow Remaining 90 Shadows 33 Neoshadows 96 Darkballs
These heartless seemed to be not only intelligent in the way the approached combat, but it also looked like they were pack hunters. He was glad they were only in the realm of darkness for a short amount of time, and during that time they were mostly participating in the reaper's game. If they'd been there for very long before dreamer had collected them all and taken them through the castle of illusions, the heartless almost certainly would've picked them off one by one. If he had to face this horde alone, he wasn't sure he'd have the mental fortitude to steel himself for it. As he expected, the heartless all leaped at him at once. He knew that if they succeeded in swarming him, he wouldn't stand a chance against their speed. So, he stepped up onto a yellow orb he had created beneath him, and it shot out into a line sparking with electricity as he rode it out of the immediate threat area of the heartless. Having avoided the attack by momentarily taking to the air above them, he turned back around to go on the offensive. It was only for a moment, but they were all clustered up. Leaping off his powerline early, he looked down onto them, his vision focusing in on them to an unnatural height. Once again, the shining white cherry blossoms filled the area around him. Without wasting a moment, he seemed to blink out of reality and appear on the other side of the neoshadows. A momentary pause and an unnatural stillness from those heartless was followed by an enormous slash mark that tore their ranks apart. One 'pop' after another as most of the ones nearby had exploded into clouds of darkness and floated off to who knows where. He looked to Ignis, who was fighting in the same area as the two of them and apparently primarily focusing on shadows. That was good. In just their area, they had someone on every remaining type of target. "Well, we didn't have to deal with the really big ones right away thanks to Kuma. Him fighting whoever that was is also probably the reason the heartless aren't immediately swarming us all at once. He controls them, and his concentration is broken right now. Really, I think that's the best we can ask for. Besides, we're masters now. We've done nearly nothing but hide behind people stronger than us up till now, but we have the power to fight back now. If we can't handle a few thousand heartless between us, then why are we even trying for No Heart? Still, once we're done...I can't say it won't be nice to actually sit down and relax for a minute." He looked to the horde of Neoshadows as it began to replenish itself from his Zantetsuken. "Yeah. I assume you took fire?" He threw his keyblade as a lance to pierce through the chest of a neoshadow that had jumped toward him, then summoned it back to his hand in a spiral of blue and red light. "I think mine is called Blade? Its for anything that requires using the keyblade at all." He jumped up and crashed down onto an unsuspecting neoshadow that hadn't even finished emerging from the ground. His planted the red side into its neck, and adjusted his hands to be wielding its more mystical counterpart. "It seems like it gives a helping hand to most things that we do. It's really nice." Total Words: 613 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 420 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 210 Heartless Defeated 5 neoshadows 1 shadow Remaining 98 Shadows 53 Neoshadows 104Darkballs
"Hah, well to be fair, you were kind of weak back then." He said to Stratos, who commented on the moment past when he'd used soldier and empowered Stratos with it, to minimal effect. "Though, that was only back then." He said, watching the boy effortlessly destroy a swath of heartless with the raw physical power the job gave him. From the looks of things, the battle was beginning to pick up in pace. Off in the distance, he spied Aux, who had decided to actively begin participating. He still wasn't sure how well they'd be able to trust him, but for the moment he appeared to be concentrating his efforts entirely toward the heartless. To speak nothing of his reliability of personality, he was exceedingly powerful, so Beuce didn't think too much on his participation. It would be an enormous boon. Stratos had begun to deal with the horde of darkballs that approached them, while Beuce continued to battle the neoshadows on the ground. In an incredibly bout of luck, Beuce managed to reach out and grab onto the antenna of a neoshadow. He could swear the beady yellow eyes grew larger the moment his hand clasped down onto it. Now that it was unable to escape with it's speed Beuce was more than strong enough to do with it as he pleased. With a heavy swing, he threw it full force into a darkball that Stratos was currently facing. The rotund heartless was caught unaware as its more slender companion crashed into it, sending both of them tumbling. At least, they would've gone tumbling if a pillar of light hadn't been called down from the heavens above and turned them both into a familiar inky black smoke. Beuce, having three more pillars to spend, attempted to incinerate two more neoshadows, but they dodged in opposite directions, forcing him to choose between the two. These things were getting a bit to clever for his liking. He fired the third pillar on the one that dodged to the left. Fast and dexterous as it may have been, it couldn't change its direction midair. So, the white light struck it dead on and immediately removed it from the fight. He fired the final pillar at another darkball near Stratos, knowing full well he couldn't hit the neoshadow with it. Instead, he took up a stance, red side at the ready. The agile heartless sprinted toward the seemingly wide open keyblade master. It lunged, only to find a flow of cherry blossoms radiating with a white aura fill its vision, and it was split in half by an impossibly fast and impossibly powerful strike. As Beuce discovered, Zantetsuken was also empowered by his new aura, along with Stratos' strength bolstering presence. Honestly, this was just incredibly useful all around as an offensive tool. He got the feeling, however, that he couldn't sustain more than one at a time, so he decided to save his other two for later. No sense showing all his tricks up front, especially when the heartless seemed to be getting more and more intelligent and capable of planning. He just hoped they didn't develop speech. Several more neoshadows seemed to rise out of the ground, now encircling him in some sort of arena. He'd started to use his stronger attacks, and they'd begun to view him as more of a threat. Taking a deep breath, Beuce prepared himself for their oncoming onslaught. Total Words: 604 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 360 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 180 Heartless Defeated 4 neoshadows 2 darkballs Remaining 111 Shadows 65 Neoshadows 117 Darkballs
Beuce looked over as stratos had come to offer a hand, defeating several shadows along the way. "Well, I wouldn't really so much say trouble, but this whole darkness thing really takes it out of you, ya know? In any case. I appreciate the hand." He said, honestly glad to see that Stratos was now directly fighting the same foes he was, as opposed to another section of the horde. Stratos appeared appeared to have not used any magic in a while, and as soon as he'd stepped close to him, Beuce could feel his muscles surge with power. Best he could surmise, Stratos was using Soldier. That was new. It was also a tad ironic, given that he used to view stratos as weak. Not in the sense of combat prowess so much as raw physical strength. "We've come a long way, haven't we?" He said, remembering their battles past. They were masters now, and they didn't need to hide behind anyone any longer. Beuce ran into several shadows and brandished his keyblade, filling it with darkness and slashing over and over, performing a massive combo. It helped him regain his lost mana, allowing him to cast more spells. In addition, it seemed doubly empowered by both his blade aura and the darkness from his Dark Knight job. The blade ripped through the ranks of the shadows like they were made of paper. "This is getting a little exhausting. I'll save this for one of the bigger guys. You know, one of those guys with the tendril faces that Kuma one shot at the beginning of the fight." He gave one last dark thundaga to destroy a large horde of shadows and went out of his dark knight form, returning to his usual non-edgy attire. Now that he no longer had to worry about the burdens of the darkness draining his health away every time he thought about attacking, he was free to go on the offensive a little bit more. A green light washed over him as he flashed a quick cure spell to top himself off, and he returned to business as usual. Throwing a spinning keyblade toward a nearby shadow, it dodge it by melding into the ground. Honestly, Beuce found these particular heartless more annoying than actually threatening, but the others had been dealing with the bigger ones, and someone had to make sure they didn't get out of hand with their sheer numbers. Although with the arrival of Stratos, the shadow and neoshadow populations had seemingly merged into one, as opposed to before where they only slightly mingled together. One of the red ones, seemingly a stronger breed of neoshadows, came charging at him. Quickly darting from side to side in a zigzag pattern, making its movements had to predict. Once it had reached him, it went to swipe. Beuce moved to slash at it ahead of time and at the very least knock it away before the blow connected, but it stopped its attack short, leaped backwards, and lunged forward once again, managing to rake its claws along Beuce's left shoulder. "Gah, these things are way worse to fight than the little ones." He decided he wasn't going to win in a battle of outright speed, as even with his blade aura enhancing his swordsmanship, it was simply faster than he was, and possessed the intellect, or at least combat instincts, to use it to its advantage. Turning his keyblade around to the blue and, he aimed a firaga spell at it. It dodged out of the way initially, but their magic often had a way of finding its target regardless, and curved its path to crash into the agile heartless. Total Words: 645 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 300 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 150 Heartless Defeated 21 shadows 1 neoshadow Remaining 380 Shadows 118 Neoshadows 170 Darkballs
Beuce maneuvered through as many heartless as he could, cutting them down one by one. He decided he'd currently focus primarily on the shadows, so as to thin their numbers down as much as he could. Individually, they weren't so much of a threat, but through their sheer numbers they threatened to overwhelm the new masters. Beuce would do all he could to keep that from happening. He focused inward on himself and draw out another new power. Similarly to when he transformed into one of his various jobs, a light began to envelope him. However, unlike other times, this light was a dark purple mixed with black. When he emerged, his outfit was far darker in color and had armored aspects to it. His hair had grown dimmer, and unlike all of his other jobs, his keyblade remained unchanged. A shadow popped out of freakin nowhere from the ground like some kinda crazy guy with a knife on the street that could meld into the ground. However, it scratched him to seemingly very little effect. Beuce turned to the shadow and produced a black flame in his hand, throwing it and instantly evaporating his aspiring attacker. However, as soon as he'd done so, he winced in pain. "Well damn, is that what using the darkness is like?" It felt like the force inside him that was giving him power also ate away at his inside every time he used it. Thankfully, it replaced it could be replaced just as fast as it was taken away. Multiple shadows swarmed him and swiped and clawed at him over and over, but their attacks were so weak, they barely got through his resistances to the darkness. In addition...Being struck seemed to caused the darkness inside to strengthen and rejuvenate his body in response, so as to not allow its host to fall when it still needed their life to function. "Man, this stuff is dangerous... It takes your blood and dries you up, but gives you just enough to keep kicking." He said, apparently given a newfound understanding of the way darkness functioned when wielded in combat. He reached out his glass arm, which was now more vibrant in some areas and darker in others so as to accentuate the images on it. He grabbed a shadow by the head and drew the life out of it to heal himself. The shadow squirmed and struggled, but to now avail. Now revitalized, he decided he'd spend it once again. Spinning his keyblade to the magic end, he called down a mighty barrage of black and purple lightning. "Dark Thundaga!" As the spell hit the ground, it exploded with a far more violent force than a normal thundaga would. Apparently, darkness was malleable and could be used to augment almost any other element, but the more he used it, the more apparent its drawbacks became. Both physically and mentally it was incredibly taxing to use. However, Beuce was no stranger to exhaustion, and while it wouldn't work on the more powerful enemies, the shadows proved to be all but unable to harm him in this form. He drained the life out of another shadow to keep himself sustained, as he seemed to be doing more damage to himself than the heartless were to him. He'd change out of this form shortly, but for now, he wanted to test the limits of what this new job they'd obtained was able to do. Besides, he'd have other things to do down the line. Total Words: 602 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 240 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 120 Heartless Defeated 26 shadows Defeat 479 Shadows Defeat 123 Neoshadows Defeat 172 Darkballs
Beuce began to laugh when Stratos said that if he didn't want him to pass him up, he'd have to keep a faster pace. "Buddy, you aren't giving me time to breathe with your growth rate. Still..." He moved his shoulder, stretching his muscles. "I guess I gotta pick up the pace. It's a good a time as any to use our new toys." Beuce concentrated on something deep within himself, something new that had just joined him. Summoning it forth to the surface, he called out "Blade!" and a silvery aura surrounded him, the color of steel. Not Steel like the wolf guy but steel as in the metal. Beuce brandished his weapon and moved through the shadows with unparalleled grace and motion. His raw power hadn't gotten any stronger, but his bladework had become peerless. No matter how many shadows tried to claw at him, he moved his weapon to intercept them, and destroyed them before they ever managed to lay a claw on his skin. Using his keyblade as a source of leverage, he vaulted over a neoshadow, quickly getting behind it. Instantly turning to face him due to its near unrivaled speed in this fight, it attacked him with a barrage of swipes and slashes from the long claws attached to its arms. Beuce maneuvered his blade in a counteractive slash for each one, spinning it as he did so. The shadow backed away for a moment as the keyblade master just stood there twirling it between his fingers. An impressive feat, given how unwieldly the weapon was, but right now Beuce felt like it was an extension of himself, and he had nearly total control over his weapon. In a sense, it literally was an extension of himself. Wasting no more time showing off to the heartless that would soon be dead, Beuce lunged forward, sliding across the ground. Normally this was a weaker, more mobile tool of combat they possessed, but Beuce had turned it just as deadly as most of their other arsenal. He slashed upward the moment he reached the neoshadow, cleaving it in two. A few darkballs rushed him, gnashing their teeth as they rapidly flew through the air. He wasn't quite able to counter all of them as, despite his skill with his blade, it could only be in on place at a time. However, being hit didn't mean he wasn't going to make them pay for it ten times over. Ice coated his keyblade as he leaped into the air at the flying heartless, slashing straight through the first one. It exploded into an inky black smoke, just like all the others had, and just like the ones before him were about to. A second leap, and his blade broke the skin of the second darkball, destroying it instantly in a very similar fashion. Much like the sliding dash, his newfound precision and overall extra efficiency with his keyblade gave it an extra boost in power. It seemed anything requiring it would enjoy these benefits as long as he maintained this form. Finally, he leaped at the third darkball, with turned on its back upward so as to try and catch the keyblade in its mouth. "You want it? You can have it." Beuce's jump brought him a fair bit higher than the rest, and instead of slashing downward onto the heartless like the other two, Beuce landed on its face and used it to propel himself even higher into the air, at which point he threw his keyblade, power side first, as a Javelin downward into the heartless' mouth and out the back of it. Total Words: 637 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 120 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 60 Heartless Defeated 1 neoshadow 3 darkballs 12 shadows Defeat 593 Shadows Defeat 168 Neoshadows Defeat 193 Darkballs
Beuce looked around at the broken and dark world. It was...hardly what he'd been expecting for their triumphant return to the realm of light, but he soon saw the cause for it. An older man standing, proclaiming he would prove his worth to Nequa. Apparently she had rejected him or something, but whatever the reason, he was bad news for the SOS. He seemed to exude dark power as he summoned forth a plethora of heartless that put the one at central haven to shame. The current most menacing of them was easily taken out by a new arrival. Beuce looked on and beamed, recognizing him as the master who would have given them the mark at Central Haven. Apparently, he'd be taking on the one in charge of the heartless for a while. Stratos casually turned to him, giving a "same old song and dance". Beuce couldn't help but chuckle. He was right. This was hardly the first time they'd been through an ordeal very similar to this, but this time, one thing was different. They weren't struggling for their lives to run away from it. They were facing it head on as masters, and they were going to blow it right out of the water. Beuce was ready, but something gave him pause. Stratos was tearing through the heartless with far more ease and confidence than normal. He'd done a lot of work in the previous battles, and there was no one he'd rather have at his side in such a time, but this was different. When did he get...that strong? Beuce leaped into the fray with his friend shortly after the battle began. "Hey, hey, hey, who said you could go and get stronger than I am when I wasn't looking?" He mused aloud. A neoshadow leaped at him, spinning its whole body with impossible dexterity. First a vertical swipe, then a horizontal one in the same jump. Beuce however summoned his keyblade and back-stepped out of the way, before lunging forward and cleaving the heartless in two. Following the larger one was a plethora of regular shadows. Beuce charged them head on and mowed them down one by one, each time a small red heart floated up. He threw out his dual ended keyblade in a straight line, decimating a row of the small heartless. Another neoshadow leaped at him with just the right timing before his keyblade returned to him, but Beuce didn't even turn to face it. Instead he simply muttered the word "Stop" and it was frozen in midair, unable to finish its assault. He raised his hand and snapped his fingers three times. The first put a seeker mine spell beneath it, the second cast a gravity spell to shove it downward into it, and the third called down a barrage of lightning bolts from above to finish it off. Beuce caught the keyblade on the return, and time unfroze for the unsuspecting heartless. Nearly as soon as it had unfrozen, it was violently ripped out of its jump and into the mines. The mines then proceeded to all go off by the impact and launch it into the air with the force, and into the decimating array of lightning bolts he'd called down from the sky. Beuce brandished his keyblade and returned to work. He did, however, look over to see how Stratos was doing. He couldn't help but feel a sense of pride that Stratos had gotten so powerful. He'd viewed him as something of a younger brother, but now, he was clearly his equal, if not more. A sense of rivalry ignited in his heart, Beuce cleaved through more of the heartless in his path. Total Words: 616 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 60 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 30 Heartless Defeated 16 shadows 2 neowshadows Heartless Remaining Defeat 714 Shadows Defeat 183 Neoshadows Defeat 196 Darkballs Defeat 1 Invisibles
The man seemed to be willing take take Luther up on his challenge. His eyes sparked even more with excitement. He nodded when Tango asked if he was the one with Illusion powers. He already knew, so there was little point in hiding it. Not to mention, Tango revealed his own element of Fire, saying something about how it would make a powerful Luther listened to his proposal of something called a "Final Fantasy". It appeared to be some variety of wager where they bet their element in some sort of competition. "Interesting. I like it! Let's do it!" Luther said, his excitement growing. He looked to Melus. "It's better if I do this alone. Normally, help would be appreciated, but it would make him stronger." He, being the challenged party, had the right to set up a variety of rules and conditions. After brief consideration, he came to a conclusive answer. "First, A set of duels, best of three. Second, For the first duel, there will be no supernatural powers, only raw skill with a blade. If you win a round, your opponent regains the use of their powers. Win again, and congratulations. Lose, and the real fun begins. Round three will have both of us at our full power, free to do as we please. Finally, Only a fatal blow will be able to damage your opponent. A stab to the heart, a slit throat, whatever you like. Take a fatal blow, and you lose the round. Anything less will be nullified. Strike to kill, after all. " As the man finished listing his set of conditions, their hearts began to radiate in a light, flooding their vision and the whole area. The earth beneath them rumbled and shook, changing the entire terrain around them. Once vision was restored, they stood opposite on another in an arena of sorts. An enormous smooth, flat surface. There was no cover to hide behind, not walls to help win the fight. The only thing that mattered here was your opponent, and how you were going to kill them. Luther took up a stance and readied himself with a focusing breath. "Okay...Let's dance!"
Luther's eyes narrowed into a glare at Tango as he banished Lea to god only knows where. Anger welled up inside him. They hadn't helped Lea at all by stepping in, they'd made it worse. Apparently, the only way to beat this man was to fight him one on one, in a duel. "Hey!" Luther called out, refusing to be disrespected to the extent of having him just walk away from them. A small slap was heard on the ground behind Tango. If he turned around, he'd find a black glove on the ground, and Luther's left hand bare. "Where do you think you're going? You might've finished your mission, but you haven't finished the fight. I won't stand for that kind of disrespect." Luther's eyes had a fire in them. It wasn't a fire of anger, though that was surely somewhere inside him as well. This man had just defeated Lea nearly effortlessly, and they'd been powerless to stop him. This was someone...who could beat him. He held his blade at his side, his hand quivering with excitement. "You wouldn't just abandon a battle half finished? Where's the honor in that?" He could barely contain the grin that threatened to creep onto his face. After all those years of withering away on the inside, finally he'd found a fire that burned away all the rust and decay, and it was nearly coming through his skin.
Adalric listened as he accompanied the group into the tunnels. He knew that his master had asked him to make friends with them but...It was a little difficult to just insert oneself into an already existing group. In addition, two of the three he was with were the ones from the realm of darkness. He was having trouble finding anything to contribute to the conversation, so he was content just listening for the moment. He couldn't quite agree with Take's logic. Hide it in a bad hiding spot, so that no one would ever think to look there. While it made sense in theory, it seemed to be overthinking it quite a bit. Shortly afterwards, they came to a fork in pathways. It seemed these tunnels never ended. His head perked up as he heard Torrin speak his name. "Oh, yes?" He listened to the young master's concerns. "Well, discretion is the better part of valor. We can't beat the light chaser in a head on fight from what I've heard, so misdirection is essentially our only option at this point. From a purely strategic standpoint the best course of action would likely be to just get one of the princesses, Aria, for instance, and keep her in the council world for an indefinite amount of time. That way, he'd never get all seven and we could simply wait out the light chaser until he died of old age, as all do eventually. Though, obviously we can't simply imprison her. So this is likely our next best option. I understand your concern, but we haven't got a lot of alternatives."
