Tocsax would say to Seth, "The Heartless [i]are[/i] the Phantoms in your world; Phantoms are your name for the Heartless infestation. As for the Keyblade..." He held up his purple-and-black weapon, "This is an example of one; let's just say that the laws of reality have to be twisted in order to make it a viable weapon. But don't worry; those with strong hearts eventually get these weapons; it is only a matter of time."

Damianos then looked at Ziton and Baqar and continued, "The enemy who has unleashed the Heartless, Leo the Second Mathematician and his Seekers of Darkness, has plenty of human minions as well, which is why warriors of all kinds will be needed."

The Emperor would then smile at Lukas, and say, "Finally, someone asks the relevant question. First up, the goal is not to reunify the Multiverse; too many lives will be at risk if we do that. No, the goal is to prevent our enemy, the one named Leo the Second Mathematician, from dissolving, then reshaping the Multiverse. This is to be done by denying him the weapon used to split apart the Multiverse in the first place. Damianos, end the riddles and begin the true exposition."

"Aye," was the Wizard's reply as his wand glowed once more, and the hologram of the Multiverse shifted into a single Earth, a blue-green globe spinning silently in the cosmos.

Damianos' voice acquired an unusual solemness as he continued speaking, "Once, there was One Earth, One Timeline, and One Humanity. In that world, in the years 2017 to 2019 in the Western Calendar, there was a boy, [i]Ascot[/i]. Ascot was a genius, smart and inquisitive beyond his years. But he felt as though he lived in a world in decline, one that was sliding head-long into nuclear warfare. And so, he searched and searched for a way to prevent such a calamity. And he found it in old texts and new physics, ones that spoke of a mysterious force that we know today as The Light, or [i]Lux[/i]. All Light flowed from a mysterious place called Kingdom Hearts, [i]the[/i] Heart of existence."

The hologram shifted to a giant 'heart', one that looked like a sterotypical Valentines' Day Heart, only it glowed blue-and-white, while its left side was marked with darker spots that made it look like the Moon's surface. Damianos continued, "Kingdom Hearts was protected by its counterpart, the X-blade; pronounced 'Key-blade'. And Ascot managed to summon said X-blade to himself, becoming its legitimate owner and giving him the power to save his world...just as the bombs were being launched. Powerful weapons of mass destruction were those bombs, containing uranium and plutonium, mundane counterparts of the Ghost Rock from Lucas' world."

An image then showed of Ascot raising his X-blade at a wave of large rockets/missiles flying towards the city where he lived, and all of those vanishing. Another wave of his X-Blade, and another spell was cast, making it physically impossible to use nuclear material for anything but power generation; people can still use nuclear energy to make electricity, but any attempt to use uranium, plutonium, or any similar material to make weapons atuomatically caused those materials to turn to lead. The group can see Ascot smiling in mingled happiness and exhaustion...before his X-blade glowed brightly, releasing an uncontrolled blast of light.

~~~~~

((Take a moment to pause and rest to that you guys don't lose track of the details.))

"Ascot lost control of his powers in saving his world, causing the Multiverse to split into its component parts. What was one, became more, what was absurd, became possible. The X-blade broke apart into several shards, because its legitimate owner had tried too much without training or experience. And Ascot, weary beyond all reason, vanished into a Tomb, even though he was still alive." A white-and-gold masoleum appeared then, flying above some skyscrapers. "But that did not mean the end of all conflict."

Scenes were then shown of people wielding lesser Keyblades that resembled the X-blade, and making war with each other. "The people of the worlds fashioned weapons of their own, Keyblades that manifested from their own Hearts, and warred with each other to dominate Kingdom Hearts. They mostly killed each other, but a few repentant survivors foreswore any attempt to conquer the Multiverse, forming the Old Keyblade Order."

"The Old Keyblade Order prospered, taking new recruits from people with strong hearts. One of those recruits was someone from this world, Leo the Second Mathemathician. Leo was a bright soul, but one who chafed under the strict restrictions of the Old Keyblade Order, as well as doubted their beliefs in cosmology; that Light was always good. To him, Light and Darkness were merely two sides of the same coin; neither can exist without the other."

"In fact, in his view, Light was tyrannizing over Darkness, and so the worlds had to be remade, so that Light and Darkness had to be in equal balance. So, he moved to do just that, summoning a giant robot known as the [i]Gurren Lagann[/i], a weapon that was only slightly weaker than the X-blade in power, but had the weakness of depending on hot-bloodedness instead of the cold hard logic that Leo preferred."

"And he largely succeeded in destroying the Old Keyblade Order. There were survivors and retired members, but there was no more structure, no more organization. Leo was now free to accomplish the next set of his agenda."

"Under the guise of a student, Leo went to the world of Shining Field, a world where Genghis Khan was never born, and his son Hulegu never destroyed Baghdad, allowing the latter to remain a centre of knowledge and wisdom. There, he convinced Hakim the Wise, the Grand Vizier, to conduct experiments on Light and Darkness, experiments that caused the world to be consumed in the latter, and the Heartless to spread and become organized."

"And that is when worlds began falling and falling in quick succession." He then paused for breath. 

"Michael, let me continue," said Tocsax, his face turning towards the group. 

~~~~~

((Take another moment to pause and rest to that you guys don't lose track of the details.))

"I used to be a part of a group created by Leo, the Circle, which in turn was the precursor to the Thirteen - actually Twelve - Seekers of Darkness. From there, I discovered many of his secrets before defecting to Emperor Michael. The tales of my exploits would keep you standing for far longer than comfortable, so I'll make this brief."

"As certain peope here can see, I am a Nobody, and my name denotes that I am the Nobody of Ascot, the maker of the Multiverse for good or for ill." He then looked at the aforementioned Seth and Lukas, before saying:

"And...as anyone who knows how Nobodies are born, that means that Ascot has a Heartless as well." Tocsax would pause, then continue:

"First up, the Heartless, despite their name, are actually disembodied Hearts, consumed by Darkness and transformed into the terror we know today. Nobodies are the remnants of the original person or people whose heart was consumed, the mind, body, and soul. Basically, the leavings of the Heartless, which then come to life. Some of them are feral, unintelligent creatures no better than the Heartless. Others, made from strong-willed people, are indistinguishable from humans, except that they start out as lacking Hearts. They are born emotionless, but can, in time, regrow a replacement Heart as they grow older."

"That's what eventually happened with me," spoke Tocsax. "Either way, what I'm getting at...is that there is a way to restore Ascot. Two ways, in fact. One is to kill his Heartless, then me, restoring the Original Person. The other is to use a sufficiently strong source of Light to restore Ascot's Heartless back into a human. We are to either look for those sources of light, or kill me, then Ascot's Heartless when he is found. This will deny Leo the ability to make his own X-blade, by restoring the legitimate holder of the weapon..."

[@Rai][@The 42nd Gecko][@Rex][@WXer][@Double][@Gentlemanvaultboy]