As much as everyone needed a break from the events of the Winterhold College labyrinth, a freezing high-altitude mountainside was not the place to do it, no matter how many pyro-infused monoliths or Red Antlers happened to litter the windblown ruins. Without their steadfast stagecoach, abandoned somewhere on the slopes below, there would be no refuge within this ill-omened place. The Seekers’ destination -and the end of their long trek through the inhospitable Frozen Highlands- loomed above them. Midnight Walk or not, the upward path was calling to them, and they could only put off their answer so long.

Even without the stagecoach that he had turned into the team’s mobile base, however, Edward was prepared to forge a path ahead. His implacable ironclad tank would plow through the drifts of snow and flatten the unseen hazards that promised to snag coats and sprain ankles. And if any minor threats poked their heads out just beyond the beaten path, the Seekers’ dreadnaught could count on his inventive new companion to wipe them off the face of Moon Mountain with a jury-rigged bomb. Edward might not receive his fair share of thanks, but Sandalphon knew that the team owed him a great deal for his hard work during this expedition, no doubt far more than they owed her. Any less helpful or solely combat-focused comrades who consigned themselves to merely being along for the ride could progress only because Edward allowed it. The archangel believes that the team’s lives and leadership could be safely entrusted to him, should it come to that.

As he prepared to set off again, his pack tightened and his new, unconventional weapon sharpened, Heismay was displeased to find that the gray-furred brother cats (whose collars, upon further inspection, identified them as Baconator and Whopper) would simply not leave him be. Relentless, dauntless, and shamelessly pushy, they chased him down wherever he retreated in order to rub up against him or attempt to climb him. He attempted to focus on the looted spirits, looking amongst them for a potential Striker. The Stargazer struck him as the most promising candidate, a more cosmic abomination to join the grotesque one he already wielded. Since neither Ace nor Heismay seemed interested, Heismay went ahead and spiritbound the thing, the Stargazer’s binding as unceremonious as its predecessor’s.



Over the course of a few minutes it eventually became clear that Heismay had little choice in the matter of whether or not these felines would accompany him on the treacherous road ahead. At the point where one of them managed to make it on top of his head, Heismay lost patience. He grabbed the young tom by his scruff, pulled him off, and sat him down in the snow next to his brother.

“That’s quite enough,” he told the two gruffly, crossing his wings. “As I told you already, you have no future with me. Are you both truly so eager to die on the long and dangerous journey that lies ahead?” He stared at the cats one after another, his expression severe. Baconator contorted himself to scratch his chin with one footpaw, while Whopper tilted his head in confusion and meowed. After a moment, Heismay let out a grunt of annoyance. “Tch. Fine, fine, very well. If you truly care so little for your safety, then do as you wish. Be warned, however, that I’ll brook no disobedience. In this company, you will be soldiers first and foremost. Am I understood?”

Whopper swatted at Baconator’s scruffy ear, and in a flash Baconator rounded on his brother to tackle him, sending both rolling through the snow.



By the time that Heismay whipped the little hooligans into shape, the rest of the Seekers were ready to move out again. With only a disgruntled head shake at Ace, the eugief and his two new charges fell in with the others on the trail blazed by Edward’s ironclad as it began to rumble upward into the howling, wintry dark. Preferring a less bumpy ride that would agonize her half-petrified body less, Sandalphon rode atop a steed provided by Edward, her own newly-adopted cleric held close for warmth. Although it remained to be seen how effective the felines would be as battle companions, it reassured her to have more than ten combatants present for what promised to be the expedition’s final battle. The archangel struggled to conceive of how things could possibly continue to ramp up after Winterhold, but she imagined that she wouldn’t have to wait long to find out. At the very least, there still seemed to be some semblance of a navigable path leading higher up the mountain, rather than slippery slopes and sheer cliffs. Maybe, after everything they’d been through, the Midnight Walk still led the Seekers onward. Or maybe, as the Soulfisher once told Sectonia, they had lost their way along the Midnight Walk because they were meant to.



Up, up, up they climbed. The wind whipped at their coats and capes, the unyielding stone fought against them, and the bitter cold seeped into their bones. Other than a handful of tough, mealy orange winterberries, the landscape yielded no solace. For Sectonia, this felt rather familiar, oddly reminiscent of the Sandswept Sky’s split mountain and Yellow Team’s grueling ascent. That particular climb, made all the more brutal by a powerful blizzard, had been so cruelly long and arduous that the peak seemed to leech the life itself from the Seekers’ bodies. Moon Mountain did not feel quite so impossible, but something strange about it seemed to turn the climbers’ thoughts back upon themselves, amplifying the doubts and fears that crawled and slithered around the edges of their minds, discreetly gnawing away at their strength. Maybe it was the abundance of shadowy recesses amongst the rocks from which dangers could spring–in which more than one traveler could swear they saw round, unblinking white eyes in their peripheral vision. Maybe it was the way that the stones were shaped, uncannily like faces, frozen in eternal torment. Maybe it was the way the wind died down, from a baleful roar to a mere whistle and whisper, so subtle that the sojourners might just be imagining it. Or maybe it was the way that the darkness closed in on them, making the backdrop beyond Moon Mountain fade away until there was nothing beyond the mountain but a pitch-black void.

Even the rumble and clamor of the ironclad tank eventually faded away. Heismay was dimly aware of it somewhere ahead of him as he continued to walk, his new charges trotting faithfully behind him, but he couldn’t see it anymore. Only the stone shards left behind by its heavy, crushing treads. At some point the person behind him -Blazermate- had fallen far enough behind him that she was nowhere to be seen when the Eugief glanced over his shoulder. Only after a little while spent traveling like this, with an occasional worried look out at the pitch-black void, did it seem to sink in for Heismay that this wasn’t normal.

Something was wrong. In the void beyond the mountain, something was moving. A gigantic, towering, indistinct figure whose nebulousness seemed a rare blessing. Heismay thought he saw enormous, squirming intestines, a glassy eye in its chest, and where its head should be…

”Dad!”

Heismay froze in his tracks, the eldritch giant forgotten as he whipped his head toward the path ahead. An instinctive reply died on his lips as his mouth hung open, suddenly dry. He wrenched off his hood so his long ears could unfurl in order to turn this way and that, trying to identify the sound’s source, but the faded echoes offered no clues.

After a moment, Heismay swallowed. “It can’t be,” he croaked as he checked on the cat brothers, suddenly very glad they were there. They were looking around, confused and alert, with their fur standing on end. “It can’t be…”

He stepped forward, past the corner of a protruding cliff, and made a bizarre discovery. In front of him lay a large alcove recessed into the mountainside, not quite a cave. It was home to a sort of town square, filled with a shadowy throng gathered before the gallows. A dark figure with furry, doglike ears and a tail, hung by the neck, and most of those in the crowd shared similar features. Angry voices, not quite distinguishable, cried out in rage. A handful of official-seeming figures with weapons, bearing either horns or very long, pointed ears, attempted to discourage the crowd from their prominent position atop the gallows platform. Within seconds, though, rioters began to hurl things their way, from rotten fruit and wads of paper to sticks and stones. Heismay’s eyes weren’t on the officials, though, but on the crowd. He hesitated at the edge, trying to peer between tenebrous legs and tails.

”Dad, where are you?”

“No!” Heismay’s heart was pounding. “This isn’t real! Tis some illusion!”

”Dad, I’m scared!”

“Damn it,” Heismay hissed. He looked down to find his cats, tensed up and ready for action. It would have to be enough. “You two, attend me!” He pushed into the shadowy throng. “I’m coming, son!”

Instantly, four members of the crowd rounded on him, throwing him back. They towered above him, all ears and tails and fangs. Heismay couldn’t make out what they were saying, but their voices were mocking. Thuggish. Dismissive.

“Bloody Paripus,” Heismay snarled, drawing his scythe. “Out of my way!”

Somewhere behind this scene, or perhaps ahead of it, Sandalphon fell to the hard, rocky floor with a cry of pain as a huge, taloned, obsidian-black foot crushed the head of her mount. With her pupil an empty circle, the archangel stared up at an immense draconic demon, faceless and horned. Around her, on a circular shelf extending out from the mountainside path, five archangels lay dying. Ramiel, Gabriel, Uriel, Raphael…their forms might be shrouded in darkness, but she could tell who they were. Their contours were unmistakable. As the great demon receded, the five broken, battered bodies began to crawl and drag themselves toward Sandalphon, reaching for her.

”You left us…you killed us…”

“Why did we have to die?”

“You shouldn’t have lived…”

Saranwrap hissed at the shadows as she stood before Sandalphon, her fluffy tail extended as far as it could go. Sandalphon tried to reach out to her cat, her voice pleading. “No…run…I’m dead anyway…save yourself…”

Voices of wrath and despair swelled around her as the archangel fought in vain to stand, her body wracked by agony. The darkness was closing in.

d

Before the climb could resume, the matter of all the dropped spirits needed to be resolved. What resulted was a selection of several loot items. And as the Seekers looked them over and talked about who should be taking what, Roxas curiously took a look at the items himself. Most of them were weapons that he unfortunately could not use due to his fusion with Ramza’s spirit. And while it might have been tempting to join Ramattra in using the Spirit Orb to redo his fusions, in the end Roxas decided not to. He was already so used to wielding his Keyblades and his Medabot parts that it was hard to imagine switching to anything else right now.

As such, most of the items were things he would not be able to capitalize on. But the collar and stickers did catch his eye. Those were items that could be used by pets, and he imagined Pokemon qualified as such. And so he decided to humbly take the two stickers.



Given the way the stickers seemed to function, it wasn’t incredibly difficult to decide which Poke Balls to put them on. He put the Hardback Sticker on Turbo’s ball, knowing she was already quite able to take hits due to being a Steel-type as well as her Filter ability. The sticker would simply amplify that further. As for the New Leaf sticker, after some thought he put it on Shocker’s Poke Ball - deciding that the tricky ghost could do well with a support move that paired with its ability to vanish and zip around with Double Team.

But after that was all sorted out, it was time to continue the climb. Compared to most Seekers, the ascent was slightly less difficult for the Nobody between his Flow Motion and his ability to create safety platforms for himself using his Phantom Ruby constructs. But even that wasn’t a guarantee that he was always safe, as he did nearly slip once or twice. And because Scamp was following him outside of his Poke Ball, that meant Roxas had to be careful about using his constructs so that they wouldn’t accidentally harm his Pokemon.

There weren’t a whole lot of items that interested Blazermate, and as she didn’t take a cat, she followed the group up the chilling mountain. While she did feel cold, it didn’t actually affect her negatively so she wasn’t going to make a big deal unless she started to freeze. As they got up the mountain, a deep fog seemed to roll in. A fog followed shortly by a blizzard…or perhaps a curtain of pure darkness. There was something strange about this blizzard, as Blazermate saw that her team mates seemed to disappear one by one. She and Roxas picked up the pace to catch up to the frontrunners, forging higher along the path, but encountered nobody before they caught sight of a dark, yawning cave entrance a little higher up. Maybe the others had taken shelter inside.

Keeping herself attached to Roxas, Blazermate made a dash for the cave, being forced to land due to the intense winds. Although on the ground she was a lot slower. Reaching the cave wasn’t a simple matter for Roxas either. Scamp being outside his Poke Ball meant he couldn’t just create platforms liberally. So as a necessary measure, he temporarily recalled the Boltund to his ball where it was safe. After that he could be a bit more liberal about placing a platform - or more importantly - a wall to help block the winds a bit, ”Just be careful not to touch those.” Roxas quickly advised Blazermate, ”They’ll harm anyone else besides me who does.” As long as Roxas was moving faster than blazermate or doing flowmotion, due to her medigun she basically mirrored his movement, although being smaller than him meant she got really close to, but didn’t touch the blocks if they were used for movement.

The pair’s quick, deft footwork allowed them to cover ground quickly, taking an alternative, more vertical path than the trail that Edward’s ironclad must have blazed. Once they reached the higher cliff, they quickly ducked inside the crevice, plunged into the dark. Between the Frozen Highland’s perennial night and the uncanny shroud that seemed to now curtain Moon Mountain, there was nothing but total blackness in every direction, with the entrance they’d just come through completely lost to sight.

”Is this another Master Hand trial thing or something? All that just…. Suddenly happened.” Blazermate said, pointing a thumb back at the cave entrance that, she soon found disappeared as the cave got super dark. ”I hope the others are ok.”

”Me, too.” Roxas said softly. Rather than call Scamp back out, he instead released Shocker, hoping the Rotom’s glow could give them at least a small light to see with.

The light illuminated only a tiny portion of the space in which the few found themselves, but rather worryingly, that area did not include the cavern’s exit. Even the frigid wind that raged around the mountain’s snowy heights had faded into the distance, although as it evanesced, Blazermate and Roxas became gradually aware of another sound: breathing, shallow but enormous, and very close by.

Then, from the darkness, the monster appeared. Half-hidden in shadow and bizarre in shape, the Seekers couldn’t be sure just what they were looking at for a few moments. It seemed oddly draconic in aspect, although on closer inspection it more resembled a gigantic, floating set of organs, a pair of huge lungs in place of wings with a windpipe that craned forward like a reptilian neck, albeit with nothing but waving yellowish tubules where the head should be. An enormous, five-pointed iron crown encircled its neck like a collar, and its trunk dangled against the floor.

The Seething Sigh stertorous avatar of ill-concealed rage, inhaled.

”And there it is. Get ready Roxas, I think we got a fight ahead of us.” Blazermate said, noting that they were a group of 2 against this monster.

”Why do they always have to look so creepy?” Roxas said as he quickly got to work casting his usual buffs: Tailwind for speed and Aeroga for defense - on himself, Blazermate, and even Shocker, ”Shocker - use Double Team!” He commanded before vanishing into his usual opening StepSword attack from somewhere behind the monster.

“Ro-tototot~” Shocker chirped as it obeyed its Trainer’s command. The toaster-shaped Rotom started zipping around in the air so fast that it began leaving behind confusing afterimages to make itself harder to accurately hit with attacks.

As Roxas and his Pokemon cast their buffs, the Sigh made its move simultaneously. A sonic expulsion rippled outward from its many tubules as it unleashed Wrath and Rancor. Its red-hot rage dealt only a little damage as it slammed into Roxas, but it burned him, and more worryingly left his mind swimming from two points of Stress. The keyblade wielder was nothing if not collected however, and the next second his StepSword bit into the back of the Sigh’s unguarded core in an instant act of revenge.

Blazermate was a bit more defensive at least at the start of combat, but seeing as it was only her and Roxas, she’d probably need to be more aggressive than normal. First though she had to see how this thing generally attacked before she did things. Having only herself and Roxas to heal made her healing much more simple, but if Roxas wasn’t taking constant damage it’d take much longer to charge her projectile shield and uber, but the latter she could supplement with ubersaw hits. But she did have some offensive powers, and threw a Disseminate at the creature, making damage dealt to the main body also deal damage to the lungs at a 25% ratio and following it up with a divine star which did very little damage, but would help her healing.

A moment later, the Seething Sigh pumped all the air still collected in its lung out of its tubes in an uproarious Sundering Exhalation. A concussive wall of wind and sound slammed into everyone present, although Shocker managed to dodge it, to deal a serious chunk of damage and two points of Stress. Then the horror took another shallow breath, and its other lung inflated in turn.

”Ah!” Roxas cried out as the wall of wind slammed him back. Blazermate didn’t fare much better, getting thrown back into a wall with a ”Kyu~”. This gave him the inkling that his usual tactics might not suffice here if the monster could just produce something like this capable of defending its flank or hitting him even while he was trying to be invisible with Poltergeist. What were they even dealing with? The mounting stress made it increasingly difficult to resist the urge to panic. For now he just instinctively reacted with an area attack of his own, ”Thunder!” He called down a Thundaga to strike the area around him with a short series of lightning bolt strikes.

Blazermate meanwhile just healed up the damage dealt to both of them, Roxas having taken much less damage thanks to his overheal. ”Hey Roxas, my abilities charge faster if you take damage. As weird as it sounds, try to manage taking a few hits so I can charge them faster. I got a feeling we’ll need to do a lot of damage to this guy so he stops oing that.”

"Three, two, one... action!"

As soon as the game began, Bruce raised up his assist trophy to call forth the fighter within. The Barrier above the base peeled away, revealing, briefly, a small stone that floated there for half a second before vanishing.

Both g-corp employees glanced around in confusion at this supposed dud, while Jr called out ”Oh come on! That’s like the best one” as he too looked around, and most notably, up.

There he spotted something which prompted him to start running towards Bruce.

He was half way across when Lucky caught on, mainly due to the red glow in the sky that heralded the incoming moon burning its way through the skies, and followed suit, legging for a spot that wasn’t going to be in its direct impact zone.

As they came running, Bruce held his nerve and held his ground. Jr very much wanted that ground, and opened fire with his vending machine cannon. Unfortunately for him, the low velocity shots were easy enough for the kick boxer to parry, and in some cases return to sender, resulting in the runners facing down a shower of exploding carbonated coffee cans.

Lucky was spared most of this, and was also willing to swipe at the other runners, finding out in the process that her sword launched rainbow trailing cats when she swung it, which rather made up for her lack of skill with the weapon.

“What in the hells is that!?" Yayama scrambled toward the corner of the stage drawing everyone else in, fleeing the glow that reminded her an awful lot of Meteor. “Who just drops a moon in a casual tournament!?” She put up an aetheric barrier up around herself, electing to deal with the issue of the mass of bouncing feline and carbonated projectiles by not thinking too hard about them.

The drinks barely scuffed the barrier, but the cats hit hard. Fortunately for Yayama, however, the barrier was more than enough to get Lucky focusing on the easier target, namly the bot causing the issue of the flying bean bombs.

The first cat smashed the weapon out of Jr’s hands, the second sent him stumbling, and the third caused him to be knocked off of his feet and crash to the ground.

It was more than enough to slow him down, such that when the moon came blazing over the heads of the crowd and over the water, he was in the impact radius.

Rather than pancake the poor boy, however, the moon actually slowed down as it approached the stage, and instead did its damage via the fiery aura surrounding it. It remained embedded in the stage for two seconds, before blasting the prince away and sending him slamming into one of the windows on facade buildings surrounding the back of the stage.

He was, interestingly, not disqualified for going in there.

Yayama likely didn’t have time to think about the implications of that, however, as while lucky was allowed to dash past Bruce and take cover in his corner by the black iron fence, the kick boxer very much made the effort to try and slam a foot into the Lalafell in-order to try and knock her into the burning moon before it exited the stage in a flash of light.

She responded with a swing of her blade, half block, half counter. If she couldn’t exploit the opening, she could at least deflect the blow and keep running forward, then bowl Bruce over and take advantage from there. That was the plan, anyways; his partner in crime could always interfere, and her favored weapon was not exactly the quickest option available.

Interfere she did indeed do. As Bruce was shoved aside and Yayama got clear of the moonfall, Lucky leapt up and then springboarded off of the wooden fence that cordoned off the river surrounding half of the stage. She used this move to reverse the momentum of her run and then bring her sword swinging down, a cat blasting out of the blade as she finished the swing.

Bruce also recovered quickly enough from the deflection, catching himself, pivoting, and then swinging a punch at the back of Yayama’s head.

The combination was enough to overwhelm the lalafell’s defenses for the moment; the boxer’s punch connected cleanly, sending her staggering away. “Not again,” she groaned, sounding dazed, before stumbling her way back into some semblance of a guard. “My chirurgeon’s going to have my head if you keep abusing it like that, you know.” She wreathed her sword in aether, preparing an Edge of Darkness should either of the duo approach. Of course, she had a trick up her sleeve; if one of them decided to test her reflexes, she’d simply transform the weapon into a katana and strike with the gathered power before they could react to the change in threat.

The two moved together, not even trying to hide their cooperation now as they eyed her dark blade from out of its reach. Then Lucky stepped to one side, swinging her sword at the air in-order to pelt the dark knight with rainbow cats, ones that bounced off of the fence that was now behind her and ricochet back her way. As he did this Bruce stepped to the other and approached with his guard up, intending to deliver a low legsweep once she was off balance from the kitty assault.

Unfortunately for them, on the third swing of Lucky’s sword the neon pink blade flashed and went dull with a drawn out power down meow as the imitation of the legendary weapon ran out of batteries.

Then a second later the idol exploded, sending her flying back into the fountain. Then the source of the hurled bob-omb shouted ”Cheaters!” at the pair, and then ”They’re working together!” across the water to where Pride Falcon was spectating the match.

“Unsporting, but not rule breaking I’m afraid young chap!” He called back, prompting an ”Oh come on!” from the young prince.

Yayama utilized the distraction to take back the initiative. Enduring the last few feline missiles, she darted forward. She swung her blade in a wide arc; Midway through, it turned into a much faster scythe sweep. The mass of demonically empowered steel and magic slammed into Bruce with force beyond the lalafell’s minuscule frame. Her expression had shifted dramatically now that she realized what the two were doing.

“Fine then. If it’s a real fight you’re here for, then I’ll be happy to provide it to you.” Her Grit swelled as she made a “come-hither” gesture toward Bruce. “Try me again, boy, and we’ll see who’s standing over who afterwards.”

The fifty three year old man gave a bark of a laugh at this, calling her comment "ridiculous" before rolling his neck around, cracking it as he did. Then he crouched down into a boxer’s pose and agreed “yes, let us end this nonsense” before coming at her with speed a fifty three year old man absolutely should not be able to pull off, dodging and weaving as he delivered swift punches and kicks with the aim of starting a combo a devastating beatdown.

The dark knight grit her teeth and powered through, taking the damage on her chin. She relied on her armor and a little blessing she’d gotten from a forest spirit to let her endure the pain, then retaliated with a Lalafellin classic: a headbutt directly to Bruce’s stomach. The unexpected blow sent the man reeling, enough that Yayama was able to ready her actual weapon and charge him while he was off balance.

Her charge was complicated a bit by a boomerang coming sweeping around from center stage, one hurled by a lucky dressed up in a turtle outfit. It was the only one that came flying, however, as a moment later the idol was forced to dodge a trio of rocket propelled boxing gloves that came her way courtesy of bowser junior.

The kid hadn’t cottoned on that this was an assasination attempt, thinking it was just an unsporting teamup, while Lucky, with her already eccentric aesthetics and fighting style, was more than happy to incorporate the powerful items into said attempt.

Yayama intercepted the flying boomerang with a Blackest Night, the shield absorbing the blow and popping immediately. The used power flowed into her blade, allowing her to launch another Edge of Darkness in Bruce’s direction - hopefully before he could recover.

He’d recovered enough that he wasn’t slammed flat by the blow, but he still stumbled back, off guard and open to being struck hard. The dark knight, however, was keen on demonstrating why she was known as Yayama the Unrelenting. She followed up with a leaping Plunge, not allowing him any breathing room. Once she was in close, her greatsword shifted, becoming an ominous red-and-black katana. The lighter, faster weapon was applied to devastating effect, a barrage of powerful slashes overwhelming Bruce’s ability to defend himself. Leaving him reeling, she finished off her assault by launching an iai strike. Halfway through, her weapon transformed once again to its original shape, resulting in the charged slash slamming into him with enormous force and sending him flying away.

He slammed into the ground next to Lucky, the momentum of the launch causing him to roll over a few times till he hit the base of the fountain, leaving a trail of blood in the process. The man himself was carved up, but impressively still conscious, a hand gripping the fountain as he tried to unsteadily haul himself to his feet.

Lucky tried to protect him, flinging more boomerangs Yayama’s way as she moved to put herself in between the tiny knight and her bodyguard. From the side there came a thunk as Jr dropped down to ground level again, but rather than come help he called out ”Yeah, get em!” as he himself went to smash an item crate, still ignorant as to what was really going on here, and prepping to steal the win once Yayama was done with the two humans.

The lalafell was finally forced to break off her attack, going on the defensive before her barriers stopped being enough to keep her hale and hearty. “Kid, they’re not playing around, help me out here!” She probably should have assumed that Jr wouldn’t have put two and two together, being a literal child, but she was still used to people accustomed to ancient schemes and modern plots going off approximately every five seconds.

”I know they’re teaming up, I’m not stupid!” Jr called out as he grabbed an odd ball, peeked up the hole in one end, and then shoved his hand into said hole. He then turned the arm cannon on the two humans, firing a burst of lemon sized yellow projectiles at Lucky, forcing her to duck and then block, ending her boomerang spam.

Behind her, Bruce glanced left and right, deciding that maybe going for a no-items 1vs1 battle wasn’t it when your opponent had magic and at least two swords. He then lunged, going for a rosted chicken of all things out of the items that had been scattered by the moonfall.

Junior still didn’t get it, of course, but at least he was helping. Yayama took the opening he gave her and lunged toward Lucky, aiming to take her out before her partner could fully recover. Electing to get straight to the point, after baiting out a block with a running slash, Yayama simply grabbed a fistful of Lucky’s clothing and hurled her toward the edge of the arena, hoping to get a quick ring-out on her (assuming these two would respect that at all.)

The popstar managed to just barely grab the railing on the edge of the arena, swinging down and planting her feet against the wall below just above the waterline. As she tried to climb up, however, Jr dashed closer, his arm cannon glowing bright, before he unleashed a power shot into the pop star, finishing the job and dunking her into the water.

She surfaced a moment later, makeup running and looking furious, but before she could start swimming back into the fray she was plucked out of the water by a surprisingly strong Pride Falcon who gave her a commiserative “Better luck next time young lady” and then put her in an armlock when she struggled to try and rejoin the fight regardless.

The fighters might not be aware of their own Galeeming nature, but a fighter being too hot headed to give up the fight was its own factor, and so the popstar was swiftly subdued for her own good as much as anything else.

This resulted in a “Damn it!” from Bruce, words said through a mouthful of roast chicken, the man having rapidly devoured his way through the healing meal. It had helped undo the damage Yayama had wrought, but with his team mate in the drink.

”Two on one! Let’s see how you like it!” Jr jeered, turning his armcannon on the kickboxer and forcing him to get on the defensive by pelting him with the last of its ammo. Yayama took advantage of this by charging in once again, taking the opportunity to refresh her barriers as she tried to force Bruce toward one of the arena edges.

While the veteran kickboxer was no slouch, he had difficulty dealing with the two-pronged offense. Although he held out initially, Jr’s supporting fire gave Yayama just enough of an opening to break his guard once more, and she went in for another throw.

Half a breath later, and Bruce was also in the drink. A few more after that, and the still battle listed man was pinned down in a submission hold by an expert grappler. Lucky, for her part, was up on her feet again, but was silently fuming rather than trying to attack them again. She might be a problem again, but for the moment, she clearly knew when she was beaten.

A grinning jr, still blissfully unaware of what the two dunked humans had been trying to do, ignored the losers entirely, instead turning on Yayama. The very beat up prince formed a blunt fencing foil of raw iron, squared up against the tiny dark night and declared “just you and me now!” before lunging at here with the training sword.

Yayama elected to simply dodge sideways, and give Jr a swift kick in the rear to send him stumbling into (or rather onto) the drink alongside the other two - although she expected this one wouldn’t need to be subdued after that happened. “Sorry, but we need to get this over with,” she said as he tumbled over, before turning to the organizer. “That’s another for me, no?”

“Quite so little miss, and there’s nothing quite like a champion to get folks riled up and spoiling for a chance to prove their own gumpshun” Pride Falcon replied with a beaming grin and a thumbs up, before asking if they’d be “up for another round?”

Sadly for the organizers, they would not, as the call had come in for them to gather for a far more serious battle. Jr was rather grumpy about the fun being interrupted. He was considerably more angry when his sister arrived to check on them, and filled him in on the attempted assasination attempt on herself and Therion, only then realizing that the last match had also been such an attempt as well.

At least he had a target to take that anger out on, regardless of how difficult that was going to be.

Although Pit had intended to head right back up following Sakura's informative call, the wall separating each of Esaka's tiers from each other was a little too high for him to scale with feats of platforming. Since he had to go find a lift he stopped by Fight of Gods on the way; a very responsible move if he did say so himself.

The atmosphere in the dojo was warm and festive, the large personalities of the deities coming together in eager pre-celebration. Apparently their fighters never made it very far, which was evident by the fact that they were a low tier dojo, but now they had representatives poised to break out of the Pools tonight - and on three fronts no less! Amaterasu (wolf version) in King of Fighters, Sif in Tekken, and Pit in Mortal Kombat. When the angel himself poked his head in for some healing Zeus wrapped a large arm around his shoulders and pulled him toward the center room so that the more upbeat gods could ruffle his hair and clap him on the shoulder.

“We'll have a grand feast indeed if all of you win your last matches today! You and Amateratwo had better show up!” The lord of lightning said, slapping a mighty hand on Pit's back after his battle wounds had been taken care of. “Keep up the good work, lad!”

So they knew the outcome of his last match, but hadn't a thing to say besides ‘good work.’ It didn't make Pit feel any better or worse, just weird, so he countered the feeling by mustering up some pluckiness and giving the god a brash declaration: "you better start cooking then ‘cause there's no way we're gonna lose!"

Zeus' guffaw followed Pit out the dojo's door. His words were true though, now that he was part of the tournament he was going to take it all the way. The last thing he wanted to do was drop out, no matter the reason - that'd be so lame. He wouldn't even be able to face the rest of the team properly.

…still, if the angel went a longer way around the Pools to avoid the MK section aftering zipping up to the next tier, at least no one was around to see.

By the time Pit was halfway around between Tekken and KoF, he slowed his pace on account of realizing something. He didn't know where Sakura was, and he didn't know how to go about looking for information himself. He wasn't a detective or a spy after all. Plus he couldn't think of who to ask that might know about a consul's visit besides the city's big wigs, the evil four kings themselves. Oh wait, maybe those gate keepers?

"Hmmm…" Pit crossed his arms as he walked, tipping his head back and forth while he thought about it. "I guess I'll just see if I can find anybody official looking."

Finding the street fighter herself would work too, although as it turned out the first person he happened upon was a different Seeker. When he caught sight of her distinctive white and red coat a little further up, Pit made a beeline toward her.

Amaterasu’s stride paused and her ears perked up as she heard the sound of his approach, before she turned to face him. It had turned out that the seekers of fight’s next match wouldn’t be for a while, and so she’d split off from the others with the intent on checking in on how the powerstone games were going, and to inform the koopa children about the fact that interlinks could break flame clocks.

Given the description of the games, it seemed unlikely that they’d make some grand discovery during them that’d push them into forming one, but she could only hope.

As such she had plenty of time for her angelic compatriot, at whom she directed a tilted head of questions in order to query his haste in reaching her. It wasn't that he had anything important to deliver, but more that he was glad to see a friendly and familiar face.

"Amaterasu! Did your team's match just end?" he asked, glancing in the direction she'd come from. Then, without much time for reply he tapped his ear and said, "did you hear?"

The wolf gave a bark of agreement. It certainly wasn’t good news that another Consul was on the way, and given the timing she couldn’t imagine this was a coincidence. They weren't going to get that lucky a second time, of that she was quite certain.

Pit nodded vigorously as though he picked up on her thoughts. "Right? I was on my way up to see what sorta clues I could find..."

And then it was revealed that he could not actually telepathically communicate with this goddess unless his own played the middle man, because he paused and said, "...wait was that a yes to the first part or the second part?"

Nearby, Captain Falcon was finishing up a quick bit of praise for the twins’ performance. After they scampered off to do their own thing - as they usually did - that left the bounty hunter on his own to decide what to do with his free time next. To say he was shaken up by his loss against Lei Wulong wasn’t entirely accurate, but it wasn’t entirely wrong either. Ever since Terry’s disappearance it seemed like he was constantly overthinking or second guessing himself. Maybe that was why he couldn’t pull out the win in this round? Either way, the message from Sakura followed by Pit’s arrival was all he needed to get his mind off of his current funk - which was sorely needed right now.

Of course it was unbeknownst to Pit that the bounty hunter was dealing with that - he only knew that the three man (or four now) team had emerged victorious overall. So it wasn't to give either of them the distraction they were looking for that upon spotting Falcon's approach Pit eagerly waved the man over.

"Oh good, you're here too, Cap!"

Part way through reuniting with the Seekers of Fight, not long after the first message about a second consul, Big Band called in again with a lot more news. When the linkpearl crackled to life once more the assembled group had gone quiet to listen in. Not just the consul's identity, but their likely path and a plan to take them by surprise? It was a lot to take in so suddenly. The first to speak again was the Gold Team's captain, who after a moment or two put his hand to his own pearl.

"You guys found out about the other consul already?! You work fast! But if we all leave the city won't that mess up our plan of getting to the Guardians?"

“We ain’t leavin’ for long. Not all of us, either. Just those who can spare the time. Gotta hope that’ll be enough. Band out.”

And there they had it.

Pit blinked. Then his expression grew a little more serious. "We're gonna have to make sure we're all ready then." Since it wouldn't be all of Gold Team as some had to stay and hold down the fort in Esaka as it were, the angel looked to Amaterasu and Captain Falcon to get their first thoughts. "Are you guys in?"

Amaterasu barked in agreement. They had time in their light schedule for sure.

”Yep, I’m with her on this one.” Cap finally chimed in his agreement, ”Our fights are pretty sparse compared to everyone else’s so I figure we’re probably best suited for this job.”

Those two confirmed for the impromptu raid party was encouraging, and it showed on Pit's face in the grin he gave them.

"Great! Me too of course!"

He did have his final Pools match later that night, but with the right strike team maybe they could pull whatever plan they came up with off, with time spare! ...assuming, of course, that R was on their way soon. Right, the exact timing was something they'd have to find out, huh?

"Me and Captain Falcon can give you a crash course in Consul combat on the way, Amaterasu! You never fought one before, right?"

The wolf gave a pair of barks to indicate that she had not, no, while her perked ears made it clear that she was more than willing to listen and learn.

This seemed to enthuse Pit, eager as he was to help out a friend even with something as simple as info dumping for them. He raised a fist to his mouth to dramatically clear his throat, then mimed pushing a pair of glasses up the bridge of his nose the same way he'd seen Lady Palutena do it many times before.

"Alright, listen up! First, they're all two-phase boss fights! You've seen their armor, right? Well they've got another form that's like a monster-y version of it! And they've all got super cheap powers! Plus they can brain wash people that are still Gleaming, and they're kinda like us 'cause they're not Galeem-ified so they don't have to stick around and fight. They'll run away or try to trick you if they start losing! And-!"

As the small group changed direction and began picking their way down the tiers of Esaka in order to meet up with the rest of the Seekers, Pit alternated between talking animatedly and trying to reign himself in so as not to draw too many curious ears. He regaled Amaterasu with everything he recalled about how the Consuls he'd met in battle before operated. Of course there were a few spots where Captain Falcon could jump in too, if he found Pit's explanation less than exhaustive.

”They also don’t leave behind a Spirit like the rest of us do.” Falcon noted, ”So I’m inclined to think that that probably means they don’t get reset by Galeem’s little system cycles.”

The divine wolf took this all in her stride, mentally inscribing it all as he went along, but the last part was certainly notable. Not actually useful in a direct sense, of course, like the powers and abilities were, but it certainly did take a certain mindset to turn away from the cycle of reincarnation that Galeem had set up and to bet everything on this one powerful life.

She wondered idly how many had lost that gamble so far over the eternity that Galeem's world has apparently existed.

In order to get back down the Low Tier, and the city’s gates after that, the group would have to swing back around to the other side of the Pools. Pit had already steered them around the eastern side through Tekken, and soon enough they crossed over into the World Warrior slice of the area - headed for the open air elevators that moved up and down the tier walls.

Grima had quickly left the arena after her match. Her initial plan of further humiliating Terumi forgotten due to her own thoughts. She was swiftly finding herself pushed to the brink, and needed to center herself and come up with a plan to handle not only the tournament, but her goal of usurping the Four Kings… Which itself was simply a stepping stone towards her true selves's reawakening.

And yet, she could STILL feel Robin’s presence in the back of her mind, gnawing away with their thoughts.

“That was a close fight. You put up a better fight when you defeated Chrom and the Shepards”

“I’m sure you’re very familiar with my full power. Alas, I am back to a weakened state.”

“Even then, you're using both your magic and my skills. A best of both worlds, but you keep-” the back and forth between Robin and Grima paused as Robin suddenly stopped herself, “Oh, it’s that Pit.”

Instinctively, Grima’s eyes snapped to the side, catching the angel as they moved through the area, “... So it is. You must be glad to see a friend in this realm” Grima retorts in her mind, absently brushing a bit of hair out of her eyes as she begins to walk, trying to intersect their paths, “This is fortuitous. Saves me the trouble of tracking them down to join their little band.”

As she weaved through the small crowd towards the trio of Seekers, Pit spotted her distinctive hair and coat and peeled off from his company to make a beeline for her, just as she'd planned.

"Robi--ma!" It might take time to separate the Fell Dragon from her vessel, clearly. Moving past the name flub, Pit flitted up to her and peeked around her form like he'd be able to tell whether or not the Friend Heart had conjured up some semblance of Robin in Grima, but the woman was still fully the latter - at least as far as it seemed on the outside. "Did you decide if you're gonna join up with us?"

“I have given it thought, yes. I still have this World Warrior tournament to conquer, but our goals do align. Both here, and beyond” Grima says, watching Pit look around her with casual interest, “I help you, you help me. A common practice amongst mortals, yes?”

The jury was out on whether either one of them counted as true mortals. Pit ceased his inspection, backed up a step, and grinned at Grima. "Heheh, I knew you'd come around! But if you want us to help you like take over the world or something, you're gonna have to pick something else."

Least of all because there were at least two self-proclaimed villainous Seekers that had designs on replacing Galeem as ruler of this patch work world already.

“No, I have no desire to take over the world. Preferably, we put everything back to how it was before” Grima states, a half-truth all things considered. She didn’t want to rule it, that much was true… But if she had to fully destroy this amalgamation as well, she’d gladly do so, “My main goal is something far less… Demanding. I’m sure your Goddess can wager a guess on it.”

Can you, Lady Palutena?

Getting her original body back, or at least its power, I imagine.

Not gonna lie, I totally get wanting to turn into a dragon. But... thoughts flickered across Pit's brain, and his face. Grima was an evil dragon, but if she was willing to work together with the Seekers to destroy Galeem and its Guardians and then return relatively peacefully to her own world, then it would be in their best interest to work with her. Plus if things got dicey for Chrom and Robin back in Archanea after this, Pit was sure that Lady Palutena would lend him out to help them if they only called.

"Hm... okay. If you really want to join us, then you'll be our teammate - and teammates help each other out," the angel said with a nod. His grin changed into a softer, friendlier smile. "So... welcome to the team! We're just about to meet up with everyone else! C'mon, Captain Falcon and Amaterasu are right over there, you can meet them first!"

Pit caught the Fell Dragon's sleeve and tugged her over to the other Seekers he'd been with.

Grima was not prepared for the angel to grab her sleeve, and as such she stumbled slightly as she was dragged along, “H-Hold on, you do not need to-!” she shouts to no avail. It doesn’t take long (or much effort) for Pit to get her over to the others, at which point Grima is finally able to remove herself from his grasp, “I would prefer not being dragged around, especially for occasions like this” the Fell Dragon comments, dusting herself off and turning her gaze to Captain Falcon and Amaterasu. She didn’t linger on Falcon much, noting him as a mortal with a… Curious fashion choice, but her eyes hardened slightly on Amaterasu. Like with Pit, she could feel the divinity radiating off of the wolf.

The divine wolf tilted her head in response to this minor indication of dislike, before glancing at Pit in expectation of an explanation. She wasn’t really affected by it, she got far worse looks around the city from its yokai, and was more curious why someone in Pit’s company might be giving her such a look.

Pit wasn't actually sure of the answer, having been too distracted with the whole Robin body double thing when initially meeting Grima to really log the dragon's distaste for divinity. He flapped his hand in a casual manner, dismissing it as anything important.

"This is our newest recruit! Hopefully she's not allergic to dogs! Her name's Grima," Pit said, putting some emphasis on the name while glancing Falcon's way, as the Smash Bros. tourney veteran was likely to make the same mistake that Pit did with the vessel's identity.

”You look familiar.” Captain Falcon said, leaning forward a bit. ”Have we met before? I swear I’ve seen you somewhere, but I’m not the greatest at names. Er, Robin? No wait, she was the other one. Um… ah, I got it! Lucina, right?” He correctly guessed that she was Robin, yet somehow managed to be even more wrong.

The mention of Lucina caused Grima to look back at Falcon, her eyes somehow narrowing even more, “You were technically correct with your first guess. Robin was my vessel. But the Robin that you knew is not the same as I. Galeem seemed to have used several versions of my original world for their creation” Grima states with a shrug, sensing Robin at the back of her mind confirming the statement: Robin did not know any of these individuals, meaning that they had to have encountered a different Robin.

"Yeah, so like I said: Grima!"

Pit should probably find out if the friend-heart had dislodged any of her vessel's original personality, most likely by just asking, but right now they had a team to meet up with and a Consul to defeat.

Amaterasu had no context for this, though she did find the talk of using someone as a ‘vessel’ a little concerning and her own eyes hardened in response to it. She could see that this was going to be a rough working relationship.

But they would have time to sort that out -or maybe not- on the way.

The spirits of the fallen resulted in, unsurprisingly, a lot of items. Still, only a few called out to Edward.



The blade would make for a good weapon to wield one-handedly alongside a firearm, in a manner the Arche's Guardian sword was a touch too cumbersome for a mere human to wield, while the rune pistol would make for an excellent firearm to wield alongside it. He replaced Odin’s Pinky with said pistol after finding that the spell he had crafted worked perfectly well for it as well, the precision weapon far more his style than the bullet hose.

He lingered a little after that, waiting for everyone to be done before sending the unclaimed items back to the armory, and getting the Strange Feather copied if no other option was selected, after which he set off into the cold dark along with the others.

---

For Edward and Edward alone, the rumble of the ironclad didn’t fade away, for his will was in it, and it was his eyes and ears in the same way the scouts roaming ahead where, and the daedra riding alongside them where.

Instead a charnel ground faded in around them.

With each step, each rumbling turn of the wheel, broken fallen bodies faded into view around them. At first only the odd stray cadaver, but as the dreadnought and his companions pressed forwards, more and more appeared, laying where they had fallen in the snow. Most were human, but among them were other species. Dwarves. Goblins. Orcs. Elves. Giants. Dragons.

The people from home.

This did not sink in at first with the Dreadnaught, nor a myriad of other details that would have clued in his foggy mind.

It was only when the form of a Jugernaught came into view, its body split open by some devastating spell, that the man seemed to come too. He gazed up at the freshly ruined machine, metals still aglow from its death, cannons still smoking from its last defiant momentage, and then cast around in a half panic.

His eyes found shattered magelocks, husks of lesser warmachines and, most damning of all, banners of the commonwealth, tattered not from time by arrows and spellfrost.

Then, a dozen eyes all locked forwards, towards the locus of this devastation, towards the hill that had been held against all these forces. As he did, the darkness fell away, and he beheld a gateway to another world, through which dark legions marched, their bodies shimmering from the multitude of enchantments.

It had not been a one-sided battle. The hill was littered with the bodies of the invaders, cratered and burned where the guns of the commonwealth had hammered them. Yet their leader still stood, her single exposed eye glaring down and meeting Edward’s own from where he had stepped out from behind the ironclad to gaze up at her in turn.

This was it. This was the day the dream of his nation had died. When he led countless soldiers to their deaths. When the gates linking its world to the others of the astral sea were cracked open despite all his efforts, and the godir returned to claim it as their own.

When his dream of a better world died.

In the face of the memory the man’s knees buckled and he had to grip the side of the Ironclad for support. At first, he was sure it was just a memory, some torment. Then a human hand grabbed his shoulder and hauled him up to his feet and, when he turned and saw the sourceress to whom it had belonged.

“Don’t falter yet Edward!” Laryssa Mierabilis (his childhood friend and staunch ally) told him, as she helped him steady himself and her cohort of mages and summoned monsters formed up around her “we can still win this! One last push!”

And with that, he was lost to the memory.

What came next was a blur. A last desperate charge up the hill towards the gateway to other worlds.

Arrows and spellfrost rained down, while lightning and gunpowder thundered in response and allies froze in revitalizing ice. The dead who he had failed to lead to victory rose against them as skeletal thrawls, and were blown apart by the roar of the ironclad’s guns and a fusillade of firecrackers. Then they were charging up the hill as the dark warriors counter charged down it. Blades clashed, shields buckled, demons and horrors brawled, warriors were thrown back by frozen antlers, and then they were through.

The final stretch, with only one last desperate spell from the invader to endure.

Then, just as it had before, it all went wrong.

The gateway shattered at the invader’s will, ripping apart the fabric of reality around them, hurling everyone and everything into the astral void that separated worlds.

Clinging to the Ironclad with one hand and Laryssa with the other, Edward despaired at their failure, until a haunting howl pierced the mirage of memory made flesh, as his eyes saw that which had not been there before.

Tumbling through the void, just out of reach, where an eyepatched cat, a skull wearing wolf, and a reindeer headed sea serpent. The cat was desperately hurling explosives in the opposite direction, trying to push them closer to the ironclad. The antlered serpent simply floated there, faithfully awaiting instructions.

It was the skull headed wolf, her eyes shining with far more intelligence than she had started the lengthy engagement with, who saw a solution. By Loona’s will, Laryssa froze solid, slipping from the dreadnought’s grip. Then she hurled herself from the body of the SomnaDrix, formed a blade of amber starlight in her jaw, and then drove it into the heart of the frozen sorceress.

As Edward screamed, she kicked herself back off it, launching herself through the weightless sea, back towards the SomnaDrix, leaving the body of the sorceress to drift. Rather than linger a corpse, or dissolve into ash, however, instead it simply faded away into shadows as all the others who had fallen in the prior battle had, something the man had been too lost in memory to recognize.

”YOU! WHY!?” Edward raged at first, before his mind finally slipped the leash of memory and he recalled that ”this... this isn't how this happened”

It should have been the moment when the dream dissolved, but the man had not truly faced his failure. How could he, really, when that failure was that in his darkest moment he had lost his mind to Urrath: the source (so it was said) of all the evil in his reality.

Could a man ever truly face that? Could the shadows emulate such a cosmic power?

As Edward came to his senses and used the wings he had not had in this moment to pull the three beings that had interrupted the elaborate setup to his downfall to the Ironclad, the darkness shifted around him. It found another change their presence had caused, the form of the invader. She had been swallowed by her own spell as a result of the minions aiding in the push when before she had won the day unscathed. It then looked forwards, saw her own failure, her own role at the moments before everything ended, and pushed her forwards to it.

Pushed her forwards into the future, into the hands of the evil that had claimed Edward’s mind, and made her its avatar again.

Then the shadows twisted, causing the Ironclad to come crashing down onto an island in the abyss.

As its passengers got to their feet, they beheld what it had in store for them. The first invader of Edward’s home, Lithyl Nightweaver arose as an Eldrich Sovereign and Harbinger of Urrath, just as she had in the last days before Galeem had claimed all of reality. At her (many) feet formed a horde of umbral demons, nightmares of flesh, which she unleashed upon the Dreadnaught’s forces.

These servants of Urrath stormed forwards to claim the Dreadnaught for their dread master, charged forward as they had rampaged across the worlds of Edward’s reality as a result of his failure. His failure to keep the gates closed. His failure to protect his home when they were opened. His failure to keep his mind while falling between worlds. His failure to break free when it had driven him to wage a pointless war of rage against future allies against their common enemy.

Against that tidal wave of flesh, what could one man do?

As much as a man’s mind could do when faced with the will of a god.

He could raise his blade and refuse to go quietly into the night.

As the White Team got moving once more they did their best to prepare and sort out any last minute tasks that needed doing, such as actually dealing with that pile of spirits. In the end, Ace didn't pick any to fuse with or spirit bind - his preference was normally to itemize anyway, so he was more than happy to let someone else wear the toothy living hat to crush them into usable equipment. The results were passed around after being appraised by Sectonia for their less obvious functions, and as usual the Cadet eyed the weapons and armor with an appreciative gaze. Realistically he couldn't carry much more on him, especially bulkier items like that... but some window shopping never hurt anyone. Even the alien looking firearm drew his interest, but it wasn't until one of the spirits produced a pair of sleek metal weapons that Ace seriously considered claiming any of the horde.

Yeah, that was the problem with window shopping - giving in and buying something after all. In this case, the hammer and hook combo. None of the items turned out to be a shield to replace his damaged one, but that hammer was just large enough to be close to the kind that Ace was used to wielding. He'd be trading defense for offensive in picking up the impact weapon, but it wasn't like his shield was in a usable state anyway. If he tried he could probably fit more into his mysteriously-more-spacious-on-the-inside backpack.

"Mind if I take those off your hands?" Ace said, approaching Ganondorf who was currently inspecting them. The Gerudo obliged, as there were other items better suited to his tastes. The hooked weapon that apparently came in set with the hammer Ace could take or leave really, but... might as well take it. He wasn't sure if he'd get to use their rather unique trait -assuming he even remembered it- but it was nice to have the option. It had been a while since he'd used a polearm like that too, so it would be good to keep from being rusty.


Of course getting practice in was not anywhere close to a priority when the whole group still had to climb the path ahead of them in search of food, shelter, and the peak of Moon Mountain which was their ultimate destination.

The trek up was rather solemn, and growing more so as they ascended and still hadn't found much to eat. What berries they did find were demolished quickly. There was still the weather to worry about too, so cold it was dangerous, with flurries coming and going. Mixed in with the snowflakes were flickers of black and shiny blue, and when they grew numerous enough to notice Ace looked up towards the mountain's peak to see if he could spot the source. Even though they were so close to their goal, it was still obscured by shadows. Had it really gotten that late, or had the persistent storm clouds just gotten that dark?

"Wonder what this stuff is," he said aloud, attempting to catch a few of the different colored flakes in his hand. Though the wind had died down for the most part, the multi-colored snow swirled stubbornly out of reach whenever he tried to get a closer look. It seemed familiar though... really familiar. The hunter turned around to see if anyone else had an idea. "What do you guys thi–"

But there was no one there, just more shadows. Ace had been towards the front of the pack, but he didn't think he'd been going fast enough for such a large gap to form. Surely the people behind him would have called out for the front runners to slow down if they were falling behind?

"Guys?" Ace tried, raising his voice enough for it to echo. No one called back. The blackness was starting to feel very unnatural now, spiking anxiety in Ace. Now that he thought about it, hadn't they been able to see the moon earlier? They were actually above most of the clouds now, so there was no way it should be this dark on the trail.

He started trudging back the way he came, down the path. The cat that stuck by him uttered a confused 'mew?' at the change in direction, but both she and the humbee dutifully followed. They didn't get far before the wind suddenly roared back to life, throwing the blue and black flecks in front of them in such quantity that it blocked their path. There was not even normal snow anymore, and with this many... Ace threw an arm over his nose and mouth, already feeling his skin begin to irritate where it touched him. They were warm -hot, almost- and there was a smell to it as well, which was what really began to jog his memory. The black flakes gradually became outnumbered by the blue, and instinctively Ace took several steps back, away from the highest concentration of them. It wasn't snow, or pollen, or particles of some mineral higher up the mountain.

It was dander.

"That's impossible...!" Ace said to himself. He kept backing up, head on a swivel to try and see through the darkness to where the source might be hiding. Sensing his tension, the two creature companions moved in close to him as his hands reached for his weapons.

It really was impossible though. There was no way something that big would have gone unnoticed by the whole group, even when not taking their various perception abilities into account. This was not their natural habitat, but if one was around there would have been signs.

A shift of movement just above the Cadet sent a few rocks tumbling down the mountainside. His head snapped in that direction, expecting to see the distinctive head piece of the Empress of Flame despite logic saying otherwise - but the silhouette that stood there, on a short rocky outcrop, was much smaller. It appeared to be a woman, calm features cast in shadow but still distinctive enough to make out the details in her shape. Tall and slim, the top half of long hair pulled back and tied behind her head. A staff in her hand and sleek, swooping pieces of armor adorning her body. The pair of large, non-functional butterfly wings at her back were particularly striking, though only Ace and his two new pets were there to see it. Dander swirled lazily around her feet, pouring down the side of the cliff towards the hunter. It had been ten years since he'd last seen her alive.

Ace stared at her, mouth dry. He couldn't imagine how this was an illusion someone might have cast, but if it wasn't, then what? She was a ghost? That might be worse. While he stood frozen, the humbee and cat took both defensive and aggressive stances, sensing something that their chosen master didn't. When the woman took a step forward all three of them tensed, but the only thing she did was speak.

"I'm happy you still remember me," she said.

Though he had no idea what was really going on, Ace found his voice. "Of course I do! You're–"

"Dead," she interrupted. "Because of you. Isn't that right?"

"Me?" Her accusation genuinely caught him off guard. That day had changed his life, and even now he thought about it and that old village from time to time, but the grief had come and gone a long time ago. At least, that's what he'd thought. "No, you- all of us knew the risks. And we all agreed to do it anyway."

He repeated some of the words the Gunner had said when they buried two of the hunters that had been with them, having taken her short speech to heart at the time. But he messed up the next part, falling into the shadow's trap when he said, voice strained, "you can't blame me."

There was silence over the next moment, save the buzzing of the humbee's wings. Then, the woman took her staff in both hands. "You don't really believe that!" she yelled down as she leapt from the stone, landing with a splash of snow and deadly dander in front of Ace and his companions. The cat arched its back as its fur fluffed up, and the humbee bared its stinger. The Cadet himself was loathe to fight the ghost, so he released his hold on his sheathed weapons and held his hands up low in front of him.

"Mae," he said, studying the shade's face as it became a little more clear. "I don't know if you're real, or what's going on, but we don't have to–"

She didn't interrupt him verbally this time. Instead, the dander that surrounded them began to spark like the shrinking fuse of a bomb. The Cadet's stomach lurched, knowing what was coming. He scooped up the pets, tossing them out of the ring of blazing blue before turning to make his own escape. For one brief moment his heart stuttered when he stepped but felt nothing under his heel. In the dark he'd misjudged where the mountain path's edge was, and he'd just stepped right off of it.

Ace disappeared over the ledge into pitch black with a strangled shout. The shaded figure stepped forward to peer down after him. The dander did not ignite, instead slowly dissolving into smaller black flecks and fading away. The ghost's shape flickered, melting back into shadow and slithering down the rock face. After a moment, Ace's cat and bee returned to the scene flustered. They looked at each other, sharing some sort of communication, before the humbee grabbed the cat in its four legs and flew the both of them down over the edge after their master.

Mokou, as per usual, was not bothered much by the mountain as they ascended. Her hands were kept in her pockets, the Immortal barely making marks in the snow as she walked on top of it thanks to her natural flight. Mokou’s thoughts often trailed onto herself, so she did not initially notice the mountain’s strange effects. It was only when the darkness slowly overtook all sight and sound that Mokou stopped, standing stock still in a pitch black void with not even a breeze.

“... Another trial. This place sure likes its tests” Mokou comments, slowly turning around to investigate her surroundings, pulling out a hand from her pockets and forming a ball of fire at her fingertips. She was used to these trials at this point, and whatever else was coming next, she’d handle just as easily.

“It’s over… That woman has destroyed me…”

Mokou’s immediately froze as a voice reached her ears, one that she hadn’t heard in the thousand years she had lived. Her eyes slowly shifted, and within the void was a familiar sight… Her old home. Complete with a smaller, younger Mokou and her Father in a sight she remembered all too vividly. The day he had been humiliated by Kaguya for failing one of her ‘trials’, and the day she had seen his descent into self destruction, his reputation forever sullied by Kaguya’s actions. The Fujiwara name was left shattered, which was a death knell for her Father.

And she knew exactly why this was being shown to her… Because this was the exact moment where she made her decision to get revenge.

The scene before her shifted, showing a quiet mountain pass. The site where a young Mokou was standing before a dead courier, holding a distinct vial in her hands with a grim expression. The present Mokou didn’t cry out, already knowing what was about to happen as the young girl uncorked the vial and drank from it. The single biggest regret she would ever have.

“You think that just showing me past events is going to get me, huh?” Mokou asks aloud, her voice not as solid as she would have liked. She was used to illusions, this was no different.

But the illusions didn’t stop. In fact, they kept shifting, showing other moments of her life. Her father's hatred when he learned what she had done, her years as an outcast, her attempts at befriending others only to watch them wither away, her first attempt at undoing her immortality. And with each vision, a new voice spoke out. Each one filled with hatred and disgust at Mokou. The Phoenix was a woman who was hard to rattle… But each voice put a knife to her heart, jabbing at each of her regrets from a life filled with them.

“Ungrateful.” “Heartless!” “Demon!” “Murderer!” “Fool.”

Mokou’s eyes squeezed tight, her hands clasped over her ears as the cacophony rose higher and higher with voices from her past. People she outlived, people she had killed, all assaulting her with their collective rage and hate. She shouldn’t have taken that Elixir. She didn’t deserve it. The immortal life that had awaited her selfish act was one filled with pain, regret, and apathy.

“Shut up” she muttered as the voices kept growing around her, a faint orange aura shimmering around her. Alas, the visions seemed to take the statement as a challenge, swiftly intensifying before Mokou yelled “SHUT UP!" and threw her hand out in a sweeping motion, a torrent of fire tearing through the air to simply burn away the past. Unlike her normal magic, this one was far more primal and unfocused, not at all similar to her condensed and elegant volleys.

… Yet, that simply made the regrets grow, and whatever she did burn away simply returned with greater force. The momentary anger dissipated within Mokou, leaving her to try to shield herself from the hate bearing down at her from all sides-

“Sphea?”

Suddenly, the cacophony died out as Mokou’s eyes snapped open. The sight didn’t vanish, a maelstrom of faces and discord… But in front of her was a clearing… And a familiar white haired woman. At least, for a second, before Mokou blinked and realized it was just her Spheal, looking up at her with innocent eyes.

“Sphea? Sphea!” the Pokemon cried out, bouncing forward and nuzzling her leg. It didn’t seem to know why she was so distraught, but it was clearly demonstrating that it was here for her. That it cared for her.

“I can’t help you cure your curse… But, so long as I live, I can help make your days worth living. A future means nothing if you can’t live in the present.”

The voice of her old friend ran through Mokou’s mind as she stared down at the Spheal who shared that individual’s name. And slowly, she smiled. Barely noticeable, but still evident as she knelt down to pick up Spheal and cradle them in her arms, the voices still present but beginning to dissipate.

She had hundreds… Nay, thousands of regrets over the course of her long life. Mistakes that she could never take back no matter how much she tried. But there were still those who cared about her… And moreover, a world that she needed to restore.

One day she’ll finally find a way to achieve a perfect rest. But in the meantime… She’d live. Not just because of the Hourai Elixir, but for those who lived for her too.

In the northwest reaches of the Forbidden Kingdom sprawled the vast and untracked Tyrannian Plateau, an arid and rocky table-land dotted by towering volcanoes and carved up by great canyons and valleys of steamy, primeval, heavily jungled riverland. From the pre-sumerian suburbs to the breathtaking cascades of the central basin to the bone-littered lava flows of the Skelos Badlands near Death Mountain, it was a realm perpetually locked in the distant past, the stomping grounds of cantankerous cavemen clad in leopard-pelts and giant reptiles where size and strength were everything. Over this savage land the Avenger soared unnoticed, blissfully free from the gaze of watchful binoculars, radar towers, and satellite tracking, to rattle off a salvo of four hellpods bound for a high, dusty ridge crowned by spiky, coniferous monkey-puzzle trees. Once the four operatives recovered from their drop, shooed away a couple curious dinosaurs, and hiked a short way to the nearby overlook, they were afforded a spectacular look at their destination. Before them lay an enormous sandstone city, its domed towers radiant in the early afternoon sunlight, not at all to the absurd scale of Midgar, but impressive nonetheless.

After a long, deep breath, Anais Partridge turned back toward her companions with the aid of her crutches. Though she’d come a long way from her childhood home, as evidenced by her very modern white silk blouse and black newsboy cap, the lavender-and-brunette seamstress had been indelibly marked by her time here. It had changed a great deal, but so had she. It need not be a woeful homecoming.

“This is it,” she told the others. “Warfang. The capital of the Tyrannian Plateau.”



When her companions offered no comment, she turned back toward the wasteland metropolis below. Her gaze lingered on the huge stone fortress that dominated the city center, adorned with carved faces several stories in height and constantly rotating. “Well, it’s not like Tyrannia has any other cities to speak of. The people of this region mostly fight over this one. As recently as ten years ago, it was home to the Mokai, a society of dragonriders. Now, it is home to dragons.”

“Dragons?” Susie’s baby-blue optics widened slightly as the robotic secretary tried to get a better look at Warfang. “Are you serious?”

“They’re mostly friendly, but yes, dragons.” Anais smiled teasingly. “No hostile takeovers today, hm?”

Susie gave a staticky scoff. “Hmph. Dragon or not, money talks. But since it’s just a quick trip, I guess I’ll mind my own ‘business’ for now.”

With a slight tilt of her head, Poppi gave Anais a thoughtful look. “It sounds like you’ve been keeping eye on place. Friend Anais visit often?”

“Oh no, no.” Anais shook her head. “The Warfang I knew is gone. There’s nothing for me here now. But I stay informed enough that it’s still my area of expertise.” This time, she gave a wry smile. “It’s why SJ picked me, after all. Hopefully I won’t be too much of a burden.”

Furrowing her brow, the Artificial Blade shook her head. “Friend of Poppi is never burden.”

At that point, the team’s taciturn fourth member, who’d been staring in solemn silence at Warfang from a higher precipice nearby, hopped down. Sorely out of place in a daylit wilderness, Grimm landed as light as a feather and stalked forward on spindly ink-black legs, his cloak rustling softly in the warm breeze. The gloomy insect said not a word but passed by the three ladies on his way to the edge, then jumped down and vanished like a dream upon waking.

Careful not to overbalance, Anais leaned over the edge and peered down to see Grimm sliding down the rocky slope below. “I suppose we’d better get going,” she muttered, looking around until she found a less steep, more plausible route down the mountain toward Warfang. “Don’t wait for me. I can manage on my own.”

“Well, that not do,” Poppi chuckled. “How about piggy-back ride? Masterpon ride piggy-back all time, and nopon not that different from human.”

For a second or two Anais blinked at her, not sure if she was joking. It was long enough for Susie to grow impatient. ”I’ve got a much better idea. Here.” With the press of a button, the secretary summoned her heavy-duty mech, painted as pink as her hair, which slammed down hard enough to send Anais’ own waist-length hair billowing. ”Normally it costs a pretty penny to rent this thing out, but since you’re basically crippled, this one’s on me. Just be careful. It’s sturdy, but if you do damage it, I’ll expect repayment in full. Plus interest!”

“Thanks…” The seamstress eyed the machine dubiously, then gave a sigh after a moment. “Well. If a nopon is basically a human, a mech is basically a dragon, right? Might as well.”

After Poppi helped her into the machine and Susie gave her a quick tutorial, the mech got moving. Its drill allowed for a controlled descent down the steep, dusty surface of the mountain, and despite her doubts Anais got a feel for the mech quickly. That left the two mechanical maidens to follow behind, keeping an eye on the Lost Number as they hovered after her.

”It’s weird having you around without Tora,” Susie remarked to Poppi idly. ”I kind of like it, actually. What’s this super-important project he can’t tear himself away from?”

“Poppi not at liberty to say,” the Artificial Blade replied. “...Although, between Susie and Poppi, it seem like Masterpon hard at work -literally- on next generation of Blade-style ladybot, bigger and better than ever.” She rolled her eyes and sighed. “Poppi try not judge anypon for freaky tastes, but if Masterpon try replacing Poppi, he in serious trouble.”

Susie narrowed her eyes at her comrade. “Replace? You think he doesn’t want you anymore after he rebuilt you in Midgar?” She tilted her head. “Well, since he used mostly Vandelay tech for your new body, I guess you’re not really a ‘Blade’ anymore, hm? And if you’re not a Blade, he’s not much of a Driver. I see where you’re coming from…”

“‘Friend’ Susie really not helping!” Poppi snapped.

At length the three reached the lower plateau. Naturally, they found no sign of Grimm anywhere, but once they made the short trek from the foot of the mountain to the gates of Warfang they found the big bug already veiled in shadow. Up close, the city of dragons seemed bigger than ever, with everything from doorways to drinking fountains scaled up to suit the draconic citizenry. Draconic imagery was everywhere, most obvious in various majestic statues depicting important members of the four guilds: Peacekeepers, Artisans, Beastmakers, and Dreamweavers. In a place like this, the three did not mind an unseen presence watching their backs. It did not take long at all for the newcomers to spot a couple peacekeeper dragons, since two happened to be guarding the gate: the purple-colored, triceratops-horned Halvor with his metallic slab of a greathammer, and the quintessential tough guy gunnar, who flaunted a spiky black mohawk and proud green scales. Not every reptile in sight was a person, though; there were plenty of scaly beasts accompanying residents on their day-to-day activities, which could make telling who was and wasn’t sentient a difficult task.

Pretty much right away, Anais pulled a large leaf off a plant to fan herself with. “Whew…it’s just as hot as I remember. The one thing that hasn’t changed, I suppose.”

Once the trio talked their way in, they found dragons most everywhere, from refined artisans to sleepy dream-weavers. They also found a surprising number of moles, sometimes underfoot, and after nearly tripping over an especially shortsighted fellow Susie began to get annoyed. “What’s with all the moles? I thought this was a city of dragons.”

Anais seemed much more at ease as she hobbled onward, leading the group deeper into the city. “The moles built Warfang in honor of the dragons, who they revered,” she explained. “Actually, what you’re seeing isn’t the original Warfang. Back when…oh, look!” The young woman excitedly pointed out a crude wheel and a very bored-looking attendant by a nearby marketplace, in front of which a handful of dragons, cavemen, argonians, and moles either dozed or watched the wheel slowly turn. “The Wheel of Monotony. That thing spins for hours…I can’t believe it’s still around.”

Grimm emerged from the shadows, drawn by the smell of a particular market stall. “Omelettes, get your omelettes here!” a Tyrannian Chomby declared. “Fresh from the giant omelette out west! We got cheese, bacon, sausage, barbeque, mushroom? You want Ugga Melon? We got it! Omelettes, omelettes here!”

Realizing he was getting as distracted as the others, Grimm narrowed his scarlet eyes and moved on, sweeping in to appear suddenly by the others. ”The Consul,” he rasped, his voice low. He stared upward at the rotating fortress with its ghastly graven faces, very different from its sandstone surroundings. ”Surely sequestered within a seat of power such as that.”

Now recovered from the brief scare, Anais nodded. “I thought so too. This is R’s domain, and I’m sure he must depart from there. We just need to find out when and how.”

”I shall slip inside,” Grimm decided, and the next moment he was gone.

Susie put her hands on her hips. ”Guess that leaves us to find out what we can out here. And try to find that Kayna girl Primrose knows.”

“You two go ahead,” Anais told the robots. “I’ll find somewhere up high where I can keep an eye on the fortress from outside. Make sure R doesn’t fly the coop before we get a bead on him.” She nodded, her expression serious and determined. “Let’s move.”



By the time Nadia finally sauntered through Esaka’s northern gate, aloof in the face of two watchful Aurumaton gatekeepers, the weather had begun to change. Since she crawled out of bed that morning the region had been overcast, blanketed by thick, morose, gray stratocumuli stifling and drizzly enough to convince many folks to stay snuggled up indoors. Now though, rays of sunlight sliced through the depressing cloud cover to shine down upon the rolling fields of golden grain to the north. It was a beautiful sight. Nadia was a city girl at heart, but after two whole days holed up in Esaka, some fresh air and wide-open space thrilled her with a sense of boundless adventure.

Of course, her mission this afternoon amounted to little more than assassination, but if anyone deserves to be knocked down a peg or two it was the Consuls. If the Seekers did manage to take down the Moebius member rumored to be on his way to Esaka, their campaign to save the worlds would be that much easier.

Admittedly, Nadia had no idea how she and the comrades she’d be meeting soon would accomplish that, but as far as she knew there were people on the case. Plus, the smarter and more responsible people on the team, like Big Band and Pit, could handle the particulars. In this case, Nadia didn’t mind playing the role of a gun that the others could point and shoot. Having originally planned to go solo until she won Mortal Kombat, the feral knew that she needed to do her part and get back into the others’ good graces. If luck was really on her side, the attitudes of Primrose and Roland represented the rest, and her mistake would be met with forgiveness–or at least, indifference. What happened, Nadia told herself, had been an accident. A brutal one, but an accident nonetheless.

Once she reached Ashwat Village, Nadia slowed her jog to a stroll and kept her eyes out, but didn’t see any other Seekers yet. Right now, she was alone. Not even Beowulf kept her company, since the wrestler had separated from her to see if he could take her advice and snag a useful spirit before his next match. As for Nadia, her fight against Taokaka and Bullet had actually been her ticket into Top 16, which meant no more fights today. And if she won her match tomorrow, a coveted Top 8 spot would be hers. She hadn’t quite memorized the bracket format yet, so she didn’t know how close that put her to the Grand Finals, but she was close. Close enough that she could already smell it.

…Or was that the scent of freshly baked bread?

Thanks to the improved weather, plenty of villagers were outside enjoying a late lunch, while the bakers and housewives who supplied such meals were already at work on bánh mì không baguettes for the evening. With wheat or rice flour fresh from Ashwat’s mills and the grains themselves harvested from fields mere hundreds of feet away from the settlement’s perimeter, visitors couldn’t eat any more locally than this. Nadia was still full from her consolatory kebabs, but she could still appreciate the aroma as she wandered around, waiting for other Seekers to show up.

She paused at the village center, the plus-shaped crossroads that made Ashwat a travel destination for anyone who was anyone in the Forbidden Kingdom. With a grin she remembered the yokai riot from two days prior…what had that pleasant woman called it? A Seethe? That one yokai who thought he could block her ‘wack-ass’ mixup still made her laugh. Her stunt had been a parlor trick back then, but since then she’d needed to put all that devilish trickiness (and more) into practice against the likes of Maya, Mira, Taokaka, and Bullet. And now that Maya’s power was hers, it would only get crazier from here.

A familiar heavy trudging caught the feral’s attention, causing her ears to swivel toward the south. When she turned, she laid eyes on the giant detective Big Band, who had already spotted her. Her first instinct was to disappear into the backdrop, but Nadia let out a sigh and braced herself instead. This was always going to happen sooner or later, so she might as well get it over with. Putting one hand in her pocket, she used her other to wave as Band approached.

“Afternoon,” the detective greeted her, looking her over. “Nice new duds you got there. That your idea of layin’ low? Or are you livin’ large on the money you stole?”

Here we go, Nadia thought. She would have rolled her eyes if Band didn’t have a point. “Hey, a girl’s gotta live a little,” she joked weakly. “Ehh…if only everyone at Banishing Flats got that chance.” Though her gaze remained shamefully pointed at the ground, she snuck a glance at Band. He raised an eyebrow at her but kept quiet, his incoming repartee pre-empted by Nadia’s admitted guilt. Heh. Though she was genuinely remorseful, and not the brightest banana in the bunch, the feral had enough emotional intelligence to tip the scales in her favor.

She continued. “I didn’t know who I was messin’ with, or the length’s he’d go to. That’s on me. But I’m gonna make up for it by doin’ my job and then some.” Nadia gave him a wry smile, wondering how many more Seekers she’d need to show contrition for. “I tracked Kazuya down this mornin’ and tried to take him out. Things didn’t go so hot…he knocked my block off with a single punch. Survived by fakin’ my death. I’d show you my scars to prove it, but…healin’ powers, and all that.”

“Tracked him down?” Band asked, moving aside as a villager walked past with a bushel under both arms. “How?”

Uh oh. Nadia’s slight fib had already backfired on her, as she hadn’t expected Band to focus on that part. “Uh…made a new friend. Wrestler by the name of Beowulf. He’s in Tekken, knows all the big players.”

“Uh huh.”

The feral tried to keep her ears from flattening as her tail twitched uneasily, but as always her smile held firm. “In fact, I think he might be a candidate to win for us, since Roland’s the only one left. Went ahead and freed him.”

Band didn’t reply for a moment. Then he gave a shrug. “Well, in my younger years I mighta been all ‘you reap what you sow’, but we’ve all done things we ain’t proud of. In the end, the fault lies with Kazuya, not you. The fact you’re here is all I need.”

With a long exhale, Nadia allowed the tension she’d been holding in to leave her body. She made a show of wiping sweat off her brow. “Whew. Purr-etty nice of you…you sure you’re a cop?”

The detective snorted. “I ain’t worn a badge in years.” He paused, his brow furrowing, then gave a wry smile. “Actually, with how things are ‘round here, I guess I ain’t ever worn one. Life’s a funny thing sometimes.”

Nadia gave a half-hearted chuckle, turning to scan Ashwat Village for any more Gold Team Seekers. “Hahaa, yeah…”



Flanked by his new companions, Heismay brandished his scythe and braced himself. He tried to throw together a battle plan to make the best of the cat brothers, but leadership was not his strong suit. He had no idea what the pair could do (if anything) and had very little experience ever thinking beyond himself in combat, always laser-focused on the head-to-head fight rather than the bigger picture. It involved a complete perspective shift, and right now, such a thing was totally beyond him. His mind raced and his heart pounded, galvanized into wild overdrive by the young voice he never thought he’d heard again, the cherished memory nearly erased by the ravages of time and alcoholism. How was this possible? It shouldn’t be. It must be some kind of trick. An insidious illusion, meant to disarm and deceive.

The shadows before him, however, seemed to be a very real threat.

Several bulled forward to attack at once, while others remained in the back, pitching hardened slumps of darkness that never seemed to end. They aimed cruel kicks at the young cats, though the brothers quickly proved more combat-capable than the average feline. Whopper dodged many the blows and thrown stones, then returned fire by hurling nails like tiny spears, small but sharp. Baconator lacked his littermate’s agility, but his clash slashes hurt a lot more than the nails, and thanks to the Bruise status inflicted by his Nip ability he could slowly turn fights in his favor as his damage output constantly ramped up.

Right now, though, Heismay wasn’t really focused on his charges. Instead he faced off against several Paripus shadows, unarmed but empowered by a savage rage. He couldn’t commit to any target for more than a second or two at a time, so his quick, glancing blows could not dispatch them. As time went on, however, he became increasingly convinced that he wasn’t doing any damage at. No matter how many times he slashed at the rioters, they just kept coming, the shadowy substance of their bodies none the worse for wear. This kept him on the backfoot, steadily pushed farther and farther away from the main throng, where his son’s cries for help were lost amidst angry shouts.

Beginning to panic, Heismay let out a snarl of helpless frustration. “Damn it, I need time to think,” he muttered. His mind raced to come up with a solution, and it landed on a technique he’d used back during the sandworm’s den, a form of practical magic that predated his discovery of Archetypes. Its flaw made it more useful against mindless beasts than intelligent opponents, but hopefully it would work here. “Secret Technique: Clone Art!” With a series of hand motions, the eugief summoned three illusory duplicates. When a Paripus lashed out at one, the clone instantly burst into light, which threw the attacker back, stunned. “Have at you!” Heismay launched forward with the other two doubles and slashed at the other three rioters. They reeled, giving the eugief the chance to push forward, and with a bullet jump Heismay surged into the crowd.

“Son!” The three Heismays pushed in with a whirlwind of bladed attacks, slowly cutting a route through the rancorous throng. “I’m coming! Where are you?”

“Dad, I’m over here!”

Heismay glared between the shadowy legs, but he saw no sign of the young eugief he sought. For a terrifying moment, he wondered if it was because he could no longer remember his son’s face…but no, even if that was the case, surely there had to be a spot of cream-colored fur somewhere. Somewhere! “...Where!?”

”Over here!”

That came from a different direction. With a growl, Heismay deflected a rioter’s grasping hand with the flat of his blade. Behind him, both of his leftover clones were gone, so Heismay leaped into the air to escape the enclosing crowd. From above he tried to get a better look at the situation while gliding. He saw nothing but a sea of shadowy figures. They were too tall, too boisterous, looming over his little boy, crushing him beneath their feet. Heismay gritted his teeth. He was running out of time.

“Just stay put!” The hermit summoned another batch of clones and descended, landing atop a rioter whose face he began to hammer with his scythe’s pommel. “I’m almost there!”

A pained yowl from behind made him jerk his head back toward the alcove’s entrance. Heismay watched, aghast, as Whopper landed near the cliffside path’s edge, his gray fur matted with blood. Baconator ran back to take up a defensive position in front of him, hissing as the dark figures closed in. They needed his help.

“Hold on,” Heismay called as he searched the area desperately for any sign of his son. “I need to- he must-!”

Groaning, Whopper began to hurl nails at his brother’s back, each one spurring Baconator to make an extra attack. With his attack speed roughly doubled, the scruffy cat beat the Paripus back with a flurry of blows, but the friendly fire damage piled up quickly. Their desperate strategy would last only a few seconds.

”Dad, it hurts! Please!”

Heismay’s shallow, ragged breath caught in his lungs. His son’s terrified voice sounded close, but the cats…they were going to die. Less than an hour after they’d chosen Heismay as their owner, and they were moments away from being destroyed by their guardian’s failures. Another dismal failure on the eugief’s part to weigh on his fractured conscience. A chill ran down his spine. For a moment, the muscles in his shoulders and arms went slack, his mouth hanging open as he perched precariously atop a stupefied shadow.

“...No more,” he growled after a moment. “Not this time.” He glanced at the leering Paripus around him, all slobbering grins and taunting words. Tears pooled in his eyes. Then he sprang forward, bouncing across the furry heads like stepping stones, until he landed in front of his cats.

“My son…is dead. Dead, you hear me? Dead!” He howled, tears streaming down his face. He seized his amulet with his off hand and held it aloft. “I carry him with me, here! Always! You have not taken him from me…and you’ll take nothing else!” Orange lines spread across his body before he transformed into the Assassin. “These youngs ones are still alive, and as long as I draw breath, I shall keep it that way!” He reached down and scooped his cats into one arm before shouldering his curved greatsword with the other. “We are leaving this place. This memory. Try and stop us, if you dare!”

Meanwhile, Sandalphon struggled to stand as her feline companion Saranwrap stood before her. Every joint ached with the grinding pain of the Petrification Disease, her frayed nerves alight with pain. The Staff of the Frost Atronach was sturdy enough to support her weight, but whether or not she could push herself upright after her fall was another story. Saranwrap glanced back at her, confused why her new partner wasn’t rising, until she realized that she needed to take action herself.



Putting her paws together, Saranwrap meowed a quick prayer. A little light filled the area around Sandalphon, and she found her wounds restored somewhat, although the Petrification Disease within her remained unaffected. The assistance proved sufficient to allow her to stand up with her staff’s help, just in time to see one of the crippled archangel shadows to take a swing at Saranwrap from behind. The old cat yowled in surprise as she went tumbling, although the Weakness inflicted by her passive allowed her to withstand the blow.

“Little one!” Sandalphon stepped over the scruffy old beast defensively, shaking from cold and fear alike. Bit by bit the specters of her fallen kin dragged themselves closer, their agonized and accusatory voices even worse than their gruesomely broken bodies. With no other allies in sight somehow, the more human part of Sandalphon felt dangerously close to panic, but her original, more logical self fixated upon a fact that she couldn’t ignore, a truth as crushing as it was liberating: this wasn’t right.

Or rather, it wasn’t correct.

“Invalid,” she muttered through gritted teeth.

The shadows paused, as Sandalphon looked up, her pupil an inverted triangle. “This is illogical. Whatever it may be, whether trial, torture, or some attempt karmic justice, it is irrelevant. Mistaken. Fundamentally illegitimate.”

Sandalphon braced herself, breathing deep of the ice-cold air, and committed herself to the correct perspective. “I am not Sandalphon. I am but an instance. An iteration. These memories that confront me were implanted. I never did those things. I never knew these people. These are immutable facts. As such, I feel no complicity. No guilt. This cross is simply not mine to bear.” With a disdainful look she turned to hobble off, between two motionless phantoms, away from this perilous stone tower and back toward the upward mountainside path. Saranwrap trotted after her, still understandably nervous, but when the old cat looked back she saw nothing but shapeless shadow.

“This iteration of Sandalphon will terminate soon,” the archangel grumbled. The bitter cold seeped into her, yet her body held firm. Like stone. “But I need to get just a bit farther.”

Well, Roland was having fun hanging around with Primrose and Band, but looking at the time he had to make it to his next match. Hopefully he'd be done with these soon or at least get something from this that would make for a good payday. But first he'd have to get to his scheduled fight. Being at the center of the city in the high tier, getting there wouldn't be too bad, but he'd just be cutting it close to his appointment when he got there. And since he took awhile, he didn't really get much research on his opponent this time. But from the looks of him, some pretty boy with a green outfit, Roland wasn't too worried, although if he knew who he was fighting he should be.

Entering the arena where people could fall off once again, he came face to face to his next opponent, a fairy boy wearing a green outfit with a sword and shield. Funny enough, not many people used shields in the City. Most weapons were more durable or stronger than with something that would only shatter. Outside of some... particular circumstances. Even then, those that took on a defensive style knew how to block or evade without such a big clunky item.

As the fight started, Roland rolled Keter, a floor he was familiar with as it was the floor he was mostly found on. And strangely a good match up against his current foe whom was announced to be "Link (Soul Callibur)". Although the man before Roland seemed to only grunt and say nothing outside of some grunts as he charged right in when the battle started. Roland was glad that he was finally fighting a sword user who didn't seem to have any special gimmicks or anything, just a fight with swords. At least at the start as Roland dodged Link's stab before striking with his own sword, which Link blocked likewise. This clash getting him to emotion level 1, giving him Scars and the voice coming from him almost disturbing his opponent with a woman's voice saying. "It takes a strong will and courage to cut your own wrist.".

Hearing that, Link hopped away dodging Roland's followup slash with his daggers showing greater agility than it looked like he had and moved to a ranged style shooting Roland with an arrow. Being much slower than a gun, Roland could deflect the arrow without much trouble and after a few more arrows from Link being effortlessly deflected by Roland, he put his bow away and dodged out of the way of Roland making his way in leaving a bomb behind. Now, bombs funny enough were not used much in the City at all, so it took Roland a little bit to notice what the big cartoony orb with a fuse was. And while he tried to defend against it, the explosion left him staggerd with Link smacking him with a sword charge to knock him off the ledge, leading to a round 1 win for Link. However this gave Roland emotion level 2, him gaining Pulsation with an ambiguous voice saying, "He who holds power should rightfully wield it."

Round 2 started, and Roland had gained some emotion levels now. Much like before, knowing his archery was useless against Roland, Link started with what worked last time, bombs. This time however he threw them at Roland. Roland however was ready for them now, and knocked them back at Link, causing him to take damage from them instead. Roland then followed up with his own ranged attacks using his pistols and shotgun, Link blocking them with his shield, but being knocked back a tiny bit from the recoil from Roland's shotgun.

It seemed both of them would be finding ranged attacks mostly useless. As such, both sides ran into each other and clashed, swords clanging, shields blocking, Roland dodging or taking reduced damage from the sword slashes that hit him thanks to Scars, and him sometimes overpowering Link thanks to Pulsation. Eventually the round ended with Link trying a hail mary dash attack at Roland as he hit emotion level 3, gaining Fervent Beats, the same voice from earlier saying "The more you aspire, the faster the beats will get.", and with that a huge power boost with a significant downside, Link just had to outlast Roland now to win a round but this time he dashed right off the ledge leading to a ringout. Knowing this, Roland also gained the EGO page Aspiration, turning the rest of the fight into a huge rush.

Round 3 showed this in good stride as Roland unleashed Aspiration right away, the area turning into the insides of a heart as Link was blasted by the EGO power, which also damaged Roland. Link tried to block it with his shield, but not even his powerful shield could block everything with some of the damage going through. Roland then continued to rush Link which was stopped by Link's shield again, Roland getting hit with a retaliatory sword slash. The two then got into a huge sword fight until Roland finally collapsed from Fervent beats, but as Round 4 started, due to the frenzy of attacks and the loss of the previous round, Roland managed to get to emotion level 5. This got him Guilt and Leer, the same girls voice saying "You’re still holding onto those painful memories… You poor fellow." and "You’re trembling so much. What makes you so afraid?" and the EGO Marionette and Remorse.

Round 4 started, and having gotten Leer, Link was thrown off guard by Roland hitting like a truck now, causing massive knockback to him when Roland hit his shield and making parrying Roland's attacks very difficult. Its as if the fight turned as Roland was at max power and speed now, and while Link had little problem blocking Rolands attacks before, now he was being pushed and before he knew it, Roland had knocked him out of the arena as he blocked a frenzy of attacks from Roland with his shield.

Then came the final round, the round that ended everything. Link knew that Roland would eventually collapse, and that while he seemed to take a lot more damage from round 4, Link also took the damage dealt to Roland on top of Roland's insane damage output now. So he swapped to as defensive as a fighting style he could. As the fight started, Roland drew his gun to use it to knock Link off the platform with a barrage, but Link used his hookshot to disarm Roland before throwing a bomb between himself and the fixer as a smokescreen. Roland didn't care though, and used the EGO of Remorse to clear the smoke as the two were now in a church, Roland in a plain white dress as he seemed to gaze at Link through the smoke as if he was looking through his soul and teleported on top of Link and tried to drive nails into his chest. Only one nail got through, but Link felt what that meant right away as any remorse about anything he had ever done overflowed from him and weakened him for a moment with Roland using this time to hit Link with Furioso.

This was where Link showed his defensive prowess, using the fact Roland constantly moved and teleported around him to keep himself in the center of the arena as he was knocked around, shield raised. But he was still taking chip damage this whole time, and Roland was hitting him with hard attack after hard attack. After Link was standing after this attack, Roland knew his time to finish the round was almost up and unleashed his last two attacks, an attack with Marionette hitting Link hard, and as he slid, fired his explosive shotgun to knock himself and Link back even further leading to a double ring out. But as Link fell out first, Roland was deemed the ultimate winner.

It wasn't long before Band and Nadia picked up the now second-newest member of Gold Team trudging her way toward them. Yayama's expression was unusually distracted, the dark knight lost in thought and hardly paying attention to her surroundings. She knew this could be a mistake, given their reason for being here, but she trusted her teammates enough to give her time to react. Also unusually, her distraction was (mostly) not taking the form of brooding at the moment, or arguing with her recently-resurfaced dark side. It might not be Eorzea or a reflection of it that she was defending at the moment, but having a clear shot at a threat to the realm had sharpened her focus considerably.

Internally, she reviewed her memories of conflict, assessing each one for relevance before deciding whether to dive in further. Implanted or not, Yayama would be making full use of her experience to ensure everyone here walked away alive except for their target. They could replace losses, in theory, but a group like theirs simply couldn't sustain more than a minimum level of attrition, and treating her troops as disposable had not once occurred to her. . . Not that the Seekers were hers, or troops in any traditional sense, but the military training had her thinking in those terms anyway.

Of all the Warrior of Darkness's past battles, the most relevant one was the assault on Eulmore. A shining city of sinister light, controlled by a tyrant of unexpected power and his lethal general, with the ability to turn the citizenry against all contenders for his oversized seat. This was tied to some exceptionally bad memories, perhaps those of her darkest hours - but as she had found strength then, she would find strength now.

She focused on the practical considerations. Anyone nearby could become an enemy at any time, so isolating the target was paramount. She'd need to review techniques for nonlethal subdual with her teammates in the likely case that they failed to totally cut off the Consul from potential brainwashing targets. This fight would require exceptional vigilance - or a willingness to discard the other ashen shadows of this world - to ensure that it couldn't turn against them at a moment's notice.

Then there was the issue of the target simply being able to flee. Catching someone by surprise was all well and good, but there was an oft-neglected downside to attempting to take down a powerful foe outside their fortress. If one's walls were broken down, then there would be nowhere to run - but if one were merely separated from them, there was still the ability to beat a hasty retreat inside them once more. Most of her foes had been conquered under the former condition, often after striking out and being repulsed. Truthfully, she wasn't sure what they could practically do to stop the Consul from using brainwashed civilians as a smokescreen and fleeing in the ensuing chaos should the fight go poorly for them.

Well, the answer is simple then, she supposed. We'll just have to hit them so hard and fast they simply don't have time to realize that they're losing this battle. Her considerations largely finished for the moment, her awareness returned to her surroundings, just in time for her to nearly bump into Band. She awkwardly stopped short, her startlement at their proximity obvious. It was times like these where she was glad for her short stride length, as if she were the size of someone like Hoary, she wouldn't have been able to stop before plowing cleanly into her metallic friend.

"Ah, hello there," she said, acting as if nothing odd had happened. "Any news to report?" Yayama asked, deflecting from her somewhat maladroit arrival. "I was just considering our tactics going forward."

Not every Seeker stationed in Esaka planned to make their way out of the city just then. Fighting Consuls was important, but their main strategy of accessing the area's Guardians without an all out assault on their towers was still to earn the right to face them through the city's tournament series - and missing just one scheduled fight meant their chances of winning were so much slimmer. That some prioritized their matches wasn't surprising, and few could blame them.

Of course those that weren't fighting could be expected to show up, such as Primrose and Therion. The former had gone to Esaka's Mid-Tier to collect the group of Seekers that had been playing around in the Power Stone Games, awaiting their emergence from various stages at the park's main entrance (which also happened to be its exit as well). Therion, Rika, Bowser Jr., and Yayama were then collected and filled in on what was going on in case their activities had distracted them from the chatter through their linkpearls, or if they had simply switched the devices off. With her ability to make herself invisible, it was hard to tell if Juri had decided to come with them or not. Thanks to Junior the group that was visible didn't look too worse for wear, but the presence of the two spirits in their possession was very telling.

"G-Corp is hunting us back," Therion told her when he spotted the question in her gaze. There was little inflection in his voice; just plain fact. Primrose tipped her head lightly just to indicate that she'd heard him. The Seekers' situation in Esaka, which had seemed so simple when they'd first arrived, was quickly headed for a complicated tangle.

Therion himself had the same thoughts. He also identified his own shortcomings when it came to facing down the types of people that called Esaka home. He simply was not well suited for one on one fights, especially when they were against martial artists and the like which excelled at them. Neither he nor Primrose were what one could call frontliners, at least not their original selves, but the thief especially had benefited less physically from his fusions than his fellow Orsterran. Before he had tried to mitigate one of his new weaknesses with more spirits, and while it hadn't worked the way he'd actually wanted it to the results were still helpful. There was no reason he couldn't do the same now, make the odds a little better for himself.

So when the Travelers arrived to Ashwat Village, one of them was a little different than they'd been that morning.


Once the rain had stopped Primrose tucked her umbrella away under her arm. She didn't waste time touring the village, though she did note that this much calmer atmosphere must be what it was usually like. Therion wasn't far behind her (and she behind Yayama who was faster than her small legs implied) as they made their way towards Big Band. His size really made him a natural landmark for the Seekers to gather around.

Though the Orsterrans were not lost in thought like their lalafell acquaintance, so they caught bits and pieces of Band and Fortune's conversation as they got closer. Primrose gave the both of them a smile in lieu of a greeting.

"Nice to see you again in one piece," she told Nadia, despite having met with the woman the day before. Of course she'd heard the feral's voice over the linkpearl a little bit ago, so her appearance at the village was not a surprise.

Therion's complete lack of reaction even to her new outfit implied that he had seen her in it at least once already, though he'd never approached Ms. Fortune since the whole incident at the motel. Being a thief himself, Therion had always been on Ms. Fortune's side in this mess (save for thinking she should have put more thought into her targets), so the only part that really concerned him was what she said about Kazuya.

"Once we're done with R," he said, going right to business talk, "we'll have to track him down again, get all of this over with."

And maybe even get a shot at B too, if his assumption about the bounty reward was correct... if it was even a real reward in the first place.

Speaking of Consul R, that was the reason they'd all gathered here in the first place. Arriving only a little afterward was another group out of Esaka, consisting of half of the Seekers' rep team in KOF, a white haired woman unfamiliar to most of the others, and the Gold Team's captain himself.

Pit's final match of the day, which also happened to be his last match in Pools for Mortal Kombat, was scheduled for the evening. He might have been thinking optimistically, but he thought that he had time between then and now to take down a Consul. Plus he was acting as the group's interim leader while in the Forbidden Kingdom - he pretty much had to be there. If something went wrong and he wasn't there, he'd never forgive himself.

...not that anything would go wrong! The Seekers had beaten Consuls before, and with Pit in charge he was going to do his best to make sure everyone came out of this operation safely. And if things did take longer than expected, he had a secret trick up his sleeve that he could use to get back to Esaka in time for his match: beg Lady Palutena to use her Power of Warp to teleport him.

After waving at the Seekers already gathered and jogging the rest of the way to meet up with them, Pit was the first to respond to Yayama's inquiry. "Not that I've heard," he said. "But they say no news is good news!"

The shift in focus had definitely helped him get past the strange melancholy of the late morning, so now in the cloudy afternoon Pit was as chipper as he normally was - although there was a hint of the commander that he technically was in his voice and body language as he went on, considering Yayama's considering.

"Until we know more about our target, we gotta plan something that has a good chance to work no matter who we're up against. Since it's an ambush -that we're pulling off for once!- it'd make the most sense to blitz him and then trap him before he can respond while he's confused."

Pit punched a hand into his open palm as he said the last part. It was a fairly basic plan, all things considered. He didn't elaborate though, instead looking around at the Seekers first with a somewhat critical, searching eye before his gaze softened up. "We can talk about it on the way though! 'Cause first we got a road trip north, right?"

They'd have to find a good spot from which to launch their attack after all. Nothing too close to Esaka, lest the Consul currently stationed there jumped in to throw a wrench into the Seekers' plans. Although with a group on the larger side, it might behoove them to find some other form of transportation besides their feet if they wanted to make decent time.

And if the traveling group might eventually turn out to be just a little bigger than previously thought due to a tail presently keeping some distance, the Seekers would find out soon enough.

---

In many stories in many worlds, dragons and humans were enemies. Whether one side saw themselves superior to the other, or one betrayed the other, or one was relegated to being simple violent beasts that needed dominating, the two races generally stood opposed. But of course that was not always the case. Especially here in the Tyrannian Plateau, where the number of humans nursing old grudges over past battles of Warfang was rivaled by those that had no quarrel with the city's current rulership, as it didn't matter to them which side was in charge. People that lived alongside monsters, dragons, and dinosaurs and treated them as kin. People like...

"To the Beastmaker Guild base, Avmar! That way!"

A tanned young woman with tribal lines patterned on her skin. She was not wearing much besides a few pieces of painted and lacquered armor, which included a feathered mask - currently perched on her forehead rather than her face, which showed off bright green eyes and a friendly demeanor. If the team from the Avenger knew what to look for, they would certainly find that locating their oblivious contact was going to be a lot easier than expected. Like so many others there was also a scaly beast accompanying her while she walked. Standing about twice as tall at its head and more than three times as long from nose to tail, with saddle harness and head piece affixed, it was easy to assume this particular monster was normally her ride as well as her friend, the latter made obvious by how she talked to it.

"We did get here kind of early though... let's stop for a quick lunch first!"

They both made a beeline for a personal favorite establishment until they were leaning over the Chomby's food cart, the Velocidrome practically salivating. Kayna herself studied the options very seriously, her chin tucked in the crook between her thumb and forefinger. "It'll be a while until we head back that way so let's get a few! What are you thinkin', Avmar? Bacon again?"

The raptor made a hoarse chirping noise, and Kayna nodded. "You're right. How about the fishy one!"

A more drawn out half-roar this time, which was apparently a noise of agreement. Kayna grinned and patted the monster's head.

"Sounds good! Two of those, please! And one meat feast, aaaand one tangy tigersquash!"

She seemed satisfied with her choices until something suddenly occurred to her, and she turned to Avmar with a curious look. "We should get one for Master Kol too, don't you think? Something he can split with that old Canyne. Hm... well, you can't go wrong with ham and cheese!"

If dinosaurs could bark, that was pretty close to what Avmar let out this time. Three barks and one wag of his long tail, which threatened to knock over any tourists that weren't used to walking through Warfang where one always had to keep an eye out for stray tails to avoid tripping over.

Within Moon Mountain, wind howled and lightning struck–not because of some inclement weather outside, but thanks to the uproarious Sundering Exhalation of the Seething Sigh, and the desperate Thundaga of the keyblade wielder the Exhalation nearly blew away. Blazermate began to patch him up right away, but Roxas knew that this little team -separated from the other Seekers by the mountain’s inexplicable darkness- couldn’t keep taking hits like that. His magic descended in a deluge of yellow bolts to electrocute both the Seething Sigh itself and the lung filled by its Shallow Breath. Each blast did respectable damage, though their random pattern left them scattered and inconsistent, not quite enough to deflate the lung. A few seconds remained before another Sundering Exhalation would strike the Seekers with withering force, strong enough to leave Blazermate -whose medibeam couldn’t be turned upon herself- in dire straits.

Of course, the monstrous, draconic Sigh would do its best to ensure that its Exhalation came to pass. It unleashed its infernal Blind Rage, granting itself a Block+ token to reduce its next instance of damage received by 75%, while afflicting Roxas with two Blind tokens, each of which would halve a single attack’s accuracy.

Blazermate could clean up those blind tokens with her cleanse ability, but giving damage to the creature would be a bit more difficult for her. She could heal herself a bit with her own passive regeneration and a thrown Divine Star which would remove the creature’s Block+ token, but real damage would be difficult until her projectile shield was charged. She did have a couple things she could do though, and one of them was an angry senator with a bit of an explosive temper. Summoning Armstrong, Blazermate sent him at the boss with him barreling through the creature before letting off a great ground explosion, damaging everything the creature had. It proved to be enough to pop the Sigh’s lung and prevent Sundering Exhalation for the time being, and the wound Armstrong left on the beast itself was nothing to scoff at, either.

”Hey Roxas, how well can you use flowmation here? If you can get me to the spots I tell you to go easily, I can help with more damage.” Blazermate said, knowing that Roxas couldn’t see the cracks in the ground she could that’d unleash exploding ghosts. She often didn’t attack with these unless it was convenient as they were often out of the way, but this room wasn’t super large and Roxas had snappier movement than she did.

”Okay, got it!” Roxas said, an idea forming. He used his Phantom Ruby to create a cluster of virtual cubes that he scattered about the area. These would hopefully provide a bit of hindered movement to the Sigh while giving Roxas some much needed launching points, ”Hold tight!”

The pair had only a precious couple seconds to converse before the Seething Sigh inhaled again to inflate the lung closer to the team, beginning another round of combat. This time, it unleashed Hysteria, a deafening cacophony of trumpet blasts targeting Blazermate. It dealt some damage, not too much but enough to be somewhat scary given her state after the first Sundering Exhalation, but the side effects were much worse. It inflicted Weak to halve the damage of her next attack, a point of Stress, and caused a shuffle; the medabot got yanked forward as Roxas and his pets got shunted away.

”Blazermate?” Roxas called, hoping his medabot friend was okay as he staggered to his feet. Apparently that blast managed to catch Shocker as well, but the Rotom didn’t look seriously hurt just yet. ”Use Double Team again, buddy.” Roxas said through heavy breaths, ”And this time, pelt him with Swift as much as you can.” With that he went into movement to try and find and reconnect with Blazermate as quickly as possible.

Shocker, meanwhile, obeyed his commands. The Rotom chirped and quickly separated into multiple afterimages yet again. But this time he followed that up by shooting volleys of yellowish colored stars at the Sigh. They weren’t super strong in the damage department, but they were reliable - able to home in and ensure that no shot missed. And as a bonus, they could hit up to two targets at once at the cost of splitting the overall damage between them. It would take more than that to deal with the Seething Sigh’s lung, however.

While the debuff on Blazermate didn’t last long, being dispelled by her rain coat, being knocked away was a bigger problem. Roxas knew what this meant though, and reconnected with her as both sides, upon recovering, went back to join each other. Blazermate didn’t have anything else damage wise to help with the inflating lungs that looked like they were about to burst, so she prepared to get her and Roxas in her Holy Word Salvation dome to not only heal both of them, but also make them both immune to the damage of the oncoming super attack.

A moment later, the Sigh released its Sundering Exhalation. The concentrated force of a gale rammed into Blazermate’s Salvation dome, yet the miraculous barrier held firm for another moment until it disappeared in a shimmer. Still, while the dome negated the blast’s damage and restored some of that dealt by its predecessor, it did not prevent two points of Stress piling onto everyone present. By now, with six points of Stress, Roxas’ mind was under duress. His vision swam, menacing voices reached him from all directions, and filthy claws teased at the edge of his sanity.

The Seething Sigh breathed in, inflating one lung.

”No, no, no…” Roxas said, his breathing getting heavier, ”Not like this…” Voices in his head were trying to drag him down and convince him they were doomed, he could practically feel claws scraping at his mind. But he wasn’t exactly a stranger to attacks that had an effect on his mind. Fighting Xion had taken its toll on his mind back then, and his mind also remembered the Organization member Zexion, who wielded illusions to similarly play mind games with opponents.

”Not like this!” He snapped, seemingly forcing himself to refocus again, ”Shocker, Fire Blast!” He hastily commanded, prompting the Rotom to spit a big powerful blast of fire at one of the lungs that took the shape of a big kanji for ‘fire’ on impact. Meanwhile Roxas went hard after the opposite lung, using his StepSword to close in and followed up with violent swinging and thrashing of his dual Keyblades. Some of his blows missed thanks to the tokens applied by the Sigh, but the sheer volume of his attacks gave Roxas the advantage.

At this point Blazermate had seen how this thing attacks and how… funnily rarely it attacks. This meant she could assist with much more than her divine stars and as Roxas went in with his StepSword, Blazermate went with him to tag team with him, but ubersawing the main body to fill up the rest of her charge before hitting Roxas with a Kritz, letting him really pile on the damage with Blazermate giving another Disseminate to mirror the damage at a lower rate along the creature and the other lung.

Now on the offensive, the Seekers not only disarmed the Sigh’s filled lung but dealt unnecessary extra damage to both lungs, on top of wounding the central body. As part of its body burned and its enemies posed greater threat, the horror responded in kind. It took a loud, almost deafening deep breath that inflated both lungs at once. Then it let loose its Wrath and Rancor to burn and stress out Shocker, followed by Blind Rage against Blazermate, which dealt enough damage to make sure she couldn’t be too comfortable even after her dome’s healing, and dished out two Blind tokens to boot.

”Return!” Roxas said frantically, recalling Shocker to its Poke Ball before the Rotom could get too hurt, then quickly threw two other Poke Balls that released Titan and Turbo respectively. ”Use Screech, and… and Curse!” He was unsure how well the latter would work considering what happened when he tried it against Two-Toed Tom. But in his stressed out state, Roxas wasn’t thinking 100% clearly. Both Pokemon obeyed their commands, Turbo employing her usual tactic of driving around the edge of the cavern room to keep her distance while screeching her engines to sharply decrease the Sigh’s defense on its central body and the left lung. Meanwhile Titan used Ghost-type energy to summon a needle that he temporarily impaled himself with to inflict the Curse status on the Sigh’s central body. Every tick of 6 seconds or so it would lose some health, though whether said health loss was based on its own max HP or Titan’s remained to be seen.

As for the Nobody himself, he took a moment to recast Aeroga on himself and Blazermate. He could benefit from the wind’s shielding effect, but also regenerate some of his MP through prolonged exposure to the spell by way of his Lucid Gain boon courtesy of Apollo. After that wind spell was recast, Roxas had to go back on the offensive, especially since he had been mostly spared from the Sigh’s most recent attacks. For now he focused his Keyblade strikes on the central body, making sure to use StepSword lock back onto it if or when the Sigh moved away or knocked the Keyblade Wielder back.

With Roxas and his pokemon taking damage, thanks to healing them Blazermate could finally deploy her projectile shield which would start to not only do a lot of damage to the Sigh and its lungs, but also vaguely defend her and Roxas from its attacks while it was up. It seemed the next ubercharge might be a medaforce beam at the rate the fight was going, but that’d be after the shield went down. For now she just used it for a lot of damage on this thing.

Due to Roxas’ focus on the Sigh’s central body, the projectile shield proved to be the damage the team sorely needed. Unfortunately, the sheer size of the monster meant that the shield could only touch the core plus one, which left the other intact long enough for the Seething Sigh to belt out its ultimate move once more. A Seething Exhalation every bit as bad as the very first cannoned out of the Sigh’s neck tubules -well away from the shield immersed in its main body- and into the Seekers’ party. The rip-roaring cyclone battered them bruised and bloody. Blazermate, seeing the inhalation coming, banished herself to dodge the attack and not take unnecessary damage but cutting her shield contact a bit short, and Roxas’ pokemon stayed conscious thanks to their sturdy defense states, but an atmospheric crush wasn’t all that their master suffered.

Two additional points of stress brought Roxas’ total to ten, which put him at the breaking point–the dividing line between breakthrough and meltdown, between resurgence and resignation. The keyblade wielder’s resolve was tested.

The trip down to the village was uneventful, for the most part. For Amaterasu, the only action had been running off to fetch the twins in-order to get them up to date on the Consul info. Other than that she’d mostly just listened in with one ear on whatever was discussed, while enjoying being out in the countryside as much as the cloudy skies would allow.

Once they arrived at the village, however, she spotted the two koopa children who had already arrived, and recalled that there was other info that they needed to know.

As always, she wasn’t exactly the right person to deliver that information however. Which was why when padded up to them she simply barked for attention, wrote “interlinks break flame clocks” on the dirt of the ground for them to read, and then promptly ran off back towards where the twins were just arriving in the village.

”Hey wait what!? What do you mean they can do that?! How’d you find that out! Hey come back!” Jr called out after her, before he and his sister came running after her, and thus right up to the twins next to which she’d sat herself down and pointedly looked at.

Jr for his part continued to indignantly badger her, but Rika got the message, or maybe just wasn’t above asking, and so turned to the other children to ask ”Do you know what this is about?”

Having not seen what Amaterasu scrawled upon the earth, the twins did not know what Rika referred to and needed to make an inference. “You mean, why we’re here?” Marg asked.

“I think we’re hoping to wipe out a Consul,” Bart answered. For the moment his focus lay on Ashwat Village, since the teens seldom happened to deploy to rural communities like this one. The sights, sounds, and especially smells -whether good or bad- were all quite novel.

“I mean about-” Rika began to reply, before a bark and a pawing at the ground interrupted her, and brought their attention to the scrawling of “Interlink” on the dirt between them all, and then concluding “-that.”

“Oh!” After realizing, Marg lowered her tone. “Well, we’re not exactly the best people to ask. Stratagems isn’t technically an interlink. But Ammy here said you kids might pull it off?” Since Both Rika and Junior were younger (at least in appearance) than them, the twins seemed to feel pretty confident about calling them ‘kids’. “If you do, just be careful. Interlinks are, like, public enemy number one for Moebius.”

Bart kept his voice down as he explained, “Because interlinks can destroy Flame Clocks. Supposedly we can, too, but the last time we tried…things didn’t go so hot.” His expression looked grim. “If we can help win this tournament, it’ll be proof that we’ve gained the strength we need. Then it’s time for a clock-busting road trip.”

“Within reason,” Marg added. “Can’t bring too much attention down on our heads, especially the Avenger. Or it’s game over.”

“They can what?! ” Jr replied after a moment of silence, tossing his arms up in the air, before adding “you lot knew this the whole time?” accusatorially.

When his sister asked him “I mean, did anyone ever ask?” rhetorically however, he calmed down a little bit, but still puffed his cheeks out in frustration.

“Still, I mean, this is a big deal, right? Should be, like, super important gotta tell every info, shouldn't it?” He said after, still clearly a little techy about it, but calm enough that he wasn't shouting any more.

As Marg scratched her head, Bart shrugged, his uncertainty clear. “I’m kind of surprised you’re hearing it from us first. Then again…maybe none of the other Seekers forged strong bonds yet?”

“It’s not something you can force,” Marg added. “We saw what happens when Moebius does that, heh.”

“I mean, I guess? Been what, a few weeks, n none of them have hung out all the time like me and sis I don’t think?” Jr said, glancing at Rika, who shrugged, and pointed out that “people come and go a lot. Or decommission themselves”

“Huh?”

“You know, like how Tora’s n Poppi not doing mission stuff any more” she clarified.

“Oh” Jr replied, before pointing out “you mean like, retire, right?”

“Oh is that what it is for not-boats? Sure, that.”

“Alright. Anyway. uh…” Jr said, getting back on track by saying/asking “Ok, so we’ve, like, seen an interlink. Cool armor thing. Really tough fight. So what goes wrong with the Consuls ones?”

Bart snickered. “Well, real interlinks are like a harmony, y’know? In order to pull off the most perfect dance, someone needs to lead, and someone needs to follow. The leader can change, but ultimately it’s that trust in one another that makes it possible.”

“Sadly, ‘trusting’ and ‘following’ aren’t really in the Moebius playbook,” Marg continued. “Moebius never trust one another, all of them want to lead, and the results aren’t pretty. When they interlink, their combined forms have two heads, each thinking and working for itself. Powerful, and unpredictable, but unstable.”

The twins grinned, crossing their arms. “Just goes to show who is worthy of power, and who isn’t.”

“Yeah that sounds messy. But also strong? Good thing we won't have to deal with that in this seeing as it is just one” Rika said, causing Amaterasu to groan intenraly as the shipgirl jinxed them all.

“Oh, huh, yeah didn't know the leading bit. When we do these fusions with these cassette monster transformations it's more like it's both of us. Or something entirely new?” Jr replied, scratching the back of his neck as he thought it through, before grinning and declaring that “so now we know that we can definitely do it!”

“I can't dance though”

“I think it's a, what are they called, one of those things that means another thing or whatever. So like not actually dancing. Clover’s parents just touched and then boom, Interlinked” Jr reassured her, fumbling over the word metaphor as he did.

“A euphemism,” Bart supplied helpfully.

His sister gave him a disdainful look. “No, dummy. He means an epithet.”

“No it's like, an Oxymoron or something” Jr retorted, because that was the funny one that had stuck with him.

There was a little more back and forth on this topic, much to Amaterasu’s dismay, that was ended by Rika. Having no horse in this race however, she did so not by answering the question by instead by just changing the topic to something more important.

“So, uh, I checked ahead with a scout plane” she explained, pointing up at one of her RC plane sized drones hovering in the sky some way off “and it looks like there's basically no road. So we can’t use the bikes or anything to go that way”

“So we can just use your whale then” Jr replied, but as Rika pointed out “it won't fit everyone”

Which certainly presented a bit of a conundrum for everyone involved.

---

Above a plain of putrid purple flesh and writhing tendrils Lithyl Nightweaver hovered on insectile wings. She had cast Edward into the astral sea, and willingly become the avatar of Urrath, the being who had twisted the Dreadnaught's mind to its own dark ends.

Now she unleashed the hordes of the umbral abyss, sending grotesque demons made out of the twisted forms of mortal kind charging across the wretched gloom of their home, and towards both Edward’s forces, and a gateway back to the world that had opened behind them.

From it echoed cries for help, cries of blame, anything that could dig into Edward’s mind and trap him in the illusion.

It worked well enough. Well enough that he drew his sword, pointed it at the enemy and ordered his troops to ”Open fire!”

It was an order his ironclad obeyed at the speed of the man’s own thoughts, its tripled barreled cannon raising up at an angle and then unleading the last of the special munitions not expended during the charge up the hill. Thrice it hundred, and thirst burning payloads rained down into the oncoming horde, spreading fire across a wide area, burning and igniting the foes.

Hordes of spiterlings where roasted in a flash, while fragile fleshling’s detonated prematurely, needle thin spines scything through nearby allies. Hulking Flesh abominations and spindily will theifs charged on through the flames, heedless of the flames licking at feet or skin.

As they emerged, however, icy projectiles crashed into them, Edward having deployed his hulking snoruyo and the frigid aura’d Reindrix into the battle. Then came a swiftly tossed bomb and a rain of firecrackers as Scrumpy dumped his entire mana reserve into a hail of minor explosives, frost-sparkling fire k.

Little could have survived such an onslaught, but a Umbral Juggernaut came charging through anyway, trailing a sicking trail of umbral taint behind it.

By loona’s will, it first suffered temperature shock, and then froze solid, as she cast Cryo-Heal on it twice, only to be shocked when it cleared the status effect and seemed to gain vitality from the act.

”Curse eaters! Keep them burning!” Edward called out in warning before their ears were all set ringing by the Ironclad unloading all three barrels into the juggernaut, slamming it back.

The SomnaDrix charged it a moment later, its freezing antlers colliding with its plated skull, harming both in the process, though momentum was on the impossible creature’s side. As was the battle of limbs, as the creature reached up its long clawed hands and dug into the foe’s twisted flesh, ripping and rending till the shadow spit apart. Split apart, and burst into dozens of the wretched little spiterlings.

They fell upon the SomnaDrix, which thrashed and bellowed, sending them flying as they dug their claws into it. As it did so, rocks formed out of seemingly thin air whenever it tossed one, and it also began devouring these rocks just as fast, revitalizing and armoring itself with stony skin as it did.

It was a bit absurd really. There was also no time to pay attention to it as the battle continued.

Edward’s own focus had not been on the chargers, he had to rely on his forces to hold them back. No he had been firing non stop at the bigger threats that had been following the horde. Umberal mistresses (a vision which the tome of the tome of corruption had attempted to tempt Sectonia with) strode forwards with insectile grace, ready to enchain the minds of his forces. Alongside them came Direcasters waddled with the exact opposite of grace, and yet this wretched kin of the dire penguin was no less dangerous than the stalking mistress.

Finally Lithyl Nightweaver floated behind them all, having shrugged off enough gunfire that Edward had turned his attention to thinning those the umbral demons around her. Several were alight with arc-fire from a shot from his smiting bishop, and he was certainly getting a lot of practice with the new triple shot pistol, but it wasn’t enough to stop them.

As they got into range they began to open fire, the direcasters fired freezing bolts that crushed the isolated most of all, while the mistresses fired singular blasts of foul corrupt magic.

It harmed and wounded, but did not, to Loona, seem to be enough for Edward to call for them to ”Fall back twenty paces before they can channel!” resulting in an impressively orderly retreat, with only Scrumpy, Loona and the reindrix having to panickedly adapt while the Ironclad and Impossible Creatures obeyed without question or concern. As they did, however, and the gateway out of this place grew closer, so too did the demands from it grow louder. Screams of fear, accusations of cowardice, demands for salvation.

They grew even louder when the second command to fall back was called, and they were pushed right to the border of it. It seemed to overwhelm the man, who commanded that ”We hold them here! Steel your wills! Do not let them take your minds!”

The hordes came on, seemingly no smaller than they had begun, but now the casters had a chance to plant their feet call upon the magics. Chains lashed out from the mistresses to ensnare minds, while the direcasters made distorted penguin cries to the skies and brought down a storm upon the defenders.

Flesh was ripped from bodies by spiked chains, lightning jolted them, and yet at the end of the onslaught, Edward had the audacity to glance around in confusion and say that ”That… isn’t what those do”

For, indeed, if the shadows could cause madness and insanity like that which the casters of the umbral abyss could call down, it would have no need for illusions or trickery. As that was what it had, however, it intensified them even further, the cries for protection and accusations of failure from the way out of this hellscape reaching a crescendo that drowned out all else with sheer volume.

In the face of this onslaught, Edward gripped his weapon, raising it towards the form of Lithyl Nightweaver hovering behind the umbral forces, still committed to this lost cause despite everything. Then he froze solid. A moment later Loona collided with the ice cube, setting it skidding backwards out of the gateway, forcing Edward out of this place.

She then turned to his forces, eyes shining with brilliant intelligence, and with great effort gave a distorted command for them to “Come!” along with a waved paw, before racing after the Dreadnaught’s form. The impossible creatures obeyed her will, and a moment later Scrumpy and the Reindrix raced after her out of pure survival instinct.

They left behind the inert and commandless Ironclad, into which the umbral forces crashed and began to tear apart, giving the living just enough time cross the barrier and re-enter the waking world.

Despite her determined announcement to get her teammates moving, Anais lingered in the vicinity of the marketplace for a few minutes after splitting up from Susi and Poppi. Her crutches did not give her the luxury of quick relocation, yes, but she also just wasn’t sure where to go yet. Even if she did remember Warfang’s layout from her childhood, and she most certainly did not, so much had changed that Tyrannia’s capitol might just as well be a new city. She figured she needed to get somewhere with a good view, but there was no telling if any of the grand towers that protruded from the sandstone cityscape were open to the public, or the private property of one of the four great dragon guilds. It would be hard for the factions in play here to be as cruel and ruthless as the district bosses back in Warfang’s Mokai days, but it paid to be careful in this region nonetheless. Its reptilians inhabitants might be cold-blooded, but civilized or not, tempers could flare as hot as the midday sun. And that was very hot indeed, so hot that the seamstress felt it increasingly important that she find herself some shade.

Already sweating, Anais made her way to a leopard-hide awning between a granite grillhouse called Tyrannian Foods and a cavewoman-owned prehistoric boutique by the name of Ugga Shinies, where she seated herself a respectable distance away from an elderly lady with bone jewelry and a theropod companion, who gave her an amicable nod. After carefully setting her crutches down, the seamstress rested to watch the marketplace as she tried to catch her breath.

There were so many people, human or otherwise, hustling and bustling about the place. She supposed that they simply must be accustomed to the conditions here. In the intervening years since her childhood here, Anais knew she’d gotten very acclimatized to the Avenger’s comfortably climate-controlled interior. It had been so long since she’d even seen combat…she loved peace, of course, but she knew she was made for more. As the child of a warrior princess and an elite warrior of the Sky Guard, fighting was in her blood. Nevertheless, she’d come to this dangerous place, the home of Moebius R an countless powerful dragons, unarmed. Well…with crutches under both arms, there wasn’t much room for her dusty old axe.

As she rested, Anais happened to turn her attention back toward the omelette stand Grimm took an interest in earlier. There wasn’t much of a breeze to carry tantalizing smells her way, but the food did look good enough to remind her that she hadn’t had lunch. At the moment, an eye-catching duo happened to be there: a sporty young woman and a splendid raptor-like dinosaur with bright blue scales and vermillion stripes. Even from here, Anais could appreciate its spiky fangs -made for skewering fish but perfectly suited for chomping omelettes- and its wicked carving talons, one per foot. Her gaze lingered longest on its saddle, reminding her just much she missed mounting up on a scaly beast of her own. She couldn’t help but be jealous of the Velocidrome’s rider…who, now that Anais looked closer, rather perfectly matched the description provided by Primrose prior to the mission. Her brown eyes opened wide. “Oh. Oh!”

Anais rose in a hurry and made a beeline for the other woman as fast as her crutches would let her, careful as always not to step on any tails. She caught Kayna mid-munch only a few seconds after she left the omelette stand and gave an awkward bow of pre-emptive apology for the words that then poured out of her. “Hi, hello, sorry! Are you Kayna? I’m an ally of Primrose Azelhart? She met you in, um, Meridi-at-han?” She paused only briefly to hope that she had her facts straight. “I’m here with some friends. Two metal girls, and a big bug named Grimm. We’re here for Consul R. Uh, here hoping to meet him, that is. Do you know him? Or I mean, know about him? You know, where he is, what he’s up to, when and where he might be going…uh, anything?”

She let out a nervous laugh and tried to calm down. “Ahah, excuse me. I’m moving too fast. Impatient. I’m Anais, Anais Partridge. If you are Kayna _{and I seriously hope you are} it’s, uh, a pleasure to meet you.”

Elsewhere in Warfang, Grimm was moving quickly. Even in a sunlit, sandstone city like this, the afternoon sun cast plenty of shadows, and the prevalence of non-human inhabitants played to Grimm’s advantage. He moved quickly, quietly, and thanks to his teleportation ability, non-linearly. In no time at all, he reached the base of the enormous, roughly cylindrical stone fortress that formed Warfang’s centerpiece.

It sat, endlessly and inexplicably rotating, atop a sort of sloped pedestal. Three quarters of it looked like rough stone, but one side had been painstakingly carved into sheer surfaces beneath six arched openings where stalwart Peacekeeper sentries stood in the flickering light of braziers. Grimm paused in the shade of a dragon statue as he peered up at the citadel. The entrance would no doubt be heavily guarded, but those lookout posts featured just one guard apiece. They would be on guard for any winged assailants that might attempt unlawful entry, but what about a small, scuttling shadow, crawling down from above? Grimm darted forward, his blurred form as indistinct and fleeting as a desert mirage, and began to climb.



Despite her small stature, Yayama was sturdily built, enough so that the 7’7”, five thousand-pound cyborg Big Band actually noticed when she bumped into him. He did not begrudge her one bit, however, and when she greeted him with an update request he gave a nod of acknowledgement. “No sweat, there’s a lot to think about. Of all the challenges this world throws at us, Consuls might just be the worst. They got a whole lotta nasty tricks up their sleeve, and that’s just the powers all of ‘em have; there’s no tellin’ what ‘secret ingredient’ R’s bringin’ to our li’l shindig.”

Band gave a sharp, tense sigh and looked around at Ashwat Village. Ordinary people were coming and going, just another day of trying to make a living off the land and its bounty. “As for news, nothin’ much. Everythin’s quiet ‘round here. All business as usual, far as I can tell. I’ve pretty much been a city slicker my whole life.”

As he surveyed the scene, though, he spotted one person who didn’t stick out as she sauntered Big Band’s way, her calico tail waving behind her. The detective tilted his head in the catgirl’s direction, indicating the way that Yayama should glance. “I guess there’s one li’l bit of good news. Look what the cat dragged in.”

Nadia could easily spot Big Band among the steady parade of farmers, carts, and draught animals, but she didn’t quite notice Yayama until just before she came to a stop at the cyborg’s side. “Oh, hi.” Although her meeting with Band with reasonably well, all things considered, she dreaded the possibility of having to go through the process of admitting guilty, expressing contrition, and resolving to do better with every Seeker of Light that found his or her way here. Nadia quickly decided to not get into it and leave it to the dark knight to broach the subject, if she felt so inclined. Instead she gave what she hoped was a disarmingly friendly smile. “Glad you’re stickin’ it out with us. We’re an odd bunch, and it’s a sucky job, but someone’s gotta do it, eh?” She scoured her mind for possible puns to squeeze into her speech, without any possible racial insensitivity, but for the moment the catgirl came up short.

Only a few moments after the lalafell’s absent-minded arrival, Primrose made an radiant entrance to Ashwat, and seconds later her sticky-fingered companion showed up with a fresh new color scheme. Big Band’s titular stature made it easy for the comrades to find one another, and although it felt good to be reunited, the Seekers did not spend much time on idle pleasantries. Rather than the past, Therion put the team’s focus onto their future–specifically, one without Kazuya in it. Nadia’s faked death might mean she was off the villain’s radar for now, but the heroes would only know peace once G-Corp’s overlord was out of the picture for good. “Right,” she replied, limbering herself up as if she was going to get on that right now. “He made things purr-sonal. I’m itchin’ to make that bastard pay.” Cracking a smile, she winked at her fellow thief. “Plus, once he’s taken care of, the rest of his sneakers are ours for the takin’. No footwear ish-shoes ever again!”

Just then, another few reinforcements turned up: two captains (one by name, one by nature) and a twintail-sporting swordswoman. Unfamiliar with this newcomer, Nadia sized her up quickly. She looked fancifully medieval, in sort of the same vein as Yayama, and her eyes lacked Galeem’s sunset-red glare…even if they possessed another, subtly predatory glint that the feral couldn’t quite place. Nadia glanced at Pit for an introduction of some sort, figuring that an explanation fell to the person in charge, but the angel seemed more preoccupied with the task ahead. Well, the feral couldn’t really fault him for that. When Grima looked her way, Nadia gave a cheerful grin and a breezy wave.

By now, Nadia was actively checking the road that led south back toward Esaka, and sure enough, when she looked again she spotted a couple more Seekers. Bowser Jr, Rika, the wolf Amaterasu, and the Bogard twins made for the strangest assortment yet. They arrived to find the rest of their comrades talking strategy about what came next.

“Northwest,” Band corrected Pit. “And from what I gather, there ain’t any roads leadin’ that way. Which is actually good for us. If we catch R in the middle o’ nowhere, he ain’t got any innocents to drag into the fight. And I know for a fact that their teleports ain’t good for long-distance travel, so all we gotta do is catch him.” Of course, that wouldn’t be easy. The theoretical ambush depended on intelligence from the operatives in Tyrannia, but given the amount of ground to cover the Seekers would probably need to get started before they got word, or it might be too late to intercept R en-route. And once they intercepted him, it wouldn’t be right to say that things got easier from there, given how powerful and unpredictable Consuls could be. Still, there were thirteen people here now, almost every Seeker in Esaka. They weren’t planning to make it a fair fight.

When the conversation inevitably turned toward practical matters, Nadia spoke up. “Oh, I found a way we could cover some ground? Maybe? Over here.” Beckoning to the others, she led the way through Ashwat toward a special building. The giant, cobbled-together horse head atop it, as well as the pungent, heady odor of animals, marked as the stable. Nadia winced, wrinkling her nose at the smell, and took a look. There seemed to be three kinds of horses available: a reddish brown kind, a chocolate brown kind, and a kind with a very weird head. That wasn’t all, though. To the feral’s surprise, she also found a handful of giant yellow chickens also geared up for transportation. Finally, there was something between a wolf and a badger, with white fur that might’ve been majestic if it wasn’t so dirty.

Nadia seemed to be having second thoughts. “People really ride animals like these…?” She’d faced bigger and scarier creatures throughout the World of Light already, so the beasts here didn’t exactly scare her, but she did not relish the prospect of trusting her life to one. “Well, whatever you guys want, I can cover the cost. I’ve got a mount-tain of cash and I’m not horsin’ around!”

A moment later, Band walked over from the local he’d been talking to. “Bad news, folks. It’s later than I figured, so there’s no way we’re gettin’ done with this before my next match. It’s either go without me, or I drop outta the tournament.” He peered at the various animals available for rent from the stable. “I don’t think any critters here want me ridin’ ‘em anyway.”

“It’s ok, we got this! Can’t fur-get the main mission after all.” Although Nadia had another match today herself, it would be late enough in the day that there should be plenty of time to deal with R and get back to Esaka before she got disqualified. “If twelve of us can’t beat one Consul, thirteen probably ‘dozen’ make a difference.”

The feral headed into the stable and reached for her magic wallet as she stepped up to the counter. “Hey there! We wanna rent some mounts for a li’l trip northwest, so you’re in for some ‘stable’ income!”

“Splendid!” The mustached man behind the counter clasped his hands. “Northwest, you said? Careful not to stray too far, I hear the flooding’s quite extensive, especially near Swopes Farm.” Shrugging, he gestured toward the available animal. “Well, we have plenty of horses, chocobos, and wulgs today. Which would you like?”

Nadia scratched her chin as she took another look around. “Hmm…well, the horses smell. Dogs and cats don’t mix. So how about a chicken? Er, chocobo?”

The man turned to whistle to a coworker, and after a moment or two she brought out a gallant chocobo steed with fluffy feathers and a brilliant dandelion color. The farmhand offered Nadia the reins. “How’s this?”

Nadia reached up to stroke the chocobo’s neck and smiled when he did not flinch away. “Poultry in motion!” She turned to look around at the other Seekers, her expression innocent. “So how does it work?”

After a good ten or fifteen minutes, the team’s mounts were paid for and ready to. Band, along with any other Seekers who couldn’t make the journey, stood by to watch the assorted horses, chocobos, and wulgs of various sizes gather at Ashwat’s edge, some riders much more confident than others. “Good luck, everyone,” he intoned, and a moment later the adventurers were off.



Within minutes of departing from Ashwat Village, the rolling golden wheatgrass gave way to a sprawling, watery rice field, where the streaks of sunlight through gray clouds shone down on glittering rivers, vibrants fronds, bamboo thickets, and trees chock-full of snow-white buds, all adrift in perpetual motion thanks to a fresh, ever-present breeze. Just as expected, no roads existed to show the Seekers the way, so they needed to rely on the position of the early afternoon sun to tell which direction to go. Conveniently, though, the wind seemed to blow at their back the whole time, as if speeding the heroes onward toward victory. In order to not risk drowning their mounts the team took advantage of the green, grassy stretches between the rivers, rather like roads in appearance. Bamboo rafts and giant lily pads permitted them to cross the waterways with a couple well-timed jumps. Other than the terrain itself, easily-startled beretsants, and the occasional farmer hard at work, no obstacles barred the travelers’ progress, making it an ideal time for conversation. They could also see plenty of interesting wildlife, from froglike Croajiro to watchful Kingambit.

After a good twenty minutes or so, the farmland got a little hillier, the groves of trees around the edges more dense, the farmhouses less frequent, and the horsetail reeds more prevalent. When the travelers exited a small rocky pass, they found themselves overlooking a beautiful fertile valley split by a rushing, deep river, too wide for even the sprightliest chocobo to jump over. The rope bridge, it seemed, was out. This valley housed a small settlement, though, which made it a poor spot for a showdown with R. If they meant to move on, the Seekers would need to find an expedient way across the river.

“Augh, my thighs are KILLIN’ me.” Once she dismounted, Nadia stretched, contorting her body in ways that should not be possible as she took a look around. It was a very pretty area, but they couldn’t stop and smell the roses right now. The locals seemed friendly, at least, and she could already see a farm girl and botanist duo possibly hoping to sell their wares to the newcomers. Upstream a ways, Nadia’s sharp eyes spotted a couple rope bridges stretched between rocky ridges. As she watched, though, one of the several small blueberry-like creatures attempted to cross, only for a face on the cliff she hadn’t seen yet to sneeze and launch the zoombini back where it came. “...Huh.”



Now much larger than the angry paripus rioters in his Assassin form, and given a second wind by his determination to keep his poor cats alive, Heismay steeled himself for action. With great effort he forced himself to turn away from the ghastly gallows that leered at him from within Moon Mountain’s shadowy alcove. From somewhere within the unruly throng he could still hear his long-lost son’s voice, his scared and plaintive cries begging his father to save him from the savage beastmen who’d trample him half to death and leave him to die, too far gone to be saved by the time his absent father finally arrived. This vision of the past stung Heismay like a dagger to the heart, and so did the act of abandoning it, but after the cats’ yowls of pain brought the eugief to his senses his anger burned much hotter than his regret. Whoever or whatever might be responsible for these phantoms, how dare they try and prey upon him, deceive him like this, with the memory of his boy. The past could not be changed, but the future had yet to be written, and Heismay would atone for his mistakes by not letting them happen again.

Even as he made to leave the sorry scene behind, however, Heismay realized it would be no mean feat. Between him and the upward path stood rows upon rows of paripus malcontents, snarling and gnashing their teeth like rabid dogs. “Leave us be!” Heismay took the initiative and sprang forward, unshouldering the Assassin’s curved greatsword for a wide, round slash that struck a whole row of beastmen at once. They faltered, stumbling backward, but the next second the crowd pushed forward again. Holding his cats close to his armored chest, the swordsman struck again and again to try and clear a path, but the horde would simply not yield. No matter which way Heismay turned, he found only more enemies out to get him, lashing out with cruel punches and kicks, stones, bricks, and other makeshift weapons. There were simply too many of them.

After a few moments he stepped back, tensed up, and then sprang upward in an attempt to leap clear over the crowd. For a brief moment his heart soared as he flew toward the open night air outside the alcove, only for hands to close around his feet and yank him back to the earth. “No!” He landed with a heavy slam as he attempted to cushion the cats’ fall with his Archetype’s large body, then rolled backward as the paripus threatened to dogpile him. When he sprang to his feet, pushing free from grasping hands, the alcove’s exit looked even further than before.

“Curses!” Heismay spat, his voice given a metallic resonance in his Assassin form. He glanced down at his cats to make sure they were still alive, then glared at the mass of rioters. “Paripus scum!” Unable to sustain his Archetype any longer, he reverted to his normal form, and backed further away with one kitten clutched in each arm. With every moment, every expenditure of magla, it seemed less and less likely that he’d be able to fight his way out of this. These obscure enemies, either no-selling his attacks or replenishing their numbers as fast as he reduced them, did not seem to follow the rules of combat as the eugief knew them. What, then, was he to do?

Breathing heavily, Heismay tried to slow down and think about this. For the moment, the rabble didn’t appear to be pushing forward, at least. He’d already gotten an inkling, based on how this encounter was clearly tailored to his painful past, that this was less of a combat challenge than it was some sort of trial or lesson. “But I’ve already chosen to make up for my failings by safeguarding these young ones,” he muttered, frustrated. “So why am I still stuck?”

Still wary, he tried to study the faces in the throng before him, searching for anything that could be a sign, a hint, or an opening. He saw nothing but murderous eyes and malicious, toothy smiles, ready to rip him limb from limb. More beast than man. “Tis all because of you,” he growled. “You people. You think yourselves victims, then turn around and trample those weaker than you underfoot, just as bad as your oppressors. Blindly tearing others down, in the hopes that it might raise you up!”

After tucking one cat along with the other under one arm, he began to gesture with angry indignation. “Look at me! The eugief tribe is outcast, worse off still than the paripus, and yet I made something of myself. Grueling and thankless it was, but I worked hard and gained a life that I could be proud of, something I could be happy with!” Tears congealed in his eyes as he gritted his teeth. “Only for you to take it away!”

The paripus began to push closer. Heismay shook his tears out and seized his scythe to brandish at the bloodthirsty throng as he began to retreat, one step at a time. “. For just a moment, though, his eyes darted back toward the gallows, to the limp figure that hung there. “Maybe you lost people, too. Loved ones. Sons and daughters, friends of your own. But what gives you the right!? To spread the same sort of evil you suffered!?” His back touched the uneven rock wall of the alcove, and he swallowed. “Maybe it was just an accident,” he guessed, a little too quickly. “I know…not every paripus is to blame for hurting him. But he laid there, on the street, for hours. How many dozens…how many hundreds of you saw him, broken and bleeding, and did nothing? Did not care?” His voice almost broke, but he choked back his grief to let out a fierce bellow. “So why should I!?”

Without realizing it, Heismay had lowered his scythe. When he looked up in the moment of silence that followed, he saw that the crowd had slowed to a stop. When he stared at their faces, he found not beasts, but mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, haggard, hungry, sick, old, and tired. Widows, widowers, and orphans. After a moment, his gaze drifted downward. The alcove was quiet.

“I blame the paripus,” he murmured quietly. “Of course I do. I must. But I mostly blame myself. For not being there. For my failure as a father.” He thought about the supposed nature of this trial and tried to work through his feelings. “This place…the final stop on our journey to the moon itself. Tis only fitting it would be our greatest challenge yet.” He shook his head with a snort. “Tis a mirror, isn’t it? A dark mirror. Reflecting the worst parts of us. What mountain is harder to scale than ourselves?”

He set his cats down and stroked their heads. “Hatred breeds hatred,” he thought aloud. “I’m well aware. Perhaps if I look at paripus and see only enemies, enemies are what I’ll find. So it’s up to you.” Heismay peered at the shadows, his gaze unwavering. “If you are beasts, I suppose you’ll try to kill me. But if you are men…you’ll let us pass.” The eugief took a deep breath, stowed his scythe, and walked forward.

His instincts cried out in alarm, and nervous energy filled his body, but as he approached the wall of legs and tails he found that he could slip through. It felt like making his way through a dark forest, albeit much more claustrophobic, but slowly he found his way through the crowd. His cats followed behind, afraid but trusting. After only a few moments, Heismay emerged from the alcove and onto a rocky ledge with the brothers at his feet. He stood, staring out into the void beyond the mountain for a moment, then turned to look over his shoulder. Behind him, the alcove was empty, a nook of nothing but stone and shadow. Heismay closed his eyes, took another deep breath, and began to climb.

Only a minute or two later, the three reached a relatively flat, recessed snowfield on the mountain slope. Heismay almost jumped to see the moon so close, only a couple hundred feet away. Had he already reached the peak? Up ahead, the path led through a narrow rock passageway to a round door in a wall of stone that seemed to block the way to the moon. When he approached he received his second surprise: that Sandalphon, of all people, had beaten him here.

“Hello,” he greeted her as he trudged her way. Despite the altitude, he felt no wind. He could see no clouds or stars, or sky at all, nor any horizon. It was as if Moon Mountain hung in an ink-black abyss, and it unsettled him. “Are you well? Did you encounter any trouble?”

Sandalphon’s eye looked empty, not even reflecting the soft light of her halo. “Only some unpleasant visions.”

“I see. And you overcame them?” Heismay furrowed his brow as the archangel nodded. “If I may ask…how?”

Sandalphon returned her attention to the strange, cubic totem by the door. “I simply informed them that they had the wrong person.”

The frankness of her response amused Heismay enough despite the bleak circumstances to elicit a snicker. “Hmph. Why didn’t I think of that?” He crunched through the snow to get a better look at the odd cube. “What’s that?”

“Some sort of archaic device,” Sandalphon reported. “It seems to accept a key. Did you find one on your way up here?”

Heismay shook his head, followed by both Baconator and Whopper. When he realized Sandalphon wasn’t actually looking at him, Heismay cleared his throat. “Uh, no.” His thoughts drifted back to last night, to the burnt-out shack near the Christmas Village. “Let’s hope one of the others arrives with it.” When he stopped speaking, the mountaintop fell dead silent, except for the occasional meow of the Seekers’ cats.