Chapter 1

I took one more swing with my Keyblade and sliced through the small creature before it vanished into nothing. Funnily enough, the creature was known as a Shadow, a type of Heartless. It had a vaguely humanoid body structure with a round, spherical head and circular, glowing yellow eyes. It also had two long, twisted antennae sprouting out of the top of its head. Each of its hands had three clawed fingers, and its feet were large and with the exception of its eyes, its body was completely black.

The reason it came to being was because the Shadow was originally a person, but had lost their heart to the darkness as well as their human physique. However, this creature only existed in the world of Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts Online, or KHO.

My friend Aubade and I had been a part of this world since the game was released to the public a week ago. We aimed to level up to a high standard by repeatedly clearing districts through out Traverse Town, the starting checkpoint in the game.

"Now that we've taken out all the Heartless in this district, we can move onto the Fourth one," Aubade scanned the area.

"What do you mean we?" My 'Kingdom Key' Keyblade vanished from my hand, "There were about ten of them and you went off to find treasures in the district."

"Someone has to find them, otherwise they'll be left to players who don't know how to use them," He snapped.

A hue of red suddenly enveloped our surroundings, and we knew an announcement from a games master would be coming. "Good afternoon, Keyblade Wielders," An omniscient voice projected to them, "Our beloved game creator, Pazu Midori, is currently in a coma. He was murdered in the game and his mind was unable to log out for unknown reasons. If anyone has any knowledge of these events, please contact the game masters in the First District. Anyone is open to bringing the murderer to justice."

Then and there, I could feel something amiss, and it wasn't the crime. All players were allowed to log back into the game after an hour of having their health points dropped. I saw my best friend panic as he tried to stop the changes from happening — away from his online avatar and towards his true self. Tried to stop his face from turning so boyish, tried to stop his height descending from 6'2 to 5'7 and tried to stop the oncoming stocky figure that he was so insecure about. Now he looked like an 18-year-old boy named Hunter Boone in Squall Leonhart's clothes.

On the other hand, I grew taller and my body builder-like muscles were taken away from me. I transformed from a player named Oathkeeper, who had a Noctis Caelum avatar, to the real me, Colton White. My pale features were gone and were replaced with my tanned-skin from being Half-Filipino. My spiky hair was replaced with short, black curls.

"Apologies for breaching your privacy," the game creator spoke again, "but in order to capture the criminal faster, we must not use avatars to hide them. I have placed this quest in your Mission Archive. Good luck to everyone who chooses to to accept it."

The red hue disappeared, leaving me too stunned to move. A pop up screen lit up above the golden fountain of Lady and the Tramp. It showed an image and name of the criminal, and if I was sitting on a chair I would've fallen backwards. "Hey, Colt— I mean, Oathkeeper," Aubade saw my dismay and tapped my shoulder, "The reward is having our level increased by 100, be given a Moogle as a companion and real ¥46,000,00. I think that's roughly $50,000 Australian Dollars."

"That sounds incredible," I said half-heartedly, still eyeing the face on the screen.

"If you don't want to do the mission with me, I understand—"

"No," I shook my head and faced him. In every player's point of view, your stats were shown on the bottom right corner along with party members, exactly like any other Kingdom Hearts game, "I'll do it. Even if she ends up in jail."

Aubade nodded warily, then he said, "You know I don't like her. She cheated on you and you chose to stay with her."

"Then it should be easier for you to finish the job," I shrugged. It was pretentious, but it felt like the right thing to do. I tapped the air in front of me with two fingers and a pop-up menu appeared. I entered my messages and typed "Did you kill Pazu Midori?" to the username Tori.

We walked over to the other side of the Third District and I held the 'Kingdom Key' up to the keyhole next to the giant door. It transported us back to the First District. There were players who frantically scanned the Victorian-age town for an unknown savior while others scurried to either capture the criminal or find a safe spot to log out. A majority of the players were from Japan and America.

"Someone help me please!"

"I don't want to be next!"

"Who will save us?"

"I'm never playing again!"

Despite the hustle and bustle, the town remained serene underneath its eternal night. They thought that Tori had the power to kill them in a neutral territory, but it's ironic how everyone had forgotten that the First District is where most survivors of the destroyed worlds can be found, therefore the safest place in Traverse Town.

And besides, my girlfriend was never much of a gamer. The reason why she started playing KHO was because she wanted to spend more time with me, but didn't want to get in the way of me having "man time" with Aubade. Today she was supposedly waiting for me to finish my daily escapade, at her house that she bought in the 4th District. That left Tori plenty of time to pick a fight with a game creator, but why?

Unfortunately, Aubade and I weren't here to stock up on items. We never had enough munny for the items we wanted and Aubade was good enough to fill up his slots with lots of healing spells. We headed over to the set of doors opposite us, passing the two lamp posts in the lower half of the district.

The doors led us into the Backstreets and a unit of Heartless ambushed us. There weren't any treasure chests in the area, so Aubade charged at a triplet of Soldiers with his 'Way to the Dawn' Keyblade and I turned to a duo of Large Body Heartless. "This is a piece of cake!" Aubade had already taken out two out of three Soldiers. One of the Large Bodies rushed me with its belly and I dodge rolled to beat him from behind. Within 2 combos, it blinked from existence in defeat.

"Colton, look out!"

I spun to find the other Large Body was almost finished with two arm-swings, and I tried to scramble away but it hit me with its Mow-Down Attack. Although it didn't physically hurt me, the game's system made my body react and cry out like a playable character did in any Kingdom Hearts game. "Oathkeeper, help me out here. Large Body is fucking annoying!" Aubade blocked the Heartless continuously.

I pushed myself to look at him, "Smack it from behind like it's your girlfriend!"

"Excepting it won't scream out in pleasure?"

"Yes!"

He flipped over the Heartless. "Thundara!" Aubade held his Keyblade up, electrocuting the Large Body into oblivion. I got to my feet and walked over to him.

"You know you could have used Thundara without getting behind it?" I smirked.

"Stuff you."

Author's note: Hi everyone, this is my first time posting on so yay! Please review and I will update in a few hours :)

- Chessa