Sora's friends from Earthland were not the only ones who wanted to celebrate his ascension to mastery. His parents insisted on throwing him a party; nothing big, just a small party of three, which Sora could not refuse. There was a time when the world could have been ending and he would not have cared as long as he had a comfy place to lie and some grilled mahi-mahi on a skewer, but that changed the night the Heartless came. The thought of losing the raft, the thing his hopes and dreams were tied to, the thought of losing Riku…of losing Kairi…it stirred something in him. It was like his mind went into some kind of protection mode. "Papa bear mode," his dad called it. After the party, he went straight back to King Kai for advice on where to go from here.

"Right now, my boy, there's a Heartless influx in Death City. If you would, I'd like you to put a stop to it. I've sent Riku, Lea, and Kairi on similar missions already."

"K-Kairi?!" Sora blurted. "You sent her out on her own?!"

"Well, I offered to send Gohan or Krillin with her, but she insisted on going alone. Eager to prove herself, I guess. Can't really blame her."

"Well…" said Sora, putting a hand over his pounding heart. "She did beat that Luxord guy for her first big fight. I guess that's a lot tougher than beating a giant Heartless."

"Exactly!" said King Kai. "Don't worry, my boy! Kairi has everything she needs to make it out there!"

Twelve Hookbats, six Trick Ghosts, two Bookmasters, and more Shadows than even Kairi could count. Always the studious one, she got a book about the Heartless from King Kai, memorized nearly every variety of Heartless, and the recommended tactics for dealing with them, though they barely gave her time to defend herself, much less implement these tactics. Luxord was cocky, treated her like a child, and treated their fight as a game. The Heartless however, seemed to take her much more seriously. To them, she was prey…until she began slaying them with relative ease. Once they began stepping up their attacks, it was clear that they saw her as a threat. And why shouldn't they? She was the two things the Heartless feared most, a Keyblade wielder and a Princess of Heart. She'd been in these woods for a day and a half. She'd suffered eight scratches, three bites, and a burn from a Bookmaster's Firaga spell. She was down to the last of the three Hi-potions King Kai gave her and had no way of knowing when the Heartless would stop appearing. From what she Sora told her, eliminating whoever was commanding the Heartless in a particular world would make them go away, but Xehanort's control over the Heartless was absolute right now, and he could have been literally anywhere. Unless someone in this world had sided with him, it looked like Kairi's job wasn't done until Xehanort was. She sat on a stump and looked to the enormous school beyond the woods. King Kai expressly told her not to draw attention to herself.

Maybe I could pretend to be a student and ask someone about the Heartless. If there's someone directing them to attack the school, maybe it's a disgruntled student or a teacher. She thought. I bet their headmaster would know, but how can I get him to tell me? I doubt he's going to want someone getting into his business, especially a "student." I guess I could tell him I'm from another school, but if he wants to know what school I'm from, then I'm in trouble!

"Hey, you."

Kairi looked to her right and saw a girl; maybe ten or eleven years old with long silky blond hair and icy blue eyes, dressed in a white and burgundy school uniform and dark brown thigh highs. At her side was an older girl; probably in her mid teens, dressed in a black Lolita dress with pale green hair, identical blue eyes, and what looked like oversized phone antennas on the sides of her head.

"Are you that mage the headmaster sent for?" The younger girl asked. "Could have sworn he said it would be a boy."

"Uh…"

Maybe it was her icy stare or the darkness Kairi sensed from her, but something about her told Kairi it would not be smart to lie to her.

"Someone…eh…did send me here to take care of the creatures, but it wasn't the headmaster."

As the younger girl continued to stare, Kairi felt like she was being dissected. The older girl however, seemed totally impassive. Finally, the younger girl smiled and said "Good enough for me."

"You wouldn't happen to know someone who might be controlling the creatures, do you?" Kairi inquired. "Someone who has a problem with the school, maybe…a student or a…teacher?"

Both girls shook their heads.

"Afraid not." said the younger girl. "Although, that's an intriguing idea."

"What do you mean?" asked Kairi.

"Er, nothing. I'm Evangeline and this is my faithful guardian, Chachamaru. What do we call you, dear?"

Dear?

It was like talking to a middle-aged woman in the body of a little girl.

"Kairi. Pleased to meat you." Kairi replied, trying her best not to let her uneasiness show.

Since you're here, would you mind accompanying us to Library Island? That seems to be where the big one was headed."

"Big one?"

When Sora recounted his time at Traverse Town and the Spirit Bathhouse, he mentioned that the Heartless disappeared from those worlds when the most powerful one was defeated.

"Lead the way, Evangeline. But let's keep my being here between us, okay?"

"If you insist."

Evangeline and Chachamaru lead Kairi across a great bridge toward an island in the middle of the enormous lake. Upon the island was a white castle-like building, which Chachamaru identified as "Library Island." A pair of Bookmasters appeared without warning and expelled fireballs at Evangeline, bet she swatted them aside like they were nothing and unleashed a torrent of ice crystals that froze the spellcasters solid.

"So, what else can that…er…sword of yours do?" Evangeline asked as Kairi summoned her Destiny's Embrace and sliced her way through another drove of Shadows. The way she uttered "sword" stung just a bit, it may not have looked threatening, but it was still an effective weapon. Didn't she prove that already?

"I can use it to undo something that's locked and even cast spells," said Kairi, not wanting to reveal too much about the Keyblade. "though your spells are probably leagues ahead."

"Oh, I don't doubt that." Evangeline replied haughtily. "I've actually never heard of anyone channeling magic through a sword before. The idea sounds rather barbaric to me. What do you call that thing, anyway?"

Kairi gave an irritated twitch, this girl's attitude was trying even her patience.

"It's…a trade secret." she replied through bared teeth.

Once they reached the grand library, Kairi was overwhelmed by the hundreds upon hundreds of shelves full of books that surrounded her. She would have been her Grandma's age by the time she finished reading all of them.

"Miss Kairi…Miss Kairi!"

"Huh?"

Kairi snapped to attention and turned to Chachamaru.

"The master suggests we kill some time here until the creature surfaces again."

Evangeline peered over a balcony and saw Kairi and Chachamaru engaging some of the creatures. Satisfied that they would have their hands full for a while, she paced the upper level with her face buried in the book she found. It was a book about mythical magical weapons, she was certain she had seen something resembling Kairi's sword in here before. And then she found it, a sword with a double hand guard, giving it the appearance of a key. This "Keyblade" was believed to have the power to undo nearly any lock, any enchantment, or any curse.

"Master, it is here!" Chachamaru called.

In the center of the room, Evangeline could see a massive black silhouette rising, forming into something almost human. Its flesh took on a dark purple color, its head was wrapped in slimy black tendrils, and a pair of chiropteran wings stretched out from its back.

Kairi and Chachamaru darted left and right respectively as the Dark Follower tried to seize them in its massive claws and sliced its hands off at the wrists. Chachamaru was an expert hand-to-hand combatant and didn't need anything but her own two hands even as the Follower's hands melted into a rippling black pool and a drove of Shadows burst out. She sliced and chopped her way through each Shadow as the giant regenerated its hands and conjured a wrecking ball-sized orb of dark energy. Kairi pointed the tip of her Keyblade at the deadly orb and cast Thundaga, causing it to burst into useless black and red smoke. Her Keyblade reappeared in her hand and she was about to summon it again when the Dark Follower was encased in a tomb of glistening ice. Evangeline descended from the upper level, floating several feet above the ground. Without warning, she lifted her hand and sent two shining ice crystals sailing past Kairi and into the doors, covering them in a thick ice-sheet.

"What are you doing?!" Kairi demanded.

"I know what that is now," said Evangeline, pointing at Kairi's Keyblade. "and I want it!"

She waved a hand and unleashed a powerful gust of icy, snowy wind that sent Kairi into a wall.

"Evangeline, I really don't want to fight you!" said Kairi.

"Neither do I." Evangeline replied." "So, just hand over your Keyblade and you can go on your merry way."

"But why?"

"Because contrary to popular belief, we vampires are not monsters." Evangeline began to explain. "I have no reason to—"

"No! I mean 'why do you want my Keyblade?!'"

"To undo the curse that was placed on me by Thousand Master! The curse that binds me to these grounds!"

She raised both of her hands and four Kairi-sized skewers of ice appeared. Kairi rolled away from the first two and shattered the remaining two with a well-timed Reflega. Before she could retaliate however, another mighty blast of wind swept up and into the ceiling, causing her last Hi-Potion to fall out of her pouch. Kairi grabbed a hold of a guard rail and heaved herself onto the top floor. She darted between bookcases as Evangeline fired more icy projectiles at her. She then jumped down to the bottom floor and was about to cast a Firaga on the doors when she sensed darkness behind her. She flipped to her right to avoid a dark projectile hurled by Evangeline and cast Reflega as she hurled another one. Evangeline's reflected spell hit her dead-center and without even thinking, Kairi hurled her Keyblade, hitting her right in the side of the face. Evangeline fell, hit the still frozen Dark Follower with a smack, and landed on the floor. After a moment, she lifted her head to glare at Kairi.

"You…you hit me!" the young vampires growled, a tear streaming down the side of her face where Kairi's Keyblade hit.

She clenched her tiny hands into fists and started breathing hard as though she were on the verge of sobbing. Kairi's sweet nature tempted her to go over to Evangeline and try to calm her down, but fear of another deadly spell kept her planted firmly where she stood.

"Chachamaru, kill this little tart!" Evangeline barked.

"Yes, Master."

Kairi's heart gave a panicked jolt as she turned to face Chachamaru, who was adopting a fighting stance.

"Dreadfully sorry, Miss Kairi." she said with clinical dispassion.

Kairi shifted, ducked, and flipped away from Chachamaru's lethal chops and thrusts, not wanting to hurt her either, but a single swipe of her Keyblade sent Chachamaru's head flying right off her shoulders. Fear gripped Kairi's heart like an icy gauntlet as the head rolled toward Evangeline. It was impulsive, instinctive, she didn't mean to do it, but she snapped out of it when she saw sparks and circuitry in Chachamaru's neck instead of flesh and blood.

"Oh, dear." said Chachamaru as Evangeline seized her head.

"Damn it all!" she growled, turning to face Kairi again. "I have to attend to Chachamaru right away, so I guess I'll let you off the hook for now!"

With that, she levitated her protector's body, blew the doors down with another blast of wind, and took off, leaving Kairi alone with the frozen Heartless. A chorus of excited voices (all female-sounding) outside told Kairi it was time for her to leave. She pointed her Keyblade in front of her, opened a shimmering portal back to King Kai's world, and dove right in.