Revus was the only one still up. Sitting on the edge of his bed, his sword and armour safely stashed in the inn's safe. The moon was bright that particular night, her light shining through the window, forming a small oval in the center of the room. The events of the day were still rushing through his head. He couldn't believe that four kids from a small town on the outskirts of the kingdom were the Light Warriors. They had all grown up hearing Lukahn's prophecy, playing their silly games, pretending to be the Light Warriors and slaying the evil Fiends. Reflecting on it, Revus couldn't help but chuckle at the thought. "Come on, Revus. You have a big day ahead of you. You have to get some sleep."

In the morning, half-asleep, Revus could feel someone poking at him. In his sleep-deprived mind, he imagined his mom prodding him to get up and ready for school. "Five more minutes, please mom..." he muttered quietly.

"We don't have five minutes!" The high-pitched voice of Maple, the youngest of the Light Warriors, screeched through his ears, jolting him awake. Not normally the calmest of them, Maple was more panicked than usual. "The princess has been kidnapped!"

"Say what?!" The sudden shock of being woken up about two hours earlier than planned (he estimated it was about 6 am, them planning to leave at 8 after clearing up some matters, including breakfast). Putting on the armour which Maple had dumped at the foot of his bed, Maple went to retrieve Revus' sword for him while Revus gathered up what remained of their stuff in their room at the inn.

Rushing as quickly as he could with armour on, Revus followed Maple, being considerably faster without armour and with only nunchucks (as Black Belts tend to use), out of town to where the other two Light Warriors were waiting for them. Ka, an absent-minded Black Mage, stood looking out into the wilderness, lost in his own thoughts, while Raich (the self-proclaimed 'god among men') was swinging his sword at a tree, clearly bored out of his mind after having to wait for Revus and Maple for all of five minutes. "All right, Garland, the strongest knight in the kingdom, kidnapped the princess in the middle of the night. We have to stop him. Got it? Good." Raich quickly explained the situation to Revus before he could respond, leaving him dumbfounded. Rolling his eyes, Raich murmured, exasperated, "Come on," and pulled Revus off by his wrist into the forest.

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*** *** ***

"Hey, do you think-"

"For the last time, NO! I do NOT think that throwing swords would ever work!"

It had been roughly five hours since the four had left Cornelia for the Temple of Fiends, and Revus and Raich were once again arguing the merits of throwing swords. This discussion annoyed the already exhausted Red Mage even further than he had thought was possible, and the worst part is that Revus showed no signs of shutting up any time between now and when they get to the Temple.

"Well, why not? I mean, there are such things as throwing knives, and swords are basically knives on a larger scale!" Revus smiled smugly, thinking he had pulled out his be-all, end-all argument.

He was in for a shock when Raich rebutted it. "We've been through this already, swords are just too big and heavy to make feasible throwing weapons! Now just leave me the fuck alone about your stupid throwing swords!" He quickly added under his breath, "There almost as stupid as your sword-chuck ideas. Though that WAS an awesome idea."

*** *** ***

*** *** ***

It had taken a full eight hours of hiking, but the four Light Warriors had finally made it to the Temple of Fiends. And telling by the trampled grass made by the hooves of Garland's horse, it seemed that he hadn't arrived much longer before them.

Quickly running through the decaying arch in front of them, into the decaying ruins, the Light Warriors had barely enough time to notice the structure of the ruins. The place was barely staying up, half the pillars being nearly nonexistent. The room Garland was in with the princess was just as bad, if not worse, than the rest of the ruins. However, none of the four could focus on that, since they were all focused on Garland. They had heard legends of this monster, how he could best three men one-on-one, and how he's twice the size of a normal man. While they had initially brushed those rumours off as, well, rumours, they had realized that they were true. Clad in full armour, he was easily twice the height as the tallest of them, and five times the size.

However, they could not stand there in awe, as Garland had noticed their entrance and had swung the massive two-handed sword (which he held in one hand), cracking the stone floor in half and splitting the group into two sides, Revus and Ka on one side, Raich and Maple on the other. "Gwahahahahahhaha! That was just a warning," came a voice booming from the armour. His voice was as impressive and dominating as the man which possessed it. "I, Garland, will knock you all down!" While it would have sounded stupid coming from a lesser man, coming from Garland it sounded powerful and carried a certain force which felt like it actually could knock them all down.

Being the first to leap into action, Revus charged at Garland, his sword ready to strike, when swiped his sword sideways, hitting Revus with the flat and sending him flying into the wall. Using that chance to strike, both Raich and Maple charged at Garland from opposite directions. However, the attempt was futile, with Garland sweeping Raich in a similar fashion to Revus, and them throwing Maple across the room. This process repeated for several minutes, with various combinations of charging at the Dark Knight, getting in a few hits, but each time with equally disastrous results for the Light Warriors.

"Why don't you just give up? There's no way you'll be able to defeat me! Soon, I will be Dark King Garland! Gwahahahahahhaha!" The Dark Knight stood there, ready for their next attack. However, instead of attacking, they just moved to the side, revealing their plan; to weaken and distract Garland while Ka prepared to cast. He knew there was nothing he could do to stop the inevitable, but he couldn't help but run towards the casting Black Mage, when out of nowhere a bolt of lightning struck the armoured man, causing him to crumble into a lifeless heap.

Having finally defeated Garland, the Light Warriors, bruised and bloodied (excluding Ka) walked up to the place where the princess was lying, asleep or unconscious.

"Damn."

"She is HOT!"

"I would just love to take her and-"

"It's a dude."

Three heads snapped to the side to face the one who had said the last statement. In what was a rare moment, Ka had said something, and like usual, he had stopped paying attention after talking. Ka, lazily gazing at the face, had realized that this was NOT, in fact, the princess, but rather, her overly effeminate brother.

As Revus and Raich stood there, discussing what to do for the night and how to handle having an extra person, with Ka staring into space, a small peep came out of Maple's mouth. Turning to face him, they stared in horror at what had happened. It appeared that Garland was not really fully dead, and had mustered up enough energy to throw his sword across the room and skewer Maple before crumbling into a heap. Again.

Aghast at the death which had just occurred right in front of their eyes, only Revus could say anything, turning to face Raich and saying, "I told you throwing swords would work."