Disclaimer: I don't own anything…

Chapter 3

A white mass of glowing white light slowly stretched up and up till the room flooded with light. The light emanating from the creature spilled into every nook and cranny of the auditorium. Much enraptured by the grand creature before him Allen felt something slither around his waist at the last minute as his feet were lifted from the ground.

"WHA?!"

The tendril whipped him up to what Allen supposed were the giant white mass's eyes. His fingers clawed at feathery material but his fingers simply slipped off as if the feathers were soaked in oil. He stopped prying at the tendrils when a calming voice reverberated off the hollow walls.

"Relax, I won't hurt you." He fidgeted in the grip of the monster and found that he wasn't being held in a rib crushing hold at all. In fact, despite the overall discomfort of being suspended in the air, the monster didn't even have sharp teeth or anything that threatened he was lunch. Allen tried to follow the giant's orders and tried to loosen up. I mean, after all, this is where he was supposed to go too. Vaguely he remembered reading something about this but strangely the book never disclosed anything relating to the World Tree.

A wave of light rolled off the creature before him and he could physically feel the light seeping into his pores. At first it was a pleasant feeling; it reminded Allen lying out in the sun. He tuned into himself and curiously left the light wash over him. As if hitting a brick wall the flow of the energy stopped abruptly at the base of his left arm. Strangely enough it seemed to be rejecting the light, denying it access and a great pain jolted through Allen. The most outlandish and freaky feeling unsurfaced as the light increased in its intensity and suddenly he felt as if his arm was just getting heavier. He looked upon his deformed arm in growing horror as he realized that it was in fact growing and were those claws?

"AAAGGHHH!"

The electricity coursed through his veins and seemed to even pierce his heart to a horrifying halt. And then all at once the pain stopped and he was on the floor once more.

"That has never happened before."

Allen looked up and he could clearly see the look of apology upon the creatures face.

He croaked, "What was supposed to happen? Who are you?"

The white creature extended a white tendril and pulled Allen up, "I am Hevlaska. What I do is part of the system. When new players arrive, I am the one they see first so that I can give them their chosen weapon."

Allen looked around his feet for any lying swords, hatchets or axes but did not see any lethal sharp things.

"You are a special case, child. Your weapon is a part of you and only you can awaken it. I think the reason why it had caused you so much pain was because I was trying to summon it when you are the one who is supposed to call out for it."

"So, that moment when my arm had grown heavier and claws came out…That was my weapon?"

Hevlaska nodded sagely, "Correct. Weapons in this game were designed to reflect each player's inner self. They share a direct correlation with each player. As time passes, each person will become more in tune with their weapon the more they wield it. There are some who have traded their weapon for a more powerful one but they will always find themselves, one way or another, with their original."

"You have great potential; it will take more time to become acquainted with your weapon."

Understanding but not fully, Allen slowly nodded.

"You will see, go now. Your friends wait."

Light shot up from beneath his feet, completely engulfing his vision as one moment he had been in about the quietest place on earth and the next he was surrounded by incessant chatter of hundreds.

"Allen~!" A familiar voice cried and he turned to see Lavi and Lenalee with pleasant smiles adorning their faces as they skirted around the milling the people. "So, how did it go Allen?" Lenalee asked politely.

"O it went well, thank you Lenalee-" He turned to Lavi and gave one of his tiny chilling smiles and said, "by the way Lavi, thanks for telling me about what to expect in there. Really appreciate it."

"Ah no problem buddy." Lavi replied nervously, his sole eye darting everywhere. His eye settled on the yet to be introduced member of the party, "O! Here's the friend we were telling you about Allen!" He pulled a man with long black hair tied back in a ponytail in front of Allen.

"You must be Kanda, I'm Allen Walker. It's nice to meet you." Allen smiled and expectantly put up his hand to shake. The other oddly seemed amused as he shook his hand. Feeling hopeful that he had made a good impression on the friend of his only friends in the game Allen's smile widened further till…

"Hmph. Who knew 12 year olds had manners."

"Excuse me?" What did he just say?

Kanda turned to look at Lenalee and Lavi as if they had insulted him. "Where did you guys find this kid? I don't want to babysit anybody." When in fact he has been the one doing the insulting.

"I'm so sorry Allen! Normally Kanda isn't like this…" She shot her dark haired friend a confused glare.

Screw being a gentleman.

"Well, at least now the even number of guys and girls will be equal." Allen spat, knowing that all guys with long hair had a touchy spot around that subject.

"Ooooh! I'm telling ya! I love this guy!" Lavi cried and burst out laughing as he seemed to be the only one who found this situation amusing. From the corner of his eye he could see Lenalee cover her mouth but Allen was on a mission. He could handle Cross, but he was here to have a good time and nobody was going to spoil that.

Allen cracked a smile as he watched Kanda work out what he said and then 'bingo' that face turned from confused to avenging angel rage mode at the drop of a hat. Now, what Allen had been expecting was another insult to be thrown his way-and not a really sharp looking katana to be thrown at his face.

Somewhere behind him someone screamed in surprise as the katana narrowly missed impaling them and instead embedded itself in the wall far behind them.

"That's NOT how you respond to people! You could've killed me!" Allen yelled."

"That was the point!"

All heads in a fifty-mile radius swiveled towards them to see the commotion and a wide berth had been cleared as people viewed them in anticipation for the bloodbath that would ensure. Free entertainment, right? But before anything remotely resembling a boxing match to the death could ignite Lenalee stepped in and bonked both Allen and Kanda on the heads with a clipboard that both of them were sure she didn't have before.

"Stop it! What did you guys think you were doing?!" She cried in indignation.

"Why did you say those things Kanda? And Allen , I never expected you to pick up a fight!" She turned to both them both of them with a look that would shame even the most heartless of villains into dropping everything and leading the life of a garbage picker. "Say sorry." She demanded, "Now."

And that was just about the furthest thing Allen wanted to do and from the looks of it his new "friend" looked revolted at the very idea. They both glanced at each other, their eyebrows furrowed and they mentally murdered each other through their glares. Turning away from each other they said at the same time, "never."

The crowd that had gathered had dispersed going back to whatever they had been doing with sighs of disappointment.

Lenalee sighed as she saw their looks of stubbornness as tough as rocks on their faces. Not feeling up to lengthening this disaster of introducing her friends, the last thing she said before heading towards the exit was:

"Lavi, will you stop laughing?"

XxX

"So, if I'm hearing correctly, this mission you guys have picked up, involves purposely going directly into the forest that has big signs saying otherwise?

"Correct, but I wouldn't exactly phrase it like that…" Lavi said.

Allen imagined all different ways this mission could go wrong and asked: "Isn't that really-reckless?"

"Well, my dear boy, what were you expecting? Of course we'd pick this mission!"

"You picked this mission Lavi." Lenalee pointed out.

"Haha, that's not important."

"Don't you think that I won't be much help to you guys?" Allen asked as he had just gotten the game after all and couldn't activate his weapon. He heard something that sounded vaguely like: "You're not very much help to anybody" but he wasn't bothered by that at the moment. Though, that didn't stop him from giving a rather tough tug at his ponytail. In a way that reminded Allen of The Exorcist, Kanda whipped his head around and was about to say something when Lenalee said excitedly: "Of course not! This will be a good opportunity for you to see a real fight in this game!" She didn't notice a thing. Good.

Allen thought about it and that did seem to make some sense so he nodded.

They set off into the forest that many others had seemed to cut a wide arc around to the point where new trails were created. Allen felt he couldn't very well blame them as the surrounding dry trees looked like hands that had had every bone in their fingers snapped. An acrid smell of ashes watered Allen's eyes and burned their noses.

He was thoroughly spooked as with every unexpected snap of a twig and wind whistled Allen thought he had spotted a shadow behind a tree. With a start he realized he had never asked just what they were looking for in the less than appealing forest and he voiced his thoughts aloud.

"On the description of the mission it didn't really describe what we were looking for…" Lavi said and scratched behind his head.

"Nothing at all?" That seemed a bit to odd, why wouldn't it have anything on it?

"Yeah, well, you see, no one has ever left this forest remembering what had attacked them."

Allen frowned, "So, we're just walking around waiting for whatever to come out and get us?"

"Basically."

"Great."

Allen didn't really see the sense in that plan but they were already deep in the creaking forest.

The earth beneath their feet suddenly jolted. Allen's eyes jerked upwards to equally surprised eyes trained on each other. A blood curdling howl ripped through the air and the trees nearest to them snapped in half as a giant caterpillar like monster crashed into the clearing. It was something out of a nightmare. The monster had hollow eyes and its face was but a mask attached to a translucent skeletal body of some half dead creature.

"Come on!" In a blur of violet and silver Lenalee launched up into the air and somersaulting in the air she smacked the heel of her glowing boots onto the head of the monster. It reared its body and long claws slashed through the air trying to swap at Lenalee as if she were a fly. It seemed to have forgotten that there were three others and two of them had weapons at the ready. Lenalee dug her heels in the floor as she landed on the ground again, "Allen, try and activate your weapon." She flew back up in the air.

"Yeah, man, don't wanna have you defenseless. Ya'know?" Lavi thumped Allen on the shoulder before running in with Kanda.

A blade slashed through the tough skin of the monster and a large hammer like weapon pounded its side. Allen pulled off his gloves and held out his arm hoping that it would transform or something. He looked up to see the attacking trio all glance at each other mid strike as the monster seemed to be getting more and more enraged rather than more and more closer to elimination.

"Get its middle! Or side! Wherever its weak side is!"

Allen watched as the trio resumed attacking with more fervor, calling out special attacks for their weapons that Allen couldn't quite hear. Allen watched in pure fascination for a moment before turning to the task at hand. He had to activate his weapon and help. He shut his eyes and focused solely on his arm. He wanted to help so why wasn't a weapon appearing or anything? A tingling sensation as if his weapon were responding awakened in his arm but before he could get much further the earth shook powerfully. It seemed as if they were finally getting the upper hand. The monster had fallen to the ground and wasn't scuttling to its feet like before. "Let's get this thing over with." Lavi said wiping a bloodied over his face to wipe away sweat. The others nodded and leaped back into action when a cry that wasn't the monsters pierced the air.

They all swiveled their heads to see a bloody claw had pierced through Lavi's chest and he was slowly sinking to his knees before a light shimmered and he disappeared. Lenalee and Allen cried "Lavi!" and that while they were distracted the monster used that moment to unleash a howl of its own to disorientate them before it didn't start to pelt Lenalee and Kanda with attacks but hurtled straight towards Allen.

Ok, he seriously needed that weapon.

That monster had killed his first friend and he was going to make it wish it had never been created. If the weapon wasn't going to appear when he called it…Then he would make it.

Allen ran straight towards the monster hoping against hope that this insane plan actually worked.

"What are you doing Allen?!" Yes, Lenalee….Just what am I doing Allen asked himself as with growing realization he realized his hand wasn't growing magically longer or anything resembling a weapon.

The monster reached out its clawed hands and swiped him into the air bringing him closer to its face. None of those earlier attacks with various weapons had killed him and all Allen had were his own two hands. So he did what any sensible person in his position would do. He pulled at the mask of the monster. And with a great suction cup noise the mask popped off and Allen tumbled through the air as the clawed hand holding him suddenly disappeared.

"Wha-Where did it go?"

The wind picked up around the area and the remains of the monster swirled in the air before flying off towards the clearing blue sky.

Allen felt something tickling his cheek and sitting up he realized that puffs of green were sprouting from the ashes of the scorched forest.

"Just what was that thing?"

XxX

"It had to have been the spirit of that forest or something."

Lavi adjusted his green bandana and happily strolled with his friends in the fading afternoon orange light. Allen trailed behind the trio and looked around the beautiful landscape of rolling hills blazing gold in the sunset.

The redhead continued, "It sucks that I couldn't have seen that…You guys are so lucky!"

"I wouldn't say so, it was still pretty frightening." Lenalee said.

Allen tuned out of the conversation. Off in the distance he could see specks of buildings which he assumed was where he and his friends were heading towards. Lenalee had mentioned something about meeting her brother but to be entirely honest he felt drained from fighting that monster and trekking over to the nearest town to meet Lavi at the regeneration station. He had a feeling he should be logging off soon but he wanted to wait until they made it to the city not too far off.

The night life of the fairly small city was astonishingly vibrant as people milled around with friends in various degrees of intoxication (He wasn't sure how people could get drunk in a dream but whatever). Tidy shops run by PCs and actual gamers had all sorts of things in their windows. One store had books floating from bookshelves to desks and pages turning by themselves. Another store sold weapons of every shape and size along with some pretty heavy duty armor. Not really paying attention to where he was going Allen was startled when suddenly they stopped in front of a small building.

It had a sign swinging on the front that read: "The Black Order Bar." The entire front of the bar was covered in simple black tiles but their shiny lacquer trapped hints of light in its surface almost making it look like a galaxy in each tiny square. Littering its shiny walls were tiny rectangular windows allowing for blurry figures to move in and out of its little frame.

A bell jingled when the door opened and immediately like a pressure door the sounds of glasses clinging, bouts of laughter and the sound of a tap being filled burst forth from the open door. They had just filed in the bar when a shadow flew over from god knows where and flying tackled Lenalee.

"MY PRECIOUS SISTER! YOU'VE RETURNED!" Clinging onto the pigtailed girl was a man with a barrette askew on his raven hair.

"Ok, brother," the girl in a near strangle hold patted her brother's arm lightly, "I have some friends with me and I want to introduce you to one of them."

Suddenly a heavy aurora surrounded the man's flowery loving countenance and a cold chill settled. He stepped away and turned towards the new arrivals.

"This is Komui, my brother, he runs this bar. And this is Allen, we met him when Lavi and I were heading back from a mission."

Allen was about to hold out a hand to shake Komuis but before he could do that, "You didn't make any passes at my darling sister, did you?"

"Wha-? No, no, I didn't!" Allen shook his head and raised his hands up.

"Hmm…" Komui scratched his chin and violet eyes peered at him from beneath his spectacles.

"Come on brother, he is telling the truth." Lenalee sighed as she pinched her nose.

"Ok~! Whatever my lovely sister says!" He crooned. Komui turned to Lavi and said, "I sure hope you didn't do anything either…"

"Komui!"

Komui shrugged and turned to the quietest of the group of four, "so, they finally found you, huh?"

"Che." Kanda turned the other way obviously not pleased that they had discovered he was even in the game at all.

A crash of glass and a yell followed soon after and Komui hurried away to see what happened.

From behind Allen he heard a weird growl, "Can we get something to eat? I'm a starving man over here" Lavi groaned.

"Yeah! Let's go ask Jerry if he could make something for us." Lenalee led them through the maze of beer soaked tables and benches till they reached a little open window with a blur of pink zooming from one side of the kitchen to the other.

"Hey Jerry!" Lenalee said and the pink blur came to a stop. A tan man with pink hair, which oddly enough suited him, stopped and threw a grin towards them. "Welcome back!" His eyes honed in on the new arrivals, " Who are those two behind ya Lena?"

"This is Kanda and Allen." She explained.

He bounced towards the window, "they look so adorable~! What can I make ya guys? It's on the house." .

Allen let the three of his friends go first as he planned what he would have. He had to put a lot of thought into this after-all…

"-And can I have 15 Mitarashi Dangos?"

"Sure, honey!"

Allen paused and cleared his throat, "actually can you make that 20?"

"Tell you what, let's make that 25."

"YES." Allen cried happily as Jerry moved away with his lengthy list of foods that Allen had ordered. Finally someone who's mouth didn't drop when I ordered my food! He mentally pumped his fists in the air and smiled broadly as he turned around to look at his friends already seated and eating. They all looked at him quizzically as he had taken some time ordering. Well, two of them did at least, the other was more involved in his soba.

When Allen sat down after pushing his heavy cart of food the sound of forks and glasses dropping in shock did not faze the 16 year old boy. He was used to it. Mere seconds later it was like Allen turned into a human black hole and food was flying everywhere as he ate.

Everyone watched for a minute before turning back to their food, they have seen stranger things.

Allen's friends, however, thanked whatever gods above were watching over them as they nearly felt sick from watching Allen eat. One, however, feel the need to stop this disgusting show. Kanda set down his chopsticks and glared at Allen, "that's disgusting, Moyashi."

Allen slurped at one noddle extra loudly and said, "if you don't like it, move."

"You move."

"It was just a helpful suggestion," Allen said while waving around his chopsticks just to spite the other, "Also, I know what moyashi means…Bakanda."

Kanda wasn't expecting that and his glare intensified as he slowly stood up, "O I'll give you a helpful suggestion you little—OKAY OKAY were all friends here." Lavi cut Kanda off suddenly.

A dark fire spurt in between the two and in a totally not scary at all way that really didn't give Lavi nightmares for months later Allen and Kanda flipped to look at him with sinister light in their eyes and growled, "Shut up."

They turned back to each other, ignoring the quivering redhead who lost all his resolve to break them apart. Suddenly they yelped (which they would deny later) as Lenalee pulled at their ears and pulled them back to their sitting positions.

She sat daintily afterwards and resumed eating. From somewhere in the back Komui yelled "That's my sister!"

Apparently Lavi had some brain cells pack up and leave because he slowly stood up from his seat and stood up on the table. People all around stopped mid drink and conversations dwindled as they all focused their attention on the red head.

"I have something to say."

Someone in the back muttered, "no kidding." But Lavi, if he heard that or not continued, "I died earlier today."

"And last week too." Someone supplied helpfully.

Lavi shook his head, "that's not the point. This game is amazing. If you mess up or make one bad move in real life that's it. But here, in Half Heroes, you get second chances." A moment went by as he let everyone consider this.

"So, I just want to raise a toast to Half Heroes!" Amber liquid flew in an arc as Lavi swung his jug in the air to happily jug down the alcohol.

With a roar everyone yelled: "TO HALF HERO-SLAM!" The door to the bar opened suddenly with a mighty slap.

A man stood heaving in the door frame with hair mussed up in all directions and sweat dripping off his glistening face. His mouth opened and closed without a sound like a fish gasping for air. The man worked around whatever was holding him back and he gasped, "h-elp."

The stranger's eyes rolled to the back of his head and everyone snapped out of whatever trance they had been in as the man teetered forward. Someone ran up to steady him and cried out, "what the hell!"

Allen, along with everyone else closet to the scene saw miniature stars crawling up the man's throat all the way up to his head. They moved in frenzy before suddenly stilling and then the stranger burst into a grand burst of crimson dust.

XxX

End of capitulo tres.

Now…(rubs hands evilly) begins da story! BWHAHA! Sorry it just began like now…three chapters in but I like to kind of fidget in my writing chair before fully settling down and getting down to business. I didn't take much time to edit because half the week I was a living zombie…So, sorry…(sits in corner and weeps) But!

I just wanted to thank:

TsubakiKEI, giselleavellaneda09, Lena-luvs-cats, karina001, and Ryuakilover. You left somereally nice comments and without them I doubt I would've continued. You can't imagine how happy it makes me to read them because it makes me want to keep writing. So thanks a lot! =)

Just thought I'd throw this out there but this is my second attempt at a fanfic. I'd appreciate it if you guys told me what I can improve on because I'm still trying to find my style. With this chapter I don't remember much from the actual manga so with the whole thing at the end I don't remember if that is how akuma poison works. Anyways, I meant to post this Wednesday but I got hit with the flu so It might take a bit longer for chapter 4 but I'll try and update next Wednesday.

Anyways, hope to see ya next chapter!

~Ill-Fated-Wish

P.S. I don't know if you guys would be interested in having me set up a playlist for the next chapters but I would be more than happy to do so. Let me know!