Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts, Fairy Tail or any of the affiliates aside from this fanfic. Please don't sue me, I only have forty one dollars and a drawing of a Tangletales(Tangela and Ninetales fusion, don't ask).
I know what you might be thinking, it's not Friday or after Friday. So what's with the update on Thursday? Well, for one I'm going to be without laptop until late Sunday. Two, I've spent my nineteenth level up (birthday) today doing something I love, writing, and I had this monster of a chapter ready before I left.
Ultimate Black Ace-Agreed, too early in the story for Xehanort and only if the Organization appears will Xemnas appear. Pete is just a punching bag. It is a Disney villain however. The book Roxas has hasn't played a notable part yet, which would suggest they don't even know he has it or haven't given it much thought. Also, glad you caught the "trio" reference. Roxas is to Erza and Mira what Erza is to Natsu and Gray at this point in time.
TheAbsolutistsCreed-I've been trying to find the balance with that kind of thing. I haven't been particularly successful yet, but it is something I'm working on. Thanks for giving me your thoughts.
AirBorne3-We'll see. ;)
Dragon Silhouette-Well, Xemnas' part in saving Roxas will be touched upon in the Edolas arc, which is quite a ways away. Unfortunately, since sea-salt ice cream is a specialty in Twilight Town and Roxas probably hasn't been there for years, he's been deprived. *Is so cruel for keeping a boy from his ice cream.* Chernabog, interesting thought. Wouldn't put it past myself if it weren't for a fact I know who it is. So you think I wouldn't make Merlin or Yen Sid evil? Then dragon connection? Perhaps. We'll eventually learn about the residents. My "something awesome" is not a KH character. It is magic.
Pedro52-Glad you find this interesting.
fyrestarr-Well, we'll see if you're right soon.
blarg7865-Evil Winnie the Pooh? Don't put it past me, that could happen. Dual wielding? Maybe. There is a line of thought involving forms but it isn't anything I can confirm or deny at this time. The same applies to summons. As for branching away into Fullmetal Alchemist, Star Wars and the like, I'm focusing on what Kingdom Hearts has first. Once the basics are out of the way there is a high chance we'll start seeing other things like a few Marvel characters popping up during the Grand Magic Games or something (just an example).
You know, I actually have that opened in a tab right now because a couple other people have suggested I read it. I've been meaning to read it but haven't had time to read anything lengthy lately between classes, writing, a job hunt and life.
Finally, I'm glad you like this fic. I'm not too crazy for the pairing centered stories so most of my energy goes into developing a plot.
Loki921-Ah yes, Tripple M. Not sure how she'd react to this version of Dark City with the legend about it here though.
Now onward, to a tale of the past, an encounter with a villain and "something awesome" (at least in my opinion) near the end.
Once more Erza felt her suspicions of the blonde rising. Why didn't he want the story being told to the others? Especially Natsu of all people?
"Legend says that Dark City was once a place of never ending light. At first it was a beautiful place where everyone was happy. However, where there was light, there should also be darkness. That's the only way to be equivalent. But where could darkness fester in a place of constant light?" Roxas was silent for a moment, as if expecting them to answer him. He kept his focus on the way ahead of them.
Erza hesitated to answer, but only one logical conclusion could reach her. "It can't... can it?" Her eyes traveled around, absently noting how not even liter occupied the empty streets.
The blonde grimaced, pausing and leaning a hand against the nearby wall as he looked about the deserted city. "But it can." He turned to meet her eyes, a serious look in his blue depths. "In the heart." Roxas lifted a hand and placed it above his own heart. He paused a moment before starting to lead the way again.
"... What happened to turn a city of light into... this?" Mira asked with a large measure of hesitance. Both she and Erza knew she probably didn't want an answer, but they both had to know. Surely a light so bright couldn't be snuffed out so easily...
"The people grew protective and greedy of their light and looked for any way to keep it for themselves. Eventually, they found something that could work." He glanced back at them, the look in his eyes was of both worry and hesitation.
Something told Erza there was a good reason for him not wanting them to tell whatever it is that the solution was. Maybe she could trust Roxas if his reason proved well-intended though. One part of her really wanted to trust the blonde.
Roxas mumbled something before looking down at the sidewalk as they walked. "There was a dragon called Buranku. A dragon of nothing. Strong against both the light and dark because he lay between the two opposites. He was a pacifist however. It was said a single one of his scales could stand alone between the two elements. Somehow, the people managed to catch Buranku. They would use his scales to construct a wall around the City of Light and once they were done, killed him."
Now it was perfectly understandable why Roxas wouldn't want this part of the story getting out. It also might explain why Roxas believed in dragons and why of all people, the last he wanted to know about the story was Natsu. "Over the years, darkness built up on the outside of the wall. The people inside had no idea however, they were ignorant and the darkness within them only continued to grow."
Erza could already tell where this was going. Something can only hold out so long before it gives. Her armors were a good example, hit them enough and they will crack under the pressure.
"What no one realized... was that Buranku wasn't dead." The blonde paused once more, looking up towards the gray-white towers that stood alone against the unnaturally dark sky. He shook his head before continuing.
"He wasn't dead...? But... you said they killed him..." Mira murmured, looking at her blonde companion with confusion.
"They thought they did. Maybe they did. Either way, he was alive in the end. It could've been something to do with him being the nothing dragon." Roxas seemed to consider this a moment before shaking his head again. "He had absorbed the energy from the light inside and the darkness outside until he was strong enough to rebel."
Erza could feel her throat turning dry. The red head had a feeling she knew what happened, at least somewhat. Those people had angered a dragon with power over light and dark.
"Buranku had become the wall. When he started to move for the first time in ages, the wall itself was restructured. This city is surrounded by a massive canyon as a result. The wall had turned into a dragon as big as a castle. Darkness flooded into the City of Light. A once pacifistic dragon, turned into something of a blood-thirsty demon. In a day, the whole city had turned red and black." As he spoke, there was just the slightest shake in his voice. Something Roxas never had done in the past.
"But the sight didn't satisfy the dragon. He was still angry with humanity. Buranku, would've gone on to destroy everything if a mage hadn't come in time to stop the rampage. A powerful mage who was able to seal Buranku." With those words, Roxas came to a stop at what appeared to be a massive hole in the middle of the city. Which was the only sign such a conflict might have ever taken place. "And here, is where the Dragon of Nothing is sealed, in the form of a castle." He gestured upwards, and the sight left Erza and Mira completely shocked.
A castle, a massive castle, was floating above the hole. She had figured there was a large building in the middle of the city, but not this big, let alone floating. It was a massive and somewhat warped looking structure. There was no visible way to enter however, so what were they doing there?
"After all this time, he still bears a grudge against the city. Even though he's sealed he's still able to manipulate light and dark, that's why it is called Dark City." Roxas sighed, looking up at the dragon turned castle and the dark sky above. "Erza, Mira, meet Buranku. Also known as the Castle That Never Was."
There was no clear bottom to the structure. Towers seemed to go both up and down with only a select few at an angle. Some of them were connected by pipe-like protrusions. Another thing apparent however, was that no clear entrance was visible. Let alone a way to get to the castle.
Mira had a deep frown on her face. "So... I guess this all means if someone takes control of the castle... they get control over the magic power it has...?"
The blonde's only answer was a nod.
"How do we get up there to stop this dark mage?" Erza crossed her arms looking around.
"Possibly the easiest thing to do today." Roxas stepped up to the edge of the massive crater and knelt down, putting his hands out. "Just need to hit a certain magical frequency..." A faint glow seemed to emanate from his hands. He stayed like that for several minutes, brows furrowed in concentration.
The sudden appearance of a glowing bridge startled both Mira and Erza. Roxas just grinned and stood up straight. Without waiting he went ahead and lead the way onto the bridge. Both girls hesitated, it looked like they could just fall right through the bridge. Yet Roxas stood on it as if it was completely normal to be standing on a glowing bridge that materialized out of nowhere.
It took a moment for Roxas to realize he was being followed and when he did he looked back at the pair. "Well? You coming?"
"You've been here before I take it...?" Erza asked, narrowing her eyes slightly.
"I lived here. Xemnas wanted to keep this power out of the wrong hands." He spoke as if it should've been obvious. Roxas offered a shrug before continuing along the bridge.
The girls hesitated a bit longer before following.
The interior of the castle was the same as the exterior. A gray white in color with the occasional window which only showed the dark sky and the city below. Roxas had warned them to stay close because it was easy to get lost. It was easy to see given that almost everything looked the same. Both girls couldn't help but wonder what his childhood had been like, growing up in a castle where everything looks the same with what sounded like twelve older and powerful mages.
It couldn't have been easy.
They'd been journeying through the the castle for what might've been hours now for all they knew. There wasn't a single clock they'd encountered in all this time. At times they'd come across some particularly odd architecture, such as overlapping bridges that reached over what appeared to be an abyss. Most recently they'd gone through what appeared to be an indoor graveyard and then a place of platforms and invisible pathways that connect said platforms.
A heavy silence had been hanging over them for a while. Mira was getting irritated from it. "So where are we going anyways?"
"The Alter of Naught. One of the highest points of the castle." Was the simple answer Roxas gave.
"We can't just use another of those corridor things? The white haired girl raised a brow.
"I'm still new to using it. I haven't really mastered it yet so it takes a lot of magic and I can only do general location destinations. That's why we ended up in the streets of Dark City instead of already here in the castle." It was a reasonable explanation. Magic involving transportation tended to be tricky.
"I see. I had assumed there was some kind of charm preventing transportation into... what did you call this again? The Castle That Never Was?" Erza crossed her arms, wanting to keep the conversation going. "What's with the name anyways?"
"The Castle That Never Was, was something many wished never was. They didn't want it to exist..." Roxas paused in his walk, forcing the girls to stop as well. They'd just stepped out to a walkway that lead to a staircase going up. The dark sky plainly visible above. He glanced at the two with a look that told them to be careful before heading for the stairs.
The girls went silent and followed, tensing slightly to prepare for whatever might greet them.
They didn't expect to see a woman cloaked in black, let alone a woman with green skin. She had sickly yellow eyes and black horn-like protrusions were coming out of her covered head. In her left hand was a golden staff with a green orb on top, where a sickly looking raven was perched.
The area around her was circular and framed with a low wall that could never stop someone from falling over the edge. A few spikes stood around the circle. It almost looked like something was meant to appear between two spikes in particular, where the dark sky shrouded everything from view.
"Oh? What's this? Some rabble from the city?" The woman asked snidely, looking terribly unimpressed.
Roxas had a scowl on his face. "You're trespassing." He held out his right hand. "Oblivion: Glimpse of Darkness." The Keyblade appeared in his hand on command.
The fact that Roxas wasn't up for banter and had gone straight to summoning a Keyblade had alarm bells going off in Mira and Erza's minds. He was dead serious now, possibly because of the green skinned woman's trespassing of his childhood home. Either way, it put the girls on guard as they too got ready to fight.
A large purple magic circle appeared above Mira. "Satan Soul!" The purple magic circle seemed to collapse over her and when it was gone, she'd taken a drastic change in appearance.
Mira now wore a dark magenta body suit with a few gold markings. The only parts of her body not covered were her forearms and the neck up. Her forearms were now thicker and scaly with what looked like dark gold gauntlets. There were black cracks on her face as well and her hair had come loose, being blown upwards by the sheer amount of magic that the girl was exuding. She even had a large pair of bat-like wings coming out of her back as well as a large lizard tail.
Erza used her Requip Magic to trade her usual armor for something more battle appropriate. A soft glow encased her body before disappearing to reveal a full-body armor that was dark gray in color with a large black Fairy Tail mark on the back. This particular armor didn't have a name but it came equipped with a broadsword hanging on the side which she immediately removed, ready for a fight.
"Oh?" The green woman looked mildly surprised but more so amused. "A Keyblade user and friends?" She tilted her head as if pondering something as she focused on the aggravated looking blonde. "I see, you were on of them, weren't you?"
Roxas just sent a glare at her that would have had many shaking where they stood. But she remained unaffected and seemingly indifferent.
"I you think you can defeat me, Maleficent, then you kiddies have horribly underestimated me." She raised her arms and as she did a sickly yellow looking magic circle formed on her staff and with her arms, the thickest thorny vines the young Fairy Tail mages had ever seen erupted from the ground.
It was only their well-trained reflexes that allowed them to avoid the thorns. Mira flying up above the sudden forest of thorns. Roxas and Erza were both forced to jump around to avoid the thorns until the stopped growing. But just when they stopped the thorns started growing with excessive speed forcing the pair trapped in the thorns to hack at the thorns with their weapons.
This left Mira to become the dark mage's focus who raised her staff and began sending out blasts and lashes of green fire that the white haired mage struggled to avoid. It was the Takeover mage's mistake of a millisecond taken to look at the thorns to check on her companions that cost her. She took a particularly large blast of green fire that sent her crashing down somewhere into the thorns.
"Mira!" Erza made the mistake of looking back to check on Mira as she escaped the thorny forest Maleficent created.
Maleficent took advantage of the red head's distraction and aimed a blast of green fire at the girl. Roxas intervened however as he too escaped the thorns, rushing to Erza's side and raising Glimpse of Darkness to block the attack.
"Stay focused!" The blonde snapped out in warning, lowering his Keyblade to get a clear view of the dark mage.
"What're we going to do? She's too strong." She shook her head, forcing her gaze back on the task at hand.
Roxas was silent for a moment before glancing at Erza out of the corner of his eye. "We'll have to end this quick. There is that one thing."
The armored girl frowned at the thought. "We've never been able to pull that off."
"Don't we always do better when in a pinch?" He offered a small smirk, allowing his Keyblade to disappear before offering his right hand. There were some minor burns on his hand where his hand hadn't been protected from the fire.
He wasn't wrong, when in a difficult situation they'd always come through in the past somehow. This was something they'd tried in training in the past but never had it been successful. That didn't stop her from taking his hand with her left, leaving space between both hands. They had nothing left to lose, if Maleficent won then she'd have control over Dark City, a source of immense dark magical energy.
The two began their charge at Maleficent as they summoned their respective weapons and in Erza's case, armor.
"Requip!" Erza's body became engulfed in a light golden glow as she switched armors. When the glow faded she now donned an armor that was black in color and was decorated with large spikes, including a necklace and two that came out of her hair. It was a black battle dress with long sleeves that reached to glove her hands and a pair of boots that reached almost all the way up her legs constructed with particularly strong metal. Her hair was spiked outward slightly with a little covering her right eye. There was a devilish shadow somewhat obscuring the upper half of her face.
She was summoning her matching weapon at the same time Roxas called a new Keyblade. This, was her Purgatory Armor.
"Oblivion!" Roxas called, adding no extra name as the cloud of show appeared in his hand and took form but before the true form could be seen Erza's weapon had also come into sight. Both weapons appearing in their interlocked hands at the same time.
For a second, the two weapons seemed to resist appearing in the same place at the same time. The pair had to tighten their grip on each other's hands without crushing the space between. Shadow of the forming Keyblade and faint light of Erza's weapon seemed to twist together before taking one solid form.
The weapon was as large as either of them standing. Thick and black with four large bat wings forming the hand guard, two on top and two below. Connected to the tip of each wing was a thick silver chain. Going along the shaft was a series of black spikes until reaching the head of the weapon. It was reminiscent of a dragon's head, two ears and a final spike between the two giving the back of the head a three pointed crown appearance. Two purple gems marked the eyes and it even had an open mouth with sharp teeth.
Their speed seemed enhanced, Maleficent hardly had time to take a step back.
A sphere of violet energy took form at the dragon-like weapon's mouth. It swirled about violently, kicking up a storm of wind.
In unison the two attackers cried out the name of the attack as it made contact. "Oblivion of Purgatory!"
The sphere of violent violet energy made contact with Maleficent's chest. For a moment the energy seemed to expand before bursting. With the burst, the winds that had started with the apparent Unison Raid began turned to fierce levels of intensity. Then, before events could even be registered the winds seemed to center in back to where the sphere had been, pulling the energy that had been escaping with the explosion back into place. Only now the sphere was darker with streaks of red swirling about.
Neither Mira nor Erza seemed to catch what happened but Roxas and Maleficent definitely did. The sphere seemed to sink into the woman's skin, right where the heart was. With the sphere's disappearance, everything seemed to come to a halt. Winds suddenly non existent as Erza and Roxas watched the results of the attack from where they had landed after the attack, back where they'd been when they began the attack.
Maleficent seemed to shake, her staff falling out of her grasp and to the ground. Her hands shakily reached up to where the sphere had been and pressed down. It was as if she were trying to stop something from escaping. Eyes full of disbelief, she stared at the blonde before taking a few stumbling steps back. "You..."
Their weapons had separated at some point revealing the original forms. The thorns Maleficent had brought up receded into the ground and it was like they'd never been there, revealing Mira to be injured and unconscious but otherwise alright.
Erza's was a gray weapon even larger than the one created from the fusion. It was lined with black spikes and practically screamed danger.
Roxas' weapon, the Keyblade Oblivion had a ridged gray handle with a pair of black bat wings circling to form the hand guard. Between the two wings where the handle met the shaft was a violet diamond. The shaft itself was black with a silver chain design along the length. For the teeth of the large key was a shape that seemed to resemble the kanji for darkness (闇).
One only had a brief moment to look before it disappeared. Gripping his right hand which had wielded Oblivion as if in pain, the blonde glared at the woman. "Get out of here before you lose it."
For a second, the pupils of her yellow eyes seemed to turn to slits. Then she shakily reached out with her left hand, her staff levitating back into her grasp. "I won't be forgetting this, Thirteen." With those parting words, shadow seemed to engulf her and when the shadows were gone, there was no sign she'd been there.
So, it was Maleficent after all. Given that she didn't turn into a dragon, that would suggest she'll turn up again eventually. Maleficent trying to take over the castle was kind of a reference to what she wanted to do in Kingdom Hearts II.
We now have an idea of why Roxas believes in dragons. Buranku, light, dark, a castle. Quite a grim tale and Maleficent was likely trying to takeover because of the "never ending light" or because of the darkness that practically makes the city and hides the light... unless the light isn't even there anymore. Or perhaps she planned to free Buranku and try to control him only for it all to backfire...
The "something awesome" being a Unison Raid titled Oblivion of Purgatory. My personal favorite when it comes to this chapter. Hope you guys liked it.
Next chapter is Oathkeeper, where some Kingdom Hearts exclusive things or people or both will be appearing. Some questions that have been asked will be answered next chapter. The Keyblade master mentioned very briefly by Makarov in Missing Ache will finally get a name for instance.
Well, let me know what you all thought of this
