A/N: Thank you to those who have been supporting the story! I'm having a lot of fun writing this, and I'm hoping to make this into a long story! I haven't been updating the story lately, I've got school... again... and a bit of lack of motivation for writing. -_-
But hopefully, I'll be able to add more content to my stories soon! Might be a while until the next chapter is done, just saying... It took nearly a month just to finish the chapter and post it on Archive of our Own. Here's to a better 2021 for writing! (That's probably something I should've said WEEKS ago, but... it's still January, so... yeah. I hope you enjoy this chapter!)
One of the Paper Macho Goombas charged toward Kairi who was still near the fountain. She pushed herself off the wall of the fountain, narrowly avoiding the Goomba's attack. The Goomba tripped over the small barrier surrounding the fountain and face-planted in the cold water inside of it. Kairi noticed a small seal with Olly's face on its back. Realizing her enemy was vulnerable, she pulled out her Keyblade and slashed at the seal, destroying it. There was a small bit of smoke that appeared after the collision, but the Goomba quickly jumped out of the fountain, clearly angered. Before it could do anything, it started to short-circuit, and a white flag appeared on top of its head.
"What does the flag mean, Olivia?" Kairi shouted, retreating toward the rest of the group.
"Flag? What flag?" She turned around, noticed the Goomba, and smiled. "Oh! Brilliant! You managed to disarm the Paper Macho Soldier! That's the first step to taking them down. Always disarm them, then strike."
"Strike?" Kairi raised her Keyblade. "Like… strike them with a sword? Or a Keyblade?"
"Yes! Once they're disarmed, they're pretty much vulnerable to any attack you use against them. I would recommend using a fire attack on them since they're made out of paper, but at the same time, I advise saving your MP for stronger enemies."
"MP… I'm not sure what that means."
Olivia shrugged. "Um… I heard about that word before. Whatever! Less talking, more fighting! Take out the creature, Kairi!"
Kairi turned around to face the creature once more, but then… She realized the creature wasn't focusing on her anymore, but rather, staring intensely at the fountain and gyrating randomly. There were chunks of stone being thrown through the air around the Goomba. After a few more seconds, the Goomba finally turned around, revealing a giant black hole in the wall of the fountain.
"It… I… It's eating the fountain?!" Kairi shouted. "That's disgusting!"
"Yeah, it is," Olivia responded. "But it's also very dangerous! We need to destroy the Goomba and then restore the hole in the town using the confetti we collected."
The Goomba turned around and continued to nibble at the fountain as Kairi slowly crept closely toward it. She lunged at it and swung her Keyblade down, hitting it with all her might. Several brown pieces of paper fell off of the Goomba's body as it suddenly flinched and fell backward into the fountain, spraying water everywhere. Kairi slashed at it once more before jabbing the Keyblade into its back. The Goomba exploded into a pile of brown confetti. Kairi panicked and tried to salvage some of the confetti that had been dropped but they were ruined by the water.
Meanwhile, Sora and Xion were struggling against the two remaining Paper Macho Goombas. One Goomba forced them backward into the walls supporting a staircase while the other Goomba prepared to charge at them. Xion and Sora cast Aeroga to push the first Goomba out of the way as the second Goomba dashed toward them. Xion pulled Sora right and the Goomba crashed into the wall, leaving a giant hole. There was the sound of something hitting the ground, but the noises made by the Goomba eventually disappeared.
"Thanks, Xion," Sora said. "Sorry about what I said before… the teasing…"
"It's fine," Xion grumbled. "No matter how I'm feeling, I'll always support my friends. But, you, Sora… you're skating on thin ice right now!"
"Okay, we can talk more about this after we kill the mushroom things, alright?" He charged at the Goomba, startling it. The winds surrounding Sora pushed the Goomba back several feet into the back of the District.
Riku and Lea followed the Goomba and pinned it against the wall with their Keyblades. Roxas aimed the tip of his Keyblade at the Goomba's face and cast a fire spell, vaporizing it completely. Strips of confetti filled the air, which Sora tried to catch. Sora walked up to the hole made in the staircase and tossed a few fistfuls of confetti at it, sealing the gap. This time, however, some yellow metal object popped out as the hole closed. Sora jumped back and tripped over himself as he stumbled backward.
"Oh, coins!" Olivia said, barely managing to pick one of them up. "Wow… these seem much bigger close-up like this. We don't have anywhere to use them on right now. Well, except for the accessory shop, but the shopkeeper is currently… origami."
"Maybe we should revisit his house again, find the key, and then just get to the accessory shop ourselves," Namine suggested. "I mean… it's trespassing, sure, but… it's for the greater good. We will use it to undo the origami your brother has spread across our worlds."
"We should seal the Keyhole first," Riku suggested. "Otherwise the darkness will continue to consume this world, as well as King Olly… Let's seal this Keyhole and then travel to a different world. There's no doubt that Olly's spread his forces across other worlds as well. When we seal the Keyhole, this streamer should disappear."
"Right, but, how do we get to the Keyhole?" Kairi asked. "It seems like it's… behind the fountain?"
"Well… I remember the second time we visited Traverse Town, Donald, Goofy, and I talked to some friends in Cid's home. They mentioned some kind of legend about the bell on top of the gizmo shop, and that I should ring it three times to see what happened."
"What happened?" Riku asked
Sora motioned to the mural behind the fountain. "Whenever we rang the bell, the mural would move. After the third ring, the mural changed to a beautiful picture, revealing Traverse Town's Keyhole."
Olivia began jumping around excitedly. "Ooh! That sounds very interesting! I can't wait to see this keyhole!"
Roxas smirked. "I think you'd like it. Sealing one of those is like performing a magic trick. Except, well… it's not a trick. And it's actually real."
"Hang on! Before we do any of that, don't you think we should repair the holes left by the Goombas?" Olivia pointed to the fountain.
Kairi walked up to the fountain and sprinkled some confetti on top of the large gaping hole made by the paper-mache monster. The hole sealed itself and released coins. Kairi let out a quick sigh of relief before pocketing the bag of confetti.
Meanwhile, Olly and his new acquaintances watched as Sora and his friends easily destroyed the paper-mache Heartless. Everyone scowled at Olly, who just stared at the ground in defeat. He had put so much time and effort into creating his soldiers, yet they were defeated in minutes by a group of… well, mostly teenagers.
"Olly…" the woman growled through her gritted teeth. "You told us these origami creatures would be strong! You said you made them invincible to the Keyblade! And look what happened! A few minutes later, your origami creations are reduced to measly scrap paper!"
"I'm not sure what happened, I—"
"Shut up!" She pounded the table angrily. "Don't give me excuses! You promised us strong Heartless, but they were weak!"
"Wait!" Olly jumped up suddenly. "Who… is that? Could that be…?" He shook his head and lowered his voice to a whisper. "No… that can't be Olivia… or could it?" He looked closer at the yellow creature hovering around them as they marched toward the gizmo shop. Out of nowhere, he pounded the table and let out an enraged scream. "OF COURSE! I THOUGHT THE FOLDED SOLDIERS WOULD BE ABLE TO MANIPULATE HER INTO JOINING MY ARMY, BUT NOOO, THEY CAN'T DO ANYTHING RIGHT!"
"Geez, I thought I had a temper," the blue-haired man sighed.
"Hmph." Olly calmed himself down and sulked and turned to face the man. "Hades… why don't you just destroy Sora and his friends yourself then?"
Hades rolled his eyes. "Look, I'm the god of the Underworld, alright? I don't exactly have time to go on a random goose chase. I'm on a tight schedule here. Gotta take over Olympus, destroy Hercules… the usual stuff. Of course, Sora's gonna find some way to stop me eventually, but I'll find a way to delay him long enough to complete my plan!"
Olly looked at him suspiciously. "And how exactly do you plan on doing that?"
Hades grinned. "Let's just say… I have an old buddy who can help me with that. And Titans. They have proven to be quite useful in invading Olympus in the past."
"How exactly did they fail, if they're so great?"
"Because… Wonderboy just had to show up," Hades said, his voice raising with every word,
"and ruin EVERYTHING AS USUAL!" His head turned bright red and flames erupted from it. Taking a deep breath, he continued his speech. "Alright, so… here's the thing. My Titans are pretty easy to spot, which will make the mission harder. I just need a decoy to distract Zeus while I enter Olympus, and BOOM! Olympus gets taken over by the god of the Underworld!"
"Sounds fun," Olly said sarcastically, playing with a piece of paper in front of him. "Well, you'd better get to it then. No doubt this… Wonderboy… is already defending Olympus."
Hades scoffed. "What do you know about taking down Greek heroes? I mean… do you have some powerful brother who rules over all of Olympus and can take down anything with one strike?"
"One strike… one strike?" Olly gasped. "Wait, you don't mean… Zeus, do you?"
"Bingo! Right on the money, origami dude." Hades summoned a sphere of darkness. "Zeus is gonna be a real tough nut to crack, and so is Hercules. I guess unintentionally being ANNOYING is a running trait in the family or something! HOWEVER!" He began to fold the sphere of darkness into the shape of a… strange creature. "My Titans and our Heartless shall destroy Olympus for good!"
Olly cleared his throat. "You keep mentioning these… Titans. What are they supposed to do in this mission?"
Hades sighed. "Just… the usual stuff. Invade Olympus, freeze stuff, burn stuff, capture Zeus, capture Hercules, I take over Olympus as the main god… that's the plan. The plan I've been working on for eighteen years now. I WILL GET OLYMPUS! I WILL!"
Olly turned back to the front of the room, where the vision of Sora and someone who looked eerily similar to Olivia and the rest of the Keyblade wielders began to fade away. Olly sighed, and thought back to his previous memories… The desire to build a kingdom, becoming a powerful ruler with Olivia at his side, introducing Olivia to origami… Perhaps one day he would be able to fulfill his wish. He moved over to the far corner of the room and opened a small black portal.
"Where do you think you're going?" the horned woman growled.
"I… I have somewhere I need to be," Olly explained. "There's a certain someone I have to take care of. And that 'someone' is not Olivia. I have an even bigger target. In the world where I came from, there was this village with a castle nearby. The world is surrounded by darkness. The people still in my world cannot escape. I shall capture the castle and the princess, and create my origami kingdom… and improve on my Folded Heartless." He slowly stepped into the portal before whispering, "Make no mistake, sister… I will make you join me… eventually."
Here's another A/N:
Some Behind the Scenes here (just for some entertainment and production... and word count increase because... more words.): Whenever I introduce a villain into a scene (like Olly), I just play his theme in the background. It's really motivating and helps me write my way through the scene. (Maybe it's because Nintendo music helps me focus, or because Olly has an amazing theme song, or maybe both. Who knows?)
