Game Master: The Next Generation

by Keyblader Chad

As an era of chaos begins to fill all creation, those with the ability to turn thoughts into power are summoned to influence reality itself. But faced with the machinations of gods themselves, and revelations of eras long past, will the power of the Azure tip the scales or only further corrupt the fabric of reality? The game has only just begun.

20. Chapter 19: Brave Vesperia

Chapter 19: Brave Vesperia

Every creak of the wooden planks beneath his pacing feet was another reminder of just why Chad paced back and forth. Every moment the ocean around him rocked the ship was yet another reminder of how this uncomfortable feeling was not going away any time soon.

He was sure more than ever that Sonic had the right idea staying far away from this kind of experience.

He peered across the side of the ship again while moving; staring into that deep abyss was enough for him to yank his gaze away and for his pace to quicken again.

"Kid," Raven's voice brought Chad's attention over to the man sitting against the cabin wall. "Yer gonna make me seasick if ya keep this up."

Chad's pacing came to a stop…to be replaced by his foot tapping away rapidly on the spot. His arms crossed with his fingers now tapping at his arms.

"Don't got the legs fer the sea, huh?"

"It's not sea sickness," Chad mumbled out and gazed over to the ocean reluctantly again. "I just would like my end to be fast, not struggling in the middle of the ocean."

"I think that's fair," Yuri spoke up from where he sat near the side of the boat, Repede curled up besides him. "Imagine how crazy it'd be if a monster sunk the ship? Just one giant munch and oops—no boat."

And there was Chad back to pacing.

"Yuri!" a female voice scolded him despite its pleasant tone. Yuri looked over to the source of the voice, fond amusement clear on his face. The young woman there, with short pink hair and dress-like clothing of white and pink colours, was staring him down. Estelle, she was once a former candidate for the imperial throne, now an author living in the small scenic town of Halure.

"Come on, Yuri," Karol also spoke up with a sigh. "They're paying clients; you can't mess with them like that."

"Aye, aye, Captain."

"Its fine really, I'm not bothered…" Chad admitted. "…Like the guy too much for how he is."

Another sighed as they walked up with a stern look down to Yuri which only made him smile more. A young man with blonde hair and a knight's clothing, a childhood friend of Yuri's and now Commandant of the Imperial Knights: Flynn. "Despite Yuri's suggestion, you can rest assured that monster activity is minimal. You have my word I will protect you all from any unforeseen circumstances."

"Besides," Judith started and looked to the helm of the ship. "The sea is no problem for Patty." A late teen girl, just a couple of years older than Karol, stood there steering the wheel, she had blonde hair and wore a pirate's outfit. Patty for her part was half watching the sea before them and half examining the coin in her hands, the coin Ardyn had given the Game Master group to be used for payment. "…Patty?"

Patty broke away her gaze from the coin; a cheerful smile now replaced anxious curiosity. "Aye! I'm ready for anything the sea throws at us! …probably."

There was a lot of calm confidence shared by the gathered Brave Vesperia, it was re-assuring certainly. One member however had her focus elsewhere. Another late teen girl's eyes kept studying the group sceptically. The brown haired mage in red and black clothing sat besides Estelle almost defensively as her arms remained crossed and she more or less examined the newcomers. "It just doesn't make sense," the mage known as Rita repeated a statement she had already made three times prior.

The conversion from aer to mana could not have been achieved without the genius mage that was her at the forefront of it all. She could easily be considered the expert on mana and the new spiritual existences of this world. Yet thanks to knowledge from other worlds—and some blanks filled in by Chad and Blue—Anna and the others had shown a rather in-depth accumulation of knowledge.

And that was fine. She wasn't bothered by the existence of other experts. To see such competition and growth after years of being shunned by other mages and scholars, she welcomed the difference.

But they were unknown. Studies in mana and spirit life forms were so new that fellow experts should've been known names to her.

Anna's fast thinking had been to explain they were isolating their studies for the time-being, taking the opportunity to learn something new without bias of others research until they felt it was time to share theories and hypotheses. Rita accepted it—mostly thanks to the insistence of Estelle—but she clearly still wasn't completely buying it. It wasn't even a case of trust; she felt she could believe they were doing the right thing too. It just bugged her that people with knowledge could slip under her radar like this. She had pride after all.

Regardless, Anna felt relieved as she looked around to see how the groups had all come together, how they were now on their way to Zaude.

After explaining their intentions of wishing to investigate the strange power emanating from the ruins, the members of Brave Vesperia had agreed to take them there only if they could first prove their intentions and expertise in such matters to gain permission from the empire.

They were flown all the way to the capital known as Zaphias, in this very ship—at the time attached to the draconic whale-like Entelexia known as Ba'ul, a partner and friend to Judith.— where they found Estelle and Rita had already arrived.

It was just as they had heard in the tavern in Dahngrest. A strange feeling of malice, a presence of malevolence flowed out from the ruins of Zaude. It was a dark spiritual power that had the mages and scholars of this world stumped. Some civilian ships and knight ships had wound up smashed across the rocks or capsized after reports of a "siren's song" in the area of this pressure.

Rita had been summoned to the capital to discuss her thoughts on the matter; of course Estelle wasn't going to let her go it alone.

Anna and the others won over the empire with their knowledge and their intentions of wanting to preserve peace and stability. It certainly helped having Estelle feel passionate in trusting them, along with the belief of Flynn.

The decision was made to keep the area around Zaude secure with the knights themselves. Flynn would represent them accompanying the rest of Brave Vesperia to the shrine itself.

In the time that had passed since the birth of mana upon this world, many had already begun to adapt well on converting abilities once thought lost to the new requirements of mana. The techniques known as artes that operated much like Blue's Sword Skills, though many of them already pulled from the wielder's own spiritual power. There of course was also the typical magical spells themselves. Brave Vesperia were more or less on top form again when it came to combat.

Halfway to the shrine, the decision was made to return the ship back to the sea without Ba'ul carrying it. If this power was anything similar to the Adephagos they couldn't risk the effect it would have on one of the last few Entelexia.

The silver lining as far as Yuri was concerned was: "We're not doing it for the empire; we're working for our clients."

Which brought the matter right back around to the payment. The coin Ardyn had given them. It frustrated Anna even now how well everything fell into place because of that man.

The pirate girl known as Patty was the one who took notice of it. Confirmed it was valuable, an acceptable treasure to take as payment for the guild.

Anna had to press the question. She had asked her: "Do you know what it is?" Ardyn had called it a 'treasure of the past.' If it was this world's past then why and how did he collect it? If it belonged to another world…Then that raised the other question of why it would be recognizable to this one.

Patty had shaken her head; she had explained that she just had a good eye for treasure. Then she had paused. "But something about it feels familiar. As if it belongs to one who follows Aifread."

Anna had left it to Chad to fill her in on that when they had a free moment before boarding the ship. Aifread, it was the name of a pirate captain who had multiple alternate versions existing across these different worlds of this franchise. Patty was this world's counterpart. "There's more to it, with Aifread once being probably somewhere in her forties before de-aging with amnesia due to some problems…but you really don't want me complicating our visit here with unneeded information," Chad had finished up with.

'Too late for keeping it simple,' Anna thought as she gazed around the ship again, Elie sitting besides her. Ardyn had suggested they find a guild to aid them, had pointed out that the Game Masters would find the right group…and then given them the exact right payment they'd need to affect a member of the group? There was convenient and then there was engineered.

"Should've let me hit him," Elie murmured besides her, a frown on her expression… evidently dwelling on the same issue.

"I'm considering it."

"I was wondering," Estelle leant forward to get Anna's attention. "Do you mind sharing stories of your travels?" She saw Anna's quizzical look in return and Elie's glance to Rita's now narrowed eyes at them. "Oh! Please don't think I'm questioning. I like hearing more about people's adventures, finding inspiration for my own stories to tell, and you seem like a nice group to hear from."

"We can start by hearing more of these private studies," Rita added on.

"If you need more inspiration then we should all have another big get-together, Estelle!" Karol excitedly offered.

"We're on one right now," was the blunt and short reply from Rita.

"I mean a relaxing one. We're always meeting each other but it's been ages since the last complete guild meet-up."

"It was last month."

With surprising amount of confidence, Karol came back with: "Come on, Rita. Stop giving our clients the stink-eye and smile. We all know you like this just as much as us." Rita's right hand had begun to lift up. "You can't scare me anymore." Wisps of fire danced across her fingers and almost immediately Karol was closer to Yuri. "Y-Yuri, help me out! You know you want to spend some more time with Estelle."

Said swordsman looked to Karol with eyebrows raised in an amused expression, not denying it but also surprised in that Karol would just say it outright to him. It was Raven who spoke up instead, "Ah, to see young Master Karol teasing Yuri, they grow up so fast. Brings a tear to this ol' man's eye."

"A splash of salt water will rinse that right outta there," Yuri said back dryly.

"Moving back from their...excitement," Anna looked back to Estelle with a smile. "I'd love to." After all, it would be quite easy to repurpose things she had done on other worlds to fit the context of this world.

Onwards they sailed. Anna and Elie freely spoke with Estelle while Rita listened intently the entire time. If nothing else, Rita did seem to relax the more she heard how kindly they spoke with Estelle, that trust slowly formed.

Blue ended up lightly sparring with Yuri and Flynn. It had started as challenging teasing coming from Yuri to his childhood friend and before long Blue was involved too as all three just passed the time seeing small displays of each others skills with a blade. At the very least, it was a good warm up exercise.

Chad? Chad continued to pace.

It was as they eventually drew near to the shrine's location that they heard it. Faint and subtle, mixed into the whistling of the wind and the flow of the waves, the siren's song was formed not of words but soft melodic 'oohs' and 'aahs' carried to them like a whisper, a call insisting one follows it to hear it louder.

"This might be a late thought to have—" Chad said looking forward to their destination. "—but knowing siren mythology should we have covered our ears?"

"Ye be right, matey." Patty said in return, steering the ship firmly as the sea around them begun to feel choppier. "It is a late thought."

Little by little the song increased in volume as they continued on. The more it called out to them, the more they could feel the intentions of the singer.

"…This song…" Estelle's saddened voice trailed off as she looked ahead to the shrine of Zaude in the distance.

Iris's hands balled up into fists to steady their shaking, her strong connection for spiritual energy let her feel the tension of the malice in the air even from this far. This song wasn't a threat; it wouldn't have been accurate to call it a lure. It was a calling, a beckoning plea that unfortunately could not protect sailors from the worsening condition of the sea. "…they're in pain," Iris continued on from Estelle.

"A pain that will rot into the very foundation of the world if left to fester," the echo of a maiden's voice spoke off the starboard side.

Floating there with a pale light surrounding her was a pale cyan skinned humanoid with a soft shade of blue for her long hair, a green dress hung low from her shoulders with the patterns on the fabric reminiscent of scales. Her face gazed down upon them yet her eyes remained closed.

"Undine?" Estelle questioningly greeted the Water Spirit.

"Brave Vesperia, I shall ensure your approach is safe. However I regret that we can not aid you at the shrine itself without endangering all of us."

"This power…it can harm spirits?!" Rita stepped closer to the edge of the ship, towards Undine. "Did something happen? Did we not completely disperse the Adephagos?"

Undine shook her head and responded, "This is not the Adephagos. Yet this malevolence, it is not entirely different. Efreet almost lost two spirits in his command to the despair that flows out. They could feel it seeping into the very heart of their being, twisting them. We must keep our distance."

Anna's hand went to her chin, her expression pulling away from the spirit to gaze ponderingly at the deck of the ship, focused on the spirits words. "Malevolence," she quietly murmured.

"Please do keep away until this is resolved," Iris insisted, stepping up closer herself. "I swear I won't allow this threat to spirits to remain."

Undine turned to face Iris. Her head tilted at the unfamiliar human addressing her. It was pleasing to hear such words in favour of her kind, particularly from a stranger. There was a convincing reassurance to the determination she spoke with. But it was precisely the fact she was a stranger that gave pause to the Great Spirit of Water. Should a stranger's words truly have felt so convincing to her? And yet… "I believe you. You have our sincerest gratitude, traveller."

"Don't risk it any further, Undine," Judith advised her. "We solved this once, we can do it again." Undine nodded to them, her form shimmering as it became nothing more than particles of light that sunk into the waves below. Almost immediately it was as if a narrow stretch of the sea before them calmed further.

Onwards they sailed through the safe passage open to them, docking without concern at the shrine itself and proceeding on into its depths.

---

The air of the shrine was as cold as the smooth grey stone and metal that formed the temple style architecture around them. Halls and corridors empty of even monsters; light was cast by crystalline coral embedded in the ceiling of rooms. Windows gave a miniscule glimpse into the deep of the sea. The light of the sun above the waves faded little by little each stairway they descended deeper into the shrine.

Brave Vesperia led the way, all too familiar with the layout of this place. It was clear to Anna how much the empire of this world had explored this shrine by now. Mechanisms for puzzles or traps were all clearly dismantled, no furniture or artefacts or any possible remnants of a bygone civilisation to be found here. There were only the empty and cold rooms.

Soon enough they had reached their destination. The sea parted here to create a circular chamber. Green crystals atop pillars maintained a barrier around the open room. The sky far above could be seen as the barrier kept the sea back, an eternal waterfall encircling the chamber. The pathway they walked upon led to a large diamond shaped platform, what once was a working magical elevator. Now a magic glyph of sorts covered it. The portal this light created would take them to the dimension hidden within this shrine: The Necropolis of Nostalgia and the Garden of the Waning Moon within.

Or at least…that's what Brave Vesperia had told them would normally happen. But if Ardyn was to be believed on what he told them, then there was really no way of preparing for where they were heading.

"Alright let's hear the bad news," Yuri looked to Rita and Judith as they examined the glyph and the magical warp formula running through it. "What are we in for?"

"Can't tell," Rita admitted with a noticeable grumble of frustration. "The Garden's still there but it's all mixed in. I'd say that it's like different locations are all tangled up in some big illusion."

Judith nodded in agreement, sensing the way the energy moved chaotically within the bounds of the glyph. "I'm oversimplifying it but you could think of it like when we were shown the past town of Yormgen. I'm more concerned by the power now that we're closer."

Anna knew exactly what she meant. That bitter coldness in the air, a chill wind flowing out of this point. This pressure, this malevolent force…it was familiar. It was not the same full force that had surrounded them and threatened to break them down during that recent fight, but its core—its nature was all too similar. "You feel that right?" She looked back to her group.

"Yeah," Blue nodded and looked upon the glyph. "It's not an exact similarity but it's like when we fought Phantom Ganon. It feels—"

"—Hollow," Iris finished.

That was exactly it. This cold feeling, the hollow nature of this malevolent force, as if it was the type of despair that clings to one and works its way inside, eating away at the heart until it left one empty. "I think Ardyn's right," Anna admitted much to her sister's disappointed sound of disgust. "This spirit, this power, it may be to do with the Chaos Lord's era after all."

Her group looked to her for elaboration; on the other hand the listening in Brave Vesperia seemed both interested and understandably confused on the topic of the conversation.

"Malevolence, that's the word that Undine chose to describe this power. The Eye of Malice was said to represent Ganon's malevolence, and according to the legends and fairy tales: Ganon is meant to be a Lord of Calamity. An existence that embodies the darkness that spread as a result of the Chaos Lord." She looked to see if the others were following on so far. Most were—Brave Vesperia being an obvious exception— Iris's posture had shifted uncomfortably as if not sure whether to speak up or not. "Iris?"

"…Taking into account that legends and fairy tales get details lost a little over generations, you're thinking of the scourge the stories talk about aren't you?"

Anna nodded. The mystery of the Azure, the Descender of the World Tree, Chaos Lord and Lords of Calamity, The foe of her parents who called himself Chaos, there was a greater picture slowly coming together with each problem their group was getting involved in. Not coincidental luck but perhaps not quite fate either—just inevitability. Something that had started from the moment her father was summoned here; it had begun to stir more with the calling of more Game Masters. If there were elements of truth obscured by the legends, if there was no coincidence to this, then there was a familiar origin for this power.

"People began to fight over the light of the Azure," Anna recalled the story she had told the children of Hyrule. "And all the while a scourge began to plague the stars themselves. Darkness, a corrupting malevolence was born in their hearts."

"Before all could be lost—" Estelle spoke up, her eyes closed as she recalled the familiar words she had read. "—Dreams and light from the heart were spread into the wind like the seeds of dandelions, reaching the skies and shining with the stars."

"You know that fairy tale?"

"The incomplete translation I read doesn't sound the same as the one you know, but certainly I've heard of it. 'The Heart's Starlight'."

"It's an old lost fairy tale," Judith confirmed. "Predates even the Geraios civilisation. Not even Krityan records have a complete version."

The magical energy forming the glyph momentarily but excessively sparked out, Rita stepped back from it as energy briefly coursed out in all directions before barely stabilising again. "We might want to save the fairy tale theorising until after we enter. I'm not sure what's going to happen to us if we leave this much longer."

Held tightly by the hilt, Yuri lifted up his sword and swung it outwards sending its scabbard off and clattering to the floor. "It's just one more obstacle on the path we chose, let's cut a path through this darkness just like before."

All gathered up together and stepped over the threshold into the glyph, the formula in full effect and manifesting the light of its teleport energy around them as everything went white.

---

On a first glance as the light faded, the domain was still somewhat what Chad recognised from the game. An ancient city of temples, platforms and walkways suspended above a deep chasm filled with some form of spiritual energy flowing like a thin layer of pale blue and green mist. The 'sky' above permanently lit in pale yellow hues cast by a clump of energy in the shape of a waxing crescent moon.

Directly ahead however was where the sealed off City of The Waning Moon had begun to lose to the other dimensions encroaching on this reality.

The passage into the temple before them had shifted. Right on the other side of the doorways threshold was not the same stone and metal of the city or even the shrine of Zaude, but black marble and black metal looking of a far more advanced civilisation. It felt like it would've been more fitting on a space faring vessel or station. Further beyond that it returned to the architecture of The City and yet once more even that shifted again. The following area was weathered grey stone, a feeling of decay and stagnation from its very foundation as a faint mist hung above the ground from that portion of the passageway.

The clash of architecture overlapped with each other, each domain's state of reality seemingly eating away at the other to claim dominance or reclaim stability in the case of The City itself. All three locations seemed to ripple and shimmer as if they were a mirage or the surface of water, an illusion barely remaining manifest.

This place really had been tangled up as multiple locations just like Rita had said.

This—Chad realised as he begun to look around—was only the start of the problems. "Welp. We split the party." His only allies to be found around him were Raven, Karol, and Patty. "Is everyone feeling okay? No side effects?"

"Just the ache of these brittle old bones."

"I'm okay but it feels so cold ahead."

"Aye, I feel like we're facing a whirlpool about to sink us."

"We're all ourselves then," Chad answered to Raven, Karol, and Patty's comments. "Safe to assume everyone else is here too, just that we've been scattered."

"Trying to find the others could take a while," Karol admitted reluctantly.

"Unless we're all heading ta the same destination that is," Raven hesitated to suggest.

If he was hoping for an alternate suggestion or some attempt to ease his fears, he was looking to the wrong person as Chad just smiled and readied his sword, looking onwards into the distortion ahead. "Caution to the wind then. Let's go towards the dangerous looking area."

"Just once I'd like ta hear 'let's go back to the tavern' instead," Raven mourned the situation.

Carefully yet boldly they proceeded down the passageway before them after one final investigation of their surroundings to make sure no one else was around them.

In a sense there was. Transparent figures all wearing robes aimlessly wandered; many humans of different genders but all with pink hair. These were the spirits of the Children of the Full Moon, the remnants of those who gave their lives to seal the Adephagos the first time in ancient times gone by. The pink hair was a familiar genetic trait across all of them.

A wave in front of one's face from Karol to no reaction was all the evidence they needed it was best to just leave them be and continue on.

The echoing footsteps on stone turned to the sound of footsteps on metal and then back to stone as they transitioned through the areas. They reached a stairway of the advanced black material again and begun to descend it. A large window was on the wall of it several steps down, it shimmered the same as the rest of the dimension around them. On the other side of the window appeared to be the ocean once more.

For just three flights worth they descended the stairs and crossed into weathered stone once more as they stepped into a large open area. The sights of The City could not be seen here. They had stepped out onto a large circular weathered platform surrounded by a star-filled abyss. The stars did not shine bright, they barely even flickered. It was as if the stars themselves were frozen in time, the only thing keeping them from vanishing into the darkness itself.

On the far end of the platform they could see the familiar architecture of the city through another doorway. The mist in this area spread out further—even into the abyss off the walkways—yet still thin. Crystalline spheres floated around the area as if they were bubbles. The light within the crystal was a pale yellow and white, the light continuously moved in shapes replicating the phases of the moon.

"Be on guard, mateys. We're not alone." Patty aimed her gun ahead of them to the robed figure standing in the middle of the platform, her back to them.

She was transparent, just like the spirits above, another child of the full moon as evident by her long pink hair. Raven's hands held his bow relaxed in their grasp yet ready to shift into battle at a moment's notice, Karol's oversized sword for his height was prepared by him too.

The spirits above hadn't reacted to them; there shouldn't theoretically be any danger. But why was one on their own all the way down here in the middle of the platform? If she was a threat then it wouldn't have been the first time Brave Vesperia had wound up facing a vengeful spirit down here.

She turned to the side, the gaze in her red eyes as unfocused as the spirits above. It wasn't her that startled the three members of Brave Vesperia. It was the abrupt cry of "Lucy?!" that came from Chad as he ran forwards.

Any concern of his location was paid no heed. Any possible confusion for recognising her face wasn't even a thought in his mind. In that moment, all Chad could focus on was how he knew that was the face of Lucy before him. Desperation and longing pushed him in a sprint across the platform and his hand stretched out to her shoulder.

It passed through her. He stumbled and pulled back, falling to the floor in his overcompensating attempt to recover from the confusion.

He glanced from his hand, opening and closing it two times before looking back up to the spirit. She still made no reaction. "Lucy?" the words came out weaker than he had intended.

Reason started to root itself back in his mind, panic fading to calmer thoughts as his breathing steadied itself. 'Right. It can't be her. She's back home…but…' His thoughts trailed off examining her facial features. He couldn't call himself mistaken either. It wasn't just a likeness, it was undeniably her face.

"You know an ancient Child of The Full Moon?" Karol was visibly concerned and confused over Chad's abrupt panic.

"…no…I just…thought she was someone else." Chad slowly pulled himself back up onto his feet and looked at the un-reacting spirit. He looked over her robe. She was undeniably a spirit, undeniably a part of this ancient group.

He didn't have a good explanation—however, a thought and a memory hovered there in his mind as possibilities to dwell on. The implication he had considered of Pandora and Prometheus being versions he had imagined.

A memory of Lucy's words came to him: "I suppose if I had a character insert for Tales of Vesperia they should be a Child of the Full Moon due to the pink hair. Maybe even make her one from the past."

The spirit slowly stepped away, fading away with each step until she was gone from their sight. Chad lightly shook his head. Just another thing he he'd have to put aside for now until later.

"Can we get outta this place already?" Raven was watching the crystallized bubbles moving about, some uncomfortably close. "Got me on pins and needles somethin' fierce." He reached a hand up to tap a finger at the nearest bubble, intending on pushing it away.

The crystal shimmered. The rippling effect on reality around them spread out from the bubble as an illusionary screen manifested from it. A scene played out within. A young man and woman in their early twenties walked through the bustling streets, their blue coloured uniforms the familiar design of imperial knights. The man despite his youth and shorter hair was recognisable as Raven. The woman besides him had long dark brown hair and brown eyes, a cheerful smile greeting townspeople passing them by.

Raven pushed the bubble harder, the illusion dispersed as it floated further away. He sighed deeply; the poker face he had normally mastered now failed him. A fond smile of reminiscence coupled with pain in his eyes. Karol's own concerned eyes met his as the young man spoke up to him, "Raven…was that—"

"—Better to leave Damuron and Casey to rest in memories, let's get a move on." He stepped forward to take the lead only to act on instinct and attempt to push the back of his hand against another bubble in his way to divert it.

Once more an illusion displayed itself. He intended to remove his touch on it quicker than last time—only to pause in wonder at the sight. There he was again, closer in age to how he was now…Casey was still there. There she was living happily with him in a home, a ring clearly on her finger, a time that had not come to be as a result of the great war.

He hesitated for a moment before taking his hand away and letting the illusion disperse again. "Well," he swallowed the brief crack in his voice away, "Ol' Raven's going senile at last."

"Judith and Rita are right; this place really is one big illusion." Karol's hand reached up towards a passing bubble, curiosity beginning to take hold. Raven's hand stopped him.

"Let it be, Karol. You've got all of life ahead of you, no need to get lost in the past and the what-ifs." Raven looked over to Chad who was pacing for far different reasons than when they were back on the ship. Chad's arms were crossed to minimise chances of contact as he walked around the bubbles and examined them and their surroundings. "Any thoughts from our mysterious spirit researcher?"

"The past and the what-ifs," Chad echoed Raven's words albeit speaking to himself more than anything. He glanced over in the direction the Lucy look-alike had faded away. "Possibilities? Some kind of dimension that records time and space?" his hands fidgeted, temptation calling much like it had for Karol.

There was the sound of metal touching crystal. No one had been keeping an eye on Patty. It wasn't her hand that directly touched a bubble; it was the coin they had paid with.

"I'm just sad I can't go with you… Sounds like a goddamn blast."

"I won't apologise."

Two gruff masculine voices spoke out—the former sounding injured, while the latter was blunt—as an illusion was beckoned forth to the coin's touch rather than an individual. The former voice belonged to a man with long dark hair, a rugged pirate like appearance with his clothing predominantly in shades of purple. An excessive amount of blood from a hole in his chest stained his clothing.

He was held carefully by a man with short blonde hair, bright blue eyes and predominantly dark coloured clothing with a waist coat and a long coat over that. The back of the coat seemed to have a symbol looking like a representation of a dragon. Two tears in the coat went through the wings. There in one of his hands was the same coin Patty now held.

"You shouldn't." Despite the pain, the injured man bumped his fist up against the blonde's chest; he continued to speak with laboured breathing. "I'm grateful. You always kept things from gettin' dull. If we ever meet again…Let's raise some hell…Eizen." The life passed from the man, his arm fell back down against his blood soaked clothing, his eyes closed yet the smile remained on his face.

The man identified as Eizen tightened his grasp on the coin in his hand. "Yeah, we will. See you, Aifread."

The image faded back into the crystalline object it was beckoned from, Patty's hand slowly pulled the coin away from it. She turned it over in her hands, frowning as she examined it. "Now I just have more questions."

"I know the feeling," Chad agreed as he stopped pacing in circles around the objects. He looked ahead to the pathway onwards. The smart decision would be to just move on here and now. These glimpses mattered little without any idea of what dimensions were tangled up here in this place…even if something about the metal area was familiar to him.

On the other hand, how close they hovered around them was too tempting of an offer. He looked between the nearest one and the path ahead. It really would be far too impulsive and indulging to entertain these visions further. "Ah what the hell, I can't figure this out if I don't get more information," Chad immediately decided and reached out one hand.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Karol interjected as fast as he could.

"Absolutely not. Here I go!"

Not settling for touching at it, Chad's fingers firmly wrapped around it and grasped tight. Once more a scene was beckoned forth. Chad's first assumption was that it would show the past first, like it had for Raven, like it assumedly had for the coin.

From a certain point of view, perhaps it was.

It was him. A year—maybe two—younger in appearance, wearing that typical outfit of his he had always visualised and now wore here too. He was standing defensively, in the way of a group of four armed individuals wearing military-ish uniforms of green and white. Behind him, protected by his intervention, was Pandora. Clutched in his left hand was the very same Biometal he had wielded when arriving to this universe.

There was a fifth one ahead of him, not armed like her soldiers, in fact she was the only reason they were keeping their weapons lowered right now. She was a young woman of a similar age with long blonde hair, blue eyes and a pink bodysuit like outfit with a long coat over it. She spoke first in the scene playing out. "Please, Chad. If you really trust me then you'll stand aside." She genuinely looked hurt by how he stood before them on the defensive.

"I do trust you, Prairie. You know how much I care about you, about the Guardians." That Chad answered her; an apologetic smile matched his words. "But I can make things right this way, by helping them. You just need to trust that this is the justice we really need to work towards."

"You weren't here then. You have no idea what they're capable of, what they've done." Prairie's eyes looked down pleadingly to the biometal in Chad's hand. "Quickman, please! You can get through to him. We're not talking anything extreme here, just holding them responsible. Don't let him make people target him for this."

"Sorry, Ally." A voice echoed out into the air from the biometal itself. "After what Albert did to Axl…I think I need to see if we can help those he also broke."

Chad's grasp on the bubble slipped a little, the scene changing in the process. Now the illusionary Chad shown was wearing the Quickman style armour. The same equipment Chad had utilised when he used the power of the biometal to escape Wily's base.

The Chad within the scene was using his speed to dodge wild swings of a scythe wielded by Prometheus. Chad did his best to avoid or deflect attacks while wielding one of Quickman's boomerangs like a blade, all while Prometheus's mad grin kept shoving itself closer to Chad's own face.

"That's it! We can still soar to greater heights! Let's go wild!"

Chad slammed the boomerang against Prometheus to knock him off balance then used the dash thrusters in the boots to get some distance again. Despite everything, Chad still gave a cocky grin back at his foe. "You want us to go all night long? People are gonna think I took you out instead of Pandora."

Prometheus laughed to the comment, he truly was having the time of his life. "I really am having a blast. It's a shame it all ends today one way or another."

"…Prometheus. I can still—"

"—Save the pep talks for your merry band of friends. You gave my sister a life back. I'm grateful." Prometheus levelled the scythe towards Chad. "But there's only one way the game can end for me. Either I tear apart the world—the very board it's played on! Or you end me and this pain with it!"

This manifested illusion faded too as Chad pulled his hand away. Silently he just worked on processing what he had seen. Pandora, Prometheus, they really were the versions he had imagined. 'The power to alter reality,' Chad thought back on what little they knew of the Azure. He was about to settle for reaching out for one more bubble only to stop in the confused stares of the three with him.

"What…was all that? It doesn't look close to anything we've seen," Karol questioned him.

"Hard to explain; think of it as just a dream."

"I've been thinking it since the manor." Raven still managed a relaxed stance despite everything. "You guys are more than you let on, huh?"

It seemed like casual questioning, but Chad had played the game. Chad knew all too well how good Raven was with masking his mannerisms. "It's…complicated." Chad offered up hesitantly. "But we mean what we said. We're here to help." His hand reached towards another of the crystalline bubbles, the phases of the moon continuing to shift within. "One more, just one more so I can try to understand the range and nature of this."

Gently his fingers stretched out and touched against it. Once more a scene was beckoned forth. This time he knew undeniably that it was his own past.

Three children, not quite ten but close, roughly eight or nine in age. One was himself, even then with a tendency for a red t-shirt albeit his clothes looked a little dirty right now from the playing around. The second was Lucy, even her with her habit of a purple top. The third child was Sara, her blonde ponytail braided at this age, her clothing less of the dresses he was accustomed to seeing her in more recent times but just a red and white top and shorts, also a little dirty from the rough playing. Her pendant still hung from her neck even in her youth.

Lucy was just half watching in amusement while also fidgeting with a small robot toy and a spaceship toy of sorts in some bold attempt to put the pieces of them together.

The young Chad was being complained at by Sara at this present moment. "Oi! Yer not trying!" She was holding a small stick in a vague dagger-ish shape and waving it around in front of his face.

The young Chad for his part was holding a longer stick and rubbing at the red mark on his wrist, frowning at her. "I am! You're too tough!"

"Yeah I am!" Sara proudly took it as a compliment.

"Lucy, make her stop."

"Busy."

Sara just smiled victoriously as she put her hands on her hips, "and I'm in charge anyway."

"Since when?!"

"Since Lucy and I came up with the name. We're Radical Dreamers."

The surge of power through the dimension around them was instant as if in retaliation to the words. Chad's hand jumped back from the crystal, a yelp and wince from him as sparks of energy lashed out around it. The scene vanished and their surroundings itself shifted. The starry abyss and weathered stone replaced by a large room of the same marble and metal as the other environment. Crystals of green light hovered in glass chambers atop pillars around the walls of the room, wiring sending their energy throughout the location. The room alit by fluorescent lighting fitting its technological level.

This room too like the stairway before had large windows showing the depths of the ocean outside it. There was more out there than the ocean itself. Distant and hard to make out but undeniably the shape of broken buildings, of broken chunks of land as if some civilisation had sunk lost to its very depths.

"Bring her back!"

They looked around on high alert for the source of the voice echoing across the room. It was a mature woman's voice, the words shaking with some kind of directed rage, a shrill tone to its demand.

"The ascension can not be complete without her. Feed her despair unto it!"

Small tears ripped through the fabric of reality, rippling like illusions just like the rest of the unstable dimensions around them.

It was the least of their problems.

An eldritch cry called out from within the dimensional tears, a monstrous and alien call from beyond reverberated through the boundaries of the universe itself. It echoed and surrounded them, each tear acted as its own source of the sound to call out multiple times overlapping in unison.

"…You've got to be kidding me…" Chad's words were in complete disbelief, too overwhelmed by that feeling to even process fear. "Lavos? Now?!"

"W-what is that?!"

"That—" Chad answered Karol, "—is our cue to run."

"Now we're speaking my language," Raven dryly muttered. All four broke into a sprint towards the pathway out of the room, transferring into other stable dimensions the further they moved away from that room.

---

The shifting dimensions had been smoother for the second group. Blue, Iris, Yuri, Estelle, and Flynn had found the change in environments to be fairly spaced out. Every so often they would see patches of red and purple miasma seeping through the walls and floor, that empty feeling strengthening as they passed the dark presence.

Blue remained focus on the goal, he pulled on every bit of training from his martial arts to keep a serene state of mind as much as possible. Yuri carried an air of calmness that seemed almost laid back about the whole situation. Flynn seemed to share this calmness yet his came across more as a result of a knight's discipline. Estelle was just as driven as the two of them yet still the concern showed itself whenever they passed by the miasma.

Iris…Iris felt herself shiver uncontrollably each time they passed. She was too in tune with spiritual energies to not have some reaction to the power. She bit her lip a little. It was more than that.

Anna was right; it was a close similarity to the power around Phantom Ganon. But it was far from the first time for her. Deepground…that despair that permeated every inch of that place, the strange un-dead abomination she and Cissnei had fought down there. The feeling there shared the same similarities.

And even that wasn't the first time. It was just as she had told Cissnei then: 'I've felt this before; it's just been a while.' This…this power right here and now felt far more familiar in source to what she had once felt before.

"Are you okay?" Estelle's green eyes held such strong care in them as she looked to Iris's own troubled expression.

"I've felt power like this before…It can't be simplified as just darkness. It's something far deeper—primordial."

Their steps slowed, the pathway ahead of them was a thinner passageway now. A crystallised bubble idly floated back and forth in the tight gap. Blue's hand began to reach out to it. "Careful, we don't know what it does." Flynn warned. Blue nodded and turned his hand so the back of it was moving towards the crystal, intent on pushing it higher and out of their way.

An illusion emerged from the crystal upon contact of touch, a scene on display to the group. It was a moment in time all too familiar to Blue's own memories.

He was younger—certainly no older than ten if he was recalling correctly. Lucy was nearby, the two children kneeling down on a mat before their martial arts master. Silently they listened and took in his words, a patient but confident smile on the man's face.

"I'm as ready as you are to begin your training. However there are things I want you to know. First: it will be Shishō rather than Sensei—" Raizo paused, smiling fondly. "—But I'm fine with you just saying Master. Next: you may find this training to be unusual to 'normal' schools. Jigen Haō was made to include elements of multiple styles along with what I myself was taught. You will both learn everything I have to teach but I will also be seeing which forms you adapt to more individually."

He leaned forwards to them a little more. "Finally: This is where you decide if this is too weird for you. I want you to use your imagination when you learn the style."

"Our imagination, Master?" the young Blue questioned.

"The games you play, the shows you watch, the stories you enjoy. Keep them in your thoughts. I will teach you to strike as if the wind guides you, to shake the earth, to flow like water, and to grasp victory in your hand like a roaring flame. Throughout it all, I want you both to visualise it. Keep that dream in your hearts and I promise you: the passion in your spirits will master my teachings, and you will see that there is nothing you can't overcome."

Lucy held her hand up; he nodded in approval to her. "Why did you choose us? My parents told me that you don't have students. So why us?"

"I've been waiting for the right ones. I trust in my instincts that you two are them."

The crystal floated up into the air, the scene dispersing as Blue pushed it above them to the ceiling of the passageway. He didn't move from his spot, his eyes remained staring at the crystal and his outstretched hand. The words kept going around in his head over and over. 'Use your imagination.'

All that training, the unorthodox way their master had taught them to imagine the techniques in a more fictional way. It couldn't be denied how easy it had made it for Blue to adapt them into actual powered techniques here in this universe. It was very convenient. It all brought him back to that moment Laughing Coffin tried to submerge him into the Lifestream. His master spoke to him, spoke of the Azure. He had chalked it up to his own willpower in the Lifestream, believed it was his mind manifesting the image of the man he respected to get him back up and fighting.

Now? Now that he felt this glimpse of an old memory awaken those feelings further—now the thoughts began to spiral. 'I didn't know about the Azure until Chad showed up. The only times I heard its name were that voice as I passed through to this universe...and my master's words.' His reaching out hand closed up into a fist as if grasping at the out of reach crystal.

"That's him?" Iris asked, her gentle smile pulling Blue back to them from his spiralling confusion. "That's the master you speak highly of?"

"It seems he held a lot of passion for teaching you," Flynn complimented his drive.

"Something tells me he'd be a hell of a fight," Yuri agreed.

Blue smiled too; of course he'd appreciate such positive views towards someone who had been there for him so long. "And he'd never forgive me if I slowed us down for this fight. Let's keep moving."

The team didn't need much more encouragement than that, advancing onwards down the pathway further.

It felt like they had barely traversed this pathway before it shifted without warning. They stepped through a doorway—that had not been there a second earlier—into a whole new environment.

It was almost like they had arrived back in the City of the Waning Moon. Certainly the large room was some form of temple or shrine. It did not appear to be that same location however. Holes scattered in the stone walls showed a starry abyss on the exterior of the room. Galaxies and nebulas surrounded this chamber. The miasma from before now flowed all around the ages of this room, covering the walls like a mist clinging to them.

There on the other side of the room was the Siren summon spirit. The pained singing now little more than a whisper in the wind as their closed eyes continued to grimace in agony, more of the miasma swirled around her form.

The masked woman stood before her, the Carbuncle besides her. A barrier of red energy manifested into existence again and again to block the sword slashes coming for the masked woman from Duke.

"You feel it don't you?" the masked woman spoke calmly. Duke came from another angle, the Carbuncle turned its head and so did the woman as effortlessly another barrier of ruby light countered the strike. "It is as you always believed: the hearts of humanity will only bring destruction." Another strike was met by another barrier. Duke's expression remained calm too, each strike a calculated attempt to test the speed and range of the barriers. "This delusion of possibility—of the future, it will still end in only one truth: everything must fade back into the darkness whence it came."

Duke swung his blade out and pushed it against the barrier, sparks grinding off the steel and energy coursing out as he continued his pressure on the shield. The Carbuncle tilted its head up to look upon its attacking foe, the woman's hand stretched up to aim her palm to the barrier. The ruby gem upon the Carbuncle's head brightened in its glow, the full force of its power had begun to push back on its barrier to reflect Duke's assault.

Another sword came from a different angle, this one aiming right for the Carbuncle itself. The intention to reflect shifted immediately to widen and strengthen the barrier itself. Iris was there, grip tight on the hilt of her blade as she pushed it fiercer and stronger towards the carbuncle itself.

She ignored the masked woman entirely, her gaze focused solely on the Carbuncle itself. The fury in her clash brought even more sparks to the barrier than Duke's attack as she yelled out: "Ywain!"

"Ah. It's been a while." The masked woman's voice spoke out. The ruby light intensified back on its intention to reflect, a surge of power burst forth from the barrier and pushed both Iris and Duke away. They recovered quickly enough to land smoothly on their feet.

The carbuncle focused its gaze upon Iris, the masked woman's head tilted to stare upon her too as her voice greeted the arrival. "Does it not hurt you to strike out with such ferocity? No fond memories for our history?"

Those words were enough to work up Iris further. The only thing that momentarily distracted her from lunging forward was Duke's surprised voice besides her. "Iris…Maxwell?"

She looked at him, her stance still on edge yet her expression quizzical as she studied his face. Slowly the memories stirred, recognition dawned on her face. "Duke? Duke Pantarei?"

Blue, Yuri, Flynn, and Estelle joined the two of them. A silent look of concern from Blue to Iris at her reaction to the scene before them, she gave the best attempt a reassuring smile she could give him at this present moment.

Blue then redirected his concern to the figures before them. "A Carbuncle? A Siren? Those type of summon spirits don't belong on this type of world."

"You're late," Duke noted to those familiar to him.

"You should know better than anyone we always make it in time," Yuri flashed a smile to their once foe. "So what exactly is it we're dealing with here?"

"A calamity." Duke simply stated. "The Adephagos was born of hubris and selfish destruction, this power shares its corruptive nature. However…you could think of this power as the very embodiment of the part of humanity that led to those consequences."

"Yuri Lowell," the masked woman's voice greeted him. "Can you continue to believe in choosing your own path, trusting your own justice, if you knew that nothing is all that waits in the end?"

"If you know what I said then you already know my answer: I don't give a damn what you have to say. We'll make mistakes but get back up and push on again. That's all there is to it."

Carbuncle flicked its head in the direction of Siren, the masked woman's hand motioned in that direction and the miasma continued to swirl around its form. Crystallised bubbles like the one Blue had touched began to manifest—it was faint but Blue noticed what looked like the visualisation of data and coding flicker through the air as they materialised. The miasma led the crystals to Siren, the darkness acting like some sort of tether between the memories within and the tormented summon spirit.

Whatever memories were being shown was having an effect, a name weakly uttered out of the lips of the Siren. "…Hauyn…"

"She has abandoned you," the masked woman's voice stated as if it was a cold fact. "They have all abandoned you."

"Is she trying to torment her with memories?" Blue asked as he watched the gathering crystals.

"Ignore the masked woman, it's just a decoy." Iris lifted her sword. "We can still save the Siren! Hit Ywain—hit the Exnine Knight with everything you've got!"

"The Carbuncle?"

"The Knight." Iris repeated with bitter pain evident.

The carbuncle lowered its stance, its gaze focused upon them all. The masked woman held her hands out and the bright ruby light of the barrier intensified in its brightness.

"Yuri!" Flynn called out as the two of them broke ahead of the others, leading the charge. "Demonic Chaos!" Flynn called out, swinging his sword five times, each one unleashing a purple wave of energy forth from the blade to rush across the stone beneath them.

"I'm with you, Flynn! Azure Storm!" Yuri followed suit with just two but larger blue waves of energy rushing from his swing. The barrier focused its strength on the attacks, flickering but holding strong as the energy crashed against it.

"Dividing Edge!" Estelle had her taken a step back before diving forward with her sword and shield. The thinner blade stabbing forward with energy remaining coated over it to attempt piercing through the barrier.

Blue followed similarly in her lead, his 'Rage Spike' sword skill closing the distance just as fast. His stance low to the ground as his sword—wreathed in its own energy—swung up at the barrier.

Iris was right besides him, energy of her own strike lashing out with the same fierce fury as before, her gaze locked not on the barrier itself but on the Carbuncle. Its own gaze locked on her in return.

Duke kept his distance in comparison to the others. He had been testing the barrier for a while after all. He watched all of them push on the barrier, strain against its reflective nature intending on pushing them back. His sword remained lowered at his side while his free hand lifted upwards, the energy of mana flowing around his arm as he began to call out. "O rain undefiled." The energy of the mana took on a golden white colour. "Wash away the enemy before me! Holy Rain!"

The light fired away from his hand and up into the air above the barrier. It rained down upon the ruby light as thin lances of golden light, the holy energy raining down upon it and bringing further strain.

Cracks formed in the light, the strain of the attacks overwhelming its defence. Blue pulled his sword back lessening the strain slightly but as he did his free hand pulled up into a fist. "Jigen Haō School!" Green energy enveloped that fist, a swirling storm of wind localised itself there. "Shippu-Zuki!"

The gale fist slammed against the barrier, further cracks spread throughout the shield as the energy forced itself against it. The rush of wind spread out through the cracks and broke it apart from within the fractures. The ruby light shattered apart into particles before them.

"Now we end this!" Flynn lifted his blade skywards; golden light manifested from within him and covered his blade. He called upon some of the dispersing holy power of Duke's holy rain at the same time. The energy completely enveloped it, the steel no longer visible as the knight commandant stood firm holding tight on jagged light barely holding the shape of a sword. "Light Dragon!" He stabbed the blade forwards towards the stationary Carbuncle. "Destruction!"

The Radiant Dragon Fang technique burst forth, the light leaving the blade as it rushed forward in the shape of three dragons. Each one crashed into the Carbuncle and lifted it into the air where it vanished into the consuming blast.

"Flynn!" Yuri yelled his name warningly. He turned and lifted his shield, barely holding his ground as a large fireball crashed against it.

The Carbuncle was now further away from where they had been attacking, the masked woman still besides it.

"Illusions as well," Blue realised. "This might take a while."

"Why are you doing this?" Estelle tried to question the threat before them. "What do you have to gain from this? The world is moving forward, People and spirits are in harmony. Why would you try to ruin all of this?"

"Purpose." The woman's voice stated as coldly as it had stated anything beforehand. "It is simply purpose. From the void came chaos, and from that sea of chaos came the birth of stars and hearts. In the end—" The carbuncle sat there calmly, the masked woman held her hand forward and dark magic began to form there. "—every heart returns to the darkness whence it came." Lances of dark energy fired out towards them.

---

A third separate group had been formed of Anna, Elie, Rita, Judith, and Repede. Their own pathways had been much the same of overlapping locations. They had come across similar crystals but had also been capable in retaining focus on the main goal.

Only one brief sighting of Judith's childhood—before her father died—was enough for them to agree on paying them no heed and advance onwards.

This was stopped when they came to a dead end. A closed off doorway before them with the fluctuating dimensional energies sparking erratically before them. The miasma flowing across the entire surface of the door, and their embedded into the door as if acting as a seal was one of the crystallised bubbles. Dark tendrils of energy tethered it to the doorway.

"It's definitely a makeshift seal, hastily made too." Rita mused, leaning a little closer as she analysed it. "My guess? It was abruptly made as an attempt to halt us or to provoke us into touching it."

"A safe bet that some of our friends have already started the fight then," Judith suggested further.

Anna examined it herself, reaching her hand closer but not touching it or the energy directly. She felt out towards it with her psychic powers, letting her energy flow around the exterior limits of the crystal's energy. It was different from the crystals they had come across so far. Every other one she had sensed the depths of had been, well, blank. They weren't storage; it was closer in accuracy to see them as connections.

The memories they showed could possibly be selected if someone focused their will on what they wanted to see before touching, otherwise it was potentially random. If there were any other underlying factors to the selection process then it was ones they couldn't sense or analyse from their position.

But this? Someone was guiding the connection now, purposefully channelling it to show only what they wanted to be shown. All Anna could feel was the sensation of despair, it was that same empty feeling the miasma itself gave off.

"Negative memories?" Anna wondered aloud leading to the others looking upon her. "I can sense the nature of this power, this dimension that links to memories…If calling upon memories like this has something to do with corrupting a spirit. Then I think they're now trying to show only the painful ones."

"Ugh," Rita frowned and crossed her arms looking upon it. "I'm gonna so kick their ass for manipulating all our hard work like this." She bit her lip and clenched up her fists. "If you're right and I think you are. Then this is a lose-lose trap for us."

"I see what you mean," Judith said as she looked closer upon the malevolent energy. "We can stop here and not aid our friends. Or we take the risk of adding our own pain to the mixture to get through." The few seconds of silence as they contemplated it were broken by a few barks from Repede who took a few steps forward. "That's sweet of you; Repede… but I'll do it."

"Oh no you don't!" Rita interrupted. "The last one you touched showed your father. If its painful memories then are you really ready for what comes next?"

"Your pain won't be any easier, Rita."

Before their debate over it could progress any further, Anna stepped forward. "I'll do it." Her sister remained silent behind her but she could feel the concerned gaze on her nonetheless. "What's going on here is connected to what we deal with. It seems only right one of us should make this risk."

"Anna."

Now with Elie speaking, Anna glanced back to her. Faced with the concerned gaze in her sister's eyes, it was all she could do to give back a hesitant but somewhat reassuring smile. "I know, Elie. I know what moment will show but I've been doing better."

"That was before Chad showed up."

"…I can talk normally around him. I smile, I joke. I'm hanging in there, Elie."

"Roll and Kalinka partly agree…But they also think you're putting on an act."

Anna's confidence softened, she was going to have to have words with them later for talking to her sister about this. "It's not easy, but I'm still holding it together."

"…Okay," Elie relented and reassuringly smiled herself to Anna. "But I'm right there with you through this, okay?"

"…Okay," Anna nodded and took a deep breath. The decision before her far more real than it had felt a few seconds ago. She held her hand out in front of the crystal. One of Elie's hands rested on her shoulder to support her, the other rested over the back of her sister's stretched out hand.

The two of them nodded to each other. The palm of Anna's hand pressed up against the crystal. Once more a scene was called upon.

"...Die…"

The gunshot rang out.

The man with short green hair and wearing a black coat and suit like clothing dropped to the floor, his black fedora rolling away. The Anna in the memory was at least seventeen, the gun dropped from her hands. Her clothing was as plain as the sterilised facility walls around her, the light fitting top and trousers looking as if she was a patient somewhere.

The walls may have been pristine but the floors of this large lab facility like room were stained in the blood of multiple bodies strewn about. She ignored all of them for the one who had been held by the one she had just killed.

She knelt down in a panic, tears filling her eyes for the young man her age wearing similar clothing to her—it stained by the blood pouring from what had to be a fatal stab wound in his body. "Willem!" She begged desperately. She frantically tried to place her hand over the wound, her other hand cupping the side of his face. "Hey! Look at me!"

His expression was unfocused, struggling to maintain a grasp on staying conscious, on not going into shock. "Go, Anna…" he weakly spoke in an English accent. "…leave me here…" his eyes darted between her and the passageway they had come through earlier.

His face…almost identical to Chad's...yet his hair a darker shade of brown, almost black. His bright brown eyes instead of blue were as filled with tears as hers.

"I can't!" Anna protested, voice breaking as she clung to his shoulder tighter. "We're going back together!" Right now it didn't matter if it was practical to move someone with this injury. They had to get out of here. Together. Desperately she tried to move him, his inability to move leaving his weight so heavy to shift. There was a small trail of blood from what little she had managed to move him.

"Don't…let this death…be for nothing…" his breaking voice tried to get through to her.

"I won't lose you!" she stopped moving them, she held herself close to him, crying against him as the blood continued to stain both of their clothing. "I can't leave…Willem…It's my fault."

His eyes finally focused in on her, his hand weakly reaching up to the side of her face and gently touching back. "…hey…we did what we could…" he caught movement in the passageway. They were being caught up on. "…Anna…The others haven't got away far enough. They need you."

"…I need you."

She was never going to leave willingly. She knew it. He knew it too. It was that fact that seemed to bring a last surge of strength to his weakening life. "Just…go…you idiot." Affectionately but sternly he demanded of her. He pushed at Anna; she fell back away from him and watched with wide eyes as he pulled himself to his feet, staggering as he did.

There Willem stood, his back to her, his wound continuing to bleed as he faced the sight of armed soldiers and machines closer and closer in the furthest passageway. It was nothing but willpower keeping him on his feet, a resolute defender taking his last stand.

She got up and made to move towards him. His hand stretched out behind him, coated in his own blood. Her fingers were inches from his—and met the touch of a pale red barrier of energy that burst forth. "Willem!"

The barrier—formed of his own energy and blood—would remain until he dispelled it or breathed his last. He looked over his shoulder to her, their captives drawing closer into the room. Despite it all, he continued to smile that confidence she had gotten used to seeing from him. "…Don't…" she pleaded desperately.

"Save them. Run."

The crystal shattered, the memory vanishing into wisps of energy that rushed away from them as the door opened up. It was almost unnervingly silent in the aftermath of the memory. The only sound to break the silence was Anna's heavy breathing as she tried to steady herself.

Elie—even with tears in her own eyes—kept her expression as strong as possible as she looked to her sister. The tears were much more freely flowing from her; it was a miracle that heavy breathing was the only sound coming from her with how clear it was she wanted to break down completely.

She may as well have been still standing there on that very day…it was too vivid. She could feel every regret and pain as clear as she had felt them that day. That deep pit within her heart that she had thought was being filled, only now could she truly tell how it had merely been covered up. "I thought…I was doing better."

"You are," Elie softly tried to reassure her. It hurt every second she didn't fully comfort her sister. But she knew, if she held Anna in her arms and let her let it all out here and now then they were not getting to the fight ahead. "The pain doesn't undo your strength, Anna."

"We can go ahead of you if need be, you two don't have to force yourself," Judith sympathetically suggested to them.

Anna shook her head, a pained smile of gratitude to her sister as she rubbed her eyes. "No… no, we'll be okay. Thank you."

"We won't say about what we saw," Rita said out of nowhere. "I don't really get it but…I get the feeling it's not something you want to bring up to that similar looking guy with you." They nodded to her even more grateful than before.

Anna felt something close to her leg, she hadn't even noticed till now that Repede had sat besides her and Elie during the entire memory being shown. She offered another grateful smile to the member of Brave Vesperia and finally recomposed herself. "Okay, let's go."

As a team they stepped over the threshold of the passageway—and stepped into the chaotic battlefield.

Just like Blue's group, they immediately emerged into that large chamber. The ruby light barriers were being shattered as quickly as they were manifested but even so, Carbuncle itself was evading the actual attacks. Either an illusion would be consumed in the blast or on the moments they caught it off guard it would scurry out of the way just in time.

Whether it was magic or the techniques known as artes, it was just ahead of them enough each time.

"Estelle!" Rita called out protectively as she rushed over to her as she finished a wide area healing spell to recover the damage that Carbuncle had been managing to land on them with spells.

"Just in time, we've got this thing on the ropes. Was worried you wouldn't get a crack at it," Yuri said dryly.

"Well we wouldn't want to show you up now would we?" Judith quipped back. Repede joined up besides Yuri and Flynn with a bark.

"I had forgotten how much this group likes to banter during fights."

"Yeah, yeah. Nice to see you too, Duke" Rita shot back to his comment on the situation.

"Ah, and more arrive…" the masked woman's voice greeted them. The carbuncle's head followed by the masked woman's looked over to Anna and Elie. "Thank you. We felt your pain. Your despair shall—" Broken doors ripped away from one of the walls and flung violently at the masked woman. They passed through her and the Carbuncle darted under it as it flew overhead and crashed into the floor behind it.

Psychic energy flowed around Anna, her green eyes shining with fury as she glared the Carbuncle down, quickly catching up on the situation having seen her attack pass through the masked woman. "You're welcome. Allow me to vent it further then."

"I think it's time we move this stalemate along. The more of you there are, the more I see my chances of evasion lessen." The carbuncle and the masked woman turned to look upon Siren. "A pity we can not finish the process yet. Calogrenant, you will have to settle for guiding her form until we can truly forge the vessel."

The crystals around Siren shattered one by one; the miasma flowed violently around her as an aura of dark power took hold of her form. Her arms began to move in a juddering manner as if no more than a marionette being led by their strings.

Her eyes opened up, bright hazel eyes stared out in pain across the group before her. Her expression the only control she had left as the darkness controlled her body. Whatever the process was here, it had rooted itself into her physical form but hadn't taken her completely just yet. The shadow turned her head, made her look upon all gathered and stopped as her eyes fell upon Anna and Elie, and widened.

"Do you see now, Siren?" the masked woman's voice coaxed at her. "Abandoned by all. See how their lives move on with you forgotten."

Pain—further pain filled the expression of the Siren as the darkness wavered wildly around her, her arms guided before her as the high grade magic spell—from Final Fantasy based worlds—Waterga formed before her. She fired it out like a high pressurised jet towards them.

"Force Field!" Estelle cried out and hastily formed the magical barrier. With no proper casting, it shattered upon impact but it did what was needed. It halted the attack.

Four of the Waterga spells were now forming around Siren; still the masked woman's voice spoke to her. "Yet still you hold on to that delusion of hope. But this is fine. Hope is the best spice to bring out despair. Sink; sink into a whirlpool of delusion until you face the truth. There is nothing but despair."

The Game Master acted first. Blue jumped up in the air towards Siren, he saw the Waterga spells all aiming for him. This…was really going to strain his ability to manipulate the elements. There was a moment of doubt filling his thoughts. He blocked it out by mentally repeating his Master's insistence. 'There is nothing I can't overcome!'

"Jigen Haō School!" Blue lifted up his leg; he called upon the wind, his body already spinning fast in the air with its aid. The Waterga spells fired out in unison. "Senpū Tatsumaki-Geri!" Like a whirling tornado he spun in the air, pushing his element manipulation to its limits—'There's no such thing!'—and past them as he willed the water to redirect itself and flow with the wind around him. He was in the centre of the storm A twister of water gathered and spinning until he kicked out in the direction of the Carbuncle and launched the wind and water in that direction.

A ruby light barrier slowed the attack and shattered from the impact, the Carbuncle dodged out of the way of the remainder.

Blue landed on the floor and immediately dropped to one knee, breathing heavy and rubbing that leg to ease off the strain, flinching at the headache such element control brought him.

"And you say Chad's the reckless one," Iris scolded him as she stood ready to fight off any follow-up attacks.

"I'm not reckless…I'm bold."

"Awake!" Rita commanded, beginning a chant for her spell. "O unmerciful and unnamed queen of thorns! Ivy Rush!"

The ground rumbled and vines burst out, they reached up towards Siren intent on restraining her in their grasp. A barrier of ruby light intercepted them, the reflection pushing them away until they vanished.

"We need to split our attention," Yuri looked to the gathered group. "We need to keep that green creature busy while the rest of us try to take down the spirit without wounding it." They dodged sharp waves of wind sent their way by Siren, one of the aero variant of spells. "Sooner rather than later."

Rita turned abruptly to two of them, "Estelle! Duke! I have an idea to stop it dodging us if the others keep it busy,"

"I'll follow your lead, Rita!"

Duke calmly nodded in agreement with Estelle "I shall place my faith in this group's decisions once more."

"A simple yes will do just fine!"

Flynn's shield blocked a large shard of ice fired their way by Carbuncle. Yuri's sword, Judith's spear and Repede's dagger cut their way through multiple smaller shards called upon by Siren's power.

"Elie, we'll hold the Siren at bay," Anna took the lead with her sister.

"Then it's mine!" Iris decided, impulsive in her rage as she advanced upon the Carbuncle.

"I'll keep her covered!" Blue called back to Anna and Elie as he followed Iris.

Seeing more attacks being prepared, Yuri took the charge himself for the other members with him. "Flynn, Judy, you're on the creature! Repede, you're with me on the spirit!"

The battlefield was a storm of magic. Siren and Carbuncle both releasing spell after spell in an onslaught upon the warriors. Bolts of lightning lashed out, Judith met them with her 'Luna Havoc Storm' arte, lightning infused into her kick as she dived through the opponent's lightning, dispersing it with her own. As she landed her spear was covered in blue energy and she struck down with her 'Luna Crush' arte. Carbuncle dodged it but the energy grazed at its fur. They were getting closer.

Shards of ice stabbed down but Repede was there, calling his own ice into form with the arte known as 'Phantom Glacier' a wall of ice briefly manifesting as a barrier before following up with its own version of 'Demon Fang'—'Demon Dog'—sending the energy wave at Siren and forcing it back.

Flynn tried to catch Carbuncle from moving, stabbing his sword into the ground and calling upon the 'Guardian Field' arte covering the area around him in a mini barrier of energy. The carbuncle illusion vanished and the real one retaliated with a Firaga spell.

Flynn's shield blocked the strike and he in turn retaliated as he called out "Lion's Howl! Beast!" And with a sword strike slashed a lion's head shaped wave of energy back. A ruby light barrier caught the attack and shattered with it.

Anna and Elie stood side by side, they focused on supporting and covering the group. Psychic powers slowing spells as best they could to then shoot them out of the air with their range focused weapons or re-direct them harmlessly away. "We could try reaching out to the Siren's spirit psychically," Elie suggested.

"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't thought about it," Anna said but paused in hesitation. "But after what we saw, I don't think we're in a stable position to do that safely."

Blue and Iris focused less on their techniques and abilities right now and more on just their skills with weapons, they moved in unison to strike out at the Carbuncle. Each strike was getting closer and closer as they covered the other's delay.

Siren called upon the power of Blizzaga, a chunk of ice flying towards her foes. Yuri struck out with such power that he halted it in the air, carving a x shape into the ice before he willed energy into the palm of his hand "Frigid Blast!" He slammed that palm forwards and the burst of energy sent the x shaped x portion back to sender. The clump of ice stuck to the Siren's body and limited the shadow's control of mobility even further before it called upon the wind to slice the ice apart.

Throughout this all and the continued fighting, Rita discussed her plans with Estelle and Duke and the three began to concentrate and gather the power of mana.

The situation still was a stalemate. They were effective in how they fought back but the darkness contaminating Siren had no stamina to wear out, pushing the in pain spirit even further. It still left them with the disadvantage that they couldn't risk going all out and harming her.

As for the Carbuncle? They were getting closer, sure. But it too seemed not to tire, and its spells were only getting stronger as they pushed it further and further. Blue was convinced they were on the edge of seeing Flare or Ultima getting thrown at them next.

The back and forth of techniques and strikes continued only a little longer until the voice of the masked woman called out Carbuncle's next command. "Calogrenant. End this with her power."

The miasma surged around Siren, stronger than ever.

She began to sing.

A melody of pain, forced and reluctant yet still containing all the power she would normally willingly wield. Fuelled by the despair of this miasma, it paralysed them. Rita, Estella, and Duke were just barely able to maintain their focus, their gathered mana protecting them.

Everyone else—regardless of which foe they fought—found themselves struggling to move, a weakness overcoming their limbs as the melody of a Siren overcame them. Even as she ceased singing, the effect still remained. Its wearing off was still too time consuming.

They were open targets.

The Carbuncle instead looked over to the focused magic users, the masked woman following its gaze. "Watch in despair as you stand unable to save them."

Two spheres of dark energy formed in the air. One cast by the Carbuncle and the other by the very miasma engulfing Siren.

"Shadow Flare." With but a single command from the masked woman's voice…the attacks screamed through the air towards Rita, Estelle and Duke.

"Estelle!" Yuri screamed out her name, straining against the effects of the song.

There was nothing any of them in the room could do in time to stop the attack.

"Watch an old man work!" Raven's voice echoed from further down a nearby passageway. "Crisis Rain!" Five arrow shaped waves of energy flew through the opening of the passageway and into the nearest orb chipping away much of its size.

Karol sprinted his way out of the doorway, his oversized sword hitting out at that same sphere as he spun with it before one final upwards swing cleaved right through it. An arte he liked to refer to as 'Ultra Punishing Swing.'

He wasn't the only one to come rushing in. "Ahoy there!" Patty raced in standing atop a fast recklessly rolling oden cart—where she even got it from didn't seem important in the current crisis—she aimed her gun up into the air, it brimming with pale blue and white energy flowing into it from a magical card in her other hand, a star emblem upon it. She jumped off the cart and called out: "Marvelous Fountain!"

The energy fired up into the air from her gun. Particles of light spread out from the fountain it resembled and spread out across the battlefield, a magical healing wave surging across those gathered and releasing them from the Siren's song. The main shot arced and descended, piercing through the second orb and damaging its capabilities heavily.

Finally, the last to join the fray appeared through Chaos Control. Chad fired off a close range burst of chaos energy and repelled the weakened shadow flare to spiral harmlessly to the other side of the room and crash against the wall at the same time Patty's oden cart crashed into another wall.

"We made it!" Karol's voice almost broke in the sigh of relief.

"That was cutting it too close," Chad admitted as he landed. "Sorry guys, you hanging in there?"

"You got distracted by the memory crystals didn't you?" Blue accused, regardless he smiled at him.

"Well this place was originally the necropolis of nostalgia. Don't we all get lost in the nostalgia?"

"Aye. He was definitely slowing us down, mateys."

"You were the first one to willingly do it!" Chad protested to Patty's accusation.

"That's not how we'll be remembering it."

"…And there you are, Chad." The voice led to Chad turning to look at the masked woman's form, a faint amusement to the tone as she continued to speak. "What would you call this? Convenient timing?"

"It's just luck I assure you."

"We agree…for us."

"Say what now?"

There was a silence that fell over the chamber, leaving only the confused and pained gasp of the Siren. Chad looked up to it, at the shadow holding it in place to gaze down upon him. Any witty remark he wanted to make towards the threats vanished into the back of his mind as he looked upon her face.

…That confused and broken down face.

"But…you're…—" Siren strained her speech to get the words out "—…dead…"

Anna turned to look sharply between the two of them, that sharp stab of pain in her own heart surfacing further at the unfortunate timing of this confusion.

Chad couldn't even process anything other than the confusion, "what are you—"

Siren screamed out. The dark miasma covered up her form further. Whatever she thought she knew, whatever misunderstanding seeing Chad's appearance had brought her…It had created further weakness for the darkness to exploit.

The miasma moved her arms with ease it had once struggled with. Waterga spells manifested again, Chad jumped and rolled his way out of the salvo of pressurised jet streams coming his way.

"Chad! What just happened?!" Blue called out while doing his best to alter the flow of the water with his abilities.

"I just got here man!" Chad yelled back.

The now recovered combatants went to move in to support, a barrier of ruby light manifested in their way. They all worked as one to smash through it…Yet those few seconds. Those delicate few seconds had been crucial.

The waterga spells were no longer hard hitting pressurised attacks. Siren had been forced to cast layers upon layers of it in those few seconds. Immense amounts of water had been summoned, but they spun and surrounded Chad like some water twister. He was in the eye of it, barely able to make out the outlines of friends and allies through the torrent swirling around him.

Before he could even attempt to process what his appearance had done to this summon spirit, before he could even process the fact they were Final Fantasy summon spirits, and before his allies could even make a move to cut through to him…

…The water crashed inwards upon him.

---

Pain.

That much water crashing upon him with force. It was too much pain to even begin to handle.

He spun and twisted as the surging torrents slammed him about in their speed, their intensity. Up was down, down was up. There was no holding his breath; the raging twister knocked the wind out of him as he lost all control over the situation—if he ever had any to begin with.

The panic continued to take over. It was too much pain. He was drowning. Death. A slow death. As quick as that fearful thought raised itself…it all stopped. All was calm.

He couldn't feel the water anymore yet still he sank as if he was still in it, thankfully the feeling of water filling his lungs vanished. There was no deep blue of the water around him, just darkness.

Slowly he felt his body right itself in that sinking sensation. His feet touched down upon solid glass. His body, his clothes…he was dry?

There really was nothing but darkness around him, that and the cracked red stained glass circular platform he stood upon.

Realisation began to dawn.

"My own dive to the heart again?"

"…Hi Chad."

Chad turned and felt the concerns and panic fade further at the sight of the friendly creature from last time, as if its mere presence helped lessen those troubles "Hey there, Chirithy. You're here again?"

"I'm sorry I can't do more."

"Hey, come on, don't feel bad. I'm relieved." Chad clapped his hands together, relieved at the absence of water around him and smiled. "Right," he barrelled forward into making plans. "Going by what I usually see in fiction, I guess I've got the benefit of time in here being faster than reality."

"…Chad."

"So how do we deal with this when I wake back up? Chaos Control? That might be hard to pull it off with all the water throwing me about. …I've not tried Chaos Blast yet."

"…Chad."

"If I put my entire focus here and now into it, maybe I can trigger it the very instant I return."

"Chad. You need to take a deep breath, okay."

Chad finally realised Chirithy had been trying to get his attention, the creature's eyes concerned—for as much as they could look so with its appearance. "…what is it?"

"I just want you to relax. Do you remember what I told you last time?"

Chad crossed his arms and leant back and forth a little, mulling it over. "Umm…something about me not picking up on things fast, calling across the boundaries with the azure. I think it was also that the edges of sleep and death…touch…" His arms unfolded slowly. He looked down upon the concerned and hesitant Chirithy.

"Just relax…steady as you go."

"I died?!" he yelled out, anything but relaxed. He began to shake, his arms wrapped around himself for support, any attempt to stop his shaking as his voice trembled. "Not like this. Not like this."

"Just listen to me!"

"You don't understand!" Chad was frantic, his wide eyes barely even focusing on the creature before him. His voice cracked as he fell apart, "I promised her! I can't do this to her! I can't do this to any of them!"

It was just like watching Cor's attack advance upon him. No, it was just like when the Bulblin had him down. He felt the strength in his legs leave him, even spiritually like this. He collapsed to his knees and continued to shake. Chirithy's soft paws placed themselves against him, trying to offer some form of comfort. "Chad! It's going to be okay." Weakly he did his best to focus on the Dream Eater before him. "You're not dead. You're on the edge of it, but you're not dead yet. But you're going to be fine."

His trembling began to slow but still he kept a tight hold of himself, terrified he'd fall apart if he let go even just a little. "What can I do?"

"Just relax. It's out of your hands now." Chirithy looked over its shoulder to the darkness away from the platform.

"What is that supposed to—" he trailed off and stared ahead. He wasn't alone. That seemed obvious with Chirithy here but it was more than that. There was something else.

"…Chirithy…"

"What do you feel, Chad?"

He moved one hand over his chest, over where his heart would be. Felt the beat of his heart, felt it reverberate all around him as if the dive to the heart reacted to his concentration on it. It wasn't alone. There was…a second heartbeat in the darkness.

He looked ahead into the darkness again. He saw it. This was like when he fought the bulblin. There was what he could've mistaken for mist, even here in his own heart. It flowed in from the darkness; a shadow-like mist enveloped the platform in its thin wisps.

There it was.

A hand reaching forward from the darkness, it looked no different then the dark shadowed mist that gently enveloped his surroundings, his dive to the heart.

He had seen it before. He thought he had imagined it in that bulblin fight. Thought of it as the hand of death reaching out for him, thought of it as just his mind's imagination getting him back up and fighting.

But here and now? it was vivid, it was real, it was something else entirely than he had believed it to be.

"…Chirithy…what is that?"

"What do you feel, Chad?" it again asked him.

It stretched out, closer and closer to the platform. Even so he felt comforted, like he was being gently enveloped by the presence around him. The two heart beats were in sync with one another. "…comfort…a warm embrace…a connection…" He couldn't move, felt frozen to the spot. His heart beat faster and he became aware of more feelings of his own that he couldn't make sense of. His vision a little blurred at the edges, was he crying? "…guilt? A longing?"

It reached the platform; it was so close to him now. It truly was made of the same dark shadows as what flowed around him. Why did it not make him feel unsettled? He did feel unsettled now but paradoxically that unsettled feeling was precisely because the presence before him didn't make him feel unsettled.

Chirithy seemed just as aware of that feeling settling into Chad, "Chad…it's okay…just relax."

"What have you done to me?" Chad questioned the approaching hand. Was there even anything on the other side of that hand? Was there someone in that darkness? Why, why did he feel at peace with something that seemed like it should be so unnatural? This was his heart, why was it here?

Every moment it drew closer, he just felt that longing strengthen. What did he feel guilty about? It had to have done something to him…right? "Who…are you?"

The hand reached him; he felt it gently caress the side of his face. Barely had he noticed a second hand had shown up and was placing itself against his chest. Still the first hand just cupped and stroked soothingly at the side of his face. Why…why did it make him feel so at ease? Was it trying to distract him?

"…Chad…" Chirithy's voice cut through all confusion. "Brace yourself."

It all happened in an instant. He felt the sensation of drowning return. He still couldn't move, unable to even react to the fear and pain. He felt the second shadowed hand phase into his chest, was almost positive he could feel its touch against his lungs.

And then there it was, soothing words as a whisper on the wind. He couldn't make out the voice. But he knew he heard the words all the same.

"I reject."

---

It was an explosive wave of energy.

The rushing waters burst away and evaporated.

There he stood.

Chad stood there as though he hadn't been almost killed by the attack. He was bone dry. His eyes were shaking, his hands trembling as he touched at his clothes, grasped at his arms, felt at his throat.

It wasn't just his clothes and skin. He couldn't feel any pain in his lungs, any trace of having been submerged in water.

"I reject."

The words echoed in the back of his mind. He wasn't saved from drowning. It never happened. The very concept of him drowning had been rejected from reality. Brief particles of azure light glittered in the air around him before they flickered and faded away.

"What just happened?" Flynn took the words right out of Chad's mouth.

"It's her…" Siren breathed out, the miasma not as closely wrapped around her form as it once was.

"It's her!" the masked woman's voice said with far more aggression.

"Estelle!" Rita broke the tension, seeing the opportunity.

"Come, O silver light! Angel Ring!" The spell flourished into existence around the majority of the room, a ring of silver light swirling and spinning as it compressed inwards. The Carbuncle disappeared and revealed itself elsewhere in the ring, then again, and again. The holy energy of the spell continued to narrow its escape attempts until finally even the masked woman disappeared and the ring was now just a small circle containing the actual Carbuncle within, the energy keeping it off balanced as it bounced it back and forth on the interior of the ring.

She wasn't done. Her hands clasped together as if in prayer. "Divine judgement for an evil soul—" They had built up a collection of mana purely for this purpose. The holy light called upon by the mana manifested around her as a dazzling aurora, the colours behind her as if she was framed by an illusion of stained glass windows. "—Sacred Penance!" The energy left her, mana and her own healing powers taking shape as a cross of energy slamming down into the circle and assaulting the Carbuncle with its might. The colours of the aurora spread out across the battlefield bringing further feeling of rejuvenation to her allies. The miasma around Siren convulsed wildly in the after-effects of the power spreading out.

The Carbuncle strained against its restraint, dark power lashing out in every direction. They weren't going to give it time. The other attacks were already underway. By the command of Rita for giant spheres of pure magical energy had formed around the Carbuncle and its prison. Each one a separate colour of: Red, Blue, Green, and Brown. "O power that lies at the root of all creation—" Fire, Water, Wind, Earth, magic spheres formed of nature, of life itself continued to spin and swirl around the foe. "—O memory inscribed in ages past, hear my call and arise before me—" Rita closed her hand up into a fist and the entire might of the spells fired out like beams from their source into the ring. "—Ancient Catastrophe!"

The purifying judgement of light and the very elements of nature had both assaulted their foe with vicious power. Now it was Duke's turn to follow up this onslaught. "You spoke of the beginning of all things. So prepare! Toll the beginning of time!" Power. Pure magical power—the same might he had once wielded against those of Brave Vesperia—was beckoned forth by him. "Begone!" In its simplest description it was a blast of energy exploding around the Carbuncle…but the heat of the blast, the strength of the magic, it brought with it the illusion of stars rushing out from the impact zone of the blast. Momentarily it was as if the light was the form of a galaxy swirling out from the blast. The 'Big Bang' spell faded away as swift as it had formed and revealed the Carbuncle to now lay there on the far side of the room, weakened and injured.

The miasma around Siren gave them no time to celebrate in their victory. A scream of pain from the contaminated spirit once more as the miasma itself stretched out and formed tendrils of energy stabbing outwards.

Chad pulled his blade up to block. Anna was there first, stepping right in front as a wave of psychic energy burst from her hand and pushed it back. "Thanks for the—"

"Are you okay?!" Anna interrupted him, turning frantically to look over her shoulder at him.

Her eyes, it took him by surprise as he looked at the panic there. "…are you okay?" he asked in return.

The miasma continued to surge and convulse around Siren. It attached itself to her form through tendrils now instead of enveloping her. Its spreading waves of malevolence chipping away stone of the walls and ceilings as it moved erratically.

"…it's corporeal…" Elie said to her sister, noting the effect on the environment. She wasn't the only one noticing.

"Raven! Patty!" Karol called out their names. "Can you get a precise shot and avoid the spirit?"

Raven let fly an arrow from his bow, it successfully pierced through a stretching out part of the miasma. The same result occurred from a shot fired by Patty and another one by Elie. For good measure, Repede had even ran forward, jumped to a wall and rebounded off of it to strike at the shadowy miasma with his dagger on the way past.

Siren shook in the air, struggled to move apart from the weakening miasma still trying to cling to her. But it was all the sign they needed. "We can still stop this!" Elie called out to the others.

Karol followed her in calling out, "It's physical enough for us to hit!"

"…Kill…me…" Siren weakly begged of them.

"Hold on!" Iris pleaded in return. "We're so close now, we can do this!"

"Kill me!" Siren insisted again now looking upon those native to this world.

"It's going to be okay," Estelle reassured her. The situation before them was uncomfortably familiar. "It's okay to want to keep on living. Fight through this!"

Yuri's blade spun in his grasp as he readjusted his stance for the continued combat. "When Brave Vesperia does something, we do it right. There's no justice in killing you. We'll sever that unjust despair around you."

The dark force had enough. Its tendrils reaching out and lashing out wildly to those who would speak of hope in front of it, manipulating Siren's resisting body to cast an onslaught of water and ice spells upon them.

It was difficult to predict the strikes; the miasma had no clear intention to its destructive attacks. It was simply just a wild display of power to anything and everything around it.

The group dodged and blocked as much as they could but still they were getting clipped or cut in their attempts. "Yuri! I'll give everyone an opening!" Karol called out with strengthened resolve to his voice. He skidded to a halt and turned to face the approaching tendrils, fetching something out of his bag.

A small robotic like toy based visually upon him was in one hand. He held it before him while grasping his sword tightly as a makeshift shield. The tendrils approached. He flipped a switch and the Karolow X device fired out a beam of mana-based energy from the drill upon its head.

A few tendrils were obliterated, the rest of the shot going on to cut through more of the miasma. Two tendrils still struck out at Karol and slammed into his sword. It bore the brunt but the impact still sent him flying to the floor.

The group scattered to simultaneously distract and gain more openings over the shadow, Estelle ran up to provide healing support to Karol with Rita supporting her.

Patty and Raven kept their distance, ranged support with their weapons splitting apart the shards of ice that were summoned by Siren's power.

With 'Sonic Leap' Blue leapt up and slashed at the darkness on his way past. He turned and put his focus on re-directing her elemental spells away as best he could on the way back down.

The malevolent power lashed out at him only to be cut back by Chad moving in the way. His eyes still looked unsettled, he knew in his heart how freaked out he still felt. Even so he pointed the blade up at it and smirked tauntingly to it. "Come on! Don't try to kill me and then move on. I'm feeling left out."

It retaliated just as he wanted, tendrils pursuing him as he rolled, ran, and jumped in and out of the strikes.

Repede, jumping and spinning in the air cleared through a wave of the tendrils from the side while they were occupied. Its attempt to pursue the group left it further and further from the host it wished to inhabit.

Another blade cleaved through more of it, Duke rising into the air past it, still more than enough stamina to keep fighting even after such a high powered spell. Anna concentrated her power to form as much psychic energy as she could in the space between the miasma and siren, putting further strain onto the weakening connection.

A tendril shifted to lash out towards her; Elie's tonfa batted it aside as she jumped up closer to it and released several shots in close range.

It barely had the opening to shake her off of it before yet another sword wielder came for it. Iris's sword stabbed directly into it. It shook and swung in the air attempting to dislodge the blade all while she swung with it, her grasp tight.

A golden light began to emerge from her hands and envelop the blade, reacting to the presence of this darkness. The same light that had manifested both on Hyrule and during her fight in Deepground.

Its convulsions were extreme now, the darkness looped in on its own form and twisted in various manners as the particles of light spread across it. Even when it managed to swing Iris off loose, the golden light still burned across it.

"Judith, get ready!" Yuri called out and rushed forwards side by side with Flynn. "Let's do this, Flynn!"

Every bit of spiritual power they had was channelled forth into their blades. They jumped at the shadow and cleaved right through the last strand connecting it to Siren. She screamed out and dropped to the floor while the darkness reached out in pathetic desperation for her.

Judith followed Yuri and Flynn in movements. She jumped into the air before the manifestation. Rapid kicks in the air and spins of her spear forced it back further and further away from its desire. "To the realm of the dead! In a moonlit casket!" The energy around her spear bust from its vessel with spinning flourishes and encased the malevolence in a sphere of energy.

Judith nimbly landed upon her feet, the energy around her spear still there and building up further and further. She nodded up to Yuri and Flynn, the two of them suspended in the air by the sheer power still flowing through their blades. She held up her spear like a javelin "Dragon's…Moon Spear!" and let it soar through the air with one strong throw. It pierced the prison, stabbed into the malevolence and unleashed its roaring energies upon it.

"Come on, Yuri!" Flynn called out to his friend before the two cried out in perfect unison: "Twin Wave!" With symmetrical sword swings they let loose the energy from their blades. The beams of light flew individually at first as two uniquely separate but similar paths of light before they spiralled over one another until becoming just one wave rushing to its destination and consuming the malevolence in its furious sparking power.

The chaos settled, Yuri and Flynn landing back down on the ground as all looked with tension still pushing their bodies to remain on guard.

The dark force, the miasma, this malevolent force was still there. Barely a small marble in size now, the tendrils little more than nubs weakly reaching out. The despair that once fuelled it overwhelmed by the faith of those that fought back.

The golden light hadn't left Iris's sword yet. She walked up to it slowly. There was calmness to her movements but her eyes showed the restrained fury as she looked down upon it. "…It's over…" a final smooth slash cut through the malevolence and dispersed it into golden particles of light.

Near silence. There was just the heavy breathing of everyone coming back down from the heat of battle, the weakened straining sounds of Siren upon the floor.

Relief was so close for them all. Only to be disturbed by the shifting sounds of movement from the other side. The Carbuncle staggered itself to its feet as the masked woman appeared besides it again.

"Wait!" Iris yelled out and ran towards it. It simply looked at her, the woman's voice scoffed and they turned away. Both threats vanished before their very eyes. "No!"

Cracks ripped through the fabric of reality around them. They didn't even get a chance to feel panic over that before the light surrounded them and they found themselves back in Zaude's deepest chamber. The glyph settled into a dull grey colour and rested inert once more.

Relief. Now the relief set in, the strength left so many of them as some just relaxed their posture while others dropped to the ground completely.

"Can we not do that again for a while?" Rita groaned out, lying down on the floor feeling some measure of relief from the cold stone.

"Try never again," Raven added on.

"Wait," Estelle looked over to Siren who was slowly pushing herself up off the ground. "Is she okay?"

Iris took the lead, moving swiftly over to the fallen summon spirit and kneeling before her. "Take it easy, don't push yourself." Iris said soothingly, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. "We prevented the forming of an Exnine Knight; you're going to be in rough shape."

"Lady…Luna? Lady…Stella?" Siren groggily spoke out in confusion before her vision focused more on the one before her. She looked upon the now widened eyes of Iris's face. "Who? You seem…familiar." She looked around the room, straining to take in the sights of Duke, of the members of Brave Vesperia, of Blue and finally: Chad, Anna, and Elie. "I don't…understand."

Excited celebratory clapping distracted everyone from the moment, everyone on edge as they looked upon the white haired woman strolling up the pathway to this platform.

Enna Kros approached them with happiness shining in her eyes, clapping in applause to the group all while she smiled to them all. "Look at you crazy kids, you actually did it." Anna and Elie's heads lifted up at the sound of her voice. Both of them looked to one another concerned and then back to their mysterious guest.

"We're having a hell of a day here," Yuri's fingers tightened around the hilt of his sword. "Who are you supposed to be?"

"You can rest easy," Duke stepped forward and motioned downwards to everyone to let go of their tension.

"Friend of yours?"

"…She can be trusted."

"He's right, you can all relax. Come on~ you all saved the day! Let's not get all tense here." Enna's bubbly energetic behaviour didn't seem to falter at all as she made her way right up to the group and knelt in front of Siren. "What a relief, I'm sorry I couldn't get to you."

The confusion in Siren's face seemed only to double at the sight of Enna before her. "Roksanne?" she shook her head. "No…are you…Alexander?"

"You can just call me, Enna Kros, old friend." She looked to Iris next. With Enna this close to her, Iris's tension seemed worse than everyone else's combined. "Iris, I'm not like them."

"Who are you?"

"Hm? You just heard what I said to her: Call me Enna Kros."

"You know I don't mean your name."

Enna stood up with a short laugh and dusted herself off, "haha, yeah…sorry, that's a lot to get into here and now."

She turned to look upon everyone in the group and clapped her hands together again. "Thank you, all of you. Brave Vesperia, you really proved once more that the possibilities of the future can be reached. I'm really glad it was people with your belief in justice that were here for this. Duke? Well done for remaining committed to believing in that path. And as for my fellow off-worlders."

"What what?!" Karol blurted out.

"You did really well. Here I was thinking it would take a while for you to run into stuff like this. I thought: Battle with Eggman here, skirmish with Wily there, maybe some throw downs with Bowser. Fun stuff, you know? But look at you all, getting mixed up in the bigger problem this early on."

"We don't have to." Chad said to her. "By all means, you want to divert us to some wacky fun then go right ahead."

"It was you…" Anna brought it back serious from Chad's attempt at banter. "I heard your voice; Dr. Light showed it to me."

Enna looked over to the sisters with a smile. "Oh? Did the palace systems record when I spoke? No sense denying it then. Yep, I'm the one who gave Protoman the path to Chad."

"Wait…She's the one Dr. Light said contacted the palace?" Chad looked over to them as they nodded. He quickly looked back to Enna "What is this all about?"

"Just doing my part to help out is all. Let's not distract from how well you all did. They used all the despair of this place as an anchor for their artificial dimension. Not to mention how they used the moon and sea symbolism to tap into the records of The Moon Cell." Chad and Blue's expressions became far more alert at the words. "Nice, you know of it! You can fill them in on it later." They frowned at her now.

"The Moon Cell?" Elie queried of them, not ready to wait.

"Drastically simplifying it for now: Akashic Records," Chad briefly said back.

"That…would explain the memories," Anna murmured. Pain shadowed her eyes at the recollection of he memory.

Enna moved the conversation back on, "I'll at least tell you what they were trying to make. An Exnine Knight is formed out of three things. A summon spirit: specifically the kind that often manifest as eidolons or espers. A human body to be used as a vessel, you got here when they still needed time for forging that." She paused as she sighed. The bubbly happiness fading for a moment now as a sad and mournful look passed over her expression. "As for the third part: The entire existence of the summon spirit is hollowed out by despair to be replaced by such deep malevolence, a darkness from before everything." Her grave expression remained as she looked to them again. "This type of darkness manifests in different ways. To some worlds it's the Lords of Calamity; in this case it's the Exnine Knights. There are other factors too. But it's all the same threat at its source."

"The spirits we know—" Judith started to ask, following on the conversation just enough as she needed to. "Would they have become monsters if this power had corrupted them?"

"I'm afraid so…maybe even worse. But you should know: This darkness is everywhere. The lords and the knights, the umbral star, all these factors intensify it but it's always there. It's not something that can just be blamed on some external force; it's a part of everyone." She tried to give them a reassuring smile. "But that's why I'm happy they made the mistake of choosing this world. You did exactly as you once told Duke. You won't let despair overtake your belief, you fought for the future and you still do."

"We choose our path and walk forward on it," Yuri echoed a sentiment he had once given Duke.

Enna smiled brightly once more after the deeper tones of these conversations. "I really do love your spirit." She looked to Siren who was steadily getting up to her feet and then floated there off of the ground. "Of course…They're not the only ones confused right now, huh?"

"They…don't have recollection of me. And then there's him…and the presence of her…" She shook her head; nervously she looked to Enna with hesitant eyes. "I can't just think of them…Where is Hauyn?"

"She's alive and unharmed. We just…can't reach her right now. I'll fill you in away from here."

"Wait!" Chad yelled out as he took a step closer to Enna. "You can't just up and leave like this! Where the hell is Chaos? What are we being prepared to face? Why did she look at me and say I was dead?! Just give us something!"

Siren looked away, hesitant to talk any further on matters. Enna? Enna gave a sympathetic smile to Chad and took another step closer to him. "I'm sorry, Chad. Truly. But you'll have to wait. I've got my rules." She raised one hand and Siren approached over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. "As for Chaos? Oh, he was never involved in this." She clicked her fingers and her and Siren vanished in a small flash of light.

Silence.

Silence as both groups processed what they had learned and also what further questions had arisen because of it.

It was Yuri of all people who broke the silence with a short laugh, "I'd love to know how you'll explain all this to the empire, Flynn."

"Maybe I'll make you help me write the reports?"

"I'll spar you for it."

"You're on."

---

The ship was being checked over by Brave Vesperia, the seas now calm as reported to them by Undine when she arrived to confirm the presence of the miasma had vanished.

It had been a challenge to get the conversations back to normal after everything that had went down…Especially with Enna just outing them as being from another world.

It was a testament really to how much Brave Vesperia had been through that they took it in stride, even if they did have lots of questions. Particularly Rita now excited to hear about the way mana and spirits worked on other worlds, or Estelle realising there were so many more possibilities of stories out there, of people and worlds to learn of.

With knowledge of the situation and the miasma cleared up, it was going to be no problem for Dr. Light to teleport them from this location. So in the meantime, the group put themselves to work helping make sure Brave Vesperia was ready to set sail and to enjoy further parting conversations.

Away from everyone else—besides the other boat docked here—were Iris and Duke looking out to the sea. Iris was smiling but she seemed disappointed in herself. "I don't know how I didn't realise what world this was earlier."

"Your time here was only a few hours and you were young."

"I should've remembered the moment Chad and Blue told me about Entelexia."

"If I recall, Colonel told you to think of them as this world's form of spirits." Duke paused and actually let out a small chuckle. "And now they are. How interesting life can be."

"…You look well," Iris complimented earning a raised eyebrow from him. "Like you've let go of a lot."

Duke glanced over his shoulder at the bustling commotion of Brave Vesperia. "It took a long time. But even I can look forwards to the future now."

She smiled, so deeply immersed in the emotion of happiness. "It's really wonderful to see. I wish I could stick around a little longer and talk more"

"And what of you?"

"Me?"

"When I last saw you, you were a child turning herself into a soldier. I saw in your eyes someone lost. I had nothing to say at the time given my own circumstances. Now I see before me a young woman who seems to have discovered the same possibilities I have."

Iris smiled again, a little teary eyed at the emotions this whole conversation brought up in her. Her arms crossed over to steady herself a little. "I started to realise what that life was turning me into. I could see the shift in Colonel's eyes day by day but I couldn't see a way out…and then there he was: An old family friend. Even after seeing how I now was, he just smiled. Smiled and held his hand out. 'Come run with me.' And so we did. We ran." She blinked away the slight forming tears and smiled up at Duke. "I'm not where I want to be. But I'm getting there."

"Perhaps time truly does heal all. I hope you can share this with your new friends one day."

"…One day…When I'm ready."

"Perhaps next time we will be afforded the opportunity to talk more. Safe travels, Iris Maxwell. Until we meet again."

"Same to you, Duke Pantarei."

She rejoined the group and soon enough Brave Vesperia set sail back across the ocean to return to Ba'ul. Duke left in his own smaller ship in another direction.

All that was left was the group from the palace of power. It was more awkward silence than it should've been. Chad distracted in his thoughts as his hand kept resting over his heart. Of course he just played things off as shaken up from the attack when Blue and Iris asked if he was alright.

Anna…Anna was far more distant than they had ever seen her. Her eyes kept averting from looking towards Chad. The memories and the pain far too freshly resurfaced to be able to handle his similar appearance like she had been prior.

When they finally returned to the palace, Elie took the initiative and led Anna back to her room, playing it off to the others that Anna would be better after a good night's sleep. There she held onto her sister as Anna just let it all out, crying against her.

She cried and cried as the grief came rushing back. The pain breaking her heart until exhaustion took hold and she fell asleep.

With her own tears in her eyes, Elie stayed there besides Anna until she too fell asleep. She had no idea how they'd be in the morning, but right here and now, this was enough.

---

Author Notes:

Note 1: My own congratulations to you for making it through this lengthy chapter that I couldn't shorten down.

Note 2: Eizen and that specific Aifread with him are from Tales of Berseria.

Note 3: Prairie is from Megaman ZX

Note 4: "Senpū Tatsumaki-Geri" Roughly translates to Whirlwind Tornado Kick.

Note 5: Despite one of the titles of that dark power and some of its aspects sharing familiarity with Malevolence from Berseria and Zestiria. It's wiser not to mistake it as 100% the same thing. Or more to the point: Berseria and Zestiria's lore is altered to mix into the wider lore of this story and will be expanded upon as we go. I don't really need this note, but as I've laid on the aspects of it a lot more for this chapter I feel its worth addressing for those coming into this with that awareness of Berseria and Zestiria.

Note 6: I've been meaning to mention this before but it kept slipping the mind. Now that the possibility has come up in a review, it seems like a good time to let everyone know. The "real world" year of this story exists purely for giving me a baseline to work off of with character ages, past events and for time passing onwards. With proper published fiction that focuses on earth and culture, the year often requires a strict consistency to how things were but this isn't a story focused on actual reality.

All that to say: Characters in-universe knowledge of lore from games and other series won't be decided on "What content was out at the time in reality" but rather: "Will it work better for the scenes I want to write if they know this in advance or if they know nothing?"

An example being that the character of Richard knows all about Skyrim and Fallout: New Vegas. Way before they were actually released for us.

That's it for this chapter. Until next time.