Anya POV:
After our group had finally finished up destroying the bomb robots, we then descended a level and found ourselves in an area that looked very highly technological. And when we moved forward just a tad bit more, we saw a very large machine that looked to be very imposing. One that Nene gawked at.
"What is this?" I asked.
"The cortex..." he said.
"The what?" Shu asked.
"The brains of the cube," Kesu explained. But before anything else could happen, a bolt of electricity zapped Nene right in the face, us then gawking at how he looked like he was in severe pain as he held onto his head.
"AUGH!... T-The memories..." he gasped as I went to him and helped him off the ground.
"What are you seeing, Nene?" I asked.
"The disease... the world destroyed... Himiko and I... and... o-oh no..." Nene gawked as he then knelt on the ground and I knew it was serious. Whatever the final thought was, he looked absolutely traumatized by it.
"What's the last thing?" I asked, him then coughing before then finally getting off the ground.
"Destroy this infernal machine... then I'll tell you," he said, me then smirking and obliging.
"I'd say this is high time for some Mystic Mermaid Corporeal action! Let's make this machine short-circuit!" I smiled as I summoned Mystic from my shadow and she proceeded to send a powerful tidal-wave punch at the Cortex, me smirking at how it got completely annihilated, but not before a whole slew of images suddenly burst into my brain!... And all of them relating to Nene! I saw the sights of the disease first taking hold on him, the sight of the world being destroyed by Destroy, him becoming even more sickly when he finally sealed him away as Deathroy, and his moments with Himiko... but the last thing? It made me gawk. Himiko wasn't an Ancient... Himiko was an android! And created by Gurgoth to actually weaken Nene without either of the two's knowledge!
"Oh... oh my god..." I gulped as I looked at Nene and he was on his hands and knees on the ground.
"Himiko... could it really be true?.." he asked as I then looked at her and she looked concerned.
"What's the matter, Nene? What's going on?" she asked as she went to her lover's side and I spoke.
"It's because of Gurgoth," I said, Nene looking at me with a frown. "He probably planned all of this. To reveal the horrible truths to Nene about what Himiko was, despite him never telling either of you two about it," I said.
"What Himiko was? What do you mean?" Szabo asked as Nene sighed.
"Himiko... Gurgoth created you as an android... with the sole purpose of making me weaker. But he never mentioned it to you..." Nene said, me frowning at that.
"But how would Himiko weaken Nene? It's not like we can sense any kind of poison in her or any kind of weaponry. In fact, she's got the Asura shadow, which is the ultimate in healing. So why would Gurgoth say such a thing?!" Jiro asked in anger.
"I have an idea, but you won't like it," Sahlia said. "I think what Gurgoth planned was to weaken Nene with kindness. To make him weaker in his heart in order to take his new robotic body over for himself. Why else would he revive Nene on this cube, where Himiko was kept in stasis for so long? He probably planned to possess Nene when he was at his weakest and have us attack him!"
And when she said that, I was stupefied. "That makes WAY too much sense! If that isn't the reasoning, then I don't know what else it could be! He's hoping to make Nene think he's weak because he opened his heart to love. But Gurgoth forgets one simple thing about love," I said.
"What would that be?" Nene asked with a forlorn face.
"Love... is one of the strongest emotions one can possibly have!" I shouted. And when I did, we all heard a voice.
"Liar!" the voice said, us looking around before then looking at the cortex I'd just destroyed. And we saw it was starting to hum to life, if only briefly. "Love is a weak emotion! The only thing that matters is power! And you will learn that one way or another!"
"Well, the rat finally crawls out of the sewers. Well, why don't you stay in those sewers, which I will now clog with tons of feces?" I asked as I then sent a powerful blast of Flarus at the circuits, which caused them to finally die down in our current area. And Nene looked at me with concern.
"Anya..." he said, me giving him my full attention. "How can you be so sure that love is all powerful... and if Himiko really is an android... what does that make me?" he asked, me frowning at him.
"And I'll ask my own question. If you and Himiko are androids, who the hell cares?" I asked as I then engaged my rockets and my finger guns on all but my love finger. "It doesn't matter about skin and bones, or wires and steel. What matters is what you feel in your heart. In your soul... the power within that is unfathomable to those who know it's true nature. And souls aren't just for shadows. They're what make us unique, they're what makes us able to act, think, and speak. What we use those souls for is something entirely different. We can use them for good, we can use them for evil, and everywhere in between. But we're going to prove that even the most hardened of hearts can do immense good in the world! Now get off your ass and let's get going to the bottom of this cube! We have a world to save!" I said, Nene sighing and nodding as he got off the ground and got supported by Himiko.
"Truer words have never been spoken, Anya," Himiko smiled.
"I don't think I can ever get the world to forgive me. But we need to save everyone. I will go out in the way a king would. Supporting his subjects through thick and thin, not mindlessly killing innocents," Nene said, me smirking at that.
"Then let's get going!" I smirked as we then continued further down. And when we did, who would we run into other than Zola and her group.
"Ah! Zola and crew! How are you do-o-o-owhaaaaattt?" I was about to ask, before I saw something that was in Zola's arms that made me absolutely flabbergasted. It looked like a Destroy, but with the properties of an Ancient and wearing clothes to boot! "Um... could I ask who this is, what's going on, and why I wasn't notified?" I asked in confusion.
"Rude," Zola said, me blushing and hammering my fingers together. "This is Blanko. And he's another victim of this Gurgoth character. He's basically that jackhole's son, used along with his sister and cousin to be used for the Destroy experiments. His sister is somewhere secret while his cousin was the Destroy that we had to deal with," she explained, me feeling absolutely sick at that.
"That's... that's horrible! Who in their right mind would subject their own family to such horrific experiments?!" Kluke asked in anger. But when I looked around us, I realized it. We'd reached the jackpot.
"We can answer thos questions later, Kluke. Right now, we need to focus on something bigger. Look around," I said, her then doing so along with everyone else. We'd finally reached the source of the bomb robots. There were 6 generators all around the room and they were right in the middle of making more of them!
"Oh my gosh! The heart of the operation, finally!" Jiro exclaimed.
"If we take out these generators, we can finally stop the bomb robots from being manufactured!" Okuni said with seriousness.
"Then what are we waiting for?! Let's do some damage!" Zola smirked as she then let down Blanko and we proceeded to issue out an all-out onslaught.
Zola POV:
With Blanko assisting us the whole time, we managed to demolish all of the generators in only 5 minutes. How did he assist? He took care of the bomb robots from a distance with his Nemean Shadow while he took out the generators by oozing himself on them and sapping them of all their strength, which then completely recharged his magic reserves to attack some more!
"Wow... I honestly forgot how amazingly strong Destroy can be... I'm just grateful that you're a good one," Anya admitted, which made me smile.
"It was hard to know how strong he was unless you saw the sight of his destruction firsthand. I did... and it was horrifying," Nene said, me looking at him and nodding.
"We need to keep going down. And when we do, we need to protect Nene and Himiko at all costs," I said, them nodding as we then finally reached a giant door.
"I think I can open this... hooooooOOOOOOAAAARRGGGHHH!" Nene shouted as he used his and his shadow's strength to open the giant door at the back of the room, which we then entered and saw we were in the deeper parts of the Cortex. And when we did, we heard a voice.
"You really think you've got it all figured out, don't you?" the voice of Gurgoth asked from the machine, which all of us furrowed our brows at the machine in question.
"Shut your mouth, you deplorable excuse of a man! Who in their right mind would experiment and hurt their own children for the goal of armageddon?! Come out of that machine and face your death like the demon you are!" Anya shouted in rage, me frowning at her and keeping a level head.
"I'll show you," the voice said... before then showing the image of Nene! But I could tell just from the voice that came after that it was a fake. "I am the one you've befriended. But you may call me Nene," he said as Anya then raspberried at the sight.
"Really? You're really going to try and pull that crap on us? Nuh-uh, we know that you're really called Gurgoth. And we also know that you think that love is a weak emotion. Well, I love our planet and I love my friends and family! And that gives me the strength I need to protect them from your madness!" Anya shouted as she let out Mystic Mermaid again and proceeded to send an enormous magical tsunami towards the Cortex, completely flooding it and short-circuiting it in the process! But when it happened, the soul still remain... but changed shape to look like someone that we'd never seen before.
"Ahaha... you are very intellectual to see through my disguise. And with all that rage. You will do nicely," the spirit said, us then gasping as the soul then went faster than light and went directly inside of Anya! And she then collapsed on the ground and proceeded to smoke out of her chest!
"Anya!" Shu shouted in shock as Anya's Mystic Mermaid then emerged from her shadow and looked to be fighting off another one. And what was the other shadow? None other than the Balaur Shadow!
"I WILL NOT ALLOW YOU TO HURT MY FRIEND, VILE BALAUR!" Mystic shouted in fury, which surprised me. I don't think I'd ever heard a shadow speak before!
"YOUR FRIENDSHIPS ARE UTTERLY MEANINGLESS! FRIENDS MEAN NOTHING IN THE FACE OF SCIENCE AND WAR!" the Balaur shouted in a very demonic voice. But Mystic then did something shocking. She punched the Balaur in the face, which caused the shadow to emerge as its own entity! But when this happened, we saw that Himiko looked to be getting weak.
"HIMIKO!" Nene shouted as he went to his love and we saw she was nearing death's door.
"Don't hurt her!" Blanko shouted as he then rushed in and proceeded to do something that surprised us all. He proceeded to use his own magic to heal up Himiko, which managed to get her on her feet again!
"Defeat Master Gurgoth now! I can't keep this up for much longer!" Blanko shouted, us then obliging and proceeding to attack the shadow with everything we had. We fired off Erase attacks, all the elemental spells in the book, all while casting protection and attack buffs on all of us. And after a tense fight, the shadow soon evaporated with the soul sitting on the ground... only for Nene to send an attack of Groundus at the soul to utterly demolish the essence!
"Is... is that it?" Marumaro asked.
"No, far from it," Anya said. "Now we need to finish the job. We need to get Nene and Himiko to the deepest point of this cube. Otherwise, the entire world is dead!"
"Then let's go! Onward to victory!" Jibral shouted as we then proceeded down the road and we saw that Himiko still needed support from Blanko.
"Why do I... still feel faint?" Himiko asked.
"It's most likely because of Gurgoth yet again! He probably set it up as a failsafe that when he removed his soul from the Cortex, that you'd have your eternal engine power down," Jiro said with a frown.
"And I thought that Nene with his disease was bad... this guy is at least ten times worse than anything Nene ever did!" Shifa shouted in anger.
"All the more reason to stop his plans!" I said with seriousness as the alarms then began to blare as we entered the final area.
"10 minutes until Self Destruct," the computer said as we then saw that the way to the command control center was at the back of a long gauntlet of machines and mechs.
"We need to get there fast! Ugh, how do we get past all this security?!" Toripo asked.
"Time to finally do something eventful! Jiro, take over for me. I'm going to get a recharge!" Blanko shouted as he rushed forward and Jiro then had to use his healing magic to support Himiko. We then rushed after him. And he then proceeded to do something that, though disgusting, looked awesome. He absorbed the machines into his body and then, after gaining their power as his own, he expelled the dead robots shortly after!
"I sure hope he does not mistake me for one of those evil robots," Joy said as Blanko finished the route after only 1 minute of this, which we then followed after and him then supporting Himiko the rest of the way to the core. And when we reached it, we saw that there was a strange machine that looked an awful lot like a capsule.
"What's this?" I asked.
"This is where we go to..." Himiko said, me looking at her in confusion.
"It's time, Himiko..." Nene said, him and the kindly Ancient then climbing into the thing together, me looking at them in confusion.
"Wait... what's going on?" I asked.
"You should get out of here. When we combine our minds into the cortex, we don't want you to be caught in the resulting explosion of energy," Nene said, me only then smiling. Nene and Himiko... they were going to sacrifice their lives so that everything else on the planet would live on.
"We will not forget your selfless sacrifices... Anya? Szabo? Joy? A 21-gun salute is in order," I said, them all then doing just that, shooting their guns 7 times to add up to 21. Nene and Himiko then closed the capsule and Anya then had our entire ensemble return to the top of the cube, us then piling into the Land Shark and escaping... and just in time, too. Because if we were just 3 seconds slower, the resulting explosion of energy would've annihilated us! But after that inital expulsion, we looked out the window and saw that the Atomic Cube detached itself from the bottom of the planet and floated back in its original spot... and when we flew away, we saw the visage of the Chimaera and Asura shadow. The asura waved goodbye while the Chimaera gave us a thumbs-up and a salute. I couldn't help but feel relieved. The threat of the atomic cube, Gurgoth, Destroy, and the deadly Balaur Shadow was a thing of the past. We could finally have some rest and relaxation.
"We will never forget this... the most noteworthy day of our entire lives... to destroy the Balaur Shadow, reform Nene, and save the world for a second time, all in a single day!" Anya smiled... but when we finally docked in Neo Jibral, we were surprised to see that the citizens were clamoring us, and that Anya's mother was at the front of the pack.
"ANYA! Where have you been for so long? It's been 3 days straight and I see you escaping from a cube in the distance? What the hell?!" Anya's mom asked in anger as Anya then spoke.
"Sorry, mother... we had to save the world from a bunch of bombs and the cube itself," Anya said bashfully as we then emerged from the ship with our new friends... and we could tell some were concerned for Blanko's presence on our group... but we were also relieved to see that the Servant Robos were in the town as well.
"Ah, my fellow automaton! I'm extremely relieved to see you finally escaped," Yasato said with excitement.
"Naturally, 61," said number 32.
"So... anyone want to mention the green kid with you?" asked one of the residents.
"He's a victim of the one who we had to defeat in that cube. An ancient called Gurgoth is the one responsible, not Nene. In fact, Nene actually saved the world," Anya said, which made the citizens shocked.
"Whaaaaaat?! Nene saved the world?!" Anya's mother asked, which made me smirk.
"And we gave him a 21-gun salute for his sacrifice," Zola smiled.
"Could we get a detailed report, King Jibral?" asked one of the citizens, her being named Bouquet and being the one in charge of drumming up business for the restaurant.
"Of course. I will give a full detailed report at 12 noon," he said.
"Uh... that's in five minutes," Anya's mom said.
"Oh?... Hahaha, I guess we lost track of time while in that cube! Well, I made my own grave, so I'll go and get that report delivered," Jibral said.
"Would you allow me to assist, Jibral?" I asked.
"Oh, no! If Lady Zola helps you, Maro help you too!" Marumaro said as I simply smiled. He was such an adorable scamp.
"Very well, let's be off to the castle," Jibral smiled as we then went to the castle in question. We had quite the story to tell.