Akurei-Shinzo: I'm back! I bet you are all wondering what's going to happen! I promise more of the plot will be revealed! You all haven't guessed Sonraku's little secret haven't you? It's going to be a huge shocker then! I don't own Kingdom Hearts or any other anime/manga that have already been published. I'm still working very hard to publish my stuff. (Sorry it took so long to update, I also working on my fictionpress.net stuff, if you want to read it I'm still Akurei-Shinzo)
Chapter 11: Demon Heart
"We're almost there!" shouted Riku as Sieg charged forward towards the door to the next world. They had been pursued by a bunch of Command Wolves that had been firing at them non-stop.
"I have to go to the potty…"muttered Zeero.
"Why didn't you go before we left?" asked Yami.
"I didn't feel like it?"
While Yami and Zeero were arguing, Riku and Sieg managed to get past the door and left the Heartless controlled Zoids behind. Sieg stood in-between the entrance and exit of this new world and would wait for Riku and the others to return. Face it; they didn't want to freak out the inhabitants of this world with a gigantic robot!
They were currently in a forest, it was a maze made from trees, Zeero reverted into his fox-form to sniff out any people nearby. It wouldn't have mattered, they heard a scream come from the north, or was it the south? Anyway, an explosion followed that scream.
"Looks like someone's in trouble," said Yami.
"Let's go," said Riku rushing towards the scene of the explosion.
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"Kurama! Look out!" cried a girl with brown hair and blue eyes.
There were a group of girls huddled together near an old, what looked like, a coliseum building. A boy with long crimson hair and emerald eyes dodged a heartless just in time before it managed to slice his head off. It was clear that he was outnumbered. There was a bunch of Heartless everywhere! The leader of the pack resembled Zeero's fox-form; only it was completely black and had seven tails!
The boy called Kurama reached behind his hair and pulled out a rose. What good that will do him Riku did not know. What was Kurama planning to do with a rose anyhow? Riku didn't think Heartless accepted bribes.
"Rose whip!" said Kurama loud and clear. In a shower of rose petals the rose had transformed into a bizarre whip, it looked like the stem of a rose in whip-form.
"That's something you don't see everyday," commented Yami. The group had been hiding within the bushes. They watched Kurama swing his whip around, taking out a few Heartless at a time.
"There are too many Heartless out there," stated Riku summoning his Keyblades. "I'm going to help."
"I'll go too," said Yami. "By the way…where's Zeero?"
"Never mind, let's go!"
Riku and Yami jumped out of the bushes and charged at the Heartless. Riku began cutting away at the Heartless while Yami summoned a monster called Summoned Skull. Kurama and his friends were very surprised to see them come out of nowhere and help.
"Need a hand?" asked Riku.
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The fight continued for several minutes, and there seemed to be no end to the swarms of Heartless after them. Yami had worn himself out after summoning his almighty creature. The Summoned Skull managed to take out a bunch of Heartless, but it took away a lot of magic that Yami possessed.
Riku and Kurama still had to fight against the multiple forces of the Heartless. There seemed to be no end to the creatures that surrounded them. Zeero still hadn't shown up, where was he anyhow? The leader of the Heartless gave a bone-chilling howl, and all of the Heartless faced Riku. It seemed that they were going to finish him off first!
The attacks continued, Riku was covered with tons of injuries and was bleeding terribly. Kurama wasn't looking too good himself either. Yami was unconscious after trying to summon another monster. He had already used up all of his magic. The head Heartless suddenly leapt at Riku and knocked him over on his side. When Riku knew what was happening it was too late to do anything. That Heartless was about to finish him with its final blow! All he could do was raise one arm up for a feeble shield and wait for death. It never came.
Riku opened his eyes and saw a flash of reddish-brown fur fly past him, knocking his attacker out of the way. It was Zeero, still in his demon-form. Zeero had a firm grip on the Heartless's neck and didn't seem to want to let go anytime soon. The Heartless roared and finally threw Zeero off its neck, but Zeero had drawn a lot of blood after his neck hold on the Heartless. The other Heartlesses surrounded the pair, but a stern look from the leader kept them from attacking.
"Should we help Zeero?" asked Riku not sure of what to do.
"No," answered Kurama.
"Why not?"
"This is his fight."
Both fighters gave a howl and charged forward. Zeero's paws began to glow a dark blue color while the Heartless's claws glowed a dark black color. The two of them leapt into the air and their attacks seemed to cancel each other out. Zeero, not being so graceful, landed on the ground with a thump and the Heartless landed gracefully on all four paws. Before Zeero could get up the Heartless used one of its massive paws to pin him onto the ground.
Zeero squirmed around trying to pull off the paw that held him down. After trying that for several minutes and realizing it wasn't doing him any good, he decided to give the paw a good chewing. It worked, the Heartless yelped and pulled its paw out of Zeero's fangs. The paw was dripping with blood; Zeero's mouth was also full of the blood.
Out of the Heartless's back sprouted out two metal wings, when they grew out of it's back blood went splattering everywhere. It spread out its wings and charged towards Zeero. Zeero jumped up and tried to use his claw attack once more, but the Heartless dodged the attack and its steel wing sliced Zeero's upper right leg. It left a very deep cut and crimson liquid slowly leaked out. Zeero continued to glare at the Heartless and the Heartless glared back. Riku had never seen Zeero act this way before, usually the demon would freak out and run, but here he was, fighting until the bitter end.
The Heartless charged once again at Zeero and Zeero ran towards the Heartless as well, his claw glowing blue and had blood dripping down from it. After a blinding flash of light the two creatures fell to the ground. Zeero looking very battered. The Heartless turned to attack, but blood suddenly spluttered out of it's own right leg. Looks like Zeero's attack had hit its intended target after all.
Zeero slowly got up and howled at the Heartless and the Heartless howled back. Then they ran toward one other and tackled each other to the ground. Zeero jumped into the air and landed a few feet away from the Heartless. The two charged at each other again with a flash of light, but only this time Zeero's right claw was stabbing the Heartless through the chest. The other Heartless who were watching slowly backed off and vanished. Zeero pulled his claw out of the Heartless's corpse and collapsed onto the ground.
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"Zeero!" yelled Riku rushing towards his friend. Zeero staggered up and hissed at him, his eyes giving him a crazy stare. Riku then noticed that his friend's eyes had turned into an eerie golden color.
"Riku, stay back!" warned a familiar voice. Riku turned to his left and there stood Daichi (haven't seen him in a while haven't we?) "Zeero's not himself now, so don't get any closer!"
Zeero gave a bone-shilling howl and charged at Daichi. Daichi held up his staff and managed to block Zeero's fangs from tearing at his throat. Daichi swung his staff at Zeero and knocked him into a tree. Zeero got up, spitting out blood.
"What do you mean Zeero's not himself?" asked Riku.
"Look at his eyes," answered Daichi. "Notice that it's turned into a golden color. In our world a fox demon's powers are measured in how many tails they have. The maximum is eight tails. If his eyes turn into a golden color it means he's about to change into an eight-tailed fox-demon. Only Zeero isn't capable of handling its powers, so instead of gaining more power he goes berserk."
"What do we do then?"
"This…"
Daichi raised his staff up high; Zeero's eyes followed the staff. Then, he brought down the staff, the rings on the staff gave a soft ring, Riku noticed that the ring seemed to clear his mind and calm him down. He also noticed that his wounds had disappeared, Riku looked around and noticed everyone's wounds were healed as well. Riku returned his attention to Zeero; the fox staggered around a bit and then fainted. With a cloud of smoke, Zeero turned back into his other form.
"Ohh…" moaned Zeero holding his head. "I don't feel so good…"
"Are you alright?" asked Riku. Zeero nodded his head. "What did you do?"
"It was simple," replied Daichi. "My staff allows me to calm down any type of creature when it goes berserk. The first time I had to use it was when Shiro…um…never mind…"
"Who is that guy?" asked Yami, who had woken up.
"Yeah," said Riku. "Who is Shiro? We keep hearing about him, but who is he?"
"Uh…." muttered both Zeero and Daichi, both of them looked very uncomfortable.
"You should go into that coliseum," mumbled Daichi, Riku noticed that his eyes didn't met his when he said that. "There are some Heartless activities going on down there."
"But," started Riku.
"I believe Kurama's friends will need your help down there," interrupted Daichi. "Yami and I will stay here and make sure more Heartless won't go down after you guys."
"Hey!" exclaimed Zeero. "That means I have to go down there!"
"Yeah," said Daichi. "So?"
"But…but there are spiders down there! And bugs!"
"What's your point?"
"I don't wanna go!"
"You're going and that's final!"
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It ended up that Riku had to drag and cowardly fox-demon down with him as he and Kurama approached the coliseum. A door slowly opened, and a tunnel was revealed, it was too dark to tell where that dark and musty tunnel lead. Kurama didn't seem worried at all, so he went in, Riku followed, dragging Zeero along with him.
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"Master, where are you going?"
"I want to have a word with that Keybearer…"
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Remember this advice Keybearer. Sometimes to find the light, you must look within the deepest part of the darkness…
Akurei-Shinzo: Like I said, sorry for taking so long to update! I have the whole story down, but it's hard to type it all down! So until next time! Please R&R!