Chapter Sixteen: Undeath
After waiting a few days, hunting wild boar, and cutting firewood, we saw some creatures go flying into the dark castle, which was easily visible from our position just in the woods. I saw the creatures and informed Jason and Amy.
"That must be our cue," Amy said. After reequipping ourselves, we headed out of the woods and up to the castle gates. Sora, Riku, and some other kids came running up minutes later. The other kids just went zooming by us, but Sora and Riku stopped to talk.
"You guys! Where were you?" Sora asked.
"Oh, just hanging around, waiting for you. What took you so long?" I asked back.
"We had to go find a magic black pot," Riku said.
"Cauldron! It's s cauldron! Geez…" Amy muttered.
"Anyway, what now?" I asked all of them.
"We have to help them get that black pot back. If we don't, the Horned King is going to make an army of undead soldiers!" Riku said.
"Yeah, I suppose that's bad. Well, what do you propose we do, then?" Jason asked.
"Well, we should split up. Half of us will help the others, and half of us will take up the rear, avoiding surprise attacks," Amy said. "Sound like a good idea?"
Everybody agreed.
"Well, I'm going ahead. I hate surprises," Jason announced.
"I'm in front," Riku said.
"I'll hang behind," I said.
"I'll go ahead," Amy said.
"Guess you and I are taking up the rear," Sora said to me. I nodded. Riku, Jason, and Amy ran ahead, while Sora and I walked backwards, making sure no surprises popped up. More squadrons of beast-men and Heartless showed up, but they were nothing before us.
"So, what's your story?" Sora asked me while we walked backwards.
"Whadda ya mean, what's my story?" I asked back.
"Well, everybody involved in these journeys has some story. What's yours?" he asked again.
"Seriously? Well… all right. I wandered across my home country for a year, fought Luce, killed my best friends on accident, was exiled into the Realm of Darkness, and in the end saved my world and turned back time so nobody else remembers. Happy?" I asked him, fighting off a few Heartless.
"That sounds… hard," he said.
"You're telling me," I muttered. We then got back to the task at hand. After a little more backwards-walking, we were near the throne room. I knew it.
"Get ready," I told Sora.
Moments later, legions of undead soldiers were coming towards us from the hallway. Their numbers seemed limitless.
"You think you can handle this many?" Sora asked me.
"No sweat," I said, getting into a batto-jutsu stance, hands on my Masamune. We charged at them together. I did the batto-jutsu, and then used the massive Masamune to devastating effect. We fought them over and over. Unfortunately, nothing seemed to kill the undead soldiers. We fought them for what seemed like an hour, then stood back to back.
"So, what are you looking for?" I asked Sora.
"Kairi. Some woman came and kidnapped her a few months ago. You?" he asked back.
"A way home," I said with my eyes closed. We continued the fight. After what seemed like forever, a great wave of darkness overcame us. When it was gone, all the undead soldiers had turned to dust. We ran into the throne room soon after.
"Guys! What happened?" Sora asked as we dashed up to them.
"That little Gurgi guy… he fell in the pot and disappeared," Riku told us. "But now the Horned King and all his minions are gone…"
"Well, I'm sure everything will work out. Let's get going," I said. My Keyblade that I had long suppressed didn't seem to like that, though. Before I knew what happened, it appeared in a flash of light. Reacting with one of the kids' magic sword, I saw the Keyhole.
I locked it.
Appearing back in the throne room to stunned faces, I quickly put the Keyblade away.
"What the… that's MY Keyblade!" Jason shouted.
"Uh…" I muttered, then ran out. I quickly beamed up to our Gummi Ship once I was out of their sight.