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Dissonance

Event XXI

Mirrors-Mortalitas

She was imprisoned again. Inside the cold void that was the mirrors, the very source of what caused all of their troubles. Charging at Poison and attacking her with everything she had, Dream had no doubt succeeded in killing her. She was absolutely certain of that. But there was a big question looming over that battle's aftermath.

Something wasn't right. Or rather than that, multiple things weren't right. For starters, she was still conscious, having thoughts of doubt, even while she was inside the cold void. That question could be ignored for a little while. It would take the others some time to find her anyway. The much more important question, the big one, was why Poison had attacked their base like that.

From what Nozomi had seen and thinking of what a warped version of Komachi would do, it didn't fit together. Why play intrigue, why scheme and lay traps, why slowly decimate them, only to lead them against a pointless attack that would let them get back all of their imprisoned friends and shortly after lead a simple, full frontal attack against the originals?

It didn't make sense. She might not be the brightest out there, but even Nozomi could easily see that something was very weird about how Poison behaved. Her last words were still floating around in her head.

"You really don't know anything. It disgusts me that I'm the other side of you. That your blood flows through my veins makes me sick. That I was created with the same face, the same idiotic visage you wear every day, makes me want to tear off my own face."

"Your game is over, Nightmare."

"Not mine but yours. You're sitting here, in the darkness of the mirror, while Poison and her goons are slowly taking over the bodies of their originals. That cunning snake thought of a grandiose plan to end this farce. Become the originals themselves."

"You're just a pitiful villain that tries to get a little bit of revenge to make yourself feel better. Friendship prevailed. Poison perished, together with all the evil copies that were created. Light will always prevail against darkness. Friendship will always-"

"You still love to give speeches. Light? Friendship? Don't make me laugh! They shun you! They wanted you gone because you were useless! No matter how hard you try, you don't get anywhere! Light? Your over-reliance on light has brought you to this mess to begin with! You're just a narrow-minded fool that pushes her ideals and desires on everyone around her. Why do you think they failed you for the teaching certificate?"

Nozomi could feel that there was at least some truth to what Nightmare was saying. But to admit that to herself meant she would lose to something that was just an evil and despicable copy of herself. "It doesn't matter what you say to me. I know I did the right thing. I always fix the mess I cause!"

"Or let others fix them for you. You are nothing without those five around you. A powerless wreck that longs for a place to belong. Everyone else has found something of their own, yet you still foolishly pursue a dream that you'll never be able to fulfill. Your name suits you, Dream, because you are nothing more than that."

"Those are great words from someone who is not even real, who is just a copy of everything I am and was, who has no way to ever become more than that."

"And that is where you are wrong. I will kill all your friends, everyone that has even a chance to know who I really am. And then I will take your place, doing what you should have done so long ago. I will be the real Yumehara Nozomi, and you will be forever lost in this mirror."

"You won't get away with that. People know me. They will be able to tell a fake from the real thing."

"And yet, your best friend Rouge wasn't able to do that very thing when I pretended to be you. You are no more than living a grand delusion about what you really are."

"Shut up."

"I'm you so I know you won't be able to accept the truth. You know, deep down, in the farthest reaches of your miserable heart that longs oh so dearly for company and friends, that you alone are nothing. When your team fell apart, you fell apart. And your only beacon of support was taken from you for reasons you claimed you understood but never did. Political reasons in a fairy kingdom? Don't make me laugh! That whore just wanted him for herself! That is what you were thinking! I know all of your secrets, you imbecile! You cried for days, wrecked your room and yet he would not come back for you. All your delusions of a fairy tale good ending went up in smoke. Alone as you were, you worked harder than anyone and still, your ignorant and idealistic personality never let you get anywhere. That is who you are Dream. A pitiful wannabe leader that lost the support of everyone she loved. And in the end, look what your ideals have brought you! Everyone went through immense suffering because of you! No matter how much you blame this place, the system or anything else. It will always be your fault. And it makes me laugh that despite all of this you still see yourself as a force of good! How utterly absurd! You are more of a force of evil than any of the others ever could be! You. Are. Me."

Nozomi couldn't stop Nightmare from delving deeper and deeper into her psyche, laying bare all her secrets, fears and wishes. And the more she did so, the more Nozomi looked at herself exactly the way Nightmare described her. Evil.

"Even so..." Nozomi's will was more than just her justification of fighting for good. She knew what it meant to make sacrifices. What it meant to suffer and be truly alone. And still, she kept moving, still she kept trying to be true to herself, no matter what anyone else might think. "Even so... that won't stop me. No matter what or who I am, no matter how or what people think of me, I will always do what I think is right!"

"That's a fools way of thinking! Are you a fool, Dream?"

Gritting her teeth and raising her voice, Nozomi shouted at the top of her lungs. "So what if I am? A fool is no more or less than any other person! I'm no more than any other girl! And I make errors just like everyone else! And yet if I need them, they're always there for me!"

"They turn to you because of the power you wield and not because of who you are!"

"That's fine! As long as it helps them, I'll be happy to lend them my power!"

"You are beyond reason and logic."

"Of course. I'm Cure Dream. Those things have no place in a dream."

"What you're saying makes no sense. I should have known that this was a futile endeavor. Let me show you one last thing. A farewell gift to the incompetent original that created me and the others."

A blinding flash of light right in front of her eyes and Nozomi could see what Nightmare was seeing. The front of the mirror, herself floating in it, unmoving and seemingly asleep. She was seeing through Nightmare's eyes.

"Watch."

Plucking the rose brooch from her chest, Nightmare held it tightly in her hand, a dark pink colored energy radiating from her whole body, forming a shell like aura around her.

Nozomi knew exactly what she was doing. And it struck fear in her heart. There was no one even remotely capable of stopping Nightmare should she somehow amass the needed energy to transform into the completed guardian. "Stop it..." The words came out on their own. She was no longer capable of thinking straight.

The aura was slowly being drained by the rose brooch held tightly in Nightmare's hand. Bending over in pain, the process was all but gentle. No human or human-like being was designed to control something like that.

The brooch glowing ever brighter as the energy condensed inside, Nightmare's face distorted in pain, her costume vanishing, leaving but a naked girl in front of the mirror. A brief smile played over her lips when the initial step was practically complete. "Guardian of Nightmares."

Dark and thorny rose roots broke out of the brooch that shattered in such a violence manner that not a single shard remained to fall to the ground. Wrapping themselves around her waist, chest, hips, arms and legs, Nightmare felt unsurpassed power flow through her. "And now... I shall end this little game of playing tag. You may stay here Dream. You may rot in this place, to forever be a monument to the stupidity of idealism and pretentious good."

Nozomi was back in darkness, no longer seeing what Nightmare could see. But she had felt the power that surged through the evil creature. There was nobody that could stop her. All the Cures together were no match for Nightmare once she took the energy of a few of her own.

Even if she escaped, would she be able to stop her? The guardian form relied heavily on the power from the rose garden, and unlike Nightmare, she wasn't willing to sacrifice the lives of others to forgo that requirement. If it would save the lives of the others, she'd sacrifice her own, but that alone wouldn't give her the strength she needed to fight. What was she to do? Give up and wait for her own end?

"No." That wasn't her. That was not what Cure Dream stood for. The urgency and desperate nature of the situation made her remember something very important. If you don't try, you have already lost. What had been an apparently hibernating body before was now glowing brightly with an indomitable aura, the very force of her strength of will. "Let me out." Just barely able to clench her fist, Nozomi felt anger that threatened to devour her whole. She would put a stop to Nightmare and if it was the last thing she did. Nobody would use her powers to hurt her friends! Nobody! "I said..."

"Let me out!" A crack in the mirror, the space unable to contain the extremely quickly rising amount of energy. Nozomi finally regaining control of her body, throwing off the shackle that the system had put on her, a penalty for dying in battle. "Nightmare!"

=== Dissonance ===

Rin was hastily tying a piece of cloth around her right arm, using her teeth to pull it tight, trying to stop the bleeding. The damn roots were everywhere and she couldn't find any sign of the enemy base where Nozomi had to be. "Where are you Nozomi? I could really use your help right now."

The answer to her question was presented to her by a massive quake that transcended quickly into a shock wave that blew dust and small stone fragments through the air. In the distance, Rin couldn't see but feel her leader and friend. That was undoubtedly the Cure energy that belonged to Dream.

Using her left arm to smash the wall in front of her, Rin headed straight for the origin point of the energy she felt. She got close enough faster than she thought. Wild spikes of raw energy were traveling through the corridor, obliterating everything in their path. Shielding her eyes from the bright light as she got closer, Rouge was completely enveloped by the pink energy, unable to see more than about half a meter ahead of herself.

Taking one careful step after another, she was absolutely sure that at the center of this catastrophe, she would find Nozomi. She wasn't sure about the state her friend would be in though.

As if she had penetrated a shield in form of a dome, Rin could finally see. Floating in mid-air, right in front of her, was a mirror. She was just in time to realize the danger she was in. Throwing herself on the ground and hoping for the best, Rin barely avoided the explosive destruction that burst from the mirror, destroying the vessel or mechanism in the process. The first thing she saw were Dream's heels. The first thing she heard was an howl of anger that spit out the name of the most powerful reflection. "Nightmare!"

"You're as thick headed as always. I didn't think anyone could get out of there on their own." Rin flinched when an angered Dream looked down at her, unable to say anything for she had never seen her leader that consumed by rage.

"Rouge. Where is she?" Not using her real name meant that Nozomi was all but in complete fighting mode now. No matter what happened, she wouldn't stop or return to normal before she accomplished what she had in mind. It had only ever happened once before, at least from what Rin knew.

"Are you planning to take her on?"

"Someone has to. And I'm the only one who stands a chance." Helping up Rin, Nozomi realized that there was one way to stand on equal ground with Nightmare, even without forcibly taking the life energy of her friends.

"She is using that thing you got when you became the guardian. At least that's what I think."

"You're right. She was very... talkative about it before she left me in there to rot. She's going to kill all the other reflections and use their life to reach the finished state of the guardian. Not even all of us together would have any chance to stop her then."

"Hate to break the news but she's taken quite a few of them already. There's a lot of stuff I need to tell you but we don't have time."

"Kiss me."

Rin briefly closed her eyes, opened them again and tried to find some kind of rational solution for why Nozomi would say that. "I know you think you're not coming back from fighting Nightmare, but is it really that grim that you want a-"

"I'll borrow some energy from you. I... sort of got sloppy when listening to Flora during this part. I only remember that one of the ways is to kiss a person willing to lend you their power!" Blushing a little, Nozomi cursed her own forgetfulness.

"That's right... you can't use the Rose Garden's power out here. So, if I... kiss you, you'll be able to fight on even ground with Nightmare?"

"It's more on the level of one kiss being equal to one reflection she absorbed. Don't look at me like that, I'm not happy about that either!"

"I'm not sure how accepting the others are going to be of this, but I'd rather give you a kiss than die horribly. It's a no-brainer, really."

Nozomi knew that she didn't have time to explain and argue with every other couple. Taking Rin's hand, Dream knelt down, the red Cure receiving a gentle kiss to the back of her hand. It took effect immediately. Both of them could hear a voice that reminded them very much of Flora in their head. "Temporal Contract complete."

A flash of red light and a flaming red orb emerged from Rin's chest, floating quietly through the air, merging with Nozomi. "That... that was it? I was thinking you'd have to kiss me on the lips or something."

"It was just a hunch. Not everything has to be needlessly complicated or embarrassing." Taking her own brooch from her chest and tightly holding it in her right hand, Nozomi could feel the power she borrowed from her oldest friend.

"Wake up, guardian of dreams." The released energy pushed Rin away so forcefully that she almost toppled over. Nozomi's costume vanished, pink energy appearing in it's stead, said energy being absorbed into her brooch. That Rin could see her naked didn't bother her. The lives of everyone were on the line.

"My pledge to the Rose!" Rin could no longer see when innumerable amounts of rose petals emerged from the brooch, completely shattering it in the process, every single petal floating less than a millimeter above Nozomi's skin, acting like a living armor.

"Watch out!" Not leaving her friend any time to appreciate how grand she looked in her incomplete guardian mode, Rose Dream felt a massive threat rushing towards them. "Palace of Roses!" Leaving herself naked and bare, the petals flew out from her, forming a dome above the two Cures, a shield that shimmered in pink and red, the two powers that served as fuel to the guardian at the time.

The red Cure could not even breathe when the enemy attack hit the shield. The dome was forced down, the ground below getting smashed in like it was no more than wet cardboard. And yet, Nozomi stood proud and strong in face of this danger. When the smoke lifted, the petals returned to Nozomi's body, forming the living armor again. If she was exhausted from protecting Rin, she certainly wasn't showing it. Rin only now noticed that Nozomi was looking quite different. She was taller than before, about a head more, her eyes were glowing in red, right, and blue, left. Her hair was shorter than before, no longer than that of Black or Bloom and, it too, was glowing in a fierce pink.

Rin couldn't see where the attack had come from and she didn't have time to catch her breath either. Nozomi picked her up in a hurry and started running. The speed at which they moved made Rin question just how superhuman that guardian mode would be at full power. Nozomi completely ignored roots and walls, smashing through everything in front of her with continuous energy blasts emerging from her free hand.

"Dream!" The roar came from the distance and it still made Rin shudder. Nightmare's voice was like a distorted version of Nozomi's as this point. Darker, deeper, consumed by hatred and the desire to destroy.

Rin couldn't comprehend fully what happened but from one moment to another, they had stopped in a halfway collapsed room, and there was someone else with them, Luminous. "Are you okay?"

"Thank you for saving me... you're... Dream, right?" Hikari was lightly bleeding from her temple and exhausted. She wasn't made or trained for endurance fights

"I'm Dream, in a way. Do you think you could listen to me for a moment, Luminous?" From the look in her eyes, Nozomi could tell that the girl was really desperate for a solution to the mess they were all in. And she was willing to take chances. "One of my abilities is to use an immensely powerful guardian mode. But I can't access the source of power I need from here. So I need to borrow a bit of your energy. I'll just have to kiss the back of your hand and you'll feel a bit more tired than now."

"You're going to do this with everyone and fight Nightmare, aren't you?" Hikari didn't wait for an answer, time being of essence, and simply held out her hand. She felt a little embarrassed when Nozomi really did it. As former Queen of Light, Hikari could tell what she was doing. A contract of borrowing power. Similar to her special ability but different. At a later time, Dream would have to repay what she had taken. Hopefully she didn't have to pay it all at once...

Both the intensity of the glow and the number itself of the petals increased when Rose Dream took in Luminous energy sphere. "You two hide. It's too dangerous and I can't keep pulling everyone with me. Nightmare will have her hands full trying to prevent me from reaching the same level of power as she does, so you'll be safe if you hide." Getting up and about to rush out, Rin quickly grabbed Nozomi's wrist, holding her back. "Rin?"

"Come back to all of us. We still need you."

"I wasn't intending to die. It might happen... this isn't just your average fight Rin. I'll try my best to come back alive." Just as the red Cure let go of her friend, Rose Dream vanished, leaving behind a gust of wind that made both Luminous' and Rouge's hair flutter.

=== Dissonance ===

"Marble Screw... Extreme!" Four massive beams of energy burst through the corridor, breaking through a solid wall of thorns and roots, Black and White leading a small group of three in fighting condition and two wounded. Sunshine was carrying both Beat and Passion, each unable to move quickly enough on their own. Thankfully she had mastered the skill of creating shields without having to use physical movement, so carrying them didn't prevent her from defending herself.

"Sunflower Aegis Helianthus!" Five dual layered circular golden shields protected their back, moving with Sunshine as one. "This is getting really straining. Where are we going?"

"As far away from the base as we can for now! There is too much chaos to look for anyone in this! Whitelight Burst!" An explosion extending from Honoka's right hand, she destroyed a sturdy wall to allow them passage. "Nagisa!"

"Blacklight Crash!" Building up energy in both of her fists instantly, Nagisa rammed them together, multiple nearly invisible shock waves causing the hallway behind them to collapse completely.

Taking a quick look around, the three judged it safe. The room was closed in every direction and there were no signs of roots penetrating the walls, at least for now. Letting Beat and Passion down, Honoka quickly tended to their wounds, using cloth from her own skirt and sleeves to bandage them. Passion was still conscious but couldn't walk or fight. "How is Ellen?"

"She's unconscious but I stopped the bleeding. It's not as bad as I thought, so there shouldn't even be a scar after it heals." Tying a large piece of cloth around Passion's leg, the red Cure flinched in pain. "Sorry but we don't have anything to dull the pain. You'll have to bear it for now."

"This is nothing compared to what I suffered when I went against Moebius." A few seconds passed before Setsuna realized that she was talking to someone from an older generation of Cures. "Right... you don't know who that is. How silly of me..."

"Save your strength. If push comes to shove, you will need every little bit of it."

"Black, White. What do we do now? We got separated from everyone else and fighting against the roots is entirely pointless. We might as well try to swallow an ocean."

"We'll hole up here for a while and hopefully Passion and Beat recover a little. I want to find others as well, but... sending anyone out there would only make things worse."

Sitting down, leaning against a broken pillar fragment, Itsuki lamented that she didn't train her offensive capabilities more. She was a well-balanced fighter with strong one-versus-one skills, but they were all but pointless in a scenario like this. Black and White seemed more capable in having a more varied skill set. "How long have you two been Cures?" Itsuki didn't think it was a rude question and having a little conversation would help to distract from the cruel situation.

Honoka was surprised to her that question now of all times. While checking on Nagisa for any wounds, she nonchalantly explained. "For about six years and some. I think with the exception of Moonlight, we're also the oldest here."

"It's been four years for me and the others on my team. It's obvious that you two trained a lot in these six years. Why? Did you expect another enemy?"

"Cure powers can be used for many things other than fighting evil that threatens the world. Nagisa once saved a little girl from being run over by truck. Another time she helped stop a robbery. I usually use my power to help me out in research that might become dangerous. And again, other times you unexpectedly find a use for them. Like now." Holding out her hand, Honoka created a floating white sphere of light that bathed the room in it's gentle shine. "What about you?"

"Honestly, a lot of my training came from work. I lead a dojo so I need to be strong. Improving my cure powers... well, that decision wasn't actually made by me. Marine came up to us some time after Dune was vanquished and said that there was no way to tell if there isn't something else lurking out there. There were also the incidents with Bottom and Black Hole."

"You're going out with Melody, right? What's that like, being with a Cure from another team?" Nagisa was pinched in the arm by her partner, a sour reminder that the whole event with Saki and Mai was not forgotten after all.

"Not any different than dating someone from my team I'd guess. I don't know, I never really dated before."

"Seriously? You're pretty good looking so I was sure you'd have dated some." Nagisa cracked an awkward smile, realizing that the only person she had ever dated was Honoka.

"I know you two are together, but how serious are you?" Itsuki quickly changed the topic, being really uncomfortable with the idea of talking about why she didn't date. It was bizarre to talk about that while all around them was chaos and disaster. But it kept their minds occupied.

"Nagisa proposed to me a few months ago. We can't get married in japan so I've been looking into which countries allow you to get married without being a legal citizen there. Of course, I said yes."

Itsuki fiercely blushed while Honoka talked about marriage to her partner as if it was the most normal thing in the world. "Wow... I'm kind of impressed."

"How serious are you about Melody then?" Honoka finished looking after Nagisa and rested her head against the black Cure's shoulder, relieved to have found nothing wrong.

"I... don't know. I really love her and I don't want her to go anywhere, but we live pretty far away from each other in the real world. I don't think I could easily move because of my work and my friends but the same is likely true for Hibiki. I... didn't really think about this before. Makes me kind of depressed."

"If you really love each other, you'll find a way." Nagisa held her thumb up to show her support for Sunshine. "I think you two make a great couple. A little hyper active but still a great couple."

"Thanks. I didn't expect to find someone I like in here of all places. And I think I'm not the only one."

"Isn't it too quiet?" Setsuna was following the conversation but she had paid great attention to her surroundings as well. The noise of roots crashing against walls and breaking through solid stone had completely vanished.

All four of them got caught off guard when an enormous energy blast pierced through one of the walls, obliterating it, sending stone fragments flying everywhere. Nagisa detected something moving through the dust cloud and jumped right at it, not waiting for any surprise attacks from inside the dirty cover. "Blacklight Devastation!"

Shock was written all over Nagisa's face when her fist was stopped instantly and the energy went right through whatever target she had hit, all to no effect. "Stop it, Black. It's me, Dream."

Stepping out of the smoke screen, completely unscathed from stopping Black's special move, Nozomi turned around and sent several bolts of raw energy flying against the wall, collapsing most of it, closing the hole she had made. "Five, including Aqua, six." The others only noticed now that a blue Cure was being carried by the pink one.

"What happened to you?" Honoka was the first to notice just how different from usual she looked.

"I'm using an ability that turns me into the world guardian of the Rose Garden, a sacred fairy place. I'm far from using it at full power right now. That's why I was looking for you, for others." Laying the unconscious Karen down, she had already borrowed energy from her friend, Nozomi turned to the other four.

"Nightmare is still much stronger than me so I will need to borrow some of your strength. All it takes is your approval and a hand kiss from me for that. You'll feel tired but there won't be any long term side effects for you."

"Have you been doing this with everyone you met?" Nagisa was a little iffy on the whole deal but she didn't see how anyone else could possibly fight off the roots and then still muster the strength to beat Nightmare.

"Rouge, Luminous, Pine, Berry and Aqua have already lent me some of their power. Please let me borrow yours as well."

"We don't have much of a choice, do we?" It was terrifyingly obvious to Itsuki that both Nightmare and Dream were monsters comparable to the infinite silhouette. Her best, their best and only bet, was to support Dream as much as she could.

"If Hikari trusted you, so will we. Isn't that right Honoka?" Nagisa practically made the decision for her partner but there was no objection at all.

Setsuna was the last to speak up. "I'm sure Ellen won't mind. Neither do I. Just stop Nightmare before it's too late."

"I have no intention of letting that monstrosity run free." Going around and forming the contract with everyone, Nozomi finally reached the next level of power. With the tenth contract complete, borrowing power from the unconscious Beat, Nozomi's appearance changed again. The petals had increased so much that they formed a long cape on her back now.

"Rose Rosary!" Holding out her hand, Nozomi created a single edged sword like object, appearing to be solid but still constantly shifting. It fell to pieces, the petals returning to her body, after a few seconds. "Still not enough... but being capable of flight should really help." Not moving her feet at all, Rose Dream slowly ascended into the air.

Honoka was hard to frighten but she couldn't help but be a little scared of Dream as she witnessed her amass energy in her right hand and shoot it at the ground, the energy dispersing on impact and sticking to all four walls, the ground and the ceiling. "Cage of Roses. This will protect you from the roots. Stay here. No matter what happens, don't leave this room."

"You sound like this whole place is going to be demolished." The yellow Cure wasn't pleased by that potential prospect.

"Possibly,yes. A fight between two guardians... I can't even imagine what will happen." Nozomi didn't even bother to use an energy attack and instead simply punched a hole into the wall as if it was the most ordinary thing in the world.

"Wait!" Honoka still had something to say to the girl that was their only hope of beating that monster, Nightmare.

Turning around, floating in mid-air, Nozomi was in a hurry to find the others, completing the needed contracts and becoming able to fight eye to eye with her copy.

"Good luck."

=== Dissonance ===

"Where the hell are we? I can't see a thing. Whose ass is this?" Fumbling around in the dark, Urara lamented that the wild escape had ended in some pitch black hole in the middle of nowhere.

"Stop groping." Kurumi slapped Urara's hand away and started to feel her surroundings as well. "It looks like we got trapped by a cave in. I can't hear the noise of the attack anymore."

"Who else is down here with us?"

"Me, Peach." The voice came from Urara's right.

"I got dust in my eye." This one from behind Kurumi.

"Is that Marine?" Trying to move her legs, Urara noticed that it was impossible. She was stuck, half buried in stone.

"Yeah. And unless I'm groping one of you guys, there is someone else that isn't saying anything." Erika wasn't embarrassed in the least to say that.

"Someone make some light." Love could feel stinging pain from her right arm and her memory was highly fuzzy.

Marine was the quickest to oblige, creating a small floating sphere of blue energy, just enough to bathe their small prison in a warm light. "It's Mint. She's out cold. And really pale."

"Check her pulse." Urara was instantly worried about her teammate. They weren't really good friends anymore, but she still cared about her.

"How do I... right, here." Closing her eyes and counting for a few seconds, Erika sighed. "It's pretty weak. She must be injured. Her right arm is buried beneath rocks so that could be it."

"Looking at my legs, I'm not gonna be able to go anywhere, even if I get free. What about you three?" Taking charge of the situation, the yellow Cure had to make an assessment of the situation first.

"Not stuck but... if I move, the whole thing could cave in." Kurumi realized that her body was just enough to prevent a literal avalanche of rocks, crushing them all.

"We don't have trouble breathing, so there has to be enough space for air to get through. My right arm is completely stuck under rocks. I can't even get up." Love had felt the pressure on her limb for a while now but she hadn't been sure what exactly it was.

"I'm fine." Erika turned around and faced Kurumi, who went as pale as a ghost the instant she saw Erika's face.

"You're not fine. Your entire face is covered in blood. Do you feel lightheaded?"

"Huh? What are you saying? I didn't get-" From one moment to another, Erika simply fell flat on her face, not moving a muscle.

Urara was close enough to get a hold of Marine's boot, pulling her closer, feeling her pulse. "Probably a concussion and shock because her pulse is pretty normal. She's not dying."

The energy sphere that Marine had created died out a second after Urara finished checking on the blue Cure. Creating a few chains, she tried to stabilize the room they had. The chains giving off light did help out a lot.

"Kurumi, can you move? You need to get Peach out. If her arm isn't broken, she'll be able to help you get us out of here."

"I can feel my fingers, so I don't think it's broken." Love tried to move up a little but her arm was buried right up to her shoulder below all the rubble.

"Watch out!" Urara ignored the burning pain in her legs as she forced herself up, increasing her range. The collapsed ceiling above Kurumi was coming down due to an error in how she had placed her chains. "Iron Maiden!" Expending most of her remaining energy, Urara created a small dome above everyone. She wouldn't be able to keep it up for long, considering that the she was preventing tons of stone from crashing down on them.

"Lemonade! Are you okay?" Love couldn't see her face very well but she could feel dust and smaller rocks passing through the otherwise impenetrable net of golden chains.

"I'm not. Dammit, I won't be able to keep this up for long. Milk! Get Peach free, take the others and get ready to blast our fucking way out of here!" Barking her orders, Urara flinched again, the pain in her legs getting almost too much for her to handle.

Jumping up, noticing a burning sensation all over her back, Rose created a small energy shield above Peach and in front of herself. "Titanium Shatter!" A dozen silvery spikes shot out from the purple Cure's right hand, piercing the rocks and shattering them from the inside. "Titanium Shatter!" Not designed to remove rubble, she needed to use her ability a third and fourth time before Peach managed to pull her arm out.

Not wasting a moment, Love grabbed Erika, throwing the girl over her shoulder so she had her right arm free, and picking up Mint as well. "Hurry the hell up Kurumi! This shit is going to come down any second now!"

"I can only get us out of here by using Abaddon, but at this range... it won't go through fast enough before the backlash of the fragments tears us to pieces!"

"Think of something dammit! I'm hitting my limit here!" Urara ached under the burden of keeping the room from breaking in. "Looks... like I'm seriously at my limit. This isn't funny!" One after another, chains started to vanish, letting rocks fall in.

Out of Kurumi's control, her body moved on it's own, the blue rose brooch on her chest glowing brightly. Tackling Peach, all five of them landed in one spot. "Adamantine Wall!"

The several meter thick, nearly indestructible shield was created not a moment too slow. Love could feel an enormous, inexplicably powerful energy rush closer. One second, chills went down her spine. The next, the heat from the energy mass passing through the tons of stone and completely vanquishing it almost made her faint. Her skin was hurting from the sheer hotness and looking up, parts of Rose's Adamantine Shield were melting.

"Are you alright down there?! Kurumi, you're there, aren't you?"

"Dream?!" The purple Cure couldn't believe her eyes. She was the sole bearer of the blue Rose and pretty powerful, but the form and power Dream was visibly wielding was beyond anything she had imagined, especially after she had to share the red rose with all the others. "What happened to... you're using the guardian mode?!"

"I only found you because I felt the blue rose that gives you your Cure powers. I used that same connection to make you put up as strong a barrier as you could." Slowly floating down the massive hole she had just blasted open, Nozomi saw the chain fragment flying towards her head and caught it with her hands. "That's quite the way to say thanks, Urara."

"You almost roasted us. You started to melt Kurumi's shield. Do you know the melting point of this stuff you crazy woman?"

"You can lecture me all you want later. But first, I need to ask all of you something."

=== Dissonance ===

"You're using something that is not related to us being Cures, isn't that so, Cure Dream?" Kaoru literally just finished patching up her sister and Saki, going straight to the point. "You want something from us other than just our safety. That's why you're here and not off fighting Nightmare."

"You're right. I need to borrow some of your strength."

"I refuse." Michiru didn't like the idea of making possibly shady deals with someone she didn't know.

"Don't be hasty, Michiru. Let's hear what she has to say." Calming down her sister, the blue Cure stared at the abnormal girl that had shown up in front of them. Dream was so far removed from human by now that she didn't feel like one at all. If anything, being in her presence was a painful remainder of what it had felt like to stand against Dark Fall. She was in the process of becoming something of equal or even superior power.

Her whole outfit resembled medieval knight armor more than anything else she knew. Petals formed sturdy knight boots and short greaves, thick gauntlets, a protective chest piece that covered everything from waist to shoulders as well as some sort of crown in her hair and a cape on her back. There was a difficult to see constant whirl of petals around her hands and ankles.

"It's a simple process of loaning power from Cures. Originally, it was likely only intended to be used with Cures that received their power directly from the Rose Garden and it was used to summon a guardian entity. I merged the Guardian entity of the Rose Garden with my Cure powers when I was the caretaker of the Rose Garden." With those obstinate sisters, there was no way she would be able to cut the explanation short. And she needed every bit of power she could get while Nightmare was just trashing the place.

"So you're... not human anymore? You're kind of like the Infinite Silhouette now!" Tsubomi was there as well, helping Kaoru with first aid. She didn't have enough energy reserves to constantly heal people, but she could dull or remove the pain of wounds.

"I... never thought about that. And I don't know what the Infinite Silhouette is." Dream was a little confused by Tsubomi's sudden mention of some kind of entity.

"The Infinite Silhouette is-" Tsubomi was glared at by Kaoru, who wanted to hear the details of Dream's loan.

"Continue with your explanation."

"I will be taking part of your power as Cure for now and that fuels my strength as the Rose Guardian. When I return to just being Dream, I will have to repay the energy that I loaned. Usually, the Rose Garden does this, but since we're cut off from it, I will have to do it."

"You've loaned from multiple people already, haven't you. No matter how strong you are, Dream, you will die if you have to repay them all at once."

"Do you see another option? This is the only way someone can fight on equal footing with Nightmare. You know that-" Nozomi was cut off mid sentence by Saki, who was just coming to.

"Don't be... ridiculous. You're gonna die? What... way of doing things... is that?"

Saying nothing, Nozomi just stood there, unable to reject Saki's argument. It was true, she didn't want to die if possible. But without the Rose Garden and unwilling to fully absorb the others like Nightmare did, this was the only way.

"What if the person who lent you the power does not exist at the time of repayment?" Kaoru was good with technicalities and especially with finding loopholes in contracts.

"I... don't know. If there is no recipient, the contract would just stall."

"So we just have to turn into civilians before you stop being the guardian. And one by one, you can repay everyone over time." Kaoru was satisfied with this kind of explanation. She wouldn't have approved of anything that permanently diminished Saki's power or her own, but a temporal loan was fine. Even if it took time for her power to return. "How do we establish this loan? This ability belongs to a fairy entity, so it should be quite silly."

"The contract is established by a kiss. However, a hand kiss or on the cheek should suffice. I went with a chivalrous hand kiss so far."

"Then that is fine. Does anyone have objections?"

"Why don't you try to knock out Nightmare with Stormflair, Kaoru?" Michiru still wasn't eager to try this out.

"Are you looking at Dream? Nightmare is even more powerful than that. She'd mincemeat us all long before I get close enough. Even then... that would be equal to trying to take out Dark Fall."

"Dark Fall? You can't be serious, sis. She looks strong, but we're talking about a whole dimension here."

"Does it really matter? Michiru, trust her." Grabbing her friends hand, Saki needed no more than that to make the redhead give in.

"Don't blame me for what happens later." Michiru sighed but agreed.

=== Dissonance ===

Everything was in pieces, shredded by the innumerable roots that had wrecked the construct in the void. Everyone was hiding in fear of the monster that was sitting somewhere deep in the guts of this fortress they were now spending their days in.

The roots no longer moved, laying dormant or dead, Nozomi couldn't tell which one it was. Her posture was more grand than ever, the petals cladding her in the full body armor of the guardian, a knight of good and protection. It was her duty to fight Nightmare, to destroy her fully and completely. This bad dream would never end until she accomplished that. She had made twenty and three contracts, with everyone but Moonlight. She was as ready as she could possibly be. And she was still scared. She was still afraid. For she had never even once before faced a foe that knew her every secret, knew her every thought. One that could do all she did, one that was an evil of her own making. The Nightmare she had created herself.

Only one enemy had ever come close to this and that was the creation of Shadow, Dark Dream. Back then, she had won by not fighting to kill but that was not an option here. Nightmare was nothing like Dark Dream.

Two spinning rings around her wrists and ankles, her face half hidden behind a mask and still letting her see more than she could ever before as human. It was a confusing feeling, to be so far removed from normalcy. Even if she was cut now, she wouldn't bleed easily. Even if her flesh was torn, she wouldn't lose control of her arm. But it was a double edged sword. Every second she spent as the guardian was worth ten as human. She was burning through her own life force to sustain this ability. That's why it shouldn't be used unless it was the only choice.

Arriving at a monstrous convulsion of roots and thorns, clogging the entrance to what appeared to be a massive hole amidst the labyrinth's hallways and corridors, she stopped. Nightmare was beyond there, she could feel it. As soon as she stepped past this, she would cease to be Dream and become the guardian fully and completely until she had settled things.

"Roses of Elimination!" Using her full power from the get go, Dream unleashed a furious energy burst that dwarfed her own glow, destroying not only the roots but the walls several meters away, melting the stone down with ease.

She didn't even have time to look at what was behind the thorns. Nightmare rushed through the energy blast itself, ignoring any potential damage the energy could do to her. Her form was similar to that of her origin, but her's was pitch black instead of pink, countless dark petals floating around her waist and arms. "Blacklight Devastation!"

Hitting a solid ten layer barrier of pink energy, Nightmare didn't bother to even care about the backlash of her initial attack. "Judgment Sun Impact!" Using Sunshine's, or rather Flare's, ability next, Nightmare smashed right through eight of the barriers, having her arm grabbed by Dream.

"Adamantine Press!" Dream didn't flinch when small bone fragments, blood and tissue flew towards her face, only to be deflected by dozens of petals. Breaking Nightmare's arm right in half was supposed to put pressure on the reflection but nothing of the sort happened.

Ignoring the dangling mess that her arm had become, she switched to a different ability. "Hyper Impact!" Bright's ability! Dream couldn't defend herself in time, the blow reaching the petals on her stomach. Most of the force was deflected to the side but she was still smashed into the ground hard enough to break apart over ten meters width of the floor. "Iron Maiden!" Summoning countless golden chains, Nightmare tied up Dream. "Whitelight-"

"Clear Zone!" Destroying the chains with Mint's ability in less than an instant of being captured, Dream took the chance to counter. "Whitelight-"

"Illumination!" Both of them finished their attack at the precisely same moment, the energy pillars clashing between them. Dream didn't hesitate to jump through the energy, the sizzling sound of some of her hair being burned not disrupting her concentration at all. "Storm-"

"Crux of Thorns!" Nightmare had been ready, just waiting for her to charge through. Four spheres of black petals instantly moved to Dream, swallowing up wrists and ankles, quickly rotating the pink guardian in mid-air and then bouncing from wall to wall, inflicting major damage to her armor.

With an unintelligible outcry, Dream broke free, small drops of blood flowing from where the petals had penetrated her armor, a normal being or Cure certainly would have lost part of her limbs. "Wings of Heaven!" Jetting around the air, invisible to the naked eye, only dust clouds at the walls showing signs of her movement, Nightmare wrapped herself into a ten layer barrier of dark energy.

"Abaddon!" Instead of using a single front to summon the countless fragments, Dream moved around Nightmare in a circle, the fragments creating a nearly solid wall of absolute death and sharpness. And with a click of her fingers, only barely audible beyond the noise of rocks still falling and the gusts of wind created by the guardians movement, the shards starting homing in on Nightmare. And yet Dream did not stop circling, creating more and more, an infinite onslaught designed to tear anything and everything to pieces.

"Explosive Beat!" Blue notes sprung up instantly all around Nightmare, each colliding with a fragment from Abaddon upon creation, exploding, the shard vanquished. A stalemate of onslaught and explosive defense. "Is that all you've got? Is it, huh, Dream?!" Shouting and roaring, Nightmare went on the counter attack. "Hell! Restoration!"

From one instant to the next, the air was burning up, the temperature so high that the oxygen in the air itself ignited, creating a sphere of flames capable of melting anything right around the dark guardian. The spread of notes stopped right there, the fragments of Abaddon incapable of penetrating the wall of absurd heat. In all of that, her arm was healing at an absurd rate. Bone was mending, cells splitting and creating tissue, veins reconnecting as if they were being sewn together.

"Glory Shaker!" Creating a set of ultrasonic vibrations in the air, the area around them fell to pieces like glass. The ceiling as well as the floor broke apart, leaving them in a wide open, dusty space. "Mirage!" Becoming invisible, Dream dove down into the labyrinth, knowing that Nightmare wouldn't be able to pinpoint her exact location.

"Running away already?!" Following her original, wrapped into the sphere of immeasurable heat, Nightmare wasn't short on methods to sniff out Dream. "Glory Breaker!" This time, the shock waves disrupted the flow of the air, revealing the invisible Dream in front of a solid wall, unmoving. "Blacklight Destruction!" The flames ceasing the instant she attacked, the invisibly stopped as well, revealing a shocked Dream in front of the wall.

The feeling of blood and guts satisfied Nightmare, knowing that it would take quite the effort to heal a wound like that. Clenching her fist around what she thought was her stomach, Nightmare crushed one organ after another while Dream screamed out in pain. Something was wrong. It was too easy.

"Blacklight Devastation! Full moon Destruction!" Using one ability with each hand, a second Dream appeared from behind Nightmare, leaving the invisibility. Most of Nightmare's available petals instantly moved to the impact zone but she couldn't deflect the blows entirely. The clashing forces were enough to cause gusts of wind strong enough to rip tree's right out of the ground.

"Wings of Heaven!" Nightmare escaped the rising damage with speed, concentrating her entire power into it. Using the petal armor to create a singular large shield in front of her, she broke straight through a thick wall, trying to put distance between herself and her enemy.

"Spade Impact!" Dream had caught up in an instant, not bothering with a shield and instead boosting her own speed even further. Hitting Nightmare's chest, the petal absorbed the blow but she was still thrown off her track. "Diamond Knuckle!" Burying her hand in the black petals, every single one trying to cut her hand to pieces, the yellow spikes functioned like an anchor, preventing Nightmare from escaping.

Going at breakneck speed, Dream smashed through multiple walls per second, their speed so high that Nightmare didn't even get to breathe in-between impacts, her petal armor working at maximum capacity to minimize the damage from the continuous impacts. Broken through hundreds of walls in a matter of seconds, Nozomi changed directions and went straight up. "Full Moon Destruction!" Unleashing the move at point blank range, Nightmare was thrown into the air, destroying ceiling after ceiling. "Abaddon!" Firing the deadly shard attack again, Nozomi didn't pay any attention to control and aim, solely focusing on numbers and power. A spreading cylinder shaped path of destruction followed Nightmare.

"Blacklight Devastation!" Appearing right behind Dream, Nightmare knew how to utilize Copy Cat as well. Hitting her better half brutally in the back, a massive wall fell to pieces when the rose guardian crashed through it. Jumping right after her, Nightmare attacked again, only to be met with a counter of the same kind. "Eternal Blooming Assault!"Their barrage of punches collided between them, each hit only lasting a fragment of a second, their arms moving so fast that they weren't visible for anyone but themselves. The petals creating spikes, shields and barriers each time, shifting in nanoseconds to support their owner.

"Spade Implosion!" Changing her tactics, Nightmare landed a clean hit on Nozomi's right arm. A shock wave created by the petal armor deflecting most of the blow blew dust in the dark guardians eye. No such chance would be left unused. "Mirage!" Making herself invisible, Nightmare instantly vanished from Dream's field of vision.

"No escape. Azure Trace! Iron Maiden! Fierce Overheat!" Overreaching herself and feeling the strain of the battle for the first time, Dream countered with a lethal combination attack. An infinite amounts of golden chains started to spawn immediately in thin air, targeting the invisible Nightmare, who was being marked by one of Windy's abilities. Dozens of chains rushed through the air, trying to tie the enemy down, missing by only inches, slowly getting faster and more accurate. Directing them from the distance, Nozomi would not let a chance like this pass. And finally, Nightmare's leg got caught by one of the chains. Over a dozen more quickly wrapped themselves all over her body, fighting with the petal armor for survival. And at that moment, Rouge's ability kicked in. The chains lit up in flames, setting Nightmare wild ablaze, the stench of burning hair far reaching through the labyrinth.

"Clear Zone!" Freeing herself from all three abilities at once, Nightmare had taken slight damage from that attack, several small burns on her face, a bit of her energy exhausted. She knew that this battle would be a long one for their armor made both of them nearly invincible until their energy ran out. "Azure Trace! Abaddon!" Copying Dream's idea without any hesitation, a tremendous amount of metal fragments raced towards her enemies location. Continuing to spawn and fire the fragments, the trace automatically adjusted the trajectory for Abaddon as she kept it up.

"Diamond Flash!" Moving in virtually instantaneous straight jumps around the place, every location she hit was destroyed just a second later by Nightmare's deadly barrage. Using Bright and Blooms enormous power to her advantage, Dream stopped for a moment and ripped an enormous pillar, easily a hundred times her size in length, out of the ground and threw it towards her attacker.

"Full Moon Destruction!" Smashing the object to pieces, the dark guardian had already anticipated the next move of her adversary. "One more! Full Moon Destruction!"

The monstrous punch connected directly with Dream's armor in the chest area. Bearing the impact instead of deflecting and side-stepping it, Nozomi grabbed the copy by her long hair and slammed her face into her knee twice before she flipped her over in mid-air. "Rose Banishment..." Twelve roses, six red, six blue, appeared all around the briefly defenseless Nightmare. "...Rosary!" At her command, the twelve roses fired energy beams all towards the targeted point, their creators enemy.

"Palace of Thorns!" Wrapping herself into a thick cocoon of dark rose roots, the energy beams didn't stop. It was a continuous attack that would not stop until whatever was at the target origin was successfully destroyed. Moving the cocoon while constantly regenerating it, Nightmare tried to sense Dream but lost her. "Wings of Heaven!" Moving again at breakneck speed, the Rosary Roses still followed her, constantly targeting and firing at her. Passing through a narrow labyrinth passage, Nightmare found herself in an ambush.

"Clear Zone!" Letting her enemy rush straight into the ability nullifying zone, Dream attempted to grab her enemy but was tricked. Several thick roots wrapped themselves around her legs, persisting inside the zone, bypassing Mint's ability to negate other special abilities. Similar to Lemonade, Nightmare flailed her origin around, smashing her lightning fast into the walls, ground, ceiling, everywhere she saw even the slightest resistance. "Palace of Thorns! Step of Aegis!"

Creating a cage of thorns, Nightmare also vastly increased her reaction speed, the thorn whip and Dream blurring into a black and pink whirl as they got thrown around wildly. Each impact took it's toll on Nozomi's armor, the enormous speed making it near impossible to determine where specifically Nightmare was. In that case, she didn't have many options.

"Adamant Press!" Using the attack to cover her arms and hands in the supposedly indestructible metal, she locked herself on the next wall, sticking to it like a spider. The thorn whip wasn't sturdy enough to withstand Nightmare's enormous pulling power and Dream's resistance. "Flare Eleven!" Creating several red spheres, each the size of a head, around herself, Nozomi instantly vanished from her spot and appeared at one of the spheres, shooting it so strongly that the orb vanished and only reappeared as it bounced off one of the lower thorn walls, leaving the roots burning. Firing the next ten shots within two seconds, the cage Nightmare had created became a liability and danger zone for herself.

The thorns vanished a second after, the spheres dispersing into the vast emptiness around them. Nightmare was nowhere to be seen and Nozomi had trouble locating her. She should have put another tracer on her, but it would be difficult to use that combination again. Clear Zone, even if enabled only briefly, would clear the mark away.

Without any announcement of attack or ability, Nightmare smashed her fists into Dream's back, the petal armor shielding her from the blow and the damage yet the impact still throwing her off her balance, sending her flying through the air. "Mirage Silhouette!" Five dozen Nightmare's were now surrounding Dream, all but one of them fake. "Stars of the North!" Each and every single one of them created several light orbs that started firing indiscriminately at Dream's rough location. The entire space between herself and Nightmare was filled with energy bolts.

"Invincible Rhythm & Melody!" Creating a iridescent sphere around herself, the bolts were unable to penetrate the shield, harmlessly puffing into thin air. A combination buff that granted temporary limitless defense but sealed offensive abilities. They were not quite even in terms of offense, but she could keep up with Nightmare.

"Diamond Flash! Wings of Heaven!" Boosting her speed to the physical limit of her new form, Dream vanished, heading deeper into the labyrinth, into areas that had been sealed off if not for Nightmare's radical restructuring. The black guardian, using the same abilities, was right on her track, both of them no longer counting on flying, knowing that crashing into a falling pillar or the ceiling would be a catastrophe at this speed.

Running in parallel tracks it had now become a high speed battle. Both of them moved so fast that they were completely invisible to the naked eye, leaving a blur of their signature color behind, trashing the ground and walls with ease thanks to their petal armor. Nightmare opened fire first. "Iron Maiden!"

The first gold chain appeared right in front of her. Instead of avoiding it, Nozomi grit her teeth, clenched her fist, let herself get caught and ripped the chain straight out of the ceiling, pulling it with her. Jumping over the next chain and deflecting a dozen more with just her armor, that one lonely chain on her right arm would be useful yet. "Fierce Overheat!" Leaving a trail of flames and magma as she ran, the chain was an immense distraction for Nightmare. The space and air between her and her origin was blurry from the immense heat the chain was giving off. Canceling the Iron Maiden, Nightmare switched to a different approach.

"Glory Shaker! Explosive Beat!" Using the Suite Cure's abilities at a much higher level than their real counterparts could, Nightmare caused both an artificial earthquake as well as filled Dream's side of the corridor with explosive notes.

"Clear Zone! " The notes were purged from existence as the Zone moved with Nozomi, something Mint had trouble with. All of the abilities she could use were far stronger than as if they were being used by their originals. "Meltdown!" Throwing red energy blasts in front of Nightmare, every impact zone turned into a magma puddle, something that even their incredible petal armor would have trouble negating for long.

Avoiding each hole was more difficult than she thought. Dream kept rapid firing the otherwise exhausting and incomplete meltdown ability at her, and just falling into one of those holes would spell certain doom.

Side-stepping every single miniature crater, Nightmare launched her counter attack. "Marine Cross!" Manifesting sixteen small blue orbs around Dream, they all started to fire, haphazard and random, no pattern whatsoever to it. Each shot was a super high pressure water bullet, effortlessly penetrating walls. Deflecting several of the bullets, Nozomi canceled out the attack with Clear Zone once again.

"Glory..." Nightmare planned to simply crush her enemy below thousands of tons of rubble, collapsing the entire labyrinth around them. The energy she was amassing was quickly reaching dangerous levels. But Dream was right on par with her. Using the same ability, focusing as much power, they both finished the second they passed a set of pillars, obfuscating their view. "...Earth Shaker!"

The doubly released shock wave resonated and with a single powerful crunching sound, both of the guardians found themselves about a bottomless hole that stretched several kilometers below. Tens of tons of stone was falling down on them in large and small parts. Using each part as a stepping stone, Nozomi quickly ascended the falling death trap. Hitting a particularly thin but wide piece of wall, Nightmare's hand broke right through the ground, pulling Dream through the stone, getting her stuck.

Emitting a single energy blast and becoming free, she was already behind Nightmare. It was now a race to the top for neither of them could survive in the void that stretched far and wide below them. They had blasted a vertical hole through the entire complex, at least ten kilometers of destruction.

"Beat Heaven!" Creating several far reaching layers of blue notes all at once, Nightmare watched everything explode in a incredible chain reaction the second the first stone fragment hit lowermost layer. Rubble became dust becoming a cloud so thick that it was impossible to see anything in it. With her speed, Nozomi shot through it in a split second, suddenly face to face with Nightmare. A malicious grin on her face. Dream blocked the first blow by crossing her arms, deflecting subsequent hits with her arms and shields. Seeing a gap in the black guardians defense, she targeted her right leg. "Azure Sky splitter!"

A wind blade of unknown sharpness collided directly with the black petal armor, the contact sending sparks flying everywhere, blinding both of the combatants. Fed up with being on the defense, Nightmare canceled the shielding on her leg. The wind blade cut right through it. At the same time, in that same instant, Nightmare focused a tremendous amount of energy into her right fist. "Thorn Queen Punishment!"

Even with all her energy put into defense, she couldn't block or deflect that blow. The bones in her underarms shattering from the impact, Dream flew towards the bottom so quickly that Nightmare was in the middle of a super sonic boom a second later.

"Iron Maiden!" Using the ability to chain herself down, numerous chains broke from the far off walls, connected to fragments and from there, more chains spawned off to connect to her. A gigantic spider web of stone and chains, slowly halting her otherwise unstoppable fall.

The pain was bearable but a hindrance. If she had been human right then, she would have collapsed on the spot. "Restora-" The ability didn't go off in time. Looking above, she faced what looked like a solid plate of silvery metal falling on her. A second later, she could see that it was an incredibly wide scale Abaddon attack instead.

Nightmare watched the impact of the attack from above. She was missing a leg but the petal armor was preventing bleeding and loss of further tissue. It would be incredibly painful but she had to regenerate that leg with Ember's ability. "Restoration!"

The roar of the beast could be heard even kilometers away, the pain surging through her body so enormous that any other creature would have died on the spot. Forcibly creating bone, tissue, muscle, all from the memory of the body.

The leg re-attached, Nightmare instantly raised her guard. There was no way that Dream would have died to just that. This battle wasn't over yet for she could still sense her energy. And she quickly realized that Dream would not come up. Far down she could see a shimmering pink spark that quickly grew into a brilliant light and then into a blinding sphere.

Six blue and six red roses circling around her, all of them did the exact same thing, stored energy in the one enormous rose right in front of Nozomi. An attack so powerful that it could destroy an entire city in one blow. Nightmare wasn't going to be taken down easily so she had to get really serious now. "My bond with the Rose!"

"That bond I paid the price for!" Nightmare was starting to retaliate in the same way as her origin, numerous gigantic thorny rose roots were filling the space around her, a single, gigantic black rose growing steadily in size as the energy reached levels equal to that of a weapon of mass destruction.

"It shall last forever!" The petals on her armor were withering one after another. The toll on her body would be enormous as well once she completed the attack.

"Until my last breath is drawn!" The only ability and attack to require an actual incantation of some sort. The pledge, the price, time and life. The four principles behind the guardian.

The time was ripe. The labyrinth was covered in darkness, the two monsters engaged in a death match dwarfing all the construct in the void had seen. One enraged, vowing to annihilate all before her. The other burning with righteous fury, certain to protect those she loved.

"Divine Rose Prayer!"

"Divine Thorn Judgment!"

The energy masses were so great that they temporarily slowed down time, bending the space around them ever so slightly. They both could feel the energy leave her hands, could watch the rose slowly open it's bloom, spread it's petals, the energy mass inside taking the form of a single bolt of unseen proportions. Even though it happened in just an instant, for those that were there, it took several seconds for the roses to actually unleash their gigantic power, off to clash.

Nozomi was first to escape to the sides, using everything at her disposal to put as much distance between herself and Nightmare as well as the energy bolts as she could. She had about two seconds before they would collide. She had no idea what would happen then.

The ground under her feet was literally vaporized as she stepped on it, a blinding mix of pink and black light removing any sense of direction from her. She saw the blast coming but she did not have time to protect herself. Swallowed up by the extending sphere of ultimate disaster, the complex was shaken to it's roots, the destructive radius of Prayer meeting Judgment bigger than a nuclear explosions.

=== Dissonance ===

Emerging from a dust pile, Urara was still half deaf. From one moment to another, half the ceiling had been vaporized and even more of it came down as dust. "Anyone alive?" Screaming much louder than she needed to, she tried to get out of the enormous pile of dust, only to sink further in. Cursing in her mind, she shot a few chains upwards, finally hitting something.

Instead of pulling herself out, she got pulled out. Standing on a large stone fragment that had fallen down, Black had one of the golden chains wrapped around her right arm. "Are you okay?" She, too, was yelling because of the blast.

"Sans my mouth tasting like the inside of a goddamn vacuum cleaner, seems so!" Yelling back, the two noticed more survivors of whatever disaster had happened. Nobody had any doubts about what actually had happened. Dream and Nightmare clashed and annihilated a massive part of the structure. Looking to the side, Urara was, for the first time in many years, so awestruck that she couldn't move.

Before her was a massive emptiness, only disturbed and interrupted by enormous dust clouds slowly rising and moving. A spherical and extremely vast hole in the middle of the structure. The upper most level seemed still intact and so was the lower most, but everything in-between looked like someone had just plucked part of the world right out of it. She couldn't judge the size because of how enormous the distance was to the other side.

Honoka was less awestruck and instead frightened. Together with Nagisa, she had a lot of destructive prowess at her disposal but nothing that could compare to this. Guessing a rough estimate of the widest points, numbers that didn't make sense or at the very least shouldn't make sense came to mind. Nothing short of a massive nuclear explosion could be so destructive.

"Watch out!" Pulling her partner out of the way, Nagisa smashed a falling piece of stone with her bare fist. "What did this?"

"The only explanation that makes any sense... is that Nightmare and Dream caused this."

"What? But... are you serious, Honoka? Hey... you're trembling." Taking the white Cure into her arms, Nagisa was blissfully unaware that the frightened girl she embraced was happy that her partner didn't understand the significance of that hole.

"Hey, someone help me get the others out!" Urara yelled and pulled Bright out of the dust pile. On Dream's instructions, everyone started to move to a specific point, following a small pink rose that floated in front of them. The roots had died down but the danger of Nightmare showing up was still very real. Most of the Cures had met up just minutes before the sudden devastation of the construct.

"Love. I can't find Miki." Inori was happy to see everyone else alive. She wasn't entirely sure how it had happened though. Her short term memory prior to the blast was very fuzzy.

"I didn't see her before the ceiling was erased. Was she here?" Setsuna, being with Love, was taking care of Ellen, who she was still worried about.

"I could have mistaken her for Aqua...I can't really remember a lot of what happened in the last twenty or so minutes."

"This is terrible.. everyone was already beaten up and now this... did anyone get caught in the blast?" Love was trying to assess the situation but it was quite difficult. Everyone was confused, hurt and afraid. If something had the power to virtually erase so much space, how could they ever hope to win?

Shaking her head, she refused to even think about despair or giving up. Everyone had stood against great darkness before and prevailed. Why would this time be any different? They might be weak, compared, on their own, but they had so many allies here. If they worked together, surely they could find a way.

Marine was frantically running around, asking if someone had seen Moonlight or knew if the base had survived whatever had caused that enormous hole. Finding Melody and Itsuki a little to the side, having taken off their boots to get the fine dust out of them, there was still no sign of Moonlight or Blossom. "Are you doing okay Itsuki?" Unable to find Tsubomi in all the chaos, Erika sat down for a moment, talking to the only teammate she could find.

"I found Hibiki and she's okay, maybe except a few bruises. Did you find Tsubomi yet?" She wasn't too eager to make Erika leave, despite having been just reunited with her own lover.

"Not yet. I just hope she's not at the bottom of that big old pile of dirt." Sighing, Erika watched Aqua and Mint slowly and cautiously remove the dust by controlled use of their powers. Nobody had much energy to spare, especially not after making that contract with Dream. "I wonder if the battle is over."

"Hey, Marine. You wanted to know about the base, right? I just remembered vaguely which way we came before we hid, so... it should be... around there. Somewhere in that direction." Hibiki had thought about it for a while, but with the blast and everything going on, it wasn't easy to recall things like directions. She pointed a little away from the gigantic hole. "It should still be there. Dusty, but there." Sneezing from a small dust cloud that rose from the ground as she flipped over part of her skirt, Hibiki earned a quick laugh from her partner. "You need a shower."

"Says the dirty blonde." Hibiki's counter was so hilarious that Erika started laughing, drawing a bit of attention to herself.

"Everyone!" Erika was instantly on her feet when she heard that shout. She knew that voice better than anyone else. "Are you okay?!" Shouting down from at least thirty meters above them was Blossom, who looked very dirty and roughed up. "I have Berry and... two Moonlight's with me! Is everyone else down there!?" All the yelling exhausted her so Blossom vanished behind the stone for a moment, taking a breather.

"Tsubomi! Are you okay? Looks like we made it through! I love you!" Shouting back, Erika didn't even blush as she loudly announced her feelings for Tsubomi. To nobodies surprise, the pink Cure stayed hidden for almost a full minute before she showed her face again.

"Erika, you're stupid!" Her face was a fine match with her own costume. "I don't see a way to get down! What happened?!"

"We don't know yet! Just stay up there, we'll get you down somehow!" Erika shouted back, a little amused by Tsubomi blushing from just hearing a love declaration.

"Hey. Did anyone else see that?" Nagisa was pointing towards one of the lower points of the hole. A few others started looking but couldn't see anything. A few seconds passed and they started to lose interest. Then, a series of brief light flashes. "Don't tell me they're still at it..."

"They survived that?" Saki had gotten a hold of herself, having walked over to stand next to her old friend. "Just how stupidly strong are they?"

=== Dissonance ===

Both of them looked a little roughed up. Their armor protecting them from certain death after getting caught up in the immense explosion had suffered critical damage and was still in the process of repairing itself. Both of them saw that as the only chance to permanently get rid of each other.

Standing on top of a giant pile of rubble, Nightmare was bombarding Dream with a barrage of punches and kicks, everyone single one being blocked. A thin trickle of blood was running down her temple, the only direct sign of injury.

Briefly lowering her guard, Dream set a trap and Nightmare fell right into it. Slamming her foot in Nozomi's side, the rose guardian rammed her elbow down with as much power as she could possibly bring up. The sound of bones breaking and flesh being pierced by the fragments was overpowered by Nightmare's outcry of rage. Their senses of pain were still heavily diluted and dulled, preventing them from succumbing from just one or a dozen injuries.

Having lost her balance, the dark guardian countered by sinking all ten of her fingernails into Nozomi's neck. A single powerful kick from her enemy destroyed her chance of ripping apart her throat but she had still inflicted horrible damage.

Bleeding from several holes in her neck, Dream lost her focus on Nightmare for just a split second. That was enough for the demon to vanish, hiding herself below the immeasurable amount of rubble, tens or even hundreds of tons of stone. Standing on top of that was an enormous risk.

Jumping down, Nozomi used a lesser form of Blossom's ability to prevent herself from bleeding out. They could still easily use abilities, but it would delay the point of full armor restoration. If either of them made it there before the other, it was their win. Attacking without need to defend.

Hearing nothing but the noise of rubble still falling and breaking apart, she tried to sense her enemy's energy, with little success. Noticing a major change in the rocks behind her, Nozomi turned around and fired several energy bolts. What she was greeted with was nothing but surprised screams. "Too bad, wrong side." Emerging directly behind Dream, Nightmare put her right hand flat on Nozomi's back. "Thorn Stake!"

Spawning directly from Nightmare's hand came multiple thick rose roots, easily the size of an arm. Tying down Nozomi, it was not a binding spell, despite it appearances. Just as the pink guardian was about to use her own power to break of, the roots retracted, ripping apart skin and flesh all over her body, in every spot the armor did not cover. And that was not the end of it.

A singular brutal energy blast hit her back, throwing her in the air. Nightmare was reluctant on following up as she had just used too much energy and her armor was in a critical state. Dream dropped to the ground, gasping in pain, a first since they had started their final battle. Luckily, she had landed away quite a distance from Nightmare and had time to get herself up and restore the wounds.

Not too far away, in viewing distance, an enormous rock split in half almost magically, without anyone touching it. "Is everyone well?" Reika, wielding an enormous two-handed sword made of absurdly sturdy ice, emerged first, covered in dust and confused about her situation.

"Somehow I'm alive." Akane coughed and coughed, having breathed much more dust than it was healthy.

"What happened to us?" Yayoi couldn't see well and tried to clean her eyes of the fine stone mist that was now in the air.

"I can't remember a thing." Putting her right hand on her forehead, Nao sighed and got up. Seeing that Reika was fascinated by something, she slowly walked over to her.

"Help!" With a whiny tone, Miyuki tried to get out of her prison, a large rock that was holding her down.

"Wait a sec, I'll get ya outta there." Only realizing now that she was in her Cure form, Akane stared at her hands for a second. Her memory was too cloudy and it wasn't important at the moment. Simply giving the rock a gentle kick, it rolled over and released her friend. "There ya go."

"Thank you, Sunny. Eh, when did we transform?" Looking at herself in surprise, both Nao and Yayoi realized that they were in Cure form as well. Reika had not needed any such realization, instantly recognizing the difference in her body.

"Everyone, you should take a look at this." The large claymore changed shape, transforming into a set of two long swords, one in each of her hands. The expression on Beauty's face was half curiosity, half warning danger.

"What... what is going on? Did we take a wrong turn at the library?" Nao took a good look around, finding herself at the bottom of what looked like an incredibly enormous hole in the middle of some sort of building.

"That is a valid question but I was referring to the on-going combat in front of us." Pointing straight at twelve 'o clock, the other four at first couldn't see anything but patches of dust that rose up without any reason. Then they saw two flashes. "You need to focus on observing. They are moving at an incredible speed."

"Say March... can you move that fast?" Sunny was having trouble comprehending just what exactly was happening.

"Don't be ridiculous... I can't even see them half of the time... maybe running but fighting?"

"Beauty?" Peace looked around, only to realize that they were by no means anywhere close to Märchenland.

"I've seen a lot of places during my times overseas but nothing like this. Judging by the size of this construction, we would have to be several hundred if not thousand meters underground. I'm unaware of any facilities of this size."

"No, no, forget about where we are... who are they." Akane was still baffled by watching the flashes, occasionally catching a glimpse of two identical looking girls fighting each other.

"The closest rational explanation is that they are some kind of superhuman entity like we are."

"Don't call us entities!" Akane rejected that idea outright.

"We need to stop them." Miyuki couldn't follow them with just her eyes either but she knew that whatever was going on, they weren't fighting each other for fun. That was a duel of life and death.

"You're right. It doesn't look like they're pulling any punches. They need to stop before one of them gets seriously hurt."

"Usually I would agree with the two of you, but do you believe we will really be able to put a hold on them?" Tensing up, Beauty switched her dual wielding to a large shield. "Here they come!"

Taking a brutal hit to the face, Nightmare was launched into the air. Jumping after her and following up with a dropkick, the black guardian crashed into something hard enough that it withstood the impact of her fall. But whatever supported the structure wasn't. Collapsing backwards, Nightmare managed to prevent herself from rolling down the slope.

Raising from the rubble, the guardian found herself faced with a group of Cures she had never seen before. It was obvious that they were Cures. A uniform, the magical energy they possessed and then the fact that nobody else but Cures were brought to this place. Not even asking any questions, she made a quick decision, pulled up the pink Cure, going by the assumption that she was their leader. "Are you okay?" She could use them.

"Somehow... who are you?" Miyuki had tried to support Reika, trying to stop them all from falling over as the black clad woman was trashed against the shield.

"Cure Dream. But this is no time for explana-" Nightmare could not even finish that one line before Nozomi had caught up to her. Using the chance, she grabbed the arm of the deceitful fiend and hammered her own elbow in the backside of Nightmare's elbow. "Titanium Pick!" The impact broke apart Nightmare's elbow, completely severing the limb from the rest of her body, blood covering Nozomi's arm, bone fragments flying through the air.

Not a second passed before the two of them resumed their battle. Nightmare ran and Dream pursued. It wouldn't be long before they got back to their full strength now. Catching up to the copy, Nozomi managed to grab her hair, slowing Nightmare down just enough to get a hold of the back of her head and slamming her face first into the ground. It was a chance. "Megaton Impact!" Reinforcing her entire arm and most of her body with the heaviest metal in Milky Rose's arsenal, Dream slammed Nightmare's face into the ground a second time. The rubble mountain below them split apart from the impact of several dozens tons of pressure in a single hit.

Yayoi, having witnessed the first attack, was staring in shock at the blood and tissue shreds that littered the ground right in front of her. Unable to hold it in, she bend over and threw up everything she had eaten before. The image of Nightmare's arm breaking in half was vividly burned into her mind.

"Hey... did you just see that..." Akane had seen a lot of brutality in her days as Cure, but nothing on that level.

Nao was covering her mouth and turning away, trying to remain comparatively calm, with only mediocre success. Looking around, at Akane, Yayoi and Miyuki, she noticed that Reika was gone.

"Megaton-" Attempting a third attack on the now defenseless Nightmare, Nozomi had regained enough power to have her armor deflect the incoming attack. Several dozen icy arrows rushed at her, almost in slow motion. The battle between her and Nightmare took place on a level so different from regular Cure powers that the attack was no more than a distraction.

Beauty, still unsure which of the two was to be fought, decided that she could start by keeping at least one of them at bay, temporarily. She couldn't rely on the others too much when the battle was fought on blood and bones, for none of them had experience in that. "Judging by that attack, she has an extremely high level of physical strength. I should keep my distance. Glacial Road!" Creating a winded and snake-like road in the air above her, Beauty used that to keep moving even though she herself stood still. "I will need as much offense as I can gather. Glacial Arbalest!" Creating an enormous type of crossbow, the bolt was magically loaded.

The appearance of new Cures was so unexpected that Nozomi had never even thought about it. Worse yet, they seemed to think she was the bad guy. Regardless, she didn't have time to deal with them in one way or another. Nightmare had to be dealt with quickly, before the battle escalated again. A second Divine clash would likely destroy whatever was left of the place.

Nightmare, using the brief gap in Nozomi's attention for her, used her healthy arm to grab Nozomi's. "Fierce Overheat!" Setting Nozomi wild ablaze, the dark guardian quickly vanished inside the rubble pile, out of reach.

"Clear Zone!" Jumping up in the air and staying there, canceling the effect of the flames on her, Nozomi could tell that it would be less than thirty seconds now before they were both back at a similar power level to before. The frozen bolts that blue Cure was firing at her were a nuisance at best. "Iron Maiden!" Targeting the unknown Cure, Nozomi watched as she skillfully evaded the forth-springing chains, barely but surely.

"Where are you looking?! Full Moon Destruction!" Breaking out of the rubble below Dream, Nightmare was face to face with her adversary for just a brief instant. But that was more than enough. The hit connected with her chest and even though the armor was enough to deflect the damage alone, the force of the hit was left intact. A loud boom almost deafened everyone close as Dream broke another wall of sound, flying straight past Beauty, crushing her Glacial Road, she flew all the way past the other four unknowns, finally losing altitude and crashing into a pile of rubble.

Nightmare realized now that those five would not prove useful. She couldn't absorb Cures and their reflections were nowhere to be seen. So she might as well eliminate them all at once. "Wings of Heaven!" Rising high up into the air, the evil guardian restored her destroyed arm again. It cost a lot of energy to continuously repair whole limbs, but she had little choice. "Abaddon!"

Reika realized instantly that neither of those two girls were going to tolerate any kind of interference. And now, the one that called herself Cure Dream, was about to unleash something extremely dangerous.

"Hey, shouldn't we be... doing something? This looks pretty bad!" Nao, following after Reika together with the other three, noticed the rapidly increasing amount of some kind of projectile above their heads.

"That's easy for you to say! I ain't got any defensive abilities!" Akane felt that they were in a real pinch. She still didn't understand anything that was going on, but one thing was very clear. They were in trouble. Big, serious trouble.

"Leave it to me!" She hadn't had chance to show off her new ability to Nao and Akane yet, so she had been secretly looking forward for a chance. The situation at hand wasn't quite what she had in mind, though.

Standing still, clicking with her fingers, a large drawing block appeared in her hand, containing hundreds of pages. "Defense, defense, defense... I got it! The Shield of Righteousness is just right for this!"

Beauty arrived at the point they all had stopped just as Peace executed her new ability. "Partum ex Fabula!" Like the unloading of a thunderstorm, Peace started to shoot off thunder in every direction. But instead of simply discharging it, the electricity all quickly started to flow inside the drawing block. With an enormous flash of lightning, the shield that had been on her block was no longer there and instead floating right above them. The edges, the full object, was completely made of electricity, semi-solid and yet just energy.

She had finished not a second too early. The rain of the metal shards had started and it was ten times as bad as a hurricane. The ground around them was destroyed, each shard hitting the ground in half a second after it launched, the destructive power easily equivalent to a rocket launcher. Yayoi realized very quickly that the shield was not going to hold. The fragments that hit it were pulverized, but each hit slowly drained the energy that sustained the construct. "Beauty, help!"

"Glacial Prison!" Creating a massive dome of solid ice above them, the shards broke through it in a matter of seconds. Regenerating the dome was a hard task but Reika tried her best.

"There gotta be something I can do to help... right!" Waiting for a single moment where she could see the attacking girl, Sunny launched her counter offensive. "Solar Rain!"

Nightmare reacted with nonchalance to the attack. Several hundred fireballs were raining down on her but even if they were to hit, she wouldn't take any damage. It was as futile as a squirrel scratching on a tank. But what she couldn't forgive was their impudence of having the gall to attack her to begin with.

Ceasing her continuous attack, Nightmare descended down, fast enough to make it look like teleportation for the others. Trying to jump away, everyone but Beauty was shocked by the sudden appearance of the black clad girl. Switching instantly to a sword and shield style, Reika attempted to hit the guardian, only to have her sword get caught by Nightmare's bare hands, where it remained stuck. "Burst!"

Nightmare flinched as the sword burst into hundreds of razor sharp fragments. One of them found their way through her armor, leaving a small cut on her skin. It was impressive for a regular Cure to be able to wound her. Impressive and unforgivable. "Stormflair!"

Beauty dropped like a rock, her consciousness blanked out by the ability. Turning to the other four, Nightmare's moves were still too fast for anyone to keep up with. Peace had her right arm bend behind her back in less than an instant, unable to even move. "Adamant Crush!"

Yayoi's scream of terror and pain woke up the other three. The bone in her arm broken, the yellow Cure passed out from the pain seconds later. Nightmare's face was showing a satisfied grin, quite pleased with herself. "Next?" Staring at Akane, she figured that the red Cure was the fire aligned one. She'd need to suffer more than just a broken arm. Maybe tearing out her liver was appropriate?

"Tempest Rush!" Unwilling to let anything else happen, March used her ability without any warning, almost vanishing from the spot. Using her incredible speed, she circled around Nightmare, creating a pseudo tornado on the spot, launched wind bullets from inside that wind barrier. A technique that combined defense, offense with lock down.

Nao's eyes went wide with Nightmare side stepped one bullet, reached into the wind wall and pulled her out by her throat. "What a cheeky little-"

"Ten Bloom Strike!" Nightmare released her grip on March in surprise, the tenfold attack sending her flying, even though she averted the damage with her armor. Effectively saving March's life, Dream had finally returned. "Hide! You're no match for her!" Barking her order at Nao, who had fallen to the ground and looked up at Dream as if she was some sort of walking disaster, the girl in question noticed Peace's broken arm and unconscious state. "Restoration!" Mending the broken bone and pierced tissue, it was an easy task.

Akane was the first to regain her senses. "March, get Peace! Happy, help me with Beauty! We're running!"

Miyuki wanted to voice her objection, not sure what to think anymore, but she couldn't get out a single word. She was strong and had experienced fighting those much stronger than herself, but those two were on a level so different, it was completely unreal. Picking up Beauty in a trance, the five of them ran, knowing that if either of those two wanted them dead, they would stand no chance.

"Protecting your new friends Dream?! How long until you run them through another disaster like everyone else?!" Blocking a barrage of attacks with her own fists, legs and armor, Nightmare applied some psychological damage.

"No matter what the future will be like, I'm making my stand here and now. I created you, I caused everyone to suffer and I will make up for it by betting my life on this! Their trust and friendship keep me going, no matter what you say!"

"What happened to your grandiose talks of justice and righteousness?!" Mocking her enemy, Nightmare backed away, using Aurora's ability to unleash several dozen beams at Dream.

"I'm bringing justice to you right now." Breaking through the beams with Clear Zone, she got a hold of Nightmare's shoulder. Both of them held on to each other, gritting their teeth, trying to overpower each other. Starting to whirl around each other, they still refused to let go.

"That's your justice. That has nothing to do with real justice!" Ramming her knee against Dream's armor, Nightmare still believed herself to be winning.

"Everyone has their own justice! You're my responsibility! My friends are counting on me!"

"I wonder what those friends of yours will think once they learn who is the source of all this!"

"Our friendship is not as shallow as that!"

"You're such a fool. They suffered, they fought, they even died! You think they'll just forgive you? They'll cast you out!"

"Shut up!" Headbutting the dark guardian, they continued to accelerate, creating extreme centrifugal forces around each other. There was no way to stop now. "Rose Liberation..." Spawning six red roses, one in each cardinal direction, one above them and one below them, they were ready to fire.

Keeping Nightmare locked down, Dream prepared to finish this off once and for all. But Nightmare had other plans. Even if her origin was ready to lay down her life to win, she didn't have that luxury. "Thorn Palace!" Covering herself and Dream in protective thorn roots, she forcibly stopped their insane movement, with dire consequences.

=== Dissonance ===

"Are all of them... Cures?" Putting Peace on the ground, Nao had even more trouble understanding the situation, now that they had encountered a small group of girls that introduced themselves as Cures and brought them to some spot that was virtually teeming with girls in costumes. She had already forgotten their names, too confused to keep up with everything that was happening.

Looking around, she started to count. "Twelve... thirteen.. fourteen.. how many are there?" As they kept walking around, she lost count and shook her head, giving a help seeking look to Akane, who just held her hands up.

"Don't ask me!" Akane was at the edge of just writing it all off as a bad dream or some sort of hallucination. It reminded her uncomfortably of when Joker trapped them in the Orb of Neglect.

"There are twenty five of us, excluding you five." Honoka, as one of the oldest and most experienced, took it as her duty to explain a few things to the new arrivals. "I understand that being told that there are twenty-five Cures other than yourself is a bit much to believe at first, but we've all been there. There was a first contact time for each group."

Sitting down next the unconscious Beauty, Honoka looked at the three conscious members of the unknown team. "Judging by just your appearance, may I guess that you're around eighteen, maybe nineteen each?"

"...Oh...yeah..." Completely baffled by the nonchalance the white Cure was displaying, Nao answered almost in trance.

Honoka wasn't one hundred percent trusting of them yet. If she went chronologically with the events of Fusion, Bottom and Black Hole appearing, these girls should have been present during all three fights or at least one. Yet, it didn't appear like anyone knew them. She had to be careful about what she told them, for now at least.

Despite the situation and the harshness of what she had just escaped from, Miyuki tried to be cheerful, with moderate success even. "I'm Cure Happy. It's nice to meet you."

Smiling at Happy and giving her a quick nod, the white Cure chose to postpone introductions until later."Judging by the condition those two are in, you showed up in the middle of the fight between Dream and Nightmare. I would explain to you what happened here, but I think it would be best if I let you ask the questions." Honoka took a long look at both Beauty and Peace, finding that they weren't physically in bad shape, just unconscious.

"Then, your name." Still smiling, Miyuki first wanted to break the ice. Akane and Nao didn't look very pleased by her decision but they didn't say anything.

"I'm Cure White. As far as I can tell, I belong to the oldest and most experienced team here." Judging that Happy was a people's person who sought contact with her fellow human beings, Honoka's initial opinion of her wasn't bad at all.

"How is it going Honoka? Are they okay?" Showing up just in time to blurt out her partners real name, Nagisa stood behind Sunny, who flinched a little at the rather athletic appearance of Black.

"And since she is already here and saying things without being asked, that's my partner, Cure Black." Pointing her hand towards Nagisa, Honoka briefly glared at her. "The others will introduce themselves later, so we should move on."

"Where are we?" Blurting out her question, Akane finally got it off her mind. "What the heck is this place? And what in the world were those two monsters down there? Are all other Cures that strong?"

"I'll start by taking your worry about all of us being that absurdly strong off your mind. Everyone here has their own style, strengths and weaknesses, so I can't really comment on how that fares in relation to you five, but the two you met are completely different from the rest of us right now." Taking a quick break to catch her breath, Honoka was no less exhausted than any of the others. She simply knew how to deal with Cures that had never met their own kind before. "As for this place, we're not sure what exactly it is but we know what purpose it serves and why we're here."

"To make it short, we Cures were too successful. I'm sure you five had your own troubles to deal with, your own enemies to fight, just like everyone else here. The problem with that is that every enemy of the Cures present here used the power of darkness. Now, darkness itself isn't evil. Darkness gives us shadows to escape the heat of summer, the night to rest from a long day and many other things."

"Wait a sec! I'm not keeping up. So, what is this about darkness? Can you make it easy to understand?" Akane usually didn't have any problems following explanations, but the circumstances were rather special in this case.

"Summarized, we beat too many enemies and destroyed too much darkness. Powers I can't quite explain without going into theoretical science brought us here to undo what we caused. Prior to this conflict you see down there, we were separated in two equal teams and made to fight each other. Supposedly, one side embodied light and the other darkness. The clash of those two produces energy and that is used to repair the hole everyone left after defeating their enemies."

Having her mouth slightly open, Nao looked at Akane, sweat drops running down her forehead. "Did you get that?"

"Not a thing." Grinning awkwardly, Sunny shook her head.

Sighing, Honoka simplified it even more. "We're not getting out of this place until the problem we caused is remedied. To do that, Cures have to fight other Cures. If we survive today, the whole thing will be explained to you."

"What do you mean, if we survive?!" Nao wasn't a fan of life or death situations.

"If the pink one down there wins, we live. If the black one wins, we die. It's as simple as that. And before you ask, not even all of us together would be able to make a difference. We know."

"But if we all try together-" Happy had never been confronted with a situation where team work among Cures could not best an enemy.

"Then we would still barely make a dent. You were down there, weren't you? To be honest, those two are lucky to be alive and in one piece. I really mean that. You saw the enormous hole, didn't you? Those two caused that and they were likely right in the middle of the explosion." Sometimes, applying a little bit of shock value was the easiest way to get someone to understand. "I'm not saying this to be mean to you or belittle your abilities, but these two are far, far beyond anything any of us have ever handled."

"Is there no way to escape this place?" Nao tried to calm down a little. White seemed to mean them well so she decided to trust her.

"Not that we know of. This looks like a pocket dimension, cut off from everything else. Earth, fairy worlds, anything. Cure powers are innate, so we kept them, but... could any of you check if any accessories or devices you use are on your person?"

A little weirded out by that comment, Miyuki reached for her smile pact, only to find it missing. "Gone!" Feverishly looking for it, she couldn't find it. "Gone! Gone! Gone! No!"

"It's the same as with everyone else then. In here, we can transform just by wanting to. No devices or fairies friends we have made it here."

"Say... could you sum up what exactly you've been doing here?" Akane was curious just how long they all had been in this place that White was being so accepting of it.

"We've been here for what seems to be more than three weeks now. Everyone but you arrived all at once, which is very odd. I assume you haven't just won any kind of great battle against your enemies prior to arriving here?"

"Not at all. That all ended years ago. Sure, we've been training a bit in case something else happened, but we were just on our way to Sea Land since we all got together for the first time in months." Explaining this to her, Sunny was startled by a sudden booming noise filling the air. "What was that?!"

"Their fight started up again. If it has been that long... maybe something went wrong when you were brought here." Honoka noticed that the blue Cure was coming to. She didn't like to apply stereotypes to people but considering what Windy, Berry and Aqua were like, she hoped that girl to be the brains of the group.

"Beauty, are you feeling okay? You just passed out when that girl yelled something at you." They all showed concern for her well being but Miyuki was the quickest to ask.

"I appear to have been knocked unconscious by some kind of attack." Fighting an enormous headache, Reika was slowly getting up, only to feel nauseous and sick the second she got on her knees. Tightly clenching her lips, she didn't want to throw up just from having a migraine. "And I was carried or moved." Noticing the presence of White amongst the group and the other Cures walking around, she went completely quiet for a few seconds. "Am I correct in my assumption that these people are also Cures but not related to our team or Märchenland?"

Honoka was very relieved that her assumption was spot on. "Yes, regarding everything you said."

"I'm called Cure Beauty. I'd like to know what exactly has happened here." Not asking the unknown Cure for her name, Reika prioritized knowing their current situation over formalities. She had learned long ago that sometimes, these things just had to be ignored for the greater good. Not introducing herself was completely out of the question though.

Giving the blue Cure a quick rundown and the same explanation she had already given the other three, Reika nodded a few times thorough the explanation. "I see... so as a consequence of our actions a few years ago, we've been brought here to remedy a situation that everyone present has contributed to. Beside the point that we should not shirk our responsibility for causing the problem, there appears to be no way to escape from this predicament at all."

"Two Reikas..." Miyuki was a little starry eyed, watching White and Beauty talk about these things like they were completely normal and the easiest thing in the world.

"Please don't be rude Miyuki." Beauty was still careful to mind her manners when possible. Of course, that didn't apply to whenever she was fighting. "Cure White... is it?" The girl had introduced herself somewhere throughout the explanation. "So, the process you and these others have been participating in consists of one team of Cures fighting another? Have there been any causalities?"

"None. The system seems to be specifically made to avoid down time that would come about from injuries. At the beginning of each battle, the combatants are subject to some kind of magic substance that heightens the desire to battle. It also significantly dulls pain, which in turn guarantees that the battles are fought seriously and without restraint. It isn't uncommon to end up with broken bones or substantial blood loss."

"Then how have there not been any causalities until now? As I understand, you've been here for several weeks. Judging by looks alone, I presume that nobody present at this time has any significant injuries from these battles."

"After each battle, both teams are also subject to a different substance, magic or energy that reduces any sustained wounds to a maximum of bruises and headaches. Exhaustion and being incredibly sore have been the upper limits of what I have experienced and seen."

"I see. Then, about those two below..."

"Hey, hey, hey! Don't ignore us!" Akane wanted to be part of the conversation but saw no chance unless they stopped talking like that.

"Anything you want to know?" Honoka didn't mind talking to either of them, she figured Beauty would have a better chance of explaining the situation to her team at a level they'd be capable of understanding.

"I don't understand any of the complicated stuff about pocket dimensions and what now, but... what is going to happen to us now?" That was the most important thing for Akane.

"I know this won't be the answer you want, but everyone else went through this already. You're stuck here with the rest of us until the damage done is reversed. If we all make it through this and Dream wins, hopefully we'll be going back to normalcy."

"This is weird. You're weird. How can you call fighting each other, Cures fighting Cures... how can you call that normalcy?" March was shaking her head in disbelief.

"Because I want to get out of here at some point. The fighting is hard but no lasting damage is done. No grudges are held. Sure, there are a lot of inconvenient things and there are a handful of real problems, but when I think about how much worse the situation could be, I'm pretty content calling us fighting each other normal."

"Worse? How could things be worse than this?" Nao wasn't convinced.

"The situation right now is an exception. Usually, each group has their own base. Everyone has their own room, we eat together, have fun together and once a day, we battle. From the reward money we get from battling, we get as much food and drinks as we need."

"You make it sound like a vacation." Akane was a little weirded out by that.

"I understand you're skeptical about this. We all were at the beginning. But it really sounds a lot worse than it actually is. If we make it out of this alive, you'll see." Honoka really hoped that Dream would pull through. Because twenty-nine other lives depended on her at this point.

=== Dissonance ===

A sonic boom ruptured the quiet air that had settled for the umpteenth time, giving word to all that were listening that the battle between guardians was not over yet. Moving too fast to be seen by the naked eye, Dream and Nightmare would not stop until one of them was no longer moving, dead and destroyed.

"Drop dead, Dream!" Screaming, Nightmare smashed her fist against Nozomi's, both of them repelled by the shock wave created from the collision, pushed back several dozen meters. Destroying the ground below them, each and every time they slowed down after a collision, their acceleration created an immense sonic boom.

Moving at speeds second only to jet aircraft in the human world each and every single one of their blows would be enough to cause a small earthquake or plain immense destruction. Facing each other for just an instant, both of them pushed themselves off the ground, taking their battle to the heights of the hole they had created previously.

Opening with a barrage of punches and kicks, Dream forced Nightmare on the defense, protecting herself with the armor and by blocking every hit as well as she could. "Spade Royal!" Hitting Nightmare's shield from the front, Dream vanished for a split second, only to e-appear in the same spot, blurred and with an afterimage. Hitting the shield again, Nightmare felt the same impact type attack as the first hit connect again but this time each impact created another one right where it ended. A bulwark penetration technique!

Taking the first real damage since she had sabotage Dream's last attempt to take her out during their whirl in the air, Nightmare spit out a few drops of blood, disliking the taste in her mouth. Accessing the wealth of knowledge she possessed from absorbing all the reflections, she couldn't find any info on that technique. From the naming, it had to belong to Misery's origin, but if so, why was she unable to use it?

Using the confused state of Nightmare, something that would only last for one more second if even that, Dream surrounded just her hand and arm with Clear Zone and grabbed the face of her adversary. "Blacklight Impact!"

Nightmare could only see a mass of black energy forming before she realized the danger she was in. "Symphony Echo!" At this rage, she would suffer too, but that didn't matter. If Dream blew off her head with another technique she didn't know, then that would be it, she couldn't recover from that. The ultra sonic waves created by Silence's ability disrupted all energy based attacks and defenses, a massive and giant EMP attack.

Retracting her hand, having missed her chance, Dream switched over to pure physical attacks. If energy was no good, brute strength would get the job down just as well. "Megaton Impact!" Cladding her arm into the neigh impenetrable metal, Nozomi used a small faint. Aiming for Nightmare's head, the weight of her arm slowed her ascend down enough to make the hit fall on her chest instead.

"Ten Bloom Strike!" Faster than Dream's attack, Nightmare was one step ahead of her once again. The blow connecting straight with the armor that protected her abdomen, Dream lost too much altitude by the impact to reach Nightmare anymore.

"Chain Tracer!" Sending out a lone golden chain, it homed in on Nightmare right away but missing her. Curving around behind the black guardians back, the chain tightly wrapped itself around her ankle. "What?!" A horrible realization dawned Nightmare as she was pulled down towards Dream. Unable to correct her trajectory, the Symphony Echo still disrupting pure energy attacks, Nightmare could only defend herself. "Iron Maiden!"

"Megaton Whip!" Hitting Nightmare, who had wrapped herself in golden chains entirely, with her full power, the impact itself caused a sound explosion that shattered walls hundreds of meters away. Releasing the chain around Nightmare's ankle only enough to let her fly towards the demolished ceiling, she grabbed hold of it with both arms, starting to whirl it around and finally smash it into the ground.

Canceling the Iron Maiden, Nightmare's head was ringing. Despite the additional layer of protection, she had felt that impact through her entire body. But that was trivial compared to what she had realized then. Dream was creating new techniques by combining abilities from those she took power from. Something she didn't believe to be possible as she had failed trying exactly the same thing herself.

Looking up, she saw Dream float high in the air above her. Her instinct warned her that another attack was coming. Jumping as hard as she could, she needed to kill Dream before she got the upper hand by creating even more new techniques. They both had access to too many different abilities. If Dream mastered creating new attacks, it was all over. Having fought at her full power right from the beginning, there were no last ditch resorts she could pull out now.

"Azure Abaddon!" Finally gaining the upper hand, Nozomi had finally figured out how to combine the properties of different abilities. She had kept believing in herself, her friends and their powers, and it finally paid off.

For the first time, Nightmare stopped her attack out of fear. What was rushing down at her was a storm of wind blades, each of them equivalent to the one that had cut off her leg. Using Clear Zone to hold off one of those combination abilities was too dangerous. "Diamond Flash!" Escaping in a straight line to the side, Nightmare felt the attack hit the ground. If the fragments shredded everything then this was complete and utter annihilation. Each of the wind blades cut right through the rubble, likely passing through everything below, reaching right into the void several hundred meters below them.

The fight had become one-sided. Nightmare had already realized that going up directly against Dream would be extremely dangerous. But what other choice did she have? Trying to find the other, powerless Cures, and take one of them hostage would take too long. In that time, Dream...

But the fight was not as one-sided as Nightmare believed it to be. Using one of the already refined and completed abilities of the others was fine, but creating one on the spot was more than just tiring. It was draining her. She couldn't keep that up for long. "Wings of Heaven!"

Chasing Nightmare, Dream ran straight into a trap. The second she came close to the ground, hundreds of golden chains broke out of the rubble, trying to tie her down. "Diamond Flash!" Dodging the chains with pure speed, Dream only worsened things. The chains, too, had been part of the trap.

She only realized the presence of Nightmare when an absurdly powerful blow connected straight with her chest. Nightmare's Megaton Impact while she had laid in wait using Mirage. Rushing into that with Diamond Flash was an enormous error. It was a sign that her judgment was starting to become rushed, the mental exhaustion of abusing her access to other abilities catching up to her.

Falling to the ground, writhing in pain and unable to breathe, Dream realized that this one error could be fatal.

"Iron Maiden!" Dozens of chains wrapped themselves around the guardian's wrists, ankles, waist and throat, completely locking Dream down. It was finally over. Nightmare wouldn't sigh of relief yet, but she knew that there was no escaping this prison. Both of them might be incredibly powerful, but she had laid this trap knowing just how strong Dream was. The chains tied all of the ground below her together. If she wanted to get up, she had to pull all of it with her. And that just wasn't possible in her position.

Nozomi realized that as well. She was feeling fear, knowing that within the next seconds, Nightmare would use a lethal blow, smashing her head and killing her. Only to proceed and kill all the others, those that had put their hopes and trust in her. "Glory Crasher Zone!" Creating a zone with a continuous effect of Melody's Glory Crasher, the vibrations almost tore her apart. She could feel veins in her arms and legs burst from the attack, blood running from her eyes and ears. It was no attack to kill herself. But to destroy the ground below her.

Catching Nightmare off guard, Nozomi jumped up, ignoring the burning pain in her body, ignoring the taste and smell of iron in her mouth, grabbing Nightmare's face. "Stormflair Echo!" The attack had an unforeseen side effect. At the same point of Nightmare falling to the ground, her consciousness suspended temporarily, as if the two of them shared the same polarization, Dream was thrown across the hole with immense force, a magnetic repulsion reaction.

Slowly getting up, injured badly from her desperate attack to free herself, Dream knew that she couldn't go on much longer. The same likely wasn't true for Nightmare since she hadn't been creating new abilities on the fly.

"Wings of Heaven!" Jumping as hard as she could, Nozomi reached a high enough altitude to believe herself to be just outside the blast radius of what she was about to do. Even though she had never used it before, her instinct told her that one little mess up and she'd burn out her entire life force.

Taking a deep breath, there wasn't much time before the Stormflair Echo wore off that monster and the fight would start anew. And the next time she got caught, she wouldn't have the power to free herself. Taking position, she was ready to end this battle. If the technique failed, she would undoubtedly die. If she succeeded then it was Nightmare who would die. Because of the, comparatively to their battling speed, long preparation time, she had been unable to use it before. But having Nightmare locked in one place without being near her, she could finally go all the way. An attack that surpassed even the Divine Rose Prayer. An attack with her life on the line.

A fluid motion, moving her hand from one side to another, the petals that formed her armor left her body, slowly ascending into the air above her. A second motion, almost serene, putting both her hands on her, now laid bare, chest, feeling her own heart beat. Closing her eyes, slowly and focused breathing, Dream's hair lost it's shine, her armor completely gone, all the petals having assembled above her.

Opening her eyes, staring down at Nightmare, Nozomi put her hands together as if she were praying. The preparations were completely. "Release of the Rose Empress!" Flying in place, stark naked, Dream's mind almost collapsed under the surge of emotions that the technique brought with it. Feeling nothing but hatred for Nightmare, that emotion was solely dominating her mind.

Looking above her, hundreds of white roses were floating quietly in the air, waiting for her command. Large, red rose tattoos had shown up on both the top of her hands and her chest, declaring her as the current Empress of Roses, something that could be called the ultimate form of the guardian, something that was the very embodiment of the Rose Garden itself.

"Isolation!" Lifting her right hand slowly above her head, several dozen roses turned blue, firing what looked like streams of petals towards the ground. Hitting the area around Nightmare, the petals vanished into the ground. Only a second passed before a true forest of enormous thorn roots broke out below the dark guardian, imprisoning her, trapping her in place. Lowering her right hand, Nozomi took another deep breath.

"Refulgence!" This time it was her left hand she lifted above her head. Numerous roses turned into a gentle pink, six at a time forming a rotating circle, creating massive energy orbs in the empty space between them, glowing bright enough to illuminate as far as any light possibly could. Again, she lowered here hand back to the old position.

At this point, Stormflair Echo wore off and Nightmare woke up to a terror she couldn't describe in words. The air above her, the entire ceiling of the enormous hole, was filled with floating roses, every single one at least four meters wide and high, a veritable ocean of roses. Noticing her predicament and imprisonment, Nightmare struggled to get free. Trying to use abilities resulted in a sharp pain in her head and nothing more, no matter how hard she tried. Dream had her locked down completely. "No... no, no, no..."

Less than a quarter of the roses made up the blue and pink ones, the majority still white. And it was time to change that. Putting both her hands in front of her chest, covering the rose tattoo, Dream felt how the technique was draining away her energy. With each breath, time seemed to slow down, her voice reaching the deepest depths of the construct. Her words almost tranquil, everyone could hear her. "Genesis and Exodus of the Roses."

Every single white rose turned into a bloody red, changing it's angle, all of them aiming at Nightmare, who was still trapped in the roots, about a hundred meters above ground. Nozomi no longer needed to say anything. The pink roses started to rotate so quickly that there was no telling how many of them there really were, the orbs being produced so quickly that soon, every red rose had absorbed one.

Nightmare saw the attack coming. The fear made her experience everything in slow motion. The beams moved through air so incredibly slowly that she witnessed how slowly, so very slowly, the space above her turned into a giant ocean of red energy, slowly descending, slowly merging, slowly coming closer. Her last outcry was heard throughout all of the labyrinth.

"Dream!"

Everyone that watched saw what happened in real time. Just as the roses fired, Dream started to fall and the red roses vanished the instant they fired their shot. A sphere, half the size of the hole they were in, a sphere as red as the most colorful rose they had ever seen, was encompassing Nightmare, the monster's last wail still sending chills down their spine.

Existing for several seconds, the sphere finally burst in a massive explosion, the shock wave powerful enough to push those watching dozens of meters over the ground.

Nozomi was laying among the rubble, naked and exhausted, no longer the rose guardian but just Cure Dream. That attack had at least taken a full year of her life if not more. But her life would have ended if she had not used it. It was the much smaller of two evils.

Breathing heavily, she could barely believe she survived. Nightmare had been just as powerful as she was, if not even a little more. Her only advantage had been her decision to ignore the limits of her body and create new abilities on the fly. If not for that, if not for that one moment where she sacrificed her health and put everything into one chance, she would have lost. She would have died, and everyone else would have died with her.

But for some reason, she could not feel relieved. She was feeling cold, fearful. Something wasn't right. She may no longer be the guardian, but still she extended her senses. And she found her. Nightmare. A faint, weak energy, as if the creature was about heavily wounded but not dead.

Ignoring the bleeding on her back, her legs, her feet, Nozomi got up, uncaring that she was walking around naked. Her instinct took her towards a small hill of rubble, dozens of meters from the hole her attack had created. Slipping and falling, suffering more cruises with every step, ignoring the pain that was booming through her body, Nozomi kept moving on, possessed by the fear that Nightmare might still be alive, that her senses had been right.

Just as she ascended the hill, she really saw her. Down below, at the foot of the hill's other side, there she was. Her armor broken and burned, her face charred, her hair shredded, her right arm missing, her left arm broken. And yet, she was still alive. What an incredible life force Nightmare had.

One step at a time, Dream got closer and closer, only to trip and fall, roll down the slope and hurt her leg. And still she got up again, her eyes fixated on the fatally wounded Nightmare.

"You really... hate me so much... even in that state... you come... to kill me..." Nightmare spoke melancholic. "Why did things end up like this..."

"I... only wanted to be... real. I... wanted to take your place... so I could... really be."

Each step took Nozomi closer to the reflection.

"Had there been... another way... I really would... have preferred that... do you think I... enjoy being... like this?"

Standing next to the reflection, Nozomi paused, listening to what the girl had to say.

"You once... saw what happens when... someone makes a reflection... of you... don't you? I... I'm... I'm the same... Just... like Dark Dream..."

"A dark dream... is just... another Nightmare... ironic... isn't it... that I only... realize now how... foolish I've been..."

"Do you want to live?" Nozomi's face was showing a trace of kindness as she looked down at the reflection.

"I can't... expect... to be allowed... to live after... what I've... done... no matter how much... I regret... all of that..."

"Do you want to live?" Repeating her question, Nozomi showed a small smile.

"If... if... you can find... it in you... to forgive me... I... I really... want to... want to live..."

Slowly kneeling down. Nozomi laid her hand on the reflection's right shoulder. "I see." Smiling even wider, Nozomi laid her other hand on Nightmare's left shoulder. With one swift notion, both her hands were tightly gripping Nightmare's throat. Her smile grew even wider, her eyes closed, the expression more terrifying than any rage distorted face could ever hope to be. "Forgiveness? Regret? Did you honestly believe I would buy into that after all of this?" Breaking out in laughter, Nozomi tightened her grip on the reflection's throat. "No. You don't seek forgiveness. You don't regret. You're a walking mass of hatred, anger and malice. You're pure evil, an abomination that I'm responsible for. And I don't shirk my responsibilities. Even if I have to

Nightmare could barely gasp, never mind answering. But the hateful glare in her eyes spoke for itself. Nozomi's laughter was heard for dozens of meters for almost a minute. And right after she stopped, if there had been anyone close to her, they would have heard the sound of bone snapping in two.

=== End of Event XXI ===