Final Fantasy XV - Kingdom Hearts
Part 74
Summary: Two warriors of Light, the Chosen King and Keyblade Master, face an unseen Darkness.
The fated reunion had happened, the day where Aqua and Ventus would reunite with Terra once again. It seems like a dream to the woman, a future where she and her brothers could be together again and enter a new age of light.
But that dream is tainted by the corruption of her brother, the very brother she once again clashes keyblades, the only difference here is she had far more to lose than ever.
Terra brings down his dark keyblade on her divine blade, forcing her back with the impact of his cruel steel. Any attempts to pursue her are dashed when Gladiolus rushes past a retreating Aqua and swings his giant sword against the Dark Gnaw. Terra's raw power against Gladiolus had gone from dwarfing the shield of the chosen king to now rivaling him, for each strike of their large blades neither would take a step back and met each conflict with raw power and force that sent tremors into the ground beneath their feet.
Not only is the shield more ferocious than before and now stands on an equal footing to Terra's power, but Aqua refuses to risk Gladiolus fighting alone and would re-join the fighting quickly. With the speed and nimbleness of the master backed up by raw power and destructive force of Gladiolus, Terra is forced to go all out against the two. Every time he would deflect Aqua's attack, Gladiolus would step in and take over the fight, and every chance Terra had to land a blow onto Gladiolus, Aqua quickly takes his focus and redirects his attention to her.
Maddening as it is that both had grown significantly more powerful than his last encounter with them, even with Ventus the child of light had a solid foot in the ground against his "brother". The boys were in the air, keyblades at each other's throats while the born from the dark boy is striking at him with ferocious and unyielding ruthlessness. Ventus, however, dodges them so efficiently and with the grace of a bird and retaliate with the equal strengths of a runaway truck.
Gladiolus strikes the dark keyblade out of the way and side-steps to allow Aqua to step in and plunge her keyblade's tip into Terra's stomach. Once her key hits him, she fired a blast of magic that blew him off his feet and knocked him back from the two. Terra flips in the air before landing on his feet, his body glowing in darkness as Gladiolus steps in front of Aqua. Terra dashes forward to the shield, unleashing a barrage of attacks upon him.
These strikes land on the shield seven times, each one stunning him before the last one has Terra slamming the keyblade downward on the shield and knocking him back. But without mercy, Terra flips into the air and brings down his keyblade upon Gladiolus again, except Gladiolus calls for the shield given to him by his Will and raises it to meet the keyblade. The make of the incredible shield easily repels the dark key and throws Terra off balance while in the air, hands up, and exposed.
Aqua jumps and kicks him in the side to knock away from her boyfriend and spins before tossing her keyblade at him. It spins like a saw as lightning traces it from the tip and then strikes Terra, creating a large explosion of thunder. He falls to the ground as Aqua re-calls her keyblade and flips onto her feet, Gladiolus shaking his head from the assault with a grunt before laying his sword on his shoulders, reading for the next attempt.
In the air, while above the three adults, Ventus dashes around Vanitas' dark thunder and fire spells while firing his magical attacks at the boy. A dual of flight and magic between the two, something Ventus had luckily adapted to with his training, using his magical gifts to keep him in the air and using mana sparingly to keep up with his nemesis.
Vanitas lets his keyblade levitate around him before a triangle of darkness appears around him, rotating quickly together in front of him and then firing a dark grey beam of darkness at Ventus. The boy dashes around it as Vanitas uses it to chase the boy like a laser, destroying the walls and even some of the ground when Ventus runs along with it. Smirking cruelly and cockily behind his mask, Vanitas believed the boy had overestimated his chances of winning this fight, but it was the other way around.
Ventus stops running by quickly turning around and then propelled himself across the battlegrounds, moving so fast Vanitas' attack could not even close in on him. He stops his attack and looks below him to see Ventus charging upward towards him like a rocket. Vanitas aims his hand and fires a large ball of dark firaga at Ventus, but even though the attack touches him, it just went through him as if he were an ethereal being.
Suddenly Ventus disappears before his eyes and he feels his back had been struck by that pesky keyblade of his "brother". Vanitas is then beaten with several hits from his counterpart, taking what he thought should have been puny lightweight attacks but now could be compared to a beating from Saix. By the sixth hit, he snarls and spins around to meet the keyblade that had caused him harm. Their keys clashed once more, both striking at each other feverishly and fast.
Vanitas then vanishes before the younger boy's eyes and reappears behind him, hand aimed at his back. Ventus quickly turned to identify the threat and raises his keyblade to protect himself, being blasted by a dark firaga. The close-range explosion sent them in opposite directions of each other, Vanitas taking to the skies while the boy named after his favored element returns to the ground with a thud.
The armored keyblade user spins around as dark energy surges around him, and after grabbing his keyblade in a reverse grip, he performs a Shotlock attack, Chaos Snake. Silvery white forms of energy zig-zagged around him before all of them flew towards Ventus, chasing him as he starts to run from them. The boy flips and leaps over these beams, spinning his keyblade to deflect or strike back at them while his foe summons more and more to hinder him.
Ventus turns his eyes onto Vanitas, locking on to him and performs his Shotlock, one he learned from Aqua, the Photon Charge. His body bathing in light, he suddenly charges through the zig-zagging energies and straight towards Vanitas. His key strikes the boy as he goes through him, then he repeats this attack repeatedly until the end of his tirade of attacks. Appearing above him, keyblade held in both hands and aimed down, Ventus drops from the air and onto Vanitas.
He brings them both down to the ground, slamming Vanitas on his back and fires an explosion of light that encases the boy. Ventus jumps backward as Vanitas swipes his keyblade at him, but even as Ventus gets away from the angry reaction of Xehanort's first apprentice, Vanitas dashes at him and slammed his keyblade into the younger boy's stomach and sends him skidding on the ground by his back.
Vanitas swings his keyblade at him, shooting arcs of darkness at the fallen child of light. They cut into the earth as they raced towards the boy, but they were intercepted by Gladiolus. He jumps in the way and with a single swing from his giant sword, the force from his mighty blade demolishes the attacks into nothing but air. He glares at the masked boy as he holds his blade up while Ventus gets to his feet, uttering a quick "thanks" to the shield.
Gladiolus in confirmation and runs towards Vanitas, Ventus closely behind him.
With Terra and Aqua, the two former students danced around each other's swings, loud clangs of steel on steel ringing out through the maze. Terra's brute strength that once trounced Aqua is now met with resolve and will power greater than ever, her strikes are precise and timed to match his strength. Until her keyblade falls for a feint from the man and when her swing was done, he slammed his keyblade onto hers and knocks it flat on the ground and out of her hands.
Aqua had no time to counter him as he grabbed her neck and throws her over his shoulder and slams her into the ground. She gasps in pain as Terra applies more pressure onto her neck, slowly closing his hand around her neck as she struggles to breathe. Desperate gulps and gasps for air as the master grabbed his armored hand, struggling to break free. Terra's smirk goes colder and crueler as he tightens his grip, wanting to see the light snuffed from her eyes.
She shuts her eyes in desperation, before opening them again to show they were glowing blue with magic. Before he can stop her, Aqua releases her grip on his arm and placed them both on his chest, both glowing. With a strained utter of a spell, Terra's temperature takes a nosedive into nearly frozen levels as his body shivers with unholy cold. The shock of the ice-cold temperature catches him off his guard and for a moment makes him lessen his grip.
Aqua then took a page out of her brother's book and gave him a sock to the jawline with enough force to force him to take a step back. He clutched his jaw in pain as Aqua jumps up to her feet, keyblade recalled in her hands, and strikes him in his armored shoulder. The attack staggers him before she strikes him three more times and placed a hand on his chest, fires a force spell to push him away. She jumps on to her feet and fires more magic at Terra as he lands on his back, crystalized spikes flew towards the warrior.
In response, Terra lifted his armored arm and with darkness manifesting around the hand, it turns into a large dark reddish claw. He aimed the hand and unleashes a ray of darkness at the master, destroying her flying spikes.
Aqua cartwheels away from the attack, letting it pass her harmlessly. Terra rushes towards her, nearly brings his keyblade down to her skull. His keyblade is struck out of his hands by a quick swipe of the master and with a twirl, Aqua kicks him in the stomach. Knocked back and at two meters a distance, Terra calls his keyblade again before Aqua takes his tactics of rushing in and starts to strike at him quickly.
The master entered a deadlock with the possessed man, keyblades locked as the steel groans and grinds against the other. Darkness and light cloaking the two, determination and strength within Aqua's eyes against the smugness and cruelness within Terra's.
"That all a master can do? I thought you wanted to "save" me, Aqua?", mocks Terra.
"I want to save Terra, not this sham!", rebukes the master.
He breaks their deadlock and strikes her keyblade with monstrous strength, nearly disarming Aqua had she not feint her attacks and riposte them. He then punches the ground between them, sending a light tremor into the ground but Aqua sensed that small fragment of his magical talent surge and instantly leaped into the air backward.
Five boulders burst from the ground, surrounding him, and would have likely crushed her bones if she remained within his circle of stone. But then with one upward swing of his keyblade, Terra demolishes the rocks and sends the shards and spikes of the boulders at Aqua like firing a barrage of bullets.
Aqua aims her keyblade at the hail of stones and casts a lower-tier aero spell. Green winds swirled and sucked up the stones, she then swipes her keyblade to the left and throws the whirlwind aside. She performs a graceful backflip and lands back on the ground as Vanitas returns to Terra's side. Gladiolus and Ventus joining Aqua's side, neither worse for wear.
The flow of the battle is running smoothly for them she believed, with Gladiolus backing them up when needed and their training had greatly increased their chances of winning this fight. She could have the confidence that this fight might turn out to be a one-sided bout with the way things are going for them, but the master holds onto that precaution that runs within her. None of them were convinced this is the extent of their enemies' strengths, and the fact Terra's smug face was constantly on she feared her attacks were catching him off guard for certain but were they harming him?
How much more was it going to take for them to get serious?
Her answers come quickly when Terra suddenly vanishes after he takes on that disgusting smirk that replicates Xehanort's. The next thing she saw is him appearing before Gladiolus and strikes him with his clawed arm. A solid punch to his gut knocks the air out of the shield and Terra propels them both away from the two wielders of the keyblade. Ventus calls for his friend's name but any attempts of them running to his aid are cut short.
Aqua returns her eyes to Vanitas, and to her dismay, grey portals appeared around him, and emerging from them are his minions from their past adventures. The unversed.
Much like their conflict with the heartless before facing the thirteen, they appeared in a horde like an army, everyone they had fought and slain together in their past. Surrounding the two, the horde of unversed traps them and cuts them off from Gladiolus and Terra. Back to back as the creatures surround them twitch and fake attack them, the two wielders of the keyblade gauged their enemies while Vanitas laughs.
"Aww, did you guys miss them? They sure missed you!", mocks Vanitas as a dark corridor opens behind him. "Don't worry Aqua, I'll keep Gladio company, try not to die too quickly!".
Aqua shoots magic at the boy as he walks back into the corridor, her spell striking an unversed scrapper instead. Aqua and Ventus stood in place as the monsters skitter around them, the larger ones readying to commence the attack and the more unique ones lazing about. One bruiser rushes to them, trailed by several floods while an archravens swoops onto Ventus with shoegazers stomping towards him.
The boy leaps into the air and brings down the archraven with one strike of his keyblade, flips in the air while locking onto the shoegazers. He uses his Shotlock, Meteor Shower to rain down meteors upon them, flaming rocks crushing the steel monsters and destroying some other variations in the process of his strikes. Another flying unversed swoops in but he flips and slammed his metal shoes on its back, launching himself higher into the air where more airborne unversed chase him.
Aqua dances around the floods that swarmed her, her feet kicking them aside while her keyblade, blessed by magic is swinging. She cleaves and cuts them down to size as the bruiser angrily launches a runaway flurry of clumsy punches. The master of the keyblade raises her barrier mid-swing to repel its anger-driven attack, quickly repelling it and forced it to stagger backward. Without hesitation Aqua plunges her keyblade into its large body and destroys it, then she fires a spread-shot burst of fire towards the others that foolishly stood behind their leader.
With Ventus using several unversed as platforms to keep himself in the air, he swaps out his main key for one given to him by Rikku. The Gull Wing. The Gull Wing's appearance takes after Rikku's gang, the same name. The keychain is the symbol of some sports team Yuna follows, a blitzball team that he swore one of Sora's island friends played, the symbol itself is attached to the weapon by the wrapping of Yuna's long ponytail. It is attached by a chain to the keyblade's hilt, this resembling that of Paine's sword, particularly the spade design where the handle meets the blade.
The guard is made from two feathers that were once a part of Rikku's old outfit (tied to the end of the two braids protruding from the base of her hair), while the blade is made from the bows seen on the arms of her clothes today.
The teeth of the Keyblade is quite literally the wing of a gull, making this possibly the strangest looking keyblade any world had ever bare witness to. Within his hands, Ventus spins around with the blade held upwards, acting like a propeller cutting through the horde of heartless trapping him in the air. He flips and dodges their attacks, seemingly untouchable as he splits one unversed in half and then tosses his keyblade to circle him, cutting down the others.
When his keyblade returns to his hand, he yells out and is bathed in light, six swords of crystal light surrounding him. The Wingblade command.
Ventus starts using the blades by grabbing each of them and slicing up the unversed in the skies, swapping them out with each swing as the blades begin to follow his actions by striking the beasts in the skies.
Meanwhile down below Aqua brings down another bruiser, spins, and lops the head off a flowersnake. The horde feels endless with the numbers that were slowly dwindling by their joint union, with Ventus using more of his powers to deal with them in the air and her holding back more of hers. Aqua knew if she donned her armor these creatures would be nothing to them if anything she could strike them all down with one spell for form change.
But in turn, she would be forced to take on Terra and Vanitas while using it, exposing her new power to Xehanort, likely overseeing the battles take place. The less the old master knew about the team's newfound powers the better their chances were to catch him off guard and turn the tide.
The master is then attacked by an iron prisoner, this one without the goblet hiding its legs. It tries to crush the master with its gigantic mace, she aims her keyblade and fires a single beam of light that pierces its skull and destroys it. She then spins her keyblade in her hand as magic runs wildly around her, activating her command style, Spellweaver. As her body glows bright blue, Aqua begins to spin around on one foot on its toes, creating a whirlwind of magic that sucked up the grounded unversed.
Together they took control over the air and ground, Aqua eradicating the ground unversed and Ventus slicing the ones in the air, and with their combined might they will be able to free themselves from this temporary isolation.
Outside of the trap, Gladiolus repels Terra's attack and just barely throws Vanitas off his massive sword. The shield grunts out when he blocked Terra's blade, flat side of the blade pressed into his chest as he holds back the dark weapon. He managed to push Terra off himself and swings his blade into Vanitas' keyblade, knocking it out of his hands. The warrior then punches the boy in his helmet-wearing face into the wall, turns, and calls his shield in time to block another attack from Terra.
"Can't believe it's taking BOTH of these asshats to take me on…don't know if I should feel honored and worried", thinks Gladiolus.
Terra's keyblade clashes with the giant blade of the shield, while Vanitas strikes from behind. Instead of meeting the boy with a quick spin, Gladiolus concentrates on Terra and pushes him back just as Vanitas raises his keyblade to plunge it into his back.
His key's tip was halted by another shield appearing out of nowhere, a loud clang rumbled throughout the battlegrounds and his momentum cut. Vanitas grunts but has no time to react when the shield disappears, revealing none other than Noctis behind his loyal guardian. The king calls his keyblade and whips it towards Vanitas, striking his chest and sent him airborne while Gladiolus strikes Terra with enough force to push him further back from the two.
"Took your sweet time", Gladiolus remarks as he and Noctis stand together against the two vessels. "I was busy with fighting that wannabe Riku and Xigbar, what's your excuse?", Noctis says, "Figured you'd be done by now". He frowns in concern at the horde of grey and dark behind the two vessels, sensing Aqua and Ventus were trapped within. "The hell is that? Heartless?", he asks. "No idea but would be nice if you got them outta there", Gladiolus says, "Hard enough fighting Terra without that masked asshat in the way".
Noctis nods but before he could do what he needed to do, several rays of light shine through the horde of darkness, and then a powerful burst of magic explodes forth, destroying the horde. Dust and sand flutters into clouds, nearly blinding the two and force them to raise their arms. When the dust settles, they glanced to see Aqua and Ventus free of their isolation and eyes back to Terra and Vanitas, neither harmed nor even panting from the masked boy's attempt.
"You'll have to do better than that", Ventus taunts, back in his stance with Aqua. They both nodded to Noctis, grateful for the backup at long last. Vanitas scoffs at the boy's taunts, slowly his anger grows and overshadows his arrogance. He suddenly teleports towards Ventus, hovering above him and tried to bring down his key on his head, but is stopped by a warped Noctis, appearing before him with his keyblade holding back.
"Nice try, but there's only one king of warping here!", Noctis bragged. He throws off the keyblade and strikes Vanitas, hitting him to the side and allowing Ventus to glide toward him, still in his command style. Ventus aims his keyblade hand at Vanitas, the crystal blades all rushing and swinging at him wildly, covering all spaces and giving Vanitas little legroom to work with. His speed may be comparable to Ventus, but neither would have been able to block all these blades to the point of never receiving a hit.
As they cut his armor and flesh, Vanitas lets out a roar of anger, blanketing his keyblade in the dark negative emotion fuelled darkness. He swings his keyblade ferociously around him, invisible to the naked eye, and destroys Ventus' crystalized swords.
He pants and growls as Noctis and Ventus joined forces and stood against him, the king brandishing his keyblade and ultima sword. A sudden flash of light appeared on Vanitas' helmet in a straight line, and then the black visor splits apart and falls to the ground. Noctis gasped in horror and shock when the boy's face is revealed, nearly doing a double-take when he confirmed he had not lost his mind.
His face is a near clone of Sora.
The only differences were his hair is black as a raven while possessing the yellow eyes of Xehanort. Not only that but the sheer malice, evil, and darkness within those orbs were as massive contrast to Sora's blue, gentle and kind eyes. Vanitas scoffs when he sees the broken visor of his helmet on the ground, then smirked at Noctis' stunning look.
"Surprised? Never thought you would see "Sora" in this light?", he mockingly asks. The king's eyes glowered and darkened. "The hell is going on? Are you a replica too? Or a nobody?", interrogates the king of Lucis. Vanitas laughed cruelly and says: "Neither, I'm the piece of Ventus that was taken away". "Sora was the piece he needed to be whole again", and then with a mockery of Sora's grin, he continues: "So why wouldn't Sora and I look the same?".
Noctis shares a confused glance at Ventus, seeing nothing but contempt and anger in the boy's eyes. Not to say the king himself was more angry than curious knowing what lied behind that mask, and those grins, a sick parody of what Sora represented. Vanitas looked at his hand, then cruelly summons his keyblade again and glared at the king. "But rest assured, our faces are all we shared, I'm nothing like that boy", he bragged.
"On that, we can agree", concurs Noctis, aiming his keyblade at him, "You are nothing like him…because if you were, I'd be worried about fighting you".
Vanitas laughs before he teleports to them and strikes Noctis. The king meets his keyblade with the ultima sword, parried his attack, and allowing Ventus to rush in and strike. On the ground altogether, the three young men trade blows and magic, keyblades and swords clanging loudly as magic either miss them or simply grazes them. Vanitas' strikes were aggressive and felt like his keyblade was a hammer while Noctis carried most of the weight of the attacks and let Ventus go in for the quick hits.
Noctis phases through one attack and managed to slash his shoulder with his re-made blade, catching Vanitas off guard and allowing Ventus to slam his keyblade into his stomach, followed by several strikes until the sixth was blocked. Vanitas grabbed Ventus' and blasts him with a dark fire spell, burning the boy and blasting into Noctis.
Noctis stands on his feet, holding the younger boy and then pushes him back to his feet as Vanitas uses an attack Riku used before, teleporting and reappearing around the two boys, striking at them with incredible speed and continuously repeats this attack. His dark keyblade lands several hits on the two, even with Ventus' speed he couldn't be touched. Not until Noctis grunts and calls for his Armiger, unleashing it and surrounding himself and Ventus in his royal arms. Guarding them against Vanitas' attacks forced the boy to backflip away from them.
Ventus spins Gull Wing in front of him, before exclaiming: "Let's go!".
The weapons shine brightly in his hands before it splits apart in two and into the air, turning into light green balls of light. They danced around each other before they in perfect sync dive into Ventus' hands, coating from hands to elbows in the same green light as his armored mixed clothing takes on more green with gales of wind around his boots and hands. His arms now covered in reddish leather armor with blades colored crimson, in his hands were single-edged curved daggers with a circle ring guard.
Spinning them in his hands before crossing them over his chest, Ventus, and Noctis both speed after Vanitas. The dark boy smirks as he raises his hand and then from over one of the tall walls enclosed around them, a twister of keyblades appears. He jumps and rides the twister, soaring into the air and away from the idiots of light. Noctis remains unfazed by this, cockily smirking at the keyblade surfer and then uses his Armiger to propel himself into the skies after him, Ventus not far behind him.
Vanitas sees the king, raises his arm, and fires some of the keyblades within the twister at his majesty. Noctis meets these rusty weapons from the bygone age by shooting his arsenal at his, his divine and far more cared for weapons easily destroyed Vanitas' weapons. Ventus then dashes and lands on the key twister, skating on them towards Vanitas at the head of the twister, focusing on bringing down the king of light. He spins around in time to dual with Ventus again, the boy's speedy attacks against his brute strength made the fight very one-sided.
Maintaining such power over the broken and rusted weapons is no short of strenuous, that much is certain, but with Ventus striking him and having Noctis break down his twister piece by piece, even Vanitas was starting to feel the sweat run down his forehead. Ventus deflects one stroke of his foe's keyblade and slashes the emblem planted on Vanitas' chest, cutting it and skates backward to avoid being cleaved in two.
Noctis warps in front of the twister and using the Blade of the Mystic, he aims the sword at the twister having all his royal arms circle around him. He fires them at the twister, turning them all into rays of Lucis light and combined them all into one massive beam that equals the twister in size. Vanitas turns and grabbed his keyblade with both hands, bathing it in the darkness that roared wildly like flames and fires the same sized beam of darkness as Noctis' attack. The two opposing forces crashed into each other with a loud sonic boom that cracked some of the walls surrounding them. The twister halts in place.
Noctis and Vanitas struggled to top the other with their allied force of nature, Vanitas grinning madly and even laughing as the darkness starts to cloak his entire body. Noctis had yet to bow down from this struggle, his grip tightening on his sword while feeling his light is being worked overtime for this. The dark lookalike uses his dark power to levitate in the air, like Noctis using his light and leaves the twister of keyblades to deal with Ventus. The rusty keys chase after the boy, skating on the ground and use his wind to quicken his pace.
Ventus then starts to skate on the walls, hunted by the keyblades that ripped and cut apart the walls, the boy skirting around them whenever they came too close. He watches Noctis hold his ground against the poser, gritting his teeth before an idea came to him. Skating on the walls still, Ventus circles around the struggle between the two warriors, and once he gets to Vanitas' side, he jumps off the way and darts straight towards his "brother" with a yell.
The warrior of darkness quickly lifts his left hand at Ventus and fires a single beam of darkness at him, striking the boy in his chest. Ventus yells out in pain as his momentum becomes undone as well as his direction being thrown off, making him soar over Vanitas. However, as he flew over the dark boy, they shared an exchange of expressions, Ventus smirking victoriously and Vanitas glares back at him until it turns to realization.
As Ventus flies over and falls to the ground, Vanitas turned to see the twister of keyblades coming after him, chasing Ventus still. He snarls and fires another beam of darkness, consuming the ruined weapons of light. Seeing from, Noctis calls his keyblade and aimed it with Blade of the Mystic, yelling as his body bathes in the Lucis light. Together with both divine weapons, the large ray of Lucis light soars through Vanitas' dark beam, evaporating it.
Vanitas could not stop this after using his dark powers on Ventus and preserving himself in such a short period, leaving only to be blasted by the light. The ray encases him entirely in light, his scream of pain as the light purges his body rings out through the battleground, the beam striking the wall behind him and nearly breaks through it. When the beam dissipates finally, he falls from the skies and onto the ground with a thud, Noctis following in-suite, though he lands on his feet and then falls to his knee.
The attack had taken more out of him than he would like to admit, using both keyblade and the Armiger in such a way probably could have killed him in the past before his training. Gods above he hated when Aqua was right about his stamina mismanagement.
"N-No…I'm not done here…", Vanitas growled, getting to his feet shakily, "Not…until I wipe those two from the face of all worlds…". Noctis grunts in exertion, why couldn't it just take one super attack to put down his enemies?
Vanitas, even with his gear burnt and even having some of his darkness leak from his body, got to his feet and hold his keyblade with both hands. But instead of going for Noctis, he turns his eyes on Ventus, on one knee. The golden-haired boy raises his eyes to meet Vanitas, a green light shines around his body as he stands up and takes on a pouncing like a stance, probably thanks to his weapons preferred style.
They both glided/skated towards before vanishing into thin air. Above the battleground, light and darkness clashes in the air at such speeds, not even Noctis could keep track on who is hitting who, the invisible sounds of steels ringing loudly above him as small explosions of light and darkness danced in the air. He could feel Ventus' heart shining brightly with determination to win, to protect those he holds dear, and for Vanitas, all the king senses were animosity, arrogance, and even pain.
They reappeared in the air, light and darkness blessing the opposing sides before like arrows they charged forth. Their weapons locked for a brief second before they both zoomed past each other, leaving a burst of light and darkness in the middle where their blades clashed. Both landed on their feet on opposite sides, standing up before Ventus falls on his knees, weapons returning to the keyblade.
Noctis sees the boy is in utter agony with multiple cuts on his body, blood seeping out of him but he knows the boy had won. Vanitas' keyblade falls from his hand as, much like Dark Riku and Xigbar, a pillar of darkness rises from his body and into the skies. The boy of the dark lets out a cackle, likely accepting his demise at long last.
The boy turns to Noctis and Ventus, now standing before him, weakened and in pain but standing tall. "Tell me…why would you side with the darkness?", Noctis asks, "If Sora did define you, then why didn't you stand by him?". Vanitas laughs and shakes his head as his body slowly fades away like all the others. "Because I *am* darkness", states Vanitas, "And oh I do stand by Sora. I am the shadow he casts".
"How much closer can I be? How else can you be so close to someone other than being their shadow?", he says, mocking. "But I never asked for this", Ventus interrupts, "To be sifted apart, nice and neat. That should have been our choice to make". Placing a hand on his heart, the boy who had grown stares down his opponent. "Not just the light, or just the dark. We decide who we want to be". Vanitas looks at the boy, and for the first time since he could see his eyes, Ventus does not see any sign of disdain, smugness, or even loathing.
He looked to be regarding him respectfully like he is pleased he dared to say such a profound statement. "But Ventus…I *did* choose who I am, you see?". "And what is that? Darkness?", challenges Ventus.
Both were silent, daring the other to challenge their views. Except for Ventus relents and huffs. "If that's what you want, then fine", submits Ventus. Noctis looks at the boy but holds his tongue. This is between them, and evidently, this was their way of settling it. With one final smug smile, Vanitas looks up to the skies before fading away, only this time for good.
His body gone, Ventus looks at his feet in wonder. Had both he and Vanitas been taking to Eraqus, grow up with Terra and Aqua, would he still think he is darkness? Or would, somehow, in another life, could he look at Vanitas and refer to him as a brother. What if they swapped places, would he still be himself or would he accept he is darkness incarnate? Even after all he had done to himself and all he held dear to him; a part of his heartfelt sympathy for Vanitas.
If he only had people as Ventus did, maybe things would have worked out far better for everyone. His thoughts were broken by a pat on his shoulder, prompting him to look at Noctis. His eyes show the boy sympathy and understanding, but there is also a look of wisdom. "He made his choice a long time ago, and so have you", he speaks, "His road ends, but yours still goes on". Calling his keyblade, Noctis gestures to the others, "And there's another obstacle in your way".
Steeling himself and his resolve, Ventus nods and races to lend his aid to his sister.
Gladiolus roars while swinging his giant sword, smashing it into Terra's keyblade while Aqua fires balls of light at him. The warrior of darkness pushes Gladiolus off him and fires a web of darkness to consume the light, firing one spike at the master. Aqua flips over it, aiming her keyblade and shoots spheres of light at him instead.
He raises his demon looking hand to guard against the holy attack, grunting and gritting his teeth with effort. His claw was struck by Gladiolus' blade, almost cutting it in half had Terra not empowered it with darkness to withstand even his attacks. Terra grabbed the blade by enlarging his hand and yanked it out of Gladiolus' hands, throwing it aside and into a wall. Disarming the shield, he plunged his keyblade into him, but the shield of the king uses his armored hand to grab the keyblade. Just beneath the teeth of the weapon.
Gladiolus then punches Terra in the stomach first, knocking the wind out of him followed by a sock to the jaw to disorient him, and finally a solid headbutt into his nose. That one just for payback. Terra staggered back in pain, unconsciously relinquishing his grip on his keyblade. Aqua quickly steps in and strikes Terra to give herself and Gladiolus some breathing space, knocking him on his back. She turned to the shield, recalling his sword.
"How much more do we gotta beat him to help Terra?", he asks, shaking his fist. Aqua frowns with thoughts running through her mind, wondering the question herself. Unless they knew exactly where his heart was, for all she knows Xehanort could be holding on to it for situations like this. However, she believes his heart would have to be somewhere nearby Terra's body, otherwise, chances of it being lost for all eternity could happen. Even Xehanort would not be able to keep his body like this if he lost his heart.
"First things first, I need to get through to him", she replied, "If we weaken him enough it'll be a start". Gladiolus nods and takes point, but she places a hand on his shoulder. "Gladio?". He looks to see her expression is deadpanned. "…could you please stop punching his face? I want him back without a broken nose".
"…I only promise to try", he grunts out.
With a weary groan, Aqua and he raises their weapons when Terra gets to his feet, darkness manifesting around him as growls. "Dark times…ahead…", he seethes as he stands in the center. Darkness rose around him; he fires grey tendrils that dances around him and flutter into the air. A wave of darkness seeping into the ground begins to cover the entire field, all the way to the walls entrapping the gang.
Attached to Terra as his body is coated in a grey aura, is the Dark Figure. A strange heartless Aqua had fought years ago, basically, on the day it was created and since then had passed on to Ansem. The Dark Figure has an ink-black, muscular, humanoid form with a partially bandaged head that hosts relatively human features, bearing some resemblance to Master Xehanort (Another reminder of who started all this). The bandages around its mouth, almost representing shackles. It has yellow eyes gleaming above a mouth filled with sharp teeth, as well as two long antennae sprouting from the top of its head.
A hole appears in between more bandages on the torso in the shape of a heart, much like the heart-shaped hole that appears in many of the pureblood heartless. Finally, it has exceptionally large hands, its torso coming to a tail-like point that fades away into its host's body.
Pillars of grey energy arose around him, circling and appearing like bolts from above, striking those near. Noctis is one of those unfortunate victims, shocked and blasted back while Ventus dashes around it. Terra's attack however was sucking everyone into the pillars, forcing the less agile Gladiolus to stab his sword into the ground to keep him in place, taking him out of the fight. Aqua and Ventus bypassed the pillars of energy, but the guardian of the host launched itself to them. It pummels Ventus and backhands Aqua for every time they got closer.
With the suction of Terra's power drawing them in while still airborne, the guardian could pummel and beat the keyblade wielders to its delight. All the while Terra would hover around on the single spot watching the two guardians suffer under the unrelenting brutality of the guardian. The guardian slams Ventus onto the ground and punches Aqua through a pillar, shocking and burning her at once.
"Join the shadows!", Terra commands.
With Ventus still on the ground, the guardian raises with its hands over its head, glowing with purple darkness. Aqua cries Ventus' name as the guardian dives down to deliver the final blow to the boy. When its two fists landed, a burst of violet energy rises like a pillar, blowing away the darkness that entrapped them all. However, Terra looks to see Ventus was further away from him, unharmed by the attack of his guardian.
Instead below the dark pure blood's large hands, is Noctis. The king must have warped and pushed Ventus out of the way, taking the hit himself to save him. Terra glowered at the king's interruption and raises his hand to command the guardian to finish off this meddler. The guardian charges a punch towards the king, only to be stopped by Gladiolus' shield. Standing above his king with his shield held high, eyes practically on fire with inhuman rage glued to Terra's eyes. Not even the guardian's attack could stagger Gladiolus, nor even sway his fury.
Gladiolus reels his fist back and with all fiber of might and rage rolled into his fist, he delivers a devastating blow to Terra's face once again. The attack throws Terra back, giving the shield and king space to work. The guardian levitates and charges towards Gladiolus, only to be stopped by Ventus jumping and slashing at it. One slash knocks it back and it is struck again by Aqua's flying keyblade. The two wielders of the keyblade stood in front of Gladiolus, handing the king a hi-potion.
Terra staggers and stumbles as darkness leaves his body, likely expending all his power in that attack to try and do away all four of them. This is an opportune moment neither Aqua nor Ventus could afford to miss. She shares a glance with the boy, they nodded at once. Aqua spins on one foot, trailing her keyblade in air tracing icy rails while Ventus leaps into the air, hopping onto his keyblade like a snowboard.
The master among them creates a web of rails made from ice, allowing Ventus to skate and grind on them, using his keyblade to suck up magic and power from them as he rides towards Terra's weakening form. Above him, Ventus spins his board as he charged towards his best friend, striking him and causing a large explosion of ice. The web of frozen rails bursts around Terra, freezing the air around him and striking him with enough force to wear him out at last.
Terra stumbles in place as darkness leaves his body like his comrades before, erupting into the skies and re-joining the others to form the final key. But still, his body shows he is far from free from Xehanort's grasp.
He falls forward, defeated and exhausted. Gladiolus helps Noctis to his feet and slings an arm over his shoulder while Aqua and Ventus run towards their fallen friend. They knelt on each side of him, helping him onto his knees as he gasps their names, weakly and sounding like himself again. "Terra…please…", begs Aqua, so close to having her family back again. "Terra…come back to us", pleads Ventus, desperate to hear him again.
"Come on, wake your ass up and come back!", yells Gladiolus, "You owe me a new shield!". Noctis chuckles to the man's attempt to awakening the warrior, sensing the light within Terra was slowly shining again, maybe even outshining the darkness within.
Terra grabbed his head with both hands, grunting, and gasping with pain. It seemed he too is trying to return to his friends, so close yet so far. But with a roar from him, suddenly violet chains appeared from nowhere and grabbed Aqua and Ventus. They both screamed in shock as they were yanked away from Terra, taken away once again as darkness erupts from beneath the warrior while he stands, still clutching his head.
"Aqua!", Gladiolus roars before he and Noctis are chained and yanked into the air. The violet chains appeared from beneath the pool of darkness below Terra, binding the four guardians as each struggle to break free from this bondage. Noctis grunts and thrashes around, turning to Terra and yells: "Fight back against the dark! Your friends are here, damn it!".
Standing tall again, with his bare hand against his head, a dark chuckle could be heard from Terra. "You will never be able to break these chains", stated Terra as he carried a dark and merciless smile on his face. "They're *our* bonds". With laughter, he swings his hands all around, controlling the chains binding Aqua and Ventus. They were yanked, tossed, and flailed about around the field, both yelling over his laughter.
Gladiolus struggled in his chains, roaring at Terra to stop while Noctis thrashes around. Fury bubbled within the shield, seeing Xehanort using Terra's body to torment and harm the two people so dear to his heart when he was so close to being returned to them. He tries to break open these "bonds", this mockery of the connection the trio shared enraged Gladiolus to no end.
"You have no power over me!", Terra gloats as Aqua and Ventus criss-cross over each other. He laughs at them, mocking their foolish hopes that their bond would bring back their friend.
Only when their yells lessened and strengths waned did he finally cease the horrible torment, letting them hang in the air like rag dolls. Aqua and Ventus stared at him, hope still alit in their eyes despite what had unfolded. This further angered the vessel, his smirk turning into a scowl. "Fools! You STILL believe you can free me?", he growled, "That bond of yours is meaningless! A simple rope that has been burned to nothing!".
"You're…wrong…", Aqua spits, "That bond is what ties our hearts together…it's how we preserved through the worst you threw at us…".
"No matter what you do…even if you destroy our bodies, our hearts will be connected to Terra's…", Ventus adds, "We won't give up on him…no matter what!".
Terra grits his teeth before he grinned. "Is that so…? Well then, lets put those beliefs to the test!", he declares. Raising his armored hand, encased in a dark fire, he clenches it. The chains holding Aqua and Ventus burst with black lightning, encasing them both. They both screamed in agony, while their friends watched in horror. "Terra stop!", Noctis shouts, "You'll kill them!".
"They claim even if their bodies perished, their bond would never break", reminds Terra, "Or are their words as fragile as is their bond?".
Gladiolus bellows in rage as he thrashes even more viciously, throwing his head as he swore and cursed Terra's cruelty, struggling to break open the chains that bind him while Noctis yells at him to stop. The torture would cease for seconds before resuming, giving the two keyblade wielders false hope that Terra is breaking through and smash their hopes into pieces, Ventus' cries ringing out as Aqua's wail of agony ripped into Gladiolus' heart.
With eyes alight with fury, Gladiolus stares at the vessel and guardian, seeing the latter watching Aqua and Ventus with a blank look. Noctis gritted his teeth as the chains held him tight, even warping is an impossibility for him. He didn't have enough mana to go all out either, having used it already and the beaten he took from the guardian, but he did have enough for one trick up his sleeves. And it only takes one look at Gladiolus to confirm his choice. The shield shares a glance with his king in time to see his keyblade materializing before him.
Noctis yells as he telepathically tosses the keyblade at the chains binding Gladiolus, cutting him free and allowing him to fall.
Once Gladiolus touched the ground, he broke into a full sprint towards Terra, sword, and shield in hand as he let out a war cry. Terra throws a chain at him, Gladiolus demolishes it with a single sweep of his sword and when Terra tries firing a blast of darkness at him, he would bash it aside with his shield. He nearly closes the gap between them, but Terra erects a wall of dark lightning in front of him, cutting him off but in turn, sparing Aqua and Ventus the torture.
Behind the see-through lightning wall, Terra smirked. "It is time to end this", he declares. "Gladio!", Noctis yells. The shield looks up to see both Aqua and Ventus being raised to the sky, slumped in agony and defeat. "Ven, AQUA!", Gladiolus roars. He turns on Terra's wall and swung his sword at it, breaking nothing but air while his two friends hanged uselessly in the air.
Only Ventus had enough strength to gently whimper: "Terra…I kept my promise…". A lone tear falls from his eyes just as Terra loosens the chains, allowing them to fall. With the state of their bodies, not even Aqua will survive a fall like that. Noctis cries for their names while Gladiolus tries to rush to their air.
Soaring past the shield, however, the Dark Figure breezes past him and quickly snatches up Aqua and Ventus, cradling them in its strong arm. Hovering in the air with one hand grabbing the chains that held them, it clenched its fist and snapped the chains.
All the chains broke apart, allowing Noctis to warp back to the ground just as the guardian lowers Aqua and Ventus onto the ground. Gladiolus only stares at the guardian in shock and gratitude, but when it turned its gaze onto him, the shield sensed something about this heartless. Its eyes were fixed on his armor, and one glance between the two is all the shield needed to put the pieces together, confirming his beliefs.
Terra's heart was right in front of them.
"HOW!? You fell to the darkness!", Terra bellowed, furious. He launches another chain, this time to the guardian. Except Gladiolus catches the chain with his sword hand before it could even get past him. The enraged shield stares down at the vessel before he crushes the chain in his hand, sword laying against his shoulder. He glanced back to the guardian and Noctis, before saying: "Give me a minute, I'll take care of him…look after the others for me".
The guardian says nothing but hovers closer to Aqua and Ventus, confirming Gladiolus' wishes. He nods to Noctis, the king holding his keyblade out for whatever may come.
With his charges secured, Gladiolus approaches the vessel as his calls for his keyblade. "You're going to give his body back, or I'm gonna break every single bone in your body", growled Gladiolus. Terra snarls and rushes into him.
Keyblade and buster sword clashing for the final time, loud ringing steel booms across the field as the earth shakes in fear of their might. Their speeds matching as well as their strengths, Terra's corrupted keyblade against the light blessed buster sword, Gladiolus matching every blow giving to him with equal measures of fury induced strikes and well-timed parries. Terra manages to slash Gladiolus' chest, ripping the jacket and cutting Gladiolus' chest, but the shield retaliates by using his armored hand to backhand Terra's face.
He then cuts Terra's right shoulder, blood spurting out from the cut. In response, Terra thrusts his keyblade to Gladiolus' face, cutting his right cheek and giving him a new scar in the future. Gladiolus swung his blade upwards, the shockwave from his swing may have missed Terra thanks to him side-stepping the attack, but this attack sends a large crack along the ground from the direction of Gladiolus' attacks. When Terra thrusts his keyblade into him, the shield rolls around the attack, the shockwave from Terra's attack reaches the wall behind the shield and leaves a giant hole in it.
Terra then lands his keyblade on Gladiolus' shoulders, but instead of cutting him, he feels as if he had struck a steel girder. With a roar, Gladiolus shoulder tackles Terra and uses his shield to bash into him, charging forth into a wall. Pinning Terra to the wall, Gladiolus punches his stomach, head butts him, and plants his elbow against his neck. Even bloodied and bruised, Terra snarls and uses a force of darkness to blow Gladiolus off him and demolish the wall behind him.
His feet digging into the earth as he grabbed his sword with both hands, Gladiolus meets the keyblade again in time to prevent his head from being lopped off. They swung and strike at each other, neither backing away nor surrendering ground to the other, Terra's attacks landing hits on his enemy's body but thanks to steel skin, even his attacks barely phased Gladiolus. They slammed their weapons into each other as more and more fury and determination pour into their arms.
Terra eventually strikes Gladiolus while leaping backward from him, his keyblade glowing violet while he is in the air. He swings it, firing a volley of darkness at Gladiolus. This forced Gladiolus to raise his shield high to block the attacks, scattering wildly on the battlefield as many hit the shield. He grunts as the impact does push him back despite how deep he dug himself into the ground, hoping to survive this onslaught of an attack to counter him.
When the barrage ended, he stands up to see Terra's keyblade performing a form change, becoming extremely huge and morphs into a cannon. It laid on his shoulder and aims, the barrel spins with energy gathered up in the barrel. Gladiolus cursed loudly as the giant beam in launched towards him, not even his shield could halt this attack and there is no chance of him being able to run to evade it. The ground shakes from the awesome power of this attack, breaking the earth as the light from this weapon bathes Gladiolus.
Dismissing his shield, he grabbed the handle of Blade of the King with both hands, gathering up all his strength within his body. Steeling his mind and body, exhaling after taking a deep breath, he raises his sword over his head. As the beam closes in on him, he lets out a bellowing roar as he brings down the gigantic sword upon the beam. Whether by some divine luck or because of his raw power, Gladiolus manages to split the beam in two, splitting them into two paths while he remains in the middle, unharmed.
Even as this monstrous amount of power pressed him, Gladiolus runs onwards, the sword cleaving through the beam even as the sides burned his shoulders and tore his clothes apart. His sword glowed in the Armiger light, like a beacon within the false light as he finally lifts his sword to cut upwards, breaking through the beam entirely. His force is so great the blast was eradicated into nothing but air, revealing a shocked and more importantly, horrified Terra.
Gladiolus raises his sword high and as Terra raises his keyblade to defend himself, Gladiolus slammed his sword down with enough force it splits the earth beneath their feet and even splits the wall behind Terra without harming him, through sheer force of a shockwave. A quick flash of light appears on Terra's keyblade, and then it is split in half, leaving Terra disarmed and without any other means of protecting himself.
So shocked and put into a state of disbelief he could not even muster up a way to stop Gladiolus. The chosen king's shield pants, feeling his body screaming in agony from the force he used to pull off this feat, even if his body was close to catching fire thanks to the attack he defied. His sword is dismissed, freeing his hands from the agony of carrying the heated steel, but also to conclude his fight with Terra was over.
"W-what are you doing…?", Terra demanded, watching Gladiolus stepping back from him. Even bloodied and beaten as he looked, Gladiolus stands tall against the man who pushed him to transcend the limits of a human body. "I beat you…never said I was gonna kill you", grunts Gladiolus, "Still need you to give that body back…". Terra growls and raises his hand to strike at the shield, but he is not even able to utter another word before the large blue hand closed around his head and held him there.
The Dark Figure appearing behind him, holding Terra in place before more vile words could be spewed from his mouth. The figure grabs for the cloth around its mouth is large hands barely able to tug on it for a moment before it grabbed the shackles and ripped them off its mouth. It gagged, coughs, and then breathes finally, exhaling as if it had not tasted the air for years.
"One…day", it gasps, voice low and deep, "I…will…set…this…right". It holds up Terra's body high in front of its, and repeats: "One day…I will…set this right!". Even as Terra struggled against the heartless, it proclaimed: "I will return to this land and protect my friends!".
The Dark Figure's heart-shaped hole shines brightly, and it is all it took for Noctis to break out the keyblade and take aim. He fires one beam of light straight towards them and struck Terra's back. Bathed in light, Terra gasps as the Dark Figure leaned backward as a heart escapes its hole, vanishing into the darkness as the heart shoots straight for Terra's chest. The moment they connected, a burst of beautiful light shines in the battleground, Gladiolus raising an arm to cover his eyes as Noctis watches with bated breath.
When Terra falls to his feet, to Gladiolus' joy, no more is his hair bleached silver but instead soft brown with deep blue eyes. The man before Gladiolus looked at his opening and closing hands, likely because he probably forgot what it is liked to have his body back. He glanced at the beaten Gladiolus, opening and closing his mouth in a vain attempt to speak, but the shield gestured the two fellow students.
"Save it for later…think it's time for a long-overdue reunion", he says. Terra follows his gaze and immediately runs to the other two, Noctis already using his magic to heal them from their torture. The former vessel calls their names, kneeling and lifting Ventus into his arms, checking him. Aqua sits herself up by supporting herself with her hands, taking in Terra. "Terra…i-is that you?", she asks, a small flashback to the last time she saw this version of him echoed in her mind.
When he faces her, a warm smile she had not seen in years adorned his face with eyes so pure and strong glimmered. "You never stopped lighting my way", he says. Aqua laughs softly as tears run down her eyes, overjoyed to hear his voice again, to have him back home. They hear Ventus stir and groan beneath them, one glance down to him they saw he opened his eyes to face his brother again. "You're here…", he gasped.
"I heard you too, Ven", Terra affirms, tears shimmering and running down his eyes, "You found me, just like you promised". Ventus whimpers in joy before he and Aqua tackled him into a hug, the boy crying while Aqua gently sobs into him, Terra eventually breaking down and holding close as he thanked them repeatedly. Onlooking the trio, the two inhabitants of Eos smile at them, before Noctis turned to Gladiolus.
They shared a warrior's handshake, the king smirking. "Looks like you got even", he says. "Yeah…", Gladiolus groans, rubbing his neck, "Bastard got a good few hits in". Noctis rolls his eyes before turning down to the pathway before him. Gladiolus nods and turns to the trio. "We're gonna go on ahead", he states, "Gotta catch up to the others".
As the trio stands up, Ventus attempts to follow but immediately stumbles and had Terra not caught him, probably would have collapsed. "Stay here and rest up", Noctis commands, "No sense in going into the big fight when you can barely stand". Ventus opens his mouth to argue, but Aqua shakes her head. "No more recklessness, we heal first then we go for Xehanort", she lectured, "I am not going to have a repeat of last time we did this".
"Agreed…", Terra hums.
Noctis and Gladiolus nod to them and both sprint of and into the canyon. However, neither got far before Aqua calls them. They see her jogging to them and then stand before them. Her eyes were shining and there is gratitude in them, her mouth opening and closing it unable to convey the words. "I…I can't thank you two enough-
"We're even", Noctis says simply.
She looks at him, surprised before the king shrugs. "Niflhiem…Altissia…even in during our search for the Royal Arms…we owe you a lot for pulling our butts out of the fire. Consider this payback for all you have done for us", he elaborates casually. Aqua's surprised looks changes into a warm smile and a giggle escapes her, nodding to Noctis. Then her eyes fall to Gladiolus, and it is here Noctis takes this as his cue to skedaddle and head off alone for a while.
Alone in the passageway, the two stared at each other before Aqua fumbles and shakes her head. "I…thank you…thank you so much…", she whispers. Gladiolus approaches her and gently wrapped her into a hug, holding her close. "Its ok…you've got your family back", he reminds, "Time to put all that pain to rest, at last, right?". Aqua hummed and whimpers in agreement, trying to hold back the tears that threatened to spill. The pain of being separated from those two is finally at an end, no more would she have to carry that pain.
Just having Terra back with them, seeing his eyes again made all those moments of isolation and despair worth it in the end. And soon they will put an end to this horrible chapter in their lives, burying the past once and for all.
She raises her head to face Gladiolus, gently placing her hand on his cheek as he brushed a stray hair from her face. The man who had claimed her heart, taking on so much pain for her and her family, now reunited with them again. The same person who helped pull her out of her despair gave her the strength to walk her path as a master, and now soon they will face their greatest enemy yet. And anything could happen…
She pulls him closer and places her lips against her, wrapping her arms around his neck as he held her closer to him. For now, there are no heartless, darkness, war, or enemies to fight. It is just her and her lover, embracing him and feeling that safety in his arms one more time before they plunge themselves into danger.
Their kiss ends slowly but before she lets go of him, she stands on her tippy toes and whispers the words Sora spoke to Kairi before.
"I love you".
Gladiolus freezes on the spot, mouth agape as she pecks his cheek and takes a few steps back, smiling innocently at him. "Better hurry, your king is waiting for you", she teases before she jogs back to her brothers. Gladiolus places a hand on his cheek, now taking a hue of red on them before he breaks out the largest grin on his face.
As Aqua leaves the canyon, she hears him yell: "LOVE YA TOO BLUE!". She turns back to see him running after Noctis, a spring in his steps. She blushes but smiles warmly and turns to see a rather astounded Terra and an equally cheekily grinning Ventus.
"…you two are dating?", Terra asks.
Aqua beams and says: "There's a lot to tell you".
As they rest and regained their strengths, they retold their stories to Terra…and made a promise to create more with him in the future.
As the guardian's numbers grow while the darkness dwindles, friends reunited, of another trio 's fate will be shown. Destiny is never left to chance…
A/N:
…I'm so tired…
Glad I managed to get this one done without having to much of a headache. These fights are really getting to me, but hey only…more to go. …oi.
So I've already decided which fights are coming next, so I won't be saying who, it'll be suspenseful! As suspense as I am…which is none.
QUESTIONS!:
Q1: Thoughts on this chapter?
Q2: Gladiolus and Terra rematch?
Q3: How do you like Ventus' new weapon?
Q4: Wanna see more of Aqua being awesome?
Q5: Aqua and Gladiolus?
Q6: Happy to have Terra back?
Q7: Wanna see the Wayfinder Trio bond in future chapters?
Q8: Can anyone guess whose fighting who next?
Q9: Anyone curious about the RC?
As always everyone, thanks for reading! Stay awesome but more importantly, stay safe!
