An entire chapter of flashback. Whodathunkit? I'd actually intended to more than just this chapter but school work once again gets in the way. Don't worry, you can expect the next chapter by at least wednesday.
Chapter 54
Brick and Mortar
The floating fortress stood proud and towering in the centre of its world, surrounded by mountains, waterfalls and lakes that stretched out into the landscape. Legends passed down by each generation of the townspeople on the ground below suggested that this floating fortress used to play host to a King that ruled the land. Others had instead tied it directly to a war council for the wars that had scarred and shaped the land past. Whatever the case, it was now home to a nineteen-year-old Neuge—the home of any Keyblade trainee hoping to one day become a master, for that matter.
Neuge's eyes fell on one of the golden chains that ran from the building to one of the large mountains in front of her. Her friend, Eraqus, who was also an apprentice learning the ways of the Keyblade had once told her that if the chains that bound their home ever became disconnected, the building would float up into the sky never to be seen again. Neuge hadn't really believed it. It seemed much more likely that the island would fall to the ground like a meteor, destroying the town below. She chuckled to herself, remembering how after reading an entire book on gravity she had spent an entire day boring Eraqus and her other two friends, Yen Sid and Xehanort, about the theory behind it.
"You should be studying instead of daydreaming, you know?"
The sudden voice caused her to turn her head with the rest of her body following after. Yen Sid was standing behind her with a small, curious smile that greatly stood out against his otherwise mature-for-his-age complexion and piercing stare.
Neuge laughed dryly. "I have been studying, quite hard at that."
"Is that so?" Yen looked down at her in mock curiosity. For those who didn't know him, they were easily intimidated by his presence. Even at the age of twenty-nine, ten years older than Neuge, he held a presence as powerful and dominant as their individual elder Masters did.
When Neuge had first met him when she was fourteen and had just been accepted to study under her Master, she had certainly felt uncomfortable around him. He was a giant of a man, standing in at an impressive six feet and seven inches. In contrast, Eraqus, who had been slightly shorter than Neuge for a while, had shot past her around her seventeenth birthday. He was now six inches trailing behind Yen Sid. And with Xehanort at five feet and ten inches and her at five-seven, she often felt as if she was staring up at a monolith of a man. But she was glad she had taken the time to know this intimidating man because otherwise she wouldn't have been able to see the heart of gold that lay underneath the exterior.
"I've finished another painting by the way. I was hoping you'd be able to give me some feedback," he continued on to say in a softer tone.
"You probably don't need my feedback. You make the best paintings. Oh, the last one made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside," Neuge said.
"Well, you have a talent for describing paintings. I love hearing your opinions," Yen Sid said.
"Yeah, my opinions are pretty great, aren't they?" Neuge thumped her chest proudly with her thumb and Yen Sid chuckled.
"Don't get too full of yourself. You know one of the first precepts we have is to have humility as well as-" Yen Sid began only for Neuge to cut him off.
"Yeah, yeah. Humility, integrity and generosity among others. I've studied the philosophy, though it's not like we ever need it. Those things should come as obvious to anyone," Neuge said.
"It's tradition," Yen Sid said simply.
"Bah, screw tradition. If I had my own pupils, I'd be rid of it all. I'd revolutionize the system. Make it a hell a lot more modern," Neuge said.
"You'd forsake a thousand years of tradition just to be remembered as a revolutionary? Interesting," Yen Sid said.
"I never said I wanted to be remembered. Legends tend to get misconstrued anyway as time passes by. I'd hope no one begins to think of me as a saint or anything like that because I'm not. It's just that I've always thought about passing on something to others that no one else could pass on. If I could bring something to the table in my own way, then that's enough I should think. Sure, it might not change with me but it's like this building here." Neuge pointed at her home with a smile. "A solid foundation to get it started, and then slowly, piece by piece, filled in with bricks and mortar until it becomes something great."
"And what exactly is it that you would be passing on to them?" Yen Sid asked.
"The freedom to think for ourselves. Something that is limited when we rely on tradition to govern our actions," Neuge said.
"Tradition doesn't necessarily mean being limited in thinking. You're thinking too simply here."
"There's no reason for it. It's purely for cosmetic reasons and forcing standardization. When you look past the front and back cover, there are still so many issues inherent within the system that we're just choosing to ignore. But we'll be here all day if I have to go down the list. How about we see this fancy painting of yours?"
That was how their conversations seemed to go usually. Compared to Yen Sid's and Eraqus' opinions of doing their best to keep the current system in place, Neuge and Xehanort's views tended to take a more extreme view. They had gained the reputation of not being afraid to speak their minds, though Xehanort was a lot more subtle with preaching his beliefs than Neuge was. One would think that given these opposing views, there would often be tensions within the group, and to be fair there were some from time to time, but they never allowed that to distract them from the fact that they were friends who held different opinions just about as much as any other friendship circle did.
Neuge and Yen Sid soon stopped at the latter's bedroom. As they entered, the distinguishable solvent smell of paint thinner and other oils wafted their way into Neuge's nostrils. It had taken a lot of training by means of observing a lot of Yen Sid's paintings over the years to even stop complaining about the smell. Neuge had asked him when she was younger if had ever thought about switching to acrylic, but Yen Sid's love of tradition had won him over yet again, big surprise there.
"So what do you think?" Yen Sid asked, gesturing towards the canvas. On this portraiture, Neuge saw whirls and wisps of the different primary colors all scattered across the night sky. Below this was a yellow field of what Neuge suspected was maize. Green paths mixed with brown split across this field in three different directions—a crossroad, of sorts. Neuge mentioned all these attributes out loud as she analyzed the painting. Furthermore, in true Yen Sid fashion, he had maintained the pattern of surrealism that had been consisted with so many of his other paintings. Neuge could see that he had used a simple but effective method of using a thick brush to pull the colors down so the maize and paths looked like they were melting under the night sky and stars.
"It gives me this really warm yet lonely feeling. Like time is slipping away but the stars continue to shine as if they're unaware of the plight below. Beauty mixed with ruin…. It reminds me of the hourglass theory, now that I think about it. We stand outside and observe the other worlds, but we can never interfere. You've managed to capture the whole universe on this canvas, I think."
"Really? The universe is a rather big place. I'd hardly think my paintings represent the be all and end all of the universe," Yen Sid said, nervously scratching at his naked chin.
"So you've captured the universe from one point of view. How many different perspectives can there really be though? We're down here, like most other people in any other world. You've painted the universe as you've come to know it. As any of us have. That's why I said the whole universe," Neuge said.
"How have you still not been named a Master?" Yen Sid enquired. "You often seem to procure wisdom far beyond even my sights."
"Eww, if you're insinuating that I may as well be older than you, no please. Also you know I don't like the title. I even asked Master several times not to select me for the Mark of Mastery. Eraqus was completely baffled when I told him. Couldn't understand why I'd refused," Neuge said.
"Because you're stubborn, I imagine," Yen Sid answered for her.
"You know me well," Neuge said. Before she could further comment on her uniqueness, Eraqus burst in through door breathing quite heavily.
"The Master! He-he-he-he-"
"Woah there! Calm down, dude. What's going on?" Neuge asked as Yen Sid went over to his study desk to fetch a bottle of water before throwing it to the panting teen. Eraqus caught it, took off the cap and gulped down a large amount of water before handing it back to Yen Sid.
"The Master… he's dead."
Seeing is believing, or so they often said. When Neuge had first heard Eraqus say these words to her, they had come translated to her as garbled nonsense. She had needed him to repeat the words again before she could fully register what he had said, and even then she still wasn't sure what he meant. Now she was standing in an abnormally stifling Examination Chamber along with Yen Sid, Eraqus, Xehanort, and the body lying before them and she still couldn't believe what she was seeing.
Her Master's grizzled mane that would usually catch the occasional crumpet on the way down while he was eating would now be completely bereft of the tiny things. His brown eyes, thoughtful and calm, would now forever remain closed. He had often talked of always striving for peace—now he had found his own eternal peace in some strange poetic sense.
"Who did it?" Neuge asked on instinct. It was a silly question to ask because if any of them knew, they wouldn't be here at the moment. One thing that she had noticed however was that she had not hesitated in calling it murder. Master had always been as fit as a perfectly tuned fiddle. Neuge could in no way imagine a scenario where the Master's death had been accidental or of his own design. Satisfied with her line of reasoning, she repeated her question more confidently this time.
"We don't know. It's best we don't let our emotions run rampant though. The last thing we need to be doing is accusing innocent people of something they haven't done," Xehanort said. He bent down beside next to the Master and tilted his face so they could see it. Neuge could only wish that she had the calmness and professionalism that Xehanort was displaying at the moment. One would think that he had examined dead bodies plenty of times before.
"You're right. I just… I need a moment, I'm sorry," Neuge said before turning around and walking out of the hall. The others didn't even try to stop her, probably lost in their own sorrows. For Neuge though it was different. There had only ever been one time in her life when she had ever needed to cry. She had gotten into a fight with a kid her age when she was five and consequently had one of her teeth knocked out because of it. Ever since that day and the subsequent fights that followed, Neuge had promised never to cry again.
She was about to break that promise, she realized, as she closed the door to the chambers behind her, sat against the wall and began weeping into her hands.
It was strange. Out of all the things their Master had taught them, the pain of loss had not been one. Now that she was face to face with the unusual circumstance, she didn't know how to handle it. She heard the door open up next to her but she didn't so much as look their way—that was until they gave her no choice but to do so anyway.
"You need to snap out of it. The Master wouldn't want you acting this way," Xehanort said.
Neuge looked up at him with streaks of wetness crawling slowly down her face. "What do I do? How am I supposed to just act like everything will be fine after this?"
"Do you believe in the Master's words? He believed that for every person, there is a trial that he or she must overcome. Their darkest hour. It may be too early to say this, but this may be our darkest hour. If we cannot overcome it, we will drown among those that have failed their own trials. You need to take all that sadness, that pain, and turn into strength. That strength will be the fuel for which you carry out your purpose."
"But the Master always said to not let those feelings become who you are. I couldn't…"
"Human emotions are what make us who we are. We can't fight them otherwise we'll give up what makes us who we are in the end. The Master would say I was wrong but I don't believe there is any right or wrong in the principles the Masters of old gave us. There are only interpretations," Xehanort said.
"Let my pain become my strength… okay. I'll figure out who did this then, for Master. I won't cry anymore," Neuge said, wiping away the tears.
"Good. Those tears are reserved for the perpetrator when we find them," Xehanort said. He offered his hand and Neuge used it to help herself up. The next thing she knew, she was staring at Xehanort's back as she followed him into the chamber once more. Seeing a dead body had taken a lot of energy out of her and she suddenly felt tired, but persevered nonetheless and looked down at her fallen teacher.
Next to her, Yen Sid and Eraqus were discussing something in soft voices, but she drowned them out and focused on the body. There didn't seem to be anything irregular about the corpse, not at first sight anyway. There was no apparent stab wound that had been inflicted, but then again the Master's tunic made this somewhat difficult to see. That any blood were to come seeping through his clothes would also be hard to see as he was wearing black.
"No blood loss, at least, not from there," Xehanort confirmed as Neuge attempted to turn her Master around. "Look at his mouth instead."
Neuge did as she was told and soon found something that she hadn't noticed before. There was a trickle of liquid dribbling down his chin.
"Saliva…?"
"Mixed with blood. My guess is something happened and he accidently bit down a bit too hard on his own tongue in the process. The question is what caused him to bite down in the first place," Xehanort said.
Neuge soon found the answer to their question lying on the floor next to the Master's chair at the end of the room. She walked over and examined the spilled chalice in her hand before showing it to the three males in the room.
"Poison? That can't be," Eraqus said. Xehanort walked over, took the cup from Neuge and held it to his nose, inhaling from it. Neuge was about to ask whether that was a safe thing to do but Xehanort was quick and pulled away to report his findings.
"It's been laced. Seems like your first thought was right, Eraqus."
"I wish I hadn't said anything," Eraqus replied sadly.
"Not like his cause of death would be determined by what you said anyway. We have no choice but to accept it and keep going," Neuge said.
"I know… still doesn't make it any easier to swallow. The Master was always careful type, so I don't see how the perp expected him to drink it," Eraqus said.
"It's simple then. If the Master let his guard down, then that means it must have been someone he knew," Neuge stated before scanning the room. It wasn't that she wanted to begin suspecting her friends, in fact that was the last thing she wanted to do, but then why else was there an unsettling feeling bubbling up in the pit of her stomach. "Did anyone come to visit the Master earlier today?"
"I came here with my Master but… no, you don't think…" Yen Sid said before shaking his head. "No, no, he wouldn't do something like this. You know that. He grew up with Master Kokan, he'd never-"
"Calm down, no one said he was behind it. It's still too early to tell anyway," Neuge said. "But there's no harm in asking him about it. Is he still here?"
Rain had started smacking against the windows of the pub now in large streaks and Neuge watched as her chalice was filled with more wine from the bartender before showing it to Sora.
"This… this is that chalice. I kept it with me when I was investigating into the Master's death, and it was also with *hic* me when I was abandoned in the Realm of the Dead," Neuge said. "Of course any traces of poison from this cup have long since disappeared. But I carry it around with me because I wanted to keep a piece of the Master with me. His death was what drove my anger, my hatred, and it was what kept me going. It's all I saw this chalice as, until a few years back anyway."
"Did you ever find out who was responsible for his death?" Sora asked. "Your main suspect was Yen Sid's master at the time, right? That's where you left off."
"So I thought initially. In fact, the evidence kept piling up, though Yen Sid refused to see it. Not only had he gotten close enough to Master Kokan to fool him into drinking poison, but he had also mysteriously disappeared off the face of the earth at that time. We searched and searched *hic* but could never find him. In my eyes, he was starting to seem less and less innocent every day, but Yen Sid continued to defend him. He was right in the end. Kokan wasn't poisoned by Yen Sid's Master, and I and one other were the only ones who knew that until recently."
"Who?"
"Who was the killer or who was the other person who knew? Because they're both the same person," Neuge said and raised her eyebrows, a silly smile playing on her lips.
"Let me take a guess at what you're going to say. That it was Xehanort all along, right?"
Neuge nodded. "You're good."
"You're kidding me. Really? He offed his own Master? Why would he- what reason would he-"
"I'm not sure, but I think that he wasn't entirely sure if he could completely leave his old life behind. He saw emotional attachment as a weakness and I suppose cared for the master in the same way I did. He must have felt that if he were going to jump into the darkness, he needed to strip away the emotions that would hold him back."
"Was there ever a point when you started to become suspicious of him? When you first noticed that something was different?" Sora asked.
"I'm not *hic* sure if there ever was a moment. Xehanort was a thinker and so any resentment that stirred, any extreme opinions… they were all hidden out of sight. If someone did notice something, then they ignored it for the sake of our friendship probably. We were all *hic* so emotional at the time of the Master's passing, and he took advantage of that. I hated him for it. I wanted to kill him for it."
"Then what stopped you?" Sora found himself asking. He needed to know because he could very well imagine what Neuge had been feeling at the time. "You wanted revenge. What stopped you from going after him?"
Neuge tucked a few loose curly bangs of hair behind her ear and proceeded to rub the bridge of her nose before extending her fingers outwards to under her eyelids.
"Maybe we should go in order. I'll just skip to when we finally found Yen Sid's Master," Neuge said.
"You found him?"
"Of a sorts…"
Yen Sid dropped to his knees and floated a hand above his now former teacher's body. Whatever Neuge had expected when she had arrived at the Keyblade Graveyard, which had been the location Master Penn had last been heard from, it certainly wasn't this. It had been a month since her own Master's death and now she was staring death in the face once again. This time though, she wasn't crying. She couldn't cry, not because the death didn't mean anything to her, but because she was too confused to cry.
"What is going on? First our Master and now yours?" Eraqus asked before yelling upwards at the sky, "WHAT'S GOING ON?"
"We shouldn't even be here. This place is forbidden for a reason. You know, they say the souls of the dead who fought in the Keyblade War reside here. The Keyblades," Neuge pointed her head at the fissure to the right of them, leading to a mass grave of the weapons. "Supposedly a curse was put on this land. The dead will rise when the cracks of the past open whole."
"Don't tell me you actually believe that, do you?" Xehanort asked. "Where did such a ridiculous tale even come from?"
"Where do most ridiculous tales even come from? Like most, they derive from a certain truth," Neuge was keen to say in a sagacious-like manner.
"No need to get all philosophical on me. Fair point," Xehanort said with a small chuckle (if it could be even classed as such because it was more the release of a sound). "But we need to investigate the body. I don't see any chalices around this time so I'm not sure the cause of death will be the same. Yen Sid, you need to let me do this."
But Yen Sid shook his head and used his body to shield Master Penn from Xehanort's investigation. "Enough! It's too much. It's too much."
"Would you rather we never find out the truth? Even if it hurts, we have to face it," Neuge tried to convince.
But Yen Sid refuted her words and kept shouting. "But the Master never killed Master Kokan. There's something strange going on here. You see it too, don't you?"
"You want to defend your Master, fair enough. But if he's truly innocent then that will show through our investigation. Don't you see? If you really have faith in Master Penn, then you'll stop being an obstacle and pull your weight," Neuge said. She couldn't believe that she had to do something like this. It was as if they had been struck by some kind of role reversal—that she was the wise one attempting to convince and lecture the child who refused to listen to any rational arguments put forth.
She had made the necessary but reluctant decision to throw all ideas of being sympathetic out of head seeing as Yen Sid continued to give her no choice but to throw him aside, but something stopped Neuge. It was an unexpected and immediate chill that ran down her spin like a jolt of lightning. She began to quiver in fright for no perfectly good reason that she could explain. It was as if the world had suddenly come crashing down on her. As if a tidal wave of emotions she had been trying to supress had burst free.
Was it then strange that the first thing that had come to her mind was the curse that she had mentioned to them just a minute before? It couldn't possibly be true, could it? No, she was definitely overthinking things. She didn't know what was happening at the moment but she was sure there was definitely a reasonable, perfectly logical explanation for the dread she was feeling.
But there had been no reasonable explanation for her Master's death, or any of the events that had subsequently followed. Her life had almost taken a turn for the dramatic, so was it really possible to find logic in the abnormal? Neuge didn't think so, and therefore she was back to the fear of the unknown which she once again tried to rationalize only to fail miserably. A vicious circle with no end.
"Neuge, get away from there!" The firm grasp of Eraqus pulled her out of her perpetual prison and placed her against his body. Neuge looked around but she could see much in way of the thick fog that had suddenly descended upon the area.
"Xehanort? Yen Sid?" Neuge called out into the fog. She could barely even see the tip of nose when she looked downward so she wasn't sure of what hopes she had finding her other two friends.
"I'm here!" Yen Sid announced, though it seemed he was struggling with something judging from the strain on his voice. Neuge soon came to find out why.
"What are you doing?" Neuge asked, watching as Yen Sid put one step in front of the other with some difficulty. Leaning on his back was Master Penn.
"I can't leave him here… wherever here is. He deserves to rest alongside Master Kokan," Yen Sid said.
"Are you serious?" Neuge let out a sigh and summoned her Keyblade. "Fine, but if you slow us down in anyway, we're leaving you behind. Where's Xehanort?"
"Not sure. That's weird," Yen Sid said. "How did this fog even appear?" And then he looked at Neuge with wide eyes and so did Eraqus. For a while, Neuge thought that there was something on her, but when she saw that they were actually looking behind her, she turned around and screamed, tripping backwards.
A ghostly figure in the shape of a human had been standing next to her until she had noticed it. Though it had the face of a human, it had not distinguishable human features about it—no nose, no eyes, no mouth, no face.
"G-g-g-g-g-GHOST!" Neuge yelled, getting up and running behind Eraqus. "Dammit! I knew it. The curse was real!"
"Listen, I'm sure there's a perfectly good explanation for this. Maybe it's some prank Xehanort set up?" Eraqus suggested.
"Well it's a pretty inappropriate prank. Let's just… keep moving for now, okay? Maybe we'll meet up with Xehanort eventually, y'know, if he isn't trying to scare us," Neuge said. When Yen Sid and Eraqus agreed to this, they set off into the fog, keeping near each other as closely as possible.
On their way through the unidentifiable world that they were not sure was even the Badlands anymore, they came across a number of these apparitions similar to the first one. They were seemed wholly unconcerned about the three strangers and the dead body making their way past them—in fact, it was as if they didn't notice them at all. Neuge soon confirmed this when she carefully walked in front of one of the ghosts intentionally. It had stopped for a second, as if sensing something was in its way, but without directly looking at her, moved around her and continued on its way.
Commenting on this strange phenomenon to her two friends, they decided it be best to hurry along quickly and hurry they did. With no signs of Xehanort anywhere, their worries were intensifying, especially when they finally found their way out of the fog and into an even stranger place, if that were possible.
"This place… it's completely made of crystal!" Neuge proclaimed in an excitement that she could barely contain. The scenery before her was simply breathtaking. The white crystal trees bore no leaves and stood tall with their shapes calmly reflected on the frozen lake's surface just up ahead. A visible cold wind blew through the air with icy snowflakes settling on Neuge's cheeks before quickly evaporating into water.
"Boy, this place is chilly. Beautiful, but if we stay here any longer we might just catch a cold. Let's keep moving," Neuge said. She pulled the hood of her parka over her head in order to warm her ears before following after Eraqus and Yen Sid.
"Is that a… door? On the other side of the lake," Eraqus told them, pointing to a door that seemed to stand perfectly well by itself, placed in between two trees on the other side of the lake. "You think that could be our way out?"
"Maybe, but shouldn't we be looking for Xehanort?" Yen Sid asked.
"Not that I don't care about him, but I'm not too fond of staying here for long either. Trust him. Xehanort will be okay. He's always been strong," Neuge said.
"Yeah… maybe he's already out anyway," Eraqus said albeit unconfidently. Neuge wasn't thinking about that, but rather Yen Sid's situation. She looked at him and shook her head.
"Alright. We've come this far, but now you have to see reason. You can't cross this ice with him on your back. It doesn't even look remotely stable and if it gives way…"
"Just worry about yourself, okay? I won't leave him behind. I've never told you this but when I started out, I could barely cast a single spell. No matter how hard I tried, I always failed. How could I even be deserving of a Keyblade when I couldn't perform such a simple task? That was what I wondered to myself every night. It all led up to a certain day when I decided to give up my Keyblade and leave my Master, but he wouldn't let me. 'I will not leave you behind', he told me. No matter how many times I kept repeating out loud that I wanted to quit, he kept saying that, and I eventually gave in and started crying. The reason I paint now, it's because of him. He mentioned how his former Master had used paintings in order to feel colors. It's those feelings that allowed me to channel the most wondrous of magics. He never left me behind, and neither will I."
"And he'd want you to die over his dead body? Your sentimentalism is going to get us killed!" Neuge shouted at him.
"Then you two can go across before me. Will that work?" Yen Sid asked.
"No," Neuge enunciated through her clenched teeth. "No, just let go off him. He's gone as far as he can. Why are you being so unreasonable?"
"Neuge, just go ahead. The Master and I, we'll catch up," Yen Sid said adamantly, too adamantly for Neuge's liking, but in the end she could only nod her head. She was done caring, or so she thought. Eraqus and Neuge made their way slowly across the frozen lake, and Neuge had been determined to keep her eyes forward and sighted on the goal, but she couldn't help and look back. That had been her mistake.
"Yen Sid… you need to come across… NOW!" Neuge yelled, putting more pressure on thin layer of ice beneath her feet than she had intended to. She lifted her left foot up slowly to see a web-shaped crack where her shoe had once been. She set her foot down in front of the crack and twisted her body to fire off several spells with her hand at the creatures that had nested themselves within the crystal trees to reveal a congress of rather large and deformed ravens.
Neuge, in all her years of training, had never quite seen anything like them before. They were beings of darkness, indicated by black fumes that seemed to be rising and sinking across their bodies like waves. They shared the common characteristic of their right eye being blinded or just closed while their left were beady and yellow. The ravens flew in a circle cawing out loud into the sky before heading downwards to attack Yen Sid.
Neuge and Eraqus did their best to support their friend as he slowly made his way across the lake along with Master Penn. Their magic some of the ravens and disposed of them, but the ones that were more aware, seemed to dodge each attack before targeting their attackers instead. Neuge did her best to push them away with Aeroga while Eraqus drew them in with Magnega before using Exo Spark, the bolt of lightning hitting one of the ravens before discharging and shocking the other ravens too in a blinding display of light.
The remaining ravens soon dispersed, but they had taken a victim along with them. The ice underneath Yen Sid's feet had cracked significantly and any step forward would spell certain doom. A slight shifting of his weight confirmed that it wouldn't have taken even movement. The ice broke apart and Yen Sid fell through along with his Master. Neuge swore and before she knew it, she was already running for the small puddle of water despite Eraqus warning her not to. As she neared it, the ice broke apart under her feet and she was sent down into the water's icy depths too.
Ignoring the sharp pains of her body being stabbed in all directions from the cold, she searched around frantically for any sign of her friend but all she could see was pitch blackness. She doubled her efforts and sunk even lower into the dark abyss in hopes of finding Yen Sid...
Neuge suddenly stopped talking. Her lips were spread apart until she placed them around her chalice and began drinking once again.
"Wait, you're just going to stop there? What happened?" Sora asked.
"In those next few seconds… I can't really remember. I know I found him but my mind was completely blank by the time I helped him reach the surface. I think I just fell unconscious and sunk into the icy depths," Neuge said.
"And you didn't die?" Sora asked.
"I'm not sure how it happened, but I woke up on land soon after, completely separate from the others. They had no doubt made it back to the other side, but I was still stuck in the realm of the dead. I mean, I have my theories. I don't think it's actually possible to die there, or maybe as long as I was in that world, I was dead just like those ghosts. Either way, I spent a year hoping that they would come back for me and fifteen more looking for a way out after having given up hope. My mind slowly withered and deteriorated until it left me nothing but an unemotional husk. When I finally left, I found that I couldn't even talk. I was so alone and all I could do was blame Eraqus and Yen Sid for leaving me. It was as if they'd forgotten about me. Just went on with their lives as if nothing happened I suppose, though I'm sure Xehanort was also a problem. If Yen Sid hadn't been so damn stubborn about bringing his Master along, we would have gotten out much faster. I would have still been with them. I wouldn't have had hatred and contempt in my heart for so many years.
"Anyway, the way I found my way out was the same as my way in. I found the same type of fog and took my chances. When I came out, I found myself at some strange castle where my home used to be."
"Castle Oblivion," Sora named.
"Yeah, well needless to say Eraqus and Xehanort were long gone. To think I'd skipped so many occasions. When I came here, it was my first time meeting Master Eraqus' pupils. They reminded me so much of him that I felt disgusted even looking at them. Of course, you should never judge a book by its cover and I came to respect them as their own people in time. I can't say I ever really felt much anger towards Eraqus anyway, especially after hearing of his death from Yen Sid.
"But to answer your question about revenge, not just against Xehanort, but in a way, against those two as well, I was set on finding them… that was until I met my second teacher. He was not a Keyblade wielder like Kokan, but he possessed a wisdom and kindness that I so desperately needed. My first words for more than *hic* sixteen words were heard by him. He taught me the idea of meditation and making your weapon the extension of yourself. In time, I came to not rely on the Keyblade at all. In my eyes it had become a *hic* weapon of my pain that I had relied on too much. I learned instead to wield a knife or a tantō and the martial art of aikido. It's why I don't spend much time teaching you and Luna Keyblade techniques. I've always said they were the techniques of the samurai."
"Bushidō, right? Maybe we could go see your teacher? If he can give me a few extra pointers, then maybe-"
"I've already taught you everything my Master taught me. The big difference of course is that we haven't had nearly as much time as I did back then. I spent *hic* four years training with my teacher whereas we've only had a month in total. I've tried to make up for that by pushing you *hic* but it's not nearly *hic* enough time. Man, I need to lay off this stuff."
"Only now you realize that?" Sora chuckled before getting up and stretching. "Oh, Luna's birthday is coming up in three days. I'm expecting you to be there, Master."
"Neuge, it's Neuge. And I'll think about it," she replied.
"Hopefully you'll do more than think. Luna won't be very pleased if you don't come," Sora said before leaving. Neuge shook her head before looking up at the bartender with a smile.
"Want another drink?" he asked.
"Nah, I'm done for tonight. I have some preparations *hic* to take care of. I kind of missed about twenty odd years of a normal life. Best I don't miss someone else's," Neuge said, letting out a yawn shortly afterwards.
