Chapter 19: Unyielding Spirit & Ascension

Zephyren's P.O.V

The match had started off as the other two had. An introduction in an arena & then we were sent of to a room. The difference was that this room had a portal in it. The portal led to a ruined harbour. Flames burned in the building to my right. To the left of me the water swirled violently. We had been told by Reikourin that this area was created on an empty plane of existence by him.

"Amazing isn't it?" Cadence said behind me, making me jump. I turned & saw her land on the ground, her new black wings folded into her back. "How one being can create a new reality out of nothing?" She sighed.

"Actually I think it's kinda creepy." I replied, shrugging. "The fact that one guy has so much power. I mean, what if he decides to turn on us?" I felt my own wings grow out of my back.

"So, you think I'm scary?" I heard Reikourin speak, though he was nowhere in sight. I stiffened. Reikourin's transparent image appeared parallel to Cadence. Just as Nexion appeared next to me.

"Cadence…" I gasped. "What…this doesn't make any sense." I shook my head, not wanting to believe what I was thinking. I mean, there's no way that Cadence could be controlling Reikourin's power.

"It doesn't?" She said, walking forward. "What did you think he was unbeatable?" I nodded. "I've been using his power for quite a while." A bow manifested in her hands, the ends were bladed. She pulled the string back as an arrow appeared on the end. "Let's get started, shall we?" I flew upward as the arrow was released. I looked to my right. Nexion was at my side, looking back at me. I nodded & he disappeared, but I felt his strength gather in me.

"Dark Rendering!" I cried as the wave of energy shot forward, no longer needing to be charge up for it.

Cadence jumped out of the way, but she was hit by the debris. She staggered on the ground & was forced to kneel. She cursed as she looked at her ankle, needing to heal the sprain. I charged forward & grabbed her throat, pushing the tip of my blade against her chest.

"Give up!" I demanded, feeling the bloodlust starting to surface. "You're not a fighter Cadence. You & I both know that." She smiled as I pinned her to the wall, then she grabbed my wrists & squeezed. I gasped in pain as I felt them break, then my eyes widened in shock as I saw felt her mend the bones.

"I may not be a fighter…" She giggled. "But that doesn't mean I'm not stronger than you!" She lashed out with a wave of dark energy. I jumped back & beat my wings, heading upwards once again. There was no way I could fight her by myself, not even with my new strength. "Run, run as fast as you can!" Cadence called after me. I looked back & saw that she had vanished. I had to find the others & help them first.

Melissa's P.O.V

"Think he's had enough?" I asked Raziel as the Unborn in front of us slowly got up.

"I guess not..." Raziel shook his head. "Why continue Xion? You can't beat us & you know it."

"Really?" Xion chuckled in his double voice. "Let's test that theory out!" In the next instant he disappeared. I shuddered as a blade appeared on my throat.

"Mel!" Raziel cried, jumping back from me as his own self-preservation instincts kicked in. He smirked. "Looks like you're faster than you let on." I laughed, as I followed Raziel's eyes to the nearby plant store. I had them burrow into the earth, Xion took no notice.

"Surrender…" Xion roared. "You defeat me like this, so surr-"

"Can you stop yelling in my ear?" I interrupted him. Raziel snickered. "Like come on! I'll still need my hearing after this!" I shot the vines up around his arms at that moment, constricting him. Next I had stone columns appear on all four sides so the vines could support themselves more. Raziel sent the wind in through the cracks & we heard Xion's agonized cries. I felt him go limp through the vines & finally his heart slowed. He was unconscious.

"Victory!" Raziel cheered as we high-fived. I let the columns down as Xion's body was warped out of the battleground.

"Where's the Final Fantasy victory music when you need it?" I sighed. Raziel laughed & nodded in agreement as we headed forward to find our next opponent.

Slate's P.O.V

"Crap! Crap! Crap!" I thought to myself as I dodged the Chaos Spear that the Silver hedgehog threw at me. I threw myself into the nearby building as he warped in front of me & launched another spear. The corner of the building was blown asunder & I barely managed to escape as the building collapsed.

"You'll never beat me if you keep running." Rain shook his head, another spear appearing in his hand. He hurled it & dashed forward at the same time. I froze the ground in front of me & jump back. He had passed his spear & slipped on the ice, doing a front flip. The bolt of energy collided with him in mid-air & I had to shield my eyes from the light. Our fight had been going on for around ten minutes now. I was getting exhausted.

"I hope that hurt him." I mumbled to myself, peering into the smoke. So far I hadn't been able to scratch him. He was too fast or my attacks had no effect. I hope all the Instructors weren't this strong.

"It did…" Rain answered, the smoke cleared & I saw that the whole right side of his body was bleeding. My mouth watered as the scent of his blood reached me & I felt the thirst burning my throat. "Doesn't matter, I think this will be a suitable handicap. Though, it'd be a simple matter to heal these wounds right here." He raised his good hand & shot a blast from it. I jumped to the left as it passed, hitting something far behind me. I turned to look back at him just in time to see him spin around as his kick connected with my stomach. I soared through the air, landing in the rubble of the newly destroyed building.

"What the hell?" I gasped, getting to my feet. "How can you still move that fast without Chaos Control, let alone a Chaos Emerald?" I looked at my body to check my injuries. My arm had been severely cut so I spit into my palm & rubbed it over the cut. It itched a little after the cut vanished, but otherwise it was fine.

"Simple. I'm the embodiment of the negative energy in the Chaos Emeralds." He replied, walking towards me. I could hear him taking deeper breaths every other step. I closed my eyes; Ferina had taught me how to sense the cold around me. Basically, I could control anything below two degrees Celsius. The water was out of the question, too obvious, plus it would take time to get it here. I heard a whirring, something mechanical. I opened my eyes & looked to my right. In the next building was a freezer! Perfect! I dashed towards the building, jumping through the wall when I got close enough.

"Ow…" I groaned. Maybe jumping through wasn't the best idea. I shook my head to get rid of the stars I was seeing. I looked around; the sound was definitely closer but still nowhere in sight.

"Chaos…" I heard Rain snarl. Son of a… "Blast!" He roared as an explosion surrounded the area.

Patrick's P.O.V

I had Tifa's arms & legs encased in water, but it didn't slow her down one bit. Every kick that got near me had a torrent of wind around it. She was able to use the wind to reach faster speeds. Something I had never seen any Human do before, only Vampires. I increased the density of the water & had more come out of the harbour to encase her body, even her head.

"Surrender!" I roared. She shook her head. I made the water swirled up & down around her nose & I saw her start try to cough as the water went up her nose, cutting off her airways. I dispersed the water momentarily as she sucked in air & closed it over her head again. I continued to do this until she passed out. Her body vanished with the water as she was evacuated from this round. I hated being cruel like that, but I had no choice. I wouldn't attack her otherwise, I hated fighting women.

"I'm so sorry." I mumbled, more to myself than to her as I turned to find my next opponent.

Raziel's P.O.V

The ground shook & we saw an explosion rise up to the west. I looked at Melissa & nodded. We ran towards the explosion as fast was we could; Melissa had past me & was slightly further ahead. She skidded to a halt & I ended up breezing past her. I stopped running to see what had stopped her & I found myself bent over in pain.

"Good…" I heard someone chuckle. "Now I can take out the majority of you all at once." I lifted my head & found that I was staring at a silver hedgehog.

"You must be Rain." I gasped, letting the wind behind me so he wouldn't feel it yet.

"The one & only…" He grabbed the collar of my shirt & threw me to my sister's feet. Slate was standing beside her, barely. "Now, who should I eliminate first? After all…" He started to ramble about our inferiority.

"Raziel…" Slate whispered, his lips barely moving. "Can you hear that freezer?" I concentrated & I heard a whirring about a block away. My vampiric senses made it seem like it was right next to me. I gave my head a slight nod. "Can you bring it closer to us?" I moved the wind over increasing it's velocity until a minor tornado formed. Think one of those leaf tornadoes you see in autumn or at the end of summer but spinning one hundred times faster. I felt it move forward effortlessly before something intervened. Something plant-like.

"I can move it faster than you can…" Melissa whispered. "Plus I can get it here without making that whirring noise that your wind is making." Slate nodded, his hands twitching impatiently.

"What's the plan?" I asked.

"I can use the ice & snow from the fridge to impale him…" He whispered urgently. "He can heal himself if he wants to, but I doubt his ego will let him do that. So-"

"We impale him multiple times until he can't move & force him into submission…" I ended for him. It was a good plan. "One flaw in it though…" I chuckled as I remembered the time I had said the same thing in the first round. "What if he uses that explosion move again?"

"Then we're screwed." Slate sighed. "Hopefully, it won't come to that."

"So, have you decided who'll be first?" Rain interrupted. "Or do I get to choose?" None of us answered. "Excellent!" He clapped his hands together. "You first pinky!" He pointed to my sister. She jumped towards him without hesitation, transforming to her other form in the process. I dashed after her; I wasn't going to let my sister fight this monster alone.

Even with the two of us, we were outmatched. He outclassed us in every way. He matched Melissa's power, he matched my enhanced speed, even with the wind, & he could cover us both at the same time even though half of his body was damaged. What made it worse was that we weren't even hitting him & he was still getting hits in on us. I took a quick glance over to Slate before I jumped back into the fray. He was encased in ice & was advancing towards the battle slowly.

"Get down!" Slate roared as Melissa ducked a punch from the hedgehog. The ice shot forward in the shape of over a thousand needles. Rain shrieked with pain as the needles pinned him to the nearby rubble. I dashed forward, holding his throat. Melissa grabbed his arms & legs & ripped them free of the ice, pinning them behind him. Rain growled with pain as we heard several of his bones snap. I lifted Slate over to us using the wind so he would get here faster.

"Give up?" Slate snarled as a long, sharp icicle formed in his hands from the fragments of ice. He pushed the blade to Rain's head, the craving for blood in his eyes. Rain's eyes went wide as I squeezed his neck harder. He was gasping for air; I released the hold a tiny little bit. Rain screamed as the icicle was rammed into his chest.

"Watch it!" Melissa snapped as the icicle stopped centimetres from her. Rain's wound was trying to heal itself, but the icicle that was still protruding from his chest prevented it.

"Fine!" Rain gasped. "I give up! To think that you three could be as cruel as me." He burst into laughter as his body disappeared. We looked at each other, horrified by how evil we had just become in that brief moment. I wasn't too sure about the others, but what I had done was pretty much something Kryonas would have done. Our feet moved forward as we searched for the others, we walked in a daze. We caught up with Patrick who had seen the explosion & was running towards us as fast as he could. The moment he saw us he caught our mood & fell into the same daze as us. Had he done something similar to what we had?

Rinalia's P.O.V

"Kratos, where are we going?" I asked once again as the Angel lead us down a dark corridor in the Archangel section of Eternia. "We've been walking for nearly two hours now."

"It's been two hours!?" Jenn groaned as she rubbed her legs. "How are you two not tired?" She glanced back. "James! That's not fair!" James had been laying down on his metal sheet & was gliding silently down the hall with us. Behind him was Veran, who hadn't stopped complaining since this morning when he found out that Neku had left Eternia for personal reasons, & Dimethos the Hedgehog.

"You'll find out momentarily." He sighed. That had been a new response compared to the last dozen times I'd asked him, so we must be close. We soon came to a large room with a weird bronze-coloured device in the center.

"What's that?" James asked, flying over the machine with curious look on his face.

"It's another portal to the dimension that the third round is taking place in." Dimethos spoke & we all looked to him. "It's powered by Chaos Energy only though."

"So that's why you're here." I said. It hadn't made sense before now as to why he'd be here unless he was related to us somehow. He nodded. "But why are you sending us to the next round?"

"Because all four of you need to meet Reikourin once again & defeat him before he tears the dimensions apart for all eternity." Kratos answered in a grave tone.

"An eternal rendering…" Dimethos sighed. "Something that should never take place as everything would continuously rip asunder. Can you imagine being ripped apart, a slave to pain for all eternity?" I shuddered at the thought.

"Why us though?" Jenn asked the obvious question. "Why do we need to do it? Why not the Instructors? Or the Archangels? Aren't they strong enough?"

"They may be strong, but they can not inflict a permanent wound on Reikourin…" Kratos said as Dimethos walked over to the panel on the machine. "Besides himself, only his disciples can do that. That's why you are the ones who will help destroy him instead of helping him destroy everything as he had intended."

"How would he have done that though?" I asked. "It's not like any of us would obey him." The realization hit me as soon as I finished speaking. "He plans to use Zephyren? How?"

"We don't know…" Kratos replied, shaking his head. "What we do know is that Zephyren will be the lord of this realm & that his rulings will be absolute & since the strongest of Reikourin's disciples is Nexion-"

"There will be none to oppose him." Dimethos finished. "And then our worst fears will be realized. There's no more time to waste." He placed his palm onto the panel & the machine started to glow. "The ten of you are our last hope. Give him a good beating for me will you?" He grinned as the last of us stepped onto the portal.

I remember a familiar pulling, the pull that you get from leaving one dimension & entering another. One tries to keep you there, while the other tries to take you to its side. It's a strange feeling considering you can feel it pulling at your insides too. But it only lasts a moment as you land in the other realm.

"This is where they're fighting!?" James gasped; none of us had been able to watch even a portion of the match before Kratos summoned us. "There's no way…" He trailed off. "This isn't a new realm. This is the ruins of Eggman Nega's laboratory."

"What?" Jenn stared at him in disbelief. "How do you know that?"

"Because I was the one to destroy it." James replied before he started to walk forward.

"Wait!" Veran called. "They said Reikourin created this realm. So maybe he had expected Kratos to send us in after the others…" His tail started to twitch as he counted of information his superior hearing had received from the coliseum. "So maybe he made this realm out of portions of places that we know to confuse us." I nodded in agreement.

"It's certainly possible." James replied. "It doesn't matter though. We still have something we gotta do right? I mean how else am I going to be able to relax unless we get rid of the disturbance?"

"Good point…" Jenn said, skipping to James' side. "Then let's go!" She looked around. "Umm….where to again?"

"What are you guys doing here!?" We heard a familiar voice behind us. Keira. "How did you guys get here!" She questioned again as she ran towards us.

"Magic." I replied with a smile. "We're here to help." Keira shook her head.

"You can't! That will get the others disqualified &-"

"There was no rule about others not being allowed to intervene." James interrupted. "Besides, you're going to have to be on our side for this one." James gestured for us to continue walking as he filled her in on what happened.

"So, we have to kill Reikourin before he can do anything." Keira clarified. "But doesn't that mean we'd have to kill his host?"

"What do you mean?" I asked. "We only need to kill Reikourin."

"I know that but I was thinking about this a lot before I went to sleep last night…" Keira said. "And I noticed, after you told me that Nexion & Verina had their own bodies due to an excess of power, that Reikourin must have been the same way. If he has a host, then the host wouldn't have been strong enough to contain all the energy which would mean he has a body."

"The only thing that would be strong enough would most likely be an Archangel." James concluded. "So that means that whoever it is isn't strong enough to contain all his power."

"But he wasn't at the entrance ceremony this morning." Veran said. "So wouldn't that mean that his host got stronger?"

"No one could get that strong in a day." Jenn said. "Could they?"

"An Angel who has ascended to an Archangel could." I said. "Wait…" I froze as I remembered what my father had told me as a child.

"An Angel will become an Archangel when they turn eighteen or they become strong enough to ascend on their own." My father's words echoed in my head.

"When's Cadence's birthday?" I questioned, urgency layering my voice.

"It was yesterday…" Veran replied. "You think it could be Cadence?"

"She was more powerful than most Angels, she was an adept in all the elements from birth. She turned eighteen last night & ascended to an Archangel." I summed it up as fast as I could. "She is the only one who can be Reikourin's host."

"If that's the case-" James lingered, thinking it through.

"Then we don't have any time to lose." Keira interrupted, breaking into a run ahead of us. "Come on! I can sense where Zephyren is!" She ran after her, not wanting to waste any of the precious time we had left.