Chapter 110: Offer
The echoes of his strike moved through the arena as the opponent fell to the floor, sword and shield falling to the ground. The crowd cheered as his victory as his name was announced to move on to the next round with the other fighters. He smiled at the cheering, raising his fist in time with the crowd's chants. "The hero is here!" He shouted with them as the chants continued.
Hikari, Brian and Max stood at the sidelines, watching the fighter chant with the crowd, making Max chuckled slightly. "I can see why Snow is here now." He said.
Brian only looked at the blond fighter as if he was an idiot, maybe being close to being Scott's identical twin. "How did this guy become a hero?" he questioned.
"I remember him mentioning that his group take care of some Heartless and other creatures in their small town. To them, he's a hero." Hikari told him, watching Snow help up his defeated opponent after finishing chanting with the crowd. "Look! He's even helping his opponent up."
"Well, it looks like that hero status has gone in his head." Brian huffed, watching the blond fighter and the other fighter leave the arena.
"Like you can talk." Hikair muttered, earning a playful glare from her red headed friend.
"Ladies and Gentlemen! Give it up for Chris!" Phil announced, allowing for the crowds to cheers for one of their up-coming heroes.
"This should be interesting." Max leaned in with application, watching as Chris made his way to the arena.
Brian and Hikari watched the teen that had prevented Sora from taking part in the tournament, seeing the blank expression on his face that they saw earlier planted on his face as if that was the only expression he could pull. What caught their attention though was how his sword seemed to shake nervously within his grip, his right hand twitching slightly. "Great….just what we need." Brian growled at the sight, pointing Chris' shaking hand to Hikari.
Max looked at them with an worried expression. "What is it?" he asked them.
"Chris has the virus." Hikari informed him, before looking at Brian. "What should we do?"
"Nothing." He simply said. "If we do something, we can easily get kicked out of the tournament." They watched as Chris looked over to them before facing the arena entrance, waiting for his opponent to come out. "We should have time though; his soul shouldn't be causing any trouble until a couple of weeks in."
"So the person that must have attacked him must have been an Endless." Hikari concluded.
"But that means it still narrow it down to Sora committing that crime." Max pointed out as they watched Chris' opponent come out of the arena.
"Sora was with us. We know that." Brian said to them. "If we can find out who the other keybearers were while we're waiting for matches then we could find some answers." He quickly turned his head around to catch one of the fighters taking part in the tournament. "Hey! Have you seen any keybearers?" He asked the fighter.
"Keybearer? Who would fight with a key?" The fighter scoffed.
"Nevermind." Brian sighed, letting the fighter go before turning to look at the other fighters watching the match.
"Hey Brian!" Max grabbed his attention. "Isn't your match next?"
Brian's eyes widened in panic. "Oh god damn it!" It didn't take long for Brian to run back into the building.
The Aversion Endless rushed through the coliseum, trying to make his way to the other side of the structure as he heard the crowd cheered for Chris' battle, having a feeling that the teen will be seen in the next round with Snow, Hikari, Max and the others. He pushed his way through the crowd of defeated fighters, ignoring anything around him just to try to get to the other side of the coliseum in time for his own match. Soon his lungs cried for help as he halted to breathe. "How big is this damn building?" Brian huffed for fresh oxygen.
"Now, here's the deal. You get rid of Herc and any sign of Endless' and I'll get rid of your Chaos problem."
Curiosity struck through the red headed teen, completely forgetting about his match as he slowly made his way to the wooden door where the source of the voices were coming from.
"And why should I work for you? Surely you can take you own battles by getting someone that's dead." Another voice huffed.
"You want to be human again don't you?" One voiced asked him.
"Letting Heartless take my home was my sin, and this….this is my punishment." The other voice simply said.
Brian placed his hand near the door to open it slowly but decided against it, having a feeling that from the sound of their voices, they were right near the door. Opening the door so that he could see who was talking would only blow his cover. With that thought, he leaned his head on the door slightly so that he could hear the conversation.
"Alright. Alright. Here's a new deal. You do this and I'll-" The voice sounded desperate.
"Hades. I'm not interested in whatever deal you give. If you want the Endless or Hercules gone, revive someone who's dead."
"YOU'LL DO AS I SAY OR-" A voice yelled.
"I don't have time for this."
Brian snapped his way away from the door, hearing movement going towards the door, as well as remember that he had to head for his match. He quickly ran down the hall that leads to where his match was being held. As the crowd's cheers filled his senses, he quickly grabbed the communicator and sent a message before heading out on the sandy arena to see the Greek solider. This should be easy. His summoned his staff as his stepped into the arena.
BOWBOWBOW
Sora chuckled slightly as he quickly ran behind a wall, seeing his blushing friend run right past him. He held his laughter, ready to follow him when sudden movement caught his attention. He looked down the alley way and saw an Unbirth waving down the alleyway. "Gotcha." He smiled as he ran after the Unbirth down the dark alley, following the blue creature around the corner. As soon as he reached the corner, Sora gasped slightly to see that the Unbirth had disappeared, his sight was left to a dead end of mirrors.
His eyes wondered across the many pieces of broken glass across the floor and wall, stepping forward to look at the reflection of each of the pieces. He didn't see the reflection of himself, he didn't see his face, his worried expression, his scared eyes. Instead, he saw faces of his friends, people that were familiar to his hearts, looking at him with a sad expression, as if they were giving him an silent plea of help. He looked at each of the pieces, seeing Roxas, Naminé, and the black haired girl for who he assumed as Xion on the floor, against the wall he saw Riku and Kairi. He looked on the other side to see a look alike of Roxas, he only assumed that he was Ventus from Riku had described him as. The other two reflections showed a blue haired woman who looked like an older version of Kairi and a man with brown, spiked up hair, if his hair was white and skin was tanned then he would look like a younger version of Xehanort. Sora stepped away slightly, looking at the pieces together, only to see his reflection of what he has become.
"So many connections to one heart."
Sora turned around to face a hooded figure, his golden yellow eyes shun from underneath the hood. "Who are you?" he demanded, slightly freaked out from the sound of his voice, it sounded as if he was talking to himself.
The mysterious figure only scoffed at the question. "You should be asking that to yourself." He told him. "Your control over your heart is only a string line now."
Sora ignored his words as he glared at the figure. "What do you want?"
"I came to help you, Sora." He simply said.
"Help me?" Sora looked at the figure questionably before glaring at him again. "Why should I listen to you? And how do you know me?" He didn't trust this guy one bit, he could feel the darkness around this guy reaching out to try and touch him.
"You're the Keyblade Master. Everyone knows you." He simply said. "Besides, I can help you save your friends."
"My friends…." Sora looked back at the pieces of shattered glass behind him. "My friends are fine."
"But the Colonel's plan will soon strike." The figure lifted his arm up, revealing his claw as he summoned a Keyblade much similar to his within the claw itself.
At first, Sora looked at the keyblade in shock, remembering that Kingdom-D was last in the hands of King Mickey but his mind soon clicked into place as he remembered that the criminal was in fact an keybearer. "You're-you're the one that destroyed Chris' life!" Sora quickly summoned his keyblade, ready to fight.
"The Order do not approve of the Colonel's actions. A replacement is only necessary." He simply said, ignoring the fact that he was just accused for ruining someone's life.
Sora continued to glare at the figure, still not trusting him as he spoke. "What do you want?" he repeated to him.
The figure only shook at the Keyblade Master's mistrust as he placed his keyblade into the ground. "You will soon lose control of your heart; you will watch your friends die by force as you have no control of your own. You can stop the Colonel though, all you have to do is balance your soul, balance your heart." He told him.
"Balance my-" Sora looked at the figure in confusion. "What are you on about?"
"You can stop the Order's plans." He told him. "If you defeat the Dark Master, the Order won't have Unbirth by their side, the Order will lose control in changing balances within hearts, the Colonel will become weak." He pointed to the shattered pieces behind him. "If you don't control yourself then your connection will break."
"My connections?" Sora repeated.
"Your heart will break. All because of one. The one for a thousand."
"Kairi…" Sora muttered to himself.
"What would you do to save her? To save all of your friends." The figure asked him, seeing the Keyblade Master filled with thought. "How far will you go?"
Sora remained silent, he didn't want to answer to the figure, he didn't want to trust him. He wanted to get away, to check if Riku was alright and to see how the others were in the tournament, just anywhere but here. He didn't want to say it to the accused criminal but he would do anything for his friends, he would jump in the darkness and be trapped there for all eternality if it was to keep his friends safe.
The figure scoffed as he looked back at the keyblade. "I see that you're too damaged to save the Princess of Heart." He lifted the Keyblade up from the ground. "Let's see what you are made of, Keyblade Master."
Sora quickly snapped out of his thoughts as the figure rushed towards him, he quickly lifted his keyblade to block the attack before pointing his keyblade at one of the broken pieces of glass. "Light!" He quickly shot a beam of light out of his keyblade and watched as the light reflected on each piece of the broken mirror before shooting past him to aim for the figure. He gasped as he watched the figure teleport out of the beam's way.
A chuckled was heard from about as Sora looked on top of one of the buildings to see the figure standing tall. "This is my offer." The stranger spoke. "I will lead you to Neo Mansion. You can fight the Dark Master there and then. You can save your friends but you will have to give up to the virus."
Sora growled at this. "I won't let the virus control me!" He shouted to him.
The stranger only scoffed at this. "The Dark Master is a Heart-struck Endless. One with the powers of darkness AND the keyblade. The only way you can balance yourself and defeat him is to let your virus free." The stranger told him. "A noble sacrifice to save everyone else. You would be saving the worlds, your friends….even her." He spoke. "The choice is yours alone."
Sora remained still, a rush of thoughts and scenarios ran through his head as if it was fully crowded with people. Every thought had a different voice, every scenario had a tragic end. "Sacrifice…" Spilled of the Keybearer's lips.
"Sora! Sora! Where are you?" Riku's voice shouted from the entrance of the alleyway.
The Keyblade Master turned his head back, only to find the figure gone. "Hey! Get back here you coward!" Sora shouted with anger.
"Sora!" Riku ran round the corner to see Sora's claw flash red as he watched his friend slam his Keyblade down to the ground to release it. "Woah! Sora! Calm down!" The silver haired friend ran by his friend and grabbed the Kingdom Key, stopping Sora's raging attack to the ground. "What are you doing here?"
"I was just-" Sora halted himself, looking back at the broken pieces of mirror on the floor before looking above him from where the figure last stood. Many questions about what had just occurred filled his head, could the figure be speaking the truth? If he was to fight the Dark Master, Vanitas, would that keep his friends and the worlds safe? 'A way to stop the Order couldn't be that simple…could it? Either way, we would have to wait to the barrier is opened' Sora thought.
"Sora? Are you alright?" Riku looked at his friend with concern, facing him.
"Huh?" Sora snapped out of his thoughts as he looked at his friend. "Y-yeah. I'm alright. I was just fighting some Unbirth and one got away." Sora quickly covered.
"At least you found them, right?" Riku seemed to buy Sora's excuse. "I got a message from Brian. He mentioned that Hades is trying something."
"We can't go down to the Underworld without the Olympus Stone." Sora informed him. "We'll have to head back to the Coliseum and ask Hercules if we can borrow it."
Riku nodded to this. "Let's head back to see how the others are getting along in the tournament." He let his spiky haired friend walk in front of him as the two began to walk out the alleyway. The Wielder of Dawn quickly halted thought and looked back at the dead end, looking around the area as if he was trying to trace something that couldn't be seen. His eyes soon led him to one of the roofs, where Sora had been looking a little while ago, a huge amount of darkness still stained there. It didn't take him long to get moving again before his friend questioned his halt.
As the two came out of the alleyway, they saw that the sun was beginning to set and the corrupted stars began to show. "Why don't we call it a night? Go to the Underworld tomorrow." Riku suggested.
Sora nodded to this as he yawned loudly. "Yeeahh. We can check if Kairi's awake and ask for the Olympus Stone too."
"Yeah." Riku was quite surprised that Sora managed to mention their friend's name without feeling guilty or regretful after, perhaps his talk with him had pushed him in the right direction. "Let's go." The two began their way back to the coliseum.
BOWBOWBOW
Brian panted slightly as he walked into the lobby where Hikari, Max and six other fighters stood as they waited for Phil to return with the new set up for the quarter finals. Each fighter/team had successfully made their way through to the quarters finals after going through a number of five rounds in one day, tiring the Endless mage strongly. All he wanted to know was who he was facing tomorrow so that he could get some long asked sleep, his yawn easily showed his intentions.
"Tired, Brian?" Hikari giggled slightly.
"Nah, I'm just yawning for the fun of it." He replied tiredly before looking around to see the other fighters.
It was no surprise that Hercules made it through to the quarter finals; he was the world's hero after all and he didn't need his own action figure or theme song to prove it. The guy with black spiky hair continued to casually talk to the Hercules, seeing that he had made it too. Brian chuckled slightly, he would have thought that they would have learnt all of the fighters names by now. Chris was remaining out of the way of the others fighters as he remained against the wall for the results, his hair seemed darker than before and his right hand began to look more swollen. Snow was attempting to talk to the guy with the red cape but the red eyed man only ignored him. The only other fighter that there is was a man in a hooded cloak that seemed to have some interest on them, seeing at the figure looked away from him the second Brian had looked at the guy.
"Now heroes! You have done well to get this far by starting tomorrow, the real challenge begin." Phil began to speak, grabbing the fighters' attention. "Each of you will have been put against one another at random and so the following will go in the east bracket while the other four will go in the west bracket. The winner of each bracket will face each other at the final for the ultimate prize." Sights were placed on the mystical sword once more before turning back to the trainer. "The fights have been set out on the notice board on your way to the sleeping quarters, make sure you're up for your match as the tournament resumes at dawn." With that set, the sarty nodded to the fighters as he went off out of the lobby while most of the fighters went over to the noticeboard.
East Bracket
Brian Devon vs Snow Villiers
Dawn
Chris Erebus vs Vincent Valentine
Morning
Semi-final
EB1 vs EB2
Afternoon
West Bracket
Team Little Devon vs Hercules
Morning
Zack Fair vs Nightmare
Morning
Semi-final
WB1 vs WB2
Afternoon
Final
EB Winner vs WB Winner
Evening
"WHHHHHYYYYYY!" Brian whined as he looked at the noticeboard, out of all of the matches, his had to be at the crack of dawn to begin the quarter-finals. It was like the worlds were out to get him for reasons that he couldn't come up with. Why is his match the only match that is set at the crack of dawn? The fact that he was fighting first and the exhaustion that he had gathered from the amount of matches he had fought today had caused the young Endless to bow down in exhaustion.
"Well, looks like you and me are setting things off in the morning." The blonde fighter grinned and he placed a playful hand of the mage's shoulder. "You think you can take down a hero like me?"
Suddenly, Brian's energy returned to him as if it never left as he leaned back up, pushing away Snow's hand from his shoulder as he glared at his opponent at sun's first light. "You're going down, blondie!" Brian said confidently to the seventeen year old in front of him, making Hikari and Max chuckle at this.
"Hey guys!" Riku and Sora emerged into the lobby, seeing Brian trying to freak out Snow by saying how powerful a mage her was. "Do I want to know what Brian is doing?" Riku raised an eyebrow at the mage.
Hikari raised an eyebrow of confusion at the two. "What are you guys doing here? I thought you were playing detective and how did you even get in here? I thought you were banned?" Hikari began her list of questions as to why the keybearers were back, ignoring Riku's question completely.
"Phil only banned me from the games." Sora explained. "We can still stay here because we're supporting you guys." He ignored the slight shock in Hikari's face, had he really been sounding that down about everything.
"We need to get the Olympus Stone to go down to the Underworld. We might be able to find more clues there and to check up on Hades." Riku told her. "If anyone knows what happened, it's Hades." The silver head quickly looked over to noticeboard for tomorrow matches, raising his eyebrow in question. "Why is Brian on his own?" he asked her.
"He was being a show-off so Max and I let him get on with it." She chuckled slightly. "I still feel bad for him though, getting up at the crack of dawn just to fight."
"You never know, Hikari, you might need to wake up." Riku said to her.
Hikari scoffed at this, "The only reason I would be up at the crack at dawn was if I was up all night or I woke to watch a sunrise."
Max chuckled quietly to himself before whispering over to Sora, "I would hate to see what they would act like when they do get together." He snickered to him.
Sora smirked as he replied. "They'll properly be the same except having more private time in their precious closet." It didn't take long for the two to start bursting out laughing, making the others look at the two strangely.
"What are you doing here?" It didn't take long for Chris to notice Sora and storm his way towards the Keybearer, preparing to swing his rigged sword towards him. Riku quickly blocked the attack and knocked the sword out of the teen's hand before holding him back. "You're banned from here!"
"From the tournament, not from staying for the night." Brian glared at the damaged teen. "We respected that you have lost someone but you have no evidence to back up your claim and no right to throw someone on the streets that is innocent til proven guilty."
Chris tried to move out of Riku's grip, only to see that there was no escape if he kept struggling. With that in mind, he stopped his movements before taking a few breathes to calm him down. He looked back at the group, his anger and hatred held back as Riku slowly let go of him. "Innocent or not, a Keybearer killed my family, my home, my life." He snared at them, mainly Sora and Riku. "I won't rest until every single one of you is gone. Even if it means getting rid of that Princess keybearer first."
Hikari and Max quickly grabbed Sora, seeing him ready to pouch for the mention of Kairi.
Riku held Brian back slightly while holding back his own anger. "If you know what's go for you-" He began to tell the Olympus fighter
"Don't worry." Chris began to back away from them. "I already know how murderous a Keyblade Wielder is." With his final words said, he left the lobby.
But how did he know about Kairi?
A/N: Damn writer block. Right, Sora and Riku should be heading to the Underworld next chapter while some action will finally happen in the fights. Hope you guys enjoy this. If I get this summer job I've applied for then I might not be able to update as much as I want…..At least it gives me time to plan.
Kingdommad