The Boy Who Fell Through The World XI

"What? More of you?"

"You still don't understand our realm." The Red King smiled cruelly at her. "Or the beings that you have encountered."

Before Yang could say anything else, a fog descended upon her.

One she recognized.

The Herbalist emerged from the mist, looking more humanoid than he was the last time she had seen him, and a pair of butterfly wings sprouted from his back.

"Herbalist."

A black dog that was slightly larger than regular dogs in both overall size and muscular build. Bandersnatch has round, pupil-less gray eyes with deep, crimson-colored markings just behind his eyes.

"Bandersnatch." The Red King spoke the name of the next beast.

Next to appear was a large lion-like Chain with white fur and a black mane. It wore a small crown on its head and had tattered bat-like wings coming out of its back. It also wore a collar with a small golden pendant that isn't very visible because of the mane. It had brown colored eyes, which weren't very noticeable, because they were small.

"Leon." The Red King smiled but then frowned. "We are missing one. Of course, it should have ascended but the other human took it. We shall retrieve the final one and it will join us."

The Red King turned his gaze and smiled as he could see them approaching.

"Yes, the one with the Jabberwalker approaches. The Great Beast protectors will be made whole!" The Red King declared with an eager smile on his face as the jewels of his crown began to glow.

BOOM!

Over twelve souls screamed as they were blasted off the golden platform and fell into the dark void. Their screams vanishing along with their bodies that were burned by the source of the explosion: a selfish, insane woman with delusions of grandeur, seeking power at the cost of her humanity and everyone else.

Their bodies fell into the dark abyss, landing in a strange plain of existence and it is there that their stories should end.

Only this world was unique.

In this world, death does not exist and even though the bodies died, they were still absorbed into the ever-expanding force that governed and created the world. These dead bodies, husk still held the remnants of the previous lives they had lived and thus they were broken down and absorbed into the Great Tree to be repurposed.

A chance to be born anew.

However, that changed when the days of chaos began with four lost maidens, their powers and broken hearts causing the realm's evolution to halt and stagnate into chaos. To protect the lives of the denizens who already lived here, the Great Tree brought all beings within it, keeping them safe inside but halted their ascension until it was safe. However, as the chaos continued it became clear that it would not end on its own, forcing the Great Tree and the beings part of it to work to stop the chaos.

A Red King who became a Prince because his purpose had been broken by the lies and cheating of another.

The Herbalist who lost his way.

A thieving racoon who lied and cheated because he was meant to.

And then, she had awakened in an effort to quell the maidens and their fighting, only to be defeated and her place taken by another lost soul who perished, and her body had been taken by the Great Tree to be made anew, becoming a new physical manifestation of the many wills who inhabited the tree. However, the chaos did not end.

More beings were coming to the Ever After, making it into a battleground for these offworlders.

What was the point of all this fighting?

Why did they bring their fighting here?

Why couldn't they just leave?

The girl who taken place of the Tree's former will, was instead meddling outside their realm, endangering them.

They had to be stopped.

And so, the Great Tree began recreating its people, allowing them to become defenders based on the thoughts, desires, and wishes of the being it had ascended, both Afteran and mortal.

A Prince who once became a King to protect the realm.

The Herbalist who can now fly.

And the various lost mortal souls who were born anew, far beyond what they once were.

The Raven, Gryphon, Dodo and Owl as the four-winged defenders.

A black dog the size of a person.

A lion with a crown and wings to call its own.

A unicorn, muscular and black with a mane of purple fire, violet eyes and purple flames blazing from its ankles and tail.

A fawn, larger than a human with horns reaching to the size of an elder buck.

A giant, white floating orb with eyes as black as the void, a mouth with black lips that opened to reveal a toothy mouth with the dark void inside with a long tongue. A white eerie glow emitted from it, almost like a moon reflecting light at night.

A hedgehog with beige colored fur, save for the feet and the needles on the back which were all black. It had no mouth and its eyes glowed crimson.

A humanoid goat that stood on its hind legs, wearing a tattered red robe which casted a shadow in the shape of a woman. From its back sprouted bat-like wings that appeared to be very sharp.

And finally, a pig like creature with blackened eyes, sharp teeth and wore a dress and apron with a white hat with frills on the side. Instead of hands, it instead had a rolling pin on the right arm and an butcher knife on the left.

Given the powers of the four girls, blessed by the magic of the two Brothers who left this world, they had to become as powerful as the girls.

And so, they were all imbued with a power not seen since the Brothers.

"May the Balance be restored." The Blacksmith said with a saddened and regretful face.

Oscar's eyes shot open, and he sat up, hearing an explosion and feeling the ground shaking. "Pe-Penny? Penny!"

She wasn't here.

But something else was.

The Keyblade he had wielded after inheriting the memories of Keyblade Master Odin: Gungnir.

It lied next to him.

"Penny…What is happening?" Oscar slowly picked up the Keyblade. "You would only give me back this…If it was really serious."

He walked out of the shack Penny had made him and looked off into the distance.

Red clouds were swirling close by.

Oscar's own magical senses allowed him to feel a dozen magical energies in the distance, all of them very powerful.

As powerful as Ozma and Salem-

Scratch that, even greater than Ozma and Salem.

"What is happening?" Oscar gripped the hilt of Gungnir tightly. "Has Drasil returned…Or has something else happened?"

He remembered what Odin had told him about the Ever After. In a way, the world itself was alive and if it had felt threatened it could create and give birth to beings with the purpose of defending it. Such a level of creation was on par with the Brother Gods, which was not surprising considering they were born on this very world.

Who was to say beings as powerful or even stronger than the Brothers had not existed in the following eons?

"I got to get over there." Oscar muttered as a green aura surrounded him.

Terra, Neo and Ventus came up onto red clearing, seeing a host of…colorful looking characters, all of them surrounding a familiar girl with blond hair.

"Hey blondie!" Neo called out, earning everyone's attention. "What did you do this time?!"

Yang looked over her shoulder, seeing the Keyblade Wielders, throwing a stink eye at Neo. "This isn't us, shortstack! Well, not completely us."

The Red King turned his gaze to see the three Keyblade Wielders who had just arrived, his eyes narrowing as he looked upon Neo. "You…"

Neo raised an eyebrow as the guy in fancy red garb addressed her. "Do I know you?"

"You hold the essence of one of the creations of the First Two." The Red King stated.

Neo just stared blankly. "Riiiiight…Can you pretend I have no idea what you're talking about?"

"Who are all these guys?" Ven wondered out loud.

Yang shifted to Penny. "They're Afterans…and formerly dead humans reborn as Afterans!"

This made them all, even the ones in Penny's heart pause as she began to explain. "I can see it all know. The poor innocent people who died because of Cinder in the Central Location."

"Huh?" Terra and Ven were confused but Neo understood, her mind flashing back to what happened in the Central Location.

"So, the pretender sees." The Red King commented, eyes narrowed. "You would use the Tree that you latched onto like a parasite to see beyond sight. You were not supposed to gain that power, let alone live past the moment of your death! Raven, Unicorn, Humpty, burn and swallow the pretender!"

(Kingdom Hearts OST Enter the Darkness)

The Raven, Unicorn and the moon shaped creature opened their mouths. A blast of blue fire emerged from the Raven's beak, while the Unicorn breathed out a stream of dark fire while the moon shaped creature called Humpty shot at Penny, its maw opened with the intent to devour her. Terra jumped and landed in front of Penny, his Keyblade morphing into a giant shield that blocked the flames. Humpty bit its mouth down on the shield, snarling and grunting as it clamped its teeth down, but Terra's shield not only held out, but it also didn't suffer a single scratch.

"Terra!" Ven called out.

"Executioner! Cook!" The Red King pointed at Ven. "Off with his head!"

Terra looked back. "Ven!"

Ven summoned his Keyblade as the humanoid goat held out his hand and summoned an axe from a blast of dark flames. The Cook let out a demented cackle as she swung her knife-hand at Ven who easily blocked with his Keyblade. The Executioner dashed in from the side and swung his axe at Ven who quickly ducked and rolled out of the way. Terra shoved Humpty back, his shield then morphing into a giant mace that he then swung right at Humpty.

BAM!

With a single hit, Humpty was sent flying through the air and crashed several yards away before he turned to help Ven.

"Gryphon, Owl, Dodo!" The Red King shouted. "Strike the Bronze Knight down!"

The Owl spread its wings out, lengthening its shadow that shot all the way to Terra, connecting with his shadow.

"Gah!" Terra grunted as shadowy tendrils crawled up his body and covered his armored frame head to toe.

Neo watched on, seeing Terra and Ven falling under attack as the Raven and the Unicorn attacked Penny who turned into Weiss who combined her glyphs with her Maiden powers to blast the pair back but the Unicorn summoned a dark portal in front it, swallowing Weiss' attacks and opened another one, sending them right back at Weiss, knocking her back.

"Okay, I'm done with this." Neo whispered to herself.

From her feet came a pink pulsation that moved along the ground and stopped several feet from her. Pink pixels rose up from the ground, taking the form of an extremely tall, humanoid creature with a dark purple, almost black body. Its physique appeared emaciated with a pronounced spine, collarbone, shoulder-blades, ribcage, and pelvis. There were two sets of purple and dark-yellow striped horns sprouting from the back of its cranium and lower skull.

There were dark-yellow stripes on its hips and on the forearms. Its hands and feet are the same dark-yellow color as the stripes. It had four digits on each hand and three digits on each foot, each ending with a pointed claw. It had a long tail that started thin and fanned out close to the tip, adorned with additional dark-yellow stripes. On its face it appeared to be wearing a grey lupine or reptilian mask with white highlights.

This was not the only creature to be spawned.

At least eight more copies of it were spawned, moving in an unnervingly quick and jerky manner.

Though the mouth was sealed, the creatures began speaking single words, all in a deep, strange, robotic, alien-like voice.

"Assessing…"

"Maintaining…"

"Multiplying…"

"Continuing…"

"Strengthening…"

"Evaluating…"

The creatures began circling around the field like hungry predators, their 'eyes' fixed on the Afterans as they moved slowly but calculated.

"Analyzing…"

"Tracking…"

"Hunting…"

The Red King glared at Neo who smirked back. "So, you brought it out."

"That's right. I know this guy here, kills people like you for real." Neo remarked as she stood next to one, patting it on the head. "Even if you got an upgrade, not only does my Semblance mimic the real one, but they come with all the skills I've got and seen so they can perfectly mimic any fighting style I want."

The Red King simply glared while the Afterans he commanded remained still.

"Now, this would be the part where I sic them all on you and watching as they tear you apart and eat the leftovers…" Neo took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. "But I am trying to become a little different now. So, the new me will give you one chance to walk away. Take it and we can call it a day because if you don't…"

"Threatening…" One of the Jabberwalkers spoke, finishing Neo's ultimatum.

"Intimidating…"

"Scaring…"

"Leveraging…"

"What they said." Neo simply shrugged.

"Neo, don't! They already died and became this way because of us!" Penny called out, having taken over from Weiss. "Don't kill them again."

"I won't if they don't force me to. In case you blacked out, tree girl, these guys aren't going to be nice to us if we simply drop our weapons. I'm leveling the playing field and giving them a chance to call off their tirade. Everything that happens after is on them." Neo softly rebuked.

A few of the Afterans seemed to look uneasy now, given the fact that Neo's illusionary clones of the Jabberwalker were the same as the real one.

The Red King, however, remain composed.

If anything, he was actually smiling now. "It would have been wiser to have simply unleashed your pets on us than simply to make your ultimatum."

Neo raised an eyebrow.

"The Raven, the Gryphon, the Owl, the Dodo, all of them were made to be the Ever After's defenders…four of the five." The Red King's red eyes flashed and he made a gesture with his hand.

Suddenly, from the red colored ground shot up spikes that pierced the Jabberwalker clones through their torsos. Neo stepped back, surprised that her clones had been taken out so quickly.

And the Red King was right in front of her.

"You can't harm me with anything controlled by my color!" The Red King snarled, grabbing's arm.

Neo summoned her Keyblade, aiming to slashing the Red King's face but red dust shot from his hand and into her hair. "Wha-"

"Pink is a variation of the color red, and I am the Red King!" The Red King proclaimed. "That which was created here, can never be perverted or used to destroy me!"

Neo let out a scream as the pink part of her hair turned red, followed by her pink eye.

"Neo!" Terra and Ven shouted.

"Fire!"

A blast of fire hit the Red King in the face, causing him to cry out in pain as he let go of Neo's hand. The Gullwings flew up to Neo, watching as she fell to her knees, grasping right side of her face.

The Red King snarled, holding the black scorched side of his face as he glared hatefully at the three fairies now hovering in front of Neo. "You are not of the Great Tree."

"And you're a big bully!" Yuna retorted.

"Yeah!" Rikku stuck her tongue out.

Paine just gave the Red King a thumbs-down.

The Red King's hand flashed, emitting a red glow over his face and the dark scorched skin instantly healed. He straightened himself, his angry glare now settling into an indifferent one. His eyes settled on Neo, whose hair and eye remained red. The Red King grinned as his eyes began to glow and the red on Neo's hair and her eye began to react.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Neo screamed as the red section of her hair lit up and now red her glowed along with the Red King's.

Red pixels surrounded her body that began to turn dark purple, becoming emaciated with a pronounced spine. Her arms and legs began to grow long and slender with her fingers growing into bone-like claws. Her dark coat vanished under the red pixels, revealing a dark purple collarbone, shoulder blades, a ribcage and pelvis. A tail sprouted from the base of her spine.

As the red pixels reached up to Neo's neck and face, she let out on final scream as a grey, metallic mask covered her face and two sets of horns sprouted from the back of her cranium and lower skull. Neo's voice was muffled and became silent as the transformation was complete, leaving a Jabberwalker in her place. Terra and Ven were stunned by what happened as the Gullwing fairies slowly floated away, now afraid of what Neopolitan had become.

Inside Penny's heart, Team RWBY and Jaune were also shocked by what had happened.

"He turned Neo…into a Jabberwalker?" Weiss slowly said, eyes wide with shock.

The creature formerly known as Neo lurched to its feet, taking a hunched over posture as its head twitched strangely, leaving faint afterimages with each movement as it began speaking in the same voice as the clones had.

"Assessing…Maintaining…Multiplying." The creature said as it crawled on fall fours towards the Red King.

"What have you done to her?!" Ven shouted.

"I have corrected her first sin." The Red King answered as the Jabberwalker continued crawling towards him.

"Stop!" Ven shouted, preparing to charge.

Only the Unicorn released a blast of dark purple fire at him and the Red King made a gesture, turning it into a massive black and red fireball that would have incinerated Ven if Terra hadn't stepped in front of him and created the shield form of his Keyblade to block the attack.

BOOM!

The Red King paid them no mind after they were engulfed in the explosion, his eyes settling onto the creature before him.

"Continuing…Strengthening…Evaluating."

"You destroyed the original Jabberwalker but your strange allowed to recreate and subjugate it." The Red King said slowly, grinning in satisfaction as the beast approached him.

"Assessing."

"A creation of the First Two, created to end life and halt ascension. You recreated it so well, that they could devour and grow like the real Jabberwalker could. The Jabberwalker couldn't ascend when you destroyed but it was so integrated into powers, you might as well have taken it and absorbed it like the Great Tree would during ascension. Only now, the Jabberwalker's new purpose requires a form of ascension to suit its new purpose."

"Searching…Seeking…Evaluating…Assessing…" The creature muttered as the Red King placed a hand on its masked face. "Evolving…"

The hand glowed and red veins traveled down its body.

"Growing…"

"Purple is a color associated with red and I am the King of All Red." The Red King proclaimed. "Now, the Jabberwalker becomes…The Jabberwock!"

The created let out a roar as its form began to grow, dark scalers spreading down its arms and up its legs to cover the entire body, black feathery wings sprouting from its back. Its neck grew out, becoming long and the mouth section of its mouth opened to reveal multiple rows teeth and the 'eyes' of the mask/face began to glow red.

To Penny and those inside her heart, it looked like Neo had literally been turned into a Creature of Grimm.

To Ruby, this was especially disturbing as it reminded her of…The Hound.

"Take the girl…" The face spoke from the mass of darkness covering its body. "Take…the…girl!"

The blackness receding as it died, leaving only a skeleton.

His face…partially in a strange white substance….

But he still had one eye…

A silver eye.

And in that instance, the man's face changed to resemble a face Ruby knew all too well.

"Take…the…girl!" The distorted face of Summer Rose screamed.

Ruby let out a startled cry as she stepped back inside the Station of Awakening in Penny's heart, the sudden transformation of Neo into the Jabberwalker and then into the Jabberwock having been all too similar to the thoughts Ruby had of her mother being forcefully turned into a Grimm.

It hadn't even occurred to her that as a part of Penny, she could ask what happened to her mother.

Or maybe she was too afraid to ask.

To afraid what the answer might be.

And to afraid to ask to be shown what happened and would potentially see her mother enduring a fate worse than death as the blackness of Grimm matter covered her body, ate away at her flesh and sanity.

She knew it wasn't the time to be thinking of such things, but Neo's transformation had brought these memories and thoughts to the surface, and she briefly wondered, if they had somehow got through all of this, would she have the courage to ask the question.

To find out what really happened to Summer Rose, her hero, her mother.

And could she live with watching what happened, knowing she might not be able to do anything to change it.