Elsewhere in the castle, Riku was walking through the halls with the Keylade still in his hand. He looked to his other hand, seeing it tremble. Biting his lower lip, he shook his head and tried not thinking about Maleficent's words. It was only one use of a dark firaga attack, so how could it be affecting him this much?

"Hey, wait up!"

Behind him, Riku saw Goofy and Donald rushing to catch up. It made him sneer as he said, "What do you want?"

"You're the keybearer. We've were told by our king to go with him." Donald said as he caught his breath.

"How many times do I have to tell you? Leave me alone. I didn't ask for you to follow me." Riku said bitterly, fast-walking ahead of them. The fact two people who were with Sora for so long were now traveling with him was infuriating. Though maybe not as infuriated as Donald was when he lost his temper.

"Wak! What's his problem?!" he shouted while jumping in place and flailing his fists with an enraged expression.

Goofy seemed curious when seeing Riku move a little slower. "Hey. Is he okay?"

Donald's anger calmed when he looked to his friend. "What do you mean?"

Goofy wasn't sure how to describe it but tried to when seeing the way Riku shambled and breathed heavily. "He looks tired. And... like he's in pain."

Donald followed Goofy's concerned expression and noticed that Riku...seemed to be weighed down by something. To the point where it did indeed seem to be causing him pain. More and more questions had mounted since they followed Riku. With one in particular being chief among them.

Did they make the right choice following him?

Deeper within the castle, Maleficent smiled victoriously within the room where she kept her most prized acquisitions. The seven Princesses of Heart, six bound within thorny vines in a grand room leading to a decorated platform in front of a great, pipe laden machine surrounded a red, blue, and green colored sparking surge of energy shaped like the Heartless insignia. And in the middle of the area where the princesses were bound...was Kairi, levitating in the air as if laying within an invisible casket. Walking up the red carpeted stairs flanked by two torch holding gargoyles, she turned to bask in her inevitable victory. At last she had all seven Princesses of Heart in her grasp. And with them, the Keyhole to this world was within reach. With all their hearts at her disposal, there was nothing to stop her from claiming its power for herself, and opening the path to that which she desired most. "O purest of hearts! Reveal to me, the Keyhole!"

Just as she commanded, six pink, sparkling beams of light emerged from the princesses bound in the sides of the room, all converging over Kairi before they reflected over to the bizarre Heartless Insignia bearing machine. It was there that the Keyhole had been hidden. And with the true chosen of the Keyblade in her pocket, Riku would be the one to bring her the ultimate prize she longed for.

So caught up in her moment of triumph, she didn't notice that the process was being closely observed by Cinder, Emerald, and Mercury. "She really loves to hear herself talk." Mercury remarked snidely.

"She's even worse than Torchwick." Emerald said in an agreement. She'd just grown used to not hearing the ginger haired criminal's voice too.

The comparison wasn't lost on Cinder going by the smirk on her face. "I wonder if it will bite her in the end just as badly as it did him." she said. But of course, her foolish allies aside, she did find herself curious as to just what lay beyond these Keyholes they had been so obsessed about. And whether Riku would have what it took now that he had the Keyblade and Sora didn't.

As Maleficent watched with contain excitement toward her plans coming to fruition, she turned toward her remaining three allies, hearing them conversing among themselves. "What is Riku's current condition?" she asked, hoping to hear further good news.

"From what I saw, he's got the Keyblade now. That little spiky haired nuisance's wings have been clipped" Mercury said with a nonchalant shrug.

The wicked grin on Maleficent's face grew as she gave a soft but maniacal chuckle. "Wonderful. Then the only weapon that could stop us is now in the possession of one who has allied themself with us. We have nothing to fear. Dispose of Sora and his meddlesome friends." With the order given, she turned back toward the keyhole, where those hearts most pure would open the way to her greatest desire. The power of the heart of all worlds.

Doing as she instructed, Cinder, Emerald, and Mercury left. Once they were out of the room, and earshot of Maleficent, Emerald took that opportunity to voice her concerns. "Cinder. If that kid is with Maleficent and has the Keyblade now, how can she be stopped? We needed him to restore Remnant. Riku couldn't care less about bringing it back." Sora was at least an altruistic, easily manipulable pawn. But Riku? He cared about nothing except Kairi.

"Exactly." Mercury said, just as concerned as Emerald, despite his unenthusiastic air with his his arms up behind his head. "I mean, I'm fine with taking out everyone else, but we need the star-child of Sanctum for-"

He stopped as suddenly both he and Emerald were met with the the menacing glare of Cinder, who spoke to him with a low, dangerous tone. "Don't remind me of things I already know. I'm not stupid," After calming herself, she continued walking, with Emerald and Mercury following right behind. "We just need to continue laying low until our own plan comes to pass. Besides. This isn't over."

Emerald was unsure what her boss meant but felt the need to ask. "What do you mean? Do you have some plan to get Riku to restore Remnant, Cinder?"

"No. He's too stubborn and short-sighted to manipulate. But..." Cinder paused as her face shifted into an intrigued, half-smirk. "Something tells me there's more to Sora than meets the eye. Even if he doesn't have that Keyblade anymore, it still chose him and obeyed him for a while. There has to be a reason. That weapon is far more special than it seems. How many weapons choose their owners, after all?"

Her words made Emerald and Mercury look at one another, realizing that Cinder brought up an interesting point. They knew what to expect from Ruby and her comrades, so they'd be able to deal with them easily enough. But Sora, inexperienced as he may have been, was still a wildcard as far as they knew. As was the Keyblade. And if Cinder suspected that the commotion outside was because of Sora...then perhaps Maleficent's victory wasn't as open and shut as it seemed to be.

"Oh, thank goodness. Back outside at last. No more water, please." Neptune said, his voice filled with relief as the group made their way back to the gates of the castle.

"I'm half-tempted to sign you up for swimming lessons." Sun said with a sly grin.

His words earned a look that seemed torn between deathly horror and infernal anger from Neptune who growled, "Don't you dare!" as they came to the previously locked doors.

Just as they reached it however, a series of shadows seemed to fall over them. Specifically shadows cast from up above. Beast and Blake noticed them first, turning to see several talon toting Heartless reared to strike them. Beast let out a roar as he swiped the diving Heartless to the side. "We've got company!" Blake yelled out, drawing everyone's attention, just in time to slash what appeared to be a trio of small flying Grimm.

Everyone else drew their weapons as they faced their foes. The Heartless looked to be two legged, blue bodied draconic beasts with a pair of spiked shoulder adorned wings and a yellow underbelly that matched the tips of the shoulder spikes and the horns jutting out behind its angular head. It looked very much akin to what a fabled wyvern would. The Grimm were smaller but more numerous as they floated into view, revealing themselves to be almost like monstrous bats. "Oh great. Ravagers." Neptune said with irritation as everyone readied their weapons.

"Another new kind of Grimm?" Sora asked, trying to aim his wooden sword to get a good shot on one of the flying mammalian monsters.

"Yup. They're an annoyance from the nation Neptune and I were from on Remnant. But a flock of them can really prove an issue." Sun explained, firing at one of them.

"Come and get it!" Nora yelled, swaying her hammer like a baseball bat.

"No. We can't stay out here. We need to get inside" Ren called out softly.

"But there's so many of them! If we don't deal with these Heartless and Grimm now, they'll just force their way inside!" Sora exclaimed, launching blasts of Fire at the Grimm and Heartless along with Ruby, Blake, Weiss, Pyrrha, and Neptune.

As Jaune, Sun, Nora, and Yang stood ready to deal with the Heartless that got in close, the leader of Team JNPR called out, "Ruby! You, Sora, and Beast go inside! We'll deal with these things and catch up!"

"What?! But we can't leave you guys out here!" Ruby protested over the gun and spellfire.

"Ruby, now is not the time to argue! Just trust us!" Blake called out as she Besides, it's not like this would be the first time you've gone somewhere without us!" Weiss urged as she skewered another of the Grimm.

"Yeah, don't worry about us, sis! We can take care of a few flying pests!" Yang cheered, firing off several rounds of buckshot from Ember Celica.

"It's not like it would be the first time you ran off!" Weiss compounded, reminding Ruby of that incident at Mt. Glenn.

It wasn't that Ruby had no faith in them, of course. Simply that after all they'd been through, she didn't want to lose sight of them again. Especially in a place like this. "But-"

"We don't have time for this!" Beast roared, grabbing one of the wyverns as it swooped down to attack, and slamming it against the doors. The force of the blow caused them to open. "Get inside, now!" he bellowed, not giving Ruby or Sora, or anyone for that matter, the chance to linger on how he managed to slam those heavy doors open with that Heartless's now disintegrated body.

"Whoa!" "Hey!" Sora and Ruby both exclaimed as suddenly they were hauled off their feet with little trouble.

"Ruby! Sora! We'll be right behind you! We promise!" Pyrrha called after them as Beast unceremoniously pulled the pair inside.

"Be careful, everyone!" Sora called back, hoping and praying that the friends who stayed with him would weather the storm that converged upon them. He'd lost far too much as it was.