The Age of Fairy Tales:

The New Gods IV

"You are saying the Gods created these Relics to represent the four gifts?"

Ozma nodded. "There's no way to know when they were created or where they might be. It was only considered a legend but I believe the Gods did indeed create these Relics. To serve as a guiding symbol for humanity."

Salem brought a hand to her chin as she contemplated what she had learned. "Knowledge, Creation, Destruction and Choice. They sound powerful, especially if the legend is true."

"Perhaps the Relic of Destruction, which comes in the form of a sword, is the key to our salvation." Ozma reasoned. "It can possibly destroy this monster."

It sounded like a plausible plan. As Salem mulled it over, Ozma had to push down the feeling of guilt he had for slightly lying to his beloved.

He had told her about the Relics but not the whole truth.

He had only said that the Gods created the Relics but did not say they had been created after the Gods had left Remnant. He did not know how she might react if given the full truth but given the threat of Sin he had to take the chance that perhaps the Relics were the answer to the dilemma they were facing at the moment and worry about the consequences.

Still, he felt terrible for this.

A lie of omission possibly but a lie nonetheless.

"And you believe these Relics exist?" Salem questioned.

Ozma nodded. "Given the world we live in, or rather we used to live in I do believe that these Relics are real and they are out there…somewhere."

"How do you suppose we look for them?" Salem questioned. "It has been so long…The world has changed since that time, Ozma."

"I know." Ozma nodded in agreement. "But if there is a chance…"

Salem brought her hands over her crystal ball. "The world is large and vast. It would take too long to find these so-called Relics, even for you."

Her crystal ball showed an image of the Grimm in the Land of Darkness.

"You suggest we use the Grimm?" Ozma questioned. "How would they find these Relics?"

"The Grimm are wide spread across the world. With my control over them, I can direct them to search out the ancient ruins." Salem explained. "They might find a clue faster than just one man, magical or not."

Ozma had to concede she had a point there.

"We'll still need to learn where this monster is and where it came from to be sure there are not more like out there." Salem continued. "At least with the Grimm, I can learn much faster."

"What should we do in the meantime?" Ozma asked.

"Prepare." Salem stood up from her chair and approached the window. "Our castle has been built and our kingdom is growing. With our powers and my ability to control the Grimm, the people will now flock to us, looking to us for protection. We will have to ensure them that despite the presence of this monster that they are in no danger to keep them calm."

Ozma nodded in agreement. They were rulers now and they had an obligation to the people to assure their safety.

Xxx

Everyone was observing the fight both Ozma and Salem fighting against the newest monstrous creature called Sin. It was a grand battle that that monster and two magic users had against each other through the world portal of Yggdrasil.

"Well, that was something." Neo said, amazed by the battle even when that witch was fighting solo it was almost close enough to be a stalemate.

A monster versus monstrosity.

Especially with how many different times that that monstrous creature killed her even with that black hole move. It was quite interesting to see how many times Salem had to pull herself together.

A monster even stronger than the present Remnant's everyday boogeyman.

'I still have to wonder if Roman would think I'm crazy for being part of this.' Neo thought to herself. 'I'm literally helping to remake history.'

She just wondered if it would make things for the better and she would have him back again.

"Of all the things that had happened. I know one thing at least I'm not reckless back in those days. And yet, I have no memory of this battle and..." Oscar paused and noticed the scene change back to the castle where the two have been talking about that creature.

Well, given how he saw Salem in danger from such a monster he could actually understand Ozma's reasoning for attacking the monster like that. Was he really that reckless back then or was it simply because he was watching a past version of himself attacking something more powerful than any Grimm on the face of Remnant?

And right now he was watching his past self as Diggs telling her about the two other relics could help them against that monster the relics of the knowledge and destruction.

"I never tried to tell her about the relics either! Although trying to choose those two relics against the monster… I admit that's what I would do, although why would I have to tell her about the relics now? Long ago after our children were born I told her the reason why was there in about the relics too. Except this is far different than I remembered."

Terra and Penny looked through the portal to see what is going on.

"It seems both parties are attempting to look for the relics of knowledge and destruction. Only now the fate of the world of the past depends on them now to the East and the West, Sanus and Anima." Penny stated.

"Which means, we're going to have to inform her again about the bad news, gone to worse." Terra finished.

Xxx

"What the heck was that?!" Poppy is astounded by the earthquake and resetting her footing.

She looked up at her mentor her attention on the West.

'Aqua!'

Aqua perked up at the sound of a familiar voice. "Terra?"

'Aqua, listen. Sin showed up and attacked the kingdom that Salem and my past self are building. They drove it off but now my past self has told Salem about the Relics. He didn't tell her the full truth but enough to keep her focused on the current matter at hand.' Oscar cut in.

'The matter being that giant monster you took on.' Neo was next.

"Sin?" Aqua's eyes widened.

'Precisely, Miss Aqua.' Penny spoke next. 'This new Sin, it's still growing in strength and I have a feeling it will be even stronger soon. Ozma believes the Relic of Destruction is the solution but he also considers the idea of using the Relic of Knowledge as well. It might be enough to destroy Sin's body but given that it was born from the powers of Kingdom Hearts, albeit a lesser version I cannot say for sure it will actually work.'

Ozma and Salem were seeking the Relics now?

They were seeking the same Relic as she and Poppy were?

Aqua sighed and looked at Poppy who had just been staring at her with confusion in her eyes.

Staring off into space and talking to people who for the most part are just voices in your head would warrant that kind of reaction.

"Poppy do you remember what I said that I haven't traveled the West of the world since I've been traveling on the East?" Aqua asked her apprentice.

She responded and nodded to her mentor. "Yeah."

Sure enough, it was easy remembering that conversation but she was now uneasy feeling about where this was going.

"It seems in the western region that monster calling itself Sin had made its move. I believe we just jinxed it." Aqua sighed. "Just now I felt someone trying to connect with me through my Semblance and I heard what they had to say. They informed me what was going on in the Western lands and it didn't sound good."

Poppy was wondering if this connection thing happened again after that monster Sin was created between the hours of training.

"Poppy... I have news one is good, one is bad, and one is the worst." Aqua grimaced.

"Let me guess the bad news first is about the western region that there are large amounts of people there right. A major fight broke out over there even causing the earthquake." Poppy pointed out. "So what's the good news?"

"The good news is after its recent fight it returned to the ocean it seems because the battle it had with two powerful protectors. Though they both of them withdrew at the end as well." Aqua answered.

"Dare I ask what the worst news is?" Poppy asked, sounding worried in her tone.

"I'm afraid so. Do you remember that story I told you and the darkness in the woods where the witch in the woods near your town?" Aqua slowly asked, knowing what the reaction would be.

The look on Poppy's face proved her right.

"No...! You don't mean that protector at the West is that pale witch that killed my home village and family." Poppy was wide-eyed in shock in horror.

Aqua rubbed the back of her neck signaling her apprentice 'sad to say that is true she is the same one.' Aqua doesn't like this news at all the more as her apprentice does too.

"Unfortunately that she is claiming herself as a deity over the western region." Aqua informed her. "Not only that they are trying to do the same thing as we are acquiring the relic of knowledge. Only she might be after the Relic of Destruction too."

Now, this is more on the act of not just of a quest for the relics.

It was now a race.

Xxx

He had no idea what to do now.

His family

His village

His people…

All of them gone.

All that was left was him because of his cowardice and those two women.

He then looked at the two females who had saved his life while they stared back for a moment…before turning away. He fell to his knees, watching as they walked around the village, looking for supplies. When the blue haired woman stopped in front of him he lifted his head and looked up at her, seeing a beautiful face staring at him as she held out one hand to him.

He simply stared.

The hand hovered in front of him for a moment before the woman sighed and lowered her hand. She turned around and walked over to her companion who watched in silence. They packed whatever supplies they could find and continued on their way, leaving the one man who survived the massacre to watch them as they left.

All he could do at this point was just watch.

It had been days since then and he wandered aimlessly, packing what he could find and leaving what remained of his home behind.

Where would he go?

What would he do?

He had no answer to that.

He was powerless and weak when the Grimm destroyed his home and killed everyone he knew.

And even if he had survived nothing had changed since he had realized how weak he truly was.

How could he possibly survive in such a dark world?

"I don't believe it!"

A voice shouting through the air caught his attention. Curiosity, the first feeling he had felt aside hopelessness and despair in days, caused him to follow the sound of the voice and to his shcok he saw the two women who have saved his life out in a clearing.

"The women who wiped out my family is now acting like a goddess and promising to protect everyone if they follow her?!" The red haired girl paced back and forth angrily. "Would they even care about how many people she had killed?!"

"I don't like it either but we're ahead of her." The blue haired woman replied as she pulled out a small rod that extended out into an ornate staff with a blue jewel at the top. "As long as we have this, she can't use it and once we find the lamp and learn what we need we'll hide them again and make sure she never finds them."

She?

What was that staff?

And what lamp?

"Why not go over to her kingdom and tell everyone what kind person their new 'goddess' really is?" The girl asked.

"Poppy, I am not happy about this either but between Salem gathering people for her new kingdom and Sin still out there we kind of have our hands full at the moment. I know that Sin sent her packing meaning it is more dangerous at the moment and it will only grow stronger." The blue haired woman softly replied. "We need to focus on stopping it and then we can worry about Salem."

The red haired girl looked like she wanted to argue some more but relented. "Fine. So how do we find the lamp?"

"Well," The woman held up the staff. "Each of the Relics gives off a similar feeling of magic and I've been around long enough to sense the magic from this one. I have trying to sense the other Relics but it's been faint. I wanted to try traveling a bit to see if I could strengthen this sense but if Salem is on the move and looking for them we don't have the time now."

She held out her hand and summoned a strange white and blue sword that to his shock transformed into some kind of strange but small chariot.

"I guess we're going to have to speed things up." The woman said as she sat down and gestured for the girl to get on behind her.

It was a tight squeeze but she managed to get and the chariot shot into the air, faster than the human eye could keep up with. He watched as they flew up into the sky and vanished behind the clouds. He slowly came out from behind the tree he had used for cover, staring in the direction the two women had flown.

Perhaps…he found his answer.

Xxx

"Things are moving way too fast." Oscar was pacing around the massive tree that was once Drasil's core. "Ozma may not have mentioned what the Relics are really for but this is still too soon."

"Perhaps Sin's appearance caused him to become desperate." Terra suggested. "You saw how powerful that monster was."

"Yeah…I guess." Oscar admitted. "It was more powerful than any beast Ozma had ever faced. Even with all of his magic."

"Speaking of, how just powerful were you magic users?" Neo questioned while sitting on a stump. "All I got from those Maidens and Salem were controlling elements and firing energy blasts."

"Well…" Oscar rubbed the back of his head. "I guess the best answer is that magic…Well, the old magic was the very essence of the world Remnant used to be."

Neo raised an eyebrow. "Huh?"

"Our magic never really had a limit as long as one had the creativity and the drive. No one really understood all the rules of magic aside from the Gods." Oscar answered, trying to explain as best as he could. "The best I can is say is…It was like having every Semblance imaginable. All of it right there if you can imagine it and master it."

Neo's eyes went wide. "Wait. Are you saying that folks back then could have done everything, from my illusions, Red's speed, Blondie's strength, Ice Queen's glyphs, Kittie's shadows and every other Semblance out there?"

"In a way." Oscar nodded. "It just took training, mastering your abilities and trying to branch out."

"…So that's why everyone was so afraid of Salem." Neo muttered before summoning her Keyblade. "If so though, I am surprised that the Keyblade is even stronger."

"Salem has no doubt had eons to master her abilities, including her control over the Grimm. She managed to keep her power and even increase it when she dove into the Grimm pools. In fact, I believe the Grimm pools rejuvenate her magic simply because they are a part of Remnant itself. Though considering her immortality and her powers being only rivaled by Oz through the centuries I doubt she's been training her magic for a long time." Oscar continued. "The Keyblade is a natural conduit for magic and like Remnant's magic it is only limited by the imagination and mental fortitude of its wielder."

"So does that mean our Semblances are like…a fractured form of magic or something?" Neo asked with her mind racing.

"…Yes." Oscar nodded. "Oz figured out a way to awaken a minor form of magic in Remnant's second humanity when he decided he needed to unite them against the Grimm and Salem."

Neo and Terra were silent as they contemplated what they had learned while Penny continued to observe Aqua's journey.

"Magic was a gift from the God of Darkness but it was centered around the two powers both Brothers wielded: Creation and Destruction. You have seen destruction every time one of the Maidens used their powers but even those were basic compared to the most potent form of Destruction magic." Oscar continued. "Creation magic in its base form was…Well, you seen what Aqua could do with the Staff of Creation. In its most powerful it cannot just create basic objects it can also create…life."

"Life?" Terra questioned. "You literally created life with this magic."

"The God of Darkness created the Grimm and despite their soulless nature they are still a form of life. Creation in its most powerful form was focused on the world itself, altering the physical realm and can even alter the state of the soul as the God of Light did to Ozma." Oscar answered, nodding at Terra's question. "Oz experimented with this form of magic over the centuries and he learned many different ways to apply it like when he created the original Maidens. He literally transferred his own magic to four young women and engraved the rules for the Maidens into them so that when they died the power would seek out a new host rather than simply disperse."

"Altering the soul…" Neo zeroed in on those words and came to a realization. "That's how you created Aura isn't it?"

Oscar looked at Neo with a surprised face.

"You, Ozpin, Ozma, whoever did something to everyone's souls to give them Aura." Neo stood up from her stump. "You admitted that Aura and Semblances are a fractured form of magic. You must have figured out a way to give everyone that power."

Oscar was silent for a moment and then nodded. "I still consider myself Oscar but I have Oz's memories and yeah…He did some pretty gray stuff in those days. He was on his own, trying to fight Salem and her Grimm and humanity didn't stand a chance on its own. He used the Relics, Knowledge and Creation to figure out a way to open a small link back to the essence of magic the Gods left in the planet to awaken a small power in everyone and that's how Aura was created."

"Wait a minute." Neo frowned. "So then how did everyone keep Aura after you used the Staff? I know how it works. It can only create one thing at a time…Unless…You used a substitute like Aqua did, didn't you?"

Terra glanced between Neo and Oscar. "A substitute?"

"Aqua let that creation spirit merge with her temporarily and she used to create a lot of things like that mountain home we saw." Neo clarified. "She even made a copy of my original weapon to give to me before we went into the Realm of Darkness."

Oscar cleared his throat. "Yes…Oz found a way that didn't need the Staff's power constantly. As it turned out since Remnant was formed from the power of the Gods themselves all he needed to really was forge a connection between the second branch of humanity and the Remnant. The problem was Oz's magic was nowhere near the power of the Gods and without their blessings he could only create a small connection which was enough to create Aura and later Semblances."

"And the Dust?" Neo prodded.

"A crystalized form of the old magic that the God of Darkness stripped from the first branch of humanity." Oscar answered.

"So all our Dust was just left over magic from back then." Neo concluded. "Does that mean we would have run out eventually?"

"Yes." Oscar nodded. "I am afraid Dust is finite even if we can find new ways to produce. Without the Gods to rejuvenate our mana reserves, Dust is all that we have left of the old magic outside of the Grimm, Salem and myself."

"So what about Aqua?" Terra questioned, looking back at the tree to see the image of Aqua flying across Remnant with Poppy on her back. "She's already awakened this girl's Aura. I am not sure she will stop at just one if she is pushed."

"That is something I might have to speak with her about." Oscar admitted. "We're all afraid that Aqua might alter history too much but I think this happening before she even came back. In fact I think it stared when she persuaded the Gods to only wipe out Salem's followers. Even though humanity survived, the knowledge of magic lingered enough to have some long term affect."

"Like Sin." Terra stated.

"Yes." Oscar nodded.

"So it wouldn't have mattered if Aqua had refused this quest. Remnant's history, at least in the near beginning was already changed." Terra looked back at Aqua's image. "She couldn't have known it would go this far…But I know she wouldn't been able to live with herself if she stood by and let all those people die."

"Yes." Oscar nodded again. "It is an admirable quality in her."

Neo said nothing as she looked back at Aqua.

Xxx

He wasn't sure if telling her now was a good idea.

Well, he told an abridged version of the Relics but Ozma wasn't sure if he had made the right call yet. Right now though, all that mattered was stopping that monster.

Salem had asked some of her subjects to look up on this creature that they had come across. Several days later the results came back in that were far off from the Eastern continent as news had spread and several travelers had told them what it is and what was called: Sin. It turned out that creature was created by a certain cult that believed had some sort of method that was despicable, especially to Ozma. Fortunately it was disbanded since the truth had gotten out so their practices are diminished.

"It seems that are indeed people out there willing to use whatever measures they believe will give them power." She spoke to her beloved about what she had been told and she could admit that even she was surprised about this as well.

Despite his earlier reservations, Ozma now has more reasons to side with his wife. The reason is that this world needs them to stop this wretched cult and any others wish to continue on needs to be stopped.

Salem could see her arguments were thoroughly convincing her husband more of the reason to join her on this cause to claim the world as theirs. "We must track down whatever is left of this cult and ensure they cannot create another monstrosity."

"Yes." Ozma clenched a fist. "We must."

Together they would unite the world.

Together they would stop this monster.

Together.