Before we proceed, I must confess that it has been extremely difficult for me to write this. This story was such a huge part of our lives, and mine—no matter how distant I might have been, or may continue to be—is no different. For the longest time, I couldn’t do it out of sheer anxiety: how could I possibly put to words anything that would amount to the type of experiences we had? The longer I waited, the more monumental the thought became. This adventure of ours was up on so high a pedestal for so long that I’ve been unable to make myself write it out. Nothing I could possibly put together would ever truly be worthy of being called an ‘ending’.
Over the years, I’ve added bits here and there. Eventually, today, I finally crossed the hurdle for the final half. Yes, it’s impossible for me to do our story justice. I am one, and we are many. But this isn’t about justice. It’s about respect. It was so much a part of me, but in doing this, I can finally divulge everything and pay respects to the essence of a story that we created together. I hope you all won’t mind it; it won’t win any Pulitzers, and honestly it probably isn’t even my best, but if I continue to focus on making it ‘the best it can be’... it would never be finished or shared.
It won’t be terribly narrative; in fact, it’ll be almost conversational, like a lecture or seminar. So without further ado, let’s resolve what was known, what was planned, and what remains yet unknown.
First, a recap.
For seven days, the random earthlings worked toward various goals—collecting wise and mystical figures, cementing alliances sought by a missing mouse-king. At every turn, darknesses both familiar and new stood in our path. Eventually, the scope of our enemies became clear to us, a vast network of villains and malefactors from countless backgrounds, controlled by a small group known as the Fiends of Heart, lead Xehanort. And behind even them, within the darkness itself, was a monstrous corruption both brutal and insidious.
We met this force face-to-abyssal-face twice, each time having utterly overpowered a host entity in an attempt to crush out our light, twice calling out our history as Earthborn. The second time, with an eruption of primordial light and the hearts of thousands at our side, we were able to silence this abomination, if only temporarily, while simultaneously freeing the hearts of countless other Earthborn, including our loved ones.
On returning to Disney, we discovered the source of the primordial light to be a mysterious entity trapped within the Cornerstone, calling themself the Guardian of Light, to whom the Earthborn are tied. From them, we learned of the two other Guardians: of Balance, responsible for the rebirth of the Nobodies as Nobodies instead of their whole selves; and of Darkness, which had seemingly become corrupted at some point in the distant past, and whom we had since fought.
The forces of light had congregated, and with the defeat of the darkness at Narnia, the leaders of the light forces determined their best bet would be to ensure the Earthborn were trained properly—and so you entered an area of compressed time, training for 1 year within 3 days. Confident with your growth, Yen Sid decided to allow you to test your mettle in the real world by joining with the Olympic Games in Thebes.
That, however, is the past. It is easy to speak of what is written; it is something else entirely to discuss the manifold futures yet to come, to unveil any single ‘true’ path of a narrative so entrenched in a vast tree of possibilities. Even then, I can only share what I know, so I am certainly missing pieces each of you still hold close.
All the same, I shall try.
The games included many faces, with both familiar and unknown people joining the fray, and lasted for three days. To some surprise, the competitions went uninterrupted; whether by the strict boundaries set by the gods, or by the seeming indifference of the darkness, no tragedy occurred during the games proper.
||One surprise occurred during a late fight between Kyle and a stranger in obscuring attire, including a lengthy duster, a helmet with an obscured visor, and… lightsabers? The combatants seemed to be going toe-to-toe, trading hits and spells, before Kyle managed, in one fell reaction, to disarm the man, grab the freed saber, and slash through his opponent (the games were, as people know, explicitly non-fatal). The visage of the figure faltered, his armor seeming to surge and flux due to the saber’s magic-disruption. The figure jumped back, calling the saber back to him, as his helmet broke down into dead nanites, revealing Ajora—though he insisted his name was now Adam.
He no longer reeked of Darkness, nor of Ultima, and his abilities seemed vastly different. Whether or not he spoke true, combat reconvened, with Kyle’s tenacity heightened. Eventually, Kyle pushed himself to the brink, even as Adam warned him to stop, and though he did incalculable damage, he barely remained upright on his knees. Adam was likewise debilitated yet still conscious—but forfeit all the same, seemingly content. He proceeded to avoid the group and all others who might seek him out.||
Once the games ended, the group stayed one final evening in town, enjoying the revelry.
||When the morning came, however, Kyla and James were both missing, unreachable, with no trace of their whereabouts. Once it was determined they were no longer in the city-state, the group was ordered back to Disney to investigate from a safe distance, as the leaders grew concerned they were being picked off. While they tried to uncover the facts, they were hailed by an incoming airship, requesting an audience with the King, with urgent news—the pilot announced himself as Adam, and said he is willing to comply with whatever safety protocols were necessary so long as he remained free to leave.
When he entered the throne room, he declared his every action, solemn if a little annoying. With permission, he was allowed to summon a weapon—and called forth a Keyblade, with which he knelt in front of the King, keeping eye contact. He declared no fealty, but pledged an alliance in whatever ways he could. He explained that his forces—which he apparently had—had been commanded to act as distractions and hindrances to the Darkness in any way possible in order to give the forces of light whatever space and time they required. Furthermore, he claimed to know what happened to James and Kyla, giving the information freely: that they had been abducted by their replicas, one of which—Kuro Oni—had become ascendent in his connection to the Guardian of Darkness, beginning to approach the devotion of the Fiends themselves.
They were located deep within the Realm of Darkness, which remained practically untraversable due to the Corruption, as they’d come to call it (as calling it ‘Guardian’ seems wrong). Their clothing would mask their presence, but the Realm—which, in this Converged worldspace, was like a spreading storm that claimed more and more land—still contorted space and time, making mapping or directions effectively useless without some manner of guidance. He personally offered such guidance, his only request being that they try to take Kuro and Kai alive. As a peace offering, he also handed over Ienzo—once Zexion, heart returned, all-too-eager to make amends for his past mistakes.
After entering a magic pact to ensure Adam’s honesty (and him freely allowing whatever punishing blows they want), the group departed on Adam’s airship, speeding over worlds and, eventually, through the stormfront that leads to the Realm of Darkness. Through the combined effort of the heroes, they managed to avoid or deflect various attacks and impediments before landing in the cursed Xarcabard, wrapped up in the ensorcelled boundaries created by Kai and Luxord. Adam split off to cause a distraction, leaving behind an android of himself as a medium and guide. With Kuro sufficiently distracted, the heroes found James and Kyla doing their best to hold their own against Kai, the Nameless abomination, and Luxord. The Nobody quickly abandoned the scene, recognizing a lost game, while—with the help of their friends—James and Kyla were able to overcome the trials the Replicas had planned for them, also putting the Nameless down once and for all.||
In every timeline, Luxord is here ambushed, slain by Adam.
||Kai escaped, leaving Kuro alone and enraged; the whole of Xarcabard seemed to writhe and turn against the group, and though they managed to rendezvous with Adam again, the airship was damaged in their escape. They were forced to find sanctuary somewhere in this unforgiving land.||
In every timeline, the heroes were inevitably brought to Traverse Town. Here, they found a small populace of refugees, all hailing from worlds lost to Darkness. The only thing keeping Traverse Town’s innate defenses in place was the power of two individuals, each thought lost: the Keyblade Master Aqua, and the Dark Fae Maleficent. The two had worked together since coming to this place after the worlds converged; Maleficent, though bitter and headstrong in her presumed mastery of the Darkness, had no delusions regarding the Corruption, so had sought to hide away from its influence. They were also sheltering a third individual, clothed in the Organization’s cloak, who is revealed to be an amnesiac Eraqus.
The heroes realized that, with a little extra power, Traverse Town’s defenses would be strong enough to allow teleportation out, giving them a chance to get home and bring the refugees with them. However, with Aqua and Maleficent gone, the defenses would soon fall without additional support, leaving no refuge for further lost survivors.
||With the help of Aqua and the Earthlings, Adam was able to reconfigure the generator for his crashed airship into a power source for the additional defensive enchantments, stabilizing the sanctuary for the foreseeable future.||
The heroes returned triumphant to Disney, bringing Aqua, Eraqus, and Maleficent along. Though hardly amicable, Maleficent agreed to act with the other Wise Ones, bringing her own dark lore into the fold and giving additional insight into Xehanort’s machinations.
||Adam warned the group, as well as the Wise Ones, that the Earthlings must be trained to forge their Keyblades. His words were taken into consideration but not heeded, given the suspicions surrounding him, and he peacefully departed.||
Shortly after arrival, Eraqus developed intense chest pains, falling unconscious. He was brought to a room to rest and be watched over while the group recuperated from their hazardous journey into the Realm of Darkness. As night fell and people were left to their own devices, Eraqus stirred, expressionless and stalking the halls, innately knowing where to go: the Nobodies Axel, Demyx, and Lexaeus. He remained distant and undetected, waiting for them to be left alone, either individually or together, and when the time was right—
—he slew them, his final blow always a stab into their chest with his strange monochromatic Kingdom Key. Their bodies dissipated into a mixture of golden dust and torn veils of black and white. Rather than dispersing into the void, these remnants split: the shredded ribbons fused with Eraqus, while the dust was drawn deeper into the castle.
Meanwhile, Sora was wracked with stress, his mind hazy and chest tightening. He walked toward the Great Hall in a daze, where the Guardian of Light was kneeling beside three unconscious forms. Their concerned gaze turns to Sora as he stumbled toward her, confused and clutching his chest; suddenly, he recoiled forward, his back arched and eyes wide as Eraqus held his blade in the young man’s back. Sora’s body visibly distorted, briefly appearing as a young blonde man and a young raven-haired woman, before he flashed in blinding light.
When the light receded, Sora lay unconscious on the ground next to the slumbering forms of Roxas and Xion, and Eraqus was down on one knee, held up by his Keyblade, more ragged veils swirling around and into him. His eyes, spheres of solid grey, locked with the Guardian of Light’s as they looked on in shock, only for him to slip down into unconsciousness himself.
As morning broke and others filled the hall, calling for aid, the Guardian explained: Eraqus’ body was being used as a vessel for the broken Guardian of Balance (GoB). The others around them, slowly stirring, were in fact Lea, Aeleus, and Myde/Dyme/(Bobbi’s choice), their bodies and hearts reunited. Xion and Roxas had had their hearts freed, but without true bodies, were unable to leave the Castle, as their forms were sustained by the Guardian of Light’s (GoL) power.
The GoB was still in a state of healing slumber, and so could not answer for his actions or his current state. However, on seeing Xion and Roxas, Merlin excitedly called for Ienzo and Even; since Even’s arrival some days earlier, the ex-Organization member had been hard at work toward his atonement: empty Replicas for the young lives ruined during his time with the Organization. Roxas and Xion were reunited with Lea, Even with Aeleus, and Myde with his sitar.
With everyone seemingly okay and rejuvenated, they moved on to their next assignments: Sora was to go with Aqua to Castle Oblivion, where they would cleanse the land and return the heart of the long-slumbering Ventus. Riku volunteered to go along.
||The others were sent to a merged world at war with itself: Paris and New Orleans, divided by the Mississippi River/River Seine (depending on where you stand). In New Orleans, Dr. Facilier had taken advantage of the chaos in the past month to grow his voodoo power into a domineering shadow force; meanwhile, in Paris, Archdeacon Frollo had become a power hungry tyrant, emboldened as a ‘chosen of God’ to wage war against heretics with his army of ‘angels’—winged Heartless using radiant magic. The populace of both worlds suffered as their worlds lay sieged by their neighbors.
The group was forced to choose who to put down first, which affected the world-state and a string of smaller consequences. After a grueling fight to put down the second foe, they found an instigator at the center of it all: inflaming both sides in a bloody cycle was the scion Chaos, fully manifest in the body of the ancient warrior Garland. Despite a severe struggle, they were eventually able to beat the Wheel-Walker—and yet, after some moments, he stood, seemingly rejuvenated. Mocking their inability to slay him, Chaos revealed that only a Keyblade could truly defeat a Fiend of Heart such as himself.
Still, winded and otherwise bored, he departed, but not without letting them in on one final revelation: the levees of the River were rigged with bombs on both sides, and he had wasted enough time that they would only be able to defuse one side—the side they are currently on, the side they saved second.
Though one side was lost to a flood, its people were not entirely without hope: if New Orleans flooded, its citizens found shelter on various boats and swamp-traversing vessels, the terrain somewhat familiar already; if Paris flooded, many of its citizens were already being hidden away by the Court of Miracles in the upper floors of abandoned homes. There were losses, but the group salvaged a damned scenario as best they could.||
Such trials would continue, for days or weeks or longer, depending on the players in the game. I could tell you of the War of the Britons, a conflict between Merlin’s land and the world of fox-witted Robin Hood, stoked on by the replica Saint. I could tell you of the Bloody Angel’s Ploy, wherein the reborn Fiend Ultima warped the light of Disney’s protective barrier to allow her entry. I could tell you of ShinRa’s subjugation of the Garden, of Hojo’s agenda pushing the populace ever further into horror for the sake of progress, and how Eraqus struck down at Marluxia behind the scenes.
You see, the stories are endless, multiplying with every choice and every action. I can no more cover the scope of these adventures than I can convey the gravitas of their culmination. Yes, there is an end, a final battle, and here have I hesitated for a year now. There are too many cogs, too many pieces, for a blow-for-blow story. But this must be known. The knowledge shared. Too many years have passed.
Xehanort needed thirteen Fiends total, and in time he collected them, imbuing them with pieces of his heart: Xigbar, Xaldin, Larxene, Garland-Chaos, Kefka, Sephiroth, Ultimecia, Kuja, Seymour, Cidolfus, Ultima, and Kuro Oni. Also required for seven heroes of Light, and he knew they were also accounted for: Sora, Riku, Kairi, Mickey, Aqua, Ventus, Roxas, and Xion to join for good measure. The Fiends ushered their forces to the Keyblade Graveyard and called forth the heroes:
“Come to us, lest we come to you.”
It was a choice with no choice. Disney had become home to thousands on thousands of refugees, and with the Bloody Ultima among their number, they could truly push an assault, if only temporarily. There would be casualties. And no matter how few, the only way the heroes could guarantee that number to be zero would be to meet them elsewhere. Their hands were tied: the Keyblade War would have to begin again.
Troops were marshaled. Fleets were set aloft. The lone star, Adam’s garden, also mobilized, automatons soaring into the atmosphere to take as much of the brunt as they could. In the end, the Fiends and Heroes were like little more than drops in an ocean as combat roared into reality. But this was their fight, and they took center stage on pillars of stone and in mazes of ruin. The Earthlings, eager to push the fight to their advantage as they had been trained to forge their weapons into Keyblades, found themselves held at bay by a sea of replica-constructs.
Still, one by one, the clashes were wrought to end, and it would seem as if the heroes had the advantage. They pushed to Xehanort and Seymour, alone on a cliffside facing the horrors of war. Too late did they recognize the situation: the guado maester, a lifeless husk, chained to the Sun-Cryst, the Cornerstone of Darkness. Xehanort called to himself a black key for every beaten Fiend, as well as his own, and pierced Seymour through the chest, tapping into the crystal’s power.
Light and color inverted. Time stopped. The crystal was suddenly hovering black sludge, undulating, swirling, and with gluttony it consumed both the guado and the Dark Seeker, growing and pulsating, taking and taking and taking, until at last everything reverted—and the coalesced corruption erupted. The heroes were forced to flee the expanding fury of darkness as it devoured all it touched, the cliffs, the sky, the bodies of the fallen, and grew into a mountainous horror. This was their goal: not Kingdom Hearts, not domination, but this. The Guardian of Darkness had been summoned, given form. And with the eons of negativity and taint finally manifest, the Earthlings came to recognize it too easily:
Sin.
The battle unerringly shifted against the forces of light, made worse by the growing miasma that seemed to everything its shadow touched into more land of the Realm of Darkness. Forced to scatter or be enveloped, all watched as the flying monstrosity began to fly, and the Wise Ones understood the destination: Disney. Time was short, and their options limited. Some of the Earthlings, drawing on their past and hoping it held true, insisted there was a way to destroy the horror from within. It’s a hail mary, and in truth they have to steal away on Adam’s airship, as Yen Sid and others would rather gather their forces to defend the people.
Sora and the other Keyblade heroes stayed behind: it is only Earthlings that go, protected as they are by the shards of the Guardian of Light residing within them. Adam cut an opening into the abomination’s hide, dropping them off before being shot out of the sky—there was to be no return. Only forward. They pushed into the core, separated into smaller groups, and fought against some of the Fiends again, this time in their more recognized “final” forms from Earth’s past.
Eventually, they pushed their way near the core, a pulsing heart that glows with cold, hollow light. The thirteen Fiends are gathered, beaten, weakened, but in the back Xehanort and Ultimecia sneered as they were enveloped by a great warping of space and time—only Garland, suddenly wracked with rage and panic and Chaos, lashes out mid-ritual, striking many of the Fiends in a haze of bloodlust to get out, get away… too late. The thirteen are ripped from the present.
All that stood between the heroes and the core was a great, organic valve, like that of a titan’s heart. At their approach, it contorted open, welcoming them into the baleful glimmer of the cornerstone and the Heart of the Guardian of Darkness. Within, they found a nauseating atrocity: the source of rot and evil, the corruptive influence that twisted the Guardian, the reason for this war, the culprit behind the loss of Earth:
It was a single, inhuman form, too many limbs, too many eyes, all black and purple and yellow with rage, dozens of feet tall, the Sun-Cryst within its chest. At first simply horrific to look at, they soon noticed key details: a piece of familiar armor here, a black wing from one shoulder, Garland’s blade in one hand, a Keyblade in another, Xaldin’s staff, and so on, and so on… The Fiends of Heart combined into some anathema against life and light, a time-travel ritual gone horribly wrong in the core of the Guardian. The Earthlings brought their full force to bear, and it was here at last, at last, that justice brought the Darkness low.
Outside, Sin hesitated, mere miles from Disney, and a great keyhole appeared at its breast. Sora, entrusted with the X-Blade by the Guardians, sealed the wound in reality, and the body of Sin began at last to unravel. At the end, only a great crystal, the light gone from its form, was falling from the sky, crashing into the great dunes of the desert.
When they would go to inspect the crash site, they would find no crystal: only the Earthlings, safe and unharmed, in a crater of cool glass, and at its center a hovering drape of black silk, seemingly wrapped around some unidentifiable form. The other Guardians approached, Balance wary, but Light rushing forward to embrace the Dark.
With Sin’s destruction and the leaders of the dark forces gone, the various armies stood down or, in the unnatural cases, dissipated entirely to their origin. The Keyblade War, such as it was, was over. Xehanort and the Fiends were destroyed. Light and Darkness could once again find balance. But in the midst of everything, the Earthborn asked the Guardians:
What about our home?
The Guardian of Balance, their power fully restored with the final death of the Nobody-Fiends, could finally answer. As some had guessed, Earth was not a question of where, but when: The First World. The survivors of that first catastrophe created the worlds as they were with their own stories and folk-lore and memories. Earth, and life as they would have ever known it, was gone… permanently.
Their loved ones were still safe in the heart of the Guardian of Light, and here Balance explained: when Light’s essence was shattered in the attack, the shards fell into Earthborn, and Balance took them—and everyone to which their heart held ties—into their being, much in the same way that Light held them now. Then, Balance bided their time, waiting, hoping for some time in which the Guardian of Darkness could be saved from whatever corrupted it.
Unfortunately, with time travel on his side, Xehanort’s initial plans were progressing too well, so the Balance opted to strike two objectives at once: in sacrificing their own essence, the Balance caused the World Convergence, forcing every world together in one calamity and destroying the subtle timelines that Xehanort had manipulated in the process. What was left of their form tried to guide the hearts of the Earthborn to Disney and the Cornerstone of Light, but Corruption found them first, fracturing what little was left, scattering the Earthborn and taking remaining survivors for Itself.
The point, though, was that now they—the loved ones, the survivors—were alive. They could live full lives, not on Earth but here, on these new worlds. The planets would need to be separated once again, once the refugees could be escorted and their lands cleared, but as dawn scatters shadows, so the remaining allied forces would help bring balance back to the worlds. Then it was only a matter of giving the other Survivors a choice of where they wanted to live.
The world order would be forever changed. All peoples now knew of other worlds, and connections had been made in ways few could have hoped. Though the worlds would physically separate, they would remain forever connected—and the Earthborn, at last, could live as they chose.
That ends the major arcs of this “heartfelt adventure”. Even then, there are dozens of threads left unanswered, stories shared between individuals, tales of finding a new home or restoring order after the war. For now, with my goal of honoring the intent of our efforts, I hope I did not disappoint too much, o reader mine.
Over the years, I’ve added bits here and there. Eventually, today, I finally crossed the hurdle for the final half. Yes, it’s impossible for me to do our story justice. I am one, and we are many. But this isn’t about justice. It’s about respect. It was so much a part of me, but in doing this, I can finally divulge everything and pay respects to the essence of a story that we created together. I hope you all won’t mind it; it won’t win any Pulitzers, and honestly it probably isn’t even my best, but if I continue to focus on making it ‘the best it can be’... it would never be finished or shared.
It won’t be terribly narrative; in fact, it’ll be almost conversational, like a lecture or seminar. So without further ado, let’s resolve what was known, what was planned, and what remains yet unknown.
First, a recap.
For seven days, the random earthlings worked toward various goals—collecting wise and mystical figures, cementing alliances sought by a missing mouse-king. At every turn, darknesses both familiar and new stood in our path. Eventually, the scope of our enemies became clear to us, a vast network of villains and malefactors from countless backgrounds, controlled by a small group known as the Fiends of Heart, lead Xehanort. And behind even them, within the darkness itself, was a monstrous corruption both brutal and insidious.
We met this force face-to-abyssal-face twice, each time having utterly overpowered a host entity in an attempt to crush out our light, twice calling out our history as Earthborn. The second time, with an eruption of primordial light and the hearts of thousands at our side, we were able to silence this abomination, if only temporarily, while simultaneously freeing the hearts of countless other Earthborn, including our loved ones.
On returning to Disney, we discovered the source of the primordial light to be a mysterious entity trapped within the Cornerstone, calling themself the Guardian of Light, to whom the Earthborn are tied. From them, we learned of the two other Guardians: of Balance, responsible for the rebirth of the Nobodies as Nobodies instead of their whole selves; and of Darkness, which had seemingly become corrupted at some point in the distant past, and whom we had since fought.
The forces of light had congregated, and with the defeat of the darkness at Narnia, the leaders of the light forces determined their best bet would be to ensure the Earthborn were trained properly—and so you entered an area of compressed time, training for 1 year within 3 days. Confident with your growth, Yen Sid decided to allow you to test your mettle in the real world by joining with the Olympic Games in Thebes.
That, however, is the past. It is easy to speak of what is written; it is something else entirely to discuss the manifold futures yet to come, to unveil any single ‘true’ path of a narrative so entrenched in a vast tree of possibilities. Even then, I can only share what I know, so I am certainly missing pieces each of you still hold close.
All the same, I shall try.
α ~ Heartfelt Adventure
The games included many faces, with both familiar and unknown people joining the fray, and lasted for three days. To some surprise, the competitions went uninterrupted; whether by the strict boundaries set by the gods, or by the seeming indifference of the darkness, no tragedy occurred during the games proper.
||One surprise occurred during a late fight between Kyle and a stranger in obscuring attire, including a lengthy duster, a helmet with an obscured visor, and… lightsabers? The combatants seemed to be going toe-to-toe, trading hits and spells, before Kyle managed, in one fell reaction, to disarm the man, grab the freed saber, and slash through his opponent (the games were, as people know, explicitly non-fatal). The visage of the figure faltered, his armor seeming to surge and flux due to the saber’s magic-disruption. The figure jumped back, calling the saber back to him, as his helmet broke down into dead nanites, revealing Ajora—though he insisted his name was now Adam.
He no longer reeked of Darkness, nor of Ultima, and his abilities seemed vastly different. Whether or not he spoke true, combat reconvened, with Kyle’s tenacity heightened. Eventually, Kyle pushed himself to the brink, even as Adam warned him to stop, and though he did incalculable damage, he barely remained upright on his knees. Adam was likewise debilitated yet still conscious—but forfeit all the same, seemingly content. He proceeded to avoid the group and all others who might seek him out.||
Once the games ended, the group stayed one final evening in town, enjoying the revelry.
||When the morning came, however, Kyla and James were both missing, unreachable, with no trace of their whereabouts. Once it was determined they were no longer in the city-state, the group was ordered back to Disney to investigate from a safe distance, as the leaders grew concerned they were being picked off. While they tried to uncover the facts, they were hailed by an incoming airship, requesting an audience with the King, with urgent news—the pilot announced himself as Adam, and said he is willing to comply with whatever safety protocols were necessary so long as he remained free to leave.
When he entered the throne room, he declared his every action, solemn if a little annoying. With permission, he was allowed to summon a weapon—and called forth a Keyblade, with which he knelt in front of the King, keeping eye contact. He declared no fealty, but pledged an alliance in whatever ways he could. He explained that his forces—which he apparently had—had been commanded to act as distractions and hindrances to the Darkness in any way possible in order to give the forces of light whatever space and time they required. Furthermore, he claimed to know what happened to James and Kyla, giving the information freely: that they had been abducted by their replicas, one of which—Kuro Oni—had become ascendent in his connection to the Guardian of Darkness, beginning to approach the devotion of the Fiends themselves.
They were located deep within the Realm of Darkness, which remained practically untraversable due to the Corruption, as they’d come to call it (as calling it ‘Guardian’ seems wrong). Their clothing would mask their presence, but the Realm—which, in this Converged worldspace, was like a spreading storm that claimed more and more land—still contorted space and time, making mapping or directions effectively useless without some manner of guidance. He personally offered such guidance, his only request being that they try to take Kuro and Kai alive. As a peace offering, he also handed over Ienzo—once Zexion, heart returned, all-too-eager to make amends for his past mistakes.
After entering a magic pact to ensure Adam’s honesty (and him freely allowing whatever punishing blows they want), the group departed on Adam’s airship, speeding over worlds and, eventually, through the stormfront that leads to the Realm of Darkness. Through the combined effort of the heroes, they managed to avoid or deflect various attacks and impediments before landing in the cursed Xarcabard, wrapped up in the ensorcelled boundaries created by Kai and Luxord. Adam split off to cause a distraction, leaving behind an android of himself as a medium and guide. With Kuro sufficiently distracted, the heroes found James and Kyla doing their best to hold their own against Kai, the Nameless abomination, and Luxord. The Nobody quickly abandoned the scene, recognizing a lost game, while—with the help of their friends—James and Kyla were able to overcome the trials the Replicas had planned for them, also putting the Nameless down once and for all.||
In every timeline, Luxord is here ambushed, slain by Adam.
||Kai escaped, leaving Kuro alone and enraged; the whole of Xarcabard seemed to writhe and turn against the group, and though they managed to rendezvous with Adam again, the airship was damaged in their escape. They were forced to find sanctuary somewhere in this unforgiving land.||
In every timeline, the heroes were inevitably brought to Traverse Town. Here, they found a small populace of refugees, all hailing from worlds lost to Darkness. The only thing keeping Traverse Town’s innate defenses in place was the power of two individuals, each thought lost: the Keyblade Master Aqua, and the Dark Fae Maleficent. The two had worked together since coming to this place after the worlds converged; Maleficent, though bitter and headstrong in her presumed mastery of the Darkness, had no delusions regarding the Corruption, so had sought to hide away from its influence. They were also sheltering a third individual, clothed in the Organization’s cloak, who is revealed to be an amnesiac Eraqus.
The heroes realized that, with a little extra power, Traverse Town’s defenses would be strong enough to allow teleportation out, giving them a chance to get home and bring the refugees with them. However, with Aqua and Maleficent gone, the defenses would soon fall without additional support, leaving no refuge for further lost survivors.
||With the help of Aqua and the Earthlings, Adam was able to reconfigure the generator for his crashed airship into a power source for the additional defensive enchantments, stabilizing the sanctuary for the foreseeable future.||
The heroes returned triumphant to Disney, bringing Aqua, Eraqus, and Maleficent along. Though hardly amicable, Maleficent agreed to act with the other Wise Ones, bringing her own dark lore into the fold and giving additional insight into Xehanort’s machinations.
||Adam warned the group, as well as the Wise Ones, that the Earthlings must be trained to forge their Keyblades. His words were taken into consideration but not heeded, given the suspicions surrounding him, and he peacefully departed.||
Shortly after arrival, Eraqus developed intense chest pains, falling unconscious. He was brought to a room to rest and be watched over while the group recuperated from their hazardous journey into the Realm of Darkness. As night fell and people were left to their own devices, Eraqus stirred, expressionless and stalking the halls, innately knowing where to go: the Nobodies Axel, Demyx, and Lexaeus. He remained distant and undetected, waiting for them to be left alone, either individually or together, and when the time was right—
—he slew them, his final blow always a stab into their chest with his strange monochromatic Kingdom Key. Their bodies dissipated into a mixture of golden dust and torn veils of black and white. Rather than dispersing into the void, these remnants split: the shredded ribbons fused with Eraqus, while the dust was drawn deeper into the castle.
Meanwhile, Sora was wracked with stress, his mind hazy and chest tightening. He walked toward the Great Hall in a daze, where the Guardian of Light was kneeling beside three unconscious forms. Their concerned gaze turns to Sora as he stumbled toward her, confused and clutching his chest; suddenly, he recoiled forward, his back arched and eyes wide as Eraqus held his blade in the young man’s back. Sora’s body visibly distorted, briefly appearing as a young blonde man and a young raven-haired woman, before he flashed in blinding light.
When the light receded, Sora lay unconscious on the ground next to the slumbering forms of Roxas and Xion, and Eraqus was down on one knee, held up by his Keyblade, more ragged veils swirling around and into him. His eyes, spheres of solid grey, locked with the Guardian of Light’s as they looked on in shock, only for him to slip down into unconsciousness himself.
As morning broke and others filled the hall, calling for aid, the Guardian explained: Eraqus’ body was being used as a vessel for the broken Guardian of Balance (GoB). The others around them, slowly stirring, were in fact Lea, Aeleus, and Myde/Dyme/(Bobbi’s choice), their bodies and hearts reunited. Xion and Roxas had had their hearts freed, but without true bodies, were unable to leave the Castle, as their forms were sustained by the Guardian of Light’s (GoL) power.
The GoB was still in a state of healing slumber, and so could not answer for his actions or his current state. However, on seeing Xion and Roxas, Merlin excitedly called for Ienzo and Even; since Even’s arrival some days earlier, the ex-Organization member had been hard at work toward his atonement: empty Replicas for the young lives ruined during his time with the Organization. Roxas and Xion were reunited with Lea, Even with Aeleus, and Myde with his sitar.
With everyone seemingly okay and rejuvenated, they moved on to their next assignments: Sora was to go with Aqua to Castle Oblivion, where they would cleanse the land and return the heart of the long-slumbering Ventus. Riku volunteered to go along.
||The others were sent to a merged world at war with itself: Paris and New Orleans, divided by the Mississippi River/River Seine (depending on where you stand). In New Orleans, Dr. Facilier had taken advantage of the chaos in the past month to grow his voodoo power into a domineering shadow force; meanwhile, in Paris, Archdeacon Frollo had become a power hungry tyrant, emboldened as a ‘chosen of God’ to wage war against heretics with his army of ‘angels’—winged Heartless using radiant magic. The populace of both worlds suffered as their worlds lay sieged by their neighbors.
The group was forced to choose who to put down first, which affected the world-state and a string of smaller consequences. After a grueling fight to put down the second foe, they found an instigator at the center of it all: inflaming both sides in a bloody cycle was the scion Chaos, fully manifest in the body of the ancient warrior Garland. Despite a severe struggle, they were eventually able to beat the Wheel-Walker—and yet, after some moments, he stood, seemingly rejuvenated. Mocking their inability to slay him, Chaos revealed that only a Keyblade could truly defeat a Fiend of Heart such as himself.
Still, winded and otherwise bored, he departed, but not without letting them in on one final revelation: the levees of the River were rigged with bombs on both sides, and he had wasted enough time that they would only be able to defuse one side—the side they are currently on, the side they saved second.
Though one side was lost to a flood, its people were not entirely without hope: if New Orleans flooded, its citizens found shelter on various boats and swamp-traversing vessels, the terrain somewhat familiar already; if Paris flooded, many of its citizens were already being hidden away by the Court of Miracles in the upper floors of abandoned homes. There were losses, but the group salvaged a damned scenario as best they could.||
Such trials would continue, for days or weeks or longer, depending on the players in the game. I could tell you of the War of the Britons, a conflict between Merlin’s land and the world of fox-witted Robin Hood, stoked on by the replica Saint. I could tell you of the Bloody Angel’s Ploy, wherein the reborn Fiend Ultima warped the light of Disney’s protective barrier to allow her entry. I could tell you of ShinRa’s subjugation of the Garden, of Hojo’s agenda pushing the populace ever further into horror for the sake of progress, and how Eraqus struck down at Marluxia behind the scenes.
You see, the stories are endless, multiplying with every choice and every action. I can no more cover the scope of these adventures than I can convey the gravitas of their culmination. Yes, there is an end, a final battle, and here have I hesitated for a year now. There are too many cogs, too many pieces, for a blow-for-blow story. But this must be known. The knowledge shared. Too many years have passed.
Xehanort needed thirteen Fiends total, and in time he collected them, imbuing them with pieces of his heart: Xigbar, Xaldin, Larxene, Garland-Chaos, Kefka, Sephiroth, Ultimecia, Kuja, Seymour, Cidolfus, Ultima, and Kuro Oni. Also required for seven heroes of Light, and he knew they were also accounted for: Sora, Riku, Kairi, Mickey, Aqua, Ventus, Roxas, and Xion to join for good measure. The Fiends ushered their forces to the Keyblade Graveyard and called forth the heroes:
“Come to us, lest we come to you.”
It was a choice with no choice. Disney had become home to thousands on thousands of refugees, and with the Bloody Ultima among their number, they could truly push an assault, if only temporarily. There would be casualties. And no matter how few, the only way the heroes could guarantee that number to be zero would be to meet them elsewhere. Their hands were tied: the Keyblade War would have to begin again.
Troops were marshaled. Fleets were set aloft. The lone star, Adam’s garden, also mobilized, automatons soaring into the atmosphere to take as much of the brunt as they could. In the end, the Fiends and Heroes were like little more than drops in an ocean as combat roared into reality. But this was their fight, and they took center stage on pillars of stone and in mazes of ruin. The Earthlings, eager to push the fight to their advantage as they had been trained to forge their weapons into Keyblades, found themselves held at bay by a sea of replica-constructs.
Still, one by one, the clashes were wrought to end, and it would seem as if the heroes had the advantage. They pushed to Xehanort and Seymour, alone on a cliffside facing the horrors of war. Too late did they recognize the situation: the guado maester, a lifeless husk, chained to the Sun-Cryst, the Cornerstone of Darkness. Xehanort called to himself a black key for every beaten Fiend, as well as his own, and pierced Seymour through the chest, tapping into the crystal’s power.
Light and color inverted. Time stopped. The crystal was suddenly hovering black sludge, undulating, swirling, and with gluttony it consumed both the guado and the Dark Seeker, growing and pulsating, taking and taking and taking, until at last everything reverted—and the coalesced corruption erupted. The heroes were forced to flee the expanding fury of darkness as it devoured all it touched, the cliffs, the sky, the bodies of the fallen, and grew into a mountainous horror. This was their goal: not Kingdom Hearts, not domination, but this. The Guardian of Darkness had been summoned, given form. And with the eons of negativity and taint finally manifest, the Earthlings came to recognize it too easily:
Sin.
The battle unerringly shifted against the forces of light, made worse by the growing miasma that seemed to everything its shadow touched into more land of the Realm of Darkness. Forced to scatter or be enveloped, all watched as the flying monstrosity began to fly, and the Wise Ones understood the destination: Disney. Time was short, and their options limited. Some of the Earthlings, drawing on their past and hoping it held true, insisted there was a way to destroy the horror from within. It’s a hail mary, and in truth they have to steal away on Adam’s airship, as Yen Sid and others would rather gather their forces to defend the people.
Sora and the other Keyblade heroes stayed behind: it is only Earthlings that go, protected as they are by the shards of the Guardian of Light residing within them. Adam cut an opening into the abomination’s hide, dropping them off before being shot out of the sky—there was to be no return. Only forward. They pushed into the core, separated into smaller groups, and fought against some of the Fiends again, this time in their more recognized “final” forms from Earth’s past.
Eventually, they pushed their way near the core, a pulsing heart that glows with cold, hollow light. The thirteen Fiends are gathered, beaten, weakened, but in the back Xehanort and Ultimecia sneered as they were enveloped by a great warping of space and time—only Garland, suddenly wracked with rage and panic and Chaos, lashes out mid-ritual, striking many of the Fiends in a haze of bloodlust to get out, get away… too late. The thirteen are ripped from the present.
All that stood between the heroes and the core was a great, organic valve, like that of a titan’s heart. At their approach, it contorted open, welcoming them into the baleful glimmer of the cornerstone and the Heart of the Guardian of Darkness. Within, they found a nauseating atrocity: the source of rot and evil, the corruptive influence that twisted the Guardian, the reason for this war, the culprit behind the loss of Earth:
It was a single, inhuman form, too many limbs, too many eyes, all black and purple and yellow with rage, dozens of feet tall, the Sun-Cryst within its chest. At first simply horrific to look at, they soon noticed key details: a piece of familiar armor here, a black wing from one shoulder, Garland’s blade in one hand, a Keyblade in another, Xaldin’s staff, and so on, and so on… The Fiends of Heart combined into some anathema against life and light, a time-travel ritual gone horribly wrong in the core of the Guardian. The Earthlings brought their full force to bear, and it was here at last, at last, that justice brought the Darkness low.
Outside, Sin hesitated, mere miles from Disney, and a great keyhole appeared at its breast. Sora, entrusted with the X-Blade by the Guardians, sealed the wound in reality, and the body of Sin began at last to unravel. At the end, only a great crystal, the light gone from its form, was falling from the sky, crashing into the great dunes of the desert.
When they would go to inspect the crash site, they would find no crystal: only the Earthlings, safe and unharmed, in a crater of cool glass, and at its center a hovering drape of black silk, seemingly wrapped around some unidentifiable form. The other Guardians approached, Balance wary, but Light rushing forward to embrace the Dark.
With Sin’s destruction and the leaders of the dark forces gone, the various armies stood down or, in the unnatural cases, dissipated entirely to their origin. The Keyblade War, such as it was, was over. Xehanort and the Fiends were destroyed. Light and Darkness could once again find balance. But in the midst of everything, the Earthborn asked the Guardians:
What about our home?
The Guardian of Balance, their power fully restored with the final death of the Nobody-Fiends, could finally answer. As some had guessed, Earth was not a question of where, but when: The First World. The survivors of that first catastrophe created the worlds as they were with their own stories and folk-lore and memories. Earth, and life as they would have ever known it, was gone… permanently.
Their loved ones were still safe in the heart of the Guardian of Light, and here Balance explained: when Light’s essence was shattered in the attack, the shards fell into Earthborn, and Balance took them—and everyone to which their heart held ties—into their being, much in the same way that Light held them now. Then, Balance bided their time, waiting, hoping for some time in which the Guardian of Darkness could be saved from whatever corrupted it.
Unfortunately, with time travel on his side, Xehanort’s initial plans were progressing too well, so the Balance opted to strike two objectives at once: in sacrificing their own essence, the Balance caused the World Convergence, forcing every world together in one calamity and destroying the subtle timelines that Xehanort had manipulated in the process. What was left of their form tried to guide the hearts of the Earthborn to Disney and the Cornerstone of Light, but Corruption found them first, fracturing what little was left, scattering the Earthborn and taking remaining survivors for Itself.
The point, though, was that now they—the loved ones, the survivors—were alive. They could live full lives, not on Earth but here, on these new worlds. The planets would need to be separated once again, once the refugees could be escorted and their lands cleared, but as dawn scatters shadows, so the remaining allied forces would help bring balance back to the worlds. Then it was only a matter of giving the other Survivors a choice of where they wanted to live.
The world order would be forever changed. All peoples now knew of other worlds, and connections had been made in ways few could have hoped. Though the worlds would physically separate, they would remain forever connected—and the Earthborn, at last, could live as they chose.
That ends the major arcs of this “heartfelt adventure”. Even then, there are dozens of threads left unanswered, stories shared between individuals, tales of finding a new home or restoring order after the war. For now, with my goal of honoring the intent of our efforts, I hope I did not disappoint too much, o reader mine.
