Chrono could tell that Tinarah wasn't fond of the answer that she was given as she walked off on to a corner. While not sure how he felt about Qamar walking over to her, but the crashing noise was what he was more concerned about. When he'd gotten to the front door, he was relieved to see that it was Take, Boreas and Torrin, but confused as to why the door was just completely knocked off its hinges. From the bits and pieces he'd gathered, he gathered an understanding of what happened to the door. "You know you could have knocked right?"
After that spectacle before him, Kel was left in a sitting down right where he'd intended to fight off the last invisible. The singing had stopped shortly afterwards so it really must've been over. You'd think he'd gotten used to the oddities that occurred when it came to fighting a mass amount of heartless, but somehow they always found a way to surprise him. Then again, this was probably something that he should make a note of. Nineteen heartless did stopped fighting in response to the music and something like that was good to know for any future encounters. Unfortunately Kel wasn't the most musically incline person and he couldn't sing himself thus any chances of him taking advantages of this were slim to none. Perhaps Aislinn would better benefit from this. She was the one who was singing earlier and apparently she'd performed the hula in the world she'd gone too. It would be something to consider if something like that ever happened again. After all if what Kel had just witness was a one time thing, then all this theorizing that Kel was doing would be pointless as there would be no way to use it in practice. Surprising no other heartless had headed over in Kel's direction. He did figure at least some amount of them would have made their way over towards him, but guess that wasn't the case. It was no skin off his nose either way and wouldn't really impede on anything. With all this over Kel got up from his seated positioned and took a couple of steps towards where he'd left Luna. He'd taken a couple of steps in her direction when a large shadow suddenly loomed over head. It wasn't another invisible that had decided to attack him while his guard was down or a darkside. A Darkside seemed like it would be much more noticeable given its complete size. A large group of shadows, twenty six to be exact, had jumped out from outta nowhere and landed right on Kel. In a matter of moments the wielder was buried underneath the swarming mass of darkness. There numerous claws clawing at him all while Kel struggled to get out from underneath them. His efforts warranted him to get his arm free, but from the position in which he currently was in it would be impossible to use his keyblade to free himself. Both his magic and aura wouldn't help him either. In the middle of all of his struggles, Kel's hand had managed to grab hold of a stray heartless near him. From there the darkness started to flow from that one heartless and into Kel. This action had set off a chain reaction and the darkness from each heartless that was around him started to swirl around him. The more darkness that spiraled around him left the heartless in a brief husk state before dissipating. Resulting in the various heartless joining the swirling mass of darkness that had taken the place of the heartless that were on top of him. Kel on the other hand had no idea what was going on. All of the weight from the twenty six heartless that had gotten the jump on him had vanished shortly after he'd grabbed hold of something. Now, while able to stand, he was surrounded by darkness. Darkness that seemed to cling to his body, forming a whole new set of armor around his new attire. The darkness had also done well in healing any injuries that he'd sustained when all of those shadows were attacking him all at once. When all this was finished, the darkness dispersed and Kel was left standing there clad in dark armor. Still in disbelief, Kel mere stood there looking over the armor that had formed over him. Words: 634 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 960 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 480 Heartless defeated 26 Shadows Heartless Injured: Darkside 1: 286/1500 Darkside 2: 1232/1500 Invisible: 22/50 Enemies Remaining: 1508 Shadows 349 Darkballs 383 Neoshadows (3 Reserved) 20 Invisibles 2 Darksides
In typical battler fashion, before Kel had officially started the battle with himself and the last invisible, he aimed his keyblade at the heartless. Now it was his turn to do the taunting of the heartless, something he had no problems in doing in. The invisible on the other hand seemed to be distracted at first. It was subtle at first, an occasional nod of its head. Said nod turned into foot tapping and that foot tapping became a small nudge of his arm upward. Plainly speaking it was odd behavior for a heartless and that as saying something given all of the things that he's seen heartless do over the course of this battle alone. Those subtle movements continued and Kel had long since lowered his keyblade, not wanting to interrupt what the heartless was doing. Maybe if it had done it once and focused back on him, then he would have fought it, but nope this heartless was really into whatever it was that it was doing. This heartless was seemingly seeming livin on a prayer. Being free from the task to having fight the heartless, Kel started to hear something in the distance. It was singing? He listened for a bit longer and thus was able to piece together what it was and it was in fact a song. He didn't what that song was though. Ya know, being born and raised in a fantasy world and bon jovi doesn't exist in most fantasy worlds and not cause he's an uncultured swine cause someone would certainly call him that. This small rant aside, Kel acknowledged that the one singing was Aislinn and when he turned back to the Invisible, it was completely rocking out to the song. Head banging, jumping up and down. Even going as far as to use its sword as a air guitar. Now this was quite the sight to see. First he'd learn that Aislinn could sing, a minor fact in the grand scheme of what he was looking at to be honest, but a fact nonetheless. On top of that, for whatever reason, this heartless actually knew how to do all of the things that he was standing there, watching it do and Kel really couldn't bring himself to do anything about it. As strange of a sight as it was to watch the heartless play air guitar, he found it to be fascinating as well. Overtime the song continued and the invisible was joined by other heartless. Eighteen shadows to be exactly. All crowded around the heartless, listening to the music in pairs. Kel could have swore he spotted one of those shadows holding up a lighter to the sky as it swayed too and fro with its brethren. After a while Kel had just given up on the idea of actually fighting and put away both his keyblades. From there he took a seat on the ground and watched the whole thing take place. The invisible had really attracted a whole crowd of shadows to watch its performance despite being very clearly still in the middle of the battle. The invisible had gotten really into his performance at what Kel could only assume was the guitar solo. Erratic movement, pretending to slam the 'guitar' on the ground, something that actually hit a couple of the heartless around it, the whole nine yards. By the end of said guitar solo, about half of the heartless that were around it had been wiped out and none of the surviving ones seemed to care in the slightest. Pretty messed up when you think about it. Kel didn't know if the song itself was reaching it end, but the performance was. What gave that away was how the Invisible made one was strum of its 'guitar', ran through the crowd of heartless that were left and jumped off the edge of the island with its arms outstretched. He couldn't help but get the feeling that it was hoping something would be there to catch it. There was not and the Invisible fell into the void, leaving Kel sitting there still perplex about what he just spectated. Words: 692 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 900 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 450 Heartless defeated 1 invisible 18 shadows Enemies Remaining: 1617 Shadows 381 Darkballs 401 Neoshadows (3 Reserved) 21 Invisibles 2 Darksides
Zephyr spotted the figured right as a drowsy spell had hit him, but he was able to shake it off. He'd taken a step closer to the figured right as they'd noticed him. There was no distinguishing features that stuck out to them, but the flute that they were holding was all that he needed to see. This was person that they were after. "Hey, wait!" Zephyr was a second to late as the figure had already made his way fallen off the clocktower. There was no sound of anything hitting the ground, a good thing is a sense, but more reason for Zephyr to look for the hooded figure. The flute was heard once more and again he spotted the figured, standing still. Was he trying to play a game with him? "Fine then, have it your way." From where he stood, he took a crouched position. "Memory make, armed gear." His legs shown in a bright light as Zephyr leap from the clocktower, felling glad that anyone who was around to see this was fast asleep. Magic graves covered his legs just in time for his landing, but he still tucked and roll then ran off in towards the hooded figure. He would play this little game, but it would end with him catching them.
The invisible that had been brought down by Kel let out a mighty howl in pain that grabbed the attention of the other invisible. Neither of them had been expecting Kel to get back on his feet as quickly as he did, which allowed Kel to land a successful preemptive strike on them. Before he could follow up the preemptive strike with a finishing blow, the other invisible had intervene with a quick swipe of its sword that prompted Kel to take a step back before being it by it once again. Once was plenty good enough for him. Once the other invisible had gotten up to its feet, standing beside its comrade, they focused their attention at Kel. From the looks of things it didn't seem like they were going to make the mistake of simply swatting him away, which did not bode fell for the keyblade wielder in the slightest. He was still tired from all of the running around that he's been doing, on top of the injuries he's sustained throughout this fight. That last hit in particular was what really done this all. Still he stood firm in his decision to fight off the heartless regardless of his current condition. He was still standing after all and he could still fight either way. He found himself adjusting his footing in preparation for the fight to come. In the very moment in which the fight looked poised to breakout between the two parties, a new challenger had entered the battle. Ananta had come running by and while her entry in the battle was brief, she had made sure to heal Kel before she left to the other parts of the battle. A surprise it was for certain that killed some of the tension that had built up for the fight, but on the other hand all of his injuries were healed, bringing him back up to full power. This brought forth another new issue for the invisible before Kel. Now that he was fully healed, injuries, bruises, and anything being slammed against the island ground might have done to him internally and externally. There was nothing stopping him from returning the favor to the duo of heartless. Seemingly they realized this as one of them had taken up a more defensive stance while the other gradually started to inch forward towards Kel. Whatever confidence that they had going into this fight was clearly gone which was perfectly fine by Kel. These were just heartless after all and not human opponents, though the fact that they had some capacity to learn, come up with strategies and adapt was more on the concerning side of things. No matter, there were still heartless that he needed to beat. A single adjustment was made to his stance and Kel quickly ran past the first heartless that was near him. An attempt was made to hit him with its sword as he ran by, but he managed to duck the attack while continuing on his assault towards the other one. The invisible on defense however tried to swipe at Kel twice, once with its sword and another with its free hand. The sword strike was deflected and the hand swipe blocked, counted by a stab from Kel's keyblade that trapped the heartess's hand in place. From there he fist bumped the hand that was stuck in the ground. Naturally this caused a chain reaction leading to the heartless exploding. Now the fight was a one on one between Kel and the last Invisible. Said invisible had already turned to face Kel in preparation for what was to come. Words: 606 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 840 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 420 Heartless defeated 1 invisible Heartless injured Invisible: 22/50 BP Enemies Remaining: 1635 Shadows 381 Darkballs 401 Neoshadows (3 Reserved) 22 Invisibles 2 Darksides
The closer that Zephyr got to the clock tower, the morr he noticed both the fog pouring out of it as well as the guards that were asleep down below. So far he hadn't felt any hint of drowsiness, meaning that his mask was working. Well enough that he was on the ground asleep like them. Stepping into the clock tower, the young mage started to head upward towards the top.
With Luna being away from the immediate harm that was the Invisibles that had grabbed her, it was time to deal with the other hordes of heartless. No sooner than he'd thought that, a small group of invisibles had headed over to where they were. Naturally their attention was turned towards Luna following the display of light that she had shown off earlier. "I'll take care of these ones!" He called out to Luna and Hikaru then ran off to intercept the oncoming heartless trio. They were ready for the keyblade wielder this time and surprisingly accelerated towards him. From three different angles they struck at him, two on each of his sides and one head on. They weren't leaving him much room to evade any attacks. Realizing this Kel stopped his progress and braced himself for their attack. He'd managed to block the first two attacks with his keyblade, but there was still the third one poised to strike. Blocking this attack required some creativity on Kel's part. His foot raised up and aura triggered, causing the heartless's blade to freeze completely upon reaching his foot. It had be to quite the sight for anyone who happened to see this for Kel was standing there, foot in the air, having a blade completely frozen by said foot with two others sword being stopped by his own two. Certainly an impressive feat that he's managed to do it, but now he needed to get the heartless back. His aura reacted to his desire and added a thin coat of ice to his keyblade, making so that the swords of the invisibles had literally slipped off of his keyblades and into the ground behind him. This granted him exactly what he needed to slam the other invisbles blade in the ground with his own foot. From there Kel again used the blade as a stepping stool to run on, right towards the invisibles head. The invisible raised its free arm and attempt to swat Kel off of its arm, if not grab and subsequently crush him. He wasn't about to let that happen. Right as it was seemingly about to grab him, the attack was stopped with a quick gravity spell that sent the hand crushing down into the island ground. Seemingly he was in the clear and Kel speed up is run to catch the heartless off guard. He leap off of its shouldn't and struck its head with a powerful vorpal blitz attack. Its head had busted open, allowed darkness to pour out while the body itself came collapsing down onto the ground. During this process, the other invisbles had just managed to free their swords from the ground in which they had been planted and spotting their ally defeated, but Kel still standing seemingly enraged them. The duo hesitated not in turning their sights at the keyblade wielder again, who was still in the process of landing. Kel knew that he wouldn't be able to dodge the attack and prepared to block it. The Invisible hit hard, really hard for Kel came crashing down into the ground. The impact had left Kel in pain as he struggled to get back to his feet. In the time he did that, both invisible had turned away from him to continue thier approach on Luna. One had taken one last look at Kel before joining his comrade. It took a bit before he was completely on his feet again and running after the two invisbles that had just left. He'd manage to make a path of ice using his aura to catch up to the heartless that had left and strike one of them in its leg, bringing it down to its knee. Words: 620 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 780 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 390 Heartless defeated 1 invisible Heartless injured Invisible: 22/50 BP Heartless Left 1690 Shadows 410 Neoshadows 382 Darkballs 23 Invisibles 2 Darksides
Back at the inn, Zephyr hadn't done much outside of sit back in a nearby chair and try to sort through he information that he was given while at the town hall. He was pretty focused on his thought, thus didn't notice at all when a kitten had made its way over to where he was sitting. When it rubbed against his leg though, he did notice and looked down at the small animal. After meeting its gaze for a few seconds, Zephyr ended up picking it up and playing with it in his lap. He felt odd about being treated dinner, but didn't have it in him to decline their offer so he simply ate what was before him. Afterwards Zephyr didn't sleep, in fact he didn't have any plans on doing so. He stood by the window to catch sight of the first hint of fog. That would be when he would head off on his own to find the flute player. Therefore he was caught off guard when the bells started ringing. Following that shock, he spotted the fog rolling in outside and quickly made his way out there right after Thea. He knew that the town hall and the kids there were the target, but his attention went to the clock tower. From that high, sounds could possibly travel throughout the town. "You go with Thea, there's something I need to check." He instructed Gavin before running off towards the clock tower, making him a mask to ideally shield him from the affects of the fog with his magic. The fact that he'd run off on his own had reminded him of all the times he'd done that in the past in the guild...and the subsequent lectures he'd gotten from Midarah.
Luna was just as confused as he was when it came to the strange attention that she was getting from the heartless. Understandably so given how she essentially had a target on her for the duration of those last couple of heartless. He would say that it wouldn't be too much of a problem right now, but that Invisible form before left its taunting of himself to specifically go deal with Luna. It would be a problem if she continued to attract heartless of that size towards them. "Don't mention it, we are friends after all." And friend would be there to have each others back, something that he was finally starting to truly accept. Speaking of friends, they were soon joined by Hikaru who had literally dropped in on them. "That was quite the entrance." Kel said, unaware of the remaining darkballls that were flying right at the group. Thankfully Luna had pushed both himself and Hikaru out of the way before ant of the could get the drop on them. It was appreciated, but now he'd spotted the new horded of heartless that had just arrived and surprise, surprise, the first one that stopped right in from of Kel was another Neoshadow. To say that he was tired of dealing with them would be an understatement, but he had little choice. His keyblade formed in a flash and he had started to fight the neoshadow in front of him. Unlike the last batch that he'd spent fighitng, this one didn't try to do anything to the stray shadows that roam about on the battle field and seemed to want to fight him using its own strength. As odd as it seemed, that was something that Kel could appreciate for it meant he wouldn't have to worry about it suddenly hulking out before him. Kel still showed no mercy and brought his keyblade down on the heartless's head, cutting it in down. As it dissipated in black mist, four pillars of light had shot up into the sky and Kel found the source to be Luna once again. Her attack had done well to remove the darkballs that were around her, but the same very moment, Kel was reminded of the last time he saw her do that when an Invisible had gone completely out its way to attack her. This time the Invisible had done better as it had successfully grabbed her. The heartless around them had to have been anticipating his first step because a darkball with a little shadow riding atop its head had flown directly in front of him. The shadow struck first with its claws outstretched and was swiftly swatted it to the side. The darkball on the other hand was more on the persistent side with its attacks and spent a bit flying around Kel, narrowly avoiding all of his attack that he threw at the heartless. When the heartless thought it say its chance to strike, it opened it mouth and prepared to strike. That proved to be a fatal mistake for Kel was able to dodge the attack and launch a counter attack of his own. "Thunder!" Sparks flew out of the tip of his keyblade, vaporizing the darkball. Now there was nothing keeping him from going after the Invisible that currently held Luna, who he was glad wasn't wearing a skirt at this time. The invisible was more preoccupied with examining its catch to notice that Kel was making his approach. The element of surprise was on his side for the time being so he had to act fast before he lost that very same advantage. One of his two keyblades was thrown it to distract it from Luna and once that had been achieved, Kel himself took to the skies and delivered a powerful Zantesuken to bring it to a quick end. Kel caught Luna when she inevitably fell down from. "And gotcha." Once his own footing was secured, he placed down Luna right in front of him. Total Words: 669 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 720 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 360 Heartless Defeated: 1 Neoshadow 1 Darkball 1 Shadow 1 Invisible Heartless Remaining: Defeat 1931 Shadows Defeat 442 Neoshadows Defeat 447 Darkballs Defeat 28 Invisibles Defeat 2 Darksides
They had managed to get through this fight without too much issues, but with Mr. incredible on the loose with those two, this whole ordeal was far from being over. They would need to do something about, they had too unless whatever other heroes showed up to help. Like the other guy who was with Mr Incredible back at the fire. Frozone was it? He seemed to be friends with Mr Incredible and he was in danger right now. Seemed to fit in with the usual requirements to get a hero to come save the say. "Master Thallasa's right, we need to rest. If we just rush out to try and stop them in our current condition then we'll do nothing to help." He understood Tinarah's point, nothing about the situation at hand would normally call for rest, but normally they would be able to use their magic to assist them in combat. As they as that Magiteck generator was up, they would not be able to do that. "Our chances will be better once we've actually rested and have everyone here, ready to fight." Chrono wasn't completely fond of resting while they were out, free to do who knows what, but he also knew that they couldn't afford to take risks like that right now.
Chrono watched as Alder had already made two of the three attempts to guess the password, feeling that he had gotten lucky in his guesses. Had he not been so fortunate, he could've just screwed them all over. Regardless of how he felt about the situation, they'd gotten in the the correct password and Chrono waited to see what would happen next with the extractor.
As the result of various different means, the heartless had thinned greatly in numbers. The tree in which Kel had been fighting off the hordes of neoshadows while keeping Luna safe was practically bare in comparison to how it started off with. The five remaining neoshadows stood perched on the tree tops, surveying the area. If they were looking for more shadows to use as ammunition, then they would find none. Those were the first to vanish from the area following the fiasco with the rouge neoshadow. Maybe they got tired of being mistreated or perhaps they did not want to be killed on sight just to remove the possibility of another rouge neoshadow arises and running rampant. Either way, they were gone now from this area and probably defeated in a different part of the island. "It's almost over." His words ere more directed at himself to be perfectly honest, after all he was still injured to a small degree. All of the moving around that he's been doing, be it fighting the heartless or simply dodging their attacks, couldn't have been helping. Sure he could've just used magic to lessen the pain, but most of his magic went to means outside of healing. Like attacking, moving around and the occasional and unintended defensive maneuver. This made it so that Kel pretty much had to power through it for the most part and he did. At this point it was more so the fatigue that was starting to catch up with him and less the actually small injuries taken. After this he would definitely need to take a small breather to rest. For now though he would keep going. He's made it this far after all and so he could keep on going. Speaking of using magic for for offensive means rather than healing, the first thing that Kel did was to fire off an firaga spell at the tree. The tree was spared form bursting into flames, but more importantly it got the five neoshadows off of their little perch and down on the ground where the actually fight was. From that point on, Kel remained on the offensive by closing the gap between them and slicing through the first neoshadow that happened to be near. That left only four left and they were quick to retaliate. Their actions were split into two, one group slunk into the ground. Forming their usually puddles as they moved about while the other two stayed above ground and took a more direct approach in trying to deal with Kel. The wielder took a quick look behind him and was relieved to see that there weren't any puddle behind him trying to head towards Luna. The heartless must have realized that the the only way they would get to the apparent heartless beacon that was Luna was to get through him and that was something that wouldn't be easy by any stretch of the imagination. Kel refocused on the fight at hand just in time to block one of the attack from the neoshadow that was above ground. That heartless was pushed back and the next attack was parried and countered with a thrust that ran through the other heartless. The one that was just pushed back made another moved and jumped into the air. As it did, one of the heartless from down below rose up, trying to get in a sneak attack on Kel. That trick wasn't going to work on him this time. Kel dodged the attack, grabbed on the the heartless's wrist and tossed it into the air with another firaga spell trailing behind it. That heartless had crashed into the one who had jumped up before which allowed the magic to burn away both of them. Now it was a one on one and it was still lurking about in the ground. Kel remained firm where he stood, opting to wait for a chance to strike to arise before making any moves. He focused in on the area around him, waiting for that perfect moment to strike. When it did arise and the last neoshadow leap up poised to strike, Kel quickly turned on his heels and cleaved the heartless in two as if he was using zantesuken. That had taken care of that, leaving this particular area heartless free for the time being and with that, he turned to face Luna. "Sorry about that." He'd offered her a sheepish smile having realized he hadn't left her with a chance to assist him despite asking her to do so. Total Words: 762 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 660 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 330 Heartless Defeated: 5 Neoshadow Heartless Remaining: 1 Shadow (Reserved) 1 Neoshadows (1 Reserved) 8 Darkballs (1 Reserved)
After the fiasco with that one neoshadow getting completely changed through the act of eating another shadow, the neoshadows seemed to be more wary about that as opposed to jumping the gun and all trying to eat them. Probably because they would end up fighting among themselves if they did, which would be perfectly fine for him. Both options really. If they didn't turn themselves into incredible hulk like monsters then they would be easy to beat and if they did and beat themselves to death, then ideally the last one standing would be too worn out to be of that much of a threat him. It wasn't quite a win-win for the last option still has the possibility of the last one standing not being worn out and ready to take on the challenge that was keyblade wielder. With that one possibility in mind, Kel would rather avoid the possibility of the latter happen. The occasional smaller shadow that wandered over here was swiftly vanquished by one of the neoshadows more in lined with the first option that Kel had thought of. Once that was dealt with, the very same neoshadows set off towards Kel in a mad sprint. His first attack had been a downward strike and the heartless did, in fact, manage to dodge the attack. Not only that, it had managed to knock one of his keyblade up into the air. It would have been an impressive feat, not counting that Kel had another keyblade waiting and ready to be use, but because that very same keyblade that was knocked into the air fell from the sky and landed right back on the heartless. Having been felled by the very same weapon that it managed to knock away caused an awkward silence between Kel and the remaining heartless. They would've been silent regardless, but this was just to emphasize how badly that one neoshadow had messed up. The silence came to an end when the sounds of feet hitting the ground were heard. The next batch of four heartless had mad their way down from the tree and up to bat. None of them were in that much of a hurry to go and fight, not after the embarrassment that was the first neoshadows attempt at fighting. What they had done instead was stranger. The four heartless had come together in a group huddle to 'discuss' their next plan of action. Least that was probably what it looked like form their perspective, but as for Kel he just saw four shadowy figures grouped together with the occasional movement that they made. Nothing more than that really. They stood like that for quite a bit, really into forming whatever plan that they hoped to come up with to get back Kel to get to Luna. Yup they were still on that train despite the numerous of failed attempts at trying to do so. Kel had decided to be the nice guy and patiently wait for them to finish formulating whatever strategy that they could Their planning must have gotten really intense for there had been a couple of times in which the heartless raised an arm up in protest or smacked whoever was next to it. Kel found it all to be pretty entertaining despite the fact that they were heartless still trying to kill them. A couple of are raises later, with another smack thrown in, and they seemed to be ready with their game plan. That plan was to simple run in from the front. All that waiting just for this was kinda a let down to be honest. Kel sighed, then attacked with a zatetsuken that dealt with the remaining batch of heartless. Total Words: 619 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 600 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 300 Heartless Defeated 1 Shadows 5 Neoshadows Heartless Remaining: 14 Shadows (1 Reserved) 16 Neoshadows 39 Darkballs
Username: CrownMoksha Preferred Name: MoK Representative photo (optional): https://i.pinimg.com/564x/c2/77/64/c27764e565fea2eaa20b4de9911ae8a5.jpg Age/Birthday (optional): 21/10-7 Favorite Heartless: ...don't really have one Favorite Color: Silver Favorite Coffee: again don't really have one
2 AP Boost, 1 HP Boosts, taking Aero and upgrading Cure
The number of neoshadows had taken another noticeable dive as there brief moment in which Kel could actually see the tree behind the mass of heartless. This of course prompted another surge of aggression from the neoshadows. The next batch of five had dropped down from the tree, one of which holding a shadow in its hand. Due to the past treatment in which they were given, the immediate first thing Kel thought that it was going to do with the heartless was to chuck it at him or Luna. The latter would be a smarter options, but their aim was not the greatest in the world. So they would be no guarantee that the shadow would hit her, let alone get anywhere near hitting her. What the heartless actually did was something both worse and more on the disturbing side of the spectrum. The neoshadow had eaten the smaller shadow. Even the other heartless were surprised by this actions. At first nothing happened to the heartless, leaving everyone standing there unsure about how to feel about that. Out of nowhere the heartless had started to change. First its claws elongated and sharpened, its skinny frame was distorted leaving most of its strength in its arm. "That is not good in the slightest." That one little shadow must have been the equivalent to spinach for that one neoshadow. Assuming the same could be said about the other shadows then it wouldn't be good new for him. The now arm strength only heartless had finished its out of transformation and was just standing in the middle of the four neoshadows. One of which had taken it upon itself to inspect its heartless friend. Moments later that very same heartless was smacked backward into the tree that the other heartless were on watching all this. From that point on the rouge neoshadow had begun the process of beating down anything that was near. Meaning that the remaining three neoshadows were the first to fall in a variety of ways. One had its head crushed, one had the apparent spine it had snapped like a twig bane style and the last one had made an attempt to escape. The puddle it dove into did naught to help it escape its face for the rouge neoshadow dove its own oversize hand into the puddle and dragged the heartless out. It heartless could scream, then this one would certainly be screaming its head off as it was toss aside and into the water. Neoshadows couldn't swim right? If that were the case, then this one was differently gone and out. The one sided heartless slaughter had come to a close and this rouge monster turned to face the two keyblade wielders. Even if the numerous changes it had just gone through, one thing that remained the same was the desire to attack Luna. After the display that Kel just watched, there was no way that he was going to let this thing anywhere near her. His grip on both of his keyblades tightened before Kel had decided to take the initiative and make the first attack. If there were to be any upside to any of this, it was that this rouge heartless lacked speed as a result of its hellish strength. This did give him the speed advantage, but he couldn't afford to slip up. The moment he slowed down could be the very same moment in which the rouge heartless swung a punch at him. While keeping up the speed advantage, Kel made a coupe of attempts to strike it. Said attempt hit its bloated arms and deflected off, doing nothing to damage it. Attacking its arms were out of the question now and both of its arms were raised into the air and brought down with tremendous force. The attack had almost knocked Kel off balanced, but fortunately he'd managed to catch himself with his keyblade. While Kel had regained his balance, the rouge neoshadow had poised itself for another attack. The ground behind Kel once again had frozen, involuntarily, and he moved to avoid the attack. Hitting nothing but the ice, the heartless had punched right through the ice and got its fists stuck in the ground. The opportunity a used for Kel to deal a decisive blow to the much scrawnier and now easier to hit center of the heartless. "Never again." He muttered, watching the heartless fade away in front of him. Total Words: 740 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 540 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 270 Heartless Defeated 1 Shadows 5 Neoshadows Heartless Remaining: 77 Shadows 26 Neoshadows 96 Darkballs
Chrono didn't have any means that he could use to help out Gylde. If he did, then he would've been used it on himself before he got to this point. He could still move and swing his keyblade and as long as he could do that, then he could power through his injuries. The remaining group of five hearts were nearby and Chrono went in to break them with quick swings of his keyblade. HP: 10/65 MP: 2/20 AP: 0/30 Hats Left: 0
The three frozen neoshadow statues shattered shortly after and Kel took this time to examine his own handiwork. Looking down at the ice that hand formed, he'd noticed a small portion raising of the top of his shoe. Somehow he'd managed to use blizzard with his foot? That was what it looked like and really only brought about more question, primarily how did he even manage to use a spell with his foot!? The chill in his body still remained and upon closer inspection, he noticed a faint bluish glow around it. It was strongest near his feet, namely the foot that was partially coated in ice itself. "Was that supposed be my aura?" Thinking back to it, he'd felt a familiar chill course through his body when he first acquired it and the color was exactly the same as well. The only difference was the lack of said color pulsing around him, but with how faint the glow was in the first place it wouldn't be surprising for him to fail to notice a small detail like that. Kel took in how this was one of the things that he could manage with his aura before turning back towards the neoshadow infested tree. The next batch of five had just arrived and unlike before, they skipped the who 'let's chuck a poor unsuspecting shadow at the keyblade wielder' and instead actually landed right on one. For supposed mindless creatures, they certainly had some sort of ingrained biased towards their lesser kind. They just stood there as menacing as they possibly could, still focusing most of their attention towards trying to get to Luna. In theory he could just free them right off the bat before they even moved. Heck, he could free the entire tree while he was at it and bring this whole little section to an end. Of course that required a level in skill with his aura that he certainly did not have right now. What he'd just did was by pure accident and there was no way he would got from accidentally freezing three to straight up frost aging a group or at least fifty five. Kel estimated that at best he could managed to freeze one or two, but it was up to his own skills right now. The neoshadows dashed forward poised to strike. Once again the majority of their forces were heading heading towards him, with that singular one still trying to slink off towards Luna. Same tactics, just with little variations to it each time. This time they had decided to strike Kel with the full brunt of their attack. In the face of this adversity, Kel stood firm and poised himself to attack. He quickly stabbed one of his keyblades into the ground before grabbing the wrist of one of the closer neoshadows and twirling it around. The heartless started to pick up speed before it was thrown in the direction of another neoshadow. The head on collision between the two heartless wiped them both out and caused a moment in which the other two heartless to be distracted long enough for Kel to jump up towards them. One in particular had been beaten by a hammer strike to the head that sent it crashing into the ground down below. The next one lashed out at Kel, but the attack was blocked his keyblade. The one that had been stuck into the ground had vanished and formed into Kel's hand just in time for him to deal a downward strike to his foe. The was the one who had gone after Luna and it took a whole firaga to the back before it could reach her. Total Words: 616 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 480 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 240 Heartless Defeated 1 Shadows 5 Neoshadows Heartless Remaining: 91 Shadows 38 Neoshadows 96 Darkballs
The heartless didn't seem to keen on waiting for Kel to answer Luna, even if it didn't take too long. In fact the heartless didn't seemed to be too fond of Luna's presence in general. Kel, who hadn't turned away from facing the heartless on account of the times in which they have already attack him from behind, noticed that they seemed to be moving more frequently than they were when it was just him. In reality this more concerned Kel than confused him. It was already starting to get annoying enough dealing with them as they were now. Throwing in aggression could add another level of difficulty to all this. His grip tighten on both his keyblades just as a neoshadow had jumped out from the tree towards the duo. Its haste had made it a simple target to strike with a quick thunder spell. "They've certainly gotten more eager since you showed up." It was kinda in a joking sense when he said it, but the fact of the matter was it was true. The past few times they have more gone through the process of slinking into the ground before their attacks and that last one just completely skipped that process and gone straight for the attack. Another one had jumped off the tree right after its comrades failed attempt. The heartless was keen on delivering a furry of attacks his way, forcing Kel to stay on the defensive for a bit. His footing remained strong and wasn't going to go anywhere along as this was the case. There had to have been some sort of hive mind interaction between the heartless for while the one that Kel was currently fighting seemingly stopped trying to actually deliver harm upon him and instead more focused on keeping him from moving. The reason behind this was clear in a matter of seconds later when another neoshadow had sped past Kel in an attempt to get to Luna. "Oh no you don't." Using both of his keyblades to keep the neoshaodw at bay from attacking, Kel delivered a swift kick to its stomach, or rather where its stomach should be. The anatomy of heartless was something that was lost upon him. He then threw Oathkeeper at the stunned shadow to keep it from immediately trying to attack him once again. It could've tried again, but it would've been difficult given that the keyblade had pierced the heartless right through its head. Dissipating into dust, he turned away form that heartless and to the one that was still on its way towards Luna. A single step was all that he had taken before another two neoshadows arose from the puddles that happened to be near Kel and latched onto his arms. His initial struggles did nothing more than just waste energy as the heartless that held him back had not only linked arms behind him, but anchored themselves into the ground. All in an effort to keep him from stopping the one heartless that was on its way towards Luna. All this effort just to attack one person was strange, but not as strange as the fact that they were still taking turns with their attacks as opposed to attacking all at once. Long as the heartless never figured that out. "Get off." Just then Kel had felt a chill run through him and faintly through his arms. Fortunately he'd added on sleeves to his recent attire change, so the cold on his arm wasn't that bad. He looked back to the heartless that were holding him back had been frozen solid. In fact there was a trail ice that both surrounded him and stretched out and caught the neoshadow that had gone after Luna. "How did I do that?" Total Words: 629 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 420 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 210 Heartless Defeated 1 Shadows 5 Neoshadows Heartless Remaining: 111 Shadows 69 Neoshadows 119 Darkballs
The effects of this battle were starting to be noticed, more so with the neoshadows as they seemed to be running low on their numbers. Noticing this did take some effort on the account of them for the most part being mixed in the swirling mass of darkness that were the smaller shadows. If they weren't just slightly taller than the other shadows it would've been more of a challenge to notice this. The heartless themselves had to have noticed this change as well for they were starting to get more aggressive with their attacks. Again this fell mainly with the neoshadows. The two trees behind him were covered in the wiggling darkness that was the heartless menace, following the growing trend that was grabbing on to the smaller heartless and tossing them at the Kel. If their aim was better they could have landed a direct hit on Kel while he was not looking. But their aim left a lot to be desired and as such when the one heartless came whizzing past Kel, landing smack dab in the sand before turning to dust, he immediately turned his head behind him towards the heartless all among the tree. The sheer amount of heartless on the tree was having a noticeable affect as there were much too many for that one tree to bear. Five neoshadows in particular couldn't keep any grip on the tree and came crashing down onto the ground. It would have been nice if the fall had just done them in, but being the larger variety they had a bit more durability than their smaller heartless counterparts. The neoshadows scrambled around on the ground before melding into it and reforming in their slouched positions. The blank stare was directed at Kel moments before they set off to attack him. The start was the usual song and dance that Kel had quick grown accustomed to when dealing with the neoshadows. Two of the puddles had taken on more of a head on approach in attacking him. The puddles got halfway there before the shadows themselves leap upward and prepared to strike. It had been during the dive downward in which Kel countered with a quick toss of his keyblade in their direction which had bisected the two heartless into dust. The remaining three puddles were a bit more clever in their approach and seemingly attacked from the front. Kel braced himself for the attack heading in the front, but the seeming attack was a feint and the three puddles scattered and swung around behind him. He fell for the feint hook, line and sinker and as a result was taking another claw attack to the back. This one did more than just sting as there was actual pain that followed the injury. It was his fault for getting careless, having grown used to the same old method of attack from the neoshadows. For the time being Kel fought through the pain and ignored it long enough to see that the neoshadows were trying the same trick once again. This time with a seemingly similar strategy. At this point Kel had felt like he'd recovered enough strength to use one of his stronger attacked, which was followed by him unleashing a zantesuken attack upon the heartless before they could make an attack. Luna had approached him shortly after he'd finished dealing with those three neoshadows. "I'm doing okay." It was more or less the truth, despite just taking another hit from the neoshadows. Kel looked up towards the tree that were still covered to the brim in neoshadows. "Think you can help me in dealing with them?" The heartless were coming up with different tactics to fight and having someone to watch his back would be nice to have. Total Words: 631 Exp: 60 Total Exp: 360 Blessed Thief: 30 Total Munny: 180 Heartless Defeated 1 Shadows 5 Neoshadows Heartless Left: 284 Shadows 97 Neoshadows 165 Darkballs
