Hollow Remains [50 Years Later]

[Shinn]

This world has seen better days. Hollow Bastion or Radiant Whatever were names long forgotten to this forsaken land driven to the edge of destruction by the darkness. As the ocean of Heartless roam the deserted streets searching for hearts that are no longer around one person stands by idly watching these wretched creatures. All in all they are in search of the heart of the world. Unfortunately the door has long since been locked and hidden away by the heroes of the past, forgotten by time itself.

He stands there with a disgusted look on his face hiding his face in shame behind a hooded black leather jacket. He thinks back to his past and remembers hearing stories from his lost parents of a time when their world was not this Hell-hole.

It must have been just a fairy tale to tell his younger self at the time. The reality was that it could never be this way. Maybe he believed them at one time, but even as a child he could see the look in their eyes. Even they couldn't believe that story.

He looks at his watch, 6:30 P.M. as scheduled. Holding out his hand a dark aura gathered there as a blue light shot out and took the form of a long blue blade of light and darkness.

The Heartless could now sense someone was nearby, it had been so long since they felt the presence of a heart in that world they were becoming unruly. Like wild animals they started scurrying around searching for the man who carried their next heart to consume.

But he was ready for them. Jumping off the cliff he was standing on he landed right in the center of the Heartless infested street. He took a deep breath to calm his nerves down. He stood there knowing full well the intense situation he was now in. But this was all according to the plan.

"Come at me!"

[00Penguin]

They never stop coming... endlessly do they come and endlessly I fight.

Was all the tatterly cloak person's thoughts were as it ran through the twisting streets. Just ahead the was a bar which once held a sign in the air to call to the people long ago. With quickness the figure jumped into the air grabbing hold of the bar as it pulled itself up and then jumping onto the roof of the building. It took a moment to catch its breath, but it was short lived as the heartless materialized onto the roof with it. Underneath it's cloak, it grit it's teeth and started running again jumping roof to roof as the heartless followed in pursuit. The game of cat and mouse continued until jumping off of the last roof opened up into what was the path towards the Great Chasm. The end of road was coming up soon, and there was not way to avoid it, it was fight or die and the figure did not want to die so in the end it was fight. The figure tore the cloak off revealing a young woman, roughen up by the conditions that she was living in. She stood her ground as she pulled out a small blunt metal object from behind her back as she ready herself for the worse.

[NiNeLiVeS]

When the fighting began, when life breathed on the fetid, foul, dead land that had once lived, something old and ancient and evil woke.

He had not been born evil, despite the legends - nothing is or was. Not demons nor angels no humans. But he had surely and wholly been molded into that direction through war and battle and greed. He had once been a great warrior and then a great sorceror and then the Guardian of a Great Prophet.

The Prophet was now dead. Gone - long gone. Dust and ashes in the wind. Occasionally her Ghost would return, pretending to be alive. It was poor recompense but he allowed it.

Lumbering from a ten year slumber, a Heart quickened and then began to beat.

Payn woke.

[Shinn]

"Are there others as well?" he said to himself upon seeing the arrival of the two newcomers. "But that's impossible..." To his knowledge there wasn't anyone left here, they had either been turned into a Heartless or escaped the world a long time ago.

But the time for asking questions would have to wait until later. Right now there was the Heartless issue to deal with. And as the Shadow Heartless came at him he leaped high into the air with several Heartless pursuing him. As he anticipated, the Heartless weren't experts in combat they just attacked without any thought other than to steal a Heart in mind. He quickly ended them in three quick slashes from his blade. As he was coming down more Heartless began to gather where he was expected to land.

But he gathered enough momentum to jump again once more in mid air and land safely on top of a aged stone pillar. Heartless nearby began to climb up the pillar in hopes that they would reach him and his heart.

The warrior raised his blade of light and struck it into the pillar which shot a bright white light down the cracks that had been created over the years. The Heartless climbing up the pillar were disintegrated instantly upon contact. As the pillar started to crumble the warrior jumped off and landed back on the streets. There was still more of them to be vanquished.

Task: Defeat all Heartless!!
No. of Heartless remaining 100

[NiNeLiVeS]

A mere hundred, give or take a dozen.

He could see the Hearts - beating off in the distance. In a different era he would smite the heroes: that was the task he had decided for himself.

But the Heartless did not discriminate. His Heart was as indomitable as theirs - more, perhaps since he was likely stronger.

It mattered not.

Payn smiled as he lifted his hand and summoned both fire and lightning.

At last. Battle again at last.

_________________

[hp=94/94]

Fire Lv3 (STRONG)
Lightning Lv3 (STRONG - all within 15 feet)

[00Penguin]

The Heartless starts scampering around her like sharks in a frenzy, until one of them... brave or stupid jumped into the air to attack. The woman saw it coming as she round house killed the Heartless in mid-flight and then using the momentum to throw another kick into the group as she started to move through the wave of the Heartless relentlessly beating the heartless up.

[Shinn]

Several Neo Heartless appeared behind him, bursting from a pool of darkness. Right then it seemed as though time had slowed itself down as he slowly turned around to face them bringing his blade forward as he turned. With a strong horizontal slash which left a blue trail of light behind, the Heartless were vanquished.

More started to come at him, his blade wouldn't be able to take them all down. Reaching into his black leather coat he pulls out a oddly shaped silver revolver with a broken chain on the end, and what seems to be a broken blade on the front where the barrel of the pistol should be. Without the need to waste time taking aim at the Heartless he fires off eight rounds with speed and intensity destroying eight Heartless in the process.

He thought to himself "not bad for an antique relic", that he just recently restored. It served its purpose for the time being. But he didn't have the luxury of standing there and reloading the chambers. And with the blade being broke he couldn't use it for any offensive or defensive purposes.

After tossing the useless weapon away he took off running up a broken down building while more Heartless followed.

Task: Defeat all Heartless!!
No. of Heartless remaining: 85

[NiNeLiVeS]

Ice came next, freezing a chunk of them solid. Then spears of stone that rose from the ground to skewer the Heartless en masse. There were not so many here - only a feeble ten dozen - perhaps even less. And not of the ilk that were capable of destroying entire worlds. Surface manifestations of a terrible disease, yes, but nothing to worry about.

It were the living ones he was interested in.

Stalking past the smoking bodies, wasting away into the wind, Payn strode forth towards a... familiar scent. One he might have recognized, long ago.

____________

Stone Spike (strong)
Ice Lv3

[Shinn]

The hooded figure who was now jumping from rooftop to rooftop looked back to see how many Heartless were chasing him. The number of Heartless had doubled now. Not panicking at the least, he raced onward to find a more open area.

But what for? If he were to do that the Heartless would invade that area and surround him leaving him no place to run anymore.

But this was all according to his plan. Besides the further he got the Heartless to stray away from that area the better. He couldn't afford to let them get any closer to...

There, just behind the crumbled down tunnel was the town square or at least what was once a town square now nothing more than a demolished open area. Jumping off the building he sprinted towards the center of the open area. It was quiet again, he could faintly hear the sounds of the other unknown people doing battle with the Heartless. A part of him hoped they would survive, but he had no time to concern himself with others. Hell, he wasn't even sure if he was gonna make it out alive himself. No, losing now would be unacceptable! He HAD to continue on for the sake of this world and for...

Heartless gathered all around him now. There was no escaping them. This was one of those "go out with a bang" type of scenarios, only this time he wasn't planning on offing himself today. With a cocky smile on his face he pulls out a black metallic controller.

"Hope you guys like my Claymore ver.2!"

He presses the button and a large round circle of light appears underneath him and the Heartless. The circle slowly rises up from the ground disintegrating any and all Heartless caught within it. With that the number of Heartless dropped dramatically.

Too bad he could only use it that one time, oh well it can only do so much and right now any help would do.

Summoning his blade once more he prepares himself for the next wave.

Task: Defeat ALL Heartless!!
No. of Heartless Remaining: 50

[NiNeLiVeS]

A sizable explosion.

The demon mused to itself for a moment - interested, despite itself. Then it shook its head: immaterial. Truly immaterial. If the stranger was as strong as expected it would figure out a way to survive. These... pests were nuisances, nothing more.

A wave of fire and lightning incinerated the foes before him as he strode towards the other one. The girl-woman-child that seemed so familiar and was... not.

[00Penguin]

Several jabs and kicks through the groups of shadows, the woman noticed an iron rebar loosely stuck in the rubble of an ancient building. Instinctively she slamed her foot down the rebar popping it out of the rubble, catching it in midair and using the spin to slam a shadow into nothing. Now with something she was familiar with the woman proceeded further into the swarm of shadows using spins and twists of the rebar to do more damage. Within all the carnage atleast a baker's dozens of poofing clouds appeared in the sea of shadows.

[Shinn]

The Heartless numbers were dropping down fast. This could be either a good thing, or a really bad thing. The hooded guy expected the worst, it wasn't the first time something like THAT would happen. But he was well prepared for it should it occur. With less than 2 dozen Heartless left the remaining Heartless began to regroup and work into teams.

As expected, the Heartless were being commanded by a strong being of darkness. What they needed, or at least what HE needed to do now was find the person who was controlling the Heartless and take that person down once and for all. He suspected that this was the cause of the Heartless still lingering around even though there was no one else in this world for them to take a Heart from except him...an-

Three NovaShadow Heartless appear from the dark corridors of darkness in front of him, each standing over him like giants or at least very very tall individuals.

He wasn't expecting to see these types of Heartless which meant he was close by THAT person. With his blade in hand, he prepares to fight all three Heartless.

The girl hadn't seen any Heartless anywhere for a few minutes. While she had cleared the area she was in of Heartless, there was still a dark presence that could be easily felt. What she didn't notice was that the shadow began to act out on its own behind her. Dancing around like a madman it rose from the floor and stood behind her holding the same weapon she was, and taking the same stance she would normally take. With the exception of an all black skin color and two bright yellow eyes it looked exactly like her in every shape and form.

The other man who had been easily defeating Heartless without breaking a sweat was now surrounded by six special type Heartless. Three Wizard and three Invisible Heartless appear before him from their corridors of darkness. Quickly all three invisible Heartless vanish leaving behind only their swords and three rings of fire which surround him. The three swords suddenly start to hover around before flying straight towards him at full speed.

Task: Defeat your given opponents!
No. of Heartless remaining: 20

---

Nova Shadow

[hp=100/100]

[hp=100/100]

[hp=100/100]

---

PenguinShadow Clone

[hp=200/200]

---

Wizard
[hp=50/50]

[hp=50/50]

[hp=50/50]

---

Invisible
[hp=90/90]

[hp=90/90]

[hp=90/90]

[00Penguin]

The area looked clear but the woman didn't feel safe. She ready her rebar as she started looking left to right. Nothing seem to appear but she did feel a present. Then she heard a sound, looking behind as her shadow started rising up and she backed up.

That's not possible, how can they do this? How?

No... this was no time to question how, she needed to take care of the issue now. The woman readied herself as she nod in saying 'come on'.

[NiNeLiVeS]

Hmpf.

Ridiculous. What could they possibly hope to accomplish with such tiny forces?

"Where are your warriors?" Payn asked. "Why must I fight against sneaks and wizards?"

[Shinn]

Payns shouts fell to daft ears. Instead the Heartless began their attack with the three Wizard Heartless. Two of the three casting Blizzard spells and the third casting Thunder. The swords that belonged to the Invisible Heartless flew past Payne striking him three times in a row before stopping in mid air and turning back around for another strike.

As for the girl who was fighting her shadow, it began its attack as well flying straight at her and grabbing her neck then using the momentum to drag her across the ground before coming to a grinding halt. The shadow stood above her cracking its neck ready to deal a finishing blow.

The hooded man seemed to be having a "fun" time with the Nova Heartess as all three of them sunk into the ground creating a large pool of darkness underneath him. He quickly used this opportunity to strike his blade into the pool which lit up brightly causing the three Heartless to jump out of the pool in pain. Then as they came out the hooded man went for the one closest to him and began dealing a series of slashes with his blade before stepping back as it finally recovered. However one of the other three Heartless was standing behind him at the time and took its revenge by clawing the hooded man from behind. The force from the attack also sent him flying forward having him land in a pile of debris. He recovered quickly and rushed back to fight again but stopped. Fighting all three of them at once wasn't going to work, he needed to fight them one on one if he stood any chance of surviving. He would have to think of a way to get them separated so he could take them one by one.