"I'll tell you when you're older." Beuce said to Aux, seeing as Karina's explanation likely would be less than satisfactory for the man. Meanwhile, they swam into the palace they'd been kicked out of just a little while ago. Triton seemed furious at first, ready to hand out punishment at the end of his trident. Once Sebastian explained the situation though, he seemed to realize the error of his ways, and that it was largely too late to take them back. He offered them the trident to take to Ursula, knowing full well what it meant. "Listen, you said you didn't need our help defending your kingdom. If that's true, the trident isn't what gave you that ability. Take it from us, it's not the weapon that makes the wielder. You can handle a few heartless. We'll go and make sure Ariel doesn't get into any more trouble, and take out the witch while we're at it. Before we go though, Karina, give him a bit of a helping hand with that thing, would you?" Beuce asked her. Just because they were taking it with them didn't mean they couldn't lend out a bit of its power to be left behind with the king. 1/30
Beuce turned to Karina, realizing that it was a good idea to catch her up on what she'd missed. "There are a few details which I'll fill you in on later, but the gist of it is that during our Mark of Mastery we found out who all the princesses of heart are." Beuce paused for a moment. "And during the last world I was in, another one got taken. Anna was her name. Elsa used to be a princess, but she passed off the title to her sister, who was then kidnapped by Mortimer." Beuce realized that there was a little bit of missing context there, so he elaborated further. "Right, also, Mortimer is also out of the wasteland. He's apparently merged with the shadow blot, and become near invincible. None of our magic or attacks worked against him. He was just made of ink and reformed. if we're going to do anything, we'll need to find a way to beat him." The keyblade wielder gave a heavy sigh, resulting in a few bubbles floating up from his mouth. "For right now though, lets not put the cart before the horse. We've got to protect Ariel for right now. I'm sure Ursula has figured it out, but that contract doesn't require us to actually give her the trident. Just bring it to her lair. Once we do that, Ariel will be back in the ocean where it's a little safer. We just need to plan ahead against any countermeasures she has against our loophole."
Beuce wore a disgruntled expression as they swam back down from taking Ariel to the land. He understood it, why it happened, and what had lead up to it, but he couldn't help but feel angry at how incredibly avoidable it all was. If Triton had done basically anything differently since they got there, even one thing, it wouldn't have happened. They could've talked Ariel out of it, or if he'd been a little less overprotective because of the decorations in her room, she never would've even gone to Ursula in the first place. Though, they were going to have to take out the sea witch regardless of Triton or Ariel, it was just now a little higher stakes than it had to be. In any case, there was no use complaining about people to himself in his head. Once they reached the lair of the monstrous sea witch, Beuce glared at her, listening to her proposition. There was no doubt that the trident had been her goal all along, and Ariel was a nice bonus if she ended up with her too. "You mean to say, if we bring the Trident back to your grotto here, you'll undo Ariel's contract and bring her back to safety in the ocean?" Beuce was silent for a moment, not breaking eye contact. "Can I get that in writing?"
After Luna seemed to explode at Aux and began swimming away, Beuce drifted up next to the man as he was rubbing his now red cheek. "Jeez. That was kinda harsh." There was a slight silence after steel spoke, with only aux nodding in acknowledgement before Aux spoke up in response to Beuce. "You know... I thought joining this time, I'd see a lot less malice. With the exception of Kaida, every girl I've met in your group seems to want me out of the picture . There's Karina, and now the princess... dont even get me started on the green haired girl..." Beuce nodded "Well I can't say I was terribly thrilled about you joining either. For what it's worth though, I agreed with you there. You had no way of knowing something was about to happen." Beuce said, scratching the back of his head. There was a lot that needed doing, and not enough of them to do it. If it wasn't important, did they even have time to worry about it? Nevertheless, one of the princesses was in danger right now, so that didn't leave much room for question. "Can't say I blame any of you. Do you still want to hurt me too?" Beuce gave a dismissing wave. "Nah...Not unless you do something to provoke it anyway. For that you can thank...thank..." A look of confusion followed by one of concern washed over Beuce's face as he wracked his mind to remember what he was trying to say, until Aux cut in. "Hikaru." He said, finishing Beuce's sentence. "Why couldn't I..." "That's what sucks about being a replica. Day by day we forget more of him. Sometimes I can barely remember him. It sucks..." "Wait, you mean to tell me i'm eventually going to forget him entirely?" "I've been trying to think of a way to stop it from happening.. no luck though." Beuce frantically reached for his pockets, but only rubbed his hand against scale and fishy skin. "Dammit! Why did we have to be fish now of all times?!" "Welcome to my hell.. Kaida wrote his name on her wrist. Probably washed off when we got separated. If I wasn't linked to him I would barely know what his name started with" "Don't let me forget his name. If I can remember even that about him, I'll remember he existed at all. Help me out, and I'll see if I can't help you out with your 'lady problems' you mentioned. Well, everyone but Ananta anyway..." Aux sighs. "I dont need them to like me. I just need then to understand were gonna have to make hard choices soon. You've been lucky so far, but that luck's gonna run out... sooner than you think." "Trust me, I understand that better than most. We've more than run out of people to hide behind. There were those black coated people Karina was with, but they seemed to be a little weaker than us. If No Heart wanted, he could take us all out whenever he wanted. We only just barely got away last time. Speaking of, do you know who he is? Why he's so powerful?" "No clue... when I was under that dark influence, I only wanted to grow stronger. I just blindly followed his every command like a soldier." Looking back to Beuce he said. "Vanitas and Nequa are up to something to. They have their own methods of growing stronger." "Jeez. That's gonna be a problem then...We've gotta find the elemental guardians and beat all of them as fast as we can or else we'll be so outgunned there's no hope." "Yeah... and before that we have to deal with the hellfire club. Sooner we have to worry less about princesses. Sooner we get stronger." Beuce nodded. "And if this "Ursula" is after one of them, we might have a prime candidate to take out." "From what I remember, the hellfire club had 10 members. I worked most often with the horseman, but if you manage dot defeat mizrabel, there's still 9 remaining..." "Well, lets go make that 8." With that, they swam off after the others.
Beuce chuckled at Karina's stammering to get out the right words. "A gift, huh?" The merman took the small flame shaped pendant in his hand and looked it over curiously. A smile entering his face served as proof that he liked it. "This is really cool." He opened the chain and put it around the back of his neck before fastening it again and letting it dangle across his chest. "This a return gift for the necklace I got you a while back?" He asked, curious where she actually got it. "If so, I think you might have shown me up a bit. Maybe I'll do something later." He half-joked. Before much else could happen, he caught sight of something in the distance. A white haired merman was heading in their direction, holding a large golden trident. "Yo, Triton is coming this way.. We should get back inside and let them know. " Beuce said, swimming back into the grotto. "Hey uh, Ariel. Your dad might be on his way."
A cluster of bubbles flew from Beuce's mouth as he gave a heavy exhale at the situation. He really didn't think they should be tempting fate, but everyone was following Ariel. They were supposed to be protecting her after all, and there was likely some variety of danger in this world or else they wouldn't have all been swept here at the same time. He swam along behind Ariel, until finally they reached her grotto. There was all manner of sunken treasure of varying worth. Judging from her explanation of a "dinglehopper" she had no idea what any of it was. Steel mentioned that they were now high on King Triton's most wanted list due to the crab having gone missing. Beuce nodded in agreement. "I guess I'll go outside and keep watch for him. Karina, why don't you come with me?" He gave a wave toward him, indicating to follow. He wasn't sure exactly how subtle he was being, but keeping watch was only half the reason he wanted her to follow him. They could get a moment to catch up this way.
Beuce finally adjusted to his new aquatic body and managed to get the hang of swimming. This might even be an experience he could translate to land if he tried. Following Ariel to the palace of "King Triton", he was met with the elderly looking merman who seemed to scold his daughter for wanting to interact with surface dwellers. She, understandably, didn't take that very well. Beuce kind of understood xenophobia, coming from the background he did, but that didn't mean he liked what was going on here. It often came from misunderstanding outside forces. Speaking of which, the king turned his attention to them and accused them of being harbingers of ruin and destruction. He pointed his trident at them and it began to glow. Being fairly well versed in magic, he could tell that it was an unbelievably powerful artifact. Having it aimed at him with its user seemingly itching to pull the trigger almost made Beuce instinctively summon his keyblade, but if he did negotiations would instantly fall through. Well, "negotiations" was a bit of a strong word for what was happening. It was more like a game of "piss off the king and hope we don't turn into fish sticks". "You're not wrong that where the keyblade goes, chaos is always right there with it. You had it a little backwards though. We don't pass through and bring chaos with us, we follow chaos and destruction to protect people like your daughter from it. We got washed here by a storm, but I don't think it was an accident we ended up where we did. If we got here by sheer circumstance, where one of the princesses of heart are, then something major is probably about to happen to your daughter. She doesn't seem to being on speaking terms with you right at this moment, and unless that trident is as powerful as all of us put together, I wouldn't bank on it being able to protect her." Beuce was staring it down. He wasn't exactly sure the exactly level of its power, but it was probably at least as powerful as a keyblade. "I don't know how much you know about the keyblade and the current status of things, but there's been some pretty bad things that have happened recently. It seems like we're just about the last line of defense against it. If you value the safety of your kingdom here, your daughter, and probably your own life, I'd suggest you take all the help you can get." Beuce said firmly, hoping it wouldn't prompt his immediate sentence to fish stickification.
Beuce was admittedly a little surprised to see Karina, but just let out a small relieved sigh and smiled at her. "What took you so long? I was expecting you back by the time we hit the last world." He joked. He was a little worried about the others that had been on the boat with him, but he was still glad to see that at least some of them were alright, and that Karina was back with them. He didn't say much on the Aux matter, as he wasn't sure he entirely trusted him. Yet, he also hadn't interacted with him much since he lost his remnant and wasn't under No Heart's control. He clumsily swam over to where Aux and the natives to the world were. "We're uh, from across the tide. We got swept away by a storm and ended up here." He said to the young mermaid. It wasn't even entirely a lie either. "If you could help us find our way around here, or even tell us where we are, It'd really help us out."
Beuce struggled fiercely through the waves as the crashed against him. It was little more than a hopeless struggle, but he wouldn't quit nonetheless. As a particularly large wave rolled overhead and crashed into him with what seemed to be the entire ocean, he was pulled helplessly down beneath the tide. He summed his keyblade and thrust it forward, flashing out of reality and cutting upward through the water in an attempt to reach the surface, but he was too deep. With the waves increasing in their force he was only pulled back down the distance he covered, and he was beginning to run out of breath. His vision began to fade, and despite all his protests, his body began to give out on him without oxygen. Finally, he couldn't keep himself conscious any longer. The next thing he knew, he wearily awoke, sure that he was dead and in some sort of afterlife. Though he still felt his body fairly clearly, so it wasn't like he was in some sort of spirit form or anything. He swept his tail to push himself upright and shook his head. It was at this point he realized he had a tail. He snapped awake and looked down to realize he was now half fish, and could now breathe underwater. Only then did he hear a shout from a voice he never thought he'd be glad to hear. Swimming over he caught a glimpse of three of his companions. At least, he recognized two of them, and the third seemed to be familiar with them. "Hey, glad to see you guys made it off the island alright."
"Well, I guess the cat's out of the bag.." The man muttered to himself as the other members of the black coats witnessed what he did. Koa yelled and asked him why, but Luther just sighed. "I'm under new management. I was taken into custody by Nequa and offered the choice of dying or joining her. This group had never done anything but bicker and argue, and it was led by an emotional wreck of a girl. I didn't really see much of a choice, and now it's too late to go back." Luther looked around at the crumbling arena, then back to Koa. "We don't really have a lot of time to chat, but imagine I'll be seeing you again." Luther didn't respond to Datsgir, as the area was becoming more and more unstable and he didn't care to die due to a collapsed building. So, the man ran after Alex through the portal and back to Nequa's lair.
Beuce shook his head when Elsa asked if there was anything else they needed. "We should be good from here. We'll get her back. You just need to worry about running your kingdom. You should probably also get that duke arrested for hiring someone to assassinate you and all." The keyblade master walked over to Faust. "You know, there's a fight to be fought still. We could use your help in the long haul, if you're willing to come with us." He said, offering his glass arm out for a handshake to the man. "It's not often we find keyblade masters that are still around after Central Haven. We'd be grateful to you."
Username: Beucefilous Images (Please send original source): This Colors: Gold, Bronze, Silver, Orange Details: Make the hair like a golden flame kind of effect, similar to this. Turn the skin into like a silver/bronze color, similar to this. Emblazon this into the forehead in kind of like a small glowing brand. Add some kind of holy, unearthly glowing look to the eyes. Would you like this returned in the form of a signature/avatar/rp banner/ or another graphic?: Nah If yes, which form: ^ Discord/Skype (put N/A if you don't want to be contacted): You have it Method of Payment (Transfer/Likes): Transfer Would you like to see the process? (yes/no): Yes
Beuce glared at Mortimer. He didn't really quite understand how he got out of wasteland, or how he became what he was now, but it was clear that they weren't going to be able to beat him in his current state. It was best to try to avoid a conflict right now, and maybe figure out a way to deal with him later. Beuce didn't say a word to him despite the taunts and the fact he'd managed to kidnap the princess they were protecting from under their noses. Beuce sighed after the mouse was gone. "We'll do everything we can. It's our job as masters. I'll be honest, the reason we even came to that party was to protect you and your sister, but it looks like we've kind of messed that up. Not to mention we're more or less stuck here." Beuce said, before looking up to avoid sounding increasingly more cynical. "We just need to figure out a way to get off world and we can probably track him down and get Anna back."
It seemed like there were a thousand events all unfolding at once, and Luther barely had time to process any of it. Alex had produced his void disc and failed to take out Shiro. Things were falling apart quickly, and they didn't have a lot of time to react. If he helped take out Shiro, it would out him and his true intentions instantly. Instead, he'd fulfill his own task. Sending an illusion forward to run at Charlie, Luther broke away and produced the void disc from his pocket. His darted as quickly as he could toward the blue haired girl while still under the cover of his misdirection. "Sorry about this. It's nothing personal, but it's my job." The swordsman said from behind her. The moment she turned around, he pressed the device against her cheek and sealed her fate.
Beuce used Thunder Bell on Shadow
Beuce used strike raid on Interceptor
Beuce used judgement on Shadow and interceptor
Beuce used curaga on himself
Beuce used Thunder Bell on Interceptor
