Kingdom Hearts; The World That Never Was

You are led to a City, looking something like a normal, standard, general environment. It is littered with buildings as tall as the skyscrapers will allow, each with rows and columns of glowing windows, as though there was activity inside each of them. Yet in spite of this, you notice that there are no inhabitants to this City at all, though all the lights inside the buildings are on.


Above this grounded City, there is a mountainous pearly white City hovering just above it, as if resting on a halo-like cloud, and gleaming brightly in contrast to the darkness of all the grayed and blackened buildings that are rooted to the ground.

Above that, even, there is a large, glowing yellow heart in the sky, shining its light down like a spotlight on the brightly shining white City above the dark one.


You begin on the ground level, in the dark city, with the buildings that are separated from each other.

???: You asked for it, pal...

Suddenly, the City began to move, as if alive, with buildings bouncing about as though they were filled with liveliness. Some retracted to and fro into the ground, like a whack-a-mole poking its head out and hiding from you in a rhythmic mechanical pattern, and many of the lights flashing on and off like slots.

Of all the hustling and bustling buildings of the empty city, many lines of them were sliding toward you in opposition, keeping you from passing them by once they appeared and hurled at you. Just that quickly, the entire lifeless city of darkness went into operation on command. The gleaming monitors overhead focused on the new target, which was like a specimen for research, and focused all attention from afar on the single object that was not inside one of the giant building bearing down on the streets of the darkness.

When the City came to life, somehow, so did the Shadows that lived in the City's code to spawn like a machine endlessly from the corners and crevices of the city's structure. These shades would dash out madly and wildly at you swiping their claws viciously. They were like an army of black ants rushing toward a single target from nearly every angle.

Ominous and ambiguous laughter was heard.

A voice echoed in the air, "You don't know who I am..." and faded.

Another of the same caliber and different pitch continued, "But I know who you are," before fading into faint laughter.

The dark City continued to mass produce the Heartless like a factory or a machine and they jumped out without cease nor number all the while Overlord Tensei trampled over them. The sharp red gleam in the eye was seen and noted for speculation, of which the sound of a shocked gasp could be heard. "You Know Where To Go," a different voice cried out from beyond, seeming more sharp than the other two.

In the distance, near the center of the city, there was a hotel-like building with an enormous flashing neon sign like that of a casino's around the entrance and a platform of stairs trailing down toward the street level.

???: Take a walk down memory lane, why don't ya?


The building was imposingly tall over Dark City and the rest of the tiny buildings under it, of which it also seemed to be monitoring expectantly, as if waiting for any of the buildings bouncing around to move about more vivaciously and recklessly, and the Heartless spawning endlessly from the factorial perpetuation. The only building not moving at all was that one, and it was flashing much more brightly than any other, being as flashy as the day itself. There was so much glitz and glitter about it, it seemed nearly overdressed, yet at the same time both fitting and alluring. Simultaneously, you would think it not to be your type of environment for every reason why, be it social class, stature, economics, morality, or even religious views, but it also seemed like it was the only option that wasn't just simulated perpetuity by the city, itself.

Just then, a different voice, much deeper and more solemn than any other, would speak out, sounding very near to Overlord Tensei. "Time May Not Be Your Friend... But The Darkness Is Not Your Foe."

Soon after, Overlord Tensei was greeted with another horde of Heartless, mindlessly trolling along, yet with their larger, more defined and powerful 'Neo Shadows' following right behind, and sporadically appearing from the ground, seemingly from inconspicuous places where gaps and small crevices held even the tiniest faintest trace of Darkness.

At the entrance to the largest, most prominent tower in all the Dark City, a greater Darkness, with large arms crossed firmly and securely like a lock, would appear as an apparition before the door, itself, almost as though it were part of it.

Overlord Tensei would not be able to pass into 'Memory's Skyscraper' until he overcame the Darkness, great and small, all around him.

"Well Done..." The True 'Seeker Of Darkness' muttered, stepping from out of the shadow of his own shadow, being naught but a shadow of yet another discarded, shed form. He knew his place, especially about being at the gateway.


The Heartless Guardian that hovered behind the Seeker, himself, wearing his own signature black jacket draped all the way to the length of his calves. It had some embroideries, but it did not detract from his prominent white spiked hair and his stern face of golden eyes. The Guardian, which was bid away without motion or cause, would sink into the building, attached a different source like a shadow than of the man, himself. "Surely, You Already Know Who I Am And My Cause." There wasn't an Ansem still walking the Present that didn't enjoy the thrill of the 'Test.' "Now, Show Us Yours!" The Seeker Of Darkness raised into the air, perfectly still, with his arms crossed and his feet just lightly hovering above the ground. He bid himself closer to Overlord Tensei, seeking to engage him directly. There was a certain look on his face and in his eye.

Mighty sweeps of a bulging dark arm crashed into those of the opponent, knocking away and crushing on collision each of the smaller spider-like hands, something like dealing with lowly Heartless 'Shadows.' "Interesting," Ansem analyzed, as the Guardian's blows clashed with the ones crossing over the area. Ansem's body would be protected from the blows.

When Overlord Tensei threw his sleeve out aggressively, it would be bat away with a swift and large outward swipe, with energy already crackling in the other hand that hadn't moved from its place yet.

"Submit!" He cried out sharply at the exact moment he saw an opening in Overlord Tensei's erratic movements. Chiefly, Ansem thrust his glowing palm directly into Overlord Tensei's chest, with a powerful concussive explosive force bursting from the point of impact on contact. Should it not connect, all of it would be kept stored in Ansem's palm.

???: Give that hand a Keyblade, and it might just be enough to take the whole Kingdom down.

The sound of distorted laughter was blotted out by the gutteral sounds of absorption in the multitudes through the vacuums of air pockets folding in from the drawing of energy.

"Guardian!" Ansem cried, drawing all attention to the next weak point calculated in Overlord Tensei's defense. Where he perceived that the Guardian was only capable of using its arms to parry the ceaseless blows, the body would suddenly appear sporadically, yet still somehow seamlessly in sync with the arms that blocked the strikes coming from all around. "... Very Interesting, Indeed..." The Seeker Of Darkness replied, more to himself than to anything or anyone else. Where the body came out to defend Ansem sequentially, the head suddenly appeared overhead with a downward headbutt.

This opening would be yet another swipe of the palm, which hadn't moved yet from its place until Overlord Tensei was acting, and the condensed energy that had been drawn into it earlier would be launched immediately as a projectile, something like a glowing disc, and seemingly both casually but authoritatively.

The sound of low humming could be heard.

"I Submit," Ansem cried, already having pieced together everything he needed to out of this battle. He drew no more energy after the crystal hands bypassed his shadow, but came to a complete halt, as if he were in stasis. He closed his eyes. His decision seemed to be final.

In that moment of silence, Ansem thought deeply. Yet, even at the thought, he felt a collection of energy that would draw out yet another Crystal Spider, he deduced, and immediately let his mind come to a still. There was nothing else to do, and he knew this, as a program. It was as if he had completely shut down, yet still looked like he was breathing and moving.

Just then, a random voice started to chant in a singsonging fashion, "Congratulations bub!" Another followed behind.

???: You've joined the club.

Moments after, when it was safe to enter, a hooded figure stepped out from the Darkness of Dark City just the same as any Heartless or other creature that spawned from Darkness, as it seemed that this 'Overlord Tensei' had done, as well, like a 'Pureblood.' The voice continued, this time directly from the one that had appeared, "And everybody here agrees," before ceasing all momentum at the end of the sentence.

The dark, hooded figure stood relatively tall, wearing his black jacket only just a bit differently than the other standing construct behind Overlord Tensei. It covered the fullness of his form, draped in complete blackness, leaving no visible distinction of who it could be at all. The face was hidden by shadows of the dark hood, itself.


It was implied from the mechanics of the city and Ansem, himself, or, what was left of him, that this was only a simulation, and also the ground level. "No need to crawl up and down the city like some lowly Heartless." When the simulation decided that the battle had ended, that was the cue for the members of the Organization XIII, who would heed the husk of Ansem just the same as they would the actual Ansem, himself. "Besides. I'm sure the others are dying to meet you."

The hooded man awaited Overlord Tensei's response, doing nothing more, in case he would draw forth more of his crystal palms that had been observed.

The low ripples of distorted, overlapping laughter, not more than chuckles, could be heard all around. It was not in jest, but seemingly in refreshing relief. The dark hooded figure that stood before him would lower his extended hand, chuckling, himself. "Is that all...?" he said with a bit of a hint of anticipation. "Then, why don't we roll out the red carpet, while we're at it!"

There was a snap of his fingers and, in two different locations at two different heights, there would be two more dark hooded figures looking nearly exactly the same as the first, save for their height, which, even still, was relatively around the same size. "Think you can keep up?" The figure said, with a dark corridor appearing behind him that he would slip into, only to appear further down the city's street, and then again once more, only to appear even further away, and then even once more, this time completely out of sight, with only the lingering fading trails of the dark corridors left behind for Overlord Tensei to follow. By the time the third had appeared, the first was already gone, and, by the time the next appeared, the second was faded away, and so on and so forth. This was his only available trail, and the two that were at different heights and angles would begin to traverse their own dark corridors in a similar fashion, though appearing from one rooftop to the next. It looked like they were all interchangeably moving around the city with no real clear definite distinction between any of them nor their trails left behind.

"Maybe so," a voice spoke from the darkness of the unknown, followed by a very sharp, precise pinpoint arrow piercing through one of the windows before Overlord Tensei's feet like a bullet, which would both destroy the glass and cause him to lose his footing and stop him in his tracks as he ran along the building's side, "But, from the way you're talkin', we actually don't know all THAT much about ya." Suddenly, even more of these precision-strike arrows would hurdle from seemingly every angle, with no real clear depiction of exactly where they were coming from. Yet, all of them were aimed for Overlord Tensei; both where he was coming from AND where he was moving to, in order to stop him dead in his tracks and gun him down, if the first hadn't served its purpose of creating an opening. If it did, the barrage would have definitely cut him down to size and pinned him in place.

At the same time as this was happening, Overlord Tensei would be able to see someone running at top speed down one of the streets of the Dark City and into a dark alley, where, immediately, he would disappear.

Finally, a dark corridor opened up in his clear line of sight at the top of one of the buildings, as if someone were coming out, or going in. Whichever it was, the dark corridor remained open, but a figure could not be made out.

The dark corridor faded with no one entering nor exiting.

???: This guy's good...

Even so, there were many many more tricks up the dark sleeves of the dark hand that had come to escort the esteemed Overlord Tensei to the Castle That Never Was. The one that had walked into the darkness below had seen him make his single bound over to the next building, where another trap was laid for him. Many figures now, which seemed to have spawned not from dark corridors, but literally out of thin air, would spontaneously generate just like the Heartless once did upon the rooftop he landed on, each of them either following him or coming toward him in order to assault him.

???: But we have something better.

Overhead, spontaneously appearing in a similar fashion as the figures that were all assaulting or following Overlord Tensei at the time, would be more of these sharp arrows of what looked to be dark energy, yet suspended in place and taking aim at him this time rather than being shot at him immediately, like the first time. This would cover that pesky 'blind spot' that he seemed to notice initially, which was something that was already accounted for long before it was perceived. More or less, the first shot(s) were just to test this guy's level of perception.

???: Certainly so.

Of the numerous figures that were all facing off against Overlord Tensei upon the rooftop, there was but a single one that actually appeared out of a dark corridor, and was garbed in black and hooded, as an Organization member would be. He walked casually through the onslaught, with none of them even daring to so much as lightly graze the man that stepped forth before Overlord Tensei.

The dark robed Organization member that was in plain view continued to approach Overlord Tensei very slowly, but with a caution that seemed equal or parallel to his own. It wasn't until Overlord Tensei took one step in the wrong direction, dodging one of the mere pawns and darting behind the dark figure that he would be met with a swift overhead blow from an overbearingly large sword like that of an axe, and with the weight of a mountain falling from the sky. One strike split the building in two, with a great deal of debris shooting up into the air and hovering in place, with the other half of the building that he stood atop falling and crumbling with him on it.

The man lugged his great sword up upon his shoulders after that, with the hovering dark energy arrows overhead immediately covering him with an onslaught of shots like that of a machine gun whose bullets had been frozen in time until the moment the sword hit the floor. Everything here was, more or less, just decoration; a simulation for a greater test, and nothing of value to anyone at all. No one missed a fallen tower that could be easily reconstructed, specifically for the purpose of entrapping and testing another who dared walk into the Dark City. Each of the arrows, some of which had not moved from their place, in spite of the others that were rapidly firing, would continue to keep a steady lock on Overlord Tensei and every one of his movements.

Many of the figures fell with him, still swiping at him mindlessly. A great deal of them also still surrounded the Organization member wielding the large sword, covering him just the same as the still-stagnant arrows that were seemingly frozen in time overhead. The man watched Overlord Tensei as he fell, but should he move, would not be so quick nor hasty to retaliate, himself, or even follow with his eyes. He stood where he was, watching the half of the building crumble and collapse as it would, returning to the same rubble from whence it was built.