Ascot, with but a blink of an eye, used Reflara to reinforce Oner's Aura, minimizing the implosion's damage on him, then Cura to heal said damage. However, it was clear that they were dealing with an opponent who rivaled Reno and Oner in creativity, and Jake in strength, and had a combination of intelligence and experience that overwhelmed the boy's own natural talent. He was going to have to use the lessons that he had learned from Joshua and Satoko - two fighters that he had learned from the most - in order to even have a chance, not of beating the Elemental Embodiment, but of affecting the battle. Drawing deep breaths, the boy once again forced himself to observe, and even grudingly admire, the enemy's style and finesse.

Realizing that the Elemental Embodiment needed to be dealt with blantantly, the boy cast aside all thoughts of a subtle backstab and joint the battle openly, zig-zagging on his motions so as to present an erratic target. Once he reached his opponent, Ascot cast Holy immideately, healing whatever remaining damage there was, healing the wounds of Oner and Jake, and damaging the enemy.

(WIP)

Belle had arrived already in he midst of the battle. She spectated for a bit as Shiva and Ascot attacked the cloaked man. It backfired with an immense Firaga spell. Unable to react quickly enough she braced for the incoming attack. Luckily for her she, along with Amaya, was saved by a CoD created by Joshua. She was saved by the attack but needed to do something herself too. She couldn't just idly stand by and do nothing.

She saw that Ascot was heading for a straight-on attack against the cloaked figure. After Ascot would have performed his attack, at this moment no knowing which one it would be, she would immediately strike after that. She slashes with her keyblade releasing multiple enlarged shurikens of light at the opponent. After that she would rush at the opponent and make use of one of her new abilities, Time Splicer. Once she would land he first strike on the opponent she would teleport around the enemy, stopping the time to move, making it look like teleportion, and strike him from various angles and positions.

Thomas rolled his eyes, resisting the urge to point out that insulting him by saying how insignificant he was wasn't likely to get him to go along with anything this guy was suggesting. If he was so irrelevant, why where they even having this conversation right now? But at this point Thomas had begun to accept that this mystery man wasn't planning on giving him a straight answer for anything, apparently. Because that would obviously be too easy for whatever kind of whacked out supervillain he was. After all, it wasn't like Thomas had the magic to strike him down or control him by knowing his name. But nope, apparently he preferred to stay anonymous.

Then he presented his offer, and Thomas struggled to say 'no'. He wanted to say it, knew he should, knew he should try to bash the guys face in or go off and find the others and tell them so there could be a communal ass kicking, but he just couldn't. Because as it was, for whatever mysterious end goal he had in mind, this guy was offering to help Thomas get stronger. Sure, there was more likely than not a hidden agenda in there, because mysterious cloaked figures didn't just come up and offer to help you out of the blue and for nothing in return, but he was confident he could handle that. After all, once he was stronger he'd be able to beat this guy too, right?

"Fine," he huffed, lowering his keyblade a bit. "Stop dancing around like you're some kind of fairy and say what you plan on saying already." If he stopped with that, then things would get ten percent better immediately in terms of his headache.

Jake saw the challenge, but decided not to slow down. Making a quick note of his surroundings without breaking stride, he swung his axes, slashing in strong, speedy arcs that left afterimages of his key-axes. He mixed it up, combining a series of quick, probing attacks with one-handed power strikes, keeping his other hand ready to follow up in case of a weak point in his opponent's defenses or a slip in his own. Sparks flew as weapons clashed, creating sounds akin to a vicious thunderstorm.

Finding the enemy wasn't going to yield so quickly, Jake then switched tactics. Switching gears to a more serpentine combat style, he began dodging and bending around his foe's counterattacks, his agility belying his size. He might have been a big bruiser, but there was at least a decade or two of experience within his muscular frame. Every time the enemy would go for a coup-de-grace, he responded with rolling defenses, counters, and sliding parries intended to force the foe off-balance.

And yet through the dust, sparks, sweat, and steel, Jake could not help grinning. It had been a while since he had a fight this intense. He was enjoying this.

"I really need to complement you, that's an interesting style you have," Jake said, hoping to spice up combat with a little conversation. "Not bad on the speed techniques, either. Self taught, or can I inquire about your teacher?"

"How you get more powerful is rather easy. We simply need to smash the seal." The hooded man said before suddenly vanishing only to appear behind Thomas. After a split second Thomas' armored arm would be hit more times within that second then one would register. The man apparently knew a lot about the arm as all the blows were at it's weak points in a, probably likely to succeed, attempt to shatter the armor to pieces." Shall we see how this show goes down?"

---

"SHE'S self taught." a voice said before a massive tornado surrounded the entire field and blades of wind interrupted everyone's attacks while throwing off the 'Elemental Embodiment's' hood, revealing an elven girl with blazing red hair. Two more corridors opened, one near Joshua and Amaya and one near the elf. From the first came out Lucus, a malicious grin on his face and the second another cloaked figure, this on in a pale grey/silver cloak.

"Seems like we're going to have some fun." Lucus said before the second cloaked figure dashed towards Ascot. They were fast, their speed easily rivaling, if not completely outdoing, his own. Their hand would grab him by the face before shoving him through a CoD. The process was repeated on Belle just as quickly and both of the Keybladers would find themselv in the inner chambers of the Cola Volcano again, which where still intact despite in earlier explosion. In their hand, a pair of short swords appeared and their shoulders shook as if they were laughing.
"Try to entertain us a bit." They said, their voice that of a female.

Jake's attacks being interrupted by the attacks Lucus sent at Jake earlier, the Elven girl looked at him silently. She raised her weapon up and leveled it, her eyes narrowing as she looked between Jake and Oner, waiting to see their actions. The ground underneath her was beginning to crack from the heat she was generating while flames licked the edge of her sword. She was more then ready to continue.

"Can this shit go anymore downhill?" Joshua muttered, getting ready to fight Lucus

"If you ask that, it inevitably will." Lucus replied, summoning two kukri to his hands.

((Pairings: Jake and Oner vs Elven girl

Ascot and Belle vs cloaked girl.

Joshua and Amaya vs Lucus Griffonbane))

So, the Elemental Embodiment was part of Lucus' group; how many strong members did said group have? Either way, the group's attacks had been interrupted, Lucus himself and another figure had joined in, and said other figure can match him and Belle at speed. And, Ascot, though beaten a couple of times - he counted the battle against Satoko as a defeat - had never met his equal in the agility department before.

Nevertheless, Ascot had a small advatage: He can use Fira now. And that is just what he did, jumping up, gliding, and then setting the ground beneath the cloaked woman on fire, hoping to deny her the advantage of terrain. He and Belle had the protection of Aura in order to protect them from the magical damage of his own flames; the claoked woman did not.

Amaya kept ahold of Joshua tightly watching from a distance before her grip tightened sensing more darkened hearts and more corridors open as she saw lucus come through one and another figure. "Father..."she whispered bringing forth her own keyblade keeping close to Joshua as her mind was telling her over and over this was not the man she knew so internally her heart said one thing and her mind said another

"What the-" Jake sputtered in surprise as his strikes seemed to be all blocked by a hurricane of sharp blades. He took a couple of steps back, taking stock of the situation around him.

Apparently, a couple more had entered the fray.

"You know, I asked her the question," Jake said in mock exasperation, before turning to the Elven swords-lady. "I mean, come on, lady, common courtesy and all, right?"

No answer.

"You know, this is going to be a very boring conversation if you don't contribute," he joked. He shrugged. "Oh well..."

Still he resumed a readiness position, and glanced to Oner.

"Kid, you okay?" he whispered. "Got any ideas right now?"

After Belle had performed her first attack and quickly went after the opponent with Ascot on her side. But to her surprise more people joined the battle, more enemies. One of the cloaked figures matched Ascot's speed and caught up to him, thus probably even surpassing his speed. Ascot was immediately thrown inside of the CoD. Belle didn't know what to do, she wanted to continue her attack and perform Time Splicer, but she didn't even get time to decide. She wasn't allowed to decide at all. The cloaked figure grabbed her head and threw her after Ascot into the portal.

She landed in the partly destroyed Cola Mountain, it was pretty intact even after the explosion. However there was dried up diet cola all over the area, and the hot pool of cola in the middle had significantly decreased in depth. But it would probably still be hot as hell. She looked over to the place where Vanellope's cottage was... it was nowhere to be seen now, completely destroyed. Belle glanced over to Ascot. He seemed okay, he is a strong boy. She stood up and faced the cloaked figure. The figure spoke of herself as 'their', how unusual.

"What the hell man! What do you guys want from us? Ugh... you probably won't even answer." she said with a sigh. Belle's keyblade appeared in her hand, and she looked at her younger partner. Ascot said nothing and immediately rushed into battle. He glided though the air and used a Fira spell to set the ground underneath the cloaked girl in fire. Belle smirked, as expected of Ascot. He wasn't going to lose again, and neither was she. Belle immediately ran through the fire, as the magic of the keyblade didn't work on her, and hurled three large shurikens of light from her keyblade that aimed at the woman's back.

To say Thomas was expecting what happened next would be blatantly denying the obvious. He had expected some kind of offer, a Faustian bargain in which he gained power but was forced to betray the group, or consigned his soul to eternal suffering, or something like that. That was what usually came from accepting offers for help, or power, with evil people, wasn't it?

So he wasn't prepared as the man suddenly appeared behind him, earning an impressed thought or two about how he did that, if it was speed at a ridiculous level, which seemed unlikely given that there was no wind to indicate he had moved, so he must have a very powerful teleport spell of some kind. Then he wasn't in a position to think about that as a rain of blows hit his armor in all it's weak spots, feeling like a jackhammer to the limb beneath it, as it would have even without the wound radiating pain through it. Magic immediately rushed to reinforce the armor, but it wasn't enough, and it vanished in a flash of light to reveal the limb beneath.

He almost had to look, and his eyes widened at what he saw. Despite the man's prediction, it still looked human, which was a small favor, but black veins radiated across the entirety of his arm, black liquid dripping down and tinting his fingernails black. The wound rippled and pulsed, almost like it was a living organism, the skin of it emerging with small bumps that seemed to rise and fall, though it might have just been his imagination. Definitely not the most pleasant of sights, and his mind reeled from just looking at it. "Okay, you opened it, congrats," he said somewhat sarcastically to Mr. Mystery man, given that he couldn't do that himself. "Now what? You gonna try and convert me into some Heartless hybrid thing, or you gonna get rid of it?"

"My boy, why would I get rid of my enemies gift when I can turn it against them." The man said, raising an arm. The darkness held in Thomas' arm began running through his body, in what was likely a very painful process, probably as bad as when the man had removed the Sign from Amaya's heart." Now, if we distribute this throughout your body evenly, you should have an easier time control it, get an overall boost to your abilities, and be able to hide it much more easily. Not a bad bargain if I say so myself.

---

Joshua and Lucus were caught in the middle of a fierce battle, Joshua trying to hold Lucus back and keep him from harming the weakened Amaya while Lucus did everything he could to do just that. Spells and blades of wind where flying all over the place as a result.

---

The cloaked girl laughed as something caught Ascot midflight and slammed him into the ground. Whatever it was, it was solid unlike Satoko's powers, and Ascot would feel the object yank him to the ground. Belle's projects would be intercepted midflight and knocked aside before several object hit in her response, drawing blood from her arms and legs as the girl laughed even more, apparently taking delight at the sight.

---

"He was foolish to try and use Fire against me." The elven girl said, her tone flat and monotone" Those flames will burn his mana and once that's done, destroy his ability to channel it, forever stopping him from casting spells. From what we know that would make him utterly worthless to you.

Now, prepare to die."

With that a full blown collum of flame erupted from under Jake, with only a split second warning for him to dodge, Even if he did, he was unlikely to come out unscathed. Assuming he survived, the girl would charge him and begin a furious assault on him, give him little time to counter attack and focus only on defense.

Ascot was yanked down by a mysterious tendril and brought down to earth, pardon the pun. In response, Ascot slashed at the thing holding him, hoping to cut it, before activating his Shotlock and firing it at the cloaked woman, sending out a number of projectiles her way. Not content with that, the boy cast a Cura at Belle, before taking a defensive stance so that he can assess the situation.

The Cloaked Woman, presumably a Nobody, had control over an element that was material, not metaphysical, that much was obvious. That was why he tried to cut it, just to see if he could do so. Nevertheless, something struck the boy as odd; his opponent couldn't be that obvious; they must have some tricks up their sleeve. He needed to prepare for said tricks without knowing what they are...which was impossible, so he would just keep himself on his toes.

Okay, not quite what he had been expecting. Then again, using darkness was what Joshua had been doing for so long, so what was to say that Thomas couldn't either? He knew the possible effects, how detrimental it could be, but it didn't seem to matter in the end, since he knew he would fight as hard as he could to keep from succumbing to it. At least, that was what he told himself as the mysterious man did whatever it was he did to him.

Then his thoughts went away in a haze of red pain as the man did...whatever it was. His veins felt like they were on fire as the darkness shifted and traveled, pulsing black spreading further along as the open surface wound diminished in turn. His fists reflexively opened and clenched as he resisted the urge to drop to his knees, tears involuntarily budding at the corners of his eyes as his blinking picked up as well. Pained grunts issued from closed lips, a strangled attempt to pretend he was strong and keep from screaming in pain.

At last it slowly came to an end, though how long it had taken Thomas couldn't guess. It felt...strange, to say the least, and he wasn't entirely sure how it felt past the general pain as the darkness seemed to incorporate itself into his body beyond where it had been before. Definitely not the most enjoyable experience.

"So, what do you get out of this," he panted as he struggled to rise again. "Helping someone who wants to kick your ass doesn't sound like a good plan in my book." Somehow, in spite of the question, Thomas had a feeling he wouldn't get an answer.

Mentally amaya was having her own battle of the lucus she knew before she was taken away from all she knew. The kind man she use to call father, but now she saw a complete monster and remembered all the things she heard that happened the four years she went missing "t-this isn't right..."she whispered to herself as herown fears of reality were ssetting in more and more about the darkness... "it destroys everything one ever knew...he looks and sounds like my father but... his light isn't there....its gone...he's not him."she told herself looking at the fight as she took a deep breath "that's not father....."she said to herself "that's a monster nothing more."she said telling herself it over and over as slowly the fear went away as she took a few steps back before she held out her hand "I need to help more..."she whispered closing her eyes focusing on finding what energy she could. Zoning out all the distractions beside the sounds of their weapons clashing as she visualized every swing and movement in her mind while looking for what energy she could find.

While speeding through the midair, Belle was knocked aside, by something she could not even recognize. As she flew through the air more objects were hurled at her, still not knowing what they could be. They were solid materials but none of recognizable shape or color. Belle would have gotten the full hit of the objects if she hadn't use her magic. Belle used Stop on the whole area around her, and quickly changed her posture, so that the projectiles only made small cuts in her body.

She could hear the laughing of the cloaked girl, which really pissed her off. Luckily for Belle, Ascot had Cure magic and cast one on her. "What is your deal?! To afraid to reveal your face? Ugh... people like you piss me off sooo much." Belle shouted. Belle had quickly formed a plan in her head, one she hoped would work. She dashed towards the girl, and when she was withing range she used a Thunder Dash, just far enough to get in front of her. She quickly used a Reverse to get behind her and immediately followed that up with a Wishing Edge.

Oner cursed as the flame began to burn his Mana. So she still had control over it huh, that was quite the power. It seemed to be different than magic, which would be the only reason why this girl, who was revealed to be elfin, would have such powerful control over it. If it was magic then it would fully be Oner's power, but since it was different it wasn't. Oner was focusing, keeping the flame from burning his Mana anymore as he was slowly ascertaining control over it to expel it. Unfortunately, this meant that he couldn't move while doing this since he was using all of his control over his very spirit and being to keep the flame from doing anymore damage, the circle on his forehead channeling more light into his arm where the flame was as he directed more of the force of his Spirit Veins, only Thomas actually knowing what the lines on him were though, into his arm. So while this kept the damage only minuscule, it prevented him from helping Ascot and Belle as another foe joined the battle.

By the time Jake came over Oner was almost done. "I am fine. I am almost done expunging this flame from mine being". When the flame column erupted though Oner's eyes widened as he was just far away enough from Jake to not get consumed by it. "No other options art available..." This would be much quicker, but it was something he didn't want to have to resort to. It was either this, or one other option, but the other option was something more risky than spending the extra seconds needed to rid this flame from him normally, and in battle every second could spell life or death. The other option could possibly spread the flame to Reno, making it have even more potential fuel and thus harder to keep back.

So as the girl was focusing her assault on Jake he snapped his other hand, mentally giving Jake an apology for spending this time not helping him and helping himself instead. A hand mirror appeared. Next he focused and in the next instant, plunged his hand literally inside of the mirror. After that he drew his hand out, the mirror shattering as he drew his hand out, the flame now being held in his hand, which he quickly threw away, Oner panting softly after that. "Curse this foul art... Reno I beseech thee to help Jake while I recharge..." Oner muttered this beneath his breath, knowing that the problem with accessing the Mirror Realm was that it took alot of Spirit, and Oner was only using his own Spirit only instead of his and Reno's.

Now Reno manifested, raising up before with just a snap he chanted a quick 'Thunder!', a few Thundaja level lightning spells dropping from the sky onto the elfin woman, covering a large area in a blast of lightning that wouldn't harm Jake, the next spells cast in the next moment surrounding him in several layered shields of spinning air and lightning, it being hard to even see Reno in the 'tornado' of wind and lightning that was protecting him. Until Oner recovered his Spirit after doing that he would have to fight this woman without his help, without his white magic. This wasn't a good situation. Fortunately it didn't take too long for that to recover as long as Reno didn't utilize Darkness, then he could help recover Oner's Spirit fairly quickly, but even the precious seconds that took would be crucial.

'Prepare to die'.

How many times has he heard that line? Or 'meet your doom!'? Or, really, any other such line? The more Jake had thought about that during his travels, the more he was convinced bad guys had a Big Book of Cliche Quotes stashed away somewhere. In retrospect, maybe it was less a book and more some zeitgeist of villainy that engendered such quotes.

Of course, all it meant in this battle was the elf chick was generous enough to telegraph her attack, even if she didn't know it. He managed to dodge the fire column, even if he did feel the flames get a little too close. He made a mental note to patch it up, but his attention was already elsewhere; the Elf was charging at him full-bore, attempting to take him by surprise just as he was trying to recover from the flame strike. Solid strategy, really.

He managed to get his axes up just in time to counter the elf's sword swings, parrying each blow as quickly as he could. Some he got fully with the axe, some he managed to anticipate, and some he barely managed to block with his bracers rather than his axes. Sparks and embers filled the air as speed met strength. He had to admit, even though he hadn't slowed down that much since his youth, this particular fighter was a pretty fast blade herself.

"Nice follow-up on the backhand there," he retorted as he managed to dodge a swipe so fast he literally heard it whistle by his ear. "You might want to work on the balance, though, it's a bit off-"

He managed to perfectly block another attack the Elf had aimed at his torso, before then slamming his mass into the smaller form of his adversary.

"-like so!"

He managed to switch to attack this time, or at least footing more equal to his foe.

"And in case you were wondering," he said, grunting as he countered and parried enemy strikes, attempting to force her back into the defense as she had attempted with him, "about the kid?

"Even if what you said was true," he countered, deflecting two rapid sword strikes with a single vicious axe swing.

"Even if he never uses magic again because of you-" He spun around her, using the force of one of her own attacks for momentum, making sure his feet only hit the floor when he could manage a safe foothold.

When she swung again, he made a wide circular double-parry that locked their weapons together. In the flat blades of the weapons, he caught a glimpse of something happening in Oner's direction, and glared back at the Elf.

"Well, even if he can't cast magic, he's still my buddy, and I won't think any less of him.

"That answer work for you?"

Before she could respond, he raised both feet and planted them square in her chest, kicking himself away while setting her up for a powerful blast of lightning. He let go of his axes to temporarily tie up her swords, back-flipping away from her, and then resummoning his axes halfway through the jump.

"Well, whose to say helping you doesn't help me?" The man asked. While he had been moving the darkness about, he had made sure a bigger amount, but only by the slightest margin, made it to Thomas' brain. Darkness there was like a poison, generating negative thoughts, which in turn caused negative emotions. Negative emotions in turn caused a heart to fall to darkness. Thomas was strong. Even if his heart was lost to darkness, his will would reanimate the body. All that remained after that was convincing him.

---

Joshua's battle had gone rather downhill at this point and he landed in front of Amaya, a deep gash across his chest from a blade of wind that had finally hit him solidly. He coughed up a bit of blood and Lucus laughed and stood over him.
"Just die you little worm." He said, raising his foot, wind moving around it rapidly. It began to fall only to be stopped the next second by a ring of metal.

"ENOUGH CHOAS!" A voice roared as War appeared" Our orders were to merely test them."

"And he failed. Therefore he dies." Lucus barked back

"No. Our leader wants them alive."

"WHY?! For the love of God why would he keep those that could eventually stop him alive?!"

"He has his reasons. Now leave before I decide your services are no longer required."

Lucus grumbled before leaving through a CoD. War turned his attention to Amaya and Joshua, kneeling beside the latter.
"That is a rather grievous wound. I assume you have some healing magic or items, Miss Amaya?" He said.

---

The cloaked girl laughed at Belle's frustration. When Belle executed her plan the girl didn't even look behind her and simply dismissed her blades to catch Belle's keyblade with her bare hands, without turning around. With seemingly no effort, she threw Belle on the ground in front of her before stomping on Belle's sword arm with enough strength to easily snap the bone as if it were a twig.

Even if Ascot moved to try and stop this, he would quickly find himself restrained. Again, what was holding him eluded sight but it was very thin and strong, like an invisible metal wire.

---

Both Jake and Reno's counter attacks hit the Elven girl dead on and sent her flying back. She landed on her feet and dusted herself off before looking at the both of them.
"Pathetic. Dusks hit harder then the both of you." She said" Honestly I was hoping for more of a challenge but that this rate, neither of you will be worth the time or effort. Why are you even trying to do what you're doing? After all, every warrior fights for something."

That insult went right over Reno's head. "Well of course they would, i'm not really good at hitting things with swords". He grinned, his obviously innocent self showing here, Reno looking as though he was completely unaffected by the fire from before, Oner having used his energy to make sure of that. Of course, the other insults about them being worth time and effort also went over Reno's head. He never really cared for such things such as combat or battle, but his answer to this elfin woman's inquiry was obvious, his own elfin ears moving a small bit as he pondered.

"Well, I'm not really a warrior and I don't really like fighting". He gave a nod, looking at the girl and Jake as he moved over to them. "After all, whenever people fight, someone always gets hurt, and that's not fun at all". He had a slightly serious expression on his face. "I am only fighting though to protect my friends, and fighting for the hope that one day..." He looked at his hands, a blue fire forming over one of them before vanishing after he looked into it for a bit. "Our universe will become one where Power isn't necessary. Where people don't need to fight". He gave a smile as he looked back up at both Jake and the opponent they had been fighting.

"I know that it may be futile or hopeless to want this type of thing, but I do not believe that it is impossible, and thus I want to do all I can to make a world where we don't have to fight at all". It may have seemed like a childish dream, but Reno's eyes and expression were both sincere and wise, wise beyond his years. While it wasn't often, actually it was incredibly rarely, Reno would have moments where he acted much wiser than he usually did.