~Introduction~
The Worlds were once one, but became shattered into many in a catastrophe no one truly remembers. Since then, they have remained separate, with great distance between them until each evolved into an individual world in their own right. By present day, the times of the Worlds being one has been completely forgotten. Now they exist as if they had always been separate, and with no knowledge of the other worlds' existence. That all began to change when the Heartless started appearing. Within the Realm of Light, each World has a Heart, a Keyhole granting access to the equal-but-opposite Realm of Darkness. From these openings, creatures of Darkness were discovered by kind-but-misguided scientist named Ansem the Wise. Ansem studied the Heartless, and the Realm from which they came extensively. His research even went as far to create man-made Heartless that he marked with an Emblem so that they could always be distinguished from their Pureblood brethren. This obsessive research eventually led to the opening of the Keyhole of Ansem's world, Radiant Garden. With the floodgate opened, Heartless overran the once-beautiful Radiant Garden until only a hollow shell of the world remained.
At around the same time, a powerful fairy enchantress called Maleficent was preparing to make her move. She'd discovered the existence of other worlds nearly ten years ago, and was now in her final preparation to begin an invasion to rule all worlds. When Radiant Garden was overran by Heartless, Maleficent moved right in and took the castle and its world for her own, renaming it Hollow Bastion. From here, she contacted a select group of like-minded entities from other worlds. With promises of power and the right to rule their respective worlds, they came to align themselves with Maleficent's plans. Only one entity stood in their way. A world called Disney Castle - ruled by the kind-hearted King Mickey - discovered Maleficent's plan and began work to thwart it.
And finally, on a tiny world called Destiny Islands, there lived three children. These three children would eventually come to hold the fate of all worlds in their hands: Sora, Riku, and Kairi. With Kairi having mysteriously moved to Destiny Islands from parts unknown, the three children plan to set out on an adventure to discover Kairi's home, and any other lands and worlds they come across in the process. But fate had other plans. A a fateful night, a storm hit Destiny Islands, and from it Heartless began to emerge and swarm. Riku, viewing this as an opportunity to expand his horizons, dived headlong into the rising Darkness and vanished. Kairi, too, was also taken away by the Darkness. Standing alone, Sora managed to summon the fabled Keyblade and defeated the Heartless boss. But by then it was too late, and Destiny Island's fate was sealed.
Sora survived and found himself in a strange town. Here he made a slew of new friends. Leon, Yuffie, Aerith and Cid; who were all aware of the Heartless and the power of the Keyblade. It was here Sora met his closest friends and allies, Donald and Goofy. During all of this, King Mickey instructed Donald and Goofy to seek out a "key" and then guard it. This search took them to Traverse Town where they joined Sora for a quest to find the King as well as Sora's missing friends. A grand tale unfolded from there. The trio traveled from world to world, occasionally doing battle with Maleficent's allies and sealing the Worlds' Keyholes along the way to prevent them from being swallowed up by the Heartless. Eventually the quest took them to the ruins of Hollow Bastion. Here they confronted Maleficent directly, as well as Riku who had joined her side in his search for the missing Kairi.
After a fierce battle, Kairi and the other missing Princesses of Heart - whom Maleficent had gathered for her nefarious purposes - were freed and awakened. However Riku was not so fortunate. A ghost or spirit calling himself Ansem had taken over Riku's body and retreated to the ominous End of the World. Sora, Donald, and Goofy followed suit, and confronted Ansem deep within the End of the World at the ruins of Destiny Islands. What happened next is a blur. Sora, Donald, Goofy, and even Riku and The King never returned from End of the World. Their fates remain unsolved.
Nearly ten years have passed. Those remaining at Disney Castle and Traverse Town believed the battle against Ansem to have been victorious despite the loss of the heroes in the process. But a new enemy soon made their existence known. All at once, fleets of Gummi Ships emerge from where Hollow Bastion once stood and begin attacking worlds one after another. This force only calls itself The Empire, its ruler remaining unknown to almost everyone outside of it. Instead the Empire was mostly commanded by a set of hooded figures calling themselves the Imperators. In response, Disney Castle scrambled to rescue as many worlds as possible, managing to unite a number of them together into a World Alliance.
With a threat of war between multiple worlds looming in the near future, and heroic figures such as Mickey and Sora nowhere to be found, things have begun to look bleak. Now the responsibility of saving the worlds has fallen onto the shoulders of anyone and everyone willing to stand up and fight.
~Traverse Town~
All was quiet in First and Second District. Recent influxes of refugees required the restoration and protection of Second District from Heartless attacks, and now only Third District was still dangerous to wander through. Being so close to Disney Castle in comparison to other worlds, Traverse Town was among the first that Disney Castle formed an alliance with. This came with a small deployment of Gummi Ships from Disney Castle to act as Traverse Town's defense against attacks from space. That also meant that the dedicated defenders within Traverse Town, led by Squall "Leon" Leonhart and his group, could focus on the elimination of Heartless within Second District - and hopefully Third District at a later time - with more impunity. Overall, Traverse Town was probably the most secured World besides Disney Castle itself. An attack here would likely be ill-advised.
All the more strange then when the Empire launched its attack. An assault against a world this close to Disney Castle? Clearly the Empire seemed to be looking for a quick and decisive victory. Up in space, the deployment from Disney Castle quickly found itself under fire from Imperial Gummi Ships, while down below the exit doors in First District burst open, followed by Imperial ground forces pouring into town. They were a mixed bag, half of them seemed to be humans in the armored uniform of the Empire, their faces partially concealed by the visors of their helmets. The other half was a type of enemy that had never been seen until now. Small, skinny creatures grey and white in color that slinked about in an inhuman way. The human soldiers had to enter through the gates, but the grey creatures seemed to appear out of thin air. They seemed reminiscent of Heartless, but bore no Heart-emblem and were clearly not attacking for Hearts. Heartless attacked randomly and in packs, whereas these grey creatures were clearly following someone's orders.
The human soldiers concentrated on First District, while the grey creatures were appearing throughout Second and Third Districts. Also within Third District, a humanoid figure in a black hood appeared out of a dark portal. There was no doubt what this person was. He was one of the infamous Imperators, 12 hooded humanoids who served as the field commanders for the Empire's forces. It looked like the Imperator was the one commanding the grey creatures. Meanwhile in First District, another officer of the Imperial forces seemed to be leading the human soldiers. Like the others, he too wore a dark uniform, but his helmet completely covered his face and head. Furthermore, both the masked officer and the Imperator appeared to be carrying no visible weapons. If attacked, however, each would summon a weapon from thin air to fight with. The masked officer would wield a sword with a curved blade while the Imperator seemed to prefer a blue oblong shield with a sharp pointed end. To top all this off, the masked man fought with a discipline disturbingly similar to the warriors of the fallen world of Aumi.
~Marchen, Land of Fable~
Marchen only recently discovered Heartless for the first time. Unfortunately, its people weren't given long to learn more about them before another threat grabbed everyone's attention. Early one morning, the grey skies began to darken with the appearance of flying vessels. This sort of thing had never been seen in a world like Land of Fable before. The world itself was also a fair distance away from Disney Castle, so it had not made any contact with other worlds yet until now and it seemed the Empire was the first to arrive. It didn't attack immediately. Instead the ships were poised above key cities and castles. Places they could open fire on for a brutally efficient first strike. For now, though, it looked like only a threat. In truth, the Empire was preparing to send messengers into the castles and cities offer a chance of surrender before any attack had to be launched. The smaller towns and villages were not so fortunate.
Instead of flying ships, thin grey creatures appeared seemingly out of thin air and began their attack. It was a controlled assault, however, meant only to herd people into groups and prevent any from scattering into the wilderness. These grey creatures were not like the little black ones at all, as they clearly seemed to be following orders and commands. In fact, the one giving the orders could be found in one particular village, the home of young mage Mira. The figure, appearing to be a human masked by a black hood, looked somewhat short in stature, possibly indicating them to be in a similar age group to Mira herself. Either way, the grey creatures were following this person's command. Their identity was still unknown to the village, but they did seem to be a mage of sorts what with the large book the figure held and apparent dark spells they were casting.
~Dawn Island~
It was early morning, Dawn to be exact. A very apt time of day for a place like Dawn Island. Over the past week, the island's Royal Family had been visited by a diplomat from a whole other world known as Disney Castle. Dawn Island had not yet been targeted by the Empire, and the visiting Emissary hoped to convince the Royal Family to ally Dawn Island with Disney Castle so a proper defense could be set up against the Empire's starfleet. Dawn Island wasn't completely defenseless at this time, as the Consular Ship from Disney Castle had been escorted by a pair of Gummi Battleships that now orbited the world in a patrol, vigilantly staying on the lookout for any signs of the Imperial Fleet.
Negotiations were beginning to wrap up when the alert signal was sent to the currently grounded Consular Ship. A fleet of Imperial vessels were incoming and would be in attack range within the hour. Unknown to the Alliance Ships, a ground invasion had already begun. Thin, grey creatures seemed to appear from out of thin air all over the island. They weren't like the Heartless, as they attacked strategically and clearly under someone's orders. Dawn Island's own military mobilized to deal with them, but the grey creatures were not alone. The hooded figure commanding them had also made their presence known, emerging from out of a dark portal that opened up right outside the government building where the negotiations were taking place. When attacked, the figure fought back by conjuring up a large scythe with which they fended off attackers with sweeping blows that seemed to conjure up blasts of wind and cherry blossoms. They were one of the Empire's infamous Imperators. And though there was no human ground forces appearing yet, there could well be some on the way as soon as the Imperial Fleet properly arrived.
@NobodiesHero@RyuShura@Renny@DangDude@Savo
