His hearth kept on beating in his chest, drowning out the noise of the street around them, all the cars and other stuff just was ignored, all consumed by the ever faster beating of his heart, and the haunting thought that he didn’t want to become a reality. He assumed that some of the other drivers were already calling him a madman, but he didn’t care, this was far more important than trivial stuff like traffic laws. Thanks to his bike he was driving through the smallest and narrowest cross between cars, much to the horror and fear of the other drivers, but he didn’t care, far from it, he felt like he could go so much faster.
After passing through between a truck and another car he finally let his bike take the turn, the rubber of his wheels screeching on the asphalt as he did so. In the distance, he could hear faint hooting from angered civilians, but fuck if he cared right now. He could take Ocean’s scolding later, but right now he just didn’t bloody care.
Then he finally saw it, his goal. The Magnum Opus, strangely dark for this time of day, something that let the tight feeling in his chest only grow stronger, a silent curse escaping his lips as he hit the breaks so hard that people a few hundred meters away turned around to see who had made that noise. Without a second thought, he jumped from his bike, pushing away several people who had stopped and stared at the new arrival, several of them landing rather unceremoniously on their buts. But instead of pushing open the door he instead slammed against the glass with a loud groan. Staggering back and holding his head he took one look at the door and dashed forward again trying to push the uncooperative piece of glass and wood open, with no success. Then it hit him, the key, he had a key.
In his frantic scramble for the precious item, he pushed his hand into his pocket, clasping the key firmly, only for it ultimately fall out of his hands and onto the ground where it bounced of towards the next gutter. His face twisting from worried to ultimate horror jumped after the little metal thing. With every little bounce, the thing did he grew more and more desperate, his hands reaching closer and closer to the key until finally… he caught it, his fingers firmly clasped around it, just above the gutter, one second later and he would have lost the thing to the depths of the sewers. A stone fell from his chest, a sigh of relief escaped him as he slowly managed to stand up again, a quick look at the key and with a determined expression he returned to the door. His had still shaking he tried to force the key inside, but it just refuses, always slipping away at the last possible second, much to his frustration. With a silent curse, the key finally slipped into its hole and with a silent click the door opened and was promptly forced open, Phoenix rushing through the empty room. The chairs were still on top of the tables, no sign of anyone even moving a single one of them, this just made him more nervous.
Bursting through the kitchen door he passed the still empty kitchen, not a single kife or ingredient had been moved, it looked exactly how the restaurant looked like when it was closed, this did not bode well. Brushing several pots they came crashing down behind him, Phoenix almost slipping as he turned around, startled by the sudden sound, but shortly after noticing the still retelling pots on the ground he cursed again, and proceeded to rush up the stairs. Every step he made echoed through the room above him, the wooden stairs making weak sounds under him and with a last sprint, he finally came into the living room. Empty, dark and no one in sight. The fear and dread that had clumped up in his through grew to new levels.
No time left to waste he rushed through the room, jumping over the couch, not wanting to run around it he landed right next to the door to Thunders room. The door stood in front of him, looming, imposing, the same door he never had batted an eye at before. Behind this door was the answer to the question that had haunted him the entire way here. His had seemed to be frozen in place, unable to reach for the handle of the door, the lump in his through growing and growing to an unimaginable size, making it hard for him to breath. He didn’t even hear his own breath anymore, his hearth overshadowing everything else in the room. Maybe if he just stood here, nothing would happen? Wasn’t that how this that thing with the cat worked, if you don’t know it’s at the same time true and untrue?
No! No, he couldn’t let thoughts like this cloud his judgment, if it was really true and he wasted any more time who knows what might happen to Thunder, he couldn't live in a delusional after all. With a final breath of air, he slowly opened the door, the piece of wood carefully sliding open, casting the daylight into the dark room before him. At first, he couldn’t see a thing, his eyes not yet used to the dark, but as they slowly adjusted he could see Thunder’s bed in complete disarray. He would never leave it willingly like that, even if no one would ever see it he felt embarrassed if one saw any sign of tardiness. The room was cramped, multiple cabinets lined the wall, as well as a table and a chair, but no Thunder. That was until he heard it, a weak, quiet cough.
His blood froze in his veins, it couldn’t be, right? No, no thinking like this! He had to press on, or else… Setting one foot in front of the other he stepped around the bed and on the ground next to it he could see his nightmare become a gruesome reality, Thunder, limply on the ground, unmoving. That was untiled a small cough escaped his through, the body moving a little bit, only to return to complete and utter stillness, minus the slight movement of breathing. His shock was quickly overtaken by anger, anger that was burning away in him, taking every thought besides the ones about Chrysopoeia. His laugh, he didn’t want anything else than to beat his face in, over and over. There was no way he wouldn’t do that, whoever did something like this to his family had to suffer.
He had almost forgotten Thunder who was still laying on the ground as he shared another one of his coughs, snapping him out of his anger-induced fantasy. In an instant the anger subsided, now replaced by worry and panic. He pulled out his phone, almost dropping it as he scrambled to dill in the right number, only to catch it right before it hit the ground. His hands were shaking as he finally managed to top in the number and put the phone to his ear. “Hello, here is Phoenix Feather, my brother has been infected with this strange new disease! I need help, now!”
>-------<A>-------<
No one dared to say anything, Ocean just sitting next to him, staring at her own hands, playing with one of her Chargers. Pinecone was meanwhile walking the hallway up and down, the anger and fury in his face telling both of them enough to not even attempt to calm him down, he just couldn’t be reasoned with. They only heard the angry and frustrated grunts of the man as he walked past them time and time again. It had taken half an hour till the ambulance had finally arrived, Phoenix even debating if taking him to the hospital with his bike or powers wouldn’t be far faster, but he couldn’t risk to hurt him, not in such a weakened state. Ten minutes alter Ocean arrived and with her Shining Armor. His girlfriend had been on a school trip on the last few weeks of the school year, and so he had been all on his own in his apartment. She had ordered him to look on his own while they were busy with their stuff, but that all had led to him becoming a victim of the horrific disease.
Ocean looked worried, and he could hardly possible imagine for himself how it felt to lose yet another friend, or at least how it felt that something like this had gotten extremely possible now. She had accepted his huge, and wasn’t able to let go for more than a minute, only when they heard an angry voice call out for the doctors did their embrace end, a voice that sounded extremely familiar. Pinecone had burst into the door, carrying his sister in his arms, she was barely clinging on to conciseness, her eyes half closed and she was coughing weakly. His loud voice echoed through the hallway, demanding that someone get him a doctor, something the hospital staff quickly fulfilled.
And five minutes later the last of the patients was rolled in, Summer. She had been found in her apartment, in the same condition as all of their other friends. She had only been found thanks to Phoenix telling the hospital staff that maybe she was also infected since she had made no attempt to enter the restaurant.
Now they had been waiting for almost an hour, and no one had said a thing to them. They wanted to get out there and hunt the bastard who did this, but their thoughts were by their loved ones, their friends and family. They couldn’t just go without knowing how they were doing, right?
Then, after Pinecone had passed them for at least the hundred times the doors finally opened again, all three of them jumped either up from their seed or turned around on the spot and stormed towards the doctor, who just stumbled back a few steps, trying to avoid being crushed by the three. “Ok, how are thy doc?” Phoenix was the first to ask, his voice was drenched in uncertainty and worry, his eyes mirrored this perfectly, they were a weird mix of worry and begging. “Are they ok?”
“Yes, how are they?” Ocean added, sounding just like he did. All while Pinecone stared at the man, with a look like he wanted to eat him, quite frankly, it was scaring the doctor quite a bit.
He stared back at them with a confused and frightened expression for a few moments before his mind managed to guide him back to reality. He shook his head, adjusted his glasses and looked down on the clipboard in his hand. “Well, they are currently stable,” a sigh of relive went through all three of them interrupting the doctor who looked at them for a moment and waited for the noise to die down before resuming. “Yes, they are stable, but they are in quite the bad condition. Until now we have always received large groups of people all at once, and most of the time not longer than one two hours after the infraction. But this, they were all alone at home without anyone to notice. They weren’t stabilized soon, and in all honesty, they are probably far worse off than everyone else here.” His voice sounded grim, staring at his clipboard, unable to look even one of them into the eyes.
“I’m sorry, but we don’t know how long they are going to hold of, they have until now the most severe cases of the disease we have encountered. And we are only barely able to keep everyone else from getting significantly worse, and they were stabilized hours ago.” Silence went through the group, their quick relive had turned into something far worse. They had again been cast into the dark unknown and worst of all, their friends were in really bad shape.
“Understood,” Ocean almost whispered, her eyes were dead, staring at the ground in front of her, her voice hollow and defeated.
That was when Phoenix grabbed her hand, she nearly jumped up and stared him in the eyes. “Don’t do that!”
She looked at him with a puzzled look. “What?”
“Don’t give up just yet. I know you don’t want to. Where is the Ocean who still hasn't given up on Ivory after all this time?” Phoenix returned, a tear forming in one of his eyes, but his voice remained firm.
Ocean stared at him for a moment before her expression changed again, first to surprise then to determination. “Yes, you are right. I can’t stop now, not while they are still breathing. I’m not giving up, forget that!” She said, her voice growing more confident and determined with every word she spoke.
“That’s more like it. In all honesty, I couldn’t do it without you, your determination and unwillingness to give up really keeps one motivated. Without that I would probably lose myself in damn thoughts about how bad all of this is,” he chuckled weakly before swiftly adding. “Anyway, let’s not dwell on that. So what is the plan?”
“Well, there is only one thing we can do, right? Find that Corrupted and hope that beating him shuts off the magic, or at least we can do it with the artifact,” she said, already deciding who would look through what part of the city.
“Ok, got it,” he returned. Meanwhile, Pinecone had just stared at the doctor in front of him, seemingly not even listening. When Phoenix placed his hand on his shoulder, he nearly jumped out of his skin, turning around and looking at Phoenix in shock. He pulled his hand back and put them up before his body defensively. “Whoa, relax there. I just wanted to ask how about you? Are you coming or do you need some time to-“
He didn’t get any further as Pinecone interrupted him, pushing him to the side and walking past Pheonix. “Of course I’m coming, what else?” he was already a few steps ahead of them when Pheonix looked over to Ocean with a confused look on his face. She just smiled and shook her head before rushing after him, Phoenix looking after her for a moment before shaking his head as well and following foot.
The doctor had remained there, staring after the three of them rather confused. Not that he didn’t knew who they were, just, he hadn't expected them to be this… this weird. They had just learned that their friends and family was infected with a disease that could do Gaia-knows-what and they just shrugged it off with a little speech like this? He just couldn’t grasp it, but they were heroes, after all, this kind of people really made much sense, right? His thoughts were quickly interrupted as a nurse called for him, the man quickly following her demands, silently hoping that they actually knew what they were doing.
>-------<A>-------<
Ocean had mobilized everything single officer she had gotten her hands on, no matter how much some of them bitched and complained about taking orders from her, she didn’t care, and it was about saving lives, so they quickly shut up and followed orders, much to her relief. She really had no patience to deal with this right now, she just wanted to get back on the streets as soon as possible.
The hours went by like nothing and at the same time, every wasted second felt like hours, the time slowly running through their hands like sand in an hourglass, every passing second bringing them closer to their failure. It was always there, every moment, the thought that they were already too late to do anything, to save anyone, but they couldn’t just stop here, they had to at least try because what else were they supposed to do? Kouwer in the fetal position and wait till everything was over? Tartarus no! If that was what Shadow Gold expected of them, he was sorely mistaken, and they were sure to show him just that.
With the sunset slowly overtaking the city the hope of finding the Corrupted just grew slimmer and slimmer, but no one in the search was willing to stop now, there was just too much at stake here. The police station had gotten an influx of reports of suspicious activity throughout the whole city as well as reports of new victims. The lines were almost always full, the populace was giving it their all to find the Corrupted as well, probably because they could be the next victim. But no matter the reason behind it, it was strangely calming that the entire city was working together like this. If Shadow Gold tried to weaken their resolves he had failed miserably, they were only stronger than before.
Then, when the night had firmly taken ahold of Canterlot City the on important call finally came. Reports of a Corrupted in “Whitetail Park”. This was it, the call they had been waiting for, at least that was what they hoped. Not wasting any time Ocean immediately gave Phoenix the coordinates, being the closest Rider to the area.
With that he spread across the city, his adrenaline boiling up inside of him, heart beating, sweat dripping from his face, but most of all, determination, pure determination. He would stop the guy, and with it, he would save all of them, no matter how hard he had to fight and who would stay in his way.
The sound of screams and civilians that were running for their dear lives was enough of a sign that he was on the right track. With a swift turn, he rode into the park, the trees were waving in the wind like nothing was happening, that was until he reached an area with trees that were missing all their leaves, the trees looking barren and lifeless. Then he saw him, the Corrupted with its strange hat and trenchcoat. In his hands were two civilians, both of them coughing like there was no tomorrow and as the Corrupted heard the loud roaring of the engine, he wasted no time, staring at Phoenix with his two glowing red eyes.
The Rider let his bike come to a stop several meters before the Corrupted, who disinterestedly threw his two victims to the wayside like they were weet sacks of potatoes, much to Phoenix’s disapproval. “So, there you are you bastard. Normally I would offer you an out, but I doubt you would take it. But if you don’t want this to turn violent, why not give up, will you?” While he spoke, he jumped off his bike, eyes on the two civilians that had been thrown to the wayside, several others apparently having returned and were caring them off, not that the Corrupted cared at all about this. He just looked at him, tilting his head, almost like he was waiting for something. During the entire time, Pheonix had grabbed into his pockets, grasping his transformation devices firmly with both hands.
Then the unbearable tension was released in a single instant, the Corrupted pulled up his arms, pointing his and at Phoenix and not a moment later several features flew towards him, some of them scratching his bike while others just were impaled in the ground and several treas around him, the Rider dodging the attack at the last second. While doing so he slapped his Driver on his waist, the device looping around it and put the Philosopher Stone in it as well, there was no time to be wasted after all.
\ PHILOSOPHER STONE DETECTED! /
“Henshin!”
\ HEUREKA! /
The Corrupted, however, did not give up this easily and let another barrage loose on him. The feathers were eviscerated by the magical vortex around him, however, and out of its depths, he jumped forward, speeding towards him, dodging every little thing he could throw at him, the feathers landing behind him harmlessly. With a swift punch to the face, he threw the Corrupted of its feet, expecting to quickly pummel him into submission, but fate had other plans for this little monster.
In an instant he turned in the air, staring at Alchemy, he could swear he could see a twisted smile on his beak, even if it should be impossible. The Corrupted stretched his arms out towards him, as suddenly green mist escaped from the, rocketing towards the Rider. Alchemy’s eyes widened the moment he saw this, in an instead he jumped out of the way of the disgusting looking mist as it consumed the part of the park he had just been standing in.
The Corrupted landed on his feet with surprising amount of grace and then quickly bowed to him, seemingly mocking the Rider. As he returned to a standing position, he coked his head to the side before dashing towards him, his claws steaming with the strange mist. Just as Alchemy dodged the first attack by jumping backward he caught quick glims at the affected area of the park he had just stood at moments before, it was dead. The grass, the flowers, and even the small animals in it had died, lifeless and black. Whatever this thing was it was deadly, and he would not find out if his armor would even protect him from it.
The the second attack hit, its claws almost scratching his arm, only stopped by Alchemy landing forward, grabbing his arm and using its own strength against it by pulling him in the same direction he had tried to go anyway, just with the new force behind it he landed with his back against one of the park trees. The tree quickly turning brown and lifeless, the claws of the Corrupted having impaled itself in it and within seconds the leaves of it were falling down upon him. Alchemy took a step back, this really was nothing good, at all.
The Corrupted meanwhile had stood back up again, seemingly unimpressed by Alchemy’S previous attempt to harm him. It’s arms hanging limply from his body as he slowly staggered towards the Rider, not because he needed to, but because he wanted to. Then his head shoots upwards, the Corrupted jumping into the air, his claws extended and he lunged at Alchemy. The attack came so suddenly that e had barely any time to evade it, but just barely he managed to, by dodging under it, the claws scratching across his antenna, leaving behind several sparks that had taken on a green tint.
But now he was facing away from the Corrupted. Something the monster was oh so keen on abusing, trying to stab his claws into his back, thankfully Alchemy turned around quickly enough, grabbing the Claws of the Corrupted with both his hands. Then it happened, he could see the feathers shooting out towards him from the back of the hands of the Corrupted, the green miasma emerging from them, but he was unable to react fast enough to do anything about it. Then he felt it, small little hist, like someone had hit him with miniature sledgehammers, the force was so strong that it knocked him back a few steppes, even if he managed to stay on his feet. His chest arched, he could already imagine the bruises on it as he tried to regain his balance, still stumbling backward, the pain making it extra hard to do that.
Thankfully, the feathers were not able to pierce the armor, so no possessed gas that could hurt him there, at least that was what he hoped. But if one of the claws of the Corrupted managed to score a hit, he doubted that he would be so lucky and if that was the case, then things would probably take a turn for the worst.
The Corrupted looked at Alchemy for a second, seemingly in disbelieve that this had worked out at all, but this was quickly pushed to the side as he lunged forward, trying to claw away at him again. It let out a bloodcurdling screech that almost let him forget that he had to dodge the attack or be turned into goodness knows what, almost. In the last second his brain finally managed to shut out the agonizing screech at least so much that he could dodge out of the way and send the Corrupted flying with a follow-up kick to the back.
The Corrupted landed on his feet, more or less, it just plunged its claws into the ground and used those to come to a stop again before glaring at him with its two glowing eyes. Alchemy just stared at him, a cold shiver running down his spine. This was taking far too long, and if he was unlucky maybe Chrysopoeia and Alkahest would show up again, no he had to end this faster, and he knew exactly how he would pull this off. He removed his Disc from his Driver and let it erupt in a blinding light all while his opponent rushed towards him again.
\ Philosopher Stone Attack Mode! /
\ Magnum Opus! /
The Corrupted was just mere centimeters away from his face, then he suddenly felt the pain in the side of his face as Alchemy swung his weapon, knocking him into a fountain that collapsed on top of him. Alchemy swung round his weapon again, pushing the red and blue gem on it.
\ WATER! /
\ WIND! /
In an instant the entire area around them was covered in ice, grass freezing over, flowers turning into popsicles and most important the Corrupted who just shoot out from the rubble and water he had found himself in was turned into an ice statue. His eyes glaring at the Rider in absolute contemplated, all while Alchemy didn’t even flinch, dashing forward and pressing a single gem on the weapon.
\ THUNDER! /
The weapon sparked with blue bolts of lightning, and as the Rider stabbed the spear into the Corrupted he could see how the entirety of its energy was discharged into his opponent, the ice shattering around him together with the whole fountain, the scream of the creature could be heard several blocks away.
But against all expectations, the Corrupted had remained to stand. His entire body was chared, small sparks of electricity were still sparking off of him, one of his eyes had a crack in it, and he was steaming. Still, he remained standing, glaring at him with his broken eye. It took one step forward, he looked like he would almost fall over the moment his foot left the ground. He did another steep, the same reaction. The Corrupted was slowly walking closer and closer towards him, shaking and staggering with every step, low growls escaping his beak as he kept glaring at Alchemy.
Alchemy just stared back at him, his blue eyes seemingly glaring through his body and right into his soul, it was frightening. Like he could see who he really was, what he feared, what he desired, his every weakness. It almost made him stop dead in his tracks and actually give up, but the anger won out in the end, the unbridled rage that he had for him, for all of them. They had taken everything from him, his family, his friends, his home, now it was payback time.
“So, I think this is where I draw the line. If I don’t stop you, all these people won’t be able to keep moving forward towards their bright future, and I can’t let that happen.” Alchemy just ignored his pathetic advances, however, simply pulling the Disc from the weapon and put it back into the Driver spinning it without even looking at it. “Birdnose, you used the powers that were bestowed upon you to attack others and infect them with a disease that could easily kill them. By the magic that was bestowed upon me, I deem you unworthy of your powers and will now take them from you!”
\ Philosopher Stone Maximum Power! /
With that, the Rider jumped into the air, the energy gathering in his leg and the wings extending from his back. With the golden lines forming around his leg he rocketed towards the Corrupted and when the whirlwind of light had formed just let him explode in a massive fireball, the beaten and battered man falling to the ground behind him. His skin had a sickly green tint to it, something that made him look even more unsettling with his skinny body, greasy black hair, and ragged clothes. The claw of a raven attached to a string laid next to him, Alchemy quickly rushing over to it and picking up the artifact. This was it, the thing that had caused this whole ordeal in the first place. He could feel the sickly energy surging through him, with a somber expression under his helmet he held the thing high. Seconds later green miasma was being sucked into it from all over the city. After a good minute, he finally felt that there was nothing left of it all, putting the claw down and stared at it, tempted to just absorb it and make sure no one would ever be able to use it.
Then he heard it, clapping. In an instant he shot around staring at Chrysopoeia, Alkahest, and Checkbook, just staring at him while Chrysopoeia was clapping. “Truly, a quite impressive display you showed us here,” he said, a surprising amount of smugness in his voice.
“Oh, you,” Alchemy growled before a smirk appeared under his helmet. “What are you clapping, I won, your Corrupted has been beaten, and the disease had been beaten. You lost, so why so smug?”
The moment later he knew he had made a terrible mistake, he didn’t knew why, but he just knew. “I hoped you would have asked this. Well, sure you healed the important idiots of the city, and I’m sure they will be grateful for this, but you missed one important part,” he chuckled, every word unnerving Alchemy only further.
“What do you mean?” he returned, trying to hide his uncertainty, something Chrysopoeia seemingly caught onto immediately.
“Simple, did you call the hospital already? I wonder if your friends are as happy as you are right now, or if they-“ That was as far as he got as alchemy dashed forward, pressed him to the ground and started screaming his lungs out.
“What have you done! What have you done!” The scream of pure rage and anger echoed through the park, much to Checkbooks amusement who started to chuckle, Alkahest however just ignored him like he wasn’t even there.
Chrysopoeia was just laughing, not even phased by Alchemy sitting on top of him, screaming his lungs out. As the Rider tried to shut him up with a punch he just grabbed the fist and held it there, then all of a sudden stopped laughing. “You really thought I would let this idiot infect your friends and not protect him? What do you think I am, an idiot? No, no, no, that idiot there was never the true culprit, at least when your friends are concerned. That would be me. You would be surprised what you can do with a Philosopher Stone and my knowledge about magic,” he returned with an ice-cold voice. Alchemy’s arm, who had tried to break Chrysopoeia’s hold just went limp. “Oh, you do get it. There is no way to save them, at least not for you. The only one who could is me and believe me, I won’t help you!”
Alchemy just stared at him, his entire body starting to shake uncontrollably. He almost whispered: “Why? Why do you do this? What did I ever do to you?” Phoenix sounded broke, weak and unable to muster up enough determination to just punch this bastard out.
“You? You never did anything to me besides being a thorn in my sights. No, your sins lay far back, so far that you weren’t even born yet, no so far that no one you knew was born yet. You can thank Fools Gold for all of this, he was the one to betray me. Heis responsible for your suffering, so if you want to complain to anyone, he is the right one,” Chrysopoeia growled, anger slowly boiling with every word he spoke. “You think he some hero in shining armor who died to fulfill his lifelong dream? Right?”
“What do I care about this! This has nothing to do with me. I’m glad that he left me the Driver behind and I don’t want to repeat his mistakes, but besides that, I don’t care about him!” Alchemy tried to reason with him, his arm still hanging limply from his body.
“Oh, but it has to do with you. The idiot managed to kill himself and denied me my well-deserved revenge. He took everything from me, and I intend in getting him back for that, or at least what he left behind you! That is what I’m after, all because your ancestor was a madman who thought he could overthrow the princess!” Chrysopoeia barked back, vitriol and hatred in his voice. Phoenix remained silent, he just didn’t know how to respond to this. “Oh, stunned? Didn’t they tell you that I wanted to do that? Liers, all of them. They wanted to look better, that is all. What point is in a legacy where you were the bad guy? Nothing that is what! We searched for the true, whole magic our whole life, my brother and me, the Philosopher Stone. When we found the ruins of this civilization, we thought we finally had it, and we did. I took care of the study of magic, and he was the engineer. But after we had created vessels for the magic, he showed his true colors. My wife had grown ill, and there was no medicine in the known world to cure her, so I had to use the Philosopher Stone.”
Chrysopoeia stopped for a moment, Phoenix could hear something like a desperate whimper before he continued his tail. “He, however, had other plans. He wanted to take over the world, make it his and after that maybe save my wife. I couldn’t let that happen, so I sold him out, hoping that that may be the princess could help me. But in the end, Fool escaped to this world, taking everything we had made, with no time left and my illiteracy in magic-tech I could not complete the stone before my wife died. On this day I swore that I would find him and make sure he suffered as much as I did, but the bastard killed himself because he never knew about the last element that magic consists of, friendship. The element that keeps everything bonded together, without it you will never create something new from the other parts. But eventually I managed to transfer my mind into my body and create a curse that would let me control everyone who wore the necklace, and I came to this world. Now I’m here to finish what I started over six hundred years ago!”
Phoenix just stared through his helmet right at him, unable to process what he had been told right now. But before he could think any more about it, he heard a loud bang. Moments later he could see Chrysopoeia being launched off of him and towards his two comrades who looked shocked towards the origin of the shoot. Charge had her gun pointed at the three, all while Monster was standing next to her, his claws ready to rip apart everyone that got in his way. “Don’t let him get to your head Phoenix, he is still a monster that has to be stopped, nothing changed there!” She shouted, pointing her gun at Checkbook, who had made an attempted to take a step forward, something he stopped the instant he saw Charge pointing the rifle directly at him.
Phoenix nodded, and slowly stood up again, Chrysopoeia did the same, glaring at them through his red bug-eyes. Then everything went extremely fast, Chrysopoeia dashed forward, directly towards Alchemy, while Charge tried to shoot down Checkbook who was attacking her and Monster had lunged at Alkahest with a loud roar.
Alkahest was the first to feel the attack of his own opponent. The Dark Rider was still equipped in his Friendship Mode, and while he tried his best to brace himself for Monster’s lung, his weapon did not stop him from being thrown off his feet. Monster was indeed unrelenting, his speed outpacing the other Rider by a good amount, his claws slashing across his body, Alkahest unable to do anything about it. Still, he did not give up. With every moment he had he tried to evade and counterattack, not that this was graced with any form of success. Even when he managed to get a hit in on Monster, the Rider just shrugged it off, and let his claws continue to dance around his opponent's body.
While Monster was living out his frustrations from his last battle with Alkahest Charge was busy dealing with Checkbook, the old Bussiness partner of her mother. The Corrupted let his metal claws slash past her as she jumped out of the way, her gun firing off several shots at him. While Checkbook let out a pained groan as the projectiles hit him, he didn’t seem to facet by all of this.
“Ah, so we meet again. Wanted to catch up on the death of your mother? Wanted to offer me your services like she did?” She heard Checkbook mock her, a glee in his tone that really pissed her off something fierce.
“Shut up! I’m not falling for this!” She shouted back, letting her gun unload on the Corrupted who merely jumped out of the way, his wings weakly flapping in the air. The suddenly Checkbook turned midair and rocketed towards Charge, who used her own speed to avoid the Corrupted, this however proved to be rather futile. The Corrupted picked up more and more speed and while she probably could do the same and outpace him in a short while this would mean she would have to stop attacking and she sure as Tartarus wouldn’t do that. Out of a sudden, she came to a screeching haul, turning around and standing right before Checkbook. He was already far to fast to stop now and instead readied himself for the impact.
What he had not expected was the impact. The light on Charge’s chest glowed in bright orange as the Corrupted collided with her. She didn’t move an inch, one could basically hear the loud cracking of the metal on Checkbooks body. With a loud groan, he fell to the ground only to be peppered with Charge’s shots.
That was until she heard a loud roar from him, in an instant he shot up in the air, high above her and let loose several of his wing blades that shot towards Charge who dashed out of the way, but a few of them did indeed hit their target. She felt the pain as the sharp edges of the wings slashed across her armor and through it. It hurt like Tartarus, but she just pushed on forward, the engines all over her body springing to live and she shot into the air, heading for her opponent.
Alchemy meanwhile was busy trying to hold his own against Chrysopoeia who was rather angry about the whole ordeal. Apparently, he didn’t appreciate it being interrupted during his monologs, go figure. Both Riders were darting across the place with super speed, trading blows whenever they meet each other. This had gone one for a while now, and Chrysopoeia was gaining ground, for every hit he managed to get in he received at least two in return.
He knew he wouldn’t last that much longer, the fight with the Corrupted had already left him somewhat exhausted, but now he was really hitting his limits. Every sprint just left him more and more out of breath if he couldn't figure out something soon he would lose this. But he couldn’t come up with anything, he had exhausted all of his options, and when he pulled out the weapon, Chrysopoeia would just start to outdo him with his knowledge about magic. There was just nothing else he could d- No, there was one thing he never tried in this mode. A vicious smile appeared on his face as he clashed again with his opponent, getting a kick into the stomach.
But instead of retreating and trying again he rushed forward, trying to strike Chrysopoeia’s foot, and actually succeeded. Well, he managed to grace him but was all he really wanted. After both had raced around the park some more they clashed again, Alchemy hitting the same spot again, not that the Dark Riders really minded, he hadn’t really hurt him there. That was until Alchemy suddenly came to a stop and snapped his fingers. Two seals started to glow on Chrysopoeia’s foot, one red and one light blue. Then it happened, his entire body was consumed by red lightning, agonizing screams echoed through the remains of the park as Chrysopoeia sank to the ground, clutching his chest. “You!” He growled, but Alchemy did not even listen, simply using the time to spin his Magic Disc.
\ Philosopher Stone Maximum Power! /
Chrysopoeia suddenly stopped his silent cursing and realized what was about to happen, with a pained groan he forced himself back up on his feet and did the same thing as Alchemy.
\ Philosopher Stone Maximum Power! /
Now both Riders jumped up in the air, their feet glowing with energy, wings extending from their back, in gold and black respectively. Then they shot towards each other, and the two vortexes of magic collide, trying to push each other back for a few moments before they consumed the park in a massive explosion that forces everyone to the ground.
The two Riders were kneeling in front of each other, both panting heavily, holding their arms respectively. “Enough!” The dark Rider finally shouted, pulling his body back to his feet and ripping the Magic Disc from his Driver.
\ Philosopher Stone Attack Mode! /
\ Magnum Opus! /
With the weapon in hand, he weakly pushed the middle gem on it and awaited the call of the spear.
\ FRIENDSHIP! /
In an instant, all three of them were consumed by magical portals taking them away without even as much as a trace. “Fuck!” Alchemy cursed as he slammed his fist on the ground.
Ocean walked over to him, having already disabled her armor and gave him a slap on the back. “Not that important. We saved the patients, defeated the Corrupted and now we know that Chrysopoeia can be wounded. I would say this is a success.” She said with an encouraging tone, only for Phoenix to shake of her and say in return.
“We didn’t save our friends. The disease they have was created by Chrysopoeia, only he can take it back,” his voice was layered with bitterness and frustration. Ocean just stared at him in complete shock, unable to even say a word. “There is nothing we can do to save them. Only he knows how he pulled it off without the artifact, he would need some-“ All of a sudden he stopped mid-sentence, jumped up with a loud pained groan and ran over to his bike with the best of his abilities.
“Phoenix? Where are you going?” No answer, only the roaring of the engine. “Phoenix?” With that, he took off leaving them behind without any answer whatsoever. Both of his comrades just stared after him, completely confused by what he was trying to accomplish.
>-------<A>-------<
Midnight, a good amount of time had passed since Phoenix had left them in the park and hadn’t shown up again. That was until she finally tracked down a strong magical energy reading at the hospital. She had immediately raced there, finding an exhausted Alchemy standing in the courtyard of the hospital, activating different attacks without any rime or reason.
“What in all that is good are you doing here?” ocean asked as she approached the ruins of the courtyard that had been partially melted frozen in other way been destroyed. “Only because we can’t do anything doesn’t mean you can let out your frustration out on the courtyard.”
\ WATER! /
\ WIND! /
\ FIRE! /
Suddenly a warm steam-tornado formed around him, followed by a loud curse form he boyfriend. “I’m not letting out my frustrations. Something Chrysopoeia said jumped to my mind. He said he had an illness with he wanted to cure with the Philosopher Stone. Together with the fact that he created the illness, maybe I can create a cure with this. Until now without any success, however.”
Ocean’s mouth was hanging wide open, staring in bath element at her boyfriends. “This is genius. No seriously, I would have never thought about that.”
“Thanks,” he returned, quickly dilling in the next combination of magic.
\ WATER! /
\ WIND! /
\ EARTH! /
Instead of a steam-tornado, this time he was covered in a mud-tornado. Instead, some of it even hitting Ocean, much to her dismay. She, however, did not have any time to complain as she saw Phoenix sink to his knees, leaning on his lance, panting heavily.
“Phoenix, are you ok?” Ignoring the muddy ground beneath her, she dashed over to him, her clothes quickly being covered in mud. She tried to help him up again but was quickly shoved to the side, Phoenix pushing in another combination, but she could see how week he already was, all that energy he had wasted finally catching up to him. On the last button push, however, he slipped, pushing the water gem again instead of the friendship gem, quickly realizing he also pushed the right button again.
\ WATER! /
\ WIND! /
\ WATER! /
\ FREINDSHIP! /
A bright green aura consumed all two of them, and she could feel how her wounds suddenly started to close again, he actually had pulled it off. “You did it, you did it!” She screamed, jumping up in the air. While her wounds were closing her energy did not return, she was still as exhausted as she had been ever since the fight had ended. As she rushed forward to give her boyfriend a kiss on the cheek, she saw how the armor faded from his body, and he collapsed onto the ground. “Phoenix! Phoenix!” He could hear her screams from far away, but ultimately they grew more and more distant until everything went black and silent.
>-------<A>-------<
He shot up from his bed in a room he quickly recognized a hospital room. Really this was getting far too common of an occurrence when this happened so often. How did he get her? Then it hit him, the illness. He was about to jump out of bed and rush to his jacket to pull out the Driver as he felt a warm and soft hand on his, Ocean. She had been sleeping next to him on her chair and just shook her head with a warm smile. “Ocean, let me go I have to-“
“No, you don’t I already took care of it. After you passed out in the courtyard, I borrowed your Driver and healed everyone. You did it, you found the cure,” she returned with a smile on her face, small tears forming in her eyes. “I hope this was ok.”
Phoenix just stared at her for a moment before lunging forward and pulling her into his arms with following kiss. Ocean’s eyes opened wide but quickly grew back to normal size, returning the kiss. She felt their lips touche, the warmth, and gentleness, it filled both of them with happiness and bliss. But ultimately Phoenix let go of her, and their lips parted. “I fucking love you,” he muttered, still somewhat dazed by the whole ordeal. Again, Ocean just stared at him and started to laugh. “Oh, fuck. I fucked it up. I ruined the moment, right?” Phoenix had gone pale in an instant, the previous blush replaced with a whitish orange.
“No, you didn’t, this was perfect. While this was not the way I expected you to say it, I couldn’t ask for a more sincere way,” she returned with a slight giggle. “Love you too,” with that she pulled him back into the embrace, and into another kiss.
>-------<A>-------<
Meanwhile, in a warehouse of the MRG in South Marekota, a place where gathered artifacts are stored and studied a scientist of the MRG is on his way to one of the newest artifacts that have been transferred to this side. Bright idea was already giddy to examine these strange rings that had been found a few weeks ago in Neighpone. They were supposedly not of this world, or at least the magic was so different than some thought that. He, however, remained skeptical, probably just a new form of magic, that wasn’t too uncommon, every five years something like that popped up and now seemed exactly the time for something like this.
He passed the last corner before the laboratory he had ordered the rings into, much to his surprise the hallway wasn’t empty, instead one of his colleges was standing in front of the door, impatiently waiting, presumably for him. He had a dark purple skin tone with black hair. “Doctor Pure Blood, what are you doing here?” He sounded already quite annoyed, he wanted to start right away, but now he had to deal with this distraction.
“Oh, I wanted to offer my help director, I’m sure I could be off-“ The man sounded rather snobbish like he thought he was better than Bright, something the doctor had already grown accustomed to. The man was a genius, but far to full of himself.
“No, I already told you that I will make the first testes by myself, there is nothing to discuss about this,” he immediately shut him down, slowly walking past him, pulling out his ID-card, pulling it through the scanner and let it take a scan of his eye.
The door opened with a loud beep as he heard Blood’s voice again as he was about to say something. He turned around with a loud sigh, ready to tell him off, again! But what he instead received was a complete shock to him. All of a sudden Blood rushed forward and stabbed a pencil into his neck, Bright unable to do anything besides grab his punctured neck and try to close the open wound. It didn’t take long till he couldn’t breathe and he sunk to the floor, everything growing hazy. “I was a pleasure working with you, doctor Bright, shame it had to end this way,” Pure Blood coldly returned, not even turning around as he walked into the laboratory, the door closing behind him. The last thing Bright witnessed as his world turned to nothingness was the loud alarm that echoed through the entire site.
Meanwhile, Pure Blood had entered the lab, slowly walking towards the suitcase the rings were being held. He pulled out the ID-card he had grabbed from Doctor Bright and opened the lock on the suitcase, the small metal case opening slowly. His cold face turned into a malicious grin as he saw what was inside, over two dozen rings, some made out of gemstone, some out of metal and six out of stone as well as a small belt buckle in the shape of a black hand with red edges.
“Finally, after so long I have you back,” he chuckled, grabbing inside the suitcase and retrieving the belt buckle and put it on before grabbing a ring with an orange gemstone inside it, covered by a casing in the form of a broken shackle. As he did this he heard footsteps coming closer, he had not much time left. He sipped it on his right hand and held it over the buckle.
<Release! Now!>
The belt buckle spoke out, as a orange light glowed from the buckle. Moments later the inside of the suitcase glowed in the same orange light and the six stone rings flew out of the case and hovered over the ground. Then the room was completely consumed by the light and as it faded six monsters stood around him.
“What is it that you wish master?” one of them asked, all six of them kneeling before him.
“We will take back what is rightfully mine!” He returned, having already switched out the ring on his hand with the silver ring with the hand on it, holding it over the buckle.
<Driver On! Now!>
The buckle quickly grew in size, and a belt appeared around his waist, the hand on top of a silver background. With a flick of two metallic squares on the side, he flipped the hand around night degrees.
<Sha ba do bi Touch Henshin!>
The belt called out, Pure putting on a purple ring onto his other hand and with a swift motion flipped a small little metal visor in the form of a butterfly down onto it. While this was happening, he heard the sounds of someone trying to activate the door and failing. Only seconds, now or never. He put the purple ring over the still shouting belt.
“Henshin!”
<Change! Now!>