Welcome to Gaia! ::

The teleport spell sends ripples through Mortimer's magic defenses. The rat turns to see the boy in the doorway. Mortimer arches one eyebrow aristocratically, astounding in itself due to the fact that mice aren't supposed to have eyebrows, and waves the small heartless vaguely in the child's direction. "So you are the one who controls this runt of a heartless." He tosses Aku towards the boy disdainfully. "Why are you here? Why were you with the Keyblade wielder? What has Merlin told them?" Each question is delivered calmy, Mortimer punctuates each with another step towards the boy. "How did you acquire this heartless? What have they done to Limos?"

Mortimer rubs the bridge of his prominent nose pensively and mutters to himself. "This is why I hate children." Turning back to the boy he steeples his fingers and leans down to be closer to his level. "Now then, the only problem I have at the moment is that quite a few people have recently come into my domain. And I don't know who any of them are. If you can't tell me about them I suppose I need to find someone who can."

Mortimer smiles at the boy's attack and summons forth his shield-crest. The giant heartless crest bursting into life to deflect the magical energy. He send out his thoughts to the cocoon room, now housing only two of the four cocoons.

Awaken. I have need of you. Within the coccon two yellow eyes snap open and shine through the thick black carapace. The coccon explodes as wriggling tentacles force their way out.

I live to serve.

Back up in the Throne room Mortimer waves away the heartless and faces the boy. "You have no idea who it is with which you meddle. I could crush you in an instant. However, this seems an excellent opportunity to test out one of my newest creations." A shadow portal opens behind Mortimer. It coalesces into a figure, human torso, snake tail, four tentacles with gaping jaws, and the two glowing yellow eyes. All of it is indistinct behind a buzzing cloud of tiny insects. Mortimer cackles and disappears through his own portal before the room is sealed by the magical safeguards.

Nergal counters the fireball with a ball of acid. Canceling them both out in midair. He then reutrns fire with a blast of poisonous mist. The insects swirl around him in anticipation of the kill. Making a buzzing sound similar to a chainsaw grating on bone. Earthbound insects scuttle towards the bow on the flagstones, waving their tiny pincers and jabbing stingers.

"Oh, very well," Merlin leaned back pleasantly and waved his hands at the tea set. It immediately jumped up and started to float around. The sugar bowl whizzed toward Okashi, who hadn't really been paying attention to the recent goings-on since he already knew magic and had no reason to be drinking tea. It began to sprinkle down on him, giving his frosting-hair a dandruffy appearance.

The cookie looked up irritably and shot a small burst of cold air at it, blowing it away.

"Haha! Well, that was certainly a surprise, wasn't it? Maybe you should all try some target practice with these." Merlin pointed up at the dancing teastuffs.

"Were you planning to do that all along?" Okashi wondered, glaring at him.

"Just a joke, boy! You were being so quiet. A little spontaneity never hurts!"

Namine furrowed her brow, wondering how to go about casting magic. She knew from Castle Oblivion that Sora used his Keyblade to cast magic, but it wasn't like she was a Keyblade wielder so that was out of the question. She fiddled with her box of colored pencils, trying to figure out a solution when it dawned on her. She looked at the box and slid out a blue pencil and a yellow one. She'd been given Blizzard and Thunder magic so she figured that if she used a conductor of the same color that she should be able to cast the spell. She twirled the yellow pencil between her fingers and then pointed it at a saucer. "Thunder!" she said and to her delight the saucer bore the mark of a lightning strike but surprisingly didn't break.

Namine glanced up at Okashi and smiled broadly. "Thanks!" she said. Looking back at the saucer that she had marked, Namine felt a swell of pride. Although she was called a witch and could redraw memories, she had never thought that she would have the aptitude for actual magic. She decided to back off of the magic for a moment, even if she was itching to try out Blizzard, in case Zumi or Kairi wanted some target practice. She didn't think they would, because if it came down to it they could always just whack away at the enemy with their weapons. Namine didn't have that luxury.