Chaos Theory

The Warriors of Blight are four top clones that Xande created: Due to an "oopsie", the Warriors of Light were blown apart, their light scattered across the Minus World while their 'corpses' remained in a state between life and death while they regenerated (due to the Master Emerald-Adjacent energies, ya see), which made their cells ripe for the taking by Xande. While most of Xande's clones are mindless pawns sent to do his dirty work, there are a few "higher quality" clones, those largely being particular clones of Doga and Unei and the Warriors of Blight. Deciding to use Doga and Unei's 'pawns' to his own advantage, he used the five as generals in his bid to regain his immortality and one-up his mentor and collegues by becoming a god and proving... something. Why no, he isn't coping, what do you mean?

Either way, his clones have other plans.

Four of the Warriors have their own regions in one of the Minus World's layers, which is where their operations occur. The regions are populated by far more clones (both of the Warriors of Light and of other people stumbling into the Labyrinth), but the ones based on the Warriors of Light are the ones that wield the most power. Few know of the true purposes and plans of their leaders.

The four also hold four distinct "Fool's Emeralds": Artificial Chaos Emeralds. In particular, Xande created five as a test or proof of concept, which he has given to the Warriors in preparation of creating more refined versions for himself (though he is not above taking back his 'gifts' if needed).

1. BRAVEWARD LAIR

Braveward Lair or the Labyrinth of the Couragous is the first region. It is a sleepy region nestled near the ruins of a fallen kingdom, said to have been ruled by King Lunar. In addition to the sleepy town in front of it, there are the Courageous Caverns that make up the majority of the labyrinth and the Palace of Wind, the former temple and ruling place of the king.

RULER: King Lunar was once an adventurer much like any other. As he conquered dungeons and accured riches, he began to gain followers. His fame was cemented when he became the first adventurer to reach the Palace of Winds: When he returned, his strength and influence were such that he became a Warrior-King and the ruler of the Kingdom of Winds - although in the present day, the 'kingdom' was little more than a sleepy village and the sprawling dungeon beyond it.

Lunar, compared to his colleagues, isn't that far removed from Luneth. Luneth is a rather blunt boy and most of his secret hiding stems from his pride as well as not wanting to seem curious about his past. Lunar, by similar token, is simple, somewhat rude with how brash he is and simply seeks loot and power - That said, the "power" aspect seems to have a motive behind it, perhaps stemming from his treasured traveling companion, a priestess of water... I mean wind...

Lunar wields the Emerald of Strength, granting him even further power and resilience. It is an emerald that is befitting of his nature as a ruler and a Warrior, emboldening his already fierce offense to levels that few could stand up to.

2. TOUGH LOVE IRONWORKS

(In hindsight, Iron Keep wasn't a great choice for a factory-centric area, but ah well. I'll update it if something better comes to mind.)

The Tough Love Ironworks are another region of Layer 33 of the Minus World. Under the firm but fierce hand of the Steel Maiden, Lufia, the Ironworks sets about creating a swath of weapons to be sold elsewhere. Rumors abound that they're making a special order: Nobody knows what exactly, but it uses a new ore and has a quantity in the hundreds...

RULER: Lufia, the Steel Maiden, is the ruler of the Tough Love Ironworks and she is constantly dissatisfied with her work, desiring to live up to "Father Takka's" standards. She is a weaponsmaster capable of wielding any of the wares her refinery puts out. However, she most favors hammers - especially ones that have a dash of holy energy to them - and fist weapons such as knuckles or claws.

There are rumors that she has a sister who ran away to live a quiet life in the Chocobo Woods far from the Ironworks. Needless to say, Lufia isn't keen to confirm or deny those rumors

Lufia represents Refia's complicated relationship with Takka and smithing. Refia is Takka's apprentice, but she doesn't want to be a smith and runs away from home. At the end of the game, Refia decides to give smithing an earnest try, wanting to thank Takka for raising her. The Iron Maiden recontextualizes this greatly, making Takka into into near divine figure, a castle in the sky that Lufia fears she shall never reach. Of course, one could easily argue that she's blinded from the quality of her own work, which seems to be approaching Legendary Smith level...

Lufia wields the Emerald of Vitality, which grants the wielder unlimited vitality. Much like the facility she runs, Lufia can operate day and night with little issue.

3. KINDWISE ACADEMIA

Kindwise Academia is the brains of the layer, filled with students eager to solve the mysterious of Life, The Universe and Everything. They are headed by the Arc-Mage, a mysterious figure whose inner quarters are sealed off from the rest of the academy. On rare occasion, Dragons and airships are said to fly across the skies above the academy.

RULER: The Arc-Mage is curious. Power-hungry. Selfish. Morally bankrupt. He's not necessarily 'evil' so much as willing to do whatever it takes to get the knowledge he seeks. His lab is largely filled with clones that he has experimented on: Organ-swapping, cell-fusing, typical mad scientist behavior. His current goal is to study the energies of the Chaos Emeralds and why some beings seem to take to it more than others. Some could argue that he's barking up the wrong tree and the Emeralds' power comes more from a mindset than physical capabilities, but the Arc-Mage is unwilling to let that possibility go. There's also rumors that he is a necromancer, which would explain his macabre sense of dressing and interests as well as rumors that he associated with the king of dragons Bahamur.

Of the four, the Arc-Mage is the one who communicates with Xande the most. This is due to him being in charge of studying the Chaos Emeralds and their energy and examining the ore found in Caverns of the Courageous before sending it off to the Ironworks.

The Arc-Mage represents Arc's curiosity and the sometimes impractical ends he is willing to go. However, the Arc-Mage not only has more freedom than Arc, he lacks Arc's kindness. While some of Arc's childishness still shines through, it's tempered by other factors. The Arc-Mage also has Arc's ties with Bahamut, as seen in the Memory of Heroes light novel,

The Arc-Mage holds the Emerald of Life: Which gives him the ability to grant life to others - and to take it away. For the experimental mage who toys with life itself, it is a fitting gift.

4. TRUSTBOUND KEEP

Trustbound Keep is the fourth and final region of Layer 33. It is a massive citadel standing alone in a black sea which is under the watchful eye of the Man in Red. It seems strangely disconnected to the rest of the going-ons on the layer, though its inhabitants seem to be aware of something terrible that lurks beneath the midnight waves...

4.5 BLACKBONE MANSE

Deep below the surface lays this macabre locale. Within, Freyr the Warmage makes his preparations; For what exactly, nobody knows. Aside from Freyr, it is hard to qualify anything within the manse's walls as "alive" or even "sentient". The interior is also surreal, being more akin to if somebody built a manor within an empty void.

The Manse only appears towards the climax of the story, sinking Trustbound Keep. It is here that Freyr works on refining the energies of the Chaos and Master Emeralds to do what Dr. Robotnik once attempted: Creating inverted Super Rings that can bring the Emeralds to him. Of course, he needs a more plentiful source of said energies, but he has apparently been looking into creating a Dimensional Ring that can warp an entire location...

RULER: Freyr is an engimatic character. For most of the story, he is strictly business-focused; either working on his objectives or attempting to keep his allies focused on their own. He's not one for words and the heroes rarely see him.

In truth, Freyr holds a personal hatred for his creator, Xande. This is because Freyr inherited some of Ingus' memories - while this isn't new for the other clones, for Freyr, he has latched onto Ingus' vague memories of his hometown: The Dark Knight village of Falgabard. In turn, this has given Freyr a hatred, not only for the one who took Ingus' former life away from him, but for Ingus himself and the person he has grown up to be as a result of his Sasune upbringing.

And so, he seeks to 'correct' Xande's actions by using the Chaos Emeralds to stop him from unleashing the Wrath of Dark, 'fixing' everything aside from the domino effect of changes wrought about due to the effect that Xande had on the world, especially in this AU.

Freyr represents Ingus' shadow: On one hand, he is just as faithful and determined to see his mission through as Ingus usually is. On the other, Freyr rebels against his origin's faith to Sasune, and looks to sever his ties to it in the most permanent fashion. His desire to undo Xande's actions is noble on paper, but the sheer impact of said actions (creating the Realm of the Sky, leading to Dark Matter's turn to good) would cause massive changes. And Freyr seems uncaring that his very existence would cease to be if he accomplishes his goals.

Freyr holds the Chaos Emerald of Immortality, rendering him unkillable. As a Dark Knight who sacrifices his life for the sake of the power to accomplish his objectives, this is a valuable tool.

5. CASTLE OF LIGHT

The Castle of Light is Xande stronghold in the Minus World. He spends most of his time plotting to make the powers of the Minus World his along with making clones of the other interlopers. However, late in the story, he abandons it in favor of a new base: A city he creates with the manpower of his clones to celebrate his soon-to-be ascension and one he wishes to merge with a certain floating city in the main world.

Ruler: The Warrior of Light is hidden for most of the story, only briefly being mentioned by his four heralds. He eventually accompanies Xande to Angel Island. When they get there, however, Onion Blight turns on Xande, revealing that he was simply using the Demon King to reach his true goal: Of eliminating all darkness within the world. His initial attempt was to use the newly revived Ulticannon to 'clean the slate', but the heroes manage to stop it. When Freyr makes his move, Onion Blight chases after him. In the end, the two join forces: Though their goals may be different, they understand that have a better chance working together than not.

My entire basis for Onion Blight is based on a particular scene in Dissidia Opera Omnia, where Onion Knight initially rejects Xande's dimensional coordinates due to the issues he caused back in his home world. In fairness, the first part of Act 3 in general had Onion Knight acting angsty due to the (original) Warrior of Light's sacrifice and due to him being unable to reconcile his memories from the previous Dissidia games with his memories of home I don't think this plot point went anywhere interesting but I'm still bitter so maybe it did I dunno. And so, Onion Blight becomes a "He who fights monsters" situation in that he wishes to eradicate darkness: supposedly to protect the world but really to avenge the suffering that Xande caused. Of course, his methods of doing this range from destroying the world with the Ulticannon to rebooting reality entirely with the Chaos Emeralds and, as history in Final Fantasy III would posit, a world of only light would be far from a good thing...

Onion Blight wields the Emerald Ring, the strongest of the five emeralds and one most keyed to the energy of the actual Chaos Emeralds. If combined with the other four, it could even unlock an awesome power...

(The "Fools Emeralds" that the five have are based on the Chaos Emeralds from "Adventures of Sonic The Hedgehog", albeit with the third emerald's invisibility swapped for vitality: Life already breaks the pattern and the ring was seperate from the set of four anyway).

Storyline

This story takes place in a world that has been split into three realms. First, there is the Realm of Light, a world where darkness is seen as evil and the ‘standard’ world. Then there is the Realm of Dark, a world where the flood of light devastated the planet and Darkness has been embraced. Lastly, there is the Realm of the Sky, created when Xande cut the world off from the sun with a flood of darkness: a realm in which travel across floating continents via airships is casual.

In the past, the third advent of the Warriors of Light led to Xande falling into a portal into the Realm of Dark. However, he instead fell into The Minus World – Betwixt and Between and a common hiding spot for the Chaos Emeralds. Xande would come to study the Chaos Emeralds and eventually came to a realization that Dr. Robotnik previously realized: That the rings and the Chaos Emeralds are connected. Xande would begin experimentation with the rings in hopes of discovering a means of regaining his immortality. In doing so, the strange space-time properties of the labyrinth result in dimensional rifts opening across different times and places of all three realms.

One of the people whose attention was caught by these rifts were the Warriors of Light. With the help of an airship gifted to them, they and Desch – an engineer friend – would travel into the rift and explore the Minus World. At the same time however, a group from the Realm of Dark arrived – An entity that goes by the name of “Dark Matter” and his enigmatic leader, simply known as “The Director”. The two parties would encounter each other, leading to a fierce struggle. With their backs to the wall, the Warriors of Light, mistaking a giant emerald for THE controller of the Chaos Emeralds, attempts to use it against the dark forces.

The Emerald does channel life energy into them. However, the resulting energy is unfiltered and without restraint. The result shatters the Warriors of Light, scattering their light across the labyrinth and leaving their bodies in a living, yet decimated state. By contrast, the Director and Dark Matter manage to flee, but are injured and retreat, leaving their operations to three underlings: The Dark Trio (Rimura, Rimuru, Rimuro). Xande has taken notice and managed to collect cells of the Warriors of Light, allowing him to bolster his ranks with clones of his arch-enemies. At some point during the commotion, the original bodies of the Warriors of Light seem to have vanished… or have they?

Meanwhile, rifts are bringing people into the labyrinth. Some are adventurers, interested in the secrets of the labyrinth. Others are travelers who have their own journeys and are simply wandering around. And some are superpower nations that also seek the secrets of the Labyrinth… so that they can use them to conquer the realms, both their own and beyond.

Chaos is sure to follow...

The basic groups are as follows:

The Adventurers: A group of Adventurers who have stumbled into the Minus World. Seeking treasures or answers, they quickly get involved in the dangerous game at hand. There’s also the matter of the Blue Rogues, as well as a certain boy with a destructive power who ends up getting a second chance at life… (Mag Launcher & Linear Cannon, Rock Volnutt, Knuckles the Echidna, Shade the Procurator, Alex Kidd, Stella of Nibana, and...?)

The Imperial Forces (temp name. Maybe): A joint alliance between the Koopa Kingdom, the Eggman Empire, the Valua Empire and the 8th Imperial Army. They mobilize their forces to seek out the destructive forces hidden in the Minus World. (Bowser, Dr. Robotnik, Queen Teodora/Galcian, Eugene Leopold)

Demon King Xande & His Minions: The Demon King has survived his original demise and this time, he is determined to not only regain his immortality, but to surpass his creator. To that end, he bolsters his rank of clones - which already include copies of his fellow students/former friends - to include the Warriors of Light and later those who have found their way into the Minus World. However, Xande’s attention is so laser focused on the avenues to accomplish his goals that he may not understand the forces he is messing with… including his own clones. (Xande, Doga's Clone, Unei's Clone)

The Dark Matter: A race of dark cloudike aliens. In the past, they sought to cover the world in darkness and were summoned by Xande’s actions. The Warriors of Light managed to banish them to the Realm of Darkness and they haven’t been seen in the Realm of Light since. Coincidentally, a group of dark cloud-like creatures appeared in ancient past of the Realm of Darkness and aided the Warriors of Dark in stopping the Flood of Light. Even today, they host the people of the light-corrupted world on their numerous air fortresses… (Dark Matter, “The Director”, Dark Rimura, Dark Rimuru, Dark Rimuro)

The Warriors of Light: A group of Warriors who have constantly manifested in response to the balance of Light and Dark tipping too far in favor of the latter. One particular iteration, from “The Legend of the Eternal Wind” fable, are said to have fought Xande in the past. Strangely, sightings of these Warriors have been reported in the Minus World, even after Dark Matter and "the Director" claim to have seen them die and four massive structures appeared shortly after the time that the two claimed the event happened… (Luneth, Arc, Refia, Ingus, Onion Knight)

The Warriors of Light?: While Xande’s clones usually have little to no free will or personality, there are exceptions. Five of those exceptions are the Warriors of Blight: A group of five who rule over different structures within the Minus World. They initially seem to be following Xande’s orders, but seem to have their own plans…

THE PLOT:

There is an overaching plot to Chaos Theory, as well as three different throughlines. Said throughlines aren’t fully thought out in regards to how they interact with the main plot so how it all shakes together at this point in time is… not too developed (cue AUs of an AU of an AU).

The overarching plotline revolves a mysterious space known as The Fantasy World or Minus World. This space twists and warps, creating new realms or shortcuts into existing ones. The result is a labyrinth, and later an “ocean” of structures such as shrines. This is due to the space being a hotbed for various types of energy, such as Star Power, Moon Power and especially Chaos Power.

Through some method, a warlock by the name of Xande found himself in the labyrinth. Seeking to recover his immortality, Xande began toying with the energies at play. While he was fruitless in directly making use of it, he came to understand the nature of the Chaos Emeralds, the Master Emerald and the space-time abilities of the rings. Thus, Xande began to experiment with the rings in hopes of drawing the emeralds to him.

Perhaps by fate, perhaps by coincidence, two parties found themselves within the labyrinth: The Warrior of Light, his four vassals and one of their allies, all of whom stood opposed to Xande previously, and an organization from the World of Darkness known as “World’s Eye” who bear similarities to the “Dark Cloud tribe”, a group of cloud-like aliens who control and corrupt planets, their callsign being their leader’s singular crimson eye.

However, not knowing of Xande’s presence, the two forces assumed that the other was up to some neferious plot. In the end, the Warriors of Light attempted to use Chaos Power against World’s Eye. However, it backfired and the four vanished. At the same time, five new structures arose in the Fantasy World: A treasure filled dungeon, a scholar castle, a lava-filled weapons forge, a manor atop a massive mountain range and a tower made of crystal, the lattermost of which creating a sea of light that makes entry towards it difficult, if not near impossible. One could also see massive airships flying around the space...

To make matters worse, Xande caught wind of his enemies being in the labyrinth and was able to secure biocells from them to create clones to search the world for anything useful. Mostof the clones are focused on their objectives, but other clones seem to be more self-interested. Then there are those that are so independent that it’s questionable if they came from Xande...

Time passes. Word soon spreads of the mysterious “Minus World”. Eventually it catches the attention of certain people. Some are explorers, such as Mag Launcher and Linear Cannon from Pannam Town or Rock Volnutt of the Skylands. It also catches the attention of power hungry people in high places, such as King Bowser of the Koopa Kingdom of Dr. Robotnik of the Eggman Empire. Some people enter for their own personal missions, such as Alex Kidd (& Stella!) of Radaxian, who enters in pursuit of the Bloom; A greedy star who has stolen the stars of planet Aeries. And finally, there are those who find themselves in the labyrinth purely by accident.

With so many people in such a place, chaos inevitably follows...

The three other plotlines/throughlines are as follows:

Plot A: A greedy Star known as the Bloom is absorbing all of the stars in the universe. When Planet Aries’ stars are absorbed, Alex and his good friend Stella set forth into the Fantasy World in order to stop it. But the Bloom isn’t the only villain who has their eyes to the stars…

Plot B: The age of Adventure is alive and well as all manner of diggers and adventurers strive to uncover the lost secrets of ancient civilizations. When the Launcher Clan (Mag Launcher and Linear Cannon) and Rock Volnutt find themselves in the labyrinth, they begin to discover a link between the ever present rings and Chaos Energy. Of course, while navigating the strange new world and unlocking the secrets, they’ll have to contend with ancient mechanisms, imperial forces and sky pirates and even secrets from their pasts...

Plot C: The odd interdimensional nature of the Labyrinth leads to some unforeseen results. When Kirby & Klonoa find themselves at an intersection between awakening and dreams, the two become fast friends. However, they quickly discover a threat that puts the dreams of all in jeopardy and the two set off to protect all good dreams everywhere. However, a certain Wizard is lurking in the shadows and is determined to make Klonoa’s greatest dream into a Nightmare of a reunion…

INVOLVED SERIES:

This rank has three categories to it; “Definitely” means that I envision it as a staple part of the AU. “Maybe” means that, had I been writing this for real, the series probably or probably not would’ve stayed. “Probably” just exists for the game that I want to include but haven’t actually played yet.

Definitely: Mario, Sonic, Kirby, Evolution/Evolutia, Mega Man**

Probably: Skies of Arcadia/Eternal Arcadia***

Probably Not: Pokemon, Legend of Zelda, Madou Monogatari* ***

* Probably the least likely on that list, but I’m putting it there anyway.

** The original AU this is based on had X as the Mega Man series in question. For Chaos Theory, it has been swapped to Mega Man Legends.