Your Memory Is A Wonderland (Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories) in Gamer's Gaming

The Road So Far…

Riku is making the climb through the underground floors of Castle Oblivion, fighting off the darkness in his heart at every turn. Having just successfully made it through the first set of worlds from his memories, Riku was confronted twice upon leaving Neverland. First, he was attacked by the Riku Replica, a copy of him that was created by Vexen using data collected in Riku’s battle with the scientist. Though the Replica put up a fight, Riku proved himself stronger, though the Replica accused him of being weaker due to his lack of acceptance of the darkness inside his heart. Afterwards, Riku was confronted, once more, by Ansem, who represented the darkness inside Riku’s heart above all else. He appeared to tell Riku that embracing the darkness inside him would be the only true way to gain power and escape from the castle. He claimed that Riku feared the darkness inside him. When Riku claimed to not be afraid of it, Ansem gave him four more world cards so he could continue his “foolish quest” to eliminate the darkness in his heart. With Vexen and the Replica taking off to the upper floors to confront Sora, a few questions remain. How were cards made from Riku’s memories if Riku had never been to those four worlds? What will Lexaeus and Zexion do to stifle Riku’s attempts to escape the castle? Will Riku ever be able to defeat the darkness in his heart and truly be rid of it? How did Ansem get that truly great tan? Riku enters Wonderland to find some of the answers, hoping that each jump…er, floor, will eventually be the one that releases him from the castle…

Now…

Riku entered Wonderland with the Key of Beginnings card in his possession. While most of the Heartless he encountered in the entrance room are familiar, he did encounter the Creeper Plant Heartless that spouted seeds at him and attacked from below with thorny vines. Despite these new foes and a really weak deck holding him back, Riku managed to fight through the room and went north using a Tranquil Darkness card. Riku dispatched the Heartless in this room with much the same ease before moving west with a Sleeping Darkness card. Riku, dispatching the drowzy detestables, made his way north and into a Looming Darkness room. Heartless attacked Riku from every angle in this next room, but Riku gathered his resolve and defeated them before moving north again, this time into a Strong Initiative room. Riku took full advantage of first strikes on his enemies, felling them easier in this room. However, with no way out, Riku was forced to backtrack to the Tranquil Darkness room. With a choice to now go north or east, Riku chose north, creating a Martial Waking room. With his deck powered up by the effects of the room, Riku had a much easier time wading through the groups of Heartless as he continued north once more, creating yet another Looming Darkenss room. Riku did his best to practice his techniques for the trials ahead, mowing through the multiple groups of Heartless. However, Riku also found himself stuck in another dead end. With the path blocked once more, Riku backtracked to the Tranquil Darkness room again and headed east, using an Almighty Darkness card to pave the way. With the Heartless much stronger than him in this room, Riku struggled but was rewarded in the form of experience. However, with his health depleted after fighting the much stronger enemies, Riku moved north using a Moment’s Reprieve card to give himself a brief respite from battle. After recovering enough to move on, Riku went north again, using a Bottomless Darkness card to move on. Left without many of his senses in the darkness of the room, Riku did his best to fight valiantly and managed to defeat the many Shadows infesting the room. Finally, Riku also spotted the Key of Beginnings door in the northern part of the room. Using his card, Riku entered the room and confronted the Trickmaster, a giant Heartless from Wonderland that represented a large portion of the darkness in Riku’s heart. Riku struggled with the massive Heartless due to the weakness of his deck here in Wonderland, but, defying the odds, Riku managed to topple the Heartless and was rewarded with the Trickmaster enemy card. Finding himself back in the Bottomless Darkness room, Riku backtracked through the world all the way to the Strong Initiative room where he found a doorway to the Conqueror’s Respite room. With yet another chunk of the darkness in his heart defeated, Riku made his way out of the nearby door and back into the halls of Castle Oblivion.

As Riku climbed the stairway to sublevel 6 of Castle Oblivion, Vexen appeared to the neophyte members of the Organization, as they met aboveground. Axel, our favorite ginger assassin, asked how they might be of service. After all, it wasn’t very often Vexen appeared topside. Gee, this seems mighty familiar. Vexen said that he had appeared to give them a hand. While Axel and Larxene may believe Sora is special, Vexen was still unconvinced that he deserved to be coddled as he was. Funny, I predict he will feel much different soon enough. Larxene spoke up, saying here they go again. Funny, I was thinking the same thing. She told Vexen that it was just another of his excuses to carry out his experiments. Vexen admitted that he was a scientist and experiments were what he did. Axel huffed and told Vexen he could do whatever he wanted, but he figured testing Sora was just a cover for testing the Riku Replica. Larxene added that calling him anything other than a toy seemed generous. Vexen told the electric blonde that she should just learn to be quiet. Axel gave Vexen a world card to give to give to Sora. At that moment, the Riku Replica appeared close by, smiling. As Vexen stared at the card, Axel told him that the card held the memories of Sora and Riku’s home. Wait, this is different… The Replica said that it was just a card and wondered what good it was. Larxene told him that, with a little help from Namine, the Replica would have all of the real Riku’s memories. Maybe they could get Namine to make him forget that he was nothing but a fake. In other words, they would remake his heart so that he would be exactly the same as the real Riku. The Replica scoffed at the idea of them remaking his heart. He said that the real Riku was a wimp who was afraid of the dark. What would he want with the heart of a loser? Larxene asked if Vexen had any objections. After all, Vexen did want to test Sora, didn’t he? Vexen agreed that it must be done. The Replica asked how he could betray him like that. Vexen told him that he would make good use of him, didn’t he? The Replica backed away, but Larxene told him to just relax. She didn’t figure it would hurt that much! The Replica yelled that he would hurt her and attacked, but Larxene simply swatted him away with a little electric sting. The blonde laughed and called the Replica a stupid little toy for thinking that he could defeat her. Larxene told him to look on the bright side, however. Along with erasing everything in his head, Namine would also erase the memory of Larxene knocking him flat. Namine stared on in horror as Larxene told the Replica that Namine would implant the loveliest little memories that he could ever hope for. It wouldn’t be a big deal that they were all lies. As the Replica laid on the floor, he screamed as Larxene approached to carry out the erasure of all that he was…

Riku, meanwhile, had made it to sublevel 6 and approached the world door, using the Olympus Coliseum world card to open the door. Making his way inside, the door shut behind him silently, leaving the hallways empty and silent once more.