"Wow, this is more beautiful than I remembered..." Luna whispered. Talus wandered up beside her, his warm brown eyes wide with amazement.

"It's like a paradise..." He murmured as his gaze slowly panned across the landscape. Altus, the kingdom among the clouds, was truly a sight to behold. It was a land enveloped in the purest of white, supplied by gently falling snow that tumbled from the heavens. Not a blemish remained to be seen -- everything was drowned in the smooth blanket of frost. Yet despite this seemingly harsh climate, the air itself was quite warm. A gentle breeze caressed the small group, putting them at ease. Ness peered across the terrain.

"This place seems to hit you in a new way every time you come here..." He whispered, following the path of a pair of blue birds, circling in the cloudless sky. They flew high over the parapets of the castle before them and disappeared over a wall from which flora seemed to grow almost naturally. Altus, despite appearing to be medieval in nature, was quite a miraculous accomplishment; the entire kingdom floated high above the clouds, the terrain suspended by some unseen force. Verdant gardens dotted the landscape, babbling brooks and waterfalls cascading into no one knew where. The castle itself was a sight to behold -- spires ascended into the heavens, as if they attempted to touch the face of God. A series of stone steps led up to large oak double-doors with two large iron knockers on them. Venus made to approach the doorway, but Luna stopped her.

"Wait, Venus. Not yet." She turned to Raltise. "I believe you have some explaining to do."

The unearthly one looked at her, incredulous. He split a sickening grin. "Why, Young Mistress, I have no intention of telling you anything." Luna took a step back, the formerly intimidating nature of the Nightmare Demon seeming to strike her once again. She looked at Talus, staring wide-eyed. The youth strode forward, a look of perplexity on his face.

"What did you just say, Raltise?" He demanded.

"I will not tell her a thing." He folded his arms across his chest. Talus' hand lanced out and gripped Raltise by the collar, hoisting him into the air.

"And why not?"

"I may only answer to you. It is you who allowed me to escape the confines of Hell, and it is only you that the fates have bound me to."

Talus squinted at him, and lowered him to the ground. He pursed his lips. "Fine then. Then I order you to explain all of this. Dio, Rasheed, and these Horsemen. And try to be quick about it."

Raltise sighed. He turned away, clasping his hands behind his back, and then he took a seat on one of the many stone benches lining the cobblestone path to the castle. He inhaled deeply before speaking.

"Yes, yes...where to begin? A bit of a story is in order. You see, the ghosts that we seek, Dio and Rasheed, are powerful Scaraban mystics from ancient times. Yes...they were perhaps the most powerful mortals to walk this coil, and a source of constant amusement for demons such as myself. But they crossed a terrible threshold one day, attempting to turn themselves into the very demons which they derived their power from. No one, not even members of my kind, are quite sure what happened that day. Needless to say, they found themselves in eternal torment soon enough."

The Nightmare Demon rose, striding across the terrain, the snow crunching against his heels. He wrapped one arm about a stone pillar, gazing across the landscape. "But they're back now. And that could mean trouble for you, Young Protector!" He turned to look at Ness. "Especially if they've tainted your sister with promises of power. And quite so, now that they've released the Four Horsemen."

Chase folded his arms, placing one foot on the stone bench, peering at the looming castle ahead. "And what about these Four Horsemen? What do you know about them?"

Raltise chuckled, clapping his hands together. "Ah, yes! The Horsemen! Quite a formidable band, yes! You see, there is a hierarchy in the demon world. The Horsemen are the vanguards -- the foremost warriors who lead the rest into battle. They possess all the powers of the apocalypse, save one -- Chaos. That right was reserved for me." Ness raised an eyebrow.

"What are you getting at? You were once one of their ranks?"

Raltise let loose a sickening strain of laughter, as if he found this quite funny. This continued for quite some time before he calmed himself and continued. "Why, Young Protector! I was their leader! The Horseman of Chaos I was, yes, and I led them into battle upon my mighty pink pony! Oh Binky, how I miss you!" He swooned. Talus rolled his eyes.

"Enough with the dramatics, just get to the point!"

Raltise's sharp crimson eyes glittered, focussing on his master. He nodded. "As you wish." He began pacing. "Yes, yes...you see, we Horsemen were an enigmatic bunch, and only called to service if something important was at hand. Yet, there were few individuals who could order us to do so, and certainly mere mortals could not, no matter how powerful they are."

Luna frowned. "You're saying they weren't summoned by Rasheed and Dio?"

Raltise grinned. "Quite so, Young Mistress! You are very perceptive. I know what the Young Master sees in you." Luna blushed. Raltise turned, pacing once again. "Yes, you are quite correct. This group could not have been summoned by Rasheed or Dio...no, there is something much more...insidious behind this. The Horsemen were merely waiting in line! It could have only been a Senior in the Demon Hierarchy who called them to action. Meaning the time of the apocalypse is truly at hand."

Raltise turned, spreading his arms out in a sweeping gesture. "Yes, yes! All you know will wither and die, for this is surely the time of prophecy when the two worlds will become one. The gate will open, and all the ghouls of Hell will pour into your world. I, of course, did not wish this to be so, which is why I had sought the Nightmare Rock in the first place. Its power alone would have been enough to prevent this dreaded day from ever happening. But now, alas, the Rock is destroyed!"

Skulryk screwed up his face in a scowl. "Yeah right, Raltise. You were intending to destroy the whole universe as we know it. This had nothing to do with preventing the apocalypse." He muttered.

Raltise chuckled. "Well, had your dimension been destroyed, you would not have to worry then, would you? Yes, yes...the true purpose was to use the Rock's power to overthrow the highest demons of Hell, and thus lead the Apocalypse myself, to be truthful. I so despised my superiors that I would have done anything to undo them!" He clenched his fist in frustration at the thought. He took a deep breath. "Well, that all has passed, and now we must work to save your world, yes? There is only one way to do so. We must recover my watch."

Dan frowned. "That old thing? You'll just use it to freeze us in time and then take off!" He waved his arms wildly. Raltise shook his head sharply.

"No, not at all! You see, the rift between the worlds may only be opened with a fusion of The Light and Dark; they need willing participants of both parties. That is why they have your sister, Ness -- The Light within her, fused with the Demonic power imbued within the two mystics will be enough to bridge the gap. Yet, that watch of mine is also infused with the power of the Demon Legion, for I crafted it using Hell's power. If we can recover it, we may be able to use your own power, Ness, in conjunction with it to seal the worlds once again."

Ness paused. "But what about my sister?" His voice, for the first time, showed concern. Raltise sighed.

"It is quite possible that her soul is lost, Young Protector. You must look past this to your duties as the Earth's savior once again. Although it may pain you to do so, this is your only choice. We must recover my watch from the Horsemen, and pray that there is enough residue power in it to seal the rift when the time comes."

The group grew quite silent for the span of five minutes. A gentle breeze ruffled Talus's hair. His brown eyes were closed in thought. Luna looked at him curiously, and bit her lip. "Well, let's go in. I don't know about the rest of you, but I’m eager to see Chartreuse and Narcy again." He smirked. "It's been a while." He turned, casting a sideways glance at Luna as he did so -- a flash of fleeting recognition entering his face for a split second -- and then he proceeded through the gathered throng toward the oak doors.

----

Seong-un wandered into a blandly-decorated room where the Angelic Petunia once more awaited him.

"Welcome to thee dest'nation, eh what?" trilled the Petunia.

"Now, what did you bring me here for?"

"Don't worry yourself over such triv'l matters, eh what," murmured the Petunia. "Your host-" here the Petunia motioned towards a frighteningly-lifelike statue shorn from diamond-"is currently predisposed, but he has left me with specific orders for you, and any others who might pass his test."

"What might these 'orders' be?" demanded an exasperated Seong-un, understandably fed up with all the nebulosity of this Petunia.

The Petunia coughed, peculiar for such a lifeform, noted Seong-un, and recited: "'If you have succeeded in my test, you clearly will play a role in events already occurring and those to come. Evil will always spread to a point it has already touched, such as a drop of water in a bowl.'" Seong-un was surprised such a strange lifeform possessed such a powerful memory, that it could recite this flawlessly — or so Seong-un believed. "'This maxim, bizarre as it is, is eternally true. In this world, where does evil always seem to strike? Go there, and ally with those of the side of good, and you will have your questions answered, my son.' That's all, m'boy, eh what?" concluded the Petunia. "Now, get yourself along and do what my master has begged of you."

The Angelic Petunia shooed Seong-un away.

Now in an autumnal environment he instinctively knew wasn't Twoson, Seong-un looked at his ring for answers, although new answers to recent questions.

"I know where I must go. Fourside. Ring! Bring me back to Fourside!" A rip in reality opened up before Seong-un, beckoning to him; confidently, he entered, and the rip sealed itself up again.

To Fourside... he thought, ...and answers to my past.

----

Amber turned around again and again, trying to take in as much of the Altian scenery as her eyes could manage. She couldn't remember ever seeing anything this beautiful since she was a child in the valley. Birds, deer, snow... even the castle was brilliant. It brought a smile to her face, and very nearly made her forget that she'd ever felt sad before.

Then she saw the inn. Compared to the rest of the landscape, it was completely out of place: a dry, dusty, grey hovel in the middle of this serene paradise. In fact, it was so completely wrong that Amber wasn't sure that it wasn't right. She started to walk towards it, perfectly happy with ignoring Raltise - he didn't sound particularly interesting to her anyway.

As she came closer to the inn, she saw a wild-haired man carrying a briefcase stepped out the door and began to walk down the street. He was turning back and forth, probably also watching the scenery, though it was hard to tell since he was wearing sunglasses. Amber watched with curiosity as he stopped, apparently very interested in something. He tilted his sunglasses forward to get a better look.

Uh oh, thought Amber. He was looking at me.

But when the man smiled, Amber knew he was alright. It reminded her of the same smile she'd gotten from Simon just before she left his house for Onett. Little did she know just how ironic that thought was.

"'Scuse me," the man said to her as he walked up. "Do you know where I could find someone named Simon Roberts?"

Amber shook her head. "I've never been here before," she explained. "And I don't think I know him, anyway."

"Oh, I think you do." The man pointed to the trenchcoat. "That used to be his."

Amber gasped. "Simon's around here somewhere?"

Now the man shook his head. "No, Simon's out there, and I need to get in touch with him. I figured you might know something since you seem to be wearing his coat. How'd you get that, anyway?"

Amber began to explain. "I was leaving the Peaceful Rest Valley, and I -"

The man held up the hand that wasn't holding the briefcase and interrupted her. "Slow down. You were leaving the valley? Who are you, exactly?"

"I'm Amber."

A look of recognition came to the man's face. "Ohhhh. I understand. This is pretty serious, then. Have you checked the pockets of that coat yet?"

"No.." Amber reached into one of the pockets, drawing out a shining green emerald. But before she could take a good look at it, the man yelped with alarm. Dropping his briefcase, he grabbed the gem out of her hand and shoved it into her pocket again.

"Don't do that!" he hissed at her. "That thing is dangerous!"

"I don't understand," Amber said. "What is it?"

"It's the Rallets Gem," the man said. "It harnesses power and unleashes fury and does all the usual crazy enchanted jewelry stuff. Whatever you do, don't use it," he cautioned her.

He picked up his briefcase from the snow. "Think hard. Where was the last place you heard that Simon might've been?"

Amber remembered what the Cameraman had said outside her ruined house. "I think he's watching my father."

"Watching your father. Makes sense. Okay, see you around, Amber."

"Wait!" Amber shouted. "You didn't even tell me your name!"

The man grinned and tossed his long hair over his shoulder. "Jakob Nolas, Attorney at Law." Then he disappeared into thin air without so much as a *poof*.

Amber turned and walked back to the group, who hadn't noticed her conversation with Jakob at all. She put her hand in the pocket and ran her fingers over the Rallets Gem, deciding that she would look at it later. After all, it couldn't be that bad, considering she had no idea how to use anything like that. What was the worst that could happen?

----

"It sounds pretty bad," Chase murmured after hearing Raltise's explanation. "But no worse than what I've read, I guess..."

"Hold it a second," Dan said. "What you've read?"

Chase paused for a moment. "Yeah, uh... crud."

"There's something about you..." Skulryk said. "You seem familiar, but... unusual, somehow."

"Yeah," Dan added. "And why, of all places, did we first meet you in Siris O'Brien's cafe?"

"I guess I have some explaining to do," Chase conceded. "I haven't really been very open with you guys. Sorry about that... I'll tell you everything."

He paused.

"I am from 20 years in the future. And in the future, all is devastation."

Many pairs of incredulous eyes stared at him. "Really?"

"Well... not as such, no. But it's pretty bad. I come from a future in which Dio's plan had succeeded, to an extent. You all opposed it, but somehow failed to completely succeed in your efforts. Life was far from peaceful when I was growing up. I learned a form of magic in order to protect myself. One day I asked my father if he knew anything about the reason for all that madness; he told me what he could remember. That day I went to the Onett library to do a bit of research, and I later headed to the laboratory of Dr. Andonuts. Lucky for me, he let me use the Phase Distorter IV. I traveled back to the time when the event was supposed to have happened, and I sought one of the warriors I knew to have fought in that event."

"Siris O'Brien," Dan concluded. "That's why you were at the cafe."

"Yeah... anyway, I talked to him a bit. I actually didn't get to tell him much before he ran off. He said something about not wanting to adventure anymore... but he was supposed to. He was supposed to join you guys, and I mistakenly prevented him from doing so. ...And now that I mention it, that might not be a good thing..."

Chase suddenly lost his balance and nearly tripped over his own feet. Much of the color drained from his face, and his bright green eyes were suddenly reduced to a dull hazel.

"Whoa," Luna said, catching him as he began to fall. "Chase, are you alright?"

"Unhh... Yeah. I'm not sure what happened. I'll be fine."

Though he said this, he wasn't so sure of it. Siris was currently out of the picture, and Chase was worried by this fact. He tried to shrug it off, and continued following his group, wherever they were headed.

----

Paithan finally managed to put all of his new possessions into organized pockets. Standing up, he smiled cheerfully, suddenly forgetting everything he'd just worked to get organized. He decided to walk back to the bridge to check on his friends, to make sure the weren't in trouble or anything.

He walked through the desert, quieter than wind, eager to see his friends again. Soon the road was beneath his feet and Paithan turned into the tunnel. Wouldn't they be so happy to see him again? They must have been so worried. Maybe the horsemen returned! That would be cool. Of course, they did destroy that bridge. Maybe those other friends came back? Like that guy at the coffee shop? That'd be cool.

Paithan was sort of shocked to find out, on coming out of the tunnel, that his friends were gone. He looked around, searched the tunnel, searched the remaining parts of this side of the bridge. He had no luck. He even almost dove into the water to search the other side of the bridge, then all of Fourside. He almost did, in fact. But he then realized that his friends wouldn't want to because they all wore trenchcoats and they were expensive and hard to swim in so they wouldn't want to leave them behind and didn't want to swim and the water was cold so why swim anyway and they didn't have a boat so maybe they went get one but this was a desert who would have a boat here? Paithan then went into a long thought process about thinking in run on sentences, wondering how one thinks with punctuation. Then he began to wonder why they would leave without him.

He came up with an answer to that much faster than he figured out how one thinks with punctuation (he still didn't understand that). Obviously they thought he was still with them! Simple mistake. He was, after all, sho... er, vertically challenged for his age. They must have thought he was right behind them the whole time, just under their vision.

So where were they trying to go before he left? ...Fourside! They did that tell a port thing and went there, so they didn't ruin their trenchcoats.

Paithan ran down to the shore below the bridge. The water near the shore was pretty solid, it looked like, so Paithan stepped on it to get ready to dive in and swim to Fourside.

The ice cracked beneath his foot on the first step, plunging his foot into the icy water. Paithan yelped as the cold water seeped into his shoe. He backed away from the water, shaking his leg to try to get the water out of his shoe. It wasn't particularly effective, but he sure felt like it was. He soon calmed down and went back up onto the bridge, looking across.

He'd been left behind, he realized. He had no place to go now, none of his friends were on this side. He was missing all the fun of the city. Oh what fun they must be having there. The buildings, the people, the shootings, the automobile accidents, the horsemen... Paithan sat on the edge of the bridge, where it was separated, looking out at Fourside, swinging his legs back and forth, thinking of ways to get across.

Oh what fun they must be having...

----

"If we're not here to look for those 'bad things', then why are we here?" asked Riley, aloud.

"The Horsemen?" asked PikaChan.

"Or Dio and Rasheed," added Eric.

We're not safe here, continued the voice.

"I don't think we're safe anywhere ... considering they want to kill us?" retorted Riley.

You don't get it... sighed the voice, giving up.

"I don't know what I'm supposed to get!"

"Do you argue with the voice often?" asked PikaChan.

"Not really," Riley replied.

"I wonder if there's anything close by?" wondered Eric, looking around.

I think there's something below us, but just go look for the others, already! admonished the voice.

"They're below us? Perfect. So how do we get down there..." The voice was about to react, but Riley added, "And yes, I am doing this to spite you." The voice shut up.

"Where are they, the sewers?" asked Eric.

"I can't think of anything else that could be below us," agreed PikaChan.

Riley volunteered the obvious. "Look for a manhole cover."

Eric seized the opportunity to use his PSI. He hadn't had the chance for awhile. "Wouldn't it be faster to just go straight down?"

"Wait," started Riley, but Eric's impulsiveness was faster. Using the same power he had threatened Paithan with after the theft of his dagger, Eric caused the pavement to crack beneath them. Perhaps using a bit too much power, Eric caused the ground to disintegrate, and they were quickly pulled down, almost as if they were in quick sand.

Amid varied groans, the voice spoke up again in Riley's mind. I told you we didn't want to find them! Look.

Not far off, an imposing figure stood. Death – the horseman of the Apocalypse. Unlike his brethren, Death had remained in Fourside, aware that this occasion would present itself.

Riley took a step towards Death and took a defensive stance in front of PikaChan. Eric began concentrating.

Death merely rested on his sickly steed, gazing impassively from the darkness of his hood.

Just get out, pleaded the voice in Riley’s head. You'll get yourself killed.

You know that's not my style ... I won't let it hurt them!

You're not going to be able to protect her, if you try it, you'll just all end up dead!

What? asked PikaChan, extremely confused.

PikaChan...? asked the voice, now also confused.

Why are you in my mind again?

I don't know. But if I'm here ... oh no...

As the voice realized it was already too late, the darkness emitted by Death was already permeating Riley's being. As it affected his mind, it triggered a dark power hidden deep within Riley's consciousness - at the very core of his existence, his origin, and his past.

In place of his sight, an inky blackness seemed to fill his eyes. Where he could feel the voice's presence, he now felt its spatial sense. The blackness then clouded his consciousness itself.

Riley clenched himself into a ball slightly, and a blackness swept over his body. He unclenched quickly, letting his arms out to the sides. A sword appeared in his right hand and a shield in his left as the energy was released, sending a shockwave through the ground and ceiling. The ceiling then began to break apart before collapsing from the energy of the shockwave, cutting Death off from the other group.

"Riley...?" asked PikaChan, cautiously. He didn't respond, but he turned around.

Almost leaving the ground, Riley swept past the others, bumping PikaChan out of the way like he didn't see her. With a swipe of his sword, Riley unleashed a burst of energy directly upwards, creating a path through the ground to the surface. He could have attacked the others since they were convenient, but enough of his mind was free from the possession that he just left.

"What just happened?" asked Eric, a bit thrown.

"Something's wrong with him," added PikaChan.

This is VERY bad, said the voice.