"Link!" He turned briefly to see Zelda, a beam of light shot forth from her outstretched arms, pinning Ganon to the floor of the ruined tower. "I'll hold him with my power. Hurry and deliver the final blow!" He could see her back arch against the strain of the magic, the effort of maintaining a spell that was too far beyond her power. The light vanished and Zelda dropped to her knees, unable to hold on any longer.

Link turned back to his opponent as Ganon struggled to get up, refusing to give in. In his hand Link could feel the power of the Master Sword, the power of evil's bane as the blade shone with a haunting blue light from within. Without wasting another second, he attacked, slashing Ganon across the face with two hard blows before driving the blade through his skull right up to the cross guard.

Ganon threw his head in the air with a fierce roar clutching at the should-be fatal wound. Link braced himself, unsure if the fight was truly over or if Ganondorf had anymore tricks up his sleeve.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Zelda stagger to her feet. He watched her lips move but could not hear the words over Ganon's roars of pain and rage. Her arms stretched up as an orb of light ignited between her hands. In his mind he could see the 6 sages, each one performing the same spell and releasing them together in a flood of white light. A massive portal opened beneath Ganon drawing him down to his prison between realms as he changed back to his human form.

Then something went wrong.

Ganondorf made one last desperate attempt to escape. He threw his arms out to either side as purple energy snaked up his arms and collected in his fists. With a cry of rage he slammed his fists together in front of him, the impact of magic nearly knocking Link from his feet. A black portal, like the one Phantom Ganon had uses to leap between pictures, opened behind Ganondorf, drawing him in. Running as fast as he could, Link dove for the portal but to no avail as the gaping black maw, along with the King of Evil, winked from existence.

He stood there for a moment staring at where the portal had been. The sound of voices caught his attention as he turned to see the sages standing around Zelda all talking at once.

"Can anyone explain to me what just happened?" Link asked as he approached, sliding the Master Sword into its sheath.

"Ganon has somehow opened a gateway between worlds," Rauru said. "I have heard of it being done, but never thought him capable of such a thing. All we know for sure is that Ganondorf is no longer in Hyrule."

"Let me get this straight!" Navi chimed. "After all that, all of the dungeon crawling, all the sage rescuing, all the monster fighting, he ESCAPES?"

"Yeah. You could say that." Raru replied with a nod.

"THEN WHAT WAS THE POINT OF GOING THROUGH ALL THOSE TRAP-RIDDLED, MONSTER-INFESTED, ZOMBIE-FILLED, FOUL-SMELLING TEMPLES?"

"Mine didn't have zombies." "Mine didn't smell that bad." "I wasn't even in a temple."

"AAAAAAAAAAHHH!" Link watched as Navi, now beet red, tore around in a temper screaming curses and bashing herself against broken pieces of tower. It was rather entertaining.

"Is there anything I can do?" Link asked.

Raru stood in silent though for a moment. "No. For now it would be best if you returned to your own time. It could be years before Ganondorf returns, if he returns at all. Should this happen, we will send a message across time for your aid."

"But…"

"There's nothing you can do. Even if we found a way to open a gateway, what then? I have no idea how many different worlds could exist beyond Hyrule. Unless Ganondorf returns we can nothing."

Zelda stepped forward and extended her hand. "Give me the ocarina and I will send you back. You should have a childhood."

The slow melody of the Song of Time filled the air as the portal opened beneath him. As he had done so often before he feel the flow of time rush past him, felt himself growing younger. The music had stopped and was replaced by the sound of distant voices, frantic voices. That was different. He felt himself become sleepy; he always fell asleep when he traveled. Just as his eyes were about to drift shut he thought he saw a hole, a small black hole in the torrent of light around him. That was different…

"Kratos look!" He turned to look where Colette pointed. She was pointing towards the Tower of Salvation, which had just come into Sylvarant. Perhaps Colette was just excited, having just been officially named Chosen and meeting her "father." Then he saw it, a small streak of light moving across the sky.

"Maybe it's a shooting star," she offered, her hands shielding the sun from her eyes as she watched the horizon.

"…"

"Or a bird."

"…" Kratos turned to look at Colette, wondering if she had hit her head one too many times. He looked back at the sky, and the streak turned into flame as it plummeted to the earth and slammed into the ground not far from the Tower.

He shook his head; there were more important things to worry about now, and he had a job to do. From within the temple he could hear Lloyd and Genis talking to someone, probably the woman who had been studying the floor as they were leaving. Colette had called her professor something-or-other.

"Come, Chosen. We should be getting back. There are preparations to be made for the journey."

As Collette started down the path away from the temple, he stole one last look towards the Tower before following her back to Iselia.

Ganondorf grunted as he stepped out of the small crater. "Not the most glorious of entries," he thought as he cracked his neck to one side, "but effective nonetheless." He was amazed that the spell had actually worked, that he was actually able to jump to another world.

He stretched his arms over his head as he took in the surroundings. It was mostly open with a few trees and mountains rising in the distance. As he turned his gaze fell upon something of interest; a lone structure, a large tower rising up out of a hole in the ground. His gaze slowly rose up the side, his grin growing with the tower's height as it stretched endlessly into the sky.

"A place truly worthy of the King of Evil," he laughed as he dropped his gaze back to the entrance. There were no guards, no patrols, and no visible defenses at all. He knew it wasn't that easy. It was never that easy.

When he got closer to the tower he felt it, an invisible barrier that surrounded the tower. When he placed his hand against it, small ripples of color spread outward along the surface like ripples in a pond. It was solid and reminded him of the one he had erected within his own tower back in Hyrule. The only difference was his caused excruciating pain if touched—this did nothing.

He turned, taking a few steps back from the barrier. He stretched his arm into the air and called his magic. An orb of purple lightning appeared in his fist as he spun and hurled it towards the tower. The impact against the barrier was like a peal of thunder, waves of color raced away from the impact but the barrier stood firm. He raised his arm again, drawing twice the energy as before. But the impact had no more effect then the first.

With a small grunt of annoyance Ganondorf lifted himself into the air, floating a few feet above the ground. Both hands raised in the air as a black orb formed between them, growing to about the size of his chest. As he threw the orb it broke apart into several smaller ones that snaked forward and collided at a single point of impact. He threw back his head and laughed as the smoke cleared to reveal a two foot hole in the barrier that slowly grew back and closed itself.

"It will take more than that," he laughed, raising an orb nearly twice the size of himself over his head, "to stop ME!" The explosion shook the ground and toppled nearby trees. Smoke billowed from the hole as he walked through, the barrier slowly closing behind him.

Dark energy coiled itself around his fist as he approached the entrance. He roared as his punch landed squarely in the center of the door, blasting it inward into hundreds of pieces. "And now to find the owner."

"We're leaving tomorrow at noon. So would you come to the village around then?"

"Okay! You got it. Now I'll be able to see you become an angel with my own eyes."

"Hehe… Yeah."

Kratos stood mute as he watched Lloyd and Colette up on the terrace. He was slightly surprised that Colette would give Lloyd the wrong time; they were clearly fond of each other. "At least it'll save having to argue with him in the morning. "Stubborn kid," he muttered to himself.

"You say something?" Kratos turned to see Raine and Genis approaching. He stood leaning against a tree not far from the gravestone. He liked Raine. She was smart, authoritative, and had even offered to do most of the cooking on the journey. One less thing for him to worry about.

"I was thinking we should go soon. It's getting late and we have a long journey ahead of us."

Raine glanced up at the balcony for a minute before answering. "I agree. We'll go get her now." As the two of them went into the house he glanced back at the grave; Anna's grave. But that meant Lloyd was his…

"Kratos look! There's another one! It's just like the one we saw earlier! Kratos look, it's right up there!" Colette stood there bouncing on her toes, pumping her arms up and down in front of her. "Hurry before you miss it!"

He looked up to see yet another shooting star falling from the sky. As it fell, it continued to get closer towards them. Like the first, the streak caught fire as it fell, gaining speed before landing in the woods just south of Iselia.

"Professor Sage?" Colette called from the balcony. "Do you think we could look for it tomorrow when we head out on the journey?" From up on the terrace came the most disturbing voice he and ever heard.

"MUHAHAHA MARVELOUS!"

"Who dares force their way into my domain?"

The armored figure turned slowly towards the voice as Mithos floated down. No one had ever gotten into the Tower of Salvation before; it was supposed to be impossible.

He was an imposing figure, clad in dark leather with black metal plates and a blood red cape. "I am Ganondorf," he spoke with a voice that commanded respect. "Who are you? You look like the king of the fairies."

Mithos' eye twitched. If there was one name that he despised being called… "I am Yggdrasill, the leader of Cruxis."

Ganondorf made a mock bow. "My apologies, I did not realise you were so important. Forgive me for not giving a damn."

"You will pay for your insults, inferior being! HOLY LANCE!"

Ganondorf jumped out of the way and launched a shadow orb across. Yggdrasill ducked to the side and retuned fire with his own magic. Ganondorf swept his arm at the spell, deflecting it back. Caught off guard, Yggdrasill spun to the left, only to see his opponent had closed the distance. He felt a fist slam into his gut along with a torrent of magic which sent him hurling across the room and into a pillar.

"A wasted effort." Mithos flew across the room and delivered a blow of his own that sent Ganondorf sprawling down the walkway.

Ganondorf rose up into the air, threw back his head and laughed. "Is that the best you can do?" He threw his hands up, unleashing ropes of black lightning across the tower. Mithos extended his hand and unleashed his angelic powers, a beam of white light, which shot forward and collided with the lightning. The spells exploded on impact, knocking both of them back.

The battle raged on, both attacking relentlessly, both unleashing their most powerful attacks, with the area between them being reduced to rubble as stray spells tore the tower apart in a storm of magical combat.

"You are truly a worthy opponent," Mithos said as he knelt on the ground here he had been thrown. He watched as Ganondorf lifted a shattered pillar off of his chest as he rose to his feet. "The best I've had in almost 4000 years. But I tire of this game." The Eternal Sword rose up and floated before him. "Die!"

Nothing happened. The shockwave emitted by the sword passed right threw him as if he wasn't there.

"How? How can you resist the Eternal Sword?"

"There is only one blade that could harm me," he sneered as he walked closer, "and I doubt even you could wield it." He stopped a few feet in front of the Eternal Sword, his eyes wandering slowly over the length of the glowing blade. "It seems we have problem. Here we are, two men of limitless power, and neither of us willing to back down." He reached out, his hand stopping an inch away from the hilt. "I know magic. As long as you possess this sword, you can't be killed, just as I cannot be killed without the Blade of Evil's Bane."

Mithos watched him, knowing full well the truth of his words. They had been fighting for hours and neither of them had gotten anywhere. "What are you suggesting?"

Ganondorf's eyes rose, meeting his gaze. "Perhaps we can make a deal."

"What kind of deal?"

A menacing grin spread across his face. "What is it you want most?"

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