Thanks to some of the excellent authors amongst the Kingdom Hearts 3 readership, we’ve been able to establish a brand new section, the Kingdom Hearts Editorials section!

In this section, we’ve already got articles by readers which include a comparison of Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy (which some argue is a little harsh!), an interesting theory on the future of the series, and more general KH3 Theories, which has attracted a great deal of interesting discussion.

Wanna have your theories, editorials, fan fiction, or artwork submitted to the KH3 website?! You can! We now have two ways for readers to submit articles to us, either via email or by direct website submission.

The email address you should use to submit content to Kingdom Hearts 3.net is Submit@KingdomHearts3.net, and should only be used for content submissions!

To directly post, check out this page.

In other other news, fans of Naruto should check out our networks brand new site, on which you can watch episodes for free, and even watch the movies. The name of the site is Naruto Online, and the address for the website is: http://naruto.ffnet.org/, so please be sure to bookmark it!

With so little Kingdom Hearts News around and plenty of people wanting to get their hands on a Keyblade, I decided I should show you where to do so. Unfortunately, this only applies to people in the US (which means I can’t get any of this so I don’t know the true quality).

Although there are real swords on the market at very expensive prices, there are some very reasonably priced replicas of Keyblades around, and Amazon.com currently has them on sale cheaper than anywhere else, including their supplier “Top Swords”:

Sora’s Keyblade (14lb) Price: $25.49 All Metal Construction Hanging Chain Included 35” Overall Length Shipping Weight: 14lb

Sora’s Keyblade (12lb) Price: $24.49 Unknown Material Unknown Overall Length Shipping Weight: 12lb

As for other Kingdom Hearts Merchandise, there’s a site that has imported items from the Official Square-Enix Store, including some of the items that were available at the Square-Enix Party 2007, and has them available at reasonable US prices:

GKWorld

Other than confirming again that the next game will NOT be called “Kingdom Hearts III”, it has now been confirmed in Dengeki PS Magazine that:

Unfortunately, this may mean very little news for a couple of months, but we’ll still keep you up-to-date on anything new!

• TheWertle is still working on translating the Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+ Ultimania book. We’ll hopefully be getting more scans of it as well. If you want to buy it yourself, you can get it at Play-Asia, but bear in mind that it’s 511 pages almost all in Japanese.
• We are also still getting translations on Kingdom Hearts: Another Report. The Proto Type Report should be the next to be translated.
• More Kingdom Hearts Novels are going on sale soon, apparently possibly with a little bit of information that we haven’t found out yet, but this is unconfirmed.
• After the great feedback on the “Fate of the Unknown” Piano Sheet Music, I’m working on the requests of other arrangements for that piece, as well as creating piano versions of other music from the Kingdom Hearts series by Yoko Shimomura. The Kingdom Hearts OST Complete is still available.
• The Square-Enix USA Online Merchandise Store should be opening soon, so if you’re a big fan, sign up to find out when the store opens.
• The Kingdom Hearts Complete Visual Art Book will be on sale in July if you wish to pre-order it now.
• If there are any unanswered questions about this site or about the Kingdom Hearts series that I might know, please ask in the Frequently Asked Questions section and read the Summary of Kingdom Hearts Interviews.

True Xinjust of KHV has got his hands on some of the Kingdom Hearts Action Figures, presumably from the Square-Enix Shop at the Square-Enix Party 2007. They look similar anyway. Click to enlarge:

Reflet of the French fansite KingdomFantasy.com has uploaded 50 pages of the Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+ Ultimania! No translations yet, but I think TheWertle is still working on them. You can view them all here or download KingdomFantasy’s RAR file of the large highest quality versions of them, if you can unRAR files.

Update: 13 more pages uploaded, including the pages of Axel and Demyx that were missing from before!

Update: 7 Scans Not In The File

KHI brought to my attention that there are two new Kingdom Hearts Novels by Tomoco Kanemaki and Shiro Amano coming out on August 1st, which are available for Pre-Order on Amazon.com in the US:

Also, the next of Shiro Amano’s Graphic Novels is coming out on October 1st:

The Boxed Set of the Chain of Memories Graphic Novels is coming out October 9th, presumably including just the two current volumes:

For those of you who missed the previous books:

TheWertle has struck again! This time with an excellent interview with Tetsuya Nomura from Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+ Ultimania called “Scenario Mysteries”, in which he confirms the Enigmatic Soldier’s name as Terra!

In Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+, many mysteries are answered but many new mysteries are also born.

In this version, things relating to additional scenes are included, but during the story there are some questions that pop up, so we’ll see if Nomura can point us in the right direction.

Question: In the original Kingdom Hearts, the King searches for a Keyblade in the Realm of Darkness, but when he meets Ansem the Wise, is the Realm of Light Keyblade he has the one that Sora is currently using?

Nomura: No. The King has the ability to use Keyblades from both the Realms of Darkness and of Light. This is an important point - There isn’t just one Keyblade from each world, but just as many as there are people with qualified hearts.

Question: During the meetings, the members of Organization XIII are sitting in chairs. Is the height of these chairs determined by things like their skills and abilities?

Nomura: No. The height of the chairs is not fixated - They move. That is to say that the height is up to each person. The leader, Xemnas, is always the highest, and to be at the same height as him would give that member a pretty bad feeling, so the other members wouldn’t do that. *Laughs*

Question: At the end of Sora and Riku’s stories in Re: Chain of Memories, Roxas looks back while Hayner and the rest are walking and eating ice-cream, and without seeming to care, Hayner and the others continue walking. Is this because they can’t see Roxas?

Nomura: Well it’s just because they don’t know Roxas that they don’t notice him, not because they can’t see him. At that time, right after Xemnas explains Roxas’ name, Axel says to leave things to him. Then, Roxas seems jealous of how Hayner and the others are enjoying themselves while eating ice-cream, and Axel interprets this as him wanting some ice-cream, so he is obliged to go buy him some.

Question: In the real Twilight Town, didn’t Roxas cross paths with Hayner and the others and make aquaintances with them?

Nomura: I suppose. You can think whatever you want about that.

Question: What triggered Roxas’ separation from the Organization?

Nomura: As he kept having recurring dreams of Sora, someone he didn’t know, he felt he needed to leave the Organization to find out who these people he didn’t know were. As Axel didn’t want him to go, he didn’t tell Sora about Roxas in Castle Oblivion, did he?

Question: In Riku’s ending in Re: Chain of Memories, could you tell us the meaning of the scene where the King and Riku are walking together and Riku suddenly plops down.

Nomura: That’s because Riku realized he couldn’t completely get rid of the Darkness inside of him. The King mentioned in Kingdom Hearts II that as Riku held Xehanort’s Heartless in his heart, he disappeared from the King’s sight. It’s a sort of foreshadowing. In this scene, the King’s face looks worried for a moment because he felt that Riku might eventually no longer be there. Riku headed towards DiZ in order to restore Sora’s memories to normal, but in the end, his departure from the King was so that he wouldn’t show his preparations to use the Darkness.

Question: Could you tell us at what point Riku covered his eyes?

Nomura: When he departed from the King. You don’t know after the scene, but in Riku’s ending in Re: Chain of Memories, when he comes to wherever DiZ is, he’s already covered his eyes.

Question: Please confirm some things about Castle Oblivion. In the additional event “The Truth about the Chamber of Sleep”, you can gather from Xigbar and Zexion’s conversation that Castle Oblivion existed in the Inbetween Realm before the birth of the Organization. The Organization then found it and used it for experiments about memories and to look for the Chamber of Awakening, right?

Nomura: Yes. Since their conversation was about Marluxia’s entry, they discovered the Castle before that. In fact, its use, according to Secret Ansem Report 7, was for only 13 Organization Members. Naminé awoke in Castle Oblivion, but as she and Roxas were born at the same time, half of the Organization moved to the Castle.

Question: In the additional event “To Put an End to Everything”, Sora says “It should have been easy to say thanks to Naminé, but I couldn’t say it”. At this point in time, does Sora remember the things that happened with Naminé?

Nomura: If he remembers, it’s because Naminé’s existence was made possible by Sora, and when Naminé and Roxas return to Kairi and Sora, many things were connected. Since Sora never got to say thanks to Naminé, please think of that as a hint.

Question: In the additional event “Farewell to a Friend”, there’s a scene where Axel tells Roxas “You really do have a heart, don’t you”. What is the actual case here?

Nomura: In this scene, it ends bringing up more mysteries about Roxas, so for the answer, maybe take care to follow your hunches well. It’s also related to Xehanort’s memories, but I can’t give any specifics now.

Question: We’d like to inquire about the new secret movie “Birth By Sleep”. In the new event “The Truth about the Chamber of Sleep”, Xigbar mentions a “group that wields Keyblades”. Is he talking about the 3 armored people in the movie?

Nomura: Yes, Xigbar witnessed them when he was a disciple to Ansem the Wise.

Question: The Lingering Sentiment (Enigmatic Soldier) is the same as the armored youth in the movie, but when he fights Sora he mentions “Aqua” and “Ven”. Are those the names of the other 2?

Nomura: Yes, the blue haired girl is Aqua.

Question: What is the armored youth’s name?

Nomura: His name appeared once in code in the 2006 Tokyo Game Show Promotional Video. Also, Ven is actually a nickname, but his real name is a little bit longer. Sora, Riku, and Kairi’s names can be seen as “Sky, Land, and Sea” respectively. The 3 armored people’s names take the shape of different properties of the world, “Water, Wind, and Earth”.

Statement: Ven looks an awful lot like Roxas…

Nomura: I can’t give any specifics about that. He may just resemble him, and if there is a connection, Sora may be related too. What I can say right now is that these mysteries are all connected to the story.

Question: In the beginning, the armored youth’s eyes are blue, but at the end they change to gold. Is this revealing a change in him?

Nomura: I can’t give specifics about this either… I think everyone’s imaginations are pretty capable so please try and anticipate a lot of things.

Translated by TheWertle. I edited and corrected spelling and grammar.

• In the photo below, it shows a screenshot of the code that flowed across the screen for a moment during the Promotional Video at the Tokyo Game Show 2006. It has been decoded as:

“Master Xehanort’s Avenger, his name is Terra.”

“Not yet awakened, he is connected to those two.”

Terra
Click to enlarge

In July this year, Square-Enix is releasing the Kingdom Hearts Complete Visual Art Book in Japan. It includes some of Tetsuya Nomura’s artwork from all of the Kingdom Hearts games.

This image is of the actual cover of the book. If you click it, you’ll see a version where I put the higher quality version of the artwork from the official website over it to make it easier to see enlarged. The actual book doesn’t include the words “Kingdom Hearts II Final Mix+” on the cover.

JP¥1,800.00 (~US$15, ~GB£7.50, ~EU€11, ~AU$18.15, ~CA$16.50, ~NZ$20.40)

TheWertle has done a couple more photos of Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+ Ultimania. The first is conceptual artwork of an armoured version of Xemnas. The second is conceptual artwork of a Final Boss Nobody named “King” in The World That Never Was. Click them to enlarge them:

Also, Zexion’s “Mirage Book” is actually called “Lexicon” (a reference book). It’s now confirmed that his element is “Illusion” as well.

Update: TheWertle also took a photo of some sketches by Tetsuya Nomura of Marluxia’s Final (3rd) Form:

Thanks to DDragonWhisper for getting the translation of the “Winnie The Pooh” story of Another Report from Kingdom Hearts Volume 4 of the Manga series: