Lone Immortus
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SIS Book 4 Chapter 92: Riddle and Qunjara
🕑 Added 2021-02-22 00:50:01 +0000 UTC'I mostly expected a warning but the person's entire being, soul included, just exploding? Thankfully my control over Earth's souls stopped her's from outright getting destroyed but what if I didn't have said control?' Daz thought as he frowned deeply. "I can store her... remains," he said, glancing at the blood and guts that covered the glass box.
"Once we leave this place you can burn or bury her as you see fit. I'll do everything in my power to help," he said, trying his best to react accordingly.
His Ember of Empathy told him a sorry story. The woman who was crying her eyes out and wailing like a banshee gave of strong feelings of distress and self-destruction.
The man on the other hand was calmer though it was like comparing a nuclear bomb to a tsunami; neither were ideal.
'They need time, above all else. Fucking door... Did it have to be so explosive? I'd rather it killed no one but it could have at least, I don't know, acted like the Laughing Skull and just outright killed her and nothing else. If I can't destroy the door when I'm out, I'm certainly putting it under heavy restrictions. Nothing, and I mean nothing, gets to try and fuck with my people's souls,' Daz thought as he waited for a response.
The man who had been quite aggressive to him thus far answered with a lost voice, "... T-That would be... helpful. We... C-Can you go on without us, please? I promise we will catch up to you."
Daz nodded. The man wasn't lying and while he had refused the same request before, the reasons now were far different. He was just an outsider to them and he felt he wouldn't be of any more help by staying, even if the woman knew his true identity.
'I fear how I would have reacted if it was someone I loved dying, let alone so violently. The way she screamed 'Michiru'... Familial love, for certain,' Daz thought. "I'll be heading on to Room 4 then."
He quickly used his Industrial Item Box to clean up what was left of Michiru while the other woman sat there, unmoving and sobbing her eyes out.
He gave her and the man one final glance before opening and stepping through the door in the middle of the room.
Instantly a pungent smell filled his nostrils. Nine corpses lay strewn about the large glass box he found himself in, three of which he recognised.
He still saw the neverending expanse of space outside of the box but this time it was easily the size of a football field, if not a bit larger. A big step up from the last few rooms, that was for certain.
Daz looked closed at the bodies. Enrique, Jorge and the Spanish woman were among them. All dead. 'Letting them go first was a mistake. Just what is this fucking place? All of them were experienced mercenaries... Well, if nothing else I've now found the third group...'
Four men and two women made up the members of the final missing team, each of whom had their bodies mutilated in varying ways. They all had horrific head injuries and differing wounds elsewhere, suggesting they encountered various monsters. "A test of might more difficult than Room 2, it seems..."
His mumbling was answered promptly.
"Test of Might phase 2: Prove your might of mind."
'Might of mind?' He noticed the difference in wording and wondered what it meant, exactly.
A second later the air in the room of glass shifted and warped much like during the first test of might. A being as large as an aeroplane slowly came into existence. It filled 60% of the football-field-sized room.
The being was covered in shimmering white scales and it had fourteen limbs, four legs and ten massive wings. The wings were pointed and sleek. Every since of its body was covered in the white scales and they looked hard, harder than anything Daz had ever seen.
Four large horns protruded from the thing's head, two on either side and each easily as long as Crusher was tall.
It's chin also seemed horned though it was a single horn a bit shorter than the other ones. It gave the creature a very angular face, Daz felt.
"A dragon?" Daz muttered in shock and awe. It was the only thing that came to mind but even that word didn't do the being justice.
The Frost Phoenix was more of a dragon than this majestic existence. At least that was the right size, this thing was easily ten or twenty times larger than the monster that had so easily killed Ger, Sarah and Jordan so long ago.
Daz felt like an ant in front of it, both in size at power. He knew his access to the system wasn't being restricted but every cell in his body told him to stay perfectly still. Fleeing would be meaningless. He didn't even need his Survivor's Instinct to know this to be a fact.
Its eyes the size of atlases blinked slowly as if it was confused for a moment, not knowing exactly where it was. Some air escaped its nostrils and blew onto the nearby Daz.
It absolutely obliterated all of the corpses on the ground into specks of dust and the air pressure rocked Daz's entire body, threatening to make in crumble from the outside-in. "WHERE AM I?"
It was a simple question but the sheer power in it's voice made Daz cough up blood and his eardrums instantly exploded. His eyes felt like they, too, would pop given the pressure of a single word this being had spoken. Thankfully, they endured, however.
Taking advantage of its baffled state, he summoned Hamson, Rimmy's main body and all three of his clones. His gems appeared behind him and both Reika and Mofolo took the cue to merge with Hamson.
The monster slowly looked down and noticed the force preparing to potentially attack it. "A WEAPON THAT CAN INJURE ME? INTERESTING. IT IMITATES THAT OF A SYSTEM GOD'S. WHERE IS THIS PLACE, MORTAL?"
Daz didn't know if he was just lucky by investing in pressure resistance or if whatever power in the voice just wasn't quite enough to instantly kill him due to his high defensive stats.
Regardless, his Lifeforce and Regeneration were struggling deeply to keep his body in one piece. Even his soul was slowly crumbling, only being held together by Soul Shell. 'It's intelligent and hasn't attacked me immediately like the tentacle thing did. I need time to recover so I should avoid being curt with my words here to buy my body time to recover. Maybe I can make it out of this.'
Rimmy was handling the pressure far better than he was and his friend's healing aura was working wonders to help keep him alive too.
"This is Earth," he answered, thankful that his vocal cords hadn't snapped in their entirety. "A planet under trial to join the greater system. This is specifically Door 6,796, formerly Door 7,254. It's a dungeon of some kind that tests your honesty and might. This room is a test of the might of one's mind, from my understanding."
"I SEE. INTERESTING A LOWER BEING OF SUCH A WORLD CAN ENDURE MY PRESENCE. I WONDER IF I MADE A DEAL WITH THIS BEING SOME EONS AGO... FORCING MY ARRIVAL IS IMPOSSIBLE SO IT MUST BE SO. A TEST OF ONE'S MENTAL STRENGTH, YES? I HAVE LITTLE INTEREST BEING HERE BUT I SUPPOSE I SHALL FULFIL MY END OF WHATEVER BARGAIN MY YOUNGER SELF MADE," the white-scaled dragon-like being gave its long-winded answered, much to Daz's pain.
He felt his relatively new E-ranked skill, Soul Shell, defend his soul before shattering immediately and then slowly reforming itself only to shatter again instantly.
Perhaps his existence as an Archreaper was the only thing keeping his soul intact right now. It was, however, getting damaged slowly as he spent more time in front of the colossal being of immense power.
'I'll die after about... ten, fifteen minutes? Damn, Survivor's Instinct is giving me fuzzy readings. I need to just got through this as quickly as possible to survive? I can definitely try,' he said to himself.
"THE PRIOR LOWER BEINGS, HOW WERE THEY TESTED? AH. MENTAL ATTACKS. CRUDE, BUT NOT WRONG EXACTLY," the thing said to itself, injuring Daz even further.
"Please... please don't attack me mentally. Just living while listening to you speak and weathering your breath is a struggle," Daz said with honesty as he fought against the damage threatening his life as best as he could. "Test me, do not kill me. The door will do that for you if... I fail."
"THERE IS WISDOM IN YOUR WORDS AND ENOUGH CHARM TO SWAY EVEN MY OWN OPINION. NO MATTER. I WOULD NOT BE SO CRUDE MYSELF. A RIDDLE, THEN. SOMETHING SIMPLE YET WHICH TESTS THE MIND, YES?" the dragon asked.
Daz nodded immediately. 'I can probably figure out a riddle with my Intelligence. If nothing else, it's a chance to live.'
"VERY WELL. LET'S SEE... A RIDDLE SOMEONE OF YOUR KNOWLEDGE KNOWS THE COMPONENTS TO AND CAN THEORETICALLY DECIPHER THE ANSWER... A PUZZLE OR WORD-PLAY... YES, THIS WILL DO. I WILL GIVE YOU TWO TRIES AT ANSWERING, MORTAL. FAIL BOTH AND I WILL BE FORCED TO ALLOW THIS PLACE TO RECORD YOU. AM I UNDERSTOOD?" the being of immense power asked.
'Record? Is that what it's doing when it kills us? Recording us somehow?' Daz thought as he clenched his fist to his chest. The longer sentences of this thing were a real challenge to not collapse to when spoken. "Perfectly."
[Soul Shell has reached level 2.]
"GOOD. THERE IS A LAKE. UPON THIS LAKE, YOU SEE A SHIP. UPON THIS SHIP YOU SEE IT IS FILLED TO THE BRIM WITH PEOPLE. YOU LOOK AWAY. WHEN YOU LOOK BACK THIS SHIP HAS NOT SUNK BUT YOU CAN'T SEE A SINGLE PERSON IN SIGHT. EXPLAIN," the dragon posed its riddle.
"May I have some time to answer? I do not wish to rush to conclusions without properly thinking about it," Daz asked, hoping not only to do as he had said but to gain enough time to ease the strain on his soul and repair his damaged body.
He had 10 to 15-minutes if the being kept talking. If it was kept to just breathing? He could likely restore his body with Rimmy's help and he'd have an hour before his soul collapsed, he theorised. Not that he intended to wait that long.
"THIS PLACE DOES NOT RESTRICT ME IN THIS REGARD. TAKE AS MUCH TIME AS YOU NEED, MORTAL. I AM IN NO HURRY," it responded with a little nod of its humungous head before it laid down and got comfortable.
'Good. Now, first, I have no idea what the answer is so I will genuinely need to think about it. System, you won't give me the answer, will you?' Silence met him. 'Thought not. Was worth a try though. Second, this is clearly the first time this... dragon thing has been summoned here for this test. The others were tested in a different manner by something else. How does it decide?'
He assumed a cross-legged position on the floor of the glass box as he held his jaw in thought. 'The truth tests seem to be identical but maybe the might ones are personalised? Maybe in a way to push each individual person to their own limits? What would I have face instead of the tentacle monster had I all my clones and Rimmy with me?'
He glanced at his tense companions and added, 'Speaking of which, the acting king, two crucial rebuilding units and the centre of our local religion just fucking vanished to help me out. I need to get out of here as fast as possible.'
He turned his focus to the matter at hand, the riddle. 'I've never actually solved a riddle before. More due to the fact I've never been given one rather than my ineptitude. Still, this is Rose's domain, not mine. Perhaps I can use the dice to sus out the answer for me?'
He considered it for a moment before shaking his head. 'I doubt I'd be hit by lightning but I don't want to know what -10,000 Luck will do to me in this monster's presence... I do wonder what it actually is. The Yaoguai seems so harmless when I mentally compare the two.'
He tapped his cheek with his finger a little. 'Well, there are common rules to riddles, no? The answer is usually far simpler than it seems. They are designed to make you overthink. That, or they're just poorly made. A ship, people, looking away, no people. Where is the link?'
Daz furrowed his brow. 'My first thought would be they jumped off but can I be sure? Two answers before I'm killed by this door. I can't really find a single thing that's particularly out of place in the ridd-... Single.'
"Are the people on the ship couples? As in, romantically involved? Every last one of them? Hence, not a single person to be seen when I turn my head back around," Daz asked, hopeful his inspired answer hadn't cost him half of his total attempts.
"DECISIVE. LOGICAL. THERE WAS NO FEAR NOT IRRATIONALITY IN YOUR THOUGHT PROCESS, JUST RAW AND PURE ATTEMPTS TO COMPLETE THE OBSTACLE BEFORE YOU. VERY UNUSUAL FOR A MORTAL. I AM IMPRESSED. IT WAS NOT A DIFFICULT RIDDLE BUT YOU HAVE NEVER ANSWERED ONE BEFORE IN YOUR LIMITED LIFESPAN. IT WAS A NEW SORT OF TRIAL FOR YOUR MIND WHICH YOU PASSED WITH EASE. WELL DONE, MORTAL," the white scaled being praised.
[Soul Shell has reached level 3.]
'It's going to take weeks to fix this damage to my soul,' Daz thought. 'Wait. You can read minds?'
"AS A QUNJARA I AM CAPABLE OF MUCH," it answered in a coy manner. "THIS WAS ENTERTAINING. ENLIGHTENING, EVEN. PERHAPS I SHOULD MAKE MORE DEALS WITH ENTITIES OF POWER AS MY YOUNGER SELF USED TO DO. SHOULD YOU EVER COME ACROSS ONE OF MY KIND, MENTION ME. IT WOULD BE A GREAT JOY TO SEE HOW A MORTAL SUCH AS YOURSELF GROWS. PERHAPS YOU WILL BE ABLE TO HEAR MY REAL VOICE THEN, NOT THE SCREAMING THAT SHAKES YOUR SOUL AT THIS VERY MOMENT."
"How can I mention you when I don't even know your name? You are a Qunjara. That's all I know," Daz pointed out while he held his chest and breathed heavily.
He could maybe learn more with The Crystal Digger's Master Identification, but frankly, the last thing he wanted to do was piss this amiable thing off. Perhaps it wouldn't be quite so friendly if he breached its privacy.
"AND IT IS ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW. FAREWELL, MORTAL," the enormous dragon-like being said before it winked out of existence.
The pressure immediately lifted entirely and Daz's body began healing rapidly. His soul though was easily seven of eight times weaker than normal. His immunity to soul attacks likely wouldn't work in the state he was in right now and forget weeks, it may even take months to cure the damage.
"Statement: You have proven your might of mind. You may proceed to Room 5, The Treasury."
"So this was the final test room?" Daz sighed deeply, though he remained rooted to the floor with his legs crossed. "I'll wait thirty minutes for them. If I don't, they'll definitely die, especially given that woman's mental state after the girl died. My kingdom may need Alpha and Rimmy but those two need my advice right now. And should it prove useless, the least I can do is get their bodies to their kin."
