Akira froze in his bent-down position for only a few seconds as his mind raced to process what had just happened. Just seconds before there was a lot of noise from the ever-changing gardens and the old mansion but now… there was only complete silence.
“Yap?” asked Fluffball as he looked around at their new surroundings.
As Akira stood up straight he was able to take in the view of the new room that they had moved to. The walls were all glowing crystal mirrors that reflected the image of Akira and Fluffball multiple times making them look like kaleidoscopes as they reflected the mirrors from the other walls as well. The floor and ceiling were both an opaque black metal that did not reflect anything.
Not that far away from Akira and Fluffball was a pumpkin-sized floating ice-blue crystal that was in the shape of a diamond.
“My luck has been terrible lately…,” said Akira, his voice echoing off the walls as he looked at the floating crystal. He reached into his pack and pulled out a gold coin flicking it at the crystal before hiding behind his shield and peeking at the crystal to see what it did.
Clang! The gold coin just bounced off and clattered to the floor rolling back towards Akira stopping only a few steps away from him.
“Yap?” asked Fluffball, searching the room but not finding what he was looking for.
“I don’t know where they went. I’m just glad you were teleported here with me. I feel bad vibes from this place…”
“YAP!” said Fluffball proudly.
Akira silently activated the [Call of the wolf-pack] skill and let out a sigh when Nox 1 & 2 jumped out of his dark shadow. While Akira was happy to add the two back to their small party, Fluffball was not all that pleased and huffed and sniffed looking away from the two.
Nox 1 & 2 ignored Fluffball and looked around curiously at the mirrored room.
‘How odd for you to bring us to a place like this…’ said Nox 1.
‘Indeed,’ said Nox 2.
“Wait, do you guys know what this place is?” asked Akira.
‘No. It just feels familiar is all.’
“How do we get out of here?” asked Akira as he scanned the walls for an opening but found nothing but his face staring back at him.
‘Maybe you should try doing what you always do and touch everything in the room.,’ suggested Nox 1.
‘Indeed That seems to work a little too well for him. Why not try that floating crystal over there?’ said Nox 2.
“Eh… I tried throwing something at it already but nothing happened.
“Yap!” said Fluffball, not wanting to be left out of the conversation.
“Well… I guess I could try it. Just make sure the three of you are touching me as well. I don’t want to be separated from you if something does happen,” said Akira as he walked forward he reached down for a second to pick up the gold coin and put it in his pocket before walking up to the floating ice blue crystal.
Fluffball with his mini form jumped up onto Akira’s shoulders trying to get comfortable while Nox 1 & 2 put a shadowy paw on one of his armored feet.
“Here goes nothing…,” said Akira as he reached out his armored hand and tapped the crystal lightly.
A soft ting was heard and Akira felt his body vibrate and his vision blur before returning to normal.
They were no longer in the mirrored room but a long hallway.
“One point for Fluffball. That crystal was indeed a means of moving around… but who built this place… and why?” said Akira as he looked around for another floating crystal but found nothing.
As they started to walk down the hallway of mirrors Akira noticed many of the mirrors were deformed or covered in an odd sheen of moisture which caused the reflections to be distorted greatly making the already crazy kaleidoscope walls even more bizarre to look at.
When they reached the end of the long hallway there was another floating blue crystal which Akira touched without hesitation and once again felt his body vibrate and his vision blur as the small party was moved to their next unknown destination.
As his vision cleared Akira’s attention was immediately pulled to a massive red crystal that was floating in front of him at the center of the new large domed room. Unlike the previous room and hallway, the ceiling was also full of misshapen mirrors. Floating around the massive red crystal were several medium-sized crystals.
‘Wanderer… you are the 7th person to come before me,’ said a mental voice that sounded more like two rocks rubbing against each other. At the same time as the mental voice spoke, red glowing text floated in the air below the massive crystal.
Unfortunately, it was in the ancient language and Akira was still a novice and could not understand 90% of it.
What he did manage to decipher made him guess that the whole text was the exact same thing that the mental voice had just said to him. Now was not the time to start learning how to read so he only focused on listening to the rocky voice.
‘You, like those who came before you, will be able to receive the reward to aid you in going to the underground palace… IF… you pass the challenge,’ said the slow rocky mental voice.
After a long pause, the mental voice once again spoke. ‘Prepare yourself! The challenge starts now!’
The massive crystal changed from red to an icy blue, while the floating crystals orbiting it all turned red and stopped their movement.
A flash of bright red light burst out of each of the crystals which started to transform as they unfolded from the diamond shape into that of a skinny waist-high humanoid crystal being with blade-like arms and legs and a triangular crystal head. There were no eyes, mouths, or ears on their small triangular heads.
Crash!
The crystal Fighters hurtled to the ground and surrounded Akira.
Kashing! Kashing! The crystal warriors smacked and rubbed their crystal blade hands against each other creating loud noises as they stared at Akira.
Akira stared back at them, his shield and sword ready for the fight to start.
Fluffball jumped off of Akira’s shoulder and grew back into his large adult form while letting out a low growl which the crystal warriors paid no attention to.
Nox 1 & 2 were silently pacing back and forth behind Akira as they looked at the crystal warriors that surrounded them.
As one, the crystal warriors stopped their hand movements and punched forward aiming their sharp blades at Akira’s vitals.
Clang! KACHA! Bam!
Akira traded several sword blows with the crystal warriors and used his shield to block others and slam back the approaching warriors in front of him.
Fluffball and Nox 1 & 2 helped fend off the other crystal warriors from the rear allowing him to focus on the fight in front of him.
After over a dozen attacks exchanged with his sword Akira frowned as he saw not even a scratch appear on the smooth surface of the crystal warriors.
Even after using the [Sword slash] skill, he found that there were still no signs of damage…
Akira saw that Fluffball and Nox 1&2’s attacks were doing no damage as well and were only able to knock the crystal warriors back as they repeatedly tried to get past them and attack Akira.
‘If this continues like this we will be drained of all our stamina and energy…If my sword won’t work what about blunt damage?’ though Akira as he quickly put away his sword and pulled out a heavy mace from his pack. It was one of the many pieces of equipment that he had looted from a demigod that had been killed so it was not too shoddy of a weapon.
Using his full strength he grasped the mace with both hands and swung it toward the crystal warrior nearest to him.
Whack!
Cracks appeared on the small head of the crystal warrior before crumbling to rubble. Even without a head, the crystal warrior continued to fight as if nothing had happened.
“This was the correct choice! Fluffball, freeze a few of these crystal warriors. I want to see if I can shatter them with my attacks!” growled Akira.
“RAWR!” said Fluffball agreeing to Akira’s suggestion before shooting out several ice shard attacks that slammed into crystal warriors fully enveloping them in ice.
BAM! CRACK!
With his one attack, the frozen warriors completely crumbled into small ice shards.
“Let’s do this Fluffball!”
“RAWR!”
With Akira and Fluffball teaming up to take down the Crystal warriors Nox 1 & 2 were forced to herd and keep the rest away while the other two slowly smashed through the other crystal warriors one by one.
Ding!
-
Secret mission complete!
Quickly grab your reward before it disappears!
Crack!
Akira looked up from the system message and saw that the massive blue crystal was crumbling as several large cracks appeared and large chunks started to fall to the ground.
When the large shards of crystal stopped falling, all that remained of the old crystal was an adult head-sized pure blue diamond crystal that was floating peacefully in the air along with a glowing leather map piece.
Akira grabbed out with both his armored hands and pulled the two floating items to him, quickly shoving them into his pack as he began to feel his body vibrate and his vision blur.
Ding!
-
You have successfully received the magic mirror key that is needed to unlock the underground palace…
…if you can find it.
When his vision cleared once more Arron found himself once again standing in the deep crevice along with Zundar and the others.
“AKIRA!” Shouted Zundar right next to his ear nearly deafening him.
“WHY ARE YOU SHOUTING!” shouted Akira right back at Zundar as he jumped away from the large Minos who looked to be ready to smack Akira for some reason.
“Are you okay? You have been standing there as if you were frozen for several minutes now,” said Zundar as he lowered his large fist.
Klyn used several buffs on Akira to try and counter any ill effects he may be under while also walking around him and inspecting him to see if there were any wounds or poisons that had managed to get to him.
“He seems fine,” said Klyn.
“Wait… I didn’t disappear in front of you?” asked Akira.
“Of course not. I was calling out to you but you did not respond so I was going to try and wake you up,” said Zundar pointing to his right fist.
“Zundar, as hard as this might be to believe… I rather you not punch me…” said Akira.
The experience he just went through was too wild for him to even begin to try and explain. He did not want to sound like some crazy person to everyone around him.
“So are we going to leave or are we just going to stand here?” asked Zundar.
“Yeah sorry. Let’s get out of here,” said Akira, turning back to the portal and touching it with his sword.
With a bright flash, he along with the rest of the party, were teleported back up onto the dry ground high above them a short distance from the hill.
Everyone was not celebrating the completion of their fight as they were all silently looking at the log cabin that was now only a few dozen yards in front of them.
It was the same cabin they had seen back in the clearing of the woods!
The door to the cabin opened and the old man using a wooden cane walked out and beckoned Akira toward him.
Everyone silently turned to Akira to see what was going on but he had no clue either. Still, he decided to just go over and see what the old man wanted.
“Young man since you are still alive… I see you took my advice to heart. I will offer you a reward of proper value for the cursed doll. Now that you no longer need it, I suggest you take this offer.”
“What’s so special about this?” asked Akira as he pulled out the cursed doll from his pack.
The old man was silent for some time before sighing and saying. “The girl that you met was my grand-daughter… she has been entering her rebellious stage lately so I needed an outsider to catch her off guard and bring her back out of her hiding spot.”
The old man sighed as he picked up a flask and took a large gulp of the liquid inside it.
The doll that was in Arron’s hands turned to look at the old man. The sickly sweet voice of the young girl who had been captured in the mansion came out of the doll’s mouth as it moved to ask a simple question.
“Grandpa, what’s a pervert?”
Pffffftttt!
The old man spat out all the liquid in his mouth and began coughing and slapping his chest as he tried to recover from the half-swallowed liquid that went down his throat in surprise.
“Who has been teaching you such words?” asked the old man.
“Him. He taught it to me after I told him about your secret books,” said the doll girl as she pointed at Akira with her cloth arm.
“Wha… wha… What are you doing snooping around in my secret collection!? You have to be an adult to see such things! Don’t tell your Mother and Father that you saw it!.. or we’ll both be in trouble…”
