The First Magic

Elijah's idea didn't work. Neither did my idea to light a fire so bright that the shadows wouldn't move with the sun, Mrs. Xiang's idea to cast magical attacks at the frozen figures, or Kristen's idea involving mirrors that I went along with, though I still didn't quite understand what she was going for. It took us that number of tries before we realized that we should leave someone behind to shake the others awake when we started writhing in pain as we felt ourselves burning alive, which really cut down on the nightmarish suffering aspect of the puzzle.

"We must be looking at this wrong," Kristen said. She was the most engaged in solving the puzzle, which was interesting, as she had been confounded and dismissive of other aspects of the Tower. I guessed she was just good at puzzles. "That stands to reason, but how?" I said. "So, what do we know about what's happening here?" she said. "We are in a replica of a school of magic, where these two individuals were somehow important. The magic works differently from the Tower. The only monster we encountered was called a hero. I don't know, it's not really slotting together for me," I said. "Maybe it has something to do with the raven and mask motif?" Mr. Xiang said. "I don't know the symbolism there, dear," Mrs. Xiang said. "Carrion birds are usually associated with death and decay. Masks are pretty obvious- deception, performance, usually with an allusion to the idea that we all actually hide parts of our inner selves," Elijah said. "Where'd you learn that?" Kristen said. "School," Elijah said. "Look, Elijah, yes, illusion and death are clearly the themes of this challenge. I just don't see how that helps with solving the puzzle," I said. "I bet there's a trick in there somewhere. Don't think about how to solve the puzzle, think of how to break it. Or, twist it, or whatever. We won't solve this by sliding tiles in a correct pattern. Elijah's right, this is a message sort of a puzzle, I'm sure of it," Kristen said. "Well, there is something I could try. I have no idea what will happen, but I'm willing to have a go," I said. The idea was half-baked at best, but out of all of my spells, only one seemed to be capable of doing anything interesting at all. "Dangerous?" Mr. Xiang said. "Only in that it'll cost a lot of mana, maybe eat into my hitpoints," I said. "Are you willing to do that," Mrs. Xiang said.

I didn't answer, just nod. The target of my pseudoportal spell was very abstract. I had to target either a person I recognized, or an area I had been to. This could, almost literally, be anyone and anywhere. As I went through the Journal to look at the exact description of the spell, I flipped through the Chat and saw my name in all caps.

Chat

ALEX! Copy of the shield spell, now! -Artemis

I was lucky to see the message, it was only from seconds ago, I had heard the scratching. I quickly drew the sigil and incantation in the Journal and a few tense minutes later read-

Close one. Thank you, Alex. How are you doing? -Artemis.

Weird time puzzle. I hate puzzles, but we're working on it. -Alex

I love puzzles, send me the deets. -Zack

Focus on the fucking robot monkeys, Zack. -Hannah

Thanks, if we can't figure it out I'll call, but we have a few ideas still. -Alex

With that I closed the Journal, after double-checking that, indeed, the pseudoportal spell had the vague target that I remembered. It didn't even specify that the targeted person had to be alive. That said, if it locked on to the soul, the spell was unable to traverse different planes of existence and would fail for that reason, and if it focused on the body you'd only get a portal on top of a corpse. I was going by what I'd heard from several devils about souls too, so I really couldn't be sure of anything.

I picked one of the two figures- the woman in the silver mask, because at least I could focus on some sort of a face as I'd seen it on her statue, and cast the spell. The tear in reality opened just like it had every time before, but for a moment I thought it had been pointless. Through the portal we could see the same pair standing in this same room, at the same distance. As both of their faces were covered and, apparently, neither of them were emotive speakers, it took a few seconds to notice that they were indeed swaying and subtly moving their hands in conversation.

"Okay, so something is happening," I said. "What does that mean?" Kristen said. "The spell creates a sort of a portal between me and my target, if they are in the same, uh, dimension. It worked, but I don't get it. It should just show them frozen in time if the two figures over there are actual people, and it should have just not worked if they weren't. Maybe there's an identical room to this one?" I said. "Time," Elijah said. "Hold on, yes! Exactly, time!" Kristen said, and she was almost jumping with excitement. "Did anyone ever take you to an escape room back on Earth?" I said. "Pfft, hardly. I had to organize and pay for it for my coworkers, and still only three people showed up," Kristen said. "What do you mean by time," Mrs. Xiang said.

"So, this is all some sort of an illusion, right? But we can see through the illusion somewhat if you use that window thing of yours. Well, what if we walked closer, so that the quote-unquote time passes until it's right before the fire?" Kristen said. "Exactly. Time, entropy, illusion, death, magic, the vibes vibe," Elijah said. "If you say vibes another time, I will begin referring to you as my young ward," I said.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. "Huh?" Elijah said. "A youth about town. Forget it, that's a good idea. We should at least check it out," I said.

So, we walked through the room once more. We all had a pretty good feel about when the fire was going to start by now, so we got just far enough. Then, I cast my pseudoportal spell again, targeting the man this time. I figured if he was literally in my line of sight, it should be enough to target him.

It worked, and this time I saw a sight that was quite a bit different from what we had seen before. Instead of the two in calm conversation, we saw the two figures, their backs to the portal, facing the entrance, which, in real life, was behind us. In the doorway there stood the most beautiful man I had ever seen, magazine covers included, blond haired and bare chested laughing as he was pouring oil on the ground and holding a lit torch up high.

"Hey everybody, I think I figured it out, but it's going to suck," I said. I was basically out of mana just from the two casts of pseudoportal. That new perk better work. I cast conjure ice three times in rapid succession, one to kill the man, one to knock the torch out of his hand, and one to be sure it's out.

I coughed blood and dropped to one knee.

It was not as bad as before, of course. Between my higher health and the Blood Magic ability, I was taking a lot less damage casting from hitpoints, but three spells still knocked me down nearly to half health. This was more because my low HP than the actual cost of the spells, but I still felt it. I also sort of felt something that I hadn't noticed before. There was a space above my heart that I felt most of the pain radiating from. I don't think I would have noticed it if not for the mention of something about channeling through that part of the body in the stone tablet. Magic. I guess if it followed easy to understand and straightforward rules it wouldn't be quite as magical.

As I was pondering stuff, waiting for the worst of the pain to pass, the room began shifting around us. Rather, the light in the room shifted. It was similar to how it had happened before, but faster. Before I had the time to stand up and look up at the pair of figures in the center of the room, I heard the clank of metal on stone, followed by bone striking stone. As I stood and looked, the two figures, both of which had looked very clearly like living bodies frozen in space, had collapsed into dust and bones. Only two items survived their crumbling- the silver mask of the one on the left, and a single coal black raven feather on the other.

"Let's grab their stuff and get out of here. I have a bad feeling about this," I said. My companions still insisted on more or less following my lead, and we grabbed the stuff. After escaping out of the strange council hall, we found ourselves back where we had come from, with no more obvious signs as to where to go next. When in doubt, check the Journal. The Log had many updates related to solving the puzzle, netting me a total of 639 experience points. I was getting close to level 11, but that wasn't a priority at the moment. More interestingly, two of the new strange challenges had updated. I was going to call them quests.

Log

Echoes of the Past Revealed: 4/4 Chamber of Shadows unlocked.

Arcane Theory challenge completed- Prevented the Fall of the first Magus. Arcane Theory increased to 5. Reward choice pending in Abilities tab

Abilities

Arcane Theory challenge rewards:

Option 1: Knowledge

Option 2: Power

That could be fucking clearer. Leaving both uncircled for now, I flipped over to the Items section to inspect the two items we'd picked up.

Mask of the Silver Empress

This is a unique item. The Mask of the Silver Empress was the masterwork of one of the first enchanters of the multiverse. In many ways outdated, the Mask is of great monetary value and still maintains some unique magical properties. While wearing the mask, your identity will be obscured. Even your closest friends and enemies will not recognize you while wearing it, and will disbelieve your claims of who you are. Instead, they will perceive you as a new person linked to the mask, and view all your actions taken while masked as the actions of a separate individual. Removing the mask in front of someone who knows both your identities will cause dissonant discomfort, but will not break the illusion. The illusion persists even if the mask is removed, so that if you take it off and later put it back on, anyone who has encountered you with the mask on will remember your actions from before and believe your masked persona has returned.

"What the fuck?" I said. "Pardon?" Elijah said. "Sorry, kid, this mask is real peculiar is all. I don't even know if it's useful or not, it's just… odd," I said and handed it over. He read the description too and frowned. "You could use this to do some very bad things and get away with it," he said. "I mean, yeah, I guess so. That said, it's not like there's cops to worry about," I said. "What is it?" Mrs. Xiang said, and we passed the mask around everyone, so that we could all learn what it did from the journal. "It is dangerous. We should keep it secure and out of reach of anybody. One person could destroy the Guild with this," Mrs. Xiang said.

I hadn't really thought about it, but, it was sort of true. I only wondered how it would interact with us all knowing the effects. Likely we'd know that 'the silver mask' was up to shenanigans, but would be incapable of connecting who it was.

"I guess I should hold on to it. If I wanted to destroy the Guild I could probably just do it without the mask, so I have the least reason to abuse it," I said. "Alex…" Elijah said. "No, he's right. That's the solution, at least for now," Kristen said. "Let me look at the feather," I said.

Feather of the Crowfather

This is a unique item. This is a single use item. Allows to seal a demon inside an undead creature. The demon will remain sealed as long as the undead creature survives. There is no other way to break this seal.

"What's with these weird f- freaking items," I said, passing the feather around. "These have to be a part of another puzzle, no?" Kristen said. "I don't know. Both could be useful in the main Tower," Mr. Xiang said. "Maybe they'll be useful in the next puzzle, but if we find a way to not use them we can keep them as rewards," Elijah said. "Maybe we're speculating from incomplete knowledge. Everyone get the update in your logs?" I said. "Chamber of Shadows? Definitely something to do with this Atrium Umbrorum," Elijah said. Since he was churchy and I didn't know anything about Latin, I believed him. "Sounds like we're close to the exit. I worry about Elijah's Vanguard challenge. Just remember that getting out alive is more important than getting challenge rewards," I said. "Yes sir!" Elijah said and I shook my head.

And speaking of challenge rewards, I opened up the Journal again. More power was always good, sure, but I thought I was in as good a position power-wise as I was likely to get. I opened up the journal and circled Knowledge.

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