Without wasting any time, Tacha chased after the rolling prism.

To her surprise, the rolling rock was quite fast, always a step ahead of her. Each time she was close to grabbing it, it would avoid her hand with a slide to the side, as if it had the limbs to dodge. Rather than twelve faced prism, it looked more similar to a slippery eel.

The chase continued until they reached the ladder at the other end of the tunnel. With a smirk, Tacha could not help but gloat at the fact that the slippery item had trapped itself. She was very glad that the secret tunnel was hidden beneath a hatch.

The prism rolled on the sides, searching for a way out of its predicament. Seeing that, the granny couldn’t help but laugh “Hehe, you have nowhere to run now” with a tremble the prism resigned to its fate.

Feeling victory within her grasp, Tacha stepped forward confidently to pick the item up. At the last moment it jumped upwards, slipping from her grasps.

Widening her eyes, the grandma tried to reach the prism, only to miss it by a hair’s breath. She watched, as it smugly shaked its body as soon as it touched the ground, only for it to run away at full speed again.

Tacha felt that a vein was ready to pop off. She couldn’t believe that an item could be so… smug!

The dodecahedron jumped around like a cricket, but halfway back it stumbled and the granny did not let the opportunity slip.

With a jump, she catched the prism midway. She felt proud of herself for having done that despite her years.

Tacha felt the dodecahedron tremble in her palm. Narrowing her eyes, she examinated it carefully. Not noticing anything strange she gave it a good shake, hoping for something good to happen.

She made her way back to the room as she was shaking the poor prism like a professional bartender. Once there she stopped, taking another look at the prism.

She felt like it was… a shade paler?

Suddendly it all became dark around her. Tacha looked around, it didn’t seem like it was a trap since there was no notification from the system.

There was nothing around her, but when she took a step, a ripple of light would burst outwards from the ground like a splash in a pond. Feeling like a kid, she played around with the light effect, stepping the ground with different rhytms.

Bright white footsteps appeared on the ground with a pit-patter sound, rushing forward. Before she could even follow them, another set of bright footsteps appeared from her right, those too heading outwards.

Then, like a tide many more footsteps appeared all around her, all heading away from her. Only one spot was all devoid of them. In her eyes it appeared like a dark path among a sea of light.

At first she thought that she had to follow the blinding traces, however now it looked like she was meant to follow the dark road.

Hesitating, she stepped forward towards the darkness. On her first step, and all of those after she left behind a footprint of light, similar to the ones that had appeared before.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Her heart fluttering by the magical appearance she walked forward, watching as she left behind the shimmering traces.

Looking back the sea of light appeared so far away, now just like a fleeble streak of light stretching across the distance like a spiderweb. It was stretching everywhere against common sense.

The footstep web reached the sky and the deepest of depths. They gave her the illusion of a detailed land with both mountains and canyons, even though she knew well from earlier that the place she had just left was nothing but flat.

Tacha kept walking forward, until light blinded her. She was back in the study, among the books and ancient items, the prism still in hand. Unlike before, the slick item was still.

There was no movement and no further reaction from shaking it more. Was the experience she just had an illusion brought by phisical touch with the prism?

As if to give a response to her question, the system made itself known.

The Special class ‘Pathfinder’ has been obtained

Pathfinder

Base class (Special)

(Lvl. 1 – 0/1.000 exp)

From the ruins of the forgotten empire, each of the survivors vowed to find a way out from their predicament. When the problem at hand seems unsurmountable and the solution impossible to find, one must find their own way.

To search for a new path, to lead through an uncharted way.

- Charting Compass (3 Mp): Gain a hint for your next objective

She changed class? So suddendly?

And she gained a brand new skill too. Tacha was feeling very excited for that reason alone: that was her first skill!

Though it was a bit disappointing that it was not a combat oriented skill. But since it was a skill useful for quests and such it was still a good gain.

And unlike other games, Elysium Online did not have quest markers to show the way. The resolution of the quest had to be accomplished fully by the player’s efforts.

Seeing that the prism had become as energetic as a normal item, she put it on her inventory. She didn’t check it yet, for she feared it was all a trick to let her guard down. She would have all the time of the world later anyway.

Right now she was curios about the new skill, so she activated it right away.

Charting Compass activated.

Select the quest to receive a clue for:

- Corruption Runs Deep II

- Tears of the Moon

- The Curse of Styx

So she had to choose a specific quest for the clue. It was a good thing, she had feared that it would give her a clue with no contest.

Tacha tapped on her arm deep in thought. She didn’t think that she needed a clue for the first quest, she still had the other two leads in case the librarian investigation turned out with nothing.

Only the other two remained. She was certainly curious about the Mark, but she felt that she had no leads at all for the ‘Tears of the Moon’ quest. And so, she choose it.

Ding!

Lumashir’s Moondrop is shimmering.

The necklance is showing you a memory.

In front of her eyes, the surroudings shifted. She was not in the little study under the library anymore, she was now in the dark underground where she had fought against the monstrous Layla.

But there was no slime lurking in the dark, only a dying man dressed in ancient ceremonial clothes, a shimmering agate necklance around his neck.

His features didn’t look entirely human. She couldn’t be sure about his ears that were covered by the fur-like headress, His mouth was extended outwards, resembling like that of a dog and his hands resembled claws.

The man panted, on the verge of taking his last breath. His amber colored eyes were barely open, but stubbornly they kept staring at the secret passage.

Dark purple markings were swirling around his neck and left arm. It was obvious that he was in great pain.

However he was clutching something firmly in his hands. It was a long bronze stick with a sharpened end. It looked exactly like the Worn Down Ruler that she had collected as spoils from the slimey boss.

And just like that, the scene disappeared.