As the door slowly opened, creaking on its ancient hinges, I looked on in shocked confusion. The password had been in English, a language that I didn’t think existed in Ferrum. The only time I had seen anything written in English since being reborn was when I’d get messages from the System.

Sure, the original puzzle in the game had been in English, but I assumed that had just been an in-universe translation. If your character understood what was being said, the game would translate it into English. I initially spoke the password in the Ancient tongue because the cairn was built before written history.

You speak that language, Johan?

The voice in my head asked me that question in an attempt to get a better grasp on the confusing situation. It was self-evident that I spoke English. He just wanted me to confirm this truth.

Yes. That was my mother tongue, though I certainly didn’t expect to run into that language here.

I stepped forward past the door and into the cairn. My body was just one step into the cairn when I felt a force try to wrench control away from me. Though the force was much stronger than it had been the first time, I was ready for it.

I stumbled slightly as I fought Thale for control of my muscles. The force pressing against my mind stopped after a few seconds, and I could sense the exhaustion that had taken hold of Thale. Any amount of mental exertion would drain him for hours, and that short mental battle would prevent him from making another attempt to wrest control from me until I was done with the cairn.

By the gods below, stop being so stubborn! If you die, I’ll die too!

Paying little attention to the voice in my head, I looked around at the underground chamber I had just entered. As I expected, the first chamber of the cairn had three statues near its center and a large stone door on the opposite side. The walls, ceiling, and floor of the chamber was adorned with marble tiles.

There’s nothing to be afraid of, Thale. I’ve already memorized the three puzzles in this cairn.

How do you know that the puzzles haven’t changed? Your first attempt to solve the door’s password was wrong. If there had been a trap on that door, we’d already be dead.

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I’ve also memorized where the traps are.

I pointed one finger at the door on the opposite side of the chamber. As I did so, my Hellfire spark jumped to the torches lining the walls, lighting them as it passed.

There’s a fire trap attached to the ceiling, and there’s a pit trap attached to a floor puzzle in the next room. Even if I were to activate the fire trap, we wouldn’t be harmed.

My body wouldn’t be harmed, but everything I had brought with me would be destroyed. Losing my wand would set me back monetarily, but it certainly wouldn’t be a serious problem.

How do you know these things, Johan? You’ve never given me a sufficient answer to this question.

As I said to Beltane, I’m an emissary sent by Death. That wasn’t a lie. I was sent here from another world when I died. In my previous world, I was able to view Ferrum and interact with it.

With the chamber now well lit, I inspected the three statues in the center of the chamber much more thoroughly. I knew from experience that the statues would depict the God of War, the God of Magic, and the Goddess of Nature. To solve the puzzle, I would have to rotate the God of War to the south, the God of Magic to the north, and the Goddess of Nature to the east.

Before reaching this cairn, you were supposed to go on a long quest where you would find three slips of paper with three different messages.

The God of War faces downward toward the body.

The God of Magic faces upward toward the mind.

The Goddess of Nature faces toward the land of ancient forests.

As I looked at the statues, I withdrew my pocket watch and said, “Mephistopheles, could you please point north?”

The watch whirred as its hands moved to be synchronous with one another and then adjusted to point unerringly in one direction. I slowly tilted the watch, and its hands moved in tandem with the tilting in order to continue pointing north.

With my eyes still on my pocket watch, I turned to the statue of the God of Magic. There, I saw something strange. Attached to the God of Magic’s belt was a small circular object that closely resembled my own pocket watch. I also saw that the statue was dressed like a low-level Mage. The God of Magic held a wand in one hand, but he did not hold a staff in the other.

The statue of the God of Magic I remembered from the game carried a long staff in his right hand. I briefly turned my head toward the other two statues and noticed that each one was different from what I remembered.

My eyes turned back toward the statue of the God of Magic, and I found myself looking directly into its eyes. Despite my short stature, the statue was the exact same height as me. I looked at the statue’s face, looked down at its body, and turned to look at the wand it carried in its hand before realizing something.

The statue was me.

A severe teenager with piercing eyes was carved into that stone edifice. He looked thin and weak, but an adult’s intelligence shone in his eyes. Fear began to fill my body as I realized that the statue portrayed me at that exact moment. I was the exact same height as the statue, and I wore the exact same outfit.

I circled around the statue, and my worries increased. The back of the cloak worn by the statue was torn in three parallel scratches. It was an exact replica of the cloak I was wearing at that very moment.