They waited. The spiral began counting down once again and they watched with nervous anticipation. As the timer came closer to being up, the same steps started to happen. The room darkening, the light spreading from the four pillars, exactly as it had before. Until finally, the timer countdown ran out while the entire gate was glowing a bright yellow. As the timer's symbols all lost their light, so too did the gate. The room lit up once again as if nothing had happened. The gate was still closed, the barrier still stopping them from breaking it down, however, there was now one new difference in the room.
The ground beneath their feet had transformed into the face of a clock, with a glass floor keeping them separated from the clock itself. The hour hand was positioned at the twelve and the minute hand was positioned at the ten. The twelve on the clock was positioned in the same direction as the gate.
The four pillars were still sprouting from the ground, however, they now seemed to be made of color-stained glass. Three of them were a matching green color, except for Toley's, which was a deep red color. Feera quickly noticed one other change in the room, the sign that had previously been their only written hint had new words on it.
It now reads: “North rose.”
The new developments confounded the party, although they did feel as if they had made some progress in the puzzle. Each member immediately set about exploring their new environment to see if there were any new clues. Unfortunately, other than what they could plainly see, there were no other hints to find.
Kara began examining the pillars with Feera as the other two members of the party were looking for any parallels that could be drawn from the pillars, clock, and the new writing. With a hesitant hand, Feera reached forward and pressed the button on her pillar. The color of the pillar changed from green to a pink hue while simultaneously, the minute hand went back to point at nine. Out of curiosity, she pressed it again and it changed into the same dark red as Toley's pillar and the minute hand changed once again to point at eight. Now, two pillars were dark red, while the other two pillars were a vibrant green.
After watching Feera's interaction, Kara stepped up to her own button and quickly pressed it. She expected her pillar to turn pink, as Feera's had. However, instead, the two red pillars changed to the vibrant green color, Kara's pillar turned to a cyan color and the remaining pillar turned into a deep blue color. The face of the clock also slowly moved until the minute hand was pointing at twelve and the hour hand was pointing at three.
Kara stared at the puzzle for a long time. After a while, the rest of the party gave up and decided to leave it to her, the person with an ability suited to this sort of thing. They had gone through a lot in the past few hours and decided to rest, to recuperate their energy in case the need to fight arose again.
They only had around fifteen minutes of rest, however, as it finally clicked for the young half-elf girl. She repeated the words to herself as if reading the sign from earlier again, “All for one, One for all. No one said that the last room's hints didn't apply here too.” Her voice was a whisper as she approached her pillar again, the cyan glass glistening in front of her, she pressed the button once again. A smile grew across her face as she got the expected result. Her pillar turned green as well and the clock moved once more so that the minute hand pointed at twelve and the hour hand pointed at two.
It made sense now, it was incredibly simple. The only thing she could think was that the god of time intentionally made the test easy for them so that they would trick themselves into thinking the correct answer was too simple, that it could not be correct because it was too easy to be the final test.
The pillars all had to be pushed an equal number of times. Red meant a button had been pushed too many and blue meant the button had been pushed too few. When Kara had pushed her button when there were two red and two green pillars, she had made it so that the buttons that were too far ahead became the new goal, making her and Sheeron's pillars show as having too few button pushes. The clock was a hint that gave them the answer, too. It denoted the number of times that they needed to push the buttons to even them out. In the beginning, only Toley's was two presses too many, so the minute hand was two spaces off of twelve. When Feera pressed her button once, it moved the hand to the nine, three spaces from twelve.
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Kara began to laugh. “Ah, it was so incredibly easy this whole time. Sheeron, come push your button twice and let's leave this place.”
Sheeron was confused, but did as he was told. The buttons all matched up to green and both of the clock hands now pointed at twelve. Underneath their feet, the clock changed into the form of a compass rose as the pillars sank into the floor, disappearing entirely. The sign that had provided their hints melded into the wall as if it had never existed, as did the spiral timer, until they now stood in a dungeon room with a compass rose on the floor. The door that had previously been gated and blocked by a barrier was now open, with all signs of the barrier gone.
“Really? That's all there was to it?” Toley said, incredulous.
“Yes, Child.” Replied an unknown, blonde youth as he entered their room through the portal behind where the gate had been. “This Was Not Meant To Be A Difficult Test. You Already Faced Plenty Of Challenges To Get To This Point. It Was Merely Meant To Be For My Amusement. A Payment For My Time After Waking Me.” He finished, confirming his identity as the god of time.
They stared at him, wide-eyed, until Feera spoke up, “Not to ruin the moment of meeting one of the primordial gods in person, but I didn't expect you to look like a kid.”
Toley giggled and Sheeron smacked the back of his head, which caused the god of time to also begin giggling before responding, “No One Ever Does. I Enjoy This Form, Though. There's Just Something So Beautiful About A Mortal Who Has All Of Their Time To Look Forward To.”
Kara nodded, not fully understanding, but not willing to question the whims of one of the most powerful beings in existence. “So, I assume that we have passed your test then, God of Time?”
“Please, Call Me Aevum.” He requested before continuing, “Yes, You Have. It Has Been A Long Time Since I Have Met Mortals Like You.”
“What do you mean, since you've seen mortals clear a dungeon?” Sheeron asked casually, causing Kara to look at him sharply. As if commanding him to be more courteous to a god. Naturally, he ignored her.
“No. One Who Has Befriended One Of My Children.” He said while looking at the party a bit closer, then his eyes locked on Toley. “Oh, What Have We Here? You're No Mortal.”
“What? Of course I am, I'm human, my parents were too!” Toley protested, then thinking of how it could be construed as rude he added, “Your, uh, Godliness.”
Aevum laughed with a bright smile, his laugh like beautiful bell chimes echoing from all around them to their ears. After he settled down, he walked closer to Toley and began to examine him. “Yes, Yes. Your Parents Were, In Fact, Human. However, You Were Not Born Human. You Seem To Be Some Kind Of Pseudo Aetherous. Although, Something Seems To Have Interfered While Your Were Being Created To Prevent You From Becoming A Brand New One. I Guess That Makes Me Your Grandfather, Huh?”
The party froze at what they heard, everything was beginning to fall into place. Fira accusing Rox of killing the Aetherous' children. Calling him a traitor, wanting him to seal away again as some kind of punishment, as well as his initial sealing by the other Aetherous and the gods, combined strength.
“Wha-- What do you mean by that?” Toley said, his voice quaking, not sure what to think. Staring at his own hands, as if his skin were falling away before his eyes.
“Sorry, That's All The Time I Have. I Must Return To My Realm. Since I'm Awake, I May As Well Attend To Some Of My Duties.” The god said, disappearing in a puff of smoke before any of the party can protest the abruptness of the exit.
“No. No! Come back! You can't just drop that bomb and leave! I need answers! You have to tell me, I need to know!” Toley said, looking around the room in desperation. Calling out to an entity that was no longer there, with more questions than he had ever had in his life. It was painful to watch for everyone in the party, but it was for more painful for the young boy who had started his journey for the expressed purpose of finding answers; Only to find more questions.
He fell to his knees as if he had run out of energy and began to stare at the ground. Feera walked over to him and put a gentle hand on his shoulder, causing him to look up at her with tears in his eyes. She smiled like a mother to her child and spoke, “Look, we all haven't known each other long, but we've been through quite a bit together. How about we go searching for those answers you need together? I'm sure we all have a bit of a bone to pick with the Aetherous now, so how about we go ask them what he meant? They have to know something, right?”
Toley nodded and wiped the tears from his eyes, then stood up. Wordlessly, he strode into the portal, disappearing into it. The others exchanged glances and followed him into the final room of the dungeon. Where they would find out if it had all been worth it. If Rox's sacrifice had been worth it. If they would continue hunting down the Aetherous for answers, revenge, or both.