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1185 Words
Putting together their quarters of the stone circle, the pieces clicked into place as they neared each other, then released a small pulse of energy. The wave revealed an entrance right on the face of the pyramid, mere feet from where they landed.
This entrance didn’t have the signature Minkalla veil over its depths, and they could clearly see a chamber room inside the gloom of the pyramid. At least, as clearly as the Eternal Darkness would allow for.
Matt took the lead and was ready for any traps, but they found none.
As they entered the interior of the pyramid, the stone circle fell apart and crumbled into dust before vanishing.
The room around them was cluttered like a pack rat’s storage house, but there were three stone pillars standing in a triangle in the center of the room.
None of them moved and were careful to avoid touching anything.
Matt reviewed his AI downloaded list of traps and puzzles but found nothing similar to particular room they were in.
The fact that the lists didn’t have any leads to pull from wasn’t very surprising, in and of itself. Minkalla seemed to have an endless list of puzzles to pull from, and it was rare for anyone to encounter a puzzle they previously were aware of. Even if they found one they recognized, it was all but assured that the planet would stop their AI from solving it.
Matt stepped through the room and made a lap around the pillars.
There were no distinctive markings on any of them, and they seemed as identical as any rift-made item. The problem was that the Eternal Darkness floor theme rendered them totally blind. Even with their spiritual perception, they didn’t have color sensitivity. The room’s challenge could be as easy as finding the items in the clutter that matched the pillar’s color, but they couldn’t know that with their limited perception.
Still, that was a big if. Minkalla never had an impossible puzzle, even accounting for floor themes, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t make the puzzle a million times harder.
It took them two and a half hours until they fished through each and every piece of clutter on the ground to find the matching junk that each pillar wanted.
When they finished, Matt was sure that the room had been a color puzzle. The Genesis Energy they received as a reward was quite a bit more than they had earned from killing any single monster besides the queen ant and giant monkey.
The next room they encountered had an altar with bones and corpses scattered around it, along with another podium where the bodies had been sacrificed upon.
Liz said, “I feel blood, namely dried blood, caked on the pillar. Anyone have an idea what this is except a place to sacrifice one of us?”
Susanne answered, “I don’t think that’s right. Look at the walls, they have murals carved into them.”
Matt joined her and saw what she meant. Along the wall, a tapestry of sacrifice had been carved in a progression, depicting a story.
People gathered around the altar, sacrificed something, and were then rewarded.
Small sacrifices meant that all the worshipers were killed, but if the rewards were high enough, riches and wealth were awarded to the acolytes.
People always seemed to be at minimum a satisfactory reward, and not one out of the thousand carvings had a single one of those rewards rejected.
None of them were willing to kill one of the others to progress, and it didn’t even seem like they needed to. Not necessarily. The murals had a number of people offering personal items and being rewarded. Sometimes more so than the groups who offered an actual person up to the chopping block.
Aster was horrified. “Do I need to sacrifice my ice cream?”
She silently yowled into the sky in sadness as they discussed what they needed to do.
Since none of them were willing to turn on each other, they reckoned they each needed to give up one of their more precious items.
Aster was easy. She had a storage ring filled with ice cream, but despite that giving up even one of the cartons was hard for her. So had a limited supply for the foreseeable fortune after all.
“Mr pyramid, I hope you enjoy Apple Fritter ice cream. It’s one of my favorites.” Aster lowered her head as she offered the ice cream. When she used her Concept to put the carton on the altar, it was immediately sucked into the pillar.
At the same time, a rush of Genesis Energy hit Aster as she was rewarded for her offering. Considering the reward was abundant, they were able to confirm the fact that the more precious an item, the better their rewards.
As the Genesis Energy stopped rushing into Aster, a door opened in the side of the wall, but everyone other than Aster was prevented from even crossing the threshold.
Matt was considering what he would sacrifice when Susanne moved forward and laid a strip of cloth on the altar.
She was rewarded with a rush of Genesis Energy even larger than Aster’s, but when they asked what she offered, she would only say, “Something I’ve carried for too long.”
Liz went up next and put a picture of her, Matt, and Aster at an amusement park. She didn’t receive as large a Genesis Energy reward as the others, but she did get one.
Matt stood up and put one of Liz’s mana concentration potions on the pillar. It was a failed product, but he kept it anyway. She had tried to improve upon the formula for months, sacrificing her little free time over their last three years. She hadn’t succeeded, but he appreciated the thought, and had kept just one of the vials despite her protests.
To anyone else, it was a standard vial of Tier 12 mana concentration potion, but to him, it was proof of her love.
The altar still rewarded him somewhere between Liz’s reward and Aster’s, but he was on the lower end. Still, it was enough, and they were all able to progress after their sacrifices were accepted.
In the next room, they encountered a forge that Matt was sure was glowing with heat.
[Fire Manipulation] allowed him some minor control over the inside of the forge, at least.
There were four pillars surrounding the forge, on which stood four small statues.
When Liz approached one, she gasped through their AI. “I think these take Genesis Energy. It tried to take a little, at least when I touched it.”
Matt thought it over before saying. “Let me test it.”
He put all his Genesis Energy into the ring with the pressure gauge before extracting a thimble full, then handing the ring off to Susanne.
Then, he repeated Liz’s action of putting his hand on the statue, and in front of his eyes, he was treated to a vision of the statue’s life.
- Writer
