One with another becomes a simple two, with that meeting the other become a whole three.
what happens then when we want four? We add a little something more.
It's here we should take our end, but it's human nature, to want to look around the bend, for the deeper and darker you dive, the closer you'll get to five.
- - - -
After waking, doing my business, and starting the trek back to what i thought was where I fell last. It took me quite a few moments to actually find anything of note, even with the light.
I did eventually find something, and that was a portion of my stuff, mostly splayed out on the ground, the knife had gouged into the stone hilt deep, and had most likely been damaged in some way, but knife repair isn't something I can do at the moment.
With the knife I found two of the spare bits of cloth that used to be my pants… they were caught onto the knife by threads, but no shirt turned pouch and no compass… the knife, I am glad I have back of course, I ate that claw, so it's nice to have a weapon that isnt the limb of my enemy.
Not having a place to put the items, I peel the strands off the blade, then wrap the cloth around my palm and the handle of the blade, and tie it up with the remaining bit of cloth on either end.
I now have a knife tied to my palm, still, until I get my pouch back, it's better there than nothing.
…
The quiet is getting to me.
Well, that and I have no clue how much time has passed in this place.
…Wait, I'm forgetting something, something that has to do with time…
As my face scrunches in thought, my eye brows snap up as I remember that thing.
I look around to see if the System had stayed around, and following just behind me, there it is.
[DING]
[How can we be of assistance, User?] the Quest Board asked
I motioned to my wrist like I was checking the time, but it did not respond, as if it didn't even realize i had moved.
So, reluctantly, I just muttered out "what's the time on that 'reward'?" Though, it was like speaking into a mic, as if my voice had been put through a loud speaker, even the slight noise ending up with my spine shivering from the echoes of my own voice.
[Ding.]
[The. Reward. Will. Manifest. In. Two. Months. One. Week. One. Day. Two. Hours.]
Hmm…
'Ahh, math, our arch-nemesis…' Magenta speaks out faux whimsically.
Ehhh… something like, two to three days?… I think..
It's some time around night, probably?
'Wow, I could've sworn it had been a whole week or something!' Orange spoke out with surprise.
i couldn't help but agree with myself, as I continue walking in the direction where the compass might be.
it took what was probably a few minutes, but my walking did eventually bear fruit in the form of a reddish purple piece of cloth, it would seem that my shirt got torn by the knife at some point... I walk over to it, pick it up and from it's now tattered side falls a puck of metal.
the Compass!
I quickly turn it around and check to see the direction i need to go to get this all over with.
only to see it pointing directly in front of me.
I look up and forward, but the compass fell near where I got launched to by that tall bastard, and all that's in front of me is a wall with an indentation in it.
its not where i fell, because the indentation is perfectly round and there isn't any blood staining it's surface...
I look down at the compass, tilt it left and right, it is stubborn that this is the right way.
I then look at the orb... the perfectly round orb. then back at the indent, the perfectly round half sphere indent...
not really thinking, I place the orb inside the indent. then everything starts to shake, and a grating noise can be heard in the silence.
then in front of my astonished eyes, and over the brick of the wall mostly illuminated in purple, ignites three runes in a yellow bright enough to pierce the darkness all their own, it is as i stare at them that they begin to fray and shift, turning from completely alien runes to... three. English. words.
ABANDON.
ALL.
HOPE.
and as I see it, my mind sparks with a memory, of an inferno, and all that laid within that place.
I know the rest of the saying, and there is something in my mind, a compulsion, to finish the saying, to say those four words...
"a-all.." my mind flashes, to the similar feeling of the Mana seed trying to influence me, but this time, it's only a feeling.
I sigh and take a deep breath, and say with a chest full of lead and a mind battling the compulsion to finish the original sentence "fack this! Dante- is a Hack writer, and ya sho'ld feel Fackin' ashamed for e'en alluding to that Ponce's power fantasy Bullshite!" I say with more of an accent then I intended as I glare venomously at the words above what's probably a door of some kind.
lets just say, I most definitely did not enjoy having to read Dante's inferno in high school.
the flaming yellow words nearly blink out of existence, before they come back, twice as strong, nearly blinding me a bit. below the words a seam in the middle of the wall opens inward with a grinding groan. the orb is somehow absorbed into the stone as this happens.
The grinding stops, as a doorway inward is revealed.
'lets hope it doesn't lead to hell, yeah?' yellow remarks.
mostly mentally drained form disregarding, what ever compulsion it was that wanted me to complete that over used saying, I pick up my shirt, tie it around my waste like a toga -so I can at least have some level of protection for the lower bits- and cautiously move into the newly discovered room full of even more pitch blackness...
----
that's the end of this chapter, short, i know, but this is simply a movement chapter for the next bit, please comment, if you want.
hope you enjoyed reading.