52 Is This the End?

Linri was conflicted about checking out the sphere. On one hand it could be something valuable and helpful to him in the future, but on the other hand, it could be something dangerous. The best way to solve this was talking to Lozna since he was the one who teleported him in here.

That was the moment Linri noticed an anomaly, his connection to the Gods were cut off. He tried imagining the line connecting the three of them but something was preventing him. He became wary, scared and distressed at the same time. Linri did not know what was going on and this thought scared him, he liked to be in control and when he can't he usually ignored those issues completely. This created his personal catchphrase which his parents dislike 'I will leave it to my future self'

Normally in this situation, he would also do the same but there was a problem he can not ignore. This matter concerned his life, one wrong move and he would die. He kept hesitating but eventually thought the same thing again. He was going to let his future self worry about this matter. Humans were creatures of habit and there was no way to change that in a short time.

Now that he gathered his thoughts Linri felt relaxed and walked towards the carcass of the beast he just slaughtered. There was a putrid acidic smell coming from there, so he pinched his nose.

Linri took out a bone torch from his backpack and used that to take out the sphere. The sphere was bright orange with tinges of red here and there. It was the size of an adult's fist and looked transparent. Once he touched it, he could feel a comfortable warmth coming from it. The feeling was like basking in the spring sun after a rain. It was refreshing.

He picked it up and put it in his backpack. Now that his excitement of finding the orb had died down he started to feel dizzy. He had just used 85 prana and it had a toll on his mental state. There was a weird feeling though, even though he had used more than half of his prana he still felt like he could cast 'Hell Hound' again. That was supposed to be impossible. Maybe it was the gods aiding him or it was thanks to the flames all around him. All in all that was a piece of good news since he did not know if he still had to fight.

Linri walked to the chandelier he brought down at the start of the fight and picked his stuff while burning his new torch. He could already see where he was supposed to go.

Linri was not sure if it was always there but there was a door behind the place where the statue used to be. With the torch in hand, he walked towards it, the new door led to a dark corridor.

Compared to the other corridors he walked through inside the temple before this was somewhat different. It felt almost like it was brand new as if it had just been built but that was virtually impossible.

Once he saw light coming up ahead he knew that the next room was within his reach. He picked up his steps and arrived at the new room in front of him.In the room, there were three pedestals, on top of each and every one of them was a tablet and a key.

He stepped into the room and the door behind him was closed. Some words appeared before his eyes. He did not know what they meant but they slowly turn into the Latin alphabet.

'With great strength comes courage, but courage without wisdom is just recklessness.'

As soon as he read them the word disappeared and he could hear a rumbling sound coming from the walls. Wait!? If he could not get out was he going to be crushed between the walls? Wasn't this a little too cliché?

He hurried to the pedestal in the middle. There was a Silver Key on top of it, tablet next to it had some words but it was in Togk language so he could not read it. Thank the heavens the words appeared in front of him magically just like before.

'There are 3 keys in front of you, only 1 of them will be able to open the door. Choose carefully and prove your wisdom; The Key to Life and Death stands before you but it is impossible to touch. Yet, it is before everyone's eyes. No one can live without it. Everyone has used it. It is the only thing from which the Philosopher's Stone can be created.'

This was..... abstract? This was way too abstract! How the hell was he supposed to solve this bullshit without any hints?

He did not have time to waste on this so Linri immediately abandoned the middle pedestal and went to the right one. There was a Golden Key standing atop it, he ignored the key and looked at the tablet. The same riddle appeared in front of his eyes again.

"Fuck!"

He could not help but curse out loud. If they were going to have the same words why the hell did they even have three tablets?

Maybe that was it, the solution must lay within the tablets. Linri looked around and saw that walls were closer than before so his conjecture was right. He was going to be crushed to death if he can not escape. Just what was Lozna thinking? Did they not need him any more? Have they forsaken him to die in here?

Linri grabbed the tablet in front of him and turned it over to see if there were any other words. There was nothing, he was not ready to give up so he threw the tablet to the ground and shattered it into pieces.

He searched the pieces lying on the ground hoping to find something, anything! But his hope did not come true as before him, lay no more than rubble.

He was getting desperate. Was this the place where his journey would end?