by nobody103
That… Zorian almost tore the entire message apart in anger after listening to that. All this time he had been feeling guilty about her dying, hoping that Red Robe was lying and there was some way to bring them back… and it turns out Spear of Resolve was planning to screw him over?
But no. No, he wouldn't be destroying the message. It was important. Too important for him to throw it away.
He would listen to the message to the very end. He owed Spear of Resolve that much, at least. Even if she tried to betray him.
[I am unsure if this message is even necessary. But if the time loop can so casually create copies of us, it can surely destroy us just as easily. Our foe clearly has deep knowledge of how the time loop works. Thus, this message. I hope it won't be necessary, but just in case, I put in a map to point you towards the invader's bases and – more importantly – the time magic research facility deep beneath Cyoria. I am rather sure the time loop exit is located there – it is an ancient artifact called 'the Sovereign Gate'. You can find its legend in various books easily enough, I'm sure. The security is high, but you will find a way to access the facility peacefully at the end of this message. The Gate did not react to me no matter what I did, but maybe it will to a proper time traveler like yourself. Otherwise, you may have to find 'The Key' to get it to open. This is bad, since – if I have interpreted the Ghost Serpent's ramblings correctly – the Key consists of the five imperial treasures of the first Ikosian emperor. The ring, the crown, the staff, the orb and the dagger. These items are all lost, likely scattered across Miasina. You'd have to conduct your search on a whole other continent. I didn't think it was possible, even with the help of something like working Bakora gates, so I didn't put too much effort into tracking down rumors surrounding them…]
After that was a map of Cyoria's underworld, largely identical to the one he already had but with the time various holes in his version filled out with relevant information. Finally, the matriarch gave him information on the government inspector that had the authorization to access the time magic research facility, to check up on their work and make sure they weren't wasting government funding. According to the matriarch, the man was not even a mage, and was easy to impersonate… which was how she had gotten access to the place.
Aside from the pre-arranged message, he did not get anything else out of the memory packet. But truthfully, the message was already a little too much for him. The matriarch's plans to betray him, the fact that Red Robe might have figured out a way to leave a long time ago, the stuff about the Key in the end…
Eventually the effects of the potion wore off and he found himself drawn to the world around him again. Both Zach and Kael were eager to see what he learned from the packet and Zorian did his best to tell them about his findings. All except for the way Spear of Resolve planned to betray him. That felt a little too personal at the moment.
The unanimous conclusion was that they had to access this time magic research facility as soon as possible. Accordingly, Zorian would raid the government inspector's place the very next day to steal his identity badges and everything else they needed to gain access to the place.
✦ ✧ ✦
Two days later, everything was ready. Since it would be a bit implausible for government inspectors to consist of two teenagers, Zach had bought them both a shapeshifting potion on the black market that turned them into nondescript, middle-aged men. Which was… weird. Regardless, with their appearances changed and with all the necessary documentation in their hands, they simply walked into the appropriate city office and demanded access to the facility.
Zorian had been worried that Spear of Resolve had been insanely lucky on her own try and that somebody was going to call their supposed superiors to confirm their orders and identity… but no such things happened. They weren't even suspicious about the fact that there were two of them when there should have been just one.
Zach, being an idiot, actually asked them about this. Zorian was about to wipe their memories and shout at him, but it turned out they saw nothing wrong with his question.
Awful security.
"You must be new," the guy talking to them said. "That place gets inspected constantly. The royals are afraid someone is going to steal their precious 'Sovereign Gate', so they check up on it constantly. That's why there's so much security around the place. Honestly, I don't understand why the researchers tolerate it. If I was in their shoes, I'd send the damn thing back to the royal treasury so I can work in peace. I bet it isn't even the real thing…"
After that, they were directed to a fancy magical elevator on the edge of the Hole, which took them down to the facility in question. Along the way, they passed next to the various other, less secretive research facilities – one of the armed guards that rode along with them was talkative and wouldn't shut up about them. Zach actually engaged the man in conversation, which was nice, because it allowed him to stay silent without looking too rude.
The other guard was as silent as Zorian. The two of them shared a friendly eye roll with each other in regards to the two gossips next to them and then ignored each other for the entire ride.
Finally they reached the place, passing through two more armed checkpoints that merely glanced at their papers before shooing them inside, and then they were finally inside.
They were greeted by a pair of researchers – one middle-aged, and one that couldn't be more than 18 years old in Zorian's estimation. They offered to give them both a tour of the place, and were quite surprised when they accepted the offer.
"We don't often get inspectors that are actually interested in our work," the middle aged man commented. He had introduced himself as Krantin Keklos earlier. "Most just want to see the Sovereign Gate to see it's still there and intact, and then leave as soon as possible."
"Oh, we definitely want to see the Sovereign Gate as well," Zach said, smiling. "We just thought it might be interesting to see what else you have got down here."
"Of course," Krantin said. "Rest assured that we have been taking good care of it. We're grateful to the Crown for allowing us to study such an amazing artifact."
"You don't believe it's a fake like everyone else seems to," asked Zorian curiously.
"I'm not sure if it's the Sovereign Gate of historical legend," Krantin admitted. "But it is surely a genuine artifact from the Age of Gods."
Over the next hour, Krantin and Aread (his younger assistant who mostly let Krantin take the lead) led Zach and Zorian through the facility to demonstrate their work. Zorian could tell that Krantin was absolutely ecstatic to give someone he considered influential a tour of the place, despite his subdued attitude. He wanted more funds and support from the Crown, and thought that pandering to them might help him get it.
There were three main portions of the facility. The first was a series of three Black Rooms – the first and smallest was reserved for experiments on plants and animals, while the two bigger ones saw human use. The second portion dealt with combining alchemy and temporal acceleration in various ways. Finally, the third and last part was based around a large black cube about four meters long on each side. There was a door-like depression on side of the cube, but Krantin explained that they had never managed to get it open.
Carved into this door was a very familiar geometric diagram – a horizontal line with an upturned triangle balanced on top of it.
"There it is," Krantin said, sweeping his hand towards the black cube. "The Sovereign Gate. Despite the legend surrounding it, we believe it is some kind of powerful time acceleration room rather than a literal gate to another world. Sadly, we have never really managed to activate it. I had high hopes that the upcoming planetary alignment and the resulting amplification of dimensional magic might be the key to getting it work, but no such luck. Shame."
"Amazing," Zach said staring at the cube with an unreadable expression on his face.
"Yes," Krantin agreed. "It's hard to believe something like this had just been gathering dust in the Noveda family tre
asury for countless decades. If it weren't for Mister Zveri's generosity in donating some of Noveda's unneeded artifacts to the Crown, who knows how long it would have languished there undiscovered!"
"Yes," Zach said frostily, grounding his teeth. "What a generous guy, that Tesen."
"Well," Krantin coughed, realizing he had struck some kind of nerve, "Although I'm happy to answer any questions you may have, this is about it for what we do here. If you would-"
Looking around, Zorian looked around to confirm they were alone in the area for the moment and then reached out to the two researcher's minds. Though both Krantin and Aread were highly-trained mages, they were specialists in time magic and had no real mental defenses. In just a few seconds, Zorian forced their minds into mindless stupor. They remained standing on their feet, and looked fine at first glance, but they were effectively unconscious.
Zach raised an eyebrow at their sudden silence.
"You got them?" he asked, turning to Zorian.
"Yes," Zorian confirmed. "So. Do you know how we can activate this thing? And is it even wise to do so? I mean-"
"We should try touching it," said Zach.
…yeah, okay. It wasn't like Zorian had any better idea.
"We should do it together, though," Zorian remarked.
"Oh, right – that way we will hopefully both activate it at the same time. We both have the same marker thing, so it should work, right?"
"Right," Zorian agreed uneasily. He wasn't so sure personally, but what else he could do? If the matriarch was right, Red Robe already knew about this place and could leave whenever he wished. The time loop still existed, though, so clearly he didn't. Why not? Zorian would have in his place.
He needed the answers the thing held.
"On three," said Zorian. "One, two… three!"
The both pressed their palm against the diagram on the door in perfect synchronization with each other.
Two seconds passed.
"Nothing is happening," Zach complained. "Damn…"
"No," Zorian frowned. He could feel something reaching out from the cube in front of them, trying to access his marker. Asking for… confirmation? "I could feel something. I don't know if you can feel your own marker yet-"
"Not really, no," Zach said.
"Well, anyway, I think if I just-"
He flipped one of the switches on his marker. The mysterious force reaching out from the cube immediately rushed into him. Everything went black.
Zorian half expected to wake up in Cirin again, with Kirielle jumping on top of him and wishing him a good morning.
But he didn't. He was instead floating in a black, featureless void. And Zach was right beside him.
"Woah. What happened," Zach asked, looking around. "Where are we?"
"The cube wanted me to give it confirmation of some sort," said Zorian. "So I said yes. And here we are."
"If we're permanently stuck in this void because of you, I'll never forgive you," Zach warned him.
"You would have done the exact same thing in my place and you know it," Zorian said.
"Well yeah, but aren't you supposed to be the paranoid, sensible one? Agreeing to unknown requests from a mysterious ancient artifact sounds pretty stupid to me."
Before Zorian could say anything, another person popped into existence in front of them.
No… not a person. The entity in front of them was vaguely humanlike, but that was clearly just a crude façade. It wore no clothes, but that was okay because it had no genitals, body hair or anything else other than smooth skin. Its face was blank and apathetic, and it's eyes were glowing white voids devoid of iris or anything else except soft light spilling out of them.
"Welcome, Controller," the entity said, its voice soft and emotionless.
Zach reacted faster than him – he immediately reached for his spell rod, only to find it effectively glued to its holster. Checking himself, Zorian noticed his own spell rods suffered similar fates. In fact, his very clothes seemed to be glued onto his skin and though he could feel his mana reserves he didn't seem able to manifest any of that mana at all.
"Who are you?" Zach demanded. "What is this place?"
"I am the Guardian of the Threshold," the entity said, as apathetic as its face. "And this is the control room."
"I don't think this is a physical place," Zorian noted. "Notice how your clothes seems to be a part of your body."
"Hey, you're right…" Zach said, frowning as he tried to roll up his sleeves and failing.
"We're some kind of projections," Zorian said. "As is the entity in front of us."
They both stared at the entity in front of them. It seemed to interpret their attention as some kind of prompt.
"What is your request, Controller?" the Guardian asked.
"Can we leave this place?" Zorian asked.
"Of course," the Guardian agreed easily. "Do you want to do that now?"
"By leave, we mean go back to the bodies we're being projected from," Zach clarified.
"The answer remains the same," the Guardian easily responded.
"What about leaving the time loop?" Zorian asked.
"Time loop?" the guardian mouthed uncomprehendingly. Its eyes flashed for a moment before it refocused on them again. "I'm sorry, but the gate is barred."
"What?" Zach protested. "What the hell do you mean 'the gate is barred'?"
"The Controller has already left the time loop," the Guardian explained. "It's not possible for anyone else to leave."
There was a brief silence as Zach and Zorian processed this claim.
"But I thought we were the Controller," Zach protested.
"You are the Controller," the Guardian agreed easily.
"But you just said the Controller has left the time loop," Zorian frowned.
"He has," the Guardian confirmed.
"Why is the time loop still in existence, then?" Zorian asked.
"The time loop cannot end while the Controller is still inside the time loop," the Guardian said.
"So the Controller has left the time loop, but you can't end the time loop because the Controller is still in the time loop?" Zach asked incredulously. "Don't you realize how stupid that sounds?"
"I don't think we're dealing with a sapient being," Zorian said. "It's some kind of animated spell performing its function and getting confused that there are multiple Controllers when there is only ever supposed to exist one. Guardian, how many people are you talking with right now?"
"Only the Controller can access this place," the guardian placidly answered.
"So wait…" Zach said in a trembling voice. "You're saying…"
"Red Robe has somehow tricked the control room into thinking he's the Controller of the loop," Zorian sighed. "He has already left. And so no one else can leave."
"The gate is barred," the Guardian confirmed.
Well, fuck.
Credits
Author — nobody103
Illustrator — Pocket Size Sleuth
Publication platfom — FictionPress.com
Book designer — Armaell