All Shades of Magic

Navigating the Belly of the Beast

The next few days were the same, walking, eating magically transformed pebbles, taking a few rests, pondering life, having nightmares and daydreams. Just kind of wandering through existence. It was miserable and therapeutic at the same time in a way. I felt like I was swimming in sorrow, but walking to keep my mind off things was an escape. Even if it was only partially effective. The crying decreased although I still had outbursts from time to time.

And finally I was almost there, only an hour or two away from the moonstone. I didn't have all that much energy, but I would recharge once I was close. Maybe within view. I was too fired up to stop now. Too excited and anxious to fall asleep or stop walking until I was there.

So here I was, at midnight, walking through the woods. All alone.

With extremely dangerous creatures lurking in the woods nearby. And I wasn't stopping yet. Not until the dam moonstone was insight.

I turned a couple nearby rocks into berries, my energy decreased further as I did so. If it weren't for my stamina I would just give up and camp. I walked for a bit and soon the darkness of the moonstone was so blinding that I couldn't sense any other magic around me. It made me feel vulnerable, and it also made me feel confident. I was so very close to this goal. Then I could go home. I would be a savior. Kimi's echoing words in my head were quickly shoved to the back of my mind when I saw it.

A humongous, collapsed temple stood in front of me. It was lead white, clearly very, very old, faded dyes imprinted latin words and markings on fallen pillars, collapsed doorways, tilting towers, and crumbling walls. The moonstone's essence was coming from inside this thing, it was a spectacular sight to behold even without the essence though. If it were artwork, it would be a masterpiece.

I heard footsteps near what seems to be an entrance and dipped deeper into the woods. I would camp here for the night, close, but not close enough to be caught.

Goodnight, temple, I'll visit you tomorrow.

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When I woke up there were people still outside. I pondered my next move while eating some berries. Real ones this time, off of a nearby bush I found. There were only a few but they were good enough to fill me up as I thought up my plan.

Maybe knocking these two out with magic? They looked ominous, dark cloaks, hoods, your typical evil mage. And if they were mages, they might sense my slightly-too-light magical aura nearby. That is, if unlike me, the moonstone wasn't blinding their sensors too.

I could always find another entrance somewhere. Maybe with the body parting spell. I could scour about. But even that had its downsides, I would be too exhausted to use more magic, which would be extremely bad if I needed some to get the moonstone back.

What to do, what to do? I thought to myself. I decided to just excavate the site by myself, maybe I could drop through the roof or something.

I crept around the ruins, finding small alcoves and treasures, but no visible entrances. I kept searching. Ducking into corners when I hear footsteps, picking up small things to study in my kingdom, running quickly away from rodents and bugs. Finally I found a miniscule opening in one of the walls and crawled through. The cold jagged cement cut my arms and face, deep enough to leave a mark, but not deep enough to bleed.

I paused before going all the way through the hole, making sure I wouldn't be seen. The inside of the temple seemed deserted from where I was laying, but I still waited a bit to come out. I quickly raced behind a pillar and examined the surrounding area.

I appeared to be in a hallway or sorts, big pillars lined the walls with murals of spirits on the walls. Vases, some intact and some smashed to smithereens, dotted around the room. The floors were done in patterned times, a latin word on each. Although many of them were broken with small plants growing in them. Ivy lined the walls from such broken spots like the one I crawled in through. It was amazing.

Footsteps made me tense against the pillar, I tried to peek out from the side. More creepy hooded people. I figured it was time to get moving. Even with the moonstone being so close I knew I still had to search a bit more before I was truly there.

I snuck around, sticking near pillars and walls, ducking quickly into corners at the sound of anything. Muffled voices came from a room in the distance. I had a daunting feeling they were all in the room with the moonstone. This is going to be a difficult task, I thought to myself as I ducked behind a particularly large vase when one of the voices became louder. Fortunately it died down again and I figured someone was just yelling.

And I was in front of the room. Now the moonstone's essence was so great it was infecting the area nearby. everything looked slightly darker, the lead white looked greyer, even my pale skin looked a shade too tan. I didn't know what the essence would be able to do once I was standing next to it. I wondered silently if it would infest light spells. It was going to take a conundrum of magic to restore it.

The voices were now almost audible. And they were blood curdling.

One voice was high pitched and gigglish, but now in a cute little girl way, in a psychotic creepy animatronic-like way. The next was more of an average pitch with low drones and high chimes in over-stressed words. Just as the high voice was, this one sounded as if it was a robot's voice, crackled and static. Forever glitched.

The last was possibly the most frightening, deep, deep words spilled threateningly from its mouth. Instead of sounding robotic, it sounded like it was undead. The fact that the voice was so deep made it impossible to believe how loud it was, booming like a yell even out in the hallway. Even with its loud voice though, I couldn't hear what it was saying.

And of course, there was only one way to find out.

I mentally prepared myself for whatever was in the next room and slowly, carefully placed my hand on the curtain, and pulled it aside.