Fallen Towers, Silent Ruins | Dream Smp

7

There was a courtyard before her. The floor was covered with dirty, stone tiles that had cracks and grass growing in the gaps between them. On the other side of the courtyard was another door, about the same size as the ones by her. Though, they seemed to be built from either bronze as they had a dull shine that reflected the bright sunlight.

There was a large, triangle shaped lock on the door. On the lock were three holes. Rose assumed that those had to do with the three keys that Techno spoke about. She let her eyes roam across the length of the courtyard, and she noticed a few different doorways scattered around.

"If you haven't noticed yet, there's more puzzles then there are keys," Techno commented beside her, "according to the tablet, it's to make things confusing. There are ten puzzles, and only three of them contain keys."

"A tablet?" Rose turned and raised an eyebrow at the pink-haired man. Techno nodded and gestured to his right.

The girl looked over and saw a stone tablet beneath a small oak tree. She walked over and kneeled down to read the words that were ingrained in the gray surface of the rock. Then, she stood up again and looked back at Techno. His arms were crossed as he leaned against the wall, watching her.

"Which of the puzzles have you done already?" She asked him curiously.

"I've just been going in a clockwise circle from the door directly to the right of the locked door," he explained. He pushed off from the wall and began walking across the courtyard, so Rose followed. He walked towards the door, and she saw that one of the three keys had already been inserted into the top-middle lock of the triangle.

"This first one was a floor puzzle," Techno told her, pointing to the first doorway at his right, "I had to move this red colored tile to a specific spot, but there were a lot of brown tiles in the way. It took me almost a whole day."

"I probably could have finished it in a morning," Rose mused provocatively. She glanced over at the pigman. He rolled his eyes at the comment and continued walking.

"The second one was quite simple." He gestures to the second opening. The wall was crumbling and Rose could spot a long, open room beyond it. "All you have to do is get across without dying to a bunch of arrows being shot from the walls, which I consider myself quite good at."

Rose almost coughed at his words. "Cocky, much?" She muttered to herself. To her disappointment, the pink-haired male seemed to have not heard. She slipped her hands into the pockets of her pants.

"I finished the third one yesterday, before I found you in the jungle," Techno continued, "it was the first one to have a key. That puzzle also was quite easy to finish —all you needed to do was shoot all the targets."

"So, I suppose we can give number four a shot, yeah?" Rose strode past the pigman and stood beside the next doorway. Every muscle in her body was itching to put the fucking show-off back in his place after everything he told her. "I bet I can finish it quicker."

The male narrowed his bright red eyes at her with a visible smirk on his face. "You're on."

Oh, now he'd done it. Cocky bastard.

The two walked inside together. They were in a dark passageway that went straight forward before spilling at a T into two paths. There was also a message engraved in large letters on the wall in front of them. Rose wiped the dust away.

"Maze," Techno read, "sounds like a blast."

"Ready, set, go!" Rose exclaimed quickly. She turned on her heels and ran down the left path, leaving Techno behind. The pigman stared at her disappearing figure for a moment before starting down the passage to the right.

The girl pulled her sword from its scabbard. She turned right at the first intersection, then right again at the next. She came face-to-face with a stone wall. Rose sighed and flipped around and went the other direction, where she found herself at a dead end again. Her feeling of determination was hanging on by a thread as she backtracked once more and went down the hallway to give the other passage a shot.

She turned to the left and walked straight ahead, pleased to find that this route continued onwards. She came upon another intersection. This time, she chose the left path. She reached another intersection, but she had a nagging feeling that she had been here before.

"Fuck's sake!" She whispered harshly. This was the same intersection that she had just been at. The passage had circled around, somehow, and had gotten her nowhere. Yet, looking down the length of the hall that was visible, she had no idea how it had ended up here.

And in this way, Rose traversed the cursed maze. Occasionally, she would come across dead ends and be forced to turn around to go down a different route, but after a while, every path seemed so very similar that she began to lose track of where she had been. She had long become sick of the stupid puzzle, and her impatience was starting to get the best of her.

Rose felt as if she was walking in circles. Each time she turned a corner, a part of her brain would raise the question of whether she had been there before. After what seemed like hours, the girl frowned and stopped walking. She took a seat on the hard, stone floor and stretched her legs out, leaning her head back against the wall.

"I hate mazes," she muttered to herself, "these are the worst kinds of puzzles. They are simply pure luck and I despise that."

"Lucky for you, there's nothing here."

Rose blinked and turned her head towards the voice. Techno stood there, looking down at her with a blank expression. "I found my way to a room. No key in this one," he told her.

"Of course there isn't. Well—that was for nothing," the girl sighed, dragging herself back onto her feet, "how long has it been? An hour?"

"About," the man replied, "if you're hungry, I brought some lunch with me. Then we can give number five a shot afterwards."

At the mention of food, Rose's stomach did a flip inside of her. "Okay."

The girl followed Techno out of the maze. The male weaved through the passageways with confidence and not a hint of hesitation. Watching him do so only infuriated Rose even more. She had wanted to prove herself the better adventurer by finishing the maze first, but perhaps this was not the best puzzle to do so on.

There will be many more chances, she assured herself. One little maze means nothing in the grand scheme of things. She hoped the next puzzle would rely on skill more than luck, because she was lacking in that department at the moment.

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A/n - hi guys!! New chapter :]
Two things:
1) if you didn't see my announcement on my profile—school's out for me! I plan to update this story once, maybe twice, a week starting from now.
2) I have a new story!! If you haven't already, consider checking out my profile page and giving Appetency a read! It's a dsmp pirate au and I think it's rlly good so maybe you'll like it too ;)
Love you guys <3
~Echo