Dawn of the Epoch

Chapter XI - Clues and Riddles

From the top of a giant pile of treasure Hunter called out, “There’s a door! Tiyana, Hongo, there’s a huge door!”

From his vantage point fifteen feet off of the ground, Hunter could see a great door. Unfortunately, the entry to the door started about thirty feet from the ground. Strangely, no staircase was to be seen. The door simply hovered there.

As Hongo climbed up to join Hunter he surmised, “We cannot reach that height. We must look for a way up there.” They searched and searched and found nothing but more and more treasure.

“I would give up all this gold for a ladder right about now.” Said Hongo.

“Keen observation Hongo, we have to work with what we’ve got.” Interjected Tiyana. “Let’s go back. If we get everyone together and start piling stuff up, we might be able to build a hill that will take us to that door. Plus,” she said with a grin, “I’m sure they’ll want to see this.”

They went back to gather the troops. People walked in awestruck. They even managed to get Shenouda across the lake. Hongo had found an ornate palanquin to carry her in. Hongo began barking orders and soon they had an assembly line going.

“This is going to take a long time.” Tiyana said between grunts as she lifted and passed heavy objects of immeasurable wealth. “My opinion of gold is dropping quickly. I’m getting knackered.”

“Yeah, no one has eaten much. I think we had better take a break before someone pulls a muscle. Hongo…” Hunter went off to talk to Hongo about a work break.

On the break, Hunter and Tiyana wandered through the chamber.

“They’ve got shelves over there. That area’s not so shiny.” Said Hunter in reference to the southwest corner of the room.

Tiyana replied. “You know, I am getting sick of hauling gold around, I wonder if they’ve got lighter material over there.”

As they walked the aisles, they found progressively cheaper, less impressive stuff. Tiyana picked up an aluminum cast of Chiron, the supreme centaur. The half-man, half-horse clutched an arrow buried in his thigh.

Hunter noticed and spoke up, “That’s Chiron from Greek mythology. It seems every mythological creature in history has a place here.”

“The statue feels light.” Tiyana remarked off-handedly.

“It’s probably aluminum. Aluminum used to be considered a precious metal. Napoleon the Third allegedly served his most important guests on aluminum plates while the others had to settle for gold.”

“Nice, I like aluminum, I’m getting real sick of gold right now. Look Hunter, I know that making this hill was my idea, but honestly I don’t think we’ll make it. At the pace we’re going it will take days to finish this, even to get it high enough for someone to jump up and grab the edge of the platform. We haven’t eaten much; we hardly have any food, or water for that matter. Maybe we should conserve our strength, I don’t know.”

“Think about it dear, you’re a smart woman. If you say stop, we’ll stop. Let’s keep walking and keep thinking.”

They continued perusing the aisles.

Tiyana continued, “When we start back up again, we really ought to start bringing stuff from this section. There’s a lot of lighter material.”

Towards the end of one of the far aisles, a painted runestone caught Hunter’s attention. “Would you look at that?”

“What?”

“This temple…”

“It’s beautiful, surrounded by clouds, up in the mountains. Where is that?”