The Red Moon Always Shines

Chapter 50: Almost there

A silence spread among the group, but after a few moments you could hear Tango hissing out, "This is the worst timeline."

"Guess we're doing puzzles then," Mini sighed. "Fly us up dragon man! We might as well get this over with as soon as we can."

In total it took about twenty minutes to get everyone to the top floor. And, just as Impulse said, it was filled with puzzles. The centerpiece to the room was a statue of a three headed hydra, each head had gemstones for eyes, all except the middle head. Over the silver statue glowing text spelling out "Find the missing puzzle pieces from the puzzles around this room and you will achieve what you wish for".

"Well, I guess we're going to solve some puzzles then!" Zedaph exclaimed, already headed towards one of the puzzles in the room. Everyone followed his lead, each person looking for puzzles best suited for them. Unfortunately most puzzles were riddle based, so there wasn't a lot of diversity.

They spend what feels like days -it was actually just hours- trying to solve the puzzles but none were doable, as soon as they thought they had one it turned out to be wrong. Iskall had just failed just another puzzle when he cried out, "Ugh! None of these are doable! The puzzle piece can't be here!"

Suddenly a door like portals opens in front of the hydra statue, the two heads on the sides eyes glowing brightly (green/blue and red respectively). The text changed to say, "And you're all here to get the last pieces".

"Should-should we go in?" Tango asks hesitantly, red eyes scanning the portal as his tail flickered with uncertainty.

Scar shrugged. "What else can we do? Go back and hope for something better tomorrow?"

"Okay, so we're doing this." The fire elemental said, and with a straight back he walked towards the portal. His boyfriend immediately made their way to his sides, they're doing this together. Behind them everyone fell into place, splitting up into duos as they did so.

"This feels a lot like when we jump through the portals." Zee comments to Mini, his partner for the portal walk. "Just, way less certain of the destination."

"Tell me about it."

Everyone held their breath when the ZIT trio walked through, and when everything seemed to be fine the rest followed. Once through it took the group a bit to adjust to the new very bright room, but once they did they took in their surroundings.

The room looked a bit like Stress' throne room, in its core concept at least, it was a room with tables for feasts and a throne for a queen or king. On the tables what could only be described as pathetic amounts of food were laid out, there was barely enough food to feed a family or three, let alone everyone who would be seated at the tables. And the food itself didn't look all that good either, barely passable for food even. And instead of Stress' stone walls this room was purely made out of quartz and accented with diamonds.

"What the hell is all of this?" Asked False, eyes wide as she looked around the room.

Suddenly a loud feminine voice echoed out, "Welcome travellers! To the feats of famines!"

All eyes turned to the throne, where they saw a skeletally thin woman dressed in a dragon's blood red (nice red color really) dress with deep lapis lazuli blue accents all over. Her hair was long and black, with blue shining in it as sunlight from the window behind her, on her head a crown of deer horns rested. Had she not been so skeletal she would have probably been a very beautiful person, but with her sunken features and dull and matted hair she was far from pretty.

"Are you Famine?" Zedpah asked hesitantly, keeping close to his lovers.

She smiled at him, the gesture kind but her features not so kind to her face as skin pulled and dragged over bone. "Indeed I am. And I can assume you're all the group sent to retrieve me?"