Tangled: Stardust and the 12 Zodiacs (Varian Fanfiction)

Chapter 22: The Ruins of Libra

"Are all of the temples supposed to be underground?" Varian huffed as he panted, leaning on the wall for support. 

"You can't really blame it. The temples were built, thousands of years ago. It's expected that some would be 6 feet below." Soul answered, walking down the stairs.

Rapunzel, Soul, and Varian continued going down the stairs until they reached the bottom. The three were now in a spacious cavern, not as big as the one from the cave they entered before the crystal cave, but still spacious enough. If not for Soul's glowing butterflies, they would have been confused as to why there were no doors or cave entrances for them to enter to get to the temple.

"Look! There's something over there." Rapunzel pointed to a small opening on the side of the room. Walking closer, Rapunzel saw it was a scale with a rock on the left pan. In front of the scale were multiple orange rocks in different sizes. Looking up, she found that there were  scriptures written in the same symbols that Varian found in Demanitus' journal. "It's a scale! And there's some scripture here too."

Walking to where the princess was, Varian examined the scripture before turning to the rocks. "I don't know what the scripture says, but it must have something to do with these rocks." He hypothesized, picking up one of the rocks.

"Scripture?" Soul confusedly asked as she walked to where the two were. 

"There." Rapunzel pointed. "Can you understand it, Soul?" The brunette inquired. 

Soul's eyes darted over the scripture, gasping softly as the symbols rearranged in her mind. No matter how many times this happened, Soul will forever be amazed at her ability to translate the Zodiac language.

"It says that, 'Balance is the key to everything. Without balance, everything will fall apart'. " She recited. 

"See? I was right. " Varian bragged, putting a hand on his chest. Rapunzel and Soul both rolled their eyes playfully at the alchemist before focusing on the scale.

"So, we balance the scale. It shouldn't be too hard." Soul stated as she picked up one of the rocks that seem similar in size as the one in the left pan holder, placing it on the right pan. However, it wasn't heavy enough to balance the scale. 

After testing all of the rocks, not one of them balanced the scale. They even tried putting two or three rocks to see if it would balance, but not of them worked.

"Okay, I was lying. It is hard." Soul admitted, sheepishly smiling. 

Rapunzel smiled a little at the astrologer when she spotted something orange inside of a small crack on the wall at the other side of the room. The brunette walked towards the wall, examining the crack. Grinning, Rapunzel reached for the rock when the ground shook and the ceiling suddenly lowering on them.

"What happened?" Rapunzel shouted, looking at Varian.

"NO! It's not me this time." He defended. She then looked at Soul who was hiding her face in her hands.

"I'm sorry! I thought that if I replaced the rock in the left pan, then maybe it would balance. I-I-I didn't know this would happen!" The girl explained frantically, glaring at Varian, who was laughing at her. "This is not funny!"

"Now, you know how I feel." Varian laughed.

"Guys! Now's not the time to be fighting." Rapunzel hissed as she tried to steady herself. She then quickly grabbing the orange rock and caught Varian's attention, throwing the object. "Varian! Catch!"

Raising his hands, Varian successfully caught the rock. The alchemist started to duck as the ceiling had already reached his head.

"Soul, hurry! Balance the scale." He yelled, giving the smaller girl the rock. Soul nodded, as she quickly placed the rock she took from the pan on the left, and when she was about to place the rock Varian gave her, the ceiling already on top of her head, pushing her down.