Chapter 1

You awake in a white space, seeing nothing but two doors in front of you. One is blue, radiating a shivering cold. The other red, making you sweat from the heat simply by being near..

…Looking around for a bit, you don't see anything else. There's only whiteness as far as the eye can see, only the two doors keeping your company.

You remember neither who you are, nor how you came to this place. Strangely, this doesn't upset you in any way.

Deciding to look around some more, you discover a few more things of note. There seems to be a strange oval shape painted squarely between the two doors. There's no indent near it, nor any other feature to discern its meaning.

Going around the doors themselves, you see that they're actually a different color on the other side. One is black in color, the other more akin to a crystal, bordering on looking like a strange mirror.

Carefully opening the Blue Door, your jaw almost drops to the floor. On the other side is a whole new dimension!

A frozen wasteland from one side of the horizon to the other, almost everything is blanketed in layer of snow. The air itself enough to chill you, you can't imagine how cold everything else is. In the distance you can see a forest, though all of the vegetation is frozen dead.

A way's off there are sheets of ice, each as thick as a man. Near it, a whole field littered with chunks of ice of varying sizes. Some are but a basketball in diameter, some bigger than boulders.

Trying to scoop up some of the ice, you feel it drain your body heat fast enough to kill you in a minute at most.

Knowing there'd be little point in trying to traverse the cold landscape, you turn to the Red Door.

Opening this one, you find a hellish landscape. The blazing fields hold not just ash and a heat so strong it feels like your flesh is frying, there's whole lava rivers and lakes!

Barely keeping your eyes open in the heat, you manage to spot some details as well. For one, this dimension also holds a forest, though not frozen over. All that remains of the trees and grasses is earie charcoal and ash.

In another direction is a scorched hill, looking like it holds a cave or entrance of some kind on the side.. you think. You aren't too sure because of the distance.

In yet another part of these blazing planes, there's a tall but narrow tower piercing into the sky, being at least 30 meters in height.

Deciding there's no chance of you surviving a voyage into either of the two realms, you simply wait with the two doors open. Hoping that something might happen.

…

At first nothing seemed to change. Both of the doors just stayed up, no creature or anything else interesting wandering in their line of sight. Well.. except for the chilling wind threatening to freeze you from just being near it.

As time goes on though, it picked up in intensity. Stronger and stronger, the gust started carrying more and more snow into the white space that connected the two doors.

Not thinking much of it, you continue waiting…

By the time you're sure more than an hour passed, you notice something peculiar. The snow that was blown in through the Red Door.. didn't seem to melt?

Perhaps it wasn't water, but it sure looked like your regular run of the mill snow. Upon closer inspection, it's not just that it didn't melt. It even removed the nearby heat from the blazing dimension!

The heat now bearable, and the snow no longer as freezing cold (yet still not melting), you realize this is a chance for you to explore more of what the Red Door hides.

Slowly but surely, you manage to kick enough snow to carve yourself out a little area of bearable temperature.

Not really seeing any other option besides making long trails if you wanted to get anywhere, you contemplate where you want to go first. It'd take a good while to get anywhere anyway..

Honestly, there's not much to think about. The tower is the only manmade structure you see, it just might contain clues about your current situation. Why would a forest or a cave hold anything of interest anyway?

Not waiting a second more, you get to work. It's not like there's anything else for you to do..

…

A few hours of hard work later, you've managed to make decent progress. There's less than throw's away distance between you now.

You manage to make out a few details now. The tower is covered in burnt vines, not a surprise really. And the stone(?) bricks its made out of are in less than ideal shape.

The tower has four floors total, with an open platform on the very top. Making your way to the entrance you take a peak through a window, seeing..

Not much really. The whole first floor is not much besides the floor tiling it, the stairs leading above, and some white powder scattered in the middle.

Taking a careful peak through the entrance, just in case you missed something from the window opening, you're greeted by: absolutely nothing new! Shocker.

The tower itself seems to be somehow temperature regulated on the inside. You have zero clue how this came to be, but you're sure as hell not going to complain.

Feeling that the only way forward is to go up, you go deeper in, wondering how the strange powder came to be, who made the tower, and oh so much more.

Suddenly, without any prior indication, the area in front of you starts to spark as though lighting will struck at any moment!

Jumping back in fear you wait for something happen.. though nothing does. The strange sparks fade away, seemingly not mad anymore.

Furrowing your brows, you inspect the area closer.

…

There really doesn't seem to be anything strange though, there's only you, the stairs, and the white powde-

Freezing, you think of an idea. Surely.. the dust wouldn't be the cause of the sparks, would it?

Even though you're not the most superstitious type, the idea does seem too hold some merit. After all, you are in a magical situation as is, some wizard dust wouldn't be too out of place.

Looking closer yet again, you see that the dust isn't actually just randomly strewn around. It's in some sort of weird, hexagonal pattern.

Wanting to go around it, you notice there's a problem.. There's no way for you to get to the stairs without crossing the strange array!

Not having any other clue as to how to deal with the situation, you do the only logic thing you can. Run away!

Well, calling it tactical retreat is more apt. You're not a wizard yourself, dealing with magic stuff will need some creativity on your part.

Remembering the burnt forest, you come to an idea. What if, maybe, just maybe.. you got a looong branch from it and tried to disperse the wizard-dust?

Not getting any other idea, you go with that!

…

A few more hours of kicking snow around, your legs getting cramped, you get to the forest.

Sadly, it seems it doesn't have the same temperature-regulating features as the tower does, making you spend even more time looking for a branch long enough to poke the array from a distance.

Arriving back at the tower with the absolute perfect stick for the occasion, you prepare to poke at the damn powder. It is charcoal after all, sadly you had to learn the hard way how easily it breaks by an earlier attempt of yours.

Lying on your belly to get as close to the ground as possible you realize that there's actually a safer option. Why don't you just chuck the damn thing at the middle of it from a safer distance?

Throwing the branch like it's nobody's business, you watch in horror as it breaks apart mid flight!

Thankfully, all of the chunks landed on some part of the powder formation, destroying the almost beautiful formation it made up.

Lighting buzzes for a few moments in random directions, though miraculously not hitting you in the process, until it dies down. Fading into obscurity.

Dazed, you carefully try to approach the now ruined array.

..it seems to have lost all power. Apparently the shape of the array is what gave it power, not the dust itself. You exhale in relief, glad you can continue to explore the tower.

Looking at the stairs, you go forward. Making sure to to take careful steps in fear of there being a similar situation on the next floor of course.

This time carefully taking in every single detail that you can muster, you spot TWO of the strange patterns on this floor!

Groaning, you look at them further. One is engraved in the floor, the other on the ceiling. They're both different than the wizard-dust one though, so they shouldn't attack.. right?

Taking a step from the stairs onto the floor, you notice that they're actually very similar. They seem to be a mirrored version of one another, just that one holds a horizontal line in the center, while the other a vertical one.

Getting closer and not seeing any effect, you become bolder and bolder, yet still hold a respectful fear of the things.

Even standing in the middle of them doesn't seem to have any effect. At all.

Are they broken?

Well.. you're certainly not going to complain over climbing further up the tower without having to risk endangering yourself!

Onto the next floor it is..

Arriving here you spot a masterfully crafted.. wooden cube. It looks pretty for sure, not something you'd ever be able to make, but it seems ordinary in all other ways.

Approaching it, you start to take notice of all the work you've been doing. Your legs start to hurt more and more, you become more and more listless. In fact, even the whole world seems to be getting dimmer, the air around you also getting cold in spite of being in a whole dimension of fire-y things.

You're getting very, very tired at this point. Barely managing to stand up. Maybe you should lay on the cube, it would probably server as pillow, better than the floor at least.. probably.

Even your hands seem to be getting sucked of all their energy, drying up in real time. Surely this is a sign that you need to have a good, quality rest.

..wait-a-minute, your flesh is drying up? That's not your usual symptom of, well, anything really!

Jumping away from the only source of this phenomenon you could think of, you stumble and fall on your back.

All of a sudden, life returns to you!

Compared to how you were just a second ago, you could run a marathon! Key word being 'compared to'.

…

The cube is danger, yet.. clearly it serves some purpose in this wretched land. Thinking about it with a clearer mind, you connect a few dots.

The temperature suddenly dropping drastically, as though you were in the Blue Door's dimension. The world getting dimmer, all of your drive and energy leaving you. Hell, even your flesh itself was sucked of life!

Clearly this cube sucks energy out of it's surrounding. And not a negligible amount either..

Welp, not your problem, you hope. At least it's not in the way of the fourth floor. The final one. Perhaps this one will hold all of the answers you desire?

Alas, what you see is just a simple pedestal. A stumpy, unassuming pedestal.

It doesn't seem to hold any strange patterns, no arrays, anything. Even upon inspecting it time and time again, there's only six spherical indents evenly spaced out on top of it.

Yet, you don't see anything you could put into them. Maybe they're not even for filling, maybe it's just an aesthetic décor, the only one this tower has..

Stumped from the lack of anything noteworthy, even more so from the lack of answers, you flop down and sit. Thinking how in hell you're gonna, well, do anything?

You can't just continue kicking snow around forever. You're already tired from the whole ordeal, not to mention the weird cube leaving your hands and part of your face as wrinkly as an 80 year old's.

…

Eventually you lie down, looking at the sky. It's.. empty? No, that isn't the right word. It certainly has some features. Yet for the life of you you cannot describe them. Perhaps it's only there to have something to look at when everything else runs out.

…

Maybe it's been an hour already, but you can't think of much else to do. You're too lazy right now anyway, you can always try something tomorrow. Which would be easier to tell when it arrives if the damn sky at least changed.

However, your plans seem to not align with fate. The tower starts rumbling, the stone blocks making it almost falling apart and throwing dust clouds into the air.

What in hell is happening?!

Scared stiff, you wait for the shaking to die down.

Seconds, maybe minutes, pass. Yet it feels like hours.

And when it finally subsides, you notice it. It. It's coming out of the bottom floor of the tower! You can't get past it!

Oh god, what even is that?!

You try to look for a way to climb down the sides of the tower, yet there's no hope. You can only wait for whatever that is to arrive and eat you!!

..

Oh, as for what exactly you saw?

A menacing red glow!

Though, it doesn't seem to be climbing up the floors. Actually, waiting for awhile, you see that it doesn't move at all, staying on the first floor.

Of course, you're not naïve enough to fall for such petty tricks. Clearly, this a trap. Once triggered, it'd pose as though it's harmless, waiting for you to get relaxed and approach it.

Haha! You've been outsmarted once again Wizard the Tower-creator! Your simple tricks won't suffice to kill anyone!

Feeling smug, you opt to wait out whatever is down there. It'll get bored sooner or later, and you're sure you can beat it in a contest of waiting out each other.

After all, you're just about to go to sleep!

Okay, maybe that's not the brightest idea you've had up till now. But there really isn't much else you can do, you muse to yourself. At least you'll most probably awake from all the rumbling the thing causes, if it decided to go up.

Still a bit on thorns, you try to calm down enough to fall asleep on oh so cozy stone floor, grateful that it's not cold because of the whole.. burning landscape you're in.