Chapter 3

…

The storm died down.

By now you're making your way back to the whitespace. You've never seen there be any change of weather, and it's always filled with a nice and comfortable temperature.

Leaving the icy realm through the same door that brought you there, you slump down on a nice piece of flat whiteness.

It might just be your imagination because you're relaxing after hours of work, it might be reality. You feel less and less tired as you drift asleep, less and less thirsty, and all the fatigue of your muscles leaving you.

Tomorrow, you'll continue chipping away at your new project.

…

It's been.. you're not actually sure how long it's been, but you've slept 11 times so far. It's kind of hard to tell how many days pass with all three of the skies keeping static, except for the occasional snowstorm and firestorm. You're not gonna risk being inside either of those, for fear of what's inside them, no matter how strange they seem.

Anywho, you've been able to confirm something interesting. The whitespace really does heal you. Well, you haven't tested whether it does so for actual injuries, but it most certainly helps with things like fatigue and hunger and such.

Standing atop her head, you're currently melting the last of the ice surrounding the big girl. As the very last chunk melts away, you hold your breath in hope.

Rumble.

The girl slowly opens her eyes.

Taking a glance or two at her surroundings, you feel her sigh.

You can't contain your joy, you would've even started jumping around were you not standing on her head.

Apathetically, she slowly gets up, not caring at all about the hill of ice above.

For a moment you're afraid you'll be crushed, you start yelling at her, warning her you're above!

Whether she heard you or not, she thankfully uses her hands to easily break through the ice barrier. How'd she even get trapped if this isn't an obstacle for her?

You take the opportunity as she rises and jump off, landing on the hill and using as though it's a slide.

Standing as imposing as anyone that tall would be, she apathetically looks around. Her gaze lingers for but a moment on the demonic tower, her eyes becoming slits for a moment as though in judgement, before shrugging.

She doesn't take notice of you, even when you yell and use colorful spells trying to attract her attention. Is she blind? Surely she can't be..

Seemingly taking a random direction, she sets off.

Baffled at her indifference, at the casual treatment of this whole situation, you can only stare at her.

Thankfully you recover your wits and start chasing after her with all your strength.

Alas, what is a mortal's top speed against someone as big as a house. Even taking a leisurely stroll, each step of hers covers dozens of yours.

Slowly Quite quickly, she disappears behind the horizon.

Looking on in defeat, you start to realize the gravity of your situation.

Perhaps you've been in denial up till now, perhaps you're simply too easy to distract to really sit still and think.

Either way, you're all alone. You're in some strange place, and the only person you've seen so far, even freed, has just up and left like you're no more than a gust of wind.

…

You're lying down in the angelic tower of the Red Door, your head squarely inside the harmless beam of light. You have been for a few days now, actually.

All your bodily needs don't worry you, you don't care. Is there any point anymore? Even if you could go wherever you wanted to in these two realms, would you find any other person? Would they even talk to you?

Not caring anymore, you don't even return to the whitespace to recover.

You slowly succumb to thirst, perhaps in your sleep, perhaps awake. The result unbothered by your state.

…

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…

You awake in a strange white space, there being no end in sight in any direction.

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

The only thing keeping you company are two open doors, a trail of snow leading from the Blue one and into the Red one.

Intrigued, you search around.

…

Huh. Clearly, you muse to yourself, there's been people here before you. You think.

Your finding after a few days are an angelic tower inside the hellish realm, a demonic tower inside the frozen-over one, some weird cave, and a field of chunks of ice.

There also appear to be slight markings carved into the various doors. Sadly you cannot identify the language, much less understand it.

No matter, there's other interesting things.

There were two dark-red stones you found, both neatly kept inside the whitespace. Something in your mind told you they were Tier 0 Attack Crystals, whatever that meant.

A shame you didn't get a chance to inspect them though. The moment they touched in your hands, they merged together.

The result was a slightly bigger, yet still perfectly spherical crystal. It became slightly less dark as well, and the voice in your head said something about it becoming Tier 1.

Maybe the "tier" reflects their size and color? You're not sure, but the idea does hold merit. After all, a clearer and more distinct color would surely sell for more.

Oh, of course, the crystal is magic. Though you're not too impressed with it, many of the things around you are.

Not having many other options, you opt to head to the demonic-looking tower.

The way there doesn't take you too long. The magic crystal being quite powerful, easily keeping the temperature around you comfortable.

Arriving at the almost-scary looking tower, you peak inside.

You see an icicle on the first floor's ceiling, from it a droplet of some unknown liquid dropping every few seconds. Every time, it falls right into a conveniently place hole in the floor. A drainage system, you think to yourself.

You put your hands forward, waiting for a few minutes for a good amount of the liquid to gather, then take a gulp.

Tastes like.. night water. Cool.

Opting to drink more of it, you eventually start to feel a rumbling.

The floor underneath you starts lighting up in a hue of blue, a pillar of light ascending every moment.

Terrified of what it might mean, you run out. No way you're gonna stay and wait for the tower to explode!

Though, anticlimactically, as soon as you no longer prevent the strange drops from trickling into the hole on the bottom, the pillar of light vanishes much the same way it appeared.

..what?

You think for a bit, suspicious of whatever this is meant to mean. Trying something, you try block the liquid from dripping inside the hole again.

Less than a couple minutes later, the pillar of blue light starts forming again.

This time, hoping it to be much the same as the Red Door's one, you let it flow through you. It's harmless.

The pillar stops growing near your hands, where you're keeping the liquid.

You can clearly see it's somehow, for some reason, obstructing the light from growing. Do you want it do that?

You're not sure. However, temporarily stopping the liquid doesn't have much of an effect. The light just recedes whenever the liquid gets near it again.

…

Thinking the light is probably good, you've tried various things in hopes of helping it ascend.

First thing to come to mind was obviously to just blast the icicle with enough power for it to fly away to tomorrow. It did not work..

Yet another idea you tried was simply plugging the hole in the floor. Perhaps there's not an infinite amount of the strange substance, it just circulates back up whenever it drips down.

That was not the case. It took awhile, but clearly the liquid does not stop dripping. There was just more and more of it the longer you waited, eventually the whole first floor of the tower flooded, it even started pouring outside.

This is working, you need a permanent solution, one that removes the icicle from the tower as a whole… But how could you do that?

Thinking and thinking, you're unable to think of anything useful. Since firepower doesn't work, it's time to start trying stupid random things.

First you light a bonfire underneath the damn magic icicle, with charcoal from the forest inside the Red Door. That did little more than just spreading smoke everywhere..

Maybe the weird snow itself will somehow melt it? You thought it certainly plausible enough to try. After all, the snow didn't melt even next to lava, clearly it's magical in nature.

Sadly, the magic inside it is not of use here.

…

You've dried dozens of different thins now, at some point even trying different mixes of the soils from both doors. Nothing worked.

You head back towards the angelic tower, perhaps it'll hold clues. Maybe they're linked in some way?

Alas, you find nothing suggesting that. They might as well be two different towers, built in different dimension, with different architectural styles.

However, as you're analyzing the red beam of light, you notice something scattered in the corner. Is that.. salt?

Why would salt be in.. whatever this place is? You try a grain, and, indeed, it does taste exactly like salt.

A lightbulb lights up above you.

Clearly, everything here is either crazy, random, or some mix of the two coupled with wizardry.

Why wouldn't the salt as well?

You scoop up as much as you can, then run back to the demonic tower.

Grinning to yourself, you tell your mortal enemy: this is the day you perish!

Slathering the salt on every part of the icicle, your grin only gets wider as you see it work!

Not a minute goes by, yet the icicle is nowhere to be seen. Yes!

Triumphant, you watch as the gentle blue light grows from the floor. This time stopping only when it almost touched the ceiling.

Why don't you head up there and help it some more ey?

…

The second floor holds a strange sphere. It floats in the middle of the room, seemingly unbothered by the world.

Clearly, you think to yourself, it's stopping the blue light from living up to its full potential.

Getting in position, ready to remove this vile foe, you fire lighting at it!

BAM!

-the sphere turned into a ring, the lightning going straight through it and hitting the wall behind, charring it black.

..let's try that again, it can't dodge forever!

Like someone very wise once said, if one lighting strike from a magical crystal doesn't take care of it, try more lighting! If that still doesn't work, you're clearly not using enough lighting!

You spam as many bolts as you can, the sphere maniacally shapeshifting to bend out of the way.

Yet, it's clearly getting overwhelmed.

A minute passes by, then another, and finally. A bolt strikes it!

Haha!

You see it wobbles for a bit, it's shape now unstable, before it extends a tentacle outwards.

Wondering what it's doing, not running as it doesn't seem like that's its intent, you look in shock at what it does. It's turning the tentacle into a shield!?

The shield is made out of the same substance as it, what's the point of doing this??

It must be provoking you!

There's another thing wise people say, you think to yourself. If there is no amount of lighting that is enough, try fire! Fire not enough? Try acid! That don't work? Just use the goddamn magic crystal in random ways until something does!

Riled up enough to do whatever it takes to defeat this foe, you throw anything you can think of at it. Elements, pure energy, anything. Even if it doesn't hurt the damn thing, it'll shame it for sure!

…

The damn sphere.. now not even resembling it's former self, has survived unscathed. First the shield, then it made an umbrella, some armor(?), and whatever else could help it defend itself.

Frustrated beyond belief, you storm up to it.

You question it, nay, interrogate it.

What are its motives, why is it here, who does it work for! You even fell low enough to threaten its family members, you're horrid..

Alas, it answers neither verbally, nor any other way. It just sits there, floating.

Angry at your attacks not working, your professional intimidation even less so, you simply SLAP it to vent your frustrations.

PLOP!

It drifts off, still sitting on air, and hits the wall.

..huh?

It's.. not staying in position?

It's easily evaded all of your magical attack up till now. Whenever it wasn't capable of doing so, it either deflected them, or simply ignored them!

Are your slaps so weak as to not even be considered an attack?

Unbothered about what that speaks about your strength, you begin slapping it again and again.

It doesn't even pretend to dodge!

If it's so, then.. why not just push it away?

You easily guide it out a random window, pushing it and letting it drift. Now floating outside, almost 10 meters above the ground, the strange sphere still doesn't show any indication of wanting to return. Does it only have defensive functions?

Amused, you wait to see whether the blue pillar of light will grow.

And indeed it does. The gorgeous and magical sight spreads from the first floor to the second, illuminating even more of the tower now.

Nodding satisfied, you happily go up to the third floor.

On this one, you count 10 slabs of stone sitting atop each other. The smallest one sits all of the rest, while the biggest wallows underneath all the others.

Picking up the smallest slab, confused, you simply chuck it out the window.

Doing the same for the second one, there's still nothing stopping you. Onto the next and the next, you quickly realize a problem.

The slabs are getting heavier and heavier, exponentially so. You're able to carry the first four on your own. Eventually you manage to remove the fifth, though it took your entire body strength to barely lift it high enough to push out the window.

Seems you won't be able to beat this one with your own strength.. oh well, that's what magic crystals are for.

You stand still, thinking a bit. You could probably push a few more slabs with pure force from the crystal, however that wouldn't work on the bottom ones.

You need something to make the whole process easier.. a ramp perhaps?

Maybe there'll be something useful on the next floor. You're tired from moving the heavy slabs anyway, why not take a break.

…

The fourth floor holds a pedestal pointing at the heavens, much the same way the angelic tower's pedestal does. The difference being that while that one has six spherical indents, this one holds only one. A triangle-pyramid indent.

You certainly haven't seen anything like that up to now, perhaps a simple carving will work?

Though you doubt you could make one so.. perfect.

You digress. Maybe you'll find an object shaped like that after clearing the third floor, if you tried doing stuff now you'd only waste time.

Going back to the slabs, you get an idea. A ramp would be perfect for this! And lucky you, there's the best material for one filling this whole dimension.

…

Almost a day has passed since then. You've not worked tirelessly of course, you took some breaks. On one of them you inspected the doors closer. Both the Blue and Red one have a backside! They're different colors as well.

One is black in color, the other more akin to a crystal, bordering on looking like a strange mirror.

You'll open the other two doors later, you think to yourself.

Another minor detail you spot is a painted on number '2', right in between the doors. What it means, you don't know.

Anywho, you've made great progress so far. The ramp is fully made out of slippery ice.

You even melted it with the attack crystal to make it as smooth as possible. The result is an unnaturally fun slide.

Pushing the next few slabs, you easily get them thrown off the tower. Only by the time you get to the 8th one do you need to use the crystal again.

Just wind itself won't work, pure force is clearly better..

With that thought in mind, you place the crystal as close to the slabs as possible, and will it to attack.

The 8th slab shoots off into the distance, neither the slippery ramp nor the air hindering its momentum the slightest bit.

Huh, neat.