CHAPTER 76 – THE OBSERVATORY
They walked together, further down the backside of the mountain. Excelsior, still somewhat worn out, rode on Orion’s back. When they reached the foot of the tower, it was much grander than they had thought. It looked more like three towers wrapped together, only divided at the top. But at the bottom, at the lobby of the Observatory, there were close to a hundred different openings
When the group walked through, they found that the massive tower was supported by a cluster of rotund columns. The light from outside cut and focused into patterns around the columns, a frame of circles. At the center of the tower, within the columns, were three sets of stairs leading up in different directions.
“Do we chance it together or go at them all divided?” debated Bridger.
”We stay together.”
“It might be the same as the dragons,” Tron tried to correlate.
“We could split back into dragon fighting teams,” said Kones.
Mitakahn looked at Euphrati. “Well…what do you think?”
“I think we should each just choose a path and walk up it,” she answered.
“Go with our feelings…” clarified Mitakahn.
“I agree,” said Excelsior, as he got back onto his own feet.
They all nodded, took a moment to decide, and walked to their target-staircase. Mitakahn held back, neglecting his instinct and waited to follow Euphrati. Together they walked to the middle staircase along with Kunezar. Tron and Anilithion simply walked up the closest staircase. Excelsior with Orion, along with Humbler and Bridger also walking up another staircase in the back. They all entered a different part of the first level.
The floor was cut up into three equally spaced rooms. Tron and Anilithion walked into their room. It had another door on the wall opposite of them. All along the walls were different codes of tiny buttons and levers. There were also four aisles going down the room towards the door, filled with several sequences of more buttons and levers. Tron knew what to do almost immediately.
The room Euphrati, Mitakahn, and Kunezar entered was much like the other. There was a large wooden gear connected by four taught coils to a glass frame with a tablet in it. On the wood surface of the gear an imprint identically matched Euphrati’s talisman of the Phoenix.
In Bridger, Humbler, Excelsior, and Orion’s room the entire span of the wall was covered in doors. Instead of any handles or knobs they found locks with tiny, reflected slivers.
Each group had to find where they placed their talismans and connect it to the Observatory, which appeared to be one gigantic machine. Tron found the right code on the second aisle towards the middle and unlocked the other door. Euphrati placed the Phoenix talisman in the center of the gear and turned it to the right. It clicked and the coils buckled into the gear, one after another.
As they snapped back the glass frame broke and shattered on the floor. A door opened behind it and Mitakahn retrieved the tablet now free from the glass. Bridger and Excelsior finally got to the right door, and it popped open. All three groups met each other on the staircase outside. Mitakahn finished letting Euphrati read the tablet before he showed the rest of the group…
The Legend of Prometheus 1: Herald
Prometheus was a force destined to roam the galaxies forever. For ages and ages, he begged for release from his plight and the reincarnation of his life…to come back as a different entity entirely. Then, one day his path collided with that of a white sun, and he woke up on MagnaThora. At this time, the great Phoenix was carving out the Burning Mountains. As she finished, the Sunbird kept one peak untouched, the highest peak, and ordained it Mount Fire. This is where Prometheus was reborn, reborn as a completely different being. He was made of flesh and blood, he had awoken as mankind. Before this sacred and momentous occasion, Prometheus was presented to the Phoenix, and the fate of MagnaThora was changed forever.
Below the mountains, mankind was wandering around the world, na?ve, juvenile, and lost, just waiting to be discovered and influenced. Prometheus was the tool in which the Phoenix would tap the source of humanity’s spirit. The great Phoenix kindled unto Prometheus all the rites of her kind, the rituals of her community, the mark of her flock, and the purpose of their faith.
The Phoenix told Prometheus the importance of her being in one simple tone...
Her mere presence in the world alone was responsible for: the orbit around the sun, the progression of time, the shifting of the tectonic plates, and the innermost heat of the planet’s core.
Prometheus marveled at the infernal beast’s grandeur. But for her, there was still one element missing. To perform at her optimal level, she required the spirit of man. And so the Phoenix beckoned the most pure force from the galaxies to play herald. Prometheus knelt down before the Phoenix, and it blew its cosmic flames onto his back. Prometheus closed his eyes. The flames seeped into his skin, throughout his body, and wrapped around his heart.
When he opened his eyes Prometheus saw everything for the first time with his new sight. A fiery yellow filter, Prometheus finally felt at home. The Phoenix gave Prometheus wings of fire to fly over the lands and summon her flock.
When Prometheus touched down on the long plains of empty canvas that would later become the Serengeti and MeadowLands, the men and women gathered at his illustrious entrance. Still a newborn race, they had never seen fire until now. So Prometheus had no choice but to churn a fireball in his hand and present it to them. He left it there on the ground for them to study as he returned to Mount Fire. Material inspiration in the form of natural curiosity would fuel their hearts and minds into motion.
Over the next couple of years, man learned the power of conviction and ambition from the flame before it ultimately burned out. And from that conviction and ambition, they discovered the skills necessary to evolve. Man learned to create their own fire. Out of the many men that took this next step in evolution were the few whose hearts craved more. They would all, in their own time, make their pilgrimage to Mount Fire and become the founding members of the first kingdom in mankind’s history; the Phoenix Kingdom.
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After they all finished reading the first tablet, the group continued up the stairs to the next floor of the tower.
“What do you think it all means?” asked Tron.
“Too early to tell...”
“Don’t know.”
“Could be that we’re supposed to be Prometheus,” theorized Euphrati.
“There’s more to this legend than only herald,” thought out Mitakahn, “I figure we’re going to have to wait and see.” They approached the next level.
Inside, was one massive room, no staircases, or aisles, nor knobs nor gears. But the floor looked like it had recently been disassembled and stuck back together. When Orion chanced a step onto the floor the piece fell out. After looking closer, Mitakahn could see that there were symbols on each of the pieces that made up the floor. And out of the ninety pieces there were only three different symbols: A phoenix, a mount, and a flame.
The one that fell out was a flame.
When Bridger risked stepping on a phoenix stone it did not fall, but when Anilithion tried a mount stone it collapsed. Each knight found their own way across the floor, slowly figuring out the combination was phoenix, mount, flame, over and over, until they reached the other side. Euphrati followed Mitakahn across in the middle. Orion, timid to go ahead, waited for his master and Bridger to plot out their path before he risked running across, cunningly tiptoeing across the air. Anilithion looked around at the entire room while waiting for Tron to figure out the path. As Tron crossed over the last stone to the other side, Anilithion’s heel slipped, and he fell through the cracks.
Tron brushed himself off unaware, his back turned to Anilithion, but Mitakahn’s scream jolted him into action. When he turned around to see Anilithion’s absence, a whip cracked and wrapped around his golden forearm, pulling him down. He caught the floor, and Anilithion crawled up his whip onto Tron’s arm and they were both saved by the rest of the group.
Tron got himself up and rubbed his wrist. Three red marks ran up the inside of his arm to his elbow, the impressions of the whip’s wrath. There was no need to give thanks or lay blame. They just kept going, as if nothing happened. Once all across, they made it easily out the door and back up another staircase wrapping around the outside of the temple.This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
On the third floor was again just one room as big as the width of the tower. The only thing on the floor was a giant triangle, the corners connected by three empty circles. Once inside next to the triangle they could see a way out and up to the next level and a glass case in the middle of the triangle. Inside the glass case was another red tablet.
All that could be read through its glass was the title, “The Legend of Prometheus II: Founder”
By the look of three empty circles, everyone was inclined to try their talismans again. After they figured out the combination and one last closer look, the three lines when turned at the same time connected the talismans, formed individual triangles themselves, acute and subtle. The other discovery was that they could be moved on the floor as a whole, but only had two locking positions, the other talismans. With a couple of random combination attempts, they unlocked the glass case and the tablet rose forth. The code was Mount to Phoenix to Flame, Mitakahn wondered if there was any significance to the order. Tron got to the tablet first, eager to read what hints and clues could be next…
The Legend of Prometheus 2: Founder
When Prometheus returned to Mount Fire, the Phoenix was waiting for him inside a cove at the top of the mount’s peak. Prometheus found the Phoenix in this unreachable cove and reported the completion of his heraldry. With one last breath of instruction, the Phoenix then blessed him and crumbled to ash. Behind its ashes was still one lone flame, burning, un-fueled and embedded within the mountainside, a portal for the Phoenix into this world, the Flame Eterna. In the Phoenix’s last breath of instruction, Prometheus was issued the task of setting up a community for the up-and-coming kingdom which involved three charges:
The first charge was to build a temple by carving out the mountainside. The temple would be crafted out of the lava frozen stone that made up the Burning Mountains. Prometheus floated in the air, on his wings, and funneled and shaped his flames to burn into the mountain. The outcome was awe-inspiring, a true work of art. The walls were ridged.
The columns were firm and curved. Inside the outer temple shell was a cathedral of thin red crystal stone walls. Within the crystal cathedral, Prometheus etched into the wall behind the temple altar the most magnificent illustration of the Phoenix, leaving the other two walls blank. He also made it, so at one point in the day, every day, the sun would hit the red window roof and reflect the rays into the room, illuminating the symbol of the Phoenix behind the altar.
The second charge presented to Prometheus was to make up trials of allegiance and commitment. This is when he erected the Observatories behind to mount. Within the building lay different dilemmas and obstacles on each floor revolving around the acquisition of a key, Prometheus’ key. This was the only way to get into the Altar of the Flame Eterna and be baptized in the Phoenix’s pure essence. These games would come to be called the Keymaster Trials, and a tribal standard among the followers of the Phoenix.
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Each member of the company had a glance at it, as they passed it around and headed up yet another fleet of stairs outside of the temple. Again, with the chance to discuss the template’s meanings while climbing ever higher into the sky.
“What about the third charge?” pointed out Bridger.
“Bridger’s right,” Kunezar seconded, “It left out the last charge.”
“At least this one narrows it down some more,” precluded Excelsior.
“We have to find the Prometheus Key,” Pinpointed Mitakahn.
Sure enough, when they got to the next level, the fourth floor of the Observatory, inside was a lone treasure chest, surrounded by three sets of stairs going up. There were three locks on the golden chest. They were of exact circles and the talismans fit perfectly inside of them. They placed them in the order of the triangle they just encountered on the floor below them and turned in the order of the template room below. And in this sequence of moves the treasure unlocked and the chest popped open.
Inside was soft red cloth lining the walls comforting the ruby red and charcoal gray Prometheus Key. The key was almost as big as a scepter. It had the welding of a phoenix’s face alternating ruby red and cold metal gray on the handle, and the most intricate system of teeth. The first of which was a thin red crystal rectangle held in by the charcoal metal latching onto the center of each side. And the second of which was a shift marked by carve-outs of two connected half-circles and a point of axis. The third and bottom tooth was the smallest and simplest. Just a short metal stub to support the two other elaborately structured teeth.
The plundered chest swallowed their talismans. Now all they had was the key. Anilithion picked it up out of the chest and brought it over to Euphrati to hold on to. On this next flight the company decided to stick together, now only having one key between all of them and leaving the talismans behind. They followed Euphrati up a staircase which seemed to bring them to the middle room of the next floor.
The door opened for them and closed behind them. Inside the room was a small stone sculpture of a wall standing alone in the center of the room. It was dark and there was a keyhole inside of it big enough to fit the Prometheus Key. Euphrati stuck it in and turned it but nothing happened. Excelsior suggested turning it a different way. It moved but did not unlock.
“It goes three ways but does not unlock, perhaps it is another puzzle?” theorized Tron.
After he walked around the back of the wall, Mitakahn retrieved the key, brought it to the other side and tried again. He slid the handle with the phoenix face in first. When he twisted the key, the other side of the key, the teeth, were pulled up and back into the groove of the wall. Mitakahn could now see the face of the phoenix on the handle staring right at him. He pressed his fingertips on the eyes for a grip and swung it to the left. A door slid open on the opposite wall to the outside. He tried moving it again, but it did not budge.
Everyone cheered for Mitakahn as they all left to move on, when he thought of another way to turn the key. He pulled the key out and it came with ease. Then he put it in the keyhole on the other side that Euphrati tried and it triggered a stone slate to fold down revealing the last crystal tablet. He pulled it out. They all moved out of the tower to the ascending spiral balcony on the outside.
“How did you figure that out, Mitakahn?” Euphrati asked.
Mitakahn could not hear her over the winds, as he yelled to them all, trying to read the tab aloud,
The Legend of Prometheus 3: Gatekeeper
“The third and final charge of the great Sunbird god was for Prometheus to protect the divine portal between dimensions, the Flame Eterna. Prometheus pledged his life to the service of the Phoenix, and vowed, upon completion of the temple and trials, to never leave the flame unprotected again. This was the anointing of the first Gatekeeper.”
“When Prometheus finished the Observatory the first of the candidates had arrived. The doors to the top of the tower locked, the levels were set, and the gates around the tower closed, as the first human hand grasped the last ledge of Mt. Fire. Five men and six women both set off and met along the road to the mount. They sat down and stared at the temple. For them it was out of reach. Yes, they were close to the top, but the temple was higher still, unreachable by mere men and women, along with the altar. Prometheus met them with a grand gesture. He flew from the tower to the temple and burned a zigzagging slope down right before the eleven candidates.”
“He modeled his wings humbly and displayed the powers of the phoenix appropriately, a courteous preview before focused testing and gauntlet hazing. He then told them the legend of the Phoenix and his own tale of recruitment. He ended his narrative with how he built the Observatories and perfectly segued into their initiation.”
“He explained to them the rules of the Keymaster Trials. There were five rules. The first rule was to work together, along with fate, to find the way through the maze. The second rule was to do whatever it took to get to the Flame Eterna. The third rule was to know that the Phoenix has all her disciples’ best interests in mind. The fourth rule was to avoid any temptation to cheat or be untrue. The fifth and final rule was to obtain the key hidden with the tower. It was the only way one can get to the altar of the Flame Eterna without wings. The last thing Prometheus said to them before they started the trials was, ‘The Prometheus Key moves throughout the Observatory. You will know what it is once you see it. Good luck and I will see you on the other side…’
Prometheus rose into the air and his giant fiery wings pumped as he flew to the cove within the mount. This was his last flight before his endless deployment as Gatekeeper to the Flame Eterna.”
“By the end of that day, none of the candidates had made it out of the trials yet. Prometheus was not at all surprised. With the future of the kingdom in mind, he had made the puzzles and obstacles extremely difficult. Nowhere close to the low level of primitive humanity. Perhaps they were unreachable standards, but one extremely earnest pledge got herself to the top of the Observatory and was able to get to the Cloud Observatory; where a boat, docked in a river of fire aimed towards Prometheus and the altar.
When she reached the altar she presented Prometheus with the key. It was the right one; a red crystal card welded into the metal ridges, and a handle with the face of a phoenix on it.
Her name was Angynei and Prometheus instantly fell in love with her. He blessed her with a kiss and her eyes burst with flames, they covered her body and settled as her wings. Angynei was the first magi of the Phoenix clan, the first priestess of the Phoenix Kingdom. The rest of the candidates slowly made their way through and became the founders of the kingdom. The last of which was a young boy, only seven years old, named Nikoli. It took him almost three days to find the key and bring it to Prometheus at the altar. Nikoli was by far the youngest member of the founding generation of the Phoenix Kingdom, but he had the strongest heart. By overcoming the hardest obstacle of all, age, Nikoli sealed his fate as an integral role in the Phoenix kingdom’s community and future.``
“Amongst the community, Angynei was deemed leader of the tribal commune. The reasoning being she was the first and quickest to pass the trials. Her being the Gatekeeper’s counterpart was also an advantage in the decision. Together, Prometheus and Angynei ruled the early days of the Phoenix Kingdom. They bore a son named Atari and led the kingdom of Mount Fire into its golden age.”
“That’s my father’s name!” Euphrati interrupted, getting more of her history filled in as Mitakahn continued reading from the tablet.
“After years of being stuck in the cove within the mount, Prometheus began to resent his assignment. Mostly he regretted missing his son’s childhood. But underneath it all, what Prometheus truly missed were the stars. When the day finally came where Prometheus could no longer guard the flame, he passed the torch to his son. As Prometheus left the altar, he instantly turned to old age. In all the years of his service he never aged. Now that his time was up, he found that his lifespan was ending. Prometheus was dying.”
“He was brought to the temple and was able to look upon his creations one last time before he died. With his dying eyes, Prometheus watched the sunset behind the Observatories, and left his earthly body. His spirit ascended to the stars, and he once again took up his destiny of roaming the galaxies forever. When Prometheus died, as an ode to her herald, the Phoenix blessed all her followers with the everlasting gift of immortality. As long as Prometheus’ spirit flew throughout space, no one baptized in the fire of the Flame Eterna would ever die from old age.”
When Mitakahn had finished, they were just coming to the sixth and final floor. This level was almost completely open. Large windowless openings gutted the walls. There were six panoramic rectangles letting the outside in. By now they were so high up that they were bordering the clouds.
Everyone was too caught up in what was above them to notice the final floor. What seemed to be the inverse of the tower was sticking out of the bottom of a cloud above the Observatory. It looked identical to the one they were in. Except the bottom of it, which would be the top of their tower, was one giant cage-looking temple room.
A mirror image conjured in the sky.
Mitakahn knew, “That is where we have to go.” As he pointed they all looked up and marveled at the magical tower, floating in the clouded sky above them. The only question was…how do they get up there?