Online In Another World

The next chamber that awaited was a far cry from the others in design; it was much taller, stretching upward with rows upon rows of bookshelves that held countless books in their hold. There were hundreds of these shelves, forged of dry wood and covered in cobwebs and dust, and perhaps tens of thousands of books.

“…A library?” He remarked, stepping in.

“Ah, I vaguely remember this room…I think,” Blimpo said.

A curious chamber, that much was undeniable; as a precaution, Emilio pushed one of the dense bookshelves that was near the entrance to the room across the black, wooden floorboards, blocking off the door.

“That won’t stop him,” Blimpo remarked.

“Yeah, but I’ll slow him down…or at least give us a heads-up,” he responded, wiping his hands off.

The reason he did it was more so that he could take a moment to explore the intriguing room. Something about books stored in a realm beyond death, held in a labyrinth of danger unrivaled; it tugged at parts of his brain he seldom wanted to acknowledge.

Walking around, he once more felt like he had little understanding of the area he was in; nothing seemed coherent about it at all.

“…I’ve been wondering, what’s up with this place? I mean, every chamber is so different. More than that, the structures within it make no sense–architecture foreign to Arcadius and now a library like this?” Emilio wondered out loud.

Blimpo sat on one of the dusty tables, tinkering with his gauntlet, “There’s a reason for that, ya know. A ‘method to the madness’ that is this labyrinth.”

“Well, I’m all ears,” he looked back at his companion.

As he prepared to listen to the explanation that Blimpo held, he retrieved a heavy book that was lathered in dust and cobwebs, blowing the illwanted substances off before sitting beside the elven man.

“It’s not too dissimilar to the rest of the After. I said it before, but the After is the place where everything goes when they die…Doesn’t matter what world or realm, it seems,” Blimpo explained, “That also includes structures and even entire regions.”

“Huh? How’s that work? I mean, buildings and all of that aren’t exactly alive, are they?” He asked.

“In a way, they are. At least, the death of such things seems to come from when they are truly forgotten. In that case, once everybody who knows about something or somewhere dies…That place is completely forgotten; it then becomes a part of the After,” Blimpo told him, “Kind of neat, isn’t it?”

It was certainly an explanation–one that required the Dragonheart to ponder it for a minute as he considered the oddities of the realm.

“So this library…You think it was part of an old, forgotten world?” He asked.

“Most likely. Isn’t that just fascinating? Worlds that are long gone, long forgotten, and infinitely far from us…Yet, here in the After, everything is equal,” Blimpo said, “In a way, I think it’s beautiful.”

Looking up towards the sea of books that lay dormant and lonely, cast away from whatever era, civilization, and world they originated from, he felt a distinct serenity in that quiet library.

“Something like that, yeah,” he muttered.

The information that Blimpo provided him with, seeming to come from a special place of fondness from the elf’s heart, lined up with the existence of the gun-toting behemoth of steel and flesh–War.

I remember the note mentioning something about War being from a different realm than Arcadius, he thought, going off of the fact it has guns…I’d assume it was a world similar to Earth. Magical concepts like this…They didn’t exist on Earth though, right? The fact it’s all connected, in some way, is just…too much to process.

“Think it’s safe to look around for a bit?” He asked, standing back up as he glanced around the foreign library.

Blimpo gave him an ‘O-K’ sign with his fingers, “As long as no sudden, loud noises are made, we should be fine. Although…This is probably a good time to introduce another one of my super-cool, mega-awesome tools…”

“Oh, boy…” He muttered under his breath.

With the goggle-wearing elf, it always felt like a gamble to witness one of his inventions, as the concept of subtlety was hardly something that Blimpo embodied. Even so, there was no doubt that Blimpo had the proper experience and expertise to devise invaluable tech in the search for the final key.

“Alright, alright, I’ve been looking for a chance to give this baby a shot,” Blimpo smiled wide.

Emilio simply watched, keeping enough of a distance so that an accidental explosion from a faulty device wouldn’t get him caught as well; the eccentric man retrieved a spherical object from his belt that fit perfectly in his palm.

“…And…on!” Blimpo announced.

Tapping a hidden button on the metallic sphere that was painted both blue-and-gray, its form shifted as plates extended outward, revealing its internal mechanism that originated from a chunk of a verdant, magical rune.

A wind rune? He recognized.

Without any warning, a silent shock wave of air propelled outward, taking a physical, perpetual veil that lined itself around the perimeter of the library.

“A-ha! Looks like it works perfectly!” Blimpo triumphantly remarked.

It was still unclear what exactly the effect of the wind-producing sphere did; the veil of air didn’t seem to do much of anything, at least not from what the Dragonheart could gather. As he walked closer to one of the walls, he gently pressed his fingertip against the barrier of still wind, feeling no feedback as it simply bypassed it.

“What’s this? It doesn’t seem like a barrier that’ll stop War. It’s not even stopping me for that matter,” he asked.

Blimpo chuckled, “Of course not. The ‘Silent Storm’ isn’t meant to keep anything in-or-out of the barrier.”

“Then?”

“It prevents any and all sound from escaping the barrier,” Blimpo told him with a smile, clapping his hands together loudly.

“Hey!–“

The action immediately made him jump on guard, though what the elf told him was processed in that very moment. What made him realize the truth of his companion’s explanation was the complete silence that rebounded with his yell, or the lack thereof; no echo returned from his initial utterance.

“…It really does block sound out,” he realized.

“Told ya,” Blimpo smiled.

Inspecting the barrier, the Dragonheart’s inner curiosity for magecraft was piqued even in the life-or-death labyrinth as he studied its nature.

“Wind magic to nullify sound…That’s smart. I’ve considered it, but I never knew if it would actually work practically. Maybe it’s more functional when attached to a tool? It might be a complex spell to use on a whim,” he muttered to himself in thought.

“Wow, you’re a real sucker for magic, aintcha?” Blimpo asked.

Taken out of his thoughts, he let out a quiet breath as he looked at one of his hands, once more trying to briefly conjure any element, but failing as his mana felt just one step away from manifesting. It was a similar sensation like feeling a sneeze come up, only to be unable to actually release it; a frustrating feeling of powerlessness.

“I just hope I can get my magic back soon,” he said.

A sudden slap on the back didn’t even make him budge, coming from the less-than-average strength of Blimpo who laughed.

“…What was that for?” He asked, slightly annoyed.

“Cheer up, friend! I’m sure your magic will return soon enough. This entire temple is quite the tricky one, indeed–it seems the Progenitor is testing us in his own ways,” Blimpo told him, “For my first week here, I lost my vision. Then the next week, I lost my ability to hear.”

It was surprising to hear, and even more shocking that Blimpo had withheld such vital information before.

“Wait, what? You’re saying you’ve experienced something similar here, too? You didn’t think to mention that before?!” He jabbed his finger against the elf’s chest.

The tinkerer chuckled, “Err…Sorry, it just slipped my mind! Truth is, I didn’t regain my senses until one thing.”

“Huh? What is it?” He asked.

Blimpo held a single finger up, “It was only after I created a new magic tool without being able to see or hear, that those senses were returned to me. Seems like I was being tested. You might be as well.”

“Tested? As if there hasn’t been enough of that already,” he sighed.

Still, it was some form of a lead for him; at least now there was some semblance of an idea on how to regain his magical abilities, or at least that it was possible to reclaim them in the first place.

…It took away his eyes and ears, and only gave them back once he made a new tool, he thought, that’s specific to Blimpo–it’s not like I would be expected to craft something like that. For me…What would my requirement be?

Pondering this, he spent some time climbing the high-rise steps of the black-wooded library to scope out the countless bookshelves.

It was decided that the library would be where they confronted War, but precious time would be needed to prepare the area for an encounter; while he studied the tall-reaching chamber, Blimpo began deploying his tools and crafting new traps.