At that answer, the brilliance of the world rippled like water struck by a stone, then folded back into shadow. Simma stood before yet another maze entrance, the thorny arch framing his path as though mocking him with its crooked welcome.
Not bad, Simma… not bad, he thought, pressing onward.
He moved into the maze.
---------------------------
[Second riddle out of five]
[Second riddle successful]
---------------------------
Not so long this time, and he wound up at another end, darkness looming in his front. The maze now seemed not to be the challenge anymore, and he has Ms. Shady to thank for that. But what might be a challenge was coming.
And it is the riddles, these riddles which are so complicated, that it rams his brain to the corner of his skull.
Right in front ahead was darkness, but immediately he stepped through the maze out to the darkness, a riddle hint spoke:
"Where the wind is born, the stone remembers.
The path lies in the marks no rain can wash away."
And what followed this voice was a spark of a very tiny light flickering on and off. But it wasn't one place, it seemed as though it was hovering around. Just then they became two, three, until many more appeared, its lights lighting up the place, flickering a bright orange colour.
Simma looked around as he smiled despite himself. It was the best sight so far, and he had noticed it now… they were all fireflies, and they served as the light.
Now Simma could see where he was a bit clearly. He was in a four-cornered wall turned green with moth that covered most of its bricked surface. Up ahead, straight in front, was the only door that led out of the place.
He looked around as he thought through the hint that the strange riddler had given earlier.
The mark lies in the path no rain can wash away.
Simma looked around. Well, no rain. He looked up but he couldn't see the sky. What he saw was also another wall where fireflies perched on.
"Great, so no rain is here..." he heaved a sigh. He knew that riddles are not to be solved word to word by the question.
Therefore, he shouldn't be looking for rain, rather he should be looking for something permanent. Something that endures.
"Yes, what rain washes away are not said to be permanent."
"When the wind is born, 'stone' is remembered," he recalled.
"Stone," he looked around him. "I just need stone."
And at that thought, he went to the left wall and scraped out some moth.
"Unh -unh, this is brick."
He went to the adjacent one and did the same, but it was also brick. Then to the opposite wall.
When he scraped off some moth, he found it. The wall was built with stone, jagged and rough, and just then the question started to carve through the moth, like a hand unseen chiselling the words:
"I am older than kings, yet I have no crown.
Carved with marks the stars passed down.
I do not speak, yet I can command,
Unlocking power with a steady hand.
What am I?"
Simma bent his head. Zolomon made the riddles harder and harder, but still yet also achingly close, as though the answer waited just behind his tongue.
"Older than kings," he thought. "This is something very ancient, maybe existed before time. I think it is land, or..." he paused then it hit.
"Yes, stone! It is right there… stone ages."
"But then it says carved with marks the stars passed down." He exhaled.
"All I know is that whatever that is carved to a stone should deal with… runes?."
He widened his eyes, that was his answer.
He cleared his throat as he said:
"Stone and runes."
But nothing happened. Rather, his ES spoke:
-------------------------------
[First attempt failed]
[Two attempts left]
-------------------------------
"Oh, come on!" Simma groaned, raking his hands through his hair. His answer made sense. Didn't it?
"Maybe… the Stone of Runes?"
------------------------------
[Second attempt failed]
[Brace yourself]
-----------------------------
"Great," Simma said. Now his chest was racing so fast that even the fastest athlete can't compete with it.
Simma thought his answer through once more. Even if he fails now, he had done great, and maybe next time he would do more.
"Here goes nothing," he said, closing his eyes as he let out his final answer.
"Runestone."
There was a brief silence and his ES spoke.
Simma's heart lurched at those words:
---------------------------------
[Great, you may proceed]
---------------------------------
"Yes!" he hissed under his breath. Fists tightening.
"That was close… so close."
The door ripped open and with a sound of two brick faces shoving together, it slipped open, opening the next phase of the maze with the normal thorny arched curved entrance.
Simma gathered himself together like shattered pieces and made for the entrance.
When he walked in:
------------------
[Third riddle out of five]
[Third riddle successful]
-----------------
The maze wound on, then spat him into the fourth chamber. This time, the hint did not fall from air, it rumbled from the carved grin of a hanging pumpkin face. Its voice was deep, hollow, and so chilling that Simma swore his very skeleton wanted to leap out of his skin.
"The stone's truth will burn away the dark… if you dare to walk into the fire that does not consume."
Just as those words landed, right there in Simma's front came a very bright golden flame. It sat on a mere floor, no firewood, no candles, no fire holder, just burning there on raw ground and on raw energy.
"No way that fire won't scorch me to death if I step into it."
But just like the weird pumpkin man face had said, he was supposed to walk into the flame.
Somehow, that was the only, meaningful option. And maybe it was too lame, yet everyone can read through it. But that was Zolomon, he would always make something too lame to make you think that way, but then when you tackle it lamishly, you will have yourself to blame.
"Lamishly? Is that even a word?" He pondered, but he shoved it off and focused.
Right now Zolomon outdid himself, and Simma maybe… just maybe might have understood. He used the word dared, and that was it… if he were to be having double mind about it, maybe the fire might indeed burn him.
Then clearing his mind, Simma walked towards the flame.
All he thought about was that incident that put the first true smile on his face, which was when they gave him a room in the Citadel, the phone that Sarah gave him, and the main one, his first friend,
Sarah.
When Simma opened his eyes, he was already standing in the fire, and for some strange, unnameable reason, the fire was chilly. Like some winter breeze was caressing him, curling around his body like a breeze wearing fire's mask.
Just then the riddle came:
"Born in a dragon's sigh,
I dance but never die.
Warm, warn, wreathe, weave,
A gift the dark can never thieve.
Name me."
"Why does it feel this one has something to do with me?" Simma thought.
Perhaps it is because it called the name of his within beast, the dragon, or because...
No way, this riddle is for a knowledge of his beast.
Though he couldn't summon it yet, he was no fool.
In fact, not being able to summon it had made him do researches about it, and he knows it all.
Yes, the riddle deals with flame, precisely the one his dragon breathes. And it may be different for the other recruits, for they might twist their riddles into a way that it will fit to their beasts.
Anyway, Simma looked up, very much courageous.
As he gave his answer.