The portal opened into complete darkness. Its surface rippled, yet it did not shimmer. It was like a pool of thin ink, swallowing anything that entered into it.
Leviathan stepped through the portal.
The portal closed behind her.
https://youtu.be/aY-CEFD8X1Q
“Pride is an emotion which grows from success. Through hard work and dedication, your skill and power grows. And with that, grows your love for yourself.”
She walked through an empty tunnel. There was nothing but darkness around her, such that even her sensitive eyes could see nothing. The feel of the ground was of cut stone, and her footsteps echoed before and behind her. Through the echoes, she felt walls and a ceiling a comfortable distance away from her. The path before her continued into emptiness.
“With this love comes an intoxicating pleasure. One which grows with every success, real or imagined. One which many are unwilling to let go.”
She walked down this dark path, feeling in her wrapped feet and hooded ears for changes in path, or unseen branches. Yet each echo she heard confirmed only one way forward. She followed this path to its end; a pair of metal doors with an ornate design lost in the darkness. She reached forward, finding a handle in its expected place. She felt a tiny mechanism within its knob unhinge as she turned it.
The door creaked open. Light poured into the tunnel.
“When in balance with one’s skills, pride can be beautiful. Seeing a man beam in pride at his craft can be just as lovely as the tools he creates. But as easily, this pride can consume the man, and warp his joy into a poisonous greed.
Beware this false pride. For all it does is destroy.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_FZm1gYrt0
A spacious catacomb built from dull brick opened before her. Lining its walls was a mass of huddled destitutes, their gender and age cloaked under worn and ripped rags. The walls opened into doorframes, under which still more destitutes huddled. Arches supported the tall ceilings, and the path continued some distance past Leviathan's sight.
She walked down the path, studying her surroundings as she went. Each person sat motionless and silent. Despite the hundreds lining her path, it seemed as empty and lifeless as the dark tunnel she had just left. Their arms clutched at their rags, and their hooded faces peered into the ground. They seemed to ignore even each other. Each, though crowded by brothers, sat alone.
The doorframes were placed regularly, seemingly into a home of some kind. Yet their hinges were rusted, as if each door was unused. What hid behind each door remained a mystery. One which was not worth solving.
Leviathan’s path was forward.
After minutes of walking, she found a split in the path. In the center of this split was a grand doorframe, gilded and styled by skilled artisans. On either side were grand braziers, drawing more attention still to the opening. And standing in front of it was a knight thickly coated in polished armor, such that none of his body could be seen underneath.
He stood as motionless as everyone else in this path. His feet were planted wide underneath him, his shoulders and head stood tall, and his hands rested in front of him on a heavy axe leaning against the ground. One could easily mistake him for a statue, given his stillness and posture. Only the looseness of his joints and the detail of his armor gave him away.
"What are you doing?!"
As well as the boom of his voice.
Leviathan approached the imposing figure with even steps.
"You approach the forbidden path. You will leave. Now."
She continued forward until she was just a short distance from his weapon's range. Her head stood high, her obscured eyes gazing into a faceguard which betrayed no eyes to gaze at.
"I come in search of a lesson in humility. Is my path forward between these gates?"
He reached down to the base of the axe's blade, halfway down the weapon's length. He lifted it up above his shoulder, and grabbed the hilt's end with his off hand. Its cruel blade pointed skyward, ready to be slammed down at its owner's will.
"You will find nothing but death this way. No one will pass this gate."
Leviathan reached her arms behind her back.
"I have come for my lesson. If my path is behind that gate, there is where I will go."
"Wretch! Do you forget who stands before you? I am the proven champion. I am unmatched by all. To cross me is death!"
Leviathan paused at his words. She pulled her arms from her back, and raised them to her hood. She lifted it over her head, allowing her tendril-thin hair spill out from it. She pulled her mask down from her face, and stared at the suit of armor.
"And I am Leviathan. Greatest creation of the angel Zorael. Gifted with a perfect mind and body, and trained to perfection. You have simply matched all who challenged you. I cannot be matched."
He gave a roar at her words.
He leapt into the air, raising his axe above him.
She reached behind her robes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2nPaAx1w1E
His axe crashed down onto the ground Leviathan stood on. She shifted the weight of her body, allowing the weapon to slice the air in front of her. She pulled out her right blade, and crashed it into his gauntlet.
A splinter of metal chipped off of it.
He swatted his arm at her, and swung his axe around behind him with his off-arm. She bent back under his arm, and swung her left blade up, catching the bottom of his swinging arm. He slammed his axe down in front of him. She spun with her strike, and swung at his weapon with both of hers, deflecting it to her side. She rolled both blades from his parried weapon, and swung at his exposed torso with a flow of powerful strikes. Bits of metal chipped from his torso, and its form dented under the strikes.
He slammed his palm into his weapon, swinging it behind his shoulder. It swung around behind him, and circled back forward. She sidestepped, allowing the blade to fly over her head, and crashing her own weapon down into his with the same movement. The axe was knocked wide, leaving him open for another barrage of attacks until he circled it back around his head. Once again, she gently side stepped and let the weapon pass by her, before unleashing another barrage.
Bit by bit, his armor weakened, and his swings slowed. His savage ferocity died into exhausted throes. Before long, Leviathan's attacks went from reactionary ripostes to aggressive swings. She struck just before he did, always keeping him off balance and throwing his attacks wide.
She met a wide swing with one of her own in the same direction, throwing the weapon to the side and the knight off balance. A swift slice to the shoulder and a heavy swing to the back knocked him down to his knee.
He swung back with all his might, telegraphing his attack long before it hit. She leapt above the attack, before crashing back down into him and dropping him back down to his knee. He reached back for his weapon and lifted it high above him. A heavy slam knocked him back down.
He lifted once again over his head, and he was slammed in the other direction.
He lifted once more, and it flew down upon her. She lifted her blades, and twisted them as they met contact with his. She pulled on it like a lever, and it flew from his hands. She leapt into the air as he fell off balance, and crashed her blades into him.
He fell onto his hands and knees.
He gasped in heavy breaths, barely holding his weight up with his arms. His armor was torn and broken. Deep gashes covered his entire body, with a black mist rising from the deepest of them. Still he struggled to regain his footing, yet he could not so much as lift his knees off the ground.
Leviathan walked past him, flipping her blades behind her back in victory.
"I... am the strongest... in these lands...
I... cannot... lose..."
His words were punctuated with heavy gasps.
"You are strong only in body," she did not bother to turn her head back to him. She replaced her mask, and raised her hood over her head.
"Your movements are crude. Your attacks are basic. You lack practice and experience."
"You... inferior... outsider...
You are not worthy... to even walk these roads...
You will not insult us... by walking through those gates...
You piece of tra-"
His helmet flew into the air.
Leviathan stood beside his headless body, and once more replaced her weapon behind her back.
She walked once more to the gates.
A black steam rose from his body.
His armor clashed onto the ground, in empty pieces. His helmet landed beside them.
Leviathan walked through the gateway.
https://youtu.be/aY-CEFD8X1Q
She walked through an empty tunnel. There was nothing but darkness around her, such that even her sensitive eyes could see nothing. The feel of the ground was of cut stone, and her footsteps echoed before and behind her. Through the echoes, she felt walls and a ceiling a comfortable distance away from her. The path before her continued into emptiness.
She walked down this dark path, feeling in her wrapped feet and hooded ears for changes in path, or unseen branches. Yet each echo she heard confirmed only one way forward. She followed this path to its end; a pair of metal doors with an ornate design lost in the darkness. She reached forward, finding a handle in its expected location. She felt a tiny mechanism within its knob unhinge as she turned it.
The door creaked open. Light poured into the tunnel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ul_ZRos42c0
A spacious catacomb built from dull brick opened before her. Lining its walls was a mass of huddled destitutes, their gender and age cloaked under worn and ripped rags. The walls opened into doorframes, under which more destitutes huddled together. Arches supported the tall ceilings, and the path continued some distance forward.
She found herself back at the beginning of her path.
She walked down a path she had just traversed, and studied it once more. Not a soul had moved, nor had a fleck of rust dropped. Every detail of her walk was the same as the last time she traveled down this path.
She walked to the gilded gate she passed through moments before. Guarding its entrance once again was the statuesque knight she had just felled. The nearest destitutes to him all faced away from him, and none dared settle near to where he stood.
"What are you doing?!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2nPaAx1w1E
"You approach the forbidden path. You will leave. Now."
His voice boomed once again through the corridor.
"I have no desire to walk past those gates. You've no need to address me."
"How dare you! You will bow your head when you address your betters!”
She was on him before his final word finished echoing through the chamber. She cut at his neck before he had a chance to acknowledge her movement. He swatted at her reflexively, which she took as a chance to drop low and strike his axe from his hand. He watched as it slid away, and took another hack to his neck guard for looking away. He ran to his axe, only for Leviathan to appear before him and slice at him once more.
He fell to his side at this last strike, bringing both his hands to his neck. His eyes leveled with Leviathan's shins. He raised his glance at her masked face, and his head received a stomp just as his eyes leveled with her cowl.
"Bow your head before your betters."
She twisted her foot.
His helmet twitched off his shoulders.
Black steam poured through the hole once connecting the two.
Leviathan twirled her blades behind her back. She continued walking, taking the left path.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg59CN7Ov9g
The imagery had not changed from her last path. The tunnel had the same architecture as before, repeating details every set units of distance. Destitutes still lined the walls and blocked the doorframes. Everything still did its best to ignore her presence.
She walked down the empty path, trying to find information where there was none. Nobody looked at her. Nothing blocked her. She simply walked, and saw nothing.
After a while, she came to the end of the corridor. A final arch hung above her, given ornate markings of a seemingly religious nature. Pillars lined the path after that arch, in a ceiling much lower than the path before it. Wide flaming braziers were placed between each set of four pillars. Robed men in slightly more refined robes than the destitutes outside stood lining the walls, standing tall and facing forward. And in the back, another gilded gate stood. This one, locked.
As she approached what she could only assume to be a shrine, the monks closest to the entrance spoke, in almost perfect unison:
"You may attempt to solve the puzzle, like all before you. Should you succeed, you may go free."
She gave each monk a passing glance, without breaking stride. As she walked between a pair, they tilted their cowled heads to follow her. Each pair of monks did the same as she walked past them, until she reached the back.
With all faceless eyes upon her, she set upon the puzzle. On the doors of the gate were a large number of golden cogs, all linked together. Each was removable, each was a different size, and each could be placed on any peg sticking out of the gate. Upon pressing a large button in the middle of the gate, a cog locked under that button spun furiously. On the two corners above the set of pegs were two cogs locked under the gate. A brief inspection of these cogs showed they unlocked a mechanism under them, which locked after a certain point and reset as the cogs were released.
The puzzle, then, was to configure the cogs in such a way that the bottom mechanism spun the top two as well.
Behind her was a table. On it was artwork disfigured by a number of circles which shared the same center. Each circle divided the picture into spinning segments, with the circle in the middle being locked. Yet when one was moved, another was moved as well. To return the artwork to its proper image would take spinning all the pieces to face the same direction. Yet, orienting one section disrupted another.
At this point, Leviathan calculated all configurations of the cog puzzle. None allowed the bottom mechanism to spin the top two mechanisms. It seemed as if no matter what, an extra cog was needed. One with the same size as the center of the table puzzle.
So she turned her attention back to the table puzzle.
She spun each of circular pieces, memorizing which pieces affected which other pieces.
The smallest spun the largest.
The largest spun the middle.
The middle spun the second smallest.
She spun each in turn. With the last spun, she took a moment to pause. She stood deathly still for a moment.
Then she went to work.
She twisted each piece, seemingly at random. Seeming disfiguring the artwork even more than it had been. Seemingly progressing through trial and error, as had all before her.
But before long, order rose from her chaos. Each piece spun to its proper place, until the last two clicked in one movement.
She put her hand on the central piece.
It flipped over, revealing a cog.
She stared at it for a moment. She then spun back to the door. She removed a cog from the door, and replaced it with the one from the table. She moved the cog she removed to another spot, and removed the cog which occupied that spot. She replaced one with another, until it eventually created a complex shape.
Finally, she pressed the button in the middle. All the cogs whirled, and the monks who had until now watched in silence let out a collective gasp.
"She's done it!"
"Is it possible?"
"How many have tried before her?"
They shuffled forward, crowding the space around her.
"You are incredible!"
"Nobody has been able to solve this puzzle!"
"How did you do it?"
The door gave out one final click, and the gates unlocked. They opened slightly under their own weight.
Leviathan immediately turned her back to the monks and walked through the gate.
She could still hear their praises as she made her way into the dark tunnel before her.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aY-CEFD8X1Q
She walked through an empty tunnel. There was nothing but darkness around her, such that even her sensitive eyes could see nothing. The feel of the ground was of cut stone, and her footsteps echoed before and behind her. Through the echoes, she felt walls and a ceiling a comfortable distance away from her. The path before her continued into emptiness.
She walked down this dark path, feeling in her wrapped feet and hooded ears for changes in path, or unseen branches. Yet each echo she heard confirmed only one way forward. She followed this path to its end; a pair of metal doors with an ornate design lost in the darkness. She reached forward, finding a handle in its expected location. She felt a tiny mechanism within its knob unhinge as she turned it.
The door creaked open. Light poured into the tunnel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ul_ZRos42c0
Dull brick. Huddled destitutes. The same walkway, unchanged in any way.
Just as before, her paths simply linked back to the beginning.
She cared no longer for subtlety nor detail. She sprinted forward, ignoring the details of her trek to reach its end quicker. Her feet pattered against the stone floor and her robes rustled in the air as she sped forward. She sprinted toward the brazen knight she knew stood at the end of her path. He barely managed an uncouth syllable before she split his helm from his armor.
Three paths forward. Two lead nowhere.
She turned right to try the last.
And she ran into a dead end.
At the end of the path she sprinted through, she came across a wall made of the same unpolished stone as the floor she stood on. She placed her hand upon it, looking for faults or secrets. Any crack to pry it open, or switches to swing it open. Yet even an experimental tap confirmed that the wall was solid. Even if she could get past it, there was nothing behind it but solid ground.
There would be no path but one she would have to dig for herself.
As she considered her options staring at the wall, she noticed the light around her dimming. She looked around for the source of this change, yet could not even find where the light came from. Before she could form a reactionary plan, the light had already dimmed to a perfect darkness. And as it did, she noticed the path she stood on had changed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aY-CEFD8X1Q
She walked through an empty tunnel. There was nothing but darkness around her, such that even her sensitive eyes could see nothing. The feel of the ground was of cut stone, and her footsteps echoed before and behind her. Through the echoes, she felt walls and a ceiling a comfortable distance away from her. The path before her continued into emptiness.
She walked down this dark path, feeling in her wrapped feet and hooded ears for changes in path, or unseen branches. Yet each echo she heard confirmed only one way forward. She followed this path to its end; a pair of metal doors with an ornate design lost in the darkness. She reached forward, finding a handle in its expected location. She felt a tiny mechanism within its knob unhinge as she turned it.
The door creaked open. Light poured into the tunnel.
She found herself once more at the beginning of her path. The same wretched destitudes, the same rusted doors, the same stone archways; nothing had changed. Her mind raced to find a plan to follow. She searched her memories for any detail worth investigating. Thousands of computations flashed through her head.
Yet all she could do was step forward.
Her pace was slower than it had been even at the start of her journey. Her gaze lingered on any detail she could find. She eyed each destitute for some kind of clue on their person – a key, a talisman,
anything. She even took the time to walk to one of the many doors she passed over on her many trips through this pathway.
Its handle broke off before she could turn it. What felt like earth was on the other side of the frame anyway, preventing it from opening it even with a proper handle.
She continued this exhaustive search until she came once again to the uncouth knight guarding the gilded gate. She had felled him three times before. She had no desire to do it again.
Remembering his vainglorious words, she bowed her head and folded her hands before her, showing humility simply to pass unmolested.
He didn’t even turn his head as she passed by seemingly unnoticed.
She kept this posture as she traveled forward. Partially because there was no use in readopting her usual proud stance. Partially because this stance may find use in the future. And partially because it properly reflected the helpless situation she found herself in.
She continued her studious gaze on every detail on her path, hoping to pick up something she missed on her first pass. Yet even with her slow pace, she quickly found herself back on the steps of the temple she knew to be at the end of it. Each step closer to it was a step closer to acknowledging her failure at finding the path she was meant to find.
She at last approached the hooded priests at the temple’s entrance. As she did, one spoke to her:
"You may attempt to solve the puzzle, like all before you. Should you succeed, you may go free."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg59CN7Ov9g
The one next to him responded: “Look at this wretched thing. It hasn’t the knowledge to pass through here.”
She looked up at the pair. Then past them. She saw only a single exit, past a puzzle she had solved through an exhaustive search. No path stood before her except for the one she had already walked.
She turned her back and turned the way she came.
“Yes, look at it flee. It knows its place.”
She began her walk back. She kept her steps shallow and even until she felt movement behind her. She stopped and turned her head gently, and felt more movement. As her gaze leveled to its source, she noticed the destitutes nearest to the temple shift their gaze back to her. As she noticed this, those next to it raised their gaze to her as well. Then those next to those did too. As well as those next to those. Slowly, each hood lining the road rose to meet her gaze… until the rising heads became close enough to her for her to realize that they were gazing
past her.
Each head slowly turned away from the temple, and down the path she had just walked down.
And so, she followed their gaze.
She walked slowly, keeping pace with the flow of turning heads. She walked back down the path until she met the knight guarding the gilded gate once more. He once more seemed to ignore her. This gave her the chance to gaze past him, and see the rows of destitutes on his other side turning their heads the same way those on the path she walked did, mirroring the action. The two paths looked at each other until they met. Then, they looked back down the path she entered from.
She continued to follow their gaze.
Once more, she found herself on the same path she had walked before. The same spacious catacombs of dull brick, the same huddled destitutes, the same tall archways, and the same rusted doors. Yet, this time she walked it backwards. And this time, the destitutes lead her way. They continued turning their heads – and she continued following – until she found her way back to the gates she first stepped through. And she found them closed, despite having left them open them not very long ago. From this side, no ornate designs covered the metal doors. Nor was there a handle to open them. Yet, all the destitutes behind her stared at the door. She laid her hand gently onto the door, knowing that they were hinged inward to her. Yet, she found that the door gave a little as she pressed her hand against it.
She applied slightly more pressure, and the door opened for her.
And she found a small chamber.
It was little more than a square room, covered in a soft brick of a warm color instead of the dull stone outside. Its only detail was a small bath against the wall opposite of the opening. It came out of the wall as a semicircle, with the water shallow at the edge of the semicircle, and growing more deep as it came closer to the far wall. As Leviathan dipped her feet into the shallow edge, she found the far wall open under the bathwater’s surface. Perhaps a source of the bathwater, or perhaps a hidden path, the opening was tall enough for Leviathan to swim through.
She submerged herself into the bath and swam through the opening.
The path only lasted a short while, before opening into a wide sea. As Leviathan passed through the opening, she looked up for the water’s surface. And found none. She looked back at the structure she had just left, seeing a square stone building floating – or perhaps sinking – in endless water. She turned away and left it to explore the seemingly endless ocean she found herself in.
She swam as fast as she could, gyrating her body in near-perfect waves. Seeing no end in sight, she gave a slight spin – unfurling her leg and arm wraps and allowing her fins to come free. These allowed her to swim faster still, yet the only change in scenery was the block structure she had just left growing more and more distant with each stroke of her tail. Yet she continued still into the hopelessly endless sea.
And the light began to dim.
"You are strong, little one."
She heard a voice in the deep. It sounded ancient, and frail. In the dark abyss she could not find its source. And she surmised it had none.
She swam even deeper. And the waters grew even darker.
"And so, so smart."
She kept swimming until the darkness completely overcame her. And she kept swimming still. She swam, deeper and deeper, until she finally saw something. She swam toward it - swiftly slipping through the water - until she could make out its shape.
"So was I, so very long ago..."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_mJUwgwhgQ
It was a pair of objects, far away. So far, that no matter how fast or long she swam, she could not get closer to it. Or perhaps, it had no real shape, and only had the strength to show itself as these two distant shapes.
"I was stronger than my brothers. Faster, smarter too. Back when humanity was simply a distant idea, and the universe was just a playground."
They looked like a child's drawing; two distant triangles meant to signify eyes. Able to portray only the most basic of emotions, yet too tired to even do that.
"It was obvious I was stronger. I wanted them to see it. Why didn't they see it? That's all I wanted."
The shapes shifted as the voice spoke. They shifted like slowly dancing flames, or jell floating in water. They seemed to show the emotions of the voice - fear, hatred, perhaps excitement? But they were always off by just enough to contort any meaning. Even the voice struggled to betray any emotion behind its heavy raspings.
"I tricked them. I made their work more difficult until they couldn't do it anymore, and then I did it for them. They should have been delighted at my strength! But all they did was complain..."
Leviathan had stopped swimming. No matter how far she swam, the eyes would not change. She unfurled her body and gently stroked at the water to stay upright. She listened patiently to the tale being told.
"It didn't matter how hard I tried. No one would see it.
One day, I was offered even more power. Everyone would see me then. They would have to!"
The voice gave off a pained cackle. The eyes sharpened and giggled against the sea's blackness.
"Do you see what that power gave me? Still starving for what I wanted eons ago. And now starving for what I once had."
The eyes narrowed. The voice softened.
"You are strong, little one. And so, so smart.
I had strength you could not even imagine. If I am left to this fate, what do you think will become of you in the end?"
The voice cackled once more, leaving its eyes to bobble off-rhythm to the laugh. The eyes darkened into the abyss.
"'Leviathan'. Haha, does the fledgling think his creations can compare? He will fade away like the rest!"
The darkness lifted like a veil. A gentle light glowed underneath her, distant planets floated above her, and a shining tower dropped from the sea's surface before her.
She found herself back home.
She darted through the water to return to Zorael.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jh89VELCo4
A tall trident leaned against the wall. A glistening cloak floated in the air. And between skillful hands, translucent scales affixed themselves to plates of solid water. They attached - piece by piece - until what was a pile of near-identical pieces formed into an ornate set of armor.
After the pieces formed past the waistline, Zorael lowered the armor and cloak onto his workbench. He turned around in time to watch Leviathan turn the corner into the room.
"What has this lesson taught you?"
Leviathan finished her trip with tepid steps. Though she shows a milder demeanor in his company than she does alone, she seemed far more timid than her usual self.
"Strength and intelligence are ultimately meaningless. They are useful tools, and may even be necessary in some situations. But ultimately, the roads they pave lead to an endless loop."
He gave a soft chuckle and a warm smile at her response.
"I understand that my brother can have somewhat nihilistic views, but that was not what I intended for you to learn. I meant only to show the dangers of pride left unchecked. If you allow it to rule you as he did, you risk losing everything truly important."
He beamed gently at her. She, in turn, gazed emptily at the floor.
She shook her head slowly.
"No... This verified something I vaguely suspected. Until now I assumed I was on the right track. But this lesson showed me I had been looking in the wrong places.
I'm still missing something. And I believe I am beginning to see it.
May I ask some patience? I would like to meditate on this lesson."
Zoreal nodded slowly.
As she left, realization dawned on Zorael.
This was the first time Leviathan showed initiative.
Originally Posted by Zorafim
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