Lucien had never seen the map carved onto the walls of the fifth floor of the Ebony Tower. He had been busy deciphering the runes one by one, methodically making his way through the walls.
He stared at the map etched on the walls, burning it into his mind. At the center there were jagged mountains shrouded by mist. Directly under them was the silhouette of a graceful pagoda floating above a sea of flames. Even further down, separated from the mountains by a vast emptiness, was a mighty castle.
Far to the left was a snowy peak standing near a fuming volcano. Nestled between them was an arched bridge. Underneath and a bit to its left was a strange ship floating on ghostly waves.
On the right side of the mountains, just a bit below, was a perfectly symmetrical pyramid. And lastly above the mountains, further away than any image, was a fearsome mask crowned with three horns. The very same mask that Sunny was wearing at the moment.
Beside each image was an inscription in the runic language Lucien had grown familiar with over the months. He pointed towards the image of the mountains and said: "That says 'Underworld-Nether."
Sunny turned towards him, his face concealed by the mask, "You can read the runes?"
Lucien nodded, "I've been studying runic sorcery for a while. This floor has helped me quite a bit in broadening my vocabulary of runes."
Sunny nodded tersely and gestured at him to continue.
Lucien then pointed to the pagoda above the sea of flames and said, " 'Tower of Longing-Hope'."
Sunny stared silently at the image of the pagoda. It was hard to tell what he was thinking with that mask covering his face. Lucien couldn't even see his eyes, it was as if the two holes cut in the mask for the eyes were drowned in shadows. Hell he couldn't even tell how tall Sunny was without focusing on him. That mask was no simple memory.
Ignoring his own thoughts, Lucien continued, pointing to the castle next.
"'Bastion-Mirage'."
"Mirage?" Sunny echoed, his voice containing no trace of emotion.
"The name of one of the daemons." Lucien explained, he'd only known of four names, Ariel, Hope, Nether, and Weaver. Now he could add Mirage to that list, although he didn't know what they were the daemon of.
Sunny glanced at him, "Bastion is one of the largest human controlled citadels. In fact, Kai is there right now."
Lucien frowned, "Humans control Mirage's citadel?"
"That's what surprised me too," Sunny admitted, "I don't know if Valor knows about it though."
"Valor?" Lucien repeated, confused, "Is that the name of the person overseeing the citadel?"
Sunny hesitated, "No, Valor is the name of the clan that controls that citadel."
"Clan?" Lucien felt stupid hearing all of the new terminologies.
"It's like… a big group of awakened, one of the three big ones in the waking world. If you remember Caster, he was the heir of one of the families linked to it."
"Ah," Lucien breathed out, "Got it."
Putting that information away for later, he pointed to the next image, the image of the snowy peaks connected to a fuming volcano. "'Jade Palace-Ariel'."
"Jade palace?" Sunny questioned, he recognized that image, that road between a volcano and a snowy mountain, that was Ravenheart. Was Jade Palace its name in the past?
"Recognize it?" Lucien asked.
"Yes, that's Ravenheart," Sunny explained, "It's controlled by the Song clan."
He turned to Lucien, "In fact, Seishan was one of their princesses.
"Princess?" Lucien frowned, in his mind from the stories he'd heard, the term princess did not fit Seishan in the slightest.
"Yes," Sunny nodded, "Once you make it out of here and reach the waking world, you can try contacting them for help. She might actually agree."
"Huh, I'll keep that in mind then." Lucien muttered and then turned his focus back on the map. Next, he pointed to the ship sailing over ghostly waves, "'Night Garden-Rime'."
"That's controlled by the House of Night." Sunny said.
"The last of the three major clans I take it?" Lucien asked, receiving a nod in response. Valor, Song, and Night, so those were the factions ruling the human world.
Shaking his head, he moved to the next image. He stared at the pyramid for a good few seconds before looking at its runes.
He frowned, "That's odd."
"What is?" Sunny asked just as Lucien pointed to the runes commenting on the pyramid. A part of them had been scratched off. That was odd, why would Nether scratch off a part of his own writing. Unless it wasn't him.
Sunny now knew that Weaver, the nebulous daemon, had appeared in the Ebony Tower sometime in the ancient past and left his infected hand there. He could have come up to this room, found the map, and scratched off a part of the runes. But why would he do that?
Unless of course the runes referred to a secret he did not want anybody to know.
"What does it say?" Sunny asked, eliciting a response from Lucien who was lost in thought.
""Tomb of Ariel-', the rest is scratched out." He said, "The name is gone."
Sunny tilted his head, surely the Tomb of Ariel would belong to Ariel himself? But then why would Weaver scratch off that name?
Lucien looked up at the final image, that of the three horned mask, "That just says 'Fate?'"
Frowning, seven images, each alluding to a different daemon. Nether, Hope, Mirage, Ariel, Rime, Weaver, and…
"Oblivion," he whispered, "that was the only remaining daemon, the only one who hadn't been mentioned by the map yet.
A shiver ran down his spine as he said that, why was Oblivion's name scratched out? Was it forbidden to be known even by a daemon? Why? They were one of the daemons, just like the remaining six, what made them so special?
Out of seven daemons, only six could be spoken of, while the seventh was forgotten.
Wasn't that eerily similar to the gods?
Out of seven gods, only six were known of, the seventh was removed from the annals of history or had yet to be born.
If the daemons corresponded to the gods in some way, if each daemon held a connection with one of the gods, then what would happen to the seventh daemon who held a connection to the mysterious seventh god?
Would they be forgotten until the seventh was remembered or born? Is that what made Oblivion so difficult to remember?
All of these thoughts spun by Lucien's mind in a split second until he forcefully ground them to a halt. He knew far too little to be making such conjectures. He needed information, enough of it to make his own rudimentary theory hold weight. He needed to finish deciphering the entire room as soon as he could.
Beside him Sunny said, "The map points to the areas controlled by the seven daemons."
"Except Weaver," Lucien said, "Nether seemed confused about them, which stands up to their mysterious nature."
Saying that, he brought out his notebook and quill from inside the [Soul Sack] and began copying down the map. He'd done that with every piece of information he had gained from the runes there. He wasn't going to stop just because Sunny was there.
Thankfully Sunny wasn't in a hurry, the map had given him much to think about, not to mention the names of five of the remaining daemons.
A few minutes later Lucien held up the notebook and compared it with the map. It wasn't exactly a perfect replica, but it was good enough for him. Storing his items back into the memory, Lucien dismissed the orb of lightning he had summoned for light. He didn't want to accidentally see something he wasn't meant to see.
Seeing that, Sunny gestured towards the stairs, "The final level then?"
"It's a small room with a singular arched gateway," Lucien explained on the way, "I haven't quite figured out how to use it though."
Sunny frowned, Lucien could see that now that he had dismissed his mask, "A gateway like the one we use to return to the waking world?"
"No," Lucien shook his head, "It's…different. You'll see."
Soon enough, they reached the final level of the tower, and the pressure emanated by the runes promptly disappeared.
Sunny sighed in relief and sat down, leaning his back against the wall, staring at the arch while he waited for his body to recover.
"What do you know about it?" He asked, glancing up at Lucien who didn't seem nearly as exhausted after reading the runes.
"Only that it contains the runes for travel and fire." He shrugged, "I haven't been able to fully translate it yet, but I figured it uses fire as fuel somehow. I've tried to light it on fire a couple times, but it didn't work."
Sunny nodded tiredly and continued staring at the arch. "Have you tried just pouring your essence into it?"
Lucien scoffed, "I'm no fool, of course I have. It didn't work. It's fuelled by something else, something we can find here. I couldn't explore the lower levels of the tower earlier because of the rot, but there might be something in there, or even outside the tower, that could help us."
Sunny frowned, "What makes you say that?"
"Nether was a very practical daemon, he used whatever material he could find around him. He made his children using stone after all, and stone is the most abundant thing in the Hollow Mountains." Lucien explained, "Therefore, it stands to reason that there's something around here that could help fuel this gateway."
Sunny narrowed his eyes and turned to the walls of the tower, seemingly staring at someplace above.
Something abundant huh? And the arch contains the rune for fire. Sunny knew of one kind of fire they could find in abundance nearby.
He turned to Lucien, "Do you have a memory that can let you fly?"
Lucien furrowed his brows and asked, "I can fly on my own, why?"
On his own? Sunny raised an eyebrow. His new awakened ability perhaps?
"You said we needed something that is abundant here, something that's connected with fire."
"Didn't exactly say that second part, but yeah, more or less."
"Come with me." Sunny said, standing up and beginning to walk down the stairs.
Lucien frowned, but didn't question him, choosing to follow him down. They crossed the room of runes, the shrine of stars, the room with porcelain hands, and finally the room with the corruption, before arriving at the first floor of the Ebony tower.
Summoning a bolt of lightning for light, Lucien stared at the room filled with debris. He could see the remnants of a worktable with rusted misshapen tools. He could see a wide table in the middle, a layer of dust above it. The room even included a broken bed. Once, it had been a beautiful room, but now all that remained was destruction.
Sunny didn't wait for him and continued onward, through a wide corridoor, until he reached an open door that led outside.
For the first time since arriving in the Ebony Tower, Lucien finally stepped outside onto the rocky ground. All around them were strange ruins, far removed from the likes of the Dark City.
These ruins were of a different kind of building, if they even were buildings. They seemed more like parts of a giant machine, something beyond his current comprehension.
He followed Sunny until they reached the edge of the floating platform. Sunny stopped there and pointed above. Above them a sea of flames lit up the sky, as if the heavens themselves were being burned. It was close enough that they couldn't be counted as stars, but far enough to still be considered a part of the sky.
"That," Sunny began, "Is a sea of divine flames from the Sun god himself. If you can manage to get some of that, it might be enough to fuel the gateway."
"Sea of flames," Lucien muttered, "It was right under the Tower of Longing."
Sunny nodded, "We're directly under it."
Lucien glanced towards Sunny, "You came from there?"
"More or less." He shrugged, "There is a cluster of islands under it where we have claimed a citadel. I chose to be anchored there."
"I see." Lucien muttered, staring at the flames.
"Can you reach that?" Sunny asked, "It will be unbearably hot there, speaking from experience."
Lucien glanced towards him as the helmet of his armour manifested, "I'll be alright."
At worst he'd need to rush back to the citadel and get Nephis to heal him.
A forest of purple lightning appeared over his armour, lighting up the stone and filling the air with a cracking noise. He clutched the Soul Sack with one hand and bent his knees.
KA-CRACK!
Like a bolt of lightning, he shot off the ground, cracking the stone as he did, and headed towards the sea of flames.
Sunny watched the streak of purple rise higher and higher until it became indistinguishable with the blinding glow of the divine flames.
Then, right before his eyes, the flames flickered and began flowing towards Lucien. It was like watching a whirlpool, except the water was replaced by the flames of an angry god. Just like that, a second rift was formed in the sea of flames.