Rise of Tempest Merlin

Chapter 5

Can you feel it? The crisp, cold and sharp, water filling your lungs. Your eyesight going blurry, and you desperate arms flailing for something to clutch to, to save you from this horrible fate.

All around you, clean but dark. Looking down, seeing the deep ocean.

You start to go limp, crashing around at the surface tiring you quickly, and you start to lose yourself.

Your eyes close, images of your life faintly seen in your eyelids, before you feel yourself being dragged down, by the ocean. You can feel the water surrounding you in a cold embrace, and a rush of fear shoots through your body, your brain panicking for air, just for air.

But, you have no will to fight it any longer.

“Mi Hermosa!!! We made it….you did it….you gave the right answer….what did you say?” asked Lilith and suddenly I was jolted back again. Again to reality.

Shortage of breath is the first sign. I'm breathing but the air just won't go in, like my lungs are surrounded by metal bands. Next comes the rising panic, the dizzy feeling and the need to get low to the ground. When I wake it's all over, the world has moved on around me. A girl on the side of the street is nothing here, just another body to step over. Then I get up as if I'd just taken a nap on the concrete like the tramps.

“It was Tempest. The line that appeared on the mirror was spoken by Prospero, the Duke of Milan in the play Tempest. It was one of the most revered comedies or rather hit plays of Shakespeare. That was the answer,” I said as Lilith helped me rise up.

“How on earth were we supposed to know that in a game named Grecian Quests we were going to be greeted in the beginning with something from Shakespeare. Who designed this game? This is absolutely bogus,” exclaimed the Avatar named Percy. Now that my first instinct of getting overwhelmed by the beauty of the character, that is the outer appearance was gone I was getting increasingly agitated at the words of this character.

“And who are you exactly to decide that you get a say in this? That you get to say what is bogus or not? And if you take your head out of the bush like you should have done ages ago then you would have realized that the clue was not for any one of you. It was for me. It is my name,” I said with a ferocity that shocked me as well.

“You go, girl,” said Lilith from behind me and I could not help but smile.

“Your name is what now?” asked the man and I gave him the stink eye. Had they not heard it when the walls had stopped coming at us and we had been saved and the room had now transformed into something else entirely.

“Tempest,” I said and looked around.

“Rightly said, you have, fair maiden,” boomed the voice again. They were standing in the middle of nothing. There was no floor, there was absolute and utter darkness and there were blobs of light around them. They were shapeless masses. Darkness is a strange substance, like ice it has three states solid, liquid, and gas, but with a twist. Since it is a sort of mystical material, it doesn't fall under the laws of science, only able to change states by the user. In solid form its almost completely black aside from a very tiny shade of red at its centre, like a candle in the dark, when a non-user touches it it’s like getting winded, if hit by a sharp point it will penetrate and quickly infect. As a liquid it’s thick; sticky, and has a pungent smell of ink, it can act like quicksand or just plain coat and suffocate people. As a gas it’s quite strange it is able to pass through solid material with ease, suffocate, and eat away like acid. As a whole Darkness is an odd thing. But never dangerous.

“Where are we now?” asked Lilith and moved around aimlessly as we floated. Nothing about this situation was remotely graceful and everyone was clumsy. But I felt that this was something that I could control. My hands and feet were not constricted and I could move just the way I wanted. There was no gravity as such holding us down.

“You are the beginning of Time. This is your first Quest, to aid Heaven and Earth in the formation of the Universe,” said the voice and I looked up and said,” Well if Heaven and Earth already exists, then the Universe has already been created. I don’t know who you are but I know this for sure that from Heaven and Earth, the Titans have already been born and they are the ones who have created Earth the way it is. The Greeks were more philosophers than they were poets and I know for sure that they thought the Universe is the Supreme power which created the Titans.”

How I knew that I had no idea but that was correct and Lilith said,” You are bluffing us and trying to see if we are worthy of the first quest. This is not how the game should be played.”

“Lilith? What are you saying?” asked Creon as he whisper screamed. And like all men he had believed what had been told to us and I put up a hand stopping him midstride and said,” She is right. We are not going to put ourselves in nonsensical danger just because you want to test our worthiness. We are in the game now and we need to begin our quests like they should be done. No more bluffing. Moreover, what are we supposed to call you?”

“Thou can address me as the Librarian,” replied the booming voice as the scene where we were standing readily changed at once and all of us slammed on the hard tiled floor immediately.

“Why does he speak in such a language? I mean, it would be easier if you spoke like us,” said Creon and there was collective sigh from all of us.

“Foolish children. Even though, thou do not have the wisdom of a hero yet, thou have impressed me with thy knowledge, as bare as it may be and now you are ready for a quest which you need to get away from on your own. All of you children will see that there is a pathway before you and once you open the door you will find where thou shouldst go ahead to find that you are the creator of thou own destiny,” said the Librarian.

“I thought that we were supposed to act like a team, isn’t it?” asked Volga as she looked at Percy and he nodded.

“All the teams got their quests together only but we do not know which level they were playing. So we cannot say for sure that they did not have to pass through this, whatever it may be,” said Percy and I nodded as well.

“I think it is a test in order to make us prove that we are worthy, worthy of the quests, and worthy of staying together in order to move across whatever comes forward,” said Creon and I smiled at him. He was speaking as if from experience. What experience I did not know yet but I figured that this thing would be better if we begun our tasks as soon as possible.

“We are not a team yet. We are not even friends yet and I think we need to go through this and take it as a personal struggle to grow into a better version of ourselves. So good luck to everyone and hope to meet you all on the other side of the door,” I said, hoping that it would be good for everyone to begin with some luck.

“The Greek heroes did not believe in luck. They believed that they made their own destiny and that is why, we are supposed to create our own,” replied Percy haughtily and I felt an immediate desire to kick him so hard that he would stop behaving like a pompous prick. But this neither the time nor the occasion to do anything of the sort. I did not answer and looked ahead of me.

The wall is red-clay brick, the hue varying from russet to autumnal browns. On this sunny spring day it feels warm to the touch, dry beneath finger tips. It has a roughness that reminds me of rocks upon the beach, the kind made so pretty by the barnacles that cling. The mortar has been there for many-a-year, holding them together as they are, standing tall in any weather. But for me, for today, I'm content to let it show me the path which I am about to embark on.

My first quest.

So let the games begin, I thought as a door appeared before me in the middle of the brick wall.