Chapter 197 - Prayers (Patreon)

A bit of a convoluted conclusion but this whole place is convoluted.

“So this giant sculpture would be…”

The more Sofia thought about it, the more it felt deeply wrong. Why would this part of the trial be all about one of the four Lords? She doubted it was specific to her, so everyone had to go through this. That was with the system supposedly knowing very little about the Deep and its Lords. And out of all things, they would choose this exact maze as the test? One that used not a simple God’s rune, but a Lord’s one?

The same Lords who would erase people for saying their names?

If she was correct, this was incredibly irresponsible. Dangerous. Not for her, maybe, but for everyone else.

Two other people still made it through so it’s probably not that bad. And that gives another very good reason as to why nobody is allowed to talk about the trial. Because for a normal person, talking about this sculpture is something with the potential to get you erased from the planet and everyone’s memory…

Sofia returned to the cavern layer to look at the statue again.

What could possibly be the real world use of that thing, outside of the trial? Who could have even made it?

I have to say. If that’s really the fourth Lord… I like Aphenoreth’s appearance better.

Somehow she convinced herself that she was right about her wild guess despite the little evidence she had. She wanted it to be true, it helped her feel safer. Learning of what she thought was the hidden existence behind this place, she felt a bit more at home. She kneeled before the statue and did something she hadn’t done in forever, she prayed.

I am sorry that I thought badly about your appearance, but it is weird. I will be using your rune a lot to get out of here so I hope you do not mind.

Thank you for helping Aphernoreth find me when I was stuck in the loop. Sincerely, I am the Deep’s devoted Saintess. And since the Orator wills it, please watch me slay a god in your name.

Sofia froze. Someone had received her prayers, it seemed. Someone that wasn’t Edrazeketh.

Her mouth opened without her consent.

“Look at you, offering your thanks to the Annihilator himself. Such a funny little thing. Are you enjoying the book, Saintess?”

“I enjoy it a lot, yes. Thank you. Are you always listening to me?“

“Cease the foolish act. Get to work. And never again call for his name,” the Orator ordered, having Sofia point at the statue, “lest you invite trouble you cannot handle the consequences of.”

“Understood… Was that all you came for? Can you help me a little or is that cheating?”

“...”

“Orator? I know you are still there…”

“Never have I been so disrespected… Do you not understand your position, youngling?”

“To be perfectly honest, not really. Are you technically my adoptive uncle or something of that sort? Since my name is… you know.”

“You may think what you will. We are largely unconcerned by such matters.”

Well, which is it, then?! Bringing up my position then backing out like this? Also what was it last time? ‘I shall never show up again’?

“Can you explain the titles, then? Why Orator, for example, is that a title you gave to yourself?”

“Very well, considering you have shown an actual willingness to accomplish your quest; I shall indulge your curiosity for a brief instant. Gods, as you call them, are aimless materializations of concepts. We are the opposite. The titles themselves are nothing but fanciful words your kind uses to materialize our functions, though some of us have taken to using them.”

“Your function is to announce things, then, as the Orator?”

“It is not. Such as the Annihilator’s function is not to annihilate, or this world would have long ceased to exist. Now return to your task, the quest is as good as revoked should you fail here already.”

As the Orator left, Sofia was immediately sent back to the empty layer, she felt oddly refreshed so she checked her stats. She still had the rune on, but she had been fully healed. Seeing her mana be full while wearing a rune was unnatural. Either way, she was grateful for the unexpected help.

I was right, then. I’m getting really good at sniffing out anything to do with the Deep now.

Sofia then started making plans to find all the orbs. She still had five to get. The one from the wood monsters layer should not be too hard to get, she thought. She had a suspicion that if she just kept going in the direction she had been going before, it would be there.

The one from the undead layer was much more problematic. Most of the monsters there were things she absolutely couldn’t fight unless she resorted to high bolting, and she remembered how that had worked against the stone drake. At least now she could explore it a bit easier, she just had to go through the parts with dangerous monsters by using the cavern layer, since she had the ritual to go there at will. Even then, I have to be careful. There’s no guarantee that where I’ll reappear will be safe.

The trap layer would be the most annoying to search for, as it was slow to navigate through, but not too dangerous.

That’s still the easy part, though.

Getting the orb from the eye layer is the real hurdle… First of all, I only know of one way to get there, which is after taking another orb. And I’m not even sure that’s how it works exactly, but supposing it is, I will only have four attempts. Secondly, I have no idea where it is. Thirdly, there’s this creature from the depths of all nightmares.

And for the last orb… I don’t even know. It should be in the maze layer representing mana, but I haven’t found that. Supposedly it would be in between the woodmen and the undead layer.

Sofia thought about her options for a while in the calm of the empty layer. Now that she had a better idea of what she had to do, she wasn’t condemned to walking aimlessly in the maze forever anymore. Her first plan was a bit of a boring one, and she feared that maybe it would push her over some kind of hidden time limit, but she couldn’t see a better way to handle the eye monster.

She trained. Having Pareth watch her from an end of the empty corridor she was in, no matter how many times she turned, Sofia was never taken to another layer. So she ran.

‘[Sprint] reached level 11’

…

‘[Sprint] reached level 30’

“It’s not going up anymore…”

That should be enough, right? My speed doubled from when I began. It’s not an incredible solution but if the thing cannot catch me then it’s as good as dead. Kind of… Now to recast the rune and get to work.

Her solution to finding the orbs in the easy-to-access layers hadn’t really changed; she already had a full map so she only needed to explore the whole thing. The first one she was transported to was the traps one, and so she got to work exploring again.

Using Pareth as an anchor to prevent layer changes worked better perfectly. As long as he walked to a corner and could see both Sofia coming toward him and the direction where she would turn, the layer never changed.

Using that technique, the orb of the trap layer was the first she found. Hidden away in a far corner of the maze, there were more traps in the room she found the orb in than she could count. That was no big issue to her, she sent the paladins one by one to die in there, and eventually, most of the traps were disarmed and she could go get the orb herself.

Green orb engraved with spikes, you’re mine!

This was a good confirmation that these orbs were the overall goal of the maze.

Sofia was ready as she pocketed the orb, and as she thought, the statue which was holding the orb opened its eye, and Sofia was sent to the eye layer.

The layer bathed in blueish light and its walls covered in eyes was still just as disturbing as it used to be. So far, no monster. Good. Sofia ran around, exploring as much of this layer as she could. It seemed the monstrosity that had chased her before had retracted and returned to its room.

Since she now knew how to prevent an unwanted layer change, Sofia explored the whole thing under the many eyes' unblinking gaze and came to a conclusion. The eye layer’s orb was either in the small dead-end corridor behind the monster’s room, or inside of the monster itself.

If it’s behind, then maybe, mayyyyyybe I can see a way.

But if the monster has it; I don’t really have a solution.

Two people passed this? How did they deal with that thing…