'Extinct? Then what do you call this thing? Wait... that's off its memory!'
Leo looked at the descriptions dumbfounded, it claimed the species to have been extinct, yet he'd just fought with one. He rubbed his eyes with two fingers and then firmly slapped his face with both hands, just to affirm that he really wasn't dreaming or even worse making sure that he hadn't gone mad!
Rubbing his thumb against the hilt of the sword as his other hand covered his mouth, Leo scanned the same few lines over and over.
'Extinct... extinct... it says theyre extinct!'
Leo may have been of unfortunate origins and his education may not have been the most adequate, but even so, there was no way to mistake its meaning. The measurement was clearly implying that none of its kind survived the ancient humans, yet he just stared down one in the battle of his life.
There were a few reasons Leo could come up with, but one in particular stood out to him. First though, he had to ask a very important question to prove it:
'What is it measuring? They're not extinct, unless... that was the last one.'
His original thought was that the measurement was of something static, like the time the mayor was replaced, but every sign involving him had the old ones name on them, of course not for long but the principle still applied.
Given the two options, the latter would be much better on his mind. That's the theory he decided to believe in for now, after all, he had to take into account the power of this tool. Unlike the runes there must definetly be a power difference seeing as its powered by himself instead of some incredible wizard.
Feeling slightly better about himself, he skimmed over the whole scripture. There wasn't much of interest here, not anything that looked like he had to concern himself with anyway. And so his eyes naturally wandered upwards.
[Circular Memory]
Those words stuck to him.
'What does that mean?'
Aside from the vague sub-title, Leo's main concern was storing the memory. And this too was surely an important detail in that process. Leo once heard of a weird rule about storing such memories.
'Some memories need specific objects, something about them being tied to an identity...'
And he was more than willing to bet it had something to do with this 'circular memory'. But that could mean anything! Wheels were circular, but where would he get that from? Leo stared at his dominant hand for a little, gazing at the dark ring he still bore on his conflicting fingers. Then, he looked back up to the writings where a flowing string wrapped up the scripture and then threw out a new one.
[Circular Memory]
[A memory of which is best stored through a circular medium.
Circularity, rumoured to have once been part of the primordial vows, alongside fire and dark. Which order they came in, no one could say.]
The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Leo quickly skimmed the text, only looking at its upper half with the information he so desired before it disappeared and the tool deactivated from the lack of continued magic.
'The ring... that's it! Rings are a circle!'
Leo bore a few rings in his pouch, including the one on his finger. Before testing wether a ring could really store this memory though, he had to choose carefully which of the them would bear the burden.
'The others are too big too fit on my fingers. This one is just perfect, but... if anyone finds out it holds a memory I can say goodbye to my hand!'
On the other hand, Leo vividly recalled what happened through the forest, to his makeshift sack that is.
'If I store it on this one, I put myself in danger... but if I don't, I risk losing it.'
Biting his nails Leo felt a heavy weight droop down his chest. Neither option seemed promising, and to be quite frank, if anyone where to see him with such a luxurious ring they'd immediately jump and devour Leo. But then again, storing it somewhere so far away from his reach, despite still being on his body, was very risky and could invite unwanted danger if discovered. After all, not just anyone can own a pure memory.
A compromise had to be made. In reality, Leo could never wear that dark ring around anyway, not whole he was this weak. And so, that left one best case scenario for him.
'I'll store it in the dark ring... but I'll keep it hidden away in the pouch. If it ever comes down to it I can wear it when I'm alone or in a risky place...'
Except, there was just one more option for him in this situation. But as with all things, there would be a heavy tradeoff. This whole ordeal involved three aspects, safety, power, and wealth. When one was increased, for Leo one of the others would decrease. For example, if the wealth would be decreased then power would increase and safety would remain the same.
'I could... blend the talisman with the memory to get rid of the trial and have all of its effects — but only if the wolfs memory is stronger...'
This would grant Leo the power of all the memories involved – if his gamble worked. But as a result, his safety would be just as bad.
A talisman would also be a target in the slums and welding a memory to one would bring its market value way down comapred to a pure memory being sold by itself.
However, should his gamble fail, not only will the trials become harder, but if he wanted to add another memory to it later on, he would have to face great hardships while doing so. To avoid a secondary trial caused by combining memories, the memory that's being added would have to be stronger than the overall power of the talisman. So strengthening a talisman at his current level didn't feel like a worthwhile sprint he could make.
Leo shrugged his shoulders in dismissal, having consulted all of his options he relegated all doubts and instead moved on with his plan to seal the memory in his ring.
Taking it off, he observed a faint emerald residue left on his pointer finger followed up by two red lines encompassing all around it. A little effort had to be put into getting it off, the dry area forward made it hard to remove the ring from the sweaty patch which it protected until now. But eventually it too was taken off, with some grazing being seen on the sirface of his skin.
Slowly kneeling down, he held the ring in a pinch and lowered it over the luminous memory stranded between the ruins. The essence surrounding it started pulsing up like it was being attracted to its structure, small parts of the memory latched on as his hand got closer. Then as he got one last look at the pure energy, he dropped the ring right into the floating pool and stepped back.
A surge of light weaved in and out around the ring, deforming its perfectly spherical shape and instead lining up in one continuous strand of magic. Between the markings on the rings there stood the perfect place for its memory, a tiny engraving of a faded star, one which Leo managed to miss on his previous inspection. Little by little the energy started flowing from one storage to another, all until there was nothing to anchor onto anymore.
The final bit of memory converted as Leo just sat there watching it occur. He didn't have much to say though, his primary concern was leaving.
'That's it right? No more enemies?'
As far as he recalled, only the things he'd sensed came with him to the labyrinth. The wolf, the eagle, and the undead soliders. All in all, he'd gotten a pretty hefty reward for hardly doing any work. Though still, no poison ivy. But perhaps what he'd gotten was even better, a guarantee to a cure. Though, that too didn't seem achievable.
His eyes were prompted back to the light as it faded away, the storage had been complete. With no hesitation or other checks he bent down and picked the ring up, not bothering to wear it but instead hiding it away in the depths of his pouch – making sure it stayed hidden beneath all the other items.
Right about now, Leo would expect the runes to congratulate him on this achievement, shouting out something like 'Chamber of Heroes cleared'. But they were no longer here with him. So in the emptiness of chaos, he walked away and into the now destroyed exit.
Beyond this point nothing was different as opposed to the rest of the maze, infact, it almost looked identical to the first chamber. And just as Leo had wondered where the flames went, taking a look back he could only feel reassured that they followed him even to the end of these depths.
His only way, again, was forward. This time however, a similar altar appeared on a pedestal at the end of the hallway and up some stairs. On this altar wrote one phrase:
'Burn the Ash'