DAY DESTINATION

[thecanopycrew]

It's early in the morning when the wagon finally stops, and the adventurers have finally reached their destination after traveling far into the forest. They now find themselves in front of a dark, strange cave, just large enough for them to enter. The rats refuse to move any further, lying down to rest as the adventurers get a moment to check the cave out.

What soon draws the attention is a small gleam from somewhere in the cave, as if a beam of sunlight had been reflected from a metal surface. The light resonates with the ambers, showing the picture of the crystal sword that had been seen on the mirror shard. Breaking apart again, two pieces fade away, showing only the guard of the sword.

When explored, the cave reaches pretty far in before it suddenly splits off in six different directions. Each of these will only fit one person, and if they enter the new path, it will close behind them. It seems they're in for a challenge that might be difficult to handle.

Somewhere inside is a piece of this puzzle.

Comments

[scionoflegend]

Dark, perhaps, but no place was silent so long as Owain was present. At every slight bend in the tunnel he would spring forward, drawing his sword and shouting "Have at you, fiend!" or "Aha! Face me, evildoer!" or "Behold, your end is nigh!" or whatever other heroic phrase felt right at the time. And for the first little while, the complete lack of foes that greeted him around each bend only served to build the suspense, making him anticipate the inevitable battle to the death that much more.

But by the time he'd lost count of how many heroic challenges he'd shouted, it was getting harder and harder to get into it. "Tunnel of Unavoidable Doom and Destruction, heh," he muttered as he walked, recalling Yoshitsugu's earlier words. "More like Tunnel of Absolute Boredom. I think I picked the wrong one."

[thecanopycrew]

The tunnel of absolute boredom continues for a while longer until it just... stops. It looks as if Owain has reached a dead end.

[scionoflegend]

It was an unpleasant surprise, to say the least, when Owain leapt around the latest bend in the tunnel with sword in hand and almost came face-to-face with solid rock. For several moments he merely stared, baffled. He hadn't gotten turned around, had he? No, how could he have, when there'd been only one possible direction to go? So then... ah, it had to be a weak wall! Just two or three hits from his mighty blade, and it would crumble into rubble at his feet!

...That proved to be a bad idea. He stopped striking the wall after four hits, pain jolting down his arms, for fear of breaking his sword. Definitely not a weak wall. But... did that mean he was trapped? Panic threatened to surge, but he forced it down. No, no, that couldn't be! That was not the heroic end his journey was destined for! Perhaps... perhaps his trial was a test of mental fortitude rather than physical, of wits over battle prowess. Yes, that had to be it! He set his jaw, sheathing his sword with renewed determination.

"SO BE IT!" he yelled into the darkness at whoever or whatever might be listening. "I shall not be thwarted by the Trial of the Closéd Path! Such delays only serve to fuel my raging blood! You'll soon learn the folly of denying my sword hand its due satiety!"

With that, he began to slowly retrace his steps, running his hands along the walls and examining them closely as he went. Surely somewhere there had to be a weak point he could break through, or maybe even a secret passageway or something... right?

[thecanopycrew]

When Owen tries to retrace his steps, he's met by a wall again, closing up his path. As soon as he looks back in the other direction, there's the wall once more. Much, much closer. He is being trapped.

[scionoflegend]

Owain halted when he encountered a blockage that definitely wasn't there a few minutes ago. He frowned, and turned back around... only to be met with another new wall right behind him. His eyes narrowed.

"Sorcery most foul," he muttered with grim certainty. He understood now. It was like the Manor of Lost Souls where they'd found Nah. The gaps in its walls had had a tendency to magically reform into solid stone--usually right when he'd wanted to pass through them--while new gaps appeared elsewhere. It had taken them forever to reach the leader of the enemies' forces. So was that the tactic his current unknown foe was employing? Delaying him as long as possible? Owain groaned loudly in annoyance. Sure, the sealed gaps had always turned back into proper gaps if he just waited long enough, but he'd never been known for his patience, and he'd despised that stupid manor.

At least now he could say that his foe was almost definitely a Dark Mage or a Sorcerer. Probably the latter--this seemed like pretty powerful magic. There had to be a way around it, though... the manor had had doors at the very ends of the hallways that could be used to avoid dealing with the magical reforming walls altogether. Owain examined all the walls around him, pushing against them to test their solidness, and even knelt to inspect the floor in case there was a trapdoor leading to a secret stairwell. There had to be something here...

Because if there wasn't, he was probably going to have to waste a few turns minutes waiting for the walls to change, and everyone else would get to the boss without him!

[thecanopycrew]

He could wait all the turns he wanted. Nothing seemed to change for him, other than a slight decrease in temperature. It was getting a little hard to breathe, as there was no place for air to get into the tunnel with both ends sealed.

Owain's sword started to shake slightly, almost vibrating before it suddenly shattered into little pieces.

Weaponless, trapped, helpless.

[scionoflegend]

When his searching turned up no traces of weak points or secret passageways, Owain sat down and leaned his back against the hard stone wall with a sigh, resigning himself to waiting. However, when the minutes had stretched on with no change in his situation, he eventually rose again and took to pacing impatiently. Just a little longer, surely, he told himself. Any minute now--no, any second now one of the walls around him would vanish, and he would charge ahead with all haste into glorious battle. And it would be that much more heroic when he arrived just in time to save his comrades from the brink of certain defeat, smiting the forces of evil for them while they hailed him as their champion.

Any second now. And the sooner the better; it was starting to get kind of stuffy in his prison. Even his sword seemed to his imagination to share in his restlessness, and he absently placed a hand on its hilt to steady it.

"Yes, Mystletainn, I too seethe at the insufferable delay, but--wait." It wasn't his imagination; the sword was shaking in its sheath, rattling faintly. He glanced down in alarm. "...Mystletainn?"

Sure, Owain had probably claimed at some point that his blade shook with barely-restrained power. But it wasn't supposed to actually happen... and what came next was never, ever supposed to happen except in his worst nightmares. He knew the sound all too well, but this was the first time he's heard the shattering of a sword off of the battlefield. In the cold stillness of the tunnel it sounded so much worse than he remembered. A shrill scream of pain, cut short, followed by the loneliest silence he'd ever known. And then he was gripping a hilt with no blade attached.

How long he stared at that hilt, he didn't know. His mind didn't want to process what he was seeing. He was a Swordmaster; he had a sword. A Swordmaster was useless without one. He always had a sword, and Mystletainn had been the one in his hands when he fought the fell dragon. It wouldn't break. Not while it had people to protect. It was the legendary demon blade, it wouldn't break!

...Except it wasn't really the legendary demon blade Mystletainn, was it?

At some point he'd fallen to his knees, and shards of broken steel had slipped from his sheath to lay on the cold ground beside him, and all he could do was stare at them. Slowly, he began to shake his head. "...This is a dream," he breathed. "A dream, or an enchantment, or an illusion..." He pinched his arm, hard. Repeatedly. "Wake up. Wake up wake up wake up wake up...!"

[thecanopycrew]

"Are you really a hero?" Someone whispers in his ear, carrying the voice of someone he looks up to. "You've never truly been a hero. You're boisterous and loud, but what good has that ever brought?"

"You lie to yourself," another voice whispers, sweetly despite the stinging words. "You believe you're stronger than you are. Without a path and without your sword, what are you really?

"They'll fail this quest because of you," a third voice spits, vitriol in their voice. "You're not smart enough to solve this challenge. You'll never realize the truth and accept it."

[scionoflegend]

"...Uncle Chrom?" The whispered voice finally drew Owain's gaze from the shattered pieces of what had been his most constant companion, and he looked about in vain for its source.

"But--but Uncle, I'm... I helped defeat Grima..." Never had such a great accomplishment sounded so pathetic to his ears. He'd helped, sure, but Uncle Chrom and Robin and Lucina had been the heroes, and everyone knew it. They were the ones with the ideas and the leadership skills. All he was good for was stabbing things with a sword... and he couldn't even do that anymore.

"Uncle..." But... Uncle Chrom wasn't here, was he? He couldn't be. Owain shook his head rapidly. "This is an illusion. You're not really here. You're not here."

The second voice was Cynthia. Owain clapped his hands over his ears. "You're not here!" And Cynthia wouldn't say that, surely... or was he lying to himself right now? He didn't know.

The third voice was Severa, and covering his ears did nothing to block it out. "SHUT UP!"

In the deafening silence that followed his shout, he slowly let his hands fall. He drew his knees up to his chest and reached for Mystletainn's hilt again, gripping it tightly, as though it still possessed any ability to aid him. "...I know," he whispered to it. "I'm not strong. I never was. I wasn't strong enough to protect Mother and Father. With a sword, I could at least help Lucina... but without one I'm useless. I'm just an annoying weirdo who yells a lot."

He took a deep breath--something that was getting increasingly harder to do in this confined space. Tearing his gaze from his broken blade once again, he looked up into the darkness, addressing whatever power might be listening.

"...But I'm an annoying weirdo who bears the blood of the Hero-King Marth. So I can be a hero. Someday. Even if I'm not one yet, I can be one. Just give me a chance... give me a chance, and I'll prove I can be a hero! Give me a chance... or just strike me down with your dark magic and be done with it already."

[thecanopycrew]

Suddenly everything changes as the end of those words. Give me a chance.

The voices disappear.

The cave tunnels open up again.

Mystletainn is whole once more.

[scionoflegend]

The sudden increase in weight of the hilt in his hands had Owain quickly looking down again, and just about dropping his sword in surprise. His sword. His intact sword. There were no scattered shards on the ground, only strong, solid steel in his grip, just as it had always been.

For a moment he could only gape, but then he began to urgently inspect the blade, running his hands over it in search of any cracks, any traces of damage, any sign that it had ever been anything other than whole. In his haste to reassure himself that what he was seeing was real he cut his fingers several times, thin lines of blood welling up, but he could not have cared less. It was all he could do not to hug the sword. Mystletainn was whole. It was sound. It had been an illusion after all.

It was only after he had satisfied himself that all was well with his blade that he noticed he was no longer trapped. Resolutely, he stood. His pleas has been heard, then. He was getting a chance. All right, Mr. Hero, the open tunnel seemed to say to him, prove it.

Never having been one to turn down a challenge, real or imagined, Owain gave Mystletainn a few good swings for further assurance before sheathing it with a determined nod. He felt drained and shaken, as evidenced by the complete absence of any dramatic declarations of heroism... but even more than that, he felt the need to personally introduce his blade to the one who would toy with it so cruelly.

...Now if only he could recall which direction he'd been going.

[thecanopycrew]

Although it might take him a while, picking the wrong way just takes him back to the closed hole, and going forward?

Going forward takes him to a new, large cave room.