I Awakened A Divine Curse

Of course, despite Jasper's bizarre opinion, there was still a lot that Auren learned from him. And even his bizarre opinion made sense in a certain light. It was just that Auren never conformed to such thinking.

Jasper had discovered that some forgotten sorcery controlled the Sundered Spire, a delicate craftsmanship that remained shrouded in mystery.

The theory made Auren think about Asenya. The fact that she could craft statues and breathe life into them sent chills down his spine. He hadn't mentioned it, but curiosity gnawed at him. He wanted to maintain a dignified front before the old woman by limiting his questions to those born of deep reasoning rather than childish wonder.

But it seemed that just as she wielded these powers, the humans of this world had also built structures in a different and ingenious manner.

It was fantastic nonetheless, although this delicate art of sorcery was now lost to time. Nothing but their mechanisms remained as windows into their magnificence.

And even those mechanisms defied understanding.

Jasper had led him to the main chamber where strange, complex rune patterns glowed softly. The symbols danced between each other like fireflies in twilight.

All one had to do was control the circular interlocking of stones carved into each other. But each movement caused the floating Temple to shift its rooms like pieces of a living puzzle. Passages they had walked through moments before suddenly twisted into unfamiliar corridors.

It was better that they did not touch anything. Auren had decided that after a few more failed attempts, lest they become prisoners of the Temple's ever-changing maze.

They spent the night in the Temple. Well, they always spent the night since there was never morning. All three of them gathered in a room. The place was surrounded by a pattern of glyphs that, after a series of trials, they were able to harness to birth fire in the center of the room.

The fire danced with a ghastly green radiance, but it warmed the entire place instantly and burned hot enough to cook their meat.

After eating in silence, all three of them drifted off to sleep, pushing whatever decisions they'd make to the next day... Well, night.

However...

All of a sudden, a terrifying shudder quaked the entirety of the Temple. The stones vibrated so intensely that Auren jolted awake, his Sinister suit of armor flowing over his skin like liquid shadow.

Meredith was also up, her gaze sharp as flint and her hands open. White light swirled between her fingers, and a moment later a grey spear materialized from thin air.

Jasper was... still... sleeping.

Auren cast down a look of disdain and kicked the charming prince, causing him to jerk upright.

"For the Glory of Heart!"

He paused for a moment, looked around bewildered, then slowly wiped the drool from the corner of his mouth.

"Master Auren?"

He muttered as he stared at Auren's ghostly face under the eerie green glow of the flame.

The entire Spire shuddered again in that instant, causing even Jasper himself to leap to his feet, all drowsiness vanishing from his face.

"Wha—what's happening?!"

Auren did not answer but closed his eyes, spreading his senses wider through the reaches of the darkness.

Then he frowned and rushed toward the stone window of the room, the others following in his wake.

Auren's eyes widened at what he saw.

'What in the...'

Meredith frowned, her eyes trembling with disbelief.

Jasper staggered back, color draining from his face.

Outside, in the Black Desert, a ferocious storm was rolling towards them.

The only problem was.

None of them knew if this could even be called a sandstorm.

The scale was enormous, but it wasn't sand—it was a wall of grey, howling and surging through the desert. It stretched from the dark skies to the black sand below. In fact, much of the black sand couldn't be seen anymore, the level having dropped terrifyingly.

Instead, there was just this storm of grey that rolled forward with savage hunger. Each surge caused the entire ground and air to quake with bone-rattling tremors.

And these tremors traveled and shook the Sundered Spire that hung suspended in the air. It would have been worse, though, if it existed on the ground.

Auren couldn't imagine what being caught in that storm would be like, but the sheer scale and terrifying power with which it devoured the landscape spoke of a force that would snuff out life without mercy the moment one got trapped within its grasp.

And for some reason, the air was searing hot, with ashes swirling around them like grey snowflakes in hell. Even though he stood far from the storm, he felt intense heat prickling his skin and was beginning to sweat beneath his armor.

Auren pulled back from the window and glanced at Meredith, observing the pearls of sweat that glistened on her face like tiny diamonds catching the ghostly green light.

"This... What do we do?"

Jasper said, gasping for breath, his words coming out in ragged bursts.

Auren glanced at him, his voice tinged with rare concern.

"Jasper, are you okay?"

Jasper exhaled sharply, then lurched forward to study the glyph patterns on the wall.

"I am... I don't do well in heat... I..."

There was something specific he sought as he traced his fingers across the glyphs as though reading ancient text. Then he stumbled to the stone interlocking that sat at the center of the room, the circular demarcation where the fire danced in its heart.

He began to shift the stone pieces frantically, moving them from place to place, causing the fire to flicker and shimmer as though changing colors, yet somehow remaining that sickly green.

Auren narrowed his eyes and observed. He understood what Jasper was attempting, but the man was failing completely—his movements too desperate, his breath too shallow, his hands trembling with each passing second.

He moved forward decisively and joined the effort. The interlocking stones formed a circle, each piece a rectangular slab fashioned to slide through the pattern freely—a puzzle in motion, a labyrinth of shifting pathways.

Jasper collapsed to the ground, sweat pouring down his face like rain as he clawed for breath.

At that moment, Auren felt a crushing weight in his chest. His crimson eyes darted across the stone configuration, absorbing every detail, every possible combination with unnatural speed.

Then his hands became a blur, fingers dancing across the stones, swiftly rearranging their positions with surgical precision. With a final decisive movement, he completed the last shift and exhaled softly.

In that instant, the flames transformed to pale blue, still dancing with their otherworldly radiance. But now, a blessed coolness washed over them, seeping into their feverish skin like a healing balm.