NOVPUBWhile Opal was lost in thoughts of how to make her illusionary world better, Karl was focused on the stones.
Their power was still present, undimmed by time. But they had gone inactive, and he couldn't understand the reason why.
The whole world was losing access to the system, and the power of the stones was dormant, but it wasn't losing any potency. It was more like it had lost its purpose, and was simply waiting for someone to wake it up again.
Mira sighed in resignation as she stared at the stones. "Well, if there is nothing to be done, then I suppose that's all there is to it. But it's good to know that this relic is genuine."
Karl nodded. "When you are ready to advance your class, or in need of something that the System should be able to do, try giving a prayer to the World Dragon while standing on the stones. If my guess is right, that should be the easiest spot in the world to access System features even as the System retreats from the world."
"So, it really is collapsing? The functions are becoming inactive?" She asked.
Karl made a noncommittal gesture. "For a time, it will be inactive. Then it will return again. But the process is slow, like the aging of dragons. It might be hundreds of years before the retreat is complete, and then thousands before it comes back to full power.
But as long as the stones here remain in their positions and undamaged, they should be fine for all that time."
Mira nodded. "In that case, when I am likely to be leaving the Temple unguarded, or it is going to fall, I will be sure to hide the stones somewhere that they won't be damaged or disturbed. That level of power is still well within my capabilities.
Do you think that I will start losing my powers as the System functions fail?"
Karl tried to remember what he had heard from Orthos and others.
"I don't think so. You should keep your powers for your whole life, but you might not be able to advance once the system is dormant, assuming that you live that long." He offered.
Mira looked concerned, then realized that Karl had said it could take more than a century. As a human, that would still put her well into her elderly years, and with troubled times coming, the elderly didn't often last.
Happy Lotus noises from upstairs distracted everyone, and Karl led the group up the stairs to make sure that the little Cleric wasn't getting herself in trouble.
The last one out was Mira, and out of caution, she locked the door to the stairs. Then, as she removed the key, the doorway simply vanished.
Nothing in Karl's vision indicated that there was a door there at all, or even a hollow spot behind the stone. At first, he was impressed by the Cleric's illusion. But the look on her face said that Mira hadn't done anything to change the entrance.
"The basement door is gone..."
Tessa gave the confused cleric a look that immediately snapped her back to coherence.
"Right, the Gods have hidden and protected the Relic, and I definitely don't remember any such room being in the temple. It looks like the door to the basement is over there." Mira amended.
There was another door to the basement down the hallway, but Karl suspected that if you followed it that the main room, where they had just been, would not be found.
Karl led the group over to the sound of Lotus' voice and found that she was sitting on the floor, playing with rabbits. By the dirt and debris on their fur, they were not summoned creatures, but wild animals from somewhere nearby.
But that didn't matter to Lotus. She was at the Bunny God's temple, and she had fluffy rabbits to play with.
Nachtia just shrugged as the others approached, indicating that there was nothing she could do about the situation, and that she wasn't all that concerned about it. The god whose shrine they were at was one of healing and fertility, and if Lotus hadn't been chosen by the Green Dragon, they would have been a good fit together.
"Did you find what you needed?" Nachtia asked while they waited for Lotus to finish.
"Yeah, I got some very interesting answers, and a bit of ancient world lore. That alone makes it more than worth the effort of coming here. Now, the problem will be going back to what we were doing before." Karl replied.
Nachtia chuckled. "What if we're not meant to? We didn't try to revert the last change to the region, why do it this time? I say we just keep up our mission, hunt the excess creatures in the region, and anything from a Monster Spawn, then wait for it to change again."
"What god asked you to clear out the excess monsters? That's just an impossible task. Between the Dungeons and the Outdoor Spawns, there will never be a shortage of wild beasts and monsters." Mira asked.
"The Black Dragon. The number of insane monsters from the Spawns was getting too high, and upsetting the balance of life and death in this part of the world, so we took up the mission." Nachtia explained.
"For fun and profit." Karl agreed.
Mira shook her head in dismay. Karl was most likely insane, she decided. It was a side effect of the System on some people. They got power, and forgot what it meant to be a normal person.
Or it could just be because of his class. Even the Rangers got a bit odd, talking to their hounds and bears, and those were just animals that couldn't truly talk back. With a bunch of predatory monsters in his head, who knew how far his version of reality had been warped?
She had often met with adherents of the Beast Gods in the past, and they were always tricky to avoid offending. It wasn't a stretch to think that Karl might be somewhat the same.
