"Do you have everything you need?" Lysandra was in front of Hera's door, having just passed a list of questions for her to ask her skill, or whatever it was. Her golden hair was down and her expression was much softer than when she first arrived.
"Yeah," Hera started reading through the questions, "I'm just going to take a moment to see if there are any questions I can phrase better."
Lysandra frowned, feeling just a little bit hurt since she was the one who wrote down all those questions, "Is there anything I can do to help?"
"No, thanks. The skill is just finicky. I'm seeing if I can adapt something to get more bang for my buck," Hera pulled out a pen and started making some notes. Since she had to tell everyone the skill was related to her relic, the questions were made as if they were an internet search, when in reality, she would be talking to a person. Well, not exactly a person since Guides were beings much beyond mortals, but still.
"I see.." Lysandra swallowed her pride, knowing that something like that could save them in the future. After all, rescuing the people from prison wasn't the only thing they had to do. They also had to take them to a safe place, "Can you explain it to me? How to make the questions better."
Hera stopped and looked up at the elf, her piercing sky-blue eyes staring back at her, "Honestly. I don't think I can. Not because I'm being petty or don't trust you or anything, but the skill doesn't let us talk about it. It's a restriction made by the system. Even saying we have that skill poses a risk. We can only talk about it with other people who have the skill, and even then, we have restrictions," the Empress let out a long sigh, "I think it's a way the system has to make explorers more inquisitive and teach us how to think about the right things to discover, but at times, it's very annoying."
"I don't think the system cares enough to teach something, but I understand that this might be annoying," Lysandra nodded, feeling somewhat vindicated, "I'll leave you to it. The rooms here are all soundproof, but since you have a safety cube, it's good to use it."
"Thanks," Hera smiled before returning to the questions and writing down her ideas. When she was finally ready and alone, she used the safety cube and her soundproof spells and called the guide.
Inside the black cube, illuminated by her own dancing lights, the Empress saw a small yet thick round clock tower emerging from the floor. After a few moments, when the building was about as tall as Hera was when sitting, the top of the structure opened almost like a flower, revealing a clockwork sphinx inside. They had a golden plate for its face with lines separating the muscles and a body with long legs and arms that ended in claws, all filled with moving gears. Their fur, if it could be called that, was made from thin metal wires giving it that natural yet artificial look. Behind their back, there were also a pair of golden and blue wings filled where tiny daggers were being used as feathers.
The guide stretched almost like a cat for a moment before turning to Hera and smiling, revealing a pair of sharp crimson fangs, "Hello," their voice was melodic and calming. It starkly contrasted with their overall appearance, filled with sharp edges and pointy ends.
"Hi," Hera smiled, "I'm Hera Kingsley. Thank you for coming."
The guide chuckled, making a sound of metal grinding that sounded like heavy machinery being dragged through the floor, "You do know we don't actually have a choice, don't you?"
"I do, but that doesn't mean I can't thank you for your time," Hera replied.
The guide smiled, "I see why the others like you so much."
"I like them a lot, too, except Percy. He's a bit of a prick. Even when he is asking me a favor, he treats me like crap," Hera huffed a little.
The guide chuckled again, making the same sound of metal grinding against concrete, "Yeah. Percy is… an acquired taste, to say the least. I just realized I haven't introduced myself. My name is Isantha."
"It's a pleasure to meet you."
"The pleasure is all mine, especially considering what you are about to attempt. And I'm not the only one rooting for you," Isantha smiled, the gears in her face shifting to allow the golden mask to move.
"Really? I didn't get a chance to talk with the other guides about it…" Hera paused and shook her head, "No, that's not true. I just knew I would try to take advantage of our relationship, so I avoided talking with them. But are you on my side?"
"In a way. Yes. We cannot interfere, but none of us like the idea of imprisoning someone else. We are even a bit iffy about zoos or keeping birds in cages if I'm being honest."
"Even criminals?" Hera asked.
"Yes. We understand the need for punishment, but removing one's freedom is something that we absolutely despise. Not that we have a better solution for criminals. If you ask most guides, we would just answer 'Don't do crime,' which doesn't actually solve the problem."
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"Yeah, if only it was that easy," Hera sighed, "But if you don't like it can you give me some information?"
"I can answer your questions as per the request of the skill. However, I cannot go beyond what I am allowed to say if that's what you are asking. Nor can I give you advice on how to proceed. Doing so would veer into the realm of interfering too much or sharing what we consider personal information," Isantha explained while shifting to sit on the top of the open clock tower.
"I see… yeah, that makes sense. I wasn't expecting it to be different," Hera nodded.
"For the record. I'm sorry about this. I, and the other guides, wanted to be able to help more," Isantha lowered her head.
"Thanks," Hera took a deep breath, "Just so I know, you can't say anything about the prison?"
"Actually, I can. But what I can say is very limited, and it's up to you to figure out."
"Oh? Ok, that's good, then. I have a few questions, but one of them is really long. Can I ask it, and when I end, we start the clock?"
Isantha nodded, reached down to the clock face beneath her in the tower, and pushed the only hand of the clock until it pointed to the number 12, "When you finish the question, I'll start the timer."
"Thank you," Hera smiled and picked up the paper with the questions. The longest one was something Eirik requested since if this data was wrong, it would affect his work, "According to what we know, this is the composition of the structure of the prison considering the materials that were brought here and the construction work. The walls are made with 25% stone brass gravel, 20% cold silver steel…." She continued talking about not just the walls but every single part of the prison and the materials used to build them for the next 3 minutes, "-and 0.35% deep sea cobalt. Is that correct?"
Isantha stared at Hera for a moment with a hard-to-read expression, "I never expected someone to be this thorough when asking a question. Yes, that information is correct."
"Are we missing something? Considering the materials that were used in its construction, is there something I didn't ask about? Something structural, I mean, not just polyester for sheets or anything like that."
"You are, but I cannot say anything else about it."
Hera nodded and looked at the next question, "How high is the ceiling of the room?"
"A bit over 2 kilometers."
Hera held in a gasp, but her poker face was terrible, clearly showing that information surprised her, "And is that the same across the entire room?"
"Can I use 30 seconds to give a complete answer?"
"Yes. The room is a rectangle since it has much more than just 2 kilometers across. But the height of the ceiling is the same. That being said, on the east side of the room, the ceiling is closer to ground level. We are talking around 500 meters of difference between west and east. For reference, the prison is on the southeast corner," Isantha explained, already getting a bit ahead of the next question.
"Ok, that's great. Let's see…" despite Hera's explanation, most of the questions Lysandra gave her were about the personnel inside the prison, "Just for the sake of saying I asked. Can you give me any information about the people inside the prison, be the guards or the prisoners?"
Isantha shook her head, "I cannot."
"Yeah. They just asked me to ask," Hera read through the paper and found another question that might help, "Would the clockwork crows bother us if we fly outside the city?"
"That one takes a minute. Is that ok?" Isantha looked at the clock still with more than 3 minutes remaining.
"Ok," the clock in the tower advanced, "The crows only do anything if you are within 200 meters of the city. Beyond that, they won't bother you. But if you attack the buildings even from the outside, it will aggravate them, and they will attack and chase you. Even then, the more you attack the environment, the more the clockwork golems will consider you a threat that must be eliminated."
"I see…" Hera nodded, but an idea came to her mind, "Does that mean that if a golem that is outside the city sees someone breaking the ruins, they will chase after the vandals?"
Isantha smiled, "That question will cost half the remaining time."
"Yes. That is correct. The golems protect the entire room, and by that, I mean the room itself. They don't care about someone who stole something and is running away. Only about people who might be trying to break the structures the room creates."
"And would they change targets? Like if someone just scratches a wall and someone else breaks a piece of concrete in the outskirts. Would the golems prioritize whoever is doing the most damage?"
"This will cost the rest of the time," As Isantha asked, Hera confirmed that she could use it, "That is exactly what they would do. If you are able to lure them to the outskirts, that is."
The clock in the tower reached 12, completing a full lap and showing Hera was out of time.
"Thank you for everything. I'll talk with the rest of the team, and Freya should be talking to you soon."
"No problems. And if you don't mind, a piece of advice. You should try to get the compendium for this room. It should get you to at least 50% completion on your treasure map, allowing you to use a skill that, according to the others, you keep ignoring."
"What skill?" Hera frowned, not remembering of anything related to her [Treasure Map].
"I said my piece. Now it's up to you. Oh, and after you are done here, I'll text you to let you know if I would want to continue talking with you or not. As much as I respect what you are trying to do, it would be hard to be your friend if you end up destroying large parts of the room."
Hera nodded, "That's fair. I hope I won't mess this up."
Isantha smiled, and the clock tower closed around her, lowering into the ground until it could no longer be seen. Hera waited for a moment and put everything she learned in writing before heading out to talk with everyone. Their current plan was to hold the guards off when they were leaving since there were too many people to rescue for a stealthy extraction. If Freya could talk with Isantha and figure out a way to lure the golems out of the city, maybe they could have an army of clockwork constructs to stop any guards chasing them after they broke everyone out.