I blacked out—of all things, from too much laughter. If the Soul Crusher or the Hermessi wouldn’t kill us anytime soon, irony definitely would.
Varga
Upon waking up and realizing what had just happened, we were all pretty flushed, trapped in an awkward silence. None of us dared speak for a while as we took deep breaths, thankful that the gas had completely dissipated.
“Well, that was weird,” the Soul Crusher said, startling us.
“Maybe if we ignore him, he’ll go away,” Raphael whispered, loudly enough for the Reaper to hear him.
Herakles pinched the bridge of his nose. “I never thought I’d pass out from laughing.”
“The gas was effective. I’ll give credit where it’s due,” Eva said.
I got up, my abdominal muscles still sore from all the giggles. “We need to try again,” I said. “We don’t have time to recover like we’d probably like… or need.”
“You’re right,” Lumi replied and gave Amelia a sly smile. “Your turn, then.”
As expected and based on our experiences thus far, Amelia didn’t look happy.
“Yeah, what’s the worst that could happen?” Riza added sarcastically.
“So far, we’ve passed out twice and nearly gotten ourselves killed once,” Nethissis shot back. “With three exceptions, of course,” she continued, narrowing her eyes at Taeral, Eira, and Lumi.
“For what it’s worth, we felt the effects of the poison much like you did,” Taeral said. “It was as close to dying as we could get.”
Eva was thinking about something. I could tell from the way her gaze was fixed on a single lever, her brow slightly furrowed and her full lips pressed into a small line. Crouching in front of her, I gently brushed her cheek with my knuckles, triggering a soft smile from her.
“Your wicked mind is cooking something up, I know it,” I said softly.
She nodded once. “I’m remembering the clicks we heard, before pressing the levers. They weren’t all the same.”
“No, they weren’t,” Amelia replied. “But the ones that released a gas or whatever sounded the same, as opposed to the neutral ones, right?”
“Exactly,” Eva said.
“Yeah, I thought so, too.” She sighed, setting her sights on another lever. “Let me try something. I have a feeling that a lever with a trigger will be slightly harder to press than the others. It’s just a hunch. I’ll half-press several of them at once, to see if I’m right.”
“If you are, we can half-press more of them and identify the neutral ones,” Raphael said. “But it doesn’t get us closer to the lever we need to get out of this room.”
Amelia pouted, but Lumi was quick to outline the bright side of this endeavor. “No. However, it saves us time by showing us exactly which levers are on a trigger, instead of us going all over the room, waiting for each of them to do something or do nothing.”
“Plus! Chances are the good lever is among those with a trigger. It has to be connected to a mechanism, right? I mean, there’s no door, so it would have to… I don’t know, pull one of the walls back or reveal a hidden exit,” Nethissis replied.
Amelia went over to the third wall, which we’d yet to try. She half-pressed all the levers on it, listening carefully to the mechanisms beyond. We waited quietly, our ears pricked. We gradually identified the sound pattern.
About twenty minutes later, I, too, could do what Amelia had just done, but to another wall. “Guys, gals, I’ll do the other wall like Amelia, only halfway down,” I said. “Two of you should cover the remaining walls.”
“I can do one,” Eva said.
“Me too,” Raphael replied.
Lumi, Nethissis, Riza, Herakles, Taeral, and Eira stood in the middle of the room, armed with what was left of the healing potions and volcanic water—there wasn’t much to go around. We had maybe two rounds of usage, tops, after which we’d have to rely on Eva and Amelia’s vampire blood for healing, along with mine. Without any magic or supernatural abilities, we were pretty limited against any hostile force triggered by the levers.
Once we were done with all the levers, we moved back into the center of the room, analyzing our work. All the levers were angled halfway down toward the floor. We’d used chalk to mark the ones that had made a neutral sound, but we were still left with about one hundred trigger levers. Taeral groaned with frustration. “Ugh. Still better than all of them, I guess, but… dammit.”
“I know,” Raphael said, shaking his head in dismay.
“You’re a lot smarter than you look,” the Soul Crusher interjected, his voice echoing through the room.
Herakles rolled his eyes. “Oh, good. He’s back,” he said, his tone flat.
“Also, it’s not the first time we’ve gotten that… compliment,” I mumbled, my cheeks burning. “Your superiority complex is rampant. Maybe tone it down a notch.”
“I’m perfectly sociable,” the Soul Crusher retorted, sounding rather irritated. I couldn’t help but chuckle. It didn’t sit well with him. “Tick tock, Varga. Tick tock.”
He knew our names. He knew our abilities. He must’ve read our minds after knocking us out and shoving us in this box. His magic was multidimensional, for sure—time and space were different here, but he was still vulnerable to Hermessi attacks. The Widow Maker had to be outside, probably doing everything in his power to protect us.
When the Soul Crusher mentioned time passing, I wondered if he was doing it to tease us or to make us move faster. After all, he’d been locked inside Zetos for so long, there had to be a part of him yearning to be free again.
“I suppose you really want to get out, right?” I asked the Reaper.
“Of course! But I can’t cut you any slack, if that’s what you’re thinking,” he said. “Rules are rules, and I’m not the one who made them. You must prove yourselves worthy of touching Zetos, and, in order to do that, you need to survive my puzzles. So, you know, chop-chop!”
I walked over to one of the unmarked levers and glanced back at the crew, waiting for their nod of approval. Once I got it, I pulled the lever down and quickly rushed back to the group. A clang echoed somewhere beyond the room.
“Oh, my. This is going to be fun.” The Soul Crusher giggled.
“Glad we’re providing you with entertainment.” Taeral scoffed.
