Chapter 21 :: An Electrifying Tower

"It's time to get up, Mithos," Kratos said. Mithos lay on the grass, sleeping peacefully from last night's battle. The survivors of the disaster all gathered in the gardens where Sirius' servants handed out food and water. Alice and Martel, fully recovered from their condition, came out of the mansion to find the doctor slain and the village burned down.

"I see. Then we must go directly to the final seal, the tower of Volt," Alice said, hearing the story of last night.

"If we can do that, the war's over right?" asked Mithos.

"At least magitechnology will be dead," Kratos said.

"Yuan, get the Zephyr ready to take off," Alice said. Thankfully, the Zephyr's invisibility barrier held during the firestorm and they were up in the air in no time. The airship headed west over the mountains to an island off the coast.

"Are you all right?" Martel asked Mithos, both in the cabin of the Zephyr. After the destruction of the village, Mithos barely said a word during the flight.

"How many more like Sirius have to throw away their lives?" Mithos asked. "We could have stopped Procyon. If I could have been out there earlier, maybe I would have been able to save him."

"And that is how our past is written. History is full of 'what ifs' and 'if onlys.' Time is like a river, constantly flowing from one event to another faster than we can even think. You will never be able to change the past, but your actions can still affect the future," Solstice said.

"But I don't think you ever had to face being powerless when so many were slaughtered," Mithos said.

"Do I? Not a day passes when I don't regret failing to stop this war before it started. It is a burden I will carry for the rest of my life."

"Mithos, you can't blame yourself. Procyon alone bears the responsibility for his crime," Martel reassured him.

"Aside from Kratos, Sirius was our only human friend," Mithos said.

"Everyone, we're about to land," Yuan called from the cockpit above. The Tower of Lightning was left to dilapidate since it was first constructed in honor of the lightning's spirit. Collapsed columns littered the entranceway and long strands of vines ran to the top.

"There's definitely a strong electric force here," Solstice said. His white hair stood on its end because of static electricity. Mithos approached Martel and as he held out his hand, a small electric shock jumped from his finger to her hand.

"Ow!" Martel was fine but they figured it best not to stand close to each other in this place.

"Mithos, open the door with this key," Yuan instructed, handing him Amaterasu's key. Mithos held the key and put it into the tower's door. Instantly, it sent a strong shock through him.

"Aaaaaaaawwwwaaaaaawwwwwwaaaa," Mithos said. He let go of the key and saw that his hair was spread out in all directions.

"You guys probably want to stand back," Martel said, pushing the door open with the bejeweled end of her staff. "There we go."

They entered a vast chamber in which lightning arced from wall to wall.

"Do not touch anything or you will risk becoming a human lightning rod," Alice warned. From the entrance there were three staircases parallel to each other. The left one led to a dead end while the center one led to the adjacent chamber. The right one, reaching the greatest height, also led to a dead end. Pedestals rested on all three passages, but only the center one had metal spike at the top.

"Well this doesn't take a genius to figure out," Mithos said, running for the center staircase.

"Hold it right there," Kratos said, grabbing Mithos' collar.

"Martel, can you fire your staff into that tile?" Yuan asked. Martel leveled her staff, took aim, and shot a burst of light. CRACK! A fork of lightning speared from the ceiling into the metal spire, charging the pedestal with electricity. It then discharged a ball of lightning in the direction of Mithos and Kratos.

"Get down, kid," Kratos said, dragging him to the floor as the ball of lightning passed over them.

"Ow... did you have to do it that hard?" Mithos replied.

"According to basic physics, lightning strikes at the highest position," Yuan said.

"You're a physicist?" Martel asked.

"No... Just happens that I listen in a lot when Lady Enigma and Darius are talking about the latest invention. It's boring actually," he replied. Alice jumped to the right staircase and with a smooth motion, struck the lever on the pedestal with her scythe. Out came another metal lightning rod. After Alice returned, Martel fired her shooting staff again. This time, however, the lightning hit the upper most staircase to charge the pedestal. The ball of lightning hit no one, and allowed them to pass safely into the next room. Two sets of stairs ran up to a center platform where the seal was carved into the floor while another door led deeper into the temple.

"Something's wrong. Volt's not here," Mithos said, flying up to examine the seal.

"Mithos, I think we should go in further," Solstice called from below. After the seal room, they came to a chamber with a large pool of water. A lightning rod stood in the center of the pool while six inactive pedestals stood on the small circular platform at the entrance. Suddenly, the ground tremored and the tiles under their feet lifted themselves into the air. Behind them, the entrance sealed with a large slab of stone.

"We're about to have a battle here," Yuan said.

"Geez, what makes you think that?" Mithos said. "Sorry... spent too much time with Gnome."

The tiles assembled themselves into the shape of a man, brought to life by a bolt of electricity. The "head" of the golem possessed a single eye made only of a glowing outline.

"It's a mindless drone, so it shouldn't be too... whoa!" Yuan started. The arms of the golem broke into tiles and spun into Yuan like boomerangs. As he tried in vain to attack the tiles, they effortlessly evaded him perfectly. "On the other hand, each of them seems to have a mind of their own."

The golem turned its attention to Mithos, who had sprouted wings and began to take down individual tiles still attached to the body. The tiles apparently could not act independently when they were part of the golem. All the tiles fell to the floor in a big pile. A ring of blocks surrounded Mithos while others were attaching themselves top and bottom. Finally, it assembled itself into a sphere with spikes around the sides shooting electricity everywhere. Inside, Mithos endured shock after shock from the monster.

"On three, we break it open," Alice said to Solstice. "One... two... three!"

"Terra areas tal sorra! Grave!"

"Fearful Raven."

The blocks immediately fell apart again, so it was Mithos that took the blows from Alice and Solstice. Fortunately, both held back at the last minute, and he was not badly hurt from that incident.

"In total, we've only damaged a few tiles. How do we beat this thing?" Martel said.

"Don't know, Martel. Even if we could destroy every block, it has hundreds more around the room to pull from. We could try destroying that eye block," Yuan suggested.

"I've got it," Kratos replied, jumping and slashing into the golem's eye. The shards fell to the floor and shattered, but a new block rose to take its place. Blocks surrounded him, creating a prison in the shape of a cube. The golem's arm grabbed the cube and threw it like a baseball towards the pool. At the very last moment before it hit the brine, the blocks separated and let Kratos fall.

"Master!" Mithos yelled. Kratos managed to hang onto one of the blocks as it tried desperately to dump him by twisting all around the room.

"I know how to beat it," Yuan said. He noticed that one of the tiles had gone too close to the water and received an electric shock from being dipped in it. When that happened, the other pieces simultaneously had an arc of electricity jump across their surfaces. "Knock the eye tile into the water."

With her shooting staff, Martel blew the block off the head of the golem, but made sure not to damage it. Then Alice bounced off the wall to knock it over to Mithos who had his sword ready.

"Starsword Magic, activate! Star Tornado!" Holding his sword like a bat, Mithos smashed the tile clear into the far end of the pool.

"Kratos, jump!" Solstice called. Kratos let go and tumbled onto the platform as his ride broke into pieces. Since the leader block had been dunked in the charged water, each of the other blocks suffered a powerful electric shock. One by one, they fell dormant.

"Hey, guys," Martel said at a lever in the wall. "Why didn't we see this before?" The lever was labeled TILE MONSTER EMERGENCY SHUTOFF.

"Great, so much for my brilliant idea," Yuan said. The six dormant pedestals now changed to the active position with their lightning rods pointed to the ceiling. A huge sphere of electricity appeared over them, emitting a buzzing noise.