Stumbling onto the spiral lift of the forge tower, Synexus cursed the pain in his mind. It felt like it was growing, and Gene told him it was because the System was warning him that he needed to finish the trial immediately.

  Once they got to the bottom, he said the phrase and the portal opened which they went through without any hesitation. His health pool was still extremely low, and his mana had finally started ticking back up.

  Going into the main archives room, they found the ghostly figures forming into the researchers that were meant to protect the records including Synillic.

  “Great Mind, what do you think we should do?”

  “Our job is to protect these records and that’s what we should do. The soldiers went up to protect the forge and closed the portal. It’s unlikely the enemy will find us.” Synillic answered his frightened friend.

  Just as he got done speaking a bloodied soldier fell through Synexus and into the room.

  “Des…stroy.”

  “What? Soldier, what happened?”

  “They…broke through.” He said pausing in between painful words as he coughed up blood.

  “We don’t have any healers. I’m sorry. What can we do?”

  “Dest...roy. Destroy…the…power core.”

  And then the soldier died right where Gene and Synexus were standing.

  “Is here mad? If we do that then the forge will be destroyed!”

  “I think that’s the point.”

  They all looked at Synillic as he spoke the words and understood. If the enemy got ahold of the forge, it could be bad news for any who opposed them. They could create weapons of mass destruction if they figured out how it worked.

  “Right then, Thylli and Arwen with me. We are going to the core room. The rest of you stay here and make sure nothing comes through that portal.”

  “Yes, Great Mind!” They all said while breaking off into their given duties.

  The trio made their way down the stairs to the entrance of the power core room. They took their time to make sure the room was clear since there were three other entrances. Once it was clear they were alone in the room, they went to the control room and Thylli started checking several control panels.

  “Great Mind, it seems that the core is already damaged due to the ongoing power fluctuations. In emergency situations, the excess power of the core is used to power the city. Continued use was never part of its design, however.”

  “Well, that’s okay since we are here to destroy it anyways, Thylli. Tell us what to do.”

  “I’ll need your help in here with me to slowly cut off the power and then activate the core cooldown process to ensure it doesn’t go critical. If that happens then it could destroy the planet without the help of the invaders.” Thylli looked from Synillic to Arwen. “I’ll need you to go below the core and turn all the red valves until they close. Then turn the blue ones until they are open.”

  Synexus hadn’t been in this room yet and took a minute to look out the window of the control room. It was a massive spherical room, and the control room was on the wall halfway up. The doors were on a catwalk lining the room. In the memory, the core was a star in the middle of the sphere and below it were pipes, machinery, and several other catwalks.

  Arwen quickly ran down the stairs towards the valves underneath the burning power core. His hands could barely touch the railings, or they would get burned. Not a mild burn either, but one that could cause a class chosen pain.

  He ran around and started to shut the red valves not having any clue what was happening in the control room.

  “What do you mean Arwen is in danger? We just sent him down there minutes ago.”

  “Something is wrong. He is closing the right valves, but for some reason pressure is building. The power outages must have damaged the regulators down there. That whole construct could blow if we don’t stop him.”

  Without another word, Synillic ran down the stairs towards Arwen. When he found him, he was closing the last red valve in the series.

  “Wait! Arwen, don’t!” But it was too late.

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  A massive explosion shook the entire catwalk causing Synillic to fall over before he caught himself on the railing. His flesh instantly started to sear from the heat, but that didn’t matter. He looked around frantically until he saw what he was looking for. Arwen’s corpse. He was missing his limbs and shrapnel filled his torso. Synillic bowed his head in sadness before pulling himself back up and looking at the damage. The entire safety system was destroyed.

  He ran back up to inform Thyllic when the entre room shook and he almost fell over the railing again. When he got back into the control room, Thyllic was panicking and pressing bottoms on every panel.

  “Arwen is dead. What happened?”

  “Catastrophic failure. It’s going critical. I can’t even cut off power. It’s like the forge tower is active and the outputs have been locked in place.”

  Realization dawned on them both. It was active.

  “We need to shut it down now! Is there any other way?”

  “Manually. But Synillic, with this heat and the unstable power, we will probably die from the blowback.”

  There was a moment of silence between them.

  “That doesn’t matter. We can’t fail here. They can’t prosper from our hard work.”

  Thyllic nodded and led the way up the catwalk to a series of ladders to which they strapped themselves to a rail next to the ladder and started to climb. Every few feet they had to unclip and reclip the strap on the rail.

  Synexus watched as his father climbed higher and higher until they were on the top of the sphere next to a massive metal cylinder that was where the power went from the core up to the tower.

  “There are two levers on either side that need to be pulled to perform an emergency manual shutdown. When we pull them simultaneously, we need to do our best to get down as quickly as possible. The blowback could be instant, or we may have a few seconds. Either way, it was always a pleasure working with you, Synillic.”

  “You as well, Thyllic. I’ll go around to the one of the further side.”

  With a nod, Synillic strapped himself to a new rail and then took a circular ladder around the cylinder to the other side. Both of the brave Zaxillians popped the panels off and they fell down into the core.

  Synexus watched this all play out, and tears started to blur his vision. He already knew how this would end.

  “Any last words, Synillic?” Thyllic yelled out.

  “Only that I love my wife and son. Hopefully they were able to escape.”

  “I’m sure they did! I love my wife too. This is for the rest of the universe!”

  As the words ended, they both pulled the levers and attempted to slide down the ladder, but it was too late. Electricity started sparking out before an explosion shook the room and completely destroyed the top of the sphere. When the bright light dispersed there wasn’t much left. The core that was once a star was now a red-hot metal orb in the middle of the room. Debris fell and clanged onto the rails and bottom of the sphere.

  Complete destruction.

  Synexus searched for his father on the railing above, but he was gone. Slowly looking down he finally saw him or his body at least. The explosion did massive damage and the fall did the rest. Synexus’ first teardrop didn’t even fall from his face before the ghostly figures dissipated.

  Another sharp pain hit his head, tugging towards the other end of the city.

  “I’m sorry, Synexus. It seems the dungeon is deteriorating at a rapidly increasing rate. You know you have one more memory to view. We need to go.”

  With a sad nod he got up and followed the owl out of the archives and outside where the city was in complete chaos. Fires were burning everywhere. There was so much smoke blanketing the sky that he wasn’t sure if it was nighttime or not. Ghostly bodies were burning in the streets and enemy soldiers were laughing. Anger filled him before Gene shook him out of it and made him follow.

  The building that the System led them to was one that he hadn’t explored in his many years inside the dungeon, but he already knew what it was. He had a memory of the interior from when he was three months old.

  As they climbed the stairs, violent tremors started to shake the world. They didn’t have any time and Synexus knew this truly would be the last memory.

  His mind stopped being pulled when they reached a door on the fourth floor. He went to open it and paused.

  “This is going to be even more painful, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, but you’re not alone. Friends talk about stuff, remember?”

  He smiled and nodded before going inside.

  It was as dark as he remembered except for the circle in the middle of the room where his mother sat looking down on him in the middle. He remembered the feel of her hand when she brushed his face. She was already in the middle of her goodbye and Synexus could feel the weight behind those words now. This was breaking his mother because she knew that her secret organization was partially to blame for the catastrophe.

  He kneeled down and wanted to break time itself to be able to say to her that it was okay. There was no way they could have known the consequences. They were being reckless, but it was recklessness in desperate times. Truthfully, he just wanted to tell her that he loved her and his dad and show her how much he had grown. One conversation to say “I’m your son! You don’t need to say goodbye!” But it was just a memory, and he had to watch it play out how it did.

  When his younger self teleported away his mom sat there in silence. Distant battles could be heard every now and then, but he could tell that she had drowned all that out. She only cared about him. Then the door opened, and a man ruined the silence.

  Rage filled Synexus when he heard him mocking his mother at one of the toughest times in her life. He again wanted to be able to reveal himself and tell him how wrong he was. How he had gotten away and lived on. The memory of Zax’xian lived on in him!

  In the blink of an eye, he saw the man move before slitting the throat of his mother. His anger turned to utter despair, and he fell to his knees at the sight. Blood oozed out and covered the last spot that he had been when he got to be with his mother. The man just turned around and laughed as he walked out the door. Synexus knew he would always remember that face and he would pay for his crimes. For not though he could only stare at the lifeless corpse of the woman that made him feel loved with his first and only memory of home.

  Bright white light started disintegrating the memory and the building he was standing in as the trial ended. His mother’s corpse was the last of the dungeon to turn into the vast nothingness. Tears fell endlessly into the white void.