Arcane Journey

Chapter 192 The Golem of Amnesia

A series of cliffs are dotted with various natural caves that intersect each other to form a labyrinth on the face of the mountain.

"300 years ago, a golem who fled from the ruins of the floating city of Azuma used this place as a refuge." The old dragon turtle led Brian and Herist to a cave, and spoke to the two of them in an old and deep voice. Narration:
"Although this is a golem with amnesia, as time goes by, relying on the intermittently revived memory, this golem engraves and draws in it about its master, the great Arcanist Opus, Felin Tales of Aoi, battles, and a treasure trove of Nether scrolls."

"So, the reason why you took the risk to save this fleeing golem from the hands of the blue dragon lich, did you predict that it would be the key to your escape?"

Brian said thoughtfully, "So you purposely hid it here, just waiting for the arrival of someone who can help you get out of trouble."

"That's right." The old dragon turtle nodded embarrassingly, and said with a smile:
"After all, this golem is the closest partner of the great arcanist Opus. The former floating city Azuma was the largest academic research center in the entire Netheril Empire. I don't believe that anyone who knows these secrets will not be able to mention it. A little interest."

"I see."

Helliste, who was quietly standing beside Brian, suddenly answered, "A magic book left by the great arcanist Opus before his death, is it the book of sages that you deliberately brought to Silvermoon City?" Museum."

"Silvermoon City is the 'treasure of the Northland', a civilized settlement of the good camp."

The old dragon turtle stroked his white beard and said calmly: "People in the world who want to know the remains of the floating city of the great arcanist must go to the library of the sages to find this book. In this case, it will at least help me filter out the evil thoughts in my heart. man of."

Brian glanced at the elf beside him, and smiled at the old dragon turtle: "I have to admit, in order to get out of trouble and not let myself fall into the hands of evil people, your plan is indeed perfect."

He recalled the events in the game. The location of the old dragon turtle was indeed accidentally discovered by a group of adventurers when they noticed the books in the library of the sages. In the end, this news accidentally caught the attention of the public lord of Waterdeep City and successfully rescued him. .

It can be seen from this that even without his own participation, this old dragon turtle who is proficient in divination can be rescued by others.

Then, without discussing too much on this topic, they continued to walk deep into the cave.

"Before the golem came here, these natural caves were occupied by a group of purple worms." The old dragon turtle said as he led the way, "Except for the cave we walked in, all other places were turned into ruins."

Brian looked around, just as the old dragon turtle said, the terrain around them was full of scars left by the purple worm's habitation, and there were even many complicated caves. The tunnel was destroyed.

Fortunately, the purple worms here have already been cleaned up, otherwise, when dealing with these guys who are good at making tunnels, they must guard against the possibility of cave collapse at any time.

As they entered the depths of the cave, Brian saw traces of carved excavations on the walls, empty wall lamps dotted the walls, and large pieces of plaster scattered on the floor where scenes and words were once brightly painted .

This tunnel leads to a passage 50 feet long, 30 feet wide, and 20 feet high.

In the dark and damp passage, bats were making noise on the ceiling, the floor was full of their feces, and the walls in the depths were covered with colorful murals.

"The golems who escaped from the blue dragon lich use this place as a hall to write and record their own history."

The old dragon turtle said, "I don't know which part of the golem's body is broken. It always recalls the past intermittently, and it forgot all about it the next day, so I followed it. Suggest, let it record the things that suddenly recalled. Oh, yes, the amnesiac golem calls this its rainbow hall."

After listening to the introduction of the old dragon turtle, Brian set his eyes on the colorful murals on the wall.

Through a simple detection of magic, he accidentally discovered that every painting exudes a faint magical aura.

Obviously, the reason why these paintings can be kept as new as new is the credit of the magic paint used to make them.

Then he didn't think too much, and began to look at the history he wanted to convey in the paintings one by one.

In these coherent paintings, he saw a group of iron golems standing neatly and orderly in a workshop similar to an assembly line workshop, hammering objects on the table frantically.

After careful observation, he discovered that it was a group of iron golems engraved with magic runes, and their job was to keep engraving magic runes on the product with both hands.

Due to doing the same work every day, one of the iron golems began to become a little strange. It looked up at the hourglass from time to time, and when the charging time was up, it immediately rushed off the workbench and ran out the door.

The iron golem next to it was very curious when it saw this. It found a shell left on the post of the iron golem that ran out first, and it was very puzzled.

The next day came soon, and the Constructor Golems arrived on time as usual, only the strange Iron Golem hadn't arrived yet.

Seeing the late iron golem, another iron golem began to worry, and at the last moment of its preparations, the strange iron golem rushed over in time.

In this way, they began the tedious work of engraving magic runes.

Not long after, the strange iron golem stopped working and looked at the hourglass on the wall. It was halfway to recharging, and its shimmering eyes showed confusion.

It is a simple painting, but Brian can see from this strange iron golem that it is no longer in the mood to continue working.

It stood there blankly, but when the sand in the hourglass was exhausted, it ran out quickly as if it had been stimulant.

The other iron golem looked at the post of the iron golem that rushed out, leaving a lot of shells, as if to find out the situation, it followed the shells on the ground to a sewer in the city, and when it reached the end of the passage, The scene in front of him stunned him.

It saw that strange iron golem holding a net bag, happily swimming in the waves, and happily playing in the water. When it returned to the shore, its right hand had been corroded by sea water and became rusty.

After a few days, this strange iron golem returned to work again. Its entire body was rusted, and now it could only drag its weak body to its own post with difficulty.

Looking at the state of this strange iron golem, the other iron golem shook his head, but this time, this strange iron golem was about to leave work before the sand in the hourglass was drained.

Seeing this, the other iron golem immediately stopped it, telling it not to go to the beach to play in the water, but this strange iron golem seemed to be possessed, pushed away the persuading iron golem, and insisted on leaving the factory.

This strange iron golem came to the beach again along the sewer, stood stiffly on the beach, opened his arms, let the waves beat his rusty body, and enjoyed the impact of the waves.

This time, it never returned to the shore, and only half of its rusty arm remained on the shore.

So far, this coherent painting has come to an end.

Seeing this, Brian faintly felt that it was very likely that the two iron golems had inadvertently awakened their own consciousness. That strange iron golem looked more like it had died on the road of chasing dreams.

He laughed out loud, feeling a little unbelievable, and even instinctively thought that this might be the accidental coincidence of the amnesiac golem appearing due to memory confusion.

Then, he continued to look at the next painting.

Unfortunately, to his disappointment, the next paintings were not as coherent as he had seen before, as if each painting represented a different meaning.

From these paintings, he found five that were more important for his next adventure.

The first mural depicts three arcanists in Netherese-era garb, using various precious materials to add to the body of a lying iron golem on a test bench.

A bright sapphire was placed in the iron golem's chest. The lower end of the mural also marked the names of each arcanist with ancient inscriptions, and there was a larger inscription below the scene.

The names of the three Arcanists translate to Bron, Karin, and Sharissa.

The inscription reads: "Here the trio of Arcanists created the Sapphire Sentry."

Brian discovered that this iron golem was the companion of the strange iron golem.

Apparently, the anomaly in the factory was accidentally discovered by the Arcanist and re-enhanced another iron golem that had awakened its own consciousness.

The second mural depicts the three arcanists handing over the strengthened iron golem to an elderly grand arcanist, and one of the arcanists also personally handed over a sapphire fragment to the grand arcanist hands.

The ancient inscription marked the name of the great arcanist, and there was a larger inscription below the scene.

The name translates to: Grand Arcanist Opus of Azuma City.

The inscription reads: "The Sapphire Sentry has established a link with the Grand Arcanist Opus of the floating city Azuma."

The third mural shows the Golem and the Archmage together placing a golden scroll in a vault filled with stars.

A beam of blue light shoots from the gem on the golem's chest.

A description is engraved below, and the inscription reads: "According to the orders of Grand Arcanist Opus, the Sapphire Sentry opened the treasury of the stars, hid and guarded the scroll of netherer."

In the fourth mural, Grand Arcanist Opus and the golden scroll engraved with runes are sealed together in a sarcophagus.

The three arcanists who strengthened the golem cast magic on the grand arcanist with his eyes closed.

Mourners gathered around, and small inscriptions marked the names of these characters, while a larger inscription described it below.

The translation of the label is the Grand Arcanist of Azuma City and his three students, Bron, Karin and Sharissa.

The inscription reads: "The Grand Arcanist Opus entered eternal sleep to escape the curse of the Netherese Empire and seal himself with the Netherese scrolls."

The fifth mural depicts a blue dracolich and his army of monsters descending on the ruins of the floating city of Azuma. The dracolich bombards the golem with dark power, throwing it into a rift in the sky.

There is a mark on the body of the dragon, and an inscription below it.

The name of the dragon lich is translated as: Krizka.

The inscription reads: "The Sapphire Sentinel was destroyed in a terrible battle with the dracolich Krizka."

…………

Seeing this, Brian fully understood the ins and outs of the whole incident.

He withdrew his gaze and motioned to the waiting old dragon turtle to take him to see the amnesiac golem.

It's a tall, burly iron golem that looks like it's been crafted from heavy metal.

It sat motionless on the ground, with a blurry light in its eye sockets.

I don't know if it's an illusion, but Brian actually saw inexplicable sadness in this blurred light.

"Who are you?" He looked at the sad golem, silent for a moment, and asked proactively.

"Who am I?" Hearing his voice, the golem raised its head, and a low and hoarse voice came out of its mouth, "Who am I?..."

"I don't even know who I am..." It scratched its head in confusion and whispered.

"The core of the soul has been corrupted by negative energy, leading to loss of memory." Standing beside Brian, Hellist withdrew her detection gaze and told him what she had checked.

Brian nodded slightly, thought for a moment, and said to the golem, "It can be seen that you are a constructed creature, but you look too strange, because in my impression, constructed creatures have no independent thinking."

In fact, ordinary construct creatures do not have thoughts, but the caster has a nine-ring spell called "Construct Enlightenment", which allows them to gain life and independent thinking in a true sense.

However, in order to successfully release this spell, in addition to consuming a lot of energy (experience points) from the caster, a very special casting material is required: the brain of a humanoid creature that has been dead for no more than eight hours.

This enlightenment ability will pass with the passage of time, and this constructed creature that has been evoked with independent thinking is also very likely to recall the memory of this humanoid creature's brain during its lifetime, and it is even possible to fully awaken it.

By detecting magic, Brian could clearly feel that the golem in front of him definitely did not acquire independent thinking through this method.

It can be seen from this that a large section of murals with profound meanings that he saw is very likely to be true.

This reminded him of the higher creations recorded in the Nether scrolls.

Could it be that this great arcanist named Opus has come into contact with the research on life creation, he thought to himself.

Otherwise, it would be difficult to explain clearly how the two golems awakened their independent thinking.

Brian felt a little unbelievable for his own thoughts. After all, life creation is regarded as a taboo existence by the church of the gods.

"I... don't know why." The golem lowered its head, the light in its eyes dimmed a bit, and there was a hint of sadness in its deep and hoarse voice, "I feel that I have lost a lot of memories...a lot... Memory... memory..."

"What about your master?" Bryan continued to ask with his eyes flickering.

"Master?" The golem suddenly raised its head, and then a touch of confusion and pain appeared in its bright eyes, as if something it had clearly thought just now had suddenly disappeared.

"Is your master Grand Arcanist Opus?" Brian said to the golem in a gentle tone, "Did he arrange a mission for you to guard the treasury of the stars?"

He suddenly realized that this golem had survived from the time of Netheril to the present, and it must have mastered some means of self-absorbing energy.

For a moment, he had the urge to disassemble it and study it carefully.

However, he was quickly suppressed again.

After all, no matter how you look at it, this golem is a complete living body, and doing so is no different from dissecting a living humanoid.

Although he is also a spellcaster, he is not specialized in Necromancy and Bloodline Mystery, so he will instinctively reject these operations.

"My master...do you know my master?..." Hearing Brian mention the name of the great arcanist, the confusion in the golem's eyes disappeared, and tears of sadness welled up from its eyes .

Seeing this, Brian was moved.

He thought for a moment, and said to the golem in a sincere tone:
"Yes, I know your master. After all, I have read all the murals you left on the wall. From these messages, I learned that you are actually the sapphire sentry guarding the treasury of the stars.

Unfortunately, you lost your memory during a battle with a blue dracolich that invaded the vault.If you don't want your master to be disturbed by invaders into eternal sleep, take us to the ruins of the floating city Azuma, we will help you drive away the blue dragon lich, and you will continue to fulfill the mission of protecting the master . "

His speech was long, but he spoke it deliberately very slowly, trying to make the golems understand what they meant.

During the long silence of the golem, everyone cooperated to keep quiet.

After an unknown amount of time, the golem suddenly raised its head, looked at Brian, and continued to say in a low and hoarse voice, "Sorry, I really don't remember the past, let alone the location of the floating city Azuma."

It got up from the ground, took heavy steps, looked at the colorful paintings on the wall, unconsciously stretched out its hand to caress the portrait of the great arcanist, and said sadly:

"However... my subconscious mind tells me that what you said is true. In fact, I can feel that there is a teleportation circle hidden in my chest. Well-meaning adventurers, if you believe me, I am willing to open it Send the magic circle, and go to the unknown place together."

Brian saw that there was indeed a bright sapphire hidden in an 8-inch stone disc on the golem's chest.

The surface of the disc is engraved with a blue circle, with eight golden lines on it, shooting out from the circle like the rays of the sun.

He exchanged glances with Helliste, who nodded slightly, indicating that there was no problem.

"No problem, we are willing to risk ourselves to help you fulfill your wish." Brian nodded to the confused golem.

"Thank you so much, kind adventurer."

The golem blurted out with excitement, and tears of joy welled up uncontrollably from its eye sockets.

Finally, it bowed deeply to Brian again.

(End of this chapter)