The Atlas Pillar (2)

Luca and Arcturus had silently listened to the slowly boiling over temper of the king, using their bond to speak mentally as they tried to come up with ways to help that wouldn't make it worse. They'd put forth several suggestions and only caused Arthur's growing frustrations to surge. After several moments of silence from the duo, Arcturus suddenly said, "I doubt Echadir would have made it so difficult to access... Does the key phrase need to be so long? It sounded like we were trying to be pompous."

Arthur turned to look at the pair, since the dragon whelp had not hidden his thoughts this time, with an exhausted expression, "How else are we supposed to ask for help? Arrogance? I've already hit that point... and why would anyone make an access phrase easy to use?" His words did make sense. An access phrase was meant to be used like a key: only by those who were supposed to use it. Making it easy would simplify a lot of the difficulties of getting inside, for users and thieves.

"Maybe we're just complicating it. Try something simple and to the point. Like, try the reason we're asking for aid. That might work." Luca, by this stage, had just started brainstorming aloud in hopes of something working.

"The reason, huh..." muttered Arthur as he stared at the pendant on the necklace with a contemplative look. "Why do we need help..." Several silent moments of staring at the necklace passed before he looked up at the ceiling solemnly. He then raised the necklace up to his head so he could look at the inscription. "The reason has to be the answer, but what is the simplest way of explaining our goal..?" The room fell silent once again after the king sighed, closing his eyes pensively.

In an odd moment of epiphany, the trio's minds suddenly cleared as they all understood just why they needed help. This mission that they had set out to do was long, complicated, and certainly extensive, but, at its core, it had a very simple goal. In a mutter, they said in sync, "For Andor."

[Code acknowledged. Confirming prerequisite conditions. Atlas Key of Andor confirmed. Mortal sovereign, confirmed. Descendant of the Dragon God, confirmed. Neutral-type demigod Dragonborn, confirmed. Unique signature of memory-type divine power, confirmed. All requirements completed. Initiating Protocol Alpha-Zero-One.] Unexpectedly, a robotic voice that reminded Luca of GlaDOS from the Portal games rang through the pillar once they spoke. With startling accuracy, it easily examined and identified them faster than even Arthur's highly trained and experienced reaction speed. The array then glowed brightly before they felt the familiar sensation of teleportation.

Not more than a second later, from a much smaller array, the trio appeared in the centre of an enormous, circular chamber with smooth black tiles covering every surface, without any light source, making it pitch black once the array stopped glowing. As Luca prepared to use his magic to cast a light spell, the entire wall began to shimmer before slowly changing colours and revealing seemingly countless screens displaying just as innumerable views of places that Luca and Arthur both recognized as various important places all across the vast continent.

As the trio stood astonished by the vast amount of viewpoints they could see around the entire chamber, a low hiss came from nearby as a tile began to roll down below like a sideways garage door. From the unknown depths of the hole came a brief amount of clanking as another tile rose up in its place, this one bearing a semicircular desk made of similar materials as the floor. Once the tile was in place following a second hiss, the edges of the desk began to glow a blueish colour, with a hologram-type keyboard design laid out across it. Luca curiously walked over, while the other two followed with apprehension, and they examined the newly appearing piece with inquisitive eyes. As they did so, one of the buttons on the holographic keyboard, a lonesome one set apart from all others, began to pulse, shifting quickly between its original blue and an eye-catching orange.

After a brief second of curiosity, Luca pressed the button before the other two could stop him despite guessing that it was necessary. A new display, this one holographic and three-dimensional, appeared at the head of the desk, flickering briefly before taking the shape of a featureless humanoid. From this display came the voice that the trio had heard not a moment before, [Auxiliary power sequence initiated. New administrative user, 'Luca', registered.] Though it had no eyes, the Dragonborn boy knew the humanoid focused on him at that moment, [Welcome, mortals, to the Andor Terminal of Logistics, Administration and Surveillance Headquarters, colloquially called the Atlas Pillar. I am called Halad, meaning 'warden', the artificial intelligence created and charged with protecting this control centre. Before I can answer your questions, which I know you have many, I must first play this recording left by the chief engineer Echadir." With suspiciously realistic motion, the hologram descended to the table and stepped off a bit to one side as another display like the one from Luca's memories appeared, with the same Ancient Elf man present.

"Good, good. If this recording is being played, that means that you have followed my instructions properly. My sincerest apologies for the wordplay to reach here, but that was not decided by me. The High Priestess appeared to have known that I would try to pull something like this and allowed it anyway so long as she provided the key phrase. Nobody would dare refuse, especially since this involves the fate of our species as well. If she was correct, the person viewing this now should be the Dragonborn Luca, the Stellar Dragon Arcturus and the human king Arthur Valar, and this was after meeting with the person titled 'Dreamwalker'. That means that, as she expected, the two faction-leading deities would call for the aid of a champion to save the plane after the fall of an alternate timeline." Within the brief time that he'd appeared so far, Echadir had shattered the minds of the three viewers beyond any expectations. Who knew the Ancient Elf High Priestess's prophetic powers were so vast?