The Black Flames

"It's okay. I can still get out," Oisin confidently lied to himself.

He was standing half-awake on a very dark room under an old temple of Lumen, the capital city of Vepera Kingdom.

It was not too hard for him to end up in this forbidden room. He was really just trying to check out the entirety of the temple, having escaped the ineffecient gazes of two guards on the way. Then as soon as he opened a certain door and landed his first step inside, he dropped.

Oisin just dropped to the ground and got gravely injured. It was at least a ten meter fall which this boy had to deal with so suddenly. His knee was instantly bruised, and a thin sound of pain escaped his throat. But he was sure that nobody heard him. 

Oisin could then barely stand up. But he cooled himself down, gritting his teeth. He looked all around him, and there were staircases everywhere, all pointing downwards.

"Why did I do this…" Oisin sighed, "This must be a secret room of sorts."

Oisin had this bad habit of going inside unknown places, or restricted places. Not because he had some mental problems but because of plain curiosity. He had read in a number of books in his early days that the heroes would suddenly stumble upon a secret artifact, or a treasure that would change their lives entirely. Oisin expected something similar. Although, he always regretted these decisions.

Oisin pushed his body on the wall, and started to walk down a random staircase from among the eight or nine there was. Slowly, because he was still seriously hurt. It is not that he did not suspect any dangers under that staircase, where he cannot even see anything, but his thought-process was simple - 'If I stay here for too long, someone will come to save me and I will never get to explore these places.'

Although, it was extremely unlikely for anybody to come and save Oisin. This temple in Lumen was almost an abandoned site. It was a small disregarded place situated very close to the rather grand Temple built by the first king of Vepera Kingdom.

Only two lazy guards were appointed to at least not pose disrespect to this ancient temple. Due to the lack of any audience or pupil here, not even the saints felt the need to ever come here. Yet, this place was not exactly forbidden for the masses. Anyone could come, but nobody did. Well, why would they?

Oisin kept walking down until he landed on a flat surface. There he saw a dim red light emanating from the wall.

"These walls must have been imbued with some magical artifacts…" Oisin wondered. 

The room was small, and had literally nothing therein, except a pillar, long and broad. There were some incomprehensible runic letters imbedded upon it which Oisin could not read. 

He touched the pillar, but nothing happened.

"What was the purpose creating this room? An education site?" he posed a question with nobody to answer it for him.

He sighed and slowly proceeded to walk up the staircase. He wanted to check out all of the rooms. As time passed, he slowly but eventually checked out each of the rooms in a similar way. And all of them had similar features. Just a dark red room with a massive pillar with runic inscriptions in the center for mysterious reasons.

The difference was in the last staircase. It was in the center of them all, for which Oisin kept it as a last treat. Oisin could easily deduce that this one was much longer than the previous staircases. Almost double the size, he'd say.

As he reached the bottom, he even noticed that the room was also almost double in size compared to the previous ones. 

"Hmm… A bigger education site? Like a classroom?" Oisin wondered.

This room also glowed in dim red light from the walls, from where Oisin could see the runic inscriptions on the pillar. 

This pillar, was also apparently double in size. 

"The inscription on this pillar seems to be quite different compared to the other ones…" Oisin noticed and went ahead to get a closer inspection on the pillar. It really was unique. Even the composition was different.

There were bricks laid down on the pillars that would seem like 'button's of sorts. Oisin thus pressed one of them, hoping to see their function. Nothing happened though.

"Is this like a puzzle?" he wondered while frowning. 

He pressed the rest of the bricks as well. But nothing happened.

"I guess it is stupid to think any treasure would still be left in this temple, that is so ancient. Even if there was any treasure, the royalties must have snatched it long ago."

As he was about to decide to move up the staircase and start shouting for rescue, he experienced a slight tremble.

"What just happened-" he looked beside.

"This…" 

The pillar started to change it's shape. It's runic inscriptions slowly broke down and started to form something else.

Oisin watched in pure shock as that turned into something recognizable for him. Thus here was a question written in front of the pillar, in pure Veperian language.

Oisin's eyes naturally widened as he said,

"A thousand year old magic this is!"

Laughing slightly in awe, he then focused on the question.

It was written in glowing blood-color emanating it's own light from the pillar. He read the question aloud -

"WHAT BURNS BRIGHTEST?"

Oisin read it a few more times.

"Eh? What burns brightest…"

'If I give the correct answer, I will totally be rewarded with something right?' Oisin thought for a while before answering, 'I am sure this is not talking about a literal burn… Real burning is within one's self to fight against something. Like the panging of someone leaving you. Someone dying… Oh, I know.'

Oisin smiled at the unalive pillar.

"The answer is obvious,"

Oisin laughed, while cleaning of the dust from his white robe, where a red collar rested tightly on his neck, giving a rather noble aura although he was the probably the poorest boy in Lumen. Oisin had an absurd self-esteem which was different from pride, that is why he would never allow himself to look like someone weak, illiterate, or stupid.

"It's ambition."

Oisin, he was the most ambitious boy in Lumen.

The inscriptions in the pillar started to change it's shape for the second time.

It quickly formed a sentence - "Indeed."

"Oh, I was right? What's my reward now?" Oisin grinned, knowing that something awaited him. But it was not in the way he expected.

With a sudden crack, the inscriptions fell away, evaporating into thin air like mist at dawn.

"What the…" Oisin's eyes widened again.

The bricks within the pillar began to crumble. A rumbling sound reverberated through the chamber, filling the air with tension. Oisin naturally held his breath, balancing on the edge of fear and wonder.

The massive pillar quickly made a ruin.

But because of that, it revealed something else. Oisin kept his cool, while grinning with his eyes furrowed. 

It was a tablet that was hidden inside the pillar. Oisin simply moved ahead and picked up the tablet. It was small, barely the size of his palm. It listed out ingredients of somethings as he saw -

"Recipe? Is this a recipe for an artifact?" Oisin wondered what might this be. After all, it is a tradition that the name of the artifact would be written at the very end of it. So he scrolled his eyes down there.

Oisin's hand shook.

His heart clenched.

And he never felt a greater silence in his life.

The last line was simple yet earth-shattering:

"Grade S: THE BLACK FLAME"