We made our way down the valley. I was not seeing a way up but apparently Ezekiel seemed to know exactly where he was going. We walked towards one of the rings, and trust me, the sight I had of it from the top did not do the thing justice—they were incredibly large. I felt like an ant walking under those things.
There was this ominous feeling I kept having that all the rings would fall down and crush us. Crazy intrusive thoughts, am I right? Anyway, the deeper we walked into the valley of the rings, the denser the air became, like a mist was emerging out of nowhere.
"Stay close Ezra," he said. "Those who get lost under these rings never rarely find their way back."
So I stayed close, wondering why we would walking into a 'no man's land' deliberately. Maybe there was a hidden door somewhere that we were going to use to get up like the training door I summoned, or maybe a portal of some sort? I was tired of thinking and guessing, so I asked him directly.
"What exactly are we looking under these death traps?"
"I was wondering when you were going to ask that," he replied, chuckling. Then he finally stopped, under the edge of one of the rings. "Are you familiar with the term 'open sesame?'"
"Open sesame?" I asked, watching him bend down and stare at the ground. "You mean that door from the kid's movie, the movie about the ruler of thieves or something?"
"The king of Thieves, young blood," he replied. "Aladdin is a classic, how don't you remember that?"
I stared at him, raising an eyebrow. "So what about it?"
"Sames rules apply here," he replied dusting out the sand he was previously staring at. It took a while but he got all the sand out of the spot he had chosen with my help of course, and I was amazed by what was hiding under the sand. It was an ear! A large white ear resembling that of a bat's, and the only thing separating it from us was what appeared to be a preamble glass of some sort. The ear was stuck against the glass upwards, as if eavesdropping on the steps our foot made.
"Is that an ear?" I asked, looking round the area we were standing, "what exactly are we standing on?"
"The sand beast," he replied, standing up on his feet. "The sand covers the surface of the beast's domain."
"What the hell is a sand beast?!"
Ezekiel smirked. "The keeper of the gates. Listen closely kid, this is how you get up."
He looked at the ears, and then he leaned forward and exclaimed;
"ASPOGEE!"
Immediately the ear glowed and simultaneously the rings glowed also. Our bodies began to dissipate, as if our subatomic particles were being transferred one by one at an incredible speed…we were being transported or in simpler terms, mechanically teleported from where we stood to the surface of the floating earth at the top. In the blink of an eye we were in the front of the building of Xaion.
I panted hard from the shock, trying to hold in my vomit. I had seen people teleport back in Yolo Central, based on their abilities, but that was it, no one had ever teleported me because they couldn't, it was a 'one person' ability. So in summary I had never been teleported in my life and I have to say, it gave a crazy hangover.
"Wasn't that fun son?" Ezekiel asked, placing his hand on my shoulder.
I rose up looking at him. His eyes were fixed on the building before us, which made me look at the building once more. There was a giant rectangular door before us, a short range of stairs laid before the door and by the side of the door were statues that resembled the statues I saw back at the temple-like building I destroyed in the Himalayas. On the doors was a carved out drawing of a shield and a sword.
"Behold, Xaion, the Guild of the Knights," he said.
"I don't see a door knob," i replied, folding my arms. "Is there gonna be another surprise teleportation?"
He chuckled walking ahead. "Come on, let's go get a drink."
We walked up the stairs, the statues looking quite intimidating the closer you got to them and the door looking more immense that it was earlier. Usually when you approach a door, you stop at a certain point to pull or push the door open but we weren't stopping. Ezekiel walked ahead and I followed. We walked through the door like it wasn't there, like it was a hologram of some sort. Turned out the door would only remain solid for those who were not sent there by the sand beast. Without the sand beast's approval, the door would not let you in.
The moment we walked in through the door, my jaw dropped. It was a large community of knights, a market of some sort with a 18th century castle design. What we walked into was the grand hall filled with stalls and a considerable number of knights, some dressed like mercenaries while others dressed like warriors. There were no sellers in the stalls, the buyers were expected to drop their money in a box placed on the counter of the stalls.
The items bought ranged from weapons to attires and what they paid with were power stones. The hall was about fifty meters high and sixty meters wide, with the floor tiled with grey marble-like stones in evenly square shapes. There appeared to be elevators in the three corners of the hall and we were headed for one of them.
Most of the knights we walked passed seemed to know who Ezekiel was. Some cheered him on, while others gave him a nod of respect and a smirk. As for me, no one seemed to be paying attention to me or to the supposedly blue hair they were seeing and personally that was better than being stared down by strangers.
"Quite popular, aren't we?" I asked as we walked into the elevator in the north wing.
"I barely know half of those people," he replied sarcastically, pressing the seventy-eighth floor button.
"Sure you don't," I replied as we watched the door close.
Before it could close completely, a boot stopped it, and in walked this large man, dressed like a 1800s western cowboy with a strange pistol blaster on his side in his holster, a black long jacket and what appeared to be a candy stick in his mouth. He had blonde hair and a black dragon tattoo on his arm.
"Ezekiel," he nodded as the door closed up.
"Barbados," dad replied, returning the nod.
"Going to the Keeper's bar, I reckon?"
"You guessed right."
There was a short silence after that, as we felt the elevator move up gradually. We stood staring at the lights on the elevator's button panel, everything was becoming awkward.
"So," Barbados cleared his throat. "I see you finally found the true second guardian." He took a short look at me, then averted his eyes when he noticed that I was about to look at him.
"Indeed, turned out to be my son," Ezekiel replied. "Ezra, meet Barbados, 'The Yellow Blink.' "
'The Yellow Blink?' I thought to myself. 'Who the hell came up with that name?
Barbados laughed out loud.
"You still put yellow in the name?" He asked. "It's just 'The Blink' kid, only the False Guardian here calls me The Yellow Blink. It's a honour to finally meet a Guardian of your callibre."
He said all these without looking at me. I behind him at Ezekiel, the man shrugged.
"It's a honour to meet you too," I replied.
Just then, the elevator stopped, making that ding sound as it opened its doors up for us.
"Well!" Barbados said, adjusting his jacket, "stay out of trouble gentlemen."
With that he walked out, taking a left turn. Ezekiel followed and so did I. The doors of the elevator closed behind us as I stood there, amazed at the sight I was seeing. The Keeper's bar was barely a bar.