Way of the Knights

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"W-what in the world?"

This were Raven's first thoughts upon taking his first step inside the palace. He was completely baffled and confused. Out of all the things that he was expecting to see inside this palace, what lies before him might possibly be one of the least things on that list. 

The interior of the palace was a vast starry space. Raven was standing on top of a milky white road filled with sparkling granules which looked like stars. The road is divided into several partitions, each leading somewhere he has no idea about. In truth however, these weren't the things that really caught Raven off-guard. 

What surprised him the most is what lies straight ahead. He doesn't have a good view of it but he could more or less make out what it was. 

There was a gigantic stone steele floating in suspension within this space. It was incredibly massive and thick, he could also see several engravings on the stone steele from where he was standing but he needed to be close enough to see them clearly. 

The thing that surprised him the most is that, that gigantic stone steele was radiating an aura that he's incredibly familiar to him but he can't remember what it was to save his life. He was pretty sure that this was his first time seeing this massive stone steele but the aura he felt was too familiar, he just can't remember what it was for the life of him. 

In fact, it wasn't just this. The whole starry skies, the very location that he's in right now, felt incredibly familiar to him but for some reason he can't remember where he felt this before and it was bugging him. 

"You're finally here." 

A voice sounded beside Raven, causing him to look over. He then saw the familiar silhouette of Inos and Astrid. 

"Yeah, sorry I took me a while." Raven replied while scratching the back of his head. 

Inos and Astrid looked at each other and smiled, Astrid then told him: "Don't worry, you didn't make us wait. In fact, you're quite quick."

"Really?" Raven couldn't help but ask. 

Inos nodded and said: "You were quicker than most of us, while it's mostly thanks to your luck that you unlocked the entirety of your Cosmic Energy, you're hard work deserves acknowledgement. Thanks to that, you arrive here sooner than what we were expecting." 

"But you should know that everything doesn't rely on speed alone." Astrid added, "In fact, speed won't help you at all for your next objective." 

"Next objective?" Raven tilted his head and asked.

"Yes." Inos replied, "Just because you entered the Palace, it doesn't mean that you can sit on the throne already. In fact you're not even close to it at all. Now's not the time for you to slack off, the closer you get to the throne the harder your challenges will be. So be prepared for it."

"Uh, what exactly do I need to do anyway? Forget about sitting on the throne, I don't even know where it is currently." Raven replied. "And what exactly is this place anyway? Why do I feel a strange familiarity with it? What's that stone steele over there? Where does the others roads lead to?"

The two weren't shocked when they were faced with Raven's barrage of questions. They too were the same during their first time here so they can't really blame him. 

However, instead of answering him. The two began walking instead and gestured Raven to follow them. The three began walking towards the direction of the massive stone steele, and as they walked towards it, Inos and Astrid began explaining things to Raven. 

"As you can see, this is the interior space of the palace." Inos stated, "It would make sense for you to feel a strange familiarity with it, after all it was Geezer who created this place. His presence are all over the place which shouldn't be surprising."

"However, the familiarity you feel didn't come from him." Astrid continued, "You've only met him twice, you can't even remember what happened during your first meeting, which means that it's not his aura that you're familiar with."

"What is then?" 

"The clues are all around you, Partner. This shouldn't be too hard for you." Inos replied with a smile. 

His words then got Raven into thinking. He studied his surroundings once more, trying to search for clues. It didn't take long for Raven to finally come up with an answer, however his realization still shocked him. 

"The Starry Skies of Spirit World!"

"Exactly." The two of them replied at the same time. 

"But how? How did Master Geezer able to keep the starry skies here?" Raven was legitimately confused. 

How can he not be? All this time, he was made to understand that the real Starry Skies of the Spirit World is hidden from everyone. It was supposed to be on a place where no one could find it or enter it. Although Raven was able to call down the Starry Skies of the Spirit World to show itself before, it's nothing more than a mere projection. He actually had no way of knowing where it is or how to enter it. So how come it's here? 

"Correction. This isn't the real Starry Skies of the Spirit World. It's only a mere clone. A replica." Inos replied, causing Raven to feel surprised once again. 

"That being said, even though it's only a mere replica, this place is created using materials that could be found on the real thing, making it infinitesimally close to the actual one." Astrid added. 

"Wait, so that means Master knows where the real Starry Skies are located?" Raven asked in a bewildered tone. The two nodded their heads to answer him. 

Now that was very shocking. Raven wasn't expecting that his Master knew where the real Starry Skies were located, what's even more shocking is that he could enter and exit the place since he was able to gather materials from that place to create this replica. 

"Master wouldn't happen to be trapped in there would he? He said that he was trapped somewhere which prevented him from leaving. I remember him telling me that its dangerous where he was, and even he wasn't confident about his chances of getting out. It wouldn't happen to be the Starry Skies right." Raven asked in a worried tone. 

"Ah, don't worry about that." Astrid replied, "He's trapped in a different place. Although the location of the Starry Skies are elusive and difficult to enter, it hardly poses any danger at all. It's either you can get in or not. I don't remember anyone dying on their attempts so you can be rest assured that he's not there."

"We're all worried about him, but right now you just have to focus on what's in front of you. You can't go where he's at just yet. You also don't need to worry to much about him. When it comes to surviving, only a few people could hold a candle to Geezer. He'll be fine." Inos gave him a reassuring smile, causing Raven to sigh in relief. 

They're right, he should just focus on what's in front of him. The sooner he gets stronger the earlier he could help his master escape. There's no point on worrying about him now since he's not even strong enough to know where he's trapped anyway. action

At some point on their journey, Raven stopped speaking and all of the unnecessary thoughts in his mind were gone. All of his attention were now focused on what's in front of him. And that's where the gigantic stone steele was suspended. 

Now that he's closer to it, Raven could finally see it clearly and inspect it closer. 

Due to him being far away, he failed to realize that the engravings on the gigantic stone steele were actually depictions of several creatures connected together by lines, only when he was closer did he managed to see them clearly. 

Once they were closed enough, Inos and Astrid paused on their tracks, which also stopped Raven from going any further. 

"This is the Steele of Constellations. Master created this by collecting several materials from the Spirit World and forging this gigantic stone steele. Engraved in the surface of this steele, is all the constellations present in the Starry Skies of the Spirit world. Even without Geezer's presence, even the newly formed constellations are showing up here automatically."

"So far, there's at least 998 constellations present within the stone steele." Astrid added, "And your task is to gain the acknowledgement of all of them, including the ones that will show up later." 

"Are you serious!?" Raven couldn't help but raise his voice when he heard this ridiculous task. 

How can he not be? 998? And that's not even all of them? Isn't this task a little to steep for him to clear? 998 is a huge number. How long is he going to be stuck here this time? And even though she said that he'll only need their acknowledgement, who's to say if he'll come out of it unscathed?

"I'm afraid not.." Astrid replied, "Only by being acknowledged by all with you be able to sit on the crown as the true Heir of the Ancestral Divine Crown.