Even though my journey through the portal is over in the blink of an eye, it still feels like I’ve just taken a freezing dive into the coldest ice water ever. When I emerge on the other side, I crash, hands and knees on a hard stone floor, and shiver like a geek about to ask the homecoming queen for a date.

The sensation slowly fades away, and I’m left standing on a circular balcony surrounded with stone handrails and nowhere to go. Even so, I’m not alone and completely useless. There’s a marble panel with six candles. Three of the flames are an unnatural yellow, three are pulsating green, and below each of them it looks like there are more slots to insert weapons into. These look bigger, like they are meant to accompany a wider variety of weapons. In the center of it all there’s a big fist-sized red button, and I realize I’m looking at some kind of control station.

I bend over the handrails to look below me and realize the balcony is actually a free-floating platform, and down below there’s an even bigger circular platform that’s surrounded by hot glowing magma beneath it. In the faint red light, I can see small details engraved in the platform floor below that makes it look like it’s a maze. Initially, it looks like there are six figures standing in it, but as it turns out, there are actually three statues and three players. My favorite band of goons. Which isn’t saying much when they are the only band of goons I know.

“Hey!” I shout.

Finn and Alloy look right up at me, while Lenard is scanning everywhere but above him, confused.

“How did you get up there?” Alloy asks.

I hold out my hands. “I have no idea! How did you guys get down there?”

“The portal took us here. What’s up there?”

“Well, it almost looks like there are controls with more weapon slots. I don’t know what they do yet. There’s also a big red button up here.”

“Uh,” Lenard mumbles. “Don’t push that red button just yet. Something tells me it’s not turbo mode.”

“Okay,” I say with a chuckle. “What about you guys? What’s up with those statues?”

“I haven’t had a chance to look at one yet,” Alloy says. He begins to walk towards the closest one “This one looks like—” He lets out a grunt and jerks back as his nose smashes against something invisible. He cusses, then holds out his hand, then cusses again. “There’s some kind of invisible barrier here. See the marks on the floor? We can’t navigate over them. We have to stay in the maze even though we can see through it.”

“Well,” Leonard says, “that’s actually pretty considerate of the developers. It would be a lot harder if we couldn’t see each other.”

“Try out some of those controls up there,” Finn says. “We need to know what they do.”

“Okay!” I say, turn my back to them, and draw my sword.

If I stretch my arm out as far as possible I can slightly see over the handrail as I slip my sword in the closest slot. When I do, the candle-light above it changes from yellow to green. Nothing else happens, either up here or down below.

I wonder if there is a correct combination, but try the other slots at random and every single one only toggles from either yellow to green, or turns to a mysterious blue. I have no idea what these are supposed to do but I figure green means go and I don’t have six swords to activate them all at once.

“Hey, Aiden!” Someone yells from below. I stick my head over and see Finn waving up at me. “There are six spots on the edge of the maze where the tile in the floor sits lower. Each of the tiles are about the same size as the statues’ bases, and at each of those spots there are carvings on the wall past the magma that look just like in the last room. They are portraits of the classes in the game.”

A light turns on in my brain. “And what are those statues of?” I ask. “I can’t see them clearly from up here.”

“They’re the classes, too,” Alloy says. “Every one that we are.“We have a Necromancer, a Wizard, and a Druid.”

I nod, then realize that they probably can’t see me do so when I’m all the way up here. Regardless, this puzzle is beginning to make sense to me. As a test, I insert my sword into the yellow weapon slot on the far left and try to twist my blade. Stone grinds as my sword spins 90 degrees, and someone down below shouts, “That statute just moved!”

I’m beaming. I know what we have to do. The blue lights represent the River Raiders below and signifies that I can’t control them, while the yellow ones that turn green are the statues. With their help down below, we can get these statues into their correct positions in front of their own portraits. I stick my head over the railing and see Alloy is waving his hands around to catch my attention.

“Which one moved?” I ask.

“The Wizard turned to the left,” he says. “Was that you?”

“I think so, let me try another.” I head back to the controls, retrieve my sword from the first, and try the next yellow one. The exact same thing happens, only now the whole Summoner statue moves forward one space in the maze by pushing my sword like a joystick. Out of curiosity, I decide to try pushing the big red button just to see if anything happens.

Someone below shouts in panic, and I rush to the edge. Down below, a jet of flame is blasting out from one of the portraits on the wall, bathing a statue and almost 1/4 of the maze in fire. When I hit the button again the flames sputter out.

“What the hell was that?” Alloy asks.

“Uh, I’m not sure,” I lie. “Do you think there is a timer or something? Maybe we aren’t moving fast enough.”

The others debate with one another for a moment, but most importantly, within a minute I’m off the hook. A grim smirk stretches across my face when I realize I can use this to my advantage.

“All right, I think I have this figured out.” I say. “We need to move these statues to their respective portraits on the wall. So, I’m going to need you guys to be my eyes, because from up here I can’t make out any of these statues.”

Finn gives me a double thumbs up. “Can do!”

One at a time, I use my sword as a joystick and we work together for nearly 20 minutes and get about half of the puzzle together before Alloy shouts from below. “I think we're missing something. I just about tripped over a staff on the floor. It’s made out of the same stone as the statues.”

I stick my head over the rail again. “What do you think it’s for?”

Alloy scratches his head. “Well, I’ve noticed that all of these statues are wielding a weapon, but not all of them right. I think we need to double check and make sure that they’re all correct before we finish the puzzle.”

“Good call,” I say. “You and Lenard navigate around the maze and work on swapping out weapons, me and Finn will continue to adjust the statues.”

We continue our work for another 20 minutes, but without my guidance from above it’s hard for Lenard and Alloy to find their way through the maze. I let them suffer through it, though, because helping Alloy pick up a dropped pencil would hurt bad enough.

When we finally make our way to the very last statue that needs to be put into position I take a deep breath and prepare myself for what I’m about to do. When I’m certain I can pull this off, I wipe the sweat off my brow, and peer over the handrail. “I’ve got bad news, guys.”

“What is it now?” Lenard asks.

I point my thumb over my shoulder and back behind me. “This last lever isn’t budging. I can’t get the last statue to move.”

“No freaking way. How? I don’t understand,” Alloy says

“Me neither,” I say. “But I don’t think it’s an accident. I think this is another part of the puzzle. The moment we enter this room the game decides which one of these statues stationary.” My heart begins to race as I say to Alloy, “I think you need to take the Necromancer statue’s place.”

Alloy shakes his head. “No way, greeny.”

“We don’t have time for this,” I say. “That first blast of fire went off to urge us to keep moving. It can’t be much longer before it happens again and it takes one of you out. There’s no way we’re going to be able to face that final boss without all four of us, so we have to move quickly.”

“He’s right,” Finn says. “Remember, the old Rose King of the Keep loved his tricks, puzzles, and complicated tactics. It makes sense that he would require us to risk one of our own party members, threaten our failure of matching the portraits to the correct class with the death of a player. If Aiden wasn’t so on top of everything, we wouldn’t have even made it this far. He’s got brains, Alloy. Think of treasure, we have to be so close to the final boss.”

Alloy lets out a groan of dismay. “All right, let’s hope this works.”

“All right, make your way to the carving relief of the Necromancer on the wall. But, I wouldn’t pull out your own wand, I’d use the stone one that the statue is holding.”

He nods and wrenches the stone wand out of the Necromancer statue’s hand, and once he’s in place on the sunken tile in front of his portrait I instruct him to hold the wand out just like all the other statues. When everything feels right, I make my way back to the control panel and insert my first sword into the Wizard slot and hit the turbo button. It makes a satisfying clicking sound, followed by nothing but silence and a permanent green colored flame. There’s no screams, and no giant blast of fire. The Druid slot is exactly the same.

But when it comes time to move on to the Necromancer slot, I’m shaking with anticipation. I think about wimping out, but then I remember the Shield, the rumor I overheard that someone wants to mutiny and take over my ship, and how Alloy has been keeping me here against my will and being an all around jerk to me. For once, I have the upper hand here, and I better not let this chance at revenge go to waste. I insert my sword and hit the big red button, only to hear Alloy’s delightful shouts of panic coming from below.

Alloy is punished by fire for 25 damage! 107/132 HP remaining!

Alloy is punished by fire for 28 damage! 79/132 HP remaining!

Alloy is punished by fire for 21 damage! 58/132 HP remaining!

Rushing to the balcony railing, I glance down and behold my destruction; Alloy sprinting through the maze as quickly as he can, then slamming into an invisible barrier and bouncing off it to the ground. On his ass in the flames, he looks up at me points. “I’ll get you for this! I swear!”

I do my best evil villain laugh by putting my hands on my stomach, lifting my head, and bellowing as I bask in the red glow of my furious revenge.

Alloy is punished by fire for 31 damage! 27/132 HP remaining!

Alloy is punished by fire for 26 points of damage! 1/132 HP remaining!

Alloy is punished by fire for 24 points of damage! 0/132 HP remaining!

Alloy has been defeated!

You have gained 700 experience points!

You’ve received the badge: “Party Foul”!

You’ve solved the puzzle!

You gain 2,000 experience points!

Congratulations! You have reached level 6! 1 attribute point has been awarded.

I can’t help but chuckle at the name of the achievement I’ve just unlocked. While it doesn’t give me any statistical boosts, it does open my eyes to a whole new aspect of the game and I wonder what other badges there are hidden throughout Libertas.

“You killed him!” Lenard yells up at me.

I smile. “That was kinda the point.”

“You knew this was going to happen?” Finn asks, shaking his fists and lanky arms. “What kind of controls d’you got up there?”

Lenard taps him on the shoulder. “Doesn’t matter, now. Let’s get him.”

I slink back to take cover just as they draw their weapons and begin to concentrate on their spells. Apparently, I didn’t think far enough ahead on my revenge quest, because now I don’t know what I should do. Luckily for me, another, far louder voice booms through the room:

“The warrior stands stronger than the rest!”

I don’t recognize the voice at all. It’s deep and masculine, but the fact that the game put the dialogue into my HUD log lets me know that it’s a narration from the game itself. Then, my ticket out of here becomes clear when massive stone bricks begin to descend from the ceiling. Floating down, gently and slowly by invisible hands, they pause one at a time to form a set of stairs that leads up into the ceiling and what appears to be a lighted room.

I dash up the stairs as quick as I can, narrowly avoiding the bolts of magic from Finn and Lenard. When I’m almost all the way up, the shooting stops and I hear them shout out to me. “How are we supposed to get out of the Keep?”

I pause on the stairs, turn, and shrug. “Kill yourselves!”

I’m already long gone before they get started up again, standing in a room with a glowing stained glass portrait of a giant red rose set into the ceiling like a dome. In the middle of the circular room there is a pedestal where the light seems to focus on, and resting on an altar of pure gold is something the shape of a sword shrouded in a thin barrier of swirling black mist.

The loud voice speaks again:

“Only a warrior willing to betray his party may find this sword.”

“Congratulations. You’ve proven yourself stronger than your allies.”

“Take this sword. May you master it and conquer in the name of the Rose King.”

With a grin, I walk to the altar and pick up the sword that appears to be made of smoke.

(LV. 10) ??? Sword (Class A)

A mysterious energy shrouds this blade. Maybe if you focus on taming it you could release its power…

At first, I tried doing what the description suggests and focus on it, grabbing the sword as hard as I can, shaking it, and ‘taming’ it, but nothing happens. I figure I must be missing something and will just have to figure it out later, so for now I just stow the mysterious blade into my inventory.

A pop-up of blue text appears before my eyes, asking me if I’m ready to leave the dungeon. For a moment, I hope that Lenard and Finn don’t get asked the same message and really do resort to killing themselves, because I begin to focus on yes. Instantly, my vision fades to black, then returns. Next thing I know, I’m standing outside the gate of the Five Roses Keep, out of the bailey, and the best part is that there’s no Finn or Lenard in sight for now. Bolting towards the forest, I’m completely free of that terrible experience.

Birch Castle and Rin, here I come!