THAT ILLUSION || ONC 2021

~•{Chapter #09}•~

After a walk of six turns and thirty steps towards the sky, the floating condor embossed iron gates clattered on her robust push. She walked into the chamber while hanging her lamp in the arch that had twenty oblique mirrors that could form a twenty pointed star from one beam. Gradually the room shined with ample light that was needed to carry out a brief ritual to make her read the signs right.

She placed a parchment over the table carved with phases of moon concocted around a symbol of infinity written in a cross.  She pulled out a black ivory bowl etched with a blazing flame, a dripping droplet, a fluttering leaf, a heap of mud and a spinning spiral, indicating the basic five elements of the universe. She placed the bowl near the lantern and picked five amber bottles from the ceramic ledge behind her.

'Summont lunar siltre.'
'Summon lunar silt.'

She conjured while rubbing her fingers over her palms. The moment she made her palm face the empty bowl, gravels of silver started filling the crescent space. With a smile toddling over her lips, she opened the first bottle and dribbled the red oil of fire into the snowy sand. She then poured the four oils; azure of water, pale of wind, brown of earth and black of space, into the sands. All drops were absorbed the moment they settled on them. Slowly a flaring beam of rufous shine erupted from the bowl to collide with the amber flame of the lantern.

As the light formed a glaring sphere, she gripped her ink-filled quill and lightened her bated breathes.

"Oh, the divine mother! May the codes be inferred right," she mumbled a quick request.

She lifted her eyes towards the sphere that started to spew some murky smoke, one after the other. With every new ebonic smoke that emerged out of the glaring beam, a new colour streaked in it. Reading the vision, she recorded the colours in the parchment, in the order of their emergence.

Purple, Indigo, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, Red. She wrote in a hurried cursive script.

After she penned all those colours, she could see them form a spectral circle encompassing one another. When the spectral arrangement with purple inside to red outside was organized, a shimmering shine of white bounded it. Slowly a thick black storm emerged out of the central circle of purple, making her drop the quill on the grounds.

Holy grace! She cried out in terror.  But, unlike she speculated the things didn't intensify. A blustery blow of wind flattened the storm, which made her arch her brows in chaos and some relief.

Before she could connect the clues, she saw the green and blue planet appear in front of her. From the blue oceans and lush and golden landscapes, she could guess that it was Earth. She picked up her quill and resumed.

Once she looked up, she could witness tiny black sphere balls from the flattened storm started attacking the planet through its eight directions. As she tried to comprehend it, the thick black storm crawled over the sphere of blue waters and green lands until it cloaked the lively planet with murk and mishap. Muffled lamentations of pain and anguish melded with groans and riots could be heard by her slender ears. As the cries heightened to a peak slowly they started to recede.

"What are these visions indicating? How can a spectral circle of colours end up in a catastrophe?" She queried herself. She gaped at the parchment and tried to analyze what had happened. She tapped her fist over the table in an irregular pulse, trying to conform the clues in any possible permutation. Yet, instead of answers questions fogged her mind. She raised her head to see if she missed anything.