Upon entering the gate, he finds a man dressed in a brown cloak introducing himself as Oliver the Proctor. Mazus and his crew approach Oliver and ask where to find the Ring of Purity. Oliver responds by saying that the only way to find the ring is to find a stone called the Rune of Elements. After obtaining the stone, Mazus must bring it to a group called the Untitled. From there, they will lead him to a castle guarded by a Cerberus, which Mazus and his group will have to slay to get in. Inside the castle, the ring will be on the empty throne located in the throne room.
Mazus and his group learn that the Rune of Elements is located at the end of a maze, which they would have to solve. As his group followed by Oliver reaches the entrance to the maze, Oliver reaches out to them and says, “There is a witch that will use her power to turn your men against each other.” After hearing Oliver’s warning, Mazus and his group enter the stone maze. As soon as the last knight enters the maze, a slab of stone from the entrance starts rising, trapping Mazus and the knights inside so that the only way to go is ahead. They continue walking around in silence until they hear a scream coming from behind only to find that the witch had used her magic to turn one of the knights from Mazus’s group against them killing half the group. While the other knights try to subdue him without killing him, Mazus goes on ahead to find the witch to take the rune.
Mazus runs until he approaches the end where the witch is sitting with the Rune of Elements in her hands. As he approaches her, he starts to hallucinate doppelgängers forming around him. They start to attack him and he notices that the only way to stop them is to kill the witch. He creeps behind the witch and plunges his sword into her heart. He picks up the rune and watches her lifeless body liquefy and mold together to form several more bodies. From behind Mazus can hear the footsteps of his knights. When Mazus and his men prepare to fight the new bodies, they speak to Mazus and his men saying, “You have passed the test. Proceed with us to the next task.”
Mazus and his men cautiously follow the Untitled out of the maze when they see the castle containing the Ring of Purity signifying the end of their journey. At that moment, the Untitled begin to mold together to transform into the Cerberus for the final task. Immediately after forming, the three-headed dog starts grabbing at the knights and eating them. The remaining knights tell Mazus to jump from the cliff to stab it from above. When he gets to the top of the cliff, he notices that he is the last man standing. With one leap, Mazus drives his sword into the back of the Cerberus’ neck and kills the beast. This opens the doors to the castle where the Ring of Purity lays. Mazus stands and stares out to see his knights killed in action. He breathes heavily and heads towards the castle.
As he picks up the ring and stares at it, he begins to think if it was worth the journey to lose all the men he brought. As he gazes at the ring, a voice inside him tells him that he has the power to unite people together to stand against a powerful enemy. He then decides to keep the ring and to not return to the Crystal Palace, but to journey off to another continent to understand what the ring means and what power it holds.
My idea of how Mazus the Black Knight looks.
Author's Note:
I chose to tell the story in third person and in present tense. I like the medieval period and I enjoy writing about magic and other supernatural elements. The main goal from this story parallel to Homer's Odyssey was the journey in which the hero has to overcome certain obstacles and has to deal with the loss of those around him, leaving him alone. Homer's Odyssey is about Odysseus going on a journey and landing up on the Cyclops’ Island. After defeating the Cyclops, Odysseus and his men end up on Circe's Island where she transforms them into pigs. After Odysseus frees his men from Circe’s magic, he and his men go to the afterworld and he encounters the ghosts of people he knew. After they leave the Afterworld, he and his men go up against the Sirens, a multi-headed monster named Scylla, and a giant whirlpool called Charybdis. The story ends with Odysseus returning home. I changed the plot of the original by making the main character obtaining an artifact for someone else. The ending was changed with Mazus not returning home and instead setting off on another journey to another continent. I like the idea of having Circe bewitching Odysseus’ men, so I decided to keep that element in my story with the witch in the maze. Scylla is also present in my story as the Cerberus.
Odysseus is a very smart person and that helps him get out of dangerous spots but his arrogance leads him to losing comrades. This is a characteristic I keep with Mazus.
Information:
Book: Homer's Odyssey
Author: Homer (Translated by Tony Kline)
Year: Published in 2004
