God of War: Daughter of War

With the arms and hands of the statue back in position, fully attached for the first time in who knew how long, Kratos and Flurry climbed up the metallic block that served as a stepping stone to reach the upper level, only to find that the way out involved sliding down a long metallic path that was surrounded by flames and molten material.

"You know, this might be a good area for me to glide down." Flurry commented, as the path was angled in such a way that she was sure she could simply open her wings and let the currents carry her, sort of like what she did back when she and Kratos were leaving the Oracle's temple earlier.

"It is dangerous, but so is sitting on my chest while I make my descent." Kratos said, because no matter how he thought about tackling this he knew that it was better than having her sit on his chest, since his back would be to the metallic floor most of the time and she would be in his view, so by having her use her wings he'd be able to keep an eye on her without having her taking up what he was seeing, "Let me help you up."

Flurry was glad that he was agreeing to even allow her to do this, since she agreed that it was dangerous, to which she let him pick her up and position her so she could open her wings, slowly since she didn't want to clip him in the face with her left wing, but Kratos stayed still and allowed her to prepare herself accordingly. Once she was ready to go she jumped off of his hand and let her wings catch the air, where she started to glide down the passage in front of her and found that Kratos did the same, stabbing the flooring with a blade like he had done a few times before this point. Flurry discovered that there were a few moving cauldrons that seemed to be damaging parts of the path, or Archimedes hadn't planned for such a thing when he built the statue, and sections that seemed to be pouring molten material, but they were obstacles that Kratos was able to avoid. So was she as she soon discovered, as she was able to move herself ever so slightly and get out of the way of everything that happened to be getting in their way, before spotting a pipe that looked like the one they had used to get out of Archimedes' resting place earlier.

She wasn't the only one that spotted it as Kratos positioned himself accordingly and leapt into it when he reached the end of the path, forcing her to pull herself up and pull in her wings to avoid being hurt, where they descended into the furnace they had activated earlier.

As they stepped out into the open area Flurry paused for a moment, because they had encountered enough enemies for her to be convinced that any wide open area like this was an area that enemies would attack them in, but nothing came at them and it allowed Kratos to move over to the moveable gear. When he turned it, however, Flurry watched as the larger gear moved into position and heard a chain moving, the very one that had been restored when the arms were fixed not even a few minutes ago, meaning the Lantern was being pulled into position. While that happened the floor moved as the large gear was locked into place, pushing them higher into the air and forming a new platform, with a fiery center that was different than before, and when the hounds started to ambush them Kratos informed her that the key was to sacrifice a few enemies to the flames. She guessed it was something that one or more of the gods desired in their puzzles, and was utilized in the designs of those who created all of the most important temples, such as the infamous Pandora's Temple, the resting place of Pandora's Box, a place he deemed to be nothing more than a myth.

A few seconds later Kratos confirmed that it was as he suspected as he punted one of the hounds into the flames, which pushed them higher than before, meaning he would have to repeatedly do the same thing until it reached the highest point it was supposed to reach, even though the monster changed each time. They discovered that the second wave was made up of satyr, so Flurry aided him in using her arrows to distract a few of them while Kratos weakened his chosen foe, a fact that was followed by him picking up the monster and hurling it into the flames when the time was right, moving the platform up to another level to confirm their suspicions. Flurry also found that when one stage of the trial was completed all of the monsters of that category, like the hounds or satyrs, perished all of a sudden, as if they were linked to each other in some manner, but since Kratos wasn't paying too much attention to is she guessed she should focus on the battle and worry about this later. The other stages were just a mix of hounds and satyrs, instead of other monsters Kratos had faced since he started his journey, but Flurry wasn't going to complain as the sections between the four corners of the platform pulled apart and they came to a stop in the upper level they had been moving towards.

Flurry also discovered a latch for Kratos to link one of his blades to and a metallic gear to spin, so he used the oath stone after locking the former into position, leaving his copy to keep a plate door open as he turned the gear for a time, which caused a purple beam of energy to shoot through the pipe and no doubt pierced the sky far above the statue.

"Oh, that's not good for us." Flurry commented, because the beam was a dead giveaway that they were in the statue and she suspected that the Furies would see it in no time, though before Kratos could say anything to her remark they found that the floor moved once more as her guardian's copy quickly disappeared.

It appeared that they were required to take care of more enemies to reach the highest point possible, the true highest point as Flurry thought about it, and one of the enemies they had to deal with were the statues, so while Kratos distracted it for a time, forcing it to miss multiple times, Flurry got around it and used her sickles to take it down. They also discovered that a few satyrs and a couple of hounds had joined the battle as well, something that prompted Kratos to resume sacrificing them into the central flame to resume moving the platform they were fighting on, all while Flurry kept herself safe and attacked only when necessary. She did deal with the odd statue or two that showed up to fight them, allowing her guardian to deal with all of the other monsters that happened to be in the area, before they reached what seemed to be the highest point in the entirety of the statue's chest, since the ceiling was close to their position. There was another portion of the pipe right in front of them, so once the last enemy was taken care of the way opened and they climbed inside it without delay, only to find that there was a lift with a crystal set in the center of it, which took them up to the ruined head of Apollo's statue and let them gaze out over all of Delos.

As they stepped off the lift, however, the pair noticed that the Lantern was being moved into position, high above the water to be exact, meaning Archimedes' statue was fulfilling part of it's strange purpose, where Kratos stood at the edge of a once pristine walkway and readied the amulet.

"Strange... where is Charybdis?" Flurry asked, because from what she could see of the water around the island it didn't look like the monster that served the Furies was even here right now, rather it was either asleep or it was aiding it's masters in their search for Orkos, though this worried her more than she thought it would.

"I do not know, nor do we have the time to waste worrying about it." Kratos stated, as while he shared Flurry's worry about the monster, for it was odd for it to leave the Lantern exposed like this, he knew that they had a limited amount of time left before the Furies showed up, hence why he raised the amulet and let it's power wash over the entire area.

Flurry watched as the path in front of them started to reform as the rubble far below them started to shift, time flowing backwards as Apollo's head reformed and lifted into the air, where all of the damage reversed before their eyes while it fit in above them, forming a new puzzle for them to complete as the rest of the stone fit into place. She also discovered that the beam from before had been redirected to fire through the statue's eyes, though since it seemed to be a single beam, instead of two for two eyes, they had to find a way to split the purple beam into two separate entities. Kratos agreed with her idea, especially since there was a large crystal nearby that seemed designed for that exact purpose, where he climbed on top of it for a moment and pushed off a stepping stone they needed to use later, all while Flurry glanced around the rest of the head chamber as she tried to piece everything together in her head. With the removal of the stepping stone the crystal was raised into the air and stopped just above where the eyes were located, meaning they had to figure out a way to lower the crystal back into position, do the same to the beam's main crystal, and stabilize everything to ensure both beams pierced the eyes that had been installed inside the statue's head.

She also expected enemies to show up and found that they didn't, meaning the Furies likely had no idea that someone in this world was capable of reaching this point in fixing the statue, though she did discover something interesting, which was the fact that the contraption that raised and lowered the main beam was unlocked. Such a thing meant that Kratos could move it if he so desired, since it was linked to a gear he could rotate, before he found a chain that pulled out part of a wall, revealing that it was a metal clasp that would hold something in place, leading them to realize what needed to be done with it. Kratos had to climb a ladder on the opposite side of the chamber and reach what appeared to be a belt that could move something from one side to another, dropping it right on top of the crystal, so he placed his copy at the start of it and returned to the chain that Flurry was standing by, allowing him to move the clasp into position. With that done the pair watched as his copy landed on top of the crystal's container and pushed it down into place, which was followed by it splitting the beam in half and let them pierce both of the statue's eyes, firing them into the Lantern like Archimedes had designed them to do when he first built the statue.

As that happened another ladder moved down into place and Kratos walked over to it, allowing Flurry to climb back onto his back before he started to make his way towards the peak, which had to be the top of Apollo's helmet, based on what they had seen so far, and it took them a few minutes to reach the highest point possible.

Once they no longer needed to climb up the ladder Flurry got off of Kratos' back and touched down on the metallic face of the helmet, which was harder to walk on as she soon discovered, but that was insignificant in comparison to what she and her guardian found out in the next few seconds. There was no path down to the Lantern, rather they were too far above it and she was sure that if Kratos tried to jump down to it he would no doubt miss and crush himself on the islands below, a fact that told her of Archimedes' failure to come up with a safe way down to the final structure. This was one of the times Flurry wished she was fully grown and had the strength to do some of the things that Kratos could do, since it would allow her to carry the fierce warrior like he did for her at times, but Kratos didn't seem to mind that fact as he found his ride to the Lantern. She spotted it a few seconds later, a winged creature that her guardian identified as a manticore, as it had the face of a lion, the jaw of a shark, the leathery wings of a dragon, humanoid arms and torso, and a scorpion tail with plates on it's back, a powerful foe he told her, and judging by how it was flying he was sure he could use it to get to the Lantern in a matter of seconds.

As Flurry considered how insane the plan was, since it sounded far too dangerous despite the fact that they were running out of time, Kratos rushed towards the edge of the helmet and launched himself into the air, where he flew down into the manticore's side and knocked it out of the air, pushing it around so he could safely land inside the Lantern's interior, all while severing one of it's wings in the process. She wasted no time in following after him to the best of her ability, gliding down to where he wanted to land, giving her a good view as Kratos and the beast hit part of the top of the structure and tumbled into the interior, forcing her to follow after them as she got a good view of the inside. The Lantern's interior was well designed, no doubt Archimedes' masterpiece, there was a central cage that held something important, likely the Eyes of Truth, she found a door to their left that had guardian statues that looked like they might stop the door from opening if they tried to do so, and there was a glowing magical door on the opposite side. As Kratos dealt with the manticore, since it's presence caused the interior's barrier defenses to activate and meant it's death would open the way forward, Flurry just stood off on the side as she stared at the opposite side, finding that she could see through the magic, meaning it had to be an illusion made by Tisiphone.

In the end Kratos killed the weakened manticore like it was nothing, forcing it onto it's back before removing the head of it's tail and used it to sever the beast's head, allowing it to roll away as the grated barrier descended into the floor so they could walk up to the container that held the Eyes of Truth.

"Make haste, Spartan, for my Mother's have realized that you're close to the Eyes of Truth, which they ruthlessly pulled from my dear Aletheia's head." a voice said, where they found that Orkos reappeared for a time, meaning he must have doubled back to the statue when he realized that it was only a matter of time until they claimed their prize, or this was a projection that allowed him to chat with them from afar, "I will do everything in my power to stall them, but they'll be here before you know it."

Kratos nodded as he stepped forward to investigate the area that was around them, taking just a moment to confirm that the door facing Apollo's statue couldn't be opened very much, in fact they could barely crack it open since the figures on each side kept it in place. With that in mind he made his way over to a lever that allowed him to rotate the rings of the odd container that the Eyes were resting in, creating a lens for the power of the Eyes to be focused through, allowing Flurry to see that it messed with the dark magic of the door she had been staring at. In that instant she had a vision of the other side of the portal that was in front of them, for that was what the magical door actually was, revealing an area that was a near identical copy of the one they were standing in, save for all of the moon designs, so if their side was Apollo's that told her that the other side was Artemis'. It only made sense to her, that both of the twin gods would be represented in some sort of trial to claim the Eyes, and as the vision ended she witnessed the figures on Artemis' side loosing their grasp on the door facing her own statue, or at least she assumed there was a statue, informing her that they would have to make their way to Artemis' side.

When she shared her information with Kratos, however, he nodded and used the oath stone to keep the gateway open so they could head through it, which they did so without delay and stepped into what appeared to be a shadowy realm that was a mirror image of their world, all while the gateway behind them was sealed with the same magic that had been on Apollo's side. After that Kratos walked over and opened the moon door, fully this time since it wasn't being held back by the figures on either side of it, where Flurry found that her guess was right, there was a statue resting where Apollo's was in their reality, as in this one it was a female wearing a robe and some sort of helm, though her robe was open in the front, revealing Artemis' stomach and breasts. Opening the door in this realm did the same as the previous one, it powered the crystal above the cage and opened it so they could get at the other set of Eyes of Truth, a false set designed for whatever trials Archimedes had created to make sure the real set were secure, and Kratos claimed it without delay. Doing so caused the platform they were on to shimmer as Kratos and Flurry watched as the cage disappeared, before it descended down into the depths of the Lantern, locking itself into place with an illusion that seemed to have been made by the Furies when they influenced Archimedes' projects.

They then discovered that Kratos could utilize the power of the False Eyes to undo the magic of the Furies, just like the real pair was supposed to do, so the lock broke apart in seconds and opened the way for him to force everything into motion with his blades, all while Flurry kept her eyes open for incoming monsters. The platform did move up the passage, just like they assumed it would, and when it came to a stop a few moments later a few pillars emerged from part of the floor and revealed that they spewed fire into a section of the area to stop them from heading over there, and this time their foes were the gorgons, two of them anyway. This time, despite the danger that they posed, Flurry pulled out her sickles as she leapt onto one of the creatures and did her best to deal some damage to it's tail, a distraction so Kratos could fight his foe and take it's head in a matter of seconds before doing the same to her target. In addition to the gorgons a couple of sibyl sirens joined the fight, where Kratos used the lightning power he had been blessed with to stun his foes before cutting all of them down, though such a thing required Flurry to get out of the area so she wasn't accidentally hurt, since some of his attacks covered a large area.

When the coast was clear, and both were sure of that fact when no more monsters showed up, Kratos used the False Eyes to undo the illusion lock again and let the platform move up to the next stage of Archimedes' trials for the Eyes of Truth, where this time they were forced to fight in a narrow corridor, thanks to the sections of the ground rising around them to form a narrow path, and their foes were Amazons. Flurry thought it made sense, Artemis was Apollo's sister and she felt that some of her followers would have been here regardless, be it due to the corruption of the Furies or not, though that didn't stop Kratos from impaling them with their own spears and planting all of them in the ground. Harpies also flew in to join the battle, where Flurry proved herself to be useful as she used her arrows to knock each one out of the air, opening the way for her guardian to take care of them when he had the time to do so, often tossing her arrows back to her so she didn't have to expose herself to their enemies. Even a statue showed up to join the fight, where Flurry was having none of that as she used her sickles and stabbed it in the back like she had done to every single one she had been able to fight, at least since landing on the island, allowing Kratos to deal with everything else without having to worry about a tough foe at a time like this.

With that done it was a simple matter of using the Fake Eyes to undo a magical lock and releasing the gear that would let the platform rise up towards the next level, and when it stopped Flurry found themselves boxed in with a centaur, the one foe she couldn't even begin to help Kratos with, causing him to beckon for her to get to safety as he fought the creature in the center of the altered arena. The centaur put up quite a fight, which was to be expected of such a being, but Kratos put it down and gutted it like he had done to the others, causing some odd floating skeletal beings to appear around them, a new type of foe that Kratos called wraiths, who had curved blades for hands and horned helmets. Flurry found that these foes were able to phase through the ground and attack however they wanted, where Kratos was able to use his blades on them while they were underground, yanking them back to his level so he could smash their faces in with their own blades or even sever their heads before they could react. His skills allowed him to clear out all of his foes with ease, allowing him to return to the illusion lock and undo it with the False Eyes, where Flurry watched as they returned to the area that all of the gears were resting in, allowing the illusory container to return to the middle of the platform.

For a moment nothing happened, no new traps and no new enemies, causing Flurry to wonder what either of them might have missed since the platform sunk and forced them to fight those waves of creatures, before she glanced at the area for a few seconds and realized the next step.

"Kratos, I think we have to close the door for a moment, to restore the container's lever," Flurry stated, because she knew that Apollo's version of the Lantern had a crystal above the area that the Eyes were resting in and Artemis' version had the same thing, meaning they likely had to undo a lock of sorts in this realm to retrieve their true prize.

"Yes, I see it as well. Smart thinking." Kratos said, where he rushed over to the door facing Artemis' statue before using his blades to grab onto the sides of the door, forcing them shut so the rest of the container could reappear, along with the lever they needed to use, causing him to quickly move over to it and use the False Eyes to undo the barrier that Tisiphone had placed on it a long time ago.

Flurry watched as he quickly moved the lever into position, just like he did in Apollo's realm, and used the oath stone to lock it in place with a shadow copy, before he beckoned for Flurry to follow him as they returned to their world, causing the False Eyes to disappear once they were on the other side. She knew what that meant, the False Eyes had returned to their rightful place in Artemis' realm and were now powering the systems in this realm, as she found that the gears that were in the floor started to move while the runes above them started to glow, just like what happened when she saw the vision of what happened in the other realm. As she expected the figures on either side of Apollo's door let go of the door, thus allowing it to be opened all the way, though as they walked forward several of the gears moved into position and also started to move the platform down into position, meaning they were close to their true prize. At the same time she found an odd mechanism resting nearby, a strange cube with a circular surface that seemed to be connected to the sun and the moon, based on Kratos' remarks on the designs, causing her to shrug as she added it to her pouch as Kratos approached Apollo's door.

She stood by him for a moment as he opened the door, allowing the light of Apollo's statue to open the prison that held the Eyes of Truth, though as they turned to face it, however, they found all three Furies standing around the Eyes, where Megaera was standing over a chained Orkos, arms bound in black goo, while Tisiphone and Alecto waited near the Eyes with smiles on their faces.

"All this effort, for such a powerful relic, and still you fail?" Alecto mockingly remarked, where she held the Eyes in her left hand for a moment, just to show them that she and her sisters had stolen the artifact as soon as the cage was opened, a fact that caused Kratos to growl as Flurry frowned, "Your quest is over!"

In the following moment, just as Kratos and Flurry started to move, Alecto used her black goo on them, pinning them to the floor, though it only lasted for a few seconds as they utilized the oath stone to get out of it, something Tisiphone was expecting as her companion snatched it in it's beak as it flew by. Flurry rushed at the illusion Fury as Kratos rushed to deal with Alecto, because with her sight, allowing her to apparently see through her powers, it made sense for her to take care of her, though she was unable to do so as Megaera lashed out with her spider legs, forcing her to raise her sickles to keep herself safe. Of course, since she had no real experience in combat training, the Fury was able to knock her weapons out of her hands with ease and struck her in the back, knocking her to the floor as Alecto bound both of them with ease, as if she was a coward who disliked fighting her opponents. Flurry found that the Furies spared no expense in binding her with goo, as she had far more than Kratos did, almost as if the sisters were more terrified of her than they were of the one who did most of the fighting, and they even bound her mouth, to prevent her from talking.

All Flurry could do was watch as the Furies picked her, Kratos, and Orkos up and departed from the Lantern that she and Kratos had worked so hard to get into since their arrival on the island, causing her to wonder what sort of foul plans the Furies had in store for all three of them.