A coule thing:

Have you been doing thos WS on mobs that directly gave you experience points--ie, not campaign mobs and such. they need to /check EP to IT to work.

If you've been fighting the prober targets, and the latent efffects (the elemental resist bouns and extra HP) have not gone away yet--refresh your gear by changing armor of un equipping the knuckles. If the bonus is no longer given they are broken.

Go back to the NPC and trade the knuckles. You should get one of two responses, one leading to abandoning the trial, the other where you get the Map to the Annals of Truth.