In the middle of the basic wooden hut was a hatch. It wasn’t hard to figure out that the hyperloop was beneath it. As expected, Silver quickly walked up and waved her wand, causing the hyperloop to open. Looking inside the hatch was a circular hole, looking down it, it seemed like it would go straight to hell.

“Well, Villin, I recall you have been in one of these before, right? It is time for us to go.”

Hearing Silver’s words, Villin walked forward silently and jumped into what seemed to be a black abyss. After going down for a while the tunnel began turning in all sorts of direction, even though Villin felt like he was being thrown around like a ragdoll, there was no pain involved as he moved at an incredible spell underground.

It took a long time to get to the destination, it was only after twenty full minutes through the tunnel that he saw the end in sight.

Going straight down, Villin saw a gooey veil beneath him. He moved towards it at top speed and couldn’t help but close his eyes. The goo was an extremely thin veil, once he moved through it, he felt like he had slowed down a lot and fell down at a regular speed for the final two meters. He fell on his ass which was a bit painful, but he quickly got up to have a decent look at where he was.

Looking around, Villin found himself to be in a room most comparable to a hospital’s waiting room. There were newspapers on a table in the middle of the room and chairs all around it. The walls were extremely white and overall, the room was clean.

He found himself just in front of one of the chairs and Silver had landed directly to his right, seeing how she took a seat, he followed suit.

“This is the waiting room. If you need to go to The Academy you will have to come here first most of the time. One of the contracted here will come to ask you about the visit, see if you have been cleared to enter, and then activate one of the teleportation arrays. I should let you know not to cast any spells here. As soon as the wards detect something is off, the teleportation arrays will all self-destruct.

They didn’t have to wait for long as after just a few minutes, a contracted came through the room’s only exit, Villin noticed the contracted was a rather old woman, considered expendable by The Academy. Places like this that were easier to get to were probably often attacked.

“Please follow me, we are already aware of your situation.” the old lady said while holding an unfamiliar round device. It wasn’t hard to guess the item was probably meant to find any hidden magi that could’ve entered the facility with them.

For a few moments, Silver and Villin followed behind the contracted. It seemed that the entire building looked like a hospital with its white corridors and the doors that came at regular intervals.

After a couple of turns, they arrived at a hallway that seemed to be more special. The doors looked as if they were made from silver and cryptic symbols covered them. At the end of the hallway was a massive golden door, the golden door didn’t have any pictures on it. It was a simple flat door with no special characteristics other then its size and the material it was made of.

The contracted showed them all the way to the door before stepping to the side “Please, enter through the door at the same time.”

Doing as she said, Villin and Silver stood next to each other and pushed against the door at the same time. It was surprisingly light and they soon found themselves in yet another location.

‘Dark’

This was the first thought that entered Villin’s mind. The area they were in was extremely darkly lit. Looking around, he noticed there was a lit torch about twenty meters away from him. Next to him was a massive pillar that reached into the darkness above. Looking at the torch, it also seemed to be hanging on a pillar. Other than the pillars and the torch, there was absolutely nothing he could see. The darkness around seemed to be magically enforced.

Villin wanted to ask Silver where they were supposed to go but when he looked around, he couldn’t see her anywhere.

He hesitated for a good minute as he waited for someone to greet him, he had walked over to the torch and yet there was still nothing that could be heard.

Thinking of this, Villin found that other than the fire next to him, there truly was nothing. The silence was quite eery.

Since he still hadn’t been greeted, Villin pointed his wand upwards, ‘Illuminatus’

‘Illuminatus’

‘ILLUMINATUS!’

Nothing happened.

Villin knew the nodes inside of his web connected, but nothing changed, no light was emitted from the tip of his wand. After trying some derivatory versions, there was still nothing.

Somewhat confused, Villin tried to cast another spell.

‘Reverto’

A translucent shield appeared around the tip of Villin’s wand, further confusing him.

‘This is probably some sort of test. Illuminatus won’t work, yet Reverto did.’

Thinking for a bit, Villin tried casting ‘Fireball’, nothing happened. After some testing, Villin found out what spells did and didn’t work. Environmental spells such as ‘Vinea Tenura’ and ‘Syrtim Celer’ didn’t have an effect. Neither did ‘Vococito’, ‘Fireball’, or ‘Illuminatus’.

Yet, spells such as ‘Void Arrow’, ‘Icy Pike’, ‘Drowse’, and ‘Reverto’ activated without a problem. As for ‘Bombardo’, he didn’t dare test it in case he destroyed something and he was wrong about the testing.

WIthout knowing what exactly he was supposed to do, Villin took the necessary precautions. He cast ‘Reverto’ and ‘Obiectus Prohibere’. Even though the latter drained his magic power quite a bit, he wanted to make sure he was safe while figuring out what exactly was going on.

‘What do you think?’ Villin asked internally, addressed towards the Kitsune who was now also paying attention to his actions.

‘It does seem to be a test. You should be fine as long as you’re careful.’ came her response.

Even though it was the most basic response one could give, it still put Villin somewhat at ease. He did not like what was going on right now. He was in an unfamiliar, dark place, and couldn’t use his full strength.

After thinking for a moment, Villin grabbed the torch off of its holder and began walking forwards. Luckily, there was a pillar every twenty meters, this allowed him to make sure he was walking straight the entire time.

After walking for ten minutes, Villin stopped using ‘Obiectus Prohibere’ in order to save magic power.

When the ten minutes turned to an hour, Villin began feeling slightly fearful that he would somehow get lost and never get out of here.

He had barely finished the thought when no more pillars showed up. When Villin noticed this, he turned back, intending to try the other way, but even the pillars he had already passed seemed to be gone.

And so, he continued walking in his original direction. After three hours, he began worrying that the torch may run out of fuel and he would have to walk in the darkness.

It was also at this point that the light began flickering. The torch became a lot dimmer and he could barely see the ground one meter before him.

After this happened, Villin began growing suspicious. He halted for a moment and entered his mental space. Both himself and the Kitsune were looking for anything suggesting he might be in some sort of illusion. He knew the Kitsune could alter dreams and make them feel realistic, perhaps someone had done the same to him.

Yet, after looking for a while, they were certain, he was in no illusion.

For eight more hours, Villin walked in the endless darkness before sitting down. Over these hours, he felt that this wasn’t as bad as he had thought. He simply walked, and continued to walk, in the endless abyss. It was peaceful in a way.

Yet, he still got tired. When he knew it was time for him to sleep, he once more got afraid. He was afraid that he would wake up back in his cell. With a zombie-like Elinoire and without a Kitsune.

He was afraid that, perhaps, everything that happened since he got out wasn’t real. Maybe, he had been exposed to a Kitsune, and it had shown him all of this. The reason he couldn’t find he was in an illusion was that he was already too deep inside of it. Maybe, the mental techniques he had learned since escaping weren’t actually real and they couldn’t be used to find out you were in an illusion.

Despite these terrifying thoughts Villin still managed to fall asleep. After all, if he couldn’t sleep because of real-life nightmares, he would’ve died from exhaustion long ago.

When, six hours later, Villin woke up, he found himself in a familiar location. He was sitting against the wall, to his sides were stone statues that would only move when someone tried to escape. Looking to his left, he could see Elinoire, staring at the wall mindlessly.

‘No, no, NO!’ Villin entered his mental space, yet he found all he had defending his mind were walls. There were no ‘laws’, there was no Kitsune. What he felt now was despair, true despair.