Sidrick dodged a glass knife and struck it with a blade of ice. It barely scratched it, the porcelain arm lazily retreating as if to mock him. The book lay on the floor nearby, a little smokey from the traps it disarmed but otherwise fine. Layla lay far enough to not get in the way but close enough to make defending her easy.

The porcelain ghost attacked again, this time with three quick swipes. Sidrick was forced to step back to the edge of his makeshift safe zone. He had tried to kill the ghost with traps when he sensed it hanging in the corridor but nothing touched it.

He had been able to see the full body of what was attacking him at least, albeit briefly. A single porcelain golem accompanied by a little creature he didn’t recognize.

Sidrick held his spider blood orb close as he waited, charging it full of mana. He was getting used to the attacks. It was like he was being teased, played with.

Space shimmered next to him. His perception focused to a razor point. He saw the veil open for just a moment.

His orb moved, flooding the small space. The overcharged spider blood froze a blink later, then crunched down. The creature couldn’t even scream as its body was smashed into paste. Its silver blood oozed out from the ice coffin’s cracks.

The veil disappeared and the porcelain golem clattered to the ground.

Sidrick stared at the silver blood. After a moment, he lifted it up and stored it in a clean potion vial.

“Excellent. That will look gorgeous on my pages,” the book said.

Sidrick rolled his eyes. “I read stories about creatures with silver blood but they were wiped out before I was born. It’s a decent alchemical base.”

“Is that why they were wiped out?”

“Yes. It was the same story for almost every nonhuman,” Sidrick said.

“That sounds…”

Sidrick just shook his head as he picked up the book and stored it in his satchel. “It is what it is.”

Examining the porcelain golem yielded nothing of note. The glass knife just turned to dust the moment he tried to touch it. After meditating to replenish his mana, all he could do was pick Layla up and move on.

He passed through one more corridor before arriving at a massive circular room. Its walls opened to numerous other corridors. At its center, a staircase wound up to a hole in the ceiling.

The layer’s center.

Sidrick grinned. Finally.

He almost collapsed as an invisible mountain lifted from his shoulders. His perception spell told him the room was free of traps, free of the constant tiptoeing he’d been doing for what felt like years.

Sidrick set Layla and his satchel down to sit. He sprawled out and looked up at the ceiling, its tiles interlocking in a mesmerizing pattern.

I should just rush to the stairs.

Basking in the moment is a waste of time.

A pained laugh escaped Sidrick as a few tears rolled down his face. He was waiting for the next golem to appear, or a hidden rune to reveal itself. There had to be something. Peace was always a lie.

But the labyrinth let him be.

#

The second layer had a mind-blurring mist that made it difficult to form spell arrays or remember complex plans. It was fantastic mental training for novice mages, though a mentor needed to keep watch just in case. To a veteran, the mist was a mere annoyance, like someone flicking their head repeatedly.

To Hedwin, the mist was decoration. Vivi said it made him look sinister.

Troubling, he thought as he fired an ash lance through a centurion in red armor.

[Ruby Centurion - lvl 326 defeated. Bonus experience gained for defeating an enemy 20 levels above your own]

Hedwin tried to ignore the messages popping up in the corner of his vision. It was all meaningless. His world’s magic was an enchantment grafted to the deepest parts of the soul. They were born with it, sculpted by it, then released to slaughter hordes of monsters. Hunters, the useless, cowardly citizens called them.

[You have leveled up! Level 307!]

An increment of power entered Hedwin’s body, reinforcing his flesh, bone, and reservoir. He hated it, the power his magic awarded for bloodshed and combat. He had seen too many addicted to the feeling, throwing themselves at challenges they could never accomplish.

He was ashamed to have been one of them.

[The Labyrinth is watching]

[The Labyrinth is watching]

[The Labyrinth is watching]

[The Labyrinth…]

Hedwin sighed heavily. The messages were neverending. He already felt a headache coming on. Quantify told him when most anything was watching him through magic—by far the most valuable and miserable function of his curse. Someone was always watching. And he was always wondering who was too strong for him to notice. When he hit 300, three new names started popping up every day, their scrying a constant weight on his mind. Others below his level could detect them, but Quantify bound his potential to false limits. Who could the average scrying expert see that he couldn’t?

He picked up an enchanted mace the centurion had been holding in one of its six arms.

“Anyone want these?” he asked, gesturing to the other five weapons on the ground.

“Go ahead,” Jonah said with a shrug.

“Sure…” Vivi said, furrowing her brow. “But why?”

“For the students,” Hedwin said. “Enchantments are hardly cheap.”

Vivi raised a brow at that but just shrugged. She levitated the weapons toward him on barrier constructs. Hedwin stored them all away in his ring, all six taking up just a small increment of space.

[Storage capacity: 110/200]

Meaningless numbers, Hedwin thought as he rolled his eyes and continued down the corridor. He could put 50 items in a crate and store them at the cost of one unit.

In the next corridor, he saw three of the invisible Fae—Fae Assassins, Quantify called them. Their names and levels were displayed over them, giving away their positions.

“Three assassins ahead,” Hedwin said as he swept ash toward them. Their cloaks flickered before they slipped away. The Fae were afraid of taking any risk.

Another Ruby Centurion entered the corridor, puppeted by a Fae far, far away. The centurion faced them with unwavering resolve, its six arms each holding enchanted weapons. Jonah appeared next to it, a blur as her armored fist blew a hole in the centurion’s chest. It swiped at her with a mace, its speed and power enough to pulp any veteran mage.

Jonah dodged the mace and delivered three quick jabs to its arms. They shattered into stone shrapnel.

Vivi raised a barrier to protect them, the shrapnel harmlessly bouncing off. It was unnecessary and she knew it.

She sighed. “I have nothing to do.”

“That’s for the best,” Hedwin said, watching Jonah’s wind spell blow half the centurion to bits.

Jomah sighed as the centurion fell. She dusted off the small bits of rock on her armor and threw the enchanted weapons Hedwin’s way.

“You seem bored,” Vivi commented to Jonah.

She shrugged. “I know we can’t go fast with the Fae around. I just wish they’d throw something more fun at us. Right now, I need to use my fists just to feel something. Anything.” Jonah looked at Hedwin. “I know, caution and control.”

“They’re Fae. Kill away,” Hedwin simply said.

That gave Jonah some pause. She wanted to ask for the full story, Hedwin knew. The small details he’d given over the years were not enough. In the end, she always moved on. Travellers always had stories to tell, few of them good. It was often better to let things lie.

They rounded the corner and entered a massive dome with a staircase at the center.

Hedwin narrowed his eyes. “No assassins.”

“Vivi, prep healing and put up a barrier,” Jonah said, a slight breeze picking up around them. “We’ll head to the middle slowly. If this isn’t a trap, I’ll eat my—“

A giant steel golem appeared from thin air.

[Fae Colossus - lvl 429]

Vivi raised layer upon layer of barriers as the colossus’ fist came crashing down. Its fist moved faster than its size should’ve allowed, impacting striking before Vivi could finish all her layers. The layers caved in, stretching like rubber to slow the steel fist’s descent.

Hedwin covered himself in bulky ashen armor, a halo of ashen horns slowly circling his head. His eyes blazed orange as embers swirled around him, fiery runes carving into his armor. A dozen ash limbs stretched from his back, poised for combat.

Jonah whistled. Vivi was too focused on maintaining the barriers to notice.

Hedwin condensed his ash limbs into two massive hands.

“I hold it, you kill it,” he said to Jonah. One of his hands intercepted the golem’s steel fist, slowly pushing it back from Vivi’s barrier. The healer released a breath, sweat rolling down her face as she willed the barrier to assist the ashen hand. Next to them, Jonah charged a white flame between her hands.

The colossus struck down with its other fist. A loud bang ripped across the room as the second ashen hand caught the punch. The colossus creaked as its two arms were pushed back, the metal’s groaning almost like a scream.

Jonah gathered the white flame over her right hand, its glow a hazy purple and orange. Runes on her armor flashed red before she appeared over the colossus. The flames around her fist intensified, illuminating the dark room in the colors of a sunrise.

The colossus tried to pull free, its ability to teleport locked as long as Hedwin was holding it.

Jonah chopped down. She ripped through the colossus like wet paper, its metal turning to liquid wherever she passed. She cracked the tile floor where she landed. Molten metal dripped off her armor as she stood and straightened.

The two halves of the colossus crashed to the ground behind her.

“Finally. That felt decent,” Jonah said, sweeping the area with a refreshing breeze. The molten metal cooled around her.

Hedwin couldn’t help but glance at her level. The numbers were lies, he knew, more or less a shoddy kill counter rather than an indication of power. A level 57 mage had nearly killed him once, the man a scholar that had rarely left his library. Hedwin had begun to treat levels as stories after that.

[The Northern Dawn - lvl 776]

Jonah had a story he didn’t want to know.

“Why don’t you wear this more often?” Vivi asked with a smirk, tapping Hedwin’s shoulder. “You look like an evil emperor.”

Hedwin groaned and quickly dissolved his armor, Vivi giggling next to him.

#

House Caelum was an old family. They were not among the Grand Houses but respected all the same. Their family was kept small, allowing them to invest generous resources into each member’s talents and education. They built their power where nobody looked and made enough connections to evade scrutiny.

But subtlety mattered little when the world was being subsumed. They carved a path to the labyrinth, half their members falling. Then more as they descended. A mere fraction of their House remained when they opened a gateway to the ethereal. Now, Layla doubted anybody but Sidrick and herself had survived.

Under her leadership, House Caelum had fallen.

Layla sat in the halls of her House’s legacy. Shelves of books, scrolls, and magical items stretched into the endless darkness. The family library was an ethereal construct, one of their ancestor’s final creations. It was a pocket dimension of sorts, a “room” inside the current family head’s mind.

Layla had never spent much time inside it. She was no scholar, after all. That was more her little brother's thing. He was a better fit for the family head, though their mother never saw it that way. To her, strength mattered more in Yenoriha’s last days than wit.

Layla sighed. She knew it wasn’t her fault. She had done all she could, fought harder than she ever had. It still hurts.

At least she had bound the Anchor to Sidrick. Her little brother would not die because of her weakness.

Layla shook her head as she picked a random book off the shelf. It was the diary of a water and lightning mage. Useless to her.

“You limit yourself,” Norell Caelum, forger of the library said. He was a gentle looking young man, his black hair short and his eyes Caelum blue. He wore large wire-frame glasses and plain mage robes. The portraits of him in the family manor were of an old dignified fellow. In those, he looked like the type to scold you for running in the halls.

The years as a spirit here had changed him for the better, Layla thought.

“Read it. I picked it for you,” Norell said, his voice smooth and patient. “You must expand your horizons, begin to look beyond your affinities and martial arts.”

“I don’t care about the philosophy nonsense. It takes too long to learn. I punch shit, it dies. Sidrick is more the type for this,” Layla said. “What I need is to focus on what I’m already good at.”

Norell shook his head as he picked a book from the shelf. “I have mentored every family head after me. It has been my greatest joy. Your mother was an especially excellent judge of character, though her methods could have been less convoluted…” He sighed as he toyed with the book in his hands, smiling. “Trust me, young lady. You are far more worthy to be the family head than you realize. You’re already stronger than many of them were, at least.”

“Not strong enough to win against a little blue scorpion,” she muttered.

“Heavensent scorpions have killed much stronger than even your mother. Besides,” he smiled, “you aren’t dead yet. You simply lack wisdom.”

Layla didn’t respond to that.

Norell held out his book. Layla sighed and took it, flipping open the first page to humor her ancestor.

“Menastel’s guide to elementary magic,” Layla read out loud, giving Norell an annoyed look. She shook her head and flipped to a random page. Her eyes narrowed. “…That is not elementary.”

“To you, perhaps,” Norell said, chuckling.

“Mana currents? What…?” Layla murmured.

“A world defines its magic as well as its people,” Norell said. “Yenoriha’s Definition did not contain mana currents, just as another world may not contain runes or enchantments. Only a world traveller can hope to scratch past the surface of the ethereal, Layla. You and Sidrick will be the first of our family to take that step. Our roots in Yenoriha held us back. But now?

“Your mother believed that you would be happy to carry our name across new lands. Wonders untold, creatures the like we could never imagine... Very cliche, I suppose. Though a decent adventure, is it not?”

Layla looked up from the book, a little light in her eyes.

#

Deep within the labyrinth, a small creature slept on a red leaf. It was barely a foot tall, its butterfly-like wings wrapped over its body like a blanket. Its ears were long and sharp, its smooth black horns curved upwards.

A larger creature appeared from a cut in space, peeling it back like fabric as it stepped out. It was twice as tall as the sleeping one, though it had no horns and its wings were closer to a bat's. It shakily dropped to a knee and lowered its head.

The sleeping creature cracked open its eyes, two globes of yellow light.

“Speak,” it whispered, the words drifting into the kneeling creature like an enchanting melody.

“My lord,” the large creature said, “the cursed one has been stolen.”

“Interesting,” it replied, a grin revealing its sharp, translucent teeth.