— Aster —

I awoke lost in the dream, not knowing who or where I was. That was until I felt steel across my wrists and ankles. For a moment, I thought I was still in the dream. The fog cleared from my mind as I realized I was awake. I was chained to the bed I had fallen asleep in.

“Must have been a fun night.” Laughing at my own joke, I noticed a solid steel cage around me. “How did they set all this up without waking me?” The cage itself was covered in hundreds of different types of padlocks, fixtures, and bolts. There was so much metal, the air reeked of it. The only other thing in the room was a set of tools; just outside of my reach.

I was strangely calm about the entire situation; the dream of releasing everything was still fresh, helping. I took a deep breath, focusing on my means of escape. This must be a test. “Ok, what do I know?” I’m strapped to a bed, with what looks to be basic handcuffs? I lay there staring over the cuffs. I came up with two ideas. One, break my thumb and slide out, or two, attempt to unlock with mana. I think they want me to unlock these, not just escape. “Option 2 it is.”

Laying back down, I closed my eyes and focused. It is an odd sensation feeling with mana, like another sense you suddenly have, and now that you have it, you can’t imagine life before it. I let the power flow into the cuffs. I could feel the mana against the catch, but when pushing the energy against the catch it would part like water flowing around. My next attempt found me concentrating on solidifying the mana I sent, but kept finding it would only hold for a little longer each time. It was only after concentrating for ten minutes did it become solid enough to push. The shackle on my right wrist fell to the bed. I felt drained, but ecstatic. It may have been simple but that was the first time I had done something truly magical.

With my right-hand free, I was able to reach the pack of picks. “??” I was finally able to move, and everything felt wrong. My body felt big and bulky, as though I was in the wrong body. My hands felt stupid when I attempted to reach for the bundle, not able to judge the distance properly or apply the correct force without hurting myself. It took a few tries before I was even able to grab a pick from the pack. Using the pick didn't make it any easier to open the cuffs, at least not with the condition I was in. Eventually, I heard the telltale click. Finally! Did they drug me or something?

I knew that following that thought would lead to nothing. First things first, I sat up. “FUCK!” I slammed my head into something. I looked up, finding nothing. I felt with my hand looking for something. I felt something smooth, and metallic. An invisible box surrounded me. I felt my eyes swell, and the world became sharper. It was like putting on glasses for the first time. You don’t realize how much detail the world had. As my eyes adjusted, the box around me slowly became visible. It showed as a shimmer, like glass slightly opaque, and easy to see through.

Once I could see the box, I easily found the latch holding the thing closed. The lock itself was a construct created from whatever this invisible stuff was. Feeling my hands over it, it felt solid, metallic, and heavy. Pushing my energy through it, I was happy to find a simple, single tumbler lock.

My body moved on its own, popping the lock before I realized what I was doing. The lock fell, and the box stayed up. I pushed, punched, and kicked trying to get free. The box didn’t budge at all. “Must be another lock.”

I examined every inch of my cell, only to find five other locks. One sitting in each top corner with one in the top center. I moved to free myself, and while working that feeling of wrongness came in waves. When the feeling came, I couldn’t do anything well until it passed. Eventually, I was able to pop the four corners latches. With only the center remaining I went to examine it, but my hand passed right through it.

“A Ghost lock?”Concentrating, I allowed the energy to seep out of my hands focusing on not letting it go beyond the surface of my skin. The energy, built and built until I could feel it like a glove covering my hand. I grabbed a pick I believe would work for this lock. The mana surrounding my hand flowed effortlessly over the tool like it was waiting for it. I was excited, my idea actually worked. I got to work on the final padlock, with little effort it popped right open. With all the locks gone, the box faded into nothing.

Getting off the bed I began to stumble as the wrongness returned. I felt like I was learning to walk again. It was the strangest feeling, I never knew how much I took walking for granted before trying with whatever this was.

“Well, let’s do this.” I psyched myself up to open all the hundreds of padlocks, latches, fasteners, and...deadbolts? surrounding the cage. I was about fifty locks in when the strange feeling stopped.

Knowledge flowed through my mind with every item opened. When I would come across a lock I couldn’t open, the information would slowly come to me as though it was always there.

It took twelve hours to open all, but one lock. I was so tired, my energy was running low, and my eyes felt heavy. The last padlock was giving me no end of trouble. It appeared to be a simple lock, but one glance with my tired eyes told a different story. There was something...moving on it, like spiders skittering across its surface. Every time I started, one of the spiders would cross my hand or over the pick shocking me. “Oh Blight, not again.”

I attempted to insulate myself in mana, but in this case, it acted like a conductor shocking me even harder. Tossing that idea aside, I focused on timing my movements to avoid the spiders. That lasted all of three seconds, there were just too many of the little spider constructs.

“This is gonna suck.” I realized there was no way to not get electrocuted. Working through the shocks, I had to struggle to keep my muscles from locking up. Somehow, I worked through the pain and moved the tumblers into place. As the last tumbler fell into place, the spiders disappeared. I did it! Why isn't it opening? A bolt of lightning struck me from the lock.

After that...I went a little crazy. I tried to break it. I hit it with the other locks, I hit it with the end table, I even tried to throw the bed at it, but I couldn’t lift the bed. It was when I tried to lift the bed, I realized how crazy I was being.

Calmly, I looked into the lock. “BLIGHTED FUCKER!” There was a literal button on the inside of the lock. I poked it with a straight pick causing the lock to pop open.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!”

The lock screamed, causing me to throw it as hard as I could against the wall. My panic throw created a divot in the stone wall.

The door to the room opened. The lock was still screaming as Jane stepped in. “Congratulations! You have officially learned lock picking.” Jane picked up the screaming lock. She closed it causing the world to quiet. “This is called a thieves lock. It is the most annoying lock there is. They are rare though.”

Frustrated and tired, I only had one question. “Why is it so loud?”

“That’s a feature of the thieves lock. It yells when it has been opened without the correct key. It also has the feature of being different every time one is made. So each one will be disarmed differently. But there is a telltale sign of these...things, the moving energy around it. Personally, I suggest finding a key, rather than picking them, but if you can’t be ready to run.”

Tired and Exhausted I fell back onto the bed. “So...Have I mastered lock picking?”

“Yes and no. This is just the beginning since most of this skill will leave you. You’ll need to train to get back to this level.”

“Leave me??”

“Yes. Skills can’t be fully learned overnight. This knowledge will stay with you, but it will fade. Until it stabilizes under your own understanding.”

I didn’t have the mental capacity to fully comprehend what she was saying. “So what’s next?”

“That’s for tomorrow. Now get some sleep.”

I only needed to be told once. I fell unconscious as soon as she left.