“Ugh,” Eli groaned. His body throbbing with various pains, he winced at the ache on the left side of his face, which had probably taken a good hit against the ground when he passed out.

Lifting his head up, he shifted around at the uncomfortable hard surface under him and glanced around in confusion. The golems and arena were gone, and the same white tiles were back. At least their strange warmth had kept him from getting cold, even if they didn’t make for the best bed.

His HUD confirmed that he’d been out for almost a half-hour, which would have given his body a little time to heal. Carefully, his joints and muscles protesting, he brought a hand up to his head and neck to feel for any cuts, but the lack of blood on the tiles made him somewhat hopeful that he hadn’t seriously hurt himself this time. Figuring his face had partially broken his fall, he felt around with his tongue but didn’t find any cuts or loose teeth. His head was throbbing with all the other aches and pains shooting throughout his body, but at least he’d survived the fight.

Shifting around and getting an elbow under him, he levered himself up and confirmed that the same shrouded darkness was surrounding him again, only a few meters away within his circular prison of off-white tiles. He carefully started rolling over, hissing in pain as the side where the one golem had punched him flared up with hot, burning waves at the movement. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he finally relaxed when he felt the tiles warming his aching back.

Looking up into the “sky” of shrouded darkness, he frowned at the new object partially blocking his view. A new display had appeared, its surface tilted and oriented toward him for easy reading. “Shit, what now?” he groaned, his pounding head only emphasizing his crappy feeling.

Sitting up and wincing at the shooting pain in his side, he read through the message a few times, but continued reviews didn’t bring a lot of clarity. He’d known about the three challenges and the difficulty, but the meaning of the results was new. The word “Initiate” was mentioned twice, but the use here wasn’t exactly straightforward and left him wondering whether he’d performed well. It wasn’t like there was any scoring key available, though he thought survival was a victory all on its own. Also, what was with the two choices?

“Crap on a crutch, ‘Accept your fate’ could mean a lot,” he muttered. “Does it mean that accepting it makes me lose the trial? Maybe it’s a life-or-death thing? Is there a ‘help’ option? Guide?”

Please restate the question

“Guide,” he said, careful to speak slowly and with careful enunciation. “Is there a help option for this quest?”

Please restate the question

“Stupid shitty piece of,” Eli began, his voice rising along with his throbbing headache, but he cut himself off before losing it. Taking a slow breath in, he imagined pushing out the stress and frustration along with the air while slowly counting to ten. After all, cursing at the thing in his head wouldn’t solve any of his problems.

“Guide, what is the display floating in front of me?”

Please restate the question

“Shit,” he groaned, realizing he was unlikely to have much luck. Still, he tried rewording his query a few different ways but finally gave up when Guide dropped its other much-used line.

Command Unknown

“At least there’s no countdown this time,” he said, distracting himself for a moment as he changed position to stretch his sore legs out in front of him, trying not to let the frustration get to him. There was so much he didn’t understand about his new reality, and ignorance was not a feeling he enjoyed.

Talay. Triage this shit. Don’t worry about what I can’t control.

“Talay,” or “turn around, look at yourself,” was something Eli had told himself for years and was something he’d stitched together from a long string of therapists and specialists. In his own way of coping, he used the familiar technique now and imagined stepping outside his body as if observing his actions, feelings, and thoughts from a distance. He took a few deep breaths, centering his mind on the present while his tight and aching joints relaxed slightly with the effort.

Without a timer on the prompt, he decided he had more important things to worry about than a mysterious floating display, like the pain throbbing in his side. He was pretty sure he’d at least fractured a foot after sweeping the legs out from under the one golem, and his head protested every time he shifted around. With that in mind, he toggled Lifesight and started inspecting his body for any wounds or other damage.

He’d barely begun when something in the prompt’s words nagged at him. Like an itch he couldn’t scratch, the distraction finally made him glance up at the display, rereading the floating message. The reward line caught his eye, but another look around didn’t provide much new information, only the shrouded darkness and tiles for company. Where was the reward? Maybe it was something he got at the end of the whole trial? Or perhaps it was behind the darkness and would be revealed later?

With few answers and many questions, he considered other options when his shiny bracelet caught his eye. Realizing that the reward might somehow be in his storage, he accessed his soulbound device but faced a familiar challenge. Since day one of having the trinket strapped to his wrist, he’d struggled to organize all the junk Lugh had stored in the bracelet. Eli had no problems when he knew what was in there, namely by storing it himself, but anything else in the DS was a crapshoot. Whenever he tried to find unknown items, it felt like he was walking through a dark warehouse, waving his arms, hoping to bump into something useful.

“Damn it, Lugh, you could have taken two minutes to explain this crap.” Shaking his head, the ache at his temples throbbing hotly in time with his heartbeat, he rubbed the back of his neck while thinking through what he wanted. So much of this new reality seemed to work off of intention and willpower. “Maybe if I asked, pretty please? Give me the Marvelous Madwen’s Magic Mage Starter Kit?” he tried, holding up his arm with the DS. The upsurge of his frustration was derailed when a weight dropped onto the top of his outstretched hand. He snatched at the large box with both hands before it could hit the tile floor, but the weight jerked him off balance enough that only a quick elbow against the tiles kept him from dropping the unwieldy thing. A stabbing pain crawled up his spine at the abrupt move, making him hiss through gritted teeth.

“Shit. I gotta remember to be more careful,” Eli muttered but couldn’t help smiling at the object in his hands. After all, who didn’t like getting a gift? The rectangular box was a pretty good size, measuring a little over a meter wide, with an image of a beautiful woman on one side. Awkwardly turning it around in his hands and careful not to drop it, he found that the other sides were a bright white color but without any other markings.

He carefully placed it on the ground next to him with the picture-side up. The woman was striking with clear dusky skin, piercing blue eyes, and a blindingly bright smile. Her features and complexion looked almost cartoonish in their perfection, like a heavily edited photo. She gestured as if sharing some great secret with her admirers just below a long string of colorful alien text. The blocky writing was not one he recognized but was undoubtedly different from the pictograph writing he’d seen in the Lurran codex.

New Language detected

Analyzing...

Greater System Common recognized

Installing language…

Installed

He couldn’t help smiling at the message, the language program again proving its value. It was the one piece of software he’d kept from the four Lugh had foisted on Eli back when this whole adventure started. He still wasn’t sure what the other three had been, but whatever they were, with the spider thing gone after the reset, he didn’t plan on messing with them anytime soon.

The multicolored lines blurred into English, “Marvelous Madwen’s Magic Mage Starter Kit.” A smaller text string just below in dark letters continued, “Your Infinite Journey Begins with Madwen!” The whole thing was pretty quirky, like right out of a PR campaign for some toy line that went well with the smiling woman.

“Huh,” he said, rereading the colorful words as another oddity surfaced. “How the heck is there alliteration? Isn’t this a translation?” He tried to lift off the top but couldn’t find any seams along the edges – it might as well be a solid rectangular block, as far as he could tell. “How the hell do I get this thing open?” he muttered, looking at the backside for any hints.

Would you like to open [Marvelous Madwen’s Magic Mage Starter Kit]?

“Yes?” he replied, placing the box back down as a familiar feeling of amusement and frustration tickled the back of his mind. A slight hiss came from the box, and the top and sides slowly rose up and away from the ground. He picked up the lid once it stopped its upward progression, moving it out of the way so he could get a look inside.

A big thick book took up the whole left side of the interior space. “Tome of Inscription – Initiate Tier” was written in big glowing silver letters above a picture of the same woman from the box front. She was in a different pose, one hand under her chin as if in thought, but with the same bright smile. On the right side was a stack of thick paper, and a small thin box was wedged between the paper and book.

With no other ideas, Eli picked up the book and used Identify.

Madwen’s Tome of Inscription – Initiate Tier

Item Class: Rare

“Interesting, but only a bit more informative. With this headache, I definitely don’t plan on any heavy reading,” he muttered. The book went back in the box, and he picked up the blank white paper, riffling through the stack. They looked and felt like good-quality paper but with almost no discernable smell. Only slightly larger than standard legal size, there didn’t seem to have anything magical or unique about them.

He put the paper back and grabbed the small thin box. The surface was a smooth, glossy black color with a simple metal clasp along its longest edge, like a fancy pen set. He touched the clip, and the top popped open like it was on a tensioned spring. Inside, nestled within a shiny white fabric, was a blue stick with a small black nub on one end. Picking it up, he turned it around but couldn’t find any kind of point or edge for writing, even though it looked like a fancy pencil. Shrugging, he used Identify on both items.

Spell Paper – Initiate Tier

Item Class: Uncommon

Mana Stylus – Initiate Tier

Item Class: Uncommon

“Damn, not a wand. That might have made up for some of the crap I’ve gone through. Instead, I’m left with more mysterious magic stuff,” he griped, unsure what to do with the items. Out of ideas for now, and with the pain in his side reminding him of bigger priorities, he put the pieces neatly back in the box. The top went back on, and the lid slowly lowered to seal the whole thing again before he stowed it away again in his DS.

A flashing light pulled his attention back to the floating display.

“Well, fuck you very much,” he said with a grimace. It looked like there was a time limit after all, and the option to continue was already highlighted in a darker color that slowly flashed in time with the countdown. He wasn’t sure if the next challenge would be more difficult but continuing brought unknown dangers regardless of how hard it was. On the other hand, without understanding his “Fate” in this context, he wasn’t about to select that one. Shrugging at the vagaries of his new existence, he tried to mentally select “Continue with Trial” by focusing on it, much like he did with Guide’s HUD. Unfortunately, there was no reaction within the display.

“Uh, how do I do this? Continue with the trial?” Eli hesitantly tried, which must have been the correct move as the highlighted option flashed three times, and then the display vanished. An eyeblink later, another message appeared.

Beyond the display, the curtain of darkness had retreated to reveal two white statues. Unlike the last set, these already stood well over a head taller than Eli and were proportionally much larger.

“Shit.”