Reya turned another corner, her footsteps echoing lightly against the ground. She had had to abandon the use of her spiraling platform now, forced to continue her journey on foot. It made her slightly uneasy; in the air she had an advantage: she was less likely to be spotted, but she had an easier time seeing enemies from above, and it was more difficult for them to reach her. As it was, very few students in their year had abilities that could let them maneuver through the air.

It was an advantage she cherished throughout her time in the labyrinth, but one she unfortunately had to relinquish after her fight with Sunstorm. Contrary to what Stella had thought, Reya hadn't actually turned invisible or intangible.

She had practiced hard and long, but even magic-users still had their limits. At her current state, she could only cast a single spell at a time. If she had used one to remain intangible, she wouldn't have been able to alter the ground to complete her trap. No, what she had actually done was a unique form of astral projection, that allowed her to leave her physical body out of harm's way and manifest an ethereal version of herself that could take care of Stella as needed. Unfortunately, it was more complicated than regular projection: doing this meant she had to pull on energy from a place she was warned against contacting. Plus that kind of magic was extraordinarily advanced, and leaned far too heavily in the direction of magic that Reya's coven strictly tried to avoid.

Maintaining contact with that dimension was an exhausting task, and if she had stayed in direct contact with it for much longer the results could have been catastrophic.

She couldn't muster up the power she needed to use her platform, as she needed to conserve as much energy as possible now. After all, it was still just the first round. She had only one chip left to collect now before she could move on. She just hoped the easier targets hadn't all been eliminated yet.

"Mornin', pretty lady."

Reya whipped around, shocked out of her reverie. On instinct she fired a blast of icy wind in the direction of the voice, but the pillar of bluish-white gas struck nothing but empty wall, coating the metal in thick flakes of frost.

A soft, deep chime of laughter rang out. "Almost had me with that one. Just a little bit more to the left and you'd have nailed me."

"Who are you?" Reya demanded. What she really wanted to ask was "where are you?" but she doubted he'd give her a straight answer. Her hands were raised and blazing with violet energy, ready to strike at a moment's notice. This enemy was either a Speeder or had the power to turn invisible, an ironic development given she had used that same bluff to defeat Stella.

"Oof, that stings," the voice said in a tone of mock hurt. "You sure you don't know? We sit together in C&J." He spoke in a singsong voice, dragging out the last syllable. Reya hesitated, thinking, but not dropping her guard. And then it came to her.

"Joshua Beckett?"

"Ding ding, we have a winner."

Joshua Beckett was, as he had said, a boy who sat beside Reya in Criminal Justice. They weren't exactly friends; in fact, Reya never took much notice of him in or outside of class, and he was more or less the same given that he was always flirting with someone else. The voice sounded different, distorted somehow, but she recognized it, the deep, suave tones, the ever-present underlying hint of amusement. Unfortunately, she couldn't say the same for his powers. She had no idea what they were, or how to counter them.

"Oh yeah, Josh. Of course I know who you are, we were in a group once earlier in the year. You were my favourite partner to work with."

"Didn't you tell me once that if I didn't back off you'd chuck me into a black hole?" His voice didn't sound resentful at all; in fact, he was very obviously amused.

Reya slightly winced internally. The memory came flooding back all of a sudden, crisp and clear as if she was watching a video recording. She had been attempting to lure him out, lull him into a false sense of friendship and security, and then defeat him and take his chip. It seemed a terrible, despicable thing to do, but she was quite okay with that. Professor Elliott had indeed said they were allowed to do whatever it took to win, and after all, only one person would be walking out victorious. Betrayals were bound to happen, she was just speeding up the process.

"If you're trying to get me to come out, you're going to have to try harder," he said, chuckling.

All at once Reya dropped the pretense. "I have a better idea. You can stay where you are, because I'm still going to find you, take your chip, and move on."

"That so?" He sounded on the verge of laughter now. "Well, take your best shot Rey-Rey."

Reya quickly hissed out a few words of Latin and aimed her hands at the last place she had heard his voice. It was a narrow corridor, which meant he had very little time or space to flee. If she made a wide-enough scale attack, there was a very good chance she would hit her mark. Twin bursts of purple energy erupted from her hands, causing a brief but brilliant violet flare to illuminate the corridor. There was a great smashing noise as the blasts hit the metal walls, but there was something else she noticed as well: the absence of any screams or yells of pain.

He had vanished again. But that made no sense. Even if he had turned invisible, there was no way he could have avoided that blast radius entirely. A glancing blow, at the very least, but he should have been hit by something.

Then a voice reared inside her head, snapping at her to regain her composure. At this moment, she was functioning as any Hero would in a real life battle. As a student she had the privilege of working with her peers, of seeing them in action at various intervals over the course of their stay here. Heroes, on the other hand, often went in blind. At most they would have only cursory knowledge of their opponents reported by dispatch services, and even then that information had to be taken with a grain of salt. Villains were careful to keep their true capabilities concealed, which meant going on face value alone could have disastrous consequences. Heroes were famous, and so were their exploits. While they too took measures to retain some semblance of secrecy, it was harder to maintain while you were in the public eye, constantly being videoed or photographed in action. Villains often hid in the dark, avoiding attention, operating in the shadows, much as this boy was doing.

Reya allowed herself a small grin. She wanted to be a Hero, and this was her first real test on the road to becoming one. Handling a hostile enemy while working with only bits of knowledge. It wouldn't be easy, but she knew she could manage.

More energy flowered at her fingertips, and this time she aimed it downwards, letting out a steady stream that pushed her gently into the air. She rose almost to the ceiling, hovering on her energy blasts while she surveyed the area below. From this distance she should be safe. If he had any long-range abilities he would have used them already, which meant invisibility was likely the only power he had. Since there was no time limit, she could take all the time she needed up here, properly assess the situation before she charged back into battle. But even if Professor Elliott hadn't given them a time limit, she remembered suddenly, one had still been forcibly imposed on her.

Her stunt with Stella had put a damper on her powers. She needed to end this fight quickly before they gave out. For now it was just a matter of finding him. A Spell of Revelation could probably help her to locate him, but she would still need to —

"Aah!"

Something heavy and firm crashed into her back, sending her toppling towards the floor. Her reflexes weren't as honed as the typical combat students, but she managed to react fast enough to release another burst of propulsive energy to slow her descent to a light fall. Scrambling to her feet, she looked around, this time with an edge. Unfortunately she got no time to ponder the sudden change. A cold sensation wound around her leg, and before the gasp was even halfway out of her mouth, she was thrown into the wall.

Powerful sorceress though she might be, Reya wasn't built for these kinds of heavy hits.

"Relashio!" The words erupted from her mouth in a scream, and a barrier of bright purple energy erected around her. In a second it expanded outwards, shooting to the wall and slamming into it with explosive force. It likely would have crushed anyone that didn't have super durability, but something told her she needed to step up her game a lot if she hoped to win this fight.

And that hunch proved to be correct. Mere moments later, a soft, airy laugh echoed out, but it sounded strangely thin now, echoing out from all around her as if his voice was coming from the very walls themselves. "Gettin' desperate now, are we?"

"How are you doing that?" Reya demanded, and she was shocked to hear the slight quiver in her voice. Was she actually scared?

"Can't tell you," he said nonchalantly. "You know what they say about magicians and secrets and all."

Reya slammed her palms to the floor, her next words issuing quickly, her voice a rough, raspy bark of anger. She was performing the same move as she had done against Stella. Even if he was invisible, he was still solid. The ground shifted underneath, warping below their feet like an illusion. Then she chanted again, and this time another bubble of energy expanded violently through the corridor. She didn't worry about keeping the force down this time; whatever his abilities actually were, they seemed to allow him to tank or evade hits more efficiently than they should normally be able to, otherwise he would have been defeated already. Her breath was erupting in sharp gasps now. She could feel her strength draining. If she didn't pause to heal herself, recover her stamina, then this was as far as she could go. It was a last ditch effort, putting it all on the line. She waited for a reaction, but none came. No snarky reply, no sudden attack materializing from out of nowhere. It seemed she had done it after all.

Then, out of nowhere, something rammed into her with the force of a charging bull. She actually rose into the air, suspended and seemingly restrained several feet above the ground by invisible cufflinks. Her chip, which she had spelled into place in the bracelet on her wrist, suddenly came loose, hovering in midair. A sharp blow reached her again, then she fell, slipping into unconsciousness.

Before she passed out, she heard the boy's voice, now longer airy and cool, but solid and angry, and speaking to someone else.

" . . . last one almost had you."

"You're tellin' me. Never took so long to reform before."

She had no idea what he was talking about, or who the other voice belonged to, and she didn't get the chance to ponder it either. Her blonde hair splayed messily around her head as it fell to the floor, and her eyes slid shut.

Ethan released a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. The dull ache in his temple had turned into full on throbbing now, and if he didn't wrap this up soon it would turn into a relentless pounding. He currently had four chips. He would probably have collected five already if he hadn't been sifting so critically through the mass of students passing through the maze, but he had to vet his options carefully.

The problem was, he didn't want to expend too much energy doing it. For most people who shared this sentiment, it was because they wanted to be fresh and reserved for the higher levels, where the most dangerous opponents would be waiting for them. For him, it was more or less the same, but it was also a bit of a drag. He wanted nothing more than to be done with this examination, to be back up top where he could either lie down or dawdle in class pretending to be listening.

Unfortunately, that seemed to be getting more difficult. The more time that went by, the less enemies passed by his stretch of land. More and more were moving on or dropping out, and if he didn't find any suitable opponents soon, he would probably be left on this level without a sufficient number of chips to move on.

Normally that wouldn't have bothered him. Whether he "won" or not — and he had no illusions about the fact that he wouldn't — he had handily defeated several opponents and collected a respectable amount of chips.

Among Elliott's long list of dos and don'ts, venturing out to blindly run into enemies wasn't anywhere there. Which meant he was perfectly within his right to stay here and refuse or bait any opponents he wished. The only issue was Professor Wyatt. The Head of Hades had taken an irritatingly strong interest in his academic career since he had first stepped foot into Helix, and Ethan could tell that he wouldn't hear the end of it if he didn't at least try in this exam. He just wished that there was a more diversified set of options to choose from.

"Haven't you ever heard to be careful what you wish for?"

Ethan opened his eyes slowly. His heart was pounding fast, but he managed to keep his face clear of emotion. He turned his head and stared at the doorway. A girl, not much taller than he was, with a head of curly brown hair clad in the blue and silver of Poseidon was standing there, leaning against the door frame and smiling in at him.

"That's not possible," he said, still only barely managing to remain calm.

"Sure it is. In fact, from what I've heard, you have a very small concept of what's possible."

Ethan rose to his feet, meeting the girl's eyes. Somehow this girl, whoever she was, had slipped under his mental radar and invaded his bubble of seclusion. The only times something of the sort had ever happened before were with Alec and Charlie. He couldn't explain it, and he'd never asked because he doubted they would be able to, but whenever Alec morphed his body into stone his mind became untraceable and unbreachable. And he had been keeping tabs on Charlie and his vicious beastly opponent earlier, but Charlie's thoughts had randomly disappeared when his powers sprung up. From the random, disconnected images he had seen in the animal's mind, Charlie had somehow progressed to being able to cover his entire body with his energy. If Ethan had to guess, somehow turning to stone and wrapping their bodies in energy caused some psychic interference. But that didn't explain how this girl managed to slip by his mental defenses.

"My name is Belle," she said suddenly, "not 'this girl.' And isn't it obvious?"

"What are you talking about?"

Belle rolled her eyes. "The way I managed to wriggle through the holes in your mental net? The way I know you're currently wondering if I can turn myself to stone — the answer's no, by the way — it's because I'm a telepath, like you. Well, not like you," she added, after a few seconds of silence. "Better."

"Well I can truly feel the humility just radiating off of you," Ethan said sarcastically. "Look, don't take it personally but I have work to do, so . . ."

He thrust his palm at her, shooting a blast of telekinetic energy. It would be enough to knock her out on impact with the wall, but not enough to seriously injure. The only problem was, nothing happened. A simple swipe of her hand and the blast was dispelled, leaving nothing more than a small gust of wind that rustled her hair slightly. To the average eye, no one would understand what had just happened. But Ethan knew. She had conjured a wall of her own mental force, completely blocking his attack with no effort at all.

"Actually, I was hoping we could talk first," Belle said conversationally. "But if you insist, you can get your trashing during the process." She casually flicked her arm and Ethan was lifted into the air as if rising on an invisible platform. He was slammed into the wall and he slid back to the floor, looking up with a pained expression as Belle slid the door closed behind them and advanced into the room with a smile as wide and wicked as a cheshire cat's.