Her coffers overflowed with gems

And treasures most sublime,

But no amount of gold could halt

The ravages of time.

Edmund fell backwards out of the entrance, landing hard on his backside upon a cool metallic floor. The azure fox was nowhere to be seen. Well aware of the rules about safety in entryways, Edmund’s first instinct was to open his constellation and view the upgrade to his sigil, but a familiar voice behind him took precedence.

“I’ll give him this; his entrances aren’t nearly as good as his exits.”

A pasty hand appeared in Edmund’s field of view, offering to help him up. Lucius Durne’s voice accompanied it. “As it should be. Balance in all things.”

Edmund took the albino hand and pulled himself to his feet, turning to find the other Durne brother grinning at him.

“Is it hot in here?” Lucius asked, sweat visibly dripping down his brow. “Why are you so hot?”

Edmund paled and pulled the swelter ring from his finger, deactivating the heat aura that somehow did little more than annoy the Durne brothers. “Better?”

Lucius nodded.

“Get in a fight with that princess of yours?” Priam asked, clearly noting both Edmund’s clumsy entrance and lack of companion. “A little lover’s quarrel?”

“Another member of our cohort, actually,” Edmund explained. “Have either of you seen a demonic blue fox running around?”

Lucius shook his head. “Can’t say I have.” He turned to Priam. “Didn’t Christopher describe something like that?”

“He did. Something about a rare mob the Dragon’s Claws ran into. They tried to fight it but it escaped.” Priam narrowed his eyes at Edmund. “You’re saying it’s a delver?”

“It acts like one,” Edmund explained. “Travels floor to floor, fights monsters, even has a pact with a demon. Doesn’t seem to collect loot, though, and I don’t think it earns Aspects like we do, either.” He tactfully omitted that the fox had started as a regular mob before he’d dragged it down a floor, unwilling to yet share his unique relationship with the Eternal Depths.

“Sounds like a worthy foe!” Priam beamed. “One that may bestow a mighty prize.”

“Don’t,” Edmund said flatly. “It’s powerful.”

“So are we,” Lucius said.

“At least powerful enough to breeze through enemies that slowed me to a crawl,” Edmund elucidated, “and that’s just a lower limit. Thrax knows how strong it really is, not to mention fast. Best case, it outruns you and escapes, worst case, it kills you both. Don’t fuck with the azure fox.” Edmund again left out that if they did manage to kill the thing, he’d stop getting upgrades to his sigil.

Priam misinterpreted his warning, leaning in to pat Edmund on the shoulder. “You want it for yourself, eh?” He grinned and winked. “Don’t worry. You saw it first, you get dibs.”

Edmund simply let out a breath and nodded, happy to let the Durnes believe whatever it took to get them to leave the fox alone. A part of him worried he would have to fight the thing eventually, but he’d stay on its good side as long as he could. Luckily enough, the Durnes didn’t press the matter, opting instead to change the subject.

“So how is that princess of yours doing?” Lucius asked. “Last we saw you two you had some choice words for her father.”

“I wouldn’t know.” Edmund shrugged. “We wound up on different sixteenth floors, and now I’m here with you. You’re just as likely to run into her as I am.”

“She must be some woman,” Priam said, winking in a way that felt just this side of uncomfortable. “I don’t think I’ve met a single person I’d spend the rest of my life a fugitive from the crown for.”

Lucius elbowed him in the ribs.

“Except, of course, for my wonderful twin brother,” Priam added with a grin. “But definitely not for someone who wouldn’t even party with me.”

“She wanted to,” Edmund said simply. “I actually had to pull some strings to avoid it. I work alone.”

“You hear that, Priam?” Lucius turned to look at his brother. “The man has strings to pull.”

“Unlike you, who’s a few strings short of a full lyre,” Priam teased in response.

Edmund sighed, less than interested in the brothers’ friendly ribbing. If he was going to have to clear this floor without the benefits of Solitude and its confluences, he’d at least get something in exchange. “How long have you been on this floor? What do you know?”

“A few hours,” Lucius answered. “We’ve worked out the basic mechanism and crafted our strategy, though it’ll have to change now there’re three of us.”

Edmund looked past the Durne brothers to take in the floor as a whole, his vision thankfully cleared of the ever-present smoke thanks to the dampening effects of The Recluse. It was unlike any floor he’d ever seen.

They stood upon a platform of sheer metal, one clearly thick enough to not so much as vibrate as they walked across it. The walls were of similar construction, plain and solid and without handholds or cracks or any such place to even consider hiding something. Their only feature was a single lever off to Edmund’s left, presumably the mechanism Lucius had mentioned.

Straight ahead, the platform came to an end at a sudden drop-off, beyond which stretched a hundred-yard chasm between the delvers and the distant platform that bore the exit. Unlike previous lethal falls that obscured themselves in darkness or clouds, the bottom of the level sat in clear view but ten feet below Edmund’s platform. He might’ve considered hopping down for a look around were it not for the four-foot-deep pool of menacing purple liquid that filled the lower level like a basin.

He glanced back up to the Durnes. “Any idea what that fluid is?”

“Not a clue,” Priam said. “But we know it dissolves wood, fabric, and leather. Seems to leave metal alone, and we both decided not to see what it does to living flesh.”

“Stay out of the purple goop. Got it.” Edmund nodded. “And the lever?”

“That’s the trick,” Lucius said. “Each time you pull the lever, a five-by-five platform rises up from the floor. Pull it enough times, and you’ll have a walkway right to the exit.”

“And the catch?”

“It’s hard to describe,” Priam said. “Do you feel how the air kind of hums?”

Edmund scowled and shook his head.

“You will soon,” Priam continued. “The lower floor acts like a giant magnet, and each time you pull the lever it gets stronger in a specific place corresponding to the platform that raises up. Every time it does, this humming feeling in the air gets stronger. At about seven platforms, it starts dealing damage—damage to us at least. Your tolerance could be lower or higher.”

Edmund nodded. “So the trick is to cross the chasm using as few platforms as possible. Is there any pattern they rise in?”

“It’s a four by sixty grid,” Lucius explained. “Platforms rise at random with the condition no two can rise in the same column. They stay up for thirty minutes before they fall again. It’ll always eventually form a path to the exit, but unless you want to spend a few days re-rolling over and over again, we’ll end up with a few extra platforms.”

“Which begs the question,” Priam said with a wide and toothy grin. “How far can you jump?”

Edmund opened his mouth to answer before realizing he didn’t entirely know. “Good question.” He shut his eyes to open his constellation, immediately directing his focus to his recently-upgraded sigil.

Trailblazer’s Sigil of the Azure Journeyman

The fourth step on the Path of the Azure Fox. Increases agility. Grants two windsteps. Increases positional awareness.

Trailblazer bonus: Sharpens hearing.

“Perfect,” he muttered as he realized the change. A second windstep was exactly what he’d needed for this particular challenge.

Lucius raised a pale eyebrow. “What’s perfect?”

“Ability I have,” Edmund replied, keeping his answer vague. “I can make forty feet with consistency, further if I use the skill I used to escape the guards on the fifteenth floor, but that’s hard to control and has a long cooldown.” His eyes flitted back and forth between the two Durne brothers, trying to gauge their reaction. Even without using Break Through, his two windsteps were more than enough to cross with only seven platforms, as long as they were spaced out well.

However, rather than shock or respect or any sense of being impressed by his mobility, a faint scowl crossed Priam’s face. “We’ll have to take damage, then.”

Lucius sighed. “It’s probably for the best we use an extra platform or two. We’ll want additional space to maneuver in case the dungeon throws us a curveball partway through.”

Edmund blinked. “Wait…. how far can you jump?”

Priam grinned and patted Lucius on the shoulder. “Well, my brother here can leap fifty feet through the air, or a hundred if he uses the wall. I, in comparison, can make it a hundred and two.”

Lucius batted his hand away. “I told you my shoe was untied! I could’ve made it a hundred and five if you hadn’t sabotaged me!”

Edmund’s attention withdrew as the brothers bickered over some competition they’d staged in the past. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that, for the first time since the first floor, he was the group’s weakest link. That first time hadn’t turned out well for the others. He hoped this would be different.

He walked past the talkative Durnes to peer over the edge of the platform, still failing to feel the hum in the air they’d mentioned. Edmund did, however, note that as he neared the pit, the sword at his hip seemed to tug itself towards it. He sighed.

Of course the magnets would affect his metal gear, the Durnes simply hadn’t warned him of it because they didn’t carry any metal gear. Come to think of it, the Durnes didn’t carry much at all, armored only in boiled leather vests over loose-fitting cloth and wielding nothing but their fists. They each wore a pack filled with what Edmund could only assume were basic supplies, but the pair clearly traveled light. It made sense. Judging by how far they claimed they could jump, mobility was central to their fighting style.

Still waiting at the platform’s edge, Edmund ran through a mental checklist of his gear, searching for anything that might’ve been affected by the magnetic field. Most of his armor he could eliminate right off the bat, as his boots, leggings, rerebraces, and pauldrons all contained no metal whatsoever, being crafted of bone and rock respectively. His crystal cuirass did have a layer of what looked like steel beneath the outer crystal, but short of abandoning the piece entirely, he couldn’t do much about that.

His bracers and shield both contained mithril, but as Edmund held them over the edge, neither seemed to feel the pull of the magnets, implying either the magical metal didn’t feel magnetism or at least felt it significantly less.

His helmet was another story. The ebonsteel helm seemed to yank his head towards the pit with increasing force the further he lowered it. Edmund removed the helmet entirely, opting to stow it in his satchel rather than allow the magnetic field to influence the movement of his head.

Next, he pulled out his rope and cut two short lengths from it. The first he wrapped around his left thigh, securing his short sword at a second point of contact to keep it from swinging about as he moved through the magnetic field. The second portion he used to tie his satchel to his waist, keeping it too secure to prevent it from shifting too much under the magnet’s influence.

The weight of his gear hung heavily as he turned back to face the Durne brothers, knowing he—and his equipment—would weigh them down. He supposed between Solitude and The Recluse, they were already weighing him down in turn. Edmund exhaled. The sooner they cleared this floor, the better.

At Edmund’s signal, Lucius pulled on the iron lever seven times in rapid succession. The reaction was immediate.

The air in the room went from dead still to alive with energy to seemingly tugging on Edmund’s very being. The iron in his blood yearned for the pit below, both pulling him towards it and adding ever-increasing stress to his heart to overcome the external force. His heartbeat raced, pounding painfully in his chest.

It hurt, but between War’s damage reduction and Perseverance’s health regeneration, Edmund felt he could’ve survived in the harsh environment for some time. Thrax, if the Durnes’ presence hadn’t deactivated them, Solitude and The Island might’ve let him withstand several more platforms.

“How’s it look?” Priam called to him. “Think you can handle it?”

Pulling his thoughts away from the effects of the magnetic field, Edmund turned his attention to the path ahead. As expected, seven platforms had arisen from the caustic pool, the vile liquid flowing off them to reveal their metallic nature. The first few maintained a promising separation, but near the end came three one after another, leaving roughly a hundred feet of empty air between the last platform and the other side.

Edmund supposed he might’ve been able to cross it using Break Through, but he couldn’t be entirely sure, especially judging the distance from so far away. Worse still, if anything attacked while he attempted that particular jump, it’d spell certain death. He turned back to the others and shook his head. “Pull it again!”

Lucius obeyed, visibly gritting his teeth and activated the mechanism once more. Edmund deflated as he watched the eighth platform rise directly in front of him, nowhere near the troublesome gap.

“Again!”

Lucius didn’t question him. Again he pulled and again a platform rose, this time further out yet still not riding the hundred-foot gap. Edmund’s heart throbbed harder still. His head ached with waves of pain. Nausea turned his stomach. “Again!”

Lucius flashed a wide-eyed glance at his brother.

“If we raise another platform, we won’t survive the half hour!” Priam called.

Edmund paused as the point struck home. Crossing now would be a terrible risk, one that could backfire in any number of ways. Another platform might’ve been exactly what he needed to make his crossing if not safe then safe enough, but without enough health to survive the full thirty minutes, whether or not it rose in a useful place, they’d have to cross then.

At least, Edmund would have to cross then, the Durnes could always just go back through the entrance and return to the dungeon at their leisure, leaving Edmund with his Solitude abilities to raise as many platforms as he needed. As he turned back to offer that line of action, however, he noted the entrance sat closed, the way out barred for the first time since Edmund had set foot in the Eternal Depths. Of course it was. Liam would never allow someone to leave after pulling the lever, not before the timer had run its course.

He cast his gaze back out over the pit, analyzing the pattern before him and charting a course across it. It’d be easy to make the last platform on windsteps alone, but the final third was too much a risk. Edmund shook his head. They could do better. “Leave it,” he called to the Durnes, walking away from the edge. “We’ll try again in a half hour.”

Lucius nodded, visibly relieved the magnetic field wouldn’t be getting any stronger. He stepped away from the lever, leaned against the wall, and sank to the floor. Priam joined him.

Edmund followed suit, keeping a few feet away from the twins as they soldiered through the field’s onslaught. Edmund watched as a drop of blood fell from Priam’s nose only to splatter onto the floor in front of him and slowly inch across the room towards the pit. He grimaced and shut his eyes.

The minutes dragged on. Soon enough, Edmund’s own nose dripped with blood. He didn’t bother wiping it clean as the magnets pulled it away for him. He kept his eyes clenched shut, the pain in his head spreading to a throbbing soreness in his eyes. His ears rumbled noise, his face flushed, and his joints ached as the magnets carried on their brutal assault.

Until they didn’t.

Over some twenty seconds, the air seemed to still and then quiet. Edmund flicked his eyelids open, finding the world tinged red for a few horrible moments before Perseverance could reverse the damage done to his eyes. He wiped a drop of blood from his tear duct.

The delvers sat in silence for a few moments, each recovering from the ordeal in their own worlds. Lucius finally broke the silence.

“Well, that was unpleasant.”

Priam groaned.

“At least we know nine’s the limit,” Edmund said. “Even if we could survive ’til the exit with ten, we’d be in no shape to fight.”

Lucius nodded. “There’s a point where an extra place to stand isn’t worth how weak the air makes us. I’m hesitant to even cross with nine.”

“What if we went ahead?” Priam offered. “We can cross with as few as three platforms, then leave you behind to reactivate your Solitude buffs.”

Edmund shook his head and gestured at the exit far ahead. “The door’s closed, and I’d bet it won’t open until we’ve all crossed. If you’re just waiting for me at the exit, then I’ll only have my Solitude Aspects for the first two thirds of the floor, and I’ll spend the last third debuffed and alone against a floor balanced for a party of three.”

Lucius scowled. “Can you jump further with your Solitude active?”

“Not directly,” Edmund replied. “I’ll definitely resist the magnetism a lot better, as well as regain access to my most powerful ability. What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking we cross ahead of you, then you pull the lever until you get a pattern that concentrates the platforms near the end. That way when you get too close for Solitude, you’ll have more room to work with, and we can come back and help you with any monsters that attack.”

Edmund blinked as he ran through the plan in his head. It made sense, allowing him to only be weak when he had the most ground on which to stand. He nodded his assent.

“It’s a devious floor,” Priam said. “Your presence forces us to fight in a stronger magnetic field, and ours robs you of your Aspects, yet by design we have to either fight together, or turn on each other.”

“Yeah,” Edmund muttered, glancing up at the ceiling, “he’s an asshole like that.”

Priam cast him a questioning glance, but Lucius cut it off by affectionately smacking Edmund on the shoulder. “No challenge too great, eh?” He pushed himself to his feet and turned to his brother. “Come, let’s make our crossing now.”

Edmund stood and watched as the brothers returned to the lever and pulled it only four times before settling on their path. The magnetic field again made itself apparent, but to Edmund it felt as little more than a faint hum in the air. The Durnes took off together, Priam but two steps ahead of Lucius as they vaulted from the starting platform.

They ran along the left wall, somehow arcing their path up along the vertical surface for several long strides before their altitude began to dwindle. With a few feet to spare, they kicked off the wall to land gracefully on the first platform. Thus far, they remained unhindered.

They didn’t linger, maintaining their momentum as they leapt across the chasm to the right wall to repeat the process. The dungeon chose that moment to strike.

A ferocious caw echoed throughout the steel chamber as a winged figure appeared from a hidden hollow in one of the risen platforms. It resembled a hawk to Edmund’s untrained eye, but its eight-foot wingspan didn’t match any bird Edmund had heard of. Between its distance and the growing cloud of smoke arising from the caustic fluid with the Durnes’ departure, he could make out few of the creature’s details.

Its coat was brown and its talons sharp, its wing feathers tipped in some metallic substance. Rather than being jerked about, however, it seemed to ride the magnetic field like a rising wind, its wingtips shifting around to optimize its motion. Madness gave it a name.

Lesser Magnetivore Roc

The beast rocketed into the air on magnetic winds and dove for the Durne brothers at the peak of their wall-run. It never reached its target.

As in all things, the Durnes attacked in perfect sync. As one they leapt from the wall to meet the roc’s dive, swinging for the steel-winged bird with their bare fists. Twin energies crackled about their arms as their punches struck true. Bright white from Priam and impenetrable shadow from Lucius burst through the airborne roc, severing both its wings in a single moment. The brothers’ momentum carried them through the now-plummeting bird, and they landed unharmed on the next platform.

Three jumps later they landed steadily on the other side, somehow halting their velocity instantaneously the moment their feet touched down.

“All good?” Edmund called to them from across the level.

“Go ahead!” Priam shouted back, no sense of excitement or exhaustion reaching his voice.

Edmund gulped. He’d known the Durnes were higher level than he, though they hadn’t deigned to share how many Aspects they’d collected in their time before entering the Eternal Depths. If the display they’d just put on was any measure, it was more than a few.

A part of him balked at their strength, at the idea of what it truly took to survive this far into the Depths. Edmund himself had certainly been lucky his fair share of times, and Thrax knew he’d never have made it this far without Madness elevating him to power beyond his level.

For the first time since he’d watched those giant rats slaughter his party, Edmund felt weak. He didn’t let that stop him. Like then, he knew now how to deal with weakness. However far he’d made it, however amicable his relationship with Liam seemed to have grown, he knew what he had to do.

It wasn’t luck or Madness that had gotten him this far. It was resolve. It was courage. It was the determination to do what had to be done, the willingness to sacrifice all else in the pursuit of his revenge, the burning need to improve himself in any way possible to better face the challenges ahead.

Upon watching the true power the Durne brothers wielded, Edmund felt weak.

He reveled in it. He reveled in the heights he might yet reach. He reveled in his renewed drive to find and take every advantage. He reveled in the opportunity danger prevented.

And he pulled the lever.

A platform arose on the chasm’s far side, just two grid spaces short of the exit. He pulled it again. And again. And again.

Whether Liam had listened to their plan or luck simply shined down upon them, one by one the platforms rose in a roughly acceptable pattern. Two seventy-foot gaps that spanned the chasm’s entire width stretched out before him, both at the chasm’s front half. The other six platforms clustered near the end, offering him plenty of space to work once he got close enough to the Durnes to lose his solitude.

The platforms overwhelmingly kept on opposite sides of the chasm’s width, further elongating his path with useless zigzags, and one particular fifty-foot leap to the second-to-last landing gave him pause, but Edmund refused to risk a ninth platform. Even from across the level he could see the strain on the brothers’ faces, and though Solitude and The Island reduced the magnetic field’s effect to little more than an annoyance, Edmund knew he’d lose their protection soon.

Eight would have to do.

Ready as he’d ever be, Edmund lined himself up with his first destination, took a running start, and leapt into the air.

The moment his body flew above the deadly drop, his sword and his satchel yanked him downwards. A moment’s terror crossed his mind before, but a second later, the force reversed, and the metal on his person pulled upwards instead. Before it could change yet again, Edmund Broke Through.

The ability sent him rocketing forward at a startling pace, its effects at first nullifying the magnetic field’s attempts to jostle him around before his altitude finally began to diminish and his steel equipment returned to its wild motion. Edmund timed his first windstep with a downward swing, kicking off of solid air at the same moment as his gear pulled him back up.

He landed awkwardly on the first platform, nearly falling off the far side as struggled to break his momentum. An unexpected upturn in the magnetic force nearly pulled him off the landing entirely, forcing Edmund to expend his second windstep horizontally to bring himself to a halt.

He paused for a moment, the twenty-five minutes remaining on the platforms’ life span an eternity compared to his cool downs. His windsteps returned swiftly from a few moments on solid ground, but he’d need an entire minute before he could Break Through again.

The dungeon, seemingly unwilling to allow a single quiet moment, released another roc.

The beast announced its presence with a threatening caw as it swept out from under a platform ahead of him to begin its hunt. Edmund launched a pair of Firebolts at it as it approached, the first missing and the second singing its left eye shut. He conjured a Smoke Lash around his left wrist as the magnetivore approached, waiting for the beast to come in close so he could deliver the lethal blow.

His challenger’s mark had other ideas.

The image on his shoulder burned with its telltale tingling sensation as the roc cried once more. No visible change came over the beast, yet at once Edmund felt its effect. His heart pounded as the magnetic field around him intensified and his metal gear lurched towards the diving roc, threatening to pull him from the platform entirely.

Edmund leaned hard against it, just in time for the polarity to reverse and send him stumbling back. As he struggled to catch himself, the beast swept overhead, its talons raking across his exposed scalp. It came away with a talonful of blood and skin and hair.

Edmund spun as the roc flew past, cracking his Smoke Lash at its departing form. The ethereal whip wrapped itself around the beast’s left wing, granting Edmund his opportunity to pull.

The roc corkscrewed violently through the air, plummeting several feet before it could regain control of its flight, but by then it was too late. It was within Edmund’s grasp.

His right hand surged for the roc’s chest, his fingers weaving past its feathers to touch the flesh below. That was all it took.

Lifeblood flowed like a river into his two fragments of the Crimson Hand, one putting it to work immediately to repair the bleeding gash on Edmund’s head as the other stored the crucial life-force for later use. The roc cried out with a pitiful squawk, its bone-chilling caws beyond it as the weakness took hold. Moments later it fell, lifeless, from Edmund’s grasp, plummeting to caustic liquid below. Before even the dungeon could reclaim its corpse, the purple fluid dissolved all but the metal tips of its feathers.

Edmund didn’t stop for Perseverance or to catch his breath or regenerate his mana, the roc’s stolen life-force more than topping him off. He simply counted down the remaining seconds on Break Through’s cooldown and scanned the wisps of smoke that arose from chemical pool blow.

The smoke seemed to concentrate in strange places, flowing in great arcs rather than billowing up as Edmund might’ve expected. The further it reached from the floor the more freely it moved, but at spots it curved back down as if suddenly affected by the magnetic force. He found that odd. There should’ve been no iron in the smoke.

He paused for a moment to watch its pattern, noting it didn’t shift back and forth randomly, but followed a specific pattern of ups and downs for more complicated than he could fully fathom. Edmund blinked as he realized its meaning.

The magnetic field had inverted itself, its direction simply changed throughout the room. All he had to do was plot a route that weaved along the upward flows, and the invisible force would hold him aloft rather than tossing him about.

Once his Break Through was ready, Edmund took a running leap not directly towards the next platform, but at an angle from it. The effect was immediate.

At once his metal gear pulled him upwards, adding crucial altitude to his jump as he soared through the air. He used both windsteps as he flew, activating them at preplanned points to renew his altitude and adjust his direction to keep himself within the upward areas of the magnetic field as he traveled along it. He landed gently on the next platform, managing over seventy feet of horizontal distance without even activating Break Through. From across the chasm, he gave the Durnes a friendly wave.

From there, Edmund progressed slowly and deliberately, relying on the smoke’s outline of the magnetic field to chart his course over the pit. He tried his best to plot out his windsteps ahead of time, but with the smoke as the only midair point of reference, Edmund knew his strategy would soon come to an end.

He’d made it three quarters of the way to the exit before everything fell apart.

As he stepped off the second-to-last platform, the smoke faded from the room. In that same moment, two great caws resonated through the air as a pair of rocs emerged behind him. With over twenty feet of empty air between him and the next landing, Edmund didn’t dare look away from the narrow path he’d charted, even as the rocs bore down upon him.

The Durnes leapt into action, running at each other’s side across the final platform and into the air. It was only then that Edmund noticed the changes to their faces. They both bled from their noses and their ears as the force of the magnetic field wreaked havoc on their bodies, yet their eyes remained unharmed. Instead, Priam’s eyes had turned milky white, and Lucius’s black as pitch.

As the brothers drew nearer, Edmund could feel his Solitude leaving him. His heart pounded painfully against his chest as his head ached and his nose bled. His challenger’s mark burned with energy as it empowered the magnetivores, and suddenly his body erupted in pain as now three conflicting magnetic fields fought to tear him apart. He opened his mouth to shout an order, a warning, anything at the approaching Durnes, but no air reached his lungs.

Priam’s and Lucius’s paths diverged midair as they passed on either side of Edmund, each pulling back for a punch at their respective target. Edmund craned his neck to watch them pass, eyes bleeding and wide with horror as a roc bore down on each of them.

Lucius cried out in pain. Priam’s shout caught in his throat. Neither completed their strike, their muscles failing them as they drew too close to the sources of the additional fields.

Edmund windstepped to spin midair, summoning a Smoke Lash in his left hand and raising his right. He struck with both, cracking his whip across the first roc’s neck as a Blood Bolt pierced the second.

The Durnes and the rocs collided midair, the former’s momentum carrying the dying birds back and down until all four landed hard against Edmund’s last platform. Edmund didn’t get a chance to watch them fall as his own motion carried off course and his metal gear abruptly yanked him towards the caustic pool below. He windstepped a second time to readjust his course and Broke Through to rocket himself towards the final platform, passing over it entirely to land in a stumble next to the exit.

He spun to find the Durne brothers lying still on the penultimate platform, blood pooling around them. Edmund cursed. “Get up,” he growled through gritted teeth. “Get up.”

The brothers didn’t twitch.

Edmund watched as the dead rocs dissolved to nothing, leaving only the wounded brothers on the five-by-five landing. At least, he reasoned, that meant they still drew breath.

Edmund muttered a second curse as he realized they lay upon one of the first platforms they’d raised, and thus it’d be one of the first to return to the deadly pool from which it’d come. The oppressive magnetic field wouldn’t lessen before then. To make it back on their own, the Durnes would have to overcome both their injuries and the field itself. Still, they lay unmoving.

Edmund’s hands burst into a flurry of motion, untying the various ropes and straps that attached his gear to his body. He shed his satchel and his sword and his crystal cuirass, stripping every ounce of superfluous iron from his body. Without his smoke to guide him, it was more a hindrance than a help.

He charged for the closest platform, jumping the ten-foot-gap with ease before maintaining his momentum and vaulting the greater distance. He windstepped twice in the air to clear the thirty feet, slipping on the blood as he reached his destination.

With a breath, Edmund bent down to scoop up Lucius’s limp form, cradling him in both arms as he turned back to face the exit. He leapt into the air and Broke Through, depending on the additional momentum to overcome the weight of a second body. He stumbled on the second platform, but leapt off anyway, righting himself midair with a windstep before crashing down next to the exit.

He deposited Lucius on the ground and took a deep breath, wiping the blood from his eyes. Allowing himself no more than a few moments to regather his strength before setting off once more. He retraced his steps to collect Priam, Breaking Through one final time to cross the wider gap. The moment he set an unsteady foot down on the exit’s landing, a chime rang out, and the air stilled.

Edmund breathed.

Long seconds passed as the pain slowly faded, his heartbeat slowed, and his head cleared.

Lucius was the first to wake, bolting upright as his own recovery Aspect took effect without the magnetic field to oppress it. Priam shortly followed, mirroring his brother’s reaction almost identically as he returned to consciousness.

“It’s okay,” Edmund said. “The floor’s cleared.”

“Thank Thrax,” Lucius muttered as he rubbed his eyes. “What happened back there?”

“It was like the field’s strength grew tenfold out of nowhere,” Priam said. Edmund couldn’t tell if he was exaggerating or not.

“It’s my fault,” Edmund said. “I should’ve warned you. I have this mark that empowers nearby monsters, and it made the rocs generate a field of their own. When you two got close, it knocked you out.”

Priam scowled. “You had no difficulty dispatching that first roc in melee range.”

“Solitude and The Island are really good at countering that sort of thing,” Edmund explained. “Once you were in the mix, I only survived by keeping my distance.”

“You got us back to the finish line,” Lucius realized aloud. “You saved us.”

“And it was my fault you needed saving,” Edmund said, offering a hand to help Lucius to his feet. “Let’s call it even.”

“Better idea,” Priam said as he too took Edmund’s proffered hand, “let’s never do that again.”

The gurgle of moving liquid turned the delvers’ heads in time for them to watch as all eight platforms descended back into the pool. The ending platform had no lever with which to raise them again. “Looks like we couldn’t if we wanted to,” Lucius said.

A chest of shining red metal arose from the floor next to the exit, to which all three of the adventurers turned their attention. Inside sat two leather cuffs, a dark metal spear, and a stack of three gold coins. Before Edmund could even conjure a description for the items, Lucius and Priam each scooped up one of the cuffs.

“The spear’s for you,” Lucius said. “The Depths knows we only take loot that comes in twos.”

Opting not to question how they’d come to such an arrangement, Edmund more than happily picked up the spear. It bore a simple appearance, eight feet of sheer dark gray metal with a pointed tip. It wasn’t until he read its description in the smoke that Edmund knew its true value.

Hyper-Magnetic Spear

Will activated. Can be broken into eight segments and worn as armor. Adheres even to non-magnetic surfaces.

Edmund scowled at the vague text before leaning his new spear against the wall and scurrying over to reclaim the gear he’d left on the floor. He reequipped it all before testing the weapon.

He found he simply had to touch the weapon and think his desire to equip it for it to whirl into action. It split itself into eight pieces, each levitating through the air to attach itself to him. One piece each guarded his upper arms, forearms, shins, and outer thighs. Between the spear tip itself and a secondary tip hidden in the way the segments interlocked, Edmund found himself with a brutally sharp point at the base of each of his wrists. As he made a punching motion, the points surged forward, passing over the back of his hand to stab whatever he struck.

With a second thought the pieces leapt from his body and reformed into a single spear, which he caught as it fell to the ground. Before Edmund could test his fancy new toy further, Lucius raised his voice.

“What’s yellow plus resonance?”

Edmund blinked at the reminder that most people hadn’t started with high resonance Aspects before he answered the question. “That’s my mark, again. In exchange for empowering the monsters, you get slightly higher-resonance Aspects and better loot.”

Lucius froze and shared a quick look with Priam before turning back to Edmund. “How do we get one?”

Edmund shrugged. “You ask nicely?”

Priam laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. “We’ll have to do that, friend.” He smiled. “Thank you for sharing in this challenge with us. It’s been an honor to fight by your side.”

“Just maybe give us a heads up next time before you up the difficulty,” Lucius added with a grin of his own.

Edmund grimaced. “I am sorry about tha—”

“Worry not!” Priam proclaimed. “There’s no challenge we can’t overcome.”

“Too true,” Lucius agreed. His face grew serious as he met Edmund’s gaze. “Good luck on your journey. May you conquer the great dangers ahead and come out stronger on the other side.”

“You too,” Edmund said, wishing he had a more profound reply. “Stay alive down there.”

“We will, we will,” Priam waved away his concerns and ushered Lucius towards the exit. “Until we meet again, Edmund Ahab.”

“Until we meet again,” Lucius echoed.

Edmund waved with a stiff hand and odd sense of relief as he watched the Durne brothers disappear into the darkness between levels. The moment they left, a cloud of smoke washed through the room, and Edmund welcomed its acrid stench. He resented the weakness the company of others subjected him too, even as it made the atmosphere more pleasant. He supposed it was a good thing he trained under such conditions.

Alone once more, Edmund berated himself for failing to warn the twins about his challenger’s mark. Truth be told it’d slipped his mind in the heat of combat, a foolish mistake borne of his inexperience fighting with others. As with all great mistakes, he’d make it but once. At least nobody had died. Yet.

Edmund shut his eyes and envisioned his constellation, opting immediately to form the confluence he’d foregone on the previous floor. With a thought he selected War and Focus to form his newest Aspect.

Tier 4 Aspect: The Target - Bronze+ Resonance

Level 1 - Allows the marking of a single enemy as the target. The target takes increased damage from all sources.

The Target, like The Tactician, rewarded crafting and executing a specific battle plan, though interestingly enough, The Target applied its damage bonus to all sources rather than just Edmund’s attacks. He supposed that had to do with Solitude’s absence from his newest Aspect.

War, Elements, Obsession, Focus, and Madness all increased in level without any visible changes to their descriptions, but Perseverance gained an entire additional line of text.

Tier 1 Aspect: Perseverance - Gray Resonance

Level 9 - Gain health regeneration. Gain greater health regeneration outside of combat.

Edmund supposed the upgrade would do little more than allow him to recover more quickly after a fight, but in situations such as the magnetic field that dealt ongoing damage even without any monsters around, it’d be a huge help.

Content with his upgrades, Edmund blinked away his constellation and turned his attention to the path ahead. The Durne brothers had left his share of the gold—one of the original three coins—in the chest where he’d left it. Edmund slipped it in his satchel, feeling not even a glimmer of excitement at holding more wealth than he’d ever touched.

His gear collected, his Aspect claimed, and with no way to retrace his steps and further explore the level, Edmund set his sights on the exit, on the next floor, on the challenges ahead, and stepped into the darkness.

Edmund Montgomery Ahab, The Crimson Hand

Aspects Unlocked: 18

Tier 1 Aspect: War - Gray+ Resonance

Level 6 - Provides a lesser increase to all damage dealt. Provides a lesser decrease to all damage taken.

Tier 1 Aspect: Elements - Gray Resonance

Level 7 - Provides access to the Firebolt spell.

Tier 1 Aspect: Solitude - Red Resonance

Level 8 - Provides a greater increase to constitution while fighting alone.

Tier 1 Aspect: Perseverance - Gray Resonance

Level 9 - Gain health regeneration. Gain greater health regeneration outside of combat.

Tier 1 Aspect: Madness - Prismatic Resonance

Level 13 - See beyond reality. Touch the unreal. Shape your world.

Tier 2 Aspect: Fervor (Madness and War) - Gold+ Resonance

Level 1 - Empowers the effects of Madness and War for each consecutive second spent in battle.

Tier 2 Aspect: Sorcery (Madness and Elements) - Gold Resonance

Level 1 - Provides access to the Smoke Lash spell.

Tier 2 Aspect: Obsession (Madness and Perseverance) - Gold Resonance

Level 3 - Gain strength and agility for each consecutive day spent pursuing your obsession. Gain mana for each consecutive month spent pursuing your obsession.

Tier 2 Aspect: The Recluse (Madness and Solitude) - Gold Resonance

Level 3 - Empower the effects of Madness while alone. Lessen the effects of Madness while accompanied.

Tier 2 Aspect: The Island (Solitude and Perseverance) - Gray Resonance

Level 5 - Grants resistance to over-time effects while in groups of two or fewer.

Tier 3 Aspect: Focus (Elements and Obsession) - Silver Resonance

Level 2 - Doubles spell damage when attacking a single target.

Tier 3 Aspect: The Philosopher (Elements and The Recluse) - Silver+ Resonance

Level 2 - Question the concept of truth.

Tier 3 Aspect: The Rift (Madness and The Island) - Gold Resonance

Level 4 - Provides access to the Rend active ability.

Tier 4 Aspect: The Tactician (War and The Philosopher) - Bronze+ Resonance

Level 1 - Deal double damage when executing a pre-crafted battle plan.

Tier 4 Aspect: The Target (War and Focus) - Bronze+ Resonance

Level 1 - Allows the marking of a single enemy as the target. The target takes increased damage from all sources.

Tier 4 Aspect: The Fissure (Elements and The Rift) - Silver Resonance

Level 2 - Provides access to the Magma Fissure spell.

Tier 4 Aspect: Rebellion (War and The Rift) - Gold+ Resonance

Level 1 - Grants resistance to mind controlling effects. Deal bonus damage to enemies above your level.

Tier 5 Aspect: The Breach (War and The Fissure) - Bronze+ Resonance

Level 1 - Provides access to the Break Through active ability.

Delver’s Mark of the Challenger

Empowers nearby dungeon monsters. Significantly increases the value of loot chests you open. Slightly increases the resonance of Aspects you unlock.

The Crimson Hand

Grants minor resistance to piercing damage. Bestows ownership of the Dread Gauntlet of Kor’Ilinesh.

Trailblazer’s Sigil of the Azure Journeyman

The fourth step on the Path of the Azure Fox. Increases agility. Grants two windsteps. Increases positional awareness.

Trailblazer bonus: Sharpens hearing.

Trailblazer’s Sigil of the Rootmother

Non-intelligent Strethian lifeforms will treat you as an ally. Gain the ability to draw water and nutrients from fertile soil.

Trailblazer bonus: draw water and nutrients from all soil.

Cloudkith Sigil

Cloud-based lifeforms will treat you as an ally. Gain enhanced perception through vision-reducing effects.