None of them were willing to let things go that easily so she pulled the information from him before any of them would set foot on the next floor, just to get the barest amount of context on what had happened to him. When she’d woken up from her nightmare, it was just the four of them, no Ben in sight and from what her aunt had to say he hadn’t been there the entire time, like he’d never arrived on the floor.

She knew that was ridiculous, he’d been the first in with the rest of them coming in close behind, there was no way they could have passed him or missed it if he’d decided to turn back, but that had left them with no answers and two options, either wait to see if anything would happen or go through to the next floor.

She’d been the one to put her foot down that they would wait and in the end it seemed like it had been the right call as Ben explained the ordeal he’d just been put through, trapped in a far more real way than the mind effect she’d just been under, even if it sounded like it came with the small bit of payoff that was him gaining his eighth awakened skill, though he seemed to have some complaints there too.

“Why is this the second time I’m getting the prefix ‘unnatural’ for a mind skill? This is bullying from the system! Not to mention that I still wasn’t able to awaken sacrilege again. I seriously have no clue what the hell this is going to end up taking.”

She had no answer for the second, but the first of his complaints was easy enough for anyone to see, especially her since even if she hadn’t come face to face with the full thing, she’d seen enough.

“It gets called unnatural because it is. That isn’t something people have going on in their heads Ben. You’re just lucky you didn’t have that added to your knowledge skill as well considering how you read.”

“I mean, I wasn’t going quite so crazy with my reading till I got it anyway so that just would’ve been unfair. But anyway, that’s what was happening to me so are we ready to move on?”

She felt herself forming a headache with the question. They didn’t have a choice but to move onto the next floor, there was no chance to leave now, but the fact that Ben had somehow ended up in a situation like that could only make her worry.

What are the odds something like this happens again? If we count what he went through in the life tower then I don’t like his odds and for all we know, we could get another floor with some mind effect that wasn’t designed to handle one like his.

Still, what choice did they have? There was no turning back and worrying wouldn’t help, all they could do was go to the final floor and hope nothing like that happened again which was exactly what they did, with Thera sending up a quick prayer of hope that nothing would go wrong even if she knew it wouldn’t have much effect.

To their luck though, things seemed fine. Ben was there and nobody else was missing, even if his first words on the floor seemed perfectly designed to counteract that good feeling.

“Well, this isn’t ideal.”

“Gods above, what?”

“I haven’t seen this floor.”

They found themselves in a vast, open plain, grassy fields surrounding them that looked like they went on forever and by all accounts would have made for a lovely atmosphere if not for the situation they were trapped in. The fact that, unlike the last four levels, they had no clue what they were about to face only made things worse and Thera couldn’t help but cast her eyes around, trying to find a sign or a countdown or something that might give them a bit of direction, only to come up empty.

“Great, then what should we do?” She muttered, wondering where this could possibly be going, with her aunt being the first to find the answer.

“Looks like another combat stage,” Funa said, nodding into the distance while the rest of them struggled to barely see the growing dot coming towards them. “Doesn’t seem so bad, it looks like you girls will be able to get another fair bit of practice out of it.”

“Or we could not and you could deal with it?” Karly tried, her hopes ending up dashed.

“I’ll step in before you die so do your best. I should probably also mention… On second thought, it might be better for you to see it for yourself, think of it as hands-on practice, not that Thera will have much to deal with here.”

Karly was busy looking betrayed by whatever it was that she was about to have to put up with while Thera kept her focus on the coming threat, doing her best to be at the ready as she considered the spells she could use from dark magic in a combat scenario and finding herself lacking. While there was no end to what she might consider when she was able to access her other magics, using solely dark made things trickier and she kept looking at her options till it was close enough to see just what they’d be facing.

“Huh, think we can win this by answering its riddles three?” Ben muttered, briefly distracting her as she tried to figure out what that could possibly mean before bringing her focus back to the threat before her.

With a feminine head, similar in shape to what many of the intelligent races in the world might have, only connected to a sleek, beast-like body being carried by dark wings, Thera stretched her memory, trying to put a name to the creature coming at them but coming up blank until Karly did it for her.

“Sphynx. Goddamn, that’s pretty big, huh?”

She sounded nervous and Thera didn’t blame her. Being nervous was probably the appropriate response. It wasn’t even at them yet and it already looked huge, she was sure that it had to be as big as a house, and with sharp teeth and razor-like claws, they doubted it would be a fun fight, especially if the two of them were going to be left to look after both Ben and her mother as well.

Okay, this is fine. Aunty wouldn’t let either of them die so they shouldn’t actually be a problem. That just leaves how we’re going to handle this.

“Hey Funa, am I allowed to offer suggestions here or want me leaving things to them?” Ben asked, seeming content to leave it as a training experience if the great spirit thought it best.

“I think we’ll happily take a suggestion!” Karly yelled at him. It had to be a few seconds away and they were both preparing their spells, but neither would say no to an easy answer.

Still, he waited to see what her aunt had to say, with the great spirit shaking her head at the end.

“I feel like if you give them the answer it will be too easy though. Thera could use the practice for thinking about how to strategically use her dark magic and Karly needs to properly face something powerful like this to grow.”

“I’d rather not!”

She was ignored by her teacher though and by then it was too late. In a flash, Funa had whisked both Ben and her mother away, leaving the two of them alone with the monster before them as it came swooping down, claws gleaming and ready to strike.

Both threw themselves out of the way, narrowly avoiding its attack while it went back to the skies, preparing for a second pass.

Before it could though, Thera struck, casting a sleep spell and putting vast swaths of power behind it to bring it crashing down, only to fall short at the end.

The beast had to have a stronger resistance than she’d expected and it woke up before it hit the ground, bringing it down but leaving it unharmed. Worse, it was close and ready for another strike.

It was as if it moved in slow motion when she watched it lunge and she fumbled with her spell, still primed to fire a sleep spell that would still leave the monster’s giant mass hurtling towards her and at the last second she jumped to dodge instead, with Karly using the moment she wasn’t being watched to fire her own attack.

Shaping a fear spell, she launched it with all she thought she could, ending with a result she never would have been prepared for. Karly thought she had a decent understanding of her mana pool by that point, but despite that, the moment the attack was unleashed, driving the beast back to the skies, she’d passed out, gripped by mana exhaustion and in Funa’s arms before she could hit the ground.

“What? What happened?” Thera yelled out, not understanding as her aunt gave a disappointed tisk.

“She’ll be fine, don’t worry. It’s the effect I was saying she’d have to deal with before. This floor is debuffing everyone's mana pool and regeneration rates to a quarter of what they’d normally be. I was hoping she’d notice it herself, not succumb to her first spell. There really is always so much more to teach, isn’t there?”

…I guess that’s why she said I wasn’t going to have to worry about it. And now I’m on my own. Great.

Even quartered, Thera’s mana pool and regeneration rates were so high that there wasn’t a chance she could cast anything to leave her under the same effect, but it still meant she was facing it alone unless things got dire enough for Funa to step in, a result she didn’t particularly want. She wanted to be able to beat it herself, the only question was how.

Ben saw a solution immediately, it can’t be that hard, right? Or it's easy to solve when you can think a billion things at once in slow motion.

She saw it come back around to dive once more, swooping to the ground as she cast the same fear spell as Karly to give herself a bit more wiggle room, only to see it. Any easy solution as well, it just came down to timing.

For anyone else, they would need to consider their mana management, but that wasn’t a worry for her. The thought didn’t even cross her mind. All she did was prepare two separate spells and wait for it to shake the fear it had just been inflicted with before coming down again.

She’d seen it attack enough now to know it had a preferred method, dive bombing its targets in an attempt to rip them from the ground, and from there she just needed to choose the exact time to strike. Not too soon that it would have the couple seconds it needed to shake the effects of any spell she cast, not too late that it was already preparing to swoop back up.

Getting it right meant waiting impossibly long, able to do nothing but watch as it bore down on her and have faith in herself when she finally fired, moving with all of her might the moment she did to avoid being taken out by the body as it smacked against the ground at impossible speeds, breaking with a sickening thud and shaking the land around it.

She didn’t know at first if she’d done it and kept on guard, trying to think of a next move if it got up again or something else came out, when what should have been a pile of bones and meat evaporated into particles of light, and with that they were finished, the last floor done.

Her legs almost gave out in relief. It had ended far quicker than the last floors for the previous towers and with her aunt there it had been significantly less dangerous, but standing in front of a monster bearing down on her like that still took something out of her, enough so that she didn’t immediately notice the particles of light it had been recondensing, taking shape and filling the floor with the feeling of divinity with her goddess, Anailia, before her.

In an instant she was bowing, same with both Karly and her mother, unable to do anything else with the feeling that came with being in her presence, while their goddess gave a light chuckle.

“Please, all of you rise,” She told them, making them fight past the feeling to see her gentle smile and happy eyes. “I must say, I had my expectations when the child of Myriad said he was going to cheat his way through, but I never expected you to get this sort of help. Quite a few up here aren’t happy with how this turned out.”

“And with all due respect, they can suck it,” Ben told her happily. “They lost, that’s all, better luck killing us next time.”

“Ben!” Thera yelled at him in horror to hear him talk like that while her goddess only laughed all the harder.

“Ah Thera, pay it no mind. You don’t worship those others and since I feel nothing but joy to see how far he’d go for one of my children there’s nothing to take offense to. And he’s right. This is perhaps as clear a triumph over a tower as one could get, minus the small incident on the fourth floor, and now it’s time for you to be rewarded for getting to the top. Given that we’ll be doing things a little differently here, I don’t suppose any of you will have any issue with me getting Thera sorted before I distribute blessings?”

There were no arguments so Anailia leaned forward, gently kissing Thera’s brow, just as she’d done at the end of her personal trial, making a notification ring out in her head as the rest of the area flooded with light from the massive amount of mana pouring into her with the change.

More than the massive feeling of strength and power that had come to her thanks to her attribute growth, more than any joy about how things had worked with her levels, given that by being at the ninth, that meant she was able to get to the first of her awakened skill instead of the zeroth, and more than the increase in potential she could feel in her dark magic since it had awakened by merging into one of her blessed skills, what Thera was feeling then and there was an absence. There was no need to even check, it was like she could feel in her soul that she was no longer giving off her charm, and with it was a feeling of being free.

She couldn’t speak at first, she didn’t know what to say, too flooded with joy to put it to words but she must have given it away easily enough. Both her mother and Ben were on her in an instant, hugging her tight with the two coming off even happier than she was. It wouldn’t have felt surprising if any of them cried and Anailia was content to let them have that moment before she was composed enough to speak as she addressed her goddess.

“Thank you Anailia, I really don’t know how to properly show my gratitude.”

“The part I played was rather small, child. I believe those words should be going to another.”

Ben will be seeing plenty of appreciation when things are a little more private.

It was meant to be a private thought but she couldn’t hide it from the goddess before her, getting another chuckle in the end.

“Very well, that just leaves one more thing before we handle the rest. Funa, how would you like to handle your due rewards?”

Thera didn’t understand the question at first, but it made sense. Her aunt couldn’t raise her magic and blessings did nothing for her, but she couldn’t guess what options there could be until she spoke up.

“Give my niece my level and add my blessing to my student’s, that should be fine.”

The notification rang out in her head before she had the chance to say anything but her face must have been painted with shock judging from the amused look she was getting.

“Don’t be so surprised, it would be wasted on me so this is for the best,” Funa chuckled. “Given how high your growth potential is, giving you the level should really just save you some time while Karly will get more use out of the extra blessing to raise her attributes.”

At the details he was hearing, Ben spoke up. “Wait, if we’re allowed to do that then-”

She was about to cut him off to say there was no way in hell she was going to take either of his rewards, but her goddess spoke first.

“Funa was allowed this as an extenuating circumstance, but under normal conditions, we don’t. It would be improper for someone to bring others to the top for the purpose of claiming their rewards.”

“Drat, fine.”

Her goddess looked none too displeased about what Ben had tried however, but she moved on to the final rewards as blessings were given and those still waiting got their levels.

It was only once that was done that they were finished. Anailia congratulated them again and they stepped outside, the sun feeling brighter than ever before while Thera did her best to not be overtaken by her sheer joy.