Yerin landed in the next room. Words appeared in front of her, but she couldn't read them. She didn't waste her time glancing at the scroll.
“Rules?” she asked impatiently. When she hadn't read the text in the first trial, the voice from the Ninecloud court had explained things to her.
“Open the box,” the disembodied woman explained. “The man in the chair has the key in his soulspace, or you can solve the puzzle keeping the box shut. You will be graded on speed and skill, but you may use any methods you like.”
Instantly, Yerin drove her hand—surrounded by sword madra—at the man's Forged gray throat.
He slipped aside, as fast as she was, and his eyes shone with a bright platinum light. “Thief!” he roared. A pair of axes appeared in his hands, and he revealed his spirit: Underlord.
He swung his weapons at her, but that was his mistake. The sword-aura around them rang like a bell, and sparks flew as the Endless Sword blocked both blows. His weapons flew to either side, and Yerin drove her hand through his chest.
He broke apart immediately, but the key didn't just fall to the ground, as she had hoped. A fake Remnant rose from his body, a towering shrimp-like creature with claws poised.
Yerin leaped into the air.
~~~
The instant the words “Open the Box” appeared, Sha Miara gave a delicate laugh. She placed her fingertips on the box, filling its every nook with her royal madra, the power that commanded all.
The puzzle solved itself.
As it popped open, she let a ripple of rainbow madra flow from her into the Forged man in the chair.
“Congratulate me,” she commanded, and he fell to press his forehead against the stone.
~~~
Sophara held the box in her hand, drowning it in Flowing Flame madra. Golden power surged around it, heating it, breaking it down.
“That box is protected by the power of an Overlord,” the man said, holding his chin in one hand.
The Underlady slipped some soulfire into her technique, pouring forth more madra. The box rose into the air at the center of a golden globe, blazing bright.
After less than a minute, molten metal poured out.
~~~
Eithan tapped the edge of the table with the scroll. “You look bored.”
“I have to look after you,” the construct-man answered, rolling his eyes.
“Ah, but that is your good fortune! For I am the most delightful conversationalist the world has ever seen.”
“...I'm not going to tell you how to open the box.”
Eithan folded his hands into his elaborately ornamented sleeves and leaned forward, smiling eagerly.
“I'm sure, I'm sure, but I need to wait a good minute or two before I leave. So tell me, as we pass the time, what's it like being you? Are you being controlled by an outside force, are you a copy of the one who created you, or do you only have your own rudimentary awareness?”
Chapter 11
Lindon passed the third and fourth trials without using any new techniques. He was afraid that he might be exposing a few too many of Dross’ capabilities, but who could tell what was going on inside Lindon’s head?
[Northstrider,] Dross answered, as the darkness faded away to reveal the fifth trial. [Northstrider could. He’s smart enough on his own, and who knows what version of me he’s cooked up since Ghostwater? Maybe he’ll pull me out of your brain without hurting you!]
Lindon resolved to use Dross as little as possible, but the fifth trial tested his determination immediately.
In a cramped room with a high ceiling, a nightmarish creature loomed over him. It was a giant shaped like a man, and its leathery gray skin bulged with muscle.
It hunched over him, dressed in ragged scraps of hide, its arms hanging so low that his knuckles scraped against the floor. It wore a hideous bone mask that grew over its face, a long red tongue lolling out of its mouth, and it carried a rough metal cleaver the size of Lindon's body.
At a glance, he suspected there was exactly enough room for the creature to swing the weapon.
Golden, fiery letters appeared in front of him: “Kill the Enemy.”
There was no scroll this time. Instead, a monstrous gray hand swept a jagged blade at him.
With a hasty Soul Cloak and the reaction speed that Dross provided, Lindon slipped aside...but the impact of the cleaver against the ground shook the room, ruining his footing.
Lindon dashed forward, pushing through the creature's powerful stench. Another palm rushed at him, and Lindon had no choice but to catch the attack in his own hands.
He caught the strike, but the giant's strength shoved his body backward against the ground.
[I bet you wish you had a weapon,] Dross observed.
Remind me to get one, Lindon responded, calling Blackflame into his palms. The giant roared and lashed backward, and Lindon conjured dragon's breath.
~~~
Charity watched Lindon on the display in the arena for the first time. He shoved the giant's hand aside, drilled a hole in its arm with black dragon's breath as it tried to swing the cleaver at him, and then burned through its skull.
A round of cheering sounded in the crowd—mostly from the Akura section—but nothing particularly enthusiastic. The view soon returned to more exciting fights. Many of the failures were more interesting than Lindon. Some of them got cut in half by the giant, only to re-form seconds later and start the fight from the beginning while still trembling in fear.
She watched the closest ranking board as Lindon's name moved up to thirty-first.
He began the sixth trial only a few minutes behind the top competitors.
~~~
In the eighth trial, Lindon had to run through a hazy yellow fog that burned his lungs with every breath. Biting snakes and stinging flies lunged at him from within the fog, and the entire place was filthy with venom aura.
He managed to dodge the snakes, but there was no avoiding the flies. They and the fog filled his veins with poison.
Which his Bloodforged Iron body broke down almost immediately.
Lindon jogged forward without obstruction. His madra had been restored at the end of each test, so he fueled his Iron body without worry.
[You're probably falling behind,] Dross said. [You don't want to be in first, but you don't want to be in last either. Why don't you make up some time here?]
After giving it some more thought, Lindon activated the Soul Cloak and ran all-out.
~~~
On the board, Lindon's name ticked up to twentieth.
~~~
“Stay on the Bridge,” the fiery letters told Lindon.
A bridge stretched out before him over an endless chasm. As he watched, it split into five bridges, each stretching in a different direction. The bridges began to undulate like swimming snakes, and then each bridge splintered into five more.
[Illusions, blech,] Dross said.
And Lindon saw one bridge stretching in front of him, perfectly straight. Ghostly illusions moved to either side, but they no longer fooled him.
Just like in the previous test, he ran steadily forward. The bridge was broken in places, but nothing he couldn't jump.
When he reached the end, he was a little disappointed. Is that all?
[Stay on your guard,] Dross said grimly. [Next is test number ten. The fifth trial was a mandatory fight, so if I'm right...]
The world darkened and brightened again, revealing a wide arena-like room filled with blowing wild grass. Another creature waited for him, a bone mask growing from its face, but its resemblance to the fifth-trial guardian ended there.
It was small, flat, and hunched, with grass growing from its back like fur. It clutched a staff topped with a human skull, and pale light pouring upward from the skull's eye sockets. The monster’s forked black tongue flickered out of its mask, tasting the air.
“Kill the Enemy.”
As soon as the letters faded, the creature raised its staff...and split into three. Its duplicates raised their staves, and all three faded away until they were halfway transparent. They ran around him, trailing green fog that drifted closer to him.