As I stand in front of the black fog, my heart starts racing at the possibilities of what it could be hiding. I take one last deep breath and step into the wall of darkness, feeling the cold brush against my skin as I walk through, sword held out in front of me, just in case something is waiting on the other side. Once again, my foot breaks through the darkness first, acting as a bridge that lets my spatial perception flow out, mapping the new room.
Sensing no immediate danger, I fully step through, leaving the fog wall behind me. The room I stand in now is long and narrow. It’s more of a tunnel or hallway than a room. The ceiling is about ten feet tall, and the walls are about eight feet apart, all made of rough stone brickwork, clearly not a natural formation. I can’t see the color of the bricks, as I am still in complete darkness, and any light would be more of a disadvantage to me right now anyway. Whatever kind of stone it is, it also blocks my spatial senses from penetrating it, so I just push my senses further out into the hallway in front of me.
Without the option to send my senses out in a perfect sphere, I am forced to make it a weird shape, conforming to the shape and layout of the tunnels around me. It takes more concentration to do this for some reason, and after some more fiddling with my skill, I am able to comfortably hold my spatial perception in odd shapes without losing focus. I even find out that by sacrificing range in one area, I can boost it in another, letting me scout out further into the tunnels than before.
After a few steps away from the fog wall, it turns from a wavy wall into something much more solid. I go back and put my hand on it. Smooth and solid, no getting through there. Man, this dungeon really doesn’t like going back after you decide to enter. Well, realizing there is only one way forward, I push my perception down the tunnel and start walking, hoping to run into Daniel sooner rather than later.
I walk for about half an hour, according to the quest timer, before I reach my first crossroads—well, before my spatial senses reach them. Still not seeing anything to worry about, I push forward until I am at the split in the path. It’s a T-intersection, with two paths open to me, left and right. Sending my senses down the left hallway, I see that it continues for a while, with two branching paths before my perception reaches its limit. The right path is shorter, maybe just thirty feet before it turns and leads to another short hallway, this one with a door at the end.
Choosing the right path because it seems more interesting, I start walking towards the door, which also blocks my perception like the stone bricks surrounding me. Whoever designed this dungeon really didn’t want anyone to see through walls. It would make navigating this place a whole lot easier.
I reach the door shortly after. It's made of a smooth stone with a knob right in the middle of one side. The door reaches nearly all the way to the roof and has no visible hinges or anything.
“Well, there’s nothing else to do. Might as well go in.” I say as I put my free hand on the doorhandle.
[You have found a trial room]
[Do you wish to enter? Y/N]
A trial room? Is that how this place operates, a bunch of rooms hidden in a maze? Should I enter, or should I look for Daniel? He’s strong, probably stronger than me in an outright fight, and these tunnels should help him, especially with his shots. He’ll be fine, and this trial is making me too curious to leave.
I mentally confirm, and the door immediately opens a little bit, like it was just unlocked. My perception leaks into the room now that I have access, showing me everything it once hid.
The room is another small one, a cube made of the same bricks as the walls out here, with two pedestals standing in the middle of the floor. Both are identical stone pillars reaching up to my waist or so, with mana crystals sitting right on top of them. I enter the room and walk up to the pillars, examining them with all my senses before I touch anything.
The only thing in the room that reacts to any of my probing is the mana crystals, which to all of my senses seem to be similar in quality to the one I got from the shaman, albeit a bit smaller, and in the shape of a perfect sphere. I try to grab one, but it’s attached to the pedestal somehow, preventing me from running off with it. The other one is just as secure. I stand in the room for a few more seconds, waiting for something to happen, but it never does.
“Maybe I need to close the door. Probably a solo trial or something."
I walk back over and push the door closed. It makes a soft click as it becomes flush with the wall, and one of the crystals in the room starts glowing as mana begins to run through it. After just a few seconds an orb appears above it, made purely from mana, much like the ones Halon taught me to make. A few more seconds pass, but the orb holds firm, a perfect sphere, better than I can create at my current ability. I look to the other pillar, and then the purpose of this trial clicks in my head.
I walk to the other crystal and try my best to form a sphere of mana over it. I’m able to do it rather easily, even if it’s a bit rougher, and after a few seconds both crystals flash with mana, and the other orb changes to a cube. I turn my sphere into a cube, much slower and much shittier than the dungeon does, but after a few seconds of holding concentration, it must be good enough, as the crystals flash and the shape changes again.
The next shape is much trickier. It’s basically a ladder, but going from top to bottom, the rungs get thicker and thicker. I get as far as creating a basic ladder shape, but before I can even try to change the size of the rungs, I lose focus for just a moment, and all the mana slips away from me, dissipating into the air. Both crystals flash with light, and then the ladder turns back into a sphere, probably waiting for my next attempt.
I look around the room again and even check my [System] notifications, looking for any sign of an attempt or time limit. Looking back to the door, the only thing on it is the handle. Touching it, I get another notification.
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[Do you wish to exit? Y/N]
I take my hand off the handle and smile. Is this intentional? Am I supposed to use this place as a safe area? Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I sit down and start practicing my external mana shaping. I skip the step of solidifying my mana, as the test never did that, and focus on making that ladder.
Hours pass as most attempts end with my mana dissipating and me having to restart from square one, but eventually I am able to get it, or close enough that I’m confident enough to continue. Even though the ladder is probably good enough, who knows what will come after that, so I keep at it for a while longer, losing track of time and putting all of my focus into this training.
After running through a few more complex shapes of my own design, I start working on holding two constructs at once, just spheres for now. After finally getting that down, I feel like I’m competent enough with mana to finish the trial. I check my notifications from my training first, smiling at the additional level.
[You have leveled up an active skill]
[Mana Shaping] lvl 12
Standing over the pillar, with my hand hovering over the crystal, I create a perfect sphere out of my mana. Both crystals flash, and then I follow what the other pillar wants me to do, making a cube, and then finally onto the ladder. After about a dozen seconds I am able to complete it, and the crystals flash once again, this time returning back to a sphere.
Back to the start, or something different? I focus on the sphere, examining it with my [Mana Sense] as thoroughly as I can, trying to find any hints or secrets to mana manipulation it may hold. After several minutes of study, I finally pinpoint what I think the trial wants me to replicate. The mana inside the sphere is constantly shifting. I don’t know if it’s some kind of mana frequency or wavelength, but to my senses it kind of looks like the mana is vibrating in a specific way.
A few more minutes of observation, [Mana Sense] levels up to eleven, and I feel like I can copy the sphere. Shaping my mana back into a sphere, I start to apply what I’ve learned, changing my mana to more closely resemble that of the other sphere. This one takes me a lot longer than the rest, nearly ten minutes before both crystals flash, telling me I have completed this part of the trial.
This time, the mana gets sucked back into the crystal, and no new shape emerges. The crystal in front of me begins glowing, and after a few seconds, it pops out of its socket on the pillar, loosely resting where it once was firmly secured. I pick up the crystal and run my mana through it, checking out my new prize.
It’s red, just like the one from the shaman, but has an even greater capacity for mana. Is it because this one is cut into a perfect sphere and the other one is rough? Or is it because this one is from a dungeon and the other one isn’t? Too many unknowns, and too little time. I pocket the crystal for later and decide to leave the room, as I have spent nearly four hours inside. I stop for a second and consider using this room to sleep, as it has been right around a day since I woke up, but decide against it as I am not even a little bit tired yet. Probably some side effect of leveling or mana, who knows. I walk over to the door and get the same message as before, but this time I mentally hit yes.
The door clicks open, and before I can even get my spatial perception on the other side, it slams into me, knocking me backwards and onto the floor before I can react. My sword falls out of my grip and clatters to the floor across the room. My spatial senses warn me of a figure rushing through the open door with an axe raised above its head, aimed right for me.
I roll out of the way as quickly as my body allows, barely getting out of the axehead's way in time. Looking up at my attacker, I can see that it is a hobgoblin, and it has an orb of light floating above one of its shoulders, illuminating the room. It’s wearing leather armor with a few rusty metal plates attached over some vital areas but thankfully only has the one handaxe for a weapon and no shield.
I send mana to my arms and legs, burning it as I launch myself from the floor into my opponent, tackling it to the ground. I manage to position myself on top of the hobgoblin, grabbing both of its wrists and pinning them to the floor. Despite being shorter than me, the hobgoblin is a good bit stronger, but mana boosting allows me to match it, at least for a little while.
In the struggle of trying to keep these goblins' arms tied down, I realize it’s a losing battle. I’m sitting here, burning a ton of mana each second, while the hobgoblin loses nothing. I will tire before he does, so I need to do something about that, fast. My first thought is a mana-boosted headbutt, but his skull looks much stronger than mine, so I throw that idea out. Then I think back to the goblin evolution pit fight all those days ago and how I created a spatial warp inside that goblin's head. I turn my focus to the hobgoblin's wrist, the one attached to the hand holding the axe, and start to shove my mana inside, allowing me to invade a small part of his body with my spatial senses.
I start shoving mana into [Space Control], feeding it far more mana than I did for that poor goblin in the pit fight. I focus not on creating an implosion like I did before, but on creating a plane of space that is ‘sharp,’ hopefully allowing me to do some damage. I feel a small ‘disc’ form inside the middle of the wrist, and I focus on thinning out the space around the edge, creating a severing edge.
My mana tanks as I feed more and more into the skill. The edge of the spatial warp gets thinner and thinner as it rapidly gains density, eventually becoming something like a solid, but far more unstable. Once I feel it reach an equilibrium, seemingly full of my mana and at its maximum for density, I use my skill to expand it, cutting through flesh, sinew, and bone before it reaches my hand and stops, cleanly separating the hobgoblin's hand from its arm.
The green beast screams out in pain and rage, filling my nose with its foul breath, its eyes filled with a fury directed solely at me. I give it a big grin, showing my teeth as it struggles against me with one hand less than it is used to. It starts to slam its stump into my side, but I pay it no attention, reaching for my dagger with my now free hand and plunging it toward my foe's neck. It tries to get its bloody stump in the way, but I create a rift, letting my blade pass into its neck unimpeded, completely bypassing its attempt to defend itself.
[You have slain a creature]
[Level 19 Forest Hobgoblin]
[You have leveled up an active skill]
[Space Control] lvl 12
[Space Control] lvl 13
A smile comes to my face as I get off the dead goblin and lie down on my back, breathing heavily after the sudden and very quick fight. Two levels in [Space Control] from that fight? Checking my mana stores, I can see that maneuver probably drained two-thirds of my mana, causing me to be almost out now, as I had to use a good amount in the trial.
I stand up and close the door, making sure it locks before I relax.
“Well, maybe I will use this room to sleep.”