They hit the ground much harder than expected.
Qaritas rolled across slick black stone, his shoulder slamming into a wall coated in thick emerald slime. Pain shot through his arm, knocking the breath from his lungs as he tumbled to a stop.
Behind him, the battered metal raft struck the floor with a deafening crash before sliding into darkness.
Beside him, Xheavend landed on one knee.
She remained there.
One hand on the ground.
The other gripping her coral-edged short sword.
Waiting.
Listening.
For one heartbeat—
Silence.
Then—
Drip.
Something cold landed against Qaritas's cheek.
He frowned.
Slowly reached up.
His fingertips came away coated in thick translucent slime.
Not water.
Not sap.
Something else.
It stretched between his fingers in long, sticky strands, almost refusing to break.
Then—
It moved.
The slime slowly crawled across his skin, inching toward the wall as though trying to return home.
Qaritas immediately wiped it against a nearby rock.
The rock absorbed it.
Like flesh swallowing blood.
"..."
"No," Qaritas decided.
"I already dislike this floor."
Inside him, Eon answered immediately.
"A sensible opinion."
Qaritas climbed to his feet and finally looked around.
His stomach sank.
This wasn't another prison level.
It wasn't another cavern.
It wasn't even architecture.
It was...
alive.
The ceiling disappeared somewhere above into an ocean of darkness where roots thicker than warships twisted through the stone like the veins of an ancient titan. They intertwined around one another, disappearing into impossible distances before descending again through the earth.
Some pulsed.
Slowly.
As though carrying blood.
Or something pretending to be blood.
Towering mushrooms rose everywhere around them.
Not clusters.
Forests.
Caps larger than houses glowed with pale blues, ghostly whites, and sickly greens that painted the darkness in an eerie twilight. Their stems were as wide as castle towers, their undersides lined with glowing gills that shimmered whenever unseen air drifted through them.
Vines wrapped around everything.
Ancient ruins.
Broken statues.
Collapsed walkways.
Each vine was swollen with thick crimson sap that moved through transparent membranes in slow rhythmic pulses.
Heartbeat.
Heartbeat.
Throb.
Tiny spores floated through the air like snowfall.
Some glowed.
Others vanished whenever they touched the ground.
The smell reminded Qaritas of wet earth...
mixed with old hospitals...
mixed with fresh rain...
mixed with something quietly rotting beneath all three.
The floor itself wasn't stone.
Not entirely.
Black rock broke apart every few yards into carpets of soft moss, tangled roots, and fungal shelves that climbed over one another like overlapping waves.
Water trickled somewhere nearby.
Yet beneath the trickling water...
Something answered.
A low pressure rolled through the earth.
Slow.
Patient.
As though the cavern itself were shifting somewhere far below.
Almost too quiet to notice.
He frowned.
"...Do you hear that?"
Eon was already listening.
"I do."
Qaritas stepped toward one wall.
It resembled ordinary stone at first glance.
Until he noticed tiny veins branching beneath its surface.
Almost invisible.
Curious, he rested one hand against it.
Cold.
Smooth.
Solid.
Then—
The wall shifted.
Not dramatically.
Not enough to collapse.
Barely an inch.
But it moved.
With the deliberate flex of living tissue.
Qaritas jerked his hand away.
The wall continued moving.
Another inch.
Then stopped.
Silence returned.
Neither of them spoke.
Finally—
Eon broke it.
"...This maze is alive."
Qaritas looked down the corridor.
"...Wonderful."
"We are inside an organism."
"I liked it better when it was merely trying to kill us."
"It is still trying to kill us."
"...Fair."
They continued forward.
The corridor curved naturally between enormous fungal trunks before opening into something resembling a village.
Or what passed for one inside the Labyrinth.
Voices drifted through the glowing mist.
Not screams.
Conversation.
Soft.
Calm.
Almost peaceful.
Qaritas slowed.
"So..."
"They're survivors."
They survived this long.
The first figures emerged between towering mushrooms.
Humanoid.
Graceful.
Unnaturally thin.
Their charcoal-black skin reflected the blue glow surrounding them while delicate silver veins shimmered beneath the surface like moonlight trapped inside obsidian glass.
Instead of hair...
Long pale tendrils floated around their heads.
Not blowing in any wind.
Simply drifting through the air as though suspended underwater.
One stood completely still.
Looking upward.
Eyes unfocused.
Whispering.
"...yes..."
A pause.
"...I understand..."
Another pause.
"...no... the stars are quieter today..."
Qaritas looked toward the ceiling.
There was nothing there.
No one.
Yet the figure nodded respectfully.
"...thank you."
He walked away as though the conversation had been perfectly normal.
Another of the strange people approached a stone wall.
Stopped.
Placed one hand against it.
"Oh."
A small embarrassed smile crossed their face.
"My apologies."
They bowed.
To the wall.
Then carefully stepped around it before continuing on.
Qaritas stared.
"...I have several questions."
Eon's answer came instantly.
"Do not ask them."
"One question."
"No."
"Half a question?"
"No."
"They apologized to a wall."
"They did."
"That deserves an explanation."
"It deserves distance."
Qaritas watched another resident stop beside a glowing root.
The root twitched.
The resident thanked it.
Then continued walking.
He slowly rubbed both temples.
"I miss normal."
Eon sounded almost amused.
"You have never experienced normal."
"...You make an excellent point."
Around them, the strange settlement continued its quiet existence.
Children chased glowing insects through fields of luminous moss.
Elders sat beneath mushroom caps, listening intently to voices only they seemed capable of hearing.
No one looked surprised to see two strangers.
No one appeared frightened.
If anything...
Several smiled kindly as Qaritas and Xheavend passed.
It should have been comforting.
Instead...
It felt profoundly wrong.
Because somewhere beneath the quiet conversations...
Beneath the drifting spores...
Beneath the breathing walls...
The maze itself continued to inhale.
And exhale.
Waiting.
For one impossible moment...
It almost felt peaceful.
Then—
Someone screamed.
Not in terror.
In warning.
"RUN!"
Everything changed.
The entire settlement erupted into motion.
Families abandoned meals still sitting on stone tables.
Parents scooped children into their arms.
Elders who moments ago could barely walk suddenly ran with desperate speed.
Nobody gathered belongings.
Nobody asked questions.
Nobody looked back.
They simply fled.
Like people who had practiced this hundreds of times before.
Like people who already knew what happened to anyone who hesitated.
Qaritas stepped forward.
"What happened?"
Nobody answered.
A young mother nearly collided with him before darting around, clutching two children against her chest.
A man carrying an elderly woman over his shoulders sprinted past.
Several figures disappeared into narrow side passages.
Others vanished beneath living roots that opened only long enough to swallow them before sealing shut again.
The village emptied in seconds.
One old man stumbled toward Qaritas.
His body appeared carved from cracked stone and pale ash.
Golden embers burned quietly where his eyes should have been.
Chunks of his shoulder crumbled away with every hurried step before reforming again.
He grabbed Qaritas's sleeve with trembling fingers.
His voice barely rose above a whisper.
"Don't..."
He struggled to breathe.
"...stop."
Then he released him.
Turned.
And kept running.
Qaritas watched him disappear into the glowing mist.
Silence followed.
Too much silence.
"...What are they running from?"
Inside him...
Eon said nothing.
No explanation.
No theory.
No warning.
Only silence.
Then—
One word.
Cold.
Absolute.
Ordered.
"Run."
Qaritas didn't hesitate.
He grabbed Xheavend's hand.
"Move."
She saw his face.
Didn't argue.
Together they ran.
At first...
Nothing followed.
Only the sound of their footsteps splashing through damp moss.
Only drifting spores.
Only glowing vines.
Then—
Click.
One sharp sound.
Metal striking bone.
Qaritas looked over his shoulder.
Nothing.
Another—
Click.
Then another.
Click.
Click.
Click.
The sounds multiplied.
Dozens.
Hundreds.
Until they resembled rain falling across an endless graveyard.
The clicking surrounded them.
Above.
Below.
Ahead.
Behind.
Inside the walls.
Qaritas looked upward.
Nothing.
He looked left.
Only glowing fungus.
He looked right—
The wall opened.
Not cracked.
Opened.
The thick fungal bloom peeled apart like a flower unfolding.
Something climbed out.
Nine feet tall.
Its body unfolded from the living wall with horrifying fluidity.
Then another.
Another.
Five.
Ten.
Twenty.
Every patch of fungus around them began opening.
The creatures had never arrived.
They had been there all along.
Perfectly hidden.
Sleeping inside the maze.
Watching.
Waiting.
Their faceless fungal heads slowly turned toward the fleeing refugees.
Toward Qaritas.
Toward Xheavend.
Inside him, Eon's voice became ice.
"Do not fight here."
Qaritas never took his eyes off the creatures.
"Agreed."
The first one dropped.
Not toward them.
Toward a refugee.
Its hooked tongue exploded forward.
The old man who had warned Qaritas barely had time to turn before the tongue wrapped around his waist.
He didn't scream.
He simply gasped.
The creature yanked.
His body flew backward.
Before Qaritas could move—
Five more dropped from the ceiling.
They buried him beneath claws.
The clicking intensified.
The entire colony descended together.
The old man vanished beneath the swarm.
His scream lasted less than two seconds.
Then—
Nothing.
No body.
No blood.
Only clicking.
One of the towering fungal creatures slowly lowered itself toward the place where the old man had disappeared.
It didn't eat.
It didn't search.
Instead...
It pressed both long hands against the ground.
The living floor answered.
The moss peeled apart.
Roots opened.
Something beneath the earth accepted what remained.
The creature bowed its head.
Then climbed back into the wall.
The opening sealed behind it.
As though the maze had just been fed.
Qaritas's jaw tightened.
Xheavend reached for her coral-edged short sword.
"Put me down."
He had lifted her after she'd stumbled over a moving root.
He kept running.
"No."
"I can help."
"I know."
"So let me."
"You're nine."
She glared.
"You keep saying that."
"Because it keeps being true."
She looked genuinely offended.
"This is discrimination."
Qaritas almost laughed.
Almost.
Instead he vaulted over a fallen archway as another creature crashed into the stone behind them.
Inside his mind—
"Take over."
Eon's answer came immediately.
"No."
"What?"
"This..."
Another creature slammed through a mushroom taller than a house.
"...is your fight."
"I'm not strong enough."
"Correct."
Qaritas sighed.
"...Thanks."
"You're welcome."
Despite everything...
Qaritas smiled.
"You really know how to inspire confidence."
Silence.
Then Eon's voice softened.
Only slightly.
"You are not weak, little brother."
The words struck harder than any weapon.
"You are simply not yet the Ascendant you were destined to become."
Another click echoed somewhere overhead.
"Until then..."
The First Evil became quiet.
"...think of me as the shield behind your back."
Qaritas's grip tightened around Xheavend.
"...Got it."
They burst into another corridor.
The maze changed.
Roots erupted from the walls.
Entire bridges rotated like turning gears.
Massive fungal towers folded inward before blooming somewhere else entirely.
Stone groaned.
Living walls shifted.
Passages closed.
New ones opened.
The maze wasn't changing randomly.
It was thinking.
Rearranging itself.
Herding them.
Qaritas sprinted across a narrowing bridge.
The stone collapsed behind him.
He jumped.
Barely making the opposite side.
He landed hard.
Turned immediately.
Xheavend was only a few steps behind—
Then—
The floor exploded.
Roots thicker than castle walls erupted upward between them.
They grew in seconds.
A living barrier.
"Q!"
"I'm here!"
He slammed Rivax's blade into the roots.
The blade bit deep.
The roots healed instantly.
Another wall slid sideways.
Another corridor folded over itself.
The maze roared.
Not with sound.
With movement.
"XHEAVEND!"
"I'm over—"
Another shifting wall swallowed her voice.
Silence.
Only clicking remained.
Qaritas attacked the roots again.
Again.
Again.
Nothing.
The maze had already moved.
Inside him—
Eon spoke quietly.
"...Find her."
No anger.
No panic.
Just certainty.
Qaritas rested one hand against the living wall.
"I will."
Something breathed behind him.
Not one breath.
Many.
Slowly...
He turned.
The entire ceiling was covered.
Hundreds of fungal creatures clung upside down like grotesque insects.
Perfectly still.
Perfectly silent.
Their faceless blooms stared directly at him.
Not moving.
Not attacking.
Waiting.
One heartbeat passed.
Then another.
Then every feeding tongue lashed toward him at once.