The Labyrinth of Echoes became actual abruptly and violently.

One moment I was in the sterile VR pod that was dark and the next I was standing on cold mossy stone, smelling damp earth, ozone, and an old reek of lost sorrow.

We were in a vast passage of dissimilar, gigantic stone blocks which oozed a vague ghostly condensation.

Torches burned in cold blue-green fire, and the shadows that they cast were long and dancing, and made the walls seem alive.

The ceiling disappeared into unbroken darkness making it look like we were in the depths of a deep hole.

"GRIIIND… SCRRRAPE…"

There was the grinding of stone that was deafening. One part of the passage turned and a new one opened and another one closed.

The geography in this location changed every minute, which was a puzzle of life, meant to bend the mind of the people trapped in it.

Kaelen uttered a little terrified squeak, and turned a knuckle white about the staff of his healer.

The walls, he said to himself, they are moving.

Seraphina, proud and alert, laid her hand on the fletching of some arrow, and looked about her with flashing, frightened eyes.

"This is mana density of an unnatural kind. It's heavy. Suffocating," she said and she was right.

The atmosphere was breathless, and the ashes of a thousand lost conflicts and shouts of hopelessness were clogging the air.

The labyrinth was not only called the Echoes, but these echoes were emotional impressions abandoned to rot in the stone.

Alex was standing next to me with his shield tented up a little, and trembling, but firm. He stared up at me, with his eyes open, and sought his way. He was willing to be my wall as I requested.

"Stay close " I said, my voice very low and smooth to slice through their mounting excitement. My heart throbbed steadily in my breast. It was a high-ranking dungeon in the game, which was known to shatter even the experienced players.

"It is not merely that this labyrinth is trying to kill you, but to make you kill yourself. It feeds on fear. Don't give it anything to eat."

I led, and Draken was in a low guard. My senses were at full alert and my Quantum Analysis Mind was already in passive diagnostics of the surrounding mana.

Great saturation of psychic and illusion magic. The air in itself is a poor-grade hallucinogen. Weak minds will break first. The major liability is Kaelen.

"You know, Seraphina, your eyes are the sharpest. Watch our back and shoot down whatever moves," I said.

"Kaelen, stay in the center. What you now need to do is to keep your head clear and be prepared to cast. "

"Y‑Yes!" he stammered.

Seraphina gave an almost imperceptible nod. The first shock had just passed and in its place was the instinct of trained archers.

We stepped carefully into the changing maze, making the only noise in the oppressive silence the sound of our feet.

The blue-green torchlight had its way with the eyes and made pictures in the stone seem to be gawking faces and shadows assume the form of monsters.

Then, whispers began. Like the sighing of the wind, they crept out of the walls and darkness above at first, faint, faint, echoes of pain, fear, loss.

...help me...it hurts...run…

"Shake them off", I said sharply.

"They're just noise."

But the maze had a long way to go.

Then suddenly the shadows were darker and blackened on the floor. They appeared to melt, and little, stooping forms started to come out of them.

They were goblins, but not of blood and flesh. Their bodies were made of shadow, pure and green in the eyes. They held daggers of solid darkness.

"This llusory Goblins," said Seraphina, and nocked an arrow. "They're intangible."

She threw an arrow, and it reached the head of the nearest goblin. The creature flicked just before it was struck, and the arrow left it and shattered against the distant wall in an inoffensive ricocche.

"Tch. Useless," she spat, pride stung.

"Do not waste your arrows," I said, and looked round the room.

At least there were a dozen of them, coming and going through the walls, floor, even the ceiling.

The disorienting cackling laughter was a confusing chorus of echoes that, at the same time, appeared to have come in all directions.

One of them came straight out of the floor at the feet of Kaelen, and his shadow-dagger cut at his ankle. He shouted and fell backwards, over his own staff.

"Counter Shield !" I roared to Alex.

Alex, who is terrifying himself, reacted immediately. He threw his shield in a resounding CLANG, mana flaring, and a wall of solid and shimmering energy sprang before him, and saved Kaelen.

A dozen shadow-daggers flashed against the barrier, and faded away with a hissing sound.

However, increasingly goblins were emerging, and they were assaulting in impossible directions. One of them fluttered into being on the ceiling and fell down, with its blade pointed at the back of Seraphina.

The chaos ran through my head. 'They aren't truly intangible. They're tied to the shadows. They are only able to appear in the weakest places of light. The source... where's the source?'

I looked, and saw the rear of the room. A taller robed goblin figure was partially concealed behind a crumbling pillar. It carried a staff with a smoking, dark crystal on it and its lips were chanting something without a sound. The Goblin Shaman of Delusion.

Draxen, that, I said, and so.

"The shaman in the back. It is playing the goblins that are imaginary. Kaelen, I need light! A powerful, wide‑area ward. Can you do it?"

Kaelen, now flushed with a desperate purpose, but still pale, nodded. He scrambled to stand on his feet, with his staff in his hand.

"I-I can try!" his eyes were shut and his voice grew louder as he sang. O' holy light, drive the creeping darkness away! Lighten the darkness! Light Ward!"

A ball of splendid pure-white light burst out of his rod. It was not an assault, it was a flood of sheer light which filled the whole room.

The shadows flew back in revolt. The unreal goblins screamed because their shapes became concrete and their bond to the darkness was broken.

No longer flickering shadows; no longer shadows; they were flesh and shadow.

They were vulnerable.

"Now, Seraphina!" I yelled.

Seraphina did not have to be reminded twice. A fierce grin lit her face. "Finally!"

She was transformed into a killing machine. Arrows by arrows were discharged through her bow, and each of them was a line of silver light, which struck its mark with a nauseating impact.

Goblins were dropping, one by one, bodies falling into dead shadows.

I moved as she was giving me cover fire. "Alex, with me! We're taking the shaman!"

We charged. Alex was a flying bastion and his shield was resisting the desperate swings of the remaining goblins. I was the spearhead.

My blade, Draken, is vibrant with cold power when I put the affinity of ice in my blade.

The shaman saw us coming. It cried, and its staff went up to call a wall of churning blackness.

"Too slow," I growled.

"Frost Edge!"

My sword came out, and a wave of razor-sharp ice flew. The wave did not only hit the barrier, it solidified it. The twisting darks solidified in seconds.

Alex responded with a strong shield blow and smashed the frozen wall to pieces like glass.

The shaman was exposed. One heart beat it gazed at me, with wide terrified eyes.

That was all I needed. Draken sprang into his breast. The battle was over.

With the last goblin melted away there was peace in the passage again. Kaelen was sweating and sweating but he stood erect.

Seraphina bowed down, and looked at Kaelen, in the first instance not a contemptuous but a grudging recognition. Alex glanced at his shield, then upon me, in a sense of disbelief and pride.

It was a minor victory, but it was our victory. We had functioned as a team.

Then I was about continue go forward then the system Panel right before my eyes.

[New Main Quest Triggered: The Crucible of Champions]

[Objective: Achieve the #1 Overall Rank in the Midterm Exams.]

[Condition: Secure first place in the final, cumulative rankings across all three trials.]

[Rewards:1x Trait Selection Card,+150,000 SP]

[Title: 'First Year Monarch' (Passive effect: Increases influence and charisma with lower-ranked individuals by 20%)]

[Failure Penalty: Loss of 50,000 SP. Title 'Overrated' applied (Decreases influence with peers by 30% for one semester).]

I looked upon the flaming writing with a slow, cold smile upon my lips.

'The Trait Selection Card showed a title that had real effects; the stakes were greater than I had expected.'

The punishment was also very harsh. It was not merely a prize which was being offered by the System--it was a ultimatum. A win would cement my status whereas a loss would turn me into a scapegoat and any achievements that I made would be forgotten.

"I accept," I grumbled to myself.

The blue panel was melted away and in the next moment the world was bursting into being.

Yet was the labyrinth not yet through with us. The real attack commenced as we penetrated further into the moving guts of the dungeon which were the guts of stone. The whispers increased in volume, in wickedness.

The Labyrinth of Echoes was a masterpiece of psychic architecture.

We stood in a cyclopean corridor carved from weeping, moss-covered stone. The air was a suffocating blanket, thick with the smell of damp earth and something acrid, like burnt memories.

Above, an impenetrable darkness swallowed the ceiling, making us feel like insects at the bottom of a well.

(To be Continue)

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