“Miss Coldstone,” Christian Belmont growls as they come face to face, glancing towards Gaius before quickly schooling his distasteful sneer and nodding respectfully to the approaching Lebard mages. “What a pleasant surprise seeing you here. Did you not feel the need to mention the forming dungeon you found within our territory?”

  “Oh? I just assumed you were aware of the goings on within your territory when you gave me free rein to explore your mountain range, Mr Belmont,” Emily replies with a small smile, her eyes crinkled in amusement.

  “Emily!” Gaius beams as he walks up to stand with her group, not even sparing Christian a single glance. “What a pleasant surprise to run into you again so soon.”

  Pod stifles a laugh as Morzea’s Guardian’s expression crumples at his long-time enemy’s obvious jab, but Silica doesn’t bother hiding her amusement, letting out a lilting chuckle as she taps her head against Gaius’ leg, asking for pats in return for her place beside Emily.

  “Looks like separating didn’t matter much after all,” Emily muses, as she turns to the final group to join them. She switches to Lerusi, the language of Lebard: “Second Mouth, it’s good to see you again.”

  “And you, Technomancer,” Guntal nods calmly, as one of the mages with him steps forward to greet Christian and Gaius in Ulea’s common tongue. “I take it from your delayed arrival that you’ve been elsewhere within this godless domain already?”

  “That I have. I’ve completed three trials already, one of them with the help of Modo’s Demon. Also, godless?”

  “Our connection with The Great Ones is weakened here. Their gaze still falls upon us, but their authority is restricted.”

  “Interesting…” Emily mutters, tapping her foot as she adds to her notes on Lebard’s extradimensional deities.

  “Are you done saying hello?” Christian asks with venom seeping into his tone, his expression stormy as he watches the friendly exchange in a language he doesn’t understand. “You appear to know each other already, so why don’t we skip the pleasantries and cut to business. I’ve already made an agreement with the Second Mouth to split these beasts evenly between us, but you two arriving makes that… difficult.”

  “So, I take it you haven’t completed another trial yet?” Gaius asks, raising his chin and looking down at Morzea’s Guardian. “If you had, you’d be aware that the rewards from this one can’t be split evenly.”

  “Hold on, Gaius, that’s not certain,” Emily says before Christian can force an argument through his gritted teeth. “We haven’t encountered a step with this many participants before: it may not follow the same pattern as the others.”

  “Ah, good point.”

  “Would you share your experience with us so we may be prepared?” Guntal asks, his translator repeating the question in common a few moments after him.

  “Gladly,” Emily agrees, soothing some of Christian’s anger. “But first, I’d like to know how many people you each entered with.”

  “Twenty-five,” the Lebard mage responds without hesitation, confirming he hasn’t lost a single member of his party.

  “Ten,” Christian answers, despite only eight others standing with him. “Though there were more waiting to enter after us that we’re yet to meet.”

  “Really? How long have you been in here?”

  “Only a day or so, why?”

  “Ah.” Emily blinks in surprise, noting the extreme time difference compared to her and Gaius’ experiences. “They’re likely in different trial spaces. If they weren’t fourth circle, or physically connected to one who is as they entered, I doubt you’ll run into them before you leave this dungeon.”

  “We’ll see. Why is the number of us here important?”

  “You may not have noticed thanks to how spread out they are, with their individual presences concealed, but I think the number of fourth circle beasts here equals the number of entrants into this trial,” she explains. “We’ve completed three trials for separate elements already, and in each one, after defeating all of the fourth circle beasts, a final fifth circle foe was spawned.”

  Doubt and concern spread through the gathered mages in equal parts at her claim.

  “After defeating those, a fifth circle resource called an elemental essence was generated along with the doorway to a rest space to recuperate before the next trial, or step as they’re referred to in the messages carved into the walls.”

  “Only one?” Christian questions, clenching his fists as his eyes flit between the four fourth circle mages facing him.

  “Yes, only one. Though, there were fewer than ten people in each of those trials, so for all I know, we may get more with forty-four of us in here.”

  “I’m sorry, but are you asking us to believe you’ve slain three gods already?” Guntal asks with a frown, his clanmates muttering in disbelief behind him.

  “I don’t believe any of them would count as gods, but yes.” Emily nods. “Besides, believe me or not, you’ll soon see the truth for yourselves. The important part is how we’ll divide the limited spoils when they come. I doubt either of your parties is confident in facing a fifth circle foe alone, correct?”

  Both Christian and Guntal nod their heads.

  “In which case, I propose we divide the fourth circle resources based on whoever fells the beasts holding them, and the fifth on whoever claims the most of the former.”

  “You have two fourth circle mages, there’s no way that won’t be you,” Christian growls.

  “Yes, but we’ll likely be doing the majority of the work against the fifth circle foe as well, so that seems fair to me,” Emily responds, glancing at Gaius and Guntal and receiving affirmative nods. “We’ll work down the list after that, so if we end up receiving more than one essence, you’ll still have a chance to claim one.”

  “Fine,” the Morzean mage concedes, turning on his heel and marching towards the closest cloud dome. “Don’t get in our way then.”

  “Well, best of luck,” Emily says to the more friendly faces around her with a small grin, before turning to address her family as her eyes and the cracks around them begin to glow as lightning spreads across her skin. “Split as you see fit and claim as many elemental cores as you can. Return to my position the moment you notice mana stir outside of the domes.”

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  ***

  As Emily’s halfway through decimating another dome filled with enemies, with two split cores sitting comfortably in her belt, her in-ear communicator crackles to life with her son’s voice.

  “Mother, something’s coming.”

  “On my way,” she says, gathering charge in her leg and throwing it out in an arcing blow that cuts through the birds and unstable winds blocking her way.

  She flashes forward in an instant, plunging her blade into the centre of another fourth circle elemental’s core, closing her fingers around it and tearing it free from the churning body of wind in the same instant. The dome blocking her senses disperses along with the half-alive horde of low-circle beasts, and she instantly feels what Mensacus was referring to.

  Unlike when they first entered the trial space, the air is anything but calm, with crisscrossed wind currents cutting through each other as they circle and slowly approach a single point over ten kilometres away, directly above Guntal’s group. Emily flies on wings of charge towards the forming enemy, meeting up with Pod and Mensacus on the way. Her son tosses her a whole elemental core without a drop of energy inside.

  “How many cores have you claimed?” Emily asks as they come to a halt beside the Lebard mages.

  “Three,” Guntal responds, not turning his gaze away from the translucent being forming at the epicentre of the twisting winds.

  Gaius approaches from the opposite side of the trial space, blinking forwards several times and clearing dozens of kilometres in an instant.

  “How many?”

  “Two. And you?” Gaius responds with a raised, questioning brow.

  “Four.”

  Another dome scatters in the far distance.

  “That makes three for them,” one of Guntal’s followers says, filling in the last piece of data for Emily.

  Their last and my last weren’t claimed before this started.

  “Looks like we get one fifth circle foe for every ten fourth,” Emily says with a small frown.

  “Then you agreed to let Morzea’s Cur take one even without helping in the main fight,” Gaius spits with more than a little derision bleeding into his tone as he understands the consequences immediately. “You know, if it were just me and Morzea in here, I’d be the only one walking out. Nothing in our current peace treaty says anything about conflicts within dungeons.”

  Emily meets his gaze, and all emotion is washed clean from her face.

  “Well… let’s say nothing about this discovery for now and see how he acts. If he joins the battle regardless, I’ll follow the sentiment of our agreement.” She turns to Guntal and switches to Lerusi. “What did the agreement you made with Morzea’s Guardian before we arrived cover?”

  “An even split of the gains, and non-aggression within the trial. Nothing more, nothing less. The first part is void already, but I won’t break my word on the second,” he responds as his translator relays Emily and Gaius’ conversation, still more focused on the overwhelming presence building above. “I also won’t come to his aid if he happens to fall to the trial.”

  Emily nods and draws her weapons, activating her metal and lightning connections to prepare for the coming fight as Gaius starts weaving together several vicious spatial blades.

  The giant, airship-sized elemental above them takes on the shape of a hawk, and all of the birds that dispersed from their scattered sanctuaries burst from the floor to support it, but the battle passes surprisingly quickly, with Gaius and Guntal repeatedly clipping the fifth circle beast’s wings to restrict its movement while Mensacus lashes out at its main body. Emily faces the brunt of the creature’s attacks, throwing herself inside it and chasing after the moving core in clear view through its translucent flesh, absorbing repeated wind-formed talons that cut through her innate barrier and carve deep grooves into her subdermal armour.

  It still takes nearly twenty minutes for her to catch the core off-guard and split it down the centre, and as she lands beside her son to recuperate, they all note the absence of the Morzean mages. Emily turns to Pod as she pulls a lightning crystal from her belt to speed up her recovery, noticing out of the corners of her eyes as two more domes disperse, revealing the wendigos, Silica, and Ivor looking around for the rest of their party.

  “They ignored us and entered another dome while you were fighting,” Pod reports, pointing out the dome in question as the divided fifth circle elemental core melts and reforms, gathering above them again and drawing in vast quantities of air.

  “That’s a shame,” Emily says, looking up and watching a wind essence come together without a doorway out of the trial. “Mensacus, call your wendigos back and go pay them a visit; we don’t need to compete for fourth circle cores anymore.”

  “Dead or alive?” the mechanical chimaera asks, grinning with excitement.

  “He doesn’t leave the dungeon.”

  “Understood.”

  Mensacus lets out a guttural howl, causing all of the Lebard mages, except the Second Mouth, to flinch back in fear and gaining the attention of his monsters in an instant.

  “I take it you two are okay with a single essence each?” Emily asks, glancing down at Gaius and Guntal as she floats up to claim the first wind essence.

  Both nod, and Gaius chuckles with sadistic glee.

  “Mensacus, you don’t mind if I tag along, right? I’d love to see the effects of your feeding.”

  ***

  The rest of the wind trial passes in only a few days, with the gathered groups stopping for rest before and after each battle against a fifth circle foe. They’re slightly surprised when the last four cloud domes burst and release their contents to join the battle as the final fifth circle elemental forms, but Emily pulls out several metal soldiers from her Factory to help offset the vast difference in numbers.

  Gaius once again separates as they enter the rest space after the trial, and Guntal says goodbye at the same time, leaving Emily with her family once again as they step into a near pitch-black waiting room with glowing words carved on the wall.

  “I’ll save one for when you need it,” Emily tells her daughter as she starts working on an elixir made from one of the two wind essences she’s claimed. “Though, we may have to search elsewhere for a sand essence.”

  ˉˉˉˉˉ

  Intelligence: 424 > 433 (533)

  _____

  The fifth step in the dungeon takes place entirely underwater, with a series of interlocked, gaping ocean trenches spewing endless swarms of aquatic beasts. Emily’s party run into another group of Lebard mages led by Hia, the First Eye, but see neither hide nor hair of Gaius and Guntal. They work together to clear the trenches of enemies and fell the fifth circle archites that spawn subsequently, splitting the two water essences evenly before parting to enter their next trials.

  ˉˉˉˉˉ

  Intelligence: 433 > 441 (541)

  _____

  On the sixth step, they find themselves walking on the surface of one of the three artificial suns present in their prior trials. The environment is scorching hot, and they find solid footing beneath the boiling gas that laps at their ankles. Emily coats them with a shield of water to protect them from burning. They don’t meet any living mages in the impossible space, but they slay twenty-five fourth circle abominations formed from magma and claim two fire essences from their fifth circle counterparts.

  While recovering in the cool waiting room after the trial and turning one of the new essences into an elixir, Emily notices one of the suns high above is now missing, leaving only two to light the space.

  ˉˉˉˉˉ

  Intelligence: 441 > 448 (548)

  _____

  The seventh step is a lot calmer than its predecessor, taking place in a vast cave system filled with mole-like monsters that give them no rest, shifting the tunnels around them and attempting to separate their group. Emily, Ivor, and the wendigo who has an earth affinity work together to thwart their efforts. They end up running into several mages from Morzea and Lebard who’ve been separated from their groups. They let them tag along with their party as they search out the fourth circle monsters hiding from the human mages, and after two weeks of looking, they finally run into and slay the first of three fifth circle moles.

  They gather eight assorted mages before the last fifth circle mole falls, but they never find the missing fourth circle mages, separating with the foreigners in low spirits as they step through the doorway to the next trial in their small groups.

  “Do you think they’ll be sent into another trial with fifth circle enemies?” Pod asks Emily as she’s midway through brewing her earthen elixir, with two essences tucked away in her Factory for later use.

  “I doubt it,” she replies without looking away from the solution bubbling away in a test tube before her. “We haven’t run into Gaius again yet, so I’m pretty certain there’s more trial spaces than we’ll encounter while here, and as I’ve said before, this dungeon doesn’t feel malicious, just challenging. I suspect they’ll be sent to a trial with the final challenge being only a single circle above their strongest member.”

  ˉˉˉˉˉ

  Intelligence: 448 > 455 (555)

  -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

  [Progression]

  -Intelligence 455/450 (Complete)

  _____

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