The iron door groans. Rusted hinges scream in protest, wailing like long-forgotten ghosts, lingering spirits left to decay. Then it slams shut, sending a shudder through the cold stone floor, leaving me alone in the darkness. Chains clank somewhere distant, followed by a soft click reverberating through my cell like a hammer strike in a courtroom.

  I wait a few heartbeats for the heavy steps to go silent, then channel my light sphere to illuminate my surroundings.

  The planks that form a cot that covers half of the room crumble into a soft, spongy mass that feels damp and fibrous under my fingers. I touch the wall, wet, too. Water trickles in from somewhere, seeping through the mortar and leaving faint cracks in the stonework. Drops form wherever enough of it collects and then drip to the ground when they grow too heavy to continue to defy gravity. Mildew clings to the surface in sickly patches of yellow and grey, a creeping disease that fills the air with its pungent stench. The walls are still solid, though. Blocks of granite resist every attempt to be weathered down, even if their surface is moist.

  The same can be said about the door. It may be covered in rust, but it is still solid. And it would be my last option to escape through anyway because it would alert the jailor outside.

  My eyes fall to a small window on the opposite wall, leading into complete darkness. I could creep and wiggle through like a contortionist, but those wrist-thick iron bars close the way. Can I pry them apart? I have nothing to use for leverage except rotten planks.

  How thick are the walls? I remember my scan rune, my first attempt at invisibility. The inscription has faded because I didn’t think it had enough utility to renew it. I need my tools, but they are locked inside the spatial ring in my stomach.

  Is there enough time to wait for it to go through? Maybe. I could wait for them to take me out to fetch the compass at that imaginary place in the wilderness. I don’t want to risk encountering The Crow, though. He may sniff out that it is all just hogwash. I should try to slip away as soon as I can.

  Why should it matter if the ring is on my finger or not to use it anyway? I’m still in contact with it, more than ever. It’s inside me. I am attuned to it after using it for so long. I’ve seen merchants access their spatial artifacts just by touching them. Why should my ring be different? Do I have a mental block?

  Believe can influence your magic, according to The Crow. Even though, most times, it doesn’t matter.

  How do I break through my self-imposed limitations?

  I sit down, crossing my legs, ignoring the rough, cold stone floor.

  I let the light wink out to have fewer distractions. Sight, smells, the distant murmur of other prisoners, and the seeping cold disappear as I turn inward. They sink beneath my consciousness like stones disappearing in a lake, inconsequential once the last ripple fades.

  I find my core, my still Tin-grade gathering vortex. Not what I am searching for. Where is my stomach?

  There! I briefly marvel at how easy it is to find it. My awareness of my body has grown a lot since I ranked up. This is nothing strange as far as I know. You need it at the copper stage to gradually temper yourself. Not that I have made much progress in that.

  I concentrate on my stomach, sinking deeper into it. I can feel the mush of half-digested food. There! I found it! A source of different flavored mana.

  Now, how do I channel mana into it to connect with it? It’s floating inside, not even touching the walls of my stomach. The mana in the food I ate is in the way. I focus on how it slowly dissolves before being absorbed and filtered towards my core. Huh? I try to take control of the flow and divert it towards the ring, but it is slippery and fights against my grasp. Well, I should have known that. It’s unattuned mana. I won’t have fine control over it until it passes through my core.

  I weave a trickle of my attuned mana into a thread and slowly guide it toward where I can feel the ring. It falls short. I funnel even more mana into the thread and try to push through the resistance.

  A blurry space appears in my mind. Great! I can see the outlines of the objects inside, but they seem vague, like hidden behind a veil. I funnel even more mana to try to break through. A slow, smoldering heat is coiling in the pit of my stomach. Don’t give up now. Hold on a bit longer. The objects grow more solid. I try to grasp my brush and ink bottle, but I have no hands here. Shit! Will they even appear in my hands? Or will they materialize inside my stomach? That could be a disaster. The heat gnaws at me from the inside, a raw, acidic burn that sends tendrils of discomfort creeping up my throat. I clench my jaw, swallowing the bitter taste rising in my mouth. Then I facepalm, falling out of meditation.

  I groan, ignoring my burning throat. I am an idiot. I have grown so accustomed to using magic for everything that I ignored the easy and mundane solution.

  I stand up, wobbling until the blood flow returns to my legs with prickling fury. I lean into a corner next to the door. I hesitate there for a moment. Then I force my trembling fingers down my throat, ignoring the spasms of my body that convulses in protest. A violent gag batters me, and my stomach twists like a clenched fist. The flood comes, hot and bitter, burning its way up as I lurch forward and retch onto the ground.

  Where is it? I need my light sphere. There! Something shiny glitters within the acidic mush. I grin. Not even my burning throat nor my watered eyes can drive away the pride I feel after overcoming my first hurdle.

  I rub my hands and the ring clean, using one of my worst old shirts as a rag, wet with water from one of the clay jugs inside my ring. Those guys didn’t give me any, nor food. Do they want me to starve, or did they forget? Maybe they will feed us later. That would be bad because they would discover my escape sooner. Focus! I haven’t escaped yet. I shouldn’t waste time wondering about what-ifs.

  I draw a scan rune on my right palm. What else could I need?

  I could try to finish, test, and finetune the air-step rune I’ve been working on. It could help me in a lot of possible scenarios.

  I take my notebook out to check my sketches. They should go on my feet. I need to take off my boots. I watch the cold and humid ground warily. Then I facepalm again. Why am I still squatting on it when I have plenty of clothes to use as a rug? Most of them are useless anyway because they are tailored for a man and too big for me.

  I may not be at my finest today. Is it because of the remorse I feel about what happened to Dante? It’s not my fault, and now is not the time!

  A few last careful strokes and the runes are finished. I hop up and Chanel to try them out. It works. I am standing in the air, on transparent barriers, half a meter off the ground. The runes are sucking in mana like crazy, though. I can feel how my core dips and empties at a visible rate.

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  Noted. I can’t support a continuous effect for long. But I don’t need to. Just flickering them on for a heartbeat each time before I step on them should be enough.

  I try to step forward, but the barrier under my right foot flickers out. A new barrier appears in my way, and I stumble over it. I whirl my arms wildly through the air, trying to catch my balance, but fall to the ground with a crash.

  “Ouch.”

  I massage my bruised hip. What the heck happened there?

  I turn the runes on and off without leaving the ground, observing what happens when I move my feet.

  They remain where they first appeared each time I start to channel. There is nothing strange about that. After all, they are based on a rune that creates a barrier fixed in space. When a foot gets more than a palm breadth away from them, something strange happens, though. Instead of staying behind, the barrier snaps forward and reappears under my foot.

  Could this be because that is the maximum distance I can channel mana outside of my body?

  Probably.

  Well, it doesn’t matter if I only flicker the rune on for an instant to step on and deactivate it immediately. This will require some practice in timing and coordination to make it intuitive. It will be useless if I have to focus on it during a hectic battle.

  Let’s practice a bit until they decide to bring us dinner.

  Jump, flicker, step, go. I don’t stumble this time, but I reach the end of the room. It is too small to last me for more than three steps. I could try to run through the air in a circle without touching the ground. Let’s try that.

  I run and run, ever faster. I am getting the trick of it. I run until I grow dizzy and sit down to reorient myself and catch my breath.

  Still no dinner in sight. I am tired of waiting.

  I project my scan rune onto the door. A part of it seems to disappear, letting me see through. Hmm. Two fingers thick solid iron. How did they even move it? It must weigh a ton. I can see a pair of thugs playing cards. I step back to cancel the scan before they see me.

  What about the walls?

  The wall in the back is solid, thicker than my scan rune can reach. I try again at different places to search for a hollow or a hidden tunnel. Nothing. The wall on the right side of the door is a foot thick and gives way to an empty chamber identical to the one I am in. I scan the last wall and come face to face with a skeleton of a man. He blinks. I freeze. We look at each other. How can he still be alive? I watch him touch the invisible wall between us with his gnarly fingers. He frowns once he discovers the resistance. I let the scan rune wink out.

  “There’s a gyal!” The sudden cry pierces through the silence. For some reason, I hear it through the door and not the wall. “I saw her!”

  “Quiet old man!” admonishes one of the guards.

  “I saw her!”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Ts… I saw her in the wall.”

  Shit! Are they going to suspect me?

  “Have you finally lost your mind?” Distant laughter drones through the Iron door. “Be silent, or we will beat you up again.”

  Okay, they are idiots. But I better start to hurry.

  My best bet is that window in the back, wherever it may lead. I could try to cobble together a force-projection rune with the kinetic rune component of my shock-absorber rune. But there would still be the problem of finding leverage to pry the bars apart. I have a bunch of swords I could try to use. No, no, this is the wrong approach. I should try to melt them.

  What happens when I create a heat rune and seal the effect inside a seal-heat rune, giving it no way to escape? Worth a try.

  First, let’s lock the door from the inside.

  I paint a seal-movement rune on it. Modifying it to fix the door in space as long as the rune can pull in enough mana not to be overwhelmed, which should be a lot in the mana density of this place. For good measure, I draw a seal-sound rune next to it.

  Then I step towards the window.

  If I draw the heat rune on the metal bars, they will stop working if I get them hot enough to deform. So, on the stone beneath it is. It’s a bit moist but more or less even. I get my rag from the ground to clean it, grinding away mortar, mildew, and dust until only solid granite remains. I draw the seal-heat rune first, then the heat rune directly under the bars, as close as I can get it. The stone sucks in half of one of my ink-bottle. Don’t think about the cost! Money comes and goes.

  The last stroke falls in place. Heat slams against my skin. Searing air snaps for my fingers, nearly catching them before I can get them away.

  “Ouch!”

  That was fast! I check my hands. Just a few singed hairs, I barely escaped burning myself. The bars are already turning red. I poke at them with the rustiest sword I have. Still solid. Now, they are turning orange. Both runes are working marvelously well together. I can’t feel any temperature change half a step away. Well, as long as I don’t take the sword out of the area of effect. It’s melting faster than the bars. I pull it out and throw it onto the floor. Hissing steam rises in an instant.

  The bars are already yellow, turning to white. Do I need to ruin another sword? Or should I wait and see if it melts down? They are starting to deform already, growing bulkier at the bottom.

  A bead of molten metal trembles on the side of one bar, quivering like liquid fire before surrendering to gravity and dripping. The bar starts to sag. Its structure warps and bends. Shit! It’s going to flow over the runes and mess them up.

  I take a step back and activate my body seal-heat rune.

  The bars are melting into a pool now, like dripping candles. Then the runes break and sputter out.

  I can see the effect of the heat wave racing across the room, even if I don’t feel it. The moisture in the walls evaporates, and the mildew wrinkles into grey, dusty flakes.

  I can hear a screech outside in the darkness behind the window. Taps of tiny claws skitter over the stone in quick and erratic movements.

  I step a bit closer to it, eager to leave. But the iron rest and granite need to cool down before I can slip through. My seal heat rune won’t do anything if the heat source is inside my sphere.

  I wait. The puddle solidifies again. I poke and prod at it with another sword because the handle of the first one is still too hot to touch it. The granite around the window has changed color and become brittle. So, I poke at it using the sword as a chisel to widen the gap. It serves as an improvised lever to pry loose the rests of iron.

  The gap is wide enough to creep through easily now. But the stone remains hot. I empty one of my water jugs on it and watch it evaporate until steam fills the chamber. I empty another one. The stone remains wet, hot but wet.

  I creep and wiggle through the still somewhat hot stone until I’m through. My light sphere illuminates a narrow passage, tunnel, or ventilation shaft. Rats look at me, baring their teeth, their eyes gleaming in the light before they turn around and skitter away in the distance. I crawl in the opposite direction of the malnourished man’s chamber. I don’t want to wake him up now. Who knows if he could get the jailors to hear him out this time? Did he feel the heatwave? Maybe. Each of the cells has a tiny window into this crawlway. But I think he should have been too far away for the full effect to reach him.

  I continue crawling forward until I reach another rusty iron fence that bars the way into a wider tunnel. This one isn’t an obstacle, though. It crumbles and breaks into rusty pieces with nearly any effort.

  This does seem to be part of the city sewers. Even if it is not functional and has been repurposed. A trickle of nearly clear water flows through the bottom of the tunnel. Should I get up or down?

  I can hear voices upwards. That shouldn’t be a problem as long as I remain invisible.

  I end up in a hall full of crates. There are people here. They laugh, drink, and play cards or snore on top of the tables around an improvised underground bar.

  I can see a staircase on the other side of the room, leading upwards, probably onto the street level, if my sense of orientation isn’t failing me. I found my way out.

  I am about to bolt into freedom, but then I stop. Maybe it is time to pay back the warm welcome these bastards gave me. What do they have in these crates?

  I pry one open with my banged-up sword under the cover of my seal-sound rune.

  Huh?

  What is this?

  The crate is full of large and hollow metallic shafts covered in runes.

  Aren’t these the same as those thunder sticks the rebels attacked us with?

  What the fuck?

  Could it be that I had it all wrong and the mysterious leader of the rebels that man they tortured spoke about isn’t the baron I stole the compass from but The Crow?

  You know what? I don’t want to know. Let’s get out of here before someone realizes that I’m missing.