As the blinding light faded away, the green meadows and rolling hills under the false sky stretched before me. I was back, back on the first floor of the labyrinth, in a place where I had battled my first beast. It felt like a week since I’ve been sneaking through that calf-high grass covering the horizon when it was just yesterday that I stood on a small black platform with fading runes.

While a light breeze played with my mane, I looked down at my still bare feet, at the cold stone slab with etched runes beneath them. Was it just me, or was my mind playing tricks on me?

“Is it bigger?” I muttered out loud.

“What?” Deckard, already kneeling on the ground laying down some device, raised his head, puzzled by my question.

“I mean the platform. Does it get bigger when it moves the group?” I explained my query. My attention was already on the small shiny disc with the crystal in the center. “Now I’m more interested in that?”

“Yeah, it does, but wait...” He paused. “...are you telling me you came here without Thread?”

I pointed to the disk. “That’s what it’s called?”

“Traiana tits!” He scoffed and got to his feet. “You did. Are you dumb, girl?”

“Just, poor,” I replied. On Earth, I’d be ashamed to admit it. Here? Not anymore. When you start from scratch, it changes your perspective. “I got a flyer at City Hall, but most of the things recommended there were too expensive.”

“They are recommended for a reason,” he said, reprimanding me, then looked off into the distance. “You must never forget where you are, in the labyrinth. It may not seem like it at first glance, but it’s easy to get lost here.”

My ears moved, slightly nodding. “Trust me. I’m fully aware of that. Last time, I had quite a hard time finding the way out.”

Biting my lip, I remembered my first dive into these depths and my desperate search for the platform.

“Actually, I was wondering if anyone has ever got lost in the labyrinth, never found their way back?” I asked the question that had been on my mind a lot yesterday. The fear I felt when I thought I would be trapped here forever wasn’t hard to recall.

“Hmm...they don’t call life the best teacher for nothing. Don’t forget the lesson because the danger of not finding your way back is a big part of being a seeker.” He warned me, then sighed. “If you want to know the exact numbers of those who stayed in Fallens Cry ask at the City Hall. They’ll even tell you what floor they didn’t come back from.”

“How do they know these seekers didn’t just die?” Not that I wish they were dead, nor I was planning on dying here myself. I was just curious.

Deckard squinted his eyes, studying me. “Guess you didn’t notice. When you got the mark, the cube produced a smaller one. Soul Dice. It’s linked to you and unique as the mark on the back of your hand. When you die, the light goes out.”

My gaze immediately fell to my hand, on the white tear on it. White tattoo, which faded as soon as I left the small platform. “Like when the mark went dark after I got the collar on my neck?”

“Yeah, exactly like that. It’s not some all-powerful tracker. It has its flaws and limits, so do labyrinths. Magic tools, for example the slave collar you mentioned, are one of these flaws,” he said, gesturing to the disk and then tapped the golden ring that appeared on his finger. “Thread exploits these flaws too. It’s a basic magic tool seekers need...”

To sum it up, activation established a connection between the disk and the ring. It drew mana from its user to create a magic thread left behind as they moved through the labyrinth floor. Deckard’s version of the tool had the option to hide this tether, which cheaper versions did not have. Generally, the higher the quality and the more expensive, the lower the mana consumption.

And that was crucial. The tool was constantly consuming mana to maintain the thread. Once the seeker ran out, they were on their own. Oh, and I shouldn’t forget that greater depths required stronger Threads, and there were places in the labyrinth where even those tools didn’t work.

This place was trying hard to entrap seekers, letting them wander around for all eternity. The thought made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

“In the party, it’s most often the mage’s job to maintain the Thread. If you are alone, or for some reason it is your responsibility, be sure you always have enough mana. Get it, girl?” Deckard sounded unusually serious, so that’s how I took it. “I got it. Never run out of mana!”

“Good, let’s go.” He gestured for me to follow him, but I didn’t. Something caught my eye. Just before he took off, a golden glowing thread appeared briefly connecting his hand and the disk. It fell lazily to the ground before it disappeared right before my eyes. I loved that tool already. Its magic looked awesome.

Was the thread still there? To find out, I waved Sage a few times through the spot where I saw it a moment ago. I felt nothing, no resistance, nor did my tail get tangled in the magic string.

A bit disappointed, yet with my curiosity satisfied, I glanced at Deckard, who was already wading through the grass. He was fast, and it took me a few quick strides to catch up with him. That’s when I looked back at the stone slab and held my breath.

I couldn’t help it. Last time, I came within a whisker of not finding my only way back to the surface, and the sight of the receding platform made me wish I had a ring like Deckard’s. I would definitely feel a lot more relaxed with it on my finger. This way, I had to rely on him not to leave his apprentice behind.

Huh, another ring. I’ve already had two, and now I wanted a third? It was ridiculous. Rings were never my thing. As a florist, they were a nuisance, especially when I was working with soil.

A stone hidden in the tall grass, which I just narrowly missed with my barefoot, reminded me I should keep my focus. I wasn’t here for the walk, though Deckard probably was. He was overleveled for this place.

“Are you really going to train me here?” When he mentioned it in the meeting, he caught me off guard. At first, I thought he said it just so I wouldn’t have to stay locked up in the barracks. Now that I was actually here, which I didn’t think would happen so soon, made me think he was serious.

“What else?” he asked, not even looking back at me.

I shrugged. “Take a nap.” I’d love that.

His laugh made me grin. I knew he’d take my remark in stride. “I did it once, and woke up with some bastard chewing on my arm. The labyrinth is not a good place for that, not when you’re alone.”

“Okay, but I still don’t get why train here?” He could not, by training, mean only fighting the beasts in the labyrinth, right? I needed to learn something other than how to bleed.

“It’s simple. I don’t have my own training room or a house with a yard. Traianas tits, I don’t even have my own place in Castiana.” He grunted and looked around. “This is the best I could come up with.”

The location wasn’t a problem. It wasn’t meant to sound like a complaint. I was just wondering why here. “What about City Hall?”

“We had a training hall booked, remember? Rezso has already paid for it. We were just stuck in the barracks. It would be a pain in the ass to find one available now. Besides, we have all the time we want here,” he said, strolling forward as if he hadn’t the slightest concern. It’s like he didn’t care about the locals at all. Actually, now that I think about it, where were they? We had already walked quite a distance, and I didn’t see any horned rabbit.

I may have won against them, but it wasn’t something to brag about. Hence my caution.

“Fuck...” I hissed in pain, stumbling as I kicked the stone. So much for my caution. Seriously, these fuckers hiding in the grass have somehow evaded my attention despite the domain.

After my outburst, Deckard looked back over his shoulder. “We should have stopped on the way to buy you some boots.”

“You think,” I spat through gritted teeth, massaging my stubbed toes. The regret of my outburst came instantly. It wasn’t his fault I walked barefoot, and I knew it. “Sorry.”

“Don’t sweat it, girl.” He shook his head then added. “We’re almost there.”

Where? I lifted my head. Grassy rolling meadows and hills full of fucking stones stretched as far as I could see. Nothing has changed, nor did I see anything special on the hill in front of us.

Sure enough, when we eventually reached the top, I had to admit that it had a decent view of the first floor. That was it. Even here, the grass was weaving between my toes and tickling my feet. “What’s so special about this hill?”

“It’s flat, leveled,” he said plainly. “Perfect for some exercise.”

It was. I mean flat. But what did he mean by exercise? “You don’t want me to fight horned rabbits?”

“No, where did you get that idea?” he marveled.

“We are in a labyrinth?” That’s what seekers do down here, right? They struggle with the beasts.

Deckard tilted his head in a nod. “That’s true...but I told you why we’re here, didn’t you listen!”

It would be a drag to book a training hall. I did listen, just like when he told me not to take even the first floor lightly. Plus, my previous experience told me that this was no place for light-hearted exercise. It kept me on edge.

“Okay,” he cleared his throat and took a tense breath. “I am Deckard [Void Walker], your...mentor. To be clear. I intend to teach you my fighting style, not Skill’s, nor help you reach my Class. I’m doing this because I’m stuck at the bottleneck on some of my skills. By teaching you, I hope to help myself. I know we should have cleared this up earlier. Sorry about that, girl.”

Yeah, it would have been better, but he didn’t have to apologize. I understood. Besides, I had the gist of it before I signed the form. It’s just his formative approach that has me a little confused right now. It didn’t fit him, and it was apparent he wasn’t comfortable with it either. Compelled to take it seriously too, I straightened up, closed my right hand into a fist at chest level, and wrapped it in the palm of my left hand. “Korra Grey [Slave], your apprentice. I hope to learn as much as I can.” At that moment, I made a slight bow.

Well, it certainly wasn’t the greeting Deckard was expecting, nor was I sure I did it right. Just something I remembered martial arts fighters doing, in the movies. It just seemed weird to just stand there or offer him a handshake.

“So, where do we start?” I asked quickly to avoid any awkward questions.

In his eyes, I was certainly an oddball. Even so, he just grinned. “With your flexibility.”

Not something I expected. “My Dexterity is 24,” I said after a glance at my stats. Omitting Intelligence and Wisdom, it was my worst stat. He must have read it in my file.

“Oh, I’m not talking about your stat. I’m talking about your flexibility. With your feet together, can you touch your toes? Put your palms on the ground or bend over so far to get your head between your shins?” He asked, to which I just shook my head. I couldn’t do any of those things, and I dreaded where he was going with it. “Exactly, that’s what I saw when you fought that mossbear. You’re pretty stiff.”

My first impulse was to object, but then I figured he must have known better. “So, dexterity leveling?”

“I think you have the wrong idea about the stats, girl,” he told me bluntly, then waited for my answer, my take on it. Knowing ahead of time that my answer would be the wrong one was pretty mind-numbing. Still, I gave it a shot. I had to. “Stats push the limits of my body.”

“Surprisingly correct,” Deckard said, taking two steps to the side. “It’s not that simple, though. Take wisdom. It is most often associated with knowledge, how much you know and can remember. To make it even simpler. Think of wisdom as a bookcase. With each point, it gets bigger, and you get another shelf where you can put more books. See the problem?”

“Eh...it won’t give me the books, just a place for them,” I said with realization. “So what I see on my Status Screen is my potential, not how strong I am.”

Deckard nodded. “Now you get it, but don’t take this the wrong way. You’re stronger than you were. As your limits rise, your body will adapt to them, and even if you don’t train, you will start to use them unconsciously. At least, to some extent.”

Well, it didn’t make me feel better. It explained a lot, though. Like why didn’t I feel stronger every time I put a point in it or smarter, for that matter.

Sighing, I looked at Deckard. “Exercise then?”

“Exercise. You’ll see, at the end of the day, you’ll be able to do splits.” His grin and the thought of getting my legs in such an unnatural position made me shudder. These workouts have always been quite painful to watch. That’s why I never tried them. Splits? At the end of the day? I would love to say impossible. Deckard seemed determined to prove me otherwise.

All right, I was expecting pain. If I had to push my limits, it was necessary. But now, sitting in what he called the open seated pose, butterfly pose on Earth if I remembered correctly, I gritted my teeth in agony while Deckard pushed my back down. He wasn’t satisfied until my shoulders were almost touching the ground. It was brutal. My body wasn’t used to this kind of treatment, these extreme positions I was forcing it into. It was only a matter of time before it gave away. And it did.

“Fuuuuck...” I cursed, nearly screamed as a brain-numbing pain shot through my body. One of the groin tendons snapped, again.

“Bear with it, girl,” grunted Deckard, now perched on my back, keeping me down. Gritting my teeth, I redirected the mana to boost the healing, unable to count how many times it’s been today during this workout.

It was always the same, just different positions where Deckard pushed me to extremes. If it weren’t for my regeneration, I’d be a cripple by now. Effective, though. I had to give him that. After only an hour of this exercise, I felt the changes.

“Can I...”

“Save your breath,” he brushed me off, which made me growl in frustration.

Those moments when I was healing were always awkward and a bit boring. But that was me. Deckard didn’t seem bothered by it at all. Now when I tried to bring my pain-ridden brain to other thoughts and made small talk, I was rebuffed.

So I waited as I had before, cursing myself for even trying.

“Healed,” I grunted as the regeneration did its job, and my tendon was in one piece, though strained to the point of snapping again. Not for long. Deckard got up, and I did the same. Taking a deep breath, stretching once I was on my feet, then asked. “What’s next?”

Why was I so eager? I just wanted to get this exercise over with as soon as possible.

He looked at me questioningly. “Didn’t you want to ask me something, girl?”

That was before. I suppressed my rude response and just growled deeply. His question, however, brought another of mine to mind. “Come to think of it, why are you calling me a girl?”

He paused, thought, and his eyes fell on my chest. Mine followed his. The size of my boobs? That was his reason? Immediately regretting asking, disappointed in him even and with blood rushing to my cheeks, I was lost for words.

His deep laugh that reached my ears made me look up. “You should see yourself,” he said, amused. Baring my teeth at him, I realized he fooled me. “Why, then?” I asked awkwardly.

“Fine,” he said, pulling his hands out of his pockets and raising them in a gesture of surrender. “If I’m not mistaken, you’ve been a [Slave] for over a year, right?”

“Yes, so?” He wasn’t wrong, but I didn’t see where he was going with it.

“Your...former master made you take the class?” He continued, to which I nodded.

“So...” He took a breath. “If I’m counting right, you should be a little over seventeen.”

“What?!” I yelped, then lifted Sage to stop him. “No, I see...I understand how you came to that.” I really did. Once the people of Eleaden reached sixteen, they chose their Class. No idiot would wait until she was twenty-eight. Still. Seventeen? I was flattered, for sure. But did I look that young in his eyes? Seriously?

“I’m pushing thirty,” I said bluntly, pointing my thumbs at myself. “Strange, I know, but there’s a reason for it.” Only I wasn’t sure whether to tell him.