"... Must we go in there?" Kiro stared into the gaping maw that had just emerged from the ground. "It seems... unsafe to be so close to that."

He gestured to the sea of blackness just a stone's drop away from them, watching as it flowed into the cliff's face and through what he assumed to be a deeper part of the dungeon.

"Don't worry!" Aer reassured him. "The void is like a river — go too deep and it'll sweep you away, but so long as you respect its power or are strong enough to swim through it, there's no danger whatsoever! And remember, I'll always be watching. If anything goes wrong, I'll be there before you can blink."

"Right." He nodded, taking a breath. Knowing that certainly helped, but he still couldn't help but feel as if going down there was a one-way trip to his death.

"So who goes first?" Seira brushed a bit of dirt off of her robes, a slight blush filling her cheeks from her stumble. "I'm excited!"

"I'll go first."

Rynn had already taken a step towards the opening, and in Kiro's mana sense, he could see the energy accelerating through his body. Was that a technique to bolster physical strength?

"Hmm... nope." Aer shook her head, the edges of her lips curving upwards into a grin. "There's enough potential paths in there to train a thousand people. You'll all be going at the same time."

* * *

Kiro's footsteps were loud in the deep quiet of the corridor, and he winced at every echo that rebounded off the narrow stone hallway. To his back, he could still faintly see the light of the entrance, but Seira and Rynn had already long since disappeared in their separate paths. It was only him now.

He shuddered, lighting a small flame on the tip of his finger.

Smooth carvings lined the interior walls of the dungeon, and he placed a hand on them, trying to decipher what they meant. They were clearly some type of rune, but he didn't know for what. Perhaps if he channeled a bit of mana into them...

He shook his head. His channeling was still novice at best, and he needed every ounce of mana he could get for this dungeon. He could ask Aer later — for now, he needed to continue forwards.

Something cracked underneath him, and he jumped at the sudden sound, his flame sputtering out into a puff of smoke.

He sighed. It was probably just a piece of wood, left here from the dungeon's inhabitants long ago. He burned some more mana, rekindling a wisp of fire in his palm.

Not wood. Bone.

It was a small thing, probably belonging to a rabbit or some sort, but it still made him look around warily. That meant that whatever was in here preyed on such things, or at least that they had killed it so long ago that it had naturally disintegrated.

He really wished that Seira was with him now. The further along he went, the more uneasy he felt, being separated from her. What if she was in trouble, and he wasn't there to save her? Or, more likely, what if she wasn't here to save him?

Then, he noticed the doors. Sticking out so much that he marveled at the fact that he had missed them even in the dark, a pair of white marble doors blocked his path, carved in the middle with singular rune. He wasn't any expert of runesmithing, but he thought that he knew what this meant.

He placed a hand in the middle of the circle, and sure enough, the doors slid open, the grinding sound of stone against stone filling the dungeon hall. If only the runes on the walls were so easy to use.

He held his breath, inching forwards, when a deep, gravelly growl emerged from the darkness. He thrust his flame forwards, and a pair of glowing gold eyes rose to meet him. He instantly backpedaled, but the thing didn't seem to move at all, instead continuing to stare unblinkingly in his direction. The first inhabitant of the dungeon.

Upon closer look, the creature looked to be a wolf, though it was harder in the meagre light of his conjured fire. And while it might not have been chasing him, but it also didn't look like it would be letting him through any time soon. That made sense — this place was meant to test students, not run them out of their own training grounds. That meant he had some time to get ready.

Not that he had many preparations to make. If he had an alchemy set, he might have been able to concoct something to melt the wolf without ever getting within five paces of it, but as of now, he didn't even have a weapon on him. He'd need to focus exclusively on his mystic arts.

Not that his pitiful excuse for a candleflame was any sort of mystic art.

He took a deep breath, trying to remind himself that this was just a training exercise, that the wolf wouldn't actually maul him once he was defeated. It was hard to think that, though, when it seemed poised to rip his throat out the second he came into the room.

It was just a wolf. Seira could have melted one of those with the flick of her finger, and he was on her level now — mystic of the First Purification.

He steeled himself, bringing a concentration of mana to the front of his palm. Then, with huff, he launched himself in.

The wolf lunged out at him, and he tossed himself to the side, the flames in his hand guttering out without his concentration to hold them in place. Darkness shrouded him once more, and he just barely managed to respark his mana when shining golden eyes turned back on him. The wolf lunged again, its agility betraying its stony composition, and this time he knew for a fact that he couldn't avoid it. So, with all the force he could muster, he slammed into its side with a fistful of flames. His mana burst out at the impact, but without his spirit to guide it, it simply dispersed, leaving him with nothing but an aching palm and an enraged enemy.

The stony wolf ignored his attack, positioning its jaws to clamp down directly on his neck.

Then, everything went black.

* * *

Rynn lashed out with a mana-propelled kick, unleashing his full rage onto the pitiful training dummy. Cracks exploded onto the body of the stone fox, and it gave a grinding whimper before the light in its eyes finally died out. That was the second enemy he had faced in this dungeon, and he was starting to doubt its effectiveness in training him. Every second he wasted was another second that Mai would be trapped on Paradise, and only the heavens knew how she was being treated there. Would her father have punished her for associating herself with a traitor? Even moreso than the weak, the Hong Clan despised those who sold out their own blood.

He kicked aside the fox, heading down the dark hallway leading to the third room. A quick flash of mana ignited the runes carved in the walls, and soft light shone down upon him, illuminating their surroundings in warm yellow.

He just hoped that this room was a challenge.

The doors slid open with the sound of shrieking stone, and an obsidian-black turtle rose to meet him.

He huffed. A turtle? That was what they were going to throw at him? Oversized or not, he would melt this thing to scrap before it even neared him. Mana gathered in his hands, and he focused on the channeling technique the Saint had ingrained into him during their journey through the void. A fireball flared in his palms, and he indignantly thrust them out, shooting the improvised technique directly at the beast's head.

The creature opened its mouth, and a bar of black and red punctured through his attack, headed straight for his chest.