Ben pinched the bridge of his nose as he took it in. He was still determined to get them out of there, it was only a matter of how long it would take. He was sure it was possible, it just wouldn’t be easy, so he needed to know what sort of time limit he was on.

“Alright, how long can you live without food?”

“Pretty sure my kind can manage about three weeks, but it won’t be a happy three, I can tell you that.”

“So then our options are either me getting us out in the next two, or else trying to complete the trial before you starve,” Ben said with a sigh. “I’ll leave it up to you man, what do you want to do? I still think I can get us out eventually, but who's to say if I can manage it in that time limit? Not to mention that if it doesn’t hand out more food then I think I’m on a tighter time frame than you are.”

The crab thought for a minute before letting out a groan. “Between basically certain death trying to work our way through this stupid thing and starving while you see if you can get us out, I choose starving for now at least. Let’s see how I feel in a couple days though.”

“Sounds good. In that case, I guess I’m going to get back to it. Not sure if I can actually break any of the enchantments that make up this trial, but I might be able to lay my own to modify them. We’ll see.”

With time of the essence, he saved the leftover food for later in case no more showed up and got to work, moving around the room to study the enchantments and trying to build a model in his mind of just what they did.

This seems wrong. What’s happening here?

He’d spent two whole days looking everything over and experimenting as he went, trying to get an understanding of the trial as he did, but with minimal luck. While he was lucky at least that the trial seemed to provide those two pieces of food each day, Greed was less so as he struggled with the hunger gnawing within him.

More important though was the change occurring within the magic of the trial, or at least the parts that seemed to be moving. There was a certain section he kept finding himself going back to, watching it change as the hours went on. It had started off as four rings of mana, but now it was down to a single one, the magic on it altering itself as the prior four had and it was picking at his brain.

I feel like I should know what’s happening here. It should be obvious, what about it is screaming out to me?

He’d gone over the entire room, and while there were other enchantments that seemed to be moving and changing on their own, these ones had stood out. He’d taken note of them after they lost their first ring, planning on checking them again after he looked at different sections a little longer in the hopes of seeing another change, with them being down to two by the time he’d decided that he should be devoting himself to that section.

Since he hadn’t had any luck with breaking the enchantments himself he decided he should actually sit down and look it over, to see how they destroyed themself, but that had been no help to him either. The ring had simply broken. There was no apparent reason that gave away what had occurred, unless of course there was some sort of kill switch within the enchantment itself, giving it a time limit.

“Wait shit! A time limit, this is a fucking countdown!”

It all snapped into place in his mind. The trial wasn’t going to just let them sit there on their hands for weeks as he worked to figure out how to get out of there, this was meant to be a challenge from a god, and Ben could only doubt that it would be so kind as to just let him out once the last one broke.

All of his minds were in a blaze as he compared the current structure of the ring to the previous one and felt his stomach sink. If it really was a countdown then he had minutes to do something. He already knew he wasn’t going to be able to break out in that time but he was certain staying would be a death sentence, meaning there was really only one option.

In a panic he looked for Greed and ran to the small crab, scooping him up before he could explain anything and rushing to the door at the other end of the room as he felt something in the air change. The density of mana around them thickened in a way he felt validated his choice as he pushed his body to its limits in his sprint, throwing himself against the door and falling through it as a loud crash could be heard from behind him, into the unknown of the trial.

The world briefly went black as they went to the other side and a part of him wondered if he was too late, if the countdown he’d seen was for completing the trial as a whole, not just entering its starting line, but that fear changed to another as he found himself somewhere different.

No solid ground beneath him, for a moment he hung suspended in a vast blue sky before he felt himself plummet. He didn’t know how high up they were, there was no land to be seen beneath him and it was possible he would be falling forever as he went, when suddenly he was assaulted by a gust of wind so powerful it knocked the air from his lungs as it struck.

He held on to Greed for dear life, knowing if they were separated now they’d never be able to find each other again as he was struck by another gust, and another after that, each throwing him in different directions before he eventually returned to his freefall.

Each time he did his best to breathe. If he let himself fall unconscious as he kept having the air knocked from his lungs then he was as good as dead, if he wasn’t already. He couldn’t even begin to guess the purpose of the trial he’d found himself in, and without understanding that, how was he supposed to get out of it?

He did all he could to keep his wits about him, observing the surroundings the best he could and finding nothing. There was only himself and Greed in that infinite expanse, no light source to be seen despite how bright it all was.

The only thing here is this freaking wind!

He couldn’t hear anything over the sound of it blowing and his freefall, and worse, as the time passed he was pretty sure it was only getting more powerful. It was as he felt himself being ragdolled about, his body feeling like it was going to break from the strain, that two different things showed up in the distance. A small glimmer of light in one direction, and a tornado in the other.

He found a small, bleak part of him wondering if it would be better to call it a hurricane. He wasn’t sure of the difference, but whatever it was it looked like it meant his death if he got too close, so instead he tried to focus on the light in the distance.

This thing has to have some sort of goal, right? Maybe it’s getting there?

It wasn’t much to go off of, but it was better than nothing, the only question was how? It wasn’t like he could fly, if he had air magic then maybe he would have been able to do something, or even if he had telekinesis there was hope. As things stood though he had a single magic skill he didn’t have any idea how to even use, and the rest of the options on his status didn’t seem like they’d get him anywhere.

All that left was his minds and what he could only assume would be a whole lot of suffering to get there as he stretched the power of his thoughts.

He wouldn’t describe his idea as good so much as he would call it desperate. With no real options he roughly shoved Greed into his jacket pocket and zipped it closed, before unzipping his coat and holding both sides of it tightly, waiting for the next gust of wind to hit.

Front!

The wind blew at his face, pushing him in the wrong direction he wanted to go and he did his best to make himself as small as he could until it passed, watching the light end up higher and higher above him as he plummeted.

Up!

He opened his jacket as wide as he could, catching more air to make him rise into the sky, feeling the strain on his limbs as he did. He wasn’t certain of how long he’d been tossed around so far, but he was sure that as the power of everything kept increasing, eventually something would break. He just wanted to get there before that point.

With every single gust that blew by him he did his best to react as fast as he could, opening and closing his jacket, making himself as big or small as he needed to be and putting himself into different angles until he was finally close, seeing a hole in space with a glowing edge he could only think marked it as a door within his sight. As long as he kept up with the wind he was sure he’d make it through eventually, but his time was up.

He hadn’t been looking at it, knowing that there was nothing he could do about the tornado behind him as it approached, but even without any violent wind tossing him about he could feel himself being pulled in and took a quick look behind his shoulder, finding it all too close as he did.

Damn it, just a little more! Just one last push up and over and I’m through, come on!

It wasn’t much to hope for, he’d been tossed around by the whims of the wind since he stepped through the door. One more good breeze was all he needed, but when it came he was tossed into despair. It didn’t throw him forward, but back, into the tornado.

As he felt himself enter the wind’s inescapable grasp, he could only be thankful that he was just being pulled around by the air. Unlike any windstorm on earth, it wasn’t filled with dust and debris as it tossed him around, but at the speeds his body was moving that was a small consolation.

He was growing light-headed but doing his best to hold onto what few strands of consciousness he could when he glanced the smallest amount of luck as the tornado continued on forward, and in an act that made him think the universe wasn’t ready to kill him off quite yet, tossed him through the hole in space, to whatever was next for him.