‘Great, now what?’ I frowned, cursing my ill-fated curiosity that led us into this mess.

  After working up the courage to at last challenge one of the red doors, we were now trapped inside this strange library slash museum.

  That itself wouldn’t be that bad, but with the murderous constructs wreaking havoc all around, our prospects of making it out of this room alive looked pretty bleak.

  The obvious solution would be to blast them all into smithereens. The gods knew I had plenty of experience with that. Sadly, this time I couldn’t even do that because the damn skeletons always reassembled themselves like nothing had happened.

  Meanwhile, I was crouching behind a mangled bookshelf, feeling like I was missing something. ‘How could they function without any power source?’

  Obviously, they couldn’t, yet no matter where I looked, I couldn’t spot anything that resembled a hidden repository of essence. Then it hit me. ‘The pedestals!’ It turned out they were not just the ordinary marble slabs they tried to appear as.

  First, there was the subtle way the constructs were preventing us from making our way toward the room’s center. And as I followed the loose threads of the constructs’ essence, it all started to make sense as to why.

  ‘That’s it!’ I grinned. If those pedestals were the source, all I needed to do was get close enough to destroy them.

  But, for that, I needed some distraction. So, I turned over to the shy girl covering behind me. ‘That reminds me… Isn’t she supposed to be a noble? So why isn’t she using any magic?’

  “Hey, Mira… Can you keep them busy for a bit?” I whispered, preparing myself to dash toward the room’s center. The girl, however, looked at me evasively and mumbled something intangible. “Sorry, what?”

  “Well, you see… I can’t use magic.” She finally said.

  “Huh? Aren’t you a noble?” I blinked in surprise. Of all things, this was not something I had expected to hear.

  Mira fidgeted, not saying anything. Still, her silence told me enough. There was definitely more to this story. Yet I had neither the time nor the patience to pry the answer out of her.

  Besides, if she wanted to keep her secrets to herself, I had no right to push her. After all, I had plenty of secrets I didn’t want anyone to know. Still, with this unexpected turn of events, I stood before yet another dilemma.

  I couldn’t run and cast spells at the same time, and with those damn constructs blocking the way, I couldn’t possibly hit the pedestals from all the way out here.

  ‘Crap!’ I had to come up with another solution, and I had to do it fast because the blasted skeletons had already recovered from my previous barrage and were getting ready to pound on us again.

  So, to distract them, I sent another volley of fireballs their way, buying myself some time while carefully studying the constructs’ formation, looking for any weaknesses.

  ‘There!’ The ensuing series of explosions didn’t do much, but it created a narrow window of opportunity for me to get within the shot of the pedestals.

  Clutching my teeth, I sprang up and started running, trying not to imagine what would happen if I failed to accomplish my objective or, gods forbid, stumbled upon one of the scattered books.

  Even after the whole beast-hunter training ordeal, I was painfully aware that I never was much of a fighter …or particularly brave.

  I always preferred staying safe behind the enemy lines while bombarding the said enemy from afar.

  So, the idea of running headfirst into a bunch of bloodthirsty magical constructs seemed nothing but terrifying. Still, I was out of time and out of options, so this was the only way I could think of to break the stalemate.

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  The air shimmered with heat as I summoned yet another fireball, yet this one I hurled straight at the nearest pedestal with a satisfying swoosh.

  However, to my dismay, the incandescent flame just bounced off without leaving anything but a black smudge on the marble’s pristine surface.

  Meanwhile, one of the constructs—some serpent-like thing with too many heads that somehow managed to avoid being hit by my previous barrage was already lunging, getting ready to tear me apart with its disturbingly long fangs.

  I cursed under my breath, pumping essence into my legs as I jumped away, diving behind one of the overturned bookshelves.

  The ground trembled as the serpent crashed into the very spot I had stood in just a moment ago, showering me with debris.

  Luckily, I had somehow managed to avoid being hit. However, I quickly realized this was as far as my fledgling battle instinct would take me—I needed to do something, and I needed to do it fast.

  Still, if an ordinary fire was too weak to break through stone, I just needed to make it hot enough to melt it instead. The air around me thickened, and sweat beaded on my forehead as I drew on my essence, pulling every bit I could muster.

  I didn’t have time to mess around with chants, so I skipped the theatrics and let my will shape the magic raw and unfiltered.

  Moments later, a searing jet of flames erupted from my outstretched hands, making the air shimmer as the heat wave surged toward the nearest platform.

  At first, the stone resisted, but then the marble bubbled and hissed before collapsing into a molten heap. ‘One down…’ I grinned despite myself.

  I was pretty sure there must have been some better, elaborate way to deactivate the pedestals, but sometimes, the direct approach was really the best.

  Devoid of the pedestal’s vital essence supply, several of the constructs became lifeless, simply collapsing to the ground.

  ‘Alright! Just four more to go…’ I thought elatedly. There were still plenty of constructs left, but even this much had already made a significant difference. The room was suddenly less crowded, making it much easier to approach the remaining pedestals.

  But the room wasn’t done with us yet. The remaining skeletons were already reforming, their shattered pieces rattling back together like they hadn’t just been grilled well-done a moment before.

  I quickly glanced at where Mira was hiding, making sure she was okay. “Mira, stay there!” I shouted over my shoulder as I advanced toward the next pedestal. She didn’t respond, though I could see her giving me a weak nod.

  It was obvious that the poor girl wasn’t cut out for such chaos—hell, barely I was—but so far, she held it together surprisingly well, which was more than enough in my eyes.

  The battle was far from over. However, now that I had a proven strategy, dealing with the remaining pedestals was a quick business. The skeletal fiends obviously resisted, but I didn’t give them any opportunity to thwart my progress, always keeping them away with a fireball or two.

  And soon, we were surrounded by utter silence, broken only by the clattering of bones as the constructs lost their power and fell apart one by one.

  “Is it over?” Mira said after finally emerging from her hideout. She looked a bit rattled, and her robe was torn in places, but otherwise, she didn’t seem to have any injuries.

  “I think so,” I replied, panting. “From now on, no more red doors,” I then added, giving Mira an apologetic smile.

  ***

  After this ordeal, we decided to stick with the blue doors only. However, this strategy also proved untenable. Apparently, after each challenge was completed, the doors were locked for good, thus preventing others from taking on the said challenge again.

  Since we hadn’t previously tried to go back into the rooms we’d already been in, I only found out when, suddenly, every door in the hallway became greyed out.

  It looked like the other contestants had already cleared all the challenges in this section of the illusory realm. ‘At least the color change is making it easy to tell which challenge is still open…’ I thought.

  This unexpected development added yet another layer of difficulty because it made the number of tokens finite, meaning plunder would soon become the only viable option.

  Luckily, we were rewarded a whopping three tokens for clearing that damn library, thus bringing our total to six.

  It wasn’t great. I’d hoped we could get at least 10, but it had to do for now. ‘I guess it’s time to find the gate…’

  Locating the gate wasn’t that hard. After some exploring, I found out that all hallways eventually converged into one large hall in the middle.

  That said, I wasn’t too keen on exploring it just yet. By the sound of it, there were a lot of people there, and after hearing all those gut-wrenching screams, I was pretty certain I wasn’t the only one who thought plunder would be the quickest way to gain tokens.

  Still, something about it felt off. There were too many people there. ‘Hmm, why is nobody leaving?’

  Yet before I could go examine the strange situation, I was stopped by a sudden high-pitched yell.

  “Step away from my fiancé, you filthy peasant!”