Chapter 38: The Trial

The Caretaker looked at Mira, Maria, and Vulcan and spoke in a more serious voice.

"I will only give you one hint. Use your brain before brawn. The trials are set up with a bunch of very complex formations, even I don't know how they work. All I know is that some of the enemies that you will be fighting in there are can kill you. Also, this little fox can't go in the trial. It's meant for humans only, but I do have something that I can give him though that should help him grow. I don't know what species he is, but I can at least tell that he has an extremely strong fire element. I have a flame that I can let him absorb since he seems to be contracted with you. It will probably take him a while to absorb it though. I don't have anything left to explain about the trial. Just remember that if you die while in the trial then you actually die. I will give each of you a talisman before you enter. If you want to leave the trial at any point then just break the talisman and you will be immediately teleported out of the trial. Are you ready to enter?" The Caretaker finished explaining.

Mira and Maria looked at each other.

"Are you ready Maria?

"Yeah, I'm ready! I wonder what these trials are like! I can't wait!" Maria said excitedly.

"Alright. We are both ready." Mira nodded and said.

The caretaker nodded and led them to where they need to sit down. After they sat down, he gave them each a talisman. After handing them the talisman, the caretaker went and activated the formation to start the trial. Mira and Maria then felt a huge sucking force and their bodies were sent somewhere else. The Caretaker then led Vulcan to an area where he can absorb the flame that he had in mind. It didn't take long for him to lead Vulcan to an empty area. The caretaker then left and soon came back with a clear orange flame. This flame was incredibly hot and dense. This flame was actually known as a flame essence. A flame essence is essentially a flame that was born from the world. They are generally born in extremely hot areas but don't necessarily have to. There are also other kinds of elemental essences as well, but any other essence other than fire or water is either incredibly rare or very elusive. The lava lake's heat couldn't even compare to the heat emitting from the clear orange flame essence. The trio didn't know, but this was actually the only flame that the caretaker had that he could give to Vulcan. The other flames he had would immediately turn him to ash.

Vulcan felt an innate desire to consume this flame. He felt like his very existence was calling to have this flame. Vulcan started wagging his tail happily and saliva was even coming out of his mouth. Magical Beasts were good for him, but his existence was born from flames and heat. A flame was clearly the best to make him stronger. The caretaker sent the flame towards Vulcan and he ate the whole thing. Soon a chrysalis formed around him and he fell into a deep sleep to slowly absorb this flame. The caretaker nodded and walked off to resume his duty of taking care of the city and waiting for Mira and Maria to finish.

***

Mira felt the sucking force finally stop and she slowly opened her eyes. She looked around and found that she was in a room that was made out of dark blue bricks and 2 torches on the wall with blue flames that were barely enough to light up the room she was in. She stood up and took out her scythe. She looked around the room she was in to see if there was anything that could give any clues. She noticed that this room was a perfect square, 20 meters long in every direction, there were no doors, and everything looked exactly the same.

'So I need to get out of this room? Isn't that too easy? There's only so much in this room. No, this is probably just the beginning. I'm already feeling a headache coming.' Mira thought to herself as she walked around the room.

Mira started to touch the bricks on the walls. Mira thought there might be some secret entrance that opened up if she pressed on a brick. Most secret rooms that she has seen are like that. She started pushing on every single brick. There were a lot of bricks and the room was 20 meters tall.

Mira would start with one column of bricks and push on the ones at her height, then she would have to jump and push on the ones that were above her. She is strong enough that jumping 20 meters high is not that big of a deal, but she could only push 2 bricks per jump. She tried to climb on the bricks, but they were too smooth and there were no grooves in between the bricks.

After she finished a column, she would move onto the next one. She continued doing this for a while until she got to her first torch. She tried to move the torch in every direction, but nothing happened. Mira felt that these torches were special for some reason though. She went to go check on the other torch in the room, but this one also did nothing. She then walked back to the column of bricks she was working on and started pushing on each individual brick.

After Mira finished one and a half walls she finally found a that could be pushed. Mira realized that each wall had 100 columns and 100 rows of bricks. That's 10000 bricks per wall and each brick was 20 centimeters long and 20 centimeters wide. This means that there are 60000 bricks in this room as every side, even the ceiling and floor were exactly the same. They are tiny and they all look exactly the same. Mira couldn't find even the least bit of difference after 15000 bricks.

She finally found one that could be pushed. It stood at eye level. Mira pushed on it and waited in anticipation., but nothing happened and the brick just returned to its original position. Mira wanted to scream.

"Dammit! What's with this room? Using intelligence my ass! The only thing I can rely on is luck to be able to find some stupid brick that can be pushed in!" Mira yelled in frustration. She kept pushing this brick, but every time it would just return to its original position. Mira realized that there is probably another brick that needs to be pushed. So Mira put her frustrations aside and remembered the location of the brick. It was located on column 56 row 7. She then continued to push bricks.

Mira tried to think of several things that could make this more efficient like an ice pole, but the stone was so slick that when she tested a smaller version of the ice pole she could only go 20 bricks high before the pole would just slide on the bricks barely putting any pressure on them. So Mira just continued the extremely monotonous task of pushing bricks.

It took her a while, but on the wall opposite of where the first brick she pushed there was another brick that needed to be pushed. It was on column 46 row 21. Mira pushed it, but it would immediately start going back to its original position if she didn't hold it there. Mira then pulled out her scythe and was barely able to reach it and push it all the way in with her scythe. Mira then started making a 20-meter long ice pole to reach the other side as she felt that the two sides needed to be pushed at the same time.

It took her a while to form this ice pole, but she was now able to push the two in at the same time. After pushing them in, they immediately started coming out to return to their original positions. Mira kept trying this as she didn't want to believe it, but the more she kept trying the angrier she got.

"FUCK!" Mira yelled.

She put down her scythe and ice pole then continued searching for bricks. She soon finished all of the walls and now started to check the floor. After checking almost the entire floor, she found a brick that could be pushed. It was near where the first brick she pushed in was. It was 7 columns away from the wall and was at row 52. Mira then tried something. Since using the pole above 20 bricks was almost impossible for her, Mira walked over to the 2nd brick and used her scythe to push it in. Then she stuck in the ice pole and wedged it into the corner of the pushed brick. She kept the pressure on it and walked towards the first brick with her scythe in hand. Once she then pushed jumped up and was barely able to push the brick with her foot, but it was enough to make a wedge where she could place her foot. She used the ice pole to keep her on the brick and kept pushing the brick in with her foot. After the brick went all the way in, she used her scythe to push the brick on the floor. After all 3 were pushed in she heard a clicking sound. Mira slowly removed her scythe and found that it didn't return to its original position. Her excitement started to slowly grow. Mira then hopped off and removed her foot and noticed the brick didn't move. She then removed her ice pole and all of the bricks remained pushed in.

She could finally have a short celebration for completing the puzzle. Well, that's what she thought, but nothing happened. Mira was starting to get angry, but then she noticed the torches. She felt that these held some importance, but didn't know what it would be. She walked over to one and started pulling and pushing it in every direction, but it didn't do anything. She got a little worried but just walked over to the next torch. She pulled on the torch and finally something happened.

One of the walls in the room started going into the floor until that side opened up to what looks like a hallway with the exact same bricks and blue flame torches. She then heard a mechanical voice appear.

"Congratulations on passing the trial tutorial! You may now pass to Stage 1 of the trial. For Stage 1, you must escape from the labyrinth!"

Mira just stood there stunned. This wasn't even Stage 1?!

"Tutorial? This was a fucking tutorial!? All I did was press on some bricks and even just doing that and finding all of the bricks took me hours at the very least! At most, it might've taken me a day or two! Now I have to go through a labyrinth where everything is exactly the same!? Who knows how big this labyrinth is too!!" Mira yelled in anger. Why was there even a tutorial? Mira could only hope that the tutorial had nothing to do with pressing bricks.

Mira then calmed down and began to assess the situation. She looked around the room and round that the bricks were still pushed in. She could use this as a sign for her starting position. She then started to look at the hallway to see if she could notice any differences. As she expected, there were no differences at all.

Mira remembered that the announcer's voice said that this was a labyrinth. She took out a large beast pelt that she kept stored in her space ring. She would use an ice needle to make incisions in the pelt and use that as a map. She then started walking forward and started mapping things down.

***

Maria was still in the tutorial when Mira finished. She had a similar idea to Mira and checked each column for any bricks to push in. She ended up finding all 3 bricks but was having trouble pushing them at the same time. Maria tried to use her light beam to push the brick, but it didn't carry enough force behind it to push the brick all the way in. She tried to use all of her energy, but it still wasn't enough. Then she started throwing a sword at the brick to see if that carried enough force behind it to push it all the way. Maria's other 2 bricks were a bit closer together so she didn't need to jump to push them in. She just used her hand and foot to push those two in, but the other brick was on the other side of the room. She kept using her spare hand to throw her spare swords at the brick. Swords aren't meant to be thrown, so it is very hard to accurately hit the brick at 20 meters. It wasn't hard for her to throw the sword 20 meters, but she needed to pretty much hit the center of the brick at 20 meters.

Maria just kept launching swords at the brick, hoping she might get lucky. Maria lost count after 100 tries, but eventually, she finally heard a click, and the brick that she threw the sword at stayed pushed in. She then removed her hand and foot from the other 2 bricks and noticed they didn't return to their original position. Maria became ecstatic, but then also noticed that nothing else happened. She then started to become worried but felt like she didn't have to search for more bricks.

Maria did the same thing as Mira and noticed the torches. She began to pull on them until one of them finally reacted and a wall started to lower into the ground. After the entire wall was in the ground she heard the same mechanical voice.

"Congratulations on passing the trial tutorial! You may now pass to Stage 1 of the trial. For Stage 1, you must escape from the labyrinth!"

Maria just stood there, dazed.

"TUTORIAL?!"

***