"Goooooood evening Axion." Lord Umi said in an announcer style voice over an intercom system. "The staff and I hope you are settling well into your place at Axion, meeting your new roommates, and bonding with others. We have done our best to bring you together with people that will help you grow and evolve emotionally, mentally, and even physically. However, there is but another aspect of schooling that will occur here at Axion. Think of this as an entrance exam, if you must, that will test your might, mind, and the people you have been surrounded with."
"That doesn't sound good.” Aurora quickly said, shooting out of bed and looking around. Everyone else was awake as well, all looking up from their beds simultaneously.
“Why the hell is he waking us up this early?” Alexander asked loudly, jumping out of bed and rubbing his eyes. He had his full normal attire already on, as if he hadn’t even changed for bed, but then again Aurora hadn’t brought anything but her dress anyway. The less she had from home, the less she had to think about it.
“Shut up Alex and get ready, I’ve heard this test could be anything under the sun.” A muscular girl, by the name of Lora Morales spoke slightly angry as she passed by Alexander. They had only met with each other briefly as they had entered the room and gone about their business, but from what Aurora could tell, Lora wasn't exactly the most friendly person on the planet. She was around 20 years old, had almond colored skin, and said she hailed from Deazure, a country to the south of Ventali. She also had long red hair, and red eyes, and always looked determined. Her strong appearance translated to her personality as well, it was almost like talking to a brick wall...that seemed like it wanted to punch everything.
“Oh goodness, what is going on?” A guy named Cypher questioned. He was a large man, probably twice the size of everyone else, but was the definition of a gentle giant. He wore a red tank top, which showed off his large arms, and a pair of black jeans and normal running shoes. His hair was in black dreads, with a slight orange tinge to them, which followed in his eyes. On his belt were two axes with a red tinge, a design straight from the Clans of Pyralis, located on the other side of the world from Ventali.
Her and the person she had initially met here, Tivar, had been separated after Alexander had come back from seeing Lord Umi. It had been an odd switch to her, but one that was out of her control. She hoped he was doing alright.
"All of you, new students and old, will participate in the Moon Labyrinth, one of the greatest and well built structures in all of Vallauria. Beautiful yet dangerous at the same time, this test will determine how accelerated your classes will be, and personalize your growth and development process here at Axion." Lord Umi’s voice spoke once again. "Your task is to make your way through the entire Labyrinth, facing Dires, puzzles, and your fellow classmates. Work with each other, or go alone, how you get to the goal matters not. Your goal? Make your way to the Sun side of the school without being incapacitated, its as simple as that. The first three people to get to the end will receive the greatest honor we can bestow. You have 14 hours until the dawn sun rises, have fun."
With that, the room went completely silent. The suddenness of all this was something that surprised all of them, but especially Aurora. While it appeared that at least Lora had some working knowledge of this place, even just based of legends, Aurora was completely lost. After a few moments, as everyone retrieved their senses, both Lora and Alexander began to move for the main door out of the small room.
"What are you doing?" Cypher asked quickly, hopping out of bed and grabbing his dual axes.
"He said this is a test, and I'm going to be the first one to get to the end. I plan on being the first one there." He said, giving them a cocky look, and continuing to walk towards the main door.
“Fat luck, I won’t let you be the first, little guy.” Lora said, shooting a competitive glare at Alexander, who just grinned at her.
“Maybe we should all work to-“ Aurora spoke softly, reaching for her bow.
“Well that isn’t the same.” Alexander muttered as he kicked the door open.
"What isn’t the same?"
"Take a look for yourself." Alexander said waving his hand at the door, and Aurora ran beside him, seeing that the hallway had been replaced by a large grasslands, without a cloud in the air and the sun high.
"How far did we move?" Aurora muttered, glancing around the area but not exiting the room. "How did the hallway turn into this?"
"Great, a puzzle." Alexander muttered. Aurora and the others followed slowly, noticing that the grass under their shoes felt and looked oddly real.
"I don't understand, what's the puzzle?" Cypher questioned, still brandishing his axes and turning in circles, ensuring they had 360 degree security. None of them truly knew exactly what was going on. “We just pick a direction and go in it, right?”
“YAH!” Lora yelled loudly, and an apple came flying full speed from the room, and smashed into an invisible wall. The apple broke into pieces and rained down on the ground, with some of the apple pieces sliding down the invisible wall slowly.
“Well, guess this is all display walls, but it looks so realistic." Alexander spoke, putting his hand on the wall. “And it's hard... and cold.”
“What does that mean?” Cypher asked, walking next to Alexander and looking out into the grasslands as if he simply couldn’t comprehend that there was a wall there. He reached his axe out and poked the wall with it, surprised that it had stopped.
"Guys...um...our room is gone." Aurora said with fear, causing Alexander to turn around and open his eyes widely.
“That isn’t good.” Alexander muttered and walked towards where the door had been, but someone had beaten him to it.
"Move." Lora said, walking past Aurora. She took a breath, then flung her fist out, connecting it with where the invisible wall was. Fire exploded from her fist, and covered the area of the wall a few feet around her fist, letting off a huge banging noise. Though, even through all that display of power, the wall remained unharmed. Lora looked at the part of the wall she had hit with extreme confusion. “Ineffective… How?”
"Maybe this?" Aurora questioned, letting an arrow fly right past Lora’s head and into the invisible wall. The arrow simply bounced off, as if the wall was literally impenetrable. “Well I guess it was worth a shot.”
"Sorry princess, but if my fists aren’t making a dent, then why would you think an arrow would?” Lora asked, walking back towards where they believed the center to be and tapping her chin. Aurora grit her teeth and held her emotion back. She hated when people only referred to her as a princess. All it did was remind her of how normal she could never be. “I've never seen whatever this wall is made out of, I simply don't understand."
"I cut it." Alexander laughed, high fiving Cypher. Aurora glanced over at Alexander’s sword, and noticed it looked to be glowing red ever so slightly. Perhaps Cypher had heated it up?
"What is your sword made out of?" Lora asked extremely quickly as she ran over to the crack in the wall. Unfortunately, it wasn’t anything more than a crack, with a small dent where Alexander had struck the wall.
"It's called Carbonanium." Alexander said, causing Lora to side eye him as if he were crazy.
"I have no idea what that is." Lora stated, as an angry look entering her face. "Did you just make that up?"
"No! I'm serious that's what it's called." Alexander insisted, then shook his head. "Jeez, even when I actually know something she doesn't appreciate me."
"You sarcastic as-" Lora started to say, but was quickly interrupted.
"Guys! There's storm clouds heading this way!" Cypher called out, pointing at huge black clouds in the distance with one of his axes.
"Calm down Cypher it's not real." Aurora tried to assure him, and herself. She started out into the grasslands and saw how menacing and real the storm clouds looked. The grip on her bow tightened, as the storm clouds drew ever closer.
“Letting our guard down would be foolish, who knows what surprises this place has in store for us.” Lora spoke darkly as she eyed the quickly approaching storm.
"Greatly reassuring Lora, you're truly the heart of this group." Alexander laughed, causing Lora to glare over at him.
"Just because I exercise caution, unlike you, does not mean I'm not reassuring." Lora shot back, but Alexander laughed like he didn't care.
"Look, it's a simple rain cloud. It's not like a little rain is going to kill us." Alexander pointed out, turning away from the raincloud, and examining the crack he had made in the wall.
"You idiot, we are in an enclosed room." Lora pointed out as the cloud took over the sky above them. Within seconds, soft rain began to fall on all of them, increasing the tension in the room.
"Yeah, that's not good." He muttered in worry, then glanced over to Cypher, holding his sword out. "We need to break through this wall. Quick Cypher, use that heating spell again before this gets any worse."
"I'll try. Fiurus!" Cypher yelled, fear obvious in his tone as a glowing red energy surrounded his hands. However, no matter how hard Cypher seemed to try, the cold rain simply continued to cool the blade back to its normal temperature. "I'm sorry...I can't."
"It's okay, we can find another way." Alexander said, continuing to look between his sword and the crack on the wall. "Lora."
"What do you want?" He asked, leaning up against the wall near, seemingly unphased by the rain completely.
"Can you create explosions without fire, sunshine?" Alexander asked in a sarcastic tone. Lora rolled her eyes and scoffed.
“I can, but only barely. If my punches didn’t work on the wall before, how do you expect a weaker version to-
“Well, usually electronics are protected on the outside, but not as much on the inside. With this crack, the structural integrity-”
“I’ll hit the damn wall.” Lora grimaced. She flung her sopping wet, long hair out of the way and walked in front of the crack, then focused for a minute. Then, she let out a loud roar and slammed her fist into the wall at full strength, letting out an explosion noise about the same volume as her yell. The whole area shook a bit and dust filled the area around her fist briefly. As Lora backed away, the crack in the wall seemed to get slightly larger.
"You have to keep hitting it like that if we're gonna escape, I need that to be wide enough so we all can hit it with all our weapons and hopefully break out of here." Alexander explained, causing her to glance over with wide eyes of anger.
"Do you really think that brute forcing our way through this is going to do us any good?"
"Yeah...what if someone gets hurt?" Aurora questioned, leaving Alexander to only look away from both of them.
"I think staying in this room is only gonna hurt us more. The water is already soaking into my boots, and it doesn't look like it's going to stop any time soon. If either of you have a better idea, speak up now." Alexander said seriously, looking into both of their eyes with a cold sort of look.
"I-" Aurora started to say, thinking a plan would come to her head, but looking around gave her nothing. Lora too, didn't seem to be able to find any sort of plan.
"Fine, I’ll do it. But I don't agree at all." Lora muttered, crossing her arms. Alexander then turned to Cypher with the widest grin on his face, indicating he may not have been serious at all to begin with.
"I knew you'd come around, now quickly, beat that wall into nothing." He called to Lora and she sighed but wasted no time. She began punching the cracked wall as hard as she could, using all her might through pure strength and her powers. After about a minute of punching, a piece of the wall finally chipped off, revealing what the wall truly was. Alexander bent down and picked up the piece of wall that had been smashed off, for a moment he stared at it. "Looks like some sort of Pawn-like tech.”
“What does that mean?” Lora asked, but Alexander simply shrugged.
"This water is salt water." Cypher said from next to Aurora. She jumped a bit, not hearing him approach.
"What Cypher?" Aurora asked, looking over to him.
"I’m so sorry Princess Flore; I did not mean to scare you. This water is salt water though… but why would they use salt? That would tear up the pipes… and rain isn’t even salty." Cypher questioned, completely confused.
"Is that bad? That it's salt water and not fresh?" Aurora asked, fear obviously catching her throat again.
“Well yes, that’s why pipes hold fresh water because they would rust away faster with salt.” He shrugged, but then he studied the water, thoughts flying through his head as Lora continued to try to bring the wall down. Suddenly, without warning, the rain that fell in the middle of the room began parting slowly in an odd shape. "Get ready! There's a dire coming!"
"What?" Alexander questioned, holding his sword in a defensive position towards where the high ceiling was opening. Without another word, a dire dropped into the water, part of its body sticking out, but with the rain starting to fall even harder, it was beginning to sink. The dire itself had blue colored fish scales with the typical pure red eyes, and was about the size of a car, with the gaze of a killer. It had large, sharp teeth, huge claws, gills and fins.
"It's a Palude!" Cypher yelled, getting into a fighting position in front of Aurora. “I’ll protect the princess, you all take that thing down!”
“Hey, I can pro-“
"What the heck does Palude mean?" Alexander muttered to himself as he looked at the ugly thing that had decided to stare Lora down, probably because she looked to be the biggest threat.
"Well it obviously means big, strong, angry fish dire, duh.” Artemis said in his ear, appearing once again beside his face.
"Go back in. Don’t let them see you. I’ll fight by myself this time." He said quickly, waving the fox off, and she quickly disappeared just as the Palude jumped at Lora. The Palude was obviously extremely fast and precise, but the brawler was skilled as well. She jumped to the side and let the dire slam into the wall, causing the whole room to shake. The creature shot back, shaking its head, then spun around effortlessly in the waist high water. The creature then launched itself at Alexander, who was now the closest target.
"Watch it!" Cypher yelled to Alexander, and he immediately disappeared into the water, causing the Palude to sail right above him, but not without being injured. Alexander, while underwater, shot his sword up in a desperate attempt to at least strike the monster, resulting in his sword managing to find a small space in the monsters underbelly, and cut the Dire. The Dire roared loudly, and slammed into the other side of the wall, shaking the room once again and sloshing the water in everyone's faces.
"This would be a great time for someone to be looking for a weakness." Alexander gasped, popping out from the water. Though, unluckily for Alexander and the rest of them, not a single one of them possessed the powers to take the Palude down in an easy way. The Palude spun around, then glanced at Alexander, it's red eyes boring into his yellow eyes. It then let out a loud roar, but instead of jumping at Alexander again, it instead chose a new target to surprise.
"Oh no." Cypher muttered as the Dire jumped at him with speed faster than he could dodge. Cypher, with his reflexes, swung both of his axes inward, which saved his life. The two blades sunk into each side of the Dires's head, which let Cypher use his strength to hold the Dire back. Due to the water now reaching his stomach, Cypher had no grip on the ground, and the Palude was able to push Cypher back. Aurora jumped to the side and notched an arrow into her bow, and fired it into one of the Palude’s eyes. It roared as the arrow lodged itself into its left eye. The dire then picked up more speed, slamming Cypher into the wall. "Little...Help…"
"On it!" Alexander yelled, jumping onto the Dire's back as it pushed against Cypher's strength, which was about to falter. Alexander pulled his sword up, about to drop it on the dires head, but then Lora jumped from out of the water and slammed her fist into the left side of the Palude's head.
"Yah!" Lora exclaimed as Cypher quickly let go of his right axe, letting the Dire fall to the right, and splash water everywhere. Alexander, without a second thought, turned his sword back into a ring then grabbed onto the dire, and fell into the water with it.
"Alex!" Aurora yelled as she notched an arrow in her bow and stood waiting for the dire to appear again. She had chosen a spot in the corner of the room, as she wasn’t adept at physical combat, seeing as she was a ranged fighter. The Dire started thrashing in the water, not coming out at all, but covering the entire room in salt water. Aurora lost track of everyone, and couldn’t even see five feet in front of her. She clutched her bow tightly, her eyes moving back and forth trying to find any hint of anything.
"The mouth is the weak spot!" Aurora heard Cypher yell from the other side of the room, but with the rain and thrashing water, it was impossible to see him. Aurora locked her eyes on the source of the thrashing, the dark blue body of the Dire popping in and out of the surface, but Aurora saw small yellow orbs glowing ever so slightly in the darkish room as it moved up and down.
"Hit him with-" Alexander’s voice rang out, but then he was pulled right back under the water. Aurora deduced that she had just seen his eyes, but since when did they glow? A few seconds later, he popped back out again, only to have the dire slam him into the wall. She expected him to be thrown off by this, but against all of her logic, he held on for dear life, not letting his grip falter at all as he was pulled right back into the water.
"He just doesn't give up does he?" Aurora questioned in complete amazement. "He's really brave."
"He's really stupid." Lora commented, as the Palude's roar pierced the room. It rose from the water once again, stopping its thrashing. This allowed the water to stop sloshing around like crazy and once again let Aurora see the other side of the room. She glanced over, looking for Cypher and Lora, but was only able to spot Lora, who was near her, analyzing the situation and probably looking for an opening. Aurora turned back to the Dire, her bow armed, and saw that it was reaching its clawed arm up to try to slice the dazed person off it. This was when Cypher chose to reveal himself.
"I got you!" Cypher yelled, jumping from the other side of the Dire and sinking his one axe blade into the Dire's raised clawed hand, turning his body, then sinking back into the water, assumingly holding the Dire's hand down.
"Lora!" Alexander yelled in an obviously dazed tone, tossing his sword at Lora who was moving to the Dire's right side. Lora grabbed the sword from the air then brought it down onto the Dire's right hand before it could slice at Alexander or Cypher. Lora too sunk into the water, disappearing much like Cypher. Alexander however, did something different. He gripped the axe on the side of the struggling Dire's head, and lifted up with all of his strength, forcing its mouth to open. He then looked at Aurora with a look of stress. "C'mon...everything you got."
"On it!" Aurora yelled back and let the arrow notched in her bow off, which flew extremely quickly into the Dire's mouth, hitting the back of its throat and causing it to growl in pain as it struggled against the three fighters. Aurora fired yet another arrow into the mouth of the Palude, now seeing dark red blood spout from its mouth, and flow freely out. She then fired arrow after arrow, trying her best to take it down, until the Dire let loose a sound that seemed like gurgling.
“That’s...enough.” Aurora spoke as the Palude’s choking sounds stopped and its body halted completely. For a moment everyone stayed mostly still, Aurora not believing that she had actually killed a Dire for the first time. Was this what it felt like? To take the life of something? She felt guilty in a way, even if it was a monster ours creature, but then both Lora and Cypher burst from the surface of the water, gasping for air.
"Hell yeah!" Cypher cheered happily, swimming over to Yato and reaching his hand up for a high five. "We got it!"
"Our problems aren't over." Lora grunted, tossing the sword he was holding back to Alexander, who was still sitting on the top of the dead Palude.
"Thanks." Alexander muttered, completely out of breath. He stored the sword on his back, laying his head onto the dire’s and sighing heavily.. "Can we go back to the dorm now?"
"I thought you wanted first place little man?” Lora asked with a cocky grin, which made Alexander groan then sit up. Despite how he was acting, Aurora noticed his eyes looked full of life, but they were no longer glowing, perhaps that had just been a figment of her imagination.
"Right, this is a test." He groaned again, looking to the wall.
"The water is still coming, we should go on with your plan Alexander, before we get killed." Cypher spoke, glancing at the water level as Alexander contemplated how they were going to get out of this situation. Aurora too looked down, noticing her feet were still touching the ground, but the water was all the way up to her chest. Aurora then got extremely worried, and looked up towards where the clouds were, wondering where the ceiling actually was.
"Oh don't worry so much everyone." Alexander laughed, looking down at the dire and running his hand over its scales. "With the weight of the water pushing on that crack, along with what I have planned, we'll get through that wall easily."
"What do you think is on the other side of the wall?" Aurora asked as the water reached her throat. She panicked for a second, but then Alexander put his foot in the water and pushed the floating Dire body towards Aurora and reached his hand down.
"I don't need you drowning on me." Alexander smiled at Aurora, as she took his hand. He pulled her up onto the Dire, directly behind him, then looked back to the wall. She felt her cheeks get slightly red, with how close they were sitting. Her mother would have never allowed anything like this, luckily she wasn’t here.
"Oh so the rest of us are free to drown?" Lora asked sarcastically, yet also irritated at the same time. Alexander laughed loudly, then leaned on the dire as sarcastically as he could.
"No she's just nicer than you, shit floats." Alexander shot back, his grin widening.
"Oh really Mr.High Horse? Why don't you-" Lora started to say but was immediately interrupted by Alexander, who seemed to be holding back a laugh.
"Hold on, lets try this again. Palude." He said simply, looking at Lora with a mischievous grin.
"Palude?" Cypher questioned, not at all understanding what Alexander was talking about.
"High Palude, I'm on a Dire, not a horse you know." Alexander corrected, and immediately Aurora giggled.
“Alexander, while I recognize you are a decent fighter, you are also a full powered idiot.” Lora sighed, looking at the crack. “Now what is this plan that you have little man?”
"Right, escaping, we still have to do that" Alexander said, jumping into the water, splashing it everywhere, then turning the Dire's head to face the wall.
"Let me guess we’re going to try brute forcing out way through this crack with our weapons?" Cypher asked seriously, pulling up his axes with a grin, but Alexander shook his head.
"Nope, I have an even better idea. TIMBER!" Alexander yelled obnoxiously loud, gripping the side of the Dires head. He then, with all his strength pushed the Dire towards the cracked wall.
"Thats not going to-" Aurora started to warn, but then before the Palude could touch the wall, Alexander grabbed onto the Dires tail.
"HEAVE!" He yelled, while pulling the tail hard, causing it to move away from the target, just enough for Alexander to grab onto the head once again. Aurora saw this, as she continued to hold on tight to the Dire, he was definitely going to do something stupid. She pushed both of her hands into an opening in the scales and held on as best as she could.
"I'll help!" Cypher announced loudly, appearing on the other side of the Dires head, and helping Alexander once again push the Dire forward.
"HO!" Alexander yelled as he pushed the Dire with all his might once more, and once again catching it before it could touch the wall.
"You both are idiots, but it might just work." Lora muttered, jumping on top of the Dire and looking to Aurora. "You better be ready, this is going to get hectic.
"Okay!" Aurora nodded her head, pushing her body closer to the Dire so she could hold on even better. Lora turned and balanced herself on the Palude's neck, watching the wall approach, then right before the Dire touched the wall, Lora flung her fist out and hit the wall. A small amount of dire exploded out from her fist, licking the wall, but simultaneously pushing the dire back with an extreme amount of force.
“Cypher get ready to jump on!” Alexander yelled loudly.
“Got it!”
The dire then lurched forward with extreme force, towards the cracked wall and Lora flung her arm once again into the wall, this time as hard as she possibly could. The wall then made a horrible shattering sound, as if it were made out of a glass like material, and crumbled slowly in Aurora's eyes, as if time itself were slowing down. For a moment she felt like clarity was coming to her mind, as if she could see and feel everything that was going on.
"Alexander!" She yelled, turning back to try to see if he and Cypher had grabbed onto the Dire before pushing it towards the wall, only to find they hadn't. Instead, Alexander’s expression hadn't changed as she turned around towards the wall. He shoved his sword into the water and reached his hand out for Cypher, which was the last she saw. Suddenly, she was plunged into darkness, with water flying all around her.
"Brace!" Lora yelled, and she immediately saw why. The Dire had started to tilt towards the ground, revealing how far the drop actually was. While it was quite a ways down, a pool of water did glitter on the ground below them. The entire area around the glittered pool was a dimly lit maze, with the pool of water being but one room in a huge maze of hallways and rooms.
"How big is this place!?" Aurora yelled in surprise, as they approached closer to the pool of water. Within a second, they slammed into the pool, going at a decent enough speed to completely knock her off the Dire and throw her into a daze under the surface. She wildly beat around in the water, her senses not telling her where the surface was, and scaring her even more than she already was. She tried to open her eyes to see something, but as she had seen before, the place had been dimly lit, which didn't help her at all in her sense of direction underwater. After a few seconds however, a pair of close together glowing yellow orbs appeared almost randomly in the water, and just as suddenly, two hands grabbed her sides and they immediately shot off to her left. Within the next second, she broke the surface to find that Alexander had come to her aid.
"How did you-" Aurora asked out of breath, and he just sported a wild grin on his face.
"I obviously swan dived a perfect 10/10 into here." He answered, only to have Cypher pop up right next to them laughing wildly.
"That was fun, let's do it again!" He yelled, throwing his arms up. Alexander laughed along with him and let Aurora go, and she just smiled along with them. They had gotten past the first challenge, but she could guess that many more lay before them, just what were they testing?
