The rest of the labyrinth was even worse. We spent two hours getting  through it. Snakes, bats, locusts, a huge red dog with horns, more  traps, guards, and a dozen other equally annoying obstacles sat in our  way. After hours of effort though, we managed to get past them all, and  we finally trekked into a huge chamber where we didn't see anything  except...a person. A tall man standing in the middle of the room  stoicly, looking pretty much completely unbothered by our presence. Once  he noticed us, his eyes slid over to pin us in place where we stood.

He  raised an eyebrow. "Visitors? That's a novelty. I'm surprised he  managed to trick you into coming down here. The last few he sent died.  Once they stopped showing up I assumed word had gotten around." He  looked over his shoulder at a stone pedestal in the middle of the room.  On the pedestal sat a single rolled up piece of paper with a worn red  ribbon tied around it in a bow. "I'm not going to let you have it. I'd  prefer not to kill you both, so you should just leave. I can still let  you go if you turn around now."

I blinked. I recognized  that voice. He wasn't making loud insane proclamations or wearing a  bunny mask, but I'd heard that voice more than once now. Spruce Bunny,  or rather, this was Abel Castleton...somehow. I cocked my head. "How are  you here? We were told you left. We even saw you in G district proper.  You were the one who sent us here. Is there a back way into this place  or something?" For the life of me I couldn't figure out what was going  on here, why he was down here with us.

Abel shook his  head. "I assume you mean the original. This isn't really me. It's a  phantasmal guardian. These are expensive to have made. It's a type of  enchantment that anchors a copy of a person to a location. I only exist  within this room, but because of the enchantment I'd as good as real in  here. The original left me to guard this place to make sure my brother  didn't get this back." His voice was cold and flat, barely inflected at  all, and it shocked me how different he was from the rabbit masked man  we had met at the sausage shop.

That didn't tell me any  more than the back entrance would have though. Why would Abel be keeping  something from his brother? I'd thought there were on good terms, this  was a lot of trouble to go through to keep a piece of paper away from  your family. I didn't have a chance at guessing any of it, so I figured I  would ask. At the very least I could ask about what the hell the paper  was. "He did send us, though he didn't give us much choice or warning.  He wanted us to get something but didn't say what. I take it that paper  is the target? What is it?"

He shook his head in  exasperation. "No one ever takes Cicero seriously until it's too late.  He tries hard to make sure that bad habit continues. I'm, not surprised  he tricked you into this. It's his style." He paused, looking pensive.  "I suppose I can tell you though, what the paper is. I won't be letting  you have it anyway so a bit of a clue isn't going to cause much problem.  The answer isn't complicated. It's the deed. When we bought this place  from the last owners we signed for it together. Sadly, that means shared  ownership, which means he can sell it if he so chooses."

That...didn't  fit with the narrative Cicero was giving us, but then again, he'd  proven himself to be pretty untrustworthy. Callie spoke up. "Why? Why do  any of this? It's been so much trouble for no real reason, and now he's  trying to get the deed? For what? Is he going to sell the circus? Would  that even be viable at this point? Who knows if everyone would be  willing to calm down and pull back a bit on fighting until this was  over."

Abel shot her a cheerful smile, the first real  expression I'd seen on him at this point. "I imagine he's facing  pressure. Despite his mercenary nature, Cicero DOES care about his  subordinates. I wouldn't have left him in charge if he didn't. I just  made sure to leave this here, because I know my bother's habits. He's  extremely intelligent, but also something of a coward. He'll fold if he  thinks the situation is beyond saving, and I didn't want that to be an  option.If he wants to sell this place he needs to come convince me to  retrieve it. No one else at G rank should be able to manage it."

I  sighed deeply, not having any other questions. "Alright. Fine, so  what's the test here? We playing checkers with you?" I was pretty sure  it was a combat oriented test, but I wasn't willing to risk an  assumption. Asking might be repetitive to some who knew what was at  stake and would have wanted to jump in, but I'd never been one to take  information for granted. Trust but verify, that was my personal  philosophy. Despite that though, I was pretty sure this wasn't going to  be a game of chess, at least not like anything I'd played before.

Abel  chuckled. "Oh no. I'd never set up a test like that. If you want to get  past me, you do it like an Ascendant should. Stepping over my corpse.  Since you're so young I'll even let you come at me together. If you can  beat me you keep the deed. But just so you know this is a very slim  chance, I only even offer because I actually like you. Shocking I know,  but if my other self got you in. Not exactly perfect, but they would do  for now. Now, as I said, you can both come at me together or you can  just lose."

Which was...deeply troubling. I knew what his  power was, but not how it worked. Presumably the version of him from  outside would have either been stronger or convinced him to stand down  because they were the same person. If he was this convinced he shouldn't  be able to lose to someone his own rank though, he must be terrifying.  Which brought up one more question I had to ask before we started. "What  was stopping some F ranker from tearing this place down and just taking  the deed?"

Abel smirked. "You haven't been Ascendants  long have you? Despite a qualitative difference in power, lower ranked  Ascendants have plenty of ways to limit higher rankers from getting  their hands on things. They can't use any of those interdictions you see  on some lands of legacy or dungeons that keep out powerful warriors,  but the weak have their own methods of self protection." For the first  time since we had started talking to the image of Abel, he seemed  genuinely excited to share. Not just mocking or sarcastic, but thrilled  to tell us all about this interesting thing he knew.

He  gestured around us to the labyrinth. "Mad Madigan, who built this maze  for me, is well known for creating vaults that can keep out higher  ranking Ascendants. This whole place is a single, delicate spatial  construct. It's precisely calculated to contain certain tolerances of  Impact. Too much dimensional weight cracks the foundation, and the whole  thing disintegrates into the void, destroying everything inside  forever. Of course, building spatial constructs on the edge of tipping  into the void is INSANE hence the Mad part of his moniker, but before he  accidentally got swallowed by a void beast, Mad Madigan was considered a  prodigy at spatial arts, so his constructions are all actually very  stable."

That opened up lots more questions, and made me  extremely nervous as to what would happen if we somehow managed to crack  the space in this place some other way besides being F rank. I briefly  felt sick as I considered that WISHES might be able to do something like  that, and remembered the thirty six Impact I'd spent on Callie's trap  skill in here. I wasn't sure how close we had come to both dying, but at  the very least we'd gotten lucky enough to survive. I shook off the  horrible image. "Alright, fine, if we need to beat you to pass we'll do  it."

I reached down and put a hand around Callie's waist,  triggering Flurry of Blows again. As I'd confirmed earlier, the change  to that subskill had been perfected, so it didn't even hurt when I  flooded the speed boost into my girlfriend. Callie, feeling the effect  take hold, flicked out a hand and sent a series of razor shard shadow  blades in at Abel from multiple directions. The enhanced Perception she  was so proud of let her see in perfect detail where to attack, exactly  how to aim and from what angles she could stab down to prevent him from  blocking those hits. She executed the most flawless attack I had ever  seen, all her Might driving those blades into the exact right positions,  since he was just a copy and she didn't need to worry about killing  him.

None of them touched him.  Not a single piece of his clothing got so much as scratched. Her blades  were so fast, so deadly, I'd expected anything he did to avoid them to  be a blur. I expected him to dart around like a maniac and maybe dodge a  few and get cut a couple times in the process. I didn't actually think  that would be enough to finish him off, but I had assumed it would be  enough to do SOMETHING. I'd been wrong. The blades came down, and he  watched them placidly, an expression of mild interest on his face. Then  he just...moved.

It  wasn't some kind of superior dodge or anything like that, he didn't  contort himself. He moved calmly and slowly, unhurried, and my head HURT  watching it. The space around him warped, and his casual, unhurried  movements were just more than they should have been. They crossed more  distance than was possible. He made a series of lazy, unconcerned  shuffles side to side, and every single one of those shadow blades just  flowed right by. He watched them go, eyes following them as he moved,  and somehow the break in his movements opened up a gap between the  strikes where none had been before.

We  just stared at him, terrified, as he smiled gently over at us. "Well,  that was certainly a lovely effort. I'm impressed. That level of attack  was much more than I expected from a Perception build. That was nearly a  five hundred Might strike. Good instincts going for piercing damage  too. I assume you used some sort of speed boosting skill. Piercing lends  well to that kind of thing, more concentration means more bang for your  buck. Meta Skills like that are rare at G rank. You must be very  successful. Mind if I ask where it is you came from?"

I  swallowed hard, just staring at the absolute monster in front of us. I  had no clue what we could do here. That had been, as he mentioned, a  nearly five hundred Might strike. Callie's one hundred fifty seven  points of Might amplified three times for the purpose of speed,  maximized by penetrating damage. We'd just thrown Might similar to what  Cark was throwing around at this guy, and he'd barely even needed to  move. "We're from the Unity. The Ascendant Academy." No reason not to be  polite.

He  cocked his head. "How...interesting. We don't get many of you down here.  Tell you what. Why don't we make this interesting. If Cicero is so  desperate to get the deed that he's chucking Academy geniuses down here  without worrying what might happen to him, something big must be going  on. Still, I can't just give you the deed, it goes against my purpose.  You have to pass the trial to get the deed. Still ,you seem like  interesting kids." He bit his lip, staring up at the ceiling in  contemplation.

He took his time  speaking, as if carefully choosing his words. "I've been stuck in this  hole for years, and this is probably my best chance to get out, so I'm  willing to talk terms. I'll let you make three rules for the fight. No  limiting my power or Skill usage, but physical limitations are in play.  However. If you fight me as is, you have to last for two minutes, and  the number increases by two for every rule you add." He grinned  savagely. "Take your time deciding. Even if I'll be fading soon, I want  to have some fun before I go." Somehow. I didn't think that would be a  problem. I also didn't think we would be sharing in his joy.