“Shall we go, then?” Azure asked her with a crooked eyebrow.

Sammy frowned at her. “Promise me you will be careful and not do anything reckless within. No dying or getting traumatized.”

Azure held up her hand. “I solemnly swear not to die or be reckless within the challenge vision. Now you, Chestnut.”

Sammy also raised a hand. “I solemnly swear the same: I will not get killed or be reckless within the challenge vision. We’re there to absorb and obtain knowledge and power.”

Azure nodded then called out, “Ozra Bosk, what will we gain from the Challenge Room visions?”

The hologram of Ozra flickered into existence with her arms out wide in a shrug. “Why spoil the surprise? Okay, fine… but only to tempt you.” She grinned. “The first one hopefully primes and accelerates you quicker to the others. As such, it’s focused on knowledge, particularly of the arcane and things I consider most important. Now, go! No more hints, you yellow-painted chicken!”

Ozra’s skin turned yellow as she made chicken wings with her arms and flapped them, going ‘bock, bock, bock’ in a taunting fashion, before finally flickering out.

Sammy shook her head briefly at the antics. “This could be a handy information font if she was comprehensive with it. I suppose we should save it for later, though…” After hesitating, she could not resist calling, “Ozra, what are the Maintenance Codes?”

Nothing happened.

With a burst of laughter, Sammy exclaimed, “She fucking forgot! I guess we can’t expect too much comprehensiveness after all…” Actually, maybe that should make me nervous…

Her eyes were drawn to a rune as she spoke, almost as if some echo of memory bound within it called to her. She couldn’t see it well from her angle, so she willed herself into flight and hovered above to get a better angle.

She blinked a bit at the whole ‘I can fly with ease’ thing.

Right. Things are easier here. Hmm.

The rune, as seen more clearly, unraveled in meaning as she stared at it. She might’ve imagined it, but it seemed even to flash briefly.

“Uhh, what is it, love?” Azure asked, her neck craning up.

Sammy smiled suddenly as the meaning fully came to her. Or translated in some way, at least. “Prime… Mover… Engineer-Architect! It’s like a title… and an identity. What Ozra was here, I think. A rune that bears her authority.”

“Mmn. That could be handy, yes. But you seem happy just to know it.”

“Yeah. I am.” Sammy floated back down to the platform. “Anyway, let’s get to business. Unless you think we should leave now and come back later. The place clearly isn’t going anywhere.”

“Could you really do that?”

Sammy met Azure’s eyes and they both broke into a grin and a brief laugh. “No. Let’s do this, Girlfriend!”

“Lets!”

The right-hand pathway led to a heavy, ornate bronze door inset into a stone wall. It had a unique identifying rune that read ‘Challenge Room for the Prime Mover Engineer-Architect — pests keep out! This door is not afraid to zap and it aims for the groin!’ While that did give Sammy a momentary pause, she was certain that they were perfectly safe. There was a palm-print inset to presumably open it, so she approached…

She suppressed a scream as she got zapped between her legs as soon as her hand neared. As she leapt backward… she realized it had dealt no damage and no pain. She’d barely felt it.

But I did feel it! What the fuck, Ozra?!

Azure had her hand up to her chin, a finger tapping her lip thoughtfully as she observed. “Fascinating. Do you think she also designed a hand-held version?”

“Azure!” Sammy admonished in a scandalized tone. She rushed over to put her palm in the inset outline to open the door, enduring briefly another groin zap. As soon as her hand went in the outline fully, there was a clicking sound, the zapping ceased, and the door slid sideways.

Instead of open space, there was a black mirror portal behind it, showing a vague but otherwise perfect mirror image of them. The surface was the telltale liquid-like appearance of the Hall’s portals.

Between two breaths Azure was next to her, hand slipping around to take Sammy’s and give it a squeeze. Nodding, Sammy went through.

It was less like a portal and more like a barrier they passed through — as thin as a razor. The transition was enough for her to tell instinctively that she had passed fully into the Hall.

On the other side was a circular chamber of wood, bronze, and copper of very high height that was maybe something like being on the inside of a steampunk clock. Gears were turning on the walls, copper tubes burst up from the checkered floor, and the decor was that definitive retro-future aesthetic. In this case, all was probably decorative as opposed to serving any specific purpose.

At floor level was a decoratively-framed black mirror portal like still liquid held vertically suspended, in the shape of an oval. Above it was the number ‘1.’ Around the chamber were other ovals inset into the wall, each number higher up than the one before. The ovals also appeared made of bronze instead of black liquid, likely showing they weren’t traversable.

“Quaint,” Azure said as she looked around. “I guess with this being cordoned off, that nasty thing in the Halls can’t get to us.”

“Seems like a fair assumption. Do you think the lives used in these will all be of Ozra and your Iteration?”

Azure frowned in thought. “I’m not sure, but maybe that is what is most logical. I wonder what her lover looked like? We seemed destined to be different, so I don’t suppose I’m a goblin or whatever she is.”

“Gremlin!” Sammy corrected. “I think. The ones she created for Maintenance are a bit different, though.”

“I suppose we’ll just have to dive in and find out.”

“If we’re separated, Blueberry, let’s not stay apart too long. That would start to give me anxiety.”

“Try to stick to what the vision seems to want you to experience. Remember that survival is our biggest focus.”

Eyeing Azure with her lip twisting, unable to argue, Sammy relented and slowly approached the portal, with Azure following close behind. There was no reflection and only the hint of ill-defined shapes flowing behind the surface.

Sammy turned and embraced her girlfriend, then gave her a smooch. “Let’s do our best. Good luck.”

Azure smiled and squeezed Sammy’s arm in support. “We will, Chestnut. Good luck.”

Hand-in-hand, they took one more leap, passing through the portal into inky blackness that slowly resolved into a new world and experience…

 

✦•············•✦•···········•✦

 

The sorceress’s inner sanctum spilled out before Ozra Bosk — the Gal’emai See veteran saboteur and engineer. Bizarre artifacts, glowing magic items, shelves of books, and bottles of grotesque ingredients were splayed to the left and right. Ozra resisted temptations within her to steal. Not her mission. She’d leave a small pack of explosives to blow them up hopefully, but her primary target was dead ahead.

‘The Spellbook of Medrei Eth — The Bane of the Redmoors.’ To mar the spellbook, to ruin it, as was her specialty? Priceless… to her employer, to their war efforts. It would change her life, change the lives of her whole clan. She’d made it so far without detection. Just a little further was the grand paydirt.

She’d avoided or ‘paused’ half a dozen spell traps and observation contingencies, as well as a few physical traps as well, testing her capable thiefly tomb raider skills. She’d been an invisible ghost! Her brand of technomagic invisibility was immune to detection, and her patented Cushion Boots of Air-Riding made it like she wasn’t even walking upon the dangerous floors. She hovered!

She could see a triple-layered trap ahead, though, and analysis via her goggles told her everything as she adjusted the focus. A scorching fire spell to any entity that moved through without special authorization. But the second layer was an incineration spell that targeted anyone who targeted any of the spells with an effect, while the third was a summoning spell that triggered upon any alteration or casting of the others.

‘Ugh. Well then! I don’t have time to unravel this puzzle. I’ll just use…’

Suddenly, Sammy had control. She felt the little heart of her gremlin body beat faster within her chest. Meanwhile, Ozra’s mind and thoughts were strangely caught in limbo and shunted away. Sammy couldn’t draw directly from them.

She was frozen in confusion and indecision. What the fuck?! How the fuck should I know?!

A System message suddenly popped into her head, distorted just like the Hall’s always was, and more like a memory of words. “You must make a believable play utilizing your own creativity based on existing information. Success carries rewards; failure complications or worse. Note that you should act quickly in situations that seem to call for it.”

Feeling the clock ticking and beginning to sweat, Sammy looked through the data of the goggles showing the aural pattern of the three spells in the room and wracked her brain for a solution that fit…

She had a big dimensional satchel on her hip. She opened it up, reached her hand in, and forced a gleeful grin onto her face as she whispered, “I’ll just use my trusty, uh… Gas Gun of Spell Stasis!” She ripped her hand out, feeling something in it and hoping against hope…

To her astonishment, she had an oversized, fat pistol in her hand, with some sort of glowing tube running back into the satchel. Quickly, she pointed the gun at the area ahead and pulled the trigger!

A huge cloud of blue gas shot out in a vague stream, and Sammy made a spraying motion to catch the whole area in it. After a few seconds, the gas seemed to coat over everything, even the air itself, then just froze. As she observed with the goggles, she could see the spells had a flashing text over them saying ‘DISABLED’ but ticking down from ‘558 seconds.’ 557. 556…

Okay, okay! Gotta move, I know…

Stowing the gun away, she gingerly moved- and almost pitched onto her face! The weird boots did not like steps at all. She found herself stumbling but managed to stabilize, then sloooowly slide forward at rest.

She got the hint then, and began to slide her feet instead of step, which functioned to give her forward movement, with gentle heel-digging making her stop. It was… something like roller skates.

Channel 9-year-old me, channel 9-year-old me…

Wincing, expecting to get incinerated at any moment, she made her way to the book, sliding through the radius of the frozen spell effects, as well as… numerous other magic items with their auras and spell effects completely still. A couple of torches had frozen bluish flames. Fortunately, no spells went off.

The spellbook was on a bookstand, which itself was up on a dais with various implements surrounding it upon semi-circle tables. She paused briefly to adjust her goggles, looking for more traps, but there was nothing, not even a lock on the book, which was left open.

She shuffled on air cushions over to in front of it, while reaching into her satchel, thinking ‘Wand of Greater Spell Ruination’...

A spell took hold of her from underneath, instantly triggered, and she found herself frozen and unable to move except for her eyes.

No, no, no, no! Fuck! Abort- ABORT!

The stand of the spellbook suddenly warbled and morphed plastically from wood into a tall, feminine silhouette cast in shadow with a faint, glowing outline. It seemed to be in robes. The spellbook she held in her hand tauntingly. “What an interesting character you are,” said a dark, distorted voice. “The prize and paragon of the Gal’emai See, hmm? Who could’ve known they contain such potential in their impish little forms.”

The full image seemed to step out from the shadow which disappeared in a final flash, revealing a vaguely aquatic-featured woman, blue-skinned with dark spots, clad in resplendent purple and gold with a great variety of jewelry, very much a foreboding sorceress queen. The spellbook simply floated in the air near her.

Hands at her hips, the sorceress smiled wickedly and spoke more normally, “Your contraptions bear promise, yet your ignorance of the finer points of spellcraft have doomed you. Hmm. I will hear you plead for your life, now, little gremlin.” She waved her hand, and then Sammy felt control of her mouth return.

Sammy gasped and cried immediately, “Azure! Please, please, please tell me you’re in there!”

The sorceress suddenly blinked. “Samantha?! E-er…”

She looked down at herself, then back at the held gremlin in front of her. Blink, blink, blink.