Ludger shifted his weight, eyes narrowing as he scanned the tunnel ahead. “What could it be?” he muttered. His grip tightened on his bracer as his mind ran through the possibilities. “If it’s people following us again…”

Luna shook her head slightly, her posture still coiled but her voice even. “I’d say something if it were people. It doesn’t feel like that.”

“Then monsters?” Ludger asked. “Why would they suddenly act odd? They haven’t been shy about attacking us before.”

She didn’t answer right away, her gaze still fixed on the darkness. “I’m not sure yet.”

He exhaled through his nose, scanning the walls one more time. Standing still isn’t going to solve this. The labyrinth’s silence pressed on his ears, heavy and watchful. “Alright,” he said finally. “Guards up. Walk like nothing’s wrong. If it’s something following, we’ll draw it out; if it’s nothing, we won’t waste time.”

Viola tightened her grip on her sword, the faint brown shimmer sparking along the edge. Luna eased her dagger halfway free but didn’t break stride. Ludger set the pace, his senses tuned to the ground beneath their boots, every step deliberate.

The three of them moved forward again, outwardly calm but coiled like springs, the labyrinth’s shadows curling close around them.

They moved deeper into the tunnel, boots crunching softly over the iron dust. The oppressive silence clung to them, thicker now than when they’d entered. Ludger’s eyes flicked to every crevice and ceiling joint, scanning for movement, but nothing showed itself.

His jaw tightened. Perfect. I start thinking something might go wrong and suddenly the air feels wrong. A dry, bitter laugh flickered through his head. Murphy’s Law in action. Think about trouble and it shows up.

He shook his head minutely. No. Don’t be an idiot. It’s not like the labyrinth can read your thoughts. What are the odds something would happen on the same day we decided to come back down here? His eyes slid to Viola, then Luna. Low. Should be low.

But the weight in the air didn’t lift. The sound of dripping water from somewhere unseen echoed just a little too loud. Every step forward felt like walking under a held breath. Ludger rolled his shoulders, forcing himself to stay loose.

Whether it’s coincidence or not, it doesn’t matter, he thought. We stay sharp and keep moving.

He glanced at the two girls and gave a small, wry smile. “Feels like the labyrinth’s messing with us,” he muttered under his breath. “Stay ready.”

The faint glow of the exit stairs finally came into view ahead — the rough-cut steps that would carry them back up to the first zone. Relief should have followed, but instead Ludger slowed his stride, one hand brushing the wall as if testing it.

Something was off. He couldn’t say what. No sudden noise, no movement in the shadows. But the air felt… heavy, charged, like the moment before a storm. Usually he had to focus to feel mana in the air — sink his senses into the ground, quiet his breathing, tune himself to the pulse beneath his boots. Now it was hitting him without effort, a dense, low thrum rolling across his skin like invisible heat waves.

He glanced at Viola and Luna. They were climbing the first few steps when they noticed his expression.

“What is it?” Viola asked, tightening her grip on her sword.

Ludger’s eyes narrowed, scanning the empty stairwell. “Don’t know yet. The mana’s… different. Stronger.” He flexed his fingers. “I don’t normally feel it unless I try. But now it’s just there.”

Luna’s gaze sharpened at that, her hand drifting toward her dagger. The quiet that had been following them all the way back to the first zone pressed in tighter, thick enough to taste.

Ludger took a slow breath, the pulse of the labyrinth crawling over his skin. “Something’s changed,” he murmured. “Keep moving, but stay sharp.”

Silently they climbed the steps, boots scuffing against stone. The only sound was their breathing and the faint drip of water somewhere deep in the labyrinth. Ludger kept his eyes forward, senses stretched thin across the heavy hum of mana in the air.

A gentle tug on his sleeve made him glance down. Luna had drifted closer without a word, her face calm but her eyes sharp. She gave the smallest nod toward the walls lining the stairwell. It was subtle, but he caught it immediately.

Ludger let his gaze slide that way as if by accident. In the dim light he saw patches where the stone looked almost swollen, veins of darker ore pulsing faintly with the same mana he felt on his skin. They weren’t obvious unless you were looking for them.

He frowned. Those spots… He didn’t have every inch of the labyrinth memorised, but they didn’t look like this when they’d passed through earlier. A couple of hours ago the walls had been just stone and iron. Now they seemed… alive. The mana rolling off them was the same charge he’d felt since the air started to thicken.

He kept walking, shoulders loose, eyes still flicking to the spots Luna had shown him. Something’s in there, he thought. And it wasn’t here before.

Luna didn’t speak, but her hand stayed close to her dagger. Viola’s eyes darted between them, sensing the tension but not yet seeing what they saw.

They moved another few paces up the stairwell, the strange hum of mana crawling higher up Ludger’s arms. His mind kept circling the sensation, trying to place it. It wasn’t just “weird” or “different” — it was familiar somehow, like a smell he couldn’t name.

Then it hit him.

His breath caught. That’s it… It was the same pulse he’d felt when studying the cores they harvested — only now it was stronger, heavier, layered. Instead of a single thrum, there were multiple, all around him, overlapping in an off-beat rhythm.

He let his senses stretch a little farther, not daring to slow his steps. One… two… three… the pulses came into focus. Six in total. Six cores.

His stomach tightened. Second zone cores. And all of them were close.

That could only mean one thing.

His eyes flicked to Luna, then to the walls. Six of the second zone iron elementals are waiting to ambush us. The realization landed like a stone in his gut. And that isn’t a behavior they’ve shown before.

He kept his face neutral, forcing his steps to remain steady even as his pulse spiked. He could feel the weight of the six cores like predators circling just out of sight. Something about the labyrinth had changed, and now its monsters were acting like hunters instead of wandering obstacles.

Quietly, almost without moving his lips, he murmured, “We’re not alone. Six of them.”

Luna’s eyes flicked up at him, the faintest nod telling him she’d felt it too.

Luna drifted a half-step closer, her eyes still fixed on the walls. Without turning her head she breathed, just loud enough for Ludger to hear, “Fighting them here would be too dangerous.”

He tilted his head slightly, pretending to still scan the stairwell. “You’re thinking what I’m thinking,” he murmured back.

Her voice stayed low and even. “This isn’t their natural behavior. Second-zone elementals don’t stalk and surround prey like this. Someone’s controlling them… or pushing them to attack us. If we fight six at once in a choke point, we’ll be crushed.”

Ludger’s jaw tightened. “Options?”

“Our best shot is to run for the first zone,” Luna whispered. “Break the circle before they spring it. But—” her gaze flicked up the stairs—“there’s a high chance we’ll be attacked there too. Whoever set this up probably expects us to retreat back to the first zone.”

He drew a slow breath through his nose, feeling the weight of the six pulsing cores closing in. Damn. But she was right. Standing here meant death. At least up top there was space to move.

“Alright,” he said quietly, eyes forward, voice steady. “We make for the first zone. Stay loose, act normal until I move.”

Luna gave a single, almost imperceptible nod. Viola glanced between them, sensing the tension but still unaware of the trap forming around them.

Inside, Ludger’s mind was already running, planning how to break the ring the moment the first attack came.

Ludger slowed just enough to fall into step beside Viola. His voice stayed low and even, but there was a hard edge beneath it. “Viola. Sharpen your senses. Eyes forward, ears open. Watch me and react accordingly.”

She blinked at him, catching the shift in his tone. Her hand tightened on her sword. “What’s—”

“Later,” he cut her off softly. “Right now, just pay attention. No sudden moves unless I give them.”

Then he glanced over his shoulder at Luna. “You take the back. Watch our six. If something comes from behind, call it. When we hit the first zone, having you in the back is less dangerous than putting you up front into whatever’s waiting.”

Luna gave a small, silent nod, already easing into position behind them, her dagger resting lightly in her hand.

Viola’s brow furrowed as she looked between the two of them, but she didn’t argue. She adjusted her grip on the sword and fell into step, her expression tightening into something serious. For once, she seemed to understand the situation without needing it spelled out.

The three of them continued up the stairwell, formation set, their footsteps measured but ready. The mana pulsing from the walls pressed closer, but now every move had purpose — Ludger at point, Viola shadowing him, Luna guarding their back, a small knot of tension ready to explode at the first sign of an attack.

Ludger’s eyes flicked over the stairwell one last time, counting the pulsing cores hidden in the walls. The pressure in the air was a coiled spring about to snap. Any second now…

He snapped his head back at the girls. “Run!” he said, low but sharp.

Viola didn’t hesitate; she knew that tone. Mana flared around her legs as she triggered her skill, her body lightening, muscles igniting. Ludger mirrored her his own Overdrive surged through him.

A faint brown glow flickered off to his side — Luna. Somehow, without a word, she’d joined them, her form blurring at the edges as she poured mana into the same technique. She just moved.

Together they exploded up the stairs like a gust of wind, boots hammering the stone but leaving only streaks of dust behind.

The walls shuddered. Then they split.

With a grinding screech, the “veins” Ludger had sensed cracked open, shedding jagged shards. Iron elementals tore free from the opaque bulges, their cores glowing like embers, claws scraping sparks as they lunged. The sections of wall they’d been hiding in weren’t normal stone at all; they looked less dense, like conjured material crafted through magic to hold them until the right moment.

Viola’s breath caught as she sprinted. “They were inside the walls—”

“I know!” Ludger barked, eyes already scanning for the narrowest gap. “Just keep running!”

The stairwell echoed with the screech of breaking stone and the thunder of three sets of feet moving like the wind, Overdrive carrying them toward the first zone before the trap could close.

The stairwell shook under their combined roar as they charged, claws gouging deep furrows in the stone. Two of the biggest lunged ahead of the rest, slamming down in front of the stairway’s mouth to block the exit, jagged arms raised like barricades.

Ludger’s eyes narrowed. Not today.

He flung his hands forward, earth-attuned mana snapping through his arms. The stone under the two blockers shuddered, then dropped out like a trapdoor. A deep sinkhole yawned beneath their feet. Both golems lurched forward with metallic screeches, losing their footing and tumbling awkwardly into each other at the bottom of the sudden pit. Their cores clanged together as their limbs tangled, sparks flying.

“Jump!” Ludger barked.

He didn’t slow. With Overdrive still thrumming through his body he vaulted the pit. Viola landed a heartbeat after him, boots striking sparks off the stone, and Luna ghosted past like a shadow, her dagger still drawn but her form a blur.

Behind them the remaining monsters slammed forward, colliding with the two fallen golems in a grinding crash. Stone chips and iron shards flew as their own momentum crushed into the pit, snarling the trap tighter.

Ludger hit the landing running, glancing once over his shoulder at the chaos. “Move!” he snapped. “Don’t stop until we’re out!”

The three of them sprinted up the last stretch of stairs, the roar of colliding monsters echoing behind them.

The faint glow of the archway leading to the first zone finally came into view through the dust-choked stairwell. Ludger’s heart kicked hard in his chest. Almost there. The roar of the elementals still echoed behind them, claws tearing at stone, but the exit was close enough to taste.

He skidded to a stop just before the archway, dropping to one knee and slamming both palms flat against the ground. His eyes narrowed as he pulled in a sharp breath. “Time to slow you down,” he muttered.

Mana surged out of him in a sudden pulse, flaring through the stone under his boots and exploding outward like a shockwave. Dust and grit lifted off the ground, every speck vibrating as his will seized it. In a heartbeat the whole stairwell’s loose earth — sand, filings, the shavings from shattered elementals — was under his control.

The air howled.

Almost instantly the particles began to whirl, first a lazy spiral and then a violent rush. It looked like a sandstorm had been called out of nowhere, a spinning vortex of grit and iron splinters shrieking around the tunnel walls. The wind tore at cloaks and hair, visibility dropping to nothing as the storm raged.

Behind them the charging golems stumbled, their jagged limbs flailing as the sand scoured their bodies and jammed their joints. The stairwell became a maelstrom of whirling debris, buying precious seconds for the three of them to break free.

Through the roar of the sandstorm, new sounds drifted in from ahead — startled voices echoing down the stone stairwell.

“What’s going on down here?”

“Is that a cave-in?”

“Did something breach the zone?!”

“I can’t see shit!”

The tones were confused, but predatory, and tense enough to set every nerve on edge. Figures flickered in the swirling dust at the edge of the archway, shapes trying to peer into the chaos.

Luna’s grip tightened on her dagger. In one smooth motion she brought it up, her body lowering into a lethal crouch, eyes hard. She was already picking a target in the blur when a hand clamped over her wrist. Ludger.

He’d stepped in without a sound, his palm firm on her hand before she could move. He shook his head once, eyes locking with hers, the storm still whirling around them. “No,” he mouthed, then leaned close enough for her to hear over the howl. “Not yet. I’ve got other plans while they are blinded.”

Luna’s eyes flicked to his, reading the intent there. Slowly, reluctantly, she eased the blade back down, still coiled but holding her strike.

Ahead, the confused voices kept calling, dust swirling between them and the three fugitives as Ludger’s storm raged on, masking their movements and giving him a chance to set the next move.

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