Well of course we have to learn about them! The gestalt magics of the dark element are perhaps the most profound in their capabilities. Space, gravity, entropy, time, and most mysterious of all, soul! It might be blasphemy to say this, but maybe Vaygris was right to seal these away before she ended the fallen world.

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  If a week ago, someone had told Narro that he would one day find Evran cuddled up with a girl in the depths of a labyrinth, he would have laughed at such an impossibility. Setting aside Evran’s extreme aversion to labyrinths, the kid had recently made enemies of every single eligible girl on their island by failing some dumb flower ritual. So, finding him with the legendary ice princess in his arms, Narro was convinced something was seriously wrong with reality.

  Narro pinched himself in a vain effort to awaken from the nonsensical nightmare in which he found himself. He wanted to open his eyes to the inside of the crudely built earth magic shelter back at camp, where he could see Lerrum smiling again. The pain of it put an end to his childish fantasy. Lerrum was dead, and he was stuck inside a labyrinth with Evran and Kaila as his only hope for survival.

  Considering Evran, Narro noted how the kid had changed in the brief time he’d been off on New Pellant. It took him five whole years, but Evran finally seemed to get over the loss of his family. He would’ve assumed the loss of Lerrum would have broken him completely, but in this moment, Evran seemed unaffected by the death of their best friend. Did he not even care? When his thoughts turned towards Arietta, Narro sneered at himself. Damn it, Narro, that’s your envy speaking again. Get a hold of yourself.

  In the few years since he’d failed to pass the continuation exam, Narro had spent a great deal of time in introspection. He’d been born with a gift — a near inexhaustible pool of mana. This led to a childhood filled with unearned praise and impossible expectations. He was destined to become the world’s greatest mage. His so-called gift had cursed him with arrogance, entitlement, and a short temper.

  Despite his incredible capacity for fueling magic, Narro lacked all talent for casting it. His parents had earned a substantial fortune as merchants, and could afford a private instructor to teach him the basics. Convinced of his destiny, Narro worked hard to learn the simplest of spells. It took him twice as long to master his first incantation as it would an average student, but his instructor had never revealed that to him or his doting parents. With no one around to compare himself to, Narro had no idea how truly terrible he was.

  Eventually his instructor grew frustrated with teaching Narro and urged his parents to send him to an academy. His home island of Hyperia had one such school, and in hindsight, Narro should have known something was amiss when his parents shipped him off to Aldea instead. Day by day, Narro became increasingly aware of his inadequacies as his classmates at Aldea outperformed him in every possible way. Though he worked his hardest, he could never compete with the inborn talent of the other students. Narro quickly became envious and resentful of his fellow students, and none pissed him off more than Evran Wright.

  Where Narro studied and practiced for hours to master a spell, Evran could watch someone do it once and then perform a better version of it on his first try. It was unfair. To make matters worse, Evran was disgustingly lazy. He never read the assigned writings, and he always did his homework late, if at all. None of that would have mattered if the damned boy wasn’t always so rude and standoffish with people. Despite it all, Evran was the better mage — no, the better man.

  Fed up with the humiliation, Narro sought him out after school in hopes of challenging the boy to a duel, only he couldn’t find him anywhere. Eventually, he ran into the kid’s roommate, Lerrum, who was also looking for him. He’d discovered that Evran had gone out into the preserve alone, something forbidden for first years. Together, the two of them entered the preserve and tracked him down to a field not too far from the gate. They found him sitting atop a pile of monster corpses with a hollow look of defeat in his eyes. It had been the first anniversary of his mother’s death.

  That’s when Lerrum finally got his roommate to open up to him, and they learned what made Evran who he was, flaws and all. On that day, Narro realized that every person had their gifts, and they also had their curses. Would he trade his entire family for Evran’s talent? No way. Narro made two great friends that day and discovered how much better life could be if you put away your envy and find joy in the accomplishments of your friends.

  Still, Narro was pretty damn envious of Evran at the moment, as the boy slept peacefully with Kaila in his arms. He shoved down thoughts of Arietta and her unknown fate. It wouldn’t do him any good to think about it. Instead, he tried to feel glad for his friend. Though he’d lost so much in his brief time in this world, the kid still found something worth holding on to.

  ***

  The first thing Evran felt when he awoke was the immense heat of Kaila’s body cuddled against his. Though he longed to cool down, he dared not pull himself away. Instead, he only held her closer, embracing her despite whatever discomfort came with it. The day before, he added his best friend to his lengthy list of loved ones lost. Today, he would risk two more names. However, in this moment, fleeting as it may be, Kaila was safe in his arms. He could protect her from anything.

  As Kaila stirred beside him, a pointed ear nearly poked Evran in the eye. Barely muffled laughter erupted nearby. Still half asleep, Kaila spun around and pulled Evran into a passionate kiss, which he gladly returned despite the audience. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t seen Narro kissing Arietta countless times, and it sure felt good to be on the other side for once.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “Good morning,” said Kaila, stroking Evran’s dark hair.

  “Good morning, you two!” interrupted Narro. “Sleep well?”

  The bashful elf glared at Narro for ruining the moment. Seeing an opening, Evran leaned in and stole a kiss on her cheek before getting up to start breakfast. Kaila’s face and ears turned a bright red as she retreated back under her cloak. Only the smell of sizzling meat brought her back out a few minutes later. Evran roasted the last of their sausages on a stone grill atop a magic flame, while Narro practiced with his sword on the opposite side of the room.

  As Evran continued to cook their breakfast, Kaila sat down beside him, resting her head on his shoulder. He was shocked at how affectionate she could be, though he wouldn’t dare complain about it. Needing a knife, he reached down to his belt only to realize he didn’t have one anymore. It had been two full weeks since he and Lerrum went on a quest to find that flower and get Evran a girlfriend. He thought the whole ordeal to be a total loss, also costing him the knife his father gifted him. Yet in the end, against all odds, they had succeeded.

  “Hey Narro, can I borrow a knife?”

  “Huh, what happened to your old one? You leave it back at camp?” he asked, sheathing his sword and strutting over to their makeshift campfire.

  “I’m surprised you remembered it. Nah, I dropped it into the void back when I was getting a certain flower from a cliff.”

  “Ah, damn shame. I always admired the handle on that knife. Oh, that reminds me. I got this back at the ruins.” Narro pulled the adamantite blade from a crude sheath of monster hide and offered it to Evran. “You’re pretty good with earth magic. Give this a handle like your old knife, and I might let you use it.”

  “Sure, but it seems a bit sacrilegious to sully such a fine blade on an academy biscuit.”

  Before graduating, every student was required the write a thesis paper on some unique magic technique they developed while at the academy. Most were useless oddities, but occasionally, a student would develop some groundbreaking spell or enchantment. Evran had been working on a way to grow certain stones with earth magic while accurately reproducing the beautiful marbling and striations that were traditionally lost in the process. The whole endeavor was inspired by his father’s knife to begin with, and now he finally found himself in the perfect situation to use his technique.

  After digging around in his belt pouch, Evran pulled out a small bead of black marble with streaks of white running through it. He sadly didn’t have any samples of the black and crimson marble from his father’s knife, which was particularly unfortunate, as it would have matched the reddish tone of the adamantite blade. Evran placed the bead against the bottom of the knife and began channeling his mana. The bead grew steadily, wrapping itself around the tang to form a perfect stone handle on the blade, marbling included.

  “It’s not so well balanced with a stone handle, but it certainly looks nice,” said Evran, shamelessly complimenting his own work. Knife in hand, Evran tested it by effortlessly cutting a biscuit in two. After adding a slice of cheese and the cooked sausage, he handed the breakfast sandwich over to Kaila. She greedily snatched it from his hand, though the girl did bother to thank him with a kiss. Two sandwiches later, Evran returned the knife to Narro, who finally got to admire his prize.

  “By the way, what’s the deal with Indon’s sword?” said Evran, still chewing the last bite of his breakfast. The gooey cheese and savory sausage almost made the coarsely textured biscuit somewhat palatable. Narro unsheathed the sword and held it out for Evran to examine. Taking the blade in hand, Evran closed his eyes and concentrated on feeling the powerful enchantments woven into its existence.

  “This is a bit beyond me, but I think it’s able to channel mana to make it sharper,” said Evran, handing the blade back to Narro. “Also, I’m not even sure this is skysteel. It’s a bit bluer than your old sword, right?”

  “I guess? Either way, it’s a damned good sword, that’s for sure. I don’t think we’d have made it otherwise.”

  After finishing their breakfast, they gathered their remaining supplies into Lerrum’s old pack, which they had done their best to repair. It lacked the restoration enchantment, so the damage it sustained from the osteomorph attack was more or less permanent. Luckily, they had a small length of cordage they could use to sew the thing back together. Once again, Evran would be the one carrying it, as Narro needed to be unencumbered to fight. Kaila would surely have refused on account of the thing still being covered in Evran’s blood, not that he was so ungentlemanly as to burden her. That, and neither of the boys trusted Kaila with the food.

  Soon they were ready to leave the safety of their current location and head back into the labyrinth proper. Kaila lingered a moment near the undamaged mural depicting the ancient’s theory of soul formation. Evran had made a small clay tablet for Kaila containing the text of the mural, but he suspected there were more secrets yet uncovered in the pictographic reliefs. Once this ordeal was over, they could always send a team of researchers back here to conduct a proper survey.

  As they’d been underground for some time, they had no idea if it was day or night outside, or how long they had slept. Given the exhausting events of the previous day, they suspected it was likely afternoon. That meant the adventurers had likely reentered the labyrinth before them, and thus the osteomorph would hopefully have switched the target of its pursuit. It was sheer speculation, but one that gave them much needed hope.

  After returning to the main path, they eventually encountered a new dungeon mark the others hadn’t seen yet. Ahead lay the first challenge room, separating the first and second layers of the labyrinth. To progress beyond these rooms required solving complex puzzles or defeating exceptionally powerful monsters, though none as powerful as the labyrinth’s guardian. For all Evran’s knowledge on the subject, he was unsure what to expect to find when they finally entered. Would the way still be open from when the adventurers went through, or would they have to repeat their efforts once more? Evran breathed a sigh of relief when all they found was a large empty room with the way forward revealed.

  “There’s no puzzle here, so was this room a monster fight, then?” Narro asked. “I see no signs of a battle.”

  “Labyrinths slowly repair any damage done to them. There should still be plenty of scars at the entrance from our fights, but in a day or so, it will be like we were never there.”

  “Um… what about their bodies?” asked Kaila.

  “Lerrum is ash now,” said Evran, taking his frustrations out by kicking a loose stone. “As for Indon, we at least got him into a stone coffin made from a rock from outside the labyrinth. It will still be there if it didn’t get blasted apart by the dragon.”

  At the far end of the room, they crossed a threshold into the second layer of the labyrinth. The roughly hewn cavernous walls gave way to tightly fitted flagstone, giving this section a very artificial feel. The large veins of glowstone streaming through the walls were replaced by larger crystals growing out through small gaps between the stones. Evran’s nose furled at the stench of miasma, as it grew noticeably sharper the deeper they traveled into the labyrinth.