Laurel was fuming. Not only had this dungeon separated her from the group, but it kept changing the path ahead. She was getting closer to the Core, but at random points she would be teleported to tunnels or rooms far from her starting point. The teleportation was subtle enough that there was no way to tell beforehand when this was going to happen, and she had to press on each time. Maybe if she was a spatial cultivator she would be able to make a shortcut. But she wasn’t, so she was reduced to running around like a rat in a cage. The Core was throwing obstacles at her constantly. Wave after wave of expert-tier mana-mutated rats and snakes. Mushrooms releasing poisonous gasses. Undetectable pit traps with molten lava at the bottom. The last room had simply flooded entirely with water until there was no breathable air at all. Each obstacle, puzzle, or fight had her moving even faster to the next one.

  None of the others were prepared for this. And definitely not the kids.

  A disgusting insect dropped from the ceiling in front of Laurel. It was huge, covered in brown chitin and an expert-level beast, again. That was all she had time to notice before a torrent of lightning caused its muscles to seize long enough for her blade to leave it in pieces. That the Core had such strong monsters to throw at her was concerning. Her students were barely initiates. Even one adept beast might be more than they could handle. The beast had barely slowed her pace and she continued to run through the halls, heedless of danger.

  Sounds from up ahead made Laurel go from a run to a flat-out sprint. Those were voices. She barreled around a corner and had to dive under a stream of fire aimed at her face. Oro shouted apologies as she rolled back to her feet.

  “We thought you were a monster! So sorry, so sorry!”

  Laurel waved him off. “It’s fine. Have you seen any of the others?” The Naxians were all together. The humans looked a bit worse for wear, having battled through their own trials before reuniting with her.

  “No, I’m sorry. We’ve been working our way past the monsters but we haven’t seen anyone else.” Oro was doing the best of this group. For all he was a timid young man, he was still a dragon and that came with some unavoidable advantages.

  “Follow me, we’re getting closer to the Core, and we need to find the others. Keep up.” She didn’t give them any time to argue before storming across the room and into the next hall. By the sounds behind her, they were scrambling to obey. Laurel slowed to a pace that would keep them as one group. It wouldn’t do to be separated and have to do this dance all over again. Another two of the bugs dropped in front of her. Curiously, these were only at the adept level. The weakest beasts she’d seen since entering the dungeon.

  “Stand back Madam Stormblade. These are dangerous but weak to flame.” Oro shouted.

  Instead of listening to him, she plowed forward, sword leading. They were easy to kill and she had no patience left to help the others get stronger. She slowed, allowing Oro to come up even with her pace.

  “Is that the strength of everything you’ve faced this far?”

  “Yes, Madam Stormblade. Fearsome foes indeed. Why do you ask?”

  “The monsters I’ve seen so far have been stronger. If we’re lucky that means the Core is sending us challenges at a level we can handle, as much as it can. Though if that’s the case, it also means this Core is far more intelligent than any of the stories would indicate.”

  “Fascinating. Do you still expect I’ll be able to bond with it?”

  “Yes, but I doubt it will ever act like a normal City Core. You’ll probably extend and manage the labyrinth, rather than reinforcing the city.”

  The dragon had nothing more to add, and Laurel sped back up. The next room held some sort of disgusting slug. The one after that had freakishly large bats. The group settled into a rhythm of Laurel running in and killing everything while the others trailed behind. The Core was closer than ever.

  The hallway after the bats was trapped, the floor falling out as soon as Laurel stepped onto it, revealing razor-sharp spikes below. Laurel simply glided across using a wisp of air mana. Then she used more to pull everyone else over the trap as well. More rooms, more traps, more monsters. They sped along until they heard the sound of a gunshot from down the hall.

  “Reina, Reynard, is that you?” Laurel had long since thrown caution to the wind and shouted the most likely people to have a gun down here.

  “Laurel?”

  Her group rounded the corner to see the two soldiers. They were bloody but whole. Brief hugs and backslaps were exchanged before Laurel urged the rest to keep moving. There was probably something being held back to guard the Core. They needed to get there or find the kids before they wandered into something they couldn’t make their way out of.

  **********

  Rebecca was crying. She had tried to be strong, but she couldn’t hold it back any more. Leander was wrapping her hand in any scrap of cloth he could find, while Flint tried to comfort her with small head pats from his place on her shoulder. A few meters away the two smallest fingers from her right hand were lying in the dirt. They had been careful. More monsters had attacked them but after the mushrooms, they were alert and ready to fight them off. There had been traps as well, but Leander’s careful prodding allowed them to avoid the worst of it. Until now.

  The spike had come out of nowhere, and so fast she only barely got the rest of her body out of the way. The wound had gushed blood at first, making her lightheaded. Leander had jumped to help and wrapped it in a wadded up shirt. Cycling her mana on his advice kept her conscious and upright.

  They had come so far, but how would they go any further? Leander couldn’t fight everything himself. Even though he would try, and say, “a cultivator can face down any odds” or something else stupid.

  Leander urged her to keep going, and in the end, she listened. What was the other option? Sit around here and hope Laurel wandered by? It had taken a leap of faith to join the sect, to not be weak anymore. She couldn’t just give up when things got hard. She wouldn’t. Besides, once everyone was safe, Laurel would heal her. That would drive her to the end. Laurel could fix it.

  Hours later–it was hard to keep track of passing time underground, but it felt like hours – the tunnel widened. The glow stones were closer together and instead of an eerie crypt, they had entered a lost temple. Carvings showed up on the walls, battles and creatures they had never seen, and text in languages they didn’t recognize. Leander kept them to the slow place, but Rebecca’s gut was telling her there were no more traps. They had been judged and proved themselves worthy, and this was the prize.

  The hall ended not in another of the crude doors but a soaring, carved archway. Their group stopped before walking inside. Even exhausted they could feel the power pouring out of the room. In the center, there was a pedestal like what they had in the sect house. It was still filled with golden light, but instead of the smooth streams they were used to, the mana was wound in a complex knot, impossible to tell all the places mana went in or out. It was probably beautiful, but all Rebecca could see was a twisted presence that tortured them for some unknown reason.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  “What now?” She was barely on her feet. Leander and Flint were a little better, but not by much. They were both ignorant of the next steps and not strong enough to do anything about it. Leander went into the room and ducked to the side of the door. There he slumped against the wall and slid until he was sitting on the floor. Rebecca joined him. She shared out the last of the food they had with them and forced herself to swallow a portion. Moments later they heard a shout. Wind blew Rebecca’s hair back and forced her eyes closed. When she opened them again, Laurel was kneeling right in front of them.

  She looked back and forth between them before pulling them all into a hug. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry,” she chanted as she rocked them back and forth. “I should have been more careful, this was more than you should have had to deal with. I’m so proud of you for making it this far. Are either of you hurt?”

  When Laurel paused for a breath, Rebecca thrust her hand out. Blood had seeped through part of the bandages, dirt and gore covered the rest. The sectmaster slowly unwound the bandages and exposed the two stumps where her fingers used to be. They weren’t bleeding any more but they still made Rebecca nauseous to look at.

  “A battle wound to be proud of. This will hurt a bit but we need to make sure no sickness sets in.” Before any clarifying questions could be asked, Laurel was doing something. Her mana seeped into Rebecca, an experience that wasn’t painful, but it made her whole body shudder. Like facing down a predator she knew without a doubt could devour her whole. That subsided after a moment and the pain began. Rebecca cried out. Her hand was burning to ash, she was sure of it. She tried to rip it from Laurel’s grasp but she might as well have tried to break an iron bar. After an eternity the pain vanished. She didn’t want to look but she had to know what was left. To her shock, her hand looked far better. The stumps had been healed over. Smooth skin covered the ends, just above the knuckles.

  “Can’t - Can’t you regrow them?” Rebecca could hear the distress in her own voice and hated herself for it. She wasn’t supposed to be afraid any more. But surely Laurel could fix this. The woman who could pull an endless stream of magical artifacts from nowhere would have a way to regrow fingers.

  Laurel didn’t break eye contact at all when she responded. “That level of healing is beyond me.”

  “But you’re–”

  “I know, but I don’t have the skill. Regrowing limbs, especially after some time has passed, is fiendishly difficult. The spirit forgets what shape it used to take. A focused healer might be able to do it but that’s not me. A cultivator at my level might be able to regrow their own limbs, but not someone else’s.”

  The stress of the ordeal hit her all at once, and without quite realizing how it happened, she was in Laurel’s arms, bawling.

  *********

  Rebecca broke the dam first, but everyone was worn out. Laurel held the girl and rocked her back and forth, doing her best to provide some comfort, while the rest of her expedition broke down. Tears cut tracks along grime-coated cheeks. Reina was doing breathing control exercises in the corner. Leander had simply passed out, using Flint as a pillow. Laurel would be witness to all of it. She was supposed to be the wise sectmaster, but this had been a challenge her students were not ready to face. She was supposed to have learned from the mistakes of her past, not letting her students bear the consequences of her own choices.

  She was supposed to be someone worth following.

  That the only casualties were a few fingers was more due to luck than anything else. The kids had done well,but this dungeon was far beyond fresh initiates, ones that had been barely trained to fight. She wanted to sigh but held the impulse back. If anyone had reason to feel disillusioned or angry, it was the teenager breaking down in her arms. For all Laurel had done to adapt to the modern era, she still thought in terms of her own cultivation journey. One where the sect was home to two grandmaster healers that could fix almost any injury. Rebecca might regrow that part of her hand eventually, but that was decades away at the earliest.

  When she cried herself to sleep, Laurel gently eased Rebecca down next to the others. She pulled some blankets out of storage and draped them over the kids before walking over to where Oro was sitting. Dragons, merfolk, and some other races tended to be more emotionally resilient than the average teenage human. Instead of breaking down, she could see signs of fascination. The kid was a scholar at heart, which would probably serve him well working with this Core. Laurel sat down next to him to talk about next steps quietly enough not to disturb the others.

  “Are you ready for this?”

  Some nerves peeked through in his reply. “I’m not sure. This is far outside of what you described, I don’t really know what to expect, and…”

  “I’m sorry Oro. I know it's a bit unfair to throw you into this. But you’re the strongest magical being in the city. If someone doesn’t start cultivating the Core intentionally, this labyrinth is going to get more and more dangerous. With your help, instead of a threat to the city, this place will be a gold mine.”

  “I – wait what do you mean a gold mine?”

  “Even as fast as we were moving, I noticed some useful plants and materials growing in some of the corners. My sect, and others, would pay for the option to send our students to harvest and train here. I have to assume you’ve lost some of the usual City Core functions with the inversion, but if you have the opportunity to steer the labyrinth, the tradeoff might be worth it.”

  There was more hemming and hawing, but eventually Oro agreed. “Let’s do it now then, before I can rethink.”

  Laurel led him over to the Core pedestal. Dragons might be wise creatures of legend, but Oro was barely more than a child, one she was forcing into a role with a city’s worth of responsibility. Maybe if she found some other cultivators that weren’t evil assholes like Corvin she could see if they wanted to take up a position here. Oro placed both hands on the pedestal while Laurel walked him through the process.

  “I know dragon magic works a bit differently than cultivators, but you should still be able to bond. The City that used to sit under the Southern Ocean had a clan of merpeople cultivating the Core.

  “Let your mana flow into the Core and let some of the mana from the Core flow into you. It will feel overwhelming so do your best to anchor your spirit to your physical body.”

  As he followed instructions, the golden glow from the pedestal got brighter. The light infused through Oro’s meridians. For a moment, it was as if his body became translucent while the mana channels shone with inner light. Reality snapped back into focus and Oro slumped against the pedestal. A gentle prod from Laurel’s spiritual senses showed he was fine, and there was definitely a new connection to the Core.

  She tapped him gently on the shoulder. “Oro, what sense do you get from the Core?”

  “From Araxis.”

  “Sorry?” Laurel was slightly concerned if the amount of new information had overwhelmed the lad.

  “You were right and wrong. It's sort of alive and sort of not. Like it's following a base nature but not really reasoning. I got the definite impression of a name though, it is the city and the city is it.”

  “Huh. It's kind of like a very smart dog. You should keep notes of all your interactions. This could be vital if it ever happens again. Even out in the wider cosmos this kind of information would be worth quite a lot.”

  Laurel went to walk away but a sound from Oro had her turning back. He had one hand still firmly on the pedestal and his eyes were half-closed.

  “Madam Stormblade. Um, well, it appears there is more benefit to challenging Araxis then you realize. The Core wants to distribute rewards for successfully reaching the final chamber.”

  “What? How, what rewards, why?” Laurel’s mind was churning, this wasn’t even hinted at in any of the stories. Depending on the rewards this place would go from useful training ground to a fiercely contested resource. She felt a bit bad for poor Oro, who would be handling throngs of would-be challengers when word got out. But maybe it would help keep an eye on the types of cultivators loose in the world.

  “I can’t really tell,” Oro said, answering any or all of her questions. “I can feel that it’s something Araxis is compelled to do, but it’s waiting on my approval.”

  “Approve it then, let’s see what happens. Best to get it over with.”

  Oro’s mana did something with the Core that Laurel couldn’t follow. There was fluttering in her senses but if she tried to pay any closer attention, the whole thing was obscured. She decided to leave it and talk to Oro sometime in the future. Instead she watched the rest of the room. The carvings on the walls were lighting up, not in the gold of an enchantment, but in brilliant colors, bringing the scene of heroes and monsters to life. The others had noticed but were too exhausted to do much more than angle their heads for a better view.

  Her attention was pulled back to the Core. All City Cores were linked to cosmic mana flows, and that link was swelling, like the Core was pumping in more and more cosmic mana. When it reached some threshold, golden light spewed out of the pedestal and towards each of them.

  “Stay calm!” Oro shouted to the room at large.

  A quick survey confirmed everyone had reached for weapons at the strange behavior. No one let go of their weapons or mana, but they also didn’t try to attack.

  The light reached them and began expanding into different shapes. They slowly resolved until Laurel could clearly see the outline of a sword hovering in front of her. A final burst of cosmic mana flowed through the Core, and the sword transmuted from mana to a real blade, made from a blue tinged crystal. She caught it by the handle as it fell from the air. Decent weight and balance. It went into the tattoo to be examined more thoroughly later.

  Rebecca was holding a new staff, no surprise there, the soldiers were clutching identical bows. Araxis must be confused by the guns. The local cultivators were already discussing their prizes but Laurel wasn’t paying attention. Leander was staring at a definitely-toxic blue and orange mushroom that she recognized from a few rooms in the dungeon. Laurel made to take a step in his direction when he exploded into action. He leapt onto the mushroom with both feet, destroying it. When that wasn’t enough he continued to stomp and smear the remains across the floor while everyone watched in silence. She needed to get the story of their trials sooner rather than later.

  They spent the next hour letting the others relax and chatting about the possibilities for an inverted Core that gave out gifts. Laurel secured Oro’s promise to codify his experiences to be added to the Eternal Archive. Bringing others to such a dangerous place was foolish, the thin silver lining of adding knowledge to the sect would have to be enough.