My surroundings lit up like a Christmas village. There were at least four different tests taking place, each with its own flavor, for lack of a better word. Trailblazer’s Mind didn’t work like any of my other abilities—it had to be handled intuitively. I got confirmation that both Felania and Violet were part of their own separate tests, or perhaps were the tests themselves, but they were both markedly different. Maybe if I’d mastered the ability before I got here, I would have been able to discern more about what the tests were all about.

  There was also a general underlying challenge that encompassed the entire dungeon floor. That one was the closest to the type of testing that I saw around Felania. Finally, in the graveyard ahead, there was a fourth and much more familiar type of test—trial by combat.

  I tightened my grip on Wayfinder and moved forward. Whatever waited in the keep had prepared this approach carefully, and I wasn’t going to be turned aside by a foreboding atmosphere. The dungeon had hidden nothing, and that told me something important. It wanted me to walk this road and see what stood in my way.

  As I advanced, I let my perception widen, spreading it out in overlapping layers the way I’d learned to do when things didn’t add up. Spirit Sight gave me the most reliable way to keep tabs on Felania, her presence bright enough to track even at distance, but she was too clean, too consistent. Her aura didn’t fluctuate the way a living being’s should under stress, and there was a faint symmetry to it that reminded me uncomfortably of dungeon constructs. Without testing, I couldn’t know what she was exactly, but I was increasingly certain she was closer to the other elves I couldn’t revive than what she claimed.

  Violet was another matter entirely. My senses slid off her in ways that didn’t feel like concealment so much as misdirection, like trying to follow a reflection across rippling water. I could detect movement, pressure changes, and the faint displacement of air, but her actual presence refused to resolve into anything concrete. That bothered me more than Felania, because it didn’t feel like dungeon magic or necromancy. It felt engineered. Perhaps it was some new type of magitech. The thought excited me.

  I tested the waters quietly as I walked, making minute adjustments to my pace and direction to see how they each reacted. Felania adapted naturally, her movements flowing with the terrain in a way that suggested long familiarity with this kind of environment. Violet’s path, on the other hand, showed brief moments of correction, as if she were recalibrating based on updated data rather than instinct. That didn’t make her an enemy, but it did mean I couldn’t afford to assume she was an ally.

  I kept my aura pulled in tight, just enough to maintain a sense of my surroundings but not enough to broadcast intent, and continued down the road. Whether Felania was bait and Violet was something else entirely, or if both were part of a deeper layer of this floor’s design, I would find out soon enough. The graveyard flanking the road was growing louder in my senses with every step, and I knew this window for observation was about to close. Whatever came next wasn’t going to wait around for me to ponder its mysteries.

  The road narrowed as it entered the graveyard, the nearby headstones leaning inward like spectators to an execution, surrounded by iron fencing that lay twisted and half-buried beneath weeds. I felt the shift a second before it happened, getting that prickling sensation along my spine that warned me I was no longer the only thing moving with intent. The air thickened, and shadows peeled away from the graves.

  They rose without sound. Fallen knights stepped free of the earth and stone, skeletal forms wrapped in fragments of armor that bore the sunburst of the Order, now dulled and cracked. Their bodies flickered between solidity and mist, phasing just enough that my eyes struggled to keep them fixed. Each carried a sword and shield, blades etched with judgment runes that pulsed faintly as they aligned into formation. These weren’t mindless dead. They stood like veterans who had fought together for decades. I used Identify on the closest one.

  Fallen Knights of the Order of Law

  Undead

  Level: 397

  The first charge came as a wall. Shields locked and blades angled, they advanced in disciplined steps that ate the distance far faster than I liked. I triggered Trailblazer’s Aura immediately, feeling it press outward to sap cohesion and dull the regenerative magic knitting their bones together. It helped, but not enough to stop them. Then I sent powerful arcs of electricity into them, scorching armor and bone. None of them faltered, even when I laced life mana into the lightning, turning it neon green. I might as well have been waving a flashlight at them.

  Steel rang as I met the lead knight, Wayfinder snapping into a polearm configuration to hook a shield aside and drive the blade through a ribcage that wasn’t fully there.

  The knight didn’t fall. It phased, the blade passing through half-solid bone, and its counterstrike clipped my shoulder with a burst of radiant pain that tried to anchor me in place. I twisted with Here Not Here, letting the follow-up strike pass through where my head had been, and answered with a lightning-charged thrust that tore through the animating force instead of the frame. The knight shattered into fragments that clattered across the stones, but the others closed in immediately, stepping over the remains as if nothing had happened.

  They fought like soldiers, rotating positions, shields absorbing blows while incorporeal bodies slipped through angles that should have been safe. I stopped trying to be clever and leaned into what worked. Force constructs formed as wedges to break their lines, and I used them to split the formation long enough to isolate targets. Cone of Winter’s Debuff blasted out in a narrow arc, frosting joints and forcing partial solidity, and I capitalized with brutal, precise strikes that reduced skeletal bodies to fragments too small to reassemble.

  Throughout all of it, they pushed me to my limits. Some were better with a weapon than I was, but there was no consistency. It was like they were each individuals, even though they had risen as a singular undead unit. Their ability to phase matched my ability to move through space. I needed an edge, because far too many of their blows were getting through.

  Pain stacked fast. A sword passed through my side during a phase shift, leaving a line of cold agony that bit deeper than the wound itself. I answered with Celestial Restoration on instinct, light flaring as flesh and spirit snapped back into place, and I didn’t slow down. Lightning Arc Mastery cracked again and again, anchored with life mana so it bit into the undead essence instead of dispersing uselessly. Each kill thinned the pressure, but the coordination never broke.

  Then I remembered that there was another dimension I could move through. They phased through matter states and I shifted in space, but I also had Blip. Once I incorporated it, I was able to move forward in time as well as space. As with most of my abilities, there was a learning curve. Just because I appeared a second forward in time didn’t mean that I knew what they’d been doing while I wasn’t there, or what to do when I got there. Still, for the most part, they seemed to be having a harder time adapting than I was.

  By the time only a handful remained, my breathing was heavy, and the graveyard was a ruin of shattered stone and scattered bones. I drove Wayfinder through a knight’s helm and ripped upward, tearing the skull apart as the animating force unraveled. Two more advanced from the right, blades raised, and I shifted to meet them, already adjusting for the next exchange.

  That was when the air to my right detonated in a concussive blast.

  Chapter Sixty-Four: Keep

  The explosion ripped through the line of fallen knights, a violent wave of force that shattered stone and sent bone fragments spinning through the air. One knight disintegrated outright, its partially incorporeal form collapsing into dust and fading light. The other two were hurled sideways, shields torn free, bodies flickering erratically as their phasing failed under the sudden trauma. I noticed something strange about the explosion, but didn’t waste the opening.

  I surged forward, Wayfinder snapping back into a heavy polearm as I closed the distance. The first knight tried to resolidify and raise its blade, but it was too slow. I drove my weapon through its chest and anchored lightning into the strike, life-charged arcs tearing apart the animating force until the bones simply fell apart. The second staggered to one knee, shield half-phased, and I ended it with a downward cut that split skull and spine in one decisive motion.

  As the last fragments hit the ground, something shimmered at the edge of my perception. The distortion resolved and Violet stepped into view, her armor shedding its camouflage in rippling waves, like heat haze collapsing into solid form. The blunderbuss rested against her shoulder, and her stance was steady despite the violence she’d just unleashed. She looked from the ruined knights to me, eyes bright and assessing.

  “Was that the power of your gun?” I asked, gesturing at the fallen knights, or what remained of them.

  She shook her head. “Nope, that was my buddy, Claymore. I love me some Claymore.”

  I didn’t know what she was talking about, but then she flicked her wrist, and a small green rectangle appeared on the ground near her feet. “You don’t want to step on that,” she said with a wide grin. I noticed it was slightly curved, with small legs holding it upright. Across the front were distinctive letters reading, “Front Toward Enemy.” It sure looked like the claymore mines my dad had taught me about. It felt a little anachronistic in this place, but I wasn’t going to complain. My armor looked like something out of a Game of Thrones cyberpunk mashup.

  “Consider me a history junkie. Just because Legends of Selmia was fantasy-based didn’t mean that I couldn’t bring some Earth history into it. That was part of the reason that I chose artificer as my class. I sorta fancied myself as a modern version of a Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. Not sure if you’ve ever heard of that book, or if your Earth even has it.”

  I nodded. “It does. But the way you talk about all this makes it seem like claymore mines existed a long time ago in your world.”

  She nodded. “The last time they might have been used was 200 years before the integration. After that, a different type of technology took over. AI and nanotech changed everything. Not as much as the integration, but still. It was like we went to bed in one world and woke up in another one.”

  “I don’t know what you mean by the integration, but I’m beginning to think we may have more in common than I originally thought. So the question is, can I trust you?”

  With another flick of her hand, the claymore disappeared. At least that’s how it would have looked if I hadn’t been paying attention. I felt the smallest flicker of spatial mana, but this had nothing to do with spatial storage.

  Instead, the mine broke down into microscopic particles, reattaching itself to her armor. I was certain that the armor was bigger on the inside, to borrow a popular phrase. “I presume that’s part of what you called nanotech, but there was also some spatial mana in play.”

  She grinned. “You’re a perceptive one. Not sure why you call it spatial mana rather than spatial magic, but potato potahto, I suppose. Interesting that you could see the nanotech.”

  “Where I’m from, we’ve come to learn that mana is broken down into different affinities. They don’t treat it like that here, and it doesn’t sound like they do where you’re from. As far as the tech, it was part of our science fiction, although I believe some countries were starting to make progress into it. My Earth still very much used claymore mines in warfare, although they were getting a little outdated. My dad was a US Marine and taught me a bit about ordnance.”

  She was grinning now. “Seriously? That’s cool, kid.”

  I chuckled. “Been a while since someone called me that.”

  “Oh, that’s on me. I’m like 57 now, and you look a lot younger than me. I’ve been hanging out with too many ogres, apparently. Anyway, what I meant was, your dad being a US Marine? That was cool.”

  “I mean, I guess so.”

  “No, you don’t get it. To people like me, on my Earth, saying someone was a US Marine was like saying they were a Knight of the Round Table, or a legate from a Roman legion. They’re all legendary bands of warriors where I’m from.”

  That made sense. “I couldn’t help but notice you didn’t answer my question.”

  She locked eyes with me, and for a moment, she felt much larger than she was. “Yeah, you can trust me. All my readings say you’re too powerful for me to have any chance against, as if my eyes hadn’t told me that already. I might be able to take out a couple of those knights, but unless I could set up traps ahead of time, they’d take my head pretty quickly. Besides the fact that you’re too strong for me to fight, I get the feeling we’ve got some stuff in common. We should probably talk about that once we’re done with the spooky undead manor. I think the elf has reached it already, and I don’t trust her farther than she can throw me.”

  I almost said I didn’t either, but shifted course at the last moment. “How do you know she’s at the keep?”

  Violet winked at me. “Drones. Don’t go asking for all my secrets. Besides, I’ve got limited resources here. Not sure if anything in this world would be compatible with me if I needed to set up a workshop and resupply.”

  I reached into Save for Winter and pulled out one of the mana rifles. It was a little long for her, but she seemed strong enough to handle it. “Take this as a backup. It recharges from ambient mana, so it should be fine here. You’ll have to get a feel for how to use it, but I’m sure you won’t have a problem.”

  As I spoke, Violet shifted the rifle around in her hands, examining it. She put it through its functions and then fired a blast at one of the mausoleums. “Hmm… decent power. Not as much as Ballbuster, mind you, but rechargeable is good.” As she spoke, the blunderbuss shrank to the size of a squirt gun and attached itself to her back.

  The gate loomed ahead of us, iron-bound and set into stone so old it felt more like a natural formation than a wall. There was something historic about it, like when Cece and I had been dragged by our parents through some of the old castles in England. I expected resistance, some final gesture of defiance from the dungeon, but the doors stood ajar as if waiting for their next meal. That thought set my teeth on edge. Nothing about this floor had been generous, and nothing had been left to chance.

  Felania was already there when we reached the threshold. She stepped out from the shadow of a broken buttress with the same unhurried grace she’d previously displayed. Her armor was clean, posture relaxed, but despite that, she wore an expression of… maybe it was fear, but I didn’t think she was being affected by whatever aura this keep was putting off.

  “It’s still not too late, hero. You’ve proven yourself worthy. Take me back to your world,” she purred, “and I’ll be all yours.”

  There it was. I wasn’t sure if it was enough for me to just kill her, but that was the lure that I’d been expecting.

  “Sorry, toots. Already taken. But I am curious why you don’t want us to enter the keep.”

  Her eyes narrowed and an expression of unbridled hatred appeared on her face. “I have no friends here. I detest everything about this place. It cost me everything. They said they were freeing us, but all they wanted was to enslave us.”

  Violet seemed content to let me deal with Felania and was caught up in the aura of the keep, her shoulders tightening as she took a pull from a flask which had suddenly appeared in her hands. She let out a slow breath before nodding to herself. “This place is bad,” Violet muttered, voice low. “Like standing next to the crematorium wall and understanding the futility of life.” She straightened after another swallow and rolled her neck. “I can manage it, but it’s not subtle.”

  I looked back at Felania. “Then you have no problem with us destroying everyone in the keep?”

  “None whatsoever. I only wish that you’d been here 3,000 years ago.”

  With that statement, the pieces started to fall into place, but I still felt like I might be grasping at straws.

  I felt the pressure as well, a cold insistence that whispered of judgment and inevitability, but it never gained purchase. Titles, Will, and sheer stubborn refusal burned it away before it could root. I watched Felania closely as we moved past her toward the open gate, noting again how nothing about her rhythm changed. No hitch in her breathing, no tightening of muscle. When I crossed the threshold, the keep swallowed us in silence, and the sense that we had just stepped inside something that had already decided our worth settled heavy in my chest.

  The interior of the keep felt hollow in a way that had nothing to do with emptiness. Our footsteps echoed too cleanly through the corridors, sound traveling farther than it should have, as if the stone were listening and passing it along. Banners bearing the sunburst of the Order hung from the walls, but they were wrong, the colors muted and the symbol stretched into sharper, harsher lines. It felt less like devotion and more like a memory of something which had come before—something which, much like me, had gone through the process of being made and unmade repeatedly.

  We moved slowly, clearing each chamber as we went, but there was no resistance. Tables lay overturned, and shelves were long stripped bare. Rusted weapons and dented armor had been abandoned where they fell. Whatever had withdrawn from this place had not done so calmly.

  One wall in a long gallery drew my attention. Names had been etched directly into the stone with care that bordered on reverence. On the left side, a title had been chiseled, deep and precise. The Honorable Fallen Before Chaos. Beneath it were nineteen names, each letter worn smooth by time, or perhaps by hands that had traced them too often.

  Opposite that list was another carving, smaller but far more deliberate. The title read The Living Champion, and beneath it there was only a single name. Adoses Gregor, Knight of Order, Bearer of Light. The space around it was unmarked, as if no one had dared add to it or remove it. Violet stared at the wall for a long moment before taking another swallow from her flask, and even Felania seemed to hesitate before looking away.