Chương 65: 65 Loop 2, Part 19

The third door opened, just like the others, and the chain dissolved into the ground. I floated through. I had the map about a foot away from my face. God, I loved magic. The room was laid out strangely. It was a singular square room which led to a winding thin hallway. It wrapped around the room twice before leading back in on the second floor. The last room had been a mossy forest. In contrast, this one was manicured. Trees came up through the floor at managed intervals, and polished stone snuck between them.

Roots curled in and around the stone. I kind of wondered how they lived if there was no dirt—just stone to support them, or even leaves and litter to fertilize them. But I wasn't going to question things, given I likely knew the answer already. The ceiling was more than 100 feet up, the trees building a sort of canopy. It almost looked like it could be walked upon.

"Is it warm in here, or is it just me?" Finn asked. I still wasn't over the fire room, but it was definitely muggy in this one. Unlike the last room, which smelled like ash and mildew, this one was strangely fresh. There was an odd silence, too.

"It's very quiet in here," Flag said.

"It reminds me of my room at night. The stones aren't saying anything, just like out there. But usually, when I talk, the room stops being so quiet."

"Buddy," I said to him.

"You can't just say things like that."

"Wait. Which part?"

"The part about an empty room talking back to you."

"Oh. Well. It does sometimes." On the north side of the wall was a plain arch with an open door, which meant we didn't have to figure out unlocking it. But it was clear, given the map, that they wanted us to enter that hallway and slowly make our way up to the canopy. Which… did I mention there was a balcony? On the second floor, the level with the canopy, was a winding balcony with two doors laid into it. One on the north side and one on the east side.

I floated up a little to get a better viewing angle and checked the map against what I was seeing. It took all of about four seconds and ruined my night. That long, winding hallway was full of traps or monsters, or both. And that wasn't even considering that it would be almost a thousand feet of walking—or I guess floating—just to travel up a single floor. Clearly, the architect had never heard of stairs or ladders.

"Finn, the hallway only goes around the room. We really have to travel that far?"

"Yes, we do," he said.

"Have you ever considered walking?" I gave him a blank stare.

"It's not that it's difficult. It's just a waste of time. Look at how far it is. Come on, man." I forced the map into his face. I was just doing it to be theatrical. The greatest thing about the time loops wasn't the infinite time. Though, don't get me wrong, that part had been incredible. If I hadn't had an idea of how to fix it, I would've been freaking out a little more. No. It was this chair. I couldn't believe I had never thought of casting [Float] on a chair before.

It might have been the greatest stroke of brilliance in my entire life. I never had to walk ever again. But it also formed a tactical advantage, because now I didn't even have to go in that hallway.

"Finn?"

"Mm hmm."

"I'm gonna go look at the balcony." I took off before he responded. He shouted after me anyway.

"Wait! Don't touch anything!"

"I'm not gonna touch anything." And I meant what I said. I went up there with pure intentions. Why would I want to do any work? The chair took me up in a quick diagonal. The entire timemy mind focused on one thing: how good it was gonna feel grabbing that key. It was going to be so nice not having to spend an hour fighting whatever horrors made it in on the other side of the door. Whoever designed this place really hadn't thought things through.

If their grand plan for forcing people into potential kill zones was nothing more than elevation, well... But of course, that wasn't the only thing stopping me. I came in level with the balcony rail, close enough to read the grain on the north door. A barrier smacked me in the knees as I tried to push the chair over the lip of the stone. I stopped moving, but the chair didn't. It felt almost like I'd been cut in half. One moment, I was floating through the air, supported by my favorite chair.

The next, I was falling from almost sixty feet up. I screamed and waved my arms frantically. But thankfully, Finn was quicker on his feet than I was, and he cast a spell. [Bounce]. I had never had that spell cast on me before. I wouldn't recommend it. Given the alternative, I'd like to say I'd have preferred falling. The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

When I landed, instead of all my bones breaking and probable death, my body did as the spell suggested and bounced almost all the way back up to where I had fallen from. And I gotta say, it still hurt. I got whiplash in my neck, and then I fell again, my arms flailing. Then I bounced again, not quite as high. Each time I hit the ground, I came back up again and got a fresh look at my surroundings. Finally, after the sixth bounce, I stopped and waited for the room to catch up.

"That was too many bounces," I said after standing. I held my head.

"It's not a very precise spell."

"It's not a very good spell."

"Would you rather I let you fall to your death?" I didn't answer, because no, of course I wouldn't. Still, I didn't want to give him the satisfaction. The chair had gone on without me. It was now floating next to the door on the balcony. The nice thing about [Float] was that in general, it prevented things falling to their doom. You know.

'Cause they could just float. Which raised a question I didn't have time for. The chair went through the barrier, but I didn't. Back in the fire room, I'd thrown a handful of dirt across the center line, trying to find out whether that barrier cared or extended past knee height. And it didn't. This one kind of reacted the same way. Which begged the question. How were these barriers made? And why didn't modern men of science know how to recreate them? There was no quick way to get it back.

Sure, there were spells I could cast, but most of them required mana and time, and I didn't wanna spend either. I didn't want to cast [Float] on myself and watch my mana drain almost all the way down.

"It'll be fine," Finn said.

"I know it's fine. I just wish I still had it." So that left propelling myself under my own power, or at least floating. [Stride] was cheaper and would have solved this exactly, if I were willing to spend an hour tinkering with the spell to make it go faster. And despite being in a time loop—or, well, kind of? —time wasn't exactly something I had lately. God. If that wasn't a statement. I cast the spell. [Float] on a chair was an enchantment. Something you paid once, and you could float forever.

But [Float] on a body was a little bit more tricky. My bar stopped being on the comfortable side of green and almost slid into yellow.

"Laz?"

"What? I didn't say anything."

"You were about to say, 'Let's take a quick break.'""No, I wasn't," I lied.

"I was going to say, 'I'll go first.'" But he cheated. He went through the arched doorway to the north, which opened into exactly what I had been expecting. An unlit, dark-ass corridor with a lot of eerie-sounding moans. Because why wouldn't there be? The golems fell in behind us, and I floated forward. The hallway was too thin. I'd known that from the detail on the map, but floating into the claustrophobic dark was something different. And there were also trees. Of course there were.

Flag drifted up to the nearest trunk and put a hand flat against the bark.

"Hello. My name is Flag. You are very tall, and you have more arms than most trees I've ever met."

"Flag? Please get behind me."

"Oh, okay. But he isn't saying anything back. I don't think he likes me." Well, he was right about that part. But I doubted he liked any of us. To be fair to myself here, I did notice. But even after the weird-ass fire-eating tree, I wasn't expecting one to have fists. I mean, come on. A tree with fists? I hated this dungeon. The first fist folded around one of my golems and ground the stone to dust. I stared in shock for half a second.

My marble light barely illuminated things, the oppressive darkness somehow magically swallowing the light. The column of dust came apart in the air and drifted, light beams shafting through. And the fist opened, leaving behind the mana battery and the lower half of the golem. And nothing else. I didn't quite know how the mana battery hadn't exploded. But I wasn't gonna question it. I rushed forward and yanked the battery out of the wreckage before the treant could decide it wanted that, too.

Those things were dangerous. Behind me, the other fourteen golems kept walking, because nobody had stopped them.

"Stop!" I yelled.

"Everyone out." The hallway was six feet across at its most generous. Which meant we were all single file. And creating quite the easy target for the trees, which surrounded us on all sides.

"We can't let them go farther," I said, gesturing at the dust of the golem ahead of me. Finn was already nodding. He had, of course, worked things out himself. But he added to my command.

"Out. All of you. Back to the entrance."

"Flag, you too." Aww. But I wanted to make friends.

"I don't think they'd reciprocate, bud." Oh. I guess that's fair. Thankfully, despite only about three of the golems being under my control at this point, they all listened. I was starting to get mad at this dungeon for limiting the usefulness of my literal fucking army. So far, they hadn't been good for anything other than being a mobile bomb holster. Which, I mean, as far as things go, wasn't all that bad, but I was starting to regret my life choices.

I was still hoping it was just this half of the dungeon that made our golems useless. All of our golems except one turned back around and marched out of the hall. Axe, however, did not turn. No. Instead, he argued. Well, he refused.

"Axe. I need you to go back. For your safety."

"I am no mere golem. I am a weapon. Trees are my natural prey."

"You're two feet of steel bolted to a painted rock. We just saw one of these trees turn a golem into dust. I'm not risking you," I said.

"If it grabs me, I would be within the tree. And my head will take care of the rest." I envied his confidence.

"Fine. You can stay. But if you lose your golem body, well, I'm not making you a new one. At least, not yet." With the rest of the golems safely ensconced in the first room, we continued onward. And so did the moaning. It didn't sound like it was coming from the trees. No. It felt like it was coming from the ground and the air. Everywhere all at once. Except the trees. My marble light barely kept us all illuminated. But the punching treants weren't doing anything yet.

I used [Wideview] to closely inspect one of the treants, which was how I was able to discern anything important. The tree was made of ordinary brown bark, the same as the trees in the lobby. And there was no sign of where the fists had gone.

"How many of these things are there?" Finn asked somewhere behind me.

"The map says the hallway is almost a thousand feet long."

"That's not what I asked."

"I know. But it answers the question." He didn't push further. Of course, that was when I heard Finn yell out in pain.