Amelia touched the feathery end of the dart, prompting Raphael to hiss from the pain. She pulled her hand back.
“No. It’s bad. It’s really bad…” he managed.
“Before I touch you with Eirexis, I need you to tell me what’s wrong,” I said. “We have to understand what kind of warfare he’s using against us.”
“Oh, screw you!” Raphael blurted. “I’m friggin’ paralyzed. It’s some kind of neurotoxin. I can’t move, but I can definitely feel pain. It’s burning through my shoulder.”
“I’m so sorry,” Amelia whispered.
“How were you too slow?” Herakles asked. “You’re one of the fastest creatures I know.”
I pressed one end of Eirexis against the back of Raphael’s neck. The symbols lit up white for a moment, as it healed him. As the seconds passed, Raphael regained his ability to move. He pulled the dart out himself, flinching. Tossing it aside, he gave Amelia a soft, gentle squeeze and served me with a smile.
“Thanks, buddy. Loving that nifty stick more and more,” he said. “As for your question, Herakles, I don’t know. I’m feeling a little sluggish, and it might have something to do with the agony we endured earlier in the previous room. Physically, we may be healed. Mentally, however… I’m honestly tired. It might be playing a role.”
“It’s not like you to admit such vulnerabilities,” Herakles replied.
“Gah, enough with the psychoanalysis, please!” Raphael retorted, rolling his eyes.
Lumi cleared her throat. “It’s not exhaustion of any kind,” she said, her gaze darting around us. “Can you not see them?”
“See what?” I asked.
Lumi’s eyes were slightly more sensitive, but once we all focused and looked around, we were able to notice them. And once we spotted them, we paid attention. There were tiny particles that hovered in the room, sparkling discreetly whenever the light caught them at the right angle. No wonder we’d not seen them straight away, given how they moved.
“What the hell are these?” Amelia wondered, watching as some of them gathered in clusters and stuck to her upper legs. They vanished as soon as they touched the leather suit. But I had a feeling they weren’t really gone.
“Nothing in this place is harmless or mere coincidence. Or natural, for that matter,” I said.
“So what are we looking at?” Varga replied, still confused.
Lumi moved her arms slowly. “I think they’re some kind of freezing particles,” she explained. “I can feel myself slowing down, much like what Raphael described just now.”
“And I don’t see it stopping anytime soon,” Nethissis added, looking around the room.
There had to be trillions of these particles in the air, and they were all drawn to us as soon as we reached their vicinity. Whenever I raised my hand, it inadvertently gathered more clusters, making my wrist feel old and crunchy. The effects were real and getting worse as time went by.
Dread rammed into me in cold waves as I realized what this meant. “The longer we’re in here, the slower we’ll get.”
We all got up, staring down at the rest of the floor ahead. There were hundreds of tiles, and at least half of them had likely been fitted with pressure plates, if not more. The logic of such a dangerous puzzle had already dictated that we’d be looking at a combination of trap and safe tiles. We had to get past them in order to reach the other side, where… a door was forming.
“Check that out,” I said, tapping Varga’s shoulder.
As if drawn with a laser, the rectangular shape of an exit became visible, glowing blue.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Herakles replied, breathing heavily.
“The only way out is through there, that much is clear,” Riza added, crossing her arms.
I exhaled sharply, knowing there was only one method of approaching this scenario. I was immortal, along with Lumi and Eira. I was also the de facto team leader. Naturally, I couldn’t let anyone else take chances with forging a path toward the newly made door.
“I’ll go ahead first,” I said. “The rest of you follow along the same plates. Should something get triggered, we duck. If needed, we move back to the last safe tile.”
Eva nodded, showing us a piece of chalk in her hand. “I’ll mark the safe ones. So I’ll be right behind you.”
“Got it,” Varga replied.
The rest of the crew offered me confident half-smiles as I turned to face the glowing door-line. The first tile was a trap, unwittingly discovered by Riza. I hopped on the next one after it. Nothing happened.
“Safe,” I said, and moved on to the next. A click made my instincts catch fire. “Duck!”
Darts were shot from the walls again. This time, they crisscrossed the room at different angles. I immediately glanced over my shoulder, still crouching, to see if anyone had gotten hurt. Several darts had hit Varga and Herakles, both of whom were on their knees, but Riza and Lumi were already giving them healing potion vials. We still had a few to use, though I wasn’t sure they’d last until the second half of this room.
The problem with healing potions was that they had never lasted. They were short-term artifices that focused on healing any damaged tissue. After that, they’d quickly wear out. Unfortunately, GASP’s magical people had yet to concoct anything long-term. Therefore, we had to ration and make do with what we had. To the Soul Crusher, this was a game, and we had a limited number of do-overs, thanks to these potions. Had we been in possession of stronger and longer-lasting healing magic, I was certain that the Soul Crusher would’ve taken it away.
What quest ever made things easy?
“It’ll get difficult if you have to use Eirexis on those of us at the back,” Nethissis said.
Eva marked the safe tile behind me. “He can swap places with me and anyone else on neutral tiles, if needed.”
“Ugh, this is incredibly annoying,” Varga said, recovering from whatever toxin had been burning through him. Lumi helped him up, while Riza pulled Herakles’s arm over her shoulders. He was slower than most of us, and I had a feeling these weird freezing particles had something to do with it.
“We need to keep moving,” I said. “Otherwise, we’ll all be stiff before we reach the door.”
“Yeah, my legs aren’t exactly my best friends right now,” Herakles grumbled. He and Riza shared a tile, and it was clearly a challenge for two bodies to occupy that relatively small space.
“Make sure you don’t fall over,” I replied. “We don’t know what the other tiles on both sides do.”
