Logan fastened the scrubber badge, surprisingly pleased by the simplicity of the sequential number 1234 on it. He quickly remembered the urgency, though, and hustled to Alden.

The elf was blushing as the others turned their heads like confused turkeys, glancing between the group gathered after the explosion and Logan scurrying toward him with the bag of scrolls Alden had given him for this exact excuse.

It had seemed like Alden intended Logan to use the ruse only if absolutely necessary, but now it was the elf himself who had used it to summon Logan in.

Meanwhile, the redhead mage sniffed and muttered to the woman who had reluctantly been helping Alden. "What has the Mages' Guild come to? Master Carpenter Lambert's latest lumber reacts this poorly to a simple Fireball? And now mage–adventurer hybrids think they deserve our time when they can't even handle fundamental casting without scrolls?"

The woman agreed and dramatically swept her flowing dress as she joined him at the opposite end of this section of the training ground.

Alden rolled his eyes at their backs, then raised his voice. "Ah, there you are, scroll boy."

His utter lack of subtlety was the kind of overacting Logan expected in a sitcom when someone was trying too hard to cover up secret business. Even someone with a low Perception stat would've seen Alden was compensating, but nobody cared enough to notice. They had already dismissed him entirely.

"What is it?" Logan asked, fumbling through the bag before handing over a random scroll.

"I was practicing with Festered Veins when I received a notification." The mage turned his chin over his shoulder and practically shouted. "Ah yes, thank you, that's exactly what I thought. Guess I didn't need the scroll after all. Oh well, let's move elsewhere so I can practice more."

Logan shook his head, but Alden had already turned back, hurrying him in the direction where the fire blast had triggered.

"Was it about the quest?" Logan asked.

"Yes. I mean, no, but basically yes." Alden lowered his voice. "While casting, I received a notification that the skill would deal 10% more damage against targets."

Logan cocked a brow. Alden was describing this matter-of-factly, but Logan was pretty sure that didn't match the skill description Alden had read aloud while they were at the inn.

Seeing his expression, Alden rubbed his cheek. "What? Do I have something on my face?" He made a sound of disgust. "As if those cretins didn't have enough reasons to look down on me already."

"No… I just didn't know that was part of the skill."

"Oh, the buff? No, of course not. That came from my Envirobond trait. It grants me alignment bonuses depending on terrain.

"But here's the thing. It amplified my Festered Veins skill, which should only happen near terrain like the blight. And it's active now."

They both glanced where the disruption had taken place. Several official-looking mages ascended from a stairwell that disappeared somewhere below ground and were talking with the fire mage, who looked as confused as they did.

"Did that area you were practicing in change terrain or something?"

"It can, which is why I was going to practice there. But the woman using it first had set it for her own purposes, and I haven't changed it. Nobody else has either." Alden grumbled. "Maybe I should have changed it as we left just to spite her." He lowered his voice further. "But only moments after I received the buff notice, that fire blast went off."

Logan scratched his head as they passed a series of hurdle-like structures. He explained to Alden what he had seen in the wavering mana seals. "Still," Logan said, "I don't understand how that relates to a terrain change."

"That's the thing," Alden whispered harshly, as though forcing the words out. "The section we just left is the only one that alters terrain types, and it never changed. The rest of the training area is completely neutral. That means, somehow, there's a second terrain that appeared from nowhere."

A connecting thought started to form, but it was fuzzy.

"And the terrain would have amplified your necrotic decay skills… so you're thinking it detected the blight?"

Alden nodded eagerly.

Logan picked up his pace, though he shook his head. "But we're nowhere near it."

"Right. But what if it is near us?"

"I don't understand how that's different."

Alden dodged around a low obsidian structure. Logan caught a glimpse of gnomish sigilry on it. They were at the center of the big stadium, halfway to the area where the fire blast had gone haywire.

"I'm still entry level with the Mages' Guild, so I'm only going off rumors. Now, this may sound off topic, but some mages have reportedly gone instantly missing. Oftentimes, it has happened in front of large crowds with plenty of witnesses. All victims are presumed dead, but in every case, it wasn't just them that vanished. The very land they stood upon disappeared too, as if someone had dug it up and the person just happened to be on it. That's unlikely, though, since this phenomenon only ever happens to Mages' Guild members, and when they're in fatal situations. And so, some people think it's a failsafe, meant to activate in the direst of needs."

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"Pretty bad luck to have a failsafe spell go off to save you, but still die anyway."

Alden lifted a finger. "Unless they didn't die. Some claim to have seen these missing mages years later. But it's never been proven."

It sounded like an Elvis-is-still-alive conspiracy, but Alden tied it together when he mentioned the possibility of exceptionally rare teleportation skills that could pull land along with the caster. But those had always been ruled out since they take so long to cast, and these occurences happened in moments.

"So," Logan said, "you think Amatra was near death in the blight, and when the blast hit, it teleported them here along with some of the blight itself? Wouldn't that have happened days ago?"

Alden shrugged. "Not always. Some teleportation takes as long as walking the distance. Others move only your consciousness, leaving the body behind."

If Amatra had triggered some near-death failsafe, that could explain why a fragment of blight might suddenly appear in the Mages' Guild training area. Alden could sense his proximity to the terrain anomaly, and he could tell it was at the border of the area, just past where the fire mage had been practicing.

They reached the mage in question, as well as the others who had joined him. All examined a wooden contraption.

"…but it's not charred, so the wood itself isn't faulty."

"Who set the enchantments in the first place? Perhaps we should replace it with the old model?"

"Master Lambert swore he engineered this lumber with triple the resistance power."

"Too resistant, it seems. Did it strengthen the blast as it repelled it? Even if that attack had hit the protections directly, it wouldn't have overloaded them."

"We should ask the man himself."

As they debated, Logan caught movement in the shadows behind the apparently malfunctioning practice dummy.

Unrelenting Hunt.

The movements shifted strangely, looping back on themselves. They were too repetitive. Logan narrowed his eyes and realized they were illusions meant to pull attention to the left.

He forced himself to look away and to the right. There, he saw a figure darting down the stairs, and out of view beneath the training ground's surface.

Unrelenting Hunt is level 28! Unrelenting Hunt is level 29!

"Alden, what's down there?"

Alden followed his gesture. "That's the actual guild itself. It descends ten levels below the surface. But the blighted terrain is up here."

"Well, someone just ran down there. They're slipping away. Can you get me down there?"

"It's one thing for me to sneak you onto the training field. But into the guild itself? I have access only to the first level. Even then, I don't have the authority to bring in a non-member, even if they are my scrubber."

"What if it's Amatra? If they pass their message to the guild, who knows what comes next?"

Alden looked torn, glancing back toward where he felt the blight's presence. He stiffened suddenly. "The buff's gone. If it was a fragment of the blight, it burned out." He sighed, then nodded. "Very well. Let's go."

Logan led the way this time. His Stealth was a higher level than Alden's, and Unrelenting Hunt helped him map the shadows, finding routes not only for himself but also paths Alden could manage despite his weaker stealth.

The moment they descended the plain brick stairwell that dipped beneath the surface, the true grandeur of the guild became clear.

Inside, the space opened wide, spanning the entire distance of the broad training area above. An atrium spiraled downward through all ten cylindrical tiers.

Each tier had a sizable landing, with walkways at least twenty feet wide at the narrowest points. Rooms jutted from the curved walls at odd angles, like chunks of cubist architecture pressed into the stone. It reminded Logan of a toy he had as a kid. A Speks cube, he thought it was called. A bunch of little magnetic metal squares that could be molded into different shapes. The guild's interior looked like it could have been made from those, except at a massive scale.

At the bottom, a calming blue glow illuminated what looked like a miniature town, complete with tree-sized mushrooms.

The hidden figure was already a level below, weaving between the cubic contours of the walls.

Unrelenting Hunt is level 30!

Logan slipped into the shadows, Unrelenting Hunt helping him to paint the silhouette each time it popped back into view. But just as he prepared to round a corner of his own, the figure spun suddenly and faced in Logan's direction.

Logan's heart jolted. Had his quarry spotted him?

"Ow," Alden grumbled as the back of Logan's head hit Alden's nose.

Logan apologized, but pressed against the cold stone and slowed his breathing. Then he felt relieved. The figure had only stopped to let a group of mages pass by and was now continuing their route.

If Logan kept up at this rate, he'd have to evade those mages, too. And there were more coming out of various rooms. He might be able to sneak well enough, but he wasn't sure about Alden.

The suspect was reaching a set of stairs that would take them to the third tier. And the longer Logan waited, the more quickly he'd lose sight of his target as they wrapped around the cylindrical layout and vanished once they were beneath him.

What if, though, Logan took a short cut?

If they backtracked a little, there was a pillar nearby he could try to climb down. Unrelenting Hunt showed him footholds, but they were admittedly pretty precarious. Still, he had the Shadowed Edge perk to improve the success of his actions while hiding. That, combined with his pretty decent Climbing… it might be worth a try. Down this pillar, then a quick dash to the next pillar, and he could be on the third tier.

Alden, however, had no chance of following that way. Worse, three guild members lounged nearby on the second tier around a soft purple fire, and one glance in Logan's direction would give him away when he tried to dash to the other pillar.

Thinking fast, Logan whispered a plan. Alden snorted and refused, but when Logan asked if he had a better suggestion, Alden huffed.

Reluctantly, the elf came out of hiding and made his way to the lip of the first tier so he could call down to his fellow mages around the fire.

"Excuse me. Yes, up here. Um, sorry to bother you, but do you know where the, uh, um, toilets are?"

Alden was mumbling his words intentionally, forcing those below to strain to hear his words, making him repeat himself louder each time.

By the time Logan descended the first pillar, Alden's face was so red it made his silver hair look stark white.

Logan was so distracted by the sight, he took a step expecting to reach the floor, but the floor was like a phantom extra step lower.

Meditate!

Time slowed and he could see the nearest mage, currently with his back toward Logan, turning his neck to see what the commotion was.

CryoPyre!

The purple flame of the fire intensified as Logan's skill made it bloom from within and expand outward. Normally when Logan cast CryoPyre, it extended from his palm and reached a target. Whatever he had done this time was different.

CryoPyre is level 25! … CryoPyre is level 28!

Meditate is level 33!

Aetherlens is level 31!

He waved the threshold perk notification for CryoPyre away when he saw the next one.

Warning! You are Exalted Kin. Chaos has been invoked! One Harmonic Thread has unraveled. Return to a Convergence Nexus to restore equilibrium.

Warning! You have only one Harmonic Thread left!

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