With a heavy swallow, Mirae looked up at Pippa. “Last one.”

  The brown-haired girl nodded. Her face scrunched, freckles jumping. “I believe I have it this time.” Her voice shook, though the calculating look in her eye suggested this next attempt would have more backbone to it.

  Hopefully, enough backbone to actually be correct. Because if that third door opened and golems came through—or arrows, or a mixture of both—they would kill them. There was a phrase her dad used when speaking about rats getting into the pantry, when they wouldn’t have food for a week. Up in trouble deeper than the latrine… something. She wasn’t exactly sure what; he’d always cut himself off just before saying it around her.

  “Alright then,” Mirae said, hobbling to the table with Pippa’s help.

  She rested her hand against the smooth stone, steadying herself. Pippa moved back around to her spot and began assembling the pieces.

  Her fingers worked faster now, more deliberately. She selected blocks based on the symbols carved into their faces, rotating each one before adding it to the growing structure. The configuration took shape—circular, but disjointed. Pieces jutted out at odd angles, creating gaps that seemed intentional rather than accidental. The symbols formed a pattern Mirae couldn’t quite parse, lines connecting and spiralling in ways that suggested meaning without revealing it.

  Pippa held up the completed structure. It looked incomplete somehow, like a ring that had been shattered and poorly reassembled. But the symbols aligned across the breaks, forming continuous patterns that bridged the gaps.

  She looked at the others. Her gaze lingered on Mirae before moving to her mother, then the wounded Harry. Pippa nodded.

  Then released it.

  The construction floated upward, drawn to the central block. It connected with a soft click.

  Then a chime rang out.

  Clear. Resonant. The sound filled the room, vibrating through stone, through Mirae’s bones. It echoed off the walls, layering over itself until the single note became a chord.

  Mirae tensed. Her puppets shifted their stances, ready to intercept whatever came through. Another failure. Had to be another—

  The wall on the far right shuddered.

  Then fell.

  The entire section dropped into the ground with a heavy thunk, stone grinding against stone as it descended. Darkness waited beyond—a passage identical to the ones they’d walked through countless times. Plain stone walls. No golems. No arrows. Just an empty corridor stretching into shadow.

  Seconds passed. Mirae’s heart hammered against her ribs. She waited for movement, for the thunder of stone feet, for anything that would signal another fight.

  Nothing.

  A sigh she hadn’t realised she’d been holding slipped past her lips. Her knees gave out. She dropped to the ground, palms flat against cold stone, fingers splayed. She wouldn’t say she’d doubted her friend, but to say Pippa had been cutting it close was putting it mildly.

  She didn’t understand the design Pippa had assembled—the circular, broken pattern that had somehow been correct. It reminded her of planting seeds back home, knowing they’d become beautiful flowers, but not the type, not whether they’d suit the garden. Her father used to complain about that. The uncertainty. The gamble.

  “I did it!” Pippa’s voice came out high, ending in a squeal.

  She rounded the table and dropped to the ground, wrapping Mirae in a tight hug. “Did you see it? I did it, Mirae! I can’t believe it. Well, I can, but I can’t.”

  Mrs Strongmail let out an exasperated laugh as she approached. Harry took a step behind her, gripping his injured arm.

  “Well done, Pippa,” Harry said with a wince.

  Mrs Strongmail dropped to one knee, resting her hand on her daughter’s shoulder. “Thank you.” Her eyes shone with genuine pride, and warmth only mothers seemed capable of producing.

  Pippa laughed. They all took a moment to absorb the situation. Mirae calmed her breath, which still hitched too high. Mrs Strongmail obsessively checked over her daughter, hands running over arms and shoulders as if making sure she was whole. Harry stood back, looking relieved despite the makeshift bandage around his wound, which had been completely soaked red.

  When they’d gathered some energy back, Mirae sent one of her puppets toward the newly opened tunnel. Never hurt to be safe. The last thing they needed was an unexpected ambush ruining everything.

  The puppet returned moments later, unharmed.

  Relief settled into Mirae’s chest. Her eyes moved back to the doorway they’d entered through, to the maze waiting beyond. Emela was probably still out there. Maybe she’d found a room like this one, but she definitely wouldn’t have Pippa’s insights. Not with Pippa having Kar’s journal, and having been chosen for his inheritance. So how had Emela been faring? Mirae had heard screams and fighting before entering this puzzle room. She could only hope that those who’d entered the maze hadn’t died in pointless battles.

  “Let’s go then,” Pippa said, pulling Mirae from her thoughts as she moved toward the tunnel.

  Mirae pushed herself to her feet. Her legs protested, muscles tight and aching.

  When they were ready, she and the others fell into their usual formation—one puppet at the front, herself behind it, then Mrs Strongmail, with Harry and Pippa in the middle. Two puppets pulled up the rear. She’d dismissed the fourth, clearing some of the mind fog and keeping it in reserve.

  The tunnel swallowed them.

  Luminescent light from her puppets washed across the stone walls, casting moving shadows that stretched and contracted with each step. Their footsteps echoed, multiplying in the confined space until it sounded like a small army marching through the darkness. The passage stretched on, twisting slightly left, then right, descending at a gentle grade that made Mirae’s calves burn with each step.

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  The air changed. Grew cooler. Less stale.

  Light ahead, steady and far brighter than that of a mana stone.

  They emerged into what could only be described as a grand hall.

  Mirae stopped. Her breath caught.

  Banners hung from the vaulted ceiling, each one massive—easily twenty feet long. White fabric emblazoned with black symbols: a stylised sun radiating light, and below it, a column of light extending downward like a pillar connecting heaven to earth. The banners dropped deep into the room, their lower edges hanging a dozen feet above the floor. There had to be at least twenty of them, arranged in two rows running the length of the hall.

  A long white carpet stretched down the centre, pristine despite what must have been years—decades?—of abandonment. A common theme within the trial realm.

  At the far end, maybe a hundred paces away, stood a pedestal. It rose from a stage of white marble, three steps leading up to the platform. The pedestal itself gleamed, catching light from sources Mirae couldn’t identify, as if the air itself glowed faintly in this space.

  Pippa gasped.

  Mrs Strongmail and Harry simply stared, mouths ajar.

  Mirae’s puppets’ glow seemed dim compared to whatever illuminated this place. The hall felt alive somehow, charged with purpose despite its emptiness.

  “What is this place?” Mirae asked, turning to Pippa.

  Her friend was already face-deep in the journal, pages rustling as she flipped through them with frantic energy. After a moment, satisfied with what she’d read, she looked up and smiled. “I believe this to be the central nexus.”

  Mirae frowned. Nexus. The word held implications. It would’ve made more sense to call something like this a Grand Hall—she’d heard noble families in Middlec had them for important meetings, for hosting guests. A sect like Kar’s would reasonably have something similar. But nexus implied something else. A central point. A hub.

  Why?

  She raised an eyebrow. “What does this place do? You said it’s a nexus, meaning it more than just a fancy grand hall.”

  Pippa’s smile widened. “That’s very astute of you, Mirae. I’m glad someone’s at least starting to pick up on the grandness of Kar’s insights.”

  Harry frowned, clearly taking offence at the indirect jab. Mrs Strongmail simply smiled, waiting for her daughter to continue.

  “This is the nexus through which Kar controls the Grand Array,” Pippa said, already moving toward the pedestal. Her voice echoed off the high ceiling. “An array specifically designed to hold what he calls in his journals the Light Fortification.”

  “Light Fortification?” Mirae repeated the words, but understanding didn’t follow.

  What did it mean to have a fortification named as such? Was it made completely of light? Did it bring light to the world somehow? Was it powered by light? The name implied so much yet gave so little.

  “What does the Light Fortification do?” she asked, following Pippa down the white carpet.

  Pippa shook her head, not slowing. “It doesn’t say. Just that it’s the sect’s…” She paused, glancing down at the journal. “Dying control. A last play by Kar himself at the end of his life.”

  Pippa said that, like Kar hadn’t written it himself.

  Mirae took a light jog to catch up, her three puppets falling into position on either side of their flanks. Mrs Strongmail and Harry fell in behind them, footsteps echoing across the vast space.

  Pippa looked at Mirae, a slight smile playing on her lips.

  That smile made Mirae frown. Some of the girl’s confidence was returning.

  “He didn’t write it,” Pippa said. “From what I’ve gathered, his apprentice finished his journal for him.”

  Mirae stopped.

  “Finished?”

  “Yeah.” Pippa didn’t wait for her friend, continuing down the white carpet toward the distant pedestal. “Apparently, Kar had to go off somewhere. The apprentice didn’t exactly say where, and it isn’t clear in the text that Kar put in here. There isn’t a single clue where he might have gone.”

  Mirae jogged to catch up again, frown deepening. Why would someone let another person finish their journals? Sure, Kar might have trusted the apprentice, but journals were personal. They held one’s ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and dreams. They couldn’t be so easily given to others to complete. As Pippa put it. That just didn’t fit with what journals were. At that point, they’d be better described as… she failed to find the word. Some form of a book that others wrote about another. Though it definitely wouldn’t be labelled as a journal anymore.

  “So I take it the apprentice died as well?”

  A shrug. “I’m not sure. Again, it doesn’t say.”

  “What does it say at the end of the journal?”

  Pippa raised the book, flicking to the last pages as they closed in on the marble platform. Her frown returned as she skimmed the words. “Not much, really. Kind of incoherent rambling about thoughts on the world.” She paused. “In my opinion, Tizark—his last apprentice—seemed like he was losing his mind toward the end. The loneliness of being the last person technically belonging to the sect drove him insane.”

  “There was no one else?” Mirae asked.

  Pippa shook her head. “Not from what I can gather.”

  They reached the platform. Three steps of white marble led up to the raised stage. Pippa ascended without hesitation, Mirae following close behind. Mrs Strongmail and Harry stopped at the bottom, taking positions beside the puppets, who stood sentinel, luminescent forms casting pale blue light across polished stone.

  Mirae’s voice carried too easily, swallowed by the vastness overhead. Another question formed—where was this place within the maze? Would others make it here? If so, did they have to wait before using the pedestal? Or could they continue?

  She didn’t want to wait. It would be bad enough if some random person showed up, let alone Emela’s oldest brother. Drion would slaughter them all. Or at best severely injure them, leaving Pippa’s partially inherited inheritance meaningless. Her chest tightened at the thought. They needed to move. Fast.

  Pippa seemed to feel the same urgency. She moved to the pedestal—a column of white stone rising to waist height, its surface smooth and covered in symbols that caught the light. She hesitated only a moment before resting her hand against it.

  Light pulsed.

  Sharp. Blinding. A beam shot from the pedestal straight down into the floor, drilling into marble with such intensity that Mirae had to squint. The light spread, branching like roots, racing along grooves carved into the stone that she hadn’t noticed before. The pattern expanded outward from the pedestal in geometric precision, lines connecting, forming circles within circles, symbols igniting as the light touched them.

  Then, the beams tore down the hall.

  Multiple streams of white light erupted from the floor, shooting upward like pillars connecting earth to sky. They slammed into the air above the pedestal with a sound like thunder compressed into a single instant. The impact rippled outward, visible as distortions in the air itself.

  Light gathered. Coalesced.

  A shape formed.

  Mist condensed into solidity—or the illusion of it. A man materialised above them, towering even in his kneeling position. Plate armour covered his form, each piece catching the light until he gleamed like polished silver. But the edges were hazy, indistinct, as if formed from fog that hadn’t decided if it wanted to be real. His eyes pierced through the haze—pure white, luminous, focused on Pippa with unmistakable interest.

  “Inheritor.”

  The voice boomed across the hall. The hanging banners shook, fabric rippling despite no wind. Mirae’s teeth buzzed from the resonance.

  “I am pleased to see that one such as yourself has made it to the Nexus.”

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