I thought, foolishly, that it would take a while to get to the first puzzle. It did not. Allowing ourselves to go more or less all out, and now helping each other in the movements, our speed through the cityscape was truly amazing.

  In less than five minutes, we’d traveled the several kilometers to the beacon, which promptly disappeared as we stepped onto a dais with a ritual circle etched into it. In the center was a slightly raised cylinder upon which sat a large chest. The ritual circle didn’t end at the base, but covered the chest as well, the interconnecting lines weaving an interesting, flickering tapestry.

  “This looks complicated,” Gregory said. “No wonder it was left behind.”

  “Looks like it involves the flow of energies in the rune circle,” I said. “Cari, are you good with sensing ambient energies?”

  “My healing skill helps me sense the vitality and health of others, so, kind of?”

  “But not stamina or mana?” Cari shook her head. “Okay, this may sound odd, but I have a skill that allows me to meditate, which I have used to get a better hold of my pathways. I don’t know if something like that would be teachable, but I am willing to try if you are.”

  “Sounds like it would help me to become a better healer, or at least get a better grasp of my Nature affinity, so sure! Thank you!”

  “Would it be helpful for me to do the same?” Gregory asked.

  “Meditation also allows my health, stamina, and mana to recover much faster, so I suspect it would.”

  We all sat a good distance away from the circle, but close enough that the beacon wasn’t active. I took up my usual position for meditation and easily slipped in. My awareness of the ambient energy expanded out around me. I felt the life of Cari and Gregory next to me, but where my circulation had been separated into the three strains, theirs was still the chaotic singular stream of the uncontrolled.

  “Do I do the upper arms or lower arms positioning?” Gregory asked, confused.

  “Whichever feels best to you,” I said without opening my eyes.

  “Now, I’m going to extend a bit of my vitality energy out in front of me. I have a profession skill that allows me to infuse my energy into an object to enchant it, and part of that is projecting different forms of internal energy outward. This, I think, will help you to understand your own pathways. Focus on the area between us.”

  I extended out my vital energy into a circle that flowed clockwise. “Now, can you sense the shape I made?”

  “I don’t sense anything,” Gregory said with only mild frustration.

  “I can sense that vital energy is there, but it’s vague and only directional,” Cari said with the same tone.

  “Alright, let’s try this instead. Maybe if it’s touching you it will be easier,” I said. Being very careful to keep the hunger aspect out of the energy, I gently made two circles this time and pushed them against their stomachs.

  “Oh! I feel it!” Cari said. “A circle?”

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  “Yes! Greg?”

  “I can feel it touching me, but I’m still working on the shape.”

  “It’s also a circle for you, try to feel it out. Cari, which direction is the energy moving within the circle?”

  It continued in this way for several hours, and they slowly got it, with Cari learning faster and helping Gregory to understand the concepts. Gregory was faster to understand the concepts of Stamina, and Cari again for Mana. Eventually a full day had passed, and when my senses reached out, I could sense the stronger, consolidated streams of their internal pathways.

  “It took me quite a bit longer to figure this shit out,” I said, proudly smiling at them both. “Several days longer. I’m truly impressed.”

  Cari smiled back, “Thank you for this, I can feel that my vine bolts should cost me less overall mana now that I have a good grasp of how it works. And my healing skill has improved too!”

  Gregory stood up and stepped up to me, extending his hand. I shook it and nodded.

  “It’s puzzle time!” I said as we all moved up to the ritual circle. I knelt and gently touched the edge of the circle. An arc of lightning lanced out and struck me in the chest. I nearly fell over as my legs locked up. All of my derived stats dropped by half.

  “Are you okay?” Cari asked as they both stared at me.

  “Did you not see that bolt of lightning?”

  They both shook their heads.

  “Huh. Well, when I touched the circle I got quite a shock that knocked my health, stamina, and mana down by exactly half. Must be percentage based,” I said.

  “Noted. How, then, do we solve this?” Gregory asked.

  “External manipulation,” I said. I sat down and re-entered meditation. I reached out with my magical senses and felt the flow of the ritual circle. “Cari, try to grab the box with one of your vines.”

  With a quick motion, the green bolt struck the ground right outside of the circle, the vine reaching in to wrap around the chest. Blue lightning burned through the vine as soon as it touched the chest. I felt the surge of energy from the circle as the vine burned.

  “Okay, maybe not.” I tried to send a strand of mana into the circle and I felt a rune within the circle activate and begin to pull in the magical energy. But it wasn't as violent as before. Or at all, really. When I stopped it, the rune settled back down to its previous state. I rested and waited to recover before continuing.

  “When I feed mana into the circle, a particular rune pulls the energy from me and activates. I haven’t tried the other types yet. Either of you want to give it a go?”

  They agreed and sat next to me again. I restarted feeding my mana, Cari fed it health, and Gregory fed it stamina. I sense two other runes activate as we fed the circle, but a central rune that rested on the top of the chest similarly started pulling the energy from the three runes. After several minutes of this, Cari stopped, followed shortly by Gregory.

  “I was starting to get low on health,” Cari said, breathing heavily.

  “Same for stamina,” Gregory agreed.

  I still had a decent amount of mana, but I stopped as well. Something was gnawing at me about this circle.

  “Why does it take so much energy?” Cari asked as she looked over the circle.

  “It’s like the chest is as hungry as you, Dan,” Gregory said.

  Of course. I recognized the sense of the pulled energy. It was being consumed by the circle. You either needed a lot of it to overcome the hunger, or…

  “I’m such an idiot. Let me try something,” I said. They nodded and I took over sending all three of the required energies. But this time, I purposely focused my hunger into the streams. The runes activated, as did the central one, but this time I felt the flow of energy reverse and flow into me. I was hungry, so why not?

  My hungry energy spread over the circle. The central rune was the first to go, with the rest of the circle quickly unraveling from the inside out. With a final soft popping sound, the ritual circle dissipated.

  “Huh,” Gregory said, slack jawed. Cari nodded appreciatively.

  “You solved it! You get to open the box,” Cari motioned for me to go get it.

  I nodded and stepped up onto the raised dais, kneeling to open the chest.