Chương 440: (433) 6.47. Twists and Turns

Back underwater once more, Vin looked around, realizing this dream was far darker than the others he'd gone through thus far. The water appeared almost murky, as though there were ink drifting within it, and he couldn't see more than about a dozen feet in front of his own face. Strangely enough there were walls on five different sides of him, boxing him in and clearly intending to force him to go in one particular direction.

"Alright," Vin muttered, curious where this dream was going as he began swimming forward.

"This should be interesting." It didn't take him long to come upon his first split in the corridor. Nor his second, or his third after that. Vin quickly realized what was going on, and he cursed as he slowed to a stop. He was in some sort of labyrinth. An endless twisting of hallways and passages, made all the more confusing because it was underwater. That meant whoever had designed the labyrinth hadn't been forced to stick to only two dimensions.

A fact that was made readily apparent by yet another split in the path ahead of him, this one not only going left and right, but up and down as well. Vin had felt like he'd been getting close to Lumel prior to this dream, but now he was all but certain. If there were ever a dream that would cause Lumel and Fria to get trapped and separated from one another, it would be a massive, unending labyrinth.

As if he needed any more proof, while Vin was swimming up the passageway, there was another distant gong sound, just like from the dream with the epic monster. Though rather than the same, nondescript male voice he'd heard before, this time, it was a woman who called out.

"Another hour has come and gone, and still you are no closer to reaching the exit. Give up your dreams of seeing the world, you aggravating child. The labyrinth shifts once more." Vin could only assume that was the queen calling out to Lumel somewhere within the labyrinth, and he flinched at the hundreds of scratching, grating sounds that filled the water like a horribly out of tune orchestra.

His eyes widened as he watched the path he'd just taken slowly scrape along itself, sealing itself shut and preventing him from going back. At the same time, two new passages opened before him on either side, expanding his options. Looking from one path to the next, Vin cursed. Massive, unending, shifting labyrinth? Oh yeah, Lumel is definitely in here somewhere.

Without access to her spatial magic, she'd be forced to swim from one passage to the next, unable to move on to the next dream, or even make her way back to the prior one. There was no question as to what had happened, and Vin tried to keep his bubbling anger toward the queen isolated as he picked up the pace, swimming as fast as he could as he went from dead end to dead end, trying to find a way forward. After hitting his fourth dead end in a row, Vin decided he'd had enough.

Placing a hand on the wall, he cast Stone Shape, ripping a hole in the stone and creating a path forward. Only for a blast of superheated, pressurized water to erupt through the opening, slamming into his chest and sending him careening back down the hallway in a flash of brilliant, golden light. Vin gasped, righting himself in the water as the hole he'd created sealed itself shut and cut off the deadly jet of water he'd released.

Pressing his hand against his torso, his heart pounded as he realized what just happened. He'd tripped his divine boon. And he hadn't woken up.

"That's not good," he muttered, somehow managing to sweat despite being underwater as he drifted there, going over how this changed things. His plan going into all this had been fairly simple. Enter Lumel's dream journey, find Lumel and Fria, and hurry them along their way down to Lumel's mana pool. The whole bit about death in someone else's dream journey meaning death in real life hadn't really phased him because if he died, he would just wake up, and after waiting for his boon to reset, he could try again.

Only he hadn't woken up. He was just as trapped inside this dream and Lumel and Fria were. No, that's not true, Vin realized, forcing himself to take deep breaths and slow his racing heart. The sudden realization that his own life was truly on the line now had caused him to start panicking, but he wasn't in the same situation as Lumel and Fria. Even if he'd just gotten himself killed using it, unlike the two of them, he still had access to his magic.

So long as he played by the dream's rules, he could use that to track down the two of them and get everyone to safety.

"No shortcuts. Just take things one path at a time. Easy enough," Vin muttered, blinking as the queen's voice called out again.

"Another hour has come and gone, and yet you still cling to this comical idea that you will become an Airwalker one day," the queen scoffed, and Vin easily imagined the annoyed frown on her face, wherever she was.

"The labyrinth shifts once more."

"What?!" Vin shouted, spinning around as the path he'd just planned on taking sealed itself shut.

"That was like five minutes! That wasn't an hour!" Wherever the queen was, either she couldn't hear him, or far more likely, didn't give a damn about his complaints. Though that better explained why Lumel and Fria were struggling so much. A sprawling, near-endless labyrinth that changed every hour was one thing. One that changed every five minutes? No wonder they were trapped. Cursing under his breath, Vin began swimming, occasionally sending out bursts of Sense Life as he tried to hone in on his two targets.

Without his divine boon he had to play things cautiously and not risk casting out his mana too far, but with each cast of his spell, he went a little wider. It took him another six labyrinth cycles, but eventually, his spell managed to pick up a source of life. The only problem, of course… Was that he had no way of actually getting to it. If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it. Vin sighed as he stared at the blank wall in front of him.

According to his spell, something living was only a few hundred feet straight ahead. But it might as well have been ten miles away for all the good it did him. He didn't dare risk using Stone Shape again, seeing as he didn't have any more lives to spare at the moment, which meant the only way to get from his current position to whatever lifeform he was sensing was the long way. Though at the very least, now that he had an actual target to move toward, Vin did have one last trick up his sleeve.

Even if he couldn't rip his way through the walls and make his own path, he'd at least confirmed that the labyrinth was made of stone. A small pulse of Sense Stone was more than enough for Vin's purposes, and he grinned as his spell highlighted the many corridors stretching and twisting all around him. He didn't dare try to map out the entire labyrinth in one go, but for reaching the target he'd detected, this was plenty.

Naturally, the path leading through the labyrinth between him and where he wanted to go was long and convoluted, so Vin got to work, swimming as fast as he could as he held the mental map in mind. He couldn't quite swim fast enough, however, and he cursed as the queen called out another one of her weirdly fast hours, causing the labyrinth to shift and change around him.

He'd gotten a little closer, but another cast of Sense Stone confirmed the path stretching from him to his target no longer existed, and a new one had formed that led in the exact opposite direction. Realizing he had a long road ahead of him, Vin sighed as he began swimming. It took fourteen cycles of the labyrinth before Vin managed to get close to the lifeform he'd detected. Sometimes the walls shifted and Vin was forced to completely double back, heading in an entirely different direction.

Other times the path forward closed off completely, and he had to drift there and wait for the next cycle before he could continue onward. And if the ever-changing labyrinth wasn't bad enough, the lifeform he was trying to reach was also moving, which made tracking it down all the harder. During his downtime between cycles Vin had at least had the forethought to try casting Sense Soul.

He hadn't even been sure if such a spell would work in this crazy dreamscape they were in, but sure enough, the magic confirmed whoever he was chasing after did in fact have a soul. The discovery filled him with renewed vigor, and Vin swam as hard as his limbs could carry him as he chased after his target. He briefly tried using Redirect Gravity to physically drag himself through the water faster than he could swim. But wherever this dream took place, gravity didn't seem to be a factor, making the spell worthless.

Note to self, invent some version of Whispering Wind that works underwater, he thought, panting as he kicked with everything he had through the water, desperate to get even closer before the next cycle messed everything up. He was barely three dozen feet from his target now, and was sorely tempted to just start ripping holes in the labyrinth once more. Only the memory of boiling, pressurized water striking him in the chest stayed his hand, and Vin forced himself to keep swimming.

Then, out of nowhere, he was hit with a stroke of luck. The queen announced yet another cycle change, only this time, a new passageway was formed. It was a roundabout path, and longer than he would have liked. But at his top speed, he should be able to reach his target before the next cycle.

"Lumel!" Vin shouted, thankful that the weird physics of Lumel's dreams meant humans could talk underwater just as well as pulmons could.

"If you can hear me, don't move! Same to you, Fria, if that's actually you! Whoever it is, I'm coming!" Vin swam forward, desperately pulling himself along with only one full arm. The memory of how effortlessly Lumel could swim through the water flashed through his mind, and Vin added a swimming-related spell to the list of things he wanted to work on once he'd survived this whole ordeal. Then a distant voice yanked him from his thoughts, as he heard Lumel's voice echoing from ahead of him in the labyrinth.

"Vin?!" she shouted, her voice faint as it traveled through the water.

"I can hear you! I'm coming!"

"No, stay where you are!" he shouted back, cursing as he cast Sense Life and realized she was moving away from him. In hindsight, calling out to her had probably been the wrong move. From Lumel's perspective, even with the strange time dilation that made dreams feel much faster than the waking world, she must have been trapped in this labyrinth for hours, all alone. Not to mention this dream came immediately after the one where she'd been forced to attend his own funeral.

It was no wonder she'd ignored his instructions and tried to chase after him. Deciding not to waste more energy shouting, Vin instead focused all his efforts on swimming, determined to reach the panicking pulmon before the queen's next cycle. He could practically feel the seconds flowing by along with the water as he swam, and he dug deeper than ever before, forcing his body to shoot forward and skim around corners as he swam with everything he had.

Turning one last bend, Vin started as he realized he'd reached a long, narrow straightaway. There, on the far end, drifted Lumel, her eyes wide and red as she spotted him. Though before either of them could swim toward the other, the queen's voice rang out one more time.

"Another hour has come and gone, and you will never find your friends again. The labyrinth shifts once more."

"Vin!" Lumel shouted, rocketing down the tunnel far faster than he could ever hope to swim through water. Or at least, that's what should have happened. Despite it looking like she was swimming with everything she had, Lumel barely moved faster than a slow jog, the dream physics of a nightmare catching up with her and all but holding her in place, forcing her to watch as the path between the two of them was sealed shut. With a shout, Vin tried to swim to her, but he could tell immediately he wouldn't make it.

As the stone wall descended in the center of the corridor, preparing to cut them off and keep them from reuniting, anger flashed through Vin's chest. He'd come all this way, survived against an epic monster, and even attended his own goddamn funeral in order to find his girlfriend and save her from her own subconscious. Like hell he was giving up now.

Ripping his staff off his back, Vin stopped swimming and hurled it forward, the long, thin shaft of wood slicing through water like a harpoon as it rocketed through the tunnel. Reaching out, Vin cast Mage Hand, directed the staff right where he wanted it to go and angling it down, landing it in the dead center of the hallway, sticking up. The staff made it just in time, and the descending wall touched down on it. The thick, powerful stone grinded for a split second as it strained, before coming to a dead stop.

There wasn't so much as a creak of wood or the sound of splinters, his glowing staff stood tall and strong, effortlessly holding off whatever powers that be commanded the labyrinth to shift around. Letting out a sigh of relief, Vin hurried forward, ducking beneath the staff and whispering a quiet thanks to the artifact as he went by.

"Vin!" Lumel shouted. Whatever nightmare physics binding her finally released her, allowing her to slam into him with enough force to drive the air from his lungs as she wrapped her arms around him and sobbed into his chest.

"You came for me!"

"Of course I did," he wheezed, chuckling as he pulled her into a big hug. Squeezing his eyes closed, he smiled and kissed her forehead.

"And I always will."