Alythia

The moment the final golem fell, the once clamorous room fell into an eerie silence, broken only by our labored breaths and the dying echoes of battle. The air was thick with tension, the loss of our comrade weighing heavily on everyone's hearts. It was the surviving archaeologist who broke the silence, his voice trembling with anger and grief.

“You!” He pointed an accusing finger at me, his face red and eyes welling up. "Why didn't you heal him? You’re supposed to be our magic user! What use is your magic if you can't save a life?!"

His words felt like daggers stabbing into my chest. I could only look down, my grip on my wand tightening. "I... I’m not a healer," I defended myself, my voice barely a whisper. "I told you I don't know any healing magic..."

The image of our fallen comrade was still fresh in my mind. I had seen the life seep out of his eyes, seen his body crumble under the weight of the golems. It was the first time I had witnessed death so closely, and it felt like a heavy stone pressing down on my chest. I felt helpless, as if my magic was meaningless in the face of death.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T KNOW?!" The archaeologist roared, his hands shaking in fury. "You couldn't even hold off a damn thing! You call yourself a magic user?!"

His accusations left me speechless, tears welling up in my eyes. I understand that this was probably just an emotional outburst expecting the impossible but I couldn't help but feel a sense of self-blame at his words.

"And you!" The archaeologist turned his anger towards Finn. "He was with you! You were supposed to protect him! What were you doing?!"

Finn bit his lip, his knuckles white around his sword. "It... It all happened so fast. And there was too much..."

"WE HIRED YOU FOR A REASON!" The archaeologist was relentless, pointing at Finn and me. "We're paying you to protect us! Not let us die!"

Finn’s face hardened. “He ran into danger himself. It’s not our fault you people didn’t prepare sufficient manpower!”

The archaeologist's anger didn't seem to be appeased. Unable to retort against Finn's accusations, he targeted me again. "And you, with your ability! Why didn’t you warn us about the golems?”

Finn, still reeling from the previous accusation, found himself agreeing. "Yeah, shouldn’t you have seen it before? Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I... I tried to warn you both, but... but it was too late.” My voice was weak. I felt cornered, like a deer caught in the sight of two hunters.

“You tried?! That’s your excuse?! Your inability cost us a life!” Finn spat, his voice a blend of fury and despair.

With a sudden burst of anger, I flared up. "I did warn you! You just didn't listen! You rushed in without thinking!"

“AND!” My face was flushed red, my hands trembling. “It was because of you that we’re in this situation! You were the one who triggered the trap earlier, and now this one too!”

Finn’s face contorted with rage “SO WHAT?! At lea-”

"Enough." 

Finn was about to continue when a stern word from Elara cut him off. The usually quiet woman had finally spoken up. "None of us knew what to expect in here. It was indeed their own faults for greedily rushing in for some treasure, but we should focus on how to get out of here." To which Rurik agreed, adding an affirming "Mhm."

Though the argument was ended, the air was far from clear. The archaeologist glared at me and Finn, his gaze full of resentment. Finn returned his gaze, the hostility between them tangible. 

I stared at my hands, repeatedly clenching and unclenching them trying to control my surging emotions. I was mad, at them for being so unreasonable and a bit towards myself. I felt weak. Though the others didn’t explicitly blame me, it didn't stop my feelings of self blame. 

The argument ended not with reconciliation, but with an uneasy truce born out of necessity. We had to keep moving. We had to make it out alive.

Continuing on, the increased tension within our group was evident. Though I was still in charge of lighting the way, Finn insisted on using his own torch as well, for ‘in case we get separated again.’ In the dim torchlight, our shadows danced against the ancient walls, creating an eerie tableau.

As we ventured further, we came across more rooms, each as treasure filled and densely guarded as the ones before. Thankfully, systemically clearing out the dumb golems weren’t that hard once we got the hang of it. Having no one urgently trapped in the middle needing rescue helped too. With Rurik, Finn, and Elara rotating in shifts of 2 at the front and I assisting them from the back, we were able to quite easily clear out each room. Occasionally someone would take a small, superficial, hit, or some flying debris would scratch the archaeologist and I in the back, but that was about it. 

Some of the rooms contained mundane looking artifacts or inscriptions that piqued the archaeologist's interest, but rarely did the rest of us share his enthusiasm. The only exception was the discovery of a battered pair of corpses in one room, their death suggesting that their group was not the first to venture into this labyrinth in recent times.

“Do you think it’s the same group before us?” I asked, to which Elara responded “Probably”.

Kicking the body with a sneer, the archaeologist let out a triumphant “Ha, serves you guys right.” Silence immediately descended upon us as we were once again reminded of the unfortunate situation earlier.

 

“What’s this?”

From one of the lifeless hands, Finn retrieved a giant roll of dense fabric, on which was drawn a giant map. The map was cumbersome and quite large, but the archaeologist insisted on bringing it along. It didn’t seem to depict the labyrinth, but rather the world as it was known during some bygone era. It looked somewhat familiar but I couldn’t pinpoint why.

 

MinisGimis

I will be experimenting with some ai generated images I made for the cover art, idk if its better to use them or the more simple but hand drawn leaf I had earlier