They finally found it three days later, on day 44, 332 km in the ring.

The freaking source of the cold. A hole in the hull, right in the metallic frame and narrowly missing the glass by thirty centimeters. The reason for the cold, the reason the station was shutting down, and the reason they were not all already dead.

All the wind was concentrating there, absorbed by the hole and lost into space, hence the wind and hence the cold. The entire station was losing its atmosphere and they would all die unless they did something about it. But for them, the hole was like a black hole absorbing everything and they could not get close enough and fix it without seriously endangering their life.

Especially as the cold around the hole was simply incompatible with life.

"So what are we gonna do?" Sophia asked as they kept observing the phenomenon from a hundred meters away, safe inside their shelter.

"We know the hole isn't that big." Paolo said, "All we need is something big enough and sturdy enough to resist the pressure, like something metal. And then we make a good soldered joint. And that's it: no more cold, no more wind, station is saved."

"You think that's the only damage on the entire station? What about challenging the other groups?" Sophia asked, disbelieving.

"We already established that the layout of the station led us there." Paolo retorted, "Based on your last map update, I personally think this ring only had two entries and one exit. With the two entries equidistant to both this anomaly and the exit. I think we took the wrong direction for the exit. But we found the source of the cold instead. We don't know if the other groups before us chose the other direction, died on their way here, or miraculously survived, got there, and chose to ignore it."

Of course, choosing to go in the direction of the cold would be the unpopular choice. But Sophia and her team always assumed that the cold was the challenge they were supposed to overcome on this ring, and so they had moved with the wind and to the cold instead of against it.

The journey in the opposite direction might have been easier, especially if the cold was lessening in that direction. If anything they were the dumb ones for taking the hardest route. But here they were rewarded with a choice: fixing those damages would could, in time, destroy the entire station or do the egoist thing, ignore it, and hope they could clear the floor before it would come to bite them back.

"So, if choose to ignore it, we might survive and complete that floor alright but potentially condemn those coming after us. That's what we are talking about?" Moana asked. But Sophia knew the girl already made up her mind: she was all for the moral high ground.

"Whether we ignore it or not, this is suicide," Michel commented, almost casually. "While it takes time for the cold to spread, the sixth ring was already affected when we first discovered it. I bet the eighth one is too. We already spent six weeks on this journey. Even if we were to turn back, we might not recognize the places we are going back to."

That was absolutely true. With that hole in its hull, the station was a ticking bomb. It would slowly turn the station into a cold, lifeless husk devoid of atmosphere. And then, it would be game over, for everyone. Just as Sophia feared.

"Okay, but where are we going to find a spare part large enough to cover that hole?" She asked.

"My shield," Lono said, determined. "It would pain me to part from it but it is 100% metal."

"Okay, we are just missing a way to make soldered joints and a way to get close enough to do it." Sophia pointed out.

"If we have copper, the boiling point is at 562°C. Enough for your fire variant of the Prismatic Orb to do the job." Paolo pointed out.

"And I have copper coins I recovered from my dead body on the second floor, thanks to you." Michel finally admitted. "Don't look at me like that. You need ten thousand coppers to make one gold in this system. Hiding a few hundred coppers away did not hurt anyone."

"Paolo could have upgraded his quarterstaff with that copper." Sophia pointed out.

"And now, he will. With whatever is left after we are done with the soldering. Now, aren't you happy that I keep it a secret and we don't have to tear down your friend's weapon to get the job done?" Michel retorted playfully.

"It's okay." Paolo tempered. "By chance, we happen to have everything we need. It's all that matters. Now we just need to concentrate on how we are going to pull this off."

And so they put the issue aside and went back to the drawing board.

★☆★

In the end, they had smelted all but a few copper anyway to make a wire, circling the shield, preparing it to be soldered in place to the wall. In the end, only twenty or so copper coins had been spared and might be used for Paolo later on.

And then, they had gotten to the wall, approaching the hole in the hull laterally, to avoid the brunt of the wind. Though the cold itself was unavoidable. They had spent less than two minutes outside, but frostnip was already all but guaranteed as they had to push through the discomfort and keep going.

And then, it was Lono who made the plunge to hold the shield in place. And just like that, the wind grew instantly weaker. Still there but weaker.

"Hurry up Sophia! I'm going to lose a hand if you don't start soldering."

And so Sophia started weavesinging the Prismatic Orb spell, targeting the shield Lono was holding. And he immediately started screaming but kept his hold firm.

The shield and the air around him had just gone up from close to -40°C to hotter than 800°Celsius. Just enough to melt the copper and slowly do the soldering. But also to leave damage to Lono's already frostbite hands. And yet, she had to use the spell again, and again, until Lono finally confirmed it:

"It's okay. Soldering done. Now, can someone pick me up here? I'm feeling like I'm dying."

The air wasn't really conductive of heat. While 60°C was enough to kill a human in the long term. A human could survive air as hot as 200°C for a few minutes. But 800°C? A few seconds were enough to do minor damage. And the brutal temperature difference? It could have as well as killed him. But Lono was alive. Just living a very bad day.

His hands were burned and already blackened, dead.

"Alright, everyone. Mission accomplished. The wind is gone. The cold should fix itself eventually. Time to help Lono, lick our wound, and wait for a better day!" Sophia shouted.

And so, they went back to the shelter. All within six minutes.

And yet, all of them had paid the price for that achievement.

★☆★

That time around, no one avoided frostnip. Michel and Prince even got second-stage frostbite, which would take months to properly heal.

And Lono...

All the skin of his hands had to be surgically debrided. And Moana was burning the midnight oil to save his brother's hands, going as far as to beg Sophia to use her only spare use of song healing to save her brother. Which Sophia would have done willingly without the begging.

Lono knew the risk and took it anyway. He did the brave thing and already lost his shield to save the station. She would not allow him to lose his hands, or even his life if she could help it. Especially since she was responsible for at least 75% of the damages he had incurred while holding the shield in place.

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Her song of healing... did save his bones, nerves, and muscles. But the damages to the articulations were apparently final. Lono would keep his hands but suffer from a sort of arthritis for the rest of his life, or at least some sort of joint pain that would never leave, which was effectively the same. Unless a healer could help with that whenever they would meet one, which might be too late by then. It was again showing the glaring weakness in their team composition and reinforced Sophia's determination to acquire a healing spell as soon as possible, or plausibly from her patron after the tutorial.

Outside, the wind was well and truly gone. And through some weird phenomenon, the snow had gathered on the ring wall and was starting to form patches of ice. Sophia did not know about the rest, but the last part was definitely a good sign. It meant that the snow was melting and then resolidifying as ice, meaning the temperature was rapidly rising but still below zero on average.

"So, what now?" Paolo asked, nursing his own frostnip, on the left hand.

"I don't know," Sophia admitted. "Fortunately, we came loaded up on food. Prince did get frostbite on his left wing and won't rush us to move for a real long time. And Michel is not complaining but with the state of his right foot, he is not going anywhere for a real long time too. So I guess that settles it. We are going to stay here for weeks and see how things are evolving outside."

And so they did.

★☆★

Every day, the snow was slowly melting and getting instantly replaced by ice. It was really weird to see the ice spread while the temperature was actually rising. But each time Sophia checked, the air by the front door was still very cold, and the marble floor, damn slippery.

Michel, Prince, and Lono were still recovering from their wounds. But else, everyone was fine.

Prince was still grumpy. And now that he was wounded, he demanded to be pampered and to get all the attention he could get, which was rapidly getting on Sophia's nerves. But Moana was happy to play along and outright smother the tressym with attention. So in the end, they were a match made in heaven.

Michel was already growing impatient. But without magical help now that Sophia was dry, he would have to heal the old-fashioned way. Moana was talking about two months of recovery to get him back to peak condition. So he was already champing at the bit.

As for Lono, Sophia's intervention had apparently not only saved both his hands but also sped up his recovery. Though he might never recover 100%, he should be up and okay within three months instead of six.

So 90 days before they even could consider moving again.

Again, it was very fortunate they were loaded up on food. Cause 75% of it was going to be eaten while waiting for everyone to recover.

★☆★

Weeks had passed and Prince was the first to get better, thanks to his magically enhanced constitution, perks of being a magical creature, and a familiar. In some way, the tressym was literally leeching on her magic to get better. But it was part of their updated contract: the magic of one spell a day to do as he pleased with it. Sophia was actually glad the winged cat was actually prioritizing his health.

After all the snow had converted to ice over the course of two weeks, then a second phenomenon had been happening, and the ice had started thining as temperature kept rising.

And then, the air finally rose all the way up to zero degrees, after no less than five weeks, and all the ice had turned liquid, turning this floor into an entirely new kind of hazard. Cause free water in zero gravity was wild. Thanks to the water's viscosity, it naturally tended to form bubbles. But without gravity, water also stopped following the point of least resistance and each bubble was doing its own thing.

So their shelter was regularly splashed by water suddenly experiencing the gravity of their shelter wards, drenching the floor before reforming smaller bubbles at the edge of their wards, which half went back to raining on them, repeating the cycle.

So that hellish ice ring had turned into a water hazard ring. Not sure if other people would thank them for that. As water could be pretty deadly on its own. But still... she kept thinking that compared to the impending doom of the station, a little water trouble wasn't that bad. And personally, she had the right cantrip to deal with it.

The question was: if the floor had already changed that much in five weeks, how would it look when Lono was finally healed?

★☆★

And the answer came after five more weeks in the form of amphibians, swinging and jumping from one bubble to the next. Build like oversized toads with extensible, prehensible tongs and armored like freaking alligators. And to add to their threats, the alien toads were using acid with every attack.

And it coincided with Michel finally getting better, after two weeks of self-imposed rehabilitation to walk normally again.

But for everyone else but Lono, it was first and foremost the tenth week of being grounded. Though at least now, they could plan to add frog legs on the menu if they were too bored... or if one such toad got caught by their local gravitational anomaly. Which did happen a couple of times that week.

But overall, the wards seemed to be working, and aside from water-induced incidents, the wards were holding up just fine and keeping the monstrous amphibians at bay.

Call it an unintentional flaw of the wards, but if Sophia had to choose, she preferred having artificial gravity and dealing with occasional angry falling toads rather than dealing with zero gravity to restore the peace and quiet that the wards were supposed to guarantee. Besides, gravity was also helping with Lono healing somehow so they were not going to give it up anytime soon.

★☆★

And they finally did it. 3 months, 13 weeks, 92 days of self-imposed downtime.

But Lono had finally recovered from his injury and everyone was back at the top of their game. It was finally time to make their way in the right direction this time and leave that forsaken ring behind.

It would only take them 16 days now that the cold was no more.

And even after going through all this. They would still have enough preserved provisions for seven more weeks.

That was the true power of Paolo planning ahead. They had come short of supplies once and decided to become pessimistic enough not to be found needing again. And now, they had the luxury to be picky over whether are not they wanted to give frog legs or not. Cause they had the meat but did not absolutely need it.

That was the sort of food security that most of them had forgotten existed. Aside from the resting area that was always packed with food, everyone had learned that their time being picky eaters was over and that anything that was comestible could end up on the menu, especially the dubious monsters they had to skin and dismantle themselves.

"This is it. We are finally going to leave that forsaken place behind," Sophia said with tears of joy, as they all went out of the shelter, for the first time all together, in months.

"Sorry I have been holding you back," Lono said, apologetic.

"Nonsense," She brushed it off, " We were all in this together, could have been Paolo, could have been me. Besides, we are still losing time now to gain time later. So now, let's clear this floor all together and leave this zero gravity madness."

"How many rings do you think we will have to go through?" Lono asked, determined this time.

"Paolo!" She called, " Your opinion on the number of floors?"

"Based on your map and the observation of the station from the bay windows, there should be twelve rings. Like the number of floors in the tutorial. To be noted that that some of the rings seemed to have a loosen theme, just like the tutorial floors." Paolo answered with his most recent hypothesis.

And yep, some of the rings seemed to have themes, and yet. The three first rings had been all about spiders. And the fifth and sixth floors had shared a common theme with the different vegetation and the presence or absence of spiders as the only true dividing factors.

"Sixth rings done, sixth more to go," Sophia concluded shrugging.

They were well on their way to finally clear the seven ring, but it would still take them 16 days.

And they were now late. After three months, it was impossible that the others had not found their way up. And it was even surprising that they had not encountered a single team going the wrong way.

But so far, they had been well and truly left alone, in their shelter, probably at the opposite side of the exit.

They had not been given any reward for saving the station. And no one would ever know it was them.

But at least, they had left a lasting impact on this ring.

And so started their expedition to the eighth ring.

★☆★

Dealing with the water and its amphibian occupants had been as easy as using the shape water cantrip. She could control up to 3 cubic meters of water or otherwise said 3 tonnes. She could not control the creature within the water but if the creature was simply in the water and she wanted to move the bubble? The creature was moving with it. It was a simple displacement and did not count as aggression.

She could freeze an empty bubble if she so wished. But if there was an enemy within it? That counted as an aggression and the cantrip strongly rebelled against it. And any other creative use of the cantrip that would count as aggression. It was all the same.

But just using the water to get the water and the amphibians peacefully out of the way? The cantrip was okay with it. And so she was using it, almost continuously, gathering all the water on the other wall and keeping it there with a thin wall of ice before repeating the process, rinse and repeat.

Never in her life had Sophia felt so powerful, so magical. And the best part? She could use it in tandem with Paolo and Michel. And this time around her wild magic kept singing instead of rebelling and once every so often, she targeted another bubble of water and let go of its random effect. Sometimes, the bubbles exploded, and sometimes it changed color or froze. Or became electrified. But it still obeyed her command and stayed way away from them so she did not care.

If an unfortunate frog ever got zapped by her electrified bubble, it would not prevent her from sleeping at night.

And so they breezed through this new and improved seventh ring.