If Po Daiyu was a spinning buzzsaw, and her brother Po Kahn was a bomb, then their father was a volcano. One that spewed red hot blades of death. Even without the aid of a soul stone, he had clawed and struggled his way to the very pinnacle of the Guan family, not content to let his brother steal all the light just because he was born first.

Like a pair of warring trees, both had grown taller than their peers, desperate to claim the nourishing light that was power. Po Dia always acted like he never cared, always said that they were equals. Pretending to be his brother, and not his king. That was in the past now. There was no going back, he thought, even as his heavy punches slammed into the door. Even as he sent shockwaves through the Guan family, its vault and the surrounding lands.

He didn’t stop himself, though he could have called it all off at any point. Until he stepped over the line, his brother would not move against him. Not because he couldn’t, but because he felt it was beneath him. That Po Shang was beneath his notice.

No longer. There were secrets within the Guan vault beyond just the labyrinth. The fact that the little rat who had taken his mother’s soul stone was hiding inside with Fa Lian was just a bonus. It had been a misstep to trust Po Daiyu with anything, though he didn’t hold the full weight of failure against his daughter. None had expected Ah Dan, a miserable little street thing, to soar into power like he was owed it.

The attempt to rid himself of two headaches at once had turned both of them into migraines.

The door fell away under his onslaught. Now maybe his brother would stir from his seat. Likely not though, Po Shang knew. As he stepped into the vault, he knew without a shadow of a doubt that none would be able to challenge him once he found what he was looking for.

If he found the vermin Ah Dan or his darling niece, he would just consider that his own good fortune once again.

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The vault of the Guan family was shattering. To the naked eye, it looked as though the floor was simply falling away, disappearing and dissolving into nothingness. To Dan’s senses, it was like the room was constricting. They needed to move now, the weight of the enchantments being broken was going to crush all of them.

He couldn’t wait for Guan Fa Lian any more, but he tried one last thing. With a swell of his mana, the first time since he has reached star stage, Dan pressed power into his legs and launched off the now empty display case that had once held the hinder ring. With as loud a yell as he could manage, he called for Fa Lian a final time.

Fruitless in his waiting, Dan began to trace back towards where he thought the vault door was, shouting out for his allies all the while. His eyes tried to see what the items he passed were called, and what they did. It was almost impossible to not focus on them and slow down, but Dan managed to keep his feet moving.

A pair of wristguards seemed to drip blood-like mana, a staff stood straight with roots growing into the wooden floor, a mechanical bird fluttered in a paper cage. Oddities, treasures and heirlooms disappeared as Dan sprinted. Chancing a look behind him to confirm what his mana was telling him, Dan saw an encroaching void. The far side of the room seemed to be shattered, the wood, the lighting fixtures, everything falling apart like a broken mirror.

“You better be at the door.” Dan growled at Guan Fa Lian through his mana. His words would appear from wherever Dan’s ambient mana waited. Even though he couldn’t perceive through his mana right now in the strange illusory vault, he could still use it. Dan leapt from another display cabinet, easily arcing over fifteen feet in the air.

He saw it, finally. The room had shivered under the earlier impacts and, when the shattering had occurred and the destruction had truly begun, had stretched itself as far as it could. The vault itself, it seemed, was trying to survive as long as possible. Dan again found himself marvelling at the way the Guan family vault had been crafted, a magic within it so potent as to self-preserve.

“Hyun! Xiaomei!” Dan got their attention as he rounded the final pieces of treasure and approached the door to the labyrinth. “Looks like you’ve nearly got it?”

It did not look like that, but Dan was hoping that he was seeing the situation wrong. There was some ribbon wrapped around one of the handles, with an increasingly large spool of it flowing from Xiaomei’s sleeve. Sweat was beading on her brow as she concentrated on turning her rigid mana into physical ribbon. Having experienced her mana himself, Dan knew that this was a taxing endeavour.

“Nearly there, was waiting for you.” Hyun Soon answered. Xiaomei couldn’t, her teeth gnashing together against the discomfort in her core. Hyun stood after speaking. He was holding the other end of Xiaomei’s spool, wrapping it around his elbow and shoulder like a climbing rope.

“What’s the plan? Have you seen Fa Lian?” Dan had to raise his voice. Distant crashes, exhibits and displays falling and shattering, were increasing in regularity and becoming quite a din.

In answer to his questions, Hyun simply shook his head. “Don’t worry,” Hyun said as though that was possible, “the door will be fine, promise. Fa Lian is too scary to die to a room, she’ll be here.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Dan wasn’t sure how Hyun Soon could be so confident. He was also terrible with not being the one solving a problem, so he paced at a reasonable distance without making a fuss. Trusting his friends wasn’t the problem, but the vault was falling into a mana void that Dan had no concept of. Whatever was happening to his mana in the furthest parts of the room was unclear. It didn’t feel like it was being destroyed by other mana, it was just… going away.

Trying not to focus on that, but unable to pull himself from his mana sense entirely, Dan looked for Fa Lian as best he could. Now that the vault was no longer changing its dimensions on whatever whim it liked, the motion sickness he had felt was less present. Looking into it was still like staring face first into an explosion of light, the potent magic items acting as a blinding flash each time his mana touched one.

He knew what he was looking for, though. Feeling the dark spot of energy within himself, and remembering the feeling of her own dark mana, Dan focused on the familiarity of her. Where are you? It was likely that the room had shunted her somewhere else, a quirk of its uncertain architecture and the way the vault had reacted when faced with destruction. She could be miles away, Dan knew.

Unsure of what else to do, and unable to find the marker of Fa Lian’s magic, Dan tried something new. Within his mana channels was an unused portion of Xiaomei’s mana. He had merged it with his own to defend from the weight of the soul stone but now it was a floating ribbon amongst the waves of his own energy.

Grasping the blue ribbon of energy within his mana, and within his mind, Dan imagined it being held in one place. For no reason in particular, he pictured that the ribbon was held in place in his right shoulder. With an imaginary pair of hands, Dan kept one end of the ribbon stationary. With the other, he began to pull the ribbon. It stretched through Dan’s mana easily, as though this was exactly what the mana wanted to do.

With a deep breath that brimmed him with pride, Dan felt all of his ambient, scattered mana in the vault gather itself into lines. Instantly the map of the vault became much clearer. Dan’s mana was now tight, straight and rigid. It was not so easily scattered away and through it, he could finally make sense of the chaotic room and its desperate desire to be confusing.

There she was. An arrow of opalescent black, she was racing the wrong way. Dan wasn’t sure how this would work, but he was sure it would get her attention. “FA LIAN!”

With all the force he could muster, he bellowed her name from his mana. He felt the words erupt from everywhere that his mana was touching, and it was a good job that Xiaomei had already fallen to her knees and finished creating the rope. She glared at Dan for making her jump, but he was focused on making sure he got to the door.

“Go right, run straight, then another right. Left at the black armour with the skull helmet and then straight again. Keep running. You’ll see us.”

Dan released the concentrated mana, letting the imagined ribbon fall free and return to his mana channels. Dan could still feel Xiaomei’s mana within. At this point, he reasoned that it was just his mana now. It was something to experiment with in the future but for now… without knowing it, Dan had become something he never truly thought he could be. A powerful, unique and valuable practitioner. The emotion of the realisation was strong, surprising Dan. No tears formed, only a large smile.

“Alright Smiley,” Hyun Soon had a smirk on his face that made Dan wary, “Fa Lian is coming? Let’s get this door open before she gets here to really annoy her.” Glad that Hyun Soon was so confident, Dan asked what he needed to do. “For right now, you hold this and stand over here.”

As Hyun Soon passed the ribbon to Dan, making sure he had enough that he wouldn’t lose grip, Dan saw something on his hands. Hyun caught Dan’s eyeline and his smirk turned into a guilty faced shrug. “Sorry I didn’t tell you, but we were going to need stuff anyway.”

“Do you even know what they do?” Dan’s ability to analyse magical items activated as he looked at the metal in and around Hyun Soon’s hand. They were apparently named “Rise” and “Ruin” respectively, Rise on Hyun’s left hand, Ruin on his right.

“Actually, I think I do,” Hyun answered, “after I put them on, my mana started wanting to move in a certain way. I think they’re exactly what we need. You ready, brother?”

Dan got excited despite the chaos and destruction of the room around him, despite the fact that Fa Lian still hadn’t made it to the door. “Okay, show me what you can do.” Dan didn’t bother looking at the final explanation of Rise and Ruin, content to trust his friend. He stood where Hyun told him to, and planted himself as solidly as he could. Dan had a fierce grip on the ribbon, he pressed one foot against a nearby stone (apparently sleeping near this strange yellow obelisk gave incredible dreams, something Dan found interesting) and his other against a solid display case.

He was at an almost exact right angle to the door. Dan could see how it would work, pulling from this direction would open the door, but there was absolutely no way he alone could get the leverage or power to first open it.

That was where Hyun Soon came in, apparently. Dan saw as, closer to the door, he too planted his feet. Hyun clenched a fist, bringing it down from above before swinging as hard as he could into the floor. In an instant, a spike of rock, around five feet wide, erupted impossibly from the wooden floor. Dan knew there wasn’t even rock beneath the floor, so it made the sight doubly confusing.

No time to wonder about the magic when his arms and legs were about to rip apart. Dan had to let part of the ribbon slide, a seriously painful burn forming from the friction as it seared away the skin below his thumb knuckle. Teeth gritted, mana coursing and all of his newfound strength and pride on the line, Dan held firm with a roar. He flared every fragment of mana, every chunk of energy within himself, Dan burned with a flaming intensity. Just as it felt like too much, the solid body of Hyun Soon appeared next to Dan and grabbed on.

The rock was still rising, and if they could stay in the same position, it would act as a lever against the door and open it. All the pair had to do was stay still. Xiaomei, for her part, needed to focus on the ribbon itself and make sure that her mana didn’t slip for a moment. The ribbon needed to be indestructible, and she was making it so.

“Dan!” Hyun Soon roared. That was all he said, but he formed his orange gauntlets and Dan understood his meaning. Dan bumped Hyun Soon slightly, and both of their mana jumped between the connections. Dan’s own gauntlets, a slightly more red version of Hyun Soon’s, began to form and the weight seemed less severe.

Between the two of them, pulling with all the might that they had, and tapping into previously unknown reserves of power, the rock formed by Hyun’s magically enhanced punch, it was enough. The door started to move. At first an inch. Then another. Then another and another, before with a slip, the resistance lessened. The stone doors formed a vacuum together and it had just popped.

The labyrinth was open.

Even as he flagged, Dan again pressed his mana into Hyun Soon. This time it was not to receive any, but to heal the other boy. Hyun Soon’s muscles were ripping just as Dan’s were, but healing that damage as it happened meant that Hyun Soon was as strong as he had ever been. A final great heave from the two boys and the door fell open into a resting position.

Dan could instantly feel why such a massive test was required. Evil, potent, ancient mana seeped out of the labyrinth’s door the moment it opened. Was it even possible that staying and fighting Po Shang himself would be less deadly?

A question they would soon find answered, it seemed.

Guan Fa Lian’s battered body was flung from behind Dan. She soared and collided with the rock raised by Hyun Soon. “Look out!” Dan heard Hyun’s voice but he was too tired and drained to react. Whatever hit Dan, it hit him hard and it hit him fast. He had no time to react or defend. As he, too, flew through the air, Dan lost consciousness.

The last thing he saw before he faded was a terrified and injured Fa Lian. As he tried to reach for her, everything went black.