As the group moved through the labyrinthian connection of hallways, Axel followed the map and avoided as many rooms as possible. This didn’t mean that entities were not encountered, as the longer the party moved, the more they were discovered. The first was a group of Wind Serpents resting at a junction point that must be crossed. Axel tested his new power and linked a throwing knife with one of the serpents, while Sky created a metal spike with her new powers to kill the pair before they knew what hit them.

Axel used this to see how much energy was drained with the smallest object he had. A throwing knife with a throw used only about one core power, which was great as he had linked and flung the blade from around the corner. However, he found he could only link the gravitational points at the center mass of the target. Axel did discover that he could link the other point to any spot on the knife, revealing interesting limitations to his power.

Sky was a little slow with generating a spike with her power, but this gave Axel a chance to see if he could link a created object to another object, which worked much to his and Sky's surprise. This allowed Axel to avoid wind blasts from the other serpent and nail it with a spike, with Sky helping to add momentum. Aria and Lyra gemmed the cores on the way, and the group did not stop for more than a couple of minutes as no one wanted to linger with the clock ticking on getting out of there.

The next encounter was a roaming Iron Titan ahead of the group, large but not as massive as the one Axel had fought earlier.

“This one is Aria’s,” Aria stated, stomping her foot. “Aria is the best to handle this without anyone getting hurt.”

“This can also be a great controlled test of how my new power works with my Aero,” Aria argued as Axel was about to say something. She stared Axel right in the eye, daring him to fight her on this.

“Fine, but don’t overdo it, please, and ask for help if it looks dangerous,” Axel relented, not having the energy to argue with her.

Axel also couldn't argue with the determined look she was giving him and stepped back with Lyra and Sky, knowing that while Aria was immune to her fire, the rest of the group was not.

Aria held out a hand, and a small pillar of red and yellow-accented flame shot up to the ceiling about fifteen feet up, alerting the Iron Titan to her presence. She began to flap her wings, and the pillar started to feed into a ball that grew hotter and hotter with each beat. The flame's color shifted from blue to white as the heat intensified. Axel guessed that Aria was using Aero, combined with the movement of her wings, to contain and feed the flames.

A dull roar emanated from the now white-hot ball, but it seemed that Aria, with her current skill and strength, couldn't make it any hotter. The heat had increased to the point that Axel, standing a good twenty feet away, felt a sting on his skin. As the Titan closed in, now halfway to Aria, she flung her hand forward with a yell of, "FIREBALL!!!"

The fireball shot across the forty-foot gap in an instant, leaving a streak of white in its wake, and struck the Titan in the chest. The explosion, even from Axel's distance, left a stinging sensation on his skin and made him stagger back several steps from the impact force. As the fireball blast cleared, Axel saw the Titan glowing red with small cracks spreading from its chest. Surprised that the Titan was still standing, though it had staggered back a step or two, Axel then turned his focus to Aria and lost his breath at the sight.

Floating above Aria were two growing white fireballs, each being fed from a flame in her hands. She was not flapping her wings this time, but her leather armor moved as if there was an air current flowing around her. It hit Axel that Aria was recycling the air pressure to feed her flames, likely to decrease the effects on her team and save energy. Each ball filled in seconds with the same white fire as the first. Axel then heard Aria’s clear voice ring out in the hallway.

“Maybe you did not hear Aria the first time,” she said, making a grandiose hand gesture at the Titan. “FIREBALL!!!”

Two streaks of white shot at the Titan this time, and Axel grabbed Lyra and Sky, using his power to anchor against the blast and shield them from the damage. Less than a second later, the two blasts merged into one. The pressure wave stole Axel's breath away, and the loud explosion activated his regeneration to heal his now ruptured eardrums.

When Axel could breathe again, he quickly turned to see if Aria was okay, only to see her in a swirling shield of air that held quickly cooling globs of metal as they began to fade into motes of light. The crimson likely died in that blast. Axel then ran up to Aria to check on her but stopped at the spinning shield of air, unsure of how much power was in it and wary of getting hurt if he tried to breach it.

As Axel stood there, he was jabbed in both ribs, realizing he was still holding Sky and Lyra. There were even drag marks from Sky's large slender legs trying to stop Axel. Axel let both go and apologized to the pair before looking back to Aria as the wind shield dropped to reveal a very tired but grinning young woman. Axel was about to yell at her but received a tackle hug and laugh from his mate.

“Sigh, what was that about not overdoing…” Axel started to say as his lips were sealed in a kiss by Aria.

The kiss lasted a while, and if Axel was not short of breath before, he was now. An unknown amount of time later, Aria released the kiss, and Axel could swear he saw stars twinkling in her eyes.

“That was so amazing," Aria said, equally short on breath. “That was so worth sixty percent of my core power.”

“Aria…” Lyra said from the side and grabbed her by the ear, pulling her over. “You used sixty percent of your core, made a lot of noise, and scared me greatly. What the crimson?”

“It was awesome though, right?” Aria asked instead of answering Lyra’s question. “I even thought of those cool lines on the spot!”

Lyra, with a scream of frustration, started to shake the aurelian by the shoulder and said, “THAT IS NOT THE POINT!”

‘We should get moving,’ Sky sent to everyone, trying to calm the situation.

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“I agree with Sky. Let's keep moving, and Aria, be careful, okay?” Axel said while breaking up Lyra and Aria before they were sidetracked more.

As they headed down the hallway, Axel saw that the white stone was scarred and marked but relatively undamaged. He could also see it was healing at a speed his eyes could track. The orb was not found as they traveled, and while a gravity gem would be nice, there just was not the time to stop. If he judged the distance traveled and what they needed to travel yet, even without delays, there would only be about twenty minutes left on the clock, and he had the feeling there would be more fights on the way.

Thankfully, the explosion either drew the crimson away through other routes or scared them away. Axel didn’t know enough to guess but was thankful all the same. As Axel’s team was within two junctions of the exit, Axel halted the group for a short rest and planning session. He also opened the Journal and saw:

Quest:

* Leave Trial before the shift starts. Countdown 23:40

“Alright, we are about two minutes away from the elevator and another hard fight,” Axel began. “Anyone else thought of other ideas before we get there?”

“Aria could fir…” Aria started when Lyra knocked her upside the head. “No, it will give you away, and we don’t know if they have a long-range power to attack you. You are a big bright target while you prepare it.”

“Oww,” Aria complained while rubbing the back of her head.

‘I could, as we move, generate a large metal shield slab to shoot down the tunnel ahead of me and Axel while Aria and Lyra use the gems,’ Sky added with a mental voice that shared the worry she was feeling.

“Ok, I can help by trying to link it, but the person may fly to it more than it to them,” Axel replied.

‘Just be ready for anyone with movement power to use what we plan to do to them as this will take a lot of power from me,’ came Sky’s happy mental voice.

“Alright, Aria and Lyra, try to take your targets out in one strike to reduce risk,” Axel finished as he got up and began to move.

“Ummm…has anyone thought that they may be innocents waiting on an exfil elevator after a shift?” Lyra asked. “We could be just attacking people who are just trying to get out.”

“Didn’t the Goddess say that they would be baddies?” Aria asked in turn while looking confused at Lyra.

“I am just saying we are doing a pre-emptive strike on strangers without knowing if they are enemies,” Lyra looked away from everyone and hugged herself a bit. “I don’t want to kill people if it is not needed.”

“I understand, Lyra, but if they are trying to avoid a shift, they should have taken the elevator up and sent it back down after returning,” Axel tried to reason. “If there is a group camping our way out, they are likely not friendly, and we are still weak compared to most groups.”

“I know, but this just doesn't feel right,” Lyra refused to look at Axel as she replied. “I can deal with things happening in a head-on fight, but jumping them feels so wrong.”

“Well, do you have a better idea?” Axel asked and waited as the timer ticked down. He would give her what little time he could, but the sands in the hourglass were running out quickly.

“No,” came the only reply Lyra seemed to be able to come up with but could still not look at Axel.

‘No, sadly,’ Sky was next with a mental tone laced with sadness.

“Aria hates it too, Lyra, but living the lives we want means conflicting goals,” Aria took Lyra gently by the chin with her hand. “They likely want money to get stronger and climb higher, while we want to survive and get stronger to complete our goals.”

“If your goals are not that strong, Axel can take your place, and you can guard Sky on the frontal attack,” Aria kept up with a gentle voice and her eyes holding a softness. “But we don’t have any more time to hesitate, or we will be fighting for our lives for the next twelve hours, as during a shift, there are no safe zones in the Trial.”

“Axel, I just can't do a sneak attack like that … I am sorry,” Lyra said while still not looking Aria in the eye. Aria just hugged Lyra and wrapped her wings around her while whispering something Axel could not hear into Lyra’s ear.

Axel received the Shade gem and changed his place in the attack. With no more time, Axel led the group as Sky built a shield as they moved. It thickened and grew quickly, but Axel could see Sky start to struggle as they entered the home stretch to see a group of five waiting for them with weapons out. The group held two humans, two aurelians, and a thalaxian.

The first human was a male who held a shield and axe while his body glowed a dull grey from some kind of body enhancement. The other human was a female who held a spear and moved from foot to foot as if she needed to keep moving. Of the aurelians, a female one wielded a bow, and Axel could see swirling air blades circling her position. The other aurelian was covered in steel armor that made it hard to see if they were male or female, but they held a heavy sword that Axel bet needed a strength cycle to use.

The thalaxian was the odd one out, and Axel could see it was standing off to the side of the others. The most worrying thing, though, was that the ground around it was red hot. After taking this in at a glance, Axel picked his target and looked at Aria to see that she had chosen hers. The group was not in a mental link as Sky did not have the power to have one up and move the shield at the same time.

Then the attacks launched from the other group, making Axel and Aria duck behind the metal slab and pull out their gems. Traveling with the shade gem was strange as the world became inky in color, and it almost felt like the warmth of his body was draining out of him, but then it was over, and he was behind the archer who was throwing wind blades and trying to curve arrows around Sky's shield.

Axel could see that the thalaxian was unleashing a stream of flame at it, trying to heat it up. Axel read that when metal was heated or chilled to a certain temperature, it caused metal controllers to have issues moving that metal. The shield and axe user was preparing to take the attack head-on with his weapon giving off a shimmer much like a shatter. Axel did not see the spear user anywhere and thought that they might have shifted locations like him and Aria.

Axel stepped out of the shadow and, using point to point locked the archer's feet in place, then swung his halberd in a two-handed swing. The woman reflexively tried to launch herself in the air, a habit Axel noticed was common in her race, but she was locked to the spot. This was her doom as the attack slammed into her chest, seeming to slow on some armor behind her clothing, but the halberd head dug deep and collapsed the front of her chest in. With a tug to free his weapon, Axel found that holding her through his swing drained a large part of his power pool.

Axel looked for his next opponent and saw Aria cleanly disabling the heavy sword user with a combo of knife stabs that started at the back of the knee, followed by ducking, then disabling a wing, then the right arm at the elbow, and finishing with her left dagger up and under the helmet. Aria was forced to release both daggers and roll out of the way as a wave of flames filled her previous position. At this moment, Axel heard a crack of thunder from behind the shield as the axe user slammed his weapon while trying to block with his shield, shattering Sky’s metal block.

The axe user did not receive the best end of that as many pieces of molten metal flew everywhere around him and everyone in his area, which sadly meant Aria, Axel, and the thalaxian all had to deal with it. Aria erected another air barrier that diverted the pieces, the thalaxian did something with heated air and thick fire, but Axel just hit the floor to make himself a smaller target. This helped as Axel was only hit by a couple of chunks that, while hurting some, until the healing kicked in a moment later reviving those nerves, which caused more pain. The metal faded from existence as it was a conjured material.

As Axel returned to his feet and took a look around, he could see that while his group had taken out two of theirs, this fight was not over. Aria faced off against the thalaxian, Sky was helping Lyra with the spear user, and Axel was looking at a large man who looked to be shaking off remnants of molten metal. This was likely to be a rough fight ahead. Gripping his halberd tightly and feeling the pain already fading, Axel charged at what would be his foe.