Floor seven was just annoying and not worth mentioning.
On eight we had to participate in a hunting competition against a wolf pack; the logic on that confused me.
I mean it was the actual challenge for the floor. There was no editing by the Monarch, that was just it. The other climbers must have found this floor to be extremely weird too.
But after winning, I think Mezu made friends with the head of the pack, Alcoroth made me go do my quest immediately after we won, so I’m not too sure what happened or which wolf he made friends with specifically.
On floor ten, I learned that Phoenixes do in fact exist, but they are much larger than I expected, and once again Mezu made friends with her.
I started to wonder if I should have any interest in these overly powered beings making friends with this little thing. I mean, this little thing did play fight with a giant snake that probably would’ve taken me a few hours to fight against.
Then again, I still don’t have an interest in my own parentage, so why should I care about someone else’s business?
Floor twelve was even more annoying than six. Again, we were on a mountain. This time we were supposed to find this jewel of the north or whatever. It was in a cave somewhere on the mountain (at least that’s what the banner said). Apparently, the way to find it was to just to get lost in the blizzard, give up, and then a path would open up.
Even though I was lost for almost a day, (Mezu wanted to try to look and wouldn’t sit down so we wandered for an extra day) I had to do my daily quest twice in a blizzard. At least the reward from the eleventh floor was a warmer coat.
Floor thirteen was somehow worse. After getting lost in a blizzard we got lost in a labyrinth.
Alcoroth found this funnier for some reason. But after at least seven daily quest completions, he started to get annoyed as well and tried to help. I’m a bit surprised it took him seven repetitions to be annoyed, with how pushy he was about climbing quicker I thought he’d get annoyed at my continuous state of being lost sooner.
I did get some more combat experience, which was nice, but as they kept respawning each day it got a bit repetitive. What’s the point of fighting all the time if you can start to predict their movements without thinking?
The way we ended up beating it was that Alcoroth covered my eyes, and after I felt this odd wave run through me, which I have to assume was some sort of mana pulse. I opened them to see a wolf (I’m assuming it was one that Mezu made friends with on floor eight) and the faded messy writings from a mana circle below it
I watched as it very casually led us all the way to the end of the labyrinth. It still left me to deal with any monsters which was fine, but still if it was walking ahead of us, it really could’ve just done the work for me.
This was a little bit annoying. If my class was now summoner, what was the point if I couldn’t do the summoning? But Alcoroth reminded me that the only reason my class changed was so that I could have a contract with Mezu and to trick the system, not so I could actually become a summoner.
The 15th floor...
On the 15th floor, I was alone.
That fluffy little brat was nowhere to be seen. The scenery that was around me though, was all too familiar.
That oddly greyish and clouded sky.
The bare nearly dead trees.
The cracked and barren blood-stained earth.
The complete lack of any sounds except for the wind and the shouts from the people fighting around me.
My body was frozen and unmoving as my limbs slowly bled out.
Well, the limbs that I thought were slowly bleeding out. But even though I now knew that I wasn't dying, I couldn't change anything.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Countless repetitions.
No foreseeable way to count it.
No foreseeable way to stop it.
No foreseeable way for me to change it.
But at some point, just like how it ended the first time, I woke up expecting to see the same sky yet again, the scenery had changed.
A clear blue sky with tall pine trees now swayed above me. I sat up expecting to see Alcoroth and Mezu.
But instead, it was my uncle's back.
I was smaller, smaller than I was in even my earliest memories.
Why was something I couldn't even remember playing out in front of me?
I had just watched something I still had dreams about happen over and over and over again for who knows how long, but now it's changed to something I can't even recognize.
My uncle turns and holds his hand out to me.
"Imuril" his voice calls out, but it's faded and distant.
His mouth moves but I can barely hear his voice this time.
Instead over it, I hear a familiar voice, familiar, and yet I really didn't know who's it was.
"Quartz! It's time! Wake up!"
I blinked and above me was a wooden roof. I sat up once again, this time Alcoroth was nearby.
I was under a pavilion, surrounded by a forest that looked like thick firm grass. The tall green grass-like structures were thin and closely knit. On three sides there was a path through the grass tree things, and I couldn’t see where they lead to.
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
On the remaining side, it was a short wide path to a much larger old shrine. At that shrine sat a large, black fox with nine fiery orange tipped tails and a grey underbelly.
Mezu was playing with its tail as he sat on its head.
"Idiot, that took you way too long."
It wasn't the voice I heard in that place. I really wouldn’t get to hear that voice again. I could barely recognize it, but it hurt to think that I couldn’t hear it again.
Fuck my useless brain.
"The young master's challenge is completed, but you didn't get up right away. Why didn't you find your way out of the maze sooner? You're not that stupid when it comes to p-"
"Shut up"
I stood up and left the pavilion going down one of the paths.
I thought I had run out of confusing tears and yet they started to call down my face the further I got away.
The path ended at a small pond with a slightly more normal looking tree. With there not being any other paths, I took a seat down in the shade.
I stared into the green tree things as they rippled in the wind. My vision blurred and I tried clearing it. But I had to keep doing it. Why couldn't it just stop?
Why couldn't I control this one thing?
"Imuril, my apologies."
It was a deep melodic ambiguous voice that rang in my head.
I wiped my eyes yet again and looked around to see a small fox, with nine tails and a similar coloring to the one Mezu was playing with.
"My floor is meant to put people within their memories, and until they find the inaccuracy, they are unable to escape it."
I looked at the fox, its ear flicked before it stood and walked closer to me. Since it seemed to be speaking in my head, I didn't understand that choice.
"Your brain itself is oddly fractured, your memories seem to already not be written properly. Therefore, my powers took the only correctly written memory, and played that one. There's no point in my test placing someone in a situation that paralyzing. I had to force you out of it."
"What? Did you just fabricate a memory, and when I found an issue with it I came out?"
"No, why do you say that?"
I looked at him briefly taking in the ornament I now saw on its head. This beast seemed much older and more intelligent than the others we had met so far.
I don’t know if that was a good thing. I certainly didn’t want to talk about this with Alcoroth, nor have him hear about it any time soon. But someone I probably wouldn’t see for another twenty floors or so, wouldn’t be a bad person to vent to. Especially since it was due to his powers that I had discovered this new memory.
“It switched… from the bad stuff I mean. It switched from that to something that I don’t even think I remember.”
“Why don’t you think you remember it?”
“I think my memories are all kind of messed up. And the size I was in that memory I just experienced isn’t a size I remember being. I mean I can’t-”
“I know what you meant. The trial can only take memories that are stored within your own brain and then manipulate a part of it. So, it is a true memory of yours. It probably has a great significance to you, otherwise it would not have gotten picked.”
“Why can’t I remember it now?”
“My powers are limited, if we were on a different floor, I could help you more. The more curious thing is that your memories switched on its own.”
“How is that more interesting than the fact that it brought up a memory I don’t even remember?”
“The challenge for this floor is limited to one memory per person. It wouldn’t switch up unless there was some other magic interfering.”
There was no notification that seemed like the monarch had interfered, so I didn’t think it had to do with me being with Mezu. That was the only magic I could think of that would interfere with me. I couldn’t use magic, and I don’t think my uncle was proficient in it either. Then what could it be?
“When it switched, did I get out because I didn’t remember it, so everything about it was wrong from my perspective?”
“No, sadly you probably would have been stuck in that memory for a long time. The reason you woke up is because I stopped your attempt. There was something within your own memories that affected the challenge. I am frustrated by the fact that I am unaware of what could have affected it. And on this floor my powers are limited so I can’t take you into your memories and see what happened.”
“What do you mean take me into my memories?”
The fox looked to his left and I followed his eye line to see a path in the forest open up.
“Follow me and I shall show you on one of the other challengers.”
I stood up and followed him on a walk through the forest. The end of the path opened up onto a large clearing with a pavilion and about twenty people sleeping within it.
We walked among the rows of people, each with varying expressions on their faces, that I could only guess were some level of frustration, constipation or happiness. He stopped at one that was furthest from the others and put a tail on their head and one on mine.
My eyes closed without my brain telling them to and I opened them and was in a library--like room. The floors were a soft grass--like texture and the ceiling was a starry night sky. There were lanterns on every couple of shelves.
“This is the memory library of the challenger you just saw. Depending on the person this appears different visually. For this elf, it is a forest library. Because the elf is a decent age the library itself is vast. As you are one as well, yours will probably be similar in size.”
“I thought you said you couldn’t get into mine on this floor.”
“As this person is still doing the challenge, my powers have a greater range of effect on them…. I am unable to put you back into the challenge, and if I did, I wouldn’t be able to take you onto this plane of your subconscious. Since you are with me in my domain of the floor, we are able to do this.”
Why did he pause during his explanation? There must have been some information he wasn’t allowed to share with me, if either by his own floor restriction or that of the monarch’s. This was annoying.
“Follow me.”
He took me to a seating area of the library and on a circular table there was one book that was being flipped through by a red glowing hand.
“What you see in front of you is the current memory being read by my magic. The selection process is random but there are sections of everyone’s internal library that are more guarded than others. Those with high control over their mana have even stronger barriers guarding their more damaging memories.”
He pointed to a staircase with a gold chain across the base of the steps. I followed it up with my eyes and saw that each of the books on the shelves at the top were chained to the bookshelf itself.
“Good memories are not so guarded as bad ones are. The memory is chosen at random and the pool of memories that can be chosen from is limited by what is blocked off and what isn't. Whether or not you remember it is not a requirement. This elf has been here a while because, like you, it is a memory from their childhood, and as that was a while ago it is taking them some time to work through the problem.”
“If the goal is to find out what’s wrong with it, then wasn’t this test set up to fail people?”
The fox looked at me, squinting his eyes, “I was told you weren’t very inquisitive. How about we stick to your problem?”
Alcoroth, you piece of shit.
“Fine. So, what do you think happened in my case? Why was my memory that should’ve been guarded not, and why was a memory that was so far back switch places with it?”
“I took you into this elf to show you what an ordered memory library of your own species would look like. You are not as old as this one, so it should be slightly smaller, which means depending on which memories are guarded and which aren't, will either make your pool smaller or about the same size as this person’s. Considering a memory as severe as the one you were experiencing wasn’t guarded at all, it seems to reason that none of your memories are guarded. But because your ability to remember things is so limited, there might be an issue with your library in the first place.”
My eyes closed and I opened them again and we were back in the pavilion.
He walked away back to the path he created, and I followed him back to the pond I was at earlier. The path closed itself behind us.
“Why did you show me that then?”
“So that you understand why I’m so confused and interested in looking into your library. Though with your lack of curiosity I wonder if my offer would be of any interest to you.”
“Offer?”
“Once you reach floor thirty, if I am summoned, I will have the capacity to enter your memory library with you and sort out this issue.”
He was right. Despite my lack of curiosity in so many other things, why was I actually curious this time? I couldn’t explain it, but I wanted to know what was so wrong with my library that the one memory I don’t want to relive was the one that was picked, and then it switched to one I don’t even remember in the slightest.
“I’ll consider it.”
“Then I will inform Alcoroth, that way if you forget my offer, he can remind you.”
I chuckled at that. It was a high possibility I would forget that entirely. And with Alcoroth being so curious himself, he’d probably be sure to bring it up whenever we did get to floor thirty.
“Alright. Let’s return then.”
In the end, no matter what happens fifteen would probably be the worst floor I’ve been on.