Wolf

Time passes as I jog my way through the maze, occasionally leaping over traps, sometimes breaking through them, and more often than not, freezing them solid. But it almost feels like no matter how long I travel through the maze, I’m never going to find the end. Which just makes me hate mazes all the more.

They really are just overused in this dungeon.

Fortunately, at the very least, I manage to avoid all of the minotaurs. Simply through using the sounds of the place to track their locations.

Also, to my surprise, almost half of the contestants in this fifth have already been killed by those minotaurs. And not a single person has made it to an exit. At least, judging by the number of people I still hear and the number I see of the surviving contestants in the maze.

Of course, this is of the people in the same maze as me. Not every single person in the quinzel.

Which is honestly starting to make me question the existence of the exits. Or exit.

Come to think of it, how many exits are there? Just one? Many?

The System didn’t specify.

I begin to slow down in my march through the maze before coming to a stop with a frown on my face.

Something’s wrong here. I just know it.

But what?

I spend a couple minutes trying to figure that out before starting to move off in a different direction when I hear a minotaur beginning to head my way. But I keep trying to figure out what’s going on as I walk.

At this point I’ve made it practically in a large circle around the entire maze. So if there’s an exit, it’s not on the edge of the maze. And I’ve made my way through a good half of the inner portions as well.

Still no exits.

Then there’s the fact that no one else has found an exit yet.

Makes me think there’s something that has to be done before an exit will show up.

I continue walking for a bit before starting to run when I notice a minotaur chasing straight in my direction. As if it’d locked onto me and is running after me somehow.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Great. Just what I needed.

I run through the maze for a while, not finding any hints of an exit.

Then something clicks in my head.

I can’t hear an exit.

Until now, I assumed that just meant the System made it so you can’t cheat to hear the exit or something.

But what if that means the exit is just sealed right now or something? Not that I can’t hear one, but it’s not open.

And I’ve been scouring the walls for any traps and the like while running, so I would’ve seen a button while doing that. Meaning it can’t be something along those lines.

My eyes narrow as a possibly comes to mind.

What if…

I grit my teeth at the possibility before deciding to just go with it and stop running. Then I turn around and begin running in the direction of the chasing minotaur.

Right. I’m pretty sure I won’t be able to kill this fella, but I should at least be able to escape from it without too much trouble. And it doesn’t look like it’s planning on leaving me alone anyways.

Time to see if this theory has any merit to it.

I keep running until I get close to the creature, at which point I take a whole second to just awe at how massive the thing is. Standing at an entire ten meters tall with the head of a bull, a humanoid body covered in fur, and hooves like a cows on its feet, the minotaur roars its way while charging down the hall towards me. With an axe in hand, of course.

Big fella.

I move up towards the wall before just stopping and waving at the minotaur. Then, the moment it begins to swing the axe at me after pulling its arm back, I turn into lunar ice element and flash towards the other side of the hall, leading the minotaur to smash his axe into the wall itself.

Bringing the damned wall down to the ground and revealing the corridor of the maze behind it.

Yep. Thought so.

This game is a damned trick. The point of it isn’t to run away from the minotaurs. It’s to bait them into making a fucking exit for you.

So I begin a rather big and rather dangerous game of chase. Without telling Sapphire about this. Because I don’t want her trying to bait a minotaur as well.

The thing would split me in half with one strike if it hit while I wasn’t elementally shifted. Much less her.

And having her here to help me wouldn’t really make much of a difference anyways.

We’re not trying to kill it after all.

I navigate my way through the maze with the minotaur hot on my tail, ignoring some of the other contestants who end up dying by said minotaur along the way. All while occasionally having it make me a shorter path through a wall.

If my theory is correct, it probably doesn’t matter which outer wall you break through. So long as you have a minotaur break through it for you.

They’re all outer walls of the maze.

So I just continue making a beeline straight for the edge of the maze.

And when I arrive at the outer wall? I lead the minotaur into breaking it, making a bright white light shine from the other end.

A light I immediately dive right on into, making me once again reappear in a large arena next to Sapphire as cheers rain down on us from the artificial audience of the quinzel. Meanwhile the commentator shouts his voice hoarse at the events he just witnessed.

But I just let out a relieved sigh, glad that my hunch was correct.

Because if it wasn’t, then I just tore a large path through the maze for no reason and wasted a bunch of time that could’ve been used for searching.

I absentmindedly wave towards the audience before glancing at Sapphire, who is currently pouting. Likely due to not being the one to find the exit.

A sight that just has me chuckling.

Anyways, time for the final fifth of the first quinzel.