Chapter 55 – Labyrinth
"So, Noah. What is it that you want me to teach you?" Asked Paula while they walked through the first level of Labyrinth.
"How to train a magic sense." Answered Noah while turning his head around. He walked slightly behind Paula, with her teammates walking in a half circle behind them. This very much reminded him of being convoyed. He stood in the center while the warden walked in front and the guardians at the sides and behind him were to prevent his escape. This was a silly thought, but taking into consideration this woman's character, he actually could not laugh this thought off
"Magic sense? That's quite a request." Said Paula without even turning to look at him. "May I ask why that?"
"I…have a unique skill." Said Noah gaining himself a few gazes from the sides.
"I see. But you can't control it well, right?" Said Paula.
"Yeah. I feel like I am lacking in enough control over my inner mana circulation so it is very tasking to use it."
"This is very common for mages. Many people with a system inclining toward magic face that problem at some point. If you studied at school you would be very well aware of that problem. However many people living in this country have just basic education. Some can't even read well. How can they know what to do with this problem, right?"
"Mmm." Said Noah without answering much.
Paula just walked ahead talking further as if she wasn't having a dialog with him but just talked to herself.
"Nobles always considered that commoners aren't worth being educated. Education is prerogative of the elite. Because of their sense of superiority they even started to hide knowledge from each other. This brought stagnation of humanity's growth and held down its development. To be a good mage you need to study but to study you have to be a noble. With this they held their status and power."
"But commoners disagreed with this. They all decided to unite their knowledge and created Guilds. Sharing knowledge and experience between each other we became a force to be reckoned with. Soon the knowledge that the guild possessed was far more than the nobles ever knew. But what's more important is, these commoners became the main force to open up new living space for humans. What well studied nobles could barely achieve, a bunch of commoners that studied on their own behind nobles backs, achieved far easier and faster. The knowledge that nobles hid so well to feel superior now is a bunch of crap worth only to wipe ass."
Noah walked behind her silently without commenting.
"It is a commoner who first created Labyrinth, you know? Made first alliance with spiritual creatures. Nobles always looked down on them and considered them lower beings. Considered them pets for their gardens. But it was the commoner that found a way to cooperate with them. Finally making humanity walk proudly on this earth instead of hiding and trembling from fear like they used to when nobles were the guardians of humanity. Commoners had to take it in their own hands to finally make humanity prosper. So what are these nobles worth for?"
Noah gulped through his drying throat, feeling nervous from her speech. She was implying something and he did not like where this was going.
"You know what a Labyrinth is, right? Studied it in your noble lessons eh?"
"Why do you think I am noble?" Asked Noah nervously
"You reek of it for miles, noble boy. How you walk, how you hold your back, how you speak. Every action you take is full of haughtiness, like this world owes you something. Like we commoners owe you something. Like you can just come up to me and ask to teach you and I would consider it an honor to give you everything I learned in my hard life."
"That's not what I thought. If you don't want to…"
"I know boy, I saw how you refused to tattle on the guys. I will tell you as a bonus. Had you tattled on them, whatever it is they hid, I would have broken your jaw and tore out all your teeth, before throwing you out of the guild and banning you from ever stepping inside." Said Paula and Noah heard the crunch of gloves from the direction of people surrounding him. "But instead we are here. I agreed to teach you, so learn. Now answer my question. Do you know what a Labyrinth is?"
"Yes. I know what Labyrinth is." Said Noah with cold sweat starting to stream on his back.
"Oh? Share your knowledge with us then. What is it that you nobles teach each other about it?"
"The dark god in its attempt to break free from hell is trying to plunge our world into darkness and weaken this way the seal that holds him locked in hell. He sends a seed of evil into our world. The seed of evil germinates deep underground where we can't find it, gathering magic energy from surrounding and polluting it with evil. Once the seed of evil is ripe it becomes the dungeon core. Dungeons break out from underground bringing dark energy into our world and polluting it. From this pollution nearby nature mutates and starts to produce monsters. Humans were sending armies to conquer dungeons and clear the environment from evil energy. But there were hundreds of dungeons all over the world and monsters were countless. Humanity was losing. Bit by bit we lost our habitat. Until only one small area was left for us."
"And how did we turn the situation around?"
"We found a way to control the dungeon. Capturing its core and locking it with the power of strong spiritual creatures instead of destroying it like we did before."
"Go on. What is a Labyrinth then?"
"Labyrinth is an intricate construction built by the spiritual creature that governs the captured dungeon. It is created so that the evil energy streaming into our world from the dark realm through the dungeon core is being divided and dispersed by filtering it through many levels of Labyrinth. This allows us to easily cleanse it, without it polluting nearby areas. As every dungeon core uses lots of magic in nearby areas, evil god can't send another seed to grow in this area until a stronger seed is still alive. So as long as we control the dungeon core, we gain a large area that is free from dungeon breaks and pollution, allowing us to build cities and cultivate lands without the fear of monster attacks."
"Why is this area infested with monsters though?"
"This is quite a new Labyrinth. A few decades ago this area was still a dungeon. And lands have not been cleansed well yet."
While they walked they passed through the low level hunting grounds where Noah and his brother-in-law hunted monsters on his first attempt to come here. That time there were a lot of monsters. But while he walked with Paula's team, not a single monster actually walked up to them. Clearly afraid of the aura these people exuded.
"Ah, there it is. The usual noble stupidity that blinds their eyes." Said Paula.
"What did I say wrong?"
"Boy, if we needed decades to cleanse the infested area we would never make a comeback when we lost the best part of all our habitat."
Noah thought on it, listening carefully.
"You all study your books but never get to question things, taking all as a fact. No boy this is not why this area is infested with monsters after decades of capturing the dungeon core. The reason is because this Labyrinth is special. What's so special about it boy? Tell me."
"Great Tree Labyrinth is above the ground surface." Said Noah.
"Exactly. When we captured dungeons before we had no problems building Labyrinths as they were underground. Tunnels and layers were made within the ground, making the ground itself be the WALLS of it. The walls of Labyrinth is what makes it a Labyrinth. They are so imbued with magic nothing can break through them. So monsters and energy had to travel through the Labyrinth to get free. However once we started to capture dungeons, the dark god learned his lessons. And the furthest from our reach areas controlled by monsters had been upgraded. As there were no more humans to fear, he was able to germinate the seed above the ground."
"When we finally cleansed large areas that we now own we faced a new problem. Dungeons where we can't build a Labyrinth. Dungeon with no walls. For decades we could not do anything to keep these cores under control as there was no method to filter the evil energy streaming from them. All we could do is destroy them, but newer cores would appear and areas would soon be infested and lost in stampedes and horde attacks coming from the dungeon breaks."
"But we found a way in the end." Said Noah.
"Yes. Indeed. Not the best way, but a working one nonetheless. It's far from ideal but at least we managed to control the dungeon. So how did we build the walls of the above ground Labyrinth boy? What became the walls of The Great Tree Labyrinth?"
"Ummm forest?" Said Noah, with more questions to his voice than confidence.
Paula laughed and shook her head from side to side.
"How do you imagine it? Bushes and trees so strong monsters can't break through them to the outside world? No boy. That's not what holds the strong monsters in different layers. That's not what makes evil energy inside it travel from layer to layer while dispersing and weakening."
Once Paula said that she finally stopped walking and turned around to look at Noah for the first time since their long walk through the forest. They were now very deep in the lower level of the Labyrinth. He has not come so deep with his brother-in-law before.
"A Labyrinth is not just a bunch of tunnels. Labyrinth is a small world. Layers of it can sometimes be so wide they would be bigger than the whole dungeon when you look at it from outside. So how does a layer of labyrinth contain more space than all labyrinths? The distortion of space, boy. Building walls of trees and bushes can't do that. With underground dungeons it was easy to do. Walls, ceiling and floors created a chamber that would distort space within. But how is it achieved here? Where there is no ground to imbue with magic circles?"
"I don't know." Said Noah. They stood in the middle of the forest, with lush greenery all over the place. It looked just like any other place they passed through while walking in the forest.
"Didn't study it in books eh? Well I'll tell you." Said Paula and swung her hand to the side hitting something unseen making blurry waves travel through empty air in the middle of forest.
"That's what makes this Labyrinth a Labyrinth. The power of the Dryad Queen. Her unique ability. The power of dreams. The walls between reality and very realistic illusions of the dream realm. These walls are the coagulation of the most harmful mind forces that you can imagine. Once you try to enter them you would feel squeezed by a mountain, kicked by a donkey and fucked by a bull within your mind all at once."
"Sounds dangerous." Said Noah gulping down.
"Don't worry, killing you is the worst that it can do." Said Paula gaining a few smirks from his 'Guardians'.
"I see. So she makes walls out of her own dream power."
"In short, yes. But that's not what's important here. What is most important is that the space we are in right now is a layer covered by these illusionary, dreamy imaginary walls and as they are not solid in the end they can be passed through."
"You just said that it can kill you." Said Noah with a strange feeling of premonition.
"If you are too weak, yes. But once you strengthen your mind enough, at least low level walls would be quite possible to pass through." Said Paula with a wicked smile on her face
"But I am not strong enough yet." Said Noah trying to take a step back but hit into the guy standing behind him unmoving like a wall.
"Noah, I've seen countless sons of lower noble houses and seventh sons of lords walking like a peacock with their high education waltzing into the guild as if they own space. But in the end none of them ever achieved even half of what any other commoner boy coming to the guild could. Do you know why?"
"No." Said Noah silently. He had a very, very bad feeling.
"They lack resolve. An uneducated commoner once faced with a solution to his problem would do anything to move forward but nobles that learn in schools have too much to lose so they never make that last bit of effort needed to reach higher. Do you have that resolve, Noah? You said you are ready to learn from me. So show me how ready you are." Said Paula then she grabbed him by the scruff with her large strong hand and threw him into the wall where he disappeared as if into empty space, leaving only the blurry waves of the distorted air.