“Holy shit!” Viy shouted from the front.

  “Woah!” Tuk said.

  “What? What?” Mul cried, unable to see.

  Their party moved forward, within the queue of apprentices, and Nar stepped into a place unlike any he had ever seen before.

  They stood upon a metal walkway, and before them, spread a massive, dark blue metal square room. And below them, there were aetherships.

  The roar of engines was almost deafening. And yet, Nar could still make out the sounds of shouts reaching up to them, as well as the sounds of high-pitched whines and hisses, and of metallic clangs and bangs of all kinds.

  Crew of various uniforms were rushing all over the place, darting in and out of ships, bent over open compartments of exposed wires and tubes, hauling cargo, parts, and doing Crystal knew what else in that hive of frenetic activity.

  “My Crystal…” Nar breathed, gazing across the massive space. “This is amazing…”

  “Keep moving!” a voice shouted from up ahead. “No time for staring!”

  “We are T-minus 20!” a voice boomed across the vast space. “I repeat, we are T-minus 20! Let’s get those bugs ready to fly!”

  Nar forced his jaw to shut as they stepped down the stairs. The chaos of activity before him was breathtaking.

  “Look!” Rel shouted, elbowing him. “That wall is open to the outside!”

  “It’s what?”

  Wind blew in their faces, cool and fresh, and Nar gaped at a massive free fall just a hundred feet away from them.

  “Crystal Almighty!” Tuk shouted, next to them, as engines roared. “We’re going outside! We’re getting out there!”

  “And on a ship!” Rel said, cackling maniacally.

  “Follow your party leaders!” a woman shouted at them as they reached the ground floor. “Stay within the green lines unless you want to get hurt! The hangar bay is no place for fucking around!”

  “Yes, ma’am! Come on!” Kur shouted at them, taking them along one of three red paths that split from the stairwell.

  Nar looked up at the beast at his side as they followed Kur. The aethership was squat and powerful looking, standing at least a full four floors above his head.

  Apprentices were being rushed to form up before the massive, open walkway that led into the dark insides of that beast.

  “Listen up, apprentices, this is your COO speaking!” Tys voice boomed from overhead. “In less than 15 minutes, you’ll be flying out into your first combat in the Labyrinth. Like all those that came before you, your first, special treat, is to clear out a den!”

  A roar sounded from the crew around them, and Nar found himself adding their voices to the massive cheer.

  “What in the pile is a den?” Tuk asked.

  “No idea!” Rel shouted.

  “Then why are we cheering?”

  “Yes! It’s good to be young!” the COO roared, eliciting laughter amongst the crew.

  “You’re younger than me, COO!” a man shouted.

  “Shut up!” she shouted at the crew, though Nar could feel the laughter in her voice.

  “Apprentices, open your ears now. Beasts freely roam the Labyrinth. They aren’t just limited to dungeons and raids. They tend to gather by species as they follow the aetheric tides to feed on ambient aether and other beasts. But, at some point, a herd of these beasts can grow too large, and bold. They become predators of aetherships and delvers as well! And when one of these gatherings finds a nice little corner from which to attack passing ships from, they become what’s known as a den. In our case, it's a den of psaelis. These dens need to be cleared up, or whole areas within the Labyrinth get blocked and shut down!”

  “How many beasts are we talking about?” Tuk muttered.

  “I feel like it has to be a lot,” Nar said.

  He regretted not having something more encouraging to tell the ring tosser, but it was probably best to be honest at that point. He had expected their assessment to be something big, and his estimate for the number of enemies they would face had just increased dramatically.

  “Now, dens are expensive. Like everything else in the Nexus, you gotta pay for the right to clear them up!” the COO continued. “That means you little apprentices are going to have to kill as much as you fucking can, so we can make a proper profit out of the corpses!”

  More laughter erupted around them, as they continued on their way towards their ship.

  “Work hard, kiddies!” a woman shouted at them. “Our bonuses aren’t going to pay themselves!”

  “Yeah!” someone else shouted. “For Tsurmirel! Show those bastards how it's done!”

  “What bastards?” Rel asked.

  “Now, we’re going to move in fast, and we’re going to land hard, guns blazing!” the COO said. “Usually, we have the Scimitar’s guns open up a nice little circle for you guys to land in, but this year we’ve hit the jackpot! The den is huuuuuge! But unfortunately, we’re going to have to share… Two other apprentice-ships are here. One of them doesn’t matter. It’s some no-name guild I didn’t bother to memorize the name off…”

  More laughter met her words, and Nar’s heart sped up, falling victim to the charged atmosphere around him.

  “But the other is the fucking Navy!”

  “Booo!”

  The roar from the crew nearly drove him deaf.

  “Exactly! Ain’t no way we’re going to lose to those fucks in blue! And that means we can’t afford to blast as many beasts as usual! We’re going to lose XP, and we’re going to look like weaklings! So we’re doing it the hardcore way! And on the plus side, there’s so many beasts out there, you guys are going to be making some freaking awesome gains!”

  Nar shouted alongside the apprentices, but unlike the crew members, their cry was hesitant.

  “So, here’s the plan!” the COO said. “The wasps are going in first. Those are the smaller, single party ships. They’ll blaze through to try and stay ahead of the other apprentice-ships, and clear just enough space to drop the vanguard parties down. And it's these parties that are going to open up enough space for the big fat beetles to land! Those are the 50-party carriers! There’s no way to mistake the two, and you know what your job is by whatever ship you’re standing in front of!”

  As if on cue, Kur turned them away from the green path, and led them into the red square that housed an aethership.

  “Fucking damn it!” Mul swore. “Why is it always us?”

  Nar clenched his jaw. In front of him, was a decidedly much smaller ship than the behemoths they had walked past.

  The ship before them was sleek looking with plenty of curves. It was like a round triangle that curved in at the sides, reaching back out again at the wings, each of which housed an angry, zapping orb of gold and rainbow aether.

  Without any other apprentices queuing up to enter the smaller ship, it was clear what their duty was.

  “Crystal have mercy,” Rel whispered.

  “It will be fine. Right?” Tuk said, gulping audibly.

  “It will be fine!” Nar said, parting both of their backs. “Don’t worry. We got this!”

  “As a bonus, there are several leaders amongst the beasts!” the COO shouted, as a uniformed woman with an open helmet ushered them towards the loud ship. “They are more valuable, and there will be prizes according to how many each party can down. And ruling over all of the den, will be the Den Boss! The Den Boss provides significant buffs to the whole den, and killing it as soon as you can will make your life a whole lot easier, and end the whole thing a lot faster! And whoever kills it, will get a massive reward from us! But if you let the fucking Navy take that head, there will punishments for a whole week! Now stand by for gear activation!”

  “Stand here!” the woman shouted.

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  Her uniform covered her whole body, and through the raised visor of her helmet, Nar could only see her tan face, with deep red eyes and lips, and several dots of shimmering blue across her face.

  They formed up in front of the much smaller entrance to the wasp ship, and Nar looked down at his chest.

  Finally going to see what this thing does!

  “Activation in 3! 2! 1! Activate!” the COO boomed.

  “Guh!” Nar grunted.

  The fabric immediately tightened at the COO’s command, and Nar found himself struggling to breath. Then, a warm sensation spread over his body, from his chest, and the material relaxed again.

  “Crystal…” Rel gasped at his side.

  “What was that for?” Nar asked, looking down at his chest.

  However, before his befuddled eyes, gray, hazy light, seeped from the fabric. The light arranged itself into segmented, laminated plates of various forms and sizes, molded to the muscles and body parts below them.

  “It’s armor…” Nar breathed, raising his now encased fist to his eyes. “It’s aura armor!”

  There was nothing else it could be, given its color and the vague sense of siphoning that he felt in his core.

  At his side, Rel was donning a similar armor, except hers shimmered in a deep, vibrant crimson, matching the color of her aura.

  And across the line, he saw that Tuk’s, Cen’s, and Gad’s armor plates looked more or less the same as his. However, Mul’s looked to be made out of tightly woven, bright orange flames that gave out no heat. At his side, Viy’s was some form of deep, swirling and shimmering, dark purple and blue, and the plates on her armor looked strangely solid.

  Jul’s was made of dark, smoky looking plates, and Nar felt a shiver run down his spine at the sight of it. As for Kur, his armor had adopted a bronze sort of metallic sheen, making him look as though he was actually encased in metal.

  “Damn…” Tuk said, with a low whistle.

  “Jealous?” Mul asked, turning around to show off his flaming armor.

  “Yes!” both Nar and Tuk said.

  “You look great!” Nar added, when he caught Jul’s eyes. “Damn! That armor looks insane!”

  Jul smiled bashfully, and raised her arms to allow him a full look at the smoke trailing armor.

  “That’s so cool…” Rel breathed.

  “Your heads and faces also cover up,” the COO’s voice explained, from above their heads. “Just think helmet on or off.”

  Helmet on! Nar thought.

  The warmth climbed over the sides of his neck, over his ears and head, then over his mouth, eyes and forehead, fully encasing him.

  After a brief moment of hearing nothing but his accelerated breathing, the sounds from the outside filtered back in, and his gray vision cleared back up to normal.

  “Wow…” Rel said, looking up at Nar. “You look terrifying!”

  “You’re one to talk!” he replied. “You’re all covered in red!”

  Rel cackled. “Good! Let them be afraid!”

  “Crew! The apprentices are under your command now! May the Crystal protect you all, and may the corpses pile behind you!”

  “Thank the COO!” the woman shouted at them.

  “Thank you, COO!” the party shouted with the other apprentices.

  “We’ll bring back a shit ton of XP!” the woman shouted again, and again they repeated after her.

  The COO laughed. “I expect no less from Ex-Climbers! Remember, this is not your first fight! Now get out there and do us proud!”

  The woman lifted her hand up and shouted a low series of grunts, which was echoed across the hangar bay by the crew.

  “Follow me!” the woman said, as the sound died around them.

  Nar was the last one to hop onto the ship, and he returned an awkward nod at the crewman that was tinkering away with some wires on an open panel by the side of the ship's door.

  “Good luck, kid!” the man said, half his face gone behind a massive set of goggles and lenses. “Make us proud.”

  “Uh… yes, sir!”

  The man chuckled and went back to doing whatever it was that he was working on.

  “You, sit there!” the woman told him, preventing him from following Rel deeper into the corridor. “Your party leader said you’re going out first with the tank!”

  She had to shout to make herself heard over the loud, pitched buzzing of the twin orb engines on the low, curved wings of their slender ship.

  “You can take off your helmets for now!” she shouted. “It gets sore after a while. Just remember to put them back on before we land!”

  Nar did as he was told, and his nostrils filled with the smell of hot chemicals once more.

  “I’m gunner Xilart! Your pilot today is Nulthmar,” she said. “So, landing is a generous way of putting it! We’re going to clear a patch, hover over it, and you guys are going to jump down! Don’t worry, you were selected to be part of the vanguard, so you can do it!”

  “T-minus 2 minutes!” a voice boomed from outside. “T-minus 2 minutes!”

  Nar’s stomach dropped at the announcement, and he licked his dry lips, despite the sweat now coming down his face in the hot interior of the ship.

  “Quick! Strap on!” Xilart said.

  She bent down and pulled a circular contraption tied to a strap from behind Kur’s back.

  “This is the clasp!” she shouted, then she grabbed another strap, with a metallic end to it. “This little thing goes in the strap and makes a click sound! If you don’t hear the click sound, it’s not locked in! Go on, there’s four of those straps!”

  Nar repeated what she was doing with Kur and strapped himself up.

  “Nice! To open up, just press hard on the red button on the side!” she said. “Like this!”

  And true to her words, Kur’s straps came undone.

  Nar searched the side of the clasp for the button, and when he found it, he pressed hard on it. The straps that had tightened around him suddenly loosened and dropped.

  “That’s it! Now strap on again!” she said, and stalked towards the front of the ship.

  Nar had caught a glance of a dark compartment at the end of the corridor, where someone clad in shadows moved their hands deftly across a panel dazzling with lights.

  At his side, Mul strapped on, pulled on the straps several times, and then finally exhaled heavily, still holding on to the straps.

  “You alright?” Nar asked.

  Mul nodded stiffly. “Don’t like feeling stuck. Don’t like being in the air.”

  “I don’t think it will be for that long,” Nar said, just as the door at his side slid closed, enclosing them in a near absolute darkness, and dulling the noise of the frenzy of activity in the hangar bay.

  “T-minus 30!” the voice shouted from the outside.

  The gunner came back onto the corridor, and pulled on each of their clasps. She pulled on them with violence, shaking them hard to make sure they were strapped in properly.

  This is going to be rough, isn’t it? Nar thought, after Xilart stopped trying to rip his straps open.

  At his side, Mul had his eyes pressed shut.

  Satisfied, Xilart checked the door and the panel that shone beside it.

  “All clear!” she shouted, and made her way back to the pilot. “Hang in there kids! This is going to be a wild ride! You might want to bite down!”

  “Damn it…” Mul muttered.

  “T-Minus 5!” the voice boomed outside.

  The engines in their ship whined to a crescendo, deafening Nar, and he missed the final countdown.

  What now? He asked, as the seconds stretched. Aren’t we going to…

  He was pushed against his seat as gravity shifted under him and then crushed him backwards and downwards.

  His head bobbed right and left, as if under a will of its own, and Nar clenched his jaw hard to make sure he didn’t accidentally bite and swallow his own tongue.

  “Woooooo!” Tuk shouted, clearly not worried about such things. “Yes! This is what I’m talking about!”

  “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Shit! Fuck!” Mul swore at Nar’s side, his eyes tightly pressed shut as his head lolled madly.

  The ship swayed, sped and turned this and that way, and Nar held onto his straps for dear life.

  Suddenly, gravity shifted the opposite way, and Nar slid towards the door side.

  BRRRRRRRRRRRRT!

  The ship vibrated under him, as a low staccato roared from under their feet.

  “Helmets!” Xilart shouted over the ship's speakers!

  Nar activated his just as a line of blazingly, bright white light cut across the darkness inside the ship.

  He looked to the side as his helmet closed around him and saw that the door was opening once more.

  Crystal! Are we really going to do this? He thought, as the ship continued to sway under him, clearly still in midair.

  The ship sped up again, crushing him against Mul, and turned and twisted.

  “No! No! No! Nooooooooo!” Mul screamed.

  “Yeeeeeeees!” Tuk shouted.

  Fuck’s sakes! Nar thought, as the ship rolled over, and they found themselves dangling upside down.

  It was terrifying, and Nar prayed to the Crystal that the straps would hold on, bearing the full weight of his body and armor.

  However, part of himself couldn’t deny that his heart didn’t beat with a heavy dose of excitement alongside apprehension, and a grin spread across his lips.

  BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT!

  The ship righted itself again, and the low sound from before, which Nar assumed were the ship's guns, vibrated from under them once more.

  All the while, the ship’s door was almost fully opened now.

  “Up!” the gunner shouted through the ship’s speakers. “Go! Go! Go!”

  To his credit, Nar didn’t hesitate. He unbuckled his straps and was up in a heartbeat.

  He saw Gad getting up behind him, slower, and he made the split-second decision to jump out first.

  With his heart at his throat, he stumbled to the door and glanced down.

  A mass of brown, black and gray fur writhed beneath him, amidst clouds of dust, but just as promised, he glimpsed a clear patch of dead bodies directly underneath the ship.

  “Jump! Now!” Xilart shouted again.

  Without stopping to think about it, Nar jumped.

  The fall was over in the blink of an eye, barely 15 feet high, and his enhanced body took the landing with ease.

  His sword was on his hand immediately, but without any immediate threats, Nar resolved to kick the bodies of the beasts away from the landing zone. The last thing they needed was someone busting an ankle by landing poorly.

  And I forgot to warm up… Nar thought. But where and when in the pile was I supposed to do that?

  “Umph!” Gad grunted, going down to her knees and hands as she landed.

  Nar reached down and yanked her back up, the adrenaline kicking his attributes into overdrive.

  “Thanks!” she said, bringing out her shield and mace. “I'll keep an eye out! You help the others! It’s too high for Cen!”

  One by one, in order of their formation, Mul, Jul and Viy jumped down. Then came the less attribute dense.

  “Ow!” Kur said, landing hard on his left leg.

  “You okay?” Nar asked him.

  Kur waved him away, and Nar looked up in time to notice and move to catch Cen in his arms.

  “Tha-Thank you!” she said, as he lowered her to the ground.

  As for Tuk and Rel, they both jumped down with enough ease, and the aethership blasted away from them.

  Nar grit his teeth as a wave of sudden gravity pressed him against the floor, but soon the ship was gone, heading back to the Scimitar.

  “My Crystal…” Tuk whispered, looking up and behind them.

  They were standing on the ledge of one of the enormous cubes protruding from the walls of the Labyrinth. Above them, through the rising dust, the hulking dark brown red shape of the Scimitar hovered above the chasm.

  The ship was shaped like an uneven half-circle, blocky like the Labyrinth, and widening as it reached the center. Across its hulking form, three massive spheres glowed with golden rainbow aether.

  “It’s huge!” Cen whispered.

  It was, and besides it, standing not that far apart, were two equally enormous ships.

  The one in the middle was longer and flatter, curved at the nose, and was made of some kind of black metal. As for the last ship, it looked very similar to the behemoth, flat block ship they had seen as they jumped through the gateway.

  “That must be the Navy!” Nar said, pointing at it.

  “It’s even bigger than ours!” Tuk said.

  Nar could only stare, jaw dropped and forgotten, at the three massive ships hovering in the air beyond the edge. In between them and where they stood, dozens of ships zipped through and fro, plunging into the dust to drop their cargo of apprentices.

  “Looks like everyone’s doing the same thing,” Kur said.

  Nar nodded, mute.

  Ships roared and buzzed overhead, hidden in the shimmering dust cloud, and Nar felt them press down on him every time they flew over them.

  Crystal… he thought, following the flight of a wasp back to the Scimitar as it burst out of the dust. This is something else…

  “Incoming!” Jul shouted, shattering the moment.

  Oh, right! Nar thought, turning around as the sound of many feet and snarling approached from behind.

  In that breathtaking moment, he had forgotten why they were there.