Elias eventually pulled himself from the floor. The first thing he noticed, other than the excruciating pain throughout his body, was the transfiguration. His feet were back. The bird-like claws he had adjusted to were replaced with bloodied feet. He sprawled his toes and simply grunted with acknowledgement at the lack of pain—they weren't broken.

  "At least they didn't go back to being broken," He thought.

  What else? Well, his channels were even more pained than he thought they could be and his Essence had plummeted to zero. He had mixed feelings about this but ultimately, he decided that the clarity of mind that came with the evident drop in his cache of power might pay off. his singular focus and foggy mind was astray from his normal character.

  He felt his own sense of self return and with it came a hefty dose of fear. Why in the name of all things divine had he just so impulsively touched the orb? Ever since he'd leapt into the 'Well of Enlightenment' he'd done nothing but recklessly pursue his own demise—or at least, that's how it felt now. He thought about it for a few seconds before shrugging. Ultimately, that was all he could do when the looming threat for not doing so was death anyway.

  After analysing his own body he looked to the orb—the orb that had decided to take every drop of Essence he had—It was gone. The pedestal remained and a faint mist of crimson engulfed the area in which the orb had been.

  "Where did it go?" he muttered to himself as he swashed the air with his hand.

  "No time for it, I've got to keep going" He said as he decided that trying to understand the dungeon in its entirety would do no good at this point. "Finish the trials, and hope that, that damned man explains this place…" He looked on to the end of the room seeing that a open doorway awaited his arrival.

  Stumbling forward to the doors he quickly checked over his life points, he'd taken some damage expelling the corruption into that orb, but still had over ninety-percent. It would do.

  He found it strange that as he approached the open doorway, he couldn't see through it, a veil of black fog—similar to that he had seen within the open expanse encased the entranceway. He didn't feel any immediate danger from it and pushed through.

  As he passed through the non-physical barrier, the fog lifted and revealed another room, much to his surprise, "No more endless corridors. Good."

  The room itself was only around eight meters wide but stretched on for roughly fifty in length, he couldn't truly workout the distance as every ten meters into the room were archways extending from the floor to ceiling, running from the edges of the walls to meet in the centre and filling the expanse between each set of archways was a wall of fog, getting darker and darker each time it passed the threshold of the arches in the distance. It created almost an opaque darkness at the final threshold that he could barely make out a sealed doorway. Other than that, the room was empty. Sure, the walls and arches were decorated exquisitely with carving and engravings of a myriad of creatures, humanoids and scenes that he couldn't quite explain—but he didn't feel any of it was relevant other than to make this room less bland. At least, that was what his limited experience and knowledge said to him.

  "What awaits me here I wonder?" He said, slightly louder than he'd spoken before, hoping for a notification or voice to answer him.

  A few moments passed, "Nothing? Obvious what this trial is then?"

  He rubbed his chin with his hand and then ran both through his greasy hair. "You know what, how bad could it be?"

  He stepped forward to the first threshold and pushed his hand towards it, as it reached the fog, his hand stopped, there was some resistance, enough so that his light push hadn't breached the translucent barrier. He pushed harder and his fingers slipped through. Immediately a jolting pain embraced the parts of him over the edge of the barrier.

  He pulled back and rubbed his fingers. "OK, so pain…" he said and his mind immediately jumped back to Pain Resistance. He cursed himself for not picking it now, more than ever.

  He bounced on the spot and shook out his hands, trying to psyche himself up for the inevitable pain—"Fifty meters… I can do that…" he said as he moved back from the fog, he positioned himself as if to break into a sprint and—ran.

  He gained as much speed as he could from the short ten meter gap between him and the threshold and hit it with momentum. Immediately two sensations washed over him. Pain and a jarring resistance to his forward momentum, it was as if he had slammed into a pool of water and high velocity. His body engulfed itself in the dark fog and began to push forward, but it was almost as if he was moving in slow motion.

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  The pain was intense, electrifying his entire body with discomfort—however, it wasn't as bad as his channels, although the pain he felt within also intensified. At this point, he was greeting the flurry of sensation like an old acquaintance.

  He pushed onwards and ever so slightly felt the pain increase as he moved forward, the ten meter section he was traversing bound to take longer than even a gentle walk should have, even with him pushing his own body to move forward at speed.

  Concentrating on his steps, his breathing and gritting his teeth he made it to within reach of the second threshold. "No hesitation—come on," he told himself as he reached out with his hand.

  Sure the pain intensified slightly, but it was still manageable. His arm passed through the second threshold and he felt a slight release of tension—it was going to hurt a lot, but it was doable.

  As his entire body became engulfed with the thicker fog he continued to focus on his steps and breathing, that was until he caught a glimpse of something to the side. His heart raced and adrenaline spiked throughout his body—within this layer of fog there was something there. A dark shape flowed through the fog, He couldn't make out its shape. Then, a second appeared, a third, then more. All around him dark shapes fluttered and crawled in the fog. He tried to make them out and as he focussed with his gaze he blanched. A half rotten face of a thick skulled humanoid encapsulated his vision, it lunged towards him and he tried to dodge in the cumbersome fog.

  His body wasn't reacting in time, he couldn't move. "Aghhh shit!" he got out as the lunge from the horrific creature came within a few inches of his body, he braced and squeezed his eyes shut in anticipation of the oncoming strike.

  Nothing.

  He opened his eyes again a split second later and the figure had vanished. "Where'd it go?!" he thought as he darted—in almost slow motion—his eyes to the other shapes around him. They were still there.

  Again, another form darted out to him, this one looked like a bat, a really fucking disgusting bat, its eyes fell from sinewy flesh, dangling around a foot beneath its face and one wing stretched out for almost three foot whilst the other only went out a foot. Its dark yellow teeth were inches long and it's eyes flung out to the sides as it opened its maw to bite into him. He blanched once more and tensed his entire body as the expected bite—completely avoided him?

  Eyes open once more there was no sight of the bat. Again he looked and the shapes flowed in the darkness—He had barely progressed two meters in the time as he had halted at each assault. The pain from the fog was still present, but with the now flowing adrenaline—he barely registered it.

  "Maybe I should just…" He began to say as he cut off his own words with determination. He squeezed his eyes shut and pushed onwards. "If I can't see them, I won't piss my own—What the FUCK?!"

  He squealed as within the darkness of his own closed off vision—more forms emerged, he could see them as clearly as if his eyes were open. Mangled and dismembered corpses and entities, monsters that he'd never even imagined could exist. They all shot out towards him—his heart felt like it would explode and he wanted to run—thoughts of fighting these apparitions didn't even cross his mind as with both the pain and the unknown nature of the fog—he felt that even trying to channel mana would cause a backlash, he didn't know why he thought that, but he was confident in it.

  With no other recourse available and after only a brief hesitation, arising from his emerging thoughts of backing out of the fog—he pushed forwards. He reached the third threshold.

  He pulled himself across its barrier, hoping for the images to fade from his view. They didn't—if anything they intensified as the rush of his heartbeat and the spikes of adrenaline flooding him increased in pace. "What's next?!" Was his only thought as his body fully crossed the barrier.

  What came however, was not what he expected.

  "Give up, lad. You're not cut out for this!" Jacob's voice rang out in his mind.

  "Jacob?!" He called in a mix of relief and confusion. What was he doing here? And… what was he saying?

  "Come on, Elias—just stop! Leave it to the adventurers, you've already let enough people die!" Jacobs voice once again called.

  "WHAT?!" he yelled—intense pain—images of creatures unknown and disturbing—and a torrent of emotion that didn't know he held flooded his body and spirit.

  "What the fuck did Jacob just say?! He didn't let anyone die. It was the Aberrations! It wasn't him!" he thought.

  "Tess didn't deserve to be abandoned like that lad, and I know you didn't mean it. But you did this. Don't bring it on anyone else!"

  His footsteps faltered as the words of his mentor calling him out on his failures rang true in his heart—the combination of all his senses overloading his rationality.

  "That's it. Good lad. Just stop." Jacob called out again—his words both a blessing and a curse. He felt actual pain in his heart as he ceased his forward momentum.

  "Jacob… don't say that…" he said, trying to focus on the direction of the voice. The fog ended up impeding any chance of locating his old mentor, but that didn't stop him.

  "Being a good boy again?" A soft and playful voice called out, "I always knew you didn't have it in you to go against him"

  His eyes widened and all other sensations fell away as he narrowed his spirit on the melodic voice. "Tess?!" he said, "TESS?!"

  A gentle laugh so familiar to him came as a reply as he stood frozen in place—wracked with pain.

  It really was her, that was her laugh. "Where are you?!" he called out.

  "I'll come to you sweetie, don't you worry" she replied.

  Sweetie? He thought as his heart fluttered and butterflies leapt out of his stomach. She'd never called him a pet name like that before. Never.

  And just like that, his mind refocussed on the moment in front of him. Illusion. Not real. "It's not happening Elias. She's DEAD!"

  "NO!" he called out as he tried to shut out both voices that responded to his resurgent movement.

  The voices continued and he channelled all of his willpower into staying his course. One to go. Just one.

  He passed through the third threshold bringing him to the final part of this challenge—at least he hoped it was the final part.

  As he crossed through entirely, the voices disappeared. The pain spiked to a crescendo and then faded. The apparitions that had assaulted him left as well as his vision fell into darkness.

  "Oh, no." he muttered as he felt his vision draw to a close and his body fall limp.

  It felt like an eternity before his eyes opened to a bright light piercing his eyes. The sun, he grimaced and shielded his face. The soft embrace of fabric gripped his other arm as his senses revealed his new location. There was no fog, no dungeon and no pain. He'd opened his eyes to a wooden walled room and he lay in a comfortable bed—it even had pillows. Around the room was a chair, a bedside table and a small wardrobe, as well as open windows and swaying linen curtains, drawn to the edges. The swaying curtains gave way to a warm breeze that embraced him in a refreshing comfort, one that he hadn't felt for a while.

  He blinked a few times and found a smile on his face. "This is—" just as he was about to speak he was cut-off by the appearance of someone he had never thought he'd see again.

  "Mum?" he said.