No More Pain For This Villain.

[Chameleon's Maze's Illustration.]

[Third Person View.]

Ren stood completely still as his eyes swept across everyone who was present: Erik, Vexa, and Aron.

If everything was to be done according to their strategy made in the tavern, they were to be divided into teams of Aron and Ren, and Vexa and Erik, but somehow, they all ended up—well, everyone intentionally followed where Ren was going.

To the third entrance of the Chameleon's Maze.

Ren sighed, but soon his ears caught onto the incoming footsteps from the right side. He didn't move, his eyes now set on the wall in front of him, while he sensed that the wall behind him had stopped moving. But he knew it would start moving again in a few minutes. It was a constant thing to keep students from getting out of this deathly maze but giving enough time for the transcendent Eldric to intervene, as he was the only one allowed to spectate this round this close.

"What are we going to do now?" Aron dusted off his clothes as he stood up and asked, his mask slightly tilted. He immediately fixed it to not reveal any of the burnt side of his face.

"Shush," Ren placed a single finger over his lips, gesturing to everyone to go quiet.

He side-eyed Vexa, gesturing for her to wake Erik up.

Vexa squatted down, creating a small string of water between her index finger. She flicked it at Erik, jolting him awake, and immediately covered his mouth to prevent him from making any sound, which left him a bit confused.

Ren closed his eyes and then reopened them, a very strange glint in them that Vexa caught on to but didn't ask about.

A low growling sound reached everyone's ears, and they noticed something approaching them from their right.

"We should—" This time, Vexa opened her mouth, but she was immediately met with Ren's eyes, silently signaling her to remain silent.

After what seemed like a minute but was only a second in actuality, Ren muttered something under his breath.

Vexa hummed in a questioning manner, still remaining silent. She might not have been acquainted with Ren's way of doing things, but after deciding that she had to follow him here, it was common sense to follow him thoroughly.

Not patient enough, Aron stepped towards Ren, but immediately regretted it as it only made it easier for Ren to grab him by his collar.

"Follow me!" Ren shouted.

Vexa immediately grabbed Erik, who was still confused, while Aron was practically dragged by Ren. They ran towards the still wall in front of them instead of running by the open left side.

"You fucker, let me go; we'll crash!" cursed Aron, genuinely fearing they would crash into the wall at the speed they were running.

But to his luck, the wall moved—this time anti-clockwise.

Ren pulled Aron in front of him while pushing him. If anything went wrong, Aron would take the damage—which would be a lot given how much mana Ren was putting into his legs. The wall moved, and the next thing they knew, they were past it.

"Huh?" Aron was dropped on the ground again.

"Phew, that was close... if that Bilae Trunk had gotten to us, it would've been a disaster," Ren said as he turned around, only to flinch a bit at Vexa looking into his eyes as if she were staring into his soul.

Ren knew that after they entered the third entrance and by the time the outer wall stopped moving, the next wall would start moving. The next wall had multiple entrances in it, so they'd move to give them a gap to pass to the next circle without having to fight any of the chambers placed besides the entrances.

"B-Bilae Trunk... isn't that...?" Erik wobbly took a stand on his feet. "Isn't that called the nightmare tree?"

"Nightmare Tree?" Vexa repeated.

"Don't tell me you don't know what a Nightmare Tree is?" Aron said sarcastically, but Vexa didn't give him any look of recognition.

"Yeah, looks like we managed to pass it though," Ren said, noticing the ground where they were standing was a bit burnt.

"Someone is fast," he noticed. "Well, that's good too."

"Anyways, what are you going to do?" he turned around and asked Vexa.

She did not respond.

"Deaf?" he asked jokingly.

"No, just... I don't know, maybe follow you," Vexa replied.

"That was not what was decided in the meeting, so I think you should take your own way. I'll take my own," Ren tried to argue.

"By that logic, you were not supposed to leave me behind too," Aron interjected.

Ren just shrugged. "So I think you should—"

Vexa cut him off as she walked past him. Ren felt a bit annoyed. Was he getting cut off when he was about to cut her off?

Vexa walked a bit farther from them, approximately fifteen or so feet, and created a large spike of ice, big enough.

"What is she doing?" Aron questioned.

"Don't tell me, I didn't notice," Ren felt dumb for not having noticed what Vexa picked up on so quickly.

Vexa released the spell, creating a very loud noise and rousing a lot of dust. As the dust subsided, the point where she hit the wall changed color from grey to black.

Ren grunted as he walked towards Vexa.

"I just sensed—" Vexa was speaking but stopped when she saw something.

"That was quick... uh oh," Ren looked into the reflection of Vexa's eyes.

In them reflected a large golem, looking menacing while holding a mace, walking towards Aron who had his back to the golem. Completely made out of debris stone, with a radiating red core in the center of its chest, and its size was about 20-25 feet in height.

Ren turned his attention from the black stone wall and looked at Aron.

"Hey—"

"There's something behind me, right?" Aron asked, to which Ren nodded. Aron replied with a silent curse.