Elevating the Odds

Ding.

The doors opened to reveal Juniluny’s increasingly expensive prize.

John Newman still sat idly cross-legged in the middle of the hall where she knew she had left him. Ten minutes ago, Juniluny might’ve smirked at her unambitious prey; caution now replaced pride, however, and this was doubly so when she saw the new feature in his hall: the four twisted corpses of beasts. As unsafe and unpredictable as her unwelcome victims were proving, John was possibly the worst... but she needed whatever he knew about the Warden right now. She stepped across the elevator’s threshold and paused in the round chamber that enclosed it.

She peered through the mostly vacant halls of this floor and counted the idle and stupid beasts that remained. Each was blissfully unaware of the invader's presence. Without standing orders to patrol, they had no reason to find the sedentary intruder. I didn’t even ask for this drooling lot! Juniluny peered out at the corpses from afar. Until she was sure how he managed to kill them, she didn’t dare step into the labyrinth proper.

All were within his line of sight... the farthest one down the hall. Thirty meters, give or take? The beating he tried to give me would probably kill any of these pitiful pups, surely... She had been caught unawares at the time. The boy's hands had moved suddenly and almost inhumanly fast, jerking violently as her defenses withered, and yet they never neared her enough to actually strike her. If it was a spell, it was none she recognized... much like everything else he did. His ability to teleport short distances came to mind. Spatial magic is rare, and it's a miracle he could pull that off... but if he could reach into far-off places, or ones he couldn't see, why would he only jump a few meters away from me earlier? He's still a novice, then... but such a useful, naturally-talented novice! It'd almost be a shame to just gobble up most of that power... not that I can do it safely right now, anyways...

Grumbling at her missing fingers, she remained in the enclosure and peered out to the weakest remaining monster: a kind of weaponized camel covered in fangs and wielding tusks jutting down and past the lengths of its irritated snout. Though she lost many spells without the use of her fingers, the spell to command even the simplest of her slaves was not one of them.

With constant, merciless use came mastery, after all. A test, then. Without components verbal or somatic, she willed her command into the horror. Heed my Will and behold my Sight: kill the human with all your might.

The path and target were laid out in the primitive brain of the wretched creature. It was exhausted and starved; naturally, it refused until the pearl glowed and delivered the agony of disobedience. With a pained groan and a sputter of foaming drool, the pitiful beast of war began its awkward gallop through the maze.

John had almost a complete minute to himself. His right eye remained closed as he created another sheathe of tunnels over it: four watching the sides of the elevator chamber on his floor and one in the lab where the girls began to scour the room for some mechanism to open either the blast doors or summon the elevator.

John opened another five in the hallways of his floor. Each one cost the bare minimum of 1 point of mana in reserve; each let him flick his eye to and fro to check for Juniluny’s approach. Another tunnel, placed at the entrance of his left ear, was opened against the elevator room wall. If the elevator left, he'd hear it. Thankfully, he heard no such indication.

What he did hear, however, was the clacking of hooves on polished marble. One of his spying peepholes saw the beast pass by, but it wasn't until it was already in the hall, trampling the corpse of a tiger-snake fusion, that John realized what was coming after him. John had never seen a camel in real life, and he would still go on to consider that he hadn't: this "camel" was sheathed in ivory fangs jutting from its mangy coat, its adorably strange face was swollen and red where it wasn't more tusks and fangs, and its dull eyes were almost buried in the excessive fat of its brows. Foam dripped from its roaring mouth (did real camels roar?!) and nearly **** John to react as he had every time thus far: blasting quickcasted serpent's lunges into it until it perished. Wait! She's still here... if she's watching this, then I can't use anything portal-based, or else she'll know-!

The hooves crushed the intertwined limbs of the next two corpses. John was running out of time to invent a way out of this that didn't show his hand. He checked the beast's level and, as the creature drew near, applied slow to the mere level 15 war beast. Its senses and reaction times dulled, but its feet knew the way; its charge continued unabated. Rising to meet his enemy with only his one eye open, John struggled to gauge the beast's distance as he activated his displacer field. His hands and feet twitched as the creature ran over the raptor, the best goalpost for distance to John, and the beast roared as it readied to gore the enemy. As the raptor-like beast's eye exploded under the vicious hoof, Newman threw his body to the left-!

Your quickcasted serpent's bite deals 268 damage to the kakamal. You suffer 23 damage from its spiked hide!
Your quickcasted serpent's bite deals 268 damage to the kakamal. You suffer 23 damage from its spiked hide!
CRIT! Your quickcasted serpent's bite deals 804 damage to the kakamal. You suffer 23 damage from its spiked hide!
CRIT! Your quickcasted serpent's bite deals 804 damage to the kakamal. You suffer 23 damage from its spiked hide!
Your quickcasted serpent's bite deals deals 268 damage to the kakamal. You suffer 23 damage from its spiked hide!

The kakamal has been SLAIN!
+1,458XP
+$215
+1 jug of misery water
+3 tufts of kakamal fur
+1 **** pearl

The creature's spines drafted by John's face, but the beast's slowed reaction time had no real chance to realize the wide margin by which John had side-stepped it. Despite how badly his hands stung from striking the fanged side of the animal, the damage was done... and his portal-based powers remained without showcase. The creature slumped forward. Its tusked head hooked against the floor and then lifelessly tugged under the drag of its tremendous dead weight.

Did... did he just punch the stupid thing to ****?! Juniluny had thought it was some strange, ritualistic magic that John had attacked her with at the school... but his sheer strength was clear now. Combined with his ability to teleport, she could see a connection with how devastating his attack had been and the distance he managed to deliver it with. I still don't know how... but even if spatial magic is difficult, teleporting just parts of yourself, for short periods of time, would be... yes, perhaps he's somehow teleporting his hands... ah, but if I'm wrong, and he doesn't need to see me, then approaching would- no no, Juni, c'mon! He would've attacked you earlier if that was the case! Her constant cycle of guessing and examining stopped dead on its tracks when the single blow from Galley came to mind; it would continue to come to mind for the rest of Juniluny's life, however long that proved to be. She shuddered at the thought of tempting some similar pain here. I can't believe I ever risked putting my hands anywhere near him... Hells below, there's no way I'm going to try to just sneak up to him now!

She gauged the distance between them. Could he have gotten the lay of the floor while she was away? Given the remaining monsters, probably not... but his power, if she had the right of it, could possibly bend or break the rules she hypothesized. Her foot nervously went forward only to withdraw back to the safety of the elevator room. She had none of her potent spells without her prime fingers. Her mind raced through every mastered spell she could cast without them, but none of them aided without her approaching him. Her mind then went on to the cantrips and hedge magic of her youth... and she nearly gagged at the thought. I can't believe I'd use that spell to... gah, but what choice do I have? Such childish chicanery is below my exceptional expertise, but... to dabble in low arts is all that remains while I'm in this state! With a miserable sigh, Juniluny Snickerbottom focused on the mental construct of a true halfling spell.

John remained standing as he awaited any new challengers. Alright... if I remember right, that thing was one of the three still alive on this floor. There's still that crocodile-bird thing, which was the strongest at the center of the maze, and then the cat-dog-whatever that hides in the corner filled with what I think is its own crap-

"Hello again, Mister Newman."

John spun around, ready to pounce with an attack... and found nothing in the hall with him. His right eye danced across the portals looking for any sign of her; the sound in his left ear from the elevator chamber had somehow echoed the voice that he could swear had been standing right behind him. Silently, he peered about and waited for her next attack.

"Don't be alarmed; I've only come with questions, this time."

John knew it for sure this time: she was saying this in the elevator room... but it was also vibrating in the air right behind his head. Is she... throwing her voice? I thought that was just a stage trick, but through all these walls... it must be a spell, right? Without a visual cue to scan, he couldn't be sure. "I've got a few of those myself."

"A bold boy bodes badly before beauty, Mr. Newman... but answer mine, and perhaps I'll humor yours."

John nodded, his eyebrow raised as he looked about for any sign of magic to crush with his Eye.

"The Warden of the Golden Rose." John stiffened at that. "I was just about to welcome her to my home when she disappeared! Poof, without a trace! Would you know how she did so?"

John knew exactly how... but he was at a loss at how to turn this around. "Would you be surprised to learn that I'm not sure?"

"You're cute, child, but only so far-"

"She's with the Order," John added, "and I'm told they keep magical items for safekeeping from the population at large. If I had to guess, I'd assume she had something that let her do that." She allowed him a pregnant pause, and he continued to flick his eyes across the various halls for any sign of her.

"You've learned spatial magic."

John tensed again at the sudden accusation. Tricia had used similar language about his teleporting and portals; the jig was up if Juniluny figured out enough about that. "A bit." She's not going to come out. John thought through other ways to get to her, including the lab, including the small platoon of girls he left there--they were now taking turns attacking the blast doors--and thought of some way to get the elevator working despite its lack of obvious mechanisms or-

Wait a minute...

John opened a tunnel in the lab that faced the elevator doors... both of which were glass decorated with lines and bars of gold. The glass was thick, and the elevator shaft dark and unlit, but he could still make out the inner-walls of the chute. I can 'port anywhere I've seen... and I know it doesn't work through photos or videos, but have I ever tried it through glass...? John focused on the elevator's shaft... and a new tunnel opened against his eye and inside the lifeless gray tube. His urge to cheer was muted as his eye was irritated by metallic dust inside the tube, but he couldn't afford to flinch or stop now. His next tunnel finished his descent towards the elevator roof below.

"Did you think I wouldn't know that you saved the Warden, hmm?" She was bluffing; despite hearing only her voice, John could now detect even this basic fib.

"She's safe?!" He tried to sound overly excited and prayed his crappy ability to lie could pass muster with the help of his magical footwear. His vision came to the roof of the elevator; to his disappointment, he found it was perfectly sealed, fully metallic, and offered no gaps through which he might peek and open a new path to his enemy. Damn it... what now?! Something else about the elevator bothered him, however, and it felt important. He struggled to place it.

"You're a piss poor peddler of plain perjury, pissant," she melodically taunted, "so I'll just ask how you did it as it is apparent that you somehow were involved."

His worry had him stare uselessly at the elevator for more seconds than was productive... until it dawned on him what else was "off" about it: despite years of shooters teaching him otherwise, there were no apparent cords, counterweights, or pulleys. He moved the tunnel to face the walls of the shaft and discovered why.

Magi-magnetic Rail: this strip of enchanted mithril can smoothly move an object along its length based on binary instructions received via particular magical device inputs. Acceptable inputs are determined on being forged. Carrying capacity: 30,000 pounds.

The rails were the same gray color as the rest of the shaft and barely gripped a protruding bit of the elevator proper. The elevator itself had no sign of magic, but each of the rails shined with energy.

"Don't be coy or quiet with me, Newman... or else I'll get frustrated!" she whined. "If you do that, I'll have to go back to my lab and play with one of the new toys I found..."

Kim's malformed body flashed in John's mind.

John covered his left eye as if in stress... and opened a tunnel to shine his Eye of the King upon the rail. Even as his plot hatched, however, John's anger crackled in his voice. "What did you do to her?"

Sovereignty: Eye of the King suppresses the Magi-magnetic Rail.

Juniluny froze... and her eyes went wide before she hissed in response, "I never said it was a 'her'-!"

The tunnel flipped. The suppression of the first rail began to falter, but not before the other joined it.

Sovereignty: Eye of the King suppresses the Magi-magnetic Rail.

He... knows, somehow. No matter how he found out, it was at the top floor... which means he could see or reach up there, which means-

The elevator groaned and then jolted down a full foot. Juniluny spun to watch through the gilded doors of the exit as the steel of her elevator screamed on the rest of its way down. The rails struggled to slow its descent; their failure was punctuated by the thundering crunch of the metal box that was Juniluny's only means of a safe escape. Her head slowly shook as she took a step towards the unprecedented failure of her creation... and she stopped as a puff of dust and ruin issued out from the edges of the door.

Her confusion was redirected when she spotted some tiny speck flickering into existence inside the tube. It wasn't a mere particle amid the rising smoke, and her eyes narrowed at the curious dot. It took her as long as it existed to realize that an eye was staring back at her.

The tiny portal winked out of existence. A presence suddenly hung over her; the air moved as if suddenly occupied. A cold sweat trickled down her naked spine as she felt a firm hand grip her shoulder from behind. Wide-eyed, she looked up.