Preparation

They did not hear an answer right away. Thinking that their neighbor was contemplating, Kyren and Nora kept silent, but their hearts were loud, thumping with nervousness and anticipation.

Then,

"Both of you, come and stand in front of the hole, let me see you," The voice requested.

Not completely trusting the person next door, both Kyren and Nora were reluctant to follow that instruction. Perhaps sensing their hesitation, the voice quickened its pace, "Hand, just show me your hand is fine."

Nora was about to step up, but Kyren held her back by the shoulder. He put his hand on the wall, palm facing the hole. His eyes closed, face grimacing, bracing himself for whatever about to come, but nothing happened.

"Next, the girl," their neighbor called with a long sign. Kyren could hear the disappointment, but kept it to himself.

Not long after Nora did the same action, a laughter erupted, startling the two of them, "Good, very good. You two want to cooperate? Fine, let's cooperate. I will get the two of you out of here."

The voice suddenly turned serious, "But you have to do me a favor, and the two of you will be doing most of the work, agree?"

There was no free lunch in this world. The fact that there was a condition helped lessen their doubt.

"Fine. What is the favor?" Kyren asked.

The voice became a tad louder, seemingly more spirited than before, "Let's talk about that later. Now, I will teach you how to deal with the locks and doors first. For this part, only the girl can do it."

Kyren and Nora both tilted their heads, a question mark floating above their heads, but in the end, it was not an unreasonable request. Nora took over, "That's fine. Then tell me, how do we get out?"

They heard a deep chortle, followed by an irrelevant question, "Before that, first tell me, do you have a candle in your room?"

Nora looked at the only source of light in the dark cell, "Yes, why?"

"How long do you think it has been burning?" The voice asked, arousing curiosity.

Only then did the anomaly was noticed. Kyren had not been here for long, but it had been almost one whole day since Nora was locked up. Not once was the candle replaced, yet the short stick of wax was still of the same height.

At closer look, he noticed a bizarre phenomenon. The flame was dancing with vigor, melting the wax at the base of the wick into a small bowl, holding a clear liquid. The moment the liquid overflowed and a drop of wax trickled down, it stopped, at the same time the flame also froze. The droplet then started to crawl back up into the tiny bowl, the flame began to move with reversed motions. The more he observed, the more Kyren was convinced the candle was being repeatedly played backward like a video, which made no sense.

The voice explained, "You can call it a spell. The candle is trapped inside a time loop as long as the spell is still in operation. Magic, I assume, is the word that you might be more familiar with."

Kyren twisted his face as if having eaten some bad food, then pinched his cheek until it was swollen. It was not a dream. Over and over again, the candle burnt and unburnt.

"This is ridiculous," he thought out loud unintentionally, with a voice that was no longer a whisper.

Compared to him, Nora expressed only curiosity, "You're saying that there's magic in this candle? Are you a magician?"

The voice chuckled, "There is indeed such a term to call people like me. People like me are closer than you think, we are just very good at hiding. The owner of this prison is also a magician, a far more powerful one than I am. But I have managed to figure out the imprisonment spell imbued on the door. As long as the spell is broken, the door won't be a problem."

Meanwhile, Kyren was feeling dizzy. The random dots started to connect in his mind. The monsters, the temple, recent cases of missing in town, a prison full of kidnapped victims, magicians. A whole world, different from what he had always known, opened in front of his own eyes. He took a seat, rubbing his eyes, feeling lightheaded.

"Are you okay?" Nora asked lightly, patting his back in concern. The boy could only wave as an answer, unable to make a sound. The burning acid was making its way up his throat, which took him effort to force down.

He sat still, waiting for his stomach to settle, before asking, "Why can my friend learn magic but I can't?"

The neighbor snickered, "I never said that you can't, just that I will only teach the little girl. Your affinity is lower than that of a newborn moon rat, it will be ages before you can even form a single spell."

Despite not knowing what a moon rat was, Kyren was well aware that he was not being complimented. With a sore mood, he shut his mouth. Nora patted his back again, comforting, but the smirk slowly formed on her face. Clicking his tongue, Kyren flicked her hand away. Nora was about to burst into laughter, but restrained in time, and started wheezing with one hand on her mouth, the other hugging her stomach. Her feet wobbled and got tangled with each other and the girl fell on her butt.

Ignoring the girl, the voice said through the hole, "There is something else for you to do. This is the map of the dungeon. I have marked the escape route and danger zones. The girl will be occupied by her role, so it will be your responsibility to be the navigator."

A scrolled-up piece of skin, small enough to fit through the hole, was passed to him. It was rough to the touch, had dark spots so dense it took up half of the surface area, and folds so tough it could not be smoothened no matter how hard Kyren picked on it. The craftsmanship was horribly poor, but given the circumstances, it might be of the best quality possible. Kyren refused to ask where the material came from.

The parchment was spread out to be a hand-drawn map using black lines as thick as the tip of finger. At the first glance, Kyren thought he was looking at a maze, but then he realized that the structure consisted of different areas, each having a distinct pattern. There were places with straight hallways that stretched for hundreds of meters, some having a junction every dozen meters, others filled with rooms and curved paths.

A red line connected a cell at the bottom of the map, which he presumed was their current location, to a door on the top edge. Apart from the highlighted escape route, there were various other symbols that represented danger levels. A careful observation revealed that the areas marked as one strike, two strikes, or three strikes. The danger level increased along with the number of strikes. In addition, Kyron also saw a few notes that depicted the functions of some rooms and hallways. It was undoubtedly a crystallization of hard-work and sacrifice after eighteen failed escape attempts.

While most of the rooms in the one-strike areas were carefully described, the two-strike zones were filled with unexplored chambers, represented by question marks, except for a few which were noted with short sentences. There was only one area marked three-strike. Nothing was drawn on this part of the map, except for a giant question mark.

Kyren started to study the map, memorizing and mapping other possible paths in his head. The red line was the shortest route, but it required crossing one two-strike and three one-strike zones. There would definitely be unforeseen variables along the way. He wanted to be ready for every possible scenario.

After managing to stop her laughter, Nora started to study magic, sitting near the hole, nodding at everything heard. Kyren was focusing on his own task and could not discern what was being taught.

Perhaps a few hours had gone by, but none of them complained about sleepiness or hunger. During this time, Nora had started to practice with her eyes closed, sitting with her legs crossed, concentrating. Seeing how her eyebrows knitted in frustration, lower lip unconsciously bitten, it looked like she still had not been successful yet.

To avoid running into the guards on its way in, the best time to start the plan was when the ghoul was leaving, which meant they had to wait until it came back. There was an observed cycle which spanned from 24 hours to 2 days. The time between the visits of the ghoul always fell within this period, either to drop in new prisoners, take away a victim, or just wandering around. At the earliest, they had a few hours left, and at the lastest, more than a day.

It was three hours later that Nora finally succeeded in constructing a spell, and around the same time, Kyron also finished studying the map. During spare time, the two of them were taught about monsters they would likely encounter, as well as a few notable locations, on their way out.

While they were ready, in the end the right moment only came half a day later. Dust fell from the ceiling. Tiny waves formed on the surface of melted wax. The entire cell shook, each tremor about two seconds apart from the next. The footsteps echoed in the close space. Immediately, crying, howling, praying, the sound of banging on the doors rang across the hallway. Madness ensued with the coming of the ghoul.