I stood on top of a rise and looked down into the valley before me. All I saw were countless walls, a few bridges, and even a couple buildings thrown in for good measure, and all connected at random. The whole mess of structures looked chaotic and confusing.

“It’s a maze,” Ace said.

“A labyrinth,” Olivia corrected him. “Inside the Labyrinth.”

“A-mazing,” Turtle joked.

Ace grinned at that and added, “It’s mazeception.”

I grunted in response and told them, “You’ve lost me with that wrong way thinking.”

Everyone chuckled at that, even when they didn’t find it particularly funny. That was a nice little distraction from the apprehension we all felt.

“No way to go around it,” Maya commented. “Our path goes right into that opening.”

“What are the odds that the mirror ball thing will lead us straight through the maze?” Ace asked.

I snorted in response. “Maybe, but I wouldn’t count on it.”

“This is the longest delve I’ve ever been on,” Bunny said with an exasperated sigh. “And you all are making it feel even longer.”

“This is definitely the deepest I’ve ever gone into the Labyrinth,” Turtle admitted with a worried look. “By far.”

“This is the deepest any of us has ever been,” Olivia added with a nod of agreement.

I looked at the others, all of whom were hesitating. None of us was eager to go into that labyrinth since there would be no clear path forward and we were bound to get lost. That would be a huge pain in the ass, made even worse by the fact that it would probably be full of monsters, and this would only put us even further behind our enemies.

The one good thing was that after that safe zone with the magic water fountain, we were all fully healed in and great shape. All of my aches and pains were gone, including the few welts I had from bugs who’d managed to bite me before they succumbed to the blessing. That fountain had even healed Bunny’s broken arm, much to her delight.

“Let’s get going,” Maya suggested before taking the first steps down that path that led straight to the entrance of the maze. “We aren’t going to solve this thing by standing around.”

We made our way down the sloping path until we dame to the edge of the maze. It was a massive stone wall that blocked our path, going at least thirty feet high and stretching out in both directions. The only opening was an arched doorway in front of us, one with no doors installed. It was inviting yet foreboding at the same time.

I stood at the doorway just long enough to check my mirror ball and confirm that it indicated that we needed to go through. Then, I shrugged and did just that.

Once I was inside, I looked around. Stone walls and floors, with three different paths we could start from. I glanced back, only to pause at the sight of a blank wall behind me. The doorway was entirely gone.

“Well, that’s just creepy,” Bunny said as she glared at the wall where the doorway had been.

Ace put his hand against the wall then shook his head. “I guess there’s no going back.”

“It isn’t like we were going to turn back anyway,” I pointed out. I held up my mirror ball again. “This thing says the left path, so…”

“At least we have something to help us navigate this place,” Turtle said with a groan.

There was a little grumbling before we continued, taking the left path as the mirror ball indicated. There was a long hallway with several side paths that we could have taken, but we continued going straight ahead for a distance.

Then the ground suddenly dropped open beneath Turtle and he began to fall. Maya immediately grabbed him and pulled him back, just as she’d done before.

I looked down at the spot where Turtle had nearly fallen and saw a trap door that had dropped open, revealing a pit down below. The pit appeared to be about seven feet deep, though the bottom had numerous metal spikes.

“A trap,” Bunny said, looking around with a worried look.

“It’s like one of those damn ant pits again,” Turtle grumbled.

“Good thing you didn’t fall for it this time,” Ace weakly joked.

“Traps,” Maya muttered. “This place keeps getting more dangerous.”

Bunny let out a sigh, then said, “Let me take the lead on this one. I can check for traps.”

Her horned rabbits spread out across the corridor and began moving forward, staggering their distance a bit so that they weren’t all in a single row. I nodded at that since that was smarter than having them all get hit at the same time if they did set something off.

“They’re pretty light,” I pointed out thoughtfully. “Traps might have a weight requirement, so we should be careful even if they don’t find anything.”

“Good point,” Bunny agreed.

“I can help with that,” Maya said, moving forward ahead of the rest of us but still staying behind the horned rabbits. She began poking at the path ahead with the butt of her spear. “This spot seems a little off. We should avoid it.”

“No arguments from me,” Olivia agreed.

A few minutes later, one of the rabbits triggered something. A spear shot out of a small hole in one wall and slammed into the opposite wall, going over the rabbits entirely. The rabbits, seemingly unaware of the trap they triggered, continued advancing forward.

“Watch out for this spot,” Maya said, pointing to the pavement stone that had triggered the trap.

We soon lost the first rabbit guide as an explosion of fire roasted the thing. A minute later, another dropped into a dark pit when the ground beneath it crumbled to dust. The two remaining horned rabbits continued testing our path, seemingly unconcerned about following the examples of their siblings.

Bunny carefully pointed out several of the traps that had been missed by rabbits and stalker alike. Her high perception was proving itself useful yet again.

My own perception was noticeably less than Bunny’s, but I still paid close attention to our surroundings. I spotted a couple of the traps that we didn’t trigger, but if we had been relying solely on me, we would have walked right into a few more.

I looked around, my eyes settling on Sir Fluff, who was the last remaining rabbit. He showed no signs of marching ahead into the traps. Instead, he waited patiently by Bunny’s side while she summoned three new horned rabbits to replace the ones who’d sacrificed themselves for our safety.

“What the hell is that?” Ace abruptly asked.

He pointed down the hall where a creature had just emerged from around a corner. It was round, about the size and shape of a beach ball, but it seemed to be made of black metal. It had spikes jutting out in every direction, and the only thing that kept me from simply thinking that it was just a spiked metal ball, was the fact that it had two stumpy legs coming out from the bottom.

The spikey ball creature ran straight towards us, moving slowly enough that Turtle had time to get in front of it to block its path. However, as soon as the monster ran into Turtle’s shield, it exploded. Turtle was sent flying back where he collided into Ace.

“Crap,” I snarled, tensing up with my hammer ready.

I noticed that when the monster had exploded, those spikes had been thrown out like shrapnel and a couple of them were now embedded into the stone wall. Nobody had been hit by one of the spikes, but we were all a bit stunned.

“Are you okay?” I asked Turtle.

“Just a little shaken,” the bulwark admitted. “Good thing I activated my ability beforehand…”

“It looks like your shield took quite a beating too,” Bunny pointed out.

Turtle looked at the front of his shield, which was now dented and badly scratched. It had a large char mark on it as well, which reminded me that Ace had said that shield would be resistant to fire and heat damage.

“What was that thing?” Olivia asked with a deep scowl.

“I don’t know,” I answered with a shrug. “A porcubomb?”

“Porcubomb,” Ace responded with a chuckle. “I like it. At least, I like the name.”

“Well, you should be happy then,” Bunny pointed out. “Because we have more of them.”

I saw more porcubombs emerging into our hall, coming from around corners. There where three of them, all slowly waddling towards us.

“Fuck those bastards,” Ace exclaimed as he held up his scepters and fired.

The first blast missed entirely, but his second attack hit one of the monsters. It immediately exploded, sending spikes flying in every direction. A glowing wall of energy suddenly appeared in front of us, blocking a spike that would have hit Bunny and another that probably would have just gone into a wall.

“I like this new force wall ability,” Olivia commented, looking quite pleased with herself.

“Me too,” Bunny quickly agreed. “I’m glad you picked it.”

“I can’t wait for my next ability,” Ace said.

Maya snorted. “I still only have the one ability.”

“That will change soon enough,” Bunny reminded her. “I think you’re a little overdue for your second ability.”

“Yeah,” Turtle agreed. “You should be getting that at any time.”

“That is good to know,” Maya responded as she pointed at the two remaining porcubombs. “But that doesn’t do much good against these things. I’m not about to get close enough to take one of those things down. Not when they explode.” Then she paused to consider, “Maybe if I throw my spear…”

“Leave them to me,” Ace said, holding out his scepters and firing both of them.

One more of the porcubombs exploded, and once again, Olivia’s force wall kept anyone from being hit by the spike shrapnel. Then she stepped to the side, out from behind her force wall and fired an arcane blast, one which hit the last of the porcubombs. She immediately ducked back behind cover as it exploded.

“I guess that’s all of them,” Ace said.

“For now,” I said with a scowl. “Those things are a damn pain the ass.”

This maze was obviously more about trying to kill us with traps than with monsters, but it clearly hadn’t forgotten about them either. And now that the local monsters had made their appearance, I suspected that we’d be seeing more of them soon.

“Let’s get out of this damn maze while we still can,” I said, wanting to clear out before more of those exploding bastards showed up.

“I second that,” Turtle agreed.

But in spite of our desire to leave, there was still the fact that we were surrounded by traps and none of us wanted to run straight into one of those. Instead, it was much safer to leave that to the rabbits.

We continued moving forward, slowly winding our way through the maze of traps and being careful not to walk into them. There were a couple more porcubombs, but we’d already figured out the trick of dealing with them. Blast them from a distance so that they explode, while using our shields to protect us from the force and shrapnel.

Then, Maya turned a corner and abruptly stopped. Turtle stepped right behind her, looked around the corner, and exclaimed, “Oh shit.”

“What?” I asked.

I peeked around the corner as well and immediately gasped, “Crap.”

There was another porcubomb, standing in the middle of the path up ahead of us. However, this one was much larger than any of the previous monsters. The previous porcubombs had only been about three feet tall, including the height of their spikes. This one was nearly eight feet tall and wide enough that it took up nearly the entire width of the path.

“Wow,” Ace commented. “That is one big spikey ball.”

Ace raised his scepter to blast the monster, but I immediately stopped him. “Don’t,” I warned him sharply. “If that thing’s explosive load has increased as much as its size…”

“Big BOOM,” Maya commented wryly. She used her hands to indicate an explosion going off. “Too big.”

“Exactly,” I agreed, giving the monster a wary look.

Olivia scowled and admitted, “I’m not sure my force wall could handle something like that.”

I nodded, since that was exactly what I was thinking. “If we’re going to take that one down, we’ll need a bit more distance and a solid spot to bunker down.”

I looked around, taking in our current location. We were right at the T of an intersection, so we could pull back around the corner and buy a little distance. One of us would have to get a solid ranged hit in, and could then run for cover. One person would have to take the big risk.

“Assuming it blows up as easily as the others did,” Bunny mused thoughtfully. “I might be able to send my guys after him.”

“That would let the rest of us get some cover,” Maya agreed.

I looked at the rabbits. There were currently two horned rabbits remaining, along with Sir Fluff. Sir Fluff didn’t seem the least bit bothered by the plan, even if it meant sacrificing himself to take down the monster. Then again, he and his smaller brethren could be brought back afterwards.

“Hey,” Ace suddenly exclaimed, backing up with a worried look. “It’s coming towards us.”

The giant porcubomb, which had previously just been standing still, was indeed coming towards us. It moved slowly, thanks to its comparatively short and stubby legs, but it was definitely moving. I didn’t know whether it had seen us, or if it was moving for some other reason. What I did know, was that we’d have to go back and lose it in the maze.

“Maybe we can get it to go down one of the other paths,” I thought aloud. “Maybe we can lure it…”

Just then, there was the loud ‘click’ as the porcubomb stepped onto a pressure plate and activated another trap. A powerful burst of flame suddenly shot out of the wall on either side of the monster, hitting it from both sides at once. A moment later, it exploded.

A deafening ‘BOOM’ ran out while the entire world suddenly shook. I dove for cover, grabbing Bunny and dragging her to the ground with me since she was the closest.

Olivia threw up a force wall, but one of the shrapnel spikes hit it and shattered the magic barrier as though it had been made of cheap glass. By some miracle, the spine smashed into a wall behind us without actually hitting anyone.

I quickly scrambled back to my feet, noticing that during the chaos, Ace had been thrown down the side corridor. And though he was shaken, he was still alive and didn’t seem to be too badly hurt.

“What the fuck?” Ace grunted as he struggled to get to his feet.

I stared at Ace, then at the walls around us, which were now covered in rapidly spreading cracks. The explosion had shattered the structure of the maze itself, and just a moment after I noticed this, it all began to fall apart.

“LOOK OUT!” Bunny yelled at Ace as a large section of wall collapsed inward towards him.

“ACE!” Turtle cried out.

The entire corridor that Ace was in was suddenly filled with a huge pile of crumbled wall that blocked the entire path. A thick cloud of dust and debris filled the air, making it even harder to see anything at all. However, from what little I could see, there was no longer any visible sign of the artificer.

“Damn it,” I snarled, moving towards the wreckage, hoping that I could see some sign of Ace.

More walls were crumbling around us. The cracking sounds continued, echoing down the hallways, though I barely heard them since my ears were still ringing from the blast.

Turtle threw up his shield and blocked a chunk of stone that fell almost on top of him, protecting Olivia in the process. He winced at the impact but didn’t lower his shield.

Another chunk of wall collapsed inward, but Maya grabbed Bunny’s shoulder and pulled her back, just in time to save her. Sir Fluff wasn’t nearly as quick and was crushed by the falling wall.

The ground suddenly shifted beneath me and I realized that the walls weren’t the only part of the structure that was crumbling. I caught a quick look at the ground near where the giant porcubomb had been standing. The ground was actually gone, and more of the stone floor crumbled away and vanished into the darkness beneath.

“Oh crap,” I whispered, my eyes going wide as I saw the spreading collapse. “RUN!”

I barely made it two more steps before the floor completely dropped out from beneath me, and I began to fall with it.