The Wandering Knight's Labyrinth
'Middle Knight, huh. So this is an Aura-attribute C-rank Rift.'
I murmured to myself as I watched the suits of armor sprawled across the floor.
C-rank was the lowest grade a Rift could be. Of course, that was no reason to relax—a Rift was a Rift, even a C-rank one.
Rifts were a massive pain in the ass for two main reasons.
The first was stat adjustment. When a player entered a Rift, whichever stat countered the Rift's attribute got nerfed. In an Aura-attribute rift, for example, black magic—the direct counter to Aura—would be lowered. Conversely, the wraiths and anomalies inside got their stats buffed, and the higher the Rift's grade, the harsher the adjustment became. That was why Rifts were such brutal affairs.
Except—
I glanced down at my hand. The distinctly unsettling breath of black magic felt closer at hand than it should have.
'My black magic stat got buffed.'
It wasn't a large boost, only a marginal one, but the important thing was that it wasn't a debuff. And since my stats were already capped at their absolute limit, even a marginal boost made a meaningful difference.
The reason a stat that should have been nerfed was buffed instead was obvious.
'The Luck stat kicked in.'
The effect of the Luck points I'd invested from my tutorial reward was unmistakable. Mind you, this was only possible because it was a C-rank Rift—blocking the nerf in higher-tier Rifts would require pumping even more into Luck.
Anyway, the second reason Rifts were such a pain was finding the Anomaly. To clear a Rift, you had to deal with its Anomaly, and the problem was that Anomalies hid. Rifts came in all varieties—some were mazes like this one, while others were entirely different worlds altogether, like ancient cities or floating gardens. Because of that, the rules for locating the Anomaly differed from Rift to Rift, which made the hunt anything but easy.
And a Rift's difficulty climbed rapidly the longer it stayed open. It might be C-rank right now, but give it a little time and it would shoot all the way up to A-rank. The key was how fast you could track down the Anomaly.
Of course, that wasn't much of a concern at the moment.
'Because I have Evangeline.'
Evangeline was a Rift guide—a human compass. With her around, there was no such thing as failing to find an Anomaly.
'So doesn't that solve everything?'
The first problem, stat adjustment, was handled by my Luck stat. The second, finding the Anomaly, was covered by Evangeline. Both obstacles were dealt with.
'This might even be speedrunnable.'
Just then, Milo strode over. He'd apparently had a rough time of it in the interim—his cheeks were flushed red.
"D-did you take my guard baton?"
Milo asked, stammering. I gave a light nod.
"Picked it up earlier."
"Why— no, whatever, hand it over. Quick. We need to send the signal so the rescue team can—"
"Not necessary."
"...What?"
"I am the rescue team."
"You're actually insane..."
I pointed at the armor strewn across the floor—the still-warm wraiths I'd just put down. Milo blinked at them, dumbstruck.
"I'm losing my mind here—"
Milo dragged a hand down his face, apparently at a loss for words.
"Besides, if we send the signal, these students won't exactly come out of it unscathed."
I gestured toward Andy and Evangeline. Milo's eyes went rigid.
"Us?"
"The Central Library is strictly off-limits. They broke in without authorization and triggered a Rift. That's grounds for demerits at minimum—and suspension is well within the rules."
"S-suspension?!"
Andy's and Evangeline's eyes went round. Milo, too, whipped his head around to stare at me in shock.
Evangeline rushed forward and shielded Andy with her body.
"Andy was dragged here by me! Andy did nothing wrong!"
she declared, face frozen stiff. Andy nodded along eagerly.
At that, Milo cleared his throat.
"Ahem! Still, that'd be way too harsh. They just finished the entrance ceremony—brand-new students."
"That's right! Have a heart, they're fresh little freshmen!"
Evangeline shouted with all the confidence in the world. I nodded as if conceding the point.
"Then we'll have to close the Rift as fast as possible, before anyone outside catches wind of it. A speedrun it is."
"Speedrun? What's that?"
"Closing the Rift as quickly as we can. Evangeline—read the translucent window up ahead."
"How am I supposed to—"
Evangeline fumbled, flustered. Just as I had my quest window, Evangeline could see a quest window inside a Rift. And unlike my own quest window—which was embarrassingly flimsy for the name—hers was extraordinarily useful. It told her everything from the Anomaly's type and name down to the Rift's defining traits.
"Read it."
I ordered curtly. Perhaps my earlier warning had done its job, because Evangeline, who would normally have snapped back with 'Why me?', answered without a fuss.
"It says the target is a wandering knight named Von Derk! The Rift's attribute is Aura! Grade C!"
A C-rank Rift, as expected. The problem was the keyword 'wandering.'
Wandering was a troublesome keyword. Anomalies tagged with it never stayed in one place—they were constantly on the move. In a Rift where the Anomaly had to be dealt with as fast as possible, 'wandering' was a death sentence.
Still, it didn't matter right now.
Because I had Evangeline.
"Evangeline. Lead the way."
"...Me?"
"Her?"
Evangeline and Andy reacted at the same time. I nodded lightly.
"Just walk wherever your instincts pull you."
"Ah. Instincts—got it."
Evangeline pressed both index fingers to her temples. In the game, this pose had been known as the 'Evangeline Radar.'
Never thought I'd witness that ridiculous spectacle in the flesh.
"Okay! Got the signal, loud and clear! Whoosh whoosh!"
Evangeline set off at a brisk clip. Her back radiated not a shred of trustworthiness.
"Is this for real?"
Andy asked in a voice that sounded like he was forcibly holding something in.
Regrettably, it was.
The role of an elite guard who discovers a Rift was a single one: enter the Rift, determine its attribute, and fire off a signal flare.
Elite guards were scouts. Scouts who gambled with their own lives. Once an elite guard risked their neck to send the signal, the Academy assembled a Rift response team of professors and dispatched it.
There was a reason the saying existed: if you find a Rift, just run and quit your job.
And here was Grave, claiming he would close such a Rift with his own hands. As fast as possible, no less.
It was lunacy.
Except the one saying it was Grave himself. The same Grave who had cut down four Middle Knights in an instant—the four that Milo had struggled so hard against.
'What the hell did this guy even do for a living?'
Milo muttered to himself as he guarded Evangeline and Andy's flanks. Cold sweat was soaking down his back.
The actual students, meanwhile, were completely at ease.
"Hmm-hmm! This way! The signal just pinged!"
"You said 'whoosh' last time!"
Evangeline and Andy bickered as they walked, trading jabs. There wasn't the faintest trace of tension anywhere—not even a whiff of it. The atmosphere was less 'Rift' and more 'strolling down an Academy hallway.'
"More of them! Clean-up on aisle five, please!"
Evangeline pointed at five newly appeared knights.
Clear up five Middle Knights, please. A bizarre way to put it—but Grave nodded without batting an eye.
Black chains lashed out at the knights. Not once had any of them managed to block the chains. They skewered the knights effortlessly—a victory so hollow it was almost anticlimactic.
That was why Grave and his group could afford to be so relaxed.
'Is this... right?'
They said Rifts were hell. Professors had actually died inside them. Everything Milo thought he knew about Rifts felt like it was being systematically dismantled.
How long had they been walking—
"Haven't we been here before?"
Andy said, pointing at the floor. Four suits of dark-red armor lay collapsed there.
"These are the knights we took down earlier. Did they just... respawn where they started?"
"Th-that does seem like it?"
"It does seem like it?!"
"Hehe."
Evangeline gave an awkward laugh.
The real problem came next.
Thud. Clank. That same bone-chilling footstep echoed through the maze again—and the problem was that it echoed from every direction at once. Knights in horrific guise came marching out of every corridor around them.
There were at least twenty. The cold light of their auras lit up the dark maze.
Faced with that absurd number, even Evangeline—who had been brimming with confidence this whole time—went pale.
Then Grave placed a hand on her shoulder.
"You will not be wrong, in a Rift. Trust yourself."
His voice was firm, without a trace of doubt. Almost miraculously certain.
The strange thing was that Grave's face looked distinctly sour about it. He was holding Evangeline's shoulder with only his fingertips, too—as if he didn't want to touch her.
Still, thanks to that, Evangeline rallied from her dejection and puffed right back up.
"Hmph, naturally! I am Queen Evangeline!"
Her chin and shoulders rose triumphantly.
The dark-red knights advanced in lockstep. More than twenty enemies closing in from all sides bore down on them like a vice—the pressure dried Milo's throat to leather.
He clenched his fists, readying himself to fight—
and Grave said, in a voice of utter indifference:
"Don't get in the way."
In the way? Seriously—
In that instant, black chains scattered in every direction. They were so fast the eye could barely follow. The knights flared their auras to block them, but the chains didn't bounce off—they coiled around the auras like serpents. The knights tried to shake them loose, but by then the chains had already wrapped tight.
A horrible miasma rolled off the chains. A curse so vicious Milo could feel it from a distance. Slowed by the curse, the knights could no longer hold the chains back.
The chains pierced them, light as a whisper.
The enemy count had grown, but the result was no different from before. The only thing that changed was the number of knights sprawled on the floor.
"Whoa! Boss, you're incredible!"
"Of course he is! It's obvious! Black magic has the elemental advantage over Aura!"
Evangeline retorted sharply.
She wasn't wrong. Black magic held an absolute elemental superiority over Aura. It wasn't for nothing that black mages were called a knight's natural predator.
But there were limits to everything.
Those knights were no ordinary Middle Knights. Milo could say so with certainty, because he'd fought them himself. This wasn't a simple matter of elemental counters.
Grave was simply, incomprehensibly strong.
'What the hell was this guy doing before he got here—'
Milo swallowed dryly, thinking it all over again.
Grave's expression never changed. At this level of power, he didn't even look entertained.
Why would someone that strong be working as a guard?
Milo couldn't make heads or tails of it.
"Evangeline, don't stop walking."
"I-I was walking!"
This time even Evangeline stumbled slightly.
A little while later, a rough, jagged instrument sound drifted in from somewhere ahead. It was faint—but the surrounding silence was so absolute that it rang out strangely, unmistakably clear.
"Found him."
Grave stepped forward, the corners of his mouth pulled up high. He looked genuinely pleased.
Just then, someone tapped Milo on the shoulder. It was Evangeline.
"You got stuck with a useless senior, huh! Must be rough!"
Milo couldn't bring himself to answer.
I'm the senior. And technically her junior, at that.
Milo said nothing.