"Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!"
Zenkhald's loud, rolling laughter echoed across the first floor of Rezar's Cave.
He stood right at the entrance. His black hair was carelessly disheveled, and covering his eyes were some thick, dark "adventurer's goggles" that completely hid his gaze. In his hands, he held rolled-up parchments containing the official order from the Council. With ostentatious disdain, he leafed through them and immediately tossed them over his shoulder without even finishing reading.
Today, about 680 mages had gathered on the first floor of the cave. Almost all available students and mentors came here simply for the sake of looking at a Grandmaster. The chance to see one presented itself rarely.
"HA-HA-HA-HA! I don't understand half of these pretentious words written here!" Zenkhald shouted cheerfully and incredibly energetically, tossing aside the last sheet. "But one thing is clear! I was given a great, historic mission: TO DESTROY THIS CAVE AND ALL ITS CREATURES!"
He put his hands on his hips. "It also says here that some twenty of the strongest and most talented students will accompany me on this epic campaign. But... I never found them! I don't see a single talent point-blank!"
The mentioned elite twenty students had been standing directly in front of him this entire time.
A young man and a girl stepped out of the crowd indignantly. "Greetings, Grandmaster. It is us. Our group will accompany you," the girl pronounced, trying to sound as respectful as possible. "My name is Mara. And his is Torlin. Allow me to introduce you to the rest..."
"Yes, yes, yes!" Zenkhald waved her off carelessly, not letting her finish. "There was some name in the letter starting with an 'M', and another with a 'T'. But I safely skipped that unnecessary information."
He's way too arrogant, Mara thought irritably. I'm actually the best in my year! What kind of disregard is this?
I've certainly heard rumors about this Grandmaster, Torlin mused grimly. But he's clearly out of his mind. He doesn't deserve this title.
Zenkhald, meanwhile, continued: "So here's the deal! I myself came to you, and you didn't even bring a gift? Where is the respect for me?"
"We did bring things, Grandmaster," Mara countered, pointing to a pile of backpacks behind her squad. "As you can see, we have five full bags of the best gear, potions, and provisions. Everything is calculated for four weeks of survival."
"FOUR WEEKS?!" Zenkhald was genuinely indignant. "WHAT, ARE YOU PLANNING TO LIVE IN THERE?!"
He shoved his hand into his robe and pulled out a small, ticking mechanical timer in black. He turned the dial and set the time: three hours and approximately twenty minutes.
Mara and Torlin, seeing this, exchanged bewildered looks. "You are planning to clear the floors in three hours?" Torlin clarified cautiously.
"NO WAY!" Zenkhald smiled joyfully. "I will clear the ENTIRE cave in exactly three hours! And if I take any longer—then shame on me."
"Then what are the extra twenty minutes for?" Mara didn't understand.
"The twenty minutes are needed so that all of you have time to praise me and express your admiration!"
Mara and Torlin whispered quietly, just moving their lips: — He's definitely lost his mind. — Seems so.
"LISTEN HERE!" Zenkhald suddenly yelled so loudly that absolutely all 680 people on the floor could hear him. He poked his finger directly at the elite twenty. "I don't believe in you! You are terrible! You are mediocrities! You are untalented absurdity and a waste of air! You won't be able to do anything and you know nothing! You will fail!"
The Academy's twenty best students froze with their mouths open.
"I look at you and see nothing but 'support.' And do you know what support should do? Your great mission, the goal of your entire pathetic existence for today—is to run after me and loudly praise how cool I am!"
Zenkhald adjusted his goggles. "I'll say it right now: I will move fast. I won't even look out for you. I'm sure most of you will simply get lost along the way, but I won't even turn around. I understand that it's hard for weaklings. Therefore, leave right now! If you're afraid—don't try to overcome your fear, it is completely right! Your story ends where I begin. Lower your heads! You haven't achieved anything in this life yet, and you won't achieve anything!"
The twenty students, instead of lowering their heads, threw them up with such anger that the air sparked. Mara and Torlin, the best in their years, stepped forward.
"Grandmaster, this is outrageous and insulting!" Mara began, her eyes flashing. "We all sweat here for days on end! Each of us has our own goal, a reason why we want to become strong! You don't even know what we've been through to stand here, and you are just insulting us! BUT WE..."
"Cry about it, cry about it," Zenkhald smirked mockingly.
Torlin couldn't take it. He stepped forward threateningly, ending up almost chest-to-chest with the Grandmaster, looming over him with his entire imposing build: "You are crossing the line..."
Thump! Torlin blinked. Mara blinked. Zenkhald vanished. And in the next second, Torlin felt a weight. Zenkhald was already standing with his feet right on his broad shoulders, swaying lightly.
"Hey, keep your distance!" Zenkhald declared from the top down. "I don't kiss guys! Only beautiful girls."
Torlin froze, afraid to move so as not to drop the Grandmaster. Zenkhald, meanwhile, unperturbedly pulled a green apple from his pocket and took a juicy bite. "Sour," he winced. Then he looked at his timer. "Well, about 10 minutes have passed. You are stealing my time."
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Light as a feather, he jumped off the bewildered Torlin's shoulders. "Last one there is a loser!" Zenkhald shouted joyfully.
BAM! He stomped the ground with force. An explosion erupted from beneath his boots, scattering the entire "elite twenty" across the floor like bowling pins.
"Faster!" Mara yelled, jumping up and rushing after the retreating figure. "Torlin, after him! We'll show him what we're worth!"
They ran down the long corridor. Mara strained her memory, recalling the map of the first floor. So, we need to turn right here to get to the second floor... Wait, did he miss the turn? she thought, puzzled.
"STRAIGHT THROUGH!" Zenkhald yelled joyfully ahead.
BANG! He crashed headfirst into the stone wall at full speed. The wall shattered into crumbs.
BANG! BANG! Next, the floor collapsed. Mara ran to the edge of the breach and peered into the swirling dust. "A whole three floors?!" she exclaimed in horror. "He smashed straight through three floors down?!" Without hesitating, Torlin and Mara jumped into the hole.
A massive stream of fire, summoned by Zenkhald, was already moving along the lower tier, completely consuming all living things. Mara barely had time to erect a preliminary water barrier before the shockwave threw them right against the wall.
Before they could catch their breath, another BOOM! was heard. The floor beneath their feet vanished again. The elite students had never descended so fast. Or rather, fallen. They simply flew through the smashed ceilings to the roar of continuous explosions.
"What floor is this already?!" Torlin roared through the din. "I think the 33rd!" Mara shouted back. "In just 10 minutes?!"
Suddenly, the explosions stopped. They landed softly on the 33rd floor and froze. Ahead, in the dim light, sat Zenkhald. And opposite him, just a meter away, hung a huge, creepy eye three meters in diameter.
Zenkhald was staring intensely straight into the monster's pupil.
Mara and Torlin dashed behind the nearest pillar in horror. "Damn!" Mara whispered, turning pale. "It's an Abyss Illusionist! It's dangerous because if you look into its eye, you'll fall into an illusion and never get out! And if you don't break eye contact in time, it will completely take over your mind! It's easy to kill; the main thing is to under no circumstances look it in the eye!"
Zenkhald's tense voice came from behind the pillar: "Listen here, Eye... You're going to blink first. I will hold out."
Mara and Torlin peeked out cautiously. Zenkhald was pacing left and right in front of the giant eye, not taking his gaze off it for a single millimeter. His own eyes were already watering from the strain. "Come on, blink!" Zenkhald demanded. "I'm about to cry here! I've been standing here looking at you for five minutes!"
"What..?" Mara and Torlin squeezed out in unison. They stepped out of cover. "Grandmaster!" Mara shouted. "Careful! It's an..." "Don't distract me!" Zenkhald barked without looking away. "A great staring contest is happening here! I will beat it!" "But..." "DON'T INTERFERE!" "Grandmaster, you..." "Quiet! Sh-h-h-h!"
Torlin sighed heavily and rubbed the bridge of his nose: "Grandmaster. It has no eyelids. It physically cannot blink."
Zenkhald froze. The silence in the cave became palpable. "Eh-h-h-h?" he drew out. "SO YOU WERE CHEATING?!"
Right out of his robe pocket, Zenkhald produced a handful of salt and hurled it with all his might straight into the monster's giant pupil. The monster let out a wet, vile squeak and popped.
"What a jerk," Zenkhald mumbled, wiping his watering eyes. And stomped his foot with force.
The floor beneath them cracked again, and they went flying down.
"Sixty-third floor!" Mara shrieked mid-flight. "If I'm not mistaken, that's where the... Oh no! It's a..." "I FORBID YOU FROM THINKING ABOUT HOW COOL THE MONSTERS ARE!" Zenkhald interrupted her. "BETTER THINK ABOUT HOW COOL I AM!"
They splatted onto the floor. More precisely, into a huge puddle of slime. What had happened to the local creatures was unclear, but an incomprehensible liquid was oozing from every crack in the cave.
"Last floor," Zenkhald commanded and stomped again.
They crashed into absolute darkness, landing in a slimy, stinking pit. In the center of the pit pulsated a giant slime-like creature—the queen giving birth to the monsters. Upon seeing Zenkhald, the creature for some reason froze, began to frantically detach from the ceiling, and, working its tentacles, tried to quietly crawl up the wall back to the top.
"HA-HA-HA! Decided to run away?" Zenkhald scoffed indignantly. "Not gonna happen!"
A snap of the fingers. The creature exploded from the inside, showering everything around in a thick purple sludge.
Levitation magic softly lifted the three of them one floor up, away from the remains. Zenkhald raised his wrist and glanced at the timer. Glowing on the dial was: 2 hours 40 minutes.
"OH COME ON!" he cried out passionately, grabbing his head. "If it weren't for that stupid eye with its staring contest! A-a-a-ah! I thought I'd handle it in 10 minutes! What a disgrace... Fine."
And he simply lay down on the cold stone floor, tossing his hands behind his head.
Mara and Torlin, covered from head to toe in dust and slime, stood and tried to comprehend what had happened. Rezar's Cave, which couldn't be conquered for five years, was cleared in a couple of hours. And the majority of that time was taken up by a staring contest.
"And... why did you lie down?" Mara asked cautiously. "There's nothing else to do," Zenkhald yawned. "Going back to those gloomy uncles from the Council again. And they are so sad and serious... Not fun at all. I'd rather lie here."
Twenty minutes passed. From above, through the smashed holes, a small figure descended gracefully. It was a girl of about seven or eight years old, completely wrapped in a robe and mask. The Goddess of Luck in person.
She walked up to Zenkhald and kicked him in the ribs with her little foot with all her might. "WHY DIDN'T YOU WAIT FOR ME?!" rang out a resonant, offended child's voice.
Zenkhald half-opened one eye. "Eh? Were you supposed to be here?" "YES!" "No one told me."
The girl rummaged in the folds of her robe and shoved a crumpled parchment in his face—the very same one Zenkhald had thrown away at the entrance. "IT SAYS RIGHT HERE! That I'm going with you! And anyway... You cleared the cave quickly again! Without me!"
"Then don't sleep in," Zenkhald scoffed, sitting up. "Your own fault." "I wasn't sleeping! I woke up early in the morning!" the Goddess stomped her little foot. "Yeah, tell me another one. You didn't even wipe your mouth after you ate. There are crumbs on your face. You probably only woke up an hour ago, and had a heavy meal on top of that."
The girl flopped indignantly onto the floor right opposite him, crossing her arms over her chest. "Unlike you, Zenkhald, I am responsible! Everyone sets me as an example!" "Responsible?!" Zenkhald threw up his hands in indignation. "Last time you smashed straight through several floors, and when you killed the queen, you just went to sleep in her nest! Because of which all the monsters ran outside! Unlike you, I immediately sealed everything up!" "That... that doesn't matter!" the girl squealed. "My rating is still higher than yours! And Aurora loves me more than you!" "NOT TRUE! I have the same rating as you!" "I scored another 200 points this month!" she declared proudly, turning up her nose under the mask. "A-A-AH! ANOTHER TWO HUNDRED?! THAT'S NOT FAIR!" Zenkhald was genuinely angered. "THEY JUST DON'T GIVE ME SUCH MISSIONS! STUPID COUNCIL!" "No, it is actually completely fair! I am better, and you are worse!" "I'M BETTER!" "I'm better!" "Me!" "No, me!" "No, me!"
Mara and Torlin sat side-by-side on the stones and silently watched the Grandmaster and an unknown little girl yell at each other, arguing over who was cooler.
And we were considered the best in our years, Mara thought with longing, looking at this kindergarten. We were so proud of ourselves... How can we even call ourselves strong after seeing this?