Another powerful skill that improved my repertoire; too bad it had a level requirement of 22. Still, I couldn’t complain about getting it.

  The corridor beyond the Remnant's chamber was short, barely twenty meters before it opened into another room.

  This one was smaller than the one I'd just fought in, maybe fifteen meters square, with smooth walls covered in the same ritualistic carvings I'd seen throughout the catacombs.

  The center, however, caught my attention.

  Two pedestals stood about five meters apart, each one with a crystal orb at the top that pulsed with blue light. Between them, set into the floor, was a circular pattern of symbols resembling a sundial.

  Right in front of the dial was a wall flooded with mirrors, and on the far side of the room a single stone door blocked the path forward.

  I approached cautiously, checking for traps, but nothing happened. I wouldn’t mind a challenge with no enemies for once.

  A plaque was mounted on the wall beside the entrance, its text easily readable despite its age.

  Wheel of time, moved by thine hands,

  Two paths of light shall become one.

  Here in the dark, the past bends,

  A pair of champions, holding the sun.

  "A puzzle," I muttered. "That leaves me room to catch my breath."

  I examined the pedestals more closely.

  Each orb sat in a rotating cradle, and when I touched one experimentally, a beam of light shot from its surface toward the mirror-wall.

  It bounced back and struck one of the floor symbols, causing it to glow briefly before fading.

  I rotated the orb slightly. The beam moved, hitting a different symbol.

  I crossed to the other pedestal and did the same. The same thing happened.

  Wheel of time, moved by thine hands.

  The floor was reminiscent of a sundial. Wheel of Time must mean the orbs. I can move them freely, and they shine on different symbols on the dial when reflected by the mirrors.

  Two paths of light shall become one.

  The beams from the two orbs must meet somewhere. On one of the symbols, presumably.

  Here in the dark, the past bends.

  That line was less straightforward. The past definitely had to do something with the sundial, though.

  A pair of champions, holding the sun.

  I was playing with the lights, shooting them at different mirrors on the wall, looking for patterns, seeing where the light rays went.

  They were beautiful, playing in all the known colors of the rainbow, lighting up the intricate symbols one by one.

  Then I stepped to the other one, trying to do the same thing, but by the time I activated the second orb, the first ray of light faded, and the orb slowly rotated back to its neutral position. The beams were never active at the same time.

  "Time-limited," I observed. "I need to activate both simultaneously."

  I tried again, this time moving faster. Aim the first orb, sprint to the second, and move it before the first resets, but I was still too slow; the first beam deactivated when I was still a step from the second pedestal.

  I attempted different strategies. Using Quick Step to gain speed was unsuccessful. If only I had the level 2 version.

  I quietly made a mental note to ask Athos about how he got the skill upgrade.

  I tried it with Leap Attack, Silk Shot, even Catapult Legs. Then I combined the skills.

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  Nothing worked. The first light deactivated the moment I got to the second one every time.

  Fuck, I cursed.

  I knew what this was about. The dungeon split the group, trying to do so in a way that left both paths with 3 players available.

  Even if there was a party trying to clear it with 5 people, the puzzle would pose no problem to them; two of them would have had to come this way.

  But I was alone.

  The puzzle required two people. Two sets of hands operating both pedestals simultaneously. That was the entire point. A pair of champions, holding the sun.

  I sat down on the floor, frustrated.

  I reviewed my options. My skills, my equipment, my abilities. Is there anything that could—

  I stopped.

  "Lune," I breathed.

  It’s a reach, but…

  Could a summoned companion interact with puzzle mechanics? There was only one way to find out.

  "Summon Pet, Lune."

  The air in front of me shimmered with bronze light, then something took shape, and suddenly Lune was there; a beautiful Fox, her fur gleaming in the dim lights, with eyes so wise-looking it was hard to believe they belonged to an animal, standing before me with her tail wagging gently.

  She looked around the room, then back at me, her head tilted in a question.

  "Hey, girl," I said softly. "I need your help with something."

  Lune's ears perked up attentively.

  I walked to one of the pedestals and placed my hand on the orb. "I need you to go to that one," I pointed to the other pedestal, "and push it when I say so. Can you do that?"

  Lune padded across the room to the second pedestal. She was tall enough to reach the orb if she stood on her hind legs, her front paws resting on the pedestal's edge.

  "Good girl."

  Now came the hard part. We had to coordinate our movements.

  I aimed my orb at one of the mirrors. The beam hit its target, starting the timer.

  Here in the dark, the past bends.

  We needed to go counter-clockwise.

  There were dozens of symbols on the dial, arranged in random patterns; however, some were different from the others.

  After a couple of seconds of looking, I found six symbols that looked like times of day: dawn, morning, midday, evening, dusk, and night.

  "Lune! Push the orb until the light shines on the night symbol!" I told her, moving my own piece to demonstrate what I wanted.

  The fox pressed her nose against her orb, rotating it. The beam hit the mirror, swung across the floor, past the symbol I needed, but then she adjusted.

  The two beams hit at the same moment. Light flared from both pedestals, illuminating the room around us.

  A chime rang through the chamber.

  One down.

  The symbol we'd hit went dark, locked in place. The remaining ones shifted, rings in the dial turning, and now they were in a different position.

  "That's it!" I couldn't keep the excitement out of my voice. "Same thing, Lune. Evening next."

  I was relieved my companion understood exactly what I told her.

  We worked through the puzzle systematically. I'd aim my orb at a symbol, call out to Lune, and she'd adjust hers until the beams converged. It took a few attempts on some, as Lune's fine motor control with her nose wasn't perfect, but we managed.

  With each successful convergence, the sealed door rumbled, ancient mechanisms grinding to life behind the stone.

  The final symbol was the trickiest as the symbols were positioned at odd angles that required precise alignment.

  Lune whined in frustration after her third failed attempt, the beam sliding past the target by millimeters.

  "It's okay," I encouraged her. "Take your time. We've got this."

  She tried again. The beam drifted left, then right, and then it hit the spot.

  The final chime rang out, louder than the others. The circular pattern on the floor began to glow with blue light, all the symbols activating at once. The energy flowed upward, forming a pillar that reached toward the ceiling before dissipating into motes of light.

  And the sealed door opened.

  "We did it!" I crossed the room to Lune, kneeling down to scratch behind her ears. "Good girl. Very good girl."

  She leaned into my touch, her fur soft and pleasant.

  I straightened up and looked at the open doorway. Beyond it, I could see another chamber, larger, better lit.

  And I could hear voices.

  "—telling you, there's no way he's still alive. That path looked deadly."

  "His health bar hasn't moved, Kara. He's fine."

  "Maybe the display is bugged. Maybe he died, and it just hasn't updated yet."

  "...That's not how the party interface works."

  I walked through the doorway with Lune at my heels.

  "Who's dead?"

  Three heads snapped toward me.

  The chamber was a wide room, similar to where I'd fought the Remnant, but larger. Scorch marks and debris littered the floor as evidence of recent combat.

  Lothras, Athos, and Kara stood near the center, all of them looking mostly fine but exhausted.

  They were surprised to see me.

  "Orion!" Kara's relief was immediate and obvious. "You're okay!"

  "Why wouldn't I be?"

  "Why wouldn't you—" She pouted. "You got separated from the party! You went down some dark, creepy path! We had no idea what was happening to you!"

  "You could see my health bar," I pointed out. I kept regular attention to theirs, fluctuating throughout our separation, but they were never in immediate danger.

  "Which never moved!" She threw her hands up. "For over an hour! We were fighting waves of monsters, getting hit constantly, burning through potions, and your health bar just sat there at full the entire time. I was sure it was bugged."

  "Waves of monsters?" I looked around at the battle-scarred room. "What happened to you three?"

  "Tower defense," Athos explained, leaning on his sword. "Three rooms, each one with multiple waves of enemies that kept coming until we killed them all."

  "It was exhausting," Lothras admitted, and the paladin sounded genuinely tired. "The waves were relentless. We barely had time to recover between each room."

  "But we managed," Kara said. "My new lute came in handy. Abstract World Symphony bought us breathing room whenever things got too hectic." She paused, narrowing her eyes at me. "Meanwhile, you apparently had a pleasant stroll through your path."

  "I wouldn't call it pleasant."

  "You just said it. Your health. Never. Moved."

  I couldn't help the smile that crept onto my face.

  "I fought through hundreds of weak monsters," I said. "Corrupted acolytes, mostly. Then I reached the end of the path and found a level 23 elite guarding a door."

  The others went quiet.

  "I guess there was a mechanic to getting rid of it," Athos concluded. "We had some to make the waves easier."

  "Not really. It was an animated armor. Fast, aggressive, had ranged attacks and area denial, and even created illusions of itself."

  "So how did you beat it?" Lothras asked. "Your health was steady all the time."

  "I didn’t take a single hit." I shrugged like it was no big deal, even though we all knew it absolutely was.

  Kara stared at me for a long moment. Then she laughed, like she didn’t believe me.

  "So," she said, "you soloed it without getting hit once?"

  "Yup."

  Athos shook his head slowly. "We need to have a rematch soon, dude."

  I smiled.

  "Who is this?" Lothras asked, apparently noticing Lune for the first time.

  “Oh my god, that mob’s so cute!” Kara lunged at my friend.

  I reached down to pat Lune's head. "This is Lune. She's my companion. We met through a… quest I completed a while ago. We had a puzzle that required two people to solve, so I summoned her to help."

  "You have a pet fox," Kara said flatly. "And you didn't think to mention this before?"

  "It never came up."

  "We've been partying together for days!"

  I couldn’t say anything to that.

  Kara looked like she wanted to strangle me, while Athos was laughing quietly.

  Even Lothras seemed amused, with a hint of concern in his eyes.

  "So," I said, deciding to change the subject before Kara actually committed violence, "what's beyond this room? Did you find the path forward?"

  Athos pointed to a doorway on the far side of the chamber. "Through there. We had a prompt to wait for you before we proceeded."

  "Then let's not keep the catacombs waiting. Everyone ready?”

  Three nods.

  "Let's finish this dungeon."