"At first, we said that if we wanted to enter the underground maze, we would have to risk being buried by the yellow sand. In the end, you urged the sand to bury us completely."
Yang Yu tried to communicate with the guardian of the underground maze again, but the guardian of the underground maze continued to do as he pleased and arranged the subsequent trials.
[Behind this wall of fire, there is an extremely complicated maze. At the end of the maze there is a staircase leading to the fifth floor. All you need to do is keep choosing forks in the road and move forward until you reach the fifth floor.
Please note that once you decide to move forward, the fire of the maze will form a wall of fire behind you. The wall of fire will follow you. Every time you take a step, it will follow you forward, leaving you no way to turn back.
Because there is no way out, please choose each path carefully.]
"It's the same design that doesn't allow people to retreat." Yang Yu scratched his head, "Once you choose a route, you can't go back and change the route. What kind of test of courage is this? It might as well be called a test of luck.
Going down a path to the end is not courage, but recklessness. "
The guardian of the underground maze fell silent.
"If you don't have anything to say, just get started. In any case, we have no choice but to move on, right? I really want to drag out the creator of this maze and give him a beating."
The guardian smiled helplessly and said, "With your current condition, I'm afraid you will be crushed like an ant by him."
"My current self does not represent my future self. I am standing here now just so that I can defeat the legendary hero Laux one day."
[You are really confident, but don't let this confidence turn into arrogance.] The guardian paused, [You have the key to the Hall of Wisdom in your hand, and it seems that you know a lot.]
"I only know a little bit. That little kitty really doesn't know anything. It's like she's deliberately hiding something."
[Perhaps, I really don’t know anything.]
The Guardian's voice became somewhat sad.
[If you can complete all the tests, I would like to tell you everything I know.
If you can get the two keys of [Courage] and [Wisdom], perhaps you have the qualifications to become a sage and can assist the brave to defeat the devil again.]
"Unfortunately, I don't have a good impression of this generation of heroes, so don't say anything that would force me to do anything."
Yang Yu deliberately revealed that he had met the current hero, but the guardian of the maze did not seem surprised by the appearance of the hero.
[Everyone has his own way of living...
I'm just giving simple advice.
All in all, there's no point in complaining about the underground maze.
The underground maze has already been built. I just unfold it and run it according to the pre-set settings.
There are some levels whose operation is not decided by me.]
Yang Yu smiled and said, "But you should have extremely high authority. It shouldn't be difficult to use your authority to reduce the difficulty of the underground maze."
[Indeed. However, I owe Laux a huge debt. I respect his choice and design, and will conscientiously complete the task he assigned to me, just as a small repayment.
If you want to ask me something, please pass the test of courage and stand in front of me. Then, I will try my best to answer your questions.]
Since the other party has made it clear, there is no need to entangle.
"It's a deal."
With a smile on his face, Yang Yu moved closer to the wall of fire. The wall of fire seemed to be repelled by some force, and the flames gathered to both sides of the wall, opening the door to Yang Yu and his friends.
[Courage does not come from outside, but from within. This underground maze does not focus on testing one's strength, but rather on testing one's awareness. The trial begins.]
Ahead was a long tunnel with no end in sight. Yang Yu led the team into it, and the curtain of fire slowly drew closer.
A moment later, Bai Jin and Qing Shi felt the magic power around them fading at a speed visible to the naked eye. In a blink of an eye, Bai Jin could no longer absorb any magic power from the air.
Not only that, Bai Jin, Qing Shi, and Lothkar could all feel the magic power in their bodies dissipating at an incredible speed and flowing into the flames behind them. An indescribable fatigue surged into their hearts.
Fortunately, no one was depressed by this fatigue.
This change is directly reflected in the attributes. The remaining amount of the blue bar becomes a point, and everyone's status bar has an additional [Magic Control] status.
Somehow, Iyas and Hake survived. Although their mana bars decreased, they still retained one third and could still use Holy Light skills.
After moving forward a few steps, a small ball of fire suddenly appeared behind Yang Yu and the others. Then, as Yang Yu and the others moved, it suddenly expanded and filled the entire cross-section of the passage.
Sensing the heat behind them, Yang Yu and the others could not help but notice that there was a wall of fire following them.
This is the restriction that this maze imposes on them. Once they choose a path, this wall of fire will prevent them from going back to choose other paths.
Since the guardian of the maze did not give any hints, there was no way to know which route was the correct one. Iyas' luck was not always reliable. For now, she would just take one step at a time and see what happened. Maybe when she reached a fork in the road, there would be some hints.
Leading the team, Yang Yu came to the first intersection.
But no matter which road you take, it's bottomless, and there are no clues around, so it's impossible to tell which one is the right one.
The wall of fire was always about five meters away from Yang Yu and his group. Once they chose a route to go deeper, the fire would follow and block their retreat.
Stopping at the crossroads, Yang Yu sat down and analyzed carefully, and he decided to follow the example of Theseus.
Theseus is a hero in Greek legend. He was sent into the Cretan labyrinth. With the help of a ball of thread sent by the Cretan princess Ariadne, he successfully found the Minotaur, killed him, and followed the thread out of the labyrinth.
Yang Yu planned to let Bai Jin and the others stay where they are so that the position of the fire would not change, and then use this method to conduct a carpet search and draw a map of the entire maze.
Although this carpet search method would take a certain amount of time, it was better than being trapped to death by flames in an underground maze.
In order to go all out, Yang Yu took out as many balls of thread as possible from the system, explained the principle to his partners, and dragged the thread into a chosen channel.
But before Yang Yu walked far, he heard shouts from the crowd behind him. Yang Yu looked back and saw a cluster of fire burning from behind him. It instantly turned into a tall wall of fire, burning the silk thread connecting him and the team into powder.
(End of this chapter)