The group did just that, starting down the long hallway. With their stats, it took seconds to reach the point where Edgar’s elemental senses had stopped. Only, the tunnel kept on going, without an end in sight.

  “Let me try again,” the wind mage said, closing his eyes once more. When they opened again, he shook his head. “Exact same as before. I’m beginning to think that this tunnel is being looped somehow. Perhaps someone else should try?”

  “I’ll do it,” Jonathan suggested. “I can probably reach the furthest out of those here, other than you.” He raised his right fist, and a swirling orb of the Void appeared above, slowly condensing into a rotating drill. With a snap, he let it loose, shooting it down the hallway. It built up speed and power, until, with a sharp crack, it struck something in the air, and broke through. Jonathan felt his elemental senses lock onto something behind him. “Get down!”

  He threw himself to the floor, just as the Void bolt shot over his head, heading down the hallway once again. Everyone else lay on the floor with him, having narrowly escaped severe injury, or at the very least, significant pain. He banished the elemental bolt, the lance of purple fading away into nothingness.

  “Well, I guess we know how this works now,” he said as he rose. “Only, how are we supposed to get out?”

  “You Void attacks are able to break the invisible membrane that’s looping us. Perhaps you should just continue using them?” Arkanon said. “Perhaps brute force is the way to go here.”

  “I mean, that might work, but I feel like that isn’t the correct way to go. My element is extremely rare. If that’s the key to this place, then the dungeon would be impossible. We know that isn’t the case, though.”

  “Who cares? We should use all of the tools at our disposal. Would you rather be stuck here, solving some riddle, or on our way through the dungeon?”

  Jonathan sighed. “You’re right.” With a sudden explosion of purple, he sent a wave of the Void hurtling down the passageway. A few seconds later, it impacted the distant wall, shattering it in its entirety. Before it could loop around, Jonathan banished it. Before them was a patch of darkness, suspended in the center of the hallway. A scant few seconds of running took them to the distortion, and another, through it. Reality warped, and a moment later, everyone stood within a chamber, with three doors. On the wall was a plaque that read:

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Three Fears. Three Answers. One Victory. Which will you choose?

  Each of the doors had a different design on it. The leftmost was shrouded in darkness, with inky black obsidian making up the frame, and shadows cloaking the door itself. Within it, a single point of light flickered between a rainbow of different colors. On it was a word.

  Unknown

  The next door was the polar opposite of the first, crafted out of shining white marble. Within it was a portal of pure light, shining like the sun. It too, had something written on it.

  Certain Death

  The final door was a nondescript wooden one, which wouldn’t have looked out of place on some suburban home. Despite that, it felt strangely unsettling. Above it was a single word.

  Mediocrity

  Jonathan frowned at the doors. “What is this? I've never seen a dungeon with choices before.”

  “There’s probably a different challenge behind each,” Edgar theorized. “Either the words relate to the theme of that challenge, or the difficulty. For example, perhaps the door marked as Unknown is a path to a sort of survival challenge, where ambushes are common, while the Certain Death one is a boss battle.”

  “Which one seems best…” Jonathan mused, looking the doors over. Each of them clearly led to some sort of battle, but as to what they were, that was much harder to discern. By far the most confusing was the last door, that of Mediocrity. How exactly could a challenge be mediocre? Or was there something he was missing?

  “The plaque did say there was only one right answer, so we probably can only choose one. We’re going to have to do so wisely.”

  “Which is it, then?” Edgar replied. “You’re our leader.”

  “Let’s go with Mediocrity. It seems like the safest option, and the most balanced. We can always run the dungeon again.”

  ***

  Jonathan cautiously opened the door, twisting the knob, and pulling on the wooden frame. The door opened, light shining from behind it. Neither a blinding white, nor some exotic color, it was simply the everyday light of a sunny day, nothing of note. The door fully opened, and the light rose, consuming the entire room. Within the span of one moment at the next, everyone was standing in another place, a massive arena, a dozen miles across. A legion of drab figures sat in the stands, dressed in a variety of subdued colors, from grey to black. Jonathan’s party stood in the center of the arena, quite a ways away from anyone else.

  You have entered the Challenge of the Third Fear: Mediocrity!

  There will be a series of monster waves, defined not by their strength, but by their number. Eventually, you will be overcome, but for a while, mediocrity will suffice. Be warned, death will be final within the first ten waves. Rewards will be allocated based on how far you reach.