Author's Notes:
Sorry everyone, I'm sick and completely forgot today was Wednesday. I literally haven't opened this app till just a minute ago.

Once again Arthur and his team exited out of another portal in the relic tomb, and once again a challenge stood before them. As they all exited they spread out a bit, with Regis taking up the rear with Nico, who Regis was leading with a vine that was tied around his neck like a leash.

"What in the..." Lilia trailed off as she fanned herself due to the extreme heat.

"What in the hell are we supposed to do here?" Theo asked no one in particular.

They stood upon a square stone platform within a sea of lava, about twenty feet in the air. The platform had plenty of space for everyone, but the heat was so intense there was no way they could stay there for too long. Over one hundred yards out stood another platform with some kind of pedestal in the middle.

"Looks like we just need to make it over there," Feyrith commented as he walked to the edge and looked down.

He then cast a powerful area of effect water spell, targeting the lava. The spell collided with the lava, releasing a huge cloud of steam. Tess then cast a wind spell to blow away the steam, to show the lava didn't appear to cool and harden as was intended.

"Maybe we just need to try a colder spell," Kathyln said as she also walked up.

"Don't bother," Arthur said as he looked down at the lava. "Instead of being cooled by the water, the lava actually absorbed the mana and became a little hotter."

"So is it not even lava?" Claire asked.

Arthur shot a small ball of aether at the lava, only for it to splash in before dispersing.

"It's probably something created by the ancient mages to look like lava and make you waste your mana trying to get across, or force aether users to learn something to get across."

"So why don't you and I just fly and carry everyone across?" Tess suggested.

"Hmmm." "It can't be that easy can it?" Arthur thought. "Let me try it out first to make sure it isn't some kind of trap."

"You should keep an open communication channel between you and us just in case something happens to you. This way we can make any preparations needed if you aren't able to relay things to us when you get back," Claire suggested.

"Good idea," Arthur replied as he pulled out his communication artifact, opened a channel to Tess, and levitated a few feet off of the platform.

"So far nothing, I'm going to start towards the other platform."

Almost immediately after clearing the platform Arthur noticed a sudden and constant drain of his mana, but it was manageable and reported it. He was almost halfway to the other platform when he realized the rate of the draining was increasing and he didn't have enough mana to make it all the way and turned around.

"I'm coming back, at this rate my core will be drained before I get there."

"But you'll be able to make it back here right?"

"As long as the rate my core is draining doesn't increase much more."

Arthur began racing back to the platform, and quickly noticed that the rate his core was being drained was still continuing to steadily increase.
He tried to use god step to return, but he couldn't see the paths, as if they were being completely distorted by the floor. As his mana depleted he activated his armor and clad himself thickly in aether.

Rapidly he plummeted down to the lava and everyone began panicking. Kathyln tried to create an ice slide to catch him, but the mana was just absorbed and the ice never formed past the platform. Tess tried to cast a wind spell, but it also never formed.

Theo grabbed Tess in a bear hug as Kathyln froze her feet to the ground, all in anticipation that she would jump after Arthur. Even though she did struggle she did not break free. Not because their hold was too strong for her to break, but because she knew going after him was an act of futility. The only thought that kept her in control and not panicking was the memory that Regis had shared of Arthur practically bathing on a river of lava, and hoping that he had a plan to survive.

With a splash Arthur fell into the lava. Everyone ran to the edge but Arthur was already submerged. Though gaged everyone could hear Nico laugh hysterically, leaving them all disgusted at how he was supposed to be one of Arthur's closest friends. Regis sank his fangs into Nico's left calf, forcing him to his knees before the majestic wolf tackled him to the ground with his claws at his throat.

"Just know this, if Arthur dies, you'll die immediately after," Regis threatened.

"So Arthur is still alive?" Tess asked with a shaky voice.

"Yeah he's alive," Regis replied casually as he walked over to the edge. "He's in unbelievable pain, but he's still keeping his wits about him." He then started to nod his head in understanding. "Yup, he's still thinking clearly. He even just came up with an idea to get out. Everyone get away from the edge."

Regis walked to the other side of the platform. The others followed and stood behind him. There was then an explosion as a geyser of lava shot up into the air. Lilia and Feyrith quickly cast a wind and water barrier as lava rained down on them. Seconds later Arthur crashed down onto the platform as the lava stopped falling.

The barrier spells were canceled, sending a wave of water out in every direction that cooled the lava between them and Arthur. With the barrier down they rushed to Arthur and grimaced at the scene. His armor at his arms and legs was almost completely melted away, and his limbs were little more than bones and burnt flesh. His head was a little better, with his hair burnt off and parts of his skull showing and his face a grotesque mess of melted flesh. If not for the pain and needing to focus on his escape he could have poured all of his aether into his armor to preserve his body. But with his focus and aether being split so much he focused on just keeping his body and head intact, while he created a sphere of aether capable of blowing him out of there.

"I think, he would have been better off dying down there," Theo said as he shook.

Everyone but Tess looked on silently agreeing, except for Nico who seemed to be thoroughly enjoying this. As horrible as it was to see him like this Tess still remained faithful that Arthur could come back from this as tears freely streamed.

"You stupid masochist," Regis groaned. "What is it with you bathing in lava every time we come across it?"

"Wait?! This has happened before?!" Feyrith asked in disbelief.

"Oh yeah," Regis replied dismissively. "This is no more than a flesh wound for him. Just give him less than an hour and he'll be as good as new. See?" He said as he gestured back to arthur who now had a purple glow.

They all looked and could see his limbs slowly growing back, as well as the flesh on his head and his face even beginning to retake some of its old features.

Oh yeah," he then looked at Tess. "Make sure to always test the bath water when you two bathe together, as you can see, he likes it really hot."

"Hang on, when did this happen before?" Kathyln asked.

"Umm, before today?" Regis replied, following Arthur's policy of not explaining things like this.

"I saw Arthur a month before the battle at the wall, and he wasn't capable of anything close to this." Feyrith said stepping up.

"And I saw him shortly before the battle," Kathyln said stepping up beside him. "It was like he changed into a completely different person right before he left compared to how he arrived."

All eyes were on Regis expectantly.

"Umm..." Regis trailed off, not sure how to deal with this.

"Just tell them."

"What?! Are you sure?"

"Just don't tell them about my part Asura body or my reincarnation."

"Well aren't you kids in for a treat," Regis replied as he sat down beside Arthur. "It's story time with uncle Regis so gather around. I just got permission to tell a story about Warrior Princess here."

Everyone sat down in front of Regis as Tess sat closer to Arthur, gently stroking his regrown hair. Regis explained the previous timeline, starting where things went horribly wrong, covered the alacryan relic tombs, his return to Dicathen, and his time as a prisoner. He also didn't hold much back on Nico. Instead of explaining him reincarnating, he explained Nico as an Alacryan spy who had his memories suppressed so he could get closer to Arthur without drawing suspicion. Using Arthur's connection to Sylvia as the reason, that Agrona saw him as a threat.

He then explained what Arthur did to bring Elijah back, but how he now had a split personality because of it, and that the plan was to try and get the Dijin to remove Nico so only Elijah remained.

By the time Regis was done explaining everything Arthur was now completely healed, and was laying his head on Tess' lap.

"Tess, did you know all of this?" Lilia asked.

Tess nodded. "He told me everything after he returned to the floating castle, after the battle at The Wall. I know it's a lot to take in, and very unbelievable, but it explains everything. How he single handedly defeated the beast hord, as well as created the perfect defense against the Alacryan's second invasion fleet.

They all agreed that it did add up, as well as his increased displays of affection towards Tess. He lost her before, and was now beyond happy to have her back.

"So since you're essentially a prophet now, how do we get out of this floor?" Claire asked Arthur while gesturing around her with her right hand.

Arthur gave a deadpan look. "This is the first time I've been in this relic tomb too."

"But you have an idea don't you?" Feyrith said with a confidence smile.

Arthur closed his eyes and relaxed as his head was still resting on Tess' lap.

"I may have come up with an idea or two while I was healing."

"Care to share?" Curtis asked expectantly.

"I'll have to use aether to get across. I was working on this idea in the previous timeline, but I never was able to really make any progress before I was captured." He then sat up and looked to everyone and he took a meditative posture. "Get comfortable, this might take a while."

—————————————————————

Silently Arthur sat with his legs crossed as he manipulated aether throughout his body in different ways to get the results he wanted. Sweat ran down his forehead and dripped from his eyebrows, as well as everyone else.

Kathyln and Tess had combined their magic to cast a swirling cold breeze around them. Unfortunately though, due to trying to conserve mana and the temperature having increased from when they arrived, it was still pretty hot.

They didn't notice the temperature rise at first, but after about an hour they did, and it continued to rise over the next twelve hours before stopping. After several more hours without any temperature changes Arthur came to the conclusion that the temperature rise was due to the large amount of mana he lost trying to clear the lava, and suspected that it was somehow using their mana to fuel it. That said, everyone worked to make sure that they kept their distance from the edge.

They had been in there for a day now, and Arthur was still trying to find a way across. He attempted to use creation to form a bridge, however similar to godstep, the floor prevented the spell from taking effect. He also tried destruction, but it ended with similar results. Unknown to the others, Arthur had made several other experiments on methods to cross, but so far there was no luck

Everyone but Arthur was eating lunch. Nico was being held within a sound dampening spell as Regis was in his werewolf form, and essentially shoving a ration down his throat. After knowing the threat he posed the others agreed completely with keeping him completely restrained. During the first meal Theo removed the gag to feed him, but Nico quickly started talking about how he and Arthur were in fact reincarnated from another world, and how Arthur couldn't be trusted. The others just brushed this off as nonsense. However since they didn't want to hear it either, Regis continued his work babysitting Nico, and a sound dampening spell was cast around him every time the gag was removed.

After a few more minutes Arthur stood up for the first time since he sat down.

"Taking a break, or did you come up with something?" Curits asked.

"I think I finally figured something out," he replied as he walked to the edge.

"Hey, be careful," Claire said. "We don't need it getting any hotter."

"Don't worry, my manas locked down good."

"What are you doing?" Tess asked worriedly as he stood at the very edge of the platform.

"Sometimes the final leap to a breakthrough is an actual leap."

Arthur's body glowed purple as he jumped forward off the platform.

"ART!" Tess screamed.

Despite knowing Arthur would probably survive the lava, seeing him like that wasn't something she wanted to ever see again.

Everyone scrambled to the ledge, but before they arrived a purple streak shot up into the air. Everyone looked up to see Arthur floating in the air above them with a set of aetheric wings, giving him an angelic appearance. He then floated back down, keeping a few inches above the surface.

"Couldn't you have done something more flashy?" Curtis asked sarcastically.

"Well, I tried to fly with aether like I do mana, but that wasn't working. That's when I remembered Regis is also able to create aetheric wings to fly with."

"Nice to see I've been a positive influence on you," Regis commented smuggly with his head held high.

Everyone else just looked at him silently with a deadpan expression.

"Anyways. I'm going to fly over to the other platform to test my wings out. With any luck a path will form to allow the rest of you to follow."

With that Arthur flew off towards the distant platform. It wasn't as fast as using mana, but he made adjustments to the aether flow and his wings as he flew. Sometimes he flew faster, sometimes slower. At one point he started falling even. However with every change came a new understanding of flying with aether, leaving Arthur believing that with enough practice and experimentation he would one day be able to fly just as fast as with mana.

After a few minutes Arthur had arrived at the second platform, but as he landed he became confused. There was no gate or another platform in site, only a pedestal in the middle with some kind of artifact atop. It looked like a bangle with a blue oval crystal the size of his palm. He tried to slide the artifact onto his left wrist, but because of his thumb it wouldn't go past his hand. Deciding this might be enough to experiment he channeled a small amount of aether into it.

Immediately the artifact began to change its size and fitted to his hand snugly. The stone then glowed, as did his eyes and suddenly he could see multiple status windows floating in the air as if from a video game from his past life. One of the windows appeared to be a map of the floor they were on, so he focused on that.

"Art are you ok? Do you hear me?" Tess asked through the communication artifact.

"Oh yeah sorry. I'm fine, I made it ok," he replied distracted.

"Since it doesn't look like anything has happened over here, are you going to be coming back to start carrying everyone?"

"I'm not sure. I found an artifact over here. It might have a purpose that could help."

The map was very simple, showing two squares, one with several blue dots clustered together, while another had only one dot with a swirling circle going around it.

"Ok, so I think it's safe to say that this is me, and that must be the others."

Arthur reached out for the window towards his square with his right hand, not wanting to risk any possible consequences for the others. however as he was about to touch the screen, his hand past right through without any reaction.

"Hmmm. Is this window even interactive?"

"Command. Options. Status." Arthur stated, saying possible voice commands to try and get any kind of response, but nothing happened. Then it dawned on him. He raised his left hand and was now able to get a response from the window.

"So it requires the hand with the relic. What will happen if I tap on my platform?"

As he tapped on his platform a series of options opened up. It was all in the language of the Dijin, so Arthur couldn't read all of it, but he could understand enough. There were a series of controls, mostly appearing to have something to do with moving the platform. Then lastly was the one he wanted the most, one labeled gate. He tapped on the option, and a shimmering portal formed near the platform in front of him.

"Hey what's taking so long?" Regis asked annoyed.

"I think I found a way to bring you guys to me, hang on."

Arthur tapped on the other platform and most of the same options came up. Below the platform were directional arrows in a circle. Based on the map the platform was up and to the left of his location, so he began by pressing the down button.

"Woah! This thing is moving!"

"That's me, enjoy the ride."

In a matter of minutes the second platform bumped into the Arthur's and came to a stop. Quickly everyone rushed off, led by Tess who rushed to him.

"Let's get out of here, the spell keeping the temperature tolerable canceled shortly after we started moving."

Arthur looked, all of them were drenched in sweat.

"Maybe the next area will be a frozen wasteland to cool you all off," Arthur teased.

"I just want normal temperatures and cold water," Tess replied.

"Gotcha, let's go then." Arthur stopped channeling aether into the artifact and pulled it off.

"So what does that do?" Lilia asked as she gestured to the artifact.

"It looks like it's some kind of control for the entire relic tomb. I saw over a hundred floors, and it looks like I could access them all."

"Do you think you could use it to control where we go next?" Tess asked.

"I already did. Next stop, the bottom floor."