In the darkness far above the maze, a small cubicle floated mid-air. The cubicle was created entirely of double-sided glass, making it impossible to spot from the maze below.
The door to the cubicle opened, and Dylan walked inside. He threw himself on the couch and grabbed a bottle from the nearby table, before uncorking it and chugging it down.
"Hah!" he let out a satisfied groan. "Wine tastes the best after running my mouth all day. Let's see how our greenhorns are doing."
Dylan grabbed a small floating orb on the table, hovering above a plate engraved with runes. The orb glowed bright as his fingers dug into it, sliding into control.
"How do I do this again? Ah, Ted said something about the right rotations," Dylan muttered as he twisted and turned. The glass turned opaque and images began showing. After some fine tuning, Dylan let go of the orb and it flew back to place.
Eight images were now shown on the glass. Each image was a sky view of the earlier candidates, facing the trial or navigating the maze.
Three of them had turned to corpses.
"Three already?" Dylan groaned. "I tried to pump them as hard as I could. Dammit!" Dylan slammed the bottle on the table. "I have to find another batch. This one is a dud."
The door to the cubicle opened, revealing a portal on the other side. A man walked inside with a smile as he sat next to Dylan, who eyed him with displeasure.
"Hello there, Dylan," the man said while letting an arm dangle on the couch's back. "What do we have here?"
Dylan stared at the man, who was a few years younger than him with a charismatic smile and auburn hair. He was his rival and friend, Jacob Flint.
"Are you here to gloat, Jacob?" Dylan asked.
"I would never!" Jacob answered with a grin while snatching the bottle. "Is it bad for a friend to see how his friend is doing? Let's see…"
Jacob took a sweeping glance at the screens, and his smile deepened. Dylan noticed his expression and snatched the bottle back.
"Don't act so smug. You were lucky with that prodigy," Dylan said. "I obtained quite the sum to get these candidates here."
"That's why you fail to raise stars. You can't mix trash with gold, Dylan," Jacob said with a smile. "You should raise the bar for people you recommend."
"I'm fine with the recommendation bonus," Dylan said, but his face was sour.
"You still need to pay the families, no?" Jacob asked. "I think the fee for a candidate's death is… one gold?"
"Two golds," Dylan said with a smile. "One from the guide, and the other from the guild. I pocket both and tell the family that I would give them another slot for next month."
"And they are fine with it?" Jacob asked with intrigue.
"Commoners would do anything to become a seeker," Dylan said while turning to the screens. "They buy their children the most expensive items and send them to their deaths just for the chance of them rising above the masses."
"And we get to reap the rewards," Jacob said. "Have you heard?"
"What?"
"There is another bonus coming for recruitments."
"You're kidding me," Dylan said, looking at Jacob with surprise. "The guild is increasing the reward? It's already quite hefty."
"I hear they are preparing for something big," Jacob added. "Despite how much we exploit the system, it's bringing us results. Desires, as luck would have it, shine the brightest in the dark."
"Cut the crap. What's the bonus?"
"The top recruiter gets…" Jacob allowed his words to linger. "A dinner with the Guild Master."
"And here I thought you were serious," Dylan said while slumping back in his chair. "There's no way that's happening."
"I heard it from the Guild Master's lips," Jacob said with a shrug. "It happened after she rewarded me for another successful trial."
"You tried to court her, didn't you?" Dylan scowled at the man.
"Am I to blame?" Jacob asked with a shrug. "It's almost impossible to find a woman of her caliber and beauty."
Dylan had to silently agree as he stared at the screens. The Guild Master of Argan's branch was a transcendent being who had once trained in the Inner Sanctums — and an unparalleled beauty and charisma.
Her arrival to Argan was marked with shame for her, but she rose to power despite the protests about the Guild Master being a woman. No one dared to question her position after witnessing her strength and sharp mind.
"Have you given up?" Jacob asked with a laugh. "Is this not what you have always wanted?"
"It's nearly impossible with these useless greenhorns," Dylan said, almost spitting the words out. "Look at them — another died. How foolish can you be?"
"There's still some hope," Jacob said as he looked at the remaining ones. His eyes hovered on a single screen, which made his smile freeze. "What the hell is he doing?"
Dylan followed the man's gaze with a frown to see the student he was bribed to allow on the test. His expression froze as well. The two men sat in silence as they watched the young man walking in the maze with a long line of monsters behind him.
"Is he a tamer?" Jacob questioned.
"A tamer cannot tame wild monsters," Dylan corrected as he rose from the chair. "Why aren't the monsters attacking him? They just… following him?"
"I have no idea why," Jacob said with a laugh. "But the lad might be your only chance to win the Guild Master's favor."
Dylan was silent as he watched the screen. He turned and grabbed the hovering orb, slipping his fingers inside and adjusting the angle of the void screens.
As he zoomed closer toward the young man, he realized that he was carrying something in his hand — a skewer of meat.
[---]
Aiden thought this world would be more complicated. As he made his way through the maze and killed the first monster who scared him shitless, he realized that he needed to take a different approach.
After looting the monster, Aiden obtained another plastic container of meat. This time, it was Direwolf Meat — a tastier variant of his hyena counterpart.
Aiden was roasting himself a meal by using one of the red lantern's natural affinities to explode and create a fire, when another Direwolf arrived.
At first, Aiden thought another battle was imminent — but the Direwolf was drooling while looking at the roasted meat. In the end, Aiden realized the truth about this world — everything was just too damn simple.
Desire governed this world, in its many forms. The Lycanthos was right about knowing what drives others forward and weaponizing it against them. Here in the maze, it was the lack of food for the monsters.
And thus, his army of monsters began taking shape. Aiden used the tasty food given to him by the system, which was the greatest asset here in the maze.
Direwolves formed a pack behind him, and even called for others to join. Aiden saw them wiggling their tails while awaiting a piece of their own comrade's flesh — something morbid yet endearing.
Aiden knew that cannibalism existed among monsters, and he had no qualms about it since the monsters began protecting him. They either treated him as one of their own or their own personal chef, and neither sounded bad.
The maze became easier to navigate with an army of monsters following him. Aiden couldn't make every monster join him, as he still needed a steady supply of meat to feed the ones following him.
After a few hours, Aiden realized that this place was a lot bigger than he first anticipated. Despite having roamed the entire place, he found no statues to get him out of here.
Instead, he found a familiar face.
The pack of direwolves surrounded something, their growls loud enough to bring Aiden to the scene. That something turned out to be a short stout young man in a sorry state.
"Borin?" Aiden muttered. "What the hell happened to you?"
Borin looked at him with a dirt-covered face. His eyes were now completely red, and the fire from his veins spilled out over his skin, destroying it as well. He looked wounded and unstable.
"You… What are these… monsters?" Borin asked as he looked at the direwolves.
"These are no monsters. They are my companions," Aiden said as if introducing his friends. "We shared countless meals together in the past few hours."
"Meals?" Borin questioned. "How the hell do you have food? We weren't even allowed to bring our weapons."
"We were not?" Aiden was surprised. "How are we expected to kill the monsters then?"
"The arts we were taught," Borin answered with suspicion. "You lied about being someone from the academy, didn't you?"
Aiden said nothing.
"You look tired and malnourished. Let me roast some meat for you," Aiden changed the subject. "And then, we can find a way out of this damn maze."