When Mica opened the Dimension, the group was transported to the middle of a plain where hundreds of knights rode enormous war beasts. Before any of them could say anything, the scenery changed to a village engulfed in flames, then to a volcano from which they could see an imposing castle floating upside down in the sky, the surface of an enormous tower in the middle of a storm, a dark room with a bloodstained floor, and the entrance to a cave overlooking a huge mountainous valley where the calm was almost palpable. All of that lasted only half a dozen seconds before they found themselves on the rooftop of the building next to the alley.
“That was... strange,” Hugo said after the Dimension seemed to stabilize, having remained on the rooftop for a while.
“Maybe I don't remember it correctly, but it wasn't like this yesterday,” Jacob commented.
“I'm sorry, I... I couldn't concentrate. Yesterday was my first time, and with everything we'd been through, Tolmoch guided us through that hallway he created. But now Tolmoch has let me do it, and... Well.”
“Were all those things we saw scenes from your book? I think I recognized a couple,” Rose commented. “What an incredible imagination! There's so much in your head that it made it difficult for you to control it.”
Mica nodded, somewhat excited by the recognition. Cat, for her part, looked at Rose strangely but said nothing.
“Very well, but nobody asked you to show off, squire,” María interrupted. “Now do your job and create a bridge to the building where Sarah lives so we can get this over with.”
“A bridge? I wouldn't know how to create one... I'd have to...”
“Less blah-blah and more work.”
“You sure are bossy, aren't you?” Hugo said to the girl. “I'll call you Mini Sarah.”
“It would be an honor merely to be compared to an inferior version of Sarah, scoundrel. Although I don't expect you to understand that.”
Hugo rolled his eyes and gave Tomás a mocking look. He laughed under his breath, but regained his composure as soon as he noticed María looking at them.
Mica approached the edge of the rooftop. Below, where the street and its pedestrians were supposed to be, there was only an infinite abyss, as if the tower they were standing on and the surrounding ones were thousands of floors tall.
He ignored the vertigo, reminding himself that all of it was fictional, and imagined a bridge connecting the place where they were to where they needed to go.
Without warning, an enormous wall rose behind him, separating the group.
“What are you doing, squire? Are you really so stupid that you don't know what a bri—”
Another wall rose in front of María, isolating her as well.
Mica didn't know what was happening. He tried to control it by closing his eyes and concentrating. Nausea washed over him as he began to feel everything around him spinning at a dizzying speed, but he didn't open his eyes. Over and over, he repeated in his mind that he could regain control, that he had to do it.
“Is here,” Tolmoch's voice said inside his head. “The Hunter has found us.”
Upon hearing that, Mica lost the little concentration he had managed to gather, and the deafening sound of shattering glass filled the room. When he opened his eyes, everything was darkness.
“Mica? Are you okay?” Cat's voice said.
“My dude! What happened?”
“Useless squire, where have you taken us?”
“Mica! Concentrate! You can do it!”
Rose's voice initially sounded as distant as the others, but before she finished speaking, Mica felt her right beside him. At the same time, the darkness receded slightly thanks to a flickering light coming from a red lamp that had just appeared on the wall. The silence was also replaced by the muffled sound of torrential rain pouring outside. In front of him was a rusted metal door with an enormous wheel, similar to that of a submarine. Beside it, a huge “99” was stamped on the wall in black block letters.
“I don't recognize this place,” Rose said beside him.
“This isn't my Dimension anymore, Rose,” Mica explained, looking around to see what else he could find. In the gloom, he could only make out a staircase leading down to another level where the red light was also flickering, and his only companion was the redheaded girl. “Tolmoch told me the Hunter managed to find us again...”
“Oh, that... That's bad,” Rose remarked.
Mica nodded, surprised by the girl's acceptance.
“Number one?” Rose said, pointing at his chest. That's when he realized they were both wearing gray one-piece outfits with a number stamped on them and the word
Champion
.
“And you're number three,” Mica pointed out.
“What does it mean?”
“No idea. If this is the work of the same person who took us to that nightmare version of the school, we can expect anything horrible.”
“Well, we can't stay here,” Rose said, as cheerful as always. “We have to find the others. You choose. Up or down?”
Mica looked at the two paths and approached the door. He gripped the wheel in front of him, expecting more resistance, but the mechanism responded without much effort, giving him access to another metal staircase whose steps were soaked.
They climbed carefully, and when they reached the outside, they found themselves on a square concrete platform in the middle of a violent sea battered by a terrible storm beneath a night sky.
“There is no path this way!” Mica shouted to make himself heard over the gale and thunder. “We'll have to go down!”
“Look at this!” Rose exclaimed, pointing to a huge sign stamped onto one of the walls beside the staircase. “It looks like instructions!”
“Can you read anything!?”
“No, but...!”
Rose extended her right hand, and from her palm materialized a long aluminum staff with a strange device at its upper end. Once it had finished taking shape, the device lit up with a buzzing sound and emitted a radiant purple light.
“How did you know you could do that!?”
“I didn't! I just felt like I could!”
“You mean we have access to our powers!?” Mica asked, extending his own hand.
“Look!” Rose interrupted him. “Welcome, champions!” she began to read. “Only the bravest join the Iron Challenge! And of those, only the strongest and most experienced make it to the Tower! So just reading this is already an achievement!”
“The Iron Challenge!? The Tower!? What the hell!?”
“Quiet! Let me continue!” Rose scolded him. “Before you lie the ninety-nine floors that represent our ninety-nine eras, with their respective ninety-nine obstacles! Remember the rules before entering, because there will be no further warnings! Every odd number represents a challenge to intellect, cunning, and resilience! Every even number, except the round numbers, represents a challenge to strength, bravery, and constitution! Every round number, namely ninety, eighty, or seventy, represents a challenge of self-sacrifice!”
“Self-sacrifice?” Mica repeated in a murmur.
“Now that you know! Advance with faith and courage! Your reward awaits you on floor zero!”
“We have to go down ninety-nine floors!? Ninety-nine challenges!? That's insane!”
“Let's go back inside first! I'll freeze if I stay out in this rain!”
Obeying Rose's wishes, Mica followed her into the small room that made up the ninety-ninth floor. The room wasn't warm by any means, but simply being sheltered from the rain and wind made it feel much more welcoming.
“Ninety-nine challenges,” Mica continued. “Of which at least nine are self-sacrifice challenges, whatever they mean by that.”
“Stay calm, Mica. Just like the school, this is a test. A game, if you want to look at it that way. If the supposed Hunter wanted to kill us and nothing more, he would've done it at any time.”
“The truth is, knowing it's a game doesn't make me feel any better.”
Rose crossed her arms and rolled her eyes at him.
“I thought you were better than this, Mica. Honestly.”
The girl's judgment hurt him, but it managed to calm his mind as he thought about the explicit humiliation behind those words.
“You're right. I'm sorry,” he said. “I'm calm now.”
Rose smiled and winked at him. He, for his part, blushed but tried to ignore it.
“Tolmoch, where are the others?” he asked aloud.
“I can't know exactly. I can only detect that Jacob fellow,” he replied in Mica's mind, but apparently also in Rose's, as she seemed to react to the comment. “He's several meters below us.”
“Then we can conclude they're in the Tower,” Rose concluded.
Mica nodded.
“Tolmoch, can't we communicate telepathically like Hugo and Cat did last night?”
“If you hadn't allowed yourself to be invaded and we were still in your Dimension, yes. But...”
“And how can you make yourself heard by Rose? It doesn't seem like you're speaking out loud through your vessel, like you did with Hugo.”
Tolmoch seemed to hesitate for a second.
“It's beyond my knowledge,” he finally replied.
“Maybe it's because I'm close to you,” Rose reasoned.
“Maybe,” Mica said, also waiting for a comment from Tolmoch, but none came.
“Very well! At least now we know what to do. To the ninety-eighth floor and our test of strength and constitution!”
“And courage. Don't forget courage.”
Mica remained where he was for a second, wondering how Rose could be so optimistic in that situation when he was so terrified. But whether or not he found an answer to that thought, he could only keep moving forward, so he followed her toward the stairs.