The next morning, Jax insisted that they had to eat at the Registry. Sophia would have preferred to cook something at "home," but apparently staying at home when there was nothing better to do was standoffish; they needed to make sure they were seen at the Registry and the Arena.

When they arrived at the Registry's cafe, Sophia shot a look of disbelief at Jax. There was no one there. How were they supposed to be seen?

No, wait, she was wrong. There was one person at one of the tables. The other person had their cloak pulled over their head, which seemed odd. It wasn't until Sophia got close enough to see that stranger seemed to be made of a combination of porcelain and metal, with glowing red eyes, that Sophia realized why the cloak was up.

If people had trouble with the Warped, what would they think about a mechanical person?

It wasn't really a disguise. It was more like the android wanted to make people look twice. There was even a teacup sitting in front of the papers and books the android was working with that made Sophia momentarily question her guess. Maybe she really was looking at someone with an extreme Warp?

"Oh, hey, hello there," a deep voice came from the android. "I don't think I know you. Are you the group staying with Merchant Arryn?"

"Yes, we are." Sophia blinked at the man. "How did you know?"

The android's lips curved upwards. "A group of five people I don't know arriving together? There aren't many teams I don't know. It was just a guess. Are you going to be heading into the Maze?"

Sophia frowned. That seemed like quite a change of subject, but it wasn't something they were trying to keep quiet. Rather the opposite, if anything. "Eventually, but we're only second upgrade so we're going to see what else we can do here for Wisps and experience first."

"We're going to be fighting in the Arena in a couple days," Jax added. "We're going to open the afternoon combats."

"I'll be sure to come watch," the android promised. "If you snagged an opener already, you must have something special. What's your team name?"

"Flying Stars," Sophia answered eagerly. "It's like falling stars, meteors, only we don't hit the ground."

The android chuckled. "I'll keep an eye out for you. I'm Bai. No team at the moment, unfortunately; we split when some of us wanted to go into the Maze and some didn't. Not sure what I'm going to do next, so for now it's odd jobs I can do on my own."

Sophia quickly introduced the whole group, then waved at the table, "If you don't mind, what are you working on?"

Bai smiled. "A map of the Maze. Well, as much as the Maze can be mapped. It moves and changes. I'm trying to see if mapping the whole thing, combining everyone's experiences, will tell me anything. There are stories about people who've been able to predict some small things about it, like which of the nodes will show up on a particular day, so I'm hopeful. I'm pretty sure there's a progression element, but there seems to also be a way to fall back to an earlier stage in the progression which distorts the analysis."

He stopped and shook his head with a chuckle. "And there I go again, talking about it without saying anything. If you do head into the Maze, please track where you enter and what you encounter. If you make a map, even a partial one, it will help too. I'll tell you what I've guessed; that's the trade I've been making and it seems to work out for everyone. I don't always get it right, but any idea of what you'll encounter is better than nothing."

Sophia glanced at the papers and books scattered across the table. "Does everything in Mazehold revolve around the Maze?"

"No," Bai answered with a shake of his head. "Most things don't. I've never been in the Maze, and I'm from Mazehold. A lot of people in the Registry go into the Maze, but that's still less than one in five of the active teams. Most farm the Hollows, protect the city, hunt the surroundings, or fight in the Arena. Usually all of those. Even the teams that do enter the Maze don't go in every day. Anyone who isn't in the Registry doesn't go into the Maze at all. It's a lot like other towns."

Sophia was pretty sure Mazehold was a city. A small city, certainly, but it was still a city. It sort of made sense that a city wouldn't have only one industry. "How many people are in the Registry?"

"Called?" Bai asked, as if he were confirming the question. "Two or three thousand; I don't know the exact numbers. It's one of the smallest of the major factions; I'm not sure if it's bigger or if the Arena is. There's a lot of shared membership. Of course, you'd know that if you're planning to fight there. Have you accepted membership?"

"Is that a thing?" Sophia frowned at Bai, then glanced at Jax. "I thought you just signed up for fights."

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Bai leaned back in his chair. "You can, but your cut is a little higher if you join. Of course, you're also expected to make yourselves available on a schedule, which can make long trips into the Maze difficult. A lot of people jump into it without thinking about it; I recommend waiting. If you're any good at it, you'll get a better deal once they know what you're worth. It can be difficult to renegotiate once you're a member, and giving up Arena membership means you will never be permitted to fight there again."

"You're telling me they use membership as a way to keep people out of the Maze?" Jax sounded offended.

Bai chuckled. "Keep them from going too deep, maybe. Keep them out entirely? Definitely not. They send teams in regularly, mostly to capture the monsters they use in the Arena but also to explore. A fair bit of the maps I have were created by Arena members. Sometimes they even send in extremely large groups; those always get interesting results."

That actually sounded like exactly what Jax was looking into: how the Arena did things differently from the Registry and lost fewer people. It didn't make sense, though; why did he have to go undercover in the Arena if someone sitting in the Registry's cafe already knew the answers and was happy to share them?

Sophia was pretty sure he was here a lot, too. The papers spread across the table looked familiar, like the ones she saw when they first arrived at the Registry while they were waiting to sell the fireflowers. He must have been away from the table at that point, because she was certain she'd remember if she'd seen him as well.

"Do be careful if you go on one of the large expeditions, however," Bai cautioned. "They always lose people, and the people who die are not always the weakest. I'm pretty sure that the big expeditions attract trouble, and if you're not ready for it when it comes, that's the end. Sometimes even if you are ready; I've seen all too many bright youngsters like you lost in the Maze. The big expeditions bring back big prizes for those who survive, but they lose more than they're worth."

Sophia frowned. Maybe he didn't know why the Arena was more successful overall at all, then; maybe she had it backwards. Maybe he was the reason Jax knew the Arena's people were more successful, but he didn't know why. That would make more sense. Wouldn't it?

That seemed like a question to ask Jax once they were in private. It wasn't like they couldn't come back and ask Bai more later, after all.

"What can you tell us about the Maze?" Sophia changed the subject slightly. "We're not planning to go in any time soon, but I still want to know what's there."

Bai flipped through one of the books until he came to a sketch. It was clearly only part of the Maze; Sophia could see an outer wall with three openings, all on a curve near the edge of the page. The wall was cut off by the edge of the paper. "This is the portion of the Maze closest to us, and the three most common entrances. There are some others, but I know less about them."

Bai tapped the middle opening. "This is the one you can see from the city wall. It's known as the Shattered Entrance, because you never know what's on the other side; it can and will lead to anything. Sometimes it even opens on a peaceful scene. Most of the time, you're walking into a fight. To the east is the Minotaur's Labyrinth. Nine times out of ten, entering there puts you in a series of winding halls with one or more minotaurs; to leave, you have to either deal with or escape the minotaur." He paused, then winked at Sophia. "I'm sure you can guess who goes in there the most."

"People capturing minotaurs for the Arena." That was an easy guess. She'd seen two different fights against minotaurs in the day they spent at the Arena.

Bai nodded, then tapped the other entrance. "To the west is the City Gate. It's a little less reliable than the Labyrinth; only about seven in ten groups that go through the City Gate find themselves in a city filled with monsters. Two in ten end up in what you can see from the outside. We call it the Outer Maze, and if you see it, back out immediately, no matter how you got there. Even if it means abandoning an otherwise successful trip deep into the Maze, get out. Anything that glows orange in the Outer Maze is deadly, even if you don't touch it."

Bai looked from person to person and waited until he saw them all nod. He sighed. "If I could teach that to everyone who goes to the Maze, I would. Most groups lose someone to the Outer Maze at some point; only the cautious ones survive."

Sophia definitely needed to go back through the papers she'd gotten from Registry Master Jessamine when they left Casterville. They included an account of the Shield of the Sun's time in the Maze, and Sophia didn't remember any mention of the Outer Maze. She did remember some complaints about the Maze changing, but she'd assumed it was slower than Bai made it sound. "If it changes each time you enter, how can you possibly map it?"

"There are patterns!" Bai smiled and seemed to relax as she distracted him from thoughts of the Outer Maze. "Certain openings tend to lead to specific other areas or maybe events…"

It turned out that Bai could talk about the Maze for hours.

Bai watched the youngsters walk away, talking cheerfully. He shook his head as he waved over a waitress to clear away their dishes and wondered how long they would live.

He'd seen so many like them die over the long decades he watched over Mazehold. They were ambitious and planned to enter the Maze; the combination was a death sentence. The fact that they were attempting to train at the Arena was a point in their favor, but the fact that they'd caught the attention of the Registry Master was not.

He wasn't sure which side of the ledger to put Old Arryn's favor; the merchant had a habit of sponsoring people who were much better than they should be, but all too many of them were also overly proud and kept going forward into things they should have run from.

Not that any of that was likely to matter. With five people, the odds that one of them would be revealed as Hallowed to the Broken Lord's followers at the Arena was all too high, and they wouldn't take chances on the rest if they discovered one. They knew that Hallowed tended to group up.

Bai was fairly confident that was simply because people who did the deeds that would earn a Hallow tended to also be people who were driven and therefore worked well with other driven people. That was how it worked back in the days of the Kestii Empire, before the Breaking; there was no reason to believe it had changed, even though they now had to hide their Hallows.

"All I can do is tell them about the Maze," he muttered. If he could fight with them, he would, but he was never made to fight. His duty was and always had been information collection, with a focus on the Maze and the Tower. It wouldn't be done until the Maze was gone and no longer created monsters. He wasn't certain he'd survive to see that day, even if it was shrinking faster than ever.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.