Chapter 616

Ludger’s eyes shifted to the forge side of the yard, where crates of bracers were being stacked as they came in, some finished, some still missing straps, some still waiting for rune work.

They weren’t done yet. But enough were done to begin. Which meant it was time for the next part of the plan. Communication was step one. Bonding was step two. Now he needed scale.

He needed more Magic Tamer progression, more control, more efficiency, more understanding to the pact art so that the guild didn’t rely on clunky rune crutches forever. And there was one place that would help him do it fast. Ludger turned his gaze north. Toward the frost.

Toward the labyrinth that didn’t care about politics, deadlines, or noble titles, only about whether you were strong enough to survive it.

The Frost Labyrinth.

A place full of monsters. If he wanted Magic Tamer skills to evolve quickly… If he wanted the wolves and the guild to become something the Regent couldn’t collar with paper. Then he needed the labyrinth. And soon.

Ludger left Lionfang before the sun had fully decided what kind of day it wanted to be. As he walked, he checked his newest classes the way he checked equipment.

Monk Lv. 07  [+5 Strength, + 5 Vitality, + 5 Dexterity, + 5 Endurance.]

Skills: Vitality Well Lv 12

Iron Skin Lv 03: Decreases physical damage by three points per level.

Magic Tamer Lv 01 [+ 07 Dexterity, + 07 Wisdom, + 07 Luck.]

Skills: Feral Ally Summoning Lv 01

Auramancer Lv 10 [All Parameters aside from luck + 05 per level.]

Skills: Overdrive Lv 21

Flame Overdrive Lv 06 - Increases your strength, dexterity and endurance by 10 points per level. Cost: 60 mana per second.

Two of them had leveled up since the north. Not huge jumps, but enough to matter. Enough to come with new skills.

But Magic Tamer… Nothing. No level. No new skills. Not even a satisfying progress bar that made him feel like the System was being fair. Which was annoying, because he’d been using it constantly.

He’d summoned Silva repeatedly. Maintained the pact. Tested communication. He’d done the work. And yet the class sat there like a stone.

Ludger’s eyes narrowed as the Frost Labyrinth’s distant ridge line began to come into view. That meant the System didn’t consider what he’d done “growth.” Or, more likely, it considered it

maintenance

.

Like carrying water after you already built the well. He didn’t like that, but it also told him something useful: Magic Tamer had requirements. Real ones.

Not “use the skill ten times.” Not “own a pet.” Something deeper. Something that proved dominance and bond under pressure. Ludger exhaled, breath steaming.

Probably fighting together.

It made sense. A pact formed in peace was one thing.

A pact that held in blood and chaos, when fear and pain hit and instinct tried to take over, that was what the System would reward.

If he wanted Magic Tamer to evolve, he needed to test the bond where it mattered. And the Frost Labyrinth was the perfect place to do it. Because down there, in the ice and bone and silent corridors, nobody cared about paper offers. Only results.

Ludger trudged forward through the cold, eyes fixed on the pale ridge that marked the Frost Labyrinth’s territory.

He clicked his tongue quietly.

“I should’ve asked Shera for more details,” he muttered. “She probably assumed I’d come back and ask.”

It fit her. She’d taught him the minimum, watched him cheat the basics with stubborn speed, and then let him leave like he was a bad habit she didn’t want to encourage. Of course she’d expect a return visit, once he hit the next wall.

Beside him, Silva lifted his head and let out a long, confident howl that rolled across the snowfields like a statement of agreement. Ludger didn’t even look at him.

“Don’t howl like it’s obvious,” Ludger said flatly. “Speak proper human language.”

Silva’s ears flicked. Then he howled again. Longer this time. With more attitude. Ludger stared ahead for a moment, dead-eyed, and sighed through his nose.

“…Who am I kidding?,” he muttered, and kept walking while his newest companion continued to communicate exclusively in the world’s least cooperative dialect.

The northerners’ town was lively in the worst possible way. Not lively like a festival. Lively like a fire you didn’t start but somehow still had to walk past.

Word traveled faster than arrows up here, and the moment Ludger cut through the outskirts, he could feel the attention swivel toward him, heads turning, voices rising, that hungry social instinct northerners had when something new happened and they wanted to punch it until it made sense.

Mostly because Freyra had a dire wolf now too. And a bracer. That combination turned the camp into a nest of loud opinions, challenges, and excited idiots who thought “pack bonding” meant “wrestle the cub until it respects you.” Ludger wanted none of it.

He moved like a shadow with boots, keeping to the edges, slipping behind stacked wood, cutting between tents at angles that didn’t invite conversation. Every time a familiar voice started to rise, every time he heard the start of “Ludger!” he changed direction without slowing.

It worked.Mostly. Still, he caught himself thinking, not for the first time, that he needed a better solution than “walk faster.”

Illusions,

he thought grimly.

He needed illusion spells. Something simple. A blur. A face-shift. A presence-dampening veil. Anything that made “avoiding people” less dependent on sprinting and luck.

Because he could already see the future: More wolves. More politics. More eyes. And Ludger couldn’t afford to be intercepted every time someone decided they wanted his attention.

Silva padded beside him, too pleased with himself to understand why Ludger was weaving like a thief. The dire wolf’s tail swished, head high, scenting everything like the town was a buffet of new information.

“Quiet,” Ludger muttered without looking down.

Silva huffed, but at least he stopped howling. It took Ludger an hour of clean movement, fast enough to avoid being “caught,” controlled enough not to look like he was running away, to clear the town and reach the Frost Labyrinth’s approach.

No one stopped him. No one called him back.

No one forced him into a conversation about “how cool it is” to have a wolf, or asked whether he’d “picked a mate for it yet,” or, worse, whether

he

had picked a mate.

Ludger exhaled as the temperature dropped another notch.

Ahead, the Frost Labyrinth waited, ice-slick stone, pale mist, and that familiar pressure in the air that made mana feel thicker, heavier, like the world was bracing for violence.

Good. People were noisy. The labyrinth was honest.

Once they crossed the threshold, the Frost Labyrinth greeted them the way it always did, cold that didn’t belong to weather, silence that felt intentional, and that faint pressure in the air like the dungeon was watching. Ludger rolled his shoulders once and glanced down at Silva.

“Alright,” he said. “Show me what you’re made of.”

Silva’s ears perked, then the dire wolf threw his head back and howled, the sound echoing down ice-slick corridors like a claim. Before the last note even died, Silva dashed ahead, silent paws on frost, body low, moving like he’d been born in this kind of cruel terrain.

Ludger followed at a measured pace, letting his senses spread. He didn’t need to rush. Not yet. The first corridor always gave you a moment to breathe before it tried to kill you.

A few steps ahead, the frost thickened. A skeletal shape began to materialize, ice knitting into bone, froststeel flickering into existence in its hands. The thing’s empty sockets burned with pale light as it finished forming, and it immediately tried to pull mana through its weapon.

A shield of ice began to bloom, flat, dense, a slab formed from froststeel output like a reflex.

Silva didn’t care. He hit it like a battering ram.

A full-body slam, shoulder and chest exploding forward, crashing into the half-formed shield before it fully stabilized. Ice shattered in a spray of sharp fragments. The skeleton toppled backward, joints clacking, one arm dislocating in the impact.

The undead tried to rise. Silva was already on it.

He clamped down on the skeleton’s skull with a bite that made Ludger’s stomach tighten, the sound wasn’t just crunch, it was

final

. The skull fractured, then collapsed inward as if it had been made from brittle glass.

The light in its sockets flickered and went out. The body dissolved into frost-dust and scattered bone, leaving only a brief shimmer of froststeel left. Silva lifted his head, muzzle dusted white, eyes bright with satisfaction.

Then he bounded back to Ludger like a proud idiot. Before Ludger could sidestep, Silva shoved his head into Ludger’s chest and started licking, big wet strokes, enthusiastic enough to qualify as harassment.

Ludger stiffened. He couldn’t help the thought that flashed through his mind with unwanted clarity:

That jaw power just crushed a skull.

…and now it was being used to lick him over and over again like he was salt.

Ludger sighed and wiped at his cheek with the back of his glove. “Yes. Good job. Stop.”Silva ignored him and licked again. Ludger’s eye twitched, but then something else caught his attention. A familiar, clean tick of progress.

[Feral Ally Summoning

: +10 XP]

Ludger’s irritation cooled instantly into focus. He stared at the notification as if it might change if he blinked. It didn’t. His guess was confirmed. It wasn’t “summon the ally a lot” that made Magic Tamer grow.

It was

using the bond under real conditions

, combat, pressure, coordination, risk. The System wanted proof that the pact wasn’t a party trick. Ludger’s mouth curved slightly, sharp and satisfied.

“Alright,” he murmured.

Then he looked down the corridor where more frost mist swirled, where the next skeleton would form, where the labyrinth would keep testing them.

“Again,” he told Silva.

Silva stopped licking long enough to howl—like it was the most obvious order in the world, then dashed forward to hunt the next kill.

Ludger watched Silva sprint ahead with frost dust still clinging to his muzzle, and a smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“Alright,” he murmured, voice dry with a hint of amusement, “it’s time for you to level up.”

Silva’s ears flicked back, like he’d heard the tone more than the words.

Ludger’s smirk sharpened. “Because I’m going to win the Indigo League with only you.”

Silva glanced back mid-run, confused. Ludger kept talking anyway, because the joke amused him and the labyrinth didn’t care.

“I won’t even let you evolve,” he added, dead serious in the way only jokes delivered with a straight face could be. “Makes it more interesting.”

Silva didn’t understand a single word of it.

But he could feel the enthusiasm through the bond, warm, focused, pleased in that rare way Ludger got when something worked exactly how he wanted.

That was enough. Silva’s tail flicked once, then he lowered his body and dashed faster, claws scraping briefly on ice as he surged toward the next corridor. Ahead, frost mist thickened again.

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