They watched the albino trio vanish around a bend, drifting like bored ghosts.

  Leo folded his arms. “We are not following them.”

  Harlada nodded. “Agreed.”

  Bert nodded too. “Yes. Let them float off into irrelevance.”

  And with the kind of unanimous confidence they almost never experienced, the three of them marched firmly in the opposite direction.

  The corridor bent sharply, widened, and then—

  They stepped into a cavernous stone chamber.

  Bert took one breath, one look, and screamed:

  “PUZZLE ROOM!”

  Leo nearly swallowed his tongue. “BERT!”

  But Bert was already pointing wildly.

  And unfortunately…

  He was right.

  The room was unmistakably a puzzle room:

  Massive stone tiles embedded in the floor.

  Seven enormous geometric slabs scattered around the chamber—triangles, a square, a parallelogram—all the size of gravestones.

  Rough outlines etched into the far wall forming a silhouette they were clearly meant to recreate.

  Harlada frowned. “What is this? Some kind of ancient sigil?”

  Leo squinted. “…Is that a duck?”

  Bert beamed. “It’s a Tangram puzzle!”

  Harlada blinked. “A what?”

  “A super old puzzle,” Bert said proudly. “You take seven shapes, arrange them into a picture.”

  Leo stared at him. “Bert… how do you know this?”

  “I don’t know”Bert shrugged. “Iguess we all have hidden talents”

  “some more hidden than others” Leo said under his breath.

  Harlada approached one of the massive pieces and gave it a shove.

  It didn’t budge.

  “…Heavy,” she muttered.

  Bert nodded solemnly. “Yes. The ancient art of Tangram requires strength, wisdom, intelligence—”

  Leo pushed past him and tried moving a different piece. Nothing.

  “—and maybe three people with working backs,” Bert finished.

  The Maze pulsed softly, lights flickering across the chamber walls.

  Puzzle detected: Tangram Configuration #14.

  Incorrect placement will activate corrective fire.

  Harlada glared upward. “Corrective what?”

  Fire. the Maze pulsed again, very helpfully.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  Leo sighed. “All right. So it’s just a children’s puzzle. Except the children die.”

  Bert clapped his hands together. “Okay! Team Tangram! Let’s—”

  “No slogans,” Harlada said.

  “—let’s solve this quietly,” Bert amended.

  They studied the etching on the wall.

  It was a duck.

  A very judgmental duck.

  Leo exhaled. “Great. We’re going to die copying poultry.”

  Bert grinned. “Not if we do it right!”

  The three of them took their places around the first stone shape.

  And pushed.

  Nothing.

  Harlada braced her feet and shoved harder.

  Still nothing.

  Leo joined them, shoulder to shoulder, straining.

  The stone scraped a millimeter.

  Bert cheered. “YES! Progress!”

  Harlada wiped her forehead. “This is going to take forever.”

  The Maze pulsed again, tone almost cheerful.

  Time limit: 30 minutes.

  Corrective fire preparing.

  Leo’s face went pale.

  “…We’re dead.”

  ***

  They had barely nudged the first two stone pieces into place — and “nudged” was generous, it had taken all three of them grunting for a full twenty five minutes — when the Maze pulsed again.

  A deep, resonant thrum rolled through the chamber.

  Maze Run #477983 completed.

  Winner ascended to Progression.

  Maze resets in 5 minutes.

  The three froze.

  Leo blinked slowly. “Wait… someone already won?”

  Harlada’s face drained. “We’ve been in here for twenty five minutes!”

  Bert’s eyes widened to saucer size. “WE ARE ABOUT TO BE RESET. WHILE HOLDING. A PUZZLE. ABOUT A DUCK.”

  Leo grabbed him by the shoulders. “Move! PUSH! Make the duck!”

  Panic set in instantly.

  They threw themselves at the nearest triangle slab, muscles trembling. It scraped forward painfully slowly.

  Harlada pointed wildly at the diagram. “No, no, that piece goes THERE—”

  Leo tried dragging another shape into place, shouting, “We need the parallelogram next!”

  Bert, attempting to lift one of the corner pieces with terrible form, made a horrible sound.

  “Aaarrrgh—MY BACK!”

  He dropped the stone. It landed on his foot. He howled.

  Leo spun, tripped over Bert, and crashed into one of the already placed pieces—

  —and knocked it out of alignment.

  It slid across the floor with an echoing scrape.

  Leo froze.

  Bert froze.

  Harlada’s eye twitched so hard it could’ve powered a clock.

  The Maze pulsed with pity.

  Incorrect placement detected.

  Corrective fire deploying.

  A hiss built in the walls.

  Harlada shouted, “MOVE!”

  A jet of bright orange flame blasted out of a hidden slit in the stone, exactly where she had been standing a moment ago. She rolled away just in time, landing hard on her shoulder.

  Bert crawled behind a pillar, clutching his back. “We’re gonna die assembling poultry!”

  Leo grabbed the nearest piece. “THEN LET’S FINISH THE POULTRY!”

  Harlada, panting, pointed urgently. “THE SMALL TRIANGLE—PUT IT THERE—NO, NOT THERE—THE OTHER ‘THERE’!”

  Leo shoved it. Wrong direction.

  Corrective fire blasted past his ear.

  He screamed.

  The Maze pulsed again, almost encouraging.

  Reset commencing.

  Bert forced himself upright with a horrible cracking sound. “OKAY—I CAN STILL HELP—PROBABLY—MAYBE NOT—AAARRGH—”

  They scrambled together, shoving, dragging, sliding stone pieces with desperate speed and almost no accuracy.

  Harlada slammed a hand on the final outline. “We’ve got one minute! ONE MINUTE!”

  Leo shoved a giant triangle into place and immediately knocked the middle square out of alignment again.

  Corrective fire scorched his sleeve.

  “STOP TOUCHING THINGS!” Harlada yelled.

  “I’M TRYING TO MAKE A DUCK!”

  “WELL YOU’RE KILLING US INSTEAD!”

  The Maze pulsed one final time, ominously calm.

  Reset in 5,4,3 ,2, 1.

  ***

  All went black.