I inspected the ten bone stairs closely, trying to spot a single difference between them that would help me clear the Bone Maze.
The ten bone stairs didn't have handrails, and they constituted numerous small identical bones that joined together to form the tread and riser of the stairs. Since the bones were similar and dead-end, I compared the pattern in which the bones were arranged to form the steps. And I got nothing. It was like all ten of them were Xerox copies of each other.
There was no time limit to clearing this Bone Maze, especially in the first stage, as the Skeleton Minotaur Guard hadn't entered the Bone Maze yet. Therefore I took my time to explore all the possibilities to differentiate the ten identical bone stairs.
I thought of marking the stairs I would climb using the rusty single sword. Standing at the edge of the bone stage next to the stairs, I used the sword tip to try and engrave the first step of the bone stairs. I decided to carve the roman letter one on the stairs indicating that it was the first stairs I climbed. I thought it would take a lot of effort to cut the letter onto the bones, but I was wrong. The sword point was able to scratch the surface of the bones easily, leaving behind a mark that read one from the roman number system.
Seeing this, I was elated, but my happiness didn't last long as I saw the mark I had carved onto the bones vanish as the bones healed themselves. But I didn't let this demotivate me. It was too early to give up, and I still had other plans.
Since engraving the stairs didn't pan out, I decided to leave behind a trail of breadcrumbs on the climbed stairs. Thinking of this, I used the sword to cut the cuffs of my rubber gloves to use them like breadcrumbs. Cutting the rubber strips into adequate size, I placed one on the first steps of the stairs.
After placing the piece of rubber cloth on the stairs, I waited patiently. Witnessing the bones heal to erase the mark I carved onto them had made me more cautious. I didn't have to wait long. A minute later, I saw the small bones joining to form the tread of the stairs split right below the piece of rubber cloth, dropping it into the empty void. Seeing this, my knees felt weak and almost gave out.
Though the breadcrumb lead wasn't successful, I noted that I shouldn't stay on a step for more than a minute. Then I got to thinking about whether the one-minute rule applied to a single step or the entire stairs. I decided to experiment to find the answer.
First, I placed a piece of rubber cloth on the first step, and then 30 seconds later, I put another piece of rubber cloth on the second step. After 30 seconds, the first step split, and throwing the rubber piece into the void, it joined back. Another 30 seconds later, the same had repeated on the second stairs. Proving that the one-minute rule only applied to the steps, not the entire stairs.
With engraving and breadcrumb trail yielding no results, I had one last trick up my sleeve. I was hoping that it wouldn't come to this, but I was left with no choice. The last trick in my arsenal was to paint the bones of the stairs with my blood.
Making a small cut on my finger, I drew blood and used it to paint a roman letter one on the first step of the stairs. A small cut wasn't enough for the amount of blood I needed, so I cut my fingers a few more times. With death looming over me, I wasn't worried about getting tetanus for using a rusty sword to make shallow cuts on my fingers. I would be resurrected, but I did not want to experience death again.
After painting the bones of the stairs with my blood, I waited patiently. After a long while, nothing transpired, but the blood mark dried up. This was a good sign, but my experimentation did not finish there. I placed a piece of rubber cloth right on top of the dried blood mark and waited for a minute. The bone stair split up and joined after throwing the piece of rubber cloth into the void. Then I sighed in relief after checking that the blood mark painted on the bones was still in place even after the bones split up and rejoined.
Seeing the positive result of my experiment, I was giddy, but I did not let it get to me and maintained my composure. Because there may be other variables that I forgot to account for or are unknown to me, all I could do now was hope for the best and begin the climb because the alternative was starving to death in the bone maze.
Now that I had found a way to differentiate between the stairs that I had climbed from those that I didn't, I resolved to climb the Bone Maze. And to be on the safer side, I decided to leave behind a trail of blood drops on every step of the stairs as I climbed them.
Hoping that everything would work out, I braced myself and climbed the first stairs. As I climbed the stairs, an unknown radiance illuminated my path. While making sure I did not stay longer than 10 seconds on a step, I left behind a trail of blood drops. After climbing ten steps, I reached the second stage of the Bone Maze.
Stepping onto the second stage, a series of T-system prompts sounded. Ignoring them, I looked for the ten identical bone stairs, but I could not see them as the radiance only illuminated the second stage but not the stairs, including the one I climbed to get here. As I tried not to panic, soon, the radiance shone on the first two steps of the ten identical bone stairs.
After the ten identical bone stairs appeared in my view, I hurried to find the one with the blood trail.
My future depended on this moment. If I fail to get the tutorial rewards, my life in this new world from this day forward will be very harsh.