Chapter 26
Wrenn’s advantage was that he had been all but blind for quite some time. He knew how to make the best use of his ears, how to stay balanced without view of the horizon, how not to panic in total darkness, and how to feel his way around when something was out of his viewing range.
That familiarity also served as a disadvantage. Wrenn was more than ‘used to’ his new eyes, he was extremely attached to them. It was a struggle to keep down the rising tide of frustration and nagging claustrophobia that was stemming from the opaque black cloth shrouding his vision; More than it had ever been in the past, even after the loss of his human eyes.
Silently, the two trainers led him along for upwards of twenty minutes. He had to walk on his hind legs since his forelegs were bound at the wrists. Wrenn felt grass, then rocks, then dead leaves under his paws and claws, until at last it all gave way to the sensation of cool moist rock.
The temperature began to drop, severely, and Wrenn realized from that, the broken nature of the ground, and the perceived changes in altitude and pressure, that he had been lead into some kind of cave or excavation.
The trainers lead him in what seemed to be twisting loops and circles for another fifteen minutes, then shoved him to the ground. He landed on his back, in an uncomfortable position. The rock dug into his wings, irritating the joint.
A voice finally broke the silence, “You may begin.”
His first impulse was to thrash and flex until his bonds broke. They had bound him with light cord for a reason, presumably so he could easily be rid of it, and he knew it would be easy enough to break the ropes through raw strength, or slit them with his beak.
It was a struggle, but Wrenn suppressed the overriding impulse to action, and just listened.
If it was as dark as he feared, then he would have a hard time getting out visually.
He needed an initial direction, and the sound of the retreating trainers would provide it for him.
Every second was a battle with his own reflexes and impulses, but he managed to hold still long enough to get a bead on the retreating pawsteps of the two other Gryphons. They were being stealthy, but the fractured shale terrain was just as bad for them as it would be for him, even though they doubtless had dim lights of some description.
When the only audible sound in the indeterminate underground space was the drip of water from the ceiling, Wrenn finally gave in to his baser instincts. He slashed at the bonds on his foreclaws with his beak, furiously rending the cord, not even stopping to spit out the irritating little bits of rope fiber that were getting caught on his tongue.
The moment his claws were free, he ripped off the blindfold.
Darkness remained. Overpowering, complete, suffocating darkness.
He cursed aloud. It was what he had been afraid of; He was so far underground that there was no light for his eyes to pick up on. It was, in the most literal sense, total darkness.
A complete absence of light that even a moonless night could not replicate.
Panic, stronger than anything he had ever known, welled up in his chest.
For years, even with his implants, the fear of total blindness had been an ever present specter.
He knew, logically, that his eyes were working properly, but that didn’t change the frantic impulses coursing through his brain and body.
Some part of him realized that that was the point. That was the test. The whole point was the panic, the panic caused by deprivation of vision.
With enormous effort, he forced himself to take ever deeper, ever slower breaths.
It took almost five minutes, but he finally managed to quiet his instincts and emotions enough to take stock.
The air tasted and smelled cool, and fresh. A few words spoken aloud echoed, revealing that the chamber was fairly large. Breathable air would, thankfully, not be a concern.
Wrenn decided to re-tie the blindfold. To most candidates, it was likely little more than a scrap of frustrating cloth to be discarded immediately. But he had suffered the fear of blindness for a long time. Having the coarse opaque fabric rubbing against his face would keep his brain from assuming the worst, and it might quiet some of his fears.
He did his best to leave enough room at the bottom for some light to seep through should he approach the entrance. It would do him no good if he couldn’t see some indication that he was succeeding.
It crossed his mind, briefly, that there must be some sort of procedure for rescuing a candidate who didn’t escape within a certain period. Still, Wrenn knew enough about deep dark spaces to know that he was in real danger of losing his life. If the tunnels were deep and winding enough, he could end up lost forever, trapped, or injured beyond the ability to move, and ultimately starved to death.
And his body?
Never recovered.
Wrenn stretched out a wing, hoping to detect a breeze across his outermost primary.
The air, unfortunately, was too still so far from the entrance.
His tail lashed automatically in frustration, the fan of feathers at its end picking up a few droplets of moisture from the uneven stone floor.
His only chance lay in moving in the direction he had last heard the trainers’ footsteps emanating from. If he could just keep moving upwards, until he struck a draft or light, then he might be able to feel his way out.
Wrenn’s one advantage was the innate Gryphon ability to sense pitch and altitude.
There was no risk of him losing track of whether he was moving upwards.
He took a few exploratory steps forward. Like any natural cave, the floor of his prison was highly irregular, with rock jutting up at weird angles every few inches. Wrenn was grateful to have quadrupedal capability. Trying to negotiate the broken terrain blind on just two hind paws would have been suicide, by way of a broken femur.
As he negotiated the slippery granite, Wrenn noted an ever so slight increase in altitude.
He continued, encouraged by the change, however minute it might have been.
Stretching his wings out at intervals, he still couldn’t detect a draft, but he did discover that he had moved into a tunnel of some sort. The floor evened out slightly, and the walls closed in.
After upwards of an hour, he wasn’t making good progress. He stopped to think, and to quell his rising frustration. Idly, he kicked at the floor, causing several pieces of loose gravel left over from the tunnel’s creation to skitter away.
The sound triggered a memory.
Something from his Special Forces training.
An antiquated survival trick.
Wrenn had a hunch. He very much doubted he could get lucky enough to find two rocks of the necessary composition, but the metal plates in his gauntlets were already half of the equation.
He removed the blindfold, and tried several rocks in sequence, striking them against his gauntlet with appreciable force.
Finally on the tenth try, a spark.
That was all he needed.
He rubbed the blindfold along the wall until it picked up enough moisture to be just slightly damp, then placed it on the floor. He knelt, and struck the lucky piece of flint against his gauntlet until the resulting spark finally took to the damp cloth and produced a tiny smolder.
The effect was instantaneous.
Wrenn’s eyes took the microscopic amount of dim light, and made the most of it.
It wasn’t enough to see very far, or in much detail, but it was enough to make out vague shapes, far more than Human eyes could have done with the same.
Wrenn could work with vague shapes. He had a lot of experience with them.
He continued down the passage at a slightly accelerated pace; Now that he could see the floor it was easier to negotiate obstacles. The first real problem cropped up several minutes later, in the form of a fork in the tunnel.
Neither choice presented airflow, light, or any appreciable change in altitude.
Wrenn tried to work backwards from what he remembered of the trip down, but without visual reference all he had was a recollection of the changes in compass direction, temperature, and relative altitude.
The choice was arbitrary; Wrenn decided to go right and eschew the left-wall rule.
He could, he decided, always return to the fork and go left if the tunnel showed signs of heading down, or simply didn’t provide any increase in overall altitude.
Now that he could see, he could start to memorize the route he had traveled, thus avoiding pointless repeats and dead ends. The damp cloth would eventually burn out, but given that it wasn’t even a full fledged flame, it would likely take several hours to do so.
As he continued through the passage, Wrenn’s frustration started to take hold again. The ability to see was something of a reprieve, but one he started thinking about escape he realized that it had only taken fifteen minutes to reach the cavern he had been left in from the surface.
Logically, he should be able to escape in that same amount of time, or even less if he could find a straight route. He had already been wandering for upwards of an hour.
The realization that the surface was, geographically close, but effectively as distant as another world, sent his brain back into panic mode.
The intellectual side of him was used to tight spaces. he had served on a ship long enough to be well acclimated to the idea of crushing weight and pressure all around him. But the part of him that reveled in an open sky, in seeing the horizon, felt caged and threatened.
He pinched his left foreleg between his right index and thumb talons until a small cut developed.
The pain abated the emotions, and cleared his head, if only for a moment.
In that space of clear headedness, another thought occurred to Wrenn.
He might not be able to reason his way back through the exact twists and turns of his route down, but he *could* carefully eliminate them and discover the general compass direction of the exit, giving him another factor to consider whenever he encountered forks in the passages.
After another twenty minutes of walking, and having to relight the tattered damp cloth thrice more, Wrenn had only encountered a single junction. The left choice had been the more promising in that instance, given that it was angled in the proper direction and tilted upwards appreciably.
Wrenn followed the new passage for another five minutes, until it abruptly ended in a wall of solid rock. The stone was comprised of massive boulders, likely the result of a cave-in.
Wrenn sat down hard and did his best to keep himself cognizant and controlled.
He had been underground for almost two hours, and his instincts were threatening to take over and send him on a pell-mell directionless dash through the tunnels. He knew that would likely result in becoming terminally lost, and that realization was the only thing keeping him from losing his mind.
For a moment, he thought he would shed tears of pure frustration. Instead, he cut loose and screeched his frustration to the ceiling, with no regard for the likelihood of another cave in.
As he stared up at the ceiling, his rage and frustration quickly died out, followed by his ill advised vocalization. The ceiling. A glimmer of hope.
As he continued to stare, Wrenn realized what he was looking at was not solid rock, but primarily dirt and roots, mixed in with large boulders.
He quickly blew on his smoldering cloth, re-vitalizing the embers and increasing the light level just enough to make out a few more details. He set the improvised torch down, and dug through the smaller stones, finally selecting a long, flat, strong looking piece of granite.
He was taking an enormous risk. If the ceiling fully collapsed, he would likely be buried under several tons of rock, shale, and scree. Thankfully, the roof was low enough to easily reach on his hind legs. If it held, then he might be able to tunnel through the relatively few feet to the surface.
His first experimental stabs with his digging stone were met with a hail of dirt that clogged and irritated his eyes. He squinted and redoubled his efforts, putting as much strength as he dared into the digging motion.
All at once, a large segment of rock and dirt came loose, nearly knocking him flat on his stomach. He beat his wings and lashed at the air with his tail to clear the dust, before continuing unabated.
Once he had hollowed out enough space, he pulled himself into the new aperture, bracing himself against the rough walls of his escape shaft with his wings.
If his claustrophobia had been bad in the tunnel, it was unbearable here. Roots dug into his joints, small stones peppered him with every movement, however slight, and dirt did its best to get into his eyes.
The only thing that kept him going was channeling his frustration directly into his digging.
He had given up all semblance of caution, and was frantically stabbing at the dirt and rock with his granite slab, forcing his way upwards inch by painful inch.
Oddly, one small part of his brain remained active enough to realize that he was sweating profusely, thus answering the question of how Gryphons biologically cooled themselves in the event of extreme heat and exertion.
That small part of his brain found it amusing that he should be inches from self-inflicted death by tunnel collapse, and the one sane thought in his head would be about sweat.
A moment later, all rational thought was replaced by sheer determination, mixed with a large dose of frantic survival instinct, as he felt the dirt around him begin to shift.
Wrenn threw every last ounce of strength into his efforts, clawing away at the dirt and scree with the slab, his tightly closed beak, and even his wings.
As the ground began to cave in around him, it became an all out scramble to stay ahead of the collapse. A tiny ray of daylight caught his eye for a moment, and the encouragement it provided lent even more energy to his efforts.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity longer than the entire stint of his stay in the tunnels, he felt fresh air against one claw. He grasped wildly, as the unstoppable force of the cave in threatened to suck him down again. His claw connected with something solid that felt like bark, and he dug in, using his wings and back paws to continue to shovel himself out.
At last, it was over.
Wrenn found himself lying flat on his chest, one claw rooted deeply in the trunk of a tall pine tree, his tail and back legs hanging over the rim of a freshly formed crater.
He lay there for several minutes, just breathing the clear cool mountain air, and staring at the tops of the pines far above, counting individual needles as a mindless task to reorient his panicked and tortured mind.
The very presence of light, color, and shapes was euphoria itself.
He hearkened back to his first moments after Conversion.
It almost felt the same; A rebirth after being caged in a dark prison.
It took a surprising amount of effort to remove his claw from the tree, he had managed to embed it quite deeply, and he ended up having to slice away several layers of bark with his free talons.
He stood, and shook himself, sending dirt spraying in all directions.
He was hot, gritty, and adrenaline soaked.
But he was free.
Wrenn had taken to the sky, allowing the euphoria of complete freedom to wash away the nightmare of his subterranean experience. Once he had gained some altitude, he quickly spotted the training grounds in the distance. He made his way there lazily, not particularly eager to start his next test. He wanted as much time as he could muster to stifle the horror of his time in the tunnels.
When he finally did touch down in the training circle, Brelik was waiting for him with a small smile, a flask of water, and two plates of body armor, “Well done. Not the fastest escape, but easily the most... Forceful. And direct. I’m not sure any Gryphon in the history of the trials has opted to dig their way out.”
Wrenn chuckled as he slurped down some of the proffered liquid, “Well, you could say I was saved by my ‘extracurricular experience’ and unconventional training.”
Brelik handed him the chest plate and back plate, “Well, you have most certainly earned these.”
Wrenn nodded his thanks, and donned his new protective gear, “How were the tunnels created? I managed some light, and they looked artificial. If sloppy. I doubt very much, given my experience, that we dig often.”
Brelik shook his head, “Diamond Dog excavations, from the war. They were trying to move by tunnel to evade us. We used blackgrit to collapse the chambers in key areas, trapping them temporarily. We then dumped boiling oil down any open entrances. Now the tunnels serve as a testing ground. If you can keep your sanity there, you’re fit to fight anywhere.”
Wrenn raised an eyebrow, “Blackgrit?”
“A powder that explodes on contact with flame.”
“You mean gunpowder.”
“We call it blackgrit, but I assume given your expression, that you know it as gunpowder.”
Wrenn nodded, “It’s an explosive, and a propellant we use in certain older projectile weapons.”
He finished his water flask and upended it, peering into its dry depths, “I could use a little more water.”
Brelik smirked.
“This... Is not what I had in mind.” Wrenn eyed the mountain lake dubiously.
The two training assistants had returned, leading him wordlessly on a five minute flight to a large clear body of water that tumbled down into a stream at one end, apparently the very same stream that fed the wheat farms further down the slope.
The two assistants had bade him stand at the end of a small wooden pier. That worried Wrenn, given that he didn’t see any boats, and his fears were quickly given form when the trainers removed four huge metal objects from a wooden lock box that could only be described as ‘boots.’
The metal objects were connected by small flexible chains that seemed to contain wires.
From what Wrenn could tell, the boots would each be locked onto one foot, irremovably.
He guessed that the only way to remove all four was to unlock all four, given that the boots were stored in locked configuration, and the trainers had to unlock all four before they actually opened.
Wrenn guessed, as he experimentally lifted the one foot that was already securely locked into a boot, that the metal cladding weighed roughly a quarter of a ton, all-four-told. He knew what was going to happen. Logically the only reason they would secure a ton of weight to his feet, split up in such a way that he could still move, was to sink him to the bottom of the lake.
No instructions were given, as with the previous test, but Wrenn watched the locking process intently. He guessed there must be an alternate set of keys on the lake bottom. If not, then he was going to find out how long a Gryphon could hold their breath, abruptly followed by the discovery of how it would feel to die by drowning.
He couldn’t make out the bottom of the lake, it was clear and his eyes were working properly, but the water was simply too deep. The bottom was a dark blue haze obscured by the opacity of the water.
As Wrenn wondered if his claustrophobia would return, he fell back on his Marine training, and started pre-dive breathing exercises. Water wasn’t such a bad thing for a Gryphon; He had observed several fledglings swimming as he had arrived, but they all seemed to stick within ten or twelve feet of the surface, well within the range of sunlight.
Wrenn became fascinated by the way they used their wings to move, and he wondered if it was possible to dive into the water from low level flight, snag a fish, and pop back out before losing too much momentum.
As the trainers secured the final boot, the majority of the fledglings moved to the shore to watch.
They seemed just as fascinated with his test as he had been with their antics.
He smiled and waved, eliciting a few whistles and cheers of encouragement. Apparently a few of them had seen this before, and knew roughly what to expect.
Wrenn began to take increasingly slow, deep breaths. Gryphons’ compound lungs could hold lots of air for long periods under varying pressures, a necessity for high flight, but he wanted to eek every ounce of space possible from his alveoli.
The only warning he received was, “You may begin.”
He just had time to suck in enough air to fill his lungs about three quarters of the way, before he was abruptly shoved off the pier and into the freezing water.
It occurred to Wrenn that he would be able to circumvent the intended test entirely if he could grasp hold of the pier, but the trainers had pushed him too far for that.
The idea must have occurred to one of the Gryphons who had taken the test in the past, so Wrenn guessed the trainers had been instructed to ensure he didn’t use that clever escape.
As he sank, Wrenn braced himself for the panic, but it didn’t come. He had been expecting a swift influx of emotional chaos, an impulse to thrash and squirm, but instead his mind remained surprisingly clear.
The bottom of the lake was rocky, so he kicked up very little dirt when he impacted.
There was almost no light that far down, but enough rays made their way through the millions of gallons of liquid to provide *just* enough illumination to pick up on shapes and even a few details.
He had decided to climb out of the lake, and worry about removing the boots on dry land, but immediately discovered why that was a non option; The sides of the lakebed dropped steeply to the lowest depth from a much shallower shelf that gradiated up into the shore.
Wrenn quickly fell to searching for the keys. Holding his breath didn’t seem difficult, but he knew that would change far too soon for comfort.
He searched for upwards of ten minutes without any success. Movement was already slow going because of the water, and the one ton of metal on his feet compounded the issue to ridiculous levels.
After another few minutes of slow intensive searching, Wrenn was starting to feel a different kind of frustration. It was slow, seeping, insidious. If it hadn’t been for several aspects of his military training, he would have missed it entirely.
Earthgov special forces Marines were trained to be creative, independent, and forceful.
A condition known as ‘objective fixation’ was a major problem among regular military troops; The danger of becoming so focused on a verbatim objective that a soldier could lose sight of the actual *goal* itself, or the safety of any civilians and soldiers involved.
Special Forces troops underwent intensive, sometimes excruciating psychological therapy, testing, and even consensual torture, to have that aspect of their human instinct broken. The idea was to replace the condition with a more diverse conception of the battlefield that was free to utilize, but wasn’t constrained by objectives, orders, politics, instinct, or linear thinking.
Wrenn realized in a sudden flash that this was how Gryphons tested for the same condition. There were no keys. The very constraint of the test itself was an illusion, designed to make use of the blind spot created by objective fixation.
A clever con.
Wrenn could almost hear his drill sergeant’s voice, as if she were there, “Sometimes the OBJECTIVE has to change, to fulfill the GOAL. The GOAL is the prize, Mr. Wrenn, and if you FORGET that, your sorry ass will have to be peeled off the front of some SOB’s TANK somewhere!”
It wasn’t exactly a tank, but death by drowning was just as bad as death by railgun shell, if not worse for the torturously painful aspect.
Wrenn glanced down at the chain securing his boots.
As he had noted before, it was thin and light for mobility. Its only purpose being to protect the wire that held together the locking mechanism.
It took a painful contortion, but Wrenn managed to snag the chain in his beak. He bucked. Hard.
Arching his back, and yanking his head up, the pressure from his neck muscles combined with the force providing by the arching motion snapped the chain, and the locking wire along with it.
The boots released instantly, dispensing a flurry of bubbles as the air trapped around his feet escaped to the surface. Wrenn followed suit, smirking. His strokes, while effective enough to get him upward momentum, were awkward, and he mentally added ‘re-learn how to swim’ to his list of things he still needed to adapt to.
He broke the surface and sucked in a few grateful breaths. He hadn’t reached his limits, but were it not for the sudden flash of memory, that little epiphany from all those years of training, he would have at best failed and been rescued in shame.
At worst he would have drowned.
That was sobering.
Wrenn wing-paddled his way to shore, accompanied by cheers from the remaining fledglings onlookers. A few had gotten bored and moved on, but the majority had stayed to see how he fared. Wrenn idly wondered if they knew he was a Convert.
After scrambling to shore, he shook himself violently. He had been underwater long enough and deep enough for the liquid to bypass the water resistant coating of his feathers.
He was soaked fully to the skin.
The trainers approached. Wrenn smirked, “So... How long does it usually take? For a Knight to realize its one heckuva con?”
Both Gryphons remained silent, and impassive, but one shot him a small half-smile.
Brelik was again waiting with water and a helmet.
The second time, Wrenn consumed the liquid more slowly.
He was tempted to refuse, he had taken his fill of water for the day but he knew he needed to remain hydrated for whatever was to come.
Brelik shook his head and snorted, “You nearly set a record for that test. You are only the third contender I have ever overseen who has displayed such emotional control under water. It is supposed to be a much more trying experience.”
Wrenn smiled, “I'm a Marine. I’ve spent a great deal of time in and around water. And my Spec Ops psychological conditioning deserves the real credit.”
Brelik raised an eyebrow, “Then you and I will speak of it when this is over. Perhaps I can learn techniques we can use to better train our Squires.”
Wrenn nodded, “Sure thing.”
Brelik sighed, as Wrenn donned his helmet, “This brings us to the next test. While I do not intend to give you instructions, it is fairly self evident. And it requires your consent.”
Wrenn cocked his head, “My consent?”
“Yes. We have to bind your wings. This is a serious action, and something punishable by torture and death if done without consent. I must first swear to you that when you complete the test, I will unbind you, or my own wings will be cut off.”
Wrenn winced, “I don’t think I’m going to enjoy this.”
“That’s the point.”
“I suppose.” Wrenn considered the warning for a moment.
His wings had become such an integral part of him, in only a few days’ time.
Deep down, he knew the deceptively simple act of clamping them forcefully shut would be worse than the stress of the tunnel and the lakebed combined.
He glanced at the stone monoliths and breathed deeply, “If I don’t consent?”
“You fail. Automatically.”
Wrenn chuckled, “I figured as much. Very well. I consent.”
The band was pure iron. Six inches thick. Any less, and some of the stronger Gryphons, like Brelik, would be capable of snapping the lock with just the force of their wing muscles. It was heavy, cumbersome, and the unpleasant press of the inner surface against Wrenn’s wings was a constant reminder of his renewed imprisonment by gravity.
Brelik had sworn his oath, solemnly, with the trainers for witnesses, as they attached the band to Wrenn, passing it over his wings and under his chest. It pressed both his back plate and chest plate into his feathers, compounding his discomfort.
If the tunnels had been emotional compromise caused by fear, and the lake by fixation, then this test was emotional compromise caused by anger.
Technically, the test hadn’t even begun, and Wrenn was already seething inwardly.
He had tried to break the band, but even Brelik couldn’t accomplish that feat, and he shattered granite slabs regularly for exercise.
The trainers had left Wrenn in the monolith circle after fastening the band on, and as per usual, hadn't offered so much as a word of explanation or instruction.
After several minutes, Brelik joined him in the ring. He had his axe out, and the pit of Wrenn’s stomach dropped out. He had a sinking feeling he knew what was coming next.
Brelik didn’t speak, he just raised his weapon.
Wrenn unsheathed his sword.
He knew the point of the test was to anger him. Unfortunately knowing provided absolutely no help in stemming the raging tide of his fury. His wings were bound, he had too-little experience to even be in his position, and he was expected to face an unshackled veteran. And win.
Despite all his training, his experience with the HLF augments, and the nagging voice in his head urging him to clear his mind before plunging headlong into combat; Wrenn attacked.
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831220
I suppose it all depends how the tech transfer works out.
I definitely expect to see their bow tech advance quickly.
Expect slow-repeating crossbows at some point.
New chapter is up.
Sorry it took so long, but the tests were a doozie to devise.
And a twist is yet to come.
Hopefully the next chapter will come quickly, but it may also go slowly, I have to intro a new character and that's always slower going for the first couple of scenes until they come fully to life.
Enjoy, and if you happen to live near me try to stay cool.
(Heat index today; 115. I'm moving to Antarctica.)
Well, shit. This won't go well at all.
Oh boy, here we go.
I think this is a multi level task. fight to win and know when to stop.
kudos wrenn's sword would snap
842383
I miss the warmth. Here in Australia it's the middle of winter and I hate the cold (anything below 20°C is cold to me), though a HI of 115 is pretty warm
A good chapter, though a few of the gryphon's superhuman feats (Holding their breath for 20 minutes, being able to break through four or five inches of iron, moving around with 500 pound weights strapped to their feet) strain suspension of disbelief. Also, that training seems unneccesarily brutal. It seems like it would have a high fatality rate, needlessly killing experienced soldiers and wasting resources.
However, I still like the story.
That initial population number of only 15,000 in the capital bothered me as really small from my modern day human perspective and how they would handle and sizable number of the current population. Heck, even .1% is still a very large number compared to that measly 15,000. Especially since capitals of countries tend to have rather large populations compared to the rest of the country. Then again, if these are the tests, they have an inherent population control because nowhere have you shown any actual restraint or safety nets for the griffons' tests. My mind has trouble reconciling this with any truly sustainable, sizable army. Maybe it's just the lawyer in me screaming, "Man this is such a large amount of lawsuits waiting to happen and lots of sadness from the reckless disregard for life." Considering one simple mistake can cost a life, this seems kind of stupid for a series of tests for someone who isn't trying for very high in their military. Example of simple mistake: accidental outbreath as pushed leads to almost no air in lungs. Since you gave no indication anyone was down there, I'll have to assume that if they actually have any safety features, it would be an estimated time to drowning. If the person does not take the breath they expect, their time is an overestimate and the griffon is therefore a dead one. Add onto that the variable nature of oxygen consumption based off the expected panic and you have a stupid death trap.
I'm trying to reconcile what's been an overall good story with plot points that seem to overly stupid from a common sense point of view. I think you were trying to make the griffons look overly strong and powerful but instead I'm getting a sense of stupidity that will automatically keep their population low and their military low. Quality warriors are nice but, and I quote, "Quantity has a quality of its own." I remember a story of a type of modern day test of 3 professional swordsmen vs. 100 amateurs who probably never held a sword before that. The goal was to pop a balloon on their body or something like that. The result was that early on the amateurs fought and lost individually. The tide turned when a large number would attack all at once, realizing that 5 of the 7 (or some other high number) would "die" in the process.
Ack, now I'm actually starting to consider the logistics of this culture because, to a certain extent, it feels like you're trying to create a Spartan warrior culture. The problem with that is the large amount of serfs/peasants/slaves they forced to work the land to feed them. Now I'm trying to figure out how that works with a carnivorous creature. How do they feed themselves? Hunting and gathering only help so much and do not actually allow for as much for the scholastic culture required for invention and growth. I point to the book Guns, Germs, and Steel which went over how humanity developed and how agriculture had to come for the later developments to happen. Ugh, I'm just going to move on with the story now. The more I analyze this, the more problems I'm running into.