Pan awoke in a dark cavern. The darkness was dotted with glowing spots made of some kind of gem, and by their light he could see the black stone floor. It looked like a cooled lava flow, in places that kind of rough pitted look meteorites get, and in others like a hardened ooze. The stone also looked like it was dripping from the ceiling, forming stalactites on the ceiling, some of which touched the floor, making a column like a wineglass stem.
His hooves made a clicking noise as he got to his feet and looked around. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he made out the form of a body near him. This was Athena, who was likewise passed out. She came to and looked around.
“Where are we?” she asked groggily. Pan shrugged, but realizing she might not yet see him in the dark added, “I’m not sure. Evil looking place, though.” He had expected their voices to echo, but there was no reverb when they spoke. Pan saw another form, Apollo, who was lying in a heap in his robes. There was a much bigger shape just beyond him, Horse, who looked like a smooth boulder if it weren’t for the cloak he wore on his human half.
The cavern was large, and Pan couldn’t find how they had gotten in there. Worse, he didn’t see an obvious way out. He recalled the doorway from the Wheel of Fate. This was the work of one of his curse cards. Athena was sitting up, overcoming the effects of having passed out, and Pan relayed these suspicions to her.
“I feel a slight breeze going that way,” she said after a moment of thought. She pointed into the darkness. It was hard to tell in all this gloom what was wall just beyond their sight horizon, and what actually led somewhere. Pan was checking on Horse, who came around with a start.
“What? Where am I?” he asked. He sounded skittish and Pan feared the centaur would panic.
“We’re in some kind of cave. It’s the effects of that Wheel of Fate card I used.”
A piece of one of the stone columns detached itself from the darkness. It unfolded into some kind of gangly creature, all knees and elbows. It had rough, dark skin, and a pair of wings unfurled behind it, held together straight back like a kind of butterfly. An ugly butterfly made of cooled lava. Its head was pointed on either end, its snout on one and two straight horns forming the other. To Pan, the thing almost looked like the head space pirate from that game series with the girl bounty hunter everyone thought was a guy until she revealed the skin tight blue suit she wore underneath.
Instinctively, Pan’s eyes flicked to where he kept his cards in his peripherals. He hadn’t had time to look at what he had when the thing spoke, its arms held wide in a gesture of greeting.
“Welcome,” the thing said in a grimy voice, “welcome to your first dungeon. You have nothing to fear from me.” It got these words out quickly, as Apollo had just started waking up and Athena and Horse had noticed the creature. “I am your guide, Arctus. I won’t harm you, and you can’t harm me, so don’t waste your cards.”
Athena was poised with her throwing arm back, ready to throw a spear should one appear in her hand. Pan made a mental note. He didn’t know what cards she had right now, but this would be a clue for him.
The two parties stood facing each other for a few silent moments, and Athena shot a glance at Pan and Apollo. She lowered her arm, remaining half on her guard, and spoke to the creature.
“We have had a trying couple of days. I’m afraid you will have to repeat yourself, because I wasn’t listening.”
The thing chuckled, snapping its beak-like snout. There were sharp triangle teeth in there, Pan saw, and it reminded him of a picture he saw once of a pterodactyl catching a fish.
“That is alright. All I said was that this is your first dungeon, and I’m here to help.”
“You can help by telling me what’s going on,” Athena barked.
The creature, its back hunched, folded its arms behind it, beneath its wings which remained straight out behind it. “Confusion is normal for those just starting to seek Elysium. But believe you me, it’s in my own best interests to catch you up to speed.”
Pan remembered the name of the game. Vagrants to Elysium. The plot of the game which was now their lives hadn’t interested him very much. Not when there was the dazzling footage of the settings, the attacks, and grand monster creatures, as depicted in the ads and teasers.
“What do you mean, creature?” Athena said. Apollo was on his feet and took his sister by the elbow.
“Athena,” he stage-whispered to her so the rock-bird-drake-person, this Arctus character, could hear, “Let me handle this. You’re frustrated, and it’s making you come off as too blunt right now. I’m afraid you may be accidentally rude to this person.”
Arctus put his T-shaped head on one side, like he was trying not to intrude on this brother-sister moment.
“I must apologize for my sister,” Apollo said smiling. Arctus returned its attention to the conversation and Apollo continued, “she can come off a bit strong and the past few days have made her cranky. But please, elaborate for us. You’re here to help, and I don’t want to interrupt.”
It nodded and began to explain.
“You are all vagrants seeking Elysium. Heroes, no doubt, who have passed from your world into these Sundering Shores, across the Styx.”
Apollo nodded, seeming to digest this information. Pan continued to wait for it to make sense to him.
“The journey before you is long and perilous, fraught with dangers to make you Hades-Sent. If you pass from these shores, it will be one of two ways. Either to the fields of peace and respite, or into the realm of the god of the dead and consignment to everlasting torment. One of these is far easier to achieve. I’ll let you guess which.”
“And if we should make it through this cavern, this dungeon we’re in, we’ll arrive in Elysium?” Apollo asked.
The thing clacked its beak again, chuckling. “This is only one dungeon. You have many, many more ahead of you.”
Pan felt uneasy. He could tell Horse felt similarly, his panic rising again. He clip-clopped nervously, pacing in the cavern. “Many more of these?” Horse asked. “What’s even down here? What do we have to do?”
Arctus watched Horse, and the creature worked its jaw side to side as though thinking, or judging. “The purpose of the Shore is to test your worthiness, hero. As for what’s down here, that is what I’m to help you prepare for. As you no doubt know, the gods, like myself, have been given sovereignty over this realm. It is up to us collectively to see how and to what degree heroes are tested.”
Athena broke in, saying, “You’re a god?” But was hushed by Apollo.
Arctus nodded, and began walking back and forth, concentrating on his explanation.
“Each dungeon is created by a god, or demi-god, or some entity given the authority and power to do so. They monitor the progress of the vagrants in their dungeon, sending them monsters to defeat and challenges to overcome. But the vagrants are given limited aid as well. Some other god, usually one who wishes the ethos of the host god to be made low with the defeat of their dungeon, will act as guide for the vagrants attempting the dungeon. Aid to counterbalance the difficulties of the challenge.”
Already this was a lot for Pan to take in, and he had some questions now. But Apollo questioned Arctus before Pan could get a word out.
“So if you’re here to help us, whose dungeon are we in now? Some kind of fire god, or lava god obviously.” Luckily, this was one of the questions Pan wanted to ask anyway, so he silently seconded Apollo’s question.
Arctus nodded to the side, saying, “This is Degranan’s dungeon. Degranan is a minor deity of corpses and burial rites.”
Corpses and burial rites? Pan looked again at the cooled lava effect on the rocks making up the cavern, and the eerie glowing gems. He noticed the others doing the same.
Arctus sighed. “Now don’t look so incredulous like that, we don’t always have to stick exactly to our theme. Sometimes you’ll find a dungeon made by Voltaius the god of forges that isn’t wrought of metal, or a dungeon made by Penelope goddess of the seasons and new growth that isn’t all flowers and fields. We’ve got to intimidate you and subvert your expectations. It’s part of the challenge.”
He thought for a moment, as if deciding whether or not to say something else and said quietly, “Between you and me, Degrenan is more show than substance.”
Horse spoke up, “But you’re here to help us with this? How are you going to do that?”
Arctus nodded again. “I was getting to that. It’s my job to outfit you all with rewards. You’ll be defeating monsters and solving puzzles, and as you do so you’ll get boons from your dungeon guide. See, I’ll be following your progress through the dungeon. I can’t help you directly, and you won’t always see me, but I’m allowed to influence what you get. I know Degrenan’s usual tricks, so I’ll do what I can to make sure you can take what he throws at you and throw it right back.” As he said this, he held up an open hand and clenched it into a fist, like he was crushing an invisible onion with his claws.
Pan felt something tapping on his shoulder as Athena asked, “What are you going to give us right now?”
It was Horse, who was looking out towards the darkness to their 5:00. Several small forms were marching towards them with menacing purpose. “Hey, uh-“ Horse began.
Arctus didn’t answer Athena. While all four of them looked away at Horse’s alarm, he had disappeared.
“Where’d he go?” Apollo asked.
Athena growled in frustration. “It was just a distraction!” she said. “He’s not really going to help us, and we’ve got incoming!”
Pan wasn’t sure if she was right, but it did occur to him that the creature Arctus might have been Degranan come to mislead them.
“We’re stuck here without any help?” Horse said, his nerve breaking before their eyes.
“Yup,” Athena said unhelpfully, “so nut up and let’s take these guys. What’d you get?”
Pan took a moment to look at the marching figures clearly. They looked furry from a distance, but as they neared the party he saw they were just ragged at the edges, like pinched off clay. They looked vaguely hyena-like, though without fur, and they walked upright. The most notable thing about them was that they were all very squat, like they had been a digital image scaled down vertically but not horizontally. This made them seem wider than normal. Each carried a weapon. Either a hunk of wood, or a broken stalagmite.
The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.
They marched out of the darkness with purpose, but when the closest saw the party, its big eyes bugged out and it screamed something incomprehensible before charging.
“They don’t seem very bright,” Pan said.
“I recognize these guys,” Apollo said as Athena drew her arm back and conjured a spear. She hurled it at the first one to get in range. The spear made impact with a thud, and the creature gave out a grunt like Alvin from Alvin and the Chipmunks would if he’d been kicked in the stomach. “They’re hobbs,” Apollo continued, “think of them as just a different kind of goblin.” A card flashed in front of him as well and he filled another of the charging creatures with lightning.
Pan couldn’t see how many hobbs were coming out of the darkness, but the wave continued. The first one’s alarm must have gotten the attention of all the hobbs in the area, because the ones headed their way now came charging.
Horse flashed a card, and with a swipe of his hand, daggers appeared in three more of the creatures, which grunted and fell forward.
The three of them threw attack after attack into the advancing wave of hobbs. They were accumulating a stack of bodies right on the edge of their sight horizon, but it didn’t deter the squat monsters. They began hopping over the bodies of their fallen brothers, arms outstretched to put momentum into the attack they would inevitably make if they could just get close enough to the heroes.
Pan stayed behind the other three. He had taken the time to look at his cards and determined that he wouldn’t be much help this fight. He still had all five, and for good reason.
Stoneform, with a picture of a nondescript, bullet-headed stone idol. The caster becomes the depicted stone idol for a duration. It didn’t say if he would gain any special properties or not.
Gibberer, which showed the head and shoulders of a stern looking creature with its arms crossed, but which had a cartoonish mouth, tongue out and blabbing, coming out the side of its head. Gibbering mouths sprout randomly around the caster. It didn’t state what the mouths did aside from gibber, and Pan assumed it would be on both scenery as well as on monsters and other heroes.
Joint Pain, which showed two silhouettes of people in agony, one with a red starburst over its right elbow, and the other with a blue starburst over its left elbow. The caster and its target become magically linked at the joints. Supposedly, if either moved an elbow, they both would move that elbow. Good single target immobilization, but it’d be a battle of wills. Pan hoped it wouldn’t hurt.
And finally, Curtain Call, which had a picture of red stage curtains drawn shut with an empty yellow spotlight in the middle. It would resurrect all monsters in a wide area. Looking at the growing pile of hobb corpses well within the range of this card, Pan knew he absolutely couldn’t cast this one.
And last but not least, there was Rack, with a picture of a rack, the torture device. It looked like a wooden contraption with hand and wrist bindings at the corners meant to hold the victim in place while the whole thing stretched. This was the card that made him loathe to participate in the fight against the hobbs. The card had a passive effect. For every card he discarded, he would draw another one. For every card he played, he would take an instance of damage for each card he’d played since drawing Rack. He couldn’t discard Rack itself, as it forced him to choose it as part of his selection, and it couldn’t be played. But, if it was the last card in his hand, it would disappear for good.
Rack had a lot of text, but Pan understood the effect right away. It was going to hurt an increasing amount to play the cards out of his hand, but if he could get through it he could lose a curse. But there was no getting around it. It would make him choose itself and two other cards, and when he discarded the remainder he would get two more he would have to play before Rack would eat itself.
Pan did some math in his head. If nothing else made him draw cards, he would have to play four cards to get down to just rack. It didn’t total more than a quarter of his total health. Still, he’d have to be careful. If he took more damage while playing the cards, or if he played the cards without being strategic about it, this could go worse for him.
He relayed this information to the group.
Horse said, “Get rid of the Curtain one,” as he sliced another two hobbs with a pair of swords.
“And the Gibberer one,” Apollo added, “It sounds dumb.”
Between attacks, Pan asked Athena which ones he should discard.
She thought for a while, killing two more hobbs in the process. One died to another spear to its chest, and another had a bell made of light drop on it and crush it. Pan made a note to ask her what the bell card had been.
“We’re getting decent experience killing these things. There’s a lot of them, but they’re weak. I’ve been through two hands already, but everything I’m getting is something I can use.” She ran towards a hobb and did a basic kick, leaping onto the thing like Mario onto a turtle. It went down even to a basic attack like that, more or less proving her point.
Pan checked his level. He hadn’t increased from all this fighting, but even the experience he was leeching off the rest of the party was giving him enough that he was almost there.
“So I should keep Curtain Call and when the hobbs stop coming we can bring them back and double our experience?”
“Yeah, actually, I’m ok with that,” Apollo said. Horse shrugged. Neither stopped killing hobbs as they responded.
Pan discarded Gibberer and Stoneform. “Apollo, do you have anything good for creep control?”
“Like, a multi-target or AoE? Yeah, most of my earth and lightning abilities do that.”
Pan’s heart sank as the two discarded cards were replaced. The first wasn’t terrible, but the second made him groan.
Miasma, which had a picture of a decaying zombie reaching through swirling mists. Fills the area up to the designated radius from the caster with a haze which causes fear.
Wheel, depicting a device like a water wheel, but with the same kind of ankle and wrist braces like in Rack. It looked like it was in the same room as the one Rack showed. It also had a passive ability. While in-hand, whenever the holder played a card, they would then draw a card and take one instance of damage. When Wheel was played, the caster would discard the hand and draw three cards.
This all but ensured Pan wouldn’t be getting rid of Rack any time soon.
When the wave of monsters stopped, the group remained huddled, waiting for stragglers. None came.
“Let’s count the bodies and pile them together,” Pan said after recounting the bad news regarding his new cards. “I can play Curtain Call, take my damage, and Apollo can try to get as many of these things as he can. Horse, Athena, you guys can catch any stragglers.”
They had killed thirty two hobbs in all.
“They’re less appealing as corpses,” Apollo groaned, trying to cover his nose with his robe and move a hobb corpse at the same time.
While moving the bodies, Athena noticed a few of them with sparkling pockets.
“Hey, there’s loot on these things,” she said. “I got something called a Crystal Wars pack. I think it’s a pack of cards.”
They rooted through the bodies, finding a total of twelve packs. Three were Crystal Wars, five were Block & Tackle packs, and four were Ambrosia packs. They piled them on the floor between the four of them.
“We should hold off on round two until we divvy out the cards,” Apollo said. “I think these were the rewards Arctus was talking about. They might be able to help us take these guys a little easier.”
No one objected, and Apollo continued. “Since there are three Crystal Wars packs, I think myself, Horse, and Athena should get one each. Pan, no offense, but you’ve got no offense.”
Pan bridled. “So what, I’m supposed to keep this deck full of curses? You aren’t going to give me even one of those packs to help me offset my disability? Look at you guys, weapons coming out your, your-“
Before he could decide on what swear word to use, Athena cut him off. “Your stats suck. You wouldn’t be able to use these effectively anyway.”
Pan grumped and folded his arms. Then came the sound of plastic packaging being snapped open. Everyone looked at Horse as five cards came floating out of the pack on clouds of sparkles. The rest of the party could only see the backs of the cards and Horse chuckled and said, “cool.”
“Horse!” they all said at once.
He noticed their looks and shrugged. “What? We said he didn’t get one, so I opened mine.”
The siblings, sensing it was every man or woman for themselves, sprang for their own packs. They each opened theirs, and Pan decided between Block & Tackle and Ambrosia.
In the end, he chose Block & Tackle.
“There’s twelve, so in the end, we should all get three packs each,” Apollo said even while reading the cards in front of him. “Oh, now that sounds fantastic,” he whispered, clearly impressed with what he got.
Pan opened the Block & Tackle set. Just like with the Crystal Wars set, five cards floated out of the packaging.
Crobar, with a picture of a flat pry bar wedged between a crate and its lid. It was an Inventory card, with the same kind of design as the one Athena had once used to make a campfire. The caster could use it to open one nonmagical lock up to a certain level.
Chalk, with a picture of a white cylinder. It provided the caster with a piece of chalk that would leave marks on most surfaces up to a maximum length.
Torch, with a picture of a crude torch with a robust fire on one end. Provided the user with a torch which would burn for a few hours.
Health Potion, with a picture of a round glass flask filled with what looked like red Kool-Aid. Provided the user with a health potion with a magnitude based on the caster’s level.
Mana Potion. The picture was the same as the Health Potion, but with blue Kool-Aid. This one didn’t provide the user with a potion, but instead allowed the user to draw two cards and discard up to two cards.
Pan wondered if these counted towards the Wheel and Rack triggers and suddenly became apprehensive about them. When he’d read the last one, they flew not to either of his bracers, but instead to his waist. They disappeared, as if going into a nonexistent pocket.
“Is that normal, Athena?” he asked. Her cards flew down to her waist and disappeared.
She nodded. “You have a card inventory screen where you can pull these equipment type cards and use them right away, and where you can edit your deck. The brown bordered ones like these aren’t deck cards. I think they’re handled separately from the other colored cards.”
He opened the screen she mentioned, and what she said was true. There were two panes on the screen, a smaller Inventory Cards panel summarizing his adventuring equipment like what he had gotten from the Block & Tackle set, and a much larger panel which was labeled Deck. He could scroll through the cards in his deck, organizing them by name, color, or quantity. There was effectively no difference between them, however, as he only had purple curse cards and only one of each besides.
He nodded and closed the screen, making a note to revisit it when there was more time. He opened his second Block & Tackle, getting two more health potion cards in addition to three new ones. These were Rope, Stepladder, and an actual Block & Tackle card. Each depicted the named object and provided one to the caster. The new cards entered his inventory.
“What’s in the Ambrosia packs?” he asked, reaching for one.
“Food,” Apollo replied. He was opening his own Block & Tackle pack with much less enthusiasm than he had done with the Crystal Wars pack.
Five more Inventory cards appeared before Pan when he popped the pack. Four cards called Ration, and a different fifth card.
Ration, depicting a plate with fire roasted meat and potatoes. Provides one day of sustenance.
Breakfast of Champions, depicting a plate topped with two eggs sunny side up, a slice of bacon, and a slice of toast. Provides one day of sustenance and makes the caster Hearty until mid-day.
“What’s Hearty?” Pan asked as the cards flew to his side.
Apollo opened his own Ambrosia pack. “That’s a decent one. It gives you a boost to your base health. Why? What did you get?”
Pan told him about the Breakfast of Champions.
“That would be much more effective if we knew what time it was in here.”
“Yeah, no kidding,” Pan said.
“Well, I think the best thing I got was Over Shardge,” Apollo said.
“Shardge?”
“I think it’s a play on words. The Crystal Wars packs are all crystal themed cards. They show what I’m guessing are mana gems and crystals, and all the weapons feature crystals in some way. I think it has something to do with overcharging a shard of crystal. What it does is let me draw two more cards and gain one more action.”
Athena said, “You should add that right now while we’re out of combat. I got a Crystal Spear card. It does more damage than my other spear attacks and it stuns the target.”
“What did you get, Horse?” Pan asked. Two cards swapped places in Apollo’s deck, one flying out of his bracer and the other flying from his inventory at his waist.
“Gemblade Dagger might have been the best for me,” he said, “If I kill an opponent with it, I get to play the top card of my deck. The rest were kinda worthless.” Two cards similarly swapped places for him. Interestingly, the card didn’t go to his horse’s body’s hip, but to his human torso waist, where it conjoined to the horse body.
“Did you all get cards in your class? I’ll admit, I’m curious how these packs work.” Pan was still a bit hurt over being denied an offensive pack, but he tried not to let it show.
Apollo said, “I think it’s random what cards you get. They’re themed according to the pack you open, but you get cards of all colors.”
Athena stood up abruptly. “We can sit here and talk about cards, or we can go ahead and raise these guys while they’re still kind of fresh. Pan?”
With that, they moved into position. Pan stood back while the other three circled the pile as best as they could. Apollo had a Chain Lightning ready to go, and Athena and Horse had bladed attacks on deck.
Pan brought out a health potion card and used it. Just like with the Campfire card, the real thing appeared. He also didn’t take damage.
Good to know, he thought. Inventory cards really are treated separately from deck cards.
Health potion in hand, he cast Curtain Call. He immediately wished he hadn’t.
