“To your left.”
“Take a step to my left, or avoid my left?”
“Avoid your left.”
“Got it…”
Maneuvering my way around yet another of the sinkholes, I continue to walk forward in relative silence. Screech is staying quiet aside from notifying me of possible danger, and Jasper and Jerry don’t have much to say, as per usual.
It’s also rather dark, more so than it’d usually be with Screech out and about. After all, it’s not possible for her to continually sling spells at the rate she was going a little bit ago. She’d run out of stamina in record time. So, now… there’s no light!
And that’s alright. It’s really not even necessary to be honest… despite all the falls, there aren’t any monsters to harry and harass us this time around, so we’re just taking it slowly. One step at a time, and a step around the occasional you know what.
“Twenty two more to go.”
“So… we’re close to the end then?”
“We should be. Oh also on your right.”
Placing the utmost faith in her directions, I take another tentative step to the left, moving past yet another concentration of pitfalls.
Really, how the hell are you supposed to do this without something that has a way to detect these traps? I can’t imagine other low levels would have the tools necessary for this. Maybe if they were a specific class of sorts…?
…You know what, the thought occurs, you’re probably not supposed to beat this without the aforementioned specific classes capable of detecting traps. In fact, you’re probably not even supposed to solo this… The climb up to this part of the dungeon on its own would likely kill any specialist that isn't focused on combat, unless they’re GOATED like me. And then any combat class optimized to deal with the enemies would fail at this segment. You’re prooooobably meant to do this with a group.
Good thing I’m a three and a half man army, that’s actually a one man army by technicality if you think about it. So, hey! I am doing it with a group!
“On your right again.”
“Mhm, mhm…”
Tippity tip tap tap my way around that, lightwork to be honest should’ve covered the entirety of the floor in holes. Now, what next Screech…
Hit me with it-
“I’m not sure what’s ahead of us.”
“...How, do you not know, what’s ahead of us?”
“It’s like there’s nothing there? I can’t exactly explain it. There isn’t any earth to manipulate but there is something there that the earth in front of us connects to? It’s interesting because it’d have to be an entirely different material or it’d have to be something man-made. That or there’s just nothing at all there and we’re walking off a cliff!”
“...You wanna give us a light for a second then?”
She pauses for a moment before responding, her thought process doing just that and processing the thought. “Oh. That works too.”
“What…” I give her the side eye of doom as she conjures a flame into existence. “Did you want us to just walk into the unknown???”
“...No.”
Liar!
“Uh huh.” I deadpan as I turn my gaze back to what’s in front of us, and…
It’s just more of the same? More of the same as in, more of what we just went through. It’s a tunnel. It’s what we’ve been going through.
“I thought you said there wasn’t any stone in front of us?”
“There isn’t!”
My eyes flick betwixt her and the path in front of us. Now, I’m not exactly convinced of her statement, but at the same time, what reason does she have to lie to me? Literally none, zilch. Plus, if there’s some magical shenanigans occurring, I’d have absolutely no clue, only she would. With her little super duper mana detection or whatever it was called.
So…
“Alright then, but if I go falling a billion miles down to my death it’s on you,” I cheer with faux confidence.
“It’ll be fine you can’t die either way,” she chirps right back, full of unending enthusiasm.
“...Right.”
Well, here we go. One small step for Koth…
Tap…
And, I dunno, one giant step for the party as a whole I suppose.
“Hm. That’s weird.” Screech hums as she puts out her flame, the light vanishing in an instant as I move us forward.
“What’s weird?”
“Oh, well my magic dissipated the second you stepped forward. But there’s still mana here so there’s clearly no suppression at play?”
“Well… I’m sorry, what suppression? Actually, it doesn’t matter, do the standard checks we’ve been doing so far won’t you?”
“Okay one moment please.”
“Waiting on you.” I playfully add on, tapping my foot gently against the stone floor whilst I… you know… wait.
“No pitfalls as far as I can tell. Oh and also I can feel the earth around us again.”
“Alright, I’m just gonna go out on a limb and say we walked through a teleportation gate then.”
“Pardon?”
…Did they pick that up from me?
“Well, think about it for a second. Jasper and Jerry went ahead of us, and then when we followed after them they were nowhere to be found. I checked my map, and they were also nowhere near us. So clearly, we went to two different areas despite walking into the same place. You said you didn’t feel any rocks or earth in front of us a moment ago, and after walking through that little bit, suddenly we’re in the middle of a different area with no holes and you can feel the floor before us again.”
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“Hm. You could be right but I also didn’t feel any magic emanating from the supposed teleport gate.”
“Well… I don’t know how exactly your ability works Screech, but… humor me for a moment here. Your perception of magic is omnidirectional, you don’t miss anything at all, and that’s only improved through your class, right?”
“Yup! That’s about right.”
“So then clearly you wouldn’t miss any active sources of magic or mana, but, if the teleport gate only activated when somebody was in range of it, would it be any different to your senses than ambient mana?”
“Hmmmmm. Actually no I don’t think it would be.”
“Mm.” Jasper mumbles, interjecting herself into the conversation.
“Hm? Do you have something to add?”
Must be important, she doesn’t often speak up out of turn. Lay it on me Jasper, give me the sauce to this situation.
“Mhm, mmm, MmmM, mm.”
“...I’m right?”
“Mhm.”
“Huh, how about that. So, these are teleportation points, right?”
“Well according to Jasper…” Screech ruminates over it for a moment, before I feel her nod to herself, gently shifting around on my shoulder. “They should be. I suppose I don’t see what else they could be.”
Alright, alright… I think I’m starting to get the idea of this.
“Alright… So let's say that theoretically, these all send you to a randomized point, then perhaps one of those points could be the end of the dungeon?”
“Mm.” Jasper mumbles again, giving me a proverbial nod.
“Then I only see one course of action! Screech, as far as you’re aware, there are no traps in this part of the dungeon, right?”
“There shouldn’t be any no. Although if some parts of this place can activate without any ambient traces of mana or magic being left around them before their activation then there could be magical traps.”
…Darn.
“Well, if they’re there, they’re there. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Now, a light if you will?”
“Alrighty!”
Once more bursting into existence, the tunnel is illuminated through Screech’s magic. Out of curiosity, I take a look behind us, and… yup, all the holes I accidentally stepped on are all gone. This is a new segment, therefore, let’s take ourselves a step forward…
Golem-LVL 15
Golem-LVL 15
Golem-LVL 15
…Huh.
Three stone amalgamations (and I use amalgamation loosely they’re just unshapely) lay on the ground. To the outside observer, I’d imagine they look like lumpy piles of rocks, but I see they have levels. Ding darn doofus monsters…
“Screech, take a closer look at those stones real quick?”
“What about them?”
“You don’t notice anything…?”
“...No?”
“Try to use your earth magic on them for a second.”
“Alright but I’m running a little low on stamina.”
32/120
And I have…
74/140
Darn. Okay, fine, fine…
“Not to worry little one, I bestow upon thee a whole… twenty stamina!”
I, REALLY, should’ve bought stamina potions.
“Thank you! Now what did you see with these things?”
“They’re golems.”
“I’m not sure what those are actually.”
…But they know a million other random facts? Whatever, man.
“Bleh, doesn’t matter. Cast earth magic on them and see if you can just, like, tear them apart would you?”
“Okay! One moment and I’ll just-kh-”
Her entire body shudders as her talons dig into my shoulder, simultaneously her conjured flame flickers out as her thoughts go white for a short moment.
“Screech, are you alright!?”
“I-yes-maybe? I tried to cast something on those but it got dispelled instantly and forcefully. I… I think? I’m not exactly sure what happened.”
Pulling my staff out of my inventory, I arm myself just in case of an attack. Because…
Thump…
I can hear them through the dark, rocks tumbling, crashing against the stone floor as the golems no doubt rise from whatever slumber they were in. And then stone strikes stone again, and again…
“Screech, I need another light, and get off of my shoulder, create yourself a platform to stand on away from me, I don’t imagine this is going to be a smooth fight.”
Without so much as a word, yet another light flickers into existence, yet as it does…
VWOOSH
One of the stone assailants leaps towards me with deceptive power, on a direct crash course straight towards my skull.
