They made their way through rooms visited by quick carnage, denizens of this mirror realm torn asunder by reflections of their own hands, efficiently and ruthlessly making their way toward their escape. They hustled through rooms of opulent wealth, most tossed and torn beyond recognition. Even the intact rooms belied an emptiness, just as devoid of life as their neighbors. Whether a feature of the Domain as a whole, or due to the areas nature as a reflection of a reflection of human space, they walked deep through a valley of uncanny, empty similarities to the world they were used to. All the same trappings of civilization, but somewhat… wrong.
Will pushed open the next door on the path, already slightly ajar, and sighed. “On the one hand, I’m glad we don’t have to fight all of these things,” he said, gesturing out at the corpses arrayed around the new room, “but on the other hand… It sets me on edge. Like I’m just waiting for something to pop out, you know?”
From the side, Nina nodded. Blades in hand, she continued scanning the room. Gerald grunted. “Think the scuffle we had put us all a little on edge.” He carefully stepped around a warped mockery of a butler, and associated viscera. He grimaced, “And it’s hardly like we’re walking through a field of tulips. That said, I’m hopeful we don’t have much longer to go. I’ve been counting the rooms, and given how many we cleared before meeting ourselves, we should be about there.”
Will, already at the next door, lowered himself into a defensive stance while listening for movement on the other side. “How many more rooms would you say are left?” He called out distractedly. Satisfied there was nothing moving on the other side of the door, he began cautiously moving into the next room, shouldering the door open as he went. “I’m getting kind of tired of – oh.”
Before them was a room unlike any other they’d seen in the Domain. Fairly stark in decoration relative to the rest of the building, its purpose also stood in definite contrast. This was not a display room, favored amongst adventurers, decked out in cases and stands to showcase the often worthless trinkets spat out en masse, nor was it one of the many room designs that warped servants might appear in. The room was rather small, being somewhere between a half and a third the size that would be typical in this interior region of the Domain. Each entry was well appointed, such that any explorers entering would immediately recognize it for what it was; beautiful rugs, comfortable, gilded benches with decadent cushions to rest on… and one massive door, easily thrice the size of the others, inlaid with gold and finished with a crimson lacquer, depicting a dragon atop its hoard.
Will stood just inside the room, marveling at the opulence. The group slowly filtered in behind him. Annette cleared her throat, “Yeah Gerald, how many rooms would you say are left?” Will snorted, smacking her on the shoulder as they headed over to check the benches.
Nina frowned, tilting her head. “Are we at the last room?”
“Hmm, yeah, kind of,” Will nodded, sinking into a cushion. “We’re in a safe room. Most Domains have these before Boss rooms. Gives anyone in the Domain a chance to catch their breath, heal up and be ready for the final fight.”
She wandered closer, hand tracing the smooth wall. “Huh? Why? Don’t Domains just kill people? Why would it give us the opportunity to rest?”
Will nodded sagely, “Mmm, kind of, yeah, but also – no?”
Nina breathed out in exasperation, a hissing exhalation. “Does your brain work?”
“Oh, definitely –”
“– Not.” Gerald and Annette finished for him, chuckling. Annette patted the cushion beside her, gesturing for Nina to sit. “What a Domain tries to do greatly depends on the intent that it inherited during its creation. When a Domain forms, it takes its purpose, or intent, from the willpower of those caught in its creation. They can be modified from this original intent over time, but how that happens is not well understood. What is understood is that Domains that take on the will of higher intelligences, anything capable of forethought and planning, tend to take on a more long term approach to existence.”
Nina leaned forward, sitting on her hands. “You talk about them like they are living things.”
“In many ways, they are. And like living things, they need certain things to keep existing.”
“Wait, Domains can die? They can be destroyed?”
Will nodded, wagging some half-eaten jerky in her direction. “Yup! New ones open up occasionally; if we couldn’t close any, eventually the whole world would be a Domain!”
“Mmm, and there’s actually substantial evidence to show that the formation of new Domains is a common occurrence, most of them just aren’t in a good location and close back up.” Gerald added.
Nina nodded, eyes glowing with curiosity. “So, what do they feed on?”
Annette smiled. “Nobody knows! Not for sure!”
“O- Oh.”
She continued, “What we do know is that, yes, Domains can extend their lives by killing and absorbing living beings. But we also know that just having living creatures in the Domain works as well. Of course, the passive method seems to be less effective overall, but it is one of the best ways that has been found for managing Domains. If a Domain is particularly violent, and doesn’t give any resources to justify the risk, just keep anything from entering and you can starve it to death. Likewise, if there’s a Domain that is beneficial for some reason, a little careful stewardship ensures a steady stream of revenue. We know this, and some Domains know this as well.”
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Understanding began to fill the younger woman's eyes. “So, the ones that grabbed up people when they formed try to be less… kill-y, so more people come in?”
“Exactly.”
Nina looked around, pulling her arms closer to her body. “I’m not sure how I feel about that.” She said warily.
“However you feel about it,” Gerald said, “it’s good information to have. Just imagine the Domain is an enemy; now you have more intelligence on how it fights.”
She nodded slowly, eyes narrowing. “And if I know how it fights, I can fight back.”
-=-<^>-=-
The group stood before the final door, preparations and rest completed, ready to face the Boss.
“Do we even have to kill it though? Maybe the other ones of us already did.” Will speculated, standing at the front of their formation.
“Best to be prepared anyway. Domains are pretty consistent in requiring Boss fights.” Gerald shook his head, “very rare that anything takes out the Boss for you.”
Will sighed. “Damn.” He shook his head, “Okay, so what can we expect? What do we know of the Boss outside of the mirror?”
“The fight is a culmination of everything in the Domain. Like previous rooms, there are a number of display cases filled with items, though the Boss room has a lot more useful items, and the Boss makes use of as many of them as it can. The Boss itself is barely any tougher than the servant creatures, but it’s got plenty of tools to make up for that.”
“Ooh, does it drop a ton of loot?” Annette asked, eyes shining.
He shook his head. “Only if you can drop it fast. Everything it uses starts to break.”
She deflated. “Oh…”
Nina peered at the door in front of them. “The door seems to match that, but is that how we can expect this fight to go? So far the only reflections we’ve seen have been ourselves and weaker mobs. Those have all been fairly direct reflections.”
Gerald stroked his chin. “Hmm… I think it would be wise not to get too locked into any specific expectation. This is a Boss monster that has not been reported. We could very well be the first group to fight this creature. Expect the idea of reflections to be present in some way, but don’t get too caught up in one thing. Be ready to adapt.”
The younger members shared serious expressions, nerves settling in the gravity of the situation. They nodded to each other. “Okay,” Will said, turning back to the door. “Let’s do this.” He stepped forward, hands braced on either side of the door, and heaved, grunting with effort as he got the large doors moving. Slowly, silently, but with a shift of pressure, of significance, they swung forward, gaining momentum. After a few seconds of pushing, the weight of the doors pulled away from Will’s palms, and they slid open enough to admit entry. Warily, they stepped through.
They stood in a large, rectangular hall with a vaulted ceiling, lit from above by a series of chandeliers set with glowing stones. Running down the center of the floor was a strip of the same gold-veined marble from the previous room, wide enough to encompass the entryway they had come through. It was bordered on either side by areas of black marble, laced with veins of crimson. On each side of the hall were 2 display stands, each containing a single item beneath frosted glass. Directly ahead of them, across the hall and centered opposite the doors they came in, was a shield shaped mirror. And further, out on the perimeter…
“Are those mobs shackled to the wall?” Nina pointed off to the side of the room, a little more than halfway up the wall, at a row of creatures bound to the wall by wrist and ankle. The same creatures they’d been fighting throughout the Domain.
Will nodded. “Sure looks like it. Why are they up there, though? Actually…” He squinted at the shackled creatures. “Something looks a little off about them…” He stepped forward to get a better look.
Silently and swiftly, the doors closed behind them. Simultaneously, the mobs on the walls began screaming, struggling against their bonds and slamming against the wall, to no avail.
Everyone in the group flinched, and Annette screamed out in shock. “AHH! What the hell is happening?!”
Gerald reached over and grabbed her shoulder, eyes scanning the room. “Calm down! We just started the Boss encounter by walking in too far, that’s all.”
Her eyes widened, and she gripped her staff tighter. “The fights started? Where is the Boss?” she asked, looking around warily.
He shook his head. “I’m not sure. Keep your eyes peeled.” He let go of the woman’s shoulder, settling back into their loose combat formation.
Just then, they heard a light tapping noise. The screaming, shackled mobs instantly began to fall quiet, subsiding to nothing more than frightened whimpers. The tapping continued, a light, infrequent staccato pattern echoing through the spacious hall. Nina identified the source first, pointing down the hall, at the other end of the white marble strip. They watched in horror as long, thin ashen gray fingers curled around from behind the mirror shield before tapping lightly on the surface.
Annette shook. “W-what do we do now? It’s just sitting there… Do we charge it?”
At the front of the group, Will shook his head. “No. We don’t know its capabilities. We stay in formation and test it from as far away as we can for now. Can you send some of your friends to harass it?”
“Oh! Yeah, yes, I can do that.” She held her staff out front, concentrating. Quickly, a buzzing began to emanate from it, followed by a small swarm of bees crawling from seams in the bulbous end of it. She lightly pointed her staff in the direction of the shield, and the swarm began to take flight.
They watched as another hand joined the first, on the opposite side of the shield. Gripping firmly, it rotated to the side and up, pointing at a shackled mob, one of the monstrous servants. Then another hand appeared. From within the shield. It was quickly followed by a body as a duplicate of the shackled mob stepped free.
Nina snorted. “That’s it? Easy!”
Almost as soon as the first stepped out, another hand reached through the mirror, pulling free a second duplicate.
She see-sawed her hand, “Ehhh, not so bad.”
A third came out.
“Okay, so that might be a problem.”