You might think that it was quite stupid of me to just go ahead and blindly walk right into the dungeon that had suddenly appeared in my fridge, especially after two seperate goblins had leapt out to try and kill me. Well, that is why I decided I would be well armed. Sure, it would have been very nice to have had a set of night-vision goggles, or a fancy pair of thermal, and three or four similarly well-equipped and trained compatriots to back me up. How about you shut up with all that rich person gear talk, and what kind of idiot is going to listen when their friend calls them up at 11pm to rant about the portal in their fridge? Not my idiot friends, no sir.
So alone I was.
It didn’t take very long after entering to think of something I should have brought, a jacket, when a cold breeze brushed my bare arms. The air was quite chilly, but not unbearably, I didn’t think hypothermia would be a concern so long as I kept moving and there was no pool of water to fall in. At least the air didn’t smell stale, something was keeping it cycled and fresh, either dungeon magic or some other natural mechanism, I don’t know, I’m no cave scientist. There also weren’t any dead bodies of adventurers laying around, or monster skeletons, at least not within the first hundred feet, just a lot of small mushrooms of various colors that sprouted from the walls and floor.
Speaking of the floors, again I’m no geologist, it seemed it was all made of a sort of dark granite. It looked like a naturally formed cave for the most part, but with random pieces that looked distinctly man-made. Odd archways carved into the wall that led to dead ends. Patches of floor that looked like brick paths. There was no rhyme or reason to it I could see, like a team of stoneworkers just did their own thing with no coordination, and left in the middle of their shift.
It was made clear to me within minutes that grabbing that roll of tape had been a good idea, as the curving tunnel finally split a four way intersection. Taking a few strips of tape, I marked an arrow on the floor for myself that pointed the way I had come, and then decided to take the path to the right, somewhat following the maze strategy of “keep your hand to the right wall, and eventually you’ll find your way out”. If somehow I got lost, I hoped to use the method to get back out.
The flashlight on my rifle was vital, with absolutely zero sources of other light I had no other way to navigate. I silently wished that I had a pack of glowsticks, or flares, but those cost money that I had never been able to justify spending. The small but powerful light on my rifle was supposed to last for three hours of continuous operation on its current setting, and I had just installed a fresh battery the day before. With the spare in my pocket, that meant I had tentatively six hours of light on this excursion, not that I planned to stay that long of course.
After making that first turn, I walked for another few minutes before the tunnel suddenly ended, and I found myself staring into a chamber, the ceiling was domed, maybe three dozen feet tall, and about thirty yards wide from wall to wall. A quick flash around with the light showed me no visible enemies, not that there was much to hide behind, given a complete lack of any decoration besides a lone chest sitting in the middle of the room.
Carefully, step by step, I made my way toward it. So far I had not found a single tripwire or pressure plate, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to trigger a trap and let myself get injured or die in whatever this place was. Who would take care of my pets then?
The chest was made predominantly of some kind of dark wood that reminded me of stained walnut, with patches of moss growing on it. Rusted bands of metal provided structural support, and best guess told me it was simple iron. There was no lock or latch I could see, meaning I could probably open it with my bare hands with little effort, yet I hesitated. What if it was trapped? Or what if this was a mimic? My hands would likely be the target. Sure, I had a crowbar back home, in the back of my car for emergencies, but that would be a long walk back. I cursed myself for not grabbing it, and added it to a mental list of things to bring next time.
Huh. Next time. For some reason I was already thinking this wouldn’t be my only trip into this dungeon.
Relying on my sling to keep my rifle steadied with one hand on the opposite wall, where another tunnel led out, I crouched down to start opening the chest, mentally crossing my fingers and praying it wasn’t trapped. The hinges squealed so unnaturally loud that I might have mistaken it for a banshee, and the sound echoed around the stone chamber for far too long. The electronic hearing protection I was wearing helped significantly, and let me pick up on the sound of more than one pair of feet impacting stone.
Something was coming my way.
I let the lid slam back shut and took up position behind it, taking a knee with my rifle resting atop. My flashlight lit up the tunnel, but a corner at the end meant I had only about thirty feet of notice if anything came around. The seconds ticked by as my heart pounded, and the running grew louder, more distinct. I wasn’t worried about it being a horde now, but it was still impending conflict.
There they were.
Three goblins came skidding around the corner, turning to face me and meeting face first with the blinding force of a thousand lumens as I cranked up the brightness to maximum. I did not give them a chance to recover, and squeezed the trigger three times, firing a round at each. Again my Impact-Sports did their job, shielding my ears as the shots echoed in the stone room. The first two goblins collapsed like bags of rocks, while the third was caught in the shoulder and sent into a spin. To its credit, it didn’t collapse, instead grabbing at the wound and turning to flee.
A fourth and final round struck it in the back, and it joined its dead friends.
I didn’t hear any more approaching, but still kept an eye on the tunnel as I dropped the less than full mag and swapped it for a fresh one, sticking the now slightly lighter one in a pocket for later. After another two minutes, no more goblins had appeared, so I relaxed and returned my attention to the chest.
It made that awful noise as it opened, but didn’t draw any more of the green midgets my way. I threw the top open and backed up, letting the lid drop backward as I aimed at the chest, waiting for something to jump out. I felt a bit silly when I found myself holding a glorified storage crate hostage, but still, better safe than sorry. I shone the light inside, finding nothing living and hungry, but was greeted with a shimmering show. My light refracted beautifully through a decent sized green gemstone that rested at the bottom, almost begging me to pick it up.
A few testing pokes with the muzzle didn’t set off any traps, so I reached in and plucked it out. Inspecting it closer, best I could tell it was just a normal emerald, or maybe peridot? Again, not a geologist, but it was green and crystal and shiny, though a bit warm to the touch, which was mildly concerning given the ambient temperature. It too went into one of my many pockets, against better judgement, and I decided I’d go see if the goblins had anything worthwhile.
To my lessening surprise, the bodies were gone when I got there. Again, no blood to be seen. Not a sign that three lives had been ended beyond the fragmented remains of four 75 grain projectiles they had been snuffed out with. An idea started to form in my head. As you know, in many video games mob corpses are rarely persistent, at least in dungeon crawlers. You kill a monster, the body sticks around just long enough to let you know it died by some death animation, then it sinks into the ground or disappears in light or some other method of disposal so the game doesn’t have to render it anymore. Then, there remains the loot and sometimes XP orbs.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Sure enough, somewhat confirmed my suspicion, I found three more of the “gold” nuggets, and a matching set of the ominous blue crystals. I chose to leave those, since I had also neglected to bring gloves, tongs, or a container beyond my pockets, but the nuggets were quickly snatched.
I decided it’d be worthwhile to test my hypothesis, or at least figure out what was happening to the bodies. If I was wrong and there was a quick-acting body snatcher, that would be something I very much wanted to be aware of. So I made my way further down the tunnels, marking the way as I went.
Soon enough I found an identical chamber, with another chest sitting in the middle. This time before I tried to open it, I scouted further down the next tunnel. Far as I could see, it was clear, and a minute later I was crouching down again to open the box. Just like the first, it made that god awful noise, and again I dropped the lid to face the coming threat when I heard their shrieks, coming from the tunnel I had just cleared. I saw them coming earlier this time, having a straighter shot down the tunnel, but there were more.
Ten of them were sprinting full tilt toward me, howling with excitement, and this time they were armed. Well, the front three were, with small clubs. They shielded their eyes as they drew closer, trying to counter the light, but that did little to stop a 5.56 to the chest. Seven rounds, three dead. Not the best aim, but I was in a bit of a rush. The rest of the goblins ignored their dead comrades except to arm themselves with the dropped weapons, and continued charging at me, just like Soviet wave tactics.
Easy enough to take them out, with my significant advantage in firepower. Two more were dropped with another four rounds before they could enter the room, and the remaining five fanned out, trying to flank me. I decided I’d deal with the two on the left first, flashing my light right in its face and stunning it as it prepared to leap at me. A single shot to the brow took it out. Its friend had the bright idea to close its eyes and blindly lunge, which was easy enough to dodge. I stepped to the side and let it sail past, hearing it crash to the floor a few feet behind me.
I turned my attention to the other three for a moment, since they were still on their feet and closing in. I aimed at the nearest of the trio, and heard one of the two loudest noises in the firearm world.
A click when you expect a bang.
There was no time to clear the dud round, the goblin was too close. I let the rifle drop against my chest, held by the sling, and drew my handgun once again. I’m not the best at quickdraws, the indoor range closest to my house didn’t allow them, but my first round struck it in the left knee cap, taking the leg straight out from under it. I ignored it for a moment, as the goblin just behind it used its friend as a springboard to get a higher jump toward me. Two rounds hit its midsection but the momentum couldn’t be stopped, and it crashed into me.
We both fell to the floor, with the goblin sprawled atop of me, still alive and thrashing. The last of the three, uninjured, drew in and raised the club to bring it down on my head, and would have succeeded if I hadn’t replaced its nose with a 9mm sized hole. The club clattered to the ground as the goblin collapsed in a heap. The one on top of me, I dispatched similar to the first in my kitchen, but with a bit more precision, placing the muzzle against its squealing face before firing. Yes, the blood splattered my face, and yes that blinded me.
I don’t think it can be said in good conscience that I make sound decisions.
Add another item to the list, goggles.
Through my ear-pro I could hear the second goblin getting back up, and the kneecapped one crawling toward me, snarling like a wounded wolf.
This is one of the few times I am thankful for having done a proper pepper spray course.
It was painful, but I forced my eyes open despite the viscera, and forced the dead goblin off of me. There was no time to stand up, but I could roll to the side to dodge the goblin as it tried to kick me in the head, an act that earned it a 9mm to the foot. It fell to the ground howling, clutching at the mangled extremity, but was silenced by the next shot. It was with no small effort that I pushed myself off the floor, and found myself staring eye to eye with the final goblin.
The hatred in its eyes bored into my soul as it desperately crawled towards me, doing everything that remained in its efforts to end my life.
I lined up my sights, and fired.
The first thing I did was clear the dud in my rifle, and reload to a fresh mag. I just barely remembered to watch the bodies, my adrenaline was starting to wear off. The battle wasn’t in vain, as I had the chance to watch that last goblin. A few seconds passed, and then the goblin’s flesh began to dissolve into black smoke. The pool of blood evaporated into nothing. Within seconds, nothing remained but the gold nuggets and the blue crystals.
It had been a rough fight, but my suspicion had been confirmed, at least so far as goblins were confirmed, monster corpses worked on MMO rules. Even the blood on my face cleared away, though my eyes were still irritated. I didn’t have an exact timeframe yet on how long it took bodies to “de-spawn”, as I had left my phone on the table near my front door, and I refused to wear watches.
After that fight, I decided it was time to call it quits for the night, ignoring the chest but collecting my “gold” and leaving the crystals again. A rough estimate was that I had been in the dungeon at least an hour, maybe closer to two, but I’ve never been good at accurately measuring time without a device. I didn’t have work the next day, in fact I was off for the next two, but a man still needed to rest, and there was no way I was going to keep wandering these tunnels while exhausted.
There were no issues making my way back out, after all I had left myself a well-marked path right back to the void. Of course I closed the fridge behind me, and after thinking about it for a moment I shoved a cabinet in front of the door, to prevent it from opening. Though my fresh food was gone, I still had the frozen goods in my freezer, and plenty of nonperishables in the cabinets. A can of soup was good enough to quell my growling stomach, as it had been five hours since I was supposed to eat dinner.
While my microwave did its work, I retrieved my phone, and finally checked the time.
11:10pm.
That didn’t make any sense.
I checked, I had called the cops at 9:33pm. They had showed up a few minutes later, and they left with the EMTs at around 10:40pm
I had gone into the fridge at about 11pm.
It had taken maybe two minutes to prepare the soup to be microwaved.
That meant I had been in the fridge for maybe 5 minutes.
By my best guess, it should've been past 12am, close to 1am. There was no way my excursion had been less than five minutes.
That was another thing I'd have to look into. Was my sense of time wrong? Was something about the dungeon messing with me? I surely hadn't imagined the trip, I had the "gold" in my pockets to prove I'd been there, and that green gem. I sure as hell hadn't dreamt it.
I decided that'd be a problem for tomorrow me to solve, that guy got everything done. Past me however, fuck that guy, the lazy piece of shit.
After the soup was finished, I cleaned the bowl and set it in the rack to dry, then went to my bedroom. In a short time I was stripped out of my gear and in the shower to wash off, still having dried blood all over me. I stood in there for at least half an hour, letting the hot water pour down on me. It dawned on me, one of those mid-shower epiphanies, that I was entirely too accepting of the whole situation. Why wasn't I freaking out more? Sure, I had panicked when the goblin was on top of me, but after that I had just gone about the motions, like it was the most natural thing in the world to suddenly find a portal to a dungeon in your fridge. Sure, go pick up the newspaper "local man finds another dungeon in his garage", hits the headlines all the time I'm sure.
Fuck no it doesn't.
And the paramedics. Why hadn't they insisted I go to the hospital? By all appearances I had been attacked by a wild animal. Where was my just-in-case rabies shot? Where were the antibiotics? Who the hell just stitches up a man on his porch and calls it good?
I almost fucking died! That goblin was a second away from bashing my head in.
Why the hell did all of this just make sense, why was I just completely okay with all of it unti-
My shower suddenly went cold as my water heater gave up, it wasn't too good at keeping warm this long, old and small as it was. I had always planned to replace it, but never had the money to commit to it. Instead, I just took it as a sign that it was time to get out and go to bed.
The dog was still laying in her same spot, just barely giving me room to stretch out. The cats finally decided it was safe to come out of hiding, having been quite spooked by the loud noises and the presence of strangers, hopped up shortly after to seek warmth from my resting body.
Soon enough, sleep took me.