Davin had felt that the plan was too simple, something had to go wrong, to him if something didn't go wrong it would violate every aspect of what he knew about everything….

Or that was how he felt as he ran from the room as six of the single-sided glowing projections climbed from the screen. The one good thing was that they didn't seem to carry with them the same innate level of fear that the larger variety seemed to radiate. All the same, he was vastly unprepared for six… honestly, when he looks back at this he will feel vastly unprepared for the entirety of this situation… let alone a horde of mobs. Running into the narrow hall to funnel them seemed far more appealing when they thought that the creatures wouldn’t be able to fit in the opening. The crashing flood of creatures as Davin dove into the hall was far more intimidating than the roar of the single large one, so when the bubbles of glowing light lit up the hall and burst like overfilled balloons made him far happier than he could have ever thought that a simple spell could have ever done before.

Hugh dropped to his knees also breathing heavily, the horde scaring him to his core, but the effectiveness of a simple spell against these things was invaluable.

"Welp, that was unexpected…." Davin let out a heavy sigh between the pants, mildly winded from his sprint.

"What did you do that there were that many?" Hugh asked an incredulous edge to his tone.

"What makes you think it was me? I didn't do anything differently…" Davin sat up from the floor. "I still think that me being the bait is abuse, I have a maximum of four hit points…"

"Because of the two of us, you're the less valuable, and I need to be able to get away if you perish." A wide grin spread over Hugh's lips.

"Perish? Already? I didn’t think that I was that annoying." Davin huffed in annoyance as he pulled himself to his feet.

"Oh, you're not, rather nice company, it's just that the collection of devices in the 'lobby' are worth more than you could ever imagine, and I would much rather not have that debt lingering over my head for the rest of eternity…." Rubbing his fingers together in the universal symbol of coin.

"Oh, totally, I would let you perish too to avoid unreasonable debt, heck if I had known, I'd throw myself in the path just to give you a few more minutes." The two of them laughed as Davin helped Hugh to his feet. "Let's see if these ones dropped anything?"

They walked back into the auditorium, the front rows of seats thrown into upheaval as a result of the crash of monsters. Looking for the motes that most monsters seem to leave behind after they are destroyed. Digging through what was left of the seats Davin didn't find anything that he would remotely consider useful, but Hugh seemed to find the odds and ends that made up the chairs a bit more interesting. Hugh held up a single cell, a bit of film that was mixed in with the debris, eyeing it closely he seemed entranced by it.

"What you got there?" Davin asked as he chucked another broken arm away.

"From the picture, it looks like a mess, I can't make heads or tails of it…." Holding the small cell up to the lights that floated around them.

"Can you Identify it?"

"I could, but I didn't prep everything for the ritual, we were a little short on funds…" Hugh said in a disappointed tone. "Worth holding on to all the same."

"Did we see any of those from the last one?"

"Not that I know of, but the bigger one seemed to make a bigger mess of things, and I doubt that we'd have for one in that." Hugh pocketed the small piece of film.

"So they can split up? Or is it just a random amount each time?" Davin asked as he looked around for anything that stood out to him.

"We'd need a larger sample size… two encounters doesn’t give us much variance…."

Davin stared at his friend. "You’d have made a great scientist in my world."

"That sounds like some kind of awful infection…." Letting out a sound of disgust and an involuntary shiver.

Davin laughed, "Ha, no, no, they are like researchers and scholars rolled into one."

"Hmmm, then yes, I would have to agree with you, I find looking for answers fascinating."

Looking around the auditorium turned up nothing else of use, but Davin was beginning to question why there was so much trash in the auditorium. From what he remembered they would have a service that would come in and do the cleaning after the theater had closed. This just seemed like too much, as if all of the trash from the entire day was just dumped back into the theater.

Sneaking into the auditorium was simple, there wasn't much in the way to cause any issues, so when Davin whistled from the end of the hall, which was enough to trigger the film to start reeling, he was still stuck once the countdown began, but since he hadn't traveled deep into the room he had a chance to make it back into the hall before the monster completely rushed him. The plan derailed when the single tear of sound that had happened when they had faced the first monster became six, the crash was almost deafening as the speakers thumped in time with them as they landed on the ground in front of the screen. Davin couldn’t react fast enough… luckily he was far enough away that he could make a break for it before he was fully overwhelmed.

The next few auditoriums went about the same, the number of projections seeming to fall somewhere between one massive one and six of the smaller ones, the larger ones needing to take far more damage than the smaller ones, but without knowing the exact numbers on how much damage that they were doing it was hard to tell, but since most seemed to pop from a single casting of Hugh's light spell, Davin didn’t think that it was a large amount.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

"So, I have a theory…." Davin said as he again lay on the floor in the small dark hall that led to the auditorium proper.

"Oh yeah? I have been formulating one myself, but since you know what more of this stuff is than I do, how about you go first?" Hugh leaned into the wall as he spoke.

"So, I think the thing that is making these "monsters" for lack of a better word, might be the projector itself, or one that has been influenced by the belief energy that likely leaked through from the tear being open." Sitting up and pulling himself to his feet.

"Hmmm, that seems like what I was thinking, and since we can't get to it, it seems to only be summoning these things where we are and then running away, hoping that they take care of us. About how much room would you say is up there?" Hugh tapped his chin as he thought about what Davin had said.

"Oh, it's not a lot, there is one more central area that they splice the film at, but otherwise it's just a group of long halls, I'd say no bigger than this one we're in now, maybe just a little larger where the reel to reel sits." Davin held out his arms, gesturing around himself at the hall they were in.

"And the 'reel to reel' is what this 'film' sits on and the machine projects these images on the 'screen'?"

"That’s pretty much it." Davin nodded along.

"Ah, so it would make sense that one of these 'reel to reels' may be our final challenge of this place. It is just a machine? So the lights won't have the same effectiveness?" Hugh wondered.

"Doubtful, but I'm sure your fire spells would be more than enough, but I don’t think that your sleep spell will be as effective."

"If a 'machine' is anything like a construct I would have to agree with you, but if we take some time I can prepare another spell, that should give us a little bit more of a leg up in the next confrontation."

"Sounds like a plan to me. I think I'm almost useless in my current condition, I'm not sure how effective knives will be against the magically mutated machine…"

"Magically mutated? Now that I think about it, that is pretty apt, but you can run distractions. Plus, I honestly doubt I could do this alone, so even in your current state, you aren't useless."

Davin stared at Hugh as a wide sarcastic grin spread over his lips.

"You are so lucky that I like you… could just leave you to the magical projector and hope for the best."

"And in your current condition, you wouldn’t survive another day with that disease." Hugh looked at his status. "No matter how many of them we fight in one go they seem to only give the same amount of 'expee'." Trying to use Davin's word for what they got to increase their levels.

Davin looked at his status. "That kind of backs up my theory of them being a part of whatever is the master of this space. Must have a cool down to the power, so if we can rush him after he summons one, that might be our best chance to take him down without too much of a fight." Davin knocked on the wall as he made his statement, in the classic action of one knocking on wood to prevent misfortune.

"As good of a plan as any, and let's hope you're right."

The next hour that Hugh spent with his nose in his book mumbling while twisting his hands in the air, was what felt like the single longest hour of Davin's life, their 'lives' a thread away from ending, the anticipation was thick in his mind. The flashlight that he'd found wasn’t very bright, but from the few times he'd had a chance to use it, its effectiveness was unquestioned. Sneaking the ladder into the largest auditorium wasn't the most difficult thing that he ever thought that he would have to do in his time in the afterlife, but it did feel like it may have been one of the more silly… By the time Hugh had finished his preparations Davin felt that he was 'chomping at the bit' he was wound too tightly for lack of a better turn of phrase.

"And ready!" Hugh announced as he closed his book.

Davin let out a long breath as if he'd been holding it for too long even though he didn't think that he was. "Finally."

"Finally? It was an hour, what possibly could have you in such a rush that you couldn't wait?" Hugh asked, a tone of mild annoyance in his voice.

"Well, I had gotten everything else ready in the first ten minutes, and you'd said not to bother you, so I made sure that I did my best to not bother you… but the suspense is killing me."

"See that’s what we're trying to avoid, even if not permanent I would like to avoid having to deal with all of that."

"I know, I know, it's more that I blame the anticipation of a boss fight."

"Boss?" Hugh asked.

"Uh… You know the one big bad at the end of a dungeon, the one that when you take them down, you know that the dungeon is clear."

"Ohh, you mean the sovereign?"

"Sovereign? Like a ruler? Huh, that makes sense in a weird way, basically what a boss is."

"Yes, because they are the rulers of the dungeon, and when you take them down, you can claim the spoils."

Davin shrugged. "I'll likely still call them a boss, but that’s just because those are the terms that I know."

"A fair point, your terms make a lot of sense and roll off the tongue easier than others that I have heard. Some call them lords and kings depending on the size of the dungeon, and how many bosses there are. What do you call it when there are lesser bosses?"

"Either a sub-boss or a mini-boss, it depends on the game." Shrugging again as his mind went to a tabletop campaign that he'd played in, where there was a castle that they were taking down and each wing had its own boss and a key to collect to get to the final boss."

"Games? Ah yes, you’ve said that before, most of your experience with this comes from them. Well, I only have second-hand knowledge in these subjects, so that puts you a little closer to it than me."

"No worries, this will just be the first of many, I hope." The last words fell more as a whisper than a statement.

Davin held a dagger in one hand and the flashlight in the other, ready for whatever this boss could throw at them. Entering the already destroyed auditorium they stood at the bottom of the stairs, looking up to the window, not seeing anything there to summon the projections. They both started to yell, nothing coherent, mainly just making as much noise as they could, hoping that they would quickly draw its attention. The shadow filled the window as the small light flickered on, Davin and Hugh began to run up the stairs, hoping to make it to the top before the rooting effect took place.

Their hopes were short-lived, as soon as the two chimed, they were rooted in place, but the fear that each of the summonings had brought with it never came, the regular beep of the countdown made Davin's ears hum, the sound seeming to strike deeper into his bones than any other time before. The final chime and the sound of tearing as five of the projections dropped to the ground. Davin turned, aiming his lit flashlight at the group, hearing a sound similar to the hiss and crackle of paper burning. Hugh's lights flew into the group and they crumpled into imaginary ash. They rushed to the back wall, Hugh climbing up to the top of the ladder, peering into the dark of the projection booth. The area near the window was empty, Hugh could see the open space, a smashed reel-to-reel lay scattered over the space, as if it was attacked. Climbing into the empty nook was a little more difficult than Hugh had originally anticipated, but he made it over without making an absolute fool of himself. His darkvision actually working and he could see just a little down the hall next to him and the distant sound of something multilegged running.

Hugh quickly waved Davin up who popped into the room almost as soon as he'd stuck his hand out the window. Nodding at one another, Davin again readied his knife and flashlight, and took the lead, hoping that they would be able to catch the projector off guard and do some damage before it could summon more of the projections.