Marius

-Layer 1-

Duskwood Cavern

HP: 10/15

-teacher, and a leader.

"Mpf," Marius murmured.

You are a teacher and a leader.

"Meh," Marius answered, beginning to stir.

Remember that, son, someone was saying. People will look to you for guidance. You must be there for them.

"Get…fucked."

The lips that belonged to the voice were smiling. He could tell.

Make us proud. And remember: just smile.

The whole world was but a fleeting dream.

When he opened his eyes it hit him: he was still sequestered in this realm of darkness. He rose slowly but deliberately, wiping the sticky gunk of sleep from his eyes as he came to realize that he’d actually collapsed on the floor of a little crook he’d found in the arena cavern, surrounded by the skulls of the dead.

His eyes blinked through the dull ache that dominated his brain, begging him to just sit down and fester. Or wait for some other hapless soul wandering through here to pick off just like the boy had been.

But as the hazy mind ventured back to the image of the young lad dissolving in the Mangler’s stomach, he shook his head and denied his baser impulse, for once.

My kingdom for some water, Marius was thinking as he stretched and commenced his limp through the dead arena of bones and crushed Crocodilian corpses. Or a cute Succubus girl. Let her suck me dry and leave me down here. The big mushroom can send reinforcements if she wants her fucking bully dead.

He passed through the exit tunnel at the bottom of the pit filled with more Crocodilian spume, ignoring the stinging sensation that nicked at his leather boots. The armor was starting to feel loose around his body, as though the damage done to it over time had caused its armored pads to wither.

This passage was different from those rugged corridors he’d tumbled through. The darkness was becoming more pronounced, stronger. His eyes could barely pick out the few inches before him and trailed his hand across the rugged left wall as he trundled on towards whatever foe waited at the end of this long dungeon. A few times he tripped and fell into the cold dark of the floor, or faceplanted right into a globule of spume that stung his face. His ‘HP’ didn’t change once, and yet he felt like every step he took was just brought him another inch closer to the death he should’ve gone through at least five times by now.

And it was at this moment, dragging himself forwards like a drone being controlled by some dark spirit, that he saw it.

Marius was not a believer in divine intervention. But even in their darkest hour, his keen eyes suddenly set upon something sparkling at the end of the tunnel bathed in darkness, something surrounded by spume and yet untouched by its sticky talons.

His brain begged his eyes not to deceive him, and yet try as he might he just couldn’t shake the image from his view.

There, sparkling in the desert sun that streamed in through the open cracks in the ceiling, was a wooden treasure chest bound up in chains.

Optimistic hallucination or a spark of luck? He thought. But it was his eyes that revealed the truth to him:

Appraisal: success

Object: Medium chest

So, it was a real, honest-to-goodness chest, huh? Ok, now we’re getting somewhere.

Marius approached the chest with renewed vigor and prospected the chains that bound it. They were old, rusted and worn. Probably a strong strike at their weak focal points could dislodge them.

Marius withdrew his dagger and steadied the blade. With both his hands he grunted and sliced at the weakest looking links in the chains.

As the dagger made contact with the chains, he instantly felt a sliver of pain shoot up his arm. He yelped, staggered back, and saw his dagger fly through the air and impale him in his foot.

‘FUCK!’ he cried out, pulling the blade out his boot with a burst of pain-fueled energy.

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Damage: 2

HP: 8/15

Marius nursed the bleeding perforation just under his front toe and swiftly set to plugging it with a scrap of his rags that remained under his armor.

Grunting with renewed anger, he spat through his frustration and building fear.

"The chains are really that strong?" he asked. "Or enchanted, right? Of course. Nothing in this place is ever straight with you. Not that a lying bastard like me can complain. But, I mean, come on – those things are as rusty as an Amarata pilgrim’s sex drive."

"Mayhap," a voice intoned above him. "These chains be not strong, your sword arm simply fails you."

Marius looked up and drew the dagger, expecting – what? – not like he knew what was dwelling in these deeper tunnels.

There was no one around. Just him and the chest.

"Or," the aged voice croaked again. "Mayhap I should say ‘dagger-arm?’ That little butter knife you wield could barely cut cake let alone my bonds, Thief."

Marius’ eyes found the voice’s origin in the glowing keyhole of the chest lying before him.

"Why am I even surprised?" he mused. "The chest talks."

"Hmpf," the chained receptacle snorted. "You could at least act surprised. My deception was good enough to mess with your Appraisal, new-blood. How does it feel to have an inanimate object best you?"

Oh, I just know I’m going to love you, Marius thought.

He focused on its glowing…mouth? Now, he was seeing with new eyes.

Appraisal: Success

Morphology: Mimic Seer

HP: 55/55

Nope. I ain’t got a chance against this thing.

"I know what you’re thinking," the harbinger of scorn continued. "How can you possibly obtain the beauteous treasures that lie within my glorious bosom? How can you ransack my riches? Plunder my plenty? Make off with my minerals? Abscond with my armaments? Obtain my greatest – hey!"

Marius was already walking away down another tunnel.

"I say!" the Mimic called after him. "Thief! Come back here this instant!"

"Nah, buddy," Marius called back over his shoulder, limping with heightened pain that radiated up his right foot. "Have a good one."

He detected panic in the chest’s ‘voice’ that boomed inside his skull even as he traveled away from the creature.

I have treasure! Treasure to be procured by an interloper skilled enough to release me from these bonds! Don’t you want treasure? You’re literally a thief!

"I’m good," Marius all but whispered. "Besides, I ain’t sticking my hand in any other holes around here."

He limped on, feeling the voice rage in his mind as he escaped its site, and the walls of the cavern begin to narrow towards one path with light at the end.

He was close to his destination. He could feel it. The walls themselves seemed to beat against his hand in anticipation. Maybe when he got there he could negotiate with whatever this ‘Matriarch’ was. It worked with the mushroom. It could work here.

"MARIUS OF CORBECK!"

He stopped as the booming sound of fury rebounded off the inner walls of his subconsciousness. It was a voice that sang with the power of a thousand tongues.

"YOUR QUEST IS VAIN WITHOUT THE WATERS OF LIFE. YOUR WOUND SHALL FESTER, YOUR BODY SLOLWY DIE. YOU WILL ROT IN THESE DARK CAVES. IS THAT REALLY THE END YOU HAD IN MIND?"

He turned slowly, pivoting on his punctured foot, and looked back towards the glowing chest in its little nook amidst the dark.

It knows my name?

"INDEED, MARIUS," the chest continued from within his skull. "YOU MAY NOT KNOW WHAT LIES WITHIN MY BOWELS, BUT I KNOW WHAT SECRETS LIE WITHIN YOU. AND I KNOW YOU WISH TO LIVE, DESPITE YOUR THEATRICS."

His lip stiffened and fists clenched. He was starting to really hate this thing.

"YOU’VE GOTTEN RATHER GOOD AT LYING, HAVEN’T YOU?" the voice chuckled. "YOU’VE EVEN MANAGED TO LIE TO YOURSELF."

Marius marched forward, his blade drawn, and stopped in front of the chuckling chest with more annoyance than he’d displayed so far. His arm quivered with the desire to strike the thing down, and his eyes flew to its chains again.

Object: Seerchain

STR Check: Failed (STR 14 vs Object STR: 50)

He snorted with barely contained fury. He’d appraised the chest, but not its chains. Idiot.

The Mimic seemed rather amused now.

"Just smile, young Marius," it chuckled.

"Ok," he spat. "What do you want?"

"To play a game."

"Cool. I’m partial to poker. The finger-challenged find it a tough game though, to be honest."

"No, Marius," the chest groaned. "We shall play my game. An old game. A game known to humans on the surface such as yourself. A fun little game: truth or dare."

Marius sighed. But his foot stung, and his body felt only weaker and weaker by the second. If this thing really did have treasures it was willing to part with, indulging it a little bit wouldn’t hurt.

"What’re you gonna put up?" he asked.

"Isn’t it obvious?" the chest responded, quite incredulous. "My hoard. Specifically – a full vial of Water of Life. Full HP restoration to the drinker. Quite the rarity for a new blood (and quite a waste, if you were to ask a seasoned adventurer). Let it not be said that I am not a caring casket."

Marius wiped the sweat that had been collecting on his forehead for the last few…days? Weeks? Who the hell knew.

"Is every creature of the Everloft nuttier than a Tilonxeel turd or am I just a weirdo magnet?"

"Ah, dear Marius," the chest scoffed. "What else is new?"

He frowned as he sheathed his dagger and sat crossed-legged opposite the chest, staring into its glowing keyhole.

"Alright," he wheezed. "What do you want from me?"

"Honest answers."

Marius sighed.

"Couldn’t you just take an arm or something?"

The chest opened itself ever so slightly to reveal rows of serrated teeth lining its insides – incisors sharp enough to rip through the feeble, already crumbling leathers adorning Marius’ torso.

"Oh Marius, I could rend every limb from your body, and yet it would barely sustain me for a few seconds. Do not mistake me for my crude, ravenous cousins in the deeper layers of the abyss – those mindless mimics who feast on nothing more than base flesh. No, Marius, I am a Mimic Seer. Truth is what sustains me."

Everloft, if you’re really alive, I know you’re probably laughing at me right now. Haven’t you shit on me enough?

The Mimic continued, unperturbed:

"Our duel shall be conducted thus: Three bouts of three questions. Both of us shall face the questions of the other. No question may be repeated verbatim or conceptually."

Great, Marius thought. This is basically an Amaratian confession booth.

But he leaned forward and straightened himself out. He’d been crawling around in the dark for so long that it might even be nice to shed some light on a few things going on around here.

"Well, Marius," the casket cackled. "You are the challenger, to you goes the courtesy of the first question."

Then a bolt of lightning arced through Marius’ mind and etched a wall of flame on the inside of his eyes:

Side Quest started: The Truthseer’s Game

Marius bowed his head and laughed. He was beginning to think that he’d either end up dead or as mad as the rest of them in this place.

"Alright," he said. "Truth or dare?"