He backed away and the hand and circles enlarged again while moving back up to sit in the center of the door. This time, Joe was able to watch the movement more carefully, and the hand and circles seemed to almost crawl through the door rather than simply move. The actual material of the door seemed to flow like water as the imprints moved. The hand also changed shape slightly, fingers elongating and the nails growing more pointed and looking more like claws than typical finger nails.
“Hey, Garnedell. Go forward, but do not touch the door or open it. Just walk forward until the hand print moves again.”
Garnedell did as Joe asked and just as Joe suspected, the handprint and circles came down at Garnedell’s shorter shoulder height and even the circles appeared to be smaller.
“Ha! I thought so. Let’s do the ultimate test,” Joe said as he turned to the Acokzau siblings, “Kilniara, mind if you do the same? Do not touch it though, just go forward but wait for Garnedell to come back.”
Garnedell stepped back from the door and the door repeated its animation, then responded when Kilniara stepped forward. The hand shape morphed even more drastically, moving from a thumb and four fingers to a thumb and two much longer fingers to match Kilniara’s hand. It also settled to her shoulder height as it had for Joe and Garnedell, although the circle indentations proved to actually be a bit larger than when he had initiated the change in the door. He called Kilniara back and stared at the door for some time, unsure what to do. It seemed obvious to him that his hand print would go on the door, but the five circle indentations threw him for a bit of a loop.
He glanced down at the dungeon map, thinking carefully, lost in thought when an idea clicked into his head. He was looking at the map of the fourth floor, with the bottom right quadrant completely filled in and the upper right quadrant mostly filled in, although there was a bit of the quadrant left, back towards the center of the maze. His eyes flickered at the obvious division of four then back up at the five circles before he pulled out the two medallions that he’d gotten from this dungeon. Four quadrants. Four monsters in each quadrant. And the goblin king on the first floor. Huh! One hole above four others. One a king. The other the servants of the king. Joe read the medallion he’d gotten from the spark once again: sigil of the goblin king’s spark. Seems fairly obvious where this is going.
Joe fiddled with the two medallions in his hand before he stepped up to the dungeon door once again, bringing the medallions up to the indentation, but not wanting to put it in yet in case it activated something. He kept a couple fingers behind the medallion even as he brought it up to the circular setting place. The sigil of the goblin king seemed obvious, and Joe brought the medallion up to the upper solo circle. Even as he brought it close, he felt the medallion began tugging towards the hole, seeking to embed itself there. The spark medallion actually only seemed to fit with the third hole in the bottom row, show no reaction to any of the other holes. Well, I guess we know what to do. Heh.
The puzzle seemed simple enough as it was, so he led turned away from the door and dropped the medallions back into his pouch.
“Right. We gotta kill the other three sub-bosses, then we’ll come back here. They should be on this floor. Ready to go?”
“The other sub-bosses? How do you know there are three more?” Kilniara asked quickly, curiosity driving her.
Joe shrugged, “I’m not absolutely certain, but it seems obvious. Goblin king,” Joe said as he pointed to the individual circle at the top, “and the four sub-bosses,” Joe finished by pointed to the lower four circles. “Do any bosses appear on the second and third floors?”
The two Acokzau said nothing, but Garnedell quickly shook his head, “No, Joe. The only one is on the first floor. I don’t think many knew about the fourth floor, but no one really cared. Most people do not try to defeat this dungeon. The labyrinth is too deadly.”
“Really? The maze is too much? This maze is ridiculously easy!”
The three apprentices looked at each other, a conversation in a glance that Joe wasn’t quite sure he understood.
“What? Why are you guys looking at each other like that?”
Zilnek answered quickly, “Well, it is obvious it is not difficult for you, but others would find the maze deadly.”
“Really? Why?”
“Most would get lost and unable to escape the maze.”
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“How? It’s simple. Here’s the map.”
“Very few can kill the goblin king to get the map.”
“Yeah, but you can just draw your own map. Why do you need this map? This thing is just a minor convenience right now.”
The three apprentices simply stared, uncertainty showing on their face. Joe also stared back, mind blank as he didn’t understand why the three were staring at him. They stared at each other for a while until Joe finally couldn’t stand it. “What!?”
The three apprentices fidgeted and the two siblings looked to Garnedell who seemed a bit uncomfortable being the defacto spokesperson, but he did step forward. “What do you mean by drawing? Why would you wish to paint a maze, mas… Joe?”
“Paint? You don’t need a pretty picture, just a map to know where to go, like this dungeon map. Just draw lines on a piece of paper.”
When Joe stated this, the three suddenly seemed to have a moment of epiphany, though Zilnek took a couple seconds longer than the other two. Is that really such a new idea? No one has ever thought to just draw the maze? Joe stared in actual shock at this revelation and couldn’t help but question it. “Are you really saying that no one has ever thought to draw out a maze before?”
The three apprentices wiggled a bit, not really saying anything except shrugging a bit although Kilniara added something that piqued Joe’s interest, “There was no need to draw it out.”
“Huh? I thought no one came through this maze because it’s too hard?”
“No. No one comes through this maze because they are too low level. The higher levels don’t find this dungeon worth it, so there are no guides or parties with guides to lead them through.”
“Guides? Huh. So it’s just not worth it for a guide to lead people through this dungeon?”
“Any party with a guide wouldn’t come to this dungeon. There is no point.”
Joe’s mind considered this but then rejected it, “But what about the people on the first through third floor. Some of them could come and learn the maze and guide people through easy enough. They could make some good money, at least for their level.”
“They are not guides, Joe. Any who are guides would likely be in other dungeons helping other more powerful parties.”
“They could easily become a guide for this dungeon.”
“If they became a guide, they wouldn’t stay here.”
Joe’s confusion grew, “OK. Something’s not translating well. If they were a guide in this dungeon, how could they know about another dungeon to guide there? They would have to go and learn that dungeon to become a decent guide.”
The three apprentices seemed confused as well, and Kilniara cautiously clarified, “The magic of the guide job allows them to map any dungeon once they are inside. If they had gained the guide job here, they would not stay here. They would seek out richer opportunities.”
As soon as Kilniara began explaining, Joe immediately understood and realization flooded through him. “It’s a job! There’s a guide job! Ha!” Joe chuckled to himself. He turned to Kilniara and ducked his head in thanks. “Thank you, Kilniara. That, I did not know!” Wow. If you can do it by magic, it would make sense why they would never even think to do it by hand. Why think of an alternative when there’s already a way to do it.
As Joe’s mind mulled what he’d just learned from the apprentices, Joe led their way to complete the exploration of the upper right quadrant and left the other three to their own devices, which turned out to be a rather joyful banter between Garnedell and Zilnek with Kilniara offering some asides. Joe soon became quite bored with traveling the labyrinth, the same hallways, walls, and chandeliers, but refused to become complacent, carefully inspecting their way as they went deeper into the dungeon. They soon had most of the upper right complete and were coming on the last of the empty spaces when they came into a similar room as the one that the great spark had been occupying, defending a last stretch of hallway beyond this room. Joe looked in to find a greater slime and smiled. Hello old friend.
“Seems like a two core slime, right Garnedell?”
“Yes, Joe.”
“Huh. Well, easy enough. I guess I’ll have to swap to my spoon spear again then… crap!” Joe cursed as he realized that he’d left his ‘extra’ weapons back at the inn, only bringing the weapons that he had able to fit on his weapons harness. He grimaced as he pulled out his normal spear, but figured he had little choice. He was a bit frustrated that he was unable to use his clubs, but he wasn’t certain how clubs would be of any use whatsoever against a slime. The slime’s surface tension, even at three core, was strong enough to resist piercing strikes from a spear. Clubs would be useless, as far as he could guess. Maybe I can pin it and beat on it with clubs for a while? That should give me something, right?
Joe grabbed the spear and stalked forward, bringing the spear to bear in front of him. Right. Going to have to stake it the hard way. Can’t throw it, the floor’s stone. I’ll have to hold it in place while I smack it.
Joe walked to towards the slime but at an angle so that when the slime leapt towards him, it wouldn’t leap towards the three apprentices in the back. He made sure that he had walked a good ninety degrees to the side of the slime before heading in. He didn’t want the slime to land anywhere near the others.
Joe sidled forward carefully, but not concerned yet because he was still quite outside the range that slimes were able to leap. Still pays to be careful! Joe began settling into the immediate, preparing his mind for combat. He took another sliding step forward preparing DODGE!
Joe flung his body to the side, his mind not even registering the shock from the surprise of being attacked so far outside the slime’s range as he was focused solely on the fight. It came at him with a speed that was significantly greater than the slimes he’d fought before. He had a response, however, as he’d been overwhelmed by the first two core slime that he’d had to fight to defend the village. Two core?! No! Faster! Joe registered the information, evaluating his situation but his body still continued its dive to the right, bringing the spear up once again to block it so that it wouldn’t swallow him. He hoped he would bounce off as he had with the other two core, although this one was significantly faster than he was expecting. Probably stronger, too! Maybe even than the three core... why? How?