Daphne, as well as her four friends, spun around nervously checking each corridor for signs of an invasion by tentacle monsters. The setup was almost perfect. There were four entrances to this room, each one wide enough for tentacle monsters to slither in two abreast. Every couple of seconds, eight more tentacle monsters would enter. If 100 tentacle monsters were truly coming, they’d have Daphne’s group entirely surrounded in under 15 seconds.
As the four younger adventurers moved to the center of the room and stood back to back, the three older elves watched on with expressions of mild curiosity. They were clearly much less worried than the others. Then again, they weren’t there the last time Daphne’s party fell victim to tentacle monsters. Such was Daphne’s thought process.
After a tense minute, everyone relaxed. Apparently, the name of the room was a silly joke just like all the other rooms so far in this puzzle. Daphne turned towards Alenia to say something, but just as she was about to open her mouth, she heard a sliding noise to the southeast and spun to look.
What emerged from the shadow of the corridor was Daphne, or most likely the morphling in her form. It shouted, “You thought it was a tentacle monster but it was me, DM!” The morphling disappeared into the corridor again.
Daphne returned to frantically checking all the corridors, but none of them showed signs of additional monsters. She and her friends finally sheathed their weapons.
“If I had to guess, they’re cultural references…” Alenia suggested, not elaborating on what exactly she was referring to. “From where, though?”
Daphne ignored Alenia’s musing and put forth a suggestion. “Let’s keep trying to light everything up. We’re almost done, right?” She turned to the white mage who was now inspecting his hand-drawn map.
“Yes, I believe we only have to light up the three dark corridors connected to this room and the two east-west corridors north and south of us. The southeast corridor will take us back to the room we started in. After that, we can double back and return here, go north and complete a triangle, or go due west to light up the remaining corridors.”
“Okay! Let’s go southeast for now and see if anything in the first room changed.”
Everyone nodded at Daphne’s suggestion, and the group proceeded down the southeast corridor which coincidentally was the direction the morphling had escaped to a few moments prior. Daphne thought she heard Alenia whisper the words ‘a shame’ but she wasn’t sure.
Just as they expected, the hallway lit up when they reached the approximate halfway point. Continuing on to the room at the other end, they found it exactly in the condition they left it at the beginning of their exploration in this area.
“Nothing special, huh?”
The white mage grunted in response to Daphne and then laid out their options. “West, north, or back to the northwest again?”
“Let’s go north. Like you said, we can do three corridors in a row by walking a triangle after that, right?”
The white mage nodded and Daphne led the group north. This corridor was already lit up from their previous time passing through it. When they reached the halfway point, the lighting abruptly changed from a neutral color to red.
“It’s red now!?” Daphne called out.
“First time this’s happened,” the swordsman said.
“Maybe this means we failed?” the white mage asked. “Like that weird pedestal explained?”
“Why did we fail, then? This light is difficult to see in. Let’s continue to the next room first.” Daphne continued north with the rest following her. Alenia’s group remained quiet.
After arriving in the next room, which still had normal lighting, Daphne requested to see the map. On DM’s console, it would look like this, although the white mage’s map was pretty accurate too:
[https://i.imgur.com/YlWk05E.jpg]
Daphne traced their route from memory by referring to the map. The pedestal must have been located at the bottom of the map, on the right side of that wider corridor. The group then walked a full lap around the outer ring before returning to the beginning. On their second attempt, they continued east in the outer ring, then made a left turn into the first narrow hallway, putting them into the room that the white mage labeled as #2 based on its location.
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From Room #2, they proceeded north to Room #5, northwest to Room #6, southwest to Room #4, south to Room #1, and northwest to Room #3. This room was supposedly the Room of 100 Tentacle Monsters. From there, they walked southeast back to Room #2. Up until this point, every room and hallway had lit up as they passed through it. However, Room #2’s lighting didn’t change when they passed through it for a second time.
Then, when they retraced their steps towards Room #5, the lighting changed to red. Daphne had a theory about why that happened. “Maybe we’re really only allowed to pass through a hallway once?”
“But then why did it let us pass through Room #2 twice?” the swordsman countered.
“Obviously, we’ll need to pass through some of the rooms more than once in order to complete the puzzle,” the white mage explained, having the unfair advantage of being the map bearer since the very beginning.
“Are we sure we failed?” said the fighter. “Maybe the hallway turning red is supposed to happen?”
“Maybe, but let’s assume the hallway isn’t supposed to turn red, for now. Let’s test if we can pass through every hallway once without passing through any of them twice.” After Daphne laid out the plan, she looked at the white mage who nodded, then at Alenia who gestured for Daphne to proceed.
“I think there’s a way to do this,” the white mage suggested as he inspected the map carefully. “We can walk the same route as last time, except when we get to the tentacle monster room, we’ll go northwest or northeast instead of southwest. Then, we’ll complete the triangle, go southeast, then go west. That should light up every hallway without passing through any of them twice.”
“Good job!” Daphne praised him as she led the group back towards the pedestal. They transited the red hallway walking south, although its lighting didn’t change even after they reached the halfway point. Room #2 was still lit up, both before the entered it and after they passed through it. They walked further south through the narrow corridor and back to the pedestal. Just as the final member of the group broke the threshold into the wider corridor, everyone heard a high-pitched chime.
“I guess that means it reset,” said Daphne. “Lead on!”
The group retraced their steps, entering the inner area from the same narrow hallway and pausing in Room #2. The lighting increased slightly within Room #2, just like last time they attempted the puzzle. They proceeded north, which caused the hallway to light up brightly as they passed through it. Everything proceeded the same as last attempt while they walked to Rooms #5, #6, #4, #1, and then #3.
This time, they exited the tentacle monster room to the northwest, returning to Room #4. Per the plan, they completed the triangle by stepping east to Room #5 and southwest back to Room #3. The lighting was still brightening each time they passed through a new hallway.
Having lit up the entire upper portion of the puzzle, the group walked southeast to Room #2. The white mage explained that the east-west hallway to Room #1 was now the only part of the puzzle that was not lit up, as far as he was aware. They each took a breath and strode west.
When they reached the halfway point between Rooms #1 and #2, the lighting turned red, causing Daphne to shout out an obscenity. “What did we do wrong!?” she yelled.
“I—I guess just lighting up all the hallways isn’t the goal? Maybe we have to visit each room a certain number of times? Wait, that doesn’t make sense…” While the white mage blabbered on about what the problem might be, the group finished walking west to Room #1, which glowed red.
“I’m so sick of this red lighting. Let’s go back to the pedestal and then check the map again.”
“Daphne,” Alenia cut in. “Look around.”
“Huh?” Alenia did look around the room, but didn’t notice anything except for an annoying red glow. “What?”
Alenia took a deep breath. “Daphne, it wasn’t just that corridor that turned red. This room turned red as well.”
“What? Oh!” Daphne looked around some more. Only now did she notice that all three corridors leading out of the room were lit up red. Also, last time they failed the puzzle, the rooms didn’t turn red, only the offending hallway. “Did we win?”
“Either a door opened somewhere in this area, or we need to return to the pedestal, don’t you think?”
“You’re right,” Daphne acknowledged. “All right, let’s go back to the pedestal.”
“Wait, Daffy,” said the white mage. “If we go back, it might reset everything. Shouldn’t we walk the entire area first before going back to the beginning?”
Daphne’s response was a deafening groan. “I can’t stand this red lighting anymore, though. Let’s go back to the beginning. We can always solve it again easily if we need to, right?”
“R—Right.”
The group walked south through the narrow hallway branching off from Room #1, then turned left and right to arrive at the pedestal.
“I can’t look,” said Daphne.
The fighter stepped up to it and read aloud. “Here Lies Daphne.”
“What!? You’re making that up!” Daphne replied.
“N—No, it really says—oh wait, it’s changing!” Before the fighter’s eyes, the engraving morphed to a new message. “On your second try? I’m impressed. You passed the test. On to the next. It’s my best. Will your quest bring you to a nest of pests while you’re out of rest? Surely I jest. Perhaps you’ll find, in a chest, a vest with a crest of the oldest and daffiest guest. I hope you’re not here to molest…”
“M—Molest?” Daphne repeated back.
“Never mind that part,” Alenia instructed. “Let’s move on.” As if on cue, the pedestal descended into the floor to the sound of grinding stone. Just as the pedestal settled in flush with the floor, a new grinding sound echoed from down the hallway to the south. The group walked over to the source of the sound and noticed a door had slid open.
“This is a big floor…” the white mage observed as they entered the new corridor. After several minutes of walking, they reached a new pedestal. “Daphne, you should have the honors…”
Daphne stepped up to the pedestal. “Please be gentle with the tentacle.” She paused. “What is WITH—wait!” The words changed like before. “This one’s harder. If you can’t trust each other, you’ll fail. Forever.”
“Not a lot to go on…” the fighter whined.
“Well, I’ll take care of mapping again. Lead on, Daffy.”
“Gentle with the tentacle…” Alenia whispered, shaking her head.