Once Shrimpie retrieved the rest of Audit Team Six from the chessboard room, Cal wondered if they’d chosen the right hallway to follow. Yes, they’d come through a wall, but had that shortened their path or lengthened it?

He didn’t have any energy left in his Ruby Staff, but his Funk Soul still had plenty of Apothos. Casting a Triple A spell, he saw that the inner sanctum of the Web Wizard’s Wreck Room was relatively close.

They were going the right way. The chessboard fight had been hard. They could only hope that the Web Wizard had frontloaded his defenses and that the siege of the inner sanctum wouldn’t be as intense.

Moving away from the chess board, the new hallway had slick, brown tiles, so slick that Cal thought they might be part of a trap. But no, Gwen’s wand detected no traps.

Murals covered the walls on both sides of the corridor. Gwen had called it. The Web Wizard had painted Sangretta sunsets, garishly orange, yellow, and pink with lots of silhouetted palm trees and dark ocean water, emphasized by the white crests of waves. If they’d been fighting a Dungeon Satyr, or a Fiendish Muse—something more artsy—they would’ve been careful around the paintings. In most dungeons, paintings had an unnerving way of coming alive. But here, they were just an eye-sore and not something trying to behead them.

The mural darkened Helga’s already dark mood, even after Kronke healed her. This time, the air was redolent of brownies, delicious, cakey brownies. Helga was back on Hurricane.

The barbarian decorator turned and gave the sink a warning. “Keep yer faucet shut, ye blasted sink woman. No more yelling. I cannae take it.”

Gwen sent Shrimpie ahead with Karl back to dangling underneath the zeppelin. Images flickered in her goggles. While she used her spy zeppelin to run recon, Cal drifted over to where Helga was reloading her musket. “Are you okay, Helga?”

The barbarian halfling shrugged. “Aye. Got cut by the paper, and didn’t fight as well as I’d have liked, but then, I do better when I can move.”

Cal knew that was true. He remembered her heroic stand against the raiders back in Mimi Drybone’s dungeon.

Helga scowled. “Also, didn’t like the blimp lifting Hurricane here. And he didn’t like it none either. No help for it, though. Yer staff ran out of power. Good thing, I got plenty of Apothos left.”

Cal thought there might be more to it than the blimp ride, but he didn’t know how to ask. This was beyond him. He was far more comfortable with numbers and statistics than with people.

Helga saw his concern, though. She lifted her chin. “I’m nae feeling right, Calcannis, but ye won’t catch me shirking neither work nor fightin’. I’ve come too far to let a little discomfort stop me.”

“What discomfort?” Cal asked, then winced. “You don’t have to tell me, though. It’s none of my business. I’m fine. You’re fine. We’re both fine.”

Kronke was licking the crumbs of some kind of pastry off his palm. Noisily.

Helga made a face. “By my grandmother’s questionable morality, lad, the noises ye’re making are enough to make me lose my gods-blessed lunch!”

Kronke sucked a finger clean of frosting. “Sorry.”

Cal still felt uncomfortable. Should he ask Helga again? Or just let it go?

Thankfully, the sink riding on the goat stayed silent through their conversation.

Gwen gestured with her gauntlets. “Shrimpie is at a door at the end of this hallway. Oh, Helga, you are going to hate this door. I certainly hate it. Not only is it ugly, but the structural integrity is terrible. Super cheap wood paneling. Wait. Yeah, I can get Shrimpie inside. One magic missile here. A little force.”

They heard the blimp crash through the door.

Karl’s voice drifted down the hallway. “Ouch! Hey, sarcasm girl, you said you wouldn’t keep freakin’ beatin’ on me!”

Cal watched as her face dropped. And it wasn’t because of Karl’s outburst. “What is it, Gwen?”

“Oh, nothing. Just, you know, ghosts of my flippin’ childhood trauma. Nothing much.” She let out a troubled breath. “No discernible monsters there. But I’m pretty sure there are traps. Or they had better be. My father basically created something he’d always talked about. Don’t waste your Triple A on the chess board room. We beat that. Save it for this next place.”

They moved down the corridor to the room with Helga taking the rear guard.

Kronke walked next to Cal. “Helga not like us fighting against friends. She no say it, but Kronke know. She not know I know, though. She no like it if she knew I know.”

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Cal was kind of lost at all the rhyming. So much rhyming He did have a question. “What friends are we fighting?”

Kronke leaned in close. “Weavelord. We fighting his minions. Helga scared we might have to kill him. It hurt to kill friends.”

Cal knew this had to do with Helga’s past, but she didn’t talk about what she’d been doing before she joined up with Kronke to try and convince other dungeoneers to stop cracking cores and destroying Nodes.

Cal weighed his words. “Well, it’s not like Weavelord was our friend. He was our boss. An abusive boss at that.”

Kronke made an agreeable sound. “Maybe all that true. But Kronke thinks Weavelord overcompensating for deep insecurities. And me there, after Mimi, before concert, he say sorry to you. He vulnerable. Friends share their vulnerabilities with each other.”

And that was Kronke. He went from licking crumbs off his hand to sharing his wisdom.

Cal couldn’t help but love him, and suddenly, he felt better about the troll paladin wielding the evil weapon that had given him almost A-Class abilities. Kronke was a bit more impetuous than usual, but he was exponentially more powerful.

They reached the end of the hall without Daphne shouting. That was a mercy.

Gwen stood at the doorway to usher them into the room. The place was dusty and full of webs, like everything else, and there was another mural of a Sangretta sunrise on one wall. Another wall had portraits of dogs playing poker. Another of those same dogs shooting pool. The paintings were so real, it was like they wanted to leap off the wall and take a seat at a gaming table, with the cup holders and the green felt. The pool table was huge, near an air hockey table and a Foosball table.

It was a comfortable place, a real man cave, and the painting of the sunset made it seem like you were outside and not in the basement of a government building. There were bookshelves, full of popular books near a conversation area.

The floor was green shag carpet, littered with cobwebs.

Cal groaned inwardly. Hadn’t Helga warned them about her reaction to green shag carpet?

Gwen pointed. “Don’t step in front of any of the tables. You’ll go right through the carpets and onto spikes. It’s your basic tiger trap. But it’s kind of stupid because it’s not like you’d go and play some Bharooshian billiards during a dungeon run. And I guess my father could walk across the webs and not fall in, and that might be fun for him. Not fun for me. He talked about having a room like this. Hey, Cal, cast your dumb spell and let me see the description. It’s not like I can get any more traumatized.”

“Don’t tempt fate,” Helga growled. She ambled Hurricane onto the shag carpet. “Now, Hurricane, let’s have ye empty yer bladder on this gods-cursed carpet. By my uncle’s hernia surgery, I think we should all show this blasted carpet what we think of it. And don’t get me started on the painting.”

Kronke went over to one of the poker paintings. “Kronke like dog paintings. They move Kronke. On some deep level.” He stopped talking and stared at them without blinking.

Cal cast his spell as Hurricane relieved himself on the carpet.

Daphne was strangely quiet. It was the right move. Helga seemed on the edge of exploding into a world-ending rage.

Cal had never seen her so angry. And it wasn’t because of the carpet.

He cast his Triple A, followed by his Triple I.

<<<>>>

Triple A Enhanced Initial Results – Room Scan

Room Type: Trap Room (Simple Pit Traps that Gwen found easily. I feel bad for her. Seeing the dark side of a parent is never easy. And yes, this came from Weavelord, but I think you all have figured that out.)

Room Name: The Web Wizard’s Rec Room

Room Purpose: To have a place to hang out with your buddies. If you have buddies. If you don’t, then this is a monument to loneliness and isolation. You have got to get out more. Meet people. Take chances. Work is not a substitute for friendship. When was the last time you called a friend to chat?

Room Description: In your typical suburban home, for your typical five-year-old, what are the two scariest places in the house? You guessed it—the attic and the basement. I’d say the basement is scarier because for one, it’s underground, and for two, it’s the place most likely to smell strange. If the sewer is going to back up on you, it’s going to be in the basement and not the attic. If you are storing potatoes and onions, you store them in a root cellar, which is just another world for a basement.

So children fear basements. Which basically makes all basements dungeons. To think, every suburban house has its own dungeon. Forget about the picket fences and get yourself a green slime.

This is the Weavelord’s basementiest room, and basically where he got the name for the whole dungeon, his Wreck Room. Oh, did I forget to say this was the Web Wizard’s work? Sure. Fine. The Weavelord and the Web Wizard are one in the same.

He comes here to shoot pool by himself. He’s pretty good.

Note: Take a look at the flow of Apothos. You’ll see something interesting.

Minion Description: N/A

Trap Description: Ask Gwen. That wand sure is handy.

Treasure Description: The paintings sure seem valuable, but you’ll have to get to the inner sanctum before I go through the whole list of what’s valuable in here. Give you a hint, though. Friendship is more valuable than gold. The real treasure is good times with people who know you and love you.

Apothos Usage Effectiveness: Error (Hostile dungeon detected. He’s keeping his cards close to his chest. Ha. Slipped a little poker metaphor in here because this is a room where poker is played. Ideally.)

Challenge Level Rating: Surprisingly C-Class. Web covered pit traps are only so-so.

Manifestation Type: Endogenous Manifestations and Natural Objects, purchased at various flea markets. A couple of things, like the Foosball table were ordered from Googazon.

<<<>>>

Gwen was quiet for a long time. When she talked, her voice was hoarse. “This must be what his basement at home looks like. He has all this stuff, but I don’t think he has any friends. What? Does he play foosball alone? It’s just kind of…kind of sad.”

Kronke patted her back. “Maybe pressures of being boss too much. Work isn’t a substitute for friendship. Cookies aren’t either.”

Helga then let out a scream that sounded very much like her Intimidating Roar mixed with her Battle Rage.

Was it the green shag carpet that finally made her snap or was it something else?