Gwen threw her rope around Helga’s arm and pulled her back. “Easy there, short stuff. We need every soldier, and that includes the depressed coffee machine.
Fullgeers’s steamer nozzle hissed. “You too would know despair too if you had seen what I’ve seen, if you’ve drank from the bitter darkness that no creamer can lessen. That no sweetener can sweeten. Even the almighty mocha trembles before the truth.”
Helga let out a strangled yell. “This is what vexes me. Listen to that madness. And if ye ask him what the truth he is, he’ll spout more nonsense. Death. Disease. Failure. Aye, ye blasted machine, I know all about such things. I’ve lost people, kin, but here we both are, in service to the Tree of Souls. Let that lessen yer despair.”
Fullgeers harrumphed in a splash of steam.
“Come with us upstairs, Helga,” Cal said. “We did a quick tour of the storage rooms. Once Dave figures out how to get more Apothos from the Node, we’ll strengthen our defenses.”
Helga shook her head. “Nay, lad. I’ll escort the blasted machine to the inner sanctum and see the dungeon for myself. Any traps? Any minions?”
Gwen coiled up her rope. “Not a one. The dungeon reverted back to being storage rooms. Mostly. Except for the rec room, which I think my father recreated in real life. There’s also a weird cave with wet carpet and a super strange, tiled room with a vent and a drain. I tried to open the vent, but it was sealed shut. No idea what that’s for. Maybe Perkle would know. Fullgeers, did you see Perkle? Were there more bat attacks?”
“I’ve seen nothing. Nothing has come for me. My watch has been as silent as the grave. As silent as the grave.”
Helga lost it. “We heard you the first time!”
Fullgeers’s motor spun up. “With the balls gone, I am free to roam. I know this place. I will find the inner sanctum myself. I will go as silently as the grave! As the grave!” The coffee machine then raced away on Perkle’s scooter.
Helga finally found a weary smile. “I’ll stay here, in the shadow, keeping watch. If something comes, I’ll run to the inner sanctum. We’ll have to fix the hole that leads to the chessboard room. Of course we will.”
“Are you going to be okay, Helga?” Cal asked.
“She’ll be fine,” Gwen answered. The last thing I want is for you to worry over me, boss man, and I’m sure Helga feels the same way.”
The halfling chuckled. “Ye be correct, Gwenivere. Ye two skedaddle. But if ye see any enemies, do nae engage. And do nae get yourself ensorcelled. We do nae need more of this friend-fighting-friend business.”
“Amen to that.” Gwen grabbed Cal and they both hurried down the hall and up the stairs, back up to the ground floor of the office building. The webs were gone, and Cal knew why. The webs, spiders, and even the huge caterpillar in the cubicle farm had all been endogenous manifestations of Weavelord’s Apothos. When Dave’s gem had dropped from the pedestal, all that Apothos had dissipated. Maybe Dave had re-absorbed some, but not much.”
The checked out the Divine Control Room, which was offline. Perkle wasn’t around to fix it, and so they couldn’t use it. The main filing room was like it had been before the Web Wizard’s dungeon. A few of its normal denizens dashed out from under the shelves. Dust bunnies scurried into the shadows. A few rabid staplers hopped around to find a hiding place.
Gwen had her goggles around her neck, but she kept one earpiece in, in case something near Shrimpie made noise or Karl wanted to contact her. Her control gauntlets were folded into her belt.
When they moved past the breakroom, Gwen nudged Cal. “We have to raid the refrigerator for Karl, so he can power up with his freezer grenades They are more effective than his cold bombs, though working in tandem with Daphne, we could start encasing people in ice coffins.”
“We’ll double back,” Cal said. “The food isn’t going anywhere.”
The rogue engineer made a face. “Without Karl to cool down the fridge, Ethel’s questionable chicken salad isn’t going to last.”
Cal and Gwen entered the cubicle farm to find it demolished. Some of it was from their battle with the giant spiders, but most of it was from the huge caterpillar that had come storming through.
The rogue engineer shoved aside a cube wall and picked up Kronke’s black breastplate with the three patches of gold. “Should we bring Kronke his armor?”
Cal shook his head. “No need for it. As the Reaper Knight, he’s basically invulnerable.” Gwen dropped the armor. Cal did find his Spirit Llama sweater vest and wiggled into it. He did a quick Triple E to check the stats:
<<<>>>
Triple E Scan Results – Exogenous Manifestation
Equipment Type: Armor
Equipment Name: Spirit Llama Wool Armor
Equipment History: Don’t dwell on the past. Embrace the future.
Equipment Description: It’s a sweater vest. Use with caution. Since it was made from Spirit Llama wool, simple levitation might be possible, or you might just feel like you’re walking on air because of how cool you look.
Quick Summary:
* Defenses Increased by 20%
* Electrical Attacks Cut by 25%
* Cold Attacks Cut by 50%
Apothos Type: Terra
<<<>>>
Cal did feel better wearing the very fashionable sweater vest. According to Paula Ru, it was the age of the sweater vest. He even left his robes open a little, so people could see it. Despite being armored, he was troubled. “Do we think Kronke can stay in control of Pinkerton?”
“One disaster at a time. Let’s just be glad we have him on our side for now.”
Cal was distracted by a few dust bunnies that hopped about the wreckage before finding a safe place to hide. A few rabid staplers raced out of an office, snapped at Cal and Gwen, and then bounced down the hall toward the main filing room.
The pair walked down the row of offices facing windows. They were for senior management. Dave’s office was down a hallway and through some other rooms.
Gwen walked over to where the smaller staircase should’ve been, but instead she found a blank wall. She squinted. “Hey, Cal. Someone stole our other staircase. Who would wanna steal a staircase?”
Cal went over and touched the wall. “It is gone. There’s only the main staircase now. I guess Dave must’ve changed things when he was connected to the Node.”
“Or it’s a mystery. The case of the missing staircase.”
The pair then came to the corner office’s closed door.
Cal felt fear grip him. They were facing a nameless enemy, and all signs had pointed them to this place. What would they find on the other side of the door? He hesitated.
Gwen shoved him. “Go ahead, boss man. Open it. It’s just an office. All the scary stuff is below us. I’m sure it’s perfectly safe.”
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Cal turned. “Then you open it. You’re the, uh, rogue. Maybe it’s a trap. Maybe there are monsters.”
Gwen rolled her eyes. “All of our coworkers are literal monsters. Our boss has eight legs and spits venom.”
“You know what I mean. This is different.” He grinned. “And I don’t see you opening the door.”
The rogue looked sheepish. “Why is it just us right now? Shouldn’t we have one of our fighters with us?”
Cal found a bit of courage. “If worse comes worst, we can vanish into the shadows and sneak back down to Dave’s inner sanctum. I still can’t believe he’s going to let us call him Dave.”
Gwen thrust open the door. “I’d rather fight monsters than talk about my father. Oh, look, a deserted corner office. So scary!”
Cal winced, expecting some vicious, rogue dungeon demon to come out, spells blasting. That wasn’t the case, thankfully. It was a dusty office, with boxes piled around, in front of wide windows showing absolute darkness. The Arcandor Initiative’s lockdown was still in place.
Gwen slid into the room, completely silent, thanks to her Boots of Silent Striding. She didn’t have her Roast Beast Fork in her hand, but she had a wicked looking serving spoon in her side holster ready for a quick draw.
Cal’s Mood Lighting spell would only bright the room a bit. He wanted full light, so he used the Ruby Staff. Everything was bathed in a red light. The desk had bits and pieces of things, an eraser, an abacus, one of the wired mouse things that went with an Electronic Abacus, and some random pieces of blank paper. The desk chair itself had big gashes in the upholstery.
Gwen walked to the window and put a hand on the glass. “Wow. So dark. No stars. Nothing. Liquid night. Blacker than the coffee Fullgeers gives me.”
Cal stood in the middle of the room, not sure where to start. He didn’t like how Gwen was staring out those pitch-black windows. “Yeah, not sure what kind of magic the Arcandor Initiative is using, but it’s powerful and maybe illegal. To wipe out entire Nodes? If that spell got into the wrong hands, it would mean the death of so many worlds.”
“No,” Gwen countered. “The dungeoneers wouldn’t want to use it, not if they couldn’t absorb the Apothos from the Tree of Souls. Maybe they could use it to blackmail worlds, or the Council of Dungeons, or the Department or whatever. But even then, most people wouldn’t want to get on Ji-Soo’s radar. She’s vicious. But kind of sweet. Strange combination.”
Cal went to a box and opened it. There were full of brown balls, with orange lettering spelling out the acronym for the Department of Universal Dungeon Efficiency. He lifted one. “DUDE balls. Why is there a box of DUDE balls?”
Gwen came over. “I have no idea. Hey, how about you use your Triple E spell on them. That should tell us something, right?”
Cal cast Exogenous Equipment Evaluation and broadcasted the results through his Triple I spell.
<<<>>>
Triple E Scan Results – Exogenous Manifestation
Equipment Type: Useless Corporate Tchotchkes
Equipment Name: Promotional Item for the Interschool Tournament of Collegial Dungeon Excellence to promote goodwill for the Department of Universal Dungeon Efficiency and to help recruit talent.
Equipment History: A hundred years ago, when Phil Phairy was managing the audit teams, he hired a consultant, Melinda Xanderinski, to help change dungeon guardian’s attitudes toward the Council of Dungeons and the Department. Back then, no one liked to be audited. Everyone hated the accounting teams, and few people appreciated a bureaucracy that demanded continual improvement. Melinda thought a little community outreach and some tchotchkes, on university campuses and at the interschool tournament, might go a long way in helping DUDE’s image. Give ‘em junk, shake some hands, and everyone would be thrilled to have some yahoos come in and tell hardworking dungeon guardians how much their dungeon’s sucked. Yay for bureaucracy! Melinda lasted an astonishing ten years. In these boxes are her life’s work.
Fun Fact: Melinda Xanderinski was a Lady in White dungeon guardian with a diploma from Nightfall University and a marketing degree from Saudrian’s School of Guardians. After leaving consulting, which was a good gig that paid well, she got a job with the Plaguebringer College of the Undead. This did not pay well, so she went rogue, and was destroyed by Cavendish Pickle, an agent of the Arcandor Initiative. Like Phil Phairy, Melinda Xanderinski was NOT a good example of dungeon guardian excellence.
Equipment Description: Box #1-3 has squeezable stress balls. They are soft foam balls, with Department colors (orange and brown). You squeeze them when you are stressed. Who does this? No one. No one has ever used these things. They wind up in landfills, poisoned by the guilt and disgust of the random people who took one home. Maybe some child, somewhere, turned the stress ball into a beloved toy because yes, when dealing with the multiverse, you are dealing with all possible worlds, but I’ll tell you right now, this is a rarity, a statistical anomaly not worth mentioning. This is why there are three boxes of stress balls a hundred years old in the creepy abandoned corner office.
Apothos Type: Mallus (Kinetic Force) and Morta (Death). There’s Mallus because you squeeze it, which can be measured in pounds per square inch, so it’s a type of super-boring kinetic energy. There’s Morta because playing with these stress balls will bore you to death.
<<<>>>
Gwen narrowed her eyes, reading aloud. “Hey, Phil Phairy was the same guy who nearly killed the breakroom cores. Probably shouldn’t be surprised about that. I’m not saying all consultants are bad, but, uh, all consultants might be bad. I’m sure there are good ones out there. It is the multiverse. But like the description said—statistical anomaly.” She paused. “Where do these descriptions come from again? And do you find them funny?”
Cal shrugged. “Mildly amusing. But I think all these boxes are tchotchkes from Melinda’s era.” They opened up boxes after boxes. They found sunglasses, orange with brown lettering, and they found beanies, brown with orange lettering, and staple removers, erasers, pens, pencils, and dark brown DUDE stationery, which made it basically useless. Most had Melinda’s marketing slogan, “Audits R Fun!” on them.
Cal snapped his fingers. “Wait. When I got that power boost in the breakroom, I heard this voice talking about marketing swag somewhere. Turns out, it was the corner office. Wow, I almost forgot.”
“Might’ve been better if you did. This is just junk.” The rogue opened a small box underneath, with strangely shaped objects, made from hard plastic. There was a sharp edge on one end. Not razor sharp, rather dull, and only about a quarter of an inch long. There was a string on the other end, so you could loop it around your wrist.
Cal’s spell was still up, so he scanned them.
<<<>>>
Triple E Scan Results – Exogenous Manifestation
Equipment Type: Useless Corporate Tchotchkes
Equipment Name: Unparalleled Parallelograms of Good Will!
Equipment Description: Take a parallelogram, paint it orange and brown (the official colors of accounting!), add a tiny blade and a string, so the Parallelogram can hang from your wrist. And then do what? What is this thing? It’s a useless corporate tchotchke, sure, but it doesn’t fit comfortable in your hand. It would make a terrible letter opener, and you can’t really use it as a weapon. What was Melinda thinking? Do you know how much time and money went into this ridiculous bit of swag? This is why people don’t trust government agencies. This! It’s embarrassing! I’m so sorry you have to see this.
Note: I’m not sure, but I think these parallelograms might be vitally important in solving the mystery you are facing. Because they have to have some use, right? Things like this can’t just exist without having some purpose. Or are they eldritch objects so useless that they threaten your sanity? No! Perish the thought! Help me! I feel my sanity slipping away.
Additional Note: It would be pretty cool if these were somehow non-Euclidian geometrical shapes, wouldn’t it? But no, they are Euclidian. Boring old Euclidian parallelograms. Whatever.
Apothos Type: I detect an uncertain mix of energies because these things are strange but powerful.
<<<>>>
Gwen poked him. “Hey, Cal, why is your brow furrowed. So much brow furrowing. Is it the description? Yeah, I find it super weird as well.”
“Not sure.” Cal exhaled noisily. “I’m surprised that the Apothos Type isn’t more specific and still strangely accurate. They are strange and powerful. Most of these tchotchkes are Mallus and Morta, but not these. It must be a clue. Why would I have heard that voice ask about marketing swag? Why else would the descriptions point us to the corner office?
“But can we even trust the descriptions?” Gwen asked. “They might be purposefully misleading.”
Cal had considered that possibility. He’d come to rely on the entity providing the information. “No. I have faith in the magic. I really do.”
Gwen left the boxes and walked around the office, glancing around, until she stopped. She took out her Wand of Secret Door and Trap Detection. “No traps. No secret doors. But wait a minute.”
She walked to a bookcase, which had a smattering of papers and old ledgers on it. The ledgers were blank, unused, relics of a distant age, back when Phil Phairy was in charge. She lifted an empty shelf, there was a clicking sound, and the bookcase swung open to reveal a tiny a tiny, tight circular metal staircase, leading down into the darkness.
Gwen lifted her wand to her face. “What the hey, Spike? Why’d you let me down? You usually detect this stuff. Only, this time, no detection. Come on, guy, you have one job!”
“Two jobs,” Cal whispered. “Traps and secret doors.”
Gwen gave him a bored, unamused stare.
“Sorry, Gwen. But it looks like we found our missing staircase. Someone must’ve moved it.”
Gwen shook her head. “I don’t think so. Look at all the dust. This hasn’t been used in a very long time.”
The elven accountant cast his Triple A spell and saw that the Parallelograms glowed with every type of Apothos, radiating power, and disrupting the flow of normal life energy around the room. “The parallelograms blocked Spike’s magic. They aren’t just your normal swag, I don’t think. Let’s take them down with us. That staircase has to lead into the basement, right?”
Gwen blinked. “I don’t know. But your Mr. Description wasn’t wrong when he said we’d find this corner office interesting. Let’s see where the stairs lead. But, uh, Cal. We don’t have a fighter with us. You go first.”
Cal didn’t like that idea at all. Neither did his staff. The glowing red ruby at the top slowly faded away until both he and Gwen were left in total darkness.