Empirical Gnollage: Installment 61 [https://squirrel.dogphilosophy.net/Installment061.png]
Al took out a fresh torch, then he and Bote shouldered their packs again and made ready to move on. "Almost done," Al reassured Haunch. He got no more reaction from the donkey than usual but Al felt it ought to be done anyway.
There was a faint sound like metal hitting stone from somewhere in the direction of their destination.
Gruntle looked up towards the grating, then stood and loped quietly over to it, listening. The others followed. Al heard another distant CLANK of metal.
"What do you think that is?"
"Metal falling. Chewing," Gruntle answered.
"A lot of chewing?"
"Nah."
"Big chewing?"
Gruntle listened for a few moments longer. A distant clattering like several small metallic objects hitting a solid floor rang out.
"Nah," he finally said.
Reassured that there probably wasn't a horde of ravenous monsters or some large devourer waiting for them, he motioned for Wikwocket to give the grating a check. It didn't take long, there was just a simple metal latch and hinges for mechanisms, and no sign of anything further to deter visitors. Wikwocket lifted the latch, and the grating swung inward smoothly. Wikwocket and Gruntle shared a glance at each other, and Wikwocket set off quietly down the hallway. Gruntle followed.
Just as it had on the other side, the hallway led to steps that turned left and headed further downwards. Wikwocket and Gruntle stopped to watch further down the hallway, then Wikwocket gestured for them to approach. She held her fingers to her lips to suggest they approach quietly. Al and Bote tried to be quiet. From the corner, they could see that this hallway mirrored the one on the other side. In the space where the other hallway had a rusting steel door, there was just an open doorway and a dusting of rust on the floor. At least this one wasn't flooded, nor did there seem to be blood-sucking plants dangling from the ceiling, though there was a pile of some sort of mud or sludge up against the far wall where Al assumed they should find the entryway to the dead hero they had come for. From here, Al could also catch the slight scent that Gruntle had earlier described as sour. It was like vinegar and freshly-cut onions.
Al could finally hear the chewing sound that Gruntle mentioned. It sounded a bit like something gnawing on sand or gravel - quick hard crunching sounds, coming from the open doorway. Some more clanging echoed into the hallway, and Wikwocket and Gruntle went sneaking along the wall to investigate. Wikwocket carefully looked in from beside the door. She stared as Gruntle leaned over her and did the same. There was another sound like several small metal objects being rubbed together, and then more chewing. Wikwocket gave Al a puzzled look and motioned him over, so Al made his way over cautiously and leaned in, holding the torch up for visibility.
Unlike the one on the other side, this one wasn't sunken down, and wasn't flooded, but it was in the same place along the hallway and about the same size. This room appeared to have been an armory or repository for heirlooms, but there was little left besides the wooden racks and cabinets. In front of one opened cabinet was a pile of metal spoons, corroding away at the touch of what Al was not at all happy to see was another very large bug.
At least this one was not quite so large, being only about the size of a large dog, and was obviously not the same species as the ones that had invaded Aemilia's tomb. It seemed entirely unbothered by the flickering torchlight as its fuzzy antennae caressed the metal cutlery and destroyed it. Once the pile had corroded to coarse powder, the creature lowered its head and began to chew on it.
"It eats metal?" Al wondered quietly. The floor of the room was covered with rust-colored dust. Wooden spear-hafts were scattered around, and leather straps lay on the floor around a set of armor racks. Whatever the creature was, it remained more interested in its meal of corroded spoons than the organic spectators watching it from the hall, though it moved a little to face the party as it ate.
"It doesn't look like it eats non-metallic things. I vote that we leave it alone and get on with the job," Al suggested. He motioned to Bote that they were moving on, and the dwarf jogged to catch up as the others cautiously made their way further down the hall. The smell of vinegar and onions was growing stronger.
"Where are those fumes coming from? Is there something fermenting in that pile of mud down there at the end of the hall?" he wondered.
"I don't know," Wikwocket answered, "but whatever it is smells like it might taste pretty good with some fish and potatoes!"
"I do not see signs of cracks or leaking in the stonework, so I wonder where it...," Bote began, but was interrupted by a quiet scuttling sound. They all turned to face the sound and discovered the bug following Bote. The creature didn't seem hostile, instead stopping an arm's length away. The fuzzy antennae reached slowly out and caressed Bote's chest.
It took a moment to realize that the breastplate was rusting and flaking apart under the touch. Bote's arms flailed to ward the creature away.
"I do not wear this as fodder!" they shouted as they backed away. Gruntle took up his flail and swung at the bug, who dodged away and scuttled quickly back to the room it had come from, and the flail smacked the stone floor hard enough that Al could feel the vibration through the soles of his boots. The yellowish mud piled in the far corner of the hall must have been shaken by it, too, since it slumped down from where it was piled up and began flowing up the hallway towards them at a casual walking pace. The vinegar-and-onion smell increased further.
If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.
"What is that stuff?" Al wondered aloud as he nervously watched it flow. If it didn't stop, he didn't want to stand there and wait for it to get on his boots. This strange new phenomenon distracted Gruntle from chasing the metal-devouring bug, and he stalked up closer to the approaching sludge.
He leaned in to sniff at it.
"Smells sour," he said, muzzle wrinkled in discomfort.
That was when the mud punched him in the face.
A fat jet of the sludge pulled itself together and shot quickly out, catching Gruntle by surprise and hitting the side of his face with surprising force. He was rocked back with the strength of the blow, then yelped as the skin where he was struck began to sting. The crude limb that had struck him was quickly pulled back and re-absorbed into the slowly but inevitably approaching gelatinous mass.
"Gruntle, get away from it!" Al shouted, noticing how the fur on the side of his face was dissolving. He was relieved that Gruntle actually took his advice. The gnoll made one angry swing at the mass with his flail, which splattered onto it. It seemed to have a surface that was a sort of skin or pellicle, and a more fluid substance from inside it leaked where the flail's strike had disrupted the integrity of the stuff's skin, and the sludge actually seemed to flow away from where it had been struck. Then, the gnoll backed quickly away, blocking another shooting wad of the stuff with his shield. The group began to back away from the oncoming flow of sludge together, and Al was horrified to discover that the flow changed to be heading towards exactly wherever they happened to move. Fortunately it didn't seem to be very fast, but they wouldn't be able to run away from it indefinitely. With one last push of mental effort, Al managed one last burst of magical violence. The slivers of magical force punctured the skin of the mass and caused more of the thin liquid inside to leak in spurts, before the skin reformed itself.
"That's it," Al announced, still backing up and shaking his head to try to clear it, "that's about all the harder magic I can manage for a while."
Wikwocket had carefully watched. "Don't worry, I'll save us this time!" she promised, and gave the deadly puddle a dramatic salute with BiteySue as if beginning a duel. Then, she sprinted towards it, stabbed, and swiftly leapt back before the pseudo-limb of sludge could reach her as it shot out. More of the interior fluid leaked through the pierced skin of the stuff. It was getting visibly shallower by this point.
The malevolent mud was obviously potentially deadly, but fortunately remained slow-moving and showed no sign of any kind of intellect or cunning beyond its uncanny sense of where they were as it flowed towards them. By retreating carefully and letting Wikwocket put on a dramatic show of martial acrobatics, the dangerous substance diminished through its repeatedly-punctured surface until the integrity of the pellicle failed and the remainder of the inside fluid spread across the floor and stopped chasing them. They'd had to retreat nearly all the way back to the grating to where Haunch was still waiting for them by that point, and it had oozed up the steps after them.
The vinegar-and-onion fumes had become uncomfortable by this point, but seemed not to be doing explicit harm. Al asked Gruntle to drag one of the slain goblins over and shove it into the remaining fluid on the floor to make sure nothing dramatic would happen. When it seemed the interior fluid of the sludge wasn't going to dramatically dissolve the goblin, they carefully stepped through what little still remained and returned up the hallway.
Wikwocket checked carefully as they went, but found no further dangers before they reached the end of the hall. The wall here had no discernible pigment or carving remaining, and appeared to have been severely weathered away - perhaps the acidic sludge had dissolved away the surface of the wall, Al speculated. Luckily, the same damage to the wall had eaten away at the seam where a door had been hidden there, making its location obvious. Wikwocket found the subtle mechanism that unlatched it, and the door swung inwards. To Al's dismay and Wikwocket's hesitant excitement, the angry dead came forth through the opened door to confront them.