CH35 – Fur and Scale Dungeon #2
The rest didn’t last long, after a quick snack of trail rations Carmilla perked up pretty quickly. I was impressed, her frail appearance must have been hiding a pretty solid Constitution for her to have that sort of endurance. But wouldn’t a higher Constitution score make her physique more impressive? I wasn’t sure, wasn’t going to ask, and probably wouldn’t understand the answer if I got one. Honestly, I didn’t really care, it was just a random curiosity.
The room I was in had a hallway to the right and left. Ryan picked the left hallway and we proceeded with the dungeon crawl. The glowing moss continued along the hallway, and I took a moment to Inspect it.
Name: Flora
Species: Schistostega Pennata
FLAGS: LUMINESCENT
Ehh. These damn generic names and scientific species designations. I’d call it glow moss. I collected some patches of it, which made my Herbalist skill quite happy.
[Congratulations! Flower Power has increased to Level 3!]
As I pocketed some of the moss, I imagined a tiny stone keep built at my homebase camp and the moss outlining it with its pleasant glow. I was getting mentally exhausted dealing with party politics and was daydreaming more and more about my camp left in the middle of the woods. I may have already retreated to its solitude if it wasn’t for the week of travel it took to arrive.
The rest of the party followed the tunnel to the right, which resolved into another room, bedroom sized I’d have to say. The room held two clear sections. A pile of wood and fabrics that looked to have been salvaged from the broken furniture strewn about the dungeon. Pondering on the wood planks and upholstery that made the pile I came to the thought that this dungeon reminded me of a posh library.
Why was there a random subterranean stone complex consisting of, from what I had seen so far, only bookshelves, desks, and fancy chairs? I was going to have to chalk this up to an oddity in some sort of procedural generation system. Found in some games the system was used to create things from random components. Used properly it was an awesome tool. Used improperly the unthinking equations of the system would generate unsightly abominations or distressingly bland content.
If that was what was used with these dungeons, the system needed some more developments. Otherwise, if this was a creation by Loki himself, he definitely had a weak point in his game. Another weak point, I supposed.
The other potion of the room was a series of low shelves made from the salvaged materials. They held a sparce collection of uninteresting goods. I ran a quick inspect across them, finding moldy cheeses, beets, and turnips. None of them had any unexpected flags.
Not seeing anything worthwhile I decided to hand back and stand guard at the door. The party converged on the pile of materials and shelves, tearing into them like starving children scenting fresh baked cookies.
Pest slid through the legs of the others snatching up everything his greedy little hands could get ahold of. I nearly laughed aloud as he stole a small round of cheese right from Dark’s hands. Dark swiped at him, but Pest deftly dodged him and dashed over to me to present the stolen goods.
Dark glowered at me and I absently flipped him off before kneeling down to Pest. The cheese was white and round, Pest bit into it and it crumbled along the edges messily. He made a face like a dog eating a lemon and opened his mouth, crumbles falling from his mouth.
“No good?” I asked him as he kept working his mouth to get rid of the cheese.
“No.” He confirmed and offered the cheese to me. It didn’t look too bad.
“That’s too bad.” I said and took it.
I sniffed it. The scent was subtle, not something pungent or unpleasant.
“The art of negotiation was very good.” He told me with a sly grin on his face and a glance towards Dark. I gave him a wink and took a bite of the cheese, crumbly and a bit dry but not unpleasant. I looked at the crumbs on the ground and frowned. In the world before, this mess would have driven me to near insanity. Another thing to clean, another task to complete on my never-ending chore list. I stared at the little pile of crumbs lost in swirling thoughts as I slowly chewed.
“Nothing.” Ryan growled suddenly and tossed a piece of wood he was holding. It crashed into a set of small shelves, breaking a set of them apart with a crash.
“Let’s move,” he said.
Was that his catchphrase? Should we make shirts with a wolf on it and that phrase emblazoned across the chest?
We turned around and went back the way we come, trying the other branch from the ratkin room. Halloway, whom was in his position as lead peeked around a corner in the hall to the left. He let out a exasperated sigh and stepped into the hallway without bothering to hunker behind his shield anymore.
“What?” Ryan asked.
“Small chest, on a raised platform on the far side of the room. Nothing else that I can see.” He answered.
Mave echoed his sigh and stepped up to shine her light into the room. Dark decided to pop a squat so he could keep an eye on the room, but otherwise started lounging. Ryan loomed with his arms crossed.
“Context for the newbies?” I asked after a moment of silence, sharing a look with Carmilla who was twisting a lock of her hair.
“Traps.” Halloway said sadly and stepped towards the room. I peeked around the corner and found an archway of stone that was missing a door. His simple explanation of the room seemed to summarize it fairly well.
This room, more master bedroom sized, had more of the tightly fitted stonework but with the addition of a stage-like section of raised floor with a small wooden chest dead center atop it. The dais had a few steps that covered its entire length providing easy access. No destroyed furniture or trash littered this room making it an exception from the dungeon’s normal aesthetic. The glow moss covered the room in an irregular pattern which may have been enough light to see by in the dark, akin to a full moon on a cloudless night.
But we have magical Mave and her magic light ball of wonders. She scanned its spotlight form around the room revealing no other interesting details. It did look to be the cliché and stereotypical trap room of a dungeon. The only thing it lacked was the charred or maimed corpses of previous failed adventurers.
With another sigh Halloway removed his sword belt and set it against the wall with his shield. He looked quite put out by the whole thing. Ryan pulled a potion out of his bandoleer and held it to the side and Mave wordlessly took it from him.
I remembered Halloway complaining about traps before, apparently, the group had a practiced routine for these situations.
“Hold up,” I said. “Why all the sighs and preparing for doom?”
“I go in, try to find the traps as I go. I have a trap-finding skill.” He explained and took a step forward. I noticed then how everyone had been keeping back a few steps from the threshold of the room. I just didn’t want to get in the way, but it was more meaningful than I had thought.
“Might not be worth it?” I asked.
“Treasure chest.” Ryan said in way of complete and immutable explanation, his arms were crossed again and he leaned against the wall, not even bothering to watch.
“Hal, no offence, but your luck isn’t really built for this. Trap detection by stepping on them isn’t very conducive to life.” I told him as I slipped up beside him and put a hand on his shoulder.
“Well then. After you.” He snapped flippantly with a gesture at the room.
“No worries, buddy. I got this.” I said with a grin and patted him on the shoulder, he looked a little surprised. I looked over my shoulder. “Unless the boss has a complaint about me giving it a try?”
“Not at all.” Ryan said with a snort and smirk. “Sounds like a good idea to me.”
“Yea, I didn’t think you would mind.” I smirked right back at him. I unslung Gloria the Glorious Cast-Iron Pan of Slaying + 3, as I called it, and propped her against the wall. She was a fine lady who didn’t need to do such skullduggery as clearing traps.
“Pest!” I called. “Megazord!”
Pest dashed through the parties legs and scaled me like a tree. His new hands and body strength gave him the bonus ability of climbing up me like a squirrel chasing a nut. He sat on my shoulder and scanned around us with a determined stare.
“Clear!” he announced.
“Okay buddy, time to kick it up a gear, yea?” I hinted at him.
“Yes!” He agreed and began to share his senses with me.
[Your bonded creature is sharing his senses with you. Your senses are heightened to the level of that creature’s abilities.]
With a deep inhale I prepared to jump into the room full of flying arrows, acid baths, scythe blades, spike pits or whatever other murderous thing was in the room. I took a second inhale just to get a hit of Pest’s sweet-sweet musk.
I started by scanning the door frame, first with my eyes and then with gentle presses and pulls at the stones around it. I half-expected for Ryan to shout at me to hurry up with it, but the group was instead retreated back and watching me chatting lowly with each other.
Catching their words with my enhanced hearing, I may have caught a few wagers being placed on my survival.
The doorframe was pretty unexceptional until I looked at the floorplate. Pushing lightly resulted in a little bit of give. With a frown I stood up and leaned into the room looking upward. Yep, that looked mean. I took a step away from the doorway and looked over the party.
“I need a stick or something. Longer the better.” I asked them.
They shared a look with each other. Mave and Carmilla resolutely shaking their heads as eyes passed over their staff and broom respectively. Halloway shrugged and Ryan didn’t even twitch towards his sword. All eyes turned to Dark.
“What about a stick from back there?” He asked weakly gesturing down the hall.
“None of that stuff was long or strong enough.” I explained with a growing grin. “Besides, it’s not like you make use of that thing.”
“Knock it off,” Ryan chastised me and jerked his head towards me as Dark looked at him with pleading eyes. “Give it to him, we don’t want to take anymore time than he already is at this.”
There it was, not a shout, but defiantly some passive aggressive bullshit. Dark, with an extreme pout, handed his spear to me.
“If you break it, I break you.” He said bravely.
“Got it, just like your mom last night.” I replied.
“Hey!” Ryan shouted and I winced a little bit. My enhanced hearing turning the decibels of the shout a little higher than I was comfortable with. He mistook my wince as chagrin but I just kept grinning at them. The fuckers. I should just push them into the room and see what happens.
I pressed myself against the wall, one hand holding Pest steady and the other hand holding the spear. I rammed the butt of the spear into the floorplate of the doorframe. A metallic snap slightly foretold the appearance of a wooden spike snapping down from above the door to stab into the entrance of the room.
“Dios,” Mave exclaimed at the sudden noise and appearance of the trap.
“That gets the blood pumping, don’t it?” I said looking at the group with a wide grin and a little cackle.
“Weird fucker.” Dark muttered under his breath.
I ignored him as a notification slid into my vision and opened its corresponding skill information.
[Congratulations. You have unlocked the Trap Finding/Don’t Step On That! skill!]
[Trap Finding/Don’t Step On That!]
Unlock Conditions – The world of dungeon exploration is a dangerous one. Traps abound and you have triggered a trap, by choice or accident.
[lvl 1] – Previously encountered trap types are slightly easier to notice. WHAT SOUND DO YOU NEVER WANT TO HEAR IN A DUNGEON? CLICK!
The new skill, while always welcome, didn’t really cause any revolutionary changes to my talents of trap detection. No handy glowing patches came to my vision to indicate where a trap may be located.
A quick look at the trap revealed nothing fancy, a sharpened wooden stake attached to a board that hung from the ceiling with a mousetrap like contraption. I didn’t spend too long investigating it.
I tamped the staff on to the floor in front of the doorway with no results. Time to put on my big boy panties. With a tender step, like that of a newborns parent escaping the sleeping infant, I stepped into the room.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
The floor didn’t fall out from underneath me, and no circular saws sliced out from the walls, so I felt that was a win. Looking around—Mave’s spotlight giving me plenty of light to see by—my new vantage point didn’t provide me with any further insights. Could it have been only the one trap?
I glanced back at the lounging party. If trap rooms were only one trap, I doubted the more experienced members wouldn’t be sitting around like they were ready to play a game of cards.
I continued forward while tamping each of the tight fitted irregularly shaped stones with the staff. Only a few feet into the room one of the stones shifted slightly with a click and the ceiling hissed as a mist of fluid floated down. I recoiled quickly covering my face, expecting the worst. What was that? Did I just get Ebola or some shit? I knew I should have found a N95!
No notification popped up to confirm my infection. The air filled with an acrid scent but other than the moistening of the stone below the spraying, nothing else seemed to occur. Pest shifted, resettling himself after my quick jump back. The sting in my scalp let me know just how hard he had to hold on.
“Hey! My spear!” Dark shouted and scrambled up to the doorway. I had startled at his shout and jerked my head to look at him. Spear? What? I was focused on the plague cloud, what the hell is he talking about? I looked at the spear, it looked fine?
“What?” I asked him in confusion.
“The haft!” He shouted with a wild stab at the air with a pointing finger. I glanced to where he was pointing. A waft of smoke lazily trailed up from a darkened portion of the wooden shaft. I tamped it onto the ground in an attempt to put out the unseen fire. The end shattered in a puff of dust and splinters. My attempt to smother the fire was a success but the spear was around four inches shorter and terminated in a frayed and jagged end. I looked at him, my eyes wide.
“It’s fine, it was only a few inches,” I said.
“That’s what Dark’s mom said!” Halloway called from behind him, and I guffawed.
“Hey!” Dark shouted at both of us.
“It’s fine!” I said and ignored his continued complaints. Looking at the wounded spear and to where the noxious cloud of death had come from I decided that my little buddy needed to not ride shotgun for this adventure. I pulled him from my shoulder and set him down carefully, making sure he didn’t touch the floor on my side of the room. He lazily wandered over to Mave, who was sitting on the floor as well. She had her knees pulled up to her chest, her chin resting on arms crossed over the top of them. She absently held the light like a resigned wife regulated to flashlight duty during a nighttime flat tire change.
With a smile I went back to the matter at hand and looked at the glistening stones in front of me, a good swath of them now glistening wet. I tried to inspect the fluid but couldn’t seem to focus on the liquid instead of the stones. Some sort of acid obviously, and I wasn’t inclined to test my boots walking through it. Moreover, the spotlight kept reflecting off tiny floating motes in the air and I wouldn’t chance stepping over the wet stones incase some of the mist lingered.
Squinting around the room I couldn’t make out any fine details. The spotlight casting long shadows across the ceiling and floor mixed with the moss growth hid any sign of spray nozzles or muzzle holes. The doorway I had entered from was centered, thus putting me a step within the room and some freedom of choice on a path. I decided to go with my favorite method and chose left. Using the slightly damaged spear I tapped at the floor and inched forward, small slivers of wood breaking off with each stone I tested. I could hear Dark grunt and grumble each time, he danced in the doorway like he had to pee.
“You are blockin’ my light.” I said and patiently waited for him to move away before continuing.
I was straining my enhanced sense of hearing to listen for any reaction from my probing. I could see myself on my stomach, inching forward with a trowel and prodding stick to do this if it wasn’t for my desire to flee at a moment’s notice.
Even expecting it, the metallic click startled me, and I jumped back. Another forceful spritz of mist descended from the ceiling to saturate the stones in front of me. The spear lost another few inches to the fast-acting acid. The stones were unmarred, seemingly impervious to acid. The special flag I had seen at the beginning of the dungeon on the walls really was proving its worth.
That path cut off from me, I turned around to go to the right from the door. I wasn’t sure if I was feeling successful in my trap triggering skills or herded to my inevitable doom.
I tapped along like a blind guy with a cane searching for a dropped contact lens. Progress was slow but I made it to the wall and turned to go deeper into the room. Somewhere along the way I lost Pest’s boost to my senses. He must have gotten tired or fallen asleep cuddled up to Mave. Lucky fucker.
“Having fun yet?” Halloway asked me, I glanced over, and he was leaning against the door frame, one hand resting on the spike trap.
“Don’t know, not sure if acid burns or implements are my thing.” I said over my shoulder.
“You’ll never know until you try.”
“Nah, I’m good.” I said and continued my slow and steady race across the room.
I made it halfway to the chest before another trap sprung. The stone I was testing pushed in like a large button. In a thunderous crash and a burst of dust a large piece of stone fell from the ceiling. I would attest in a court of law that it was so close it scrapped my nose on the way to the floor. Only the length of the tool I was using to test the stones kept me out from under it. I hadn’t received a negative status affects but my ears rang from the crash and my eyes stung as dust billowed out.
A high-pitched screaming resolved as my ears cleared, peering through the dusty air I saw two booted feet kicking in the air at the room’s entrance. I quickly followed the safe path I had made and looked into the hallway. Halloway was on his back writhing and clutching at his face. Blood streamed down the sides of his head and oozed out from his fingers. His yells of pain quickly taking on a wet gurgling quality.
I pushed at the spike trap as I tried to get a better look and it broke away in a shower of splinters and dust. My assumption that the acid was airborne must have been accurate and the stone trap’s dramatic entrance must have pushed it right into the doorway. It caught Halloway in the face, but the trap must have shielded him some, or his throat would have been burning too.
I was digging in my pocket for a snake oil tonic but stopped as, in her impressive manor of professional medical care, Mave was next to him before I had been able to reach the doorway. She had the healing potion opened in one hand and was trying to pull a hand from his face so she could administer it. Elongated shadows cast from her discarded light ball flailed about the room in a surreal manner. The light pulsed irregularly as the glass ball fought the distance limits of the magic Word.
It was a rave, and the only one raving was Halloway. Was my memory off, or had this been the second time in this dungeon that Halloway has his face melted off?
Ryan took up position on his other side and grabbed hold of his wrists. Knowing what was coming I quickly turned around, I really didn’t want to see it, but couldn’t avoid hearing it. A wet squelch oozed through the hallway as a sob escaped from Halloway.
“Ish it bad? Ish it bad?” Halloway wetly coughed out between sobs.
“I got you. I’m taking care of you. I want you to keep breathing and count your breaths for me.” Mave told him, her accent leaking out under the stress, but otherwise in a calm and controlled tone.
I turned to look at him, her calm words making me think the wound was superficial. I had seen lots of blood, but head wounds do that. I shouldn’t have trusted her demeanor. It was horrible. Half his face was burnt off, the skin that wasn’t sloughed and dripped away from him like a dropped cherry pie. Part of his nose was missing, revealing the sinuses. The eyelid completely gone and part of the eye beneath missing, the thick fluid it held oozing out.
I turned away again and stepped back into the trap room. I did my damndest to hold back my gorge, but let’s just say that the cheese Pest had found was no longer with me.
He would be fine. Right? Sure, he has done the find-traps-with-body thing a dozen times! Right?! His bread and butter chosen profession! A Chosen’s profession, even! So normal that Ryan and Mave were prepared and ready to fix him up at a moment’s notice. Totally standard stuff. As I made my way along my small trail through the traps, his sobs and cries quieted enough that I could hear a Word being evoked. Healing potion and pain-killer magic, he’d be square in no time.
I came back to my new friend, Mr. Crush-The-Fuck-Out-Of-You. He was a silent and stalwart gentleman, unmoving in his rock-solid convictions. He was an inspiration to me to remain calm and stable in these trying times. An unrelenting cliff face that could never be defeated by an ocean of turmoil.
I relied on him. He was my rock. I gave him a fond pat. He wasn’t a raw rock, but a piece of the meticulously fitted stone that was prevalent within this dungeon. A polygon of irregular proportions. It was the size of a six-person dining table and came up to my shoulder, which was quite a bit larger than the other stonework. A huge round eyelet was drilled into the center of its top. Looking up into the space it came from only revealed more stone and a thick metal hook that must have been holding it up until the trap was spung.
The string of inane thoughts and investigation of Mr. Crush-The-Fuck-Out-Of-You successfully distracted me enough to tamp down my emotions and still my thoughts at Halloway’s distress. I was able to go back to my job of clearing a path to the chest. It better be one hell of a prize.
I was mildly distressed as I discovered the spear was partially underneath the stone. If it was pinned under the it there was no way I could remove it. I prodded it with my foot and hope swelled as it easily pushed to the side. I snatched it up and found I held half of a spear. A quarterstaff really. If quarterstaffs were three feet of wood with a pokey metal tip on one end. I wasn’t exactly sure what a quarterstaff was. The other half of the spear was well and truly crushed under the rock. I tried to surreptitiously hide the shortened spear from view of the hallway. Didn’t want to make Dark start crying in front of his new girlfriend after all.
That gave me a twinge of sadness for Mave and irritation over Dark. Fuck him and his spear too. Glancing back to the doorway I saw Halloway sitting up and breathing steadily, face re-intact. His beard and eyebrows didn’t seem to count under the aegis of the healing potion. An eyebrow was completely gone and his beard a little spotty with a missing mustache and he now resembled a very curious Asian Amish man. Yea, he was super fine. They had even found something to clean the blood off his face.
“You good?” I called with a stifled laugh. He responded with a weak thumbs up in that weird style where you use your middle finger instead of a thumb.
I turned back to the traps, the path forward blocked with an estimated thirteen zillion pounds of stone. The safe path seemed to now lead towards the other wall. I took a hesitant step to the center of the room.
Well, I tried to, but my foot caught on something, and I fell forward. My half-spear slammed down in front of me, and the ceiling hissed like a snake. With a surge of panic, I scampered to my feet, losing a boot in the process. A quick look revealed a row of short spikes had stabbed up from a seam between the stones. I quickly hopped over it to the safe side and leaned against Mr. Crush-The-Fuck-Out-Of-You.
My boot was wedged in between two of the spikes like they were made to fit around it. That had been close. Looking at the acid sprayed stone just past it I realized id had been very close.
Seemed like I really was lucky bastard.
I leaned over and tugged on my boot. It was pretty solidly wedged, so solidly in fact, that I grabbed it with two hands and pulled to little success. I kneeled down next to it and grabbed it by toe and heel. With a great effort it came loose, and I tumbled backward. Mr. Crush-The-Fuck-Out-Of-You was there to catch me with his rock-hard hands.
[You have taken Blunt Damage.]
With a flash of brilliant light and sparkling stars in my vision—which I am pretty sure were unrelated to the night sky—I decided to have a little lie down.
“You good?” Halloway called out from the doorframe, and I responded with my own shaky middle fingered thumbs up.
“Traps suck.” I said.
“Yea.” He said back.
“Any day you want to finish.” Ryan grumbled loudly from deeper down the hallway.
“Feel free to hop in.” I called back. No response followed.
As I was blinking the stars away, I stared at the ceiling. In the absence of Mave’s spotlight, the moss’s glow took on a more substantial light. The nebula-like swirls along the ceiling beautiful in their meandering. Not enough uniformity to create a pattern but flowing pathways and voids that were pleasing to the eye.
“Oh, fuck off.” I muttered to myself as I studied the moss. “Yep. Fuck you.”
“What?” Halloway asked as I muttered.
“God damn moss is talking to me here.” I grumbled in a decent imitation of Ryan and got to my feet. “Watch this shit.”
I struggled for a moment to put my boot back on and when successful, Halloway gave me a slow clap.
“Nice,” he said.
“No, not that! This!” I told him with a glare.
While staring at the ceiling I took a step into the center of the room. I didn’t die. With some confident strides and a few skips and hops I wound my way across the room two more times. I completed my little journey at the top of the dais after having jumped the steps that lead up to the chest. I was standing to its right side and kept my hands and feet in the vehicle at all times as there wasn’t much safe space for me there.
“Viola.” I said and took a bow.
Halloway was looking at the ceiling and missed my bow, I realized with a frown. Why put on a show if nobody is going to watch? I clapped my hands softly, nodding and smiling at an imaginary audience. For myself of course.
“Oh.” He said.
“What is going on?” Mave asked as she peeked into the room.
“Look to the heavens for your answers, and Loki will provide.” I brought my hands that were waiving at the audience together and spoke the words haughtily.
Mave, with sour expression at the mention of Loki, stared at me with the look.
“Praise be he,” I told her. A notification flashed and I swear a glow came from the heavens to highlight it, but the others didn’t even twitch, so it was either just for me or imagined.
[Loki has given you a blessing.]
Well, that was neat. Hadn’t I gotten a blessing once before? Never did figure out what it did. On a whim I decided to Inspect myself.
Name: Viktor
Race: Human
Type: Chosen
Allegiance: Loki (Alpha Tester)
FLAGS: HAS_BOUND (Pest), ALPHA_TESTER_0, DEVELOPER_INSPECT_2, DEVELOPER, GUILD_MEMBER(Red Wolves), BLESSED(ACID_RESISTANCE)
Health: Healthy
Energy: Full
I let out a little laugh after closing the Inspect screen.
Mave gave me the ‘what’ look with a cutely scrunched nose.
“Got a blessing from Loki.” I said with a smirk and she rolled her eyes.
“That’s nice I guess, for a pagan.” She said grumpily.
“You guys will never guess what it was for,” I said with a chuckle. “Acid resistance! Ha!”
“Little late,” Halloway said with such venom I expected him to spit on the floor or something next.
“Loki guided my feet and has given me his blessings for following his wisdoms!” I prophesied to the ceiling.
“There is a fucking map on the ceiling.” Halloway said, spoiling my fun.
A sudden blinding light was shining into my eyes and I threw my hands in front of my eyes.
“Hey!” I drew out. “Stop it!”
The light flicked out as Mave switched her light ball back to a soft glow. I didn’t even know the spotlight could be focused that much. I chuckled again as she gave me the look one more time before walking back into the hallway.
“Get on with it.” Our fearless leader yelled from the hallway.
“Yea, yea.” I responded with a flippant wave of my hand.
The chest atop the dais wasn’t large, a couple feet deep and a few feet wide. It was made from felt or soft leather material with thicker bands reenforcing its edges. Two straps wrapped around it with simple buckles holding them in place to keep the chest closed. It made me think of a classic style steamer trunk luggage. Always wanted one of those. The chest didn’t quite fit the bill, a little basic and unadorned like the vintage style trunks, but was close enough for my personal tastes. I glanced at my ceiling map, and thick moss was absent from the area above the chest. That was the sign I had noticed that indicated safe travel.
It should have been obvious in retrospect, but the ceiling map was very fuzzy on the edges and encapsulated the prospective puddle size for the acid too, not just the stone trigger. Very little of the ceiling had clear patches, and with the spike traps and who knows what other things I didn’t trigger, the patches were very disconnected.
I gave the chest an inspection just in case, not sure what I was looking for. I didn’t see any obvious temple of doom pressure plates or trigger wires. The simple pin buckles holding it weren’t large enough in my estimation to be hiding any sort of trigger mechanism. Good thing it didn’t have a lock, I wouldn’t know how to open it without a key anyhow. I never did take up a lockpicking hobby, no matter how many online videos I watched. A hammer always seemed the easier solution to me anyway. But I could probably discover the skill by just sticking a twig in the lock and fiddling around for a bit.
Gently as one could with a thick and aged into place leather strap, I unfastened the two buckled. I slowly lifted the lid, afraid of a trap that might be within. I peeked into the cracked lid. It was too dark now.
“Hey!” I shouted over my shoulder. “I need a flashlight.”
With a sigh audible from a room away and some stomping feet to proceed it, Mave’s spotlight was shining at my backside. I scootched to the side a little so the lighter filtered into the chest.
With a frown I slowly lowered the lid and redid the buckles. At a measured pace I quietly followed the safe path through the traps, stepped over Halloway, and passed by Mave to get into the hallway.
The party was watching me curiously and I shared a look with them before settling my eyes on Ryan who was glaring at me.
“Nope.” I said firmly.
Ryan’s face stormed over, his mouth agape and ready to berate me when he was interrupted by a sharp crack splitting the air.
We all looked out to the chest as it warped like a plastic tupperware in a microwave for too long. One of the leather straps had burst open, the metal buckle that had held it closed bent and broken.
“Was it trapped?” Halloway asked.
“Nope.” I said.
The chest continued to warp and bulge outwards. The pressure built until the other strap burst with a loud crack and the whole trunk exploding open like a jack-in-the-box loaded with a stick of dynamite. The torn and shredded leather that had made the chest went flying out in a festive burst of cruel confetti.
The light from Mave’s spotlight revealed a group of ratkin as they struggled to their feet from the shredded remains of the chest. The four sets of glowing blue eyes still bright enough in the spotlight’s harsh white light to be easily recognized.
“Dios mio.” Mave quietly said to herself.
“Ratkin zombies?” Halloway asked.
“Yep.” I said.