One moment I was straining for any hint of sensation in an empty expanse and the next I was standing in an empty stone room. It was a definite downgrade from the palatial residence of the goddess I had just left but I was happy to see it. Call me perverse, but my first thought was to use the Mage Sight spell again, just to see what it did outside the presence of a searing divine light. As soon as I cast it I was practically blinded again.

This time, however, there was no excruciating pain to go along with it, just a ton of light. Instead of the bright, solid white of Miris’ domain though the light around the room seemed to be from a multitude of shades and spread all across the walls, ceiling, and floor. As if one of the early backers tried to convince a Mage here in Novarra that Jackson Pollock was on to something.

“What the hell is wrong with this spell?” I muttered to myself. Or I thought it was to myself. Sounds to the right of the room proved to be coming from a man standing just outside a window of some kind. It was difficult to tell what he was wearing, or even what color it was for that matter, because it all glowed with colorful magic too.

“How- Wh-” the man tried and then seemed to give up and just crossed his arms and looked at me. Since he didn’t actually ask anything or really do anything of interest I decided to ignore him and turned my attention back to the room I was in.

The room that was evidently filled to the brim with magic. I glanced down at where my feet were and noticed something odd: there was no magic I could detect in the flagstone I was standing on. Just then the spell wore off and I was once again standing in a normal stone room. If a room that looked like a medieval dungeon with a braced wooden door in front of me, behind me, and an observation window on the side could in any way be considered normal.

I glanced over at the man behind the window and was hit with a brief spurt of envy. He was wearing a black cloak that put my own to shame over black leather armor and he looked pretty damn awesome. There was no doubt in my mind he was some kind of rogue-type. He still made no movement and kept his silence, however, so I resumed my study of a room that I was increasingly starting to believe was infested.

Infested with traps. I decided to test my suspicion but I wasn’t sure what to use for that. Miris must have given me something I could use, I reasoned, so I looked down at my little pouch and Inspected it.

Name

Traveler’s Bottomless Bag

Grade

Epic (Soulbound)

Effect

Hold up to 50 pounds of items in an extra-planar dimension without weight.

Description

Given to all Travelers in Novarra. Like all Soulbound items, these bags can never be lost, traded away, or stolen.

Contents

* Lockpick (3x)

* Tension Wrench

* Gift of Miris

* Silk Rope (30 ft.)

* Padded Grappling Hook

* Minor Health Potion (2x)

* Coinage (2g 5s 5c)

Just the idea of a weightless portable storage in another dimension had my mind racing along all kinds of wild tangents and the Gift of Miris looked like it might be interesting but I tried to focus on what would be immediately useful. I supposed I could use the grappling hook on the rope to trigger the traps in a line to the door. Or even just throw some copper pieces out in front of me. Not exactly how I’d prefer to spend the money, but I just needed some kind of projectile strong enough to spring the traps.

Then it hit me, I had the Mana Bolt spell. It was a ranged projectile that I assumed would travel to wherever I aimed it. Figuring it couldn’t hurt to try, I held out my arm and willed a Mana Bolt into existence. It looked as though a deep blue mist suffused with a bright blue glow gathered around my hand and then coalesced into a vaguely conical shape just in front of my palm. It all happened in the space of a heartbeat and the magical projectile shot out towards the stone floor just as quickly.

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There was a sharp clicking sound as it struck an innocuous-looking flagstone and I was struck dumb by the sight of an enormous gout of fire spewing forth from a hidden nozzle on the left wall. It was like someone took a flamethrower, mounted it in the wall, and then made sure the trigger got held down for longer than it really needed to be. I could only stare at the fuzzy afterimage of the flames that spread across my vision. The entire room is filled with… more of that?

I drew my hand down my face and heaved a sigh. This was not going to be an easy task. In the end, I used almost all of my silver and copper coins in addition to cast after cast of the Mana Bolt to find a path I could inch forwards on to the door across the room. Despite the chaos of colors it flooded my vision with, I also cast Mage Sight so I could study which traps coincided with the different colors and patterns.

The hardest part, however, was when there was no magic at all involved in the trap. My Mage Sight didn’t pick it up and it was a big temptation to step on an area that was obviously clear of magical threat. After a couple darts, cleverly-disguised hunting traps, and poisonous gas clouds I grew to hate those clear spaces more than the known magic traps. A near miss with a noxious brown gas that spread more than I was expecting also forced me to use one of my health potions to stay alive.

It was all I could do to keep my precarious balance while I hacked my lungs out, trying to expel the poisonous gas from my system. I could see faint messages in the bottom right corner of my vision that said things like You receive 12 damage from Poisonous Gas! They were completely clear despite the tears in my eyes and pain racking my body. After several more like it appeared I panicked an managed to reach into the pouch at my side. There was nothing inside it but I was still lucid enough to will one of my minor health potions into my hand.

The cork at the top of the vial popped off in my rush to down the red liquid but I hardly noticed even as it landed on the floor next to me and was struck by a bolt of lightning from yet another trap. As soon as I took the potion I felt a bit better but it came with the alarming knowledge in the back of my mind that taking another one in the next hour wouldn’t work. I could only gasp for air as the messages finally stopped appearing. It seemed I would live after all. I’d like to say I just continued on through the room after that but it took me some time to motivate myself to get going again after the intense, and very real, pain.

Finally, many grueling hours later, I managed to cross the ten feet to the door. With a sense of utter relief I reached out for the iron handle but then paused. I wouldn’t put it past whatever demented group of Gnomes came up with this room full of deadly traps to have one last surprise right before the finish. I weighed my options for a minute before they were taken from me and the door opened on its own.

The man in the black cloak who had been watching me earlier now stood in front of me in the doorway. Although I couldn’t quite make out the details under his hood it sounded as if he was smiling when he said, “Relax, there’s nothing on the door, or the frame. We want to train our people not kill them.”

“Although,” he continued, “I’m not quite sure how you got in here.”

“Miris put me in here,” I answered his unspoken question, “I think she was trying to test me, or prove a point, or maybe just kill me… Actually, it was probably all three, come to think of it.”

Even though I couldn’t see the man’s expression I got the sense he was surprised. He asked, “You’re a Traveler, I take it?”

I just nodded, too spent from my crawl across the room full of traps to do much else. In fact, I was still balancing precariously on the side of one foot to prevent one of them from killing me.

He grunted almost inaudibly then his head turned away as if he was lost in thought for a minute. After a time he seemed to be looking more or less at me again and gave me a proposal, “How would you like some real training? It won’t be free, you’d have to do some work for me in return. However, I can promise that it will be more than an equitable exchange and you’ll have the right of refusal for any work I request from you.”

It sounded ideal to me, actually, but I was still a bit put out at having to scamper around his little room of deadly and disastrous delights so I just responded with, “I can work with that.”

The man gave a nod and said, “Good. Meet me at the entrance to the Hall of Traps when you’re ready to begin.”

Quest Offer: Priming the Trap

You’ve been approached by a mysterious man and asked to meet him at the entrance to the Hall of Traps. He has offered you training in exchange for your help in the future. Any work you do will come with the right of refusal.

Reward: 2000 xp

Accept This Quest? Yes/No

Yes. The quest pop-up disappeared when I accepted it but I was sure I could find it again in a Journal or Quest Log or something. If I remembered right, that quest reward was more than my first level so this training looked like it would work out nicely for me. I looked past the cloaked man into the plain room beyond but didn’t see anything of interest. But with my enhanced Elven hearing I could have sworn I actually heard him grinning.

A sense of dread washed over me as I realized what was going to happen just as the man pointed behind me, back the way I came, and said, “The entrance is that way. Good luck.” Then he shut the door in my face.