“Can you even call this a puzzle?” Aisha asked with scorn.

The second room had a big, locked door on the back wall, and a massive pile of colored wooden blocks. The blocks were all painted green, red, or yellow, and three white boxes had been painted on the floor. It didn’t take Lilith to figure out we just had to sort them by color.

“I feel… insulted?” Derrick mumbled under his breath while we lugged the colors into their separate piles.

“Toys are the theme for this dungeon. Be graceful, give the System the benefit of the doubt that it is sticking to the theme, instead of insulting us.” Lilith wasn’t even being sarcastic, but genuine. I wondered if she was trying to suck up to the System, and would it or could it work? If it did work, I wanted to get in on it.

“Even if it’s an easy puzzle it still took us at least ten minutes to move and restack everything. That’s longer than all the fights against the toys in the first room took combined!” I must have been a shade too enthusiastic; I got a suspicious look from Lilith.

“Last one,” Aisha chimed in when she placed the green cube on the green pile.

A deep rumbling shook the ground, and the heavy doors opened to reveal stairs going up. The stairs wound around the walls with a subtle curve, and at the top of the stairs sat a door beneath a large arch made from enlarged wooden blocks, with a sign above the blocks that said in large, simple letters, Playroom. Even though the letters were simple, they were in vivid pastel colors that caught the eye.

“Dad thinks all the weird things in dungeons are real places the System observed in lower dimensions,” Aisha said without really thinking about it, distracted from her study of the cute blocks with the same thoughtful look I’d been giving them.

“Is that why people suddenly keep coming to my mom to try and learn about their past lives?” Derrick seemed confused why anyone would want to talk to his mother. She was a seer and alchemist booth, with enough of a gift with alchemy that even Mommy visited her shop.

“What are the odds that you awaken a memory even slightly useful to you in that scenario? Mommy showed me the Multiverse once, for all practical purposes it has infinite dimensions. Awakening past life memories seems unlikely to ever prove relevant to your current life, but more knowledge is always better.” Lilith mused to herself. I didn’t dwell on the idea, the now was far more interesting than the then, but if the then could unlock awesome powers maybe it wouldn’t be so boring?

“If it has even a small chance to give me a head start on a good class, unlocking a trait, or powerful ability, it’s worth it I think.” Aisha shared her opinion while I walked up to the gate and peered into the Playroom.

Beyond the arch were netted walls and a pit full of hundreds of vibrantly colored balls. Pastel colored blocks made up the walls of the ball pit below the surface level, while the netting lay over pink walls. The ball pit stretched on like a long hallway for a good twenty meters, beyond which I could only make out a big room with a checkered floor. It was far enough I couldn’t just activate Dragonfly Strike and teleport past the obstacle.

“This looks fun,” I laughed and jumped into the ball pit. The balls were softer than I expected, and while I sank some, I didn’t go far enough down to find a bottom of the ball pit.

“That’s almost certainly a trap,” Lilith scoffed at me.

Derrick and Aisha watched me with the same intent look Lilith did, as if they too were waiting for me to writhe in pain or be attacked by something. That’s when I noticed the balls of the pit shifting slightly, as if something were slithering towards me in the pit. I couldn’t see an enemy, and if I couldn’t at least sense them, I couldn’t target them.

“Ow, yeesh!” I cried out when something bit my shin. The pain wasn’t bad, and I don’t think I was bleeding, it was more annoying than anything, but it stung a little. The ball pit started writhing, and I could tell more things were coming for me. “I’m getting bit!”

“Crown of Thorns!” Aisha activated one of her support spells. A thorny halo appeared above my head, and the bites stopped coming. Instead there came hisses and pained noises from the creatures attacking me, when their attacks hit themselves instead.

“That’s an awesome spell, Aisha!” Now that I was protected, I dived into the balls to search for my enemies. It turned out to be some of the balls themselves. The first creature I pulled up was made from six balls linked together, with a dragons face molded into the first ball. It was weak enough I crushed it bare handed.

“I never thought I’d see the legendary ball dragons.” Derrick quipped.

“Really? Are they rare?” Aisha missed his sarcasm.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

“Maybe? I was making fun of them.” Derrick frowned.

“Let me handle this,” Lilith raised her staff and circled it through the air. “Locust Swarm!”

A swarm of darkness exploded from the tip of Lilith’s crystal staff and flew into the ball pit. Some came very close to me. The insects were creepy looking, like malevolent grasshoppers, and ball pile writhed like a mass of ants as the locusts and ball dragons fought eachother. I took the opportunity to swim across ball pit and hop up onto the ledge.

“Better swim across while their occupied,” I called to the other three.

“How deep was it?” Derrick called to me.

“I don’t know?” I smiled helpfully.

“Just go,” Aisha muttered and pushed Derrick, who managed to get his footing and leap off the edge at the last minute, and just before his boots hit the balls, he leaped again off of nothing, before swan diving into the balls over ten meters short of the end, where I stood.

Aisha took a running jump, but she didn’t even make it as far as Derrick and his double jump did. Lilith, on the other hand, gestured and the swarm of locusts formed a platform that she rode across the pit, like some kind of awful insect queen.

“That’s so creepy,” I reminded Lilith of my dislike of her insect servants.

“What unholy abomination is this supposed to be?” Lilith ignored my complaints, and pointed at the checkered floored room. While we watched the room pulsed and rearranged itself, the black and white tile floors changed into a splash of bright pink accented by fluffy white clouds and lollipops. The entry before us now said Welcome to the Land of Candy, while the far exit read ‘Exit’. The room had transformed to become a curved path formed of colorful blocks, that lead from the entrance to the exit. Dog sized pairs of dice lay in piles, but they had eyes that watched us.

What followed made me question how serious the System took kids. The six sided dice would roll at us on our turn, and we would move however many squares ahead the dice landed on after we hit them. Destroying the dice with a hit was treated like rolling a six, which I found out when one of my punches triggered Imminent Doom as an affliction. No one else managed to kill one of the dice, despite going out of their way to try.

On some squares we won sweets that gave small temporary bonuses to our attributes. Other squares sent us back to the start or gave us a vegetable that we had to eat. As the only one who didn’t like vegetables, it really wasn’t much of a punishment for the other three. Maybe it was karma for me killing one of the dice? Did the System care about petty things like that? I hoped not.

Lilith won. For a game with probability involved, it didn’t surprise me. She had the good luck, and I had the eventful luck. Derrick and Aisha both reached the end of the land of candy before me. For winning, Lilith got a candy bar that improved all of her attributes by one. Derrick, in second, got a choice of candy to increase on attribute, and Aisha got a basket of temporary boost candies. I got a basket full of broccoli.

I nearly threw it against the wall, before the item information came up, at which point I feel like I got the best prize. Well, second best prize.

Item: Never-ending Basket of Broccoli

Health Boost: Eating a broccoli floret restores 5% of maximum health over ten seconds.

Stamina Regeneration: Consuming broccoli increases stamina regeneration by 10% over 30 minutes.

Detoxifying: Broccoli has a natural detoxifying effect, curing minor poisons and disease.

Comedic Relief: Carrying the basket full of broccoli is adorable. +??????

I popped a floret into my mouth and chewed. The taste wasn’t any better, but knowing I’d get buffs made it more tolerable. A lot more tolerable.

Lilith stared at me while I chewed, to the point I nearly choked, she looked so intent. Aisha and Derrick also looked at me suspiciously.

“Want some broccoli?” I offered.

“No, I’m good.” Derrick waved it off, but the girls each took a piece and nibbled at it suspiciously. Aisha and Lilith’s eyes both widened, as they felt the warmth flow through their stomachs and the stamina and health effects topping up their health and energy.

“Every half-hour is minorly inconvenient, but an acceptable hindrance. Derrick, eat some. It gives buffs,” Lilith commanded, and Derrick ate a piece of vegetable rather than argue.

“Onward!” I filled the silence with an exuberant cheer, and pushed the exit from the game room open, to reveal a room full of train tracks, and a small train. A steam whistle blew.

The room was a pain in the butt. We had to climb onto the train, and then make our way from the passenger car towards the locomotive at the front. Along the way jack in the boxes sprang out of cleverly hidden wooden panels to attack us with knives, while stuffed bears wearing bandit masks with slingshots would jump in through windows from the roof. None of the enemies were difficult to defeat, and thanks to me being in front no one got stabbed by a jack in the box. The slingshots from the bears left welts, but the harm they did felt more psychological in nature than physical. I only got hit by one slingshot, Aisha got hit by six, Derrick by five, and Lilith by two. Aisha didn’t seem to notice that Lilith hid behind her.

Once we stopped the train, or hit the big red button in the locomotive, the train stopped itself at the station on its next pass. A teddy bear with a golden star on its vest and a slingshot on its belt, who spoke in a weird accent, waited for us.

“Why I reckon’ you four are mighty heroes, and Nice and Friendly Corners owes you a great heaping hopping bunch of thanks. We’d offer you hospitality, but those dastardly bandits done burned our town to the ground,” the Sheriff explained.

Lilith, unamused, saw no sign of a town. She looked around repeatedly, but there was just the train track.

“What started the problem with the bandits?” Derrick asked.

“Well now, ya see, the Grand Toymaker gets a little bored sometimes. When that happens, he makes us all play out his scenarios. Since you ain’t toys you don’t have to play by his rules the way the rest of us do.”

“Where’s this jerk at?” Aisha asked indignantly.

“The Grand Toymaker is in the Toymaker’s Palace, right through that there portal. He doesn’t take kindly to strangers trespassing, so you’d better go prepared.”

“I’m prepared to kick his ass,” Aisha hissed, with magic popping and exploding in little fizzles from the end of her staff.

“Let’s do this,” I jumped through the portal first. “Oh, that’s gaudy!”