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Mira looked towards the new door with a frown and looked back to Tiamat with grave seriousness.
“Hey, Tiamat. Before we go through this door, this is only a game and risks are part of it, but this dungeon is big trouble. My black pin was my coding for danger. Do you know what the Great Filter Theory is?” Mira asked, Tiamat shook her head and started to get a distant look, indicating she was accessing her local memory files. The AI was predictable in taking the rhetorical question seriously.
“Don’t bother looking, I'll tell you. It's one theory of many, still floating about trying to answer the Fermi Paradox. The paradox is: If there are aliens beyond the Earth, then where the heck are they now? Because we aren’t finding them. The Great Filter posits that some great disaster; natural, social, or technological must have occurred with the civilizations. It destroyed them before we came onto the scene. So, the question is this: did humanity pass this dangerous hurdle already or is it still to come? Is our continued existence, our future, still in doubt?” She took a quick breath.
“Humans have managed to avoid several likely existential threats already. Did the theoretical aliens fall to the known threats that mankind has already faced and avoided like nuclear weapons, Nanotechnology, and AI? But is something more yet to come? Some even greater danger that could result in extinction?” Mira asked rhetorically.
"This dungeon feels like the same type of thing. All the adventurers who came but didn't leave got filtered out." Mira said.
“But Mira, the monsters so far were not that bad. Sure, the Gate Guardians were tough, and the Roc would have been a challenge but no biggie, M.”, Tiamat said confidently.
“Exactly my point, T. Let's pay attention and be extra careful because I think this dungeon’s filter is still to come.” Mira said cautiously. She slowly opened the next door, staff at the ready.
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Beyond the door, the pair came to another extremely large and unique room. Mira quickly dubbed it The Alchemical Vivarium. It was an enormous garden filled with exotic plants, farm plots, and both mundane and magical herbs. The area stretched too far to see the borders of the room with all the plants growing into and above the pathways that wound through the room.
The ceiling was domed high above. Large windows embedded in it seemed like they might be open to the air as clouds floated through and the sun rays dappled the wild plant life with light. The air was filled with earthy smells and the sounds of small animals, birds, and insects.
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The pair carefully stalked down one of the many twisting paths, noting many small, cleared areas beside the path. The cleared areas had pallets with piles of harvested vegetables and plants. A rustling in the plants gave them both a start. Tiamat took to the air and Mira readied a spell.
From the dense underbrush, a line of small mushroom men marched, dragging cuttings of corn stalks and cucumbers. The little RedCaps were tiny, no more than three inches tall. Their heads were mushroom caps looking like large-brimmed hats. The group had a pair of guards, slightly larger specimens, that brandished spears and made threatening peeps at Mira. They interposed themselves between Mira and the work gang. The little men fearfully dropped their harvest and fled into the brush, as the guardian RedCaps warily watched. Mira started to follow but the guards yelled and thrust their little spears in her direction until she backed off.
“This place is amazing. All this food! I can see so many rare magical treasures growing in there. Oh my! Basilisk Thorn, Elder Lilly, Fay-fern, and Ghostly Orchids. This is awesome! Damn. Those little guys are only bringing out mundane food and not the alchemical plants.” Mira said with disappointment.
“What's the big deal? I’ll just fly over and get you what you want, right?” Tiamat said.
“Not a good idea. For every nice alchemical treasure I see, there is an equal number of deadly plants. Strangle Vines, Doom Spore, Blight Weed, Abyssal Lotus. Ugh. Any harvesting would need to be exceedingly slow and careful. Crashing through there would be painful and very likely fatal. Probably not our filter, but I would bet some adventurers regretted it. We will stay on the cleared paths for now. The risk versus reward is just not enough to put the effort on for those right now. Come on!” Mira said with authority.
The pair walked on, careful and attentive to threats that might come from the jungle, the sky, or the path ahead. They saw many RedCaps hard at work and some of the little Glimmerling sprites flitting from flower to flower. They even saw some of the Shadow Web spiders dropping on long lines. The massive room was a mini ecology with many hunters and prey.
In the foggy distance, Mira could see a terrace on the far wall with stairs visible as well. If they continued in their current direction, they should be able to get further into the palace and on to a higher level. The undergrowth gave way quickly to a less dense region.
There were separate, fenced-in pastures with stone enclosures. Each enclosure had a herd of rare magical creatures. Mira’s jaw dropped seeing Gryphons, Rocs, Pegasus, Wyverns, Aurora Sprites, … and Pseudodragons. Mira looked quickly at Tiamat. Her expression was angrier and more murderous than Mira had ever seen her.
Tiamat took off like a bolt of lightning aimed at the enclosure of her kin. Mira’s magical sight showed the barrier separating the large pens, but Tiamat didn’t have that ability. She didn't see the potentially deadly spell she was about to fly into. Mira conjured her rod and cast.
[Lesser Bind], she yelled. Tiamat’s magic resistance shrugged off the spell and she continued to barrel toward her kin. As she crossed the hidden threshold of the trap spell, she crashed into a wall of force and bounced off. She collapsed falling to the dirt in a heap.
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