Alistair, Juno, Zola, and their collection of summons entered the dungeon and immediately encountered monsters. They beat the goblin-like creatures back, and pressed onward. For the next hour, the three Fledglings encountered wave after wave of monsters in the darkened chambers, the snarling creatures on a nonstop rampage to thwart their progress. They also reaped numerous awards.
Juno and Zola leveled up and picked up several Attribute Cards along the way. Alistair received two Attribute Cards, one in DEX and the other in CON. He leveled up, and used the bonus from his level to improve his new Wandbound Spell known as Eclipse Claw. He planned to test this later, and see the difference between it and Dragon Claw Strike, which was a similar melee attack yet one that didn’t need a wand.
Alistair didn’t get any new Imprint Cards, but his summons all leveled up, Ziggy and Noctarii moving up one level and Hooty jumping two levels.
They reached a circular chamber when Tarnis spoke, the dungeon master snarky as always:
[It took you all long enough, ugh. I was starting to get bored watching you kill Tritanian goblins. Don’t worry, you won’t encounter any more of those foul creatures. They are extinct, especially now that you have destroyed all that remained. But that’s fine. There are plenty of other goblinoid creatures to throw at you later on. Welcome, Fledglings, to the main part of the dungeon. The yellow maze!]
The ceiling expanded, briefly revealing how large the room was before it shrunk down to a normal size. Dozens of yellow walls propped up, all ratcheting in a position.
“We can just destroy the walls,” Juno said as he tapped his wand against an obelisk stone. He handed this to Zola, who did the same.
[You could, but for every wall destroyed, the maze beyond changes. It is an endless maze in that way, with only one portal that will bring you back to the beginning. And that’s if you can find it. Maybe if you’re lucky, you’ll find the skeletons of some of your peers who have tried this one, maybe not. Maybe those skeletons will attack you…]
“Are you implying that you killed Academy students?” Zola asked, her wand drawn. “I don’t think the Board will like to hear that.”
[No, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t skeletons in my dungeon!]
Squish…
“I agree,” Alistair told Ziggy.
“I’m with the slime. Tarnis, you’re a butthole,” Juno said. “A big, stinking—”
[Watch your mouth, Fledgling!]
Squish! The slime hopped up onto Alistair’s shoulder at the sound of Tarnis’ voice.
Ahead, the walls illuminated with a neon purple glow that soon changed to gold. The path on right featured faeries above the clouds, the path on the left, butterflies. “We should go this way.” Alistair gestured toward the faeries.
“Are you seeing something we’re not?” Juno asked.
“You don’t see it?”
“I don’t see shit, bro.”
Rather than let Tarnis know what he was thinking, Alistair fired a message off to the others.
Alistair: The song mentioned faeries and horses. My best guess is that we take the path that features faeries or horses, depending.
Juno: Your power is showing you something on the wall?
Alistair: Gem Gaze. It has to be that. I have leveled it to three now. I can see mana outlines. They are very bright.
Zola: Nice.
Juno: What if we’re given both options?
Zola: We haven’t been given both yet. We can figure that out when we get there, if we get there.
Juno: Or we turn back.
Zola: You don’t seriously mean that, do you?
Juno: Hell nah. I was kidding. I don’t think Tarnis can actually kill us.
Zola: But his monsters could.
Juno: True.
Alistair: I could send Noctarii ahead with instructions, but he can’t see the icons to my knowledge.
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Alistair asked the shadow fae if he could make out anything. Noctarii, who had since removed his mask so his face glowed, shook his head. “Nothing on the walls.”
Alistair: Looks like it’s just me.
A lurching sound filled the chamber.
[If you wait too long, Fledglings, the maze will change. I forgot to tell you that part. Don’t lollygag. Get lost in the maze!]
Juno: Tarnis is such a dick. I can’t believe the Academy forces us to put up with this sweaty chodebowl.
Zola: Is that even a word?
Juno: It is now!
Zola: So if we destroy the walls, the maze changes, and if we do something like split the party, it could change as well, meaning we won’t be able to relay information back if we send someone ahead. Not ideal, but all of this is doable if you’re certain you remember the song.
Alistair: Here are the lyrics to the chorus: And faeries were dancing, on the sun’s golden clouds. Horses were prancing, lost in the crowds. They’d been lost for days, lost in yellow mazes, once again. Just so you all know what I’m looking for.
Zola: The getting lost for days part doesn’t sound ideal.
Juno: Especially because I’m hungry. I’m not the only one, right? Do we have time to stop for a snack?
Zola: Absolutely not. We’re trapped in a dungeon.
Alistair: Food can come later. I’ll lead the way. We’ll stay close, and hopefully reach the end of this madness soon.
Juno: For a second there, I thought you were going to do the voice.
Alistair: Maybe, but hopefully not.
“Noctarii, Hooty, stay close,” Alistair told his summons as he pushed ahead.
Hoot! Hoot!
The three mages and their summons traveled down a corridor, where they came to a new set of options, one demarcated by faeries and the other suns. Alistair relayed what he was seeing to his classmates.
Zola: Could the suns have anything to do with ‘sun’s glowing clouds?’
“I’m going to assume ‘no’ and stick to the lyrics,” Alistair told her aloud as he took the faeried pathway, where they came to several piles of skeletons. The bones shook and quickly formed into a group of mangled fighters holding large femurs as weapons.
No levels were presented, but Tarnis did laugh like a madman as Juno fired on the first one, ripping away part of the skeleton’s ribcage.
Zapp!
Alistair did the same, his shot knocking the head off one of the skeleton combatants. It still pursued him, the headless skeleton swinging its weapon. Alistair quickly sidestepped this and lashed back with Dragon Claw Strike.
Ghost: Good, but next time, finish off the skeleton before it can pursue you.
Zwwish!
Zola hit one of the skeletons with a blast of power Alistair hadn’t seen her use before. It crumbled the skeleton, leaving a card in its wake. “Another Attribute Card,” she called to them as Juno and Alistair handled the other skeletons.
“It’s yours,” Alistair said as he joined Juno, their wands drawn.
Zapp! Zwissh! Zapp!
Oink! Piglet tacked one of the skeletons and shattered most of its bones.
“Hell yeah!” Juno said. “You’re going to have to try harder than this, Tarnis!”
The three Fledglings blasted through a second wave of skeletons, and were soon met by another group that were larger, more menacing with horns pressing out of their skulls. Even so, the enemies proved easy enough, Alistair estimating they were a warm-up to the main event. They dropped cards too, Alistair able to pick up a point in STR.
“Which way?” Juno asked as the small group came to a three-way fork, each path with a glowing light beyond.
Alistair was just about to point to the left path that had faeries when he paused.
“What’s up?” Zola asked.
Alistair blinked twice as he saw the images that had played out on the walls of the path on the right. In the image, horses wearing decorated saddles pranced and threw their heads back.
Tarnis’ laugh broke through Alstair’s thought:
[Second-guessing yourself now, are we? You thought this would be easy, didn’t you?]
“Ignore him.” Zola turned to Alistair, the look of utter conviction in her eyes. “What’s your gut telling you?”
“Horses were prancing, lost in the crowds.” Alistair nodded to the path with the faeries. “This way.”
He didn’t hesitate again as they moved ahead, the three Fledglings soon fighting their way through another mob of skeletal monsters. These ones dropped several cards, Juno and Zola getting Attribute Cards, and Alistair netting an Imprint Card known as Cryptic Endurance.
[Channel the relentless vitality of the undead. Cryptic Endurance increases your natural endurance, the boost is derived from the card’s level and 1.5x multiplier for every five points in STR.]
Ghost: We are going to be so strong in the near future.
Alistair didn’t know what to say to the assassin’s almost sinister enthusiasm, so he simply moved on.
The next chamber they came to had three available paths.
This time, the faeries were below the clouds on the right and the horses in the middle were prancing through a crowd of people. Alistair was about to comment on how easy it was, but then he remembered that he not only had access to his memories—worth exploring in the future—but he also had the Gem Gaze power, allowing him to see magical secrets.
They took the passage with the horses prancing through the crowds, which increasingly drew Tarnis’ ire:
[Are you sure about this one? Are you sure you know where you are going? You know where confidence can leave you, Fledging—dead in a ditch getting trampled by livestock! I knew people that died that way, but not me, I was busy back at the Academy working on heightened levels of Resonant Mana. Do you think this is easy? Do you think designing dungeons and entire systems is something that just anyone can do?]
“We don’t care, dick-for-brains,” Juno said.
[Maybe you’ll care about this!]
The walls all fell at once, followed by the sound of rumbling hooves.
Ahead, Alistair spotted a two-headed bull charging in their direction, the bull closing in on them. By the time its handle appeared—Deathbull, Level 6—Alistair had already activated his Thick Skin power and was rushing to the side to avoid the Deathbull’s onslaught.
He aimed his wand and prepared to fire Nova Strike when he heard Zola cry out.
“Help!”
Trapped under a piece of the fallen wall, Zola pulled at her leg with one hand and aimed her wand at the bull with the other.
Squish! Ziggy sprang forward in her defense, the slime done for.