Alfric was eager to be going back into the dungeons, but worried about whether Verity was in a good state for it. She wanted to not be a bard, or to be only half of a bard, and while it would be good for her to have some versatility, that versatility was definitely not what she was there for. Still, they had more than enough bows for her to take one, and her lute would be available inside the trunk if she wanted to switch over. Having a half-bard half-archer seemed like it might not be the worst thing in the world, but it really depended on how much Verity’s efficacy as a bard deteriorated when she was doing something else and not using a lute.
Their target was Moil Meadows, and part of the reason they were heading there was that the flowers that bloomed in early summer were supposed to be one of the great sights of the region. For whatever reason, flowers grew better there, fuller and longer lasting. Isra had wanted to see them, and Alfric was curious himself, though it wasn’t terribly out of the ordinary. There were all asorts of things like that around the world, usually some combination of entads and benign dungeon escapes, or the scars of deeper magics that were now barely known to the world. Alfric was somewhat skeptical that an entire magical profession could be utterly lost, but history ran long, and the past was a dangerous place.
The trip was made with the help of the garden stone and the helmet, which together could bring them anywhere in a handful of moments, the travel so simple and easy that Alfric had contemplated starting up a cargo business. The helmet allowed them to scream through the air at thirty miles an hour, half as slow as a cartier, but still so quick that he needed to keep well clear of trees. Even with armor, hitting one of them would probably kill him. Mizuki felt no such compunctions, and regularly zipped through the trees, going between them with the grace of a starling, and Alfric felt like it was only a matter of time before she got distracted or missed seeing a branch until it was too late. He had done the flying to Moil Meadows, with a bit of negotiation, and landed early in the morning, not too long after they’d taken breakfast.
Alfric had expected the flowers to have spattered the meadows with color, and they had done that, just not in quite the way that he’d expected. There were broad regions to the coloration, yellow at the tops of the mild hills, blue in the valleys, reds by the streams, and pinks around the scraggly trees that dotted the landscape. Orange and purple flowers crowded around rocks, and tiny white flowers bloomed in patches of moss where the ground was sufficiently wet for it. Alfric thought that it looked like a map he’d once seen, one that showed northern Inter in terms of its biomes and agricultural products, and he thought that if only he’d known enough, the patterns of the flowers might have acted as a map of their own.
“This is amazing!” said Mizuki. “How have I never been here?”
“It’s twelve miles of walking,” said Verity.
“I’ve walked twelve miles for less,” said Mizuki. “Helmet, please.” She held out her hand, and Alfric reluctantly took it off and gave it to her.
“Be careful,” he said, but she was in the air before he finished talking. She swooped up and then out over the fields of flowers.
“They’re not natural,” said Isra, whose palm had touched the ground. She rose from being crouched. “I’m not sure what’s causing this.”
“We could try to track down the plantmaster,” said Alfric. “Though I don’t know where they’d be.” He pointed to a pit that had been dug into the meadow, the walls reinforced with flat stones. It didn’t look particularly safe, but people had been running the dungeon, and it hadn’t rained lately, so he thought it was likely acceptable. “That’s our dungeon.”
“I hope there are flowers,” said Isra. “We’d expect clandes, right?”
“Maybe,” said Alfric. “Frankly, after last time, I think our odds of finding something outside expectations have to be much higher.”
“If it’s another theater,” Hannah began.
“We’re better equipped for it,” said Alfric. “The garden stone is better outfitted for the long-term, and we’ve talked to both Kell and Marsh about us being gone. There’s nothing pressing for us to go back to, excepting Verity’s need to practice for the upcoming performance, and if she needs to leave for that, we’ll still have four.”
“I can practice in the dungeon,” said Verity.
“Not with the Full Symphonic Lute,” said Alfric. “I don’t think I could let you stay in there in good conscience.”
“Well, here’s hopin’ that it’s somethin’ interesting, profitable, and not a large project that takes near a week of work,” said Hannah.
“If we find the same theater, we’ll have confirmation that something very odd is happening,” said Alfric. “It’ll probably be enough to draw the attention of someone with expertise in dungeon science.”
“Are you not that?” asked Verity.
Alfric laughed. “I’m a dungeoneer,” he replied. “And not an expert, just someone who knows a lot. There are people Inter employs to study such things.”
“And why haven’t we gotten their attention already?” asked Hannah.
“There aren’t many of them, and they don’t come out for every weird thing that happens in a dungeon,” said Alfric. “I’ve sent letters, and the ones who replied wanted some kind of verification that this is actually happening, that it’s not just a random occurrence.”
“Here’s hoping?” asked Isra.
“Not really,” said Alfric. “Though it would be interesting, it’s not really what we exist as a dungeon party for.” He looked up to the sky and couldn’t see Mizuki. When he looked to the horizon, he spotted her just in time, flying a foot above the flowers with her arms dangling down to brush through them. She had slowed down a bit, but was still going faster than he’d have liked.
“I’m going to take a turn when she’s done,” said Isra. She was back in her Tarbin clothing, which was sensible given they were going into a dungeon. Her hair had been tied back and then covered, and there was no skin showing, which would make her safe from all sorts of attacks. Alfric was glad that they hadn’t had to have a talk about proper dungeon attire: he’d been worried that Isra’s new look would extend too far.
When Mizuki landed, Isra took the helm and rose into the air, moving out over the flowers with considerably less speed and touching down at various points.
“Neat flowers,” said Mizuki. “I love springtime.”
“Are we good to do this?” asked Alfric. “Because in five minutes or so we’re going to need to be able to fight against hostile forces.”
“We’ll be ready,” said Verity.
“I’m ready, I just wanted to stop and look at the flowers first,” said Mizuki. “You know, if we’ve got five minutes, why not?”
“I just want us to not be surprised,” said Alfric. “I feel like we haven’t trained as much as we should have, and it’s been almost two weeks since the last dungeon.”
“We’ll be fine,” said Mizuki. “I’m going to obliterate anything we find in there.”
“Except the valuables,” said Hannah.
“Right,” said Mizuki.
“Because otherwise we’re just goin’ in there and killin’ things for no reason,” said Hannah.
“Right, right,” said Mizuki. “You know, I’m so glad we’re clearing this up now, that would have been quite the blunder.”
Isra touched down gently and handed the helm back to Alfric, who put it back on. He had no confidence in the thimble armor to protect him — it just wasn’t thick or sturdy enough — but the helm would keep his head safe, and that was vital. Flying was a bonus.
From the reports Alfric had read, the Moil Meadows dungeon was nothing special, though it had a slight focus on artisanal crafts and smaller animals than usual. If any of that held, it would be a fairly unremarkable dungeon, but if Verity was having some sort of sway over the dungeons, everything Alfric had read might go out the window.
They prepared themselves, made sure the trunk was ready, and then Alfric went down the stairs to the dungeon mouth, opening it with his key. There was a slight hitch in the lock, which needed oil, and he tried not to take that as a sign.
There was a familiar smell to the tunnel that led into the dungeon proper. There was always a tunnel like that, not quite a part of the dungeon and not quite a part of the real world, a liminal space that separated the two, a barrier that looked mundane but was base magic that had been firmly encoded into the world. The dungeon beyond would be odd and magical, but the tunnel was somehow more mysterious and powerful, in its own way.
His bident was drawn, but there was nothing in the first room of the dungeon, and he breathed a sigh of relief. The room had no ceiling, and there was summer sky overhead, with sunlight obscured by clouds. Where the blue of the sky could be seen, there was something off about the color, and richness to the blue that you never saw in the real world. It was almost like a bird’s egg rather than a sky, and once Alfric had ensured there were no monsters, he looked closely at it, trying to see if there was some trick to it.
Once everyone was through, Alfric set his pack down. The trunk was right there, but the pack had everything that might be vital in an emergency. Once it was down, he had a lot more range of motion, and he felt like he was ready for a fight, though there was always a feeling of trepidation and uncertainty before the actual battle began.
Alfric nodded.
They weren’t in a proper room, and there was no door. Instead, there were steeply banked rock walls, like a gray canyon. Moss gathered in places along the edges, and water trickled down from above, slow enough that it presented more as damp patches than actual flow.
The first living creature they saw was a mat of fur rising up from the rough stone floor. Before Alfric could even call out, arrows were zipping by him, uncomfortably close, and the creature fell back to the floor before it could rear up to its full height.
said Verity, half in astonishment, half with pride. The creature was bleeding out, its features impossible to identify under the long, curly fur.
said Verity.
The bow Verity was using had been dubbed the Triple Shot, not because it fired three arrows, but because every time you used it, it acted as though you’d fired three arrows and then picked the best of the three shots. When you used it, you felt nothing in particular, and they had only managed to suss out that it was a bit more accurate than a normal bow before getting Filera to identify it. It was a good weapon for an inexperienced archer, but there was only so much that such a bow could help. The criteria that bow used depended upon the archer’s wishes, and that was a powerful effect, but it was applied to something comparatively local, and a bit of a waste in Alfric’s opinion.
They spent some time looking over the furry creature, who had skinny limbs beneath all that fur. Mizuki thought that it was cat-like, but the skeletal structure didn’t seem quite right. There was nothing of value on the corpse, and nothing magical nearby, so they continued down the canyon. Alfric didn’t like that they hadn’t seen any doors yet. Dungeons were sometimes like that, open and without discrete rooms. They could be difficult to handle.
The canyon — it was the only way for Alfric to think about it — split in two, with the too-blue sky hinting at diverging paths ahead. Alfric took the left path, giving the right one a close look. He was worried that something would come in after him.
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They retreated and put the masks on. The fit was poor, but it would help keep them from experiencing any symptoms in the short term. In the long term, it was probably better that they didn’t spend too much time in the dungeon, especially if Isra couldn’t say for certain what the poison in the air was. This was the sort of thing that stopped a dungeon run dead in its tracks.
said Isra.
As much as Alfric didn’t like a dungeon with no doors, he really didn’t like being under a time limit. The dungeon wouldn’t be able to be stripped down, and they were at risk of pushing too hard, taking on too much. He resolved to keep a steady pace and carry on as though he wasn’t thinking about the poison in the air and their exposure to it. They would need to go to Filera immediately after the dungeon was done to get a diagnosis; he’d heard horror stories of dungeoneers taking a dose of poison and shrugging it off only to end up with brittle bones a month later, or a belly that would no longer hold food. There were, unfortunately, certain ailments that a cleric couldn’t cure.
The left path opened up into a larger section of canyon, one with ample room to move around. Four small creatures crouched near a fire, and for a moment Alfric was worried they’d be humanoid, too much of a reminder of the bastlefolk, but the creatures unfolded in inhuman ways and turned toward the party with pure, unthinking menace.
Alfric charged forward, trying to keep the creatures from getting to the rest of the party. He stabbed the first to reach him in its chest and then used the entad’s power, blasting a satisfying hole that spattered blue blood out the creature’s back. Alfric pulled the bident out in time to bring the handle up to block a strike, and then Isra was next to him, appearing from nowhere for only long enough to fire another arrow and leave in an eyeblink. She’d found her mark, dropping the creature that had been trying to get at Alfric.
The other two fell down without any apparent force, and Alfric held for a moment, expecting them to get back up. On closer inspection, something had gone wrong with them, and their skin was separating from their musculature, sliding off like their dead bodies had been sitting out in the sun for days.
said Mizuki.
Alfric looked at the other bodies and saw that they were in a similar state, oozing out blue fluid that was at least partly their blood. Despite the fact that they had been around a fire, they were without clothes or any other markings of intelligent construction. The eyes were black and too far apart, like a fish’s, and the mouths were pinched with the teeth jutting out and overcrowded.
Beside the fire there were tools, but nothing magical, and it was difficult to figure out what the tools actually were. One was clearly a long-handled spoon of some kind, but the others were mysteries, wooden workings with a few sharp edges and rounded pieces, possibly for shaping or hammering something. There was no evidence that any of them had actually been used for anything, and it was likely that it was just dungeon nonsense. They were too crude to sell as henlings, and Alfric pushed on, still worried about the potential poison in the air.
The ‘canyon’ continued on, narrowing and widening, splitting and sometimes merging. Alfric didn’t like the merges. They were the sort of thing that made it much more likely to get lost, and much harder to keep track of. Still, they went some way without much more than scrub and a bit of sand under their feet, with the same fake sun above their heads. A part of Alfric wanted to use the helm to fly up into the air and take a survey of what was outside the dungeon, but he already knew what he would see there. It would be a flat and empty place, devoid of life and bereft of any purpose or meaning. Some dungeons wrapped back on themselves, but others had hard barriers, and a few just continued on in the flat space outside what was purposeful. He couldn’t quite remember whether he’d told Mizuki any of that, but he was mildly surprised that she hadn’t asked for the helm yet to go see for herself.
The left hand path through the winding and branching canyon brought them to a wide open place with thick blades of grass growing up from the ever-more-common sand on the canyon floor. In the center of the open area there was a log cabin of crude construction that was partially hidden by just how much stuff there was around it. Alfric was scanning for creatures or traps, but he saw bird baths, chairs, lanterns, pumps, a large variety of tools, poles, piles of rope, and half a dozen other things.
He moved forward, bident set in front of him. The cabin had windows with crude, bubbled glass, and Alfric did his best to peer inside. When Verity saw him, her song shifted, and he found his pupils dilated as he looked into the dark room. If there was something there, he wasn’t able to see it.
Isra drew back and fired, and one of the windows shattered. They sat in front of the cabin, waiting, but after a full minute had passed, Alfric relaxed.
Alfric was glad she’d said it, because it meant that she’d been listening to him when he’d told her things about the dungeons and how they worked. And it was a good point, though laying in wait for a strategic advantage was quite rare. Most dungeon monsters were so mad that they wouldn’t be able to consider ambush. Alfric had heard a few stories about monsters feigning helplessness and then going in for the kill when dungeoneers got close, but this felt like a myth to him, and so far as he knew, hadn’t ever been fully accepted as anything more than fantasy.
He tested the handle of the door, then slowly pushed it open, looking around the interior of the cabin for obvious or unobvious enemies. Sometimes there were mimics, items that looked normal and benign only to leap up and attack you: the book-bats from their first dungeon had been from that category.
The cabin seemed to be a workshop rather than a living space, one set up for making candles or soaps. There were lots of picked flowers sitting in bins, and a cabinet that was filled with colored bottles. Alfric moved in slowly, stepping to the side to give the artillery the opportunity to fire if anything came to life, but the room was quiet and still.
said Mizuki.
said Mizuki after no one had spoken up.
said Alfric.
When everyone was in position, Alfric flipped up the trap door. Thankfully, it had a ladder going down, and he slowly lowered his lantern down to get a look before descending himself. There were no obvious exits from it, just the ladder down, and Alfric lowered himself slowly, trying to keep a hand free.
The room was filled with weapons and armor, an almost unbelievable amount of them on every wall. If the cabin above was some kind of perfumer’s workshop, then the cellar was … it was hard to say. It didn’t have the look of a place that had been created by a collector, since things weren’t really ‘on display’. It felt more like someone had needed to gather up weapons and armor in secret, a cache created for some unknown fight. Alfric wondered whether there might be any analog out in Moil Meadows, but he doubted it. This was a place where someone had prepared to bring death.
said Mizuki.
Once the whole party was down in the basement, the trunk followed. Its clawed feet gripped tightly to the rungs of the wooden ladder, but left no mark on it. For as fast and frightening as the trunk could be, it was incredibly delicate.
Alfric began loading things into it. There was a complete suit of full plate armor, but it wasn’t magical, and was unlikely to fit, especially since the proportions were wrong for a human, too wide at the foot and too narrow at the shoulders. There were entads that could correct for a problem like that, but they were so expensive you’d usually be better off getting armor that fit without magical intervention. It was all going into the trunk anyway, but Alfric kept his attention on the ones that Mizuki had marked. He wished that he had some way to mark them, and made a note to get some colored string or something like that, which could be attached to the lid of the trunk for easy access in a situation like this.
The mundane weapons were probably not worth that much, but at a few dozen rings each, they were well worth taking. Many shops were inundated with weapons, and weapons existed in abundance in dungeons at far greater rates than they could be found in the world, largely for unclear reasons. Perhaps war had made repeated marks on the world, or perhaps there were sites of mass battles hidden all across the continents. Whatever the case, many of the weapons they were taking, and perhaps the armor too, would be either melted down for the metal or hammered into some new shape, the original workmanship completely obliterated.
As they were packing everything up, Mizuki hefted one of the swords, feeling its weight, and brought it down with a chopping motion. There was a tremendous clatter from the opposite wall, and several things fell down, cut cleanly in half.
said Mizuki. She slowly and gently handed the sword over to Alfric.
With that minor scare done, the rest of the weapons were packed up, perhaps a hundred of them all told, so many that Alfric ran out of the burlap he’d been using to quickly wrap them in.
By the time they’d loaded up everything from the cabin worth taking, Alfric was feeling a bit off himself, in spite of the mask and the ventstone. He was going to have to find a better solution, he decided, something that could keep him breathing properly, perhaps with a seal around his mouth.
There were murmurs all around. They were feeling it, that was certain, but it seemed rather mild, which had to partly be because of the masks. Seven entads was a decent enough haul, though he itched to push his luck with one more room. After the theater, he’d been hoping for something, some clue as to why that had happened and how they might make it work again. Nothing had been suspect thus far. In fact, it had almost been a boring dungeon, the two fights they’d had over too quickly.
They left the cabin behind, with the recess behind it unexplored. It would have taken them deeper into the dungeon, and Alfric had a feeling that in another hour, he’d be feeling the effects of the foul air so much that it would impact his performance in a fight. He was dizzy, dizzy enough that there was no question it was a real effect and not just his imagination.
They had gone back through two wider parts of the canyon when they encountered something that they shouldn’t have been able to encounter: a path leading to the right. They had stuck to the left as they’d gone further in, and they hadn’t gone down any of the branches for lack of time.
For a moment, Alfric only stared at the rogue path.
Somehow, unaccountably, they had gotten lost.