Fireball

The Trogodytes hadn’t appeared while I’d been fooling around with the water, which led me to believe they weren’t going to appear at all. Perhaps the traps had scared them off. If I was lucky the traps might even have killed them.

The plan was to walk only on one side of the hallway while my fireball went down the other. The long I had it out before meeting with the Trogodytes, the longer it would take them to fully reverse the fireball out of existence. I was still going to go for the instant strikes with my swords in case they could see the invisible blades ahead of time.

Plus I found the light comforting. It was scary always moving about in a gloom

I paused at the threshold (plus another ten feet for the invisible pitfall) while my fireball lit the spiders’ lair.

I gave it a count of thirty. When I reached the end, and my fireball still hadn’t come reversing back at me, I skipped over the trapdoor and onto the rug—creepy.

All five of them were in the far corner. And they were... dancing? Lost? It was hard to tell. I had to crouch to see them, and they in turn were hunched by the ceiling. They were arranged in a circle and following each other around in the ring. Their steps were rhythmic. Each landed in sync with the others. Their spears stabbed out like flower petals unfurling on the near silent beat of their feet. There was no chanting, singing, or speaking involved.

Step Step STAB. Step step STAB. Step STAB step step step STAB.

And then they’d repeat.

They hadn’t noticed me. Whatever sense they possessed was clearly limited.

I watched until they finished there ritual and left back the way they’d come. I could have taken them unawares, but that didn’t guarantee I’d win. And they hadn’t been trying to harm me in that moment. It would be like the dark elves all over again.

I gave the Trogodytes another five minutes before I ducked under the ceiling and moved further into the room. I retrieved the Dead King’s spear and then crab walked over to the tunnel. My swords had done their work carving out the passage. If I turned sideway and held my breath, it was just wide enough to squeeze through. If the tunnel ceiling had been as low as the room’s own ceiling I wouldn’t have fit.

My fireball led my way into the room on the far end of the tunnel.

It was mercifully empty. Merciful because my arms were currently pinned to my sides. I could use my spells to fight back thanks to my ring, but defending myself would be far more difficult. The room was about the same size as the last, one of the dungeon’s “small” rooms.

The floor was tiled in hexagons, which reminded me a bit too much of the cave bees for comfort. The river ran into and through the room in more or less a straight line, disappearing through a grate in the wall at right angles to the one it came out of. Above the grate was a crude sketch of a sword.

I shuffled into the room proper and stretched out my arms. Then I stretched them out some more and spun on the spot. Such a simple set of actions would have been impossible only an hour ago both do to injury and brain damage. I was going to enjoy my health when and where I could.

The room had two doors, each set in one of the walls the stream didn’t touch. Both were wooden, and both appeared harmless under careful scrutiny from my ring.

I decided not to hide in the crevasse and instead went to the far side of the room while I readied my swords. If there was a trap and it set off an earthquake or released a swarm of ants or started flooding the room I wanted to be in a position where I could react. It was too easy to imagine the ragged edges of the tunnel simply... closing while I was in it.

Sword Storm III

The doors didn’t stand a chance. I was pretty sure I wanted to go through the one on the opposite wall—that was either south or west—but the I knocked down both just in case.

Both opened into hallways. I peeked the wrong door first, just to make sure nothing obvious stood out to me. It was a dead end. Just 30 feet of corridor moving back to the room I’d come from before ending in a stone wall. It might have been another false end, but it was in the wrong the direction. I could waste time looking for it later if I needed to.

The hall from the other door led both straight ahead and to my left. I’d need to cast North Star to be sure which way I needed to go. Until that point I decided to simply take the path which didn’t end in a door after fifty feet; the left hand path.

This corridor was far longer. Five right angle bends prevented me from seeing its whole length at once. In fact it was so long that one of my fireballs went out as I was reaching the end.

I took a sip from one of my waterskins. My stomach growled. It was starting to get late. My will-o’-wisps from my sword storms still provided me light but the sudden dimming was unnerving.

I’d been stopped just before a flimsy-looking wooden door set (for some reason) thirty feet before the corridor arbitrarily ended in another stone wall. It wasn’t just the doors and the inconveniences, the layout of everything made no sense whatsoever.

Fine, place your room at the end of a 200 foot hall for no understandable reason, but at least end the hall at the door. Or move the door to the corner of the room which you’ve made flush with the wall. Not whatever this was.

I studied the door. And then I studied it some more. Now that I had my fancy ring I wasn’t going to drop dead to yet another easily avoidable dart trap. It was death by volcano or nothing for me.

The door was as safe as any I’d ever seen. I ducked back around the corner just in case while my swords tore through it.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

I spun back round the corridor a moment later, handcannon in hand. What I’d seen of the room had been empty except for a rotten piece of fruit, but if that piece of fruit suddenly moved, I was ready for it.

My remaining fireball and jack-o’-lanterns flew into the room ahead of me, revealing a collapsed ceiling, the aforementioned rotten fruit, and little else. To my left were two more doors, one on the same wall as the door I’d come through, and one on the wall opposite it. The fact that I hadn’t seen the first door in the corridor on the way here, meant the corridor would have bisected the room if it had continued straight through, rather than following its shape.

Madness.

I had no idea which way I was trying to head at this point. I’d need to go back and carve more ‘x’s in the walls to figure out which way south-west was, or wait for the next sunrise to protect my compass.

Until that point, I’d just have to open both doors. I wouldn’t bother checking them for traps this time. My swords could do the checking. If they failed to find anything I’d check with my ring after.

I lined up my swords and then exited the room. Several minutes of crunching and crashing later I returned. If I stood between the two destroyed doors I could observe the space beyond both at the same time. Fireball for the space to my right, jack-o’-lanterns for the space to my left.

To my left was a short corridor which ended in another door.

To my right, the broken doorway opened up into a room. In the room were a trio of lights. Reflections. Three large flaming reflections getting closer. Ruby beetles. And they were angry about their door.

***

I hadn’t been able to stop the beetles before. That was before the dark energies of the fort had doubled their power.

One of my swords winked out, its timer done.

That was also before I’d lost most of my swords.

I brought my two remaining swords around to bear. I had to look at the positives. Two swords would be enough. These weren’t the same beetle as last time. They might be weaker.

I could tell because there was less of them. And because they were uninjur—Positives, Oswic!

They were moving in a straight line. They were—

Surge and spray, they were fast. I barely got my swords in the way in time. Come on will-o’-wisps move!

True Teleport II

I cast the spell in the same instant my swords struck. I couldn’t afford to wait a moment longer, the beetles had only been about thirty feet away and they were as fast as dogs.

I reappeared a mere twenty feet away. I hadn’t had time to get my will-o’wisps into position to light up anything further away. I should have left one behind as backup. I’d gotten sloppy.

Two of the beetles appeared completely uninjured. Not so much as a scratch on the lead one I’d stabbed with my sword.

The third’s head had been split in half. My sword was still lodged in its shell. I must have gotten lucky with the strike, because the blade wasn’t coming out. When I tried to lift my sword free the head came with it, like a log wrapped round a splitting axe. They didn’t seem to have any blood. From the right angle you wouldn’t have even been able to tell the beetle was dead. It looked like it was nodding.

A few seconds to try and fail in retrieving my sword was all I got. The other two ruby beetles noticed me. My other sword was already in position, directly above the back of the closer beetle. It plunged down.

The beetle was flattened.

Not in the bug way, but in the “newborn fawn doesn’t know how to use its legs” way. All six of its legs went in six different directions as my sword skittered across its carapace.

Even now the blades weren’t enough.

My fireball struck the face of the collapsed bug, but did little more than make its head glow.

The second beetle spun a quarter circle on the spot like an unambitious top to face me. Then it charged.

Push IIII

I sent the force straight down onto the beetle’s back. It collapsed mid charge and skidded several feet before stopping.

My sword tugged free. I flew it through the air to strike at the beetle I’d just downed. It struck, and not a moment too soon. Both beetles were rising to their feet, despite the weight pressing down on them. Aside from the initial shock, they barely seemed to notice it.

The blade scraped off the creature’s back once more, but this time it caught one of the still splayed out legs. There was a crack like a pick axe striking home, and the leg shattered at the joint.

The beetle hissed like an armload of marbles being thrown down a hill. The missing leg barely slowed it. My sword, which had been ineffectually pinning the beetle, danced up and back, ready for—

—the sun rose—

—another blow. It was not in the swords’ nature to pin creatures in place. Not unless they were impaled by them.

My best bet was to get close enough to a wall to teleport over. A wall other than the one next to me, for that lead only into the hallway I’d just come from, which the beetles could easily access. I started sprinting for the far corner of the room.

Clothes’ Hanger

I wasn’t going to make it.

☼Sword Storm II☼

The light faded from my spell, but the rune remained. I could still feel it with my ring. Had my protection failed? Or had it done its job?

Three new swords joined the two previous and struck down, knocking the bugs off their feet once more. The crash when they hit the ground wasn’t as loud as the ogre had been, but it was loud.

I was nearly at the wall. The beetles were nearly back on their feet already. I pressed down as best I could with all five swords on the beetle already under the influence of Push III. Once again it didn’t seem to notice my efforts.

How did that make sense?

Maybe if the beetles could lift far more weight than they themselves weighed it would—

I swept my swords around and under the five legged beetle. It didn’t matter how strong you were. If you couldn’t touch the ground, you couldn’t move. Not unless you had—

The swords didn’t quite make it into position under the pounding legs of the beetle. Where its legs impacted the swords they ticked up and over, just like the ones on the previous floors. It didn’t matter. My swords lifted the rear end of the ruby beetle into the air, depriving it of its back three legs. The laws of the natural world still held—

Wings exploded from the beetle’s back. A typhoon of dust obscured the beetle’s form while simultaneously blowing my swords back and the beetle forward.

I was out of time.

My shoulder bounced off the wall (I’d been running sideways to keep an eye on the insects) at the far end of the room. My ring revealed a space beyond which wasn’t a pit, vat of acid, or pool of lava.

Safe TeleportII

I was going to be safe. It was in the name.