Chapter 28 Tension #2
“I like the spirit,” Sasha said, nodding in approval.
Marq shuddered, despite being the largest and strongest of the bunch. His cheeks paled beneath his shaggy facial hair. “Please, let’s not talk about spirits.”
“Everyone, welcome to the Dinniman Dungeon!” Ming announced.
“Kriqir’s crummy outpost,” Sasha said. “Keep an eye out for orcs. They tend to explode around our darling Main Character.”
Rolling her eyes, Em took the lead. She wove them deeper into the underground passageways of the outpost. The tunnel system widened, the ceiling vaulting overhead, the stones carved with jagged emblems or geometric patterns, and stray skeletons hiding in the eroded earth.
Shadows swayed in time with Sasha’s or Ming’s movements, always a step ahead of the party as they explored further into the catacombs.
The stillness, silence, and sense of abandonment clung to everything.
Em began to doubt that Kriqir kept orc troops or an outpost this far beneath the swamp.
An irritating, faraway drip plucked along a puddle somewhere, the only sound beside the clinking of their armor or weapons against their tense bodies. If there were any ghosts in the tunnels, they were elusive and never showed face.
“You sure you know where we’re going?” Em couldn’t help but ask Ming after another bend around a corner led to more length of empty tunnel.
“There haven’t been any forks in the path, so I assume there’s just one way for us to go… forward,” Ming said, chewing on a fingernail in thought.
“I could get lost going from my kitchen to my bed in my apartment,” Jane giggled to herself. “Maybe we should’ve brought a GPS.”
Harry sneezed.
A whiff of foul, meaty odor filled Em’s nose.
Sasha drew her knives, leather sheath singing against metal blades.
“Orcs,” she spit into the dirt.
“See?” Ming said. “Told you.”
Em’s stomach shriveled.
“Not to interrupt your adventuring, but I would find it helpful to inform you that the region you’re about to enter is designed for a more advanced party,” Inky sang out from Em’s pocket, startling her.
She swallowed back her gasp, tugging the journal and feather pen from her skirts, fumbling with the pages to inspect the scene playing out across the pages.
“Your intern Secondary Characters may find themselves overwhelmed soon if you do not seek out aid from the absent members of your plotline.”
Despite the pen’s warnings, nothing read unusual in the descriptions rolling across the blank pages.
“We’ll be fine, thanks.” Em snapped the book shut again. If she could make an army of orcs explode in Mercer Village, she knew she possessed the power to transform any scene to go her way.
“Look!” Jane pointed ahead.
They entered a new chamber, the muddy ground turning into solid rock. Like a giant chess board, a large grid of stones lay out before them, arranged in random colors of blue, green, or red.
Em barely touched her toes on one of the stones. The hissing click of the hidden pressure plate responded as it sank beneath her weight. She shot a glance at her interns, already predicting the entire sequence internally. “Check out the walls.”
“There’s some sort of mural…” Ming said.
“It’s a typical pattern puzzle,” Sasha grumbled.
Without glancing at the grid, the dryad danced about the floor sequence, muttering the color order displayed loud and clear on the walls around them.
With each click and sigh, the pressure plates latched into place as Sasha wove her way across the chamber.
None of the obvious hidden booby traps were triggered by the agile dryad—the holes in the ceiling for bolts, the armed statues along the walls, or the hidden cracks beneath the wrong color choices that no doubt led to deadly falls.
Sasha reached the other side of the board, perfectly intact. She gave a dramatic bow in response to the gawking interns across the dungeon. A low rumble released a hidden door on the wall behind her, opening to the next passage.
“How did you do that?” Ming scrambled to catch up to the dryad.
“This is not my first dungeon, sweetheart,” Sasha waved the mentor-in-training’s excitement away.
The rest of the party followed. Marq tried stepping on the wrong tile, but Harry tugged him back onto the proper path.
“You’re not dying today, Marq,” the vampire said.
“Drats,” the barbarian grumbled.
Em took up the rear, barely glancing at the amateur puzzle.
This is all you’ve got? she thought to her shitty plot. Even with her new cast of Side Characters and without Stephanie’s awful writing, it was all so damn predictable.
The next passageways were no better. Next came the typical light reflection puzzle.
The interns scattered about the room under Sasha’s orders and arranged the silvery beacons’ rays of light toward various mirrors along the walls, allowing a pile of shimmering crystals to bask in the cool glow. Once again, it opened another doorway.
“How beautiful!” Jane breathed at the pinkish hue of the towering gemstones.
Sasha just tugged on the nursing student’s arm. “C’mon, let’s not waste time, girlie.”
“This is fun!” Ming said, likely just trying to keep the party’s spirits up.
Em didn’t bother assisting her team. Instead, she racked her mind and surveyed Dinniman’s Dungeon for anything unique or original hidden in the ruins along the stony walls or within the looming shadows. But as always, she was left with bitter disappointment and a list of tropes.
She didn’t budge as Sasha showed the interns how to properly crank and rotate half-crumbling statues into just the right direction to unlock the next door.
Or worry as everyone else pushed and shoved on large rocks about a thigh-high maze into matching ruins along the slick floors.
By the time they entered a fourth puzzle chamber with nothing but an empty slot on a pedestal for a magical artifact, Em was numb.
Inky’s previous warning about the dungeon being too difficult for her interns made no sense. This had to be as cliché as every other sequence she’d suffered through.
This sucks. Em massaged her temples.
“It’s long, and it’s pointy shaped.” Sasha’s tone ground with exasperation.
The interns bickered about which magical artifact from the dozens of chests throughout the chamber would fit into the slot.
The dryad’s amber eyes stared at Em, begging like an exhausted schoolteacher in need of a break.
“You going to do anything, sweetheart?” Sasha snapped. “You’re the one who wanted us to sneak into this outpost in the first place.”
“Yeah, sorry.” Em dragged her feet to join the others in the center of the room. She examined the various potion bottles, gemstones, and enchanted weapons her interns held out to her. Apparently, they hadn’t found the right artifact to unlock the puzzle yet, despite their argument.
“Long and pointy…” she mused.
“Maybe it’s not any of these?” Ming offered, way too jittery and excited for this boring drag of a puzzle. “Should we circle back to the other puzzles and see if we missed something?”
“It looks like a dagger should go in there,” Jane said, holding out the amethyst, rusted knife she’d found.
“That’s too long,” Harry complained.
“Let’s try it anyway.” The blonde girl tried shoving the knife into the slot, but nothing clicked into place.
“Clearly we need to keep searching.” Sasha rolled her eyes.
“She’s right,” Ming said. “Let’s check any of the crates and barrels we haven’t dug through yet.”
“Oh, my chest hurts,” Marq moaned, clutching at himself.
“Quit dying, Marq, and help us out,” Harry snapped, dragging the barbarian after him as the interns all split up to hunt throughout the room again.
Sasha stood with her hands on her hips, glaring and tapping her foot impatiently as she watched the new adventurers struggle to find a solution to the puzzle.
Em bit her lip. This was wasting her intern’s precious energy, and she needed them to be in an optimal state when they finally infiltrated Kriqir’s outpost. Especially if the tantalizing, growing stench of orc said anything about how many enemies awaited them at the end of the dungeon.
“Maybe we need to combine some of the artifacts?” Ming called out from across the chamber.
“Obviously!” Sasha threw her hands up in exasperation.
Fuck it. Em dug her journal and Inky from her pocket and wrote: “All of the puzzles in the Dinniman Dungeon solved themselves, allowing a clear, uninterrupted path for Em’s party to reach Kriqir’s outpost.”
With a groaning rumble, the pedestal’s slot unlocked itself. The door at the end of the chamber rolled open, as did the one in the next passage, and the next. A
A beam of light at the end of the long tunnel flickered to life, cutting through the murky dimness of the dungeon.
“How did you…” Ming’s exclamation was cut short.
“Oh, my chest!” Marq complained again. He toppled against the barrel he’d been scrounging through, sliding down onto his knees in the dirt. His head sank forward, chin to his collarbone, as he let out a low groan.
“Get up.” Harry kicked at the barbarian. Even while kneeling, Marq was taller than the vampire. “Quit dying, you’re wasting our time.”
Marq crumbled into a heap on the ground, writhing.
“Marq!” Harry aimed to kick him again, but Jane cut in, blocking him.
“No, stop,” the blonde girl said. Her blue eyes widened as she dropped beside the twitching, moaning barbarian. “He’s seizing up! It isn’t a joke this time…”
“Shoot!” Ming ran across the chamber. She struggled to help Jane roll the brawny barbarian into a recovery position. The muscles along the barbarian’s arms spasmed, fingers twisting into clawed hooks, and his eyelids fluttered.
Em’s throat clenched as she watched the interns attempt to relieve their friend.
“What in Novella did you do?” Sasha demanded, shooting her a glare.
“Nothing!” Panic lumped in Em’s throat as she read and reread the words she wrote to be sure. “I just unlocked all the other passageways!”
“Well, can’t you do something about him?” Sasha asked.