My interest. It is
Sorry in advance if there's any absence over the next couple of weeks. Holidays and all that, wot wot. Anyway, let's see how this wackiness goes...
It's an old story. Adventurer meets dungeon, adventurer explores dungeon, adventurer walks into gelatinous cube because adventurer failed his spot check, adventurer dissolves in acid. But it is not
so; luckily (for a given definition of "luckily...") for Corvin St. Germaine, Principled Knight and Annoyer of Party Members With Decent Night-Vision, his particular encounter with the infamous 10'x10' corridor happened to occur during gelatinous cube mating season.
"But I mean. That doesn't even make sense. It's a gelatinous cube, it doesn't even have the right parts for that," protested Gromak, the party's half-orc barbarian.
"That's humans for you. They'll make a level-adjusted template out of anything that moves. Or doesn't, apparently," replied Arlissa, the elven rogue.
"Can we stop talking about this please?" Corvin asked as he did his best to hold his new daughter in her swaddling cloths, quite the task since she kept squirming and sliding out.
"And that's another thing," Gromak went on. "How do you even have a kid already? You were only in there for like five min--"
And thus the career of Corvin St. Germaine came to an abrupt end, as he settled down to raise his half-gelatinous-cube daughter in the small duchy of Bloodmoot. And since Arlissa and Gromak found the idea of adventuring without their straight man more depressing than they cared to admit, they decided to join him in taking up the NPC lifestyle and help raise little Ariel into the family business.
Naturally, she took after the rogue. Just can't get around those rebellious teenage years, can you?
Room One
As the vision faded, Ariel let out a deep, gurgly breath. "Okay. Waking up in a strange place, don't know how I got here, freaky psychic visions, trap-filled corridors, monsters, riddles... must be Tuesday."
Whistling in the dark aside, traps and dungeons were pretty much her bread and butter. Fighting wasn't really her specialty if there wasn't a handy meat-shield around to distract the baddies while she figured out where their kidneys were, but at least she knew what was coming. That probably evened things out... right?
"...Yeah, right. Because the universe is always so good about balancing things out like that. Tell you what, why don't we try thinking like a thief and break a few rules? Always works in the epics. Except when it doesn't."
That said, she decided on the clever solution to what looked on the surface like a simple problem. If room number one was as similar to room number seven as the vision made it look, then she should be able to cave the roof in and find a tunnel above it. Odds were there was probably a pressure plate or twelve hidden in the room anyway; wouldn't be fun otherwise, right?
And with that pleasing thought, Ariel got to work, searching for any hidden pressure plates that would trigger a cave-in. Failing that, she would scale the walls and look for the weakest areas in the ceiling. In either case, she would either trigger the pressure plate or dislodge the ceiling with controlled use of a carefully placed black powder charge. Naturally, she would leave a long enough fuse that she could get well out of the way of the collapse. No sense in relying on her natural squishiness; she did have vital organs, after all.
Once the ceiling was collapsed, by whatever means, she would scale the wreckage into the tunnel above and proceed past the second room to the ravine.
Room Two
While in tunnel above, Ariel would try to learn what she could about the lever/spikes setup, if the tunnel went through the second rooms mechanical bits, trying to learn what she could about the workings of this place, as that knowledge might very well save her life at some point. Otherwise, the room was pretty well circumvented.
Like a boss.
Room Three
"All right," Ariel said as she emerged onto the ledge. "Not gonna lie, I'm pretty sure that bridge violates a few safety codes. Unless this place was built by shrews, in which case: hey, nice going, shrews. Lucky for me, though, I know two things. One, I've got sticky fingers in more ways than one, and two, my answer for that freaky orb isn't going to be 'heights.'"
And with that charming quip, she proceeded carefully across the thin bridge on all fours, relying on her expert balance and natural stickiness to keep her from slipping off.
Room Four
Yeah, let's keep the internal monologue internal this time. Scary things in the dark can just stay in the dark, thanks. Anyway, maze, right? Follow-the-wall isn't exactly an elegant solution, but it works. Of course, if this is one of those tall-wall-no-ceiling deals, that makes things a lot simpler...
If there was no ceiling in the labyrinth, then Ariel would do the only sensible thing: scale the wall and creep across the top of maze all the way to the exit, avoiding any scary monsters along the way. If there was a ceiling, then she would follow the wall on her right until it either led her to the exit or got a little too close to the freaky noises, in which case she would turn around and follow the opposite wall, repeating ad nauseum until the exit was reached. And just in case she got turned around, she would be marking the intersections with a bit of slime.
Room Five
"Huh. Wonder if we're related," Ariel thought aloud as she looked at the blue sludge coating the cave. "Gurgle bloop bloop jiggle pop gurgle spit fizz hiss?" she asked in the language of her (non-humanoid) ancestors, though she didn't really expect an answer.
After waiting a moment, just in case, she proceeded along to the three monsters.
"Once more into the CR+2 breach... so, I need to fight one of you, right? Those are the only conditions, nothing else? Great! In that case, I challenge you--" she said, pointing to the pterodactyl, "To a game of rock-paper-scissors!"
Shaking her fist twice, then, she threw scissors. "Oh, look at that. Scissors beats paper," she said, making a snipping motion towards the pterodactyl's wings. "Guess I get to pass, then. Be seeing you!"
And with that, she would scramble past the pterodactyl while it was still working out what she was talking about, in case the cleverness which had gotten her this far wasn't actually going to work this time.
Room Six
"Looking good, ladies," Ariel said with a wink to her infinite reflections along the walls, floor and ceiling. The infinite winks back were more disconcerting than they had any right to be.
"Well," she said after a moment. "I've gotta admit, I think I'm at my wit's end with this one. Aside from breaking the mirrors, which would be a shame and probably dangerous, I've got nothing up my sleeve. But hey, you know this place better than I do, right? So one of you classy dames has to know the way out of here."
Clearing her throat, then, Ariel spoke to the reflection across from her. "Mirror, mirror, on the wall, how do I get to the exit hall?"
EDIT: Carrying on, because why not.
Once her reflections had told her how to get out of the room--because if you can't trust yourself, who can you trust, right?--Ariel proceeded to the exit.
Room Seven
Right... The other, other, *other* room with the monsters you don't want to screw with. You know, normally I'd be expecting some kind of long-forgotten treasure in a place like this. A few hundred Henries, maybe, harr harr.
But in all seriousness, there was only one course of action. Or, ya know, two. Depending on how you counted.
Taking a good, quiet look at the wreckage, Ariel tried to find a spot where she could squeeze through; she wasn't a full-blown ooze like her mother had been, and she still had some vital and vulnerable bits, but she could still fit into much tighter spots than your average humanoid. If there just flat-out wasn't any way she was going to get through, though, she would perform a silent coup-de-gras on each of the wolves in turn, then get to work moving the wreckage until she could make it through.
Room Eight
Approaching the bored looking gentleman with the button and the weapon, Ariel flashed her slickest smile and turned on the charm. He didn't appear very impressed.
"Right, right, goods and services. Look, I don't know what a Henry is, so how about I just show you all the stuff that I have and you let me know if you see anything promising. All right? All right."
And thusly, she proceeded to do just that, emptying out her pockets and pouches and digestive cavities and showing the attendant everything she had, constantly keeping up a string of distracting banter. If she did so happen to have something that qualified as a Henry, then fantastic, it was a done deal and she would proceed onwards. Otherwise, once she was past the halfway point with her gear, she would give the button a deft press while he was distracted, leaving some thick slime to keep it in place while she ran for the stairs.
Room The Last
Keeping the Red Orb in her periphery vision, Ariel circled it slowly.
"You know, you're a real pain in the ass, whoever you are. Plucking me out of my life and dropping me into this little rat-race of yours with no explanation and no reward; is that any way to treat a lady? Especially one who knows a thing or two about the Rule of Three? Not that I'm really threatening, mind you, in either the verbal or adjectival senses. I'm just saying, I'm going to find out who you are, eventually. Might want to keep that in mind."
"But in the meantime," Ariel continued. "You want to know what my greatest fear is? It's been running through the back of my mind since I started this little game of yours: dying alone in some dungeon somewhere, uncelebrated, with nobody to find my body or sing at my funeral. Pretty damn scary, if you ask me."
Once the way was open, she would step towards it. But one thing first... "Oh, before I go, though? Thieves don't like leaving empty-handed, and we never leave without getting the last word in. And the word... is yoink!"
With that final taunt, she plucked the Red Orb from its resting spot and bolted towards the exit...
Author
Topic: Amorphous RTD - TURN 1 - THE GAUNTLET (Read 5132 times)