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[_DivideByZero_]

Check out the noise.

The passage up ahead is slick with a layer of ice. The air is still and cool, and the light of your torches flickers and fades at will.
The layer of ice is thin at first, only enough to create a slick surface of frost. But as Raioyris heads down, the air grows cooler, and the brickwork under the ice fades into the obscurity of snow. Nearby the door, there are several spilt barrels, and you find a toppled cart filled with food, wrapped in paper.

He comes to a halt in front of a massive door, ten cubits wide and fifty in height. Vertical lines run up and down from the top edges... converging on a centerpiece made from gold, with eight empty sockets that seem to have once held gems, judging from the splinters of crystal left inside each socket.

The gate looks ancient. Rai scrapes a layer of tarnish off the surface, along with frost. But the frost seems relatively new on the door's surface. A keyhole with a nondescript shape blocks entry.

[Egan_BW]

"Sorry, I may have accidentally damaged the beetle. It seems simple enough to rectify, however."

Give Giles the beetle and its battery.

[WunderKatze]

Use mage power to map out the inside of the key slot as best as I can, then if it is mechanical try to use my locus to open it.

[Caellath]

The more Gilles talked to the labyrinth's entity, the more he felt like he needed to do some research. Unfortunately, that had high chances of being ultimately fruitless, and he'd always been a man of action. "Goodbye, Lady." The man had his suit perform a clumsy bow before following behind Raioyris to check for the source of the noise.

"It's ok. Let me see, Solj." Gilles received the bug with the suit's smaller secondary arms and decided to spend some time examining the beetle while Rai checked the door.

Examine the bug and see if it was damaged or the battery can be simply re-inserted. And check for Gilles' former experience with them on whether the robot bugs have enough intelligence to be trained or follow commands if reprogrammed.

[_DivideByZero_]

The Banshee disappears into the shadows; after following Rai, the party discovers tunnels in the ceiling, large enough for Wilbur-sized spiders to crawl through.

The more Gilles talked to the labyrinth's entity, the more he felt like he needed to do some research. Unfortunately, that had high chances of being ultimately fruitless, and he'd always been a man of action. "Goodbye, Lady." The man had his suit perform a clumsy bow before following behind Raioyris to check for the source of the noise.

"It's ok. Let me see, Solj." Gilles received the bug with the suit's smaller secondary arms and decided to spend some time examining the beetle while Rai checked the door.

Examine the bug and see if it was damaged or the battery can be simply re-inserted. And check for Gilles' former experience with them on whether the robot bugs have enough intelligence to be trained or follow commands if reprogrammed.

This thing is ancient. The battery slips into place, and after the short squeal of a capacitor bank charging, the artificial creature is back to crawling around. Or trying to.

Its engineering is different from that of the dungeon crawling spiders. It is less organic, more blocky, and it has a serial number stamped on the bottom. A quick look at the formatting brings a familiar entity to mind: the ancient Monsoon Picoelectronics Corporation. The serial number contains the product number, an identifier pertaining to the species, and a year of production: 3906.

Gilles checks his watch. 4092. Time flies.

Use mage power to map out the inside of the key slot as best as I can, then if it is mechanical try to use my locus to open it.

[3 -> 0] Rai tries to use his locus to pick the lock. Unfortunately, it's just not practical to contort a Locus into such a small space. Not without melting it down... but Locus Alloy has a tendency to bond with other metals. Its melting point is very high, and so it will have melted and alloyed with the surrounding materials by the time it will flow.

[4 -> 2] The lock does have a soul, however. You can just feel the adversarial attitude radiating out of it. By directing his attention to different parts of the lock and gauging the negative reaction, Raioyris is able to identify a distributed locking mechanism inside the door, with lots of open space.

[WunderKatze]

"An adverse lock, great."

[Caellath]

Gilles spent some time distractedly poking the beetle before coming to a realization. They never asked the Lady what was up with that strange thing and with the man they'd found cocooned, and the guy himself seemed a bit unresponsive for the moment. Well, crap. In any case, he had more pressing issues; he'd check that thing again after taking a peek at what exactly was going on with the noises.

"Rai, what's up? Is that lock just mechanical or soul-bound?" he asked, moving closer to take a better look while his suit's manipulation hands stored the bug for later examination.

Put away the bug and check out the door and its lock.

[_DivideByZero_]

Gilles spent some time distractedly poking the beetle before coming to a realization. They never asked the Lady what was up with that strange thing and with the man they'd found cocooned, and the guy himself seemed a bit unresponsive for the moment. Well, crap. In any case, he had more pressing issues; he'd check that thing again after taking a peek at what exactly was going on with the noises.

"Rai, what's up? Is that lock just mechanical or soul-bound?" he asked, moving closer to take a better look while his suit's manipulation hands stored the bug for later examination.

Put away the bug and check out the door and its lock.

Gilles steps up to the door and puts a large hand on it. The massive door creaks somewhat and his suit's weight pushes it forward slightly.

The party hears something trickling down inside the door, like a marble rolling down a series of ramps.

[Caellath]

"I wonder if that's a trap."

Move away.

[_DivideByZero_]

"I wonder if that's a trap."

Move away.

Gilles backs away into some long loops of chain hanging from the ceiling.

The door swings back into place, as if pulled by springs. The sound of its motion resounds throughout the cabin.
Or was that actually the sound of the door? Sounds of metal glancing and scraping off metal can be heard on the other side.

[Caellath]

"Mhmmm."

Check out the loops of chain.

[_DivideByZero_]

"Mhmmm."

Check out the loops of chain.

There are several loops. A number of them seem to have been cut or broken and are lying on the ground in a pile. The remainder are still left hanging, and by pulling down on one end the door can be made to move in the inward direction to the chamber beyond.

[WunderKatze]

"Oh, it has a soul.

But I'm not sure how much of it is actively manipulating the physical lock.

You think there's someone right on the opposite side?"

Try to negotiate with the lock, see if there is a 'why' to it's adverse behavior.

[_DivideByZero_]

Try to negotiate with the lock

It is not in the nature of a lock to make negotiations. It's--
Something slams against the other side of the door.

A piece of the lock inside the door falls and settles to the bottom, clanging against its internal mechanisms on its way down.

At this moment Raioyris puts the pieces together. The keyhole of indeterminate shape, now that he looks at it, seems a lot like a crater. Somebody put a round in this lock a long time ago, and it's been bitter ever since.

...That's at least one of the possible interpretations.

[WunderKatze]

"This lock seems to have been made subject to firepower somewhat recently. Perhaps..."

Try to repair the lock using bits of memory metal using tools created from memory metal.

"... I can repair it.

I mean, I am a practiced surgeon."

Even then... It seems strange for one to repair the lock on a door one is trying to open.