Serious Plots 8: Rawr serisaurus!

[Gullara]

This thread is for the more Serious Plots in Nexus that people don't think really pertain to a particular location.

Rules

1. Use [Location Tags] or [Plot Tags] in your posts.
2. Each location or plot is under the control of its creator.
3. Play nice and keep the drama low. Serious Plots is just a name.

Archive

Spoiler

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Serious Plots 7: Why so srs?
Serious Plots 6: Srs bsns
Serious Plots 5: No lulz.
Serious Plots 4: So Srs it hurts
Serious Plots 3: Too srs for my shirt
Serious Plots 2: SERIOUSNESS OVERWHELMING
Serious Plots

This thread is managed by Gulaghar. He will create the new thread when this one reached 50 pages. Please contact him for updates to the OP.

[Reinholdt]

[Underground Laboratory]

Sophie blinks.

"Oh. I'm sorry. I think I misunderstood why or how you're here. Sorry about this little deception. We're actually shutting this place down, so... you're free to go."

[Underground Laboratory]

Magler eyes Sophie warily. "W-well, the books aren't especially important ma'am. I'll leave you to it and see myself out ma'am." Magler says, walking slowly towards the door. Backwards so he can keep an eye on both of them. Of course if he's allowed to get far enough, the second he's out of sight he'll start running, footsteps slapping against the floor.

[Chaotic Bob]

Spoiler

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Blue City

"If you insist," Needs^*answers, seemingly oblivious to both Affidavit's sarcasm and request for mental projections instead of verbal communication. It could just as easily be ignorance as a deliberate snub, honestly, and there's no easy way to determine which one is in play here. Hold on a second, though. Needs is the one who steps up as commander? Not a Magtok? That's...that's certainly unusual. Magtok would be the obvious choice for this sort of thing, but he doesn't seem rattled or even a little upset by this usurpation, content to just trail behind and grumble about Affy to himself instead. It briefly occurs to him to try to throw a rock down the hall, to see if the wall behind them will suddenly shoot forward and launch them all with it, but that would be beyond stupid, so he doesn't do anything of the sort.

"I will need a lock. If you cannot find one in the room ahea, I will use my own," Needs reports to his two cohorts, his amethyst kite shield shifting once again, molding itself into a lock that will perhaps be further shifted in a few moments, to perfectly accommodate one of the reptilian skeleton keys.

[The Blue City]

Curious how eager this place is to shepherd us, hmm? I wonder if Feia got fed up with her prey stalling for too long before falling into whatever trap she has planned for them. Oh, and on the subject of traps, here's one now!

Because the key-dragon has to be a trap of some sort. They've spent a whole couple of minutes here without something trying to kill them!

As they enter the room, blue-robes takes a moment to scan the walls. Extra dark stone is a little weird, sure, but the primary concern is in making sure there's no magic laid into the walls that's going to activate and zap them all.

Needs, you have a very strange approach to puzzles. I don't think you need to, mmm, make a lock to fit the keys. If you want a door to open, you can always just blast the ceiling until it breaks."

[The Blue City]

For the record, throwing a rock ahead would not actually launched the wall ahead. It stays in lock-step with whoever the furthest behind in the group is.
So it isn't really pushing them forwards so much as preventing them from retreating. A technicality, to be sure, but it's there.

Now, this entire room is a highly magical area, as is likely to be the case with literally every place from here on out. It's Feia-land. Magic is to be expected.
However, it is worth noting that there is very specifically awful magic here.
It crawls like a toxic sludge just below the surface of the ebon walls, running in veins beneath the floor, and congregating in vaguely symbolic patterns on the ceiling above. There's no outwards effect on the room, yet, but it does seem like it's being very carefully restrained by whatever material the room is constructed of.
There is no specific effect here, so much as a conglomeration of everything that could go wrong with anything. Think of something associated with the idea of a "curse" and it lies distilled within the energy beneath. Misfortune, plague, death, stubbed toes, localized vacuum collapses, electronic failure.
A lot of it seems like it is likely to interfere with itself, but that clearly wasn't much of a concern.

Which brings us back down to that key-dragon.
It's very clearly an animate construct, though it hasn't started to stir up until anyone enters the room (at which point its head turns towards them and somehow produces a warning growl).
More interestingly, all of that seething curse seems even more concentrated in the patch of wall most closely located to it.

[Lord Magtok]

The Blue City

"This chamber might be thousands of miles below ground, Affidavit. It may be a single room suspended in a void, connected only through portals. Shattering the ceiling, or indeed, any other proposed sword to the Gordian knot may just kill us faster," Needs points out, politely keeping his contribution to the conversation inside his head this time, instead of speaking them aloud where the skeleton key dragon might hear. "It is too late now, besides. Leaving now would be admitting this pitiful drake is an insurmountable threat for us. Even if we got away safely, our story would be tainted, its preliminary stage marked by flight from adversity at the first sign of danger."

No, we can't have that. We cannot let the mere suggestion of a dragon send us running the other way. A decisive strike is needed, a declaration of will and power in the face of this looming mass of calamity and woe. A revelation, one of many to come on this accursed day of reckoning. To do that, a seal must be broken, and the first of Needs Food Badly's magical veils must be cast aside. The sorcerer bows his head and strides towards the dragon, alone. A familiar black cube finds itself hovering before the sorcerer's hands, clasped tightly together, as if in prayer.

"Do you know what a cleric is, Feiadyne? A cleric is Faith. Faith, and a holy symbol. No more than this is needed," Needs informs the dragon who is obviously not Feiadyne, as memories, promises, oaths, and prayers coalesce into physical form. An orange robe is stained an ugly obsidian; chrome and circuitry are pushed aside by bone and pulsing magical energies, and his carrot-orange iris is marked by a new pupil, a narrow crescent moon like that of a cat. Needs, like all MagClones, was already half-dead before any of this even began. The entire left side of his body was cast aside and tithed to the grave. Now, whether or not it was a deliberate tithing, whether the ceremony's portents and symbolism were intentional, well...that hardly matters. The point is that, whether or not they acknowledge it, each and every MagClone has a very personal and very powerful connection to Death, the first of Libitina's domains. Aside from some canoodling with the goddess herself, none of the clones have ever really done anything with that particular narrative, however. None of them have ever been too keen on anything to do with magic, really.

None of them, save for Needs.

"Inmortui, Averte" the Cleric of Death calls out to the skeletal key dragon, in a voice that pushes back against all the curse and decay it represents, an auditory shockwave reverberating against the confines of this room. That was all of Needs acting upon the dragon. There are no pacts with cosmic cephalopods here anymore, no forbidden tomes or demonic rituals dividing up the MagClone's power across a thousand different sources, giving him countless strings to pull upon but so little raw strength with which to do so. All of the arcane power that Needs once was defined by has twisted and contorted itself into something new, something , something pure. It is this focused will that jockeys with the dragon for dominion of this space, that demands it get thee gone, that it find a way out of this room right now, or be rent asunder by a champion of entropy itself. Die monster, you don't belong in this world.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[The Blue City]

Magic this, magic that, magic magic magic. Oh how frustrating it is to be unable to see this all through his own eyes. How delightful it would be to see it all as it really is, to deconstruct every little piece of supposed magic into that which it really is.

How fun it would be to systematically dismantle all the magic in play here, to reach in and twist the code and strip it of any strength, any harmfulness whatsoever.

If only.

Instead the blue robed figure has to simply stand there and watch and try really hard not to think about how everything Needs is doing is absolutely not magical and-

From an outside perspective it must be quite interesting to observe the soft nullifying field that the blue-robed figure emits, as if their sheer power of disbelief is enough to make any nearby magic start to doubt itself.

Blue very deliberately places himself as far away in the room as possible from Needs and stares at the ground, just in case. Sometimes a little unexpected nudge of disbelief can be just enough to cause a fireball to go awry. We wouldn't want anything like that happening.

I am not suggesting fleeing, Needs. I'm suggesting we skip all this trivial nonsense and carve a direct path across to Feia. Does it matter if we're a million miles undergorund or isolated in total emptiness? We can make our own portals, we can step through any obstacle, we have no need to play her game. If she can see us, she will be watching. She will be amused by this. She will have time to prepare for our arrival.

[Reinholdt]

[Sagittarius Towers --> Elsewhere!]

Fettina waggles her hands and makes an 'ooo' sound so it's clear she knows what 'spooky' means. "Just let me know if something really dangerous comes at us. Dena says I have a 'problem' taking things seriously. And paying attention. This whole new 'bulletproof angel' thing isn't helping either."

Fettina seems pleased that the cat approves of her gear and abilities. She nods in agreement and hustles after him, key-tar bouncing on the strap over her shoulder.

And they're off! But to where?

Why [Gem Mountain] of course!

Once Reinholdt can remember how to get there. They may have quarter-climbed another close mountain by mistake first, but Rein gets it right eventually!

"Hey now, don't dismiss the spooky. I don't exactly remember everything about this place, but I do remember running for my life at least three different times. You are good at running right?" This is an important question. It has played a key role in Reinholdt's successful adventures.

"Waiiit. Are you actually bullet proof?"

[5a Violista]

[Gem Mountain]

As they approach the correct mountain, it should become fairly obvious that they're going in the right direction. The sky gets darker and gloomier, clouds suddenly start to fill the sky, and the air starts to feel more uncomfortable.

Sure, it could just be a coincidence but nearly the same thing happened the last time Reinholdt was here so he could take it as a sign they're going in the right direction.

The mountain itself is, of course, imposing and large. On the side of the mountain is the fairly large cave entrance, shaped very much like a skull with a gaping mouth and eye sockets.

...
So, y'know, standard adventuring fare. No big deal.

[Murkus]

[Gem Mountain]

"Dude, I got wings. Running is for suckers," says Tina. "And yeah, totally! Just hide behind me if things get dicey. I'm not actually sure anything can hurt me like this." Fettina, you have no basis for that statement.

She pays little enough attention to her surroundings that she completely misses the general vibe of the region, but she'd have to have the IQ of a log not to stop when they reach the cave. "Pretty on the nose, but I dig the aesthetic honesty. Also, dude. I am not winded at all after that climb. Maybe I should stay like this, huh?" She offers up a brave grin.

[Reinholdt]

[Gem Mountain]

"That would feel irresponsible of me." To bring Tina out on an adventure and then hide behind her when something goes wrong. Still, if she's as impervious as she says, it's a practical idea at least.

At least he does pay attention to his surroundings, largely from habit. Gotta keep an eye out for ambushes and traps. So when the atmosphere grows darker he is reassured that this is the right direction. A reassurance that is quickly confirmed by the skull of whatever massive earth elemental this mountain cave is carved out of.

However, Rein is not quite like Tina, though he does give her a grin back. "Phew. Well I'm jealous. Let the poor mortal catch his breath, yeah?" Reinholdt doesn't really wait for permission, sitting down for a moment to rest. It gives a good chance to set up and check his gear. Two flashlights with fresh batteries, rope, small tools for questionable activities, loaded pistols, sharp knife, backpack, and one flashbang. He doesn't usually keep his gear out on him like this, but he doesn't trust his hammerspace in this dungeon.

He doesn't really take more than five minutes on this break. Rein stands back up in short order. "Alright. Sorry about that. Let's head in. I'm tired of feeling like it's going to rain on me." Water is the worst! With flashlight in hand, Reinholdt will head to the entrance and peer inside.

[5a Violista]

[Gem Mountain]

The inside of the cave seems pretty straightforward and boring, honestly. Not much going on. The air is very stale and motionless and otherwise breathable.

There's just powdered bone all over the floor in patterns looking like it was blown by a breeze, littered with a couple fresher bones here and there, with some evidence of being gnawed on and snapped - probably by wolves or something. A handful of different sets of footsteps are barely noticeable in the bone dust; some going in, some going out, and some leave the relative safety of the main pathway. A couple of yellow hard hats and a clipboard lie about carelessly. And a battery-powered jackhammer that has no-doubt run out of power because it must've been there for a while.

There are a couple other offshoot paths from the cave, but they look like they probably don't go anywhere and have considerably less bone-dust along their floors.

Regardless, they're headed towards the treasure room that Reinholdt has talked about, right?

Should they follow the obvious path, the [Ballroom] where Rein was told to not look into the mirrors that lined the entire room. The mirrors are shattered still, leaving empty frames and shattered glass all over the floor. The strange green lights that used to light up this room are gone - luckily he brought those flashlights! At the far end of the room is the door (shut, but with their handles still working) leading towards the throne room.

And.
In the center of the ballroom is the stone throne, torn from the throne room and lying sideways on the ground. The back has three empty slots where jewels once were.

If anyone bothers to check, magic and magic items will have a slight decrease in efficiency where they are at.

[Murkus]

[Gem Mountain]

"Poor mortal. One too many adventures? Bones achin' on ya?" Fettina bends next to him, hands pushed into her knees, and winks. "Don't worry, secret's safe with me." She's happy to let him wait, mimicking him and perusing her own gear.

When they finally do get in, the place is a little disquieting, but nothing that stands out as frightening to Tina. She casts her flashlight beam around as they reach the throne. "So, Rein?" She asks in a whisper. "Where's the goodies?"

[Reinholdt]

[Gem Mountain - Ballroom]

"Hmph! I'll have you know, I change this body out every six months. It's impossible for me to get old age syndrome." Or so Reinholdt claims.

On the way in, Rein frowns and will take a closer look at the discarded clipboard. It might give a hint at what construction was going on here. Or it might be just the clipboard without any notes on it. Kind of odd these things were abandoned. Did something scare the construction workers off? Were they eaten? Might be those bones over there.

Well regardless, moving in remains the best choice. "Now what's that doing in here?" Reinholdt moves to throne, running his hands along the grooves that once held the gem sisters. He glances at Tina. "You can't possibly expect goodies already? Next room over has the major fork and the shortcut to the treasure room I really hope isn't one way. There might not be any goodies at all if people have been here already and cleaned it out. Oh and there's like... some really bad fey at the bottom. Might be let loose now. Come on, we just gotta look and see what they've done with the place."

Rein will approach the door leading to the former throne room. He doesn't remember this door being trapped, but just in case, he'll check it over. Particularly for any new additions that might be a trap add on by whoever moved the chair. If he finds nothing, he'll cautiously open the door.

[5a Violista]

[Gem Mountain - Ballroom]

The clipboard that Rein finds has four pages on it. The first two are a printed out email discussing the job and how the company's being hired to map out the region and deliver four specific boxes - along with descriptions of the boxes, and instructions to not open them under any circumstances - to the employer along with general descriptions of where they are found - one in the southwestmost room, one in the treasury room, and the remaining two are found to the North, with one on the same floor as the rest and the other requires going up some stairs to the burial chambers.

The third is a map apparently drawn by one of the workers, drawn on professional paper but a little sloppy because it was drawn while walking around in the dim lighting of this area. There appears to be some collapsed hallways but luckily Rein should be able to tell there's still an open pathway to where the treasury was. Also, to the dungeon but why would he want to go there? (I mean...unless the treasury's door is closed again.)

Spoiler: map

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The fourth page seems to be a tally of work-related accidents that occurred on-site as well as names of the injured and estimates of how much the insurance is going to cover. Nothing really major; a couple of fallen rocks causing bruises on shoulders and arms (but luckily they were wearing hard-hats) and small cuts from random reasons, someone was bitten by an unidentified wild animal, a fight broke out in one of the tunnels, someone claims to have been chased by a gorilla and hit his head in panic, a hallway collapsed while someone was walking through it and it took three hours to dig him out leading to a broken leg and other minor injuries...
...and that's about it, either implying there were no further injuries or what happened was so sudden that nobody bothered to write it out on the clipboard.

Looking around the ballroom doesn't really reveal anything new.
Just shattered glass everywhere and empty mirror-frames. Sure, the glass does cause the light to reflect in strange ways but that's to be expected. Not really that interesting, this room. Just try to not go barefoot, if possible.
Well, maybe there's a shadow or three where it shouldn't be, when list up by the flashlight. But the shadows vanish quickly, so maybe it was just a trick of the light and the mirror shards' reflections.

Anyway.
The throne doesn't respond to Rein's musings.

And the door is not trapped, like it wasn't before. He should find no traps, and the door will open easily (even if it is a little squeaky). Just a hallway behind it. No need to be so cautious! This place is probably practically empty, so where's the danger in being casual?

There's a winding path, and as they approach the [Throne Room] they might notice that it starts to get just barely bright enough that it would probably be okay to turn off the flashlights: in place of the old throne, there's now a new one except it looks ghostly and not-really-physical and glows purple with a mist coming off.
Nobody's sitting in the throne.
If somebody tried to sit in the throne, they'd probably fall through because it doesn't actually look real.

As before, there's three paths branching off from here, east and north and west. As the map suggests, the East path where the treasury is located seems to be blocked off but the map also says that the workers made a detour to that pathway; all you have to do is go north and then turn right and then you're back on track.

[Murkus]

[Gem Mountain - Ballroom]

"What? Dude, it's like you're straight outta my world. How old are you?" Fettina chortles, but she's genuinely interested in a not-so-pushy way. They move to the throne, and she glances around with flicks of her flashlight. "I'm always expecting goodies. I'm just so deserving that they fall right into my lap."

She follows after him when he moves again. 'Really bad fey' seems concerning, but if Rein doesn't feel the need to elaborate, Fettina doesn't care too much. Though... "Hey, if these things are really all that bad, then all the less likely that somebody will have cleared the place out. Win for us!"

The neon gal will keep a watch while Rein checks the door. She's not terrible at observation when she's actually focused on it. She attaches her flashlight to the bottom of what looks for all the world like a retro-style raygun.

[Reinholdt]

[Gem Mountain - Throne Room]

"Yeah? What's your world like?" Reinholdt ends up shrugging. "I have absolutely no idea how old I am. Time's based on some constant right? It holds up so poorly when you hop through dimensions. And then spending time in the void between dimensions. That doesn't even count the deaths, resurrections, clones, and shape changing. Like... Do I include the period where I was a sword?" Reinholdt throws up his hands. "And then there's the Nexus itself. It's either been ten years or three. If you'd force me to guess I'd say I'm... nineteen." Reinholdt is a terrible guesser and it's probably on purpose.

"Deserving huh? Or will you just take anything that falls in your lap?" Rein smirks at her a little. "But you may be right about how clear the place is. One way to find out."

Traveling to the throne room is a good start. Rein turns off his flashlight for now to conserve batteries. "That's new." Reinholdt says, nodding at the spectral chair. "I heard this place used to belong to the Skeleton King, but he was defeated. Do skeletons become ghosts when they die?" Maybe it goes human -> zombie -> skeleton -> ghost. But that's only four lives. Nine is still superior.

He consults the map again. "Looks like we're going to have to make a detour. Whoever came before us was planting some boxes in four locations. Do you want to hunt those down or go straight for the treasure room? Cause we could swing by this room in the bottom left first. I've never been there." Rein leans over to Tina and points it out.

[5a Violista]

[Gem Mountain - Throne Room]

As Fettina looks around, she'll mostly see evidence that people were here at one point, like maybe a year or two ago but obviously aren't here anymore. Besides, of course, the occasional misplaced shadow, there's really nothing to note.
She is correct, however!
Since this place is so dangerous, there's still definitely lots of treasure everywhere for them to find.

Rein is probably also correct, skeletons become ghosts and ghosts can't sit on the same throne as before so that's why they threw out the old one.

Exits are North, West, South. ;p

If they choose to examine the north and west doorways before deciding which way to go, they'll notice the following:
Sure, they're both a little dusty but just like the room they're in, there's evidence that the last people in this place went through both paths frequently.
The west path appears to lead to a hallway lined with unlit torches and some of those large-and-bright construction lights that allow construction workers to work at night, along with extension cables (but the construction lights are out and not working at the moment; presumably, the generator they're attached to hasn't been used in quite a while). On the hallway floor there's also a voodoo-esque doll, surrounded in a chalk circle and with 'caution, men at work' tape around it.
On the other hand, the north path (although it has a door, the door is stuck open) leads to a room lit partially by the glow of the throne and partially lit by torches. The torches are pretty dim, however; just a faint glow comes from them. The room (at least, what they can see without getting closer or going through it) appears to be either a study or library of some kind, judging by the shelves and the desk.

[Murkus]

[Gem Mountain - Throne Room]

"Just a planet full of people who are scared of being ugly first and of dying second," Fettina says, a little more morosely than she meant to. "...Not that you're scared of those things. But I guess isn't everybody?"

She grins at his spouting off. "Man, I really picked the right guy to help with this whole problem I'm having, huh? You've really lived it. Seen it all." She glances down. "Except what happens to skeletons when they die, I guess. Hell, I dunno. How do you get elected skeleton king in the first place?"

"Sure, we can hit up the bottom-left room. I've always been a fan of starting at the bottom," Fettina says, straight-faced. "And I don't mind seeing those boxes before we go straight for a 'treasure room'. Sounds like trap city." The angel flashes her light from exit to exit. "Which way, tiger? Skip creepy doll maybe?"

[Reinholdt]

[Gem Mountain - Throne Room]

"Being terrified of death around every turn is half the thrill of dungeons." Gotta get that adrenaline fix. He shakes his head though. "I've seen a lot, sure. In dusty tombs and trapped pyramids and other dark corners of the soul. It's the social scenes I'm lacking in. Not nearly enough to have 'seen it all'. I've never seen a snake dance before Dena. Or those light chairs of yours," Reinholdt says, giving just as a few examples. "Certainly no one with as delightful a figure as yours either."

"I'm reasonably certain they elect a skeleton king by putting their best bones in a pile and using those to make him." It's as good a system as any.

Rein tilts his head towards the west passage. "This way. And agreed. It's already super sketchy of us to check out these boxes. I don't want to add messing with voodoo dolls to the list unless absolutely necessary." Rein will start down west passage, doing what he can to walk around the cordoned off doll, though he will take a closer look once he's near it. Just in case it reminds him of anyone he knows.

[5a Violista]

[Gem Mountain - Throne Room => Southwest Room]

The doll is actually pretty bare-bones. There's not all that many identifying features about it, so it's doubtful the average person would recognize it. Sure, it's only got one eye - the other must've fall off at some point in the past, the doll is pretty old, after all - and the eye's a faded red. Not...really too many more details about it.

The hallway is pretty boring, to be honest. Since they ignored the doll, nothing spooky happens as they go down the hallway towards the southwest room.

Imagine a cutesy and brightly-colored bedroom of a cute little girl.
Now, instead of a cute little girl, replace it with one of those dead-eyed possessed girls from a horror movie.
Now, instead of a bedroom, imagine that someone took a jackhammer to the walls and then tried retrofitting it into the break room of a construction site.
Knock everything over like a whirlwind went through it.
And fill it with skeletons. Not, like, the kind of lively skeletons that would have voted for the skeleton king. Instead, just normal human-like skeletons of people who probably were part of the construction crew and then died somehow. Bones picked clean, and maybe a little singed like maybe they caught on fire or something of that sort. Hardhats still on, of course.
That's what this room looks like.

There appears to be a large manmade hole in the wall that presumably will bring them back to the entrance of the cave, as the map suggests.

Actually, since they were wondering about the boxes: there is, in fact, a box. It's dark red, with gold trim, and is roughly the size of a breadbox. It has a similarly-colored lid, and is tipped on its side. And its lid has been removed and is lying on the ground, meaning the box is open.
If they choose to look inside, it has what appears to be fresh blood on the inside.

This mish-mash of rooms has some pretty interesting furniture. A bright-pink bed with floral patterns. A worn-out couch and a water cooler. A desk with a greenish night-light (that is still working) and construction lights (that are not powered) and a small gas-powered generator. Some creepy drawings mixed in with construction documents that say similar things to what Rein found earlier. And so on.
All-in-all, it's a pretty fun and visually exciting room.

[Murkus]

[Gem Mountain - Southwest Room]

"Hah. Stick with me, flatterer. I'll make a social butterfly of you. Just like me, eh?" Fettina favors him with a wink as they skirt around the doll. His theory on the skeleton king seems sound, so she says no more on the subject.

The chrome gal takes in the new room with her usual nonchalance, not one to be put off by a few skeletons and a box formerly full of blood. She cans around with the torch Rein provided, one hand placed rather seriously (if a little unprofessionally) on the butt of her raygun.

"So Rein. Fill me in on the dead crew. Were they here the last time you were? What the hell were they doing?" Fettina scans 'round. Unless something ghastly pops out at them, she won't object to moving on to scan the other rooms. What's up with Little Susie Sadist's bedroom decor? Do you know who used to live here, maybe? This doesn't make me think of... fey stuff."

She will try one thing before they meander on. The desk with the nightlight. Might as well check if it has any drawers or compartments to search, and see if it looks like the crew left it or if it's... older.

[Reinholdt]

[Gem Mountain - Southwest Room]

"Social butterfly huh? Is that where I'll get my wings?" Rein gently brushes against Tina's wings as if they were born from her own extroversion. "Mine better shimmer."

Reinholdt takes a long time looking around from the entrance before stepping into the room. "No no, the fey are imprisoned on the sixth floor down, past the immortal gorillas. This room may have belonged to one of the gem girls who lived on the upper floors before I arrived. Two of those died and one lives with her dad elsewhere now. I wonder if she ever got her body back?" Rein frowns for a moment before continuing. "But the construction crew was definitely not here back then. So they showed up after I did and you've got as much idea as I do about why they were here. If I normally had to make a guess, I'd say they pissed off whoever was living here by trying to remodel."

The treasure hunter walks forwards a bit before kneeling down to look at the tipped over box. "But that wouldn't make sense if this room did belong to one of the gem girls. So they probably died because they opened the bo- W-wait. This blood's fresh. What?" There shouldn't be fresh blood in the box. How creepy. What were these boxes supposed to do?

Rein slips his hands in his pockets and pulls out a pair of sturdy leather gloves. He slides them on before he gently tries to turn the box back to a standing position and replace the lid on top of it.

[Morty]

[Crossroads - the Quest Begins]

The King in Rags will have instructed Damon and Ilpholin to meet at a crossroads, some way away from Riverside. They are to meet up there and receive further directions. The crossroad is fairly lonely, having once been important but fallen into disuse over time. Now only rare travellers go through here, or people who would rather not be seen. A crude wooden sculpture of a wailing figure in chains stands next to the crossroads - carved by someone as penance for a sin no one remembers now.

[5a Violista]

[Gem Mountain - Southwest Room]

The box is righted and closed.
Shortly afterwards (but probably for an unrelated reason) a gentle breeze picks up, blowing southward from the door into the room. The air that's blowing in feels...stale. Slight hint of charcoal. Also, a little humid and sticky.

Also, you know that feeling you get when somebody's watching you? They both will probably get that feeling, coming from the north-by-northeast direction. Or maybe the north-by-northwest direction; it's hard to tell, with feelings like this.

The desk, as Fettina searches its various drawers and secret compartments, will find basically what you'd expect in a room belonging to a girl like this: more drawings like the ones on the wall, regular little-girl drawings including one presumably of her family (a mom and a dad with crowns on, with two little girls between them, and some other presumably male adult off to the side) and of her home, which is a castle, and...and so on. Also, a dagger taped to the underside of a drawer, an old black notebook filled with names and other miscellaneous info detailing how and when people died, some rocks, some vials filled with long-dead plants and flowers, and a diary with a low-quality lock (with a key attached to the spine) filled with various plans for taking over the world and becoming its ruler.

So, y'know, pretty normal things.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Crossroads]

Damon arrives more-or-less on time. After a quick glance around to confirm that there's no one else conveniently waiting around yet, he sits down just off the road in a ring of black fire, contenting himself in the darkness it generates around him.

That ought to be a fairly obvious sign for Ilpholin. Not many people who just casually sit around in darkness-generating black fire.

[Reinholdt]

[Crossroads]

Ilpholin does not actually arrive on time. It's most unlike her. When she does arrive, she looks very much like a normal nymph with purple hair and emerald eyes. As most people know her.

A moment of contemplation is given to the crude sculpture before Ilpholin approaches the ring of black fire. Curious. Flames that produce the opposite of light. "Damon I presume? Sorry I'm late. I was feeling particularly ill this morning."

[Murkus]

[Gem Mountain]

"Can't you already fly, knucklehead?" Fettina says, poking him with the tip of her wing as he moves away. She's kind of surprised he's messing with the blood box - and a little unnerved that he's unnerved by it - but she doesn't let it get to her too much for now.

"This place has quite a history," Fettina comments as she tosses the desk. She takes the dagger and the family drawing, then glances in the diary. The neon girl emits a snort of approval. "Girl's got goals. Wherever she is now."

Then comes that feeling. Fettina gets wary. "...Maybe we oughta move on. You feel that too, Rein?" She flicks her light around. "Think that's the immortal monkeys or the evil fairies?"

[Reinholdt]

[Gem Mountain]

"Pfft, well yes, but it's not as cool as wings." Good for not accidentally bumping into corners though. Wings are rough like that.

Rein shivers and stands up straight. "Uh, yeah, I do feel it. I don't think it's either of those creatures unfortunately. Something else probably. Something hot." Rein thinks for a moment, stepping back towards the north. "Dragon perhaps. Elemental. Demon. Any ghost that also is on fire. Leaning towards demon. Old fashion fire and brimstone kind. That's the feeling I'm getting anyways." They could sit in a spectral throne, heat up the dead air in the dungeon, and watch them from afar while also needing blood boxes disturbed.

"Regardless, I think you have the right idea. Let's keep moving and head to that library." Returning through the voodoo doll passage to throne room and then north from there to the area with the books. It might be in the same direction as the presence that's possibly watching them, but it's also the most reasonable place to go according to the map. Everything branches off from there.

"Do you know how to check for traps Tina?" Rein asks as they walk.

[5a Violista]

[Gem Dungeon - West Wing]

Their way back to the throne room is uneventful. The breeze probably feels nice, in spite of the humid, charcoaly, stale smell. As they walk, it continues to feel like the breeze is coming from the direction they are heading.

I feel like dungeons like these are always easier to enter than to exit.
...just a feeling I have.

As they travel back to the throne room, they may notice that, against all odds...
...the voodoo doll has not moved. It has remained motionless.

The ghostly throne is exactly the same as it was before the went west. They'll have no trouble heading to the
North Wing - Study.

The room is, in fact, a study and not a library, as evidenced by the desk in the middle of all the bookshelves.
There's a bunch of books, mostly boring. The selection is pretty much what you'd expect in the library of a medieval-era castle, with books in various languages, atlases, books about plants, religious texts, political documents, more religious texts, books on magics and alchemy...etc. As it's behind the throne, it's likely very few people historically used this room, besides royalty and trusted aides.

It's likely they still don't need their flashlights, due to the dim torches and the light from the throne.

Makes one wonder why the craziest and most destructive gem-girl was in charge of this area.

So, question.
Besides the doorway they went through to get into the study, there's three ways out of this room. And they're unblocked with no cave-ins or anything. So why did the explorers only map out one (to the east) but leave the two northward exits unexplored? Especially because supposedly two of the boxes they were looking for are said to be to the north?

There's actually a relatively easy explanation.

To the east, there's a single room, also lit by torches. It looks pretty relaxing, and (from their position in the study) looks like it could be the castle's Solar - or, in other words, basically a private sitting room. There's some sort of texture on the walls, but it's too far away (and the lighting too dim) to see properly. So, that's somewhere they would likely go, especially to drill a tunnel into the east wing.

On the other hand, the two unmapped northward paths are...not good.
The path on the left is lit by torches, but that only makes it worse - because you can see corpses (not just skeletons) of workers littering the hallway. (Odd how that went unmentioned in the incident report.) And whenever neither Rein nor Fettina are looking directly down that hall, you could swear there was movement or twitching...though, that could be entirely explained by the torches casting moving shadows.
Plus, the breeze is coming from that direction, which would explain why the torchlight is moving, causing moving shadows.
The northward path on the right leads to an unlit stairway which leads upwards. The air around the stairwell reeks of death.

So that's why.

It would be really nice if they could just run into a tour guide to explain everything to them, because I'm sure everything has reasonable explanations.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Crossroads]

Damon stands up, a wave of his hand causing the black fire to swirl around him. Makes it rather hard to get a look at him - those who can't see through darkness just see, well, darkness. Those who can just see a lotta fire.

"Sssicknesss?" He hisses curiously. "Sssomething you sssuffer from regularly? That would explain why I am to asssisst you."

A single black not-flamey hand extends from the darkness, offered to Ilpholin. "Well, whatever the reasson for my asssisstance, I asssume the king gave you directionss?"

[Reinholdt]

[Crossroads]

That's a lot of darkness and fire. What oddity did the King in Rags have join her? Ilpholin accepts the hand offered with her own and shakes. "Temporarily regular I'm afraid. Morning sickness passes quickly enough at least." It shouldn't hold her back in this endeavor.

"He provided instructions, but not directions. I was told to come here and wait for more."