We all gathered in the Tanis kitchen, the door of the dungeon waiting before us. I double checked my cloak, the potions within rattling as if to confirm their presence. Around me the others seemed to be nervous, especially Thalia to my surprise, but then again, she had been sneak attacked and almost got hit by the poison arrows, it just happened that Liora and Kaelen were faster than her. As we stood by the door, i grabbed my bag and pulled out the 6 potions of vigilance.
"Everyone takes one, and drinks it before we go in, the effects last for an hour and make it so it's harder to surprise us by sneaking up."
Handing them out, everyone took their potion as I gathered the vials again and put them in my bag. We took a moment to look between each other before we reached for the door, one by one breaking down into sparks as we were whisked away to the dungeon.
From the first dungeon, I had expected dim and cramped hallways again with ancient brick, but instead the dungeon was fully illuminated with metal panels layering the wall. In front of us a wall seemed to mark a tunnel left and right. Glancing back to the others Kaelen who was holding an unlit torch started to put it away as Liora shrugged.
"Guess this one has better lighting."
We walked to the end of the hallway where the paths divided, Jax, Liora, and Kaelen were closer to the right while Selene, Thalia, and I were closer to the left.
"D-Don't the monsters only appear when the items are disturbed? Why not just explore for now."
Selene asked, looking to everyone else trying to see if they agree. We all nodded as an agreement was made, Selene, Thalia, and I would go left, while Jax, Liora and Kaelen would go right. I reached into my bag, grabbing the 3 antidotes and 3 healing potions to pass to Jax, Kaelen, and Liora. They nodded as they started down their hallway and we did the same.
The hallway itself was rather short, no longer then 10ft or so before turning and curving to the right where we could go either left or straight from the turn. Selene who was leading up started left where we were met by another similar hallway to the entrance, with a wall and two hallways left and right. As we continued, I let Thalia and Selene go ahead as I took my spear and began to mark the tunnel behind us.
Heading forward, Selene seemed to be following a popular philosophy among adventurers for dealing with mazes, it was even brought up in the 7 stars book series called the rule of left. If your in a maze, always go left, you will eventually find your way at minimum back to the entrance. Following that rule we ended up making our way down another hallway and turning left to see lights around a bend to, you guessed it, the left. Walking around thee bend we saw a strange room before us.
It was very mechanical, with the hum of what seemed to be a strange engine below us as part of the floor panels turned to grated catwalks and let us see into a massive carbuncle engine. On the walls several tubes seemed situated with strange mechanical things beyond them, a set of gears seemed to be spinning, almost like they were massive windup toys. For now, they seemed inert and silently sat in their pods.
"Welp, we found at least one, if not two of the items."
Thalia said pointing back towards the right of the doorway we had walked in. Sure, enough two simple wooden chests sat, contrasting against the mechanics of the rest of the dungeon and especially of the room around them. We all looked to each other with a collective agreement to leave them be for the moment, while grabbing them wouldn't have been too problematic, the biggest issue would have come from the lack of half our team to have a proper fight, especially if there were two items, and we accidentally attract two swarms of enemies at once. So instead, we continued to look around the room.
Selene seemed drawn to the pods themselves as she looked inside and around the mechanism with a curious expression. Thalia on the other hand was hanging from the catwalk and inching towards the large engine below as if trying to study it. I however was drawn to something different. Across the room there was a bronze colored panel with a blue glowing glass. Stepping up to it the glass changed, almost like the system screen as it showed 3 options.
Notes log - last entry updated 3 days ago
Production list
Higher clearance login
Looking trough the options I wasn't sure exactly what to select, so I went down starting from the top. I tapped my finger to the Experiment log as the screen shifted to what seemed to be a large message
Log 231 - March 12 5328
Login info: Dr. Einwright
I am well aware of the approaching war and what it means, especially with what is at stake, but they are running me ragged here! They wanted me to upgrade the Sutar units to be able to hunt down the masks, NOT EVEN THE DAMN ELEPHANT AND HIS WHOLE GROUP COULD ACCOMPLISH THAT, WHAT THE HELL ARE A BUNCH OF PARTIALLY BIOCYBERNETIC SOLDIERS SUPPOSED TO DO THAT THE STRONGEST OF THE WORLDS CANNOT. I am a damn good scientist, but that's too high a hurdle I'm supposed to jump here. If it wern't for the assistance of the Acadia kingdom's massive treasury and collection of materials and items, I would have refused on principle. I'm in too deep now so I have to at least try, but I will promise nothing, I just hope the fact that they are gathering the fateless doesn't mean they plan to replace me.
Update - edits made: August 5 0016
I always knew that Mammon and his group were headstrong, but the fact that they have not given up is ludacris. They lost the first war, and 4 of the worlds were destroyed in the process. What in the hells can they believe they are going to achieve by trying again with a second war!? I have refused to participate this time, because frankly I don't want to draw the Ire of Red again.
While I had been reading, I had been confused, this seemed almost like a journal about something thousands of years ago, the worst part is since the gods step down and are replaced every 10,000 years, I have no Idea of this is almost 5000 years old, or 15000, 25000, or more. However, what truly made my blood become ice and my face drain of blood so much I could feel my face chill despite the comfortable temperature of the dungeon was the mention of that man.
He was a story every child knew, the masked man who was more of a walking calamity than a man, there are legends of entire kingdoms he destroyed because he didn't like the flavor of a pastry he tried at a cafe. The kingdoms couldn't even stop him if they wanted too, and gods know they have tried.
Some believe he is the king of hells himself, others believe he is a vengeful god who didn't want to give up their position and now wanders the world, but what made him terrifying was that he was sporadic and chaotic, in one moment he would flick his hand and skin you on a whim, in another he walked into a kingdoms castle, grabs their entire treasure vault on his shoulder and hands it to an orphanage. There are even rumors that he recently became a teacher at the omnimagic academy.
However, there was always a reason you never said his name aloud, because despite nobody knowing how, he always knew when someone said his name, and if he was bored, he might even stop by. Selene and Thalia seemed to notice my expression as the two rushed over to me.
"Aiden, what's wrong, what happened?"
Thalia asked, her strings ready to act as a garrote wire.
"T-T-This place has something t-to do with the smiling mask."
Selene and Thalia froze, not moving even so much as an eyelid, as their own faces drained of color.
"I-I'll get t-the others, w-w-we need t-to get out of h-here."
Selene said rushing towards the hallway as I forced myself to continue reading the message.
I am currently hiding with a friend Mr. L in Misagen, I won't participate in another war. If you are of the sons of blue, don't look for me, I refuse to serve you in this war anymore, if you are of the masks, I plan to avoid this war and hold no part. Please leave me alone.
As I finished reading my mind was racing. What war, there was a war that red participated in, that would have been etched into every history book for the next 100,000 years, he has never participated in any wars, did he silence everyone who knew, are we now marked for death because we know? What is a son of blue?
As my mind raced Selene came back with the others as Jax seemed confused, but Kaelen and Liora were pale faced knowing what this was.
"Guys, I still don't get why we have to leave so quickly, there aren't even any monsters awake yet, plus we haven't even gotten any items."
Liora seemed to be trying to tell Jax that the less he knew, the less he would be likely to make the mistake of saying the forbidden word while thinking of things other than the color. Jax seemed to be starting to argue, but as he looked to where Thalia's normal stoicism was replaced by panic he seemed to pale, realizing something was terribly wrong.
We all sprinted towards the entrance of the dungeon with a speed that felt like a snail's pace. We needed to run, to get in the vehicle and drive away to a different kingdom, not a different continent, we needed to escape. We went around the corner, running for the doorway, but as we ran the world seemed to slow down to a crawl, every step felt like 100 years as I saw true fear, a small stream of sparks started to form from above.
Red has entered the dungeon Vault of the Mad Mage