Matthew Nesheim
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Chapter 82: The Silver Door
🕑 Added 2023-09-07 17:00:01 +0000 UTCA tremor shook the cavern. Oh great, the place is going to break apart. I suppose Blake just thought to himself, ‘If I can’t have it, no one can.’ She wondered briefly about the kobolds and the two trolls Smith and Smithey, but then she reminded herself that they weren’t her problem right now. Getting herself out alive was.
She bent down to check Severin’s corpse. If she was going to die here, she was at least going to die a rich woman who had just looted the corpse of her ex’s arch-mage avatar. However, no sooner had she stooped down to check Severin’s inventory than Lefty appeared at her side, grabbed her, and lifted her to her feet. “What are you doing? We don’t have time for that right now.”
In response, a shower of rock pelted their bodies as a boulder the size of a small car smacked into the stone near the cavern wall, leaving a crater.
Calista gave a desperate look to Lefty, “I’m robbing his corpse.”
“But why?” Lefty ducked as another tremor shook the cavern. Above, a thundering crack sounded against the ceiling. A moment later, another massive rock fell and smashed onto the floor not fifty feet from where they stood.
Calista snapped, “Because he’s my cheating ex, okay? Because if you think I went through all this shit for no loot, you’re crazy. That’s why.”
Lefty answered, “This whole place is about to … I don’t know, break apart or explode or something and if we don’t start looking for a way out now, we’re going to be smashed to a pulp or dropped down into the lava, or something horrible and I don’t think I can get out of here without you.”
She grimaced, “Fine. Go investigate that door. I’ll be right behind you, I promise.”
As the mage hobbled toward the black building with the silver door, Calista saw something move to her left. The dragon was crawling toward her. Calista could see now that the dragon’s hind legs were too broken to move and so Vevic was dragging her bulk forward with only her forelegs. The wyrm’s golden eyes, one swollen and bleeding, gleamed with an evil light as they focused on Severin’s dead body.
I have about ten seconds. She knelt again, accessed the [loot] window, and quickly scanned through the inventory. There was a staff, a bunch of money, a ring, a spellbook, several scrolls, gems, a few rods that looked magical, a pair of potions, parchments, more scrolls, a skull of a small animal … it was there she stopped reading, selected the staff, money, and gems and took off not two steps ahead of Vevic’s grinning maw.
The dragon hissed something sinister in draconic as Calista ran off with the staff, the ring, and the spellbook in her hands. She’d had just enough time to place the gold in her inventory, but as she ran away, the dragon paid her no mind. Vevic was leaned over the body with her claws clutching the corpse as though it were stolen treasure. Is she going to eat him? Then another tremor shook the room and she realized she didn’t care.
As Calista raced toward the black building, more rocks fell from the stone ceiling and crashed to the floor with thundering cracks that sent bits of rock flying in every direction. Lefty was right, I shouldn’t have even bothered with that. She stuffed the staff and the spellbook into her inventory just as she reached the doorway where Lefty was trying to decipher the runes.
“What does it say?”
“It says something about how the first secret matches the first key,” replied the mage.
“Yeah? Well, I don’t have a clue about the first secret, but I do know where I found the first key.” She accessed her inventory and selected the small silver key she had found in the chest with the Emberblade. She pressed it into the keyhole and the door slid open.
The first secret is you were meant to find the dungeon. You were sent here for a purpose.
“Oh,” Calista laughed as the door closed behind them. “We’re not meant to find the secrets. The secrets are meant to find us!”
Lefty stopped, “What do you mean?”
“There’s a voice in my head,” she explained.
Lefty looked worried, “Calista, this is a really, really bad time to roll for insanity.”
“No, the door talked to me. When I opened it, it told me we were meant to find this dungeon. That we’re here for a purpose. That’s the first secret.”
They were standing in a darkened hallway lit only by a glowing green gemstone that was mounted to the wall like a torch. The soft light lent an eerie feel to the corridor that was made of the same black onyx as the building’s outside.
“Okay, which way?” Lefty asked.
Calista shrugged, “Screw it. Let’s go right.”
After two corners and two more gemstone torches, they came to another doorway. This one was made of brass and covered in the same style runes as the gold outer door. Lefty, again, went to work on deciphering what they said as Calista looked on.
Finally, he nodded, “It’s just another door with another secret.”
“Which means I need to use my next key,” Calista added as she opened her inventory. If I can only remember which one was second. The first one was easy because the room smelled so badly. What was the second … Then she remembered. The kobolds officers. Selecting the small brass key they had stolen from the kobold command room, she fit it into the keyhole and turned.
The door slid dutifully open.
The second secret is that Lady Loveless needs your help in the next life.
Sonofabitch. Calista could feel the white hot anger filling her chest as she stepped through the door. Tell me something I don’t know. The worst thing about this place is the talking doors. No wait … She then thought about Blake, … the second worst thing about this place is the talking do … no wait. Then she remembered the sex dungeons. Okay, the third worst thing about this place is …
“Are you okay?”
Lefty was looking at her with a concerned expression. Calista blinked hard and shook her head. “Yeah, I’m fine. Let’s keep going.”
“But what did the door say?” Lefty asked.
Calista rolled her eyes, “It said we’re meant to help Lady Loveless in the next life. Whatever that means.”
“Well that’s nice,” Lefty said cheerfully. “I always liked her.”
I didn’t. Calista grimaced as she walked through the door.
This hallway was not straight and angled like a box but was a spiraled ramp that descended into the darkness. Though the ramp was wide enough to fit three people walking abreast, there was no railing and so she and Lefty walked cautiously, sidestepping at times to fight the vertigo. When finally they reached the bottom, they found themselves in an empty room lit only by a red gemstone torch. On the wall opposite the torch was a doorway made of gold.
Lefty again interpreted the runes. “This door says that this secret is that we were …” he paused as his face became a mask of shock, “… that we were meant to find each other.”
Calista shrugged. “I guess they can’t all be super awesome plot twists.”
Lefty looked at her with astonishment. “Are you noticing these secrets are tailored to us?”
Calista gave him a baleful look, “Are you noticing that these so-called ‘secrets’ could have been written by the one creative dev Concept has left? I mean, I told you what I thought about that company and their writing.”
Lefty shook his head. “Whatever you say.”
Calista then looked through her last two keys. She had the gold key with the yellow gem she had stolen from the treasure chest after the five-faces puzzle and the bone key she had stolen from the ethereal room. We’re not going to have the last key and we’re going to get stuck in here, but I guess that’s better than being crushed to death. She looked at the door. Gold door? Silver rune? I guess I’ll try the gold one with the yellow gemstone first. She pressed the key from the treasure chest into the slot. It worked. The door slid open as they then entered a room covered in a pool of inch deep water. As the gold door slid shut behind them, a soft, feminine voice came to them from above.
“Shenza din’Hooba and Calista Stricthaven, welcome to the doorway to your next life.”
Before them, a doorway made of light rose from the center of the pool. Almost as if it were something biblical, the door was angel fire mixed with starlight and it sat there crackling like a campfire in the middle of the room.
The voice continued, “Through this doorway is your second chance. A new life that awaits you on the other side. Endless possibilities, endless adventure. Step through now and there is no going back.”
Calista raised her hand, “Okay, then count me out.” However, as she turned around the room was shaken by a tremor followed by a clap of thunder as the feminine voice spoke again.
“Okay, then I suppose a bit of explanation is in order.”
