Disclaimer: I do not own any of the races, classes, lore, spells, or mechanics of Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition from Wizards of the Coast. This is a fanfiction story based in a personal world with original characters. No money is being made from this work. This is for pure amusement due to my fascination with D&D mechanics.
D&D Adventure
Pt. 11 – Down the Hall
With their lunch eaten, the group collected their belongings and set off down the hallway. Ander led the way after ritual casting another Detect Magic. No one wanted to be illusion trapped again. Even so, every once in a while, someone would reach out and touch a wall or step a little too hard on the ground, just to reassure themselves the hallway was real.
They made it about forty or so feet down the hallway before they came upon a simple wooden door. What drew Ander's attention was the shiny silver door handle adorned on the simple wood. Without saying anything, and completely at ease that there was no magic radiating off it, he reached out for the handle.
Just as his hand grasped the smooth metal, Ander realized too late that the door, was not a door. A tooth-filled mouth opened up front of him, and without warning the door slid around him, cocooning him in a wooden prison.
"Mimic!" Ander managed to yell before he was smothered.
Jun wasted no time in pulling his hammer out and whacking the cocoon. Iados grabbed his shortsword and joined Jun. Everyone else just stood back, with Elaine and Carric readying shots.
"What's a mimic?" Kerri eyes were wide as she watched the spectacle.
"It's a shapeshifter that likes to eat just about anything." Carric explained as he let loose an arrow. Just as the arrow hit it, the door unfurled itself from around Ander, and shifted into a dark grey, humanoid shaped ooze. It stretched itself until it was towering up above its prey. Pseudopod arms outstretched, it roared showing off both sets of its razor-sharp teeth.
Ander, who'd just been the equivalent of spat out, just looked up at and sneered.
"I hate mimics." He snarled as he brought his hand up and fired a Fire Bolt at the creature.
The mimic growled and reached out with his pseudopod hand, hitting Ander and sending him skidding backwards into the wall. Elaine and Carric fired their shots, bringing down the mimic together. It collapsed into a slimy ball.
"That could have been so much worse." Iados helped Ander up. "One time a mimic disguised as a chest was smuggled onto our ship by a rival crew. Damn thing took out three of our mates before we managed to kill it."
"Judging by the amount of slime left, I'd wager this one wasn't that old, or that strong yet." Carric and Lia were both hunched over the slime ball. "He probably wasn't expecting all of us to just immediately hit it."
"I hate mimics, I just hate them." Ander grumbled as he looked over his clothing, moaning every time he found a hole burned through by the creature's acidic saliva.
"Got some history with them?" Kerri asked as she knelt down cast Prestidigitation to fix the holes for him.
"My first year at the Circle, some of the upper classmen decided to pull a prank and hide baby Mimics disguised as mints under all of the freshmen classes pillows." Ander explained. "They were so small that there wasn't any real danger, but mine somehow ended up my nose, and down my throat. The little thing fought the whole time, giving me the worst indigestion of my life, and damaging part of my stomach and esophagus."
"That sounds awful." Kerri patted his shoulder comfortingly, but she did make note of the uses of baby Mimics for later use.
"I couldn't sleep with a pillow for weeks, I was always afraid that there was something under it." Ander shuddered. "Let's just get going, I can see another door just up ahead."
Leaving the Mimic slime behind, the group headed off towards the next door. On the way, Jun took a good luck around and found that unlike the fountain room and the previous hallways, this hallway had visible dust and small animal droppings.
The next door was the same as all the doors they'd encountered before, wooden and simple. The handle wasn't locked, but did give some resistance when Jun turned it.
Walking in, they found a broom closet. There were two literal brooms in there, the straw molded away in clumps, and the wood slightly bendy. Ander walked further into the room, and very easily saw a slit in the wall, just a couple of inches wide. Using one of the Light sticks, he took a closer look. In the back of the slit was a small pinprick of light.
"Do you see anything in there?" Jun asked, hunched down next to the Halfling.
"Maybe," Ander said, sticking the Light stick into the slit. The stick went in only a few inches, before the tip broke off. No muss, no fuss, just a small crack as the stick broke.
"Fascinating," The wizard whispered as he pulled out the Driftglobe, turned it on, and started preparing another Detect Magic ritual. "Jun, I'm gonna be here for a while."
Jun sighed and went back out into the hall.
"He's found a slit in the wall, and won't leave until he finds out what it does." Jun explained as he joined the others.
"Should we leave him here and continue exploring?" Iados asked.
"A couple of us could at least go down to the end of the hall," Lia pointed at the end of the hall. "There's a turn at the very least, and we could see what's there."
"Sounds like a plan," Elaine said. "Ander's got the other Light stick, let me see if we can borrow the Driftglobe so you'd have some light."
"Can't," Jun interjected as Elaine turned towards the door. "The slit broke the stick, so now he's using the light ball."
"We don't need light," Iados said. "I've got darkvision, I can see just as well for a while in dim light."
"I'm good as well." Lia added. "Iados and I will go see what's around the bend, and wait for you guys there till Ander's done. That way we can alert you if there's any trouble." The two of them didn't wait for confirmation, as they started heading down the hall.
"They're going to make out, aren't they?" Elaine asked Kerri as they watched the two of them head down the dark hall. Elaine soon lost sight of them, but Kerri didn't.
"Maybe," Kerri said, as she watched them grasp hands just as they went around the corner. "What do we do in the meantime?"
"I've got those dice we found back in the mushroom room. I could teach you guys an old soldier dice game while we wait." Jun suggested as he pulled the dice out of his pack.
"Why not, it's not like we're on an actual clock or anything." Carric settled down against the wall with the other three following suit.
Around the corner, Iados and Lia were making out.
"Not that I'm complaining, but is this really the best place to do this?" Lia asked as they came up for air.
"Hey, you're the one who volunteered us for recon duty." He smirked. "Are you saying you don't want to make out with me?"
"No, and if we weren't in this dusty dungeon I might try to do something else to you." She said playfully, gently biting his lip.
"You know, there were some beds back there." Iados purred. "They're a little moldy, but I'm sure we can work around that."
"You sure you want to risk that illusion again?" Lia brought her hand up to trace one of his horns.
"Maybe we can just kick Ander out of that broom closet." Iados suggested softly instead after a moment's hesitation. Lia laughed and the two of them resumed their previous activity.
About half an hour later, Ander emerged from the broom closet, a satisfied smile on his face.
"Did you learn anything?" Jun asked as he threw the dice. They settled on a 6 and a 4, a result which made Jun hang his head. Carric smirked as he scooped up the dice next.
"It's an interesting spell. Just about anything you put in the slit just breaks. I tried the broom handle, little bit of paper, even one of the small knife's I have on me. The tips just broke off of all of them. I stuck my hand in, and I didn't even feel any pressure on it." Ander made a show of holding up both hands to show. "There were some runes carved into the stone, and I took a rubbing of them to show a Wizard I know back at the Circle. This kind of magic seems just up his alley." Ander pulled out the rubbing and showed them. "Where are Iados and Lia?"
"Supposedly up around the bend scouting." Kerri said as she pointed. "We're all pretty sure they're making out, at least."
"Is anyone concerned about that behavior?" Ander asked as he sat down with the small group. "I mean, isn't that the kind of behavior that causes drama in a party?"
"In the long run, maybe," Carric shrugged. "I was under the impression that this party was done once we're done clearing this place."
"Well, we've been working so well together, I've kind of been playing around with an idea." Ander said, crinkling his nose.
"What kind of an idea?" Kerri grinned as her 2 and 3 beat out Carric's 4 and 2.
"The Circle employs groups to go out and explore." Ander took a turn rolling the dice. His 5 and 4 were ignored. "They hear rumors of places, like this, and sends a group to check it out. I was wondering if you guys would be willing to join a group like that."
Silence descended on the group for a moment as they considered.
"What all would be entailed if we did agree?" Kerri asked.
"Well, we'd have to submit a request to the Circle, and get certified. Once certified we'd receive badges and papers sanctioning our group." Ander explained. "The money we find and certain items would be ours, barring any powerful magic items. Reports would also have to be submitted on the mission."
"So, we'd basically be treasure-hunters." Carric said with a grin. Ander nodded. Elaine rolled the dice, but couldn't beat Kerri.
"It's something to consider at the very least." Jun stood up. Cupping his hands, he yelled down the hall. "We're on our way to meet you!" Addressing the rest of the group, he winked. "I figured we'd give them a bit of a heads up first."
"Before we head out, do you mind lighting this again?" Ander asked Elaine as he held up the stick from before.
"Not at all," Elaine said as she reached down and cast Light on the tip. "Are wizards not allowed the Light cantrip?"
"I'm not sure," He shrugged as they followed the group down the rest of the hall. "I focused more on offensive spells for this trip. This is the first time I've really been away from home, so I was more concerned about getting back in one piece."
"I understand that." Elaine said. "How many sanctioned groups does have the Circle have?"
"Not many," Ander explained. "Each group has to have a Circle member within their ranks. Nowadays there aren't a whole lot of members who want to leave the safety of the Circle. Most of the adventuring types left and joined groups about thirty or forty years ago. A large number of them went missing, and that's turned a lot of the younger members off volunteering."
"What happened to them?" Carric asked as he slowed his pace to keep up with the two of them. They'd met up with Iados and Lia, so Kerri and Jun were filling them in on what Ander had seen in the closet and vice versa.
"No one really knows." Ander shrugged. "A few of their remains have been found over the years, but not all of them. It's just assumed that they died in battle while adventuring. We can't bring them back to life, and most of the bodies were too old to communicate with."
"So, what you're saying is that there's quite a few unfinished jobs out there." Carric said, the corner of his mouth going up. Elaine gasped and hit him in the arm.
"What was that for?" Carric rubbed his arm.
"Just wanted to make sure you understood how rude and disrespectful that was to the dead." Elaine crossed her arms. "We're talking about whole parties dying, and your first thought is how to benefit from their deaths."
"It's not like I knew them." Carric countered. "Besides, if Ander wants us to form an actual sanctioned party, then I'd like to know what the job market is like."
"Sanctioned party?" Iados asked loudly. "Who's sanctioning it, and who are they?"
Carric turned around and jerked a thumb down at Ander. "While you two were messing around, Ander here proposed the idea of the seven of us forming an actual party and working for the Circle."
"Would that contradict with your work for the Elder Door Sanctum?" Kerri asked as she looked over to Lia.
"I'm not sure, to be honest." Lia told her. "Of course, I really hadn't given much thought to what would I'd do after this."
"Me either, I was going to wait and see if I survived this first." Iados said with a one-shouldered shrug.
"This isn't a decision that needs to be made now." Ander said as he held his hands up. "We can talk about it once we're done here, but it's something to keep in mind."
Everyone nodded, and they set off down the hall in silence.
Twenty or so feet down, the barren rock hallway changed. A small alcove came into view with a pile of what appeared to cloth at least five feet tall and at least ten feet wide. An ornate rug made with swirling designs of reds, blues, yellows, and whites covered a majority of the fifteen feet hallway. A tapestry similar to what they'd found in the tomb from the graveyard hung on the wall. This one showed people sitting in pews while a person in black robes seemed to be preaching. The hallway ended in a large metal door with no handle.
"Wow," Ander said as he pushed his way forward towards the rug. "Look at this workmanship."
"That's an awfully nice rug down here." Iados commented with a raised eyebrow as he reached out and grabbed Ander's arm. "That and the tapestry are probably the nicest things we've seen."
"Your point?" Ander rolled his eyes.
"My point, is that so far everything down here from the brooms to the beds earlier have been rotted with age. Why isn't that rug?" Iados asked.
Ander paused to consider that point for a moment before his eyes lit up.
"Because it's probably magic!" Tugging his arm out of Iados's grasp, Ander approached the rug, prepping a spell on his way.
"What's the worst a rug can do?" Jun said as he and everyone else watched Ander step onto the rug. As they watched Ander begin casting the spell, the corners of the rug began to twitch. Before anyone could warn the Halfling, the opulent rug had rolled itself into a ball, with Ander in the middle.
"Help!" Ander cried out, his voice soon becoming muffled as the rug twisted around him. Lia had to stop herself from rolling her eyes at the sight of Ander once becoming cocooned.
Jun grabbed his warhammer and swung out towards the ball. At the last second a sudden thought occurred to him as his hammer slammed into the ball. Ander gave a grunt of pain as the rug-ball was thrown into the wall. The distraction was enough for Ander to escape. Crawling as far as he could.
"That hurt!" Ander yelled at Jun, as he rubbed his shoulder.
"I'm sorry," Jun said as he faced down the rug. "Didn't occur to me till I'd hit that you might get hit as well."
"Future reference, person in the rug gets hit too." Carric called out as he sent an arrow at the rug. The arrow pierced a hole in the rug.
"Don't damage it!" Ander yelled out.p.
"Then how are we supposed to stop it?" Elaine asked as she sent a crossbow bolt at the rug as well. Hers missed.
"If you give me a little bit of time, maybe I can find a command word to make it stand down." Ander explained as he got to his feet. "Do you have any idea how much we can sell an enchanted rug for?"
"Do you know how much a rug that size must weigh?" Carric asked back as he sent another arrow piercing through the fabric. "We still have to carry everything we take from here through the forest back to town."
"Jun's strong, he can carry it no problem." Ander waved at the Barbarian.
"What am I doing?" Jun yelled exasperatedly as he dodged the rug that was now trying to smother him.
"Capturing the rug!" Ander yelled. Jun sighed and leapt towards the enchanted decoration.
"Shouldn't you be helping?" Lia asked Iados as the two of them lounged against the wall.
"I'm sure Jun doesn't need my help against a rug," He answered. "Besides, I kind of want to see how this ends."
"A copper piece says Jun gets wrapped up." Kerri held up the coin in between two fingers.
"Nah, he'll tear it apart first." Lia said with a smile.
"I think you're both wrong," Elaine chimed in as she joined them, crossbow back down at her side. "Personally, I think Carric's going to take it out first."
"Just to be fair, I'll put a copper in on Ander taming it." Iados laughed as the four of them settled in to watch the show.
It took about ten minutes in all, between Jun wrestling with the rug, Ander shouting out seemingly random words, and Carric shooting arrows out every so often. Finally, just as Jun had evaded another attack from the rug, an arrow struck the rug and a flash of light emanated out. Everyone closed their eyes from the intensity, and when they opened them again the rug laid in tatters on the ground.
"I was so close!" Ander cried as he fell to his knees.
"Good shooting." Jun said to Carric, ignoring the Halfling.
"Good dodging, I was sure that rug almost had you a few times." Carric said back.
"If I let a rug get the better of me, I'd never hear the end of it." Jun laughed before a large sigh from the wall next to them caught his attention.
"That would have been such a funny ballad. 'The Story of Jun vs. The Rug', I'm sure it would've been a hit." Kerri remarked as she shook her head. "Oh well."
Iados ambled up to the two of them. "While you guys were playing with the rug, we went ahead and checked out a couple of things. The pile of rags is nothing but mold at this point. We used my club to shift around in it. Lia and Elaine also noticed that the tapestry on the wall has an outline of Vecna's symbol in the background." He explained as he pointed at the tapestry. "It's very faint, so you have to kind of unfocus your eyes to see it."
"I went to see if there was anything behind the tapestry, and the part I touched nearly crumbled to dust in my fingers. I lifted a small corner near the floor, and peeked behind but I didn't see anything." Lia explained, pointing out the corner and where part of the tapestry had disintegrated. "This thing is definitely not magical, or finely made."
"What about the door?" Jun asked, watching as Ander made his way over and begin examining the walls.
"We couldn't find any opening mechanisms." Iados explained as he too watched Ander. Not two seconds later, Ander pried a section of the rock out, at eye level to him. Behind it, was a lever. "Obviously we didn't look hard enough."
"This place was built by dwarves." Carric crossed his arms. "Makes sense that the lever would be eye-level to a Dwarf, or Halfling."
"Well, shall I do the honors?" Ander asked as he reached out and pulled the lever. With a grinding noise, the door began to pull up like a portacullis. It got a few feet off the ground, before a loud snap was heard and the door crashed back down.
"That didn't sound good." Kerri said as Ander furiously moved the lever back and forth in its holder. Jun went over to the door and tried to pull it back up. However, neither he nor Iados could get a grip good enough to brute force the door.
"Well, I guess it's back down the hall." Kerri sighed as she turned on her heel and led the way.
"Remember, the hallway is only 40 ft. this time." Carric reminded everyone as he followed. Lia went over, and gently guided Ander away from the door.
"Hey, there's still two other hallways we haven't explored yet." Lia reassured him.
"I bet they won't have any magic rugs though." He said somberly, casting a mournfal glance at the pile of tatters as they passed.
"You don't know that," Lia said. "Come on, it's not like you haven't already found a cool magic item. You found that Driftglobe, that's cool."
"Yeah, but it's not worth very much." He said dejectedly. "You can find quite a few of them back home."
"Is money all you look at?" Lia asked exasperated. "What about the spirit of adventure?"
"Spirit's all fine, but you can't buy or rent an apartment with it." Ander explained. "My girlfriend and I want to move in together back home."
"Well, that's sweet," Lia's tone softened, a little taken aback.
"Wait, if you're moving in together, then why are you trying to form a party that'd make it impossible for you to actually live there?" Iados called out over his shoulder.
"It's the symbolism of the whole thing." Ander waved his hand. "It's a signal from me to her that I want to move to the next step in our relationship."
"I think it makes perfect sense." Kerri said as they rounded the corner.
"Please, your idea of moving in with a guy is to crash at their place for a week while you perform at the local tavern." Elaine scoffed.
"Hey, I've saved a lot of money." Kerri countered. "Besides, I never accepted their offer until there was at least a small chance of the relationship becoming more than just a booty call."
"I usually give a relationship at least a year to progress enough before I call it off." Lia chimed in. "Of course, I'm an elf and we do tend to take things slow and savor them."
"So a year to you might be what, six months or so to the rest of us?" Kerri asked.
"Maybe," Lia said with a shrug. "You've also got to factor in the chemistry you have with the other person."
"What chemistry?" Ander asked as his brows knit together.
"Chemistry refers to how the couple compliments each other. There are different types. There's the obvious sexual chemistry, how you to respond to each other's needs and communicate in bed." Lia said with a mischievous grin.
"Social chemistry: how the two work together in actually being able to hold a conversation and discuss ideas and feelings." Kerri added. "Also feeds into how your viewpoints on different issues or situations mesh or conflict."
"One I would say is important is Belief chemistry." Elaine suggested. "How your beliefs be they political, religious, or otherwise stands in versus theirs. Do they conflict? Do they work together? If there are differences, are they big enough to cause friction in the relationship? Can they be worked through?"
"Definitely, and that one kind of goes with Social, but more in-depth." Lia said. By this point, the three females had begun walking closer to each as they compared points.
"Does everyone put this much thought into relationships?" Ander asked Iados as he pointed to the girls.
Iados nodded. "At some point in a relationship, you're going to ask yourself all those questions." He explained. "They're taking a scientific approach to it now, but those are really just questions that come up the longer you're with someone. There are some categories that are more important to some people than others."
"What if you don't ask those questions?" Carric asked, chiming in.
"Then is the relationship really worth it?" Iados locked gazes with Carric.
"Isn't the whole thing that 'love wins' no matter what?" Carric's face scrunched up in confusion.
"Not always," Jun answered. "Sometimes love is bright, but it burns fast. My daughter's mother and I had that kind of love when we tried to make it work after she was born. At some point before her first birthday, our love just fizzled. Those questions started to come up, questions about the future we wanted and they were just too different. Love can be an instigator, but you need timing and perseverance to make it work long-term."
"Some relationships have an expiration date, and you can't change that. Trying to fight it, usually ends in heartbreak." Iados turned to look at Ander. "How about you and your girlfriend, have you talked?"
"We have, but now I'm thinking we need to talk more." Ander rubbed his head. The girls had gone quiet as the boys had started talking amongst themselves. As Iados talked of expiration dates, Elaine shot a glance at Kerri, whose face remained impassive.
As they rounded the corner and headed back up the illusioned corridor, Kerri got stuck for a moment before she was able to continue on.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed this latest chapter! A note on the character levels that I should have made earlier, the characters won't all level at the same time. In order to reflect how much training they had prior to starting out, I rolled percentile dice for each of them, and that reflected what percent of the experience needed for level two they had already accumulated. Jun had about 80% of the experience needed, hence his time in the military. Ander had the lowest with around 20%. I do award them experience based not only on battles, but events and milestones. I'm using a modified version of the Unearthed Arcana: Three pillar system. Thank you for sticking with this story and till next time!
