Dungeon Crawling

Among the endless sea of trees, the many bushes and flowers that grew amidst the woodland, the critters from the air, ground, and underground fully dominated the place except for a small circular area where nothing dared to step into, barren like the past battlefields where mages bombarded whole forests into barren earth. The entire party stood before that eery desolate area, Dwelm being the most expert with maps with second place reserved for the gnoll herself. He pointed right where the grass refused to grow and Lulu promptly agreed.

Bushy glanced briefly, her large ears fluttered as her elven lineage warned her to not take any more steps forward, there was something very wrong with that place. Tenpao walked forward, this feeling - something akin to a sixth sense, he felt that the ground was staring back at him, daring him to step further and dare he did. Tenpao walked bit by bit until he was at the very center, raised both of his swords, and stabbed down, the ground altered, briefly moving like waves then stabilized.

"Illusion," Dwelm said, walking forth and beginning to examine the ground. Dwarves may be known only as blacksmiths, but Dwelm learned a thing or two about runes in wartime, principally how to break them and disarm runic traps. Eventually, his rough palm passed through a part that had a sudden change of magila like suddenly moving a hand through a blanket and then being pricked by a long forgotten toothpick underneath. Dwelm waved at Bushy, "Help me find the runes with Ten, if we find all of them I can break this illusion."

This was an opportunity Bushy wouldn't pass, to learn about runes even if a little would surely help her on the future exam for the Magical Magicks School for Magical Wizards. The gnoll looked around but figured they were doing good on their own and gave herself a chance to wind down after carrying so much weight throughout two days and dropped the backpack. Bushy, Tenpao, and Dwelm began looking at the fake dirt, and by tea time they managed to figure out how many runes there were, mixed with their previous experiences they could also figure out which way magila was flowing through the runes.

Dwelm and Tenpao began reversing the flow which made two different streams of magila clash against each other, loud sizzling and cracks spread through the woodlands, many curious squirrels and rabbits came to take a look over at the magila dissipating into the air, and the vision of a barren land slowly began to dismantle itself to that of old stones covered in moss and cracks.

The stones began shifting, "We undid the lock," Tenpao said and Dwelm simply replied with a smile, both moved away from the stones as they shifted to open, and sunlight reached down touching the stones below that hadn't been illuminated by years, the air from below raised up and a distinct fungal smell infected everyone's nostrils with the smell of death and decay.

"Achoo-" Lulu wiped her nose then looked down, "Are we going to use lanterns or torches?" Lulu took a big whiff and then coughed, "Pam- cough- kin doesn't smell anything flammable."

Tenpao tapped on his chin for a while, Dwelm began rummaging through the backpack until he found rope, he tied down on a nearby tree and gave a good tug before showing a thumbs up to the rest, the leader approached the hole and looked down, vines and moss grew among the cracked walls, but otherwise didn't smell like a firebomb, but he had to be sure. "Let's start with lanterns." After all, ruins were always filled with traps different from ancient ruins.

Tenpao looked back at the tree and waved Dwelm to come closer, "There are records of the previous kingdom before Poma, seven hundred or so years ago," Tenpao said. At the same time, Dwelm handed him the rope, "Their last king was obsessed with the idea of true immortality," He threw the rope down and slowly began descending, "And funded various laboratories to search his answer by arcane means," The fungal smell was stronger down there but his nose was getting used to it, something that Lulu couldn't do as she was having a sneeze attack, "point is, there was a record of over twenty laboratories, we found fifteen."

"Why would the acorn staff be in a laboratory that searched forbidden magic?" Bushy asked the question but all that Tenpao could say was, that this area was still technically part of Oddtown as the only other nearby city was three hundred miles away, therefore the magic from there bled all the way here causing odd ideas among the mages, that was an answer Bushy definitely refused to accept but wouldn't voice it, she didn't have any better theory herself.

Lulu had taken back her backpack and lit all the lanterns before going down, she now was distributing them. "Alright, everyone take your positions." All the party surrounded Lulu with Tenpao in front and Bushy and Dwelm at Lulu's side.

The soft studs of metal shoes against old, moisty stone cracked by the claws of time - spiders and centipedes crawled through and to the fissures that the walls held, the corridor was evidently abandoned by all common races, left to decay and be forgotten. A light, however, drew the eyes of the corridor, peering, stabbing eeriness mixed with fungal spores contaminating the very air, four lanterns clicked against each other with each step taken, a rag-tag party formed a day ago being led by someone once said to be unbeatable on the battlefield among common soldiers.

But the darkness only knows how to devour, not how to fear.

"Huuaahh" A deep asthmatic exhale followed by gurgles and popping of bones, a multitude of bodies being dragged on the harsh ground until revealed by the light of the lanterns. The elf due to her nature was the most affected by this environment, now seeing the fruit of the labor from seven hundred years ago she froze, still as a shadow like many others, feeble easy prey ready to become another part of the conglomerate of darkness.