So I woke up all determined to finish this crazy tower and get whatever is waiting at the top, but something told me to go check on my pets, so before I head up any further, I’m going to make a quick trip down.
I make it downstairs, and I’m glad I checked. All my pets have gone mad. Their eyes are glowing red, and they all come at me with murder in their mind. I’m glad I picked up a collection of food in the tower. I quickly toss out rations to them, and they calm down. I make sure they have fully returned to normal before I climb back up. I cast a last glance down at them, and wonder what I’m going to come down to the next time.
I make it to the third floor, and quickly study the pattern of boulders. At first glance it looks intimidating, but I quickly figure out the way to solve this problem. I quickly cast detect monster before I start moving around, and don’t see anything. I still feel threatened, and I’m starting to think that just means there are no monsters, yet.
I get to work, and find a shiny silver ring. Along the way I meet a friendly ogre. I try to talk to him about what I’m doing, and he grunts in response. I don’t know if he understands. As long as he stays out of my way, and doesn’t pick up any of my treasure, I don’t mind having him around. It gets boring all by myself, pushing massive pieces of rock around.
I find a marble wand, and it’s too much for me to carry. I decide I can leave a stack of food here while I finish the last area. I keep a lizard corpse, and the lembas wafer. I quickly go through the last of my plan. Once again the door is locked. This time I cast the spell before I open it. Nothing serious awaits me on the other side, so I proceed to unlock, and open it. I quickly take care of the gold golem on the other side, and a small puppy. I feel bad about killing the dog, but I don’t need any more pets, and it will likely die if it follows me up the stairs.
The moment I get to the top of the stairs, Sting starts to glow. I can sense a small team of hill orcs, and a large group of uruk-hais. I try to remember what I’ve heard about them, but the only thing that comes to mind is that they like poison. I quietly wish I was resistant, and consider going back down until I’m prepared to fight them, but I decide to tough it out. Before I completely commit myself though, I cast my spell for detecting monsters.
There’s a lot of them. I recognize most of them, but there are a few I’ve never seen before. I don’t know what to do, but I figure I might as well continue. Anhur will protect me.
First comes the puzzle. It’s fairly easy once I see what the pattern is. I get to work, and see a boulder that isn’t in my mind. On a whim I throw a dagger at it. The boulder opens it’s glowing red eyes, and for an instant I can see arms and legs. This must be one of the mimics I’ve heard about. Probably giant, if it’s pretending to be a boulder. I finish it off with magic and get back to work. I comes across a nice little imp. I tried to talk to it about what I’m doing, but it just walks around in circles murmuring “We’re all doomed,” I decide to ignore it.
A few monsters appeared out of nowhere, but other than a few sew rats, they were all peaceful. Or they tolerated my presence. I finally finished, and now I’m trying to mentally prepare myself for what may be the toughest battle of my life.
Why am I heading into certain death alone? I’m going downstairs for some backup. I know I’m risking their lives by bringing them into this, but if I die, who will take care of them? Yes, definitely better to die as a group than to die alone. I head downstairs full of determination, and maybe a little bit selfish. I decide to grab some food on the way, in case, you know, they turned feral again.
It happened again. They all turned evil. I toss out food as fast as I can throw it. Once I’ve regained their trust again, I take them upstairs. Both cats first, then I go back down for Fritz. The next level only has space for me to take one at a time. They are all having a great time picking through all the stuff I’ve left on the floor.
I finally make it to the top floor. I go first, and unlock the door. A uruk-hai opens it. I take a step back, then send a blast of magic through the open door. It hits the uruk-hai, a grey unicorn and a large mimic. I decide that’s pretty good for a single shot, so I try again. I kill two uruk-hais, and do some damage to some other enemies before I get engulfed by a dust vortex.
I can’t see, and for some reason, I can’t detect any monsters either. Sting starts quivering. I don’t know what to make of that, so I strike out blindly. After a few hits, I destroy the dust vortex. The first thing I hear when I’m back on solid ground is the zap of a wand. I see a streak of magic missiles fly through the air. They hit the unicorn, and continue on to me. They bounce off without doing any serious damage.
I back out of the room, and let Aurora take my place. I’m still blind, and I fumble over the junk left on the floor. I don’t want to leave Aurora all alone, so I follow behind her, ready to blast anything and everything.
I manage to kill a few more uruk-hais, giving Aurora enough space to enter the room. I follow at her heels, but she’s blocking the doorway so I can’t do much to help her out until she moves out of the way.
Suddenly I can see again. Sting stops quivering, and I see that it’s still glowing a bright blue. I’m still waiting for Aurora to get out of the way. Somebody zaps a wand, and it hits her. I swallow my apprehension. We will make it through this. I try to prod her forward so I can help with the mess of monsters, but she’s not moving. Another zap. The wand hits her again, and she falls to the floor.
“Nooo!” I yell. I’m filled with rage and anguish. I fire off a spell into the room. It hits a few of the creatures, but none of the look any worse. I quickly send another blast into the mess. Another perverted orc falls. I don’t have the heart to smile at his demise. They killed my pet. My friend. The only other being that’s been with me since the start. My heart is aching, and the only thing I can think of to heal it is killing all of these motherfuckers.
I kill off a few more of the evil abominations that are only loosely related to orcs before I back up the corridor a bit. I’m starting to rely on magic too much, and not doing close to enough damage to justify the cost. Not with this many creatures left to kill.
A uruk-hai walks into the hall, and zaps a wand at me. A stream of magic missiles hits me, and bounces off my cloak. Glasnosh isn’t so lucky, and falls to the barrage.
“You asshat!” I shout, picking the first word that came to mind. I fire off a bolt of magic and kill it, but a forest centaur picks up the wand before I can get to it. There’s still some asshole zapping a wand of striking from somewhere in the room, but they are killing creatures for me, and it harmlessly bounces off my cloak. At least some good news in this mess of despair.
I manage to kill the centaur, and run over to grab the wand before it can do any more damage. A giant elephant walks up to me. I’m too shocked to do anything. It’s not quite an elephant, but the same size, and it has a pair of tusks that end in a sharp spike. I think it’s called a mumak. It butts me with it’s head, and I fall over. It feels like all my ribs are broken. I can’t breathe. I scramble backward, but I’m not fast enough. The mumak bites me, and butts me with it’s horns. I try to move faster, and manage to get partway up the hall before the mumak can squeeze through the door. I keep moving back, hoping that the hall will fill with monsters, and I can make the most out of my spells. My wish isn’t granted, and I fire off a handful of bolts before the mumak makes it to me, but most of them miss it. By now I’m almost out of energy. I’m ready to fall over from exhaustion, but I have to go on. I keep running away until I’m at the stairs going down. I fire off a final blast and let out a cry of joy as I see the massive beast collapse to the ground. A barrow wight is close behind, so I decide against eating the creature, and run down the stairs to recover.
I stay for as long as I can bear. I’m healed, but not fully rested in terms of magic. I decide to try it anyway, and climb up. The barrow wight is waiting for me, but so is Fritz. Between the two of us, it quickly goes down. A golem rises from the floor, this one looking like a living tree. It’s entirely made of wood.
This is the time for a powerful fire spell, I think to myself. Since I don’t have anything like that, I content myself with stabbing it. Fritz pitches in, and we soon have it on the run. We manage to overtake it, and it crumbles into a pile of quarterstaffs. I see another orc from hell, and calmly walk through a hail of arrows to reach it. Sting makes quick work of it, while it tries to kill me by smacking me with it’s crude bow. If I wasn’t so full of rage I would laugh. I will make them pay. Each and every one of them.
As I get close to the room, the grey unicorn leaps toward me. It’s fast, I can already tell, and the spike on it’s head isn’t just for decoration.
I take a quick breath, and fall on my usual spell in the hopes that I can defeat it with basic magic. It resists my spell, and next thing I know it’s beside me, butting me with it’s horn, biting and kicking. I try to fire off a few more blasts of magic, but it doesn’t do any visible damage. I remember the wand I picked up, and point it at the unicorn. Nothing happens. In a fit of rage I raise the wand up in the air, and snap it in half. I was expecting a shower of sparks, or some show of magic, but nothing happened. The unicorn continued it’s assault. I went back to my basic spell, and this time the unicorn collapsed.
I start to feast on the remains, but I’m interrupted by a scorpion, and an arrow fired at me by a plains centaur down the hall. I fire off a bolt of magic which doesn’t do anything. I endure the attacks of the scorpion, and fire off another blast. Still nothing. The centaur fires an arrow, and it hits the scorpion, killing it. I’m a little annoyed that I won’t get credit for the kill, but I’m fighting for my life right now, and one less enemy is one less enemy whichever way you look at it.
I step up to the centaur, and Sting makes quick work of him. I’m about to look through his possessions when a soldier steps around the corner and fires a dagger at me. I decide to test my aim with darts while waiting for him to walk up to me. I hit him four out of five throws. Not too shabby. Sting makes quick work of him, and seeing that the corridor is empty at the moment, I resume my unicorn meal.
I still don’t finish. A full grown crocodile decides to interrupt me. It clamps down on my foot with it’s strong jaws, and swipes at my other leg with it’s claws. I retaliate with magic. My aim is a bit off, and it takes a few tries before it dies. It managed to get some solid hits in. I decide to run downstairs at the next sign of trouble.
I am able to finish my meal, and I snatch the unicorn’s horn before I walk back towards the stairs. Of course, nothing can ever go my way. What did I do to deserve this shit? An air elemental just engulfed me. I’m pummeled with debris before I can even react. I stab in random directions with Sting, but nothing stops the endless debris. I finally fire off a bolt of magic, and I fall to the floor. There’s no sign of the elemental. I hope to Anhur I killed it.
I have even more reason to go downstairs now. I finally make it there, and take a nice long rest. I feel up to full health, but I stick around until I can cast a few more spells. I’m still not at peak condition for magic, but I’m hoping it will be good enough to clear out the rest of the room. All I want to do now is claim my treasure, and go back downstairs with Fritz so I can properly mourn.
I make it to the room, and confidently waltz in. Off to the side I see what looks like a chicken on fire. Oh God, it’s a pyrolisk. Before I can react, it turns it’s fiery gaze toward me, and half my scrolls catch fire and go up in smoke.
I immediately drop the rest of my scrolls, as well as all my potions. Next thing I know, that thing is beside me. I try to move away so I can safely blast it, but I’m sucked up by another dust vortex.
“Fuck you,” I say half heartily. I tear through it with magic, and once it’s gone I take care of the little fire bugger. I hurriedly pick up my stuff again before looking at what creatures are left in the room.
There are a few creatures sleeping. Must be heavy sleepers to have missed all the noise we were making. There’s a jelly, and a mold. A hill orc yawns then makes it’s way toward me. It’s no problem to kill, thanks to Sting. Next I focus on a leprechaun hiding in the corner. I manage to kill it rather quickly. It leaves a corpse behind, and I gobble it up. I suddenly feel very jumpy. This will be interesting.
There’s a fog cloud that I take care of, then proceed to collect all the gold and treasure strewn throughout the room. I find a mimic, easy to kill, and a giant mimic, more of a challenge. I’m finally positive that I have emptied the room of all monsters, and worthwhile loot.
There are three tiny rooms, and I go into each of them. Two are empty. The third has a bag, and a scroll of scare monster than crumbles when I try and pick it up. Inside the bag is a wand. Seriously? All this work for a fucking bag, and some weird wand? I lost two of my best friends for this shit. I pull the phone from my pocket, ready to tear Spoiler a new one, but I should wait until I’m back in the main dungeon. Monsters up here are just too strong, and strange, for me to deal with.
On the way back down we encounter a sasquatch. Fritz fights bravely, but is killed by this fucked up snowman. I flee down the stairs while I still have a chance.
I finally make it back to the main dungeon. Alone. I try to pick up the pile of loot I had left for myself, but my knapsack can’t hold any more items. I have a brainstorm, and start putting items in the bag I found upstairs. Now I can pick up my pile. I can’t handle the weight, but there’s nothing I’m prepared to leave behind. I put some more stuff in the new bag I found, to help clean up my backpack. When I’m finished, my burden is somehow lighter.
Sweet. At least some good came out of all that shit. I can carry anything I want now, with this magic bag of lightness.
I wonder what to do next. I decide that I must have done something to piss Anhur off. Why else would he have let all three of my pets die on me. I resolve to go down to his altar, and sacrifice as much as I need to, so I can get back into his good grace.
With that in mind, I make my way to the stairs down, and take a well deserved nap.
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