Chapter Eight
There’s no easy solution.
“What’s the story, boys?” Erinocalypse calls as she casts again. The impatience is clear in her tone. “We can’t just stand here all day.”
Callidus shrugs. “Your call, dude. I don’t know. Both options sound bad to me.”
“I just need to do one more thing,” I announce to the group over the crunching of Balderdash13’s axe hitting the back of another crab shell. “I’m going to scout ahead to figure out if we’re at all close to the White Rock Ravine and then we can decide.”
“Why you?” TexBadass protests. “I thought Callidus was our scout.”
“He is, but his Stealth ability doesn’t help him in this instance, and I’m a higher level so I have more health points to spare.”
“Fine,” Tex agrees reluctantly. “Make it quick.”
I stow my bow and arrow and pull out the long knife I looted from the goblin a few days ago. I can’t picture it being much help against an Imperial Crab, though. God, I hope I can out run them. I take a deep breath and inch toward where Callidus is standing. Toward where the icy bolts of pain begin. I hope there’s an end to this.
“Wish me luck.”
Before anyone can respond, I’m off, sprinting. Close to the rock face to maintain some semblance of protection from the Imperial Crabs. I’m running faster than I remember ever running before. My Stamina isn’t high enough to allow me to run this fast forever, but at the moment, it’s working. I’m not able to outrun every single ice attack from the rock, but I avoid enough of them.
[- 105 HP!]
[- 100 HP!]
[- 120 HP!]
[- 90 HP!]
[- 100 HP!]
I lose count and with hit after hit my health is down by ten percent. Just as I start to wonder how far I should run before giving up, something begins to take shape through the fog ahead of me. I can only make out the tall outline at first, but as I run closer I realize it’s not moving. It’s a structure of some kind.
It’s a column.
I found it!
I keep my sprint up for the final few yards—now is not the time to let down my guard. When I reach the column itself, I slow down and realize the shafts of cold pain are no longer shooting at me. My health is is down to less than half so I sit with my back to the column and pull out a health potion while I send a private message to the others.
Quest Completed: Find the White Rock Ravine
Description: Though it was shrouded in fog and not navigable on the map, you managed to find the gate to the dungeon
Reward: + 190 XP
Quest Offered: Break-In
Description: You found the gates but they’re not open. The easy part is over, but you still have to figure out how to unlock the gates.
Reward: + 190 XP
Not bad. I’ll get a reward for just doing what I had been intending to do anyway. I need to get the others here.
SirAsh3r: Good news. You can run. I found the gate and still have about half my health left.
At a quick glance, I don’t notice a lock. I’m not sure I can risk keeping my back to the beach so I sit against one of the columns.
SirAsh3r: Bad news. I don’t think th—
I can’t complete my message because a searing pain shoots through my body. An Imperial Crab found me while I had my attention elsewhere and has clamped its enormous claw down on my forearm.
[- 1000 HP]
Goddamnit! Another twenty percent gone in just one hit. With my free hand, I hack at the creature with my knife, but it barely registers. The hard shell has too much armor for my pathetic little blade to do anything at all. I try to twist and pull to maneuver my arm free, but it doesn’t do any good. It’s not letting go. The best I can do is to continue to flail and lash out with my knife, trying to keep moving, stay out of reach of the other claw and hope to wear it down.
Damn it!
Little by little my health bar continues to fall. The potion I drank wasn’t enough to fill my points, and the initial attack took me down back to maybe thirty percent of what I should be. I can’t drink another health potion now that I’m in combat.
And I can’t get free of this overgrown crab cake.
Damn.
I’m just about to sacrifice myself completely and try my luck dying and respawning when a familiar two-handed battle axe crashes down on the claw, forcing it to release its hold on me. I duck out of the way and withdraw as SteelFeather and Balderdash13 finish off my attacker. It takes them only a handful of blows to do what would have taken me dozens.
I feel a cool, comforting energy pass over me as TexBadass heals me back to full. I sit back on the ground, back against the column as the other players, my teammates, finish sprinting into view and joining me at the dungeon.
“So,” I say with exaggerated nonchalance. “You got my message.”
Erinocalypse rolls her eyes and tries not to smile. “Yeah, we figured if you couldn’t even tell us the bad news it must be really bad.”
I get back to my feet. “Yeah. Someone is watching for more of those crabs, right?”
“On it,” Balderdash13 confirms. She and SteelFeather take up positions to guard us as best they can.
“I don’t see a lock,” I say with a wide sweeping gesture at the gate.
Wide stone columns on either side of the double doors, carved almost all the way into the rock face itself serve as gargantuan, formal markers indicating the entrance to the dungeon. They tower overhead, the entire height of the cliff. They’re about eight feet in diameter and are completely covered with intricate carvings of animals repeated over and over again. Between the two columns is a set of wooden doors, reinforced with steel and sealed tight. I walk up to the doors and push to see if there is any give at all, but nothing moves.
“Be careful,” Erinocalypse warns. “If those ice darts are any indication, there could be traps and things here outside the dungeon too.”
“Well this is bullshit,” TexBadass complains. “The mayor gave us all keys. What the hell did he do that for if there’s no lock?”
“It’s the corrupted code,” I say. “It has to be. Causing glitches like the map and now changing the terrain and quest requirements completely. It doesn’t want us to get inside.”
“But it’s not impossible?” Callidus asks.
I shake my head. “I don’t think so. Not impossible, but I’m not sure why. Look at these rings here on the door. This is a puzzle.”
Embedded into the two doors, right over the seam where they would open and admit us, are four rings of increasing size. Each of the four rings is fitted with four medallions with symbols imprinted on them.
“This one here looks like a flame,” Callidus says from where he is inspecting the door. “And is this a … rock? A mountain?”
“Probably. Then these last two I see are probably a drop of water and … what is this? A gust of wind?”
“Representing the elements.”
“Looks like it.” I step back to examine the door and puzzle as a whole. “So each of the rings has each of the four elements represented on it. What are we supposed to do with that?”
“A little help,” SteelFeather yells, more panicked than I have ever heard him.
Chapter Nine
I whirl around to see SteelFeather swinging his sword hard as he can into the leg of an Imperial Crab the size of a house. The crab swings its claw into him, knocking our tank over completely as it advances on the group of us cornered between the two stone columns against the door.
I can’t even think about a plan, or about what anyone else might be doing. In two seconds, I have equipped my bow and arrow and am looking for some accessible, vulnerable spot. Maybe a joint? Maybe the eyes, if I can reach them? But … it’s a crab. All I see is the hard shell and this arrow is not going to pierce it.
Callidus has activated his Stealth and snuck completely underneath the behemoth. All six of us try to bring down this monster, but we barely ma
ke a dent. Working together, the two tanks manage to take out one of the Imperial Crab’s legs, but he still has plenty more and the loss of one doesn’t even seem to slow him down.
I get off a handful of shots, almost all of them hitting their mark and lodging in the leg or claw joints, but that’s not enough to slow it either. The creature’s health bar lowers only microscopically. Damn. That’s barely anything. TexBadass stays as far back as he can, out of the reach of the claws and frantically maintaining the health of the rest of us while we struggle to take down the crab.
I step back against the door and quickly examine the creature.
Name: King Imperial Crab
Level: 28
Description: You thought his minions were hard? This guy exists solely to make your life miserable and to keep you from entering the White Rock Ravine.
I wonder if anyone else has looked closely at it. There’s no way … I shake my head and back up further. There’s no way we can defeat him.
Two more steps and I hit the door, gently bumping my head on one of the elemental medallions. I rub the back of my head, looking at where I hit. Maybe we can’t defeat it, but there’s still a chance.
At the top of the nested rings is a small brass triangle, pointing down, presumably marking the spot the medallions should line up. I’m sure they need to go in a particular order to unlock the latch. But what order? Where would we have seen the elements displayed? We’re right by the ocean so … water? This is carved into rock. That would be earth. There’s the fog, so maybe that is supposed to represent air? But I guess it could also maybe be water? And even if it did, how am I supposed to know what order those go in?
I try at random—water, earth, air, fire. Nope. Water, earth, fire, air. Nope. I can’t calculate how many options there are. Too many. We don’t have time for me to just guess.
Inspired, I pull out the brass key Mayor Barnaby gave me back. I turn the key over in my hand two or three times, looking for engravings, notes, symbols, anything that could remotely signal the order the elemental symbols on the door should be arranged in. Nothing. Disappointment fills me. I didn’t realize how much I was counting on the damn key to help until I feel this despair.
There’s nothing. It’s worn and solid but completely blank. There is nothing. I look desperately at the medallions again. Is there any chance they are numbered? No. Okay, let’s try fire, earth, water, air.
Nope.
Damn it.
“Asher, what are you doing?” Erinocalypse has finally noticed I’m not battling the crab and yells at me. “Quit hiding behind the column and help us.”
The columns. Of course.
I step back as far as I can without getting in the others’ way and crane my head to look at the top of the columns. The animals carved there, covering the surface of the stone, are intricate, but not as repeated as I had initially thought.
The top of the left-hand column is covered with the most beautiful representations of birds. From swallows and pigeons to eagles and vultures. Wide wingspans depicting the birds flying. Small collections of birds grouped together. As the art continues down the left column, the birds end and the fish begin. Whale, dolphins, seals and fish of all sizes span the stone, swimming in their invisible ocean.
I start to have hope again, moving to examine the column on the right. While it is also covered with animals, the scope of the top of animal chosen is much broader. On the top of the column I can make out a variety of mall burrowing animals. Mice, rabbits, badgers, but also snakes, spiders and even a wolf. Each creature is detailed and clear.
On the bottom half of the right column, the animals represented are even more varied. I step up to the column and rest my hand on a large representation of a scorpion. Around the column I recognize animals that remind me of the desert—a camel, cheetah, lizard. At the bottom of the column is an elephant.
I can guess what this means. I can only guess. But then near the very bottom of the right hand column, near my set, I spot another carved bird. A phoenix. Fire.
I can solve this.
I step up to the door and begin turning the rings. They’re wide and heavy, but if I throw my whole weight into it I can turn them by myself. I glance back at the top of the column on my left just to be sure, and drag the first ring around so the medallion painted with a gust of wind is in the first position.
Air.
The second ring is easier to move; the water medallion is already near the top. I pull it into place and feel it settle into place.
Water.
Behind me, Balderdash13 screams. I turn to see SteelFeather held aloft, upside down, fifteen feet in the air by one of the King Imperial Crab claws. Erinocalypse shoots off spell after spell, her hands moving rapidly and not taking her gaze off of the enemy. The crab takes damage from her fire bolts, but none of them make it drop our tank.
I turn back to the door. The sooner we can get into the dungeon and away from this creature, the better. I take another quick look at the column on the right. Burrowing creatures are my next clue, so I take my best guess and drag the medallion with the mountain on it into place.
Earth.
Balderdash13 screams again and I turn just in time to see SteelFeather crumple to the ground. I hesitate for just a second before casting my sad little level 1 healing spell on him. TexBadass has started healing too, so I look at the scene to see how else I can help. We can’t have anyone die. We’ve already had to go through so much.
One last ring to go. Maybe I’m just not up on my elements. These last two choices were kind of vague, but the phoenix confirmed my guess. The flame medallion slides into place.
Fire.
I lean close and think I hear a set of clicks deep in the door’s locking mechanism but it’s difficult to hear over the screaming and thrashing behind me. I push experimentally on the door and feel it give way.
Chapter Ten
I push the dungeon doors open wide enough to allow one person to slip through and call out to Callidus. He is behind and under the King Imperial Crab and has the farthest to run. He darts me a glance for only a second and returns his focus to the battle.
I realize with the door only ajar, he can’t tell that it’s open. I move to stand in the door itself, so I’m partially blocked from view.
“Callidus!” I call again, this time ostentatiously waving my arm to gesture him over.
He gets it this time and takes off in a sprint. I lose sight of him for a moment when he activates Stealth to cover the few seconds he’ll be in the crab’s line of sight. I move out of his way as he comes barreling through the door and call to SteelFeather next. He has taken the most hits, pulled the most aggro. The others will need to be quick about their own retreat once he’s removed from the equation. As soon as SteelFeather meets my eye and recognizes our escape, the other three are not far behind. One by one, the players sprint toward me, ducking through the crack in the open door until only Erinocalypse remains battling the monster.
“Erinocalypse, get over here,” I yell at her. I don’t have any patience for heroics right now. We can’t afford to lose her.
She casts spell after spell, her hands moving rapidly and her eyes never leaving her target as she backs up. Step by slow step, she retreats between the columns to the door. As the only target remaining, Erinocalypse is drawing all of the crab’s wrath and attacks. And yet she still doesn’t step through the open door.
The rest of us are in danger every second this gate stays open.
As I scream her name, I watch Erinocalypse get knocked over. She collapses to her knees, but even from that position she continues casting her fire bolts as quickly as her mana regeneration will allow. Is she crazy? Why isn’t she running?
I quickly examine her character stats and see that now that TexBadass isn’t within sight to maintain her health, she’s fallen below half. I shoot my Bestow Relief spell at her, the little I can do.
“Erinocalypse, goddamnit. Get over here!” TexBadass has joined me at the
door to call for our sorceress.
“Erin!” Balderdash13 screams from behind us.
But she still doesn’t acknowledge the sound of her name. Spell after spell, attack after attack. She keeps pushing.
Finally, I realize she’s probably going to keep going until she dies or it dies. I have to put a stop to this.
I stand, half in, half out of the doorway. I equip my bow and arrow and nock an arrow. The King Imperial Crab doesn’t notice me, so for the first time I’m able to take a slow, deliberate aim.
A crab’s eyes are tiny in proportion to its whole body. But on a creature this size, the eye is approximately the size of a car tire. I will my breath to slow and take my shot.
A moment later the monster reels back in pain. Finally! I hit a sensitive spot and dealt enough damage to get a reaction from it.
In that split-second, when Erinocalypse is surprised at the enemy’s reaction, when she realizes she is no longer the only one attacking, she pauses her spell casting briefly. I take my chance, hurry the few feet between us, grab her arm and drag her back through the door with me.
“Stop! Let go of me!”
I barely have enough time to follow her through the door when the crab is on top of us again. TexBadass, Callidus, and Balderdash13 shove the door closed. SteelFeather hacks at the tip of the giant crab claw that reaches through the gap in the door. He lands a few hits and when I add my own effort the group of us manage to push the crab back and close the gate.
It clicks. Now we’re locked in.
I close my eyes and lean my forehead against the door, taking a deep slow breath. This is practically our first chance to rest since we landed on the beach.
“What the hell, Asher.” Erinocalypse’s tight grip on my shoulder spins me around to face her. “I almost had him.”
I look at her incredulously. “What are you talking about? You almost died.”
“That’s bullshit, and you know it.” Her finger jabs in my face. “I was the only one even dealing any real damage before you all ran and hid. I just needed help keeping my health up and I could have brought it down.”
Depths of Camlan Page 4
