Then, with a few somber commands, Yenrab had the group moving about, slow and careful, checking out the corridor forward. The party found and cleared more webs that had been left by the nefarious arachnid. Bern marveled at the cleverness of such a beast.
Bern played point, a torch now in hand, his shadow enframed in reddish-orange flickers that made it dance against the wall, swiveling eagle-eyed, from side to side, and scanning the various aspects of their lane for any sort of arcane traps or animal predations that might be secreted away into the cracks and lines of the stone. All kept their weapons loosened and at the ready.
The corridor, interrupted once by an empty side chamber, wasn’t so long, really, but its traversal seemed to last an eternity. The stress of having faced such dire combat, all at once on the tails of so much goodness, made them jumpy. The rain was distant behind them and had become a reassuring sound. It told them that the way was clear if they needed to leave quickly. But in front of them was the silence of a tomb. Imagined sounds came unbidden to the inexperienced ears of the fortune seekers. None of them quaked, but neither did they all feel that warm and stalwart bravery shown by the heroes of the age.
“Hey, guys, look at this!”
Bern had slowly paced himself ahead of the group as he sought out advance warning of danger. He may also have been looking to pocket a bit of something for himself, as those of his kin are likely to do, but so far as anyone could tell, he hadn’t thus far. Having heard him exclaim, the party hurried to join him.
“What did you find there, Bern?” asked Tracy, always the first when it came to items of curiosity.
“Well,” said Bern matter-of-factly, “you see this stone door frame here? Through this frame there is a dead guy dressed up like a bigwig. And if my street pals weren’t all full of it when they told me the adventure stories, then I gotta say that this looks a bit like an epic boss fight.”
“Crap. Really?” Yenrab asked, not a flinch in battle but not someone who was fond of them either.
“Yeah. There’s this really big zombie-looking corpse lying on a dais, wearing armor and holding weapons. Also, there’s a bunch of coins scattered about the floor,” the rogue described with a thoughtful look upon his face. “It screams trap.”
“Alright, guys, listen up.” The bard looked around speculatively. “What we need to do is make a kill zone. In the tale of ‘Ouch, Ah, So This is a Kill Zone,’ the heroes set a series of traps and obstacles and then lured the big baddy out, letting him run through trap after trap before turning and fighting. What does everyone have?”
Everyone slipped the straps from their shoulders and dropped their packs, openings face up, so that they could riffle through and list off their various belongings.
“I’ve got 50 feet of hemp rope,” everyone mentioned at the same time. There was a pause and then light laughter.
“I’ve got caltrops.” The thief looked at them all with a grin.
“Well,” Yenrab said as he dug through his tent-sized rucksack, arms deep with it, “I’ve been hankering to use this thing.” He pulled a massive iron bear trap from his bag, dropping it with a heavy clank. The others simply gasped.
“Holy moley! That’s awesome, Yenrab!” Bern cried with amazement. “As a professional trap breaker, I have to say that I would not want to be caught in that.”
“Yeah, most things don’t. So, I’ve been saving it for a special occasion.”
“A special occasion? Is that what you call it? Well, alright . . .” Carric was rubbing his hands together as he looked about the room for bearing. “Hmm . . . I’m thinking rope across the corridor at the sharp bend there, caltrops after.”
“Yeah, I’ve got caltrops here, but they’re really just for making people hop about. I don’t think a zombie is going to care about spikes in its feet,” Bern informed him.
“Yeah, ya know, he’s right. Good call, Bern Sandros,” Yenrab stated, then coughed uncomfortably. “Now we need to talk about torches.”
Bern shook his head. “No, we don’t. I think zombies can see in the dark. They are pretty shite walking dead if they can’t. Besides, if we do that, then I can’t see.”
Yenrab simply nodded, but Carric Smith had other words for the man.
“Yeah, yeah, learn to see in the dark, human,” the bard chuckled as the party prepared their defenses. “How the heck you guys became the dominant sentients in this world is beyond me.”
“Ask your mom, humie-spawn,” the rogue said with a laugh. “There’s a reason you, Tracy, and Yenrab are half-human.” Pantomiming an erotic dancer, he added, “We’ve got moves!” The others laughed along with him.
Yenrab and Bern set up the defenses, having the best idea as to how to set them and where to do so. Carric gave them a second look over, approving that they indeed looked well-set. Tracy paid close attention as everyone did their task, hoping to learn more about these strange people and their customs. Then each of them affirmed the work with a bit of congratulatory aplomb, and from that point on, talk ceased. They moved back to the entrance of the chamber and ran over the plan one final time before drawing their weapons and readying themselves for battle.
***
Bern crept forward, alone, while the rest waited at the tomb’s entryway. He had kept his torch lit and alive, and now regretted it a bit, thinking maybe he could have sat this one out and let the others handle it.
This is creepy, mate. What have you done to yourself, bro? Being an assassin is supposed to be posh, deadly, and well away from the undead. That is practically the job description. And how can I pay it forward to my mates on the street if I get eaten by a zombie in a dungeon? Stupid, stupid, stupid.
He continued forward, though, his doubt pushed aside by fierce bravery and habit. Bern Sandros isn’t no slouch nor coward. I spoke a lot of game, and now I have to play it.
The rogue moved into the chamber, dusty and sparkling with the gleam of coins. Upon ancient shelves, and stacked into the corners, stood and lay burial artifacts, some decomposed and broken, but others with a valuable metallic shine.
There was a creak, and then the corpse arose, mouth gaping, its face home to a soundless and endless scream from beyond.
“Called it!” yelled the rogue, backpedaling quickly from whence he came. His voice quavered a little as he tried to emphasize his lack of fear in the face of the zombie.
“Who couldn’t have called it?” Carric yelled back.
It was very large for a goblin, standing perhaps a good five feet in height. Though it was still shorter than the rest of them, it looked very imposing. It’s seemed muscular in its dusty, mummified flesh that was still well protected in its suit of black mail. From its leathery arm, it held a spiked ball from a chain of rusted but still functional metal that it swung in maneuvers practiced in an era long ago.
Bern rolled under the quick and powerful arc, the ball smashing into the door frame and momentarily getting stuck within the stone.
The rogue flipped him his middle finger as he scrambled and ran passed the party. He was sure no one here would understand the gesture, but it satisfied him nonetheless.
His harmonica locked shut over his face, the bard blasted a powerful riff forward, hoping to blast the creature back. It slid a little, its dry and crispy feet making a crinkling noise as the thing slipped back maybe half a foot, but it did not fall. Tatters of rotted flesh left a trail from where it had been pushed.
“I didn’t call it or really think it was a zombie, guys. I’m more of a living-in-the-forest type of guy though, ya know, so I wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of other guys would have known,” said Yenrab in an explanatory fashion.
A thunk sounded as the barbarian’s hand axe slapped against the zombie’s mail, failing to connect with rotted flesh. The large half-human stepped back out of the way as the thing swing at his meaty body. The party slowly retreated, step-by-step, leading it out into the corridor.
“I really didn’t have any opinion on it either way, guys. But if I have t
o vote, I’d say that Bern, indeed, called it as you say for he was the first to mention the concept,” Tracy noted in a, to Carric, maddeningly logical manner.
The wild mage blasted energy into the creature’s mail, cooking it underneath. The smell that came from it was that of burned earth and baked tin.
Despite the party’s onslaught, though, the mummified corpse kept lumbering forward, and they kept moving backward, with one eye on the traps they had placed. An axe arced overhead. An arrow launched into its eye. It kept marching onward. There was a blast of magical sound. But slow and steady, it stayed its pace. One by one the adventurers turned the corner, chatting and joking to keep the fear aside as the undead monster moved to take them.
And then, it fell.
“Look at that!” cried Tracy.
They all turned. It was like nothing they had ever seen before.
Rounding the corner in no-brained pursuit of its quarry, the zombie had fallen over the rope, slapping face-first into the bear trap laid for it. It snapped shut upon the hard skull and dusty, rotted flesh. With a snap the skull cracked and broke, exploding and expelling out onto the dusty floor. The party leaped upon it, smashing it with an axe, slashing it with swords, until, finally, it succumbed to the death it had long avoided.
“Well, that was fun,” Yenrab said with a bit of quavering false bravado.
“I don’t know about that, but at least it’s done now.” Tracy breathed a sigh of relief.
“Well, I guess that was a special occasion, Yenrab!” said Carric with a six-mile-long grin. Then his mood seemed to just boil over and grow from elation to an almost ecstasy. “We did it! We actually did it!! Holy cow, we did it!!! We actually stopped a real zombie, not just some song I learned in college but a real one. It feels good to do, not just think.”
Then there was a bit of silence. Unknowingly, the party had waited for Bern to make some witticism or add some observation. His absence in the conversation was a little unnerving. Looking about a bit, surprised, the party could not see him.
“Bern?”
His voice sounded from far around the corner.
“I’ve got first dibs on the treasure!”
“Gods above . . .” groaned Yenrab, Tracy, and Carric simultaneously. They paused and then laughed before racing back to get their own share of the treasure.
Chapter 16: One Big Family
How to be an Adventurer—Large Cities and You
Large cities are a different breed of dungeon, adventurer, and full of its own set of traps, monsters, and unlikely encounters. Areas still go down, but they also go up, and things often go sideways. Merchants abound, as do lies, treachery, and a good amount of deceit. Be on your toes.
Cities are also a place of treasure, though the means of its procurement are very different and often illegal. Take care to judge your situation wisely—fortunes can be made but, so easily, can they also be lost in these gilded places we often call home. Stack the odds in your favor whenever possible, and also be on the lookout for someone else who is doing the same.
And always, always, find the tavern. For adventurers, there is always some place full of people ready to give you a coin for good competition, music, or simply the right tales. Such a place is often well-made for the party of four or five heroic folk, and even better for the skulker of the groups, whose fingers find themselves within the purses of others more often than not.
As a final word, be prepared for the worst, for unless the majestically divine, handsome, and intelligent overseer of your adventure is also your nanny, you may well find things going out of hand. Be prepared to run, and keep a nice deposit of cash at the ready in case of emergency.
If you follow this advice, you should be wealthy, and with powerful assets, in no time.
***
In the morning, they arose, bleary-eyed, from a brief rest to a wet but sunny day, grass and ground glazed in thin ice. Moving out into that frosty late morning felt good, even companionable, and the birds chirped agreement all about them. Overhead, a flock of geese flew in V-formation, well fed up with Mother Nature’s plan for the here and now.
Coins clinked reassuringly within their bulging sacks, and they all nodded at each other, perhaps a bit shaken over the death of recent allies, but well buoyed by their success as well. And they didn’t speak but, rather, remained thoughtful. Bern pondered his journey to the guild and compared his dreams to the reality of what had just happened. Carric thought over his plan to be an entertainer, and then contrasted that with the rush of adrenaline and bravery he had felt when he blasted that zombie with waves of concussive musical magic. And even Tracy thought about his own peculiar self, and wondered if maybe life wouldn’t be better if he were focused on doing instead of simply researching and learning. Yenrab could read it in all of their faces, and though he smiled within, he said nothing.
The day was spent in silence and marching. The sun overhead melted the ice and frost into a muddy slop, but no one complained. It glooped and glopped about them, and once, Tracy even fell into the mess. Yenrab helped him up, and they exchanged no words.
They didn’t speak until sundown. The four of them had gathered the driest bits of scraggly pinyon they could find, and they now sat over a sodden and smoky fire, its blaze weak, but its warmth welcome.
“Yenrab—” Carric began, while Bern simultaneously began with, “Mates—”
Tracy looked as if he had been about to speak as well.
Yenrab looked at them with a smile, his young face bearing a weight of wisdom well above his years. “So you want to be adventurers?”
They all looked relieved. Carric and Bern began to speak at the same time, stopped, started again, and then Yenrab intervened.
“Carric’s been here longer. You first, Carric Smith.”
“The book is all about becoming an adventurer, right? And that’s what you are doing, Yenrab, right? You, yourself, you want to be an adventurer?”
Yenrab nodded. “I wasn’t sure at first, but I knew that destiny or fate wanted me too. And now, for sure, I know that this is where I belong. I believe both the Great Bear and my avatar, the Gamer, have chosen me to be their hero for some reason, and I plan to do them justice. Also, ya know, its growing on me.” He pulled a few coins out from the pack and played with them in his hand as he said it.
“That all gets divvied fair shares, savvy?” Bern admonished, lapsing into a red-district dialect. Then he looked a bit embarrassed.
“Yeah, I savvy,” Yenrab chuckled. “Carric, continue.”
“Well, I was thinking that maybe we should, uh, we could follow that path together. I’m in the book, and I didn’t think I should be, but now, with everything that happened in the ruin, I think maybe I am—”
“You are, Carric Smith, and I’d be happy to have you.”
Carric smiled at the large half-orc.
“Besides, I can still play shows at taverns. Adventurers go to a ton of taverns. Who says I can’t be an adventurer and a musician?”
“Not me, for sure,” Yenrab answered. “Bern, what were you thinking about?”
“Same stuff, really, mate. But said with a lot more confidence. I don’t really need to go to the underground. Not with all of this swag just lying about for anyone to grab.”
Bern paused, a bit thoughtful.
“I’ve never really looked in that book of yours. Am I in there?”
Yenrab nodded at him. “You are, Bern Sandros. It doesn’t say much though. It says you are a street urchin gone thief and assassin with a heart of blemished gold.”
Bern scoffed, “Tarnished silver at best, mate.”
Tracy peeped up, uncharacteristically shy.
“I know, I’m a bit of a handful. Everything is so different at home. But I know I am in the book, and I know that Coraellon wants me to quest, not simply question. I will join your group of heroes and learn your ways as best I can.”
The others looked surprised by the speech. Little did they know that Tracy had spent the w
hole day preparing it.
“Well,” Yenrab stated with a smile, “the book says you are one of us, and I personally can’t see how we’d get along without you. Don’t change, Tracy, but you know, just be a little more tactical.”
“I’ll do what I can,” Tracy remarked soberly. They all gave a chuckle, eyes rolling with disbelief. Tracy smiled at them with mischievous eyes.
They were all silent again a bit longer, looking into the blaze and imagining the future. Until Carric’s enthusiastic bellow startled them all.
“Good gods, people. We need a name!”
“Inside voice, mate,” Bern complained. “What in the gods’ names are you talking about?”
Carric stood up and faced them all, his shyness burned away by his exuberation.
“Our group, our party, it needs a name! All of the great adventuring parties have one. There were the Midway Marauders, the Blazing Blue Jays—”
Bern laughed out loud. The others looked at him.
“Sorry, mates, just, where I am from, blazing is all about smoking pipe weed. I was just imagining adventurers wandering about ruins like that, and you know what, never mind.”
Tracy barked out forced laughter and then stopped when they all glared at him.
“Sorry!”
Carric cleared his throat, his enthusiasm undiminished.
“Anyways, so, like, we need to have a name. Something that sounds amazing. Something that advertises who we are and gets us good quests and jobs.”
Yenrab signaled agreement and stood up.
“The Heroes of the Great Bear.”
“Pah!” Tracy objected, standing himself up to face Yenrab. “The Crusaders of Coraellon!”
Carric looked uncomfortable at the argument that seemed on the edge of breaking out. Bern, however, looked quite decisive and ready to take action.
“Mates, something we all have in common. We’ve all lost our way, yeah?”
They quieted down and looked, waiting for more.
How to Be an Adventurer- World of Gimmok Page 12
