In Dungeons Deep

Quiet was the way to go, and he remained so as he stepped into the next room. Luckily there were no giant pests to jump at him in this one, but it was also similarly in ruin. Rather than calling it a complete loss, Hogarth tried to think in a different direction. The chests were empty, the furniture broken, but maybe there was still some use to be had. Without lids, the chests still made for decent boxes. A single drawer remained at the bottom of the dresser, and inside it was an old, folded up sheet. It had probably been a replacement for the bed at one point, though now it was layered in dust and chewed full of holes. Unraveling it a bit revealed undamaged, if still funky material within. It might have a use. So he tucked it under his arm, lifted the chest by one side, and lugged it back to his room. He set the box beneath the shelves and dropped the sheet in before stepping out into the hall.

He barely had enough time to throw the shield up as the worst jump scare of his life came hurtling at his face. The wood thunked and he heard the angry screech as a rat the size of a lap dog bounced away and down the hall. Others were crouched and hissed as their initial skirmisher came rolling back among their number.

There were three in total, two of them snarling in a very nonrodent manner while the third growled and rolled to its feet. He kept the torch low and pointed towards them, the shield held tight toward his center mass.

Something more reactive than simple fear took hold as he faced down the rats. It was an unfamiliar readiness, a tension of being in the moment, and only this moment. He didn't wait for the rats. Hogarth closed the distance himself. Another pounced but his shield met it and went further, pushing his whole body and the strength of his arm to catch the creature on the surface of his shield and slam it against the left-hand wall. He heard with detached awareness the sound of crunching and pained animal noises, but there wasn't time to let it sink in. He stepped towards and pitched the torch in a follow up swing that swept the flames in the snouts of the other two rats and forced them to retreat, shrieking with singed and curling whiskers.

In double tap fashion he brought down the shield and used the blunt lip to deliver another ruthless crunch into the neck of the first rodent before pressing after the remaining pair. His heart hammered purposefully in his chest as they sprang, and it was all he could do to batter them off. One he repelled as he had the first engagement, striking with the flat of his shield to ricochet the animal away and down the hall.

The second slipped through the opening and clawed uncomfortably up his leg and back. Before it could do more than needle him with its nails, he swung the torch around and pressed the hot end into its greasy gray hide. He felt the muscles tense and then it hurled itself from his shoulder, smoking and burning as it abandoned the fight entirely. The last rat paused long enough for its brain to process its options, before hissing and following its roasted pack-mate.

"Fuck you too!" He growled, kicking the air in front of him as the rat turned the corner and was gone.

Giant fucking rats. Hogarth huffed, his body tense and pulse racing. He looked down to see that the one he'd smashed was good and dead, blood trickling from mouth and nose. It was gross, but he gave it a nudge with his foot to make aaabsolutely certain it was dead. Then he picked it up by the tail and carefully carried it at arms length into the bedroom with a fireplace. He had absolutely no intention of eating this thing, but there was no way he was just going to leave it rotting in the hall. That would draw who knew what else, if not simply more rats. There was plenty of kindling in the room, so he stuffed a broken down chair into the fireplace with the rat and set them both ablaze with the torch. It smelled awful, but most of the stink went up the fireplace with the smoke. He wasn't sure if this was the better option, but it wasn't rotting rat corpse so he took it for a success and retreated to his bedroom.

He closed the door, pulled free the gem, and considered what had just happened. It had all been so fast. Now that the adrenaline fading away, he could feel the uncomfortable itch from each claw that had poked through his clothes. The fabric over his shoulder was torn, probably when the rat vaulted off him. It wasn't much, but he could feel the tiny droplets of blood sticking skin to fabric. It hadn't done much, but the few layers of material between him and dirty rodent claws was still appreciated.

He'd only killed one of them, but nonetheless he had his first victory. And he killed something! Part of him felt the twinge of guilt, but it was distant. The rats were dangerous, and had started the fight. He'd ended it. And did pretty well, too!

With the thought of victory in mind, the small, spartan room felt a little less gloomy and just a bit more cozy instead. It wasn't his cage, but his fortress, his retreat. A hunting lodge, even. It was his haven as he explored the dungeon. From this point, he was truly beginning an adventure.

***

Given the intensity of it all, it was hard to tell just how long Hogarth spent clearing each room in the hall. There were more rats, but the little monsters had gotten a taste of fear after their first skirmish and fled when given the chance. None of the bedrooms had much to offer, though there were some more functional discoveries if nothing else. One of the rooms had what he was going to assume was a toilet, because it was an awful smelling hole cut into the stone that angled out of sight into the unknown. He'd never use it given the rodent situation, but at least now he knew where he could dump his, well, dumps. He was able to salvage more fabric, and there was even a few sets of clothing. They were in just as rough shape as some of the other things he found, but everything was embroidered and eventually he found the remains of a jewelry box that had a few sewing needs inside.

When he found nothing useful, he brought back things that were interesting instead. The jewelry box that had the needles had a broken music box in the lid that he figured was worth messing with at some point. He rolled up pieces of paintings that were intact enough to show part of their pictures, collected all the pieces of a broken marble figure of a knight, and stashed anything metal that would fit into his bag. It might not be useful now, but metal was always worth recycling.

When he felt a yawn coming on, he knew it was time to fall back. The doors that could close he did, and draped little bits of string on each. If they were disturbed before he came back, he'd know there was company. If not, well, it could mean a lot of things. He wasn't sure if he hoped to run into someone or if that would be an even more dangerous situation than just rats. Either way it would tell him something more than he knew the next time he came through.

The fork at the end turned out to lead into two separate corridors. Torches were inconsistent, but he could see what looked like another set of rooms like the ones he'd already explored as well as a stairway at the end that went even deeper underground. Those rooms were to the right hand fork, and to the left a much shorter stretch of hall with a single solid door looming at the end.

Satisfied, Hogarth returned to his own little room and removed the crystal to secure it. Setting it on top of the stove, he used some of the cleaner piles of cloth to replace the straw pillow then stretched out on the cot. His phone couldn't connect to anything, so he'd turned it off in favor of keeping it for a timepiece. With nothing to check, he took turns staring into the stove with its strange burning stones and the sorcerous glow that lit his necklace. It was far from the most comfortable arrangement, but he was asleep before he even realized it.

The growling of his own stomach startled him awake, and it was fortunate there was nobody to see him fall off the cot and fling the mace into the corner. It clattered and rolled across the floor back to him, which he frowned at before slowly climbing to his feet. The room was just as it had been when he fell asleep, and when he briefly turned on his phone, saw that it was a little after six in the morning. Thought it was a little early for his tastes, his internal sense of time at least remained on target.

The more pressing concern was the hunger he was unaccustomed to ignoring. Hogarth had never been at risk of going hungry. He'd worked fast food for years. Now he wasn't sure where he would even find his next meal.

He was going to have to press a little harder today.

Starting with the bedrooms, Hogarth wore the shield across his back and began to clear out each one with torch in one hand and mace in the other. He found the rats had ripped up the remains of a mattress and were building a nest in its center. They were fast, but something simply clicked as he lashed out with fire and violence. They tried to overwhelm his guard but he'd gained an instinctive sense of their movements.

When one of them lunged towards his face, he was ready. The mace caught it in mid air and shattered its skull as it was battered aside. The whirling flames sweeping in front of their noses forced the others to halt their advance, and with a ruthless returning swing he smashed another over the head. The rat shuddered and convulsed as it died. Two more pressed for advantage, one of them managing to slip around him to jump on his back. He didn't hesitate to throw himself bodily at the nearest wall, forcing the rat to spring away before being crushed. The one darting around his legs was served a sharp kick that lifted the animal off the ground and pitched it into a pile of rubble.

It was all the room he needed to close on the first rat and break its spine with a hard swing of his arm. The last rat wiggled for shelter beneath the remains of wardrobe that had fallen to become part of the ruin that was the bed. It was reckless, but he just shoved the end of his torch in and let the dry wood burn. As soon as the singed rat popped out he brained it just as surely as the rest.

The victory was satisfying, and he was more comfortable with the emotional aftermath killing left him with. He just didn't get to enjoy it for long, with the room slowly going up in flames.

Hogarth swore as he tried to stamping at the edges first, then batting at the flames with loose debris he found around the room. All he succeeded in was spreading the fire and smoke around until it was everywhere, the sting of it billowing into his nose and eyes. So much of the room was such ready tinder that he abandoned it, retreating into the hallway.

Backing away, he was forced to watch as the room simply changed from a bedroom into a stove. A string of regular sized mice made a run for it between his legs and under the door of a room he'd already searched. Unlike the first rat he'd disposed of, he could smell the burning animals in the room and there was no door to even attempt to smother the smoke. It trickled out into the other chambers. He was stuck with the consequences.

Rather than retreat to his room, Hogarth took a pull from his water skin and headed back towards the closed door on the other side. It was a time crunch now to secure the floor. Anything dangerous was either waiting for him here, or down those stairs.

Rusty latches and hinges made him work for it, but eventually he shouldered his way through and stabbed torchlight into the darkness. Instead of a bedroom, he discovered what looked like a modest study. Tall shelves lined the walls, filled with leather bound books and piles of scrolls in various states of decay. A desk was plastered with melted wax and bits of yellowed paper that had at some point fused into the wooden surface, and there were dried up bottles of ink next to an assortment of brittle quills.

He was no detective, so he didn't bother trying to look for clues as to what had happened here. Instead he looked at it from a gamer perspective, considering what the room might be hiding that was of value.

A grin tugged at his cheek as he contemplated one of the many tropes of dungeon engineering. Most of the bookshelves were in a poor state, but the one on the wall furthest from the entrance seemed to have fared the best of them. There was even a trio of books that had refused to sag and tilt over even though their neighbors had seemed to melt together like paper mache.

Placing his hand over the center book, Hogarth gave it a tug and felt far too much satisfaction as it responded with a mechanical clank. Nothing else happened. He tried it again, rewarded with the same outcome. Refusing to believe it was somehow just broken, he pushed and pulled every direction until he realized that the book was essentially the door handle, holding it open while his other arm pulled at the back of the shelf. Only then did it scrape free from the wall and he was able to use both hands to push it farther open.

A recess had been built into the wall, revealing a closet sized space. Another shelf for books had been built into it but was empty save for a few scrolls and a single, leather wrapped tome that resisted the ravages of time. Best of all was the intact chest set squarely in the center of the floor in front of the shelves. "Fuck yeah!"

He wanted to pop it open, then and there. Fish out whatever it was and hold it above his head like an idiot. Unfortunately the tickle of smoke reaching his nostrils reminded him of the mess he'd made in the dorms. Better to retreat with his win, even if it meant another missed meal. He was soft enough around the middle to handle it.

The chest was just small enough he could prop it onto his shoulder, and just light enough that he felt like he could break into a trot if necessary. Confidence was at an all time high even though the smoke had bled into the corridors. That was a problem for after he played with his new loot.

He closed the study up behind him to keep any more smoke trickling in, then started a walk that ended as an excited jog back to his room. The smoke was just thick enough to turn the air sour and deepen the shadows, giving an edge of paranoia to his retreat as he pulled open the door and ducked inside.

Tossing the crystal onto his cot, Hogarth sat next to it and settled the chest across his legs. He then shrugged out of his pack and propped the shield and mace against the bed frame before teasing open the lid to the chest.

He was careful at first, then swung it wide open to peer into its contents. He couldn't suppress the gleeful, idiotic giggling as he reached in to scrape his fingers through the collection of coins and precious stones that littered the bottom of the chest. There was even a ring mixed among them that warmed to his touch, giving him the very strong impression of magic. In a velvety pouch he found a milky orb just a bit smaller than his fist, the white substance swirling strangely within as he peered inside. The last piece of treasure looked to be a leather scroll of some kind, held shut by a pair of metal bands at either end.

For the size of the chest, it wasn't much, but it was his first real taste of the treasure and prizes waiting deeper in the dungeon. Greater risk, greater reward, but he had to believe the things he'd found would help him overcome the challenges ahead.

Given the nature of the ring, Hogarth studied it first. The outside looked like simple polished metal, but when he turned it against the light saw that there was etching on the inside, an inscription in swirling symbols that reminded him of cursive. He didn't hesitate to slip it onto his left pointer finger. When nothing happened, he gave it a tug. The ring popped free, so he tried it on his dominant hand instead. Still nothing. Underwhelmed but still enthusiastic, he returned it to his left hand and moved on.

The orb was also exactly what it physically appeared to be. A glass ball with murky white liquid inside. None of its magic qualities, which he was entirely certain existed, revealed themselves. He was going to have to do a lot of experimenting, it seemed.

Since the coins and jewels were, well, literal treasure he went to the scroll in hopes it might reveal the nature of the other items. It did, but not the way he expected it to. A bit of folded parchment slid out of it when he tipped it on its end.

Putting aside the scroll, he carefully unfolded the page and felt a tingle through his fingertips as words burned to life.

My dear Oslo, it is my hope you find these words in my company, or at my direction. I know not what will become of our home with the loss of the Odinstone, but I know that the roots are spreading and our hold is tenuous at best. The other students were evacuated, but some are missing. Should the worst come, I hope you can find them. I've left what I can, but most of my tools were taken. I wanted to find you myself, but the lord demanded we abandon the halls at once and had me all but dragged from my study. My precious son, may the gods watch over you wherev...

Hogarth scowled as the words began to fade, and the page itself darkened and then crumbled as if a flame had burned it away. Hogarth brushed away the ashes, wondering what happened to Otto, the author of the letter, and the people that had lived here long before.

"Typical Atlantis style ending. Sounds like they screwed with Norse gods and magic, and their castle or keep or whatever the dungeon used to be took the hit for it."

It was interesting to learn a hint of the dungeon's backstory, at least. Maybe if the opportunity ever presented itself, he'd make a video about the adventures and lore he dug up during his travels. The more valuable hint was that everything he'd taken from the study had use. They were items believed to be of use to someone trapped or displaced by the dungeon.

He assumed the money was just money, in the event this Oslo guy made it to civilization. He picked out a shiny copper coin to keep on him just in case, for luck if nothing else. The ring was another easy equip, just leaving it on to eventually stumble over its use in the field. The ball he feared would break, but it still fit easy enough in the pocket of his slacks so he figured he'd just take it out sometimes and play with it.

Without the distraction of the letter, Hogarth finally got around to unravelling the leather. The skin was a little stiff but softened as he rolled it across the cot and flattened it out. Most of it was blank. At the very center was a circle of runes painted onto the hide in black ink. An intricate pattern of knot-work lines wove around each rune, each line carefully placed in a strange maze that spiraled into the center of the circle. Touching the runes, he recognized the tingle in his skin this time for the magic it was and recklessly pressed his hand over the ink. With his hand flat he was able to cover the picture entirely, and didn't pull it away until the sensation subsided.

A simple, solitary square had taken its place. He had no idea what it meant until, slowly but surely, ink spread out from it and formed other squares, each connected by simple, solid lines until he realized he was looking at a map. It was the closest to a minimap as he was likely to get, and as he watched the lines move it didn't take long for them to reach the stairwell and come to a stop. That was the boundary line of his exploration after all, and it made sense in a video game progression sort of way that he was limited by his own achievements.

He grinned as things seemed to be coming along nicely. He had a magic ring, a little gold, a bunch of neat junk, and a magical map. And a big fancy marble.

It'd just be easier to enjoy if his stomach wasn't trying to eat the rest of his organs. He knew it was a little dramatic to be so concerned about food, but he'd gone from eating whenever he got the slightest bit snackish to straight fasting. That he only had a mild headache brewing was probably his luck still working in his favor.