The system finally came back to life — like an emergency operator who shows up late and smelling like coffee.
| STATUS UPDATED |
HP: 17 / 70
Stamina: 8 / 40
[Minor fracture – right shoulder]
[Light bleeding – left leg]
[Disoriented – (-2) Perception for 5 minutes]
| ACTIVE CONDITIONS |
→ Lost in the Devil of a Place
→ Shaken Confidence, Reinforced Sarcasm
"Ah… great," I muttered. "Still alive. What a tragedy."
I got up slowly, leaning on a damp rock.
The ground wasn't natural stone… it felt different. As if it had been smoothed by hand. Sculpted. And up ahead, a faint pale light flickered — like someone had left a secret burning in the dark.
I moved closer. My footsteps echoed the wrong way — like someone else was walking with me, but deliberately half a second behind.
The light came from runes. Living runes. Breathing, in slow, purple pulses along the walls.
Down there, at the bottom of the hole I'd dug for myself, was an ancient sanctuary.
I kept walking down that damned narrow corridor, where the only thing tighter than the path was the common sense I was clearly ignoring.
The temperature dropped. The air thickened. The smell changed.
It wasn't just dust and moisture anymore… It was the scent of something alive, that hadn't seen the light in a long time.
And then I heard it.
Not a roar. Not a whisper.
A song.
Low voice. Hoarse. Almost childlike. Humming a wrong melody:
"Little stone talks… little stone lies… But dead stone sings… with no disguise…"
I stopped.
My hand went straight to the pickaxe on my back.
The glow from the runes flickered subtly — like they sensed something approaching.
And then… it showed itself.
| ACTIVE ENCOUNTER: Incomplete Subterranean Entity |
[Name]:Brelgrik, the Whispering One
[Race]: K'tharnian (degenerate subspecies of dark elf)
[Class]: Former Scribe / Runic Madman
[Size]: Medium (slender, skeletal, 1.80m)
| ATTRIBUTES |
Strength: 5
Dexterity: 12
Constitution: 6
Perception: 14
Intelligence: ??? (unstable)
Charisma: -4
| MENTAL STATE |
→ Fragmented. Capable of rational thought in brief moments of clarity.
→ Alternates between aggression, paranoia, and childlike excitement.
| PASSIVE ABILITIES |
| Runic Tracking (detects recent magical usage)
| Voice Mimicry (uses others' speech to confuse)
| Stone Memory (remembers ancient rune patterns)
| WEAKNESSES |
→ Strong light
→ Firm voice (respects commands spoken with authority)
He crawled out from behind a pile of rocks, moving on all fours like a broken animal, his body wrapped in rags stitched together with strands of hair — probably his own.
His face?Technically human… if you consider "human" someone who fell headfirst into a bucket of syphilis and unresolved trauma.
His eyes were way too big, glowing with a sickly violet. His teeth — small and chipped — looked like tavern porcelain that had been through one too many fights.
As soon as he saw me, he froze.
Then screamed — a high-pitched hiss, like a rat being crushed inside a church bell.
And he attacked me.
With… a spoon. A rusty one.
"AAAAAHHHH! HE HAS EYES THAT SEEEEE!!!"
I dodged with ease. It didn't hurt — it was more like being poked with a baby fork. I stepped back on instinct, not out of necessity.
He tried to bite me, failed spectacularly, and scrambled down the tunnel on all fours, giggling and spitting.
My first instinct was to let him go.
But… he was the first (relatively) non-hostile living thing I'd seen down here. And more importantly: he had bits of maps taped to his legs. And scroll fragments stitched to his back like a cape.
He wasn't just a lunatic. He was a lunatic who knew things — and maybe, just maybe, held the final piece of Ashveil's filthiest political puzzle.
"Son of a—"
I took a breath, grabbed my pickaxe with my good hand, and followed him.
Because of course I was going to chase after a spoon-wielding elf-goblin-maniac.
I ran through tunnels that looked like they'd been carved by a drunken sculptor with unresolved anger issues. The lunatic — Brelgrik the Whispering One, according to the system — left behind a trail of spit and paper scraps stuck to the walls.
The labyrinth was alive. Literally. The walls pulsed with weak runes, like they were trying to remember an old spell… or a really bad experience.
Then the system reminded me I was, unfortunately, not alone.
| ACTIVE ZONE: Abyssal Labyrinth – Level 2 |
→ Danger Level: Moderate to High→ Detected Creatures: 3 species→ Residual Magical Influence: Constant→ Light structural instability→ Hostile entities roaming with no fixed pattern
The first came from above. A creature clung to the wall — four eyes, translucent skin — and dropped right in front of me, screeching.
| ENEMY ENCOUNTERED |
[Name]: Visch-lurker
[Type]: Runic predator / mutated amphibian
[Behavior]: Territorial / Blind / Heat-reactive
[Weakness]: Metallic noise
"What an ugly bastard."
It lunged at me.
I smacked it with the pickaxe right where I thought the head should be. Crunchy noise. Wet shriek. The thing exploded into angry gelatin.
"Okay… that was easy. And disgusting. But easy."
I moved on. And the challenges kept coming — like the labyrinth was testing my patience.
I turned a corner and came face-to-face with a creature that looked like a skinned eel made out of raw meat and regret. It had four white eyes, a split tongue, and the texture of moldy pudding.
The thing dropped from the ceiling, hissing like a haunted kettle.
"Oh good. Dinner's here."
It launched at me with all the grace of a living torpedo. Pickaxe to what I guessed was its forehead.
Splatch. Head sank like spoiled flan. Body slid across the floor and stopped moving. With flair, I wiped the pickaxe on the wall like it was a dirty napkin.
"Next."
Two goblins emerged from a crack in the wall. Short, pale, full of attitude. One screamed:
"FOR THE GODDESS OF THE TUNNEL!"
The other tripped and faceplanted. Glorious.
The first one came at me with a bone dagger. Cute.
I spun the pickaxe. Clean hit to the temple.
The body flipped midair like a cursed coin and dropped like a sack of flour.
The second one was still trying to get up.
I kicked him in the ribs. Lights out.
Two strikes, two knockouts. If this were a tournament, I'd be in the finals.
Didn't even have time to celebrate.
The next corridor got cold — like "mother-in-law just arrived" cold. And then it showed up:
A creature made of mist, with too many teeth and not enough body. A spectral hound, floating like it thought it was better than everyone else.
I tried to look confident. It growled. I growled back.
Didn't work.
So I focused… and cast a fireball at him.
It went straight through. Hit a rune on the wall.
The rune exploded.
The ceiling collapsed on the dog.
Yep.I won a fight against a ghost using physics and coincidence.
I kept walking through the labyrinth — sweaty, heart pounding, and with the distinct sense that the entire universe had conspired to throw me into a raffle of God's worst biological experiments.
And then I heard him again:
"STOOONEEE… HE'S GOT STONEEEE! THEY'RE GONNA TAKE MY STONEEEE!"
The lunatic.
I rounded another corner and saw the violet glow. A chamber.
And there, perched on a block of stone, was Brelgrik. The rag-draped goblin-elf-squirrel-maniac clutched a piece of parchment and laughed like he owned the world.
"YOU'RE NOT THE MAYOR! YOU HAVE NO RIGHT!" he yelled, then darted into a side hole.
I sighed. Tired, filthy, and emotionally vulnerable at the idea of punching something else.
The hole he escaped through was narrow — but I'd shoved my dignity into worse places, so I followed.
I crawled through a tight passage that felt like the throat of a creature that snacks on claustrophobia for breakfast. On the other side, the space opened up. Not in a welcoming way — more like a "you're-about-to-regret-this" kind of opening.
A stone chamber. Symmetrical. Worn tiles on the floor. And old runes. Lots of them. The kind of runes that had definitely killed more people than time itself.
I stopped for a moment. It was too quiet.
Then I took the first step.
CLIC!
It was almost polite. Delicate.
CLANK-CLANK-SHUNK!
Two meters ahead, three stone spears shot up from the floor like they were trying to skewer a pig for a banquet.
The tips tore through the air and slammed into the opposite wall with enough force to convince any sane person to go home, become a farmer, and reconsider their revenge plans against corrupt officials.
I froze.
"Okay," I muttered, "at least it wasn't one of those traps that stab you from below. That's something."
Up ahead, I spotted the lunatic — Brelgrik, squatting atop a stone ledge.
He was biting his toenails. Yes. Toenails. And softly singing:
"You step… it stabs… You fly… it stabs… You think… IT STAAAABS!"
He giggled.
I looked back down at the floor.
There was a pattern. Some kind of sequence. Maybe an old thief's dance. Maybe a runic mobility code.
Or maybe it was just a field of death traps wearing camouflage.
I exhaled, took one step back…
And just stared.
At the far end, Brelgrik waved the parchment at me — the one with the wax seal — like he was saying: "Come get it."
I wanted to get it. But the question was:
How, exactly, do I get through this damned labyrinth of stabby doom?