I want to be somewhere, I don't care much where.

[Quakerlol]

You fall out of your gate into your land, sinking a few inches into the soft mud underneath your feet. You look around. You appear to have landed in some sort of muddy tunnel, stretching from left to right, seemingly endlessly. The gate hovering above you is casting a weak orange light, the only reason you can see down here. You pull out your SAFETYLUMINESCENT HUSKHELMET and equip it. Much better! Now, not only can you see in the dark, but you have some sort of infrared-vision setting. Well, that sure is convenient! You pull up the server window. Isaard's still asleep. Big wriggler. Looks like some imps are creeping up on him, though! Did that one steal a sword from the armory? Holy crap!

You smash into the imps with a few chairs, causing them to explode into grist for Isaard to pick up later. Man, he really needs to wake up and stop being all vulnerable and asleep! He may sound smart, but he can be pretty dumb sometimes. You go ahead and fortify his respiteblock by piling up a couple of chairs at the door. Dumb imps aren't getting in now!

You close the window (Isaard's gonna have to fend for himself) and look down the tunnel again. No sign of imps or ogres or anything. You equip your pickaxe and look to each side. Looks about the same either way. Hmmmm. Left or right?

[Shipfish]

==> Give up on directions and talk to your moirail.

[Quakerlol]

==> Give up on directions and talk to your moirail.

Moirail? Hahahahahaha who could you be talking about you have NO IDEA what you are insinuating there but okay yeah you should talk to Isaard. He does need to wake up, after all!

herobound.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=pester2&action=display&thread=92

Wow. Isaard.... this guy has even more problems than you thought. First he hallucinates an eyeless monster in his room, which told him to follow it. Then he tells you about his dream which involved purple, horrorterribles, and some weird meeting with himself? That probably all means stuff but all you know is that it does not mean sanity. On the bright side, though, he liked your gift! You think. He went off on a weird tangent after you gave it to him, but he was very polite and gneiss nice about thanking you so that is an improvement. Come to think of it, it was remarkably nice, comparatively speaking. Could you be getting through to him, finally? You blink a bit. Could he... no. No way! You're reading too much into this. Kyanas said he probably didn't pity you back, after all. You should stop being stupid and dumb and get on with the game.

You arbitrarily choose the left corridor, and squish down the muddy path. You also activate the infrared vision, because goodness knows you can't see for crap and there will definitely be monsters in an underground labyrinth thing. Hopefully none that are too strong for you.

[Shipfish]

==> Continue (cautiously) down the tunnel/path thing. If you have a way to write down a map, do so.

[Quakerlol]

==> Continue (cautiously) down the tunnel/path thing. If you have a way to write down a map, do so.

You take a few steps forward and sink into the mud. This is really going to get annoying. While trudging forward you poke around a bit on your computer functions. This helmet seems to have a few more programs than your old husktop did. There's the infrared option, which you have on. There's also some option that says STATS. You flick it on and off a few times, but it doesn't seem to do anything. You leave it on in case it works later. There's also a MAP function. Well dang! That sure is convenient! You activate that, and a small rectangle appears in the upper left corner of your screen. There's an orange blinking swirly thing, the color of your sprite, that an orange dot which you assume is you is moving away from. It also seems to be oriented with the points of the compass. You're currently headed SOUTH. As you move forward, more and more of the map is revealed as you see it.

You approach another T-intersection. To your left, the east, is a long, paved tunnel, lit with torches at regular intervals. That would be a nice change from this darned mud. Its walls also seem to be covered with pictures of some kind, but you can't make them out from here. You swivel your head to the right and WHOA HOLY CRAP. You pull your head back into the tunnel and lean against the wall, hoping they didn't see you. The tunnel to the right is INFESTED with ogres! They were milling around in that tunnel as far as the eye can see, which was not very far since there weren't any torches down that way. Looks like if you're going to go any further this way, you're going to have to deal with them. Or you could go back. You check the map. The two tunnels have shown up on your map, and the one on the western side is filled with black dots roving around, labeled CAVE OGRE. Well, what now?

[Shipfish]

==> Get your butt out of that tunnel and skedaddle down the other one! Come back when you have gained a level or two!

[Quakerlol]

==> Get your butt out of that tunnel and skedaddle down the other one! Come back when you have gained a level or two!

That sounds like the most sensible course of action by far! You peep out to look down the ogre tunnel again. None of them seem like they're looking this way. Phew. The hall to the left is long and straight, with no end in sight, and nothing to hide behind. You're going to have to sneak down it or run like heck. Cautiously you turn down the brightness on your helmet (there's a BRIGHTNESS TOGGLE in the menu, cool) for maximum sneakage and step onto the first of the paving stones. Your shoes don't make too much of a noise, but you're heavy enough to scrape and scuffle a little bit. You look over your shoulder, panicked, but they haven't noticed you. Darn this hallway and all those torches all along it. You're sure it's very nice, and that all these paintings and carvings and reliefs and stuff all over the walls are important and relevant to your planet and what you're supposed to do, but right now you don't have time for them! Maybe later. You also realize you're tracking mud down the hall. Well, not like your lusus is around to see you.

The hall is long, and you still can't see an end. You've gone about twenty or thirty feet before you bump into a pedestal. Because of course there's one of those. You have about half a second to register that it has a very nice-looking swirly wing emblem carved on it, like the one you saw in that other cave, before it crashes to the ground. The noise it makes is enormous, and it echoes hugely in the hallway. You jerk your head over your shoulder and see the ogres all turn in unison, silently. For a split second you stand in silence, frozen, your bloodpusher racing. Then one of them roars, breaking the spell, and you turn and run like a startled hopbeast.

Your shoes clatter on the floor as the ogres lumber after you, occasionally shoving a pedestal over out of sheer dumb rage. Why did you have to be so CLUMSY? You don't make mistakes like this in the tunnels. Stupid stupid stupid! You check the map, and you can't even count how many ogres are behind you. There's a lot and that's all you know. You run, run, run down the hall, sprinting for dear life, when you see what looks like a light approaching. But no, it's not approaching you, you're coming closer to it! It's a big huge lantern that is fastened to the wall which you are running towards! Dead end.

Gosh.
Freaking.
DARN IT.

[Shipfish]

==> Oh no! Oh no! Er, umm... Macguffin! Or, um... author's choice?

[Quakerlol]

==> Author's choice it is.

Looks like there's nowhere to go but forward. You grit your teeth and begin running with one shoulder forward, hoping there's a room on the other side of that wall. If not, you are about to get some bones broken. This might hurt.

==> Stebia: Bust through that wall Kool-Aid-Man-style

That made no sense but here goes everything! You hunker down, put on an extra burst of speed, and launch yourself at the marble wall full-speed. There's a flash of pain in your shoulder, but the wall collapses, and you crouch and roll into the room. A few rocks fall on you, knocked loose by the crash, but your helmet deflects most of them. You lay there, partially stunned, until you realize that the ogres are not currently trampling you. You look up and see that the hole you busted is too small for them to get in through. A couple of them are shoving their hands through, but luckily you rolled far enough that they can't reach you. Phew.

You sit up, groaning a bit at your bumps and bruises, and inspect the damage. Your shoulder isn't too bad. There's quite a bit of bleeding, but nothing really seems to be broken. You try to rotate it, and ouch. Jeez. Good thing you lead with your left, or this might have been a problem. You know you need to make sure it doesn't stiffen or something, but wow does it hurt to move! You put your hand over your shoulder to keep some of the bleeding down and turn your helmet's lights all the way up, to try and see where you are.

[Shipfish]

==> Look around, see if your map says anything important.

[Quakerlol]

==> Look around, see if your map says anything important.

Your map has this place labeled as ATRIUM OF THE GODS. Well, that sure sounds important! You should probably look around. You shine your headlamp on the nearest wall, and see an unlit lantern right next to the hole you busted. You walk over to it. Luckily the ogres seem to have lost interest and are leaving. The lantern isn't like any you've seen before. It's a small glass orb nested in a wire frame, surrounded by four iron bars that form a box. Pretty, cute, actually, but there doesn't seem to be any way to light it. It doesn't have a filament or buttons or anything. You wonder....

You hesitantly reach out a finger through the bars and tap the orb. It lights up briefly, leaving a small sunspot where you touched it, before fading. Hmm. Well, you're close. You investigate the base of the lantern. It has the same wavy-wing design you saw before, in the cave and on the pedestal you knocked over. Weird. Maybe it means something. You trace your finger along the grooves of the design. It lights up where you touched it, but only briefly. You try concentrating on the brightness, but that only makes it fade faster. Hmm. Okay. So concentrating doesn't help. Maybe you should let your mind wander.

You take a deep breath and touch the orb, closing your eyes. You try to stop thinking about the game, the dark underground cave you're in, and the monsters currently milling around the only exit you know of. Deep breaths. Phew. Okay. Think about something else. Think about something happy. Think about... your friends! Good! You're sure everyone is doing fine. Aruale is probably smashing things up right now, or hanging out with Lerena. Those are basically the only two things she does, besides fishing for her lusus. And she does like hanging out with Lerena, they are basically best friends. Probably more than best friends, actually! Some people you know think they're going to go pale but you think that they might be redder than that. And there's Kyanas, who is one of the smartest people you know! As soon as you talk to her you're going to ask her about those murals and symbols, you know she'll figure them out. And Kratus is probably being ridiculous as usual. You bet he hasn't even left his hive yet, silly zone-out-er that he is. And Isaard is probably doing just fine without you with his magic and stuff. You know everyone is doing just great.

Your eyelids start to turn oranger as light begins to filter through them. You crack them open and see that the lantern in front of you is burning brightly, as are a thousand identical ones all around the room! The room is much larger than you'd thought, with a big domed ceiling that the lanterns are spiraling up inside. Wow.

[Shipfish]

==> Stebia, you are too adorable. I love you.

==> Captchalogue a lantern and explore this room.

[Quakerlol]

==> Stebia, you are too adorable. I love you.

You don't know why, but you suddenly feel a great sense of well-being! The lamps flare a bit brighter.

==> Captchalogue a lantern and explore this room.

The room is well-lit enough that you don't have to do that! There must be hundreds of lanterns, each casting a creamy white glow on the room. It's very soothing after the heart-pounding evasion of those ogres. The lanterns' illumination reveals gorgeous mosaics all along the walls. They look like they're in a sort of sequential pattern, and you're standing near the beginning. You move to your left a little and start examining.

The pictures start off showing green fields, romping hopbeasts, all manner of adorable things. The hopbeasts sometimes have open mouths with lines coming out of them, which you guess means they're talking or something? You have no idea how sequential art works so you will assume they are making noise and not barfing up chopsticks. There's also the occasional glimpse of a figure in the corner of a panel, just a flash of bright robes and the merest edge of a shining wing here and there. The sky is blue and sparkling stones set into the mosaic show you that the dew is even more brilliant than it was when you saw it! Then you get to the hole you busted in the wall. Oops. Looks like you took out a sizable chunk of the mosaic. Way to go!

You edge around the fallen rubble and find where the mosaic picks back up. You don't see the hiding figure anywhere anymore, and the dew has less sparkle now. The hopbeasts look confused (about as confused as animals made of small bits of stone could be, you guess) and aren't making noise anymore. Some of them seem to be digging big holes in the ground, like they're looking for something. You start seeing more scenes underground, more of the hopbeasts building things in tunnels. And then there's another chipped section and the hopbeasts are back on the surface again. You move right again but you're back at the beginning of the mosaic. Huh. You wonder what that's all supposed to mean.

You move in front of the nearest lantern and look at that symbol on the base of it again. Two symmetrical swirly bits that sort of resemble wings. You wonder what it means. You wish you could take a picture of it or something. Maybe one of your friends would understand it, but you have no idea what it could be! Oh well. It's probably not important.

So what now?

[Shipfish]

==> Grab one of those lanterns, because OUTSIDE the room it is dark and you might need it.

==> See if there are any exits to the chamber.

[Quakerlol]

==> Grab one of those lanterns, because OUTSIDE the room it is dark and you might need it.

Has the command console not been paying attention? You are clearly still wearing your SAFETYLUMINESCENT HUSKHELMET, which admittedly did get its goggle plates a bit cracked in the crash. But the light works just fine! You flick it on and off a couple of times to make sure of that. Yep, everything's good. The computer interface isn't damaged either, although the screen has cracks through it. You're sure that can be fixed.

==> See if there are any exits to the chamber.

That's a better idea! You look at the MAP function on your helmet but it doesn't show any exits besides the one you made! You also didn't notice any on your circuit of the room. Hmmm.

You look up. Maybe there's another shaft up there? The lanterns and your helmet are making it hard to see. And you have no idea how to turn the lanterns off! It doesn't look like there's any way to get up there, but that might be part of the game's challenge. You squint upwards. It doesn't look any farther than your gate. You guess this is your only option!

You bend your knees and take a deep breath before STRONGjumping as high as you can! You shoot up, up, up towards the top of the dome! As the lamps get less frequent, you can see that there is indeed a circle of sunlight above you! You get closer and closer and you can almost reach out and grab it! Your ascent slows, and frantically you grab at the ledge as you hang in the air, but it crumbles under your fingers and you start plummeting through the air!

YOU DID NOT THINK THIS THROUGH YOU DID NOT THINK THIS THROUGH YOU DID NOT THINK THIS THROUGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!