Chapter Four Hundred and Seventy-Two - All You Can't Eat

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Chapter Four Hundred and Seventy-Two - All You Can't Eat

Chapter Four Hundred and Seventy-Two - All You Can't Eat

"Alright, before we go any deeper, we should take a minute to go over what we'll be facing on the second floor," Amaryllis said. She was already pulling the big book out of her bag and tugging it open to the right page.

"I hope it's not more eating, I expect dungeons to be good exercise, not places where I get stuffed," Calamity said with a pat to his tummy.

"Hpmf, no worries about that," Amaryllis said as she tapped the tip of a talon at the page. "The second floor of this dungeon is one where we won't have a choice but to fight. There's a small puzzle by the exit, but it seems like it's a very easy one."

"What kind of fighting?" I asked.

"Nothing too complicated. The floor is laid out as a very basic maze. The last delver who went through said that the 'right hand rule' was able to solve it within half an hour. The enemies on this floor aren't anything too special. Imps of some sort or another."

We all nodded, then stopped. "What's an imp?" Awen asked.

Amaryllis shrugged. "Some small lizard, I think? I don't know."

"Aren't they little devil people?" I asked.

"I thought they were insects," Caprica muttered.

Amaryllis cleared her throat. "In any case. These imps drop pages when they die. These are the pages of a recipe book. The exit to the maze has... hmm, the notes aren't too precise, but it says here that you need to complete the recipe blocks by the door and it'll open for you. In any case, the floor boils down to killing these imps and walking around for a bit. Let me handle the puzzle at the end."

"I'm not sure if I'm really capable of fighting so much," Booksie said. She tightened her grip on her club. "B-but I'll give it my best!"

Awen reached over and patted the bun on the back. "It's not so bad. A little scary, but not so bad."

"We'll keep you safe," I promised. "We can keep Booksie in the centre of our formation, so she won't have to fight anything to begin with."

"No!" Booksie said. "No, I want to help, please? The whole goal of this is to help me become stronger, and I won't gain any strength if I'm forever coddled and kept safe."

"That's the spirit!" Desiree said. "Let's show these imp creatures your fearsome determination!"

The tunnel leading from the first floor of the dungeon to the second was just a long corridor with a handful of random 45-degree turns in it. The walls were strangely familiar, something like drywall, painted an inoffensive pastel green over flooring that looked suspiciously like linoleum.

Interestingly, the second floor of the dungeon wasn't below the first, but just just deeper in. It started with a door. It was one of those easy-to-open doors you'd find between a kitchen and the main floor of a restaurant, the sort with no handle and hinges that went both ways.

"Okay," I said. "Caprica and I will be at the front. Then Amaryllis, Booksie, and Desiree. Calamity and Awen, can you take up the rear?"ViiSiit novelbi/n(.)c/(o)m for latest novels

"Well done!" I said as I patted her on the shoulder. At the same time, my friends moved in around us, keeping an eye out for more imps.

"That thing didn't look all that strong. What level was it?" Calamity asked.

"Six," Caprica said. "A Skeletal Imp. It dropped something." She knelt, then rose with a small sheet of crumpled paper. "This must be one of those recipe parts you mentioned, Amaryllis."

"Looks like it," Amaryllis agreed as she took the page and carefully unfolded it. "Yes, this looks like a part of cookbook. There's a page number in the corner and everything." She held the page up, and it was easy to see where it had been ripped out of whatever book it belonged to.

I supposed we'd be finding more of those as we went. "Let's keep moving. We're sticking to the right-hand rule, right?" That was an easy enough trick. As long as we kept a wall to the right of us, then we'd eventually be able to solve the entire maze!

Unless the book was out-of-date and the right-hand rule no longer worked.

Well, we'd figure that out if it came to it, I was sure!

The restaurant theme continued as we moved deeper in the maze. Old paintings hung on the walls, with pretty landscapes and sometimes some impressionistic figures. A lot of the paintings actually had random courthouses in them, and the people were often dressed in severe black robes.

"Stay sharp," Caprica whispered when she caught me staring. "I think I heard something ahead."

"Okay," I muttered back.

True to her word, it wasn't long before more imps showed up. They darted from around both corners of an intersection, little red blurs that scrabbling our way with fearsome, squeaky cries.

Amaryllis was quick to react, her dagger-wand flashing with a bright burst of electrical light. Her bolts struck true, frying the first imp and connecting to the second to send it tumbling our way. It caught an arrow from Calamity mid-flop and came ragdolling toward us.

"I feel like we might be overleveled," I said.

"There's no such thing," Amaryllis said. "Only those who are ready to face an obstacle, and those who aren't."

"I guess. But this almost feels unfair for the poor imps."

"Broccoli, they want to eat us."

"Ah," I said. That was a fair point. "Well, we're not going to give them a chance!"

With a couple more pages added to Amaryllis' pile, we continued on through the dungeon. It didn't take long before we were ambushed again, then again, then yet again, but really, a few imps coming at us while yowling wasn't all that big of a threat.

I figured we'd come out of this floor without too much trouble.

***