This Used To Be About Dungeons полностью

“But we could get stranded, yes?” asked Mizuki.

“If you go through, you can just use the warp,” said Alfric, shrugging. “So you’d be stranded in the sense that you’d be in Liberfell without having to walk six or seven miles, yes.”

“But we’ve no reason to think the wardrobe itself can make the trip, ay?” asked Hannah.

“This is true,” said Alfric. He looked the wardrobe over. “My guess is that it’s one-way travel to the hex of your choice. We don’t know how repeatable it is, whether it might have daily limits on use or weight or some other parameter… This will almost certainly have to be looked over by a cleric of Qymmos, because each test sends us a minimum of six miles away.”

“Less than that, I’d think,” said Hannah. “Take it to the hex border, fiddle with the dial, and try to end up with the portal in view, ay? In theory, you have a hundred feet to walk from wardrobe to portal.”

“Right,” said Alfric, feeling slightly embarrassed at the correction. “So, I think what we’ll do, if we are all planning to end up in Liberfell, is to have Isra and Mizuki go through, talk with us over party chat about what it was like, then warp into town. Then Hannah and I can carry the wardrobe to the hex edge with Verity’s help, and hopefully we can warp it in.” He was somewhat unsure of this part, but it seemed like the only way to deal with it.

“It’s over the weight limit, ay?” asked Hannah. “Even if you stripped down to nothing.”

Alfric thought about this for a moment. He hated to admit it, but she was right, and by a fair margin. “Okay,” he said. “Well, there are public rooms back near the warp at Traeg’s Knob, and houses. We can…” He trailed off. “Well, we don’t have a way to lock it up, which is a problem.”

“Lock it up?” asked Hannah. “Who’s going to steal it, ay, when it’s so much a pain to move?”

“I’m in favor of the plan where I leave right now,” said Verity. “I need a proper meal, something hot. Could I possibly go do that while the two of you figure out logistics, or would that be horribly rude?”

Alfric bit his lip. “If we’re carrying it uphill to the top of Traeg’s Knob, would you think you had it in you to give us a song of strength? I’ll leave it to your discretion, because you know your own needs.”

Verity grimaced. “I suppose, but that means that I have to sing and walk.”

“Well, I’m out of here,” said Mizuki. “Isra? You too? Because I don’t want to walk back up a hill that I’ve already walked down, and someone needs to get us some rooms at Liberfell.”

Isra hesitated. “Yes,” she said. “I’ve never been.”

“You’ll love it,” said Mizuki. “I’ll make sure they don’t hurt you.”

“Hurt me?” asked Isra.

“It’s a joke,” said Mizuki. “No one is going to hurt you in Liberfell, and if they do, I will personally set fire to every single house.”

“And that’s another joke,” said Isra.

“See?” asked Mizuki. “This is going to be fun. Portal boy, one portal please.”

“Portal man,” said Alfric, giving her a smile. “Coming right up.” He spun the dial, then opened the door again.

It wasn’t the city of Liberfell, but rather, a field that must have been somewhere near it. Mizuki stepped through, then immediately tried to go back, just for the sake of testing, and her hands went through an invisible plane, exposing red meat and bone. Alfric knew enough to know this was just visual, seeing into her body, but it was still horrifying. Her mouth moved, but there was no sound.

said Alfric.

said Mizuki.

said Isra, who stepped in as Mizuki stood off to the side.

said Mizuki.

said Alfric.

said Mizuki. And with that, she cast the warp, disappearing to the center of her hex, where Liberfell was. Isra quickly followed, and Alfric shut the wardrobe after them.

“This is a really good entad,” said Alfric. “It’ll save us an enormous amount of travel time. Even if it’s hard to move, if we center it in whatever hex we’re basing out of, that’s thirty-six miles we don’t have to walk. And if we can get it to work with something else, we could cut out travel time altogether.”

“You’re excited about this,” said Hannah.

“And getting ahead of yourself,” said Verity.

“Well, sure,” said Alfric, shrugging. “But it’s one of the vitals, or at least a good piece of the puzzle.”

“And an absolute pain to move,” said Hannah, sighing.

“Let me see if it’s really over the weight limit,” said Alfric. He grabbed the wardrobe and tipped it so that it was resting its weight on him, then quickly made the sign for the warp. The worst-case scenario would be if he’d misjudged where the weight was, and ended up at the top of Traeg’s Knob without the wardrobe, which would mean a bit of a trek back, but no, the warp simply failed.