Learn The Lore

Before my eyes, Strep leapt backward. Her body expanded and formed into the shape of a large chest which fell conveniently back on its original spot.

I saw the invading player approach me.

Exploration build, piecemeal armor. All high level. Runes lining his great axe all in fashion at the time: A damn MinMaxer.

𝖂𝖔𝖔𝖉𝖊𝖓_𝕾𝖜𝖔𝖗𝖉89
Level 89 | Knight | Kills 690 | Deaths 150
Axes are meta now, get over it.  
No, I’m not changing my name. 
Will trade boss help for rare equips.
Streams every evening wooden.sword@LiveTruman.

I belied my contempt, and was sure to follow all the rituals of friendliness. Healing items dropped, weapons put away.

“Woah, a disheveled one! You aren’t with The Foundation are you?”

The patchwork knight searched me up and down.

“I am The Traveler, a pacifist, I'll bring you no harm.”

The Knight in black steel helm and silver pauldrons laughed.

“Haha, that's what you all say, but I know you've got ‘Kharmae Lupa” loaded up if I struck you. How in this world did you survive The Cryesomme Moor without armor?”

“Very carefully.”

“So any good loot up here or did you take it all?”

“That doesn’t concern me. You're here for ‘da loot,’ I presume?”

“Of course. What exactly are you here for then, Traveler?”

“I'm sorry?”

“You’re alone. You don't fight, you don't loot, you incarnate just to burn it in acid rain. Just running around the world naked and dying. Why? What's the point?”

“The point, you patchwork paladin, is to appreciate the environment and the lore of this world. Everything in this dying world has a story to - .”

Why is he laughing?

“Oh man, it's true, you all really are just a bunch of blowhards. Lore's not that deep dude, and there’s dozens of worlds like it. Have fun. Move on.”

There was so much I would have like to say to this fool. About the things I have seen, the wonders of this miserable world, but what is there to say of a man who wears black leather with Purple Zelzaamite boots.

I wordlessly stepped aside, gesturing in, but the knight held his hands up in a defensive posture.

“Um, yeah, no thanks. This place doesn't look like it holds any value. Maybe if you're 'in it for the lore.' haha!”

And with an exaggerated bow, the figure left. 

“Sorry, Strep. Yet another fool caught in the eternal rat race of loot and war hurried onwards to the next high. Maybe next - Strep?”

She sat next to the spawncamp. Her skin was a dull green. Her eyes were staring at the floor.

“Nothing of value…”

“Strep?”

“I came all this way for- after everything I -it can't all be nothing of value, right?”

“Um,”

I wasn't sure what to say. I’ve seen many weeping monsters. The Carrion World is filled with those weeping for what once was or never will be. But, I have never seen one sad.

“I mean look at me. I'm a treasure chest! What kind of chest would I be if I didn't have value!”

“Strep, don't pay any attention to him he's just -”

“Just what! He didn’t even look! Just - just - HURK”.

It was no use, her color turned dark grey. Her bawling stopped only from the large breastplate falling out of her mouth. It clattered to the floor and she beat her hands against it.

“I mean look at all of this junk! It has to be worth something right? Look around there’s full suits of this!”

Wait, full suit? Hmm

“I’ll prove it. You stab me, right now. You can have everything in here. There’s bound to be a few pieces worth something? Prove I have some value. Show him! Show him he CAN'T SAY THAT!”

I raced over to the inconsolable lizard, grabbing her by the shoulders.

“Strep!”

“I’m not worthless!”

“Get a hold of yourself, I've got an idea.”

“You already tried. They said - they said-”

“They said it seemed like there was nothing of value in here.”

Strepsia stopped her crying for a few moments to look at me, sniffling as she did.

“I - I don't follow, Traveller.”

“'Seemed' is the key. Adventurers travel from across dimensions to see this eternal grim dark world. We can’t take anything back with us except memories. So we take things that seem important to the world.”

“Oh.”

“Look, back on Handleiding Isle, you were a dungeon lord, right?”

“I think I'm still current… You aren’t going to report me, right?”

“Where’s your Bloodfountain?”

“Oh, I don’t really use it. That ink’s expensive and it doesn’t matter.”

“It does, can I have it, please?”

She reached to a leather pouch next to her corset and fished through the crumpled certifications and licenses, until retrieving a bone and Zeldzaamite pen.

“I don’t know if I’m supposed to be giving you this.”

“You aren’t, but I won’t tell.”

I took the breastplate she just coughed up. There was nothing particularly wrong with the breastplate: good steel, decent polish, soft floral embossing. However, an adventurer this far would find it too weak for taking.

𝕴𝖗𝖔𝖓 𝕭𝖗𝖊𝖘𝖙𝖕𝖑𝖆𝖙𝖊
Wrought Iron | Armor
For a standing army, this armor
stood between life and death.
Now it stands between your foot, 
and the bones it failed.

I finished scribbling my invisible words on the plate and held it up.

“What do I have, Strep?”

“You have an iron breastplate.”

“Here hold it. What do you see in your mind's eye?”

𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕮𝖍𝖊𝖘𝖙𝖘𝖍𝖎𝖊𝖑𝖉 𝖔𝖋 𝕾𝖈𝖆𝖑𝖊𝖘, 𝕾𝖈𝖎𝖔𝖓 𝖔𝖋 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕾𝖆𝖚𝖗𝖆
Wrought Iron | Armor
As a final humiliation to the vanquished.
Scales The Slaughterer left the grand armor of his victims to rust.
It didn't help them anyways.

“Who’s Scales?”

“Your tombguard.”

“I have a tomb?”

“Indeed. Let's make this dungeon a story worth telling. So what we have to work with”

“Well, you’ve already seen.”

𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕮𝖆𝖒𝖕𝖘𝖎𝖙𝖊 𝖂𝖎𝖙𝖍 𝖆 𝕻𝖊𝖗𝖋𝖊𝖈𝖙𝖑𝖞 𝔑𝖔𝖗𝖒𝖆𝖑 ℭ𝖍𝖊𝖘𝖙.

“I think you mean...”

𝔗𝔥𝔢 ℭ𝔞𝔳𝔢𝔯𝔫𝔥𝔞𝔩𝔩 𝔬𝔣 𝔔𝔲𝔦𝔢𝔱 ℜ𝔢𝔭𝔬𝔰𝔢

“Yeah, whatever! See that cavern over there, its a dark hallway and loops back around to the campsite you adventurers like.”

“Perfect, a dungeon loop! Are there any other monsters or bosses in these caverns?”

“Nope, just me! I'm the boss! Here I have the deed somewhere…”

I looked around the small cavern. Large urns, chests, Campspawn and bench in the middle two entrances divided by a stalagmite column.

“We need only one change. Here.”

Between the cheeks of my loincloth, I kept my Dimensional bag - only for emergencies. I pulled the bag and dropped a few powder kegs and some rope.

“What are those for?”

“We are going to make deadly environment traps.”

“I thought you were a pacifist?”

“We aren’t going to actually use the mine, think of it as a wall.”

“Then why not just use a string?”

“Because! You…wouldn’t understand!”

I placed a single tripwire mine on the entrance closest to the cave mouth. I was sure to use the thickest rope I could find.

“Wait! I thought we weren't supposed to make the traps look obvious.”

“We want this trap to look obvious.”

“Why?”

“So that adventurers assume the whole room is booby trapped and will come back later.”

“I see, so they will go to the hallway.”

“It's not 'The Hallway.'” I corrected while furiously scribbling on the hall entrance, "It's called the…”

𝕮𝖆𝖙𝖆𝖈𝖔𝖒𝖇 𝖔𝖋 𝕾𝖙𝖗𝖊𝖕𝖘𝖎𝖆 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕾𝖆𝖚𝖗𝖆

Strep shrugged and led me down the cavern covered in cobwebs, and low level spiders.

“I should probably clean up all of this armor I cough up, but I just never found the time, being a chest and all.”

I said nothing as I kicked aside a rusted helm. It flew before being caught in a spider’s web. The spider glared at me before working on a new web.

“On its own the armor is worthless, but … help me arrange these so we can place some mines.”

The plates, mails and loose bones were rearranged: Some reaching for a mine laden chest, some curled up by stalagmites. Strep placed a skeleton and armor suit into a thinking pose alongside a powder keg. Others helplessly posed in makeshift traps.

“Right, twenty mines, ten sword spikes, three ceiling axes - None actually meant to kill anyone?”

“Correct, the goal is to get the adventurers to burn through armor and items.”

“What if it does kill them?”

“That’s one less adventurer to worry about.”

“But I thought you were a pacifist.”

“Environmental kills don’t count! Now where is the next room?”

“Oh, that room? Um, Traveler, can't we just wall it off or something?”

“No, we should use every room… Why are you looking like that, Strep?”

𝔑𝔬𝔴 𝔈𝔫𝔱𝔢𝔯𝔦𝔫𝔤:

𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕲𝖗𝖊𝖆𝖙 𝕭𝖎𝖌 𝕽𝖔𝖔𝖒 𝖔𝖋 𝕬𝖘𝖘𝖍𝖔𝖑𝖊𝖘

“By the Weeping Widows of Wannasob Valley! Strep, This room is huge!”

I beheld a vast cavern room with a dome shrouded by blackness. A low pool of water puddled under dripping stalactites. The cavern columns and small torches around the expanse gave the impression of an underground cathedral.

“Why in mod's name don't you use this space?”

“Well, I - um - LOOK OUT!”

Strep pointed to a glimmer rattling toward me. I effortlessly dodged to the right as the giant wheel sped past me. I swear I could hear it laughing as it crashed into the cavern wall behind me.

A Skellicyclist?

“Strep, I thought you said there were no other monsters here?!”

“Oh, these aren't monsters - They're just assholes! HEY! I just respawned that pot!”

ack ack ack ack ack

“How many of these Skellicyclists are there?”

“Every time I ask, they only say 'ack.'”

“Okay, here is what we are going to do, give me a sword from the hallway.”

I judiciously placed it by the door along with several related suits of armor.”

𝕾𝖜𝖔𝖗𝖉 𝖔𝖋  𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖒𝖇𝖊𝖗-𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖗𝖎𝖔𝖙𝖊𝖊𝖗.
Impure Zeldzaamite | Scimitar
When the reckoning came, he was not fast enough.
So he turned to his chariot. So did his men.
They would never be slow again. They ate their horses in starvaton.
They consumed themselves in obsession.
 They are one with their chariot now.

*ack ack ack ack ack*

“Oh, clack off!”

Strep shot her tongue at the skellicyclist who only flipped the sign of the horns and sped off.

“This room will either scare off the professionals or trap and exhaust the amateurs.

“Won't they expect a grand prize?”

“They might, but my what’s important about this item is that they spend long enough looking at the lore to -

“LOOK OUT!”

By the time I explained the dynamics of emergent narrative it was too late.

𝖄𝖔𝖚 𝖆𝖗𝖊 𝕯𝖊𝖆𝖉

*ack ack ack ack ack*

I hate skellicycles.