Maple Manor - Maintenance Tunnels Crosspost

[Tayl]

Of all the places in Maple Manor, the network of tunnels and corridors snaking throughout the building were easily the most dangerous place to go wandering around blindly-- with the exception of Ignis' room, of course. The ooze population was difficult to manage, even for the many Infernal Guards occasionally assigned manor duty, and rumors of nastier creatures lurking within the depths of the myriad tunnels were often traded between maids and Infernals alike.

While the corridors could be accessed from any number of hidden entrances scattered throughout the manor, the primary entrance to the tunnels could be found at the end of the guest room hallway, behind a door that usually remained locked. A key from one of the head maids - or a whole lot of confidence and lockpicking skill - would be required to head into the depths.

[Tayl]

Soon enough, Yval arrived at the door thanks to his lizard speed. Now for the awkward part..... waiting.

...

...

...

:dicro:

[Tayl]

Sure enough, an Infernal Guard quickly materialized in the space next to the door, quite possibly to Yval's surprise. Even more surprising would be said Infernal's appearance-- a peculiar mix of rather attention-grabbing garments that looked closer to a rich anime villain than a servant of the Lord of Torment... well, maybe aside from the fact that they appeared to have a skeletal dragon head. Complete with ominous points of purple fire burning inside the eye sockets!

"Ah, and you must be Yval. Excellent, excellent; I've been meaning to take a crack at these tunnels for some time now, and with Ignis expecting company there's no better time than the present. Are we expecting any more help, perchance?"

A polite, concise Infernal, no less. Now that's really weird.

[Tayl]

Yval almost Lizard Jumped(tm) at the infernal's sudden appearance. The skeletal dragon head was unsettling for him, but he calmed down once said infernal spoke. The politeness...... felt really weird coming from a scary-looking guard. :dicro:

"Y-yes. Dicro will be helping too.. just need to wait for him."

:dicro:

[Tayl]

Eager to get his mind off of the whole... Thyx situation, Dicro wasted no time in hurrying over to the maintenance tunnels. He slowed when he noticed not one figure, but two. Arquen did say he'd send an Infernal over, and apparently he wasn't messing around. Dicro had hung around with Ignis and company enough to recognize the second figure as Ismare, one of the Sincarii, confirming Arquen's words in their conversation earlier. Not that Dicro had any reason to doubt him, of course... but it was another matter to actually be tagging along with someone of such significance for what was supposed to be a mundane cleaning mission.

Essentially, he was grateful that Yval was new here, having no reason for Ismare's presence to send a shiver up his spine. Well, aside from the skull and typical ominous Ignis aesthetic, anyway.

"Oh, hey, Ismare," Dicro greeted, seeing no reason to let his nerves keep him from being courteous, "I'm guessing Arquen sent you over? I'm ready if you guys are, then! Sorry about the wait! I had to, uh... deal with. Something."

Deciding not to pursue that conversation thread any further, Dicro handed Yval a duster he'd picked up on the way over, figuring it'd be hard to do any dusting that without one. He bent over a little bit, leaning in to speak to Yval:

"If you twist the handle open, these things have knives inside. You might need it."

Well that's reassuring.

[Tayl]

Definitely reassuring.

".....noted."

Well, this definitely wasn't for stabbing slimes. That would be absurd. Besides, Yval kind of learned the hard way some time back....... the slime he threw a rock at that one time ate it. He could still see the rock floating around within the slime. eugh.

......that whole day was a trainwreck anyway.

"Yeah, I'm pretty much good to go."

[Tayl]

The infernal - Ismare, if Dicro's greeting was anything to go by - turned towards Dicro once he made his appearance, brandishing a large, old-fashioned key inset with a distinctive purple gem: a master key to the manor, if Dicro happened to recognize it from the copy that Arquen had used to unlock the rooftop.

"Ah, Mister Corrune. Pleased that you could make it," Ismare acknowledged in their distinctive subdued, unsuited-for-an-infernal tone, likely only adding to Yval's apprehension, "Master Arquen wished to ensure that you and any other maids assigned here remained unscathed. I will endeavor to make certain that is the case."

With no further ado, Ismare inserted the key into the lock, and after a few moments of tumblers clicking and wards subsiding, the door swung open. The infernal proceeded in first, flicking on the lightswitch and taking stock of the corridor ahead. Both Dicro and Yval would be able to see that the dim, stone-lined tunnel was mercifully empty of any hostile lifeforms, but certainly seemed in need of a good cleaning.

[Tayl]

Dicro couldn't help but feel a bit flustered at Ismare's formality, but that was quickly replaced by his need to stifle the response of "good luck with that one." Alas, now it was too late to politely thank them for their aid without it being weird, so the master of social interaction remained awkwardly silent as the door opened. Fortunately, he couldn't let his awkwardness spiral into further awkwardness as the site of the tunnel immediately put him on edge, defensively walking in front of Yval as he followed Ismare inside.

It was quiet. Too quiet. No trails of slime or the remains of a giant spider's snack or anything of the sort. Certainly dusty, but not as bad as the last time he was here.

Don't remember last time, Dicro. Don't remember!

He gave a distrusting glance down the corridor, half-heartedly brushing his duster along the wall. This was early in, so perhaps his instincts were right. On the other hand, he did give Ignis a pretty stern glare about last time, so maybe he actually did something about it? Imagine.

...Actually, wasn't Arquen swarmed by things from down here? Hmm.

"Hmmmm."

The one time he considered actually trying with this whole dusting thing, a goopy shuffling noise and a small shadow at the end of the corridor immediately prompted him to whirl around and squint down the hall again. He didn't see anything, so maybe he just imagined it...

"Hmmmmmmmmm."

He turned his head back toward Yval, the disgruntled hmming still clear on his face.

"Hey, Yval, you have fire magic, right? Would you mind adding a little more light?" he asked, his tone more friendly than his expression.

[Tayl]

Right away, Yval didn't like how quiet it was; that's never a good sign. He went to the other wall to begin the dusting, listening very closely for any suspicious sounds-

the shuffle. the fucking goopy shuffle.

Yval didn't turn to the direction of the noise like Dicro did, but he did squint as he dusted. Maybe that was just a fluke? Judging by Dicro's hmmming, that didn't seem to be the case. Probably.

Turning to Dicro when he was asked a question seemed to confirm suspicions though.

"Sure thing."

He created a small mote of fire in his free hand.

"Whoops. Wrong cantrip," Yval immediately hurled the fire mote down the corridor. He then pulled a torch out of his bag of holding to light it with prestidigitation without a second thought.

"There we go."

Yval...

[Tayl]

Aside from the brief moment of goopy shuffling, nothing else of particular import seemed to stand out in the immediate vicinity, even when illuminated by Yval's misfired cantrip. However the mote of flame happened to catch a scrap of cobweb hanging in the middle of the hallway junction, briefly revealing something amiss on the far wall-- a large, clean gash carved into the stone of the corridor a few feet off the ground. Ismare wasted no time in advancing into the intersection, kneeling to investigate the scene at hand.

"Interesting. As clean as this gouge is, there's no debris left from the impact. Definitely magical in nature, but it's difficult to determine what exactly; not something anyone on hand at the manor is capable of, as far as I am aware. Certainly handy that the two of you were sent along to help, yes indeed!"

Well, that's definitely not confidence-inspiring.

[Tayl]

Whatever that goopy shuffle of unclear existence was, Yval's spell seemed to keep it at bay for the time being.

"Thanks," Dicro said, almost about to smile when the cobweb started on fire. He settled as it burned away and didn't start anything else on fire, but his relief was short-lived as Ismare attracted his attention again. He frowned, gesturing to Yval to bring the torch closer to illuminate the mysterious gash as he followed Ismare forward. He squinted at it, trying to think of anyone who could make such a specific sort of impact, but Ismare was right: he couldn't think of anyone in the manor whose magic worked like that. And if Ismare was insistent on it, it seemed doubtful it was just some Infernal he hadn't met yet drastically missing an ooze or something.

"Well, that figures," he sighed, uncapping his duster and resisting the urge to jab the blade into his face.

"Be careful, then," he continued, looking over at Yval with a concerned look, "Not sure who or what we're dealing with here, but I've worked here way too long to assume that whoever caused this isn't still lurking around."

Just another day in the life, really.

[Tayl]

"Yeah....... " Yval was actually almost impressed by how cleanly the gash was done. Despite that, his expression was more of a "are you fucking serious" look than anything else as he stared at it.

".....Hang on, I just figured something out for lighting. Wow, I'm an idiot for not doing this earlier,"

Yval quietly held the duster over the torch until it caught fire, after uncapping it of course. Then he snuffed out the fire on the torch before storing it back in the lizard bag bag of holding. Yeah, already this felt a lot better.

Property damage? What the Fuck is that???

[Tayl]

"As is the case for these things, yes. Stay vigilant, and keep an eye out for anything out of place-"

Before Ismare could continue their convenient infernal exposition, they vanished without a trace mid-stride after proceeding a short distance down the left-hand corridor. If either of the two decided to see what exactly had just transpired, they would discover some manner of transparent barrier dividing this particular hallway off from the rest of the tunnels, blocking view of both people and their vibes. The barrier itself lacked any sort of energy signature that might normally tie a spell to its caster, which in and of itself raised no shortage of questions, and Ismare still appeared to be nowhere in sight...

...But the alarmingly high number of motionless infernal guards strewn about the hallway in various states of disarray might be more of a cause for concern. Indeed, it was a bad day to be Dicro Corrune.

[Tayl]

Yval was the first one to check it out. On noticing the barrier, he inspected it a little more. Was this some form of illusion spell??? He had so many questions about this thing, but he became focused on the very disconcertingly large number of infernals on the ground. He immediately skitter-shuffled back over to Dicro. :dicro:

"Something really fucky's going on, and there's a bunch of guards collapsed on the ground just past this weird barrier,"

Before Dicro could say anything about that, Yval had already been gently tugging him along to show him what was on the other side so he could see for himself.

They're absolutely not dealing with slimes now. Even if there may or may not have been like One earlier. :dicro:

By now, the lizard maid was channeling his inner dicro. Well, expression-wise anyway. His voice somehow remained calm when he spoke, "What should we do now? Whoever put up the barrier is probably the same one who took all those guards down," and the rest of his message was sent via cantrip, 'do you mind if I temporarily gave you darkvision? It would probably be better if one of us could actually see in the dark.'

To be fair, it wouldn't be very smart to ask that out loud if whoever did this was actually still there listening in.

[Tayl]

Dicro jumped when Yval set the duster on fire, but quickly settled down when nothing else caught aflame. Well, settled as much as he could, anyway, considering the impending feeling of doom in the pit of his stomach.

Ah! There it was, validation. First Ismare seemingly vanishing into thin air mid-sentence, then Yval clearly noticing something in front of them, then following him along and seeing the horrible sight before them. Great!

No. Not great, really. This situation was so exceedingly bad that he couldn't be sarcastic about it. This barrier wasn't ordinary magic; it was something that would have had to come from high skill and deep arcane knowledge. And the sheer number of Infernals strewn about...

He wondered what Yval was thinking right now. "Is this because of that Hell College place across the street," maybe. That would be the best-case scenario, Dicro thought. If only he knew little enough to assume it was some common assassin. No, he was connecting some dots, and he didn't like the picture that was forming. He hoped he was wrong. He could already feel his mind fading out, replaced by chill and instinct.

"Ismare...?" he tested, voice echoing down the hall. He didn't expect any answer, furrowing his brow as he tried to make sense of the scene in the dark. He turned to Yval, the concern clear on his face. And not the sort of concern Yval had seen on him before: there was no sweating, no frozen smile, no nervous laughter. Just pale flesh, still movements, cold determination.

"Yval..." Dicro didn't look at him, still focused on the corridor ahead, "I think you should leave."

That was callous. As it should be, he reminded himself. Whatever specifically lied ahead, Yval didn't deserve to have to be part of it. That was why he liked it here, that was why he always liked it here.

"You need to tell Ignis or Arquen or anyone that there's been a major security breach. Someone who can do something about it. I think everyone is in danger right now, and I don't know that the two of us alone can handle this," he said, his voice uncannily steady, as though prepared for something unspoken.