#don't think my landlord would be happy if i installed a mini-dungeon under his house though

[interactivestorytellingwithkalh]

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Chapter 2: Part 2

Passing the stairs, he noticed the door to the cupboard under them stood ajar. So that was why the house seemed so quiet. 

He nudged the door open with the tip of his slipper. A pile of cardboard boxes had been pushed further in under the stairs, revealing a staircase spiralling down into darkness. 

He tugged the covers more firmly around himself and descended.

The darkness only lasted some four or five turns, before Ravio’s night lights started appearing on the walls. The soft glow illuminated the stone walls and cast overlapping shadows on the central pillar around which the staircase wound.

Eventually it straightened out into a corridor. At the end waited a heavy iron door, locked with seven peculiar locks, none of which looked like a lock actually should. Legend wasn’t even sure there were proper keys to any of them.

He paused to disable one of Ravio’s more outlandish traps, then warily made his way around the rest until he reached the iron door. He knocked seven times, paused, then knocked another two. 

As he waited for the iron door to open, he shivered and shuffled his feet closer together. Down here it was cold, and the grey stone walls did nothing to help the matter. Maybe they should invest in tapestries. Would they be able to afford woollen ones?

The iron door groaned open. “You’re awake!” Ravio, with goggles pushed up on the top of his head and some sort of magic powder streaked across his chin, beamed at him. “How are you feeling?”

“Like a hedgehog. Don’t you have any heating down here?”

“Not worth the expense.” Ravio stepped aside and Legend scurried down the two steps into the warmly lit workshop. Tools, jars, notebooks, and small boxes with scrawled labels were scattered across the various tables. Elaborate paths had been carved between scattered scrolls and discarded magic items. Piles of overdue library books leaned dangerously. In one corner, an area had been cleared for a permanent teleportation circle. A large fireplace crackled merrily next to it. In the centre of the room, a gaggle of interns huddled around a ring suspended in mid-air. One of the interns was poking it with the tip of a pencil.

“Stop it.” 

The intern jumped back and hid the pencil in a pocket.

Ravio finished doing up the various locks on the iron door and approached the suspended ring. The interns scattered like magpies in a field. Legend trailed after Ravio. 

“My latest experiment!” Ravio plucked the ring out of the air and held it up for Legend’s inspection. 

Legend took it and turned it over in his hands. Silver threads wove around an opaque golden stone with shimmering diamonds set on either side, like small snow crystals. Along the inside, impossible to see, but barely noticeable when he ran his finger along it, was a finely engraved spell. “What does it do?”

“This —” Ravio folded his arms and, with a satisfied grin, leaned against the table — “is a Mirror Ring, or a Ring of Spell Turning.”

Legend felt his mouth drop open. “It’s not.”

“It is.”

“You made this?”

“I repaired it. Remember the peddler who came up along the coast with that co-worker of yours? At the docks?”

Legend nodded.

“I bought it of him for a joke of a price. It was a complete wreck, mind — the metal was bent out of shape and the spell had been scratched out in places. It took a lot of work to restore, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to replicate it, but —”

“Does it work?”

“Sorry?”

Legend ran his fingers across the stone and the diamonds. “Does it work?”

“That’s the prize-winning question, isn’t it? Want to do a trial run?”

“I’d kill to do one.”

“Fantastic! If it kills you, I’ll pay the funeral.”

“Deal.” Legend put it on. The metal warmed and tightened until it sat snugly around his index finger. 

A cacophony of silver bells started chimed from the iron door.

Ravio blinked. “Are you expecting guests?”

“Not that I know.”

“Let’s go see who’s knocking, then.” Ravio straightened and clapped his hands. The interns looked up from their various projects. “Shop’s closing for the night. Finish what you’re doing and make sure you tidy up — I don’t want any of my tables damaged, you hear me, Maple? Oak is expensive.”

One of the interns, a dark-haired girl with heavy shimmering eyeshadow and dark robes, rolled her eyes and started muttering a cantrip under her breath. Legend faintly recalled encountering her during a visit to Holodrum. Her grandmother ran a magic shop in the outskirts of Sunken City, if he remembered correctly. Perhaps Maple was training to inherit the shop.

“Right, let’s go.” Ravio shushed the silver bells, unlocked the iron door, and ushered Legend through.

Through the cold corridor, up the spiralling staircase, and out of the cupboard under the stairs. At the sight of the kitchen, Legend’s stomach rumbled.

“Go have something to eat —” Ravio grunted as he pushed the cardboard boxes back into place over the stairs — “I’ll get the door.” 

#linked universe #lu #writing #interactive story #ok why did no one tell me grabbing two races and mashing them together into one was this difficult #no we're not talking about the logistics of how it would even happen #also i want ravio's workshop #don't think my landlord would be happy if i installed a mini-dungeon under his house though