The Red Mountain
June
Luz’s POV
“Alright everyone, you know your positions.” Luz’s voice was steady even as her hand tightened around the mouse. A bead of sweat rolled down the back of her neck though she couldn’t tell of it was from the early summer heat or the anticipation of what’s to come.
“Don’t worry Luz, this is what we’ve been training for.” Amity spoke loud and clear over Luz’s headphones. If she strained her ears she'd be able to hear Amity speaking from her setup at the kitchen table. It was kind of weird playing the same game in the separate rooms of the same house but this was the only way they could do it without getting an echo.
“Absolutely!” Gus agreed wholeheartedly, his character did a little dance making all of them chuckle.
“Luz, would you like to do the honors?” Willow asked, her smile present in her voice.
“With pleasure.” Luz grinned wide as she approached the mouth of the cave, red light pulsing through veins of quartz beckoned them into the waiting maw. A prompt appeared on her screen and with the single twitch of her finger, Luz and her party were inside the red mountain.
Immediately Gus and Luz illuminated their surroundings, Gus pushing mana into his sword and Luz activating a light glyph she’d found a few weeks ago. Three paths sprawled out in front of the party, each pulsing with that same energy from the entrance of the maze. “So it doesn’t really matter which path we take, since the maze re-randomizes with every play through.” Luz explained, “Gus, you’re in the lead, you make the call.”
Gus’s hum buzzed through her headphones, “well we paladins are nothing if not to the point right?” He chuckled as he led the way through the middle corridor followed by Willow, then Amity, then Luz.
They spent a few minutes marching in line through the tunnel before it opened up into a cylindrically shaped cavern dimly lit by the pulsing veins and a series of stones with glowing multicolored runes. If they looked up the cavern would stretch several stories high with the runes scattered all over the walls as well as a black door shaped stone right at the top. Looking down however revealed the floor to be riddled with cracks that allowed a yellow light to seep through from below.
“Looks like we’re starting with the rainbow room guys,” Willow said. This was a room they knew well.
“Positions everyone,” Luz directed and everyone fell into place how they’d discussed. Gus, Amity, and Luz each took a different slab of stone on the side of the cavern opposite to where the door was and Willow began hovering with her feet off of the ground but close enough to help if needed.
“Everyone ready?” Luz asked and with the affirmations of the rest of the party she drew back on her bow and fired at the rune closest to the ground, shattering the stone it resided on. Right on cue the cavern rumbled and lava rose in the crevices between the stones they were standing on. Slowly the stones began to rise up through the cavern with the ones they were standing on already starting to break apart.
With practiced ease, Luz, Amity, and Gus broke the various rune stones as the slabs they were standing on slowly disintegrated. Due to the weight factor of heavy armor, Gus’s slab broke first and he had to jump to the next one as his previous spot was replaced with lava.
This room was always one of the first they came across in their previous runs so they were able to navigate it fairly easily. The faster they broke the rune stones the faster they rose and by the time they got to the top of the cavern they still had a whole quarter of the floor left and we’re able to go through the door at the top of the cavern without issue.
“Alrighty gang, one down, two to go! Great job everyone!” Luz congratulated, she knew that this was one of the easier rooms they could come across but it was important to keep morale high since it was only going to get harder from here.
They continued down the corridor, following the red pulses for about a minute before they heard it. The sigh of wind rushing through the tunnel. The shudder of the walls of the cavern acknowledging their presence. The rumble of the mountain waking up.
A very distinctive audio cue of cracking stone echoed around them as though to engulf them.
Luz’s grin widened. “They’re here early. Everyone to the center of the path. Gus, summon your shield. Ladies and gentlemen get ready to run.” Luz dropped her light glyph and Gus just barely had time to swap weapons before stone arms shot out around the party, just missing them as they darted to the center of the hallway.
The party surged forward, all pressing into Gus’s back as he led the way with his shield barely emitting enough light to see by. Gus, with his heavy armor and low dexterity, wasn’t particularly fast, though thankfully he still made for one hell of a tank. With the rest of the party pressing squarely against his back, they were able to increase his movement just enough to stay a step ahead of the growing hord at their heels. Gus’s shield acted like a cow catcher on a train, breaking away spawning arms and forcing the few enemies that spawn ahead to get plowed underfoot.
A whooshing sound came from behind them. “Amity, boulder!” Luz shouted over her headset.
“Got it!” Amity summoned a gust of wind just in time to throw the hurtled boulder off course. It struck the wall next to them crushing the emerging arms and sending shattered stone in every direction. Luz sucked in a breath as she and the rest of the team took some damage, though thankfully not nearly as much as it would have been.
“Keep pushing everyone, I see light ahead!” Gus exclaimed. Luz heaved a sigh as she pushed forward, her vision consumed with the backs of the party members before her. Then, she blinked as a thought crossed her mind. There weren’t a whole lot of light sources in this mission…
“Wait, Gus, what kind of light-“
“Oh shit!” Gus’s shout crackled as the cavern opened before them revealing a rickety wooden bridge swaying over a pit of lava at least fifty feet across.
The party slowed at the obstacle, but there was no time to hesitate with the horde nipping at Luz’s ankles. “Positions!” She ordered.
“But-“ Gus crackled.
“Just run!”
This mission was coded so that there were three obstacles before a party could reach the heart of the mountain and those obstacles were chosen randomly from a pool of fifteen options. Some options couldn’t spawn at certain parts of the tunnel or after some other specific challenge. For example, the poison mist can’t come before the flood of lava because it’s flammable, and the room full of false red crystals that needed to be pressed in a pattern had to be first in the rotation because it took so long.
The very few times Luz had encountered the rickety bridge, whether on her own or with the party, it had either been the first obstacle or hadn’t had any unstoppable enemies prior to it. Unfortunately, that led to her ‘take it slow and steady’ strategy flying out the window as the unstoppable horde threw another boulder which Willow was called to counter this time.
“Same plan, just faster!” Luz reminded them. “Go!”
Willow gave a noise of disapproval as she grabbed Amity by the shoulders and began flying her over the lava pit. In this position Willow could only fly at half speed and Amity had much greater difficulty aiming spells but it was the best they could do. Gus charged forward first on the bridge, within the first ten planks three of them collapsed under his weight and his foot fell through the bridge on the third.
“Guys?!” Gus called out.
Luz rushed after Gus. She had a much higher dexterity than the others so wasn’t worried about falling through the cracks of Gus’s wake. “Amity, shatter at the land!” Luz said, hoping the push of force sending the horde backwards and her forwards would buy her some space.
“Not enough mana left!” Amity called right as the horde reached the base of the bridge and rushed forward like marbles into a funnel.
Now or never. “Then shield me!”
Luz became illuminated in Amity’s purple aura right as the wave of enemies hit her. She grimaced as the stone army struck at her, grabbed for her, and threw boulders at her. Her dexterity modifier as a ranger with her armor made her mechanically somewhat a difficult target to hit, but the shield spell on top of all that made her one hell of an easy miss. Still, despite her advantages, in the moments it took her to help Gus out of the trap the horde had gotten enough high rolled hits on her to reduce her HP to almost half and they were still striking.
Amity was doing her best to pick off the golems who could throw while Willow carried her to the other side of the lava but it wasn’t enough.
An idea sparked in her mind, it probably wouldn’t work, but as her HP went down another notch she knew she had to try something. “Gus!” She scrolled her wheel landing on the proper glyph, “hold on!”
With one hand she slammed the ice glyph over Gus’s hand engulfing both their arms and part of the bridge's rope handle in a block of ice, then with her other she threw a fire glyph at the feet of the encroaching horde. The delicate framing of the rope bridge burst apart behind her, the golems falling into the caldera below. Luz and Gus would have tumbled after them but the ice encasing their hands kept them firmly attached to the rope bridge as it swung them to the other side. Both Luz and Gus ‘oofed’ as they collided with the wall and took damage but at least they weren’t dying in lava.
Luz breathed a sigh as the opposing golems tried to throw boulders at them from the other side of the cavern but they were well out of range. Then she frowned as her HP bar reduced even further, almost to the red. “Oh dammit,” Luz muttered, wiggling her mouse to try to break the ice glyph faster. “Bridge is still on fire guys.”
“Are you kidding me?” Willow called from above, she had almost made it to the other side with Amity.
“Yeah, and unfortunately my health is starting to run a bit low.”
“Alright, alright, Luz, hang on!” No sooner had Luz latched her free hand onto Gus’s armor did Gus, with his increased Paladin strength, break them both free from the ice and began climbing the bridge like a ladder. Occasionally a plank would fall and Luz would reach out to help steady them before Gus continued his goblin scramble up the side of the cavern staying just ahead of the creeping flames below. Finally they reached the lip of the lava bowl and heaved themselves over the edge.
“Do you guys have any healing available?” Luz asked swallowing a few berries to get herself out of the red.
“Holy crap, that was close.” Amity muttered, facing the army still huddled around the other side of the cavern as they continued to throw boulders that promptly lost momentum and fell about halfway through. Meanwhile Gus and Willow pumped Luz with as many healing spells as they could spare. She wasn’t quite back to full by the end but at least she was in the green.
The party heaved a collective sigh of relief as they took inventory of their remaining items and rejuvenated their mana. They were a little less equipped than they’d have liked but better off than they’ve been in the past.
“Is everyone ready?” Amity asked, the anxiety that once would have been ever present in her voice was replaced with a giddy anticipation.
“I’m all set,” Willow said.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Gus.
Luz felt the grin spread wider across her face. “Let’s go.” She placed the brass key into the lock and the door to the heart of the red mountain opened before them.
Achievement Unlocked:
Your party reached the heart of The Red Mountain!