October Mini Event: Dance, Magic, Dance!

[solravehmods]

As the bats and will o’ wisps become a little more...absolutely everywhere, a curious addition can be found within the Altar Room. The doorway stands in the middle of the room, cheerfully holding itself up and leading to...somewhere.

That somewhere may or may not be an underground maze. An odd liquid (that may or may not be blood) has been used to write on one of the high walls; great riches await those brave enough to venture forth.

What riches could be in there? Better yet…

What else is in there? A log from the 18th to the 24th will be made for anyone interested in taking part in this mini-event, and further details can be seen below!


The Maze

Any character worth their spit knows better than to go into a strange door in the castle alone; for each of the specified encounters, there is the potential to choose your own adventure, or play up RNG to see what fun shenanigans your characters might get up to when it comes to running through this underground domain.

1. Start
At the edge of the map are four, green dots. You may elect for your characters to start at any of the four corners, and all will lead to the center eventually. The starting points that can be chosen are:

1. North West
2. North East
3. South West
4. South East

2. Monsters
Any maze worth it’s spit has a myriad of cool monsters that one can come across. For the unfortunate, getting lost and finding one of the many dead ends within the maze will increase the chances of coming across those ominous purple dots upon the map, at which point, characters may find:

• 1. Minotaur- It’s a maze. You didn’t think there’d be a minotaur? These half men, half bulls aren’t the most intelligent, but standing at a good eight feet and equipped with large, stone hammers, they aren’t the type of crowd you want to cross.

• 2. Sphinx- These wily cat women may not be inclined to attack at first, but out of all monsters within the maze, they are the hardest to be rid of. Capable of teleporting those who irritate them right back to the beginning, the easiest method to defeat them is to answer them these questions three… or a riddle. That also works.

• 3. Skeletons- Fresh from the skeleton war, these guys have a bone to pick with you. Unfortunately, they cannot be coerced with ketchup and puns, and spaghetti will just make them angry.

• 4. Dead Hand- Some characters within the castle may already be familiar with these insidious creatures, but for others, the first sign of their appearance is sickly, grotesque hands jutting out of the ground. Getting too close to them will lead to a nasty shock, as the moment a character is within reach, they will seek to grab and hold them there, as it’s body rises from the grave, and seeks to take you back down with it.

• 5. Headcrab- THEY’LL GRAB YOUR HEAD, BY THE-- HEAD!!! But no really.

• 6. Tonberry- These small, reptilian creatures may not appear to be much harm, and they aren’t, so long as you keep your distance. Difficult to defeat, Tonberries also deal an immense amount of damage; if a single blow doesn’t kill you outright.

• 7. Blockhead- these irritating living walls will trap characters within dead ends, refusing to let them past and loudly proclaiming that characters will never find their weak points. Characters will have to be keen eyed and fast to respond to take these massive walls out- or they could simply wait for them to get bored and go away. Spoilers: they won’t get bored and go away.

• 8. Boggart- a creature with no true form of it’s own, it will take the shape of one’s greatest fear. The more people involved in confronting the creature, the more confused it will get, leading to a horrible amalgam of their conflicting terrors. Word on the street is, the easiest way to defeat them is laughter.

3. Chance
Chance areas are less about hostile encounters than they are significant, and often odd, changes to the environment. The only thing to do in most situations is grit your teeth and keep moving forwards- but will you really want to?

• 1. Tar and feathers- less horrific, and more humiliating. A suspicious black sludge covers the floor and walls of the corridor, emitting a somewhat odd smell. Characters will find themselves covered in the substance whether they want to be or not- it is tar, after all, and tar loves to cling to whatever it can. And at the end of the corridor…. Poof. Hope you like looking soft and fluffy.

• 2. Topsy-turvy- Characters who wander down this corridor will find themselves suddenly on the ceiling- or is it that the floor has become the ceiling, or the ceiling has become the floor? Aside from being rather disorientating, characters who take the chance and continue on will find things returning to normal soon enough.

• 3. Multicolor Tile Puzzle- In the words of the great Papyrus, remember what the each color does! Red tiles are impassible! Yellow tiles are electric! Green tiles are alarm tiles- step on these to fight a monster! Orange tiles are orange-scented; they make you smell delicious! Blue tiles are water, which contains piranhas! If you smell like oranges, they will bite you! Purple tiles are slippery! You will slide to the next tile! However, they also smell like lemons, which piranhas do not like! However, yellow tiles are electric! If a blue tile is next to a yellow tile, it will zap you! Finally, pink tiles! They don’t do anything! Got that? Good. Go!

• 4. The randomly swinging axes- there’s always some randomly swinging axes.

• 5. Indiana Jones theme- is...is that a boulder? That sure is a boulder- are you...going to just stand there, or-?

• 6. Icy what you did there- stone suddenly gives way to ice, leaving characters to slip and slide their way across the space to the other side. Unfortunately, slipping and sliding seems to mean ‘only going in one direction at all times, with no ability to stop themselves’. Less unfortunately, there does seem to be a way out of this.

4. Goal
Incidentally, this small, yellow section of the map is your-- well, goal! Located in the center (sort of) of the labyrinth itself, a nondescript wooden door leads into a room that’s seemingly safe to hang out in, at which point, characters will have the option to select from a series of pedestals with the words choose one inscribed upon them. For those looking to RNG:

1. Very worthwhile*
2. Not even remotely worthwhile.
3. Sans probably left this here
4. Pretty standard for an ancient labyrinth, honestly

*Please note that very worthwhile is not, and will not be David Bowie. It’s just not happening, I’m sorry.