DreamLyrics™ Play-by-Post Forums Fun & Games ETD: Escape the Dream Episode III: The Sixfold Seal

You approach the three blue-white torches carefully and hold a hand near one.

There is heat.

Not scorching, not wild, but real enough that your fingers feel it. The flame is an odd color, more moonlit than firelit, but it gives warmth like ordinary fire.

When you bring one of the stubby candles near it, the wick catches.

The candle flame burns smaller and more normally than the torch, yellow-orange rather than blue-white.

So yes.

You have found flame.

Or at least a way to carry some away.

The torches themselves, however, are firmly fixed to the wall. The brackets do not shift, and the flames seem bound to the Game Room. Taking a lit candle seems much more practical than trying to take a torch.

You then examine the white knight with the mirror-bright shield.

It is one of the white knight pieces on the board, carved like a ceremonial horse and rider. The shield on its side is definitely real: polished, round, reflective, and very much like the shield shown in the Bright Corridor painting.

The shield is attached, but not permanently. There is a seam, a clasp, and a small catch that looks as though it could release.

When you test it gently, the catch does not open.

Not yet.

The knight gives the faintest little tremor, as if aware of your attention.

Your latest attempt at insight does not reveal any clever new trick about sacrificing the knight, moving it to the edge of the board, or getting it captured.

But your earlier understanding of the painting remains clear: this room is not about stealing the shield first.

The painting showed a white chess piece triumphant before a black king.

The black king here is not shattered, burned, or fought.

It is waiting to be defeated.

The room still feels like it wants one decisive chess move.

The shield is probably not the move.

The shield is probably the prize.

Blow the candle out for now, will relight it when I leave.

"Bishop C4 to F7" If nothing happens I will push. "Checkmate!"

You blow out the candle for now. The wick gives a tiny curl of smoke, but remains ready to be relit from one of the blue-white torches when you leave.

Then you turn back to the board.

“Bishop C4 to F7.”

For a moment, nothing moves.

Then the white bishop glides.

It does not scrape across the stone. It moves smoothly, silently, almost ceremonially, sliding along the diagonal from c4 to f7.

The black pawn on f7 vanishes beneath it with a small sound like a chess piece being set down on a wooden table.

You add, with appropriate emphasis:

“Checkmate!”

The word echoes through the Game Room.

For one breath, the whole chamber is still.

Then the black king trembles.

A deep note sounds from somewhere beneath the board — low, final, and resonant. The black king bows its crowned head.

One of the three blue-white torches flares high.

Then the front of the black king opens like a tiny door, revealing an obsidian key resting inside.

At the same time, the polished shield on the white knight loosens with a soft metallic click.

The white knight turns its carved head toward you by the smallest possible amount.

It is difficult to say whether this is approval.

But it is very easy to say that the shield is now free.

Obsidian Key acquired.

Mirror Shield available.

The Game Room has yielded.

Collect key, shield and light the candle keeping a careful alertness for draughts. Return to the main room. Is it that easy??

When you do things in the right order, it's that easy. Where to next?

I need a lens before the labyrinth and don't know yet about the smoke tunnel, so the choice would seem to be Bright Corridor or Silent Crypt. I'll head for the latter as I don't want to lose my flame or have to lug these combustables further than I have to.

Your reasoning seems practical.

The lens is still missing.

The Bright Corridor probably wants the mirror shield, which you now have.

But the Silent Crypt wants fire, and you have already gathered fuel. Better to use it before you end up carrying half a broken study through the entire dungeon.

Before leaving the Game Room, you relight one of the stubby candles from the blue-white torch. The candle flame catches normally, burning small and yellow-orange despite the strange color of the torch that lit it.

You take the lit candle carefully, along with the satchel of kindling and the mirror shield, and return to the central chamber.

The southwest passage waits beneath the painting of a hearth-fire driving pale figures back into their coffins. The 4 tile remains set firmly beneath it. The hidden door stands open.

Beyond is a short, cold passage descending into darkness.

The air smells of dust, stone, and old ashes.

As you enter, the candle flame bends slightly away from the room ahead, as if reluctant.

The passage opens into a circular crypt.

Seven stone sarcophagi stand around the walls. Some are carved with stern, sleeping faces. Some are plain. One has a cracked lid. Another is wrapped in rusted chains that look decorative rather than useful, which is not especially comforting.

In the center of the room is a bronze fire pit.

It contains only old gray ash.

The hearth-fire painting comes back to mind with perfect clarity: not a spark, not a candle, but a proper fire with fuel beneath it.

The candle in your hand gives just enough light to make the shadows move.

Or perhaps the shadows are moving on their own.

From one of the sarcophagi comes a dry scraping sound.

Then another.

Then a slow, hollow knock from inside a third.

The lids do not fly open. Nothing attacks.

But pale fingers curl around the edge of one stone coffin, and a skull-faced figure slowly begins to sit up, as if waking from a very long and very inconvenient nap.

Another stirs. Then another. They do not seem fast. They do not seem pleased.

And, most importantly, their empty eye sockets turn toward the little candle flame with unmistakable distaste.

I evaluate whether I have time to place my kindling combustables into the fire pit, light them then add more wood pices to catch fire before the undead stir.

If I am doubtful I will back away and maybe prepare better now I know what faces me ahead.