NOVGO.NET Chapter 2017 An Experimental -
Chapter 2017: Chapter 2017 An Experimental Chapter
— Kat — (Early in the evening)
The girls were set up in the same conference room as yesterday. Angie was absent, but both Lin and Jen were there. With one looking a fair bit more uncomfortable then the other. “Is doing this really ok… Gran?” asked Jen.
Lin nodded. “We’re moving away from the Diggers at least. They left most of us in the dark about their ill thought out attack because they assumed we’d warn the King. I mean, I likely would’ve and I’m a little annoyed I wasn’t keeping a close enough eye on things to know the exact time of the attack… but still. It shows a distinct lack of trust.”
“Um… but aren’t we doing the same thing?” asked Jen.
“Of course we are. The difference is, we’ve been upfront about it. We warned them that things were changing. That we were looking to shift away from such an aggressive stance and even tried to convince them to stand alongside us. The fact that they didn’t, and failed to mention such a serious operation is actually a breach of the agreement we have with the family. I’m unsure how much the Fleurs were involved. Still… I wonder if anyone alive in either family actually remembers the agreement? Perhaps I need to go find the original document…” mumbled Lin.
Ramor clapped his hands together. “Fascinating as those details would be, we need to get moving before it gets too late. From what Jen has told us,” Ramor nodded to the girl in question who flinched back a bit at the attention. “activity spikes around this time as everyone gets in from their jobs in the afternoon, just before late night classes. For this, we want Hedera on overwatch, while Kat and Lily sneak inside. The plan starts like this…”
— Kat — (Later in the evening)
*Did we ever figure out how to properly dampen your sense of smell?*
[Not really]
Lily and Kat were sneaking inside the Digger’s spy base. The annoying part of that, was that the best entrance for them to use was one of the many sewer entrances. They were numerous, and not often used. Probably because you had to go into a sewer. Kat was travelling along the ceiling as a dispersed mist while Lily snuck through the shadows. Lily had always plugged her nose with shadows to try and limit the smell. It… wasn’t really working.
Kat also wasn’t sure if she was happy about her position or not. She couldn’t smell anything while she was made up of water but she had a full view of all the gross stuff building up in the sewer walls. Worse, the water nearby was vaguely under her awareness. She hadn’t wasted any demonic energy on controlling it, but she still had enough awareness of it, perhaps due to her dispersed nature or the slow movement through the tunnels. Having that awareness meant she was aware of far too many of the gross details floating nearby.
*Let’s hope the entrance is where it’s meant to be…*
— Kat — (Early in the evening)
Ramor placed a small brooch down on the table. “This is your key inside. It’s a bit of a rush job, but based on what Lin and Jen have both shared it should be enough. A word of warning though, it will only work once. The original plan had called for a few spares but they crumbled and we don’t know how quickly we can get more. It will open the door, but on your way out you’re going to need to follow someone else.”
“Wait, so how does everyone else get inside then?” asked Kat.
Ramor glanced at Jen who immediately glanced towards Lin. Lin sighed at this, but answered. “There is a rather unique way of pulsing your mana through certain areas on the doors you can use. The passwords change pretty regularly and we don’t know them. Additionally, we’re not sure if Lily’s mana would work for this because it can be really sensitive. A lot of people like to say it ’recognises the mana signature’ but we have no good way of storing individual signatures. Way too difficult.
“What the key in your hand does, is essentially force the enchantments to think you put in the correct passcode. The problem is that, forcing such an outcome without triggering anything else AND fixing the enchantment back up afterwards is complicated. Far too complicated to make reusable. Perhaps if we were willing to have you carry a giant block enchanted with weeks or months of effort. But we don’t have that time and this is meant to be a stealth mission… so the card.
— Kat — (Later in the evening)
The door slid open and the pair glided inside. The keycard had worked. It had also, disintegrated into little sparkling dust causing a brief panic. It would have been really nice to know about that part ahead of time. Especially when it was so bright. The light from the hidden door had spilled out into the sewer and sent the dust fragments alight. It was like someone had thrown a pulverized disco ball in the air. Lily had quickly wrapped them in shadows and shoved them away, but had the corridor inside been occupied they would’ve been seen.
Still, it was empty and they’d chosen this tunnel for a reason. Apparently it was one of the furthest entrances from the main body of the base. They had a long walk ahead of them. Though the fact it was so well lit was actually a problem, and not one they’d been warned about.
*What’s the plan? There aren’t really any shadows I can see. There are too many lights. Even my mist form might get spotted there are so many! We weren’t warned about this!*
[But we were told there are another few doors along the way, they just aren’t locked. Perhaps things are darker further in? It seems like a super weird oversight.]
*I guess…*
— Kat — (Early in the evening)
Ramor continued. “After making your way through the tunnels you should end up in the ’the maze’ which is really just what happens when you try to connect something like thirty tunnels together. Poor design decisions that are being used as an extra layer of defence. There are a few traps to watch out for, but none that will bother you two. Most are set to detect or attack people at stomach height. A cat and a bunch of water aren’t going to be hurt by them.”
“Ok… but how do we get through the maze?” asked Kat.
Lin then pulled out a bit of paper, on it was a perfectly drawn map of the maze in question. “I don’t have all the traps marked because those get updated semi-regularly but you should be able to get through. There are actually three entrances and you want this one if possible…”
— Kat — (Later in the evening)
The map helped immensely in some ways, but was a hinderance in others. It turned out, when you travelled the optimal path you tended to run the risk of encountering others. Only the fact that none of them, that Lily and Kat noticed, were trying to be overly stealthy. Their were ’main routes’ through the maze that a lot of people used. With people coming and going, it was hard to justify going for their original door.
It was on the exact opposite side of the maze, and while Kat was near invisible, and the maze had far better lighting for Lily to use when sneaking around. That didn’t mean detection was impossible. Especially when groups or two or three people moved together. Simply having more eyes on the problem made things harder. They had to take different back routes, and even a few quick dashes behind a set of thieves.
A particularly tense moment was when one of them seemed to spot Lily. Looking right into the corner she was hiding in. The shadows had wrapped around her perfectly as far as Kat could tell. No sign of her passing was there… yet the man remained fixed on Lily’s location. Well, until he slammed face first into a wall. “Gah!”
“Fred are you daydreaming again?” complained his companion.
“No, I just…” countered Fred.
“But NOTHING Fred. I do not want to end up in ANOTHER pit because you tripped over the wire while trying to get something out of your teeth!” insisted the woman.
“That only happened once…” mumbled Fred.
“No, it was FOUR FUCKING TIMES FRED!” hissed the woman.
“Oh… um…” began Fred.
Only to be cut off. “No ’nothing’. I promised your ma I’d look out for you and prevent you getting yourself killed. It was the dumbest thing I ever dead, but I will NOT let you get yourself maimed in the maze AGAIN. Now let’s get going.”
*That was really, really close.* Kat thought as the pair made their way down a different path, Fred literally being dragged away from their spot.
[It was. I’m not sure if he actually knew I was there or could just sense that something was wrong… but he was definitely looking at me. Or like… the spot a bit above me? Perhaps he could sense the magic but didn’t actually see me? So he was trying to startle the ’person’ that was there?]