She didn’t need them anyway. Avery was a wizard. She could figure out what was going on through observation and experimentation. That was what magic was all about, finding out what was real and what was negotiable. Granted, illusions weren’t exactly her primary focus. Neither was any sort of spacial magic. She was in fact probably one of the least useful wizards to have working on a ‘suddenly the entire city disappeared’ problem. What she did have, was a whole dungeon she built from the ground down.

And a door that required two people to open to get into it. Suddenly that particular lock didn’t seem like the best idea.

Nothing was wrong, she could just run between the buttons and have them both depressed at the same time. Mechanical locks always had resistances built into them. It took time for the mechanisms to reset once the weight holding them down were released. That was the same theory behind the city’s inner gates only being openable after the whole night had passed; the gate defaulted to closed, and it just took that long for the mechanisms to reset

Since she woke up on this button, it was almost certainly at its maximum capacity. All she had to do was move over to the other button, stand on that until it had enough weight, and enter the dungeon before the door closed again. Sprinting to the other lump of stone jutting out from the path, Avery counts the seconds after her stepping off. As soon as she reaches the further panel, she turns to see that the first button is up to the point the initial button had been. That meant it reset in three seconds or less.

After two seconds, the button Avery was standing on reached flush with the ground. Stepping off of it, she times the reset to be six seconds. Calculating, she does the same to the first and finds it to take one second to depress and three seconds to reset. With that in mind, she had two seconds to run from the first button and get in the door.

That run was three seconds.

Maybe she could speed it up a bit. All she had to do was cut off one second. How hard could that be?

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Picking itself up from the stones of the valley leading toward potential death and slash or dismembering, again, the frailer of the two lets go of the strongest one, having forcibly removed them both bodily from the social interaction. The other one just lays sprawled out against the rocks, complaining.

"If we're going into a place worth any amount of greenery, I'm going to be completely useless.”

“No you’re not, don’t say that.”

“Yes I am. You have one of those fancy ‘useful on its own’ abilities. Mine nearly kills me any time I use it.”

“That just means you don’t break things while stuck in the mud. You still have other uses.”

“Oh yeah?”

“You can hold things for me.”

Suddenly, out of absolutely nowhere, a couple of bipedal rats appear with weapons drawn, one black-furred and holding the hilt and half-blade of a broken steel sword, the other brown-furred with a wooden spear in a two-handed grip. They demand to see their manager, or their ‘core’, as they call it. At least, that’s what they assume they ask. It sounded more along the lines of, “You take core to for us!”

“We don't even have a core, and even if we did, we aren't hooked up to it right now,” states the standing one. The one on the ground sits up, and puts its hands behind its back.

“No weapons, take dungeon to.”

Down on the ground, the stronger creature starts sparking, until the standing one smacks it upside the back of its head and stops what it’s doing.

“Yeah ok. It’s just up this path. Follow me.”

The rats look at each other.

“Really? That easy?”

“The place has nothing to do with me, and it costs me nothing to help you. Is there any reason I should just not help?”

Without putting away their weapons, the rats refrain from giving them reasons not to cooperate and follow them up the hill.

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Landing on the second button again, the door slides open. Before she could start sprinting into the dungeon, Avery sees the invader sprinting out.

“What have you been doing, and why am I out here?” she asks, glaring at the approaching monster.

“No time to explain,” it says, running past her and off the cliff. A moment later, she realizes it had grabbed her when she follows downward.

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Stabby almost gives into his instincts to chase down the hengeyokai on his own, before remembering how stupid of an idea it would be to not let anyone know where it was going. As soon as he passes the doorway into the center room, he beelines directly to the door Smashy had gone into. He was the one more likely to solve puzzles, and thus go further into the dungeon without any intervention.

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Smashy could have gone further into the dungeon, since he’d already solved the puzzle and opened the door, but the tiles were still a mystery to examine. They had a set of nine symbols on them, and came in an assortment of shapes. There didn’t seem to be any pattern in how the symbols were arranged on the tiles themselves, other than that no symbol had been directly next to another of its type on the same piece. There was one that had two copies of two symbols on one two by two grid, but that was a rarity. With nine symbols, it was rare to get the same one anywhere on the tile.

As if to deliberately interrupt his thought process, Stabby barges into the room and immediately starts yelling.

“Quit solving puzzles and come back, he got past me and is escaping!”

“Fine, but we’re definitely exploring this place later, it’s great!”

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Both of the knowledgeable ones head toward Shooty’s room, only to find him already entering the central chamber.

“The puzzle is impossible,” he informs them.

“Well, we’re leaving anyway. Hengeyokai got past me, it’s out there somewhere now,” Stabby informs him.

“There was just a pit with a bunch of random symbols on it. There was nothing to do,” he continues.

“Yeah,” states Smashy, “the pieces are in my room.”

“This place is the worst. We better not come back,” Shooty continues, walking out of the dungeon.

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Though unable to create monsters, the core is able to manipulate them. By adjusting the mana link an individual slime has to the dungeon itself, it can incentivise a particular direction of travel. Slimes are perhaps the easiest creatures to do this with, as they regard the mana link as food and immediately move to engult it. Without any expenditure of effort at all, as the link will remain a fixed distance from the slime in question, a blue slime makes its way up to the central room leading to the first floor.

“Up into the pit,” the core commands, “to devour my enemy!”

With all of its strength, the blue slime flings itself toward the opening and slams into the wall. The hole was far too high, and it had no limbs with which to climb.

“This is a dampener on that plan.”