A faint glow came from within the tunnel. Fires were burning, but none of the smoke made its way to the entrance. Most likely it was drawn through fissures or other ventilation within the cracked rock itself. I took each step with care, scanning fully in front of myself at all times down to the tiniest nook. I’d seen enough Indiana Jones to know the traps were often sneakily hidden and the last thing I needed was a bloody great ball of rock chasing me out of the tunnel system.

Sun tapped me on the shoulder and pointed to a fork in the passage. “Room,” she whispered right by my ear. “Two soldiers.”

I nodded. They were the signatures that I’d seen while outside. Moving towards the room, I peeked around the corner. The men were out for the count on their blankets. The toppled, empty wine bottles confirmed the reason for the Unconscious status effect. A fat, solitary candle sputtered in a crevice on the wall.

“Shall we leave them?” I whispered.

Sun pushed me inside with gentle insistence, answering the question. I took her cue and stood over the paralytic soldier. At her command, we both struck, killing the sleeping figures. My gut twisted as Sun’s victim’s brains leaked everywhere. At least my thrust had been relatively clean as the poison soaked dagger pierced the skull. There was no honour in slaying people who were unable to fight back. I steeled myself against the guilt with the faces of the girls, knowing the men before us would have brutalised them and killed me out of hand. Leaving the corpses where they lay, we headed back out into the main cave. With the bodies piling up, I would have much to loot once this mission was over.

Sun was content to hang on my shoulder, watching for movement on the unfolding minimap. I wasn’t going to make a fuss about the sneaky advantage it gave to us over our enemy. I just hoped the aliens weren’t aware of it and wouldn’t snatch it away just when we needed it the most. There was nothing worse than a nerf when you’d grown used to the glitch.

“Wait!” I whispered. A thin, almost invisible thread was stretched across the floor at ankle height. I followed its trail down the passage to a dark nook at the turn ahead. Sun made to step over it until I held her back.

She glowered at me. “What?”

I knelt down and reached over the thread. The layer of dirt was just too neat, especially as people had walked this way only recently. I rubbed my hand gently over it, revealing a thin layer of cloth laid atop a cross section of branches. Pulling on a corner of the buried fabric, I yanked the whole sheet away revealing a six foot deep pit with wickedly pointed spikes at the bottom. Some of the timbers were darkly stained from previous victims.

“Thanks,” whispered Sun, stepping around the side of the pit.

“My pleasure. Just call me Indy.”

“Why would I do that? Your name’s Mark.”

“Never mind.”

The thread was joined to the trigger of a primed crossbow. I yanked the quarrel and snapped it in two. The whole place seemed a health and safety nightmare, especially when they were all drinking. Chances are I could’ve let them get bladdered and they would all eventually fall to their own traps. We didn’t have the luxury of time, though, as the screams of the girls echoed up from far below.

We came to the next room and the relatively smooth wall of the passage opened up into a jagged, fissured mess. Stalactites hung from the cracked ceiling. A small fire crackled in the middle to give light to the two tunnels leading from the hollow chamber. Burned bones hung from the same type of cord that was used to boobytrap the crossbow behind us. Skulls, ribcages, all manner of vile body parts swinging gently in the draughts.

“Look,” whispered Sun, pointing. “Footprints.”

I followed their snaking trail across the room. They didn’t just take a neat, obvious line, indicating there was a purpose to their placement.

“Shall we mimic them?” she asked.

There was something tingling in the back of my mind. The whole thing just seemed… off. After their ploy with the hidden stakes, the neat trail looked like it had been left there on purpose.

“Let me check something first.”

I ran outside and returned with one of the rusty longswords. Turning the blade sharp edge to the ground, I raked it back and forth at arm’s length in the dust. When I’d reached the limit of my reach with the weapon from the mouth of the small chamber, I shuffled forward and continued my search. Sure enough, near the edge of the fire, I found the first trigger plate. I carefully scooped the muddy dust away and found the tensed thread buried beneath.

“It goes to those,” said Sun, tilting my head to the ceiling. Tucked up out of view were two ceramic pots attached out of sight to sections of rock above me like pendulums. The twine I held was attached to their anchors. One nudge on the plate and it would’ve severed the fixing, causing them to swing down violently. I’d have been a little more worried about a bloody great scythe from a Hammer Horror movie than the seemingly innocuous pots.

“Let’s get them down,” I said, checking the floor between the trapped path and the walls. There was only the single trigger, and we collected the containers. The pungent stink of oil emanated from the rim of the pots and their purpose became clear. An unwary attacker would stumble on the plate and cut the threads. The two containers would swing down, smash to pieces against each other, and drench the party in oil. The helpful little beacon fire was actually the ignition source. I thanked God that I wasn’t currently doing an impression of a human torch; screaming from scorched lungs while I blundered blindly against the walls until the fire became too much to bear.

We made it safely through with two additions to my inventory.

Item – Jar of Oil (common)

Type – Weapon/Craftable

Description – A jar brimming with flammable oil. Considering oil was incredibly valuable in the time period you’re located, you’d be better off selling this than incinerating your enemies… Only joking. I love the smell of napalm in the morning!

Requirements – Str 1

Effect – Douses the area in a flammable liquid. Keep away from naked flames. Unless you want to napalm them sumbitches.

Misc - None

“You’re good at this,” Sun whispered.

“I’ve played a lot of videogames,” I replied.

The continuing passage shifted all over the place, leaving us unsure of which way was up or down. As we travelled deeper, the traps became more basic, as if the deserters were more interested in drinking and raping than guarding their home. Spiked maces were tied to the ceiling in a similar fashion to the oil. A small number of pits, far shallower than the one near the entrance, were set in the floor. The rock prevented any deeper excavation, but the little fangs would sure as shit mess up our feet and lower legs.

Deep voices and terrified pleading came from the corner ahead. Our minimaps picked out fourteen signatures waiting for us, all yellow. I had to assume the girls were also within the number which left us eleven enemies to deal with. My maths hadn’t been great when forecasting my business income, but even a dunce like me knew the odds were heavily stacked against us.

“Wait!” Sun whispered, holding me back.

“What?”

“Are you ready for what you might have to do?” she asked.

“Haven’t I already proved I am?” I replied, the leaking, broken skull flashing through my mind.

Her next question uncovered the reason for her nervous tone. “You know they’ll use the girls to protect themselves. You might have to… hurt them. To save yourself.”

“I don’t know if I can,” I answered honestly. Of course the cowards would use their victims as human shields. Why hadn’t it occurred to me? Because it’s so abhorrent, your mind doesn’t think like that. Well I would need to start thinking like that, and fast. The creatures I was facing in the coming worlds were far worse than the pissed-up rabble hiding in the cavern system. In one of them the demons were harvesting their souls for god’s sake. After the trouble I went through to save Astrid, did I really have it in me to endanger three innocents, even if it was for the greater good?

“You can do this,” said Sun, with a belief I sincerely doubted. “All you need to know is that they are dead anyway. If you can save any of them, that’s a sign from the gods that they are favoured. Your hands are clean, no matter what the outcome.”

“It’s easy to say when it’s not my life on the line.”

My forward momentum had hit a brick wall so I took the time to check the annoying glow on my achievements tab.

Achievement Unlocked – Spelunker Extraordinaire

Description – Reach the inner sanctum of the deserter cave without triggering any of the traps. Not even Indy can boast such a feat! Your steadfast application of observational prowess has unlocked the ability to see where others can’t.

Reward – Perk – Night Eyes (Lvl 1)

“Cool!” I whispered.

“What?”

“I think I can see in the dark now.” The light from the guide fires thwarted my attempts to try it out.

“That’s impossible. Are you ready?”

“Not really,” I replied. Like a mother bird pushing her fledgling from the nest, Sun urged me on with a gentle nudge. The minutes ahead would determine if I would fly majestically or smash into the ground like a hapless, cartoon coyote. My efforts wouldn’t be rewarded with a cheerful meep-meep as my antagonist escaped, but rather a deluge of blood and pain.