Corvayne stood for a moment in awe of the giant steel room he was in. A glowing pink haze suggested the room went on for a long while past where the silvery steel walls faded into it, and looking down at the slightly glowing pinkish-red goop below him, he imagined the stacked girders and walkways that held the rows of jars were at least another layer deep in the goop.

Leading the group across the bridge onto the stacks, he could taste that some of the strawberry jam aerosol in the air. Not surprising since it flowed from the walls, as well as from pillars supporting the room. There were bits of jam even falling from the ceiling, globs driping along several layers of jars above them to fall and splattering parts of dark steel grated walkways with pink ooze. Even if he wasn't wearing the jam stuffed artifact pants he was pretty sure he'd be sticky.

Hari touched a glob on a handrail and tried to wipe it off. “Why so much sugar goop?! Pervert dungeon!”

Nyxion laughed. “Takes one to know one!”

Corvayne offered Hari one of many towels he had started carrying on his person. Adventuring was messy business. “I would assume it's functional rather than preference based. The ooze is probably to contain and diffuse abilities that find things inside of here.” He demonstrated by having a shadow limb try to touch a puddle of jam. The part that touched it burst into a little puff of shadowy smoke.

Wick nodded, and dipped her finger in jam, then pointed it at the wall. The little glob glowed green a few times before it evaporated and a small [Disrupt] flew out.

She smiled and adjusted her glasses. “It eats magic up. Which is the good news, because it probably means there's reasonably dangerous magical tools here.”

Corvayne stopped and turned. “So what's the bad news?”

“There's probably reasonably dangerous magical creatures.”

“There's people in this one!” Hari shouted as she slid back, then pointed with a knife at the glowing pink tube. Corvayne came over and looked at the jar, holding a sharp toothed body with razor sharp talons and no eyes.

Corvayne tapped the screen attached to the container's bottom and read.

Blood-and-Blood-and-Bleeding-and-I-and-AM-and-Tired.

Subject: Deceased.

Termination date: 24,675.02

Internment date: 24,675.02

Notes: Physical traces of curse, but no observation of actual roots. Hold for burial. -STA

Aflliction: Betrayer.

No life signs. Stasis at full efficiency.

Corvayne shook his head. “Dead before they put them in. Though, it sounds like they were studying curses.”

Going down the row, they found another three humanoid bodies and several non-named monsters before they reached the first isle crossing the rows. All of the subjects they found were twisted with extra body parts or replacements, and quite a few of the creatures had extra long Watcher names.

Wick looked back at Corvayne. “Anyone you know?”

He shook his head. “Not yet, thankfully.”

Nyxion looked upset. “Let's look for someone who's alive.”

After another row and more dead people and monsters, Corvayne stopped and tried to get a reading on Spears.

“She's down.”

Nyxion took the stairs two at a time, which made Wick look over at Corvayne. “You know what's up with him? You think maybe he hit his head when he fell in that dumpster?”

Lady Blood Claw sighed. “I find it funny that you are confused at all.”

Wick folded her arms. “The fuck's that supposed to mean?”

Corvayne found a jar with someone marked alive, but they looked contorted in pain with spikes jutting out of them.

Name Unknown

Subject: Chemically induced coma.

Internment date: 23,961.15

Handling: Warrior 25/Thug 6. Can shift objects closer to him. Projects self-damaging spikes 10 ft.

Notes: Extremely hostile to everything including self. Some curse infrastructure visible if subject is restrained while trying to harm their current target. Recommended be placed into long storage and checked at 74,000. -STA

Affliction: Berserker, (pending classification) Iron Maiden.

Hari tried using her Investigator spells on one of the containers but shook her head. “It tells me the slime in the jars is more concentrated 'Strawberry Stasis Jam' but I can't push past that.”

Lady Blood Claw held a hand up. “Focus on our actual objective.”

Wick nods. “Operation Childhood Friend.”

Corvayne stopped examining jar filled with leeches to look at her. “Is THAT what you got out of everything I told you about the Village?”

Hari looked between them. “I thought all the girls hated him? Were blind and crazy?”

Nyxion put a hand on Corvayne's shoulder. “Don't get distracted.”

Corvayne nodded, and pushed out his compass again. The sickening feeling of all the ooze diffusing the effect faded as he just let the direction drift, walking down rows and isles, moving back and forth until he was standing on a walkway above a large gap in the pods. He gestured into the goo, sure.

“Five or so from the end on the left, either that layer or another under it.”

Nyxion ran down the nearby metal stairs to stand right at where they dipped into the jam then he stopped, hand gripping the rail as he looked between the jar Corvayne had indicated then at the sludge.

Wick pushed him out of the way. “You fussy bitch! Move.” She tossed her robe off in Corvayne's direction. “You got a towel right?”

He caught her blue robe. “Yes?”

Wick took her braids and tied them together. “You know how to open these things?”

He looked at her and the jam. “I should go. My... new armor is suited to this.”

“You don't care if you're covered in jelly? Fine. Come with.” Wick pulled her pants off, prompting Lady Blood Claw to grab Nyxion's shoulders to turn him around.

Wick thrust the rest of her clothes into Hari's hands and climbed naked over the railing, then dropped into the goop with a squelching noise, bobbing quickly to the surface. Corvayne grit his teeth and jumped in after her, falling into the jam and...

((Tall alien)), Hari, and Wick dragged him back up the stairs. All of them were covered with jam and he felt like his limbs had been dragged through gravel. Nausea filled him as he felt something sloshing like a swimming pool inside of him.

He turned his head and spit out a glob of jelly, not helping the sloshing feeling. It was like he was balancing a mass of water over his head. What had happened?

He looked at ((tall alien)) and he knew she was his training partner but her name was sliding off his mind. She looked furious even though her skin had large patches of fizzling rainbows edged by streaks of gray, then the rest was a sort of luminous blue with neon glowing green lines. It must be some very particular brand of angry?

He could see she had cuts on her arms and legs. “What were you doing? You fool!”

Corvayne tried to speak and it came out as a burble, so he spent a moment coughing up the jam currently filling his lungs. The pants did something and he expelled a cloud of pinkish mist with a dark red puddle of drool and soggy strawberry bits. He could taste the sugar in his mouth and back of his throat and coming out of his nose.

“What... what happened?” Corvayne tried to scrape some of the jam off his face.

Hari looked at him, naked and covered in slime. “When you jumped in there was a flash, we thought you triggered some sort of trap!” She then crouched and gave him a sticky elf hug which he felt was heartwarming if not a little gross.

R-something... no it was Lady. Lady Bloom Thorn? Lady spoke. “The curse seemed to have hurt us when we went in...”

His scrambled thoughts made him wonder if he had hit his head jumping in.

Lady continued talking while squeezing sludge out of her hair. “Whatever the anti-magical effect is, it does not like me and it hates you. It caused you to explode in black vines that tried to electrocute you.”

Wick put her hand on his forehead then lifted his brows and shone her phone light into his eyes, which caused Corvayne to jerk his head away and shut his eyes, spots appearing in the dark. Wick spoke while he was blinking off the spots and her voice was clear and extremely enunciated. “My knight, I think it's no longer safe to have you assist us. You were wounded just from a few moments of exposure.”

She took him and gently embraced his head against her heart, which Corvayne enjoyed in a purely romantic way despite the slime and lack of clothing, then Wick looked up and sternly announced. “I will take the lead here.” Then back at him, smiling kindly. “Rest, we may need your help if your former lover becomes hostile.”

Wick was acting and talking very weird. “Spears-Like-Water was just my-”

Hari snapped her fingers which made Corvayne see she was holding a hand up in front Nyxion's face while the other was covering her legs. “Dickhead! No look, looking! No looking!”

Nyxion rolled his eyes and pushed her aside. “I don't find teenage blob women, goo covered chemelions, or slime princesses titillating, you half-baked tart. Look, the slime on him is slowly dissolving.”

Oddly enough, Corvayne felt a sharp sense of what Nyxion said was tickling the back of his mind, but Wick squeezed his hand and looked him face to face. It was so odd to see her not flinching away when this close. She kissed his lips chastely then gave him a serious look.

“I want to establish that it was not a trap. Can you bear a little pain, Corvayne?”

“Uh, yeah Wick but-”

Wick leaned over to the gap under the railing on the landing and dipped her finger in, then let a dollop of slime fall on Corvayne. there was a popping noise as it touching him stung, then something that felt like claws poking up out of his skin caused a trickle of blood to appear. The pink drop glowed bright blue in a flash then hissed and dissolved.

He then felt Wick and Hari taking his pants off, pulling his legs up then letting them flop down on the metal. They at least left him with the waterproof leggings, but it was sort of odd seeing Wick wearing nothing but the Jam Jammies. “Hari, I wonder if you mind assisting me, since we are both already in dire need of a bath? A little more wouldn't be too terrible, would it?”

“You asking nicely are making it sound dirty!” Hari complained, then stepped down into the slime from the stairs they were on, putting a steel knife in her teeth as she swam under the railing and resurfaced.

Wick stepped down into the goop and laughed. “Curious, these breeches work despite functioning off magic! My rings and earrings, sadly, are not active.” She then dropped all the way in up to her neck as she walked down the stairs.

Nyxion in an agitated voice cried out. “Can WE please focus on rescuing Lady Water now that you're both done rubbing our enigmatic exploding spear-man?”

Corvayne pushed himself back to his feet, using the steel railing to steady himself. “We'll focus on the mission when you stop focusing on either of my girlfriend's tits. Wick, be careful. We don't know if there are threats in the jam. The green button opens the tube, one good tap and it will crack right open like a rock crab in heat...” He saw that everyone was looking at him, even Hari up from the slime.

Lady Blood Claw looked at him. “Nyxion, how many of us are acting out of character?”

Nyxion folded his arms. “All of us besides the long eared minx, but I have an excuse, as do you.”

Hari lifted a hand from the goop to flip Nyxion off. Corvanye turned to where Wick had swam up next to the floor.

“Wick, you don't feel odd, do you?”

“It's to be expected, my love! I'm covered in jelly and there's a sensation I'd describe as ten million ants are crawling on body parts I don't have. But I hardly see the concern that would merit, given your injuries? This should be my burden to bear.”

Corvanye felt a weird chill. “You haven't sworn since you took a dip in the slime.”

“I'm really... freaking... fine!” She lifted a hand out to give him a thumbs up.

Nyxion gestured. “If you don't hurry I'm going to also take a dive in the slime and we'll lose the rest of our sanity.”

Wick took a deep breath then submerged herself. Corvayne could sort of see her in the goop as a dark spot blocking latent light diffusing through the jam.

Wick then surfaced a moment later. “I'm afraid it's the deep container, one more row down.” She tossed a jelly covered metal box towards the stairs. “Unless she's in that.”

Corvayne used his senses to try to help, but found they had become even more erratic and made him feel a little disoriented on top of that fading sloshing feeling. Lady Blood Claw retrieved the crate Wick had recovered. Corvayne turned back and saw Wick vanish under the slime again, and he felt something poke him.

He saw a shadow hand extending, trying to wave at him. What? With the goop the limb was thin and reedy, but it was gesturing frantically. Back at Hari? No, it was pointing further. Corvayne squinted into the gloom, getting up and walking up the stairs. Lady Blood Claw looked at him, sizzling rainbows now mostly gray spots.

“Where are you going?” She looked between the girls and him.

“My shadow hands have a mind of their own...” He called back down at her, then strode down the row. He passed a bridge, more jars, another bridge, then saw the wall form out of the dimming pink glow, with a single line of brighter haze implying a gap in the aerosol of jam. A door, half closed.

Then the passage jolted, a few inches but he saw the gap being pushed open. Something down in the muck on the other side of the door sloshed back, and Corvayne could see something huge was in the goop, hints of fins pushing up slime behind the creature. He heard another dull thump and the door started to slowly open. He turned and pulled rope from his ring as he started running back. He heard metal groan and saw the sloshing of the slime to his side as the dark form behind the door broke past it then started swimming towards Wick and Hari.