Chương 101: Penicillium - Chapter Ten

Chapter Ten Opening the door just a smidge, Tyro peeked out into the next room. Phillipe had a kerosene lamp--because even with my magical night-vision providing mushrooms, we still needed some light to see by--but he'd shut it off for this part.

"What do you see?" Phillipe murmured. Tyro gently pulled back and pulled the door shut.

"Goblins," he said.

"I see what might be some sort of storage room? Lots of old wooden shelves. They're tipped over to make little goblin huts."

"How many?" Phillipe asked. When Phillipe had said this was a training mission for his son, he wasn't exaggerating. It seemed as if he really intended to have Tyro learn everything he could while down here, which included scouting.

"I say three huts. Maybe seven goblins. There's a firepit in the far end of the room. Door to the left. Um, I can't see too deep into it, it's dark."

"So, seven goblins total?" Phillipe asked, and Tyro immediately shook his head.

"I saw seven. I bet there's a lot more than that. And I can only count three huts, but there could be more. They obscure my vision a little."

"Good. I'd say never assume, but that's wrong. Always assume that there's more you don't know," Phillipe said. I nodded along behind him. That sounded like a very reasonable way of seeing the world. Almost scientific, really.

"How do you propose we clear the room?" Phillipe asked.

"We need to clear it?" Tyro asked.

"The exit isn't too far to the left. We could run to it, make it into the next room before the goblins have time to rally."

"That's possible at times, but do you know what's in the next room?" Phillipe asked. It was obviously a rhetorical question.

"We hold the door then. With the two of us working together, we shouldn't have a hard time. They're just goblins. Kill a few and they'll break."

"Ah, but break to where? Did you notice any place for them to go?" Tyro winced.

"Just the passage we need to head into."

"Which means," Phillipe said leadingly.

"Which means we'll have to fight those who ran no matter what." Phillip nodded, and seemed pretty proud.

"I don't think your idea is terrible. We can hold the entrance and fight the bravest of the goblins on our terms. Then we move in and clear the rest of the room before moving on." I raised my hand.

"I can clear the room," I said.

"Depending on how large it is." Phillipe looked at me, then back to the door.

"It's a medium-sized space. Fifteen yards by twelve, more or less. The goblins will have shelters to hide in as well." I considered it. What was the dispersal range of one of my mushrooms? Well, that depended on a lot of things, but at a guess, I'd say a [Dead Man's Cough] could spread its spores over a five metre square without too much fuss. Given about four of them... I opened my satchel and winced. I had lost a number of my mushrooms already as we travelled. The most delicate ones, though, were still fine.

My [Bottle Pops] were stored in a tin, to keep them from bursting on impact. I opened the tin and pulled out four of them, then four mildly-squished [Dead Man's Cough] and my knitting supplies.

"It's hardly time to start knitting," Tyro said. I gave him a flat look, then started to do just that. It was amazing what skills could do for a person. Having my [Knitting] skill above level sixty meant that I could make stuff so fast that it almost looked magical. My needles clicked like a typewriter being worked at by someone inspired and in under a minute I had my first net.

"Here, let me make three more of these," I said.

"And those are?" he asked.

"Holsters, of sorts. You'll see." Tyro was impatient, which led me to work as quickly as I could, but that also meant I ended up making a few mistakes. I hoped neither of them noticed as I worked past a few less-than-perfect knots.

"Here," I said as I finished up. I placed the mushrooms together in pairs and tied them all up. I even added some extra soggy [Dead Man's Coughs] to the set. They'd need replacing soon anyway.

"Toss these out to the far corners of the room. Arc them as high as you can so they hit the ground hard. Oh, and put your mask on." I reached for my own and shook a few droplets off of it before putting it on. Then I fussed Sir Nibbles's face into his own little cloth mask. Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings. Tyro looked to his dad, but Phillipe just shrugged, the corners of his moustache curled up in a knowing smile.

"Alright, fine," Tyro said. He took the first of my bombs, but I grabbed him by the wrist.

"Mask," I insisted. He rolled his eyes, and I had to remind myself that he was just a teenager and that meant he was entitled to being somewhat of a dick. I'd wait until I was done with puberty myself before I really started to cast stones. He at least put his mask on, like I'd asked. Tyro then opened the door and flung the first of my mushroom bombs in.

He jumped as it hit something and exploded with a loud pop that echoed in the enclosed room, but that didn't stop him from grabbing the next three and tossing them in as well.

"Now, close the door for a bit," I said. He did as I said, and I approached the door and leaned my ear closer to it. It took a while. The first thing I heard were goblins shouting and skittering around in a panic. Clearly we'd woken some of them up in a rather rude way. Then the coughing started. There were louder cries and calls for help, but they amounted to nothing. I backed away from the door as a goblin on the other side started to pull it open.

It was only Phillipe's quick action that kept the door closed as he grabbed the handle and tugged it shut, but not before a small puff of dusty air slid into the room we were in. The goblins on the other side clawed at the door while choking. I waited, first a minute, during which the scratching of nails on wood stopped, then a second minute.

"The spores should have settled by now," I said, voice warped slightly by my mask.

"Will they be a danger to the next crew to come down?" Phillipe asked. I considered it.

"Yes. If they kick up the spores and inhale them, they might choke. A tiny number wouldn't be too bad, I don't think, but anything more than that and it might be as lethal to a human as it is to a goblin."

"And you just had that in your bag?" Tyro asked. I looked at him.

"I have far worse in my bag," I said. That wasn't entirely true. I really needed to discover new, more lethal mushrooms. Unfortunately, anything I found down here wouldn't be easy to hybridise while we were in the dungeon itself. It would have to wait, and I'd have to work with what I had on me and what I could grow while down here. Phillipe opened the door, putting his shoulder into it to move the weight of whatever was blocking the other side.

That turned out to be a couple of goblins, their faces an unappealing purplish-green.

"We're marking this door," he said as he set down his pack and got out a small knife. With a few stabs at the doorway, he marked out a symbol that I didn't recognize. Three triangles, in a line. Then he found some chalk and filled in the markings, making them that much more obvious.

"Here, add the symbol on either side of the door, and on the ground by the threshold."

"What's it say?" I asked.

"To any delver that's from the guild and who pays attention, which ought to be all of them, but we both know better... it says that the next room is contaminated with something lethal."

"Any details other than that?" I asked.

"No," Phillipe said.

"We'll hardly write them a manifesto. But any trap-finder should be able to discover that the air is tainted." I nodded along. I could imagine George figuring it out with a sniff.

"Won't that slow down anyone coming after us?" I asked. He nodded.

"Which is unfortunate, but this is a multi-day trip. Tomorrow, this area will reset. Teams don't go much further than this floor every day. Maybe three times a week a team will reach the fourth or fifth floor. Once a month or so someone will mount an expedition to the sixth or seventh floors. There are some valuable materials further in, that'll entice people regardless of the time cost."

"Well, speaking of time, should we get going?"