A Trip to the Tomb

      It was a cold summer night, all the people on Mystery Island had gone to bed. There were but two people awake on the island, an old Nimmo keeping an eye on the Rock Pool, and the Island Mystic. Or so they thought. As the rain gently poured down on sleeping island a silent figure rode ashore and docked his boat.

      He was covered in black clothes and a hood, leaving himself unrecognizable to anyone who saw it. As he passed the Island Mystic, he stopped to peer in through the window at what the old man was doing. The Mystic was huddled around a fire, throwing fish bones in and muttering to himself. On any other day, the hooded figure would have stayed to watch, but he didn’t come to watch the Mystic, he came to find treasure. And so he continued on his path to the Lost City of Geraptiku.

      There’s an old deserted tomb there, and it’s rumored to have treasure. As he crosses the gate into the ancient city the figure lowered his hood. The grey Ogrin scans the entrance to the tomb before raising the door and entering. It didn’t look like anyone had been there since the archeologists had cleared out. Dodging one trap after another, the Ogrin suddenly finds himself face to face with a pit of snakes. The pit covers the entire floor, and is at least five feet across. Behind him he had narrowly escaped swinging blades suspended from the ceiling. There didn’t seem to be any way across, but he had to try. Backing up as far as he could, the grey Ogrin took a running start to his lithe jump over the pit. Stumbling on the landing, he slowly stood, walked over to the edge and stared down into the pit. Only one snake tried slithering up the wall to get to him, but the pit was too low for it to get high enough to bite.

      Yeesh, he hated snakes.

      Hunched over and ready for whatever trap was next, he continued down the long hallway. He came across a few that others must have set off previously, remains of swinging axes or spikes lying broken on the floor. When the path split off into a T intersection, he stopped to think for a moment.

      “I was told to follow the path but the path splits.... I should go right, and if that doesn’t work I’ll double back and go left.”

      Heading down the dark path he heard a noise, soft yet audible. Paw prints broke through the dust covered floor, leading off into the shadows.

      “Well this can’t be good.”

      Did he dare go further? There was likely some large animal waiting in the dark for him. But fortune never did favor the sensible, it favors the brave. Those who are willing to take risks. Those who do incredibly stupid things.

      Fortune has favored a grey Ogrin named Nalu before, so why not again. Picking up a piece of a broken wooden trap, Nalu fished around in his bag before finding something that would light a fire, and fashioned a torch for himself to see into the dark with before plunging headfirst into the possibly dangerous shadows.

      As it turned out he had plenty of reasons to worry about those paw prints, they belonged to a Kougra who was scared out of his mind and was starving.

      “Who are you?”

      The Kougra seemed too afraid to even move his mouth to say his name, but after a few minutes of questioning he was able to get out of him that his name was Dean and that he’d been wandering around here for three days without supplies.

      “Why would you come in here without supplies?”

      Dean just stared dumbly into the corridor.

      “Here, eat these.” Nalu handed Dean a bag of Neocrackers, thinking that the Kougra would nibble on them. Instead the green Kougra swallowed them all in one deft motion. “I said eat, not inhale.”

      “Sorry.” Shakily Dean stood up, “This corridor take you to a dead end, we should go back the way you came.” Dean needed Nalu’s support in order to walk at first but got the hang of it eventually and was able to walk while keeping stumbling at a minimum. Apparently Dean had gone exploring looking for a mummy or something the archeologists had missed the first time around, and when he got lost had spent extensive time wandering the corridors. “This turn will lead up to a trap door, go straight ahead.”

      He continued giving little instructions like that until they reached a part of the tomb that neither of them had ever been in.

      “We should find an exit and leave.” Dean whimpered, the excitement of adventuring had long ago passed for him.

      “We’ve come this far, let’s keep going.” Dean started protesting, so Nalu suggested that he should stay there. Unfortunately, the idea was not well received.

      Eyes wide with fear, the Kougra shouted “No! No! Don’t leave me alone!”

      “SHHHHHH!” Nalu hissed, covering Dean’s mouth with his paw. “Fine, we won’t split up, but I’m still not leaving. Let’s go.”

      Progressing forwards, there was a distinct lack of traps that made Nalu suspicious. They wouldn’t just not make traps here, better to keep their eyes peeled for something. Dean, bless his heart, didn’t seem to notice anything at all, so focused on attempting to persuade Nalu to leave still.

      All it took was Dean to run ahead to try to catch Nalu’s eyes to set off a trip wire low to the ground to start making the entire path start trembling. The floor began breaking up farther down until the chain reaction caused the ground to crack and fall apart right in front of them.

      “Let’s get out of here!” Dean yelled, taking off and leaving the Ogrin behind.

      Nalu couldn’t help but think he must have been close for this damaging of a booby trap to occur. Turning to run he realized that Dean must have been faster than he thought. He couldn’t see the Kougra anywhere! Whenever the path split up he tried to take a second and look for Dean before the ground shook where he was standing and threatened to fall apart beneath him. They keep running trying to get ahead. Taking a sharp turn the path here seemed steadier and he finally caught sight of the green Kougra.

      “Dean! Stop!”

      The words had barely escaped his lips when the Kougra tripped over some vines and got tangled up in them.

      “AAAAAAHHHHH!!!” Dean kept screaming, over and over again until Nalu finally had to cover his mouth with his paw.

      “Stop screaming, I’m going to cut you out of here, but you have to stop screaming.” You never know what could be coming next in these tunnels. He got to work sawing off pieces of vines that were wrapped around the Kougras arms and legs. Ogrins weren’t known for their strength though, and it took him a few minutes. “Here we go.... And done.” Helping his friend stand up, they headed back the way they came only to find that the path had disappeared and a bottomless pit was there instead.

      “Oh no! How are we getting out of here now?” Dean wailed.

      “Follow me, we’ll find a way out of here.” Nalu said, leading the frightened Kougra away from pit.

      They wandered two days. They didn’t quite know how, but they managed to elude many of the traps mysteriously strewn around this tomb. Or maybe they were set off by other adventurers.

      They happen upon a flight of stairs that leads down into the darkness. It seems to go on forever, but the the two boys finally reach the very bottom and enter the dimly lit room they find there.

      The treasure room.

      Splitting up, the boys scoured the room, checking behind high columns, under broken pieces of rock that may have once been statues.

      The entire room was empty save one old flight of wooden stairs. Climbing it, a door opened. Bright light blinded the boys and stepping towards it, they realized they were outside. Before they could turn around the door slammed shut, sealing them out of the tomb.

      No treasure, no artifacts. The only thing the boys had found in the tomb was a friend.

      Maybe that wasn’t so bad of a reward.

      The End.