Which Way Do They Head?
Another Room with Chests
The three entered a new room, which was 80 feet wide, 75 feet long, and had a ceiling 120 feet high. The room was mostly barren. Aside from 4 chests off to the left as they entered and rows of statues on the left and right walls, and a complex-looking door on the other side, there was nothing in the room. The statues were arranged as males of various humanoid races (including beastkin races) on the right wall and female figures of the same races found on the right on the left wall; surprisingly, none of the statues seem to be dwarves. Among the statues were races Evan had seen before been made aware of, like elves, orcs, and rabbitfolk, but there were also races hadn't seen before, like some kind of canid beastkin, what looked like four different kinds of cat beastkin, and even what appeared to be a few reptile-like races and a dragon-looking race. All the statues have surprisingly large assets, their figures are highly attractive, and the statues were all completely naked. Each race seemed to be made of different stones that had surprisingly similar coloration to their skin or fur, the hair on the statues didn't look much different than the rest of the statue the figures were sculpted into.
Jillian practically rushed over to the chests and threw them open, anything was better than being in the buff. The first chest she threw open had a pair of undergarments, curiously and suspiciously sized to her current figure, along with a set of short-sleeved/legged fine clothes and set of leotard-styled leather armor, she didn't mind that too much since she preferred to have some measure of freedom to her movements. She quickly threw the attire on, mostly due to wanting to no longer remain naked, and continued on to the next chest. The next chest had a pair of basic daggers, two basic shortswords, and a shortbow with a quiver of 20 arrows, all in what appeared to be a generic human style and with sheaths as needed. The third chest she opened had a collection of pouches of varying sizes, a 50-foot coil of hemp rope, a tinderbox, a day's worth of trail rations, and a waterskin. The last chest she opened had what she recognized as her old merchant scales, a set of alchemy supplies, 5 torches, and a mess kit. A quick check of one of the pouches confirmed to Jillian, but nobody else just yet, she also had her thieves' tools.
Looking at the statues, Evan and Glarka were thinking about what the challenge might be. "How much you betting the door is locked," inquired Evan.
"Neither of us has enough on us for that sort of bet," said Glarka as she scanned the female statues, she spent a bit more time inspecting the female orc statue before saying, "this orc reminds me of myself."
"Ancestor, maybe," said Evan thoughtfully, "or maybe someone related to an ancestor. There is no telling how old these chambers are, maybe we need to bring the statues together as a mated pair."
"That sounds too obvious though," sad Jillian as she finished securing everything, her baldric adorned with several pouches across her waist and her back legs were similarly adorned.
"Oftentimes the simplest solution is the best or right solution," said Glarka, "sometimes an answer is so simple that it completely slips your mind, like a room with a giant fertility idol where you have to partake in proper sexual intercourse to open the door."
"That's the room we first met you in," said Evan, "but you made yourself known after we opened the door, and came out of the remains of a ball of corrosive slime that nearly killed the two of us."
"Oh," said Jillian, "so this dungeon is built around being kinky?"
"Sure looks that way," said Glarka, "whoever designed this dungeon was a perv with...exotic tastes."
"Going by the fact nonstandard races seem to be prevalent," said Evan, "I'm inclined to agree. Especially given the puzzle I solved when I first entered the dungeon and the effects that came after."
"What puzzle? Explain," sad Jillian with surprise. Glarka just gave him a look that told him to 'go on' almost as soon as he mentioned the puzzle in the first room.
"I'm not surprised you wouldn't know, chances are most of the people that entered the dungeon the way I did were unaware of the puzzle. Anyway, there was a slider puzzle on the wall in the first room, it had a hint nearby that said what needed to be made in the puzzle was something that owls do not have."
"Well, that's cryptic," said Jillian with annoyance.
"The answer was a penis, I had to make a penis in the slider puzzle," said Evan with a tinge of annoyance to his own voice.
"Come again?" Said both females in the same tone simultaneously.
"Male owls don't have a penis," said Evan, "it's not all that widely known, and the only reason I knew that is because I grew up near a forest, and one of the ways to keep entertained was reading various academic works that could be bought for cheap, one such piece was on the biology of owls."
"Someone was brilliant but also very juvenile," said Jillian with further annoyance, "who knows what other perverted things we'll be exposed to while we're here?"
"That's not including any future females we encounter along the way," said Glarka, "something tells me this place has a one guy limit to a party, seeing as there are two females that were basically dropped into this place and the sole guy just walked in on his own volition."
"An interesting theory," said Evan, "but let's wait until we have more examples than just you two; if we are still running around with a party of 5 or 6 and I'm the only guy among the whole party, then I'll be more than willing to concede the point."
"I suppose that would be a good idea," said Jillian, "but just what else would we be bound to team up with after this?"
"Hard to say, but chances are we might end up nowhere near any of us are familiar with. If the dungeon pulls in random women of various races not commonly seen from random points in the world, what do you think that could mean for exiting the dungeon?"
"Good point," said Glarka, "we got a bit off-topic, what happened after you solved the puzzle."
"I joked about the member I made with the puzzle being bigger than my actual member, there was a bright flash, the puzzle and its hint were gone, and some parts of me felt a bit snugger in my clothes, especially the groin area."
"Oh," said both women at the same time, in different surprised tones.
"Well, given I was a ball of slime for a bit," said Jillian, "it's not too surprising this place has something about it that causes alterations in physical appearance."
"I guess I'm lucky I arrived topless," said Glarka, "although I didn't appreciate prior dungeon delvers treating me as a combat encounter."
"You both treated me as a combat encounter, I think," said Jillian.
"That had more to do with the hostile behavior the literal slimeball you came out of was showing towards us," said Evan, "it literally moved to attack us first."
"And my consciousness would probably still be locked inside it with no input on actual decisions if you hadn't dealt with it," said Jillian. "so, how are we going to solve this puzzle?"
"Since Glarka is the most physically capable of us," said Evan, the orc woman smirked with amusement, "she will be the one primarily seeing which statues can be moved before we do anything else. Once we confirm which statues can be moved, then we'll work on bringing them to their mate."
"What if both sets of statues can be completely moved," inquired Glarka.
"Then we move them to the center of the room," said Evan, "I think that might be the best approach."
"You're probably right on that inclination," said Glarka.
"I think I'll just go and check the door," said Jillian, "even if it is sealed magically, there could be some clues on or near it."
"Good call," said Evan, "I'll join you, just in case there are some surprises nearby."
"Thanks," said Jillian; with that, the two of them made their way over to the door while Glarka checked how secure the statues were.
It took a few minutes, but Evan and Jillian made their way over to the door. It didn't look like it at a distance, but the door was red for a moment before shifting to green. Regardless, there was silver, gold, and platinum filigree adorning the door with naked figures of all the races there were statues in the room, what appeared to be humanoid dragons with noticeable physical assets, all around what seems to be a pair of fertility idols (one like the one they saw in the room where they met, the other seems to be some kind of draconic fertility figure), the one they were familiar with seemed to still be feminine while the other one had clear masculine features, especially below the waist. All the figures, idols especially, seemed to have exaggerated features regarding their physical genders.
"I think we need to orient the statues similar to how the figures on the door are."
"That makes sense, " said Jillian, "and probably more in line with what to expect with this dungeon, it also is a bit more complex than your initial idea."
Glarka was doing her best to check the statues, it didn't take too long to notice all the statues were not secured to the floor, she began moving each of the statues to the center of the room. After she brought statues over, Evan and Jillian worked together to orient the statues similar to how they were positioned on the door, being sure to space them similar to how they would with how things were presented on the door. It took what felt like hours, mostly due to how heavy the statues were. All three were feeling exhausted by the time the circle was finished.
Before placing the last 4 statues into place, the three of them settled down to sleep for a bit, the room itself seemed safe enough. They all slept quite soundly, and started off at different sleeping points. Evan was sleeping on the wall to the right of the doorway, Glarka was sleeping at the wall furthest to the left, and Jillian was resting at the wall furthest to the right.
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What was clearly a few hours later, the three woke up, Evan had barely moved from where he had been sleeping, but the two women were sleeping up against him; Glarka was sleeping on his shoulder, her bosom enveloping his arm (not that he minded, the sensation was actually quite enjoyable), she was also muttering something he couldn't quite make out other than it involved her breasts in some way; Jillian was sleeping with her head in his lap, one of her hands seemed to be trying to remove his pants unconsciously, it was clear this dungeon had done something more to her than she was willing to share.
After carefully waking the two women so as to not be a victim of something potentially deadly, Evan and the two women completed the circle. As if on cue, the middle of the circle manifested two towering statues similar to the images on the door, the female fertility figure looked to be made of solid jade while the male fertility figure had clear draconic properties and appeared to be made of solid gold. The statues in the circle around them were now suddenly adorned with key-like patterns all over their bodies composed of silver and platinum. The door also swung open to reveal what could best be described as some kind of maze.
At the entrance, it stated the next chamber was some kind of maze, but also one sign next to the sign proclaiming it was a maze was also going to be dotted with questions, riddles, and challenges.
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