Tree Dungeon

by Andrew Karevik

  This was not what I had been expecting to hear. I had assumed, initially, that Gariatha had merely wanted somewhere to store her treasure. That she had arrived in the hopes of finding a more secure place to keep her valuables, as she did not trust the banks of the cities. But to create a new realm that served as an afterlife? This was no small task.

  Could I do this? Yes. I had explored my own abilities greatly when creating the realm of Igio. I realized that my power to create new planes of reality could mimic the divine energies, creating an area that could theoretically draw in the spirits of those who died. I had briefly even considered creating a spirit trap that would capture anyone who died in certain rooms, to deny them the option of resurrection. This was out of curiosity to see how mortals would behave if they only had one life to live in a dungeon. But I had scrapped the idea as too cruel to do so.

  “You have come with a very humble request, and the great wealth you have offered me is recognized,” I said. “But what makes you believe that I am capable of such an act?”

  “The words of a weary prophet, the story of a land you created where giants wander about,” she replied, sighing heavily. “And blind, stupid hope. This is not the first time we’ve tried to seek a new home for our dead. We have been searching ever since Ternoth’s godheart was ripped from his body. Can you do it?”

  “It is within my power,” I said. “But it is a question of whether I am willing.” This request was odd. Surely, there had to be some other way for these people to find peace in the next life. It was strange, to consider the fate of a mortal beyond this realm, especially when I had simply assumed that they all went to a place referred to as the Eternal Woods. But perhaps that fate was only meant for those who followed Agara. I still knew little of the nature of the gods and goddesses in this world. Sometimes it felt as if this knowledge was hidden from me, as when I absorbed knowledge and essences of others, I never learned about divine magic.

  “I understand this question,” she replied. “But consider this prospect. We are seeking an afterlife so that the other gods have no power over us. To die without the favor of a god is to be cast into the underworld, Hell, as some call it, where we are to live a dull, miserable existence. We will be unsafe, prey for the devils that roam that accursed land.

  “However, if we are to live in a realm created by you, we are free from the tyranny of the gods who care not for orckind. We will be able to raise one of our own as a deity, granting him or her the status of god. And since all orckind will worship them, this god will be Greater. And the new orcgod would be grateful to the being that has made it all happen.”

  This plan seemed farfetched to me. The gods, it would seem, were too jealous to simply allow the orcs to bring a new god into the fold, especially if he would challenge Emerhilk. But it was not for me to judge on the merits of this plan, rather I was to decide if I would provide an afterlife to these people. It would be a considerable expenditure of power. I had amassed enough magic to do so, but burning so much for something other than growth would be hard on my body. Worse yet, I could not see any way that this afterlife would return more magic to me, meaning it was not an investment, but rather a sacrifice.

  “There is a great cost for this,” I told her. “One that I may not be willing to bear.”

  “The Eight Tribes are united in this decision,” she said. “Whatever you wish, we will provide you.”

  I sat in silence for some time to consider this. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this development was in line with my goals. I didn’t just want to grow; no, I wanted to be a home to the gods, where they would hold their courts. Perhaps if they raised the new orcgod, he would agree to use one of my other realms as a hall to hold his court. This would legitimize me in the eyes of the other gods. Perhaps they too would consider the benefits of a neutral meeting place for all gods.

  Three days passed as I contemplated, and to her credit Gariatha did not move for those three days. She stood valiantly, waiting for my answer. By the third day, after looking at all of the angles, I decided to go with her people’s plan. I would create a new realm, one meant to draw in the souls of the orcs who died. But there were limitations to what I could do.

  The first was that the realms I created needed life essence in order to function. But the life essence was not the same as the leftover residue from those who died. It was the thriving, active energies of a spirit. I would need a swath of orc spirits who were strong enough to allow the realm to have its drawing effect.

  The second limitation was that until I had enough number of spirits, I would not be able to draw orc spirits from all over the world—let alone through the various afterlives. This would not be an instant success. It would take thousands, if not hundreds of thousands to give me the strength to draw from anywhere. At best, I could capture souls within me, as well as within a mile radius around the forest. This would take centuries to properly achieve.

  Gariatha understood the terms well. We spoke for some time about the proper strategy of how to kickstart the realm, so that it was strong enough to pull in at least a few spirits. These spirits needed to be the strongest and greatest of orckind, the champions who would be able to provide the foundation for New Orcsamar. They would be responsible for stewarding over the realm, protecting it from dimensional creatures, such as devils, who would no doubt arrive in the hopes of finding fresh souls to devour.

  And, most uncomfortably, we also discussed how these spirits would be departed from their bodies. After all, these orcs would be in their mortal form upon arriving. Gariatha’s suggestion was a simple ritual, a poison to hasten things along, but I disagreed. My mind flashed back to my Mother Tree, to Yggdrasil’s own world, where only those who fell in battle were worthy of going to Valhalla. I could not disrespect these great orcish champions by asking them to just lie down and die. No, I would instead create another level, one mighty enough to fell even the greatest of orc. I would give them a warrior’s death, and a place of eternal glory where they could revel in their victories forever and ever.

  Chapter 26

  The orc tribes all agreed to my plan. Many were delighted, as Gariatha told me, to find that their greatest warriors would be challenged by my designs. When the time was right, each tribe would bring two of their champions to me, to compete in the dungeon. It was requested that I make survival a possibility. The orcs who survived would go on to become candidates for becoming a forerunner for godhood. I agreed to these terms. It would not just be a place meant to kill. It would be a proving ground for any orc who saw fit to test their courage against the ultimate challenge. It would also be a home for those orcs who were growing old to find an honorable death. An opportunity to die with their boots on.

  Ehdrid had a great many concerns with this plan. Namely, he feared that the gods would consider my actions as hostile, an attempt to steal the souls that powered their own realms. He warned me that this would have dire and cruel consequences. They may even seek to kill me, should my realm grow too powerful. I asked him what he would do in this situation and he shrugged. To him, the best course of action would have been to send the orcs on their way. But then again, Ehdrid had his own people to be concerned about. If I were to be slain by the Greater Gods, then his people would either perish with me or be displaced, forced to live in the human lands again.

  I took note of his concerns but continued with my plan anyway. It would be a few hundred years before the gods were able to take notice of what was happening. And by then, I would have enough orc spirits living within my new realm to serve me in a time of war. That had been the other agreement the tribes pledged to me. That while their spirits would be living in a glorious rest, should the time come, they would rally up in the afterlife and serve me in battle. Only those who died within the third level would be given this honor. I would give these great warriors the title of Einherjar, just as they had been called back in my Mother’s home.

  I requested that Gariatha erect a post
within the goblin village, a place for her to stay for the time. I had been impressed with her tenacity and wanted to keep her near me, for advice on how to best prepare the third level. I knew little about orckind and wanted to learn what types of combat appealed to them. This level would be a monument to their prowess, and that meant I must know as much as possible of their ways.

  Gariatha agreed that she would stay but wanted more than a house. Rather, she wanted to build a trading post inside of the goblin village, so that she may continue to conduct her own business. This was a matter for Ehdrid to handle, not me, as it was his own village to watch over. His main fear was that a trading post would bring in non-adventurers. Word would get out about his village and crusading humans might return to kill his people. Gariatha countered by offering to put a barracks of a hundred of her own soldiers in the village, to watch over his people.

  The prosperity to be had, she argued, would benefit the village greatly. The goblins would be able to sell their own wares in this trading post, exporting their unique creations to the rest of the world. And, with Gariatha purchasing magical items in bulk to sort through and export, the goblins would be able to buy whatever they wished, always having first rights to anything her post received. The prospect of even more magical items was appealing to Ehdrid. He agreed to the post but stipulated that it would be outside of the village, in a market square. Outsiders were never to enter the village.

  I was excited to see this new development. Now, on top of building a new realm, I would get to watch as the goblins and orcs created a new economy within me. Perhaps, someday, I would have an underground city just as opulent and glorious as Oregmyer.

  The months passed by as I developed the new level of the dungeon. I consulted with the young human architect, Thomas, to design me stronger, deadlier traps that could overtake even the burliest of orcs. I had learned in my conversations with Gariatha that orcs were vastly different from the other races. While all other races considered adventurers as a class or a job, such as a noble or a farmer, orcs did not view adventuring as foreign to their nature.

  It was expected that all orcs would venture out in the world at a young age and plunder dungeons, fight monsters and earn their scars. Then, upon reaching maturity, the orc would return to their homeland and begin to raise a family, a new generation of orcs to go out into the world. By nature, they were conquerors and explorers, hearty and strong. After the orc had built his family up or carved himself a new kingdom, he would enter into the last phase of his life, the Wandering Years. It was in this phase that the orc would simply go out into the world as he did when he was a boy, looking for adventure and excitement.

  To most civilized races, a dungeon was a place of nightmares and horrors. A peasant or farmer would never consider entering such a place. But for orcs, they were created to thrive in such an environment. It was to them a part of life, same as the humans who sent their young to school for a time. I could expect that these champions would be elder orcs who had a strong wanderlust and thus had seen many more dungeons than the average adventurer.

  Thomas, fortunately, had a great deal of creativity when it came to designing traps for me. He was a curious human, for he was always tired, very frightful and easily startled by anything. I once saw him yelp upon seeing his own shadow shift due to a torch weakening. But he was brilliant when it came to building rooms and setups meant to annihilate a living person. He spoke meekly, always had his head down and mostly mumbled, but then he’d show a sheet of paper to me that would change my entire way of thinking about a trap type.

  The nature of these traps had certain specifications. This dungeon level was meant for an orc to undertake alone. The Wandering Years pushed an orc to seek solitude, conquering dungeons and slaying monsters alone. It did not matter the personality of the orc before they began to gray, when the final Wanderlust kicked in, they wanted to be alone. So, these traps needed to reflect that solitary nature. They could not rely on teamwork or group solutions.

  Orcs were also highly resistant to magic due to the fact that their god, Ternoth, had created them for the purpose of fighting the old wizards who used deep magic. And since most magic paled in comparison to deep magic, orcs generally ignored any spell other than the highest tiers of magic. Of course, this had drawbacks. Orcs could not use arcane magic, as their bodies could not manipulate the energies without disruption occurring. They could use magic items just fine, but there were no orc sorcerers or wizards.

  This meant that the dungeon level would be entirely martial in nature. It would be a contest of pure strength, combat skill and cunning. No dirty tricks through the use of magic, no sudden teleportations or even disintegration spells. An orc would laugh all of those off. It was true that I could focus and create some high level spells to affect these orcs, but doing so would take too much magic. It would be far better to invest that power into better, more efficient traps.

  The third level would be a gauntlet, a series of five rooms connected to each other, doors unlocked and easy to go through. An orc would pass through this gauntlet quickly, much faster than other levels of the dungeon. There was no reason to draw this out. It would be less than two hours of a challenge. But it would be the hardest challenge possible.

  I decided to go with a one room, one trap principle for the first four rooms. Rather than stick a bunch of traps into a single room and rely on the orc to solve each one to open the next room, I would make the trap immediately obvious. And there would be no way to solve these traps other than overcoming them. This meant there were no levers that would turn off the buzzsaws, no secret compartments to crawl through in order to escape. Either the orc would be strong enough to defeat the trap, or they would be killed by it.

  Before the first room, I created a depository to place one’s items. Entering the first room would trigger an item killer that would destroy any magical object worn by the orc. If I couldn’t use magic against them, they couldn’t use it against me. Items placed in the depository would be gifted to the trading post or returned should the orc somehow survive. This was to be a place only for physical strength and cunning. There would be no tricks on their end either.

  The first trap was a take on the classic moving wall. Normally, stepping into the room would cause two walls to close towards the adventurers, forcing them to find a way to escape before they were crushed to death. Sometimes this escape would be a secret way out, a door to unlock or even a lever to shut it off. But Thomas had a different design that made it far deadlier.

  The walls would begin to move slowly at first, giving the impression that they moved at this rate the entire time. This would cause the adventurer to begin to think for a way out. Then, at a random interval, the walls—attached to high powered pressure pistons—would fire out as fast as they could go, slamming together and crushing the adventurer to death. The slow, plodding pace would set the expectation that this was a puzzle to solve, when in reality it was a trick to lure them into losing focus on the walls themselves.

  The only way to stop these two walls from squashing the person within would be to either be strong enough to catch them and hold them apart, or to smash a hole in the ground to where one could hide. They would have to figure out their own solution; I wasn’t about to afford these champions any kind of special benefit. Only the greatest would be able to pass through the doors, which would only open after the mechanism fired off.

  The second room was a rather cruel design, but I liked its efficiency. Upon entering the room, poison gas would begin to pump in. This gas, however, was odorless and tasteless, weakening the physical attributes of the one breathing it in. A door would open and a modified Shrevar would emerge. This Green Shrevar was unlike its cousin, in that it wasn’t designed for stealth, but rather straight combat. But it could breathe the poison as if it were air and would, in fact, heal from the presence of the gas. The warrior would grow weaker and weaker, while the Shrevar would remain the same the entire fight. Slaying the Green Shrevar would
allow for entrance into the next room. But the effects of the poison would still remain. The poison wouldn’t kill the orc, of course, but it would simply weaken him for the rest of the challenges ahead.

  The third room was one of my own designs, a thin, narrow plank across a bubbling lake of acid. The plank, from the onset, looked to be perfectly safe to walk across, at least until the champion would make it a few feet towards the door. Then the entire plank would break, resulting in an unfortunate end for the orc, unless they somehow had the foresight to prepare for such an event.

  The fourth room was completely dark, with a Dimensional Shrike resting within. These creatures were ethereal in nature, translucent and long, with spindly blade appendages that would emerge from the Astral Plane and pull unsuspecting victims into another realm. The Shrike was clever enough to know in which realm to pull the victim, taking them to a realm without air, or in some cases a realm of pure fire to cook their food.

  Dimensional Shrikes were persistent, unafraid and relentless. Once the creature had a lock on a victim, it would continue to stalk and attack until either the shrike or the target was dead. Even if the orc was able to escape the fourth room, the shrike would follow. It was a perfect creature to use.

  Should the orc survive those four rooms, they would be faced with the last, ultimate test of their strength and cunning. The final room of this gauntlet was an obstacle course of sorts, with spinning blades, floors rigged with air pressure traps that would fire the orc into the ceiling at lethal speeds, all the while, as oxygen drained from the room. The orc would have to simply navigate past each obstacle to reach the exit door, leading back to the beginning of the dungeon. I did not expect anyone to survive this last room. With the combination of exhaustion from the poison, the fact that the course was unintuitive and labyrinthine in design and the loss of oxygen, a single mistake would be fatal.