venusadept_2 | Into Sol Sanctum!

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Into Sol Sanctum!

The door from Milliways opens into a small room, fairly plain except for a statue at the opposite end. The walls and ceiling are made from a bluish stone, while the floor is brown and speckled with some kind of glowing lichen. The light is bright enough to see fine, although you wouldn't want to read by it.

The room's one significant feature is a statue, about eight feet tall, depicting what appears to be a man with a lion's head, holding a sword with the point between his feet. It stands against the far wall.

Once the group is through, Felix gestures around. "This is the room where I think the door is. At this point, our best bet would probably be to close our eyes and feel along the walls for either an opening or some kind of button." He pauses, then adds, "The statue won't move for my magic, so it might well be hiding the door itself."

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Varric ignores the blocks and the pyramids. His attention is on those buttons in the floor. They've got all kinds of floor-based traps back home and he'd just as soon know if he's facing one before the avalanche gets triggered, thanks.

Felix sighs again before he answers.

"If this is like the other rooms I've been in that look like it, the door won't open until the blocks are on those buttons. We probably need all three at the same time, though I haven't dealt with more than one so I don't know for sure."

Well. Sort of answers. Meanwhile, he's looking back and forth between the two sides of the room, trying to figure out a route that will get his block to a button without dropping it into a pit.

'Sort of' isn't strictly comforting.

"So, this is normal?"

She moves ahead, carefully approaching 'her' block.

"They're supposed t'move like that?"

"Interesting. Back home the mages don't go overboard with this kind of design. They just hire somebody to set things up so the slightest wrong move burns off your eyebrows." Varric shakes his head. "How much of a chance do we have of winding up scorched if this goes wrong?"

Felix shrugs. "Normal might not be the word I'd choose, but yes, that's how they work."

Varric's question takes him by surprise. Scanning the walls and ceiling, and finding nothing that looks like a dragon head, or even a spout, he hesitantly responds, "Probably we won't. But I suppose one or two of the buttons could be decoys." He pauses, then continues, "I can heal anyone who does get hurt."

Kate goes stalk still the moment 'burn' leaves Varric's mouth.

She turns over her shoulder, lack of amusement running wild across her features. Somehow, Felix's promise of healing is less than comforting in the wake of 'probably' and 'I suppose.'

"Right."

She digs a pair of worn leather gloves out of an inside pocket, and starts yanking them on. She agreed to help, and these blocks aren't going to move themselves.

"Let's get to it, then."

"I can live with that," says Varric, who's gotten a little more familiar than he'd like with the idea of waiting for a mage to come up with a cold spell before his coat scorches irreparably. "I'm claiming this block, here...."

Technically, they will move themselves, and it would be quite hard to get over or between the pyramids to where they are. But they won't move themselves without the people in the room also moving.

Felix is proceeding slowly, making use of the fact that the pyramids are arranged differently on the two sides, and that they block the blocks from moving, in order to steer his block around pits and other pyramids. He does have to backtrack a few times, but he's definitely making progress.

It's a little trickier than she expected. She's vaguely reminded of parlor tricks she's seen using magnets — move one this way, something else goes that-a-way; get too close, and you either attract or repel the opposite piece.

She nearly loses her block in a pit, at which point she stops and re-evaluates things.

"Will they continue t'move against us after we've got our hands on 'em? Or do y'think we can control how they move then?"

"Couldn't even begin to tell you," says Varric, who's trying to concentrate on his own block. "This is clearly the work of someone who had far too much time on his hands in the first place."

"I don't think we're supposed to get our hands on them. If this is like the others I've been in, they will just reflect our movement until we get them onto the buttons."

Felix is a bit distracted at the moment, having maneuvered himself into a tricky dead end. He's kind of glad he can just watch the block, rather than worrying about stepping into his own pit.

The proverbial light bulb comes on.

"Your world's interestin'. That's for damn sure."

She smirks at the fellas, and then sets her jaw. Move the blocks without touching them, right. That certainly changes things.

She figures out how to get her block away from the pit, and then starts moving. Slow and steady wins the race, right? She takes her time, careful not to get in anyone else's way, and eventually has her block near one of the buttons.

It's taking a little longer for Varric- he keeps expecting a concealed beartrap to snap on his foot if he steps anywhere even slightly unusual- but he gets the hang of it eventually. Really, though, he's just glad the mages in Kirkwall don't seem to have ever thought like this.

As soon as all three buttons are pressed, the blocks stop moving and the door opens. The room beyond is almost completely dark, lit only by the light spilling through the doorway, but the way it echoes suggests that it's long and narrow.

Felix narrows his eyes and draws his sword, without a word.

Kate's sixshooter is already in hand. She doesn't look nervous, but there's the telltale sound of leather gloves skidding over rosewood and metal, in a grip that's just a shade too tight. She doesn't like going anywhere her vision is compromised.

"All right. Who goes first, gentlemen?"

Assuming they can't walk three abreast.

"Bianca's got a pretty wide cone of fire," says Varric, readying the crossbow. "I can cut a good swathe through anything that tries to surprise us if I have to."

"I think I'll go first, unless one of you objects," says Felix. "My weapon doesn't quite have the range of either of yours."

They probably could walk three abreast, if they were willing to get quite cozy. But it wouldn't be comfortable.

Kate nods.

"No objections here."

Not that she'd mind going first, but it makes sense for Felix to lead. She'll keep close as he does.

"Fine by me," says Varric. "I'll cover what I can."

Felix nods and starts forward, moving slowly. Once he gets about five feet past the door, two braziers on the walls light up with popping sounds. Their light doesn't extend very far, but they certainly negate any attempt at stealth.

Felix sighs.

She lowers her weapon — the instant the torches crackled to life she was ready for anything — and lets out a slow breath.

"Well, the lights are on."

Is anybody home?

"I think I like it better in Kirkwall," says Varric. "There might be more torches than shadows in the sewers, but at least they're more or less always burning. Having them just pop on like that... that's eerie."

"And it usually means there's something powerful, very close." And while it could be another summon tablet, Felix would put his money on a dangerous monster.

Someone with sharp eyes could probably make out a glint of something metallic in the shadows ahead.

One thing becoming an outlaw does for a body is sharpens its senses. She sees the glint ahead, but she doesn't say anything. With the threat of 'something powerful' hanging in the air, calling undue attention to their party seems unwise.

She does touch Felix's shoulder, however, and quickly glances at Varric to make sure they both see it as well.

Varric spots it, all right, and has Bianca ready and aimed immediately. The instant he has an excuse to- which is to say, as soon as he's sure that it's a threat and not something that's likely to set off a cavalcade of other traps- he'll fire.

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