The Homeseeker: An Elemental Adventurer LitRPG

Chapter 37 - Chaos

"This cannot be right," Fran said, punching the wall furiously. "I just destroyed this stone!"

"The Chaos Chamber repairs itself?" Yelsa asked Rep, terrified.

"I do not know. I was only told they are unpredictable and one should never enter one," Rep replied.

"There must be something we are missing. There must be another door," Gorb said, running his hand against the walls, feeling for an exit.

"Maybe if we break the Artifact!" Fran ran to the center of the room and blasted the ceiling with a fireball as Rep tried to protest. The Artifact continued to shine, unscathed.

"I cannot die like this," Fran said to the Artifact, enraged. "Not sitting in a room until I starve! What can be done, Rep?"

"I have told you all that I know nothing!" Rep said, frustrated. "I am not hiding information!"

"I know that! I know that!" Fran said, running her hand over her face. "I just wish someone had a way out for us."

"I have found no doors in these walls," Gorb announced as he finished his circle around the room. "But I will press against all the stones. Perhaps one of them is a pressure plate for an exit."

"Why would there be an exit in a room that is not intended to be escaped?" Fran asked sharply.

"Because..." Zalan blinked in surprise when the idea came to mind. He felt his mood swing strangely. He went from confident they could break the wall, to dread of being trapped, to almost manic in wanting to find an answer in short minutes. His emotions just kept swirling, no matter where he was. He ignored the unsettling nature of his erratic mind and focused on the room. There had to be a way out. "Because... some people would forget about this room and accidentally get trapped. They wouldn't want the castle dwellers that were intended to go through here to get stuck."

"If what I recall of Docrun is true, then there would not be anyone else intended to pass through this room. He prized his treasures. He was known for always walking with his jeweled crown on and his golden scepter, even in his private quarters. He never left them for anyone else to manage," Gorb said, but he stopped pushing against stones. He was curious where Zalan was going with the train of thought.

"Okay, that might be better. Because then the king would only have this one way in. He wouldn't make multiple ways to get to his treasure room, right? So, he would have to pass through here. How would he deactivate the room?" Zalan asked, looking around at his friends.

"Perhaps from the outside? Before he entered?" Yelsa asked.

The travelers turned to Rep instinctively.

"I do not know if that is possible," Rep shrugged, frustrated that they still looked to him for answers.

"Okay, then what else? How else could he get out?" Zalan asked.

"Why are you ruling out the possibility to disable it from the outside? That may be the answer," Yelsa said.

"Yeah, but if it is, then we're dead. There's really nothing we can do if we were supposed to turn it off outside. So, we have to assume it's not the case. Then we can figure something out," Zalan said.

"Right," Fran was nodding with new conviction. "There were thieves that went to the treasure room after Docrun's death. They must have figured out how to escape."

"Or, the only ones who escaped were the ones that knew how to deactivate it from the outside," Yelsa said, her eyes pointedly on one of the skeletons slumped against a corner. Zalan didn't want to dwell on the idea, quickly moving on.