Dinner Party To Die For

Chapter 7: How Do We Get Out Of Here

 After that little message, everyone was shocked and stood silent in the room. After a few minutes had passed, Cassandra goes over to Zeke and grabs the paper from his hands.

Everyone looks at her confused.

"I'm trying to figure out what we have to do next to get out. They both had pieces of paper with them I'm guessing. So let's see what they have to say."

She looks down at the crumpled piece of paper. She looks up, and immediately runs to the other side of the room where a light green wooden case is. Nobody knows what she's doing, so they go over to her, and grab the note. It says, "I left my decoder in the brightly colored box so I wouldn't lose it, but the thing is, I can't find the code. All I can't remember about the code is it's in a place the stars don't shine."

And as soon as they read it, Lily pulls out the other note that she had grabbed earlier once they found Alice.

"This one needs to be decoded!" Lily shouts as she starts to look for the code.

They decide to split up. One group looks at the accessories of the others, and another group looks for the code. Alex, Joseph, Alice, Zeke, Sally, and Kevin look for the code. So that leaves Lily, James, Jack, Cassandra, and Sarah to look at the accessories. Everyone takes off their jewelry, scarves, gloves, and other items that help portray their character and they put them on the couches.

The two groups get to work and start looking at various objects. The group looking around the house starts grabbing pots and vases to try and find the code. But with no success. The other group is grabbing everything and turning it inside out while looking at it all very closely. Lily grabs Joseph's crossbow, and realises that there is a small hole in the side of it with a little panel over it. She opens up the panel and finds a piece of paper. She unravels it and everyone jumps when they hear her shout, "I found it!"

Everyone runs over to look. The paper says, "--61. The first numbers are not over nor under. Look in plain sight. The darkest part of the room is where you will find it."

"So we need to look behind something. It's not over or under, it's in plain sight, and it's in the darkest part of the room." Alex says

"Have any of us tried looking behind the cabinet with the decoder? I mean, it's behind but in plain sight, and it's dark back there." Joseph points out

"Now that I think about it, we never did look back there." Kevin says

The whole group runs over to the cabinet and moves it away from the wall. The look all over the back and in the bottom left hand corner, something is scratched into the wood.

"This is it! We got the rest of the code! It's '7091!'" Jack says to the others

Cassandra starts to put it into the lock and it opens. The reach in and grab the decoder. She goes back to the table and puts down the note to be decoded. She waits as everyone puts their accessories back on. Once everyone has everything again, she puts the decoder over the note and lines it up with the piece of paper, normally it says, "I know all you want is to become a dark man, bute one not does it so well with yours. Look in the thing where the fire is held in place for you all."

But with the encoder, it says, "Look in the fireplace."

"So they wrote all of that, just to tell us to look in the fireplace. Really?" Sarah says

So they look in the fireplace and there is a big mat in there. They grab it and put it on the floor. They unroll it, and see an outline in the center with a note.

The outline resembles a small hexagon, they pick up the note and read it, "You are a step closer to escaping, on this mat there is a small hexagon. This is your key to escape. For every challenge you complete. The winners will be given different colored chalk and a gem. But in many challenges, you will be forced into other realms. In some realms, not everything is as it seems. In each realm, there is going to be something to do or someone to help or interact with Someone here has been taken over by dark magic and is planning to trap you all here and make you their slaves. To help you along your way, in some realms there are shards hidden in cloth bags from my group that had failed. Collect three of these shards to bring a guest back from the dead. The only ways out, are to fill in this map, or kill the traitor before sunrise, and you will be set free from this time period. Hopefully you can stop the guest and not end like us. One of the bags you will need can be found in one room on the fourth floor of the estate."

"We know what we have to do, we have to find the traitor before anyone else dies." Kevin says

"Yeah, but, how do we find out who it is." Zeke says

"We need to just observe. It said it's only one person, so if one person dies and it's them, then we can get out." Alex says

"Yeah, but three people have to die to get one back. And who knows how many bags there are in total." Sally says

"That's true, but, the note said that in the other realms, we would meet other people to help or interact with, maybe they'll know something." Kevin points out

Everyone nods and starts to sit down. As Sally stands up, she looks at the mantle on the fireplace. There's a note there. "Hey, I think I found something." she calls out as she picks up the note. Once everyone gathers around she reads it.

"Well done finding out the secrets of the night, but that isn't all. Not only is one of you being fueled by dark magic, so is this house. A long time ago, some woman put a curse on this house to freeze it in time. I am that woman.I cursed this house to make it my safe haven. Until an old man showed up. I decided to turn this house into a palace for him to live in. But it was for a price he couldn't bear to pay. So I had him killed in a way nobody could find out. It was like a mystery. The price was his sanity. He didn't follow my every command when he arrived so I drove him insane and killed him without a trace. And I knew nobody would come find him because they all hated him for leaving out of nowhere. So, I made him write his will, and I made him write it for you, Kevin. Then I closed down the house for a few years while these two cleaned it up. It made me realise how wonderful a new toy is. Well, a few, new toys. I'm sure we will meet eventually, but only once you defeat me. You see, all challenges take a life, but they really are all surprises. Just keep your eyes peeled for some familiar face during challenges. ~ The Watching Woman"

"Wait, what? She was the one that had killed him, and given me the house? She was the one who made me throw this party. She will pay!"