Andrew Rowe - Sufficiently Advanced Magic

I moved to the table, keeping the key close at hand. The mist was rising, but not particularly rapidly. I guessed I’d have at least a few minutes before it got high enough that I’d be breathing much of it in. Of course, if it was acid mist or something, I’d need to act a lot sooner.

I’d played a lot of Valor in my youth. It was a fairly standard game of tactics, common in noble households like my own. Each side started with twenty pieces, many of which had different functions. Based on what I’d read, I assumed I’d be playing against the tower itself.

If the tower played like an average civilian, I’d have a good chance.

If the tower played like my childhood companion, Sera, well… I’d have better luck inhaling the mist.

The Valor board was stone, and the figures atop it were forged from red and blue gems. The board was in a standard starting configuration, save for a single missing piece on the red side. The ruby statue from the first room, I realized. If I had taken that, I’d have one more piece to play.

Assuming I sat on the red side of the table.

I sat down on the blue side, which was opposite from the entrance. It was unintuitive, but I hadn’t been given any instructions. Nothing said I had to take the side with a disadvantage. My hand shook as I reached for the first piece.

The mist was rising. How long did a game of Valor usually take? A half hour, maybe, against a new opponent? Maybe a little less, if the enemy was missing a key piece. Fifteen minutes.

I didn’t have that kind of time.

I reached across the table for the red side and systemically removed each of their pieces from the board, with the exception of their goddess.

Then, I moved my own visages into pincer positions around the enemy goddess. She was pinned; the game was won.

A red key appeared in the center of the table. I cheered aloud, shamelessly.

Cheating? Nah. I was just playing to win.

I picked up the red key, heading for the gold door.

I knew even before I tried it that the key wasn’t going to fit.

Apparently, brute forcing a victory on the board earned me a specific type of key, not access to any room I wanted.

My winged key from the first room was gold. Would it work on the golden door? Probably, but I still wanted to save it for an emergency.

I knew the orange door might take the red key. I hadn’t been into an orange room, though, and I wasn’t sure if it would have a gold exit as an option — meaning my gold key might be useless if I headed on that path.

If I continued down the gold path, however, I was likely to continue to see orange doors. It was a safer option.

I tried the golden key in the lock for the golden door. It twisted in place with a click. I retrieved the key successfully and then touched the gem. The door slid open.

The next room was fairly straightforward; I could see three doors on the opposite side of a yawning chasm that covered two thirds of the chamber. A standard chasm challenge. The door gems on the opposite side of the room were the same colors as the ones in the current chamber, confirming the pattern.

The chasm wasn’t fathomless this time. I saw water maybe twenty feet below where I stood. There was a ladder on the opposite side of the room, leading out of the water and up to the side with the doors. I also saw two blocks with what looked like levers embedded in them. Presumably, those were switches to make a bridge across the water.

Metal poles were anchored into the walls. There were two on each side, spanning the entire chasm. They were a few inches out from the wall, and it looked like I could potentially grab onto one and walk on the other. It was probably an alternate way to traverse the gap for someone with a lot of dexterity.

Since I was able to successfully retrieve my key, it dispelled a bit of my paranoia about the keys being single-use. I still couldn’t be confident it would always be like that, but it meant I could probably do a little more testing without being overly worried about losing my keys.

Before heading into the room with the chasm, I walked to the orange door to test my hypothesis about the red key. The mist was at nearly waist level now, so I didn’t want to take much longer. The rising vapor was chilly, but didn’t burn my skin or anything, and I wasn’t feeling any obvious symptoms from it.

I turned the key in the lock — it clicked into place. Apparently, red keys and orange doors were compatible. I retrieved the key and opened the door.

The chamber in front of me was gigantic. Looking up from the doorway, I could see up hundreds of feet, with no indication of a ceiling above.

A gigantic eye stared at me from the opposite side of the room. It was perhaps fifty feet away and three times my height.

By that, I mean that the eye was three times my height. Just the eye. The monster it was attached to? Well, I couldn’t get a good look at it from my vantage point, but it was the sort of size you counted in floors , not feet.

I did see azure, shield-like scales around the eye, though. And that gave me a good idea of what I was looking at.

Seiryu, the God Serpent. Guardian of the Serpent Spire. It was looking right at me.

I stepped away from the door, allowing it to close, and rushed into the chasm room.

I never considered myself a coward. I didn’t think of myself as very brave, either. When seeing a god beast, though, my level of bravery was largely irrelevant. No sane mortal would have lingered another moment in that creature’s sight.

I only hoped it wouldn’t follow me. If it did, no walls, no teleportation to other rooms, and no degree of prayer would save me.

Inside the chasm room, I forced my eyes shut, taking deep breaths. I’d been scared before, of course, but—

Seeing the sheer scale of that thing, knowing that it could annihilate me effortlessly… It made me feel smaller. Insufficient.

What am I doing here?

I shook my head, clearing my mind. I had work to do.

I glanced around the room, getting a better look now that I was inside. The challenge seemed fairly straightforward, but first impressions could be deceptive. The floor wasn’t divided into tiles, which was good. I didn’t want to have to take a circuitous route.

I took a few steps closer, nearing the chasm itself. The water started only a few feet below where I was standing. It looked deep, but not insurmountably so; I could see a stone floor maybe around twenty or so feet down. No signs of monsters in the water, but I did see a large grate on my own side that could hide something behind it. Horrible apparitions, maybe, or treasure.

It was too easy. Maybe the room was designed to give me a chance to rest, but it didn’t fit what I knew of Selys. One of the goddess’ many titles was “The Mistress of Trials”, and it was well-known that she enjoyed providing mortals with escalating challenges. She was a gambler of a goddess, and she expected her followers to follow her example.

So, what was the gamble here? Would the obvious hand-holds on the side break away from the wall, sending me into the water below? That was underwhelming. I mean, I’d just made it through two rooms that were almost undoubtedly lethal.

I wasn’t far from the water, so I pulled the dueling cane off my belt and extended it, reaching down to tip the metal blade into the liquid below. There was no obvious reaction when it touched the surface of the pool, so I withdrew the weapon and ever-so-carefully set it down.

I opened my backpack, pressing the top of the quill against the wet metal. No telltale burning. I leaned down and sniffed, and the liquid didn’t smell like much of anything. Finally, I gingerly pressed a finger on my left hand against the liquid. Nothing. Ordinary water, as far as I could tell.