The Mad Rat’s Lab

“Hey, Usufet. Do you know the way?”

After the falling ceiling room, there was a straight passage filled with traps. Usufet did a great job spotting (activating) them for me. At the end of that passage, I had to climb a long staircase, at the end of which we found a door.

The thing is that, on the other side of this door…

I’m sure you’ve seen this before. A room with platforms everywhere, including the ceiling; with stairs in impossible directions, even upside down; and lots of archways that teleport you to another one. I know this last one because I tried it.

And everything has the same color: blue. The color per se isn’t important. What’s important is that everything is the same color, making it very hard to distinguish anything.

Currently, I’m standing in the middle of a platform, trying to make sense of the layout.

The gravity changes according to the ground, so… I’m not sure, but I could swear I’m hanging upside-down right now.

“The entrance is that one. I used that path, then came through that arch… Turned left, right, straight, left, left, left…” I scratch my cheek. “Hmm… yeah. I have no idea which parts I tried or not.” I turn to my minion and ask again. “So, Usufet. Do you know the way or not?”

Usufet stares back with a devoid gaze on its ugly face. As expected, it’s no use.

“Urgh, what am I going to do now?” I don’t have the pressure of being the first to reach the opponent’s dungeon core, but there’s a time limit of two hours. I can’t stay here indefinitely. “I guess… I can only do this.”

I manipulate the game’s menu and make something pop in front of me. It’s a coin with my symbol, the one with my head’s silhouette and lightning, on one side and a cross on the other.

“Alright, here I go. Heads, I take the right path. Tails, I toss the coin again.”

What? You’re saying there’s something wrong with how I’m doing it? Leave me alone! I can do it however I want!

*Clink!*

The coin makes a metallic sound when I flip it. But before I can catch it, I hear creepy laughter right next to my ear.

*Huhahahaha!*

“W-what the fuck!?” I instinctively turn around at the same time I jump away. Just in time, because a blue fist strikes the place I was a second ago. “I thought there were no monsters here!”

I didn’t see any monsters. Only blue stairs, blue platforms, and blue archways… and a blue monster in front of me, the same color as everything else. When I say blue I mean completely blue: the face, the clothes, even the ‘white’ of the eyes.

…Ok. I think I get it now.

The blue… clown? It sure looks like one. The blue clown starts attacking with its fists as it keeps laughing. It’s very tall at over two meters, forcing it to hunch over to pass under the archways.

This doesn’t prevent it from being a danger to me, though. If I lose sight of it even for a moment, I’m sure I’ll lose track of it. I can assure you: being lost in this place with a huge clown stalking me isn’t a comfortable position to be in.

“Usufet, do something! Help your master, your creator!” After my monster ignores me, I start to regret not bringing more mobs with me. “If only my Good Follower was alive… I suck against single, strong enemies…”

I now have the Chaotic Beam, so I’m not as utterly useless as I was before. Still, I’m not sure I want to waste so much MP for just a clown.

“I truly miss the Champion’s buff… With it, everything is so much easier…”

With no other options, I start running away, chased by the blue clown. Usufet follows from a certain distance away, staying out of harm’s way. Of course, I could try to get rid of the clown by running away, but I don’t think this is a good idea. If I do so, I won’t know where it is anymore.

*Clink! Clink!* I don’t forget to use the coin flips to decide where I should go.

“Okay, next is… Tails! Then, I– Ouch!”

Distracted by the coin toss, I receive an attack from the clown, which triggers my Lightning Shield, forcing it to take damage. When I look at my stats and compare it to the clown’s HP bar, I notice I took less damage than it did.

“Aha! I know how to get rid of it now!” Since it takes more damage than I do, I can just let it hit me instead of wasting MP! I just need to wait for the skill’s cooldown to end. “Ain’t I smart? Fufufu! Hahaha!”

Having decided what to do, I immediately apply my new tactic. I run away a certain distance, wait for the clown to come close, and then receive the first attack head-on before running away again.

It takes a while, but finally, the clown’s HP falls to a critical level.

“Haa… this is getting boring. It’s safe but incredibly boring. Let’s end this quickly. Chaotic Beam!”

With my spell, its remaining HP disappears, and the clown drops dead to the floor… Or not. Instead of falling to the floor, its body starts convulsing and undulating, slowly expanding like a balloon.

“...Usufet? What’s going on now?” Only the usual silence follows my question. “Alright, I guess I can only assume things on my own, as usual.” I shake my head while activating the inspection tool. “Clown Explosion is the innate skill? Never heard of it before…”

I nod. “...right. The usual thing, isn’t it? Every clown explodes on death, releasing smaller clones to continue harassing the poor children… I’m sure they do in dreams.” I start hitting my head on the wall with each word I say. “Why, didn’t, I, inspect, the, damn, clown, before, I, killed, it!”

The clown keeps expanding until it reaches three meters. Then, with a popping sound, it bursts.

*Pop!*

A multitude of blue clowns are created and launched in all directions. They fly away until they hit something or gravity pulls them into the ground. When I say gravity I don’t mean ‘downwards’. They fall towards the closest platform – regardless of whether said platform is horizontal, vertical, or upside down – scattering throughout the whole labyrinth.

It doesn’t take long for me to lose track of all but the one that landed in front of me.

“Ugh, well… Here goes my hopes of having an easy time after killing that clown…” I say, scratching my head.

This is a perfect situation for me: lots of weak enemies! Or it would, if they were close together; and, more importantly, if I knew where the fuck they are!

“Shit.”

 

---

 

“Cough, cough!” I stand up after the explosion that shook the whole room. “I made a mistake pressing that button… Cough, cough!”

I take a look around. The previously immaculate room is now covered by scorched marks everywhere. All the screens are broken, and the corpses of my minions are scattered everywhere.

On the opposite side of the entrance door, there wall has collapsed, leaving a gaping hole inviting me in. From my position, I can see a passage on the other side of the hole.

“No… This shouldn’t be possible… Unless I missed it somehow…”

Ignoring the green cloud, which I now know it’s harmless, I quickly run out of the room and start looking around. Sure enough, I find an arrow painted on the wall, close to the entrance of the control room. It’s pointing in another direction. In the rush to get to somewhere safe, I didn’t see it before coming inside.

Following that arrow, I soon reach another door. On the other side, there’s a passage with a hole in one side. “Tell me it’s a lie…” I mutter, trying to deny the truth. Everything becomes clear when I see the control room connecting to the hole.

“...”

I had assumed the arrows were pointing to the control room, it never crossed my mind the control room was on the way to my actual destination.

“I got got.” I shake my head. “I lost my minions because of an error. The green cloud wasn’t poisonous, but the button did cause an explosion, and I was in the wrong room… The only saving grace is that I’m still alive.”

It was all a trick, and I fell for it.

“Haaa…” I rub my face with one hand. “I need to focus or I’ll lose. This dungeon isn’t as easy as I expected.”

Right now, I’m sure he’s struggling against my clowns. I’d love to watch his stupid face as he struggles, but I can’t allow myself to get distracted anymore.

At the end of the newly discovered passage, the wood and metal plates disappear completely as the passage gives way to a natural cave. There’s nothing in here, except for bluish dust suspended in the air.

“Hah, nice try. I won’t fall for this. Not after my previous blunder.”

This cave looks identical to one of those ‘resting areas’ in his dungeon. I’m sure it’s the same. The problem with those sleeping traps is that it doesn’t matter if you know them or not, they’re equally dangerous.

Knowing there was a high chance I’d find something like this, I came prepared. I cast my own poisonous cloud covering the whole cave.

“It might be another trick, the dust might be harmless. But I can’t take the risk.” I move as fast as possible while checking for traps.

When I reach the other side of the cave and make sure there’s no more bluish dust, I deactivate my skill. The tunnel has returned to the aspect it had near the laboratory area.

“Hmm. My MP took a large hit, and my HP is below half. It could be worse.” I shrug my shoulders.

A blunder of that magnitude would have cost me my life if I were inside my dungeon, so I can’t complain.

“I should be close to the dungeon core by now, I’d say one or two more rooms at most… Ups, that was close.” I step back just in time. An arrow passes grazing my nose. “Poison arrows, maybe? It’s a classic.”

Classics are classics because they work. Otherwise, people would have stopped using them long ago. I won’t ever criticize anyone for relying on the classics.

But before I can take another step, another arrow passes by my side. “...another one? This angle…” I look in the direction the arrow came from and notice a small hole in the ceiling. Then I notice a whole lot more on the sides, ceiling, and even the floor. “Isn’t this a little bit too excessive? I mean, it’s still a classic, but…”

My thoughts are interrupted by a metallic sound coming from behind.

When I turn around, I see that the passage has been blocked by a giant ballista. It is slowly rising from the ground, and the string is being pulled, getting ready to shoot in my direction.

I quickly look around. A straight passage, filled with tiny holes, and a giant ballista on one end. Then, there’s a closed door on the other side, so far away the door looks tiny. Why didn’t I notice it before? It’s the perfect place for this kind of trap.

I must run away! I don’t want to have a taste of that giant arrow.

“Everybody, run!” In the panic, I forget I’m the only one alive. “We must… ah, right. I’m alone.” I start running, ignoring the small arrows that start flying everywhere as soon as I come near the holes. “Almost there…!”

But before I reach the door, the mechanical sounds coming from the ballista stop. There’s a second of silence before the string is released.

The giant bolt flies in my direction.

“Shit!” I put all my strength into pulling the door open before hurrying inside. I crash into the door’s frame and fall to the ground. I squirm around to pull it close, slamming the door behind me. Immediately after, there’s a dull thud coming from the other side. If this wasn’t a game, I’m sure the door would have been destroyed. “That was close…”

Before standing up, I inspect the new room. I would never enter into an unknown room on purpose, but I had no choice today.

The first thing I see are a few statues, evenly distributed around the perimeter, illuminated by purple light. There’s a text written in a column in the middle, right at my current eye level. It says: Choose wisely.

“Do you have no more ideas, or are you doing this on purpose!? Aargh, how annoying!”

 

“You can’t use a trap as a required mechanism to proceed further into the dungeon. What you can do, is put them right next to the door the invaders will have to unlock, or in the only passage that leads to the dungeon core. Regardless of what you do, a trap should be possible to avoid and its activation can’t be required to beat your dungeon.”

- General knowledge every DMA player should know.