Wary after his brush with death again, Garrett stayed to the middle of the group, with Min-Tul in front and Xul'Gomoth in the back. The three of them continued down the hallways until they reached a large door with strange markings on it.
"I can't read these," Garrett said, not recognizing any of them as similar to the Illiman, Dwarven, or Elven symbols that he had encountered so far. "Does anyone know what these say?" Both Min-Tul and Xul looked it over before shaking their heads. "Do you at least recognize what language it is?"
"Yeah," Xul said, "It's Faen."
"Faen?" Garrett asked, having an idea of what it was, but he needed to be sure.
"Yeah, the language of fairies and pixies," Xul said, confirming Garrett's suspicion. "Though, it is very strange. What is some of it doing all the way down here in the Darge?"
"Maybe when Illimas made this, they had help from some Faerens," Min-Tul suggested. "That would explain where they got these crystals that illuminate the place." He gestured to the glowing crystals that lined the hallways.
"Perhaps," Xul said, looking closer at one of the crystals, "Though I thought the cut was more Elven to me."
"Either way," Garrett interjected, "none of us can read these symbols, right?" The two others nodded at him. "And there weren't any other paths?" The two others nodded again. "So, we have to go through this door, don't we." Once again, they nodded. "Alright, here we go." Garrett pushed on the door and it slowly opened.
Inside was a large empty room with large stone tiles on the floor. After a quick count, there were 10 tiles across and 20 the length of the room, making for a total of 200 tiles. They were each about 5 ft by 5 ft with no markings on them. On the other side of the room was a wide platform with a large door. On the walls and ceilings were small holes, aligned with the center of each tile.
"Well, this clearly smells of a trap," Min-Tul said, observing the room.
"But, we don't have a choice," Garrett said, steeling his resolve.
"Wait, let's send Xul in first," Min-Tul said, turning around to Xul'Gomoth.
They frowned back at Min-Tul. "Hey, I'm not invincible," they said, pointing to the right side of their face. "I can still die, you know. What about your ball and chain?" Xul pointed to Garrett's new weapon.
"Yeah, we could use this to check for any traps," Min-Tul said. Garrett nodded and threw the ball onto the first tile. They waited with bated breath, but nothing happened. "Makes sense the first tile would be safe." Garrett dragged the ball back and aimed it at the next tile. As soon as it landed, the tile crumbled under the weight, causing Garrett to be dragged forward.
"I gotcha!" Xul said, managing to grab Garrett's ankle before he went over the edge.
Garrett's eyes went wide as he stared downwards towards stone spikes. As he breathed heavily, he looked around, he could see the entire underside was covered in these stone spikes.
"You okay?" Min-Tul asked, checking over Garrett for any injuries.
"Yeah, I'm fine," Garrett said out of breath. "There are spikes all over this place under the tiles. But, most of them were being held up by stone pillars."
"So, we need to find out which of these are safe to walk on," Min-Tul said. "Want me to throw the ball so you don't get pulled?"
"I think that's a good idea," Garrett said as he handed the chain over to Min-Tul.
Min-Tul swung the ball, allowing it to land next to the first safe tile on the right. The ball didn't break through the tile. They all breathed a sigh of relief. Min-Tul yanked the chain back and threw the ball onto the next tile in the same column. This time, the ball didn't break through the tile, but the tile sank into the ground slightly. Almost immediately, fire shot down from the ceiling, and the walls, five streams of fire concentrated right above the tile. If anyone had been standing on it, would have roasted them to ashes. Min-Tul immediately pulled the metal ball back, and the tile slowly returned to its regular position.
"Are you serious right now!?" Xul exclaimed. "Why would anyone design something like this?"
"I guess it makes sense," Min-Tul said as he allowed the metal ball to cool down at his feet. "If this was designed by Faerens, or at least with them in mind, then they wouldn't have to care about these traps."
"And I guess then the symbols on the door were supposed to help guide us about what are the safe tiles," Garrett said, turning back to the door.
"Well, as long as we don't touch any of the trapped tiles, or stand in the same row as them," Xul said nervously.
"Yeah, we have the ball and chain. As long as I don't press on any of the tiles that are in the same row or column as us, we should be fine," Min-Tul said, picking up the now cooled metal ball.
"Provided that's the only thing that comes out of the walls," Xul said.
Garrett and Xul both waited at the entrance as Min-Tul began testing the tiles. Slowly, tile by tile, they began to reveal the path forward. Every time the fire shot out, Xul grabbed tightly onto Garrett. The trio of them was careful in their steps and Min-Tul was even more careful about which tiles he threw the metal ball onto. After what felt like an hour, they all managed to make it across the room.
"Whew, we made it," Xul said, breathing a sigh of relief.
"Glad we had this thing," Min-Tul said, handing back the Chain Ball to Garrett.
Garrett wound the chain back around his hand, happy to be on solid ground. "Okay, we have to keep on moving. No point in standing around here." The other two nodded in agreement and they opened the door.
On the other side was a crossroads of hallways. There were four other pathways connected here, none of which were marked. They peered down each of the hallways, with all of them leading to darkness except for one. That path, as they looked into it, lead into the room with the rock elementals guarding the prisoners.
"Well, with that weapon of yours, we could probably take them," Min-Tul said. "What do you want to do?"
Garrett pulled out a silver coin and flicked it into the air. He caught it before it hit the ground, looking at the result. He gripped the metal ball tightly and nodded.
"We're going in."