Turned out not only was there an enchantment in place to open the door when scholars and visitors come, but also an enchantment to prevent those who wished to abuse, steal, or anything overall malicious to be unable to enter.
Magic is amazing, convenient, and applicable to all parts of life and more! Of course, asking older gods for their power in exchange for their sanity is much more fascinating.
Also, turns out what went wrong was nearly outright stating their intentions, and then truly stating their intentions.
Being honest is rough, difficult, and tragic. Honest and good people with kind intentions are usually stamped out, backstabbed, and schemed against. Next time, they'll perfect their acting skills and lie for sure.
They're just kidding, of course. Probably. They'll tuck that thought into their mental secret plan folder.
At this point, they just couldn't truly tell if it's their own thoughts or the voices in their heads anymore. It was too difficult to separate the two. Perhaps the solution to their problem lies with what is to come.
Oh yeah, another thing that's truly, very integral to saving their other self.
The librarian was quite the humorous person! With what they "know" and at first blush, they thought her to be the truly rational-scary-paranoid-monstrous-genius who can think of dozens of solutions and being four steps ahead at a glance the moment she is confronted with a problem.
After nearly having their hearts jump out of their chest, she took out a strange item from a pocket, waved it over them, "hmm'ed," and let them pass without neither a glance nor word after pointing the way.
At least, that's what should've happened. Instead, before the young boy could take his third step, a calm voice stopped him.
"Oh right, what are your names?" the librarian asked offhandedly without looking up, as though it was just an afterthought.
However, that gave them pause.
Names...
Their names are...
Names. Names. Names.
That particular word ran in their minds over and over.
Like a program running into an error, their mind kept running and running on without execution, solution, or end.
Well, there's an end: it crashes.
It froze them in place, both themselves in the library, and their other self in the dungeon. They became still, blankly staring ahead.
Then, that word just appears in their minds once it crashes.
Names. 𝘕𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘴. 𝗡𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘀. What were their names? Names are identities one carries throughout their lives. Their whole, entire being. Just a name can tell who they are, where they're from, and what connections they may have with others.
Did they not think of this earlier? Wasn't it important? Why did they not think of a solution then, but instead brush it aside? Was it possible for something affecting their cognition-?
Oh, right. Their other self is in trouble. That's the entire reason they're here, after all.
In this moment, the unintelligible voices whispering in their ears fell silent. A rare moment of silence to think upon.
However, they did not have the luxury to just stop and think. Time was ticking, and the librarian may become increasingly suspicious then she already was.
So, the young boy turned his hand around and opened his mouth. However, the moment the young boy try to say a random name, something in them- no, he said "no," and instead shoved something into his-, no, their mouths.
""My name is _______.""
With a bow and a small word of thanks, he started pushing the wheelchair away, enduring the pounding headache that wouldn't seem to ebb away anytime soon.
As he was doing so, the young boy couldn't help but feel as though a pair of eyes bored deep into his back. If eyes had the power to light a piece of wood on fire, surely these pairs of eyes could certainly create the blazing sun.
They couldn't help but silently breathe out a sigh of relief once it turned away.
Still, their thoughts couldn't help but return back to over a minute ago. They knew their way of thinking was peculiar; their mind was a labyrinth in of itself. Their unknown "knowledge" didn't need to tell them that something was off.
What were they missing exactly...?
Suddenly, the young boy abruptly came to a halt, his footsteps squeaking on the wide, polished floor.
"Oh, right, I forgot."
Feeling a pair of curious eyes fall upon him, he turned around towards the librarian once more and seriously regarded her with a somewhat thoughtful face.
"Excuse me," he began as though it was an afterthought. "Is there a...very detailed, logical, coherent, and extensively-tested survival guide on what to do when unprepared with literally nothing in a dungeon?"
...
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
Faint drops of water rang out besides the young man as they fell into the puddle.
The young man didn't just sit there the whole time, wasting the precious resource called time. He wasn't that useless, of course.
Well, he is dependent on his two child selves, and one is disabled, but it didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. Although he hadn't touched the cell's bars yet in case some curse was placed on it- at this point, caution is very much needed- he explored the rest of his cell.
Nothing but blood that has been sticky and dried for who knows how long, ragged pieces of dirty cloth, and unidentifiable pieces of flesh.
He hoped it wasn't anything related to humans, but something in his gut told him it was most likely true.
After scouring every corner, the young man looked at the cell bars, and wondered how to open it.
He approached it tip-toe by tip-toe. In the darkness, it looked incredibly rusted with age, so maybe there's a chance he can break it with his flimsy strength. He just needed to wait for his other selves to-
His trail of thought immediately screeched to a halt.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
The young man tilted his head side to side. He didn't know when, but something had changed. He could feel it in his very own gut.
Slowly backing to the back of the cell, he strained his senses- especially his ears- as much as possible.
The world became much darker and scarier than it had three seconds ago.
Still, he continued to lean against the wall, and its tiny cracks and edges poked and pricked his back.
The young man didn't know much time had passed-
'No,' he corrected himself. His other selves had counted for him. It was only a scant few seconds when his back was pressed against the cold, stone wall. The world around him seemed to slow as his- no, they racked their brains to determine what the danger was.
As he did so, he finally noticed what changed it.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
At first, it was faint- incredibly faint. In the silence, the drops of water were like booming drums, so his sense of hearing didn't pick up on it. The mental clock in his head continued to tick by, counting every second, until eventually, he barely managed to pick out something else alongside the drops of water.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
𝘛𝘢𝘱.
It was so faint, he thought the voices in their head were playing tricks on him. It wasn't the first time it did, and it surely wouldn't be the last.
Still, the young man slowly- and as quietly as possible- knelt on the floor. Putting his arms against the cold ground layered with something squishy and sticky, he lowered his head and gently pressed his ear against the ground. The icky, sticky feeling he felt on his ear made him hesitate, but he had already long foregone hygiene and cleanliness.
Earlier, he had already tried peering through the cell bars, and couldn't see anything past a feet or so, and within the feet it was all incredibly vague. He could only rely on his other senses.
He prayed it wasn't so, but it was so. Soon, although faint, vibrations of both sound and feeling touched his senses. To his growing horror, it was getting louder and louder.
Every second made his heart skip a beat. His heart began beating erratically, and his breathing became irregular and rougher. His attempts to smother it were met with some success, forcibly calming himself down through deep breaths.
The young man knew this whole time it was a race against time. The longer he stayed in this cell- this dungeon, the longer the potential danger may come, and it came sooner than they hoped.
He tried to make himself inconspicuous as possible. Maybe this "thing" that's approaching was some weak goblin, and maybe he could jump him-
He suddenly realized- he didn't know when it changed- but the "𝘵𝘢𝘱" became more of a "𝘵𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘱."
𝘛𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘱.
𝘛𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘱.
𝘛𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘱.
Whatever was coming sounded incredibly slow, lumbering each and every step this approaching thing made. He guessed it to be a large humanoid, carrying something incredibly heavy in order for it to be creating vibrations, faintly shaking the ground each and every step it made.
It didn't even sound that close, and yet each step it made drew it closer and closer to where his cell was.
Now, the cell bars began to shake and tremble each step this "thing" made.
He felt like hours began to pass by as the sound became louder and louder. His body heated up, and he felt his face flushed. His attempt to control his breathing failed more and more, while his hands began to feel sweaty.
It was all too much for him to handle, too much- until finally, it all exploded with a dump of cold, freezing water pouring onto him.
The young man had his breath caught in his throat as 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘩𝘶𝘨𝘦, from the left outside his cell, came into view.
A giant, malformed humanoid monstrosity made a faint contrast against the darkness. Nearly three meters in height, its head looked to be tiny in comparison to its large gray body.
Two, thick muscular arms the size of tree trunks, hang from its broad shoulders, and its stumpy legs carrying all of its fat that was faintly trembling- or was it muscle?- each and every step.
In its hand was a large mace of some kind- a long, somewhat metallic thick handle over a foot long with the head of a circular-shaped spiked ball. Whether it was rusted or made out of some kind of metal, he didn't know. All he needed to know was that one swing with it, regardless of where it landed, and he would be sent straight to heaven.
Mostly naked except for its head that was covered in a rusted, metallic helmet and his waist mostly wrapped by some ragged, old brown cloth, it was a sight to behold.
How the young man could even describe with such detail in the darkness, he didn't know.
The young man knew this was no hallucination. The air had changed, yes, but he could barely even notice it. His senses couldn't possibly be tricking him at this moment. Danger was literally in front of him.
Without so much as a grunt, it slowly continued to lumber past the rusted cell bars. Each and every step it made created large vibrations, seemingly shaking the entire dungeon; it made his heart and shoulders jump each time.
The young man had never hoped more desperately for the cell bars he wanted to break out of to be heavily fortified.
Even then, as he so desperately hoped, he quietly and nervously watched with bated breath.
It felt like hours when it began to disappear to the right of the cell, he couldn't help but heave a very, very small sigh of relief.
Then his heart stopped beating when it- slowly- turned around and 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬𝘦𝘥 right at him.
The young man stilled.
He didn't move, nor try to make himself look smaller.
It was impossible to hide in this cell filled with blood, ragged pieces of cloths, and mushy rotten flesh that scattered across the dingy cell's floor and walls.
All in all, his eyes never left this giant monstrosity, keeping it in his field of vision.
Seconds ticked by, sucking the young man's life away as they had a staring contest. Unblinking, he tried to peer into the slits of the helmet, where its eyes should be. It was darker- much darker than the dungeon around him. Like a black hole, it seems to absorb all light into its dark, unknown depths.
It was an apt description, as he saw nothing else in it...except there was 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨. Something so peculiar; so captivating; so alluring; so indescribable; so incredibly ineffable, it pulled at him- 𝘤𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘥 to him. Its attraction heightened further when the voices in his head spoke with greater vigor, their unintelligible whispers more and more attractive.
He sat there, seemingly stunned and still as a statue, when it reached out for the cell's bars. Even when tore apart the rusted bars all at once like breaking a couple twigs; even when it approached him with each and every step; even when it stood over him and raised its mace, preparing to strike down, he, no-
𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘺 rolled under the monstrosity at the right moment just before the mace struck against the stone floor. The resulting impact shook the earth, clouds of dust rising in the air and tiny shards of stone and rubble flying everywhere, bouncing off the walls and ground, scattering everywhere randomly. It was a testament to the builders of this place that the ceiling didn't cave in upon impact despite its age.
Getting onto his feet, the young man, mostly unharmed, immediately ran out of the now-opened cell, and down the right path in a matter of seconds. There were scratches here and there, most of them grazed from the flying sharp pieces of stone. It didn't include just parts of his body and the soles of his feet, but also mostly his right shoulder and arm that was used to unskillfully roll across the ground, but they were ignored- minor injuries in the grand scheme of things.
Without looking back, he ran with his bare foot down the ancient stone hall. Before he could make it further, a quiet roar brought a chill down his spine, and the hair on the back of his neck raised. He felt eyes on his back, but unlike the librarian, this one was filled with an eerie mystery. If eyes can speak words, than it surely would be translated into this:
"𝗪𝗲 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗺𝗲𝗲𝘁 𝗮𝗴𝗮𝗶𝗻."
'That creature is surely blessed by an old god, although I don't know which,' he thought. It seems his other selves will have to find out which one.
That only further increased his desire to escape, and so he did. He continued sprinting away, with only the sound of his footsteps softly pitter-pattering against the stone-cold ground, his beating heart thumping, and his heavy breathing accompanying him deeper and deeper into the unknown.
Thus, the long-awaited adventure begins.