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hh_mirror2010-12-31 10:52 pm
shoggies.livejournal.com) wrote in hh_mirror2010-12-31 10:52 pm
DETHTOWER has arrived!
As the first day of the year dawns, crudely-lettered posters appear around the school. These posters contain almost nothing aside from their cryptic lettering.
It is a New Year for humans.
The Stars Are Right!
for
DETHTOWER
FOLLOW THE SIGNS
Enjoy DETHTOWER.
(The bottom of each sign contains an arrow, pointing in a direction that will lead to another sign, with another arrow, and so on, until reaching a large sign which now stands upon the school grounds.)
It had been promised many months ago. Certain elements of plan had changed- it was certainly not atop the tower of House Hufflepuff- but, nevertheless, it had now come into being. Stone by stone it had risen, its name given by Nathan Explosion, its construction hidden by the odd angle at which the architectural monstrosity was set in regards to normal, three-dimensional space.
Their initial idea had been relatively simple- a laser mounted atop Hufflepuff Tower. But then, the Shoggies had realized that they did not know how to build a laser- fortunately, Lezard came to their rescue with some blueprints. These blueprints, being filled with windmills and extra components as they were, necessitated a more complex idea than the original one. The Shoggies had used the blueprints as a foundation, building upon it with their own strange notions.
To say their results were strange would be an understatement. The structure is not obvious by a simple glance at the school grounds, only evidenced as something indescribably odd in the general vicinity of McGraw tower and T. Rex's quonset hut. But, if a student were to approach these structures, they would find a sign. A large sign is carved in stone, reading 'DETHTOWER IS HERE. STAND ON THE X AND LOOK THIS WAY.' There is a very large "X" carved into a flat piece of stone set into the ground before the sign, while the sign itself it marked with an arrow. A student choosing to stand on the "X" while facing in the direction of the arrow would see the path open up before them, leading into the interdimensional space in which the Shoggies had constructed the DETHTOWER. Incidentally, the Shoggies capitalized the entire name deliberately, insisting that each letter was as important as the one following or proceeding it.
A student choosing to follow this path, despite the glimpse it gives of the non-euclidean monstrosity that was the DETHTOWER, will soon find themselves standing before an absurdly huge, and utterly impossible structure. Another immense placard stands before it, containing metallic lettering laid within dark stone- the Shoggies had in fact created the lettering from meteorites given to them by Skwisgaar and Toki for Christmas. The sign reads, "DETHTOWER. YOU ARE WELCOME. BEWARE OF LASERS, WINDMILLS, BOTTOMLESS PITS, REALLY SHARP SPIKES, LOTS OF TRAPS, ACID LAKES, SHARP SLICEY STUFF, FALLING STUFF, MOVING SHADOWS, BYAKHEES, AND THE SHINING TRAPEZOHEDRON."
The DETHTOWER itself illustrates the accuracy of the sign. It is indeed a tower- if a 'tower' can consist of countless towers, seemingly attached to some central bulk by angles that shouldn't have existed. The windmills, if they can truly be called such, are immense, insane things- the Shoggies have interpreted the blades of a windmill quite literally, and covered most of the building's impossible faces with these constructs. Metallic, shining, and sharp, each windmill's blades resemble those of a weapon, but greatly increased in size. Spinning swords, scythe-blades, axe-heads, all of these are represented amongst the array of whirling architectural accents. The lasers, which are mounted to various pivoting parts on the exterior, are abundant, and fixed in what appear to be entirely random locations. That the DETHTOWER is located within its own small pocket dimension within that of Hogwarts is the only reason why the grounds in its vicinity have not been entirely torched. The small area surrounding the DETHTOWER within its pocket dimension still has a few patches of vegetation, but, it doesn't seem likely that these will experience a long life. Luckily, the lasers do not shoot directly downward, and thus the huge covered entrance patio appears to be relatively safe.
This entrance to the DETHTOWER is located on ground level, yet approached by a broad flight of stairs. This is only the first architectural abnormality amongst many to be encountered by those who might choose to pass into the DETHTOWER's Escherian domain. The large metal doors bear yet another warning. "DETHTOWER IS NOT RESPONSIBLES FOR CAUSING INJURIES OR DEATH OR INSANITY. YOU WAIVE YOUR LIFE AND SANITY WHEN YOU ENTER DETHTOWER." These words (including the extra 's') had been contributed by Skwisgaar and Toki's 'eyesball throw-up children', Shoggies 3, 4.6, 10, and 18. Beneath these words is an etching of a Shoggy, with a 'word bubble' like etching over its head, reading "ASK US ABOUT A GUIDED TOUR! SEE THE SHINING TRAPEZOHEDRON!" Mounted to the left of the doors is a large box, with a hole in the top, along with a sign reading, "DETHTOWER DONATIONS. WE WILL TAKE MONEY OR CHIKEN OR ANYTHING ELSE." To the right of the doors there is a large stand containing many identical pamphlets. The stand is enchanted to replicate these pamphlets, ensuring their constant availability.
These thick pamphlets are all labeled DETHTOWER!, and feature a much-less madness inducing image of the DETHTOWER on the front, made by Toki Wartooth (and signed as such in a corner). The original had been made of construction paper cut outs, and, the original pamphlets had been Xeroxed by him during a brief trip to Mordhaus for the purpose. The pamphlet's contents were typed out by a group of Shoggies at the school compy lab, and the print-outs had been cobbled together by Toki into some vaguely sensible format. The first page states "DETHTOWER IS EXCITEMENT. DETHTOWER IS WINDMILLS AND TREASURES. DETHTOWER IS FUN WITH SPACE AND TIME.", while the second consists of another life waiver. The third page is a Shoggy's attempt at mapping out the first floor of the DETHTOWER via ASCII characters- it is not at all informative. Several more pages follow in this fashion, all about as useless as the proceeding one.
The next pages detail several special features contained within the DETHTOWER, and several of these contain badly-taken, rather crooked photographs of the locations described. Amongst these are a "Forest of the Black Goat", whose accompanying photograph is severely tilted, and contains a multitude of Yule trees stuffed around an effigy vaguely reminiscent of Baphomet, but, much more alien. A Shoggy has ended up in the frame, dwarfed by one of the Yule trees, suggesting that the size of these items is in fact abnormally large. Something else is in the photograph as well, or part of something else. The identity of this ropey and inexplicable something is entirely unclear from the badly-focused photograph, but, the page does state, "Come to see the Black Goat's young! SOOO CUTE!"
Another image depicts what appears to be a hallway of indeterminate length. The floor is covered in what appears to be ice and packed snow. Only the foreground is at all in focus, and the walls can be seen to contain complex hieroglyphics and images, with Shoggies as a repetitive theme. A Shoggy in the foreground gives some idea of the hall's immensity, while a few man-sized albino penguins can be seen nearby. The text accompanying this image calls it "The Hall of Shoggy History, with penguins", and informs the reader, "We share our history with you! Then you can look at the penguins. We did not eat them all."
One small image depicts what appears to be nothing at all, or, any number of possible horrors in the complete absence of lighting. This place is titled, "The Room of Mysteries", and the text accompanying it asks, "Is it a Dhole? Is it a Grue? We don't know! Can you can find out what lives in the Room of Mysteries? (No lights are allowed. Shoggy will take them before you go in!)".
The next page contains a collage of various pictures, some showing boxes and chests with very questionable angles and geometry. "Treasures and Traps! Find them!" exhorts the text at the top, while several pictures depict what appear to be very unsafe contraptions involving blades and spikes, while others show pits full of acid or fire or apparent emptiness. Another small block of text indicates that, "Odds of finding a trap are better than finding a treasure. The treasures are sooo cool! Some treasures are cooler than others. There is a Necronomicon! Maybe there are two." A little Shoggy with a speech-bubble is drawn in the corner, saying, "One free treasure with guided tour!"
Yet another image depicts a huge, vaulted chamber, with far too many corners to be possible, containing a squid-headed effigy with a number of stone blocks, just the right size to contain a human sacrifice, positioned around the effigy's feet. Lettering comprising the word "FHTAGN" covers the front of raised pedestal containing the effigy. This location is labeled as "Temple of Great Master Cthulhoo", and suggests that visitors please bring a sacrifice if possible, or at least some sandwiches. At the bottom of the page, there is a small note in bold lettering. "SOME BYAKHEE GOT IN SO BE CAREFUL. Remember, we have guided tours!" Dark, unclear, fluttery shapes in the shadowy upper reaches of the image hint at what these byakhee might be.
The final image in the illustrated section depicts another wide area of blackness, with faint, somewhat off-centered glow, evidently being emitted by some sort of box on a pedestal. The pinkish lump of a Shoggy is barely noticeable at the edge of the light, and its size in comparison with the pedestal suggests that it is of perfectly normal size. This room is evidently a favorite of its creators, with its lettering taking up two pages of the pamphlet, and calling it "THE SHINING TRAPEZOHEDRON! The Heart of DETHTOWER. See EVERYTHING. IA NYARLY! IA 'ZATOTH! Don't forget your flashlight!" This page includes a repetition of the life and sanity waiver, as well as a little drawing of a Shoggy containing a speech bubble which says, "If you want to see the Shining Trapezohedron, remember to ask for the guided tour! Shining Trapezohedron is only for the Guided Tour! There are magic lights but we will provide more lights."
Another page lists a series of bullet points detailing other features of the structure, such as:
- Enjoy sooo many hallways!
- Crazy stairs room bends human notions of space and gravity!
- DETHTOWER power core! Sooo green and glowy. Might mutate humans. We don't know!
- Make your own Cthulhoo icon in the crafts-room!
- Have sandwiches! There is a sandwich-and-hats-table in the entrance hall.
Next to the stand containing these detailed pamphlets, a small kiosk has been erected, manned by several Shoggies. (The Shoggies have agreed amongst themselves to rotate operation of this kiosk.) This kiosk is clearly labeled, "GUIDED TOURS! 3 galleons. 1 galleon discount for cultists!"
((The DETHTOWER is of course entirely unsafe, but still under the usual Hogwarts no-death enchantment. A Shoggy will be happy to take a character to a desired area if asked nicely and paid for the Guided Tour. Feel free to handwave this if you don't want to bother actually threading with the Shoggies. Likewise, if a character gets lost in the DETHTOWER, there are many lurking Shoggies, and one will take them out of the maze if asked and treated nicely. Without the Guided Tour, the place is impossible huge, disobeys the known laws of space, physics, and time, is filled with random Lovecraftian monsters & traps, and is pretty much incomprehensible, maddening, etc. Your basic Lovecraftian Funhouse. =D It's still maddening with the Guided Tour, but, the Shoggies at least know where it's safe to walk. Good times!
The Shining Trapezohedron does have a couple of specific effects, but magical lighting + Shoggies with flashlights assure that it will only serve as a maddening window into all space and time. The Shoggies asked Lezard to help them with putting just about every anti-theft charm possible on the Shining Trapezohedron, and also keep a constant watch on it. The treasure chests scattered around the DETHTOWER contain either various Lovecraftian effigies/artifacts/books, or more frequently, shiny junk the Shoggies thought was good for a treasure, and these are not under enchantment. Anything 'good' is behind at least one or more traps, and probably some byakhee or generic tentacle monsters of the mindless, tentacle-only variety. The Shoggies aren't much concerned about these, having accidentally infested the place with far more than they intended, but, they insist that the Black Goat's spawn and the giant albino penguins be left alone as part of the 'exhibits'. =D ))
It is a New Year for humans.
The Stars Are Right!
for
DETHTOWER
FOLLOW THE SIGNS
Enjoy DETHTOWER.
(The bottom of each sign contains an arrow, pointing in a direction that will lead to another sign, with another arrow, and so on, until reaching a large sign which now stands upon the school grounds.)
It had been promised many months ago. Certain elements of plan had changed- it was certainly not atop the tower of House Hufflepuff- but, nevertheless, it had now come into being. Stone by stone it had risen, its name given by Nathan Explosion, its construction hidden by the odd angle at which the architectural monstrosity was set in regards to normal, three-dimensional space.
Their initial idea had been relatively simple- a laser mounted atop Hufflepuff Tower. But then, the Shoggies had realized that they did not know how to build a laser- fortunately, Lezard came to their rescue with some blueprints. These blueprints, being filled with windmills and extra components as they were, necessitated a more complex idea than the original one. The Shoggies had used the blueprints as a foundation, building upon it with their own strange notions.
To say their results were strange would be an understatement. The structure is not obvious by a simple glance at the school grounds, only evidenced as something indescribably odd in the general vicinity of McGraw tower and T. Rex's quonset hut. But, if a student were to approach these structures, they would find a sign. A large sign is carved in stone, reading 'DETHTOWER IS HERE. STAND ON THE X AND LOOK THIS WAY.' There is a very large "X" carved into a flat piece of stone set into the ground before the sign, while the sign itself it marked with an arrow. A student choosing to stand on the "X" while facing in the direction of the arrow would see the path open up before them, leading into the interdimensional space in which the Shoggies had constructed the DETHTOWER. Incidentally, the Shoggies capitalized the entire name deliberately, insisting that each letter was as important as the one following or proceeding it.
A student choosing to follow this path, despite the glimpse it gives of the non-euclidean monstrosity that was the DETHTOWER, will soon find themselves standing before an absurdly huge, and utterly impossible structure. Another immense placard stands before it, containing metallic lettering laid within dark stone- the Shoggies had in fact created the lettering from meteorites given to them by Skwisgaar and Toki for Christmas. The sign reads, "DETHTOWER. YOU ARE WELCOME. BEWARE OF LASERS, WINDMILLS, BOTTOMLESS PITS, REALLY SHARP SPIKES, LOTS OF TRAPS, ACID LAKES, SHARP SLICEY STUFF, FALLING STUFF, MOVING SHADOWS, BYAKHEES, AND THE SHINING TRAPEZOHEDRON."
The DETHTOWER itself illustrates the accuracy of the sign. It is indeed a tower- if a 'tower' can consist of countless towers, seemingly attached to some central bulk by angles that shouldn't have existed. The windmills, if they can truly be called such, are immense, insane things- the Shoggies have interpreted the blades of a windmill quite literally, and covered most of the building's impossible faces with these constructs. Metallic, shining, and sharp, each windmill's blades resemble those of a weapon, but greatly increased in size. Spinning swords, scythe-blades, axe-heads, all of these are represented amongst the array of whirling architectural accents. The lasers, which are mounted to various pivoting parts on the exterior, are abundant, and fixed in what appear to be entirely random locations. That the DETHTOWER is located within its own small pocket dimension within that of Hogwarts is the only reason why the grounds in its vicinity have not been entirely torched. The small area surrounding the DETHTOWER within its pocket dimension still has a few patches of vegetation, but, it doesn't seem likely that these will experience a long life. Luckily, the lasers do not shoot directly downward, and thus the huge covered entrance patio appears to be relatively safe.
This entrance to the DETHTOWER is located on ground level, yet approached by a broad flight of stairs. This is only the first architectural abnormality amongst many to be encountered by those who might choose to pass into the DETHTOWER's Escherian domain. The large metal doors bear yet another warning. "DETHTOWER IS NOT RESPONSIBLES FOR CAUSING INJURIES OR DEATH OR INSANITY. YOU WAIVE YOUR LIFE AND SANITY WHEN YOU ENTER DETHTOWER." These words (including the extra 's') had been contributed by Skwisgaar and Toki's 'eyesball throw-up children', Shoggies 3, 4.6, 10, and 18. Beneath these words is an etching of a Shoggy, with a 'word bubble' like etching over its head, reading "ASK US ABOUT A GUIDED TOUR! SEE THE SHINING TRAPEZOHEDRON!" Mounted to the left of the doors is a large box, with a hole in the top, along with a sign reading, "DETHTOWER DONATIONS. WE WILL TAKE MONEY OR CHIKEN OR ANYTHING ELSE." To the right of the doors there is a large stand containing many identical pamphlets. The stand is enchanted to replicate these pamphlets, ensuring their constant availability.
These thick pamphlets are all labeled DETHTOWER!, and feature a much-less madness inducing image of the DETHTOWER on the front, made by Toki Wartooth (and signed as such in a corner). The original had been made of construction paper cut outs, and, the original pamphlets had been Xeroxed by him during a brief trip to Mordhaus for the purpose. The pamphlet's contents were typed out by a group of Shoggies at the school compy lab, and the print-outs had been cobbled together by Toki into some vaguely sensible format. The first page states "DETHTOWER IS EXCITEMENT. DETHTOWER IS WINDMILLS AND TREASURES. DETHTOWER IS FUN WITH SPACE AND TIME.", while the second consists of another life waiver. The third page is a Shoggy's attempt at mapping out the first floor of the DETHTOWER via ASCII characters- it is not at all informative. Several more pages follow in this fashion, all about as useless as the proceeding one.
The next pages detail several special features contained within the DETHTOWER, and several of these contain badly-taken, rather crooked photographs of the locations described. Amongst these are a "Forest of the Black Goat", whose accompanying photograph is severely tilted, and contains a multitude of Yule trees stuffed around an effigy vaguely reminiscent of Baphomet, but, much more alien. A Shoggy has ended up in the frame, dwarfed by one of the Yule trees, suggesting that the size of these items is in fact abnormally large. Something else is in the photograph as well, or part of something else. The identity of this ropey and inexplicable something is entirely unclear from the badly-focused photograph, but, the page does state, "Come to see the Black Goat's young! SOOO CUTE!"
Another image depicts what appears to be a hallway of indeterminate length. The floor is covered in what appears to be ice and packed snow. Only the foreground is at all in focus, and the walls can be seen to contain complex hieroglyphics and images, with Shoggies as a repetitive theme. A Shoggy in the foreground gives some idea of the hall's immensity, while a few man-sized albino penguins can be seen nearby. The text accompanying this image calls it "The Hall of Shoggy History, with penguins", and informs the reader, "We share our history with you! Then you can look at the penguins. We did not eat them all."
One small image depicts what appears to be nothing at all, or, any number of possible horrors in the complete absence of lighting. This place is titled, "The Room of Mysteries", and the text accompanying it asks, "Is it a Dhole? Is it a Grue? We don't know! Can you can find out what lives in the Room of Mysteries? (No lights are allowed. Shoggy will take them before you go in!)".
The next page contains a collage of various pictures, some showing boxes and chests with very questionable angles and geometry. "Treasures and Traps! Find them!" exhorts the text at the top, while several pictures depict what appear to be very unsafe contraptions involving blades and spikes, while others show pits full of acid or fire or apparent emptiness. Another small block of text indicates that, "Odds of finding a trap are better than finding a treasure. The treasures are sooo cool! Some treasures are cooler than others. There is a Necronomicon! Maybe there are two." A little Shoggy with a speech-bubble is drawn in the corner, saying, "One free treasure with guided tour!"
Yet another image depicts a huge, vaulted chamber, with far too many corners to be possible, containing a squid-headed effigy with a number of stone blocks, just the right size to contain a human sacrifice, positioned around the effigy's feet. Lettering comprising the word "FHTAGN" covers the front of raised pedestal containing the effigy. This location is labeled as "Temple of Great Master Cthulhoo", and suggests that visitors please bring a sacrifice if possible, or at least some sandwiches. At the bottom of the page, there is a small note in bold lettering. "SOME BYAKHEE GOT IN SO BE CAREFUL. Remember, we have guided tours!" Dark, unclear, fluttery shapes in the shadowy upper reaches of the image hint at what these byakhee might be.
The final image in the illustrated section depicts another wide area of blackness, with faint, somewhat off-centered glow, evidently being emitted by some sort of box on a pedestal. The pinkish lump of a Shoggy is barely noticeable at the edge of the light, and its size in comparison with the pedestal suggests that it is of perfectly normal size. This room is evidently a favorite of its creators, with its lettering taking up two pages of the pamphlet, and calling it "THE SHINING TRAPEZOHEDRON! The Heart of DETHTOWER. See EVERYTHING. IA NYARLY! IA 'ZATOTH! Don't forget your flashlight!" This page includes a repetition of the life and sanity waiver, as well as a little drawing of a Shoggy containing a speech bubble which says, "If you want to see the Shining Trapezohedron, remember to ask for the guided tour! Shining Trapezohedron is only for the Guided Tour! There are magic lights but we will provide more lights."
Another page lists a series of bullet points detailing other features of the structure, such as:
- Enjoy sooo many hallways!
- Crazy stairs room bends human notions of space and gravity!
- DETHTOWER power core! Sooo green and glowy. Might mutate humans. We don't know!
- Make your own Cthulhoo icon in the crafts-room!
- Have sandwiches! There is a sandwich-and-hats-table in the entrance hall.
Next to the stand containing these detailed pamphlets, a small kiosk has been erected, manned by several Shoggies. (The Shoggies have agreed amongst themselves to rotate operation of this kiosk.) This kiosk is clearly labeled, "GUIDED TOURS! 3 galleons. 1 galleon discount for cultists!"
((The DETHTOWER is of course entirely unsafe, but still under the usual Hogwarts no-death enchantment. A Shoggy will be happy to take a character to a desired area if asked nicely and paid for the Guided Tour. Feel free to handwave this if you don't want to bother actually threading with the Shoggies. Likewise, if a character gets lost in the DETHTOWER, there are many lurking Shoggies, and one will take them out of the maze if asked and treated nicely. Without the Guided Tour, the place is impossible huge, disobeys the known laws of space, physics, and time, is filled with random Lovecraftian monsters & traps, and is pretty much incomprehensible, maddening, etc. Your basic Lovecraftian Funhouse. =D It's still maddening with the Guided Tour, but, the Shoggies at least know where it's safe to walk. Good times!
The Shining Trapezohedron does have a couple of specific effects, but magical lighting + Shoggies with flashlights assure that it will only serve as a maddening window into all space and time. The Shoggies asked Lezard to help them with putting just about every anti-theft charm possible on the Shining Trapezohedron, and also keep a constant watch on it. The treasure chests scattered around the DETHTOWER contain either various Lovecraftian effigies/artifacts/books, or more frequently, shiny junk the Shoggies thought was good for a treasure, and these are not under enchantment. Anything 'good' is behind at least one or more traps, and probably some byakhee or generic tentacle monsters of the mindless, tentacle-only variety. The Shoggies aren't much concerned about these, having accidentally infested the place with far more than they intended, but, they insist that the Black Goat's spawn and the giant albino penguins be left alone as part of the 'exhibits'. =D ))
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His eyebrows were arched really high as he approached the tower. And he thought the visions he had gotten from Selatcia were strange.
At least the Shoggies were a familiar site.
For perspective of 'familiar'.
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"All right," he said, smiling slightly. "Gotta see if it's up to Deth standards, after all."
Not that he didn't expect it to be.
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Nathan grunted his agreement, and took one of the pamphlets once they'd reached the top, where Ofdensen and some Shoggies were already waiting. Pulling out his reading glasses, he looked over the pamphlet. "So we get treasure just for coming? Brutal."
Pickles staggered over to get one of the pamphlets as well and started thumbing through it. "Aw heeey, there's no Dethklok tribute room thingy in there? Ain't this the DETHTOWER? Are we even gettin' royalties?"
Nathan didn't seem to share Pickles' concerns at the moment and just continued reading the pamphlet, occasionally trying to sound out unfamiliar words.
no subject
The trail continued outside, eventually leading them up the DETHTOWER's steps to where the others were gathered. Skwisgaar also took one of the pamphlets even though he'd already seen them mid-production, and idly glanced through it while strumming his ever-present guitar with his other hand.
"Royalties? Don'ts we owns it?" he asked no one in particular. It wasn't as though they needed the money, he just didn't like the thought of some random douchebag jackoffs claiming the DETHTOWER as their own, when it was the Shoggies who'd made it. "Forgots a flashlight," he mumbled as he read the pamphlet.
no subject
Toki had been getting curious about seeing the DETHTOWER ever since the Shoggies had brought him a pile of badly-taken photos along with the disorderly text for the pamphlets. He'd followed the trail of arrows with childlike amusement, while going on about how proud he was of their 'children'. When he finally did see the DETHTOWER, however, he stopped dead in his tracks, needing a long moment to get over the impossibility of the sight. "Buts. . .buts. . .how does it exists? Stairs can't go likes this. . ." Toki murmured as he ascended the steps, holding onto Skwisgaar's hand quite tightly, and looking directly at the stairs rather than their surroundings. It was far easier than attempting to reconcile their impossible angle. The large covered entrance area before the doors wasn't so confusing at least, as long as one didn't attempt to look down the impossible stairs. "Is likes a painting bys that one guy." By that 'that one guy' he meant Escher, who'd managed a few similarity non-ascending yet ascending staircases. But he'd managed those on a two dimensional plane, where they could exist as an illusion. This impossibility was concrete, and the sanity waivers were already making perfect sense.
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"I thought we owned it, since we built it," threw in Shoggy 24, one of the many other non-'adoptionated' Shoggies hanging about. "No, we don't get to own what we build, the person who told us to build it gets it," another Shoggy put in, which lead to a noisy debate amongst the Shoggies as to who exactly owned the DETHTOWER. Shoggies, being a slave race, were used to their constructions being owned by whoever ordered them to build it- having come up with the DETHTOWER on their own, this really did create a difficult point for them to muddle through. The eventual consensus of this was delivered by Shoggy 3. "We think the DETHTOWER owns itself buts that we ams the Managers because we runs it so that makes Great Master Cthulhoo the Overs-Manager. Since no one tolds us to build DETHTOWER then no one is the owner, but, yous can still be DETHTOWER Kings since it doesn't matter with Kings. Master Nathan might be a Special Kings since he gave to it is name and names are importants. We thinks Master Lezard is a DETHTOWER King too, because he's the owl-god what mades the blueprints with windmills and helped us with lasers. But he didn't tell us to builds it. DETHTOWER Kings means you always gets free guided tours! So that might makes us DETHTOWER Kings too." "And we gots lights, don't worry!" Shoggy 4.6 told Skwisgaar.
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because A) there's 3 seasons of canon evidence to support this, and B) their lazy mun doesn't feel like doing a character torture thread. This was why the Dethtower seemed like Disneyland to Nathan, and not like the house of horrors that it actually was."Royalties, yanno, like paying us money to use our name," Pickles explained to the Shoggies. "Uh, parta our name. Pretty sure we trademarked 'd-e-t-h'." He sadly had no Shoggies of his own, so didn't really consider this a family business the way Toki and Skwisgaar might. And he was just sober enough for the business end of this thing to actually matter to him.
"Never heard of Lizard, and I don't want some other jackoff owning something with our name on it," Nathan said.
"Beinga king sounds kinda cool, though," Pickles put in.
"Yeah, but not 'Special'." Nathan had been on the receiving end of too many short bus jokes (nevermind that he'd never actually ridden in one) to like the title. "Overlord King or something brutal like that."
"And we should get spiky crowns and shit!" Pickles added.
no subject
It simply hadn't occurred to Skwisgaar to try and make sense of the impossible geometry and maddening angles, until Toki noted them, that is. An unpleasant pressure began to build behind Skwisgaar's eyes when he contemplated the exterior of the DETHTOWER more closely, and he reached up to massage his temples in a vain attempt to relieve it. Despite this, he didn't find the DETHTOWER horrifying in the least (yet) -- it actually reminded him of an interesting dreamscape. In particular that of a recurring dream he'd had for as long as he could remember, of twin ravens watching him with their hauntingly aware gazes, a twisting tree of impossible dimension, horses like spiders... things that were perhaps not meant to ever be comprehended, and yet felt as familiar to him as his own skin.
This was probably why the DETHTOWER was seeming a lot like Disneyland for him too, albeit one he'd soon need a break from if his headache worsened.
"That mights be the Lizard guy Toki gots stuck with fors the one Secret Santas bullshit," he said a bit absently, checking his pockets for any leftover drugs that might help the headache. "Ja, a tributes room and crowns woulds be metal," he added. "The reals kind, whats makes your head hurt because they's so heavy. My head ams already hurting..."
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"Hangover, dood? Got yer cure right here," Pickles said, handing over one of his bottles of whiskey to Skwisgaar. He had several more, so sharing wouldn't hurt his supply. He raised his own bottle in a toast before chugging some.
"Yeah, real crowns with spikes," Nathan was saying, mostly to himself. "Sharpened spikes that could kill someone. And some of that black rock stuff, onyx..."
no subject
"T'ank yous," Skwisgaar said as he accepted the bottle. "Guess it's a hangsover, but I don'ts remember drinkings that much last night."
Being in pain hadn't dampened Skwisgaar's enthusiasm overmuch, and once he'd stopped trying to make sense of the architecture he was mostly fine. It could be Hogwarts' general protective no-kill field at work, or more likely that Skwisgaar was in fact the (demi)god he believed he was and thus not susceptible to the insanity-inducing effects of the DETHTOWER. This didn't preclude the power of suggestion from affecting him, which had probably been the real cause of his headache in the first place.
At least the whiskey was helping. He glanced back down at the pamphlet and resumed idly looking through it while waiting for the tour to start, and occasionally offered Nathan more suggestions for their crowns and such.
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One thing though.
"No spikes on the crowns," he said. "You might injure yourselves."
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"Master Nathan gaves to us the name," Shoggy 4.6 attempted to explain again, but Shoggy 27 cut in with a clarification of its own. "Master Lezard isn't a jackoff, he's an owls-god!" "So he can't be a king," another Shoggy interjected. "He'd have to be a God-King." "But it's good to be special! Does an Overlord-King need a special hat? It sounds like a lot of words to fit on a hat!" Shoggy 10 piped over a growing hubub of Shoggies, who were once again falling back into debate with each other over the specifics of the DETHTOWER.
The entrance patio at the top of the stairs provided a relatively sane immediate area, and so Toki lifted his eyes from the ground- evidently, it was entirely possible to traverse that impossible incline. If the DETHTOWER was affecting Toki more than his bandmates, it was perhaps because he found himself actually thinking and wondering about how it worked, and how the Shoggies had actually put it together. Of course, he was Toki, which meant that he soon found himself wondering if the Shoggies could teach him to build impossible geometries out of lego bricks.
Toki's attention gradually came back to his bandmates. "Don't thinks it's exactlies a hangsover," Toki offered, "More like whens you play a videos game for too long, and a bit of a hangsover too. Can I haves some of thats?" Toki indicated the whiskey bottle Skwisgaar was holding. Being a bit drunk sounded like a good idea. Not shitty drunk, but, a nice buzz would at least loosen his own sense of balance and perception's requirements upon itself.
The cacophony of Shoggies once again simmered down. This time, Shoggy 10 was elected to deliver their consensus to Ofdensen and the band. "It's sooo cool! You can be DETHTOWER kings, but since no one tolds us to build DETHTOWER, it means that we tolds ourselves to build it!" This was evidently a point of awe for Shoggy 10, who managed to convey its sense of amazement in its tone. "This means its ours! And Great Master Cthulhoo's since we're his, but, we don't thinks he'll care whats we do with it!" "It's sooo cool!" the crowd of Shoggies announced in near unison, all overjoyed by the realization. In the past, the Shoggies had only slaved for others, and never got to keep the results of their efforts. This was the first time that the Shoggies had realized a right to claim their own work. They'd made a few random things after they'd turned on their original creators, but, hadn't understood that they could 'own' them. "So lets us know what you wants on your Dethtower-Kings crown-hats withouts spikes because Master Charles-Butler says so. We just have hat-hats folded rights now, not crown-hats so you gots to wait." The Shoggy crowd, done with their debate, began to disperse, leaving little groups to chat about how cool it was to actually own something, while Shoggies 3, 4.6, 10, and 18 gathered up again to start the tour. "The tour starts throughs the doors! Is there someplace you wants to see first?" asked Shoggy 3.
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"He does sound like a jackoff," Nathan growled decisively, "and I'm an Overlord God King then." Like hell he'd let someone with such a stupid name get a better title than him. It was bad enough the Dethtower wasn't theirs despite having the 'deth' prefix, and they hadn't even been allowed to perform a brutal concert for the grand opening like he'd originally wanted to, when the Shoggies had first told him of their plans. And now no spiked crowns? The whole venture was turning out to be disappointing, in the frontman's opinion. "Crowns without spikes aren't metal," he grumbled. "I want spikes."
"Gahd, we came to see this shit, not to fucking argue semantics. Either we're gettin' the show on the road or Ahm goin' back to my room to get high," Pickles commented with all his usual tact, flailing his bottle around and making shooing motions at the Shoggies. "Gogogo. Anywhere. Just show us something theat'll blow our minds and shut these douchebags up, okey?" He sighed. "Sahrry 'bout 'douchebags'... low blood sugar," he mumbled, digging in a pocket, and then washed the assortment of pills down with some whiskey. Much better.
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As far as ownership went he was glad the Shoggies got to claim one of the things they'd laboured on for months as their own, even though he would have liked to own the tower too. He was also getting bored just standing around arguing about shit, so jumped at the chance to finally see the DETHTOWER's interior in person. "Gives to us the fulls tour," he told the Shoggies, and reached for Toki's hand again now that the tour seemed to be starting.
He glanced at Toki with a slight frown before offering the bottle of whiskey. "Don'ts get too drunks." Babysitting an obnoxiously drunk or high Toki wasn't very fun when he wasn't also drunk or high himself and they weren't alone, and he'd had his fill of that at the potluck Yule party. But a little alcohol would probably help them both enjoy the tour more.
"Spiked armours sounds goods to me," he offered, hoping the idea would appease Nathan so he wouldn't be so growly the entire tour. More growly than usual, that was. Skwisgaar carefully didn't suggest white armour, since his argument with Toki about their armour ideas from before had soured him on it (because who in their right mind would want to look like a metal Elvis? It was a good thing Toki hadn't censored his opinion.) Black would be better anyway, since black went with everything, and would look particularly awesome with his Explorer, he thought.
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None of the Shoggies actually turned these on- the DETHTOWER was in fact lit, at least in the vast, shadowy area which the doors opened upon. Dim magical fires flickered from sconces set into the walls, which possessed far more angles than was proper. Other than several large passages whose dark apertures lead deeper into the construct, the only real feature in this room aside from the supporting pillars was a large table, surrounded by a number of Shoggies, and containing a pile of dead fish mixed with a bit of mystery meat, alongside a pile of folded paper and aluminum foil hats. "Here is the sandwiches and hats table! We don't haves crown-kinds now, but we haves shiny ones," Shoggy 10 announced. "The shiny ones are the bests." "And you can use them to keep them out of your mind!" a random Shoggy at the table added in, not choosing to clarify who 'they' were.
"Picks me outs a hat, ands one for Skwisgaar too," Toki told the Shoggies, happy to indulge them by wearing a silly folded hat. "I'll gets sandwiches later, ams not really hungry now." Toki didn't trust the Shoggies' concept of 'sandwiches'. A couple of hats were brought to the guitarists, both folded out of aluminum foil, and Toki donned his to the Shoggies' approval. "Now yous look soo cool and readies for the tour!" Shoggy 4.6 declared. Toki for one was quite pleased to take his tour of the DETHTOWER in his regular clothes and a foil hat- stomping through something the size of the DETHTOWER in armor just sounded sort of tiring.
"We starts over here!" Shoggy 18 declared when everyone had finished with the sandwiches-and-hats table. The Shoggies all squelched towards one of the aperatures- possibly the one on the far left, although, the number of angles in the room made it very difficult to assign a definite orientation to anything. "Todays it goes to ours Hall of History, ifs you go the right way!" As the tunnel was approached, it was evident that there was lighting within it, but dim and widely spaced- as for the tunnel's direction, it was just best not to think about it. "Follow rights behind us," Shoggy 3 warned. "Ifs you don't, you waived lifes and sanities and we can't be held responsibles." "Exactly rights behind us," insisted Shoggy 10. "Even ifs another tunnel looks sooo cool. You asks us first, so we can shows you." Toki fell in line behind the Shoggies, seeking to pull Skwisgaar with him- he sensed that it would indeed be wise to follow their advice.
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Not even the impressive interior of the Dethtower could make Nathan completely forget his irritation, but it did help put him in better spirits pretty quickly. He wandered off on his own to have a better look around and to poke at the 'sandwiches' and hats, the former of which he wisely decided against sampling.
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He made his way to the table and put on one of the aluminum foil hats, then wrapped one around his bottle as well and staggered off after the Shoggies. Since everyone else had a hat, Nathan put one on too, and reached over to put one on Ofdensen before likewise following the Shoggies down into the tunnel—or was it up? He couldn't tell, like his equilibrium was slowly shifting. Or maybe the ground was sloping...
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He wasn't sure what purpose the foil hats served, or who "they" were, but he put his on without protest. Probably the Shoggies simply thought they were fashionable, he figured. Afterward he took in his surroundings, admiring the Shoggies' hard work as Toki pulled him along after their hosts. It reminded him a lot of the Dethtub band room -- maybe they should have just requested their own tower from the start? But the portal was extremely useful, and he wouldn't want to give that up considering it was their only way home.
"Prettys sure we's already waived those things by beings in Dethklok," he said in response to the Shoggy reminding them of the life/sanity waivers. "So don'ts worry about us." He was content taking a tour rather than exploring on his own, although that was subject to change if he saw any good spots for a quickie. It seemed fitting that he and Toki be the first to "christen" the DETHTOWER should the opportunity arise, and this was clearly not far from his mind, with the way he put an arm around Toki's waist and slipped his hand into Toki's pants pocket as they walked.
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"Hmmm...maybe if the scientists could create something with retractable spikes..."
Then he looked around.
"Ah." Yeah, this is disorienting.
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"Master Toki-Dad said we shoulds remind people abouts the waivers when we starts the tour," Shoggy 3 explained. "We had to put lots of traps intosides the tower because of alls the treasures." The Shoggies stuck to one half of the wide hall as they began what might have started as a descent, but quickly stopped feeing like one. "Somes of the traps are retractsables spikes!" it piped proudly at Ofdensen, pleased it knew what 'retractable' meant. As if in illustration, a side tunnel opened a moment later- at the mouth of the tunnel, an array of spikes were visible, and something that was surely alive at one point had been impaled by the contraption. The thing was slightly smaller than a horse, and definitely wasn't a crow, a mole, a buzzard, an ant, or a human being. It did have leathery wings, some sort of carapace, and definitely wasn't of earthly origin. "Byakhee!" announced Shoggy 10. "Most of them are still alives, but sometimes they get caughts in the traps." It took all of a minute for the four Shoggies to swarm the corpse, devouring the edible parts and dissolving the rest.
Toki held Skwisgaar's hand as they walked, his grip getting tighter as they moved further along in an indefinable direction. He couldn't help but feel as if the tunnel had actually twisted upon itself, and that they were now technically walking upside-down in comparison to their normal orientation, only, gravity was cooperating. Although he too was interested in "christening" the DETHTOWER, the skewered byakhee had proven that wandering off on their own could indeed be a Very Bad Idea. The Shoggies had a lot to show off, besides- as they progressed down the weird corridor, the Shoggies would indicate various wall-carvings or trap-contraptions, which Toki made sure to compliment them upon enthusiastically. At one point, the corridor was split by a wide breach, filled with what appeared to be acid. The Shoggies squelched over to a wall, and prodded at the details of a bas-relief for a moment, until a span of stone suddenly projected, allowing them cross the divide (which might have been on the 'ceiling' or possibly 'sideways'. Toki was convinced of this.).
After the divide, the tunnel continued to snake around- a few side-tunnels split off, but, the Shoggies remained stuck to the central corridor, occasionally shifting from one side to the other as they squelched, insisting that Dethklok and Ofdensen follow them as they did so. After an indeterminable amount of time, the tunnel appeared to 'level out', at least in that it seemed to run straight for a time before emptying into some vast space up ahead, which appeared brighter than the surrounding area. "Up aheads is our Hall of History! We will share it withs you," Shoggy 4.6 declared.
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Pickles was staggering so badly that he would have toppled over and gotten an acid bath had Nathan not grabbed him by the scruff of his neck. The drummer slurred a laugh, only vaguely aware of what was happening as Nathan kept herding him along, making sure he didn't wind up in the hospital ward for weeks again.
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"This isn't going to be a boring history lesson, is it?" Nathan asked suspiciously. There was nothing he'd seen thus far that would support that conclusion, he was just naturally wary of anything that sounded too educational. Pickles echoed the sentiment, with a "boooooorr-ENG!"
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because his mun might still make him get lost-- Mordhaus had its share of similarly gruesome and even worse traps built in, after all, and he wasn't bothered by those. They were simply a part of Dethklok's home, and helped keep the jackasses out. But Toki seemed to be legitimately afraid of the DETHTOWER, which was what did put a damper on Skwisgaar's plans. He raised an eyebrow as he watched the Shoggies going to work on the Byakhee. Since the dead creature didn't resemble a proper dragon (especially not once the Shoggies had finished with it), it was easily forgotten as they moved on, Skwisgaar's mind turning from thoughts of getting laid to the latest song he'd been working on. He withdrew his hand from Toki's pocket so he could one-handedly finger his guitar, able to accurately imagine the sound of each chord. At least the atmosphere of the DETHTOWER was conducive to songwriting, if nothing else.Toki's grip on his other hand was getting awfully tight, causing Skwisgaar to glance at him. "You wants to goes back?" he asked in an undertone, having assumed the tour might not be that enjoyable for Toki if he really was scared. There was no point in continuing if it was going to become more nightmare fodder, since it wasn't as though Toki was lacking in that department. Nor was Skwisgaar, but it seemed highly unlikely that he'd be subjected to his mother fucking anyone here -- thank Odin. Even the most ghastly, unimaginably horrific monster would pale in comparison to that, for the Swede.
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By the time they actually reached what appeared to be the end of the corridor, the Shoggies were virtually quivering with excitement. The corridor fed into what appeared to be an even bigger one, rather well-lit, especially due to the packed snow and ice on the ground reflecting the magical light from torches set into the carved walls. Wandering about the icy expanse, which was relatively level for the DETHTOWER, were a number of giant albino penguins, most of them around six feet tall. "If you get boreds," Shoggy 10 told Pickles and Nathan, "You can looks at the penguins!" "You can pets them but don't breaks them," Shoggy 18 added in. "They were soo hard to get here withouts eating them." The Shoggies were very protective of what creatures they'd managed to acquire, aside from the byakhee, as those were an infestation. "You can gives to them some fish if you wants!" Shoggy 3 said. "They's in the water way down theres." Indeed, at the far end of the Shoggies' Hall of History was a still expanse of water, as the Shoggies had luckily remembered that penguins needed food.
A few weird, fluttery shapes could be glimpsed high overhead, but, didn't bother anyone as the Shoggies lead Dethklok and Ofdensen down the hall and narrated their story. Toki was of the opinion that the Hall of History had leveled out into a relatively 'normal' plane. The bas-reliefs on the walls were exactly what the Shoggies had promised- in massive images, they detailed the story of the Shoggies as well as the amorphous creatures could remember it. Vegetable-like creatures with leathery wings and star-like heads featured prominently in the first half of the images- according to the pictures, these creatures had created the Shoggies from vats. The pictures continued on through a story of the Shoggies building many cities, both underwater and above. About halfway through, the Shoggies in the carvings rebelled against their masters, devouring the vegetable-like creatures who had created them, after which they inhabited the cities they'd built by themselves. During the course of the images, the backgrounds shifted from scenes of prehistoric plants of the simplest nature, and the earliest land creatures, through more developed plants, and even onto some dinosaurs before the backgrounds turned into barren, icy wastelands. The final images contained beings who the Shoggies identified as Cthulhoo and Nyarly taking them from the frozen cities and bringing them somewhere else, that they called "the Vault". Toki was of course even more impressed with his 'children' by the time they'd described what had happened in most of their carvings- it seemed that what he considered a relatively innocuous appearance was misleading. "Wow-wee! We gots some brutal kids," Toki exclaimed as he surveyed the Shoggies-eating-their-former-masters carving. "Didn't know they'd done an alien genocides."
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This was why, on the morning of the DETHTOWER's completion, Shoggy 21.5 was actually waiting for Vladimir and Valentine to emerge from the bedroom. It had to wait until nearly noon, but as soon as it had the chance, it announced, "Master Baron Vladimir! Master Lord Valentine! You were seeking a good place for your party. I told you there would be a DETHTOWER soon. We have it, I can show it to you. It is the best place for a party! It's sooo cool." This was unusual behavior from Shoggy 21.5, who'd never waited around to greet them in the morning. It had wanted to go immediately, but, Vladimir insisted on a proper breakfast first, during which Shoggy 21.5 kept going on about their construction, which actually sounded. . .fascinating.
And so, after they'd finished with breakfast, and indulged in a few of Valentine's little treats to start the day properly, the Baron and Valentine donned some appropriately lavish winter coats and followed Shoggy 21.5 out to the school grounds, where it lead them to the DETHTOWER.
Which was not at all what the Baron had been anticipating. He'd gathered that the DETHTOWER involved a tower, lasers, and windmills in some combination, but as soon as they passed into the DETHTOWER's little pocket dimension he found that the idea in his head, colorful as it was with Valentine's chemicals floating around, was a pale notion compared to the reality. One of the lasers pounded a spot of repeatedly-blasted ground only a few meters away, as if emphasizing the tower's presence. Which was hardly needed, as the DETHTOWER emphasized itself well enough without the random laser blasts. These seemed to hit some spots more than others, making them avoidable enough as they approached the impossible staircase leading up to. . .the same level they were already on. For a moment, there really weren't words to describe the thing- the DETHTOWER was an overwhelming mass of whirling death and inconceivable angles. "My dear Valentine," the Baron eventually said, "I think. . . I think that I may be impressed."
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Likewise, he was at ease with the appearance of the DETHTOWER. The very oddness and unreality of it made it more real to him, the lasers made the perfect staccato counterpoint to the visual artistry that kept his eyes constantly moving, and the possibility of sudden violence was a thrilling adrenaline hum behind it all. This place was opera. "My dear Baron," he said, eyes trying to track everything at once, "I think that I may be home."
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Real was as good description for the DETHTOWER, as, it was all the more so for its utter impossibility. It was like some sort of stacked and tangible proof of the small and incomplete nature of most reality, a visual proof of things only suggested by advanced mathematical theorems. The whirling blades and bursts of light and color were beautifully engaging, but it was the angles that held him entranced. He'd always known that three-dimensional space was a limited picture, as the Spacing Guild's Navigators ability to bend space proved this, but seeing its solid proof in the flesh was remarkable. "I may never look at our Shoggy in the same way," Vladimir admitted, as he slipped an arm about Valentine's shoulders, while Shoggy 21.5 beckoned them 'up' the stairs to the tower's entrance, where the shapes of many Shoggies could be seen milling about. "I was beginning to doubt that we'd ever find a place truly worthy of our union. But this. . .this may be perfection. And it matches your gorgeous mind so very well."
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The DETHTOWER made him reconsider. It added a few entirely new dimensions (several of which were questionable) to his usual perception of the world around him, and quite cheered him. "If they're capable of building a marvel like this, one has to wonder what other little surprises they're capable of." He regarded Shoggy 21.5 thoughtfully for a few moments before returning to his dreamy good humor. "It certainly is incredible, isn't it? Even among the weirdest wonders of the Imperium, I can't say that I saw anything to rival it. The word magnificent might not be out of place." He inspected the stairs with almost professional scrutiny as they approached. "I wonder if there's any way that they could install one of these on the Aurora Islands. It doesn't have to go anywhere, but it would be such a marvelous thing to have."
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"What a lovely idea! One of these would be an excellent addition." The Baron was no less fascinated with the staircase than Valentine, and had to smile amusedly as they made their way onto the stairs. Well, hovering a couple inches above them, in Vladimir's case, but, he was still moving along the sort of geometry he'd only beheld in Spice visions, or under the influence of some of Valentine's little treats. Although he was still feeling quite pleasant, as they ascended the Baron reached into his robes to pull out one of his little metal spice containers, taking a deep whiff of its contents as he flipped the lid before offering it to Valentine, his smile widening as everything grew a bit brighter. "Ahhh, lovely indeed. We'll have to see if the Shoggies do any contract work. . .they do seem amenable to suggestions. I suspect they're bargain laborers." As they called everyone 'Master' and appeared to be a slave race, he suspected that 'bargain' was 'free', as long as the Shoggies got fed. "Perhaps they can do a couple of giant, whirling blades sculptures as well."
Shoggy 21.5 reached the top of the stairs ahead of them, where it announced to the other Shoggies that it was conducting a tour for Master Baron-Vladimir and Master Lord-Valentine, before going and collecting pamphlets to give to the pair. "It's all about the DETHTOWER," Shoggy 21.5 said, while a number of other Shoggies clamored around, asking if they'd be able to help, while a couple more extended pseudopods, asking for their 'tour galleons'. "So we never run out of flashlights!" Shoggy 8 explained, arriving with one in a pseudopod. With a bemused smirk, Vladimir gave the Shoggies their requested coins- their architecture was impressive after all. After a moment of debate amongst themselves, Shoggy 21.5, Shoggy 8, and Shoggy 21 (also with a flashlight, and who Shoggy 21.5 had greeted happily, announcing that it could 'remember when I was you') were gathered up by the door, ready to start the tour once their guests were.
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He fairly skipped on the stairs, reveling in the oddity of their dimensions, and accepted the Baron's offering of spice with not-at-all concealed glee. It added another layer to the proceedings, another bit of richness to this particular work of art, and he would be sullying it by partaking in anything lesser while here. "Blades would be lovely as well as practical," he burbled. "Reflective and lethal. How they would gleam..." He stared thoughtfully down at the Shoggies ahead, noting how they were connected and yet capable of speaking separately, and how their amoeba-like nature both contrasted and was enhanced by the surroundings, humming happily all the while.
"Everlasting flashlights," he said, taking his up, blinking it on and off several times in a pattern, and reaching out to pat a Shoggy pseudopod. "The miracles of paid tours. You should really consider selling those little chemical lights that they hand out at raves, as well. Baron, I believe you're familiar with them? Multicolored gaudy things, I adore them. I can stare for hours..."
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Shoggies 8, 21, and 21.5 ushered them into the strangely-angled Dethtower entrance chamber, pointing out the sandwiches-and-hats table as usual, laden with its heap of fish and mystery meats. A few Shoggies were at work on the hat side of the table, diligently concocting more hats from aluminum foil. "If we had the chemical lights we could attach them to hats!" one conjectured, which met with a chorus of 'sooo cool' from the others. "Do you know where to get them, Master Potions-Master?" The Shoggy wasn't sure of Valentine's name, but was aware of his position due to the Shoggies who'd attended his salvia class. "And would you like hats?" A pair of curiously-folded foil hats were offered, more like weirdly-shaped tiaras of surprisingly complex make for a foil hat. "They're Y'ha-nthlei-style like from Innsmouth! We're getting pretty good at folding hats." The Baron accepted the curious 'hats', passing one to Valentine. "We started with sooo easy hats, but, we've been doing it for sooo many hours now," the Shoggy explained. Indeed, the hats collected on the table were starting to show a progression from the simplest of triangular hats to bizarre constructions like the one that Vladimir found himself admiring. The Shoggy had managed to work some impressive shapes into the cheap material, and he had to wonder what actual Y'ha-nthlei style metalwork looked like, wherever that was.
Once finished with the sandwiches-and-hats table, Shoggy 21.5 took the lead and squelched along toward one of several tunnels leading off the entrance chamber. "Remember, you waive your life and your sanity in DETHTOWER! We are not liable if you don't follow and get eaten by the grue!" it announced. "Or maybe it's a dhole, we don't know since we haven't seen it." Having fulfilled the obligatory warning, the Shoggies squelched excitedly into the corridor that Shoggy 21.5 had chosen. "Sooo cool, we're going to go see the Trapezohedron! Follow right behind," Shoggy 8 announced, keeping close to the left-hand side of the chosen tunnel with the other Shoggies. It was impossible to tell which direction the tunnel sloped, or possibly twisted, and all sides, walls, ceiling, and floor, were covered with complex carvings, many involving tentacles and a strange, three-lobed eye. These designed flowed into one another, and the entire effect was directionless confusion. "What an effect!" the Baron declared, offering his arm to Valentine as they moved into the tunnel. "Should we see if they can install one of these too? Perhaps as a way to connect up the islands. . ."
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Valentine regarded the Shoggies at the hat table with amusement, and a certain amount of approval. Anything that built this wonderful place, no matter how brainless, earned a certain amount of regard from him. Not respect, exactly--nobody here, save the Baron, had earned that token--but he was willing to consider them some of the not completely useless and more entertaining ones. "I could procure some for you, out of pocket... if you'll do a service for the Baron and I as well. Would this be acceptable? An immediate answer is, of course, not required; simply owl Lord Valentine Wolfe once you have decided one way or the other." To sweeten the deal, he picked up one of the more complex hats, running his fingers delicately along the foil so as not to destroy the bizarre shapes of it.
He admired it for a while longer before settling it on his head at a rakish angle. "How do I look?" He struck a pose. "I'm not quite the clotheshorse that Finlay Campbell was in his--ahem--heyday at court, but I think I pull it off rather well, don't you?" He sauntered after the Shoggies, examining everything with interest. It was all so... beautiful. The confusion was majesty. "That is a splendid idea, if it could be done," he said breathlessly, taking the offered arm and squeezing happily. "A pleasant distraction to us, and likely to fend off unwary unwelcome visitors."
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"A celebratory joint class is a splendid idea!" the Baron agreed, eyes following the trail of light left by Valentine's flashlight. "We could commandeer the Great Hall for it, perhaps, unless a more interesting place presents itself. The Great Hall is really quite dull, so unimaginative." A ceiling that copied the. . .sky outside. Why the hell wasn't it made of glass, if that's all it was supposed to do? "It's a shame that using the same venue twice in a row would be in questionable taste. Ah well, I'm sure we'll find somewhere, now is not the time to bother with working details."
The Shoggies were delighted to hear that Valentine knew where to procure glow-sticks, but even more delighted to hear of another possible project. "Sooo cool, we get to build and we get chemical lights for hats? We will send you an owl!" As word of this commission would spread quickly, and many Shoggies would indeed find it interesting, Valentine Wolfe was destined to receive a very interesting delivery late that evening, consisting of a bucket which formerly housed chicken, now containing a couple of dead birds gathered in the Forbidden Forest, in a rather advanced state of decay. One might have been an owl, but, it was hard to tell. A note scrawled in large, clumsy letters on the bucket would say "Hello. We decided. Here are owls. We want to build and get glow-sticks."
The many weird facets of the Shoggies' aluminum-foil craft seemed to brighten when Valentine donned the bizarre tiara, sending a prismatic shower of chemically-inspired sparkles over Valentine's form. "Very well indeed- you look scintillating, my dear Valentine! You pull if off wonderfully- far better than I, certainly." The Baron indulged the Shoggies by carefully putting on his own weird tiara-thing. The creatures seemed to be easily swayed by admiration of their creations, and indeed, the Shoggies appeared thrilled, with Shoggy 8 exclaiming, "You both look sooo cool! And we can make more tunnels! We've made sooo many tunnels."
The tunnel was indeed confusion, beautiful, remarkable confusion- 'tunnel' was something of an understated word, considering the overall effect was something like travelling down the twisting gullet of some impossibly enormous creature, down to strange quiverings and palpitations in the walls and floor. . .or whatever they were. The passage was not at all regular, almost tube-like, and, in charting their path mentally, the Baron was certain that gravity was playing such a way that he and Valentine were walking (and floating) nearly upside-down. As the Shoggies darted around a certain section of the corridor, insisting they follow close, what the Baron had thought were more tentacle-like carvings sprang into alertness and motion- not all the sinuous carvings were of stone, but the whole was worked together in such a way that the transition between tentacle-monster and carving was seamless. The chemicals in the Baron's mind quickly transformed the rest of the scene into one of equal living splendour. Occasionally, the Shoggies would pause to point out one of the many strange statues which had been erected along the huge corridor- although every single one looked different, ranging from almost-human to completely inhuman forms, every one of them was indicated to represent the Shoggies' "Master Nyarly". Eventually, they came to a forking path, where Shoggy 21 announced, "We can go that way right to the Shining Trapezohedron, or we can go that way and go to visit the dhole first. Or maybe it's a grue. Or, maybe it's the crafts room today, we're not sure." The Shoggies looked to Vladimir and Valentine expectantly, and Vladimir turned to Valentine, allowing him to determine their route. Either was sure to be intriguing.
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She dumps several fat little roast Andoran Game Hens into the donation box - she believed they'd be a better fit than a single large chicken - and turns to the Shoggies' kiosk with her money and signed waivers.
"Hey, little guys, I'm interested in a tour."
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A couple of the Shoggies, at the kiosk, 15 and 28 to be specific, both tried to collect Laori's tour money at the same time, tangling up and accidentally fusing their pseudopods in their enthusiasm. Shoggy 6 took advantage of the opportunity to ooze forward. "Welcome to DETHTOWER!" the Shoggy announced. "It's sooo fun, with sooo many things to see! I will be your tour guide, and so will Shoggy, and Shoggy." The Shoggy indicated the tangled Shoggies, who finally managed to untangle themselves with a loud squelching sound. "What is your name Mastress? So we know what to call you."
"Sooo lucky, you get to give a tour!" said the group of Shoggies who took over the kiosk to Shoggies 6, 15, and 28 as they emerged, with Shoggy 6 carrying an unlit flashlight in a pseudopod. The first chamber past the doors was a vast, shadowy area supported by oddly-spaced pillars, and possessing far more angles than seemed proper. Several more Shoggies were here, gathered about a large table containing a pile of assorted meat, mostly fish, but also with some less identifiable lumps mixed in. Next the pile of meat was a pile of hats, some folded from paper, others from aluminum foil. A number of dark passageways lead off from the impossibly-shaped chamber.
"This is the sandwich-and-hats table!" Shoggy 15 piped. "Today we have fish-and-no-bread-sandwiches. You can takes some now, or when you're done!" The Shoggies waited to see if Laori wanted to take any 'sandwiches' or hats, while debating whether to show her the Hall of Shoggy History or the Forest of the Black Goat first.
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She soon ceases goofing off, however, adjusts her hat, shoulders her omnipresent giant spiked chain, and tells her guides, "Okay, I'm ready when you are. Prince in Chains, this is going to be awesome!"
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"We will start over here!" Shoggy 6 indicated one of the tunnels with a psudopod. "Today it goes to the Forest of the Black Goat!" "It's sooo cute," Shoggy 28 added, as the group began to squelch toward the indicated tunnel, joined by Shoggy 5 3/4, who'd quietly fallen in with them at the table. "Follow right behind us," Shoggy 15 said before entering the tunnel, which sloped in an indescribable direction, and was dimly lit by widely-spaced magical sconces. It was not a small tunnel, but rather a tunnel of ridiculous size- the Shoggies were not used to building on a human scale. "Right behind us!" piped Shoggy 6 as a reminder, joining Shoggy 15 at the start of the little procession, while Shoggy 28 and Shoggy 5 3/4 followed directly behind. "Who is the Prince in Chains, Mastress Laori?" asked Shoggy 6 as they started down the strange hall, the walls of which had been decorated with raised-bas relief carvings displaying various monsters and gods familiar to the Shoggies.