Roguelike Roulette [Slot 1c]
Level 5: "This place looks uninteresting"
Marash wanders north and encounters a large kobold. She tests the rod she found on the novice paladin and the kobold dies immediately. This, it seems, is a rod of Drain Life. She puts it away while it recharges and scoops up the cloak the kobold dropped. She has been granted the ability to learn a new prayer, but has no book to learn it from.
She quickly realises this is a magical cloak and replaces the one the worms destroyed, hoping to discover its secrets.
Soon after, as if the world taunts her, she comes across a mass of yellow worms. They seem quiescent, so she backs away.
To the west she uncovers a pair of secret doors, but as she is picking the the lock of the north path, the door south opens up, revealing a small kobold, a blue yeek and a metallic blue centipede behind her. Immediately she spins and turns the rod on them, destroying the kobold. She claims the kobold's leather boots and marches down on the offense.
The centipede was fast, but weak. Marash claims a bronze wand and tangerine potion as her spoils.
Marash is hungry again. She slips the boots on her feet while devouring another ration.
The room she had been trying to access contains only a kobold skeleton, which she lets be.
As she trudges back to investigate the other side of this dungeon level, Marash discovers the room she came down into is now occupied by a pack of jackals. At least 8 by her count.
The pack turned out to number 11, but none of the jackals even hit her before she slays them. She proceeds unfazed, only to be soon bitten by her carelessness. Not far outside the detection range of her last prayer, she stumbles into a trap that summons monsters to attack her, a giant yellow centipede to her left and a giant white tick on her right.
She panics and is quickly poisoned by the tick, which appears more fearsome than she expected.
Trying to calm herself, she turns her rod of Drain Life on the tick. It makes a dent, but not much. She tries the wand next and discovers it to be a wand of Magic Missiles, but she isn't sure they'll be enough to take the tick down before it kills her.
She downs one of the two dark green potions she has collected, but it doesn't seem to have any effect.
Finally, she tries hitting the tick with her mace. That works a lot better than she expected and, though she is grievously wounded, the tick dies first. She prays for healing.
To the east she finds the centipede that fled the battle, and a mass of red worms. She approaches the worms, nervous she might not be sufficiently recovered from fighting the tick.
At her approach, the worms crawl on her, enveloping her in flames. Fortunately they die before doing much damage.
Past the worms, Marash finds another set of stairs down. She retreats to claim a pair of scrolls she saw earlier, then reads one at the head of the stairs before descending. They turn out to be scrolls of Blessing, and she packs the remaining one safely away.
[to be continued...]
