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Post by Red Charge on Feb 10, 2014 7:00:41 GMT -5
The room was rather small, a serving room for the lounge, there was nothing to really be had in there. Oddly enough though, Klepto noticed, the direction in which the person supposedly went to led to nowhere. Had he gone out the window? Either way there was no time to ponder this. Moving on to the lounge, Klepto noticed a very odd piece hanging on a wall, a golden jigsaw puzzle piece inside a case on an almost empty section of wall. Or at least Klepto thought it was empty, the preparation for more cases was on the wall already, but apparently whatever objects the master of the house wanted to hang there, they were not ready for display as of yet. The case on which the Golden Puzzle Piece was in was labeled '1 of 9'. A collection then? This piece could prove valuable. A medium piece of what appeared to be solid gold, if he could find the rest of the pieces, perhaps he could benefit a thousandfold out of the entire collection.
The rest of the lounge was decorated with... trophies... not the kind he found in the corridor downstairs, but the kind that used to look you in the eye before you hung it on the wall. Dead monsters stared at him eerily from all directions. Many were unfamiliar to Klepto, possibly reminders of an exotic hunting trip in some far off land. The largest one was directly above a fireplace, it looked somewhat like a cross between a phoenix and a drake, but bigger and meaner looking than both. There were tusks, teeth, claws, heads, pelts and who knows what else on the walls. Whoever this pony was, he enjoyed going hunting and wanted everyone to know about it.
Other than that, a few large sofas, a table and several bookcases were the only other things in the room.
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Post by Klepto Moonlit on Feb 12, 2014 14:28:38 GMT -5
There was nothing of too much interest inside the serving room, other than a disturbing lack of exit for whatever had been standing in front of the dumbwaiter. Maybe it had been another thief, one that had ducked out of the window before Klepto's arrival. Good for him he supposed.
An object in the lounge itself, however, caught Klepto's eyes immediately. Solid, gold, puzzle piece. Cha-ching. The thief eagerly made his way over to its frame, pulling the object off that wall and stashing it away in his bag. The eight other empty frames, as well as the '1 of 9' label intrigued Klepto. Where were the others, off getting cleaned? On loan? Surely the entire set would be more valuable than one by itself, but where were the others?
Some creepy-looking monster trophies peered at Klepto as he did a quick scan of the rest of the room. Whoever lived here must have been into hunting. Or dead stuff. The thief exited the room, deciding not to bother with items that were either too large or that he couldn't guess the value of.
A thought hit Klepto as he exited the lounge. If that golden puzzle piece had been there... maybe it wasn't another thief he had seen? Why wouldn't they have snatched it as well? And it wasn't like they had only taken the other eight. The thief glanced behind him for a moment before turning back. He needed to stay on his toes in case someone snuck up on him from behind. At this point he didn't know who he was here with.
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Post by Red Charge on Feb 12, 2014 15:08:24 GMT -5
As he progressed out of the lounge, he saw a long corridor lined with rooms on one side, the other side had one room and then opened up to where the stairs to the first floor were and continued on the other side. The first door marked to his right appeared to be the bathroom. The next one after that must have been the master bedroom, or otherwise an office of sorts if the bedrooms were in the other wing. From downstairs, he heard a loud clattering.
As he perked his ears to listen, there was silence for a few more moments, before he finally heard another sound, a thud on the first step of the stairs.
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Post by Klepto Moonlit on Feb 12, 2014 15:30:18 GMT -5
"Bathroom, bedroom, office..." Klepto thought as he looked at the rooms in front of him. The office might be his best bet, especially if there were more valuable trophies to be had.
The sound of a loud clattering below him interrupt his train of thought, however. Clattering that could have very well belong to a suit of armor getting knocked over. "Please stay on the floor, please stay on the-" *thud*
Nope, it was now on his way up to greet him.
The gettin' had soured and it was time to get out. But taking the stairs would bring him face to face with the thing. And if it heard him taking the dumb waiter... could animated suits of armor hear? ... Taking the dumb waiter might be a death-wish. The thing would be waiting for him at the bottom.
Waiting for him at the bottom...
The thief sprinted back through the lounge and serving room, jamming the button on the service elevator without getting back inside. He had to hope the security system would take the bait. Or that if it hadn't, it would be slow enough to give him time to figure something else out. The thief quietly made his way closer to the door of the lounge, trying to gauge whether the thudding mass was getting closer or further away.
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Post by Red Charge on Feb 21, 2014 6:17:05 GMT -5
But the noise had stopped completely as soon as Klepto hit the dumbwaiter, leaving the pony hanging. The clatter of the dumbwaiter did not carry over, surprisingly, to the hallway or the stairs. Soundproofing? Maybe it just seemed loud because Klepto was nervous. Either way, whatever it was on the stairs didn't seem to be moving forwards or back anymore. Perhaps Klepto should take a look. On his way back to the corridor, Klepto passed through the lounge again, but this time something strange had happened. The heads previously mounted on the walls followed him as he went and made no effort to conceal the fact, if they were sentient at all. Was he being watched? Recorded? Was this a magical security system or just a method to intimidate trespassers?
Either way Klepto would have to choose what to do next, the options were clear - take the dumb-waiter back down, proceed down the stairwell corridor or enter one of the rooms on it to see if he could hide there in case whatever it was he heard followed him up.
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Post by Klepto Moonlit on Feb 27, 2014 17:10:13 GMT -5
But the thudding was now completely gone. Had whatever was making it stopped moving? Was it just standing their on the staircase? The thief really had no plan for this unexpected event.
Well... he could slowly descend down the staircase. That seemed like a much safer option as opposed to taking the dumbwaiter or hiding in a room. What Klepto didn't want was to get cornered. Riding the dumbwaiter down, only to find the thing face to face with him, would get him cornered. Hiding in a room, only for the thing to come up and find him, would get him cornered. At least if he took the stairs he could scurry back up and move on from there.
The heads in the trophy room were now watching him. He really wished he had a couple dozen blankets he could throw over their heads, partially because he wasn't sure if they were acting like cameras, but mostly because they were creeping him out.
The thief walked over to the top of the stairwell corridor, blinking down at the steps in front of him. "Alright, one step at a time. Hear anything, high-tail it. See anything, high-tail it. If neither of those happens, get to the bottom and get the heck out."
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Post by Red Charge on Mar 8, 2014 17:11:44 GMT -5
What Klepto saw from the top of the stairs made him shiver slightly. The two suits of Equiterian armor were now standing in front of the door, spears facing forwards, shields raised. Had someone moved them? Were they really ancient Equiterian golems, or rather a sophisticated alarm system designed to make intruders BELIEVE they were? But then again, how many intruders would even know of ancient Equiterian defense systems anyway? Klepto wracked his brain to try and figure out what Hind Sight had said about those golems.
They would rush to the entrance of a keep and form a phalanx, preventing any intruders and spies from leaving. Would they attack him if he just went by them, or only if he tried to leave? Those spears were long and easily could reach the foot of the stairs. Klepto COULD take the dumbwaiter down, but was that really wise knowing all of the alarms have been tripped around the house?
Then a sound came that made Klepto's heart skip a beat, a sort of low rumbling... growl... something from the depths of the house on the floors beneath him, a terrible sound... moving towards him.
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Post by Klepto Moonlit on Mar 15, 2014 12:13:58 GMT -5
Klepto stared blankly at the two suits of equiterian armor guarding his way out, uttering a single curse in his thoughts. If he was remembering what Hind sight had said about equiterian golems, trying to leave through that door would definitely get him shish-kebabed. Taking a step off the stairs could possibly get him shish-kebabbed. He wasn't willing to risk the threat being a bluff. If someone had taken the effort to program the statues re-position themselves, they had likely went ahead and assigned them to stab anything within range as well.
"Okay, I'm stuck on the top floor. Unless I take the dumb waiter. That's an option. A dumb option, but an option." The thief remembered their being a window in the serving room, one that that mysterious whatsit may or may not have exited through. At this point, trying to navigate down from a two-story window sounded a lot safer than making it past two spear-happy armor suits.
The he heard the rumbling. He didn't want to know what was making the sound, but he could imagine it being something big and with a lot of teeth. And probably with a pretty good sense of smell, which likely through hiding out as an option. Now leaving through that window was only reaffirmed as his best option. And if for some reason that wasn't viable, at least he'd be close to the dumbwaiter.
Klepto quickly turned around, darting back through the the lounge (past all the trophy heads watching him eerily) and into the serving room. Before he looked out the window, though, the thief quickly looked around for any obvious way to open up some secret corridor in the room, mostly in the direction that the whatsit had scurried off to. There might be something out of place that was an obvious clue, or maybe the wall was hollow if he knocked gently in different spots. Creepy mansions like this were bound to have secret passages, and he wouldn't have been surprised if that thing that ran away when he came up through the dumbwaiter had taken one of them. Finding such a passage would sure beat jumping out of a two-story window.
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Post by Red Charge on Mar 22, 2014 18:41:55 GMT -5
Nothing, no visible or hidden way he could tell for that other shadow to have vanished. Something which made Klepto suspect that other shadow was not pony at all. Considering the defenses the mansion had, it was quite possible that a magical sentry was in place, something that could travel through walls... but such spell sentries were unheard of... even in the Equiterian Empire such things were rare, at least, that's one of the things Hind Sight rambled on about on one of their journeys.
Perhaps it was a unicorn who teleported away or phased through a wall silently? Either way Klepto saw no evidence as to where the shadow he saw went, nor did he know whether it was wise to try and follow him. His time was running out and his options were few.
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Post by Klepto Moonlit on Mar 29, 2014 14:18:02 GMT -5
Well that was no luck on the 'secret passage'. Either it was doing a good job of hiding or it simply wasn't there. But he still had the window. If it did turn out to be a viable option, he could simply bypass the statues and rumbling below him. And if it wasn't... well, he'd have to figure that out later. He still had the dumbwaiter at least, though that seemed like an admittedly poor idea.
The thief made his way over to the serving room window, trying to assess his chances of using it as an exit without breaking anything.
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Post by Red Charge on Apr 6, 2014 14:48:11 GMT -5
Looking out the window, Klepto saw that escaping the mansion would be an easy deal, he could easily climb down to a lower roof and from there make his way to the ground. That wasn't even a problem for the thief, not after having scavenged through traps in the desert and Equiterian Ruins. No the real problem was that the view out of the window was entirely unfamiliar to the colt. Instead of the blue sky the earth pony was used to seeing was a multitude of vibrant, almost neon shades of turquoise, green and pale yellow. He could no longer spot a sun in the sky, the light of day seemed to come from nowhere he could really see and the oddest thing is, it seemed to come from directly above everything, leaving absolutely no shadows to hide in. What had before been a perfectly manicured grass yard was now a patch of short, stubby, purple mushrooms. Where there were birch trees now were erected root like wooden tendrils with fruit-like orbs the color of tanned skin, though they were smooth and appeared to be full of liquid. In Klepto's mind the closest analogy would be a pregnant womb.
The topography of the area remained mostly the same, the hills were identical and even the mountains but instead of a bustling city with massive docks and airship hangars were now vast expanses of land with strange flora, plants growing sideways off the side of a hill that seemed completely leveled, the strange orb-like fruits rolling about from their root-trees occasionally. The place looked twisted and Klepto had a feeling the ground, which looked unnaturally soft and moist would feel unnatural against his hooves. The question at this point was, would it be wise to leave the mansion? As far as he knew it could disappear back into the real world and leave him stranded there forever. But then again not escaping meant facing whatever was in the mansion with him.
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Post by Klepto Moonlit on Apr 8, 2014 16:54:45 GMT -5
"Awesome. I can get down from here no problem," the thief thought to himself, eagerly pulling the window open. It was only after he had done so, however, that he realized that something was off. This... wasn't Trottingham. This was... it was... an illusion spell maybe? Or maybe he had been drugged without knowing it?
The thief was dumbfounded. Rainbow colors spiraling in the sky, bulbous fruit dangling from a gnarled tree, and one heck of a lazy gardener if those mushrooms were any indication. Klepto shut the window back down, shaking his head to clear his thoughts. "Okay, window's not an option. Not until it decides to stop with the crazy."
Maybe there was a less-crazy window he could leave through. Or even better, maybe there was a weapon lying around. He had a dagger on him, but a sword or crossbow would do a better job if he came face to face with that grumbling thing.
The thief pulled out his dagger, figuring it would be wise to have it at ready, and stepped through the lounge into the upstairs corridor. Maybe that master bedroom-looking room would have a crossbow in it. After all, that would be the type of weapon you'd want when someone broke into your house, and the master bedroom would be the place to keep it. So naturally that was the place where Klepto would need to look.
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Post by Red Charge on May 7, 2014 16:03:00 GMT -5
However, as soon as Klepto left the room, he discovered he was in another corridor entirely than he was before. Where was the parlor with the monster trophies? The door to the upstairs corridor was gone... or rather... on the other side? Instead of a door to his left there were two doors to his right. But that's impossible, he had just looked out the window and there was no wall indicating a room there... would the doors open into the outside? There wasn't even a balcony on this level as far as Klepto could see.
His options were either to continue down this strange new corridor or to take one of the doors. He had a feeling that whatever was going on, it wasn't going to stop anytime soon. In fact, as the door behind him swung back and forth, he noticed the small upstairs kitchen had changed into a three different rooms, one with each swing of the door. He barely managed a glance at the rooms, but something very eerie caught his eye on the last swing. He could swear he could see something standing in the darkness, something large and beastly, breathing. But as the door finally lost momentum and shut, it was gone.
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Post by Klepto Moonlit on May 11, 2014 12:50:42 GMT -5
"Oh, so the house decided to go crazy too." Now it was obvious that magic was in play here. Or drugs. Either way, navigation wasn't going to be nearly as straight-forward as the thief had hoped. The house seemed to be deciding which doors led to where on the fly, which meant any door could lead to any room. As evidence of that, the door behind him was switching between rooms with each swing. He couldn't tell what the first two were, but the last must have been the 'go here if you want to die' room. Or more likely, the monstrosity of a guard dog was still in the house with him.
"Ooookaay..." Klepto thought, shaking the jitters out of his head. "Beastie is in here, behind any or all of these doors. I have no idea where I'm going... Might as well see what's behind door number one." The thief trotted over to the first of the two doors, taking a deep breath before peeking inside. He wanted to be ready to slam it shut if he spotted his pursuer. And if he didn't, he wanted to find something to prop the door open to keep it from appearing when he exited.
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Post by Red Charge on May 11, 2014 12:56:46 GMT -5
As Klepto opened the door it suddenly opened up to a very wide and very empty room. There was not a single piece of furniture in it and the only light source was from the ceiling, a single 2x2 square hole in the ceiling (which was impossibly higher than the one in the room he was in). Apparently this led to nowhere. From somewhere down the corridor, Klepto could head a door closing. Whatever it was he saw in that room, it must have also been moving between the rooms, searching for Klepto, perhaps.
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