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Fantasy Cursed Island

Deadwood Deer

Ten Thousand Club
Warning to Readers: This RP is, while not very explicit compared to some, not intended to be read or partaken in by younger readers and writers. This game contains descriptions of gore, violence, some adult jokes, and some other things not intended for younger audiences. We try not to be explicit, but this is not for younger readers. If you take offense to anything described above or can reasonably be assumed to be within the sphere of what is described above, please find something else to read.

Also this is a bastardized hybridization of Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition and Dragon's Dogma, so nothing is going to make sense when combined if you only look at it from the lens of one.
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The day turned to night around the island. The island was said to be cursed, or rather it's ruins were. Not many people would voluntarily go to the island, it was the very reason it wasn't on any maps! No cartographer could make it onto the island and escape alive. In the past, small units of soldiers had been sent to investigate, but they never returned. So more soldiers were sent, and they never returned. Eventually, the king stopped sending soldiers. The island was generally considered off-limits. Not by law, of course, if you wanted to go die that was on you, but people tried to keep each other from visiting that cursed ruins. Yet even so, a small boat pulled up to the island. The one man willing to ferry people to the cursed island had found work once more in a young treasure hunter by the name of Jerry.

Jerry didn't look like he would last long. He was skinny, and wore no protective armor aside from a steel gauntlet on his left hand. At his hip was a thin sword, good for precision thrusting and perhaps cutting, but not much else, and a perfectly balanced, in his estimation, dagger. He used a green strip of worn cloth as a bandana to keep his hair out of his face. Jerry was a treasure hunter, and he believed that, with as many people as had gone into the ruins, surely something of great value was contained within. There was an old phrase for young fools like Jerry. "Beware the old, in a profession where one usually dies young. Pity the young in a profession where one rarely grows old."

For all Jerry's optimism about the treasures hidden within the ruins, he did come with some semblance of preparation. Within his backpack were enough supplies that he could spend a week diving into the ruins and still have enough food to make it back to the top, with all the typical equipment of a crafty rogue, from lockpicks to climbing gear, and a trunk he'd paid to have wheels attached for ease of movement. Jerry wasn't a strong man, but he was a smart one. "Thanks, Tim," Jerry said to the boatman as he unloaded his belongings at the dock that somehow still stood. Tim wasn't the boatman's name, but nobody knew what it was, so Jerry just called him Tim. A small coin pouch flew through the air into Tim's outstretched palm before the boatman grunted and shoved off from the dock. Part of their arrangement was that Tim would return every few days in case Jerry made it out, but after a month, if Jerry didn't return, Tim was free to do what he wished with the rest of Jerry's belongings at the inn.

"Okay, night island," Jerry said, rolling his head on his shoulders to pop the joints, "Bring me that treasure." Shouldering his pack and picking up the handles of his rolling trunk, Jerry began looking for an entryway into the ruins.
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The ruins lay ahead, with only a relatively small amount of mostly barren rock between them and the docks. A few shrubs and scraggly trees managed to grow there, somehow. Actually, judging by the color, they may have been dead. Off to the side of the dock, clear of the water, there was an old platform of wood, mostly fallen apart. An abandoned bedroll lay on the intact portion alongside an empty lantern, but there was little else there.

The ruins themselves covered the remainder of the land, stretching up to the starless sky, partly silhouetted by the full moon. They were ancient, no doubt, built in a style unseen anywhere else. Even from there one could see fallen stones where time had worn the place down, but still it stood. The entrance lay in front of the docks, a pair of doors far too big to be reasonable closing it off. They weren’t there to keep anyone out though, as the moment someone approached, they’d open all on their own.
 
"Well, looks like the stories are true," Jerry said out loud as he examined the platform. He hadn't expected to be sleeping comfortably, and he was no stranger to a cold floor, but any comfort was a welcome. He placed the bedroll in his trunk for now, deciding to repack his pack to fit it later, first he had some exploring to do. The lantern was definitely welcome, he hadn't been able to afford one when in town, so his only like source would have been candles and torches. This was definitely a more efficient use for his oil, hopefully it worked. He didn't much of anything beyond that. A few scraps of moldy cloth, rusty shards of metal, nothing that was worth taking along.

When Jerry heard stories of the bizarre structure, he expected old architecture that had fallen out of fashion. This was not old architecture that had fallen out of fashion, this was rock termites holding hands. He was surprised there was even a door to open! Let alone one that opened! Jerry's sword came from its sheath and he held in front of him to stab with if something came through the door. But nothing did. Jerry narrowed his eyes at the darkness behind the door, even the moonlight didn't pierce it. "Too late to back out now," he decided. Tim wouldn't be back for days, and he'd never hear the end of it if he gave up with nothing to show for it. Jerry put oil into the lantern and lit it, hanging it from his belt to keep his hands free while he pulled the trunk in, examining the darkness just beyond the lantern light for any danger.
 
The entry hall was surprisingly ornate, or intended to be, at least. There were some water features along the side, fountains that calmly poured water into small pools. The floor was pattern with short sets of steps, gradually leading down without being an actual slope. The hall proceeded forward a few yards before coming to a reasonable door. This one was not automatic like the first.

The room beyond was lit as the ceiling had long since caved in places to let moonlight shine in. It was a much wider hallway with less decor, unless you counted the plants that grew through the cracks and rubble. Along the walls were a number of remains, nothing but bones and gear now. Judging by the armor and weapons, they were adventurers as well. While some were splayed out on the floor, others still sat against the wall, as if they had given up and waited for death.
 
Jerry puzzled over the water features. How were they still functioning after all this time. That meant one of two things, as far as he could tell. There was magic in play, and the fountains would run until eventually they were destroyed, or there was someone maintaining them. Finding nothing of note beyond that, however, he pressed on.

Well, these guys didn't turn out too well. The skeletons strewn about the room told Jerry it had been years since someone had come through here, and their positions and seeming acceptance of their fate suggested that they were unable to leave.

"Wait..." If that was true, then Jerry needed to secure his exit right now. "Sorry, old timer," Jerry grunted as he dragged the helmet, still holding its owners skull, into position to keep the door ajar. Satisfied that that would allow him through, he began searching bodies. The weapons were old and rusted, and their armor held little value to the treasure hunter, but with so large a group of adventurers, at least one of them would probably have something useful.
 
Searching the bodies more closely, he'd fine that some pieces of equipment actually weren't rusted. In fact, some even still had their shine, despite their owner being reduced to bones. It seemed it wasn't simple decay that had done this.

There wasn't much time to ponder this as steps could be heard from the room further in, coming closer. Stepping into the moonlight was a...beast of some kind. It was a little bigger than a large wolf, though it's body shape was more like that of a hyena. The face looked like neither, with a nose that was little more than two holes and a mouth filled with razor sharp teeth. The eyes glowed yellow and some kind of sickly fog seeped from the creature's mouth. The fur on its body was short and thinning in several places. It looked diseased but still walked and moved without hindrance. Its eyes were already locked on Jerry as the only other moving thing in the room.
 
"That... that is a big doggy." There was no way Jerry could draw his sword that quickly if the thing decided to pounce. He sat the trunk down and put his hand on his dagger, assuming that, if nothing else, he can put his gauntlet in the beast's mouth to keep it busy while he cut its throat. "You can move on or we can do this, Cujo."
 
The beast eyed him for a moment before it acted. It reared its head back before opening its maw, exhaling a cloud of its toxic gas towards him for a ranged attack. The fumes were poisonous if breathed in, but thankfully the attack went more forward than out, so it could be avoided to either side.
 
"Whoa!" Tuck and roll! Jerry dove to the side and rolled back to his feet before punting a skull at the creature's head.
 
The beast still had its mouth open, so the skull got lodged in its jaws, fog blowing out the eye sockets for a moment before the beast stopped its poison breath. It shook its head for a moment before simply crushing the skull in its mouth. It turned its attention back to Jerry, though it had wasted a good bit of time dealing with the skull.
 
Jerry had taken the opportunity while the beast was busy with a skull in it's mouth to pick up a rusty shield from one of the corpses. There wasn't anything he could climb on and there was no way he could outrun it, but he could keep it away with the shield. Even rusted and rotten, the shield was heavy, though, requiring both hands to hold.
 
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The beast snarled and charged at him, running to close the distance before it jumped upon him with teeth bared and claws outstretched.
 
"Not today!", Jerry grunted as he hefted the shield up, catching the beast on it but still being shoved back by the force and weight of the impact.
 
The beast landed against the shield, hitting against it with its claws. Finding that wasn’t doing much, it started exhaling its poison gas again.
 
Jerry tried to shove the beast back as he held his breath. His arms were busy keeping the shield up, so instead he reached arount it with his leg to kick the beast.
 
The shift of balance was enough for the beast to fall to the side. It managed to land with one paw, but it couldn’t keep its balance and wound up falling onto its side, leaving it vulnerable.
 
Taking this opportunity, Jerry dropped the shield and pulled his dagger, stabbing it into the beast's neck to cut it's throat.
 
The beast flailed and howled in pain as the blade met its neck. But it soon became clear this creature had unnatural vitality. Rather than falling limp as one normally would when stabbed in the neck, it started trying to shake him off. While it certainly wasn’t dead just yet, the blow had dealt some significant damage to it, weakening it considerably.
 
'I forgot this place was cursed,' Jerry internally shouted as the beast sent him off. He'd left his knife in it's neck, and he probably wouldn't get it back until it died. "Why didn't I hire a thug?", Jerry muttered as he drew his sword.
 
The beast got to its paws once more, coughing a bit as only small wisps of dog came from it’s mouth, along with a bit of blood. It seemed he’d at least crippled its breath attack. The creature shook its head and growled at him before charging once again.
 
Jerry met the charge by planting his feet and thrusting his sword through the beast's eye. It was durable, but generally things die when you screw up the head, so maybe that would kill it.
 
The beast met hit attack head on, taking the sword right through the head. Sure enough, that was enough to finish it off. However, it wasn't enough to stop its momentum, so its body still kept moving forward a bit.
 
Scrawny blonde treasure met bone covered floor as Jerry fell backwards under the weight of the monster. "I really should have hired a thug," Jerry groaned. "Get off me!" After some squirming, he worked his way out from under the corpse and pulled his weapons out, wiping the blood off on the fur of the creature. "I'm gonna need some better defenses," he muttered as he pressed on, having already explored the room and found very little worth taking.
 
As he stepped away from the creature’s body, it began decaying rapidly until it was nothing but a pile of rotted flesh and bones.

The next room over had a large statue in the middle depicting a lion poised in a graceful laying position. There wasn’t much more beyond that, aside from extinguished torches along the walls. To the right side there were two paths. One headed downwards in a set of stairs while the other stayed level and curved sharply left, hiding whatever could be beyond.
 
Jerry looked at the fork in the road and the statue, then at the hall. If the last room was any judge, something was going to happen in this one. Picking up a brick, he climbed up the lioness statue for the height benefit and the possibility of concealing himself before chucking the brick down path that curved left.
 

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