Chapter Text
The door vanished behind the three adventurers and they were left alone in the darkness again. A light appears in front of them, and as they get closer, they can see that the light was emitting from a pedestal, which was roughly chest-high (or head-high for the dwarf). The pedestal had a screen wrapping around it that showed the pixelated faces of the three adventurers that stood before it. On top of the pedestal were two buttons, one reading "TRUST" and the other "FORSAKE."
The female elf's voice filled the room.
"Only one of you will play this particular game. Let's find out who it's going to be."
The pixelated faces spun around the pedestal and landed on Merle.
"The rules of this game are simple," The male elf said. "You all probably know this already, but you're not the only ones currently making your way through Wonderland right now. This section of the game will be something of a... a competitive mode. Right now there's another group in another chamber identical to the one you're standing in now. Now the next room you'll face will feature a deadly, deadly challenge. But based on your decision in this room, you can change your fate in the next."
"Oh", Taako thought, "it's just the prisoner's dilemma."
"The prisoner's dilemma?" Kravitz asked.
"Yeah," Taako explained, "It's this thought experiment thing. The idea is that two prisoners are captured and separated during questioning. They can either confess to the crime or betray the other person. If they both confess, they each serve one year in prison. If they both betray, then they both serve two years."
"What if one of them confesses and the other betrays?" Kravitz asked.
"That's where things get interesting," Taako said. "The one who betrays goes free, and the one who confesses is sentenced to three years."
"Did you ever have to deal with this before?" Kravitz asked.
"Lots of times," Lup said. "We figured out early on that we should just coordinate what our decision would be before we went on missions. But, uh, that's not really an option here."
"Yeah," Taako said, "I'm glad I'm not the one who has to deal with this right now."
Merle slammed his hand on the "TRUST" button. The walls illuminated bright white and letters appeared on the wall in front of them, reading "YOUR DECISION: TRUST."
Taako held his breath as "THEIR DECISION:" appeared.
Bright red letters reading "FORSAKE" filled the rest of the screen.
"Shoulda picked forsake," Taako mumbled. "Now I've got that bad luck looming over my head during the worst possible outcome."
"Don't worry," Magnus said, putting a hand on Taako's shoulder. "I'm a protection fighter."
"You suck!" Merle yelled at the disembodied liches. Black smoke came from his mouth and rose toward the ceiling.
"Hey, Koko?" Magnus asked. He waved Merle over to join the conversation "In the other room, when I was like 'I don't wanna cut off my pinky,' and now in here, when Merle was all like, 'I don't wanna go in there bad—guy', this like fog stuff came out of our mouths. What's that?"
"Whenever we complain, there's this sort of necrotic energy that makes the fog leave us," Taako explained. "So here's my best guess: This place isn't trying to kill us. It's trying to make us miserable. And it seems like it's feeding off of that. That's my best guess. This is a place designed to make us miserable and it's—every time that we vocalize that, it knows that it is succeeding and it's feeding off of that energy."
"So do you think it's better to give it what it wants? Or to stay super positive?" Magnus asked.
"Oh, I have no idea," Taako said. "I mean, I will say this. I don't see any reason to feed it if we don't have to."
"Yeah, let's swing towards the positive side of things," Magnus agreed. "Alright, let's do this."
The three adventurers entered the next room to find the ceiling covered in industrial equipment with a hatch in the center. The door disappeared behind them and three large cubes appeared before them.
"Welcome to the Monster Factory!" The male elf exclaimed. "This is so exciting. Each of you will roll these dice in front of you and you will build a bespoke foe to square off against. It could be something new altogether, nobody knows! Now, based on the consequences of the Decision Game, there will be some... difficulties imposed on you during this challenge, but let's not worry about that. Let's roll those bones."
Merle volunteered to go first. The die in front of Merle had names of different monsters on it. He rolled the die and got "slime." The box glowed bright green and disappeared.
Magnus went next, rolling the box with adjectives on it. He got "poisonous" and the box disappeared.
Taako went last and rolled "regenerating." He sighed with relief and said, "Oh, that could have gone so much worse."
The machinery roared to life. Sounds of industry filled the air around them as the monster was being created.
"Aw, that's so disappointing," The female elf whined. "I've seen a regenerating poisonous slime before."
"Oh, well that's nothing to worry about," The male elf said, and Kravitz didn't like the sound of that. "They didn't win the decision game. So they're gonna do it again."
The three adventurers rolled again and got exponentially worse results.
"Hell yeah!" The male elf exclaimed. "A flying, electrified dire bear! Wonderful! That would be what you would have to face if you both chose "betray", but unfortunately you all are getting the sharp end of the stick, so to speak. So, one more dice."
Another die appeared, this time rolling itself before anyone could read what was on it. As soon as it landed, the elves squealed in delight, filling the adventurers with dread.
"Oh, this is delicious!" The male elf said. "Not only are you facing off against a regenerating, poisonous slime and a flying, electrified dire bear, you're going to face off against multiplying regenerating, poisonous slimes and multiplying flying, electrified dire bears. This is gonna get zany!"
The machines whirred to life again and two beasts fell out of the hatch. The first was a fifteen foot cube of slime that emitted a horrible stench. The other was a giant dire bear with beautiful angelic wings. Bolts of electricity crackled around the bear as it roared, shaking the room.
Taako gripped the umbrastaff. He looked over to the other two adventurers. Magnus had his shield out and Merle was flipping through his Extreme Teen Bible. Then Taako turned back to the monsters in front of them and prepared for battle.