Taylor Hebert Dungeon Girl Part 3 (Patreon)

Taylor smiled as she stepped into her dungeon and saw one of Emma’s stupid minions just standing down the hallway. ‘At least I managed to recreate the dungeon.’ It had been nice to see Kurt and Lacey since she hadn’t seen either of them since her mother’s funeral. Sure, there had been a couple of awkward moments where they’d mentioned how long it had been since they’d seen her and lying about the art project hadn’t been particularly fun though it wasn’t really a lie considering she was planning on making things out of the steel beam but overall it was nice to see her father with some friends. Thankfully they hadn’t stayed more than a couple of hours which meant she still had plenty of time to work on her dungeon before she had to crash for the night. 

She summoned her bow and a quiver filled with arrows. “Okay, let’s see how well this works. I could hit a target at camp.” She pulled an arrow out of her quiver, lined the prongs up with the string like she remembered then drew back the bow, aimed at the first girl down the hallway then let go of the string and arrow which sent it into the leg of the second girl that she hadn’t been aiming at. “Fuck.” She scowled as the two girls charged her. Thankfully the one she hit with the arrow in the leg was limping and thus slower. She drew another arrow, fumbled it into place, drew the bow back and shot the girl charging her in the shoulder. She brought her bow up and blocked the girl’s swing then smacked her across the face with it. She could almost hear the camp’s archery teacher screaming at her about bows not being melee weapons but she’d summoned it, she could always resummon it if it broke.

She finished beating the girl until she turned into pixels then grabbed an arrow from her quiver, loaded it and then pulled her bow back and tried to aim at the girl that was still limping towards her. She left go of the string and smiled as the arrow hit the girl in her stomach turning her into pixels. “That was harder than I remember.” She walked over and picked up the seven dollars the girls had dropped then loaded an arrow and continued toward the end of the hallway. “I need some practice.” She peeked around the corner and saw a girl twenty feet down next to a door that might or might not be window dressing. She carefully lined up her shot as best she could then fired. She was annoyed but unsurprised when the arrow missed the girl. “Fuck it.” She grabbed her staff off her back and blasted the girl with lightning. She smiled as the girl dropped a nice black skirt. She put the staff back on her back and velcroed it in place then walked over and picked up the skirt. 

She set her bow on the ground then swapped the dress to her off hand and grabbed a marker out of her pocket. She looked at the wall. “I almost feel bad about this.” She drew a couple of large circles on the wall for a makeshift target then picked up her bow and headed back down the hallway to drop the skirt in her garbage bag loot sack and get some practice. Twenty minutes of shooting at the target had improved her aim from maybe hitting the wall to at least hitting a two foot square area. “That’s better… I guess.” She had a feeling using the bow was going to be a work in progress. 

She loaded another arrow then headed down the hallway toward her next target. “I wish I had an experience bar for archery.” She smiled as she saw an Emma copy walk into the end of the hallway then turn around. She fired and smiled when the arrow stuck into the target’s side and turned her into pixels which dropped a bill. “One shot kill. Maybe I am getting the hang of this.”

The next twenty minutes of running around the school shooting people disabused her of that notion, sure, she was getting better at shooting stationary targets but moving targets were still very much hit and miss, mostly miss. The only real saving grace to the method was that it wasn’t expending resources and it was quiet. Even the ‘mana’ she’d spent summoning the bow had already regenerated. Thankfully she was getting some decent drops or at least stuff she could sell.

Another fifteen minutes saw her saw swapping to her lightning staff in frustration and gleefully clearing the minions in the boss room with lightning. She turned her lightning staff on Sophia after she accidently pulled her and was rather amazed when it worked really really well, like full health to nothing in three seconds. She blinked as Sophia screamed and pixelized dropping a book, a mask, a shadowy cloak and a vial. “That was suspiciously easy.” She looked around suspiciously for the real boss to jump out or for something weird to happen. After about ten seconds of nothing jumping out at her she walked over to the pile of loot and picked up the book and read the title, “Archery… are you fucking kidding me?” 

She took a breath then let it out and opened the book. She smiled as she realized she had a much better idea of how to shoot and how to adjust for a moving target. “Okay, not sure I want to admit that I got archery tips from Sophia… wait, why did I get tips from her? Only archery cape in town is Shadow Stalker… shit, black smoke, walking through things, what would explain why no one called her on shit and how they could steal stuff out of my locker, she’s a fucking cape.” 

Taylor took a deep breath as she resisted the urge to scream or kick the loot or do anything else that she’d regret. She let the breath out slowly then took another as she thought about all of the times the teachers had looked the other way. She really didn’t want it to but the pieces were fitting together in a way that made her sick. “Okay, maybe it’s just my power fucking with me, I’ll check later.”

She picked up the smiling theater mask and looked at the popup. “Theater mask of Disguise. Not only does this mask allow you to see out of it perfectly despite having ‘glass’ eyes and breathe despite not having any holes for air, it allows you to alter your skin and hair color as well as your hairstyle while it’s worn.” She grinned as she looked at the armor rating which was higher than the glass helmet she’d grabbed from the goblin dungeon. “Okay, that’s a nice start.” She picked up the shadowy cloak that looked more than a little supernatural as it looked like it was made out of a combination of black silk and shadows. “Shadowy cloak, this ‘armored’ cloak gives a bonus to hiding in shadows. At least it looks better than Shadow Stalker’s actual cloak, pretty sure that was just camouflaged fabric.”

Taylor picked up the vial and looked at the popup. ‘Vial of shadow dye, this dye changes an item’s appearance to be shadowy thus giving a bonus to hide.’ She glanced at the shadowy cloak. “Probably like the cloak, could be useful even if I want to hit the bitch in the face. Calm down, you don’t know that Sophia is a cape.” She tried to ignore the voice in her head telling her that the pieces fit. She equipped the mask and cloak then worked on collecting the money, knives and dropped clothing from the girls and tried not to think about the fact that Sophia might very well be one of the local ‘heroes’. 

Danny jumped when a cloaked and masked figure came out of the broom closet, it wasn’t until he saw the large trash bag filled with clothes she had slung over her shoulder that he realized it was most likely just his daughter. “Taylor?”

Taylor smiled which caused the mask to smile. “Yes?”

“Why is your mask smiling?” Danny asked warily.

“It smiles? Awesome. I found it on the boss.”

“You killed a boss without me?”

Taylor set her bag of clothes on the floor. “I didn’t mean to pull her and she died in like three seconds to lightning so it wasn’t that bad.” She frowned as she thought about the fact that Sophia might very well be a cape.

“Ah, why the frown?”

“Sophia might be Shadow Stalker, the crossbows and her powers fit and it would explain how things kept going missing from my locker.”

“Or your dungeon needed a boss?” Danny asked hoping Sophia wasn’t an official ‘hero’ even if he agreed with his daughter about the pieces fitting together in a way he didn’t want to deal with.

“If there is no connection, why Shadow Stalker? I’d barely heard about her before I looked up the local capes which was after I’d made the dungeon the first time. Why not have the powers of a local villain?”

“Shadow Stalker is supposed to be a hero.”

“And the teachers ignored all of the crap they did, her being a ‘hero’ explains some of the insanity.”

He rubbed his face. “How do you prove it without getting yourself in trouble?”

“No idea, hit her with a taser for being a bitch?” Taylor asked sarcastically.

“That would likely just get you in trouble with the cops. If I hadn’t already decided that you’re never going back there, this would do it.”

“You believe me?”

“I believe it’s worth looking into, if it was just your subconscious, wouldn’t Emma have been the cape?”

“Or Sophia would have had Master powers,” Taylor agreed. She’d spent way too many hours when Emma first started giving her shit wondering what had screwed up her previous best friend to assume that her subconscious wouldn’t go with master powers if there wasn’t something to the idea of Sophia being Shadow Stalker.

“On a different note, how are you doing with the bow?” Danny asked trying to change the subject away from Sophia.

“I’m getting better but I’m still going to need to practice before I consider using it in the real world.” Taylor really didn’t want to accidentally shoot a civilian because she hadn’t practiced enough.

“Considering arrows are rather lethal unless you’re using them against a brute, I’d rather you didn’t use them against real people unless you’re out of better options.” He was really hoping she’d pick up some decent non lethal options if she wanted to be an official hero which she probably would at some point.

“Agreed,” Taylor replied as she glanced up at the clock. “I should have enough time for another run or two before I should grab some sleep.”

“Sounds good, I’m going to watch the news, then I’ll probably get some sleep. We can try something interesting tomorrow.” 

“I’m looking forward to it,” Taylor replied as she closed the broom closet. She couldn’t help thinking about her father’s last comment and the dresses as she said “Emma” and opened the door revealing a dungeon. She stepped into the dungeon then frowned as she realized she wasn’t in Winslow though she was in a mostly empty hallway.  She focused on the stuffed animal she could see halfway down the hallway. “Weird and a little suspicious.”

She summoned her bow and quivers then carefully advanced down the hallway. Even being careful she wasn’t prepared for the stuffed bear to lunge at her from ten feet away and sprout three inch claws as it flew through the air at her face. Thankfully her instinctive reaction was to try to hit it with her bow rather than just scream or jump back. She jumped back and shot an arrow at the stuffed creature as it prepared to jump at her. She was a little surprised when her arrow hit it in the chest and the thing’s life meter only went down by a third. She grabbed her knife off her belt as the creature jumped at her. She blocked with her bow as best she could then stabbed it with her knife as it grabbed onto her bow. Sadly stabbing the creature wasn’t all that effective either. Thankfully slashing sideways was a lot more effective at least judging by it losing half its health in a single slash. She stabbed it again finishing off the last remaining sliver of its health bar.

Taylor glared at the button the bear left when it died. “I’m going to hate this dungeon.” She let her bow vanish then pulled her shield off her back and swapped her dagger for her sword. She wasn’t really looking forward to getting into melee with the stuffed animals but slashing them seemed to do the most damage. She carefully made her way around the corner and blocked the fluffy stuffed bat that made a beeline for her eyes. She slashed the thing out of the air then frowned slightly at the bit of cotton stuffing it dropped. She stared at the hallway filled with stuffed animals, patrolling dresses and ‘innocent’ looking long sleeved blouses that were probably anything but innocent.  

“Yeah, this is going to be a long dungeon.” Thankfully the stuffed animals had cotton for brains so it wasn’t all that hard to block with her shield block then slash them or otherwise cut them apart though she was rather thankful for her armor by the end of the hallway because some of them had wicked sharp claws. The blouses were probably the worst as the arms stretched and tried to strangle her whenever she got close and would run away to try to ambush her if she tried to shoot them from range. The only upside about the blouses was they dropped mage cloth which was a rather neat shimmery fabric that would look rather neat if she ever got enough of it to make a costume out of.

Sadly, none of the stuffed animals were all that vulnerable to lightning otherwise she would have just stayed back and shot everything from range. Still, they were decently vulnerable to her sword and rather stupid so it didn’t take more than an hour to make her way to the gym where an old white haired man dressed in an old fashioned charcoal grey suit was sewing together a stuffed chimera. “Crap.”

The old man looked looked up with an eerie smile. “Visitors, so nice of you to stop by so my cat can play.”

Taylor gulped as the pony sized stuffed chimera stood up and snorted a gout of flame. “Shit, nice kitty?” She backed out of the room then shut the door. ‘Okay, I need a better plan than charging in there and trying to slash something that can breathe fire.” She winced as the chimera slammed into the door, thankfully it didn’t actually have all that much mass which meant she didn’t have any trouble holding the door closed. ‘So much for it resetting.’ 

She leaned against the door as she mentally went over her collection of weapons and supplies. ‘A couple of healing potions in my pack, some cloth, a staff that probably can’t hurt it and a spell to summon a bow that probably can’t do all that much damage to it. I’m going to need something to wedge the door shut if I want to make it out of here.’ She smiled as she glanced down and saw a wooden wedge on each side of the doors. ‘That should work, wait, it can’t be that easy.’ She reached down and grabbed one of the wedges and wedged the door open six inches then ran down the hallway hoping that her plan would actually work.

She dashed around the corner then peeked back around it. She smiled as she saw the chimera with one of it’s heads sticking out of the gap between the door and the frame as it tried to follow her. “Agh!” she jumped back as it breathed fire at her then blushed slightly as she realized that the stream of fire wasn’t even close to long enough to reach her. “Okay, let’s see how much damage I can do with the bow.” She put her shield on her back using her character sheet then summoned her bow and stepped back into the hallway. 

Taylor drew an arrow then shot the boss and frowned when a bare sliver of its heath went down. “That’s going to take forever...” she trailed off as it breathed fire at her, thankfully the fire only reached about 10 feet and didn’t seem able to set the building on fire. She pulled a scrap of crappy cloth out of her backpack and an arrow from her quiver then wrapped the cloth around the arrow then knocked the cloth wrapped arrow. “If I time this right, I can set it on fire…”

Three minutes later and a decent number of cloth scraps later she managed to catch one of the pieces of cloth on fire by shooting it through the chimera’s flame breath. She smiled as she saw the little flame icon under the chimera’s health bar, not that she really needed the icon as there were visible flames on the chimera. “Finally! Die!” She continued shooting at the boss, more for practice than because it was doing a significant amount of damage to it. She sighed in relief when the chimera turned into pixels. 

Taylor ignored the cloth and plushy toy that dropped as she ran over to the door and looked at the tailor sitting in the middle of the room with a half finished stuffed dragon in his lap. She slipped back into the gym then raised her bow and shot him in the head. She blinked as he turned into pixels and ‘dropped’ a chest. ‘Okay, that could have been bad.’ She glanced around the rest of the gym making sure there weren’t anything else that was going to jump out at her. ‘Okay, at least I won.” She glanced down at the chimera plushy and the bolt of mage cloth that it had dropped. “That’s nice.” She cautiously picked up the plushy and looked at the popup. “Suspiciously cute chimera plushy that likes to eat nightmares.”

“It really is sort of cute,” Taylor muttered to herself as she put it in her backpack. She picked up the bolt of mage cloth with a smile then walked over to open the chest. She frowned as she realized the chest was locked and she didn’t have a key. “I need some lockpicks or a drill.” She pushed on the chest and was a little surprised that it shifted. “Must not be very full. Still, it’s too heavy to haul out of here, I’m going to need the cart.”

Thankfully going back and getting the cart, her father and a drill wasn’t all that hard. She winced as the drill bit broke without leaving a mark on the chest’s lock. “Sorry.”

Danny set the portable drill on the cart. “I figured it was worth a shot, I probably needed a new bit anyways. Any idea why you didn’t get the key?”

“No clue, they might drop off the stuffed animals the boss makes or maybe the chest is random loot and I need to learn to pick locks?”

“Decent guesses, what we need is a locksmith or a dungeon with magical keys or lockpicks.”

“Wait a second, I think I can make some lockpicks,” Taylor replied as she opened her crafting menu and started looking for the lockpick pattern.

“That could be useful, not exactly heroic but useful,” Danny admitted as he moved the chest to the cart.

Taylor frowned as she found the section for keys and lockpicks. “Okay, the lock has to be open to make a key but making lockpicks is easy and extremely cheap.”

“Can you actually pick locks?”

“How hard can it be?” Taylor asked warily.

Danny started laughing as they left.

0o0o0

Randal Martin looked up as a teenage girl walked into his shop pulling a handcart with something that looked suspiciously like a treasure chest. “Don’t see that everyday, something I can help you with?”

Taylor stepped into the locksmith’s shop far enough that the door could close then looked at the tall athletic looking man with broad shoulders. “Yeah, my employer picked this up at an auction and it didn’t come with a key. Can you open it?”

Randal raised an eyebrow as he looked at the old fashioned treasure chest then shrugged. “Let me grab my picks.” He reached over to the shelf and grabbed his lockpicking kit then walked around the counter and bent down to look at the lock on the chest. “Shouldn’t take me more than a minute.” He grinned as a few seconds later the lid opened and he got a look inside. He blinked as he noticed the contents of the chest. “Is the chest bigger on the inside?”

“Maybe? It was locked, how would I know?” Taylor asked as innocently as she could.

“So, I’ve got to ask, where did you get a chest that is larger on the inside and where can I get one?”

“My employer got it…” Taylor trailed off as she realized he wasn’t buying it.

“Kid, I hate to tell you but you’re not the greatest liar in the world.”

“Fine, I found it in a dungeon after I killed a large stuffed chimera, happy?” Taylor asked sarcastically.

Randal grinned as he realized she was actually telling the truth. “Okay, cool, where is the dungeon? Let’s go.”

Taylor blinked in shock. “What do mean, let’s go?”

“It’s a dungeon, it’s going to be awesome. It wouldn’t be fair if I didn’t get to play too.”

Taylor blinked in shock. “Um, dungeon. It’s dangerous…” she trailed off unsure what to say.

“Oh, right we should gear up.” He walked over his cabinet, opened it then pulled out a set of biker’s leathers that he’d built armor into. “This is going to be awesome.”

“Don’t you have a shop to run?”

“So, flip the sign to closed, where do we have to go?” He pulled the jacket on then slipped a laser gun into his pocket.

‘Dad is going to freak.’ Taylor opened her mouth to argue then closed it as she realized that she could ‘find’ the dungeon entrance somewhere so it could could just be a one off thing. She looked into the chest and grabbed the book, ornate white robe and sewing kit then put them in her backpack. “What about the chest?”

“What about it, it should be safe enough here. Where are we going?”

Taylor turned and walked out which is when her father walked up. “Hi.”

“Did you get the chest open?” Danny asked as he looked past Taylor at who he was guessing was the locksmith as the man stepped out of the shop.

“Yes but the chest was larger on the inside and he opened it,” Taylor explained.

Randal shrugged. “Professional curiosity, sorry. It’s not everyday that someone comes in with a treasure chest and I like treasure chests. Right, dungeon, I’ll wave my fee if I can take a look at the dungeon, she was going to tell me where it was.”

Danny stared at the man that was in his early to mid twenties that looked way too excited about going to a dungeon with his daughter. “Do you have id?”

“Oh right, sure.” Randal quickly pulled out his wallet and showed Danny his license and his locksmith license. “Sorry, just the chance to explore an actual dungeon is really neat.”

Danny looked over Randal Martin’s licenses as he wondered how much coffee and sugar the man had consumed recently. “Up to you if you want to show him where you found the dungeon.”

Taylor glanced back and forth between her father and the shopkeeper. “Sure, it’s a bit of a drive.”

“Let me grab the chest and lock up,” Randal walked back inside, pulled out his phone and sent a text to his best friend, ‘Going dungeon delving, be back later.’ He put his phone back in his pocket then locked the door, picked up the chest and walked back out. He was looking forward to going to an actual dungeon.

Danny was less than amused as they got into his car and he drove toward the old ferry station. It was public enough that people hung out there now and then but private enough that they probably wouldn’t get interrupted while they explored a dungeon especially if Taylor opened the door on the side of the building.

Taylor for her part was just hoping things didn’t blow up in her face and that she could convince Randal that they’d just found the dungeon and were otherwise completely normal. On the upside, if things didn’t go completely sideways having a locksmith in the know about the dungeons would be nice.