Hall Duty, Part 1

Hundreds of passageways. All look the same. Only one leads home. The others... well, Jake had never seen anyone come back from one, anyway. He tried to avoid going any further down them than necessary.

He was just the janitor, after all. No need to go getting overly curious.

It was a strange job, sometimes, working for the Grand Magus of Chaos. Most days it just involved cleaning up various nameless oozes that found there way into the shifting corridors of the palace. Some days, like today, he had to follow a strict set of protocols to reset one of the Magus's many death traps.

Corridor #15 was always the worst. There was this high-pitched screeching that always echoed through that one. Jake would run both ways to the primary glyphs. Fortunately, just a splash of cat's blood and a thirty second chant was enough to set that one right.

Number 37 was almost peaceful. Gentle melodies wafted through the air on the scent of fresh-baked cookies. It didn't need reworked very often, though, as adventurers never trusted it. Their loss, really. The eternally youthful kittens running around it were such a joy.

Of course, chances were that one was certain death, too, but at least it seemed a more pleasant way to spend one's final minutes.