Verity awoke to a very different world. The room was suddenly ten times larger than she recalled. The table seemed dozens of feet above her head. The keyhole was now the same rough size she was and she moved to peer inside the dark recesses of the unknown. It seemed like the only choice she had as the door was not going to open on its own to let her out. Her clothes and bag stayed with her at least, shrinking along with her body. The potion bottle remained inside, its innocent appearance masking the threat it held. She breathed in a long mournful breath and jumped into the unknown. The drop was only a foot at her former size and much less than she was expecting. The sharp shock of the landing startled her but caused no actual damage.

The mini room hidden under the other one had two doors. One was just a doorway leading down a dark tunnel that she realized was the pipe she had seen before and the other sat opposite it towards the side she had entered. This door held an additional keyhole that she immediately knew matched the bottle. What would have happened if I had not stuck the potion bottle in my satchel? Verity thought to herself.

She reached into the bag to pull it out and fitted it into the hole. It was as she had anticipated. The makeshift and very fragile key fit perfectly and she felt the door give way to allow her entry. She was greated by another meesege written in the same script as the previous.

Seek The Key To Unlock What Is Next, Climb The Wall To Perish Fast

You have passed the first stage and proven wise beyond your age

Keep this key to free your soul, but wary be, to do too soon

Whilst the body's trapped, the mind is safe,

Madness lies within us all, but too the small it cannot swell

Travel through the paths ahead

Be warned the beasts have not been fed

Challenges will be offered

But the key provides protection though to do so forfeits a future action

Mind the skies and tell no lies

Then if lucky, you may not die

Look beyond to find your prize,

but be warned it is also your demise

Verity committed the words to memory and moved to the back to get her reward the line about it bringing her demise was worrying, but at the same time was not. It could mean anything, nothing, or something in the middle. She would die sometime in the future and maybe this 'prize' would be responsible yet that could be years or decades away. Truths were not always a hundred percent true. The area past the words was a small alcove built into this second mini room and it contained a small flowing fountain that was expelling a solution similar to the other potion but strangely inverted. The light from the room seemed to be sucked into it and a cold feeling overtook her as she watched it move.

It was apparent to her that she was supposed to fill her potion bottle with this and it would let her have a free pass on any of the challenges or should she not need that, then it would revert her back to her tall former self. She thought that was all she would be receiving at first and was confused as to why the words had implied a second prize, but then a slight inconsistency in the corner caught her attention.

A cloak of the same color as the ground and fitted to her size was there. The cloak molded perfectly to her small shoulders and reached just above her ankles in length. She loved it and realized it was magical when it changed color slightly to match the shadows in the room. My first magical item! She was overjoyed and awed by the find. Magic items were rare and expensive. Even the human nobles she had served would only have an article or two of clothing or jewelry in their collection. Specialized enchanters or master mages would be needed normally to produce a product capable of holding permanent or semi permanent enchantments. Dungeons simplified things some, but they still needed a large sum of energy to produce something like this so Dungeon lords rarely wasted the resources unless it was for a vital item.

With her supposedly death causing the cloak and potion, she proceeded to enter the other doorway towards the unknown labyrinth beyond.

****

"AH! Oh my sand, no no no no no, ouch. Ouch! You damned bug get away! Oh shit! No, bad bug! No no no no!" Verity was running, fighting, screaming, and running some more. She had been in the maze for a few hours which at her size translated to an hour's slow walk at a normal height, yet was filled with infinitely more perils. Bugs were now the bane of her existence. Three were chasing her as she cursed at them wishing she could communicate with them to make her anger known to the dumb beasts trying to murder her.

She had been doing well for a while, so when she ran across an ant that was about the size of a small child, she was not all that alarmed. When said ant became two and then three, well, she became concerned. At one point there had been dozens chasing her, yet she had dwindled the numbers over time. Her stamina was flagging, but they seemed tireless and followed her regardless of what she did.

She had tried to climb the hedges and shrubbery that lines the paths, only to realize belatedly that ants can climb. How had she never thought of that? Perspectives changed when suddenly everything was a threat. She repeatedly found her hand grazing the potion bottle thoughtfully as she pondered drinking ti to regain her size to crush these ants for their crimes, but she remembered the rhyme and continued running.

Her legs burned from the lack of energy in her as well as the repeated stress and sprints she was doing to keep out of range. At long last, she found a respite in the form of a large beast trudging slowly down the lane ahead of her. The vibrations from ins plodding steps sent shockwaves along the ground and while it was difficult for her, the ants were struggling much more. She was able to lose them by timing her running to the beat of the creature's large feet. She refused to get too close as it could increase the danger, but she ran in its wake before slowing to a walk to trail it. It may be a mindless dungeon creature or perhaps had some base intelligence, but either way, it would likely lead her deeper into the dungeon before it went off to circle its territory. She planned to walk in its wake for as long as she could. Her new cartography skill became very useful now that she had the time to begin to draw her trip through the maze.