If anybody had been watching while we performed our next set of tests, they’d have thought us monsters. Given that we had no idea what the grass around the hotel might be, the first thing we needed to do was make sure the area was safe to approach and we wouldn’t die outright, simply for stepping into it.

Catching a squirrel without damaging it was surprisingly easy. a simple blast of my Mind Magic knocked it out and once we had it, we only had to wait a little for it to wake up. Its chittering was a little annoying but given that we wanted it active, we couldn’t do much about it, well, other than have Lia toss it into the grassy area around the hotel and wait. The squirrel demonstrated remarkable aerobatics, righting its flight by using its bushy tail but without anything to push against other than air, there was little it could do to keep itself from landing in the grass.

Moments after its landing, the thing shot off, fleeing the area as quickly as its short legs could carry it. Interestingly, it stayed well away from the hotel, taking a course that wouldn’t bring it closer to us or it during its escape. Maybe the little critter had some idea that the hotel was dangerous, though neither Silva nor Alex indicated that they could feel anything from it. Even Luna and her divinely granted eyes couldn’t detect anything useful, she only reported a weird sensation in her gut when looking at it. Sadly, we couldn’t be sure whether that sensation came from worrying about it beforehand and her body or mind now reacting to her worries or if she sensed something disturbing about the building.

Either way, the squirrel got away easily, not showing any troubles on its way back into the trees and didn’t appear to be harmed so we decided that we could move into the area without succumbing instantly. Unless the grass was somehow restricted to targeting humanoids or something, but in that case, Silva could easily drag us out, hell, with enough time and a lot of effort even Alex could manage. It would be fairly painful for us, but they had the strength, even if their mass was a little lacking when it came to providing adequate traction.

Regardless of our first experiment, we proceeded with caution. The first of us to jump down was Lia, to make sure there was no trouble, she wrapped a rope around herself beforehand, just in case. While she landed without trouble, she immediately called back that the hotel’s creepy aura was a lot more pronounced on the grass, making me wonder if there was some actual magical effect. After waiting a few minutes to make sure there were no additional problems, Luna followed after Lia, leaving me as our best healer behind.

While I wasn’t overly happy that Luna might be walking into danger, our experiment with Lia demonstrated that Lia was safe, and if it turned out that her safety was due to some vampiric trait, Lia could easily get Luna out, allowing me to heal her in safety. Alex and Silva also came trotting out from between the trees, Alex riding on Silva’s back for once.

Again, the only detrimental effect reported was the creepy aura, meaning it was almost certainly safe for me to join them and for us to continue towards the suspected dungeon. Jumping down from the branch I had been on, I did just that, easily landing in the soft grass before focusing on the hotel.

The difference in sensation was incredible. Up, on the branch, the hotel had looked somewhat creepy, the vines and shrubs growing on and around it a little threatening, but from my new vantage point, the darkness around the building seemed deeper, almost as if it was about to devour me. And for me, who frequently ventured into the shadows, to consider darkness as creepy meant there was some sort of fear or mind-altering effect involved, I didn’t fear the dark, I revelled within the shadows.

Closing my eyes for a moment, I started to focus on my own mind. Mind Magic was incredibly useful when working with other minds, but I could also direct it towards my own. It was something I was incredibly careful with, simply because messing with my own mind using magic could have all sorts of unintended consequences, but simply looking shouldn’t be too dangerous. Using the lens of my Mind Magic to observe what was going on, I could easily detect a pressure, for lack of a better word, pushing against my mind. It was difficult to interpret what it was pushing on, but my best guess was that it increased primal fears. Fear of the dark, in this case, perhaps fear of the unknown as well. Not terribly dangerous, but it certainly increased the trepidation felt when looking at the creepy hotel.

Armed with the new information, I carefully used a bit of magic to neutralise the pressure, very careful to keep my Mind Magic well away from what I perceived as my mind. I had no desire to accidentally reduce my own sense of caution by decreasing the threshold at which I considered something dangerous or something along those lines.

That done, the sensation faded and the building looked just like it had before jumping down into the grass. A little creepy but it was far from enough to make me uncomfortable. Replicating the same action with my companions was simple for Lia and Luna but a little more difficult when it came to Silva and Alex, simply because their mental structures were so different from mine. Still, once I had found the magical effect, neutralising it worked just as it had within my own mind. On the plus side, I got a point in my Mind Magic when working on my own mind and another when I finished with the minds of my companions, pushing the skill to a respectable fifty-one.

With the initial obstacle dealt with, Lia continued forward, the rest of us following behind at a distance. At the same time, Luna began channelling a bit of Life Magic into one of the seeds she usually used, ready to deploy it in an instant. She had yet to really find her niche, but maybe the forest of creepy plants would help her with that. My own contribution to our security was a conjured shield of Ice that I wielded with my Ice Magic, ready to cover Lia at a moment’s notice. Hopefully, our precautions would prove needless but it was better to prepare and not need the caution than to blunder forward and get a deadly surprise.

As we got close to the building, the vines near the various windows seemed to tense, or maybe that was just my imagination. They didn’t react when Lia kept moving towards the door, but when she stepped too close to one of the windows, she had to dodge a strike.

“Do we want to try destroying them from up close?” she asked her cleaver at the ready.

After a moment of consideration, I decided that we should at least make an attempt. It was a little dangerous, especially if the trap vines were somehow linked to other traps that might trigger when we attacked the vines but it was worth testing.

“Go ahead but all of us should be ready to flee it things turn sour,” I replied. Given my previous attempts, I knew that trying to destroy the vines with magic wouldn’t work, so I conjured another shield, ready to defend Lia if something unexpected happened.

Lia stepped closer to the window again and, just as before, the vine struck out, only this time Lia didn’t simply leap back, she merely side-stepped the strike while her cleaver flashed out, striking the vine with impressive strength. Sadly, the result was a little underwhelming, there might have been a bit of damage to it, but nothing that made me think Lia could get through it. Out of curiosity, I used Observe on the vine, now that we were close up I was confident that I’d get a proper reading, only for the ability to do nothing. It was as if there was no creature there for me to observe, nothing that I could get a read on.

“Guess that didn’t work,” Lia admitted, stepping further back.

“Only way in is the door, unless we want to play hardcore dodgeball. Maybe that’s the intention, you can enter through the windows but it’d be incredibly difficult,” I mused, before deciding to try something. If the vines couldn’t be damaged, maybe it was possible to work around them.

Using the two shields as a beginning, I started to conjure a frame of Ice, hoping that I could create a short tunnel for us to enter through the window, without the vines smacking us. Sadly, the attempt failed just as everything else had failed, the vines simply destroyed the tunnel before Ii could even get it to connect with the window.

Leaving us with the door and no other option to enter.