Looking into the laundry room, we still couldn’t see any danger. That might be because there was none, or because the danger came from traps or similar hazards we had yet to detect. It was just like this entire place, eerily quiet and filled with an, now moist, air of foreboding. Even without the mist I had just conjured, there would be a chill in the air, one strong enough to send shivers down the spine of even the most valiant soul and yet, we had to prevail.

Once again, Silva took the lead, sniffing the air and likely relishing the fact that the moisture made all the scents even more pronounced, allowing her to detect even the most minute traces of danger. From her growls, I could tell that the only danger she could detect came from some laundry detergent that might be caustic enough to harm somebody’s skin. Again, there didn’t seem to be any enemies present and when I scanned the floor and ceiling, I had to conclude that there were no visible traps. Stomping on the ground for a moment, I sent out a pulse of Earth Magic, trying to determine whether there were any pitfalls or false walls, ready to unleash hell on us but the pulse petered out almost instantly, the magic devoured by the environment.

Letting out a sigh, I remained at the door, my eyes scanning the room while I protected Luna, allowing Lia, Silva and Alex to search the room in peace. On one pass of my eyes, I noticed something strange on the wall above the washing machines, some marking that just caught my attention.

After the first search through the room was done, I called out to the others and we shifted our formation, allowing me to move freely while the others guarded my back. That way, I could fully focus on the odd markings and study them at my leisure.

And odd, they were. The more I looked at them, the more I became convinced that there was a pattern to them, almost like one of those puzzles where you had to shift one tile around in order to complete a picture. Only that the tiles weren’t really moveable, at least not on any sort of mechanism, nor was I able to determine what sort of image it might become.

Reaching out, I gently touched one of the markings, after doing a few tests to make sure there was no danger involved. Feeling it, I realised that just touching it let a tiny amount of my Astral Power flow into the marking, accepting it with incredible ease. With my Astral Power within the marking, I could feel a little more about it, to the point that I quickly became convinced I could move and even subtly alter it.

Before even trying to move it, or alter it in any way, I stepped back and took another look at the entire thing. There was a pattern there, I could tell now, a sequence of numbers of shapes that screamed of disorder to me. Looking at the shapes and the numbers my mind began to connect to them, and I recognised a possible pattern. If arranged correctly, the numbers would form a sequence where two were the sum of the following number, until they reached the last. Only, the last shape of the marking wasn’t quite right, it didn’t fit with the rest but the difference was minute.

Stepping forward once more, I infused my Astral Power into each of the markings, feeling them come alive under my hands, and began to shift them around. It was incredibly weird, the markings moved along the wall without disturbing the material in any way, flowing smoother than sand but as they moved they didn’t shift at all, as if cast in concrete. Things worked out perfectly until I reached the last marking, the wrong marking, and at that point, I had to suddenly push in a lot more Astral Power, almost as if the marking didn’t want to cooperate. With additional power, still only a smidgen of what I could accomplish, it worked but now I had to keep the marking from changing until I had moved it into position and could shift it into what I considered to be the right shape, the one fitting with all the rest.

Once that was accomplished, I felt the Astral Power I had channelled into the markings coalesce, glowing almost as if I had completed a Runic Circle, before fading away. The moment the glow was gone, the wall where the last marking was crumbled away, leaving a smooth opening that revealed a space roughly the size of two shoeboxes.

Looking inside from a few metres distance, I saw multiple items and after making sure nothing was about to jump at me I plucked them out.

The first was, to my amusement, a towel. Or at least it looked like one, when I used Inspect on it, it was labelled as the Towel of the Traveller, a cloak that increased the Resilience of the wearer by two points. Just looking at it, felt a little flabbergasted, it was nothing but a towel with a pair of clothespins attached, and yet, it was also a magical item of relative remarkable quality.

“Lia, that towel might be best for you or Silva,” I lobbed it over, still not quite sure what to make of it, so I pulled out the second item, hoping that it wasn’t as ludicrous.

Luckily, it wasn’t, it was outright normal. Well, normal for a world that wasn’t insane, in our current world, it couldn’t consider it that. It was a nice, black leather coat, a little too large for me but if I wanted to wear it, I definitely could. Inspecting it revealed it as the Imperial Trenchcoat, giving some protection against weapons while also increasing the wearer’s Charisma and Strength by one point each. Handing it over to Lia, who promptly donned it, I had to facepalm, just a little when I realised that the coat had eagle insignia on both shoulders, in matte gold. The German Imperial Eagle. I wasn’t quite firm on heraldry, but I was relatively certain that it was its name. At least it wasn’t carrying a swastika or lighting bolts or anything along those lines. Still, the coat perfectly fit Lia and it was a lot better than anything we had access to, so needs must and all that.

Lastly, the third item was a key. An incredibly dirty one but when I touched it to take it out, I felt a weird sensation flow through me and realised that I had just gained a fairly large amount of EXP. Not quite enough to give me a level up but going by the surprised looks on Luna’s face, it was enough for her. The noises made by Lia and Alex indicated something similar, bringing a grin to my face. This might have been the equivalent of a boss fight, though I wasn’t sure. Maybe there were some hints in the room that would have helped to find the solution or there was something else we didn’t know, maybe in the rooms we had bypassed.

Either way, after solving the riddle we continued our search of the room and came up empty. But we now had a key that might fit into the lock of one of the closed doors we had encountered, hopefully allowing us to continue on our path through the eerie hotel.

We quickly tested whether the key might open the door in the back of the laundry room but it didn’t fit. Maybe once the thick layer of grime was removed, something we unsuccessfully tried, so for now, the door remained closed and back into the hallway we went.

Keeping cautious, Silva took the lead again with a shield of Ice hovering above her, something that proved a good idea the moment she came close to the first door. Just a few minutes ago, the room had been perfectly calm and empty but now, a length of cloth shot out of it, trying to strike Silva. I managed to block it with the shield but I could feel the impact. It wouldn’t have broken Silva, she was tough like that, but it would have seriously hurt.

Taking up positions around the door, we burst into the room, my Ice Shield leading the way but there was no active danger inside. The length of cloth, a bedsheet, that had tried to strike Silva just moments ago was on the floor, lying limply as if it couldn’t harm a fly, it didn’t even twitch when Silva sunk her teeth into it and viciously shook it with an angry growl.

Just another trap and despite going over everything in the room once again, we didn’t come across anything that indicated something was amiss. Just the murder bedsheet, now no longer as murderous.

Carefully and prepared to dodge any and all murderous laundry, we made our way back to the reception, ready to continue our exploration.