The Mad Rat’s Lab

 

*Bzzzt!*

An electric arc hits me after pulling a lever.

“Aaagh! Shit! It’s the wrong one again!” I pull the lever next to the one I just pulled and the door opens.

“Let me try it next time, brother! I’m lucky! Hehehe!”

“Um, ok.” Not like it’s important who’s the one pulling the lever… as long as the door opens, nothing else matters.

We are currently in our fourth dungeon. It’s full of traps everywhere… And as you can imagine from our previous conversation, we’ve already found several doors locked with two levers. If you pull the wrong one, a trap activates.

I know, I know. It’s a 50% chance, but still… it hurts. Also, precisely because it has a 50% chance to do nothing, these kinds of traps, if you can call them traps, are quite cheap. And this dungeon is FULL of them.

We have encountered traps in which, if you pull the wrong lever, you suffer an electric discharge. Traps that spew fire, traps where the floor banishes, traps that drop a boulder on your head… and a lot more like being hit by a cold blast, blinded, having the HP, EP or MP directly drained, and any other thing you can imagine.

There are even traps that make more traps appear!

The only kind of traps we haven’t found is the instant death ones, but I don’t discard one or two instant death traps hidden between the absurd amount of other traps.

So far we haven’t encountered a single monster, only traps. You might be surprised at hearing this, but yes, there’s not a single enemy in this dungeon.

Ah, before I forget! The third dungeon, the one after the collapsing bridge, was very easy. In fact, I’m not sure if the other team understood the rules for the tournament’s first phase at all. A mix of humans and elves living in wooden houses on top of the trees looks amazing, but that’s the only thing they have. It isn’t dangerous because the enemies are scattered, and it isn’t deadly either. Especially if you compare it to the instant-death bridge trap.

In short, we beat it without any troubles: no deaths, no surprises, and we reached the end in a short amount of time. It might even be the easiest dungeon I’ve ever been - relatively speaking, now that we are level 5, because the first dungeons I invaded, at level 1, were easier.

*Fwoosh!*

“Agh!”

“Hey, Lemon, didn’t you say you were lucky? Hahaha!”

I taunt her after receiving a burst of fire right in the face. She pulled the wrong lever in the next trap, just after saying she was lucky.

“N-no! I’ll show you! This one doesn’t count.”

Doesn’t count my ass! But I don’t mind, because as long as she doesn’t die, it doesn’t matter who takes the trap’s damage.

*Click!*

In the next trap, she manages to pull the correct lever and starts showing off.

“See!? I told you I’m lucky!”

“No, you pulled one right and one wrong. In any way you see it, that’s the 50% chance you have when pulling them at random…”

“Gununu…” How can she make grinding noises with her teeth when she doesn’t have a mouth at all? “You’ll see I’ll also guess the next one!”

“Ok, whatever you say…”

*Bam!*

“Pfft! Hahaha! You pulled it so convinced, and then got slammed by that giant log! Hahaha!”

“Again! This doesn’t count!”

“It’s ok, feel free to pull the next one too.”

Meanwhile, Ricard and Laura are following us and talking between themselves. Sometimes, they laugh at our actions, but it looks like they decided to leave everything to us for now.

*Clik!*

“Yeees! I guessed it! See!? I can do it if I want.”

“You did it!” I shout with enthusiasm. Then, I return to a mocking tone and say. “But this only makes it a 50% success, you know? If you say you’re lucky, shouldn’t your success ratio be higher!?”

“Ugh…!”

Like this, we proceed through this all-trap dungeon, changing who pulls the levers so that nobody dies.

 

We’re crossing a narrow corridor when a trap that shoots poisoned arrows activates. They hit Laura who’s the one leading us right now, but they are weak, so we ignore them and continue moving forward.

“I think we should be reaching the end by now.”

“Yes, I think so too. We’ve been here for a long time and found lots of traps. I calculated how much cp was spent in those traps, and if I’m not wrong, we must be near the end right now.” 

Walking in front of us, Laura turns around, and Ricard confirms her suspicion. Clara shrugs her shoulders.

“It’s good if it’s true. I’m tired of so many traps already!”

“Me too, Mad Rat. By the way, I think it’s time to swap places: my HP’s getting low, and I’m already out of MP to use heals.”

“Ok, Lily. When we exit this corridor, we swap.”

Everyone resumes our dungeon invasion after my words.

Right now, everyone is low on HP. Most traps don’t deal a lot of damage, but it’s damage that can’t be prevented, and it’s impossible to avoid most traps in this dungeon. We managed to stay alive by switching who walks in front and taking turns to pull the levers, but we’re reaching our limits.

We soon reach another room. There’s a closed door at the other end, and four pillars with a lever placed on the four corners of the room.

“This is weird…” Says Laura. “Until now, each door only had two levers.”

“That’s true.” I add. “Maybe this one works in another way? Who wants to try and pull one?”

“I’ll pass. As I just said, I’m too low on HP right now.”

“I don’t mind pulling it…”

“Me! Me! I’ll do it!”

As expected, Clara enthusiastically rises her hand, interrupting Ricard. After I nod, she approaches one lever and pulls it.

*Bzzzt!*

And she’s electrocuted.

“So this isn’t the correct one…” I comment.

But then, I take another look at the lever and see something unexpected. Unlike what happened until now, the lever returns to its original position. It’s as if it’s telling us to pull it again.

“How weird… Then, what happens if we pull another one? Or pull the same one again?” Stroking her chin in a thinking pose, Laura also noticed the same thing as me. “Hey, Lemon. Can you try and pull that one next?”

“Sure thing!”

My little sister goes there and pulls the lever Laura pointed to. When pulled, it releases another electric blast before returning to its original position.

We try a few more times. Pulling a single lever at a time, regardless of which is it, doesn’t work. We only take damage from activating the trap. And pulling the same lever again only releases more lightning.

“...I have an idea.” It’s Ricard who proposes the next action. “There are four levers in the four corners. It’s impossible to pull two at the same time because they are far apart, but we are four players… so what’s going to happen if we pull them all at the same time?”

“It makes sense to try.” I say.

Each of us moves in front of a lever, and we pull them all at the same time. Instead of the usual *Bzzzt!* sounds, what we hear are four *Click!* sounds followed by a cry. My cry.

“Aaaaaaa…!”

The ground under my feet disappears and I fall. I fall… and continue falling. Will I ever reach the end? Just as I think so, my body is impaled by spikes that immediately kill me. Ok, that was very timely.

“Brotheeer! Are you ok!?” I hear a distant shout from my little sister.

No, I’m not. I’m dead. But there’s no need to shout because they’ll know as soon as I come out of the hole.

In my phantom form, I rise from the hole. I rise, and rise, and continue rising. It’s the same path as before, but I’m now moving slower… So it takes more time than the fall. When I finally come out, I see everyone looking at me.

I also see that the door is now open.

“Don’t need to explain.” I say. “It was the correct method to open the door, but it also meant one of us had to die…”

Both Laura and Ricard nod at my words, and Clara…

“Hey, hey! Your face and cry were so funny! You have to see the replay later! I’ll save it later, and watch it loooots of times! Hehehe!”

…she’s making fun of me.

Luckily, right behind the door, there’s the dungeon core. We break it and proceed to the next dungeon. Though I don’t think we’ll have time to beat yet another one.

Let’s see if we can reach the second phase of the tournament with our three deaths and four dungeons cleared. I think our chances to make it are quite high… I hope so.

 

---

 

“Fufufufu! Hahahaha!”

Rising his arms up, a player laughs maniacally. A hood hides his face, so it’s impossible  to know who it is.

“Hey, bro! It’s thanks to you showing those videos that we’re having such an easy time in this dungeon!” Another hooded player, walking right next to the first one, interrupts his laughter. “But I still don’t understand why are you so obsessed with that player… how was he called? Mad-something…?”

The first player clicks his tongue.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk. Aren’t you ashamed of yourself for asking such a question? Isn’t it obvious to follow a player who has such crazy and innovative ideas? When I saw His first video, I discovered a whole new world! It was to such a degree, I had no other option but to switch to the Flesh Monstrosities faction! How could I, who was striving to reach enlightenment, ignore such a great inspiration, after all?”

In a very excited tone, the first player tries to convey how his life changed and why he adores that player so much. But the second one only looks at him in disbelief, as if he’s a lunatic.

Then the first player continues talking, in a reprimanding and somewhat exasperated tone. His eyes opened as much as possible, almost as if they were going to pop out of their sockets, giving him a deranged expression.

“Also, how can you forget the name of the greatest evil genius of all time!? I’ll say His name as many times as needed so that you never forget it again! The name of the illustrious personage who’s illuminating the path forward for all of us who believe in a better future! The one who brings despair to everyone equally! The player who has managed to balance so much despair with equal satisfaction, making other players want to invade his dungeon even knowing they are going to suffer! Remember my words, because I’m sure His name’s going to last through the annals of history; a name so noble that even I, His most devout follower, sully it every time I say it! I tremble in excitement every time I remember it!”

The player pauses his explanation and shudders before continuing.

“And His name is…”

“Come on, haven’t you learned by now that it’s a waste of time? He’ll forget about it in just a few minutes…”

A third player interrupts his monologue. Like the previous two, he’s wearing a cloak that hides his face.

“Also, I don’t understand the reason why we need to hide our faces with hoods and cloaks. Videos of the first phase won’t be shared until the end of the tournament… It doesn’t make sense. Aren’t we here to show His amazing might?”

A dry laugh escapes from the first player at the other’s question.

“Ha! As if it wasn’t obvious! We are His followers in the dark, those that support Him and fuel His evil machinations! We aren’t worthy enough to show our ugly appearances to the world. Only when we meet Him in person, and He acknowledges our existence, can we show our faces to the world!”

“Huh, so it’s something like this, Leader. Now I understand!”

The third player enthusiastically nods to the first’s words, as if he just reached the ultimate truth. The fourth and last player takes this chance to bump his fist into the third’s side.

“Of course, it is like this…! Are you a moron, that you don’t even know something as simple as this one!?”

“Sorry, sorry…”

He lowers his head in shame at his blunder, awkwardly scratching his head.

Like this, the group of four players proceeds through the dungeon. Behind them, there are lots of corpses from very weird and disgusting creatures, like something that looks like a shrub with eyes, for example. And in front of them, a passage full of mushrooms awaits.

The first player, walking in the front, turns around and excitedly exclaims.

“I hope you didn’t forget about the poison resistance skills! As His followers and devout believers, it’s an indispensable skill!”

He sagely nods at his own words before turning again to the front and walking into the tunnel.

“And don’t forget to check your status screen and battle log every once in a while! This is one of His teachings, so we must never forget it! As much as I would like to give Him our deaths as a sacrifice for His glory, we can’t afford to do it yet! We must first reach the second phase and show the world His greatness! Fufufu! Hahahahaha!”

Following behind him, like ducklings following his mother, the other three players soon join him in his maniacal and deranged laughter.

It’s obvious why two of the followers are doing it, but why is the other one, the one who doubted the Leader’s words, laughing too? Maybe he’s just following the other’s actions to not be left out. Or maybe, just maybe… he has been completely brainwashed by now. Who knows?

 

“The increasing popularity of ‘The Mad Rat’s Lab’ led to lots of players knowing about it, and those players further increased its popularity in turn. And as always happens when lots of humans like or talk about the same thing, factions emerge.

There were those who liked surprises and the unexpected, who called themselves explorers; those who enjoyed suffering, called masochists; speedrunners who competed for who cleared it faster; those who wanted to see others’ despair, also called recruiters… But the most deranged of them treated the dungeon as a holy site, the player who created it as a god, and the lessons learned in the dungeon invasions as god’s teachings.

In this tournament, the world was about to learn about the Mad Rat’s Cult and its followers, the Mad Cultists. As well as the most deranged of them all, who the others called Leader.”