Thane stepped through the cracked double doors of the covered entrance, boots scuffing against faded marble tiles dulled by time and grime. Above him, the high arch of the two-story foyer stretched upward, the remnants of a once-grand chandelier now a skeletal iron cage hanging precariously. Twin curving staircases loomed ahead, curling up like the horns of a great beast, their steps choked with dust and cobwebs.
To his left, an open archway led toward silence and shadow. To his right a matching arch led into what looked to have been a study? After a brief internal debate he turned toward the study. It definitely wasn't because light filtered into the room. The air in there felt heavier, saturated with the scent of old paper and mildew. Books, many swollen with moisture or eaten through by rot, had tumbled from decaying shelves. A massive desk sat skewed in the center, one leg splintered and broken, the leather top puckered and peeling. Thane sifted through drawers filled with brittle papers and ink-caked pens, but found nothing useful—only the echoes of a mind long fled.
He stepped back through the foyer, drawn toward the opposite room. As he neared the threshold, a chill settled into his bones—colder than before, unnatural. The space beyond yawned like a crypt, its long table stretching out like a stone bier in a forgotten tomb. Chairs slouched in decay, their frames bent and rotted, upholstery devoured by mold and time. Tall cabinets lined the far wall, their glass doors smeared and opaque, revealing nothing but shadow. Dust spiraled in lazy swirls through the grimy windows to the left. Windows? He squinted. That couldn't be right—there weren't windows facing the courtyard on this side. And yet here they were. Nope. Nope nope nope. He didn't need a danger sense skill to know that room was a hard pass. Might as well have been outlined in glowing red [DO NOT ENTER] warnings.
From there, Thane proceeded further into the manor. He briefly stopped at a little closet on his left, only twisted hinges clinging for dear life to the door frame. Peering in he spotted decaying cabinetry, shattered porcelain, and a rusted rolling cart lay on its side. Its wheels seized and frame bent. He paused, briefly checked under the cabinet only to be greeted with empty spider webs. He sighed and moved on toward the faint light bleeding in from the far end of the hall.
The broken glass double doors gave way to what remained of a conservatory, a hollowed echo of nature's reclaiming hand. Moss caked glass panels filtered in the dim evening light, casting faint greenish hues across the stone floor. Vines crept like lazy fingers across every surface—overturned benches, iron trellises, even up the fractured walls. Exotic plants had either grown wild or withered into delicate skeletons, their twisted forms frozen in time. A fallen harp rested gently in a heap of soil and leaves, its strings curled and broken, as if it had sighed one last note before silence claimed it. Despite the decay, the space held a strange peace—quiet, private, and untouched by whatever violence had ravaged the rest of the manor. Thane stepped inside slowly, instinctively careful not to disturb the living greenery underfoot.
A faint glow caught his eye.
Half-shielded beneath a curtain of ivy, a bulbous fruit pulsed with a sickly green bioluminescence. It clung to a crooked stalk sprouting from a cracked planter, as though stubbornly thriving in spite of its surroundings.
"Okay... that doesn't not look like it wants to eat me," Thane muttered, narrowing his eyes. Still, curiosity won out. He focused on the strange fruit and thought, Identify.
[Glowgut Gourd – Edible]
[Emits faint bioluminescence. Taste described as 'mucus-flavored soap' with chalky undertones. High in fiber. Technically food. Won't kill you. Probably.]
He stared. "Technically food. That's... reassuring."
Still, he plucked one off the stalk and turned it over in his hand. He was sure that in this world, beggars can't be choosers. He just wasn't that hungry – yet.
[SYSTEM HINT: Inventory]
[See something you want to keep? Great! Just focus on the item and think: [Add to Inventory]. Poof—instant storage, no backpack required. Warning: This does not work on moral dilemmas, awkward conversations, or unpaid debts. (Note: taking items out of inventory takes 5 seconds, so maybe don't store your flail in monster infested territory.)]
Not sure what I think about the snark, but at least the information is useful.
Circling around the rear wall of the conservatory, Thane glanced once more at the faintly glowing gourd in his hand. Add to inventory, he thought, and the fruit vanished with a soft shimmer of light, leaving his palm empty and faintly warm. He blinked. That was... weirdly satisfying.
He moved on, stepping through a narrow archway into a dim hallway where the ceiling sagged slightly, and the wallpaper peeled in long curling strips like ancient parchment. A damp chill lingered in the air, and the faded scent of mold and old paper tugged at his nose.
To his right, a set of warped thick wooden double doors leaned crooked on their hinges, one slightly ajar. He nudged it open with a cautious hand.
A shallow, circular room opened before him. Dusty rays of light filtered through the jagged remains of stained-glass windows, casting fragmented colors across the floor like a broken kaleidoscope. The bench that ringed the outer wall had once been padded for comfort, but now the cushions lay sunken and torn, their stuffing scattered like the aftermath of a dogfight. The room felt oddly hollow, like it had been a place of whispered conversations and stolen solitude—now gutted of both warmth and purpose.
He stepped inside briefly, running his fingers along the edge of a warped bookshelf built into the wall. The shelves held only a few sun-bleached scraps of paper, the remnants of once-loved pages now too brittle to touch.
A small sigh escaped him. "Cozy. In a haunted, everything-is-dead kind of way."
Stepping back out of the ruined reading nook, Thane continued down the narrow hallway, the dim light growing thinner with each step. The silence pressed in close, broken only by the occasional creak of the now wooden floorboards beneath his boots. At the end of the hall, a narrow staircase curled upward into shadow.
He paused at the base of it, eyeing the steps with suspicion. The wood looked desiccated and brittle, grayed with age and spiderwebbed with cracks. One tentative press of his boot on the first step made it groan ominously—less a warning, more a death rattle.
"Yeah, that's a 'nope.'"
Turning back, he re-traced his path through the manor, each room a silent, decaying monument to what once had been. The building groaned around him like it was remembering him as he passed. Moments later, he found himself once again beneath the shadowed grandeur of the twin staircases in the foyer, the cold air familiar now, but no less eerie.
Thane lingered at the base of the central staircase, its wide marble steps stretched upward like the spine of some slumbering giant. It was the most intact thing he'd seen in the entire manor—uncracked, unbowed, untouched by rot. The same couldn't be said for the handrail. The once-polished wood had darkened with age and neglect, warped in places and splintering in others. Even looking at it made his palms itch with imagined slivers.
He gave it a skeptical glance, then squared his shoulders.
At least the stairs themselves don't look like they'll crumble under me.
He paused, casting one last glance over his shoulder toward the rest of the ground floor. He had a nagging sense of incompleteness.
There's got to be more down here. Pantry, cellar, servant quarters—something. But if the only way to reach it is through the dining room? Yeah… not today.
The memory of that unnaturally dim space sent a ripple down his spine. It didn't matter what he might find past the dining room—something about that room refused to be ignored. Or trusted.
With a quiet exhale, Thane turned back to the stairs and began to climb, boots echoing faintly against the stone. The chill of the marble seeped through his soles with each step. The railing creaked once under the pressure of his elbow—he jerked away from it, deciding then and there to rely on balance and caution instead.
As he neared the top, he could already see the transition waiting for him—worn wooden floorboards stretching into the darkened hall above, their age promising every bit the uncertainty the ground floor had. He was worried about the elevation—being off the ground, above the ruin—what if he fell through.
Let's see what you've been keeping hidden up here.
Thane turned left at the top of the landing, his steps quiet against the warped wood. The hallway stretched ahead, dim and heavy with the scent of dust and decay. Most of the doors hung partially open, crooked on their hinges like they'd been abandoned in a hurry. He peeked cautiously into each room before entering, careful to test the floorboards before putting his full weight down.
The rooms on this wing had once been bedrooms—maybe for guests or servants. Stripped bedsprings, empty wardrobes, and cracked mirrors greeted him again and again. In one room, he found nothing but a collapsed ceiling and the lingering smell of mildew. In another, only a broken crib and claw marks across the floorboards, too old to be fresh but too precise to ignore. He didn't linger.
Near the end of the hallway, the floor sloped abruptly toward a jagged hole torn through the boards. Thane approached carefully, keeping his balance as he looked down into the gaping void. Below, the outline of a stone cooking range told him exactly where he was.
Kitchen, he guessed. Or what's left of it.
He crouched beside the hole and stared for a moment, imagining the weight that had collapsed the floor. Something heavy. There was nothing to find here but trouble.
Thane stood and turned back, retracing his steps across the landing. The right hallway had a different energy—less collapse, more preservation. At the far end, a grander door stood slightly ajar, its ornate handle dulled by time but still elegant. He pushed it open and stepped into what had clearly once been the master bedroom.
A canopy bed sat half-sunken on one side, its mattress rotted and slouched. Drapes hung limp and discolored over shattered windows, swaying slightly in the draft. Across the room, a massive wardrobe leaned awkwardly, one side braced against the floor, the other tipped forward like it had nearly toppled.
Something faint glowed beneath it.