Treasure Hunter Elaine: Chapter 1: Tomb Raider

My name is Elaine V. Lilian. I'm a Callidus of the 14th officio, and–

*clink*

–And… what was that…?

I turn around, looking back the way I came down the ancient stone gallery. The grand gallery of the pyramid to be precise. The tunnel wasn't all that wide, maybe four feet at the most, and it wasn't much taller. The ancient path was gently sloping up, leading me towards the king's chamber in the center of the pyramid. The walls of the grand gallery and the hieroglyphs on them were illuminated by the yellow light from my soul gem. The light wasn't all that bright, I couldn't see anything more than ten feet away from me; the rest of the pyramid was pitch black.

I turn forwards again and lift my foot up, and look down to see the stone tile I stepped on slowly rise back into place.

What.

This pyramid is trapped. This pyramid is trapped with a pressure plate. That… that doesn't happen in real life. You don't find pressure plate traps in pyramids. China, sure. But in Egyptian pyramids…you only find traps like that in movies. Did… did I fucking wander onto an Indiana Jones set by mistake or something? Should I expect Nazis to ambush me the moment I exit the pyramid or something? Russians? Commies?

A few seconds later, I could hear a rumbling ahead of me and feel the floor beneath my feet shaking.

Oh fuck me with a rusty rake, that's a fucking boulder. I've wandered onto the set of Raiders of the Lost Ark without knowing it, haven't I? That must be what happened, no other explanation makes sense. Well, it could be one of the other movies if I'm not on the set of the lost ark. One of the others must have had at least one boulder trap in it.

Despite my best attempts at disbelieving the trap into non-existence, I could hear the boulder coming closer and feel the floor shake even more violently.

Well, I'm not running back down the ascending passage to the entrance or jumping down a couple stories in the greave's shaft to get out of the way; it would take me far too long to make my way back, magic or not. So instead, I cheated.

I turned and faced the wall, somewhat disappointed that I was going to ruin the hieroglyphics on it. Using my magic, I stuck my whole arm into the wall, as far as it would go. The stone of the wall let my arm through, as if it was made out of clay. I then started scooping out large sections of the wall until there was a space large enough for me to squeeze into.

Just in time too. Not a few seconds after I jammed myself into the hole, the boulder rushed by me and slammed into the entrance to the ascending passage.

To anyone else that might have worried them more than a bit, having the only exit sealed off, but like the wall, I can dig though the boulder as well when I need to leave.

But for now, I exit the hole in the wall that I dug and continue on my way to the king's chamber, where all of the treasure is.

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I was interrupted before by that out of place trap, so let me start my introduction again. My name is Elaine V. Lilian. I'm a Callidus of the 14th officio, and I'm a treasure hunter. I'm blonde, about 5'8" tall and I usually wear a black t-shirt and jeans when I'm not in my costume. My magical girl costume… Well, it's a simple blue dress that turns white at the skirt. The white sleeves go to my elbows and the tiny amount of frilliness at the end is still too much for my taste. On top of the dress is white leather duster that reaches down to my ankles and is way too fucking hot to wear in the desert, or the jungle, or anywhere else on earth. At least the pyramid is cool enough to wear it. As hot as it is and how odd a white duster is, I have grown attached to it.

Rewinding to the bit about being a treasure hunter, it's exactly what it sounds like. I travel the world, find temples and ruins, and take whatever is in there that isn't nailed down. Thank the gods for the large inventory to stash things in.

As for actually breaking into pyramids, temples, tombs and such, it's pretty easy most of the time. Using my magic, being able to mold and shape any solid material I can hold in my hands, I can pretty much dig into tombs and get through blocked passageways rather easily. In fact, that's usually what I end up using my magic for, as well as for disabling traps.

Right… traps. That boulder was absolute bullshit. I can't even to begin to understand why the flying fuck that was here. That's Hollywood-tier traps. I can't even watch most of the movies that deal with ancient ruins because of how wrong they are most of the time.

Anyway. The ancient Egyptians did not do boulder traps, it wasn't their style, let alone boulder traps hooked up to pressure plates. If you want pressure plates, head to China and enter the Mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang. You'll find more than enough working automatic crossbows hooked up to pressure plates there. The Egyptians, as well as most civilizations that buried valuables with their dead, preferred more subtle traps like putting poisonous powders like hematite on the floor for you to slowly breathe in and die as you explore the pyramid. Poisonous powder that is suspiciously absent in this tomb.

Oh well, hopefully I'll find a few answers as to why this pyramid is so fucked up trap wise in the king's chamber.

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It wasn't long before I made it to the king's chamber. There was a pitfall or two along the way, but those were easily circumvented.

As for the king's chamber itself, it was massive compared to the ascending passageway. It had to be at least twenty by twenty feet in size, and at least ten feet tall.

…It was also empty. Scratch that, the place looked like it was ransacked. The sarcophagus was empty, the few urns in the room were shattered, and there wasn't a single valuable left in the place.

So then I began looking for the fake wall that led me to the REAL King's Chamber.

Yeah, the Egyptians were actually this paranoid, not that it wasn't for a good reason. The Egyptians liked making fake dead ends to trick robbers into thinking nothing was left in the room. The same "dead ends" were even made to look like they were already looted to discourage the grave robbers from looking any closer. If they did look around any closer, the grave robbers might find a wall plastered over and painted to look like the rest of the room.

Said wall was rather easy to find. After a few thousand years, it wasn't in anywhere near the same condition as the stone that surrounded it. Although it's been sitting undisturbed all that time, the paint no longer matched the stone surrounding it, and parts of it were already flaking away. It only took a moment to tear the wall down, and after doing so I saw what was behind it and sighed. Of course.

The passageway was blocked off with several tons of stone blocks, the same stone that was used to build the pyramid to begin with.

Yeah, this is also a thing that they occasionally did to deter thieves. After finding the fake wall, thieves would occasionally find the passageway blocked by several tons stone. That's right, after the King's Chamber was finished, it was completely blocked off to prevent any entry.

I could dig though it… In fact unless I want to return to the Warmaster empty-handed I have to dig through it, but it's going to burn through a grief seed. Maybe several more if the passage turns suddenly and I don't notice.

Well, at least Nero is going to make sure I get all of the grief seeds I need if I can bring anything she likes back. She loves her ancient trinkets.

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Well that luckily only took two grief seeds. The passage didn't turn… just had a shitload of stone to dig through. Which was more than a little annoying when I kept wondering if the passageway turned and I didn't notice.

Ah well, at least I'm here now, and the Warmaster is going to be thrilled when she sees this. I mean, there was a lot more uncovered from Tutankhamun's tomb in the 20s, but this is still more than I've ever seen. I see several dozen golden statues of warriors, animals, and Gods ranging from a few inches to a foot and a half in height, several gems, and if I'm not mistaken, a few magical weapons. There's also a few scrolls and tablets for me to read through later.

Right, I should probably go over what happens to the treasure that I find. The Warmaster gets first pick out of anything I find, which means all the magical weapons either belonging to or enchanted by ancient magical girls end up hers, along with most, if not all of the art, gold, and jewelry that I find. I get paid for whatever the Warmaster takes from what I gather on top of what my normal salary is. Granted, I'm not quite paid anywhere near the value of the artifacts, but it's better than nothing, and much better for my health than trying to sell anything Nero wants on the black market.

Anything left over is mine to do what I want with, either to sell on the black market, give to fellow researchers to go over, or do anything else really. Most of the larger things, like the sarcophagus and the canopic shrine, I leave alone, because there's no possible way for those to fit in my inventory. The Warmaster grudgingly accepts that, on the condition that I at least look through them for anything small enough to carry.

I don't tell her that I don't look too closely when I do check them. I don't mind digging through dirt, stone, and what have you to get into the tomb, but I draw the line at sticking my hands in the remains of a dead guy. That grosses me the fuck out.

You can probably see why I'm here and not on the front line murdering people and bathing in their blood like an Eversor.

Anyway, the treasure. I stuff everything I can carry into my inventory. Most of the statues look golden, but are actually wood that's been gilded. That doesn't take away from their value though, they're ancient statues belonging to an ancient civilization. They have a better value to weight ratio for researchers, thieves, and generally anyone without a magical inventory capable of holding everything nearly weightlessly. Lucky me, I'm spared the trouble of having to pick and choose what to take and  get to nab everything in one trip.

After looting the rest of the room, I turn towards the canopic shrine. The shrine itself is about seven feet tall and made out of mostly gilded wood with a few statues around it. I spend a moment using my magic to make stairs out of the stone under my feet and climb up to pry the top off. Once that's done, I look inside—

Well. That's odd.

It's empty.

I don't mean "Oh, there's nothing Nero wants inside, no gold or jewelry" empty. I mean "there's nothing fucking there" empty. No canopic chest, no canopic jars, not even the dust of ancient organs on the ground. I'm the first one that's been in this room for thousands of years, so it's not like someone made off with it and left all the gold behind.

So why go through the trouble of building a Canopic Shrine if you're not going to put anything inside?

Curious, I turn to the sarcophagus. I walk up to it and start working on prying the lid off. It only takes me a few moments to take it off, thank god I'm not a Vindicare or I'd have to blow it off if I wanted any hope of seeing what's inside. I look inside and—

Well.

That's… new.

I wasn't expecting to find a magical girl sleeping inside.

…

What the absolute fuck?