One Shot: Dungeon of the Endless

* CHAPTER 1 *

Image Credit: Tristan Savatier

Four monks converged in a wood. One from the East, one from the West, one from the North-East, and one from the North-Kardashian-West. They all came to rest on the edge of a ruined cave, into which a flight of rough-hewn steps lead down into the earth. The one from the North-East smiled and looked at his three chance companions on the road.

"Well met Brothers I am Nitro the Flaming Monk!" he cried, as a shower of sparks flew into the air in an entertaining firework. "I see we have all set out to explore this mysterious dungeon that suddenly appeared in this forest because of recent earthquakes. And I can see from your raiments that you are also monks. And as is popular tradition among monks we should introduce ourselves and tell their story."

"Oi! I ain't never 'eard o' that tradition," bellowed the heavily tattooed and impressively bearded monk from the West. "But oi'll byte. Me name's Pipu Kaka, monk o' the aipen 'and."

The first monk frowned. "The... Ebon Hand? I thought they were mostly Clerics..."

"Nah nah nah, mayte!" Pipu corrected. "Aipen! Like... naught cloised." He placed his hand palm upward in front of him to demonstrate.

"Ah, the Way of the Open Hand!" Nitro repeated, recognizing the reference, then nodding to the man to the East. "And you sir?"

"Oh, right, heh, I'm, uh, Malvolio Penumbra," the eastern monk responded in a quick gruff tone, tipping his finely crafted top hat. "Shadow Monk, and one helluva card player too, we should play sometime, provided you can cheat better than me, which you probably can't, cuz rest assured I can cheat pretty well, yep, pretty good, pretty good at cheating well..." he then trailed off and his gaze fell on the North-Western monk.

"My name is Asato KERAI!" his hooded head gracefully snapped into a bow as he accentuated the last syllable by punching one fist into his other palm. But when he turned his fist over and opened his fingers, there was a small but bright flame in his hand. "And I start fires." For the first time, the other three Humans could see from under his hood, the slender features and pointy ears of an Elf.

"It's true, you don't see many Wood Elf monks," Asato continued, as if anticipating their first question, a habit he had picked up living in mostly Human lands. "But when you grow up in a forest and haven't yet learned to control your latent fire magic... you can run into some rather awkward situations that involve accidentally burning your village down...

"I was cast out of Elven society and branded a criminal," Asato still continued, his thick Elvish accent masked by the incursion of a foreign influence. "So I had to live on the streets until I was found by the monks of KERAI!" He snapped into the same bow as before. "Who taught me how to harness my gifts and become powerful elemental warrior."

"Well met I say again!" summed up Nitro. "Now shall we enter the cave and see what adventures await us?"

===

* CHAPTER 2 *

"Well, I guess we know what happened to all the adventurers who answered this challenge before us," Malvolio muttered as they reached the bottom of the stairs, and the four monks immediately got to work. "Something musta did a number on them but good..."

The first room was absolutely littered with the results of much carnage: broken swords, cracked and dented suits of armor, crushed bones of every kind. All cluttered around a large brasier full of, what appeared to the two pyromaniacs in the room as, lamp oil. On the far wall was a large stone door with no hinge or handle of any kind, save for a large hole about three feet wide and about head-high off the wall. Asato was poking around inside the hole with his thieves' tools, Pipu was examining the stability of the brasier, while Nitro was rummaging around the discarded items. He picked up one, a back-scratcher of particular ornate design, flourished it to an imaginary crowd, launched a pleasant shower of sparks, and placed it triumphantly in his pack.

"This hole could very well be some kind of lock," offered Asato, climbing down to the floor. "But it needs a very complex key."

"Oi! I think we should knock ovah this oil!" Pipu shouted, as he hurled his full weight into the brasier, which only succeeded in splashing some on the ground.

"Or... light it on fire?" offered Nitro with another flash of his signature firework.

"Leave that to me," Asato flashed a winning smile to go along with the flame that appeared in his hand. He measured 30 feet from the brasier. "I suggest we all stand back..." With the action of playfully blowing a kiss from one's hand, the flame fluttered from Asato's palm and settled neatly into the center of the brasier, which immediately burst aflame. Malvolio quickly ran as far away from the light as he could manage and seemed to slink completely out of sight.

"WHO DARES ENTER THE DUNGEON OF THE ENDLESS!?!?" boomed a voice from everywhere at once in the chamber. The ground and the walls rumbled as a fearsome giant stone humanoid figure at least ten feet tall rose out of the rubble and brandished a club menacingly. The three visible monks were caught stunned and silent.

"He does..." came Malvolio's voice from the shadows behind Pipu, followed briefly by his body, which quickly disappeared again.

"Uh, yeah, I do!" cried Pipu, slinging his quarterstaff from his back, which made a strange eerie whistling noise as he did so. "Tis I, Pipu Kaka o' the aipen 'and! And oi'll PUNCH YA BLOODY FAICE OFF!" He leaped into battle with a flying fist almost as frightening as his war cry, joined closely by Nitro who aimed a savage kick at the giant's right leg.

Asato's eyes were drawn to the fire, but in a display of self control, he decided to stand back from the melee and rely on his Elven heritage. Pulling out an elegant longbow, he knocked an arrow with impressive skill and let loose a shot directly at his enemy's eye. But to the Elf's dismay, the stone figure reacted with blinding agility - shifting his club into his other hand, it grabbed the arrow out of midair, then in a single sweeping motion, loaded it into a crossbow that Asato had just noticed was mounted to his other wrist, and let fly back at his attacker.

Asato felt like he was looking in a big stone mirror, as he barely had time to deflect the arrow from his vital organs, preventing it from causing too much damage as it landed in the flesh just below his right shoulder. "I guess that's it for ranged attacks," he muttered and grimaced as he broke off the shaft of the arrow, just in time to see Pipu become the target of two massive club strikes.

But as the stone figure let out a mechanical hum/roar and tried to advance, it wandered out of the light from the burning brasier. No sooner did its leg reach the shadows, then he was staggered by a thunderous blow from a fine walking quarterstaff to the shin, belonging to Malvolio who just that moment appeared from his hiding place in the shadows. He got right in close for an elbow strike against the kneecap when something caught his eye.

"Hey, you know guys, uh," Malvolio chuckled, "I'm not much of a peeping tom, but I think there's something up this guy's stone tunic that looks like it might fit in that door over there..."

"Why I believe Malvolio is right," offered Nitro, who had a good view from where he was hard at work on the giant's other leg. "It looks like the giant's dick is the key."

"Wait a second," rejoined Malvolio. "His dick is the Ki? I have six Ki Points, but I still couldn't get that door open..."

"No, the KEY to open the DOOR..." tried Nitro once again, but he was interrupted by another savage attack from Pipu.

"Well then what ah we waitin' foah!?" shouted Pipu as he wiped the blood from his chin. "Let's PUNCH 'EEM 'EEN THE DEEK!"

Pipu's first strike was an uppercut, which did in fact cause the conical key between the giant's legs to go crashing upwards. Pipu's next move was a spinning leg sweep to the rear ankle that sent the giant towards being sprawled on its back. But rather than let the monster fall prone, Pipu leapt into the air and aimed a shoulder charge into its back, sending it headlong towards the door on the other end of the chamber, where the three-foot hole was just about waist-high for the giant... Upon impact there was a loud thud, a satisfying click, a mechanical whirring, and a grinding of stone as the door started to slide open, giant still attached to one side, hum/roaring angrily and swinging its club wildly.

"It's time to finish this stone monstrosity!" proclaimed Asato, taking hold of his bow as if it were a giant mallet used for a percussion instrument. "Prepare to hear the Gong of the Summit!"

Asato swung his bow in midair and at the point where it would have connected with an imaginary gong, instead a painfully loud noise emanated from a point just next to the stone giant's face. The figure stiffened, cracked, then exploded into a thousand tiny pebbles, which clattered to the floor, just as the door finished sliding into place.

"Excellently done, brothers!" congratulated Nitro. "I propose we take some time to meditate on our victory!"

===

Batman: Arkham Knight, Let's Play #11 - Nightwing

Batman: Arkham Knight, Let's Play Archive!

UPDATE: While the video has been updated, none of the commentary below (from 2016) has! Please consider this a re-post!

We ended the last episode by handily destroying a squadron of attack drones in Divinity Churchyard, but then almost immediately being destroyed by a group of Cobra tanks on Bleake Island. But I guess we can chalk up that embarrassing defeat to the lingering effects of Scarecrow's fear toxin pumping through my system, because we're back in the saddle with another chance to take out the Arkham Knight's Cloudburst tank in this episode.

As much as I ranted about the many problems with the Batmobile battle mode sequences in last episode's recap, I do appreciate how the slower and quieter Cobra challenges allow a good opportunity for some dialogue to explore the relationship between villains. For example, it's apparent that Scarecrow has a very businesslike approach to his plan, while the Arkham Knight appears to take things very personal. In fact, if it weren't for the Knight's bravado and desire to face off against Batman, there's no way we would be able to get close enough to eventually destroy the Cloudburst. But as it happens, we're able to withstand the relentless assault of a tank that's stronger than the Batmobile in every way and emerge victorious, pulling the Arkham Knight out of the twisted burning wreckage just in time.

But just when it appears that we'll finally have some face time with the game's eponymous villain (i.e. punch his lights out), the Arkham Knight's masked face suddenly morphs into that of the Joker, which is a direct copy of what happens in Arkham City after defeating Mr. Freeze. Not only is it unoriginal, but it's a totally unsatisfying ending to an extremely challenging boss fight. At least that's how it felt while playing it. Maybe it was more fun to watch in a purely cinematic atmosphere where I was able to cut around a lot of the slow and frustrating parts.

LEFT: Mr. Freeze, Arkham City / RIGHT: Arkham Knight, Arkham Knight

Anyway, with the Cloudburst gone, Poison Ivy should be able to use her three giant plants to neutralize the remaining fear toxin in the atmosphere. But upon returning to her base of operations in the Botanical Gardens, we find that the toxin has already severely weakened both the plants and Ivy herself. With one final heroic gesture, Ivy shares her life energy with her plants, giving them the power to absorb the toxin and save the city. However, clearing the toxin took every ounce of vitality she had left, and after her task is done, Poison Ivy dissipates into a cloud of pollen and floats through the city she once terrorized, a symbol of her ultimate selfless sacrifice. Although in this version of the story, Poison Ivy is technically a human/plant hybrid, so part of me wonders if her genetic material somehow survived in seed form, waiting to be replanted in the right soil, so to speak.

With the toxin gone and no concrete leads to Scarecrow, Alfred has the bright idea to check some side missions off my list. And since Nightwing was convinced that Penguin must have had several more weapons caches hidden throughout the city, I made Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot my next target. Nightwing had in fact located another truck, which led us to another hideout, but upon jumping into the fray, we suspiciously don't receive any help from Dick Grayson like we did the first time. And then after destroying the cache itself, we're greeted by a video message of Penguin threatening a captive Nightwing! This is not a good night for my allies: first Oracle, then Robin, then Lucius, and now Nightwing have found themselves in the clutches of nefarious villains at one point or another throughout this story.

The ensuing rescue mission of Nightwing has some of the best banter in the game, where Dick Grayson cockily taunts his captors while they administer a beating. Or, as Nightwing infuriatingly puts it: "Oh, so this is a beating? I wish you would've said something. Do you guys want me to act like I'm hurt?" It's this lighthearted attitude that made the lighthearted Dick Grayson the perfect match to pair with the somber Bruce Wayne back when they were Batman and Robin together. And the smattering of comic relief he provides is one of the reasons I would love to see Bradley Cooper play this role in a live action version of Batman: Arkham Knight.

Once Batman finally rescues Nightwing, it's a pretty straightforward task for the two of them to team up and clear the room of henchmen, but it's what happens after the dual-team combat that really puts the exclamation point on this side mission. Penguin himself somehow manages to get the drop on Nightwing while Batman was priming the weapons cache to explode, and now Batman has to watch as yet another one of his allies is held at gunpoint! But Dick Grayson is a trained crimefighter in his own right and isn't so easily bested: with a well-placed elbow to the Penguin's ample gut, the former Robin knocks the diminutive crime boss off balance, then flips him to Batman for a tag team power bomb! Even though this part of the aforementioned live action movie would have to be performed by a stunt player, I would still love to see the incomparable Stuart Pankin portray the Penguin for all the dialogue-centric scenes.