Archive Race!

[dragonhoard]

ARCHIVE RACE

On Wednesday, March 6th, Adrian Flyte and Curio request the help of their coworkers (and any interested parties from the QF) to come help them test out their new, experimental maps of the Archives. And because nothing's fun if it isn't competitive, they've also decided to make a little competition out of it. Come prove your navigational mettle, explore an extra-dimensional space and maybe find a cool toy to take home!

The rules are simple: each participant will draw a random card from the Archives' extensive card catalog, and then use one of the experimental maps to navigate their way to the location that item is stored. Once they've retrieved it and brought it back to the main floor, they'll receive their final time - and be allowed to keep whatever junk they've dug up.

THE MAPS

Because the Archives exist in a Escherian multi-dimensional space, they can be pretty difficult to map and navigate thoroughly. The maps Adrian and Curio have produced reflect this, folding over on themselves in origami-like patterns. Some of them even have rotating parts which must be aligned correctly in order for the map to be properly read.

THE ARCHIVES

The Archives have one main staircase which runs through all the levels in roughly numerical sequence, but it's much faster to navigate the space by the multiple hidden shortcuts on each level. Some levels make dreamlike transitions into one another, some are full of trapdoors or secret chutes, and some have access to secondary staircases that go in counterintuitive directions. It's hard to get lost on the main staircase and very easy to get lost anywhere else.

SAFETY MEASURES

Everyone who's sent into the Archives is given one of the teleportation medallions crafted by Byron Best. These magical devices will pop their wearers back to the main level of the Archives if any extradimensional destabilization occurs, but they also sometimes malfunction randomly. They can also be triggered manually if the wearer gets lost (or finds their target item!).

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ATTEMPTS: Maya

[dragonhoard]

Maya makes her Archives run in 29 minutes and 5 seconds. She was sent to sublevel 332, "Abjured Objects". The item she was sent to retrieve is a glow-in-the-dark vintage Hasbro Ouija Board, printed circa 1990. Its archive card notes that the matching planchette has been archived separately "for safety concerns".