Sighting her prey, Tierra grinned broadly. She’d seen this set up before. Ostentatious and jewel-bedecked, the chest practically dripped with the promise of glorious treasure within. It was designed to make corpses out of excitable thieves.

Kneeling down before the chest, Tierra leaned in close to smell its surface, finding nothing but lacquered wood and old metal. She ran her fingers over the chest, searching for hidden switches. There were none. Reaching to its lid, she raised it just a fraction of a single centimeter, listening closely – as it lifted, she heard the twang of wires, a spring and a metal bolt. One wire on either side and the spring in the center. Chuckling to herself, Tierra hopped over the chest and swung her war hammer’s spike toward the ceiling, biting deeply into a soft cleft of stone there. With one foot on each wall to her sides and her war hammer as a handle above her, she suspended herself in the small corridor, about a foot above the treasure chest. With her other hand, the young adventuress lifted the lid from the chest and watched her caution pay off.

A pair of scythe-like blades snapped out behind the chest and swung around to its front in a flash, while a dart trailing liquid poison flew off and struck the stairs she had just descended. Anyone who had been in front of, beside or behind that chest would quite dead by now. Tierra dropped down in front of the chest and pulled her hammer out of the ceiling, replacing it in its harness, and then looked into the chest.

Treasure, and each piece wrapped in purple velvet. A saber was no use to the adventuress, but the targe near it was. In the five-sided design of the classic medium shield, it was crafted from hardwood bound in thick suede, with white metal studs in a spartan array on its front face. Her left hip would be a great place to keep that. Another fold held many large coins of gold and silver, which the lady accepted graciously. Finally, though, Tierra found the real treasure here. A small satin bag with a tiny crystal phial half filled with a pinch of blue crystal powder – atenaar. This treasure she savored, and placed it daintily into her leg pack.

Finished, Tierra turned around, and began the trek back to her “instructor”.

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Tierra Nena, Miss Kylie Wild