Sharon gazed across the wooden ramp and onto the ramparts. All he could see was one lone armored chevalier casually walking along the wall, whistling on a rather cheerful tone beneath his helmet as he passed the rampart and disappeared into one of the many guard towers dotting the ramparts. "Deep down. Kind of like your Falere." Sharon commented, giving a small smile back at Serphia when the Captain turned to give him a nasty look. "Except in the castle, naturally. Dungeons are usually located deep within the building." Turning to look away from Serphia and towards the castle, Sharon pointed towards the complex of large stone buildings that made up the core of the fort. "But first, we need access to the main buildings. Once we have it, we should be able to find a way down into the lower levels of the castle." "Then we need to move. The patrol will eventually come back." Alissah explained, before the human suddenly walked past the group and crossed the wooden ramp to jump down onto the ramparts on the other side. Taking a moment to look to either side, she eventually signaled for the rest of the group that it was safe to follow. "Down the stairs, to the yard. There should be an entrance to the main buildings somewhere there." Sharon instructed as he guided Serphia and the Night Elves down towards the small yard. Although they were entering the fort, there were few signs of any White Hand soldiers. The walls were quiet, and only a few faint figures could be seen through the night on the other side of the castle, as well as the occasional movement in the lit windows of the castle. As they arrived at the bottom of the stairs however, it soon became apparent that they were stuck in a small alleyway with a solid metal door blocking the path ahead of them. But before Sharon could even utter a sentence, Smokey had stepped forward! "No worries! The maestro's got this one!" Smokey explained with full confidence as the dwarf, still mostly white, approached the metal gate and attached a small satchel which he squeezed inbetween the side of the door. Fiddling through his many pockets, he eventually retrieved an ivory adorned lighter and heavy dwarven cigar. Using the lighter to light his cigar before putting it back into his pocket, the dwarf took a deep breath on the cigar, before gently tipping the hot cinders of his cigar onto the small cloth satchel he had shoved into the side of the door. A small explosion immediately occurred, and the metal door swung open, revealing the warmer interiors of what seemed like to be a barracks of some sort. "Solved! Hehe!" Smokey exclaimed triumphantly while blowing out a heavy cloud of smoke as he turned towards the group. "You idiot! Every fool within a hundred feet must have heard that explosion!" Alissah sneered angrily at the dwarf, quickly rushing up to the door to look inside to see if anyone was coming! "Buu-huu, next maybe you could try a 'thank you' for making sure we didn't remain sitting ducks down here!" Smokey complained back at the woman, clearly not agreeing to the criticism of his work! In the meantime, Sharon had already buried parts of his face behind his glove as he leaned against Serphia's cheek. "This is not going to end well... " --------------------------------- "We have received reports of a mechanical failure of some kind down in the base level of the elevator in sector N." Said one of the chevaliers as the group walked towards a large set of heavy duty bronze doors that were built into the wall in front of them. The room that they were standing in was a larger, open hall with rows of heavy stone pillars supporting the naked cave roof above them, carrying clear signs of dwarven architecture in them in their rectangular shape and sharp corners. Much like the cove below, the large hall seemed like it had been mined directly out of the reef itself, before being built into, with multiple bare cave walls breaking the pattern of block walls. The hall appeared to be a vast storage, sectioned into different parts labeled everything from 'food', 'utility' to 'ammunition'. An elaborate network of rails had been built into the floor and sides, clearly designed to ferry heavier goods from the elevator. Some smaller rope driven loading bays could also be found in the various corners of the room, and judging by their labels lead to the various cannon positions around the battlements. The group that now stood in front of the heavy bronze doors of the elevator shaft consisted of two chevaliers wielding swords and a halberd, one armored White Hand battle mage, two rather bored and impartial looking storage workers in simple blue linen uniforms, and a rather annoyed looking bald gnome in a heavy leather apron who gazed at the door with utmost dismay through his large goggles. "This is the fourth malfunction we've had in one month! I told the administration time and time again that this is what happens when you outsource component production to the lowest bidders! Those goblin parts are messing up my brilliant design once again! I did not spend two months designing this system for it to be ruined by cheap solutions!" The gnome, Arolf Steamtrinket, ranted on as he pointed angrily at the door. "They said something about there being a gas leak of some kind." The chevalier next to the gnome continued, as Arolf looked up towards him. "My ingenious system is driven purely by steam! Unless they forgot to turn on the ventilation for the coal ovens, there should be no chemicals free at all!" Arolf's furious ramblings were cut short however as a deep, metallic groan suddenly emerged from the heavy bronze doors in front of them, which made the entire group look towards it with sudden curiosity. Slowly but surely, something began to push the heavy bronze doors apart, as the heavy gears and machinery holding them in place let out a trembling mechanical roar. Between the doors, a thick, green blob of goo could be seen seeping out between the doors which had managed to push the doors a dozen inches or more apart despite their attempt to automatically shut! "Oh by the holy blitzfuse! The grey-goo worst case scenario has occurred, the nanobots have come to consume the world! Just like Thinker Ripzgeld predicted!" Arolf exclaimed, the gnome struck by a sudden onset of terror as he gazed at the expanding goo between the doors. The surrounding humans, although they looked startled by the gnome's reactions and the mysterious goo, seemed instead more confused than afraid! "Nano-bot what? What's a 'nano'!?"