The dungeon, Fiona was quickly learning, was more massive and sprawling than she’d ever dreamed. Ever-changing, too, if the newly-opened hiding spot was any indication. Some rocks must’ve fallen, or the ground must have shifted — she wasn’t knowledgeable about the changes to the ground or about the dungeon to be able to tell, but Crispin, at least, eyed the revealed cache with a critical, suspicious eye.

“I’ve seen these before,” he told her, though he didn’t take his eyes away from the ornate chest before them.

“Have you?” Fiona asked as she approached it, though didn’t get as close to it as her guide did. “It looks like… just a chest?”

Instead of a verbal answer, Crispin reached a hoof out to tap the front of the chest — which promptly opened with little difficulty to reveal the most beautiful crown she’d ever seen. She even let out an audible gasp and took a step forward —

“Don’t.”

Fiona faltered and stopped, though she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the glittering crown. “Don’t?”

“Like I said, I’ve seen these before. It’s either cursed, or...” Finally lifting her gaze from the alluring piece of jewelry, she looked up to find Crispin’s brow furrowed, a mild scowl on his face. With little fanfare, he slammed the chest closed with a hoof and then, after stepping off to the side, gave it a solid kick.

The chest careened off to the side and bounced against a rock before it came to a perilous rest balancing over the edge of a cliff Fiona didn’t even realize was there, so shrouded in darkness as it was — and then, with a startling, frightening wail, it tipped over the edge and vanished. “What in the world—”

“Ah,” he said, as if everything suddenly clicked into place for him. Crispin enlightened her, too, a moment later: “A mimic.”

“A what?”

“A mimic,” he repeated as he turned and began to walk down the passageway once more. Fiona hastened after him, lest she fall too far behind with… whatever a mimic was. “A monster that takes the form of a chest to entice less experienced adventurers into opening it and trying to retrieve its contents.”

“Um.” She was almost too afraid to ask, but — “And, um, then what do they do…?”

Crispin made a soft noise as he continued onward, and did not look back. “They snap shut around them — with their numerous sharp teeth.”

“O-oh.”