Dungeon Core Academy: Books 1-7 (A LitRPG Series) by Alex Oakchest (book suggestions txt) 📕

After conversing, the Collector learned that Milark’s tribe had abandoned him, on account of his club foot that he dragged behind him, which slowed him to such a point that even trolls found it too sluggish.

Milark’s story tasted foul as the Collector listened to it, and as such, it extended an offer of continued acquaintance with possible affection, which he was told common folk referred to as friendship.

The Collector understood Milark’s troubles all too well. Though Milark had parents once, and he knew his ancestry, they were still alike. The Collector had nobody, had never known the kindness of a parent. His creation was as much a mystery to the rest of the world as it was to him, and no amount of torturing various historians, healers, mages, and scribes had ever brough him closer to the truth.

The only truth he ever received was from a mind-healer.

“You collect because it makes you real,” the woman said, gesturing at the Collector’s various arms and legs he’d grafted to his body. “Every new appendage confirms your existence.”

The Collector had agreed with her, and he’d taken her brain to see if he could profit from it, but alas it did not graft as well as arms and legs and wings did, and no amount of artificery would help.

And so, the Collector carried on collecting, and it was a happy sort of life, even if he never felt fulfilled and always needed the next prize.

“Milark,” said the Collector, watching its friend stroll into the ruins. “I was just entertaining my collection. You know what, my friend? I think I have almost mastered it. Another achievement to strike from the list; that makes it comedy, acting, dancing, and jousting all ticked off. I wonder what I will turn my hands to next.”

Milark stood underneath the great throne and nodded to the Collector’s collection gathered in a semi-circle around it. His face showed neutrality, but it had not always been so. When he had first come to live in the castle ruins, Milark found the Collector’s collection distasteful.

“Somethin’ ya should read, m’lord,” said Milark.

He held a book in his hand. The Collector peered down from its throne and looked at it. The book’s leather cover tasted old, but the pages tasted quite new on his tongue. Freshly printed, no doubt by artificery. The advancement of artificery had heralded a new age in Xynnar, where mana-drenched books could transmit the words within them halfway across the world. The Collector didn’t trust it. When words were easy to spread, they became cheap.

“A book, Milark?”

“M’lord has a keen eye. A book you should read, methinks.”

“Pass it here.”

Milark lifted the book, glanced at the throne twenty feet in the air, too high even for a troll.

“I was talking to my collection,” said the Collector. “One of them learned telekinesis before I took him. Come on now; pass it.”

Nothing happened.

“Fetch my whip,” said the Collector. “The one with the blue gemstone, if you please.”

This time, the book rose through the air, landing perfectly in his palm. Lacking a title on the cover, the tome gave nothing of its contents away. The Collector licked both the thumbs on its right hand and flicked onto the first page, where it saw its title.

“Totemly Brilliant – The Ballad of Beno Versus the Beasts. What is this, Milark, another of your fancies?”

“It’s from that poncy bugger scribe. We met ‘im once, remember? Gullyiard or summat like that.”

“Ah, Gulliver Shaw,” said the Collector. “Warscribe, as I recall. This is not a fable, then?”

“It’s a true account, m’lord. ‘E’s staying with a dungeon core in the wasteland, and it took out a whole bloody roost of werewolves.”

“I believe they are called a pride of werewolves, not a roost.”

“Right y’ar. You’re so clever, m’lord.”

One of the collection sighed and muttered, not quite under its breath. “It’s a wolf pack, you absolute idiot.”

The Collector pretended it couldn’t hear. Threats aside, it was in no mood to actually use physical punishment. Doing so always cast a grim light on the rest of its day.

Milark shuffled nervously on the spot.

“You want to ask me something, but you hold back,” said the Collector.

The great stone troll blushed, the rocky skin on his cheeks flushing slightly red. “There’s a fox cub in the forest over yonder,” he said. “Lost its mam and pa. I’s seen it wanderin’ alone. Can I…”

The Collector sighed. “Yes, you can have it, as long as you can coax it to you. But no more stray animals after that, okay Milark? You must have twenty pets now, and that’s enough for anyone. Wild animals are a great responsibility.”

“I takes good care of them.”

“I know you do, and it’s clear how much they love you, but enough’s enough. The fox cub is to be your last.”

“You’re so kind m’lord.”

The Collector wanted to smile at the praise, but he didn’t. The last time he had smiled at someone with both lips, their face had turned white, they fainted, and the Collector had to carry them all the way home to their village. There, he was chased away by fifteen men, three women, and two dogs, all of them wielding pitchforks. Except for the dogs, of course.

“Now, a core in the wasteland, you say? I will have to read this. If the account is true, it may be worth a trip, Milark. After all, I cannot pass up a chance at adding to my collection, can I?”

Both Milark and the Collector stared at the collection then, and the Collector couldn’t help but feel proud about all the dungeon cores it had already gathered.

One had come willingly, and he had paid for another, but the rest? Those were the most satisfying. The rest he had dragged screaming from their dungeons.

CHAPTER 22

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