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

And then, Shadow was gone.

I switched to my core senses now, seeing the world through the eyes of Edgar the raven. Once again, I was greeted by passageways decorated with stone carvings and statues of underworld gods. Muralled hallways with archways of perfect geometry and exquisite engravings, the patterns showing images of monsters and death, together with runemarks that bore dark meanings when translated.

The only sounds were the gentle flaps of wings, soft as a fairy’s whisper. Onwards Edgar went, his way lit by mana lamps that could only have been of the self-replenishing kind, or they would have burned out long ago. The flames flickered, the light cast silhouettes of his wings on the walls.

Edgar must have flown for half a mile through a linear set of passageways, when he halted. His raven squad, and a solitary duck, stopped behind him and hovered in midair.

“Don’t say a word,” I told him, projecting my core voice into his tiny bird mind.

The narkleer was ahead of them. Good old Kainhelm, patrolling the ancient Hallways with his lovely flap of back skin hanging off him and his rays of invisible death radiating out in every direction.

Edgar and his flock were far enough away to be unaffected by Kainhelm’s toxic energy, and at least we knew where he was now. This was a good start.

“One of you can stay and keep track of Kainhelm. Don’t get too close. The rest, head back,” I said.

The ravens flapped back through the tunnels until they joined Shadow, waiting by the hole in the wall.

“Kainhelm is far enough away for us to begin the assault,” I said. “We didn’t spot an entrance to the inner dungeon that way, so we’ll head in the opposite direction. Gary? It’s time. Shadow will take the lead but be ready to support her.”

After they clambered through the hole, which Wylie had to widened to allow Gary to squeeze in, they headed in the opposite direction from the narkleer, with Shadow and her ravens leading the way and using her scouting abilities to detect traps.

I helped, of course. As a dungeon core, I know how other cores think. Even if the core residing here wasn’t trained at the academy, which I suspected was the case, I have an instinct for where other gems will set traps and puzzles.

“It feels strange,” said Gary, his leech legs squelching as they stuck and unstuck on the ground. “After spending so long in Core Beno’s dungeon, I find being in another disorientating. It is funny, how a core’s personality bleeds into their dungeon, no?”

“How do you mean?” said Shadow, without turning around.

“Our delightful core is practical. Free from unnecessary flourishes. He has little artistic flair, to be sure, but everything in his dungeon has a purpose.”

“I kinda like the aesthetic of this place. It looks like a dungeon should. Like you can feel its age in the air, and when you look at the stone the weight of history bears down on you. Beno builds his dungeon with all the artistic flair of a tavern toilet.”

“Can you two be quiet?” I said. “Focus.”

They wound their way through cramped tunnels where the roof brushed Gary’s head, through passageways so wide you could guide a carriage through them, up hills, down slopes, and even across a chamber filled with ankle-high fetid water. I made Shadow check it carefully for drownjacks, of course, but after learning how shallow the pool was, there was nothing to fear.

There was no hint of trap nor puzzle so far, and that was what worried me. The safer this place appeared, the more it would disarm us, and the more dangerous it then became. This was another core tactic, one not utilized so much nowadays; lulling heroes into believing a dungeon was harmless.

“Finally,” said Shadow. “A room up ahead.”

They came to a room, circular and with a domed ceiling, on which was a mural depicting Snaggleneck the demon’s massacre of King George’s army, a famous tale in the Underworld grimoire. It was most likely untrue; contrary to popular opinion, most demons just want to be left alone with a warm fire and cup of herbal tea. Being summoned constantly by wizards and demonmancers can become quite tiring.

The room was covered in dust so deep in some places that it looked like ash. The smell, reaching me through Edgar’s olfactory gland, was cloying. His sense of smell was weak, but there was so much dust that it was too much even for him, and so I shut this part of my core senses off.

Shadow had no such luxury, and she raised her arm and coughed into the crook of her elbow.

When the last raven fluttered into the room, a steel door, one we hadn’t noticed due to it opening on the inside of the room, slammed shut, and a lock clicked into place.

Gary pounded on the door with four of his legs. “Let us out, you blighter! I hate the dark. I cannot take it, I tell you!”

Shadow rubbed his back. “Gary, you spend your life underground, in the dark.”

“That is different, madam. I am used to darkness created by Core Beno. Darkness my master calls home. This is uncontrolled darkness and is quite, quite different. The air in here is poisoned, I am sure of it.”

Truth be told, I was surprised at Gary’s nerves, but I wasn’t surprised that the door locked behind us. It was just standard dungeon practice; when you lace a room with puzzles and traps, you make sure the only way out of there is to solve the traps or die.

It was strange experiencing it all from the other side, delving through another core’s dungeon. We used to do it in the Dungeon Core Academy for practice, of course. We’d devise traps for the other cores and have them try to