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

“Aye, well I like the feeling of gold in my purse. Don’t worry, my lad. This dungeon wants to beat us. It’s not gonna stop until it does, and that means there will always be loot.”

After the heroes left the dungeon, I spoke to Tomlin. “They’re not wrong. I’m on a losing streak, Tomlin my friend. Five times these sword-swinging schmucks have beaten me. I’ve tried everything. New traps. New monsters, new puzzles. I’m worried I’ve met my match.”

“Is your well of ideas running dry, dark lord?”

“It’s so dry that rats are nesting at the bottom of it. I’m beginning to think it’s me, you know. That I’ve become too predictable. Or maybe heroes are just getting stronger these days.”

“You could shut dungeon. Stop heroes from coming in. Take more time to get ready.”

“I notice you didn’t correct me about my predictability, Tomlin. Do you think I am becoming stale?”

“Dark Lord, things that work in past do not always work in future. When Tomlin go to surface town last week, he speaks to a healer. He and Tomlin talk, and Tomlin learns about treatments for disease.”

“Oh? I didn’t know you wanted to be a healer.”

“Tomlin is in charge of growing Dark Lord’s essence vines. Sometimes vines can die when parasites grow, and Tomlin must treat them. But parasites get used to treatment, and become resistant. It is same with treatment for illnesses sometimes. Healer told me this.”

“Heroes are the parasites, and my dungeon of death is the treatment. I like that, Tomlin.”

The kobold gave me a mischievous smile. “So perhaps Dark Lord should close dungeon for a while. While he develops new…treatments.”

“I could do that, but there’s every chance that the three brothers will move on to another dungeon, without me having defeated them.”

“Would be so bad?”

“Five times they’ve taken loot from me. Imagine if there was a parasite attacking the essence vines, and no matter what you tried, it kept surviving. Would you give up and let it run amok over every essence leaf?”

“No, Dark Lord,” admitted Tomlin.

“I can’t let this go unanswered. If the Pickerings move on to another town, to another dungeon, they’ll do it in the knowledge that they bested me every single time. Word will spread, and my dungeon reputation, such as it is, will plummet.”

“Pride is leading Dark Lord down a dark path.”

“This isn’t pride. Do you really think that of me, Tomlin? That I’m so pathetic I’d let pride keep a hold on me? No, I like to think I can rise above it. This is much more than boring, basic pride. This is an intense desire to show these heroes that I can utterly destroy them.”

Tomlin gave me a kindly stare. Coming from a kobold, a creature of wolf and lizard ancestry, it was quite a sight.

“Dark Lord will find way to flay them alive and tear out organs. Tomlin has faith in him.”

“Thanks, Tomlin. That’s very nice. It makes me feel better.”

“Tomlin must go back to cultivation room now. Essence vines need tending.”

“Don’t tell the others about our conversation,” I said. “Morale is low enough as it is. We’ll let Gary, Fight, Death, and Kill heal from their wounds, and we’ll rethink and regroup. I’ll end these no-good heroes if it’s the last thing I do.”

After our conversation, I did what has rarely ever failed me in times of need; I got to work. My old classmates and instructors at the Dungeon Core Academy might have had many descriptions for me, but they would never have denied that I work hard.

It was a hindrance to my social life back then. While the other students were having the dungeons core equivalent of parties, I surrounded myself with piles of books from the academy library. Tomes on critters, beasts, traps, puzzles. I soaked it in until my head felt ready to burst. Figuratively, of course, since I lack a head and thus cannot burst it.

Despite all my studies, it seemed that I still had work to do. No matter how big a core’s dungeon was, no matter how many creatures they had, there was always a hero who could undo all their progress.

Over the next few days, I worked like never before, denying myself even my favorite pastime of reading adventure books. I dredged my memories of everything I had ever learned in the dungeon core academy.

“The problem is,” I told Fight, Death, and Kill, who were keeping me company in my core room while they recovered from their wounds. “that Cael is a wartificer. He can use that stupid feather of his to etch runemarks on his blades, giving them different effects. Lightning bolts, fire, ice. He can do the same with his armor too. Why is that such a problem, you ask? It means that he can change his battle tactics in an instant.”

“Fight!”

“Death!”

“Kill!”

“Yep,” I said. “Exactly what I was thinking. I’ll have to come up with a trap he can’t scribble his way out of.”

I made plans. I scrapped plans. I looked at new ones from every possible angle. I schemed, connived, plotted, hatched. The idea of defeating Cael and his brothers utterly consumed me until I could think of nothing else.

When I was finally settled on a ruse, I set about making what I needed for it to work. The sun rose and slept three times on the wasteland above while I worked, but none of its rays touched us down in the dungeon.

Visitors from Yondersun, the town above my lair, came to visit every so often while I worked. The braver townsfolk enjoyed touring my dungeon, and I allowed them to visit some of the trap-free chambers and speak to my monsters. It wasn’t ideal, but I had no choice. Given my proximity