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

“Are you by yourself?” I asked.

She looked around. “Are you expecting anyone else?”

I thought back to the meeting with Reginal and his six guards earlier that morning. I still hadn’t decided what to do about him, and here was Galatee. Two chief visits on the same day. I felt blessed.

“Never mind,” I said. “What can I do for you?”

“Let me ask you something, Beno, if you don’t mind.”

“Nothing would give me more pleasure than to spend all day answering your questions.”

Galatee frowned for a second, then hid it behind a smiling façade. “Let’s say you are digging a hole. Just you and a shovel going down, down into the dirt. You’re hot, sweaty, your arms ache, and your daily progress is limited by what your muscles can handle.”

“I use a team of kobolds to mine for me,” I said. “But go on.”

“One day you are standing in your little hole, and a group of people approaches you. They’re experts at digging, they tell you. They have expertise, tools, and manpower. They will help you dig your hole much faster and much deeper than you ever imagined, and all they ask is that a tiny portion of the hole belongs to them. Most of it remains yours.”

As tough as it was for me to pierce her complex web of subtlety, she could only have been talking about the Silkers and their offers to boost Yondersun commerce. That meant Galatee had come here for the same reason that Reginal had.

Telling her about Reginal’s visit would be a mistake, of course. As would making Galatee aware of exactly how much I knew about the whole thing. One thing I had learned is that if you act dumb, people treat you like you are dumb, and nobody takes much care in leaving their guard up around dumb people.

“I would question how much gold there is to be made in simply digging holes,” I said.

“Beno, what do you think the goal of Yondersun is?”

“What’s the goal of any town? You spread like moss. Just grow and grow as far as you can. I didn’t know there was any other aim than to exist.”

“For the town as a collective, perhaps. Individuals should have dreams of how they want to shape it. Look around us, Beno. When you go to the surface, I mean. All you’ll see is desert, desert, and more desert.”

“That happens when you build your town in a desert.”

“Yondersun is at enough of a disadvantage as it is. If we’re to become something, we need to have a vision, and we need to take risks. Sometimes, that means allying with people who offer to lend you a shovel, even if you don’t much like the hand wielding it.”

“If it’s shovels that you want…”

“The Silker merchant guild has offered to invest in Yondersun, Beno. They will build a guildhall here and lend us their centuries of mercantile expertise. They will use their connections to establish favorable trade routes.”

“Really? That is surprising news.”

“I was surprised too,” said Galatee. “But Yondersun is in its infancy. The Silkers want to become our only merchant guild now, so that they will reap the profits when we grow even bigger.”

“What’s stopping you?”

She smiled. A genuine smile, one that she didn’t hide. Even so, it was like getting a grin from a coyote. “I thought you’d see the practical side of this. I like that about you, Beno. You’re colder than a grave.”

“Don’t butter me up,” I said. “What’s the problem?”

“In a word? Chief Reginal.”

“That was two words if my arithmetic is as good as it used to be.”

“The stubborn fool of a goblin won’t see that without this helping hand, Yondersun will forever be scrabbling around at the foot of the mountain, searching for a foothold. We’ll survive, yes, but little else. What is the point in just surviving, eh? We need to climb to the summit!”

“Plenty of people don’t even get the luxury of survival. Not so long ago, your people lived underground and survived on mushrooms and vermin, while engaged in a war with Reginal’s clan.”

“I don’t intend to be thankful for merely existing. No, if Yondersun is to become something more, we must accept the Silkers’ help. We need to climb the top! Reginal, oaf that he is, doesn’t see that. Instead, he sees Silker assassins in every shadow. He imagines them to be puppet masters, pulling the strings of all the nobility in Xynnar.”

She’s working her way up to it, I thought. The part where I get drawn in.

“Perhaps he has a point. A merchant guild doesn’t get to their size without underhand play.”

“They’re a bunch of jumped-up rug sellers, not diabolical masterminds operating from dark corners. They want to give us help, gambling that Yondersun will grow large enough for them to earn a profit on their investment.”

“If it’s that simple…it’s easier to ask for forgiveness than permission,” I said. “Don’t you think?”

“Just take their deal? No, Beno. The two clans’ peace is fragile enough as it is. As much as I know accepting the Silkers’ help will secure our future, I won’t threaten our present in order to do it. The Wrotuns and Eternals are living together, yes, but it will take a few generations before people truly believe we are one people. Not until our great-grandchildren are born inside Yondersun’s walls.”

“Then you’re hamstrung by your own democracy.”

“Aye. The problem is that Reginal and I are co-chiefs,” she continued. “Neither of us can act without the other’s agreement. As long as the fool resists, then I’m powerless. Soon, the Silkers will tire of waiting for a decision.”

“Why not kill Reginal?” I said.

Galatee said nothing then. She just stared at me for a minute. Then another.

I couldn’t read anything at all in her eyes. I had expected