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

“You won’t be sorry, Beno. Me and you going for two drinks. You’ll have a great time! Two buds having three or four ales, what could be better?”

While we waited for Hardere to finish with his client, Gull and I went for a drink, which meant that I watched him swig down three ales and belch after each one. After that, we went for a stroll and a float around the warrens and alleyways of Hogsfeate. Gulliver, suitably filled with liquid courage, doffed his hat and flashed his smile to every pretty lady who walked by, catching a few wry smiles as a reward.

Avoiding the plaza and exploring the backstreets of Hogsfeate, I got a better feel for the town, and an even better feel for its residents, which didn’t make me better disposed toward the place.

Lingering glances. Sidelong stares. Muttered curses, barely disguised frowns. I had the feeling that I was never going to be popular around here.

We stopped in front of a giant bronze statue of a man holding a shield and a sword.

“Is it just me, or do people seem to hate me?” I said.

“It’s you.”

“I must be imagining it then.”

“No, I mean it’s you, as in they hate you.”

“Thanks, Gull.”

“Excuse me,” said Gulliver, talking to a teenage lad wandering by with a sleeping lamb tucked under his arm. “Any idea why people around here are so rude to my friend?”

The lad, his nose bright red, sniffed. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his nostrils. “On account of Namantep,” he said.

“What’s a Namantep?”

“It’s a,” sniff, “Who, not a what. She was a core. S’posed to protect the town, my master told me. Only, she went insane and destroyed half the buildings, killed hundreds of people.”

“Ah. That might explain why I’m not popular.”

The lad pointed at the statue. Sniff. “Sir Dullbright was the one who stopped her. Shattered her in half, he did. He’s a hero! Er…no offense.”

The statue took on an unwholesome air now that I knew the man was a hero. His sword and shield should have been a giveaway, but I’d thought that he might just be a soldier. Some heroes are soldiers, to be sure, but not all soldiers are heroes.

I floated a foot away from the statue of Sir Dullbright, feeling repulsed by it. “What’s with his stupid name anyway? Dullbright? Completely idiotic. Like being called Sir Fastslow. Sir Bluntsharp.”

“Come on, don’t take offense to this, Beno,” said Gulliver, and then addressed the lad. “Why are cores allowed here at all, if they caused so much damage?”

I spoke before the lad had a chance to. “Because towns and cities might have some self-governance, but they can’t overrule the law of the land. Xynnar was founded on equality, or so they say.”

“So they say,” agreed Gulliver.

Sniff. “Not for want of trying,” said the lad.

He jerked his thumb. Way across from us, beyond the plaza and emerging from the biggest, most extravagant house at the top of the town slope, emerged a man so rotund that he looked like a pumpkin ready to roll down the hill.

Sniff. “That’s Sir Dullbright. He’s the governor, and he’s been trying to get equality laws repealed for decades. Not just for cores, neither. Goblins, kobolds, imps, gnomes. Everything.”

“A lovely guy. I’m surprised he’s still alive; you don’t often get statues of living people commissioned.”

“Sir Dullbright decommissioned it ‘imself. Increased taxes to pay for it. Said it was good for the town, since it would boost morale.”

“He’s let himself go a little,” said Gulliver. “An example of a phenomenon I have seen time and time again. Success is good for the purse, bad for the gut.”

Sniff. “Gotta go now, Mr. Core. An’ let me jus’ say; I don’t take no stock in Dullbright’s crap. So long now!”

The lad was away before I could say anything, weaving through the plaza and soon lost among the crowd, the only sign of his existence the bleating of his newly-awoken lamb.

“Let’s continue our tour,” said Gulliver. “How about the Pickled Frog and the Bearded Lady next?”

“I don’t want to meet any of your exes,” I said. “And no more drinking. We didn’t just come here to see the mage; there’s something else.”

Hogsfeate’s mercenary bulletin board was far away from the town plaza, separated from where the shoppers and traders and everyone else congregated. There was good reason for that, given the people such a board attracted.

Gathered around it now were mercenaries, men at arms, women-at-arms. Rogues, barely-disguised thieves, barbarians, journeymen. Some wore armor of dazzling metal or exquisitely made leather, the lack of scratches indicating little use. Sons of nobles, no doubt, who had grown bored of the easy rich life and fancied taking a beating from a monster before scuttling off home and bragging to their rich friends.

Some wore combat leathers that had seen not just better days but better decades, serving not only as protection but as a walking advertisement for their wearer’s battle experience. Others, lacking both money and experience, had fashioned ridiculous armor from straw stuffed into a burlap sack and stitched shut. That was the thing about being a mercenary; there was no monetary hurdle to climb in order to get started. A poor man could rise as a mercenary with the right amount of skill and luck. Unfortunately, a poor man would have to start with homemade armor and weapons, and for these sorts of people, luck was curiously absent.

“Slim feckin’ pickings,” said one. “I swear, they take all the good jobs and give ‘em to the heroes guild and then they leave us with the crap. I feel like a glorified rat catcher sometimes.”

“Tell me about it. I haven’t bought a new girdle in months.