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

had already traveled, I didn’t even know where I was going. There had been no time to explain, and neither the overseers nor my new owner – ugh, what a word to use – saw fit to tell me.

The only thing I knew was this: just a few days ago, I had finished building my evaluation dungeon. This was something all cores had to do after studying and graduating from the Dungeon Core Academy. They’d get released into the wide world…well, a muddy room deep underground…with nothing but their wits and a scrap of essence moss.

From that, they’d have to apply all their lessons and grow and build an entire dungeon. The only way to make sure you passed was to kill a party of heroes who had entered your dungeon to get their grubby little mitts on your loot.

So, how did I fare?

Brilliantly. Really. I slaughtered a bunch of heroes like they were little beetles scampering over my dungeon floor.

But if I was talking to someone who knew what really happened, I suppose I’d have to be honest about myself and my abilities.

The truth was, I had allowed a couple of heroes to flee my dungeon. That goes against the dungeon core rules, letting heroes escape with their lives. It goes against everything we stand for. But they were brothers of my friend, who was both a little girl and a hundreds of years old dungeon core named Vedetta.

Plus, I did kill a party of heroes immediately after that.

But again, since there might be someone going around spreading a pesky thing known as the ‘truth’, I suppose I would have to be honest about things, if anyone asked me. It wasn’t a party of heroes, as such. It was only one hero, and one person can’t make a party. At least, not a very good one.

So yes, it was just one hero, and yes, he was a bandit who used to rob and murder innocent travelers. Not exactly an example of heroic virtue. But the academy definition of a party is ‘One or more people working together with a shared aim.’ Their definition of a hero is ‘One who is not a core or monster, and finds their way into the core’s dungeon by their own means, for their own motives.’

So the lone bandit was, by the laws of dungeon coredom, a party of heroes.

Unfortunately, the academy overseers didn’t look on my semantics too fondly, and they told me I had failed my evaluation and would have to be smashed up into core dust, which would then be used to create a new core gem who, hopefully, wouldn’t be as disappointing as me.

Then, something wondrous happened! As I was waiting to meet my fate, which I was determined to take without showing any fear, an overseer came to see me.

He said, “Your fate has changed, Core Beno. You have been bought. Yes, yes, strange, isn’t it? A benefactor has bought you, a core.”

He told me that henceforth I would no longer be working for the Dungeon Core Academy, and I wouldn’t be pulverized into little pieces of core gem.

Woo hoo!

I tried to imagine who my new benefactor was, and why he would want me. There were a few plausible reasons. Dungeon cores are masters of traps and puzzles, which means we make for great home security.

Perhaps a ridiculously rich merchant had bought me to protect his family. Maybe I would live what counted as a life of luxury for a dungeon core. I would have a core room made of marble, and I would rest on a velvet cushion while harp music played from the corner, and the smell of extravagant spices drifted to my imaginary nose and promised untold luxury.

Which brings me to the present. To lying in darkness in a gods damned rucksack, with glass bottles rolling against me.

I’ve never been a snooty core, and though I don’t remember my first life, I don’t think I was a snooty man. In fact, I was probably a rough-and-ready barbarian with the silver tongue of a bard, deft fingers of a rogue, and a glorious, glorious wizard beard.

So, I decided that I’d suck it up. I didn’t want my mysterious benefactor’s first impression of me to be that I was a pain in the arse.

As we carried on going wherever we were headed, sounds increased. Muffled voices. Horses braying. Maybe cows, too. Do cows bray? No, cows mooing. That’s what I heard.

Smells drifted into the rucksack. Incense. The delicious aroma of a stew cooking that threatened to awaken taste buds I didn’t even have. That was a bad part of being a core – phantom feelings. I don’t need to eat, drink, sleep or urinate, but sometimes I get glimmers of those urges. It’s a hangover from my first life that should lessen the older I get.

It was then that I heard a voice.

“Ahhh,” it said, coming from right beside me. “What a nap! I could have slept for decades. Wait…tell me I didn’t sleep for decades!”

I knew that voice!

“Core Jahn?” I said.

“Beno? Is that you?”

Hearing Core Jahn’s voice was like a blast of comfort. Despite the manly front I displayed, I had been a little worried and a little lonely.

But Jahn was here, which meant that I wasn’t the only core bought by our benefactor. I’d always liked Jahn. He was a joker. He was cheerful. But he never, ever listened in core class.

Jahn had become an academy legend recently, but not for the best reason. His dungeon evaluation happened at the same time as mine. During our evaluation, we all started in a small core room with nothing but a patch of essence moss on the wall.

Essence is part plant, part fabric of the world. We cores draw our energy from it. We absorb it deep inside our gem selves, and we can