The Culling of Man: A litrpg adventure (Peril's Prodigy Book 1) by Craig Kobayashi (ereader android TXT) 📕

what I came for," Warrion said, then stopped. His eyebrows came together as he ran the words through his mind again, then nodded with a wry smile at his own accidental cleverness before continuing. "Athios told me you got a quest and only have 48 hours or some shit. We gonna do it tomorrow?"

"Okay, one: nice one on the 'came' joke. That was pretty solid. Two: I did get a quest and yes, I'm going to do it tomorrow, but you don't have to go. It's for the egg," Garath explained. He noticed the Assassin's shoulders slump slightly. "You are welcome to come, of course. More the merrier and all that."

"Well, I'm not doing anyone much good here. Gary and his little construction crew have been handling most of the real 'to-do' items around HQ. And fishing is a hard nope for me… it's just ultra boring, you know?"

"You've never been fishing with Daisy.” Garath laughed.

"Daisy?"

"Yeah, little blond girl. Here with her grandma. Blasted the doors open when we got here. Ringing any bells?"

"Oh, Daisy. Dude, that kid's bat-shit."

"You're telling me," Garath agreed with a smile. Even though the little Elementalist didn't like him much, he found that he quite liked when she was around. The shit that came out of her mouth was rich with an innocent hilarity that somehow renewed his hope for humanity.

"So, what's the quest?" Warrion asked.

Garath went over the prompt he had received after retrieving the egg from his Items panel and told the Assassin about the artesian well in Lynnwood that supposedly had the best drinking water on Earth.

"Who's going?" Warrion wanted to know after the Necrologist had brought him up to speed.

"So far? Me and you homie," said Garath. "I was going to head downstairs and see if anyone else wanted to come along. I noticed a dungeon on the map too. It’s actually not far from the well, coincidentally. Maybe we can even kill two birds with one stone."

"A dungeon? I thought the only dungeon near us was the Space Needle, the tower of something or other..."

"That's the only capital D dungeon near us, yeah. I saw a handful of lowercase D dungeons around though," Garath explained. "It's probably a good idea to get some gear and level up a bit in a few of the lowercase ones before the Space Needle anyways. The one I have in mind is actually at the Alderwood Mall."

"Bonus! Too bad that sushi place is probably down for repairs..."

"Right?! You wanna do some recruiting with me?" Garath asked. "Max party size is five for the little D dungeons. Athios will probably want to come but we’ll want to add some diversity to the group. I'm thinking we will probably want a tank and healer to round out the group."

"Probs a good idea," the Assassin agreed.

Tarzan meowed haughtily as the Necrologist got to his feet. "I'm sorry!" he apologized. "I can't just sit there until you're done napping, you sleep like eighteen hours a day."

The fluffy black cat pinned her ears back and looked away from Garath, mortally offended. He rolled his eyes at her then turned and left the room, following Warrion down the corridor and into the main hall of the building.

Gary's child-labor construction crew had dragged all of the cushioned furnishings, originally placed throughout the converted school building, into the large, open main hall and it had become somewhat of a hang-out locale for members of The Band. Garath scanned the crowded room trying to locate his old neighbor, Sharon. Sharon was seventy-eight years old and the saltiest, fussiest old lady he had ever met. She was sweet deep down, probably. When Sharon had chosen her Class, a Naturist, just before The Culling, her decrepit body had transformed - erasing the damage that time had done and restored the bitter old bird's body to peak condition. His seventy-eight-year-old neighbor now had the body of a beautiful young lady in the prime of her life - though her personality had not changed in the slightest.

Garath was speechless at the time, even more so when Mark - a mid-thirties, overweight banker of some type that had lived on the same floor that Garath and Sharon did - witnessed her transformation and also chose the Naturist Class in hopes of a similar transformation, but nothing happened. After The Culling, Garath posted a forum in the World panel to see if anyone else had seen or experienced a transformation like Sharon's. He learned that it had actually happened to anyone whose Vitality would have been below five before choosing a Class. As five was the base Vitality for Level 1 of each Class, those whose Vitality had increased upon choosing a Class also experienced a transformation - so that their body would match up with their Attributes. It all seemed a bit heady for Garath but he supposed it made sense, especially after feeling the increased Strength Attribute first hand. After all, having increased Strength or Dexterity with seventy+ year-old joints and ligaments could definitely spell disaster.

When he finally located Sharon, Garath was not surprised to find her hanging out with Daisy's Gran next to the fire place. It was a comfortable 73 degrees inside the old brick building but the two of them were cozily lounging a few feet from the blazing fireplace in the center of the main hall. The wooden tops of school desks work fairly well doubling as firewood, as it turns out.

Garath and Warrion sank into a vacant couch next to the two old ladies. The Necrologist couldn't help noticing that the discussion going on just behind the couch, where a large group of Raid members were standing in a circle, ended abruptly as they sat. He looked curiously over his shoulder and caught the eyes of several people staring at him - then quickly looking away when they made eye contact - and Garath couldn't help feeling like he had been the subject of their conversation. The Raid leader was more than