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

Suddenly, the core vision turned black, and I was yanked out of it. The sensation was a jarring one, and it made me feel like someone had picked me up and shook me around.

I gave a mental command for my feelings to fade. Though I usually wanted to keep my feelings with me as much as possible, they had no place in a battle.

“Are you okay, Core Beno?”

Warren was staring at me now, concern written on his green face.

“Fine,” I said. “There are eight Seekers. Tell me about them, Warrane. What race are they?”

“The Seekers are like the Wrotun; they attack with different races.”

“So we could be dealing with anything. Fine. What weapons do they generally use? What spells? Do they have mages, archers, illusionists, barbarians? I need to know everything.”

“The Seekers’ attacks take many forms, Core Beno. This leaf has seen men who can grow spheres of trembling purple energy on their palms. Not as bright as the First-Leaf’s staff, but enough to hurt. He has seen flaming arrows fired from a great distance. Orcs with swords made from glass. Chimeras who can follow a scent miles through the tunnels.”

“We’re dealing with eight enemies of unknown race or powers. Hmm. At least I know where they are. I don’t have the essence to create eight creatures of any kind except leeches and spiders, and I doubt that would be a fair fight. We’ll have to be creative.”

“This leaf is yours to command.”

“You’re a little too subservient sometimes, Warrane.”

“It is his only way of restoring honor.”

“Even so, be your own man. Surely you won’t do anything that I tell you to?”

“This leaf will act on any command if it means he can gain back his tree’s honor.”

“Okay. Go fight the Seekers by yourself.”

Warren’s lips twitched. “Core Beno? This leaf would offer advice; it wouldn’t be in either of our interests for him to fight them alone.”

“Ah, good. You do have your own mind! I’ll need you to use it, okay? You’re here to help me, and you’re worth more than just carrying me around. Tell me, in your best judgment and from your knowledge of the Seekers, what is it most likely we will face? If you’re wrong, I won’t hold it against you because I know this is a blind guess.”

“This leaf knows there is a magic user,” he said, rubbing the swollen part of his face. “He is most displeased with his way of finding this out. The Seekers rarely send just one kind of attacker.”

“They mix things up, like a party of heroes. Maybe this isn’t so different from what I’m used to.”

“They are getting wiser to our traps. Each time they invade, we must lay twice as many to repel them the next time.”

“As I thought; some of them have the rogue-like ability to disarm traps, or their mages know the right spells. Okay. I might have something we can do, but I’ll need to get closer to them. Since I don’t have pedestal points all the way up there, you’ll have to carry me.”

“This leaf wonders, does your idea involve stealth?”

“When its eight versus one, stealth is the only way. A core must work in the shadows. The closer he gets to the light, the nearer he is to defeat. I’ll be pushing myself as close as I can bear.”

“The Seekers can detect when a leaf is nearby,” said Warrane.

“Just a leaf? Or they can sense anything?”

“Tavia once experimented with this. She released a trained dirtfox into the tunnels during a Seeker attack. It followed them for an hour, and returned unharmed.”

“Interesting. Yet they notice you straight away?”

“In an instant.”

“Then they can detect the mana in you. They need torchlight to see, so it isn’t as if they have extraordinary senses, and they couldn’t spot Tavia’s fox. Yet they saw you straight away. I suppose you’ll have to stay here.”

“How will you get close to them?”

Create kobold, I thought.

A kobold formed in front of us. I hadn’t warned Warrane, and he jumped when he saw the creature appear beside him. He recovered himself soon, since it wasn’t the kobold herself that worried him, just her sudden reappearance. After all, there was a kobold family in Wrotun.

This was the third kobold I had ever created, and the first female. She looked much like my other two; a squat figure who stood upright, with the scales of a lizard and a wolf-like face. Her eyes were slanted, more feminine than my old kobolds’. She was slightly less muscular than them, too. She had a shock of black hair on the top of her head, which ran down her scaly back and stopped just above her tail.

I was about to speak to her, when a message appeared in front of me.

You have created three kobolds – [Minor] proficiency gained!

Due to creating three kobolds, and in a large part thanks to the bond you fostered with your first two, you have earned a [minor] proficiency.

 

You can now choose from the following roles when creating kobolds:

- Miner

- Scout

- Shaman.

- Cultivator

 

Core List created: Creature Proficiencies

Kobold – [Minor]

I would have made a fist and pumped it in the air, but it was pointless because Warren wouldn’t have been able to see my core hands. What’s a fist pump if nobody sees it?

I was happy, though. This was a great step in my core career; a creature proficiency.

Master cores, ones who had created many creatures in many dungeons, earned proficiencies over time. Some cores might prefer using goblins to defend their dungeons and thus might earn proficiency after creating many of them. The bonus they get could be anything; their goblins might be tougher to kill, harder to see, they might smell nicer.

But…not every core earned them, and