Tower Climber (A LitRPG Adventure, Book 1) by Jakob Tanner (free children's online books TXT) 📕

weaponry and artifacts. Max had normally avoided it as Sakura had told him he should rely more on training his body and mana as weapons and learning as much about other traits as possible. A weapon would only make things confusing for his training and create new obstacles for when he needed to be quick on his feet. But for this current operation with Casey, there was a specific tool he had in mind.

The owner of the stall was a skinny grizzled looking man with a scar over his left eye. The scar-covered eye was blind and glassy looking. Some people would opt to cover part of their face with an eye patch but that was clearly not this merchant’s style. Intimidating customers was clearly part of his business plan.

“Whaddya want?” he barked at Casey and Max as soon as they approached.

Max gulped.

He didn’t know how to describe exactly what he wanted, but he knew he’d seen it in action before. He wanted a tool like the one the assassin had used when he had come to kill him on the October monster wave. He wanted a tool that broke through magical wards.

“I want a knife or some kind of cutting device to break through magical wards,” Max explained.

The man’s one good eye fluttered with surprise.

“You know, young man, such tools are deemed illegal by the climber’s guild,” said the merchant.

“I do,” said Max. “And I don’t care. Do you?”

The man snickered. “You’re clearly a fool boy, but I’m not in the business of chaperoning idiotic children. If you want to buy a ward-breaking device, I’ll sell you one. It will cost you one hundred gold though.”

Max bristled at that price. He only had about twenty gold to his name. Maybe Casey could pitch in some money too, but they still wouldn’t be anywhere close enough to the merchant’s price tag.

“Could you do twenty gold?”

“Sorry, nope. See ya around if that’s all you got to play with,” said the man.

Crap!

Based on the information the librarian had given them, any secret means they’d have of exiting the tower-zone would most likely require a ward-breaking device. Without one, they wouldn’t be able to go ahead with their plan.

“Here’s a proposal,” said Max. “For ten gold coins, can I borrow the knife for two days and then return it to you?”

The merchant man scratched his chin.

“It’s not a bad offer,” he said. “Make it fifteen gold and we got a deal, but you’ll also need to provide me with some form of collateral.”

Max and Casey looked at each other nervously.

“What do you mean by collateral?” asked Casey.

“Well, what’s to stop you two from running off with my fancy knife and selling it yourselves and never coming back to me,” said the merchant. “I need something that tells me—you’ll definitely be coming back. With another customer I might make them give me something of equal or similar value, but as you two are just a bunch of kids, something more sentimental might work. Like how about that rat in your pocket there?”

“Toto!?” shrieked Casey.

The gerbil immediately hid from view.

“So that’s the rat’s name, huh?” said the merchant.

“Toto’s not a rat, he’s a gerbil,” said Casey, correcting the man.

“You say ‘tomahto,’ I say ‘tomayto,’” said the merchant, grinning. “I promise to take good care of him.”

Casey shuddered.

“The fate of the city and all of us might rely on this,” said Max. “You’ll see Toto again in a few days.”

Casey grumbled and handed Toto over to the merchant. “He likes salt and vinegar chip crumbs and he likes to be petted every hour or so. If you ignore him, he’ll get irritable and depressed.”

“Don’t worry, sweet cheeks,” said the merchant. “This rat and I are going to have a grand time, aren’t we chap?”

The gerbil climbed up onto the merchant’s shoulders and sat there slumped and depressed. He waved its tiny claws to Casey.

Max and the merchant then exchanged the money and he got the ward-breaking knife.

“I’ll see ya in a few days,” said the merchant. “I want that knife back more than I want this rat, ya hear?”

The two friends then left the market.

They walked along for a bit and then Max looked over his shoulder.

“Has anyone been following us?” asked Max.

“Doesn’t look like it,” said Casey.

Good. They could immediately get to work on their plan.

69

In one of the leafy suburbs of the tower-zone was a loose sewer grate.

Max pulled it up, revealing a ladder into the sewer down below.

“Pee-yew,” said Casey, holding her nose.

A horrible stench of the city’s sewage wafted up from the dark shadowy hole. There were the rusting handles of a built-in ladder used by hydroelectric or sanitation city workers to get down to the lower levels of the sewer. Of course, Max and Casey weren’t there to inspect the sewage levels or the inner workings of the city’s refuse system. They had other plans.

Max grabbed the handles and started his descent into the darkness of the sewer.

He entered a dimly lit passageway with a small concrete footpath alongside a river of sewage.

The shadow of a rat scurried in the distance.

“Spiders!” shouted Casey when she landed on the sewer platform after him. “Ugh, it’s icky down here!”

Max looked up and down the passageway. It was dark and smelly in these sewers and he couldn’t be certain about what else lurked below the tower-zone.

Drip!

Both Casey and Max jumped in fright from the sudden drop of water from the ceiling hitting the river of sewage.

“Alright,” said Casey. “Let’s hurry and get out of this sewer. I don’t want to stay down here any longer than I have to.”

“Amen to that,” said Max.

He oriented himself based on where they’d entered up top and figured that taking the left passage would head in the direction of the wall that separated the tower-zone and the outer-rim.

They headed deeper into the shadows of the sewer.

After about thirty minutes of walking down the winding path of the city’s subterranean passages, Max took a step and smacked head