City of Fallen Souls: A LitRPG Adventure (UnderVerse Book 3) by Jez Cajiao (fb2 epub reader .txt) 📕

“A thousand gold!” she barked, and I grinned.

“Done!” I said. Nerin blinked as she unfocused her eyes, reading the notification, even as I felt my mana dropping as Oracle cast the spell.

“I swear to obey Lord Jax and those he places over me; I will serve to the best of my ability, speak no lie to him when commanded otherwise, and treat all other citizens as family.

I will work for the greater good, being a shield to those that need it, a sword to those that deserve it, and a warden to the night.”

“I will stand with my family, helping one another to reach the light, until the hour of my death or my Lord releases me from my oath.”

“Lastly, I will not be a dick!”

“I, Lord Jax, do swear to protect and lead you, to be the shield that protects you and yours from the darkness, and the sword that avenges that which cannot be saved. As the Tower grows in strength, so shall you,” I said, grinning.

“I…I…”

“Welcome to the family, Nerin!” I said, and she glared at me.

“You tricked me!” she huffed.

“Nope, I gave you exactly what you wanted.” She stomped off, sitting down hard in the chair to my left and continuing to glare furiously at me.

“So, anyone else I need to speak to?” I asked the room winningly, smiling around and pretending not to notice the angry stares I was getting.

Chapter Fifteen

“I think it’s probably best to quit while you’re ahead, Lord Jax,” Augustus said calmly, striding forward to take up station where he could watch over the entire room.

“Bollocks,” I said succinctly. “Honestly, Augustus, I’ve spent all my time trying to damn well survive so far. I count being alive as a win these days, so let’s just keep on fucking trucking.”

I grinned at him. “Besides, I have to thank you. I caught the end of the fight with the two men in leather masks… that was pretty fast work.”

“I’m a Centurion Primus in the Legion, Lord Jax. If they’d managed to land a hit on me, I’d have died… of shame.”

“Well, still, it was impressive,” I smiled, glad that he was on my side.

“It was; a bit too impressive, unfortunately,” said Soween as she was sorting through some papers.

“How bad?” Mal asked, and she grimaced.

“Two to one, if he fought again, and that was the best odds. The gangs also didn’t like that they had to submit to a random number draw for their place in the fight. They all wanted to go first.”

“Thank the gods we already moved to next round then, handicap…” Mal said, grinning, and Soween winced.

“What’s this?” I asked, and got an even bigger grin from Mal.

“Bettin', son. It's where the big boys make their money. Now that they’re pissed off, we’ve offered a handicap, and they’ve demanded a level limit. We said we’d consider it.”

“While making it clear we can be bribed…” Soween interjected.

“Exactly!” Mal said, pointing at her.

“What?” I asked.

“We offered a handicap, such as limitin' the fight to the lowest leveled member of the Legion… that’d be you.” Mal said, nodding at me. “Then we let the gangs know we can be bribed, so they’re payin' us a fuckload of extra gold to put more lethal creatures in with you.”

“Okay…” I said, looking from one of them to the other. “And how does this help me?”

“You said you’d be the one fightin' in the arena,” Mal chuckled. “So, when we had to substitute this absolute unit for you, we let 'em know this would be the option after round two. The gangs all have their blood up now, and they have to pay more to put someone forward each round, but if they win, they get the entire purse of fees that has been put in so far. They think it’ll all work out in the end, because they’ve all got their ‘ace’ killers…”

“What?” I asked suddenly.

“Their top fighters, like the Prometheans are basically muscle for the Skyking. The ones you see on the street are low level, but there are a couple of really high-powered enforcers out there! I’m betting they send Altair; he’s insane!” Soween said, grinning maniacally.

“Yeah! Let’s hope they send him. Man, the odds we’d be able to get for that fight…” Mal stared off into the distance dreamily.

“Uh, guys…?” I asked, looking from one of them to the other. “What level are we talking here?”

“For Altair?” Soween asked, tapping her chin. “Oh, I don’t know... thirty, thirty-five, maybe?”

“What?!” I said, although it may have come out as a squeak.

“You killed an ancient SporeMother, right? This isn’t gonna be an issue for you?” Mal asked, glaring at me. “Because it better not be. I’ve already placed all their fees on you to win the next round!”

“Ah... I love the confidence and all, but maybe this would have been better discussed with me?” I shot back, glaring at them. “The SporeMother was fucking old, and I was damn lucky!”

“You were there while we were plannin' this!” Mal snapped, pointing a finger at me.

“When did we say this bit?” I asked him suspiciously.

“When we were plannin' it out! When you were… oh.”

“When I was…?”

“Destroying Horseshoe street,” Mal said, rubbing his chin. “And then we put the finishin' details on it yesterday, before the fight started…”

“So, you planned it without me, basically?” I asked him and he grimaced.

“Well, maybe some of us didn’t have the luxury of lyin' around! Some of us had to make the best of a shitty situation to make the plan work!”

“I was unconscious!” I snapped. “I wasn’t having a Sunday fucking lie in!”

“Details!” Mal snapped back, waving his hands dismissively.

“Look, you cock,” I said, sitting forward and pointing at him. “I gave you the outline of the plan, and you swore you could make it work… I don’t know the damn city, or I’d have done it myself! I just found a way around the worst part: trying to get loads of people out of the city through