The Crafter's Dominion: A Dungeon Core Novel (Dungeon Crafting Book 5) by Jonathan Brooks (e ink epub reader .txt) 📕

The entire world rests on my shoulders…or is that being a bit too dramatic?  She wasn’t sure where all of these nervous thoughts were coming from, but it probably had to do with the fact that she was currently involved in sneaking into the Royal Tree…in broad daylight…with over 35 Elves that were technically non-rebellious rebels…hidden by the shadowy ability of one of their number.

“Tell me again why this wouldn’t have been better at night?” she whispered ahead of her, barely able to make out the form of Winter ahead of her in the darkness covering him.  She wasn’t sure why they had put her so close to the one person she was nearly convinced would betray their cause, but the Elder had been adamant about the arrangement of their group.

“Keep your mouth, shut, Ranger.  They might not be able to see us, but they can certainly hear us.”  While she couldn’t see it, Echo heard the sneer in his voice, but she was learning to ignore it – along with just about anything else that came out of his mouth.

Besides, she already knew the answer, but she couldn’t help but speak out from her nervous energy.  She was nowhere near the strength of those that were infiltrating the Royal tree, nor the strength of those they were trying to infiltrate; all of the Royal Guards were Elites in their own right, and The Rebels had already proven they were worthy of their Elite designation.  Echo felt like a tiny mouse walking among giant Agorphiers, the six-legged monsters she had helped to kill back near Avensglen with the Elder’s help.

That, and there hadn’t been an Elf-on-Elf war in over a millennium; the Ranger was worried about what would ultimately happen today.  Every Elven life was precious to their people, because there were so few of them compared to the other races – especially the Orcs.  From what she knew of them from talking with Kelerim, they held very little value in individual lives, because there were almost always more Orcs around Orcrim than the society could easily support.  So, if they were forced to take a life of one of their own today (other than that of the Chamberlain, whom she was pretty sure was on the Elder’s kill list), it could have greater repercussions than what the Chamberlain was doing.  (Or not doing; Echo was still undecided on that point).

If they were forced to take more than one life…then how was what they were doing going to help?  Sure, they might free the Royals from this mind-control thing the Chamberlain was doing, but at what price?  Would they slaughter all of the Royal Guards, who were Elites that could potentially be the only thing that would hold back their eventual destruction?  Killing unnecessarily today would only hasten their demise as a people – it was bad no matter how you looked at it.

Peering out from her darkness shroud, cast at great expense to cover the entire group by an Elite named Mordecai, she saw that they were already at the base of the Royal Tree.  No one saw them, despite a big black cloud of shadows moving in coordination, because no one further than 5 feet away actually saw a big black cloud of shadows.  Instead, what they were seeing (or weren’t seeing) was a slight distortion, as the Nether energy used to power the spell took the simple sunlight streaming through the treetops and used it in a way to make them invisible.  It was very similar to how Echo could bend that light using her Holy energy, so she understood the idea; unlike her special spell, this shadowy spell twisted and practically destroyed the light so that they wouldn’t show up to the naked eye.

Unless there was a much brighter light nearby, which would overpower the Nether energy in the spell and highlight them easily – which was what happened during her “rescue”.  Light shadows helped to hide them even more, but dark shadows, such as what they would see during night-time, only seemed to emphasize the dark cloud of shadows that hid them.  This was one of two reasons why they had to move during the daytime instead of at night.

The other reason was because they needed the Chamberlain and the King and Queen in the same room in order to sever the tie correctly between them all, ensuring that the Royal family didn’t die right then and there; during the daytime, they were almost guaranteed to be in the Royal Bowery, where they held court.  Or, at least, that was what Churven had told them.  All of these possible-truths and unknowns are messing with my mind.  I honestly don’t even know what to think anymore.

They passed by dozens of people, individuals going about their business in the capital as they made their way to the Royal Tree.  It wasn’t hard to find, as it was in the center of the tree-city, positioned away from all of the other trees nearby so that its magnificence wouldn’t be marred by anything in close proximity.  Either that, or its roots were so large that they literally prevented any trees from growing within a certain distance of its base.  The latter felt more likely to Echo.

Before she was prepared, they arrived before its awe-inspiring presence; Echo looked up and up and up, seeing the Royal Tree with new eyes.  She thought back at her capture and “imprisonment for her own safety”, as well as her second capture and escape by the Elder, and she realized she had never really taken in the sheer magnitude of how large the Tree was.  It soared over 700 feet into the air, was at least 2,000 feet at the widest portion of its base, and had miles of branches lovingly nurtured into thoroughfares for those living and working within its expanse.  Hundreds of rooms just