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

“And your essence? Tell me that you didn’t absorb it.”

“I cultivated it into vines,” he said proudly. “Two walls of them, growing happily. I might plant a third wall too. And guess what? I fou-”

Core Jahn could talk for days if you let him, and I was suddenly filled with an urgent need to at least try the plan that had just occurred to me. To do that, I needed to use the crystal. It pained me, but this chat was going to have to be brief.

“Is there anything you need to tell me, Jahn? Anything I should know?”

“Well, two days ago I began digging a tunnel toward the east. Then I excavated one to the north, and I carved two rooms. I went for an oval shape, because-”

“Jahn, is there anything vitally important I should know, or anything that you’d like to know from me?”

“I said to myself last week, Jahn, you need to-”

No, I wasn’t getting anywhere. Jahn was going to talk for hours. Ordinarily, I would have let him, but this was an emergency.

“Sorry, Jahn, but I have to go. Take care, my friend. We’ll talk soon.”

“Beno? Why do you need to go?”

I realized then that I had no idea how to stop him from talking to me. So instead, I sent out an order using my core voice.

“The first kobold to come to the core room, pick up the crystal and take it to the alchemy chamber gets to be temporary leader while Warrane and Wylie are gone.”

Ten minutes later, after getting help from one of Wylie’s miners, I was in the alchemy chamber, with the crystal placed down on the deconstructor sphere.

The kobold eyed me warily. He was one of the miners I had created to help Wylie in his digging and excavation, and he’d spent his time in the dungeon under Warrane’s supervision.

His name was Maginhart, but I hadn’t been involved in naming him. I guessed it must have been Warrane, as his supervisor. Afterall, Maginhart was another of the Soul Bard’s middle names. My dungeon was starting to grow so large that I was losing my personal involvement in things. I guessed that was both a good sign and a bad.

Maginhart kept glancing at me. As one of my creatures, he would get a vague sense of where my eyes were. Even if they weren’t visible, he would know when he was catching my gaze or not.

“Do you have something to say?” I asked.

Maginhart nodded. He had inherited more of the lizard side of the kobold genes, and his thin tongue stuck out of his mouth and rattled when he breathed. “Thisss kobold doesssn’t want to sssound rude,” he said, his tongue seeming to spin over every ‘s’ sound.

“I never killed anyone for talking plainly,” I said. “I don’t remember doing so, anyway. Wait, have I? There was the…nope. I definitely haven’t! Go on, Maginhart.”

“Thissss kobold…he…” he began. His grasp of language was somewhere between Shadow and Wylie. “He wondersss why you are playing with cryssstals, and not helping Wylie and Gary.”

“That’s a good point. It might look like I am just playing, but I have a plan. Watch.”

Focusing on the crystal set on the deconstruct sphere, I gave a command.

Deconstruct crystal.

After a whirring sound and a flash of light, which startled Maginhart, I was left with a pile of dust.

It looked like crushed glass, and for a second I had a sickening feeling that this wouldn’t work and that I had just wasted the communication crystal.

“Maginhart, could you just feel the crystal dust for me? Careful you don’t cut yourself.”

The kobold kneeled beside the pile. He prodded it, and then picked up a pinch and let it drift from his hands. “It isss sssoft.”

“Good. We’re getting somewhere.”

Next, I created a leech. The squelchy thing was barely bigger than a slug, and its skin was dark brown and covered in slime.

“Leech,” I said. I knew I wouldn’t get an answer back, but it would understand me as its creator. “Eat some crystal dust.”

After the leech slithered over to the dust and ingested some, I felt my nerves play up. I reminded myself that my nerves weren’t real and that I was just excited to see if this would work.

The leech didn’t look any different after eating some dust. I had no messages to tell me anything had changed. Maybe I had messed this up. Still, I had to see for sure.

“Okay,” I told it. “Go north in the dungeon and stop when you find the rest of the kobolds.”

The leech left the room. Normally I would have chatted with Maginhart to see how he felt about the dungeon, and how well he had settled in, but I was too on-edge for small talk.

Have you ever felt like that? When you’ve just fed a deconstructed communication crystal to a leech, and you’re anxious to see if it was a waste or not?

I checked my map and saw that the leech had stopped now, which meant he had found the kobolds.

At first, I heard nothing. I had messed this up, hadn’t I?

“What’sss thisss?” said Maginhart. Kneeling beside the pile of crystal dust. He lifted a pinch of it and held it to his ear. “Huh?”

“What is it?” I said.

“It isss talking. Lisssten.”

He walked to me and held the little pinch of dust close. I heard voices now. Kobold voices that sounded far away, but voices none the less. The first was male, the second voice female.

“Does Shadow think that Dark Lord will rescue Wylie?”

“Cores aren’t sentimental, Tomlin. Why would he rescue him when he can just create another?”

“Tomlin doesn’t believe Dark Lord would abandon him.”

I looked at Maginhart. “That’s enough. Thank you, you can place the dust over there, separate from