Dungeon of Chance: Even Odds: A Dungeon Core Novel (Serious Probabilities Book 1) by Jonathan Brooks (interesting books to read TXT) 📕

finally getting into this, are you?” her brother teased.  She punched him in the shoulder, but it was like punching a rock; it was even worse than it had been before he became a Hero.  She shook her hand to get some feeling back into it as she nodded.

They walked down the hallway leading further into the dungeon, and it took another unexpected turn.  I guess we really weren’t supposed to see that Dungeon Core, were we?  She didn’t know enough about dungeons and their Cores to know, but she supposed that they weren’t typically visited and touched like Rosara had done.  I’m guessing that’s why what happened to us…happened.

They soon came to a spot where the hallways branched out in 3 different directions: Left, straight ahead, and right.  In front of each hallway was something different from anything she had seen before on the floor, some of the glowing stone that she remembered seeing in the original 3rd room of the dungeon, just before they reached the Core.  The left one had a single square glowing stone, the center 2, and the right passageway had 3.

“Where to?” Arcen asked.

Jeska was stumped after looking at them for a moment.  “I have no idea, but I’m guessing that these are some primitive form of numbering.  So…hallway #1, #2, or #3?”

“Well, you know, 3 is my lucky number,” Pascale offered.  “Good things always happen in 3s, right?”

Rosara snorted.  “Uh, no, I’ve always heard that it’s the opposite.  Like people you know dying in 3s and all that,” she stated with a superior tone of voice as she tossed her hair out of her face.  “At least, that’s what Father always said.”  Her tone lost a little of its superiority when she mentioned the Mayor, because her father was currently doing whatever he could in private to pretend that she didn’t exist.  Fortunately, Jeska’s own father was still managing his own disgust and distrust of his children, but she could see it steadily getting worse as the days went by.

Jeska knew about some superstitions when it came to odd numbers that sailors tended to swear by – positive superstitions.  Something about the duality of even numbers didn’t sit well with them, so they always had an odd number of crewmen on board, had an odd number of masts and sails, and carried an odd number of pieces of cargo.  So, if she had her vote, it would be either 1 or 3.

“I think we should check out 3 as well,” Kelty said, which caused a smile to form on Pascale’s face.  Jeska knew they had been getting a little closer to each other as the stress of the days wore on, but she thought it was a good thing.  As long as one of them didn’t mess up their relationship and ruin their group, it should be fine.  Yep, fine.

She wasn’t jealous or anything—

“Okay, I guess 3 it is.  Let’s check it out.”  So, they did – or at least they tried to check it out.

Just as they saw the entrance to the new room, some noise above Rosara’s head made Jeska look up, only to see what appeared to be wooden spears falling towards their Support member.  “Look out—” she began to advise, but it was already too late.

Rosara had heard the noise as well and looked up – only to get a face full of sharp wooden projectiles falling from the ceiling, impaling her body in multiple places. Normally, that wouldn’t have been so bad, as each of them had experienced worse injuries in the dungeon; unfortunately, in this instance she had her mouth open and…well…suffice it to say that it wasn’t pretty.

“What—?” Arcen yelled, turning around a moment too late.  Gone were the times when they would bemoan or cry about a death, so they all just stood there looking at Rosara’s impaled and skewered body, trying to figure out what happened.

Pascale was the first to move; he looked around and noticed something immediately.  “It looks like this stone – right where her left foot is located – can be depressed.  This is some sort of…trap, maybe?”

“Great – so now we have to look out for traps?” Kelty complained.  “Aren’t the monsters enough for us?”

Jeska just shook her head, realizing immediately why there were traps in there in the first place.  Whether it was her “Intellect” having an effect or not, but she was able to piece things together.  “I think in the future there will be more and more traps; what better way to train for an unknown ‘Threat’ than to be ready for anything, not just learning how to beat these monsters.”

Arcen shook his head, as well, but he wasn’t disagreeing with her.  “More and more about this Hero business I find that I don’t like, but I know it is necessary.  I guess that just means we have to be on the lookout for—hey, I wonder if that’s your job, Pascale?” he asked, pointing to the smaller man.  “You’re a Scout, after all, and you did find that moving stone.”

Pascale just shrugged.  “So I did.  I guess I can do that; my prior occupational experience can probably aid in that, as well.”

“Wait…I thought you said you were a pickpocket?”  Her brother was confused.

He just shrugged again.  “I was.  But I wasn’t always just a pickpocket.”

“Don’t tell me you used to break into places…you did, didn’t you?”  Pascale was silent, with just a small smile on his face.  “Did you ever break into the Mayor’s villa?”  Again, the former pickpocket and thief was silent.

Jeska had to wonder why he asked that, but it was soon made clear he was just looking out for their group member.  “Because if you did…I would keep that to yourself; Rosara will have your hide.”  That’s for sure.

Because they hadn’t seen the room yet, they continued on down the