Deathless dungeoneers.., p.1
Deathless Dungeoneers - Book One: A LitRPG Dungeon Diver Adventure, page 1
DEATHLESS DUNGEONEERS
BOOK 1
J. D. ASTRA
CONTENTS
Summary
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1. The Dungeoneer
2. Nexus Node
3. Dungeon Owner
4. Dungeon Discovery
5. Dungeon Defiler
6. New Node
7. Barters and Bargains
8. Romantic Interlude
9. Dry Dungeon
10. Bones for Days
11. Celebrity Dungeon Owner
12. Floaty Idea
13. Goddess Fruit Fun
14. No Node Too Deep, No Monster Too Big
15. Welsh Is the New Desedra
16. The Ultimate Game Changer
17. Farm, Farm, Farm
18. Buried Truths
19. Slander and Slights
20. Get Your Grind On
21. Downpour
22. Bury the Hatchet
23. Resurrection
24. Burned and Broken
25. Zephitz Inn
26. Here Fishy, Fishy
27. Fin Up or Fluff Off
28. A Crafty Plan
29. Cephalo-Raiders
30. Feast for the Beast
31. Paradise
The Adventure Continues…
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SUMMARY
An underrated dungeon. A determined dungeoneer. One chance for a new start.
Since the moment Rhen delved his first dungeon, he’s wanted nothing more than to own one himself. When a tiny plot pops up in the Dungeon Owner’s Guild, Rhen decides to take a leap of faith and realize his dream.
Rhen soon discovers the little dungeon has a lot more to offer than the Guild previously assessed—and that could mean big trouble. A powerful rival dungeon owner is breathing down Rhen’s neck for snatching up all the delvers in town, envious of his wild luck and the success he’s built from it.
To keep his dungeon safe and profitable, Rhen must acquire enough dungeoneers for a raid group and unlock the ultimate wealth: the Nexus node—a doorway to a new realm and a path to escape a dangerous secret. If he can’t power the Nexus node with the dungeon’s limited energy, his venture could be over before it’s even begun, and his dreams of founding a realm he can call home a faded memory.
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1
THE DUNGEONEER
Rhen was about to die a horrible, gruesome death. The eight-foot tall, slavering moth monster grabbed Rhen’s feet and began wrapping them in acidic silk string. The moth monsters liked to eat their prey alive, like most spiders, and wrapped them in silk in a similar fashion for meal preservation.
The young dungeoneer carefully played at being unconscious, waiting until the monster’s tender underside was closer to his blade-hand. He only had one good chance at saving his life and, boy, did he not want to die. For one, Rhen hadn’t saved his essence in the dungeon’s Resurrection node recently; he couldn’t afford it. So, if he died now, he’d get set all the way back to syntial level Prima I—and a different realm—losing about five months of progress.
More importantly, getting spit out of the gelatinous between realm after weeks of incubation, naked as the day he was born and missing all his gear, powers, and memories since his last check-in was just about the most unpleasant experience of his life, aside from the dying he didn’t remember much of. Was Rhen even himself if he was reborn from the between realm?
A philosophical question that would have to wait.
The moth’s tubular tongue slapped against Rhen’s neck, tasting him. The slippery tongue slid across his cheek and lips with a wet schlick that made Rhen’s stomach tight with fear. He remained deathly still, for if he didn’t, he’d be dead for sure. The moth’s silk burned on his shins, and Rhen knew the acid was eating away his simple leather boots.
The monster’s mandala tattoo on its lower abdomen flared with purple light, and the silk grew stickier, and thicker. The moth picked Rhen up at the waist as it began wrapping his thighs in the anima-enhanced silk, trying to ensure its prey couldn’t escape. But that lift gave Rhen just the edge he needed to close the distance with his blades before the monster’s razor-sharp wings could slice him in half.
It supported Rhen’s back as the cocooning process moved up to his waist, and Rhen tensed his grip on his crescent moon blade. He triggered Swift Twitch with a thought, significantly increasing the speed at which his muscles could contract. A surge of hot anima poured from the syntial; a mandala-like spirit tattoo that directed the flow of his energy. The anima coursed down his arms in a burst of blue light and the moth screeched in fear, but too late.
Criss. Cross. Slash.
In three swift movements, he diced the moth’s thorax, spilling its guts all over him. The monster didn’t even know it was dead, its body frozen in the wrapping pose before it collapsed to the ground. Rhen breathed a deep sigh of relief.
That.
Was.
Close.
He ran his blade down the sticky, acid-covered silk, then stepped out of the half-completed cocoon. The monster’s entrails slopped off him to the ground and a shiver ran down Rhen’s spine. He could’ve been in those guts.
There among the gory mess was the small, glimmering purple gem. It was the anima crystal—the storage apparatus for all beings’ power, which allowed them to cast spells, even nasty ones like acid-infused cocooning silk, or awesome ones like Rhen’s Swift Twitch. Rhen thanked his luck for that ability, which had saved his bacon more than a few times now.
“Are you okay down there?” the concerned voice of Rhen’s delve leader called from above.
Rhen slipped the anima crystal into a secret pocket on the inside of his leather jerkin. He looked up at the hole created by careless anima drilling and gave a thumbs up. “Just another horromoth, higher level though, and big. It had an ancilla level syntial on its abdomen that infused the silk with acid that, I assume, was to start pre-digesting me.”
“Gross,” the delve leader said with a shiver. She was a squat woman from the Dwarvish realm of Fjagrasill, competent and kind. She’d led the delve without incident—up to now.
But, so long as none of them reported the incident of collapsing rock because the knucklehead drill operator wouldn’t listen to Rhen, they’d all be fine. Incidents meant a docked pay, and no one wanted that. If Rhen had died, that would’ve been another story.
Deaths got reported directly to the Dungeon Delver’s Guild by the dungeon’s Resurrection node. The reports were all reviewed scrupulously to ensure it was a dungeon death, not some back-alley robbery, or fighting ring games. Rhen wasn’t certain how they derived that information, but it wasn’t his business, or his problem.
“See any good veins?” the knucklehead with the anima drill asked as he popped into the opening he’d created with his careless extraction methods.
Rhen inhaled deeply through his nose and activated the small [Primordial Breath] syntial on his diaphragm.
“Light,” Rhen whispered.
The anima heat mounted in his lungs until he could hold it no longer. He blew all the air out with force, blanketing the room in a brilliant shimmering fog. It poured from his mouth like a steaming kettle and filled up the space. The sparkles faded to a dim, silvery glow, and the walls of the cavern winked back at him.
“Veins-a-plenty!” Rhen called back.
This was going to be an excellent payday.
The careless driller whooped. “All right, you make sure there aren’t any more of them horromoths down there and I’ll get some equipment loaded.”
“No backup, Delve Leader? I almost died by cocooning just now.”
“Other team’s workin’ a dungeon node boss right now. Can’t spare any more fighters.”
The dwarf woman disappeared from the hole above, leaving Rhen with the careless man whose name he hadn’t bothered remembering. They were on a temporary dive together, not a long-standing team. That was fine. Rhen preferred not to make too many connections or stay in one place for long. He followed the flow of the dungeons, like many other dungeoneers, and with it came the wealth he needed to one day be a dungeon owner himself.
Rhen walked the perimeter of the circular cavern. The black rock was rich in silver and turquoise veins of ore. Lafite and Auramine. Not rare materials, but mid-tier. They’d fill his pockets with coin all the same.
A small fissure in the wall caught his attention and Rhen stopped. He squatted down, peering through the gap. It was too dark to see, so Rhen took another deep breath to fill the space with light. His breath clung to the walls, lighting up the narrow passage, before spilling into the cavern beyond.
It was enormous, and the angle of the fissure put his position at the top of a slight incline. There was a screech, and another horromoth flap-ran past the opening. This one was a beast of a thin
Each node could be activated with different levels of anima to transform them for four distinct purposes. Resurrection nodes allowed anyone to save a copy of their essence and be revived on death. Well, reborn on death. Rhen still didn’t want to think about that.
Then there were Mastery nodes, which gave holders of anima crystals the ability to integrate that crystal’s power into themselves, unlocking new spells, traits, and abilities. Third was the Control nodes. They could be used to map a dungeon and rearrange areas that were cleared of all large living creatures. These nodes were essential to set up bases of operation and delve deeper.
Last was the most important: Nexus nodes. This was what Rhen so craved to find in his own dungeon one day. Nexus nodes connected dungeons by way of portal, sometimes even to different realms. Seventeen realms had been discovered and connected over the several hundreds of years that Rhen’s people, the Shin’Baran, had been dungeon diving.
A wide grin spread over Rhen’s face. “We might have hit the motherlode.”
“A node?” drill-man asked, excitement in his voice.
The delve leader was back at the opening with uncanny speed. “Stake it and get out. We can’t delve deeper here tonight if there’s a node boss. We don’t want to risk another collapse.” She glared at the drill-holder.
The glowing breath in the cavern faded, and with it, his enthusiasm. Going against the delve leader would get him kicked from the raid, and he couldn’t afford the dings on his record with the Dungeon Delver’s Guild; he had two already.
With a sigh, Rhen put his hand against the fissure and channeled his anima through the identification syntial on his side, then down his arm to the wall. A glowing white circle appeared in the rock with Rhen’s name and a three, his team number. Now the other greedy delvers couldn’t drill this spot without the tools registering Rhen’s mark. There was a lengthy legal process for anyone who stole another delver’s location that could have them removed from the Dungeon Delver’s Guild, but it typically wasn’t worth risking.
The drill-man dropped a rope through the opening. He pressed his hand against it and green anima flowed down it, popping the rope out into a runged ladder. Rhen was grateful to not have to climb his way out. Despite wanting to press on, he had been delving for a good nine hours already.
When he reached the top, the drill-man patted him on the back. “It was worth it, right?”
Rhen glared at him. “You owe me new boots.”
He looked to Rhen’s feet to see his big toes were popping out of the dissolved leather. “Every man’s responsible for his own losses.” The drill-man retreated down the well-lit cavern to the sounds of buzzing tools and cracking rock.
“Fluffer…” Rhen muttered, wiggling his toes.
It was an arduous hike back up to the dungeon base, with several different biomes to traverse. Rocky caves that had once been populated by the horromoths, slimy tubes used by thick slugs called grubbers, big, open swampy caverns full of glowing mushrooms, and even a few spaces with open lava pits.
This was Desedra I, the largest dungeon in Resplendare, owned by Adelus Desedra—the wealthiest man for many realms. Rhen had worked Desedra I a few years back, but the pay rates were scandalous. Rhen, having a small scandal of his own at his last dungeon, didn’t have much else left to turn to. He was a good fighter, an intuitive diver, and those things mattered for something despite his record.
Finally, Rhen made it to the exit checkpoint where he was stopped by Reclaimers.
“Deposit here,” the Cadrian woman said, pointing to a bucket with her sharp nails. Her skin was black as night but glimmered with gold as if she’d been dusted in it. Her eyes were a sharp garnet, and two sawed-off horns protruded from either side of her forehead.
Rhen patted himself down, then removed the crystals from his many pockets—save for one. When twelve crystals, all mostly the purple of horromoth and decently sized, had been dropped in the bucket, Rhen grinned. “That’s it.”
In his periphery, Rhen noticed the floating orbeye, the monster turned monitor through anima control. The orbeye was a head-sized, all black eyeball encased in crystal that walked on twelve, noodly legs. The crystal glowed a soft blue, a syntial lighting up on one of its facets. It must’ve been sending a visual feed back to the headquarters right outside the dungeon, because the glow of the crystal was strong. Rhen put his attention back on the pat-down agent.
An ancilla level syntial on the Cadrian’s stubby horn glowed a brilliant orange. That glow filled up her eyes, and she combed over Rhen with scrupulous care. He hadn’t expected to get such a thorough inspection on departure but knew that even a tiny anima crystal couldn’t escape the piercing gaze of Detect Anima.
“Oh, wait!”
He pulled the secreted crystal from his jerkin interior pocket and plopped it in the bucket.
“Missed this little one.” He grinned brighter, and the Cadrian scowled.
She finished her inspection, but held him another moment. Everyone tried to sneak out little treasures; it was normal. But with Rhen’s record, he supposed it was only fair he got the strip-down treatment.
The Orbeye approached, glowing a soft blue, and then the syntial on the Cadrian’s horn flared to life again. The blue anima flowed to her temple and her oversized ears twitched. She cocked her head, listening intently, then nodded.
“Sen Thun-Desedra would like to see you.”
Sen wanted to see him, huh? That couldn’t be good.
The Desedras were an enormous family. Everyone who wed into it took Desedra for their familial name for obvious reasons. Power came with it, even in small measures for someone as low down as Sen Thun—a man who married into the family through a cousin of the main familial line.
So no, an invitation to see Sen was not good, but it was far better than a visit to Zeichen IV, named for her late father. She wore the real crown in the family. She was a first-born in a long line of first-borns. A trip to her would take Rhen most of the evening, and there probably wouldn’t be a trip home. But Sen and the other extended family members scrambling for power stayed close to the dungeons and didn’t have the brazen guts of Zeichen.
Rhen beamed, hiding his apprehension. “Great, so… I can go?”
She waved him off without a word.
It wouldn’t have been that tiny anima crystal he’d “forgotten,” would it? That was too small an infraction to get an instantaneous notice to appear. It had to have been something else. Rhen hadn’t misbehaved in any way—well when there’d been witnesses. Maybe there had been witnesses…
Rhen walked with a swagger out into the wide dungeon opening, a wide-mouthed cavern of blackened rock and stacked pallets of goods. It was buzzing with activity. Anima-powered train carts flowed up the left side from the exit checkpoint he’d just come from. Those carts were dumped into a sorting station. People of all races sorted the crystals and ores, lifting them with a magical flick of their wrists and tossing them to the next appropriate station for size and power assessments. After their assessment, the minerals and gems were stacked into the pallets that were lifted by powerful machines and dropped onto vehicles bound for distribution centers. Desedra ran a profitable business of selling off their power to others; they had more than enough for themselves… Zeichen was practically a god, or so he’d heard.
