The Beginning (Dark Paladin Book #1) LitRPG Series

by Vasily Mahanenko

  “It’s the road of trust!” Zangar landed heavily next to me. “It’s not possible to tell. Only possible to show. Feel trust. You passed test. You trust me.”

  I opened my eyes again. The necromancer was, in some unfathomable way, sitting right on the air without any visible discomfort. Overcoming my fear, I raised myself – at first on all fours, and then standing up. Even the short flight wasn’t so terrifying as standing on something invisible!”

  “We go there,” now Zangar was pointing at the opposite side of the abyss where the Labyrinth was located. “Follow me. Follow every footstep.”

  The necromancer slowly moved forward as if he could see where he was going. I stood still‒ couldn’t force myself take a single step. I was scared to no end! I cursed myself in every way, calling myself names like “weakling” and “coward girl”, but my internal motivators refused to work. My body seized up and refused to move on.

  “I help.” Zangar returned and threw me over his shoulder, like a sack of flour. “I trained: you – no. Hard if no training. Teacher warned me.”

  I didn’t even have the strength of a cynocephalian. I grabbed him hard, hanging on like a hungry tick, and it would have been a truly heroic deed for me just to unclench my fists. The entire world contracted for me to the sight of the skull on my partner’s back; I was hanging on the fangs of it with both my hands. When Zangar set me on my feet again it took me quite an effort to unclench my cramped and pale upper limbs. I would never have thought that I suffered from acrophobia! I was a paratrooper after all; I even got to skydive once! I wondered – was that the last trick my body just played, or should I prepare myself for more surprises like that? What else did I not know about myself?

  Gradually I felt better. Zangar was doing his own thing, letting me regain my composure. The cynocephalian did not try to slap my cheeks or shake me back to normal – it was as if he knew that I just needed to be alone for a while. Once I regained my ability to perceive the outside world I realized that we were standing on a small ledge on the wall of the abyss, and within just a couple of meters of us there was a big door about two meters wide.

  “Passage!” It was as if the necromancer felt that I could control myself again. “We skip first test. Say when ready.”

  “It’s fine, I’m okay now. How do you know about the passage?”

  “My teacher told. He’s great player! He’ll be Viceroy soon! Test in one year. Let’s go.”

  All I could do was be surprised at the encounter my fates had arranged. I noted to myself that I needed to ask Zangar thoroughly about life outside the Academy. Once I got a chance, that is.

  The group needs a key to continue

  2 keys detected within group

  Need confirmation of permission to use key

  Three system messages appeared in front of my eyes as soon as Zangar touched the door. With a soft whispering sound it opened, presenting a dimly lit corridor of gray stone.

  “Go first. You see the Way.” Zangar moved to the side. “There are traps there.”

  “How are the traps related to seeing the Way?”

  “They aren’t.” My partner sighed heavily and added: “You afraid of heights. I don’t feel well in dungeon. Bad concentration. Afraid to hurt group.”

  The door closed with a barely audible sound as soon as we stepped into the corridor. I took a couple of steps into the corridor and then returned to the door. For some reason I briefly forgot that I needed to explore everything and my life depended on it. The inner side the door had no handles, buttons or openings. As soon as I touched the door, the familiar system message appeared before my eyes:

  The group needs a key to continue

  1 key detected within group

  Need confirmation of permission to use key

  I indicated by gestures to Zangar that we didn’t need to activate anything, stepped away from the door, lowered myself down on all fours and slowly crawled forward, studying every stone thoroughly. An outside observer might’ve thought this move stupid; however, I recalled a movie where a similar invisible road existed, the same as the one along which the necromancer carried me just a few minutes ago. Indiana Jones, and I couldn’t remember which part. If one were to juxtapose that movie with Zangar’s warning about the traps, we had to use special care moving forward.

  It was the attention to detail that enabled me to see a slab that seemed incongruous to the passage cut through the rock. It was set right in the middle of the corridor. It was just under a meter wide and placed in such a way that avoiding stepping on it was practically impossible. The Book of Knowledge immediately highlighted the slab in red, indicating danger. I was about to jump over the possible trap when something caught my eye: there was a small round hole in the wall, right above the slab. It was quite hard to notice in the dim half-light of the corridor. The hole had an identical counterpart on the other side. Thirst for knowledge overpowered common sense. Having explored both walls and ceiling around me to find any extra unexpected holes, I stretched out my arm and carefully pressed down the slab.

  Phphpht! Phphpht! Phphpht!

  Three lightnings flashed in front of me at such speed that only the Book of Knowledge helped me figure out what had happened. Each wall had three counterpart openings. From the holes on one wall, steel arrows with barbed arrowheads were shot, flying into the openings in the other wall. One arrow was shot at the level of feet, the second about waist-high and the third close to chest height. That’s why I hadn’t noticed the top two sets of openings: I was mostly crawling around close to the floor. Repeated pressing on the slab activated the arrow again, as if the trap mechanism had an unlimited supply. I put my hand next to the hole and sighed with relief when nothing happened. Apparently, this trap did not have photo sensors, so nothing pierced my hand. But this was just the very first trap! An initial level one! Just to show sloppy players what was in store for them… More than likely there would be not only photo sensors, but other interesting things as well. Bracing myself, I aimed for a point beyond the slab and took a running jump across the dangerous area. It didn’t work out as gracefully as I planned, but the main goal was achieved — I avoided being killed.

  “Zangar!” I called the necromancer. "There’s a trap here. Be careful.”

  “Thanks.” My partner jumped over the slab and joined me. “I see problem. Speed is low. We could run out of food.”

  “I agree with you on that one,” I stood up from my knees and leaned against the wall. Only the Chancellor knows how many traps are set further down the road. If I were to spend 30 minutes for each, that’d be a very long road indeed. “How did your teacher pass through this corridor?”

  “I don’t have information.”

  “Was he alone?” I was getting another crazy idea.

  “He found partner. They came out together. Why question?”

  “So, listen. I don’t want to move at a snail's pace. You can see yourself: that’s slow. Do you have any objections against adding another player to our group?

  “No. More is easier. Where we find new one?”

  “Excellent! So here’s the setup: if I die, you should go out of the corridor and wait for us at the entrance. But only in case of 'if'! Then use the second key. I’ll find a new player, take him to the hidden teachers, he’ll get his two keys; then I’ll come back and we’ll go through the corridor anew.”

  “The idea is clear but I have questions. Why would you die? Why ‘if’?”

  “Because I’m the one that has the protection. If you had it, you’d be the one who could die.”

  “The idea stopped being understandable,” the necromancer laid his ears back.

  “There’s nothing to understand." I activated the defense, put on my artifact just in case, took an elixir in my spare hand, looked again at Zangar, who never figured any of this out, then screamed: “Leeeroooooooy!”‒ which resounded throughout the corridor‒ and rushed in.

  Enhanced defense was my only possibility of success. The idea was si
mple: if we were to study the passage to find the traps at the rate we were moving, we’d be stuck there for a very long time. Therefore, one needed to activate them all, preferably at the same time; well, at least as quickly as possible. Nothing else occurred to me besides activating them with my own body, and I rushed ahead before common sense had a chance to kick in and put a stop to it. I was bit by arrows, stakes popped out from the ground, fire tired to burn through my shield. Once the walls moved in trying to crush me, yet the protection held. Or, rather, another vial I downed restored my Energy before it crashed to zero. I tumbled out into a huge room, tripped over a thin string line which was supposed to have cut my feet off, and practically smashed my face on the stones. The Energy bar leveled out at 32 and stopped twitching, indicating that the troubles were over. Getting up to my feet, I looked back along the corridor and could not contain a surprised whistle: by now the Book of Knowledge had already digested all the information it received and now highlighted both the traps and the safe path. A narrow green passage framed by everything else lay in front of me!

  “You are alive!” I heard Zangar’s almost surprised shout from somewhere far away. “The frame says so. Will you come back for me?”

  “Wait! I shouted in response, looking around the room. “I’ll be back soon!”

  The corridor had led me into a huge cave hewn in the rock; one couldn’t really call it a room. Lit by a few magic lights, the cave was mostly drowning in darkness; however, one couldn’t miss the small pedestal, about a meter high, that looked like a dais in the very center. And a thick open book resting on it.

  I blew off an ample layer of dust and sadly stared at the unfamiliar letters: the open page was written in a language I didn’t know. Making sure that my artifact photographed the page well, I leafed through the entire book cover to cover, but was unable to find anything I could understand. Except for a picture showing three humanoids wearing loose hooded clothes and standing around a shining ball, their hands up in the air as if they were casting a spell. That was the only graphic in the book. Despite its significant size, the book had just twenty pages: the sheets were made of wooden boards.

  It would’ve been incredibly silly to leave the book in its place, but I was really uncertain about trying to take it with me, given the kind of place this was. I was practically sure the book would have some kind of spring under it that would activate a clever trap, so that the entire cave would collapse. That was the reason I never looked at the cover: the risk was too high. There was nothing else interesting in the cave; the next thirty minutes were taken up helping Zangar avoid all the traps in the corridor.

  “You studied this?” The necromancer immediately figured out the situation, seeing, just as I had, the dais with the book first.

  “I don’t understand the language,” I sighed. “I recorded everything, but right now this all looks like Greek to me. Just a jumble of strange symbols.

  “Cynocephalians’ language is complex. Not many know it. My teacher wrote book. Left here. Told me of it. I can read. You interested?”

  “So this is not a creation of the Labyrinth?” I said gladly, heading towards the pedestal. “Then we need to expropriate it and then…”

  “Stop!” Zangar yelled. “No taking the book! There’s a trap under it! Teacher took old book. Left his own! Thus he avoided the trap. You have a book? What do you give in exchange?”

  “What was in the book he took out of here?” I immediately peppered him with questions. “Have you seen it? What is it about?”

  “No, I never saw. Teacher protects it. In it there’s power. There’s knowledge. It will help become a Keeper. Not allowed to talk about it. Forbidden.”

  “Fine, but what’s this book about?” I said slowly in dismay. If Zangar’s teacher was planning to become one of the big wigs of the Game, it would be pointless to hope for his goodwill and permission to at least study the item he stole.

  “Process of Game creation. Teacher obsessed with this topic. He studies. Researches. Seeks. What he found he wrote down. The book’s five hundred years old. So long it’s been here. Teacher wrote it when he was recruit. Then found new knowledge. It’s not here. That’s old. You interested?”

  “Go on, read already!” I ordered, burning up with curiosity, but caught myself in time and added: “When you read – read it in the original language and then translate at once. Additional knowledge wouldn’t hurt me.”

  Zangar agreed and started moving his finger along the symbols, reading them out loud in a strange guttural tongue; then he explained the meaning. As a result the Book of Knowledge helped me read the last page without the necromancer’s aid.

  The main idea of the book was that about four thousand years ago three powerful beings, whose names were unknown, came to realize that the world's setup needed to be changed. They created the Game: a sentient mechanism, into which they placed certain algorithms and transferred all their power and strength. The process of creation was what the picture showed. Those beings died, and the Game itself then developed the rules and laws which it had to follow. The mechanism randomly selected a limited number of beings from all the variety of the worlds available and turned them into players. The rest were taken under full control by the Game and forced to do whatever it deemed necessary. The difference between an NPC and a player was that the latter had a “soul” image – a copy of consciousness, knowledge and experience that the Game transferred to respawn point in case of death. A respawn point was, in effect, a 3D printer that printed a vessel into which the “soul” would then be placed and live there. NPCs had “souls” as well, but after each death the Game wouldn’t restore them; it would wipe out the memory and place those “souls” into new bodies: the children. That was the basis of all the various theories concerning reincarnation. Seeking to reduce the load on its resources, the Game chose the Emperor for itself, granted extremely broad powers to him and altered him, adjusting for its needs. The Emperor was a player, but only in terms of the presence of the “soul” that persisted. In essence, however, he was a part of the mechanism that was an inalienable part of the Game with a certain personal will.

  “Teacher continued research. Always studies. He learnt name,” Zangar added as soon as the book was finished. “Name of one of Creators. It was human. A woman. All worlds know her. Madonna.”

  “That’s not possible,” I frowned. “That woman lived two thousand years ago. But definitely not four!”

  “Time flows vary. Somewhere faster. Somewhere slower. Problem of the Game. Not enough resources. Your world is slow.”

  “Wait. So, some three guys created artificial intelligence, conferred enormous powers to it, forced the whole world to do its bidding, and after that quietly died, leaving the players to deal on their own with that creation?”

  “All correct. The three were strong. All-powerful. Decided to start all anew. Decided not to kill. Created a machine.”

  “Which does the killing for them. As far as I understand, only about one percent of living creatures are players! The rest are NPCs, who simply weren’t so lucky as to be chosen! Based on that logic, the quantity of NPCs is always stable: their souls are copied from one body to another. Then how can one explain, for example, the birth rate boom in my world? There, the number of people is increasing exponentially!”

  “No contradiction. The Dark ones destroyed several worlds. The worlds are not there, NPCs are not there. Their souls return. Overpopulation is everywhere now. Soon new worlds will be made. Will take most of NPCs. There’ll be war. In all worlds. Preparation is underway now. They make NPCs mean. To like blood. To like destruction. Less load for worlds. Easier for players.”

  “It’s a mad world order we’ve got,” I whispered in astonishment. “The Game does whatever it wants! What if it decides that the creatures are imperfect and need to be destroyed? Who would stop it?”

  “I have no knowledge. Teacher studies, not I. Talk to him. He likes explorers. We need to move. Door is ahead.”

  “
Wait a minute,” I still couldn’t get over the knowledge I just received. I’d already decided that the Game had existed forever, that it had predated all that there was, and now it turned out that it was just a cool-looking chain leashing all the creatures. How had Zangar’s teacher found that out? Most likely not from standard open sources! Perhaps from the book that had been here before? I looked at the wooden book again, at the necromancer, who had already opened the door at the other end of the cave, and then I asked yet another question:

  “What was in the book that lay here?”

  “You repeat yourself, partner. I have to repeat also. Not allowed to talk about it. Forbidden.”

  “I’ll start from a different angle. How did your teacher find this passage?

  “He is great player. His partner is great researcher. They found together. Chance encounter.”

  “Great, let’s try to unravel this topic. The passage through which we just arrived. Who said that it’s the only one? What if there are other passages? That would enable you to skip not only the first level of the Labyrinth, but also all the rest? Why did we rush in at once? We need to return and explore it in detail.”

  “Only one key left. Entrance door is closed. We can open one door. Entrance to here, exit from here. No choice.”

  “There’s always a choice.” I wouldn’t give up. “We can add another player to the group, take him to the hidden teachers and get a new keymaster. Don’t you want to check it out? What if I am right and there’s one more cave? And in it there’s the book about which you wouldn’t tell me anything? What do you think‒ which will please your teacher more – that you return from the Academy, or that you’ll return from the Academy with the book?”

  “With the book better,” I didn’t have to convince Zangar of the obvious. “Not clear how to return. Not possible to jump up. Invisible bridge creates fear. It checks confidence. I won’t be able to return.”

  “So, my fear of heights was induced?” I exhaled with relief. “Fine, then I have another suggestion outright. We can return through respawn. We’ll just walk into one of the traps.”