“The place I am about to show you is treated twice a year with anti-essence alchemical lotion. Very rare stuff that only master alchemists can make. There are many other nasty defense mechanisms that don’t bear discussing. So don’t get any ideas about making your little wolf monsters tunnel their way here so that you can steal everything.”
I made a mental note of the anti-essence lotion. A chemical that limited essence use might come in handy in the future.
If Brenda was right, then it was beyond Maginhart’s current alchemy expertise. But maybe his master, Cynthia, would know of it and be capable of brewing some.
I didn’t say any of this to Brenda. Instead, I followed her through what turned out to be a cavern system under the lodge. The passageways were made from a cold-looking stone. Narrow in some places, wider in others. Despite being a connoisseur of underground spaces, I refrained from giving a critique.
Soon, we came to a wide-open chamber with a hundred glass cases inside it. Inside every case was a Revered Trinket. I couldn’t take my eyes off them. It was like showing a hungry man a banquet of the finest steak.
“Since there was no winner of this decade’s tournament,” said Brenda, “the Revered Trinkets that were to go to the victor have not been used. Most will stay here, along with the rest of the Revered Trinkets, where they will be put to use in ten years. However, the tournament elders have been informed by many witnesses that you and your academy stayed to fight the Shielded Republic, while the Dungeon Core Academy fled.”
“It was nothing. I’m well known for my selflessness.”
She raised an owl eyebrow. “I’m sure you are.”
Floating in this place filled with Revered Trinkets, I began to get a suspicion about the owl in front of me.
“You aren’t just a bureaucrat, are you, Brenda?”
“Whatever do you mean?”
“This place. They wouldn’t give just anyone a key. It would only be someone who has proven themselves trustworthy of being the custodian of such an array of trinkets. Not only that, but it would have to be someone capable of defending themselves and the trinkets if the need arose.”
“You sound as though you’re getting ideas, Core Beno.”
“Not ideas. Just suspicions,” I said.
“It has been hundreds of years since the war with the Shielded Republic. The Battle of the Five Stars tournament was created shortly after. All this time, only certain people have been trusted with guarding the integrity and legacy of such an honored tournament. Not to mention all the boons and resources that come with it. Sometimes I spend my days behind a desk, and other times my duties carry me into more interesting places such as this.”
“You’re the head elder of the tournament, aren’t you? My friend Gulliver heard rumors of a secret sect of people who oversee things, but he thought it was just talk.”
Brenda smiled. “The head elder’s identity is never been divulged. That secrecy is yet another legacy of the tournament. Let’s end that line of questioning, shall we? Nosey beaks get caught by the cat.”
“If you say so. I’m hoping you didn’t bring me here to learn the history of the tournament.”
“Because you stayed to defend the arena and the spectators within it until the Empire guards arrived, it is been decided you deserve a reward. You are not the winner of the tournament, but your actions have earned a boon all the same.”
“Boon. There’s a word you don’t hear every day.”
“Have a look around the Hall of Revered Trinkets, Beno. See what treasures are kept here. You can take one Revered Trinket from this chamber.”
I eyed the glass cases hungrily. “Just one?”
“He told me you were never satisfied.”
“He?” I said.
“Never mind. Choose your trinket. I don’t have all day. You can take any trinket you want. But once you make your decision, it is done. You will likely never see this chamber again. Not even if you return in ten years’ time and win the tournament. No core has ever been allowed to peruse our whole exhibition. I suggest you make your decision carefully. However, I also suggest you bear in mind that I have other duties. I am not your assistant.”
Brenda retreated to the wall of the chamber and settled onto a steel rod that was fixed onto it, gripping the rod with her talons. She then produced a book from somewhere inside her feathers and began to read.
Faced with so many different trinkets and with only one choice, I felt overwhelmed. Choosing between three options after my fights had been hard enough. How was I supposed to make a decision when there were so many treasures to pick from?
For the next few hours, I floated from case to case, looking at the trinkets inside and studying the texts etched below them.
Although the text explained what the trinkets were, I knew they didn’t tell the full story.
Take the Glade of Rest, for example. When I chose it, I believed it was just a magic item that allowed the user to rest for longer than was physically possible. After experimenting with it, it turned out to be a tool that would let me train my monsters for extended periods, while little real time passed.
In short, the Glade of Rest was a middle finger to the laws of time.
So, what nuances were the rest of the Revered Trinkets hiding?
As Brenda turned page after page in her book and gave the occasional impatient cough, I threaded my way through the chamber.
I saw the Pants of a Thousand pockets. From the outside, they appeared as regular trousers but could hold as much weight as a metal chest without burdening the user. An amazing item, yet useless for a dungeon core.
Then there was the Eye of the Basilisk. An eye taken from a basilisk and preserved in mana, then forged into a gem. It could be set into a sword or a ring or a crown. Anyone who looked into the gem risked turning to stone.
And what about the Robe of Guilt? The wearer would learn the darkest secret of all those who he passed. I imagined that would become awkward after a while.
They were all fine trinkets, but they just didn’t feel right.
A voice called to me from the other side of the chamber.
“For God’s sake, Beno. Can you make your choice?”
“There are so many! Tell you what. Why don’t you go and complete whatever tasks you need to do? Just leave the key with me, and I’ll lock up when I’m finished.”
“Nice try. Hurry it up, if you please.”
Brenda had told me I wasn’t going to get another chance to come to a place like this again. Never would I have the opportunity to peruse such a place and pick whatever trinket I wanted. So, I wouldn’t be rushed.
I spent another hour working my way through. Brenda became more impatient, and I became more enamored with the trinkets.
Finally, I saw what I needed.
Just as they say that there can be love at first sight between two people, so can there be between a core and Revered Trinket.
The trinket that sang to my heart was in a case the furthest corner of the room. It was almost tucked out of sight.
When I first saw it, the item inside the case didn’t look like anything special. Just a glass vial with mysterious air swirling inside.
But the text painted on the glass display sold it to me instantly.
Ethereal Core Elixir
When absorbed into an empty core, the Ethereal Core Elixir will expand a core beyond its natural potential.
After seeing this, could I choose anything else? If I had interpreted this correctly, the core elixir might help me leave my Base-quality core. With it, I could move at least one step further up the rankings.
“Brenda? You’ll be pleased to know I made my choice.”
She flew across the chamber before swooping down to join me. She was so quiet that somebody without core hearing wouldn’t have known she was there. Not until they turned around and saw a sharp beak pointed at them.
“Finally! You’re choosing the Core Elixir, hmm? I thought you might have picked something a li
ttle more useful, Beno. I don’t know if you saw it, but there’s a sword around here somewhere that is strong enough to cut through a diamond.”
“I want the elixir. Final answer.”
Brenda pressed her talons against the case. Mana washed over it, and the case opened.
There it was. The elixir. My gateway to another level of core quality.
“I’ll just carry this back for you, shall I?” she said.
“Thank you.”
“No, thank you, Beno. Your bravery against the Shielded Republic is a credit to the cores who fought the very same republic hundreds of years ago. The spirit of those brave cores rests in you. I’m sure of it. I don’t care what people are saying about your core quality. I hope that we see Beno and Jahn’s Academy competing in the Battle of the Five Stars in ten years.”
“Perhaps you will. In the meantime, I’m sure our paths will cross again, Brenda. Good luck until then.”
Chapter 29
Later, back in my dungeon, I retreated to my core chamber. I commanded the doors to lock shut and ordered my monsters to avoid disturbing me. Only Tomlin was present.
My kobold friend had initially been upset to spend even a second away from his cultivation duties.
“Dark Lord’s essence didn’t replenish fast enough during the tournament!” he said. “Tomlin must work harder. He used his dungeon wages to purchase a book in Heaven’s Peak that he hopes will give him new ideas. The Dark Lord’s cultivation chamber does not befit him, and does not look like the work of an F-class cultivator.”
“Tomlin, you are doing an excellent job. But I have an important task, and I only trust you to do it.”
Now, eyeing the elixir sitting on a pedestal, I couldn’t help but feel excited. Part of me didn’t want to try this, in case it didn’t work. The disappointment would be too much.
But how cowardly would that be?
No, I just needed to do it.
The problem was, I didn’t know how. I had never heard of an Ethereal Core Elixir before, not even in all the reading I had done at the academy. The Revered Trinket itself didn’t come with any instructions.
I wondered if I should ask Maginhart to study it. Though it looked like the elixir bottle was filled with energy rather than liquid, perhaps there was something alchemical that needed to be done to it.
“What is the task Dark Lord wanted Tomlin for?” said Tomlin, his eyes glancing at the door that blocked him from leaving and going to his cultivation chamber.
“Uncork the vial please, Tomlin.”
“That is the task?”
“This elixir is worth more than your life, Tomlin.”
He looked a little aggrieved at this.
“Sorry, I misspoke,” I said. “It is a Revered Trinket, and it is worth 500 of you. Open it carefully, please.”
Tomlin uncorked the vial and stepped back. The mist inside the vial drifted toward the lip but didn’t leave the glass.
“Curious,” I said. “I’ll have to look into this.”
Overseer Gill was nowhere to be seen for the next few days, and Bolton was visiting Hogsfeate with Anna to buy clothes for her upcoming first term in a new Chosen One school.
This meant I had to do what had never failed me in the past. I had to get some books, study them, and figure this out for myself.
For the next week, I sent my kobolds to many towns in search of the book I needed. First, Wylie and Klok journeyed to Hogsfeate together. When the town’s library proved fruitless, I sent Tomlin and Shadow even further afield.
I sent them to Heaven’s Peak.
The journey in a mana-carriage would have taken a day. In a normal carriage, a week.
It took Tomlin and Shadow seconds to leave my dungeon and enter God’s Fist. From there, they made their way down the mountain and into Heaven’s Peak below.
The reason their trip was so quick was that I had never destroyed the link between the portdoor in God’s Fist mountain, and my dungeon. As such, monsters could cross from my dungeon and be in a mountain hundreds of miles away in just seconds.
The beauty of it was that the inner tunnels of God’s Fist were rarely visited in-between tournaments, and the next was a decade away. This gave me a way to travel across Xynnar without moving a mile.
Of course, I had to be careful. It was said that the mountain and its portdoors weren’t accessed between tournaments. Just in case they were, I had built a stone wall directly behind the portdoor. To a stranger who opened the door from the God’s Fist side, it would look as if it was blocked off, as it should. But on my side of the door was a hidden tile. My monsters merely had to stand on it, and a secret hatch would open for them.
It was after their trip to the book shops in Heaven’s Peak that Shadow and Tomlin returned with what I needed. A book big enough to knock an elephant out if you thumped it with it. Though, I don’t know why anyone would do that.
On the front, written in golden letters, was its title.
The Revered Trinkets of Xynnar and Their Uses
Tomlin turned the pages for me, stopping when we reached a chapter that made my inner core bubble with excitement.
Finally, I knew how to use the Ethereal Core Elixir.
The first step was that I had to empty all the essence out of my core. That wasn’t difficult. I merely created a dozen bone guy warriors. Using Essential Overload, I pulsed all my remaining essence into them.
Their skeletal forms took shape in my core chamber. I surveyed their starting levels, happy with the results. The lowest among them was level 12, the highest level 16. Before Essential Overload, the bone guys would have had to battle scores of heroes to level up so much.
I dismissed the bone guys. Alone in my chamber and empty of essence, I moved onto the second stage of the elixir.
Next, I had to use the ethereal core elixir like I would an essence plant.
Focusing on it, I absorbed the elixir and brought it deep into my core. It was easy to do, as natural to me as a person taking a breath.
No sooner had the elixir hit my empty core, then something didn’t feel right.
Pain tremored through me.
This was a shock enough. Ever since becoming a core, I had rarely felt pain. We just didn’t have that kind of sensation. Only core – destroying weapons were capable of making a dungeon core feel pain.
“Demons’ arses, they poisoned me!” I shouted.
The sound of my voice was enough for me to pull myself together and stop being so melodramatic. Even so, urgent thoughts flooded my mind.
Was the elixir a poison? Had Brenda subtly guided me to choosing it so that I would ingest it and be weakened?
But what did she gain from it?
The answer didn’t matter right now. All that mattered was the agony spreading through my inner core. It felt like someone had stuck a shard sword deep into me and used the mana infused weapon to burn through my inner core.
I felt like I was going to split apart into hundreds of pieces, and then there I would lie. A destroyed core resting on his own chamber floor. Tomlin or one of the other kobolds would eventually find me, and that would be that.
No. I wouldn’t let this be the end.
I had to get this stuff out of me. The only way was to try and pulse the elixir out of my core.
I was just about to begin when a voice spoke.
“Do not pulse the elixir out of you, Beno. Whatever you do, do not do that. An ethereal elixir evaporates if you pulse it out of you before it has worked through the channels of your core.”
It was Overseer Gill, standing in my core chamber. His belly was tanned, and he’d bought a new necklace from somewhere.
I wanted to ask him how he had gotten in. A core’s chamber is the most protected of all the rooms in his dungeon. How had Gill entered?
And then a new tremor of pain rampaged through me.
I got ready to pulse the elixir out.
“Whatever you do, do not expel the elixir. You must use the technique I taught y
ou. Use Essence Pulse to circulate the elixir through your core.”
“Are you mad? You taught me that technique to make my essence stronger! Think about what it will do to the elixir.”
Gill nodded. “The agony will become more intense with each circulation. That’s no surprise, young one. The elixir is burning ethereal holes inside your core. This is like taking a flame to the naked skin of your spirit and burning it black. But without it, your Base core will not rise from its anchor.”
I tried adjusting my core senses to see if it would lessen the pain. Even when I muted them completely, the pain remained.
Fixing Gill’s words in my head, I tried to reassure myself. All I had to do was get through this, and I would no longer be a Base quality core.
Using Gill’s technique, I pulsed the elixir through my core, completing one circuit.
Agony washed through me. A river of pain trickled deep within my inner self.
“Again,” said Gill.
“Again? I can’t.”
“You said you were ready to suffer to become the core you need to be.”
I circulated the elixir once more.
Twice.
After a third time, it was like my whole core was ready to burst into pieces. I felt like a man who had just swallowed a glass of liquid lava. Suddenly, my resurrection as a dungeon core seemed a mistake. The pain was so bad that my previous death as a man seemed a thousand times more preferable.
“Again!” said Gill.
“It isn’t working!”
“Again!”
Pulling every ounce of resolve from every nook and cranny in my core, I used the Essence Pulse technique. I pulsed the elixir all the way through my core once more and felt it sear new paths inside my core.
“Again!”
A great river of light burst through the core chamber floor like water spraying from a geyser.
It filled the room with blinding white until I could see nothing. Not the chamber walls, not Gill, not the empty elixir bottle.
Dungeon Core Academy: Books 1-7 (A LitRPG Series) Page 150