Realm of the Nine Circles: A LitRPG Novel

by P. Joseph Cherubino

  “Let’s try this again,” Kalmond rumbled.

  The ape stood tall and pounded its chest with a roar that shook the chainmail beneath Kalmond’s Chest Plate of the Fallen Paladin. The dwarf let the ape have his fury. Kalmond readied a lunge. Boots sank into the ground and calf muscles hardened to rock. The ape burst forward and Kalmond released his trademark lunge attack.The axe blade headed straight for the ape’s chest, but a swiping arm deflected the blade slightly. Still, it was enough. One good strike took the ape down to 60%. Blood and fur flew, and the bellow of rage became one of pain. Kalmond tasted blood

  Saliva filled the dwarf’s mouth and wet his beard as he bellowed louder than the ape. So this is what the bloodlust bonus feels like, Kalmond thought, as his heart beat hard enough to ache. Advancing, he reversed the axe swing and caught the ape squarely in the ribs. The axe carried the ape with it as he passed in a low arc. Kalmond felt bones grate against the blade as the ape slid from it showering him with blood. He finished the beast with an overhand swing, splitting the creature nearly in half from skull to abdomen. The ape was high level and yielded 200XP.

  “Eew,” Holly exclaimed, wiping dwarf slobber from her pristine white robes.

  “Sorry,” Kalmond growled with a crooked-toothed smirk as he wiped off his chin with his gauntlets. The metal scraping his lips didn’t hurt, but brought with it the fine taste of spiven steel.

  “Why did you take a blood lust perk?”

  “Came in handy, didn’t it?” the dwarf asked as he rifled through the ape’s corpse.

  Ape Pelt 10

  Small Fire Diamond 100

  Scroll of Weeping Sickness Lvl. 5

  He tossed the scroll to Keerna and pocketed the rest while the sorceress expended valuable mana healing him.

  “You don’t have to do that,” Kalmond said, feeling better as he said it.

  “Don’t worry,” that spell will come in handy.

  They resumed their way, through the tracking spell had worn off. It was easy to follow the hoofprints up the mountain slope towards the craggy rocks. When they found the dungeon doors, they were open.

  “Well,” Holly said. “I don’t think we need a signpost. Are you gonna be a gentleman and go first?”

  The Sorceress Keerna quirked a smile and gave Kalmond a look that broached no reply. Though he knew a familiar face was behind the glittering eyes, it didn’t make her any less foreboding.

  Kalmond sighed. “Fine.” He pushed open the heavy door with his shoulder. “But don’t think I’m taking orders from you.” A tinkling laugh followed him inside and he knew—he just knew—that he’d be taking any damn orders she pleased.

  Chapter 14

  “Shh,” Thornbark hissed, “Stop!”

  Thuglar turned slowly from the dark passage ahead to face his centaur companion. “What now?” he asked, not bothering to hide his frustration.

  “I’m really sure this time. I heard something,” Thornbark replied.

  Thuglar pointed to his spiked hears, “Hello? You see these things? Elves have higher perception ability than…” A fuzzy red square appeared in the corner of Thuglar’s eye. Instinctively, he batted his hand at the object.

  “You see it too?” Thornbark asked. “It’s a friend proximity notice!”

  “Looks different in the VR world,” Thuglar said.

  “I wonder how we answer it?” Thornbark asked, then his hooves clattered as he skittered backward.

  “What happened?” Thuglar asked.

  “You don’t see that? I have a chat window.”

  “I guess… you just think it and it happens,” Thuglar replied. Sure enough, the chat window appeared for him as well. His angular, elven face split wide with a toothy grin when he saw two names: Kalmond and Keerna.

  “We’re inside!” Thuglar said, and the chat window displayed his words.

  “Include me in the chat,” Thornbark said.

  Thuglar closed his eyes for a moment and concentrated hard. Open chat to Thornbark90, he thought.

  “I’m in,” Thornbark exclaimed in the chat window.

  “This is so weird,” Thuglar said.

  “We just passed the entrance,” Kalmond replied. “Looks like you killed some Goblins.”

  “Yeah,” Thuglar began, “and—”

  The raptor vine was not there moments ago. It wrapped itself around both Thuglar’s ankles while he spoke. Before he knew it, he was clawing at the powdery dust and rough passage floor as his face bounced against the rock. The vine dragged in deeper into the dungeon with alarming speed. The surprise attack took just 5% of his hitpoints, but it had him firmly in its grasp.

  Thuglar was working too hard to find the right weapon and to call for help. He was still getting used to living in the game rather than controlling it from a keyboard. It was hard to see his inventory sheet with his face bouncing off the passageway floor. All he wanted was his hatchet of rending. Suddenly, the hatchet appeared in his hand. He didn’t have to pick it from the inventory, he just needed to think about it, and there it was.

  Thuglar swung the hatchet wildly at his ankles, but the plant still held on, even as the hatchet blade made sparks against his elven shin guards. The passage grew colder as he slid deeper underground.

  “Help, damn it!” Thuglar screamed. Reading his own words in the translucent chat window as the world shook around him made his stomach lurch. His hitpoints dropped another 10% as he slid along the stone passage.

  Just as the indignity of being murdered by a plant began to sink in, an arrow sprouted from his thigh. “Ouch, you motherfu—”

  A notice popped up:

  Centaur attacks with arrow: 5% damage

  “Sorry!” Thornbark’s text appeared. “Thought I could hit it!”

  “It’s two inches wide!” Thuglar shouted as the fingernails of his left hand ripped away while he swung wildly with the hatchet. He managed to sit up and slide along on his armored butt plate.

  A sudden roar filled the passage, making Thuglar’s ears ring. Kalmond the dwarf hurtled past him, axe raised high. Thuglar screamed and watched helplessly while Kalmond swung his axe. He wanted to close his eyes against what he was sure would be the amputation of both his feet.

  The dwarf’s berserker attack worked, earning Kalmond 50XP. Thuglar lay flat on his back, panting and bleeding from the fingers while Kalmond stopped paces ahead, hands to knees, panting and drooling. With shaking hands, Kalmond rummaged through his satchel until he found what he was looking for. He downed a golden meade and watched as his endurance rose by 10 and his intelligence sank by a single point.

  The dwarf produced more food and devoured it lustily until his endurance bar reached 100% again. Thuglar sat up.

  “Thanks for using up a berserker charge for me, brother,” he said with a sharp-toothed grin.

  Kalmond reached out a hand and pulled up his old friend as hoofbeats revealed the form of a very bashful centaur.

  “Sorry I shot you, Thuglar,” Thornbark said.

  “Eh, it’s the thought that counts,” Thuglar replied, slapping Thornbark on his front horse shoulder. That was as high as he could reach.

  Keerna appeared and instantly cast a healing spell over Thuglar. The arrow sparkled and disappeared.

  “Wow!” Thuglar exclaimed,”That feels amazing!” He turned to face Keerna. “Whoa! You are so hot!”

  Keerna deactivated her spell and sighed. She put her hands to her hips and tapped her foot.

  “Thuglar, meet Keerna. She works at Plexcorp with me.”

  “Oh, hey,” Thuglar said, looking a bit sheepish. Then, he brightened. “Kal, I can’t believe you didn’t tell me about the new VR harnesses!”

  The dwarf paled. “How did you—”

  “Wait, you work for Plexcorp?” Thornbark gasped.

  Kalmond rubbed his hands over his face. “Guys, what the hell is going on?”

  Thornbark shot Kalmond a sideways glance. “You didn’t know about the beta test? I got this box in the mail and—”


  “I got my box today,” Thuglar interjected. “The VR harness is badass! The note with it just said I’d been specially selected, then Virgil gave me this chalice quest—”

  “Virgil!” Keerna exclaimed. “Virgil must have done it. But how the hell did he know that we’d need the harnesses today? It doesn’t make sense.”

  “He must have planned this long before today,” Kalmond said.

  “So did we just get lucky?” Keerna asked.

  “He’s a sage.” Kalmond replied.

  “In a game!” Keerna shot back. “A damn video game!”

  “He’s a human brain inside a computer. He must have predicted this,” Kalmond replied.

  Keerna stood, shaking her head and tried to process the implications. “That is some weird and scary shit.”

  “Virgil works for Plexcorp?” Thornbark shook his head, confused. “He’s a real guy?”

  Keerna and Kalmond exchanged a look. Keerna nodded.

  “Guys, it’s so much worse than that.” The words spilled out of Kalmond in a rush. He told them about the fractured code, the new prototype, his boss’s increasingly erratic behaviour. When he faltered, part way through their discovery of the floating brains, Keerna took over. She described their flight through Plexcorp’s maintenance shafts and the attack on Dante’s lab.

  Thornbark whinnied and shifted on his hooves. The half-man, half-horse sound filled the passageway and echoed like a greek chorus. “I’m in my apartment in Singapore. Nobody will find me for days! What have you gotten us into?”

  “Not us,” Keerna said with a shake of her head. “Virgil’s running this show. If we beat Mylos, Virgil can save the game.” She cast her eyes at Kalmond. “And us…”

  Silence fell like a stifling blanket until Kalmond stood. “Sitting around won’t get us out of this. Let’s go.”

  The passage opened into the mouth of a trackless cavern. Stepping closer to the edge and looking down, Thuglar whistled.

  Keerna cupped her hands together, then threw her hands upward. A bright ball of light rose from her uplifted palm, then slowly hovered into the cavern mouth and down the slope. Jagged rocks stood out along a narrow, winding path.

  “I counted four switchbacks before the light went out,” Thuglar said.

  “Let’s get moving,” Keerna said, pushing past the adventurers to take point.

  “Thornbark, you take the rear. You’ll get a high-ground advantage with your arrows,” Kalmond said, hanging back to stick close to the horse man.

  Thuglar switched his hatchet for a fire saber and stuck close to Keerna, who appeared to be empty-handed.

  “Where is your weapon?” Thuglar asked as the path sank down the steep slope. Low walls hemmed them in as the cavern loomed up overhead.

  “It’s a spell,” Keerna replied, “Star wraith familiar. Blind ‘em and fry ‘em!”

  Kalmond saw the glow around her hands. “Cool,” he said.

  Thornbark clopped to an abrupt halt. “Stop,” he hissed.

  “Oh, not your damn horse hearing again,” Thuglar called back over his shoulder, voice dripping with annoyance.

  “Giant Bats!” Thornbark hollered, just as dark forms swooped down from the blackness above them.

  They had no choice but to fight single file. A bow string sang and an arrow hummed its deadly profanity, finding its home dead center. The single-shot kill earned him a hefty XP bonus:

  Exp: +120 (60,+60 One-Shot Kill)

  Four more bats swooped down, and another arrow cursed into the darkness.

  “Nice one-shots!” Kalmond exclaimed as he jumped high to clip the wing off another giant bat. The creature hit the ground and slid neatly under Thornbark’s trampling hooves. Keerna fell back to the center of the group, holding back her attack. Thuglar destroyed the last two bats with several well-placed strikes.

  “Huh,” Kalmond said, “You’d think there’d be stronger monsters this deep.”

  “Dude,” Thuglar said, “Every time you say that—”

  A cold wind bore down on the questers, followed by the drumming of wings.

  “Here they come!” Keerna screamed, letting loose with a dual-wielded star-wraith summoning spell. The light blinded the bats, but also the players.

  “Can’t see!” Thornbark called out, changing his bow for a boar oak studded club. He flailed wildly, scoring random hits at things he could not see.

  The star wraiths drew off many of the bats, taking some of their blinding light with them. The giant bats raked at them with their claws and slashed at them with long fangs. One of them took Kalmond to the ground, joined by three more. They piled on so fast and so thick, he lost the ability to swing his axe. His HP dropped to 15% and fell at an alarming pace.

  “Help!” Kalmond called out, voice muffled by the disturbingly soft bodies that caused him so much pain. Probing claws found the joints between armor plates and dug in. He didn’t need the pop-up telling him he took infection damage, his burning skin told him that. His vision blurred.

  “The bats are plagued,” Thuglar shouted out as he saber cut the smallest of channels in the relentless stream of bats.

  With the star wraith spell expired, Keerna took up her rope dart. Its golden chain provided needed light as she whirled it about her body, striking bats five and six at a time. The weapon was fast and accurate, but it caused little damage. Seeing his opportunity, Thornbark jumped over Kalmond to smash the bats with his club as Keerna stunned them.

  “Why the fuck did you just jump over me?” Kalmond moaned as his vision turned red.

  “Help him!” Thornbark called out to Thuglar.

  “Trying!” Thuglar replied with the last of his spare breath. “Gotta take the bats down, or it’s no use!”

  The team-attack of Keerna and Thornbark let him progress just far enough to reach his fallen friend. He stopped swinging at the incoming bats and slashed at the growing pile that obscured all but the dwarf’s feet. Soon, the pile of bats caught fire under the attention of Thuglar’s saber.

  “Finally!” Kalmond exclaimed, rolling over to crush the last of the bats beneath his dense carriage.

  He lept to his feet and bellowed. Even with 50% health, Kalmond was formidable. Working together back-to-back, Kalmond and Thuglar ceased taking damage and started giving it. Their blades flashed in tandem, axe and sword, not faltering even when column of light flashed down from above and drowned Thuglar, signifying a level gain. Soft, broken bodies piled up around their feet until the last of the bats, sensing their loss of numbers, disappeared again into the darkness.

  “Status?” Thuglar asked, bleeding freely from countless cuts. The ground seemed to pull at him like a terrible infant begging for attention. He just wanted sleep.

  “Damn, you people are needy,” Keerna said, activating her healing spell and dual-wielding it for Kalmond.

  Without needing to be told, Thornbark and Thuglar faced away from the two to cover them.

  “I’m at 95%,” Thuglar announced. “I dinged just at the right time.”

  “80% here,” Thornbark chimed in.

  Kalmond waited, then asked, “Status, Keerna?”

  “65%,” the sorceress said, almost casually.

  “Damn!” Thuglar exclaimed, and forced a health potion into her inventory. Thornbark dropped some healing powder by her feet.

  “Thanks, guys,” Keerna said.

  Kalmond moved away. “Save your mana,” he said. “You’ll need it.”

  Keerna clucked her teeth, “This isn’t my first rodeo, Kavacado. Don’t be a hero.”

  “Just trying to conserve,” Kalmond said, scarfing down a glow pear pie. “I’m at 85% now. I can heal as we walk.”

  Keerna picked up the healing items and consumed them, then kicked at the creatures littering the floor. “Just teeth,” she muttered.

  The two walked in silence down the long path without speaking, listening for signs of creatures in the dark. Time stretched long before they reached the chamber floor.

  “I
got about a thousand XP from that,” Thornbark remarked.

  “Me too,” Kalmond replied. “I’m so close to thirty-eight I can smell it.”

  Keerna and Thuglar also reported gains of more than a thousand XP, though a note of smugness in the thief’s voice suggested he was delighted to be in his thirties like the rest of the team.

  “We must have killed a hundred each.” Thornbark said, then looking up, noted, “I can’t even see the roof.”

  “That’s been true a long time,” Thuglar said, examining the area round him by the light of his fire saber.

  The room was cavernous, corners obscured by deep flickering shadows. The walls enclosing the space were pocked with openings, dark and foreboding black holes that halted their steps.

  “You see those?” Thugar asked, waving his sword in the direction of a cluster of the passages.

  Kalmond grunted. “Not big enough for humanoids, but there’s at least a few dozen.”

  Thuglar nodded. “Back up, in case we set them off. We buff, dive in, stay tight.”

  “Like Turtle Deep?” Kalmond asked.

  “Wait up. I haven’t done Turtle Deep,” Keerna said.

  “I’ve read a player guide but I’m too low to go there,” Thornbark added.

  Thuglar grinned. “Nothin to it. Just jump in, stay tight. Back to back. Keerna, you’re our healer, just keep that magic flowing. Thornbark, don’t shoot anything we haven’t pulled.”

  “Focus on stuns, slowdowns and chill shots, and area damage,” Kalmond broke in. “If we’ve guessed right, we’ll be hit with mass waves of mobs. There will be too many to fight one on one, but they should be easy enough to take out if we cluster them.”

  The centaur nodded and Keerna responded by taking a mouthful of a sparkling purple liquid. She laid her hands on Kalmond’s shoulders first and a tingle ran over his body.

  His HUD announced:

  Blessing of the Righteous

  +4% maximum health