by Adam Elliott
“He did seem very convinced that we’d handled them,” Cayden said, expressing a similar concern as Silver. “It is possible that we’ve come into contact with the owner and didn’t realize it.”
“Which begs the question of what sort of player steals an artifact that causes this sort of havoc without returning it,” Michael added. “Assuming of course, that it is a physical object with any power and not just some trinket that triggers the event.”
“We do need more info.” Cayden agreed. “Which is one of the short term goals I’ve been discussing with Dinah.” For once the Toy Soldier’s face did not twist into a mask of annoyance at her first name being used. “The second upgrade to the Keep was, as Valserys helpfully pointed out, a dungeon. As of yet, we haven’t had much use for it, but I refuse to believe that the Developer put something like that into this event without intending for us to use it as part of the event.” Cayden smiled grimly as he regarded his allies.
“I think our next goal must be to capture a Warden officer if we want to have any hope of getting to the cause of all of this.”
Epilogue
Day 12 - Midday
Resources â F â 640 -20, Z â 790 +10, M â 280 +5, I â 700 +20, P +40, R +20
Research Complete (Warfare) - Barracks
“The books you requested.”
“You’re too quick Ainsworth,” Cayden said without looking up from the text he was studying. “I haven’t even puzzled out all of these quite yet.”
“Might I suggest you begin puzzling faster then, Sir Cayden?”
That bit of prim and proper snark was at last enough to draw Cayden’s attention away from the page. His eyes flickered up just as the head librarian carefully deposited a stack of books heavy enough to make the table groan slightly under their weight.
Bastion’s Librarian was, to Cayden at least, the perfect example of a man who fit his name to perfection. Some people were Kevins, or Davids, or Steves. Ainsworth, he was absolutely an Ainsworth.
Just a tad over five feet tall, the diminutive Elan was among the oldest of his kind that Cayden had ever met. At least, he thought so. When Cayden had tried to pry on the subject, the librarian had replied only that he was “older than most and younger than some,” which was of course, supremely helpful. Even an attempt to order the information out of him had proven a failure when the Elan had helpfully reminded him that he was a librarian, not a soldier.
But he was old, that much was clear from his hunched back and scraggly grey beard. Unlike many of his kind, Ainsworth looked almost human. It was only his eyes with their unnatural crimson hue that gave him away as anything less than an octogenarian who had somehow stumbled into the tower by mistake.
For all he knew, he could just be an old human in contact lenses.
As far as Cayden could tell, Ainsworth just came with the place. The library had finished construction while they’d been out on campaign, and just as with the jail, it came with an employee to keep it running. Valserys didn’t hire him, nor did anyone he’d interrogated on the subject. Even now, Cayden wasn’t sure whether the Elan had been drawn to the library by some compulsion, or whether he’d come into being fully formed when the library was finished.
How cruel would that be, to come into existence in old age, with the sole purpose of acting as a librarian? The very thought made him shudder.
“Are there any other subject you’ll be requesting? Or shall I leave you to your work?” The old man asked, dutifully separating the stack of book into three distinct piles.
“No, I think this should do.” He replied with a smile.
The library had been one of his first destinations once things had settled down upon his return. Unlike the dungeon, the library did have a practical effect on the war effort, in that it significantly increased their overall research points. Still, Cayden hadn’t been convinced that was it’s only purpose, a conviction that had rewarded him with enough new runes to bring his total vocabulary to 1837/2000, on the very cusp of his next leap in power.
Even that knowledge hadn’t been enough, however. It wasn’t like the Developer to give them something as detailed as the library, without hiding some sort of Easter Egg within its shelves.
So far, however, that search had proven fruitless.
“Very well Marshall,” Ainsworth said curtly, indicating each stack of books in turn. “As requested, these three are every bit of knowledge the library contains on the Liar King. These four deal with constructs in general, or the Wardens in particular and these last five are the tomes most related to Elan magic.” The librarian tapped the final stack with a fingertip as he added. “I took the liberty of marking all relevant passages that I could locate, seeing as you appeared somewhat overwhelmed.”
Cayden blinked in surprise. “That… in two hours?”
“Sir. You’ve been here for six.” Ainsworth said with just the slightest hint of bemusement.
“What?!” Cayden shouted, lowering his voice only after a steady glare from the Elan. “I’d set an alarm… and… oh” He rolled his eyes as he realized his mistake. Even a high tech smart device powered by literal magic could still screw up when he selected PM instead of AM. “These are going to have to wait; our turn is going to be starting soon.”
“Of course, sir,” Ainsworth replied dutifully. “But before you go, I had one more thing to call to your attention.”
“Hmm?”
“It will take not but a moment.” The elder man smiled thinly beneath his well-kept beard. “You had initially gathered all our books on the language and runic characters of the Great Emperor.”
“Yeah,” Cayden replied. It had put them off on the wrong foot to start off with. Ainsworth didn’t appreciate the fact that Cayden’s Find Rune ability had allowed him to gather every book he’d desired without even stopping to inquire about the filing system.
“You missed one.” The librarian said, clearly relishing the words as he extended a thin volume.
“It must not have been important,” Cayden replied. Most likely it was a book that contained only runes that he had already added to his lexicon. “Put it on the pile and I’ll-”
Any further words caught in Cayden’s throat as he caught sight of the leather bound cover. It was bland, a brown leather book no more than a few dozen pages at best. But it wasn’t the size or quality of the book that drew his breath, but the symbol stamped into the leather on its surface. A symbol he’d seen only once before.
The rune of The White Knight.
From the Author
Thank you so much for reading Tower of Babel: Speedrunner. I’ve been a writer in one form or another for much of my adult life, but this is actually the first time I’ve been proud enough of my work to publish it under my own name. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I stressed out and panicked about meeting my deadlines.
If you liked the story and want to support me as I continue to release additional books in this and other seriesâ, there are a couple of ways you can do so. The simplest is to just leave a review. It takes as little as a minute, and good reviews are the life blood of a self-published author. You can also recommend my work to others via any of the myriad LitRPG platforms that are out there on Facebook and elsewhere.
In the event that you like my work and want to tell me how much you liked it, or you hate it and want to tell me how badly I suck you can contact me by E-mail or on Facebook and Twitter. You can also sign up for my Mailing List if you’d like to be made aware whenever a new book becomes available for publish. Saves people time camping me on Facebook, if nothing else.
Finally, by reader request I now have a Patreon page. Readers will get the earliest access to rough drafts, cover art and other fun goodies.
If you like LitRPG, but somehow simultaneously have been living beneath a rock and don’t know about it, I recommend the LitRPG Podcast by the Amazing Ramon Mejia. While you are there I also recommend you look into purchasing his amazing book Adventures on Terra:
Beginnings and Adventures on Terra: Escape. Ramon runs an incredible show and he is probably the person single most responsible for making me believe this book could succeed. So, if you like this book, give him some love while you are at it.
If you don’t like it, it is his fault.
While I’m at it, I’m also going to recommend the amazing works of Life Reset: A LitRPG Novel (New Era Online Book 1) by Shermer Kuznits and the amazing Delvers LLC Series by Blaise Corvin
And of course, I want to plug all the amazing LitRPG communities:
LitRPG Society
GameLit Society
LitRPG Facebook Group
LitRPG Books
LitRPG Forum
I’d also like to thank Tomas Muir for the amazing cover art. He helped me short notice this time, which is always nice.
Thanks to Podium Publishing, who’ve picked up Tower of Babel for an Audiobook series, with the first book releasing this December.
Thank you to my readers, the next one will be coming much faster this time, I promise.
And as always, thanks to my beloved Maea for putting up with my usual meltdown as deadlines grown near.
Want to read more? Please enjoy this teaser for another of my upcoming LitRPG novels:
Blue Hills
Chapter One
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Alexander mashed his face helplessly into the pillow beneath him, groaning in frustration as even the plush weight of it pressed over his ears was unable to fully silence the shrill mechanical noise.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
What even was that noise?
Alex tried to place it within his sleep fogged mind without opening his eyes. Even though the closed lids he could feel the radiance of the sun beating down on him from the nearby window. He must have forgotten to draw his blackout drapes before he went to bed.
Today was not starting out well.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
âOkay, let’s cut that crap out right now!â Alex grumbled as he rolled onto his side and at last opened sleep crusted eyes.
It was an old mechanical alarm clock, the type he’d last seen in a motel on his drive through the deep south. Probably thrice or more his age, it’s crimson numbers blinked with each infuriating beep. It even sounded old, now that he was listening like the clock was struggling its best to produce every beep.
The table beneath it looked just as ancient; a hand carved wooden thing that made up in charm what it lacked in sophistication. This wasn’t some thrown together Ikea end table, it the sort of relic that got passed from family member to family member, held onto even though if anyone was honest, it was kind of ugly.
Of course, the big concern was that neither table nor alarm clock belonged to him.
This wasn’t his bedroom.
In a panic, he rolled onto his right side, reaching out across the enormous king sized bed to give the bunched up covers a quick tug. They moved freely, but that only filled him with mixed emotions. The bed was empty, and he was alone. It was a small blessing that he hadn’t stumbled home blackout drunk with a stranger from the bar, but it did nothing to answer his immediate question. Where the hell was he?
Beep! Beep! Beep!
âOh for…!â Alexander growled, reaching for the alarm clock. Deactivating the alarm proved harder than expected in his exhausted state, but he restrained himself from throwing it at the wall just long enough to locate the switch on its rear facing. It wasn’t until the clock had been well and truly silenced that he read the numbers on the old timey LCD. Six O’clock.
For a night owl like him, Six O’clock in the morning was a near mythical time, one that only ever came around when tabletop gaming stretched so far into the evening that it rolled around into early morning. He hadn’t set the alarm for six in the morning in, well, ever.
Despite that, he felt surprisingly rested. Alexander was by no stretch of the imagination a morning person, even getting up at his mid-afternoon wake up time on the weekend typically left him a shambling zombie of a man until he’d finished downing a cup or two of the pure powdered sugar and caffeine he called ‘iced tea.’
This morning though? Now that he’d pushed through that initial fog of half consciousness, he was quite lucid.
Score one for adrenaline. Alex thought to himself. Even as it crossed his mind, however, he knew that wasn’t right. Apart from that initial fear that he’d drunk his way into a one night stand, nothing about the situation he’d found himself in had prompted much of an actual fear response, which was odd in and of itself. He’d just woken up in a strange bed, in a place he didn’t recognize. Shouldn’t he be more frightened?
Chirp-chirp!
The sudden noise in the still air of the bedroom did send a jolt through him as if to accent just how odd the calm he felt was. It was nothing, of course, just a Blue Jay sitting on the windowsill, babbling away with a number of other birds just out of sight. The bird was beautiful. In truth, Alex couldn’t recall the last time he’d seen a bird like that in the city.
Maybe a pigeon that was particularly fearless of the subway that rumbled past his flat on the third floor?
This place was nothing like his flat. No cheap drywall or ‘apartment beige’ on these walls. These were hardwood, massive logs cut and paneled along the wall to give the feel of a log cabin. No, that wasn’t right. He could see part of the outer frame of the building through the room’s sole window, and it looked no different on the outside than it did on the inside.
Not exactly a lot of log cabins in the city. Where the hell was he?
Alexander rolled over once again, awkwardly contorting his body until he managed to bring himself fully upright. The comforter fell from his chest as he rose, and he could feel the coolness of the wood beneath his feet as they touched the floor. It was at that point that he realized that however, he’d gotten here, it hadn’t been with his clothes.
A short scan of the room with a bed sheet wrapped around his waist confirmed what he suspected. His clothing was nowhere to be found. The search did turn up clothing when he checked the wardrobe, but the flannel work shirts, jeans, and overalls he found there weren’t exactly in keeping with either his semi-professional work attire or his more grunge casual wear. He wasn’t sure which he’d have been wearing when he got here.
Come to think of it; he couldn’t remember much of anything that must have happened in the lead-up to his arrival here. What memories he had of the previous day were fuzzy at best. He knew he’d gone to work. He’d been ill and tried to call in sick, but his boss wasn’t having any of it, so he’d dragged himself half dead to his cubicle. He remembered the morning meeting, sitting down at his desk and then…
The sudden sound of knocking from the other room startled Alex out of both his recollections and the bed itself. His bare backside hit the floor with a thud, just barely managing to pull a long white sheet down with him to preserve his modesty.
The knock came again after a brief delay, then a third time after a proper amount of time had passed. Whoever was outside was patient, but insistent. They weren’t going away, but maybe they could provide some answers.
âJust a minute!â Alexander shouted at the sound of the fourth series of knocks as he struggled to his feet and cinched the sheet tightly about his waist. A quick peek into the bathroom found surprisingly modern fixtures, save for the claw footed tub that dominated the left side of the room, but none of his clothing. His search of the living room proved no better. A TV, a two chair cafe-style dining room table festooned with books and a thick bearskin rug were the only things of note in the spartan common room.
Definitely no pants.
âI’m coming; I’m coming.â He called out as the knock came again, carefully skirting the two windows on the front of the living room to avoid giving his visitor an eyeful as he moved for the door. It was only once he was safely concealed against the wall beside it that he finally reached for the door.
Alex was surprised to find not
a single lock on the old door. His apartment had a chain, a deadbolt, and a knob lock and he still felt unsafe, but his guest could have just walked through at any time, had she not been so polite.
And of course, his guest had to be a woman. Because this simply wasn’t awkward enough.
âOh! Hello, Alexan…â She started moments after the door had opened just wide enough for her to see his face. Her eyes had begun locked on his, but as she spoke they drifted downwards, her words trailing off as that gaze traveled along his bare, muscled chest. âI. Oh my. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for you to rush this quickly! I’ll wait out here until you’re dressed!â
It was difficult to place the age of the woman standing on his porch, save for the fact that she was quite a bit his senior. Her dark hair was streaked through with patches of silver, her face wrinkled with lines of age, but without the full on wrinkles of someone in their twilight years. She still cared about her appearance enough to dress well, a prim and proper business casual skirt and blouse, while her cheeks were tinted with the slightest hint of rouge. She looked like every other middle manager who had stopped climbing the ladder in her forties, save for the cute little miniature top hat settled on the back left side of her head.
âI’m having a little trouble finding my… wait. Did you just call me Alexander?â He asked.
âWell, yes?â The woman asked in confusion; her eyes still averted from him. âDo you prefer Alex?â
She knew his name. How the hell did she know his name!
âIf you’re still getting yourself acquainted, I can come back.â She said as she studied the craftsmanship of the wall next to the door.
âI… look, I’m a little confused on what the hell is going on here,â Alex replied, an edge of stress finally finding purchase in his voice. âLike for starters, where are my clothes!â