Dungeon Master Read online

  Dawn of Adventure: Dungeon Master

  The Dungeon Master's Quests: Journey into Glory a LitRPG Series

  Andrew Bardsley

  Copyright © 2019 by Andrew Bardsley

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Books by Andrew Bardsley

  The History System Chronicles

  Book One in the Series: The First Era

  Book Two in the Series: The City god

  The Ether World Series

  Book One in the Series: Into the Ether

  Book Two in the Series: The Inscribed Angle

  The Dark Part of the Soul

  Book One in the Series: The Unknown god

  Dawn of Adventure: The Dungeon Master's Quests: Journey into Glory a LitRPG Series

  Book One in the Series: Origins

  Book Two in the Series: Dungeon Master

  Book Three in the Series: Dungeon Battle

  Book Four in the Series: King of the Realm

  Book Five in the Series: Legendary Weapons

  See Author’s page

  https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B07LGBBBYD

  Contents

  Chapter 1 Dungeon Monster

  Chapter 2 Building up a Defense of the Dungeon

  Chapter 3 Helpful Friends

  Chapter 4 Defenders

  Chapter 5 Advancement to Journeymen

  Chapter 6 Dark Alley Fight

  Chapter 7 Magical Books

  Chapter 8 Magical Dungeon Discovery

  Chapter 9 Rock Worms

  Chapter 10 The Library

  Chapter 11 Magical Discoveries

  Chapter 12 Dungeon Dive

  Chapter 13 Reality Hits

  Chapter 14 Boss Level

  Chapter 15 An Unexpected Guest

  Chapter 16 Being Observant Helps

  Chapter 1 Dungeon Monster

  Rhef had just placed her hand to confirm the quest information of the mine in front of the usual guild counter with the guild administrator smiling. As she took away her hand, Ceras concentrated on his experience he had received and saw the following:

  XP 2 of 15 too level 6 Wizard (Task required for progressing from Apprentice to Journeymen completed)

  Five stat point to place into character sheet

  Five stat point to place into Dungeon sheet

  Ceras updated his charter sheet placing all his stat point into intelligences:

  Character Name:

  Ceras

  1st Class

  Wizard

  Character Total Level*

  5

  Major

  Strength

  Fortitude

  Agility

  Number

  48

  48

  48

  Major

  Intelligence

  Charisma

  Knowledge

  Number

  35

  20

  20

  Minor

  HP

  MP

  Stamina

  Carry Limit

  Number

  374

  295

  250

  106

  Regen Sec

  4.8

  8

  5.8

  N/A

  The first thing that he noticed was that he charisma and knowledge stats had unexpectedly gone up; this one was more question he had about being a dungeon master. He decided to wait to place the stats in the dungeon sheet until he had a chance to talk to Hidden-Caverns. Ceras was eager to get back to the Hidden-Caverns with some additional monster sample for defense so he said the rest of the team, “I’m heading back to the dungeon, if you want to come later to help out with the defenses, I’d be really grateful.”

  As he said this, all of them received the following quest information in their views:

  Quest Title

  Help Defend Hidden-Caverns

  Description

  Ceras asked of help to prepare the defenses of the dungeon Hidden-Caverns.

  Level

  6

  XP per team member

  3

  Reward

  You'd be luck, not much money at the moment.

  Ceras was shocked that now he could issue quests to give his team experiences point, but looking down at the reward he wondered how long it would be until he was able to pay them.

  The team looks slightly shocked to receive a quest from Ceras, and Rhef said in a tone of mockery as her eyebrows shot up, "It seems like you're going up in the world. Not many organizations can give quests out."

  "It must because he is a Dungeon Master now. Ceras could you please hand over all the items from the mine so I can sell them in the market," said Grikius.

  After that was done, Ceras ran out of the guild, into the plaza that was now full of people buying and selling items early in the morning. The smell of fresh bread was enticing him to stop and eat, but he was in a hurry to get back as he was afraid of leaving the dungeon undefended.

  As Ceras ran with his chain mail armor on, he only felt the slight hitting of it against his clothes, but was not burdened by the weight at all, checking his stats, in his head, he was no way near his carry limit. Initial he had not been pleased when he had received the wisp's dying blessing, but now he had experienced that it enabled him to use magic and his warrior stats together, to create some kind of hybrid wizard-warrior he was grateful for it.

  With the 'advantage' he thought with some sarcasm, of being a dungeon master, he would need all the power he could gain. Normal for people with the goddess blessing the whole experience was not a real matter of life or death, as they would get resurrected, but now he had the very real prospector of dying if the dungeon fell, he fell the importance of the situation. When he thought about it some more, he certainly did not know everything about the situation as the dungeon Hidden-Caverns had been very vague on the detail. Ceras did not really know what it was to be a dungeon master, and Ceras certainly did not trust the dungeon yet which made everything ever so complicated.

  Soon he was out of the large city walls, running north of the city to where they had hunted for earth trolls. When he ran past a small wooded area, he decided to check it out for any monster. Walking over the dark soil in between the tree, over the grasping tree root that anchored the trees into the ground, he saw several small hole indicatives of rabbits. Smiling to himself at the irony that he was glad to see the warren of these hateful little #&*# monsters he saw one of the beasts pop its head out of the warren and charge at him without delay:

  Name of Monster

  Level

  Agility

  HP

  MP

  Skills

  Rabid Rabbits

  1

  1

  5

  -

  Ceras easily dealt with it with one hit of his staff, but he got more annoy when the sound of the thud of the hid, brought several more rabbits out of their warren. Each of them was equally as easy to deal with, but the longer he stared, the more that shot out from the warren until he was afraid of being overwelled by the ball of fluff aggression. After grabbing one of the rabbits, he ran further into the forest to find other monsters.

  After several hours he had collected a number of monster types he was smiling as he looked at the summary on his table:

  Name of Monster
<
br />   Level

  Agility

  HP

  MP

  Skills

  Rabid Rabbits

  1

  1

  5

  -

  Forest Wolves

  2

  2

  10

  -

  Fanged Rats

  1

  2

  7

  Fanged Rats Queen

  3

  4

  21

  Tusk Pig

  3

  4

  30

  -

  Charge

  Goblin

  4

  4

  40

  -

  -

  Goblin gang leader

  5

  3

  60

  -

  -

  Earth Trolls‎

  5

  1

  100

  -

  -

  Rock Troll

  7

  2

  150

  -

  -

  Kobolds

  5

  3

  50

  1

  Building

  He was not completely satisfied as he wanted to bag a monster, for the dungeon’s defense, that was high level for this area. Ceras was wondering through the forest at the moment with little hope of getting what he wanted, as he did not have Rhef tracking skills or the dog Apollo for hunting any creature, so he depended on his luck. Hearing a wailing sound in the distance, he thought maybe I'd got lucky this time.

  Ceras creped around the forest using the large trees and earth mounds created by the root systems of the old trees, as cover to approach the wailing noise. As he looked out from behind a large oak tree, in a clearing, he saw a hovering skeleton woman with stretch skin over her exposed bones and white hair. Her face was full of anger as she screamed at a group of goblins throwing a stone at her. As the stone shot into the air, from what Ceras could see from his hiding position, they broke up into dust in midair as if there was a grinder pulverizing them. The group of goblins had a look of fear on their face as one at a time they were pickup into the air by an unseen hand and shredded into a bit of flesh that fell on the ground as a bloody mess.

  Ceras move around the edge of the clearing, attempting to approach the Banshee:

  Name of Monster

  Level

  Agility

  HP

  MP

  Skills

  Banshee

  8

  4

  400

  -

  Scream

  He tried to hurry as quickly as possible as it would not be too long before the banshee decimated the goblins. With only three goblins left he had reached a rock behind the back of the banshee, as he was about ready to rush out of the forest and hit the monster with his staff, Ceras stepped on a twig making a loud snapping noise. The banshee swiveled in the air, with a surprised look on her horrific face and started to open her mouth to scream. Ceras ran forward as the scream hit him full in the chest, forcing him to the side, causing him to fall at her feet. He felt the pain of laceration on his chest but gritted his teeth as he pushed his staff up into the stomach of the banshee and released a fire spell. The fire spell effects took place; the banshee dry skin started to light up with flame burning with an acid smoke. Ceras cast the immobilization spell, and the banshee froze in midair. Quickly he hit the banshee again and again with his staff, each time releasing a spell of frost to add damage. After about seven hits, the banshee fell to the ground with a small thud. Picking it up, he placed the body in the bag of holding, as it magically disappeared at the entrances.

  Looking around the last few goblins had run off into the wood, leaving behind the piles of mangled flesh of their fallen comrades. Satisfied with his collection of monster bodies in his bag, he set off to the dungeon entrance at a run.

  Soon he was in the steep rocky hills, with many grey dark outcrops of rock sticking out of the side of the hill. He finally made it to the entrances of the dungeon; the first thing he noticed was that all the mine equipment had been cleared away. Then he saw that large spiders were coming out of the mine to pick up rocks and carry them back into the mine.

  The hidden-caverns voice sounded in his head as if a person was standing right next to Ceras, and he said, "Welcome home, oh great dungeon master. I'm just trying to tidy up a little and also use the metal in the mining equipment."

  Ceras said as he looked around the now empty sight, "This gives me an idea, how about if we hide the entrance of the mining tunnel until we're ready for visitors."

  Hidden-Caverns hummed for a while as if he was thinking, and said, "Not a bad idea, it may throw of adventures for a while, but we'll still lure monsters into the dungeon for building up the power. I instruct the spiders to start masking the entrances. So, did you get any monster for me to absorb."

  Ceras smiled with satisfaction and said as he avoided an outcoming fanged spider, "Yes, I've quite the range. Where do I need to drop them?"

  Hidden-Caverns said in a matter of fact tone, "Anywhere in the mine is fine as it all my realm. I've even managed to the extent domain onto the surface."

  Ceras started to approach the tunnel to the old mine, and just at that point several spiders scurried out, his immediate reaction was to jump back, he heard laughter in his mind from Hidden-Caverns who then said, "You can control them if you want to. Just reach out to them with your mind and then imagine what you want them to do."

  Ceras stood still for a second and tapped into the psyche and thought about one of the spiders in front of him. At first, it was like groping through soup for a fly, but then he lacked onto the spider-sense of self. Suddenly in his mind, he could see the world through the multitude of spider's eyes. It was like looking through panes of glass set at different angles, the internal image in his brain was interpreted, and a clear image of himself standing on a rocky outcrop was presented to him. He thought of looking to the side, and the image changed, as the spider moved its head, to the side of the mountain. Ceras played around with moving one leg at a time or all at once. He found that he had macro control over every aspect of the spider's body, as he played around. Next, he tried sending the spider complex instruction and task to do. As he watched the spider build a small wall of rock, Ceras smiled to happy with what he was able to achieve.

  During his experimentation Hidden-Caverns had stayed silent, at the end he said, "See what did I tell you and you seemed to get the hang of it really quickly. You'll need to practice controlling more than one monster at a time, which might be a bit harder. Any way in you come and drop off the new monsters as we'll need to use them in defense of the dungeon."

  Ceras entered the mine tunnel into the dungeon, as spider creeped out of the way. As he lit up a light on the end of his staff, he was able to see that there were now spider webs all along the tunnel, blocking it off. With a thought, he was able to move them as he passed spiders crouching as if bowing down to a king. After traveling through the first and second level, he navigated his way to the spherical room where he had become dungeon master. Just outside the room, he dropped all of the dead monster body parts onto the floor where they were quickly absorbed with a light surrounding them.

  Hidden-Caverns said in a surprised voice, "Not bad I'm especially happy with the banshee. The Kobolds will be very helpful in developing more levels as their good miners. All we need now is to come up with some defenses. Over to you, oh my great dungeon master."

  Ceras said in an inquisitive voice, "I've noticed a few interesting items, and I'm wondering how your stats work. One thing I noticed is that some of my stats have gone up unexpectedly, and what do your different stats mean from a normal character sheet?"

  Hidden-Caverns seemed to sigh in Ceras mind with a heavy breath, and said, "It best if I explain what a dungeon is.

  "The first information you need to know is that dunge
ons were created anciently along with the blessing of the goddess you human receive to help combat monsters in the world. Before human had the blessing of the goddess, they were about to be wiped out from existence due to the ferocity of monster in this world.

  "As part of the blessing the concept of Dungeons were created by the ancient power for several reasons: The first was to draw monster into its depth to and battle enabling them to control the monster population in the area. This is down by killing them in the dungeon and their power being transferred to the dungeon and the dungeon master; the second is to give human a training ground where they can level up quickly by fighting different monsters and also gain ingredients and magical supplies that will provide for them... You seem to have zoned out a bit, maybe it best if I show you in."

  Ceras nodded as his mind started to be filled with images as if he was watching a play unfold by the theater groups that wandered the land.

  --

  The warrior was being perused across the grasses land by a large saber tiger, who had been hunting him for days. Gason, the warrior, was far away from the limited safety of his village's walls provided him, but even being in the walls of the village would not help him against this monster. As he ran for his life with the sweat pouring down his face matting his long hair that was damp on his forehead, he thought about the way of life his tribe experienced and sighed with frustration wondering if the thing would ever change, because if it did not human would be lost from this realm.