Tokens and Towers Vol 1 chpt 8

Chapter Eight: Almost Bludgeoned in a Dungeon

Everything was dark by the time I awoke, my body aching, my head throbbing, my mouth dry. Yuck.

“Rer-ree…” I said, only then realizing that the gnomes had gagged and blindfolded me, not to mention the cold hard steel cuffing my hands behind my back. There was a smell too, one of stone and sweat, panic setting in almost immediately.

Maybe some people would be into something like this. There is a whole set of people that love to be bound and blindfolded, and there is a set of readers that would maybe like to read about those kinds of things. But I am neither of those people, and aside from the trash lit work I did as Angel Farts (regardless if Clovis says it is okay—don’t listen to him), this was by far the worst thing that had happened to me in Genera.

Yet.

And mostly because I didn’t know where I was, I was entirely restrained, and I had no idea where Axl Rose or Clovis were, my haggard, writerly ass without my weapon of choice and the misguided spellbook who was slowly becoming my ride-or-die.

“Roe-riss…” I tried to say, the gag with a salty, jockstrap taste to it that made me want to, well, gag. “Roe-riss…”

<You have two days to reach the tower. Once you reach the tower, you will join the first floor of the first realm.>

“Roo-riss? Rer-ree? Rer-ree, relp!”

<I’m sorry, Randy. I’m not able to interfere at this time. You have two days to get to the tower.>

Two days? Had I been out that long?

“Rare ram rye?”

<The gnomes have taken you to one of their dungeons along the outer rim of the tower.>

“Roe-riss?”

<Clovis is here as well, as far as I know.>

I heard the sound of a set of keys. A door opened, followed by the sound of leather boots on stone tile.

“Time for your breakfast, intake,” came a high pitched voice. What followed was yet another reason why I would never trust a gnome again. Some sort of lumpy lukewarm porridge was dumped on my head, which triggered the Mad Lad within.

I’d seen people do it in movies and TV shows, a handcuffed guy or lady using their head and body to take someone down, where they proceeded to go ballistic in an effort of self-perseverance. It didn’t seem realistic; hell, I had even written scenes in which someone got out of cuffs in some way, but it couldn’t be possible, could it?

I was a Mad Lad, and I was determined not to die by the grubby little paws of a horde of fuckboy gnomes. Whatever the synthetic reality was that Lily had mentioned, I wasn’t about to become part of it.

So I went for it.

Lunging forward, I slammed into the gnome. I used my legs to straddle him and began bashing my head into the front of his face. I didn’t hit it every time; once or twice I caught his chin with my forehead, but he stopped struggling after a few good hits.

Just to be sure he was out, I got to my feet and started kicking at him, only to slip on some of the porridge he’d poured onto my head, causing me to fall straight onto my ass. My struggles had a way of dislodging the blindfold and the gag, both of which were around my neck by the time I finally sat up.

The light burned my eyes for a moment but I blinked a few times, got my bearings, and started strategizing what I should do next. One look at the gnome spawned a box that allowed me to loot him. Sure enough, I got the keys to the cell and a dungeon map, which immediately synced with my User Interface. And I thought that was it. I had the keys, and I had a map, two things that were necessary to escape a gnome dungeon. But then I realized that equipping them wasn’t the same as being able to use them.

I needed another pair of hands to get the metal cuffs off.

“For… for fuck’s sake…” I sat with my back against the stone wall and lowered my head.

<Would you like me to show you where Clovis and your weapon are on the map?>

I looked up as if Lily was in the room with me, wishing in that moment that she was. What would she look like? Why did I find myself wondering that when I was literally caged in a gnome dungeon? All I really needed was an extra pair of hands; then, I could likely get the cuffs off and the door open.

<Would you like me to show you where Clovis and your weapon are on the map?>

“Sure.”

A translucent map took shape before me, indicating that Clovis and Axl Rose were just a few levels above.

“That’s great and all, Lily, but…” I stretched my shoulder back, and in doing so my knuckles grazed the wall of the cell.

“Ooo…”

The sound came from all around me, a woman’s voice echoing through the corridor.

“Did… did you hear that, Lily?”

“Lily?” the voice asked. And even though there was an echo to it, there was a sultry nature to the voice as well, not quite a Jessica Rabbit, but maybe a smokey Jessica Alba. “My name isn’t Lily…”

“Then… then what is your name?” I asked. Sure, I’d bite. I was talking to a wall. What the hell else did I have to do?

“Dungeons don’t normally have names, intake...”

So she’s… she’s the dungeon core! In my head the dungeon fantasy author named Jonathan Brooks did a backflip.

The revelation struck me like a frying pan. The gnomes had put me in a dungeon, obviously, and this was a fantasy world, which meant that the dungeon was probably sentient. It likely had a core as well, but I wasn’t about to go down that route—I’m more of a tower climber than a dungeon crawler—not with the time limit looming over my head.

“Do… do you want a name?” I asked.

“I’ll take any name you can give me, handsome.”

The dungeon is flirting with me… This thought was followed by another one: make it work, Randy, make it work.

I cleared my throat and lightly grazed my fingers against the wall again, the dungeon giggling as I did so. “Do… do you think you could get me out of this cell?”

“What’s your name, baby?”

“Randy, the noun, not the adjective.”

“Give me a name, Randy, and I’ll help you get out of here.”

“Shit…”

“You want to call me Shit?”

“No, um, Chelsea! Yes, Chelsea, I’ll call you Chelsea.”

I felt my heart drop. Chelsea was the name of my ex wife, and for it to be the first name to come to me… made sense.

It entirely made sense.

Look, I told you back in the fictional author forward (if you read it) that this story doesn’t have sex and romance. And it doesn’t. At least not that I’m aware of. Don’t worry, I’m not about to figure out a way to score with the sentient dungeon core. Were there ways to hook up with a dungeon? Sure, but that’s not this kind of story. Maybe my alter ego Angel Farts could write something like that, but why would he?

So don’t get any weird ideas, because I’m certainly not getting any.

With that out of the way, you should know that there was a little heartbreak before my story began. Yes, I’m divorced, and no, we didn’t end on great terms. There’s a reason for what happened, and I’ll get into that later, but none of this is why I decided to call the dungeon Chelsea, and while it seemed as if I was being impulsive, or saying the first name that came to mind, this wasn’t exactly the case.

I had a feeling that being friendly with the dungeon would help me retrieve my axe and save Clovis. By giving the dungeon the name Chelsea, the things I said to it (because yes, I was about to flirt back) would be authentic, or at least I could make it sound that way.

“Yes, Chelsea, my lovely lady dungeon.”

The wall quivered. “Ooo… I like that, lovely lady dungeon. Chelsea is a good name. Like shell and sea combined, but with a sexy little ‘ch’ sound.”

“That’s right, Chelsea,” I said, enunciating the ‘ch.’ “Could you maybe open the cell door for me… baby? I’d love to get out of here so I can go outside and pick some flowers for you.”

<Would you like me to make it easier to find Clovis and your axe? There are many chambers in this dungeon and I have located the best paths to reach him.>

“Yes, Lily,” I told my companion AI. I immediately regretted thighs.

“Lily? I thought you wanted to call me Chelsea…” said the dungeon, and as she did so, the opening she had started to form at the front of the cell began to shrink.

“Wait, it’s not like that, baby! It’s just, Lily and Chelsea, where I’m from anyway, are… um… nicknames. Yes, Lily is a nickname for Chelsea.”

“That makes sense. I… I like that we’re close enough now for you to give me a nickname. Hold tight, baby.” Chelsea produced an opening at the front of the cell, the bars melting back. I slipped through it, wrists still cuffed behind my back. I was free! My next stop was a door at the other side of the room, which was also locked. “Do you think you could help me with these cuffs?”

Chelsea laughed in a shy way. “You’re so naughty, Randy!”

“I try,” I told her. “Think… think you can open this one?”

The stone wall near the door began to quake, a face of a woman taking shape. “Are you really going to leave me?”

“No, of course not. A beautiful, um, wall like you? I’d never leave you, not even for a second. Chelsea, you are my heart,” I said, which was something I’d definitely told my ex-wife before. Ugh, this was rough.

“I’m… your heart?”

“You sure are, my little button, my little sweet thing.” I turned my back to the wall, showing her my cuffs. “Think you can help me with these.”

The dungeon made a sound as if she was going to sob. “I don’t have hands. Do… do you still like me even though I don’t have hands?”

“Of course! Fuck a pair of hands—wait, that came out wrong—I just need my hands to…” I grinned at the wall. “Do you like being tickled?”

“Yes…”

“I need hands to tickle you properly.”

“Randy, you wouldn’t!”

“I would if you could somehow get these cuffs off me.”

“You are such a bad boy. I would if I could, baby, Baby Randy.”

“I prefer Mad Lad, but that will do too.” I motioned my chin to the door. “Think you can pop it open for me?”

“There are more of those nasty gnomes on the other side…”

I took a deep breath in and prepared my neck for more headbutts. “That’s fine. Just let me take a few steps back so I can get a running start…”

****

If you are imagining me bursting into a narrow corridor guarded by a pair of burly Level Two gnomes in gnarly black armor like a Mad Lad frothing at the mouth and shouldering into the first gnome trying desperately to headbutt him to death, you wouldn’t be far off.

It was a vibe, and by this point I truly had nothing left to lose.

Wham!

The first gnome hit the ground, my head smashed into his chin, my next headbutt actually connected, and I was about to get him again when I was struck by a club across the back by the second guard.

Christ, did it hurt. It was like all the wind and the good sense were knocked out of me in one go. The gnome likely would have beaten me to death had it not been for the ground shifting, the gnome falling into a hole, Chelsea crushing him seconds later.

“Holy hell, Chels!”

“Did I do good, Baby Mad Lad Randy?” asked the dungeon, her voice ricocheting off the narrow corners of the corridor.

“You… you bitch!” the gnome that was still alive pointed a finger at the wall, aware the dungeon itself had changed sides. His nose was bleeding now, his black cone-shaped hat somewhere on the stone floor across from us.

“Don’t you call her that!” I positioned myself on top of him again and like some sort of demented dolphin, I bucked up and down, delivering a few more deadly headbutts.

And yes, they hurt me as well, my HP flashing.

The gnome guard expired, or at least I thought it was his last breath out. I rolled onto my back, my assailant releasing a cloud of post-mortem gas that had me gagging in an instant, my back still hurting from the clubbing I’d received, my forehead on fire from all the headbutts.

“What’s next… Lily?”

<There are two doors up ahead. One door leads to the barracks, which is where you will encounter more gnomes. The second door leads to an obstacle.>

“Baby Mad Lad Randy, you called me Lily again,” said the dungeon. “Do you have another nickname I can call you?”

I almost said Angel Farts but that had never been a nickname, it had been a poor attempt to be clever.

“No, no, nickname for me, aside from Mad Lad. Now, what do you mean by obstacles, Lily?” I said under my breath.

<This is a dungeon, and most dungeons have obstacles to prevent people from both entering and escaping.>

“So… unless I want to try to dress up as a gnome, or fight my way through a horde of them in the barracks, I should take the obstacle path?”

<Correct. I have highlighted it on your map token.>

Mere mention of this map token spawned a translucent map in front of me, indicating the direction I should go.

“All right, let’s do this,” I said as I charged ahead, still with my hands behind my back.

I took the door on the left, which opened on its own due to Chelsea’s assistance. It wasn’t going to be easy. Trailing up the room were a series of stone platforms, and it looked like I was supposed to jump from platform to platform. The only problem was the field of spikes below, which would spell instant death. Not only that, the platforms were moving.

I was going to have to jump from floating platform to floating platform.

“Chels…”

“Yes, Baby Mad Lad Randy?”

“Um, How much do you like me?” I asked as I examined the hovering stone platforms.

“I don’t know how to answer that. I’m still getting to know you. What do you do for a living?”

“I write fantasy books.”

“People read fantasy books?”

“Some people, yes.”

“The gnomes never read.”

“I’m sure they’ve found other ways to pass the time, like wanking each other off and flicking boogers. Or maybe they’ve all reached Zen-like states in which they don’t need to read fantasy as a form of escape. I digress, can you… control the platforms?”

“Maybe…”

“Normally, I’d be all for the challenge, but not having usage of my hands is making me second guess this little obstacle here.”

“I can make it a bigger obstacle if you want,” she said, her voice dipping into something sultry. “You like them big, right?”

“Jesus, Chelsea, let’s save something for our…” Don’t say wedding night, Randy, I reminded myself, but it was too late. The words had already left my lips. I really needed to get a handle on the things I say. “Let’s save something for our wedding night.”

<You intend to marry this dungeon?>

Lily’s voice took me off guard. She had yet to really comment on the bonkers situations I continued to find myself in. Strange to see what finally triggered her.

“No, Lily, I don’t intend to marry…” I smiled at the wall. “Shit.”

“So… so you lied to me?”

“No, of course not,” I told the female face that was starting to appear.

“Baby Mad Lad Randy, I thought… I thought we had something special.” Water began to drip from the ceiling.

I glanced up at it, horror painting across my face. “Are… are you crying?”

“It’s been a rough week for me!”

“Chelsea, Lily, Chels, shit—all the names I’ve already given you—look, it’s all good, it’s me, please, let’s just get through this together.”

“...Together?’

“Um…” I watched as the water dripping from the ceiling started to slow. Is this how she orgasms as well? I thought, not quite sure of the bodily functions of a dungeon. There were writers who sat around thinking about these sorts of things, or at least I hoped there were, but as I promised you in the beginning, this is not that kind of story! More importantly, someone needed to save Clovis before these grubby gnomes used his loose pages as toilet paper.

“Sure, together, just… just relax, and let me get to the next room. Clovis is in the next room, right, Lily?” I said under my breath.

Please tell me Clovis is in the next room… I thought as Lily took her sweet time to answer me.

<As you can see on the map, after this room, there is a short hallway that leads to where the gnomes keep their treasures. Clovis is there.>

“Clovis is a treasure?” I asked her.

<According to the gnomes, yes.>

I smirked. “He’s a national treasure in my book.”

<I’m sorry, I don’t understand the reference.>

Clovis would appreciate that compliment, I thought as I moved onto my next question, which was asked through gritted teeth as I tried to conceal my voice from the lady dungeon. I could still see her face, the dungeon watching me with pupil-less eyes and occasionally tilting her head to the right and left, as if she were being coy and hoping to use her shoulder to entice me.

“Are their guards?”

<There is one guard.>

“Awesome, I’ve got a few more headbutts in me. Chelsea, can you…?” I stopped, realizing I’d made a cardinal sin in not looting the gnome from earlier. I turned back to him, a box appearing before me and letting me know what was lootable.

Oh, hell yeah…

The gnome had actual lyra, and I’m not talking about LyraCoin, this one had cold hard cash. DeFi be damned, I was back in the money. A quick, intuitive swipe from one of my cuffed hands added this to my inventory list.

“Ten lyra, thank-you-very much,” I told Lily, Chelsea, and whoever else was listening.

“I like a wealthy man,” said Chelsea.

I almost bragged about the Harmon Token I had and how this translated into LyraCoin but stopped just in time. Best not to go around fanning myself with crypto lest I find me a gold digger.

“Chels, can you stop the platforms?” I asked as I prepared to ascend the moving platforms no matter what. “Pretty please.”

“Sure.”

The nine platforms that moved up the room at an angle came to a stop. The only problem was, some of them weren’t stacked next to one another, meaning I’d still have to do a little hopping.

“Can you line them up?”

“I sort of wanted to watch you challenge yourself a little, Baby Mad Lad Randy. You have a nice tush…”

“I… I certainly do.” I patted my cuffed hands on my ass. I summoned my inner American Ninja Warrior and launched myself in the air, moving from platform to platform. I was a natural, and had this been the actual TV Show, I would have certainly made it through the first obstacle.

Chelsea teased me on one of the final platforms, the dungeon vibrating the platform just a little and giggling as I nearly faceplanted.

But in the end I’d made it. It was time to save Clovis.

****

The most important part about saving a friend’s life is making a grand entrance when you do so. I just happened to do that as I raced toward the door of the treasure room, Chelsea popping it open.

And not a moment too soon.

The gnome tasked with guarding the treasure, which mostly consisted of junk, had his pants down, his little gnome in his clammy hands as he took a piss right next to Clovis.

The words that came to me next would be perfect for my tombstone:

“Hey! Piss on someone your own size!”

The Level 2 gnome turned to me just as I took off toward him. Sure, I got spritzed by a bit of urine, but I also managed to slam the living hell out of the Peeing Calvin the gnome. As I had done to his peers, I offered up a few epic headbutts, practically shifting into seizures as I protected Clovis from what was left of the gnome’s golden shower.

By the end of the headbutting session I had a knot on my own forehead, I reeked of piss, I was a bit breathless, and Clovis was hovering over me, drooping to some degree.

“Are… are you okay?”

“Never been better.” I rolled onto my back and did my best Undertaker impression, sitting up with gusto. “What the hell was that all about?”

“It was his idea.”

“Obviously, Clovis. I mean why was a gnome pissing on you in the first place? Why would you let him do that?”

He shrugged. “I read online that you shouldn’t play dead if a bear attacks your tent. But gnomes are smaller, so I thought playing dead would work. He was trying to shock me into waking up.”

“By pissing near you?” I didn’t wait for an answer. “Weirdly, with the gnomes of Genera. That sort of checks out.”

“What’s up with your arms?”

“What’s it look like, Clovis?” I asked him as I showed him the cuffs.

“Who is the book?”

Clovis and I turned to Chelsea, the dungeon’s face taking shape on the wall, her eyes narrowed to some degree as if she were irked that she wasn’t getting enough attention.

“He’s a friend…”

Chelsea made a pouty face. “You didn’t tell me you had a friend, Baby Mad Lad Randy.”

“Who did you think Clovis was? I kept mentioning him. At least I think I did.”

“Who is Baby Mad Lad Randy?” asked Clovis.

Chelsea sighed. “I thought Clovis was the name for whatever spicy item you may have in here, maybe a toy for us…”

“In the treasure room?” I took a look around and saw Axl Rose leaning against a drawer filled with necklaces. “Looks like we’re back in action,” I went for the best axe I’d ever owned and returned it to my breakaway sheath.

“All right, Clovis, you and I need to check for loot and then get the hell out of this…” I smiled over at Chelsea. “Love, we’re going to be leaving for a while, and I don’t want you to get too worried. If you could, perhaps, make an exit for us that leads outside, we’d really appreciate it.”

Clovis tilted a few inches to the left. “So… you’re in love with the wall?  Am I understanding this correctly? I think the term for that is objectophilia.”

“Clovis, it’s not just a wall, it’s a dungeon. And she’s a she.”

“I didn’t want to assign a gender to it without her consent.”

“Not now, Clovis. Chelsea, love, my heart, is that possible?” I nodded my head from Clovis to the loot the gnomes had stashed in the room. “Take a look around, grab anything that looks good. And no fucking mustaches this time. We don’t need a mustache.”

“That mustache would have made a great disguise. Have you ever thought about rocking a mustache, Baby Mad Lad Randy?”

“Call me Randy—noun, not verb—Mad Lad is a nickname I’ve given myself and…” I raised my voice a little. “Only Chelsea can call me Baby Mad Lad Randy.”

Chelsea purred with delight, the room shaking. One glance up at the ceiling and I saw it was wet again.

“Hurry, Clovis, or we’re going to need an Umbrella Token. Look for good stuff. Tokens. Look for tokens. And food. I’m starved.”

“The gnome had a questionable sandwich.”

“I’ll be the judge of that.” I ducked next to the gnome and transferred the questionable sandwich to my inventory list. As I’d been told before, food didn’t register in my inventory list as a token. The next few things I looted did, all of which had no additional perks—a Golden Necklace Token, a Silver Ring Token, which, alongside my Instant Muck Token, left me with just a few more slots in my inventory list. Once I hit level five, Lily said I’d get a bit more space.

“We’re looking for valuables, Clovis,” I told the book, which hovered just over my shoulder. “You know, stuff we can sell.”

“Why?”

“Remember that merchant we ran into? We didn’t have anything to sell him. Next time we see someone like him, we will.”

“Hey, I found another token,” Clovis said as he scanned a skeleton that sat in a shoddy throne.

The token floated in front of Clovis, a rim of orange fire tracing around it and forming a dragon as it dissipated.

“Let me see that…”

Flaming Weapon Token (rare)

Usage of this token allows you to ignite your weapon for two minutes. You can use it five times.

“Oh, hell yeah.”

“I don’t have a weapon anyway,” Clovis said as he moved on.

“You have a sword.”

“I don’t have a hand to use the sword.”

“Flaming swords are cool.”

“I read a book about a guy who had a flaming sword—”

Commotion in the hallway interrupted our conversation. I sensed that we needed to hurry.

“Anyway, you have a sword,” I reminded him. “Since you didn’t grab a weapon at the start, I’m guessing that’s the one you are proficient with. Did the voice tell you something like that?”

“No, and if they did I would have ignored them. I’m pretty sure because I’m a spellbook that I would have just chosen myself, which I sort of did.”

“We’ll unpack that later...”

There has to be something super lootable around here, I thought as I took another look around, but for a treasure room, everything seemed to be trash. More muffled yelling caused me to hup two. Figuring it would buy us a little more time, I pushed the throne in front of the door while Clovis continued searching through the increasingly shit loot.

“I always liked going to estate sales. There are so many Upstate.”

“That’s nice, Clovis, but we’re looking for things to sell or use. So the shinier, the better. And tokens.”

“I don’t give a McShit! Just kidding, I’ll keep looking.”

“Come on, come on...” I gave up my search once sounds outside disrupted my gleeful scavenger hunt. “Chelsea, dear…”

“Yes?” The dungeon’s face, which had been partially obscured by a tapestry, began to form, the tapestry shifting to the side. “Can you…” I looked to the opposite wall. “Is that the direction of the tower, Lily?”

Both Lily and Chelsea answered at the same time.

“Yes.”

<Yes.>

I squinted at the wall. “Can you make a hole that we can escape through and seal it up after so the gnomes can’t chase us?”

Chelsea’s stony throat quivered. “I… I have a confession.”

The banging on the door grew even louder; the skeleton in the throne seat slowly started to shift forward in a creepy way.

“I’ve been seeing someone else, Baby Mad Lad Randy. There, I said it!”

“You… you have?” I pretended to be shocked.

“Yes, while I was having fun with you, there’s… there’s this gnome, Thorgrim Maltwhirl. He’s really well-endowed. You’d like him.”

The gnomes started to hack at the door with their blades.

“He doesn’t know about you…”

“—And he doesn’t need to know. Please, Chelsea, love, dearest, an exit.” I made a frame with my fingers to show her what I meant. “Right there will do.” There was now a gaping hole in the door behind me, and I could see a horde of angry gnome eyes on the other side. What the hell was wrong with these gnomes?

“Please, Chelsea, an exit! I’m happy for you and the gnome. I want it to work out between the two of you, between you and Thorgrim, really, I do.”

The ceiling started to drip again.

“You… you do?”

“Please, Chelsea, an exit! Please, Chels, baby, my little button. We’re so close!”

“If you want a real relationship with Thorgrim the gnome, it’s important that you’re honest,” Clovis began.

“Please, an exit!”

“Yes, yes, right away, Baby Mad Lad Randy. And… and I’ll confess to the gnome in my own time. Thank you, Book.”

“No problem, Dungeon Goddess. Did you read the book Dungeon Goddess?” Clovis asked me as the wall began to shake, a chute of sorts taking shape courtesy of Chelsea. “I wish that author would write another one.”

Light poured into the room as the hole opened up.

I motioned for Chelsea to make the hole larger. “Where… where is this dungeon exactly?”

<Are you asking me or the dungeon?>

“Anyone who has an answer—I’d greatly appreciate it.” A breeze started to blow in, the door behind us mere seconds away from bursting open. Lily’s voice came to me.

<The dungeon is built into the side of a cliff.>

“I… see…” I sucked in a deep breath through my teeth. “Clovis?”

“Angel Farts?”

“Let’s go!” I grabbed the book and charged toward the opening. The door burst open behind me, bits of splintered wood hitting the air as gnomes piled in.

“Whee!” Clovis shouted as I leaped into the chute that Chelsea had created for us. The portion behind us quickly sealed. We picked up momentum, both of us screaming like school girls as we were deposited out the other end.

“Holy… holy shit!” I cried, my cursing less for the sudden expansive drop, and more for the absolutely enormous ogre I now saw in the distance, the creature easily four or five stories tall, an angry look on his face.

“I’ve got you!”

Just as we hit the air, Clovis opened up down the middle, spreading wide as I gripped his pages tightly. I ignored the buzzing in my stomach as Clovis lowered us into a forested area defined by orange and red leaves. We reached the ground, the sense of alarm slightly settling in my gut as I took my first step on solid land.

“Did… did you see the ogre?” I asked Clovis, wide eyed now. The ogre was clearly guarding advancement to the tower, meaning that unless we had another plan, we were likely going to have to fight it.

“You never answered my question.” Clovis fluttered before me like a disheveled bird, his pages in disarray.

“What question exactly?”

“Did you read Dungeon Goddess? I can’t remember the author’s name.”

“What? No? There’s a lot I haven’t read. Why are you asking me that right now? We literally just shot out of the side of a cliff and… whoo! That was crazy, right?”

“But you’re a writer.”

“And you think writers read every single book as soon as it comes out? We’re way too selfish for that, Clovis. Maybe some hate-reading, you know, see what the competition is up to. Then there are your favorites, of course, but there’s simply not enough time to read everything that’s out there.”

Clovis turned away from me, the floating book examining a sign that had been staked to one of the trees. “Ogreview Cafe and Grill, huh?”

“Maybe we should check it out. I’m still hungry.”

“You have a sandwich,” he reminded me.

“That’s right…” I turned in the direction of the sign, feeling good about the time we were making. We were close to the tower. Soon, the tutorial would finish. “I’ll eat it on the way. Hopefully we, or at least I, can get a proper meal and maybe a bit of information. I hope you’re ready to fight an ogre.”

“Maybe not fight him, but I’m certainly ready to view the ogre. I’ve never seen one before, you know.”

I started to laugh but stopped myself. “Yeah, I know. Come on, Clovis, try to keep up with me.”