The Book of Dungeons - A weak to strong litRPG epic

Gladius Cognitus the Scrivener, Master of Languages, did not know English because it wasn’t native to the world of Miros. Instead, he understood Common, the language everyone in the game spoke.

I gave my sword the order to spell out the words KEEP HIM OCCUPIED. My blade deftly sliced the air in a matter of seconds, writing letters big enough to fit a billboard. Dino had taught me that a looser grip on weapons was the most resilient, so holding on to a hilt that rapidly moved on its own wasn’t a problem.

I’d fallen behind the giant’s legs, so Flagboi had no clear view of me or my instructions.

Fabulosa Roger that.

Flagboi Roger what? What did he say?

I slipped Gladius into his sheath, erasing the message, and darted toward the golem.

Fabulosa materialized and dropped to the street. She landed hard, taking 65 falling damage. It seemed strange that she hadn’t invoked Hot Air to break her fall until I watched her reaction. To her credit, she desperately scrambled from the kaiju, looking back with panic in her expression that I knew to be a ruse. She ran toward the nearest doorway.

Flagboi took the bait, making the kaiju lumber after her. The goliath took extra stutter steps to correct its balance with every stride, but the awkward gait closed the distance, almost falling head-first into the tower Fabulosa entered. Like a bear tearing apart a bee hive, it clawed through a free-standing tower at an intersection of canyons. Gnomes, humans, and dwarves abandoned the building, which wobbled from the damage hollowed out by the colossus. Many landed safely and fled, using Featherfalls and other escape mechanics, but many didn’t.

Fabulosa leaped out a second-story window, several floors beneath the giant’s attack.

A red circle appeared beneath her feet, and a new icon appeared on her nameplate, which explained the visual effect—Locked On. When she sidestepped, the circle followed.

The giant stopped smashing into the building and staggered around it, but the damage was done. The tower’s upper half listed over, but Flagboi avoided its path. He leaned the golem sideways, hurtling it into the intersection with a crash—but he’d dodged the falling tower.

Flagboi Timber!

Duchess Is anyone here a citizen of Heaven’s Falls? I want to know how many kills Flagboi is wracking up.

Audigger I used to—but switched after I left. Gnome mandates are worthless.

As Flagboi chased Fabulosa, I ran toward the giant, looking for ways to climb onto its legs and reach the open hatch. The crashing tower fell between us, leaving a long pile of rubble billowing with dust so thick that I needed Magnetism to navigate. Luckily, the scarf Fabulosa gave me allowed me to breathe.

Flagboi took longer than I expected to stand the golem. When I reached the ridgeline of the pile of rubble, it was still crouched in the intersection, righting one of its legs.

Fabulosa cast a spell called Elemental Blast, aiming at its head, but it landed for zero damage.

By the time I climbed the rubble, the giant was nearly standing. It leaned against nearby buildings for support, its hands crumbling their facades as it gained its footing.

The commotion cleared the neighboring skyscrapers after the tower collapsed. The quake informed citizens that the basalt highrises gave no shelter. Rivers of gnomes spilled out of doorways, fleeing to other parts of the city.

Flagboi may have realized our plan, but the dust lingering in the air must have hampered his visibility. Unless controlling a battle mech gave him a magical survey of battlefields, he’d have little chance of spotting me from dozens of stories above the ground. Locked On kept Fabulosa in his sights, and the giant lumbered toward her once it regained balance.

Fabulosa ran toward a wide bank of basalt structures that formed into a curved wall significantly higher than the golem. They would be much stronger than the spire Flagboi toppled behind, and, given his reaction to the falling tower, he wouldn’t be so cavalier to bring them on top of himself.

Fabulosa Hot Aired herself into the air, raising 320 feet—roof-level with many of the towers. I’d forgotten the blessing’s scaling potential. By giving six more followers Glowing Coals, I’d brought our settlement’s number of blessed followers to eight. Hot Air worked for ten seconds per blessed follower.

The giant reached her before she finished her eighty seconds of hang time, swiping at her with its great fists.

Fabulosa combined Hot Air with her cape’s Windsong power, giving her lateral movement toward the bank of buildings. She used her spectrometer to become immaterial before its fists connected. She capped out her altitude nearly eye-level with the giant, and Air Jumped up an invisible staircase, reaching a terrace above its raised fist.

The overhang of the golem’s basalt helmet blocked Flagboi’s field of view, and it had to lean back in order for its pilot to see her, causing it to stagger to regain its balance. She threw flowerpots at the head to keep its attention.

My legs weren’t idle during their interaction. Though great boulders and rubble fell around me, I dashed toward its ankles. The only problem with Fabulosa’s maneuverability was it forced me to keep up with them, and the faster she moved, the more damage we caused to the city.

I ran between the giant’s legs, planning to climb its ankle and close enough to Slipstream into the open hatch on its thigh. Without a weapon, I could manage, and since Flagboi devoted his attention to Fabulosa, he wouldn’t try to shake me off. It seemed like a good plan.

But Flagboi had other plans. Before I could reach his ankle, he raised the giant’s foot to a terrace three stories above ground level—testing its weight on the tower. When the giant wasn’t flailing its limbs, the basalt towers offered sturdy support, and the terrace held. The tower golem giant lifted itself off the street and up the face of the buildings.

Fabulosa disappeared into the building like a clownfish inside a reef.

Fabulosa Whatever you’re going to do, do it fast. I’m running out of building up here, and I can’t shake this Locked On debuff.

Audigger Is he doing what I think he’s doing?

Duchess He’s King Konging it! Go Flagboi! Go!

Toadkiller Buildings didn’t go well for Kong, as I recall.

Duchess Oh, shush, don’t spoil it. This is fun.

Audigger I can’t believe I’m missing this.

Toadkiller I know. I’m almost in Heaven’s Falls.

Audigger Bah. You’re days away.

Toadkiller I’m closer than you!

Audigger Maybe—but I know a guy.

The pressure of enemy players complicating our struggle wasn’t something I could worry about now. Fabulosa had already reminded me of Hot Air’s power, and I invoked the blessing. As I rose, a chunk of falling basalt triggered Anticipate, sending me sideways by 20 feet. I would have liked to use that for later in the fight, but debris that could cause so much damage was worth avoiding.

My ascent with Hot Air moved faster than Flagboi’s climb, for he needed to test every handhold and foothold with care, and manipulating the giant still seemed awkward for him. I considered casting Earthquake, but I could only cast it once. The golem’s size trivialized the spell’s 30-yard area of effect, and I couldn’t be sure removing one foothold would knock the giant off the building.

When I reached the giant’s knees, I activated Slipstream’s interface to see if I could reach the hatch. I couldn’t. I willed Hot Air to stop raising me and targeted a point in the air next to me. The Compression Sphere sailed me close enough to the opening that Slipstream bridged the gap.

I landed with my feet and hands braced inside the hatch, but the sudden lurch of the giant’s leg dislodged me. Precarious landings were the norm after Slipstream, but I’d had no experience with moving targets.

I fell inside the leg and grappled the nearest interior brace at the price of konking my head on a metal frame. The hit cost me a momentary Dazed debuff, but only 60 health, something a quick Rejuvenate patched up. The ladder running the length of its leg lay beyond my reach. Hanging onto the iron brace disoriented me like a Tilt-a-Whirl. My inability to see outside severed my sense of which direction the leg moved or when it would change direction.

The body parts and deplorable smell captured little of my attention during my fight to hang on. Survival instincts had a way of filtering out unnecessary sensations that used to bother me.

A crunching sound from the bottom of the shaft signaled when the giant stepped into the building, anchoring it so the other foot could find another foothold. The pause wouldn’t last forever, and I jumped. I landed while clunking my jaw against the rung—but in time to wrap my forearm around it and hang on.

More crunching below preceded a gravity increase and a moment of freefall before the giant stepped onto another terrace.

I climbed while the leg jostled me. Since my trident inflicted structural damage, I could disable this thing from the inside. The hanging bodies didn’t glow with Detect Magic, but they might use a strange undead energy. They lacked classic undead animation, but destroying them may interfere with the giant’s workings.

But sabotaging its extremities was too violent. By climbing into its torso, I could destroy more centralized functions in a more stable environment.

Updating Fabulosa about my progress in the group chat tempted me, but I didn’t want to tip off Flagboi. The violence of the leg’s movement waned as I reached its hip. Magnetism showed an iron girder whose attraction surpassed those around it. The spell’s arrows showed a hollow inside the brace, filled with a chewy center of silver. Using Mineral Mutation, I targeted the silver vein and turned it into wood.

The world inside the leg shook with a hard bang, nearly causing me to lose my grip on the ladder. Metal squealed above me, and stones outside shattered and broke. A grinding sound began as if the golem were dragging its foot over basalt rooftops. While the noise deafened me, most of the leg’s reeling stabilized into gradual shifts.

Remembering that I stood inside the construct, I decided not to do that again. Falling from hundreds of feet without Anticipate wouldn’t end well for me.

I climbed faster, throwing myself into the chamber at the bottom of its torso. The oval chamber tilted and shifted, but it lurched gently compared to the leg. I bypassed the bedroom, lunged for the stairs, and pulled myself up by the railing to the closed hatch.

The last time we were here, I’d barely begun to Mutate it open before the golem sprang to life. At first, I thought all of Flagboi’s runes rigged it to collapse, scaring us out of the structure.

I had 50 seconds left on my Mineral Mutation cooldown when Fabulosa broke the radio silence.

Fabulosa I’m sorry partner, I’m out of spectrometer juice and had to pull the cord. I lit out of there and am drifting north, but whatever you did to the leg seemed to work. He’s hobbled.

Apache Are you okay?

Fabulosa Yeah. My hood is up, and I’m heading to the plateau. I kept him occupied as long as I could, but I’m tapped. Unless the winds shift, it’ll be a while before I return.

Flagboi It looks like it’s down to you and me, Patch.

Duchess What’s going on Flag?

Flagbio I’ve got a mouse in the house, but he’s getting no cheese.

I didn’t like seeing Flagboi use my nickname, nor did I like his confidence in reaching the inside of his golem—it should have been a source of weakness. If he thought of me as a mouse, then I’d show him I was a rodent of means.

I played my ace—Earthquake. Casting it in the center of the mech seemed the best place.

Dust fell down the stairs as the tower golem shook. The railing that I’d been steadying myself with pulled off the wall and slid over the edge, landing in the oval chamber’s center. The ceiling that once anchored it spiderwebbed with zigzagging fissures, but the stairway still held.

The room reeled to the side and settled in a distant crash. Lying on the floor, I felt every vibration, and when it stopped, the room’s orientation told me the torso was still upright.

Flagboi somehow piloted his construct through the Earthquake.