Titan: A LitRPG Adventure (UnderVerse Book 4) Jez Cajiao (top ten books of all time TXT) 📖

manawell and started pouring my mana into it. “We don’t have time for this shit.” I fought to keep my irritation down, focusing on the sensation of my mana being ripped from me.

“Can we help?” Yen asked, and I paused, eyeing her as I felt the tugging of my mana, before grinning.

“Yes, you damn well can!” I said, relief washing through me. “In fact, anyone who has spare mana, get your ass over here and put your hand on the bowl, please.”

I monitored the details, watching it ticking up as more people came and went. It was particularly amusing to see Grizz staggering as he experienced what looked to be his first ever mana migraine, as the bastard had started to show me up just a little too often.

It ticked ever upwards, while others searched the room, eventually finding a collection of crappy armor, some robes, and a handful of trinkets, including a dog-eared old book, clearly well-thumbed and looking like it was from back home.

“’Condition…” I wonderingly read aloud, the damaged cover making it impossible to read the rest of the title. “Who the hell was Kevin Sinclair?” I muttered when someone handed it to me, and I flicked through the first few pages, frowning. I paused when I realized he’d written about the north of England and grinned to myself. No matter where I was and what happened over the next few days, I was making time to read this.

Clearly, the Lich had an extensive library at one time, as a chest was found buried under a mountain of bones. It was filled, to my relief, not with gold or jewels, not even potions, although I’d have loved to find those.

No, it was full of books. Dozens of them. I turned to Grizz, who’d followed me and looked him dead in the eye.

“Grizz, these are from my realm. This might seem stupid to you, but I damn well NEED these. I trust you to make sure they come with us, okay?”

He nodded and started sorting the books out, putting them into different bags on his belt and coordinating some with the others.

I noticed him pause on one, a cover that showed a scantily clad woman with pointy elven or feline ears and boobs bursting out of her bikini, by a guy called Atlas Kane, slipping that one into his pouch with an unashamed grin and a wink to me.

“There’s probably not any pictures in that, you know?” I said, and he shrugged.

“If not, maybe Yen will read it with me,” He waggled his eyebrows, then checked to make sure she hadn’t heard him. I snorted and walked back to the Vault as Yen moved everyone back from it, standing to attention as I stepped up close.

“It’s at nine hundred and ninety,” she said simply, and I smiled gratefully; forty minutes, it’d taken.

“How long do we have left before the ships arrive?” I asked her, and she swallowed hard.

“Ten minutes…” She grimaced, and I nodded. I’d known it was getting close, but I had lost track of time.

“Well, hopefully we can loot this and get the hell…” I started to say, before she interrupted me.

“They should have reached the Sunken City ten minutes… ago.” Yen clarified, and I froze before letting out a long breath.

“Well, it is what it is…” I said philosophically, trying to hide the fear I felt, and the anger when it came to the fact that some crazy motherfucker was actually breeding the goddamn things.

I reached out, gripping the edges of the manawell, and poured the last ten points into it.

The well flared brightly, the silvery, mercury-like liquified mana within shining brighter and brighter…. until the mana well drained and fell off the side of the structure.

We all froze. Everyone looked from me to the well and back to me again, and my mind went over what had just happened in a panic.

It didn’t make sense!

Then something changed with the Vault; the gently glowing walls began to grow brighter. At first, it was almost imperceptible, but as the seconds passed, it blazed, and lines of solid silver began to spread from the space where the well had sat. They poured out in all directions, flowing across the surface of the construction, until they had entirely ringed it, with many dozens of tiny runes flaring to life as they went.

Soon, though, they died away and the structure became quiescent again.

I waited politely; then after a minute, I stepped forward, noticing a feeling that I’d missed in all the confusion before.

I could feel a wisp.

I’d never really noticed it until recently, and that was with Oracle, so I’d assumed that it was down to the fact that it was Oracle, and we were so close.

I’d believed I could feel her presence because we were bonded, and she was my companion and my lover as well.

Now I was questioning whether there was also more to it, as I felt something moving inside the Vault.

It felt similar to the way a magnet is drawn by iron, or vice versa. Not strong enough to really notice, unless you were close to it, or experienced with the feeling. I only recognized it because I’d been trying to ignore the sensation of loss that not having Oracle nearby had been building in me.

I watched the structure, frowning at seeing the silvery lines start up again, traveling back and forth, but now, I felt the difference, and I watched one in particular.

After a handful of seconds, it vanished, after pausing momentarily, clearly realizing I was watching it.

“Yes,” I said slowly and clearly. “I can see you, and I know what you are.”

Nothing happened, except for my people staring at each other, and then back at me, involuntarily projecting a slowly growing concern that I was losing my mind.

A concern that was elegantly summed up by a gnome further back.

“By Garran’s hairy nutsack, we’ve got another crazy one! I thought we were leaving all of them behind?” an elderly gnome whispered to his friend.