Dungeon of Chance: Even Odds: A Dungeon Core Novel (Serious Probabilities Book 1) Jonathan Brooks (book recommendations txt) 📖

end of the day, he’d probably be able to do a little bit of both.  As he saw Percy’s reduced group leave his dungeon for the day and the next group come inside, a bit rattled-looking after hearing what happened to Crade, he settled in for the long haul.

And he did his best to try to ignore the Heroes’ deaths as they tackled his second dungeon room.

Chapter 26

“We’ve been doing this for 4 days, and no one knew about this?  I’m glad there aren’t any other Heroes from the mainland here, because they’d look at us like a green deckhand on their first voyage.”

Granted, Jeska had to admit that a lot had happened in those 4 days and it all sort of blended together in a bit of a blur, but how is it that only now are we figuring this out?  She felt foolish and extremely ignorant, which weren’t normal feelings for her, but at least they were trying to rectify the situation.

It all started when they were finishing up their 4th “shift” inside of the dungeon, which was going extremely well – just like everyone had experienced so far.  Even Percy and his group were challenging the 2nd room now, especially since they woke to find that a brand-new Hero had been chosen (via the appearance of another Class Orb Tier 0) to join their ranks in the morning.  Sarah couldn’t replace Crade, who had apparently blown up when he had renounced his desire to be a Hero, but the former merchant’s daughter was already getting integrated into the group.

Wow, had that been a shock.  When word got out to the other Heroes about what had happened to Crade, it had sent waves of apprehension and even panic through them all.  “What if it happens to us?” and “Will I just blow up one day?” were whispered among many of the new Heroes, but when another Hero was “found” the next day, they all understood what it meant.  If they didn’t want to be a Hero, they had better buck it up and do it anyway, because once they had chosen the duty, there wasn’t any way to back out.  If they chose to renounce that duty, the world would choose another.

It was harsh, but it also sadly made sense.  If they didn’t work to get stronger to defend against the inevitable Threat that was coming their way, if a Hero skimped on the duty that they had taken on to save their fellow people and the world, then they were worse than useless – they were obviously taking up a spot on the Hero team that could be filled by someone who would do their duty.  Why it had to result in someone dying for that to happen, Jeska nor anyone else knew, but that was apparently the way it was.

Instead of scaring them even further or causing them to hesitate in their journey to get stronger, this news actually invigorated all the Heroes – including Jeska.  Yes, the fate of Crade was horrible, disturbing, unfair, and completely unnecessary – in her opinion – but it also inspired her to strive to be the best she could be.  Not because she was afraid of any type of retribution if she didn’t do her best, but because she had been given this duty to succeed, and the only one holding her back from being great was herself.  Well, herself and her group, of course.

And her group was doing quite well, if she could be so bold as to brag a little.  All of the groups were, in fact, though it had taken a couple of days or “shifts” in the dungeon to get a lot of the challenges figured out.  But her group, in particular, was leading the way as far as progress, as they had just reached the third room of the dungeon – after finally managing to have everyone survive against the onslaught of monsters in the second.  All it took was a ruthlessness that none of them thought they had in them; but when they brought it out, something changed in the way they fought.

It feels…insane sometimes, the way we’ve been forced to fight.  But I guess that is exactly what we should be feeling.  It all stemmed from the abandonment of fear.  It sounds simple, but having died dozens of times by that point, Arcen showed first what it meant to just…let go.  He let go of any fear of pain, any fear for his own life, and concentrated on what he was there to do.

“Alright, I’ve had enough of these defensive strategies—it’s time to take the fight to them,” he had said near the end of their 3rd “shift”, before running inside ahead of them, completely disregarding their plan.  Jeska knew exactly what they were talking about. Almost all of their plans to that point had largely been to run inside as a group, and then defend against the monsters as they came to them. There were alterations to this strategy, dependent on their placement in the room, or even having 1 or 2 of them break off to attempt to attack from behind; for the most part, though, it was all based on one strategy: defense.

There were more of the monsters than there were of them, so it had made the most sense – and it had worked…for the most part.  Even by that point someone would die – or even 2 of them – when they cleared the room.  Not even the addition of Kelty as an actual Healer Class, via a Class Orb, they had picked up as a drop recently was enough to prevent it.

But Arcen changed all of that when he charged into the room, taking the fight to the monsters instead of waiting for the fight to come to them.  He had a Skill that he hadn’t really had a chance