The Luckless: A MMORPG and LitRPG Online Adventure (Second Age of Retha Book 1)

by A. M. Sohma

  Kit slipped her recipes back in her inventory, and watched a dwarf carrying a tray of food traipse down the walkway, making a beeline for her cell. He unlocked the door and left it open as he joined Kit in the chamber. He set the tray down on her cushion and fussed over it, rearranging dishes and muttering to himself.

  Kit stood and looked back and forth from the dwarf to the open cell door to the elves who were still going out of their way to ignore her.

  This must be my chance to break out.

  As the dwarf kept fussing, Kit grabbed a branch meant to feed her fire, and quietly approached him. She bit her lip, feeling a little sorry, then activated her skill. “Violent outburst!” She slammed the branch down on the dwarf’s bald head. He crumpled over her tray with a groan.

  Kit gleefully tossed the branch aside and waltzed out of her cell, brushing bark grit off her palms. She confidently strolled up the walkway, almost missing the way the two elves glared at her. She rested her hand on the iron ring of the door. “Do you want to come?” She asked.

  Gold Lashes sniffed through her nose and looked away, but Silky Hair continued to glare at her.

  Kit shrugged. “I thought it would be the neighborly thing to offer. Whatever—crabby cakes.” She opened the door with a grunt, set foot in the hallway, and the two elves erupted in shouts behind her.

  “Escaped prisoner! An elf prisoner has escaped!”

  “In the dungeons! Hurry, a prisoner has escaped the dungeons!”

  Kit wanted to turn around and give the elves a piece of her mind, but the adrenaline kicked in, and instead, she sprinted down the hallway. She didn’t get far before dwarf guards poured out of an inlet and captured her. Again.

  The tattletale elves shouted until the dwarves marched Kit back into the dungeon. The guards removed the stunned dwarf from her cell and locked her in.

  “That was your lucky break,” one dwarf told her. “For no one escapes from a dwarf-made cell.” He shook a thick finger at her, although he did frown and wrinkled his brow curiously at the two traitor elves as he strolled past their dungeon cell.

  In no time at all, Kit was left alone again with only Gold Lashes and Silky Hair to keep her company. “What the heck was that?” she asked

  Gold Lashes sniffed and stuck her nose up in the air. “I don’t know to what you are referring.”

  “I was almost out of here, and you called to the guards!”

  “You were loyal-less and planned to leave us behind,” Silky Hair said.

  “I asked you if you wanted to come with me!”

  “Save your words, Whispryo. She is not a true elf. She has betrayed the elegance and honor of our people and is a dancer.” Gold Lashes sneered, making her beautiful face look pinched.

  Silky Hair nodded sagely. “Indeed. That is why you cannot be allowed to escape,” he told her.

  Never before had Kit wished she could violently kill an NPC. “Well done. So you two are tattletales and snobs! Want a caramel for your prize?” She accented her sentence by flinging one of her burnt caramels at the elves, popping Gold Lashes on the nose.

  “Why, you!” The female elf stood, her face stiff with fury.

  “Let it pass; she is not worthy of your attention,” Silky Hair soothed.

  Kit stuck her tongue out at his back and considered unwrapping one of her gooey caramels and lodging it into his perfect hair.

  A breeze brushed the back of her neck again as the party channel activated.

  “Kit, what’s up?” Riko asked.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever been so infuriated in my life!” Kit snarled.

  “Are the dwarves treating you that poorly?” Riko asked.

  “No, it’s the elves!”

  The conversation fell silent for a moment. Then Prowl spoke. “You mean they’re not helping you?”

  “No. They’re actively working against me.”

  More silence.

  “That’s...unexpected,” Riko finally said.

  “What do you mean by that?” Kit dug through her character panel until she found the candy recipes again.

  “Those elves are supposed to help you escape. Prowl and I finally remembered that when we first entered the White Needles Mountains with our main characters, there was an elf in our party. She was taken captive, just as you have been, and two elf NPCs who were in the dungeons helped her escape.”

  Kit tapped her fingers on a caramel-crusted pot. “So basically, you are telling me that Bryce messing with my character’s reputation and making me an elf dancer has screwed me over even more than we thought.”

  “Sort of,” Riko said.

  “That’s fantastic.” Kit sighed. “Are you sure Prowl and Cookie just can’t come down here and beat them up?”

  “Kit,” Riko scolded.

  “You have no idea how annoying they are!” Kit complained.

  “Try to hold steady for now,” Riko said. “We’ll keep trying to talk to the king.”

  “Because it’s been working so well already,” Prowl said.

  “Don’t worry. We won’t leave you in there, Kit,” Riko said. “Prowl will gladly volunteer to go kill a fire demon solo to intimidate the dwarves into doing as we ask.”

  “When did I say that?!”

  Kit smiled. “Thanks, guys. I appreciate the help.”

  “That’s what party members do; we support each other. Oh—the king has returned. Talk to you soon! Bye-byeee!”

  After Riko said her farewells, the party channel went silent once again.

  Kit rubbed the back of her neck and eyed her candy recipes. “If I’ve got nothing better to do, I guess peppermint sticks it is.”

  Hours passed, and Kit made several more attempts at escaping. Like clockwork, every hour a dwarf would come in with a tray of food for her, and Kit would slip out of her cell. The moment she opened the dungeon door, Gold Lashes and Silky Hair would shout their heads off, alerting the guards. She tried everything to get around their fury—from slipping out the door as best she could to smacking them with branches as she passed by—which seemed to only infuriate them more.

  In the end, she decided to bide her time and see if the two elves would ever sleep—which would probably be her best opportunity.

  Still, she did not waste the ample time she had on her hands, and passed the hours cooking candy. It bothered her, though, for in the back of her mind she knew time was a precious commodity, and she didn’t know how much of it they had. To be sitting in a cell—even if she was leveling her candy-making skills—was ineffective and perhaps even dangerous.

  Kit was still musing over this when a dwarf came in with another dinner tray and found her lounging on her surprisingly comfortable cot, gnawing on a chunk of toffee.

  “Hey there,” she said, flicking her character panel away—she had been staring at the dimmed community tab with dread.

  A dwarf—the poor dwarf who had thus far been responsible for all her dinner trays and had received multiple whacks on the head in reward—eyed her warily. “Are you going to try to escape this time?”

  “Nope. I’ve given up for now. Unless I can create a caramel that will glue an elf’s mouth shut, I’m stuck. I do feel bad about smacking you, though. You want some candy? I have peppermint sticks, caramels, and some toffee that will chip your teeth if you’re not careful.” Kit spread out the goodies on the tray when the dwarf set it down on her cushion. “I recommend the peppermint sticks. But if you’d maybe be so generous as to bring some milk down here, I could then try my new fudge recipe I got for leveling my candy-making skills.”

  The dwarf looked curiously back and forth between Kit and the two tattletales in the other cell. “You do not get along with your fellow elves?”

  “She is not a true elf!” Gold Lashes stated loudly.

  Kit rolled her eyes. “Do you think you could maybe try to expand your repertoire of insults? You could at least make fun of my pink hair.”

  The dwarf scratched his grizzled beard. “What does she mean, not a true e
lf?”

  “I insult their idea of elvish honor because I’m a dancer.”

  “She is a disgrace!” Silky Hair chimed in.

  The dwarf picked up a peppermint stick. “Then you mean to say all elves dislike you?”

  Thinking of the many elf players in Retha, Kit said, “Not all of them, but a vast majority, yes.”

  “If you are an outcast from even some of your fellow elves, you may as well say that you are not an elf at all.” The dwarf started nibbling on the peppermint stick.

  Kit winced. “When you say it that way, it makes me sound like I’m some kind of disease.”

  The dwarf laughed—a jolly sound that came from deep within his chest. “Not at all! It is quite the reverse, actually. It implies you are probably a good egg.”

  “A good what?”

  The dwarf kicked the cell door open and stepped out of the cell. “Aren’t you coming?”

  “I thought the point of being imprisoned means that I stay in prison?” Kit said.

  “If you’re the kind of elf that your finicky relatives can’t stand, there’s a good chance you’ll get along great with us dwarves. So, there’s no need to keep you imprisoned.”

  Kit scrambled to her feet. “You mean that?”

  The dwarf released another belly laugh. “Of course! Come, I will reunite you with your companions.”

  Kit snatched up the various candy-making implements she had left out and shoved them into her inventory. She scrambled out of her cell, hurrying after the dwarf. The elves watched her with raised eyebrows; Kit winked at them.

  She hurried to catch up with her jailer-turned-savior, who opened the dungeon door with a creak. “What’s your name?” She asked.

  “Drust, son of Harvik. And you are?”

  “Kitten Lovemuch. It is my pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

  Drust acknowledged her with the wave of his peppermint stick as he marched on. “I must apologize, Kitten, for detaining you for so long.”

  She followed him up a spiral staircase. “I’m merely thrilled to be out of prison. How is the peppermint stick?”

  “Quite good, actually. You should speak to some of our cooking staff. They make colored, edible crystals that are quite delicious. I’m sure they would be willing to share the recipe.”

  “You mean rock candy?”

  “We call it crystal candy, but I would not be surprised if the rumor spread that they are actual rocks.” Drust huffed out another belly laugh as they exited the seemingly endless staircase and marched into an open cavern. “It is probably why so many believe we actually eat rocks. This way. Your companions are feasting with King Brasil.”

  “Thank you,” Kit barely remembered to speak as she gazed around the cavern, hit by another wave of nostalgia.

  The dwarf city of Brunascar had been carved into the hollowed innards of a mountain. The buildings seemed to sprout out of the mountain itself and were an elaborate mixture of stone bricks and steeply pitched ceilings. Geometric shapes and jagged lines were carved into every surface, and everything from the ground to the bridges twinkled with unmined gems and ores. Crystals lit the immense cavern, and a rickety mine car track zig-zagged everywhere.

  She followed Drust across a bridge that spanned a chasm so deep she couldn’t see the bottom. By then her rusty recollection of the area had returned, and she realized Drust was taking her to the feasting hall, a giant stone structure that was sturdy and squat—probably, Kit suspected, because it needed to be unshakeable thanks to all the wild parties the White Needles dwarves threw.

  When they reached the feasting hall, Drust nodded to the soldiers standing guard outside, then flung the doors open.

  Sure enough, inside, Riko, Prowl, Cookie, Vic, Gil, and Axel were seated around a large rectangular table with King Brasil at the head. Other players were there as well—laughing over the food and talking with each other and some of the NPCs.

  Cookie leaped to her feet when she saw Kit. “Kit! You’re free!”

  Vic leaned around her friend to peer in Kit’s direction, as did Gil. “Welcome!” The Crusader said, saluting Kit with a goblet of wine.

  King Brasil, however, did not share her friends’ enthusiasm. He leaned back in his chair, and between the way his grizzled gray hair erupted around him and his bushy eyebrows, he closely resembled a storm cloud. “Drust, why do you sully our halls with the presence of an elf?”

  “I am pleased to say, King Brasil, that Kitten Lovemuch is not a true elf.”

  “Oh? How can this be?”

  “She’s been rejected by her own people. The elves we hold in our dungeon for trespassing scorned her and declared she is not fit to be considered one of them.”

  “You know, it’s a really good thing I have strong self-confidence, or this would be really insulting,” Kit said.

  She was properly ignored.

  “And you believe, Drust son of Harvik, that this reject of elvish stock is a suitable companion?”

  Drust shrugged. “I thought she couldn’t be all that bad, for I’ve never seen anyone annoy an elf even half as much as she does.”

  King Brasil nodded slowly and finally addressed Kit directly. “Tell me, reject, why have your people scorned you?”

  Kit glanced from Drust to King Brasil. I think I’m more on trial than I thought. If I give the wrong answer, King Brasil might tell Drust to march me back down to the dungeon.

  She cleared her throat, rolled her shoulders back, and lifted her hands, palms up, in an appeasing manner. “I am afraid, great King Brasil, that my people have abandoned me due to my passion of dance.” She took two tiny steps forward, making the bells on her anklets jingle. “It is the elvish way to be demure and quiet—even in one’s joy. I find I cannot do this; instead, I rather enjoy wild and passionate dances—which my people find distasteful.”

  “They reject you over small things such as dancing?” King Brasil frowned.

  Kit squirmed uncomfortably for a moment. “And quite possibly for the way I dress. But I have to say that I absolutely would wear something else if I could only find an outfit that I could dance in that covered my stomach. That would be a dream come true.”

  “I see.” King Brasil obviously did not see it at all as he continued to peer at Kit the way a child peered at animals in a zoo. “Well, Mistress Riko and Master Prowl have been yammering away about how wonderful you are and what a close companion of theirs you are, so we may as well take them at their word…. Please, Kitten Lovemuch, join us in this feast.” He motioned for Kit to take one of the empty chairs, and then returned his attention to the drumstick on which he’d been gnawing.

  Kit slumped into the chair, relieved she was finally out of the dungeons and hopeful they would soon be able to continue the quest.

  “Well done, Miss Kit,” Gil said.

  “Yeah, that was rather ingenious,” Cookie piped in.

  “I’m surprised it worked,” Vic said.

  Prowl yawned. “Yeah, well done and all of that.”

  Riko leaned across the table and squeezed Kit’s hand. “I’m sorry we weren’t able to help you get out.”

  “It’s fine. I’m out, and that’s all that matters. So, have we made any progress on the seals?”

  “No, but I suspect your absence is what held us back.” Riko gazed around the feasting hall, her tawny skin glowing in the flickering torchlight. “I think now if we approach Brasil when he is alone, he will be willing to discuss them.”

  Kit took the pewter plate Cookie offered her and nodded. “That sounds about right.” She stared at the feast, not really hungry since the dwarves had practically stuffed food down her gullet while she was in jail. She joined Riko in looking around the room, sifting through the deep scents that swirled around her. There was the faint smell of must and mold—which most cavern cities possessed—but there was also the clean, crisp scent of snow beneath it, as well as the metallic odor of molten metals.

  Even in the feasting hall, she could hear the faint tap of the d
warven smiths honing their craft.

  She cleared her throat and returned her attention to Riko. “Do you think we should approach him as a party—like we did with the old guy?”

  Riko shook her head. “No, I don’t think it’s necessary. As long as you’re there, as the party leader, I think only a few of us should go.”

  “You of course—you’re the best with manipulating NPCs,” Kit said. “But who else?”

  Vic, who had been glaring at Axel as he wolfed down butter-smeared rolls, clasped her hands together. “I’ll pass.”

  Cookie nodded. “Then I will as well. Oh—we could go see Tremblebach Falls again while everyone else is busy!”

  Kit picked up a goblet of wine and swirled it as she stretched her memory. “Tremblebach Falls…that’s the biggest underground waterfall in this zone, right?” The falls were a thing of beauty—all white and frothy. They gushed at the far end of the cavern that housed Brunascar and provided fresh water for the dwarves year-round.

  “Yeah, and they’re so impressive. I’ve never seen a waterfall like that in the real world,” Cookie said.

  Axel shoved another roll in his mouth. “If you’re going to Tremblebach again, I’m gonna train.”

  Riko winked at the warrior. “Actually, I want you and Prowl to come with us when we talk to King Brasil.”

  Axel choked on his roll. “Seriously?”

  “Yep!”

  “No way, I don’t wanna,” Axel declared.

  Prowl snorted into his goblet. “Give it up, kid. When Riko’s got her old-lady claws in you, there’s no escape.”

  “If that is the case, may I accompany you—Miss Cookie and Miss Victoria—to Tremblebach Falls?” Gil asked. “Unless…do you need me to come as well, Miss Riko?”

  “Nah, I only have two elbows to place handsome young men at, so you go have fun with the girls. Next time I need some muscle-arm-candy, it will be your turn, though.”

  Gil bowed his head in acknowledgement.

  Kit scratched her misplaced cheekbone tattoo, her ears twitching as she started to pick up on some of the conversations the other players in the area were holding.