IAmNotTheHero

Chapter 23

When Diya returned to the ninth floor, the hub was just as lively as before. The first lights of dawn painted the sky red and pink, but the locals showed no signs of slowing down. Traffic appeared to be heading out of the settlement instead of staying within its walls, though. Much to his alarm, there were more De Lawney men on the streets. Diya couldn’t tell whether it was because the crowds...

Book 2 Chapter 22

In the end, Baba wasn’t as convinced as Diya would’ve liked. He expressed appreciation of his son’s progress and achievements, of course, but refused to make any commitments without evidence. Baba insisted that Diya pushed himself with Runeseeker since it likely would help him achieve feats, unlike any other climber. Once he understood the ability and had nurtured it, Baba would make a de...

Book 2 Chapter 21

Diya left Kartik’s store with a new card. Initially, they had agreed on a ten-ninety split on all sales. It was the same rate Kartik offered Baba. However, Red Charger’s card should’ve sold for one-hundred pounds at most. Thanks to Diya’s presence, Kartik had made an additional twenty-five pounds. The card Yuki had traded could’ve potentially earned him a lot more coin at another auct...

Book 2 Chapter 20

The bustle of a busy settlement welcomed Diya, followed by a blast of cold air. The stone buildings immediately around the hub carried the FTF’s logo and snow-covered their roofs. Even though the moon was directly overhead, the streets were busy with woolly bovines pulling carts. Diya spotted several people riding tall, horned deer and strange shaggy beasts too.

“Keep moving, mate,”...

Book 2 Chapter 19

Diya was pleased to wake up in his own bed the following morning. The accommodation only had single beds, and the pair were too tired to put two together. It wasn’t that Gwyneth put him off, but sharing a bed with her was starting to get confusing. He liked her warmth and how she felt next to him, but it also had him stuck in limbo regarding what to do about Victoria. Diya needed space to get...

Book 2 Chapter 18

The remainder of the journey was uneventful until the trio reached a dense stretch of mangrove forest. Most of the local fauna had stayed outside of Gwyneth’s light until then. She had napped while Diya and Oss rowed. The moon crossed its apex and was low in the sky when she awoke, poked Diya, and took his place. Oss turned down the offer of rest. While his body rowed, his mind and Core had b...

Book 2 Chapter 17

When the trio left the ancient structure and returned to the swamps outside, the FTF’s compass went wild. The arrow swiveled back and forth, pointing at what they had just left behind and the way forward. The mangrove forest was dense where they stood, and backtracking would require traveling through the now unstable ruins. So, they agreed to travel into the unknown towards the FTF settlement...

Chapter 16

When fighting most beasts, Diya knew what weak points to target. Thanks to his martial prowess, he’d have little trouble using hit-and-run tactics to attack them directly. As a result, the fights never lasted too long, and his opponents fell before inflicting major injuries on him. Unfortunately, the tortoise lived within an impenetrable shell and spun much too fast for him to focus on one sp...

Book 2 Chapter 15

The eighth floor wasn’t as hot as the seventh, but it managed to feel more uncomfortable due to the humidity. The mangrove forests reminded Diya of the third floor where he met Gwyneth, but there were no hardened elevations in sight. While it had been spring on the past level, it was mid-summer on the eighth. Diya struggled to take his first breath after passing through the gate. Gwyneth look...

Chapter 14

The pair hydrated once more before finding their way down to ground level. Gwyneth refused to descend with her body pressed against the sun-baked stone, so they took a roundabout route. Diya used Slimeskin to lower them into the crag’s passageways, and then they used the compass to leave the natural stone maze.

Gwyneth paused before they stepped onto the sand. “Someone else has been h...

Chapter 13

Gwyneth struggled to keep up with Diya. She wasn’t used to prolonged treks over uneven terrain, and the powerful attack spells had drained her considerably too. Diya didn’t let her slow down, though. He kept them on track using the FTF’s compass, and they continued their journey through the crags.

Fortunately, the pair didn’t get into much trouble with the local fauna. They stayed...

Book 2 Chapter 12

Diya’s right hand jumped to the axe at his waist as he spun to his left. It was the mining party from before. Most of them sat not far away with their legs dangling in the water. Only one of them had a pickaxe out now. The rest didn’t carry any obvious tools or weapons—except the one with the bone club. He stood further away from them, leaning against the cave wall and chewing a piece of ...

Book 2 Chapter 11

Even though it made him look suspicious, Diya couldn’t help but repeatedly look over his shoulder. A couple of hours had passed since they started, and the sunrays caressed the titanic oasis behind them. They were two-thirds of the way over the dunes now, and the temperature was still low. The sands had already started shifting, though. The subterranean worms had begun their stirring. They we...

Chapter 10

Diya’s first instinct was to craft a pair of boots. He imagined using the Harden, Relax, and Exploding runes to construct a launching mechanism that would help him jump higher or further. Baba had taught him that positioning on the battlefield was everything. Getting to the high ground or forcing foes through a chokepoint could turn the tide....

Chapter 9

Despite Marcus’s warning, the pair didn’t leave the settlement straight away. Upgrading Explorer’s Fountain Pen might’ve restored Diya to near-full strength, but the events on the sixth floor had worn Gwyneth out. The sun had already crossed its apex in the sky, and they’d need to move at breakneck speed to get far from the settlement and set up camp. Diya didn’t think Gwyneth could...

Book 2 Chapter 8

When Diya released the pedestal, the vision ended. He found himself standing in front of the upgrade station with Gwyneth clinging to his side. The upgrade station's runes dimmed, losing their bright white and sapphire shades. Diya didn’t recall the monolith’s lights lingering during his last upgrade. On looking around, he discovered dozens of eyes were focused on him. They lingered for a s...

Book 2 Chapter 7

Gwyneth stopped struggling once the vehicle had passed all the way into the seventh floor. The third rum-carrying wagon didn’t follow them. She remained motionless, watching the gate. Only a handful of pedestrian climbers followed, and they weren’t dressed like the sixth-floor residents. The chaos on the other side must have frozen all transit. Diya waited until they turned a corner, and th...

Book 2 Chapter 6

“I thought I’d see you again,” Ashish said when the pair found him. He waved at the bartender as they joined him at the table. “Your cards might be great, Diya, but they raise too many questions.”

Thanks for the warning.

“It was shortsighted of me,” Diya said, suppressing his real thoughts. They needed Ashish. “I should’ve used cards the crew traded me.”...

Book 2 Chapter 5

“Thank you, Ashish,” Gwyneth said, squeezing Ashish’s arm after they exited the store. “You made that experience a lot less painful than it needed to be.”

“I tried calling out to you when you entered the market but then remembered you were trying to keep low,” he replied, cheeks reddening. “You look like someone that works for a noble house, and Diya carries himself like o...

Book 2 Chapter 4

“This is grand!” Jagdish exclaimed, running his hands down the Slimeskin coat’s sides. As Diya had predicted, the man rolled up his sleeves just past the elbows as soon as he put the garment on. “Why isn’t it as smooth as yours?”

“I think it's the Shadow rune,” Diya answered. “It seems the more I use it, the rougher and darker the material gets. What do ...

Book 2 Chapter 3

Even though Jagdish loved wearing coats, Diya had never seen his forearms covered. Most ended at the elbow or cut off at the shoulder. So, he tweaked the original coat’s design to have extra baggy sleeves. Jagdish would have the option to roll them up. He hoped Slimeskin’s elastic nature would accommodate transformations and augmentations, too.

The base shape was the most straightforw...

Book 2 Chapter 2

The crew celebrated the first mate, Ashish. If not for his presence in the crow’s nest, the leviathan would have caught the vessel unaware. Since its body was twice as long as the barge and its head constituted a third of its length, Diya was sure it could’ve destroyed the barge within seconds. The entire crew would end up dragged to the sixth floor’s depths. Fortunately, his sparrow soul...

Book 2 Chapter 1

Garuda felt like a much too grand a name for a cargo barge. Though long, the vessel had a boxy appearance to it, and the triangular scales didn’t help. Then when the first storm hit, Diya saw the barge’s wings. At first, he had assumed the folded wood and cloth along the vessel’s sides were additional sails or tarp for covering cargo when the weather turned. Instead, Jagdish Sing and his ...

Chapter 56

Fever dreams plagued Diya. His drug-addled mind cooked up scenarios showing what might have happened to Victoria after they left her. He saw her valiantly hold off the wild De Lawney men as they struggled against her vines. Then Edgar appeared out of thin air and thrust his disguised spear into her stomach. Victoria screamed and collapsed to the floor before all the men around her morphed into ...

Chapter 55

Even though rage pulsed through Diya, he grabbed Gwyneth’s hand and pulled her towards the door. The building anger and doubt made him want to find Edgar and dismember him, but they were outnumbered. Fighting would them would be as good as a death sentence. Diya’s head told him to believe Victoria, but his chest hurt too much to listen. Diya saw her meet one of the De Lawneys head-on and ho...

Chapter 54

Much to Diya’s surprise, the Hyene continued to struggle despite the suffocation. It clawed at the tentacle, trying to scrape it off as the minutes passed. Its grunts and groans were loud enough to draw whines from the other hyenes, but none of them came to its rescue. When Diya blocked out the struggling warrior’s sounds and listened, he couldn’t hear them at all. It wasn’t just the ho...

Chapter 53

The fifth floor’s sun was directly above their heads when Gwyneth spotted a Hyene scout. The hills around them had mostly flattened out, and an almost endless expanse of shoulder-high grass surrounded the trio. Ahead they saw nothing but green and yellow plains dotted with wide-canopied trees. Victoria slowed and pulled out her map. According to the notes, the hyena warrior patrolled the regi...

Chapter 52

Dreams starring the Boleyn siblings plagued Diya’s night. He saw Alexander surviving his injuries but spending the rest of his life in bed with dull eyes. Edgar successfully took over as heir and filled the Boleyn’s house coffers but cost the family its reputation. They became reviled as the rest of the houses. Victoria came after him again but grew resentful following his rejections and ma...

Chapter 51

Cackling and manic laughter stirred Diya from his slumber. At first, he thought local pubs had just closed or the inn kicked drinking patrons out of the common room for the night. He crawled out from under the heavy covers and peeked out of the window, hoping to find out what joke had set them off. Diya saw dozens of ugly yellow eyes glowing in the darkness instead.

Torches and magical li...

Chapter 50

No matter how hard Diya tried, he couldn’t get his heart rate to slow down. He regretted not studying the party through his looking glass earlier. If he knew it was the Boleyns, he would’ve exited the cover without the black ink coat. Gwyneth claimed it had an intimidating air about it and would deter people in the settlement from bothering them. The Boleyns had just ruined the plan, and no...