Tokens and Towers: (A LitRPG/GameLit Adventure), page 1
Tokens
and
Towers
(Volume One)
By Harmon Cooper
Copyright © 2022 Harmon Cooper
Copyright © 2022 Boycott Books
Art by Richard Sashigane
Font by Shawn King
Audiobook narrated by Daniel Wisniewski and Rebecca Woods
www.harmoncooper.com
writer.harmoncooper@gmail.com
Twitter: @_HarmonCooper
Harmon Cooper’s Patreon
All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Prologue/Fictional Author Foreword
Chapter One: The Gnomes Must Die
Chapter Two: Axl Rose - A Perfect Name for a Perfect Axe
Chapter Three: The Chapter in Which I Discover I Am Now A Crypto Millionaire
Chapter Four: Just My Luck
Chapter Five: Clovis the Spellbook and the Mad Lad Fight a Hangry Kobold
Chapter Six: Loot or Die, There is No Try (Clovis Gets a Mustache)
Chapter Seven: Revenge of the Gnomes
Chapter Eight: Almost Bludgeoned in a Dungeon
Chapter Nine: Open Mic Night at the Ogreview Cafe and Grill
Chapter Ten: Skill Points and an Ogric Beatdown of Enematic Proportions
Chapter Eleven: We’re a Guild, Baby!
Chapter Twelve: Clovis and the Mad Lad Get Their Asses Kicked by Hemotropic Butterflies
Chapter Thirteen: The Chapter in Which We Battle the Giant Ogre
Chapter Fourteen: Flashback to Viagra Falls
Chapter Fifteen: A Snooze and a Revelation on the First Floor
Chapter Sixteen: Deathmatch
Chapter Seventeen: I Should Be Dead Right Now (But I’m Not)
Chapter Eighteen: Fighting Meerkats in the Endless Desert
Chapter Nineteen: Dung Beetles and Scorpions - Time For Some Pest Control!
Chapter Twenty: Pyramid and Rune
Chapter Twenty-One: Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Ascendants
Chapter Twenty-Two: Hamsterdam Is One Hell of A Place
Chapter Twenty-Three: The Hamfather; or, Why Clovis and I Shouldn’t Take Quests from the Hamster Mafia
Chapter Twenty-Four: I’m Not Even Going to Try to Describe What Happens in This Chapter
Chapter Twenty-Five: Hop, the Teenage Drug-Dealing Hamster
Chapter Twenty-Six: One Act Slay
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Shop ‘Til We Drop
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Fighting Murder Hornets Isn’t What it Used to Be
Chapter Twenty-Nine: Burning Books with Vampires
Chapter Thirty: Capture the Swag
Chapter Thirty-One: Against All Odds
Chapter Thirty-Two: Barbarian with A Heart of Gold
Chapter Thirty-Three: Angel Farts, Wolf Tamer
Chapter Thirty-Four: Keep on Grinding in the Free World
Chapter Thirty-Five: Fortress of Dwarves
Back of the Book
Prologue/Fictional Author Foreword
This story might not be for everyone, but if you’ve made it this far, it’s probably for you.
Too soon? I’ve been saving that intro line forever, and now I’m feeling like I botched the opening line already, which is generally considered the most important sentence in a book.
In that case, I’ll just get straight to the point.
My name is Randy Lionheart and I’m a fantasy writer. With that in mind, I promise that you will be thoroughly entertained by the crazy story to follow, a story which would be way less crazy if it weren’t for the fact it actually happened to me, and is still happening to me (I’m still trapped in this fantasy world known as Genera as we speak).
If you’ve never read a LitRPG before, strap in. If you have, sit back, enjoy the ride.
Congratulations, you will laugh your ass off!
At me.
That’s right, I’m the guy who fell asleep (or maybe died) in a sensory deprivation tank and woke up in a world populated by all sorts of chicanerous creatures, from rogue halflings to an assortment of elves, sketchy wizards, treacherous gnomes, and ravenous trolls; the same fantasy writer who also spent his last book advance on crypto, leaving me completely broke.
But more on that second part later…
For some reason, you’re still here and wondering when this story is actually going to start, and what this Mad Lad of a writer (aka me) has in store for you.
We’re almost there, reader, but before we kick this one into high gear, before we portal to another world and start the tutorial so we can reach the tower and get working on those floors, I need to clear up a few more things:
THERE WILL BE CURSING.
But there won’t be sex.
And there will be pop culture references galore that are totally going to date this story. I am also forced to seduce a dungeon core at one point in the first act; take quests in a floor populated by bipedal hamsters known as Hamsterdam; and fight everything from raging murder hornets to Japanese goblins, among other wacky situations. So expect violence and shenanigans.
I swear to you that as soon as chapter one starts, this story will kick into super high gear with a metric crapton of action, batty challenges, a smattering of stats, unhinged tournaments, fun characters, and clever enough banter as I slay my way toward the tower.
Because that’s what Tokens and Towers is all about, and I wouldn’t have it any other way even if it is indulgent.
It’s safe to say that I’m just as excited as you are to kick this one off, dear reader, itching to grab the nearest weapon and start grinding and looting like my life depends on it while dealing with a powerful yet misguided flying spellbook named Clovis.
Congrats to both of us!
We, you and I, are about to embark on an epic journey, the epic-est of journeys, one that has never been told before. With that in mind, I’m going to exit stage left and let this story shine before you figure out a better way to spend your time.
My name is Randy Lionheart.
Let’s get wild.
Chapter One: The Gnomes Must Die
—Steps to Using the Float System—
1.) Once you have taken off all of your clothing, put your earplugs in and shower to remove any excess oils in your skin. Do not use the conditioner (don’t worry, you can condition afterwards) but do use the shampoo and bodywash, all of which are hypoallergenic.
2.) Enter the float tank. Controls for the music volume and the light are on your left. You may close the door to the tank or keep it open. The outer lights will turn off automatically.
3.) Your session will begin. Just float. Concentrate on your breath as you do so.
4.) After ninety minutes, the float system will tell you that your session has ended.
5.) Once your session has ended, carefully get out of the float tank and take another shower. Your skin will feel soft from the Epsom salt. You may now use conditioner.
6.) After you have toweled off and dressed, please—
I stopped reading the instructions at this point. I got the gist, and had already watched the instructional video the wellness center had emailed me.
Coming here was supposed to be my Hail Mary. A friend of mine had let me use his gift card with several ‘floats’ on it, which was what this place called being suspended in a sensory deprivation tank for ninety minutes for restorative purposes and to enhance creativity. This was supposed to be an experience that would spark something for me. Yet here I was, naked as the day I was born, showering in a bathroom a thousand times nicer than any bathroom I’d ever had, and I couldn’t stop thinking about how they had rechristened the sensory deprivation tank to ‘float tank.’
That was probably the fantasy writer in me thinking.
I guess ‘float tank’ does sound a bit nicer, but I think I’ll call you Tanky the Tank…
I turned off the shower, and as water dripped from my skin, I finally opened the hatch. It truly was a hatch, to the point that it almost resembled a cremation oven, the inner surfaces of the tank smooth, white, and oh-so-plastic. The interior of the tank was about eight feet across, and five feet high. As soon as I was in, an indigo light flicked on and a light soundtrack started up, the music somewhere between ambient piano and white noise.
“Weird…”
I lowered into the ninety-four-degree water that was standing at about ten inches high, the bottom surface of the tank quite slick.
You’ve got this. You need this, I reminded myself as I relaxed onto my back, the water laced with Epsom salt aiding in my buoyancy.
Reaching my hand over my head allowed me to close the hatch door behind me, a tinge of claustrophobia coming to me as I tried to adjust to my little wellness oasis. I tried to get comfortable as the music carried through the water and into my plugged ears.
You’re not going to die in here. Tanky the Tank isn’t going to kill you…
Once I was nice and floaty, I pressed my thumb against a button that turned off the light.
My heart jumped at the sudden darkness. I actively stopped myself from turning the light back on. I needed this. I needed to be alone with my thoughts, to work through some shit.
The hint of fear slowly filtered away.
Soon, I was floating co
Just float…
I was here, everything was in its right place, and I would come out of this float session with an idea that would rebuild my literary career.
At least that was the plan…
****
What? I thought, coming out of my meditative, float tank reverie. Did someone just speak to me? And was she British?
Why am I hearing voices? And what is this about gnomes? Focus, Randy…
I was in this float tank for a reason. I needed a novel idea, something that would keep the royalties coming in and the fantasy writing ship afloat until I stumbled across my next concept, or at least until the crypto I had dumped my savings into would moon, making me rich enough to afford a one-way ticket to outer space.
I quieted my breath yet again, waiting for my muse to finally appear, that clever beauty who had most graciously blessed me with The Mana in the White Castle, War Beast, Mage of Rage, and Kung Fu Fable, my bestselling cultivation series with gaming elements. It was the same dastardly muse who had also shat the bed with my experimental Oh, Great, I Fell in Love with a Demon Mimic and Now I’m Going to Hell to Become a Dungeoncore Farmer, which was some cringe-worthy GameLit erotica I wrote under my pen name Angel Farts that had sold all of seven ebook copies (and one was returned, but I still count it as seven).
Come on, Randy, think…
Forget about your pen name… forget about Angel Farts…
But thinking about thinking had a way of making me feel like I was overthinking. In that case...
Focus on your breath…
Come on, man, focus!
There it was again, my thoughts interrupted by a British lady, a voice I couldn’t quite place.
It should have been easy to blink my eyes open, find the light switch in the float tank, and climb out. After all, I wasn’t suspended in that much water, and the support staff had told me what to do if I started to feel claustrophobic. There was even an intercom system. Yet I brazenly resisted the urge, wondering if this woman was indeed my muse, that she had finally come to me in a dream state and had decided to take a British voice just to shake things up a bit.
< Welcome, Randall Lionheart...>
“—Please, call me Randy, the noun not the adjective…” I told her, which was my go-to introduction that I found funny but usually didn’t get the laugh I wanted.
“Is this a loaded question?” I asked aloud.
There was an echo to my voice now, darkness still enveloping me.
“Sure, um, human,” I said, just ready to get on with it. “Is that what you wanted me to say?”
Wait… what?
Vortex, vacuum, spiraling down the drain, being uploaded, watching the movie Frozen on shrooms, what it must feel like to be lubed up and sucked through a giant straw, Havana syndrome, taking both the red and blue pill at the same time, being waterboarded—all would describe what happened next as I was portaled to another world, my senses on fire and my head spinning.
Suddenly, I was no longer in a darkened float tank alone with my thoughts. I was now in a forest straight out of Narnia, crisp, pine needles beneath my feet, a slight breeze and a bit of birdsong in the air.
Even worse, I wasn’t alone.
A group of what I would describe as ‘tough guy gnomes’ stood across from me, most of the pint-sized bruisers muscled up and wearing dark, skintight leather and tunics, oozing aggression, some with oiled forearms and biceps.
I thought of the old cartoon Hargrim the Gnome, and how nice those gnomes had been in that show. Surely this troupe would be friendly. Surely they would help a bewildered guy who had magically appeared before them.
After all, they weren’t goblins…
“Fellas,” I said, showing them my hands. “Fellas…”
This has to be a dream… I thought as the lead gnome hawked a giant loogie in my direction, one that was yellow enough to lead me to believe that he might actually have an underlying medical condition.
I tried to will myself awake and failed.
“Fellas…”
They all took a collective step closer to me. If this was a nightmare, one that involved a murder of gnomes, I damn sure wasn’t going to let these short little bastards treat me like a communal Fleshlight, not after all the bullshit I’d been through recently.
For once in my life, it was time to kick some serious ass.
It was time to introduce these shifty gnomes to the Mad Lad.
Chapter Two: Axl Rose - A Perfect Name for a Perfect Axe
A glint of something caught my eye. I went for it, the axe easily coming loose from the nearest tree trunk.
The British lady’s voice startled me once again, but the mention of a primary weapon also caused me to take a quick look around, where I saw that there were other weapon options, from a sword to a spear, even a gnarly-looking dominatrix whip, all within reaching distance. There was even a spellbook…
“Come again?” I asked aloud, wanting to confirm the inevitable.
Is this… is this some kind of game tutorial?
Goddamn if I didn’t want to slam my thumb on an invisible ‘pause’ button and try to get my bearings. If this was a dream, and in my dream there were game elements, then that was utterly the most badass dream I could have asked for because, as it turned out…
Wait for it…
Wait…
For…
It…
You guessed it, I was (and still am!) a LitRPG writer.
Not only that, I was an avid gamer, and had read enough reader comments across the internet and through book reviews to hear just about every opinion there was on what the reader would do if they were portaled into a game world. Stats, buffs, debuffs, just get buff, min-max, farming XP, grow a dick, grow some tits, farm some shit (I still have yet to figure out why that’s part of the genre), no stupid main character, no Debbie Downers, no Mary Sues, if you’re a mimic don’t be too gropey, keep politics out of it—all were things I was versed in.
This was literally my element, and I intended to act on the directions.
“Things are about to get really fucked up around here, fellas. I’m warning you…”
I returned my gaze to the gnomes, truly understanding in that moment what it felt like to glare someone down with murderous intent. The Mad Lad was a nickname I’d sort of given myself, and by sort of I mean that it was the name I referred to myself as when my darker side came out.
Sometimes it was necessary to let the Mad Lad out of his cage.
As much as I didn’t want to, I was about to get medieval on these gnomes.
The first cone-hatted fucker started to growl, which threw me for a momentary loop.
“You came to the wrong forest, asshole!”
The high-pitched, nuts-squeezed-between-his-legs voice that came out of his mouth almost had me barreled over in laughter.
I suddenly noticed something behind the gnomes. It was as if the trees pressed away behind him, a tower emerging from the landscape like an erection, the morningest of woods, the tower vibrant and sparkling and clearly a place a down-on-his-luck-but-pretty-good-dude writer like myself would rather be than a forest with a bunch of dickheaded gnomes.
“You aren’t going anywhere!” the lead gnome roared in his high-pitched voice as he took off in my direction.
