Read the Author's note! Read it! There's a minor story edit in there that you will probably want to know about.

***

Milo’s mana had recovered to nine by the time he encountered his next enemies. He froze as soon as he saw the fleshhungry skeleroos after rounding a bend in the tunnel. Heart thumping, he backed up slowly and crouched low. They hadn’t seen him.

He was glad to see that they were just more roos, rather than a new type of monster he didn’t know how to fight yet. There were only two of them, standing still and facing each other as if engrossed in conversation. Still, it got his adrenaline pumping to stumble upon creatures that were, by definition, hungry for his flesh.

Although they don't have stomachs, so how does that work? Whatever...time for real world test number one.

Steadying himself, he held up the book, wrapped in big rubber bands, blanket, and rope. Spending a single mana, he sent the book ghosting forward at incredible speed.

Aiming was laughably easy. He intended the book to catch the rightmost roo in the skull, and so it did. Maybe if his target were moving it would be different, but a still target felt like shooting fish in a barrel.

One moment, the roo stood there, oblivious to Milo’s presence. The next, after a muffled crack, its head was simply...gone. The body beneath it crumpled to the ground, whatever magic holding it together severed. Milo dismissed the resulting kill notification as he rapidly decelerated the book.

Boo-ya, critical hit.

The second roo cocked its head to the side, looking in apparent consternation at the pile of lifeless bones in front of it. In the distance, a sharp noise indicated its buddy’s skull had ricocheted off of a rock somewhere. It turned to investigate.

Milo opted to let the second one live for a bit. He wanted to test himself against an aware opponent. The book came back and bobbed in front of the creature for a few moments before darting in for a glancing blow on its ribs. The roo tried to kick at the odd floating package, but missed entirely. Milo moved the book a few meters away, watching in amusement as the skeleroo chased it around for several seconds while he kept it dancing out of reach.

Alright, I clearly have its attention. With no further warning, he punched the book forward at the monster, aiming for center mass. It didn’t have time to dodge, and the book plowed through the ribs to impact its spine. The spine held, causing the roo to go airborne as Milo continued to push, ultimately smashing the skeleton into the side of the tunnel. It shattered into pieces, concluding the fight.

Can it even be called a fight? I was freaking toying with it. This skill is so awesome.

He summoned the book back to his side before the skill’s 20 seconds were up and reviewed his kill notifications.

It turned out both enemies were level 3. The first group he’d fought with Backlebutt at his side had been a mix of four level 2’s and two level 3’s. Milo honestly hadn’t noticed any difference in toughness from one level to the next. Although, there had been some variance in how effective Backlebutt’s rocks were, so maybe that accounted for it.

He noted after some quick math that he’d gotten slightly less experience this time around—actually more, since he wasn’t sharing with Backlebutt, but less per contribution. He’d just received 54 xp, which meant 27 per level 3 roo. Before, he’d received 15 xp for his half of a level 3 roo, which came out to 30 total per level 3 roo. It must be because he’d leveled.

Killing higher level stuff in relation to my level gives more xp, check.

Next, he examined his weapon. The book’s wrapping was already loosening, which he’d been worried about; it was really hard getting it snugged and truly secure with just his one hand. Resolving to do a better job on his next go-round, he undid the rope and blanket in order to check on the book’s status.

It had held up well, not suffering any obvious major damage. It was maybe a little smushed in a couple of spots on the edge of the cover where it stuck out past the pages, lacking support there, but the binding and everything else was in good shape for now.

That was really good; he’d purposely not held back with his power in this fight. He wanted to be able to trust the weapon when things got dicey, and he now felt a lot more confident in that regard having tested it here.

Milo took his time rewrapping the book before proceeding, trying several different approaches to tightening and tying off the rope to maximum effect. He was really wishing he’d paid more attention to knot-tying in Boy Scouts; he’d always found knots to be kind of a drag as a kid and, with the exception of the square not, had forgotten them all within a day of learning them. After much trial and error with the book, however, he eventually stumbled on a good solution and ultimately got it done.

When he’d finally finished, he was surprised to find twenty minutes had passed and he’d worked up a light sweat. However, the wool blanket was now cinched quite firmly against the book. He tested it by grabbing rope in several different spots, shaking vigorously each time. It held.

Satisfied, Milo continued on.

Just a couple of minutes later, he came upon a fork in the tunnel. Remembering that he and Backlebutt had always chosen the rightmost tunnel when they were together, he opted to keep with tradition. There was still the chance the man was alive somewhere ahead. He hadn’t found a body yet, or a trail of blood, so he held on to some hope in that regard.

After taking a few steps, he got an idea and backtracked so that he could see the entrances to both of the path options. Then, he spent a mana to activate Skim, focusing on footprints.

The light was too dim for him to discern any prints using just his eyesight, but Skim had no trouble picking them out. His own prints became visible in his vision, easily identified by the fact that they’d doubled back to where he now stood. However, he was quickly able to find another set that he deemed to be Backlebutt’s, given they were ostensibly the only two people in here.

The prints weren’t clear, however. Compared to Milo’s own, Backlebutt’s were scuffed and broken. Something must have messed them up, but it’s not like there’s wind or rain in here. Roos? Why aren’t those prints lighting up? Frowning, he changed his Skim prompt to ‘prints of any kind’. Immediately, the tunnel lit up with a large number of additional prints.

Weird. I’m pretty sure kangaroos have feet and therefore footprints. Must be because I was imagining a shoe’s tread; it must take my intention into account.

That was good to know. What was something else he could learn with the remaining seconds of Skim available?

Oh! ‘Prints of living beings’!

It looked like Backlebutt had been pursued by a large number of skeleroos. Perhaps Milo could find out if he’d survived. Unfortunately, his prompt made all of the prints vanish except for Milo’s.

That’s...what? They all died? That didn’t make a whole lot of sense.

Hm. ‘Prints of dead beings.’

This time, Milo’s prints vanished. The roos’ prints came back. Backlebutt’s stayed missing.

The heck? He can’t be alive and dead. It’s like Schrodinger’s Backlebutt up in here. Skim’s duration ran out before he could figure out what was going on.

Okay, so either Backlebutt was resurrected right that second, or I’m missing something.

Not willing to let this go, Milo thought about it for a minute until he thought he’d figured it out, activating Skim once more to verify; he was doing fine on mana.

‘Prints of the dead’

The roo prints lit up again.

‘Prints of the dead who have been deanimated.’

The prints went dark.

‘Prints of the dead who are still animated.’

The prints stayed dark.

That’s it, then. The prints had only lit up before because the skeleroos were technically classified as dead creatures; Skim wasn’t telling him anything about their status of being animated or “alive”, same as Backlebutt. Milo’s prints only changed because he knew definitively that he was alive, not dead. The skill wouldn’t tell him anything he couldn’t know.

Wait a second, though. Shouldn’t it have interpreted what I meant with dead vs deanimated, like what it did with the shoeprints vs footprints? Or do kangaroos really not have feet? Is it some weird anatomical thing where it’s technically all leg? Milo was missing Google sorely at this moment.

And given all this, how did Skim answer my question about a mage class option when I clearly don’t know that answer?

Skim was rapidly becoming a candidate for replacement in his view; it was just too darn finicky. Mentally throwing up his hands, Milo trudged onward down the tunnel.

Perhaps 50 meters down the forked path, he saw more evidence of Backlebutt’s passage in the form of a pile of skeleroo bones. Barring roo on roo violence, that was some solid evidence that Backlebutt had made it through in fighting shape.

The path began to grow rougher as Milo continued, which made him nervous. Lighting was becoming more and more of an issue. The torches were placed roughly as far apart as before, but in places where the tunnel squeezed him in on both sides or bent sharply, he was left to fumble in near-blackness, at risk of turning an ankle. That wasn’t even mentioning what creatures might lurk unseen.

He tried once to take a torch out of one of the sconces to carry with him. It came free no problem, but the fire was instantly extinguished, plunging him into utter darkness. Panicking, he’d quickly replaced it and the torch flared straight back to life.

Magic shenanigans. He supposed he should be grateful; there was no way these torches would stay lit all this time without magic.

He noted in the back of his mind that, should he ever need a bludgeoning weapon, one of the torches would work nicely; it had been surprisingly hefty. He would simply need to find another light source until he could get back in the range of another torch. He was happy with his book for now, though.

There were a few spots where the path became so steep that Milo felt more comfortable tossing his bag down before turning around to climb the descent rather than trusting his feet alone. As his mana topped up, he would occasionally spend one to hop on his floating book and skip over some of the more challenging parts, then use the next fifteen seconds happily coasting along, resting his legs and practicing his aerial control.

Surprisingly, he went quite a while without encountering any more enemies. Perhaps Backlebutt had flushed them all out? Or maybe the challenge in this section of the dungeon was simply the terrain by design; Milo could easily imagine some less athletic people having a terrible time of it here. He might have struggled much more with only his one hand to use for climbing if not for his ability to jump on his book and fly over stuff. He was frankly amazed Backlebutt had made it through in one piece so far, assuming he was indeed being chased the entire time.

He used Skim another time to verify the man had made it this far, finding his prints easily—right along with the roos’.

Dude’s a badass. Milo estimated himself to be a couple of miles from where he’d slept off the potion at this point. The fleshhungry skeleroos weren’t slow, which meant Backlebutt had to have covered much of that distance going at a brisk jogging pace at the very least, while fending off attackers, while traversing dangerous terrain...in the dark. Legend.

His hopes of finding the man kept growing—right until they fell off a cliff.

Or, more accurately, until Milo encountered a cliff.

He’d been hearing sounds of water growing louder and louder as he’d approached it, and as he drew closer to the edge the sound filled the tunnel with a dull roar. Peering over the side, he saw a narrow channel where the water surely flowed, but which was far enough down that it just looked like a deep, empty gash running perpendicular to the trail.

Past the narrow ravine the path continued, the far cliff’s edge enough lower that it would be a relatively trivial, if nerve-wracking, leap.

However, after activating Skim once more, Milo discovered that not a single one of Backlebutt’s footprints showed on the far side of the ravine, the man’s trail ending cold right where he himself stood.