The catacombs were a series of huge rooms connected by narrow corridors. Walls of worked stone with burial niches along the length, filled with bones. The structure was regular, and the squares were all connected along the corridors. Nero could only see as far as the light reached but he sensed the waves of red Essence emanating from the skeletons deep inside and found the peculiar arrangement of rooms interesting. It made his job way easier.

Right after he got to the bottom of a long flight of stairs, almost three hundred feet deep, he sent a flame ahead to take a look. Once he saw the big room ahead, he sent an empowered fireball at the longest range down the corridor, hoping it would blow against the far wall. Instead, the fireball went the full three hundred and sixty yards before detonating. He felt the influx of mana signaling he'd killed something, but all hell broke loose.

Hundreds of skeletons rushed from all the rooms the fireball went through. Nero heard the cacophony and tossed another fireball, that exploded in the first room. Then another, which exploded in the second room. Some skeletons entered the fifty-foot long corridor leading to the first room and blocked the passage. Nero could see the last seconds of the flaming debuff on them. He ordered all of his floating flames to strike the skeletons and ten of them perished. Altia fired her magic arrows, killing the already badly damaged skeletons. The front row was dissolving and the monsters kept pressing forward.

Nero finished another fireball and threw it, not increasing the area of effect this time. It detonated in the corridor, clearing it of skeletons. Before the next one was ready, the monsters from the adjacent rooms were flooding into the first. SIghing at the loss of loot, he tossed the next fireball at the center of the first room with the maximum seventy-two feet of blast radius.

More mana returned to him thanks to his [Ignis Victoria] Skill. He readied another fireball while Altia kept killing the skeletons entering the corridor. He threw his fireball in the room again, the mana regained not the only indication he was killing a lot of monsters.

Compatible Anima detected. Energy absorbed above the threshold. Processing upgrade. Weighing Attribute strain.

For defeating a foe twelve times your level, you gained +1 Willpower

Compatible Anima detected. Energy absorbed above the threshold. Processing upgrade. Weighing Attribute strain.

For defeating a foe nine times your level, you gained +1 Reason

"Accolades!" He grinned. Then he started to cast another fireball.

Altia chuckled. They were still pumping mana into their spells but the situation seemed under control.

"Yeah, I got three of them now. I just didn't want to distract you! [Magic Arrow] [Potion Toss]!"

Nero finished his fireball and tossed it into the first room again."

"We need to retreat then. Let's return to the zombie area. If we keep killing, you'll run out of Attribute strain and level."

They backed off, climbing the stairs quickly and reaching the surface. The moon hadn't moved, proof this Dungeon was an eternal night, unlike Rafflesia's. The problem was, most zombies had respawned. Nero used the last flames to clear a path back to the path leading to the landing area. They ran through and once they were with the haunted woods at their sides, he started casting another fireball.

"Out of mana when this one finishes."

"Understood!"

Altia kept the left hand over the potion pouch and fired more magic arrows with the right hand. Nero finished his [Fireball] and Altia tossed him a mana potion, doubling the effect as her purple Skill duplicated the potion with the vial and removed the contents to spread as a magical mist on Nero.

The fireball flew and struck the zombies that had gathered. Once again they burned and Nero moved back to finish the few that survived the fiery onslaught.

They gathered the loot and checked the stairs. Without floating flames, Nero had to spend the next several minutes creating more. Altia scouted around, to make sure there weren't more zombies. When Nero had all of his flames gathered, she returned.

"I've found a card," She said to him with the same grin like the cat that ate the mice. "Check!"

[Barbarian] - yellow Class - Requires level 10, Strength +20, Vigor +20.

+10 Strength

+10 Vigor

+5 Endurance

"Uklangor Kills!"

Special: Add a third of your base Strength to Vigor.

Special: Add a third of your base Vigor to Strength.

Special: You can enter a berserker rage either at will or automatically when hurt. Your Strength and Vigor increase by 20% while your mental Attributes decrease by 60%.

"That's a hell of a double-edged blade," Nero whistled. "We should trade that one. I'd rather not become blind in the middle of combat. How are you? We need to go back down there. But first, let me use one of the stress-measuring blank cards on you."

Altia gained Strength, Willpower, and in a whim of fate, Charisma. Nero saw that her strain levels for Endurance and Reason were high enough she would gain the next Accolades in those Attributes. He showed her.

Nero checked his clock. They wasted half an hour already. Down in the catacombs, the corridors were quiet but Nero could see the glow of the Essence crystals scattered around the floor of the first room ahead. he signaled for them to move on and they reached the room. Three skeletons were inside and their skulls turned to face them. Green flames danced in their eye sockets and the monsters charged them. Nero shot two flames at each monster, spending one of his castings. Altia shot one [Magic Arrow] at each of them, doubling the spell on the third monster that crumbled into motes of light instantly. Nero bashed the flaming and now frail skeletons with his shield, ending their un-life.

They quickly looted the room without paying much attention to the cards. Nero saw two with green borders and a pale green background, Classes. The focus of this Dungeon were Class cards, that was confirmed.

The room had three corridors leading out, not counting the one they came in from. Nero tossed a fireball left, ten seconds later another to right, and another ten seconds a third one ahead. Before he finished the third casting burning skeletons came from the right corridor, and Altia placed herself blocking that path, bashing the bones with her staff. With the press of monsters coming in from behind, there was no way the monsters could dodge in the narrow corridor. A blow from her staff was all that took to finish Nero's job.

Once again Nero was out of mana. He drew his clockwork sword and ran to block the left corridor where the skeletons that survived the fireball were coming from. He mowed down the monsters, a single swipe of his sword enough to send bones sprawling and causing the monster to dissolve. he went twenty feet down the corridor then backed out, going for the front one to intercept the third room of monsters he pulled.

Five minutes later they were tired, with minor injuries where the skeletons managed to land a blow and victorious. Altia used a healing potion and two mana potions on them and they went to collect their loot in the three rooms they'd cleared. The side rooms had only two corridors, the one they came from the central room and another going deeper and away from the stairs. The second room at the center had the same setup of four corridors as the first. Nero stood at the center and repeated the stunt. He tossed a fireball to the left, another to the right and a third straight ahead. This time none of the fireballs returned mana on the first strike, a sign that he killed nothing.

"Altia, don't block the corridor. We are retreating to the first room. Stay next to me, you go first on my call."

She nodded. Skeletons came from both side corridors but not from the central one. They returned to the first room and Nero started to cast. The room they just vacated filled with skeletons and he tossed the strongest fireball he could muster into the press of bones. It detonated right at the mouth of the corridor as it impacted a skeleton attempting to cross the hallway. The flames rushed down the corridor and flared into the room they were at but without reaching the ape-kin couple. A massive influx of mana flooded Nero and his Arbitrium lit up, restoring eight points at once. A few of the strongest skeletons entered the corridor.

"[Magic Arrow]!" Altia finished those while Nero kept watching for any surprises.

Compatible Anima detected. Energy absorbed above the threshold. Processing upgrade. Weighing Attribute strain.

For defeating a foe fifteen times your level, you gained +1 Willpower

He saw Altia's device light up between the second-to-last magic arrow. "Willpower," he told her. "Reason", she answered.

They returned to the second room down the center and found a carpet of crystals and cards. Nero had no idea how many and he wasn't going to count it now but it was a lot. He sent one flame down each side corridor the full forty yards they could reach and found the rooms to be empty. Another down the hallway in the middle showed a massive iron door.

"I think we found the boss," He remarked.

Altia used her potions to freshen them up. Nero flexed and jumped a bit to get his blood pumping. Then he summoned more flames to a total of thirty.

"Let's go then," She ushered him forward with a hand on his back.

Nero pushed the door, wincing at the horrendous grinding sound it did. Whatever was inside would know they were coming. The room was large and Nero thought it was a throne room. A dozen rows of round pillars flanked a ten feet wide red carpet, threadbare and rotten, leading to a series of wide steps and a throne. Along the sides several sets of plate armor stood guard and sitting in the throne the skeleton lord, wearing a fur cloak and a circlet. By his side, a massives sword leaned against the throne.

"Altia, use something to jam the door," He whispered to her.

She summoned a [Hatchet] white card and knelt to hammer the edge of the ax head under the door.

Nero knew the suits of armor were undead from the reports he read. The Dungeon was geared for large scale fights and this one wasn't different. Nero stood by the door frame, unwilling to enter. Moonlight filed in from the partially broken stained glass windows, an impossibility if they were still underground. The green flames in the skeleton lord's sockets flared as the gaze of the monster fell on Nero. He started casting there, readying his spell. He aimed the fireball eighty feet ahead of him and once the bead of fire flew, he backed off after his wife. He left one flame licking the top of the door frame and they made it back to the second central room.

The clanging of metal drowned any other sounds. Nero started on another fireball and finished when the first suits of armor were already rushing down the tunnel. He aimed the fireball at the flame he left behind and shot. it detonated, bathing the suits of armor in another cascade of flames. Despite being hit twice by the spell and the lingering flames that dealt the damage equal to a third fireball over the ten seconds of casting time, the suits of armor were still standing, although they were red-hot and looking soft. Flames licked the undead armor, promising to deal another twelve seconds of fire damage to them. Nero wouldn't wait.

"Spread out your damage!" He shouted. Nero wanted to let the secondary effect of the first fireball to run its course.

"I know!" She shouted.

Altia fired a barrage of [Magic Arrow] spells, as fast as she could. Nero sent one flame for each suit of armor and readied his sword. The armors were levels fourteen through twenty and were tough. The fire still did good damage due to their undead nature but made them just as dangerous from the superheated metal. Nero moved to block the tunnel so he had to fight a single armor at a time.

The armored undead had weapons, unlike their lesser cousins. The types varied, like maces, spears, swords, war hammers, or axes. Some were unsuited for the narrow corridor while others made the armor even more dangerous, like a halberd or a pike. On those, Nero used a second flame. Ten minutes was all it took to finish the suits of armor. Nero used all of his flames except the one he used to target his fireball by the door frame. The fire magic seemed immune to fire magic. Maybe because they were or because they were his. He didn't know. What he knew was that he had to summon more flames.

It was time to fight the skeleton lord, without his retinue. They entered the boss's room and found the boss in the same spot as before. The monster stood up and the iron door behind them closed. It was a common theme of Dungeon boss fights to block the retreat and restrict access of victorious Adventurers to the rest of the Dungeon. Winners should play nice and leave, that was one of the messages. The other was that there was no escape. A boss fight was one to the death unless you already had a [Egress] card. They didn't despite the hundreds of crystals they gathered.

Without much to use his mana for, Nero started another fireball without the extended radius while the skeleton lord lazily descended the dais, dragging his huge sword behind him. Nero shot the fireball at the foot of the stairs and the fire blanketed the skeleton lord, burning his cloak away. Nero then fired all of his flames and crouched. He ejected his Class cards without letting them completely out and swapped the green [Warrior] to the bottom before slamming them back in place. He checked his stats and drew his sword.

The skeleton lord, flames licking his bones, screamed silently. The couple of living beings still felt the wail of the dead lord in their souls. Nero was shaken and so was Altia but he stood tall and bashed the flat of his revving sword against his shield.

The skeleton lord charged and Nero answered in kind. He used [Stoneskin] for an extra bit of damage resistance and once they were six yards apart, he triggered [Dash n' Slash], [Mobile Strike] and a [Shield Bash] as his extra blow. The skeleton lord, with his centuries of experience, wasn't idle either. He used a Skill of sorts because Nero's shield bash aimed at the boss' mid-section ended up banging loudly against the sword, damaging both pieces of equipment. A rent nine inches deep opened in his pavise shield.

But the shock also meant the lord had no way to evade Nero sideways swing. it caught on the skeleton lord's hips and sheared through, breaking its ileum bone and scraping against the spine. Sensing a blow to its sensitive weak spot, the skeleton lord jumped back, disengaging only to get three [Magic Arrow] on its ribs. Weakened by the deluge of fire, two ribs broke.

The lord set his unholy gaze on the woman. He too triggered [Dash n' Slash], closing the ten yards in a flash. The sword came down but Nero wasn't idle. He burned another three points of Stamina to use [Intervene] - [Mobile Strike] - [Shield Bash]. Once again the sword met his shield but this time the weapon wasn't augmented by a Skill and was deflected sideways, hitting the cold stone floor.

"[Potion Toss]!" Altia shouted and dropped two empty large round vials with a holy symbol etched on the glass. A yellow mist with a faint glow surrounded the skeleton lord. [Double Tap] and her summoned [Holy Water] flasks worked to dispel the dark energies that animated the skeleton lord. She could see cracks on all bones, including the skull.

Once again the roar of anguish, which Nero now was sure was another of its Skills. The couple froze for a few seconds and the skeleton lord struck Nero on the left shoulder. He fell down on the ground with his left arm limp and a huge gash on his deltoid.

Altia circled around, keeping a certain distance from the boss and Nero between them. The young man didn't bother to stand up. he sliced with his sword, catching the tibia of the left leg and severing that bone. The skeleton lord was thrown off-balance and took a couple steps back to restore his bearings. He had to favor the right leg now.

Nero steeled his will, broke the fear effect of the lord's Skill and used his own. The same old combo but this time he couldn't use his shield. Instead, he sailed through the stone floor and struck twice in rapid succession against the right leg of the boss. he severed the knee joint. and toppled the big skeleton. Nero felt his burning shoulder heal.

"[Cure Wounds] - [Potion Toss]!" Altia special Class ability sped up the action of using potions, allowing her to fire her Skill in sequence.

He rolled away from the skeleton's reach and detached his battered shield. The Skeleton lord got on his left foot and knelt on the rest of the right leg. The green flames were now licking the outside of the skull, flaring in anger.

"Backoff, Altia. We'll finish him with ranged attacks."

Nero quickly changed to his [Mana Bolt] build and sacrificed a white card for mana. It gave him as much mana as half a night of rest, and for this build specialized in mana regeneration, it was more than enough to top his resource. The couple rained magical spells on the skeleton lord and soon the boss was no more.

They didn' get any Accolade for killing the boss. Instead, it dropped three cards and a huge crystal. Nero measured it and discovered it had two thousand Essence. The boss was level twenty. Two of the cards were [Egress]. The third one, Nero was expecting to be a Class, but he was surprised by it. The Classes from tier-II Dungeons were stronger and had a steep Level requirement. It was almost as if the Dungeon wanted to taunt the delver.

[Rogue] - blue Class - Requires level 20. Agility +10. Dexterity +10

Agility +20

Dexterity +3

"Not a thief. Not an assassin. A scoundrel, yes. I'm a rogue."

Special: Add a quarter of your Agility to the damage of your melee attacks with light weapons or unarmed.

Special: Add half of your Agility to Perception to detect traps or secret compartments but not hidden creatures.

Nero checked the time. One hour and twenty minutes. They were falling behind but the next two Dungeons were rank-I and well-farmed. They gathered everything and used the silver cards.