Armored Skeleton: Level 16

This skeleton I am facing now is a pain. Literally. He’s already severed the tendons on my left arm with his iron sword, making my arm useless until I can heal it. Thankfully, I’ve managed to regrow my right arm these last few days, but that was a huge pain too, actually. This skeleton has also gotten some decent cuts along my sides and arms, my blood is flowing freely. Experience tells me I’ve only got another minute or two before the loss of the red juice inside of me makes me weak and disoriented. Not to say I’m not currently weak and disoriented already, I've got three arrows in my back, all of which have been poisoned and are slowly spreading a nasty hallucinogen through me. I’ve got to cleanse that soon before I start turning into a crazy psycho. I’ve never let the poison get too far yet but from just the early onset of the stuff the toxin does strange things to my brain.

I’ve already taken care of the two skeleton archers that turned me into this pin cushion. While the the long range projectiles have been entirely troublesome and unfair, the skeleton archer variety come with literally zero armor to guard them. I’ve found that a well thrown stone is enough to incapacitate them, a stone that was covered in flare at least. While the flare skill ends as soon as it leaves my hand, I have found, through numerous tests, that the effects still linger for a minute, like decaying radiation. If the archers had any sort of covering over their torso I would be screwed, more screwed than I already am, but as it is now a solid throw to their chest destroys them. My only problem is my aim, which is why I have three arrows in me instead of just one. Let me tell you, my accuracy does not improve the more hallucinogenic I become.

I’d cleanse myself now, but I don’t have the mp to spare at this point. You’d think that reaching level 14 would grant me more mana than I would know what to do with, but inflation is a bitch. Each attack I do requires more and more of the sweet golden elixir of mp. I hoarde the stuff like an addict.

This last week has been absolute hell. In fact, there is a part of me that really thinks that this place is hell. It's not what I imagined hell would be, but I think they nailed eternal torment on the head. After losing my room to the fire, my already difficult life became much more so. Outside of the flying insects biting me, the agruimen biting my ankles every chance they get, carrion birds following my every move, and wynots trying to eat my face off, I am constantly being harassed by roving parties of zombies and skeletons on search and destroy missions. Ironically, this now larger place, larger every day, has allowed me room to run and hide, the various scattered ruins providing me minimum shelter as I kick out its dubious and unwilling inhabitants each night. Fortunately, only the zombies and skeletons seem do be under direct control of the enemy mage as those are the only creatures making a concentrated effort to eliminate me. All the other creatures I just seem to run into like encountering pokemon in the tall grass.

Of course, Pesos is still a one hound army. She’s been coming at me every day now, and she is getting smart, much too smart. My only saving grace with her is that she stubbornly works by herself, seemingly unwilling to coordinate with the zombies and skeletons. That's fine by me, I think I would surely die if they worked together. Pesos has killed me every time in various and creative ways, she’s ripped out my throat, front and back, crippled me in the sides and legs, almost knocked me off a small cliff, and even started breathing a corrosive fire like attack at me after she reached level five.

She is super troublesome. Each day she comes back, she comes back a level higher than the day before and is apparently learning skills all so that she can kill me faster. My godly healing abilities have saved me every time and I’ve been barely been able to exterminate Pesos, but every day its gets harder and takes longer. She can find me anywhere, I cannot hide from her.

I have not been idle either though, I have been able to level up as well these last seven days. But, Judas Maude, I have to say, Pesos is getting stronger faster than me. Each new level I get takes more and more effort but she gets granted a new level each day. I fear that soon, she will be able to wear me down and kill me. All she needs is for me to run out of mp. Or give me an insta-kill.

Yeah, it's been hell.

Another issue I am facing is that the zombies and skeletons I have been squaring off everyday have been multiplying their numbers like bunnies. I am forced to actively engage them in an effort to cull their number, a tiresome and time consuming task. The zombie’s and skeleton’s levels have also been increasing slowly I noticed, not as steadily as Pesos does, but the average level of the zombies have gone up a couple of times. New types have appeared as well, bigger and stronger than the regular zombies. I can still one shot the big ones with Thor’s Hammer, but its a trend I can’t ignore. For the skeletons, new classes are appearing too, like the archer and armored types I am currently fighting. Despite my best efforts, everybody is getting stronger and I don’t feel like I am gaining any ground. Unlike me, all my enemies seem to just be granted levels by existing, even if I kill them. My leveling has become harder and slower. It’s just not fair.

The skeletons are leading the zombies around. It makes sense, none of the zombies have any brains, even the new types. Which is funny because the skeletons don’t have any brains either, but I guess they are using their ghostly intelligence. I can see it in their dark hollow eyes.

The armored skeleton is even slower than the other types, but he more than makes up for it in his skill with his sword. Also, the metal armor he carries around makes it extremely difficult to kill him as the flare isn’t nearly as effective against plain metal compared undead flesh and bone. A dagger with the edge skill used can still cut through his armor moderately well, but it lacks the explosive power that direct contact with the bleached white bones would have. Like I said, this guy is a huge pain.

I’ve already destroyed his following of zombies, big and small, as well as taken out his archers and regular skeleton soldiers, but this guy doesn’t give up. They never give up when they find me, the skeletons and zombies have always fought till the bitter end. And bitter it always is, for both of us. Each fight leaves me filled with cuts and holes and with enough infections and poison to stun a team of oxen. Only careful timing and planning of my mp keeps me alive.

…

If what I am can be called alive anymore. I would think at this point the system would recognize me as an undead too.

Food continues to leave me in want. Honestly, despite how hungry I am, lately I have had trouble eating the wynot tiblits. The heal and cleanse skills keep me healthy, but I have lost a significant amount of weight, weight I really couldn’t afford to lose in the first place. I look like skin and bones. I think I now know what Golum felt like, having the ring of power grant him additional lifespan. I have been wondering when I will start coughing gollum as well. Like Bilbo Baggins said, “I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread.”

A permanent lack of sleep haunts me as well. Zombies do not tire, and they constantly seek me out, exhausting me and not letting me get my beauty rest. Each evening I have to find a new place to sleep, a new ruin, and old ruin, a thick tree, a large brush, a hollowed out den. I think I know what it feels like to be homeless now, unable to settle down and to constantly be on the move less I am found and surrounded, desperate and alone. The few hours of sleep I am able to get are fitfull and short. Constant interruptions from flies, skeletons or zombies that found me, or small critters stealing their way into my alcove to grab a piece of me, and the inevitable curse every night at midnight are killing me. Each of these things are a constant torment for me. The infections are getting worse too, taking less and less time to paralyze me. I feel constantly stiff these days, it's ironic that if it weren't for all the interruptions in my sleep, the infection might have just killed me already.

I know that the infection I have right now is currently in the red zone, almost to the point of crippling me. My mobility has been reduced to a mere shuffle. In fact, it's probably to the point of being a fatal flaw. My mobility is the only thing I have against this armored skeleton.

I take a quick glance at my mp and see that it’s currently sitting at 34.The number is also doing a little jig to a weird funky tune I can hear. It seems the hallucinogens are acting up. You’d think that being able to generate 13 mp a minute would be enough, but it can hardly keep up with my expenditures. It’s enough though and I burn through 20 of my mp to fight off as much infection as I can. If there is one thing I have learned this last week, its how to better manipulate my skills, especially my healing and cleanse. It would have taken more mp than I have available to cleanse both of them, but by concentrating on just one function I want it to work on, I can specialize and keep myself alive a little longer.

Oh joy.

I feel the cleansing effect on me and instantly I feel lighter and limber, the infection mostly taken care of. I return my attention to the porcelain white skeleton trying to do me in. The bastard has that look in his nonexistent eyes that I always see near the end of battles. An impotent rage. I can understand the anger that comes from always losing, losing in video games to my older brothers every time made me crazy too. Perhaps he’s upset that he’s lost so many of his comrades to me here, I don’t know, but near the end of these fights the skeletons always become bolder, more aggressive and take bigger risks, often throwing away their lives in a mindless attempt to finish me off for good. Its that crazy look in their eyes that I see now. He is dangerous.

Not today, little soldier. Your giving me a run for my money, though.

At this point, the skeleton comes at me, attacking me with sharp jabs and slicing motions. I think he knows that time is my ally here as eventually I’ll gather enough mp to finish him off easily. The skeleton has his own wounds too at this point, our skirmish has lasted more than fifteen minutes and my healing abilities are far superior than their own.

Both of us are stumbling around now, my evades are more like a drunken jig than knowledgeable movements. I am glad nobody is here to see my desperate scrambling around the slippery ground, short hills, and dens. I fall to the dirt more often than not, rolling around clumsily before righting myself. There are no points for style here, only the winner and loser, the alive and dead. I do my best to avoid getting more injured as I look for an opportunity to step in. The hallucinations are not helping.

Soon enough, the skeleton makes a mistake and slips on a small slope I had jumped up on to. It's odd to see skeletons losing their footing, considering they only have bones down there anyway so they must have some supernatural grip, but to be fair to him, I did get him pretty good on that leg earlier. I think I had cut his knee cap or something, I couldn't be sure through the armor.

I’m pretty sure I am not just seeing things so, seizing the opportunity, I pounce on the fallen soldier, its heavy black armor weighing him down as well as my weight, diminished though it is. His whole body sinks an inch into the mushy ground and I hastily set an edge skill on my skeleton dagger. Rather than trying to pry his helmet off, I just stab directly through it, reaching the skeleton’s skull with the quick thrust.

His body, which had been struggling mightily a moment ago, falls limp at the strike and I breathe out a sigh of relief. Fighting these armored dogs directly was too much trouble. The only real strategy I had with them was to cover their own armor with flare, basically cooking them from the inside. It took a lot of mana to use my skill of objects not in my own possession, something I learned through trial and error, but the effects were always spectacular. The only problem is getting past the pointy piece of metal the skeletons always had with them. Besides intentionally letting myself get skewered, I had no way of closing in on them. I have tried picking up the sword of a fallen skeleton before, but other than the fact that I have no idea how to use it other than pointing the sharp end forward, it is far too heavy for me. I have lost quite a bit of muscle mass here. Getting wounded a hundred different ways does that to you.

Despite my best efforts, I have not been able to unlock any additional skills for my repertoire. Judging from how I acquired edge, I thought it would be rather easy to experiment with forms and come up with new ideas. Projectiles, shields, AOE attacks, bolts, any and all of these things I have tried in various forms or other, but much to my dismay I was never rewarded with a new skill. None of my attempts worked the way I wanted them too, anyway, so maybe that’s the crux of the problem.

Screw you, too, System.

I sit down on top of the skeleton’s heavily armored torso. I am too tired to move away, I’ve killed all the stupids zombies and skeletons, so I should be fine. A little ways away I see the carrion birds feasting already, not even waiting for my fight to be over. They caw and heckle wildly, picking at the flesh and bones of my slain foes and swallowing them down their impossibly large gullet. They really are the clean up crew of this place but they should be thanking me. Without me, there would be nothing for them to do.

I had theorized a few days ago that these birds are, in fact, officially the garbagemen of this place, and in fact they might be providing and even deeper role than I had assumed. Perhaps there was a limit to the amount of zombies and skeletons that could be produced here, relative to its ever growing size or whatever, and these birds were recycling the material so that they could be used again? Or even worse, what if by gobbling up these remains the birds are somehow returning the mana to its creator for the use of more skeletons or zombies? It’s a harrowing thought, but the birds are too fast and flighty for me to take them out. I can’t stop the process even if I wanted to.

I start cleansing myself, finally getting rid of the effects of the poison. It’s a good thing too, because a few more bars of that crazy electronic jig I was hearing and I really would have gone insane. Now I wait some more, I still need to heal the cuts and abrasions, and I have whole chunks of missing flesh yet.

I survey the battlefield. It’s a massacre, dozens of bodies lay on the ground in various stages of disassembly. I know the zombies are already partially decomposed, but this place looks like a week old battlefield.

I don’t notice the odors much anymore. In fact, I feel a little dead to everything right now. I can hardly muster up the motivation to take the arrows out. They are a sharp pain in my back, but I know they will hurt like hell on the way out. Besides poison, the skeletons like to barb their arrows too.

My plan this last week was to gather up my strength, get my arm back, get a couple more skills like a good little gamer, and then follow this path to its conclusion by challenging the mage again once I gain enough levels to wipe the floor with them. It's like when you realize that a level 8 charmander and level 9 pikachu will not allow you to defeat Brock.

That plan was blown to hell when I came to the sudden and shocking realization yesterday that, in fact, this world does not revolve around me.

…

...

Besides the obvious self centeredness of that statement, the meaning behind it left me paralysed and in despair. I had been working under the assumption that this place was game like, like there were rules and algorithms set in place, a path per se, towards victory left there by the creator. Nobody makes an unwinnable game.

But there are too many inconsistencies to this place, too many clues and hints to the fact that I am not a player here. I am an anomaly. The mage has got its own plans, big plans by the look of it, and he can’t be bothered with a pest like me. I am not his rival in this game.

This place has a life of its own, its growth in land mass was astonishing, the new creatures, places, lands, forests, mountains, and especially, the Temple.

While before the thing was like a one bedroom shack, it has since turned into an impressive structure. My careful scouting of it left me aghast, the temple now looked like a palace instead, with huge ornate doors, pillars, rooms, and height. Gold and silver glinted in the greenish air. Whether the inside had a basement of sorts I don’t know, but all it was missing was busy servants attending to the place like a magnificent english manner. The skeleton guardian was at the entrance still, his left arm regrown like my arm was and he had some friends now too, a couple armored skeletons and some archers as well. Zombies wandered around the entrance as if waiting for me to step foot in so they could tear me apart.

All these things contributed to my realization, but the biggest one was that nobody was meant to survive here. It’s only thanks to my bizarre acquire of these healing and cleansing powers that I am alive, no human, no matter the preparation, would be able to survive here.

There is no grand plan of confrontation between good and evil, no stage of confrontation, there is no meaning in me being here.

This place wasn’t meant to house me and has been punishing me for my impertinence of continued living every day,

…

Well, screw you too. I didn’t ask to be here.

…

Honestly, I am starting to feel like giving up. I know its unpardonable, but at this point my only hope of getting out of here is fading away like the embers in an old fire. There is so much pain here and I feel so weak and tired. Not even the juicy excitement from a level up arouses me much anymore. All I see is dead green smog coating the horizon.

I had a cousin who had committed suicide. He was a veteran from the Afghanistan war, had two kids and a steady girlfriend with the baby momma. There hadn’t been any signs of PTSD, as far as I could tell, but there must have been something there. Suicide wasn’t something I could understand, around my cousin there were many people, friends and family, who cared deeply for him. I won’t pretend I now know what he was feeling that night he took his life, but I think I can understand a feeling of true despair a little more.

I am losing ground.

With a sigh, I check my notifications. I dismiss all the infection notices, those blasted things are so annoying.

Oh ho, looks like I leveled to 15 during the fight. It’s about time. Another notification catches my attention though.

You have reached level 15! Next skill granted.

Barrier: Sub-Skill of Flare

Sweet guns and roses, I finally got it. I pull up my status to look at my new acquisition.

Inner Light: (level 15)

A unique light attribute class able to learn every light attribute skill and uses mana directly for every skill. Class locks all other potential attributes and skill types. Skill usage limited only to quantity of Mana available

Mana:

24/320.9796

Regen: 15.86923222 per minute

Skills:

Cleanse

Clear body of foreign influences

Heal

Enhances natural healing

Flare

Coat external surfaces with light energy to give a light attribute to object

Edge:Sub-Skill of Flare

Coat the edge of a blade with light energy to give a specialized offensive light attribute to object

Barrier:Sub-Skill of Flare

Project a corporeal light energy plane to create a specialized defensive light attribute barrier

Hot Dog. Hot Stinking Dog. Hot, chili smothered, cheese covered, onion blasted dog.

I finally feel energy and motivation filling me and I stand up animatedly. I feel woozy for a second, but I give a fist pump to the air.

I am both pissed beyond reason and eternally grateful. I have tried hundreds of times to create some sort of barrier slash shield with flare this entire time with zero success only to have it handed to me upon reaching level 15. I could have really used this a few days ago. Or a few minutes ago.

I want to try this out immediately, but I suppose I should wait until I have actually healed myself. Priorities and all. If it works at all like I think it will, I believe I have just solved my biggest problem, the looming giant that has been haunting me since the day my room burned down.

The dark mage’s spell that took my arm away, I hadn’t had any defense for it. No matter how I imagined my attack on the temple, I couldn't get past that issue. Every chance was doomed to failure. Now, hopefully, I had a way to deal with it.

Hallelujah.

I close my eyes, the sense of relief is palpable.

I’m ending this now, I swear to God. I can’t wait anymore, I can’t stand this place anymore. With this new ability, I should have a good chance. This is absolute hell, and my enemies have only been growing more numerous and dangerous everyday. Now that I have a way to move forward I’m taking it and I am not stopping. I’m not going to spend another second here; it’s either going to be him or me.

It's do or die now, and at this point, I am no longer afraid of death. I’m coming for you, you scrawny mage bastard in your huge stinking temple. My arm is crying for vengeance.

When my mp is is high enough I pull out the arrows in my back.

Ouch. That really hurts.