(James)

James was more than happy to be led back through the maze by Dana. He was carrying the vast majority of their gear, loot and food. In fact, he was pretty sure Danas bag was empty and she was only carrying the book.

Not that it mattered massively to him. His strength was more than twice what it had been when the system first rated him. Though he hadn't spent much time testing It, he barely registered the weight of the nearly full bag on his back.

He was actually glad that all he had to do was follow Dana, for now at least. It gave him an opportunity to mess around with his newly discovered skill. He alternated between using Mana sight and Aurora lenses to examine everything around him as he moved the Mana in the air.

Though the scenery kept switching between shades of blue and orange, he could always follow the white core in Dana's chest or the light yellow aura that surrounded her.

For just a moment, he tried to use both skills at once, and he almost keeled over at the pain in his eyes. He glimpsed a world of grey, with swampy white mist. Honestly, it scared him. He didn't try that again.

As his competency with mana force increased, he tried to push the mana into the crystals in his gun. They held the mana he pushed in, and he saw no sign of them being full, or losing the energy he put in. They must be like actual mana batteries that shot out any mana he put in when he pulled the trigger. Luckily, it looked like it meant he wouldn't have to make any more of these crystals.

He didn't want to try and use up any of his mana immediately by firing the gun any more. This was an opportune time to learn about Mana beyond what Dana could teach him. He wanted to learn how he could use his mana in tandem with his items and possibly armour. Not just learn a few simple spells.

James shook his head to dislodge that particular line of thought. Dana was doing much more than him with mana, and he couldn't compare than at all.

He just went back to using Mana force to rotate the clip one chamber at a time and told his brain to shut up.

---

Dana had no idea how to get to the west side of the maze from the Venter, so they had taken the long and agreeable more scenic route through then around the garden. James spied the somewhat mangled corpses of the dead patrol from the day before. He wasn't surprised to see the bodies were still there, but he was surprised to see they were no longer the muscled monsters he had wrestled with. They now looked to be just skin and bone.

"Wait a second."

Before Dana could start walking around the outskirts of the garden, James ran over to the pile of corpses, pulling a spear out from over his shoulder and poked the one on too.

"Were these things as skinny as this yesterday?", James called over his shoulder at the slowly advancing Dana.

She took a close look at them and shook her head.

"No. They were all still dripping blood when I dragged them out here."

"Huh."

James just kept poking the top one with his spear until it rolled off the pile. A distinct sound of rattling coins emerged.

"No way."

James pulled the largest corpses from the pile, that of the Komodo lizard. It had almost knocked him over the previous day, but he could easily hold it in one hand by the folded scales on the back of its neck.

He shook it violently and sure enough, he heard the sound of metal emerging from inside its limp skin.

"Is there money in It?"

Dana asked as she reached to pull one of the smaller lizards from the pile. She hesitated before touching it, remembering the acidic slime on its skin. But she saw no wet sheen on It, so went ahead and tore a hole in it from a small puncture wound.

A handful of coins fell out, only a few shiny silver coins, and more dull brown ones.

With a slight grimace, she tore off more of the skin from the skeleton and saw nothing else inside.

"So when they die, they only leave skin and bones? And money?"

"I guess so."

James had followed suite with his larger monster and was cutting the skin and scales from the joints.

"Why do you want the scales?"

Dana couldn't imagine a worse thing to carry around.

But James had other ideas.

"Look at the inside of the skin, it's treated like leather."

Dana reluctantly looked at his frankly gross dissection and saw the skin was in fact completely dry, yet still flexible.

"This stuff is a bitch to pierce, so I'm thinking of putting it on the armour."

"Why not use the scales of the evolved komodo thing. There was way more, and I don't think we even managed to break its skin."

James paused for a moment as he considered the rough roll of scales in his hand.

"Shit. You right."

And with that, he threw it behind him.

"But the skin of the corrosive lizards is something else."

"Why would you want This?". Dana tore a strip of skin off the lizard in her hands. It was weak and thin. Slightly gelatinous. She made a face at it.

"Its weak as hell."

"Maybe, but I bet if I rehydrate it, I can make some armour that's corrosive on the outside."

Dana imagined the slightly disgusting possibilities, but she had to agree.

"Fine, but I'm not carrying It."

"Fair enough. But you have to get the skin off that one."

Dana sighed, but took the spear from his hands and got to work anyway.

James allowed himself a small self-satisfied smile. He was only being reasonable.

Only 20 minutes later, he had all the dry acid skin he could ever want tucked into his bag. Dana had even taken the food from it and carried that herself. She would not allow for their food to be contaminated by the lizard skin.

James had discovered that along with the bones, the claws and teeth were still attached, but only slightly.

The claws of even the biggest lizard were still small and useless compared to their new weapons, but James had discovered something about the teeth of the corrosive Lizards. Instead of a lot of small black teeth, it was more like one long curved tooth on each jaw that was covered in long thin spikes. James noted with some level of satisfaction that they resembled the jaws of an animal trap.

He gathered the four long teeth, and careful wrapped them in the previously discarded roll of scales. Hopefully, they wouldn't break before he could use them as a deterrent on his armour. They would look awesome.

"You done?"

Dana was standing well away from his carving and had pocketed the small amounts of coins that she could scrape from the corpses.

James remembered the body of the evolved komodo still lying in the workshop. That thing would be great to use. Somehow, he had never really registered it's presence in the room. He had not only forgotten it when he was making the armour in the first place, but he had even become complacent enough to have sex in the same room as it. He thought deeply about it. Maybe it's scales and skin let it become harder to notice. Besides, if it had no meat to decompose, and it's flesh was already treated because of the system or whatever reason, then there wouldn't even be a smell. He had to get back to that damn lizard.

"OY!"

A coin rebounded off his head. Not hard enough to hurt him, but more than enough to break his line of thought. He turned to an irritated Dana with an apologetic smile.

"Yes, let's go. Got to get phones and food and also potentially rescue the four people who can guide us through this nightmare."

Dana seemed to shrink a little.

"Well, why you being so slow then. Come on."

With that, she began jogging away. Reluctant to get left behind, James hurriedly put the spears back on his back and awkwardly shouldered his bag again.

With a final check to see if his gun was secured in his belt, he ran after her.

They were back in the halls. This was one place James did not want to be. Ever.

The image of blood stained dimly lit hallways was more than a horror film for the college survivors, it was their grim reality.

But James wasn't as scared as he had been before. He was stronger, better armed, he had support this time.

Of course, despite the constant threat of a patrol encounter, James continued lightly practising his mana. He never let it drop below 60, giving him an even dozen shots before he would have to switch to another weapon. Even then, he would have to be conscious of mana exhaustion. It wasn't fun the last time he had tried it.

At least they hadn't encountered any patrols. Though this meant they had been less than stealthy as the traversed the hallways. James was far from oblivious to this, but instead of being against the lack of stealth, he embraced it. It wouldn't do any good for him to always be on edge. He would get anxiety or something.

Luckily, none of the classrooms they were passing had any piles of bodies in them. In fact, despite none of them being locked, there wasn't a trace of blood in any of them.

"Hey," Dana said softly.

"Huh?" James perked up at the sound and instantly entered his battle pose. His battle pose at this point was almost a fencers pose, but with a revolver instead of a sword. He relaxed when he saw no source of danger.

Dana smiled at his little display, and James willed for his cheeks not to blush.

"You know how when things die here, the muscles and organs and stuff kinda go?"

James, still a little embarrassed, shuffled back to a relaxed standing position and cleared his throat.

"Uh, yeah. Only three hard things and the coins or other things get left behind. What about it?"

"Did that happen to the dead people?"

James stood open-mouthed as he relived the moments he saw in the classroom filled with death. He could have sworn the smell of blood was thick in the air again and he saw the savaged bodies of many. Their agony filled faces frozen in his mind. Though he never wanted to, he placed a name to each face, and his interactions with them. Knowing everyone had its downfalls.

James was bought back to Dana shaking him by his shoulders, then when he didn't immediately react, she hit him across the face with her book.

He was lightly stunned for just a few seconds, but while he was, he still felt the grip of horror on his heart. Adrenaline and fear had helped him through the gruesome scene in the first place, but he was still haunted by what he had seen. He could feel his heart pumping hard in his chest, and he was coated in a cold sweat.

Dana pulled him into a sitting position as the effects wore off, panic evident all over her. James smiled weakly to try and calm her, and she hugged him, her breaths ragged and fast.

"I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

Dana started to mumble in his ear, and he put one arm around her back, the other holding his upper body up.

"No. No. It's fine. I just panicked. I guess I'm not over it yet."

James forced an easy tone into his voice. In reality, it was taking all of his effort to not shake over his entire body.

Dana pulled back and helped him to his feet. She picked up the pistol he had dropped when he first froze, and then her book that she had thrown down after she hit him with it.

"So. What was that about? Are you ok?"

Her voice was shaky but she kept it together and started to calm herself.

"I... I think so. It's just. That's not something you forget about."

"Ok. I promise I won't mention it again."

James pulled a faint smile and nodded appreciatively. He took the gun from Dana's hands and put it back in his belt.

Desperate to distract himself from the entire ordeal, he looked ahead to their very near destination. Something just above the doors to the college gym drew his gaze as it seemed to glitter in a thin shaft of sunlight.

Skill learnt: Farsight (B)

His view suddenly sharpened and he was certain what he was seeing wasn't supposed to be there.

He pointed, directing Dana's gaze.

"Is it just me, or is that a giant web?"