Dix had no idea how long he spent on the obstacle course. By the time he decided he had had enough, he knew the entire course like the back of his hand, and could hit every non timed target without looking. It was probably way too long, but when you don’t get tired, and you don’t have anything you need to do, why not spend your time doing the things you love. Without any girls around, Dix went with training. He even dove into the filthy water to make sure he had Diving, and then what was probably some skill like Hold Breath showed up a while later.

Before heading off to the next test Dix decided to try one section of the range that he thought would help him get a skill he wasn’t particularly keen on, but may need someday in the future. The skill he was hoping to grab was really something more useful for a sniper to shoot through crowds, or for a dedicated bow or crossbow used to fire around allies and swinging monster limbs. It would require awareness of movement near and around the target, as well as excellent timing. Truthfully, Dix wasn’t much for combat at ranges beyond mid range, but this would be an excellent skill to use when initiating a fight from ambush. It was why he had grabbed the arbalest. Learning the skill in the first place would be easier with the bow, since he didn’t have to crank it to load, but the arbalest was what he would use the skill with in the future.

Snatching up one of the bows from earlier, along with the arbalest, he headed to the swinging rings. The rings were set up so that they stayed aligned, but swung at different speeds. The purpose was to shoot through the entire series of rings without the arrow getting knocked off course, and still hit the target in the right spot. Without skills it would be incredibly difficult, but, with luck and great timing, it was something that could be done with a couple of rings at the right timing. Arrows don’t exactly pass something instantly. They are fairly long, and typically move much slower than a bullet. But this particular challenge on the range was obviously set up to teach a skill. There were thirteen rings swinging in front of the target already, and several more set up to be added as needed.

There had been a bit of tingling warmth in Dix’s head earlier when he had first been paying attention to the pendulums, and he suspected that watching the rings would gather him another skill. It would likely be something like Timing, which would segue perfectly into what he was trying to do here.

After watching for a while without getting more than the tingle, he started firing arrows. Four arrows in and the tingle turned into a surety of exactly how long each ring took to make a full swing, his arrow to clear a ring, his fingers to release, and the arrow to reach the first ring. After that it was a little bit of math and memory. And a bunch more arrows. Then it was easy. He could just tell when the right time to shoot was. He would still need to pay attention to the things around the target, but as long as his attention was in the area he would know when to fire. It was actually even easier with the arbalest, but it still took a couple shots before he had it timed correctly.

Pleased with himself at getting yet another useful skill, Dix wandered back towards the table full of weapons with Roanoak in attendance. During his walk, he double checked to see if he was missing anything that may help him before he moved on. The only real thing he had missed was the Hogan’s Alley setup, but he saw no purpose for it other than maybe a Quick Draw skill. Whatever skill he had that made him change weapons so quickly and smoothly seemed to work with throwing weapons just fine, so he didn’t feel the need.

When he got back to the table he divested himself of all of the weapons he had on him. He would most likely put quite a few of them back, however he always liked to start from empty before he geared up to head out for a fight. There was a faint smile on his face as he stroked the weapons laid out for him. Once again he was struck by their purity of purpose. These were not the pretty, overly done weapons you would see for sale on the internet. There was no filigree, fancy colors, or unnecessary decoration. Each and every piece on the table was perfect in its simplicity.

Without really looking at him, Dix complimented Roanoak on his work. “You really are the God of Crafters. These are all beautiful. Simple. Clean. Deadly. Excellent work. I’m quite impressed. With the melee weapons from the Hall of Iron too, obviously.” Roanoak just smiled. Everyone, even gods, likes it when the things they love to do make a favorable impression on someone.

It was a few minutes later when Dix spoke again. “So, I think I’m at least ready to start gathering what I need for the next test. Is it like the last one? Lots of enemies, important rules, and no chance of dying?”

Roanoak snorted. Shaking his head, he relied, “Well, the last part about enemies, rules, and dying is all the same. Nothing else is. Gather up what you think you would like to use. Cover a variety of ranges and enemy types. Sorry I can’t be more specific.”

Dix just shrugged and started loading up. Once again it was mostly knives with a sprinkling of other things. Several spikes, and a pair of chakram, just in case, rounded out the basic throwing weapons. A bolo for fun, although he doubted he would use it at all. While javelins, spears, or even axes would be heavier damage thrown weapons, they were also just plain heavier, and he didn’t want to carry them around. His biggest debate was between a bow and a crossbow for his heavy weapon. He already had a pair of small hand crossbows, but they were only a little stronger than a thrown knife. Nothing on the table hit harder than the arbalest, but it was slow as hell to reload. A longbow would be faster firing, close to the damage, and a longer range. Tough debate. In the end he took both. It was a test that didn’t limit him to a certain number of weapons, and having several had come in quite useful during the melee test.

Finally ready he looked up to see Roanoak smiling and shaking his head. Cocking his head, Dix asked, “What?”

Roanoak just barked a laugh. “Ready for war?”

Looking down at himself, Dix realized he actually had more weapons than he had in the melee test. He moved around a bit to check his range of movement. He drew and flipped several knives, then caught them and sheathed them again. The hand crossbows came up fast, and both the longbow and the arbalest could be rolled off his shoulders in a reasonable amount of time. Even his two quivers didn’t interfere. He smiled an evil smile. Yeah, he could go to war like this.

Dix nodded, and the range vanished.

In the new room Dix just stood there, dumbfounded and silent. Next to him was Roanoak, who was laughing so hard he was having trouble standing, even with four legs. It didn’t help that the centaur was stomping one of his hooves into the ground and covering his whole face with one of his hands to try and hide his mirth, and pointing the other at the human. Dix just started shaking his head at the idiocy of the whole situation.

When the centaur finally calmed down, Dix just asked, “Carnival games? Your second test is fucking carnival games?” This, of course, sent Roanoak back to snickering. “So the first test is murder and mayhem. A no holds barred tournament of bloodshed, violence, and the consequences of bad combat decisions. But the second test? No, no. We couldn’t possibly make it as realistically dangerous as the first test, that would be sadistic. We gods aren’t that cruel, so we’ll make sure you can’t get hurt. Instead we’ll make a game. It’ll be fun. But don’t worry, there will still be plenty of blood, death, and agony to enjoy, just not yours. The last thing we want to do is take your entertainment from you.” Dix’s voice had risen as he spoke, growing harsher, and dripping with sarcasm and scorn. His eyes were fierce and his anger was very apparent as he glared out at the scenery of the second test.

The second test was a carnival game as Dix had suggested, but a carnival game as designed in hell. It was reminiscent of those shooting gallery games with the little rifles that shot pellets, but had sights that were purposely incorrect. There were lines of monsters passing back and forth following carefully laid out pathways between the pits of lava, spikes, acid, and a host of other things that he either couldn’t see, or didn’t understand. Even the sky had monsters gliding, diving, and climbing in a horrific display of aerial domination. And each and every monster on the course had a spike attached to their head from which dangled a meal, conveniently placed right in front of their eyes, but away from their mouth and hands. All of the meals appeared to be sourced from the same general animal: humans. Severed arms, legs, toes, torsos, and heads were all bouncing along, leading the multitude of monsters on parade. There were even whole bodies for the larger members of the horde.

Goblins, ghouls, and gorgons. Fairies, fauns, and fomorians. The whole menagerie of monsters were things out of nightmares and dreams of children. Dix could put a general label to most of them, but some were beyond his knowledge. The lines started about fifteen feet away from where he was standing and continued out of sight. Each row contained, at most, three types of monsters of various sizes, and moved in the opposite direction of its adjacent rows. The skybound monster flocks flew in strange patterns that wove and interlocked with those of their neighbors. All in all, it was an impressive, if horrifying, display of control over things which would be better left alone or dead.

Dix sighed. There was no point getting angry about this. Most likely it was all an illusion, or at least some sort of strange construct creation of the gods. And how do you judge gods anyways, particularly those not of your world? In theory, in their religions they were the thing that determined what was right and wrong anyways, so judging them on this would be pointless. He imagined gods were much like how bad a bunch of parentless children with unimaginable power and a multitude of dedicated servants would be. With no checks and balances on their power, and no one they loved or respected, there was no need to behave in any particular way. Sure, some would probably turn out alright, but most would be monstrous. Having never been a follower of any religion, or even a student of mythology, Dix was unsure of exactly how to deal with these gods, so he went with his old standby and treated them just like everyone else.

With a shrug, and a shake of his head, Dix let it go. Turning to Roanoak, who had stopped laughing and actually looked a little ill at ease and nervous, he asked, “So, what is it I am doing here exactly?”

For a moment, Roanoak just looked down at Dix, trying to determine how upset he was. Eventually he gave up on piercing Dix’s stonelike poker face, and moved on. “There are a multitude of different monsters here, as you can see. They have different strengths and weaknesses, and, at least for this test, different point values. None of which are going to be told to you. Nor will you be able to view your score. Points are only awarded for the dead. It starts as soon as your first attack hits and lasts ten minutes. Good luck.” With that said he disappeared.

A quiet groan slipped out before Dix could stop it. Great, a mystery test. This is bullshit. Well, if it’s a mystery, it must have some sort of reasoning behind it. Let’s see what we can find. Looking out over the fields of monsters didn’t exactly fill him with hope of understanding the test. It did however calm him down enough that he could engage his brain. OK, if I was making a test like this what would I do? After a moment of thought the idea of what he would do finally came to him and he burst out laughing. OK, I’m totally going with that one. I’m sure no one else ever tried it, most people have more sense. Dix figured the trick to this test was telling people that monsters had different point values. Maybe they did, but no one said it was a large difference. If a goblin was worth one point and a giant worth three, was it still worthwhile to try and kill the giant?

If he had to kill a whole bunch of monsters, and they were fairly well packed in, one of the most efficient skills for the job that he had was Exploding Shot. The only problem was that it had a fairly modest radius of effect. Now, if he could get several Exploding shots in a fairly close area together, that would make a fair bit of difference. But there was no telling if it would be enough of a difference. Maybe he should go bigger. No, no maybe. Definitely bigger. Dix started laughing again, but this time it wasn’t his nice laughter. This was darker, more sinister. It was the laugh of a man who hunted other men for sport, seeking entertainment in the pain, violence, and misery. It proved he no longer needed to practice how to laugh like an evil mastermind, he had it down pat.

Dix took one more long look at the rows upon rows of monsters. There were certain sections that he was determined to hit hard, and a few that he planned to try and use for a trick or two. He had no real hope that the tricks he wanted to try would work, but he was going to do it anyways. He let the arbalest slide down his arm, and set it nose down with his foot on the ring at the front to help keep it upright. One more quick check that everything was loose and ready to be used, and then he unslung his longbow. The first thing he was going to do was going to hurt. During his skill practice he had actually tried doing what he was about to do, and while it worked, it damn near split his skull in half. Other than during the first test when he stabbed himself with a dagger he had felt no pain during the tests, so he figured it was about time for some more.

With a couple of deep breaths, Dix aimed toward the non existent ceiling. The arrow on his bow multiplied, each extra arrow seeming to be an illusion clustered around the real arrow nocked on the bow. Now for the hard part. During training he had started with Exploding Shot, and then cloned the arrow. This time he was going to go the other way, hoping it would at least make the pain bearable. Unless the bit he was planning to add at the end made the whole thing worse.

It worked, after a fashion. There was significantly less pain in his skull, but his whole body burned as though his blood was fire, which in a way it kind of was at that point. The amount of mana he had to pour out to make that many Exploding Shots was insane. Dix could feel his mana pouring out of him in a torrent, but he held on, waiting until they were all fully charged. Finally he let the arrows fly. Full Multishot of fifteen arrows, all of which would explode on contact. But he wasn’t done. As the arrows left the bow he pushed all of the stamina and mana he could grab into the arrows, forcing one more skill onto each and every one. Hail of Arrows. While the massive drain of resources was mildly painful in that tingling annoying way, it seemed he had finally figured out how to correctly combine stamina and mana skills. His knees almost buckled with the power expenditure, but he managed to keep his balance. Dix knew he didn’t have time for weakness right now, he had monsters to kill.

Struggling somewhat, he managed to get himself fully upright, and quickly started firing arrows almost as far downrange as he could, trying to get the arrows there before the explosions started. He only got a few before it started, and he couldn’t really aim the arrows falling from the sky, so the results were less than he had hoped, but more than expected. He had been firing at some sort of blue ogre looking things that were carrying large barrels on their backs that they kept dragging mugs out of while they walked along next to some crazy looking goblins juggling oddly shaped metal balls. Dix had been putting arrows into their knees right before they put weight on them, causing the joint to collapse and the creatures to crash to the ground spilling their barrels. It was definitely alcohol, but was it ale, or spirits? It was a gamble to spend so much time on making sure it spilled, but if it was spirits, the pay off would be worth it.