The rising sun broke me out of my slumber. The ball of light was millions upon millions of miles away and it felt like it existed to spite me with its harsh light. I tried to turn away but my arm was pinned down. I cracked open an eyelid and nestled into my chest was Lin, still sleeping. Maybe waking up like this wasn’t so bad after all.

Lin opened her mouth and let out a sleepy yawn, her sharp fangs reflecting the glare. She flopped back onto me and groaned, resisting the urge to awaken. I ran my fingers through her hair and rubbed around the base of her fluffy ears. The thick fur was soft as silk and as I stroked them they danced around dodging my attempts to hold them down.

Lin snorted and looked up at me with a half dazed smile. “Hey there mister, you're going to have to buy me a drink before we get too frisky.”

“Well here I was hoping to get to pet the kitty before she took me to the next death trap.” I said.

Lin rose out of bed and stretched, arching her back to an impressive degree. The blanket fell away exposing her nude body and I couldn’t help but steal a glance. Her tanned skin was covered in little scars and scratches, a testament to her battle hardened nature.

“See something you like?” Lin asked, shoving me out of the bed. She laid down on the bed smiling at my prone form. “I think I’m starting to like having a cuddle buddy I can push around.”

I tried to rise but flopped back onto the floor. My arm felt like pins and needles were jabbing it and I knew it was from the lack of blood flow. I had to shake it out trying to get feeling back into it. As my body sorted it out the sensation tripled and I grit my teeth. With my still working hand I poked her in the nose causing Lin to sneeze.

“You like having something else other than that rock-hard pillow to lay on. Can’t say I mind however…” I said.

I got off the floor as soon as my arm returned to normal and started to get dressed. Lin followed suit and the two of us walked together to sit at the table. Lin threw a clay pot on the stove with some leftovers and started making us a kind of soup for breakfast.

“So today the goal is to get you a level higher, and more importantly…” Lin said pointing a finger at me. “Staying alive.”

I raised my hands up and said. “You got me, no more heroics to save my pal.”

“I’m sure I’ll have to drag your ass out the fire again at some point. Babysitting mages is always a pain, I just hope the payoff is worth it.” Lin teased.

“Why’s that?” I asked, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.

Lin came over and checked on me, tapping me on the forehead. “Did I make you brain damaged?”

I waved off her hands and sat back in the chair, crossing my arms. I tried to show her how serious I was and it looked like it did the trick.

“Well there's all the stories about wild crazy adventures getting into spell slinging magic battles with demons, wiping cities off the map or of some really strong mages able to hop dimensions.” Lin said.

My mouth hung open and all I could manage was a strangled gasp. I thought about my next question carefully, I needed more information but I also didn’t want to play my hand that I wasn’t from Ewyernar.

“Well of course, but those are the legends. I’m more so thinking about, at what level does being a mage really pay off?” I asked.

Lin looked stumped. She sat on the table kicking her legs while staring at the ceiling. The moment of silence was a good chance for me to take a quick look and see if any of the minions left requests. There were only two, one was to ask permission to harvest more clay and the other to try something to harvest the ore.

I approved both but told them to wait for Lin and I to leave before they headed outside. I was curious how they planned on getting the ore. I had a few thoughts on it and if I had the time I would have tried some experiments, but levelling up was far more important.

“I would think around level seven or so. That’s when I’ve seen some mages, druids or priests pull some crazy stuff, but don’t discount your fighter types like me.” Lin said, thumping her chest. “While you might learn how to sling a fireball, all it takes is one good kick to the head to knock you out.”

Now that was interesting. It went against video game conventions, usually with more levels you had more hit points so you could take on bigger and badder foes while tanking their hits. I did notice an absence of any health value on my character sheet. It did give a sense of reality to the situation I was in, no matter how powerful I got, one solid critical hit could end it all. As if sensing my thoughts Lin continued.

“Mind you there's tons of ways to toughen up, the toughness talent or armour enchantments can dampen hits and make them feel like nothing, removing the chance of death by a thousand cuts. I have even heard of a few special talents that can change a killing blow to a bad wound instead.” Lin said.

“Are there any tales of crazy high level heroes kicking the bucket for something silly?” I asked.

Lin threw her head back and laughed. “Oh yeah, Orozco the Great. Dude was super smart and talented but classically unlucky. After blasting an evil dragon out of the sky to save a kingdom he tripped on the stairs on the way to meet the king. Fell all the way down and died when he hit the bottom. It turns out he had changed out a few of his protection spells for parlour tricks to impress the king.”

I grimaced at the thought but I imagined a wizard in fiery robes that were a touch too long walking up a grand staircase, only to trip over his own feet. It was a sobering thought but the brush with death yesterday made me appreciate the irony and chuckle at the dark humour.

“All the more reason to take that toughness talent, can’t have stairs ending my career too early. Besides, who else would be around to give you a hand.” I said.

Lin gave me an affectionate punch and winked. “Now you're getting it. Stick with big sister Lin and we can make you the toughest egghead on the block.”

The meal was served and despite being rather bland I enjoyed it. The hot meal warmed my body almost as much as being in the warm bed did and I found myself being energized. One look out the window however drained me.

“Wow…that’s a lot of frost.” I said, rubbing my temples. “That stupid stag hare I fought ruined my coat too.”

“Hang on a second.” Lin said going back into the bedroom.

She returned with the wool blanket and produced from her jacket a long pin with an open brass ring attached to it. She pulled me to my feet and wrapped the blanket around me like a cloak. She ran the pin through the blanket near my collar and then moved the open portion of the ring in line with it, slotting it through. The ring then clicked into it and she twisted the ring locking it into place. It was a rather simple yet ingenious way to pin it.

I tugged on the makeshift cloak and was delighted to find it held firmly in place. Lin then slapped me on the back and thrust my bag into my arms.

“For that I’m going to charge you a five silver fee later.” she said with a playful wink.

“I think I’m starting to understand how you operate.” I said.

“Let’s go, that tower isn’t going to loot itself!” Lin cried pushing me out the door.

With breakfast over and our gear on there really was nothing left to do but go on our next adventure. The outside world carried a chill to it that promised snow. The thin layer of frost coating everything worried me. I was no stranger to winter and the lack of heating and food in the dungeon could lead to a disaster.

I was however in a world of magic, so there had to be some way to get it. Years of gaming crossed my mind and the spells to create food I had always overlooked in favour of lightning bolts now started to show their appeal. However there was always one other possibility.

I followed Lin in silence, dipping under frozen branches or jumping over to the odd fallen for a few minutes wondering how to approach the subject. Lin felt like a pretty straight forward woman and it was probably best to just get on with it.

I yawned and looked around me pointing out the frost. “Winter’s coming, might have to bunk down in the town-”

“No.” Lin said firmly. “We can manage, and if push comes to shove I have a few contacts we can meet outside town in the woods.”

“That bad, huh?” I asked, trying to sound casual about it.

“Josh. I get what you're trying to do but until a certain someone is dead lets just say it’s not safe for me there, and by association for you as well.” Lin said.

I gulped and dropped the subject. Whatever it was we were on our own then. I held out hope that maybe we would have a lucky find at the tower. The possibilities of handling magic items for real made my hands shake with excitement. Better yet we might even find new spells for me to add to my book.

The journey went faster than expected and a few hours later we broke for lunch as the sun reach its zenith. The forest had thinned and in the distance between the trees I could see open fields. I thought Lin had said it would take most of the day to get there and I saw her staring at the map.

“You know I just figured something out.” Lin said.

I waited for her to speak up and she showed me the map, pointing out the scale. The writing was messy and when I squinted my eyes it was hard to tell what was actually written.

“This was made by gnomes, those short bastards think the world is a lot bigger than it actually is. Upside, we didn’t over shoot the place so it should be just over there.” Lin said, point at the fields.

When she didn’t follow up her statement I tapped her. “The downside?”

“I’m getting a gut feeling that it might be dangerous.” Lin sighed. “I’m not a scaredy cat but for some odd reason I’m getting butterflies in my stomach.”

I frowned, we did come all this way already but if Lin wasn’t feeling it then I would rather take it extra safe. Looking around me at the frost I knew we needed to come back with something, even if it was more old blankets or firewood.

“We can take it slow if you want, just take a peek and if you still feel it's dangerous we can go home.” I said.

The last bit of hare Lin had brought us vanished into our bellies and we walked together to the edge of the woods. A bit of warmth touched the air as it was noon and the frost around us started to melt. My fear of the cold vanished and was replaced with a new fear.

Ahead of us was a sprawling abandoned town. It was easily a dozen times bigger than the town I first found, with this one having a windmill, a church and a sawmill connected to the stream. The buildings were made mostly of wood with many of them in stages of advanced decay hinting that the town had been deserted for decades now.

Then smack dab right in the middle was a sixty foot tall stone tower. The pointed roof of it glowed bright red and a shimmering wall of energy surrounded the tower filling the air with latent energy. The wide base of the tower had uprooted several smaller homes and kicked up mounds of dirt as if it had shot straight out of the ground.

“That’s a wizard tower alright.” Lin whistled.

“What with the weird light wall?” I asked.

“Magical barrier, which means there's no way in.” Lin sighed. “Well we can still pick around the town and see if there's anything useful.”

I scratched at my chin and I could see at the very base of the tower open spots where the shimmering wall didn’t reach all the way down. I pointed it out to Lin and she climbed a nearby tree to take a better look.

“Hey you're right, I can see there’s something under the tower.” Lin shouted down.

“Like what?” I asked.

“There might be an underground portion to it. You know that church doesn’t have a big graveyard but it does have that stone building beside it. Which means something fantastic for us.” Lin said.

She climbed back down and put a hand on my shoulder. Her cheeky grin didn’t fill me with confidence that this was going to be easy.

“Ever wanted to be an archaeologist?” Lin asked.

“What exactly are you talking about Lin?” I asked.

“Well answer me a little philosophical question. How long does someone have to be dead in an abandoned place that it goes from grave robbing to archaeology?” Lin asked. Leading me down towards the ghost town.

It clicked with me and I looked between the church and the magical tower. “There are catacombs under there. Catacombs stretching from an abandoned church all the way to the very clearly evil tower.”

“Oh yeah. Probably extends under the entire town.” Lin nodded.

“Are there going to be undead?” I asked.

“Almost certainly. Abandoned town, old creepy red magic tower and not a single sign of wildlife near it. We got ourselves a necromancer baby!” Lin cried.

I put my hand over her mouth and shot her a dirty look. We were in eyesight of the tower, walking over an empty field. If someone was around we were sitting ducks if they chose to attack us.

“Why are you excited about that?” I hissed.

Lin pulled me to the closest ruin, a dilapidated house with dead vines twisting over it strangling the small building. She looked around the corner, starting at the tower for a minute. Her tail twitched behind her and it took every ounce of self control I had not to reach out to grab it.

“Tower is dirty, no lights are on and the barrier is starting to fail. The mage is probably dead too. Great news, weak undead are a goldmine of experience early on. We can sack the catacombs and if we are lucky there will be a way into the tower from down below.” Lin said.

“I thought you said you had a bad feeling. What if there is a massive horde of them down there and we get overrun?” I asked. “I can only do about five spells a day and I promise you there's probably way more than that down there.”

“Josh, my boy.” Lin said, pulling me in close. “I get you are feeling a bit worried, but we are a team. I know you got my back, you can’t take your eyes off it.”

I had been caught red handed and I didn’t have a counter for it. Lin raised her eyebrows and wore a smug expression. I had to admit defeat.

“Fine, let’s just play it safe so we can make it home in one piece.” I said.

Lin led me between houses, dipping into alleys or walking through broken homes. Little had been unclaimed by nature, plants grew up between the floorboards, empty bird nests were in every rafter we walked under. There were even piles of bones stacked up in one house, Lin told me they were beast bones and not people but the grisly sight was still unnerving.

I felt better keeping in the shadows and out of the line of sight of the tower. It also let us know most of the buildings weren’t worth looting since everything was broken or rotting away. The church however was like the buildings in our town, made of stone and still mostly standing. A solid door of stone barred us from entering the church sadly and Lin didn't see another easy way in.

Lin and I went behind the church and there was the simple looking square stone building. Lin walked up to it briskly and kicked the rotting wood door straight off its hinges. Fragments of wood vanished down into the depths below, clattering off the many stairs meaning a bad slip could make me end up like Orozco already. Lin lit her lantern and attached it to her hip standing where the door had once been.

“Are you sure about this?” I asked.

Lin took a whiff of the stale air coming up the dark stairs leading into the depths of the earth. She sighed fondly like she was smelling fresh apple pie.

“Oh it’s going to be a fun day after all. Don’t fall behind!” Lin cried, rushing down the stairs.

Turns out my adventuring partner was crazy after all. Not wanting to be left up top by myself I followed the light heading down, praying that we made it out of this in one piece.