Bones stood in the middle of a goblin village, surrounded by the corpses. This was the 3rd goblin village he had cleared. He was wiping the blood off the sword while reading his notifications. He was deeper in the forest and goblins started to feel like a proper challenge. With bone spears and bone nova, Bones started using different kinds of weapons in battles, hoping to learn the basic mastery for each! Lately, he’s been fighting up close and at mid-range and he started to feel that he was lacking in close combat. Why use different weapons? Because he wanted to learn five different weapon masteries to unlock a weapon combat mastery. A mastery that increased the effectiveness of all weapon types! Maybe even his bone spear?

Status.

Status

Attributes

Name: Bones

Race: Undead Skeleton lvl 11

Class: Bonemancer lvl 13

Profession: ???

Hp - 250

Mp - 380

Sta - ∞

STR: 15

AGI: 5

END: 5

VIT: 25

INT: 38

WIS: 5

Free points:

The sun was setting down and it was getting darker. He was done with the goblins for the day. There’s another prey he wanted to hunt tonight. Checking his quest marker, he saw he was approximately an hour away from the target’s area. Storing his weapon, he moved in the direction of the marker.

Spiders weren’t his usual targets. Especially spiders reaching his waist. These were nocturnal, see-in-the-dark, poisonous and around level 13. They had a hard carapace making them hard to deal with and use their chelicerae to hold prey while injecting venom. Perfect training targets, or so he thought!

After a gruesome night, Bones reluctantly admitted that mistakes were made. Spiders were fast and numerous and he did not have fun at all! If it wasn’t for his poison immunity and no flesh to bite into, he would be dead already, hundred times over. He did get his weapon combat proficiency! Along with a level in class, a lot of spider silk and a poisonous salve he planned to make use of. With another quest done, he found the spot void of corpses and sat down in meditation.

Someone was bound to find the corpses by now. I wonder if an investigation would be made? That mage brat looked like he had some connections by the way he was carrying himself. Hopefully no one with the searching ability would come to investigate...

Back in the adventurer guild, a report by the guild scout was delivered. Another adventurer's party was found, killed and looted. While it wasn’t uncommon for adventurers to die, even in the newbie zone regulated by the guild, for the two whole parties to die within weeks, it was. Also, monsters didn’t loot the bodies! Inquiries were made and by dawn, a new contract was posted to investigate the killings, find the culprit and bring him to the guild, dead or alive! Which meant that sooner or later, someone with the searching abilities would track Bones down.

Horus was a level 17 scout adventurer, also in the service of the boss Vol and in his hands, he was holding a newly posted contract. Found you…

Horus was looking for clues in the clearing, where the fight took place. He wasn’t the first one here, he could tell by the tracks left behind. Unlike the others, Horus had both magic perception and a searching ability. There were faint traces of mana still left on the scene, one particularly strong. Arcane magic? It wasn’t him? More or less, he could tell how the fight played out. Everything seemed like what he was looking for apart from arcane magic. He turned his head, looking at a faint trail left by mana and then ran off in the same direction.

My mana regeneration can't keep up with the way I fight. Should I invest points in wisdom? I like the feeling of power though. Maybe I could drop the point in WIS just for a little a bit and…no no let's not lose ourselves. Then again…

Bones spent his morning meditating, in a dilemma. In battles, he tends to use his skills in quick succession, which would leave him empty of mana. He could either boost his mana with intelligence or boost his mana regeneration with wisdom. Intelligence would also increase his damage and wisdom would increase his casting speed.

A burst damage or sustained damage? *sigh* “I’ll leave the decision after the next level.”

Slowly, he stood up, dismissing his status screen. After spending the night killing the arachnids in dozens, he leveled up his class to level 14. One more level and he would gain a new skill. Depending on the skill, he decided to invest either in intelligence or wisdom. Looking at the map, he marked the new location. Outside the newbie zone and one he was already familiar with. With a new-found resolve, he started walking.

By the end of the day, before the night fell, he reached the field. He still clearly remembered the night the skeleton army marched. Southeast, in the direction of the capitol huh? He stepped forward and looked around. The clearing seemed larger during the day than he remembered. It was an open field, without a single part of the tower in sight! He was walking around, the patches of grass, up to his knees. He was sure the field would have been a beautiful sight, full of flowers of different colors, if it weren’t for a few hundreds of holes, skeletons crawled up from. As he was looking at the remnants of the ritual, he sensed two figures entering the clearing and approached him. Bones turned around and looked at the newcomers.

Judging from their get up, they seem to be the guild's scouts. Patrolling maybe? Hardly, this was far outside of their patrolling route.

“You there! What are you doing out here?” Shouted one of them as soon as they got closer.

*tsk* No manners. “Walking, as you can see.”

“Hm? Are you being smart with me? What’s with your equipment? Remove the mask so we can see who you are!”

“Amazing! Trouble seems to follow me wherever I go!”

“Relax, Brine. We just want to ask you some questions, if that's alright?” Interjected the other scout, a woman.

Bones nodded after a second of consideration.

“Do you know what happened here? And- ” after a period of silence, she continued “ -have you seen anyone suspicious? There’s a killer on the loose, attacking anyone with connections to the adventurer guild!”

Bones' body stiffened at the question and he gasped. “What?” Is there someone else but me attacking poor adventurers?

Seeing his reaction, she continued, “You DO know something! Any information you can provide will be helpful!”

“Hm, yes I might have some information.” He looked at the holes in the ground not far away from where they stood “I presume these holes were made by the skeletons we’ve been hearing about in the guild. I don’t know anything about the killings though. Could there be a connection between the two?”

This time, scouts were surprised and tensed at the mention of the skeletons. They both turned to look in the direction Bones was looking at and saw a field full of holes.

“This… Look over there! The circle on the ground and the formation? This IS the sight of a ritual! This must be the place the necromancer used to summon his army! We need to report this to the guild right away!” shouted the reasonable scout of the two.

She was both roused and livid, while her colleague just nodded and kept observing Bones. They didn’t stick around for much longer. The woman drew in her notebook what was left of the formation and wrote everything else they found. When they were done, they left, but not without the man giving Bones a stink eye.

What a weird bunch.

Bones continued searching for the remnants of the tower, when he felt the slight tug in his soul. He turned around in the direction he felt the tug coming from and walked over. A tug felt stronger as he got closer. It almost felt like a heartbeat. It was here! He knew it! His formation to the basement was bound to him. He didn’t want anyone entering or breaking into the basement, so he spent a lot of time and work, to make it soulbound to him.

It’s underground! Am I going to have to dig up the entrance?

He was circling the area, trying to find an entrance or a tunnel or anything for that matter. He couldn’t find any.

*sigh* “I guess I’m going to have to dig one up!”

Bones went to work. Where he felt the tug was the strongest, that’s where he started digging. Without a shovel, he was forced to improvise, so he kept lodging his bone spear in the ground and removing the earth before the spear dissipated. It wasn’t practical and it took him a few hours until his spear went through the layer of earth and disappeared in the dark. He had found a way down! Meanwhile, in the distance, hidden among the trees was Horus, overlooking Bones digging earth. What in the hells is he doing? He got here a couple of hours ago and saw Bones dig. He couldn't Identify the figure from a distance so he wasn’t absolutely sure it was his target, so he crouched and waited.. A couple of hours later, he lost his target while fiddling with the system.

“WHAT? Where did he go damnit?” He jumped out of his hiding spot and rushed the field in the direction Bones was digging. He wasn’t seeing anything as he got closer. Where's the damn hole he was digging? It has to be somewhere here! Bones made a hole alright, small enough to not be as visible from a distance. Someone would have to be within a few meters to be able to spot it over the patches of grass surrounding it. Was I mistaken? He looked around, seeing nothing but a field of grass until the beginning of the forest. Nah it has to be here somewhere!

While Horus was outside searching for the entrance, Bones was down below the surface, sensing the layout of the cave-in he just jumped in. He found the remnants of his tower. The whole ground floor caved in, sometime in the past. Nothing was left unscatched by the passage of time. Only the walls outlining what were once the rooms and foundation, were left behind. The cave itself was large, dome shaped. Stalagmites domed the cave, shining dimmed blue to their surroundings.

What a mess. Basement was below the ground floor. There should be steps leading to the basement, if there were any left.

He searched around for the formation, looking at the walls that he once called his. He allowed himself a pang of nostalgia but quickly dismissed it. This is not who he was anymore, he was different now. Threading a different path, wherever that path would lead to! He couldn’t find the steps, but he did find the familiar markings on the wall from which he felt a tug. He was about to touch the markings when something fell through the entrance he made. He turned around and looked at the figure that just landed, slowly getting up from the crouched position.

“The fuck are you acting so bad-ass for?” Depreciated Bones. He had a feeling someone was bound to come for him.

“Watch your mouth, peasant! You made a lot of noise in the last few days, it’s time you shut the fuck up!”

“Oh? And you think you’re capable of doing that Horus?”

At the mention of his name Horus frowned, he didn’t expect someone three levels lower than him could Identify him! Worse is, he couldn’t identify the person in front of him! If it wasn’t for the shitty mask his target wore and his tracking abilities, he wouldn’t be sure if he had the right person.

“First was Thomas, then Norris. Who sent you after Vol? Was it Trevak?”

*chuckle*

“What’s so funny?” Horus snapped back.

“I think you’re misunderstanding something here. They came after me, not the other way around!”

“What? Do you take me for a fool?”

“Quite frankly? Yes?” As he finished speaking, Bones placed his hand on the marking on the wall and it lit up, shaking the whole cavern. Horus lost his balance for a second and when he looked back at Bones, he was gone! “God damnit, not again!”

Bones didn’t actually disappear of course. The moment he touched the markings, he got the prompt asking him if he wanted to enter the dungeon. He didn’t think he had a chance against Horus so he accepted the prompt and got transported to the new area he was unfamiliar with.