The booklet contained information he otherwise wouldn't find in the guilds library, like personal notes, theories and synergies between the classes. Truth be told, Bones already knew what his choice of class would be. Learning a second class is a decision not to be taken lightly. Most take on a second class because of the synergy between the classes and to complement the prowess of the first class and in some rare cases, out of desperation.

Not everyone is satisfied with the choice of their first class and choose to replace it and focus on leveling their second class, despite the experience penalty.

Bones was warned, what felt like ages ago, that choosing a second class this early on the path would damper the progress of his first class. Something that happened to gang boss Vol, back in Westbrook. He was outdone by the more specialized assassin Trevak. Bones agreed and chose to focus on his main class as he liked it. He thought it suited him well.

The booklet didn't contain information on the Bonemancer class but it did provide the information Bones was looking for. He was looking for an insight into the necromancer class focusing on the minion build. Bones didn't plan on learning how to summon skeletal minions. He was looking for an insight into minions' builds in general. His interest was in golems specifically and after finding and reading about what he was looking for, he stored the booklet and brought the first prompt back up. He gave it a glance and without hesitation, accepted.

Would you like to advance a class Bonemancer > Bonemancer Adept?

Yes/No

You have chosen to advance a class Bonemancer > Bonemancer Adept

Advancement initiating…

Bones felt the mana overflow him. He didn't feel discomfort nor pain, unlike the time he overloaded his core. It was a pleasant and constant stream of mana coursing through him. He felt the changes taking place. This overflow lasted for a minute and a soft ding sounded out when it was over. A new prompt appeared and he read the description of his new class.

Congratulation on advancing the class Bonemancer > Bonemancer Adept

Bonemancer Adept - You have threaded the path of bones and have chosen to advance further. The mastery of bone manipulation and any consequential related skills is increased. The adept can specialize in dealing direct damage or learn to create golems made of bones to do his bidding!

+1 INT per level in class. Points are added retroactively for every level prior to class advancement

+1 free point per level in class

Recommended point distribution: INT

ding

"WHAT?" Bones blurted out. What he read about the attribute distribution left him flabbergasted. He hurriedly displayed his status screen to see if the boost to INT was real.

Status

Status

Attributes

Name: Bones

Race: Undead Skeleton lvl 18

Class: Bonemancer Adept lvl 25

Profession: ???

Hp - 390 (3.9 hp/s)

Mp - 780 (23.8 mp/s)

Sta - ∞

STR: 22

AGI: 5

END: 5

VIT: 39

INT: 78

WIS: 16

Free points:

"I'll be damned, it's real! " No wonder I felt the rush of power overwhelm me. It was from a sudden increase in INT.

DING

Hm? Oh right…

The not-as-soft sound of notification reminded him he was not yet done with the advancement. A new prompt appeared, asking him to choose a skill of his choice.

New skills available:

Bone Absorption

Create Bone Golem

Corpse Explosion

Bone Totem

Skills available were interesting in many ways and would most likely dictate his path from here on out. As for the skill choice of his newly advanced class, Bones - of course - picked Create Bone Golem.

You have learned a new skill: Create Bone Golem

Create Bone Golem [active] - a magically animated creation made from bones. Golem creation starts from construct creation, automaton creation and mana nucleus creation. Golem is operational after the mana nucleus is infused with the construct.

ding

"There’s more?"

You have learned a new skill: Golem Mastery

Golem Mastery [passive] - increases efficiency of created golems with levels in a skill. Efficiency applies to golem's physical attributes and its ability to comprehend and follow the instructions given to them. Golem attributes depend on the materials used to create the golem and the level of golem mastery.

Mana cost depends on Golem's level and is affected by Golem Mastery.

Golem Mastery: +1 golem per 10 levels in a skill

I’m actually feeling a little tired going through this wall of text. *chuckle*

Bones waited for a minute and after seeing that no new notifications were incoming, he got up. He had a few hours until the sun set and he planned to explore and test the extent of his new skill until nightfall!

Creating golem followed a set of rules, as stated. The first rule being using bones as a material. Manifesting bones of mana, like his attack skills did, wasn't possible. Bones had to find suitable bones necessary to construct a golem. The Viper's body was out of the question as it was already half dissolved. He needed new bones, preferably untouched and undamaged. Not any bones would do either. He assumed his shaping skill would come in handy while constructing an endoskeleton for his golem. He just hoped his shaping skill was a high enough level for the occasion.

Bones took out a bundle of small bones from his inventory. He intended on using them to level his shaping skill. They were all small bones, altered and put together in the form of a small animal. A cat, to be more precise. He didn't know if they would suffice since they were previously made but the whole point in shaping them, apart from gaining experience, was for this moment to test the golem creation skill.

With bones prepared beforehand, it didn’t take long for Bones to have his first construct done. The next step was creating a nucleus with a clear mental image on the capabilities of the golem. More complicated "programming" would make for a more complicated nucleus, so he started with a simple set of movement and behavior rules to follow. It wasn't hard to visualize the movement and behavior of a cat as he was already familiar with the small balls of fur.

After a few minutes of probing and testing how it all worked, a tenth of Bones' max mana dropped and the nucleus was made. All that was left was to slowly infuse it in the skull of a cat.

A created nucleus levitated atop of his palm. He kneeled by the cat construct and pressed his hand gently against the cat's skull. The nucleus went through and tendrils of mana spread out from it, attaching themselves to every major bone in the construct. A second later, a new notification appeared, confirming the successful creation of his first golem. Bones smiled, a success at first try!

Now then, what should I do with it? It won't be much of a test if a cat slumps down and sleeps…

"Come!" *psst psst* "Come here!"

Bones moved and the cat followed, but fell to the side after the first few steps. Bones turned around and sighed. Of course it would be like that. It's always like that.

"Now then, what went wrong?" Bones approached the overturned construct, crouched beside it and inspected every inch of its body.

The body shouldn't be the problem. It doesn't matter that the bones aren't the most accurately constructed. They don't have to be as there’s no flesh and muscles to support. Then, is the problem within the nucleus? Seeing how it actually moved a few steps and stopped, it seems its body movement was constricted? No, not constricted, hm…Bones carefully inspected his construct and the way the nucleus was connecting everything together. Tendrils of mana attached are no good! He concluded after making an observation.

The tendrils coming out of the nucleus were only attached to major bones and needed to be attached to most if not every bone in the body for it to be capable of free and natural movements! "Well, this just became more complicated…"

Bones positioned the cat upright and dismissed the nucleus. He would have to create the new nucleus with the same programming, but with more tendrils of mana he would have to guide and attach to bones himself!

After creating the new nucleus, while in the process of fusing, Bones guided the tendrils as planned but failed to attach them to every bone. He repeated the process and after a few hours, Bones stopped. His every attempt to make the cat golem move more than a few meters failed. He was making progress, just not at the rate he would like to make.

This is really hard. Creating the nucleus and guiding tendrils is mana starving!

Even with a boost to his maximum mana, Bones was left with low mana. Adding more tendrils increased the cost of fusing the nucleus. Whatever it cost him at the beginning, now it cost him three times as much. The only upside to his failures were the levels in golem mastery. At level 5, golem mastery provided him with a necessary boost to golem creation efficiency. Mana necessary to guide the tendrils was slightly reduced and he found it slightly easier to attach them to the whole construct. When he successfully attached the last of tendrils, his creation was complete at last! Bones metaphorically exhaled a breath of relief, not even realising he worked on the golem throughout the night.

Bones ran through the jungle with a small cat made of bones at his heels, barely keeping up with him! While he battled the giant rats in swarms, the cat leisurely lazed on the ground at a distance. Truly like a cat, he grinned.

Bones wasn't killing the giant rats just for the experience, but to gather enough materials for the new golem. Every minute his golem was functioning, he was gaining a miniscule amount of experience. After a few hours, the cat stopped following him. Bones frowned but was relieved when he saw there was nothing wrong with it. The nucleus ran out of mana and dissipated.

Seems, without the mana core, the time the golem would function depended on the amount of mana used in the creation of the nucleus. This could be troublesome if it happened in the midst of a fight.

Bones considered using the mana core he got from the Ant Queen for a moment but quickly dismissed the idea. At least not before he got his hands on the extra mana core. After recreating the nucleus and with the cat in tow, he continued decimating giant rats and other kinds of rodents for the rest of the day.

At the end of the day, he made good progress with golem mastery, but it would still take quite a while to get to level 10 and have another golem available. He could've deconstructed the cat and made a new golem but he really didn't feel like doing it. The cat being his first golem and all…

Bones made another progress and gained a new level in the race. His race was now level 19 and it wouldn't be long until he gained a new racial skill at the next level. Until he completed his short-term goal of reaching level 10 in golem mastery, Bones continued decimating rodents and switching to salamanders the next few days. With different sorts of bones collected, Bones was thinking of what kind of golem he wanted to make and what for?

Another day passed and Bones had been in the dungeon for four days now. His practice netted him levels in Bone Shaping and Golem Mastery, along with usual experience gained in other skills. His meditation was getting close to advancing and that was something he looked forward to! His Bone Armor was getting a lot of beating and with that, a lot of experience too. Mend skill, as usual, was leveling at a slower pace but was more effective with every level.

Bones tried making another golem while having the cat golem and found that while he could create the skeleton and the nucleus, he couldn’t fuse them together. His Golem Mastery was still missing a few levels until he could create another golem. Still, he practiced creating a golem and separately, creating a nucleus with as many tendrils around it as possible. Practice made perfection and more importantly, gave skill experience!

Bones couldn’t tell how big the dungeon was, but as he went deeper, he found monsters of higher level. That meant, hopefully, that he was heading in the right direction toward the boss!

Time passed as Bones cleared zone after zone. After each zone, he would stop for a period of time and practice. Eventually he started reading Chronicles of the Skeleton King while he meditated. He wasn’t sure how accurate the book was, but the Skeleton King had quite the background.

“The Skeleton King was of a Giant race. A tall humanoid being, reaching up to four meters tall! Back then, among the various tribes, a teen had risen in reputation. His savagery towards his enemies and the way he fought, earned him the class Berserker. With a giant battle-axe and his giant frame, he was a towering presence to other races. The Giants were truly beings made to be warriors! They were few in numbers. Believed to be nature's way of balancing things. Over the years, the teen became a man and the man was known to others as a Wargod, a title bestowed to him by the system as well as his enemies. When the Wargod advanced to the third tier, he started conquering outside the tribe and in the direction of the other races.

In the wake of the conquest, he led his army he referred to as his minions, and left only ash and destruction. Alliances were made to subdue the Tyrant and his conquest was eventually stopped. Grievously wounded, he disappeared from the known world. After four hundred years of absence, the name of the Wargod was all but forgotten.

The comeback of the King was written in the annals of history. First, the tribes fell. Giants were wiped out from existence. The village fell, then the town and soon, the city. A new monstrosity appeared with a giant skeletal frame and a giant battle-axe by its side. It commanded the army of the undead and with each city fallen, its army grew. Past alliances were reforged and new alliances formed and ascendants were forced to retaliate once again. The Skeleton King was pushed back and eventually retreated to the Underworld where he reigned supreme but not before he took down a dozen ascendants. It was the most brutal battle seen until the Guild Wars a few thousand years later, that turned the once two major kingdoms into the desolate area that was now a part of the Desolate Lands.”

Bones finished reading and was deep in thought. “To put it simply, he escaped death by becoming an undead, an ascendant undead somehow, and then made a comeback by wiping out his entire race so he would be the only one left? Finally, he was forced to retreat but not before killing a dozen of ascendants.” Advanced to the third tier?

“From what I could tell, apart from having some sort of a variant warrior class, Berserker - the King, had dominion over undead?! The book even mentions soul attacks and binding the souls of the fallen to himself."

This…solidifies the idea I had. Yes, I think it could work! Bones looked at the cat golem, basking in the sun. Seemingly, an idea formulated in his head. He didn’t like what he was going to do very much, but with the system guidance, it shouldn’t be like it was before. It would take some time before his plans came to fruition but he had all the time in the world. The first step beginning with…He took out a set of small monster bones and started shaping them. Roughly an hour later, he switched to practicing creating nucleus and repeated, until he had enough practice and moved to a new zone.