The cart kept on moving for a while until we reached its final destination. It looked like a fancy underground train station, just scaled down to mine carts instead of trains. We could see several other carts parked at the other platforms, but a quick look at the dust that had gathered on them revealed that only 2 of them beside ours have been used. The footprints in the dust also helped to deduce this.

"Filyn and Mr. Armor seem to have reached this place." - Garami

"No surprise there. Speaking of surprises, we're not going to encounter any undead hiding in the shadows again, are we?" - Mira

While asking, Mira was clinking with her sword guard all the while. You're just itching to get into a fight...

"Unless they are good with their stealth, then no. This station seems to be an undead-free zone." - Garami

"Tch, what a letdown." - Mira

We left the station and took the stairs up to the ground level. When we arrived at the surface, a strange sight came into our view.

The tunnel exited on the top of a hill, so we have a good look over our current location. The place is a gigantic city made out of half-decayed buildings. The undead can be seen in the shadow of the buildings, so there's no doubt about it, we're in Tir na Nog.

From the looks of it, the city is covering the whole island. I can see apparent differences between several sections of the city, like the color of the lighting. One place seems to be decorated with skulls and jack-o-lanterns. Is that some sort of "Halloween town"?

The color of the lights is extremely noticeable. Mostly thanks to the fact that it seems to be night now. But how!? My watch tells me it's still 16:00! The whole island is covered by a giant wall, so maybe that wall is some sort of magic device that creates a dome of "night"? That sure would be helpful for the undead populace..., which prolly is the ONLY populace here.

"Can you see where Filyn went?" - Garami

"Garami, searching for people is technically more your thing than mine." - Mira

Drats. I have to do all the job. Note to self: after recruiting some male members to prevent people from mistaking the Guild to be Alf's harem, look for some Scouts.

Hmm...there are no obvious signs of destruction here. Of course, the buildings have had better days, but I think that's just part of the whole ghost town shtick. If I only had a map...!

"Hold on, wasn't this place a sub?!" I shouted as I ran back down and looked through the train station.

Success! They had a giant map of the city! There are usually maps on subway stations, but since this place goes just from Tree Sea Isle to this place and vice versa, I thought any potential maps down here would show the city instead of the subway routes. Lucky me~.

The map looks hand-drawn. It was probably made to be a replacement for that old, barely readable one from who knows when that is now placed in the corner of the station. If I had to choose, I'd say the handmade one is better. The city seems to be divided into 8 districts, which matches the overall impression I got from looking at it from the top of the hill. Plus the districts are color-coded to match the lighting, which helps to figure out where I am.

The southwest district, the one where the train station (Horror Hill Station, according to the map after Bloom translated the gibberish text on it) is located and our current location, seems to have nothing special going on for it except Horror Hill Station. The streetlights gave off a strange grey light though, if that's anything. Which also meant this part of the map was colored grey.

Moving clockwise to the west district, which is colored red (blood red. Yikes.), several tombstones were painted on the map. I remember seeing that. There was a giant graveyard in that direction! *Brr*... The name for this district is "Tombstone Town". Doesn't seem to be anything special here.

In the district to the northwest, there seems to be some...spring? Waterwork? Lake? Whatever it is, it's the purple district. We could go there if we ever get thirsty. The name is "*something* Spring", but the first half is unreadable due to the map having deteriorated right there, Typical...

And the north district is gold-colored. Literally. There's a painting of a castle on that part of the map, but the borders between it and the northwest and northeast districts have a padlock and chains drawn on them. Not to mention the huge "WARNING" signs written there. I bet that this district is closed off for us commoners. Maybe there's a key somewhere to unlock it? But let's let sleeping undead lie. If the guy who wrote this map is that scared of this castle, then who am I to disbelieve them?

In the mentioned northeast district, colored green, there are theater buildings and masks covered on it. And for some reason...a dragon? I think it is, but the drawing looks half-assed. Almost on purpose. Weird. For some reason, this place is named "Silver Key Theater". But there's no silver, nor any keys here! ...KEYS!! That may be a clue on how to unlock the closed-off castle district!

Whatever secrets that theater is holding, we need to get past the east district first. This place is marked by the color blue, and it seems to be a church pictured here. The place's called "no-dead-land" for some reason, and those "WARNING" signs are there again. Along with some better pictures of dragons than the one on Silver Key Theater. Dragons, as in plural. Yikes...

The southeast is colored yellow and shows several houses. I'm not sure about the name, because someone has cut off that part of the map for some reason. Suspicious...

And the last place, the south district, is the place filled with jack-o-lanterns. It is colored orange, but for some reason, the author behind the map decided to name it "the place where idiots want to live". How rude!!

Anyway, it seems like I've gotten a good overview of this island. Where would Filyn..., no need to ask. She's gonna go straight for the castle. Golden lights and locked doors, it just screams of "adventure". In that case, she's prolly taking the shortest path through Tombstone Town and the whatever- Spring.

"I'm back", I told Mira after I returned to the surface. "Did anything happen?"

"Nope. This disco-of-the-dead land is as dead as its name suggests. Except for some dust clouds over in that red area." - Mira

"Tombstone Town. I knew it. Let's go!" - Garami

---

???'s PoV:

"Wait, why're we going to such an ominous-sounding place!?" - Mira

"Because that's the place that idiot would go to! I think. Come on!" - Garami

"Right. We got to save her...or whoever's poor enough to encounter her!" - Mira

"Whatever comes first!" - Garami

*Running sounds!*

......

*Sound of metallic footsteps...*

---

Garami's PoV:

Here we are. Tombstone Town! And without even needing to look for them, here are our zombies!! ...Cut into confetti.

"Filyn's been here." - Mira

"Gee, what tipped you off?" - Garami

We followed the trail of destruction, encountering more dead (properly dead, not undead) zombie remains. It would be a waste not to clean up after her, so I absorbed most of the corpses Filyn had left behind for us. This is getting me a nice boost to my necromancy counters.

I immediately put them into use by creating some Gloom Skeletons to help look for Filyn. I choose the expensive Glooms instead of normal ones because it would be difficult for Mira to see the difference in case we came across some wild Skellies. The Gloom-variant is said to be rare, so what are the odds? ...Is not something I'll go and say out loud. I might jinx myself.

Before long, I reached enough Spectermancy proficiency for the class to reach Lv.20 and obtained [Create Undead: Zombie]. Yay~.

I tested it out right away, to horrifying results. The "Lesser Zombie" that came for free along with the skill stinks! Not only literally, but its abilities as well! It's slow, looks like it could fall apart with a single sneeze, and did I forget to mention it smells? Not as bad as the mess Filyn left behind, but this guy will still not be popular if I used it in populated places such as Velantas. I need to upgrade it sooner than later...

"Garami, keep your head in the game. We're supposed to be looking for Filyn, not having a blast with necro-whatever." - Mira

"...Did I forget to mention there's a golden castle in the north?" - Garami

"PLUNDERING!!" - Mira

"Yeah, what about Filyn?" - Garami

"Filyn who? ...OH! Uh, I mean, of course! We need to be looking for Filyn!" - Mira

Yeah, I shouldn't have mentioned the castle to her...

But thanks to Filyn, we're reaping a boatload of profits here just by following her. Especially me, but the undead remains sometimes have some fancy equipment on them. These will give us quite a buck back at the pawn shop in Velantas.

"Garami! I found something here!" - Mira

"What now? ...Oh, god! Mira, don't start robbing other people's tombs!" - Garami

"Meh, the owner must be out for a walk anyway. Now, take a look at this!" - Mira

Mira, despite all common sense and etiquette, forced open the lid of a coffin that was yet to be covered with dirt. There's luckily no corpse down there. Did they forget to place it in there, or is Mira right and the owner is just getting some fresh air? Good luck trying to get that in this gore graveyard. And if it's the latter, then the owner must prolly be part of the bloodbath by now.

Instead of a corpse, the coffin was filled with coins. Sol coins even! They're mostly bronzes, but I could still spot a few silvers here and there. Nice. And hold the press! Isn't that!

"Good work, Mira!" - Garami

"Well, this [Detect Treasure] thing I recently got is so alluring whenever it makes a ping... Wait a minute. Why is this loose change so impressive? Garami, are you really a...*gulp*, a cheapskate!?" - Mira

"Not getting why you sound so shocked over that, but no, I am not. I'm talking about these beauties." - Garami

"Beauties? What... EXTRA MEDALS!?" - Mira

Yup. A pair of them even. They got a shambling corpse and the word "zombie" on them, so I'd guess they're Zombie-type Extra Medals.

"No clue why they're here, but Mira, if that skill of yours makes any more noise, go and see what it wants." - Garami

"Already on it!" said Mira as she started running around with a shovel god knows where she got from. Still...

"Hey, Bloom. Explain." - Garami

"Must I? This place stinks..." - Bloom

"Do it or I'll use these guys to hunt for a skill that will make you part of the unliving," I said while flashing the two Medals in front of her.

"Okay, okay, I will talk! But...I do not know what is going on here. Honestly! Extra Medals are normally obtained from quests given by the World System, or World System-administrated Dungeons." - Bloom

Chaos Dungeons, in other words. Like that poison cave that I got my sweet new threads from.

"Finding them in a coffin in an old graveyard on an abandoned island isn't exactly a common case, but it doesn't qualify for either of those situations." - Garami

"I am forced to agree with you. If you would not mind, I could dive into the World System network to obtain a better idea of what is going on." - Bloom

"You can do that?!" - Garami

"Yes, but it will prevent me from assisting you until I return." - Bloom

"...Could this diving potentially-" - Garami

"Obtain highly classified information or personal information about people using the World System? No. But I do not think this case is either of those. Tir na Nog does not strike me as a confidential World System project." - Bloom

"Tch. Then one last question." - Garami

"Yes?" - Bloom

"How will this affect [Gamemaster]'s skill proficiency?" - Garami

"Let me tell you this: I will wish to never have to dive ever again." - Bloom

"So it's deadly exhausting. That sounds promising for the skill levels. You have my permission." - Garami

"I'd rather wish this idea had been denied..." - Bloom

Bloom gave a listless salutation before disappearing again. Hopefully, we will get to the bottom of this Medal mystery, AND I'll get some more AP~. Speaking of which, they gathered up again when I wasn't looking. I have over 25 AP now since my last shopping spree! The doubling effect of being a Champion is one thing, but all my passives are getting some sort of exercise every day.

I could ask Bloom to take care of investing them, but that would prolly lead to a heap of useless skills. Better to do this manually.

That [Detect Treausre] skill Mira mentioned sounds like something, so I can get that. As for any other new skills...probably not. It will be too messy to keep track of everything unless they are passives. Besides, several skills have reached their maximum level, and evolving a single 1st tier skill to its 2nd tier costs 6 AP alone. It seems that [Identification] can evolve as well, but it needs 10 AP, almost half of what I have on hand now, and the new skill doesn't seem to have skill levels even!

...However, it also seems to give you more information for your buck. And it even has a demons-only variant of itself!? No extra costs either, even when the skill gets better at looking past obscurations of the demonic type. There's also the fact that it gives you more info on "hellish" targets, but I have the Kigal-Note for that so that part isn't so important to me. It is still quite a nice upgrade though...

As for the other skills I could evolve, I have three Ability Skills on the list. [Mana Auto-Recovery], [Speed], and [Dexterity]. The latter two are given as a reward for some Hunting Titles, and so are their T2 variants, but I wouldn't be annoyed for having to evolve them right away. The T2 Ability Skills grant extra status points with level-ups, so even if I have to live with my stats a little lower than usual for a while, it will be worth it in the length.

And evolving [Mana Auto-Recovery] is a no-brainer. Faster recovery for MP? Why didn't I do this before?! It's been stuck at Lv.50 for a while now. Then again, the new skill will have its level reduced to Lv.1, so even if it's a higher-quality product, the output will still be lower than normal for a while until the level catches up.

The verdict? I'll evolve the three Ability Skills, along with obtaining [Detect Treasure]. I have other skills that could need an upgrade, but better stats are always welcomed. And I can't wait until I've killed a gazillion who-knows-what. My levels would reach the roof by that time, and that would cost me lots of potential free status points!

[Detect Treasure] is to help Mira in looking for more Medals. Trying to obtain rare T3 skills through Extra Trials is way better than having to buy T1s from the Skill Shop, then train them for god knows how long until I can use them as materials for upgrading my unique items.

When my AP reaches 10 or more, I'll think about evolving [Identification]. It seems like a good buy.

SYSTEM MESSAGE:

You have consumed a total of 21 AP.

You have acquired the skill: [Detect Treasure Lv.1].

You have evolved the skill: [Speed Lv.50 (Max)] into skill: [Swift Speed Lv.1].

You have evolved the skill: [Dexterity Lv.50 (Max)] into skill: [Nimble Dexterity Lv.1].

You have evolved the skill: [Mana Auto-Recovery Lv.50 (Max)] into skill: [Mana Greater-Recovery Lv.1].

Great! Let's go treasure hunting, AKA, Medal hunting! ...That's weird. I'm feeling like I'm forgetting something important. Like, a "the whole reason we're in this place"-level something. ...Meh. Must just be my imagination.

---

Name: Garami | [Dungeon Raider] Race: Stygian Executioner Gender: Female Level: 24/50 Traits: 4 Karma Value: -200 Main Class: Arachnid Assailant Lv.43 Sub Class: Weaver Lv.34 Sub Class: Demonic Rogue Lv.31 Sub Class: Spectermancer Lv.20 Sub Class: Alchemist Lv.16 Skills: 109 Titles: 27 Blessings: 3 Aether Points: 7.8 HP: 333/333 MP: 655/655 SP: 347/347 STR: 473 VIT: 213 MAG: 467 RES: 313 SPD: 686 DEX: 715 INT: 120 LUC: 150 LP: 19

Skill List:

Skill List: Ability Skills: [Extra Health Lv.6] [Massive Mana Lv.15] UP2 [Minimized Mana Consumption Lv.14] UP2 [Mana Greater-Recovery Lv.1] EVOLVED [Increased Stamina Lv.10] UP1 [Greater Strength Lv.9] UP1 [Tougher Vitality Lv.6] [Resistance Lv.11] UP6 [Swift Speed Lv.1] EVOLVED [Nimble Dexterity Lv.1] EVOLVED Attack Skills: [Guard Lv.4] NEW/UP3 [Parry Lv.5] NEW/UP4 [Hardlight Claw Lv.9] UP3 [Darkness Bullet Lv.35] UP3 [Darkness Drain Lv.3] NEW/UP2 [Poison Ball Lv.14] UP3 [Demon Claw Lv.14] UP2 [Thread Control Lv.2] NEW/UP1 [Web Bomb Lv.27] UP3 Magic Skills: [Darkness Magic Lv.6] REPLACED [Healing Magic Lv.6] [Necromantic Rites Lv.17] UP9 [Create Undead: Skeleton Lv.11] UP7 [Create Undead: Zombie Lv.1] NEW [Magic Eye of Poison Lv.4] NEW/UP3 [Magic Eye of Blindness Lv.15] UP2 [Magic Eye of Weakness Lv.13] UP1 [Magic Eye of Fragility Lv.8] UP2 [Magic Eye of Slowness Lv.4] NEW/UP3 [Magic Eye of Deterioration Lv.13] UP1 [Summon Phantom: Ghast Spider Lv.6] REPLACED Crafting Skills: [Weaving Lv.30] UP1 [Tailoring Lv.23] UP1 [Dyeing Lv.13] [Repair: Cloth Lv.4] UP2 [Alchemy Lv.15] UP4 [Synthesis Circle Lv.12] UP2 [Conversion Circle Lv.2] UP1 [Trap Creation Lv.8] UP3 Active Skills: [Liquid Control Lv.14] UP3 [Aura of Darkness Lv.33] UP1 [Optical Cover Lv.30] UP3 [Cleanse Poison Lv.11] UP5 [Misdirection Lv.2] NEW/UP1 [Sticky Limbs Lv.28] UP6 [Cutting Thread Lv.30] UP3 [Web Wings Lv.11] UP2 [Dreadful Menace Lv.12] UP2 [Spatial Storage Lv.26] UP3 [Nature's Webbing] NEW Passive Skills: [Dagger Proficiency Lv.19] UP3 [Scythe Proficiency Lv.24] UP4 [Rope Proficiency Lv.14] UP3 [Lurk Lv.50 (Max)] [Aiming Lv.41] UP6 [Evasion Lv.24] UP6 [Jump Lv.14] UP3 [Parkour Lv.50 (Max)] UP3 [Ambush Lv.31] UP2 [Sadistic Constitution Lv.19] UP3 [Throwing Lv.40] UP3 [Camouflage Lv.40] UP3 [Demonic Disguise Lv.10] UP1 [Climbing Lv.32] UP4 [Riding Lv.14] UP2 [Slumber Lv.8] UP1 [Dreamlike Form Lv.25] UP4 [Necromantic Harvest Lv.10] UP5 [Necromantic Knowledge Lv.9] UP4 [Necro Ailment Lv.1] NEW [Fear Reinforcement Lv.17] UP4 [Destruction Reinforcement Lv.11] UP3 [Concentration Lv.50 (Max)] UP4 [Prediction Lv.37] UP4 [Parallel Thinking Lv.44] UP5 [Vital Point Knowledge Lv.27] UP4 [Language Adaptation] Perception Skills: [Gamemaster Lv.35] UP4 [Detect Poison Lv.21] UP9 [Detect Monster Lv.40] UP4 [Detect Trap Lv.11] UP2 [Detect Treasure Lv.1] NEW [Vision Reinforcement Lv.39] UP4 [Auditory Reinforcement Lv.38] UP4 [Olfactory Reinforcement Lv.35] UP5 [Tactile Reinforcement Lv.34] UP2 [Taste Reinforcement Lv.32] UP6 [Tracking Lv.28] UP4 [Danger Sense Lv.30] UP4 [Sense of Direction Lv.50 (Max)] [Identification Lv.50 (Max)] [Evil Eye of Dark Sight Lv.11] UP2 Leadership Skills: [Leadership Lv.19] UP7 [Charisma Lv.13] UP5 [Party Lv.16] UP4 [Control Undead Lv.7] NEW/UP6 Resistance Skills: [Darkness Resistance Lv.16] UP3 [Light Resistance Lv.5] UP2 [Poison Resistance Lv.19] UP6 [Blindness Resistance Lv.9] UP1 Elements: [Darkness Element Lv.13] UP4 [Lesser Light Element Lv.14] UP5 [Lesser Poison Element Lv.19] UP9 Monster Skills: [Demon's Strong Muscle Lv.15] UP2 [Demon's Spiritual Arts Lv.16] UP3 [Demon's Nimble Legs Lv.20] UP4 [Glow Web Lv.29] UP3 [Spider's Bite Lv.16] UP2 [Spider's Poison Lv.20] UP3 [Demon Spider's Thread Lv.13] UP3 Extra Skills: [Demon Lord Lv.1] [Darkness Dragon - Zahhak Lv.1]

Title List:

Title List: Achievement Titles: [Reincarnator] [Titan Killer] [Fearbringer] [Darkness Technique User] [Merciless] [Daredevil] [Destroyer] [Mystic Arts Master] [Rescuer] [Mysterious Killer] [Dungeon Raider] [Light Technique User] [Poison Technique User] [Dungeon Clearer] NEW Hunting Titles: [Dread Spirit Genocider] [Monster Slaughterer] [Insect Slayer] [Beast Slaughterer] [Arachnid Slayer] [Snail Slayer] [Slime Slayer] [Serpent Slayer] NEW [Lizard Slayer] NEW Status Titles: [Migrant] [True Chaos] [Slayer of the Ultimate] [First Clearer of "Shadow Poison Jar"] NEW