We spent the rest of the week moving to and from our hideout, ambushing the scant few dungeoneers that were wandering around at night, while simultaneously recruiting other skeletons to our cause, which caused our numbers to swell in the three days we spent.

We now numbered fifty seven, with roughly fourty two of us having been equipped from either the gear chests, or from hapless dungeoneers who no longer needed their gear.

I myself had leveled up twice more, although I hadn't spent my skill points, as I was holding out for something I could use in various situations.

Name: N/A 7:43 PM Race: Undead Sub-race: Skeleton Class: N/A Sub-class: N/A Level: 4 Available Skill Points: 4

Hp: 50/50

Mp: 8/8

Stamina: N/A

Head: Healthy

Torso: Healthy

Left Arm: Healthy

Right Arm: Healthy

Left Leg: Healthy

Right Leg: Healthy

Buffs:

Debuffs:

I was sitting in our new safehouse, safely nestled in the confines of another barracks styled room, which was behind a false wall, which had been discovered by a skeleton who had volunteered as a scout for our descent into the dungeon. It seemed this place hadn't been found by any dungeoneers, mostly because none of them had expected something like this to be on the third floor. Thus, it worked perfectly for the rest of us, although it was a bit far from the stairs to the second floor, so communicating between both forces was time consuming, and dangerous.

The stairs turned out to be at the very back end of the floor, whereas the stairs to the fourth floor were hidden around various areas. Sometimes they were open, sometimes they were closed. I myself hadn't been able to figure out any pattern. The floor itself was similar to the halls of the second floor, but they were slightly wider, taller, and they also had a somewhat darker hue to them, as if they were beginning to try and press down on you.

The monsters we encountered seemed to be goblinoid in nature, and while they seemed to dislike our presence, they didn't attack us on sight. When we explained what we were doing to those that we came across, they almost always snorted and walked right through our ranks, passing us by. They were short, maybe three feet tall, their skin a sickly green, and they all wielded some sort of crude weapon or tool. I was honestly, a little jealous.

In our new barracks, I was sitting on one of the beds, which was in surprisingly good shape, considering it was in a previously unknown room, as far as I knew. It was still unfit for repeated use though, as it looked like it could break at any moment, although the rest were pretty much the same. I had been looking through various types of skills for hours, trying to find something that could either boost my early offensive or defensive capabilties. So far I had narrowed it down to five skills I could choose from.

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Skill Points Available: 4

Touch of Decay: Whatever you touch shall crumble, wither, and die. [Uses 5 Mp per cast] (Skill points required: 6)

Firebolt: Send a bolt of fire to your enemies, and burn them to ash. [Uses 4 Mp per cast] (Skill points required: 2)

Shield: Defend yourself from the attacks of your foes, wherever they may be. [Uses 3 Mp per cast, lasts five seconds, damage under the threshold will be negated] (Skill points required: 4)

Necrotic Roar: Let those who hear this roar, wither away. [Uses 10 Mp per cast] (Skill points required: 10)

Element Infusion: Let your weapon be a conduit for the elements, and let your enemies beware your terrible wrath. [Uses 6 Mp per cast, lasts one minute] (Skill points required: 4)

While I would love to shout my enemies apart like a certain game character did to a king, [Necrotic Roar] was out of my price range at this point, although I filed it away for future purchases. Having something potentially powerful like that would give me a great advantage later on, although I assumed I wasn't going to become a mage any time soon, with how my mana was increasing by only one point per level. [Touch of Decay] would give me a weapon for when I was unarmed, but it too was out of my budget. So, I could choose between [Firebolt], [Shield], and [Element Infusion]. While Firebolt would allow me to attack from range, I wouldn't get many uses from it, so it wouldn't provide any lasting benefits.

That left [Shield], and [Element Infusion]. While [Element Infusion] had a variety of uses, and could greatly increase my combat power in short bursts, [Shield] could be used to potentially throw my opponents off balance, so long as their weapons didn't break through. There wouldn't be much I could do against raw power.

Thus, I spent my points on [Shield].

Shield Lvl. 1 Acquired!

I sure hope this is the right choice.

There were around thirty other skeletons resting in the barracks as well. The rest were out patrolling the second floor, watching for signs of dungeoneer activity, or hiding in the second floor hideout. That was also where we were sending new recruits, when we could get our hands on them. It turned out that the first group of skeletons I had worked with was busy. They had been gathering the other skeletons left and right, arming them with bones made from their dead, or volunteers, who then became living shields for the other warriors.

It seems my brand of insanity rubbed off on them.

They probably had some sort of leader, or someone thinking about how to use bones as weapons. Either way, from our own estimates, they outnumbered us roughly four to one. They'd certainly give the other dungeoneers a headache, which would make it easier for us to move around later on, although we'd probably have to start hiding soon, since I doubted the guild on the surface would just sit idly by while an army grew beneath their feet.

Either way, that problem should take care of itself, in time. So long as they all died. I hoped that they would at least, so I wouldn't have any competition in regards to gathering more and more to my cause.

I didn't even want to think of them becoming allies, since I had been attacked twice already by my own kind, although one of them counted as me provoking them.

After getting lost in thought for I didn't know how long, I decided it was as good a time as any for some sparring, and so I grabbed the nearest skeleton who could hold a sword properly, and we began swinging our blades at each other. Sometimes I blocked, sometimes I dodged, and maybe, I'd been hit one time before I remembered I had a skill that could deal with that sort of thing, and maybe it left a decent crack on the side of my ribcage.

However, there was some luck in this situation, even though one of my ribs was now barely hanging from a fragment of still connected bone. One of our skeletons turned out to have slightly more mana than the rest of us, and they'd gained enough skill points personally to get a healing skill. Soon a light [Healing Word] was cast, and my ribcage slowly mended.

We have a healer. We have tanks. We have DPS. We are the optimal team composition.

I almost couldn't stop myself from laughing at the absurdity of it, despite how useful it actually turned out to be, as we could now spar without as much worry, and we were able to recover from battles so long as our healer had time to recover their mana. She even had a decent bone structure, if I had to say so. There was still no way I'd ever even think about romancing a skeleton, though. Partially because I had no libido to speak of, but also because I had no interest in relationships in the first place.

Thus, they were guarded zealously by eight of our number. We trusted each other, but when I ended up assigning a personal detail to our first healer, they took to it with a particular fervor, and not even we could be healed, unless there were at least two of them watching.

I was still being healed when the stone door opened, and a skeleton walked in, closing the door afterwards, the stone grinding into place, before stopping with an audible clicking sound.

"One of the patrols spotted some dungeoneers fighting other skeletons, who were using bone clubs, and bone shields." These words were directed to me, and I stood up, the news having hit me a little harder than I expected.

I didn't expect that woman's prediction would be anywhere near reliable. Guess something's going to happen soon.

I thought for roughly a minute, trying to think of a feasible plan. "Get all of our people on the second floor back to the hideout, and try to stay undetected. I don't think we'll have enough time to get them all down here. If you can't make it back here without being detected, I want you to go and stay with them until it's safe to move. Even then, make sure you're not being followed. Do everything you can to throw off even an imaginary pursuer. If they find all of us, then we'll lose the war before it even starts." When I finished speaking, the skeleton turned, and left the room, and the door was subsequently closed behind them, and everyone went back to what they were doing earlier, whether it was resting, checking their own statuses, sparring, or vigilantly watching the rest of us for any dangers to the healer.

I felt paranoid at this point, but if what I assumed was correct, then soon the second floor would be the absolute worst place for us to be, and the third floor wouldn't be much better. I was glad we'd recruited so heavily that we needed to move down a floor to find another safe room. Things would probably get a fair bit more difficult from this moment forward.

I grabbed a whetstone, and started sharpening my blade. It felt strangely relaxing to hear the grinding of the stone against the metal. Soon, I imagined I wouldn't be able to relax at all.