“Fuck, fuck, fuck. Just run. Keep running. You can do this. You are Marvin the Magnifique, you can't die here!” Not only was I probably going to die here, but I was also going mad and talking to myself.

Fuck Carl and his, “It’s only one night, we’ll be fine.” It is not bloody fine, and he is now dead.

Fuck they are closing on me. I activated Dash again. I have never used it so much in one go, and my stamina is dropping fast. I am going to die here.

I am not going to die here. I refuse. I just have to figure out how to survive. I am smart. I figured out how to get out of Prince Seth’s palace with a bag full of stolen loot. I can figure this out.

Sure, I had to spend the loot to escape the city. Those Immortal soldiers are relentless, but I still did it. No other level twenty can say they pulled off such a heist and got away. It hurts that I can’t say it either. I am still in the kingdom, albeit on the edge of the kingdom. I don’t want to alert the nearest Immortal Garrison. There are probably wanted posters, and there is no honour among thieves.

Fuck. I am not in the kingdom anymore. I am in a fucking dungeon. A wandering dungeon. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Dungeons, or Trials as they are officially known, come in all shapes and sizes. Some are fixed in one place, and towns and cities are built around them as they are farmed for resources. The fixed dungeons also provide a safe area around them, which keeps away wandering trials like this fucking one.

“Sure, Carl, it is only a quick two-day dash between safe zones, Carl. Nothing will happen, says Carl. Well, you know bloody what, Carl? Something happened!”

I had only joined with Carl and his troupe of entertainers six months ago. I figured it was good to hide in a crowd. Carl had four musicians and three actors, plus himself. They specialised in musical plays, which Carl and Susie usually wrote. They were quite good, too. Some were sophisticated romances for when we performed for the nobles, and we had some good slap-stick comedies for the taverns and for when we did street performances.

I joined as an illusionist. My ability to create scenes and images of monsters really upped their game, and we were now getting more invites to perform for nobles. I thought my days of solo performances and pickpocketing idiots were over. I am going to need one hell of a performance to get out of this.

Illusionist is a specialisation of the Mage Class. I was only offered the specialisation because I had stumbled on the Light Manipulation Ability Stone. I say I stumbled on it because that wasn’t what I was breaking into that safe for. Who keeps such a valuable ability stone in such a simple safe anyway? Ability stones only drop from trials like this one, so they are really rare and expensive. I hadn’t even specialised my Rogue Class into Thief yet, but I still got into that safe. It did max out my Lock Picking Skill.

I wouldn’t have been able to learn Light Manipulation if I didn't have an affinity for it, anyway, so stuff whoever that merchant was going to sell it to. It is mine and always will be now.

I looked around. No, trials like this don’t produce the Light Manipulation Ability. The terrain was barren dirt and rocks, the sky was billowing black clouds, and the air was humid and heavy. I glanced behind me. Skeletal warriors were chasing me, between eight and ten of them. Some with rusty swords and some with spears. There was the occasional piece of armour on some of them. This was some sort of undead trial. Fuck Carl and his tight fisted scrimping. We should have at least hired some guards to protect us.

I looked at my dwindling stamina. There was enough for one, maybe two more uses of Dash. I looked at the rocky formation I was running towards. It would be touch and go, plus I needed enough stamina to fight when I got there. Fuck, fuck fuck.

I activated Dash again. I remember the time I got the skill. I smiled a bit. Francesca’s husband was chasing me. He was surprisingly fast for a guy who spent all day in an office. I was just a young Rogue back then. Francesca was using me like I was using her, but it was fun right up until her husband came home unexpectedly. I considered sending him a thank you note, as that skill has saved my butt more times than I can count, but Francesca was on a good gig there, and I didn’t want to spoil it for her.

Then I noticed Dash had levelled and maxed out at 10. Suddenly, my stamina usage wasn’t dropping so fast, and my running felt freer and easier like I could keep going forever. That feeling was an illusion, of course. I know illusions. My Stamina was still dropping. I risked glancing at my skills to see what had changed. I had learned a new skill and a point in my Agility Attribute. This happened occasionally when you maxed out a skill. Not all the time, but sometimes.

My new skill was called Free Runner, and it allowed me to run further and faster with less stamina cost. As the skill levelled this would improve. It is definitely what I needed here. I don’t know how long I will need to survive this trial, but there is plenty of open space, and I will be running a lot. I still have Dash available as well.

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They say trials are a test and are there to help you grow. They say trials will provide a way for you to succeed if you are good enough. I say those people are fucking liars. Trials are death traps, and they are out to kill you. Well fuck you, you undead trial. I am Marvin the Magnifique, and I will survive in spite of you.

I thought about my skills, as I have to fight soon. It isn’t looking good. When I specialised my Mage Class to Illusionist, I lost a lot of my previous mage spells as they weren’t compatible with Illusionist and the light-based specialisation. I didn’t mind back then, as I could do so much with light, and it meshed well with my Rogue Class. I can manipulate light, which means I can create my own shadows to hide in. I can create illusions for guards to chase or distractions for my pickpocket skills. It was great.

It is not so great now. Right now, I could use some Ice Spikes or a Fire Bolt. Fuck, even a bloody gust of wind would be helpful. The thing with Undead is they are pretty much immune to light. They don’t use light to see, so I can’t blind them with Flash or distract them with images or, in fact, any illusions. These skeletons have no flesh, so my Burning Light won’t have the same effect.

Fuck. It is my Burning Light that probably got the others killed.

We appeared in the trial suddenly and unexpectedly. We only had what we were carrying; the horses and carts were left behind. I was carrying my Spatial Bag, which was fortunate. It has forty slots and reduces the weight of what is in it by 80%. It was a hugely expensive bag, and the previous owner was incredibly angry when she discovered it was missing. It might have been a gaudy yellow shoulder bag with pink flowers, but I replaced the strap and covered the outside with a dark material. I also added a clip so it clips to my belt and doesn’t get in the way when I am running or performing my acrobatics in the well-planned and sometimes improvised escape manoeuvres. OK, mostly improvised.

My bag has my personal supplies, including my knife collection and emergency food. You never know when you might need to leave a place suddenly, so I kept it well-stocked. I am not going to need my disguises here, though.

When we arrived, Tim said we would be in a safe zone for several hours so we had time to sort ourselves out. A lot of that time was spent discussing our situation. Loudly and angrily discussing our situation and blaming Carl for getting us here. Looking back, I think that time could have been spent in better ways, but we were rather upset and angry.

None of us noticed when the timer ran out of the safe zone. The first thing I heard was Susie screaming. Then, I saw these pale, flesh-like creatures surrounding us. They were tall and humanoid, naked and hairless.

I have the Identify Skill, as it is incredibly important for me to identify unsuitable marks. This Identified them as Fleshlings, and the ones I Identified varied between levels 15 to 20. There was more screaming and yelling as people scrambled for weapons. They all had some type of weapons. We were outside the safe zone, and they are not complete idiots.

Knives are my weapons, both for fighting and throwing. I had maxed out my Throwing Skill, and I got Precision Throw, which makes me incredibly accurate. I threw a knife into the face of the nearest Fleshling, and it sank into where the eye should be, but it didn’t really do anything else. It certainly didn’t kill it, and it didn’t slow it down. The Fleshlings were not fast, and they didn’t seem to be smart, so that was good. They were still going to be hard to kill.

I saw Tim’s arrow have the same effect as my knife.

The good news is these things are not fast, and I was. Agility and Dexterity are my top attributes, second only to my luminous Intelligence. I got my fighting knives out and stepped forward to the nearest Fleshling.

I didn’t have the Duel Wield Skill or even Ambidextrous. What I did have was Clever Hands, and I got Quick Hands when I maxed out my Pickpocket Skill. My Basic Small Blades Skill is also on the verge of maxing out. I Dodged the claw strike from the Fleshling, sliced deeply into its leg, and dodged away again. Dodge is another one of my favourite Skills.

This hampered its movement, so I did it again. It was a pretty dumb creature, so I did it again. This put it on the ground, but it was still alive. I ignored it for now and concentrated on putting the next one on the ground as well. If I can make a hole, we can certainly outrun them.

Then I saw a flash of flame, and Carl yelled, “Hey fire works! They burn!”

I saw Susie use the simple charm Spark to light up one near her, so I stepped into the gap I made and used Burning Light to light up a whole row of them. I don’t use the Burning Light Skill much. I found the skill stone lying around in a store, and it was light-based, so I took it with my five-fingered discount and learned it to remove the evidence. It is less effective than my Firebolt, which I still had back then. It is a smaller area and in a straight line. It also took more Mana to set things alight.

They do burn easily and hot, like fat. But they don’t burn quickly, and they can still move when they are fully alight. The smoke started to choke me, and I heard others coughing, and the burning figures moved forward to attack us. I stabbed one to try and bring it down, and the flames burned my hand. My leather jacket was the only thing that saved my arm, and it was blackened from that.

I sliced it with my other arm to make it go down, and my jacket caught alight. I pushed my way out of the smoke and flames and shrugged off my flaming jacket. That was my favourite jacket gone. I actually paid for that jacket. The Tailor added hidden pockets for me. That annoyed me until I looked back toward the others.

All I could see was smoke and flame, and all I could hear was screaming. Horrible, gut-wrenching screaming of people burning to death. I turned and started running, and I haven't stopped yet.