“Gilligan, Gilligan, wake up.” I heard someone's voice, as I opened my eyes. I saw a small face hovering above mine, just as I registered a slap on my face.

“Hey, what was that for?” I climbed to my feet as I looked at who had slapped me awake. But a sudden pain in my chest caused me to drop to my knees.

“You were seriously injured, a shard of the metal spike punctured your lung and broke your spine” as Peigi explained what had happened the memories came rushing back in.

“How am I not dead?” I asked as I felt my chest.

“Don't worry, I used my healing to keep you alive as your body fixed most of the damage. You were the only injury, but Cathy and Bobivin didn't survive Cathy’s defensive skill. And the wall took jerry.”

“what do you mean the wall took jerry?” I finally managed to get to my feet.

“The wall pulled back and a small metal arm reached out and grabbed Jerry, when the wall popped back into place, Bobivin’s constellations weren't there.” I could tell peigi was starting to get worked up as she paced in circles around me.

Skelton, Max, and Godwin were standing near a door that hadn't been there before Cathy had exploded. I could see from where I was standing that the door was built to be strong, it looked like one of those doors you would see on a castle in some medieval movie. I walked over to the group and Peigi started to follow me.

“ What's this door?” I asked when I was close enough to the group that I didn't have to yell.

“It's the door to the next room, it appeared after we finished this room.” Max responded, as he walked over to me. “Are you alright, I saw that shard of the spike stab through your body.”

“Yeah I'm fine. We should get moving, we don't want to get too far behind." I spent another minute reassuring everyone that I was fine. Before I convinced Max to open the door, I walked over to Cathy and Bobivin’s body and put them into my inventory. I didn't like to carry corpses with me, but I didn't want to leave their bodies in this place.

when Max opened the door and we all got pulled into the next room like we were being sucked up into a giant vacuum. I was sent tumbling through the air as everything looked like a blur. My hip hit the ground first and bounced, my shoulder hit next and it stopped my tumble as it collided with a tree.

Personal alert: You have completed a puzzle room. Rewards granted: +500 leaderboard points and 1 class appropriate weapon.

The blue box popped unbidden into my vision, and before I could get up from my position on the ground a spear appeared in the air above me. I managed to catch the spear before it collided with my head. The grass around me was the deep blue of the ocean and slightly damp. I slowly got up from the ground and put the spear into my inventory with a thought. I was surrounded by trees the size of two small trees stacked on top of each other. The other people in my group were getting up as well, but Skelton was standing there like she had never been knocked over.

“Is everyone alright?” Peigi rushed around to everyone and made sure no one had any injuries.

“I think we're fine, I assume everyone got that personal alert?” Max brushed Peigi off and walked to the middle of the group.

“I got a big axe” a massive axe appeared in Skelton's hand, the head of the axe had to have been the size of a small dining table. I identified the axe in her hands

Weapon: hero's great axe. Damage: high. Speed: low.

Modification slots: 2 out of 4 left.

Modification effects: phaser. Flame burst.

I used identify to figure out what all the different things on the weapon did.

Modification slots: put weapon modifiers in these slots to provide that weapon with a permanent benefit.

weapon modifier: phaser: allows the wielder to slightly warp space around the weapon.

weapon modifier: Flame burst: when triggered it causes the weapon to explode into a burst of flames and reforms the weapon in the wielders hands.

“Everyone see the weapon modifiers? They look like spells built directly into the weapon." I pulled out my own weapon to see if it had those slots too.

Weapon: copper tipped spear. Damage: medium. Speed: medium.

Modification slots: 2 out of 3 left.

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Modification effects: split.

Weapon modifier: split: splits any abilities used through this weapon into 2 additional copies.

I leveled my spear at the nearest tree and activated scorpion strike. The tip of my spear punched a hole a few inches into the tree, and two nearly identical holes appended next to it. The force of the impact shook the crown of the tree and caused leaves to flutter to the ground around the group. I turned away from the tree and started to walk away, but then the tree started to creak and groan. The vibrations from when I had struck the tree only increased, sticks started falling from the tree as three big hairy masses landed on the ground around me. Skelton grabbed my arm and picked me up, she set me down a few feet away from the unraveling mounds of fur. Three distance screeches erupted out of the mound as the giant weasels stood from their fall.

“Acid hail” Godwin held his hands up and they started glowing green.

The air around his hands roiled like a public pool in the middle of summer. Before any of the weasels could react, little green darts zipped out of Godwin’s hands and turned the first weasel to Swiss cheese, the weasel's corpse sizzled and melted as the acid penetrated its flesh.

The other two weasels ran over to attack Godwin, but Max intercepted one with a tower shield he pulled out of his inventory. The weasel max collided with, got launched in my direction and I quickly stabbed it with my spear. My scorpion strike got split into three and the weasel died with three holes through its skull. The weasel that got around Max clamped its sharp teeth on Godwin’s leg. Skelton walked up behind it and ripped it off his leg. If he hadn't been screaming from the pain before, he definitely was now. Skelton tossed the weasel up in the air like she was serving a baseball to herself. She hefted her axe in one hand and swung it at the weasel that was still falling. When the axe collided with the weasel, it sounded like a cannon went off. The biggest chunk of the weasel that hit the ground wasn't much bigger than an apple. Peigi ran over to Godwin’s leg and ran a glowing wand over his injured leg, which healed almost instantly.

Four more weasels rushed into the glade, these four were nearly twice the size of the last three. Two ran at Skelton and the other two ran at me. I used my spear to keep them at a distance but they were forcing me to retreat away from the group. I tried to use a scorpion strike on one of the weasels but it jumped out of the way and I missed the strike. Godwin used his acid hail on the weasel I missed, but the acid dissipated into smoke before it hit the weasel. A sudden fiery explosion behind the bigger weasel I missed let me know Skelton had thrown her axe and triggered the flame burst modifier. The explosion distracted it for long enough that I managed to put three holes in its throat before I turned my attention on the other weasel that was hounding me. Three more weasels walked out of the forest on the other side of the glade while I kept getting pushed back into the forest away from my group. The weasel hounding me jumped to bite at my legs, but I swung my spear to clobber it in the side of its face. This one was different from the other. I used identify, I wanted to hit myself for not using it on the other weasels

Hateful weasel. Natural manifestation (hate cursed). Status: hateful, assisted soul manifestation, mana starved. Danger: low.

It made sense why they were so aggressive, its status said it was mana starved. I wanted to get the weasel off of me so I could go help the rest of my party. I used the spear to push it back a few feet, then I unmerged my soul with Titania’s. She landed nearly on top of it and her front claws ripped up the weasels back. Three more weasels rolled out of the forest near me, two were the size of a dog, but the third was the size of a small bear.

Titania took the attention of the two smaller weasels, which left me the big one to deal with. This weasel was massive, its claws looked like they could disembowel me with one swipe. I set my feet in a fighting stance, straightened my back, tensed my arms, and focused on the tip of my spear. I needed to strike true, this needed to be a decisive blow, because I wouldn't get a second chance. My focus narrowed down to just the bear and me. I could feel something in the air around me. The heat of battle flowed through me, I could feel it crawling through my veins, stimulating my muscles. The heat would flow from my heart, out through my body, then back into my heart in an endless cycle. The air also radiated heat, but it wasn't the same as mine. The big weasel stood there watching my actions with a gaze that demonstrated it had a non-animalistic intelligence.

The little worms of heat that wormed their way through my body felt like they were a part of me, but now that I was focusing on them, I could tell they were something new that came with this world. I slowed my breathing, they giant weasel seemed content to watch me. I felt the heat flow through my body. I grabbed some of it with my mental fingers and nudged it to speed up slightly, but nothing happened. I tried again and again, eventually I achieved some success. My perception shrunk down and I followed one of the worms of heat into the center of my being.