Chapter 2

An armory of gold

I obeyed the skeleton that had now left me and continued walking toward the end of the hallway, where he had pointed at.

Not that I had any choice since that was the only way I could go.

The faint light from the torches bounced off the walls, if anyone would have seen me I'm sure they would have gotten a scared, after all, I was a skeleton monster walking a dark stone hallway.

My steps were stiff and awkward now that I was aware of what I was. I glanced at my body a few times, feeling it, even though I couldn’t feel anything on the bones of my fingers, yet somehow, I could still feel the cold softness of my bones, maybe it was a skeleton’s intuition of its own body. Or maybe it was part of how real this game was.

VRMMO games were new to me, so I wasn’t sure just how realistic they would be, especially the full body immersion technology, but so far, I was impressed at how real it felt.

Now I just needed to learn how to log off, granted if this was a game, which I was sure it was, there was no other explanation for the RPG elements that were clearly in this world.

I wondered how long this hallway extended too , for I had walked quite a while now.

I turned my head back, and saw what I had left, which was nothing but the reddish brown wall and floor made of stones where my shadow danced to the rhythm of the flickering fires of the torchlights that hanged from the wall.

There was no point in going back, and even if I wanted too, I was just going to end up back to the endless darkness, so I might as well just keep going forward.

I was amaze at how well I was taking the fact that I was a skeleton, perhaps the fact that this was a game made me feel better, yes that must be it.

I continued to walk through this endless corridor, getting used to this body of mine, as well as cursing whoever had made this corridor so long, wondering if skeletons got hungry.

But somehow I knew the answer to that question, the numbness that ran through this body told me everything I needed to know. Heck, I couldn’t even feel the floor underneath my feet as they walked over the stones on the floor. This body truly was numb. I could probably walk for hours, which seemed like it, for this corridor was endless, and just when I was about to stop and rest, not that this body needed it, I spotted, far ahead, with the hollow holes I called eyes, a door.

image [https://i.imgur.com/HLs2qhZ.png]

The door was made out of long pieces of wood, each lined next to each other with long black cracks of space between them, there was a skeleton head hanging in the middle of the door, which I found odd. There were also torch lights hanging on each side of the door, despite them illuminating the door, I could feel a certain darkness from the door. I didn’t know if it was my skeleton’s intuition trying to tell me something, but there was an ominous feeling about this door.

And the fact that the door was also taller than me , though I didn’t know the height of this body, I was certain that I was my height, which was an inch shy of six feet .

Even though I wasn’t certain about this door, the fact that the large skeleton skull that hanged in the middle of the door had Its jaws hanging low, made me curious. The way its jaw was hanging low made it looked like a door knocker on a house. Could it? No, that would be silly, but what could I lose for trying.

I looked back at the long corridor passage and saw nothing but empty space, so going back was not an option, besides, I was already here, and who knows, perhaps whatever was behind this tall wooden door might have answers to the many questions I had.

I reached for the skull’s jaw, wrapping my bony fingers around its pale, white jaw, and slowly, for the jaw was heavy, knocked on the door.

Deep and roaring sounds of bones came out of the skull’s jaw as it banged its lower jaw against the wooded body of the door.

The sounds engulfed the dungeon, no doubt traveling through the corridor. Perhaps it wasn’t such a good idea . I had already seen that one skeleton, so I wasn’t the only one here. What if I had awaken something else, something not so friendly. Maybe I should go back, I turned my head back, is it too late to go back? I let out a laugh, though it wasn’t really a laugh, it was more like a slow movement of my jaw.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

And just when I was about to moved one leg back, rethinking my decision of knocking on the door, the door began to move.

The wooden body of the door began to drag itself slowly on the stone floor underneath this corridor I found myself in. Its body dragging itself to open. As the door was opening itself, I could see, barely, some kind of room at the other end, so I did the next logical thing and walked inside.

The room was big, stretching vastly horizontally and vertically. There were torch lights hanging from the stone walls of the room, illuminating the room, yet most of the room was not being illuminated from the light of the torchlights that hanged on the wall of the room, but from the many swords ,shields, treasure chests, gems and gold that was sprinkle all around the room.

Making the room look like it was made of pure gold.

But what really caught my eyes, or lack of, was the large armored statue standing in the middle of the room like some tower overlooking the vast treasures in the room.

It had black and gold armor with a sword as tall as it, standing in front of it.

‘Hello,” I tried to say with these bones of mines, but only empty air left my mouth. So I did what anyone would do who had stumble upon all this gold and treasure, I walked to the treasure chest that was the closest to me, and as I began to walk toward it, the torchlights that hanged from the walls began to flickered as if a wind was blowing through them.

I stopped.

For the wind seemed to be alive. I looked at the giant armored thing in the middle. And if I had any flesh or muscles on my face, I would have swallow my saliva, for the giant armored thing began to move, swinging the sword that it was holding, its size creating a deep roaring vibration that ran through the large room and through my bones as well.

“I didn’t mean to steal anything, I swear,” I said almost instinctively. No doubt it had notice my intention of walking toward one of the treasure chest, maybe it was the guardian of this room created to protect this room from intruders, which I was .

The giant armored knight began to walk toward my direction, its large and heavy feet dragging themselves through the stone ground. I wanted to run, I mean, if you saw a giant armored knight statue walking toward you, wouldn’t you run? But of course I didn’t, instead I prayed that this was really just a game, and nothing more.

Just one big game which had glitched on me, and I was still in my room, which I called home. I mean, how do I know I wasn’t, this Virtual Reality game was new to me, in fact, Magic and Swords online was my first VRMMO game.

The armored dark knight stopped in front of me.

I could feel its heavy stare behind the rectangular visor in its dark helmet. I looked up at it, he was massive, maybe twenty feet. I also noticed the same health and magic bar I had seen on the skeleton.

The only difference from the skeleton npc I had stumble prior to him was that next to the HP and MP words there were question marks instead of numbers.

I looked more closely at him, spotting his name, just like the skeleton.

“Dark Armored Knight,” it read, and next to his name was the same “Lvl” letters that only meant level, which was filled with the same question marks next to it as his HP and MP bars.

And if you were familiar with RPG games, that meant that our levels were so far apart that I couldn’t even comprehend his, not that I knew my level, but whatever it was, it probably wasn’t high enough compare to this behemoth standing in front of me.

As we both stood in silence, his stared felt like an eternity that was falling on me.

And just when I was beginning to worry if he was going to strike me, he began to walk away from me, whatever he was looking for, he must have found it, because he didn’t crush me.

And to my surprise, he didn’t walk back to his sword that was thrusted deep into the stone floor of this treasure vault. But instead he walked past it and toward the darkness that the torchlights failed to vanish deep in the corners of the room.

It was too dark to see what he was doing from where I was. So I did the next best thing and just stood where I was, not moving an inch or a bone.

I glanced over at the weapons and armor that were all around the room, they looked Like high end weapons that some high end bosses drop. And I was sure they were high end weapons, for all I could see from them were question marks hovering over them.

The room really looked like a treasure vault ready to be looted, for there was nothing but richness at every wall and corner. I looked up and saw the flames of the torchlights shining their red flames on what looked like vast corridors that ran around the room, no doubt hiding more treasure above. The giant knight’s footsteps brought me back from my little expedition, just hearing the heavy steps would give anyone shills. As the knight walked toward me, I noticed he was carrying something. I just hoped that whatever it was, wasn’t going to be the last thing I saw.

He stood before me, but this time he had, on both hands, caring them like toys, two items.

“Basic sword,” the item on his right hand read,

“A sword for beginners, low durability.” I looked at his other hand,

“Basic shield, low durability,” both weapons seemed to be for beginners, which I was, I think. I had no idea how to see my level or my stats, but now was not the time to figure that out. I looked a him, and something in me told me that it was okay to grab the two items from his massive hands.

They were quite light on my hands.

I swung the sword around a bit, getting the feel of it, If I was still inside the game, then I must say that this feels pretty awesome, so life like. And just like the skeleton I had met before this giant knight, he also pointed me toward another direction, but this time it was a door instead of a corridor, which I was glad, growing tired of walking endlessly.

I looked back at him, and bowed my head, thanking him for the weapons. I had no idea if he understood my thanks, or not, but either way, I was glad to have something to protect me with.

The knight looked at me for a brief second and then began to walk back, his heavy feet creating loud and cavernous noises only a knight of his size could.

He stopped at his spot, which was in the middle of the room (I think, for the room was massive so I couldn’t be sure) and grabbed his sword, pulling it out of the stone floor like a knife out of butter, and brought it to his face, and stood.

He looked like some protector created to protect the treasures of this room.

I walked toward the door he had pointed too, leaving him behind, and feeling safer with the shield and sword in my hands, wondering just where this one was leading me off to.