Instinct took over and before he knew it his fist was rocketing towards the skeleton’s face. It didn’t seem to care, however, as it raised its axe. He made contact with its skull, sending the creature stumbling back with a crack. The crack wasn’t one of the skeleton’s bones though, and Liam yelped in pain as his own knuckle bone fractured. He got over it fast as he had no time to dwell on the pain, the undead creature recovering its footing and approaching him once again.
Backed into a corner, Liam had no choice but to engage once again. He dropped under a slow axe swing and swept the things legs out from under it, 2 years of martial arts in his younger years finally showing their worth. Whilst he could perform certain moves that an untrained person could not, those years of practice did nothing to prepare him for what happened next. The skeleton simply broke into its individual bones upon hitting the ground, the blue light emanating from it flashing on impact before disappearing completely.
Two new notifications joined the growing list demanding his attention, but he took a few breaths to centre himself before pushing back aside the thoughts about the reality of his situation and finally deciding to check on them. He could figure out if he was having a mental break or not later, for now he compartmentalised his feelings and focused on surviving as if it were real.
[You have entered the Limited Dungeon - Phyris’ Sealed Catacombs
Long ago, a young scion of the Phyris Clan was betrayed by his own family. They had grown weary of his ascent and ambushed him at the moment of his breakthrough. Unbeknownst to them, he had already turned to the dark art of Necromancy to further his power and was able to preserve his existence through Undeath. Now as a Lich he commands the hordes of his ancestors to seek a way to escape and take revenge upon those that wronged him.
This is a Limited Dungeon and as such you are unable to leave until one of the following criteria are met:
Ander Phyris slain: 0/1
Dark ritual complete: 47 hours 54 minutes remain]
He read through the information twice to make sure that he understood it correctly. According to whatever was putting these messages in his head he had just under 2 days to stop a Lich on the warpath or it and whatever else was down here would be unleashed upon the world. It sounded crazy, and he was tempted to just find somewhere to sit out the 48 hours it would take for him to be able to leave, but then he remembered how his mother had raised him, to always do right wherever he could, and he reluctantly resolved himself to stopping this Ander fellow. The thought of his mother brought back fresh grief that he pushed down with everything else that he was bottling up as he brought up the next message.
[Congratulations! You have slain your first foe.
This may only be the first step on your Path but it is an important one.
The bones of your first enemy lay the foundation of your Path, as such you have learned:
Appraisal I
Undead Lore I
Hafted I
May you walk far and never stray.]
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
There was more to unpack there as he had apparently learned something from killing (re-killing?) the skeleton. He definitely didn’t feel any different and the only new knowledge in his head was how much it hurt to have a fracture on his knuckle so what did this System mean? He had no idea what he could do to figure it out so he blinked the message away and opened the third and final one, hoping that this one would add some clarity, or at the very least context, to the situation.
[Level Up!
You have reached Level 1.
You have 5 Free Attributes to assign.
You have unlocked the Status function. You may access this by thinking or saying ‘Status’.]
Finally, he had some information he could act upon, he thought to him was he read the last message. It took seeing the words ‘Level Up!’ for him to relate this System with some of the games he had played growing up. Unfortunately he had discarded such hobbies, like video games and martial arts, when he had been forced by circumstances to devote himself to his studies. He now regretted that he had given them up, as they would’ve helped immensely now, but he had little choice in the matter as a child so there was little for him to reflect upon.
‘Status.’ He thought, trying it out for the first time. And, sure enough, it worked.
[
Name: Liam Karr
Race: Human (Earth)
Path: None
Class: None
Titles: None
Level: 1
HP: 86/110
Stamina: 42/130
Strength: 12
Dexterity: 10
Vitality: 11
Endurance: 13
Intelligence: 15
Willpower: 17
Free Attributes: 5
Traits:
None
Skills:
Appraisal I
Undead Lore I
Hafted I
Powers:
None
]
He had seen something similar when the System initialised but it had disappeared before he got the chance to read it. This time he would make sure to go through it properly to understand what it meant. That being said, as he started at the top section of his Status, he had no idea what most of it referred to.
Path had been mentioned in one of the notifications he had received and apparently he had taken the first step despite his Status declaring that he had ‘None’. Class and Titles he had more context with from the games he used to play. Unlocking a Class would probably come with major benefits for him and Titles sounded like it would be some sort of achievement tracker. If those achievements came with rewards then he would hunt them down but if they were merely for bragging or some other such reason then he likely start ignoring that section altogether. Level was self explanatory given the notification he had not long ago received. Killing enemies would let him Level Up which would in turn grant Free Attribute Points that he could assign to himself if he ever figured out how. They were a clear goal for something to acquire more of so getting these Levels would be his immediate priority until he felt confident enough to take in Ander Phyris.
HP represented how healthy or close to death he was, though how such a thing was even measured he had no clue, whilst Stamina probably meant his energy levels considering the low amount he had of it left and how tired he was feeling. The attributes themselves were even easier to figure out. Each of them did what they said they did, with Strength making him stronger and Endurance making him tougher, but the question of what would happen to him if he happened to increase his Intelligence? Would the System directly mess with his brain? Would it be able to change him into someone else or write things into his personality that he wouldn’t even realise were fake? He decided to hold off on anything to do with either of the less physical attributes in case it messed with its head but was open to the idea of increasing the others. After all, who wouldn’t want to be strong enough to throw a car or tough enough to be unfazed if such a throw were to hit you?
The last section made even less sense to him than any other part of his Status. Both Traits and Powers were empty of any information whilst Skills had 3 Skills listed that he had no idea what they did. He honed in on them and was surprised to find that focusing on one brought up its description. He quickly did that for all 3 and read through them.
[Appraisal I
General Skill
Grants basic information on a target by focusing on them. Grows through use.
Tier I: Uses Lore Skills to provide additional information]
[Undead Lore I
Lore Skill
Grants knowledge of Undead. Grows through defeating and collecting information on Undead.
Tier I: Provides information on most types of Lesser Undead, but not their Evolutions or Variants]
[Hafted I
Combat Skill
Grants enhanced muscle memory and learning with all One Handed Hafted Weapons that scales with Tier. Grows through use.
Tier I: Can utilise the Tier I effects of One Handed Hafted Weapons.]
[Appraisal] and [Undead Lore] would be immensely helpful at gathering what he had been trying to get his hands on this whole time: information. Whilst he would see how much [Hafted I] helped him out sooner rather than later as, echoing down the passageway, he heard the sounds of shambling feet heading towards him.