Devi limped over to the corpse that had started this whole fiasco, her whole body shouting in protest of the movement. If she had never toppled it over, the bats wouldn't have swarmed her and torn her to shreds, and almost killed her.

She flicked through the numerous notification windows that had popped up as she shuffled painfully to her destination, annoyed that they all couldn't be put in the same window. They mainly said the same thing, what she assumed were kill notifications, but mixed in were a few level-ups. And by a few, she meant two. Both her Race and Class had leveled up in the fight to her surprise.

At first, she couldn't believe it, but looking around at the sheer number of bat corpses that lay singed and battered, along with the current state of her body made her rethink that assessment.

There were quite a few bats that were swarming me after all, she reasoned to herself as she recalled the maelstrom of wings and teeth that she had weathered just a few moments ago. She had thought multiple times in the last few minutes that she was going to die, and judging by her health, she almost had. After the fight, she had been left with only 3 health, far too close to zero for her comfort. Though she didn’t know for sure if she would die if her health reached zero, she certainly did not want to conduct any experiments on that subject with herself as the lab rat.

She knelt down next to the desiccated corpse, its skin wrapped gauntly around bones, with decaying fabric giving it some semblance of modesty, but not much. Battered armor still clung to their lifeless frame, with large claw marks marring its leather surface. One hand, with long, slender fingers that definitely didn't look human, was still clenched tightly around a hilt, the blade snapped halfway down its length, rust coating the whole thing. A small flat disk lay near their other hand, glowing gently in the dark.

Devi eagerly scooped it up, hoping it was the missing piece of the door, only for her excitement to burst as she realized it was only slightly bigger than her palm, not nearly big enough to fill the hole in the stone doors. The disk was flat on one side, though slightly domed on the other, with a small rough crystal set in the middle. Along the edges were a few symbols, though they were just carved, not inlaid with anything like the magic tools she had seen so far.

Thinking back on it, the door didn't have anything set in the carvings either, just plain engravings covering its surface. The only difference between the door and this small disk was that the object in her hand was glowing faintly. It emitted about as much light as a phone with its brightness turned all the way down—enough to dimly illuminate her hand in the darkness, but not much else.

She pocketed the strange disk and looked over at the other side of the corpse. A small satchel lay open, its contents spilling out in a jumbled mess around its mouth. The worn material looked like it would disintegrate at the lightest touch. She could see a few more of the odd disks poking out of the bag, though these appeared not to be glowing.

Taking a deep breath to gather her nerves, she reached over the desiccated corpse, trying not to look at it, and tugged the pack off its shoulders. For a brief moment, the strap caught on one of the bony parts of the corpse, and she had to engage in a tugging match with the dead guy as they put up one last bit of resistance. Eventually, she had to reach over and unhook the strap, not wanting to rip the corpse's arm off to get to the bag. She didn't think the satchel could withstand that much abuse.

Once she had the bag in her hands, she eagerly looked through it, hoping it had the missing door piece, only to be disappointed. There were quite a few things in there, but none of them could fit into the circular section of the stone doors.

She did find quite a few interesting things, however. The first things she saw were the other disks, all of them identical to the one she had resting beside her, except none of them were glowing and didn't have any carvings marring their surface. One or two of them didn't even have the small crystal set in the middle.

They almost seemed like blanks, materials ready to be turned into the finished product. What that finished product was, she had no idea, but at least it glowed a little, saving her from having to keep the firestarter going for light.

Along with the disks, there were several different tools scattered at the bottom, alongside a tattered journal and three vials, each labeled with its own symbol. She had a sneaking suspicion about what the vials could be, but unfortunately, the labels weren't in English or any other language she recognized.

However, when she looked at them, she realized she could read what they said. It was like looking at a word in Russian, even though she couldn't understand Russian, she could still read it. Confused yet intrigued, she saw that the labels read Mana, Stamina, and Health, confirming her suspicions.

Nice, potions, she celebrated inwardly. Well, most likely potions, as the alternative of poison seemed unlikely.

She eyed the presumed potions for a moment, uncertain if she should consume them all right away since her resources were nearly depleted. If it hadn't been for the timely level-up, none of her stats would be above ten. Eventually, she decided to save them for a more urgent situation. She was relatively safe, at least for now, so she could afford to wait.

Tucking the three vials into her own pack, Devi began perusing the worn and battered journal. It was written in what she assumed was the same language as the vials, but for some reason, she was able to understand it perfectly. Carefully turning the pages, each one on the verge of falling apart, she read through the entries.

The journal detailed the journey of the corpse, named Aks'ta, as they ventured into the cave system in pursuit of a cursed beast that had fled. They had been tracking it for a while until they finally cornered the monster in an underground ruin. Aks'ta had attempted to vanquish the beast there, but as they went in for the final blow, the curse itself erupted, taking on a physical form. Caught off guard by the sudden attack, they suffered grave injuries and were forced to retreat, sealing the entrance to the ruins and taking the key, hoping it would contain the monster.

Within the caves, Aks'ta discovered fragments of mana stone and decided to create array disks that could potentially confine the curse if it physically manifested again. Multiple pages were dedicated to what Devi could only assume were equations as Aks'ta designed the array disks and the array itself. She couldn't begin to understand the language and theories presented; they were far beyond her rudimentary grasp of magic.

On the final few pages, there was a complete schematic of the array disk, the very same one that rested on Devi's knee, providing her with light to read the journal. The central crystal was referred to as a mana core, and Aks'ta had been in the process of gathering the remaining few needed before being attacked by a large spider.

Barely escaping with their life, Aks'ta lost the key in the process. They soon realized that their regenerative abilities wouldn't be enough to counteract the venomous poison coursing through their body. The last pages of the journal were filled with fragmented thoughts as Aks'ta's life slipped away. They expressed longing for their absent partner and the desire to witness the blooming of firelights once more. They spoke at length about their family back home—siblings, parents, cousins—knowing they would never lay eyes on them again.

It was a difficult read. Witnessing the final moments of anyone's life, regardless of whether they were real or fictional, stirred up emotions. Raw feelings and distant memories were laid bare on those pages. They themselves, immortalized by their own hand. Their whole lives a collection of letters. Words. Ink. Dead, until someone reads them.

Devi had a few pages of last memories herself. Letters written, sealed. Never sent. Never read. Locked away, but not discarded. Letters written to friends, family, people she thought might not understand. Even her landlady once.

Each one kept.

Just in case.

Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Devi shook her head, trying in vain to disperse her memories. She hadn’t had a flashback to those nights in a while. At least a few weeks, maybe. Deffienlty at least seven days.

She needed a distraction, and she couldn’t just throw herself into the latest bug at her job, spending the night working until she was too tired to think. Falling asleep instantly, no thinking involved.

Instead, she flipped through the journal until she found the notes on the array disks. They spanned multiple pages, intricate diagrams with abstract calculations about things that she could only guess at filled every inch. There were steps Aks’ta took to make the first one, but those were filled with technical jargon, and seemed to skip many steps they probably assumed were just intuitive or were so basic, they didn’t feel the need to write them down specifically.

For someone who already knew the basics, probably a little more than just the basics, the steps outlined would have most likely been easily followed. But Devi, an absolute novice when it came to any sort of magical crafter, had no idea where to start.

She turned the finished array disk over in her hands, seeing the symbols that lined the edges. They looked similar to the ones she had been carving, but none of the ones she knew showed up. Which made sense, if she was interpreting the notes right, the array disks were meant to contain curse energy, not create fire, or purify water, like the tools she had created so far.

Devi turned the blank array disk over in her hands, wondering where to start. The journal had extensive notes on the internal mana structure of the disks, but she had no idea how to do that. Or really, what something’s internal mana structure looked like. She didn’t even know how one would go about seeing it, let alone shaping it.

She frowned at the completed disk and decided to poke around a little bit. Closing her eyes, she extended a bit of her own mana into the object. Devi had noticed a tremendous improvement in her control over mana since she first dabbled in it just yesterday. It no longer required her full concentration just to move her mana around. The real challenge came when she attempted something more complex, like sending mana to two different hands or splitting the stream of energy into different threads.

Her mana flowed from her fingertips, and she gritted her teeth, maintaining her connection as it seeped into the disk. She could faintly sense her mana flowing through the disk, although it was different from how her mana moved through her magic tools. Rather than being absorbed by the tool, the disk allowed her mana to pass through it, exerting only a gentle pull. However, when she tried to redirect her mana, it felt like hitting a solid wall.

Carefully, she mapped out the flow of mana through the disk by experimenting with different movements, comparing her observations to the detailed notes in the journal. Gradually, she began to grasp a small portion of what the journal described. The mana twisted and turned within the disk, following the carved symbols on its outer edge and forming intricate pathways within. It was as if the disk itself guided the mana, rather than simply allowing the energy to pass through like her magic tools did.

She also noticed that it seemed incomplete, with the mana being directed out of the disk and fading into the air. She pondered over this for a moment, realizing that the disks were intended to be used as part of a larger array. If they were all connected as depicted in the diagram, it made sense for the energy to seep into the air. To finish the array, she would need to draw lines in some sort of ink, connecting the seven array disks, with symbols drawn in between.

There was a short discussion talking about how the array wouldn’t work in other mana densities, or if a large disturbance was present, but Aks’ta theorized that it should work within the ruins.

Devi opened her eyes as she withdrew her mana, or at least attempted to. A significant portion of the energy she had used to explore the object dissipated before she could recapture it. Her body groaned in protest as she raised her head, realizing she had been hunched over the disk for an unknown amount of time. While her other resources had regenerated slightly, her mana remained at 17.

She scowled at her mana pool. It didn't seem quite sufficient for the task of crafting one of the disks, but she was eager to start before she forgot the complex shapes of the mana structures she had observed.

Then she remembered her Skill. It only cost three mana to raise her Wisdom by one point, which would yield seven mana or possibly more, depending on how the percentages worked. Devi quickly muttered the Skill to herself and then checked her Status page.

To her surprise, her Wisdom had increased by two points instead of one, although it had cost her six mana instead of three. After a moment of contemplation, she assumed it was because [Attribute Enhancement] had just leveled up to level one. She remained cautious about using this single data point to predict the effects of future levels, but it appeared to be a positive sign that each level would enhance her abilities to a greater extent.

Now with an additional 14 points of mana, the additional points were seemingly unaffected by her percentage increases, Devi returned to the blank disk, ready to craft it into the finished product. However, she faced one slight problem: there were no instructions on how to proceed with the carving process. The journal only emphasized the importance of the internal structure and mentioned a few key steps taken by Aks'ta to achieve the final outcome.

To compound matters, the final array required seven disks, yet she only had six blank ones. There was no room for error. Devi couldn't afford to make a mistake with any of them. She had only one chance to get it right.

Cautiously, she extended her mana into the blank disk, attempting to familiarize herself with it. Her mana encountered resistance as soon as it left her hands. It was akin to trying to force two magnets together with both of their north ends. The stone resisted her attempts to move her mana through it.

Scowling at the stone, she began to slowly probe its surface, searching for areas where her mana could pass through. She discovered a few places that were more malleable, allowing her mana to flow into the stone.

Rather than forcing her mana in a particular direction, she allowed it to go where the stone seemed receptive. It spread throughout the entire stone, meandering without a discernible pattern, branching out and reconnecting like a small stream of water flowing down a hill, following the path of least resistance.

The pathways her mana followed were very similar in nature to the intricate internal structure of the finished disk, just more natural, less rigid. She began attempting to reshape the pathways, aiming to have them mirror the ones she had seen in the original array disk, but encountered quite a number of setbacks.

The first challenge was getting anything to change at all. She couldn’t simply force the paths to instantly transform but had to slowly guide them to align with her desired configuration. It required small changes, a gentle nudge here, a slight tweak there. While she felt it might be possible to overpower everything, she realized it was beyond her reach.

The next challenge was that her changes didn’t stick. She managed to slowly start shaping one area of the disk into what she wanted, but when she moved to work on a different section, her alterations instantly reverted in the absence of her mana to support them. Devi had to hold anything she accomplished in place as she proceeded to work elsewhere. It felt like solving a puzzle where she had to use every finger to carefully maintain the pieces in position while she meticulously nudged the final one into place with her nose.

Finally, according to the journal, certain sections could be locked into place with a carefully carved glyph. Which was a challenge to do while her focus was split holding multiple parts of the mana structure in place. Every light tap shifted how her mana moved slightly, making it difficult to keep everything how it should be.

Devi finally got an entire section of the disk complete, a single symbol helping pin everything in place. She was about to release her concentration and take a small break when she noticed her work seemed to wobble as she did.

She quickly turned her focus back on it, stabilizing it with her mana.

Well fuck, no breaks until this is over I guess.

Time didn’t hold any meaning, there were no clocks to tell her to take a break, no concerned coworkers telling her to go eat. Just her single-minded focus on her task. Which was good, since she couldn’t take a break even if she wanted to.

By the time she had started working on the last section, her mind was beginning to wear a bit thin. She had to keep three different sections from reverting, on top of making the small necessary changes.

But she had done it, with one last tap of the small chisel she had, Devi cautiously started removing her mana, ready to spring back at a moment's notice if she sensed something was wrong.

As she was staring intently at the stone disk, waiting for something to go wrong, she heard a skittering in the tunnel ahead of her. The sound of pointy feet clicking against stone.

Devi quickly sprung to her feet, remembering how the journal mentioned a monstrous spider. She was in no condition to fight but didn’t see much of a choice. Her fingers went to the three vials she had stored in her pack as she decided to enhance her Agility again since it worked remarkably well against the swarm of bats.

She muttered the Skill, focusing on her Agility, but as soon as she felt the mana leave, pain stabbed through her head. It was like someone had taken a railroad spike and hammered it into her skull. Multiple times. She felt the world start to spin as her vision began to fade.

The world suddenly tilted as she fell to the ground, head slamming into the cold unforgiving stone.

From out of the dark tunnels emerged eight glowing eyes, which were the last thing Devi saw before she blacked out.