Eventually, the remaining humans get reduced to just one guy left. He continues to fight in the corner and cuts another of the mob zombies in half as it jumps at him.
“What the hell! Why is this happening!?” He screams.
“Alright! Everyone, back off a little please! I want to talk to him.”
The zombies immediately stop attacking and back away from the guy. Holding a sword in front of him defensively, he shifts around as he waits to be attacked from any side.
“Who the hell was that!? Did you do this? Who the hell are you!? Show yourself!”
“Move aside, move. Thank you… Yes, that would be me.” Bug says as she comes to the front of the horde. “Hello human.”
“What the fuck…?
“Hi, I wanted to ask you some-“
“Holy shit! You're that bounty that everyone was talking about… The, the talking Gremlin! Aren’t you!?”
“Ehh? Bounty? What’s this now?”
“What the hell do you want, you little monster!? What pit of hell did you crawl out of!?”
“Pit of hell? No, I was born here in the Dungeon. Regardless, I wanted to ask you- “
“I don’t care what you want, you little bitch, I’m going to kill you after what you did to me and my friends! Then I’m going to collect that ten-gold bounty as I parade your corpse through the fucking-! “
Didn’t he literally just ask me what I want though? Is he an idiot?
Bug points to him and simply says, “Shut up. Inflict Pain. You, punch him some. You, take his weapons.”
The man cries and screams as he is punched repeatedly, and his weapons are ripped out of his hands. He ends up getting lucky and runs his sword through the guts of one of the zombies, but honestly, that just makes it easier to disarm him. Once Bug orders them to stop, the two step away from him and rejoins the horde. The one still has the sword stuck in him, but it doesn’t seem to bother the zombie in the slightest. Bug decides to just leave it there for now.
“Ok… Now then. Human, as I was saying. I want to ask you some questions. I am willing to forgive you calling me a bitch for now, and I promise that if you tell me what I want to know, that I will spare your life. Deal?”
“Hachk.. Ache, fuck you monster. I can’t trust that you will hold your… hak… word. I won’t tell you anything!” He says as he spits out a blob of bloody spit towards Bug.
Bob the Archer, who was standing stoically next to Bug the whole time, quickly reaches down and blocks the spit with his hand.
Huh, that must have counted as an attack against me. It’s a good thing that I have them set to take hits for me.
“Eugh, uh, Bob. Wipe your hands on your pants or something. That looks nasty…”
Bob does as he is told and then Bug turns back to the guy and addresses him. “Now human. That was quite rude. I am offering you a chance to live, and you have quite literally spat at my offer. It’s not even like I wanted to ask you anything all that important. I just want information about the Dungeon. Like, why were you guys in this room, and why were you so surprised that you got attacked? This is a Dungeon you know? You really should have been keeping your guard up.”
“Fuck you, that’s why!”
“I’m sorry, but I have no interest in breeding with you human.”
“Wha, what? No, I am telling you- “
Bug steps forward and stabs him the throat in one swift motion as she withdraws her sword. Ripping the sword out of his throat, she immediately stores it again as he stumbles back against the wall.
“I know, I was just trying to be funny. You don’t have to take everything so seriously human. And I really would have let you live. You are the third one to receive this offer, and yet so far no one has accepted it… Do I really look that untrustworthy? Oh… I’m talking to a corpse… tch, Raise Undead. Hurry and get up already. I want to be out of here before more humans show up.”
//Killed lvl 3 Human – 15 exp gained!
//Killed lvl 4 Human – 20 exp gained!
//Killed lvl 4 Human – 20 exp gained!
//Killed lvl 5 Human – 25 exp gained!
//Congratulations! You have reached lvl 10! – Your stats have been increased!
//You have earned 3 Free Stat points!
//You have earned 1 Skill point
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
//Congratulations! You can now unlock a Class. Please select a Class before attempting further leveling.
//Warning! Further exp gain has been capped at 100 until class selection.
//Warning! You have reached your capped limit on experience. 100/100. All exp gained past the cap will be lost. Please select a Class.
…
Crap… I guess that seven humans were a bit too much exp. It’s good I was finally able to reach Level 10, but I don’t like it that I lost experience. How much did I lose? Maybe I shouldn’t have killed that last guy… Eh, doesn’t matter. I just need to hurry up and get out of here, find some place safe, and then select my class.
Raising the rest of the corpses, Bug stores everything and then heads for the door. Behind her, she can hear as something is dragging on the floor, so she turns to look at what the noise is.
Behind her, three of the mob zombies are dragging their ruined bodied to try and follow her. One is missing a leg, another looks like its spine is probably broken, and the third is simply missing its lower half.
“Jeez… These things are pretty hard to kill huh?”
Bug looks the guy that took an axe to the back of the head, the first human that died when her zombies attacked. Despite having most of his head destroyed and his brains leaking out, the zombie is still standing just fine with the rest of them.
“I wonder how much it takes to actually kill them…? A few of the mob zombies did get killed though. Maybe it is just a matter of if they take too much damage for their bodies to keep being able to move…”
Pushing aside the question for now, Bug point to the three ruined zombies and gives them an order. “Return upstairs and kill anything that you can. I don’t need you three slowing me down.”
Giving them the order, Bug turns and leaves the place that the humans called a Safe Room and proceeds down the stairs. Eventually, the three mob zombies make their way out as well, and as soon as enough distance has grown between them, Bug cuts her connection to them. They will keep heading up to the first floor even without her input now, and she might as well not waste the mana being used to keep them controlled.
As she heads down the stairs, Bug rolls her shoulders as the discomfort of leveling-up settles on her body. Quickly, she spends her Free Stat Points and then looks over everything.
----------------------------------------
Stats
Name – Bug
Age – 0
Race – Gremlin
Class – Class Selection is available!
Level – 10
EXP – Capped 100/100 [Please select a Class]
Free Stat Points - 0
Heath – 78/78
Stamina – 31/33
Mana – 92/141 [170] [-29 From Control Upkeep]
Vitality – 13
Endurance – 11
Strength - 11
Dexterity - 18
Magic - 17
Intelligence - 18
*Luck – N/A
*Note: Luck is a work in progress stat. Points cannot be put into this stat at this time.
----------------------------------------
The Second Floor… honestly, it doesn’t look any different than the first. Bug doesn’t really know what she was expecting to find as she descended to the next floor, but she has to admit that she is mildly disappointed that this floor doesn’t really look any different than the first one did.
It is all just cave walls, wet moss, dirt covered floor, and glowing mushrooms radiating a gentle light. Off to the side she even finds a Jelly eating a piece of trash that some human probably left behind. Looks like a food wrapper or something.
Killing the Jelly, Bug tries to use Raise Undead on it, but the spell fails. She had a feeling that it wouldn’t work, but it was worth trying.
Storing the Jelly skin and selling the trash, she looks around and picks a direction at random as she ignores the warning that pops up in her messages about lost exp.
“Guess we’ll head left for now. Just need to find a hole to hide in so I can pick a class safely…”
Wandering down the halls, Bug navigates around some bloody messes where the humans had already killed most of everything in the area. All of the corpses are cut up and mangled and are in the process of being digested back into the Dungeon. Their bodies are falling apart and turning into a sludge that is being slowly absorbed by the thirsty dirt covered floor.
‘Goblin. Dead.’
“So, this is a Goblin huh… Why are all of them missing their left ear? Looks like they have been cut off… Hmm, Raise undead.”
The spell fails to take hold on the melting body, and Bug nods her head.
So, if a corpse gets left for too long for the Dungeon to eat, then I can’t use it. Looks like they have to be fresh. Good to know.
Storing the Goblin corpses and selling them just barely manage to net her three points despite there being eight of them. The damage being too much, their value had dropped severely. Still, Bug would rather get what she can than let the Dungeon eat.
Resuming her walk, Bug listens to the noises coming from further in the Dungeon and notes that it is sounding much quieter than the first floor was today.
“Honestly, the humans are so weird. Hmm… Maybe it has to do with that bounty that that guy mentioned. Are they all up there looking for me? I don’t see why they would be though. I doubt that my fur is any more valuable than the others, and I doubt that they want my stuff… Maybe it is because I’m different? So, that makes them want to hunt me down? Well, all the more reason to make some distance from the first floor then.”
Eventually, Bug comes across a hole in the wall that is high enough that a human would have a hard time checking it for occupants. Climbing up the wall, Bug holds her dagger as she is ready to stab anything that might be living inside. She still remembers what the old human had taught the little humans while she was hiding. On the lower floors, she won’t be the only one using these holes as hiding places.
Checking inside, she finds it to be clear and then crawls in. Peeking back out, she looks down at the horde of zombies that are mindlessly waiting down below. Some of them are listlessly staring up at her, as if they are awaiting directions.
“Ummm… Spread out and play dead for now. I’m going to need to find a way to manage having all of these things following me around. It’s going to make hiding much harder…”
Once she is certain that all of the zombies are now all lying about and the hall now looks like a massacre just happened, Bug returns back inside and makes a bed for herself to relax on. The sleeping roll that she had just recently received is much more comfortable than her old bed of moss and blankets, so she is quite happy as she plops down and gets comfy.
Alright, first. Going to learn Turn Undead. I need to have a way of dealing with any Undead that get raised by the curse and decide to attack me. It’s not a problem just yet, but it could be in the future.
A quick loading bar later and a twinge of pain that is much less that Raise Undead was, and Bug has her new spell.
It is a simple enough thing. If she finds an Undead that isn’t already hers, she can throw a point of mana at it and dominate it if it is weaker than her. If it is stronger than her, then she will have to use more mana until she can wrestle it under her control. It can even be used to steal Undead from other necromancers, but they will be able to resist her attempts to do so by strengthening their own control. Bug makes a mental note to be careful around other necromancers. Especially ones that are stronger than her.
With that taken care of, Bug pulls out some food to snack on and directs the System to show her Class options.