Chapter 5: Giant Zombie Rat

Giant Zombie Rat - Lv.5

Hp: 30/30

Yes, now this was what I wanted. Rubbing my hands in excitement I circled around the rat slowly. Before I could look at it more, a blue box appeared, notifying me of my mana affinity skill leveling up. Swiping it away in a hurry, I examined the reanimated rat for more details. The reason that it was level 5 was because the corpses I used to create it were level 4 and level 6. I was a little bit bummed that it was a higher level than me but that didn’t matter. It was on my side after all.

Although the name of it was giant zombie rat, it looked like any other giant rat. There was no decayed flesh or bones showing on its body. The only way you could tell it was different was from its cold dead eyes. Other than that the only other difference from normal rats was how muscular it was. My ritual seemed to combine the muscles of the dead rats together, making the reanimated corpse stronger. Motioning with my hand, I beckoned the rat to come closer.

With a surprised look I watched it nuzzle against my hand. Petting in absentmindedly I watched as an expression of happiness spread across its face. Huh, I didn’t know the dead could feel. I just assumed that they were cold emotionless husks of their former selves. This would require more studying in the future. I petted the belly of my rat as it rolled over in pleasure. Hmm, this would be a problem. Now that I knew it had emotions it would be hard using it as bait. At first I was going to send it out to fight against other rats and watch from the sidelines. But now I felt like I needed to fight alongside it. I mean just look at the way it smiled….so cute.

Shaking my head furiously I stopped petting my rat and stood up quickly. I would not fall for its cuteness. It wouldn’t even live that long anyways….or so I thought. I honestly had no idea how long it would live. My journal said as long as its body wasn’t destroyed it should last an extremely long time but that was if I used one of the extremely complicated spells that was in the journal. Right now I was only using the easy rituals so I didn’t know if that applied. Looking into my rats eyes I began to speak.

“Can you understand me?”

Looking at me curiously the rat nodded its head. It could understand me too? What could this rat not do? The next few minutes were spent with me conversing it. Although I wouldn’t really called it a conversation per se. My undead prophet title enabled me to understand my giant rat, but it didn’t work the way I thought it would. At first I thought I would understand my reanimation as though it was speaking English, but that was not the case. It was more like I could feel what it was saying. A short squeak meant yes while a long squeak meant no. It was stuff like that. I didn’t really understand how it worked but I wasn’t complaining. I would take what I could get.

After dealing with my new ally, I took a brief glance at my mana affinity skill. I had noticed it leveled up while I was reanimating my corpse.

Mana Affinity SkillSkill Type: PassiveSkill Rank: UniqueSkill Level: 2Exp: 2%Effects: Any skill using mana cost 2% less. You are more sensitive to the mana. This enables you to know when someone is about to cast a spell due to the amount of mana being gathered. Anything mana related comes easier to you.

I guess necromancy was still considered magic since my mana affinity skill leveled up while I was using it. My mana cost discount was low at the moment but in the future it would be powerful. None of my other skills had leveled up so I would need to train them more later. I continued on my exploration with my new zombie rat by my side.

The next forty minutes or so flew by quickly as I fought more giant rats. One thing I noticed while I was hunting down the Giant Rats was that the more I went to the left, the more frequently they appeared. After I killed the first one, it took me a whole ten minutes to reach the second one. But from the second one to the third one it only took me seven. And from the third to the fourth it only took me five. This meant that it would only take me about three minutes to meet the next one. All of the rats that I had fought were all alone so that was pretty nice. Before I continued on I decided to review what had happened.

Together my rat and I were deadly, to say the least. Two on one was overkill kill to begin with but my zombie rat knew exactly when to strike in tandem with me. The only injuries that I had received were light scratches on my arm. They weren’t even that bad since they would heal on their own in the next ten minutes. My battle strategy was that my zombie rat would distract them while I attacked them from behind. I gained quite a bit of experience in my magic spells but sadly neither of them leveled up. From what I could tell, my experience bar was filled almost to half. This meant that if I killed three more giant rats, I would level up.

Another thing I noticed about my zombie rat was that it didn’t feel pain. It had been struck many times in our battles but it still continued fighting like nothing had happened. It also had a habit of eating the corpses of the enemies it killed. I couldn’t really use one of the giant rat corpses because there was barely anything left of it. I had no idea if gnawed off bones would be useful but I guess I would find out. I had no idea how something so small could eat something that was almost as big as it. Normally I would be irritated but some of the wounds my zombie had received had healed. I guess by eating flesh my zombie rat could heal its wounds. Hmm, that wasn’t that bad. The only problem I had with it was that I needed corpses for my necromancy.

After collecting my thoughts I glanced at the weapon in front of me. This had been the first dropped loot that I had received in this dungeon. I guess loot was rare because I had killed quite a few rats and received nothing. I had no idea how the whole loot concept worked but I wasn’t complaining. I glanced at my weapon’s information to review what it did before I continued on.

Rusted Iron Sword

Description: An old iron sword that has seen many battles

Effect: +1 Strength

Damage: 6-12

Durability: 22/30

The rusted iron sword gave me one strength as one of its effects. I was pleased with the bonus since one strength was better than none. Thanks to this sword I no longer had to fight with my hands against the giant rats. I was already excited from this to fight more enemies. The damage it gave me ranged from six to twelve. I didn’t really know how that would work out in combat but I guess I would find out pretty soon.

With my iron sword in my hand and my zombie rat following me, I continued on. As we were walking I noticed that my zombie rat was beginning to walk sluggishly. Maybe it was sick or something? My thoughts were interrupted when I glanced up to see two shadows moving towards me. I got into a battle stance as two giant rats jumped out of the darkness. Dodging to the side quickly, I swung my sword as fast as I could.

-7

Although I managed to hit the giant rat on the side, I had almost missed. The only reason I hit the giant rat was because of luck….. or my dexterity skill. Normally I would’ve said it was luck but my luck was currently at zero so who knew how I hit that rat. Seeing as how I never wielded a sword in my life, I would need to practice with this sword after I leveled up. Utilizing this sword was harder than it looked and using it would do more harm than good until I was proficient at using it.

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My swing had only done seven damage leaving the giant rat with twenty-three health points. Both of the rats I was fighting had thirty health which wasn’t too bad.  Twisting my hand around I tried to get a feel for the sword as my opponent watched me carefully. While the rat watched me I wondered if there was a way to combine the spells I knew with the weapon in my hand. There had to be a way. There just had to be.

As I began thinking I dodged several swipes from the rat in front of me. I only had to worry about this one since my zombie rat was fighting the other one. I had fought enough giant rats that I could tell what they were going to do by the way their muscles moved which was why I was dodging its attacks so easily. Once the giant rat left an opening in its defense, I took a step forward and lunged with my sword. The moment my sword plunged into the side of the rat an idea sprung into my mind. Why not try combining my wind blade and my sword?

Taking a couple of deep breaths I began gathering mana toward my blade. It was the same principle as with my hand except I was using my sword this time. Twenty seconds later and my sword was covered with wind. I could do this, I just needed to focus.  Grabbing the hilt of the sword with both of my hands, I swung it like a bat the moment the rat jumped at me. Tensing all my muscles in my arms I swung as fast as I could.

-14

My wind covered sword easily tore through the rat’s body separating its top and lower half. I was forced close my eyes as blood splattered all over me. Spitting out some of the blood in my mouth, I took a look at my now crimson colored sword. Wind thrummed off of the blade powerfully as if it lusted for battle. I would definitely be using this attack more often in the future.

The reason I was able to kill the giant rat in that one hit was because I had already lowered its health a decent bit before I attacked it with my enhanced sword. While I was looking at the pieces of the giant rat I realized something. How the hell was I supposed to use it in necromancy? Fuck. Although the corpse was still technically useable it was better if it was in one piece. Oh well, there was nothing I could do about it now.  There’s no point in worrying about something that I can’t change. I glanced over to my zombie to see how it was doing.

As I glanced over to my left I quickly recoiled in shock. My zombie rat was being torn apart by the other giant rat. Why was this happening? I honestly had no clue. I quickly rushed in before the other giant rat could kill my zombie. For some reason my zombie rat was slow, noticeably slow. Normally he would be able to dodge quite easily, but right now he couldn’t. I would have to look to my journal for answers after this fight. I killed the giant rat quite easily seeing as how it was focused on my zombie rat. A few wind bladed attacked to the back and it was dead. As I was finishing it off my zombie rat died.

Sniff.

Oh well, I could just make another one. I watched in interest as my zombie rat slowly disintegrated into bone dust. I created a rectangular earthen container and stored the bone dust inside of it. The reason I changed the shape was because I didn’t think a cup would fit in my pocket. I based the shape off of a container I once saw that held a ring. While I was creating it a lone giant rat tried to sneak up on me. It was soon defeated quite easily and I was awarded with a level up. After a few minutes of debating, my skill allocation was completed.

Status WindowNameColm MarythouAge: 16Race: HumanLevel: 3Gender: MaleTitlesThe Peerless Descender, Undead ProphetHealth: 115/120Mana: 50/120Stamina: 70/120~Strength: 10[1]Agility: 13Vitality: 8Dexterity: 9Intelligence:15Wisdom:15Luck:0~SkillsMana Affinity, Wind Blade, Earthen Spike, Necromancy, MeditationUnallocated Points: 0

With my five skill points I raised my intelligence and wisdom to fifteen and my agility to thirteen. I had a feeling that if I kept on increasing my intelligence or wisdom, my mana pool would increase. I would just have to keep experimenting to see which stat did which. I also noticed the one that was by my strength. The reason I had this as because of my sword. I could hardly wait for more equipment that would increase my stats.

Once my points were allocated, I began looking for a suitable place to train my necromancy skill. Although the light bulb gave me more light than the moss, I did not want to make a trip back there every time I wanted to do something. I needed a new base around here since I would be fighting more rats more frequently and I might need to rest without traveling long distances. I took a couple minutes to look around until I came upon an extremely bright section of moss. These large quantities of moss were all clumped together making it almost as bright as the lightbulb by the ladder. Nodding my head I decided that I would make this my base.

The next twenty minutes went by with me gathering all of the corpses together and getting the bone dust I had left at the ladder. Once everything was placed by the moss, I glanced at my corpses. Right now I had four corpses that could still be used and bits and pieces of another corpse. Looking back on it now, I probably should’ve killed the giant rat another way rather than splitting it in half. However I was too caught up in the moment and ended up ruining a good corpse. I would probably still be able to use it. I would just have to read my journal and find out. But before I read my journal I decided to meditate and restore some of my mana.

After my mana was restored I took out my necromancer journal. I was just about to open it when I felt another chill pass through my body. I glanced towards my left and right to make sure I was alone. I could never tell in this obscure darkness. After about a minute of staring I decided that I was truly alone. Stepping over the giant rat corpses I walked a couple of steps beyond my new base. Before I started reading my journal I decided to create an earthen wall in case any giant rats tried to sneak up on me. You could never be too careful and I did not want my journal to get accidently destroyed. I was positive that I would never get another one like it.

Placing both of my hands on the ground I began gathering mana. Once mana was circulating around my hand I began directing it beneath my hands. This wasn’t that challenging for me since I was essentially creating an earth spike, albeit quite a bigger one. Although my hand was touching the cold floor of the sewer, I could feel the warm earth beneath it. For some reason, the mana that was in the earth felt more robust than the mana in the tiles of the sewer. This made it easier for me to sense.

Once enough mana was gathered I moved on to the next step. The walls in the sewer were separated from each other by a distance of around fifteen feet. It was different in other parts of the sewer but it was mostly fifteen feet. The ceiling was a decent height away from me. It was close enough for me to barely see it but far enough that I wouldn’t be able to touch it using conventional means.

Pushing my mana into the ground I watched as an earthen spike erupted from the ground. I pushed more mana into the spike making it bigger and denser. I did this until the spike itself was unable to get any larger. I moved a couple inches to the side and repeated the whole process again. Since my earth spike level was so low I would need to create multiple spikes in order to get the result that I wanted. The more I did this the more in tune I felt with the earth.

Sweat dripped down from my face as I gathered more and more mana. Although I had the mana to create earth spikes, the more I made the more exhausted I was becoming. I was forced to toss my jacket to the side because wearing it was making me too hot. This was probably the only time was thankful for the cool breezes that flowed through this sewer.

After I finished creating three giant earth spikes, I walked over to the middle of them. Placing my hands on the ground once more I focused on combining them. What kind of wall had gaps in it? After a few minute of manipulating the earth, my spikes were finally beginning to look like a wall. Once I finish manipulating the three spikes I had to meditate in order to regain my mana. I would make this little section of  a sewer into a fortress. No matter how long it took.