Lucas stared wide-eyed at the man who was placidly reading his book. He couldn’t be mistaken; those were Faruk’s clothes. He had seen them enough to know that. Before Lucas had a chance to decide what to do, the man raised his head and noticed him. Suddenly, his mount started moving much faster towards him. Lucas wasn’t sure if the man had ill intentions toward him, but he was ready to fight back if necessary. However, when he identified him, his will to fight deflated a little.
Human – Lvl ??
There wouldn’t be much he could do if the man decided to attack him. If Lucas’ estimates were correct, he could see up to 10 levels above his own. So, that meant that the man was above level 20, and Lucas had a feeling it was not by a small amount, maybe due to that weird mount he had with him, indicating that he had already seen a lot. Maybe sensing Lucas’ concerns, the man stopped more than ten feet away from him and smiled.
“Hey there, I mean you no harm. I just need some information,” the man called out. “Is it okay for me to come over there so we can talk?”
Lucas began to think rapidly. Why had Faruk’s clothes appeared there? Was it because he had them with him on his ring? Were they related somehow? That couldn’t be it, could it? However, this really didn’t seem to be a part of the quest he was supposed to on this floor; it seemed like a totally random occurrence.
Besides, someone who hadn’t had that encounter with the necromancer’s corpse in the woods wouldn’t even recognize his clothes, and might ignore that strange man riding a turtle in the middle of the desert. Another point against this idea was that Faruk’s clothes were unique; they even had their name on them.
Although Lucas couldn’t identify them with the man wearing them, he was pretty positive it was the same outfit. The oddness of the situation left him speechless for a while, but thankfully, the man who talked to him was patient and waited for his reply.
“Yes, it’s okay,” Lucas said, regaining his voice. And the man approached, still smiling, with his wrinkles even more visible now on his face, indicating his age.
“Apologies for troubling you with this, but I have been lost for some time now. Do you by any chance know where the closest city is?” the man said, with a soothing tone, leading Lucas to believe he was some sort of teacher. He had a keen ear for that type.
“Yes,” Lucas said, pointing toward the city he had come from. “It’s that way.”
“Thank you very much for your help, young man,” he nodded and started to move towards where Lucas had pointed.
“Wait!” Lucas yelled before the man could go far, his heart pounding in his chest. The man acted like a regular NPC, just a passerby asking for directions, but that couldn’t be all. Lucas knew it couldn’t, not with those clothes on him. The man turned to him, still smiling, but that smile disappeared when he heard Lucas next words. “Are you… Faruk?”
It was a crazy assumption. Faruk was dead; Lucas himself had seen his bones resting in the Dark Forest. Those clothes could just have been placed there due to him having the same set on his ring, something the system did to mess with him, or something. But after hearing the man speak, Lucas doubts about this theory increased.
He had read a lot about the necromancer’s journal to know a little about the person behind it, and something about the way that man talked was awfully familiar to him. So he made a gamble, if it wasn’t him, the man would say he had the wrong person. But if it was him…
The man jumped out of the turtle and moved towards him with insane speed, and in the next second he had his hands on his neck, pressuring him with something pretty similar to his death aura; death mana.
“How do you know my name?” The man asked, none of that friendly tone in his voice now. Instead, it had a clear killing intent, making Lucas shiver and consider whether he should use his chance to restart the floor. “Speak!”
Instead of giving up, however, Lucas gambled once again and let out his Death Aura at the maximum capacity. He could see that the man noticed the change around him, and his expression showed confusion, as he let Lucas go. Gasping for air after being released from the necromancer’s grip, because now he knew for sure that was indeed the same man he met in the Dark Forest, only much more… alive now.
“What… are you?” Faruk said, sounding almost afraid.
“Is this how you greet people where you come from?” Lucas said this while rubbing his neck.
“Answer me, how do you know my name?” Faruk said, regaining his composure.
“Or what?” Lucas said, standing his ground. “You can’t kill me. I can leave this place like this if I want to” Lucas said, snapping his fingers.
He saw some doubt appear in the man’s eyes. Lucas’ level was too low for him to be of any threat to the necromancer, and his speed shouldn’t be anywhere near as fast as his, especially with his mount by his side, but he seemed to be speaking the truth about being able to leave somehow. They stood there silently, facing each other for some time before the man’s expression softened.
“Forgive me for my past behavior; in these times, one needs to be careful, you understand,” he began again. “But if you could please elucidate from where you know my name, I would be very grateful.”
Lucas pondered the necromancer’s words carefully, and Faruk waited patiently while Lucas debated with himself. Previously, he felt like he knew Faruk somewhat due to possessing his personal journal and having read much of what he had chosen to write in there. But because of that, he had let his guard down and been reckless in asking if he was Faruk, never expecting the reaction that followed. Reading his journal and knowing the man were two very different things, and he had learned that the hard way.
Now that he considered the possibilities of what a powerful necromancer could do to him, if he so willed, Lucas seriously thought about quitting now while he still could. His main concern was: What would the necromancer’s reaction be if Lucas told him everything? What if he had some way to possess his body and use that to leave the tower once he figured out he was dead? Lucas hadn’t read anything about possession in the man’s journal, but that didn’t mean much; Faruk might have learned it and just decided not to put it in his journal for whatever reason.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
Despite all the danger involved, Lucas had to admit his luck had changed ever since finding the necromancer’s corpse. What if this was one of those situations where danger went hand in hand with opportunity? Would he just let the opportunity go out of fear?
Despite the delay, deep down, Lucas knew he already had his answer. His curiosity alone would be a huge impediment to just giving up for the sake of safety, not to mention his profound desire to get strong and control his own fate. He couldn’t deny that he felt that this could be a great step towards his goal. He was new to this whole system thing, but he had a feeling things like this didn’t happen very often.
Trying to find courage in the fact that he could give up any time he wanted and ignoring the fact that Faruk could probably kill him before he managed to do so, Lucas answered the man who was waiting patiently, remembering another fact about his journal. “Maybe. But first, I need some assurance that you won’t attack or harm me, no matter what I say.” Lucas broke the silence.
“Of course. What do you propose?”
“A promise is fine,” Lucas answered immediately.
“A promise… are you sure? And you will trust my word?” Faruk asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Sure,” Lucas replied simply.
“Well, I must say you are truly an odd fellow. However, my word is trustworthy, and I never break it if I can help it,” the necromancer said, with a tinge of curiosity in his eyes.
Oh, I know, Lucas thought. Hadn’t he read the necromancer go on and on about his word, how he never broke it, or how he would rather die than break it in his journal? So yeah, he had a pretty good hunch that the man’s words were to be trusted. Of course, he could be lying, but who would bother to lie in their own personal journal? With this, Lucas felt a little more confident in his plan.
“It’s settled then. I promise I won’t attack you, no matter what you say to me,” the gray-haired man said solemnly.
“All right, I will tell you how I know your name, but it will take a while to tell you the whole story, and I’m not sure how much time I have left,” Lucas said, remembering Aysha’s warning to him that if someone stood for too long without any progress on a floor, the Tower would kick them out. Or at the very least make him restart the floor, taking away one of his ‘lives’.
“Why? Are you dying? Is this what that aura was?” the necromancer asked him.
“No, it’s not that, it’s complicated… come, let’s find a place where we can talk, it’s a bit odd to be discussing these things in the middle of the desert. I’ll try to be brief once we arrive,” Lucas said, and began walking, but Faruk stopped him.
“If that’s the case, then hop on my turtle. It will be faster this way,” he said, pointing at the beast waiting behind him. Lucas looked at the thing, a little incredulous.
“Really?”
“Trust me,” the necromancer said with a smirk.
In the next minute, Lucas felt like he was flying on the back of that leggy turtle. He could barely believe his eyes. Seeing the speed in which that beast moved, it felt like he was about to take off, flying towards the sky, and a few seconds later they arrived at the city Lucas had left.
“Where did you find this thing?” Lucas asked, looking at the turtle. Instead of answering, the old man retorted with another question.
“Isn’t it funny to give such speed to a turtle? Whoever is behind the system must have a remarkable sense of humor,” the man said, laughing, and Lucas had to agree with him on that point. Himself being a proof of that sense of humor, with his glass bones turning into an incredible deadly weapon. “Where should we go?” he said, looking around.
“I don’t know, but the fewer people there are, the better,” Lucas said, and the curiosity from the necromancer intensified.
Ten minutes later, they were sitting at a bar that was even worse than the one Lucas had gone earlier. This one had only two people in it, and one of them was talking to himself while the other was sleeping on the counter. Both of them ordered a beer and chose a table far from the others.
“So?” Faruk said anxiously.
Lucas scratched his head. The entire way, he thought of the best way to tell everything to him, but the first part was definitely the worst. How do you say that to someone?
“I don’t know how to tell you this, but… you are not real,” he said, deciding to take a more direct approach.
“What are you talking about?” A confused look appeared on the man’s face, with some anger mixed in there too, no doubt about it. Lucas couldn’t even judge him. If someone told him something like that, he would probably have the same reaction.
“I saw your corpse in a forest on the outside,” Lucas explained, uncertain of what to say.
“Outside?” The man’s eyebrow was raised.
“Yes, we are inside a challenge now, on the second floor, to be more exact.”
Faruk’s face was blank, and then he frowned even more.
“What did you say just now? I couldn’t hear you.”
“I said that we are inside a challenge now; it’s called the Ten Floor Challenge,” Lucas repeated, but the scene in front of him was the same as before: the necromancer’s face was blank, and then he frowned.
“This is odd,” he said, and he looked around for a while before speaking to Lucas again. “For some reason, I can’t seem to hear what you are saying. But you said that you found my corpse, which is peculiar because I’m very much alive as of the last time I checked. But you didn’t find it in here,” he said, making a motion with his hands around the room, “you found it outside.”
The necromancer waited, and Lucas nodded in reply. Afterward, the necromancer was silent for about five entire minutes. It became obvious to Lucas that the system had placed some sort of block that prevented Lucas from telling NPCs that they were just part of the challenge. However, he didn’t even need to explain that to Faruk, who seemed to be putting the pieces of the puzzle together.
“This is odd. Even though I don’t sense that you are lying, and I don’t dispute the fact that such a thing could be possible, it is a little hard to believe that I’m dead,” the necromancer muttered, seemingly talking more to himself than to Lucas.
What surprised Lucas, however, was that the necromancer apparently had a way to tell if he was lying or not. Was that something all necromancers could do? He had skimmed through a great deal of his journal but hadn’t found anything mentioning something like that. Before Lucas could delve into these thoughts any further, the necromancer spoke again, this time looking straight at him.
“I’m not saying I don’t believe you, but it would be easier for me to accept what you just told me as a fact if you had some sort of proof for your claim,” he said expectantly, breaking the silence.
Lucas considered the necromancer's request for a few seconds before briefly showing him his version of the necromancer's clothes. He saw no point in hiding it, having come this far. He had already weighed the dangerous possibilities of engaging with an unknown, powerful necromancer and had decided to take the risks, so he wasn’t going to back out now.
The look of shock on Faruk’s face after seeing an exact copy of the clothes he was wearing at that very moment told Lucas that this was proof enough for the old man. Once Faruk seemed to grasp his situation, a deep sadness mixed with curiosity appeared on his face.
“So, I’m dead.” He stated, and a few moments of silence passed before he added, “May I know what the circumstances of my demise were?”
“You were trying to acquire an object that you believed would help you rise in power and maybe bring your wife back, somehow,” Lucas said, and at the mention of his wife, the killing intent from the man could be felt by Lucas. “I shouldn’t have to remind you that you promise not to attack me,” he said, with a straight face, refusing to show any fear.
“Forgive me, this is a sensitive topic for me, but how do you know about all of this? I don’t remember telling that to anyone,” the man said after a few seconds, managing to calm down.
“Your corpse was part of a quest. I had to go through some fog and a bunch of undead and ghosts that you left to protect you, I guess. And when I reached your body, your skeleton to be exact, I found your spatial ring,” Lucas showed the ring on his finger. “And inside, I found your journal.” Lucas took the journal out and showed it to the necromancer, who’s eyes open wide.
“Oh, by the way, we’re on a different planet too. The forest, as well as your skeleton, got transported here,” Lucas added. Hearing that, comprehension appeared in the necromancer’s eyes.
“Are you in the Second Chance Program?” the man asked suddenly, eager to hear his reply.
“Yes…” Lucas answered, a little more fearful of the hope that could be heard in the man’s voice.
“Then I still have a chance!” The man said, raising from his seat, and Lucas was ready to flee at any moment.