As soon as she saw them, she ordered her zombies in formation at the entrance, placing the biggest one in the center so as to create a choke point. She wasn't a Tactician, but she was able to guess as much. Then, she took place behind the defense line, waiting for the attackers to crush into her force.

She probably miscalculated something, because while they were able to prevent most of them from passing, some were still able to slip trough. So, Elena found herself surrounded by four of the roaches, far more than what she would be able to handle alone.

She could call one of her other minions back from the blockade, but she knew that would defenitly spell their doom, they were already in difficulty and she felt that some of them were on the brink of death. It was only thanks to her monstrous zombie roach that they were able to keep up.

Thanks to its doubled size it could spew acid twice as much as it did before, melting two or three of the living roaches at a time and effectively keeping them at bay.

But going back to her current predicament, she decided the best solution would be to break towards where her minions were making their last stance, going back to back with them so as to prevent the roaches from attacking one of them from behind.

So, she ran towards the lone roach blocking the way and jumped over it, leaving a shallow but long cut over its back using her knife. She landed where she meant to be and started the real fight.

It was a long night, though you couldn't really see the time passing inside of the cave. Elena fought for her life, fending off multiple opponents at a time and receiving multiple cuts from the sharp appendaces of her enemies and some burns from the acid that was continuosly spat towards her.

She wasn't sure how much time passed or how many roaches she fended off, but at a certain point everything went still and she had somehow learned another skill.

[ Common Skill obtained! One-Handed Combat I ]

The tunnel's floor was covered in acid, green blood and dead roaches, both melted off completely or just a bit. After a quick count, she found there were seven bodies in good enough contitions to be able to do anything with them, and another fifteen that were just mush. Also, only her biggest zombie remained, even if he was also quite battle worn and... spent.

She ordered it to eat up the melted roaches and she started dragging the other seven in her cave, so as to bring them back to unlife. She was able to resurrect three of them, before she was emptied of mana...

[ You Leveled up! Because you reached Level 3, you have been awarded with a Mind Point ]

... or so she though. Thanks to the level up, all of her mana was restored and she also received a Mind Point, which could be used to raise either Intelligence, Wisdom or Perception. She promptly put it into intelligence, raising her total mana by five points.

She then proceeded to resurrect another three roaches to add to her minions, leaving only one she would have to raise later, when she recovered enough mana.

And, as if the new skill and level up wasn't enough, another one of her skills reached a new level.

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[ Your Skill -Raise Lesser Undead- Leveled up! You may now raise the living in the form of Lesser Skeletons ]

That made her really happy, almost enough to make her forget the battering she had been receiving just a couple minuter earlier. After all, she was leveling up both in skills and class levels at an astonishing level!

It usually takes a week or two to raise the level of a skill from I to II, and even more time for the successive level and so on. But she was on a roll!

Also, the third level of Raise Lesser Undead granted her the ability to raise a new type of undead, skeletons! This kind was as common as zombies to find, but were slightly sturdier and defenitely more agile than their rotting counterpart. Finally, they didn't stink as much, which was always a gain.

Thanks to the knowledge granted by the level up of the skill, she also knew she could order her zombies to strip themselves of their flesh, effectively becoming skeletons, but even if the cost in mana was minor than creating them from scratch, she still didn't have enough.

Also, she would leave her biggest zombie as it was, because it would probably lose it's ability to spit acid if it transformed.

After finally eating her cold dinner, she went over to the tunnel, her minions leading the way towards the side room from which the roach flood had emerged. Sure enough, once they arrived, she couldn't help but notice the big hole on the opposite side of the entrance. It defenitely wasn't there when she last checked these side rooms. She would have noticed something this big, ominous and completely covered in acid.

Alas, she couldn't do anything about it now. She either moved out of the cave or went in and discovered where these roaches where coming from. And so, she did the only logical thing. She checked her status screen, took a deep breath and together with her minion dived into the dark, dark hole.

[ --- Status Screen --- ]

Name: Elena | Class: Necromancer – Apprentice | Level: 3

Condition: Battered | Mana: 5/25 (7 Mana/3h)

[ --- Stats --- ]

Str: 5 | Cos: 5 | Dex: 8

Int: 8 | Wis: 6 | Per: 7

[ --- Skills --- ]

Common: Basic Farming III | Reading II | Writing I | One-Handed Combat I

Uncommon: Raise Lesser Undead III [Lesser Zombie, Lesser Skeleton]

Rare: Analyze-Self

[ --- End of Status Screen --- ]