Ash stumbled into the wall, reeling.

  You have been dazed! Your thoughts and actions will be muddled and slowed temporarily.

  Ash’s mind was reeling but she managed to turn, spotting the skeleton she’d seen before. It was now standing and in the process of swinging a small club at her. Another impact landed on her shoulder before she could think to defend herself, but then her training kicked in and she brought her own large cub up and around, smashing the glowing weapon into the skeleton’s side with a loud Thwack!

  The skeleton was knocked staggering from the impact, taking one step to the right, then falling to a knee atop one of the tiles. The 2. An incorrect tile.

  Click.

  A dart flung out of the wall, bouncing off of the skeleton’s skull. Then the spikes in the ceiling began to lower, starting with the section immediately above the skeleton but continuing around the room, each section cascading down in a slow grind. Ash noticed with horror that the door behind them was also closing, sealing off the way she had entered.

  The skeleton itself lurched up and forward, but its shoulder got caught in the descending spikes and she watched in fascinated horror as it struggled to free itself, slowly being lowered to the floor where it was locked in place when the spikes finally stopped moving, settling a few centimetres above the floor. Several of the creature’s bones had been snapped, but somehow it was still moving, weakly clawing the ground and flailing its club in her direction.

  Finally, the room stilled completely, the path back blocked by a wall of stone and spikes. Ash’s head had eventually stopped spinning and, with a sigh, she stepped forward to smack the trapped skeleton in the face. The skull cracked, but remined whole even as the kill notification pinged into her perception.

  You have slain 1 Level 2 lizardman skeleton. You have received 18 Exp!

  Glow has reached level 5

  Your light affinity has reached level 3

  Ash breathed out a sigh of relief, then gasped at the sight of her health bar, now back down to 2 meagre points. Her head still ached, as did her shoulder. She checked around her for signs of danger, but the walls were now still. She could still make out the light, perhaps with a glimpse of green jungle beyond, but there were two more rooms between her and it. She could also make out a vague shape on the floor of the next room, likely another skeleton lying in wait for her.

  Ash sat on the floor of trap room and settled in to wait for her health to recover, pulling out her potion of deflection and considering if she should just drink it straight away. She mentally cursed herself for her lack of focus. Letting herself be distracted from the danger by solving a puzzle, it felt like such an obvious rookie error to her. She should have taken the potion the moment she decided to come back in here. She almost drank it straight away, but given the current lack of danger she decided to hold off until her heath finally fully recovered. Fortunately, that would be only around an hour thanks to Tyra’s early breakfast.

  Ash used the time to consider her options for auxiliary specialisation. She had just reached level 10 in Rune lore, and wanted to see if she should just specialise immediately. She currently had 2 other viable skills, Assess creature and Scribe. She wasn’t much interested in picking scribe, but assess creature was incredibly useful. Knowing what and how dangerous an enemy was had the potential to keep her alive, maybe even more than any potential strength gain could. It could end up being worthwhile waiting for that skill to reach level 10. That being said, she didn’t know what other skills it would also boost, if any. More than that, what Hestia had mentioned had stuck with her, the fact that picking both Rune skills would boost one another. In the end, in came down to the simple fact: Many people could be good at a few things, but only few were the best at something. If she double specialised, she could be that person. The one that could be relied on in at least one way. She could still benefit from and advance the other skill, just a little more slowly. For anything else, well there would others in the village to help with that.

  I don’t need to do everything. I want to become a person that can be relied on, but to also have others around me that I can rely on too. Double specialising is the way to go.

  Ash picked Rune lore, quickly accepting the prompt and smiling at the notification.

  You have chosen the auxiliary specialty: Rune lore. You will have + 50% increased progression with this skill, + 25% with the Runic Inscription crafting skill and + 10% increased progression with scribing.

  You have selected all three specialisations. As a reward for rounding out your character, you have a bonus 5% increase in skill progression.

  In addition, you are the first to have your particular combination of specialisations within the offensive magic class. Your bonus will double and apply to all sources of progression.

  A bonus? Ash considered, That’s neat. And it was increased by my rather… unique combination too. I guess there are some benefits to boing unconventional. 10% increased progression… I wonder if my skill progression bonuses are additive or multiplicative? Whatever way, my Rune skills are being boosted by 85% at least. Plus, everything else is getting a little help too, let’s make the most of it.

  Feeling reinvigorated, Ash stood, refreshed her glow spell, swigged down the deflection potion and proceeded on to the next room.

  She about half way down the corridor, grimacing about the metallic taste of the potion, when the smell hit her. The scent of decay, always present in the ruins, amped up with additional ripeness. The reason quickly became apparent when her light reached into the next room and the lump on the floor was slowly illuminated.

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  A thick red pool of blood had dried onto the stone, surrounding the bisected corpse of a recently dead lizardman. An obsidian axe lay, just beyond the creature’s outstretched claws. There was no sign of what had caused the death of the creature, aside from it being strong enough to completely chop the thing down the middle. The slice looked to have been clean, around the height of its midriff. Ash looked at the axe, the scaled features, now bloated from decay. It all reminded her of a previous terrifying encounter.

  This… This is the same lizard-man who tried to reach me during their first attack! It must be. This is what happened to it.

  A dead lizardman. It wasn’t a skeleton, not yet, but Ash decided not to risk letting it get the drop on her. She darted forward, reaching for the discarded weapon. Her fingers closed on the back of the axe head when suddenly the rotted arm jerked forwards. Quicker than she could pull back, it twisted and gripped the axe’s handle. The lizard’s head lifted, swollen-purple eyes staring lifelessly at her as it yanked back on its weapon. It was strong, surprisingly so, pulling the axe clean out of her hand. Ash was forced to watch in horror as the creature’s other arm pushed upwards, the torso righting itself on the blood caked floor. At the same time the lizard’s lower half also rose, the two legs and tail starting towards her as the disembodied torso clawed its way across the ground, brandishing the glinting axe head menacingly. Ash stumbled back into the corridor, but realised there would be no escape that way. She found her footing by the entrance of the room, holding her glowing weapon out before her in two hands. As disgustingly horrifying as it was, she would have to make a stand here.

  The legs came at her her first and she swung, only for them to spring off of their tail and dodge to the side, nimbly avoiding her attack and twisting in the same motion to slap at her with the tail. Ash was only saved by the wall of the corridor, the tail swinging out too wide and bouncing off of the stone.

  She took the initiative, stepping forward and clubbing the twisting legs as they tumbled in the air like she would a baseball, a wet smack of wood on flesh sent them flying across the room.

  She realised too late that she’d failed to imbue in her frost touch, but there was no time to berate herself as the torso was already in reach. She twisted to swing again, but the thing pushed off of its empty hand, lurching unnaturally at her with its jagged axe whirling, smashing straight into her chest. There was a shattering sound as the potion’s deflection magic broke, leaving her with only a slight scratch though her clothing. Then her own attack hit, blasting into the torso with the combined power of Light and Ice magic. She registered the damage totalling up, 14 physical, 12 ice and 12 light piling into the rotting flesh for a massive 38 point impact. The torso was slammed into the floor, stunned and twitching.

  She was impressed it was still alive, but she wasn’t going to risk letting that last. She powered down with a follow up strike. She noticed the legs leaping at her, tail spinning in a lethal looking whip. She didn’t let that distract her, focusing on the strength of her withered arms and the weapon clutched between them. It smashed down on the decaying lizard’s mutilated face, splattering it into the stone. Frozen chunks of gristle sprayed outwards as the creature’s disembodied tail slapped limply into her side, the lower half now returned to lifelessness.

  “Fuck. You.” Ash panted, shaking some gore off of her trousers. “Ugh… So gross.”

  You have reached Level 13 in Arcane Conduit.

  You have reached Level 6 in Frost Touch.

  You have reached Level 17 in Great-hammers.

  You have slain 1 Level 4 bisected lizardman zombie. You have received 496 Exp!

  You have levelled up. You are now Level 3. You have 1 stat point available.

  There it was. Level 3. Ash immediately checked her stat page. 21/27 hit points. She had actually only taken 6 damage in that last fight, though her deflection potion had saved her from taking 10 more. That axe blow would have sliced off a whole 13 damage otherwise.

  Technically I didn’t need the potion to win this time, but it’s nice to not survive by a mere hair for once! Ash thought. Plus, if that axe had truly carved into me, who knows if I’d have acted as cleanly. Ash grimaced at the thought.

  Now she had levelled, her stat point could be placed into constitution, giving her 6 more health and stamina to work with. She deliberated, then held off for now. She should discuss that with her friends back at the village. She did still need to get out of this ruin, but in a pinch she could assign it at the last minute, effectively healing her for 6 instantly.

  On that note, she assessed the room ahead of her. Something had cut that level 4 lizardman completely in half, instantly killing it. She definitely did not want that to happen to her. Ash also considered dismantling the corpse like she had with those skeletons earlier. She eventually decided against it for two reasons.

  One, she had just gotten almost 500 experience from killing it, and fairly easily at that. If it revived, she could potentially earn those points again. Secondly, she didn’t feel like getting herself splattered with any more of the decayed guts of the stinking creature. Maybe that second one swayed her more than she’d like to admit. She did, however, pick up its obsidian axe. Leaving it with that would just be asking for trouble.

  Ash found the trap almost instantly. A thin tripwire, stretched across the doorway. Without the light shining on it from both sides, it would have been much harder to spot, but with her torch and the glow of the entrance beyond, it clearly stood out to her.

  She cautiously moved up to it, still wary of pressure traps, and simply stepped over it.

  There, trap avoided. Ash 1, Lizardman 0. Ash thought smugly. Or is that 2 for me now? She shrugged Well, I’m going to call it 2.

  With that passed, she continued slowly down the corridor, examining the next room in the light of the open entranceway beyond.

  This chamber was a little smaller, the walls seemed to be carved with several worn depictions, surrounded by runes. Ash was intrigued, so she almost missed when her foot started sinking into the floor, pulling back just in time to not activate whatever trap she had stepped on. It was another pressure plate. Actually, a whole line of them in the doorway. The ground beyond it seemed to be made of larger tiles, so after a quick probe with her club, she simply hopped over that trap as well. She spent a moment exploring the chamber for more, but it did just seem to be that single trap here.

  Another easy one. Is that because this is the real entryway? If it wasn’t for that freaky zombie Lizard-man, then the danger definitely seemed to ramp down the closer I got to this room.

  She spent a moment examining the murals. There was one on each wall, surrounded by indecipherable runes.

  One day I’ll be able to read those for real, Ash thought with determination. Maybe then I can make more sense of these worn images.

  Without context, and wanting to hurry back to share her discovery and advancement with her friends, she decided not to linger too long before finally stepping out into the light of day.