Just before her vision faded to black, a sound pierced through the haze.
DING
CONGRATULATIONS
BOSS MONSTER DEFEATED (SECONDARY OBJECTIVE)
More notifications followed in rapid succession.
100 XP RECEIVED
YOU HAVE LEVELLED UP
RESTORING ALL STATS...
A rush hit her. Warm, full, electric.
---
NAME: Thalia Michelle Grave
LEVEL: 2
TITLE: Necromancer
JOB: Herald of Death
HP: 100
MP: 10
FATIGUE: 0
STRENGTH: 10
STAMINA: 5
AGILITY: 1
MAGIC: 1
INTELLIGENCE: 16
XP: 110
SKILLS: Summon Undead (LVL 1)
---
It was like someone turned her soul back on. Her limbs no longer screamed in pain. Her lungs filled easily. Even the dull ache in her shoulder, the one she'd carried for years after slamming it in a car door as a kid, gone.
She blinked, dazed for only a moment.
Then she stood up.
To her right: the undead, dragging feet and slack jaws, getting closer.
To her left: the exit.
She tucked the sword between her waist band and belt and adjusted it slightly to fix it in place, the sword slowly began to vanish until it was gone completely just like before.
But this time, she was ready.
Her fingers curled around the hilt and she drew the blade with a single, crisp SHINK, that echoed through the caferia.
Then it reappeared in her hand while the scabbard stayed invisible on her hip.
It was… beautiful.
A shortsword, clearly not of earth, carved with mystical symbols she didn't recognize. The hilt was wrapped in worn leather, faded and nicked with age. Small cracks decorated the crossguard like battle scars. Whoever made it, made it to last.
But it was the blade that stole the breath.
It shimmered with an unnatural polish, no rust or grime, just gleaming steel that seemed to hum in her grip. When she moved it ever so slightly, it resonated like it was singing.
It was a sword with history.
A relic, priceless.
She focused on the sword for a moment and another window appeared.
ITEM INFO
TYPE: ???
DAMAGE: ???
ACCURACY: ???
RANGE: ???
MOBILITY: ???
"So that old man basically gave me a gacha sword..." She knew she'd have words with Gerald once she got back
'Somewhere in a new York Pawn shop and old man sneezes'
"Well if it can sense when I'm in danger and travel thousands of miles, not to mention that hole in the ceiling, then it must be pretty decent."
She took a battle stance, the steel humming in her grip, and a faint smile played on her face.
"Either way…"
Her eyes narrowed, gaze set on the approaching undead.
"Now it's my turn."
She sprinted straight for the horde.
The first zombie reached for her, slow and predictable. With fluid precision she sidestepped and drove the edge of the blade through its midsection, slicing clean out the other side. Blood sprayed behind her like a fan of red mist. She spun sharply, expecting another strike.
The zombie was still upright, but not for long.
Its top half slid clean off the bottom, collapsing in two separate thuds. A pool of blood quickly formed beneath the severed body.
She raised the sword and flicked it downwards, splattering blood onto the floor in a clean, practiced arc.
DING
ENEMY SLAIN
+15XP
CANNOT RESURRECT – BODY TOO DAMAGED FOR RESTORATION
"Dammit. Makes sense I guess. Headless over there came back as a skeleton with no head. Looks like I gotta keep 'em intact if I wanna bring 'em back."
Behind her, her lone skeleton warrior continued fighting the encroaching zombies with wild, jerky swings. The rest of the horde, stunned at first by the chaos, had started to recover. Now they were surging toward her.
Two more zombies lunged at her.
Thalia gritted her teeth, gripped the hilt with both hands, and sprang forward. She twisted her body low, using her momentum to slice the legs out from under the first one, not enough to sever completely, just to break its stance. Before it could collapse, she reversed her grip and slammed the pommel into its forehead, staggering it backward. With a fluid step forward, she buried the blade into its chest and twisted.
DING
ENEMY SLAIN
+15XP
The second zombie tried to flank her, but she anticipated it. She ducked under its grab and rolled across the blood-slick floor. Coming up behind it, she slid her blade across its spine with surgical precision, no limbs lost, no dismemberment, then kicked it forward into a table. She leapt onto the table, springboarded off it, and drove her sword straight through its back.
DING
ENEMY SLAIN
+15XP
WOULD YOU LIKE TO RESURRECT?
QTY: <1>
COST: 5XP
"Nice! Now let's get some more troops on the battlefield."
She tapped YES.
UNABLE TO RESURRECT (ZOMBIE)
SKILL "SUMMON UNDEAD LV1" TOO LOW
"Dammit, dammit, dammit—"
She frantically tapped through the menu.
WOULD YOU LIKE TO SPEND 100XP TO UPGRADE
SUMMON UNDEAD LV1 → LV2?
Without hesitation, she tapped YES.
And for a brief moment, everything went dark, as in... gone. Not blackness with sound. Just nothing. A void.
Then in a blink, she was back in the cafeteria.
DING
SUMMON UNDEAD: LV2
YOU CAN NOW SUMMON (3) UNDEAD
"That place... where was that?"
CHOOSE WHICH CLASS YOU WOULD LIKE TO RESURRECT:
> 1. SKELETON – LV1
2. GHOST – LV1
3. HUMAN – LV1 (UNAVAILABLE: ZOMBIFIED STATUS EFFECT)
4. LOCKED
5. LOCKED
"The skeleton over there worked pretty well as a shield last time. Let's go with a few more."
She selected SKELETON – LV1 with a quantity of 2.
This time she watched the process closely, horrified and fascinated.
Flesh peeled off their bones like candle wax. Blood, fat, muscle, and organs sloughed away into a thick black ooze that quickly dried and then evaporated as if the world itself was rejecting their remains. Even clothes and hair dissolved into the void inky void.
An unnatural wind swept the room again, brushing her hair and flickering the lights. Then they rose, red light gleaming in their hollow sockets.
Without being commanded, they stepped in front of her like loyal sentinels.
She smirked. "Let's give 'em hell."
Thalia charged into the fray.
She kicked off the ground and vaulted over a knocked-over table, slicing downward in a diagonal arc that cut through two necks in one swing. She ducked under a flailing arm and swept the blade through a zombie's chest, the impact making her shoulder jolt. She pivoted on her heel, slammed her boot into another's chest to create space, then stabbed upward through the jaw, the blade popping out of the skull's crown.
Her undead allies weren't idle either. One tackled a zombie and began beating it mercilessly with its bare fists, the other two slashed at incoming attackers.
DING
ENEMY SLAIN
+15XP
DING
ENEMY SLAIN
+15XP
DING DING DING
XP messages flashed and stacked in the corner of her vision. Every time she cut one down, every time a skeleton crushed a skull or gutted a rotting corpse, the notifications flooded in.
She leapt onto a table, slid across its surface, and kicked off the other side, flipping into a downward plunge that ended with her sword buried into a zombie's gaping mouth. Blood gushed out of the back of its head, spraying the air until it spurted to a halt and finally dripping off her blade and onto the floor.
DING
+15XP
And then, finally... silence.
She stood at the far end of the cafeteria, right where she'd been trapped earlier. Her chest rose and fell rapidly, blood soaking her face, her arms, her clothes, her boots. She turned to look behind her.
A trail of bodies. Carnage. Blood smeared across every surface. Some bodies were twitching, most still. Her skeletons had fought savagely, too savagely.
Only one of the summoned remained.
The headless one.
The others… had been torn apart. Their bones cracked, shattered, or scattered across the floor.
SPLAT
SPLAT
SPLAT
The headless skeleton stood at a corner, relentlessly smashing a zombie's head into the edge of a table. The zombie had long since stopped moving.
"Hey man," Thalia called out, slightly amused and slightly disturbed. "We're good. We won."
The skeleton paused, tilted its body slightly, then dropped the mangled corpse like a scolded child.
"...Did it just... pout?" She blinked. "Nah. No way."
The job was done.
"Now, let's take a look, shall we..."
She flipped the system window into view.
ENEMIES SLAIN: 33
+495 XP
"Four ninety-five? That's... pretty damn good. I think?"
She glanced at her lone undead minion. "Let's keep the summons to a minimum for now. Don't wanna scare off any survivors with a full boneyard marching behind me."
---
NAME: HEADLESS SKELETON
TYPE: SKELETON
LEVEL: 1
SKILLS: NONE
(ABLE TO LEVEL UP)
-MORE-
"So I can even level up my summons huh..."
She wiped the blade in the crease of her arm and sheathed it. It vanished from sight in a shimmer.
"I should probably wash my face. Hey, you..." She paused and eyed the skeleton.
"I don't wanna keep calling you, you. Hmm... well, you're a headless skeleton... How 'bout Headless?"
The skeleton gave two enthusiastic thumbs up.
"Ha ,so you do understand me."
If it had a head it would've nodded as it's bones clattered while it answered her question.
"Interesting... All right, Headless. On me."
She walked toward the elevator, stepping over the trail of bodies. Headless followed closely, bones clacking on tile.
She pressed the button and waited as the elevator began its slow crawl up.