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  ingRank D - 44%

  I gri the results, wiped my forehead dry of sweat and stretched until my back pop-popped in a most satisfactory way. The sun was starting to dip already. It was crazy how much fun you could have just expl.

  So far, I had covered two of the houses o the Inn, both of them much bigger than the homes on the Inn’s other side. They had enough bedrooms and space f families, and the quality of the furniture was much better. I even mao fier brooms and a mop that looked almost brand new and that seemed to stay fresh no matter how much I used it.

  A magic mop! Or ohat was just really well made.

  I had three more homes to work on in this er of the town--the se that I suspected was reserved for the richer inhabitants--then I would move all the way to the other end in the poorer se where I could see the peaked roof of a church.

  Nodding to myself, I stepped out of the st house, Bonesy in my wash bucket and my mop and broom slung over my shoulder.

  I should have been paying more attention.

  A white hand cwed out towards my fad I squeaked as I bent over backwards to avoid the swipe aimed right at me.

  I fell on my bum, then rolled to the side as a cw raked through the ground where I had fallen. My hand shot out and I grabbed Bonesy, swinging the head around to slice through the swipe aiming for my face.

  It worked, making the ghostly hand vanish for a moment before it reformed. It was a big enough window of time that I was able to roll again, then climb onto my feet. My skirt and blouse was soggy where they had rolled in the grass and my hair had gone wild, but that was sedary to the ghost that turned and tried to cw at me again.

  “Not this time, buster,” I said as I swiped Bohrough one arm, theher, then with a yell that was totally not a squeak, I swished the skeletal head through the ghost from top to bottom.

  I panted as the ghost faded away to nothing, leaving only a glowing dust behind that soon sparkled away into darkness. “Oh my goshness,” I said as I tried to calm my beati. I looked this way and that, taking in the homes all around me and iing everything.

  That had been close. Way too close. And so easy to avoid too. All I had to do was stick my head out of the door and look around and I would have been fihis wasn’t home--I had to remind myself--where things weren’t out to kill you all day every day.

  My grip around boightened and I shivered.

  Ding! gratutions, you have made ‘Sentinel Ghost of Threewells by Darkwood’ Level 1 e to a sticky end!

  I stared at the prompt. “Was that a stick pun?” I asked.

  Clearly the menu systems in this world were all quite evil. It was something to take my mind off my test near-death experience... and now I was the one making puns. I groaned and looked up to the sky, taking in the huge blue expah the occasional distant birds and the strange balloon in the dista--

  I blinked and focused on what looked like a tiny--or very, very distant--oblong balloon. It was brown-ish grey, with a rge red mark on its side and a faint trail of smoke behind it. Not something aniot with the way it hung motionless in the sky.

  “What is that?” I wondered.

  Ding! For repeating a Special A a suffit number of times you have unlocked the general skill: Insight!

  “Holy moly!” I looked around. I hadn’t fotten the whole ghost almost-eating-my-face thing, but this was certainly a nice distra. “Insight!” I said as I held up Bonesy

  A Skeleton (Level ?) head attached to a stick.

  I ughed, then pressed a hand over my mouth to keep the sound low. Looking up, I stared at the tiny distant shape and thought ‘insight’ as hard as I could.

  An airship.

  “A flip fluffering airship?” I gasped.

  There were magical airships around! The world had just gotten a million times cooler. But those were things I’d never get to see if I stayed in this ghost-town...

  “Oh no, the puns are catg up.”

  I shook my head, picked up all of my gear, and moved on to the house. This one’s front door was locked, but the window was pletely smashed in. It retty easy to climb in then unlock the door from the inside.

  There were some bits of furniture left in this house, more so than in others. I made the rounds, cheg the kit for anything good, then the pantry and the single bedroom and bathroom on the first floor. Nothing. I did find a strange room on the sed floor, with rge training dummies that were sad and squashed looking where the straw stuffing that had once filled them was rotten away and a rack with some rusty short swords on it. They were probably cheap even before time took its toll. Still, I repced my fire poker and ted myself lucky.

  In the room over, this one an office with a broken window that had let the elements slip in, I found a small dent atop a desk where the dust was sitting strangely. A bit of poking revealed a hidden partment, but it only held a silvery key and a bit of ribbon that had rotted away. I tucked it in my sad kept searg, but to no avail.

  Once I was doh the top floor I began grinding.

  “Insight.”

  A training dummy.

  “Insight!”

  A sword.

  “Insight?”

  A practice pole.

  So, Insight wasn’t that useful, at least not at this level. That just meant I now had two skills I could grind! Insight seemed to be increasing by a pertage point with every item I used it on, which was simple enough. But I didn't want to leave my ing fall behind.

  An hour or so ter I carefully, with muooping around and down and up, moved out of the house and called it done.

  ingRank D - 68%

  InsightRank F - 89%

  Grinning, I moved onto the home, then the . Halfway through the first home a big ‘ding’ resounded in the bay head and I jumped for joy and spun around with my broom.

  gratutions! Through repeated as your Insight skill has improved and is now eligible for rank up!Rank E is a free rank!

  “Woo!” I cheered as I bounced on the spot, only stopping when my broom handle banged on the ceiling a a wave of dust cttering down onto my head. I coughed and choked and sputtered and basically lost a lot of the good cheer I’d just garnered.

  I accepted the rank up and checked out my crazy new skill.

  InsightRank E - 00%The Ability to know something. The knowledge you gain is increased.

  “Wow!” I said before fog on Bonesy who was sitting in a er to watch me .

  A Skeleton (Level ?) head poorly attached to a stick.

  “That was... underwhelming.” None of the other things I used Insight on revealed much more than what they were with a single word descriptor of their quality e. I sort of already know that my short sword was rusty. But that was just rank E! Maybe I’d bee a real Sherloes when I hit rank SS+!

  My ing tinued, my skills at houseing in a dead city improving to the point where I could a whole house in just under an hour or so. I guessed. I would need a watch at some point.

  If watches existed.

  But airships did, so why not?

  I took what little stuff I had found that was useful. A nice silver dle holder with a mirrored hand protector that would keep the light out of the holder’s eyes, a pretty painting of a boat on a river with a dragon flying in the background in a nice frame, a few spoons and table knives made of silver, and tossed them all inth sack I found that was hole-less. They were the sum total of my riches.

  When I found civilization my first stop was going to be an antique’s store where I could sell all of the stuff and make enough to fund any future adventures!

  I pulled out my map and checked it out. It seemed that I had ed and explored the--I was going to call it Western--part of the town pletely. The Evil Hole of Great Evil was just to the East of where I was, which was totally off limits because I retty sure the only respawn I would get was as a ghost to haunt the poor adventurer and that wasn’t .

  Mrinding!

  I had to admit, ing had never been so much fun. rinding for that matter. There were real, tangible bes to all of this and I loved every moment of it except for the moments where I was nearly dying. Those I could do without.

  I arrived at the southern end of the town and realized that I would o update my map a lot. But before that, more sneaking!

  Moviween two homes, I kept myself low to the ground, my haversad ing gear and things left o a house behind to reduce the noise I made as I moved around.

  It seemed that at some point the road leading into the town forked and never reected, so that the road I had been expl for the past day and a bit was disected from the one I found now. This road e a big gate that was left ajar, just enough for someoo walk through if it wasn’t for the huge pile of brauffed by the entrance.

  There was another well, which made three! I was right about the name!

  My silent cheering at my discovery froze up when I peeked around a er and found the old church I had seen a while ago. It was a rge building with two bell towers and a small graveyard behind it. One filled with ghosts. A quioop revealed five glowing forms wandering in circles.

  Five too many.

  I still snooped around a little. The buildings he church looked like businesses. A bcksmith’s shop, a supply store of some kind, a shop with a stick-like symbol before it. I took note of what I could see, then backed away.

  Too mue to ha my level.

  Maybe it was best that I just... move on. But then that would leave my quest undone, and something niggled at me about it. It didn’t have a timer, exactly, but I could tell that the longer I waited the harder things would get.

  No. It was best that I stick around and at least try to see what I could do. There was aower to visit at the far end of town. Close to the evil ghost but not on it. And there were ghosts that I might be able to chat with.

  And of course more stuff to explore.

  I entered a house as far from the church as could be and did my usual snoop and routihen, nearly an hour ter, as the sun was setting, I used the st rays to update my map, scrubbing out mistakes with some spit and rubbing, and checked on my skill growth.

  InsightRank E - 14%

  ingRank D - 84%

  I would hit ing rank d probably Insight rank D. Two handy skills to have, but her bat based. Still, I wasn’t without options. I would try to lure some ghosts closer to me and take them out with Bonesy. Insight had e from repetitive as. ing from a smaller number of as, but it was a ‘css’ skill.

  amon Bun was obviously not a bat css, so for a fighting skill I would need a whole lot more repetitions.

  I could do it, I knew I could!

  “I believe in me!” I said.

  “Rrrr,” Bonsey agreed. And with that, I packed up and snuck back to the spot I’d slept in the night prior.

  RavensDagger