RavensDagger

  I stood at the very edge of the baly and looked down at the big mushroom just a few feet down. A few feet down and a few feet away. Aween me and the big fluffy looking mushroom was a two storey drop to a rocky field.

  “Okay, it’s okay, it’s obviously a path,” I said to myself as I looked at all the big bouncy-looking mushrooms all lined up in a curve that led to the ptform down. This was a... risk.

  And risks could be bad.

  I shook my head, then unwound one of my ropes. It was more than long enough to make it from where I was to the ptform. I created a loop, set a knot into it, and hung the rope off of a rocky outcropping. A few really hard tugs without so much as a creak and I figured it could hold my weight.

  Then I tied the rope around my waist. If I fell it would hurt. Hitting the ground all the way down would hurt more.

  I jumped on the spot a few times to unlimber myself, made sure that my backpack was nid snug, then I jumped.

  I didn’t expect the mushroom to defte on nding, then burst back to its full size.

  My knees shot up into my chest and I barely had time to kick at the mushroom down.

  I nded ohird bum-first with a scream that echoed across the dungeon. I mao flip once, my backpack flopping around, my legs kig out to find purchase. My hand scraped the wall and I belly flopped onto the fourth mushroom down.

  It shot me bato the air where I had plenty of time to see the ptform ing before I nded on it face first.

  “Ouch,” I said as I id on the ground, cheek pressed down, butt in the air and knees and wrists ng with pain. That had been, I decided, a horrible idea. A no-good, very bad, super dumb idea.

  Health 107/110

  I climbed to my hands and knees, straightened my skirt back down from where it had flipped, then crawled away from the edge when one foot slipped over it. “Nope,” I said. “Not until Jumping is way higher.”

  I took a moment to rex and calm my rag heart, then stood up and undid the rope around my waist. I tied it to a rod took in my surroundings.

  There wasn't much to see. This ledge was about half a floor lower tharance ledge with a rocky archway filled with vihat partially hid a wooden door. The ground was e sb of stoh a small sce at the end with an unlit brazier on it. There was a sign hanging from the door, I cleared the vines before it.

  Out for tea-Maddy the Hatter

  Did someone live here? Just in case, I knocked carefully on the door and waited a moment. When no answer came after my third knock I opehe door and looked within. “Hello?”

  The inside was a corridor. The ground packed earth, the walls were rough stohat might have been chiseled to be a little more uniform, but not enough to prevent creeping vines from climbing all the to the ceiling.

  A few glyph-covered stones hung in little iron cages, the rocks glowing blue and green and red and lighting up the corridor quite nicely.

  I checked for traps, wished I had a ten foot pole, then moved in. Nothing shot out of the walls, there were no time travelling critters and I couldn’t hear anything except for a faint and distant clig.

  Careful not to make too muoise, I retrieved my showerhead fil and held it close by my side as I moved on.

  The corridor opened up to a field of sorts, a small hill surrounded on three sides by hedges that climbed up and up and up. The green sky had three bright suns in it, all of them carefully moving around and making the entire area bright and cheery while throwing my shadow around in weird ways.

  A rge door stood open on the far hedge, some twenty meters away. Aween me and that doht atop the hill, was a rge skeleton sitting with his legs sprawled out. He had an upside-down tophat on his head and was bringing a tea cup up against his mouth with a faint king noise.

  Two animals sat o him on a b id out atop the hill. One was a calico cat, with patches of fur missing, the other a long green shat was missing an eye and quite a few scales.

  “Hello!” I said as I waved to the group. “Ah, it’s a ernoon for tea, isn’t it?”

  The skeleton stared at me without any eyes to see. His long legs gathered up to his chest and his toes dug into the b before he stood up straight and tall.

  “Insight,” I whispered as I took ihree before me.

  Maddy the Hatter, Skeleton Milliner, level 4

  Zombie snake, level 2

  Zombie cat, level 2

  I smiled at Maddy. “Do you like tea?” I asked. It seemed like a good pce to start a versation. He could invite me to tea, and I had some hoo share, and we could chit and chat and bee the best of friends.

  Maddy threw his cup to the ground where it shattered. The door behind me shut with a dull boom and the k of a logaging sounded out.

  Reag up, the skeleton removed his hat and reached an arm into it. Out came a big floppy wizard’s hat, all purple and covered with uneven yellow stars. He pced the hat atop the shen he pulled out a sed hat, a nurse’s cap with a big red cross on the front which he spped onto the cat’s head.

  “Um?” I asked.

  Zombie Hedge Wizard snake, level 2

  Zombie Nursing cat, level 2

  “Oh,” I said. “That’s really !”

  Maddy spun on a heel, quite literally, and stomped off the hill, smming the door in the hedge behind him with a loud ctter and bang.

  “Did I say something wrong?” I asked the almost-cute zombie animals.

  The snake opes mouth wide and a fireball shot out of it.

  I ‘eeped’ and hopped over the rather slow-moving projectile and heard it boom against the wall behihen it opes mouth again and a sed fireball started to form.

  “Oh, shoot.”

  At least this time I knew what to do.

  I tossed my backpack off and started running and jumped over another fireball. They weren’t very big, and they only moved as fast as a dodgeball thrown by, well, me. Easy enough to avoid. But they were fireballs.

  I started spinning my fil around. I didn’t have all that much mana, not enough for two zombies as tough as the time rabbit at least. There attern to the fireballs. They would unch, then slow down ohey were a few feet from the shen it would close its mouth, stare at me, and ready the one.

  A pattern!

  I waited for the fireball which I somewhat nimbly sidestepped, the warmth of it washing past me as if I had walked by an open oven but with less cookies and more fiery death. The moment the snake closed his mouth I rushed up the hill and brought my fil down.

  It smacked the snake right on the head like a very hard, very rude boop.

  “Hah!” I shouted before reag down to pull out my knife. I didn’t want to do it, but it seemed as if I had no choice. At least I could reason that you couldn’t kill something that was already dead.

  A blur of white barreled into me, cws swinging this way and that with a cattish howl that seumbling bum over teakettle down the hill. When I regained my feet it was to find the zombie snake pletely healed... well, mostly healed, it was still very dead, but now bandages were ed around it and it had a few psters on its snout.

  I took a moment troup while the snake shook its head and gred at me with its one eye. I had overlooked the calico, which arently a very bad idea. There was a clear theme here. The hats gave the zombies csses or something simir. No wonder Maddy was level four!

  The snake was a wizard, which meant fireballs for days. The calico cat was a nurse, which meant healing and first aid for the snake.

  That made everything a whole lot harder.

  I had to focus on the healer.

  With a huff, I picked up my fil and charged for the cat, only to pause as I had to jump over a fresh fireball. And that, right there, expiheir gimmick. If I ran after the cat the snake would pelt me with fireballs. Focus the snake and the cat would hit me instead.

  Tricksy zombie animals were not my forte.

  I charged after the who turail and darted away, moving faster and slower as if to bait me into getting hit by one of the fireballs raining down ohen, the moment the test fireball shot past, I turned and hopped up the hill in three bounds and brought my fil down on the snake again.

  As expected, there was a screeg yowl and a ball of angry kitty shot towards me.

  So I hugged it.

  “ing hug!” I shouted, because attaames are important. A bit of ma me and washed over the kitty.

  Ding! gratutions, you have eliminated Zombie Nursing cat, level 2!

  I wao whoop in delight as a ghostly cat purred out of the nurse, but then a fireball struck me in the chest and I went rolling down the hill again.

  This time the snake ying for keeps. Fireballs, much smaller than before were raining down towards me, eaoving way faster than the big cumbersome ones from before.

  I ran, breath catg in my throat as I panted and patted down my chest. The gambeson aher coat were singed and smoking a little but they weren’t too damaged.

  I rae stone off to one side, jumped over it, and nded in a crouch that ended with my back pressed against the cool rod my chest heaving.

  That had been... well it had been terrifying.

  The snap and crackle of fireballs hitting the stoopped a moment ter. “Are you done, mister snake?” I asked. “I really don’t want to have to fight.”

  I dropped my fil for a moment, tugged my k of its sheath and transferred it to my left hand befrabbing my fil again. Maybe I could throw the k the snake and distract it?

  I checked my menus for anything handy and was surprised to find a message waiting for me.

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

  “That was fast.” Maybe dodging fireballs gave more experiehan just skipping around?

  gratutions! Jumping is now Rank E!

  JumpingRank E - 00%The ability to jump. You ow jump farther and higher than before.

  I was about to dig into that when a hiss sounded frht above me. I looked up to find the sh its floppy wizard hat staring down at me, mouth opened and fireball growing.

  My knife-wielding hand shot up and the sharp steel dug into the monster’s pate.

  I ged back as the snake flopped around, then began to turn to dust. The hat glowed and disappeared with a soap-bubble pop.

  I leaned my head back against the stone, eyes closed as adrenaline coursed through me.

  “o self: snakes are sneaky.”