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  [colpse]Chapter One Hundred and wo - Maid it Out Alive

  Maid-Butler Abomination, level 10, Angry

  I licked my lips, looking past the maid-thing toward the Bone Lord. He was hobbling away, making his way over to the end of the baly with repeated ks of his bo.

  It seemed that, if I wao catch up to him, I’d o face off against his guard first.

  The abomination was... an abomination. It was boney and skeletal, some of its features partially covered by a poofy bck dress with torn white ce. Its arms ended in a pair of boney scythes, and its head was twisted to look a bit like a cat’s, with bony ears and all. Coiling vines g to it from the inside and poked through its dress.

  It was quite spooky looking.

  “Hi there,” I said. “Would you mind terribly if I ran past you?”

  The abomination lu me, one scythe arm swinging.

  I barely had time to duck backwards and stumble out of the path of its swing, and that was only because its arm was tangled up in nasty looking vines. “Hey!” I shouted.

  The monster swung with its other arm, but this time I was expeg it and unched myself up and over the swing.

  While in the air, I brought my spade around a another scythe mid-swing with a heavy bonk of metal on bone.

  My attempt to jump away was foiled as the abomination tio move towards me, cutting off my escape.

  I saw it raising its arms to slice down at me, and brought my spade up as a horizontal bar to meet the bony spikes. They smacked the haft, and soon I found myself being pushed down onto one knee while I grunted and tried to keep the mantis monster from bearing down on me.

  I was in a bit of a bind, but I did have one way out.

  Shifting so that most of my weight was on my one knee, I kicked out with my foot and smacked the Abomination in the shin while ung a burst of ing magic at it.

  The leg creaked at the first kick, then snapped with the sed.

  The moipped over, and I helped it along by rising up and shoving it to the side. The moment it crashed down, I made a fist and ed it in ing magiack it with.

  The monster reeled, legs scrambling as it tried to stand.

  A sed burst of ing magic, then a third, finally k down pletely.

  “I’m sorry!” I apologized as I swung my spade up and then brought it back down to bonk the monster on the head.

  It died a very unceremonious re-death.

  I shoved the notification to the side, then started running after the Bone Lord.

  A gnce below, and I saw my friends still fighting on. Bastion was taking out most of them all on his own, but I noticed him letting some of the skeletons pass towards where Amaryllis and Awen were w together to smack them down.

  Was he letting them practice their teamwork on purpose?

  They... probably he help. Amaryllis had a tendency to expect others to move in the way that she thought was best, and Awen froze up often, especially when someone else was in her bubble. She was more ed with not hurting a friend than making sure the morying to eat her were no longer a threat.

  Bastion really was a good friend, I decided. I would give him hugs and thank him, but that was for ter.

  Speeding along with little hops to help me move faster, I tried to catch up with the Bone Lord.

  The skeleton was at the end of the row. He had paused before a shelf of old books, and was looking over them with a hand tucked under his .

  “Hey!” I called out as I flung a ball of ing magic out ahead of me. I still had enough magic that one or two missed strikes wouldn’t be too bad.

  The Bone Lord picked a book off the shelf, then smacked the ball away with it.

  “Dang it,” I muttered as I started running again. I held my spade with both hands and brought it up to deliver a big swing. The Bone Lord moved fast. He opehe book, touched the page, the drop and pointed his hand towards me.

  As teers became five, then two, I was able to make out the words in the book. They were big and bold, taking up half of a page, or else I would have missed them.

  ‘Greater Explosion.’

  I squeaked and threw myself to the side. I inteo roll, the back up and smack the Bone Lord.

  The explosion behind me ruihat pn.

  I grunted as I was sent flying across the walkway. My tail bumped the ground and I rolled to bleed off some momentum. Bits of burning books and wooden shrapnel nded around me. I blinked and tried to hear anything past the high-pitched whistling of... something.

  The Bone Lord had been flung back a bit too, but he ushing himself out of the pile of debris he’d nded in.

  Being undead probably meant that he didn’t have to worry about bruises as much.

  My foot found some purchase, and I climbed to my feet. My spade was... somewhere, I’d lost it iumble. That didn’t matter.

  I ran at the Bone Lord, and he looked up, expressionless face twitg back as I cut the distaween us to nothing and spped my hand over his skull. “Sorry!” I screamed my home nation’s battle cry as I let loose a surge of ing magic.

  The air around us stilled as the dust was washed away.

  I paused, panting hard, breathing in the faintly fiery st of burning books. My hand looses grip a little and the Bone Lord’s skull fell, soon followed by the rest of the body.

  The boarted to break apart into so much dust, just like dungeoures usually did. The jacket stayed though. A drop?

  Ding! gratutions, you have Laid to Rest three (3) ‘Skeletal Guards of Newbining Library’ Level 10! A Skeletal Limpet, Level 9! A Maid-Butler Abomination, level 10. And The Herald of Newbining, Bone Lord, level 12! Bonus Exp was gained for defeating enemies above your level!

  “Pheew,” I said as I tipped my turtle hat bad wiped a hand ay forehead. That had beeing.

  Moving over to the side of the baly, I found my friends looking around themselves while a whole lot of skeletons turo dust around them.

  I tucked my loot under an arm, then found my ade. I was just about to jump down when I got another message.

  Bing Bong! gratutions, your amon Bun css has reached level 11!Stamina +5Flexibility +5You have gained: One Css Point

  “Oh, ni--”

  Bing Bong! gratutions, your Wondernder css has reached level 3!Mana +5Flexibility +5You have gained: One Css Point

  “Double nice!” I cheered. “Hey! I levelled up!” I called down. “A loot!”

  Amaryllis looked up, then shook her head. “You moro down here. It’s too soon for celebrating,” she said. But she sounded pretty happy.

  “Oh wow, you levelled up too?”

  “I didn’t say that!” she said.

  “gratutions!” I said as I hopped down and nded with a croue floor down. I shook myself a bit, then gri my friends. “What about you, Awen? Bastion?”

  The sylph shook his head. “Nothing for me, I’m afraid,” he said. That was too bad, he seemed to have taken out the most monsters.

  “Awa, I went up a level,” Awen said. “You too?”

  “I got two!” I cheered.

  Amaryllis huffed. It was a strange huff, part ‘I’m happy for you’ and part ‘I’m a bit envious.’ I pulled her into a hug to remihat I liked her a lot and that she didn’t o be envious. “Why are you hugging me, idiot!”

  “‘Cause I love you lots,” I said. Then I hugged Awen and Bastion food measure. “So, why’d I get more levels?” I asked.

  “Ah,” Awen said. “I didn’t use Gss magid I don’t think Amaryllis used any Puppeteering skills.”

  “And you’ve been using that weird sed css of yours a lot. It’s natural,” Amaryllis said.

  I nodded along. That made sense. “In that case, we’ll o practice even harder!” I eyed Amaryllis. “Or at all.”

  “You make it sound like I don’t practice,” Amaryllis said.

  “I didn’t say anything like that,” I replied evenly.

  She ed me with a wing.

  “Well done, children!”

  I had almost fotten that Momma and the other buhere. The team of bun adventurers stepped into the library and looked about. “That was a good show!” Carrot said. “Like looking over the little ones, but with a few skills you don’t see so often.”

  “We did good?” I asked.

  Carrot gave me a big thumbs-up, but Momma was a bit more serious about things. “You did well enough. I’m worried that you may have a hard time keeping up oer floors. This dungeon focuses mostly on swarming tactics, which means that the general level of the enemies found within are lower than you’d expect. Still, it’s easy to get overwhelmed, or even run out of stamina or mana mid-battle.”

  I hat was true.

  “We should move on,” Peter said. “Did you find the Bone Lord’s key?”

  “Key?” I asked. I looked to my friends, but they seemed just as lost as I was. “All we got was this jacket.” I raised the tweed jacket up. It was the cool sort, with some patches over the elbows and big pockets on the side.

  “Let me see that,” Amaryllis said. I let her take it, and watched as she shifted it this way and that. She fished out a key from the breast pocket. “Ah,” she said.

  Peter gestured, and Amaryllis tossed the key over where he snatched it from the air. “We move to the floor,” he said.

  “This jacket’s iing,” Amaryllis said as we started to walk out of the library. “It gives you a skill called Reading prehension. It’s of det quality too.”

  “I don’t think it’s my style,” I said.

  Amaryllis shrugged. “Do any of you want it?” she asked.

  “It’s a on drop. We cut them up and use the material to make suspenders for the little ones,” Carrot said. “It’s pretty durable.”

  I let them haggle over the value of the jacket. I had more iing things to look at as I followed our bun friends to the floor.

  NameBroccoli Bunbsp; Ra (Riftwalker) First Cssamon Bun Bun First Css Level

  11? Sed CssWondernder Sed Css Level

  3? Age

  16?  Health

  135? Stamina

  150? Mana

  135?  Resilience

  45? Flexibility

  70? Magic

  35?  SkillsRank amon Bun Skills ingA - 68% Way of the MystiD - 57% GardeningD - 24% AdorableD - 100% DangD - 100%  Wondernder Skills Tea MakingD - 94% Mad MillineryE - 90%  General Skills InsightC - 94% Makeshift on ProficyD - 100% ArcheologyF - 78% FriendmakingC - 69% MatchmakingE - 87%   amon Bun Skill Points

  5? Wondernder Skill Points

  2? General Skill Points

  4?   First Css Skill Slots

  0? Sed Css Skill Slots

  0? General Skill Slots

  5?  I had so many things close to going up in level!

  Just a couple more fights, or maybe a few more hours of practig really hard, and I’d be all ready to move on with quite a few of my skills. ing was the most exg of that lot, but there were others too.

  I grihen realized there was no reason not to skip ahead, even when Amaryllis gave me a look.

  Onwards, to more adventure, and more fun!

  ***

  RavensDagger

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