It appeared out of nowhere in my hands, I almost fumbled it.

  The blade was rather minimalist with a straight, double-edge which tapered off into a point. No guard, barely a pommel. The handle was fit for a double grip, albeit with no room to spare. The length totaled to a meter or so, less reach than I’d’ve liked. It felt weighty, but wasn’t all that heavy. My senses were somehow in disagreement on the matter. The color stood out, oddest of all. It was entirely white and the material looked almost liquid, with a gentle flowing glow within. Magic sword. It seemed wrong, yet felt right.

  My ability to judge swords ended there. Despite the menacing appearance, the creature ahead didn’t lunge or even make an effort to approach, as if rooted in place. The stillness afforded me a moment of strange calm, which led to breaking my shitty excuse of a stance and taking off my cumbersome winter jacket. A quick throw landed it into a corner of the room.

  Further examination explained the source of our awkward stalemate. Its legs had gone rigid, anchored against the walls. The arms wavered menacingly though, well out of reach. It chittered.

  Attempting to understand my contradicting sensations, I dragged the point across the ground under its own weight. It dug a slight but visible groove. Sharp magic sword. The observation sparked some confidence, and a plan - to keep it simple, hit and run maybe. Trying to chop one of the legs off tempted me since the bone golem looked unbalanced and the main body was sure to require a lot more work.

  Alas, the Errant turned into a hexaped as two of the arms anchored to the sides and it slid forward, slowly. Regardless, I felt very rushed all of a sudden. There were about ten meters between us, but almost half of that was the open room. Luring it in and skirting around appealed, if not for the potential prospect of getting stuck between several of them down the line. Some miracle of bravery or foolishness, a bit of both perhaps, pushed me on until only a meter of distance remained. It stopped sliding forwards again, shifting from six legs back to four. The chittering began anew.

  I swung at the bottom right appendage, claw, without really committing. It was diagonally opposite of the jaw and looked like the second most dangerous. The Errant tried to pull back but my slash nicked it and cut off the claw tip. Very sharp magic sword.

  A rush rose, fueled by the lack of resistance during the slice. My class felt pretty good right about now. Again. On the second try, the jaw predictably tried for my sword. My blade lingered in hopes of slashing it mid-grab. No way could it snatch the weapon out of my hands with no leverage.

  Then it reintroduced me to two very hard life lessons. One, assumption was the true mother of all evil. Two, I was a fucking idiot - should’ve kept it simple.

  It latched on all right. In answer to my wrenching, the bone golem dropped itself at a slight backwards angle. The tension from pulling combined with its downward momentum jerked me forwards. I desperately let go of the sword but it was too little too late. While the talon was out of reach due to the shifted angle, the spiked limb faced no such problems and headed right for my face. Mindless reflex and pure adrenaline overwrote my flinch and caused me to shove my left forearm in between.

  A hastily summoned sword appeared and intercepted the spiky appendage, even catching the blow on the flat. The impact knocked both me and the sword down the hallway. It was less of a perfect block and more a shitty parry, if even that. A clang, crash and sore tailbone punctuated my maneuver.

  I scrambled and picked up one sword while vaguely cognizant of stickiness in my left arm, but no apparent impeded function. Moving spread a dull ache, yet securing my other sword took priority, close to the monstrosity as it was…

  Oh no.

  The jaw grabbed it by the handle and the plummet of my stomach turned into a song in my heart as the hilt exploded and blasted the pincer apart. The clipped sound of bone ricocheting off the walls and skipping across the floor was like music to my ears. The sword fragments dissipated in streams of odorless smoke. One more property to add on to a growing list.

  The turn of events prompted me to take stock. The jaw had been ruined, while two others were a little damaged. The advantage helped me settle in. I swiped at it while remaining out of reach and only took single steps forward before retreating. While quick and overly co-ordinated, the lack of mobility ultimately crippled the monster, especially combined with the damage it had suffered. It attempted to jam my sword between two appendages a few times but it just wasn’t the same anymore and ended up giving me free hits on it instead. A red veil covered my eyes, some amalgam of hatred and focus.

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  The ends of the appendages damaged easily but hacking through the spine step-by-step took ages. Taking the last leg off guaranteed victory, it could barely move at all anymore. A gleeful and methodical rhythm of heavy hacks and experimental stabs ultimately severed the skull-spine, it took a fair few tries. The assault winded me, while catching my breath invited harsh reality to sink in. Blood stained my damaged sweater sleeve and the pain escalated at a steady pace. Even so, remnants of anger mixed with morbid curiosity led me to warily examine the corpse instead.

  I startled and landed on my ass, nearly cut myself on my own sword too. Fucking whispers. The jump-scare restarted the rapid beating of my heart and slowly surging pain faded away.

  “Think: condense,” the System spoke, voice closer to an intrusive thought than sound.

  A whispered “personal space” answered it. Good idea though. Stilling and putting my ear to the walls, then the ground, identified nothing at all. Instructions often inspired me, to do something else.

  I returned to the mangled carcass. Condense.

  A small ugly-ass black and yellow screen popped up. It read ‘Distortion Fragment (1/25)’. Not a bone golem then. Undead still seemed spot on though, despite the lack of supporting evidence.

  My interface offered three options. The first was to condense one energy. The second offered a material, bone meal. The third was to perform a manual harvest. Well, it was something. I picked energy and the remains wafted odorless smoke until only a tiny shiny crystalline shard the size of my pinky-nail was left. It was pretty but alien, with a swirling white fluorescence in the middle of the clear nail. It gave off no light, yet glowed. Once again, the sensory conflict resurfaced. It reminded me of my sword but not quite as solid, effervescent perhaps. Shaking off the confusion paired with an idea and I thought ‘inventory’, apparently in vain.

  I snatched my winter jacket off the floor and put the fingernail-shaped crystal in the left pocket. My cigs took up the entire right. I grabbed a cigarette too, lit up and set about to review the damage after a coughing fit, a result of my parched throat. My worries settled. Function remained and the bleeding wasn’t too bad. It hurt like hell now though. Constant flinching and swearing accompanied the peeling back of my slightly ruined, dark green sleeve.

  Figured I might as well try but thinking ‘mending’ at my sweater had no effect. The fight had probably taken a lot longer in my head than it had in practice. There were some scratches on the sides of my forearm which broke the skin but nothing life threatening.

  Interface.

  The class button blinked intermittently. Good. My mana bar was empty. Not good. Cigarettes were a decent measure of time passed so I closed the interface, sat down, and had another smoke, dragging it out on purpose. The orientation neglected to mention what the regeneration rate was, which felt rather important for my continued survival. My delays had nothing at all to do with trying my damndest not to think about anything and just be for a bit.

  The surroundings failed to provide any convenient distractions. Didn’t notice anything interesting besides the unnaturally smooth texture of it all, apart from the parts damaged by the battle, and the lack of dust. If only my Roomba had been this good, and less vulnerable to cats. Even the creature and my formerly owned sword had left nothing behind. Reflecting on the past brought me dangerously close to complete collapse again.

  Already stale air quickly downgraded to dive bar quality but I couldn’t care less because this was the best smoke of my life. Taking out my anger on the Errant distortion whatever certainly boosted my mood. Checking for a spell description ended up a disappointment as mending only mentioned the cost. Goddamnit, I wanted to cry out in frustration. Yeah, alright, breakdowns later.

  My pack-a-day habit couldn’t last for long at this rate, prompting me to search around for the other cigarette. Half of it remained, having gone out on its own. For once, I was grateful they did that. Stubbing the finished cigarette made me consider pocketing it. They were called filters after all. It was fouled by tar now but if my doom-thinking ended up being correct then it was bound to come in handy at some point.

  As much as I don’t want to, should probably break ‘em off before smoking. Regardless, I chucked the dirty one. My breathing finally slowed and reality quickly closed in despite my resolution to ignore it, but there were still a few distractions left.

  First up were stats. The System had given my class’ stat boost right after selection and even leveled me up now. My magical endurance had soared to 26 but my mana bar still showed empty. That wasn’t good at all. It meant at least 8 hours of waiting for a new sword and a reflexive nudge brought the remaining one a little closer. Some testing indicated a minor improvement to my capabilities, but nowhere near the expected forty percent. Then it hit me for the fourth time today. I assumed, but didn’t actually know the baseline.

  Well, shit.

  I fled my own failures and embraced the blinking class box instead. A new sub-tab appeared under ‘Ability’, called ‘Class Skills’. I got a slight dopamine high out of reading that one and promptly selected it, which rewarded me with a prompt.

  “Vocalize skill-tag.”

  Was a list too much to ask for? I seriously questioned the wisdom of letting people like me make their own choices. Had nothing against the common folk, but one half was dumber than the other. I wasn’t religious but a prayer for humanity would probably have been appropriate at this point. Then again we’d been smacked by a god-equivalent, so it was probably for the best to avoid drawing any attention from that front.