Book 2, Chapter 5: AutoBone

[Alen]

A single screen hovered in front of Alen, a blank white space—like a sheet of paper, with a blue border. He stared in concentration at the little white screen, taking numerous glances at the system-created notepad that hovered just beside his new system application to make sure that everything was correct. It was a mess of words and commands he’d created himself since he started using his own mana programming language and stopped basing the commands on languages like HTML and PHP, along with lines and lines of his four days’ worth of effort.

Granted, the whole thing took less time than expected to create, and it didn’t cost much mana, but if his prototype worked properly, then he expected to be able to shape bones into more complicated shapes. More intricate works would have to wait for when his mana programming language advanced further.

He wouldn’t be making the stupidly destructive wheel skeletons from Dark Holes any time soon, but he should at least be able to make something basic like a sphere.

As he sent mana into the white screen in front of him, a simple 3D circle formed within the previously blank space. He picked one of the shaping tools he’d assigned and sent mana into it, assigning it to a specific spot in the sphere. Immediately, he felt a very small amount of mana drain from his body as the ball within the system application grew a thin, but extremely sharp barb in one direction, making it look like a needle.

He grinned and grabbed a shard of bone from his pouch. Immediately, he assigned the needle in the program to a variable and activated the next part of the process.

In his hand, a small wisp of purple began to form, a strange greenish-black mana pulsing within the center of the little strand. Alen stared at the manifestation of the variable he’d created and channeled it into the bone with a look of concentration on his face. Along with it, he sent mana into the piece to fuel the growth process. Finally, as the final part of the purple strand sunk into the bone, Alen sighed as he relaxed his shoulders and stared at the shard of bone in his hand.

“Alen, get ready,” A voice—female, from behind him said. “The search party took a stop by that large rock, and we’ll go in as soon as they fall asleep.”

He nodded, letting out a sound of affirmation as he gingerly held the piece of bone in one hand and activated the spell within.

Ssssss…

With a small hissing sound, the shard began to grow into a sphere the size of his fist. He held it by the top, pointing the bottom part of it in front of him. Suddenly, with a silent explosion of bubbling bone matter and mana, a sharp point manifested in in front of him, creating a wickedly sharp point made out of extremely hard mana-enhanced enamel.

“YE—!!” Alen was in the middle of screaming ‘yes’ when a hand covered his mouth and pulled him down, pushing him front-first into the top of the large spire of earth they were camping on. He blinked, surprised as he stared at Lynn beside him who had a finger against her lips as she glared at him.

“Quiet down,” She said, eyeing the ridge of the large rock as a ball of light idly passed through just below them, pushing away the darkness in order to reveal anything that might be creeping towards the Cava’tal camp. “You’re going to get us killed.”

Alen glared back. How dare you interrupt my triumphant cheering? He licked the palm clamped against his mouth.

The elf recoiled from the sudden moisture on her hand, barely stifling the shout that threatened to leave her lips. She glared at him and punched his shoulder. Alen laughed quietly through the pain, his shoulders shaking as he covered his mouth. Eilynn wiped her hand on her coat and threateningly narrowed her eyes at him.

“Hey Lynn,” He whispered, poking her on the arm.

“I’m getting you arrested as soon as we get the Cava’tal off of us.”

“But you’ll break me out anyways, right?”

“Go die.”

He laughed, glancing at the lizardmen who were eating dinner below them as before looking back at the elven archer with a grin. “Ohoho, is this embarrassment I see? Are you going to blush and shyly run away now? I don’t support tropes, you know.”

“Shut up,” She shook her head and smiled lightly. “We’re about to attack a group of people who are at least in the fifth threshold, you know that right? The main group is even stronger. We’re massively outclassed, so you should take this more seriously.”

“See, I’m in too good a mood for that.”

“Stop subjecting my hands to your perverted fantasies. I’ll have you know I crushed a bug with that hand a while ago. I had it all over my palm.”

Alen looked at her disgustedly. “I meant my mana program. I finished it just now. And why the hell did you use your hand to crush a bug? Just stomp on it. What the fuck did it do to you anyways?”

“It’s a bug.”

“That doesn’t answer anything!”

“What?” She gave him a look. “Don’t tell me you’re the squeamish kind of guy? That’d be disgusting coming from you.”

“Lynn, all life must be treasured. Don’t elves pass along these kinds of teachings?” Alen reprimanded her, as if he hadn’t killed a bug himself just a few minutes ago.

“I don’t know what elves you’re talking about, but my people had to move locations a few years ago because we hunted the surrounding ecosystem’s food chain to near extinction,” Lynn grinned, mimicking the motion of drawing a bow and releasing an arrow with a little ‘pew’ sound as she looked down on the Cava’tal below.

“And up next comes global warming.”

“What?”

“Nothing. You’re being awfully conspicuous, Lynn. I thought your ear flaps would be enough to tell you that you might as well be shouting at the lizards down there with how much you’re moving about.”

She shook her head. “Hmph, this is nothing. I can even jump up and those lizards have no way of seeing me. Their vision at night is absolutely terrible.”

“Then why are we lying down on the dirt?”

She looked down at him and Alen realized she’d been sitting up all along. She’d just pushed him to the ground when Lynn had covered his mouth. The corners of her lips were twitching into a laugh as he silently sat up and dusted himself off.

“Hey Alen.”

“Fuck off.”

Suddenly, a tired voice rang out from nowhere, the sound seeming to reverberate from the inside of their heads. “Can you two stop making so much noise?”

Lynn blinked and seemed to press something in the air in front of her. “Roland? Weren’t you sneaking up to their camp?”

“I couldn’t,” Roland’s voice rang out again. “The scaly bastards set up magelights all over the place, and I saw alarm runes carved into the pieces of metal they were tossing all over the ground a while ago. You two will have to start the attack later. I’ll follow up.”

Alen opened up the party’s chat and pressed the button. “Aight. I’ll start summoning my new skeletons now.”

“Good. Lynn, how are you doing your attack?”

Eilynn grinned and glanced mischievously at Alen as she replied. “I have a new technique ready. When you hear the boom, start attacking.”

“Got it.”

“Wha, and here I thought I was the only one making new spells,” Alen said. “What did you make?”

“You’ll see,” She smiled, looking down at the camp below with destructive anticipation.

Alen shrugged and took out a few black shards—insect carapaces. Over the four days they’d been running from the Cava’tal, they’d encountered a lot of bugs, and Alen had managed to adjust his spell to be able to create the insects from the pieces he got from their carapaces. It took a lot more mana due to a lot of factors—mainly being the material, but it was worth it. Right now, he was staring at his current favorite summon.

The Nighthunter Scorpion.

He opened up his bone-shaping system application, something he’d come to call AutoBone, and held the piece of carapace in one hand. His mana reached into the black exoskeleton and wrapped around a colorful ball of strands located within. The necrotic mana wrapped around it like a cocoon, and slowly, the black-green ball of mana left the carapace; bright, colorful lights gently pulsing within.

Alen grinned and pushed the strands wrapped up in his mana into his AutoBone app.

Suddenly, the white space within the application changed. Quickly, the form of the Nighthunter Scorpion came into shape. It was a large creature, with a terrifying obsidian chitin covering its body as a golden pattern ran down from its head to its back, and finally, up its tail.

He pursed his lips, praying to whatever god he knew for the program to work. I’m going to start worshipping all of you as soon as this program works, he desperately thought.

As a test, he picked one of the shaping tools and zoomed into the scorpion’s legs. He was going to make it thicker, sturdier—stronger. He willed the tool to glide over the leg, and a tense moment passed, before Alen felt a very small amount of mana leave his body and run into the system application in front of him. Slowly, the leg he’d glided the tool over got thicker in one spot, along a straight line, signifying his experiment’s success.

“Yes!” Alen pushed his fists up, a look of uncontrolled joy on his face. “God isn’t fucking real! I win!”

Lynn glanced at him weirdly, almost expecting a bolt of lightning from the sky to smite him. She looked back down below to make sure nobody heard him. She shushed in his direction and went back to whatever she was doing. Alen meanwhile continued to change and edit the structure of the scorpion in his application. To the purple strand within that he was editing, it acted like a big block of Legos, and every addition he added in acted like a new extra piece attached to the whole.

Because of this, he could simply take those pieces off, save the configuration he set them in, and graft them onto a new purple growth-strand after he finished editing this one.

He still had no way of copying muscle memory or consciousness, but his progress towards the purple growth-strands were advancing by leaps and bounds. With this, he only had to edit a single scorpion, while adding the improvements to the rest of his shards.

Alen got to work. He had about two hours to badass-ify this Nighthunter and the rest of his undead, and he was not letting that chance go.

Tonight, he was going to create some Alen-brand undead.

Lynn glanced back at Alen and felt a shiver run down her spine as she looked at the horrifying army of undead forming around him. He’d figured out how to make undead of those Nightstalkers the day they killed one for the first time, and now, he’d managed to make them even more terrifying.

The massive scorpion stood two meters tall and nearly five meters long with its tail, even bigger than it was originally as the jet-black color of its scales changed to an inky black-green. Its four legs had thickened and were covered in sharp barbs that threatened to lacerate anything that was brave enough to touch it. Its back had deformed to create a surface like a saddle, while its pincers had gotten bigger, heavier, and most importantly, sharper. Even the stinger gave off a deadly vibe from the feeling it gave off.

It stood beside the necromancer who seemed to be focused on something in the air in front of him. Around him, more of his undead crowded. Larger bone wolves with more teeth, spurs, and sharper claws, skeleton apes with thick, powerful arms and mouths full of jagged teeth, and a large bone snake that was five meters long and had a maw full of needle-like fangs displayed in rows.

That wasn’t even mentioning the other enemies they’d managed to kill over the past four days. Alen had collected samples from all of them and apparently imprinted their consciousness into the exoskeleton shards along with large amounts of his mana, so it was obvious that he was nowhere near finished.

Lynn looked at him and smiled. You aren’t the only one who has a few new party tricks though. She plucked an arrow from her quiver and drew her bow, pointing it at the camp of lizardmen who were preparing to go to sleep. A stone in her bracer glowed, and the arrow turned into another one of the ballistic earth arrows. She released the string and stepped to the side, but strangely enough, the arrow refused to fly. It stayed suspended in the air, rotating lightly, but anyone who looked close enough would find that power was built up and restrained, ready to be released at any time.

The elf drew another arrow, and then a green stone in her bracer glowed to transform the arrow into something that looked like a large needle made of plant matter. She aimed it at one of the tents and released the bowstring, letting it stay still in the air as she drew yet another arrow.

She did this multiple times, a plethora of multicolored arrows floating in the air all around her. There were eleven arrows in total, her current limit for the spell. She checked and found that the mana inside her body had been depleted by a large amount. She’d be able to fire a few more special arrows after this barrage, but she’d have to stick with the normal ones afterwards.

With the destructive power this attack was going to show though? It was fully worth the cost and preparation time.

“Alen, you finished?” She asked.

The necromancer threw a tooth to the ground and she watched as an especially large bone ape formed. Attached to its arm was a large needle in a conical shape that was attached to a short handle of bone—a lance. The ape snapped off the thin section of bone that connected the lance to its arm and held it in its powerful hands as it mounted the skeletal Nighthunter.

The young man’s emerald eyes shone as he looked back at her with a massive grin. “Edging.”

“I don’t know what that is, but I’m betting you a piece of silver you’re being gross again.”

Alen walked up to her, shrugging. “What’s that? Alen doesn’t agree to the bet because he’ll probably lose a silver coin? Whoa. Who would’ve thought,” he said.

She smiled, shaking her head as she opened up the party’s voice chat. “Roland. We’re about to start the attack.”

“It’s about time,” Roland’s voice let out a huff. “I’m tired of walking around after our Galeboat broke down. Let’s get this over with.”

Eilynn nodded and looked at Alen who stood beside her as his undead descended from the large rock, gathering on the ground below as their magic-enforced bodies of enamel and chitin tensed up. Finally, she glanced down at Roland who was hiding in the shadows near the undead, and seeing that everything was in order; she waved her hand and released the arrows.

There was a soundless scream as the arrows tore the air apart. Finally—

Boooom!

The earth arrows hit the tents like artillery shells, sending stone shrapnel everywhere as more arrows hit the surrounding area. Ice arrows burst and sent frost in all directions, followed by poison arrows that released a cloud of spores into the air. Finally, a single flaming arrow exploded against the camp, igniting the spores in the air and causing a massive roar as flames soared in all directions, evaporating ice and creating a cloud of steam and smoke that obscured all sight as panicked shouts rang out from the encampment.

As soon as this happened, a handful of metal disks soared into the camp and caused powerful tremors as vibrations ruptured the earth. Roland charged at the camp, and behind him surged a tidal wave of twenty-eight undead of all vicious shapes and sizes.

The undead ape wielding the lance held it at the ready as the scorpion it had mounted charged into the fray and weaved into the melee. It blurred into the mist of water vapor as the ape thrust the lance forward, catching a member of the Cava’tal scouting party in the stomach and thrusting his weapon right through.

The lance was swept to the side, and the gravely injured lizardman was sent flying off into the path of an improved bone wolf that ripped out its throat.

Charging on, the ape and scorpion duo lost the element of surprise as they fought against three more lizards. A gauntlet-clad fist crackled with lightning as it cracked against the scorpion’s thick carapace, barely damaging it before the attacking lizardman dodged to the side, suffering a cut from the scorpion’s stinger. The lance stabbed into his shoulder.

Another lizardman jumped, raising his spear to stab at the ape. It cracked against the ape’s chest, breaking a rib off, but the undead managed to grab the weapon, pulling the lizardman in and catching him by the neck. Suddenly, the ape’s ivory bones turned a terrifying black-green as ice the color of liquid darkness raced up from its thick arms to its powerful hands.

Cra-a-ack.

With snapping noise, the bone ape’s hand crunched down on the lizards throat, the flesh decayed by Necrotic Blessing’s version of Deathchill Touch weakening its defense to the point that the ape easily snapped its neck with a bit of effort.

Bang! With an explosion, a torrent of flame blew against the ape’s back as the third lizard, a female sorcerer, let loose a stream of flame from her hands. Before it could go any further and actually damage the ape lancer, a black beetle similarly reinforced by Necrotic Blessing rammed against her from behind, eliciting numerous cracking sounds as her magical barrier shattered. She flew into the side of the tent nearby, the cloth collapsing on her as no further movement came from within.

The ape looked down on the injured lizardman pugilist in front of it and wordlessly threw the corpse in its hand aside, letting it crumple to the ground like an empty sack.

Once again, a command rushed into the ape’s consciousness from its master.

I’m going to start using the other undead. Uh, don’t use the lance to smash their faces in. Stab the fuck out of the lizardmen with it. That is all.

The ape almost seemed to nod, a reflex remaining from the pulsing orange strand within its skull as it readied its lance once again, the Nighthunter it rode letting out clacking sounds as it snapped its razor sharp pincers in anticipation. The lone lizardman in front of the duo paled, glancing nervously at the black ice that crept into the tip of the bone lance…

Roland slammed his shield into a Cava’tal warrior’s blade, knocking the warrior back a step with a grunt. With a twist of the enemy’s long blade, he slammed the pommel against Roland’s exposed chest. The orange-haired man had a calm look on his face as his breastplate lit up, spreading the force impact all over the plate as he paled and backed off, gaining distance as he let out a diagonal slash with his glowing blade.

The lizardman gave him no breathing space though, with the power of an enemy at the eighth threshold, it pointed its palm at Roland, letting loose a powerful burst of air at the ground and blowing the sand beneath their feet into the orange-haired warrior’s face.

Roland was blinded, and was about to suffer a grievous wound when the lizardman was forced to back off after an arrow glowing with an earthen light nearly blew off his foot. Two voices rang out in Roland’s mind.

“Be careful! That guy’s a lot stronger than the rest of them!”

“I’m sending some of my undead over, don’t get killed!”

Squinting his stinging eyes at the lizardman in front of him, Roland readied his shield once again, the thrill of fighting a competent humanoid opponent once again burning in his chest as the techniques he’d refined returned to him. He wouldn’t be able to utilize them to the full extent because of his stats, but he had the Enchanting magic he loved so much to help him this time.

He raised his shield calmly, slowly stepping to the side as he circled his foe. A few moments passed…

CLANG!

Metal shrieked against metal as the elegant longsword glided past Roland’s tilted shield. The surface pulsed. A shockwave blew the sword to the side. Roland punched, and the shield made contact with the lizardman’s face, dazing him. With a slash, Roland’s sword sliced into the enemy’s leather armor, but failed to leave a cut on the lizardman’s skin.

His foe stabbed forward and met air as Roland shrugged his shoulder and avoided it with a bare amount of movement. Roland stepped forward and sliced, leaving a deep wound on the lizardman’s bicep. The lizardman winced and stomped on the sand below, making it erupt into a shower of dust the blinded them both.

The scaly warrior didn’t need to use his sight to see though. The dust itself acted like a complete sphere of vision for him. He stabbed at Roland and found purchase in the gap between the warrior’s armor. Then, he held his sword by the blade in a half-sword grip and slammed the guard against Roland’s chest, sending him reeling. The lizard prepared for a final strike at the opening presented to him and—!!

A large fist suddenly flew into the cloud of dust and made itself known to the lizardman. Having no time to dodge, the lizard could only use his injured arm to block the strike.

Crack!

His ulna snapped from the sheer weight of the strike, black ice creeping up from the leather to slither into his flesh, leaving a stinging cold sensation as the chill bloated the muscle beneath his scales to spread a virulent necrosis.

He was sent flying back, rolling along the sand for a few meters until he finally came to a stop. Above, the empty sockets of a Nighthunter Scorpion stared down at him. The lizardman sucked in a final breath.

Two pincers snapped towards him from both sides in a scissoring motion, unceremoniously severing his head from his neck.

The bone ape mounted on the scorpion stood still as silence reigned on the surrounding camp. Tattered tents, black-green rotfire, the corpses of foes, and piles of bones littered the ground; glowing in an eerie orange light as the crackling flames burned away at the copses left behind by Lynn’s initial barrage. It had wounded most of the lizardmen, giving Alen’s undead an easy time as they picked off the dozen injured Cava’tal stationed in the camp with their superior numbers.

Roland looked around and sighed helplessly. He was riding in the wave of adrenaline battle had brought him, and had a decisive counter ready to kill the lizardman at the final moment, but Alen had to muck it all up with that sneak attack.

Pouring the contents of a potion into the wound on his shoulder, Roland opened the party chat.

“See, Lynn. That was easy.”

“All thanks to me.”

“Hello? Can we just talk about how awesome my undead looked? My Necrotic Blessings were on point.”

“Oh? What’s this though? Why do I feel like I gained more XP than you did?”

“Shut up. You timed your arrows perfectly and just picked them off before my undead could. It’s kind of fucked up that people give XP too, though. I’m not sure I even want it…”

Roland pressed the button. “You’ll have to get used to it. With the number of Cava’tal after us, this won’t be the last we’ve seen of them. Just the last two encounters we had with a search party a few days ago nearly got us killed. We’re lucky to say we only lost a Galeboat then.”

A short pause. “…Yeah,” Alen said.

Lynn voice rang out inside their minds, changing the topic. “Anyways, I didn’t target the Galeboats in my attack. Are there any good ones we can take, Roland?”

“Let me see,” Roland said. He waved away the party chat and walked to the edge of the camp, stepping over still burning bloodstained cloth to see boats anchored to the sands just outside the range of Lynn’s attack.

There were four in total. Two were in somewhat bad shape, reflecting years of use and repetitive repair. One was relatively new and had barely any scratches on its surface. Roland was going to call taking that one when he spotted the final Galeboat, a large piece of cloth draped over the surface.

He pulled it away and felt his eyes widen.

In front of him stood a single Galeboat that was larger than the rest. The hull was made from a smooth, warm, sand-colored material, while the front seats were capable of carrying three people. The sails were furled and were a pearly white in color, but were obviously bigger than a normal Galeboat’s. As for the captain’s seat, the steering wheel was designed in intricate patterns, while the levers attached were crafted well and sturdy. Roland knocked his fist against the hull, hard.

Sturdy, he assessed.

A hand clapped his shoulder. “Yo,” Alen’s voice rang out. “This one looks good.”

“Is that… more space?” Lynn asked, grinning as she climbed up the boat and sat down, stretching her legs at the extra space presented to her. She then lied down on the seats, comfortably resting her head over her arms as her feet dangled out from one side. She looked at Alen.

“You walk.”

“No.”

Lynn clicked her tongue and sat up as Alen and Roland climbed into the boat after her. Roland made himself comfortable in the pilot’s seat as Alen plunked down beside Lynn. Enjoying the extra space, Alen set his bag down in front of him and leaned his staff beside him against the edge of the seat.

Above them, the sails unfurled and caught the perpetual winds that blew across the Sandsea, slowly propelling their new boat into motion.

Alen felt the wind against his face and grinned. It was good to have a Galeboat again. Walking on sand was tiring, and he’d had enough of it after just one day. Never again. Lynn pulled out a box from her bag and started eating, what seemed to be the Sandsea’s equivalent of snacks entering her mouth. Alen plucked a piece and had one himself as their boat picked up speed and turned, heading towards their next stop.

Suddenly, the boat stopped as Roland pulled a lever to furl the sails.

Alen furrowed his brows and looked back at him. “What?”

Roland squinted his eyes. “Something’s coming towards us. A lot of somethings. Lynn, can you take a look at that?”

The elf stood up from her seat and looked out at the horizon. There were little black figures in the night, and was that… the flicker of a torch? Those were too big to be people. Those were sails. A lot of them. She paled.

“Roland. Full speed, towards the alternative stop, now. Hurry!”

Alen stood up and gave her a look as he squinted at the dark horizon. He saw nothing. “What?”

Wordlessly, Roland released the sails and turned the wheel, letting the boat do a 180 as they began to speed away on the opposite direction. At the same time, having detected their retreat, the darkness in the distance suddenly lit up as multiple lights shot into the sky, revealing their boat, and the massive Cava’tal fleet chasing behind them. At the prow of the massive Galeboat in front of the fleet stood a single lizard with scales the color of blood.

Alexandrius.

The necromancer looked back and laughed dryly. Lynn and Roland laughed helplessly with blank eyes, the complete turn of events almost unbelievable to them.

Alen glanced at the recycled shards of the undead he’d summoned and smiled weakly.

“We are so fucked it's insane.”