Chuck was awoken by a scream, he scrambled to his feet as Sha ran into the clearing. The man was screaming something he couldn't understand, but the others seemed terrified by whatever it was.

Moments later a large six-legged lizard with a wide head and squat body entered behind Sha. The beast roared and panic ensued. Chuck watched, horrified as Sha's body started to turn to stone. Some little part of his mind told him to run. He grabbed his pack and bolted. He heard yelling behind him but he was too afraid to turn to see what it was about.

"Chuck, not that way!" Erwin yelled.

"It's too late, we have to go," Bargo said, grabbing Erwin and pulling him along behind for the first few steps.

Erwin knew Bargo was right, the boy wouldn't be able to be saved. Even the few fire bolts he fired at the forest basilisk did little to damage the creature. It's attention focused on chasing the lone straggler into the woods. Erwin had to ask himself why a basilisk was this far south. They needed to report this to the outpost. Hopefully, they could send some more experienced hunters out to eliminate the threat before it expanded its territory.

Chuck ran through the forest, his pack in one hand. He could hear the beast crashing through the trees behind him. Occasionally he would point his hand backward and fire off an ice arrow. He had no idea if they were doing anything to the creature but it made him feel better. He needed to find a place to hide before his stamina ran out. Right now his body was running on adrenaline but that wouldn't last forever.

He crested a small hill and saw the tops of buildings in the distance. Even that little pause let the creature get closer. He ran down the hill at a dangerous speed. The beats letting out a bellow above him before it started down the hill. Whatever magic it had used to kill Sha it hadn't used to kill him, yet. For that he was thankful.

As he got closer he realized there was no smoke or sign of life in the direction of the village he spotted. He couldn't change his plans now. He only needed to find a place to hide. He passed the first dilapidated structure ten minutes later. It looked ancient. Vines covering most of the stone structure. He glanced at the doorway and noted that the entry was blocked by debris. He had to slow a little bit to catch his breath. The creature was having a harder time coming down the hill even with six legs. It gained him a minute or two to look around.

He started checking the doors on each building he passed. Most were rotted away, the inside of the building blocked by collapsed stones or stuck shut. He heard the beast scream again as it reached the bottom of the hill. Chuck was out of time. He bolted down the winding street, farther into the abandoned city.

The beast was closing in on him, these tight turns were more to its advantage as it was quickly able to switch directions with six limbs.

The road ended in a cliff and Chuck studdered to a halt, almost falling off the edge of a ravine. He didn't have time to question why a ravine was inside a city. He looked around frantically and finally spotted an open unobstructed door. He bolted towards the entrance as the beast rounded the last corner towards him.

He dove inside the entrance as the beast ripped his pack out of his arm, nearly tearing it out of the socket. The force spun him around and he stumbled backward into the house. His foot found open air as he fell through the rotten floor.

Chuck screamed as he fell through floor after floor. Eventually, he impacted hard dirt.

***

The beast finally got its quarry, the delicious sack contained the dried goodness it had hunted for so long. The fleshling escaped but that was fine. Their essence tasted awful anyway. It tore open the covering until it could get at the goodies within. Pleased when they spilled out across the ground. It happily munched on them, ignoring the cries coming from the fleshling.

***

Chuck coughed and groaned. He managed to roll himself over, staring up at the hole he had made in the floors above. He closed his eyes and concentrated to see his skills.

Light Armor: 118/800SP to level 5

Bladed Weapons: 5-5

Ice Arrow: 4-5

Multitasking: 7189/20000SP to level 3

Minor Heal: 1-1

Sneaking: 4-5

Short Sword: 8/20TP to level 1

He realized he had been out for nearly ten hours. He cast a minor heal on himself, feeling better almost immediately as the energy flowed through him. He lucked out, the floors slowed his fall enough to prevent any serious injuries. He decided to concentrate on the short sword skill and find out what TP meant.

Name: Short Sword

Rarity: Common

Level: 0 - 5

Type: Trained

Stat: Dexterity

TP to Next level: 20

Description: You have a better understanding of the blade and your body remembers the motions.

That didn't explain a lot. He concentrated on the trained identifier to see what that brought up.

Trained: You have trained to become an expert at this task. Training will always be superior to skills purchased. Trained skills cannot be advanced through skill points.

So TP was training points. It made sense to Chuck. It's not like you needed the skill to do something, but training with it would make you better. He wondered why it was eight out of twenty though. He recalled the training the night before. He did twenty-six reps before he stopped and had to start over and do fifty-five more. That made eighty-one. Was it ten reps per point? Ugg, that was going to add up quickly.

He could test it in a few minutes when he recovered.

Chuck pushed himself off the ground. His body was still sore from the fall and run but he wasn't injured or bruised anymore. There was very little light down here. He looked up and counted the floors. It looked like he was four floors down. He searched the gloom, finding a missing brick in the wall. Beyond that was a hallway.

'At least I have a possible way out.'

Before he went exploring he decided to test his theory about TP. He did nine reps of the sword forms Erwin showed him. It took him considerably longer to do them as his muscles didn't want to cooperate. They had gone through so much abuse he was surprised he was able to finish at all.

He checked the skill.

Short Sword: 9/20TP to level 1

Yep, ten reps for every point. He sighed. At least it was something to do. He looked towards the wall. He didn't feel like pulling bricks out one at a time but he wasn't sure how sturdy this building was. Another sigh escaped his lips as he walked over and started to work the bricks out.

It took Chuck four hours to work enough of the bricks out to squeeze through the hole. Inside the hallway was dark. He ended up having to use his scabbard to feel along the floor and walls.

Eventually, he came to the end of the hallway, and a rusty metal door. He tried to push the door but it was stuck tight.

He backed down the hall ten meters or so. Then he cast ice arrow at the door, trying to aim for the hinges and locking mechanism. The echos as the ice struck the door were deafening in the small hallway. He had to stop after five shots, he could feel his limit being reached.

He walked forward and used his hand to inspect the damage. It looks like all of the spells had ripped through the door. He gave it a shove. There was a groan as the door collapsed inward, dust choking the air as it hit the ground. He had to retreat and let the dust settle for a few minutes before he could enter the room. There was a soft glow coming from some moss on one of the walls. It didn't add a lot of light but it was infinitely better than poking around in the dark.

The room looked to be filled with crates and stranger apparatuses. Chuck had no idea what they were for, the word laboratory sprang to his mind though. He froze. He knew what a laboratory was, not just the word. With it came knowledge about scientists, science, and other knowledge that had been locked away in his dysfunctional brain. It wasn't all of his memories but he was getting the feeling where he came from, magic and skills didn't exist. He didn't know how that was possible but it would explain so much about his confusion.

He looked around the room for anything useful or a way out. He came across a skeleton, propped against a wall. Behind it was scratch marks in the tough stone of the room. Chuck counted them up. Eighteen in all. A memory surfaced of people doing this to mark days. God he thought, could this man have been trapped in this room for eighteen days, only to perish. It didn't bode well for Chuck's chances of escaping.

The corpse was wearing some sort of pendant and a threadbare sachel. The pendant looked to be gold, with some sort of gem inlaid in it. The satchel didn't look like it would hold up for long but since he lost his pack perhaps it would last long enough.

Chuck removed the pendant and sachel. He inspected it, putting the gem up to his eye. So when a wispy figure appeared and started talking he was a bit startled, to say the least. He dropped the item and the figure and voice faded. He picked it up and tried it again. The figure appeared again and started talking in an unknown language.

'A journal or recording device of some sort?'

He would have to figure it out later. He opened up the sachel and was going to drop the pendant inside. Only inside was not the same as outside. He saw a black nothingness. He found a small rock and dropped it into the bag. Nothing changed externally. He felt like his mind was trying to tell him something but the memory wasn't surfacing. He tried to hold onto the next rock he put into the bag, as soon as it touched the darkness it disappeared. Frankly, it freaked him out a bit. Before he did anymore testing he decided to check something. He closed his eyes and concentrated on his menu. He was relieved when he saw the blessing icon was no longer greyed out and the timer was gone. He opened his eyes and let out a sigh of relief. Not that he wanted to experience death again but it was nice to know he was covered.

He set the bag on one of the old crates with the top open. Before he could lose his nerve he stuck his hand into the bag. He was relieved to note it didn't obliterate his body or suck him into whatever it was. He pulled his hand back out, seeing that it was still intact. His other worry was that the weird magical item would somehow remove his hand. It was a risk to try this but he needed to know what he was working with.

He stuck his hand back in and tried to touch the sides. He couldn't feel anything, he kept pushing his arm deeper in until it was up to his shoulder. Yet even then he couldn't feel any items or walls within the strange bag. His mind was screaming at him that he knew what this item was but the memory wouldn't surface. He wondered where the rocks went when he felt something in his hand. He was so startled, he yanked his arm out of the bag and fell on his ass.

He looked towards the arm that was in the bag, inside it were two stones.

"What the hell?"

That's when his mind finally clicked and he realized what the item was. It was a bag of holding, or he thought it was. Some sort of item that had more space on the inside than the outside. Chuck had no idea how this was physically possible, only that magic had to be involved in some way. He was curious about the threadbare appearance of the bag as well.

Chuck looked at the corpse and wondered what the man could have stored in the bag. There must be a way to check. He tried sticking his hand back in and thinking of different items. He only got lucky when he thought of money, pulling out a handful of coins. It looked like gold, silver, and copper. He shoved it back in the bag.

This wouldn't work. He tipped the bag upside down and tried shaking it. He even pushed it inside out. That turned out to be a weird experience. The black plane took the shape of the bag, only on the outside. He quickly returned the bag to normal, the sight giving him a headache. Next, he held one hand in the bag and thought 'empty'. The bag poured its contents all over the floor. Chuck hadn't thought that would work and forgot to hold it over the crate.

The coins and other items hit the ground and bounced along the floor creating a racket. There weren't as many items in the bag as Chuck had imagined. He spent the next ten minutes cleaning up the mess and putting the items on the crate to look at.

First, he counted the money. There were three gold, twenty silver, and thirty-four copper coins. At least he thought that's what they were. He had nothing else to compare them to.

Next were two skill books. Unfortunately, he couldn't read the titles as they were in some unknown language. He would get back to those later. There was a third leather book that looked like a journal of some sort. The language looked to be the same when he opened the book. There were also a bunch of calculations and diagrams inside.

There was what looked like a signet ring, and a wedding ring of simple gold. A simple looking dagger that he strapped to his belt.

Last was the food and water. Two water pouches, both were empty. The food seemed to be dried rations, almost the same as the ones he had. They still appeared to be edible but Chuck would wait to test that until he was starving.

He put all those items back in the bag, along with the amulet. Then he moved to the skill books. He tried to open the first one and ran into the same issue he did when he first got his other skills. The book simply wouldn't open.

'Must be some requirement that needs to be met before opening the book.'

He tried the next one and it opened.

Name: Mana Manipulation

Rarity: Epic

Level: 0 - 5

Stat: Willpower

SP to Next level: 800

Description: Allows the user to manipulate the mana of common spells, allowing for additional spell effects. Mana cost of additional effect is based on the effect added. Also allows for the combining of spells. Three spells of common level.

Do you wish to train this skill? Y/N

The skill was impressive, as it should be for its rarity. Chuck immediately added it to his training queue. He decided not to bump any of his other current skills in priority. While this spell was impressive it had little utility for him at the moment. He only had a few spells, only one of those were of the common classification. He was more interested in the mana manipulation aspect. He wondered if this is what Ricardo had been using. It also made him extremely curious as to what the other skill book could be.

While all these items were nice they meant little if he couldn't find his way out of here. He did have an alternative way out but he wasn't sure he had the nerve to try that.

He started looking around the room, even going so far as moving the crates. Behind one of the stacks of crates was a barricaded door. It was another rusty metal door like the one on the opposite end of the room. Like that other door, it was rusted shut.

Chuck backed up and hit the door with two ice arrows before he ran out of steam and had to sit down and rest. It was a slight improvement over his first attempts when he was only able to cast four of the spells before he practically passed out.

After recovering he walked over to see the damage on the door. The spikes of ice tore straight through the old rusty metal. He peered through the openings but it was too dark on the other side to see. The door looked to be clear of fallen debris, so this plan should work.

It took Chuck another hour to pierce the door enough for him to be able to pull it out of the way. He was glad the elements had turned most of the door to a rusty mess. If not for that he likely wouldn't have been able to penetrate the door with his spell.

This time he left the bottom hinge intact, it made it so the door didn't fall to the ground and stir up a giant ball of dust. There was a wooden beam across the outside of the door that fell apart with little effort as he pulled the remains of the door inward. 'How awful it must have been to be imprisoned in this room.'

Chuck stepped through the opening into another hallway. With the door open there was enough light spilling into the hallway to see. The hallway rose and turned after about five meters. Chuck followed the hallway as it wound upward, eventually stopping at a thick wooden ladder. He looked up to see that the ladder ended at the next floor up, light could be seen filtering through the floor.

He tested his weight on the bottom step, it creaked ominously but held. He decided to remove his armor and sword to place it into the bag since the bag didn't feel heavier with what was inside it. The armor was a bit fiddly to get into the bag. Chuck had to turn the bag inside out to get the bag to accept it. It was good to know that was an option.

"Well, Mr. Creator, if you want my help a little assistance with keeping this ladder together wouldn't go unthanked."

Chuck let out a breath and slowly climbed the ancient ladder. The fourth step gave way just as he pulled his weight off of it. There was no turning back now so he kept going.

A couple of hair-raising minutes later Chuck climbed off the ladder and lay down on the floor above. He didn't trust the floor to contain his weight so he crawled towards the opening in the far wall where the light shone through.

What he saw through the hole left him speechless. A massive crater spanned the distance, it was worn down with time and was partially filled with water, but it was still clearly visible for what it was. It looked like something had taken a chunk out of the city. Chuck could see a few scattered buildings on the far sides of the crater. A few houses even having collapsed into the massive hole. It appeared the house Chuck was in was close to the edge of this crater. He carefully cleared away the brick of the wall so he could get through.

Once on the outside, he cautiously made his way away from the edge. One he didn't want to fall in, and he also wasn't sure if the creature was still around. He eventually found his way back to the house he entered. He knew it was the right house because his bag, what was left of it was scattered in the dirt. All his food had been eaten but there was no sign of the creature as far as he could tell.

After re-equipping his armor and sword, he made his way back towards the camp. The trail was easy to follow.