Chilly collected his equipment and took a long look at his character sheet.

Gregory “Chilly” Morhuil

Level

Exp

Skill Points

Spec

3

1/3

1

Fire

Life

Life Regen

194/194

11.6

Armor

Fire

Cold

Lightning

Chaos

84

45.65%

0

0.00%

0

0.00%

0

0.00%

0

0.00%

Incinerate

Helmet:

Iron Barbute

Vitality

Body Armor:

Iron Plate Vest

???

Pants:

Iron Pants

???

Boots:

Iron Greaves

???

Gloves:

Iron Gauntlets

???

Jewelry:

???

Mainhand:

Iron Axe

???

Offhand:

Iron Kite Shield

As he saw it, there were two things that he could do right now. The first was to tackle the boss. Simple. Straightforward. With only a sprinkling of kinda stupid. They were both level three though, so it shouldn’t be that difficult. Though the fact that he couldn’t really use his door bothered him.

The other option was avoid the boss for now, and try to get to level 4. That would mean killing the other Weeping Angel and exploring the rest of the Mausoleum in hopes of finding another level three enemy. If he did manage to get to level four, then Incinerate’s damage would increase and his health would get a small but significant boost. He wouldn’t be able to allocate further skills until level 5 but it still would be worth it to get to level 4.

Still leveling up before the boss would make the fight easier. More damage on Incinerate, more life. And as that one penguin had so succinctly put it. More life regeneration.

On the other hand. The goblin was fat. Which hopefully meant that it wouldn’t charge him like the ghouls did. Really that was his only weakness. Getting charged. If he could avoid getting locked down, then his regeneration would really shine. 11.6 life regenerated per second meant that he would fully heal in less than twenty seconds. A long time in a fight for sure, but in the grand scheme of things, not long at all.

Plus...he would get to fight a boss.

With that problem out of the way, Chilly headed over to the boss room. He collected his door from the room with the cursed table and stashed it close to the entrance to the boss room.

Peeking inside the boss room revealed the goblin and its angels in the same position as before. The goblin appeared to be sleeping on its stone throne. Or more likely in some form of stasis. Ready to wake up the moment someone entered.

Chilly limbering up, then got into a sprinters starting pose.

“Get set...” Chilly murmured quietly to himself.

Then with nary a bang, he shot off. In a rush he raced towards the shrine. The goblin immediately perked up as soon as Chilly stepped foot into the room, but the two angels remained predictably still.

Chilly grinned. As expected.

The goblin wobbled off the chair, and fell to his feet. From underneath its considerable mass it pulled out a short skull tipped staff, which immediately began to glow with an inner light.

Not taking that as a good sign, Chilly redoubled his pace. He was only half way towards the shrine that was giving the goblin double damage.

The goblin raised its staff and with a guttural scream jabbed it towards Chilly.

Three purple skulls manifested around the bone white skull of the staff, and immediately flew high up into the air. They twirled aimlessly before accelerating directly towards Chilly’s head.

Eyes wide, Chilly jerked to the side to try and avoid the evil looking skulls-

-but failed as the skulls swerved at the last moment, sinking into his skin like a poison. A feeling of nausea welled up inside him as the skulls disappeared entirely under his armor. A distinctly similar feeling to that of desecrated ground. The feeling quickly faded as his life regeneration kicked in, bringing his life total closer to full every second.

Chilly recovered from his failed dodge and leapt at the Shrine of Tel’Atur.

Shrine of Tel’Atur

Grants nearby allies 100% more damage

Desecrating this shrine destroys it and steals the effect for 60 seconds.

Desecrate?

Chilly willed yes as hard as he could. A pulse of black energy pulsed through the plinth. The golden light rising up to the ceiling sputtered then faded as a wave of golden particles flooded out of the plinth and flowed into him.

The goblin screeched in horror.

A sense of power overtook him.

Incinerate

Unleash a beam of fire that burns enemies that it touches. The beam dissipates after 6.1m.

Deals 100.9 Fire damage per second

Channeling

Chilly laughed maniacally as he unleashed Incinerate at the flabbergasted goblin.

Fire roared out from his extended palm. Much hotter than it was before. Hot enough that he began to worry that his hand would burn just from the proximity. The flames roared outwards, and engulfed the hapless goblin. Grey grin skin immediately sizzled and burned, releasing a god forsaken stench that immediately made Chilly recoil as fast as Channeling would allow.

The goblin panicked. Its once confident expression entirely gone, replaced by a deep rooted fear. It turned around, wobbling on stick thin legs and began waddling away. Before it made two steps it collapsed, slamming the staff butt first into the ground.

You have slain a level 3 Crypt Goblin!

You receive 1 experience!

“Haha!” Chilly crowed his victory, careful to extinguish Incinerate in case it accidentally touched either of the Weeping Angels. On second thought. He did have less than a minute of double damage. Why not take advantage of it?

Just before he could enact his plan to commit angel genocide and get to level four, a pulse of purple light exploded out of the staff. The staff that was still standing upright where the goblin had collapsed in a pile of bones.

Chilly froze as the light passed over him-

-but it didn’t seem to do any harm. His natural regeneration was healing him quite nicely in fact.

Except...it was doing something. Whenever the light passed over any of the corpses littering the cathedral floor, they began to twitch. Their limbs shuddered to life as the purple power flooded through their decomposing bodies and gave them life.

Putrid Ghoul (x29)

Level 1

Chilly’s eyes widened in horror as his gaze flashed back to the skull staff.

Skull of the Bone Giant

One handed staff

Rare

Ilvl: 3

10-15 physical damage

Grants Summon Bone Giant

Grants Mass Revive Undead

6% increased physical damage

7% increased fire damage

Adds 6 cold damage to attacks

“Stupid...” Chilly muttured, slightly panicking at the situation. “Always check the weapons.”

Regretting his incomplete information gathering, Chilly turned to the immediate threat. The ghouls had risen. All level one, but that only made them have slightly less health. Plus they wouldn’t give experience. In other words. Useless.

The first ghoul turned to look at Chilly. With a guttural screech-

You have been Hindered

-began racing towards him.

Grimly Chilly checked behind him. The way back was too far and covered in rising ghouls. While he was hindered he would need someplace closer that wasn’t surrounded on all sides by ghouls. The near wall to his left would do nicely. He pushed past the slowing effect of Hinder and jogged quickly towards the closest wall

As he arrived he checked the duration of the Shrine effect.

Desecrated Shrine of Tel’Atur

100% more damage

37 seconds left

Chilly dodged around several still rising ghouls and dove into an alcove between two buttresses. With his sides partially protected, he summoned Incinerate, panning it across the charging undead.

The empowered Incinerate melted through the undead. Fire raced out hungrily, eating through rotting flesh like a hot knife through butter. Flesh charred and bones cracked under the intense heat. Dozens of the undead collapsed, crumbling to dust and further covering the dirty stone flagons in soot. Waves of purple miasma burst out and combined, creating a dense cloud of desecrated ground that spread until it covered the entirety of the cathedral.

The miasma spread until it flowed over Chilly’s boots, which caused a faint feeling of nausea, but was easily outpaced by his life regeneration.

None of the ghouls could withstand the empowered flames for more than two seconds. The undead that were further back, ran at him, but soon entered the six meter radius of annihilation.

Suddenly a ghoul jumped out from the other side of the buttress and swiped at Chilly’s outstretched arm.

Chilly blasted the creature with a concentrated blast of white hot fire. Barely a second later, its ashes mixed with the roiling flames and scattered across the room.

The momentary distraction created an opportunity for the remaining undead. They took full advantage, using the momentary lapse in fire to close the distance. But the power of the Shrine was too great. Chilly swept the ray of fire back across the room, and undead flesh cindered, practically ripping some of the undead in two at the waist.

They fell in droves.

Black ashes swirled throughout the room, as dense purple miasma made it near impossible to see.

Desecrated Shrine of Tel’Atur

100% more damage

2 seconds left

Chilly let his arm fall, as the power of the Shrine left him.

Incinerate

Unleash a beam of fire that burns enemies that it touches. The beam dissipates after 6.1m.

Deals 50.4 Fire damage per second

Channeling

You are Exhausted

Artificial weakness flooded through him as the strength left him. Somehow he knew that should he have punched one of the ghouls it would have utterly devastated it in the same way that Incinerate had.

The feeling of loss only made him further aware of his exhaustion. He had been running full tilt since he had spawned in the Annex. While exploring the dungeon was exciting. The constant adrenaline spikes had left him weary.

He leaned up against the wall, keeping an eye on the swirling purple miasma for any further undead as he carefully brought up what ‘Exhausted’ did.

Exhausted

Persistent Debuff

Lose #% of your current life per second.

Chilly stared in disbelief, then pulled up his life total.

It wasn’t going up. Exhausted plus desecrated ground dealing so much damage over time that they together effectively reduced his maximum life pool by 6.

Slightly scared, Chilly dismissed the windows and took another look at the purple miasma. Just as he did so, he caught a faint sign of movement behind the swirling smog. His heart jumped into his throat, as a giant white femur faded into view.

Chilly’s eyes travelled up the giant bone, one meter, two meters, three meters. Until his gaze settled on a skull with two purple flames burning maliciously in the eye sockets. The skeleton was bare. No armor covered its form. In its right hand, a large two handed sword made entirely of bone was held loosely.

Bone Giant

Level: 3

“Oh dear,” Chilly whispered. He immediately rushed out of the alcove, but Hindered slowed him down. Even though he couldn’t run at full speed, he still made the attempt. He was in no state to fight a level three. Especially given the current environmental concerns.

The Bone Giant took a ponderous step forward, easily crossing the distance between them and swiped wide with its sword.

Chilly dove to the ground, falling underneath the giant weapon, feeling the wind of its passing overhead. He rolled to his feet immediately continuing his slow jog out and away from the skeleton. He was heading towards the entrance that he had come from. This was no time to continue exploring.

The Bone giant was having none of that though. With the sound of grinding bone, it pointed its sword at Chilly. Glowing twisted runes bloomed to life along the abnormal length of the blade. They pulsed in rhythm. Once. Twice. Then a wave of purple magic shot down and out the tip.

As before, the foreign magic didn’t seem to deal damage. Instead a sharp crack of stone rumbled through the room, as bone spikes the size of a car ripped out of the ground, forming a wall in front of him.

Chilly stumbled to a halt. Further stoney detonations reverberated as the stone spikes ripped their way out of the ground on either side of him. Chilly shot a glance backwards and saw that the spikes had fully surrounded him and the Giant. Creating an arena.

He would have to fight.

Or did he?

Bone Wall Segment

Life: 200

Armor

33

Fire Resistance

5

Cold Resistance

5

Lightning Resistance

5

Chaos Resistance

0

Not impossible. Just difficult.

Chilly turned to face the bone giant releasing Incinerate. Fire roared across the intervening space and licked hungrily at the skeleton’s chalky bones.

The giant lunged forwards, its blade slashing downwards impossibly fast. Chilly cancelled Incinerate as his butt puckered and he sidestepped. The stone flagon shattered under his feet, pelting him with tiny stones and pushing him away.

Chilly fell onto his ass, but quickly rolled to the side and got back to his feet. As fast as he could he raced along the wall and turned as he heard the sound of the bone sword being ripped out of the stone floor.

Incinerate washed across the space once more, only to be interrupted as Chilly dodged another widely swung blade.

This time the blade didn’t get lodged in the floor, and the Bone Giant immediately transitioned the horizontal slash into a lightning fast lunge.

Chilly retched as the giant blade crashed into his stomach, and launched him halfway across the bone arena. He rolled several times, before his momentum was abruptly halted by one of the wall segments.

Dazed, but unwilling to lay down and die just yet, Chilly rolled onto his hands and knees just as the skeleton took a bounding leap. It rose high into the air, arcing across the intervening space to land blade first where Chilly was unfortunately lying.

Pain thrummed through him. Without his regeneration, it felt as if he had just been ripped in half. Desperately. Chilly got onto his hands and knees only for a massive force to crash into him from the side.

Chilly went flying. In the air, he saw a little penguin clutching Realm Walker fearfully while sitting on one of the Bone Wall Segments.

Chilly crashed down, once again stopping at a wall segment. Exhausted and injured he got back to his feet. Ironically, now that his health was lower, his regeneration was beginning to recover. Healing him at a slow trickle.

The feeling of lethargy that Hindered him, suddenly faded as the ghoul’s special ability wore off.

The Bone Giant approached through the purple miasma, only to be greeted by a column of searing hot flames. Small cracks developed across the surface of the ivory, as soot gathered along the surface slowly turning the white skeleton black.

The Bone Giant shrugged off the flames, and reared back for another swing. Just as it did this, Chilly desperately pushed off of the Bone Wall Segment and rushed forwards, diving past the Giant’s legs.

Bone sword crashed into the Bone Wall Segment. Shattered bone went flying everywhere as bits from both the sword and the wall cracked off from the unimaginable force.

Chilly rolled to his feet, and immediately used Incinerate to cook the Giant’s backside.

As emotionless as all the undead up until now, the Giant didn’t react to the overt butt burning. Still its bones steadily cracked under the intense heat, and began to develop a faint glow as their temperature rose far beyond what they could handle.

The Giant jerked its blade out of the wall, and swung wildly at Chilly. This time, Chilly jumped backwards, out of the reach of the giant blade. Without the slow from Hinder, the Giant’s motions didn’t seem so impossibly fast.

The Giant took a large step forward, jabbing its blade forwards in a lightning fast stab, but Chilly was prepared. He ducked underneath the blade, strafing around the undead Giant with newfound speed. He flickered Incinerate on for half a second, then dropped the spell as he dodged backwards again.

The giant recovered slowly from the missed jab. Its blade fell to the floor and scraped loudly against the flagons, before it managed to lever it back up to a ready stance. Fire engulfed it briefly once more, as it reoriented on the rapidly strafing human.

Suddenly the Giant raised its blade high and squatted down. Then without any indication of effort, launched itself into the air in a glorious leaping slam. Recognizing the move, Chilly rushed forwards to the space the Bone Giant had just occupied, and traced the falling Giant with Incinerate.

The Giant landed with a crash. Then immediately whipped out its blade striking Chilly in the temple.

Chilly went flying. Tumbling across the arena with stars in his eyes. He slid to a stop and drunkenly got to his feet. There was...something familiar about that attack.

The giant approached slowly, Its sword raised high and was immediately engulfed in flame. The flame wobbled and wavered as Chilly struggled to hold his arm steady. Still, it served its purpose. THe once white skeleton was covered in faintly glowing orange cracks and covered in soot.

The giant took a large step forward, its blade rushing through the air in a vicious chop. Chilly dodged to the right. Once again getting showered by the stoney detritus the blow conjured up.

“Now...it's gonna...pull the sword out” Chilly whispered and unleashed Incinerate.

The Giant ripped the blade out of the ground. In a smooth motion it pivoted, wildly swinging its blade in a horizontal arc at Chilly.

Chilly ducked down low, only to spring to his feet half a second later.

“Now the...stab...”

The Giant lunged forwards stabbing viscously with the two handed blade. Chilly smoothly sidestepped the enormous sword and bathed the skeleton with Incinerate. Small cracks fused into large fissures the spiderwebbed across the Giant’s bones.

“...Jump,”

The Giant squatted down and leapt up high into the air. Chilly canceled Incinerate, and rushed forwards. Instead of stopping where the Bone Giant had jumped from, he continued, going as far as to leap forwards and roll to get extra distance.

The giant skeleton landed with a crash, and a moment later a second crash followed as the blade lodged itself deep into the stone. Chilly rolled to his feet, unleashing Incinerate without remorse.

The skeleton jerked its blade out of the ground, though couldn't manage it in one motion. After getting more leverage, it pulled with more conviction, dislodging the enormous weapon. It lumbered towards Chilly, who waited for it to get into range and rolled out of the way. The blade predictably slammed down embedding itself once more into the unforgiving stone.

Chilly got to his feet and unleashed Incinerate. Fire licked hungrily at the blackened and charred skeleton. Cracks developed along its length, extending and propagating until suddenly, it was all too much. The Bone Giant shuddered as various bones on its body cracked and fell to ash on the floor. The rib cage fell as the pelvis cracked in half, toppling over the entire upper body, until the skull crashed mightily into the ground shattering into countless off white shards.

You have slain a level 3 Bone Giant!

You receive 1 experience!

Congratulations! You have leveled up!

You are now Level 4

Will your status screen open to allocate your points.

Around him, the Bone Wall shuddered and crumbled into dust. The floor undamaged from where the bone spikes had ripped out of the ground.

“Bloody, hell...” Chilly muttered, “get me out of this purple smoke.”

Without further ado, Chilly hobbled his way back to the entrance of the room. The moment he stepped past the desecrated ground, his life regeneration shot back into action. Satisfied, but exhausted, Chilly sank to the floor and watched his health tick up.