After half an hour of walking Dan came upon the massive Rabbit. It was feasting on the corpse of a fox, with the loud grating of stone on stone with every chomping bite. Dan could see blood leaking from underneath it as it ignored the world around it, content to enjoy its meal in peace. Trying not to gag from the strange scene of predator becoming prey, Dan set his fox skeleton down and began to cast his reanimation spell.

The three second cast time was more than enough for the large rabbit to take notice and tear itself away from its meal. Unfortunately for it, the time it spent deciding whether or not it was worth trying to kill this strange glowing animal was enough for the skeleton to jerk itself upright and stumble a few steps before spotting the rabbit and charging at an alarming speed.

While the rabbit was busy trying to figure out how to deal with the skeleton he began to cast Decomposing Mist on the rabbit to soften it up. The large rabbit was certainly imposing. Its hide had turned into a rocky gray armor that seemed tough to get through, luckily his spell was doing its job and slowly eating through the armored hide, allowing the fox to latch on and rip away hunks of flesh.

Dan stood back to watch the spectacle, starting to become convinced that he wouldn’t have to do anything as the Rabbit became more and more sluggish and the decomposing mist wore it down further. With a sudden large burst of speed the Rabbit surprised Dan by whipping its head around and smashing the skeletal fox, causing it to burst into pieces, the blunt attack from the rabbit’s head enough to break the magical bonds holding the skeleton together and instantly killing it.

With a wince Dan sighed, he should have expected it to play by Dungeons and Dragons rules where skeletons were weak to bludgeoning or blunt damage. That was fine though, the Rabbit was nearly dead anyways, and Dan just had to finish the job that the reanimated fox had started.

Dan cast Decomposing Mist one more time before taking off his shield and walking to the rabbit. He really needed to find a staff or something, this shield really was not optimal for solo play if he could just raise a Zombie that could tank for him. Nonetheless he braced behind the shield as the rabbit charged him. He felt a thunk and looking over the rim of the shield he saw the rabbit sliding itself off the spike and trying to maneuver around him. The wound from where it impacted was pretty deep and the stone skinned beast was panting heavily and shaking as it attempted to gather the strength for one last charge.

Dan took away the decision from it as he charged forward and impaled the rabbit on his shield’s spike. Finally the beast gave up the ghost and slumped to the ground, defeated. Pulling his shield back over his back he waited for the notification to come.

Quest Complete! You have killed the Raile! Calculating rewards… You have earned 1000 experience plus a new spell, Summon Thrall.

Summon Thrall (Novice 1) - You may designate a reanimated creature as a thrall, making it a permanent and resummonable pet. This thrall is not counted towards your undead summon limit.By using this spell you will resummon your thrall at your current level. Increase this skill to allow for more thralls in the future. Costs 30 mana. 3 second summon time.

Congratulations, you have leveled up! Would you like to view your experience log? Y/N

Looking at the log Dan saw that the Raille, as it was apparently called, gave over seven hundred experience on its own, and with the other animals he had killed on his way here he had gained the two thousand experience needed to level up to two. Though this was the last thing that was running through his mind as he was surrounded by light and was given a dose of pure pleasure from the simple act of leveling up.

It was over as soon as it began though, and Dan was craving it again. Dan didn’t do much drinking or smoking, but he could see how an addict might be drawn to something like that from the sheer pleasure of the situation. Dan waited a few minutes until the rush finally fully left him and stood up to look around him. The Raile was very much dead, and he could see a few bones sticking out of its skin from the decomposing mist. Dan was then left with a dilemma, should he leave the corpse as it is so that when it becomes his thrall it keeps its armor, or should he melt it down like the fox and make it a skeleton. Abyss, Dan didn’t even know if it would stay as a skeleton if he resummoned it, or if it would regenerate all its rock-like skin. Shrugging to himself he decided to leave it as it is and resummon the corpse, while hoping this wasn’t the wrong decision.

A few seconds later and the rabbit was standing on its feet again. Looking at it pleased, Dan knew he would never be without a tank again. Though how was he supposed to designate it as a thrall? In response to his thought he was shown a prompt.

Would you like to set Raille as your thrall? You can change this to another creature at any time. Y/N

That was an easy enough prompt to answer. Mentally clicking yes, Dan was glad he wouldn’t permanently be stuck with a rabbit as a tank and would be able to upgrade to something else in the future. Maybe there was a bear he could hunt tomorrow or even a-

“Gods help up! They're surrounding us!”

Dan heard the scream somewhere in the fox territory, interrupting his thought process and making him look towards the area where he heard the scream. There certainly was danger over there, and while the thrill of the level up was still with him, he decided to pack it up for the day. Maybe the players dying would learn from their mistakes and run into good fortune like himself.

With that he started to make his way towards the city gates. A few minutes later he was gagging at the rotting stench from the rabbit behind him as the wind blew it towards him. Dan gave the rabbit a mental order and it jumped in front of him, with the wind thankfully carrying the stench away from him.

It took quite a while to get back to the gates and the sun had nearly set by the time he was approaching. The guards manning the gates squinted as he approached with the rabbit in front and as the came within a couple meters of the guards they could see the Raille clearly.

“Drake there’s a necromancer right here!” Called one soldier, holding a spear shakily at Dan, who just now realized how much of a moron he was for bringing a zombie up to the city guards, assuming he’d be let in.

“Well kill him you blasted idiot! You know what the mages guild thinks about necromancers, there’s no way he’s licensed!” Another guard shouted from on top of the wall. With shaky hands Dan walked back from the armed and approaching guard, while trying to calm him down.

“Hey now, please chill out, this is all a big misu-” No more calming words were said as an arrow sprouted in Dan’s head instantly killing him.

You have died. Calculating: Shot by city archer Josh for attempting to enter the city with a reanimated pet. You have lost 500 experience and will respawn in 10 hours.

Another game session done with him ending up dead. He was back to level one with that blow but at least he wasn’t too far away. He learned another valuable lesson though in not to attract the guards ire or show his mage abilities in town. With that he decided he had enough for the day so he took off his helmet and went to bed, exhausted but happy that things were finally starting to go his way.