“Ughhhhhhhhhh! Oh god, why, why does this hurt!?”

“It fucking buuuurrrnnnss! Arhhhhhhhhh.”

“Fuck the system! Fuck the goaHG! Aaah ha ha! FUCK YOOooo- ergh!”

…

“Did it fi- Aghhhhhhhhhh! Nooo… Whyyyyyyy!?”

The Gejan, Jessica, Alba, Peter, and an army of wyverns watch the screaming and writhing [Hero] as things shift beneath his skin.

Nothing has been done to numb the pain that comes with bones ripping through flesh as they move and readjust themselves.

For dreaded minutes, all they can do is watch as Quasi screams and writhes as bones crack and sprout from his bloody back. It doesn’t come out neatly, but tears through skin and grows into twin structures of white drenched in red blood.

Eventually, the [Wings of Bone] skill completes and the [Hero] lays breathing heavily in a puddle of his own sweat, blood, and ripped skin.

“Jessica!”

Eventually, he calls out her name, and the [Archpriestess] casts [Heal] on his bloody back.

Once healed, the [Hero] shakily stands with [Wings of Bone] sticking out of his back.

“That… That was horrible. Who the hell makes a skill like this…?” he groans as he extends his new appendages.

The wings flex easily and have a fifteen-foot wingspan. A type of bony leather can be seen flexing between sharp bony protrusions.

“Well, it’s a good thing I’ve had wings before, though I do wish I had a tail.”

Without saying more, the [Hero] bends his knees, extends his wings, and then jumps up with a mighty flap.

He takes flight and eyes start watching in awe as he begins soaring through the air. At first, the flight seems a bit off and wonky, but Quasi quickly gets a hang of it and starts doing flips and rolls in the air, which inspires many wyverns to mimic his actions as they follow his lead.

After a good few minutes, the [Hero] lands. He flexes his new wings and extends them in front of himself. He examines the joints. The wings have no muscle tissue, but, for arcane reasons, he can flex and move them with just a thought.

“So, are we going yet?”

He looks at the group. The Gejan are ready and waiting to travel to the next floor. Aldonis has his sword on his back, Orlan is holding his spear, Darrow has his weapons on his back, Thorous has both her blades on her hips, Jessica has her arms folded and Mule hovers above.

As for Alba…

“Are you sure you want to stay?”

Alba bites her lip and slowly nods, “Yes, I’ve been useless for a while. It is too dangerous for me to travel with you any longer.”

Quasi nods in understanding. The tunnel leading to the next floor is small, too small for a wyvern to have any hope of fitting through. Since her skills require minions to be effective, the best choice for her is to stay with the wyverns and level her class.

“Aright, let’s get a move on. Joker will take point.”

_____________________________________________________________

The travel down had been silent for ten minutes and probably would have lasted several hours if the [Guardian] wasn’t bored.

“Commander, if you ever want to test that new skill out, just ask.”

I roll my eyes at my team as they all chuckle, except for Darrow. He is dead-serious, which makes his words all the funnier.

“I’m not about to commit suicide to test out a skill that only activates when I’m dead. Unless I absolutely have to, those kinds of risks can wait.”

“Yeah, but how would you know if it works or not?” he asks, which gets another round of laughter.

“Darrow,” I say.

“Yes, Commander?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Laughter resumes again and I can’t help but chuckle with the rest.

Which is good, because I am very on edge regarding the next floor. Volpe warned me that the most difficult floor is the ninth and that I will need to use everything in my arsenal to surpass it.

Normally, I’d test [Undying Apparition]. Sure, testing it is all risk and no reward, but eh. However, the prospect of a hidden mechanic, like a prolonged cooldown, make me reconsider slumming it in the unlife when I’ve got a prophecy of doom hanging over my head.

Speaking of cooldowns, the whole mechanic makes sense, but the fact that some skills have them but the system does not say so is another huge error. For example, [Enchanted Bone Javelin] can’t be spammed. Once it is used, I can’t use the skill again for ten minutes. However the proto-skill [Bone Javelin] can be used continuously with no cooldown.

“So, what did you choose as your new class?”

I look at Jessica. Her inquiry reminds me that I have a new class now. With a thought, I open up my status page.

“[Engineer].”

I frown at the new class and the boringly common skill, but I couldn’t game the system. Unfortunately, the system keeps track of combined classes, which means that my [Necrotic Mindlord] class is still treated as being two classes. Only now that my [Hero] class is passed level one hundred am I allowed another unrestricted leveling class.

“Really?” Jessica says in surprise, “I thought you would choose [Mage] or even [Warrior].”

I shake my head, “I would like to. There are a lot of [Mage] skills that I wish I had and a physical class like [Warrior] would help me in the survival department, but those aren’t going to give me the ability to obliterate armies. As of right now, I need to improve what I got, which are minions. [Engineer] should help me with that.”

“Huh, I never thought of it that way.”

I leave her to her thoughts, my own are focused on the next floor.

__________________________________________________________

“I smell blood.”

The first to speak again is Darrow and at his words, everyone begins sniffing.

“I do too.”

“Same.”

Quasi frowns, “Weapons ready.”

The group, though confined by the narrow corridor, are able to get their weapons in hand. Joker begins moving faster, creating a bit of distance so as to give ample warning if something is about to happen.

As the group continues down, the smell of blood is accompanied with the horrible stench of decay. The smell suffuses the whole tunnel, growing stronger and stronger as they go deeper.

The group slows when they see light coming from the end of the tunnel. A very dark violet light that puts everyone on edge.

“Be ready for anything,” he says as they approach the light. Joker is the first to enter, and then the rest of the group follows.

The first thing to greet them is a lake of blood and viscera. Corpses of monsters float upon the waters and gargantuan bones protrude from the lake's hypolimnion into the air. Some of the monster corpses are as small as a horse and as large as a freightliner. At the center of the carnage, a bloody mountain rises a mile into the air.

The party’s eyes follow the slope of carrion up to the peak and are there transfixed with dread. . A monstrous, jet black whale the size of an aircraft carrier hovers o’er the mountain of gore. It sports a long crystalline horn upon its brow and casts the floor in an eerie, black lit glow. To Quasi, the thing looks like a narwhal with pitch-black skin and glowing violet neon stripes.

And then he looks at the screen waving near its head.

“Oh, we might be fucked.”

“That is bullshit. Complete, utter bullshit. What the hell is that level scaling? No, this is not right. It should be level five hundred or something! Why the fuck is its level so high? That is fucking cheating…”

Everyone turns to the [Hero] as he begins ranting, cursing, waving his arms. His reaction is not uncommon for him, but the length and extensive screaming is.

Jessica counts three minutes before he finally calms down. In those three minutes, a hardened [Sailor] would be blushing.

It is only near the end that Jessica realizes what Quasi just went through. He just went through all the stages of grief in three minutes. Currently, he is now on the final stage.

“Alright. Ok, I understand. Resources were poured into you as a last line of defense against someone like me. If I was in your shoes, I would do something similar. One monster to destroy them all and I have to surpass you.”

Quasi sighs, glaring at the floating monster, more relaxed now, but still annoyed.

“So, commander. What’s the plan? You’re the only one who can fly.”

The [Hero] shakes his head.

“I’m doing this alone.”

“What?”

“What?”

“What!?”

Everyone yells in surprise, especially after he had been ranting, screaming, and cursing for the past three minutes.

He ignores their questioning stares as he goes to Joker and retrieves his staff.

“I want everyone back into the tunnel. That’s an order. You too, Peter!”

The group begins to complain, but quickly go silent as Quasi’s aura expands out like a thick mist. His expression is no longer recognizable. No smiling, frowning, or anything discernible. Just neutral and serious.

“Leave.”

He commands once more and they all nod with grim faces. Within a minute, everyone is gone except for Quasi. He stands at the precipice between the lake and the tunnel upwards.

With a flap of his wings, he takes flight and glides silently over the bloody water. He stops after half a mile and then just floats in the air.

“So, this is the moment. The final test.”

Quasi moves his hand to his belt and grabs the metallic dagger. A dagger he obtained on the first day of his summons. It has found little use after that first day, but it has stayed with him.

He grips the hilt, feeling the rugged leather covering up the metal underneath. He tilts the dagger, allowing the metallic surface to reflect his face.

It’s unfortunate that there is no readily available alternative that he can think of.

“Third time’s the charm.”

The [Hero] shifts the dagger towards his face and shoves it through his eye, easily penetrating through the soft flesh and reaching his brain.