Jess had never liked heights, she would not go far to consider it a phobia, but she certainly preferred to avoid them.

"Haah." Jess sighed, moving slowly around the top of the tower; every creak and moan of the wood caused Jess's heart to race faster. But eventually realised that there were no staircase or elevator or any normal way to get down.

Another sigh escaped her lips as she leant over the edge and realised how she was supposed to get down. There were a number of platforms on the way down, each with too much distance from the other to simply step down and even at a distance Jess could tell the wood was rotted and crack: One impact away from crumbling.

There was only one way down and she loathed that it was her only option.

Taking a deep breath to calm herself, Jess swung her leg over the side and gently placed it on a plant of wood that reinforced the tower's structure. She first tested the wood by slowly pushing weight onto it, not having much confidence as it continued to creak and moan under the pressure; but still there was no other choice and so Jess began carefully descending the tower, one cautious step after another.

On a glance down Jess noticed a complete lack of rails; being familiar with the type of ride the [Devil's Drop] was, she found the fact strange. The truth was that the [Devil's Drop] was not the kind of ride she had imagined, nor was the [Unlucky Carnival] what any of the girls believed it to be.

It was far more sinister than a derelict carnival filled with derelict rides and attractions taken over by ghosts and monsters. The unlucky one was not the carnival, but rather those unfortunate souls who found themselves within.

Jess's descent was not as easy as she made it seem. After a while she had gained some confidence, moving at greater speeds, only to almost fall to her death with a piece of wood crumbling beneath her. It was only the claws of her left hand, digging into another piece of wood, that kept her from becoming a smudge of the ground - Jess breathed heavily as she hung from one hand, desperately reaching with her other to try and gain a little more stability.

From then on she realised that caution was definitely how she should proceed - of course that only lasted until the halfway point.

As Jess had completed half of the climb from the top to the first platform a gravelly screech came from the surroundings. It was far too difficult to see where it was coming from, but the source quickly revealed itself.

Jess noticed something quickly approaching from the sky, and being in a dungeon she knew that couldn't possibly be good. The quick approaching monster soon became visible to Jess and while not innately frightening, a flying monster attacking her in such a vulnerable position was certainly a cause for concern. Jess began moving as quickly as she could, desperate to reach the platform as it would be the only place she could fight before the monster arrived in full force.

What had appeared was a humanoid monster made from stone and rock, each of its movements feeling heavy and weighted despite flying through the sky at incredible speeds. Gravel and dust rained down with each twitch and manoeuvre. It had a cruel snarl adorned with sharp teeth and its features were not entirely detailed due to being made of stone, Jess could tell it was glaring directly at her.

[Gargoyle (30) (Monster)]

"Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. -" Jess muttered to herself over and over again as she descended further - she was close, but not close enough.

Jess was forced to swing to the side in order to avoid a swipe of the gargoyle's sharp talons, the attack cracking into the wood, shattering more of the support and shaking the tower. Jess was no better, her sudden and forceful movement almost splitting the wood she had grabbed in two resulting in a sharp and sudden drop that only her claws stop her from meeting.

She let out deep panicked breaths as she tried to reposition herself, the gargoyle pulling wood from beneath its stone talons. It had perched itself on the wooden beams in that paradoxical state of weightlessness despite being made of pure stone and at a speed Jess did not expect it crawled over to her, raising one of its clawed hands to strike.

Jess panicked and moved as quickly as she could, just barely missing one of the beams below. She fell as the gargoyle's snarl turned to a sneer and Jess hoped desperately that she was close enough to the platform to land without it breaking.

Her back slammed into the wood and she felt it crack under her, but not entirely, however, it would not last long. Jess moved fast and picked herself up, but the gargoyle moved just as fast as it flew down to attack her. Jess was ready though, her fist reared back before launching forward in near perfect form and crashing into the gargoyle.

But it was not enough, leaving only a crack along the gargoyle's face along with breaking off parts of its nose. The gargoyle sneered at Jess before moving to attack once more; with their distance Jess would not have been able to evade the attack without [Quick Dodge], however, the skill almost sent her off the back of the platform and to her death - perfectly positioned for the gargoyle to kill her.

If not for her quick thinking, ducking at the last second, she would have been defeated in an instant from her own skill. From below Jess activated her other skill [Strike], landing a devastating uppercut on the gargoyle.

As a monster with fairly high intelligence it had realised the danger and used its hand to block the attack, only for a mixture of the skill, [CQC Master] and Jess's new gauntlet to crush its defence and shatter the gargoyle's hand. The gargoyle was unable to scream as it physically could not make noises like that; instead its stone face shifted in a display of pain, before glaring hatefully at Jess.

However, the gargoyle was slow and so were its facial expressions, allowing Jess to activate [Bone Exoskeleton], charging straight at it and pinning it to the floor with her enhanced strength. The exoskeleton's claws were sharp and scratched against the gargoyle's face, though, while the skill was strong - stronger than the stone of the gargoyle's body - the creatures magic prevented an easy win as it beat its stoney wings to try and push Jess off of it.

The wood below them was cracking, but only Jess cared as the gargoyle knew it could fly to safety - in fact the monster was hoping the floor beneath them would collapse and was thrashing even harder.

Jess knew she had to finish things instantly, her skill off of cooldown and her hands brought together above her head. The gargoyle's face shifted to that of fear as it tried to get out from under Jess, but before it could a [Strike] empowered hit crushed its stone skull.

The force of the attack not only killed the gargoyle, but also sent ripples of force through the wood; bringing it crumbling beneath Jess.

In her impulsivity she had failed to recognise the environmental effects of her attack and now had to sprint to the edge of the platform as it disappeared below her. With no other choice Jess jumped down, digging her bone claws into the wood to her side in an attempt to slow herself down; succeeding only barely and stopping just above the next platform with a far less stable tower.

But as she had made her way down she heard something unpleasant: Two gravelly screeches coming from the distance.

Soon enough two more gargoyles appeared and began attacking, but now Jess was ready and already on the next platform to fight them. She needed to beat them soon as her exoskeleton would not last forever.

Getting into a stance, the gargoyles sneered and rushed to fight.

At such speeds they could not evade a fist to the face, not destroying it outright, but knocking out a sizable chunk that sent the gargoyle crashing through wooden beams behind Jess. The tower shook as it lost more and more of its support, but that gargoyle was nearly defeated.

The instability prevented Jess from fully evading the next attack and without her exoskeleton she would have sustained a heavy injury. However, what she got instead was a gargoyle's claws stuck between the bones of her skill and like before her empowered strike was enough to crush the monster's head.

I'm so glad [Strike] has a low cooldown. Jess thought, before noticing her [Bone Exoskeleton] skill was about to run out. She quickly moved towards the bumbling and near headless monster, finishing off the gargoyle with a series of normal punches.

With that the skill rested and Jess took the time to recover her skill's cooldowns - before descending once again.

She had gotten into the groove of killing gargoyles fairly quickly, even as they increased by one with each descent she made her way down with ease. 

It was only upon her fifth platform that she came across a problem, one she learnt to deal with, but a problem nonetheless. From there she had to start fighting [Gargoyle Soldier (35) (Monster)] monsters which were much tougher and wielded stone weapons and shields.

However, by first removing the lesser gargoyles from the fight she found they were not too hard to deal with.

As a result, Jess rose quickly in level to 32 - finally reaching the ground with one extra skill to show for it:

[Flowing Fist (0%) (C+): Learn the techniques of the Flowing Fist school of martial arts. A combat style reliant on parries, evasion and redirection of force]

The skill was not immediately useful, nor did it fit the style of fighting Jess enjoyed - but she still felt it could be useful in practise. Gargoyle's were not the best practice partners for anything beyond evasion and so she had not managed to progress the skill much.

However, [CQC Master] increased by five percent just from acquiring the skill; so even without using it Jess was happy to have gotten it.

When Jess reached the ground floor she thought the trial would be over and intended to head over to the rain cloud in the distance as she knew Bailey would be nearby. However, she could not do that as creature blocked her path - one she could see was of a superior quality than even the gargoyle soldiers that surrounded it:

[Gargoyle General (40) (Mini-Boss)]

It had only a single weapon, but was significantly larger than the other gargoyles. Unlike all the others it didn't have any wings and instead sported a large, interlocking, stone tail that moved jerkily like a faulty contraption.

It sneered at her, its stone sword being raised, only for the soldiers to fly forward and attack. Jess felt no danger, even taking the time to practise parrying weapons with the backs of her hands. This failed a lot and Jess often needed to save herself using [Quick Dodge] to jump back, but sometimes she would successfully parry a spear and open the gargoyle up for a [Strike] enhanced attack that would finish the fight.

Like that [Flowing Fist] increased in proficiency and [Strike] reached level nine. 

Soon enough the gargoyle soldiers were all dead and the general had not even moved. It simply glared at Jess while she smirked back; she hadn't clocked its intentions, but they had failed nonetheless.

Typically gargoyle's used their high defence and inexhaustible nature to whittle down enemies; what they hadn't expected was a foe that could pierce those defences and be equally inexhaustible.

The general raised its weapon high before charging forwards, deciding it felt strong enough to kill Jess.

[Flowing Fist] was primarily about footwork as the light movements, only digging in to redirect an attack, allowed for both precision and power when done right. It had helped Jess descend as she lightened herself on the platforms and reduced the strain on the wood and it had assisted her in fighting the gargoyles as she more easily evaded their attacks. Even now it assisted her as the heavy attacks of the gargoyle general hit only air.

However, in return she could not land a damaging blow herself, unable to deal significant damage to the monster's stone armour and body. 

In theory it would be an endless fight, one between two inexhaustible enemies, but Jess was not so lucky. From below the tail of the gargoyle slammed into her stomach, sending her backwards - as she rolled against the floor, it was only a quick push to her side that prevented her from being crushed beneath the stone sword of her enemy.

"Shit!" Jess yelled out, once again just barely moving out of the way of another attack with [Quick Dodge]. She was beginning to regret feeling disappointed with the skill considering how much she was using it, as like [Strike] it had risen in level all the way to eight.

At a safe distance Jess dug in and shot forwards, spinning just enough to evade another downward slash with knowledge from [Flowing Fist] before letting out a [Strike] right on its chest. There was no real change, but she had gotten back into the groove of attacking and knew to look out for the tail as well.

Like that the fight continued with both fighters at a complete stalemate.

[Flowing Fist] was rising in proficiency slowly, but it would certainly not be enough. It was only as the system chimed that Jess finally allowed herself to smile.

The choice is obvious! She thought, spinning over a sideways slash before digging in and rearing her fist back. It shot forward, but did not remain a fist, instead extending outwards and allowing Jess's fingers to push into the stone.

She had not hit a vital area, but her fingers dug into the stone up to the first knuckle and sent out a web of fractures with its hole at the epicentre. The gargoyle glared at Jess, but she jumped back away before any attacks could hit her. Grinning all the while to mock the gargoyle and enjoy her evolved skill:

[Precision Strike (1) (D): Greatly empower the piercing effect of the user's next attack. Piercing power scales with STR, AGI and skill level]

Between the skills and the claws of both [Bone Exoskeleton] and the predator ghoul race the skill was perfect for Jess - she even found it worked well with the [Flowing Fist] style. So while she had lost destructive power in not choosing the other available evolution, [Heavy Strike], the skill she had chosen was perfect for her.

With renewed vigour, Jess moved to end the fight. Rushing forward for the last time and using the swing of her enemy's sword to jump high, reaching its snarling face. From there all it took was a single precise strike - sending fractures straight through its head and killing the creature moments after.

With its stoney body crashing to the ground, Jess happily walked over while looking at her level increase to thirty five; only to be annoyed by the dropped item.

"A damn sword!" Jess moaned as she headed out of the [Devil's Drop] area; ready to meet up with her friends again.