Up in the gallery, surrounded by his undead party and corpses of ratkin he had killed, Seventh finished his Meditation and opened his eyes. The skill was enjoyable to use, he could think and plan while watching his health and mana slowly ticking up.

  Only problem was an almost complete lost sense of time. He had no idea how long he was out, but the blood surrounding the ratkin was still sticky on the tiled floor.

  Health and more importantly mana full, Seventh was ready for some experimentation in the necrotic nature.

  "Raise Dead."

  He pointed at the ratkin with all four limbs still intact. Shadowbolt had ripped its armor to shreds and the chest was raw flesh without fur.

  The body twitched twice and made a small skittering sound before its dull empty eyes flickered with hollow life.

  With Death Sense, Seventh could see a faint grey color emanating from the corpse change into pale blue. Occasionally small white sparkles crackled from the blue, swallowed by the darkness of the dungeon.

  The small undead stood up, crouched knuckles brushing the floor. Waiting patiently orders from its new master.

  Second casting completed without a hitch, but the third was interrupted. Seventh could feel mana flowing around his body, but the spell didn't activate and mana slowly returned somewhere in his chest. Not in the heart or lungs. Somewhere deeper.

  The feeling was interesting so he tried it again with same results.

  "Just two casts and I'm out of mana? Can't really surprise enemies with sudden zombification during combat then," Seventh pondered out loud.

  Still, two new undead were better than none and they could use bows. He really would like others to have ranged weapons too since the ratkin were too short to see over the shields.

  Maybe they could be carried on backs and shoot from there.

  Trying to imagine the sight, Seventh eyed the others and the ratkin. Almost like sensing his intent Adam and George turned around to eye him back. Only when Seventh sat to Meditate his mana back they turned to their task of keeping watch.

  While using Meditate, Seventh thought about his party and new additions.

  Only when his mana was almost full, Seventh realized he had kept his eyes open the whole time. He had stared right at the two undead ratkin.

  They were a small race. Most of were under 5 feet in height, but usually crouched to conceal their silhouettes, making them appear much smaller. They had short fur ranging from black to light brown, with spotting around sharp snouts, palms, and feet.

  Perfect for ambushes and sneaking around, but didn't do too well against armored targets. Not that there was any armored targets around here, Seventh's party wore torn leather armor.

  Seventh pointed at the pile of bows, quivers and other equipment he had looted from the corpses. "Ratkin, arm yourself with a bow and arrows. Pick up a melee weapon for backup."

  Why had he piled the loot on one pile, some sort of old habit?

  It hadn't meant anything and just cost them time. In the future he could just check the packs for potions or other lootables, and skip the loot pile. Or better yet, raise the bodies and order them to give him potions and valuables.

  "I will figure that one out at some point," he said and waved his arm dismissively.

  Ratkin duo didn't react, but Seventh could see a small sway in the others. Did they want to turn around to face him? More things to figure out with this class.

  The blue box popped into existence and surprised him.

  Seventh furrowed his brow at the message box. He hadn't even cast the spell, so why did it rank up? And how had he already ranked up his class?

  "Did anyone of you just do something? Raise hand if you did."

  Stolen novel; please report.

  No body raised an arm.

  Confused, Seventh checked his Status Screen and noticed his Necromancer skills.

  When and why had his skills jumped up in rank? Did Shadowbolt skip the F rank altogether and went straight to EE?

  Checking the LOG was a mess. While meditating it reported every second his health and mana. Just scrolling to the combat took several seconds and he had sped past it and had to backtrack.

  And no, Shadowbolt had ranked up twice during the fight. From rank FF to F, and then to EE. It had gained some substantial benefits from the sudden ranks.

  It did more damage now, and had adjustable Mana use. Whatever that meant. Description talked about light levels so maybe that was it? Or could he focus more mana per bolt to boost up the damage and distance?

  Seventh's analysis of his favorite offensive spell was interrupted by his new spell.

  A scouting spell? Long casting time made it impossible to use in combat, but it could be used for scouting up ahead.

  "No time like the present," Seventh said and activated the skill. Half a minute later he was staring at himself, eyes closed, sitting in the middle of the undead horde.

  He didn't like what he saw.

  Rot

  Decay

  Death

  The green faintly glowing eye quickly flew away and dissipated in the darkness.

  After a long, silent, moment an echoing grunt of a command was heard in the hall, "Follow. Ratkin at the back."

  The dead started their march again, but they didn't return to the corridors. The hall was more open and felt different, more fresh and lively. They walked along one of the walls, keeping pillars between them and the wider central hall.

  While walking, Seventh absently raised his hand to touch the beautiful mosaic. His hand brushed the complex geometric shapes made from square- and diamond-shaped, small glossy tiles. Tiny bumps felt cool beneath his fingers, irregular, imperfect. Some tiles were chipped, others missing altogether, leaving shallow gaps where patterns once continued.

  Seventh raised his head to look around in surprise. The thought felt odd, almost alien to the point it felt like someone else had said it.

  There was only his party and the ratkin minions. Nobody had spoken. They couldn't speak.

  He didn't raise his hand again when they started moving again.

  The hall ended at two enormous doors hanging from their hinges. The doorframe was so high a giant could have walked on tiptoes while having ample headroom. The hinges themselves were massive blocks of rusted black iron, the height of a grown man.

  Peeking outside, Seventh saw an odd sight.

  Massive stone steps descended down, flanked on both sides by stepped open yards. The yards were the size of fields and overgrown with squat, stone-carved shrubs, long eroded by time. Dirty copper planters dotted the space, tarnished and greened, filled with metallic wilted flowers made of aged copper.

  Above it all stretched a high ceiling, impossibly tall, tiled with countless shades of blue and white. The pattern was deliberate, meant to mimic the open sky. At its center, a radiant burst of golden and orange tiles formed the shape of a stylized sun, casting no light, but creating the illusion that daylight might still exist somewhere beyond the stone.

  At the end of the steps, far below, another yard and similar, massive closed doors. That yard wasn't decorated with planters or shrubbery, but looked like a central yard of an castle centered on a well.

  Seventh took in the unique architecture. He had never seen such a weird place, underground out of all places. Maybe the ratkin weren't actually ratkin, but normal rats in a giant's castle. Did that make him a lilliputian?

  "No, I'd remember a giant's castle inside a cave," Seventh hissed silently.

  Looking at the party he commanded them, "Fan out. Ratkin in the middle with me. Advance carefully."

  After regrouping the formation advanced down the steps. There were normal sized stairs in the middle, larger steps were waist-high.

  Seventh could feel his pulse quicken. There was excitement in the air. A small breeze dried a drop of sweat on his brow.

  "Shut it!" Seventh ordered. If he wasn't too busy looking around for ratkin he'd...

  He thought and stopped. Others continued without him, leaving him a dozen steps behind before Seventh got a hold of himself and joined back at the group.

  When hurrying to the others he looked around. No one was near him. No one living anyways.

  But there were chunks of stone laying around the stairs, the big ones. Every third step had a pile of stones and gravel on both sides. It looked like a mason's discard pile, but the stone was different.

  "Hold."

  At the next step with a pile, Seventh approached a pile to investigate. It was dense black stone with small white spots. He hadn't seen that kind of stone anywhere in the dungeon. Why it was piled?

  Taking a chunk with him for further examination, he returned to his spot and ordered others to advance.

  Without other delays or stops, they reached the bottom of the stairs, the courtyard with a well. Seventh peeked down out of curiosity and could see a dark wavy surface of the water. There were buckets around and rope so they could use this as a water source.

  If it wasn't poisoned or something.

  "Only if you needed to eat or drink," a voice reminded him about this life after death.

  That wasn't just inside Seventh's head.

  That was real.

  He quickly raised his spear, scanning for enemies. Others got the idea and raised their shields and weapons. All except the ratkin. They were happily behind the seven humans with their bows.

  Seven?

  Seventh saw the odd undead among the others.

  He was behind them, just like he had ordered.

  He wasn't so dirty or rotten.

  He almost looked like a living man.

  Seventh could feel his spine chill and his grip tightened around the spear.

  "Bob?"

  "In the flesh," Bob replied.