We crashed hard into a rocky floor far below. It had to have been at least fifty feet, and my entire body ached. The Mind Mage had crashed to the ground next to me with a thud. Ragged breaths told me he was still alive.
“Ryzel, you alive down there?” a deep, gravely voice called from somewhere above.
Ignoring the system messages in my vision, I forced my body to roll over, my bones screaming in pain and protest from the action. Barely illuminated above stood an odd-looking man on the ridge of the pit the mage had attempted to trap me with. His skin was pulled taut across his face, and his nose was just entirely gone.
Beside me, the mage made a loud groan before forcing out his own words. “Yeah, I'm still alive, Gren. Get me out of here.”
“All right, one second. It's gonna hurt like hell. Only way I can do this is to swap you with one of these skeletons up here,” Gren, the apparent Bone Mage, called back.
“Dammit,” I muttered, anger flooding me. My quarry was about to escape, and I was too broken to do anything to stop him.
There was a flurry of motion above, mixed with a loud snarl as the giant form of Floof came into view just as it collided with the Bone Mage. It was too late to stop the spell he had been casting, as the body next to me had been replaced with bones, but it was enough to make sure we had at least one source of information.
The sickening noise Gren's body made as it was crushed in between the rocky ground and Floof landing atop it made me rethink my earlier hope. Still, I could accept his death as at least a partial victory. Ryzel wouldn't escape me forever.
“Holy shit, Ryzel, how do you live through a fall like this? Hurt me like hell,” the gravelly voice yelled out somehow to my utter astonishment, still alive. “Well, at least we got the dog too now. Can you get me out of here?”
“Sorry buddy, I got orders from the top. But hey, I do appreciate you helping me out,” Ryzel called back.
“Wait, what? You can't just leave me down here. Come on, man!” His words did nothing to sway his former ally as the hole above us vanished. Ryzel had reversed his spell, sealing the three of us deep underground.
We were likely just in another connected portion of the caverns we had found below the neighborhood. But considering we had barely mapped any of that at all and how hurt I was, it wasn't going to be easy to find our way home. There was no chance either Floof or I were getting back to Ash before she had to leave. And worse yet, the Mind Mage was still out there. At least, he was almost certainly as badly hurt as I was, hopefully worse.
“Floof, keep him pinned,” I said, trying to force myself to sit up. Several bones popped as the pain got worse. I let myself slide back down flat onto the ground as I read over the System notifications.
__________
Adaptation
Lesser Robust Skeleton
Type
Reactive
Your bones have been cracked, splintered, and crushed, repeatedly. Given this level of internal damage and the time it has taken to heal it over and over, your body has learned to reinforce the strength of your bones. Lesser Robust Skeleton has increased your bone density by 10%.
18/50 Recaptures Unlocked for Lost Hero Progression.
Adaptation Points (105)
Adaptation
Robust Skeleton
Type
Reactive
Despite the increased density of your skeleton, you have continued to destroy your bones in new and unique ways. Your body has further refined its ability to regrow the bone to prevent further damage in the future, further increasing your bone density by another 25%.
19/50 Recaptures Unlocked for Lost Hero Progression.
Adaptation Points (115)
Adaptation
Any Landing
Type
Active
Your senses have adapted to better understand safety while falling. Any Landing allows you to directly use your Perception to reduce the damage to yourself. The higher your Perception attribute, the easier it will be to quickly determine the safest spot to land.
20/50 Recaptures Unlocked for Lost Hero Progression.
Adaptation Points (125)
__________
These were all useful adaptations and things I wished I'd had minutes ago. But beggars couldn't be choosers, and it wasn't like this was going to kill me. It was just going to be an incredibly unpleasant experience. And I had had plenty of those before and survived them.
Carefully, I started testing joint after joint. Both of my ankles were broken, likely my right knee as well. Somehow I had also managed to break a couple of ribs, but at least nothing in my back or arms seemed worse than bruised. That meant there were things I could handle.
“Floof, drag him over here.”
“Hey, whoa, come on. We're both trapped down here. There's no need for anything like that, right? Ryzel left me down here too,” Gren pleaded.
Luckily for him, he did actually have a benefit that his ally didn't. Ryzel would have been far too dangerous to leave alive. This guy, on the other hand, was chock-full of useful information that I very much wanted.
I turned my head just enough to see Floof stand up off of the body, bite into its arm, and drag it over. It didn't move like a human body. The limbs didn't have the right bounce to them. Just what the hell was he?
A skeletal head rolled toward me from the inside of the hood and started speaking. “Come on, please? I mean, look at me. I'm already dead. You really got to kill me again?”
Ignoring the question for the moment, I instead reached out and grabbed its skeletal neck. Squeezing tightly, I snapped it to the side and jerked the head right off. Without access to its limbs, it was much less likely to be any kind of problem.
“Dammit, I liked that femur…” he started to say, before I cut him off.
“Stop whining. For the moment, your skull stays intact. I can't say the same for the rest of your body, but if you want that much to remain true for at least your head, you better start answering every question I have. And if I think you're lying, you're not gonna like it.”
Closing my eyes briefly and forcing myself to ignore some of the pain radiating through my body. It did little to help. Instead, it was time for a different type of distraction: intimidation.
I looked the skull directly in its open sockets. While there were no eyes there, each one burned with a bright red manafire. I wasn't sure what type of undead he was, but so far he seemed entirely sapient.
Narrowing my eyes, I spoke again. “Let's start with what flavor of undead you are anyway. After that, you can tell me about the rest of your people. What exactly are they after?”
“Man, you can't just ask people that. How would you feel if I asked you what kind of Human you were?”
I tightened my grip on the base of the skull.
“Okay, okay. Damn. Don't break anything else, please. I'm a Bone Revenant. And the people I'm with are part of the Cackling Jaw Gang. They paid a bunch of money for an arena spawn in this integration.”
That explained some of the strangeness with this valley. Not everything, of course, but with what Death had told me about the old System. Combined with this being an arena, certain things were finally falling into place.
“Who are the other four factions, then?” That wasn't an accurate question, but there was a good chance he had no idea I'd already dealt with the Rachnia Consortium. And there was no reason to spoil that surprise just yet.
“How the hell should I know? This thing hasn't been going on long enough for us to figure that out. All I know is you've managed to throw a giant goddamn monkey wrench in all of this. The boss leveraged everything we had for every advantage you can get in this arena, and then somehow, out of nowhere, a local like you pulls all this shit off. Kind of insane when you think about it.”
“Wait, you entered into an arena competition, and you don't even know who the other competitors are yet? And you thought you had a chance at winning.” This bone revenant was incredibly stupid. That or he was screwing with me. I couldn't be sure which, and it didn't overly matter at the moment. I held all the power.
If we were dealing with an arena whose makeup of the valley entirely lined up with that idea, it meant there were three other factions we hadn't run into yet. With the jungle deep underground, that was likely where at least one of them was, possibly two. Neither the Rock Trolls or us were counted, so who the hell was the fifth?
The Abyssal incursion we had fought off was a possibility, but that just didn't seem right. I was sure that was tied to whatever Death had caused by entering this plane. This valley was more dangerous than I realized, and mapping it out was becoming a higher priority by the second. As was getting in full contact with the other Rock Trolls. We needed more allies.
“The boss had plans. I was getting him all the bones he needed. We were building an army. Things are going great. And then a god damn new faction sprung up out of nowhere. As far as any of us could tell, you and your stronghold are one of the most powerful things in this damn valley. You ever consider letting a bodiless Bone Mage maybe join up?”
I had no idea exactly how he did it, but somehow he managed to waggle the bone above his eye sockets along with his request. But despite how much he may want it and how much I had neutralized him as a threat, it still likely wasn't going to happen. Would we keep him as a prisoner for the time being? Absolutely, if I could get him back to the Neighborhood. But considering he'd been part of the group behind the terror of our newest residents, he would never be welcome.
“Don't do anything stupid, and you might live long enough to be a prisoner. That's the best I'll give you,” I said, turning my attention back to Floof. “Floof, destroy the rest of his body, while I work on healing. We're going to have to figure a way out of here once I can move.”
The dog barked in response and started to drag off the rest of the skeletal frame. The only light in the cavern came from the glowing eyes of Gren. But it was enough to see just what Floof did once he reached one of the stone walls.
Holding one of the limbs in his mouth, Floof began to rapidly swing his head back and forth, treating the body like one of his toys. Repeatedly, it was smashed into the hard wall behind it. Pieces of it were breaking off, little by little. It would take a while to entirely destroy it like this, but Floof looked to be enjoying himself.
“So not to push you or anything, but you know there's a bunch of weird shit down here, right? The boss has been kind of avoiding these tunnels. That's why Ryzel and I thought maybe we trap you down here. Didn't really think he would leave me behind, though, so ugh, you might wanna heal faster.”
“The more you keep your mouth shut, the better the chance you survive,” I said, sighing slightly. The problem was, he wasn’t wrong. Considering the Leviathan had already fought in the river, who knew what was actually at the depths below this valley?