How to Steal from a Fantasy Deathworld - Chapter 6 (Patreon)

AN: Think I'll post 5 more chapters and then do the daily one chapter a day releases, that way there's meat to actually read through first


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Blackrot  rat - 100%

"Oh, thank god it's only you little chef."

It really was the small rat that led him to salvation. The rat's name had popped up, along with a thin red bar beneath it. Back at full health now too.  He couldn't see the tiny monster itself, just the bar moving around, getting smaller and vanishing away. It hadn't looked any different than the prior identify, so maybe the upgrade wasn't active? He'd gotten an upgrade for it, where was his upgrade?

Wade shuffled blindly forward, one hand tracing the wall, the other stretched out before him, expecting to run into something. The walls here felt different from the tunnel. It wasn't flaking off or breaking into dust at his touch. "Identify."

Mana-empowered compacted dirt.

Mana-empowered? Second time he'd seen that appear inside materials.

He checked over his character stats, and his mana remained at- no wait, it had gone up from one to two for some reason. Health was still at 94 out of 100. The number was accurate enough to his situation. Why was his mana at two now though? And the rat's health bar had vanished, scampering away.

He triggered Identify again, and let it run across everything. The darkness didn't feel as oppressive when everything had neat little labels floating above them.

Mold. Dirt. Stone. Looked exactly the same as it had before, no upgrades there either. Stone. Stone. Stone. More mold. Ah - there was the little rat.

"Hey Remmy, wait up for me." He whispered out, mostly to keep himself sane. The tunnel curved left, then right. The rat paused at each turn, health bar wobbling as it sniffed the air. "I'll get you cheese somehow if you can lead me out of here, you can trust me buddy."

Maybe that's what he'd used his goddamn single coin for. Good cheese for the tiny rodent that helped guide him when an entire god couldn't be bothered.

The phone didn't buzz at his thoughts, so at least Wade had the relief of knowing Play couldn't read his mind.

He kept his breathing steady, trying not to think about the picking sounds that still echoed from far behind him. His guide came to a stop. Wade's eyes caught something beyond it - a faint golden glow in the distance, barely visible around another bend in the tunnel.

"Please nothing worse. Please please please." Wade whispered as if that would actually change something. The rat's ears twitched at his whispered voice, seemed to get spooked and scurried forward toward the glow.

Wade followed behind, then peeked past the corner. The light seemed a little blinding compared to the dark everywhere, but once his eyes adjusted he could see more. It was a small break chamber of some kind, his entry into it was one of four. Shelves were setup on the edges of the walls, and floor cots. Like this was some refuge center point.

At the center of it was a dusty table made of metal, covered in papers. A lantern sat on it, giving off the yellow light. Correction - he couldn't tell if it was actually a lantern or not. Looked more like it belonged in some snooty rich house as a decorative quirk. A salt-lamp of some kind maybe? A giant crystal lump with a golden metal sconce at the base and the crystal inside seemed to glow softly like it was filled with string lights.

There were simple looking metal stools all around the table, some knocked down and others pushed away. No one had been here in a while, judging by the stale air and clear dust all over the place.

Time to start with his current favorite method of dealing with anything so far: "Identify?" He whispered.

Mana-crystal Lantern (High Quality)

Ah. So, that's where the improved identify works. He could now tell the quality of things. Neat, if somewhat completely useless, upgrade.

Unstable Metal Stool (Poor Quality)

Mana-preserved papers (High Quality)

Level 37 Undead Nathir Slave - 100%

Wade had a double take as he saw the last nameplate and health bar floating in his view. Worse, it was higher level than all the other skeletons he'd run into prior by a mile. Was this some kind of boss monster? He stopped moving and breathing from his little corner. The health bar hovered over something the wall here hid him from. So if he couldn't see the skeleton, it couldn't see him either.

Everything remained quiet.

The skeleton's health bar didn't move.

Wade heard skittering again and could see the cause of all this: The rat's health bar moving around in the distance, getting closer to the undead's health bar.

The little terrorist continued until he could see it from the dark shadows of the table stools in the dim light. Whiskers twitching as it investigated something. Likely unaware of how close to death it was. He could see it clearly now, pitch black fur, and some kind of dust was trailing behind it. Like a small swarm of flies catching back up to their host. Made his skin crawl a little watching it.

And once more it was gone from his line of sight, going deeper into the chamber beyond, only the red health bar above it visible from his sight.

Given how close the rat had come to the skeleton's health bar, either it was too tiny for the boss monster to wake up, or they woke up due to sound.

Hah. Optimism. Wade knew better than to trust that was going to happen. There was only one law he subscribed to, and that was Murphy's.

And speaking of, he slowly brought out his phone, and set it to 'Do not disturb.'

Play wasn't going to kill him with a heart attack today. In the full silence, he could still hear noises: Wood being stepped on, a long distance away. Creaking. Far above. Chances were the skeletons who had chased him here were sniffing around, now past the blockade he'd done. Perhaps not literally, but certainly searching for where the juicy human had limped off to. Nothing he could do himself right now other than hope the mob would chase past the trapdoor and into the deeper tunnels above. Right now, he had a high level skeleton to consider.

He did have a few bits of data he could work with: The skeletons above the trapdoor hadn't found him yet, so these enemies didn't have some kind of bullshit Wade-detection wall hack. Assuming this all followed rules of physics, maybe the skeletons would only react to loud enough noises? Or a line of sight.

He could potentially sneak past this boss skeleton. Worth a try.

Wade crept forward, one slow step at a time into the chamber. Eye peeled in the direction of the boss skeleton's health. As he turned into the chamber slowly, he could see where it was. The row of linen cots. Only one was occupied.

It was on it's side, curled up slightly. Skull looking away from him. Motionless, as if asleep.

 Just like a horror movie, he thought. The moment I turn my back, it's going to attack for maximum drama.

But with this angle, he could potentially sneak all the way past it if it worked on line of sight. Three other exits from this chamber outwards. One looked to have stairs roughly cut into the stone leading up somewhere, maybe a different section of the room or a path out? The other two tunnels like the one he'd sulked in from were more naturally formed and looked less civilized. Though there were mats on the ground leading to the further one ahead, with the side walls looking more rounded though that could just be his imagination. The last tunnel looked wild and untouched.

Of course, his eyes focused on the only actual sign of civilization: The rough cut staircase upwards.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained and so forth… He thought, and continued to sneak into the room, aiming for the staircase.

The path took him quite close to the skeleton, to the point he could see details. Fabric was ripped up with age, a small dagger on the side of a leather belt of some kind. Loincloth maybe. For a boss skeleton this one was a lot less equipped than the miners behind him had been. No hardhat, no rotting tunics filled with belts, loops and tools, nothing. Just the belt with the knife and dried up fabric where a shirt and pants might have been worn. No boots either. Wade's eyes narrowed down at the dagger.

He couldn't say the word out loud, so he prayed whatever this game system was, it could be triggered non-verbally. Identify.

Hand-made Steel Dagger (Poor Quality)

So Play couldn't read his mind, but the system could. Another point to both being different entities. As for the dagger… weapon was a weapon, he didn't care if it was just slightly sharper than a rock. Better than his hands.

He could continue to sneak away through the tunnel and see what was on the other side. Or he could try to sneak the dagger out without waking up the dead.

He turned to continue his slow trek through the room. Better be safe.

… But what if being safe was taking the first easy hit in?

He had the advantage right now, was he going to skip out on it over the slim chance of successfully sneaking? With his luck?

He stopped midway past the skeleton.

Nope. Having a skeleton behind him like this at all times was just asking for shit to go wrong. He could slip up ahead, fall somewhere and cry out in pain - game over. Or something else could wake the skeleton up and then he'd have a boss level skeleton stalking around behind him. Better disarm the skeleton now and start the inevitable fight on his terms.

Wade fixed his resolve, then reached out to the skeleton before pausing midway with an even better idea: If he was already certain this thing would wake up and attack him then instead of disarming it, wouldn't it be better to just outright cripple it somehow?

His hands changed trajectory, very slowly reaching out to the stools nearby.

The skeleton remained dead on the cot.

Wade's fingers wrapped around the metal legs.

No motion from the dead guy.

The metal stool was silently lifted up. He moved with precision and care.

Level 37 Undead Nathir Slave - 100%

The red health bar remained exactly where it had been the whole time, no movements. No breathing.

He got closer, stool high above him, like a caveman about to brain his sleeping companion.

Would he be able to kill it? Last one had been insane. Even knocking it's skull off hadn't done enough damage, and then smashing the entire thing after also hadn't re-killed the thing. Not to mention only on a critical hit triggered by some kind of luck did the skull feel like a regular skull. And what if the stool slam in the tunnel made enough sound the skeletons behind would track him down with?

Too many possible issues with this plan. But did he have much of a choice?

Wade hedged his bets, angled his stool for maximum damage, and then prayed. The stool swung down as hard as he could.

Luck triggered: Critical hit!

Level 37 Undead Nathir Slave - 87%

It hadn't died. The skeleton's perfectly untouched head snapped toward him with a crack, fully awake. Empty eye sockets stared at him, and a half second passed as both of them stared at each other. Wade broke the silence first, giving a small unhinged giggle. "Yeah, that's about what I thought."

The undead monster lunged forward with two skeletal hands… only to find the spine, hips, and legs missing in the equation.

Wade hadn't swung for the skull at all. Last time he had, the undead bastard just continued with it's merry life as if a skull was a luxury bone. This time he had swung for the skeleton's lower spine, right below the rib-cage.

A skeleton crawling after him was a lot less of a danger than one running.

And given that the legs remained motionless while the rest of the skeleton started trying to go after him, Wade's plan had paid off.

The skeleton's hands clawed and snatched through the air far too low for anything. It tried again, this time using it's elbows to jump off the ground before trying to grab his throat again. Wade narrowly dodged that attempt by sheer reflex, feeling the tips of the fingers brush up against his neck. With another bolt of pure reflex, he pushed the stool forward like a plow, slamming the enemy into the wall. The stools legs became Wade's handle, while he kept the flailing monster ahead of him pinned against the wall.

Level 37 Undead Nathir Slave - 87%

"I cut off your legs you goddamn hack." Wade hissed out, amazed that his attack had barely tickled the undead's health bar. Was this the higher level difference? Fuck he needed levels and more stats or something.

His head split into two different trains of thought. One one hand, being able to do thirteen percent of health damage as a level 1 against a level 37 meant the level differences weren't super insane and could be worked around. On the other hand, it seemed he'd need to do a lot to kill any of these skeletons. Lethal fucking difficulty.

The skeleton's jaw unhinged, and tried to bite him. It couldn't get anywhere near him, not for lack of trying. Wade tried to crush the skeleton up against the wall, but that was equally failing. Whatever the skeleton was made of, he couldn't break the bones like this. And if he brought the stool away so he could slam it down for another attack, he was sure that thing would kill him somehow in that split second of freedom. Even without legs it nearly got his neck. It was thrashing already, wildly. He could feel it even move him slightly off when both those bony hands started to grip the side of the stool and push against him.

Wade could push his full weight against the struts holding the four stool legs together at the bottom. And the skeleton pinned against the wall couldn't do jack shit for better leverage other than try to bite and claw at him. On the other hand, Wade couldn't do jack shit either other than hold the skeleton pinned. A stalemate then.

The skeleton was clearly homicidal and continued it's best attempts to scramble out of the stool pin, but so long as Wade didn't do something stupid, he'd keep the skeleton in place.

Unfortunately, if he didn't do something stupid soon, he'd get eventually too tired to keep the skeleton in place.

Fortunately, he had just the stupid idea he needed.

If everything here is a game with consistent rules, Wade could break it. And he had something the skeleton under him didn't have:

Guaranteed damage over time.