Reluctant Necromancer

The sun was going down by the time we made it back to the van. John confirmed that the dungeon was a level three on our exit. Holy shit! Mara radioed in our completion and news about the dungeon level. Montgomery was less than pleased about that little tidbit. It meant for now we were the only ones able to reliably take it on. Hopefully that would change soon. I did not want to dive that dungeon constantly. Or even frequently. Occasionally was more my speed. Never was a good option as well.

We piled into the van and I tried to snuggle up to Ashley. Despite being hosed down by Oliver several times during the dungeon, neither of us were smelling that great though. We sat with our thighs touching and held hands.

Showers that night were brief but thorough. Five people and two bathrooms needing to all shower was not a recipe for a lot of hot water for everyone. And I’m not sure Oliver and John showering together actually saved any hot water no matter what they claimed. And Ashley wouldn’t let me shower with her despite using the same exact argument. It was bullshit.

Apparently for my ingenuity and foresight I was deemed to go last. By the time I got in the shower the hot water was nearly gone. I had enough time to wash my hair before it turned very quickly to barely lukewarm. I got out of the shower shivering slightly as I dried off and slipped into pajamas.

Ashley was already under the covers when I came in the room. I was exhausted. I crawled in right after her and scooted until we were nose to nose. “Hi.”

“Hi,” she whispered back. Her eyes darted all over my face, drinking me in. Then paused for a moment on my lips.

I smirked and leaned forward until I closed the distance between us. Just a brief brushing of lips. But when I pulled back there was a more relaxed smile on her face. “Hi,” I whispered again for some reason.

She giggled, “Hi.”

“Do you want to…” I rolled onto my back and opened my arms. She nodded her head and crawled over until she was laying with her head on my chest. I inhaled her scent. Clean, fresh, and a little vanilla. “Goodnight,” I breathed out.

“Goodnight.”

I was asleep a few minutes later. Something about her warmth and the weight of her body on mine relaxed me and made me feel safe. She was way better than a weighted blanket.

The next morning I woke up to her once again wrapped around me like a koala. It was less jarring and more pleasant this time than the first. I stayed there, basking in the warmth for several minutes. I couldn’t get a good look at Ashley as she had her head tucked right under my chin, keeping me from looking down. But I felt her warm breath against my skin. Her fingers dug into my side. Her thigh pressed around mine.

I lay there and just let the day start around me. We’d been running around, busting our asses so much since the apocalypse, or whatever you wanted to call it, happened. I really just needed a lazy day lounging in bed with my beautiful…girlfriend? Partner? Cuddle buddy? I still wasn’t sure what we were, everything was still so new.

So of course there was a pounding on the door that had me practically leap out of my skin. Ashley groggily stirred, “Five more minutes, babe. Please.”

“Hey!” Mara’s voice carried through the door. “Get up or I’m going to eat all your pancakes.”

“Who made them?” I called back. Ashley continued to squirm in my arms, a frown on her face.

“I did.”

“Pass.”

“Fine. Oliver did.”

“Ok then. Be down in a few.” I listened to her footsteps retreat from the door. I nudged Ashley in my arms. “Hey, looks like we’re being summoned. They’re bribing us with pancakes though.”

“Who made them?” she asked with a still sleepy voice.

“Apparently Oliver.”

“Ok then.” She still hadn’t opened her eyes.

I laughed. The world wasn’t that far gone from where it was a week ago. Everyone still knew to avoid Mara’s cooking.

Ten minutes later we were dressed and headed to the kitchen. Ashley’s hair was up in a messy bun that if anything just kind of made her more gorgeous somehow. I’d run my fingers through mine and left it down. We thankfully both had clean clothes to change into since our shopping trip the other day.

God, even the shopping trip felt like ages ago. So much had been going on in such a short amount of time. It was no wonder I felt so overwhelmed and kind of despondent. We hadn’t had a single day off from fighting something that was trying to kill us since we got here. I’m surprised any of us were still functional at this point.

Turning into the kitchen we found a large stack of warm pancakes on a plate on the island along with a plate of crispy bacon. We quickly loaded up on food and carried it into the dining room next door where the others were sitting around the table.

“Hey! There’s the sleepyheads,” John greeted us.

“Morning, gals,” Oliver offered.

“About time,” Mara groused.

I gave Mara the finger and greeted the other two, “Morning.”

Ashley smiled at everyone warmly and flopped into a chair next to John. I slid into the chair at the head of the table on her other side. We quickly dug in and the others returned to their conversation. Apparently Mara had convinced Montgomery to give us the day off. I finally smiled at Mara when she told us.

After breakfast we all split up across the house to investigate what we’d gotten from the dungeon. Ashley decided that she wanted to use the [plant] essence from the goblin shaman. She went into the backyard to absorb it and see what it would let her do. She was apparently shooting for something called a Dark Ranger confluence from Mara’s rare confluences book. She thought it would tie in well with her hunting and trapping knowledge. I’d assumed she was going more rogue sniper. Shows what I know. Oliver also got around to using his [light] essence from his dungeon reward.

I went to my room to figure out more about my own rewards. I took them out of my bag and placed them on the bed. Unlike with essences, just holding them didn’t trigger any kind of prompt from the system.

So I tried to manually prompt the system myself. I started with the weird golden fruit. I picked it up in my hands and concentrated on asking the system for more information. Surprisingly, it worked.

[System Treasure: [Golden Opite]. From the mana realm, this fruit is grown in rich spirit mana fields. When consumed by a system user it forces the body of the user to grow stronger by condensing the spirit into the flesh, furthering their path along to rank two.]

Interesting. I remembered from attaining my [Death] confluence and my spirit essence that we’d have to do something with our body and spirit to progress to higher ranks in the system. Getting the essences wasn’t the final step. We could still become more powerful…which was a little frightening.

I set the fruit aside and picked up one of the large discs and repeated the process of asking the system for information.

[System tokens are used at System Plinths to make purchases from the system.]

Both straightforward and incredibly unhelpful. I focused on System Plinths asking once again for more information.

[System Plinths form in large population centers or travel hubs. They act as an interface directly with the System. Users may purchase many items from across the realms in exchange for system tokens.]

The likelihood of one of those popping up around here were probably less than none. If I wanted to use these, which I most certainly did, I would need to travel. Hopefully I could convince the rest of the party to go with me. I’d hate to go alone.

Huh…a week ago I wouldn’t have felt that way. Stupid friends growing on me. Making me soft. It was clearly Mara’s fault. The only benefit I was getting was Ashley. Not that that was an insignificant benefit.

I pushed the annoyance with myself and my growing attachment to the group to the back of my mind. I’d let my subconscious chew on it for a while.

I put the tokens away in the bedside table. I’d probably want to store them in the safe with the essences when we got around to buying one.

I picked up the Golden Opite and gave it a good look over. Its skin was golden. Like not like an apple, like metallic and shiny. But it dimpled when I squeezed the fruit. It also wasn’t cold like metal. I pulled it up to my nose and sniffed it. Kind of citrusy and woodsy musk. I squeezed it in my hand and it was firm like a ripe plum, with just a little give.

Finally I just stuck it in my mouth and bit down. Either it worked the way the system said, or you know maybe it killed me. I felt pretty confident in the system info though. It hadn’t seemed to purposely lied to us yet. And what kind of reward would poisonous fruit be?

Flavor exploded across my tongue. It was a little sweet and a little umami. One of the most delicious things I’d ever had in my life. I couldn’t have described the flavor compared to anything else I had ever eaten because it wasn’t like anything else I had ever eaten. Nothing came close. I pulled it away from my mouth and the flesh inside was a pale purple. Juice dripped down the side from the bite mark and I hurriedly slurped it up and took another bite. It was firm, but not crunchy. Kind of like a melon. The skin was thin like a plum.

I devoured the entire thing in a few moments. I leaned back after sucking the last juices from my fingers. If there had been any seeds I hadn’t noticed them. A soft whine escaped me knowing that I might never have one of those again. What a tragedy.

Then I was hit with a deep sensation. It wasn’t painful, but at the same time it was like my entire body was in a vice. I felt squeezed and condensed. It was intense, but not agonizing. A few moments later it faded away. Then there was a notification.

[Congratulations user. You have taken the next step on the path to true power and moved from a [Bronze] tier to an [Iron] tier, Rank [One] Essence Practitioner. There are three ranks of power. Each rank contains multiple tiers to unlock. First Rank is focused on growing the power of the body. Second Rank is focused on the strengthening of the soul. Third Rank is focused on bringing the two into harmony as a single entity.]

I blinked the notification away and felt my entire body get heavier around me. My eyelids felt like they weighed hundreds of pounds and were a struggle to keep open. My last thought was a mild panic that a nap in the middle of the day was going to fuck up my sleep schedule so bad.