I continued deeper into the fortress, the path simple and easy to follow. Still, I moved slowly, stepping quietly while constantly stopping to listen for any movement and checking around every corner. I would not be surprised again. Progressing this way, I fought six more skeletons, slowly approaching and managing to fight only one at a time. All were easier than the first three.

  Then I came upon a large arched doorway, two massive skeletons standing on either side.

  Both ten-foot bone monsters wore rusted metal armor that hung loosely over their ribcages. Each held a large wooden club, tips resting against the stone floor. I stared at the barrier to my progress, peeking from around the corner, eyes wide.

  They were completely still, white statues, pristine in their boneness, unlike the eight skeletons that I’d fought up to this point. It was almost as if someone had polished these ones, creating a warrior to be noticed. I pulled my head back, my heart hammering. I’d simply go back the way I’d come and look for anything I’d missed. Surely Dev would have secrets I could explore without having to continue along this route.

  “Yeah,” I whispered to myself. “I’ll just go back.” I quietly turned and started creeping back the way I’d come.

  .

  The word flew up from the depths of my being, a bubble rising from a hot and roiling mass buried beneath fathoms of frigid waters.

  I stopped. Instead of digging into what was happening to my emotions, I turned back. I’d rather face the skeletons. Still, I could be smart about this.

  I found a small stone and used it to aggro one of the monsters. It worked shockingly well. The skeleton hit by the stone started forward, leaving its companion behind. As it approached the intersection where I hid, I backed away. The second I saw it, it saw me. Green-fire eyes glowed brighter and it lunged toward me.

  “Shit!” I hissed, stumbling back.

  The skeleton swung its massive club around in a ponderous arc, one so telegraphed that even I could dodge it. After the weapon passed, I leaped forward, swinging my hammer into the skeleton’s hip with all my strength. My effort was rewarded with the tiniest of chips breaking from the dense bone.

  “Shit,” I said again.

  I hadn’t judged the timing well at all, and the club was coming back around. I didn’t have time to get out of the way. Instead, I lurched forward. The blow landed, a blunt pain in my shoulder. It should have crushed my head, but the skeleton’s arms were long, and I’d gotten within its reach, having only been hit by bone instead of wood.

  I clobbered its leg again and my fight continued. The slow movements of my adversary allowed me to keep just ahead of its attacks, and slowly, frustratingly so, I was able to whittle the cumbersome skeleton down. It finally fell with a satisfying crack as my hammer broke through its femur. Three strikes to its skull later, blue light zipped from the shattered remains of its skull and into my chest.

  I’d won, but something about the fight felt hollow, the word still echoing through my mind.

  Ignoring it, I took a break to recoup, eating and drinking some of the food Clark had given me, and then I fought the second skeleton. The fight was the same, long and tiring, but the two skeletons netted me more fragments than the previous six combined, so that was nice.

  After a long rest on the cool stone floor, I looted the large skeletons, gaining a worn massive club, two sets of old leather armor, and seventeen copper coins. I pumped my fist. It looked like pizza was on the menu for at least a few more days. I was just as happy about that as I was about the fragments I’d gained, the total having grown to seventy.

  How many would it require to get to level one? I’d spent a decent amount of time thinking about other games I’d played in the past; there was a wide range, but most required around five hundred to level up the first time. It might still take me some time to reach level one.

  As I pondered, a faint sound reached me, a discordant melody barely heard over the ambient noises of the fortress. I cocked my head, listening. It sounded as if it came from the room beyond the doors that the large skeletons had been guarding.

  I stepped up to the heavy wood and pushed. The door held firm. I studied the entryway and found a small lever, nearly a switch, jutting from the stone to the right. I flipped it up, a heavy click sounding with the movement. I pushed the arched double doors again. Just as a gap opened, the music expanded in volume.

  It was painful and loud, nearly just random notes reverberating from beyond the portal. There was sense of order to the sound, and I could just make out a pattern, a beat with a rise and fall, revealing intent beyond random sound. It was like slow rolling waves of broken instruments crashing against a stony beach.

  I hesitantly took a step into the dark room, my eyes taking a moment to adjust to dim, green-flickering torches along the room’s pillars. There was movement below, like the floor opened up to a long-dead forest swaying to the music. Pairs of barely visible green lights bobbed up and down, disappearing and reappearing in coordination with the music. I took another few steps forward, up to a railing, and furrowed my brow as I tried to make sense of what I was seeing below.

  With horrific realization, my mind grasped the scene below. Hundreds of skeletons, cloaked in an assortment of rotten gowns and suits, moved in step with the slow beat of the music. As if they were on a tangled mess of strings, their movements were too quick and jittery, no grace accompanying their dance. Most didn’t dance alone, their hands barely touching in a gross approximation of partnership. The pairs of green lights were their eyes, disappearing and reappearing as they spun.

  I stood upon a balcony overlooking a ballroom. I could just make out a stage on the far side of the room, raised a few feet above the dance floor. A dozen or so skeletons sat in a semicircle, pounding and plucking at their once-instruments. I stared, transfixed by the ghastly parody below me.

  I came back to myself with a start and stepped back in panic. What if there were skeletons on the balcony with me, lurking in the deep shadows? All the surety I had built up to this point through successful combat abandoned me, and I stumbled back toward the door. My back hit something solid. I turned. The arched double doors I had just walked through were closed. I yanked on the large handles, pulling with everything I had, but they didn’t budge.

  I placed my head on the door and tried to focus on my breathing. My heart thumped in my chest, feeling as if it were trying to break through my ribcage to escape. I was locked in here with hundreds of skeletons. I had no hope of defeating even a fraction of them.

  I didn’t know how much time passed, but eventually, I calmed down enough to turn and face the room. My eyes had now fully adjusted to the low light, and I scanned the balcony. A few pairs of skeletons stood along by the railing, appearing to be deep in conversation. None had the build of the heavy-boned warriors I had fought to gain access to this room, so if I had to, I might be able to take down a few.

  Even with my eyes adjusted, I still couldn’t see if there were any doors along the walls of the balcony. That would be my best bet if there were a way out of here. Luckily, none of the skeleton pairs on my level were near me, so I randomly picked right and started creeping along.

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  Once-plush carpet quieted my footfalls, which helped me gather the smallest amount of confidence while I moved. Even though the sound of the deathly orchestra would have been much too loud to hear any but the heaviest stomping, my size made that a real possibility, so I was grateful for anything that helped.

  I came upon the first pair of skeletons. So far, they had done nothing to indicate they knew I was there. Their teeth clacked as they bobbed their heads, miming a conversation. They looked as if they were background actors in a movie, only going through the movements. I let out a slow breath as I watched. What was going on here? After a few moments of paralysis, I shook myself from the oddity of the situation enough to keep moving.

  The room was a large rectangle, its length at least triple its width, making the balcony quite long. I passed two more pairs of skeletons in their own mock conversations. I had yet to come across any doors, my whole body growing increasingly tense with each step I took farther into the room. If something were to happen now, I’d be pinned by at least six skeletons, forcing me into a desperate close-quarters battle.

  I neared the end of the balcony, my eyes staring hard into the gloom, desperately trying to make out the outline of a door. Near where the balcony terminated stood three skeletons, leaning on the railing overlooking the dance floor, heads nodding and jaws waggling like the rest. I ignored them, staring at the wall. Sweat poured down my face. My jaw muscles felt like they were going to tear from the bone. My next step landed on nothing but air.

  I was so focused on the wall at the end of the balcony that I’d completely missed the gaping hole in the floor. I pitched forward, yelping as I tumbled, landed on a pile of debris, and rolled toward the dancing skeletons. I felt bones bounce from my body as my fall came to an end. I’d plowed straight into the dense, dancing horde. I was going to die. It was bound to happen eventually, so accepting my fate, I curled into a ball, squeezed my eyes shut, and hoped the first blow would pierce my brain, ending it quickly.

  I lay there for quite some time, and after what felt like minutes, I peeked through a squinted eye. The music still reverberated through the room, and the skeletons still danced. Their focus was completely devoid of my prone form. I was like a stone in a river, the skeletons flowing around me. I opened both eyes and raised my head—nothing but bones and rotten cloth.

  After another minute of gathering my courage, I got my feet beneath me and stood. I moved slowly, crouching so as not to stand out more than I already did. My legs and core burned with my awkward crab walk. I didn’t let the pain push me to move faster. My head gradually cleared the shifting plane of skulls until I could see over the bobbing horde of white bone and gray flesh.

  A hard bump from behind had me twisting sharply, my shoulder knocking a passing skeleton to the ground. With no acknowledgment, the skeleton, wearing a faded and torn pink dress, rose and continued with the flow of dancers. No reaction at all. .

  I shook my head and turned toward the musicians. Perhaps, it would be easier to see any exits from the stage.

  I began to wade through the dancers, my size preventing me from dodging every passing skeleton. The bumps and nudges went unnoticed, or at least disregarded, as the skeletons continued their halting and graceless dance.

  Luckily, the stage was close to where I’d fallen, and in less than a minute, I pulled myself up. I stared at the orchestra, ensuring they wouldn’t rush me now that I had exited the crowd and stood on their level, but they too ignored me, bone fingers slamming against broken instruments.

  Just as I began to turn to study the ballroom, a rasp sounded from one of the performers. I whipped back, raising my hammer in preparation, but nothing rushed toward me. I heard another rasp, this time with the cadence of speech.

  I stepped forward, straining to hear anything beyond the clanging of instruments. There it was again, accompanied by movement from the skeleton at the end of the semicircle. I watched it intently, and sure enough, its jaw opened, and the low rasp reached me again. I debated ignoring the skeleton and simply looking for the exit, but something about the sound the skeleton made connected with an emotion I was all too familiar with.

  Despair.

  I inched forward, keeping my eyes trained on the skeletal musician. Its fingers continued to smash against what looked like a nearly shattered guitar, but its glowing green eyes held my own. Its mouth opened and closed again. This time, I was certain the sounds were words, desperate and pained. I quickly moved across the last few feet and leaned forward, needing to know what the skeleton said.

  Its jaw parted, and with the sound of bone grinding against bone, I heard its words. “Kill me.”

  I pulled back, staring at the skeleton. Its mouth opened again. “Please…”

  In all my years of struggling with depression and self-hatred, I’d never once felt anything near the complete despair that filled this skeleton’s words. It was the despair of centuries—the despair of pure and unrelenting torture. Without thought, I swung, my hammer shattering the skeleton’s skull. The glowing green of its eyes winked out with what I swore was a sigh of solace.

  The music of the other eleven continued unabated. I stared at them, and they all stared back. I would have thought it impossible to convey emotion without any flesh, but in the glowing green eyes of the remaining musicians, I saw hope. With a rising sickness, I went to work. My hammer fell faster and with more surety than ever before, each swing obliterating a skull, and each step taking me to the next blow. In seconds, the music was gone, a near-unbearable silence replacing it. I faced the now-still skeletons, their dancing ceasing along with the final note.

  As one, they turned to face me, a sea of glowing-green eyes. I clenched my jaw. What would they do now? If they all rushed me at once, I would die immediately. I gripped my hammer in both hands and held it before my body, as if it could ward away the dead.

  As one, they turned to my right and made a mad dash toward the wall opposite the balcony I’d fallen through. I thought they would simply slam against the wall and stop, and at first they did, the skeletons at the front crunched between the wall and the piling bones behind them. Then, with skeletons piling, the wall shattered, and blinding light streamed in.

  I blinked as my eyes adjusted. The wall had been covered glass—windows and doors to a large outdoor terrace. The ballroom floor emptied quickly. Even the skeletons on the balcony had followed, some shattering their legs by jumping to the dance floor. These pulled themselves through the shattered windows with their hands. I stared, wide-eyed, as the skeletons didn’t hesitate, all leaping from the now-exposed outdoor balcony, plummeting over the edge.

  I raced after the stragglers, watching as dozens and dozens of skeletons flung themselves to their deaths. I reached the crumbling railing and looked down. Hundreds of feet below lay cracked and shattered bones strewn across red rocks. A blue light ascended from the piles of bone, coalescing into a sphere as it rose. It was dense but somehow still completely transparent. It shrank as it reached me, zipping into my chest.

  The counter of my fragments appeared in the top right of my vision, rapidly ticking up until it stopped at seven hundred and forty-three. In less than a minute, I had increased my fragments by a factor of ten.

  “Ha,” I chuckled, but then my face drooped as I stared at the shattered remains below. “That is a lot of lost loot, though.” I shook my head; I should be grateful. I remembered the twelve dead skeletons inside and rushed back to their remains. I gained fifty-eight coins from them, giving me one hundred and one copper coins. I also looted a broken violin. Everything else was broken so badly that it was designated as junk or scraps. My inventory only had ten free slots, so I left the junk behind. I’d have to ask Clark if there were any merchants I could sell my stuff to.

  I went back outside, closed my eyes, and basked in the sun, taking a moment to relax before combing through the ballroom for a door or secret passage. The sun was bright and directly above, its warmth and light a welcome contrast to the dim interior I’d been traversing. A light breeze cooled and calmed me, peace settled, my breath slowing and deepening.

  A sound, distant and faint, mixed with the breeze, scratching at the relaxation I’d just attained. I ignored it, thinking it nothing more than the wind whistling through some crevice, but like a quilt with a faint smell of rot, unease blanketed me. I scowled, cocking my head to listen. The sound came again, too faint to be discernible, but the smell of rot grew.

  I opened my eyes and followed the sound to a far stone railing. I leaned over the edge, then heard it again. As I listened, it resolved from a distant cry to a horror-filled shriek. It was muffled, but I was certain that’s what I was hearing. A woman shrieked from somewhere within the fortress. My heart quickened to a heavy and fast thud. What could I do? I had no idea where she was, and I was so far from any kind of hero that even if I could find her, I would be useless.

  I kicked a pebble in frustration, and something incredibly strange happened. It sailed between two balusters, and instead of falling, it skipped as if it had struck stone, falling when it had sailed another few feet. I kicked another pebble, this one bouncing off a baluster back at me. I picked up two more and dropped them over the railing. They landed on the other side at the level of the balcony, suspended in the air. I quickly gathered twenty small stones and then returned.

  I gripped the stone rail, palms sweaty, staring at the two stones that looked to be hanging in midair. What if it was just an illusion and I plummeted to my death?

  The woman’s scream reached me again. With a clenched jaw, I climbed over the railing.