"Greetings big guy."
Jumping up and hitting the knee of the giant skeleton resting in the room I was in, bone dust fell from his knee in response to the kneeslapper.
"I hope you'll watch over me while I go into a half seizure."
Smiling at the giant, the armor wearing giant's empty eye sockets stared at me all the while the sunlight bounced off of the giant spear in his chest.
'...That reminds me.'
Turning to pick up the giant axe with a blade head the size of my waist, I ripped it out of the chopping block and placed it into my inventory, placing myself onto the chopping block.
'So let's summarise everything that I've uncovered so far.'
First, there were these stronger, faster and more skillful variants of undead called elites
Due to the fact that they were basically akin to extremely well trained variants of their undead kind, we could say that they were probably leaders of sorts if the theory that the malaise made their hosts stronger wasn't a stretch.
These elites besides being stronger, faster and all around better also dropped items corresponding to their strength like the runes I was now using.
'I'm hoping the Inferno Rune isn't going to hurt as much since I already have the blaze rune.'
Second, I now knew how to gut and dissect a human being to take out their organs but unless it was to satisfy Guillian's experiments, I wasn't going to be doing that anytime soon.
'I should probably check in on him to see if there are any new mutations.'
Third, due to the looped nature of time that reset everything back to its initial state, people developed a technique called timebreaking.
Timebreakers, as they were called, are able to reach into the ether and most probably cut off those threads that I had briefly seen in this looping world.
'In hindsight, that's probably how they became timebreakers.'
It was probably more complicated than this but I digress.
Fourth, boss's and elites are able to time break, but the effects of timebreaking are mostly just more permanent wounds, so unless in vital areas, I should be able to survive.
Fifth, the malaise is actually in an incomplete form, only infecting corpses and raising them from the dead.
It's full form on the other hand could cause madness, induce it, infect through it, kill its host and then raise it all in one breath.
'And I think the messenger said it also mutated corpses and animals into stronger forms'
If what she said was true I pray to any God but fun that there's a cure to be found without having to unseal it.
Sixth, there were ways to become immune to the malaise as evidenced by the snake people and actual people turned snakes.
'If given the chance, I should check if my headless form can become immune to it, I hope I don't have to test it though.'
Seventh, there was actually a way to talk to God, the thing was, you literally have to be prepared to meet him, i.e. you have to partially kill yourself.
'I'll probably only talk to him at the start of each loop.'
Eighth... (Why is it spelt like that)
Well...
There is no eighth.
Maybe the fact that I returned back to the place I first appeared could be the eighth point, but it seems rather underwhelming compared to everything else.
'I probably shouldn't have included the fact that I can now perform surgery if that's the case, but oh well.'
Tapping the base of the giant's knee, I wondered once again how they managed to run such a huge spear through his body.
'The better question would actually be how they got him in here in the first place.'
Staring at the ceiling that would only allow the giant to stay crouched if he wanted to stand, I glanced at doorway that would barely be able to fit his finger.
'Ok shut up the random thoughts Slade and get back to what you're supposed to do.'
Slapping my face with both hands, I snapped myself out of the random tangent my mind seemingly was going to and focused on the things I wanted to do in this safe place.
'Runes.'
More specifically, the Inferno rune.
Staring at the tornado of fire engraved onto the surface of the stone, it was different from the blaze rune which had the image of a hand on fire.
They were similar but at the same time different.
'Hopefully not to different.'
Recalling the pain that had occurred when I first used the runes, although I was granted supernatural powers that certainly made killing that much easier, the power was only granted with an equally painful cost.
And again, sure I can tolerate the pain, that didn't mean I liked it.
"Hooo... Stop dilly dallying Slade, you can do this." Letting out a long breath to calm my nerves, I sent mana into the rune and braced for the pain.
And the pain came rolling in like a wave.
'Bloody fucking hell!'
Instantly crouching downwards, my body instinctively curled up like a shrimp as I felt as if I was back on the battlefield again.
But instead of bullets flying by my body at a hairs breadth, sharp blades of fire whipped at my skin, leaving behind thick penetrating sensations of burns.
Just like the other two, the Inferno Rune manifested a larger than life version of the image printed onto the stone, slowly breaking the stone down to form a flaming tornado that surged towards me.
Clenching my teeth, my arms took the brunt of the damage as despite me tucking the arms deeper into my fetal position, they burned as if dipped into boiling oil.
Eyes nearly popping out of my skull, I felt something run down my face as something that I could only describe as spiciness started to crawl across my body like a colony of ants that had gained a taste for human flesh.
And human bone as it seems.
Sweat clinging to my forehead, I let out a gasp as the inferno rune seemingly carved its very existence into my body, making it so I could never forget.
'I sure as hell won't forget that.'
Placing my hands against the ground, sweat beaded on my forehead and sunk into the thirsty stone ground.
'Bloody Mary.'
Breathing heavily, as time passed, my vision came and went, my heart still beating as if someone had injected it with pure caffeine slowly returning to a more human level.
"Hoo..." Letting out a final sigh that seemed to mark the end of the ordeal, I sent a grateful glance to the giant skeleton who's eyeless sockets bore into the back of my skull.
'Now what the hell did the Inferno Rune do to my body.'
Feeling a slight anticipation for rewards of enduring the pain that would sate the dopamine goblin in my brain, I moved to check my hands only to pause.
'...I'm not wearing my own clothes.'
Picking at the blue cloak over my body, it was distinctly different to the bandage covered hands that I was so used to unravelling when checking the additions created by the runes.
Instead taking its place, the blue robe that had suddenly appeared at the toll gate set at the end of the Black bridge was thrust onto my body
The thing was, although I was half tempted to find out why this happened, I instead pivoted straight back to the topic at hand.
My hands
Looking at them, the flame tattoo had undergone dramatic changes.
Vines still creeping up from my elbow to my wrist, a good portion of the vines on my arm were now colored black as ash, smoldering embers surrounding them.
The flames themselves also underwent changes, being more vibrant and seemed to glow in the darkness as they wrapped around my hands.
And I couldn't be sure, but I think the flames were more... defined.
As if I was watching things in 60pp and moved up 144pp
A higher resolution so to speak.
"It truly is fascinating how pain beyond normal torture is used to engrave albeit interesting looking tattoos on my body." A small smile formed on my face.
"I want to see the face of the one who created these runes."
Admiring the tattoo and making a promise to meet the creator of these runes later while carrying a bouquet of knives, I walked out of the giant's prison and officially entered the Prisoner's quarters.
Feeling a tingle of pain remain in my hands from the runes engravement process
"And would you look at that, volunteers."
Walking out from beyond the corner, zombies, skeleton archers and shieldbearers slowly shambled out.
The standard trio of undead I had seen that seemed to be everywhere I go.
'I almost missed you guys.'
Feeling the mana float into my hands, I added slowly as flames started to burn the corridor.
'Almost.'
+++
Tree