It was three days later that Marie finally managed to gather up the mental and physical energy to move on. Even though the city of the dead was visible if she walked a few hundred yards to the north-west, the pain in her burned hand and much-abused arms and shoulder had sapped her will to do anything other than slowly recover.

  Except, it wasn’t a slow recovery.

  She wasn’t an expert on injuries or medicine, but she’d not expected the burned skin to begin flaking off to expose the healing flesh underneath this soon. She still couldn’t use it though - not properly. Not that she was complaining.

  Not about that anyway.

  “I mean really Napoleon. [Treasure Hunter]? It is just insulting. I am an archaeologist. I do not do it for money or glory - it’s about learning what the past was like. It’s an intellectual pursuit - not a financial one.”

  The skeletal dog sat opposite her with its head tilted to one side. Silent. As usual.

  In between them sat the chest - exactly where it had been since she’d got the notification of her new Class. New Classes… and Skills.

  As if to prove she wasn’t a mere [Treasure Hunter], she’d not touched the chest. Not made a single attempt to open it.

  …

  …

  She wanted to though. Mon dieu she wanted to know what it held.

  But she had principles.

  And other priorities, now she wasn’t spending sixteen hours a day resting and recovering.

  She glanced at the treasure chest a final time before she got up.

  Nineteen levels! It must be beyond valuable. She looked down at her hand as she rose. What was I thinking…

  It had probably been partly due to the fever, or delirium from the pain or adrenaline. She’d never have attempted any of what she’d done in those final hours if she’d been in her right mind.

  That was in the past though, and a rumbling stomach pushed her to move. A nearby river had provided fresh water but now her supplies had run out - even with her [Stretch Rations] Skill - so she needed to forage.

  Leaving her [Concealed Camp], she headed north and east for a mile or two, keeping watch for anything edible. She’d ventured south once, the previous afternoon, and though she’d found the sea and its rocky shore, there was no hint of food. Maybe if she had a fishing rod…

  But all she had was her trusty spade. She didn’t leave the camp without it now. She only wished she had something that could function as a shield for her new [Improvised Shield] Skill, but she had nothing large or sturdy enough besides the copper pot - and that was out of the question as a historical artefact.

  There were also a few throwing-sized stones in her pocket, just in case, picked up from the river.

  And, of course, Napoleon.

  “And there is another, almost as big a travesty, Boney. To call you lesser undead. Do not listen to it - you are great. Super. Formidable.”

  The skeletal hound continued to trot alongside her without a sound beyond the clack-clacking of its paws on the occasional stone.

  “It’s not like I’m going to sell it, you know. Well, I might have to sell some of it, but only if I have to - to purchase food or a place to sleep. There was a man where I came from - a fictional man - but he used to say ‘it belongs in a museum’. I do not know if you have those around here, but if there are I would of course donate whatever is in it. Even if it is valuable.”

  She flexed her burned hand. It was wrapped in a cloth she’d cleaned and smeared with ointments and aloe vera, though both were running out. The blackened skin cracked and it itched, but she left it alone.

  A light drizzle began, but it barely registered to her. Even if it had, her [Elemental Resistance] meant she wouldn’t have minded.

  What was concerning though, was the lack of wildlife. That and her lack of knowledge of plants.

  —

  An hour later and she’d managed to find a total of four ingredients she was reasonably certain were safe - all plants she’d found along the riverbank. Dandelions, nettles, green onions, and wild garlic. She was lucky she’d recognised the garlic - her mother would have smacked her if she’d missed it. Even so, she’d had to smell it to make sure.

  Assuming the plants here were the same as back home.

  After another half hour following the river she came to a wooded area, but as she stood on the edge of it she had second thoughts about going in.

  “What do you think, Napoleon?”

  The dog remained silent, and she teetered on the brink of indecision.

  She’d seen no creatures beyond a couple of frogs and newts in the river. A flash or two of silver could have been a fish or a trick of the light. She’d thought she’d heard a bird in the distance once, but if it had been she hadn’t been able to find it.

  “There’s not likely to be anything dangerous in there - is there? Wolves? Bears? Logically, they would have nothing to eat…”

  But then again, logically, there was no such thing as the undead.

  Deciding to call it quits for the day, she trudged back along the riverbank, picking a few more handfuls of dandelions.

  “It will not be the most filling meal, but tomorrow we will look further, okay? It is a good thing you do not need sustenance. How do you survive anyway?”

  Napoleon had no insights to give as they returned to the camp. If it hadn’t been for her [Precise Cartography] Skill, even Marie would have missed it, so well did it blend into the rocks around, and as she set about making dinner she ran into two further problems.

  The first was easier to solve, as the lack of a cooking vessel was remedied by the copper pot - albeit with a thorough wash in the river first - and dropping one of the dwindling supply of iodine tablets into it.

  The second was less simple. Finding sticks and branches was no issue - she’d picked up some from the forest edge - but lighting it was another matter. She had matches, but stopping her hands from flinching away from the flame took half a dozen tries, and ruined the first five. When it was finally ablaze on top of the flattest stone she could find, Marie set the pot of water on top of it and began chopping the plants as fine as she could with the old knife she’d found, a spare glove protecting her hand as she did the nettles.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  It wasn’t the worst soup she’d ever had - that honour went to one made by her aunt Isabelle - but it wasn’t far off. If it hadn’t been for the addition of the wild garlic, it would just have been water with a metallic tang.

  But it was something, and as she spooned more down her stomach stopped rumbling. A third had gone by the time she felt, well, satiated would be the wrong word, but full enough. She sat next to the dying embers of the fire, wishing she still had some wine left, and spoke to Napoleon.

  “Tomorrow we should look down along the coast. If there is a village near here, it will probably be near water.”

  The skeletal dog lay down next to the fire.

  “If we cannot find anything after half a day, we will come back, and the next day we follow the river to the forest. Surely there must be things living there. I will move the camp further east when we know whether north or south is better for us.”

  With nothing else to do, and a lack of conversation from her only companion, Marie changed the dressings on her hand and shoulder, and went to bed.

  —

  Three days later, Marie had relocated her camp north along the river on the outskirts of the forest. The coastal route had held absolutely nothing. It had wasted a whole day, and all she had at the end of it had been the remnants of the underwhelming soup.

  The second day had been more promising, with faint signs of life as she’d trekked north. She’d not found anything to supplement her dwindling food supplies but she’d stocked up on the same four plants she’d used to make the soup and spent the evening moving her tent, her gear, and finally the chest - hanging it around her neck in a sling made from her jacket again.

  It hadn’t exactly been a resounding success, but she had levelled up as a [Scout] and gotten a Skill called [Wild Cooking]. She wasn’t sure exactly what the parameters of the Skill were, but when she’d made her soup again this morning, it had seemed thicker, and less bitter.

  Still though, she needed something of substance. Whilst her hand had grown more pink than charred and angry red and the swelling had reduced, and the pain in her shoulder was almost gone if she kept it relaxed, the little glimpses she caught of herself in the running water of the river or the pot as she cooked showed a gauntness that hadn’t been there before. She’d never had the greatest diet, but she’d never looked unhealthily thin.

  So now it was to the forest that she turned.

  The trees weren’t too dense near the edge, and the undergrowth was soft. Keeping the river on her right she passed under the eaves and tapped at her leg to signal to Napoleon to keep close.

  Fortunately, she didn’t have to worry about him being quiet.

  With eyes, but more importantly ears open, she crept in between the boles of trees, stopping to examine some mushrooms on some of the trunks.

  If only I knew what they were…

  It wasn’t worth the risk.

  Away from the city, the sky and light were the same as back home. From the amount of daylight and temperature, she’d have guessed it was at the tail end of summer, but without knowing where in this world she was, there was no real way of knowing. All she knew was that she had about 12 hours or so of daylight in which to explore and hunt for supplies, although, as she’d discovered, her (presumably) [Twilight Vision] Skill made moving around in the dark a real option. Not complete darkness, but as long as the moon or stars were out and it wasn’t too cloudy, she could see reasonably well. It wasn’t enough to sketch or check her notes by, but it was enough to let her get around without worrying that she’d break her neck. Maybe when she felt up to it she’d make more use of it…

  Hours passed, and the sun was almost directly overhead when Marie heard something she’d been praying for.

  The soft song of a bird.

  She’d gone almost ten miles north east of her camp, following the river, coming across nothing more than ants and beetles and grubs, but at last it had paid off.

  It took another twenty minutes to find the creature - the trees grew in denser patches, with bushes and ferns and rocks between, the ground rising and falling as she moved up and away from the riverbank.

  When she finally spotted it, she saw some sort of pigeon, though more green and yellow and brown than grey. It sat twenty feet up a tree in a nest. The thought of what might be in it made Marie’s mouth start salivating, and she pulled one of the stones from her pocket.

  It would be a difficult toss - her right hand was still bright pink and sore, but her left was the weaker arm, and the arrow wound in her shoulder made throwing a challenge. But she really wanted this.

  Pushing down the pain, she took the stone in her right hand, and crept around to get a clearer line of sight.

  Before she could take it, another pigeon flew in, spent a few minutes in the nest, then flew off again. Marie waited another few minutes for it to disappear completely, then moved a few yards, waited for the one in the nest to stick its head up, and took her shot.

  Whether her bandages, her [Thick Skin] Skill, or the smoothness of the stone was to thank, it didn’t split the still-healing skin of her hand, and the rock flew like a bullet and cracked the pigeon creature square in the head, killing it instantly.

  Which left Marie with a twenty foot high climb to reach her prize.

  Crétine.

  If the tree branches had been higher or thinner, she might have been in trouble, but as it was, after ten minutes of careful manoeuvring and shimmying, she got into a position to inspect the kill.

  The body of the bird itself was large enough to fit comfortably in her cupped hands - maybe ten ounces? The pièce de résistance though was the two eggs it’d been sitting on. They weren’t as large as a hens egg but mon dieu she could almost taste them.

  That, however, would have to wait. She’d found her first prey and she wasn’t going to waste it.

  With extra care, she took the eggs and dead pigeon and carried them down to the forest floor, then settled in to wait.

  It was mid-afternoon by the time the second pigeon reappeared, fluttering down to the nest in apparent confusion.

  Its confusion lasted only a second before a rock from Marie put it beyond care forever, and picking up the second bird, she started on the way back to her [Concealed Camp], following the mental map she’d built up and arriving as the sun was beginning to dip below the horizon.

  That night, she had her first proper meal since finding herself in this strange world.

  Pigeon, plucked and gutted, stuck on a branch and spit-roasted over her fire. She even made a feeble attempt at a sauce with what was left of her soup, though she saved the eggs.

  Napoleon got the bones.

  —

  Over the next week, Marie settled into a steady routine. She’d wake at dawn, eat a meagre breakfast from what she’d foraged the day before, move her camp a couple of hours walk east round the edge of the forest, then go hunting. Once she’d caught enough to last a day or two she’d return, rest, then cook. She preserved what leftovers she had in a couple of spare pouches or simply left it in the pot, but covered it so it wouldn’t attract insects. She wasn't sure how it worked - or even if it would work on food, but whenever she packed something away, she put a finger on it and made sure to say [Preservation Touch] aloud.

  As her hand began to return to normal and her shoulder hurt less and less, she began to sort through the artefacts she’d found in the manor house, filling out notes and cataloguing what she remembered of the place. She tried to keep it mostly factual, but it was impossible to do away with interpretation altogether when she’d been using her [Glimpse of the Forgotten] to see what it had once looked like.

  Twice as she travelled round the densely wooded area she came across more ruins - these ones thankfully devoid of any skeletons until Napoleon traipsed through them after her. There was nothing of interest there that she could find, although seeing what they had been with her Skill was enough in and of itself. The knowledge that an inn or waystation had been built here at some point suggested a significant travel route, and another that looked like it might have once been a farmstead gave a reason for the wild apple trees she found there, though she’d had to stay clear of a nest of wasps.

  Not that wasps are six inches long, or black and red. At least, not any I’ve seen.

  Some of the animals were like that. Others were normal, and she began to see more and more the further from the village she travelled, but many were similar to something from earth but with a particular difference. Like the four-winged bird of prey that looked like a cross between a bluejay and a kite, or the strange rodent-like creatures that could have been rats if they weren’t so long and didn’t glow in the dark, or the boar she’d seen in the distance and steered well clear of that had looked as though it was wearing armour.

  A few though, were completely alien to her. One or two she’d only heard, but the sounds they made were so… unnatural… that she could only imagine what sort of creature they came from. One she had seen had left her unsettled; it had looked like a moving rug, though only a couple of feet long, which had wriggled up a tree faster than should have been possible, perched on a branch, then launched itself off, gliding down towards something. That something had been one of the weird rat creatures, on the other side of a tree. Marie hadn’t understood until it had flickered and phased or teleported through the trunk of the tree to land on the unsuspecting beast, then enfolded it and constricted with a horrible crunching of bones. She’d given that a wide berth too, and ever since had kept one eye on the treeline wherever she walked.

  It wasn’t exactly peaceful, or relaxing, but it was working, and she’d levelled up her [Scout] Class again, though she hadn’t received a skill this time.

  And all the while, the mystery of the chest taunted her.

  Hi all! Welcome to my book, Miscast Heroes.

  I'm uploading a few chapters to start with and then will upload one a day after.

  The full first book is available on Patreon - and I greatly appreciate anyone who chooses to support me there.

  Hope you enjoy it - please leave comments below!