A familiar sensation raced through my frame… but that was as far as it went. I couldn’t feel any sensation from Bone Armor at all. I didn’t panic… yet. It was a new skill and I’d not explored it very much yet.

  I shifted my focus to the new girl. “What’s your name?” I asked. Judging from her expression, my skeleton was quite a bit stronger than I thought. In fact, it seemed to be dominating her in combat. Thinking about the level gap, that made sense.

  “Lidya!” She gasped through staggered breaths before dodging to the side. My skeleton, even unarmed, was no slouch. If she let up for even a moment it would latch on and grab her, and that would be the end. Fortunately for her it wouldn’t actually be ‘the end’—it had already restrained her once, and all I needed to do was have it let her go.

  “...Wait, wa—” She coughed harder. “I can’t, it’s too much.” She was panting.

  “Should I send out Lucas?” I asked. “He’ll help if I ask. He’s an expert in melee combat.” The line had been set.

  She looked at me confused, then hesitatingly asked,“Why would you do that for me?”

  And to set the hook, “I just admire your determination and want to encourage it.” Clean. She smiled and gave a nod before falling on her ass. It was easy to fluff someone up by using their own hard effort as the reason. Who else could see how hard they were working but themselves? No doubt she felt she deserved much more than the level she was currently—and maybe she did.

  “I’ll leave him out here for you.” I looked at my skeleton, “If you attack him he’ll fight back, and if you say, “Release me!” He’ll let you go.” It was fun to find out I could give my undead lasting commands. How long they persisted I didn’t know, but it seemed giving them commands with an ongoing task expended MP. “Be right back.” I turned and headed inside.

  Lucas and Glenn were still chatting inside, the two had gotten closer through sheer likeness. The both of them were extremely analytical in their decision making, and excellent problem solvers. This made sense for Glenn who had been an engineer before the apocalypse; Lucas must have learned that approach to problems naturally.

  “New girl is outside waiting for you,” I said when he looked up, which caught him off guard.

  “Huh? I don’t even know her name yet… I haven’t talked with her… how did you—” He was confused, and definitely a bit flustered.

  “I told her you’re gonna help her train.” I cut him off. “Her name is Lidya and I think she has potential.” It was true that I felt she had potential. She wasn’t slacking, at least. I wondered if her lack of progress had some reason other than her group had purposely held her back. “Let’s go.” I gave no room for refusal. I couldn’t after all, “I talked a big game so you gotta do this for me.”

  I didn’t know when I started to think like this—see people in such a way. Was I always this good at planning for other people or had it just been a mindset shift? Convincing Lidya to train with Lucas rather than on her own had come so easily on a pure invention.

  “Oh, and there’s this thing.” I turned to Glenn and tossed him the material the behemoth had dropped. The stuff glowed and sparkled as it launched through the air. I had looked it over and determined it was a material for a skill and not for some profession, therefore probably better for Glenn to hold onto than me.

  Lucas and I talked as we made our way back outside, “Have you made any preparations for tomorrow?” I asked.

  “Outside of making sure everyone has enough potions from the quartermaster, there isn’t much else to do,” he said, “I’m more concerned about the new members. Marcus and Bethany are prepared and we’ve fought together and know what to expect out of a demon.”

  Tomorrow morning was set to be a new demon wave arrival, the problem was just how many were going to come. More demons meant more EXP, but also more danger. I was confident ‘we’ would be alright, but would all the new members be fine?

  If we survived tomorrow there would be a huge spike to our fighting power. Both Jessica and I would reach level 30 and unlock a new skill slot and whatever else came with that milestone. Everyone else would probably be level 29, or level 28 at the minimum.

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  The abode would get a massive power-up as well, and allocating new points was starting to get me a little excited. The tree was huge, and I wondered just what new fortifications we might be able to add, what new items the quartermaster might sell, or even new buffs we might receive while inside the abode.

  “Don’t go easy on her.” I turned to Lucas just before we arrived. “Maybe she’ll survive tomorrow for it.” We were expecting more than 30 enemies, but any less than that and it would be a cake walk for us. A part of me wanted to see a literal wave—fifty plus demons. My body missed that adrenaline rush.

  While Lucas introduced himself to Lidya, I took myself off to the side and continued working with Bone Manipulation. The familiar feeling was there, but I could never bring it out of anything other than the frame of my own skeleton. Bone Armor granted no sensation, no familiarity.

  It was the worst possible outcome, and it seemed there wasn’t really anything to do about it. Skills gained levels with you, and I hoped that as it leveled it would become more malleable as a skill. At level one, or maybe even level two it would allow me to access Bone Armor as a source of attack. That was the hope, at least.

  The problem was understanding how the skill functioned. Levels meant sending bone up and out of my flesh, which I knew already would be excruciatingly painful. Just from the little test the pain of it poking the muscle around the bone already hurt, let alone tearing through my flesh.

  I turned to watch Lucas and Lidya as I brainstormed the path of least resistance. Lucas looked like an adult toying with a child, but after every exchange there was a brief lesson to be taught. For fifteen minutes at least, I stared into the distant light as the two sparred, letting my thoughts mull over the issues.

  Eventually, I resolved on what I thought was the best approach. If I wanted to practice bone manipulation I would just have to do it in places where my bone met almost no muscle and the least amount of flesh. Places like my elbow, my knee caps, the knuckles of my hand—and that thought immediately made me think of wolverine and his claws.

  There were solutions that could be explored, but not today and probably not tomorrow. The smallest chance I might be injured before tomorrow was a risk that was out of the question. “You doing okay there Mike?” Lucas had finished his short lesson.

  “Yeah, fine,” I replied. “Problem-solving.”

  “She’s not bad. Your judgment was decent enough.”

  “Decent enough?” I asked jokingly. It was true though that a lot of snap decisions I let Lucas make. “That’s why you call the shots in battle.”

  “True.” He laughed while watching Lidya and my skeleton go at it.

  “Do you want one too?” My eyes followed my new sparring robot.

  “That won’t do it.” He said confidently. “Not fast or strong enough.”

  “I can surprise you.” I was sure Spikey #1 or Spikey #2 going all out could make him break a sweat in a 1-on-1. Together they’d still lose but do some serious damage. But it wasn’t them I was referring to.

  I decided to pull out my newest skeleton general “How about this guy.” My latest undead servant towered over both Spikey #1 or #2 and held a massive ivory spear nearly as long as he was tall.

  “Where did this one come from? The behemoth?”

  I nodded happily.“Yeah, I don’t know how strong he is so maybe you can help me out.”

  “Right…” Lucas shrugged, but a fire had been ignited in his eyes. He was already standing and had pulled out his sword.

  “Don’t go easy,” I added, “if you break him I can always re-summon him.” I didn’t want Lucas to hold back. The only limitation on the behemoth was that he didn’t have a shield yet. So when he wielded the spear on one side with one hand, his opposite side was completely open.

  Lucas moved like a shadow at my newest general and struck out like lightning. The heavy spear that looked to weigh hundreds of pounds swirled like a baton made of air and deflected the slash off with a spark. The recoil sent the sword towards the sky and Lucas staggering back.

  “Jesus!” Lucas said. “That wasn’t what I was expecting.” He backed off some distance. I was surprised as well to see the speed and the strength of the behemoth’s move. “Both hands this time.” And then Lucas went in again, this time starting an extended clash.

  My new general, looking as stable as a mountain, had no choice but to slowly retreat backwards. The spear spun in his hand like a performance, constantly deflecting Lucas’ sword strikes. Clanging metal droned in the air, and I worried that before long everyone would be awake from the noise.

  Thirty seconds passed with no clear victor, and Lucas was already starting to work up a sweat. “This thing is insane…” He groaned. He had done some damage, but it mostly superficial as even the boney skeleton was unimaginably hard. “He isn’t even using a shield yet.”

  I was grinning ear to ear, thinking this guy could take on five or six demons at once on his own. There was also something else there too. “He was using a skill wasn’t he?” I asked Lucas.

  “I think so yeah,” he panted.

  Neither of my other generals or minions could use skills outside of the mages, which I didn’t really consider a skill. Their attacks were just certain elements.

  But my new general – no, King Spikey as I would now refer to him – was using an actual ability, something that manifested MP to strike out.

  I suddenly felt so much better about the coming demon wave…