The Forsaken Ruins of Arachnid part 3

While eating breakfast together at the table, I heard a voice resonating in my head. "System, show me my status window." I murmured in my head and a window poped out showing my stats. I could see my health and energy capacity. It showed me that my stats are quite balanced, except for my agility, which was pretty high. On the contrary, my strength and mental strength were quite low. "Show me my skills and abilities," he thought to himself.

Arthur ate as he was lost in his thoughts. He examined the skills he had developed up to this point; they were fewer than he had anticipated. His skills were: Aura Sense, Aura Vision, Aura Sword, Acceleration, Dash, Battle-Focus, and Precise Strike. Silently, he reads the description of these skills, and there he found a proficiency bar and a level bar, meaning that these skills are growth type skills and maybe they can even evolve.

While doing so, he discovered three skills that had three question marks instead of a title, and there was no description. He stayed here for some time and was almost completely healed, at which point he decided to wander around the forest with the ulterior motive of finding the strange dungeon and destroying that damn curse, mostly because a quest had popped up but also because he felt indebted to them.

After he ate his breakfast and thanked them, he went back to his room and started getting dressed and equipped with his sword, then went out to find it. A lot of time passed, and Arthur was aimlessly wandering around, studying and examining the area around him and the herbs. Some were health-restoring with healing abilities, and others were toxic when they came into contact with fire. He picked them up and put them in different smaller bags in his backpack and continued wandering aimlessly around the enchanting and breath-taking magical forest.

The sun is setting as he takes a break from all the wandering and leans on a boulder, but there was no forest clearing in sight. Frustrated, he gets up and makes a step, but the ground brakes and he falls down into a seemingly bottomless pit. His heart is beating like crazy, as if it wanted to break out of his chest and run away to safety on its own, but all this thinking does not slow down the fall, so he activates some of his skills like Aura Sense to scan the pit, Aura Vision to look around and maybe find something to hold on to or slow down his fall. Then he spotted some vines which were growing out of the stone walls and hanging down.

With a glimmer of hope, he activates another of his skills, Battle-Focus, which makes time slow down a little, mostly when it can get no worse, and concentrate more as well as find some openings. As he fell, he caught a few vines with both of his hands and held on to them as much as possible. Meaningless, there were scrapes on his hands because of the friction between his hands and the vines caused by the falling speed and the small thorns on the vines, which cut into his hands through the gloves.

The pain was pretty much unbearable, but he clenched even harder and infused energy into his whole body to strengthen and harden it, which took a lot of energy and he was getting slower and slower. A strange sound resonated in his ears *snap!* The vines ripped and snapped, and Arthur fell down, again, with his back to the bottom, further down. As he got closer to the bottom, the light disappeared, time slowed down when it could get no worse, and he crashed down, down to the ground.

*Arghhhh!!!* His vision gets blurry as he passes out. *drip..., drip..., drip...* Water drops were slowly falling on his face every few seconds... *Phhuuaaa!* Arthur screamed as he jumped up and stood upright with a burning sensation in his hands and a throbbing pain in his back, which brought him to his knees . "Damn, could it possibly get any worse today?"

He screamed after he leaned with his back against a boulder, and as if someone heard him, his status window popped up, "Warning! abnormal state. The user is poisoned! The health rate is dropping continuously! Caution and get treated!" "Now that's all that was left, wasn't it?!" He said, grinning and silently laughing as he was leaning on a boulder.

He cleaned his teeth, and he slowly stood up on his legs, bearing the pain, and as he searched for his backpack, he stumbled from time to time. The backpack absorbed a lot of the impact from the impact between him and the ground, where it was shined upon by the moon's light. After he arrived at his bag, he opened and took out the herbs, which were completely crushed. "Hmm...." He thought about it and put a handful of herbs in his mouth, some of which were crushed further and put on his hands, slowly taking away the burning pain from his hands.

"So it's dark outside and the annoying warning window finally disappeared. *Phew* finally." One window disappeared, but another one showed up. * New Skill, Body Entchantment: it is an active skill that will harden and strengthen your body for two minutes, has a cooldown time of two hours, and it's a growth-type skill* He carefully read the description and smiled silently, after which he stood up and put his backpack on his back and started exploring the cave system while activating Aura Vision and Aura Sense once again.

The deeper he goes into this maze-like cave system, the more webs he sees until he reaches a place where in the distance the light of a torch can be seen. Arthur ran towards it, and there was indeed a torch in its holder on a stone wall from which stairs led upwards, and Arthur followed the stairs. The stairs led him to a huge hall where you could see all kinds of things and items. Some seemed strange, others glorious and majestic, and some otherwise mysterious. There were gold and silver coins lying around, as well as weapons and clothing. Something like this could only be found in a treasure room, and secret or hidden treasure rooms have artefacts in them too. But all the textures made him feel strange.

It made him feel that he was not ready to face the consequences of taking away the treasures here. That's why he made his way through all the glimmer and gold to find the place where the two girls were cursed, which he found. But the skeleton was a lich, an undying being stronger than him, and he could feel that difference in power.

It turned around to see him. Its eye-holes were filled with a purple light. The same went for the mouth too. It started smiling at Arthur, "What are you doing here, little boy?" "Are you lost?" After it asked this, the lich appeared behind Art, who struck after it with his dagger. Of course, the undying being stopped it after taking a few steps back and looking into Art's eyes, which were focused on it, and his unwavering eyes did not get shaken by it.

Lich: "Do you think you can kill me? You! A weak human being?!" It said, "Mocking Arthur."

Art: "I may not be able to kill you with ease, but I can kill you or at least take you down with me. "I am certain of this!"Art was expressed by pushing the knife further, causing the lich to fall back.

Lich: "I see. Interesting, all the humans peed themselves after seeing me, yet you have such unwavering eyes that are set on a clear goal. I would love to crush those very eyes! Vex of Ruin!" It said this while grinning and casting a spell that should ruin Arthur's mind.

Art: "A mental attack?" "Interesting-"

"Bane of Darkness, Bane of Poison, Curse of Sloth!" Multiple casting, this undying being is not your typical one. The Vex of Ruin is a constant mental attack that calls forth your deepest trauma, the Bane of Darkness makes you blind, which was neutralized by Arthur's Aura Sense, the Bane of Poison is a curse that gives you the abnormal status of being constantly poisoned, and the Curse of Sloth makes you slower and less agile. That is, it slows you down and dulls your senses.

Arthur felt like his head was spinning, and he could feel the lich's mocking gaze on him.*??? and ??? are activating* A black aura appeared and negated every curse, and the other kind of absorbed the dissolved curses, and a new ability appeared in his stats, Curse tolerance. Without having time to think about his new ability, he rushed towards the lich, which was shocked at the fact that his curses were neutralized. "Chaos, Champion of the Fallen, come forth!" The Lich summoned something, to which Art backed down. A portal on the ground opened and a sword, which was held by a lot of skeleton arms, came out. The undying being gripped its handle and the arms let it go and disappeared, to which it pointed its sword at Arthur.

The sword was black and had runes on the fuller. The hilt had a majestic form, yet in the middle of it was some kind of purple gem. The handle was made out of black leather, and the pommel was also a dark purple gem. "I was originally a magic-swordsman and not a mage," he said with a grin. It drew the sword towards its body and dashed over to Arthur, who, through a flinching response, moved his head sideways, barely avoiding getting his head pierced through. It started pouring attacks on Arthur like it was raining. All Art could do was either block, parry, or deflect the lich's attacks, which made his hands heavy and hurt. He could barely feel his hands, and with each strike he blocked, a throbbing pain was sent through his body. Arthur was pushed back with each strike, even with his skill Battle-Focus.

He was obviously unprepared for this fight. The smell of the blood flowing out of all the cuts he received and his sweat could be smelled in the air, and the blood flowing down from his head into his eye slowly limited his vision. *Bing... A new stat has been added: Pain resistance*The window poped out, which blocked his vision even more, but once again his body gave a flinch response and evaded the lethal strike.

Arthur caught the lich's arm and tried to throw it over, but he couldn't even move the undying being. It grinned at him and punched him powerfully in the back below his ribs. He was smashed into the wall and coughed up blood at the impact, *cracks...* Arthur could feel and hear some of his ribs breaking. He fell on his knees with both of his hands holding his sword's handle and supported himself with his sword and slowly lifted his head up, but the lich put his bone hand on Art's head and pushed it down and leaned down on him. "I guess you are all talk, because you really are weak...!" It mocked Arthur with a smile and a malicious laugh.

[POV Arthur]

Damn it, am I really no match for him?! Can I do nothing? Why is the status window showing up now, of all times? Wait, one of the skills with the three question marks is clearing. *New skill, Absorption, a passive skill:* and in the description... *It can absorb an opponent's energy, whether it is dead or alive. As you activate it, your enemy will be unable to move for three seconds. In the beginning, the absorbed energy will heal all your injuries before giving you a power boost. It isn't limited to the energy absorption when it heals, but only when it boosts your power.

Depending on the amount you absorb, it will only affect your stats up to four times, and the effect lasts for ten minutes for every time you drain energy out of your opponent. It is a growth-type skill and can evolve. But caution: Precondition your body can withstand this in the long term (there is a 5 percent chance of becoming stronger after overusing it... In your state you will die). * "Only up to four times, lasting for ten minutes every time you drain energy!" I reread it in my thoughts. I went back to the window showing me all my skills, and I could see a mastery bar and a level bar. This gave me a smile on my face, and I started laughing silently.

When the lich heard Arthur's laughter, he pulled his hair back and looked him in the eyes, and Art grabbed his bone hand. "Why are you still laughing when you are at my mercy?" "Absobtion," Art muttered after he grabbed the undying being tightly with his second hand too. A dark-red and black aura surrounded his hands. "W-what is happening?! I can feel my energy being drained!" It asked itself, confused and wondering why it could not free itself from Arthur's grip. After the three seconds were over, Arthur was all healed up and struggled to hold on to the lich and absorb even more, but not for long. The undying being created an energy shock-wave which pushed Art far away, and even on this occasion, he tried to absorb some energy from that attack, which worked but only a small portion.

He drew his dagger and threw it at the lich with a lot of force and infused with aura. The lich was being pushed back, and Arthur dashed at it at full speed and kicked it even further away, catching his knife and picking up his sword, followed by him taking his battle stance. "Now it is time for round two!" Art expressed grinning at the lich. After the lich came to his senses, both of them dashed at each other, piercing and striking with their swords at each other. The clashes of swords filled the cave with sound, and the smell of blood and sweat was really strong. Both struck at each other, resulting in both getting injured, yet they enjoyed the fight with a smile on their faces. They blocked each other's strikes, and the blades slowly became dull, and they dodged some attacks. Art managed to get a grip on the undying being and used the skill absorption to drain even more of its energy. Again, it was stunned for three seconds, and Art's injuries healed completely, and he drained even more energy.

A notification window pops up *Warning, you have reached the maximum power boost you can get at this skill's level* The skill level went up a little and the mastery did too, by 0.01 percent. He pushed the lich back because the three seconds ran out and jumped back by doing so. He dashed at the lich, and when Art was about 50 meters away, he said, "Activate Acceleration," and his speed increased, including his quadrupled stats, allowing him to outrun the lich and cut off one of its arms. Arthur let the point of his sword face the ground as he slowly turned around and saw the lich kneeling on the ground, supporting itself with the sword, and it started laughing loudly, echoing in the whole hall.