First round around the cemetery

The desire to fight was visible in Morti's eyes. With great strides he walked through the cemetery, proud as a bear and without worries. He was looking for ghosts with red glow in their eyes.

As he got closer to the large tombstones, he felt he was being watched. Suddenly, a ghost shot out of the ground and grinned cheekily at him. Mortis just looked at him coldly, jumped towards him and stabbed the ghost with a spear-like weapon.

The arrogant ghost raised both arms and laughed briefly, but that quickly faded as he received three stabs in the chest. Shocked, he looked at the weapon but did not recognize any sacred symbols or spells.

When the ghost recovered from the shock and felt pain, he wanted to charge at Mortis. But the latter used the sweep of his scythe and the black blade cut through the spirit. It gave a deafening scream and slowly dissolved, except for a small orb that traveled into Mortis' sea of souls.

The high-pitched sound of the defeated spirit attracted more spirits. Four of them came and wondered at what was happening. They saw the young man, but nothing in particular struck them, only an anxious feeling.

One spirit started chanting while the other three rushed towards Mortis. They were very fast and the only solution was to swing the scythe and keep moving. Mortis jumped to the side and hit the ghosts to defeat them one by one. It worked for two jumps, but then they adjusted.

Ice arrows appeared from above and flew toward Mortis. Now he knew why the fourth ghost was chanting. He used the "scythe whirl" to dodge the ice arrows, which he succeeded in doing. In the process, he hit two ghosts, but they were not defeated.

Mortis ran towards the mage spirit, which did not move and tried to chant faster. But this chant was interrupted when Mortis, sprinting, held his scythe forward and rammed the blades right into its mouth.

The ghost flew back a few feet to gain distance, but Mortis kept running toward it. The ghost panicked, although there was no reason to. Mortis just kept running since the other 3 ghosts were behind him and he was just waiting for an opportunity to turn around without taking too much damage.

The spirits didn't seem to give him a chance though, so he kept running towards the mage spirit to absorb its soul for mana and stamina, since he couldn't keep going like this forever.

After several meters, Mortis realized that he was not getting any closer. In rage, he suddenly turned and swung with full force, hitting two spirits. The second spirit he hit dissolved except for the soul core, which Mortis pulled back into his sea of souls.

This shocked the other spirits so much that they did nothing for 2 seconds and that was their undoing, as Mortis did not stop and continued to beat on the spirits. So he sucked in 2 more souls, now only the mage was missing.

This ghost floated away full of fear, but he didn't get far. Two other spirits came and held him - it was the older woman and the girl.

Mortis ran towards the evil spirit, jumped up and with a downward blow he split the spirit in two. As the soul core was about to disappear into Morti, the two friendly spirits watched jealously.The girl asked, "Can I also leave the place when you hit me with the scythe?"

Mortis considered. Normally yes, but does it have to be slain even though they are friendly?

That's when the system spoke up, "Friendly spirits can just be picked up if that's what they want. All they have to do is put their hand on the spirit. You will also receive EP for redeeming friendly spirits."

Morti didn't need to be told twice. He took his right hand and placed it on the girl's head. Then he asked, "Do you want to leave this world?" The girl nodded and her soul wandered into Morti's sea of souls, where she first found peace. Next, he did the same to the older woman.

The cemetery was right in the middle. Mortis didn't want to storm it, but work the area like a spiral to have a way to escape in case of emergency.

"Lvl up, they're level 12 now, spread out their SP! Put 1 mana, 3 strength, 2 agility," the system reported.

Mortis continued walking along the edge when suddenly five ghosts rose from a large tomb. All in one pile, just what I need, Mortis thought.

He used scythe whirls twice and killed four ghosts. The last one he worked on with normal swings and slashes.

"Why wasn't the first group so easy? What level are the ghosts anyway?" asked Mortis.

The system only answered, "They have the level Host. Everyone else has status points too, but if you were to convert it, they're all something like level 15-20. You wouldn't get a quest that wasn't doable."

After taking a short break and noticing his mana was increasing again, he continued on his way.

After about two minutes, he didn't see any more ghosts, friendly or evil, but he realized there should be some nearby. So he used "Walking in the Spirit Realm."

There he saw a family of ghosts huddled under a tree in the spirit realm. He approached them carefully, since he couldn't see if they were good or evil. The old woman had said that they could hide their nature, but was that true in the spirit realm?

As he got closer, he saw that all five of the family had like a halo over them, indicating that they were pure souls.

The spirits were speechless when they saw Mortis. He was like being on earth, full of color and completely normal. The father stood protectively in front of the family and fearfully asked, "What do you want? What are you?" Mortis answered with a friendly grin, "I am the Grim Reaper and I am here to bring you peace.

What I meant to say was that I'm here to get free EP." "You can bring us peace and get us out of this dungeon? But how?" the father asked. Mortis replied, "Because that's my job." He put his hand on the father's head and asked, "Do you want to be redeemed and leave this world?" "Yes, we do." No sooner were these words spoken than the father shone brightly, detached himself from the exoplasm, and the soul disappeared into Morti's sea of souls. The others noticed the peace and were the next to be redeemed by Mortis.

Each one he redeemed made him feel as if he was defeating someone. So he got mana and stamina back from each soul. What he also noticed was that if he touched spirits in the spirit realm, he would stay in the spirit realm. When he had almost circled the graveyard, he was attacked by 5 spirits: 2 mages and 3 melee fighters. They attacked him at the same time. He was able to block a lot, but still took a blow to the skull and was hit in the back with ice arrows. He staggered a bit, blood running down his face, which made Mortis really angry now. He used scythe whirls to quickly get behind the 3 melee fighters and damage them. In the process, one disintegrated. Then he immediately used it again to kick the 2 mages' asses. Both were caught, the second dissolved as a result. But that was not enough for Mortis. He immediately swung his scythe at the other mage, but he quickly dodged it backwards.

This made Mortis even angrier and frustrated him a bit. Why were the damn mages so fast when it came to fleeing? He didn't want to chase after the ghost, but what was he supposed to do when he was taking care of the other two? If he moved, ice arrows would just rain down on him, and it seemed that the mages in the spirit realm couldn't cast spells when they were on the move. Nevertheless, he ran a little after them, taking the scythe far below and hurling it at the ghost.

The weapon spun several times and with the blade it bored into the creature at the shoulder. The scythe fell to the ground with the blade as the spirit formed into a ball. Mortis quickly grabbed his weapon, turned nimbly, and used the "scythe swing" to finish off the two remaining enemies. He hit both with one swing, but only one became a bullet, while the other still looked too good for Mortis' liking. But after a few blows, he finished this one off as well.

Lvl up! You reached level 13. Spend 6 SP! Put everything on mana.

Mortis was done with the big round and walked out of the spirit realm to his bag to take a break and eat something.

Mortis Lv 13: Strength 26, Agility 30, Intelligence 4, Vitality 10, Stamina 10, Mana 32, Charisma 22.