Chapter Seven: Saferoom

SEVEN

Roan woke up. Which was a surprise to him as he had thought he was dead. Fragments of the last few hours he’d been awake came in flashes as he winced to himself. Embarrassment washed through him but he shoved that aside as he took in his surroundings.

Light, real, clear, clean, yellow sunlight streamed around him. The smell of flowers filled his nose and as he shuffled to the side he felt the soft texture of thick grass beneath his back. It was the absence that truly took him by surprise.

There was no pain. His myriad of injuries he’d endured fighting his way through the crypts weren’t screaming at him. Ankle, scalp, the multiple cuts to his torso, all of it was gone. Even his insufferable thirst had been sated, though he knew that wouldn’t last long.

“He’s awake!” Moira called and Roan turned to see the healer not far from him. A tree grew from the ground and she sat against it, the shade of it helping cover him and others seated around it.

“Where?” Roan asked, his voice a croak as he swallowed hard to clear it. He slowly sat up, careful not to pull anything as he looked over his body. Someone had removed his coat and tattered shirt, the two ruined garments in a pile next to him. His pants had been turned into shorts and his wounded legs had bandages wrapped around them.

“The safe room between levels,” a new voice said and from behind the tree came Darren and Taoya. There were others Roan sort of recognized, those who had fought or been called to aid Moira or Taoya in their mad dash. All of them were covered in identical bandages as he was, limping or moving stiffly as people settled around him.

“Go through the notifications, it’ll be faster,” Darren said. Roan nodded, but looked them over before he did so. He wasn’t one of them, not some well-trained and connected sect or college student. They all seemed to know each other, had connections and familiarity that he couldn’t match. Taoya’s open, honest face reassured him. If they had wanted to stab him, then they would have done it while he was unconscious. Or not even carried him through the crypts.

FLOOR 1.01 SAFEROOM

LEVEL 1 CLEAR RATE: 9 %

LEVEL 2 OPENING IN: 44 HOURS

ACCESS MARKET?

CURRENT BALANCE: 250 CREDITS

Roan frowned as he stared at the balance. He had a hundred-twenty points before the battle on the boulevard. He had to scroll through his alerts to find where the infusion of funds had come from. Seven more of the inferior skeletons in the fight and then he saw what the second rank skeletons had been.

POOR SKELETON (x3)

20 CREDITS

Each of those skeletons he’d killed in the second hallway had been worth double the originals. He didn’t like the look of the clear rate for the level though. There was no way the tower would offer them a reward for that poor of a performance.

“Who, uh, undressed me?” Roan asked as he pushed the alerts away.

“That’d be me. I’m a trained medic,” Moira said, squatting on her heels as she looked him over with a clinical eye.

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“Access the market and look at medical supplies. You had two inferior healing potions as well as one inferior bandage. Just for your information,” Moira said with a stiff smile. Roan winced as he opened up the market for the first time. His mouth slowly dropped as he looked over the screen that filled his vision.