Boned

I was about to die. Not in the figurative sense. My mortal coil was within moments of be shuffled off. I knew it and I could do nothing to stop it. Everything around me was moving in slow motion. I had taken a job at an industrial warehouse because it was either this or the coal mine. My brother had a friend who was one of the managers there, the guy had called me to tell me not to work there. He told me it was dangerous and not just physically. Hearing that from someone with personal experience held some weight. I applied for the warehouse position shortly after.

There had been accidents before. Forklifts hit shelves, trucks backed into the docking bay too fast, or someone decided to come to work drunk. No one died. A few people got hurt, but nothing serious. Of course, I had to be the exception.

I shut my eyes as the industrial sized pieces of sheet metal were about to reach my body. A hard hat and reflective vest were not going to stop me from getting sliced into chunks. If I were lucky there would be enough of me to pack into a coffin. I wanted to be buried in a simple pine box on what remained of my family farm. There wasn't much left of it, we were about to have that in common, but the old house and family plot was still there.

Time was really crawling. I had heard the 'life flashing before your eyes' thing was fake but right now I could have played some of my greatest hits. What would I start with?

Against my better logic, I opened my eyes. The sheet metal was gone. In fact, the entire warehouse had vanished. I patted myself down.

Still in one piece, I thought.

My work gloves and hard hat had disappeared. The brown set of work coveralls had been replaced by a pair of comfy blue pants and a short sleeve shirt that was a few shades lighter. My steel-toed boots had been swapped for a pair of leather booties. They lacked any sort of laces or straps but fit my feet perfectly and stopped just above my ankles.

I stood in a thin clearing between the edge of a forest and the base of a mountain. The trees looked familiar enough. Bark, branches, and leaves, just like they were supposed to have.

Was this the afterlife?

Clearly, I wasn't at work and this wasn't my apartment. I was about to die. Or I had died. That much was certain. The air smelled fresh without a hint of exhaust. A cool breeze kept the sun from being overbearing.

Where am I?

I hadn't been approached by the lollypop guild yet and there was a complete absence of a white rabbit. The closest thing the warehouse had to a wardrobe were the cabinets in the breakroom. That ruled out the big three that came to mind.

There was a flash of white on the edge of my vision as I stood. I reached out to wave it away and froze. A skeletal hand appeared instead of my own. I tried to wiggle my fingers; the bones moved. Looking down at my body I found that I was completely devoid of skin, muscles, and blood.

I screamed. Nothing came out. My skeletal hands gripped where my throat should have been catching nothing but air. The thrashing of my legs clacked against the stone floor.

Muddled memories flooded into my mind. They were fuzzy, but I knew that adventurers would show up eventually. They would hear me and that would spell my demise. I scrambled to my feet only to kick something. It rolled across the small hallway.

The body of an adventurer lay at my feet. It was their head that had rolled to a stop against the far wall. It settled amid a pile of bones. The sound of metal grinding on stone brought my attention to two other adventurers that lay dead a few feet behind me. Spikes that had dropped from the ceiling held them in place and were now retracting.

I had played enough videogames to put the pieces together. Ten to one, I was in a dungeon. For some reason I was now a skeleton. Judging by fresh dead around me, I had been one of the monsters set for defense. This raised an entirely new set of questions.

Was I bound to this place? Were there other monsters? Would they attack me? Was I always going to be a skeleton?

If this were a videogame, I'd just pull up my status. A blue window appeared in the air before me. In the center was a picture of a skeleton. The new me, apparently. To the right was a list of text.

Name: -
Job: Monster
Experience (XP): 25
Evolution Cost: 1000 XP

Ok. Either this was the last fleeting moments of my brain firing, or I was truly in another world. Both options didn't give me any options to change my situation. If this was indeed the last moments before my brain finally died, it wouldn't matter if I played along or not. On the other hand, if this was my new world, I'd prefer not to be stuck in a dungeon constantly fighting adventurers.

I turned back toward the decapitated body. The armor was still intact. Getting the loot felt like the right thing to do. I reached down to grab the body only to be stopped by more words hanging in the air.

Loot Items?

I nodded. The armor and clothing disappeared from the body. I looked down at myself only to find my bones were still on display. If nothing else, I really wanted those boots. Where had they gone?

The words in the air disappeared only to be replaced by a three-by-five grid.

Inventory - 5/15 Slots Available
Travelers Clothes
Travelers Cloak
Travelers Belt
Backpack - Empty
Leather Boots
Leather Gloves
Simple Broadsword
Minor Healing Potion x1
Adventurers Badge - Copper

With a thought the Broadsword appeared in my hand. The new weapon had a decent balance to it. My experience with sword fighting was limited to smacking my friends with pool noodles or wrapping paper tubes. Until I found something better I'd just treat it like a sharp baseball bat. In a flash the clothing and armor appeared on my body. I slid my new sword into the scabbard on my hip. My skull was still exposed. More adventurers would come.

Backpack +20 Inventory
Inventory - 33/35 Slots Available
Minor Healing Potion x1

The backpack flapped around as I moved. I unequipped it and sent it back to my base inventory. Maybe I would need it later, but now it was just annoying. I turned to the two dead adventurers caught in the spike trap to find they had vanished. Only the one near me could be looted. I would have to keep that in mind.

The passage I stood in wasn't very wide. It was just large enough for three people to stand shoulder to shoulder. The fuzzy memories told me that was usually how we waited. It wasn't just me who guarded this place. We were there to distract the adventurers and only engage when they got beyond the trap. Flashes of my fellow skeletons triggering the spikes too early played in my memory. I had no idea what lay beyond this passage.

A clack-click brought my attention to the piles of bones nearby. The scattered pieces gathered to quickly form three new skeletons. They each grabbed a rusty short sword that I hadn't noticed in the mess. Their bones clattered and creaked as they found their places in the passage. I moved to the one closest to me. It didn't turn to look at me or acknowledge me in any way. I pushed it. The skeleton rocked back but didn't move. I couldn't remember if my fellow skeletons had noticed me before.

There was a small voice in my head that told me to stay here. That I needed to guard the passage. Thankfully, that voice was easy to ignore. The remaining options were to go deeper into the dungeon or see if I could find a way out and I doubted the outside world would be kind to a wondering skeleton.

I skirted around the trigger for the spike trap and headed down the passage. It took a few moments to identify the switch on the other side. Once I was beyond the trap, I studied the new area for any more triggers. The fuzzy memories didn't give me any hints. I looked back at the other skeletons. The trio stood in the same place, swaying with the occasional breeze.

It was time to see what this world had in store for me.

~~~~
Keep going or get back to Harry?