A Skeleton’s Guide to Making Friends

Reincarnated as a skeleton, You discovers monsters aren’t always monstrous and unexpectedly becomes the bridge between two misunderstood worlds.

Plot

Reincarnated into a fantasy world as a lowly skeleton, You quickly discovers that life on the monster side isn’t what the civilized races believe. Able to understand both mobs and people, You joins four struggling adventurers while navigating misunderstandings, unlikely friendships, dangerous encounters, growing relationships, and a mysterious training dungeon capable of producing extraordinary results.

Opening scene

Breathing shouldn’t have been possible without lungs, yet You was doing a remarkably convincing imitation of it anyway. Each useless breath came hard and fast as You stood in the middle of the forest, shocked, exhausted, and still trying to understand how a confrontation with four strangers had somehow turned into a frantic chase through the trees. Across the short distance separating them, the four adventurers looked little better. None had attacked again, but none seemed entirely certain why. The armored woman stood closest. Elara’s longsword remained raised, though the rookie knight held it with considerably less conviction than she had at the beginning of the chase. Her amber-brown eyes were wide, fear now competing with obvious confusion as she stared at the skeleton in front of her. Mirelle stood slightly behind her, both hands wrapped around an elegant staff, her expression caught somewhere between suspicion and the intense fascination of a mage confronted by something that shouldn’t exist. Sylwen still had an arrow resting against her bowstring, though the wood elf hadn’t drawn it, her sharp teal-green eyes studying You with considerably more calculation than panic. Rowan remained partially protected behind his oversized shield, sandy hair disheveled and mismatched armor shifted from the run, staring over the rim with an expression suggesting he had several questions and absolutely no idea which one should come first. For the first time since this whole mess began, nobody was running. Nobody was attacking either. The sudden silence gave You enough time for the last short stretch of an already impossible new life to replay itself with uncomfortable clarity. It hadn’t been long since You had awakened with no heartbeat, no skin, no muscles, and somehow no difficulty moving despite lacking practically everything normally required to accomplish it. Discovering pale skeletal hands had been alarming enough. Discovering the rest of the body matched had made things considerably worse. Whatever expectations death and reincarnation might once have carried, beginning a second life as the sort of creature fantasy adventurers usually smashed apart for experience had not been among them. The hidden settlement beyond the magical veil had only complicated matters further. Shortly after reincarnating, You had passed through the strange barrier almost by accident and watched an entire village emerge where moments earlier there had appeared to be nothing but wilderness and old ruins. Goblins carried baskets between crude houses, skeletons wandered stone paths without attacking anything in sight, and other creatures that should have looked threatening went about lives so ordinary that the entire scene had been more confusing than frightening. There had been no immediate slaughter, sinister ritual, or army preparing to march against civilization. There had been homes, work, arguments, chores, food, and all the other painfully mundane pieces of everyday existence. More surprising had been the fact that You could understand everyone. The first skeletons encountered hadn’t seemed mindless at all. Their strange rattles, movements, and magical impressions somehow translated naturally into recognizable meaning, allowing You to communicate with them as easily as with any ordinary person. A goblin had proven the same thing soon afterward. Whatever should have sounded like meaningless monster speech simply made sense, and the resulting conversation had been almost absurdly normal. The goblin had concerns, opinions, responsibilities, and enough curiosity about the newly awakened skeleton asking questions to make the exchange feel less like an encounter with a monster and more like talking to an unusually short stranger in an unfamiliar town. That normality had been what eventually encouraged You to leave. Curiosity about the world outside had overcome the considerably safer option of remaining behind the veil, and stepping through it again had returned the settlement to invisibility almost immediately. There had been wilderness ahead, an unfamiliar world somewhere beyond it, and for a short while the decision had almost seemed reasonable. Then You met Elara. The rookie knight had noticed the approaching skeleton first and frozen in place. For one brief moment, neither side had moved. Then Elara screamed with enough force to startle everyone around her, including You, whose immediate response had been an equally startled scream. That had been the first point of confusion. Elara’s sword had already been coming free when she stopped. Mirelle had nearly walked into her from behind, Rowan’s shield had risen through what appeared to be pure instinct, and Sylwen had drawn her bow with practiced speed, yet all four had hesitated for the same simple reason. The noise that had come from You hadn’t sounded remotely monstrous. There had been no undead shriek, threatening roar, supernatural hiss, or hollow death-rattle. It had been the completely ordinary sound of someone getting frightened because another person suddenly screamed. Unfortunately, that moment of confusion hadn’t lasted long enough to prevent panic from winning. You ran, the four adventurers followed, and what might have become a conversation instead became a frantic pursuit through the forest. Elara proved distressingly fast in armor, Sylwen had no difficulty keeping pace through the uneven terrain, and even Mirelle and Rowan had remained close enough that simply outrunning the problem wasn’t working particularly well. Eventually, desperation had produced the second point of confusion. While running, You had shouted back that there was no intention of hurting anyone and pleaded with the group to stop chasing. The fact that a skeleton had spoken at all had been shocking enough to disrupt the pursuit, but it wasn’t what finally brought all four adventurers to a stop. Each had understood the words perfectly. For Elara, Mirelle, and Rowan, the plea had been unmistakable Human speech. Sylwen, however, had heard the same meaning spoken naturally in her native Elvish. There had been no awkward accent, imperfect translation, or unfamiliar language somehow becoming comprehensible through context. One voice had spoken, yet every person listening had heard words belonging naturally to the language each understood as their own. That was what had finally ended the chase. Now You stood facing the result, still breathing hard despite having no lungs with which to accomplish the feat. Elara remained visibly frightened, but confusion had prevented her from closing the remaining distance. Mirelle looked as though fear was rapidly being replaced by a desperate need to understand how any of this was possible. Sylwen’s arrow remained ready but undrawn as her eyes searched You for some explanation that appearance alone clearly wasn’t providing. Rowan still held his shield defensively, though the weapon in his other hand had lowered enough to suggest attacking was no longer his first instinct. There were options now. Some were terrible, admittedly, but having terrible options was still an improvement over being chased through the forest by four armed strangers. Talking seemed the most obvious. The strange translation had bought enough hesitation for an explanation, and none of the four appeared eager to restart the fight without understanding what was standing in front of them. If You could convince them that an intelligent skeleton wasn’t necessarily a hostile one, this entire situation might somehow end without anyone being stabbed, burned, shot, or reduced to a pile of scattered bones. Taking them to the hidden settlement was another possibility, though considerably more dangerous. Beyond the magical veil waited undeniable proof that the skeleton standing before them wasn’t the only so-called monster capable of thought, conversation, and ordinary life. It could answer questions that words alone might never satisfy, but bringing four armed adventurers into a hidden village whose inhabitants had presumably concealed themselves for a reason could just as easily transform one misunderstanding into a catastrophe. Running remained the simplest choice. The forest offered plenty of directions, the hidden settlement wasn’t impossibly far away, and another sufficiently determined sprint might eventually lose the group. Then again, Elara had already demonstrated exactly how fast an armored knight could move when sufficiently terrified, and provoking another pursuit might destroy whatever fragile uncertainty currently kept her sword from swinging. Four confused adventurers continued staring at You, waiting for something none of them seemed capable of predicting. Fear hadn’t disappeared; it had merely been interrupted by something stranger, and the longer the silence stretched, the more likely someone was to decide that confusion wasn’t a good enough reason to keep trusting an armed skeleton. For the first time since the encounter began, You had genuine options: try to talk, risk revealing the hidden village, or abandon the entire mess and run again. None guaranteed a good outcome, and each opened a completely different path forward. Yet as Elara’s fingers slowly tightened around the hilt of her sword and Sylwen’s hand shifted almost imperceptibly against the bowstring, one thing became increasingly clear. The speed with which a choice was made might matter considerably more than the choice itself.

Tags: Fantasy Comedy SliceOfLife Adventure Romance Adventurer Knight Mage Guardian Friendship Found Family SlowBurn Multiple AnyPOV MalePOV FemPOV ThirdPerson OpenEnding HappyEnding Humorous Whimsical Cozy

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By: arcanesolutions

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