He strolled out to the nearest firepit a couple tents down. There was that fire. A couple of the guys on watch huddled around it. “Hey–-”
A chill spiked throughout his body. A daemon had stepped out behind the tent in front of him. A skull with empty black eyes, death itself, staring down at him.
“P-ple-p,” he stuttered.
“Shhh.” Death held a boney finger to its fleshless lips, then placed a hand on Jaquis’s shoulder. “This might hurt a little.”
***
The screaming was a bit more than I had anticipated, but fortunately Atan was able to dispatch the other two guards that had appeared with a single swing of his hammer, while the skin of the one in my grip shriveled to its bone.
The paladin hobbled over to me. “Hurry, others would have heard that.”
He needn’t tell me again. I bent over the petrified corpse and placed a hand on his head. My anima twisted with his, snipping his soul from his body, and finalizing his death. Then I uttered the command, “Rise.” Components from my satchel rose in a string of dust, once vials of blood and a human heart, then into a stream of purple energy that twisted down my arm into the corpse’s nostrils. Bright light filled his eyes and gaping mouth. His head twitched, and his jaw snapped from side to side. His arms jerked inward then straight out again, followed by his legs kicking back and forth.
I stood back and watched as this beautiful thrall of mine rose again with purple glowing eyes, a shambling servant of my will.
I had to ask myself: Should an honorable mayor take so much pride in raising the dead as unwilling servants? Well, the undead in question had been a bad guy, so if anything, it was a sort of rehabilitation opportunity to do some good. Besides, his soul was long gone now, this was just a husk really.
“What was that noise?” someone shouted.
Well, better hurry up rehabilitating the others.
===
Jevrick’s Main Quest: Become Mayor of Maplebrook
Side Quest:
- Deal with the Greenfolk Bandits
- Slay Green Thumb
Undead Servants: 3
Bandit Population: 297~
===
“Welcome to a fresh start! This is your opportunity to right your wrongs, to do something with your undeath. Now get out there and rehabilitate yourselves!” I pointed straight at the mobs of bandits charging at us. My three lovely zombies grunted in solidarity, and shambled toward the oncoming wave.
Atan braced his hammer and uttered a prayer. The weapon ignited with holy fire, while a violet smoke wreathed around his body.
A paladin, a necromancer, and three shambling corpses versus an army of bandits; what fun!
Hundreds of the Greenfolk with a variety of sharp killing tools weaved through the tents.
I thrust out my arms and spread out my fingers. Glass bulbs floated from my satchel and swirled into ash that weaved around my hands. Blue darts of aether manifested at the tips of my fingers, growing in an instant from the size of grain to a carrot in shape. Fwoop! The darts launched from my fingers, ten in all, and spun through the darkness and straight into the vanguard of bandits. The darts pierced their line, throwing ten men back to the mud. Another wave came. I fired another volley. The death was instant, blades and hammers flying into the air as another wave of ten men crashed into a heap of bodies and dirt. I had enough components for one more volley, which I deemed to save.
“Fetch me more soldiers!” I commanded my three servants. They grasped the corpses of the fallen and dragged them across the muck.
A third wave of assailants swarmed Atan. I feared he might get totally eclipsed by the frothing fur-covered berserkers. He proceeded to surprise me.
Right as a dozen warriors closed in on him, the paladin charged straight through the right flank of their line—thrusting the top side of his hammer through them like a battering ram. He blitzed straight through the stomach of the farthest bandit, bisecting him in fire and ash. Then he swung the hammer's momentum wide, summoning a ball of crackling energy. The ball arced through the enemy, punching through the chests of one, two, three, four, five more bandits before dissipating.
Now the wave was down to a posse of four men. Atan swung down his hammer into the ground between them, smiting them with an explosion of radiant flame. He then hobbled back toward me.
Powerful! Though his attacks seemed to take more effort than a cast of my Force Darts, he barely seemed winded.
“Well done,” I said.
He exhaled. “A fraction of their numbers.”
“Let’s even those odds a bit.” I pressed my hands down on four bodies beside me, my hands long enough to touch two at a time. The corpses rose to join my contingent—now seven strong. I commanded five of them forward in a reverse ‘V’ formation. I expected the front two to fall to slashing weapons, but the back three would be able to pincer their attackers. My last two follow behind to toss any fresh corpses my way. In the meantime, Atan would have ample space to work in the center of the formation as needed.
Another wave of bandits crashed into my formation, and thus my plan unfolded as I had anticipated. Not only this, but what bodies I could not retrieve were forming into a nice blockade for the next wave.
We fought back three waves of attackers before Atan had to retreat. The poor knight panted heavily, sweat running from his helmet and down his neck.
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We’d cut down a good fifty Greenfolk, but still they came. Why? By all accounts I thought they might flee in fear and confusion. Perhaps they thought there were more of us than there were. My zombies most likely aided that assumption. Or, maybe a religious aspect was at play—some devotion I’d yet to uncover.
I recalled my servants to cover our flanks as warriors closed in on us. I sent out my final volley of Force Darts, piercing the skulls of the front men, which allowed a surprise opening for my zombies to latch on to the back men as their comrades fell suddenly.
The screams of people being devoured alive was serene, giving a sensation unlike any I’d felt before. A twinge of exhilaration filled my chest.
I shook it off. None of that, now.
I’d been counting my use of magic. No more components for Force Darts, and only enough material to raise a handful more thralls, yet still bandits rushed at us. Perhaps I’d severely misjudged Atan’s warning about getting swarmed. We needed a decisive blow to their ranks—we needed to kill their leader. But Green Thumb had yet to reveal himself. I knew on two accounts - the first being my true sight had yet to reveal his name, and second that absolutely none of these thugs were using any form of druidic magic. Was Green Thumb more of a coward than I thought? Or. . . was he simply not here? The revelation stabbed my gut like an arrow—wait, no, that was an actual arrow.
I looked down at my stomach where a fletched shaft had pierced my stomach. I was rather perplexed how the thing had managed to piece my charm’s barrier. I sensed a subtle magical property about it. A mere arrow wouldn’t end me, but it had managed to cut a hole through my fine mayoral coat—and that was unacceptable.
I twisted back to see the archer, the fiend, knocking her next arrow. I ran forward. The arrow flung and pierced through me again, this time through my chest. I reached out a hand. Dark tendrils of magic whipped from my palm and snapped around her arms. Her eyes bulged as the tendrils glowed and writhed, sucking her lifeforce from her and filling me. She withered away, as my body healed of any cracks or dents the arrows might have caused.
“We must retreat!” Atan called out, arrows breaking against his armor. A smokey barrier encompassed him, acting as a sort of gelatin that slowed the projectiles down just before striking him so that they did not pierce his plating.
This was an infuriating ordeal. I had truly hoped to lure Green Thumb out and end this in a single encounter. What would it mean if I pulled back here? I would fail. I would have accomplished nothing than to dwindle the numerous ranks of Maplebrook’s enemies. Green Thumb would likely develop an appetite for retaliation. I could not leave here, not like this. The town counted on me. I needed this to work. But supplies were low, and for some ungodly reason, the bandits were still coming.
What fools these mortals were! Had they not seen us cut down so many of them? Why. . . Wait. . . I looked down to the arm of the archer I’d just dispatched. Her skin bore a similar tattoo as the others, but it bled as though freshly inked. I crouched and pried open the wound. Green dust hid there. A herb perhaps? Was this the ‘unknown effect’ my True Sight noted when looking upon the bandits? Something that was driving them to bloodlust? I needed time to study it. Atan was right, this battle was forgone, for now.
I scraped some of the blood and dust into a vial in my satchel and corked it.
“Ser knight!” I called while consolidating the last of my servants to surround me.
Atan felled another batch of warriors in a slam of energy, then backstepped toward my position. The majority of his smokey barrier had receded, but still clung to his armor. An arrow found a gap in the protection and stuck into his shoulder. The head of his warhammer smashed into the mud as he grabbed the wound.
“Afterlives!” He snapped the shaft and tossed it to the ground.
I sent out three of my last six zombies to shield him. Arrows pelted their frail forms, dropping them to their final death.
There was little time. I spoke the ancient language and drew my hands out to create a portal, a rippling window for our escape. I was first through, and then Atan. I looked at my beautiful servants one last time—the first of the three staring at me with forlorn eyes. I nodded to him, and he nodded back, and he and his brothers stood off against the horde’s final advance, giving me enough time to dispel the portal.
Atan and I stumbled back to the tree line that overlooked the bandit camp. The tents were alive with the horde bandits as they swarmed and yelled vicious cries.
The paladin slumped against a tree and dug out the arrowhead with his knife. He placed a hand on his shoulder and radiance seeped over his wound. “I’ve never known the Greenfolk to be so. . . tenacious.”
I nodded, having pulled out the vial of dust and blood I’d taken. I held it up to the moon for light. Spectacles of the substance swirled in the crimson liquid. “I must research this. Perhaps I can better anticipate their capabilities.”
“Well,” Atan sighed, his wound healed. “Let us pray that lot doesn’t descend on Maplebrook in retaliation. You and I managed to hold them back at our full strength, but we would not be able to stop them before they razed the town.”
“Right. . . at our full strength.” I sighed. “All the more reason we should return in haste and warn the town. Infernos,” I swore. We had not fulfilled our deal to dispatch the Greenfolk for the kobolds, which also meant no diamonds. “Come, we must hurry.” I began to summon another portal, when Kispic hopped out of the brush.
“Dead-dead, yes? Green Thumb gone-gone?” he squealed.
I shook my head. “I’m sorry, little one. But, not to worry, we killed more of them than they killed of us! We will have another shot at this, I swear.”
He looked out at the camp of blood lusted bandits. “Maybe. . . Maybe I help?”
I chattered my teeth. “How would you help, young kobold?”
His big eyes narrowed, and he looked down at his feet.
I pitied the small thing, but also appreciated his offer. I patted his head. “It’s alright, you have done enou—”
“Would this help-help?” he said, raising his belt of materials to me. “I can find-find you more if you need?”
I gingerly took the belt, knowing that at least one of the pouches had held small diamonds, and guessing that the other three might possess equally useful ingredients. “I. . . I’m not sure what to say. Why offer these things so freely?”
Kipsic smiled, his tail wagging. “You fight Greenfolk, you stop pali-man from kill-killing me. You want to help Kobolds, I help too.”
I smiled. “Thank you, little one. Please, you are welcome to accompany us then.”
The creature hopped up and down excitedly.
“Wait a second,” Atan grunted. “The townsfolk will not appreciate a kobold being brought into town. They already revile you.”
“Hmm. Fair enough,” I muttered. “What then would we do?”
Kipsic pointed up a finger—then disappeared.
“Hmm, looks to be solved to me, no?” I said.
Atan sighed. But he did not retort, bested by my kobold companion and my enduring wit no doubt.
So, as a party of three, we journeyed into a safe kobold hovel that Kipsic knew of to rest for a short while and regain our strength. I took the moment to replace my Darksight spell with my Visage spell, and donned my old face. There was an argument that I should unprepare Force Darts, but if I could acquire glass bulbs, then it would be invaluable. Once marginally rested, I ported us back to the road that would lead us to Maplebrook.
***
They huddled around Green Thumb’s snoring body, the dark druid ensnared by dreams. He’d slept through the whole fight. Sixty-four men had died, and their leader was taking a nap.
“You wake him up,” one said to another.
“No way, I’m not getting turned into a sprig,” he responded.
“He needs to know. He’s gotta make those adventurers pay!” a third declared.
The army of bandits all shouted in approval—then Green Thumb snorted and scratched his body-long beard.
The bandits clenched their breath.
But Green Thumb merely rolled over in his fur sleeping sack and continued to snore.
“Maybe we’ll tell him tomorrow.”
“Fine plan.”
“Agreed.”
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