《Undead History》 The Start Of Something Bigger Prologue The battlefield still smoldered. A gray dawn stretched across the hills, the sunlight barely piercing through the thick haze of gunpowder and death. Thousands of bodies lay scattered across the fields. French, Austrian, Russian, piled atop each other in, twisted in their final moments of agony. The crows had already begun their work. The 22 years old Henri Fontaine, an infantryman of the 1er regiment d''infanterie de ligne stepped carefully between the corpses, his musket resting on his shoulder. The winds of December bit through his tattered uniform, sending chills to the skins through the holes on the clothes, but was barely acknowledged by him. His mind was elsewhere, on the locket he now held in his gloved hand. ¡°Gabriel¡­¡± he muttered under his breath. Gabriel had been alive just hours ago, laughing about how the Emperor had outplayed two entire armies with nothing but a bit of fog and audacity. Now, his body lay in the mud, his face half-buried in the bloodied earth. Henri had pulled the locket from his fingers, knowing his friend had meant to send it back home, to a girl waiting somewhere far from the horrors of war... A gust of wind carried the stench of death, making Henri¡¯s stomach turn. He had seen battle before, but Austerlitz¡­ Austerlitz was something else. The screams, the chaos, the moment when a Russian infantryman''s bayonet had rushed toward him, eyes wild with desperation, wanting to take someone''s life before the wounds on his body take his first... He shook his head. No point dwelling on it. He was alive. And the Emperor had won. That''s all that matters... The silence was what disturbed him most now. The battlefield should have been noisy¡ªmen groaning in pain, officers barking orders, the sound of carriages hauling away the wounded. But it wasn¡¯t. It was quiet. Too quiet. The silence was too loud... Too unbareable... But then... A twig snapped. Henri turned sharply, his musket lowering instinctively. A man stood among the dead. No, not a man. Something that had once been one. His coat was Austrian, torn and caked with dried blood. His skin was pallid, his mouth slack. A musket ball had taken half his jaw, yet he stood as if nothing was wrong. His arms twitched unnaturally. Henri took a step back, gripping his weapon tighter. His breath quickened. The man¡ªno, the thing¡ªlifted its head. Those clouded, dead eyes met his. Then it moved. If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement. With a guttural, unnatural groan, it stumbled forward. Its motions were slow, almost clumsy, but it did not stop. Did not falter. Its boots dragged through the mud, leaving streaks of blackened earth in its wake. Henri raised his musket. ¡°Halt! Stay back!¡± No response. "I said stay back! Halt! Or I''ll shoot!" Still no respond. The thing slowly approached him without a care about the musket pointed at it... Panicked, he fired. The shot rang out across the field, echoing over the corpses. The thing stumbled. Its chest exploded in a spray of crimson, its body rocking backward from the impact. And then it stood up. Henri¡¯s blood ran cold. His hands scrambled to reload, but the creature was already lurching toward him, its mouth parting in a silent snarl. The crows overhead cawed, their wings flapping wildly. For the first time since Austerlitz began, the usual fierce Henri Fontaine felt something deeper than fear. He felt horror. __________ Chapter 1 ¡°I¡¯ve seen men survive things they shouldn¡¯t have. But that? That was wrong.¡± Henri sat at the edge of the campfire, rubbing his temples. The regiment¡¯s field camp had been set up outside a ruined farmhouse, just a few miles from the main army. Around him, his comrades talked, drank, and sharpened their bayonets. For them, the battle was over. For him, it wasn¡¯t. ¡°Are you certain it wasn¡¯t just some poor bastard refusing to die?¡± asked Pierre, a fellow infantryman, as he gnawed on a piece of stale bread. ¡°I put a bullet through its chest,¡± Henri said. ¡°It stood back up.¡± A moment of silence. The fire crackled, casting flickering shadows across their weary faces. ¡°Maybe you missed the heart,¡± Pierre said, forcing a chuckle. ¡°Bad aim, Fontaine.¡± Henri shook his head. ¡°I didn¡¯t miss.¡± Before Pierre could respond, a commanding voice cut through the camp. ¡°Soldiers of the Grande Arm¨¦e!¡± Every head turned. A French officer, uniform pristine despite the day¡¯s march, stood atop a wagon, holding a sealed letter. The insignia was unmistakable¡ªthe personal seal of the Emperor himself. ¡°By orders of The Emperor, the 1er R¨¦giment d''Infanterie de Ligne is to advance east! You will march at dawn, securing the road to Bohemia. Intelligence suggests Russian forces are in retreat, but there are reports¡ª...¡± The officer hesitated. His eyes flickered toward the firelight, uncertain. ¡°...¡ªreports of strange occurrences along the way.¡± Henri felt a chill crawl up his spine. Strange occurrences. He tightened his grip on the locket in his pocket. The war wasn¡¯t over. Not yet... "You will march at the first light! So get as much rest as you desire possible before the time comes! Now! As you were!" The officer left afterwards. Everyone came back to what they were doing. But it wasn''t like before... No one spoke a word. They all continued with what they were doing, but their mind was now occupied by the uncertainty from the announcement of the officer. Later on... Everyone went back to their tent. Henri, rested on the beddings, mind wondering... "What the hell was that thing... Strange occurances...?" He was troubled. Troubled of the unexplainable creature he had encountered that afternoon... But he eventually closed his eyes to rest... Whatever it was... It would be explained later... No use spending all night to think about it... __________ The regiment departed at dawn. The snow crunched beneath their boots as they trudged through the frostbitten countryside, muskets slung over their shoulders. A thin fog clung to the trees, muffling their footsteps. No one spoke of the officer¡¯s warning. But Henri could see it in their eyes¡ªthe unease, the glances toward the horizon where the sun barely rose. Hours passed. The first village appeared in front of their eyes. Or rather, what used to be a village. The houses stood hollow, their windows shattered. Doors hung ajar, swaying with the wind. The smell of rot clung to the air. ¡°Mon Dieu¡­¡± Pierre whispered. Corpses littered the streets. Not fresh, but not old either. Their flesh was blackened in places, twisted. Flies buzzed in thick clouds. Henri took a slow step forward. The silence here was even worse than the battlefield. Then he saw it¡ªclaw marks, deep ones, raked across wooden walls. Like something had torn through the homes from the inside. A rustling sound echoed from within a nearby barn. That moment, it was like all of the minds of the whole regiment was on the same thing... Every musket in the regiment was raised at once. Something was inside... Something... Unpleasant... "Things"... Chapter 2 The tension in the air was suffocating. Every musket in the regiment was raised toward the barn, fingers trembling against the triggers. The silence of the abandoned village pressed down on them like a weight, their breath visible in the frigid morning air. Captain ¨¦mile Duroc, the regiment¡¯s only officer, stepped forward. He was a man in his late thirties, his face hardened by years of war, but there was something almost fatherly in the way he held himself. He raised a hand, motioning for the men to lower their weapons. ¡°Steady,¡± he ordered, his voice firm yet calm. ¡°It could be a survivor. A child, perhaps.¡± The soldiers exchanged uneasy glances, but they obeyed. Henri, however, kept his musket half-raised, his body coiled like a spring. His instincts screamed at him that something was wrong. Captain Duroc took slow steps toward the barn, his boots crunching against the snow-covered earth. The large wooden doors loomed before him, slightly ajar, revealing nothing but pitch-black darkness inside. He placed a hand on one of the doors and gently pushed it open. The moment the gap widened, something exploded out of the barn. It moved too fast. A blur of tattered Austrian blue and pale, dead flesh shot forward, knocking Duroc onto his back. A red-eyed soldier, or what had once been a soldier, straddled him, its mouth snapping open to reveal jagged, broken teeth. Duroc barely had time to react¡ªhe raised his arm to shield himself, and the thing bit down savagely on his wrist. He roared in pain. ¡°Mon Dieu! Get it off him!¡± Pierre was the first to react, rushing forward with his bayonet. He thrust the blade into the creature¡¯s side, but it barely seemed to notice. It kept its grip on Duroc, gnawing into his wrist with a sickening squelch. Henri didn¡¯t hesitate. He flipped his musket, gripping it like a club, and swung with all his might. The stock slammed into the thing¡¯s skull with a sickening crunch, knocking it sideways. Duroc scrambled away, clutching his bleeding wrist as the soldiers descended upon the creature. Bayonets and rifle butts struck repeatedly until it stopped moving. If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. The body twitched once more, then went still. Duroc sat up, panting heavily, his sleeve soaked in crimson. ¡°What¡­ what the hell was that?¡± muttered Jacques, one of the younger soldiers, his face pale as a ghost. ¡°An Austrian deserter who¡¯s lost his mind,¡± Pierre said, still trying to catch his breath. ¡°That¡¯s all.¡± Henri wasn¡¯t convinced. He had seen madness before, but this? The way it moved, the way it didn¡¯t react to pain, the way its eyes glowed red¡­ Duroc groaned, pulling his coat tighter over the wound. ¡°Let¡¯s move. There¡¯s nothing left for us here.¡± ¡ª They marched through the snow, passing more villages as the day wore on. Each one told a different story. The second village they found had been burned to the ground. Charred remains of houses still smoked, blackened skeletons of buildings standing like gravestones. Bodies lay scattered in the streets, some missing limbs, others half-buried in the ash. There were no signs of survivors. The third village was eerily intact, but abandoned. Pots of stew sat frozen on tables. Chairs were knocked over. Footprints littered the streets, all leading in one direction¡ªtoward the forest. Whatever had happened, the villagers had left in a hurry. The fourth village was worse. The smell hit them before they saw it. Corpses lined the main road, stripped of clothing and valuables, stacked as if prepared for burial. But no graves had been dug. The doors of the homes were wide open, the interiors ransacked. Bandits, most likely. The soldiers said nothing as they moved on. Finally, as the sun began to set, they stumbled upon something different. A village untouched by war. The houses were intact, smoke curled from chimneys, and in the distance, children played in the snow. It was surreal, like stepping into a world before the war had begun. The villagers regarded them cautiously, eyes wary but not unkind. They spoke little French, but their gestures were warm, offering bread and water. Henri saw no weapons among them, only farmers and their families. The village elder, a graying man named V¨¢clav, stepped forward and greeted Duroc with a respectful nod. He spoke in slow, careful German, a language Duroc understood well enough to converse in. ¡°You have traveled far,¡± V¨¢clav said. ¡°You are welcome to rest here.¡± Duroc nodded. ¡°Thank you. We appreciate your kindness.¡± That night, they gathered in the largest house, a simple but sturdy building with a roaring hearth. Duroc sat at the head of the room, his bandaged wrist resting on the table. The soldiers ate in silence, exhaustion weighing on them. Henri was the first to break the silence. ¡°There¡¯s something out there,¡± he said. ¡°Not just soldiers or bandits. Something else.¡± V¨¢clav¡¯s expression darkened. ¡°You have seen them.¡± The room tensed. ¡°You know of them?¡± Duroc asked. V¨¢clav nodded slowly. ¡°We have heard stories. Some say the dead do not stay dead anymore.¡± The words sent a chill through the room. Henri leaned forward. ¡°You believe it?¡± The elder¡¯s eyes were grim. ¡°I do not know what to believe. But we do not take chances. When we find bodies, we burn them.¡± Silence fell over the group. No one laughed, no one dismissed it. The day¡¯s events had been proof enough. Then, a low groan interrupted the quiet. Duroc clutched his head, sweat dripping down his face. His breath came in ragged gasps. ¡°Captain?¡± Pierre asked, concerned. Duroc exhaled sharply, shaking his head. ¡°It¡¯s just the cold. I¡¯ll be fine.¡± But Henri wasn¡¯t so sure. And as the night dragged on, he couldn¡¯t shake the feeling that something was terribly wrong...