《Accidental Necromancer》


 Chapter 1 - Gross Human Anatomy

    <h4>Chapter 1 - Gross Human Anatomy</h4>


    Do you remember where you were, the day the Earth stood still? The day everything went boom, the old order came crashing down, and everything old was new? The day when magic returned, and all the fancy toys we¡¯d built for ourselves stopped working?


    Of course you do. Everyone who was alive that day remembers it. Probably right down to the moment, right? I¡¯ve heard a thousand of those stories since then. It¡¯s a shared trauma, something we can all collectively agree was absolute shit.


    A lot of folks didn¡¯t live through those first few minutes, hours, and days.


    But enough of us did.


    My experience of the apocalypse was as weird as anyone else¡¯s. I was in school when it all went down. Med school, at the University of Vermont, to be specific. To be more precise, I was in Gross Human Anatomy class, getting ready to slice my way into a cadaver for the first time. Creepy enough vibe for you? Yeah, they make all medical students practice on dead bodies before slicing into living ones.


    Well, they used to, anyway. Nowadays we just have healers, right? But I¡¯m getting ahead of myself in the story.


    I rolled into class dead last. Everyone was looking forward to this for some reason. For me, not so much. It wasn¡¯t that dead things bothered me. Really, it was the opposite. I¡¯d seen enough dead bodies already, so it didn¡¯t have a ton of oomph for me.


    Still, the class would be fun, and our teacher was none other than Dr. Gideon Carver. With a name like that, you¡¯d think he¡¯d be the perfect person to teach this class, and you¡¯d be right: the man had locked down the dissection of human remains for over a decade. On the plus side, that meant he knew this subject cold, and he¡¯d had plenty of experience teaching it.


    On the down side, he had a rep as an asshole, so I needed to watch my mouth around him if I wanted to pass. So far, that hadn¡¯t been an issue. I just had to keep the streak going!


    ¡°Selena, get in here!¡± That was Mark, the Nice Guy in my lab group. It was nice to see him show up; he missed the first two classes, and I wasn¡¯t sure if he was dropping or just not bothering to show until the actual cutting began. Must be the latter.


    ¡°Heya, Mark. Guys.¡± I nodded to the other two students at our table. Karen Looming was blonde, sharp-tongued, and annoying. Alfred Castle was the final member of the team; a close friend of Karen¡¯s, he had a bad habit of believing he was the smartest person in the room, when he rarely if ever was.


    ¡°Glad you made it, Miss Serrano,¡± Dr. Carver called from the front of the room. I flashed him my best smile, but it wasn¡¯t good enough, because it didn¡¯t turn his frown upside-down. He did turn his attention elsewhere, at least, directing the other tables as they prepared to begin the lab.


    Today was basics. We were doing some simple incisions and closures. Cutting and suturing. Easy stuff, really. With six tables and twenty-four students, it was still enough to keep the good doctor busy. Someone was bound to screw something up. Hopefully not me.


    ¡°Selena, you mind if I do the first cut today?¡± Karen asked, her voice saccharine.


    ¡°Sure, no problem,¡± I replied.


    ¡°I¡¯ve been looking forward to getting into Mercutio here,¡± Alfred added. ¡°But you can go first, Karen.¡±This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    I rolled my eyes at the name. Naming dissection subjects was a long-standing tradition. Hell, when we did this in undergrad, it was cats, and everyone had Garfield or Bill or some other popular cat name on the table in front of them. It was a staple part of the class.


    When one of the teams decided to name their guy "Guildenstern," everyone thought it was cool. Then the second group went from there to name their guy "Rosencrantz," and most people got the joke. Because ¡®Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are¡­¡¯


    Either you get it or you don''t. Not gonna spell it out for you.


    All of this was cute and fun, but then my darling team decided they were going to hop on the Shakespeare train by naming our cadaver "Mercutio." Mark wasn''t there to vote against it, and I got overruled. That''s my defense, and I''m sticking to it. So, there we were, about to explore one of the more exciting, if a little over-dramatized, parts of doctor training.


    It was annoying, but fine. I was in this to win it. My diploma was the only thing about medical school that mattered to me. I wasn¡¯t interested in making friends or influencing people. I had a job to do, and I focused wholly on that. The rest of them could all go hang.


    I picked up a scalpel, weighing the instrument in my hand and thinking about where I¡¯d want to make my cut. Even though Karen was the one making the first slices, I figured I could hop in next.


    That turned out to be fortunate.


    When it happened, when the Event went down, nobody was prepared at all. Karen was in mid-cut, making a small incision that Alfred was going to suture back up. Mark was standing there looking stupid, while I tried to pay attention to what our professor was saying as he explained the process. Dr. Carver was droning on talking about the angle of incision, the right pressure to cut just so much, but not deeper than necessary, and other factoids. In fact, everything was exactly the way it had been the day before, and the way nothing ever would be again.


    The first thing everyone noticed was the power going out. The projector showing images on the whiteboard at the front of class died, along with the overhead lights. The next thing we all felt was a moment of intense fear, like something was happening around us or to us that we couldn''t explain. That fear felt primordial, something I feared even though I¡¯d never felt or experienced anything like it.


    The next moment, pain flared in my skull like someone stuck a dagger between my ears. I screamed and almost dropped the scalpel. I couldn''t remember ever feeling pain that intense.


    But as quickly as it arrived, it was gone again. What remained was that feeling that something had changed. Something I had taken for granted forever wasn''t there anymore.


    The quiet was what struck me next. There was no hum from the air conditioning units blowing air into the room. But it was more than that, because I quickly realized there was no noise from outside, either. No cars honking. No engines racing. It was like the beating heart of modern society had just turned off.


    I pulled my iPhone from my pocket, but it wouldn''t power on. I slipped it back into the pocket, wondering what the hell was going on. I knew for sure my phone was charged. For it to fail so completely, that implied whatever this was, it was a lot bigger than a power outage. I started thinking over possible reasons, but none of them were good. Had we been hit by an EMP?


    ¡±Is anyone''s phone working?" I asked. If it was just mine, that was a lot better for all of us. If all the phones were out, that was extra bad news.


    While I''d been recovering from my migraine, I wasn''t paying attention to what the rest of my classmates were doing. As I glanced around the room, I realized most of them were holding their heads. A few lay on the classroom floor where they¡¯d fallen, only now starting to climb back to their feet. Everyone in the room had the same brief migraine experience I had, Carver included.


    Uh-oh. That wasn''t good. I didn''t have to be a full doctor to know that an entire room full of people all coming down with the same symptom at the same time was not a great thing. Was this some kind of an attack? Had we been hit by radiation? Or something worse?


    I turned to the professor. "Doctor, what the hell is happening?"


    "I don''t know. We should call¡ª"


    He was cut off by someone screaming behind me. It was more of a shriek, really, and it ended with a gurgling sound that just enhanced the creep factor. I whirled in place and managed to pivot in time to see our cadaver, Mercutio, sitting up the table while he held Karen with both arms, chewing on her neck.


    Whoever said that Gross Human Anatomy would be boring?

 Chapter 2 - Rosencrantz, get him!

    <h4>Chapter 2 - Rosencrantz, get him!</h4>


    Yeah, that officially locked down first place as the ¡®weirdest thing I''d ever seen.¡¯ Mercutio was now sitting upright, making growling noises as he dug his chompers deeper into poor Karen''s neck. His skin hadn''t changed; he still looked about the same as he had before all this happened: naked, pale, and very dead. But for whatever reason, our med school project had turned into a genuine zombie.


    Fortunately, I had seen more than a few zombie movies. Almost by reflex, I knew what to do. The scalpel was still in my hand. I took it and stabbed Mercutio solidly in the temple, as hard as I could. It wasn''t as easy as I''d thought, punching through. My first blow sort of glanced off. It got the zombie''s attention, though. It unlatched itself from Karen, which caused a fountain of blood to splash all over the lab table before she slumped to the floor. Mercutio was looking at me like I was the Chef¡¯s Special. I figured I had a couple seconds before he made a lunge at my throat next.


    So I stabbed again, this time putting my back into it a little bit more. This time, the blade punched through his skull, solidly embedding itself in the tissue beneath. I shoved it in all the way to my fist, and the blade snapped off inside the thing''s head as it turned to face me.


    According to the movies, that should have taken it out. Unfortunately, this zombie hadn''t seen the same movies I had. It took the blow and kept coming at me, sluggish but consistent. Next thing it did was sort of flop over in my general direction. It was still seated on the table, and didn''t seem to have complete control of its muscles. Maybe that was something that would improve with time? I didn''t want to find out!


    As the thing tipped itself toward me, I scooted sideways, doing my best to dodge out of the way. Instead of landing on top of me, the zombie grabbed my lab coat with both hands as he fell off the table onto the floor, dragging me along with him. I fell hard on top of the monster, and I admit it, I screamed.


    Don''t look at me that way. You would have, too.


    I was fresh out of weapons, my scalpel a useless piece of plastic. Wait¡ªI still had my cell phone! I whipped the thing out of my pocket, transferred it to my left hand, and proceeded to start bashing the thing in the head right where I''d wounded it with the scalpel. Bone splintered and broke as I hammered the creature with repeated blows. I hammered the iPhone into it over and over as the monster thrashed on the floor beneath me.


    Finally, something I did must have had an effect, because the creature just stopped moving. All at once it collapsed like its strings had just been cut. I heaved a huge sigh of relief, panting from the exertion.


    My cell phone was trashed. There were bits of brain all over it, and the screen and back plate were both shattered as well. I dropped the useless thing on the floor.


    I''d done a number on the zombie''s skull, too. The small hole from my scalpel was now a much larger hole, with a lot of messy edges and what looked like some brain matter showing. Gross. But at least it wasn''t moving anymore! I slipped as I tried to get myself back to my feet, and my hand landed hard on the zombie''s sternum. It felt cold, almost unnaturally so. And I realized with a start that there something was under my palm which hadn''t been there before.


    Without thinking, because if I''d thought for ten seconds, I might have left well enough alone, I scooped the object under my palm up and glanced at it. To my surprise, it was a small, black crystal, the sort you might see at a New Age shop. It was tiny. Maybe the size you would use for a dangly earring or something.


    But I didn''t get to stare at it for very long, because as I did, the crystal vanished. It didn''t just disappear. It literally sank into my palm before I could even reach over with my other hand to scrape it off. And as the crystal vanished, it left something behind, inside my head.


    A rush of new thoughts flooded my mind. They felt like memories. But it was difficult to call them memories, since this wasn''t even close to anything I''d directly experienced. It was like new knowledge, unfolding in my brain without me having to do anything at all. Any other time, learning like this would have been awesome. I¡¯d have killed for a crystal that magically taught me everything I needed to know to pass my next exams, for instance. This wasn¡¯t like that.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    Alongside the memories, I got an image in my mind of an elaborate network of swirling energy. In the center were five ¡®sockets,¡¯ all interconnected. One socket was now filled with a small black stone, while the other four looked¡­weird. Like they ought to be able to fit a similar stone, but were blocked. I felt like I needed to do something to unlock them.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black stone - Control Undead


    Point 2: X


    Point 3: X


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    I wanted to be able to stand up and shout to the world, ¡®I know Kung Fu!¡¯ or something else comparably cool. But the crystal didn''t give me any practical, real-world skills like that. Instead, supposedly, the memories I''d been given taught me how to ¡®Control Undead.¡¯


    Which would have been really useful, a few minutes earlier. But the zombie was dead, and I was hoping to never run into another one again...


    My first glance around the room told me that hope was in vain. Mercutio hadn''t been the only zombie to wake up. All of them had. Plus, Karen was now shambling around the room as well, chasing poor Alfred even after her demise. It looked like at least two students from other groups had fallen in the initial assault, and then risen again to join the fun.


    Zombies were real. Was there any chance the magic spell that crystal thing supposedly taught me was real, too? It was worth a shot. The nearest zombie was Rosencrantz. He was menacing Dr. Carver, backing him into a corner. I stretched out my hand toward Rosencrantz, reaching deep inside myself for that well of power those memories said was sitting there waiting for me to use it.


    At first, nothing happened. But then I felt something connect inside me, almost like it clicked. All at once, wisps of black energy sprang from my fingertips, reaching out like tendrils toward the zombie. As soon as the first tendril touched it, Rosencrantz stopped moving. He just stood there like a statue as the other wisps of whatever the smoke-like black stuff wrapped themselves around him.


    Then in a flash, he was mine.


    I felt it the second it happened. One moment, the zombie was an enemy and a threat. The next, I knew intuitively that it would do whatever I asked. Rosencrantz was mine now. He was my servant, bound to my will. Mine to order and command. Or that¡¯s what the crystal¡¯s pseudo-memories said, anyway. It was time to put that to a test.


    ¡°Rosencrantz, come to me,¡± I told it.


    The zombie did as I asked. It strode swiftly to my side, and then stood there waiting for more orders.


    ¡°How were you doing that?¡± Carver asked.


    I shook my head at him. ¡°I''m not sure, myself!¡±


    He got over his fear quickly enough and joined me in staring at the now-passive zombie. ¡°Fascinating. Can you control more than one? How did you do this?¡±


    I held up my palm, like that explained everything¡ªwhich of course, it didn¡¯t. I shook my head and pointed at Mercutio¡¯s body. ¡°Hard to explain. When I took down that zombie there, a crystal appeared. When I picked it up, it was sucked into my palm. Now I can ¡®Control Undead,¡¯ apparently. Just one, though, at least according to the memories the crystal gave me.¡±


    ¡°Fascinating!¡± he repeated. ¡°We should experiment some more once we can. For now¡ªwatch out!¡±


    That last was because another of the zombies was headed our way. This wasn¡¯t a cadaver; it was one of the students, a guy I only knew by his last name, Stevens. Like Karen, the zombie had gone for his throat, and he¡¯d come back as a zombie. Didn¡¯t take long, it seemed.


    Again, I¡¯d watched enough movies to know that was bad news. If the zombies busted out of this room, they¡¯d kill other people who would come back as zombies themselves, and next thing you knew we¡¯d all be extras in a new version of ¡®The Walking Dead.¡¯


    Most of my classmates were either dead or fled. Alfred was still alive, trying to keep a table between himself and Zombie Karen. A trio of med students stood in one corner using stools to fend off the two zombies trying to get at them. All around the lab, little dramas were played out, and unfortunately it didn¡¯t look like the students were winning.


    Zombie Stevens was still making a bee-line for me.


    ¡°Rosencrantz, get him!¡± I called out. My zombie lurched immediately into motion, staggering forward to attack Zombie Stevens. I didn¡¯t know if he¡¯d be able to beat it solo, but it took the pressure off us. I needed to get some more people on board with stopping this menace here and now, or we were screwed.


    ¡°Doctor, we need to stop them from getting out,¡± I said.


    ¡°I¡¯m game, but how?¡±


    ¡°Go for the head. Worked on that one,¡± I replied, pointing. ¡°But it takes more than a couple of hits.¡±


    Most of the dissection tools were small and not very adapted to this sort of thing, so I grabbed one of the wooden stools, picked it up, and smashed it to the ground hard enough to shatter. There was one good chunk about two feet long with a pointed end. I snatched that up, and handed another clunkier piece of broken wood to Carver.


    ¡°If they get out of this room, how many new zombies are they going to create? We have to stop this.¡±


    He nodded, taking the club. ¡°Let¡¯s go, then.¡±

 Chapter 3 - Zombies, I think?

    <h4>Chapter 3 - Zombies, I think?</h4>


    Rosencrantz grappled with Zombie Stevens, the two more or less matched, which made sense. Stevens kept trying to lunge past Rosencrantz, but couldn¡¯t, not with my zombie¡¯s arms locked down on him. Pinning Stevens in place was enough to keep me safe, but I was going to have to do something more permanent if I wanted to end the threat for good.


    Could I do that? I looked down at the chunk of stool leg in my hand. It ought to be enough to take down a zombie, but¡­ I found it was one thing to smack my phone into a cadaver come to life, and entirely another to do the same thing to a fellow student. I made as if to take a swing, but then I froze. I couldn¡¯t do it.


    What if it was curable? Mind, I didn¡¯t think it likely was. The zombie that turned Stevens had done an extraordinary amount of damage to the front of his throat. He was definitely dead.


    But was dead even dead, now? I¡¯d been attacked by a zombie and then I cast a spell to control another zombie. Maybe there was other magic, too? Something that could restore Stevens? My thoughts raced as I struggled to come up with some way to capture him instead of killing him¡­again.


    Before I could think of anything, Carver stepped in, swinging the club I¡¯d handed him like he was trying to bat a home run in baseball. He hit solidly, then swung again. The second blow cracked something inside Stevens¡¯ skull, and the chunk of wood sticking out the side of his club embedded itself in the zombie¡¯s skull. Carver yanked it free with a nasty slurping sound.


    It went down like a pile of bricks, sagging in Rosencrantz¡¯s grasp.


    ¡°Drop it,¡± I told my zombie, who obeyed, dumping the corpse on the floor. I turned to Carver. ¡°You think there¡¯s any way we can save the students who¡¯ve been turned?¡±


    Carver glanced toward Karen, still threatening a terrified Alfred. If we didn¡¯t get her off him soon, he was going to be another zombie. He looked back at me and shook his head. ¡°Too much damage. Too much risk trying to contain them, too. We need to tend to the living now.¡±


    I nodded, understanding. He was only saying what my gut already told me. The dead were dead. Well, unless they were undead, but then the best bet was to make them dead again, so it was close to the same thing in the end. If we later found a way to restore people, we could do something about it in the future. For the time being, we needed to keep people alive.


    ¡°Ah, look!¡± Carver said, holding up another tiny black crystal in his hand. Like it had for me, it vanished, sinking into his fingers. His eyes went vacant for a moment, his mouth slack, as the gem poured whatever memories it contained into him.


    ¡°Control Undead?¡± I guessed, but I was wrong.


    He shook his head. ¡°No. This one is Animate Dead. Watch!¡±


    He waved a hand over Stevens¡¯ body and black tendrils poured from his fingertips. They dipped down toward the former zombie, spiraling about it and sinking beneath the skin. For a long moment nothing happened, and I wondered if maybe you couldn¡¯t animate the same dead body twice.


    But then the fingers moved.


    That was followed by Stevens clambering back to his feet. I readied my club, just in case he attacked, but the new zombie did nothing of the sort. He just stood there, facing his creator and waiting for instructions.


    ¡°You can command him?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Seems so,¡± Carver replied. He pointed at Karen and told it, ¡°Go stop that zombie!¡±


    Zombie Stevens took off at a brisk walk, heading right for where Karen stood. She¡¯d finally worked her way around the table and had both arms locked on Alfred¡¯s left forearm, trying to drag it into her mouth while he screamed bloody murder. It was understandable, I guess. His girlfriend was trying to eat him, after all, and not in a fun way.


    I headed toward the pair of zombies pinning my classmates in the far corner of the lab. Two was going to be tough. As soon as I got their attention, they¡¯d probably come after me, same as the first one had when I stabbed it. I had to make the blows count.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.


    One of the zombies up ahead was Guildenstern, ironically. It felt almost poetic as I gave my next order. ¡°Rosie, grab Guildenstern. Don¡¯t let him get away or hurt anyone.¡±


    My zombie rushed ahead, staggering into Guildenstern¡¯s back and reaching around to grab both his arms. That gave him enough leverage that he¡¯d pretty much locked the other zombie down. The other one, a cadaver I hadn¡¯t caught the name of, turned and bit my zombie in the shoulder. I felt the injury as it happened. Not as pain, per se. But I was aware of the damage done to my creation.


    ¡°Hey! You leave Rosie alone!¡± I shouted as I rushed forward, club in hand. No holding back, this time.


    I slammed the club into the side of the zombie¡¯s head as hard as I could. It wobbled on its feet, almost going down but not quite. Then it turned toward me, that gaping maw of teeth opening as wide as a human mouth could. It lunged forward, and all I could think about was keeping those teeth away from me. I stabbed upward desperately with the sharp, broken end of my club.


    The point went right into its mouth, and its forward rush impaled it on the spike. The zombie staggered and I watched the ¡®aliveness¡¯ vanish from its eyes. It sank to its knees, dragging my weapon down with it.


    I had to put a hand on its forehead to get enough leverage to recover my weapon. When I did, another crystal popped into my palm. I snatched it up, hoping for something useful. That animate spell the professor got was way more interesting than my Control Undead spell.


    Like before, this was another black gem. Same size, same color. It sank into my palm, and more memories flooded me.


    It was the same spell. I¡¯d gotten a second copy of the Control Undead gem. But somehow getting a second copy did something new anyway. The new memories were more than a simple repeat of the first set. This time, there was more context, more information.


    A vision unfolded in my mind, showing the two gems coming together and merging into a new, slightly larger black stone. I knew intuitively that I could now control twice as many undead as before. Better still, I knew that I could do this again¡ªmerge more stones. Two more Control Undead stones would enable me to merge them all into an even larger crystal with greater power.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black stone (Tier 2) - Control Undead


    Point 2: ?


    Point 3: X


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    How many stones could I have? I wasn¡¯t clear on that, but there seemed to be a limit, and it wasn¡¯t especially high. I¡¯d been able to add a second stone because it was the same as the first one, and now it felt like that had opened up a second spot, so I could add a new type of spell, if I found one. That was good information to have.


    But I needed to count my money later, and worry about the fight for now. I turned toward the pair of zombies struggling beside me and cast Control Undead for the second time. Black tendrils of what had to be magic curled out from my fingertips, wreathing Guildenstern with energy. The magic sank into his body, and then all at once, he was mine, too.


    ¡°Rosie, Guildenstern, stand guard,¡± I told them. They both obediently turned to face the rest of the room, and I went to deal with the students I¡¯d just rescued. It was two men and a woman, all of them looking terrified.


    ¡°How did you do that?¡± one of the guys breathed. ¡°You can control them?¡±


    I didn¡¯t see any sense in hiding data here. We were all in this together, at least for the time being. ¡°If you kill one, then touch it, a crystal will appear. They give you some sort of power. Dr. Carver got one too.¡±


    A quick glance over my shoulder told me Carver was still doing all right. He¡¯d taken out Zombie Karen with a combination of his zombie and his club, and it looked like he was trying to calm Alfred down.


    ¡°What are they?¡± the woman in front of me asked.


    ¡°Zombies, I think?¡± I shrugged. ¡°They got Stevens and Looming.¡±


    ¡°Oh shit,¡± the man who¡¯d been silent said. He held up an arm with a bite mark on it. ¡°Am I screwed?¡±


    I shook my head, worried but unsure. ¡°I don¡¯t know, dude. I can say these aren¡¯t traditional TV zombies. I stabbed one in the head with a scalpel, but it didn¡¯t go down. Took beating it in the head with my phone to finish it. Stevens and Looming turned, but I don¡¯t know if that¡¯s because they were bitten, or because they died.¡±


    He didn¡¯t look terribly relieved. ¡°I am so dead. So, so dead.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d give it a while to see before you give up,¡± I told him. ¡°Would suck to assume you¡¯re a dead man walking and do something dumb. Figure while you¡¯re alive, there¡¯s probably hope.¡±


    Then I looked around. We¡¯d curtailed the immediate problem. Carver had Karen¡¯s zombie animated as well; he must have gotten a second copy of the same gem, just like me. It was creepy as heck watching two classmates shamble around as dead bodies, but then, it was also creepy having two naked zombies in front of me. I really needed to get them clothes, stat.


    I did a head count. Both humans-turned-zombie were accounted for. Everyone still in the room was rescued. Most of the class had fled when things went crazy. I had Rosencrantz and Guildenstern beside me, and I¡¯d smashed Mercutio pretty solidly.


    But there had been six tables. With six cadavers.


    Which meant three of them had escaped with the fleeing students.


    Some days, it just wasn¡¯t worth getting out of bed¡­!

 Chapter 4 - Here They Come

    <h4>Chapter 4 - Here They Come</h4>


    I headed over toward Dr. Carver, my zombies in tow. They were docile, but I wasn¡¯t sure what would happen if one of the other students panicked and attacked them. Would they stand there and be beaten apart, or fight back? Either answer wasn¡¯t good, so I kept them close. Carver was doing the same as he went toward one of the large windows to peer outside.


    Alfred stood there sobbing and holding one hand clutched against his chest. The fingers were bleeding; I could guess what probably happened.


    ¡°Karen get you?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± he managed to say between sobs. ¡°I¡¯m dead. I am so dead.¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°I wouldn¡¯t be so sure. Yeah, the people they killed came back, but these aren¡¯t movie zombies. This is something different. Get yourself together.¡±


    I¡¯m not sure if he even heard what I was saying. The guy was already pretty far gone into his fear. I brought my thoughts back to where I was, what I had to do next. It was the only way to stay sane in a crazy situation like this.


    Carver came over to join us. ¡°You should look outside.¡±


    ¡°Why?¡±


    ¡°Just take a quick look,¡± he replied.


    I wasn¡¯t sure what it was he wanted me to see, but he was insistent. And he was my teacher. I went to the window and looked out.


    The world had gone insane.


    A group of short, green-skinned creatures chased a pack of students across the quad. What looked like one of our escaped cadavers was out the too, gnawing on something. Nearby, a police car was on fire. No sign of the officers who¡¯d been in the car.


    In the distance, smoke rose from various parts of the city. I saw one tall apartment building wreathed in flames, but there was no sign of firemen coming to put it out.


    ¡°We can¡¯t expect a rescue, can we?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Whatever this is, it¡¯s widespread,¡± he replied. ¡°I think we¡¯re on our own.¡±


    ¡°Doctor, three of the cadavers got away. They¡¯re outside, somewhere,¡± I said.


    He looked around, surprised, but did quick mental math and nodded. ¡°We should go after them, yes? They¡¯ll have more crystals.¡±


    I was more thinking that if we didn¡¯t go after them, they¡¯d kill more people and turn them into zombies too, but I¡¯d take whatever answer got me some backup. ¡°I think we should, yeah. You with me?¡±


    ¡°Lead the way.¡±


    His zombies made me more nervous than mine. Part of that was probably the magic connecting me with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. I knew, intuitively, that they¡¯d do as I asked and not work against me. It was creepy, watching the other zombies. Doubly so because Carver¡¯s zombies had been classmates. I didn¡¯t know Stevens well, and Karen was a bitch. But watching them walk around like this just felt¡­wrong.


    On the other hand, my zombies had their own issues. Like, they were naked, for one thing. At least Carver¡¯s zombies had clothes on. Mine were walking sexual harassment. I dashed over to a cabinet where a bunch of assorted supplies were stored and liberated two hospital johnnies. It wasn¡¯t perfect, but fitting those on the zombies at least made them seem a little less weird.


    ¡°Okay, we should go,¡± I said. He nodded, clearly amused at my antics, and gestured again for me to lead the way. I ordered my zombies out into the hall. Much to my dismay, Rosie opened the door without any trouble at all. Bad news for Team Human.


    The hall outside was dark. No lights and an afternoon sun meant things were only going to get blacker from here. Noise from another room down the hall got my attention, so I headed that way with caution. Could be student survivors; might be one of the escaped zombies.This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    I got to the doorway and peeked inside, then hurriedly pulled back. That wasn¡¯t one zombie. There were ten of the things in there, all wandering around aimlessly. I was lucky none of them had spotted me. I padded my way back up the hall to where Carver stood as quietly as I could.


    ¡°There¡¯s ten of them in there,¡± I said, keeping my voice low.


    ¡°Ten zombies? That¡¯s an alarming reproductive pace,¡± he replied. ¡°Were any of them the cadavers?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°One was.¡±


    ¡°So the other two are still elsewhere. It worries me that wherever they are, they could be continuing to grow their numbers. But I don¡¯t think splitting up is wise, in this case. We should attempt to attack them together.¡±


    ¡°Never split the party,¡± I agreed. I wasn¡¯t sure about attacking, though. ¡°Couldn¡¯t we just close the door and bar it somehow? Let the police deal with this when they get here?¡±


    In spite of what I¡¯d seen outside, I still had hope. I figured for sure, someone would have gotten word out about all this and by now there would be reinforcements on their way. The police. The National Guard. The Army. Someone would be coming. I still had no clue what had happened; but that¡¯s how the world worked. Disasters happened, but then heroes showed up and saved the day.


    Carver shook his head. ¡°There are windows in those rooms. Even if we could somehow block the door, eventually something outside the windows will catch one of their eyes, and it¡¯ll smash its way out. Then the others will follow. Besides, so far each zombie we killed has had a crystal, right? The more of those we get, the better armed we¡¯ll be for fighting off the others once we find them.¡±


    It made sense. We hadn¡¯t attacked more than a few of the things at a time yet, but now there were two of us and four zombies on our side. Ten enemy zombies was a lot, but I had hope that we might be able to handle it.


    ¡°Okay, I¡¯m in.¡±


    Carver smiled. ¡°Remind me to give you an A, if we survive this and classes resume. I think this constitutes sufficient extra credit.¡±


    I laughed, and he joined in. That was apparently a little louder than we should have been. Something in the room down the hall crashed down, and then the door slammed fully open. One of the fresh zombies stood there, looking down the corridor toward us. It let out a hissing sound and then came stumbling our way.


    More zombies boiled out into the hallway behind it. The fight was on!


    ¡°Rosie, Guildie, protect me,¡± I called out. Both of my zombies responded immediately, stepping forward to stand between me and the approaching band. Yeah, all ten of the monsters spilled out into the hall. Clearly pack creatures. When one got interested in something, the rest tended to head that way as well. I filed that away for future reference.


    Carver gestured, and his zombies settled into a defensive position in front of him as well. Guess I didn¡¯t need the verbal commands? I¡¯d have to try that.


    ¡°I¡¯ll help, too,¡± Alfred said, coming up behind us. He''d wrapped a jacket tightly around his left arm like a shield, and held another chunk of broken classroom stool in his right. ¡°I don¡¯t know if I¡¯m a dead man walking or what, but while I¡¯m breathing, I¡¯ll fight.¡±


    The other three students, the ones I¡¯d rescued, were hiding inside the lab room, staring out at us through the window in the door. It didn¡¯t look like they were going to be much help.


    I rapped Alfred¡¯s stick with mine. ¡°Good to have you.¡±


    ¡°Here they come!¡± Carver warned.


    Then the front rank of zombies hit our zombies, and everything got crazy fast.


    Our zombies acted like a blocking line. They basically took one approaching zombie out of the fight, each. Since the front rank was four zombies, that worked out really well for us. They immobilized all of them. But the rank right behind those was another four zombies, and they were coming up fast. If we didn¡¯t take down the frontrunners quickly, we¡¯d get overwhelmed.


    I darted in, stabbing the nearest zombie in the chest with the pointed part of my club. The weapon went in, the weapon went out, but I couldn¡¯t tell if it actually did any real damage. Was I hurting them? Did it have to be a head shot? That was going to be a lot harder, since the creature¡¯s head was so close to Rosie¡¯s.


    Trusting my gut, I went for the body again. I stabbed three more times, and it finally went down. I ordered Rosie to grab the next one¡ªjust in time, because it was closing in fast! Another zombie came rushing at me, this one a young woman who¡¯d had a messy enough death it made me blanch.


    She was my age or so, blonde, and covered with blood. It wasn¡¯t a pretty sight. I got the club horizontal just as she reached me, slamming it into her open mouth before she could chomp down on my face. Her teeth closed on the wood, leaving dents behind. These things bit hard! She almost yanked my weapon straight out of my hands, but I held on.


    ¡°Little help here!¡± I called out, but there was none to be had. The others were already heavily engaged as well, the second line hitting us in force.


    I lashed out with my legs while I kept it at bay with the weapon in my hands. Snapping out one kick after another, I hammered blows in against its knee. These weren¡¯t sensible shoes, either; I was wearing Docs. Those steel toes had enough hitting power that I figured I could do some serious damage.


    Maybe I needed some martial arts training¡ªwhere¡¯s the crystal that would teach me kung fu?¡ªbecause my right leg got worn out before her knee gave. I switched legs; this time, it only took three more blows before something gave out inside the zombie¡¯s knee, and she went down. Her mouth opened as she fell, like she was surprised. That gave me full control of my weapon again.


    I spun the club around, aiming the pointy end down, and drove it into her open mouth. End of zombie.


    But there were still more of them closing on me. This fight was nowhere close to won.

 Chapter 5 - Crystal Clear

    <h4>Chapter 5 - Crystal Clear</h4>


    I reached down and tapped the fallen zombie on the forehead. A new crystal instantly appeared, but it wasn''t black like the others had been. Instead, this one was clear. I picked it up, wondering what it would do. Was it a different kind of crystal? Maybe a different sort of spell?


    As expected, the thing sank into my hand, feeding me a new burst of memories. It wasn''t a spell this time, or not like Control Undead had been. This was something different. Somehow, the crystal was making me faster, able to move better. It was like I could feel new energy thrumming through my muscles. The same image I¡¯d seen before appeared, now with a second crystal.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black stone (Tier 2) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear stone (Tier 1) - Agility


    Point 3: X


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    It hadn''t magically transformed me into an Olympic gymnast, but I was way faster than I had been a moment before. As another zombie came at me I dodged nimbly out of the way. A move like that would¡¯ve dropped me on my ass not long ago, so I¡¯d take it.


    I swung the stool leg like a baseball bat, slamming the zombie in the chest and knocking it back a step. It responded by raising both hands like it was going to lunge at me, so I took a step back, planted my feet, and set the pointy end of my weapon toward it like a small spear.


    It rushed forward, impaling itself on my weapon. That was enough to take it down, thank god, but it crashed into me in the process, sending me staggering back a foot. Between the shove and its weight, I lost my weapon, still embedded in the monster as it slumped to the floor.


    I needed that back, badly! Even with my added speed, without a weapon I was a sitting duck. It took everything I had to roll the zombie over¡ªit was dead weight, and the guy had clearly loved pizza too much.


    As I rolled the thing over, another crystal appeared. I snatched it up. This one was pure black again. But, though I held it in my hand, it wasn''t sinking into my skin like the other crystals had. In the back of my mind, some of those memories the crystals gave me came briefly to the surface. Each intelligent being could only hold a certain number of mana crystals. That number was set by the highest rank of crystal they had embedded. Since I had merged two crystals to form a second tier one, that meant I could have two of the things, but not a third. I wouldn''t be able to have a third crystal until I managed to get one of the spells to tier three.


    All of this flashed past my mind''s eye in under a second. It was weird; like something I had always known, even though I knew full well that was impossible. Whether these things were really magic, or just some sort of technology that was so insane it might as well be magic, I didn''t know. Either way, the effect was the same.


    I shoved the spare crystal in my pocket. There would be time to experiment later, and I needed to figure out whether I could unseat one of the things so that I could slot in a new one. Something told me that was possible, but I didn''t know exactly how.


    The other two monsters on my side of the hall were still both engaged by my zombies. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were doing a good job of keeping their targets pinned down. How about Alfred and Carver?


    There was a shriek to my left. I whirled, moving so fast I almost turned too far. That was going to take some getting used to.


    Alfred was in deep trouble. The zombie he''d been fending off with his bat had finally gotten his claws and teeth around the chunk of wood. It was all Alfred could do to keep it from wrenching the weapon out of his hand. Meanwhile, the other one was no longer satisfied to chew on his leather jacket. It had a hold of his shirt with both hands now, and was slowly inching its teeth closer to his throat while he struggled to push it away with just one arm.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    He wasn¡¯t going to last more than another minute if I didn''t do something. I dashed forward, my club cranked up against my shoulder, and then I let it go.


    The swing was perfect. With my speed boost, the weapon was moving twice as fast as I could have managed before. It hit the zombie in the head with a meaty THWACK, shattering the skull and sending the monster into a crumpled mess on the hallway floor. With his weapon free again, Alfred quickly beat the other zombie about the head and shoulders, making it stagger backward. He had some breathing room again.


    Alfred glanced my way. ¡°Thanks!¡±


    ¡°No problem,¡± I gasped out. I was already winded. Clearly, I should have been doing more cardio to prepare for the apocalypse!


    I reached down and tapped the ankle of the zombie I had just killed. Another crystal popped into my hand; clear again, this time. It was technically my kill, so I didn''t think this counted as loot stealing.


    Carver had taken down a second zombie, which meant all he had left were the two that his animated zombies had locked down. I was in the same boat, so I turned back toward my guys to back them up.


    With Rosie holding the first zombie at bay, taking it down was a breeze. The agility crystal gave me enough extra freedom of movement and oomph behind my blows that I killed it without too much trouble.


    ¡°Rosie, help Guildenstern out,¡± I said. The zombie turned to help his ¡®brother,¡¯ lashing out with claws and teeth at the zombie Guildenstern had locked down.


    Meanwhile, I tapped the fallen one and snagged another crystal. It was starting to seem like every monster we killed dropped one, which was fortunate, because I had the sense we were going to want a lot of these things. Like, those crystals were giving me serious ¡®gotta catch them all¡¯ vibes. It was clear that gathering a good collection of the things was vital to survival.


    This crystal was also clear. By the time I stood back up, my zombies had torn their opponent up enough that it wasn¡¯t moving anymore.


    ¡°Enough,¡± I called out. Alfred and Carver had taken out the other zombies, so I ordered them to ¡°Guard me.¡±


    They moved into a watchful pose beside me while I reached down and tapped the zombie they¡¯d killed. I wasn¡¯t sure if it would drop something, since I hadn¡¯t technically administered the killing blow. Would it still work?


    Another black crystal popped into my hand. I added it to the others in my pocket. Damn, but those were going to be valuable. More important than cash or gold, that¡¯s for sure. I¡¯d managed to collect seven of the things, which felt like a small fortune. Keeping them safe was going to get tricky.


    As I stood I saw Carver looting his last zombies. I looked over at Alfred who leaned against the wall, looking pale and panting.


    ¡°You okay?¡± I asked him. He nodded. ¡°You loot your zombie kill yet?¡±


    He shook his head. ¡°No, I didn¡¯t. Wasn¡¯t thinking. Looting? I feel like I¡¯m in Baldur¡¯s Gate.¡±


    ¡°No shit,¡± I replied. He wasn¡¯t wrong. This was some wild and crazy stuff.


    I watched with curiosity as he leaned in and gently tapped the zombie he¡¯d killed on the forehead. A crystal popped out¡ªclear. He picked it up and it soaked into his hand just like all the others. His eyes glazed over for a moment as the crystal gave him whatever gift it was designed to deliver.


    ¡°What did you get?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Strength,¡± he replied. He flexed an arm. ¡°It doesn¡¯t look any different.¡±


    ¡°Those clear ones seem to impact something about our bodies. I got one, made me faster and more agile,¡± I told him.


    ¡°Interesting. I found only black crystals on mine,¡± Carver said. ¡°Unfortunately, I can only slot two of the things.¡±


    ¡°Me too,¡± I told him. I figured I didn¡¯t need to explain the reason behind it. He¡¯d absorbed crystals, so they¡¯d probably told him the same things they had me. ¡°We all okay to move on? I think we need to keep going. This is one of the cadavers, but there¡¯s still two missing.¡±


    ¡°We should, but with caution,¡± Carver replied. ¡°When I looked out the window, zombies were clearly not the only threat. The longer whatever this is goes on, the more dangerous things are going to be, especially if there are other varieties of monster running about.¡±


    ¡°Agreed. Lead on, Doctor?¡± I asked.


    He flashed me a winning smile. ¡°I think we ought to have our minions do that for us, don¡¯t you?¡±


    With a gesture, he ordered his zombies to set off down the hallway ahead of us. Then he turned back to me. ¡°Order yours to watch our rear, will you Miss Serrano?¡±


    ¡°You got it,¡± I replied. I opened my mouth to give the order, but remembered that Carver was commanding his without speaking. That might be a useful, even a vital skill at some point, so I tried mentally projecting the order. Sure enough, they took up positions behind us. If something came at us from that direction, the zombies would at least give us a little warning.


    We pushed on to the stairwell. There was screaming from above and below. I looked at Carver, wondering which way we should go.


    ¡°Down, I think,¡± he replied to my unasked question. ¡°This building is too large to defend. We need to vacate it and move to someplace where we can more reasonably keep the monsters at bay.¡±


    Without another word, he set out down the stairs, his zombies still leading the way. He¡¯d made it about ten feet before something green about the size of a small child came around the corner of the stairwell, saw us, and let out a tremendous shrieking sound.

 Chapter 6 - And my axe!

    <h4>Chapter 6 - And my axe!</h4>


    Like the shriek was a signal, next thing I knew there were a half dozen of the things rounding the corner, rushing at Carver. His zombies set themselves up to block the attack, and they more or less succeeded. The creatures coming at us were strange. They only stood about three feet tall, with skin the color of green jell-o and small knives in their hands. They were wearing scraps of clothing, but not much.


    I had to wonder where the things came from. The initial zombies were actual cadavers, risen from the dead. What were these? They looked like goblins from some fantasy movie, and under the circumstances maybe that¡¯s precisely what they were. But that didn¡¯t explain where they¡¯d come from. Had whatever happened changed something into these creatures? Maybe they¡¯d been corgis yesterday, or worse¡­people?


    Those knives they had were sharp, though. Without just a quick thought, I sent Rosencrantz and Guildenstern forward into the fray, then looked about to see if there was anything else I could do. One of Carver¡¯s zombies went down quickly, and only the arrival of mine evened the odds enough that his second didn¡¯t fall immediately after. We needed more options. I didn¡¯t want to try fighting these things with just my club. They were nimble, and even with my speed boost I was worried about those knives.


    There, on the hallway wall, I saw my answer: a fire extinguisher. And because this building was totally old school, the compartment where the extinguisher was stored had something else as well.


    An axe!


    I rushed over and yanked the weapon out. It was heavy and not balanced for killing goblins, but it had a lot more reach than the stick I¡¯d been using before. It would do.


    With the axe in hand I sprinted back to the stairwell. Rosie was on the verge of going down, and I couldn¡¯t let that happen. If we lost the zombies we¡¯d be stuck fighting these things hand to hand ourselves, and based on what I¡¯d seen so far, that was going to end badly. I worried about the people who didn¡¯t have pet zombies to defend them. If these creatures were running around all over, then this was beyond bad.


    I shoved all of that aside and hefted the axe over my head in a big downward blow. It smacked one goblin aside with a glancing hit, but then bit deep into the shoulder of the one I¡¯d actually been aiming for. They were packed in so close around Rosie that it was hard to miss.


    The thing squealed like nothing I¡¯d ever heard. It gushed bright red blood from the wound, spatters splashing everywhere, including on me. My stomach heaved, but this wasn¡¯t the time. The goblin I¡¯d hit yanked itself backward off the axe head, which caused it to bleed even more fiercely. It staggered a few more steps and then went down.


    But the others now recognized me as a bigger threat than the zombies. Guildenstern had crushed one goblin, and all three of our remaining zombies were each fending off one of the creatures, but that still left one more, and it was coming straight at me, dagger flashing.


    It thrust the blade toward my heart. I saw it coming, and thankfully I was actually faster than these creatures. The axe¡¯s weight slowed me down, but dodging was simple enough. I batted the knife-hand to my right with the axe haft as I shifted my body out of the way to the left. Before I could recover my balance enough to counter-attack, Alfred was already there, swinging his club in a quick downward arc that took the goblin in the head. He followed that up with three more swift blows, and it went down.


    I turned back to the zombies, but one on one, they were holding their own okay against the goblins. Carver¡¯s zombie had even taken its foe down, and was now helping Guildenstern finish off his foe. I brought my axe down on the one fighting Rosencrantz, and that was pretty much the end of the fighting.


    A tap of that goblin and the other one I¡¯d killed won me another pair of clear crystals. I motioned for Alfred to take two as well. ¡°You stepped up. You get the reward.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± he replied, kneeling down to gingerly touch two of the dead goblins.


    Carver did likewise. ¡°Good thinking on the fire axe. We should check the halls on the other floors as we go, and maybe pick up a few more.¡±


    ¡°I was thinking the same thing,¡± I replied. ¡°If the zombies can open doors, I bet they can use a simple weapon, too. They¡¯d be more effective armed.¡±If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.


    Carver cast his animate spell on one of the goblins, and it worked. It was smaller than the human zombies, but it picked the knife it had carried back up. I snagged three more knives from the dead goblins and passed them to the other zombies, while Carver and Alfred each took one.


    Better armed, we continued our cautious descent. The lab was only on the third floor of a four-story building, but it still seemed like there were more steps than there¡¯d ever been before today. We halted on the second floor, which was ominously quiet, and Alfred darted down the hall to snag another axe.


    ¡°There should be one on the ground floor too,¡± I said.


    ¡°And we¡¯ll pass it on the way to the main entrance,¡± Carver added.


    We pushed ahead to the bottom of the stairwell. We¡¯d returned to the marching order we¡¯d used before¡ªmy zombies in the rear, Carver¡¯s ahead, us sandwiched in the middle. It seemed the best plan, letting the zombies shield us from any surprise encounters.


    By the time we reached the ground floor, the screaming had stopped. Whether that was a good thing or not, I had no idea. Was everyone dead? How bad were things out there?


    ¡°Hold here,¡± Carver said. ¡°I¡¯ll send the goblin zombie out to scout.¡±


    We did as he asked, holding position while the undead critter waddled out of the stairwell into the area beyond. It came back a minute later.


    ¡°What did he see?¡± Alfred asked.


    ¡°He doesn¡¯t talk,¡± Carver replied. ¡°But since he wasn¡¯t instantly attacked, odds are good the coast is clear. Let¡¯s proceed with caution, but I believe it¡¯s safe.¡±


    My nerves were shot as we rounded the final corner. For all I knew there could be fifty more zombies down there, or something worse. But we were in luck; the coast was clear. No zombies, no goblins; nothing was waiting, although there were clear signs of recent fighting. Blood stains marred the floor here and there, and the walls had gouges torn out of them in several places. Whatever happened here was already past.


    I was starting to doubt we¡¯d ever find those two escaped cadavers. I¡¯d been pretty sure I saw one outside when I looked out the window, and that one could be anywhere by now. And then there was one more that could be almost anywhere. If they were both loose in the wild, we might end up with a zombie epidemic yet.


    The main doors were halfway down the hall, squarely in the middle of the rectangular building. We headed that way, guards up and weapons at the ready. One more fire axe was available for the taking, and Carver snagged it.


    Then we were at the doors at last. They were heavy wooden doors, and were mostly closed. One was ajar a small bit, letting a ribbon of fading daylight into the room. The orangish cast to the light told me we were getting on toward late afternoon. The sun would be setting before too long, and I couldn¡¯t imagine that would improve the situation. We needed to find someplace we could fortify before that happened.


    Carver had his Karen Zombie open the door wider so we could peer out. The signs of slaughter were much stronger out there. I spotted the remains of several dead bodies scattered across the quad. Some of them were goblins, but most were human. A gust of wind blew smoke past the doorway, swirling as it met the air currents from inside; a police car was still on fire on the street nearby. Other cars were scattered about the nearby roads, all of them motionless, like they¡¯d simply stopped working.


    There was no movement. No creatures charging at us. No zombies running about. All was quiet, but I knew in my gut this wasn¡¯t over.


    ¡°Should we make for our dorm?¡± Alfred asked. He lived in the same building I did, graduate student housing that was a little nicer than the undergrad units, and a whole lot cheaper than a Burlington apartment. ¡°I bet others headed there.¡±


    ¡°It might be a good place to start,¡± I said. Although that building had a lot of doors, and it wasn¡¯t especially defensible. I had a hunch we wanted something more easily secured.


    ¡°You two can do that,¡± Carver said. ¡°I am heading for home.¡±


    ¡°You sure?¡± I asked. I didn¡¯t know where he lived, but getting anywhere was going to be difficult. It looked to me like cars stopped working right along with the electronics, which was going to make travel tricky.


    ¡°Yes,¡± Carver replied, without elaborating. Instead, he gestured at the Karen zombie and made a pulling motion with his hand. She dropped like a sack of potatoes. Then he marched forward into the quad, headed in the direction of the burning police car. Wondering what he was up to, I followed.


    I didn¡¯t have to go far. He¡¯d been heading for one of the more unusual bodies lying in the grass. This one was a horse. From the gear, it had been a police horse; the city had a few of those, and they¡¯d probably used them to help respond when the crisis first hit.


    This one looked like it had been stabbed to death with small knives, so probably goblins had gotten it. There was no sign of the officer who¡¯d been riding it.


    Carver gestured at the horse¡¯s body, and it shivered, then slowly rose back to its feet. That was more than a little disgusting, because it had been hacked up pretty badly, but now he had a zombie horse, complete with saddle. I wasn¡¯t sure I could bring myself to ride something that gross, but it would get him where he was going a lot faster.


    Which meant he really was leaving us. Shit.


    ¡°You two take care,¡± Carver said. ¡°My advice is to hole up somewhere and wait for some of the worst of this to blow over. If it¡¯s localized, then help will get here from outside before long.¡±


    ¡°And if it¡¯s not?¡± I asked.


    Carver gave me a weak smile that didn¡¯t reach his eyes. ¡°Then we¡¯re all in a lot of trouble, Miss Serrano. I wish you the best.¡±


    Then he turned, mounted his dead horse, and rode off without another word, the goblin zombie trotting at his side. Alfred and I were on our own, and night was going to arrive way sooner than we were prepared for.

 Chapter 7 - Splitting the Party

    <h4>Chapter 7 - Splitting the Party</h4>


    There was zero time to waste, so I set off across the quad toward our dorm building. It was only a couple hundred meters off, so my hope was we could get there without attracting any more monster attention. I kept a sharp lookout as we moved, using my zombies as a screen ahead of us to intercept anything nasty that we did run into.


    ¡°Thinking the dorm is the best bet, then?¡± Alfred asked.


    I shook my head. ¡°Probably not. Too many ways to get in, too hard to defend. But you¡¯re right that a lot of people will probably go there, and it would be good to get some stuff from my room. You must have something there you can use too, right?¡±


    ¡°Sure,¡± Alfred replied. ¡°I¡¯ve got a good backpack. Water bottles. Shit, toothbrush? How bad do you think this is, Selena? Will it pass quickly?¡±


    I shrugged. ¡°I have no more idea than you do, but I wouldn¡¯t count on it. This¡­is big. Whatever it is. I don¡¯t think it¡¯s just gonna go away.¡±


    As we closed with the building, I pulled my zombies back. If there were people inside trying to defend the building, they might decide my guys were attackers and take them out. I wanted to keep my zombies in one piece, which meant keeping them close to me.


    ¡°You get any good crystals?¡± I asked Alfred.


    ¡°Strength,¡± he replied. ¡°I have the other two from the goblins, but neither slotted itself. I don¡¯t know what they are.¡±


    ¡°Okay, from what I can tell, the way this works is you get two of a kind and they upgrade to a level two crystal,¡± I told him. No sense keeping secrets; he¡¯d be more useful keeping us both alive if he had more information. ¡°Once you have a level two crystal you can lock in a second crystal, like I did. I¡¯m guessing that if we can rank a crystal up to the third tier, then we get to slot a third crystal.¡±


    ¡°Got it,¡± Alfred replied. ¡°Merge to win!¡±


    ¡°Something like that,¡± I muttered back.


    The area around the main doors was all glass panels from floor to ceiling, and all of those panels were now shattered, the shards scattered about both inside and outside the dorm. That wasn¡¯t a great sign. Nor were there any people defending the lobby against attackers.


    ¡°I¡¯m on the third floor,¡± I said. ¡°You?¡±


    ¡°Fourth.¡±


    I nodded in reply and moved into the dorm, carefully avoiding the shards of glass still hanging from the panels. This place was a serious mess. Shattered lobby furniture was everywhere, and there were a few bodies of dead goblins there as well. I went to one and tapped it, but no crystal appeared. I was guessing that meant someone had looted the creature, which felt like a good sign. The more people were out there gaining these strange new powers, the better we¡¯d be able to defend ourselves.


    Using the elevators was out of the question, so we hit the stairwell, moving up them at a faster pace than we¡¯d used back in the classroom building. I felt seconds slipping away fast. We needed to motor.


    When we reached the third floor I turned to head down the hall to my room, and Alfred made to continue up the stairs to his. I grabbed his arm. ¡°Wait. You sure you want to split up?¡±


    He hesitated, then nodded. ¡°Yeah, I think this place is clear, and I can probably handle one or two creatures if they show up.¡±


    I felt like that was a super bad plan, but I shrugged and let go. ¡°Be careful. If you get done before me, meet me at room 302. If I finish first, I¡¯ll join you upstairs.¡±


    ¡°Sounds good. I¡¯m in 409.¡±


    Then he was off, and I was on my own for the first time since all this went down.The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    I opened the door from the stairwell and started down the hall. My door was only a dozen feet away, just past the bathroom. I reached into my pocket to grab the key card and held it against the lock before I remembered¡ªno power, no locks. But if I was right, the power being out ought to make it so the door just opened. That was a fire safety thing, right? I tried the knob, hoping.


    It turned, and the door opened.


    ¡°Hold it right there!¡± a voice said from inside.


    ¡°Kat?¡± I said. ¡°Hey, it¡¯s me!¡±


    ¡°Selena holy shit, you scared me and ohmygod what is that?¡±


    She was pointing at Rosie with the baseball bat in her hand. I had a bunch of explaining to do. ¡°Cadaver from anatomy class?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s walking, Selena.¡±


    ¡°Yes. Yes, it is. And I have to tell you, that¡¯s not the weirdest thing I¡¯ve seen today.¡±


    ¡°Oh my god. I know what you mean. I watched that mess through our window. The monsters, they came out of nowhere, it looked like. They just attacked people. It was a slaughter,¡± Kat said.


    Kat was my roomie for the year. She was a graduate student in the Classics, which in my (carefully kept to myself) opinion was tantamount to a degree in ¡®do you want fries with that?¡¯ But she¡¯d been a polite, friendly, easy to live with roommate, so I wasn¡¯t complaining if she dyed her hair blue and had the common sense of a baby rabbit on weed.


    ¡°Did you have to fight any of them off?¡± I asked her.


    She shook her head. ¡°I¡¯ve been hiding in here. I take it you did?¡± She gestured at the blood stains on my axe.


    ¡°More than I¡¯d like, yeah.¡±


    ¡°Selena, what the fuck is going on?¡±


    I shook my head, unsure how to answer because I didn¡¯t really have answers. ¡°I don¡¯t know, Kat. I wish I did. But we can¡¯t stay here. We need to get somewhere safer.¡±


    ¡°Our room feels safer than out there right now,¡± she snapped back.


    She was scared. I got it. I was frightened, too. But if we let that control us right now, we were going to end up dead instead of scared. ¡°Kat, the lock on the door doesn¡¯t even work. Does the water still run? The toilets flush? I¡¯m betting the water went out with the power, right?¡±


    ¡°Yeah¡­¡±


    ¡°When, not if, those creatures come marching up here looking for a free meal, the entryway doors are smashed glass, our room¡¯s lock is busted, and campus security is probably either dead or fled. We need to rally up some folks and try to get someplace more secure,¡± I told her.


    As I talked, I went to the closet and grabbed by backpack. It was an outdoorsy thing I nabbed from Fjallraven because it looked cool, but now I was extra glad for the rugged waxed canvas. What felt like a dumb choice the next day might just save my bacon. Bag in hand, I went around the room tossing necessities in: a couple changes of clothes with a big focus on stuff that would wear well, a steel water bottle (full, thank goodness), cotton pads I¡¯d bought on a lark and was now doubly grateful for, a small notebook and pen¡­


    I tested a flashlight, but it was out as well. Whatever took down the power really broke everything. Even the simplest electrical devices weren¡¯t working anymore.


    ¡°Selena, I don¡¯t know if I can do this,¡± Kate said. She¡¯d seen what I was about and grabbed a backpack to mirror me, but then slumped down on the bed a minute later.


    ¡°Not a lot of choice, Kat.¡±


    ¡°Maybe we should just stay here and wait for help? I mean, help is going to come. It has to.¡±


    And every other disaster we¡¯d ever read about in the newspaper, she¡¯d have been right. This time, I just wasn¡¯t so sure. But the look on Kat¡¯s face told me there was no way I was convincing her of that, so I changed tactics. ¡°Maybe so, but how long will it take? A day? Two? Three? We don¡¯t know how widespread this is. It could be a little while before they can get help to us. We don¡¯t have much water or any food, and we can¡¯t even lock our bedroom door right now. Let¡¯s get someplace safer to hole up while we wait, okay?¡±


    ¡°Okay,¡± she replied, and turned back to piling stuff into her bag.


    I¡¯d grown up in the Northeast kingdom, that corner of Vermont where living outdoors was in most folks¡¯ blood. It really hadn¡¯t been in mine¡ªI always preferred my nose in a book to camping. But you couldn¡¯t grow up there without absorbing a lot of that stuff, almost like osmosis. Turned out I had a little bit of prepper in me, because I had matches, a candle, several packages of nuts, a thin rain jacket, and a lot of other things I was suddenly incredibly grateful for.


    I took some spare, oversized clothes from Kat¡¯s closet. ¡°You mind if I get my zombies dressed?¡±


    ¡°You understand how insane that sentence sounds?¡± Kat replied. Then she sighed and nodded. ¡°Sure. I¡¯ve packed what I¡¯m bringing.¡±


    I picked out some old, grubby clothes and tossed them to my zombies, ordering them to dress themselves. They set about it, not especially dextrous, but they were managing. As weird as it might be, I was going to be much more comfortable once they were both in some regular clothes instead of patient johnnies.


    Noise from outside got my attention¡ªsome sort of moaning sound. I peeked out the window and let out a gasp.


    The quad had been utterly empty when I entered my dorm. It wasn¡¯t anymore. There was a small sea of zombies wandering across the open space. They were moving this way from one of the undergrad dorms, and unless they had a sudden change of heart, they were coming directly toward our dorm. Right in the middle of the mess was one naked zombie. That had to be one of the missing cadavers. It must have gotten into the undergrad dorm and turned a ton of the students there.


    And our dorm was next on the snack list.

 Chapter 8 - Too Many Legs

    <h4>Chapter 8 - Too Many Legs</h4>


    We were out of time. I shouldered my bag and gave the mental command for the zombies to move out into the hallway. Nothing attacked them, so we were still clear for the moment, at least. The zombies coming this way were still a few minutes out. They weren¡¯t coming at us too fast, so there was still time to make a getaway, but not a lot of it.


    I glanced back at Kat, who was still shoving things in her bag. ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡±


    ¡°Coming!¡±


    Crystals. She needed one. I had spares. When Kat came closer, I fished one of the clear crystals out of my pocket. ¡°The monsters drop these. They give you powers, and you¡¯re going to need something.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll take it,¡± Kat replied. She picked the crystal from my palm.


    Right away, it sank into her fingers, vanishing. She let out a gasp, staring at her hand, shaking her fingers.


    ¡°It¡¯s okay. It sort of does that. You should have some new memories? What did the stone give you?¡±


    ¡°Stamina and endurance,¡± Kat replied. ¡°I feel like I could walk for miles, which I sure couldn¡¯t have done two minutes ago.¡±


    That was probably a perfect find for her. Kat was a kind person, but she was heavy to the point that she started puffing going up a flight of stairs. I¡¯d worried about her ability to escape a horde of zombies chasing us. Maybe the crystal would give her a shot. Now, where to go? Where could we go that would be safe? I set off toward the stairs while I was thinking.


    ¡°Shit!¡± I said.


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Alfred,¡± I replied. I¡¯d forgotten about him. ¡°He¡¯s from my class. Fought the zombies with me. He¡¯s upstairs grabbing some things. Come on, let¡¯s go get him quickly.¡±


    Without waiting, I set off. More people would boost our odds of survival. I hadn¡¯t stuck around to count the zombies outside, but there were at least a couple dozen of the things. I could kill a few, with the help of my zombies, but there was no way I could take out that many. Even with Kat and Alfred, it wasn¡¯t going to happen, but three was better than two. We had to start somewhere. Getting more people together would only help.


    I glanced back at Kat, who was throwing her backpack over her shoulder. ¡°We need to hurry.¡±


    ¡°I know! I¡¯m coming. Go ahead and I¡¯ll catch up.¡±


    ¡°Anyone else still in their rooms on the floor?¡± I asked.


    Kat shrugged. ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡±


    Of course not. She¡¯d been hiding in her room since all this went down. I felt a twinge of frustration at that, and wondered if I was making a serious mistake bringing her along. The stamina crystal would give her the ability to keep up, but I wondered if she had the mental wherewithal to survive the mess we¡¯d found ourselves in.


    I set off toward the stairs, watching for more axes, but not seeing any. I didn¡¯t recall there being any fire axes in the dorm, which made a certain degree of sense. Graduate students were a bit less rowdy than the undergrads, but I still wouldn¡¯t trust most of them enough to leave axes lying around where they could grab them.


    I¡¯d passed my zombies by the time I hit the stairs, leaving them trailing close behind. They weren¡¯t too fast, and I hoped they wouldn¡¯t end up being what slowed us down. The last thing I wanted to do was give up the advantage they represented. They followed behind me, working to keep up, and I darted up the stairs to the fourth floor.


    Which room had Alfred said he was in? Was it 407 or 409? I remembered it was something like that, but not the precise door. Hopefully, he wouldn¡¯t be too difficult to find. When I reached the top of the stairs I headed out into the hallway. First room was 401, then 402 and 403¡­ Time was ticking away as I jogged toward the doors I thought he¡¯d be behind.The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Alfred! We have to move, let¡¯s go!¡¯ I called out as I approached. My hope was he¡¯d hear me shouting and come out to join me.


    That worked, thank god. His head popped out of room 409 a few seconds after my shout. ¡°What¡¯s up?¡±


    ¡°Zombies headed this way. Lots of them.¡±


    ¡°Too many to fight?¡±


    Well, look who¡¯d grown himself a spine! Good¡ªwe were all going to need to step up in a big way. I nodded to him. ¡°Way too many. By now they¡¯re probably getting close to the front doors. We¡¯re going to need to slip out the back or the sides.¡±


    One of the things which made this dorm a poor one for defense was going to work in our favor now¡ªtoo many entrances. There were at least four doors I could think of, and probably one or two I didn¡¯t know about. Big building, lots of doors. Shitty for keeping monsters out, but really good when trying to flee without them spotting us.


    Alfred had wrapped gauze around his wounded hand and packed a backpack, which was slung over both his shoulders. In his right hand he carried the fire axe he¡¯d picked up, and I saw the goblin knife wrapped with strips of torn t-shirt and tucked into his belt. He looked like someone cosplaying a zombie apocalypse survivor, which was pretty appropriate, if you thought about it.


    We ran back toward the stairs, running into Kat as she climbed up to join us. I did quick introductions, and we were on our way back down. Kat was huffing and puffing before we hit the bottom, but she was still moving, which was more than she¡¯d have been able to do yesterday. I still worried about her, but so far, so good.


    I moved down the hall slowly, watching for movement. If the zombies had made it to the dorm, some of them might have already slipped inside through the busted windows. I didn¡¯t see anything, but without power the halls were pretty dark. If I wasn¡¯t careful I might stumble into one of the damned things.


    We reached the point to turn toward the rear exit and headed that way with more speed. If we hadn¡¯t run into zombies yet, they probably hadn¡¯t made it this far. The passage stopped at the dining hall¡ªget through there to the kitchen, and we could make a quick exit out the back, avoiding any chance of being seen. But the doors were locked.


    ¡°My turn to help,¡± Alfred said.


    I was going to ask what he had in mind, but before I could he stepped forward, axe in hand, and brought the blade down heavily on the double doors right where they met, right at the lock. There was a booming sound as he brought the blade down, cutting deeper into the wood than I¡¯d expected from a spindly twenty-something kid.


    But he¡¯d absorbed a Strength crystal. That must be boosting him a lot, to have that sort of power. A second blow sent chips of wood flying. A third shattered the locking mechanism entirely, breaking it apart and letting us into the dimly-lit dining hall.


    ¡°Nice work,¡± I told him. ¡°Let¡¯s let my zombies lead?¡±


    ¡°You got it,¡± he replied, gesturing for me to send them on.


    Crashing glass from somewhere down the hall behind us told me that we were out of time. The zombies were breaking through and coming into the building. There was no turning back now.


    I sent Rosencrantz and Guildenstern ahead, moving toward the kitchen. The room was darker than I liked, but there was enough light coming through the big windows lining one side of the room to allow us to see okay. That wasn¡¯t going to be the case once we reached the kitchen. I doubted there would be much light there at all.


    We reached the doors into the cooking area and hesitated while I peered through the round windows. No movement within, but I¡¯d been right¡ªthere was very little light in there. It would be super easy for something to sneak up on us.


    On the plus side, I could see the door to get out, too. It was only about thirty feet away.


    ¡°Okay,¡± I told the others. ¡°We¡¯ve got about thirty feet to reach the doors to outside, but the room is dark. It would be easy for something to hide in there. We need to be careful.¡±


    Alfred nodded. Kat looked scared, but after a pause she nodded as well. I figured that was as good as I was going to get and turned back toward the kitchen doors, sending Guildenstern inside. He barged through the doors, smacking them aside, and waddled his way toward the center of the room.


    Nothing came rushing out at him. That was a good sign.


    I sent Rosie in as well, then gestured for the others to come along and followed my zombies in.


    The kitchen was every bit as dark as it looked from outside. I moved forward, taking in the scene. Light splashed across the space from a single small window on the far wall. It didn¡¯t cast nearly enough illumination, but it showed clear signs of a struggle. A knife block had been tipped over, knives scattered across a counter. It looked like a couple were missing. Dark stains marred the floor; it looked like blood to me, but in the darkness I couldn¡¯t be certain. Dropped pans, overturned bins, and food scattered across the floor all told a similar tale.


    Something had come through this place, and it probably wasn¡¯t friendly. The less time we spent here, the better. I sent my zombies toward the door, following close on their heels.


    Before I¡¯d gone ten steps, Kat hissed and grabbed my shoulder. I turned and saw her pointing at one corner of the room.


    At first I wasn¡¯t sure what it was she¡¯d seen. It looked like a weird pile of paper, or maybe packing material. Then as my eyes continued to adjust to the dim light, I saw forms that looked a lot like bodies. Bodies wrapped up in something, like a cocoon.


    Oh, no. No no no. SHIT, no.


    Movement near one of the cocoons caught my eye as something with too many legs and eyes scuttled out into view. A second one followed it, then a third.

 Chapter 9 - What About The Cooks?

    <h4>Chapter 9 - What About The Cooks?</h4>


    The three biggest spiders I¡¯d ever seen scuttled forward from the shadows. They made a bee-line for us. I had a sneaking suspicion those cocoons in the corner were the kitchen staff, and those spiders were aiming to add us to their collection. Not my kink.


    ¡°Run!¡± I shouted, rushing toward the door while I passed the mental command for my zombies to cover us.


    One of the spiders jumped at Rosie, wrapping legs around him and biting his neck. Fortunately whatever venom these guys had didn¡¯t seem to work on my zombie, because he kept fighting, and ripped a leg off the offending spider.


    Alfred and Kat were right behind me, making for the doors, but the other two spiders ignored the zombies and kept coming at us. We weren¡¯t going to make it to the back doors before they were on us. I turned to face the things.


    I¡¯ve got no real bone to pick with spiders. They do their thing, I do mine. I took enough biology classes to know that world without spiders would suck.


    But these things were spiders of unusual size, so to speak. I didn¡¯t think even Australia had critters this big. Their main body was the size of my head, and their legs were about as long as my arm. Like, these things were big, and that size meant they moved alarmingly fast.


    One of them was on top of me almost before I could get the axe in to block, but I barely managed. The blow wasn¡¯t strong, though, knocking it aside without really hurting the thing.


    Beside me I was vaguely aware of Alfred fending off the other spider. His strength made moving the axe easier, and his blows were faster than mine even though I had the agility stone. I was starting to get a little magic envy.


    My opponent came back at me, scuttling in at an angle. It was trying to bite my ankle. I had no idea what the venom of a spider this big would be like, but I definitely didn¡¯t want to find out! Those fangs looked huge, and I was certain they¡¯d inject a lethal dose.


    I pivoted the axe and swung it like a golf club, blade coming in to meet the monster spider as it closed with me. This time I made a solid impact, slicing through one of the legs and making a shallow cut in the abdomen. I was half expecting a squeal or screech, but apparently that wasn¡¯t happening. The spider was just as silent as I struck it as it had been before. It seemed like it had enough, though, because it dashed away from me, heading back toward the cocoons.


    Guildenstern caught it halfway there, stomping his bare foot down hard on the middle of its back. Bug juice splattered, and the thing spasmed, then went still.


    ¡°Good job, Guildie!¡± I called out as I whirled toward the other two.


    Rosie must have scared off his spider, because it was nowhere to be seen. There were a couple of spider legs on the floor, though, so Rosie had done some serious damage. Alfred was just finishing his spider off, his axe coming down hard in a powerful blow that bit into the floor tiles, breaking one. The spider stopped cold.


    ¡°Nice moves,¡± I told him.


    ¡°Thanks,¡± he replied. Was that a blush? Aw, cute. At least he was keeping it together.


    Unlike my roomie. A glance her way told me she was freaking out. A certain level of ¡®oh shit¡¯ was to be expected, but I had a feeling she was going to go over the top. I went to the spider Guildenstern killed and tapped it, receiving another clear crystal for my troubles.


    ¡°Oh my god. What the hell was that?¡± Kat babbled. ¡°They were spiders! They were coming for us and they¡­ Ohmygod.¡±


    I left her to sort it out for herself and checked on my boys. Guildenstern was unhurt, but Rosencrantz was looking a little ragged. He¡¯d already taken some stab wounds from the goblins, and now he had spider bites as well. If the critters had venom, that at least didn¡¯t seem to be affecting him. But these spiders had fangs the size of my fingers, and he¡¯d been bitten more than once. His head lolled to one side, still mostly attached, but not as securely as it used to be.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    That sucked. Unlike Doctor Carver, I couldn¡¯t just go animate something. I had to take control of an existing undead. I could see some plusses and minuses to each, and right now the damage accruing was a negative. I considered dumping Rosie, just chopping his head off with the axe or something and controlling one of the other zombies from outside, but I hesitated. It might be hard to grab one of the things out of the crowd, and if even one of that pack of zombies spotted me I worried the rest would get interested really fast, same as back in the classroom building.


    I¡¯d stick with Rosie for now, and hopefully find some duct tape or something to patch him up. That settled, I turned back toward the others. ¡°We need to keep moving. Those zombies won¡¯t be far behind us.¡±


    ¡°Selena, we can¡¯t just leave!¡± Kat said.


    I shook my head at her, surprised. ¡°I¡¯m sorry?¡±


    Far as I was concerned, leaving was precisely what needed to happen next.


    ¡°What about the cooks?¡± Kat asked, pointing at the cocoons.


    I winced. I had a good idea what was inside those cocoons, and it really wouldn¡¯t be super pretty, if I was right. Spiders had venom which broke down tissue into goop, so they could more easily eat it. With the size of these things, those cooks would be like a bird that had been caught in a web, encased in silk, then bitten a few times to ¡®soften¡¯ it up.


    There was a study about what happened to birds caught in spiderwebs. If they were encased, and not rescued by a human, the mortality rate was one hundred percent.


    ¡°Kat, they¡¯re dead,¡± I said softly.


    ¡°You can¡¯t know that. We need to check,¡± Kat replied. She went to a tipped over block of knives and pulled one out as she walked toward the cocoons.


    ¡°We only killed two of the spiders,¡± I warned her. ¡°The other is injured, but it¡¯s still out there somewhere.¡±


    That got her to stop for a moment, but then she shook her head. ¡°It must be scared off. It¡¯ll run for it and not come near us, now that we showed them we can bite back. Come on¡ªwe need to at least see if they can be helped. Aren¡¯t you training to be a doctor?¡±


    That stung. I was training to save people, and if these people needed medical help and I had a proper emergency room and a couple more years of experience, I could maybe do something. But even if they were alive, the amount of venom they¡¯d have inside them would be lethal without access to a modern hospital.


    The nearest hospital was Fletcher Allen, less than a mile away, but it might as well be a hundred or a thousand miles. We¡¯d barely managed to get anywhere since all this started. Trying to make the trek to the hospital was insane.


    But she wasn¡¯t wrong. If it were me trapped in there, I¡¯d want someone to at least try, right?


    ¡°Okay, we¡¯ll check on them, but be careful¡±! I said. I pulled another knife from the block and went toward the nearest cocoon. I set both zombies to guard me; if they saw any dangers, they¡¯d attack. Kat might think that injured spider was long gone, but I wasn¡¯t so sure. Nor was I completely certain there weren¡¯t more of the things, someplace nearby. It paid to be cautious.


    I tapped the webbing with the knife, which stuck fast. Not great. I had to pull hard to get it free again. I tried again, this time deliberately hooking a chunk of fibers with the serrated part of the edge. Sawing back and forth on the silk took some doing, but the threads parted faster as I continued to work. Once I cut apart that little bit, I slipped the knife back into the cocoon and pulled out a little more, repeating the effort.


    It was tough work, but after a couple of tries I was getting the hang of it, and the webbing was coming apart more readily. I felt like I was almost through to whatever was stored inside, but it was weird. I¡¯d gotten a sense of the contents by pushing the knife against the cocoon a few times, and it didn¡¯t feel solid enough to be a person, even though the shape looked roughly human. It was more¡­squishy. Like the cocoon was around a big water balloon.


    I had a very bad feeling about this.


    Finally the knife cut deep enough, and red liquid flowed out of the tiny gap I¡¯d made in a dribble. I cut the gap wider, careful not to slice inside the cocoon in case the person was still alive inside, just injured. But deep down I already knew what I was looking at even more of the spiders¡¯ victim dribbled out of the wider gap in the web. That wasn¡¯t a person in there, not anymore. I backed away, gagging.


    ¡°You all right?¡± Alfred asked. He stood there, axe in hand, watching over me and Kat just like my zombies.


    ¡°Ugh. No, I¡¯m not,¡± I replied. ¡°They¡¯re definitely dead. There¡¯s nothing we can do for these people, and unless we want to join them, we need to move.¡±


    Before Alfred could reply, Kat shrieked behind me. I whirled and saw precisely what I¡¯d been afraid of: the missing spider, fangs deep in Kat¡¯s calf.

 Chapter 10 - Colder

    <h4>Chapter 10 - Colder</h4>


    I was moving in an instant, axe lining up to smack the monster away from her. My gut was cold with the horrible feeling that I was already too late; each time Kat¡¯s heart beat, it was pumping more of the spider venom deeper into her body. But I had to try. Kat fell over screaming as I approached. She kicked at the spider with her free leg, but it wasn¡¯t letting go.


    I sliced my axe in a swift downward swing. The spider was distracted and missing enough legs it wasn¡¯t as nimble as it had been. My swing struck it solidly in the side, splitting it in two; one less thing to worry about. If only we¡¯d been able to kill all three spiders in the first place..!


    I ripped the fangs out of her leg to prevent more venom from being injected and knelt beside Kat, unslinging my backpack and yanking out a spare t-shirt. Using the shirt and a serving spoon someone had dropped on the floor, I improvised a tourniquet, then tightened it until Kat screamed.


    ¡°Sorry! It has to be tight. We need to stop the venom from getting out of your leg,¡± I told her.


    She was sheet-white, lips pursed, but she nodded her understanding. I went down to her leg to see what else I could do.


    Her calf was already swelling. I took my knife to her jeans, slicing them up from the bottom cuff to let me better visualize the injury. It wasn¡¯t good. There were two holes, each big enough I thought I could cram a pinky inside. The good news was they¡¯d bled a little when I ripped out the fangs. That hopefully washed out some of the venom.


    The skin around the bite was already beginning to blacken and rot. I¡¯d never seen anything like it. Plenty of spider bites had a necrotic effect on tissue, but it was small, and it took time. This was happening quickly enough that I was watching it like a time-lapse video.


    ¡°I¡¯m screwed, aren¡¯t I?¡± Kat asked, her voice thick with pain.


    ¡°What!? No, we¡¯ll figure this out,¡± I lied. She was right. Unless we got her proper medical care stat, she was going to die.


    ¡°The look on your face says otherwise,¡± she replied. ¡°I¡¯m sorry. You were right. We should have just run. I¡¯m sorry.¡±


    ¡°Shut up,¡± I told her. ¡°We¡¯re gonna get you out of here. Alfred, see if you can find me a couple of brooms or mops, so we can make a stretcher? We¡¯re going to have to carry her out.¡±


    But he shook his head. ¡°Better plan: I¡¯ll just carry her myself. If we use a stretcher, neither of us can fight. If I carry her your hands are still free.¡±


    ¡°You sure you can manage?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. That strength crystal is pretty cool.¡±


    I nodded. ¡°All right then. That¡¯s the plan. We need to get moving fast. Those zombies are probably already in the building.¡±


    Kate tugged my arm. ¡°I¡¯m getting colder. And it¡¯s getting harder to breathe.¡±


    Neurotoxin spreading through her system. I gave the tourniquet an extra twist and tied it back down. She was well on her way to losing her lower leg, and for all I knew I was sentencing her to a slow death instead of a fast one, but I couldn¡¯t just leave her. We had to at least try.


    Alfred looked down at the wound as he approached and grimaced. ¡°That¡¯s not great. Should we try to remove it?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± I replied. Neither of us had any surgical background. We¡¯d be trying our best, but the results wouldn¡¯t be pretty, and infection would be certain. Without antibiotics and other meds, Kat was in deep shit.Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    Kat raised her hand weakly. ¡°I vote for leave it until we have no other options.¡±


    Alfred and I glanced at each other, each knowing we were probably already at that point. But if we took her leg off here, it would leave a blood trail, and we still didn¡¯t know how smart these zombies were. Would that lead them right to us? Maybe. And besides, even if we took the leg off, she¡¯d likely die of blood loss unless we could cauterize it or something. That would take time we just didn¡¯t have, not with zombies closing in.


    After he hooked his axe into loops on his backpack, Alfred leaned down and scooped her up. He was gentle, compassionate; if the world hadn¡¯t gone to shit, he¡¯d have been a good doctor. Meanwhile I was over here worrying that there was no way Alfred would be able to unhook that axe quickly if we were attacked again, so we were down another fighter. He was probably right that this was better than both of us having occupied hands, but I still worried.


    More noises came down the hallway from the direction we¡¯d come. The zombies were on their way, so it was time to go. As I led the way toward the loading docks in the rear of the building, Alfred called out. ¡°Hey, there¡¯s still a lot of food here.¡±


    ¡°Yeah?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m hungry. Betting everyone is going to be very hungry soon,¡± he replied. ¡°I don¡¯t see how we can, but I wish we could bring some of it with us.¡±


    ¡°Agreed, but I can¡¯t see how, either,¡± I said. I went over to a nearby shelf and scooped up some sealed plastic bags of dry goods: slivered almonds and sunflower seeds for the dining hall¡¯s salad bar. Both decent emergency food. I stashed them in my backpack. ¡°That gives us something for tonight and tomorrow, anyway. We¡¯ll figure the rest out after, if we need to.¡±


    The longer this whatever-it-was went on, the more I figured it wasn¡¯t ending on its own anytime soon. I could tell Alfred was of the same mind. My best hope was this phenomenon was limited to a small region, and things would be normal outside it. But the sinking feeling in my gut said that wasn¡¯t the way this was rolling out.


    I sent the zombies ahead into the loading dock area, and when nothing jumped them I followed, with Alfred and Kat trailing right behind me. The docks were clear, and a few steps later we were out in fresh air again.


    ¡°Now what?¡± Alfred asked. ¡°Where can we go?¡±


    He was asking me? It wasn¡¯t like I had any more idea how to get us out of this mess¡­ I thought about it a moment, considering. We needed at least intermediate medical supplies¡ªsomething a cut above a first aid kit, like a paramedic¡¯s bag. We also needed security. Where would people tend to go, in a dangerous crisis, if they wanted safety? Probably the police. Campus security had their own office, and it wouldn¡¯t shock me if they¡¯d managed to defend it. The problem was, it was almost as far as the hospital, in an entirely different direction. It was the opposite direction as the zombies, but who knew what other dangers lay that way?


    ¡°I see two choices,¡± I said at last. ¡°We can try to slip northeast, sneak around the zombies, and work our way up to the hospital. Or we can head away from the zombies, southeast to campus security. The UVM rescue station is right there, too, so they¡¯ll have medical supplies for Kat.¡±


    ¡°The hospital would be a more-sure bet,¡± Alfred said. ¡°Doctors to handle this, instead of us. Even with the power out, they¡¯ve got the skills and knowledge to help her.¡±


    ¡°Assuming the place isn¡¯t overrun, yeah,¡± I replied. ¡°That would absolutely be best. I don¡¯t know if we can evade the zombies, though. And I have a hunch the campus cops have probably kept their shit together enough to create a secured area.¡±


    ¡°Point. The hospital is big. I wasn¡¯t thinking about security.¡±


    ¡°None of us are used to thinking that way,¡± I replied. ¡°But it¡¯s getting dark, and I¡¯m betting the monsters, spiders, and everything else aren¡¯t all going to bed until morning.¡±


    He shivered. ¡°We should get going.¡±


    We set off, moving along the back side of the building and trying to remain as inconspicuous as possible. With my zombies scouting a little ahead of us, I figured we were mostly safe. They were likely to attract attention first, so we¡¯d probably have some warning. But as we reached the edge of the building, we were still in the clear. I heaved a sigh of relief as we set off across the open space to a thick stand of trees on the far side of a parking lot.


    The creaking of a door that badly needed oil came from behind me, freezing me in my tracks.


    I did say our dorm had a lot of doors, and one of them was only twenty feet to our rear. A zombie had shoved it open and staggered out into the evening air. The moment it looked up, it saw us right away and started toward us. Behind it another zombie exited, and then a third.

 Chapter 11 - On our own

    <h4>Chapter 11 - On our own</h4>


    There was no time to screw around. Alfred was strong, but the only way we¡¯d outrun these things would be a flat-out sprint, and I didn¡¯t think he could handle that while carrying Kat. I whirled back toward the others and shouted, ¡°Alfred! Go! I¡¯ll hold them off. Get to the security office.¡±


    He snapped me a nod, hefted Kat more firmly in his arms, and set off at a jog across the parking lot, making for the trees on the other side. Once he was past them he¡¯d be almost to what we hoped was safety.


    That left me and my zombies on our own.


    It was time to see what I could do. I gave my boys a mental command, ordering them to rush forward and engage the lead zombie. Rosie grabbed it by the shoulder while Guildenstern attacked with the knife I¡¯d given him. Between the two of them they were making short work of the first attacker.


    The second came straight on at me. I hefted my axe and ducked under a swiped from its hand, coming up with the axe into its torso with a wet smack and what sounded like the breaking of bones. It doubled over and collapsed forward. I whipped the axe back, then up and around, bringing it down hard on the back of the monster¡¯s neck. It went down for good.


    But there were already two more zombies outside, and who knew how many more coming this way. The noise from our battle would certainly attract some more attention, so I needed to make this fast. Blunt their attack and then take off for the trees, hoping to lose the rest of them.


    A quick look over my shoulder told me Alfred was only halfway across the parking lot. He was slowing down, too. I needed to hold them off longer.


    I tapped the dead zombie and was rewarded with another black stone. I slipped it into a pocket and moved to assist Rosie, but Guildenstern had already chopped their opponent up pretty well. A blow from my axe to its spine finished the job easily enough. I sent them forward to engage the other two, each one clinching, arms on the shoulders of the opposing zombies, tying them up.


    That gave me time to pocket another black crystal from the fallen foe. Like the last one, it didn¡¯t sink into my hand. What I badly needed at this point was some time to sit and explore how these things worked. I needed a breather. A lot. But that wasn¡¯t happening yet. It would have to wait.


    I closed with the two enemy zombies tied up by mine. It took two solid blows from my axe to take each of them out. I tried to ignore that these people had probably been students like myself, killed by a zombie and thus turned into one. I hadn¡¯t recognized any of them yet, thank god, but it was still a shitty feeling, killing things which had been people an hour ago. I collected two more black crystals¡ªthat was four more in all, so I was deeply hoping they might be able to connect together the way the first ones had.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 1) - Agility


    Point 3: X


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black x6


    Clear x3


    From what I¡¯d gleaned out of the memories I¡¯d been fed from the stones, getting a stone to tier three would open the third Point, allowing me to insert a third type of stone. Making that happen meant building two tier two stones, though, so I effectively needed two more copies of Control Undead to make that happen. I had six black stones, so with luck, it might just be enough.This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    With a bang the door came fully open and a swarm of the monsters came pouring out, one zombie after another. Two, four, seven¡­ It was definitely more than I could handle. Alfred was already almost to the trees, so it was time to beat feet.


    I sent my zombies down the hill into the parking lot as fast as their legs could carry them, but the ones chasing us were about the same speed. They were keeping up with us just fine. I could outrun them, but I¡¯d need to leave my zombies behind, and I wasn¡¯t willing to dump the advantage my boys gave me.


    Instead I decided to use my zombies as lures. I ducked down behind a car in the parking lot and waited for the first zombie to catch up. It was focused on what it could see, which was Rosie and Guildie, so it missed me entirely until it was too late to slow down. I popped up swinging, the axe coming in hard against the zombie¡¯s hip. Something went crack, and the thing staggered sideways. It was still alive, but I¡¯d slowed it down a lot and now the ones coming up behind it were stuck, too, blocked by the zombie in front of them and the cars on either side.


    ¡°Time to go!¡± I wished I could have gotten another crystal, but I¡¯d only wounded a zombie, and sticking around felt like a bad plan. I took off at a sprint toward the trees, quickly catching up with Rosie and Guildie. We¡¯d gained enough distance I felt comfortable reaching the tree-line without the enemy catching up.


    I stopped cold right in front of the trees, though. This wasn¡¯t a real forest, mind. Just a stand of trees. But they were packed pretty close together and spanned almost as much area as the parking lot behind me. Anything could be hiding in there. More spiders, goblins, whatever. And I wouldn¡¯t know it was there until it was just about on top of me. That was some scary shit. I in no way wanted to go into that darkness.


    ¡°Alfred! Where are you?¡± I called out. There was no answer. He must have already gotten through the trees by that time, right? He was probably already getting close to the security center.


    Assuming he hadn¡¯t been eaten by something already, anyway.


    The moaning of an oncoming zombie horde made my decision for me. There were a dozen zombies ambling across the parking lot toward me. Fortunately they weren¡¯t that bright, so they kept getting blocked by cars. But that was also spreading them out, so when they did reach me, they¡¯d have me surrounded. There was no way I could fight so many all at once, from all directions. It was time to bite the bullet and go into the woods.


    I sent my zombies ahead of me, hoping anything nasty waiting inside would go after them first and give me time to react. The darkness once I was under the canopy was nearly complete. There was no dim glow from streetlights in the parking lot anymore, and it felt oppressively black all around. The fastest way to get to safety was to move fast, so I pushed my zombies as fast as they could travel.


    Something crunched in the darkness to my right and I whirled, axe at the ready. I swung in the general direction of the noise, my axe smacking into a tree and rebounding off the trunk. It made a lot of noise, and maybe that helped encourage whatever it was to mind its own business, because nothing came after me as I pressed on.


    Finally, I was back out in the moonlight. After the dim shadows of the trees, any light at all felt like a blessing. East Avenue was directly ahead of me, so we plowed forward across the road, racing toward the side streets where I hoped we¡¯d find safety.


    Five minutes of huffing and puffing later, I was in sight of my destination. I hadn¡¯t been down to this end of campus too often, but I knew my way around well enough to find it even in the dark. Angry voices from somewhere up ahead caught my attention, and I slowed my approach. So far the zombies hadn¡¯t even exited the forest yet, so either I¡¯d lost them or they were just moving slowly through the trees. Either way, I¡¯d take it. That gave me the time In needed to assess what was happening ahead of me.


    I spotted Alfred at last. He stood in the middle of the street just in front of the security center. Kat was still in his arms, but she wasn¡¯t speaking. She looked unconscious.


    Barring him from entering were four men in uniforms, each of them carrying some sort of improvised weapon. Two had long, spear-like shafts of rebar. One had an axe a lot like mine, while the last carried a short blade that looked something like a machete.


    From the angry tones of voice shooting back and forth, this new crew wasn¡¯t friendly, and they stood between my roomie and getting the help she needed. That wasn¡¯t going to stand. I stepped forward briskly toward the crowd, my zombies close behind.

 Chapter 12 - Complete Control

    <h4>Chapter 12 - Complete Control</h4>


    I marched straight toward the men, my pair of zombies not far behind me. Kat needed help, and she needed it now. These people were not going to stand in the way, not if I had anything to say about it.


    ¡°What the hell is going on here?¡± I called out as I approached.


    ¡°Who are you?¡± one of the men called out.


    I was almost beside Alfred now, and I hefted my axe onto my shoulder. ¡°Someone whose friend is badly hurt and needs medical attention. Are you going to let us past, or am I going through you?¡±


    ¡°Like to see you try,¡± he shot back.


    ¡°Bradley, shut the hell up,¡± the older man beside him said. He lowered his rebar, and the others followed his lead, dropping the tips of their weapons some. ¡°You a student, miss?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°Med school, yeah. He¡¯s carrying my roommate. She was bitten by a spider the size of a poodle. We need to get her some care, fast.¡±


    ¡°Got it,¡± the man replied. He stepped forward and offered his hand for me to shake. ¡°Ed Lords. I¡¯m the security supervisor this evening, so I¡¯m in charge here for the time being. You good with that?¡¯


    ¡°Mr. Lords, if it means getting Kat medical care, I¡¯m willing to do whatever,¡± I told him. I shook his hand. It wasn¡¯t like it would hurt, although I got the sense from his grip that he was stronger than the average guy. Maybe he already had a strength stone embedded?


    ¡°Holy shit, what are those?¡± Bradley asked, pointing. He¡¯d finally seen my zombies and was predictably freaking out.


    ¡°Relax. They¡¯re under my control,¡± I told him. I turned back to Lords. ¡°Cadavers from the classroom. They came to life when all of this happened. I killed a couple and picked up the power to control them.¡±


    ¡°Complete control?¡± Lords asked.


    ¡°Rosie, dance a jig,¡± I said aloud. No sense telling them I could use nonverbal commands until I had to. Rosie danced a moment until I told him to stop. ¡°Yeah. They do what I ask. Kinda gross, but I doubt we¡¯d have made it this far without them.¡±


    ¡°You got the power from one of those crystals, right?¡± Lords asked. I nodded in reply, and he went on. ¡°We¡¯ve killed more than a few weird creatures ourselves, and they all drop those little stones. One of the EMTs inside got a white stone that lets him heal. Let¡¯s get your friend in there to see if he can help her, eh?¡±


    Healing powers? Why the heck couldn¡¯t I have gotten those instead of zombie control? I was a doctor in training! Healing magic would be way cool.


    On the other hand, without my pet zombies, I wasn¡¯t sure we¡¯d have gotten as far as we did, so maybe it was for the best. I followed him toward the security office, where I saw¡­lights inside? Maybe they had found candles or something?


    Moaning behind me made me glance back. One of the zombies had broken clear of the woods. It hadn¡¯t spotted us yet, just ambling about randomly.


    ¡°Another of yours?¡± Lords asked.


    I shook my head. ¡°No. There¡¯s a whole pack of them back that way. We should probably get inside before they spot us.¡±


    ¡°And you brought them straight to us?¡± Bradley complained.


    ¡°I thinned them out some,¡± I snapped back. ¡°But Kat needs help. We couldn¡¯t think where else to go.¡±The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    Lords gave Bradley a stilling look, which seemed to mostly work, then turned back to me. ¡°It¡¯s all right, we¡¯re glad you did. Our job is to keep students safe on campus, and while things might be going crazy, that¡¯s still the job. Let¡¯s get you all inside, then. Oh, except the dead ones, okay miss? We bring those in it¡¯s just gonna scare the shit out of the other folks, eh? You can find some quiet nook to store them out here.¡±


    I opened my mouth to protest, then thought better of it. Lords was being helpful, and if they had a healer, that might be the difference between life and death for Kat. Besides, I¡¯d just been thinking that I¡¯d do whatever it took to save her. This wasn¡¯t that large an ask.


    ¡°Rosie, Guildie, come,¡± I told them. The zombies followed me as I went to the parking lot right in front of the office, checking cars. I found one with an unlocked door quickly enough¡ªthis was Vermont; not everyone locked their car doors. I ordered both zombies into the car and told them to stay there.


    Then I gave them the mental command to defend themselves against any attackers, but otherwise to stay out of sight. There was no guarantee they¡¯d be all right, with no supervision, but it was the best I could do under the circumstances.


    The zombies settled in for the night, I followed Lords into the building. The front room wasn¡¯t large, with a waiting area and a large service desk. A single candle rested on the desk, giving some dim illumination. Beyond the desk, the space opened up some, and a group of people huddled in the dim light from the desk candle and one more, placed at the far side of the room.


    Aside from the four men who¡¯d met us outside, all of them campus police, I saw another two dozen or so people. That was way more than I¡¯d expected, far better than I¡¯d had any right to hope for. So far all we¡¯d run into were the dead. The survival rate from this mess didn¡¯t seem to be awesome, but the campus cops had beaten the odds in this place.


    ¡°Virgil, get over here,¡± Lords called. ¡°Wounded.¡±


    ¡°On it,¡± a man said from the middle of the room. He snatched up an aide bag from the floor next to him and threaded his way past the sitting people to the entryway where Alfred still held Kat. ¡°Put her down so I can examine her, okay? Right here is fine.¡±


    Alfred set Kat down where he asked. She moaned, but otherwise didn¡¯t stir. The venom was hitting her harder; she¡¯d passed out a while back, but now she was pale, sweating, her breaths shallow.


    ¡°What happened?¡± The man had an EMT shirt on, and he certainly seemed competent enough, checking Kat out for injuries and assessing her condition. He noted the tourniquet, still holding itself together. ¡°How long has this been on?¡±


    ¡°Less than an hour,¡± I replied. ¡°We were attacked by spiders the size of a dog. One of them bit her. I got the tourniquet on as quick as I could, but some of the venom had already gotten through, and I¡¯m sure more has since.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I can see that,¡± he replied as he continued checking her over. ¡°Mr. Lords, bring the candle closer?¡±


    Lords did as he asked, giving us more light to see by. The medic pulled back Kat¡¯s pants leg, easy enough since I¡¯d cut it, but the cloth was wet with dark liquid now, and what was beneath was even worse. The rot I¡¯d seen setting in hadn¡¯t slowed. Kat¡¯s lower leg was a mess, with a lot of the flesh already ruined by the venom. Red streaks ran up and down what was left of the skin on her lower leg, but they stopped at the tourniquet, thank god. It was still bad, though. Very bad.


    ¡°Can you help her?¡± I asked.


    ¡°I will try,¡± he replied softly. ¡°My name¡¯s Virgil. Was a paramedic over here before¡­all this. We¡¯re going to have to take the leg. There¡¯s no way I can save it after all of that trauma. But I think I can close the amputation wound, keep her from getting an infection. I might be able to clear some of the poison from the rest of her system, too. But if we remove the source by taking her leg, her body should be able to mostly heal itself.¡±


    Losing her leg, with all of this happening? How would Kat even survive, without the ability to run from whatever monsters came after us next? This was a shitty-ass choice, and I wished more than anything else that Kat was awake to make it for herself. No matter what answer I gave, it could be the wrong one. But there was really only one answer I could give. ¡°Do what you can.¡±


    Virgil nodded. ¡°I will. You¡¯re a med student, right?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. Him, too,¡± I replied, pointing at Alfred.


    ¡°I could use some help while we do this. What year are you?¡±


    ¡°First,¡± I admitted.


    ¡°Okay, maybe not as much help as I¡¯d like,¡± Virgil said with a chuckle. ¡°But it¡¯s still better than nothing. Come here, and we¡¯ll get to work.¡±


    My stomach did a little flip at that. If this was school, I¡¯d be thrilled to stand in and help in a surgery. It was a lot different when the patient was my roomie, dying from a flesh-eating venom from a giant spider, with zombies running around outside. I didn¡¯t even like Kat all that much; we¡¯d been thrown together by random room assignment. But I wasn¡¯t going to let her die without trying my best to save her, anyway.


    ¡°I¡¯m in. Let¡¯s go. She hasn¡¯t got much time,¡± I replied.

 Chapter 13 - Calm Moment

    <h4>Chapter 13 - Calm Moment</h4>


    The surgery totally sucked.


    I¡¯d always looked forward to my first chance to help in a surgery. I envisioned myself standing there beside some expert physician, handing him the tools of the trade and helping with some part of the procedure or another. In my imagination the scene was always sterile, cold, and calm.


    The reality of saving Kat was nothing like that. She remained unconscious throughout it all, which was the biggest blessing. We didn¡¯t have an operating room, or proper lighting, or proper tools, or medications, or¡­ It just wasn¡¯t a good time.


    About the only fascinating part was watching Virgil use his powers. After we took off Kat¡¯s lower leg, he touched the wound left with both hands, a white glow spreading from him to the injury. As I watched, the wound knitted itself together, the skin stretching to meet itself and close the injury. The glow stopped before the wound fully healed, but I¡¯d just watched a week of healing happen in seconds.


    ¡°Holy shit, that was epic,¡± I said.


    Virgil chuckled. ¡°Thanks. Takes it out of me, though.¡±


    He slumped back against the wall, looking exhausted. His eyelids drooped.


    ¡°You okay?¡± I asked.


    He nodded. ¡°Yup. Magic has a price, though, and mine means I need a nap after. Your friend will be okay now. There¡¯s still some venom in her, but her body is stronger now, and she¡¯ll handle it. You should get some rest yourself.¡±


    ¡°Thanks for helping her,¡± I told him.


    ¡°It¡¯s what we do, right?¡± Virgil replied.


    ¡°Yeah.¡±


    I wandered off, finding a quiet corner where I could at last have a few minutes of peace. It felt like it had been days since all this started, but it couldn¡¯t have been more than a few hours. I glanced at my watch to see what time it was, but it was as dead as every other piece of electronics.


    Thinking back, I tried to estimate based on the sunset. It was maybe seven in the evening, or eight? Class was at two, so five or six hours. Such a short period of time for everything in my life to go upside down.


    I pulled the watch off and was about to throw it against the wall in frustration when I thought better of it. It was a nice Apple Watch, and if everything went back to normal tomorrow I¡¯d feel pretty stupid if I smashed it. I figured the odds of things suddenly reverting weren¡¯t high, but they couldn¡¯t have been worse than this mess kicking off in the first place, right? I fastened the watch back to my wrist.


    Then I remembered the crystals. I pulled them out and examined the inner settings where I¡¯d embedded the ones powering my magic. It was time to figure this shit out.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 1) - Agility


    Point 3: X


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black x6


    Clear x3


    First thing I wanted to do was identify those nine unknown stones. I picked one of the black ones up, careful to keep what I was doing to myself. I had a feeling that these crystals were going to be super important in the days to come. Currency? Power? They represented something, that much was sure. And Dad always taught me to not flash expensive stuff in front of strangers.


    I couldn¡¯t just absorb them, because I didn¡¯t have any empty spots. I wondered if I could empty one back out again? First, I envisioned the stone settings, then I reached out with mental fingers toward the black stone, carefully trying to pull it free from its setting. As I suspected, it didn¡¯t move. There was a shimmer from the second setting every time I envisioned pulling at the black stone.


    Having a tier two stone allowed me to have a second stone. It wasn¡¯t going to let me take out the tier two without taking out the other one first. At least, that¡¯s what I hoped it meant. I reached out with imaginary fingers to the clear stone, hoping it would move.If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.


    It did. It popped out, first in my mind¡¯s eye, then into the fingers of my right hand. That was something! Now I had a way to test the stones. I carefully set the agility stone aside and picked up one of the unknown clear ones. This time, it sank quickly into my skin, and I immediately felt stronger. A strength stone! That might be really helpful. Alfred could use it right away; it would bump his stone up to tier two.


    I had this vision of some sort of trading post where we could all exchange crystals. Then we¡¯d go win more of them, come back, and swap until we all had the ones we needed. It was a great plan. I just didn¡¯t think humans were going to work that way. Maybe I¡¯d be wrong this time and human nature would be set aside for the duration of the emergency, but I doubted it.


    Taking out the strength crystal was easy, now that I knew what I was doing. I popped it back out and tested another one, which gave me a boost in willpower, and then the final clear one, which was for stamina. I sucked in a breath as soon as I felt my endurance and health improve. Kat already had a stamina stone, but she could sure use another one about now. A second stone would boost hers to tier two. It would certainly help her healing.


    I set that one aside to give to her once I was finished with my testing. There were still six black crystals unidentified, and I wanted to know what they all did before I lost the chance. Calm moments seemed few and far between, and I wanted to take as much advantage of this one as I could.


    One by one, I checked each black stone and then removed it. I was in luck, and then some! There were two additional Control Undead stones. I slotted one, and then the second, which merged together to form a new tier two, and then almost instantly merged with the other tier two to give me my first tier three stone.


    I could control more undead now. Four smaller ones like my zombies, or two bigger ones. I hadn¡¯t seen anything bigger and meaner than the zombies and was sort of hoping I wouldn¡¯t. The fact that my power let me control tier two undead implied the existence of tier two undead¡ªand probably tier three, four, and¡­ It didn¡¯t bear thinking about for too long.


    Merging the stones into a tier three opened the third point for me, which means I¡¯d be able to use a third power of some sort. I quickly checked the other black stones to see what else I had. One was Nightvision, which might have been useful a short while before. Hell, with no flashlights or other lights, it might be one of the most useful powers I¡¯d seen. With it slotted, the dim candlelight was enough that the whole room seemed bright as noon.


    The other three stones were likewise useful. One was an Animate Dead spell that was the same as what Carver had been able to cast. Thinking about him made me wonder if he was okay. He¡¯d ridden off into the city on an undead horse, which probably made him one of the fastest things out there. But he was still alone, and new dangers seemed to be popping up everywhere. I hoped he would be all right.


    Then I also had an Augment Undead spell and a Heal Undead spell. Both of those seemed especially useful. The former would boost an existing undead, making it more combat effective. The second one would heal their injuries. I thought of Rosie right away, his head and neck so badly savaged. Both of my zombies had taken a serious beating, but now I could fix at least some of that. I worried that healing might take a lot of my personal energy, like it did for Virgil, so I¡¯d need to be cautious about using it. Just having the ability to heal my minions in a pinch was awesome, though.


    I slotted the Agility back in. Simple as it was, that stone had probably already saved my life at least twice. I didn¡¯t want to be without it. Then I popped in the Augment spell. Since I didn¡¯t know how badly healing would wear me out, it made more sense to slot the buff rather than the heal, at least in the short term.


    Not any stranger to computer games, it was clear to me that I was well on my way to ¡®pet class¡¯ sorts of powers. I had a control power, a buff, and a heal. Put those together and it wasn¡¯t a bad way to go. For the time being, it was definitely the best combination of available powers.


    After I put the remaining crystals back safely in my pocket, I examined what I had.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 1) - Agility


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 1) - Augment Undead


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Nightvision, Heal Undead, Animate Dead


    Clear: Strength, Will, Stamina


    The stamina crystal, however, was about to be donated. Kat needed this one more than me. I palmed it as I stood up and returned to her side.


    Kat was still unconscious, but she looked less pale than she had before. Her face wasn¡¯t covered with sweat. If anything, she looked downright peaceful. I hoped she¡¯d wake soon. With luck, the extra stamina stone would help. I laid my hand over hers, and the stone I held sank instantly into her hand.


    Was that a little more pink in her cheeks already? In the dim light, it was probably more wishful thinking than anything else, but I hoped ranking up her stone would give her stamina enough of a boost that she¡¯d heal faster. It wasn¡¯t going to give her back her leg, but the sooner she kicked out the rest of the venom, the better.


    A loud bang from outside made me jump. Further back in the room, people muttered, but Lords held a finger to his lips and made a shushing sound. I kept low, but since I was at the very front of the building I could peer out through the windows there.


    Outside was about as dark as night could be. I reached into myself and removed the buff spell, then plugged in the Nightvision spell again. Instantly the outdoors was more like dusk. That was a whole lot better!


    What I saw out there wasn¡¯t, though. We had a parade of goblins wandering through the lot. The bang was one of them bashing a car hood with his club. I¡¯d run into these guys before. While the zombies were pretty stupid, the goblins showed some serious cunning. They weren¡¯t going to win a Nobel, but they were definitely smart enough to see the flickering candle flame through the windows.

 Chapter 14 - A lot of trouble

    <h4>Chapter 14 - A lot of trouble</h4>


    ¡°Candle!¡± I hissed.


    Lords swore softly, then quickly put out the nearer one. Someone in the back of the room blew out the other, dropping the room into utter darkness for everyone except me. Far toward the rear of the room, someone whimpered in distress.


    The response time putting out the lights was good, but I was pretty sure the goblins had seen something, because they were still coming right for us.


    Lords came to crouch beside me. ¡°What did you see?¡±


    ¡°Pack of goblins. There¡¯s nine of them, making their way across the parking lot toward us. The dark doesn¡¯t seem to bother them,¡± I told him.


    ¡°Or you,¡± he replied. ¡°Goblins?¡±


    ¡°Short green things, generally with pointy sticks or clubs? Not a lot of brains, but they¡¯re still dangerous.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, we saw them. Goblins, huh?¡±


    ¡°Seems to fit.¡±


    ¡°And they¡¯re coming toward us?¡± he whispered. I just nodded in reply, as the goblins were getting pretty close. Lords seemed to get the message, because he was moving a moment later, gliding through the mostly-dark room, tapping a few of the men on their shoulders. I figured it was probably the same crew he¡¯d greeting Alfred and I with. It was just a few cops, but that was what we had to work with here. The bigger problem was the lack of light. I wasn¡¯t sure what they planned to do about that, but I¡¯d underestimated Lords.


    He and his three men went to the door and stacked there. I piled on at the end. I¡¯d seen enough fights now to know that I could help, especially if I could get the zombies out of the car and into the fight. Since the goblins weren¡¯t going to pass us by, from the looks of it, that meant we had to fight or run. In fact, I was more surprised others didn¡¯t join us.


    ¡°You sure you want in on this, miss?¡± Lords asked softly.


    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ve fought these things before.¡±


    ¡°All right, then. Close your eyes when I light the flare,¡± Lords said.


    Then he went to the front door and swung it open, stepping outside into the night. As soon as he was outside, he smacked something against his leg, and it started glowing very bright. I shielded my eyes, but I was already half-dazzled by the brilliance, my Nightvision working against me this time. I quick-swapped it back out in exchange for my undead buff.


    The other three cops rushed outside to join him, and I staggered along right behind them. A quick mental command to my zombies woke them up and got them moving, opening the doors on either side of the car I¡¯d stuck them inside. Then it was time to see if I could do something to make them a little stronger.


    I focused on the Augment Undead spell, on how the crystal felt in my mind and on the memories it had given me. I knew intuitively how to cast the spell, even though I¡¯d never even tried before. Tendrils of black smoke-like magic drifted from my hand, lashing through the air until they reached Rosencrantz. Once it touched the zombie, the magic sank into its skin and vanished, and I had the strong sense that Rosie was now a whole lot tougher than he had been a moment ago.


    ¡°What was that?¡± Alfred asked, stepping out beside me. He¡¯d helped with the surgery on Kat, too, and I was pretty sure it had bothered him as much as me. He¡¯d gone off on his own after, same as I. It was good to see him coming back out to fight, anyway. I¡¯d seen him get into it a few times now, and while he was a little slow getting started, he picked up the idea that it was fight or die pretty fast.Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.


    ¡°New spell. Got something for you, too,¡± I said. I grabbed the strength crystal and handed it to him. Alfred gasped as it immediately sank into his skin. ¡°Second strength crystal. Now you can slot another stone. Figured anything that helps us stay alive is a good thing.¡±


    ¡°Thanks!¡± Alfred said. He pulled out another clear crystal from his pocket and absorbed it. ¡°Now I¡¯m fast and strong. Time to take the fight to the enemy.¡±


    Strength and agility was going to be a deadly combination. I hoped it would be enough to help us win this one, because that was a lot of goblins, and they looked super mad as they rushed toward us.


    Lords and his fellow cops met them like a wall, but they were almost immediately forced back. Alfred stepped up to join their line and everything changed fast. He swung his axe, killing a goblin with one swing. The back-swing wounded another.


    Meanwhile, Rosie was coming up behind them. He had the goblin knife I¡¯d given him in a hand and once he was within striking distance he stabbed the nearest goblin several times. It let out loud squeals as it died.


    Two of their kind dead in just a few seconds proved too much for the remaining goblins. They took off, racing away across car hoods and under bushes until they were well out of sight. Lords didn¡¯t even try to give chase, ordering his men to stand fast.


    Alfred knelt down and touched the goblin he¡¯d killed, while I went around to the one Rosie killed and did the same. I got a clear crystal for my trouble. Those all seemed to be about physical or mental attributes, enhancement of our body or mind. I was still hoping I¡¯d eventually get a second agility one myself, because that would be awesome. I was already tough to hit, what with how fast I could dodge. Making that stronger had enormous appeal.


    ¡°Good fighting,¡± Lords said. He recovered the flare, which was still going strong, and walked around the area outside the doors, checking to be sure no more surprises hid there.


    ¡°Nice thinking on the flare,¡± I replied. ¡°With the power gone, that was brilliant, if you¡¯ll forgive the pun. What about firearms, though? Can¡¯t you just shoot them, or are you conserving ammo?¡±


    Lords shook his head. ¡°Can¡¯t use them. Guns don¡¯t work, the flash-bangs don¡¯t work, and none of our vehicles will start. I don¡¯t know what all¡¯s up with that, but it¡¯s weird as shit. The computers and power are all down, but the cars too? At first I figured, EMP. But then those creatures started popping up, and we tried shooting them, but no love.¡±


    Half the reason I¡¯d figured this spot would be safe was because the cops here would have guns. Now he was telling me guns stopped working along with the power? No wonder the police weren¡¯t able to get things organized and under control again. They were as weak as anyone else, weaker maybe if they hadn¡¯t gotten stones of their own already.


    ¡°How come no one else came outside?¡± I asked.


    ¡°They¡¯re just kids, miss,¡± Lords replied. He waved his other men back inside, and Alfred went along. Lords stood watch, continuing to chat while I directed my zombies back into their car.


    ¡°You can call me Selena.¡±


    ¡°Selena, then. They¡¯re mostly kids. Never had to do much fighting. Even the staff who took refuge here aren¡¯t that capable,¡± Lords replied. ¡°And none of them have those things, the ones you have.¡±


    ¡°None of them?¡± I asked, shocked. Surely they must have picked up at least one or two by now? I figured most anyone would have had a fight or two in order to get to this place.


    But Lords shook his head. ¡°None I know of, anyway. My boys, they each have one stone. All clear crystals. Strength for myself and Brad, agility for the other two. Mostly we¡¯ve just holed up inside where it¡¯s safe. Haven¡¯t ventured out much yet. Too risky.¡±


    I wondered about that. Playing it safe wasn¡¯t actually doing them any favors. If they never faced any risk, they¡¯d never get any of those stones. They¡¯d just stay normal, which in this new world was increasingly looking like it was synonymous with ¡®victim.¡¯ If people didn¡¯t learn how to fight, there were going to be a lot more fatalities.


    I set that aside and asked the next obvious question. ¡°What¡¯s next? I assume come dawn you have some plan in mind for what to do?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m still hoping that we¡¯ll get assistance coming for us soon,¡± Lords replied. ¡°Somewhere out there, folks are organizing and getting ready to come help those affected, same as any other disaster. Probably best if we just sit tight. The station has food and water supplies. The medics brought over their gear, meds, and other stuff too. We¡¯ve got what we need to survive a couple of days if we have to.¡±


    ¡°You think this will be over in a couple of days?¡± I asked, kicking one of the dead goblins with my boot.


    ¡°It better be, Miss Selena, or we¡¯re all in a lot of trouble,¡± Lords said. Then he turned and went back inside.


    I stared at the pair of dead goblins a moment longer before following. Personally, I thought he was right.


    We were all in a lot of trouble.

 Chapter 15 - Real Power

    <h4>Chapter 15 - Real Power</h4>


    Someone had relit the candle, now that the danger was past, but folks had learned¡ªtwo women were hanging heavy drapes over the front windows to make sure the light didn¡¯t leak outside.


    ¡°Hey, Kat¡¯s awake,¡± Alfred called out. He knelt on the floor beside her.


    I wended my way over. She was indeed awake, although she still looked dazed. I joined Alfred in kneeling at her side. ¡°You okay, Kat?¡±


    She nodded. ¡°Woozy. Virgil gave me some painkillers. You were outside?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. Goblins,¡± I replied.


    ¡°Really?¡± Kat asked. When I nodded, she sighed. ¡°I was hoping it was all a bad dream.¡±


    ¡°Me too. But sadly, nope. We¡¯re still in the shit.¡±


    ¡°My leg feels weird,¡± Kat said.


    I looked at Alfred, who shook his head, She wasn¡¯t fully awake yet and either didn¡¯t know or didn¡¯t want to. It wasn¡¯t my job to force her into that before she was ready, so I lowered my voice and shifted the topic. ¡°I gave you a second crystal. Found another stamina one, so yours is double strength now. Should help you heal faster.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± Kat said. ¡°That was awesome of you. I think I¡¯m gonna sleep some more, okay?¡±


    ¡°Very okay,¡± I replied. ¡°You get some rest.¡±


    She was back asleep in just a few minutes, but this time it looked much more like regular sleep, instead of the feverish unconsciousness she¡¯d displayed earlier. Kat was definitely going to pull through, now. I only hoped she¡¯d be able to survive what we¡¯d done to her.


    ¡°That was nice of you, giving her another stone,¡± Alfred said. ¡°And thanks for the one you gave me, too. Here¡ªone good turn deserves another.¡±


    He handed me a small black jewel. He must have looted that from a zombie at one point or another. I took the stone from him, quickly swapping out the Augment spell to test it.


    ¡°Thanks!¡±


    This one was something new. Alfred had found himself a Drain Life spell. That was interesting, and I left it slotted. This was the first direct damage type spell I¡¯d seen since this whole mess began, and I was excited to get a chance to see it in action. I went to pocket the Augment stone again, then noticed something odd¡ªit was broken! The stone had shattered into several large shards. When I tried to absorb it into me again, it failed. The thing had lost its magic.


    ¡°Well, that sucks,¡± I said.


    ¡°What¡¯s that?¡± Alfred asked.


    ¡°Look¡ªthe stone broke when I took it out,¡± I said, holding out the shards. ¡°I¡¯d been trying to test the ones I found, see what they were, but I guess if you swap them out too much or something, they can fail. This one just broke apart when I popped it out.¡±


    ¡°Makes sense,¡± Alfred replied.


    ¡°How?¡±


    ¡°Well, as much as any of this stuff makes sense, I mean,¡± he replied. ¡°If this was a game and you were just swapping spells like mad, that would be a little overpowered, wouldn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°I guess,¡± I replied. ¡°Hey, how did you know I gamed?¡±


    He chuckled. ¡°Well, I could say because everyone our age does, but mostly it¡¯s because of how well you handled everything. Zombies, goblins, spiders, and more¡ªnone of it made you so much as blink.¡±Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    I¡¯d been doing a lot more than blinking, but I knew when to take a compliment. ¡°Thanks.¡±


    ¡°No worries I¡¯d never have gotten here without you.¡±


    A short while later, I¡¯d drifted off beside Kat when something woke me. At first I worried it was something about Kat, but the heat she¡¯d been giving off was gone, and I was pretty certain she was out of the woods now. I lay there watching her and listening. That¡¯s when I heard the voices. They were clearly trying to keep their volume down, but the space just wasn¡¯t that large. It was easy enough to pick out Bradley and Lords¡¯ conversation.


    ¡°Look, they have how many of those things?¡± Bradley was asking. ¡°We have barely any. Time to collect them so we can redistribute them to the actual fighters.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll note she was out there fighting, Brad,¡± Lords replied. ¡°In fact, her monster took down one of them. I don¡¯t recall you doing that.¡±


    ¡°Exactly my point,¡± Bradley snapped back. ¡°She has the power to do that. Her friend, too. They each must have more stones than any of us. Think how much safer all our people would be if we had more stones to protect them.¡±


    ¡°Enough of this, Brad. We¡¯re not taking people¡¯s things, even weird things like these. You want more stones, grow a pair of stones of your own and go after them, same as that girl did.¡±


    Bradley walked off in a huff at that point. It was good to know Lords was sticking up for me, but I predicted problems coming from Bradley, and I didn¡¯t know how the other police would lean. Were they close supporters of Lords, or would they buckled if Bradley tried to execute a palace coup?


    It was increasingly looking like this might be a waypoint in my journey, not a final destination. I couldn¡¯t afford to stick around if Bradley was going to become a threat. As far as I was concerned, wanting to remove my ability to defend myself constituted a threat.


    I made sure the spare stones were all tucked away deep inside a zipper pocket inside my main pants pocket. Sooner or later I¡¯d figure out a more secure way of handling them, but this would do for now.


    Then I closed my eyes again. Rain was just starting to drum on the rooftop as my eyelids shut and I returned to a deep slumber.


    <hr><hr>


    Gideon Carver sobbed as rain poured down around him, mixing with his tears. He was all but blind, between the dark, the rain, and his crying, but he¡¯d gone beyond caring.


    The graves were dug, both of them. His wife. His daughter. Both of them gone, savaged by something while he was away because he hadn¡¯t managed to return to them quickly enough. He knelt beside the fresh graves, running his fingers through the dirt.


    More than anything, he wanted them back. The worst part was he could do it. He could animate them both. He had the magic to accomplish that, now. Drop the other two and he could have his beloved family again.


    Except they wouldn¡¯t really be his family. They¡¯d be monsters wearing their faces. None of Carolyn¡¯s memories would remain. The undead version of his daughter Kim wouldn¡¯t play with him or ask him to dress up. Everything they had been was gone now. Lost forever. Even with all his power, he couldn¡¯t actually bring someone back from the dead, not really. His power generated the semblance of life, not real life.


    He staggered back inside the house, leaving the horse outside to watch for dangers. The goblin zombie came with him to keep him safe indoors, just in case some threat snuck in. This was his life now, running from one danger toward another, always wondering when something new would leap out at him. It wasn¡¯t a pleasant thought, but lost in his own mired mix of fury and hate, Gideon didn¡¯t mind having unpleasant thoughts.


    Gideon settled himself into his bed, secure behind a locked door, with a servant that never slept standing guard. The zombies stank a little, but not enough to make him send his guardian away.


    A good night¡¯s rest would clear some things up, at least. He knew there was no coming back for his family. Even if this all miraculously faded overnight, that bit of damage felt permanent.


    For that matter, this new world felt awfully permanent, too. Gideon felt in his gut that things were not going back to normal anytime soon, if they ever did. These stones that the monsters dropped? They were the new power in the world. Cars didn¡¯t work, electricity was gone. But those stones conveyed real power on anyone who had them, and the more of them they had, the stronger they¡¯d be.


    Which meant all he needed to do to rise to the top of this new pyramid was to gather more stones than anyone else. That was what real power looked like, now. With real power like that, he could have protected his family somehow. Saved them.


    But since they were already gone, he¡¯d gain the power anyway, and then use it however he saw fit. Tonight, he¡¯d sleep. In the morning, when it was light again, he and his minions would take to the streets and go monster hunting. Gideon knew that out there, others would be doing the same thing. The race was on now, for real power. The sort of personal power granted by the stones was something new and strange in the world. Once, people who had guns made the rules, then it was people with wealth. Now, real power would rest in the hands of those who could use magic.


    Gideon planned to surpass all the rest.

 Chapter 16 - Bad to Worse

    <h4>Chapter 16 - Bad to Worse</h4>


    I woke up to sunlight streaming through the big windows in the front of the building. I¡¯d managed some solid sleep, thank god. I¡¯d been exhausted after the running, fighting, and everything else that had made up my day. Waking up on the hard floor of the security office with only my lab coat as a pillow wasn¡¯t ideal. But given everything I¡¯d just been through, it was better than the alternative.


    There were others stirring. I spotted Lords standing near one of the windows, clearly on watch duty. Had he been there all night? I figured not; he¡¯d probably had people taking shifts. I went over to stand beside him.


    ¡°I¡¯m happy to take a shift tonight, too,¡± I told him.


    ¡°Hmm?¡±


    ¡°For night watch. Smart move. I should have thought to offer before.¡±


    ¡°Ah, yeah. Well, for now it¡¯s just me and my men. We¡¯ve been trained for¡­well, not precisely this sort of thing¡­¡±


    ¡°I doubt anyone has!¡± I replied with a chuckle.


    He smiled at that, although it looked a little forced. ¡°Right. But at least we¡¯ve had training to deal with a crisis. A couple of us are former military. The students are an unknown quantity still.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re still hoping help is on the way, then? That someone else is coming to save us?¡± I asked.


    His face fell into a deep frown. ¡°Yes, that¡¯s my hope. But I gave what you said last night a lot of thought. Do you really think this thing, whatever it is, is everywhere?¡±


    I shrugged. ¡°I have absolutely no idea. Seriously, I have no more information than you do. Here¡¯s my thoughts, though. If we assume it¡¯s global, and the whole world is in the same mess, and we¡¯re wrong? Then rescue comes in a day or two and we¡¯ve put in a lot of extra work for nothing. But if we assume help is on the way, and it turns out nobody is coming because they¡¯re facing the same mess we are?¡±


    ¡°Then we¡¯re all dead,¡± he replied. ¡°I do see your point. You were very effective out there last night. Your friend, too. How many of those crystals do you have?¡±


    The question made me more than a little nervous, but I had to say something quickly. Too long a pause and he¡¯d assume I was lying. ¡°Three. I got lucky and got doubles of the same crystal back to back. If you get two of a kind, they merge, which is why I can control two zombies. One crystal only let me control one.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s impressive. My men and I have one each. We shared them around to make sure everyone got one. Mine is strength. Bradley¡¯s got strength, too. Samson has stamina and George agility. You think we ought to get more of those things, then.¡±


    It wasn¡¯t a question, and I was glad of that. Some rest had brought him around. ¡°I do, yeah. Every monster we kill seems to drop one, so it¡¯s easy enough to get more. If we work together, we can gather some, maybe get more doubles so we can boost people up. Once you have a double, you can slot another crystal. The memories they give¡ªyou got those too, right?¡±


    He nodded.


    ¡°Well, once you get a double, you get a little more information about them. The number of crystals we can slot is equal to the highest tier crystal we have. If we get four of a kind, they¡¯ll merge into a tier three crystal¡ªmore powerful, and we get to slot a third stone. I think if we gather eight of a kind it merges into a tier four and opens a fourth slot, but that¡¯s just a guess.¡±


    ¡°It makes sense, though,¡± he replied, rubbing his chin. ¡°I¡¯ll talk with the guys, see if they¡¯re up for some patrols to gather more stones. We need supplies anyway. We¡¯ve got some food and water here, but not enough. And we should try to find more survivors, too.¡±This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    ¡°Sounds like a plan. I¡¯m happy to help if we go scouting.¡±


    He nodded and then left, heading deeper into the building to chat with the other campus cops.


    The conversation hadn¡¯t been an easy one. A quick lie had helped, but I had a lot more crystals than I¡¯d let on, and if word about that got out, it might backfire on me. The last thing I wanted was to give up all those stones, though. Yeah, passing a few on to friends who needed them was one thing. Being ordered to hand them over by a relative stranger had zero appeal, though.


    Part of me still wondered about what happened if a person died, too. Did humans drop stones, like monsters did? Maybe we only dropped stones if we had some socketed when we died? If it turned out that killing people resulted in significant loot drops, things were going to do seriously sideways in a heartbeat. Everyone was already on edge. Give terrified people a good reason to kill each other, and things would go from bad to worse fast.


    I checked my inventory.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 1) - Agility


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 1) - Nightvision


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead, Animate Dead, Drain Life


    Clear: Will, Unknown


    Losing that Augment Undead spell sucked. I really liked that one, and wanted to see what the impact was on my zombies¡¯ fighting ability. But it was a good lesson to have, too. I had been just stripping stones out and re-inserting them. At least I learned that was risky now, instead of losing a higher tier stone.


    Removing the Control Undead stone was out of the question, now that I knew it might shatter on removal. It was the only thing better than tier one I had. Losing it would put me almost back to the beginning. For better or worse, I was stuck as a necromancer right now. Accidental or not, that was probably not going to make me super popular with everyone else. Lords had been right to order me to leave them outside for the night. I could only imagine how they were starting to smell by now, even though they¡¯d been stuffed full of preservative before being shipped to the University for dissection.


    I wanted to believe Lords was right in being super cautious, and that things would get better before too long. My gut said this was too weird for things to go back to normal anytime soon. Unless this was some sort of mass hallucination, I couldn¡¯t see a happy ending here. Maybe the event was limited to a small area, and all we had to do was walk out. But if electricity and cars didn¡¯t work in the area, how was help going to get to us?


    No, survival was going to require action. Sitting around hoping someone else would save us might feel nice in the short term, but it wasn¡¯t a strategy I was willing to bank on. It was time to take some action, whether the others were interested or not. I quietly grabbed my pack and axe, and moved to the door.


    I stepped outside into the morning sunlight, intending to do a quick loop around the building to see if there was anything useful out in the open. I had my pack and my axe, and ordered Rosie and Guildie out of the car as I approached. I¡¯d been right; they were beginning to stink a little. Maybe if I slotted that Heal Undead spell, I could fix that? But I didn¡¯t want to risk losing Nightvision. That was too helpful. The better answer would be to find some more zombies and kill a few to get more black stones. I needed to find some more so I could Control a third one, anyway.


    Nobody seemed to notice as I slipped away down the sidewalk looking for trouble. Those zombies had been out wandering last night. I was betting some of them would still be around somewhere.


    Noises from a few streets over caught my attention, so I headed that way. I was cautious in my approach. No sense rushing into something deadly. If I ran into more than I could handle, I¡¯d go back and get help from the security office. Alfred was there, plus the campus cops. That was plenty of backup.


    Two blocks away brought me to a row of apartments I¡¯d never visited before. I wasn¡¯t sure if these were student housing or faculty, but they had the vibe of being attached to the college in some way. They¡¯d also clearly been ransacked.


    The first apartment building was a mess of shattered windows and broken doors. Furnishings from inside had been thrown out through upstairs windows, from the looks of it, and then just left scattered across lawns. That didn¡¯t look like zombie damage; the undead were a little more mindless in their approach. I had my money on goblins doing this. Either that, or something I hadn¡¯t seen yet. I moved forward with as much care as I could manage.


    I¡¯d only made it halfway across the lawn when a hissing noise from behind me got my attention. I whirled in place, raising the axe, and found myself staring into the eyes of the largest snake I¡¯d ever seen. It hissed at me again, then moved forward in a rapid, sinuous motion that closed the gap between us in seconds.

 Chapter 17 - Death Hug

    <h4>Chapter 17 - Death Hug</h4>


    Rosencrantz and Guildenstern were in ¡®guard mode,¡¯ so they started moving even before I ordered them. That was a good thing, because this snake was fast! It closed the gap between us more quickly than I could easily react, and its fangs sank into my calf. I let out a shout¡ªthe pain was intense. The snake¡¯s head was almost as big as my own, and seeing those fangs punch through my pants almost made me pass out.


    It yanked at my leg, pulling me over onto the ground, and then whipped the rest of its body forward. I got the idea right away; the snake was going to wrap me in coils and hug me to death. Not cool!


    But before it could wrap coils around me, my zombies came to the rescue. They each grabbed onto a loop of the snake and started going to town with their knives. It didn¡¯t take more than a blow each for them to get the snake¡¯s full attention. It let go of me and turned toward them, biting at Rosie¡¯s leg. The bit tore away a chunk of the zombie¡¯s flesh, reminding me that I really needed to get the Heal Undead slotted so I could repair my undead critters.


    Blood ran freely down my leg and into my boot, but it had to wait. I still had my axe in hand and used it to lever myself back to my feet. Putting too much weight on the injured leg was not an option, but I hopped my way a couple of feet closer and swung the axe as the snake tried to chomp Guildie. My blow bounced off its skull, but sent its strike wide.


    The zombies kept stabbing.


    My axe must have gotten the creature¡¯s attention again, because it whirled back at me, lightning-quick. I fell backward away from the strike, jaws clamping shut just inches from my face. The zombies¡¯ hold kept it from reaching me. I clambered back to my feet again and took another swing.


    This time, the axe bit deep into the snake¡¯s neck. Blood sprayed from the wound, dripping across the fresh grass. That was enough for Mr. Snake¡ªit decided discretion was the better part of valor and tried to flee. But the zombies still had a tight hold of its body. It wasn¡¯t going anywhere.


    Before it could turn its attention back to them and free itself, I brought the axe down on its neck again, then two more times until the head finally broke free. It thrashed another few moments after I beheaded it, but there were no new heads growing or any other weird magical shit. The battle was done.


    Panting, I tapped the snake¡¯s head and was rewarded with something brand new: a green crystal! And this one was tier two! I pocketed the winnings and dropped my pack so I could fish through it for something to wrap my wound. I had a basic first aid kit¡ªsome gauze, ointment, and other basic crap¡ªfrom my room, but I was going to have to replace that stuff before long. At the rate I was burning through supplies, I needed to find a way to refresh them soon.


    I cleaned the wound with some water from my bottle, then hit it with antibiotic cream and gauze, wrapping around it all with a cling wrap. The holes made by the snake¡¯s fangs were big enough they could probably use sutures, but I didn¡¯t have a kit, and the idea of sewing myself up made my stomach flip. It could wait until I got back to the others.


    The good news was that I didn¡¯t feel any venom effects. I poked at the snake¡¯s head, checking the fangs¡ªI remembered reading somewhere that venomous snakes had hollow or grooved fangs, and this one did not. I was probably okay, but I lashed the head to my backpack, just in case.


    As I cleaned the wound, I considered the snake and the stone it dropped. It had been significantly more difficult to fight than the other monsters I¡¯d battled. This one took what, four blows with my axe, plus at least three blows each from the zombie daggers? It had taken a serious beating. Nothing I¡¯d faced so far was that strong.


    And it dropped a tier two stone, which implied that yes, I wasn¡¯t imagining it; this creature really was stronger than the ones I¡¯d fought yesterday. But that revelation opened the door to a whole slew of new questions.


    Were all monsters now tier two? Had all the ones we saw yesterday ranked up somehow? Or was it only some creatures? If there were a bunch of tier one critters still out there, maybe I¡¯d just gotten unlucky, running into this one. The fact that there were now tier two monsters, however, implied that we might eventually see tier three or higher as well. I was tier three, technically. I¡¯d beaten the tier two snake, but I¡¯d been hurt and Guildie was injured as well. If it had been a tier three snake, would I have been able to beat it at all?


    The sense that I needed to grow stronger, quickly, increased. The existence of more dangerous creatures and the possibility of even harder foes appearing down the road made that very clear. But how to get that through to the others, back at the security building?


    I glanced at the snake¡¯s body.


    Yeah, that would probably work.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    I had the zombies each pick up one end of the snake. Between the two of them, they managed to carry the thing fairly well. Bringing it back with me had two major advantages. I could easily convince people of the threat level, and from what I¡¯d heard snake tastes like chicken. For people who didn¡¯t have a lot to eat, this was a lot of meat. Find some way to grill it up and it ought to provide a basic meal for the people huddled inside. With some food in their bellies, maybe they¡¯d be more willing to get outside and fight.


    Before we took off, I decided to test my two new stones. I focused and carefully pulled the Agility stone clear, hoping it wouldn¡¯t break. It didn¡¯t. I sighed with relief, then slotted in the clear stone I¡¯d won the night before. This one was another Agility, which was interesting. I could merge it with my other one and be a lot faster. But before I did that, I wanted to check the green tier two. I pulled the Nightvision out¡ªagain, no breaks¡ªand then added the green stone.


    Instantly my mind flooded with information about plants, specifically their growth. The spell was Entangle, which felt fitting given that the snake tried to tangle me up in its coils. It would allow me to turn the grass or other plants into a weapon, pinning targets in place. They could rip or cut their way free, but at tier two the spell would hold a lot of things fast.


    Good enough for now! I left it slotted, and then added back the other Agility stone. It merged with the one I already had in place, and now I had two tier two stones alongside my one tier three. If I was going to advance more, I still needed a way to get a stone to tier four. But this was a great start! I felt faster than before, and my reaction time was clearly better.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 2) - Agility


    Point 3: Green Stone (Tier 2) - Entangle


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead, Animate Dead, Drain Life, Nightvision


    Clear: Will


    Using the axe as a cane, I made my way back toward the security building. I winced with every step, but the wound wasn¡¯t that bad. I kept my head on a swivel the whole way back, though. I¡¯d been surprised by one monster this morning. A second encounter, with me injured and the zombies laden down? Not good.


    Fortunately we made it back to the parking lot in one piece. One of Lords¡¯ men¡ªI think his name was George¡ªsaw me coming and jogged over to check on me.


    ¡°You all right, miss? Boss was worried when he saw you were gone.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m okay. My leg¡¯s a little banged up. Is that paramedic available? I patched myself up, but I could use another look,¡± I replied.


    ¡°Yeah, we can get him. What were you thinking, going out like that?¡± he asked.


    I shot him a Look. ¡°I was thinking that if we all sit tight here, we¡¯re all going to die. That snake my boys brought back? It¡¯s a second rank monster. Tier two. Dropped a tier two stone, and was hard as hell to kill.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s that even mean?¡±


    I sighed. Hadn¡¯t this guy ever played a single video game? ¡°It means they¡¯re getting stronger. The monsters. This one was harder than anything I saw out there yesterday. If there are more tier two monsters like it, then that changes everything. We need to grow stronger too, or we¡¯ll be left behind.¡±


    ¡°Uh huh. Let me get Lords and the paramedic,¡± he replied, then walked off.


    Why was this difficult to understand? If we didn¡¯t step up, we were going to be stepped on. How could I make them see that?


    Lords and the paramedic came out moments later. The young guy bent over my leg and unwrapped my careful bandaging.


    ¡°You did a good job on this. Any poison?¡± he asked.


    ¡°No, pretty sure I would have felt it by now,¡± I replied. ¡°I brought the head just in case, though.¡±


    ¡°Smart move,¡± he replied. He checked it over. ¡°Shit, that looks like a regular garter snake. They¡¯re usually cute. And about a foot long.¡±


    ¡°This one grew past average, I guess?¡± I replied with a chuckle.


    He laughed, too. ¡°Sure did. Okay, I can get you patched up with my spell. Hang in there a sec.¡±


    White power flowed from his hands, down into my leg. As I watched, the holes knitted themselves back together. My leg itched as the injury healed, but all I felt was relief that I could get this fixed so easily.


    He leaned back when the wound was mostly closed. His face was pale and sweating, but he still took the time to rewrap the gauze around my leg. ¡°Got it most of the way. You¡¯ll want to stay off it another day or two, let it heal up.¡±


    ¡°Thank!,¡¯ I replied. I didn¡¯t think we had a day or two for rest, but there was no point saying so. It felt ungrateful. ¡°That power is awesome. We need to find more like it. Where did you find it, anyway?¡±


    ¡°Some sort of stone monster we saw right after the whole mess started,¡± he replied. ¡°I¡¯m Henry, by the way. I suspect I¡¯m gonna be seeing more of you?¡±


    I laughed at that, nodding. ¡°Probably will, yes. I¡¯ll try not to need your help too often, but we need to get out there, or we¡¯re in trouble.¡±


    Lords broke in at that point. ¡°You say this thing dropped a second tier stone?¡±


    I nodded. He cursed. Good, at least somebody understood what that probably meant.


    ¡°Can I see it?¡± Lords asked.


    ¡°I slotted it to see what it did,¡± I replied. ¡°Since they can break if you take them out, I don¡¯t want to do that without cause, if that¡¯s all right.¡±


    ¡°They can break?¡± Lords asked.


    ¡°Yeah, one shattered last night while I was testing a couple,¡± I replied. I pulled the broken shards from where I¡¯d stowed them in a pocket. I figured it might be worth keeping them; maybe they could be repaired, or used somehow. There was still too much I didn¡¯t know about all this.


    He took the broken pieces from my hand. ¡°Well, that sucks. We¡¯ll need to be careful, then. And the snake?¡±


    He gestured to my kill.


    ¡°It¡¯s a snake. How much food did you say you had in storage? I¡¯m guessing whatever it is, it¡¯s not enough. I figured we could grill this critter up and give everyone a good meal. With some fresh food in all our bellies, it might make things easier to manage.¡±


    ¡°Good thinking,¡± he replied. ¡°I¡¯ll get some folks collecting firewood so we can roast it. I can dress it; never done a snake before, but it can¡¯t be too different from dressing any other animal.¡±


    He helped me back to my feet, and we got busy with the work of keeping this little collection of people alive.

 Chapter 18 - Outrageous Fortune

    <h4>Chapter 18 - Outrageous Fortune</h4>


    It turned out Bradley of all people had grilling skills. I can¡¯t say I was shocked. He looked the type: sort of had that somewhat overweight, straight from the back woods vibe. I didn¡¯t like him, didn¡¯t trust him, and didn¡¯t want to hang around him.


    But he knew how to cook snake, so he was everyone¡¯s hero of the day. Turns out garter snake did indeed taste like chicken, and a ten foot long version had a lot of meat on those bones. We grabbed junk wood from pallets next to the building and broke them up while Bradley rigged some grills and set about cooking the thing. He skinned it, too. Was saying something about curing the skin to make stuff with it.


    Far as I was concerned he was welcome to the skin. I just wanted some of the meat. It smelled delicious.


    I worried a little that the smell could draw monsters to our spot, but it didn¡¯t, at least at first. Instead it drew more people. The first ones showed up half an hour after we got the fires started. They¡¯d seen the smoke.


    ¡°Got movement down by the rugby pitch!¡± George called out. He was on lookout duty, perched atop the police station where he could see things coming from a ways off. ¡°Looks like people!¡±


    The pitch was south of us, down past the rescue building and a helipad. I squinted and thought I could see people coming out of the wood line. It seemed like a whole bunch of them, which I wasn¡¯t certain was good or not. We already had a bunch of people packed into a relatively small building. There was Lords and his three fellow police; myself, Alfred, and Kat; Henry and two EMTs who worked with him at the rescue center; and a dozen other students who¡¯d been in the area when everything went to shit. That was twenty-two people, which we were already going to struggle to feed and house, especially if the bulk of them didn¡¯t start contributing soon.


    As the people headed our way came closer, I got a rough head-count. It looked like about two dozen more people, and they were a big mix. Bunch of older adults, even a few young kids among them. Clearly not part of UVM, so maybe they were from one of the hotels up the street, or from the mall half a mile down the road?


    I shuddered at the thought of the mall. University Mall was Vermont¡¯s biggest; not a huge claim to fame, but with the power off and monsters appearing, that place had to have become an instant nightmare. If anyone had survived to escape it, they were lucky and tough.


    Lords stepped away from our group, grabbing Samson to join him. Samson was a big black man who didn¡¯t talk much, so I hadn¡¯t had any real interactions with him yet, but he looked competent enough. I figured the two of them would likely be enough to handle any major issues, but I went up to Lords anyway.


    ¡°Want company? If there¡¯s any trouble, my new Entangle spell is pretty good at being a non-lethal cooldown,¡± I said.


    He hesitated, and I could tell he hated the idea of bringing a civilian with him into an unknown situation, but then he nodded. ¡°All right. But you take orders from me, and you listen, deal? And the zombies stay here. No sense freaking these folks out.¡±


    I snapped him a nod. ¡°You got it.¡±


    ¡°Hmph. We¡¯ll see,¡± he told me. Then we set off together.


    I had the only real weapon out of the three of us, which bugged me, too. Both of them carried lengths of rebar that worked pretty well as spears, but they didn¡¯t have much of a point and were heavy as hell. For people with strength stones, that maybe wasn¡¯t as big a deal, but if I remembered right Samson only had a stamina stone. He looked pretty strong to begin with, which was probably the only reason he was able to use a weapon that heavy at all.If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    ¡°Lords, it looks like families,¡± Samson said.


    Lords nodded. ¡°It does. There¡¯s a hotel just past that clump of trees. Betting they saw the smoke and headed our way looking for help.¡±


    Privately, I wondered if the hotel might not have been the more secure base of operations, but it was tough to say. The biggest problem we were going to have in the short term was water. With the power out, getting fresh water supplies wasn¡¯t going to be simple or easy.


    Back home, it would be.


    That thought brought pain, because it made me worry about my family for the first time since all this started. I¡¯d been able to keep them out of my head for the most part, focused on surviving one thing after another. I knew mom and dad would be doing the same thing, and they had better odds than I did, if I was being honest. Sure, the gun cabinet was full of useless chunks of metal now, but the well in the backyard that supplied water for our house was still a well. The pump was dead, but they¡¯d rig up something to draw water out of it in no time, and mom¡¯s garden was over an acre. They¡¯d be okay, at least for the short term.


    People in the Northeast Kingdom¡ªman, that sounds corny with a magipocalypse going on, but it¡¯s what we called northeastern Vermont¡ªwere survivors. I¡¯d grown up there, and I was used to tough winters, making do, and figuring shit out as I went along. Sure, I¡¯d had the easy life for a few years in Burlington, at college. But I remembered my roots well enough.


    It¡¯s not like my family were preppers, not really. But everyone out where we lived was into making sure they had what they needed for emergencies.


    We followed a path from the rescue building down to the helipad. As we went, I eyed the woods to the east of us. There was a brook out there somewhere; I could hear water gurgling over stones. That might help solve our water issues. But I could have sworn I saw something moving in there, too.


    ¡°Lords, don¡¯t pay too much attention, but I think we have company in the woods to our left,¡± I said softly.


    He almost looked, in spite of me telling him not to. ¡°You sure?¡±


    ¡°Nope. Just thought I saw some movement. Might have been the wind,¡± I replied.


    ¡°Or it might not,¡± Samson added, gripping his weapon tighter.


    ¡°Exactly,¡± I said. ¡°We need to get those people out of the open fast. If something comes at us¡­¡±


    ¡°If it does, have your Entangle ready,¡± Lords told me.


    ¡°That¡¯s the plan,¡± I replied.


    But nothing jumped out at us as we approached the band of people. The nearer we got, the more it was clear these were scared refugees, not something more sinister. There was an older couple helping each other along, a family of five, a young couple, and a trio of guys in business suits.


    Lords held up a hand when we were about ten feet away from them. ¡°Okay, folks, hold up right there. How can we help you?¡±


    One of the business suits stepped up. ¡°We saw the smoke. Didn¡¯t look like a structural fire, so we figured there had to be people there. We need help. You¡¯re police, right? You have to help us! There¡¯s no power, and there are these things running around. They killed Joe.¡±


    Behind him, several of the people walking with him were nodding in agreement. They all looked exhausted and terrified.


    I yanked at Lords¡¯ sleeve. ¡°We need to get them back to our base. Let¡¯s get them fed and figure things out from there. I don¡¯t like being out in the open like this for too long.¡±


    He glanced around seeming to realize that we were standing in the middle of a very large field with lots of hiding places around the outskirts. He nodded back to me. ¡°Okay, we¡¯ve got some food and a relatively safe place to rest for a bit. Come with us and we¡¯ll get you fed.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± the guy in the suit demanded. ¡°We want to know what¡¯s happening, and what¡¯s being done about it! My car won¡¯t start, my phone is dead, and then there¡¯s¡­creatures¡­running around.¡±


    I stepped up. ¡°My phone¡¯s dead too. Didn¡¯t have a car, but I had to fight my way through a ton of weird shit to find these guys. Don¡¯t worry; they¡¯re actual police, the campus police for UVM. The food is a little weird, but it¡¯s real too. Let¡¯s get all of you back to our camp where it¡¯s a little safer, and we can talk more there.¡±


    ¡°No, I want answers now!¡± the man sputtered. ¡°What is all this?¡±


    Lords shook his head. ¡°Back at camp. We¡¯ll tell you everything we know, which isn¡¯t much more than what you already do. But we¡¯ll share info, supplies, and make plans for what to do next. But we need to move now.¡±


    ¡°I¡ª¡°


    Mister Business Suit didn¡¯t get more than that one word out before an arrow went through his neck, and he went down, gurgling.


    Arrows? I ducked out of instinct, turning to my left, in the direction it had come from. The woods were no longer placid: a small horde of goblins rushed from the wood line, running at us with weapons in hand. The weapons were crappy; it looked like a mix of knives and crude spears, for the most part. But at least one of them had a bow, and that was major trouble.

 Chapter 19 - Drain Life

    <h4>Chapter 19 - Drain Life</h4>


    Lords was moving faster than I¡¯d have expected from the man. As the goblins rushed us, he lunged forward across the gap between our two groups, ushering the party forward with his hands. ¡°Let¡¯s go! Move fast! Up this road, hurry!¡±


    The other two suits took one look at their buddy on the ground and started running. The rest of the group hurried along in their tracks, quickly passing Samson and I as they raced down the road toward the police station.


    I wished more than anything that I had my zombies with me, but I couldn¡¯t sense them at this range. That sucked. If I were a little closer maybe I could order them to head this way. Since that wasn¡¯t an option, now was a good moment to try a new spell. I cast Entangle toward the oncoming goblins.


    The grass shot up around two of the little monsters, wreathing their feet, which made them stumble and slow just enough that more blades of grass wove themselves up around their legs, until they were stuck fast. Not bad! That didn¡¯t even close to even the odds, but it was better than nothing. Maybe I could cast it again?


    Before I could try, I got hit with the shakes, like I¡¯d just run too far with too little fuel. I remembered Henry talking about how using his healing power exhausted him. This had to be the same thing. Whatever we drew power from to make these spells happen, it took something out of us, too.


    The damned goblins were almost on top of us, and I couldn¡¯t afford to be a fall-apart. I hefted up my axe as best I could and staggered forward a couple of feet to stand beside Samson. Another arrow slashed through the air. I saw it coming and stepped sideways, avoiding the shot. Thank you, tier two agility!


    ¡°What¡¯s the plan?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Good job on the spell! Plan is, you two cover me as best you can and we run like hell,¡± Lords said. He was a few feet away and¡­scooping up the business suit¡¯s body? I wasn¡¯t sure what he was thinking, but then I saw the man¡¯s eyes flutter and realized he wasn¡¯t dead. Without an emergency room, ordinarily I¡¯d figure he was toast anyway. But we had Henry. If Lords could get him back there in time, maybe Henry could save him.


    ¡°You got it,¡± Samson replied. He gripped his rebar with both hands.


    ¡°No heroics,¡± Lords snapped back. ¡°Running fight. Keep them away from the noncombatants.¡±


    Then he set off at a surprisingly fast pace for someone carrying another man. Maybe I ought to look into strength stones, too. Hell, it sounded to me like someone could use all of the things. Stamina to heal faster, and I¡¯d bet money more will would help me be able to cast more spells.


    We ran alongside Lords. I was on the far right, closest to the oncoming goblins, and watched carefully for that archer to fire again. When he did, I called it out. ¡°Arrow!¡±


    This one wasn¡¯t aimed for me; it clattered off the road about a foot ahead of one of the kids. That made me angry, because kids weren¡¯t a fair target. Not now, not ever. There wasn¡¯t much I could do about it besides shout at them. They weren¡¯t close enough to fight, yet. But they were going to cut us off long before we reached the relative safety of the rest of our group.


    Up ahead though, I saw help on the way. Bradley and Alfred rushed down the street toward us, weapons in hand. George must have seen the goblins pop out and sent them as reinforcements. I glanced over at the monsters. The two I¡¯d Entangled had finally freed themselves, but they were way behind the pack. Not a major worry. I sensed that the spell had refreshed itself enough to cast again and gave it a shot.


    Two more goblins were stopped cold, but so was I. The physical backlash from the spell was enough to make me stagger and stop running, gasping for breath. With an effort of will, I brought my breathing under control and readied my axe. They were too close to keep running. It was time to fight.


    The first goblin rushed up and tried sinking a knife into me, but my agility came into play again. It wasn¡¯t quite like the creature was moving in slow motion; it was more like it just seemed slow. I sidestepped the blow without much trouble, and in spite of being weakened by the spellcasting, I smacked him upside the head with the blunt end of my axe. He went down, and another shot¡ªthis time with the sharp side¡ªfinished him off.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    Two more goblins were on me by then, but as they charged a chunk of rebar nailed one of them in midair, sending it sailing off to the side. I chopped the other goblin down to size with my axe.


    So many goblins, though! There was no time to count the things as they rushed at us. Then Alfred and Bradley were there, coming in on the goblins¡¯ right flank with everything they had. And we¡¯d finally gotten close enough that I could sense my zombies again. I called them and told them to double-time it. If I could get them over there quick enough to make a difference, then maybe things would be closer to even.


    For now, there were too many of them. Even with my speed, it was all I could do to keep the things at bay with my axe. I wasn¡¯t landing any more blows. Samson was in worse shape; he¡¯d already taken a few small cuts from goblin daggers. An arrow flashed past his head, narrowly missing.


    ¡°Step back!¡± Samson called out. I did, following him in careful, concerted steps as we gave ground to the oncoming band of monsters. That let Bradley and Alfred tear into their flank all the more.


    My boys were finally on the way! I sent Rosie off to deal with the damned archer¡ªjust find and destroy, please! Then I ordered Guildenstern to come to our aid. They were still a little ways off from their targets, as zombies weren¡¯t the fastest creatures. We just had to hold.


    I got in a lucky shot that took down one of the goblins. Two more darted in, and one of their knives slashed into my left arm. It stung, but I wasn¡¯t bleeding too badly. They kept playing that same game, though¡ªquick, darting movements forward with little slashes. There were too many of them for me to easily kill one when they attacked, but if I played defense, sooner or later they¡¯d take me down with tiny cuts.


    Entangle wasn¡¯t cutting it. As a spell, it was useful, but if I used it now the goblins would kill me before the weakness wore off. I stepped back from them again, Samson and I still giving ground in front of their attack, and used the few seconds of respite to switch stones.


    The Entangle stone popped out. The Drain Life spell popped in. Thankfully, the tier two stone didn¡¯t break. I¡¯d been hoping it would hold up, because I really didn¡¯t want to lose such a valuable stone. But I had a hunch I wanted to try. When I¡¯d first slotted the spell, I¡¯d gotten all the memories around how to use that magic. It would harm another, and heal me.


    I cast Drain Life on the nearest goblin, stretching out my hand as black fire reached from my fingertips toward the monster. It squealed as the magic struck, sinking into its body, withering its skin.


    It was actually pretty horrible to watch, but I couldn¡¯t dredge up sympathy for the goblin. They¡¯d attacked me.


    I felt the punch from the magic use hit my system, but a moment later there was a flood of golden energy, pulled from the goblin¡¯s body back into my hand. The wound on my arm closed in an instant. The remaining ache from the snake bite on my ankle? Gone. And most of the energy loss from the spell cast itself faded away, too. I¡¯d hoped that might be the case.


    The goblin wasn¡¯t quite dead yet, which was disappointing, but it was slow, weak, and Samson crushed it with a quick blow from his rebar.


    ¡°What was that?¡± Samson asked.


    ¡°New spell. Drain Life,¡± I called out. ¡°If I set them up, you think you can knock them down?¡±


    ¡°You know it, lady! Do it.¡±


    The spell hadn¡¯t quite reset yet. It seemed like it took a little time between casts, even though it restored my health. Why, I didn¡¯t know, but it didn¡¯t matter. I felt it the second the spell came back online, and reached out my hand to cast again. Another goblin shriveled up, and Samson was able to smack it down as well. The energy I got almost completely wiped away the exhaustion from the spell. We were doing this!


    Then an arrow sprouted from Samson¡¯s shoulder.


    He staggered back with a grunt, letting go of his rebar with one hand to clutch at the wound. The goblins could tell it was dinnertime, and came in with a rush, driving sharp knives into Samson¡¯s legs. He cried out in pain.


    I came in swinging, my axe cleaving away one of the goblins, then taking another down on the backswing. All at once Guildenstern was there, too, tackling a pair of goblins to the ground. They shrieked as he bit one and slashed the other with his blade.


    A horn blew. It was a signal, clearly. All at once, the remaining goblins took off and ran back toward the trees. I was too exhausted to chase, but cast one more Drain Life spell on one as they dashed off. It toppled over as the spell hit, barely coming back to its feet before Alfred cut it down with his axe.


    ¡°You guys okay?¡± Alfred asked, coming over.


    ¡°Been better,¡± Samson said through gritted teeth. He was in rough shape, between the arrow and the knife wounds he¡¯d taken, and he collapsed to his knees.


    ¡°Lay down,¡± I told him, pulling what was left of my first aid kit from my pack. ¡°I¡¯ve got to get some of these wounds dressed.¡±


    I looked back toward the station and saw why the goblins had retreated. Lords was on his way back, and he wasn¡¯t alone. George was there too, and they¡¯d convinced half a dozen of the students who¡¯d been camping with us to come and help as well. With eight more people rushing into the fray, the goblins must have finally decided they weren¡¯t going to win this fight.


    We were in the clear, for now. But that many goblins all in one place made me think they were organizing, and the way they¡¯d all turned and run as soon as the horn blew said the same. Just across the brook was a forest preserve. Tons of trails through acres of woods. Plenty of space for a lot of goblins to gather, and way too close to where we camped for my comfort.


    That was a problem for later, though. For now, I needed to close up these stab wounds as best I could. I sent mental commands to the zombies to come back to me and guard, and got to work saving a life.

 Chapter 20 - Crafting Skills

    <h4>Chapter 20 - Crafting Skills</h4>


    I¡¯d patched up most of Samson¡¯s injuries, but he was still bleeding pretty bad. I raised my head to shout for some help. ¡°We could use Henry¡¯s skills here!¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s on his way,¡± Lords said, crouching next to his wounded man. ¡°You gonna make it, big guy?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ll live. Been through worse than a few paper cuts like this,¡± Samson replied. He reached out and clasped Lords¡¯ hand, but didn¡¯t try to get up. As stiff an upper lip as he was showing off, those cuts had to hurt like hell, and I hadn¡¯t removed the arrow at all, just stabilized it.


    I sat up and looked around at the aftermath of the battle. Alfred and Brad were moving through the dead goblins, tapping them to get stones. I really hoped that meant they intended to share them, because Samson and I had taken at least half of those guys down.


    Rosencrantz came wandering over at that point, two arrows sticking out of him. One was through his right arm, the other stabbed into his chest. I winced at that. My poor zombie had seen better days. I needed to get that Heal Undead spell slotted in, but at the same time, what could I pull out? If I yanked agility, the next arrow might not be so simple to dodge. And Drain Life had already proved to be maybe my most useful spell. I needed more stones, badly. Soon as I got something to tier four, it would solve a lot of problems.


    I snapped off the arrowheads and pulled the shafts free, trying to do as little additional damage as possible, but Rosie was still looking the worse for wear. Alfred noticed, too. ¡°He¡¯s kinda banged up, huh?¡±


    ¡°Yeah.¡±


    ¡°And getting stinkier.¡±


    ¡°Noticed that, too,¡± I replied, rolling my eyes. ¡°What do you want me to do? Those zombies have saved our asses how many times now?¡±


    Alfred held up his hands, palms toward me. ¡°Whoa! Not complaining, just noting. We¡¯re all doing what we have to, here. You¡¯re right that they¡¯ve been a big help. But unless you find a way to keep them running¡­¡±


    I nodded. ¡°I know.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve got a handful of those stones from the goblins we killed,¡± Alfred said.


    ¡°Good,¡± Lords cut in. ¡°Bradley, you got some too? Bring them over. You two, George, Samson, me, Selena, and who else was out there fighting? Actually in the thick of it, I mean.¡±


    One of the students raised his hand, holding a crude club. ¡°I hit one over the head with this. Does that count?¡±


    ¡°It does today,¡± Lords replied. He looked at the other students who came over to help. ¡°The rest of you?¡±


    Before they could say anything, George shook his head. ¡°They didn¡¯t get in any shots. Came over, though, and I think that counts for something.¡±


    Lords seemed to consider that a moment, and I decided it was time to chime in. ¡°Much as we all need more stones, we also need more people able to fight. If we give each of them a single stone, I think that¡¯s probably enough to make them better able to join in, next time. Because one thing¡¯s for sure¡ªthere¡¯s going to be a lot of next times.¡±


    The kid who¡¯d raised his hand looked green at that idea, but he didn¡¯t balk or back down. Good for him.


    Lords had Alfred and Brad plunk their finds down in a pile on the street, figuring it was better to do this now, rather than waiting until we were back at the station. More people there, and eventually the noncombatant types would figure out that those crystals were the key to staying in one piece. Fewer arguments if the loot was divided on site. I still worried that by doing that we just kept them as noncombatants forever, but Lords was in command here, not me.


    Bradley tossed a bow on the ground next to the stones, along with a quiver that had four arrows left in it. ¡°Your critter took down the archer. Nice work, there.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± I replied. ¡°For the save, too. You guys were just in time.¡±


    He gave me ¡®bro nod¡¯ back. I still didn¡¯t trust him further than I could throw him, but he had helped. That was worth something. I turned my attention back to the loot.


    There were fourteen stones. We¡¯d killed fourteen goblins? That was wild. We hadn¡¯t lost anyone, which was flat out amazing to me. It had been close, but we¡¯d survived okay. Well, except business suit guy. I still didn¡¯t know if Lords had gotten him back to Henry in time to save him or not.


    ¡°The guy with the arrow in the neck?¡± I asked.


    Lords shook his head. ¡°Was too late.¡±


    Or maybe we just needed to get Henry more white stones with healing powers. He had a single tier one stone, and he was already able to do a lot. Get him ranked up, and how capable would he become? But I wasn¡¯t even sure where we could get more of the things. I hadn¡¯t seen a white stone drop yet. I¡¯d have to ask Henry later where he¡¯d found it.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.


    Speaking of colors, there was a new one in front of me. About two thirds of the stones were clear, just like the ones which dropped from the goblins we¡¯d already fought. But four of them were brown.


    ¡°That¡¯s a new color to me,¡± I said, pointing at one. ¡°Anyone seen it before?¡±


    Head shakes all around.


    ¡°Selena, you have any ideas for how best to do this?¡± Lords asked. ¡°You¡¯ve been figuring this crap out faster than most of us.¡±


    I thought for a moment before replying. ¡°Well, the biggest problem is that while we can un-slot a crystal, there¡¯s a chance it¡¯ll shatter.¡±


    ¡°What?¡± Bradley asked, alarmed.


    I pulled the broken fragments of my Augment Undead crystal from my pocket and held them up for others to see. ¡°When I pulled it, it just broke apart. There¡¯s no magic left in it. I don¡¯t know the odds of that happening, but now we know there¡¯s a risk. If possible, we should try not to remove the things. Especially as we rank them up.¡±


    ¡°How does the ranking thing work?¡± George asked.


    This time Alfred cut in. ¡°You just touch a second stone of the same kind, and it absorbs in like the first one. Two of a kind ranks up the existing one to second tier.¡±


    I nodded, and expanded on what he¡¯d said. ¡°And two tier two stones will merge to become a tier three. That¡¯s harder, because you need the second slot open for stones of the same kind. I have a tier three stone, which means now I can slot three crystals.¡±


    ¡°Tier three is what, four of a kind?¡± Bradley asked. ¡°How many of those things you been hoarding there, anyway?¡±


    Lords cut him off before I could throw it back in his face. ¡°That¡¯s enough of that. She fought for those and earned them, same as you did today. How do we best divvy these up then?¡±


    ¡°I think you guys should have first dibs,¡± I said, shrugging. ¡°None of those stones are going to make me rank up. But you have a strength crystal, right Lords?¡±


    He nodded.


    ¡°So if you touch any of those clear ones, and they¡¯re strength, then it¡¯ll absorb in, merge, and become tier two. You¡¯ll be setting yourself down a path, but you¡¯ll open up a new slot.¡±


    ¡°What do you mean, a path?¡± Lords asked.


    Alfred came back in to help with that. Clearly the kid had more gaming experience than was healthy. ¡°It¡¯s like a computer game. The higher we rank these stones, the more it hurts if they break, right? So as we rank them, we¡¯re not going to want to pull them out again, because they can shatter. The higher rank, the greater the loss. Once you have a tier three or four stone, that¡¯s going to pretty much define the way you fight.¡±


    ¡°Makes sense to me,¡± Lords replied.


    Lords and Bradley had strength crystals, while George and Samson had agility. With ten clear stones, I figured there were probably at least one of each in there. Since Samson was worst injured, we all agreed to let him try first. It took him six stones, before one finally sank into his hand. He gasped, then smiled.


    ¡°Ah, that¡¯s nice. Tier two agility,¡± Samson said. ¡°I feel faster already. Just¡­sort of wish I had stamina now instead!¡±


    Oops, I''d thought he did have stamina. We all chuckled at that, then went on. Since there were only four clear stones that could still be agility, we let George try those out, but none of them worked for him. He shook his head as he set down the last one. ¡°Not this time.¡±


    ¡°There will be more chances, trust me,¡± Lords said.


    None of us doubted him.


    Then Lords let Bradley check the clear stones for strength crystals. Brad got lucky on the second try, the stone sinking into his palm. Lords checked the remaining eight, and on the very last stone he also got a boost to tier two strength.


    ¡°Okay, the easy part is out of the way,¡± I said. ¡°Now we need someone with an open spot to check the rest of these and see what they are. Slot one in, take it out, try the next, repeat.¡±


    ¡°But there¡¯s a chance they¡¯ll break, if we do that?¡± Lords said.


    I nodded. ¡°There is. But we need to know what these things are.¡±


    ¡°Makes sense to me,¡± he replied. ¡°I have an open slot. I¡¯ll test them and announce each, so we all know. Fair?¡±


    Nods all around.


    He went through each stone in sequence. Thankfully, none of them broke. I had to wonder if they had a little resilience that perhaps wore down. Maybe each time a stone was slotted and removed, it had a higher chance of breaking? I had only removed the Augment spell what, twice? I knew there were some I¡¯d done more than that, so there was a random element involved.


    The other eight clear crystals were three stamina stones, two will stones, two intellect stones, and one charisma stone. The four brown crystals were what really interested me, since we hadn¡¯t seen any of that color before. These were something brand new¡ªnot spells, nor boosts to our personal abilities, but instead they granted skills.


    ¡°Two of them are Weapon Making, one is Hunting, and the last is Armor Making,¡± Lords said. He shook his head, then looked at Alfred. ¡°I¡¯m remembering what you said about video games. My kid played games with shit like this. Is that our lives, now?¡±


    Alfred just shrugged. ¡°You know as much about it as I do, sir.¡±


    The sir made Lords grin a little. ¡°It¡¯s okay, kid. I¡¯m not mad. But I may lean on your game advice some here.¡±


    George ended up with a Weapon Making stone. Alfred took Stamina. I grabbed Will; I couldn¡¯t slot it now, but I had a hunch it would help with spellcasting and said as much, so Lords snagged another of them to bring to Henry.


    ¡°He wasn¡¯t here for the fight, but anything we can do to help him heal better is good for all of us,¡± Lords said.


    Nobody argued with that.


    Once the other stones were passed out to everyone who was involved in the fighting, there was one left over, an intellect crystal that Lords held onto. ¡°Just for safekeeping. We can¡¯t split this ten ways. Let¡¯s get it to someone back at camp who can use it.¡±


    Henry had arrived by then. With my help removing the arrow and him using his healing power, we managed to close the awful wound in Samson¡¯s shoulder. He wasn¡¯t wholly better, but he¡¯d live, and was able to get back to his feet again.


    ¡°Back to camp,¡± Lords said. ¡°We need to talk to these newcomers, see where they¡¯re from and what they know. Then we need to talk about what we¡¯re doing next. This clearly isn¡¯t getting better.¡±


    ¡°No, it¡¯s getting worse,¡± I added, softly. He stopped talking and glanced my way. ¡°That many goblins? And that horn that sounded their retreat, it came from inside the woods, so there had to be more of them in there. I think they¡¯re gathering out there somewhere. It¡¯s going to be a problem.¡±


    ¡°One we¡¯ll figure out,¡± Lords said, but his face looked grim, and I understood why. We were a camp of strangers, mostly college kids. There were some actual kids in the group now. How were we going to keep everyone safe if things just kept getting worse?


    And this was day two of the mess, not even noon yet, if I was guessing from the sun right. If this was the story of our lives now, we needed to get to work.

 Chapter 21 - Puppy Love

    <h4>Chapter 21 - Puppy Love</h4>


    The smell from the cooking snake was going to kill me.


    It was so good! Smelled like someone was setting up for a chicken barbecue. My mouth watered as a gust of wind blew some of the smoke my way. Distracted, I glanced over toward Brad and his makeshift grill. Alfred saw and laughed.


    ¡°What?¡± I asked. ¡°You saying you don¡¯t want some of it?¡±


    ¡°Nope. I¡¯m as hungry as you are,¡± Alfred replied.


    Both of us were better off than some of the others. We¡¯d raided one of the kitchens back at the University for non-perishable dry goods. I still had most of mine in my pack, and I was willing to bet he did, too. Having some reserve food handy was just smart under the circumstances.


    But cooked meat? It was amazing how fast something you could miss something as simple as a hot meal. ¡°If Bradley cooks that snake right, I¡¯ll take back every bad thing I ever said about him,¡± I added.


    ¡°He bothering you?¡± Alfred asked, looking concerned.


    ¡°Not much,¡± I replied, keeping my tone light. The truth was, I did have worries about the man. He¡¯d talked about making me give up my crystals more than once now. It was turning into a broken record, and an extremely unwelcome one.


    The more time went on, the more certain I was that building up a good base of those stones would spell the difference between success and failure in the world we now lived. Failure meant death, so that added even more importance to the things.


    As soon as we¡¯d returned to the police station, Lords got the story from the refugees we picked up. It was about as expected: sad and somewhat gory. They were the survivors from the Doubletree hotel just past those trees they¡¯d come out of. They¡¯d all been staying there when things went sideways. Some of the people working at the hotel took off in the first minutes after the Event happened, and others, including some guests, had tried to leave since then. Some of them hadn¡¯t even made it out of the parking lot before one monster or another got a hold of them.


    Others had, and I wished them well, wherever they were. Maybe they¡¯d gotten back home and found other people to work with. Maybe not. But these people had been desperate, trying to figure out what to do with themselves. They saw the smoke from our cook fire and figured they were out of good options. They got together as a group and made their way to us.


    If we hadn¡¯t met them halfway, the goblins in those woods would¡¯ve been all over them before we could assist. They¡¯d have died, every one of them. One of them had¡ªthat guy with the arrow through the neck hadn¡¯t made it. But the rest were thrilled to have even the modest security we were able to provide.


    Their story told, Lords went about trying to build a barricade around the station. Now that he had a tier two Strength stone, he was very strong! Not lift-a-car strong, but we didn¡¯t need to lift them. We dropped cars into neutral and rolled them to where he wanted them, then he and Alfred flipped them over on their side. Between the two of them, both at tier two, they had enough Strength to make it happen.


    Rolling the cars around was still a lot of effort, but as each car joined the others in a crude wall around the station, it made us all feel like a bit more secure. If those goblins came calling, fortifications might be just what saved us.


    ¡°Food¡¯s just about done!¡± Bradley called. He¡¯d been excused from wall work so he could keep cooking. Nobody was complaining about that. I think we were all drooling at the smell.


    ¡°All right, let¡¯s call a break,¡± Lords said. ¡°We¡¯ve done good work. We can finish after eating.¡±


    Which of course was when a chilling howl reached our ears.


    It sounded like a dog, or a wolf, but also different. Like, this was no friendly pooch howling to be let out. This was the nightmare dog from a horror movie right before it jumped out of the shadows. Or the dire wolf from a fantasy film as it started hunting. Everyone glanced around, wondering where the sound came from. Before we could say anything, two more howls joined the first, this time from a slightly different direction.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    Great, whatever it was, there were several of them.


    ¡°Non-combatants, get in the station!¡± Lords shouted. ¡°Everyone else, buddy up and watch the walls!¡±


    ¡°Buddy?¡± Alfred asked.


    ¡°You got it,¡± I said, although I already had a couple of buddies with my zombies. Never hurt to have someone else watching my back too, though. I brought the zombies out of the car where I¡¯d stashed them. Some of the newcomers were pretty freaked out by zombies walking around the camp, still.


    More howls, closer this time. Whatever they were, they were definitely coming for us. I wondered if it was the scent, drawing them in? The smell of meat cooking must have been traveling for a good distance.


    I glanced at my crystal setup again, since I¡¯d changed it slightly during the last fight. Entangle wasn¡¯t slotted anymore. I¡¯d put in Drain Life instead, and what a difference that made! I was looking forward to using it again.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 2) - Agility


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 1) - Drain Life


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead, Animate Dead, Nightvision


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2)


    Clear: Will x2


    Then something bounded onto the roof of a car next to me.


    It was a quadruped, made entirely of bones. I couldn¡¯t be sure, but it looked like a canine of some sort. Whatever it was, it had been dead for a long time now. There was no flesh or fur still left there, just old bone. It leaned back its head and howled again, a long, piercing cry that chilled me. Two others just like it jumped up beside it, snarling at us.


    The trio of undead dogs rushed us, and all hell broke loose.


    I sent my zombies after one of the things while Lords rushed another. The third was coming at Alfred, and he wasn¡¯t going to be fast enough to dodge. These things were moving! Unless I missed my guess, these were all tier two; they were fast, and something about their howl was slowing down Alfred and Lords enough that the difference was that much worse.


    But they were undead. Could I control them with my spell? I only had two tier one zombies under my Control Undead spell, so in theory I ought to be able to command an additional undead, even if it was tier two. It was worth a try.


    I focused my will on the one about to bite Alfred, and black fire shot from my hand to envelop the undead dog. It turned my way as soon as the magic hit, and tried to rush me, but then the spell sank into its bones, and it stopped moving entirely.


    Alfred was about to smash it with his axe, but I stepped in to stop him. ¡°Wait! I¡¯ve got this one under control. Sit, boy.¡±


    The dog sat.


    Alfred slowed his charge and lowered his weapon. ¡°That was awesome! Thanks for the save, Selena.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s more of them, though, and I¡¯m at my limit for control,¡± I said.


    I turned back toward the battle. My zombies were barely keeping one of the things locked down, and the other had Lords¡¯ left arm in its mouth while he punched it with his right. Where his weapon had gone, I had no idea, but as strong as his punches were now, he wasn¡¯t taking it down.


    ¡°Help Lords!¡± I told my new pet.


    It darted forward and chomped the rear leg of the one biting Lords, which yelped and let go. It turned, trying to snap at my dog¡¯s muzzle, but Alfred was already there, dropping an axe blow on its neck. The undead dog went down in a deluge of bones as the magic holding them together vanished.


    Lords was bleeding pretty heavily from his wounded arm, but he still spared time to flash me a nod and a pained smile. ¡°The other one?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve got it, get yourself to Henry for healing!¡± I said. And my zombies mostly had already done their job, although they were even more torn up now.


    They¡¯d tackled the thing, pinned it to the ground, and then proceeded to beat it with their fists. The undead dog snarled and snapped, but it wasn¡¯t going anywhere. I picked up my axe, walked over, and delivered the finishing blow. Then I leaned down and tapped it, getting a black stone. Tier two, like I¡¯d suspected. Nice!


    By the time I was standing back up again, I saw Bradley there with a chunk of rebar, trying to bash in the head of the dog I¡¯d controlled. Alfred stood between them, fending him off.


    ¡°Outta the way, kid!¡± Bradley snarled.


    ¡°It¡¯s not¡ª¡°


    I gave the dog a mental command and it dashed off, hopping into the car my zombies had been using as their home base. Bradley watched it go, then looked at me. ¡°You control it?¡±


    ¡°Yup. So please don¡¯t break my new puppy?¡±


    ¡°Puppy?¡± he snarled. ¡°Those things tried to kill us. Cut up Lords pretty well.¡±


    ¡°And now that one is going to fight for us,¡± I shot back.


    ¡°Or maybe I should just kill it now and get the stone, eh?¡± Bradley said. He hefted that rebar in a way that was more than a little menacing.


    Rosencrantz and Guildenstern noticed, too. They were still in ¡®guard mode,¡¯ which meant they went after anything that threatened me. Him raising his weapon apparently met the minimum standard, because they both took steps forward to flank me and drew their knives.

 Chapter 22 - Hope

    <h4>Chapter 22 - Hope</h4>


    Brad didn¡¯t react well to that at all. He saw the zombies coming at him as a legitimate threat, and to be fair, they were. He was tier two himself now, so he might be able to take down both of them, but it wouldn¡¯t be a simple fight. Plus, he¡¯d seen my Drain Life spell in action. He raised his rebar higher, in a guard.


    ¡°Don¡¯t,¡± I warned. I had my Drain Life spell ready to go. He so much as twitched that rebar toward me¡­


    ¡°Don¡¯t what? Defend myself against your monsters?¡± Brad spat. ¡°Those things are disgusting. We should put them all down. The mutt, too. Bet they¡¯ll drop crystals, and we could all use more of those.¡±


    He advanced a step, and I backed up. Maybe not my best move, but he was holding a five-foot chunk of rebar and had a tier two Strength stone. I wasn¡¯t sure if he could kill me with one blow or not, but I didn¡¯t want to find out. Rosie and Guildie were now side by side with me, staring him down with daggers in hand. I sent a mental command to the bone dog, ordering it back out of the car. If he wanted to throw down, I¡¯d need everything I had ready for him.


    ¡°What the hell do you think you¡¯re doing, Bradley!?¡±


    He jolted when Lords said his name and shrank into himself. His hands lowered the rebar, and he looked almost sheepish. ¡°Protecting myself! That girl is going to kill us all with her monsters, and you know it!¡±


    ¡°I know nothing of the sort,¡± Lords said, ripping the rebar out of Brad¡¯s hands. ¡°She¡¯s done nothing but help so far.¡±


    ¡°How do you know she didn¡¯t order those things to attack us in the first place? The girl¡¯s controlling dead things, Sam! It¡¯s not natural!¡±


    Lords looked at Bradley like he¡¯d grown a second head, which for all I know was possible at this point. ¡°Are you serious? Natural?¡±


    He glanced around, then gestured at the broken bodies of the undead dogs lying on the ground. ¡°Have you looked at what we¡¯re fighting? What about any of this strikes you as natural? We¡¯ve got zombies, goblins, giant snakes and undead dogs. How is any of this natural?¡±


    ¡°I¡ª¡° Brad started to say something belligerent again, I could see it in his eyes.


    But Lords cut him off. ¡°I don¡¯t want to hear it. Go back to your grill. Start serving up that food you made. Come on, man. We¡¯re here to protect people. Not threaten girls.¡±


    Bradley looked like he wanted to say more, but he just grimaced and stalked off without further comment. I made a gesture, and my undead headed back to their car again for storage.


    ¡°All right, that¡¯s enough. Attack¡¯s over, and we¡¯re safe,¡± Lords told the crowd which had gathered around the altercation. ¡°Food¡¯s done! Go get some hot chow.¡±


    That shifted everyone¡¯s attention back to their empty bellies, and people followed Brad over to the grill to get some food. I sighed, worrying. The kind of mad vibes I was getting from Bradley didn¡¯t bode well for future relations.


    ¡°Sorry about that,¡± Lords told me as people drifted off. ¡°He¡¯s a hothead, but he¡¯s usually pretty decent. I don¡¯t know what got into him.¡±


    ¡°I think he¡¯s scared,¡± I said frankly. ¡°Hell, we all are. Anyone who isn¡¯t frightened right now is an idiot. But people like him, Lords? They¡¯re used to control, used to being in charge. They don¡¯t deal well with scared.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll make sure he keeps a lid on it,¡± Lords growled. ¡°Worked with the man five years now. He¡¯ll be fine.¡±


    Then he stalked away and left me there, wondering.


    Bradley was going to be a major problem. I felt it in my gut. He didn¡¯t like me, and now I¡¯d challenged his authority and made him look bad in front of his boss. This wasn¡¯t even close to settled. I¡¯d have to make sure I didn¡¯t end up alone with the man, like, ever.Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.


    A tap on the shoulder made me jump, but it was just Alfred. He stepped back when he saw how startled I was. ¡°Sorry about that. Didn¡¯t mean to scare you.¡±


    I shook my head, mostly to clear it. ¡°It¡¯s okay. Just rattled from all of that, you know? We have so much trouble here already. Why make it worse by picking fights among ourselves?¡±


    He laughed. ¡°Especially with the strongest of the bunch of us.¡±


    ¡°What, me?¡±


    Alfred cocked his head at an angle. ¡°You hadn¡¯t seen that already? It¡¯s why he hates you so much, that Brad guy. You¡¯re the only tier three we¡¯ve got. You have three undead under your control and the only direct damage spell we have, too. Honest, I don¡¯t see anyone else in this group being even close to you. You rock, Selena.¡±


    I had to laugh at that, partly because it sounded so stupid, but he wasn¡¯t wrong. If I did the math, it was clear: I was the strongest combat asset the group had. Henry might be more important than me, because he was a healer. But I could probably punch out more bad guys than any two folks we had, now that I had a new puppy to join my minions.


    I called the dog over with a mental nudge. I¡¯d been doing that enough times now that anyone who hadn¡¯t seen I could control them without using my voice, wasn¡¯t paying attention. The dog trotted over to stand in front of me, skeletal tail thumping on the pavement. It canted its head at an angle just like a living dog might have. The thing was so cute I wanted to laugh.


    ¡°You need a name, sir!¡± I told the dog. ¡°Something good.¡±


    ¡°Spot?¡± Alfred asked. ¡°No, that¡¯s dumb. Something good. What about Bones? Boney?¡±


    ¡°Too on the nose,¡± Samson said from a short distance away. He was chewing a chunk of snake on a stick, and handed us each one.


    ¡°Thanks!¡± I told him. He smiled. We¡¯d fought side by side against the goblins out there and watched out for each other. I guess that formed a bond that didn¡¯t snap too easily. ¡°I think you¡¯re right. That¡¯s too simple and easy. You have any ideas?¡±


    ¡°Huh. Maybe. I helped raise a service dog once,¡± Samson said. ¡°You know, from a puppy? They farm them out to good homes from about three months until they¡¯re a year old. She was a good pup. Took to commands like you wouldn¡¯t believe. Smartest mutt I ever met, too. Her name was Hope.¡±


    He reached down and patted the bone dog on the head. ¡°I was thinking we could all use some Hope, right about now.¡±


    ¡°I like it,¡± I said. ¡°It fits, and you¡¯re right. Hope is the thing we probably need more than anything else. How¡¯s that sound for you, pup? You like the name Hope?¡±


    The dog sat back on its haunches and yipped at me in response. I didn¡¯t know how it was making that sound, or the uncanny howls it made when it was first attacking us. Wasn¡¯t like the dog had vocal cords, but it didn¡¯t have a heart or lungs and was running around anyway, so the old rules were all gone.


    ¡°We¡¯re going to go clear the apartments just north of us after eating,¡± Samson said. ¡°Up where you ran into that snake this morning. Lords wants to gather any survivors we find there, and any homes that are empty, we raid for useful materials.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I can help,¡± I said.


    ¡°Count me in, too,¡± Alfred said.


    I hadn¡¯t seen any survivors when I¡¯d been up there, but I hadn¡¯t gotten very far into the apartment block before I¡¯d gotten bit and forced to withdraw. If I remembered right, that was the nearest regular housing to the campus police station. It was a good pick for a first area to scout. We¡¯d undoubtedly find supplies up there, and maybe a few survivors hidden as well.


    Each day that went by, survivors were going to be fewer. This disaster was so epic in scale that I could barely focus enough to consider all of the factors involved. How were we even going to survive? We had no source of water, no long-term source of food either. Our shelter was going to keep us more or less safe for the time being, but that depended on getting more people with crystals, which meant killing more monsters.


    More people meant more security, but also meant we¡¯d struggle to get enough food and water for everyone. No electricity, no combustion engines, and no guns meant that our entire tech base was toast. If this was world-wide, how many people were going to survive that?


    Probably not many.


    Overwhelmed, I sagged back against the car wall behind me and closed my eyes. It was so much. Too much to take in. The Event, whatever it was, happened yesterday. It hadn¡¯t been twenty-four hours yet, and how many people were already dead? Was there any hope left?


    As if to answer my unspoken question, the bone dog leaned forward and bumped my hand, whining softly. I opened my eyes and looked down at her. Yeah, after Samson¡¯s story, she was officially a her now. Since I couldn¡¯t tell what her gender had been in life, that was good enough for me.


    ¡°I¡¯m okay, girl,¡± I said. ¡°Thanks, though.¡±


    She snuffled my hand, then barked and returned to her car at my unspoken command. Better to keep my undead out of sight as much as I could. Already I¡¯d seen a few of the newcomers staring at the zombies in fear or disgust. Bradley was over there chatting away with everyone as they got their food. What he was saying, I didn¡¯t know. Was it just my imagination that a few of them looked at my undead with more anger in their eyes, after they¡¯d gotten their chunk of snake? I hoped so, but I had a bad feeling.

 Chapter 23 - Part of the Job

    <h4>Chapter 23 - Part of the Job</h4>


    Everyone was feeling much better after some food, and the fact that we were returning to where I¡¯d found the first snake had folks in a good mood. In fact, Lords had more volunteers than he needed. That was probably a good thing, too, especially in the longer run. We needed people to get out there and fight off these monsters, win more crystals, and above all¡ªgrow stronger.


    He set up five team leaders¡ªAlfred, Brad, me, George, and himself. He¡¯d have brought Samson too, but he wanted someone he trusted and knew in charge of the station while the rest of us were away.


    To each of the team leaders, he assigned two volunteers who didn¡¯t have any magic yet. They were more vulnerable, so they were at least nominally under the command of the person who had some upgrades. I was surprised that two of the students raised their hand right away to join my team. They were frat boy types who I¡¯d seen hanging out and chatting with Bradley earlier, which left me feeling suspicious. But when Lords assigned them to my team, they were nothing but polite, so maybe I had less to worry about than I¡¯d thought.


    At the last minute, Henry came over to join us. ¡°I¡¯d like to come, too.¡±


    Lords didn¡¯t sound enthusiastic. ¡°You sure? You get hurt, we¡¯re down our one healer.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I am. If one of you is hurt badly, how are you going to get them back to me in time? Makes more sense if I¡¯m out there on the battlefield where I can help,¡± Henry replied. ¡°Besides, you¡¯ve got two more medics back here if someone needs basic first aid.¡±


    It made sense, and despite Lords¡¯ reluctance, he finally agreed. Henry was attached to his team, making it a crew of four, so it was sixteen of us who set out north toward Centennial Court.


    It didn¡¯t take long to run into trouble. We¡¯d only just reached the first cross-street, where Centennial really began, when we saw several big-ass snakes just like the one I¡¯d killed. They lay out in the middle of the road, sunning themselves. The afternoon was still warm, so the asphalt must have been toasty for them.


    ¡°I count three,¡± Alfred said.


    ¡°Any others nearby?¡± Lords asked. We were all still a good distance away, so the snakes hadn¡¯t reacted yet.


    ¡°None that I can spot,¡± Brad replied.


    ¡°Okay, here¡¯s what we do,¡± Lords said. ¡°My team has the healer. We¡¯ll be reserves. If something else pops up, we¡¯ll handle it. The rest of you, advance. See if you can hit one of the them with that bow, Brad.¡±


    ¡°Can do,¡± he replied, drawing one of the arrows we¡¯d recovered from the goblins and nocking it to the goblin bow.


    Personally, I thought my Drain spell might be better for pulling, but I was perfectly willing to let Brad get their attention instead of me. Those bites hurt! I readied the spell anyway, and gave orders to my critters to guard me.


    Bradley fired and missed. The arrow clattered against the pavement a foot away from one of the snakes, which hissed and twisted, investigating the sound. Before it could do more, he had another arrow nocked and aimed. He fired.


    This time, the arrow struck the snake about two feet down from the head. It writhed, twisting around itself until the arrow snapped off. Part of the shaft was still embedded in the snake, but it hadn¡¯t been enough to take it down. It had definitely noticed us now, though. All three snakes came forward at us, moving to the attack, and we advanced to meet them.


    Hope was the quickest among us. She rushed in, teeth bared as she snapped at one snake¡¯s tail. It hissed and turned, trying to catch her, but she was too quick for it, at least so far. I dropped a Drain Life on the snake, which slowed it enough that I figured Hope was out of danger. Rosie and Guildie rushed the same snake. Already injured and slowed, it went down quickly under their daggers.


    Around me I saw the other teams had done about equally well. Brad and George¡¯s teams took on the snake Brad shot, while Alfred¡¯s team was left with the third. Alfred had just about soloed it, from what I could tell. His axe was covered in fresh blood, and the snake had a couple of axe-shaped slashes in its skin, along with a missing head.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    Looting was next. Three snakes got us three crystals, all of them green. One was a tier one Entangle, just like my spell but a bit weaker. The second was a tier two Plant Growth, which seemed like it didn¡¯t have a lot of combat use, but might be handy for something else. Farming, maybe? The third was a tier two Regenerate spell, that was interesting; when Lords checked it, he said it was a passive spell that slowly regenerated damage.


    We gave them to folks who had no crystals slotted yet. One of the guys on my team, Tom, got the Entangle spell, and the Plant Growth went to a woman on Alfred¡¯s team. The Regenerate spell went to one of Brad¡¯s team. There was a brief discussion about handing that one to Henry, since we all wanted to keep our healer alive. But to slot it, he¡¯d need to remove the Heal spell, which might shatter it. Nobody wanted to risk destroying our only healing magic, so it was handed to someone else instead.


    Lords ordered Brad¡¯s team to return to base with the snakes, drop them off, and return. The rest of us pressed forward.


    ¡°Go up, knock on doors. Be loud,¡± Lords told us. ¡°If there¡¯s anyone inside, we want them to know we¡¯re here to help, not bring more trouble. If there¡¯s no one inside, check the place out. We¡¯re looking for water, food, and other useful supplies, and anyplace empty is fair game.¡±


    ¡°And if we run into monsters?¡± Tom asked.


    ¡°Call for backup if you need it. The houses aren¡¯t far apart, so a shout will carry,¡± Lords said. ¡°Otherwise? Take them down.¡±


    With that, we all split up and began investigating houses down the street. Lords and George were on the west side of the street, Alfred and my teams on the east.


    Alfred¡¯s team took the first house, so my team was on for the second. It was a good-size two story house with a garage out back. First thing, we checked the yard for trouble, but there were no monsters in evidence, so I went up to the door and knocked, loud.


    No answer. I hammered my fist against the door again. ¡°We¡¯re here to help! Anyone inside?¡±


    The sound of movement on the other side of the door reached my ears. I nodded my head at my two team mates. ¡°Tom, watch for anything coming our way from outside. Entangle it if you see anything. Neal, stick close to me. Someone¡¯s in there.¡±


    I tried turning the knob, but it wouldn¡¯t budge. Locked. Neal surprised me at that point, stepping up.


    ¡°Let me?¡± Neal asked.


    I moved aside for him, and he used his club to break in one of the windows beside the door. He glanced in through the hole and mustn¡¯t have seen anything, because he stuck his hand in next, reaching for the inner door knob. With a twist, he had it open. ¡°Voila!¡±


    ¡°Not bad,¡± I told him with a grin that he returned.


    The door opened easily into a darkened interior. Hope came inside with me, but I held her back from going too far with a mental order. We didn¡¯t know who or what was in there. It could be civilians or monsters.


    I called out again. ¡°Hello! We¡¯re here to help. Anyone here?¡±


    ¡°Stay where you are! I have a gun!¡± a man¡¯s voice called from somewhere inside.


    I decided not to tell him it wasn¡¯t going to help him, that guns wouldn¡¯t work. That wouldn¡¯t inspire confidence. Instead, I opted for cool diplomacy. ¡°We¡¯re here with the UVM police, looking for people who need help. We¡¯re rallying survivors at the police station a couple of blocks from here.¡±


    ¡°You are? Oh, thank god,¡± the man said, finally coming into view as he moved down the stairs. He did have a pistol in his hand, but it was aimed at the floor, and based on what Lords told me guns didn¡¯t work anymore, anyway. ¡°We¡¯ve been so scared. The screams last night were awful. What¡¯s happening?¡±


    ¡°We?¡± I asked. I gave a mental order for my Hope to slip back outside so she wouldn¡¯t scare these folks, and the dog quickly obeyed.


    Before he could reply, I spotted a couple of young children on the stairs behind him. He spoke again. ¡°My wife and kids are here with me, too. My name¡¯s Keith Henson. I teach at UVM. Are you¡­are you all students?¡±


    I nodded to him. ¡°A lot of us are, yeah. But we¡¯re here with some of the police, too. Sam Lords is running the group. Do you know him?¡±


    I hoped that dropping a familiar name might help build trust, but Henson shook his head. ¡°Never met him. Doesn¡¯t matter, though. You¡¯re human, not some sort of creature. The things I saw through our windows last night¡­¡± He shook his head, his eyes haunted.


    ¡°Mr. Henson, it¡¯s going to be safest for your family if they come with us to the station,¡± I said. ¡°We¡¯re getting people in one place so we can protect each other. I¡¯ve seen the same sorts of things you have. We need to team up to survive this.¡±


    ¡°I understand,¡± Henson said. ¡°What do you need me to do?¡±


    ¡°Gather your family. Have them each pack a bag they can easily carry with clothes or other essentials.¡± His kids were young. Other essentials might include stuffed animals, at that age, or whatever. ¡°Then get together whatever food and water you have and pack that as well. Bring it all to the front yard. We¡¯ll help you get it back to the station.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ll take care of it. Thank you. Thank you so much!¡± Henson replied.


    I turned away from the door, leaving them to it. Neal looked over at me. ¡°You handled that pretty well.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± I told him. ¡°I was in school to become a doctor. Talking to people when they¡¯re scared is part of the job.¡±


    I glanced back at the house Alfred¡¯s team was checking, but they were still inside. There were no shouts or screams, so they were probably just searching it for useful supplies. We moved on to the next house.


    This time, the door wasn¡¯t locked. It wasn¡¯t even closed. Something had hit it hard enough that the lock smashed right out of the wood. I grimaced. That wasn¡¯t going to be good.


    ¡°Be ready for anything,¡± I told my team. They nodded, and I kicked the door fully open, sending my zombies in ahead of me to scout.

 Chapter 24 - Call for Backup?

    <h4>Chapter 24 - Call for Backup?</h4>


    I followed right behind my zombies, axe up and at the ready. The house reeked. It stank of old meat and blood. The red stains on the floor in the front hall told me we probably weren¡¯t going to find anything friendly in this place.


    ¡°Anyone here?¡± I called out, loud as I could. If there was a survivor in here, I wanted to let them know we weren¡¯t hostile. It was a lot more likely there was something nasty inside, though. In that case, making some noise while I was still in the doorway meant I could get the heck out of there and call for backup.


    No answer. Nobody called out, and no growls either. I beckoned my team forward. ¡°Stay close while we make sure there¡¯s nothing hiding in here.¡±


    They both nodded, following right on my heels. I had Hope bring up the rear, right behind them, so nothing could sneak up on us. We cleared the downstairs first and saw more blood stains, torn and broken furniture, and a kitchen that looked like a tornado had at it. Stuff was everywhere, and it looked like the food stocks in particular were raided hard. Boxes of cereal were torn apart, bits of their contents scattered all over the floor.


    From there we went upstairs, watching for attackers as we moved. Again, there were no sounds, and I was starting to hope whatever had hit this place was already gone.


    The first room¡¯s door was shattered, pieces of wood scattered all over the inside. Whatever broke through had definitely killed whoever was hiding there. Enough blood soaked the carpet that there was no doubt someone died in this room. What made it ten times worse was this was a kid¡¯s bedroom. Two kids, based on the bunkbeds. There were no bodies, no remains. Just blood and broken furnishings.


    We pressed on, finding a bathroom and storage room, both relatively intact. The attacker didn¡¯t seem to care about toothpaste or soap. But the master bedroom was as much a wreck as the kids¡¯ room: door demolished in the same way, interior in ruins, and blood all over. Just as in the other rooms, though, there was blood, but no bodies. Had it been an attack of zombies, maybe? That would explain why there were no remains.


    ¡°Damn, this looks like a bear ripped through this place,¡± Tom said in a whisper.


    ¡°Big bear,¡± Neal added.


    I started to relax a bit, now that we¡¯d cleared both levels without finding trouble. ¡°I¡¯m just as happy whatever it was isn¡¯t still here. Let¡¯s get back down to the kitchen, see if there¡¯s anything worth salvaging.¡±


    We headed back to the kitchen and began looking over the mess, but the place was in tatters. The shelves were wrecked, food scattered. Something had torn into all the family¡¯s dry goods, eating a lot of it and scattering the rest all over the floor. That made me think it probably wasn¡¯t zombies after all; I¡¯d never seen the zombies go after any food besides living things or the recently dead.


    Whatever it was, it had made a true mess of the place. At first I was certain there was nothing worth saving, but then Tom opened the fridge. The power was out, so it wasn¡¯t really cold inside anymore, and most of the goods had spoiled. But there were apples, a few blocks of cheese, and a big jar of peanut butter that all looked worth keeping. We¡¯d want to eat them pretty soon, but it was more food, which we needed badly.


    I turned the tap on for a second and got some water, so there was still a little pressure in the pipes. I turned it right back off again so we didn¡¯t waste any. We¡¯d want to drain every tap we could for drinkable water. Soon enough, we¡¯d be boiling stream water for drinking. A well was going to be a necessity, but I didn¡¯t have the foggiest idea how to dig one¡­


    ¡°Selena,¡± Tom hissed.


    I turned, alarmed at the tone of his voice. He was pointing at a gaping black hole in the wall, halfway down the hall leading from the kitchen to the dining room. We¡¯d come around the other way and missed seeing it, but it was a stairwell leading down. A cellar, most likely.Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    A blood trail led from the kitchen down the stairs. Something had still been bleeding when it was dragged down there. That plus no bodies upstairs didn¡¯t take too long to put together. Whatever hit this place had taken its dinner downstairs to eat. That meant there was a decent chance it was still down there.


    ¡°Shit,¡± I said. Then I told the others, ¡°Stay put.¡±


    I snuck closer to the doorway, Hope right beside me. A glance into the dark told me there was barely any light down there. Maybe a couple of small windows were letting in some sunlight, but it wasn¡¯t much.


    ¡°We should get help, right?¡± Neal asked. ¡°Call for backup?¡±


    ¡°If we need to, sure,¡± I replied. I wasn¡¯t so sure we did. I was tier three, and I¡¯d been tearing up the tier one and tier two critters we¡¯d faced. I hadn¡¯t run into any tier three threats¡ªyet. Was it possible this was one? Sure, but even then, I had the other two guys as backup. I felt pretty confident, especially with my Drain spell.


    I picked up a chunk of broken wood from the floor and tossed it down the stairs. It clattered against the steps, banging its way down before hitting the cement floor at the bottom with a thunk.


    Something below snorted.


    Yup, the monster was still down there, and whatever it was sounded huge. I backed up into the kitchen and rejoined my team. ¡°Okay, guys. We need to figure out how we¡¯re going to fight this thing. I think we can get it to chase us up here. I definitely don¡¯t want to go looking for it in the dark down there.¡±


    ¡°Right on,¡± Tom said.


    Some backup might be useful, in case whatever it was turned out to be a bigger menace than I was expecting. Just because we hadn¡¯t seen any tier three monsters yet didn¡¯t mean there were none. ¡°Tom, I don¡¯t think your Entangle will work inside, but you¡¯re the one best able to get away from trouble if you run into it outside. Go down the street to Alfred¡¯s group. Tell him I need him here ASAP.¡±


    ¡°Got it,¡± he replied, then took off.


    ¡°What about me?¡± Neal asked.


    ¡°Ideally, you and I wait here for backup to arrive. Then we wake that thing up and get it to chase us topside, and avenge the people who lived here,¡± I told him.


    He swallowed hard, but nodded. Poor kid wasn¡¯t used to life or death situations. None of us really were, but I¡¯d had more chances to face them. So when whatever was down there snarled and growled again, then started moving around, I rolled my eyes and sighed, rather than quaking in fear.


    ¡°Or it¡¯s going to come face us sooner rather than later,¡± I added as the stairs creaked under the creature¡¯s weight.


    ¡°Now we leave, right?¡± Neal asked. He was sheet white.


    ¡°Not gonna be time,¡± I said softly. Whatever it was, it was picking up steam as it moved. If we ran, it would run us down. Doors wouldn¡¯t stop it¡ªwe¡¯d already seen that. It was time to fight. ¡°Whatever this thing is, it¡¯s too fast to outrun. We need to stand our ground while we wait for help.¡±


    Hope barked. My zombies set themselves up on other side of the doorway into the kitchen, while Hope placed herself dead center. She¡¯d be a target, but she was fast. I hoped she could avoid whatever it was. My palms were slick with sweat, and I wiped them on my trousers one at a time in the seconds we had left.


    The monster that barreled from the basement was a thing out of nightmare. It had to have been a black bear, once upon a time. Before the Event warped it into something new.


    Now it was just a walking horror.


    The thing shambled up out of the cellar, looking one way then the other, and spotted Hope barking at it. It turned to glare at her, and I got my first good look at its face. Tatters of fur hung from its skull, revealing red tissue beneath. It was like the bear was shedding all its fur, I realized as it lumbered into the hall, struggling to fit itself in the narrow space.


    Under the fur was something slick, bloody, and disgusting. The creature had massive paws adorned with pitch-black claws that shredded the wood floor with each step. It lumbered toward Hope, grunting and snarling.


    I cast Drain Life on the thing, and it staggered. The brief wave of weakness passed over me, replaced by a feeling of strength as the demon bear¡¯s vitality flowed toward me. The moment of hesitation was all Hope needed¡ªshe darted forward, her teeth catching one forelimb just above the paw. She tore, ripping away a chunk of fur and flesh, but the bear didn¡¯t seem to care. It swatted Hope, sending her crashing into the wall, and pressed ahead.


    Hope was okay; I saw her getting back to her feet and shaking her head out of the corner of my eye. Drain Life hadn¡¯t reset yet, so I stood my ground on the other side of the kitchen island, hoping it would serve as at least a brief barrier for this monster.


    ¡°Neal, get ready!¡± I called out, but when I glanced over my shoulder, he was already gone. ¡°Figures. God damn it!¡±


    The bear charged.

 Chapter 25 - Entangled

    <h4>Chapter 25 - Entangled</h4>


    The demon bear rushed me, and I swear I now totally understand what people mean when they talk about their lives flashing in front of their eyes. There was a brief moment where everything seemed to slow down and all I could see were those horrible red eyes, boring into mine. This creature was so full of anger and hatred that it was practically oozing out of its pores.


    I screamed¡ªI¡¯d love to say it was in defiance, but I¡¯m betting it sounded closer to terror. Thankfully the timer on my Drain Spell expired and I unleashed it as the thing barreled out of the hallway and into the kitchen. Even a second Drain Life didn¡¯t finish it off, which shocked me. I figured two casts of the spell would probably do anything in. It had to be at least tier two, at that rate.


    My zombies launched themselves at it from either side, grabbing hold of the bear¡¯s shoulders and stabbing with their knives. The tiny blades looked pathetic next to the raw size and power of the bear, and it shrugged both zombies off, flinging them sideways. It reached the kitchen island and tore into it, shattering the marble top and ripping the wood panels apart.


    But then Hope was back in the fray. My faithful puppy ran up to the bear, let back her head, and howled!


    It was the same cry I¡¯d heard right before the bone dogs attacked the station, the same nerve-chilling sound. This time, it didn¡¯t do anything to me, but it clearly impacted the bear. The monster slowed and shook its head, like it was trying to shake off an annoying fly. It turned to glare at Hope and snarled.


    ¡°You leave my dog the hell alone!¡± I shouted as I swung my axe at the thing¡¯s head. I hit¡ªthe axe head sunk a couple of inches into the side of the thing¡¯s face. It staggered back, ripping the weapon from my hands, and clawed at the axe until it clattered to the floor.


    I¡¯d successfully gotten its attention back on me, which maybe wasn¡¯t my best move. Thankfully, that Agility crystal was still working for me. When the bear swung a paw at me, aiming to take my head off, I dropped. Fast as I could, I just let myself fall to the floor so the claw sailed by overhead. Shards of wood broken loose by the blow embedded themselves painfully in my arm. Then I rolled, rushing back to my feet again. I¡¯d never been this fast in the old days, so thank god for magic.


    Both of my zombies were working the back end of the demon bear over with their short blades, stabbing it again and again. It ignored them, though, still focused on trying to hit me. Maybe it knew I was the person in charge? Either that, or my Drain spells were just doing that much damage. The timer was almost up. I had a feeling that one more cast and I could finish this thing off. I just needed to survive a few more seconds.


    The bear lunged at me, but the weight of my zombies on its hindquarters slowed it enough that I was able to step back, out of the kitchen, toward the front end of the house. I heard voices out there. Help was on the way! I had people coming, so all I needed to do was hang on.


    Then it was pushing through the hall, rushing at me with nothing at all to stop it. Just before it could arrive, Hope dove in the way and howled again. It slowed the bear, but didn¡¯t stop it. Another second and first Hope, then I, would be torn apart.


    I felt the Drain Life timer expire like a drink of water after a day in the desert. I reached out my right hand and cast the spell. Black mist shot from my fingertips and stabbed into the creature, sinking into it. The bear froze, withered visibly in front of my eyes, and then collapsed.


    It was over.


    I panted, trying to catch my breath. Almost on autopilot, I walked nearer to the thing. I wanted to be damned sure it was gone, but Hope rushed in to make sure for me, chomping it on the snoot. The bear didn¡¯t react at all. It was well and truly dead, at last.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.


    ¡°Nice job, pup,¡± I told her. She yipped in response. I swear, she acted more like a regular dog all the time.


    The bear was gross, but it undoubtedly had a crystal, so I gingerly put my palm on its forehead. The fur was exactly as disgusting as I thought it would be, and I wanted to find some hand sanitizer fast. Or soap. Or something. But a nice-sized clear crystal popped out into my hand. Tier two, by the looks of it.


    ¡°Selena! You all right?¡± That was Alfred. He was there, with his team¡ªand mine. I¡¯d sent Tom to get him, and Neal must have met them on the way in and come back with them.


    I nodded to him. ¡°Yeah, I¡¯m good. It¡¯s dead.¡± I shot Neal a glare, and he blushed, then looked away. That¡¯s right, you should be embarrassed, you shit. Running off and leaving me.


    ¡°Come on, let¡¯s get you outside. There¡¯s blood on your arm. You need Henry?¡± Alfred asked.


    I followed him to the door and back out into welcome daylight, but I shook my head as I walked. ¡°I¡¯m fine. It never hit me, just some shrapnel from its claws blowing up the cabinets in the kitchen. I finished it with a Drain Life spell, and it healed the cuts.¡±


    ¡°Gotta love that spell,¡± Alfred said with a smile. ¡°I¡¯m glad you¡¯re okay. I came as soon as Tom reached us, but we were two houses away. Sorry it took so long.¡±


    ¡°All good. I¡¯m going to sit here on the steps for a few minutes and let my team ransack this place, though. Now that the monster is dead, they should be safe enough.¡±


    Tom seemed okay with that idea, but Neal shot me a black look that told me I¡¯d struck a nerve. Well, that was intentional. He¡¯d taken off when I asked him to have my back. That meant I couldn¡¯t trust him, not at all. I plunked myself down on the steps like I said I would and leaned back against the cool stone, letting it soak some of the heat of the fight away from my tired muscles.


    Turned out that casting Drain Life three times in rapid succession didn¡¯t come without a cost. I was bone-tired, and it wasn¡¯t fading away quickly like one might expect. I¡¯d burned through a lot of some sort of resource casting that spell over and over. My gut, and a few wisps of memory from the spell stones themselves, told me I could improve that with more Will, so that would have to be something I chased down.


    Tom stuck his head back outside. ¡°Did you already get a stone from it? I tried tapping it, but nothing popped.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I did,¡± I told him. ¡°Got a tier two clear. I¡¯ll give it to Lords when we meet up in a bit, okay?¡±


    ¡°Sounds good,¡± Tom replied. ¡°We¡¯re avoiding the bear and the basement, but working to get whatever food is salvageable from the kitchen and supplies from upstairs. I brought you this.¡±


    He tossed me a damp facecloth. ¡°You got a little bloody there,¡± Tom added.


    ¡°Thanks,¡± I replied, catching the cloth. I noticed he had my axe, too. ¡°Can I have that back?¡±


    He seemed a little reluctant, which I could understand, but he came forward and set it down on the steps beside me. ¡°Sure.¡±


    That was a longing look if I¡¯d ever seen one, and I could totally understand. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, we¡¯ll make getting weapons for you guys a priority. There might even be something in the garage here. I¡¯ll join you guys once I rest some. We¡¯ll want to check the garage, too. Might be something useful out there.¡±


    It took me a good ten minutes and a light snack from my backpack before I felt well enough to stand again without a wobble. By that time, Alfred¡¯s group had finished with their first house and jumped ahead of us to the next one. I¡¯d just gotten back to my feet when Neal¡¯s head poked out around the corner of the house.


    ¡°Hey, we went to the garage. Some cool stuff out there, but we could use your help,¡± he said.


    ¡°Oh! You could have waited,¡± I said, a little alarmed. They¡¯d gone to investigate a new building without backup? Anything could have been hiding in there. ¡°I¡¯ll be glad to help.¡±


    I scooped up my pack, slung it on, grabbed my axe, and followed him. My menagerie was in tow right behind me. The side of the house was covered with a nice lawn that ran alongside the driveway, but I couldn¡¯t quite see the front of the garage from where I was at. It was tucked away fairly well back there.


    It wasn¡¯t until I reached the back yard that I got a good look at the garage and realized the doors were still shut. Neal was a few paces ahead of me, and Tom was right by the garage itself, but neither of them were in the garage, nor was there any sign they had been.


    Alarm bells went off in my head, but I couldn¡¯t think why they¡¯d lie to me.


    Then Tom reached out a hand toward me, and the grass writhed under my feet. It grew two feet in as many seconds, braiding itself around my legs. I was stuck!


    He¡¯d cast Entangle on me? For a split second I couldn¡¯t understand why. Then Bradley came around the corner of the garage, his rebar in hand and a dark look on his face, and I knew I was in deep shit.

 Chapter 26 - Do No Harm

    <h4>Chapter 26 - Do No Harm</h4>


    A lot of things happened very quickly after that spell landed on me.


    My full attention was on Bradley. I knew he was going to be trouble, and here he was, angry face and five feet of iron, coming straight for me. I swung my axe at the grass pinning my legs, thinking nothing more than to break free of this trap.


    My critters, on the other hand? Well, I¡¯d left them in ¡®guard¡¯ mode. It turns out that firing off an Entangle spell definitely read as an attack to them. Both zombies and Hope locked their gaze onto Tom in a hot instant. The zombie twins made lurching movements in his general direction, but Hope was faster. She was on him in two bounds, teeth tearing out the back of his ankle.


    Neal screamed and fell, which just made more of him available for her teeth. I noticed that out of the corner of my eye, but I didn¡¯t have the focus to worry about it, because Brad was almost on top of me.


    ¡°What are you doing?¡± I shouted at him as he dashed toward me.


    ¡°You think you¡¯re so good, so smart? We¡¯re killing your monsters, and the monster that controls them too,¡± Brad hissed. Then he swung the rebar at my head.


    Brad had dual Strength crystals, so if that bar connected with my head I was done for. In desperation I raised my axe, trying to block the blow. The rebar collided with the wooden shaft, but I lacked the arm strength to hold back the full force of that blow. My block kept the strike from killing me and redirected the attack, which slammed into my shoulder. I felt something snap. That was a dislocation or a broken bone, my medical brain babbled at me, just before the pain hit like a freight train.


    The impact knocked me off my feet, which bought me two seconds while he got the weapon back under control and prepared to swing again. I gasped, sucking in breath as best I could, the pain clouding my mind. It hurt!


    But I wasn¡¯t helpless. I reached out with my other hand and cast Drain Life on Brad. The magic flowed from my fingers and sank into him, then returned to me in a flash moments later. Bradley staggered backwards, barely holding the rebar he¡¯d had over his head for a crushing blow. Meanwhile, the Drain restored me. The shoulder still hurt, but I could move it again.


    And between my axe blow, the fall, and Tom having puppy problems, the Entangle was barely holding me at all anymore. I kicked my legs free from the rest of the grass and got back to my feet.


    ¡°Brad, we can talk about this,¡± I said. Deep down, I had a feeling we were way past that.


    ¡°No, we can¡¯t,¡± he shot back as he caught his breath. ¡°I saw you counting all those crystals the other night! You¡¯re hoarding, and we¡¯re not having it!¡±


    Shit, I was so careful when I¡¯d been testing the unknown crystals, I was sure no one had seen them all. I knew letting people know I had so many of the things would be a bad plan. This was why.


    I didn¡¯t know how he thought he was going to get away with this¡ªprobably blame it on a monster or something. He¡¯d clearly plotted this attack out in advance. He¡¯d planted Tom and Neal with me so he¡¯d have allies when he made his move. Speaking of which, where was¡ª?


    A club slammed into the small of my back, waking up the nerves there with a flame of fresh pain. I swung the axe blindly and connected with whatever had hit me, then turned to see the blade embedded below Neal¡¯s breastbone. He was white, with a stunned look on his face. As I pulled the axe clear, he dropped his club and grabbed his stomach with both hands instead.


    He¡¯d live. Henry was here. If we got him to the healer in time, he¡¯d be¡ª


    Rosencrantz came up behind Neal and bit into his neck while stabbing the dagger into his chest once, twice, three times. I grimaced. That was an awful way to go, but he¡¯d done this to himself, and I still had Brad to worry about.Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    Brad had himself back in a guard again, eyeing me warily. ¡°You killed him! You¡¯re going to pay for that. No matter what happens now, they¡¯re never gonna take you back in. You¡¯re done. When I kill you, they¡¯ll see me as the hero, now.¡±


    ¡°Talk, talk,¡± I spat back. The timer on Drain expired, and I cast it at him again, feeling the rush of healing repair my injuries as Brad staggered under the magical attack. Guildenstern was coming up behind dear old Bradley, so all I needed to do was keep him focused on me just a little bit longer. ¡°You want me? Come get me. I¡¯m betting one more Drain Life will finish you off. Think you can get me before the timer runs out?¡±


    He snarled and came at me, but he was weak and slow compared to how he¡¯d been when he first attacked, and this time my legs were free to move. I used my superior Agility to zip back two steps, making it easier to block his first wild swing. That was all he got before Guildenstern¡¯s knife hit him in the kidney. Then it was Brad¡¯s turn to gasp in pain. He turned, and was about to whack my zombie with his rebar¡ªthat wasn¡¯t happening. I rushed forward and hooked the makeshift spear with my axe blade, knocking it away.


    Which left Brad entirely open to Guildenstern¡¯s loving embrace.


    The zombie grabbed on with both hands, teeth working on Brad¡¯s neck while Guildie plunged his dagger into Brad over and over. The man started letting out a gurgling cry, but it didn¡¯t last very long before he went down.


    I checked the rest of the area. Hope had killed Tom. Rosie was chewing on what was left of Neal. That almost made me lose my lunch, so I ordered him to knock it off. Dead was dead, and Rosie didn¡¯t actually need to eat. My attackers were all dead, so what now?


    I was panting, half panicked. With the shouting and a couple of screams, I figured that more people would be on their way. How was this going to look when they got here?


    Lords liked Brad. I¡¯d seen him stick up for the shithead more than once. He knew Brad was a problem, but he also put up with the man acting out far more than had ever been safe. I understood. Both of them were cops, and police took that whole brotherhood thing seriously. Maybe if there¡¯d been more time, Lords might trust me enough to listen to my side of the story here, but he¡¯d known me for a day.


    They were going to come over here and see me surrounded by three dead people, all of them killed by my undead creatures. There¡¯d already been more than a little discomfort about the undead. That was totally natural; they were weird and more than a little icky, although they were starting to grow on me. But I wasn¡¯t going to let other people kill them. Those creatures were mine, and they were my best chance of staying alive in all of this.


    I was a cop-killer. That was how Lords, George, and Samson would all see me. They¡¯d known Bradley for years, and me for twenty-four hours. If I was lucky, all they¡¯d do is kill my creatures and lock me up, but how could they even do that? I had my Drain Life spell, so I could hurt people even from inside a cage. They¡¯d have to force me to hand over all my crystals, and that was a death sentence in this new world.


    It was time to run. I didn¡¯t have any other options.


    Thankfully the Drain spells had healed my injuries. I glanced at Brad, wondering if I ought to¡ªand then decided that he¡¯d come for me, so why not. I reached out and tapped his head, and a tier two Strength stone came out into my hand. Then I quickly went to Tom and repeated the process, collecting his tier one Entangle. I couldn¡¯t slot the things right now, but they were still valuable. Sooner or later I imagined people would set up ways to trade the things, right? It wouldn¡¯t always be this chaotic, surely.


    Or maybe not. I looked at the two stones I¡¯d just picked up off dead humans and shivered. Every person with these crystals was now a walking, talking piggy bank. Sure, killing monsters won you a single stone per creature. But people dropped their stones too. If I was killed, would I drop every crystal I had embedded? Probably. Plus they could loot my pockets for the spares.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 2) - Agility


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 1) - Drain Life


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead, Animate Dead, Nightvision


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Will x2, Unknown (Tier 2), Strength (Tier 2)


    That was a lot of crystals for one kill. If they¡¯d killed me, Bradley would have been the one with all that power in his hands. The thought made me shiver.


    Voices were coming my way. It was time to go. I couldn¡¯t stick around, not and face the others, not after what I¡¯d done. I stared down at the three dead bodies, trying to feel something about it. I wanted to be a doctor, which meant healing people, and doing no harm. Now I¡¯d killed three men.


    I had zero time for these thoughts. Later, I could break down and get upset if I still felt like it. Just then, I needed to move, if I wanted to survive. I sent my creatures east ahead of me and set off into the forest behind the house. That would be Centennial Woods, a forest preserve big enough that I felt sure I could get lost in it.

 Chapter 27 - Wooden Walls

    <h4>Chapter 27 - Wooden Walls</h4>


    Carver was up with the sun and moving about on his mission. His house lacked many of the supplies he¡¯d need, but that was fine; he had a horse, after all. Dead, but still able to take him around the city faster than anyone could travel on foot. That was a significant advantage, and one he planned to use well.


    He¡¯d gathered up everything that might be useful, packing them into bags he strapped to the horse¡¯s saddle. He and his wife had enjoyed camping, before their daughter was born. They¡¯d intended to do more of it, once she was a little older. He packed their two-man tent, a sleeping bag, a large plastic bladder full of water, and all the non-perishable food he had in the cabinet.


    Weapons were thin on the ground, but he had an ancient compound bow from when he¡¯d been younger. Gideon hadn¡¯t fired it in years, but he still remembered how. He grabbed that and the quiver of arrows; only ten, and they were old, but it would do for now. That plus the biggest carving knife in the kitchen would serve as a start.


    He piled anything else that looked like it could be useful into a backpack and slung it on, then marched back outside and mounted his horse again. Gideon glared down at the goblin zombie, wondering if he should bring it with him or not. He might well find something better elsewhere, but for the time being every advantage counted. He reached down and took the zombie¡¯s hand, pulling it up behind him on the horse. If they needed to move fast, he didn¡¯t want the zombie slowing him down.


    As set as he felt he could be, Carver took one last look at his house. It was empty now. There was no reason to mourn it; everyone that had made it a home was dead.


    With that he set off at a fast pace, trotting up a side street and then turning north onto North Prospect. Stopped cars were everywhere. The Event hit in the afternoon, and traffic hadn¡¯t been light. Every car had simply stopped right where it was in the middle of the street. Still, it was easy enough for his horse to dodge around.


    He saw almost no people. It was early, and the night had been full of screams from the dying. Many people were likely exhausted and trying to rest as best they could. Later today, perhaps, they would venture out. Or maybe they¡¯d remain hidden, hoping things would somehow return to normal before their food and water ran out.


    Gideon liked to think of himself as a realist. Under the circumstances¡ªmonsters, no power, no vehicles¡ªhe guessed probably half the city¡¯s population had died on the first day. But some would have survived, either by fighting off the monsters or by hiding from them. Either way, those survivors would be forced to venture out before long. He recalled reading that most people had only a few days worth of food in their homes. Once that was tapped out, they¡¯d have to look for more, or die.


    Without trucks hauling more food into the city from elsewhere, food stocks nearby were going to dry up faster than anyone could replace them. In the long run, the city was going to be a place of death. Most people who remained there were going to die. Fodder for him, at this point, but he didn¡¯t want to become one of those casualties.


    In the short term, though, he had time. And Burlington had resources he simply couldn¡¯t get anywhere else. In this case, what he was hoping to find were dead things. Or more correctly, undead things.


    His ride carried him north just a few blocks until he saw the white tower of St. Joseph¡¯s Home, an old assisted living facility. It wasn¡¯t the building itself that interested him, but what lay just beyond it: the Mount Calvary Cemetery. Funny, how people often placed cemeteries right next to assisted living or nursing homes. Appropriate, perhaps, since it was easier to move the residents on to their final abode, but a little grim. One could just look out the window and see one¡¯s eternal reward waiting in a large, open field.


    Morbid, but true.


    Riding closer, he saw the place had been ransacked. Zombies were all over. Some of them look like they¡¯d been interred and risen when the Event hit. Others wore regular clothing and the marks of a bloody struggle. It was easy enough to decipher what happened here. Carver hoped that the fact his classroom cadavers had risen meant dead bodies all over had done likewise. That would turn every cemetery into a perfect hunting ground for him. Since he already had a couple of black crystals, earning more would empower him faster than any other sort of hunting he could accomplish.


    The dead had indeed risen, and then they¡¯d gone after the nearest source of living humans¡ªSt. Joseph¡¯s. With the raw number of undead running around the place, he doubted anyone remained alive inside.You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    Which was perfect, for him. He¡¯d found his hunting ground. It was time to begin killing monsters and collecting their crystals. One zombie spotted him as he rode up and slid down from the saddle. It gurgled at him and started moving his way.


    ¡°And you will be the first of many, my friend,¡± Gideon said, nocking an arrow to his string and taking aim. He waited until the zombie was only a dozen paces away before firing. Better to be sure, and hit, than to take chances.


    The arrow pierced the zombie¡¯s skull and it collapsed in a heap. A quick tap got him another black stone. Gideon gave his horse and goblin zombie mental commands to guard him¡ªno sense taking chances! Then he pressed ahead, looking for his next target. There were so many, perhaps even hundreds of undead in this place. By the time he was done here, he would have the beginnings of the power he knew could be his.


    <hr>


    I ran headlong into the trees, legs carrying me as fast as they could. Hope was out ahead, scouting the path down to the brook I could hear burbling somewhere in front of me. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern had fallen behind me, but that was okay. Having them as a rearguard was a sensible precaution. I had no way of knowing if I would be followed, and how soon that pursuit might begin. If people came after me, they¡¯d run into the zombies first. Rosie and Guildie would buy me time.


    Images of the three men I''d just killed kept flashing before my eyes. Each time, I shoved those thoughts away. I had a feeling I was going to be pretty messed up about it, once I had time to sit and think. But that time wasn''t now. Not if I wanted to live¡ªand I did.


    We hit the brook. It wasn''t huge, but I would still get soaking wet crossing the thing. There wasn''t enough daylight left to dry out my clothes, so I turned south, looking for a quick way across.


    Only ten meters upstream I saw what I needed: a space where there were enough boulders close enough together that I felt confident I could hop across. I sent my undead over first. They just waded through the river, as they didn''t need to worry about getting cold. I followed after, once Hope scouted the trees on the other side. I knew this forest was goblin territory, so I needed to be careful and watch for ambushes.


    Once I was across, I considered which way to go from here. The northern end of the forest was bigger by far, and I didn''t want to end up lost. I veered south, instead. That was also a risk, as it took me closer to the police station. By now, Lords and his people might have sent word back to watch for me. They might even have returned themselves. I wanted to be careful to stay far enough away from the station to avoid detection.


    At the same time, I wanted to skirt the forest, not delve deeply into it. I didn¡¯t have a compass or map, and I only had so much food and water with me. Getting lost would get me dead.


    The goblins were just as large an issue. They were still around, I felt sure of it. Based on the numbers we¡¯d already seen, there were a lot of them, too. It made me wonder where they¡¯d come from. Like, the zombies had been dead bodies before the Event. It sort of made sense, if you accepted magic, that they came back to life. The giant snake had been a snake. The demon bear? Probably just a bear. Those skeleton dogs had been someone¡¯s buried pet, most likely.


    But what were the goblins? Had they been created out of nothing? Or had they been something else before, too? I realized with a start that I hadn¡¯t seen a single squirrel since entering the trees.


    ¡°No way. Definitely couldn¡¯t be that,¡± I whispered, glancing from tree to tree. Still none of the small furry things.


    Holy shit, that had better not be what happened. That would make for so many goblins!


    All at once I stumbled across something surprising: a paved path! Parts of these woods were a sort of park, if I recalled right. I¡¯d never been out there, but classmates had. There was a parking lot where people could leave their cars, and trails through some of the forest. Maybe, with a little luck, I could find that parking lot and locate some supplies from abandoned cars?


    I looked ahead down the trail. There was no sign of danger, but that didn''t necessarily mean anything. I¡¯d already seen that the goblins were very good at hiding, when they wanted to.


    "What do you think, girl?" I asked Hope.


    She gave a soft chuffing sound, then marched ten feet down the path, eyes scanning the trees on either side. After that, she turned back toward me, gave another chuff, and set off again.


    "I guess that answers that question," I said. "Let''s go, guys."


    Zombies close behind me, I followed Hope down the trail. But she stopped after only about a hundred feet. She glanced off the trail to the right, then back at me, then back into the woods. Without any sound, Hope left the trail, veering north again, deeper into the woods.


    I peered where she¡¯d been looking, and for a long moment couldn¡¯t see anything amiss. Then I did, and couldn¡¯t believe I¡¯d missed it.


    Walls.


    Someone¡ªsomething, more likely¡ªhad built a wood palisade in the forest. The trees they¡¯d cut had been left with enough branches that the end result blended into the woods very well. I was close, and hadn¡¯t even noticed until Hope told me where to look.


    It had to be the goblins, right? It was probably them, although I couldn¡¯t rule out some other group of monsters or people setting it up. It was near the brook for water, in the forest to hunt game¡­ As fortress locations went, this wasn¡¯t a bad one.


    I issued a mental command for the zombies to follow Hope, and then did likewise. We never ran into whoever owned that fort, not even a single scout. But I kept watching over my shoulder for a long time even after I could no longer see those wooden walls.

 Chapter 28 - Map Quest

    <h4>Chapter 28 - Map Quest</h4>


    Alfred was the first on the scene, coming around the corner at a run. He¡¯d started moving as soon as he heard the shouts and cries of alarm coming from behind the house Selena¡¯s team was searching. When was she going to get a break? She¡¯d been in the middle of every fight so far, even running into that monstrous bear. Now her team was in trouble¡ªagain!¡ªand he was going to get there in time to help, even if it meant leaving his teammates behind.


    He rounded the corner, and stopped cold.


    There were three dead bodies lying on the ground. The nearest he recognized as Neal, and he wasn¡¯t quite dead anymore. He was clambering back to his feet, in fact, even with his throat gnawed and multiple stab wounds to his belly.


    Another body stirred, slowly rising as a new zombie. At first Alfred thought it was Tom, but then he blinked. That wasn¡¯t Tom at all. It was Brad? What was he even doing there? He stepped back, easing his way clear of the zombies. He didn¡¯t know what was going on here, but this wasn¡¯t something he wanted to handle on his own.


    The third body still wasn¡¯t moving, but it was also clearly dead, whoever it was. Alfred hoped it wasn¡¯t Selena, but he couldn¡¯t tell without getting danger close to the zombies.


    ¡°What¡¯s happening?¡± Kara called out behind him, huffing for breath. She was one of his team members, finally caught up, and hadn¡¯t seen the zombies before she spoke, so her voice carried well. Both zombies locked their eyes on the pair of them and advanced.


    ¡°Shit,¡± Alfred swore. ¡°Back up. Come on, let¡¯s go.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re zombies,¡± Kara said. ¡°We can take ¡®em!¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s Neal,¡± Alfred snapped back. ¡°And Brad! These are our people. I want some backup before we deal with this mess, okay?¡±


    ¡°Oh¡­¡± Kara¡¯s face went white at that, and Alfred could understand why. After all, they hadn¡¯t lost anyone yet. They¡¯d fought goblins and bone dogs and giant snakes, but nobody on the home team had died in any of those battles, unless you counted the guy in the business suit. But Alfred didn¡¯t know his name, and he was betting Kara didn¡¯t either.


    It was different when you knew the name of the zombie trying to eat you.


    His second man, Joe, came jogging up, saw the zombies, and didn¡¯t ask any questions¡ªhe just backed up with the rest of them.


    Lords brought his group over next. He took in the scene and his face didn¡¯t get white, it went red. He was furious, and it was easy to see. He whirled to Alfred. ¡°Damn it! What the hell happened?¡±


    Alfred shook his head. ¡°I don¡¯t know. I heard shouts and came as quick as I could. Got here and saw¡ªthis.¡±


    He gestured toward the oncoming zombies.


    ¡°Where are the rest of their teams?¡± Lords asked. ¡°Selena? Tom? And Brad should have had Samuel and Cecilia with him, right?¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s another body in the grass over there,¡± Alfred said, pointing. ¡°I couldn¡¯t tell who it was. Maybe the others already turned into zombies and wandered off?¡±


    Lords turned to Henry. ¡°I know it¡¯s a long shot, but is there anything you can do for them?¡±


    ¡°No, no way,¡± Henry said. ¡°Dude, they¡¯re not infected people. If it was a disease, maybe my heal would help. Maybe. But that¡¯s not what¡¯s happened here. Those people are dead. I can¡¯t heal death.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s all right. I figured as much. Stay here,¡± Lords replied. He started forward toward the monsters.


    Alfred stepped up to join him. ¡°I can help, if you want backup.¡±


    ¡°I said stay here!¡± Lords snapped. ¡°Brad was an asshole, but he was a friend, too. And Neal was one of us, too. My people, my command, my responsibility.¡±


    He strode forward, rebar in hand, and made short work of both zombies. As Alfred had already learned, having a tier two Strength crystal gave one a massive boost in combat ability. It only took one swing to drop each zombie. Lords hit them each a second time, to be sure, but they were both dead again. Then Lords went forward to look at the scene.


    This time Alfred just went ahead and joined him. Lords glanced over and saw him. ¡°Stay behind me. I don¡¯t want you stepping on any evidence that could tell us what happened here.¡±


    ¡°It feels pretty obvious,¡± Alfred said. ¡°They ran into zombies and it was too much for them to handle.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, maybe,¡± Lords replied. He knelt next to a section of grass that was far longer than the rest, then went to the third body. ¡°It¡¯s Tom. Shit, he¡¯s been mangled.¡±


    ¡°Not zombies, then?¡± Alfred asked, coming close enough to see the body, and instantly regretting it.


    ¡°Could be,¡± Lords replied. ¡°But he¡¯s not rising again. If it were a zombie kill, wouldn¡¯t he rise? And see these bite marks? That¡¯s not human teeth that made those. Those are dog bites.¡±If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    There was no sign of Selena or her critters. Where was she? Alfred looked around and spotted a few lines of trampled grass, heading into the woods. Lords saw the same thing a moment later. Both of them followed the trail a short way, but stopped shy of entering the trees. It was already getting into late afternoon, and the shadows inside the forest were long. Anything could be hiding in there.


    ¡°What do you think?¡± Alfred asked at last. He had a bad feeling he knew what happened here, but he didn¡¯t want to say it aloud.


    ¡°It¡¯s pretty obvious,¡± Lords replied, his voice soft. ¡°Selena killed them. I don¡¯t know why, or what happened. Brad wasn¡¯t supposed to even be here. It looks like Tom got off an Entangle on her before her dog killed him. Her zombies killed Neal and Brad. Maybe she lost control of the monsters and they attacked everyone, and she fled?


    ¡°But I think the more likely answer is she ordered them to attack the others. Some sort of confrontation got out of control, and she killed them, then fled to avoid punishment,¡± Lords finished.


    ¡°But why? She¡¯s been helping us. Why kill them like that?¡± Alfred protested.


    Lords turned to him. ¡°I get that she¡¯s your friend. Brad was mine. I¡¯m not going to waste more lives chasing after her in that forest, mind. We know the goblins came from there, and there¡¯s probably a lot more of them. She went in there, she¡¯s on her own. But if she comes back, she¡¯s not going to be welcome to rejoin us. I can¡¯t take the risk. Can you live with that?¡±


    Alfred wasn¡¯t sure how to react to that. Before the Event, he¡¯d thought Selena was a jerk. She was stuck up, too smart for her own good, and a know-it-all. But since the world went insane she¡¯d been a rock, always looking out for him and making sure he made it through. On the other hand, now she was gone. Even if she survived, the odds of him seeing her again were slim.


    He figured he had two choices: go off into the dark, goblin-filled forest solo trying to find someone who might already be dead, or stay the course and stick with the people actually building something together in this place. Only one of those two options had a decent life expectancy.


    ¡°I¡¯m with you, sir,¡± Alfred said.


    ¡°Good man,¡± Lords replied, clapping him on the shoulder. ¡°Let¡¯s go and bury our dead, then head back to the station. It¡¯ll be nightfall before too long.¡±


    Lords turned and walked away from the woods, already barking orders. Alfred stood there another few moments, staring into the trees and wishing Selena well with all the hope he could muster, and then followed.


    <hr>


    The wall of trees around me ended abruptly when we reached the parking lot at last. Hope kept us moving parallel to the path, which as I expected led us right to the spot. Unfortunately there weren¡¯t too many cars around. Things had blown up in the middle of a work day, so that made sense, I supposed. There were four cars, a minivan, and an SUV scattered across the lot, making the space feel much more huge than it really was. I mean, there were spaces for at least a hundred cars there. With so few, it felt downright empty.


    No one was about. I waited, hiding in the trees at the edge of the woods, and watched the space for a long time to be sure. If anyone was out there they had more patience than me, that¡¯s for sure.


    That didn¡¯t mean there were no signs of people, though. Here and there I saw splashes of dark red on the pavement, a silent memento of the chaos which must have reigned here right after everything went crazy. There¡¯d clearly been some fighting in this place, but just as obviously whatever happened was long since over, the combatants moved on.


    Once I was fairly confident I wasn¡¯t going to get jumped the minute I stepped onto the asphalt, I started toward the nearest car. If there were supplies inside I could use, I had to find them. Being part of a big group had a lot of advantages that I¡¯d need to replicate solo now. Scrounging for supplies was going to have to become a staple part of my day, at least for a while.


    The car was locked, but my axe made short work of the driver¡¯s window, which let me unlock the thing. I didn¡¯t find much useful inside, though. The minivan was next. I didn¡¯t have to break into this one; the side door was fully open, and something had torn through the inside, ripping apart seat cushions and shredding a perfectly good basket full of picnic supplies.


    There was a baby bascinet and two car seats in the minivan. No sign of the kids that had been in them, or their parents. I tried not to think about that.


    It wasn¡¯t until I reached the SUV that I hit pay dirt. It was also locked, but I bashed the window open, same as I had on the first car, then went through the vehicle for supplies. This owner was a good Vermonter and kept their emergency kit in the car, even in summertime. It had a bag of rock salt, a couple of blankets, bottle of water, road flares, and even two bags of beef jerky¡ªsomeone¡¯s idea of survival food, I supposed. I also found the best possible thing, sitting in the glove box: a map.


    I mean, this was the twenty-first century. Nobody had maps anymore. We all had phones, right? Nobody needed paper maps.


    Except now the phones didn¡¯t work, and holy shit was it a pain in the ass to not know where things were. The map was for the entire state of Vermont, which meant it didn¡¯t have as much detail as I¡¯d prefer, but it did have blown-up sections for a couple of major cities, and Burlington was definitely one of those. It still wasn¡¯t perfect, but now I had a much better idea where I was and what was around me.


    With the map in hand, I felt a lot more confident. I could plan my next moves, figure out where to go from here, and then act. Ever since things went nuts I¡¯d been running from one thing to the next, trying to just do the next right thing so I could stay alive and in one piece. Survival living was all well and good, because in an emergency it kept you alive. But if I kept acting that way, sooner or later the luck would run out and I¡¯d end up dead.


    It was time to make plans, to plot out my next moves with some care and thought. The map was going to be a key in making that happen. In fact, as I scanned the area around me on the mini-map, I spotted something that probably ought to be my next stop. Turned out, there was a cemetery maybe half a mile away. If the cadavers came back as zombies, maybe some of the dead buried there would return, too?


    I needed more black crystals if I was going to up my game, and that seemed like it would be the best possible place to find them. But¡­ Not at night. Dusk was already falling. By the time I worked my way through the woods to that cemetery it would be full dark, and that seemed like the worst possible time to go investigate a place full of undead.


    ¡°Caution will keep us alive,¡± I said to Hope. She chuffed softly at me in response.


    I bedded us down in the SUV, the zombies just outside to keep watch and Hope inside with me. She sat in the front, alert and watching for danger. As the daylight continued to fade I noticed that her eyes were glowing a faint blue. That glow was the last thing I saw as I closed my eyes and drifted into a troubled sleep full of rough dreams.

 Chapter 29 - Army of the Dead

    <h4>Chapter 29 - Army of the Dead</h4>


    It was a long and restless night. The forest was no longer a peaceful place. I woke at least a dozen times to various noises, none of them pleasant. First it was a pack of goblins, who looked like they were out on a hunt. They made enough noise to rouse me as they crossed the parking lot on their way to wherever. My zombies were hunkered down, though, and just about invisible in the darkness. I stayed very still until they were well past.


    Sometime later, I woke again to a distant roar that sounded frighteningly like the demon bear. That was all I needed was to run into another of those, but thankfully it sounded far off, and didn¡¯t repeat itself. A wolf-like howl made Hope perk up her ears at one point as well, but she kept quiet and it wasn¡¯t repeated.


    After all the noises, I wasn¡¯t as well-rested as I¡¯d have liked, but when daylight began splashing over the treetops I figured it was time to get moving anyway. I¡¯d gotten lucky so far, but relying on luck was never a great plan. It was time for me to take some forward action. I needed to find a way to stop running and begin building, and the fastest manner I could think of was to grow in power and strength.


    ¡°All right, girl,¡± I told Hope. ¡°We have a hike ahead of us, hey?¡±


    Hope wagged her tail in response.


    Yesterday had been a thing. I still wasn¡¯t sure how to deal with having killed three people. Part of me was still shocked, even horrified at what I¡¯d done. But overall I was having trouble dredging up a lot of guilt over it. Brad planned all of that. He¡¯d organized those two as helpers, planned the ambush, and they almost succeeded. If they¡¯d beaten me, would they have let me live, and just killed my creatures and stolen my stones? Brad knew if he let me live I¡¯d have told Lords what he did.


    No, there was no way they¡¯d have allowed me to survive. I would have been a brave casualty in some sort of attack, a heroic soul who died defending them from monsters. Or maybe they¡¯d just have dumped my body in the brook and claimed I wandered off. The only way I was coming out of that alive was with them defeated. If there¡¯d been some way to take them down without killing them, I would have. But the only tools I had were pretty lethal, and they were the ones who forced me to use them to survive.


    That was something I decided I could live with.


    I ate a quick breakfast from my stash of food and drank the bottled water I¡¯d found the evening before. I still had a full water bottle of my own, in my bag. I¡¯d need that for later. I repacked my bag, making sure I wasn¡¯t leaving anything that could be useful. The blankets had kept me warm through the night-time chill, and I wasn¡¯t leaving those behind. One went into the bag, but the second wouldn¡¯t fit, so I tied it to the top.


    The map stayed out, though. That was going to live in my pocket for a while. I needed it to make sure I didn¡¯t get lost cutting across the forest to the cemetery.


    As I set out into the forest again, I felt better with each footstep. My journey was carrying me further away from Lords and his collection of people, but that wasn¡¯t wholly a bad thing. He was too cautious, I realized. Here I was all by myself at last, and my first impulse was to rush into the fire. I was headed toward danger because I knew that was how I would become strong enough to survive all of this.


    If he kept hiding in the police station, only venturing out in short scouting runs, those people were never going to become stronger. Not at the pace I had a feeling people were going to require, anyway. I¡¯d seen the fortress in the forest, after all. Whether those were goblins or something else, they were clearly numerous and well-organized. Sooner or later they¡¯d come for Lords and his people, and they¡¯d lose.


    I hoped to chart a different path for myself as I marched through the morning sun. It was less than a quarter mile to the interstate; I89 ran through the woods here, carving a wide path. It startled me, running across it. The trees just ended like they were a wall, and beyond was a grassy stretch leading down to the highway.


    Between the open grass on either side, the median, and three lanes traveling in each direction, that was a lot of open space to traverse. Worse, there were cars out there in the middle which could easily be hiding anything. The road wasn¡¯t packed, but there were scores of cars within sight, and zero way to tell if anyone or anything was hiding in or around them.


    There was no movement out there beyond the wind blowing through the grass, but that didn¡¯t mean it was safe. I hunched over next to Hope. ¡°What do you think, girl?¡±If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    She barked a quiet yip, then dashed out into the opening. I hadn¡¯t ordered that! How smart was this dog, anyway? The more I interacted with her, the more like a regular canine she seemed to act. It was the right move, though; as a skeleton dog, a monster herself, maybe she¡¯d be less likely to attract monster attention. Any humans hiding out there might try to attack her, but Hope was fast. I sent her a mental command to return right away if she thought there was danger.


    But there was nothing. She reached the median without incident, then let out a loud bark there, like she was giving us the all clear. One zombie ahead of me and the other behind, we set off to join her. I watched carefully as we left the woods, but still nothing¡ªno movement, and no attacks coming my way.


    When I reached the cars, I saw they were all simply empty and abandoned. I tried to imagine what happened here after the power went out and the car engines all stalled. These people had been commuting somewhere, and then everything just¡­stopped. What had they done?


    They¡¯d probably tried to wait it out, at first. But when they realized their cell phones were gone, their car was dead, and no additional traffic came along for over an hour, they probably started walking. It wasn¡¯t that far back down the highway to get to civilization. The next exit was half a mile or so south, and there were hotels, shops, places to get help.


    Of course, they couldn¡¯t have known that monsters were tearing through everything. How far had they gotten before running into trouble, I wondered?


    We made it across the danger zone and back into woods on the far side. According to my map, if I proceeded due east, I¡¯d end up at the cemetery. I didn¡¯t remember there being one out that way, but Vermont had lots of old cemeteries in out of the way places. I watched the trees for hints when the canopy was thick and it was hard to tell direction from the sun alone. North side tends to grow more moss; south side grows more branches. It¡¯s because there¡¯s more sunlight on the southern side, when you live up north.


    I climbed a hill after a bit, which was a surprise. The map didn¡¯t show elevation. It was the smart call, though, because from higher up I figured I could see my destination. By the time I reached a small clearing toward the top of the hill, I had a decent glance at where I was going. My line of sight to most of the cemetery was still blocked by trees, but I could see a good chunk of it, and I¡¯d called it completely right. The place was overrun.


    Even only seeing part of the place, there were hundreds of graves in sight, and a lot of them were obviously exhumed recently. The bodies wandered around the cemetery, aimlessly moving from one area to another. There were dozens of undead, just where I could see them. It was hard to tell at this distance, but it looked like these were old bodies, closer to Hope in appearance than my zombies.


    The magic had still brought them back, though, and the fence running around the cemetery kept them in. That was a big plus for me, since it meant I wouldn¡¯t need to go hunting scattered undead all over the countryside.


    A clattering sound from down the hill caught my attention and made me reassess that statement. One set of old bones, dressed in tattered rags for clothes, stumbled up the hill. It had clearly spotted me and just as obviously wanted to say a special hello. I chuckled. One skeleton just didn¡¯t seem like a threat anymore.


    I cast Drain Life on the thing, feeling a rush of strength coming to me as it stumbled and almost went down. Hope was after it in a dash, snapping a leg off as she tore into the thing. My zombies went to assist, but they didn¡¯t make it to the skeleton before Hope finished it off.


    ¡°Neat and fast. That¡¯s the way to do this,¡± I said. I walked to where the scattered bones rested and tapped the skull. A single black crystal popped into my hand and instantly merged into my palm.


    I gasped as new knowledge poured into my mind from the stone. It had linked with Drain Life! I had that spell up to tier two now!


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 2) - Agility


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Drain Life


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead, Animate Dead, Nightvision


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Will x2, Unknown (Tier 2), Strength (Tier 2)


    That was amazing. Drain Life had already become my staple combat spell, even at tier one. Without that I¡¯m sure Brad¡¯s attack would have been a lot more dangerous. I don¡¯t know if I could have beaten all three of them without it. The ability to cause damage and heal myself was invaluable, and now it was twice as strong as it had been.


    I felt more ready than ever to face what was up ahead. We set out again, Hope leading the way as we descended the hill toward our destination. I made sure to remain extra alert. If there was one skeleton outside the fence, there could easily be more of them as well. How it got out, I didn¡¯t know. If it was one very old grave which happened to lay outside the fence, maybe unmarked, that would make sense. But if there was a break in the fence somewhere, there could be a lot more of them waiting in the forest. I kept my eyes open.


    We made it to the fence without running into more undead, though. We rested just inside the shelter of the trees. Well, I rested. My critters didn¡¯t need it, but walking half a mile while watching for bad guys in every shadow takes a ton of effort. Besides, I wanted to see what I was facing out there.


    The answer was, a swarm of undead. This graveyard was very old. A lot of the stones were exceptionally worn, so I had to guess they were a hundred years old. Some might be even older. And there were hundreds of stones. Lots of hundreds. How many had unearthed themselves, I couldn¡¯t say. Less than half, for sure.


    That was still an army of skeletons.

 Chapter 30 - Boneheads

    <h4>Chapter 30 - Boneheads</h4>


    If I was looking for undead, I¡¯d come to the right place for sure. That cemetery held a swarm of skeletons. Better still, they were unarmed. They wandered about aimlessly, following the fence like they were looking for an escape but couldn¡¯t find one. From where I was at, I was safe. But I couldn¡¯t attack them either, not unless I got closer to the fence, anyway.


    The fence itself wasn¡¯t high. It was wrought iron, painted black, and came up to my sternum. I could climb over it, but the fence was made of a series of connected vertical bars, and each bar was pointed on the top. I¡¯d need to cross that barrier very carefully. It wasn¡¯t something I could do fast, or I¡¯d end up impaling myself.


    ¡°Gonna have to be careful,¡± I told Hope. ¡°Climb over, and I might not be able to climb back out before I¡¯m overrun.¡±


    Plus, I doubted Hope or the zombies would be able to climb over that fence, so I¡¯d lose some of my biggest assets. Rather than risk it at all, I figured I¡¯d cruise around the outside edge of the fence and see if I could find a gate. It took some time to work my way around to the road side. On the forest edge, the trees grew almost right up to the fence, so the going was slow. Once I was out to the road, progress was easier, but the skeletons started paying me a lot of attention as soon as they saw me. I quickly had a small pack of the things following me around the fence line.


    There was a gate. As it turned out, there were two of them, one on either side of a looping, circular driveway inside the fence. But I was confused as heck, as I approached them, because both gates were open!


    Yet even as I got near them, the undead shied away. They didn¡¯t come within twenty feet of either gate.


    I examined the things from a little ways off. It looked like there was an invisible wall keeping the skeletons away, but I didn¡¯t want to trust it, and I didn¡¯t want to be on the run from a couple hundred suddenly-free undead, either! There were gates which could be closed and locked, but they were wide open. As I neared the gates I saw inscriptions on the metalwork. It was some language I didn¡¯t recognize. Heck, even the characters were weird. They looked something like Hebrew, but it could have been that or something else entirely, for all I knew.


    People have been scared of cemeteries for probably as long as we¡¯ve buried our dead. I¡¯d read stories about all the things we used to do to make sure the dead stayed that way. It was all nonsense, of course! Everyone knew that the dead couldn¡¯t climb out of their graves and start walking around.


    Oh, yeah. Well, maybe everyone was wrong about that.


    People came up with all sorts of inventive ways to keep the dead inside these places. I¡¯d always assumed it was just interesting folklore, but after all I¡¯d seen, and then this? I had to wonder. Maybe something like this had happened before, sometime? Maybe those people from thousands of years ago knew more than we thought, and the traditions they passed down had roots in real magic that had once been more common.


    Whatever the case, those open gates were still somehow holding back the skeletons. Even when I moved to stand directly in front of the wide-open gate, the undead still wouldn¡¯t come within twenty feet. They saw me. They wanted to piece of me, for sure. But they stood there at the closest point they could approach, gnashing their teeth at me for a minute or two, and then wandered off.


    Interesting. I needed to experiment more. ¡°Rosencrantz, I want you to go into the space, and then come back to me.¡±


    The zombie did exactly as I ordered. He walked forward through the gate, marched out about halfway to where the very interested skeletons stood, and then returned to me. No problems at all. Whatever was holding them all back, it wasn¡¯t impacting the undead under my command.


    Next experiment: I reached out with a Drain Life spell, but they were too far off. I couldn¡¯t reach twenty feet with the spell, not yet anyway.


    ¡°Gonna have to go in there,¡± I said. ¡°You guys ready?¡±


    Hope barked, and the zombies shuffled from foot to foot, about as eager as a zombie could be. With my little army beside me, I stepped into the cemetery, moving to about where Rosie had walked. That seemed safe enough.Stolen story; please report.


    I had gained some serious attention by that time. Several dozen skeletons surrounded me like a half-moon, all of them ten to fifteen feet away. They absolutely wanted to eat me for lunch, but some power held them back.


    ¡°My turn,¡± I said, picking one nearby undead from the crowd as my first target. I hit it with Drain Life and it staggered, almost collapsing entirely. My Drains were hitting a lot harder than they had when they were still tier one! But the spell felt like it was taking more out of me as well.


    I counted to fifteen before I felt the timer lapse this time. Longer cooldown period for sure. That was important to know. I cast the spell again, hitting the same skeleton, and this time it just collapsed in a heap of bones. The energy flowed back into me, but it was nowhere near enough to offset the drain from casting a tier two spell twice, back to back. I panted and almost sat myself down on the paved driveway. The new version of the spell was twice as strong, and it was hitting me twice as hard. I wasn¡¯t going to be able to cast it three times before burning out, like I could before. Two was my cap, now.


    Getting that Will crystal slotted was taking on new levels of importance. I debated taking out the Agility and replacing it with Will, but I held off. Agility had kept me alive more than once now, and I didn¡¯t want to risk shattering a tier two stone. The stuff Alfred said about stacking up stones ¡®setting a course¡¯ returned to me. He was right; with crystals sometimes breaking, nobody was going to want to switch them out, especially as they got ranked up.


    I could remove it. I just didn¡¯t want to.


    One skeleton down, like two hundred more to go. Worst part was, I couldn¡¯t recover the crystal from the one I¡¯d killed right now, because there were a bunch of other skeletons surrounding the spot. I¡¯d have to clear them out, first.


    I stood there a few minutes, resting and not taking any offensive action. About half of the skeletons watching me lost interest, leaving only a dozen in a loose perimeter. Being as careful as I could, I walked toward one of the things. It reached for me, clawing at the air with bone hands, but it couldn¡¯t take even a single step closer, from the looks of it. I came forward until I was only a meter or so away.


    More skeletons joined it, a half dozen of the things all reaching for me, but so long as I remained outside their reach, they couldn¡¯t get me. I got just a little closer and swung my axe at the nearest arm. The axe head lopped the thing off at the wrist. I hacked again and took off the arm just above the elbow, but two other skeletons reached for the axe head and almost grabbed it before I could drag it back. Killing these things was going to be tricky. Not super dangerous, unless I screwed up. But tricky.


    I cast Drain Life on the one I¡¯d injured and it went down in a heap. The other skeletons redoubled their frantic efforts to reach me, but they weren¡¯t getting anywhere. Once the spell reset, I cast it on another skeleton, wounding it, and then managed to dart in and land a quick blow on the wounded undead¡¯s skull, splitting it and killing it. I dove back before the others could grab my axe, or worse, my arms. I¡¯d had to get pretty close for that one.


    Three down, a zillion more to go. I backed up a few feet again and sat to rest.


    But the skeletons weren¡¯t quite as mindless as I hoped. They looked at the three piles of broken bones, then at me, and promptly wandered off again, leaving me to my devices. All of them just took off, walking away from the gates. They¡¯d figured out that they couldn¡¯t get me, but I could get them, and they weren¡¯t having it, I supposed.


    It let me get close enough to quickly tap the three dead bodies for their crystals. I snagged three new black stones and shoved them in my pocket.


    Getting more of them, though? That was going to mean going past the protective area of the gates. I could always just cast Drain Life twice on each of them from the outside of the fences, I supposed. But if they were smart enough to vacate the gate area when they realized I could hit them but not the other way around, I figured they¡¯d probably do the same thing with the fences. Just stay outside of Drain range, and they¡¯d be fine.


    Besides, that would take forever. If I managed to kill one of the things every ten minutes that way it would be a miracle, and there were hundreds of them. To clear them all out would take days. I wanted something faster.


    I left my pack near the gate, inside the safe zone, and ordered my undead to my side to support me. Then I marched forward, down the driveway and into the danger zone. Almost as soon as I passed the point where they could get at me, I caught their interest again. Six of the things stumbled in my direction immediately.


    ¡°Let¡¯s do this, guys!¡± I called out, and my undead went into action.


    Hope sprinted at the skeletons, taking out one¡¯s leg just below the knee. It toppled, but didn¡¯t die right away. The neighboring skeletons tried to grab Hope, but she was too fast for them.


    The other three came on at me, but Rosencrantz and Guildenstern met them partway, blocking their path. The knives they carried weren¡¯t very effective against bones, but they were a good barrier. I dashed in, axe held high, and smashed one of the boneheads. Another had slipped past Rosie and grabbed my arm, bones cutting slices into my skin. I twisted my wrist, breaking the painful grip, and cast Drain Life on the creature. That made it slow, and healed my wounds¡ªa good combination.


    Rosie finished it off.


    But there were more of them closing in now. The brief melee had gained a lot of attention. Dozens of additional skeletons walked toward us. A few chased Hope, and she led them away from me, but the majority came right at the zombies and me, ready to tear us apart.

 Chapter 31 - Animated Discovery

    <h4>Chapter 31 - Animated Discovery</h4>


    There were way too many of them to safely handle. I was growing more confident by the minute, both in my spells and my fighting skills. But I counted eleven of the things approaching now. It was time to get clear, regroup, and find a new strategy.


    I ordered the zombies to withdraw, but they were locked in melee combat with a pair of skeletons. It wasn¡¯t simple for them to just disconnect themselves. I dropped a Drain on the one facing Rosie, and it died on the spot. My zombie had damaged the skeleton enough that the spell finished it off. That allowed Rosie to smash the one still fighting Guildenstern and free them both up to withdraw.


    Which was good, because the second casting of Drain left me staggered. I couldn¡¯t cast a third time if my life depended on it. I backed up, using my zombies as cover from the oncoming monsters.


    One skeleton sidestepped the zombies, coming danger close to me. I blocked its first blow with the axe haft, but it was too near to get in a good swing. That left me fully on the defensive, and weak as I felt from casting the spells, it was all I could do to keep those bone hands away from my neck!


    Hope shot past my legs, grabbed the skeleton by a tibia, and yanked the bone free. Suddenly hopping around with only one good foot, it was an easy kill¡ªI swung for the bases with my axe and knocked its head clean off.


    That was the only one still close enough to be a threat. The others had been too slow to catch us before we were back under the protective radius of the gate. I set all three undead into guard mode, just in case of weirdness. The skeletons might not be able to get me there, but they weren¡¯t the only threats. Then I walked my way back to the fence where my pack rested and slumped down on the grass beside my bag, utterly exhausted.


    This wasn¡¯t working. I mean, it was, but I¡¯d killed¡ªcounted up the piles of bones¡ªeight of the things now, not counting the one on the hillside earlier. There were tons more of them, too many to count while they were all moving around. I fished the three black crystals I¡¯d gotten from my pocket and jostled them in my hand. They might help. Come to think of it, the other five might, too.


    ¡°Hope! Come here, girl,¡± I said. The bone dog rushed over, bone tail wagging. ¡°I have a special mission for you. I want you to grab a skull from one of the skeletons we killed.¡±


    She cocked her head at an angle and looked at me quizzically. It was a complex instruction, to be fair. Maybe a mental command would work better? I glanced out into the field and focused on the nearest pile of bones, my gaze centered on the skull. I envisioned that skull in my mind¡¯s eye, then sent that visual to Hope, with the command, ¡°Fetch!¡±


    The dog took off like she was shot from a cannon. Fetch must have been one of her favorite games, back when she was alive, because she tore up the grass racing to obey. She rushed in, dove into the pile of bones, and came up with the skull in her boney jaws, then raced back toward me. Once she was in front of me again, Hope plunked the skull down beside me and sat on her haunches, the image of a proud canine.


    ¡°Good girl, Hope. Good dog,¡± I told her.


    I had no idea if this was going to work. I needed to touch their remains to get a crystal. Was touching a skull enough, if it was separated from the rest of the body? Only one way to find out. I reached out, gingerly but hopefully, and touched the skull with my fingertips.


    A small, clear crystal appeared in my hand. ¡°Yes!¡±


    That made everything a lot easier.


    There were four more piles of bones to loot. I sent Hope at one of them after another. The skeletons just ignored her. I wasn¡¯t sure if it was because she was like them, wasn¡¯t bothering them, or if they just recognized she was too darn fast for them to catch. Whatever the case, they let her be, and ambled off to wander aimlessly as far from the gates as they could get.


    One by one, she brought me the skulls, and each time I tapped them for a crystal. I ended up with four more black stones, so I had seven black and one clear unidentified crystal to figure out.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 2) - Agility


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Drain Life


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare StonesThe tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    Black: Heal Undead, Animate Dead, Nightvision, Unknown x7


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Will x2, Unknown (Tier 2), Strength (Tier 2), Unknown


    My problem was, I really didn¡¯t want to lose any of my spells, but taking stones out risked that. Nonetheless, I needed to do it. Worse, I knew precisely which spell I had to take out. That Agility had saved my life a stack of times, but of the three stones I had embedded, it was the weakest link. I needed more Will so I could cast more spells. I needed to get Heal Undead socketed so I could heal my zombies, both of which were looking ragged as hell now. And that Animate Dead spell would be awesome, too.


    Doctor Carver had used his to raise dead bodies, and I had a bunch of dead skeletons over there. If that let me increase the size of my fighting force, it would make a huge difference.


    I crossed my fingers and removed the Agility stone.


    It didn¡¯t shatter. I heaved a huge sigh of relief at that. It was one thing to recognize I needed more options, another to lose something that had kept me alive over and again. But now I had a free socket. It was time to test the stones I¡¯d just obtained.


    I figured I¡¯d check the black crystals first. Those were the ones most apt to help me in the long run, so that was where I¡¯d start. I slotted the first¡ªHeal Undead! Now I had two of the things. I quickly pulled the second one from my pocket and held it in my hand. It merged with the other, forming a tier two Heal Undead spell.


    That done, I cast it on Rosencrantz.


    My zombie had taken a beating for me on so many occasions. His left arm was barely still attached. His ribs were half flayed open. His right leg was savaged, and his back was a mess from getting tossed across the room by the demon bear. As I cast the spell, all of those injuries vanished. Even the rot and decay shrank back, healing itself so he looked¡­well, he was clearly still dead, absolutely still a zombie, but he wasn¡¯t quite as offensive as he¡¯d been thirty seconds earlier. I¡¯d take that as a win.


    I¡¯d had enough time to recover since my Drain spells, so I cast the Heal a second time, this time on Guildenstern. Like Rosie, he¡¯d been through the wringer for the last couple of days, and he had all the wounds to show it. Just as before, the spell undid all of that, healing his wounds and making him look basically as good as new. He was upwind, so I could tell he even smelled better.


    The spells took a lot out of me, though. I rested for a bit, waiting for the exhaustion to fade like it always did. Getting a Will stone embedded was really going to be helpful, but this Heal spell was, too. So many choices, and too damned few spots! I crossed my fingers that the other stones included something to rank up my Control Undead spell. I needed to get that to tier four so I could add a fourth power.


    Once I was feeling more myself, I cast the Heal Undead spell on Hope, too. She wasn¡¯t too banged up, being fast enough to avoid most injuries. But she¡¯d taken a few blows, and I wanted to make sure she was in the best shape possible before I risked taking the Heal Undead stone out. I winced as I removed it, but it didn¡¯t break, either. Phew!


    Time to check more stones.


    The next black stone was another Control Undead. Finally! Now I just needed three more of the things. I glanced out over the cemetery. With all the undead out there, I was sure there¡¯d be enough of the stones to rank me up. I just needed to kill a lot more skeletons first.


    I quickly went through the others. The next was Darkness, which sounded interesting, especially if I coupled it with Nightvision. Sounded like the basis for some sort of rogue or assassin build, if I were looking at things from a gaming perspective like Alfred talked about. Then I got an Augment Undead¡ªa nice replacement for the one which broke.


    Next up was something called Shadow Walk. It would let me become a shadow-like figure, semi-intangible and mostly invisible in darkness. Not very effective in broad daylight, but it could be useful for slipping into someplace. I popped it back and tried the next stone, which was Harm¡ªlike, the opposite of Heal. It would do damage to someone within a short distance. More damage than Drain Life, from the looks of what it was telling me, although my tier two Drain did about the same. The main difference was that Drain Life also healed me, and Harm would not. Still, might be useful.


    I took it out and socketed the last stone. Another lucky find this time¡ªa second Animate Dead. I fished into my pocket and pulled out the one I¡¯d already identified, and held it in my hand. It merged with the first, and now I had a tier two Animate Dead embedded alongside my Control Undead. That was cool. I needed to experiment with that some, but first, I had one last crystal to check. I gingerly popped out the Animate spell, and then added the unidentified clear stone, which came back with Agility.


    Another great find! If I gathered a few more of those, I could get another tier three stone! But it had to come out, for the time being. I needed to experiment with the Animate spell, first. I quickly removed the Agility crystal and heard a pinging sound as it popped into my palm. Glancing down, I saw the stone had broken.


    ¡°Shit!¡± I swore, glaring at the shards. That sucked! I¡¯d never had one shatter during the initial ID before. If I was going to lose stones when I just checked them, that made the whole process much more fraught.


    Still, I was in a lot better shape than I had been.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Animate Dead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Drain Life


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead (Tier 2), Nightvision, Darkness, Augment Undead, Control Undead, Shadow Walk, Harm


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Will (Tier 2), Strength (Tier 2), Agility (Tier 2)


    I stood back up and walked partway to the nearest pile of broken bones. Oops¡ªI still needed the skull. Which one was for this skeleton? It was the first one Hope had brought over, so I grabbed the skull and rolled it the rest of the way to the bone pile. Then I gathered my focus, and cast the Animate Dead spell.


    Black fire shot from my outstretched hand, wreathing itself around the bones, filling them with new life. They stitched themselves back together in front of my eyes, and moments later there was a new skeleton standing there¡ªbut this one was under my control!


    ¡°Okay,¡± I said, ordering the skeleton to march closer to me. ¡°Now, it¡¯s time to get back to work.¡±

 Chapter 32 - Upgrades

    <h4>Chapter 32 - Upgrades</h4>


    I¡¯d been hoping that the Animate spell would effectively double my number of controlled minions. As I explored the new spell, I found that it would animate a single dead body into something basic, like a tier one zombie or skeleton¡ªor I could combine a few bodies to create something more complex and higher tier.


    As I looked at the piles of bones in front of me, the spell gave me a sense of what I could do with them all. I¡¯d Animated one skeleton already, which left me limited. Since I already had one tier one under my control, now I could only summon a second tier one. I released the skeleton from my spell and it clattered to the ground, nothing more than a pile of bones again.


    Now I had new options. I could summon two tier one skeletons, or I could use up two bone piles, merging them to make tier two options. There were two I could choose from: skeleton warrior and skeleton mage. I tried the first, but the bones weren¡¯t close enough together. I¡¯d have to merge the piles if I wanted to make that work.


    ¡°Well, guys, I can think of a few options here,¡± I said, chatting with my zombies and Hope. There wasn¡¯t anyone else around¡­! ¡°I could just send the zombies in, let them get killed, control new skeletons, and repeat until they were all gone.¡±


    The problem with that, of course, was I wouldn¡¯t get crystals from the ones I controlled, just the enemy undead. Since my goal was to farm as many crystals as possible, I¡¯d end up losing at least half of the loot if I tried that method. Not ideal.


    Another option would be to raise two skeletons, send them in, and repeat over and over until all the enemy skeletons were dead. That might work. I gave it a shot, trying to raise the same skeleton that I¡¯d raised before, but¡­nothing. Apparently I could only raise a dead thing once, and when I released it, I¡¯d used up whatever spark of magic made the spell effective.


    I rolled the skulls for two other skeletons back to their bodies, and cast twice, back to back. The effort of the spells left me panting, breathless, but they worked! I had two skeletons out there, right on the edge of where the enemy undead could reach.


    The reaction was instant. Two dozen enemy undead came rushing over at top speed. In the distance, others threw rocks! One stone pinged off the skull of one of my skeletons, almost knocking it over. I ordered them to march forward¡ªthis was a theory test, after all. It wasn¡¯t looking great, but if they could even take down two enemy skeletons before they were destroyed¡­


    ¡°Nope,¡± I muttered, watching the wave of undead overwhelm my pair of guys in seconds. They didn¡¯t even take down a single enemy before they fell. ¡°That one¡¯s not going to work.¡±


    I¡¯d used up three out of eight bone piles now. If I was going to get the best possible milage out of this stuff, I needed to go for quality. The other side had quantity, numbers I wasn¡¯t going to beat without upping my game in some other way. I glanced around, staring across the street.


    This was, oddly enough, a residential road. The opposite side was a string of nice houses, and from the looks of them they were empty. I couldn¡¯t count on that, but if I had even a little luck, maybe I could find something over there to help equip my guys, help them fight better.


    I rested until I¡¯d recovered enough to cast again, then looked at the remaining bones. Merging piles to make a stronger undead would be the right move, but I wasn¡¯t going to be able to scoop all of the bones close enough before I was overrun with attackers. Maybe later. For now, I just Animated two more and then recalled them quickly to my side. Thankfully, once they were under my command they completely ignored whatever had been keeping them away from the gate.


    Now I had five undead: two zombies, two skeletons, and the bone dog. I shouldered my bag and we set out across the street as a group. One of the houses had solar panels on the roof, and I figured we¡¯d check that first. Not because I thought the electricity would work; with every device fried, I was sure whatever the Event did had wiped out solar, too. No, I just figured that someone with solar panels was more likely to be handy, more apt to have tools and stuff I might be able to use.You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.


    I went straight up to the door. With Hope beside me and the other undead arrayed as guards around me, I knocked. No answer. I knocked again, hammering as loud as I could. If there were people there, I wanted to leave them be. Everyone was going to have a tough time; the last thing I wanted was to steal from someone who needed their supplies.


    But there was no answer, so I tested the door. Locked, but my axe made quick work of the handle, which then let me open the door itself. We swept the home quickly, searching for any people or critters hidden inside, but it was empty.


    In fact, it looked intentionally empty. As I looked about, the bedrooms had clothes left scattered about, like someone had hastily packed. Two adults and a couple of teenagers, from the looks of it. The kitchen told the same tale, with most of the storable foodstuffs removed. There was some fruit and cheese in the no longer cold fridge that were still worth eating, so I had that for a quick lunch. I wondered as I ate where these folks had gone. Clearly, they¡¯d had a destination in mind.


    What was nearby? I scooped the map out of my pocket and peered at it, then slapped my head. Of course! We were only a few blocks from the airport, and on the far side of the airport, the Air National Guard base. They had hundreds of full-time military personnel over there. Their weapons wouldn¡¯t work, the planes were all trash now. But the command structure had likely remained intact. It made sense that would be a good place to go. It might be worth me checking it out, once I was done with the cemetery.


    Food finished, I scooped up what other odds and ends I thought might be useful from the kitchen, and refilled my water bottle from the tap. There wasn¡¯t much left in the pipes, but it was enough, and it still smelled okay. I was going to be boiling water soon, though.


    A quick cruise around the house found me some other odds and ends. I grabbed a nice black leather jacket out of the mom¡¯s closet. She clearly appreciated night-life, because the cut was not what I would consider ¡®mom chic.¡¯ It was too warm to wear, but I looped it through my backpack straps. Some protection from grabbing claws would be welcome. One of the teens had a baseball bat in their room, too, which I passed off to Rosie.


    From there it was out to the garage, and that was the mother lode.


    The aluminum trash cans caught my eye first. There were two of them, and they had lids. I popped the lids off and instantly regretted it; old trash and warm, late summer days was not a great combo. But the lids themselves were in good shape. They weren¡¯t supremely sturdy, but they were fairly decent, and they¡¯d work as makeshift shields. I handed one each to my zombies, then looked around for more weapons.


    Potential objects were all over the place. The family had been gardeners. There was a hoe, a rake, a lot of other long pole-type objects, but I ideally wanted my guys to have shields. That meant one-handed weapons. I found a mallet, a big wood job with a large head that was perfect for fighting skeletons. Guildie got that one.


    An aluminum baseball bat sat in the corner. I snagged that, and the biggest regular carpenter¡¯s hammer on the workbench, and gave them to the skeletons. Looking at what I had here, I was already beginning to feel more confident in our odds. Sure, we still couldn¡¯t take the whole swarm down at once, not even with all of this. But the skeletons were basically unarmed, and now we were not. That sort of qualitative advantage was exactly what I¡¯d been looking for.


    I opened the garage door and walked down the driveway to the street. Glancing one way, then the other, I quickly spotted what I¡¯d been seeking. The house next door had their trash cans already outside. These were plastic, rather than aluminum, but they still had lids, and in some ways that was probably better. These trash cans were big, heavy duty monsters with large lids made of thick plastic. Not a perfect shield, but not bad at all. I handed one to each of my skeletons.


    My little team of undead stood arrayed in front of me. I¡¯d armed all four of the bipeds; Hope already had her teeth and her howl. With shields to block the enemy rushes, and the bats and hammers to crush bones, we were going to be much more effective this time.


    ¡°Saddle up, folks,¡± I told my growing army, drawling out the words. ¡°It¡¯s time to show those skeletons who¡¯s boss in these parts.¡±


    Yeah, I seriously needed to find more people sooner or later. Talking to my undead was a lot like speaking with a wall. They didn¡¯t so much as moan in response, except for Hope. My pup was brighter than the others, reacting with energy and enthusiasm to my call to arms. Probably a side effect of her being tier two, which was another reason to aim for more, stronger undead next time I cast Animate.


    We crossed the street again, the early afternoon air heating up and shimmering over the pavement. Back through the gates, straight into the breach. It was time to see how capable my army was, now that I¡¯d had some upgrades!

 Chapter 33 - Shield Wall

    <h4>Chapter 33 - Shield Wall</h4>


    I had my undead form a tight rank ahead of me as we entered the cemetery for what I hoped would be the last time. No promises; there were a lot of skeletons in there! But I had a good feeling about this run.


    The skeletons were in the middle, my zombies on the outside. I¡¯d noticed a tendency for the enemy undead to chase after my skeletons especially, and if that held true again I wanted to take advantage of the situation. Getting the enemy focused on the center of my shield wall would let the wings whack them, or so I hoped.


    ¡°Heh, shield wall,¡± I muttered with a grin. ¡°Feels like I¡¯m in a Netflix viking movie.¡±


    And then we were inside, and I locked it down. We had already attracted some attention from the locals, which meant I needed to have my game face on. Hope trotted alongside me. She was my skirmisher¡ªstronger than any one skeleton foe and faster to boot, she could help head off any incoming we picked up.


    My primary role would be ensuring we didn¡¯t get overrun. I knew that as soon as we got any distance from the gates, they¡¯d be all over us. I needed to watch for it, be ready for it, and react fast when it happened.


    The bulk of the cemetery lay south, to the left side of the gate, so that¡¯s the direction we veered after entering. I kept our left flank within ten feet of the fence and marched us straight down the line. Right away, the skeletons saw us coming and moved to engage. Two of them came from our front and two from our right, and more poured across the grass as the word got out there were tasty tidbits available.


    ¡°Rosie, watch your flank,¡± I ordered. I pointed at the undead approaching us from the right. ¡°Hope, block those incoming.¡±


    That¡¯s all I had time for before the initial clash. The oncoming undead smacked into the rough shields with a mixture of a crash and a thud, depending on whether they collided with aluminum or plastic. Whichever the case, the shields held, and that¡¯s what mattered. My undead held the shields at almost arm-length, then brought them in as the enemy hit the shields, absorbing the rush without taking damage.


    After that, it was easy. There were only two of them in this first test, and they faced four weapons capable of delivering some serious blunt-force trauma. Both skeletons went down in seconds.


    ¡°Yes!¡± I shouted. ¡°Advance!¡±


    My line pushed ahead enough that I was able to tap each of the fallen undead, gaining two new black crystals. A glance to my right told me Hope was still running the other two skeletons ragged, but there were more approaching her. She wasn¡¯t going to be able to keep that up forever. But she¡¯d wounded one enemy, so I dropped Drain Life on it, which finished it off.


    Now we had six enemies directly ahead, and four more approaching from the right, still a little ways off. The six hit the shields first, and this time my line was forced back a step from the sheer force of the enemy charge. But then Rosie took one down with a well-placed blow to a shoulder followed by a head shot that fractured the skull. The skeletons in the center of my line teamed up and beat one enemy down. But my team was struggling.


    I didn¡¯t want to cast another Drain, not yet. I needed my wits about me, and I wanted to see how close together I could chain cast them, so I was estimating about a minute before I cast again. If I could cast once every minute without being worn down, that would be good to know.


    Instead, I rushed to the line and brought my axe down between two of the shields, landing hard on the head of an enemy undead. It staggered, almost falling, and one of my skeletons finished the job.


    But more of them were coming at us from the side, now. Rosie pivoted¡ªhe had been watching his flank, good zombie! His shield caught the first of the new wave of attackers, while the rest of the shield wall was three against three. Those kind of odds were stacked deeply in our favor, thanks to the shields and weapons. Rosie was going to end up overwhelmed, though. There were two of the things facing him, another right behind, and six more coming about ten feet back.


    I stepped up alongside Rosie and hammered a blow down, shattering the neck of the nearest skeleton. There wasn¡¯t time to loot it; another undead replaced it almost as soon as it fell. Rosie¡¯s blows kept coming. He was a killer with that baseball bat, and it was taking a serious toll on the enemy force.


    But we were coming too close to being overwhelmed. ¡°Withdraw! Fight them as we back up to the gate.¡±A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    The line did as I ordered, slowly marching backward, killing more enemies with every step. We left a path of broken undead littering the ground during our withdrawal. So far, not bad. With Rosie and I holding the flank and Hope running interference out there in the grass, slowing and distracting the oncoming undead, we were able to back up almost as fast as they came at us.


    Then, disaster.


    One of my skeletons stumbled over something as it stepped back, and went down. Two enemy undead tackled it before it could get back to its feet.


    ¡°Defend our team! Hold the line!¡± I shouted to them.


    They were already on it¡ªmy undead beat the hell out of those two skeletons, but the damage was done. They¡¯d killed my guy, and now we had a hole in the wall. Losing the guy wasn¡¯t the end of the world; I could always animate more. The hole was sealed quickly when Guildenstern closed ranks, pulling in closer to the other friendly skeleton. But we lost the shield and hammer. Equipment mattered. With the shields and weapons, my guys were at least twice as effective as they¡¯d been before. We¡¯d killed a lot of skeletons.


    Staying alive mattered more, though. I could maybe send Hope dashing in to recover the gear later. For now, we needed to finish our withdrawal before they could block us off. The space in front of our shield wall was now a veritable sea of undead, and only their disorganization and lack of arms was keeping us alive.


    I cast Drain Life again, and was thrilled to see that I wasn¡¯t wiped out from the cast. It had been something like a minute, and that was what I needed to know: how fast I could chain cast the spell without wearing myself out so much that I was useless. I¡¯d need to test, and see how close I could cut it, but this was a start.


    All at once we were in the clear. The enemy undead had reached the point they wouldn¡¯t cross. We were back near the gate again. I kept us backing up a little further, just to be absolutely sure we were in the clear. Then I left the undead on guard and sagged to the ground. I drank deep from my water bottle, wiping sweat from my brow. Swinging that axe around over and over was hard work!


    It didn¡¯t take me long to get reset. I had Hope run out to grab the shield, then dash back over to fetch the hammer our skeleton had dropped. I didn¡¯t bother having her fetch skulls again. From my rough count, we¡¯d left something like ten unlooted piles of bone, which would be nice to get, but I wanted to finish this, not still be fighting these creatures days from now. The sooner I killed them all off, the better.


    Once I had the shield and hammer back, I raised another skeleton and armed it, and we went back in.


    We had more experience this time, or at least I did, and that was critical, since I was the one calling the shots. We didn¡¯t follow the fence, this time. Instead of following it straight south, we went in at a south-west angle, straight into the biggest pack of undead nearby.


    There were fifteen of them, and I believed we could do this. My team did a shield rush, slamming into the front rank of undead. My zombies knocked two skeletons straight off their feet, while the others stopped the opposing enemies in their tracks. Hammers and bats came raining down, one after another. I sent Hope around the side, harrying the edge of the enemy formation. She ripped a leg bone away from a skeleton in what was becoming her signature attack, knocking it off its feet. That made it simple for Guildie to finish it off.


    I cast Drain Life, then started counting. This time, I tried casting it again at a thirty-count instead of sixty seconds. I felt tired after the second cast, but not wiped out. From the feeling, I could keep that up a few times in a row, but not indefinitely. Everything I did to learn where my new limits were helped make me stronger and better able to fight.


    Only a couple of minutes later, all fifteen skeletons were dead, and we were backpedaling hard again to avoid the mass rush coming our way. We didn¡¯t even lose anyone, this time, and we¡¯d crushed even more of them.


    I sat back down to rest, drinking some more water, and did a rough headcount of enemy skeletons. It was getting easier to pick them out, now that there were fewer. I had overestimated, early on. I¡¯d figured there were at least a hundred of the things, but I¡¯d just killed over two dozen between those two assaults, and there weren¡¯t forty left in the whole graveyard. I really had thought there were more, but I¡¯d either miscounted, or they were hiding somewhere in the trees deeper in the cemetery.


    Once I was rested, we moved back on the attack again. Shield wall up, we moved to the edge of our ¡®safe zone¡¯ and I watched for a big, nearby group. I saw one right away, a cluster of eight undead not far away, and a little closer to the fence. They were even headed our way, but as soon as I had my shield wall advance, they stopped coming at us and just waited there.


    Weird behavior, for them¡ªI¡¯d been used to them coming at me with a fury as soon as I came into the space they could approach. Were they getting smarter, somehow? I glanced around but didn¡¯t see a trap waiting to spring, so I chalked it up to weirdness, although I decided to be extra cautious and watch for trouble even more intently than usual.


    ¡°Advance,¡± I told my guys. ¡°Let¡¯s take them out!¡±


    My shield wall marched forward at a quick pace and crashed into the enemy, hammers and bats falling with quick blows, four of the enemy dropping instantly. The other four backed up further, though, forcing my team to advance again to keep up. And then the undead continued backing away.


    No way this wasn¡¯t a trap. I pulled back from my line and looked around, trying to see the jaws before they could close on us. I called out to my shield wall. ¡°Pull back. We need to withdraw, and¡ª¡°


    BANG! The door to a little shack I¡¯d barely even noticed shot open with a crashing noise, and undead poured out of the shack, each of them carrying some sort of gardening implement. I saw hedge shears, hoes, rakes, trowels¡ªyou name it, if it was a tool in the gardening section of Home Depot, one of those things was carrying it.


    The shack was off to my right, and it was danger close. We were about to get smacked hard.

 Chapter 34 - Into The Breach

    <h4>Chapter 34 - Into The Breach</h4>


    With a thought, I ordered Hope to intercept the rush of attackers as best she could. Anything she did to slow them down would help, but I already knew it wasn¡¯t going to be enough. I had my pair of skeletons form a smaller shield wall at a ninety degree angle to the zombies. Their shields ought to keep him in one piece long enough to hold the attacking wave back for a short while.


    The four retreating undead that had been luring us closer rushed in as well, and another dozen were right behind them! The enemy was making their big push, and we had to find a way to hold. Rosie nailed one with a strong blow, and I finished it off with a blow from my axe. I was trying to hold the Drain spells in reserve for when I needed them most.


    With our little arrowhead formation set up, we were as good as we¡¯d get. ¡°Pull back! Slow march backward!¡±


    My undead obeyed, clearing some distance between us and the attacking wave. The zombies took down two more skeletons on their side, but my skeletons were struggling. As I¡¯d learned, weapons made a huge difference, and these foes had them too. Several enemy skeletons bashed down one of my soldiers with long poles¡ªhoes or rakes, from the looks of it. They hooked my guys¡¯ shield with one weapon, then the others went to work, beating it about the head and shoulders until it collapsed into a pile of bones.


    I stepped into the breach. There wasn¡¯t any choice anymore. We were still pulling back, but I didn¡¯t want to lose all of my creatures and weapons, and the safe zone was another fifteen feet back. Maybe if I¡¯d just run as fast as I could, I might have reached it before they pulled me down, but all I could think of was that I needed to stay with my troops and help them fight.


    It wasn¡¯t my smartest move.


    As soon as I stepped up to fill the gap left by my fallen skeleton, two of the enemies rushed me. I crushed one¡¯s skull with my axe, dropping it. The other smashed into me at a light jog and I tumbled backward, landing hard on my back with the skeleton dropping on top of me. All the wind went out of my lungs¡ªand a sharp pain, the most intense I¡¯d ever felt, stabbed me in the gut.


    I gasped, barely able to breathe. The skeleton¡¯s face was just above mine, teeth gnashing violently inches away. I¡¯d lost control of my axe somewhere in the fall, and one of my arms was pinned beneath the attacker, but the other was still free. I tried to hit it with the heel of my palm, smacking its face as hard as I could. It shifted, and the pain in my gut redoubled. I realized it must have cut me with something. That was the only way it could hurt that badly.


    Barking caught my ear, and then Hope was there. She tore into the enemy skeleton¡¯s neck, shaking hard until the head popped off and the thing collapsed into a heap. I could move again, but my body didn¡¯t want to. I¡¯d been hurt, badly so, and even small movements brought that pain back to full roaring strength.


    I glanced down at the wound. ¡°Shit!¡±


    It was a short pair of pruning shears, and what looked like two or three inches of dirty steel were embedded in my abdomen.


    I was a doctor in training. As soon as I saw the injury, I knew I was in shit trouble. With an ambulance and an ER, that sort of wound would still take weeks to recover from. If I had Henry around with his Heal spell, maybe it would take days, instead, but without medical care? I was hosed.


    But I did have medical care, of a sort, anyway. I could cast Drain Life and it would heal me. I didn¡¯t want to cast it while the weapon was still inside me, though. I had no idea what that would do. Which meant pulling the thing out before I cast my spell, which was going to seriously suck.


    I grasped the handle of the shears and got ready to pull. Even touching it hurt so badly that I whimpered a little with the pain. But there was nothing else I could do. I needed the healing from that Drain spell, and I needed it fast. I ground my teeth together hard and then yanked the blade free, tossing it immediately aside.


    Teeth locked together or not, nothing stopped me from screaming as loud as I could, as soon as I¡¯d pulled the blade free. I slammed my palm over the wound, putting pressure there to slow the flow of blood. My palm felt instantly soaked, and I knew I was bleeding like mad.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.


    But I was also ready to cast, so I locked my eyes on the nearest enemy undead, reached out my free hand, and let loose. Black fire shot from my fingertips and sank into the skeleton, then transferred part of its health back to me. The wound under my hand twisted and shrank, the tissue coming back together and closing the hole.


    Rosie finished that one off, and Hope blocked the advance of a couple more, giving me a moment to get back to my feet. I grabbed the shield and hammer my skeleton had dropped and stepped forward.


    The wound was mostly better. It still hurt, but I could move freely again. I was pissed. The right move would have been to retreat, even if it meant losing all my undead. I¡¯d almost died back there, lying on the ground. If Hope hadn¡¯t come to my rescue, I might have. The undead were replaceable. I wasn¡¯t. It was something I needed to remember.


    I cast Animate Dead on one of the slain skeletons, and it clambered to its feet to fight at my side, picking up my old axe as it rose. Then I bashed the nearest enemy with my shield, knocking it back. That set it up nicely, and the skeleton took it down with two swift axe blows.


    The entire battle had broken down into a mess of a melee. My zombies were still side by side and continued to churn through the unarmed zombies on their side. But the armed ones were harder to kill, and a lot more dangerous. One of them hooked a hoe onto the top of my plastic shield, almost stripping the thing right out of my hand. Rather than let go, I allowed it to drag me forward, and dropped the hammer hard on its shoulder. The clavicle snapped, and suddenly one of its arms was useless. With just one arm, it couldn¡¯t hold the hoe well enough to keep my shield locked up, so I was able to get the plastic between me and an income rake just in time.


    The blow sent me staggering back a step anyway, and I realized we were just about at the finish line. A few more steps back, and we¡¯d be in the clear, back where the enemy couldn¡¯t reach us.


    Truth was, though? We were winning. The zombies had taken down their entire line, and now turned to help my skeletons with the armed foes. Hope was in the middle of it all, biting at legs, ripping and tearing. Each one that she ¡®legged¡¯ was hopping around instead of walking. It made them a lot easier to escape¡ªor kill.


    We could withdraw. A few more steps back, and we¡¯d be safe. The enemy would be there an hour from now, after we rested.


    I wanted this finished, though. I called out commands to my troops. ¡°Reform the line! Shield wall, side by side!¡±


    They did as I asked, locking their shields together to make it harder to get past them, and then dropping hammer and bat blows into the gaps. My one skeleton without a shield did his best to stay alive on the right side of our formation, using his axe to demolish one foe after another.


    I joined the line beside that one, using my shield to block an incoming blow from a trowel, then swung my hammer, shattering the arm carrying the makeshift weapon. My axe-skeleton finished it off with a powerful blow. We had this. I felt the momentum of the battle shift and knew that we were going to do this, that we could win the field.


    The enemy realized it, too. All at once they backed away. Few of them were left. Of the eight or so armed enemies, I saw two left, and they fled with the others, backing up out of our reach. They were reinforced by another dozen skeletons, with more flowing to join their numbers from around the cemetery.


    Maybe twenty of them left, all told. It was still a lot. I dropped another Drain on an injured foe as they retreated, killing it. The healing poured into me, further repairing the damage I¡¯d taken. Taking a deep breath didn¡¯t hurt anymore, and I¡¯d never been so grateful to have pain fade away. For a few moments there, on the ground, I¡¯d honestly thought I was a goner.


    ¡°Two steps forward!¡± I called out, and my troops marched ahead. I swapped the shield and hammer back to my skeleton, taking the axe back instead. Better to have them on the front lines, not me.


    While they held off the enemies, I touched every pile of bones in reach. There were a good number of them, and each one dropped more crystals into my hands. Once I¡¯d hit each one I could, I ordered my troops back until we were all squarely within the safe zone made by the gates.


    Across the field, the enemy undead had organized themselves into their own formation. It looked like every single one left on the field was gathered there. We were heading into the endgame, now. They¡¯d brought out every skeleton they still had, and it was going to be one last battle to finish this place off for good.


    I considered the handful of crystals I¡¯d collected. There were a few, and combined with the ones I¡¯d snagged during our earlier runs it added up to over a dozen. Would that be enough to rank any of my socketed crystals up, though? I had a feeling it probably wouldn¡¯t. I might come close, but it wouldn¡¯t put me over the top.


    All those piles of bones sitting out there, untouched, though? Those would!I needed to get back out there and grab all of those stones, and I didn¡¯t want to put it off until tomorrow. I wanted to end this today.


    I drained the rest of the water from my bottle and picked up my axe, then called out to my undead. ¡°Shield wall time, boys! Let¡¯s finish this fight so we can go rest.¡±


    They formed their rank, Hope tailing along right beside me with an excited bark. She was ready. My line of battle was ready. I felt my stomach, where I¡¯d been stabbed. The flesh there was still tender, but the wound was closed. I was as ready as I was going to get, too.


    We marched forward.

 Chapter 35 - One Brick

    <h4>Chapter 35 - One Brick</h4>


    As the sun began to sink for the third day since the Event, Gideon watched his minions carrying out their assigned tasks with a sense of satisfaction. It wasn¡¯t pleasure; he wouldn¡¯t allow himself that, not so soon after the death of his family. He had done well, though, killing scores of undead and gaining their crystals.


    There was still much work to accomplish, but it was coming together well. The cemetery was enormous¡ªhundreds of undead wandered the grounds, ranging from ancient skeletons to newly minted zombies. Most of the residents at St. Joseph¡¯s were already undead before he arrived. He¡¯d allowed the few survivors to flee the dead. Gideon didn¡¯t want to kill if he didn¡¯t have to, but this was his home, now.


    He¡¯d selected the central building, oldest of the lot, as his base of operations. The newer residential building was in the process of being torn down by twenty skeletons wielding heavy hammers. Brickwork was coming apart as they rained down blow after blow. Undead laborers were not precision workers. Many of the bricks were shattered by their efforts. But enough came apart intact that he had other undead carrying the bricks in wheelbarrows to specific points around the central compound.


    Tomorrow, his army would begin using those raw materials to build a wall. There was cement mix in the storage garages, and he intended to put all of it to good use. Gideon walked from pile to pile, observing the work. He wanted a good, high wall around the place, sufficient to protect him and his troops from attack. Tearing down the building to get the bricks for the wall seemed the most expeditious manner.


    ¡°You¡¯re doing it wrong,¡± a voice called from across the street.


    Gideon¡¯s gaze snapped up to observe a man standing there. He looked forty-something years old, with a short salt and pepper beard, and no visible weapons. That didn¡¯t necessarily mean anything anymore, though, as Carver well knew. He readied a Drain Life spell, one of the one¡¯s he¡¯d newly acquired and ranked up from his efforts in the graveyard all day. If this man was a threat, Gideon would kill him without hesitation.


    But the man held his hands up, palms facing Gideon. It didn¡¯t truly mean he was defenseless, but that was what the gesture was intended to imply. ¡°Sorry, couldn¡¯t help but notice you¡¯re plunking the bricks down all over. Building a wall?¡±


    ¡°Something like that,¡± Gideon replied, annoyed. Who was this man, and why was he here?


    ¡°Won¡¯t work. Not like that, anyway,¡± the man replied. ¡°Worked in construction my whole life, and it¡¯s pretty obvious you haven¡¯t. You look more like a college man. Professor?¡±


    ¡°Doctor, actually,¡± Carver replied, arching an eyebrow. ¡°What makes you think it won¡¯t work? Brick walls aren¡¯t that complicated.¡±


    ¡°They are if you want them to be taller than a man, and if you want to make this place defensible, I imagine that¡¯s the goal, right? You¡¯ll need thickness, and you¡¯ll need to build supports,¡± the man said. ¡°Ideally, sink rebar into a cement or concrete base, and then use the rebar as support for the bricks above. Although to be honest, you could do better just building a poured concrete wall inside a wood shell.¡±


    All of which made sense, although Carver wasn¡¯t sure how much of it was essential. He prided himself on being an educated man, and he knew something about engineering, if only the barest bits. What the man was saying rang true. His undead lacked the knowledge to accomplish this sort of complex task well, though. At least, on their own they did.


    ¡°What do you want?¡± Gideon asked. He gestured to the road between them and the unbuilt wall. ¡°Why are you here? Why bother me? You must see my minions. I could have them kill you and they¡¯d feel no remorse, nor hesitate a moment.¡±


    The stranger swallowed hard. ¡°Reckon you could. But if you were of a mind to, you probably would¡¯ve already. I watched you at a distance earlier, while you mopped up the monsters in the graveyard. Then I watched you do things I¡¯d never seen any man do, like shoot black fire from your fingers and raise dead bones back to life.This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    ¡°If you can do all that, I figure you might be one who¡¯ll survive all of this, who can keep people alive, even when I don¡¯t know what the hell is going on,¡± the man went on. ¡°My name¡¯s Brian. I ran my own construction firm before all of this went on. Now? My trucks are dead, my workers are who knows where, and I¡¯m left with just me, my wife, and two kids who I want to keep alive more than anything else.¡±


    Wife. Children. A pang stabbed at Gideon¡¯s heart. This man still had what he¡¯d lost, and it hurt. But at the same time, he fully understood Brian¡¯s desire to keep his family safe. Wasn¡¯t that what had motivated him, too? He¡¯d fought so hard to get clear of the college, raced home to save the ones he loved¡­


    He¡¯d been too late, and that shame would be his to bear, forever. But he understood all too well the fear and need which drove this stranger. Strangely, he found himself wanting to¡­help.


    ¡°You want my protection,¡± Gideon replied, wavering between offering and rejecting the man.


    Brian nodded. ¡°Yup. But I don¡¯t want to freeload. You need a foreman, someone to direct your critters in their work. I¡¯ve worked hard all my life, sir. I can do what you want. I can make your critters do the job, direct them in ways that will make it happen. All I ask in return is a place to keep my family that¡¯s safe, and to keep us fed.¡±


    It was a fair offer. If the man was lying, or proved to be a poor worker, it would be simple enough to remove him. Gideon had plenty of undead now, more than enough to keep him safe from one family. As he thought it over, he realized that hiring Brian on would have other benefits as well. The man could direct some of his undead here at the base, while Gideon took others elsewhere to gather resources and additional crystals.


    Gideon stepped into the street, two skeletons following close behind him. He kept the Drain spell at the ready, prepared to blast the man if he twitched wrong. But Brian stood tall. His eyes betrayed fear, but his spine was straight. He didn¡¯t back down or flee, even when Gideon stopped just a few feet away and stared into his eyes.


    That was enough to make a decision. Gideon nodded. ¡°All right, Brian. If you¡¯ll become the foreman I need, I will defend you and your family from harm. You should bring them here, to me. I have plenty of housing in the main building. I¡¯ll send a pair of my skeletons with you to help you carry any belongings you want to bring along. There¡¯s plenty of basic supplies in the assisted living building¡ªmattresses, dishes, food, and so on. But feel free to bring any touches from home you want to keep.¡±


    Gideon reached out a hand. Brian took it and they shook.


    ¡°Thank you, sir,¡± Brian replied. ¡°You won¡¯t regret it. I¡¯ll help you get this place turned into a right fortress. And more than that, I can help in other ways as well. I killed a few goblins, got a couple of those crystals. Weapon and armor making, which I thought was odd, but starts making a lot more sense now. I can build your army weapons, shields, and armor. Make them ten times as effective.¡±


    Gideon laughed. ¡°You should have led with that! Very well. Take the skeletons as guards, and return soon. I¡¯ll be waiting and ensure my minions don¡¯t harm you when you arrive.¡±


    He gave mental commands to the skeletons to follow Brian, protect him, and obey any simple commands¡ªbut also to return before full darkness fell no matter what.


    Brian rushed off, the skeletons in tow, leaving Carver wondering what he ought to do next. He hadn¡¯t planned to build a community of humans, but Brian¡¯s arrival had been fortuitous timing. If he hadn¡¯t shown up, Gideon¡¯s undead would have begun constructing the wall tomorrow, and it probably would have collapsed soon after. They¡¯d have needed to begin anew, and if there was one resource that felt most threatened it was time.


    Gideon would do almost anything for more time, but the world was racing ahead regardless. New monsters had spawned today, more powerful ones. He could only imagine that would continue, and eventually the creatures attacking would be much stronger than his basic undead. The fortress had to be complete before that happened, he needed supplies stockpiled before then, and most of all he had to grow stronger as well.


    Not just for himself, now. There would be children within his walls, minors that he had taken on an obligation to protect. Gideon took such things seriously. He¡¯d promised to defend Brian; assuming the man was true to him, he would be the same in turn.


    This wasn¡¯t what he¡¯d planned, no. He hadn¡¯t created plans beyond a needto gain strength and power. But this new shift had the feeling of being something important, like he¡¯d begun a thing that would become more valuable to him over time.


    The world was changed. Everything old was falling down. It would be replaced by something new, but who would decide what that new order would look like?


    He would, Gideon decided. He would rebuild a world that made sense to him. One brick, one monster, one crystal, and now one human helper, at a time.

 Chapter 36 - Ticking Sound

    <h4>Chapter 36 - Ticking Sound</h4>


    Our lines crashed into each other for what I hoped would be the final fight.


    The enemy undead had the numbers still; we¡¯d worn them down, but it was close, now. Twenty of them, six on my side. That wouldn¡¯t be fair, except each of my team was worth two or more of theirs. Those shields held back their rush like a proper wall, although my line had to give up a couple of steps, pushed back by the sheer violence of the enemy rush.


    It was the wings I worried about. Outnumbered as we were, they were bound to try to wrap around our flanks, envelope the line, and that would be the end of us. To fight that, I had Hope on the right flank, harrying anyone who tried to go after Rosie there, and I was on the left doing the same.


    Three skeletons rushed me, trying to curve around Guildenstern¡¯s shield so they could get behind our line. I met the first with a solid axe blow that sent it staggering back. The other two managed to get close, though, one of them grabbing my axe with both hands. I zapped it with a Drain Life that sent the skeleton to its knees. Axe free again, I shattered the kneecap of the third, dropping him into the grass.


    Wounded that badly was about as good as a win. We could clean up the damaged enemies later, and there were at least three enemies missing a leg now.


    ¡°Two steps back!¡± I called out to the line, and my undead obeyed. That got us clear of the wounded, so they wouldn¡¯t drag themselves closer and attack our legs.


    But that charge was the worst of it. Once we held against the rush, with every remaining enemy undead piled into a mass, I knew we had this. I could feel it in my gut. Half their numbers were dead or damaged and left behind already. All we had to do was not screw up at this point, and we had this battle in the bag.


    I cast Drain as quickly as was safe; probably a little sooner than was wise, because the strain was beginning to show. I wasn¡¯t as quick to block, and a skeleton claw left long scratches in my face. I blocked its follow up shot, then took its head off with a blow from my axe. The cuts hurt, but I¡¯d had worse now, thanks to that stab wound. I knew I could handle the pain, and the next Drain Life I cast would heal me, anyway. It wasn¡¯t like that spell gave me invulnerability. I could still die. But anything that didn¡¯t kill me right away probably wasn¡¯t going to, since I could just heal myself right after.


    Getting hurt was still painful as hell, but pain wasn¡¯t going to kill me.


    Time for another Drain. I cast, and the healing magic flowed back into me, closing my wounds and healing worn muscles. I dropped back a step, panting. The spell wounded an enemy and Hope finished him off a second later. We were actually running out of active enemies, which was good, because I was pretty worn out.


    And then the last standing enemy went down. It was just cleanup, after that. We rolled forward, landing finishing blows on the damaged skeletons left behind during our slow backward march. I had Hope do a quick sweep of the graveyard, too¡ªjust to be certain we hadn¡¯t missed any. It turned out we had; she came over with a leg bone in her mouth, but when I went to investigate she¡¯d already finished off the last foe.


    It was over.


    The sun was beginning to set before I finished collecting all of the crystals. There were just so many, and they were scattered across a wide area of the graveyard! I had a hard time believing how many of the things I¡¯d gathered. Dozens of crystals. Most of them were black, with a scattering of clear ones as well. It was perfect, everything I¡¯d hoped for, really.


    I didn¡¯t know if there were enough there to rank up any of my key spells, but I had to hope there were. There¡¯d be time to sort that out later, though. For the time being, night was falling, and I needed to find someplace to set up camp. I wanted more than a car, this time, and those houses across the street looked very appealing. Sleeping in an actual bed would be amazing, for starters, but I could also secure the place that much better, with my additional troops.


    There was the house I¡¯d already searched. Since I knew that was cleared out, and the folks who departed seemed unlikely to return, it was the ideal place to stay. But I¡¯d already cleared out most of the things I thought I could use from that house, and it made more sense to investigate one of the neighboring spots.This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.


    I walked down the street a bit, eyeing each home. Strangely, none of them seemed to have people inside. I mean, it wasn¡¯t that easy to tell. There was no power, so it wasn¡¯t like the electric lights were going to show if someone was present. But I figured most people would be trying to light candles or something as the dark came on. That¡¯s what Lords¡¯ team did, back at the police station.


    None of these homes had even a single light. Not one. Had they all left? I imagined a group of families, all heading over to the Air Guard base together, looking for shelter. Maybe that¡¯s what happened. I hoped so, anyway. It would be nice if there was a gathering point for sane, decent people.


    I stopped at one of the houses, picking it for no obvious reason¡ªit was smaller than most, and not especially expensive, but there was a garage. Garages often had cool stuff that would be useful for me, so that was a plus. I went up to knock on the door, and as I¡¯d expected, there was no response from within.


    But when I looked through the big front window, there definitely wassomeone inside! A man sat on an easy chair in the living room, his eyes closed. I hesitated; he hadn¡¯t heard my knock, so maybe he was asleep, or maybe he was hurt. I¡¯d wanted to be a doctor for too long to ignore the possibility that a man was sick or injured without helping.


    Breaking in wasn¡¯t difficult. The man left a key under his front mat. This was Vermont. Home intrusions hadn¡¯t been common, at least until after everything went to hell. Once I had the door open I left my undead outside on guard, except for Hope. I wanted at least one ally in there, in case the man wasn¡¯t alone.


    ¡°Hello?¡± I called out, extra loud to allow my voice to carry through the house. ¡°Sir, do you need help? I¡¯m a medical student.¡±


    No response. He didn¡¯t shift, didn¡¯t move. I winced. The odds of him having survived seemed less by the minute, but I had to know for sure. I went to the easy chair and placed my fingers on his neck, but I could tell just from the man¡¯s face that it was already too late. He was dead. It had happened sometime earlier that day, I was pretty sure.


    As I withdrew my hand from his carotid, they felt something hard on his upper left chest. I had a hunch what that was, and pulled back the shirt to see the outline of a small implanted box¡ªa pacemaker. The man had a cardiac condition, and when the electronics all went out, the pacemaker did, too. He¡¯d survived a little while, but the Event had been a death sentence for him.


    I wondered how many others like him were out there. Every person who relied on electronics to survive was probably already dead. Pacemakers were the obvious one, but what about oxygen tanks and insulin pumps? COPD patients couldn¡¯t breathe well enough without supplemental oxygen that didn¡¯t exist anymore. Diabetic people needed insulin to survive, which required refrigeration. Maybe a heal spell would help them, but maybe not.


    The world had changed, and it was taking a lot of people down in the process. I¡¯d been fighting so hard to survive, I hadn¡¯t thought about what it would mean for others.


    A ticking sound caught my ear, and I glanced around the room, wondering what it was. It sounded mechanical, which stunned me. I was so sure that everything was destroyed by the Event. If some sort of electrical device had survived, maybe there was hope for restoring power, eventually?


    I looked, but at first couldn¡¯t find the source of the ticking. It was a very soft sound, only audible at all when I was as quiet as I could be. It wasn¡¯t until I glanced down at the dead man¡¯s wrist that I realized that was the origin of the sound.


    His watch still worked.


    I slipped it off his wrist and examined the thing, praying I¡¯d found even oneelectrical device still working¡ªbut I knew in my heart what I was going to find, so I wasn¡¯t shocked when I found it was a wound-spring design. A very old watch, maybe something this man had worn for decades. I¡¯d never worn a wind-up watch. Even as a kid, it had always been digital faces. But I knew how they worked, I¡¯d seen plenty of them.


    It was overly large on my wrist. I would need to remove a couple of the gold links from the band, to make it fit, and that was probably something to handle once I knew I was secure in this place. I called in my small army, and together we swept the place, making absolutely certain there were no surprises. I even thought to check the basement this time, so see? I can learn!


    Once I knew the house was empty of monsters and people, I moved a couple of large pieces of furniture against the back door, basically sealing it off. Then I left one of my skeletons there as a guard, just in case. There was no sense taking chances.


    A sweep of the house told me the man clearly lived alone. There was some food still good in the kitchen, though, and water remaining in the pipes. In fact, the man had filled several gallon jugs¡ªthey were next to the kitchen sink, so he¡¯d probably filled them there. He¡¯d been trying his best to survive, too. His body betrayed him.


    If I¡¯d gotten to him in time to give him a Stamina stone, would that have been enough to save him? I wondered. The clear crystals improved our bodies and minds. Maybe one would have healed his heart. Maybe it would have taken two. But I had a hunch these crystals, this change, was both the source of many problems and also the solution.


    Speaking of stones, it was time to examine everything my long day of battle had earned me. I found candles in the kitchen, and matches, but I wanted to be cautious about lighting them. A light would show up from a good distance away. I brought the candle and my pack to the garage instead. There were only two tiny windows on the side of the garage. Not much light would escape there, so I lit the candles, plunked myself down on one of my blankets, and poured out the loot.

 Chapter 37 - Count Your Winnings

    <h4>Chapter 37 - Count Your Winnings</h4>


    There were a lot of stones on the blanket in front of me. First thing I wanted to do was to count them and divide them out into groups. I also checked out my existing stones:


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Control Undead


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Animate Dead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Drain Life


    Point 4: X


    Point 5: X


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead (Tier 2), Nightvision, Darkness, Augment Undead, Control Undead, Shadow Walk, Harm


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Will (Tier 2), Strength (Tier 2), Agility (Tier 2)


    On top of that, I checked the hoard of crystals from the day¡¯s labor. I had sixty-seven of the things, all told. Twelve of them were clear, and the other fifty-five were black. I couldn¡¯t help but feel excited as I looked at them all. I badly wanted to hit at least tier four in one power. That would open up another spot for a new stone.


    I still wasn¡¯t sure which stone I would put in. Augment Undead was useful, but so was Agility. Overall, though, I expected I would socket Will next. That would boost my ability to cast Drain Life more often, and if there was anything going to keep me alive longer, it was probably that spell. My hand went to the spot just under my ribs where I¡¯d been stabbed. It wasn¡¯t even tender anymore, but the echo of pain still lingered in my memory. Without that spell, I¡¯d have died out there.


    Identifying all of those stones meant yanking one first, unfortunately. Which one? Taking out the tier three stone made no sense, so that was off the table. If I yanked the animate spell, I¡¯d lose my skeletons. If I yanked the Drain Life spell and it broke, I was totally screwed, though. Of the two, I could afford to lose Animate a lot more, so that¡¯s the one I gently pulled free. It appeared in my hand, and the skeleton I¡¯d brought with me into the garage collapsed in a heap of bones.


    I grimaced. The one at the back door was probably in pieces, too. ¡°Rosie, go mind the house, okay? Stand in the kitchen and make a lot of noise if anything comes into the house.¡±


    The zombie walked off, leaving me with just Guildenstern and Hope as guards. That would hopefully be enough to keep me safe for the time being. There were plenty of bones out in the graveyard to Animate once I was all done identifying everything, so I¡¯d be okay.


    One by one, I socketed the clear stones. Thankfully, none of them shattered on removal. Of the twelve new stones, I ended up with two Strength, two Will, three Agility, two Stamina, two Intellect, and one Charisma. This was interesting stuff, now that I had time to sit and think about it. I was never what you¡¯d call an avid gamer, growing up, but I¡¯d played some D&D with friends in high school, and a few computer RPGs. I knew the lingo, and these crystals matched up pretty solidly with the stats you usually saw in games.


    Why was that? I could only guess. Maybe the stats were just obvious. Like, there were only so many key factors that went into determining the capabilities of a person, so the crystals happened to be named the same thing as the games? That could be. Or maybe there was more to it than that.


    I remembered the writing on the cemetery gates, how it held back the undead. That was magic, and it predated the Event, probably by hundreds of years. Maybe longer¡ªthe cemetery was only a couple hundred years old, but the inscriptions had likely been used on many other graveyards for much longer.


    What if this wasn¡¯t the first time magic had come to my world? Maybe bits of magic like those gate inscriptions and the game stats were lingering vestiges of another Event like the one I was living through. If it happened a thousand years ago, it would have been much less catastrophic. After all, there were no firearms or electric lights, back then. No cars or airplanes, either.


    I had no way to tell which was true, but the idea gave me hope. If this was something that came and went in cycles, that humanity had faced and survived before, even if it was ages ago, it was much more likely we could do the same thing again.


    The new find put me up to four Will stones¡ªwell, a tier two and two tier ones, anyway. I merged the tier one stones for all the stats, and then merged the Will crystals into a tier three. That was looking like a prime candidate for my next power, all right.


    ¡°Okay, clear ones done, now I need to go over the black stones,¡± I told Hope. She yipped in reply.


    This was the really exciting part, because these were the stones that would enhance my combat power the most. I carefully socketed each one in turn, and then slowly got myself a running tally of what everything was, plunking the stones down into one pile for each spell.


    One by one, new spells came into my hands. I found crystals for Fear, Health to Mana, Protection from Undead, Contagion, and Curse. I¡¯d half wondered if I had already found all the spells the black stones granted, but apparently not. Some seemed to be rarer than others. As I went along, there were a lot of Animate Dead crystals, and a fair number of Control Undead as well. Both my professor and I had gotten those spells right away, fighting zombies in the classroom, and it apparently wasn¡¯t by accident.


    The new spells were interesting.


    Health to Mana looked positively broken. It would convert some of my vitality into mana, which would let me cast more spells. When coupled with my Drain Life spell, this looked positively abusable. At tier one, maybe not so much; but if I could get it ranked, that might be awesome later on. Unfortunately it seemed to be rare.Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    Protection from Undead appeared to be much like the writing on the graveyard gates. I¡¯d inscribe a series of runes on something, empower the runes, and then enemy undead wouldn¡¯t be able to pass by. Super useful, but highly specific, too. I figured that one would be sitting in my pocket a while. Fear was likewise a limited use spell. It would make a number of enemies flee me. Lower ranked ones, for the most part, but it had a reduced chance to work on same tier or higher tier monsters as well. Personally, I¡¯d rather blast them with a Drain than chase them off¡ªtoo much chance they¡¯d come back again when I wasn¡¯t ready, later.


    The last two new spells were both of the same variety. Contagion cast a disease spell which could move from one target to another. It reduced their stats¡ªall of them, from the looks of it¡ªby a small amount. If they touched someone else, the debuff would spread. Curse was also a debuff, but it was single target, and did damage over time. Every few seconds the Curse would cause more harm. It looked like it did more damage than a same-tier Drain Life, but of course it lacked the healing aspect.


    Still, any new attack spells were something I was very interested in.


    There were thirteen Animate Dead stones, twelve Control Undead stones, eight Drain Life stones, five Heal Undead, three Nightvision, three Darkness, three Augment Undead, two Harm, two Shadow Walk, one Health to Mana, one Protection from Undead, one Contagion, and one Curse. I went on a mad merging campaign, piling them all up as best I could. Only one shattered, in all of that¡ªa Darkness spell.


    My tier two Animate spell mixed with two more Animate stones to make tier three, and then four more of them to finally hit tier four. I socketed the last ones without any trouble and felt a rush of new power hit me. But I still had seven more of them! I was literally one shy of hitting tier five.


    Where was another zombie to kill when I needed one? Shit, did I have to go find another graveyard?


    On the plus side, the tier four version of the spell was plenty powerful. I could Animate eight tiers worth of undead now, so that could be eight regular skeletons, four tier two skeleton warriors, or two tier three undead. I¡¯d have to go outside to the piles of bones to see what the tier three options looked like, but I could tell they existed, now that I¡¯d ranked up the spell.


    The really good find was the twelve Control Undead stones, though. Because my Control Undead was already tier three¡ªfour tier one stones worth¡ªadding twelve more brought me to sixteen, which was enough to merge them all into a single tier five stone. Since I¡¯d already kicked Animate up to tier four, I had an empty slot. I put a Control in there, then added another; that was tier two. I unsocketed that, and did it again, then merged the two tier two stones to get a tier three¡ªwhich instantly and automatically merged with the other tier three into a tier four.


    Then I had to do all of that all over again with the other eight stones. My pulse raced as I added the final ones together. What would happen? A tier five stone should open the last slot, giving me five spells! Would it do more than that? I had no way of knowing.


    I merged the final stones together. They melded with the tier four stone and became tier five. Instantly, the fifth Point opened up, unlocking, but that wasn¡¯t all that happened.


    A second ring of Points appeared in my mind¡¯s eye, surrounding the inner ring. Only one Point was unlocked, the one just outside the tier five Control Undead. It was like I¡¯d opened up a new ring of socket Points, each one connected with one of the inner Points. A flood of additional information hit my mind at the same time.


    I suddenly understood how it all fit together.


    As each inner point hit tier five, it would unlock a point on the outer ring. Those, in turn, would open a point on a third ring once ranked up to tier five, and if I ranked up a third ring point to tier five, that would open up a fourth ring. I wasn¡¯t sure if there was a limit, a cap of some kind, or not. It was possible I could eventually slot hundreds of crystals, hundreds of powers.


    There were limitations, though. Each outer ring crystal needed to be the same color as the associated inner crystal. Because my tier five stone was black, the outer ring Point I¡¯d opened up also needed to be filled with a black crystal. The ones beyond that would need to be, as well. I could slot multiples of the same spell, and double up, if I wanted¡ªso adding more Animate Dead spells, for example, would increase my maximum army size. But whichever color crystal was slotted into the inner circle determined which color the outer Point had to be.


    Now I had six Points open to embed crystals. Control Undead had to be in one of them, since it was my only tier five. I probably couldn¡¯t risk taking that out ever again, because if I did, I¡¯d risk shattering sixteen crystals worth of magic. That would seriously suck. But I needed to carefully consider which spells to add, beyond that, because the colors I chose would have a lot of weight down the road.


    I pondered it for a long while, going over a variety of possible configurations, until I finally came up with one I thought would work.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Animate Dead (Tier 3)


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Animate Dead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 3) - Will


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 3) - Agility


    Spare Stones


    Black: Heal Undead (Tier 3), Heal Undead, Nightvision (Tier 3), Darkness (Tier 3), Augment Undead (Tier 3), Shadow Walk (Tier 2), Shadow Walk, Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Animate Dead (Tier 2), Animate Dead, Drain Life (Tier 2), Health to Mana, Protection from Undead, Contagion, Curse


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Agility, Stamina (Tier 2), Intellect (Tier 2), Charisma


    It felt like a good combination. The difficult slot was really the new outer ring one, because I had to ponder for a long time which spells to put into play. But having four extra skeletons under my control was a big deal. I¡¯d already demonstrated just how powerful it was to field a large force of minions. With the Will addition, my Drain Life would cast much more often without burning me out, so I had one good offensive spell.


    I really wanted to add either Curse or Contagion, too. Either of those would be a welcome addition to my arsenal. But they were tier one, and the spare Animate was tier three. In the end, that helped finalize the decision for me.


    Adding Agility instead of something else was also a major question for me, and one I had a feeling I might second-guess the next day. I¡¯d keep on experimenting, for sure. Agility had saved my life more than once, but so had some other spells. Augment might be a better choice there, or Curse. I¡¯d keep my options open and test some variations when I had the chance.


    For now, though, it was time to get some well-earned rest. This had been a hell of a long day. I gathered up my loot, carefully moving all the spare stones into a small bag I¡¯d picked up during my scavenging. It was nylon, built tough, and had enough padding to protect them. The stones secured, I went back into the house and upstairs to the bedroom and the welcome mattress waiting for me there.


    With Hope curled up on the bed beside me and both zombies waiting just outside the door, I felt secure enough that I drifted off into a deep sleep right away, maybe the first good rest I¡¯d gotten since the Event happened.

 Chapter 38 - Hasty Withdrawal

    Chapter 38 - Hasty Withdrawal


    Alfred stared out into the night, watching for movement. The goblins had been more active, and he worried they might try something now that the sun was down and most of the humans were secure inside the police station, sleeping. They kept guard shifts, of course. His would end in a few hours, and then he¡¯d get some much-needed rest.


    He could barely recognize himself, at this point. He still carried the fire axe, but now he was strong enough to wield it with one hand, while the other hand carried half of a solid wood door. They¡¯d taken a few doors, chopped them in half with a hand saw, and then nailed leather or nylon straps to the wood. His shield had two straps, one for his forearm, the other to grab tight in his fist.


    It looked wildly out of place on his five foot ten, fairly unathletic frame. Alfred had never been one for sports and weight lifting; his mind was his weapon. And yet, there he was, axe and shield in hand like he was some fur-wearing barbarian out of a movie. His crystals expanded his Strength, Agility, and now Stamina as well¡ªbut he still looked about the same as he had three days prior.


    The world was a strange place, and was only getting more so.


    Movement from the direction of the station caught his eye, and he glanced over, but it was only Lords, coming to check on the guard posts. ¡°All quiet?¡±


    Alfred nodded. ¡°So far.¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s hope it stays that way. Everyone could use some rest tonight,¡± Lords replied before walking back to the station.


    Frankly, most of Lords¡¯ refugees had been resting far too much as it was, from what he was seeing. Bradley, Neal, and Tom¡¯s deaths hit Lords hard and many of the students harder. It was the first casualties they¡¯d had, and a clear indication just how dangerous the world had become. Now, more than half of the refugees sheltering at the station were afraid to go out. How dangerous the world had become wasn¡¯t a shock to Alfred; he¡¯d seen it from the first moments after the Event. His girlfriend had died in front of him¡ªand then promptly tried to kill him, once she woke up a zombie. Then the spiders, goblins, more zombies¡­ No, he had no illusions left about the changed world.


    Alfred worried he¡¯d hitched his cart to the wrong horse. Selena was out there somewhere, probably doing just fine. Maybe other groups were, too. But this group was headed for trouble.


    Things went sideways with Lords agreeing that leaving the camp should be a volunteer-only duty. If people weren¡¯t leaving the camp, they couldn¡¯t get crystals. Without crystals, they were helpless. That rule just ensured the people who had no way to defend themselves would never learn to do so. They worked camp jobs instead, cooking food, cleaning clothes, and standing watch alongside others who¡¯d earned power.


    The stay-in-camp crowd was already starting to whine about it some, though. Alfred spent most of the day out of the camp. He¡¯d spoken with Kara and Joe, the pair who¡¯d been his partners the day everything blew up and Brad was killed. Both of them agreed with him, in premise at least: getting out there to fight more monsters so they could gather more crystals was key. Without the stones, they were helpless. Each of them had acquired a single stone before they set out that morning.


    By lunch, Kara and Joe were tier two, Kara for Strength and Joe for Agility. By the end of the day they were partway toward tier three, and Alfred had hit tier three, letting him socket a third stone. He picked Stamina for that, because he wanted to be able to survive some hits, not just deliver them. The way these stones worked, at tier three his Strength was insane. He could kill someone without any Stamina boost in a single shot, and was one-shotting goblin scouts all afternoon as they cranked up the intensity of their approach.


    But more than half of the refugees in Lords¡¯ camp had no stones, which meant they were at best cannon fodder, and realistically just needed to be kept away from any pitched combat. In fact, his fellow guard had no crystals yet. Martin was the kid¡¯s name¡ªundergrad student who¡¯d been doing work study down in the library annex not far away when everything went to shit. His eyes were still useful to watch for attacks, but if the goblins hit, Martin would be useless in a fight.


    Alfred had spare stones. He could give the man one. He had a spare Strength and one of Will. The latter, he was hoping to swap with someone else for another Strength. The sooner he could get that to tier four, the better. The former, he was saving to rank up. But he could pass one over to Martin. He hated the idea, though. If the man had gone out with them on patrols, supply runs, and to look for more survivors, then Alfred would¡¯ve personally made sure he had at least one crystal.


    He couldn¡¯t see rewarding the guy for sitting around in camp, though.


    Something flickered through the air, and Martin¡¯s hands went to his chest. He fell with a grunt, an arrow protruding from him. An attack? Or a lucky shot by a lone goblin? Alfred couldn¡¯t take the chance. He ran to the alarm, a big brass thing like a bonus-size dinner bell they¡¯d set hanging from a light pole, and pulled the rope hard.The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    The bell tolled. Alfred kept ringing it.


    Lords was out in a flash. ¡°What¡¯s happening?¡±


    ¡°Martin¡¯s down!¡± Alfred shouted. ¡°Arrow. Not sure how many attackers, but the arrow came from the east.¡±


    ¡°George! Get Martin inside to Henry, see if he can heal him,¡± Lords called out as more people exited the police station. ¡°Let¡¯s get up on the walls, but watch for archers out there.¡±


    They¡¯d surrounded the station with a ring of cars, each tipped on their side and braced with heavy rocks. As more people got Strength crystals, moving heavy stuff became casually easy. Alfred thought he could potentially lift a car solo, at this point, but he hadn¡¯t tried yet. Tipping one sideways was simple. Hauling in park benches or filling sandbags to use as ramparts had fallen to those who stayed at the base during the day, so he hadn¡¯t seen them at work¡ªbut the effect was fairly good. They had a wall, now. It wasn¡¯t perfect; there were gaps between the cars here and there. But it was better than nothing at all.


    People rushed out of the station, moving toward the walls, but it was already too late.


    A fireball soared through the air from someplace outside the perimeter, slamming into the middle of the open space inside the wall. It exploded there, knocking several people to the ground. One man was close enough to catch fire, and he rolled back and forth, trying to put out the flames while he shouted in pain. Like that was the signal, goblins poured through two of the gaps in the wall. They¡¯d used the few moments after Martin fell, that distraction, to get themselves from the wood line into position to strike.


    Now they were inside the walls, dozens of them rushing forward to the attack.


    Alfred surged against them, his axe taking down a goblin with one blow. Something darted through the air and banged against his shield¡ªan arrow. Close call, that. He kept the shield up and at the ready, hoping to block any similar attacks.


    Another fireball slammed into the compound, exploding directly in front of the station itself. The blast blew the massive glass window out front to smithereens, sending shards flying back through into the still-waking people inside. Screams and cries of pain started up inside the station, as flames caught and roared up the front of the building.


    Alfred hacked down another goblin, then a third, but there were too many of the things. He found himself forced back, step by step, toward the front of the station where Lords and the other active defenders fought against dozens of the creatures.


    ¡°Alfred, join the shield wall!¡± Lords called, and Alfred stepped back, locking shields with the man. ¡°We have to hold them here!¡±


    A third fireball hit the station. This time, it was aimed at the roof rather than the front. It blew up with flames that lit the night, sending sparks flying dozens of feet in every direction. Alfred winced and ducked, then barely dodged a goblin spear. He snapped the spear off with his axe, then twisted his wrist and sent the blunt side of the axe into the goblin¡¯s head. The hapless creature was blasted ten feet back and fell to the ground motionless.


    But another fireball slammed into the building. Whoever was sending those, they were careful not to hit their own people. But they¡¯d hammered the building three times now. Flames roared behind him as they spread over the building. Another blast blew one of the cars from their wall over, sending it crashing to the ground and shattering their wall. More goblins poured through the new gap. There were too many of them, even without the fireballs. With that edge? This wasn¡¯t going to be a fight. It was a slaughter.


    ¡°Lords, we need to withdraw!¡± Alfred shouted. ¡°We can¡¯t hold, not against this.¡±


    He watched the indecision flash across the man¡¯s face. Then a goblin rushed Lords, barreling into the man¡¯s shield. A quick blow with a bat took the creature down, but there were more of them approaching. The wall was down, more fireballs shot across the sky, the station was burning, and everything was going to shit.


    Alfred considered just running for it, but he couldn¡¯t bring himself to leave the people behind. What about Kat, Selena¡¯s roommate? Or Kara and Joe, the folks he¡¯d scouted and fought alongside the past two days? He chopped down another attacker, and then the world seemed to blow up around him. There was a bright flash of light as the flame impacted directly against Lords¡¯ shield, which shattered. Shards of wood flew in all directions. One stabbed into Alfred¡¯s leg¡ªand then he crashed into the ground, tossed by the explosion.


    Thankfully, this blast threw the goblins back, as well. By the time Alfred was back on his feet, more of the monsters swarmed through the wall into the grounds, replacing those which had fallen. It was a reprieve, not a win.


    Lords was down. Alfred made his way to the man¡¯s side, but he was gone. The broken shield exploded in front of him at point blank range, and huge daggers of wood penetrated his body in too many places. There was no way he could have survived that.


    None of them were going to make it, unless someone took charge and got them out of there.


    Alfred raised his voice, shouted as loud as he could. ¡°Shield wall! Hold the line! We¡¯re withdrawing. Everyone else! Help the wounded and move! We¡¯re moving out to the west. Move, people! Move!¡±


    His voice boomed over the sounds of battle, and amazingly, people listened. The wall reformed, holding back the goblin tide. Behind him, people were helping each other from the burning building, coughing and gasping in the growing smoke. There was a gap in the western wall, and that¡¯s where the refugees fled. Alfred spotted Kat hobbling off, using crutches they¡¯d found someplace to help her get along.


    He turned his full attention back to the goblins. The group was moving, fleeing to the west. There were buildings there, deeper into campus, that they could base themselves in. He and his team had cleared a few earlier in the day. They could find a new place to rest and recover. But only if the shields held long enough for the others to escape.


    Alfred looked right and left, to George and Samson, and the other warriors still defending the retreat. They nodded to him. With a roar, the line stepped forward, weapons flashing as they strove to push the enemy back.

 Chapter 39 - Smoke And Fire

    Chapter 39 - Smoke And Fire


    I woke with the dawn again. That hadn¡¯t been my habit, before all of this. I¡¯d been more of a night owl. But these days it felt like there was always more that needed to be done than there were hours in the day, so as soon as sunlight hit my eyelids I¡¯d snap awake and be unable to drift back off. I yawned, stretched, and packed my things back into my bag again, then headed back downstairs.


    The man¡¯s body was still on the chair where I¡¯d found him. That had to be first on my list. I¡¯d taken his watch, stayed in his house¡­ The least I could do was bury the man. A quick glance out the back door in the kitchen told me that he had a large enough back yard to make that happen, but I wondered if it might be better to bury him in the actual cemetery. After all, the fence there had kept the undead inside it. If he ¡®woke up¡¯ at some later date, it would probably be better for everyone if he was contained like that.


    After a quick breakfast, I headed for the garage again, my team of undead in tow. I¡¯d spotted a shovel in there when I was working with the crystals the night before. I snagged that, and we headed back out to the road. I figured I¡¯d have the zombies dig a grave and then we¡¯d haul the man over after the hole was ready.


    Hope let out a series of barks. She sounded alarmed and dashed down the road toward the south before howling at her top volume. That was her magical howl, the one that stunned opponents.


    I turned, already preparing a spell, then stopped. It was another set of undead! Skeletons, just like the ones I¡¯d fought in the graveyard. There were five of the things ambling down the street toward me. Was there another burial ground nearby? How many cemeteries did this city have, anyway?


    There were four of the things. I had a Drain Life ready to cast, but changed my mind. I had a tier five Control Undead spell now, which meant I could control sixteen tiers worth of dead things. I only had four¡ªtwo tier one zombies, and Hope. I reached out with my Control spell, and a ray of black fire shot from my hand and enveloped one of the oncoming skeletons. It came under my command in an instant, and the others turned to attack it. Before they could destroy it I ordered my new minion to move away from them, back toward us, as fast as it could.


    Then I cast the spell again, grabbing another of the skeletons and repeating the process. I did it twice more, until I had four of them under my command, all moving toward me. Then, because I wanted to see what my new Drain Life spell was like, I cast it on the final undead. It collapsed instantly, falling into the road as a pile of bones.


    I walked up to the bones and tapped one of them, a new crystal popping into my palm. I glances at it¡ªand I could tell what it did! The stone was an Animate Dead crystal. That was new. I¡¯d never been able to tell what the crystals did until I¡¯d socketed them. After that, I could tell which was which just by holding them, but I¡¯d always had to place them into a Point first. Now it seemed I could identify them just by touching them?


    Maybe it was another benefit of hitting rank five.


    That was the sixteenth Animate crystal, the last one I needed to rank it up to tier five. I pulled the other Animate Dead stones from my bag of crystals and held them in my hand with the new one. All of them sank quickly into my palm.


    I felt them merging with the tier three stone on the outer ring. They merged, and in a flash it was tier four. But things weren¡¯t done at that point. The tier four vanished, moving to merge with the other tier four Animate Dead spell. Together, the two become a tier five stone, still in my second Point.


    With the old outer ring Point clear, and Animate now up to tier five with its own outer Point, I now had two slots open. Which spells should I put in them? What would work best?


    ¡°Whichever I slot, they¡¯ve got to be black spells,¡± I mused aloud, talking to my new collection of undead.


    I figured I¡¯d think about it while I worked. With my escort increased, I had plenty of security now. I handed the shovel off to one of the new skeletons and had another pick up a shovel that had been dropped during the battle the day before. The two of them went to work, digging a new grave for the man whose watch I wore.The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    Meanwhile, I went around Animating a bunch of bones. I had no Animated undead, and I had sixteen points worth of them to play with. What to do? Would I be better off with sixteen skeletons? There was no shortage of bones to use. Or should I opt for quality over quantity? I could get eight skeleton warriors instead.


    That felt like the better plan to me, so I began having my undead move piles of bones closer to one another. Once they had that done, I cast Animate Dead, focusing on bringing up a tier two monster. The spell only used the bones from one body, but it pulled something, mana perhaps, out of the other set of bones, leaving them empty. I could feel that those drained bones were useless to me now.


    I managed to cast it four times before I needed a break. The grave was dug by then, and the morning sun was well above the horizon. It was time to bury the stranger whose house had given me refuge, so I ordered Rosie and Guildie to go wrap the man in a blanket and bring him to me.


    As I was waiting, I took in the sky, now bright blue¡ªexcept in one area. Off to the west, a plume of dark grey smoke poured into the air. Some sort of fire, and it was a big one. I got the feeling the worst of it had already passed, that the bulk of the flames had burned themselves out while I was still asleep. I hadn¡¯t seen the remaining smoke earlier against the dark sky, but it was plenty obvious now.


    I had a pretty good idea what it was, too. That smoke was rising from right about where the campus police station stood. I had a bad feeling they¡¯d been hit last night. Maybe by the goblins from their fortress, maybe by something else. But that much smoke wasn¡¯t a good sign.


    I turned to Hope. ¡°You think we should go check on them?¡±


    She growled. That wasn¡¯t a sign of approval.


    ¡°Maybe you¡¯re right. Bradley did try to kill us,¡± I replied. ¡°But Kat is still there. Alfred, too. And a lot of innocent people, besides them. The ones who tried to hurt us are already dead, and at this point I don¡¯t really think any of the rest of them are a danger to me. Not now.¡±


    Hope gave a chuffing sound.


    ¡°I have no idea if you understand me at all, girl, but you¡¯re good to bounce ideas off,¡± I told her. ¡°We need to go check. If all¡¯s well, then we¡¯ll just walk away, no harm, no foul. If they¡¯re in trouble, though, we might be the only ones who can save them.¡±


    While I waited for my zombies to return with the man, I went back to raising some of the bones, casting Animate Dead four more times. By the time my mana was run down again, I had eight skeleton warriors under my control, and my Animate spell was maxed out.


    The skeleton warriors were a lot stronger than the basic skeletons. I could feel the power in each of their steps. They were stronger, faster, smarter, and understood weapons and tools better than the basic skeletons had. Somehow the spell granted me a basic understanding of their capabilities. They could use weapons much better than their basic brethren, and they would work together better as well. The eight of them were much stronger than sixteen basic skeletons would¡¯ve been. Especially after I got them some weapons.


    I¡¯d made the right call.


    I kept the burial ¡®service¡¯ short. It wasn¡¯t like I was a priest, and I had no idea what religion this guy was anyway. I said a few words of thanks for his home, and what I¡¯d taken from him, as my zombies laid him into the grave. Then the skeletons filled his grave back in, and that job was complete.


    ¡°Now we need to arm the rest of you properly,¡± I told my assembled troops. ¡°If we¡¯re headed into a tussle with the goblins, I want to make sure we¡¯re as prepared for it as we can be.¡±


    We worked our way back out to the road, then headed south. We stopped at each house, knocking first to see if anyone was there, but they were all the same. Each home was locked, but empty, and all of them had signs people packed up some essentials before departing. Part of me badly wanted to go to the Air Guard base and see if I was right, if that had become a rally point for survivors. But not yet, not until I was sure my classmate and roommate were still okay.


    Instead, we worked our way through one house after another, collecting everything that could serve as a weapon or shield. We raided every trash can for the lids; they weren¡¯t perfect, and I¡¯d need to build better shields at some point here. But for the time being, they¡¯d work. We found a fair number of baseball bats, too. Popular sport. More houses had one than didn¡¯t. There were also a slew of large kitchen knives, hammers, and other tools which could double as weapons in a pinch.


    The real crowning glory was finding a pair of bows. One was a kid¡¯s bow, maybe for teens, and the other for an adult. There were two quivers of arrows there, as well. I couldn¡¯t shoot a bow to save my life, but the skeleton warriors could. I armed two of them with the bows, giving each a heavy kitchen knife as a backup weapon. Having some ranged firepower besides my Drain would be a massive boon.


    I crossed a small river as we moved south, then quickly found where the additional undead came from. As I¡¯d thought, there was a whole other cemetery just off the main road a bit. Unlike the one I¡¯d fought in the day before, this one had chain link fences instead of the heavy wrought iron. There were no inscriptions on these; they were cheap fences from a hardware store, not craftsman forged work. The skeletons had torn the fences apart, and they were all over the place.


    As I approached, the first ones saw us and headed our way. I grinned. There were only about two dozen of the things. I¡¯d faced so much worse, that barely even tickled my concern meter now.


    ¡°Shield wall!¡± I called out, and my undead formed themselves quickly into a line, preparing for battle.

 Chapter 40 - Gutted Ruins

    Chapter 40 - Gutted Ruins


    The battle didn¡¯t last long. It wasn¡¯t even much of a fight, being honest. As the enemy undead came my way, I started casting Control Undead on the ones toward the rear of the pack. As each one slowly came under my control, I had them bide their time, waiting. By the time I¡¯d cast it four times back to back, I¡¯d tapped out most of my mana. Much more and I wouldn¡¯t be able to fight well, and as easy as this looked like it would be, I wasn¡¯t in the mood to take major chances. As much as my new life might feel like a video game at times, it definitely wasn¡¯t.


    But with four of them under my control at the back of the enemy line and my row of six skeleton warriors, two zombies, and four regular skeletons formed up, I was in excellent shape. That wasn¡¯t even counting Hope or the two skeleton warriors I¡¯d made archers. I had the archers on standby. I didn¡¯t think I would need them for this fight, and the arrows were of minimal use against skeletons anyway. I only had so many arrows, and the last thing I wanted to do was waste any of them.


    My front line turned into a threshing mill, the shields holding back their foes while their weapons tore the enemy undead apart. It wasn¡¯t even a close contest, not at all. The four skeletons I¡¯d controlled grabbed some of the undead from the back, too, dragging them down and further turning the already confused mob of foes into a right mess.


    Still, I wanted to capture as many of these as possible, not necessarily kill them all. The Control Undead spell was super useful, because I could capture an enemy and turn them to my side, rather than killing them. But in order to do that there had to actually be undead handy, and while it was quickly becoming clear undead weren¡¯t going to be in short supply, I couldn¡¯t count on always having them around to control. I needed to take advantage of the chances when I had them.


    Like right then, I had a bunch of skeletons I could Control. Later, if I ended up in a pitched fight with the goblins, I¡¯d probably have no shortage of dead bodies I could Animate, but finding undead to Control would be tougher.


    It was the careful application of both spells which would maximize my combat effectiveness, so I wanted to be sure to take advantage of every Control Undead opportunity which presented itself.


    Before the last of the enemy undead went down, I cast Control Undead as many times as I could. The final cast left me gasping for breath and barely able to stand, but I¡¯d nabbed four more of the things. That left me with twelve Controlled skeletons, which was the beginning of a decent army.


    ¡°I¡¯ve seriously got the Evil Overlord starter kit going on right here, don¡¯t I?¡± I said, as my front line took out the final few skeletons.


    I¡¯d killed fifteen of them and captured eight, plus the four from earlier. It was a good start. I still needed four more undead to maximize the Control spell, but I didn¡¯t see any more of them. There might be some, wandering about, maybe in the woods, but I was also cognizant that if my friends were in trouble, the clock was ticking. I looted the crystals from the dead and got ready to move on.


    There were five clear crystals and ten black ones. I ended up with two Strength, one Stamina, one Intellect, and one Will, for the clear ones. The black stones gave me two each of Control Undead, Animate Dead, and Darkness, plus one each of Contagion, Curse, Augment Undead, and Nightvision. It was a good haul, and I loved being able to identify the crystals without actually inserting them. Now that my crystals were ranking up so well, I didn¡¯t want to go taking them out all the time. The risk of loss was just too high.


    The additions of a second Contagion and Curse finalized my decision to socket those. I merged them both into tier two stones, then added them to the outer ring Points. When it was done, I was a hell of a lot stronger, and ready for whatever I had to face.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Curse


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Contagion


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 3) - WillEnsure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 3) - Agility


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead (Tier 2), Augment Undead (Tier 3), Augment Undead, Control Undead (Tier 2), Darkness (Tier 3), Darkness (Tier 2), Drain Life (Tier 2), Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana, Heal Undead (Tier 3), Heal Undead, Nightvision (Tier 3), Nightvision, Protection from Undead, Shadow Walk (Tier 2), Shadow Walk


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Strength (x2), Agility, Stamina (Tier 2), Stamina, Intellect (Tier 2), Intellect, Charisma, Will


    I paused long enough to search a vacant garage next to the graveyard to see if I could get some more weapons for the eight new skeletons. There wasn¡¯t much I could easily use for shields there, although there were enough tools to sink a ship. With some time, those saws could reshape chunks of plywood into new shields easy enough. I made a mental note to swing back through this place after and see what I could do about upgrades for my army.


    No bats, but there were some heavy tools that worked okay as weapons. I armed the eight new undead with whatever was handy. One got a massive monkey wrench. Another got a hammer. There was a shovel I armed one with, and two more got big chunks wood, about the length of my arm. They looked like stakes for a signpost or something.


    That might be another good source of shields, come to think of it. There were a lot of stop signs around, and they sure weren¡¯t going to be useful for much else. Once I had some breathing room, I really had a lot of work to do.


    As soon as my battle group was armed as best I could quickly manage, we moved back across the street and out a side road called Juniper Drive. According to my map, that would take us right near the highway again. I followed the road to the end of a big loop, then cut between two houses and moved into the forest. We skirted north of a pond and soon came back out at the big open space of the road.


    I¡¯d picked up a shield, myself, along with the biggest kitchen knife I¡¯d found. The thing was practically a cleaver, but it still sucked. I wanted something better, but it would do for now. The shield was a bigger deal. Crossing an open space like this, we¡¯d be wide open to attack from the other side, and I already knew the goblins had bows. I kept my shield up as we advanced into the open.


    Fortunately, there was no whiz of arrows zipping past my head, no shout of alarmed goblins calling for backup. If any of them were watching, they remained very still.


    Rather than re-enter those woods, where I knew I¡¯d be surrounded by enemy forces in no time, I had my group move south along the highway instead. We kept walking until I saw the Hilton parking lot, then we cut off the highway and into the lot, and from there went up a narrow driveway to Centennial Woods Way, which went east and west. East led up to the parking lot where I¡¯d slept two nights ago. West went toward the police station. I still couldn¡¯t see it from where I was, but the stench of smoke was much stronger now. I had no doubts left about where the smell was coming from.


    The road would lead me on a twisting path right alongside the deep forest, and I eyed those trees with intense suspicion. The woods were thick, the trees close together, and the space beneath them dark. Anything could be hiding in there. A whole army of goblins could be waiting for me to bungle.


    ¡°Nuh uh,¡± I said aloud. ¡°Not today.¡±


    It felt more certain all the time that I was going to have to battle the things. I wanted it to be on my terms, though, and not from an ambush. There might be no one in the trees there; it could be entirely clear. I was still better off taking a safer path.


    We backtracked and went around around a small pond. There were still some trees, but it was much more open. I led us to the rugby field without running into any opposition. From there, it was just a short hike to the police station.


    But the station itself was gone.


    I could see where it had been as soon as we reached the rugby pitch. The smoking remains of the building stood like broken teeth, reaching for the sky. Gray smoke billowed from the mess. They¡¯d built up the wall of cars around the site, but it hadn¡¯t helped them. Several of the cars were gutted and burnt, too, and there were holes in the wall where they¡¯d shoved vehicles out of position.


    No signs of movement from inside the camp, so I pushed ahead. I wanted some clues, more than anything else. If Kat and Alfred escaped, that was awesome, and I¡¯d see if I could help them. If they hadn¡¯t, then I¡¯d find a way to avenge them instead.


    The place had been utterly ruined. The cars had been set alight. The building was destroyed, as were the other two nearby it. A few bodies littered the ground. No goblin corpses, but there were a few humans.


    Lords was one of them.


    I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about that. He¡¯d been fair to me, at least for the most part. I didn¡¯t think very much of his leadership skills, and I¡¯d run off because his good buddy Brad tried to kill me and I didn¡¯t trust Lords to believe me if I told him about it. Clearly I wasn¡¯t that broken up about the man dying.


    But he¡¯d tried to help people, and that was worth a lot, especially given everything happening. When the world was falling apart, the people who tried to hold it together were valuable. He¡¯d been one of those.


    I ordered the skeleton I¡¯d armed with a shovel to start digging him a grave. The least I could do is see him put into the ground, like I had for the man this morning.


    Voices caught my attention. Someone was coming my way, moving toward the station from the west. Was it survivors from Lords¡¯ group, or someone else? Whoever they were, they weren¡¯t close enough for me to make out their words yet, but they sounded human.


    That didn¡¯t mean they were safe, though.


    I ordered my skeleton to stop digging, and the others to take up hidden positions inside the gutted aid station nearby. I joined them inside, and once we were well-hidden, all we had left to do was wait and see who was coming to pay us a visit.

 Chapter 41 - Show Of Force

    Chapter 41 - Show Of Force


    It was humans, not goblins. That was a good sign, but I didn¡¯t recognize any of them, so I remained hidden and watched. Whoever they were, they had better weapons than the refugees at the station had when I left. They¡¯d all been armed with rebar or chunks of wood. My fire axe had been one of the best weapons of the lot.


    This crew was different. They all had shields, for starters. It looked like they¡¯d sawed a bunch of doors in half for most of them, but a few folks had stop signs strapped to their arms instead. The weapons were better, too. I saw a lot of spears, and they weren¡¯t just sharpened rebar. These spears were hafts of wood with a knife blade of some sort tied to the end. The whole thing looked pretty well put-together. I also saw bats with nails driven into them, a few crude sword-like weapons, and one guy even carried a fire axe like mine.


    ¡°Someone¡¯s been here,¡± one of them called out. A woman.


    ¡°Goblins have definitely been here,¡± another shot back.


    ¡°No, this was someone else. I¡¯m seeing a lot of footprints all around,¡± the first person replied. ¡°Large group of humanoids. Maybe a dozen or more.¡±


    That was my army¡¯s tracks she was seeing. And probably mine.


    ¡°Lords is still here,¡± she went on. ¡°We can get him buried, at least.¡±


    ¡°Look around for others,¡± a familiar voice said. That was Alfred! At least he¡¯d made it. ¡°We lost eight people in the confusion. I want to confirm deaths, if we can.¡±


    I hesitated, considering my options. I could maybe withdraw and not get noticed, but I thought the odds of that were slim. If I started marching a small army away from the aid station, someone was going to see us. We could sit still, but sooner or later someone would want to clear this building. The aid station was gutted, the roof collapsed, the interior a burnt-out ruin. But they¡¯d still want to check it over, just to make sure there hadn¡¯t been anyone trapped inside when it burned, and to look for any supplies they¡¯d missed before.


    The best option was probably to just make myself known, but I wasn¡¯t sure what sort of reception I was going to get. After all, as far as these folks were concerned, I¡¯d killed three of them and fled into the woods. At least, that¡¯s the story I figured they were telling themselves.


    No, I needed to take charge right away. I had to be the one they were worried about screwing with, not the other way around. There were only six of them. With my current stats I had a sneaking suspicion I could take them even without my undead. Unless they¡¯d started going after crystals a lot more than they had been when I left, most of those people probably had a tier two at best.


    I gave mental commands to some of my undead, having the tier one skeletons march out through gaps in the sides of the building. They moved in pairs, keeping themselves under cover enough that they wouldn¡¯t be seen right away. I gave them about a fifteen count to get to where I needed them. Then I ordered my skeleton warriors to advance, shields up, out the front door of the aid station. I followed close behind with the archers.


    A phalanx of armed skeletons with shields marching out the ruined doorway got their attention right away! Alfred started calling orders to his people, telling them to form up, and they quickly made their own wall of battle. Holy shit, the guy had turned into a halfway decent leader! Who¡¯d have thought?


    Right when they got themselves formed up was when I had six skeletons pop out of hiding on either side of their formation. The tier one skellies weren¡¯t as strong or as deadly, but seeing more foes on their flanks had to hurt. My archers stepped out to either side of my main line of battle and nocked an arrow, although I didn¡¯t have them aim. Yet.


    Hope barked, then howled. Alfred¡¯s entire party froze in their tracks. One of them trembled and dropped to his knees.


    But Alfred didn¡¯t. The jackass just set his shield down on the ground, all nonchalant, and called out to me. ¡°Selena, is that you?¡±


    I came forward, the skeleton warriors parting in front of me to allow me by. ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s me.¡±The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    ¡°What¡¯s with the theatrics?¡± Alfred asked, gesturing at the undead. ¡°I thought we were friends.¡±


    ¡°Classmates, anyway,¡± I snapped back. ¡°But after three folks from your group tried to kill me a couple of days ago, let¡¯s just say I¡¯m feeling like caution is warranted.¡±


    He scowled. ¡°I had a feeling that¡¯s what happened there. We found Brad, Neal, and Tom. Had to put two of them down.¡±


    ¡°Put them down?¡± I blinked. I was pretty sure I¡¯d left all three of them dead as doornails. Then it came to me¡ªtwo of them were killed by zombies. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern turned them into zombies when they died. Oops. Probably should have made sure they were dead, dead. ¡°Shit. Zombie bites. I¡¯m sorry, Alfred. They came at me, my undead fought back automatically. If they hadn¡¯t, I¡¯d definitely be dead right now instead. I should have made sure they weren¡¯t coming back, though.¡±


    He shook his head. ¡°Not a problem. If they tried to kill you, they got what they deserved. Can we¡­maybe take things down a Defcon or two? I can get my guys to put up their weapons, you get the skeletons to back off?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°I can do that.¡±


    I ordered the twelve tier one undead to back away, then move to the perimeter. They¡¯d give me early warning if anyone else came at us. No more surprises was a good motto. The warriors, on the other hand, I left in their rank, standing on the steps in front of the aid station. A little show of force was in order, just to make sure nobody got any funny ideas. I came down the steps, Hope close behind, and Alfred came forward to shake my hand.


    ¡°It¡¯s good to see you, Selena,¡± he said. ¡°I was worried you¡¯d been killed.¡±


    ¡°Not yet, anyway,¡± I said as I shook his hand. ¡°I ran into a lot of trouble, but came through the other side pretty well.¡±


    ¡°Better than we did, from the looks of it. How many undead do you have now, anyway?¡±


    I shot him a look that said ¡®you seriously expect me to answer that,¡¯ and he just laughed.


    ¡°Fair enough. You¡¯ve got a lot of them, though. We could use your help,¡± Alfred went on. ¡°The goblins hit us last night, and they have something new. They were lobbing fireballs into the camp, burning down buildings and blowing up cars. It was a mess. I¡¯m still shocked so many of us survived.¡±


    I almost hesitated to ask, because I knew the odds were shitty. But¡­ ¡°Did Kat make it?¡±


    Alfred nodded. ¡°She did. We got crutches for her, so she was able to hobble her way back toward campus. We set up a temp camp west of here to get some rest and tend our wounded. Henry made it too, thank goodness, so he was able to tend our injuries. Kat¡¯s with the others.¡±


    That was good news. Kat wasn¡¯t a friend; we¡¯d been shoved together as roommates by the college, and there hadn¡¯t been time yet to bond. I wasn¡¯t sure we would have, if things hadn¡¯t gone nuts. But she was still someone I knew, so for some reason it mattered to me whether she lived or died. Humans are weird about stuff like that, I guess.


    ¡°You look stronger,¡± I told him. I could sense it from him, now that I was nearby. That was new. The last time I was with these people I had no idea who had crystals embedded and who didn¡¯t. Now, that was all changed. Alfred was a tier three. None of his teammates were, though. Most of them were tier two, and the guy who¡¯d gone to his knees was tier one. Still, Alfred hitting tier three was pretty cool. He must have worked hard for that.


    ¡°I am,¡± he replied.


    I decided to give him a little knowledge and show off at the same time. ¡°Tier three?¡±


    ¡°How?¡± Alfred asked me, shocked. ¡°How did you know that? Just from looking? From touching me? What was it, some new spell?¡±


    I laughed. ¡°Not a spell. I don¡¯t know exactly why, to be honest. You¡¯re the first people I¡¯ve been able to do this with. I can see tier levels of people from just looking at you. I think I unlocked the ability when I hit tier five.¡±


    The info drop was intentional. Since I knew he was tier three, and he was the strongest of this lot, letting them know I was tier five would hopefully make them less interested in screwing with me. Of course, if they knew killing me would make me drop all my crystals, it could backfire. But I was going to need to take chances with people sooner or later, and Alfred felt like someone I could trust, at least a little.


    ¡°Tier five?¡± Alfred said. ¡°Wow. Yikes, you have been busy, huh?¡±


    ¡°Just a little bit. You too, though. Are you the leader of this group, now that Lords is gone? How did that happen?¡±


    Alfred ran a hand through his hair, looking embarrassed. ¡°Lords died last night in the attack. Without him calling commands, we¡¯d all have just died in place, I think. I called for a withdrawal, and then helped cover the retreat until we got the noncombatants clear. When the mess was over, I asked George and Samson if they wanted to take over, and both of them declined. They said I¡¯d done a good job and should keep doing it, so here we are.¡±


    ¡°Not bad,¡± I told him. ¡°I think they picked a good man for the job. Listen, I have an idea where there might be people gathering. Maybe we can get your other people there? Get some help against the goblins?¡±


    ¡°That sounds like a good plan. Where?¡±


    Before I could answer, I got mental feedback from the skeletons I¡¯d set watching the eastern approach. We had company coming¡ªgoblins, and a lot of them. I sent a mental order to the undead to stay under cover and wait, then ambush the enemy if it got closer enough.


    ¡°Later,¡± I told Alfred. ¡°We¡¯ve got incoming. Your buddies from the forest are on their way. Wanna team up and take them down?¡±


    ¡°You got it,¡± Alfred replied. Then he turned to his people. ¡°Tighten up the ranks. We¡¯ve got trouble coming, people! Let¡¯s get ready for a fight!¡±

 Chapter 42 - Feudal Oath

    Chapter 42 - Feudal Oath


    Gideon watched as his army poured themselves into the work of building his fortress. The walls were coming up quickly, now that the skeletons had better direction. Hiring on Brian West was perhaps the smartest decision he¡¯d made so far. The man worked almost as hard as the undead, and didn¡¯t shy away from giving them directions. Once Gideon told the work-crew undead to obey Brian¡¯s orders, they snapped to the work as he commanded.


    But as well as things were going now, it was time for him to make his next moves. Already, scouting parties of his undead troops were bringing back supplies from different places around the city. He¡¯d sent a squad of undead to acquire canned and dry food from a nearby grocery store, along with all the bottled water they could bring back. Eventually he was going to need to find ways to grow fresh food to support himself and any other humans he had working for him, but for the time being, they weren¡¯t going to run out.


    He went down to the wall, where Brian was hard at work. ¡°I could use a few moments of your time.¡±


    ¡°Sure, boss. What¡¯s up?¡± Brian replied.


    ¡°I need to leave the base for a while. There are things I need to do which I can¡¯t just send undead to handle for me,¡± Gideon told him. ¡°I¡¯ll only be gone a day, perhaps two. Think you can hold down the fort while I¡¯m away?¡±


    Brian blinked, surprised, but nodded. ¡°I can, yeah. Are you leaving some of your minions behind to help guard, though? I don¡¯t know if I can hold off an attack solo.¡±


    ¡°Yes, I¡¯ll be leaving enough troops to keep the place secure, and to continue assisting you in building up the walls. You have the plans we worked out together, so implementing them shouldn¡¯t be a major problem,¡± Gideon replied.


    ¡°Yup, can definitely do that,¡± Brian replied. ¡°Thanks again, for taking us in. My kids are safe. That means everything to me. You need me to do something, you say the word. I¡¯m your man.¡±


    Your man. Like a feudal oath, that was. Like he was pledging his allegiance, his loyalty. Was that what the world was returning to? The powerful would protect the weak, and in return be given their fealty? There were worse systems, certainly. But the weight of that was heavy on Gideon¡¯s shoulders. He hadn¡¯t intended to go around saving people, and yet, there he was, taking in Brian and his family.


    Perhaps that was the way things would have to shift, given this new world. Already Gideon was so much stronger than any single person could have been before the Event. Sure, people had forms of power in the days before. They had wealth, which they could use to buy influence. That wasn¡¯t the same as real power, though. Gideon could kill a man by staring at him and casting a single spell. His Harm spell was strong enough that it would one-shot a tier one monster, so he was fairly sure it would do the same to a human without any crystals.


    That was power. He wanted more of it, now.


    ¡°Excellent. Continue the good work, Brian,¡± Gideon told him. ¡°I¡¯ll be back soon, with more supplies, more crystals, and a larger army. Once I¡¯ve returned, we¡¯ll begin working toward next stages.¡±


    ¡°What will those look like, sir?¡± Brian asked.


    Gideon laughed. ¡°I¡¯m still figuring it out myself. I wasn¡¯t expecting to take on you and your family, and that¡¯s turned out well, so I am okay with playing things by ear a little bit. We might need to bring in a few more people. Carefully selected, of course, but having some more help might be useful as we grow. The undead will keep us safe and handle most of the more menial labor, but having more real people around would be good, too.¡±


    ¡°I can see that,¡± Brian replied. ¡°If I run across any candidates, you want me to talk to them?¡±If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    Gideon considered it a moment, but then shook his head. ¡°I don¡¯t want you to do anything that could put your family at risk while I¡¯m gone. You let someone in, they could do harm before you could stop them. If you see someone who looks honest and might be useful, give them a meal and tell them to stay in a nearby house. They can wait there until I return to vet them.¡±


    ¡°Thanks for thinking of me, boss. I appreciate how much you look out for my family.¡±


    Gideon gave him a smile. ¡°I thought it was going to be annoying, keeping other people besides myself safe. Instead, I find the prospect appealing. Your children are wonderful. I wish my own child had survived to play with them.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry, sir. Wish she had, too,¡± Brian replied. ¡°We¡¯re very grateful.¡±


    ¡°I know you are,¡± Gideon said, clapping Brian on the back. ¡°And I¡¯m glad to have you. If you see others like yourself, have them wait nearby. I¡¯ll vet them when I return. Meanwhile, keep those walls rising. They¡¯re the crux of our defenses. With them, we¡¯ll be a much harder target to attack.¡±


    ¡°You think we¡¯re going to see major attacks,¡± Brian said. It wasn¡¯t a question, not really.


    Gideon nodded. ¡°I do. This Event, whatever it was? It hasn¡¯t gone away. We have to assume this is the new normal, and probably will be forever. The old order is gone. Destroyed. That sort of power vacuum always causes trouble. Whether it¡¯s the monsters, groups of humans, or both, eventually I¡¯m sure we¡¯ll come under attack. That¡¯s why I want us to become as strong as possible while we have breathing room.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll make it happen, sir.¡±


    ¡°I know you will,¡± Gideon replied.


    Then he walked off to ready the band of troops he was bringing with him. Gideon was headed to Lakeview Cemetery. The one he¡¯d fought so hard to capture was one of the largest in the city, but Lakeview was another very large graveyard. There ought to be as many undead there as there were at St. Joseph¡¯s. He would go there and work his way through the undead, capturing ever more crystals. With luck, he could double his power, maybe even find out what tier six looked like. He¡¯d already reached tier five with multiple spells, and was closing on it with others.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Animate Dead


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Control Undead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Harm


    Point 3, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Curse


    Point 4: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Will


    He was fairly confident that once he ranked the Animate Dead spell up to a second tier five, the two stones would merge and become a single tier six spell. Once that happened, Gideon intended to begin ranking yet another Animate Dead spell in the outer ring slot. The more units he could control, the stronger he was.


    At present, he could Animate twenty-four tier one units, and Control eighteen more. He had Animate maxed out, but only had fourteen skeletons under his Control; he¡¯d lost a few in a quick skirmish with goblins earlier in the day. They were becoming an increasing annoyance, and would need dealing with sooner rather than later.


    That still left him with thirty-eight undead under his command, since he¡¯d Animated entirely tier one minions, rather than opting for stronger ones. At the moment he needed extra hands most. More undead allowed him to send out more scouting and supply runs, while still continuing work on the wall. More hands working on the wall meant it would go up all the sooner.


    He would take the undead he Controlled with him, Gideon decided, and leave the Animated ones behind. With a mental nudge, he ordered the Animated skeletons to remain at the base, not venturing further than fifty feet outside the walls. They should defend against attackers, protect Brian and his family, and obey Brian¡¯s orders around construction and¡ªhe decided, after a brief hesitation¡ªdefense, at least until Gideon returned.


    No, he needed to take one Animated undead with him¡ªhis horse. He wanted to be mounted for this trip. It wouldn¡¯t get him where he was going much faster, since he¡¯d still be locked to the pace of his skeletons. But it would leave him fresher, should they run into trouble, and would also allow him a quick getaway if they encountered something he couldn¡¯t handle.


    Twenty-three undead should still be enough to keep Brian¡¯s family safe, and give him the work crew he needed to continue his efforts. The other fourteen skeletons plus his horse ought to be strong enough to keep Gideon safe on his travels. Thus decided, he gathered the troops, mounted his horse, and rode out through the front gate with a wave to Brian.


    He¡¯d return in a day or two with even greater strength. Nor was this the last graveyard in the area. Gideon Carver would get to all of them, in due time, and suck the power from each spot, growing stronger as he did. By the time he was done, no one would be able to contest his domain.

 Chapter 43 - Caster Duel

    Chapter 43 - Caster Duel


    My archers were already shooting, firing arrows into the oncoming goblin swarm. I ducked back behind the line of my skeleton warriors and ordered them to advance, protecting themselves with their shields. Ahead of me, the less well armed tier one skeletons were doing their best to skirmish with the first goblins, but they were going to be overwhelmed fast if I didn¡¯t do something.


    ¡°Advance!¡± I called out, and my undead got moving.


    A huge fireball streaked by overhead, and I ducked instinctively even though it was nowhere near me. The thing slammed into a car about twenty feet back, and I felt the heat from the burst, even at that distance. I did not want to get hit with that!


    ¡°Holy crap, Alfred! What was that?¡± I hollered. He¡¯d mentioned fireballs, I recalled. I wasn¡¯t sure what I¡¯d expected, but that was damned terrifying.


    Alfred was back with his warriors already, getting them lined up and organized. He had them spread out, though, probably because they already knew about the fireballs. I ordered my skeletons to do the same. No sense losing an entire squad to one lucky hit.


    ¡°That¡¯s their spell caster,¡± Alfred shouted back. ¡°You think your guys can take him? If we need to run, we should do it now, while they¡¯re still coming at us.¡±


    I considered that a moment. That was no way a tier one spell. It had to be at least tier two, maybe higher. It would obliterate my undead if it hit. But from what Alfred said it sounded like the enemy only had one caster able to do this stuff. If I could take him down, then that might make all the difference. He wasn¡¯t the only spell caster around, and it was time to show him that.


    ¡°Yeah, I¡¯ve got this,¡± I told him. ¡°Hunker down.¡±


    He looked like he was going to object, but then shook his head and ordered his people to take cover behind some of the still-smoking cars. With his people in relative safety, I could focus on dealing with the threat.


    First I ordered my entire line of battle to rush the enemy, and I was hot on their heels. There might be a lot of goblins out there, but I was willing to bet the caster didn¡¯t want to fry his own troops. Once we were at close range, he wouldn¡¯t be able to toss fireballs at us without killing a lot of goblins, too.


    A fireball smashed into one of my warriors, and it exploded, sending shards of bone flying in all directions. One chunk of rib slashed past my face, narrowly missing me. I really needed to get some armor, and probably a helmet, and I needed them sooner rather than later. Instead I kept my shield up to protect myself as best I could. It wouldn¡¯t be enough to block a fireball, but it would protect me from shrapnel.


    There! I saw the caster. It was another goblin, interestingly enough. He was bigger than most of the other goblins, and dressed in some rudimentary armor, while most of them wore rags. He was still too far away for my Drain Life spell, but that wasn¡¯t my only ranged weapon now.


    First I cast Contagion, hitting the nearest goblins, who were packed in close against one another to fight my warriors. The spell quickly spread from one to the next, staggering the enemy force. I could see a visible difference in each goblin as it became afflicted. They were weaker, less coordinated, and more tired. One stumbled and fell forward on its face, only to be smushed by a heavy hammer blow from one of my skeleton warriors. With the front rank of the enemy force weakened, my undead tore through them.


    I pushed us forward, ordering my undead to advance as fast as they could. Another fireball flew by overhead, smashing into one of my archers and destroying it. Damn it, I was losing undead too quickly here! Fortunately I¡¯d be able to replace at least some of them. I¡¯d already seen Dr. Carver Animate a goblin, back on that first day, so I knew it would work.


    We punched through the enemy line. My warriors went to work ripping apart their backline, and opened a gap just wide enough for me to break through. I surged ahead, Hope right beside me to watch my back, two skeleton warriors flanking me as well. Together we pushed straight on for the goblin caster.


    He¡¯d seen me for sure, but he apparently had the same limitations I did in terms of casting¡ªtoo many shots wore him out. He¡¯d gone for the archers because they were trying to shoot him. An arrow protruded from a dead goblin right beside the enemy caster. But now he had no juice left to handle me, whereas I still had a full tank.


    And now I was in Drain Life range.


    I cast the spell, black fire launching from my hand toward the goblin. He shrieked and tried to duck behind a shield, but my spell didn¡¯t work like that. You couldn¡¯t deflect it; it didn¡¯t bounce off. The black fire wreathed itself around him, sinking into the goblin, sucking out his power and vitality before returning them to me.


    I felt renewed. The goblin? He¡¯d had better days, but he was still on his feet.If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    That was impressive. I¡¯d half expected him to drop with just the one spell. This guy was a lot stronger than his fellows. My timer was up to twenty seconds now on Drain Life, so I had a little ways to go on that. I slammed Curse down on him, instead.


    This was the first time I¡¯d cast the spell so I was curious what it would do. There was no light show, no black fire shooting from my fingertips. Instead, the Curse just took hold of him without fanfare. I felt the first tick of damage as it hit him, and watched the goblin double over in pain as sores appeared all over his body.


    He looked up, eyes scanning the battlefield for the source of the pain, and he saw me. His eyes locked with mine, and he raised the staff he carried, pointing it at me.


    ¡°Oh, shit!¡± I swore as I dove sideways, trying to get behind some sort of cover before he could finish casting.


    The fireball rocketed through the air, smacking into the ground where I¡¯d been standing with a roaring explosion of flame and heat. I was already in the air, so the burst picked me up and carried me further. I slammed into one of the overturned cars, my shoulder screaming in pain.


    Not cool. I was up in a flash, looking for the little green bastard so I could give him another dose of Drain Life. But he wasn¡¯t there anymore, wasn¡¯t anywhere close to where he¡¯d been standing before. He¡¯d used the distraction to flee the battlefield, and the other goblins were beating feet, too. Frustrated, I cast the Drain Life on the nearest goblin, the black fire sucking life force from the hapless creature to heal my injured shoulder. It dropped to the ground, dead, and I felt much better right away.


    ¡°Form up,¡± I told my little army. I counted my losses. The goblins killed three of my Controlled skeletons, one warrior archer, and two of the melee warriors. Not super great, but most of those losses were Animated, rather than Controlled. That was good, because it was a lot easier to replace Animated losses.


    I wondered if there would come a time when I¡¯d ditch the Control Undead spell entirely. I mean, it was nice to have. But I could only replace losses when I ran into undead. With Animate? Well, my guys and I had killed fifteen goblins over the course of that short fight. That would let me more than replace my losses.


    ¡°Holy shit, Selena,¡± Alfred said, walking over to join me. ¡°That¡ªthat was amazing!¡±


    ¡°Yeah?¡± I asked, honestly shocked. I¡¯d half expected him to be horrified. I¡¯d cast a Contagion spell, a Curse, and multiple Drain Life spells. It wasn¡¯t what most people would call ¡®nice¡¯ magic.


    ¡°Yeah,¡± he replied, nodding earnestly. ¡°That rocked. I wish you¡¯d been here last night, now. They never would have beat us back.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t too sure of that. This time I knew in advance I was up against another caster, and I¡¯d rushed him to take him down quickly. More than that, he hadn¡¯t known I was there. I¡¯d carried all the advantages, this time. Next time might not be as easy, and a sneak attack in the middle of the night, when I couldn¡¯t see the goblin caster to target him? That could have gone very differently.


    Maybe I needed to socket that Nightvision spell again, after all¡­


    I didn¡¯t tell Alfred all of that, of course. Why blow the good vibes? ¡°Glad I was able to help this time, anyway.¡±


    ¡°You sure did,¡± Alfred said.


    I went over and began looting the goblins for the crystals and recovering the arrows my skeletons had shot. It didn¡¯t take long. I got back most of the arrows we¡¯d shot, although one snapped. I also found two kind of crappy bows and two quivers of goblin arrows. They weren¡¯t as good as the modern weapons I¡¯d already found, but every bit helped.


    Fifteen goblins gave me fifteen crystals, five brown and ten clear. Best of all, I knew what they were without socketing the things. I had two Strength, two Agility, one Stamina, two Will, one Intellect, and two Charisma, for the clear ones. The brown ones were more skill type effects: one each of Weapon Making, Armor Making, Tracking, Building, and¡­Farming?


    We were getting skill drops for Farming now? I shook my head, wondering just what the world was going to look like in a couple of years, at the rate things were going.


    I hadn¡¯t told Alfred yet that I could identify the crystals without socketing them, and I wasn¡¯t sure I wanted to. He¡¯d let me loot the dead without protest, which was only fair from my perspective. My undead and I had killed every one of them, after all. But it felt fair to pass some of those along to his team. It would be a nice gesture, and one I could afford to make. If I kept my identification ability secret, I could pass off the trash crystals to his people and they¡¯d never know.


    But eventually they¡¯d find out. Sooner or later one of them would hit tier five, and they¡¯d know. That wouldn¡¯t be great for any sort of lasting relationship, and people were going to need to work together to survive this mess. With a small inward grumble, I went over to Alfred, coming up close so we could speak privately.


    ¡°I want you to have some of the crystals for your team,¡± I said. He looked like he was going to protest, so I held up a hand to forestall him. ¡°You all were here. Yeah, I killed them, but you¡¯re going to tell me if I¡¯d gotten in trouble you wouldn¡¯t have helped?¡±


    He shook his head. ¡°No, I would have.¡±


    ¡°Right. So, here you go,¡± I said. I handed him six crystals. ¡°Those two are Strength, that¡¯s Agility, that one is Stamina, and these two are Building and Farming.¡±


    ¡°Farming?¡± Alfred asked. ¡°That¡¯s weird.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what I said! But you¡¯re the one leading a community now, so maybe it¡¯ll help you more than me.¡±


    ¡°Hey¡ªyou didn¡¯t take the time to slot all of those,¡± Alfred said. ¡°How¡¯d you know? Another tier five power?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°I think so, yeah. I can tell what a crystal does just by touching it, now. It¡¯s a nice feature. I was getting tired of the damned things breaking.¡±


    ¡°Gonna have to work on getting my Strength up to five, myself.¡±


    ¡°Are you close?¡± I asked.


    He shook his head. ¡°Only tier three, remember? I¡¯ve got a long way to go yet, but I¡¯ll get there.¡±


    ¡°I know you will.¡± I looked over at the battlefield. ¡°Listen, we should clear out. Collect Lords¡¯ body and any other dead from last night. I¡¯m gonna Animate some goblins to replace my losses, and then we should skedaddle. Those guys were scared off, for now, but I can¡¯t guarantee they¡¯ll stay scared. We should motor.¡±


    ¡°You coming with us?¡± Alfred asked.


    I almost winced at the hopeful note in his voice. I¡¯d gotten used to working alone, relying on myself. Not worrying about getting backstabbed. But I shrugged. ¡°Sure. For now, at least.¡±


    ¡°Good. I¡¯ll get my people moving,¡± he replied, and hurried off.


    I looked down at Hope and sighed. ¡°So much for solitude.¡±


    She gave me a peppy bark and wagged her tail. I had to smile at that, so I reached down to pat her skeleton head. Then we set off to animate ourselves some goblins.

 Chapter 44 - Lemon Fresh Zombies

    Chapter 44 - Lemon Fresh Zombies


    Alfred opted to bury their dead right away, rather than trying to bring them back to the others. They¡¯d taken shelter in a UVM building, he told me, and there were monsters wandering around outside it. Burying someone there wouldn¡¯t be simple. I had my skeletons do the job; since one of them already had a shovel as its ¡®pole arm,¡¯ it didn¡¯t take too long to dig six graves for the bodies we found.


    I found myself staring at Lords¡¯ face as the skeletons tossed dirt on top of him. Could things have gone differently? If I¡¯d stayed, would he have accepted my story? Alfred told me Lords had effectively banished me in absentia¡ªhe¡¯d declared I wasn¡¯t to be welcomed back, if I tried to return. I didn¡¯t think he¡¯d have changed his mind just because I was still standing there when he showed up to the ¡®scene of the crime.¡¯


    But maybe he wouldn¡¯t be dead, then. It was a sobering thought.


    By the time we had their dead into the ground and covered, it was heading into late afternoon. I wanted to get moving and check out the Air Guard base. Alfred wanted to get home to the rest of his people.


    ¡°I¡¯ve already been gone too long,¡± he argued. ¡°We have a lot of defenseless folks back there. I took half our fighters with me.¡±


    ¡°Defenseless folks? At this point, nobody should be defenseless anymore,¡± I shot back. ¡°They¡¯re freeloading, and it¡¯s a bad plan.¡±


    He shot me a look that said he agreed with me but couldn¡¯t say so. Ouch, that had to suck. Alfred had an overdeveloped sense of responsibility, and it was going to get him killed if he wasn¡¯t careful. I sighed, but figured I¡¯d at least go with him to his new base. My troops would be more than enough to keep his squad safe for the walk.


    We set off, moving along the main roads. I had my warriors on point, except the archers, who were close to me. The other skeletons were on my flanks, and Rosie and Guildie brought up the rear. Alfred, his people, Hope, and myself were all tucked in the middle of a comfy undead sandwich.


    Which is actually a gross concept, now that I¡¯ve said it. Unfortunately that¡¯s exactly how a lot of his people were reacting to them, too¡ªlike the undead were disgusting things they wanted to be far away from. I reminded myself that I¡¯d had days to get used to running around with dead things. It didn¡¯t bother me anymore. Even the zombie smell was mostly covered up with a couple of spritzes of a bathroom spray I¡¯d found while searching houses.


    Lemon fresh zombies for the win!


    They hadn¡¯t had that time, so it was only natural they¡¯d feel a little unnerved. This felt like more than that, though. At least a couple of them really didn¡¯t like me, which told me there were more than a few stories about me circulating in the group.


    Alfred led us directly down the road toward the core of campus, then turned off as we approached Jeffords Hall. It was a science building focused on biology¡ªmostly plant stuff. As places to set up went, I¡¯d have aimed for agriculture instead, but it wasn¡¯t an awful idea. There were wet labs; the building had a decent reservoir of water, and there was a water tower just outside. It would work for a while. The enormous glass windows covering the entire area around the entryway¡ªstretching up all three stories¡ªwere mostly shattered, though. I had to wonder how secure they could possibly be in this place.


    ¡°How are you guarding that whole building?¡± I asked. ¡°It seems too big, unless you have a lot more people than I remembered.¡±


    ¡°We do have more,¡± Alfred said. ¡°A few more people joined us every day. But we¡¯re not trying to hold the entire place. We¡¯ve got everyone up on the top floor, and then we filled the stairwells with desks, chairs, lockers¡ªanything we could find. No way an attacker can get up there.¡±


    ¡°No easy way down, either,¡± I pointed out. ¡°What¡¯s your escape plan if they, I don¡¯t know, toss fireballs at the building and set it alight?¡±This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.


    Alfred pursed his lips tight, frowning and looking away. He didn¡¯t reply. I didn¡¯t need him to; it was obvious he didn¡¯t have an answer for my question. When, not if, the goblins hit this place, they were trapped inside. They might be able to stop the goblins from coming upstairs, although I wasn¡¯t even certain of that¡ªthe goblins seemed good at building stuff, and ladders were not that hard.


    But all they really had to do was toss a bunch of fireballs through the gaping hole all those shattered windows made. Toss them into the first and second levels, where they¡¯d catch the place on fire and start burning it from the bottom up. It¡¯s what I¡¯d do, if I were them, anyway.


    If I didn¡¯t convince these people to leave, they were all going to die.


    When we got to the front entry, I saw how they were going up and down. Alfred hollered for ropes, and they dropped a trio of heavy ropes, each one knotted multiple places to make them easier to climb.


    ¡°You okay managing the ropes?¡± Alfred asked me. ¡°We have one seat-lift we can use for people who can¡¯t climb that well.¡±


    With my agility, I figured I could handle it at least as well as he could, so I just flashed him a nod and a smile. But I was wrong. Alfred moved to the nearest rope, grabbed on, and all but launched himself up it. He didn¡¯t even bother using his legs, or the knots. He just went up hand over hand, each time lunging a good meter higher. It was nuts. I¡¯d never seen such a display of raw strength.


    Tier three Strength made a big difference. It was a good thing to remember. I gave orders to my undead, having them slip into the ground floor of the building to stand guard, but to fight back if attacked.


    Then it was my turn, and I made my way up quickly, too. Maybe not quite as fast as Alfred had, but well enough that my high school self would¡¯ve been pleased. I hated climbing the stupid rope in gym class. Now? It was a breeze.


    When I reached the top, Samson and George were both a short distance away, huddled up with Alfred and talking. They were quiet enough that I couldn¡¯t pick out the words, but the looks George shot me gave me the idea they were probably discussing me.


    I went over to them, and they broke up their circle, all turning to face me. ¡°Samson, good to see you healed up okay. George, good to see you, too.¡±


    Samson nodded to me. George glared daggers. He wasn¡¯t happy, clearly.


    ¡°Lords said she wasn¡¯t allowed back,¡± George spat out. ¡°If she came calling, we were to send her packing.¡±


    ¡°Lords is dead,¡± Alfred said. ¡°We need to figure out how to move forward on our own now.¡±


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t mean we just ignore what he told us to do!¡± George said.


    ¡°No, it doesn¡¯t,¡± Alfred replied. ¡°But you said you wanted me to take charge, remember? If you¡¯re changing your mind and want to take over¡­¡±


    George shook his head vehemently. ¡°No, that¡¯s not for me. I¡¯m not a leader. But damn it, boy. She¡¯s a murderer! She killed my friend, and if we let her back in here, she¡¯ll kill more of us, mark my words.¡±


    ¡°You wanna tell us what happened that day, Selena?¡± Samson rumbled.


    ¡°I can, if you want,¡± I said. When they didn¡¯t respond, I assumed that meant I should continue. ¡°Neal told me they¡¯d found something. Asked me to come with him. As soon as I got to the back yard, I knew something was wrong, but didn¡¯t know what. It was an ambush.


    ¡°Tom hit me with Entangle, locking me in place. Then Brad came out of hiding and rushed me, hoping to take my head off. Fortunately for me, when they attacked me it triggered the ¡®guard¡¯ reflex for my undead. Hope rushed Tom. My zombies went after Brad, and then Neal as well when he hit me with his club.¡±


    ¡°You did none of that damage? We saw stab wounds, some bad ones,¡± Samson said.


    ¡°No, I fought too,¡± I replied, keeping my chin high. ¡°I managed to get a shot in against Neal with my axe, and cast a Drain Life on Brad. If I hadn¡¯t done those things, I¡¯d be dead right now instead of them. Not sorry.¡±


    George turned to Alfred. ¡°And you believe her?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I think I do,¡± Alfred replied. ¡°You saw how Brad was. The guy was an asshole, he was already hostile toward her more than once, and I heard some of the shit he was talking during that first snake barbecue. You did, too, I bet. I can¡¯t say I¡¯m shocked he tried something like this.¡±


    George looked like he was about to retort something, but then shook his head, turned on his heel, and walked away.


    I shrugged. ¡°Sorry, Alfred. I didn¡¯t mean to make waves here. If you want me to just go, I can.¡±


    He shook his head. ¡°No, I want you to see what we¡¯ve got going on here, anyway. With your undead down at the ground, I doubt anyone will see you as a major threat right now. They might be a bit more nervous if you had all your critters with you.¡±


    Behind us the rest of his squad was finishing the climb into the top floor. All of them ignored me. How was I going to convince these people they were doomed if they stayed here, if they all hated my guts?


    I wasn¡¯t. That was the answer, and I could feel it coming. Part of me wanted to just leave now and save myself the trouble, but it felt wrong to not at least try. I followed Alfred deeper into his lair, wondering if there was any hope for these people at all.

 Chapter 45 - Lot To Ask

    Chapter 45 - Lot To Ask


    Their lair was a true mess. They had an excuse; they¡¯d fled the police station in the middle of the night and holed up in this place, huddled and fearful. Then they¡¯d spent the morning setting it up to be defensible, what with filling the stairwells. I still wasn¡¯t convinced that was a smart plan.


    What they hadn¡¯t spent time on was making the interior more livable.


    Blankets were draped over tables to form partitions in the rooms, allowing for some semblance of privacy, but the whole setup looked like a scene from a war movie¡ªthe part where the residents of the bombed-out city were huddled in the dark trying to stay alive. It wasn¡¯t a pretty sight.


    Alfred hadn¡¯t been kidding when he said they¡¯d picked up more people, though. He had dozens of refugees living in those rooms. I saw one woman trying to wrangle a pair of kids while she breastfed a baby. Right next to her was an older man, just sitting on the dirty concrete floor, staring at his hands. Some folks were handling the changes and adapting, while others¡­just weren¡¯t. Was there a way to help people like that man? I didn¡¯t know.


    ¡°Alfred, this is a lot more people than you had before,¡± I told him in a soft voice.


    ¡°Yeah. I¡¯ve been taking a team out on scouting runs, and we¡¯ve been bringing back more refugees to the camp as we searched.¡±


    I nodded. That explained why he had so many crystals, too. He¡¯d been out there, facing down danger. ¡°We need to get these people somewhere safer. If the goblins attack, it¡¯s not going to end well.¡±


    ¡°I know. But where do I take them? You said something about the Air Guard base?¡±


    ¡°I haven¡¯t been to see it yet, but a lot of houses nearby the airport have been carefully abandoned,¡± I said. ¡°Like, the people are gone, but there¡¯s no sign of violence or struggle, and they packed up before leaving. Took a lot of food and clothes, stuff they might need. They had to have gone somewhere, and it looks like they went as a group.¡±


    ¡°Probably were picked up by someone¡¯s patrol,¡± Alfred said, nodding. ¡°We did that, basically. Swept buildings on campus and rows of houses, looking for survivors. When we found them, we invited them to pack up and join us at the station. But how do you know they¡¯re gathering at the Guard base?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t. It¡¯s just a guess because it¡¯s nearby.¡±


    He led us into a room, inviting George, Samson, and two people I didn¡¯t know in with us, then shutting the door. It had been a classroom space before. Now, he¡¯d rearranged a few chairs into a circle, for meetings I presumed.


    ¡°Have a seat, folks. For those who don¡¯t know her, this is Selena. She¡¯s a classmate of mine. Selena, you know George and Samson. This is Kara, and Joe. They were fighting alongside me that day Brad attacked you, and they¡¯ve come with me on my patrols ever since,¡± Alfred said.


    I checked them out. Both of them were tier two, as were George and Samson. Was Alfred the only tier three person in this entire group? No wonder they¡¯d made him leader. But that was not good at all. It meant that most of these people hadn¡¯t been out there fighting. They¡¯d been holed up, hiding, instead. Good short-term strategy with terrible long-term results.


    George still looked pissed. Samson looked cool and reserved. Kara eyed me skeptically. I recognized her, now, from the fighting that morning, before everything went to shit. Joe just had his eyes on Alfred and no one else. I wasn¡¯t sure if that was hero worship or something more, but there was some intense emotion going on there.


    ¡°We need to figure out what we¡¯re doing next,¡± Alfred said. ¡°You¡¯ve all been leaders in this group, so I brought you in to hash it out. Selena thinks she knows where there¡¯s a gathering point. But¡­she¡¯s not sure.¡±


    He looked toward me, so I guessed that was my signal to explain. ¡°I found a bunch of abandoned houses near the airport. People had packed up and left, and it looked like they¡¯d gone together, as a group. My hunch is that the Air Guard base might be out doing patrols, bringing people together.¡±


    ¡°Did you see the base?¡± George asked. ¡°Go there, I mean?¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°Not yet, no. It was where I¡¯d planned to head next, but then I saw the smoke rising from the station and headed west instead to make sure you were all okay.¡±


    ¡°We could have used the assist last night, but we¡¯re okay now,¡± Kara said. ¡°You¡¯re not sure that Guard base is even still there then, are you?¡±


    ¡°What do you mean?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Airplanes,¡± Kara replied, like that explained everything. When we all still stared at her with a blank look, she sighed and went on. ¡°When the power died and the car engines went out, what do you think happened to any airplane still in the air? Anything taking off or landing at the airport just dropped out of the sky. It¡¯s got to have been a mess over there.¡±Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    Shit, she wasn¡¯t wrong. I hadn¡¯t even really considered the fallout from everything that happened. How many airplanes were in the air at any given time? I didn¡¯t know the answer, but it had to be thousands, right? Now everyone aboard all of those planes was probably dead.


    I¡¯d come to assume the Event was global; it was the only thing that really made sense. If it hadn¡¯t been, I was sure someone would¡¯ve figured out a way to get aid into the affected area by now. They could have set people up on bicycles, maybe towed trailers of supplies with some bikes, or something. No aid had appeared, no outside backup at all. To me, that shouted volumes about how large scale this catastrophe had been.


    Everyone who¡¯d been relying on power to survive was dead. Every ICU patient, everyone who needed oxygen supplementation. Every person aboard a plane. People on boats out in the ocean were likely dead as well, or would be eventually when their food and water ran out. I shivered, thinking about anyone on the train that passed under the English Channel. They¡¯d be utterly in the dark with miles of tunnel between themselves and freedom, probably surrounded by monsters, too.


    ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s a good point,¡± I said, after a pause. ¡°But the Air Guard side of the field is separated from the civilian. They¡¯ve got runways between them which ought to work as firebreaks, right?¡±


    Kara nodded. ¡°It¡¯s possible, for sure. I just think we need to make sure there¡¯s actually someone there before hauling all of these people someplace miles away, across dangerous terrain, to somewhere that may or may not have help. We get people all the way there on a hope, and they¡¯re going to be pissed if we¡¯re wrong. Hope isn¡¯t a strategy.¡±


    I chuckled. ¡°You talk like you¡¯re in the military yourself.¡±


    ¡°Kinda am. Army ROTC, so I¡¯m technically a ¡®cadet¡¯ rank,¡± Kara replied with an easy smile. ¡°I don¡¯t have a ton of training, but even the bit I¡¯ve gotten has helped some. More in terms of attitude than anything else.¡±


    ¡°I bet!¡± I replied. ¡°Could have used you for some small unit tactics the other day.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be glad to help,¡± Kara replied. ¡°But for now, I think we need to keep the civilians here, at least until we¡¯re sure there¡¯s a good option elsewhere.¡±


    It made sense, what she was saying. I hated it, because it meant that mom and her kids were going to remain in this deathtrap for another day or two while someone checked out the base. If that goblin with the fireballs hit this place, there was no way they could defend it. Would the handheld fire extinguishers work, still? I thought they might, since they ran on pressurized gas. That should still function. Probably.


    But would it be enough to keep the building from burning down after the goblins lobbed half a dozen fireballs into the lower levels? I doubted it. They¡¯d designed themselves a fortress, but it was one they couldn¡¯t easily escape.


    ¡°Do you think you can keep them from burning down the building if they attack?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Maybe,¡± Alfred replied. ¡°We do have an escape route, though. There¡¯s an elevator shaft cleared. We can get people down the ladder, through the roof of the elevator¡ªit¡¯s stuck at the basement level. Then out the doors, down a hall, and there¡¯s a tunnel connecting to one of the neighboring buildings. We¡¯ve got a way out if things get bad, Selena.¡±


    ¡°Well, that¡¯s a relief,¡± I said. It still wouldn¡¯t be easy. Was Kat going to be able to climb down a ladder, missing a foot? Would that mom be able to get her kids and baby down safely? ¡°You want someone to go check out the Air Guard base. I¡¯m sort of assuming you want me to go check it out, right?¡±


    There was a brief pause as the rest of them looked at one another, then finally back at me. Alfred spoke first. ¡°If you¡¯d be willing, that would be terrific. You¡¯ve got your undead. They¡¯ll keep you safe, so you don¡¯t need to take a whole team with you. Find out if there are people there and if they¡¯re taking on more refugees, then come back and let us know?¡±


    I hesitated a moment before answering, so he went on.


    ¡°I know it¡¯s a lot to ask. But I can¡¯t go¡ªthey need me here. I can send a team, but I¡¯ve only got about a dozen people who are even vaguely combat effective. I¡¯d need to send half our fighters to even have a chance of them making it safely, and that would put everyone else in danger.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I can do it,¡± I told him at last. I kept seeing that mom and her baby. There was no way she¡¯d survive without some sort of secure location. Her kids, too. ¡°I¡¯ll go check the place out.¡±


    ¡°We should send someone trustworthy with her,¡± George snapped. ¡°I can¡¯t believe we¡¯re planning to trust a known murderer with something this important, but I understand the need. Even so, we should send one of our own along, just to be sure she does what she says.¡±


    My temper washed over me like a wave. ¡°Really? Murderer? Listen, asshole. Your friend tried to kill me. I¡¯m sorry I had to kill him. More sorry than you can know. But I¡¯m not sorry that I¡¯m alive and he¡¯s not.


    ¡°You want to send someone with me? Sure. But if you think that will somehow control me, or shape what I do, think again. Do you really think any one, or hell any ten of you could stop me, if I didn¡¯t want to be stopped? Send someone with me if you¡¯d like, but if they turn out to be another Brad, they¡¯ll be another dead asshole.¡±


    George looked like he was going to get out of his chair and launch himself at me, but Alfred put a restraining hand on his shoulder, and I got to see what tier three Strength looked like when applied. George didn¡¯t move at all.


    Kara spoke up, then. ¡°I¡¯ll go.¡±


    Everyone stopped and looked at her.


    ¡°It makes sense to have a rep from our group there, and no offense meant Selena, but you¡¯re not from our group at this point,¡± Kara said. ¡°I¡¯ve got skills that might be useful in the field, and I know how to talk to military folks, which might also help. I won¡¯t get in your way or slow you down, and I¡¯m also not a testosterone-fueled reject from an apocalyptic film like the guy who came after you, so I¡¯m not worried about that.¡±


    Everyone in the room turned from her to look at me.


    I considered it for a moment and then smiled. ¡°Sure, I¡¯m good with that. I¡¯m in charge?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re the one with the undead legion,¡± Kara replied, deadpan. ¡°You¡¯re in charge.¡±


    ¡°We have a plan,¡± Alfred said, standing to close out the meeting. ¡°Let¡¯s make it happen. The sooner we get these people somewhere safe, the better.¡±

 Chapter 46 - Gunpowder Burns

    Chapter 46 - Gunpowder Burns


    As the meeting broke up, I approached Alfred. He flashed me a smile, hints of the annoying, gawky med student he¡¯d been a week ago still there on his face, although so much had changed that I knew he was no longer that man.


    ¡°What¡¯s up?¡± Alfred asked.


    ¡°I was hoping I could go check in with Kat, before we head out,¡± I said. ¡°Just to say hi, let her know I¡¯m okay.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s no problem,¡± he replied. He called out across the room, ¡°Kara, how long will it take you to get ready to go?¡±


    ¡°I can be ready in twenty minutes or so,¡± she replied.


    ¡°Sounds good. Meet over by the ropes when you¡¯re set,¡± Alfred said. Then he turned back to me. ¡°We¡¯ve got a little time. Why don¡¯t you come with me, I¡¯ll take you to her?¡±


    We proceeded through their lair, the squalor and grime still getting to me. They¡¯d only been in this place for less than a day, but it was a mess. I didn¡¯t want to think about what the bathrooms looked like¡ªI caught a whiff as someone came out of one, holding their nose. It was rank.


    Dozens of people trapped in a closed space without running water, flush toilets, or the ability to bathe. The whole place reeked.


    Alfred saw me looking and grimaced. ¡°Yeah, I know it¡¯s bad. And getting worse.¡±


    ¡°This won¡¯t work as a base,¡± I told him. ¡°Not in the long run. You¡¯ve got no water, no easy routes in and out, and frankly, not even close to enough defenders.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯d have more defenders if you joined us. Your undead would make this place a lot safer.¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°I appreciate the vote of confidence, and my spells would add something. But it¡¯s not enough, not by myself. Even with my undead it wouldn¡¯t be enough to keep this place secure. Sooner or later someone is going to hit you harder than you can fight, and it¡¯s gonna be a mess.¡±


    ¡°What do you suggest, then?¡± Alfred asked, his voice getting hot.


    It hadn¡¯t been my intention to piss him off. ¡°You need to get these people out there, Alfred. These crystals, they¡¯re not really optional anymore. If people want to survive, they¡¯re going to have to learn to fight.¡±


    His shoulder sagged, telling me that he knew I was right. Alfred looked away. ¡°I know. I do know! But how do I get them to do that? These people are scared, Selena. They¡¯re terrified. Most of them are too scared to step outside, let alone actually go on a scouting run. The idea of fighting a goblin isn¡¯t even on their radar. I don¡¯t know how to fix that.¡±


    I didn¡¯t, either, although I had suspicions about how it was going to resolve itself. People who didn¡¯t get on with living were going to find themselves dying. I figured probably half the population was already dead, and that was only going to continue plummeting as time went on. Once the food in supermarkets and shelves ran out, what then?


    Hunting and farming were going to become part of most folks¡¯ lives. That, or getting out there to fight monsters. Probably some of each, if I was being honest with myself, which wasn¡¯t all that appealing. I had only a limited clue about basic gardening. Farming was way past my skill level.


    ¡°Here we are,¡± Alfred said. ¡°Room 314. She¡¯s inside. Kat¡¯s been watching a lot of the kids, especially the ones who¡­whose parents didn¡¯t make it.¡±


    I winced at that. As bad as the Event had been for everyone, it had to be a lot worse for kids. Kat was good at handling rugrats, though. She always had been. ¡°Good call on the job for her. Your idea, or hers?¡±


    ¡°Hers,¡± Alfred replied, opening the door for me. ¡°Kat? Someone here to see you.¡±


    Kat was in the far corner of the room, surrounded by a pile of kids. The youngsters looked like about kindergarten age, give or take a year or two. Kat had a book in her hand¡ªwas she reading them stories? She startled when the door opened, reaching for a baseball bat on the floor beside her. A good reflex. Then she saw it was Alfred and relaxed. ¡°Yeah? Who?¡±Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    I stepped inside. ¡°Me.¡±


    ¡°Roomie!¡± she shouted. With an effort, Kat got herself back to her feet, grabbing the crutches from where they rested against the wall beside her. She was still missing most of her leg below the knee. No prosthetics easily available these days, I guess. I wondered if we could make her a peg leg or something? Kat the pirate?


    She started toward me, and I met her partway, where she scooped me into a hug. Somehow even with just one leg Kat still managed to act like she was pulling me up off the floor. She relaxed her grip, looking me up and down with an excited grin.


    ¡°You did make it!¡± Kat said. ¡°I knew you would. Figured you¡¯d run off to join someone who wouldn¡¯t backstab you, but it¡¯s good to see you. Been rough for us.¡±


    ¡°I heard. I didn¡¯t find another group, although I¡¯ve got a lead on one. I¡¯m taking off with Kara to go see if the Air Guard base is active. I have a hunch they¡¯ve turned themselves into a place for refugees to gather.¡±


    ¡°That would be excellent,¡± Kat replied. ¡°We were almost torched to death last night. We could use someplace safe. These kids have already been though enough.¡±


    ¡°I saw the damage. It¡¯s the smoke that made me come make sure you all were okay,¡± I told her. ¡°If the Guard base is taking people, Kara and I will find out, then come back for all of you.¡±


    ¡°And if they¡¯re not, then we¡¯ll just have to find someplace that is,¡± Kat replied, her tone way more upbeat than I remembered. Her lower lip trembled, though. She wasn¡¯t actually as optimistic as she wanted to sound.


    I glanced over at the kids. They were probably why. I could get behind spreading some hope around when young kids were in the room. ¡°That¡¯s right. Might take some time, but we can survive this.¡±


    Alfred coughed. I looked his way. ¡°We¡¯re getting close to time for you to head out.¡±


    Instinctively, I glanced at my watch. It had been about fifteen minutes since we left Kara to her packing, so he was right. She ought to be ready before too long. I let my sleeve drop back over the watch, but Alfred saw the movement.


    ¡°Does that thing work?¡± he asked, pointing to my wrist.


    ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s a wind-up. They still work. Just electronic ones don¡¯t.¡±


    ¡°Interesting. It¡¯s not just electronics, though. Cars don¡¯t work, but that could be an electrical thing. We did some tests, though, around guns and other explosives. Turns out, gunpowder still burns,¡± Alfred said.


    ¡°It does?¡± Having some firearms would change everything!


    ¡°Yeah, but it just burns. Slowly. No explosions,¡± Alfred said. ¡°We emptied out a few pistol rounds to check. Gunpowder is basically good for starting camp fires now, and not much else. I found a pack of firecrackers. Same deal. They smolder, slowly burning, but they don¡¯t go bang. Not anymore.¡±


    ¡°Well, wind up clockwork things seem to still function,¡± I said, showing him my wrist. The watch was big for me, but beggars couldn¡¯t be choosers.


    He stared at it a good while, nodding to himself. ¡°That¡¯s good to know. Most watches used batteries, and those are all toast. But if we can find some more wind-up ones, that could help us a lot in terms of coordination. I¡¯ll make sure my scout teams keep their eyes open for more.¡±


    I gave Kat another hug goodbye, and she told me to hurry back with good news. Then we were on our way back to the opening at the center of the building, where all the ropes waited to lower us to the ground. Kara wasn¡¯t there yet when we arrived, but she didn¡¯t keep us waiting long.


    When she walked over, she¡¯d changed her clothes. She wore sensible boots, jeans, a light long-sleeve shirt with police body armor over it, and carried a good size backpack. At her hip was a quiver of arrows, and she had a bow in her hand.


    ¡°Archer?¡± I asked.


    She nodded. ¡°I used to shoot for fun before the world exploded. Now I shoot to survive. I¡¯ve got a tier two Agility and tier one Charisma stone, too.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t sure how much good the Charisma stone would do. I¡¯d never messed with that one much. But maybe I ought to experiment more. After all, Kara here was on Alfred¡¯s inner council, and she was on her way to hopefully meet with a bunch of military officers. Having some extra Charisma couldn¡¯t hurt with those sorts of things, right?


    ¡°We¡¯ll see if we can get you some more stones along the road,¡± I said.


    ¡°I¡¯m game for that.¡±


    ¡°Good! I¡¯ve got a few archers among my undead. Stick with them as much as you can, stay behind the main shield wall, and I think we¡¯ll be fine.¡±


    Alfred had a few of his people toss the ropes over the edge, so Kara and I could descend. Once we¡¯d hit the bottom, I rallied up my undead. Hope was especially happy to see me, woofing and barking.


    Kara spotted him and gave him scritches where the ears would have been on a living dog. Hope¡¯s tail thumped against the ground so hard I worried for a moment she was going to snap it off.


    ¡°Dog lover,¡± Kara explained. She was beaming at Hope. ¡°Doesn¡¯t matter what breed.¡±


    ¡°Is bone dog a breed?¡± I asked with a laugh.


    ¡°I guess it is, now,¡± Kara replied. She stood back up, shifting the pack on her shoulders. ¡°We ready to get this show on the road?¡±


    ¡°I am. Let¡¯s go see if we can find somewhere safe for these folks.¡± Before it was too late, I didn¡¯t add.


    The late afternoon sun was already moving toward setting, and we had a lot of walking ahead of us. Travel at night would be much riskier than a daylight trip, but I wanted to get as far as we could before we stopped to rest. That meant making the best possible use of the daylight hours remaining.


    I shouldered my own pack, and passed mental orders to my undead regarding our marching order. The tier one skeletons were my scouts, again. Rosie and Guildie were my rear guard. The tier two undead, including Hope, stuck with Kara and I, forming a solid phalanx of shields with a scattering of bows behind them. We were as prepared as I could make us.


    With that, we set off into the evening, ready for whatever the night could throw our way. I hoped!

 Chapter 47 - Utterly Soundless

    Chapter 47 - Utterly Soundless


    Kara was an interesting traveling companion. She was interested in the undead, at first, but once she understood how they moved and fought, our conversations quickly moved on to other things. She was practical in a manner that most people lacked, and I truly appreciated that. Too many of Alfred¡¯s little group were sitting around like they thought someone was going to save them¡ªwhich, technically, was what the two of us were trying to do with this mission.


    That didn¡¯t make it okay. I felt in my gut that this world simply wasn¡¯t going to tolerate that sort of attitude anymore.


    Interestingly, Kara concurred. ¡°I think he¡¯s taking too light a hand. I know he only just got tossed command of that mess, and he¡¯s worried if he¡¯s too hard people will rebel or something. But he¡¯s not doing anyone favors by allowing them to sit there idle.¡±


    ¡°Exactly!¡± I said. ¡°Unfortunately, we¡¯ve got a lot of scared people who are, I don¡¯t know, in ¡®freeze¡¯ mode, I think? I looked at some of them, and they need help. Counselors, therapists, something¡­because they¡¯re going to die, if they don¡¯t get back out into the world and start carving a piece of it for themselves. Sooner or later some monster is going to kill them.¡±


    Or some person, I thought to myself. Alfred knew that, too. He told me he¡¯d had to kill a man, out there on one of his scouting runs. When he touched the body after, he¡¯d gotten the tier two Stamina crystal the man had embedded. I knew it because I¡¯d managed to loot crystals from Tom and Brad. But it was information both of us preferred be kept quiet, at least for the time being. There was no sense spreading word that anyone with crystals was a walking piggy bank, waiting to be raided.


    Not that I thought Alfred and I couldn¡¯t handle ourselves. We absolutely could. But who wanted to live like that?


    We¡¯d worked our way down Beaumont Avenue to Main Street, which wasn¡¯t really a street anymore at that section¡ªit was more like a small highway, three lanes full of stopped cars moving in each direction. We were avoiding the forest altogether, since there was a known enemy occupying that area. That left us open to new threats, though, so we kept our eyes open as we moved.


    There was movement out in the road. It had already grown dim enough, the sunlight starting to fade, that I couldn¡¯t tell exactly what it was, but we quietly shifted direction, moving into a large stand of trees off on the side of the road instead. It would be better to remain undetected, and there was a nice path between the trees that allowed easy enough movement.


    Right up until the lead skeletons in my brigade smacked into something and came to a halt, unable to continue. I ordered the rest of my undead to be on their guard, and advanced to check it out.


    ¡°Kara, I don¡¯t see anything here. Maybe some sort of magical force field?¡± I called out.


    ¡°Then order the skeletons back, and we can go around,¡± she replied.


    I did so, and they tried to move toward me¡ªbut they were stuck. That¡¯s when I finally realized what had halted them. As they strained to come toward me, I saw thin strands of silvery thread floating in the air.


    Webs.


    A quick glance to the right and left of me confirmed my worst fears. There was a wall of webbing across the path, and it extended into the trees on either side as well. We¡¯d walked right into a web cul-de-sac. ¡°Shit! Kara, spiders! It¡¯s web! Watch for spiders!¡±


    I made the snap decision to abandon the skeletons who¡¯d been stuck. This trap was well-made, carefully considered. I didn¡¯t want to fight whatever creature or creatures made it. I retreated back into the middle of my still mobile undead, and we began backtracking out of the trap.


    A leaf landed on my shoulder, and that happened to make me look up.


    It was utterly soundless as it dropped, this monstrous black thing the size of a pony. It made not a whisper of noise. If I hadn¡¯t felt the leaf land; if I hadn¡¯t looked up right away; if I had slotted anything other than the tier three Agility stone? I probably wouldn¡¯t still be here.


    But I saw the thing as it fell toward us. Without thinking about it I dove into Kara, slamming both of us out of the way with all the force I could muster. She swore with a startled yell as we both dropped clear. I pushed us so hard we almost both ended up in the webbing off on the side. I¡¯d knocked over one of my skeleton warriors, too.This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.


    The spider slammed down into the path just a second after we were clear. Its legs caught it easily as it went grasping for prey that was suddenly a fast moving target. One of the legs slammed my ankle with bruising force as we dodged.


    It whirled toward us, but I was already taking action. I still had my shield, which I planted firmly between us and the creature. Then I slammed down Curse followed immediately by Drain Life. The healing energy knitted my injured ankle back together, allowing me to easily rise back to my feet.


    The spider rushed me, and I bashed it in the face with my shield, screaming. The impact tossed me back a few feet to land on my butt. Kara was there, nocking an arrow to her bow, but she wasn¡¯t going to be quick enough. This thing moved like lightning.


    It had attacked me, though, and my undead were all still in ¡®guard¡¯ mode. They weren¡¯t as fast as the spider, not even the goblin zombie warriors. But there were a lot of them, and collectively all of my undead pounced on the thing. Spears stabbed, blades flashed, and the spider, large as it was, seemed to decide that discretion was the better part of valor. It jumped!


    I braced myself, holding my shield out, because I thought it first it was coming at me. But it had jumped clear, sailing to the side of a large tree. From there it started to scuttle away¡ªbut not before Kara nailed it with an arrow.


    ¡°Nice shot!¡± I called out. The arrow staggered the already wounded monster, and gave me time to cast Drain again. The black fire blazed a trail from my hand and struck the beast, which shuddered where it stood before dropping to the ground.


    I went to its side. Whether it was alive or not when it dropped, I wasn¡¯t sure, but the landing had certainly finished the job if my spell hadn¡¯t. I tapped the creature, and a very large crystal fell into my hand. I¡¯d hoped for a tier two stone from the thing, but what I got was something much better!


    The stone in my hand was tier three, and clear. Best of all, it was for Agility. It immediately sank into my palm and merged with my other tier three Agility stone. I sighed as I felt them consolidate into a tier four stone. Fast as I¡¯d been a moment before, I moved stronger, faster, and better now. I couldn¡¯t believe how fluid my body felt, like I could have run up the tree trunk just like the spider.


    Pretty cool. But I¡¯d accidentally eaten the loot. I frowned at that. Not fair to Kara. I turned to her, and she cocked her head sideways.


    ¡°The stone merged with one I already had socketed as soon as I touched it,¡± I said. ¡°It was a tier three Agility. Sorry.¡±


    She waved it off. ¡°It¡¯s okay. You and your undead did the majority of the work anyway.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but still not cool. We need to be splitting big prizes. Or alternating, or something.¡± I dug into my pocket. ¡°I¡¯ve got two tier three stones here, either of which might be useful for you. One is Nightvision, the other Strength. You want one?¡±


    ¡°You serious?¡± Kara asked. ¡°I won¡¯t say no, but we can just hand me the next bunch of crystals instead.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m serious. I don¡¯t want you thinking I¡¯m just out here picking up everything myself. If people are going to survive this mess, we¡¯re going to need to find ways to work well together.¡±


    ¡°Agreed. Okay, then¡ªI¡¯ll take the Nightvision. I can¡¯t believe you don¡¯t have that slotted already, but if you¡¯re offering, I¡¯ll take it. We could use that right now, don¡¯t you think?¡± Kara asked.


    I fished the stone out. I looked at it, hoping I wasn¡¯t going to find myself needing this spell at some point down the road. Now that I knew there were a lot more than five slots available, there were a lot of spells I thought might be more useful, even if they were situational like Nightvision.


    I peeked at the new layout of my crystals:


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Curse


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Contagion


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 3) - Will


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Agility


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead (Tier 2), Augment Undead (Tier 3), Augment Undead, Control Undead (Tier 2), Darkness (Tier 3), Darkness (Tier 2), Drain Life (Tier 2), Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana, Heal Undead (Tier 3), Heal Undead, Nightvision (Tier 3), Nightvision, Protection from Undead, Shadow Walk (Tier 2), Shadow Walk


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Strength (x2), Agility (Tier 2), Stamina (Tier 2), Stamina, Intellect (Tier 3), Charisma (Tier 2), Charisma, Will (Tier 2), Will


    Brown: Weapon Making, Armor Making, Tracking


    But I passed it over to her, and it slid easily into her hand the moment she held it. Kara looked at her palm, then at me. ¡°Wow! This is incredible. Not only can I see like its broad daylight, I think I have more clear vision than before, too. I can pick out individual leaves on trees from way further away. Thanks, Selena. I appreciate it.¡±


    ¡°No worries,¡± I replied, flashing her a smile. ¡°We should get moving, though. No telling if there are more spiders in these trees.¡±


    ¡°Oh, good point. What about your skeletons, though?¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re stuck in the web.¡±


    ¡°Which is probably flammable,¡± Kara pointed out, holding up a lighter.


    ¡°Oh!¡± Yeah, that made sense it would still work. My watch worked, so a lighter would as well. It was just pressure and a spark, after all. ¡°But, um¡ªthere¡¯s a lot of web in the trees around us. Are you sure¡­?¡±


    Kara was already off, chuckling as she approached the wall of web where my skeletons were stuck. She held the lighter near the web, then laughed. ¡°Let¡¯s find out, eh? Be ready to run.¡±


    Then she flicked the Bic and lowered it into the webbing.

 Chapter 48 - Petco Problems

    Chapter 48 - Petco Problems


    A short while later, we were walking away from the mess we¡¯d left behind. We were a little singed and smelled of smoke, but Kara¡¯s antics had recovered all of the trapped skeletons, so it was probably worth it.


    ¡°You¡¯re nuts, you know that?¡± I said.


    Kara chuckled. ¡°Nah, I figured we were good. Look, the webs burned, just like we thought, and the trees didn¡¯t all go up. I¡¯m bummed we couldn¡¯t get the other crystals, though.¡±


    There had been more spiders hiding in the trees. Half a dozen or so, all smaller ones like the few I¡¯d seen in the kitchen the day of the Event. When Kara lit up the web, it spread rapidly along the strands until it reached the trees. Then the flames shot up webs draped around the trees and from tree to tree, turning the whole thing into a massive, brief firebomb. One after another, a bunch of dog-sized spiders caught alight and dropped from the branches to the ground.


    I just ordered my undead to book it out of the trees and took off as fast as I could. I¡¯d halfway expected all the trees to catch fire and burn to the ground, but Kara was right. Almost none of them did.


    ¡°With the fires still burning in the underbrush and a couple of the trees, it didn¡¯t feel worth the risk trying to go in after them,¡± I pointed out.


    ¡°I agree. Still a bummer, though,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Whoa.¡±


    She put a hand against my chest, halting me.


    ¡°What?¡± I asked softly, halting the advance of my undead.


    ¡°There¡¯s something on the rooftop over there. A lookout,¡± Kara replied.


    I looked where she pointed but couldn¡¯t see anything. The evening was dark enough that her Nightvision had to be giving Kara a serious advantage at this point. If she said there was someone up there, I had to take her word for it. I tried to remember what was in that building¡ªit was a strip mall, basically. A string of stores in the same building. There was a Staples in there; I¡¯d shipped stuff out using that store. What else? An art store and a pet store, if I remembered right.


    We advanced with caution and halted in the shadows near a smashed up gas station. I was mentally cataloguing resources as we moved, and it occurred to me that each gas station still probably had a big underground reserve. While the gas wasn¡¯t exploding anymore, same as the gunpowder, it probably did still burn. That could be useful for a variety of things, from fires to weaponry. Maybe for more, too¡ªcould we use gasoline to power a steam engine, for example? Air pressure seemed to work, so maybe steam engines would as well¡­


    I snapped my attention back to the present. All of that would be important to figure out¡ªlater. When my life wasn¡¯t in imminent danger from whatever it was lurking out there in the dark. I¡¯d hoped to reach my little cottage base before it grew too dark, but with the spider delay, it was obvious that wasn¡¯t going to happen.


    ¡°Can we slip around whatever it is?¡± I whispered.


    ¡°Probably,¡± Kara replied, her voice low, too. ¡°Come on, we¡¯ll go across Main Street to the north side and use those trees over there for cover.¡±


    We did as she suggested, still using the undead to lead out. I¡¯d seen the hard way how valuable that could be. If one of us had fallen into that web, instead of the skeletons, there¡¯d have been no way to avoid the dropping spider. The trees gave us good concealment, but it wasn¡¯t enough. As we passed between the hotel to our north and the Staples plaza to the south, I saw movement on both sides. Bipedal beings with weapons gathered at the entrance to the hotel on one side of us, and the pet store entrance on the other. It looked like a good squad in either direction.


    I all but held my breath as we went by, wondering if we were about to get hit, but neither group rushed us. We continued moving toward the interstate, steadily chewing up the meters until we were past the danger area, and I heaved a sigh. ¡°Holy shit, that was tense. Could you see what they were?¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± Kara replied, her face grim. ¡°The group to the north? They were more goblins. I thought you said they had a fort in the forest?¡±Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


    ¡°They did. Or rather, there is a fort in the forest. I didn¡¯t see the goblins there, but I¡¯m pretty sure the wall I saw was their work. It had the same look as the other stuff they construct.¡±


    Kara grunted. ¡°Probably them, then. Well, it looks to me like they branched out. If they¡¯re controlling a forest fort and the hotel, that has to mean there¡¯s a lot of them. They¡¯re probably slowly consolidating, bringing in more goblins as they run into each other. Just like we are.¡±


    ¡°Makes sense. What about the south group? All I could see were shadowy figures standing near the pet store entrance.¡±


    ¡°Was that a pet store?¡± Kara laughed. ¡°Okay, that makes a weird sort of sense. They were rats. Like, rat-people. Rat faces, rat hands, rat bodies¡ªjust standing up on two legs and carrying spears and shit. I wonder if they used to be in cages in that store?¡±


    ¡°I mean, it could be. The first creatures I fought were cadavers that came to life in my anatomy class. Then spiders that I think used to be normal size that grew to be monsters. The snake we all ate for lunch that day.¡±


    ¡°That was good. We caught a couple more after you left, and ate them, too.¡±


    ¡°I was even wondering if the goblins used to be squirrels. Have you seen a squirrel since the event?¡± I asked.


    Kara thought for a moment, then shook her head. ¡°I haven¡¯t, now that you mention it. That¡¯s a scary thought. There were a lot of squirrels out here. If they¡¯re all goblins now, or even if a lot of them are, we could be in a world of hurt.¡±


    ¡°All the more reason to gather more crystals,¡± I replied. ¡°Only way to defend ourselves for sure.¡±


    We pressed on north up the highway, staying off the road itself. By remaining close to the east side, near the trees, Kara was able to spot the break in the forest where I¡¯d cut in toward the graveyard. It was full dark by the time we got that far, and I was halfway tempted to call a halt for the night. If Kara hadn¡¯t taken the Nightvision crystal I probably would have, but with that she was able to guide our way well enough.


    It was getting late by the time we made it out to Patchen Road. We popped out of the woods not far from that first cemetery I tackled. As we walked past, I noticed that there were two new skeletons inside it. I wondered why some had appeared right away, while others seemed to take time to pop out of the ground. Too damned many questions without answers. With luck and time, maybe some of them would become more clear to me.


    I cast Control Undead on the two skeletons. They were only tier one, but I¡¯d lost a few of them in the fight with the goblins, and this helped replenish my numbers some. Once they were under my Control, they could easily walk out of the graveyard gates and join us.


    From there it was a short walk down the road to the old man¡¯s house, where I¡¯d spent the night before. ¡°It was safe this morning,¡± I told Kara. ¡°But we¡¯ll want to clear it again now, just to be sure.¡±


    ¡°Of course. You like this particular house?¡±


    I shrugged. ¡°The man who¡¯d been living there had good vibes. I¡¯m wearing his watch. I buried him¡­¡±


    Kara looked at me quizzically, so I explained the story about finding the old man, his failed pacemaker, the probable cause of his death, and how I¡¯d take refuge in his home.


    She nodded at the end of the tale. ¡°Makes total sense to me. He didn¡¯t need his stuff anymore. You did. But you did the honorable thing and took care of his body, too. It was a nice touch. I figure the world has gone to shit, Selena, but we don¡¯t have to be shitty all the time too. If we can find ways to maintain our integrity, it¡¯ll only help when we look back on how we lived through this.¡±


    I stared at her. Was this the same woman who¡¯d cackled as she lit a small forest fire? She was an interesting contrast¡ªsometimes the joker, sometimes serious and smart.


    ¡°Yeah,¡± I said, simply. ¡°That feels right to me, too.¡±


    My undead warriors had the house cleared in minutes. There were no new opponents inside. I showed Kara a guest room. ¡°Figured this would work for you?¡±


    ¡°Sure, since it¡¯s upper floor. How are we managing security?¡±


    ¡°You okay with skeletons standing outside your door?¡± I asked. ¡°I usually just set the undead into guard mode and go to sleep. I let them handle anything that crops up.¡±


    She laughed. ¡°Well, that¡¯s a big change from the way we¡¯ve been running things. We have like four people rotating on guard twenty-four/seven. I¡¯ll take it, don¡¯t worry. Having things that don¡¯t need to sleep watching us while we do? Hell yeah!¡±


    We got some dinner from the remaining household stores, chatting a bit about the things we¡¯d seen together while we ate. By the time we¡¯d finished eating, it was getting late enough we both elected to head to bed. I¡¯d already had a lovely night in a real bed last night, but Kara hadn¡¯t slept on a real mattress since the Event happened. She was thrilled to have a mattress, blankets, and a real pillow.


    I set most of the undead in hiding positions around the house, set to alert me if anything approached, and attack anything that tried to enter the house. Then I sprinkled a few in the hallway outside each of our doors, and set a few on guard next to each outside door. I wanted us as secure as possible, and this time I had the troops to do that.


    Short of a massive goblin army, we ought to be secure. And even if a massive army arrived, odds were we¡¯d get woke up by undead fighting them off in time to vanish into the night ourselves.


    Hope climbed up into my bed with me, her tail wagging away. I grinned at her.


    ¡°Yeah, girl. We¡¯re back home again. But tomorrow we have more walking to do.¡±


    She let out a short yip, spun around a few times, and then settled herself into a ball of bones. I stared, smiling at the sight. I¡¯d always loved our dogs when I was younger. It was nice to have one again, and Hope acted just like a living dog enough of the time that it was almost possible to forget she wasn¡¯t still alive.


    I lay my head down on the bed and was asleep faster than I thought possible.

 Chapter 49 - Bird In The Hand

    Chapter 49 - Bird In The Hand


    We were both up shortly after dawn the next morning, which I supposed was becoming the new normal. Now that there were no more alarm clocks, something had to wake us up, and there were a shortage of roosters in downtown Burlington. The sun seemed to be doing the job just fine, though.


    ¡°Where are we going from here?¡± Kara asked over breakfast.


    I broke out my map and spread it on the table so the close-up of the city was visible. ¡°Well, we¡¯re not far from the airport. We follow Kirby Road, and it¡¯ll bring us directly to the fence line that surrounds the runways. From there we bust through the fence and cross the runway area. With any luck there¡¯s a nice, well-organized Air Guard base on the far side.¡±


    ¡°And if you¡¯re wrong? If there¡¯s no one there?¡±


    I shrugged. ¡°Then we figure something else out. I don¡¯t have next moves beyond that. I¡¯ll probably help you get back to Alfred and then start walking home to where my parents live.¡±


    ¡°Well, that one¡¯s not an option for me,¡± Kara replied. ¡°I¡¯m from New Jersey. Long hike.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± I replied. ¡°That has to suck, not knowing what¡¯s going on with your friends, family¡­¡±


    ¡°Yeah, more than a bit. I don¡¯t dwell on it, though. How about you?¡±


    ¡°I grew up like a hundred miles northeast of here. Still a long trip, but not impossible. I doubt most of Alfred¡¯s people would make it that far, though.¡±


    She didn¡¯t argue with me about that. Both of us had similar ideas about the folks holed up with Alfred, refusing to get out into the world.


    ¡°Have you considered not bringing along all of the undead when we go there?¡± Kara asked.


    I shook my head. ¡°No, I hadn¡¯t. I figured we might need them if we run into anything nasty along the way. You think I should?¡±


    Kara shrugged. ¡°Hard to say. They¡¯re dead bodies. Some folks might be a little iffy about folks controlling dead humans in battle. It has a sort of evil vibe to it, y¡¯know?¡±


    I considered it, then shook my head. ¡°I don¡¯t think that¡¯s the best plan. We run into trouble on the way there and we could die without them. I don¡¯t want to give up one of our main combat advantages unless I absolutely have to. Make when we get closer, I can leave them somewhere while I go inside. But I¡¯d rather make the trip with them.¡±


    ¡°Makes sense. We¡¯ll play it by ear,¡± Kara replied.


    We set out, using a similar marching order to the night before. It was only a short walk up to Kirby Road, but from there it was about two thirds of a mile to the fence. We passed a long string of houses as we went along. Like the others in the area, these all looked abandoned. Whoever had lived there had either moved on or was hiding themselves well.


    Not that I blamed them. If a bunch of undead came walking past my house, marching down the middle of the street, I might stay hidden, too.


    Things were quiet, for which I was grateful. We¡¯d been running into more monsters, and now some of them like that spider were tier three. A tier three creature was as dangerous as two tier two monsters, as we¡¯d learned. Harder to kill, easier to die from. The trend was becoming obvious to me: as time went on, the monsters were growing stronger. Whether that was the existing monsters ranking up somehow, or new ones appearing, I wasn¡¯t sure yet. The increased threat level was clear, though.


    The houses dried up, leaving the sides of the road dominated by a handful of trees and openings. We were almost to the fence when I heard humans screams from somewhere ahead.


    Both of us froze for a moment, waiting and unsure. But the second scream rang out, echoing down the road, and I growled something vulgar, then ordered my undead to march forward at a quicker pace.


    ¡°What are we doing?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°Someone¡¯s in trouble,¡± I replied. ¡°We¡¯re saving them.¡±


    ¡°Okay, we can do that.¡± She already had her bow out and nocked an arrow to the string.


    We rounded a corner and came face to face with a mess.


    About a dozen people stood in the road, trying vainly to defend themselves against half as many monstrous attackers. The humans looked exhausted. Most of them carried backpacks or other large bags. A third of them were young kids, hunkered down between grownup legs as they tried to stay away from the attackers. It was the kids screaming.


    The attackers were something new. I¡¯d never seen anything like them. Each was humanoid, with two legs¡ªbut they also had two arms and two wings! They wore light leather armor, and everywhere the armor didn¡¯t cover was feathered. Their faces looked a lot like a regular bird¡¯s head, white and grey. I stared, surprised¡ªthey looked like humanoid pigeons more than anything else, and I wanted to start chuckling at the sight.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.


    But each of the pigeon-people carried a nasty looking spear, and as I watched one of them stabbed at a human. The man blocked the spear with the weapon he carried, sending the point skittering against the pavement, but he¡¯d barely avoided being gutted. These people were in a lot of trouble, and they needed help.


    Fortunately, help was here.


    My front line rushed in, weapons at the ready. The bird people saw the attack coming and took to the air to avoid them, though. I hit the nearest with a Drain Life spell, killing it in an instant. That felt like a good start to the fighting. Kara nailed another with an arrow, but it failed to take him down. Wounded, he flew higher, dodging to avoid further arrows.


    Their victims had figured out help was there, and were doing their best to add what skills they had to the mix. A flash of light shot from one man¡¯s hand, lashing out and striking one of the bird-people. It was a wound, not a kill¡ªbut I finished that one off as soon as my Drain came off cooldown.


    Losing two out of six of their party seemed like it was more than the birds wanted to deal with. They made squawking noises at us and then flew away south, heading toward the main airport terminal. In the distance I spotted other flying things circling the taller buildings of the terminal. More of these bird-people? I hoped not, but I had a feeling that¡¯s exactly what they were.


    I stepped forward through my undead ranks, heading toward the people they¡¯d been attacking. ¡°Folks, they might come back with allies at any moment. We should get you all moving. Where were you headed? We can help you get there.¡±


    ¡°Across the runways,¡± one man said. ¡°Couple of days ago a team came through telling everyone that the Air Force had a base there somewhere, and were taking people in. Do you know anything about that?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know anything for sure, but I think it¡¯s true,¡± I replied. ¡°We can get you there, but we really need to move.¡±


    ¡°Aren¡¯t those more monsters?¡± a woman asked, pointing at my undead.


    ¡°Yeah, but these ones are on our side,¡± I replied. ¡°They¡¯ll help protect us while we get where we¡¯re going.¡±


    They seemed to believe me, thank goodness. I wasn¡¯t sure what I could have done if they¡¯d decided we were more bad guys. Leave them, I suppose. I couldn¡¯t help people who didn¡¯t want to be helped. But these people had just seem us rush in to defend them, which probably helped a lot in the trust department.


    We pressed on, quickly making the fence. It was a very sturdy chain-link with razor wire along the top. I was wondering how we were going to make a hole in it for everyone to get through, but one of the men we were escorting stepped up as soon as we got there. He grabbed half the chain link in each hand and then pulled, ripping a person-sized gap in the thing.


    ¡°Nice job!¡± I told him. ¡°Strength crystal?¡±


    ¡°Tier two,¡± he replied, clearly proud of himself. ¡°Got them from some goblins the other day. That¡¯s what finally decided us on going for it. It just wasn¡¯t safe at home anymore, not with more monsters popping up all the time.¡±


    ¡°Well, you made that a lot easier,¡± I said. ¡°Let¡¯s get everyone through now, though.¡±


    I pondered what Kara had said about my undead. It sounded like the Air Guard was over there, which was good. I wasn¡¯t sure how they would react to a bunch of undead coming at them across the runways, but I was equally loathe to leave them behind. If those birds hit us while we were out in the open, we might need all the help we could get. Especially from my archers. I decided to bring them. Better safe than sorry.


    As we came through the fence, the tang of smoke hit my nostrils. It wasn¡¯t hard to see where it came from. There were two smoking wrecks of planes in the middle of the tarmac. One was completely annihilated; it looked like the pilots had been trying to land it without power, and it just hit too hard, breaking up and exploding. There wasn¡¯t much left of that one. The second plane had maybe been trying to take off when the Event hit. It must have gotten a bit off the ground, then lost power. It had also caught fire sometime in the days since, but the wreck was nowhere near as bad.


    The thought of all the people who¡¯d been in the air when the Event hit came rushing back to me, and I paused, just staring. How many people died in those first few minutes? How many more in the days that had passed since?


    How many of us would still be here in a month? Or a year?


    I shook the melancholy thoughts off. I could brood another time, because I needed my wits about me for this next part.


    It was clear even from across the open space of the runways that the base was active. Smoke rose from a few places, but they were thin, controlled columns of smoke, not the remnants of burned buildings or planes. The same sort of fence that we¡¯d just passed surrounded the Guard base too, but it had been heavily reinforced. Plates of metal were attached to the chain link, giving it more support and cover for people behind it. Guard posts were placed here and there along the walls, and all of them looked occupied.


    Whoever was over there saw us as soon as we crossed the first taxiway. Kara spotted the movement first. ¡°We¡¯re about to have company, I think. The guards on those towers spotted us. I think they called an alert, because I see troops forming up over by those gates.¡±


    I looked where she pointed, but all I could see were some vague signs of movement. We pressed on. Meeting these folks was the goal, after all. If they came to see us partway, that wouldn¡¯t be a bad thing. Probably, anyway¡ªwe were still hoping these were the good guys, and some Colonel hadn¡¯t gone all power mad, taking the place over as his personal fief.


    Hey, it happens in movies! It could happen here, too.


    We were at the last taxiway before they rushed out to meet us. I had my undead back up behind me, so our refugees and their kids were out front where the Guardsmen could easily see them. Kids were a lot less likely to get us in trouble than skeletons, I figured.


    Nonetheless, as soon as they were within bow range, they stopped. There were ten people there, a mix of men and woman, all in uniform with what looked like armor strapped on over it. Half of them had bows. The other half had some sort of magic crackling at their fingertips. I hesitated, halfway wanting to call up my own magic, just in case¡­ But I held off, still hoping these would be friendlies.


    ¡°Drop your weapons! Drop all weapons and make no sudden moves, no spellcasting!¡± one of the Guardsmen called out.


    I glanced at Kara, who shrugged and set her bow down. ¡°We came here to talk. Let¡¯s talk.¡±


    I set down my shield and the heavy kitchen blade I¡¯d snagged, hoping we were making the right call.

 Chapter 50 - A Six

    Chapter 50 - A Six


    I glanced at the uniformed party, and I had to admit, I was impressed. Their top guy was tier five, a man who was maybe in his early forties and looked to be in charge. His rank had a whole pile of chevrons on it, and while I didn¡¯t know enough to recognize what rank that was, I knew enough to know he was enlisted, not an officer, and pretty high up.


    The rest of the group was a mixed bag, but none of them were under tier two. They had two tier four people, four tier threes, and three tier two. It was a powerhouse, compared to what I¡¯d seen so far.


    The leader picked me out of the crowd immediately and strode toward me. He was wary, but didn¡¯t seem unfriendly. He reached out a hand, and I shook it.


    ¡°Master Sergeant Farnsworth. Not every day I see another five crystal wonder showing up on our doorstep,¡± he said. ¡°You must have had quite the adventure.¡±


    Of course he knew¡ªlike me, he was tier five, so he was able to see our precise ranks. I grinned at him. ¡°You have no idea. Well, I mean, you probably have some idea, having hit it yourself. But you know what I mean.¡±


    He laughed at that. ¡°I do indeed.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m Selena Serrano. Before everything went to hell, I was a med student over at UVM. Now, I just try to stay alive.¡±


    ¡°And keep others alive too, from the looks of it. Our lookouts saw you fighting your way past those avians.¡±


    ¡°You could have come sooner.¡±


    He shook his head, lips pursed. ¡°They¡¯ve been doing that to draw us out. Attack small bands, and then once we commit to assisting them, the avians send in a larger force. Next thing we know, we¡¯re in a pitched battle. If our rifles still worked, that¡¯d be easy¡­¡±


    ¡°But as things stand, holy shit is flight a serious superpower,¡± I agreed.


    He nodded. ¡°You¡¯re the first rank five person we¡¯ve seen come through, though. Colonel Turner will want to meet you for sure. And of course we¡¯ll be glad to give shelter to the people with you. There¡¯s plenty of space inside the walls for more people. We¡¯ve taken in a few hundred civilians so far, but we have supplies to last for a while yet.¡±


    ¡°Hundreds?¡± I asked, shocked.


    ¡°Yeah, we¡¯ve been working hard at it since we realized things weren¡¯t likely going back to normal anytime soon. Getting the base locked down and fortified was the first step. Thankfully, a lot of our reservists started coming in to help. We¡¯ve been putting the refugees to work as they arrive, too, at least those who are capable of it.¡±


    All of this was good news. But we still needed to get help for Alfred and his people. ¡°There¡¯s a group, Kara here is a member, run by a classmate of mine. He¡¯s got dozens of people with him, but a lot of them are helpless. No crystals. Scared, not really handling the Event well. We came out to see if you guys were creating a safe haven, and thank god you are, but we really need to get back to them to bring them in. Unless you can send troops to collect them?¡±


    ¡°Where are they at?¡± Farnsworth asked.


    ¡°Southern end of the UVM campus. They took over Jeffords Hall.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know exactly where that is, but if it¡¯s UVM, that means getting past the avians, which won¡¯t be simple. The larger the group, the more likely they are to see it as an incursion into their turf and attack,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°Listen, the Colonel will for sure want to meet you, so why don¡¯t we do that first, and then he can help us figure out how to get your friends in, all right?¡±


    ¡°Sounds more than reasonable,¡± I replied. ¡°Can we pick up our gear? I don¡¯t want to leave good weapons out here in the open.¡±


    ¡°Of course! All right, I should go over the rules for everyone, just so you all know,¡± Farnsworth said, turning to address the entire group. ¡°Basically, the laws here work the same as the ones you¡¯re used to before things went sideways. Don¡¯t take things that aren¡¯t yours, don¡¯t hurt someone else. That sort of thing.


    ¡°We have some new rules, too. Don¡¯t cast spells on anyone without their consent. No more than one pet per person inside the walls. Weapons need to be peace-bonded¡ªtied down, so you can¡¯t whip them out if you get mad at someone¡ªfor everyone except the actual Guard members.¡±


    ¡°Why do uniforms make you an exception?¡± one man asked from the group we saved.


    ¡°Because if we screw up, it¡¯s a lot more obvious, and frankly, we know each other well enough to know that¡¯s not likely to happen. Lastly, because we¡¯re the ones defending this base against attacks, so having our weapons tied up doesn¡¯t help anyone. Any other questions?¡± Farnsworth asked.


    I had one. ¡°I¡¯ve got a lot more than one minion here. What do I do with the other undead?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, you have quite the collection. We¡¯ve got a sectioned off area just inside the walls where you can leave them. Think of it as cold storage. You¡¯ll see a few other odd critters in there, but they¡¯re all under orders to leave each other alone, so your undead will be okay. You can keep one with you, same as everyone else.¡±Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.


    I turned to Hope. ¡°I think we¡¯ll keep you with me.¡±


    With that, we got underway. The rest of the trip across the open area went quickly, the Master Sergeant and his people hurrying everyone along. I glanced back at the other side of the airfield, where the civilian airport terminal was. It was badly beat up, but it was definitely occupied. Scores of those bird creatures flew around the tower, and darted in and out of various buildings. There were a lot of the things!


    We reached the gate, and it actually swung open for us as we approached. As we went inside, I saw they¡¯d rigged a winch system to open and close the gate, and a Guardsman who looked like he could bench press a car picked up an enormous steel bar to lay across the braces on the inside of the gate. Getting through there wouldn¡¯t be easy for an attacker.


    I had to admit, the security made me feel good. Between the walls, the Guards in towers along the wall tops, the gate, and the obvious way these folks had gone after crystals to gain power, this was probably the safest place I¡¯d been since everything went to hell.


    Farnsworth showed me where they¡¯d set up their pet care center. It was a fenced off section just inside the gate. Inside, I saw a trio of big dogs, more like wolves, a whole pile of regular house cats, and a solitary skeleton, resting in the corner. I led my undead inside, ordering them into one corner, and told them to basically power down unless they were attacked.


    I turned back to Farnsworth. ¡°What¡¯s with all the cats?¡±


    He laughed. ¡°You won¡¯t believe it. I barely do, and I was here. This old lady came in on day two, must have been ninety. She had a whole pile of cats in tow behind her.¡±


    ¡°Regular cats? I don¡¯t know if feeding cats makes sense when we¡¯re worried about starving people.¡±


    ¡°We thought so too. But then she told us they weren¡¯t just normal cats. They each had powers,¡± Farnsworth said. He shrugged. ¡°We asked for a demo, and she had one of them vanish and a second one breathe fire. Turns out she was right on the money. The fact that she¡¯s tier three didn¡¯t hurt, either. More rank generally comes with a little extra leeway, as you¡¯ll find yourself.¡±


    That was good to know. I wondered if he could see that I was essentially a double tier five, or whether it just told him I had the one tier five stone. My suspicion was that the only information we got about each other was the highest tier stone we have socketed. If so, would it be more advantageous to tell them I had two tier fives? Or should I keep that information to myself?


    For the time being I opted for the latter choice. I could always tell them later. I kept Hope with me, and we exited the pet lounge, rejoining the others.


    Farnsworth took charge quickly, ordering a few of his reaction force to take the new refugees we¡¯d saved over to a medical building.


    ¡°You¡¯ll get looked at for any injuries or illnesses there,¡± he told them. ¡°We have people with healing stones, and good experience with modern medicine as well. They¡¯ll make sure you¡¯re looked after, and then they¡¯ll direct you from there to the Community Center, where you¡¯ll be given food and a place to sleep. You¡¯ll hear more about duties tomorrow, after you¡¯ve had some food and sleep.¡±


    The refugees all looked thrilled to hear that. I¡¯d half expected some of them to balk, but no one did. They were all so happy to be somewhere things weren¡¯t trying to kill them that they all followed the Guardsman Farnsworth assigned to lead them over to medical.


    Kara stayed with me, and Farnsworth cocked his head at her. ¡°You should go with them.¡±


    ¡°With respect, Master Sergeant, I really need to make sure my people back where I came from get taken care of. Now that we know this is a safe place, I have to get back there soonest to bring them in,¡± Kara replied. ¡°There¡¯s a major goblin nest nearby. They already attacked and overran our first base. If they hit again while I¡¯m gone, my people will be in serious danger.¡±


    I nodded. ¡°The building they¡¯ve holed up in is defensible, but the enemy has a spell caster. A goblin who can drop fireballs on folks¡¯ heads. If they come at that building, they¡¯ll burn it to the ground, and maybe anyone inside as well.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s grim,¡± Farnsworth replied. ¡°But my orders are still clear. Everyone has to go through the regular processing routine. Only exceptions are anyone rank five or higher, and we haven¡¯t had any of those until you, Selena. Don¡¯t worry. We¡¯ll get your friends taken care of, but first we need to ensure you¡¯re not bringing influenza or something worse into the base, okay?¡±


    Kara looked like she wanted to object, but she glanced at me, then at the Master Sergeant, and sighed instead. ¡°All right. I was a ROTC cadet, Master Sergeant. I understand orders. I¡¯ll go. Selena, make sure you tell their leader what¡¯s going on?¡±


    ¡°I will, no worries,¡± I told her.


    Kara set off after the rest of the group, and I was left alone with Farnsworth. ¡°What¡¯s next?¡±


    ¡°Colonel Turner will want to see you right away,¡± he replied. ¡°He has standing orders about any high rank arrivals. You¡¯re being treated differently because you could be a major asset, or a major threat, and he¡¯s taking it on himself to find out which personally.¡±


    ¡°Awesome. I¡¯m pretty sure I¡¯m not a threat to this place. Holy shit, do you have a lot of people here!¡± I said. It was true. There were a lot of people wandering around the base, moving from building to building. Less than half were in Air Force uniforms. Most were in civilian clothes, but even the civilians were taking shifts watching from guard towers and handling other tasks.


    ¡°You might be surprised,¡± Farnsworth replied. ¡°One rank five is worth a great many regular people, in terms of combat effectiveness.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve seen that, for sure.¡±


    ¡°Then you know how much damage you could do here, if you wanted to. Come on, I¡¯ll take you in to see the Colonel.¡±


    We went straight toward a large building in the center of the base. From the looks of it, the place used to be an administrative building. It was brick, with lots of windows. Most of those had been boarded up from the inside, which made sense. They had an aerial enemy across the way, so windows were a dangerous hole in their defenses.


    From there we hit a flight of stairs, but went down instead of up, as I¡¯d expected. The building had a few sub-levels, and we went to the bottom one. Once we¡¯d reached the final floor, Farnsworth opened the door and held it for me. We passed from there through two more security check points before we reached the offices of the base leader.


    His door read ¡®Colonel James Turner.¡¯ Farnsworth rapped hard on the wood frame, and the door popped open a moment later, showing me a middle-aged man who still looked more fit than I was on my best day. That had to be Colonel Turner.


    I froze as soon as I saw him. Not because of the rank, or how buff he was for an old guy, but because he had something I¡¯d never seen before. Turner was close enough for me to get a read of his tier level.


    He was a six.

 Chapter 51 - Fascination

    Chapter 51 - Fascination


    Colonel Turner glanced at Farnsworth, then directly at me, sizing me up. There was something positively magnetic about the man. I felt drawn to him in a way I couldn¡¯t explain. If he¡¯d been running for president, I couldn¡¯t imagine anyone voting against him. I didn¡¯t think I¡¯d ever met someone with so much raw presence.


    ¡°This must be Miss Serrano,¡± Turner said.


    ¡°I am. But Selena is fine,¡± I replied.


    ¡°Excellent. Please, come with me. Master Sergeant, that will be all for now, but hang out someplace close. I might need you when we¡¯re done talking.¡±


    ¡°Yes sir,¡± Farnsworth replied.


    Turner led me into his office, Hope following close behind me. It wasn¡¯t an enormous space¡ªjust room for a desk, a few chairs, and a book shelf. I glanced at that. You can learn a lot about someone from their choice in books. His shelf was all nonfiction. Some history, some science, a few books whose titles looked like they were for military strategy, a medical tome, and other assorted topics. Eclectic; that did reveal a little about his nature. Might be useful.


    ¡°Please, have a seat Selena,¡± he said, waving to one of the chairs. He moved around to the other side of the desk and fell into his chair. ¡°I¡¯m sure you¡¯ve had one hell of a journey.¡±


    I sat, as he asked. ¡°It hasn¡¯t been easy, no. But that¡¯s true for everyone. Colonel, I have friends who are in trouble, back on the UVM campus. Kara and I came here to scout the place out and see if it was safe or not. Now that we know it is, we need to go collect those people, or they¡¯re going to be overrun by goblins.¡±


    He raised a hand like he was asking me to slow down. ¡°Don¡¯t worry. We¡¯ll do all we can for your friends. Getting a large enough force out there and back safely isn¡¯t going to be simple, but we¡¯ll do what we can to help.¡±


    That wasn¡¯t exactly the answer I¡¯d been hoping for. They had hundreds of people here, some of them very strong. Surely they could afford at least a small team to go rescue Alfred¡¯s people?


    ¡°Right now, I want to know more about you, Selena,¡± Turner went on.


    ¡°Me? Why?¡±


    ¡°Because you¡¯re the first tier five person we¡¯ve had join us here. We have a few at that rank here, but all of them are military. We got them to that rank by pooling crystals and then doling them back out. Master Sergeant Farnsworth is one of our rank five Guardsmen.¡±


    ¡°I saw,¡± I told him. ¡°Just like I can see that you¡¯re tier six. Impressive.¡±


    In fact, he didn¡¯t just feel like a six; he felt like a strong six, as best I could tell, anyway. It wasn¡¯t like I had ever met someone who was tier six before, so I didn¡¯t have much to gauge it off, but my gut said he was more than just a tier six. He likely had at least one other stone at tier five, too.


    Something still felt wrong about him, though. Part of me was still wanting to fawn over the man, to trust him, reacting like he was the perfect leader. The other part of me rebelled against the whole concept.


    He looked a little annoyed at my answer, but brushed it off. ¡°Like the Master Sergeant, I got all my crystals from the collective work of many airmen. We¡¯ve had people out fighting monsters daily since all this started, and as the base commander, we elected to make me one of the first rank fives. We only pushed me up to rank six this morning.¡±


    Of course he¡¯d been taking in the lion¡¯s share of crystals. He was the leader of these people, so it just made sense they would hand over the stones, allow Turner to dole them back out to everyone. That was to be expected. Right?


    At the same time those thoughts were crossing my mind, I felt like I wanted to throw up a little bit. Was this man ever even out in the field, fighting? Or was he just leeching off the hard work of others?


    The two thoughts were so wildly different from each other that I felt confused. What was happening to me? Why was I struggling to keep my thoughts clear?


    ¡°All of our rank five airmen and officers got there the same way: by working together,¡± Turner said. ¡°But not you, I¡¯m guessing. We haven¡¯t seen anyone from outside our fence arrive with anything higher than a rank three crystal¡ªuntil you showed up. My question is pretty easy. How did you manage it?¡±If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    I thought I was beginning to understand, at least a little. He knew about being able to loot stones from dead people. He must know; how could he not? He was the commander of so many men and woman¡ªthey had to have run into at least one unfriendly human, and then they¡¯d found out that people could be looted for their stones the same as monsters.


    In a lot of ways, people were the best possible loot sources. Kill a monster, get one stone. Kill a human who¡¯d been fighting for a bit, and you got all the stones they¡¯d collected, both the ones they¡¯d socketed and any spares they had, too.


    He wasn¡¯t asking me for my story so much as trying to figure out if I¡¯d gotten to tier five by murdering a bunch of people.


    Just like that, whatever hold he¡¯d had over me snapped. My thoughts felt clear and unclouded for the first time since I¡¯d laid eyes on the man. The headache still hadn¡¯t faded, but my mind was my own again. I closed my eyes, counted to three, and then opened them again, locking my gaze with his.


    I was pissed. Before speaking, I readied my Drain Life spell, just in case. ¡°Colonel, I don¡¯t know what sort of game you¡¯re playing here, but I don¡¯t appreciate whatever spell you¡¯re using. Control magic? Command powers? What exactly are you doing to me? Because I gotta say, the headache sucks.¡±


    He blinked once, twice, then leaned back in his seat and laughed, a deep, belly laugh. Part of me wanted to immediately laugh with him. I shoved that treasonous slice of my mind down, hard.


    ¡°My apologies,¡± Turner said. ¡°My Charisma is tier five. Once it hit that level, it started acting as a sort of¡­fascination. When I give orders, people snap to just a little more. When I ask questions, they¡¯re more inclined to answer honestly. It¡¯s not mind control, no. But a tier five Charisma makes it easier to lead these people through all of this mess.


    ¡°I didn¡¯t mean to make you uncomfortable, but unfortunately there¡¯s not much I can do about it. Short of removing the stone, it¡¯s ¡®always on,¡¯ I¡¯m afraid. I¡¯m impressed you noticed, though! That¡¯s rare and unusual; you must have some interesting stones socketed. What is your Will rank?¡±


    Will was what blocked his Charisma? That was good to know. I needed to get my Will up to tier five ASAP, because this was bullshit. ¡°Tier three.¡±


    That explained why I was struggling so much. If his Charisma was tier five, it knocked out my tier three Will. I was able to sense what he was doing, and to some degree shut it out. But not enough. I¡¯d answered his question about my Will rank without even thinking about whether or not I should.


    ¡°All right. Now, please answer my question from before? It¡¯s important we know how you grew so strong, so quickly,¡± Turner said.


    ¡°Because you want to be sure I didn¡¯t murder people to get where I am?¡± I asked. Best to take the bull by the horns, here. If his Charisma was making me veer toward unthinking honesty, then I could make sure I was honest and blunt at the same time. ¡°I didn¡¯t, for what it¡¯s worth. I did have to kill three people, because they attacked me. I regret the need but not the deed, if you get my meaning. If I hadn¡¯t killed them, I¡¯d be dead right now instead.¡±


    He nodded, urging me to go on, but didn¡¯t say anything more. I was grateful for that; his Charisma seemed strongest when he was speaking, especially if he was giving commands or asking questions.


    ¡°Most of the rest was just from running into a graveyard that was very full of undead,¡± I explained, hoping this was the right move. ¡°The cemetery I found was fenced in with these old-school wrought iron fences, and the undead couldn¡¯t leave the place. I was able to get in, kill a few, then repeat until they were all dead.¡±


    ¡°How many?¡± Turner asked.


    ¡°Sixty-seven undead, in that cemetery. I ran into a few more undead before and after that, too.¡±


    He whistled. ¡°That¡¯s a lot of crystals. You still have them all, here?¡±


    The urge to tell him the truth was overpowering, and I blurted out the answer in spite of my wanting to lie. ¡°Yeah. In my pack.¡±


    ¡°Good to know,¡± Turner said. He must have seen my worries written on my face, because the next thing he did was try to assuage them. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, Selena. Nobody is going to take your things, here. In fact, we have an exchange where you can trade in your crystals, maybe get others you¡¯d find more useful. We allow trades of common stones on a three to two basis, so you get two for every three you turn in. Rare stones are listed at three times the value of commons.¡±


    That was cool news. I definitely wanted to check this exchange out. I still didn¡¯t wholly trust him about nobody taking my stuff, but¡­ I had to start trusting someone, sooner or later. Living on my own had been okay, but it was lonely as hell. Working with other people had to be better, right?


    ¡°Well, not killing people for those stones makes a big difference,¡± Turner said. ¡°If you¡¯d been killing for crystals, we wouldn¡¯t allow you to stay. That¡¯s why I pushed the issue¡ªand it¡¯s the main reason why you were brought to me straight away, so we could find out the answer. You¡¯ve worked for them instead, and I have no issue with that at all. You¡¯re a survivor, clearly, and someone we want working with us.¡±


    His words made me feel pride, and I had to shove that down, too, since I wasn¡¯t certain if it was real or not. Yup, was definitely going to rank up Will the first chance I got. Zero doubts.


    ¡°Thanks, Colonel. I¡¯ll be glad to help out¡ªI do mean that. The exchange sounds awesome, too. Now, about my friends?¡±


    He chuckled again. ¡°You¡¯ve earned some answers, there. Come with me. I want to show you our situation room.¡±


    He stood, walked around the desk, and opened the door, waiting for me to follow. I rose and together we left his office, headed down the hall toward a much larger space, buzzing with people.

 Chapter 52 - Command Center

    Chapter 52 - Command Center


    Where Turner¡¯s office had been small, without much flair or extravagance, this room was anything but. It looked like the sort of hidden military command post you saw on movies: a huge screen, blank, of course, and buckets of equally useless computer terminals took up most of the space. I supposed those would all eventually end up tossed out in the trash, or maybe melted down to make something that was actually useful.


    The main focus of the room was now a large table¡ªand I mean very big. It was the size of three or four family-ready dinner tables all merged. The thing was covered with a diorama of the base and the surrounding land. Whoever built it had some real skills, too, because it was quite obvious what everything was. I saw the base fence, the building we were in, all the structures which made up the civilian airport terminal, and more beyond. The map didn¡¯t go as far as UVM, but it did show some of the highway we¡¯d crossed to get here.


    The room looked like it had been designed for dozens of people to work there, but now there were only five soldiers gathered around the big map, and us.


    ¡°Welcome to the command center. That¡¯s Major Kim Jones, my second in command. Beside her is Captain Hal Cisco, in charge of intelligence. Sergeant Williams, Tech Sergeant Brady, and Sergeant Meadows are here assisting us today,¡± Turner told me, beckoning me toward the table. Jones came over, and shook my hand, flashing me a smile. ¡°This is where we gather intelligence on the surrounding land and use it to make decisions about how to move forward. Here¡¯s the base, easy enough to see. That neighborhood there, it¡¯s mostly cleared already. Once we have the numbers, we¡¯ll settle those houses, get people in there. Probably have to build a wall around the place, to keep people safe, but we¡¯ll get it done.


    ¡°Over there, to the north and easy, there are quite a few fields already under cultivation. Mostly corn, unfortunately. Feed corn for cows won¡¯t do us a ton of good. We¡¯re expecting a lean winter, and we¡¯ll be relying on what we can scavenge from food depots and supermarkets to keep people fed. But next spring, we aim to get those fields back under cultivation, for human food.¡±


    It was smart planning. The Winooski River ran alongside the base and a lot of those fields. It created a sort of defensive barrier, and more important it represented a consistent source of fresh water. That river never ran dry, not even in the summer. It got low, but it would keep on giving fresh water year round.


    There were some islands in the river, too. I¡¯d heard something about that, once, but I¡¯d forgotten all about it. Might be something worth checking out at some point. I set the idea aside for the time being.


    ¡°This all sounds awesome. Have you heard any word from outside the area yet? Anything at all?¡± I asked.


    Turner shook his head. ¡°Not yet, no. I haven¡¯t dared try sending any of my people out. We¡¯ve captured a few horses during our scouting runs, but we only have a few, and even on horseback it would take someone a long time to reach anyone. I¡¯ve considered sending troops to Montpelier, at least¡ªwe could see if the state government has any sort of structure remaining. Getting someone to Washington DC would make sense, too, but that would take weeks if not months just to make the trip.¡±


    ¡°And no guarantee of finding anything when they got there,¡± I added, nodding. ¡°I think that makes sense. It sucks, that we¡¯re on our own. But I can¡¯t see throwing away lives trying to get that far. We need to rebuild¡­something¡­first, here. Use the tools we have and get people back together.¡±


    ¡°My thoughts exactly,¡± he replied, nodding.


    ¡°Why show me all of this?¡±


    ¡°Because you¡¯re fifth rank,¡± Turner said. ¡°We have five people at that rank or above on the entire base: myself, Kim, Farnsworth, and two other enlisted leaders. I¡¯m the only one at rank six, but as you can probably guess, having another rank five person join us is a pretty big deal.¡±


    I nodded, thinking. ¡°I¡¯ll be glad to help get things organized and people safer, sure. How can I help?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ve got black stones, right? That¡¯s what Farnsworth passed along,¡± Jones said.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.


    ¡°Yeah, mostly,¡± I replied.


    ¡°Then you¡¯re a one woman army,¡± she replied. ¡°You can do a lot of good. Those spells let you animate and control undead, so you¡¯re an instant force multiplier. Instead of facing one foe, anyone fighting you is up against an entire strike force.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s been pretty useful so far,¡± I said. ¡°Kept me alive.¡±


    ¡°And now you can use those powers to help keep others alive,¡± Turner said. ¡°We want to bring you on board. To help us grow this place, expand it into a safe haven for people from all over the region. Folks badly need that right now, I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll agree.¡±


    I agreed completely. After all, if I didn¡¯t get back to Alfred before too much longer, odds were he and everyone with him would die. ¡°I totally do. My friends need that sort of help badly. I don¡¯t know if I¡¯m the type to pop into uniform and listen to orders, though. I never joined ROTC for a reason.¡±


    Turner laughed. ¡°I wasn¡¯t planning to stick you in uniform unless you wanted it, no. We can certainly do that if you want, but if you¡¯d rather remain civilian, that¡¯s fine too. In fact, you¡¯ll end up being a leader among the civilians. None of them are higher than rank three, so you¡¯ll have a great deal of influence right away.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t wholly sure that was true. I was young, and if there was one thing I¡¯d learned it was that older people generally thought they ought to be obeyed by those younger than themselves, whether it made logical sense or not. Still, he was right that my powers would afford me some extra oomph.


    ¡°That all sounds great, but¡ªColonel Turner, we need to get some people out to the university to pick up those refugees I left behind. I promised Alfred I¡¯d be back for them, and I won¡¯t break that promise. How do we get them back here?¡±


    ¡°Hal, want to fill her in on the situation? Short version¡ªthe long one would take the rest of the day,¡± Turner explained to me.


    Hal Cisco was maybe four or five years older than me, with dark hair and a little brown tinge to his skin that made me think he had some Latino blood in him somewhere. He grinned, enthusiastic as he moved back to the table to show off his stuff.


    ¡°The main issue is the avians,¡± Cisco said. ¡°They didn¡¯t appear right away, interestingly enough. On day one, we had skeletons to our west, some sort of mud monsters coming out of the brooks south-east of us, and a few spiders in our base itself. The avians first appeared on day three, and they grew in numbers every day after that.¡±


    ¡°The things look like pigeons,¡± I mentioned.


    He nodded. ¡°We¡¯ve noticed that, too. We haven¡¯t seen a single pigeon for almost forty-eight hours, and we¡¯re thinking those two things might have something to do with one another.¡±


    I nodded. ¡°Yeah, same. The goblins are all over the forest, but squirrels? Nowhere to be seen. Also, giant spiders, giant snakes¡­ It¡¯s like a lot of the wildlife just got all magicked up.¡±


    ¡°Interesting about the goblins,¡± Cisco said, making notes on a clipboard. ¡°I may want to ask you some more about that, later. But anyway, we¡¯re getting off track. The avians are gathering at Burlington International Airport. They have complete control of the facility there, and there¡¯s hundreds of them. They¡¯re mostly tier two, with some tier three warriors as well. The leaders might be higher still.¡±


    ¡°So they¡¯re roughly at parity with you guys, from what I¡¯m hearing?¡± I asked.


    ¡°More or less,¡± Turner said. ¡°We haven¡¯t seen any avian rank fives, yet, so we probably have an edge in raw power. And if you include all our civilians we almost certainly outnumber them.¡±


    ¡°But most of our civilians are not warriors,¡± Jones added. ¡°Some are, and a few have even sworn oaths and put in Air Force uniforms. But most are just scared people trying to keep their families safe. We¡¯re trying to get everyone at least one tier one stone, but not everyone is willing to go outside the fence. Most are not, in fact.¡±


    That felt understandable to me. It must be nice, sitting behind mostly safe walls where the bad guys couldn¡¯t get you. They had food, shelter, and people risking their lives to keep them safe. What more could a post-apocalyptic refugee ask for?


    I couldn¡¯t believe how differently my own course had gone. I could have been just like those people, if I¡¯d made a few less-weird choices. Instead, I¡¯d ended up being one of the most powerful people in the whole area, from the sounds of it. How wild was that?


    ¡°Okay, so the avians are going to be an issue,¡± I said. ¡°The goblins, too. They¡¯re in the forest just past the highway there. Also, south of the goblins, Kara and I saw a big collection of what looked like rat-people, too. They might also be trouble. But surely we can thread a path through that mess?¡±


    Cisco looked at Turner, the map, then back at me. His frown didn¡¯t look confident at all. ¡°Maybe. But every time we send anyone west, across the airfield, the avians come after us in force. We¡¯ve tried going around, but they¡¯re keeping lookouts. Even when we went a half a mile south, trying to dodge them, they still spotted us and came swooping in. Turned into a big fight.¡±


    ¡°Weird that they didn¡¯t attack us in force, then,¡± I murmured, staring at the map.


    ¡°Yeah, they don¡¯t seem to do more than harass groups coming east toward our base,¡± Cisco said. ¡°But they have a serious hate on for us. We don¡¯t know why.¡±


    That left me with far fewer options than I wanted. I had to get back to Alfred¡¯s crew soon, or they were done for. Every day that went by, the area between here and there was only going to grow more hazardous, harder to break through. It was obvious to me that more monsters were continuing to appear, and they were getting stronger, too.


    We needed to get through or around these avians. But how, I didn¡¯t know¡ªyet.

 Chapter 53 - A Fighter

    Chapter 53 - A Fighter


    At that point the meeting was pretty much done. Colonel Turner dismissed me, saying he and his people would work on a plan to get to Alfred and his people. I had a sneaking suspicion it wasn¡¯t going to happen, though. They were too wrapped up in their local war with the avians. Getting past them in any sort of timely manner wasn¡¯t going to be simple, and it wasn¡¯t their focus.


    Farnsworth was waiting outside the room when I came out. I was surprised to see him; I figured he was too important to run escort duty and said as much.


    He laughed. ¡°Yeah, I suppose you¡¯d think that. But my job is to take care of whatever the Colonel says needs doing. In this case, that¡¯s keeping an eye on the only tier five on the base who isn¡¯t wearing this uniform.¡±


    Okay, that made a certain level of sense. I mean, if I went on a rampage, most people in this place wouldn¡¯t be able to stop me, but Farnsworth would have a good crack at it. ¡°Yeah, I see the logic there.¡±


    ¡°You do? I thought maybe you¡¯d be offended at the notion,¡± he replied.


    ¡°Why would I be offended that you guys see me as a threat? With the crystals I have, I¡¯m basically a living weapon,¡± I told him. ¡°I get it. It¡¯s okay. Where are we off to next?¡±


    He shook his head, looking bemused. ¡°You¡¯re nothing like most kids I deal with here. You sure you don¡¯t want to sign up? I¡¯m betting the Colonel would give you some nice rank to go along with the stones you¡¯ve already got.¡±


    My head felt so much clearer now that I was away from the Colonel and his tier five Charisma. Holy shit, that sucked! I remembered the feeling, how he¡¯d had me wanting to follow his every order. And that was with a Will of three. What if I hadn¡¯t socketed a Will stone? He probably could have nicely asked me to turn over all my spare stones, and I¡¯d have done it.


    Well, maybe not that far. The sort of control Charisma gave him didn¡¯t seem to allow him to order folks to do things too strongly against their nature. Like, I doubt he could ask someone to kill themselves or something. But if he kept ranking that power up, who knew where it would end?


    Regardless, I didn¡¯t want to hang out with the man any more than I had to. He didn¡¯t seem to be using his powers in ways that were double-plus creepy, but even the relatively ¡®gentle¡¯ control he¡¯d exerted was more than I wanted to deal with on the regular.


    ¡°Maybe sometime,¡± I told him.


    He reached down and patted Hope. ¡°Nice to see a dog here, even if it is a weird one. There aren¡¯t too many canines on the base, and I miss ¡®em. To answer your question, where we go next is up to you. I do need to run you through medical, just to get someone with enough Healing crystals to scan you for disease. We can¡¯t risk an outbreak¡ªyou being a med student, that must make sense, right?¡±


    ¡°Of course!¡± Even a minor epidemic would be a nightmare. I wasn¡¯t sure what sort of healing magic they had, and their clinic probably had at least basic supplies. But even with magic, disease could get bad. ¡°Let¡¯s do that first, then.¡±


    Turned out the scan was literally that. Farnsworth took me down to their clinic, where an actual doctor looked me over¡ªwith magic, instead of with a stethoscope. He just stared at me, touched my shoulders, and nodded.


    ¡°You¡¯re fine. Some signs of recent injuries, but they¡¯re all healed already,¡± the doctor said. ¡°I¡¯m guessing you have some sort of healing power yourself, or regeneration?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, one of my spells hurts the monster and heals me for part of the damage,¡± I told him.


    ¡°Drain Life?¡± he asked. When I looked shocked, he chuckled. ¡°There are only so many spells out there, and I like to be familiar with as many of them as possible. That one is common enough that I¡¯ve seen it before. Anyway, you¡¯re cleared. No sign of infectious diseases, and no injuries that need tending.¡±


    I left the clinic, rejoined Farnsworth, and then we were off to our next stop.


    ¡°The Colonel told me you¡¯d been interested in seeing the Crystal Exchange,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°How about we go there next?¡±


    He wasn¡¯t wrong! The idea of a safe way to exchange stones with others was exciting. I had a feeling eventually trading posts like that were going to be a backbone of our survival. Early days, folks mostly needed to just get a few crystals. Almost anything would do, just to get them started.If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    But then we needed to rank those up, so we could socket more. To rank the embedded stones, we needed more of the same kind. It was like playing ¡®three of a kind,¡¯ but with tons of options, and we needed a lot more than three. Now that I was certain we could reach tier six, I wanted to get there bad. But if it took sixteen of the same stone to reach tier five, it was a good bet tier six was twice that. I¡¯d have to wipe out an entire additional cemetery to get there.


    Or I could just go to the exchange and swap some of the ones I wasn¡¯t using for others that I would.


    ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s definitely a plan,¡± I told him.


    He led the way, taking me back up toward the admin building. Turned out the exchange was inside, on an upper level. As soon as we came near the exchange, I saw signs of heightened security: soldiers patrolling the halls, a check in desk in the hall, stuff like that. Farnsworth got us past it all pretty well.


    ¡°Have you guys had trouble here?¡± I asked, gesturing at the latest guard as we passed.


    ¡°No, and we want to keep it that way. These crystals are probably the most valuable things in the world, right now. Money is worthless. Guns won¡¯t shoot. Missiles won¡¯t fire, and won¡¯t explode even if they did,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°Those stones represent power, survival, and a lot more besides. Colonel Turner ordered high levels of security right from the beginning, not because we had people trying to break in, but to dissuade anyone who thought it might be a good idea.¡±


    Then we were there. Farnsworth opened the door and held it for me to pass, and I was inside the Crystal Exchange. An older woman was behind a counter in what amounted to a small room. The whole place looked more like a closet than anything else¡ªa big closet, but still.


    There were no windows. The space was well inside the building. With avian adversaries, that made complete sense. The woman was maybe forty, possibly as much as fifty. Her hair was definitely dyed, which made it harder for me to peg her age. I could see her tier as I came closer, though¡ªshe was tier four.


    ¡°Farnsworth, you old rat! What are you up to today? Got company?¡± the woman asked. Then she turned to me. ¡°Hello! My name is Maura. How can I help you?¡±


    Farnsworth stepped up to the counter. ¡°Colonel has me escorting the young lady around for the day, and asked me to bring her by. She¡¯s rank five.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m Selena. Nice to meet you.¡± I wanted to correct him and say ¡®tier¡¯, but didn¡¯t bother. These people wanted to call them ¡®ranks¡¯ instead, who was I to correct them?


    But it was tiers.


    I checked my socketed stones and pulled the nylon zipper-bag from my backpack, fishing through it to remind me of what I had. It was weird, how once I hadn¡¯t been able to tell them apart without using them first¡ªbut once I¡¯d absorbed a stone, even briefly, I could always tell what it did.


    Now, I was able to do one better. All I had to do was look at a stone and I knew what powers it contained. A cool fringe benefit of tier five.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Curse


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Contagion


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 3) - Will


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Agility


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead (Tier 2), Augment Undead (Tier 3), Augment Undead, Control Undead (Tier 2), Darkness (Tier 3), Darkness (Tier 2), Drain Life (Tier 2), Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana, Heal Undead (Tier 3), Heal Undead, Nightvision (Tier 3), Nightvision, Protection from Undead, Shadow Walk (Tier 2), Shadow Walk


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Strength (x2), Agility (Tier 2), Stamina (Tier 2), Stamina, Intellect (Tier 3), Charisma (Tier 2), Charisma, Will (Tier 2), Will


    Brown: Weapon Making, Armor Making, Tracking


    I had no shortage of stones, but a lot of them were already merged. Time to figure out how they¡¯d handle that. ¡°I have a lot of stones to trade. Colonel Turner said you could help with that, and I am so on board with a swap. From day one I¡¯d been hoping people could set up a safe-ish way to trade these things fairly.¡±


    ¡°Well, we don¡¯t do even trades here, you understand,¡± Maura said. ¡°Did Colonel Turner explain that?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°He told me it was a three for two deal, for common stones. So I give you three, I get two. And for rare stones, those are worth¡ªI think he said three times as much?¡± I hadn¡¯t actually forgotten, but I wanted to see how she¡¯d answer.


    ¡°That¡¯s exactly right,¡± she replied. She turned around, poking into a cabinet.¡°We have a decent collection. I have a lot of brown crystals, but you being a fighter type, I doubt those will interest you much. They¡¯re all crafting and such.¡±


    ¡°What told you I was a fighter?¡± I asked, curious and a little embarrassed.


    ¡°The skeleton dog next to you. The fact that you¡¯ve got a rank five escort, which means you¡¯re dangerous, plus Farnsworth said you were rank five¡ªand nobody gets there without being a warrior. And the look in your eye, too. I¡¯ve been around the block and seen a few things. You¡¯ve got grit, kid. Keep doing what you¡¯re doing. You¡¯ll be okay.¡±


    ¡°Um, thanks?¡± I said, managing a smile. I wasn¡¯t sure if that was a compliment or not. It felt¡­like it probably was. ¡°So what other sorts of stones do you have?¡±


    ¡°Aside from the browns, I¡¯ve got a fair number of clear crystals, a few black ones, quite a lot of yellow stones, a handful of red and dark blue, some green ones¡­¡±


    Too bad there weren¡¯t a lot of black ones, but I guess I couldn¡¯t have everything. Maybe it was time to pick up another color? First I needed to find out more about those other colors, see what they did, what their capabilities were, and then make some decisions.

 Chapter 54 - Wrath and Reward

    Chapter 54 - Wrath and Reward


    Gideon rode back toward his castle, an army at his back. He¡¯d never felt so strong, so in control. He wished more than anything that his wife was still here to see this, because if she were still alive, he had no doubt he could keep her safe. His daughter, too.


    He¡¯d done it. Reached tier six, with his Animate Dead spell. It had taken clearing two additional cemeteries, but the second one did the job. Not only had he won his way to tier six, he had a second Animate up to tier four, and scores of unused stones as well, including a variety of new ones he¡¯d never seen before.


    The trip had been more than worth it. There was a risk, of course. It was always going to be a risk, going out into this changed world. But the rewards had proven to be more than worth it.


    Things were clearly going well at the base, too. West had been as good as his word. Even at a distance, Gideon saw the walls standing tall around his new home. They weren¡¯t quite what he¡¯d pictured, but they certainly looked strong enough, and he trusted the man had done all he could to make them sturdy. After all, those walls shielded West¡¯s family, too. His kids would shelter behind them from the outside world. He¡¯d put everything he had into making them solid.


    He rode up to the front of the building, where Brian had a set of gates mostly installed. They were clearly still a work in progress, with wooden beams blocking the way for the time being where a door would eventually sit.


    Brian West was already there, helping undead move those beams out of the path. ¡°We saw you coming and got to work clearing you a path! Be just a moment or two.¡±


    ¡°Well done, Brian,¡± Carver said. ¡°You¡¯ve gotten more accomplished than I imagined possible.¡±


    ¡°Well, there¡¯s a lot more to come. But it¡¯s a good start, yeah. I have the wall base in place all around the main building. All that¡¯s left is to get it up to its full height. Ideally we want ramparts, too, where your guys can fight off attackers. But that will take even more time.¡±


    ¡°Time is something we can spare some measure of,¡± Gideon replied. ¡°Now, did you find anyone else, anyone you trusted?¡±


    Brian hauled one of the last beams away, finally opening the pathway through. ¡°I did. Two of my guys, from the old business. I¡¯ve had them camp out in what¡¯s left of the building you¡¯re tearing down. It¡¯s still inside the wall, but it¡¯s not in your personal building. Thought that would be better, until you returned.¡±


    ¡°You did well. Have they joined you in the work yet?¡±


    Brian nodded. ¡°Yup. Were out here working with me all day. No complaints there. How was your trip? I couldn¡¯t help noticing you had more skeletons with you coming back than you left with. I take it things went well?¡±


    ¡°They did,¡± Gideon replied, sliding from his saddle. He¡¯d spent enough time sitting in it the past two days that he was sore. That would fade with practice and experience, but for now, he wanted to stand. ¡°I tackled two nearby graveyards, killing the undead in both. A great many new crystals. In fact, I have some gifts!¡±


    ¡°Sir?¡± Brian asked.


    Gideon pulled a largish shard of crystal from his pocket. ¡°This is a tier three Strength stone. With it, you will be able to do this work even more effectively, and if you need to defend yourself it will help with that, as well.¡±


    Brian hesitated, then reached out and took the stone from his hand. It sank immediately into his palm, and a smile crossed his face. ¡°Wow. That feels amazing. I¡­I¡¯m so strong now!¡±


    He reached over to one of the heavy wooden beams and lifted it one-handed, without strain. ¡°That¡¯s incredible! Thank you, sir.¡±


    ¡°That is not all,¡± Gideon said, smiling. He pulled out two more clear stones. These were smaller, but they were still obviously magical crystals. ¡°These are both Stamina stones. They increase one¡¯s ability to resist damage, survive injury or illness, and heal faster as well. They¡¯re only tier one stones, mind; not as powerful as your Strength crystal. But I thought you might appreciate your wife and daughter having these. Their odds of surviving any hardship which comes up increase with these.¡±Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    West choked up a little as he took the crystals from Gideon¡¯s hand. ¡°Thank you again, Mr. Carver. I can¡¯t tell you how grateful I am. Anything that helps my family stay alive is a gift.¡±


    ¡°Family is important. These were dropped by the monsters I killed, but I cannot use them myself, at least not right now,¡± Gideon said. ¡°It didn¡¯t feel right to hoard them when they could help you and yours.¡±


    If it stopped West from facing the same tragedy he had, then it was more than worth it. The man had proven himself to be true. He¡¯d earned the reward in recognition of that.


    ¡°Now, why don¡¯t you introduce me to these other people you brought in?¡± Gideon added. ¡°I¡¯d like to meet them both. Once that building is fully torn down, we¡¯ll want to consolidate everyone in the main structure. To do that, we need to trust them fully.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re at the back of the lot, working on the wall over there,¡± Brian said. Shouting from that direction got both their attention. ¡°Weird. Ryan is running this way. Something¡¯s up, sir.¡±


    Gideon didn¡¯t hesitate. He mounted his undead horse, sending mental commands to the undead nearby. They formed ranks in front of him. By the time the man was near enough for them to hear his shouting, Gideon¡¯s legion was ready to move.


    ¡°Rats! There¡¯s rat creatures! They¡¯re attacking the wall! Brian, we need reinforcements back there or¡­¡± The man, Ryan, skidded to a half, realizing Brian wasn¡¯t the only living person out there. ¡°Oh, shit, is that..?¡±


    Wet nodded. ¡°That¡¯s Mr. Carver. He¡¯s back from his trip. Now, what¡¯s going on?¡±


    Ryan was panting, but was in good enough shape he still managed to get his words out. ¡°Rat creatures. Like rats and people got mushed together. Stand on two legs, carry spears and shit, and they¡¯re attacking the east wall in force. The skeletons there are fighting back, but they¡¯re having a tough time.¡±


    ¡°Then we shall reinforce them,¡± Gideon said. He pulsed a mental command to all the nearby undead. They marched forward, moving with speed toward the other side of the compound where the attack was.


    What sort of creatures were these? He¡¯d seen goblins, giant spiders, zombies, skeletons, and much more, but nothing like what Ryan had described. It would be interesting to see what they were up against this time. The Event changed the world, but those changes didn¡¯t appear to be static. Whatever happened was still happening; the alterations were ongoing. New monsters continued to spawn, often more dangerous than those which had been around before.


    He rode behind his troops. There was no sense being on the front line, not when he had mindless minions willing to fight and die to defend him. He pushed them into a swift march, and they responded, almost reaching a jogging pace as they crossed the open ground.


    When he was close enough to see what was going on, Carver still didn¡¯t know what to make of it. Ryan¡¯s description was accurate. These creatures were some sort of man and rat hybrid. They stood on two legs with rat faces and claws. They carried spears, but had sharp teeth as well. They were tier two, also¡ªmuch more deadly than the goblins they¡¯d been facing. The rats had already slain half of the undead minding the wall, and were doing a number on the remaining ones.


    But no longer. First, Carver cast Grave Dust, a damage over time spell that hit a wide area. He wasn¡¯t sure if he¡¯d gotten all of the enemy forces, but he¡¯d tagged at least a good chunk of them. That spell was tier three now, which might be enough to take down the tier two monsters all by itself, but he wasn¡¯t waiting for that. He ordered his undead forward.


    The skeleton warriors that made up his front rank crashed into the tier two rat-men. With their shields and clubs, they were a deadly strike force. But the enemy was also tier two, and they held their own well enough¡ªat least until Carver¡¯s second rank entered the fray.


    That rear row was made up of spell casters.


    Carver didn¡¯t have as many skeleton mages as he did skeleton warriors, but he¡¯d taken the time to make ten of them. The first ones he¡¯d made were instrumental in taking down the second cemetery, so he¡¯d added still more to his force. If he didn¡¯t still need a shield wall Carver would¡¯ve been tempted to spin up even more of the things.


    Each of the undead mages cast, sending rays of black fire into the enemy ranks. It was a Harm spell, he was pretty sure. The damage they did was substantially more than his Drain Life could manage, that much was sure. Each caster that landed its Harm killed a rat-man. Like clockwork, eight of the enemy troops went down, one after another.


    For a moment it looked like the rats would break, would run fleeing into the ruins of the city around them. But there was a roar from behind them, and another score of rats joined the battle from the ruins. The new additions raced across the open ground, leaping over debris and dashing around obstacles in their haste to rescue their brethren.


    ¡°Hold the wall,¡± Carver ordered his skeletons. He sent a mental command to his undead mages to take a step back, but to continue casting. He knew his shield wall would have to give ground under an assault of that weight, and he wanted them to have room to do so.


    One step was all he was willing to give them though. No more than that. This was his home! Anyone who dared attack it would die. He¡¯d make certain of that.


    The rat reinforcements crashed into the battle lines, adding chaos to an already unruly mess. Carver¡¯s line remained solid. They gave the one step he allowed and then stopped there, holding the enemy back. His undead mages cast again, and another collection of rat-men died.


    All of them would die. Anyone who attacked him would fall. He¡¯d make certain of it. He¡¯d reward those who served him well, and those who didn¡¯t would face his wrath.

 Chapter 55 - Pet Rocks

    Chapter 55 - Pet Rocks


    As Maura poked around in the big cabinet behind her, opening drawers and peering into them, I looked over the stones I had as spares, wondering which I could afford to give away. I had quite a few of them, but a lot of them were things I wanted to keep, because I thought they might be useful later on.


    For example, I had a hunch that Health to Mana, coupled with Drain Life, would be insanely broken. I only had the one crystal, so the spell had very limited power for the time being. It was definitely a rare stone, too¡ªI¡¯d seen enough black crystals to get a decent feel for which were less common. That one I was keeping.


    Obviously I was also keeping all the stones I was actively using, like the spares for Animate Dead, Drain Life, and Will. Those felt like clear wins to hang onto.


    Some of the others I didn¡¯t care about all that much. For example, I¡¯d slotted Entangle, early on, but never used it much, and I took it out as soon as better spells became available. I pulled both of my Entangle stones out of my bag and set them on the table. All three brown stones, too. Maybe at some point I¡¯d want to start making weapons and armor, but it wouldn¡¯t be anytime soon. I figured I could work out something to arrange for that. I plunked those on the table as well.


    I stared long and hard at the couple of Charisma crystals I¡¯d gathered. Before today, I¡¯d dismissed those as relatively useless. Now, I was nowhere near as sure. The Colonel had a tier five Charisma stone and it gave him powers almost akin to mind control. That was insane.


    It wasn¡¯t a power I wanted. I was okay with controlling my undead, but that was about as far as I wanted to go when it came to ordering people around. At the same time, I wasn¡¯t certain I wanted to trade those away, here. If I did, odds were excellent those stones would flow immediately to the Colonel, amping up his already powerful stat. How far was he from tier six? What would happen when he reached that level? Or tier seven, or higher?


    I wasn¡¯t sure I wanted to know the answer to those questions. I left those in the bag, at least for now. If they had something amazing to trade, I¡¯d think about it.


    I figured I could trade a few of the other clear ones, though, like the lower tier Strength crystals and the Intellect one. I wanted to keep the Agility and Will, and I had a feeling Stamina might do me some good as well, so I hung onto those. Of the black crystals, well, I wanted to keep most of them. I pulled out the two Darkness stones, figuring I was less likely to use them. The Nightvision, Protection from Undead, and Shadow Walk stones came out as well.


    By the time I was done, Maura and Farnsworth were both staring.


    ¡°What?¡± I asked.


    ¡°You¡¯ve got a lot of those rocks,¡± the master sergeant said. ¡°More than anyone I¡¯ve seen gather on their own. It¡¯s impressive.¡±


    ¡°Oh. Well, thanks,¡± I replied, blushing some. ¡°These are the ones I think I can trade.¡±


    Maura looked the stones over, sorting them out. ¡°These ones are all commons. The others, those are what we call rare. That includes the Nightvision, Protection from Undead, Shadow Walk, and Tracking.¡±


    It seemed to me like they¡¯d made the system too simple. I had a feeling that some of those were rarer than others. For instance, Protection from Undead had only dropped once out of all the undead I¡¯d killed. I had a feeling that one was extra rare. Or maybe stuff like Nightvision and Shadow Walk were only uncommon, not rare. Still, it was their trading shop, and everyone was only figuring out this stuff as we went along. I had no doubt things would change as we learned more.


    ¡°Hey, how are you seeing what the stones are?¡± I asked. ¡°I got that ability at tier five, but¡ª¡°


    ¡°But I¡¯m just tier four?¡± Maura replied. She chuckled. ¡°Trade secret. But I¡¯ll tell you anyway¡ªyou also get that power at tier three Intellect.¡±


    ¡°Oh! Okay, that¡¯s cool.¡± And it made sense, in a way. I wondered if there were other hidden benefits from ranking up various stats?


    ¡°All right then. The rank three Darkness is worth four credits while the rank two one is worth two. Nightvision is a rare so worth three credits since it¡¯s tier one. Ditto Protection from Undead. Your Shadow Walk stones are worth nine credits total, since they¡¯re rare. The Entangle stones are common, so three credits total. Two tier one Strength stones are worth a total of two, and the tier three Intellect is worth four. For the brown crystals, the two commons are worth one each, and Tracking is worth three. Your total is thirty-five credits.¡±


    ¡°Pretty sure that¡¯s the most anyone has ever delivered here,¡± Farnsworth muttered.


    ¡°Yeah, it is,¡± Maura agreed. ¡°Selena, this is a great deal of wealth in this new economy. You can use a credit to get a day of food and lodging without work, here at the base. But I suspect you¡¯ll want to spend them to acquire new stones, am I right?¡±


    ¡°Spot on,¡± I replied, starting to get excited. She was pulling out small drawers, like you might find at a jewelry store, each one padded with soft fabric and covered with small crystals.


    ¡°Outstanding. Here¡¯s the yellow crystal collection. We have more of these than anything else. They give air powers, and they drop from the avians. Since we¡¯ve been fighting them a lot, we¡¯ve got a lot of them.¡±


    I examined the stones while she went to pull another drawer. There were almost two dozen stones in the set, but a lot of them were duplicates. I quickly examined them to see what the spells were. I saw Gust of Wind, Flight, Levitate, Wall of Wind, and Tornado. It was easy to tell which ones were rare¡ªthere was only one stone each for Flight and Tornado. Those were the spells I was most interested in.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.


    Being able to fly would rock! But it didn¡¯t mesh well with my other stones. I couldn¡¯t very well leave my undead legion behind and go flying off into the sunset. Also, since there was just one of the stones, I figured the effect would likely be weak. Gathering enough of them to get the power tiered up would be a challenge, so I grudgingly set the stone back down and¡ªfor now¡ªgave up on my childhood dream of being a flying superhero.


    She pulled out the clear tray next. I glanced over the stones there, and wasn¡¯t at all surprised to see there were zero Charisma stones. I knew where those had gone.


    There were a good variety of the others, though. I saw two Strength stones, an Agility stone, three Stamina stones, two Intellect, and three Will stones. I immediately set aside the Agility and Will stones, then after a moment of thinking, added the Stamina stones as well. That would burn a lot of credits, but those were the three stats I was working on building, so it was worth it.


    Black was next. My heart skipped a beat when I saw them, just five lonesome stones on the cloth. But three of them were Animate Dead spells, and the other two were Control Undead. Those were my core spells. Making them stronger was going to be vital to my survival, so those five joined the pile.


    I was up to ten stones. ¡°You said that it counted at three for two, right? So thirty-five credits is¡­?¡±


    ¡°Well, thirty-six would buy you twenty-four common crystals,¡± Maura replied.


    I nodded. ¡°Makes sense. Let¡¯s see what else there is?¡±


    The green stones were of little interest. She had stones for Entangle¡ªseemed to be very common. There was one for Plant Growth, and another for Leather Skin¡ªseemed to be some sort of protection or armor spell. Animal Control sounded interesting, but I already had a bunch of minion-control spells in my black stones. I passed on those.


    Blue was for water magic. Maura told me they¡¯d gotten these from mud creatures that attacked out of the river. She only had a few. The water spells tended to be pretty useful. The ones she had were Create Water, Waterbreathing, and Fog. Cool to see more spells, and I filed all the information away for later¡ªbut not enough to make me want to switch to another color.


    The red crystals were far more intriguing. Red was for fire, and I¡¯d seen firsthand how powerful a good Fireball spell was! There were only three, but all of them looked cool: Flame Bolt, Burning Weapon, and Wall of Fire.


    I only had twelve stones in my pile, which was only about half of my credits. I pondered the fire spells. There were only one of each of the three, but any of them might be useful. Flame Bolt was an attack spell, like Fireball but less explosive. Burning Weapon seemed to do just what it said¡ªlight my weapon on fire to make it do more damage. Interesting but not key. My plan was to let my undead do most of the fighting. Wall of Fire could be useful to redirect enemies, though.


    While I was thinking, Maura clapped her hands together. ¡°Oh! I had one more thing you might appreciate. Most folks don¡¯t care, and in fact we¡¯ve been struggling to figure out a use for them, but¡­ You might like these. I only have two, and they¡¯re rare stones, but they might be just what you need.¡±


    With that, Maura pulled out two stones. They were gray crystals, almost like a smokey quartz. As soon as I saw them, I was interested, and when I saw the power they unlocked I was even more so. Each of them was a Minion Augmentation stone.


    I picked one up and my mind flooded with information about the crystal. Unlike most stones, this one wasn¡¯t meant for me to absorb; in fact, it wouldn¡¯t have been absorbed into me even if I had an open slot. These stones were meant for pets, minions, and other controlled creatures. In order to use them, I¡¯d hold them at the same time as another stone, which would merge them. Then I¡¯d touch the stone to a minion I controlled, and it would give them a permanent augmentation.


    ¡°Cute,¡± I said, staring at the crystals. ¡°Pet rocks?¡±


    Maura chuckled at the joke. ¡°Rocks for pets, certainly. I thought that with your specialty, these might be extra useful for you.¡±


    She was right. Of all the stones in this room, those two were probably the ones which would help me the most. I did a little mental math. The other twelve stones would use up eighteen credits worth. If I added in both pet stones, they were three credits each, six total, and because of the exchange rate would burn nine more credits for a total of twenty-seven.


    I had thirty-five credits on the table. I glanced over at Farnsworth, who still wore the crazy cool armor he¡¯d had on when he led his team out onto the airfield to meet us as we approached the base. He also had a sword belted to his side, and they¡¯d been using proper shields as well. I could use some of that.


    ¡°How much for armor or weapons like that?¡± I asked him. ¡°Is it possible to buy gear with these credits?¡±


    ¡°Sure, easy enough,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°If you want to do that, Maura here will give you credit coins, and then you¡¯ll bring them to the smithy. If you want something weird, it might cost more and take a little while, but they have stock stuff on the shelf they can just rig to fit almost anyone. Armor is three credits for a whole set, or one or two credits if you want a partial. Weapons range from one credit for something basic to two or even three credits for something complex. Shields are quick and easy, so a credit each.¡±


    ¡°Awesome. I think that¡¯s what I¡¯ll want to do,¡± I replied. I wanted armor for me, to keep me alive, and maybe a sword and shield as well. Not because I was any good at all using one, but I¡¯d learn. Beyond that, my troops would only get more powerful if I armed them better. I¡¯d done some of that, giving them basic weapons and gear as I could. But it would be much better to equip them properly.


    Spending twenty-seven credits on crystals left me with eight. I could get armor for three, a shield for one, a sword for two, and that would leave me with two left over for minion weapons. I pulled out the tier three Strength stone and added it to the ¡®for sale¡¯ pile, which boosted my credit total by four more.


    ¡°If my math is right, adding this brings me enough credits to buy these twelve stones and have twelve credits left over?¡± I said.


    Maura glanced across the table, did some mental math quickly, and nodded. ¡°Is that what you¡¯d like to do? I can get you the credit chit now.¡±


    I thought about it for just a moment, and then nodded. She flashed me a smile, scooped away the stones I¡¯d traded, and pulled out a sack that jingled as she moved it. She poured some of the contents into her hand, counted them out, and handed me a dozen of the heavy brass coins. I looked them over, surprised to see someone using coinage¡ªbut these weren¡¯t regular coins.


    ¡°Security Forces challenge coin?¡± I asked, holding one up.


    Maura laughed. ¡°Repurposed. They¡¯re a military tradition, to award people and commemorate events. The Colonel had them all collected, every one we could gather, so we could use them as a form of on-base currency for the duration of the emergency.¡±


    I had a feeling the ¡®duration¡¯ was going to be longer than most folks thought when all this started, but I could tell from the look on her face Maura was feeling the same thing.


    ¡°Works for me,¡± I replied, smiling as I pocketed the coins. That would buy me all the gear I needed for myself, and a bunch to upgrade my minions as well. ¡°Master Sergeant, you mind escorting me over to the smith?¡±


    ¡°Miss Selena, it would be my pleasure.¡±


    I turned back to Maura before we headed out. ¡°Thanks for your help. I appreciate it!¡±


    ¡°Glad to. Just be sure to bring along anything new and interesting you run into,¡± Maura replied. ¡°Always happy to trade.¡±


    With that, we were off to our next stop. Once I had the gear I needed, it was going to be time to get myself back out there. I had a growing hunch that Colonel Turner wasn¡¯t going to go rescue Alfred and his people. If I was right, then I needed to be ready to do the job for him.

 Chapter 56 - Linothorax

    Chapter 56 - Linothorax


    The smithy they¡¯d set up was a bit off the beaten path. Farnsworth took me out toward the airfield. We didn¡¯t leave the fenced in area of the base proper, but we were a lot closer to the wall they¡¯d set up facing the runways. One of the larger hangars had been repurposed as their armory and smithy.


    ¡°See, most of the usable metal we have is from the planes,¡± Farnsworth explained as we walked. ¡°Aircraft aluminum is light, but resilient. It doesn¡¯t weigh you down, and it certainly wouldn¡¯t stop a bullet¡ªbut that¡¯s not something we need to worry about anymore. What it will do is stop a claw or sword cold.¡±


    ¡°Makes sense to me. But isn¡¯t it difficult to shape the stuff?¡±


    He held out a hand, palm down, and see-sawed it back and forth. ¡°Sort of, yes. But we have some amazing machinists here on the base, and that¡¯s before they picked up the Armor Crafting and Weapon Making skills. With those as well, it got much more simple.¡±


    ¡°How do those skills work, anyway?¡± I asked. ¡°I mean with the spells, I get it¡ªwe insert the stone, we get the power to use magic in a new way, along with all the information we need to use it. Are the skills kind of like that?¡±


    ¡°More or less. They¡¯re more informational and less functional. The skills don¡¯t let you magic a piece of armor into being. They do give you a deeper understanding of armor and more knowledge about how to make it. Coupled with the skills our people already had, they¡¯re able to do a lot,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°Shoulder cops like these I have on are easy - just a gentle curve shaped into the metal. Knee and elbow protection is a little tougher, I gather.¡±


    ¡°And what¡¯s the body harness you¡¯ve got on?¡± I asked, curious.


    ¡°They call it lamellar. Because big sheets of aluminum are harder to shape into complex curves, they¡¯re still trying to figure out how to manufacture a full breastplate from the stuff. They can do it from steel, but we have limited quantities of steel, and it weighs a ton. This stuff is easy to make, easy to repair, holds up well in combat, and saves a lot of lives.¡±


    I could see that. The whole body harness was made up of a bunch of individual slices of aluminum sheet, cut to rectangles about the size of a playing card cut in half. They¡¯d punched a series of holes in the cards, that Farnsworth called ¡®lames,¡¯ and then strung them together with what looked like parachute cord. Figures they probably had plenty of that around, too.


    The end result looked mad protective, and I was definitely in the mood to buy some better protection. ¡°What about helmets?¡±


    Farnsworth shook his head. ¡°We¡¯ve only made a few. Again, it¡¯s a metal thing. We have plenty of aluminum, but it doesn¡¯t shape well in tight curves, and that made helmets hard. Plus, I guess the weight of the helmet actually impacts how much protection it gives, something about inertia? I didn¡¯t understand all of it, but if you¡¯re curious you can ask Sergeant Bear in a bit. Once we get more steel from scavenging cars, we¡¯ll do better in that department.¡±


    We reached the hangar. The building had two massive doors, front and back, and they were both halfway open. I guess they needed to be¡ªI could feel the heat pouring out from a dozen paces away. I peered inside, and the setup was pretty complicated. Forges, flames, quenching buckets, and a ton of other stuff I couldn¡¯t recognize.


    ¡°Sergeant Bear!¡± Farnsworth called out, as he marched out of the sun. ¡°Got a customer for you!¡±


    A tall woman stepped out of the dimly lit background, striding quickly toward us. She had dark hair, was built like a linebacker, and wore a heavy leather apron over her uniform. Her face was streaked with sweat, her hands grubby, but she wore a smile on her face.


    ¡°What¡¯d you bring me this time, Farnie?¡±


    ¡°I told you not to call me that.¡±This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    ¡°Did you? I musta forgot,¡± Bear replied. ¡°Sorry, Farnie.¡±


    ¡°You know I outrank you, right?¡± Farnsworth asked.


    ¡°LOL. Sure thing, Farnie.¡±


    Farnsworth glared at her, then at me, the look on his face saying something like ¡®you see what I have to deal with?¡¯ Me, I was wondering if they were already lovers or just at the flirting stage. I had a feeling it was more the latter, but I wasn¡¯t thinking it would take much longer. All the markers were there.


    I kept my opinions to myself, though, and stepped forward to shake Bear¡¯s hand. ¡°I¡¯m Selena Serrano. I¡¯ve got a bunch of those credit tokens, and Farnie here told me this was the place to come to get properly geared up?¡±


    Bear shook my hand, chuckling at the joke. She was tier four, same as Maura. ¡°Linda Bear. Nice to meet you.¡±


    Farnsworth gave a grunt of disapproval at my joining in on the teasing, but he didn¡¯t comment on it. ¡°She¡¯s a rank five. Been out there on her own the whole time, and brought in a bucket of crystals for Maura. Figured we could get her outfitted a bit better.¡±


    ¡°Whatcha looking for, kid?¡± Bear asked.


    ¡°Armor, shield, and a weapon for me. I have undead, too¡ªbunch of skeletons, mostly. I figured I¡¯d get some simple weapons with the rest of my credits.¡±


    ¡°I see. Cute dog,¡± Bear said, pointing at Hope, who wagged her tail in response.


    ¡°Thanks! So, can you help me out?¡±


    ¡°I surely can. I¡¯ve got full sets of the aluminum body armor your buddy here is wearing, in a variety of sizes, and ready to go,¡± Bear said. ¡°But¡ªI might have something else that can work for you, and if you want it, I can let it go for just a credit instead of two. Two credits for that shirt plus the aluminum for your neck, shoulders, elbows, and other bits.¡±


    Farnsworth chuckled. ¡°What, you¡¯re gonna foist that lino bullshit off on her?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not bullshit, ass. It just doesn¡¯t fit me,¡± Bear snapped at him. Then she turned back to me. ¡°It¡¯s a new type of armor. One of our scout runs came back with more cloth than we knew what to do with, and the crystals I used for Armor Making gave me a lot of ideas. Seems like the Greeks used to make armor by laminating layers of cloth. Lots of layers. They used glue to hold them all together, give them form, and some solidity.¡±


    She went rooting around in a bin that was filled with discarded bits of armor. They looked like they were mostly experiments gone wrong; the woman must have been making armor like mad! Finally she grunted and pulled something that looked a bit like a stiff t-shirt out of the bin.


    The armor was white, with a few embellishments on the shoulders. It had no sleeves, but the shoulders did sort of stretch out in a way that helped protect a bit of the upper arm. The thing protected both front and back. It buckled together on the sides. Bear tossed the thing to me, and I was shocked at both how light and how sturdy it felt. The whole thing was molded to fit a female frame, so it wouldn¡¯t work for a skinnier guy.


    ¡°I used epoxy instead of glue,¡± Bear said. ¡°Which was both good and bad. Good, because it¡¯s hella hard now. I tested a chunk against arrows, and it stopped them as well as the aluminum did. It¡¯s good armor. Bad, because, well, epoxy shrinks as it cures, and although I¡¯d thought I had accounted for the shrinkage¡­¡±


    I held up the torso armor and eyed her frame. There was no way on Earth that was going to fit her. But it might just work for me. ¡°I see the issue. Help me see if it fits?¡±


    A few minutes later we had me buckled into the contraption, which fit like a glove. Bear made a few adjustments on the fly, tweaking the straps and cutting off a little of the bottom edge. When she was done, there was no chafing left at all. It was only about as heavy as wearing a sweatshirt or two, but because of the sleeveless nature it wasn¡¯t that hot.


    ¡°I like it a lot,¡± I said. ¡°Definitely a winner here.¡±


    ¡°Great!¡± Bear replied. ¡°I¡¯d like to see it used. There¡¯s only a few women fighters here, and most of them have a little more in the chest than this will allow for. The bad part of a linothorax¡ªthat¡¯s what these are called¡ªis they really have to be made to fit the user. A poorly fitting one won¡¯t work out well. But you seem to be just about right for this one.¡±


    I was especially pleased with the purchase. Bear went on to get me hooked up with an aircraft aluminum shield, a steel short sword, the other bits of armor I needed to protect myself, and four more shields and spears for my undead. That used up all my credits. If I wanted to get proper weapons and armor for the rest of my army, I¡¯d need to get more crystals to trade.


    ¡°Sergeant Bear, thanks so much. I really appreciate the armor,¡± I told her.


    ¡°Wear it in good health. I¡¯m sure I¡¯ll see you around again,¡± she replied.


    Getting more crystals was doable. Farnsworth escorted me back to where I¡¯d left my undead in the ¡®daycare¡¯ they had set up, so I could leave the spare spears and shields there with my skeletons. I didn¡¯t expect them to stay there long, though. The next thing I needed to do was find Kara, and maybe have one more conversation with Colonel Turner.


    If he wasn¡¯t ready to make a run to rescue my friends yet, then it was going to be time to plan that rescue ourselves. It was already past noon, and every hour we waited put Alfred, Kat, and the rest of their people in even greater danger. Whether Turner was ready or not, I was going back out there to save them.

 Chapter 57 - The World We Lived In

    Chapter 57 - The World We Lived In


    My undead army was in pretty good shape. Thanks to my crystals, I could Animate sixteen tiers worth of undead, and Control another sixteen. I wasn¡¯t maxed out, but I was fairly close.


    For Controlled undead, I still had Hope at tier two, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern at tier one, and six remaining tier one skeletons I¡¯d captured from various graveyards.


    My Animated ones were a mixed bag, too. I had four goblin zombies at tier two each, plus another four skeleton warriors at tier two. I¡¯d shifted over to quality over quantity. The extra jump in power from tier one to two seemed to make a lot of difference in a fight, so it just made sense to maximize the power of my troops.


    I focused on giving the tier two undead the new weapons, too. Between the bows I¡¯d scavenged from homes and the ones I¡¯d looted from dead goblins, I had enough to arm all four goblin zombies with bows. They had an Agility boost of some sort, which seemed to make them better archers, so they got the ranged weapons. The spears and shields I¡¯d just bought went to the tier two skeleton warriors; since they were larger, bulkier, and a little stronger, having them form the core of my shield wall made sense.


    I¡¯d also merged together the stones I¡¯d acquired from Maura, where I could. The extra Will stones I¡¯d bought were enough to boost my Will up to tier four, so I did that right away. That ought to bring me close enough to Colonel Turner¡¯s Charisma that I could better keep my head around him.


    The Minion Augmentation stones were burning a hole in my pocket. I wanted badly to check one out and see how exactly they worked, but I wasn¡¯t sure what I wanted to add yet. There was a lot I didn¡¯t know about them, and I wanted to make sure I maximized the value of such a rare and powerful asset. I¡¯d give it a little more thought before using them.


    Once my little army was re-armed properly, I surveyed my crystal setup and spares again:


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Curse


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Contagion


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Will


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Agility


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead (Tier 3), Animate Dead, Augment Undead (Tier 3), Augment Undead, Control Undead (Tier 3), Drain Life (Tier 2), Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana, Heal Undead (Tier 3), Heal Undead


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Agility (Tier 2), Agility, Stamina (Tier 2), Stamina (Tier 3), Charisma (Tier 2), Charisma, Will (Tier 2)


    Gray: Minion Augmentation (x2)


    I was in good shape. I¡¯d come a long way since the Event blew my life up. Was that a week ago? I tried to backtrack how long it had been, and I was pretty sure it had only been five days. That was insane! How had the world changed so much in so little time?


    Mom and Dad would¡¯ve been proud, anyway. They were tough; I knew they were out there defending their home against all comers. I¡¯d accomplished a lot in less than a week. Hopefully it would be enough to make a difference here.


    Farnsworth came over to me as I got ready to leave the pet camp where my undead were stored. ¡°What¡¯s next, Selena?¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t have to escort me everywhere, you know,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure I can find my way around now.¡±


    He coughed into his hand. ¡°Actually, I do. Orders.¡±


    I arched an eyebrow. ¡°Because I¡¯m tier five?¡±


    He nodded.


    ¡°That¡¯s just stupid. You really think I¡¯m going to ruin the good thing you guys have going here?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Farnsworth answered, blunt as ever. ¡°I think you¡¯re a good kid, who has been helping other people out more than most folks since this mess started. If you were under my command I¡¯d be thrilled. But you¡¯re also unarguably one of the most powerful people on the base right now. If you decided you wanted to fight us, we¡¯d win. But you¡¯d do a lot of damage.¡±


    ¡°And you¡¯re with me to ensure that doesn¡¯t happen.¡±Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.


    He nodded again. ¡°Got it in one.¡±


    It seemed like a shitty waste of the man¡¯s time to me, but I couldn¡¯t fault his logic. It was a little frightening to have a soldier tell me his base was so scared of me that they had one of their most powerful fighters tailing me all day just in case I went nuts. I was used to picturing the military as being above it all, able to handle whatever came their way.


    But that was before. Now, one person with enough of these stones could outfight a hundred, maybe even a thousand people without magical upgrades. It was a world we all had to get used to.


    ¡°I was thinking I should check on Kara, see how she¡¯s doing. Then I need to meet with Colonel Turner again, as soon as he can be available,¡± I said. ¡°It¡¯s past noon, and those goblins will certainly come after my friends come nightfall, if they haven¡¯t already. We need to get back to them to get them here soon, or it¡¯ll be too late.¡±


    Farnsworth winced at that. ¡°Selena, I don¡¯t think you¡¯re going to get a lot of help from the colonel on that score, not right away. We¡¯ve pulled back from scouting for more survivors over the past two days, thanks to the bird people. We still have people going out for supplies, and if they happen across survivors they invite them as well. But only east of here. Not west. Any people we send west are met with immediate resistance.¡±


    ¡°Master Sergeant, I get that you guys are in the middle of your own war here, but I¡¯m not letting my friends down,¡± I told him. ¡°We¡¯re going back to get them. With or without you.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I figured as much. I just don¡¯t think you¡¯re going to get much help from the base. Not right now, not with everyone already on high alert and worried about the avians attacking our base.¡±


    I didn¡¯t doubt him. That was the vibe I¡¯d been getting here since arriving. ¡°Doesn¡¯t change my plans. Where is Kara right now?¡±


    ¡°Probably getting lunch at the dining facility. Come on, I¡¯ll take you there,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°I can get you a lunch on the house, at least.¡±


    A short trip back across the base brought us to the building with their dining hall. It had been deeply modified, of course. Without power, the indoor stoves and ovens were trash, so they¡¯d blown out the wall of the building, knocked it right down, and set up a series of shelter tents over the open space just outside it. There, they built cooking pits and wood-fired ovens. I could smell something good cooking from a ways off, and my mouth started watering.


    ¡°Is that pizza?¡± I asked.


    Farnsworth shot me a grin. ¡°Yup. Today¡¯s the first day they¡¯re serving it. We have buckets of tomato sauce and more flour than we know what to do with, but cheese has been an issue. We found a good supply of the stuff sealed in wax blocks, though. It won¡¯t taste precisely like something from Blaze, but what I hear is they¡¯re getting close.¡±


    He led me into the line, and ordered us each a personal pizza. I took mine and a large plastic cup full of water, and followed him into the dining area proper. The lighting was dim inside, but there were enough windows that it was workable. So much had changed¡ªwe were going to need to relearn things like candle-making, I guessed, if we wanted interior lighting. Unless there were spells that did that. Maybe there was some crafting spell that could create lights that worked for a long time?


    Like I said, so much to learn.


    I spotted Kara already seated with a few locals and waved to her. She spotted me, waved back, and Farnsworth changed course to go to her table. We joined the collection of folks she¡¯d been conversing with.


    ¡°Selena! How¡¯s it going? This place is amazing!¡± Kara said. ¡°We need to get the rest of my group back here as soon as we can. This will be perfect for them.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, it will,¡± I replied. ¡°That may be trickier than we¡¯d hoped, though.¡±


    I explained the situation with the bird people, and how the Guard base was pretty much playing defense for the time being. The implications I got from Turner and Farnsworth were that they intended to push back hard against the avians, soon, but that they weren¡¯t ready for it yet. Our friends didn¡¯t have time to wait.


    ¡°So I¡¯m going back anyway,¡± I told Kara. ¡°These guys have a base to defend, and hundreds of civilians to protect. They can¡¯t send a large enough force to punch through the enemy lines, and they¡¯re not ready for a big showdown against the avians yet. But I don¡¯t need to punch through them; I¡¯m hoping I can slip past, instead. Then I¡¯ll get Alfred and his people together and bring them back here.¡±


    ¡°Sounds good. When do we go?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°I wasn¡¯t sure you¡¯d want to come,¡± I told her. I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about it, either. She wasn¡¯t weak, but she wasn¡¯t as strong in combat as me. She wasn¡¯t even close. Kara wouldn¡¯t be a burden, but this trip would be risky enough for me. It could be deadly for her.


    ¡°It¡¯s dangerous, yada yada. I get it,¡± Kara replied. ¡°But they¡¯re my friends, too. I¡¯m in.¡±


    I looked into her eyes, saw the determination, and just nodded my acceptance. Sometimes, you have to just take people at their word and roll with it. ¡°Okay. Then we need to go sooner rather than later. Come nightfall, the goblins will be even more active, and we¡¯ll be easier to ambush, too.¡±


    ¡°But the avians won¡¯t,¡± Farnsworth pointed out. He¡¯d been mostly silent while I filled Kara in, but now he chimed in with some useful thoughts. ¡°They¡¯re much less active after dark. They pretty much all retreat inside, leaving a few guards out to watch for attacks. If there¡¯s any time you can slip past them, night would be best.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t sure that was going to work. We¡¯d already been away one night. For all we knew, the goblins had been attacking Alfred¡¯s people for twenty-four hours already. If we didn¡¯t move soon, it might be too late. The night would bring more danger from other monsters, too¡­


    ¡°He¡¯s got a point,¡± Kara said. ¡°And I have that NightVision stone you gave me. Using that, I ought to be able to spot any traps like the one that giant spider set. If waiting a few more hours maximizes our chances of success, we should think about it.¡±


    ¡°Can Alfred hold out that long, though?¡± I asked.


    Kara nodded. ¡°I have faith in him. He¡¯s done a good job so far. He¡¯s got a warrior¡¯s heart.¡±


    How different that description sounded from the man I¡¯d known in my classes! Alfred had changed a lot. We were all changing; I¡¯m sure I was different, too.


    ¡°Okay, if we¡¯re going to wait until nightfall, we should get some sleep first,¡± I said. I turned to Farnsworth. ¡°Is there a place we can crash for a few hours, get some rest?¡±


    ¡°Sure is,¡± he replied. ¡°Finish your meals, and I¡¯ll get you to a quiet room you can use until dusk.¡±


    We had a plan. It wasn¡¯t a great plan, but it was better than not having one. I wished the military had just been able to take all of this off my shoulders, that they¡¯d simply had the troops to go fight the bad guys, save the good guys, and I could watch from relative safety. I was tired. Bone-deep exhausted, and the thought of going back out there into the mess the world had become didn¡¯t appeal.


    But this was the world we lived in, now.

 Chapter 58 - Punch Through

    Chapter 58 - Punch Through


    I woke to a gentle vibration at my wrist, plus a pinging sound. My eyes snapped open, and I was fully alert in moments; but it was just my watch. I¡¯d set the alarm for seven in the evening. Enough time to get some solid rest, but early enough so we¡¯d be able to leave with the setting sun.


    My pack was undisturbed next to my cot, Hope standing guard. Kara was still asleep on the next cot over. I slipped my boots back on and gently roused her.


    ¡°Time?¡±


    ¡°Yup,¡± I replied.


    There was no one else in the bunk room. It was a large room, filled with rows of cots, but the other residents were all out and about still, taking care of the business of the day. Farnsworth told me this was where they put newcomers soon after they arrived, until they had more permanent housing. He¡¯d offered us a pair of the cots to rest for a bit. Sleep was going to be in short supply tonight.


    Before we were ready to go, Farnsworth appeared at the door, first knocking, then coming inside. ¡°You¡¯re already up. Good. Colonel Turner sends his regards and best wishes. He asked me to let you know he¡¯s sorry he can¡¯t send more help. With the way we¡¯re under siege from the avians, right now¡­¡±


    ¡°He can¡¯t. I get it,¡± I told him. ¡°When we bring our friends back, they¡¯re free to stay though, right?¡±


    ¡°Absolutely. Anyone willing to work is welcome.¡±


    I hoped everyone Alfred brought was willing to do some sort of work. Freeloading wasn¡¯t going to get folks very far in this new world. The Guard would find something useful folks could do, I felt confident of that. Bringing them to this place would at least give them a shot. Beyond that, it would be up to them.


    Farnsworth took us to the gates, stopping briefly to pick up my undead. With my full force back behind us, we made our way out through the main gates.


    ¡°Wish I could come,¡± Farnsworth said, before we took off. ¡°I¡¯d help if I could. Orders.¡± He shrugged helplessly.


    ¡°Thanks. I appreciate the thought, at least,¡± I told him.


    ¡°You¡¯re a good one, Selena. I hope you get back to us in one piece.¡±


    ¡°Oh, I will. It¡¯s anyone who gets in our way who needs to be worried, tonight.¡± I meant it, too. I was on fire, and not willing to let anything slow me down. If someone attacked us, I was going to tear right through them.


    ¡°I bet. Stay safe out there,¡± Farnsworth added. Then he closed the gates behind us.


    We were on our own, again.


    Kara led the way south, skirting the fence line to stay off the runways. There was too much open space out there. Even with the avians mostly sleeping, we didn¡¯t want to take a lot of chances. There was a small forest on the southeast side of the runways. We made our way there, not entering the woods, but staying just outside them where we had optimal visibility without being able to be seen at a distance.


    From there, we slipped past the flight academy Farnsworth told me about when he was briefing us on the surrounding area before our nap. It was abandoned and locked up. In a pinch, he said, that ought to be a relatively safe place to rest. It was cleared in the first days after the Event, and the avians hadn¡¯t moved in yet. This was about the closest we wanted to get to their base of operations.


    I watched them in the distance, torches lighting up the top of the terminal and air traffic tower. He¡¯d been spot on about them mostly staying inside at night, thank goodness. I didn¡¯t seen any of them flying around, just a few silhouettes from their guards as they passed in front of a torch.Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    Route Two was a short hop down Aviation Drive. Once we were on a main road, the going felt a lot easier, but the danger was probably higher. The further we got from the Air Guard base, the less their sphere of influence mattered. The bird people, too, were probably clearing out random monsters spawning near their home. As we moved away from both, we entered territory we didn¡¯t know, that was controlled by who-knew-what.


    People were out and about. I spotted one group that looked like a family¡ªthey had some kids with them, anyway. If they¡¯d approached us, I¡¯d have suggested they backtrack our path, head to the Guard base. But they took one look at the ranks of undead traveling with me and headed in the other direction, fast. It was a little sad to see¡ªI didn¡¯t want to scare decent people. On the other hand, that same fear was probably keeping a lot of would-be attackers away from us, too. That part, I couldn¡¯t complain about.


    There was enough cloud cover that the moon was only providing light illumination. If it hadn¡¯t been for Kara¡¯s NightVision, we¡¯d have been in deep shit. Well, that, and my undead didn¡¯t seem to need a lot of light either. They were moving along without much issue. I was not. I tripped and stumbled more times than I could count, but I couldn¡¯t be upset about it. If the visibility was so bad I couldn¡¯t see the ground in front of me, it also meant most things out in the night couldn¡¯t see me.


    It took us hours to move the couple of miles up Route Two toward our destination. Cars were dead in the street all around us, and they gave us plenty of cover. The night was noisy, though! The sounds of violence rang out all around us. A scream, to the north. Then sounds of combat to the south. Banging, like someone was striking a drum over and over.


    This wasn¡¯t the Burlington I¡¯d known, not even close. This was a nightmare compared to the street I used to hike. My friends and I would walk down Route Two from the University to the mall at least once a week or so. Burlington wasn¡¯t a big town¡ªthere wasn¡¯t that much to do here, at least, not before. I knew this street.


    But not anymore. It was nothing like what it had been. My senses tracked the smallest sounds, worried they might represent a threat.


    Finally we passed the mall itself. We veered north a bit, there, and avoided coming anywhere close to the place. I wasn¡¯t sure what was going on there, but it was bad news. Flames erupted from a score of spots in the parking lot around the mall¡ªsomeone had set cars aflame, and they were burning merrily. That drumming sound I¡¯d heard before? That¡¯s where it was coming from. I didn¡¯t know what was happening there and didn¡¯t want to.


    Not tonight, anyway. I couldn¡¯t fix the entire world. Trying to fight every monster everywhere would just end up with me getting myself killed. But with some luck, maybe I could save my friends.


    Once we reached the intersection with Interstate 89, though, we had some choices to make. I knew the goblins had captured the hotel on the north side of the road, and some rat creatures had taken the mini-mall on the south side. We slipped through them, the first time Kara and I passed this way.


    That wasn¡¯t going to work out as well this time.


    The goblins were on the move. They¡¯d rushed across the road and were actively attacking the rat people, who fended them off as best they could. The rats had set up barricades to keep the attackers back and shoved spears at attackers over the low walls. Other rat-people in the roof of the mall threw short spears or fired crude arrows into the mass of attackers.


    ¡°Well, shit,¡± Kara said. ¡°I was hoping things would stay easy.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, we can¡¯t get that lucky. What do you think? Cut north?¡± If we moved north, we could slip between the hotel buildings the goblins occupied, and if they were all busy with the rat-people, maybe they¡¯d left that unguarded?


    But Kara shook her head. ¡°No, I can still see them there. The goblins are still all over the place on the north side of the street. That force attacking, that¡¯s maybe half of their troops. We go north, they¡¯re going to be all over us.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the play, then?¡± I asked. On the plus side, if the goblins were fighting the rats in these numbers, maybe it meant Alfred¡¯s people were okay. They couldn¡¯t have enough goblins to hit both places at the same time, right?


    On the other hand, they were one hell of a barrier for us to cross right now.


    ¡°Honestly? I think we just rush ¡®em,¡± Kara said. ¡°Punch through the goblin ranks. That will lighten the pressure on the rat-guys, and maybe they¡¯ll rush and counterattack the goblins.¡±


    ¡°Maybe isn¡¯t a great strategy.¡±


    ¡°No, but unless we want to travel way out of our way to the south¡ªor go north through the woods we know are goblin-infested¡ªwe don¡¯t have a whole lot of options.¡±


    She wasn¡¯t wrong. I did say I was going to punch through anyone who got in my way tonight¡­ Guess it was time to demonstrate the resolve behind that. I passed mental orders to my undead, forming them up into ranks. Shield wall up front, with the archers behind.


    ¡°Ready?¡± I asked Kara.


    She nodded.


    I gave another silent order, and my undead moved forward, pushing straight down the street into the rear guard of the goblin strike force.

 Chapter 59 - Field Museum Exhibit Exchange

    Chapter 59 - Field Museum Exhibit Exchange


    The goblins were so busy with their own fight, they didn¡¯t even see the threat until we were right on top of them. As my skeletons marched forward, moving in two columns of tight ranks between the stranded cars, one of the green-skinned creatures finally became aware of our advance. I was watching for it, saw the moment where the goblin recognized our threat, and turned to alert its fellows.


    Before it could, I dropped a Drain Life on the creature and it dropped like a pile of bricks. One down, whole lot more to go.


    My archers unleashed their arrows next, firing over the heads of the front ranks. Arrows pin-cushioned goblins who thought they¡¯d been behind cover¡ªand they were, from the rat-people arrows. Just not from ours. Several more goblins went down before they even knew where the attacks were coming from.


    Then they turned on us with a vengeance, screaming and shrieking as they rushed our line.


    The goblins slammed into a wall of aircraft aluminum shields, each interlocked with the ones next to it and backed by a tier two skeleton warrior. Those warriors were strong, and the shields didn¡¯t move. My personal shield was a good-size round, which made it flexible and easy to manipulate. But the ones I¡¯d acquired for the skeletons were large, Roman-style things. It was stupidly hard to get around them when they were locked against each other.


    I gave my undead a mental command, and as one they hinged their shields out, giving them enough room to stab with their spears. More goblins fell.


    We were forced into two columns by the nature of the path. Because of all the cars, there was no easy way to just push our entire force through as a single unit, so I¡¯d split us into two roughly equal teams. Each one had front ranks of shield and spear skeletons, with bow and arrow goblin zombies behind. That row was followed by a human¡ªme for one side, Kara for the other¡ªand a couple of tier one undead as a rear guard.


    We churned through the enemy ranks like hot knives through butter. I grinned, loving this. These creatures had hurt enough people, and watching them fall so easily was a balm to my heart. I dropped a Drain on a goblin that had hidden under a car and was coming at Kara, nailing it before it could even get close to her. She saw and flashed me a quick salute in thanks.


    But mostly, I just kept my troops moving forward in a steady pattern of block, open shields, stab, march, repeat. It wasn¡¯t as quick as I might have liked, and I worried about getting bogged down in the mess of monsters, but we were able to keep moving. That was the key here, I figured, because there were still a lot more goblins than I had undead. If they got their act together and came at us from all directions, we¡¯d be screwed.


    Shock and awe was a term I¡¯d read about in history books, not seen in reality. Until now, anyway.


    An arrow whistled past my head and I ducked, raising my shield instinctively. But it hadn¡¯t been aimed at me. The arrow stabbed into a goblin that had crept up on me from behind, using cars for cover so it avoided detection almost until it was too late. The creature had a wicked knife in its hand, and I didn¡¯t want to think what they would have done to me, if it had gotten close enough to stab. It was dead now, though. I tapped it and got a clear crystal for my trouble.


    Then I stood and looked around for the source of the arrow, finally spotting a rat-man archer atop the strip mall to my left. It shook its bow, almost like a wave, so I raised my shield high and shook it in reply. I wasn¡¯t sure what to make of that¡­ This was the first time since the Event that some monster had acted in a way that made me hope we could learn to cooperate or something. If these rat-beings were able to understand that the ¡®enemy of my enemy is my friend,¡¯ then maybe that could blossom into true alliance?


    And if it was true for them, what other creatures might it be possible for? The bird-people? Perhaps even the goblins? Others? It was information I needed to get back to the Guard, because right now they were operating under the assumption all of these non-human things were monsters. Now I had to wonder if that was really true.


    I didn¡¯t let the question stop me from plowing my troops through the heart of the goblin horde, though. We kept dropping them like a harvesting combine in autumn. I was having to step over a lot of dead goblins, and thankfully I had the time and space to tap them each for stones. I wasn¡¯t able to see what they all were, but I could worry about that later. For the time being I just stashed the loot in pockets.


    A sheet of arrows slammed into the ranks of the goblins directly ahead of us, fired by the ratfolk. It was obvious they were avoiding firing at us, focusing their fire on the goblins who¡¯d abandoned their cover to engage us, and those arrows were devastatingly effective. Half a dozen goblins formed up to stop us, only to be wiped out a moment later by a volley of fire.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    I tapped each as we kept moving, pushing forward.


    Finally, the goblins had enough. A horn sounded from the hotel to my right, and the remaining green-skins took off like a shot, fleeing from the battle, running north as fast as their short legs could carry them. I dropped another with a Drain spell, just for good measure, but for the most part I let them go, even ordering my archers to hold their fire. They were recovering arrows as we walked, but not all of them, and we really couldn¡¯t afford to run out.


    With the goblins gone, there were no more barriers to our advance. I ordered the undead to step up the pace, quickly moving past the battleground. I glanced back, looking at the rat-people again. I drew my sword, held it up high above my head, and waved it in a circle, hoping they might see it.


    A cheer went up from the south side of the road, strange, animal voices calling out wordlessly into the night. Spears banged against shields, and hands beat on barriers, all of them making noise. I wasn¡¯t wholly sure if they were celebrating the win or trying to scare us off, but again I had the sense of intelligence behind their actions. They understood that we¡¯d helped them. Whether that meant future cooperation was possible or not, I didn¡¯t know. But it left me hopeful.


    Once we were clear of the fighting zone, our two units reformed into one and Kara slipped over to stand beside me again. ¡°That was wild! What a fight. I took down two of them myself.¡±


    ¡°I got a few, too,¡± I replied with a smile.


    ¡°Your undead got more than a few,¡± she shot back. ¡°I looted a bunch of crystals. We can split them up later?¡±


    ¡°You looted them, you should get them; if you hadn¡¯t looted them, some other person or monster might have.¡±


    ¡°Your undead killed most of them,¡± Kara replied. ¡°I¡¯d feel better about giving you some of these.¡±


    I shrugged, accepting what she¡¯d said. Personally, I wasn¡¯t too worried about it. It was growing increasingly obvious that my strike force here was a powerhouse, and so long as I was careful about it, I was confident I could get all the stones I needed. Sharing and making her stronger wasn¡¯t hurting me. It was helping us both.


    ¡°We¡¯re almost there,¡± I said. ¡°Hopefully Alfred and his people are still in the same spot.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I hope so,¡± Kara replied. But she was peering ahead into the darkness. Jeffords Hall was still far enough away that it was invisible to me, at night. Her NightVision, though¡­


    ¡°You see something?¡±


    ¡°Hard to tell, still,¡± Kara said. ¡°But I think I¡¯m seeing smoke rolling up from the building. It¡¯s still standing; it¡¯s not burned down or anything. But it doesn¡¯t look great.¡±


    Crap, that wasn¡¯t good. I¡¯d been worried the goblin pyromancer would be able to lob fireballs into the building, setting it on fire from the lower levels upward, and burning Alfred¡¯s merry band to death. If the building was smoking...?


    ¡°We¡¯ll know soon,¡± I replied as we turned onto Beaumont Avenue, and from there into a parking lot. We were almost there.


    Once we were close enough, we got a good feel for the story of what had happened.


    Jeffords Hall was abandoned. That much was immediately obvious. The place was badly burned, almost gutted by flames. Alfred had taken my warnings seriously enough. The huge glass windows on the lower two levels, which had all been shattered and left open, were boarded over. He¡¯d found big sheets of plywood somewhere and nailed them over the open space, giving at least minimal protection.


    But the goblins had ripped the plywood off the bottom level. Goblin bodies were everywhere around the base of the building, so the defenders had taken a ton of foes down during the fighting, but it hadn¡¯t been enough. Once the boards were out of the way, the goblins busted into the ground floor and presumably set some sort of fire down there. I couldn¡¯t tell if it had been magical or mundane, but however they started the blaze, it had done a number on the building.


    There was no easy way to get to the top floor to see if there were any survivors up there, but no one answered our shouts upward, either. I was pretty sure the place had been abandoned. Hopefully that, anyway. The alternative was shit.


    ¡°What now?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°We need to look around, see if they went elsewhere,¡± I said. ¡°We probably ought to try to go up there and find out if they left a message or something, but I don¡¯t know how to scale that mess. It might be easier just to move north, onto campus, and see if we can find them in the other buildings.¡±


    ¡°Sounds good to me,¡± she replied. ¡°If we do a quick sweep and can¡¯t find them, maybe we can swing back and try to climb up there.¡±


    We moved around the south side of the building, then back north toward the university greenhouse. There was a lot of evidence of activity here; marks in the dirt showed where something heavy had been dragged from the greenhouse toward Jeffords, and I quickly figured out that was where they¡¯d gotten the plywood, because a big stack of boards was still there, unused.


    A flyer on the greenhouse door caught my eye¡ªsomething I¡¯d forgotten about entirely until just then. The Field Museum, in Chicago, had done an exchange with UVM that year¡ªallowing a special display of a number of relics and other cool historic crap. It wasn¡¯t something I¡¯d paid much attention to before. I was a medical school student, not an anthropology or paleontology major. But now, I made a mental note of where the collection was being housed¡ªthe Marsh Life Sciences building¡ªbecause I had what felt like a really good idea.


    Wasn¡¯t sure if it would work. But if it did? This was gonna be epic.


    ¡°What do you have there?¡± Kara asked, glancing at the flyer I¡¯d yanked from the door. I showed her the picture on the piece of paper, grinning ear to ear. ¡°Oh. Ohhhhh! Oh, shit!¡±


    ¡°Yeah. Not sure if it¡¯s going to work, but I figure it¡¯s worth a shot.¡±


    ¡°Hell yeah!¡± Kara replied, smiling as broadly as I was now. ¡°Let¡¯s move that way, and see if we can find our friends on the way.¡±


    We set off across campus, watching for any signs of survivors. If we could, we¡¯d save them. If we couldn¡¯t, then I was god-damned sure I was going to find a way to avenge them.

 Chapter 60 - Life Finds A Way

    Chapter 60 - Life Finds A Way


    We found Alfred and his people at the next building over. After leaving the greenhouse, we continued deeper into the campus. Everything was dark; without lights, without even moonlight, it was difficult for me to find my way around. I kept my eyes peeled for any signs of life, figuring wherever they were they might have torches or candles lit, at least. But there was nothing. We had to rely on Kara¡¯s NightVision to keep us from running smack into chunks of debris littering the ground.


    It hadn¡¯t even been a week, and things were utterly falling apart. I was surprised how fast everything went to shit, but I suppose I shouldn¡¯t have been, given everything that changed with the Event. What little I could see of the campus looked like a bombed-out war zone.


    A whistle from somewhere up ahead caught our attention, and we looked up. I couldn¡¯t see anything, but Kara could.


    ¡°It¡¯s them! They¡¯re on top of the Aiken Center!¡± Kara told me. She waved a hand, and atop the two-story building, someone waved back, barely visible against the night sky.


    A few minutes later ropes were lowered for us. I ordered all my undead to hunker down and keep watch. If anything dangerous came close, they¡¯d give me some advance warning. Then we looped the ropes around ourselves so the folks topside could haul us up.


    Alfred was waiting at the edge of the roof when we arrived. He looked haggard, far more exhausted than the last time I¡¯d seen him, which was saying something. But he was still alive, anyway, and it looked like his people were, too.


    ¡°We were worried when we saw the other building,¡± I said. ¡°What happened?¡±


    ¡°I took what you said to heart, about them tossing fireballs inside,¡± Alfred replied. ¡°We boarded the lower floors up, but we couldn¡¯t keep them out well enough. It held at first, but once they got some of the boards removed, getting inside wasn¡¯t hard. They did exactly what you thought they would¡ªthey started fires on the bottom level. Didn¡¯t even have to use magic. They gathered gasoline from the cars in the parking lot and doused the ground floor, then set it alight.¡±


    ¡°Shit,¡± I replied. What else could I say? Sometimes, being right isn¡¯t all it¡¯s cracked up to be. ¡°How did you escape?¡±


    ¡°That elevator shaft we left open,¡± Alfred said. ¡°We started moving people out of the building through it as soon as the fires were lit, and we knew staying would just get us all killed. Even if the fires didn¡¯t reach the upper floors, the smoke would. Most of us were able to get out in time, but we lost a few to smoke inhalation, and a couple of our fighters defending the place against the goblins. Thank god you found us before they discovered our new hideout. What¡¯s the story with the Air Force?¡±


    ¡°Air Guard,¡± I corrected. ¡°They¡¯re exactly what we need. They¡¯re defending the base, taking in civilians, and fending off monsters. It¡¯s the perfect setup. They do require everyone work, mind. There¡¯s no exceptions. They find a job for everyone, and if you want to stay, you¡¯re expected to contribute. At least the grownups are, anyway¡ªnot sure how they¡¯re handling kids.¡±


    I added the last comment because I saw that there were still a good number of children huddled together on the rooftop. Best I could tell Alfred still had a little over two dozen people. He¡¯d kept them all alive throughout some nightmarish crap. I had to admit, I was impressed.


    ¡°That¡¯s good news. Did they send more troops, or just you two?¡± Alfred asked.


    I shook my head. ¡°Just us. They¡¯ve got a fight of their own. Bunch of bird people have taken over the civilian airport, and they¡¯re at a nasty detente with one another right now. They couldn¡¯t afford to send a strong enough force to bust through, because it would leave the base too weak.¡±


    ¡°So of course we came anyway,¡± Kara said, grinning.


    Alfred put a hand on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. ¡°And we¡¯re all grateful you did. Now we need to figure out how to get everyone back there, though. How was the trip here?¡±


    ¡°Not easy,¡± I replied. ¡°We had to fight our way through a bunch of goblins who were battling rat-people down on Route Two.¡± Alfred stared at me, his eyes big. ¡°Yeah, I know how it sounds. This is life now, I guess?¡±


    He chuckled at that. ¡°Yeah, I guess. Okay, then, what¡¯s the plan? How do we get these people through?¡±This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.


    I looked over his shoulder, checking out his band of refugees. Some of them were armed, which was good to see. But my guess is maybe a quarter of his group were combat-ready. The rest might be able to defend themselves in desperation, but they weren¡¯t going to be much use in a fight, and would be more likely to get themselves killed.


    There was someone I didn¡¯t see, though, and figured it was just the darkness. ¡°Hey, where¡¯s Kat?¡±


    ¡°Selena, I¡¯m sorry,¡± Alfred said, his voice thick with emotion. ¡°She¡­didn¡¯t make it out. Kat helped herd all the kids to the elevator shaft, helped them get down, but then she kept helping other people, too. She took an arrow through a window before we got everyone out. Kat¡¯s gone.¡±


    There was a roaring in my ears, and I wasn¡¯t sure I¡¯d heard what he said correctly. Before I knew it, I was sitting down on the hard rooftop, and my thoughts felt like they were moving through molasses. Kat was gone? Dead?


    I¡¯d known her less than a month. She wasn¡¯t a lifelong friend, not someone I loved. She wasn¡¯t family. We¡¯d barely been roommates for long enough to really get to know each other, and we hadn¡¯t even been close friends, before the Event.


    But I¡¯d fought to keep her alive, tried to save her, get her to safety. I gave her crystals to help her heal better, got her help from the healer at the police station, protected her when I could. And now she was dead, killed by those same goblins who¡¯d been shitting on everything for days now.


    ¡°Hey, are you okay?¡± Kara asked. I looked her way; she¡¯d crouched down next to where I¡¯d landed when I sat abruptly. ¡°Selena?¡±


    I just shook my head. No, I wasn¡¯t okay.


    All this time, I¡¯d been dealing with things as best I could. When monsters woke up in my classroom, I¡¯d fought them off. I rescued a classmate and my roommate, and fought still more monsters. Then I was betrayed by people, who tried to kill me. I¡¯d gone off on my own and done okay, but everything had been rushed. Surviving took priority. There was no time to process any of the things I¡¯d been through, and now it was all crashing down on my like massive ocean waves in my mind.


    I ground my teeth together, pulling my mind back into some semblance of order. The grief I felt at Kat¡¯s death was still there, still vibrant and alive in my head and heart. I¡¯d cry real tears for her.


    Later.


    The other emotion that rose through the grief, pushing it aside and supplanting it, was rage.


    I closed my eyes, thoughts suddenly racing ahead at full-steam again. I saw a way forward. There was a way to get the remainder of Alfred¡¯s people to safety, and path that would also make those horrible creatures pay! And I was going to take it.


    I opened my eyes again, saw Kara still there, staring at my face.


    ¡°Selena?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be¡­all right,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯ve got a plan. Kara, I want you to stay here with Alfred and get his people ready to move. We want everyone at the ground floor, but hidden. I¡¯m going to go get something, and then we¡¯re going to escort everyone back to the Guard base.¡±


    And we¡¯re going to take care of the goblin problem along the way, I thought but didn¡¯t say aloud.


    ¡°Get something?¡± Kara asked. Then her eyes got wide, as she remembered what we¡¯d discussed before. ¡°Ohhhh! That. Gotcha. I¡¯ll make it happen.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± I replied, flashing her a smile as I stood back up. ¡°Alfred, I need to get back down to the ground floor. I¡¯ll be back in fifteen minutes or so, and if I¡¯m right, I¡¯ll have the solution to all of our problems with me when I return.¡±


    He looked confused, but didn¡¯t ask questions. He passed me a pair of glowsticks, instead. ¡°Take these. For some reason, they still work, so you won¡¯t be in the dark.¡±


    Then he helped me get the rope looped back around my waist and personally lowered me back to the ground. Once I was down, I gathered all my undead again. With luck, I wouldn¡¯t need them, but I was going into a building I hadn¡¯t explored, which meant anything might have taken up residence inside. Always better to be safe than sorry.


    We moved as a group north, toward the Marsh Life Sciences building. It was too dark to see details, but the place looked fairly intact, from what I could tell. The front door was unlocked, and I sent my undead into the place ahead of me, joining them once they¡¯d moved a dozen feet into the interior space.


    The exhibit had been set up in the next room over, really the only room in the building large enough. I read they¡¯d even had to make alterations, tear down a wall or something just to make it fit well. I cracked the glowstick, pleased when it lit up right away in a brilliant lime glow. It cast a little light, enough to see by as we slowly moved through the space, watching for danger.


    Then we were in the makeshift exhibit hall. But as soon as we entered the room, I knew something was wrong.


    The platform was empty.


    It was a big platform, over twenty feet across, and it dominated the center of the space. There was no mistaking that the object which should have been there, wasn¡¯t anymore. I started sweating.


    The Fields Museum didn¡¯t send their exhibits out into the world very often. It was a rare enough thing. But Vermont had a paucity of museums, so they¡¯d made an exception, not only sending extremely valuable exhibits to another state, but allowing them to be housed at the University rather than a proper museum. There just weren¡¯t any museums in the area capable of handling the exhibit, not with the security requirements the Fields Museum insisted upon.


    I¡¯d read about all this in the news on my phone, and from the college newsletter as well. It was admittedly cool stuff, even though I wasn¡¯t much of a history buff. There was no way the exhibit could just be gone.


    Something big shifted behind me, and I dove sideways just in time to look up at enormous jaws closing on one of my skeletons. The creature¡¯s maw slammed shut with a crunching sound, then lifted the skeleton into the air. It shook its head side to side, breaking the skeleton apart entirely and sending splintered pieces of bone flying in all directions.


    Then the tyrannosaurus skeleton opened that mouth again, and let out an earth-shaking roar.

 Chapter 61 - Monster Is A Relative Term

    Chapter 61 - Monster Is A Relative Term


    Don¡¯t ask me how the skeletal remains of a sixty-something million year old dinosaur was able to roar. I haven¡¯t the foggiest idea. The only answer I can give is ¡®magic,¡¯ and I doubt that makes the whole thing any more comfortable. Might as well try explaining how it was walking around, while we¡¯re at it.


    In that moment, though, I wasn¡¯t thinking about any of those things.


    I¡¯ve seen all the ¡®Jurassic World¡¯ films. Who hasn¡¯t? I used to chuckle when I saw people freeze after a big dinosaur appeared. Like, run, you idiot, RUN! But no, they¡¯d freeze in place while this titanic thing roared overhead, then generally leaned over and ate them. Any self-respecting hero runs from the dinosaur. We don¡¯t freeze.


    In practice? Dude, I totally froze, and you would have, too.


    Luckily I had a lot of undead with me.


    My minions did not freeze. They saw a threat to my safety and engaged. Hope landed herself firmly between me and the monster, and howled. The howl didn¡¯t stagger the tyrannosaur like it might have a lesser creature, but it did make it take a step back. Instead of chomping on me, it turned and bit another of my skeletons in half while the others formed ranks between it and me.


    That monster was going to tear right through them. I felt its tier level¡ªfour. Nothing I had was going to take it down. Maybe, my entire force could beat it, working together, but my undead would be decimated.


    They bought me the precious couple of seconds I needed for my brain to reboot and kick back on, though. I was moving again, thinking more or less clearly again. I¡¯d been expecting a pile of bones, and had hoped to try using Animate on them. With the fossilized bone being so old, I hadn¡¯t even been sure it would work, but figured it was worth a try. The last thing I¡¯d expected was to find the damn thing already awake!


    But I had a spell for that, too. Control Undead was my first spell. In a lot of ways, it was still my strongest and the one I was most familiar with. I reached for that power as the T. rex took down two more of my tier one skeletons. I was running out of the things, but they were less armed, with crappy shields compared to my fancy tier-two shield wall, so the dinosaur was focusing on the easier pickings.


    It turned out that wasn¡¯t the worst thing in the world. As I started casting Control Undead I realized that tier four dino was going to eat up eight tiers worth of my Control capacity. That was half of what I had! Hope was two; Rosencrantz and Guildenstern one each. And the last two tier one skeletons were the only other ones I was controlling¡ªthe tyrannosaur had killed the others. It left me more than enough to control her.


    A rush of black fire leaped from my hand toward the beast. It roared again, and I almost lost control of the spell, but hung on, maintaining focus with all the Will I could bring to bear. The flames reached the dinosaur and swept over it¡ªonly unlike the other undead I¡¯d Controlled before, she fought back!


    It was like trying to play tug of war with an elephant. I felt overmatched, like I couldn¡¯t possibly win, like she was going to rip herself free at any moment and then tear me apart. There was something primal and devastatingly strong about this skeleton that I hadn¡¯t felt from any of the weaker ones.


    ¡°No way, lady,¡± I told her, stepping forward as I continued to pour magic into her. ¡°You are mine!¡±


    The tyrannosaur roared a third time, but I was getting used to it already. I stepped forward again, feeling stronger. She backed away from me, this time. With a smile, I kept coming.


    ¡°It¡¯s okay, girl,¡± I told her. I had the sense she was far smarter than most of the undead I¡¯d run into. As smart as Hope, at least¡ªprobably more. ¡°We¡¯re going to be friends. Allies. Partners, even.¡±


    There was a sensation like a click in my mind, and the magic settled over the creature, my Control locking her down as a minion. I wasn¡¯t sure, but I had a sense she¡¯d heard my words and relented, which made me feel better about the whole thing. What Colonel Turner was doing with his Charisma had left a bad taste in my mouth; the last thing I wanted to do was enslave intelligent beings, even if they had been dead for sixty million years.This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.


    ¡°Good girl, Sue,¡± I said, calling her by the name the Chicago museum had given her. I figured she¡¯d been called that for a long time now, so who was I to change her name? ¡°Come on. We¡¯re going to get out of here. And I¡¯ve got a lovely hunting ground for you to visit. We¡¯ve got some bad guys to dispatch.¡±


    Getting her out of the building turned out to be pretty easy. I had no idea how they¡¯d gotten her inside, as big as she was. Probably a special door somewhere, or maybe they¡¯d brought her into the building in pieces and then reassembled her there? Either way, those weren¡¯t options for me, and weren¡¯t necessary anyway.


    I just ordered her to walk out through the massive windows at the front of the building. The glass didn¡¯t hurt Sue at all, and it didn¡¯t slow her down, either. I had no idea why she¡¯d stuck around that building rather than go elsewhere. Near as I could tell she hadn¡¯t even left the room where she¡¯d animated. Maybe she¡¯d only ¡®come back¡¯ recently, and she hadn¡¯t had time to explore yet? There was no real way to know for sure, but I¡¯d been lucky to find her.


    There was one more thing I wanted to do, before I rejoined Alfred, Kara, and the rest of them. For style points. Because it was badass. And if I was being honest with myself, because in the back of my mind I was still on fire with rage at the goblins for everything they¡¯d done. All my anger over the entire Event was now wrapped up in that small, hot ball of fury.


    ¡°Down, Sue,¡± I commanded, and she knelt. That brought her back close enough to the ground that I was able to step up her leg and clamber onto her back.


    Some sort of saddle was definitely going to be in order in the near future, but this would have to do for the time being. I settled myself in about midway down her spine, a couple of feet from her hips. Sue shifted underneath me, and I felt awe at the raw power I felt in her bones.


    She was so much more than just a skeleton. Magic infused her, flowed through her, connected all her pieces together. On the smaller skeletons it wasn¡¯t so obvious, but for Sue, the bands of magic were visible in the darkness, glowing with a faint blue light at each connection point between her bones. It was stunning, beautiful, amazing. She was a creature of magic, and an enormously powerful one.


    And she was mine.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go, girl,¡± I told Sue, sending mental commands to her. I wanted to go back to where Alfred and his people ought to be waiting by now, and I wanted to make sure she didn¡¯t hurt other people, so I gave her the same standing order I gave the rest of my undead¡ªno hurting humans unless they¡¯re trying to hurt me.


    We set off at a lumbering pace across the grounds, Sue slowing herself down so my other undead could keep up. There was speed in her bones¡ªI felt it, there for me to command. She could run a hell of a lot faster than I could, when she wanted to.


    I rounded the corner of the Aiken Center and was disappointed to see no one outside. I glanced around, wondering why they weren¡¯t there, when a voice called out from inside the ground floor.


    ¡°Selena? Is that you?¡± It was Alfred! He stepped outside, holding his shield up, weapon at the ready.


    I chuckled from where I sat atop the undead titan. ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s me. I made a new friend. Say hi to Sue¡ªdon¡¯t worry, she won¡¯t hurt you.¡±


    Alfred dropped his guard and laughed. ¡°Sue, huh? Shit. I completely forgot that exhibit was here!¡±


    ¡°Me too,¡± I admitted. ¡°Saw a flier while we were looking for you.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re all down from the roof,¡± Alfred told me. ¡°We felt the ground shaking and I hurried everyone back inside to hide from whatever it was, but we¡¯re ready to go.¡±


    I was impressed. That was pretty fast. ¡°All your gear packed and everything?¡±


    ¡°We didn¡¯t have much left from the last time we fled. What we had, we kept ready to move again, just in case.¡±


    I nodded my understanding. They¡¯d been through a lot and lost a ton. Now, I was going to have to ask for even more faith from them. ¡°Okay. Let¡¯s get your people together and get ready to move them out, then.¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s the plan? We going to go south around the forest?¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°You guys can try that, if you want. I¡¯ll understand if you do, and with Kara you¡¯ll have good NightVision to make the trip. But I need to end this, and now I have the power to do it. Before, I had no way to take out that goblin stockade in the woods. With Sue? I do.¡±


    ¡°You want to attack them head on?¡±


    ¡°Yup. They killed Kat. They killed Lords. They¡¯ve killed how many others? The goblin force has grown in size and strength each time I¡¯ve come through here. If we let them continue getting stronger, eventually they¡¯ll be an enemy we can¡¯t beat.¡±


    I¡¯d given this a lot of thought. I had no idea my hypothesis about the goblins being former squirrels turned into magical beings was right or not, but wherever they were coming from, they were growing in numbers and getting stronger. The Guard wasn¡¯t going to get out here to deal with them anytime soon, which left it up to me.


    Alfred hesitated before replying. ¡°Most of my people aren¡¯t fighters.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t need them to be. Have your people stay well back of the fight. If you have some who want to join me, they¡¯re welcome. But I¡¯m planning to do this alone.¡±


    ¡°Not gonna happen,¡± Kara said, stepping out into the night. ¡°I¡¯m with you.¡±


    ¡°Me, too,¡± Alfred said. ¡°We have other people who will want some payback, too. If you think we can do this¡­¡±


    I gave Sue a little mental nudge. She lifted her head skyward and roared into the night, the echoes carrying back and forth between the buildings.


    When silence reigned again, Alfred was laughing, a big, hard laugh. ¡°All right, then. Let¡¯s do this.¡±


    I grinned, glad to have direction and purpose. It was way past time to make those goblins pay for what they¡¯d done to my friends!

 Chapter 62 - Prep For Combat

    Chapter 62 - Prep For Combat


    We stopped by the greenhouse before setting out. That¡¯s where they¡¯d buried Kat and the other casualties from the goblin attacks¡ªjust outside the greenhouse, on the lawn, was a row of five simple mounds with wooden markers. Alfred explained they¡¯d picked the spot because the greenhouse tools were right there, which made it easier. A few of their braver people had slipped back into the Jeffords building after the goblins departed, collecting their dead.


    I stared down at those graves for a few minutes, trying to parse how I felt. I was crying, which felt weird. It wasn¡¯t like Kat had been a close friend. She was a short-term roommate I¡¯d had for a couple of weeks.


    But she was someone I¡¯d tried to help, tried to save¡ªand I¡¯d failed. It was like I¡¯d taken all the pain, anger, and frustration I¡¯d felt in the days since the Event and poured it all into that one death. Maybe it was just because one death was easier to grasp, understand, and mourn? If I tried thinking about the billions of people across the planet who¡¯d died or were dying, it was too much.


    One person, though? One person was something I could feel fully.


    I turned away from the graves and gave Alfred a nod. ¡°Thanks for burying her.¡±


    ¡°Least we could do. I¡¯m sorry she didn¡¯t make it.¡±


    ¡°Me too,¡± I replied. It had always been a long shot, her survival. Kat wasn¡¯t a strong person to begin with, and then she¡¯d lost her foot. Losing her hurt, anyway.


    I mounted up again, climbing aboard Sue for the trip. Kara joined me. She had her bow and a quiver of arrows, so she could still fight from Sue¡¯s back. Her NightVision would guide us and help us avoid ambushes, too¡ªand she¡¯d see better from a higher vantage point.


    The rest of my undead were spread out in a pair of skirmish lines ahead of us, ready for anything. Kara would clue me in if there was trouble hiding up ahead, then I¡¯d tell my undead to stomp them.


    Alfred and his people made up our rear guard. Most of his people were noncombatants, without even a single crystal, so I had his combatants back there guarding them and making sure no one snuck up on us from behind. Once we made contact, we could move some of his people forward, but keeping his people safe was a top priority for me.


    It was about an hour before sunrise when we started down Carrigan Drive. Moving Sue down the center of the roads was tough. There were too many stranded cars, and she was agile, but moving between them just wasn¡¯t possible in some places, and she wasn¡¯t quite tall or large enough to just crush them underfoot. Instead, I sent her down the grass on the roadside. We had plenty of room there.


    That road turned into Centennial Woods Way right before the turn-off to the police station. The building where I¡¯d slept that first night after the event was a gutted ruin, now. One more thing destroyed by the goblins. We kept moving past it. I wanted to hit the goblins at first light, if we could, and that meant making good speed for the rest of the journey.


    As we were passing the police station on our right, Kara sat up straighter, her attention more sharp. ¡°Contact front.¡±


    ¡°Where?¡± I asked.


    ¡°There, and there,¡± Kara replied, pointing at dark patches of the wood line. It still wasn¡¯t light enough for me to make out anything there besides shadow. ¡°Two goblins, one at each post. They took off running as soon as they saw us coming. I only spotted them after they moved. They were pretty well hidden.¡±


    So the bad guys knew we were coming, now. That meant everything relied on speed, at this point. The longer we gave them to get ready, the harder this fight was going to go.


    I halted Sue and ordered her to crouch. Then I turned to Kara. ¡°Come on¡ªwe¡¯re not going to want to be riding her for what¡¯s coming next.¡±


    ¡°You know Sue isn¡¯t a she, right?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°Huh?¡± I blinked at the apparent non-sequitur.


    ¡°Sue has they/them pronouns,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Said so right on their BlueSky account. They were named a girl name early on, but there was no actual evidence of the bones being from a female T. rex, so the museum switched their pronouns to ¡®they/them.¡¯¡±


    I rolled my eyes, but bit my tongue. You know what? Kara had been an awesome friend through some nasty crap. If she was worried about the gender of the sixty-something million year old fossil, I¡¯d roll with it. ¡°Got it. Sue is a they. But we still need to get down from their back¡ªthis isn¡¯t going to be a comfortable perch when she¡¯s busting down goblin fortress walls.¡±The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°Right!¡±


    We both slid down from the titan. I set my army in motion, moving them forward into the forest, and quickly walked to Alfred. ¡°You¡¯ll want to keep your people safe. I see two options. You can all hide in the library storage building over there, or you can use the distraction I¡¯m about to give you to bust through the forest and get out the other side. We can link up with you on the interstate after.¡±


    ¡°Why not just come with us?¡± Alfred said. ¡°Stick together, bust through, then come back later when we don¡¯t have helpless people to protect?¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°The goblins are all through this forest, and it¡¯s their home turf. We try to just walk through it and they¡¯ll hit us from all sides. They have the numbers, and allowing them to bring those numbers to bear is only going to get us all killed. Our best bet is for me to give them something else to think about.¡±


    ¡°Fine. If you¡¯re insisting on this crazy path, I¡¯ll leave my people back in the library annex. But I¡¯m coming with you. We¡¯ve got a few others who can fight, to guard the rest. You¡¯ll need as many hands as you can get, though,¡± Alfred replied.


    ¡°I¡¯ll take it,¡± I said. There was no point in arguing with an offer for help. He was right¡ªevery additional weapon would improve our odds of success. My undead were entering the woods, and I rushed to catch up. ¡°Anyone coming with had better get moving, though¡ªwe¡¯re getting left behind.¡±


    As we walked, I surveyed my crystals again:


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Curse


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Contagion


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Will


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Agility


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead (Tier 3), Animate Dead, Augment Undead (Tier 3), Augment Undead, Control Undead (Tier 3), Drain Life (Tier 2), Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana, Heal Undead (Tier 3), Heal Undead


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Agility (Tier 2), Agility, Stamina (Tier 2), Stamina (Tier 3), Charisma (Tier 2), Charisma, Will (Tier 2)


    Gray: Minion Augmentation (x2)


    I wanted to use a Minion Augmentation on Sue, but I realized with a start that I couldn¡¯t. As soon as I picked up the stone, I understood that to apply a stone and augment a tier four creature, I¡¯d need to apply a tier four stone. The good news was, it would boost their effective tier without making them cost more Control Undead points. The bad news was, I needed a tier four stone to make it work, and I wasn¡¯t interested in giving up my Will or Agility stones.


    Much as I wanted to do it right away, boosting Sue would have to wait. I could hit Hope with an Agility or Stamina stone, though. After a moment of thought, I opted for Stamina. It would let her take more damage and heal faster on her own. I scooped both crystals into my hand and called her over as we marched. Then I gently pressed the stones into Hope¡¯s forehead. They sank into the bone the same way they¡¯d have disappeared into a human hand.


    There was a deep blue flash which spread from her skull down her bones. As I watched, Hope grew slightly larger, her bones thickening and strengthening. She was noticeably sturdier now than she had been before. It was a start.


    With one of my minions boosted¡ªI was saving the other ¡®pet rock¡¯ for Sue¡ªI had one more thing I wanted to do to prep for the fight. Hoping this wasn¡¯t going to be a mistake, I wrapped mental fingers around the Contagion stone and gently pulled it loose.


    There was a snapping sensation in my hand and I groaned, looking down. The crystal had shattered when I removed it. Not terrific, but it couldn¡¯t be helped. The power I needed most at that point was stuff to amp up Sue. I socketed my tier three Heal Undead stone. Keeping her on her feet was going to be the entire fight.


    Maybe there was a way to make her tougher, though? I glanced at that Curse stone. It was a tier two rare, and I really didn¡¯t want to break two of those in one night. But I wanted Augment Undead slotted, so I gingerly removed the stone. It didn¡¯t snap. I slipped it back into my pouch and pulled out the tier three Augment Undead, slotting it into the space where Curse had been. I immediately dropped the Augment spell on Sue, making her much stronger than she¡¯d already been. Since the spell was only tier three, it wasn¡¯t enough to raise the dino to tier five¡ªbut stronger was stronger.


    Now I was as ready as I could be.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Augment Undead


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Heal Undead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Will


    Point 5: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Agility


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead (Tier 3), Animate Dead, Augment Undead, Control Undead (Tier 3), Curse (Tier 2), Drain Life (Tier 2), Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana, Heal Undead


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Agility (Tier 2), Agility, Stamina (Tier 3), Charisma (Tier 2), Charisma, Will (Tier 2)


    Gray: Minion Augmentation


    My troops were still marching steadily uphill. We hadn¡¯t run into any goblin defenders yet, but I knew they were somewhere ahead, getting ready for us. The stockade they¡¯d built couldn¡¯t be more than a couple hundred feet away.


    ¡°Kara, any sign of them? Be careful to watch the treetops,¡± I said.


    ¡°I am. Nothing. If they had any scouts through here, they¡¯ve already withdrawn.¡±


    Dawn was already starting to light the sky. I could see it in the few gaps between the trees. But not much of that light was making its way to the forest floor yet. I wasn¡¯t sure if that was an advantage for us, or them. My suspicion based on what I¡¯d seen so far was that the goblins were mostly nocturnal, which meant we were basically hitting them when they¡¯d be their most exhausted, most spent.


    I wasn¡¯t a lot better, of course. Even with the afternoon nap, Kara and I had been up and moving all night, running from one fight to another. But this would be the last fight. After this, I could get these people over to the houses on the far side of the forest, and we could all get some decent rest.


    My army continued up the hill.


    A rain of arrows answered our advance, barbed heads barely visible in the low light as they flashed through the air toward us.

 Chapter 63 - Mommy鈥檚 Very Angry

    Chapter 63 - Mommy¡¯s Very Angry


    I heard the arrows whistling past my head and raised my shield to stop them. One thudded into the aluminum, glancing off. Another smacked into a zombie goblin standing just in front of me. The zombie staggered but didn¡¯t go down. Then another arrow arced in under the shield and sliced into my calf. It stuck there, not moving, and I cried out in pain.


    Sue echoed my shout a moment later with a roar. Their mouth opened and the sound that came out was near deafening, even though the dino was facing away from me. I remembered what it was like being in front of that roar. I¡¯d just been on the receiving end of that roar not long ago. Before the echoes were even gone, Sue set out up the hill at a trot that left the other undead behind.


    Okay, Sue was more than a little pissed, and they were running to go hurt the people who¡¯d hurt me. I had to admit, the tyrannosaur¡¯s version of ¡®guard mode¡¯ was heartwarming to see. Probably not for the goblins, but it was for me.


    I staggered and fell, unable to keep my balance with my wounded leg. That sucked, because the arrow hit the ground funny and felt like it was trying to tear itself out of my calf sideways. Not fun. Super unpleasant, in fact. I screamed again, and I think I damn near passed out.


    Then warm hands were on my leg, a golden glow spreading over the wound. It was Henry! ¡°Hang in there. Getting the arrow out is going to hurt, but I¡¯ve had a little practice at this now, unfortunately.¡±


    He sawed the tip of the arrow off and then yanked the shaft free from my leg. I¡¯m pretty sure I gave another big shout at that, but almost as soon as it was gone, the pain faded. More golden glow suffused my leg, shone brightly for a moment, and then faded.


    ¡°There,¡± Henry said with a grunt. ¡°It¡¯s closed, and I¡¯ve cut off pain reception for a little while, but the wound is still there. If you¡¯re too rough with it, it¡¯s just going to open back up again.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll be careful. Thanks.¡±


    ¡°No problem,¡± Henry replied, his face grim. ¡°Just get us out of this, okay?¡±


    ¡°Working on it!¡±


    I glanced up at my undead. Sue was almost out of sight, tearing into a pack of goblins in the trees ahead. My other undead were about halfway between us, so I had some catching up to do. I got myself back to my feet. The leg was still tender, but I could walk on it, at least. I didn¡¯t think running was a good idea, at least not until I could heal myself with a Drain Life spell.


    As I checked the battlefield I noticed there was something new about a couple of my undead, and I realized right away this was new information my Heal Undead spell was giving me. I could tell when they were injured, could even feel how bad their injuries were. The goblin zombie who¡¯d taken an arrow was lightly injured. Sue had taken a few hits, but was even less damaged.


    I cast Heal Undead on the zombie, and its health immediately topped off. I felt the drain from the spellcasting, but my Will was high enough it didn¡¯t sap me too badly. My next spell was a Drain Life, targeting the first goblin I spotted out in the open. The daylight was growing stronger by the minute, making my targets much more visible. The Drain killed the goblin outright, and flooded me with healing, knitting the tissue in my injured leg back together. In seconds, I was as good as new.


    My skeletons and zombies were almost to the goblin line, but they¡¯d bogged down Sue, when where I really needed the dino was at the goblin base. I could barely see the palisade walls through the trees, but just the glimpse was enough to order them into a full-on assault.This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.


    This was the part I hadn¡¯t wanted to be riding them for.


    As I raced up the hill to rejoin my troops, and my skeleton warriors crashed into the goblin defenders, their line already in tatters from Sue tearing through them, the T. rex shot forward at a speed that was more than a little surprising. I mean, I¡¯d had a sense Sue was fast from riding them earlier. They just gave off this vibe of massive power. But actually watching the tyrannosaur accelerate to a car-like speed was impressive and a little scary. I was very glad they were on my side!


    I heard them slam into the palisade more than I saw it. The boom echoed back down the hill, and the cracking of lumber splitting apart came next. The wall came apart, logs tumbling in every direction as the ropes holding them together came apart under the strain and the titan¡¯s mass blew them right out of where they¡¯d been set in the ground. I managed to hit them with a quick Heal Undead, which repaired some of the damage they took from the impact.


    Then Sue was inside the walls, and the goblin screams really started up.


    My undead had reached the ranks of the ones still outside, but they had no fight left in them. They just broke and started running in all directions. Hope took one down, racing after the goblin and snagging a leg in her teeth. My zombie goblins took down most of the rest with their bows. It was a slaughter.


    I tapped a few goblin bodies as I continued climbing the hill. This wasn¡¯t where the main fight was going to be. I had to get up there to that fort so I could help Sue. A flash of bright orange light came from inside those walls, and the tyrannosaur roared again in fury¡ªand pain. That had to be the goblin with fire magic, casting his spells. Sue needed me.


    ¡°Selena!¡± It was Alfred, running up alongside me. ¡°There¡¯s another group of them south of us. They¡¯re closing in fast.¡±


    I looked back, but didn¡¯t see them. ¡°Where?¡±


    ¡°A few hundred meters off. Kara spotted them. She¡¯s holding them off with her bow, but there¡¯s way too many,¡± Alfred replied.


    That had to be the force they had down in the hotel, across from the rat-people. We¡¯d torn them up quite a lot earlier, but there still had to be dozens of goblins down there, and now that we¡¯d attacked home base, they were all headed for their fort to stop us.


    ¡°Pull her back, Alfred. Everyone with me. We need to take the fort, now! If we win here, it doesn¡¯t matter how many goblins they bring in from elsewhere. It¡¯ll be too late.¡±


    He snapped me a nod. ¡°I¡¯m on it. We¡¯ll catch up with you in a minute.¡±


    Then he turned and darted back down the hill, urging Henry and Samson to stay tight with me. That was all of the people from his group who¡¯d joined us for this strike: three fighters and his healer. I was very glad to have Henry with us, though. His healing had already helped me once, and I felt sure we¡¯d use him again before all this was through.


    I ordered my undead into an arrowhead formation in front of me. They folded around me as we raced forward. A few of the goblins tried to stand against us, but they were washed away in a combination of arrows, spears, and Drain spells. One goblin on the wall top tried peppering us with arrows, but my shield deflected the first one, and my Drain Life spell didn¡¯t give him a second chance.


    Then we were at the walls, punching through the gap Sue made into the interior. My warriors spread out slightly as they moved through the gap, meeting light resistance from some goblins who¡¯d been trying to flee the battle raging inside.


    The interior space was bigger than I¡¯d thought, maybe the size of a football field. The walls were roughly oval, and the space within was filled with a combination of tents and wood buildings. It looked almost rustic, like a little medieval village from an HBO film.


    The big open space in the middle was hotly contested, though, and I use those words intentionally. Sue stood there in the middle of the space, their bones blackened in two spots from fireball impacts. The dino was still fighting, though, still trying to chase down the dozens of little attackers swarming all around like ants. The goblin mage cast another fireball, which took Sue in the chin, knocking them sideways into one of the houses.


    Sue staggered, but kept their feet.


    I had the gap plugged with my force, but Sue was struggling to pick out targets with so many goblins underfoot. The mage was hiding among the others, which made it impossible to single him out.


    Not so for me, though. I dropped a Drain on his ass.


    The goblin mage staggered. This time, it was him barely keeping his feet! He¡¯d seen where my black flames shot from, though, and returned fire¡ªliterally! Before I could react, a fireball streaked across the courtyard toward me, burning its way through the air.

 Chapter 64 - Time To Finish This

    Chapter 64 - Time To Finish This


    All I could do was plant my shield in front of my face and hope for the best as the fireball shot toward me. This was going to hurt, no matter what I did.


    My undead had other plans, though. Two of the skeleton warriors in my front row saw the spell and took their ¡®guard¡¯ orders literally. They stepped in front of the blast, raising their shields and quickly locking them together.


    The fireball struck their conjoined shields head on, detonating with a burst that sent both warriors flying backward into me. They crashed into my shield in turn, and all of us ended up in a heap on the ground. On the plus side, we were all mostly in one piece, anyway, although the skeletons had seen better days. Their bones were scorched and brittle. One had all the ribs on one side staved in. It wasn¡¯t great.


    As much as I wanted to, I couldn¡¯t afford the mana to heal them right away. Sue had to take priority. They were still surrounded by goblins, and as deadly as the titan was, damage was still stacking up. I cast as soon as I had myself back to my feet, the black fire from Heal Undead shooting across the way to sink into Sue¡¯s bones. They roared as the magic healed their wounds, and goblins cowered.


    It was past time to finish this. In the wake of Sue¡¯s roar, about half of the goblins still within the walls were rushing us, the gap being the only way out. I wasn¡¯t planning to let them out, though. They¡¯d started this war. I intended to finish it so completely that the goblins wouldn¡¯t be a threat for a long time to come. I ordered my warriors to stay close with me, pinning shut the gap in the walls.


    The wave of goblins smacked into my front row, but the skeletons held them off. I cast a pair of quick Heal Undead spells, restoring health to the two badly damaged ones. I needed those warriors intact! Even without the gear I¡¯d gotten them from the Guard, my skeleton warriors were worth maybe two goblins each. They were tough, strong, and fought well. They were also pretty difficult to kill, as spears and arrows just didn¡¯t do all that much damage to them. Not the way they would to a fleshy creature, anyway.


    With the Guard gear, those warriors were tough as nails. The aluminum shields were massive, and once they locked them together it was damned hard to get around them. I had the warriors play full defense, not worrying about fighting back. All they really had to do was keep the goblins penned in, while my other undead got to work.


    I had my goblin zombie archers climb atop some of the fallen logs, using them as vantage points from which to pepper the oncoming swarm with arrows. They fired as quickly as they could, mostly because it was impossible to miss. There were just too many goblins rushing us¡ªany arrow they fired hit something!


    Meanwhile, I was working to make life more difficult for the goblin mage. First, I dropped another Heal on Sue, because that asshole goblin hit my dino with yet another fireball! How many of those things could he cast, anyway? I had limits. Surely, he did, too? But when he cast, it did the same thing to him that my spells did to me: exposed him. I saw where the blast of fire came from and was able to pick the green-skinned mage out of the crowd quickly.


    So I dropped another Drain Life on him.


    He staggered, dropping to his knees. He¡¯d seen me again, and was working up the energy for another spell. The ball of glowing fire appeared in his hands, and I knew there was no way I was going to be able to cast another Drain before he threw it my way.


    Fortunately, Sue also spotted the glowing ball of light, especially when I gave the titan a mental nudge in that direction. As soon as they saw the mage, they went right for him, crossing the distance in three astonishingly fast bounds. One quick snap, and Sue had the top half of the goblin mage between their teeth, shaking it back and forth before swallowing it down.


    I wasn¡¯t sure where the upper part of that body went. Logic said it should have fallen to the ground once Sue swallowed, but¡­nope. No sign of it at all. I chalked it up to more magical weirdness.


    Just like that, the fight was over. I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about it. I¡¯d wanted revenge for Kat. Ever since finding out she was gone, there¡¯d been no space in my head for much else. She was a friend, if not a close one, and now she was gone. Because of them.


    That anger and fury had left me driven. With it gone, I felt sort of hollow, and I wasn¡¯t sure what to make of it. Nothing I¡¯d done would bring Kat or any of the others who¡¯d died back to life. But maybe it would make a difference for those of us still alive. I had to hope so, anyway.


    With the mage down, the rest of the fight was basically mopping up. Sue had already slaughtered scores of goblins during the initial attack. Now I ordered them to turn back toward the entrance and the last couple dozen goblins desperately trying to fight their way past my tiny shield wall. One actually did manage to dive out between the legs of my skeleton warriors, but an archer picked it off before I could even cast Drain Life on it.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    Sue¡¯s arrival finished that fight very quickly.


    All that was left was the looting. I went from goblin to goblin, touching each one. There were a lot of goblins, so this was going to take more than a little while, but we had time, now. With the fortress taken, as soon as Alfred and his people made it inside the walls, they¡¯d be safe from the few goblins remaining outside. Besides, I¡¯d seen a few goblins manage to climb out over the walls, so word of the fort¡¯s fall would undoubtedly spread fast.


    There was one goblin I especially wanted to tap, so I headed straight toward what was left of the mage. I touched each goblin body I saw as I moved that way, but my focus was on the remains of their leader. When I reached what was left of him, I couldn¡¯t help but make a face. Sue really had eaten the entire top half, and I was hoping that wouldn¡¯t mess up the way looting worked.


    What was left was gross, even for me. I gingerly tapped the goblin mage¡¯s foot. To my surprise, three crystals popped out into my hand, not one.


    He¡¯d been tier five, which surprised me. The first time we met, I was sure he was at least tier two, but that fireball spell hadn¡¯t felt like a tier five spell. Now I knew why. One of the crystals was a bright red tier three fireball spell. That was awesome; I wasn¡¯t sure if I¡¯d use it, but it was an excellent find. I felt sure that had to be a rare, so even if I just traded it to the Guard it would be worth a fortune.


    The second crystal was tier five, though. I¡¯d never seen a tier five stone drop before. That was amazing! Better still, it was tier five Will. That explained how he¡¯d been able to cast so many spells back to back. He¡¯d been using an underpowered spell with an overpowered Will score. The goblin mage must have had all his minions out gathering Will crystals for him, the same way Colonel Turner had his people collecting Charisma for him. It made perfect sense, when I was able to see all the details. I put both of those stones away in my pouch with the others.


    The third stone, however, was something I¡¯d never seen before.


    Where the spell and skill crystals were some variation on transparent to translucent, this rock was opaque. It was carefully carved from a dark gray stone shot through with bits of green and red. The thing had a shape something like a rook piece from a chess board, looking something like a tower about the size of a smartphone.


    As I held it, the colors shifted. The overall gray tone remained, but the splashes of color shifted to pure black as the mana of my spells supplanted that of the prior owner. The longer I held the thing, the more I understood how it worked and what it was. I¡¯d beaten a tier five monster, leader of an entire force of monsters. When I won, I earned the right to own their home. The ¡®chess piece¡¯ was sort of a control stone for the fort. I held it and memories of how to use the thing filled my mind, telling me how to take control, maintain control, and use the new fortress I¡¯d earned.


    This was something new and incredibly cool. I¡¯d have to explore it in a lot more depth¡ªbut later, once I had Alfred¡¯s people to safety. Already he and Kara were at the gap in the walls, coming through with Henry and Samson. It looked like we¡¯d made it through with zero human casualties, although the last of my tier one skeletons seemed to have gone down somewhere along the way. I was better off building up more quality anyway. Monsters weren¡¯t going to get easier to face with time; if anything, it was obvious the opposite was happening. I needed my minions¡¯ power level to climb as well if I was going to keep up.


    ¡°Selena! You okay?¡± Alfred called out.


    I nodded. ¡°We have the fort. What¡¯s the situation outside?¡±


    ¡°What¡¯s left of them are running like all the demons of hell are chasing them,¡± Kara replied. ¡°I don¡¯t think the goblins are going to be an issue anytime soon.¡±


    ¡°Should we tear down the walls here, just to be sure?¡± Alfred asked.


    I walked over, crossing the distance between us. ¡°Don¡¯t need to. I got a magic stone from their mage that gives me control over this place. I¡¯ll take care of it. But first, we need to get you and your people somewhere safer than the library annex.¡±


    ¡°Good call. Samson, Kara, you mind?¡± Alfred asked.


    Both of them agreed to go, and I sent two warriors and two archers with them, just to make sure they weren¡¯t ambushed by lingering goblins. The woods would clear out, in time, but there was no sense taking chances.


    Once they were gone, I went back to work collecting as many stones as I could from the dead. Alfred saw what I was about and joined in, and I really couldn¡¯t complain. He and his people had helped, after all. But then he came over and handed me the ten stones he¡¯d collected.


    ¡°You sure?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Yeah. This one was all you, Selena. You saved us. You took the goblins on pretty much solo. You deserve this.¡±


    I appreciated the thought, but didn¡¯t want to be a jerk about it, ether. ¡°I¡¯ll make sure each of you who came along for the fight get something out of the loot anyway. No arguments. Henry healed me, Kara¡¯s vision was clutch, and you and Samson were fighting and risking your lives, too.¡±


    ¡°I won¡¯t argue, then,¡± Alfred replied, flashing me a grin.


    ¡°Good.¡±


    I ordered the undead still with me to begin digging a massive grave. While I didn¡¯t need any extra undead right now¡ªmy Animate Dead spell was still maxed out¡ªit occurred to me that having a reservoir of bodies nearby might be useful in the future. By the time Samson and Kara were back with the rest of Alfred¡¯s refugees, the grave was dug and my undead were dragging goblins into it one after another.


    The process went much quicker with my other undead back, and even some of the refugees helped, pitching in to clean up the inside of the walls once they heard we¡¯d be resting here for a bit. I¡¯d been up all night. So had Kara, and some of Alfred¡¯s fighters were almost as exhausted as us. Getting a few hours of rest in a secure place before we tried punching through the bird-peoples¡¯ domain just made sense.


    I set my undead on guard duty so the humans could all rest, and in a very short time they were all finding relatively clean spots within the walls to bed down. I joined them, Hope staying close to me to ensure I was undisturbed, and fell almost instantly to sleep.

 Chapter 65 - Aftermath

    Chapter 65 - Aftermath


    Kara woke me a little before noon with¡ªgasp!¡ªa cup of hot coffee. It was instant, but that was fine, as far as I was concerned.


    ¡°How?¡± I asked, taking the steaming cup from her hands. ¡°I mean, thank you! But how?¡±


    ¡°Break room at the library annex had a coffee station. We scooped everything¡ªmugs, sugar, a bag of actual grounds, plus some of this crappy instant shit. Figured you could use something to help you wake up after a night like that.¡±


    I sniffed, the smell of the hot coffee itself helping wake me up, and then sipped. It was trash coffee, but it was still coffee. I wasn¡¯t about to be a snob. ¡°I passed right out. How¡¯s everyone doing?¡±


    ¡°Your undead are still patrolling around the fort, but nobody came anywhere near us. We haven¡¯t seen any sign of the goblins since they fled. My guess is, they¡¯re gonna keep running until they find someplace new to settle down.¡±


    ¡°Hopefully far from here,¡± I added, and Kara nodded. ¡°We should start toward the Guard base soon. Get these people somewhere safer.¡±


    ¡°Are you sure?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°What do you mean?¡±


    She shrugged. ¡°I don¡¯t know. You told me that the colonel there was sketch, right?¡±


    ¡°Maybe. I mean, he¡¯s got a tier five Charisma, and he clearly knows what it does. He¡¯s able to get his people to do pretty much whatever he wants,¡± I said. ¡°But you¡¯re the military woman. You told me they could be trusted.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, and I¡¯d love to think so. Mind control shit worries is, is all.¡±


    I sipped some more coffee, thinking before replying. ¡°It¡¯s not really mind control, just¡­influence. Still, I feel the same, but we¡¯re short on options for these people. Even if we took down this group of goblins, there will be others. Then there¡¯s the rat-people we ran into, and the avians near the base. Alfred told me last night that the refugees he picked up yesterday brought a nasty rumor with them, that there¡¯s another necromancer in town. One who maybe doesn¡¯t care as much about keeping people alive.¡±


    That last bit had worried me, when I heard about it. I¡¯d managed to scale my power levels fast by hitting just one graveyard, but then I¡¯d gotten distracted. I¡¯d come riding to Alfred¡¯s rescue, then scouted the path to the Guard base, and fought back through the goblins to reach Alfred¡¯s people. Days of time spent, and I didn¡¯t regret it for a moment. But how much stronger would someone have become if they¡¯d just power-leveled the entire time, instead? There were a bunch of cemeteries around the city, after all. The one where I¡¯d fought all those undead was hardly the largest. Not even close.


    ¡°Yeah, short on options, but not without them,¡± Kara replied. ¡°What are you planning to do, Selena?¡±


    I took another sip to buy myself time to answer. I¡¯d been fairly sure what I planned next when I went to sleep earlier, and now I was certain. Colonel Turner might have all of the best intentions in the world in mind; using his Charisma to keep people working together for the good of all was a noble thing, at least on the surface. It still left a bad taste in my mouth.


    I¡¯d popped out the tier four Will the night before and added in the tier five, instead. After that, I¡¯d moved the Agility so it was in the outer ring, giving me another space on my interior ring. Now that my Will was tier five, I had little to worry about from Turner¡¯s power, at least not until he hit tier six in Charisma, and I figured that might take him a while.


    But that might create its own issues. If I was the only person who could resist his Charisma, then I was the only threat to Turner having absolute power over the Guard base. He¡¯d shown no sign that he felt that way, when we met¡ªbut would I have even seen it if he had, back when my Will was lower? I couldn¡¯t be sure, and after the betrayal by Bradley I wanted to be more cautious.


    ¡°I¡¯m coming back here,¡± I said at last. ¡°This fort, this place? It¡¯s don¡¯t know exactly how it works yet, but it¡¯s a special location now. The goblin mage was some sort of boss creature, and he dropped a control stone. With it, I own this place. I control it. I gather that means I¡¯ll get some special new abilities or magic related to the location, but I¡¯ll need time to figure all of that out. I plan to turn this spot into my own fortress of solitude, I guess.¡±This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.


    ¡°Fortress of solitude, huh?¡± Kara replied. ¡°Don¡¯t suppose you¡¯d care to have a plus one? I know you have sleepless guards and all, but another person to talk to couldn¡¯t be bad?¡±


    I flashed her a wry smile. ¡°So much for the solitude aspect, I guess.¡±


    ¡°I can come too, then?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, if you¡¯re okay with having a lot of undead around, I suppose so.¡±


    ¡°Awesome! No, undead don¡¯t bother me. I think Hope is cool and Sue is amazeballs.¡± Kara fished around in her bag and pulled out about a dozen crystals. ¡°By the way, these are from all the fighting last night. The highway battle, some of them, but a few from the fort fight, too.¡±


    ¡°Keep them,¡± I told her. ¡°If you¡¯re going to stay out here with me, then I want you strong. We¡¯ll get you in to see Maura at the Guard base, and trade some in for other crystals. Maybe some better gear, too.¡±


    I had a heaping pile of the things already from the goblins Sue slaughtered inside the fort, plus the ones I¡¯d looted outside. By a rough count I¡¯d hit about fifty more crystals last night¡ªa massive haul. Maybe enough to rank up another stat, even, since a ton of them were clear. Kara left me to talk to Alfred, so the two of them could begin encouraging the people Alfred had collected to rouse themselves and get ready to go.


    That gave me time to examine the findings. It turned out there were fifty-two tier one stones in the loot. Interestingly, four of them were red¡ªand all of those were Fireball spells! Was the goblin mage somehow teaching others the spell? Or was Fireball just something that goblins sometimes had available? Impossible to tell, but those four stones plus the tier three one from their leader would make a tier four Fireball spell. I wasn¡¯t sure if I wanted it for myself, or maybe to add to Sue with the Minion Augmentation.


    I had a feeling I was going to go with option b. What¡¯s better than a skeleton tyrannosaur I could ride into battle? A fireball-casting one, that¡¯s what.


    That was for later, though. I still wanted to assess the rest of these crystals. Of the remaining forty-eight, thirteen were brown crystals. Those included: Archery, Tracking, Weapon Making (x3), Armor Making (x2), Farming, Alchemy (x2), Carpentry, and First Aid (x2). I thought the Archery one might be interesting for Kara, so I set it aside, along with the Alchemy ones¡ªI wanted to maybe keep those for myself. The rest were basically trade bait for the Guard.


    That left thirty-five more crystals, all of them clear. I¡¯d found six Strength stones, seven Agility stones, eight Stamina stones, six Intellect stones, and five Charisma stones. There were only three Will stones, but after finding a tier five on the boss goblin, I supposed that made some sort of sense. I merged the clear stones down as best I could, and then took a look at what I had.


    The extra Agility threw me over the top to tier five. I was faster than ever, and best of all, as soon as I added the stones to bring Agility up to tier five, a third ring unlocked! I promptly merged all the Stamina crystals I had together and put them in that slot. From all I¡¯d seen, that ought to vastly boost both the amount of damage I could take and how quickly I healed. With my Drain Life spell, healing wasn¡¯t a major issue¡ªbut staying alive long enough to cast it and heal myself was.


    I needed stones for Samson, Alfred, Henry, and Kara, and I considered what to give them for a bit. I ended up deciding to pass Henry the First Aid crystals. If he was low on mana, he could always use that as a backup. Kara got the Archery and my spare tier two Agility stones. For Samson and Alfred, I gave them each three tier one Strength stones.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Augment Undead


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Heal Undead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Drain Life


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Will


    Point 4, Outer Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Agility


    Point 4, Third Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Stamina


    Point 5:


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead (Tier 3), Animate Dead, Augment Undead, Control Undead (Tier 3), Curse (Tier 2), Drain Life (Tier 2), Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana, Heal Undead


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3), Stamina (Tier 3), Intellect (Tier 3), Intellect (x2), Charisma (Tier 4), Will (Tier 3), Will (Tier 4), Will


    Gray: Minion Augmentation


    Brown: Tracking, Weapon Making (x3), Armor Making (x2), Farming, Alchemy (x2), Carpentry


    Red: Fireball (Tier 4)


    Control Stone (x1)


    With all that taken care of, I joined the others in preparing to leave. It didn¡¯t take us long to pack up what little folks had. I took a last look around the battle-worn fort, considering what I wanted to do with the place. It was mine, now. I could set it up however I wanted. I¡¯d need to explore that in detail when I returned, but for the time being I¡¯d just let the place take care of itself.


    If anything tried to move in while I was off escorting Alfred¡¯s people to their new home, well¡­ I¡¯d deal with it the same way I had the goblins.


    Mounting up on Sue, I rode to the front of our formation, and we set off east toward the airport.

 Chapter 66 - The Uncertain Future

    Chapter 66 - The Uncertain Future


    We arrived at the airport at quarter past noon. Having a wristwatch was a boon sometimes, although every time I looked at the face I was reminded of all the people who hadn¡¯t survived the first week after the Event. The world had changed. Some of us had managed to change with it. Others, not so much. It was a bittersweet thought.


    Almost the moment we crossed onto the open area of the runways, the avians took notice of us. I grinned as I saw a flock of them take to the sky, winging our way. I wasn¡¯t worried. Kara had her bow out, and my archers were at the ready¡­ But I didn¡¯t think we were going to need them.


    As soon as the bird-people came into range, I ordered Sue to use their new special attack. The titan looked skyward, tracking the incoming targets. Then Sue opened their mouth and spat an enormous fireball directly at the avians.


    I¡¯d added the Fireball spell to her using Minion Augmentation, and it turned out to be an excellent idea. It was like riding my own skeletal Godzilla into battle, and I was loving it! The Fireball detonated against one of the bird-men and caught a second in the blast. Both of them tumbled to the ground, burning as they fell. The thuds when they hit the pavement were audible even at a distance.


    The rest of the flock decided that discretion was the better part of valor. They turned around and fled back to their tower.


    I looted a pair of tier two Charisma stones from their dead. Holy crap, but I was getting a ton of those things. That was unfortunate, because I really didn¡¯t want the sort of control they gave over other people, and I didn¡¯t want Turner to have more of them either. It was a sticky moral dilemma I still hadn¡¯t figured out. I felt confident I could keep my Will high enough that he wouldn¡¯t be able to manipulate me, but what about other people?


    Farnsworth and his team strolled out to meet us partway across the runways. He was shaking his head and grinning when he saw me riding Sue. ¡°Of course you found a dinosaur. Where the hell did you find a dinosaur?¡±


    ¡°Class trip,¡± I replied with a grin to match his. ¡°The goblins I mentioned, the ones causing us issues west of here?¡±


    ¡°Yeah?¡±


    ¡°They won¡¯t be bothering anyone anymore.¡±


    ¡°Nice. Well, looks like you¡¯ve taught the birdies a lesson about screwing with you, too,¡± Farnsworth added. ¡°We could use that sort of firepower. I don¡¯t think I¡¯m going to be allowed to let you bring that thing inside the walls, though.¡±


    I¡¯d expected as much. They liked me as an ally well enough; they just didn¡¯t trust me, not wholly anyway. I¡¯d gone and done my own thing when they couldn¡¯t or wouldn¡¯t send people to help Alfred. More than that, I was just too strong. Farnsworth couldn¡¯t stand against me, not with Sue at my side, and I was pretty sure he was the strongest fighter they had. If I wanted to cause trouble for the Guard, I could. None of their other residents could say the same. Even the ones strong enough to make waves were under the control of Turner¡¯s Charisma.


    It wasn¡¯t a major issue, since I wasn¡¯t planning to stay long anyway. ¡°Not a problem. I¡¯m making some trades and heading back out. But these are the refugees I was telling you about. They could use a place to stay.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re absolutely welcome,¡± Farnsworth replied. He turned to address the entire group. ¡°Everyone works, here, mind. There¡¯s no slacking. If you¡¯re a fighter, you can join our Guard force. Or you can help in a lot of other ways. Up to you. But more hands are always good to have.¡±


    I stuck around for a few hours while Alfred and his people were run through medical, checked out for any major problems or illnesses, and given temporary lodging. Farnsworth took me to Maura where I swapped in a bunch of my less useful stones for credits. Not the Charisma crystals, though. For now, I hung onto those.The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    Fourteen credits gave me enough bargaining power to pick up a lot of stuff I figured I was going to need, with a big focus on food. Setting up that fort again was going to take some time, and I wanted to be sure I had the supplies to make it work. I traded in most of the credits on foodstuffs, but some I spent on more frivolous things. I¡¯d remembered how much I liked coffee from the cup Kara brought me earlier, so a tin of instant coffee went in the pile, along with several big water bladders, a couple of cots, sleeping bags, and actual pillows.


    Yeah, I didn¡¯t need a pillow, but damn, sleep without one for a week and you¡¯ll miss having one, too. The Guard must have raided an outdoor-living store, because they had a ton of camping supplies. I grabbed some camping cookware, too.


    Once I¡¯d wrapped everything I needed, I had it brought out to the main gate. Sue and the rest of my undead were waiting for me just outside, and the Guard helped strap the packages to Sue¡¯s bones.


    ¡°You sure you won¡¯t stay?¡± Farnsworth asked. ¡°We could use you, and you¡¯d be as welcome as your friends.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t entirely sure that was true. Colonel Turner had been a gracious host, as always, but he still gave off the vibe that he wasn¡¯t wholly comfortable with me around. My high Will made me a threat to his control, and that would be enough to make any leader nervous. Coupled with the fire-breathing dinosaur, it was hard to blame him for not rolling out the red carpet.


    ¡°I won¡¯t be far,¡± I told him. ¡°You run into trouble, just send a runner to let me know. I¡¯ll come help. You¡¯ve got my friends here, after all¡ªI put a lot of work into getting them someplace safe. I¡¯m not just taking off and leaving them.¡±


    For now, anyway. I still worried about my parents. They were over a hundred miles away, which was only a couple hours drive in the old days. Now? It would take me days to get that far, even with Sue to help. Sooner or later I needed to make that journey, but it wouldn¡¯t be today. The distance for that trip was long, and I wanted to be as strong as possible before I started off.


    ¡°Good enough,¡± he replied. ¡°Be safe out there. Though I think I ought to be saying that to the monsters, when you¡¯re around. You won¡¯t have too much to worry about.¡±


    Kara came outside the gate, a large backpack slung over her shoulder. She¡¯d re-armed herself, too¡ªbetter bow, lots more arrows, improved armor, and that was just what I could see without peeking into her pack. She was huffing a bit under the load, but Farnsworth helped her get the pack attached to Sue¡¯s back.


    ¡°You bring enough gear?¡± I asked, amused.


    ¡°Everything I need!¡± Kara replied. ¡°I¡¯m ready for the next adventure.¡±


    ¡°Of, good. Because if there¡¯s one thing I¡¯m sure of, it¡¯s that we have plenty of that ahead of us,¡± I replied. I was already seated on Sue¡¯s back, so I reached down a hand to Kara. ¡°Up you go!¡±


    She pulled herself onto the titan¡¯s back, settling in just behind me. The other undead formed up around Sue, and we were ready to get underway.


    Cheers and shouts caught my attention, and I looked to the right, toward the wall around the base. Alfred was there¡ªSamson too! With them were maybe a dozen of their other people, all of them waving and cheering as we set off.


    ¡°Be safe out there!¡± Alfred called. ¡°And thank you, Selena. For saving us, for bringing us here. You too, Kara.¡±


    ¡°Best of luck to you both!¡± Samson called.


    ¡°Back at you!¡± Kara hollered back. ¡°We¡¯ll be fine. Selena¡¯s the toughest bad-ass in the area. See you all soon!¡±


    I looked back at Kara and raised an eyebrow. ¡°Toughest bad-ass?¡±


    ¡°Who else would it be?¡± she replied, grinning.


    Boy, I hoped that she was right, but I wasn¡¯t so sure. There were other forces out there in the world. By this time, some of them would likely be at least as strong as I was. A few might even be stronger. I¡¯d grown a lot, learned a ton, and become more powerful through all these crystals than I¡¯d ever thought possible. These were still early days, though. The Event happened a week prior, and in such a short time it felt like everything had changed.


    The truth was, we¡¯d barely scratched the surface of what was to come. Humanity had begun adapting to the Event. Many of us had died; those still alive were stronger and better suited to survival than we¡¯d ever been. New societies like the one at the Guard base were beginning to form and flourish.


    Where things went in the long run, though, was still anyone¡¯s guess. But that was part of the adventure, wasn¡¯t it? Not knowing what would happen next? I¡¯d come to expect the unexpected, and even relish the danger, which was almost as weird to me as the Event itself had been. I wasn¡¯t the person I¡¯d been, before. None of us were.


    ¡°Well, let¡¯s go set that fort up,¡± I told her. ¡°Then we need to see out exploring more of this new world. There¡¯s a lot out there, and I want to see all of it.¡±


    ¡°Sounds great to me,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Lead on, McDuck.¡±


    I groaned at the pun, and she just laughed while I set Sue into motion, moving us back across a runway that was notably clear of nearby avians. They watched us from a great distance, but none of them tried to get close enough for Sue to Fireball them. Further proof they weren¡¯t stupid animals, which made me wonder if there wasn¡¯t a way to cooperate with them rather than fighting them.


    A question for another day. That day, the sun was warm and bright, the sky clear, and we were riding off toward the uncertain future in as good shape as I could ask.

 Chapter 67 - Make Him A King

    Chapter 67 - Make Him A King


    Carver stood over his map table. He was rather proud of the thing. It had taken a fair bit of work and more than a little personal scouting to get a good feel for the way the city was falling out, but at last he had the first inkling of understanding how this new world was shaping up.


    At the lake front, someone had decided to play pirate. Gideon wasn¡¯t sure who it was or just what they were up to, but he¡¯d spotted a pair of vessels flying honest to god Jolly Roger flags on their masts. They were a good distance from shore when he saw them, but they clearly were returning to land periodically to raid and scavenge. Finding a way to contact them was on his to-do list.


    Most of the downtown region of the city was a disaster and growing worse by the day. Fires had broken out, spreading quickly from building to building. Without a fire department, they raged uncontrolled. To prevent the fires from taking down his new fortress, he¡¯d ordered his undead to tear down every building within a few blocks. They¡¯d scavenged everything useful from the structures, even recapturing the construction materials where possible. Over time, he¡¯d surely need more space.


    He¡¯d returned to the UVM campus earlier that day, recalling that there was a traveling exhibit from the Fields Museum that he might just be able to make use of¡­ But the one dinosaur they¡¯d sent was gone, probably wandered off, from the looks of it. There were signs of battles on the campus, so someone human had stuck around, trying to make their stand, but he saw no sign of them still being there. Unfortunate; he would have considered taking in a few more people.


    There were goblins to his east, or so the scout undead he¡¯d sent out reported back. Several bands of rat-people were scattered across the city as well. And monsters were showing up with increasing frequency as time went on. Interestingly, they weren¡¯t spawning close to the castle Carver was building. When something did wander into his zone of control, his undead dispatched it quickly, but nothing was appearing inside his walls, for example.


    That had worried Gideon a great deal. It was clear these monsters were appearing from somewhere, although he¡¯d yet to see the process in person. If they could appear anywhere, then in theory a dragon could appear in his bedroom while he slept, and eat him before he even had a chance to wake. But that didn¡¯t seem to be how it worked. The monsters were appearing mostly in places where the existing monsters hadn¡¯t been cleared yet. Somehow, the act of clearing an area kept new creatures from arriving there, too.


    It was something he needed to study with much more detail, because it would mean the difference between creating actual secure, safe regions, and never being able to do so.


    ¡°Sir! Come quick! There¡¯s something you have to see!¡±


    That was Brian, Carver¡¯s de facto second in command, out in the castle courtyard from the sounds of it. While the man didn¡¯t seem especially upset by whatever it was, his voice sounded alarmed. Gideon ordered several of his undead to join him and went quickly down the stairs and outside.


    His castle was coming together nicely. The walls were finally up, although they still had a lot of work to do. When finished, the stone wall surrounding his base would be taller, with stairs leading up the inside to battlements from which his undead could patrol and defend the place. The one building he hadn¡¯t done much to change was the old administration building of St. Joseph¡¯s. That was now the core of the ¡®castle,¡¯ where he and those he¡¯d brought under his wing slept, ate, and worked.


    The ¡®courtyard¡¯ was what had been the back yard of the administration building. Now, it was the grassy centerpiece of his castle. Brian¡¯s wife had taken to planting a small flower garden there, which Gideon rather liked. A spot of bright beauty made each day that much nicer.


    But now, there was something new in the space.


    Hovering about four feet above the ground was a small gray statue. It was only about five inches tall, and it looked something like a medieval tower¡ªperhaps like the rook from a chess set. There was nothing beneath it but air.


    It hung there, not glowing, not flashing, just¡­floating and doing nothing.


    ¡°What is it, sir?¡± Brian asked.


    Carver shook his head. ¡°I don¡¯t know. But I mean to find out.¡±


    He stepped forward, intending to grab hold of it, but Brian grabbed his arm. ¡°You sure that¡¯s wise, sir? What if it zaps you or something?¡±


    Gideon arched an eyebrow, and Brian let go. Then he looked back over at the strange carving and sighed. ¡°You¡¯re probably right. I have minions. I should use them for this sort of thing.¡±You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    Instead of reaching out to touch it himself, he sent one of his undead over. It snatched the carving from the air, and¡­


    Nothing at all happened.


    Carver wasn¡¯t sure if he felt disappointed or not. He¡¯d been expecting something more interesting than that. He ordered the skeleton to bring it to him. Sitting in the undead hands, it didn¡¯t look any different. What was it? Finally deciding, Gideon reached out and took the thing from his skeleton.


    Immediately, it began to change. Where it had been only gray before, now it was streaked with lines of black. From the crystals he carried? Perhaps. Much like when he embedded those crystals, Gideon¡¯s mind flooded with information about the stone. It was a control stone, used by the ruler of territory to help control the lands they¡¯d won. Apparently, building up his little castle had triggered one to appear here.


    He held up the stone, watching it as it continued to change color. Fascinating stuff; he would need to explore this new type of magic in much more detail.


    <hr>


    Colonel Turner took the stairs up from his basement office at a steady, solid pace. This day hadn¡¯t been going his way so far. From the sounds of it, things were either about to get a lot better or much worse. It was difficult to tell which, so he tried to keep his mind open, to be ready for whatever.


    As much as he tried to keep her out of his thoughts, Turner¡¯s mind kept returning to that Serrano girl. She was a powerful weapon, but she¡¯d already proven to be difficult if not impossible to control. His Charisma, which kept everyone else around him in line and following orders, seemed to have limited effect on her. If anything, that was more true after her return than it had been during her first visit. He wasn¡¯t sure how she was doing it, but somehow Selena was resisting his Charisma.


    Will crystals were the most logical rationale, and since she was a caster, it stood to reason she¡¯d attempted to build that up. Was she already rank five in Will, though? Based on the raw number of undead she controlled, Turner felt confident she was rank five in at least Animate Dead, and probably either rank four or five in Control Undead as well. If she was rank five in Will as well, how many rank five crystals did she have? How had she gotten so damnably strong so quickly?


    Then there was the titan skeleton, the tyrannosaurus. It wasn¡¯t enough that the girl left his base and came back with a dinosaur under her control; no, on top of that, the Guards on his walls said the T. Rex was able to spit Fireballs. She¡¯d used a Minion Augmentation on it, he was sure of it. She was strong¡ªtoo strong for him to easily control. That made her a potential threat, and he hadn¡¯t kept his command for so many years by allowing threats to his power to linger. Sure, the nature of the dangers he faced now were wildly different from those in the old world. But his mindset toward threats? That was old and well-established.


    With effort, he pushed her from his thoughts. She¡¯d taken off again, and there was little he could do about her for the time being. Better to keep her as an ally, if an uneasy one. She¡¯d be far worse as a full-out enemy. For the time being, he had other problems which needed his focus.


    ¡°You said it just appeared in mid-air?¡± Turner asked Farnsworth, who was leading the way up the stairs.


    ¡°Yes, sir. Snapped into being like¡­well, like magic, sir. I heard the pop, turned around, and there it was.¡±


    ¡°No one has gone near it?¡±


    ¡°No, sir. I¡¯ve got six of my people guarding it right now,¡± Farnsworth replied. ¡°They won¡¯t let anyone near it, and if it turns into a giant monster or something, we¡¯ll have people there to face it right away.¡±


    Turner didn¡¯t think it was going to change into a monster, but it wasn¡¯t impossible, given all the other wild things he¡¯d seen. ¡°Good call.¡±


    They burst out into the fading daylight, the afternoon sun still casting an orange glow over the base. Farnsworth¡¯s description had been accurate. About thirty feet away, Turner saw the strange object he¡¯d described.


    It floated about four feet off the ground, this small piece of gray stone. It was the height of a hand, perhaps five or six inches, and looked exactly like a rook from the chessboard in his quarters¡ªa stone tower, complete with a heavy front door. It didn¡¯t glow, shine, or give any other indications of magical nature¡ªaside from the floating bit, and the ¡®popping into existence¡¯ part, anyway.


    He felt called to it. Without a word, Turner walked closer. He heard Farnsworth¡¯s steps coming along behind him, so he knew he had backup if something bad happened, but that didn¡¯t feel likely. This wasn¡¯t a threat. Whatever this thing was, it was something different, new¡ªsomething they hadn¡¯t seen before. But that didn¡¯t mean it was harmful.


    ¡°Careful, sir. We don¡¯t know what it can do,¡± Farnsworth warned, once they were only a few paces away.


    ¡°That¡¯s true, Master Sergeant. But we need to find out what it does,¡± Turner replied. Before he could second-guess his instincts, Turner took three steps forward and grasped the thing in his hand.


    It took only light force to tug it free from whatever was holding it in the air, and once it was in his hand it didn¡¯t try flying away. Nor did it turn into a monster, shock him with magic, or anything else strange. The stone did begin to shift and change, though, new color twisting through it. Interesting; the color it changed to matched his rank six stone. It was linking to him, bonding with him in some way.


    As it did, Turner¡¯s mind flooded with new information, same as it had when he¡¯d absorbed crystals. He knew what he was holding and how to use it. With this, he would end up far more than just a colonel in the Air Guard.


    ¡°You okay, sir?¡± Farnsworth asked.


    ¡°Yes, Master Sergeant,¡± Turner replied. ¡°I¡¯m good. This is interesting. It¡¯s going to take a little experimentation to figure it out, but this artifact is a powerful thing. It¡¯s going to change things for us, in a good way.¡±


    Especially for him. He felt the power this thing represented. And he knew, deep in his gut, that there were more of them out there in the world. Probably more appearing all the time, too. One of these would make him even more powerful than he had been.


    Enough of them would make him a king.

 Chapter 68 - Eminent Domain

    Chapter 68 - Eminent Domain


    We reached the old goblin fort in the late afternoon, before dusk. I went in first, riding Sue, because I figured if anything nasty had taken up residence while I was away, we¡¯d be able to deal with it together without too much trouble.


    Sue let out a massive roar as we stepped in through the gap she¡¯d torn when we attacked, but there was nothing inside. No waiting horde of goblins, no new monsters to face us. Apparently either we hadn¡¯t been gone long enough for something else to try taking up residence, or the blood and carnage left from the fighting had been enough to deter would-be campers.


    Either way, it was good enough for me. We did a quick loop of the interior before returning to the gap where Kara and my other undead waited.


    ¡°All clear!¡± I called out. ¡°Come on in.¡±


    I slid down from Sue¡¯s back as Kara joined me, and the other undead took up guard posts around us, waiting for more instructions. We had a lot of work ahead, and first on the list of things that needed doing¡ªI had to learn more about this control stone thingie.


    ¡°You seem distracted,¡± Kara said.


    ¡°I am, a bit,¡± I replied. ¡°Picking up that tower stone, it did the same thing as absorbing a crystal. Dumped a ton of information into my head. Way more than the crystals do, in fact. It¡¯s¡­all in there, but it¡¯s like it¡¯s flopping around. There was so much information that I haven¡¯t parsed it all.¡±


    It was a weird sensation. The info was all there. I knew it all; I had the memories. But they were random, unsorted, and chaotic. I needed time to sit and understand them all fully.


    ¡°Sounds like a pain,¡± Kara replied. ¡°What do you need from me?¡±


    ¡°Right now, just some quiet, I think,¡± I replied. ¡°Not that I don¡¯t love chatting, but I need some alone time to go over all these memories. Maybe see if any of those goblin huts are habitable? I don¡¯t know if we can live in them, or if we need to burn them as biohazards.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m on it.¡±


    ¡°Bring Hope with you,¡± I suggested. ¡°Just in case you run into any surprises.¡±


    ¡°I love puppies! I¡¯d be glad to.¡±


    I passed Hope the order to follow Kara and keep her safe. The skeleton dog hesitated a moment, like she really didn¡¯t want to leave me. I sent the mental command again, reminding her that Sue was guarding me, so I was probably fine. Hope wagged her tail at that and took off after Kara.


    That left me with some time to sit and contemplate the control stone. I pulled the thing from my pouch and examined it. It had changed since I first picked it up, taking on the colors of my major crystals, instead of the goblin mage¡¯s. But since that initial change, it hadn¡¯t altered its appearance at all.


    I figured there had to be a way for me to absorb the thing somehow, like I did for the spell and stat crystals. After all, the goblin who¡¯d carried it hadn¡¯t kept it around in a pouch. It had appeared in my hands when I touched the mage¡¯s body after Sue killed him, same as his stat and spell crystals had. The double crystal drop was new, too¡ªbefore this even higher tier monsters had only dropped a single stone. I figured that was probably because this was some sort of ¡®boss¡¯ monster, so he gave extra, but I¡¯d need to experiment a lot more to find out.


    The stone felt heavy in my hands as I focused on it and worked my way through the information it had given me. It was a control stone¡ªit granted me the ability to control land, to own a domain. That word, domain, seemed to be special because it popped in my memories multiple times.


    With more control stones under my power, I would control more territory. Given enough of them, I could control large swathes of land, if I wanted to. Personally, I wasn¡¯t especially interested in becoming Queen Selena, but it sounded like that¡¯s sort of what these things were all about. They were a way for high-tier people to fight over land.


    ¡°Like we needed new ways to do that,¡± I muttered. Humanity had been fighting over turf since we lived in caves.The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.


    But I had to admit this was different. The stone would literally connect me to the terrain I controlled. I would be the master of that land in a much deeper, more magically-tied manner than anyone alive had seen. I¡¯d feel it if someone attacked the sanctum at the center of my domain, for example. The domain would also attract beings, serving as a focal point for monsters or people who could be useful to me.


    That¡¯s how the goblin mage had apprentice mages with him, I realized. I¡¯d found four tier one Fireball spells. Those apprentices were a bonus he¡¯d gotten from the control stone and his link to the fort. If I took over the fort, I wouldn¡¯t get goblin mage apprentices; something else would appear for me. Judging from the way my crystals colored the control stone, my best guess is the fort would start spawning some undead for me.


    ¡°They need to be burned,¡± Kara said, holding her nose as she came back over. ¡°A lot.¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°The huts,¡± she explained. ¡°They¡¯re a wreck. Biohazard. Whatever you want to call it. They¡¯re trash. Goblins are disgusting.¡±


    ¡°Ah. Well, that sucks. I was hoping we¡¯d have someplace nice to sleep tonight. I traded for a couple of tents, because I was afraid of that, but even so, that¡¯s not ideal.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll leave you be so you can keep working on that thing,¡± Kara said, nodding toward the stone I still held. ¡°I should get those tents set up, anyway. You doing all right?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. There¡¯s a lot, but I¡¯m getting through it.¡±


    There¡ªthe piece I was looking for, at last. I found the memories about how to activate the damned thing! The control stone was easy to use, it turned out. All it needed was for someone tier five or higher to hold it and focus their mana on it, sort of the same way I channeled magical force into one of my spells. Instead of channeling it into the spell, I¡¯d pour it into the stone, which would activate.


    Wherever I was standing when I used it, that would become the focal point of my new domain. The center of my lands, basically. I could use it here at this fort, or someplace else. The only thing I couldn¡¯t do was use the control stone too close to another domain. If I tried, it just wouldn¡¯t work. The domain centers had to be far enough apart that the lands they controlled didn¡¯t overlap.


    Once it was live, I¡¯d absorb the stone into me. I could take it out after, but doing that abdicated my control of the area I¡¯d ¡®conquered.¡¯ It would be up for grabs again. Short of me taking it out, the only way to take it from me was to kill me.


    That news didn¡¯t thrill me. Crystals already turned people into walking piggy banks, ready for anyone to shatter and take the contents. It was something I¡¯d found out the hard way when Bradley and his friends tried to kill me, and something I¡¯d worked to avoid spreading around. The more people who knew that other people were a quick way to gain power, the worse things would be for everyone.


    Anyone with a control stone inside them just had one more thing to loot when they died. If I took this on, I¡¯d be even more of a target than I already was. How much was too much? I mean, I already carried multiple tier five stones inside me. I was a loot box from hell. This would make me even more of one.


    On the other hand, I was already a super tempting target. Anyone out there killing humans was probably already tier five and could see that I was, too. They¡¯d know that much just by looking at me. Hmmm¡ªthat made me wonder how visible the control stone was, once absorbed? I dug into my memories for the answer.


    I wasn¡¯t thrilled with what I found. The answer was yes. First off, anyone who saw me would sense something ¡®extra¡¯ about me, once I used the control stone. I¡¯d feel different, special, even to a tier one person or monster. People tier five and up would be able to sense the control stone. I realized I probably had sensed it on the goblin mage, I just hadn¡¯t known what I was feeling. He¡¯d given off the sense of being their leader right away, and once Sue took him down, the remaining goblins just crumbled and fled.


    That wasn¡¯t so bad. The more complex part was that I¡¯d gain a sense for other nearby territories as well. The more control stones I had, the wider the area I could sense other leaders. With just one stone, I¡¯d probably be able to feel the area around the city. With a few, I might be able to sense leaders across half the state or more.


    And they¡¯d be able to sense me, too.


    I wasn¡¯t at all sure I wanted to play in that arena. We were only a week into this mess, but I was sure there were some humans out there who¡¯d pushed harder than I¡¯d been able to. They would be stronger than me, possibly with a heap of followers they could command. Telling them precisely where I was living felt like a super bad plan.


    Some of my undead were on the walls, keeping a lookout. One of them on the southern wall had spotted something; I felt that there was danger approaching. Grateful for the break, because I had no idea what I wanted to do with that control stone, I tucked it back into my pouch and rose, heading swiftly to the ladder leaning against the south wall.


    The walls were simple rows of tree-trunks planted into the ground, their tops carved to sharp points. The goblins hadn¡¯t built proper battlements, but they had lookout posts on each wall. One of my goblin archers was up there waiting for me.


    Peering over the edge, I spotted what it had immediately. We still had enough sunlight that I could see a good distance through the woods, although the trees made that tougher than I¡¯d have liked. Mostly, I just saw a bunch of movement in the distance. I swore under my breath as I tried to move side to side so I could get a better idea what I was looking at. Then I wished I hadn¡¯t seen it at all.


    It was the rat-people, the ones I¡¯d seen down on Route Two, or a bunch just like them. They were making their way up the hill toward the fort, and they were coming in force!

 Chapter 69 - Parley

    Chapter 69 - Parley


    We hadn¡¯t even been there for a couple of hours, and already the fort was under attack? That wasn¡¯t a great sign. I¡¯d been hedging about whether I ought to use the control stone here or somewhere else. With this latest news, I was leaning hard toward somewhere else.


    The rats had been fighting the goblins. They must have noticed when the goblins pulled up stakes and left town. It would have been hard to miss. Now they were¡ªwhat? Trying to take the fort as their own? It wasn¡¯t that great a base of operations. I was more than happy to hand it over to them, if they¡¯d asked nicely.


    I wasn¡¯t about to let them just kick me out, though. Strength mattered in this world, and unless I was way wrong, the appearance of strength mattered almost as much as actually having it. I had power. I knew that. But if I let others push me around, would they believe it? Or would they assume instead that I was weak and easy to take down?


    The best way to stop a bully was a punch in the nose, at least in my experience. I sent a mental command to Sue and slid down the ladder as fast as I could. The dino was already marching toward the gap we¡¯d smashed in the wall before I hit the ground.


    ¡°Kara! We¡¯ve got incoming!¡± I called out. ¡°Those rat-people from the other night are on their way to pay us a visit.¡±


    ¡°Awesome. Want me with you, or on the wall with my bow?¡±


    ¡°Wall with your bow,¡± I replied. I had enough stamina crystals now that I¡¯d be a hard target to kill. Kara wasn¡¯t so lucky yet. I made a mental note of that¡­ If she was going to continue working with me, we needed to get her ranked up, and soon.


    I mounted up on Sue¡¯s back while Kara was climbing the ladder I¡¯d just come down. I had Sue hold position, because I wanted to go out at the right time. Better ¡®shock and awe¡¯ when there¡¯s some good shock involved.


    ¡°How close?¡± I called out when she was at the guard post on the wall top.


    ¡°Fifty meters!¡±


    ¡°Holler when they hit twenty-five!¡±


    I readied Sue to rush out through the gap we¡¯d created. If I did end up keeping this place, I needed to get that repaired ASAP. No sense leaving a hole anyone could wander through. The fort had a gate, albeit one that was a bit small for Sue¡¯s bulk. We¡¯d need to change that, too¡­ So many things to do, and too damned little time.


    ¡°Twenty-five!¡± Kara shouted.


    That was my signal. I gave Sue a mental nudge, and the dinosaur started forward at a walk. As soon as we were through the palisade, though, Sue bounded ahead and let out a blood-curdling roar. The bound crossed a third of the distance between us and the rats. The roar stopped them all in their tracks.


    The rat-people ducked down, hiding as best they could in the shrubs. It wasn¡¯t nearly enough to conceal them. There were too many of them, for one thing, and there just wasn¡¯t enough ground cover. Still, they cowered and backed away, obviously terrified of Sue. Their roar had that effect on people.


    I paused and ordered Sue to do likewise. These creatures had showed up on my doorstep. If they twitched in a way that looked like an attack, I¡¯d have Sue blast them with Fireballs.


    But I also remembered that arrow one of them had shot into a goblin, right before it attacked me. Had that arrow saved me? I doubted my life was in real danger, but if the goblin had gotten its dagger into me a couple of times, it would have hurt, and might have been a lot worse than that. Drain Life healed me, but I could only cast it if I could concentrate. That wasn¡¯t easy when I was bleeding.


    The rat-archer had known what he was doing when he fired that shot. At the time, I figured it was an ¡®enemy of my enemy¡¯ sort of thing. But it demonstrated they were capable of more than just mindless violence.


    Point is, I wasn¡¯t sure why these creatures were here. Did they want a fight? Or something else? I waited, wondering what they¡¯d do.


    At first, none of them moved at all. They cowered, trying their best to hide. After a long pause, one of them shuffled forward slowly, spear held between outstretched arms like it was an offering. The rat-being took three steps toward me, then laid the spear down on the ground and backed away.


    That wasn¡¯t the action of someone who wanted to pick a fight.The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.


    ¡°What are they doing?¡± Kara shouted from the wall. ¡°Surrendering?¡±


    ¡°Looks like?¡± I wasn¡¯t sure if it was surrender or parley. All the other rat-people had kept their weapons, so I was leaning toward the latter. I turned toward the one who¡¯d laid his spear on the ground and shouted down to him. ¡°What do you want?¡±


    ¡°No fight!¡± the rat-man replied, stunning me. They could talk? ¡°Need help!¡±


    Not only could they talk, they¡¯d come here asking for help? Okay, this was getting weirder all the time. I had to admit I didn¡¯t hate it. If humans were going to be sharing the world with all these strange creatures, we needed to find ways to make friends with at least some of them. I found that I wanted to take a chance on this.


    Oh, I knew I could just blast them all into oblivion. There were over twenty rat-people out there. That would be twenty more stones for my collection, a substantial amount of loot.


    I just didn¡¯t have it in me to go all murder-hobo on everything I met. Sure, that might make sense from a certain point of view, but I wanted a better world than that. Everything I¡¯d ever known was gone, and now we were stuck building something new from the ashes. Was it going to be a Mad Max sort of world, or something better? I had a feeling which we ended up with depended on our choices.


    I slid down from Sue, ordering her to hold position, but to burn them all if they tried attacking. I wanted to see if peace was possible¡ªbut I wasn¡¯t going to be stupid about it. I pointed to the one who¡¯d dropped his weapon. ¡°You¡ªalone¡ªcome inside with me.¡±


    I beckoned with my arms as I spoke, showing what I had in mind. The rat-guy seemed to get it. He took a hesitant step forward, looking up toward Sue the whole time. I chuckled quietly, under my breath.


    ¡°Sue won¡¯t hurt you unless you try to hurt me,¡± I told him. ¡°Come inside.¡±


    Then I did as I¡¯d instructed him to do¡ªI went back through the gap, into the fort.


    My undead were mostly gathered just inside the gap in the wall. The archers were up on the walls, but the rest were waiting for me inside like an honor guard. I marched through them toward a fire pit where Kara had set a small blaze burning. Once I was by the fire, I waited.


    I didn¡¯t have to wait long. The lone rat-man came through the hole in the wall. He glanced back over his shoulder, clearly terrified Sue was going to eat him. Then he saw the undead inside, waiting in silent ranks, and froze. I beckoned him forward, and he did as I asked.


    Once he was near the fire, I spoke again. ¡°What do you want?¡±


    ¡°Help.¡±


    That wasn¡¯t very useful. ¡°Help how?¡±


    ¡°You kill green things?¡± the rat asked. ¡°Chase away?¡±


    I nodded. Whatever he wanted, he needed to work up to it, I guess.


    ¡°They kill us. Hurt us. Thank.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re welcome,¡± I replied. ¡°How¡¯d you learn to speak like me?¡±


    ¡°We were small before. In cages. Grew. Got smart. Understood words we always heard.¡±


    In cages¡­ I remembered the building they¡¯d been defending, out on Route Two. It was a pet store. Were these the pets from the store, changed by the magic of the Event? Okay, that was cool. It also meant my theory about many of these creatures being altered old-Earth life was probably true.


    ¡°I¡¯m glad we can talk,¡± I said. ¡°The goblins are gone. What help do you need?¡±


    The rat looked abashed at that. ¡°We are few. Green things¡ªgoblins? Were many. Could not win. You save us. But now, new enemy coming.¡±


    Awesome! I¡¯d managed to take out one threat, but apparently there was another one looming? At least these guys might be able to clue me in about who else was being a problem in the neighborhood. That was worth quite a lot.


    ¡°What enemy?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Like your dead-things,¡± the rat-man replied.


    Undead? I¡¯d heard rumors from one of Alfred¡¯s people about another necromancer in town somewhere, but he was supposedly west of here, closer to Lake Champlain. It could be him they were talking about, but I had a feeling it was something closer at hand. Could be yet another necromancer, or it might be something different entirely. I remembered that we¡¯d had zombies escape the lab building, back on day one. They¡¯d infected other people outside, and those zombies had probably gone on to infect others.


    I hadn¡¯t seen any wild zombies for a while. That hadn¡¯t made me suspicious before. Maybe it should have.


    ¡°They attack you?¡± I asked.


    He nodded. ¡°They live in big home toward rising sun. Attack us last night. We fight, but¡­ They are many. We few.¡±


    That was more than a little interesting. There was a big horde of undead somewhere near the pet store, but east, not west. This didn¡¯t sound like the necromancer Alfred¡¯s man told me about. It sounded like something different.


    ¡°Big building?¡± Kara said. She¡¯d slid down the ladder to join me. Her bow was still in her hand, but otherwise she looked pretty relaxed. ¡°I wonder if he¡¯s talking about University Mall? You remember what we saw¡­¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I remember.¡± Boy, did I ever. We slipped past the mall in the dark, on our way back to rescue Alfred.


    When we went past, it was bad. Someone had set multiple cars ablaze in the parking lot, and there was drumming, coming from the mall itself. Lots of loud drumming. Neither of us had dared get close enough to the place to see what was going on there, but it was just down the street from the rats¡¯ pet store, and the mall was clearly a hot spot for something.


    Maybe it was a hot spot for undead?


    Whether it was the mall or somewhere else, though, I was inclined to help these critters out. Allies seemed like they might be useful to have, for one thing. But even more important, a horde of undead meant a heaping pile of black crystals. I needed to rank up my crystals badly, and there were only so many cemeteries in town. I¡¯d figured on going hunting¡ªride Sue around Burlington, using my map to find as many graveyards as I could.


    But if there were a bunch of undead all in one place, taking them down was in my best interest. If it won me some goodwill from a potential ally, too? Bonus.


    I pulled out my map, showing him the lines of the roads. I pointed to the spot in the woods where the fort was, then to their pet store. ¡°This is where we are. This is your home.¡±


    He nodded his understanding.


    ¡°Show me where your enemies are,¡± I said.

 Chapter 70 - Out Of Time

    Chapter 70 - Out Of Time


    It took me more than a few minutes to get across the concept of a ¡®map¡¯ to the rat-guy. When I first showed it to him, he had no idea what he was looking at. For him, it was a picture with squiggly lines. I needed a better way of showing what I was talking about, so I put the map away.


    Then I drew my own version of it in the dirt, explaining each object as I added it. ¡°That¡¯s where we are now. This¡ªall of this is the forest. Down there is the main road. That rock is your building, where you came from. This rock is the building on the road that the goblins were living in¡­¡±


    I went on for a bit, but he did finally get the idea. Once he understood that I was placing these things to make a picture like a bird would see from the sky, he caught up fast. These creatures weren¡¯t stupid at all. They were uneducated, but not dumb. It was something I figured would be good to remember.


    ¡°Dead things are here,¡± the rat-man said. He placed a series of several rocks next to each other a bit to the right of his building. Based on the placement, I was fairly sure Kara¡¯s guess was correct.


    ¡°That sure looks like the mall,¡± Kara added.


    ¡°Yeah, I think you¡¯re right,¡± I said. I turned back to our guest. ¡°They¡¯re attacking you, huh?¡±


    He nodded.


    Most of the undead I¡¯d seen loose in the world sort of wandered around, only attacking things they saw right in front of them. They weren¡¯t especially bright. Even Sue, who was the highest tier undead I¡¯d seen, remained in the building where she¡¯d animated. ¡°If they¡¯re moving out and attacking surrounding areas, that implies they might have some sort of leadership.¡±


    ¡°Another necromancer?¡± Kara asked. ¡°Supposedly there¡¯s another one out there.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but deeper downtown, right?¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯m not sure this is a person. It could be another monster leader, like the goblin mage was.¡±


    ¡°A monster with an army of undead at its back? This sounds like a job for super-necromancer!¡± Kara quipped.


    I chuckled, but inside I was a little worried. This represented a huge opportunity, but also a hell of a lot of danger. Still, if I¡¯d wanted a safe life¡­ Well, frankly, that idea was gone. It went away with the Event. Sure, I could maybe go hole up in the Guard base, hide myself there, and let others defend me from the threats outside. I hadn¡¯t been doing that so far, though, and it didn¡¯t feel like something I could live with.


    ¡°Why us?¡± I asked the rat-man.


    ¡°You help before. Against green-things¡ªgoblins. Help now? We pay.¡±


    ¡°Pay?¡±


    The rat-man nodded, then reached out a paw-like hand, opening it to reveal half a dozen clear crystals inside. ¡°We give. These now. Same number after. Yes?¡±


    I thought about it a long moment, then glanced at Kara. She made a small nodding motion with her head. She was in. ¡°All right. We¡¯ll help you. I¡¯m Selena. Do you have a name?¡±


    The rat-man nodded. ¡°Names on cages. Name is Patches.¡±


    ¡°Patches, huh? Okay, we can work with that. When do you want to do this?¡±


    ¡°Soon. Night fall soon, they come, kill rats.¡±


    A glance at the sky told me he was right about the timing. The sun would be setting in a couple of hours. My watch said it was only five in the afternoon, so some of that was the forest making evening feel like it was coming on sooner than it really was. But if the undead were going to attack them once it was dark, we didn¡¯t have a lot of time.


    I wasn¡¯t thrilled with the idea of going in there just as it was getting dark. Kara had NightVision. I didn¡¯t. On the other hand, I did have a dinosaur capable of spitting fireballs, so to some extent I could make my own light sources. It wasn¡¯t optimal, but neither was letting the undead wiped out potential allies.


    ¡°Let me talk to Kara about this, okay Patches?¡±


    He nodded, so I stepped aside, beckoning Kara to join me. Once we were a little distance away, I asked what felt like the most pressing question. ¡°They want us to go help them now. By the time we get there, it¡¯s going to be nearly dark. No electricity means no lights inside. You up for this?¡±Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    ¡°I¡¯ve got Nightvision, remember. I can handle a night mission just fine. Are you going to be all right in there?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, I think so. Figure I¡¯ll have Sue light the place up some.¡±


    ¡°Light the¡­ Ohhhhh, Fireballs. Right. Because shooting off Fireball spells in enclosed places always works out well.¡±


    I couldn¡¯t hold back a laugh at that. ¡°Didn¡¯t know you were a gamer.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not. Wasn¡¯t. But I had a Facebook account, Selena. I doubt there¡¯s anyone alive who hasn¡¯t seen those memes.¡±


    ¡°Fair enough. I think the interior of the mall is big enough to handle a few fireballs,¡± I said. ¡°It would still be safer if we waited until morning, though.¡±


    ¡°Safer for us. Less safe for them,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Unless you want to have them camp up here with us..?¡±


    It was an option I hadn¡¯t considered. If I invited the rats to the fort, they¡¯d be clear of the danger, at least for the time being. Hell, this might even make a decent place for them to stay in the long run, if I didn¡¯t want it! And from what Kara said about the huts, I wasn¡¯t sure I did.


    Kara saw me thinking about it. ¡°They wouldn¡¯t have to stay¡­ And the undead would keep us safe enough for one night.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, that could work. I was just thinking that it might be worth handing the whole fort over to them.¡±


    ¡°What about that stone thing you found?¡±


    ¡°It works anywhere that hasn¡¯t already been claimed,¡± I said. ¡°We can pick a different place. We¡¯re not locked into this one.¡±


    Kara heaved a huge sigh of relief. ¡°Oh. My. God. Yes, please! You have no idea how bad those huts stink. Goblins are gross, dude.¡±


    I laughed again¡ªcouldn¡¯t help it. She was good at that. ¡°Okay, so we invite them up here, let them stay in the goblin huts. You and I can sleep somewhere nearby, I guess. Sue will keep an eye on us while we sleep.¡±


    Hope barked next to me.


    ¡°And you can watch too, yes,¡± I told the dog.


    We went back over to Patches, which was still a weird name for a creature I was holding a conversation with. ¡°We¡¯ll help, but it¡¯s too risky to go in there this close to dark. Once the darkness hits, they¡¯ll be very difficult to kill.¡±


    Patches seemed alarmed at this and broke in, cutting me off. ¡°Dead things will kill us, come dark!¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°Not tonight, they won¡¯t. We¡¯re inviting you all up here to the fort. You can stay in the goblin huts. But you¡¯ll need to get your people moving fast, because sunset is coming soon.¡±


    ¡°Stay here?¡±


    ¡°Yup. You can stay here, for tonight anyway.¡± Beyond that, we¡¯d see. Before I handed over something as valuable as those wooden walls, I wanted to get to know these folks better.


    ¡°Patches go get others.¡± He rose to leave.


    I had a thought. ¡°Actually, we¡¯ll go with you. I don¡¯t know if you¡¯ll be able to get everyone up here before darkness falls, so let¡¯s make sure you all make it. I¡¯ll ride Sue back down the hill with you and give you an escort up to the fort.¡±


    ¡°You do this?¡± Patches asked, his eyes round as the moon.


    I nodded. ¡°Yeah. You folks have been cool so far. It¡¯s the right thing to do.¡±


    It took me under a minute to get Sue ready for the trip. I had Kara remain behind at the fort with the rest of my undead¡ªunder protest, from both Kara and Hope, who wanted to come along as well. I didn¡¯t think we needed more firepower than Sue could provide, though¡ªand the last thing I wanted was to come back up to the fort after sunset and find it was full of giant spiders or something.


    She understood the importance, but Kara wasn¡¯t happy about it. Neither was Hope.


    I mounted up, and we rode off down the hill.


    The rats were pretty quick on their feet. They weren¡¯t able to keep up with Sue when she was going full-tilt, but I settled her into a gentle trot and they were able to stay with her okay. We zipped past the trees at a good clip, making our way to the road in no time.


    Patches led us down the private road which led to the Hilton. That was the hotel where the goblins based themselves while attacking the rat-people. Now, it was gutted and empty. The goblins had made a royal mess of the place, and it looked like maybe the rat-people had gone through looting and clearing the place out after I shooed away the goblins. Few windows were left unbroken, and there were furnishings tossed out windows, lying scattered in the parking lot.


    Then we were through the mess and crossing the street. Sue picked her way through the cars, her skeletal talons clacking loudly against the pavement. A group of the rat-people came toward us, all armed, and at first I was a little worried¡ªbut this wasn¡¯t an attack. It was a reunion.


    I watched as Patches went and gave another rat-person a huge hug, sweeping them up into his arms. Other rats did likewise, and I realized what I was seeing. These people weren¡¯t sure their friends, family, and loved ones that they¡¯d sent out to meet me would return.


    They¡¯d been hoping for my help, but for all they knew, I¡¯d just kill them all. It was an understandable fear. After all, that¡¯s what most beings were doing, right? Fighting each other? Killing each other?


    ¡°Patches,¡± I said. He glanced up, breaking away from his hug. ¡°You risked a lot coming to see me, didn¡¯t you?¡±


    He nodded. ¡°Was scared. Rats better at hide than fight. But needed to. For her.¡± He pointed at the rat-person he¡¯d been hugging, then swept his arm past the crowd. ¡°For all.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re a good leader, Patches.¡± Now, more than ever, I felt determined to do what I could for these¡­people. Sure, they weren¡¯t human. But they acted more human than some of the Homo sapiens I¡¯d run into since the Event. That made them more than human enough, in my book.


    No sooner had I said that than I heard a deep, booming vibration out of the east. Another followed, then a third.


    Drums. I was hearing drums, same as the other night when Kara and I slipped past. They had to be coming from the mall. Whatever evil waited there, it was starting to wake up for the evening. We were running out of time.

 Chapter 71 - Buying Time

    Chapter 71 - Buying Time


    As the drum-beat picked up, I glanced at the horizon, where the fading sun was just beginning to slip below the horizon. On the one hand, I loved being proved right. It always felt nice to know you¡¯d made the right call, and entering the mall at night would have been flat-out stupid. If it hadn¡¯t been obvious that whatever power lived over there was more active at night before, it sure as hell was now.


    On the other hand, here I was, potentially in the line of fire anyway!


    I turned to Patches. ¡°Get your people moving. If they¡¯re starting to wake up already, it won¡¯t be long before they grow more active. You¡¯re sure the undead were coming at you tonight?¡±


    ¡°They did last night,¡± Patches replied. ¡°We beat them. Barely. Sun rose before they kill us all, dead things left.¡±


    Which meant they¡¯d probably be back to finish the job as soon as possible. Okay, that tracked, but it meant we were dealing with something bigger than the undead I¡¯d seen before. Skeletons and zombies didn¡¯t care if the sun was out, and neither would a human necromancer. If whatever was leading them was an obligate night-hunter of some sort, odds were good it was a monster, not a person.


    It would be something new, too. Something I hadn¡¯t seen yet. That was pretty interesting from an intellectual perspective, but I was still all for waiting until daylight hit to go hunting whatever it was. My mind kept flickering to ideas like ¡®vampire,¡¯ which didn¡¯t improve my mood.


    ¡°Hurry your people along,¡± I said at last. ¡°Fast as you can. I¡¯m going to scout in that direction, see if they¡¯re coming and maybe slow them down a bit.¡±


    ¡°Thank you. We will hurry, but many ratkin, much supplies, much stuff,¡± Patches replied.


    I glared. ¡°I¡¯ll hold them for as long as I can safely do so, but make no mistake¡ªif they retreated only because of sunrise, they¡¯re probably going to be all over you any minute. Get your people moving fast.¡±


    Patches bobbed his head, then dashed off to speak with others of his people. Ratkin, huh? Okay, that worked for me. Better than rat-man or rat-people, anyway.


    I patted Sue and gave the dinosaur a mental command. Sue trotted through the parking lot, heading toward the east side of the complex. It had been a strip mall, back before the Event. The anchor store was a big PetCo, which was where Patches and his friends had been born into this world. From what I could glean out of what the ratkin told me, my hypothesis was right. They¡¯d been pets in cages, before the Event. After, they were infused with magic and somehow became something more than that.


    Hell, so had I, if you thought about it. Humans were infused with magic one way, rats another¡ªbut we¡¯d all been changed by the experience.


    We moved out through the parking lot in front of a defunct Staples, and I had Sue walk toward the edge of the lot, facing southeast. There was still enough fading daylight to see a good distance, and we had enough elevation that I had an excellent perspective.


    The immediate area was clear. I could see all the way down to the large, looping roads that were on and off ramps from the highway. In that area, everything looked calm, with empty and quiet roads broken up only by dead vehicles.


    Just beyond them lay University Mall, and that was anything but quiet.


    The flames I¡¯d seen the other night were already visible in the parking lot. Someone was taking the time to light new cars aflame each night, then, because they wouldn¡¯t have burned that long¡ªthese were new fires. It was tough to see much more than that. The mall was a tall set of buildings and blocked my view of the larger parking lots on the eastern side. Couldn¡¯t see anything inside the place, either.


    But what I could see was the horde of lesser undead boiling out of the west side of the mall and heading my way.


    It looked like it was mostly zombies. The distance was too great to be one hundred percent sure, but it looked to me like most of the creatures coming at me were dressed in modern, regular day clothes. If they were risen dead from a graveyard, they¡¯d be wearing funeral-type clothing. These guys were wearing t-shirts, dresses, and all sorts of other random stuff.If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    I had a feeling I was looking at the results of a zombie outbreak. Back on day one, when the cadavers came to life in my lab, I watched people they killed come back to life super fast and start attacking other people. It was every bit as horrifying as the movies wanted you to think. Poor Alfred¡¯s girlfriend tried to eat him. Ugly scene.


    Anyway, a couple of those zombies got away, and I¡¯m betting they weren¡¯t the only dead bodies to wake up and start walking around since the Event happened, either. When things went to hell, it was mid-afternoon. There would have been a thousand or so people in the mall. Worse, it was the sort of place people might try to gather, to consolidate.


    All it would really take is one zombie, tossed into a thousand or so confused, angry, frightened people, and with the speed people they killed turned, it would turn into a nightmare fast. I wondered if that was what I was facing. Could there be a thousand undead over there? Or more? The idea gave me chills. The idea¡ªwhich I had good evidence to support¡ªthat some sort of stronger monster was somehow controlling an army of undead that size was even more frightening.


    A horde of a thousand zombies is a potentially world-ending catastrophe all by itself. Left alone, they could kill even more people, slowly growing the horde until it was next to unstoppable. With some stronger thing commanding it, though, that was even worse.


    I looked at it as if an ¡®evil me¡¯ was working the problem. If I could command all undead, unlimited numbers, and had no principles at all, I¡¯d go street by street, combing the city for survivors. Clear each building, one at a time. The zombies kill anyone you meet, which nets you crystals for each kill. Then, the victims they kill rise and become new zombies, which you also control.


    It wouldn¡¯t end. Not unless someone stopped it, anyway. Sue shifted underneath me as the zombies poured across the highway ramps toward us. I understood the feeling. Sure, I had a Fireball-breathing dinosaur on my side, but there had to be a hundred zombies heading our way. And more still poured out of the mall every minute!


    ¡°Sue, we may need to test your range in a minute,¡± I said. The dinosaur didn¡¯t reply, but they ducked their head, almost like a nod. Tier four monsters were pretty smart.


    I hit Sue with Augment Undead, buffing their stats up. Now everything Sue could do, they could do better than before. I had a feeling that included spellcasting, so it ought to bump up the Fireball effects, too. After that, there was nothing else to do but wait.


    It wasn¡¯t until the lead ranks crossed the main highway and started walking through the second ramp that I felt like they were close enough to hit. Not for me¡ªthey were still outside my Drain Life range. But for Sue? I had a good feeling about it.


    ¡°Now!¡± I said, sending the mental command. Sue spat a quick Fireball directly at the oncoming horde.


    I watched as the flaming sphere shot through the air, arcing high before gradually falling. It turned out I¡¯d waited a bit longer than I needed to¡ªthe spell impacted about ten feet past the front of their line, smacking one zombie in the chest and setting a couple of nearby ones on fire.


    The rotten thing was, I didn¡¯t think I was going to be able to go collect the crystals from any of these guys, not at the rate more of them came pouring out of the mall. I was guessing maybe a hundred and twenty so far, and more still exiting the back doors every couple of seconds.


    It wasn¡¯t a very organized mob, though. If there was a commander on the field, they were doing a shitty job organizing their troops. But the sun still lit of the western sky just a bit. Maybe the enemy leader was waiting until it set entirely before coming out to play?


    ¡°Sue, hit them again, quick as you can fire,¡± I commanded.


    The dinosaur spat another Fireball a few seconds later. Looked like there was a timer for the spell. Might be fifteen seconds, maybe a little less. I wasn¡¯t sure how many shots Sue could make without resting, yet. Guess we might be about to discover that!


    The Fireball blew apart a couple more zombies, but they were spreading out as they moved, so there wasn¡¯t much splash damage happening. I considered rushing down there with Sue to trample as many of them as we could. With my Drain spell killing some, my ability to heal Sue, and the fact she outranked the zombies by a ton, we¡¯d probably be okay. So long as I didn¡¯t fall off her.


    I really didn¡¯t want to land on the ground in the middle of a massive zombie horde, though. I¡¯d seen the movies. Not a great way to go out.


    Sue fired a third time, but I could sense their mana was running low, so I called it quits at that point. We¡¯d killed a few of them, and the fires started by the Fireballs were burning merrily, forcing some of the horde to divert. It was time to get back to the ratkin and see how their evacuation was proceeding.


    We rode up to the front of the PetCo, which now looked wildly different from before. Scores of ratkin of all ages were gathered outside. I saw a few older ones, graying and stooped, dozens of adults¡ªand was shocked to see a fair number of ratkin children as well. They had kids here? Crap. No wonder this was taking time. ¡°Patches! How¡¯s it going? The undead are almost here!¡±


    ¡°We are mostly prepared,¡± he replied. ¡°We gather the last things now.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll make one last rush at them, then. Try to stall for a couple more minutes. But we need to go. Five minutes, maybe ten, and they¡¯ll be here.¡±


    ¡°Thank you, Selena,¡± Patches said. ¡°We hurry.¡±


    Muttering under my breath, I whirled Sue around and rode back toward the horde. How could I do otherwise after looking at the cute, terrified little ratkin cubs? Damn it if I wasn¡¯t a sucker for kids.


    ¡°All right, Sue. We¡¯re gonna have to buy them some more time. You up for this?¡± I asked.


    Sue roared her readiness, and against my better judgement and all common sense, we charged down the hill toward the enemy.

 Chapter 72 - Lady Death

    Chapter 72 - Lady Death


    Sue bounded down the hill toward the advancing army of zombies and spat out a quick Fireball on the way. The spell exploded right in front of the horde, sending clods of dirt flying in all directions and stalling their advance for a critical few seconds. Confused, leaderless, and without any real direction, the undead surged ahead anyway, trying to make their way through the mess the impact made.


    But then we were right in their midst. Sue ripped the top half off a zombie and sent it flying dozens of feet before it crashed to the earth again. The dinosaur stomped on another zombie, crushing it into the soil. Sue was a true wrecking ball, able to drop zombies faster than anything I¡¯d seen before.


    There were a lot of zombies coming our way, though. The nearest ones grabbed into her leg bones, turning themselves into dead weights, slowing Sue down. I blasted one of them with a Drain, forcing it to let go. Sue kicked another off. But there were too many of them, and the zombies quickly had us surrounded.


    ¡°Not good. So not good,¡± I muttered, wishing I¡¯d brought Kara and the rest of my undead along for this trip. I could definitely use some additional backup.


    Fighting them like this wasn¡¯t a winning proposition. The zombies were already trying to climb Sue¡¯s legs. Give them enough time and they¡¯d clamber their way up to me, and I¡¯d be fighting hand to hand from the top of a moving dinosaur in a field full of zombies. Sounded to me like the perfect recipe for disaster.


    I shot Sue a mental command, ordering the dino to get clear. They ran northeast, sort of perpendicular to the zombie horde¡¯s line of advance. This did a couple of things for us. First, it shook most of the undead off her legs. Just as important, it got the zombies following us, rather than continuing their advance toward the ratkin.


    With them chasing us instead of surrounding us, I had a little more breathing room. I also had a few more tiers worth of Control Undead left to me¡ªfour, in fact. I quickly Controlled the two zombies still hanging from Sue¡¯s legs, ordering them to turn and hack their way into the horde. They rushed to the attack, and each of them felled an enemy zombie before the bad guys figured out I was using their own forces against them.


    As soon as the horde realized what I¡¯d done, they tore my two zombies apart. But that just left me more Control points free again, so I use the spell four more times, controlling four zombies on the army¡¯s right flank. I waited until I had all four under my power before ordering them to attack.


    They turned on the flank, ripping into the nearest enemy zombies and taking down several. It was awesome! If I could keep this up a little longer, I could whittle this force down substantially. Just keep them chasing Sue while I slowly Controlled a few at a time, and eventually they¡¯d all be dead. I wasn¡¯t going to get crystals from the ones I controlled, but that was a price I was willing to pay to keep these assholes busy a little longer.


    I turned Sue around because we were running out of space to stay ahead of them. We sprinted back in the other direction, the zombies still hot on our tail. Before we¡¯d taken two steps, though, a black ray shot from the horde, slamming into my shoulder.


    Pain raced through me. The spell almost threw me off Sue¡¯s back; I barely managed to hang on. Before I could stabilize myself, a second beam hit me, and this time I screamed. It felt like all my nerves were on fire. I ducked down, trying to make myself as small as possible on Sue¡¯s back, and commanded her to run as fast as she could, and get clear. A third beam slammed into her side, staggering her for only a moment before she returned to her regular pace.


    Those were Harm spells; I¡¯d cast them myself, so I recognized the magic in play. But what was casting them? I hadn¡¯t seen signs of a spell caster in the mix out there, but it was almost full dark now, so I might have missed something. I cast a Drain Life on the nearest zombie, which refilled my health enough that I could concentrate again.


    But Sue was hit by two more black beams, and this time the spells almost made her lose her footing entirely. If the dino went down, I was screwed, so I cast Heal Undead to repair the damage their Harm spells were doing.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    The Harm spell was clearly low level. I was guessing tier one, maybe tier two at most. That meant it probably wasn¡¯t a human necromancer out there. I was looking for some sort of undead monster that could cast. I¡¯d seen a few, like skeleton mage, pop up when I was using Animate Dead. Maybe there were some creatures like that in the horde?


    I watched the horde as we raced away from it, looking for clues. If I could spot the undead that were casting the spell, I could Control or Drain them. But I needed to see them, first. Another beam shot from the center of the mass, striking me in the shoulder. The pain was intense, but I bit my lip and kept watching for the caster.


    There! I caught a flash of white in the middle of the mess. That had to be bone. A skeleton? Maybe it was a skeleton mage. If so, I¡¯d been seriously missing a trick by not animating some of those myself. They were pretty strong.


    I reached out with my magic and cast Control on the skeleton mage. It locked down under my control instantly. Awesome! I had a secret ally now. If I could keep the others from figuring it out for a few minutes, maybe I could do some good with it. I ordered the mage to zap zombies, instead of me. It took a few seconds before the timer on its spell reset, but then I felt it cast. Somewhere out there in the mass of zombies, one of them was having a very bad day.


    Now that I knew what to look for, I hunkered down on Sue¡¯s back, watching for flashes of white. I saw a second one and took it over, too, ordering it to blast zombies from within the pack. It wasn¡¯t much, but it was something. I was whittling them down, and each zombie I killed now was one I wouldn¡¯t have to worry about later.


    Sue tossed another Fireball in the direction of the horde, then I guided us both back up the hill toward the Staples parking lot. Another ray of Harm hit Sue as we fled, but I was able to heal that well enough. Those ranged undead were a lot more powerful than I¡¯d guessed before, though. I was going to need to acquire some of those for my own army, soon as possible.


    Thankfully, the ratkin had already begun their march, a long column of furry bodies leading north from the PetCo, across the road, and through the Hilton complex on the other side of the highway. I heaved a sigh of relief at that. If they¡¯d still be struggling to get their act together, I wasn¡¯t sure what else I could do. Those zombies would be up the hill in minutes, and we needed to be away before they could see where we were going. The last thing I wanted was for us all to be besieged in the fort all night.


    Patches was waiting for me with a small rear guard of five other armed ratkin. ¡°Come quick! We go. All others already gone.¡±


    ¡°Good timing,¡± I told him. ¡°Let¡¯s get this show on the road, then.¡±


    The ratkin rushed to join their brethren in flight, and I pulled up the absolute rear, sitting backwards on Sue so I could see where we¡¯d come from. I watched as the first zombies scaled the hill and ambled through the parking lot. Without a direct threat, they seemed uncoordinated as they wandered their way to the Staples building. I heard glass shatter¡ªthe front-runners had reached the glass windows on the building and were breaking their way in.


    Whoever was commanding these undead still wasn¡¯t out and about yet. They¡¯d issued orders for their undead, same as I could for mine. But without having their eyes on the target, they couldn¡¯t change those orders on the fly as the situation changed.


    If I gave an order like ¡®go attack that building and kill everything in it, plus anything else that gets in your way,¡¯ they¡¯d do precisely that. If the inhabitants of the building had just departed, though, the undead would keep following their orders anyway.


    As I finished crossing the street and moved into the shadows around the hotel, the last redness of the setting sun left the sky. Behind me, the undead were storming the strip mall. More sounds of breaking glass reached me across the distance. There wasn¡¯t going to be much left of the place by the time they were done. But I was beginning to have hope that we¡¯d get away clean, here.


    If any of the undead were smart enough to track us, it ought to be easy enough to do. Even if the ratkin had managed to travel with no trace¡ªwhich objectively, I noted they were not doing, and I couldn¡¯t blame them since they were fleeing at top speed¡ªSue left a trail a blind person could follow. As soon as I left the pavement we were leaving big dinosaur-skeleton tracks everywhere we went, ripping up the soil.


    Once we were in the forest, I felt much better. That was ridiculous, really. The undead weren¡¯t going to be afraid to follow us. But I felt the rest of my undead not far ahead, and I knew that fort represented at least a little shelter and security. If that horde came calling, we¡¯d have mostly-sturdy walls between them and us.


    Closing the gap in the walls would have to be a top priority, assuming I was even keeping the place. If I handed it over to the ratkin, that would be their problem, but it opened the bigger one of wondering where I ought to go next. I had cheap labor, which was cool because it meant building a new fortress wouldn¡¯t be impossible, just a lot of work.


    We were getting close. I called down to Patches. ¡°I¡¯m going to ride to the front, to make sure they get inside safely. Join me as quick as you can.¡±


    ¡°We will. Thank you, Lady Death.¡±


    I blinked, surprised at the weird name. I almost went to correct him with my real name, but then shook my head and started on my way. I guess from their perspective, that title fit.

 Chapter 73 - Five More Minutes

    Chapter 73 - Five More Minutes


    I woke as the first rays of dawn hit my eyelids after what had been a very fitful night¡¯s sleep. Kara and I crashed in one of the watchtower parapets. Sue stood guard at the bottom of the ladder, ensuring we weren¡¯t disturbed by any of the ratkin. They didn¡¯t want to go anywhere near her, and I couldn¡¯t blame them.


    My other undead had stood watch through the long night, keeping their deathly eyes open for any attackers, but there¡¯d been nothing. The zombie horde we¡¯d left behind hadn¡¯t picked up our tracks and decided to follow us. I wasn¡¯t convinced whatever was directing the horde was just going to let the ratkin all go, though. I¡¯d seen a few ratkin zombies in the horde, when I was doing my heroic delaying action, which meant those creatures were fodder for this army the same as humans.


    They might have gone after easier prey for the time being, but in the long run anything which allowed that army of undead to grow larger was something it would inevitably chase. And that was something I needed to stop in its tracks. The bigger that horde got, the more dangerous it would be. I¡¯d seen hundreds of zombies, and that was just their opening rush. I was willing to bet there were hundreds more still in the mall. Maybe as many as a thousand of the things, if they¡¯d turned everyone who¡¯d sought shelter in the mall after the Event.


    Now they were clearly turning outward under the command of some other being. With the zombies on the prowl in those sorts of numbers, no one would be safe. Even the Guard base was potentially in jeopardy. I probably was the one really safe one out there, between my powers and Sue¡¯s speed. Any smaller batches of undead, I could take down handily. And bigger ones, Sue could outrun easily.


    But this wasn¡¯t a threat I wanted to flee from. That many undead represented a massive opportunity, one that might not ever come again. I¡¯d gained enormous power just from taking down one graveyard with under a hundred undead in it. How strong would I become with hundreds of zombies worth of crystals?


    It was growing ever more clear that survival now meant growth. The threats were continuing to expand in scope. I needed to gain more power to keep up with it, or I was going to be in a lot of trouble when I fell behind. This zombie horde represented a massive opportunity.


    ¡°Kara, hey, we ought to talk.¡± I shook her arm gently.


    ¡°Five more minutes¡­¡± she mumbled, eyes still closed. A little drool trickled from the corner of her mouth. She was still out like a light.


    I couldn¡¯t help but grin, and I even reached toward my pocket for my phone to snap video. It wasn¡¯t there, of course, and remembering that cost me some of my good mood. I let her rest a little longer so I could sit and think, but I grew restless quickly, and went down the ladder instead.


    Sue nodded a good morning to me, and Hope ran over, yipping as she ran in circles. She¡¯d been less than thrilled about being left on the ground, but ladders aren¡¯t that great for dogs. I told her wherever we settled as a home would have stairs instead, which seemed to mollify her. I wasn¡¯t sure if she understood the words or just my tone.


    Patches came toward me. ¡°You rescue ratkin. We thank again.¡±


    I nodded. ¡°It wasn¡¯t that big a deal.¡±


    ¡°Was,¡± Patches protested, holding up a paw. ¡°You slow dead so we escape. Give us place to rest safe. You save. We thank.¡±


    To my horror, I saw that another dozen of the ratkin had gathered in a semicircle behind Patches, all nodding, and then the entire lot of them went and bowed in front of me. I blushed furiously. ¡°That wasn¡¯t why I helped. Get up, please. You asked for help, so I did. It was just the right thing to do.¡±


    ¡°And all beings do right thing?¡± Patches asked me. I swear to god, the rat managed to raise one bushy eyebrow at me.


    ¡°The good ones do,¡± I replied.


    He nodded. ¡°Just so.¡±


    I shrugged my shoulders, shaking off the compliment. From my point of view, it was the minimum standard. But if it had won me new allies, I¡¯d take it. ¡°I¡¯m going to have to go back down there and face them. That undead horde is too big. If I leave it alone, it will spread everywhere, kill everyone and make them like that. I saw some of your people in there.¡±


    Patches lowered his gaze. ¡°We know. When they kill, we rise as dead.¡±


    ¡°We need to stop that,¡± I said. ¡°If we don¡¯t put an end to it soon, they¡¯ll be unstoppable.¡±


    My biggest worry was that they might already be beyond my ability to contain. The raw numbers I faced the night before were like something out of a horror movie, and my gut said that was the tip of the iceberg.This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.


    ¡°We will help you,¡± Patches said. ¡°Ratkin can fight, too.¡±


    I wasn¡¯t thrilled with that idea at the outset. I¡¯d gone to a fair bit of trouble to save them from this mess, and now they wanted to throw themselves back into it again, too? I was tier five. With luck I¡¯d hit tier six or even more, after this was done. These guys were all tier one and two, same as the undead I¡¯d seen. Their odds of survival were slim.


    I pointed that out. They didn¡¯t care. Not helpful! We finally negotiated it down to three volunteers from the ratkin joining Kara and I on our quest. I¡¯d only managed that by reminding them that if we failed, the survivors would be needed to protect the rest of their people.


    After I left them to figure out which ratkin were crazy enough to go into that mall with us, I grabbed a quick meal while surveying my current undead legion. I¡¯d already decided that I was going to take everything I had with me for this trip. There was no point holding stuff back in reserve, not against an enemy this massive. Sue was going to be my big hitter, obviously, but the rest of my force was powerful, too.


    I had a full roster of Animated undead. There were four goblin zombies, all of them tier two and each one armed with a bow, arrows, and a knife. These zombies were not the ¡®stab them in the head and they die¡¯ type, but they did take damage from stab wounds. Hit them hard enough or enough times, and they¡¯d go down. I learned that back on day one. So the bows would work. To round off the party, I had four Animated skeleton warriors, each heavily fortified with spears and shields I¡¯d procured from the Guard base. They were all tier two as well, and were crazy effective as a shield wall.


    That was all sixteen tier points of Animate Dead. I also had a good number of Controlled undead, although I still wasn¡¯t maxed out there. I had Sue, who was tier four and cost me half my Control points alone. Hope was only tier two, so she used two points. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern had somehow survived everything I¡¯d been through, trailing along with me since day one. Sooner or later, I needed to get those guys some buffs. Find more of those pet augmentation stones and buff them up, maybe. They¡¯d been with me through a lot.


    That left me four points worth of Control Undead, enough to grab two to four of the enemy and make them mine. I intended to use that to maximum effect once we struck.


    Kara slid down the ladder and joined me as I finished breakfast. ¡°Hey! Thanks for letting me sleep in.¡±


    I pointed to the corner of my mouth and grinned. ¡°You¡¯ve still got some drool, yeah, right there.¡±


    She flushed and wiped her face. ¡°Showers. We need a base with showers, Selena. Surely there must be a magical way to make showers work? Hot showers would be best, but I¡¯d be okay with cold ones. I miss showers.¡±


    ¡°They¡¯ve got field showers at the Guard base,¡± I pointed out.


    ¡°Yeah, but that colonel gave me the creeps.¡±


    I arched an eyebrow. That was good information to know. I¡¯d gotten something of a mixed vibe from the man, but I also had known issues with authority figures, and I was an obvious threat to the man¡¯s power base, thanks to my Will level. Some of the nasty vibes I¡¯d gotten could have been from Turner just not knowing how he wanted to deal with me, personally.


    But if Kara was getting similar feels, that was worth knowing. ¡°Yeah, I felt a lot the same. You know his Charisma is tier five, right?¡±


    ¡°Yeah? I don¡¯t have any Charisma crystals. What does it do? Make people want to kiss you, like in games?¡±


    ¡°Something like that, yeah.¡±


    She froze. ¡°Wait, really?¡±


    ¡°Well, sort of. I don¡¯t think he can command people to do something completely against their nature. But he can ¡®suggest¡¯ you do something, and you¡¯ll be more likely to think it¡¯s a great idea. My Will was almost as high as his Charisma, and the fight between our stats almost gave me a headache.¡±


    ¡°So Will blocks that control?¡± Kara asked, her attention now laser-focused on what I was saying.


    ¡°Yeah, seems to be the only thing that does.¡±


    ¡°Guess I want to see about getting some of those, then,¡± she replied with a shiver. ¡°I don¡¯t want to be controlled by someone else, Selena. Not ever.¡±


    I got the hint of an unspoken ¡®again¡¯ at the end of that statement, but I let it go. If Kara wanted to open up more about her past at some point, we could talk. Otherwise, it was her business. ¡°Turner doesn¡¯t seem to be abusing the power, from what I saw. He¡¯s just using it to keep everything in order on the base. But that¡¯s why things are running so smoothly there. Everyone listens to him because he has a magic power that makes them want to obey.¡±


    ¡°Tell me that doesn¡¯t sound creepy as fuck,¡± Kara replied.


    ¡°No, I¡¯m right with you. That¡¯s creepy as fuck.¡±


    ¡°Is that why you didn¡¯t stay there? Why you headed back out to this fort?¡± Kara asked me.


    I thought about that a sec, then shook my head. ¡°It probably had something to do with it. But I don¡¯t see joining them as a good way to push ahead. If we want to thrive in this new world, we need to grow with it. That means getting a shit-ton of crystals, which means being out in the thick of it, facing down bad guys and killing monsters. I didn¡¯t think I¡¯d be able to do that as well from inside their walls. And besides, with Sue, do I really need them?¡±


    ¡°Fair enough. What¡¯s the plan now? We¡¯re going back in, I¡¯m assuming?¡± Kara asked.


    I nodded. ¡°If you¡¯re game, I want to leave before noon. Whatever is controlling them seems averse to daylight, and if that¡¯s the case I want every advantage we can get.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m in. Let me finish eating, and we can hit the road right away.¡±


    She went back to her food. That was something we had plenty of, thanks to the trades I¡¯d done at the base. I figured I¡¯d leave it here at the fort. The ratkin were too grateful for my aid to go rooting through it, and if the worst happened and we didn¡¯t come back, they could make good use of it. There was always that chance, and as morbid as it sounded, thinking about dying to a zombie horde, it was worth reminding myself once in a while that all it would take during this attack was one serious screw-up, and we¡¯d be dead. Worse than dead¡ªwe¡¯d be new additions to the zombie horde.


    I was confident we could win, but this was a far bigger battle than anything I¡¯d been in so far. Going into the heart of this camp was going to be a serious shit-show. I just hoped we were ready.

 Chapter 74 - Dungeon Crawl?

    Chapter 74 - Dungeon Crawl?


    An hour later, Kara and I were scouting the mall, scoping the place out to find the best way inside. It turned out this was going to be a tougher nut to crack than we¡¯d first thought. At night, it looked like all the armies of hell were pouring out of the place, but now that the sun was up, it looked like any other abandoned post-apocalyptic structure.


    Our first stop had been to check the dead zombies I¡¯d killed the night before. I was pretty sure between Sue and I, we¡¯d taken out over a dozen zombies. If possible, I wanted to grab their crystals. But when we arrived at the scene, there were no zombie bodies left behind. The grass was scorched where Sue¡¯s Fireballs hit, but there was no sign of the undead we¡¯d killed.


    ¡°Well, that sucks,¡± I said. I slid down from the dinosaur to check through the brush where it was thicker, just in case some had been missed, but no luck. The enemy had brought their dead back home with them. ¡°Looks like whoever is running the show over there wanted to recover as many crystals from their dead as possible.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, that seems likely,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Hey, we never did talk about loot distribution from this dungeon crawl.¡±


    ¡°Dungeon crawl?¡± I sputtered.


    She rolled her eyes at me. ¡°Seriously? We¡¯re entering a dark, enclosed area full of monsters, looking for a boss monster that¡¯s controlling an undead legion. You¡¯re telling me this doesn¡¯t read like a dungeon crawl to you?¡±


    ¡°I guess. What was that about loot, though? I figured we¡¯d just split it fifty-fifty.¡±


    ¡®Selena, I love you, but you¡¯re nuts, you know that?¡± Kara said. She slid off Sue and came to stand next to me. ¡°For real. If we split evenly, with you doing like ninety percent of the heavy lifting, sooner or later you¡¯re going to resent me for it. You have what, three tier five stones now? And you ride a Fireball-breathing dinosaur skeleton into battle? I have a bow.¡±


    ¡°Well, I like having you at my back. It¡¯s worth it.¡±


    ¡°I appreciate that, but let¡¯s get real here. You¡¯re doing most of the work. I¡¯m tier four now, myself¡ªwhich makes me half the power of a single tier five. You have three tier five stones. Let¡¯s make this equitable. We can renegotiate later, once I¡¯m stronger too, okay?¡±


    We hammered out a deal pretty quickly, mostly at her behest. I wasn¡¯t convinced that she was right. My feeling was, getting her stronger quickly was in my best interest as well as hers. But then she¡¯d gone on about me being the control stone owner, so I¡¯d be the one setting up a fort somewhere, and I¡¯d need to trade stones for resources from the Guard¡­ I couldn¡¯t say she was wrong. We settled on her getting a quarter of the haul, with Kara getting all the stealthy and assassin type black stones, me getting the caster type black stones, and clear ones being divvied to make up the difference.


    After that we mounted back up and trotted to Route Two, then hung a right on Dorset Street, the road which ran past the front side of the mall. Part of the street was hard to navigate; there¡¯d been a nasty crash, probably cars moving too fast when they all just shut off.


    There was nobody around. That was something we¡¯d noticed right away, as soon as we left the forest. Usually, there was some sort of sign of life out on the main roads. Before it had been goblins, then the ratkin¡ªbut both those groups were gone. At night, the zombies had been active, but during the day they were nowhere to be seen. The whole area was like a dead zone.


    My guess was, that was from the zombies¡¯ activity. They were either killing or scaring off everything nearby.


    I guided Sue into the mall parking lot. It was over half full of cars. Not totally packed, but there had clearly been a lot of folks shopping the afternoon everything went sideways. Most of them were probably zombies, now.


    Here and there we spotted the burnt out hulks of cars that had been set on fire. Those were the flames we¡¯d seen at night. But no movement, no monsters roaming. No sign of anything wrong at all.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.


    In a way, that felt almost intentional. Any human survivors would want to visit the mall. It had clothing stores, a grocery section in the Target, area sporting good shop¡­ Heck, even crap like the vitamins at the Vitamin Shop would probably be valuable before too long. It wasn¡¯t like we could manufacture new ones.


    I made a mental note to keep an eye out for toilet paper. That was already selling at premium prices at the Guard base. The couple of rolls I¡¯d bought us were only going to last so long. When I shared my suspicions with Kara, she agreed.


    ¡°Yeah, it¡¯s a logical place to look for supplies. It might not be someone¡¯s first choice for a scavenging site, but it would be high on the list.¡±


    I nodded. ¡°That¡¯s my point. They come here looking for stuff. They poke around, looking for trouble, and find nothing. Hell, the glass on the main doors isn¡¯t even shattered. The place looks pretty good, aside from a few burned cars in the parking lot. They think it¡¯s all clear. They go inside. Boom! The trap is sprung, and a thousand zombies descend on them.¡±


    ¡°Well isn¡¯t that a cheerful image. Yeah, it¡¯s probably a honeypot trap. So what do we do about it?¡± Kara asked.


    I thought about it a moment. Ultimately, we still had to go in. The only other choice that made sense would be to mount up on Sue and ride off for somewhere very far away, so that when this horde hit ten thousand zombies, or more, we¡¯d be far enough distant that it was someone else¡¯s problem. For multiple reasons, I didn¡¯t like that plan.


    ¡°The plus side is, we already know it¡¯s a trap. They can¡¯t surprise us, because we know they¡¯ll be coming,¡± I said. ¡°When we go in, we hit with shock and awe. Make them be the ones reeling. If we can keep them off balance, we win.¡±


    We were committed to the attack, which left figuring out which entrance to use. There were a lot of them, dozens of doors of various sizes. We did a quick lap around the building on Sue¡¯s back, both scouting and looking for entry options. When that trip was complete, we had only a few options big enough for Sue to enter the building. Most of the doors were simply way too small for her.


    There were a number of loading bay doors in the back of the mall that she could use, but we nixed those for two reasons. First, we¡¯d be in the back storage rooms of Target or another big store. Sue might get inside, but she¡¯d never be able to move through the small personnel doors leading into the stores themselves. Second, because those loading doors were all locked. We checked.


    That left any of the five big, fancy glass door entrances. There were two into the mall itself, and three others into various big stores. After thinking about it a bit, I decided we¡¯d enter through the Target entrance.


    ¡°Why that one?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°It¡¯s plenty big, and the interior space has a high overhead, so Sue can walk around okay.¡±


    ¡°Yeah, but that¡¯s true of JC Penny¡¯s, too.¡±


    ¡°Target has TP.¡±


    ¡°Sold.¡±


    We lined up a dozen meters from the glass entryway. It was a lot of glass, and remarkably none of it was busted. Yet. That was about to change¡­ Then I smacked my head, spotting something much better. I guided Sue to the right, and lined her up outside a corner of the Target store that was all windows. Like, twenty feet or more of glass, with only a little stone at the top and bottom. It was going to be way easier guiding Sue through that than it would be through even the main doorway.


    Sue spat out a Fireball, and it blasted the glass apart, shattering it inward like a bomb hit. The glass rained down inside while the explosion boomed like thunder. Our path was clear.


    Kara and I stayed aboard Sue as we picked our way over the stone lip into the store. It was a little smoky inside from the Fireball, but nothing had caught fire. Sue clambered over the edge, and we were inside. Fortunately, the place was heavily bedecked in windows, so there was plenty of light to see by. The interior looked dim, but I didn¡¯t need to rely on Kara¡¯s NightVision¡ªyet, anyway.


    We pushed ahead into the space.


    ¡°See anything?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Not yet. The big bad won¡¯t be in here, though, that¡¯s for sure.¡±


    ¡°Why not?¡±


    ¡°Too bright,¡± Kara replied. ¡°If they hate sunlight, they¡¯ll be somewhere dark during the daytime. Probably very dark, like those storage rooms you were talking about.¡±


    She was probably right. That didn¡¯t mean we were safe here, though. Somewhere in this building were hundreds of zombies, and we¡¯d definitely rung the dinner bell for them by blowing in the corner of the building! Without the guidance of the creature controlling them¡ªassuming we were right about that¡ªthe Fireball should have called just about every zombie for miles around.


    I sent Sue mental commands to continue forward, marching gradually toward where the Target store met the rest of the mall. If I remembered right the dino ought to be able to slip through there. Sue might have to duck a lot, but it ought to work. Once we were in the main area of the mall, Sue would be fine getting around. Getting into some of the smaller stores might be tricky. Getting into the back areas with Sue probably wasn¡¯t possible unless we literally busted down the walls.


    I heard a faint rumbling, almost like drumming. But lots of drums, and quiet. ¡°Do you hear something?¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Coming from the mall hallway, I think.


    Sue took a few more bounding steps in that direction. As soon as we had a good line of sight with the doors to the mall, I saw what was making the noise. We¡¯d woke them up, all right. It looked like every zombie ever made was in that main hallway. Hundreds upon hundreds of them, and they were all making their staggering, unsteady way directly toward us.

 Chapter 75 - Zombie Targets

    Chapter 75 - Zombie Targets


    What do you do, when a horde of hundreds of zombies comes rushing down the mall concourse toward you?


    Well, in my case, I ordered my undead T.rex to shoot a Fireball at ¡®em.


    The flames blasted forward like a rocket. There was a lot of glass between the Target and the rest of the mall, but the doors were open, so it wasn¡¯t going to stop the zombies anyway. The fireball found one of those openings, slashing out through the doors and then impacting the floor just beyond. The explosion sent flames shooting in all directions, and sent zombies flying.


    By the time the zombies were sort of back on their feet, a little more dazed than they had been before, Sue¡¯s timer was up, so I had her hit them again. The Fireball blew the lead zombie literally apart, and torched his nearby buddies. They ran around in circles for another minute, setting a few more on fire. Did I get credit for killing the ones that died from buddy-inflicted flames?


    That was all the grace period we were going to get, though. The front-runners hadn¡¯t been packed in too tight, but the ones coming behind were like a solid mass of zombies, all pushing each other forward to get to us. The sea of dead faces stretched back as far as I could see, deep into the mall.


    They ran through the doors, entering the Target, and rushed us. Holy shit, were there a lot of them! Kara picked off some of the leaders with her arrows. I ordered my undead to make a fighting withdrawal, the warriors sheltering the archers, as they made their way to the now-defunct escalators in the middle of the space. The warriors would hold the bottom of the escalators, giving the archers free rein to shoot all their arrows.


    I mean, they literally couldn¡¯t miss. There were so many zombies coming into the store that any arrow sent their way was going to hit something.


    Kara kept firing, more of her arrows killing a zombie than not, but she glanced at her quiver, then at me. ¡°We¡¯ve got a problem!¡±


    ¡°About a thousand of them, yeah. Care to be more specific?¡± I replied, having Sue fire off a third fireball. This one impacted just inside the Target doors, slowing the advance for a bit. That helped ensure Kara and the zombie archers could pick off the remainder. Sue did her part, too, stooping to snag a zombie in her teeth and snap it in two.


    ¡°Arrows. Running out,¡± Kara snapped back as she fired another into a zombie that had slipped through and was trying to scale Sue¡¯s leg.


    Shit, we hadn¡¯t thought of that. Our battles so far had all been pretty short. Kara was able to recover her arrows after. But in a fight like this, with so many targets? How many arrows had she come in with, anyway? Maybe thirty? Forty? I wasn¡¯t sure, but she¡¯d emptied one quiver already and was working on the second.


    The advantage of the target rich environment was our archers couldn¡¯t really miss. The disadvantage was they were all going to run out of ammunition way too soon.


    I wasn¡¯t. I had mana working for me, which didn¡¯t run out so much as I wore out. But our archers were going to be out of arrows long before this battle was decided.


    ¡°Shit. Kara, save your arrows. Use them only on anything trying to scale Sue, okay?¡±


    ¡°Got it!¡±


    ¡°Watch yourself, too. I don¡¯t see any yet, but the force last night had skeleton mages that cast Harm. Hurt like hell, but I could heal myself. I can¡¯t heal you,¡± I told her. I felt a chill as I said that, suddenly wondering if bringing her along was a terrible mistake.


    She got lower on Sue¡¯s back, which ought to help make her less visible. Harm was a line of sight spell, so if they couldn¡¯t see her, they couldn¡¯t hit her.


    Kara was running out of arrows. Once they were gone, she still had a short sword on her hip, but she¡¯d die in seconds on the ground. We¡¯d both tied ourselves to Sue¡¯s back bones with heavy rope, so that we wouldn¡¯t fall off, precisely because neither of us would survive more than a few seconds on the ground. Kara¡¯s utility was limited right now, and the risk level to her was still high, especially if those mages made an appearance.Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    The sea of zombies poured into the building. Sue bit one and stomped on another, but it was nowhere near enough. In a flash I saw how this was going to end: the zombies would hem Sue in, then climb the dinosaur to get to the tasty treats on top. We¡¯d stop them for a bit, but when you have thousands of zombies climbing toward you, there¡¯s only so many you can kill before you go down.


    ¡°Not today,¡± I muttered, casting a Drain Life on a zombie trying to climb Sue¡¯s leg. I ordered the dinosaur to turn in place, using its tail like a massive bludgeon. With one sweep, several zombies went down. It still wasn¡¯t nearly enough.


    I ordered all my other undead to flee. Hope was already back by the main doors, using her howl to slow down the zombies¡¯ advance. With her covering them, some of my other undead might escape, too. Especially if I could buy them even a little time with Sue.


    With a thought, I ordered the dinosaur to race sideways across the store. It didn¡¯t get us closer to the exit, but it did get every zombie in sight chasing us instead of paying attention to my lesser undead. One quick sprint from one side of the store to the other, and I¡¯d successfully given my other undead time to flee.


    Now it was time for us to do the same. I turned to Kara. ¡°Hold on tight! This is gonna be bumpy.¡±


    Mostly, I hoped our ropes held.


    I ordered Sue to make a mad dash directly through the middle of the zombie army.


    Have you seen the old Lord of the Rings movies, back when TV was still a thing? Remember the riders, when they plowed into the bad guy army? Yeah. That was us.


    Sue¡¯s bulk smashed into the front ranks of the oncoming undead like a freight train. Zombies went flying in all directions. The dino¡¯s tail did almost as much damage, flailing back and forth and knocking undead aside with each blow. It wasn¡¯t an easy passage. Each step Sue made landed on a zombie or two, which made the dinosaur rock from side to side, almost staggering a few times.


    For Kara and I, riding on their back, it was a bruising experience.


    We weren¡¯t killing an awful lot of them this way, but they weren¡¯t slowing us down, either! With a burst of speed, Sue broke through the far side of the zombie horde. Not the side facing deeper into the mall. I wasn¡¯t sure if there was another side in that direction. From what I could see, the zombies just kept coming.


    Instead, we bolted for the hole we¡¯d entered through. Sue bounded forward, my butt picking up new bruises with each massive step, and then with one final leap, we were outside, in the open sunlight again! I didn¡¯t have Sue stop until we were a good fifty feet away from the opening. Then I had our mount pause, turn, and see whether they¡¯d follow.


    Whatever ambivalence the undeads¡¯ leader had toward sunlight, it clearly wasn¡¯t a big deal for the zombies. They weren¡¯t anything close to as fast as Sue, but they kept coming at their steady, deadly pace. Before long, they were climbing out through the windows we¡¯d shattered to get in, and making their way toward us again.


    Kara was panting a little. ¡°Well, that didn¡¯t work as well as we¡¯d hoped.¡±


    ¡°We didn¡¯t think it through,¡± I said. ¡°I didn¡¯t think it through. I knew there were hundreds of the things, maybe more. I didn¡¯t think through what that meant in terms of fighting them, though.¡±


    ¡°If we hold still, they¡¯re going to wreck us,¡± Kara said. ¡°They seem pretty dumb, though. What about kiting them?¡±


    ¡°Kiting?¡±


    ¡°Run Sue ahead a bit. Blast them with fireballs. Run a bit more. Blast again. Repeat until zombie legion is a pile of burned goo.¡±


    ¡°Burned goo, huh?¡±


    ¡°Did you look at the damage that spell did in there?¡± Kara smirked. ¡°I meant what I said.¡±


    It was maybe worth a try. If I ran ahead of them, we could keep blasting them at range. Any that got too close, I¡¯d zap with a Drain. Even if they all retreated at some point, we¡¯d have whittled them down.


    ¡°We can give it a shot,¡± I said. I passed the order to Sue to hit them with another Fireball as the zombies were now outside in enough numbers to start a steady stream heading our way. ¡°Wear through some of them, anyway. Hey, what are you doing?¡±


    Kara was untying the rope that held her on Sue¡¯s back. She flashed me a grin. ¡°I¡¯m no use to you up here. But I have that Shadow Walk spell now. I can slip back there and loot the dead zombies while you keep the rest busy. They recover their dead, remember? We killed dozens of them in there, and you¡¯ll kill dozens more out here. You knock ¡®em down, I¡¯ll loot them up.¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°It¡¯s too dangerous. Not worth the risk.¡±


    ¡°This many crystals? If we kill a hundred of them here, you willing to give up a hundred crystals? Because I¡¯m not.¡±


    She wasn¡¯t wrong, damn it. I hated seeing her taking on all that extra risk, but it was the best way to get at least some of the crystals we¡¯d won. I figured eventually the zombies would force Sue and I to withdraw through sheer numbers. If that happened, the undead army would haul their dead back with them, and we¡¯d lose those stones.


    ¡°One condition,¡± I said.


    ¡°What¡¯s that?¡± Kara replied, her voice challenging. She really wanted to do this, and I understood.


    I was the one with the flashy powers, the fire-breathing dino, the undead, all this cool shit. She wanted her contribution to matter, too. She¡¯d found a way to do that, so now she was grabbing it with both hands. I wasn¡¯t going to talk her out of it, but I could show that I recognized what she was doing.


    ¡°We move the split to fifty-fifty,¡± I said,


    She thought about it for a second, snapped me a nod, and said ¡°Deal.¡±


    Then she slid down Sue¡¯s leg with a whoop and went running off into the parked cars, using them to cover her advance.

 Chapter 76 - Something Malevolent

    Chapter 76 - Something Malevolent


    I guess we had a plan, anyway. It wasn¡¯t one I was thrilled with, as it put Kara immediately in harm¡¯s way. She was the one putting herself at risk, though. Same as I was. I hoped she¡¯d be okay, but there wasn¡¯t a lot else I could do to ensure that.


    No, that wasn¡¯t entirely true. I reached out with my mind toward the undead I controlled. Hope was still dashing around the parking lot, legging the odd zombie and then zipping off to attack another one. I redirected her, asking the skeleton dog to keep an eye on Kara and help protect her if she was attacked. Hope dashed off, chasing after my friend.


    I couldn¡¯t even see Kara anymore. She¡¯d completely vanished. Had to be that new spell she had. If it allowed her to hide that well even in broad daylight, that was way cooler than I¡¯d given it credit before. I caught a quick glimpse of her as she dashed from one row of cars to another, but as soon as she was back in shadow, she vanished again. That was cool as hell. Maybe she would pull this off.


    If she was going to be able to loot the dead ones, I had to do two things to help. First, I needed to make a lot more zombies dead. Second, I had to get the bulk of their force away from the Target store. Right now the damned zombies were still streaming from the hole we¡¯d made in the glass, and as I watched more came out both entryways to Target, too.


    ¡°Sue, smack those guys again for me, would you?¡± I said.


    The dinosaur turned and blasted the enemy again, blowing a bunch of them into the air. It was kind of fun, watching the Fireballs go off. Sort of like ¡®bowling for zombies,¡¯ in a way.


    The rest of my undead were all off to one side, but they were attracting some attention. I didn¡¯t want that. It was better for me to be the sole focus of the horde, so I could lead them all on a merry chase. I ordered my undead to withdraw, pulling back into a little copse of trees next to the parking lot. From there they were to play defense if anything came after them, but otherwise hunker down.


    If Kara needed backup, they¡¯d be relatively close to her. I could send the whole batch in to distract attackers and give her a chance to escape, if things went sideways.


    We got off one more Fireball, and I cast Drain Life twice, knocking down two more foes, before they started getting close enough I felt I had to worry about it. I directed Sue to dash about twenty feet, then turn and set up again. The good news was, we had plenty of runway, as the mall had an enormous parking lot. The further we got from the stores, the fewer cars were parked there, too. Made it easier to hit the bad guys without stuff in the way.


    These zombies were sort of middle-speed. Like, they weren¡¯t the ¡®fast zombies¡¯ from ¡°28 Days Later.¡± But they weren¡¯t the slow zombies you saw in old movies, either. Something closer to the middle of the road, like a ¡°Walking Dead¡± style zombie. Sue, on the other hand, was able to hit something like twenty or thirty miles an hour, by my best guess. And unlike a living T.rex, Sue didn¡¯t get tired running at that pace. They could probably keep it up forever.


    Shit, escaping from a monster like Sue would be a nightmare, wouldn¡¯t it? I mean, the thing would just keep chasing you¡­forever. Until you killed it or it killed you, or it somehow lost the trail. And good luck getting away from something that fast with no working automobiles.


    A black ray shot from the mob, smacking Sue in the side. My dinosaur roared in pain from the Harm spell, and I scanned the mob of enemies, looking for the casters. Some of them were harder to spot than others, but it looked like zombie casters weren¡¯t a thing. Whatever was making the skeleton mages, presumably the boss of this army we hadn¡¯t seen yet, it had some of the powers of a necromancer.


    ¡°There!¡± I shouted, pointing. Sue followed my mental commend, pivoting toward the skeleton mage, and fired. Three seconds later, the offending skeleton was a pile of smoking bones, the zombies surrounding it aflame.


    I moved us further away again, casting Heal Undead as we went. Keeping Sue in fighting trim was vital. If the dinosaur went down, I¡¯d have no choice but to run for it and hope I could outrun this mess. The thoughts I¡¯d just had about the difficulty fleeing undead came roaring back. Nope, keeping Sue upright was key, much more important than spending mana to take a few zombies down with Drains.


    Scanning the legions coming at me, I watched for more skeletons, picking them off where I could and having Sue Fireball them otherwise. I also tried to get a rough count of what we were facing. It just wasn¡¯t possible. Even trying to guess, I just failed. There were over two hundred zombies outside the mall at that point, more still coming, but it had finally slowed some. They continued to pour out the hole we¡¯d made in the glass and the south entrance, but the east entrance slowed, then stopped.Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.


    I spotted Kara make a dash to that door, Hope close behind. A zombie exited the building in front of her, and she took it down with a slash of her sword. Then she was back in the shadows next to the building and I lost sight of her again. I figured she¡¯d gotten inside, though. From there, she¡¯d go try looting the ones we killed. All I had to do was keep the rest of them busy.


    Another short sprint to get some distance and we were trotting down the road that snaked through the middle of the parking lot. Not many cars stalled out, there, so the way was mostly open. That helped Sue sprint faster, and it gave the zombies no cover from Fireballs. I ordered Sue to spit another one, and another set of zombies went down.


    ¡°What we¡¯re doing here is working, but oh my god is this taking forever,¡± I muttered.


    Each Fireball killed a few zombies. Sue could cast Fireball about four times a minute or so, with all the running around we had to do, so we were taking out maybe as many as a dozen a minute. After ten minutes of ¡®kiting¡¯ the army, we¡¯d left a string of dead zombies stretching over a hundred meters, but there were still at least two hundred more out there facing us. On the plus side, the zombies had finally all but stopped leaving Target. A few still trickled out the south entrance, but only occasionally.


    Kara was in there, I knew that, and I hoped she was being careful. At least the flow of zombies through the store had pretty much stopped. She could loot the dead without worrying about being overrun.


    There was a massive crashing noise to my left, and the main entrance next to the Applebee¡¯s tore open, releasing another horde of undead. That was on the east side of the mall, and a little south from where Sue stood. In effect, they were setting up a pincer movement to trap me.


    ¡°Not cool,¡± I said, glancing around for some way to keep from being trapped between the two groups. The whole operation had just gotten much more dangerous.


    This was a planned attack, now. I felt sure of that. The initial surge? That was easy to explain as zombies hearing a noise and chasing whatever made the sound. When we busted in the glass going into Target, we¡¯d woke the whole army, so they chased.


    But this second group, pouring from precisely the exit where they would be most threatening to me? There was no way that was an accident. If they¡¯d popped out of the Victoria¡¯s Secret instead, they wouldn¡¯t have been a major problem. The two hordes would have merged.


    I glared at the mall entrance. I saw the zombies easily enough once they were outside in daylight, but of the space inside, I could see nothing. Whatever was inside was shrouded in shadow, effectively invisible. In spite of that, I still had a sense of being watched by something malevolent. Our boss foe was out there, somewhere. We¡¯d woke up the leader.


    That made all of this ten times as dangerous. Dumb undead were relatively easy to kill. Guided, controlled undead were another thing entirely.


    As I watched, both sets of zombies formed up, building themselves into ranks. They started using the cars for cover, especially the ones south of me¡ªand I realized with a start that a bunch of those were carrying shields, too! They were crappy shields, tossed together without much real thought. But they¡¯d soak up a lot of the damage from Sue¡¯s Fireballs.


    I Drained one shield-carrying zombie as it came into range, then another, but there was a limit to how many I could take on that way, and there were far more shields than I had mana.


    My options were running out. I sent Sue mental commands to turn and run back toward Dorset Street. The zombie mobs had formed up into two solid forces, each maneuvering to pin me between them. My only real option was to run east, away from both groups. Predictably, they followed.


    I pointed Sue at the southern force. They had the shields, and they were close enough to me that they were about to become a serious problem if I didn¡¯t deal with it. Sue hit them with a Fireball, but as I expected it hit the massive shields and broke apart. The spell might have injured a couple of them, but it wasn¡¯t slowing their advance.


    ¡°Okay, we need to collaborate on this now,¡± I said, patting Sue¡¯s bones.


    This time, I dropped a Drain on a shield-holding zombie, taking him down and putting a gaping hole in their shield wall. Then I had Sue spit a Fireball. The spell flew true, striking the gap perfectly and blasting apart their ranks.


    They reformed quickly, though, forcing me all the way out onto Dorset Street. Once I was out in the road, I turned Sue around to hit them again, but I was shocked at what I saw.


    Instead of chasing me, the zombies were all returning back the way they¡¯d come.


    The ones with shields were making a slow but steady withdrawal, using their shields as cover. The other, larger group didn¡¯t have shields, so they just turned and moved back toward the Target building as fast as their zombie legs could carry them.


    It was a full retreat. They weren¡¯t even stopping to collect their dead, so every zombie I¡¯d killed outside was going to win us more crystals. That part was awesome.


    The less awesome part was worrying about Kara. I couldn¡¯t see her, had no idea where she might be. But I¡¯d asked Hope to keep her guarded, and I could tell where Hope was. The dog was inside Target.


    Right in the path of over two hundred returning zombies, trotting back along the same path they¡¯d taken to chase me. In another minute, all of them would be inside the building again, and Kara was going to find herself completely surrounded!

 Chapter 77 - Loot Run

    Chapter 77 - Loot Run


    Kara slipped into the mall through one of the regular doors, flashing a grin at the skeleton dog following close behind her. Leave it to Selena to send a guardian angel to watch over her! It was a nice thought, although she hoped the dog would be okay. Kara was confident that she could get out of this place in one piece, even if things went badly. But Selena really cared about that dog, so she didn¡¯t want anything bad to happen to the pup either.


    It had taken a while, but the flood of zombies had finally slowed enough that she could get inside. For a bit, she¡¯d wondered if the flow of undead was ever going to let up, but eventually it had.


    She wasn¡¯t sure whether that was because all available zombies had already been deployed, or if there was a reserve somewhere deeper within the building. Based on the number of cars they¡¯d seen outside, odds were on the latter, so she intended to be extra cautious. Another rush like the last one at the wrong moment and she¡¯d be in a shit ton of trouble.


    The rotten thing was, she was actually a fan of zombie movies. She¡¯d seen most of them. These zombies weren¡¯t even as bad as some of the ones in films. After all, a single bite didn¡¯t turn you into one, like you saw in so many versions of the story. Alfred was living proof of that; he¡¯d taken a zombie bite day one and was still kicking.


    You only turned if they killed you. That was excellent news, and made the whole thing a lot easier to handle.


    That said, it still sucked. Zombie movies were cool. Real world zombies were decidedly not cool. They stank, for one thing. If anything, zombie flamb¨¦ smelled even worse than the original, and the store was full of that smoky smell, faintly reminiscent of overcooked bacon that had also somehow gone bad.


    She slipped from shadow to shadow as she danced her way through the store. Without power, there were plenty of shadows to hide in, and even at tier two, Shadow Walk made her close to invisible inside a shadow. Against humans, on their guard, Kara figured she would still have issues. But these zombies were not especially bright.


    A steady trickle continued moving from the doors to the deeper parts of the mall, down a few aisles, and then out through the south doors, but it was nothing like it had been. That allowed Kara to make her way over to the center of the store where the escalators were, and from there toward where Sue had blown up a bunch of the things. Hope was nowhere to be seen. The dog was still around; Kara felt sure of that. But wherever she was keeping watch, she was as good at being invisible as Kara.


    The ones too close to the mall¡¯s interior would have to wait, for now. While there were still zombies coming through, she couldn¡¯t get that close to their path. But there were still plenty of other zombie bodies to tap for crystals. She started with the ones nearest the escalator, then moved from there to the shattered glass Sue had used for entrance and exit from the place. There were a stack of dead zombies there, and it was far enough from the doors she had no trouble looting them.


    Her pocket jingling faintly with the rattle of two dozen new crystals, she made her way deeper into Target, heading for the piles of dead nearest the mall entrance. That¡¯s where most of the ones she¡¯d personally slain were, along with the ones Selena¡¯s archer zombies had taken out, too.


    Another batch of three undead came from the mall, stalking their way down the aisle. Kara ducked for cover, barely avoiding being spotted. The undead continued on their way¡­and no more followed. Was that really the end of the horde?


    She almost felt disappointed. They¡¯d figured there might be a thousand of the things in this place. A thousand undead was a heaping ton of crystals, more than enough to catapult both of them to some serious power levels. How many had come out this way? Counting a moving mass of bodies like that wasn¡¯t easy, but she was guessing somewhere north of two hundred, but less than four hundred.


    Now that the coast seemed to be clear, Kara moved closer to the mall doors, where the slain undead were thickest. Zombies riddled with arrows lay everywhere, alongside burned and blasted undead. One after another, Kara touched them as quickly as she could, collecting a new crystal from each. Most of them were tier one, but she was delighted to find a fair number of tier two crystals in the mix as well. Every little bit helped!Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.


    She reached down and pulled one of her arrows from a zombie body, examining the shaft. It was in pretty decent shape. Certainly still usable. Most of those arrows probably were, so she started collecting those at the same time, sliding each arrow back into her mostly empty quiver.


    Having extra arrows was never going to be a bad thing.


    Kara moved quickly from body to body, tapping each gross, rotting corpse in turn. Seriously, she was glad Selena had insisted on splitting the loot fifty-fifty now, because this was truly disgusting. She pulled yet another arrow from a body with a shlorping noise that made her wince. Totally gross.


    She¡¯d been doing a pretty good job developing her spell collection, but Kara knew she had a long way to go if she wanted to catch up with Selena and truly be an equal partner. This mission might be the one that did it, though. Most of her crystals were black and clear, same as Selena, and that was all these undead seemed to drop.


    Kara: Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 3) - NightVision


    Point 2: Clear Stone (Tier 4) - Agility


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 2) - Shadow Walk


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 2) - Stamina


    Point 5:


    She had a few spare stones, too, including one Darkness spell that she really wanted to socket. With the combination of Darkness and Shadow Walk, plus NightVision, she could create pockets of shadow, which in turn made her invisible, but she¡¯d still be able to see. The synergy was incredible!


    Selena¡¯s synergy was excellent, too. It was like the black crystals had two well-defined paths to tread. You could be a necromancer, animating and controlling undead, casting various attack spells at a distance¡ªor you could become like a shadow assassin, stealthy and hidden, striking from the darkness.


    The latter appealed to Kara way more than the former.


    There were a few final zombies to loot, just outside the doors, deeper into the mall. Kara slipped up to the big glass doors, trying her best to keep herself hidden, and peered ahead. There was no movement. Nothing so much as twitched out there in the shadowy space beyond.


    The mall was big. A handful of scattered skylights above let some sunlight in, but not much. It was a single story mall, so there was no upper deck above, but the ceilings in the main hall were still close to twenty feet tall. The net effect made the entire place feel like a massive, empty cavern.


    Beyond that, Kara had an instant sense of something powerful and wrong waiting out there. It knew she and Selena were there. Whatever it was, it was awake, aware of them, and actively fighting them.


    ¡°Well, shit,¡± Kara murmured, her voice barely audible.


    Those four zombie bodies lying out there in the open, ready to loot, suddenly felt more like a trap than an opportunity. Kara turned and left them alone, heading back the way she¡¯d come.


    When she reached the escalators, though, she remembered Selena saying something about toilet paper. They had some, but it would be good to grab a little more while she could. The chances to do so might become a lot more rare before too long. Kara dashed up the steps, reaching the top floor and scanning around for a moment before she found what she was looking for¡ªone bag of toilet paper rolls and one box of the other hygiene product she figured they¡¯d both be missing before long.


    Then she headed back to the escalator, but noise from below made her freeze before she descended. Exercising maximum caution, Kara slipped up to the edge of the steps and peered over.


    The zombies were back, and in force! They were pouring through the doors and the shattered window, scores of them. It was like a reverse of the initial flood, only this time they were all rushing to get back into the mall, instead of leaving it. For a terrible moment Kara worried that something bad had happened to Selena, that she¡¯d been overrun, hurt, or even killed.


    But then something poked her from behind.


    Kara almost screamed at the shock. She whirled in place¡ªto see Hope sitting there, doggy face tilted at a little angle like she was curious what Kara was up to.


    ¡°You are going to give me a heart attack!¡± Kara hissed softly.


    Hope flashed her a doggy grin.


    Seeing Hope was good news, though. If Selena was dead, the spell controlling Hope would have faded, and the dog would have reverted to being a monster again. Since Hope was still on her side, watching out for her, that meant Selena was okay, too.


    Escape was still going to be an issue, though. The flood of zombies filled half the store downstairs, now. Worse yet, their numbers were so high that they were pushing their right flank closer to the escalators. As Kara watched, the zombies furthest on the right were pushed over by the sheer mass of undead so far that one of them actually stepped up onto the escalator.


    Once he was moving up the steps, he kept moving.


    Once one zombie started going up the stairs, the one behind it followed, and the one after that, and the one after them¡­


    In moments, the dangerous situation had turned deadly. Instead of being trapped on the upper floor while zombies went past below, now she had a single-file stream of zombies heading up the steps directly toward her.


    Once they reached the top, she¡¯d have to fight them hide and hope they somehow missed her. And if she fought, it would only attract the attention of the other zombies, sending even more of them after her. Kara knew she could take down a good number of them, but not hundreds!

 Chapter 78 - Writing On The Mall

    Chapter 78 - Writing On The Mall


    Whatever was controlling the zombies had flipped the game on me. I¡¯d had their army out chasing me across the parking lot, and although the going was slow, it was also steady. Sue and I managed to take down dozens of the enemy troops, even after they tried to pin us between two forces.


    But now they were all withdrawing. Whatever mind was in charge, it had decided it was losing too many undead and not getting any return. Sue was simply too fast. Even with the second wave of zombies, even with the scattered Harm spells from skeleton mages, it just wasn¡¯t enough. I kept Sue healed with my magic, and if they zapped me, I Drained an enemy to heal myself.


    We were winning. Slowly, but we were, and the enemy had realized that. That had to be the reason behind the withdrawal. Whoever was running this show woke up from its daytime nap, realized it was at risk of losing half its army, and withdrew rather than continuing the fight.


    Ordinarily, I¡¯d have been thrilled, but Kara and Hope were still in terrific danger.


    The first thing I did was order the remainder of my undead in through the northernmost entrance. There weren¡¯t many zombies trying to get in that way¡ªjust a small handful. My little army formed up a rank of shield-users with archers behind, and marched swiftly forward, taking out the few enemy in the way. I gave them orders to join Hope and protect Kara.


    Then I pushed Sue into a sprint and the dinosaur dashed forward, spitting out a Fireball as we approached the enemy force. The fleeing zombies didn¡¯t even notice, didn¡¯t so much as turn back to look when the spell blew a few of their rearmost undead apart. They just kept flowing back into the Target, using every entrance, even the one Sue made by smashing through the glass wall at the corner.


    We didn¡¯t slow down as we rushed in, so Sue barreled into their ranks from behind. Zombies went flying as the dinosaur¡¯s legs crashed into them. Sue chomped a zombie, tossing it aside. Then we were at the gap we¡¯d made in the glass, still moving forward.


    The enemy force continued to ignore us, which was just weird. I mean, we were completely surrounded. If they turned on us now and just grabbed Sue, then started climbing, I¡¯d be in a bucket of shit. But they didn¡¯t. The enemy undead kept moving forward like automatons, which was accurate; that¡¯s all they were. They¡¯d been given a command¡ªretreat. They¡¯d keep doing that until they completed the order, or they were killed.


    For whatever reason, the enemy leader had a delayed response when it came to giving orders. My guess is whoever commanded this horde couldn¡¯t actually see what was going on. They had a sense of what was happening, especially when their undead died. When Sue¡¯s Fireballs started making a serious dent in their force, that was the signal which caused them to retreat.


    Provided I didn¡¯t blow up a bunch more undead, the big bad might not even be able to tell where I was. I ordered Sue to stop attacking, to focus on pushing through the mass of enemies rather than killing them. If we could avoid attracting extra attention even a little longer, that would be amazing.


    We were inside. I glanced around, checking the situation¡ªit wasn¡¯t good.


    Somehow, part of the horde managed to go off-course. Instead of moving back out into the main part of the mall, they¡¯d climbed up the escalator. There was one zombie at the top, and another dozen climbing the steps to join it. As I watched, the one up top sprouted an arrow from its head.


    Good, that had to be Kara. I wanted to shout to her, but held off. I didn¡¯t think the enemy could hear me. My best guess is whatever controlled the horde would be hidden someplace much more secure, and dark. Somewhere deep inside the mall. I couldn¡¯t know that for certain, though. Better to not take chances.


    I¡¯d been working to avoid killing them as we moved forward, but I couldn¡¯t allow those zombies to keep climbing the steps. I moved Sue to the base of the escalator, blocking more from moving up, then had the dino launch another Fireball. This one torched its way through the first zombie and crashed into the next, blowing them both apart.The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.


    I dropped another with a Drain Life.


    About that time, the rest of my undead showed up. I ordered them to climb the steps, letting them slip past Sue so they could attack the enemy from behind.


    With Sue keeping more zombies from ascending and my other undead moving to engage the eight zombies still climbing, I felt pretty confident Kara would be all right. That let me return my attention to the rest of the enemy army.


    It flowed past us, no longer trying to climb to the next level. Instead, the zombies just raced on, quickly moving through Target and out into the mall beyond. Already, there were no more remaining outside. The last fifty or so were still in the Target, swirling around Sue¡¯s legs as they pushed and shoved their way through the store.


    I wanted to blast them so badly. I wanted to have Sue tear into them from behind, to take down as many as possible. More crystals would always be a plus, but the main reason I wanted to go back on the offensive was to do more damage to this place.


    There was something dark in here, something powerful, sinister, and dangerous. I sensed it when I was outside. I could still feel it, somewhere in the distance. Whatever it was, it was strong. Maybe too strong for me, maybe not, but I could weaken it by reducing its army to dust.


    For now, though? I had to sit tight. Each zombie kill gave the enemy a better fix on my location. If I started having Sue wreak havoc on the remaining zombies, it might just get their leader to send a few hundred more of the things after us. Right now, we needed a break. Needed time to consider our next moves, and hopefully tally up our winnings. With all the crystals we¡¯d won from the fighting, both of us could grow much stronger.


    ¡°Selena, thank god!¡± Kara called out from above. She fired off an arrow, which killed the last zombie on the escalator.


    ¡°What, you thought I¡¯d leave you in here?¡±


    ¡°Didn¡¯t figure you¡¯d want to, but I wasn¡¯t sure you¡¯d be able to fight your way in.¡±


    ¡°Wasn¡¯t hard. They¡¯re not fighting,¡± I told her. ¡°They¡¯re withdrawing, and so are we.¡±


    ¡°For now, right?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°Yup. Just for now.¡±


    Kara and the rest of my undead came back down the steps. She tapped each dead zombie along the way, picking up their crystals. By the time she reached the bottom, the only zombies remaining in the store were unmoving ones. Re-deaded ones? What do you call dead undead?


    I glanced out into the dark mall beyond the doors. A few zombies were still over there, but not many. They were acting weird, though. I had Sue trot over so I could get a closer look.


    Peering through the glass doors, I realized the zombies were lying down right in the middle of the big mall hallway. That was odd enough, but the truly strange thing was they were clearly lying down in a manner that formed letters on the floor.


    As I watched, the last ones moved into position. The writing wasn¡¯t complicated. It spelled out ¡°Come in and die.¡±


    A threat? An invitation? Maybe a little of both. I wasn¡¯t sure. The whole thing felt mad ominous and sixteen levels of creepy, though. I backed Sue up through the mall and rode over to pick up Kara as she reached the bottom of the steps.


    We made sure to tap the few I¡¯d killed on the way in, and then I hauled Kara up onto Sue¡¯s back and we all retreated the rest of the way out of the store. I filled her in on what I¡¯d seen, and she did likewise. I was surprised to hear that she¡¯d sensed whatever this boss monster was, too.


    ¡°You said it felt like it was watching you?¡± I asked.


    Kara shrugged. ¡°Maybe. I don¡¯t think it was actually out there in the hallway. It was more like it knew I was there, not that it was actually staring at me.¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± I said. ¡°That¡¯s a lot like what I felt, too.¡±


    ¡°What was it?¡±


    ¡°I wish I knew,¡± I replied. ¡°Whatever it is, it¡¯s strong and deadly. We¡¯re going to have our work cut out for us, fighting our way to it, let alone beating it. We might need to figure out another way of beating that horde. Something their leader isn¡¯t going to expect, and won¡¯t have planned for. With the numbers they have, it¡¯s going to be a nearly impossible fight, if we just straight-up battle them.¡±


    The more I thought about it, the more correct that idea felt. A pitched battle favored the enemy deeply here. We needed another way, but for the life of me, I couldn¡¯t think of any brilliant plans.


    Once we were back outside, I set all my undead to ¡®guard mode,¡¯ watching for any enemies that might come after us. Then we dismounted Sue.


    I went right over to Hope and scritched her ear. She¡¯d done precisely as I asked, sticking by Kara even when it got dangerous, helping to ensure her safety. ¡°Good job, girl.¡±


    Hope wagged her tail in reply, which made me smile.


    Kara glanced at the battlefield around us. Dead zombies were stretched over a few hundred meters of parking lot. We¡¯d fought a running battle over a lot of turf, and it showed.


    ¡°Yeah, we¡¯re gonna have to do a bunch of walking to tap all those zombies for their crystals,¡± I said.


    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s all right,¡± Kara replied. ¡°I was just thinking. You know what to call a couple hundred dead zombies?¡±


    ¡°A good start?¡± I asked, laughing.


    ¡°You know it. Come on. The sooner we loot all these guys, the sooner we can tally up what we got.¡± Kara held up a small nylon bag and jangled it. The clink of a whole lot of crystals pinging against each other reached my ears.


    That was excellent news. We needed those stones. The more of them we could get, the stronger we¡¯d grow. Next time we hit this place, it would be with both a better plan and stronger spells at our command.

 Chapter 79 - A Lot Of Stones

    Chapter 79 - A Lot Of Stones


    It took longe than I¡¯d thought to collect all the crystals outside the mall. Dead zombies were strewn over a space the size of several football fields, so I suppose I shouldn¡¯t have been shocked. But it was already mid-afternoon before we were done. One we¡¯d gathered them all, we withdrew to the grassy area inside one of the on-ramps to the highway. Neither of us could relax while we were anywhere near the mall.


    Once we were a good distance away, though, it was easier to let our guard down a little. I posted my undead as guards around us, stationing them a bit away, while Kara and I grabbed some food under a stand of trees.


    As we ate, I laid down a spare shirt from my bag, then poured out the stones I¡¯d gathered from a small satchel, using the shirt to keep them all in one place.


    It was a healthy sized pile, only made larger still when Kara dumped her collection there as well.


    ¡°We really did kill a lot of the things, huh?¡± I said, staring at the loot.


    ¡°Yup. Kicked ass. Lot more ass to kick before we¡¯re done, but we sure got a lot of stones today,¡± Kara said. She glanced at the sky. It was still fully bright, sun not yet setting, but I knew what Kara was thinking. ¡°We going back in there today?¡±


    I shook my head, grimacing. ¡°I don¡¯t know. What do you think? Whatever that thing in there was, it¡¯s probably more active at night. If we¡¯re around when the sun sets, it could be really bad news.¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know if that matters, though,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Like, if the boss monster is hiding deep in the mall, somewhere super dark, then it¡¯s effectively always night there, right? And if it¡¯s undead, it might not be sleeping during the day. It could just be planning its next move or something.¡±


    I nodded, accepting the point. ¡°Some undead sleep during the day, though. Well, vampires are supposed to, right?¡±


    ¡°I hope we¡¯re not up against vampires too.¡±


    ¡°Well, whatever¡¯s in there, my feeling is that if we just rush in there we¡¯re going to be in trouble,¡± I said. ¡°I¡¯m sure there¡¯s spaces inside that Sue can¡¯t get to. That¡¯s where the boss will likely be, so we¡¯ll lose our biggest advantage. On top of that, I¡¯m pretty sure he still has a lot more zombies than we saw. Even if that was half of his force, there¡¯s likely still over four hundred undead inside.


    ¡°On their turf, in the dark, probably without Sue for the critical final battle, and with us already worn out from the fighting earlier? To me, that sounds like a good way to get killed. I was thinking about it, and it feels to me like maybe we can whittle them down some.¡±


    ¡°How so?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°Split our loot and go back to the fort to rest for the night. Come back down here at first light and bait them out again. If we have to, we go into the mall proper, using Sue to escape if we need to, and bait a good chunk of their forces.¡±


    ¡°Kill a bunch more, loot them, repeat daily until we¡¯ve worn them down,¡± Kara said, nodding her understanding. ¡°I get it. I like it. Won¡¯t they just grow stronger every night, though?¡±


    ¡°Yeah, that¡¯s true. We¡¯ll just have to wear them down faster than they can recover.¡± I wasn¡¯t super fond of that. Every zombie was coming from some hapless person killed by another zombie. That horde only grew by slaughtering more people, and there were few enough of us left. ¡°I¡¯m not thrilled about leaving the horde or its leader active and killing people. I just don¡¯t see another way that isn¡¯t a suicide mission.¡±


    We tabled the discussion, turning back to the crystals we¡¯d found. All told, there were one hundred and eighteen stones. Forty-six were clear, the other seventy-two were all black. It was the biggest collection of stones either of us had ever seen. Much bigger than the crystals the Guard base had in their shop. Even larger than the pile I¡¯d picked up from soloing the cemetery.


    Even more interesting, a few of them were tier two! We had three clear tier two stones and seven black tier twos. It was a nice addition. I had a feeling most of them were from the skeleton mages. I¡¯d nailed a lot of them with my Drains.


    I sorted the stones into piles, then identified each one, letting Kara know too, of course.


    Loot Pile


    Clear StonesUnauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.


    Strength x7


    Agility Tier Two x1


    Agility x7


    Stamina x10


    Will Tier Two x1


    Will x8


    Intellect x6


    Charisma Tier Two x1


    Charisma x5


    Black Stones


    Animate Dead x9


    Animate Dead Tier Two x2


    Augment Undead x6


    Augment Undead Tier Two x1


    Contagion x2


    Control Undead x10


    Death Blossom x1


    Curse x2


    Darkness x5


    Darkness Tier Two x1


    Drain Life x9


    Drain Life Tier Two x1


    Harm x3


    Health to Mana x1


    Heal Undead x5


    NightVision x6


    NightVision Tier Two x1


    Phantom Step x1


    Protection from Undead x1


    Ray of Death x1


    Shadow Walk x2


    Shadow Walk Tier Two x1


    Venom x1


    It was an enormous pile.


    Most fun of all, there were a few new black spells mixed in. Death Blossom was a fun one. It was an area of effect damage spell which made a bunch of black flowers grow, then spit out some sort of dark energy that damaged anything nearby. Phantom Step was practically made for Kara, and we handed her that one right away. It allowed a very short-range teleport. Each new tier would boost the range.


    Ray of Death was more my speed. It was sort of like Harm¡ªdirect damage, line of sight, fires a black ray at the target that did damage. The main difference seemed to be that Ray of Death did a lot more damage than Harm.


    Last was Venom, which allowed the caster to coat any weapon that cut or pierced foes with poison. With Kara¡¯s archery being her main weapon, this also seemed like an obvious one for her.


    In the end, Kara got all the Darkness and NightVision, the Phantom Step, Shadow Walk, and Venom. She asked for the Protection from Undead, too, so she got that one as well. We have her Death Blossom and the Harm crystals as well, just because an extra damage spell or two might save her at some point.


    I ended up with the bulk of the black stones, though. We evened that out by giving Kara more than half of the clear ones. Since she was going down a more physical path than I was, stuff like Strength and Stamina would matter more for her anyway. And the ones she didn¡¯t want to use, she could trade to the Guard.


    At the end, my tally for the day was Animate Dead x9, Animate Dead Tier Two x2, Augment Undead x6, Augment Undead Tier Two x1, Contagion x2, Control Undead x10, Curse x2, Drain Life x9, Drain Life Tier Two x1, Health to Mana x1, Heal Undead x5, Will x3, and Stamina x4.


    Kara was ecstatic. The new stones bumped her Agility and NightVision to tier four, which let her slot a new stone. It became instantly obvious which one she socketed, because she started dashing around the little green space, blinking from one place to another. She¡¯d set off at a jog, then vanish for a moment and appear five feet further along.


    ¡°Phantom Step?¡± I asked, grinning at how much fun she was having.


    Maybe I needed to rethink getting some of those Flying stones. Look, up in the sky! It¡¯s a bird! A plane! No, it¡¯s Super Necromancer!


    Okay, maybe not, but it would be fun!


    While she played with her new spell, I went over the process of merging mine together to socket them into place. But as I did so, I realized this was going to be a big one. Even before I merged all the stones together, I knew I was in for a jolt. The power building in my palms was incredible, and it resonated with the forces already at work inside me, building to an almost physical vibration.


    The first one to kick over was Animate Dead, blasting me with a shock I felt all the way down my spine as it went to tier six. With that same electric feeling, my Will kicked over to tier six, too. Then Stamina slammed in at tier five. It was nuts, the difference I felt. The raw power humming through me was incredible.


    Augment Undead went to tier four. Heal Undead hit tier four, too. Drain Life went all the way to tier five, opening a new socket on the outer ring!


    The power coursed through me, and my confidence soared.


    I wouldn¡¯t need to worry about falling for Colonel Turner¡¯s Charisma anytime soon, that¡¯s for sure. And the number of troops I could Animate had just doubled, from sixteen tiers to thirty-two! That was a massive leap forward. I was close to finishing tier six Control Undead, as well. Being able to control thirty-two points of undead would be insane. Even keeping my existing undead, I¡¯d still have twenty points left over. That was enough to grab a sizable chunk of the enemy army, turn their own weapons on them.


    When all was said and done, I had a dramatic improvement in my socketed stones:


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Augment Undead


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 6) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Heal Undead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Drain Life


    Point 3, Outer Ring:


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 6) - Will


    Point 4, Outer Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Agility


    Point 4, Third Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Stamina


    Point 4, Fourth Ring:


    Point 5:


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead x6, Augment Undead x5, Contagion x2, Control Undead (Tier 3), Control Undead x10, Curse (Tier 2), Curse x2, Drain Life x5, Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Health to Mana x2, Heal Undead x2


    Clear: Strength (Tier 3) Intellect (Tier 3), Charisma (Tier 4), Charisma (Tier 3)


    Brown: Alchemy (x2)


    Control Stone (x1)


    At the end of it all, I rested, exploring the strength of my new abilities. It felt incredible.


    ¡°Kara, I want to go back to the mall after all,¡± I said.


    She stopped her teleport practice. ¡°Yeah? If you¡¯re sure, I¡¯m with you.¡±


    ¡°Not to attack. I just ranked Animate Dead, and I want to use the bodies of those skeleton mages to raise a few of my own. I¡¯ve wanted some of those guys for a while, and seeing them in action today, I definitely want them now!¡±


    Kara laughed. ¡°Sure, we can do that. Let¡¯s head over right away, before the sun starts going down. We¡¯ll get you some more friends, and then head back to the fort to camp.¡±


    ¡°Sounds like a plan.¡±


    I got up and dusted myself off, already working on the next big decisions I had to face. Those rank-ups opened two additional slots, on top of the one open one I¡¯d already had. There were three empty crystal sockets in my little layout, now. My next job was to figure out how I wanted to fill them.

 Chapter 80 - The First Domain

    Chapter 80 - The First Domain


    Carver felt like he¡¯d studied the control stone long enough. It was time to take action. He picked the thing up, hefting it in his hand.


    Once he did this, he¡¯d be linked with the land in a way he still didn¡¯t wholly understand. He would become its ruler and owner in a magical sense. The sort of land ownership humanity practiced before the Event was a pale imitation of this sort of ownership.


    This base would become a part of him, he a part of it. He¡¯d know if it was attacked, and it would spawn defenders to aid him. He could expand his area of control by acquiring more control stones, too. Gideon wasn¡¯t sure he wanted to do that. One of these stones would tie him deeply to the land. What would two or more do? Still, it was worth considering, when he came across more.


    The hints he¡¯d learned from exploring the memories it deposited while he held the thing told him that mostly, these were granted to beings who were already powerful, already acting as leaders, and already gathering followers to them. These were indeed all things he¡¯d been doing. The broader question was, how many other people had them, too?


    One other tidbit he¡¯d gleaned from the device was that other people with their own control stones would get information the Domain he formed when he used the stone. If they were close by, they¡¯d be able to sense the location of his castle.


    The castle walls were coming along just fine. His undead put a ton of work into the project. It had been his primary focus. In fact, since acquiring the control stone it had been the true center of Gideon¡¯s attention. The longer he waited before using the stone, the more advantages he might lose. For example, if someone else used a stone too close to this castle, they would own the land instead of him. All the effort poured into building the castle up would be wasted, then.


    But use it too early, and others might come knocking, hoping to take the stone from him. He needed to move soon, but needed to have the castle defenses as complete as possible, too.


    A knock sounded on his office door. He put the control stone away. ¡°Enter.¡±


    That it was Brian coming in with news didn¡¯t surprise him. Brian was his seneschal, his executive. When Gideon was gone from the castle, Brian remained in charge. He also managed the other men who¡¯d come to join them. It was normal to see Brian coming in at various times of the time, bringing news he felt Gideon needed to hear.


    What wasn¡¯t typical was the alarmed look in Brian¡¯s eyes. ¡°Sir, just got a report in from one of our scouts.¡±


    As the so-called Pirate King began having bands move deeper inland, into the city, Carver had a handful of volunteers moving through the space between his keep and the lake, watching for trouble. It seemed that might have already paid off.


    ¡°The pirates?¡± He hated calling them that, but it¡¯s what they were using as their motif, right down to Jolly Roger flags on their masts.


    ¡°Yes, sir. They¡¯ve gathered in force. Right on the shore, in a few of the bigger buildings down by the docks. Cleared out the rat people, and look like they¡¯re settling in to stay.¡±


    That second part was the alarming bit. Gideon felt it likely the pirates had their own control stone. They operated from ships, though. It gave them a flexibility that his fixed location lacked, but it was possible there was a weakness as well.


    It was Brian who¡¯d pointed it out, while Gideon discussed some of his concerns with the man. What if the control stone had to be used on a fixed point? A mobile vessel, like their ship, wouldn¡¯t work, then. The base selected had to be a structure or location¡ªnot a vehicle.


    The idea made sense. Seeing the pirates taking terrain and settling in like they were getting ready to stay meant they were probably getting ready to use a stone of their own.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.


    Gideon had only a crude idea how large the zones of control were. It might be a mile, or two, or ten. If it was a mile, it¡¯d be touch and go from that location to his castle, depending on just where they used the thing. If it was more than a mile¡­


    Best to use his before they used theirs.


    Quickly, he pulled the control stone out of his pocket. He grasped it, turning it over again and again in his hands. He wanted more time. Time to finish the construction, time to grow his army stronger. Time to learn more about this thing¡¯s secrets, and what using it meant.


    He was out of time.


    ¡°I¡¯ve already put this off long enough,¡± Gideon said, standing.


    Brian backed up as Carver raised the control stone with both hands. He¡¯d never used one before, obviously, but just by holding the thing he had an intuitive sense of how to use it. Activating the stone was just like casting a spell. He poured mana and will down his arms, into his hands, and out through his fingertips. Black and clear energy swirled into the control stone.


    The stone sucked it up, every drop.


    Then, when all the mana required for the activation was absorbed by the now-glowing carved rock, it flashed with energy¡ªbefore fading away entirely. A moment after the flash, it was gone. The control stone had been absorbed into him, much like a spell crystal.


    Gideon staggered backward as a wealth of new data flooded his senses. It was a lot¡ªtoo much to process all at once. He staggered backward, backs of his legs bumping his chair. He half-fell, half-sat in the chair, wincing as the colliding images came to him from all over the castle.


    He could see everything inside the core castle itself. Amazing! On the one hand, he had a vague sense of the entire place without even paying attention. It wasn¡¯t like seeing everything in the castle all at once, more like having a general feeling of the place. If someone died here, he would know. If an attacker came calling, Gideon knew he¡¯d sense the approach.


    The other form of sight he¡¯d gained was far more precise. Anywhere in the castle proper, Gideon could look just by thinking about it. He had absolute surveillance over the place. That was strange, and a little uncomfortable. Gideon had earned the trust of the families he took in by being honest with them. The last thing he wanted was for them to think he was spying on them.


    Telling them would be the honest thing to do. Not telling them might be simpler, though. Even if he never looked at anything he shouldn¡¯t, there would be some people who thought he did. It was¡­ Not ideal.


    ¡°Are you all right, sir?¡± Brian asked.


    Carver shook his head to clear it, then realized that looked like a no¡ªBrian had come closer swiftly. Carver held up a palm to stall him. ¡°I¡¯m all right. Just a little overwhelmed.¡±


    Even reaching tier six in Animate Dead hadn¡¯t kicked that hard. The raw quantity of information about his lands that he now had access to was enough to make him dizzy.


    Something to the west called to him. Gideon was on his feet and rushing to the west-facing terrace before he even thought about why.


    There was a new force in the wind. Some strange power was pulsing, and if it was west of him, it had to be the pirates. The power surged, growing by the moment. It felt familiar. That had to be a control stone! It was seasoned with whatever crystals the pirate lord had installed, so it would feel similar but different.


    They must have felt his Domain¡¯s formation, and they were responding by making their own.


    The pirate Domain snapped into being a moment later. Its border was not too distant from his. Not idea, but perhaps some sort of accord with those people could be made. It would be better to have human neighbors as allies, especially ones with the strength to obtain a control stone.


    ¡°Was that them using their stone, sir?¡± Brian asked.


    Carver nodded. ¡°It was. I think it was centered at the main docks, right downtown. We¡¯ll want to¡ª¡°


    Another surge, this one from the east. It was in the direction of the UVM campus, but felt farther away than that. The Air National Guard base, perhaps? He¡¯d heard rumors of a group of survivors there.


    Whoever it was, they had a control stone, too, and must have also felt his Domain go active. They¡¯d also decided it was time to use theirs. The third Domain in the area snapped to life. It was a good distance off. Further than the pirate docks, which was a relief. One near neighbor was going to be potential trouble enough. A second would have been very unwelcome.


    Still, he felt sure they¡¯d come into contact sooner or later. As allies or enemies, he had no way of knowing.


    ¡°Was that a third one, sir?¡± Brian asked. Clearly, only those holding control stones could sense what was happening.


    Carver nodded. ¡°It was.¡±


    ¡°Will there be more, you think?¡±


    Gideon shrugged in response, but he remained on the terrace, waiting. He gave it a good ten minutes before stopping his vigil. ¡°I think no more, at least not tonight. Anyone else planning to join this game of Domains right away would have done so by now.¡±


    ¡°Three of these things now. Probably more coming eventually, too. We¡¯ll need to make plans to deal with them, sir.¡±


    ¡°Agreed. First off, though, we need to focus on these so-called ¡®pirates¡¯ next door to us. They will either become allies, or we will have a second control stone by the end of the month.¡±

 Chapter 81 - Three Domains

    Chapter 81 - Three Domains


    We swung back through the mall¡¯s parking lot again before taking off for the evening. Didn¡¯t spend a lot of time there. Just enough to give me some more fodder for Animate Dead. It had been a while since I first found out the spell could create tier two skeleton mages, and I hadn¡¯t taken the time to try doing that.


    After seeing them in action against Sue and I, I was a convert. They took damage about the same as any other tier two skeleton, and traded off magical skill with weapons for magical attacks, like a tier two Harm spell. Given the rate of fire they put out, plus how quick my goblin archers had run out of arrows, I was veering hard toward skeleton mages for my ranged support in the future.


    We recovered most of the arrows when we looted the dead, but not all of them. Getting more meant trading with the Guard base again, and there was only one thing they really wanted: more crystals. Each one I traded away was one I wouldn¡¯t have to grow, myself, and there were a lot of things I wanted to trade for. Being as self-sufficient as possible was just good sense.


    It turned out I¡¯d killed ten of the tier two skeleton mages, which was more than I had the points to Animate, anyway. Each body could be Animated back into a tier two skeleton, with the spell giving me options for skeleton warriors or skeleton mages.


    By the time I was done, I¡¯d Animated eight skeleton mages, enough to fill the entire Animate Dead spell. That added a ton of firepower to my band, although I wanted to get some more tank-type undead. The goblin archers weren¡¯t really needed, so I dropped them. That was as simple as withdrawing my mana from their bodies; they collapsed where they were into a heap.


    That gave me eight points back, and I looked at the zombie bodies all over the lot¡ªthat was more raw materials than any necromancer could ask for. Animate Dead gave me three options now. I could create a tier one regular zombie, a tier two zombie bruiser, or a tier three zombie elite.


    I only had eight points to spend, so as interesting as the tier three was, I wasn¡¯t sure it was a good idea. I could only do two elites and one bruiser. On the other hand, was that actually worse than four bruisers? One extra zombie might matter less at this point than the oomph from a higher tier.


    If there was one thing I¡¯d learned from fighting alongside Sue, it was that tier mattered. Sue was much stronger than a stack of tier twos.


    In the end, I went for the elites. I Animated two zombie elites and one zombie bruiser. Then I handed off the equipment from the goblin archers to the new guys. The goblins had shields and short spears, in addition to their bows. The spare gear, I bundled up and tied to Sue¡¯s back for the return trip.


    It was moving into early evening as we entered the woods, climbing the hill toward home. It wasn¡¯t going to take us much longer to get there, which was good. Neither of us wanted to be out after dark, with the way the undead grew more active at night.


    ¡°Hey, Selena, what¡¯re you thinking about doing with the ratkin?¡± Kara asked. ¡°And the fort, too. You gonna use the control stone?¡±


    ¡°I¡ª¡° My mouth opened, I got one word out, and then I froze. There was a burst of magical energy from the northwest. Someone nearby had used a control stone. Now there was a Domain nearby. ¡°Well, shit.¡±


    ¡°What? Are you okay? What¡¯s wrong?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m fine. Just¡­I guess because I own a control stone, I can feel when stuff happens nearby that involves them?¡± At least, that was my guess. It seemed to pass the logic test, anyway.


    ¡°Did someone just use one?¡±


    I nodded and pointed toward where I¡¯d felt it. ¡°Out that way. Not too far, though. I¡¯m pretty sure it was somewhere in the city.¡±


    ¡°Can you still use it? With another one so close?¡±


    I pulled the control stone from my pouch, holding it in my hand as I reached out to it with my feelings. The stone felt hungry, like it wanted my mana. It would be so easy¡ªI intuitively understood what needed to be done. I¡¯d just hold the stone and pour mana into it, just like that, and¡­


    But not right now. I shook my head to clear it, and put the stone back away. ¡°I can, yeah.¡±


    ¡°Well, that¡¯s a relief. I guess the radius on those things isn¡¯t too big, then. A mile, maybe less?¡±


    I pulled out my map, peering at it, measuring distances with my eyes. ¡°Depending on exactly where it was set up, the Domains could be a little over a mile in radius. Pretty sure it¡¯s less than two miles, but I can¡¯t be sure. I only got a direction and a general sense of distance.¡±


    Before I could say anything else, a second wave of magical force hit me. Another one! A second Domain went live. This one was almost due west, and was even further away. Definitely over a mile. It had to be right near Lake Champlain.Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.


    ¡°Another one?¡± Kara asked, seeing my eyes.


    I nodded. ¡°Wow. That was wild. I wonder¡ª¡°


    Another one hit.


    This Domain was east of me, and based on the distance and direction I knew precisely who that had to be. There was no question in my mind: Colonel Turner had acquired a control stone. He¡¯d already tightly controlled the base. Now it would be locked to him more tightly than ever. I needed to watch that man carefully. My gut said he was going to be trouble.


    ¡°And that was Turner,¡± I told Kara. ¡°I¡¯m guessing the first one used it which spooked the other two into jumping in as well. Thing is, I can now feel roughly where each of those Domains are. As I get closer, I¡¯ll definitely be able to find them. Anyone else holding one of these can, too.¡±


    I pulled the stone back out, hefting it in my hand. ¡°I couldn¡¯t sense the other control stones until they were used, so I think they won¡¯t sense this one until I use it. But once I do, it¡¯s like putting out our home address for everyone to see.¡±


    ¡°And if they kill you, they get your stone, same as you did from the goblin?¡±


    I nodded. That was the core of why I hadn¡¯t used the thing yet. I wasn¡¯t shocked that Turner felt confident enough to go for it. He had his unit backing him up. Lots of people there, very well organized. That there were two other groups out there with similar confidence was jarring, though. My feeling was that folks would tend to wait longer, build themselves stronger first, before opening up a whole new pile of risk.


    But maybe that wasn¡¯t how leaders thought? I didn¡¯t know. Leading people had never been a goal, for me, which was part of why I wondered if I was really the best person to have this control stone. I was willing to bet Turner would pay me a pretty penny for it. Probably even order his people to go hunt specific trait crystals, if I asked. It was worth a lot, I knew that much.


    I just didn¡¯t trust Turner, though. For all I knew, the man was perfectly honorable. He certainly hadn¡¯t done anything bad to me, or anyone else that I knew about. He was bringing in refugees, leading probably a thousand people at this point. In spite of all of that, his Charisma power gave me the creeps, and something about the man felt off.


    Giving him the stone wasn¡¯t in the cards. But neither was using it, at least not today. Waiting a little longer wasn¡¯t going to hurt me. Watching the others to see how Domain owners were going to act toward one another would only help.


    Keeping my focus on growing stronger would benefit me most of all.


    I put the control stone back in my bag with my other crystals. ¡°For another day. We have enough to worry about with this mall problem. If I use the stone now, we¡¯re probably picking up three additional enemies. Let¡¯s deal with the one we have first.¡±


    ¡°Makes sense to me!¡±


    We pushed on as the sun gradually moved toward setting, and soon reached the forest fort. The ratkin had been busy while we were away. All of the broken timbers had been repaired. You couldn¡¯t just walk through the hole in the wall anymore. Now you had to use the gate. The ratkin had two guards on the gate, and they opened it as we approached.


    Patches met us as we rode in. He eyed my undead a bit nervously. ¡°You have some new ones?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. One of my spells got stronger. They work for us, don¡¯t worry,¡± I told him. ¡°Everything quiet while we were gone?¡±


    ¡°Yes. We repaired the wall and cleaned out the huts. I also took the liberty of asking some of my people to expand the little shelf you and your friend slept on last night. Since you seemed comfortable there, we made it larger and more secure,¡± Patches added.


    I glanced that way, and he wasn¡¯t kidding! What had been a tiny lookout platform was now about three times the size, with cute little sidewalls. ¡°Thanks. That looks great.¡±


    Then he asked the question I knew he¡¯d wanted to since we arrived. ¡°Did you defeat the dead?¡±


    ¡°We made a start,¡± I told him. ¡°We killed over a hundred of them.¡±


    That was followed by my having to explain what a hundred of something was. Once he grasped the scale, he seemed impressed.


    ¡°That is not enough?¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°We saw several times that number. They withdrew into the mall, though, and we needed time to plan and prepare before going back in after them. Kara and I will return there tomorrow to hit them again. We¡¯ll keep doing it until they run out of undead to fight.¡±


    ¡°The battle may take many more days, then.¡±


    I nodded. ¡°Yeah, most likely.¡±


    Dinner was something we all did together, that night. The ratkin had cooking fires set up, and they shared from what foodstuff they¡¯d brought or gathered over the day. I pulled some food from the stores I¡¯d bought at the Guard base and shared those out as well.


    It wasn¡¯t fancy, but it was a step toward building trust and cooperation. That felt like a strong win, to me.


    By the time dinner was done, it was full dark and I was getting sleepy. I ordered a quartet of skeleton mages into the newly expanded lookout post. I set them along the wall, facing out. They¡¯d watch for anything coming our way. The other undead, I spread out to various watch platforms on the walls, except for Hope and Sue. Both of them slept at the base of the ladder up to Kara and my suite.


    Well, they didn¡¯t sleep. But they lay down there, on guard.


    Kara was asleep faster than me. Her light snores carried on the night air and made me chuckle. I hoped I didn¡¯t sound like that!


    I was way more worried about the control stones than I¡¯d let on earlier. I¡¯d come so close to using it earlier. Back when the Domains were going active, I¡¯d felt an almost overpowering urge to use my stone, too. Was that why there¡¯d been three so close together? The second and third found their Will wasn¡¯t up to passing the test, so they lost control?


    Will was one of my strongest crystals. It wouldn¡¯t shock me if it had just saved me from making a shitty, potentially fatal mistake.


    Eventually I drifted off to sleep, but I tossed and turned a lot, my dreams filled with flight from a zombie horde, like in a bad movie. Before I¡¯d slept more than a couple of hours, though, a flash of alarm shot through me like a jolt of adrenaline. Something was wrong.


    I blinked away sleep, trying to find the source of the threat. It was my skeleton mages, the ones up here with me. They¡¯d seen something dangerous. I rushed to the wall to peer out into the forest beyond.


    It didn¡¯t take more than a couple of seconds to spot what my guards already had. The forest crawled with movement. It was like a wave of ants from some nature video, except these weren¡¯t ants.


    They were zombies.

 Chapter 82 - We鈥檙e Under Attack!

    Chapter 82 - We¡¯re Under Attack!


    It wasn¡¯t just a few of the things, either. This was a sea of zombies. An ocean of undead. I hadn¡¯t seen this many of the things in one place since watching ¡°World War Z.¡±


    We clearly hadn¡¯t been wrong when we guessed there might be as many as a thousand zombies lurking in the mall, because there were so many hundreds of them working their way through the forest that it wouldn¡¯t have shocked me if a thousand of them were marching our way.


    ¡°Kara, wake up,¡± I said, pitching my voice so it wasn¡¯t quite a yell.


    ¡°Wha?¡± She sounded groggy. I needed her alert.


    ¡°We¡¯re under attack, Kara!¡±


    That woke her up fast. Nobody had survived this long past the Event without developing a highly refined sense for danger and good reactions to same. Kara bolted upright, looking around. She saw me at the wall and came to join me, poking her head up above the timbers.


    We hadn¡¯t been the only ones to notice. The ratkin occupied a few of the other rampart guard posts, and they¡¯d also spotted the attack. So far, they were still just chittering nervously to one another, although I spotted one ratkin rush down his ladder to wake the others still sleeping below. The undead were still too far out for arrows, and probably too far for most spells as well.


    ¡°Holy shit, Selena. How do we fight that?¡±


    ¡°I have no idea,¡± I replied.


    I wished I did. Those sorts of numbers, though? This wasn¡¯t going to be a fight. It would be a slaughter.


    I had twenty assorted undead humans, plus Sue and Hope. There were also Kara and myself, both of us more than capable of taking down a few zombies. A few! This was so far past that I froze, unable to think my way through the problem. The ratkin had some warriors, too. A couple dozen of them were capable of fighting. It wasn¡¯t even close to enough.


    Those zombies would hit the walls and look for a way through. Worst case, they¡¯d find a way to batter down the walls. If they had shovels, they could undermine the walls from the outside, digging away at the dirt that held up the palisade. Hell, there were enough of them that they could do it with their bare hands. They¡¯d still get through in short order.


    Best case, they couldn¡¯t take down the wall. But there were enough of them they could literally do the ant thing¡ªclimbing one atop the next until they¡¯d created a set of undead stairs, climbing right up to where we were. Once they reached the top of the wall, it would all be over. They¡¯d swarm the defenders at the wall, kill us, then surge down the ladders into the space inside, slaughtering everyone else living within.


    We¡¯d cost them a lot of soldiers. I figured even trapped like this, we could account for hundreds of undead. Sue alone would make them pay a steep price for the victory. But undead could be replaced. There were still probably tens of thousands of living humans in the surrounding area. Left alone, without our interference, the mall horde would grow uncontrolled. It might reach a large enough size that nobody could stop it, if it was allowed to remain unchecked.


    Clearly Kara and I had scared the monster in charge of the horde way more than I¡¯d thought. I figured we¡¯d pissed it off, but this was way past that. This swarm had to be the majority of its troops. This was a Hail Mary strike; if we somehow beat the horde, the big bad couldn¡¯t have much left to defend itself with.


    Which would be great if I could think of any way to beat it, but I was drawing a solid blank on that one.


    ¡°Selena, seriously¡ªhow do we fight that?¡± Kara asked. She sounded scared now.


    I was, too. They were getting closer, and we were running out of time to come up with a plan. Another ten minutes and they¡¯d be at the walls.


    ¡°I don¡¯t think we can,¡± I replied, my brain snapping back into action. I shook my head to clear it. We needed crisp, non-panicky thinking here. ¡°Come on!¡±Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.


    I went down the ladder quick as I could, racing to the bottom. The ratkin were mostly awake at this point. I saw them gathering in the wan light from the fire pit embers. One ratkin was giving orders. That had to be Patches. I headed his way.


    ¡°Lady Death,¡± Patches said. ¡°We are under attack?¡±


    I wished he wouldn¡¯t call me that, but this wasn¡¯t the time. ¡°Yeah. Patches¡ªwe can¡¯t win. Not against this.¡±


    ¡°But you have power over the dead!¡±


    ¡°Limited power. There are too many of them out there.¡±


    ¡°A hundred?¡± Patches asked, remembering our conversation earlier, where I¡¯d explained what that meant.


    ¡°No. Many hundreds. They will reach the walls and either tear them down or climb over. Either way, if we stay we will all die.¡±


    ¡°So we run.¡± He didn¡¯t sound happy about it, but I¡¯d gotten the message across.


    ¡°Yes. I¡¯m sorry. I don¡¯t see another way. I never expected them to pursue us like this.¡±


    I should have, maybe. I knew we¡¯d tweaked the nose of whatever run things there. We pissed it off enough that it spelled out a message for us in undead bodies. It knew we were a threat. I just figured it would wait where it was strongest, not come knocking at our home base.


    Clearly, I¡¯d grossly underestimated how much we¡¯d pissed the boss undead off.


    ¡°Kara and I will mount up on Sue and buy your people time to get away,¡± I told him. ¡°But you need to get out of the fort now. Once they reach the walls, none of us are going to escape.¡±


    Patches nodded and rushed off to talk to more ratkin. They were all up and moving now, and his shouts gathered all his people near the gate. I felt a tap on my shoulder and whirled, ready to fight¡ªbut it was just Kara.


    ¡°What about us?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°We¡¯re mostly packed anyway,¡± I replied. ¡°Help me hook the supply bags back onto Sue. We¡¯ll bring what we can. With luck, we can lead them away. Maybe if they chase us they¡¯ll leave the fort alone.¡±


    I doubted that, but hey, it was possible.


    Kara and I swiftly went to Sue¡¯s side and started hooking up the big satchels the Guard gave me along with the supplies I¡¯d traded for. We had plenty of rope, so tying them to Sue¡¯s back wasn¡¯t difficult¡ªit just took more time than I liked. We were running out of precious minutes. I glanced at my watch. By the time we were ready, it had been six minutes since I slid down the ladder. The undead had to be almost on top of us.


    ¡°We need to get out there. Buy the ratkin time,¡± I said. ¡°You with me?¡±


    ¡°You bet!¡± Kara replied. She looked scared, but also determined.


    I ordered Sue to bend down close to the ground and we both clambered up onto her back. All my other undead were gathered around Sue, lined up in two ranks, with Hope standing ready in front of them. We were as prepared as we were going to get.


    ¡°Open the gate!¡± I shouted as I ordered Sue to rise and start in that direction.


    Two ratkin lifted away the bar holding the gate shut and flung the doors open. They swung out, revealing nothing but the night-time forest, thank god. The zombie horde hadn¡¯t reached us quite yet.


    There wasn¡¯t time for a slow advance, so I ordered Sue to surge forward. The dinosaur rushed toward the gate, powerful legs carrying us all outside in just a few strides. Hope ran alongside, keeping up, while the rest of my undead marched to follow us.


    ¡°Lady! Where do we go?¡± Patches asked as I rode past.


    I halted Sue, my thoughts racing. Where could they go where they¡¯d be safe? Or at least have a shot at safety? I remembered pouring over my map, looking at potential sites, good places that were defendable. But nothing was defendable against a foe like this.


    Hidden and out of the way would have to do. I pointed north. ¡°That way. There¡¯s a river. Where the big road meets the river, there¡¯s a bridge, and near the bridge is a large island. You should be safe there for a while.¡±


    ¡°Thank you, for all help you give us. You join us there?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± I answered as honestly as I could. ¡°I will if I can. If not, Patches, then lead your people bravely and well. Good luck!¡±


    Then I had Sue bolt forward again, turning toward the enemy rather than away from them. They were close enough to be easy to spot now, even in the dark woods. I swallowed hard, fighting back my fear. That was a lot of zombies.


    Our main advantage was Sue. The dinosaur moved faster than the enemy undead, even burdened by our supplies, Kara, and myself. If we played it smart, they¡¯d never get within hand to hand combat range of us.


    My undead were another matter. I was going to lose them in this fight, I was already pretty sure of that. The zombies and skeletons were just too slow to escape. Thankfully they were replaceable, but losing my army was still going to sting, and leave me a lot weaker.


    Their sacrifice might save the ratkin, though. I ordered them to form up their ranks, melee ahead with casters behind, and advance along the outside of the wall toward the horde. At least with the wall on their right, they couldn¡¯t get flanked on both sides. They weren¡¯t going to be much more than a speed bump, anyway. Not against so many hundreds of zombies it was impossible to even estimate their numbers.


    I had Sue spit a Fireball at the oncoming force. It burst perfectly, blowing apart a couple of the nearest zombies and setting half a tree on fire. I¡¯d need to watch that. If I set the entire forest ablaze, we might all die in the conflagration.


    Reaching out a hand, I cast Drain Life on one of the nearest foes. It dropped instantly. Before I could crouch back down again, two beams of dark energy streamed forth from somewhere inside the horde.


    Both of them slammed into my chest. Two Harm spells, probably cast by skeleton mages. The first I handled well enough, although it hurt like hell. The second was a shock though. I hadn¡¯t seen it coming, wasn¡¯t braced for the attack¡ªand it sent me tumbling from Sue¡¯s back, falling toward the dark ground below.

 Chapter 83 - It鈥檚 Coming

    Chapter 83 - It¡¯s Coming


    I hit the ground hard, the breath knocked out of my lungs. Something snapped in my chest, sharp pain stabbing along my right side. I gasped, barely able to suck in air. Stars flashed in front of my vision, and I blinked, trying to get them to go away.


    It hurt! I couldn¡¯t recall ever hurting so badly. The pain was intense and kept coming at me, so strong that I couldn¡¯t move beyond curling up around myself. There was no breath left for a scream or shout. It was all I could do to take in even the smallest bit of air.


    Sue¡¯s foot came down a meter from my head. The dinosaur roared¡ªthe volume was epic, penetrating even my dazed state. I managed a smile at that. Sue¡¯s roar had a way of making anyone facing us think twice, and I envisioned the undead horde stopping in their tracks. The dino spat a Fireball, too. The spell sailed over the heads of my other undead, vanishing somewhere past them.


    I tried to get up but still couldn¡¯t move that much. My right arm was hurt, too. Broken? Sprained? I couldn¡¯t tell, just knew I was in rough shape. Falling twenty feet onto my back and side wasn¡¯t a great time. I hadn¡¯t had a chance to tie myself onto Sue¡¯s back, and oh man was I regretting that now!


    All of a sudden, Kara was there in the dirt, next to me. ¡°Selena! You¡¯ve got to get up!¡±


    At first, I wondered if she¡¯d fallen off, too. But she seemed okay to me. Unhurt, anyway¡ªshe was pretty upset. I couldn¡¯t think straight. She wanted me to do something, but what? Get up? Why?


    Zombies curled around the left flank of my undead force, attacking them from the side. Sue bit one in half while my skeleton mages zapped a few more, but they didn¡¯t stop. They kept coming. One of them slipped under Sue¡¯s feet, shambling toward us.


    It was right behind Kara, about to fall on her with claws and teeth. I opened my mouth to gasp out a warning, but I still had no air in my lungs. How was I still not breathing? There was no way to warn her in time.


    Instead, I reached out with my left hand, and almost by reflex I released the power behind my Drain Life spell. Black fire splashed from my fingers. Kara¡¯s eyes went wide as she saw the spell. She started to turn toward the threat she knew had to be behind her, but before she could, my spell blasted free of my hand, burning through the night toward the offending zombie. It was wreathed in my magic.


    The zombie dropped where it stood, and its vitality flowed back into me. The bones in my ribs and right arm knitted themselves back together, bruises healing in rapid fashion as well.


    Let me just say that resetting broken bones without any pain medication hurts like hell! This time, I managed to find the breath to scream.


    ¡°You all right?¡± Kara asked.


    I nodded. ¡°Will be.¡±


    She levered me up to a sitting position. Everything still hurt, but the worst of my wound were healed by my spell. Kara put a shoulder under my arm and guided me back to a standing position. She was just in time¡ªanother zombie had slipped past Sue¡¯s teeth and was rushing us. I took it down with another Drain.


    The healing from that spell pretty much topped off my health. While I still felt the lingering aches from the fall, the injuries themselves were gone. I snapped Kara another nod, this one sharper and more together. ¡°I¡¯m good now. Thanks.¡±


    ¡°Well, you save me, I save you¡­ It all evens out in the end, I figure.¡±


    We needed to get out of there, or we were both going to be beyond saving. My little line of undead were slowing the zombie advance, for the most part, but only slowing it. Already they were pushing hard against the left flank. One of my tier three zombies went down, then another. Another minute or two and they¡¯d shatter the shield wall entirely, and be all over us.


    Two beams from Harm spells slammed into Sue, wounding the dinosaur badly. I grimaced. I was almost certainly going to lose the majority of my undead to this debacle, but losing Sue wasn¡¯t an option. We needed the T.rex if we were going to have any serious chance against the horde and whatever was leading it. I cast Heal Undead on Sue, repairing some of the damage.The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Come on!¡± I told Kara. ¡°We¡¯ve got to motor. Are the ratkin clear?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know!¡± Kara replied. She was already climbing Sue, scaling a rope dangling down the dinosaur¡¯s side.


    I glanced around, not seeing the ratkin, and had to hope they¡¯d gotten away. We could still buy them some more time, but there was only so much we could do against a mass of undead like this. I grabbed the rope behind Kara, using it to help scale Sue¡¯s bones. I was only halfway up when my shield wall broke entirely.


    My undead went down so fast I barely saw it. One moment they were holding hundreds of zombies at bay. The next, the shield wall broke and my undead were just dying, one after another. In under a minute they were all gone, the enemy horde rushing Sue, planning to tear my dino¡¯s bones apart to get to the tasty treats riding up top.


    Wasn¡¯t going to happen.


    I wrapped the rope around my waist and arm, hoping that would keep me in place, then ordered Sue to run for it. Sue took off at high speed, running east through the woods at something like twenty miles an hour. It wasn¡¯t the fastest pace they could manage in the open, but within the confines of the forest it was top speed.


    That left me dangling halfway down a rope off Sue¡¯s flank, bouncing hard against T.rex hip and rib bones with every massive footfall. If my ribs hadn¡¯t just been healed, there was no way I could have hung on. As it was, it almost felt like I cracked something all over again. Not my idea of a good time.


    Another black beam shot out of the night, slamming against Sue¡¯s side. I hit the offending skeleton mage with a Drain, taking it down. Those were the big threats to Sue, so those were my priority targets.


    Somewhere out there, a howl shattered the night, stunning the zombies nearest to us for a valuable few seconds. It was Hope! She¡¯d survived, somehow, and was running with us. I glanced down, spotted my dog, and passed her mental orders to stay clear from the main horde. I¡¯d already lost almost all my undead. I didn¡¯t want to lose her, too.


    Then Kara was pulling the rope, dragging me higher. I helped, pulling myself up the rope as she dragged me onto Sue¡¯s back.


    When I was finally up top, panting for breath, she flashed me a grin. ¡°Finally! Now what?¡±


    I kept my head low to avoid being targeted by more Harm spells and took in my surroundings before answering. Except for Sue and Hope, my undead were all gone, destroyed by the horde. The zombies had fully surrounded the fort walls and were pouring into the interior space. Anyone who hadn¡¯t gotten out while we held them off was either dead or soon would be, but I knew at least most of the ratkin had escaped. They¡¯d run north, directly away from the horde.


    A trickle of zombies moved in that direction, probably following whatever trail the ratkin left behind. Most of them were either trying to get through the gate into the fort or chasing Sue, though. That was the idea, after all.


    ¡°Now we lead these assholes on a merry little chase,¡± I replied. I ordered Sue to dart another twenty meters away, then turn.


    We had some fighting distance now. The zombies were still coming at us, but they couldn¡¯t encircle us anymore. There was no easy way for them to cut off our escape. We were finally back in the same scenario as the mall parking lot, where I could run, then blast a couple of times, then run again.


    ¡°What did you call it, fighting then running?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Kiting!¡±


    ¡°Yeah, that. We¡¯re gonna do that.¡±


    Sue spat another Fireball. It exploded in the front ranks of zombies, blasting them to pieces. More filled in right behind them, of course. It seemed like the flood of undead was unending, but I wasn¡¯t trying to kill them all. I was only keeping them distracted for long enough that the ratkin escaped.


    We got off two more Fireballs before the zombies started getting dangerously close to us. At that point, I had Sue run another couple dozen meters, then turn back around again. Would the zombies be smart enough to realize they couldn¡¯t catch us, and stop chasing?


    No. No, they were not.


    They kept coming, and we hammered them with spells and arrows. Kara was firing shot after shot, taking down a zombie with each arrow as often as not. My Drain spells killed a zombie in a single hit, and even took down the tier two skeleton mages in one shot. Sue¡¯s Fireballs, of course, were even more epic.


    We strung them along for another fifty meters, cutting down tons of the damned things. But then I felt something that chilled me to the soul. You know those stories that talk about blood freezing in your veins? Yeah¡ªthis felt like that. The sensation of cold was everywhere, the chill sinking so deep I wondered if I¡¯d ever feel warm again.


    I knew that sensation. I¡¯d felt something close to it before, back at the mall. That feeling of malevolent intelligence coupled with enormous power was the same I¡¯d sensed emanating from somewhere deeper inside the shadowed interior of the complex.


    Now it was here.


    I glanced at Kara. Her pale face told me she felt it, too. Whatever the leader of this army was, it was climbing the hill behind its army, making good time toward us. I already knew what was going to happen when it got here¡ªI felt its raw power as it grew nearer. This wasn¡¯t a foe we could beat. Not now, anyway, not at night, with all its forces in play, and our fighting force as weak as it had ever been.


    ¡°Selena¡­ It¡¯s coming,¡± Kara whispered next to me. I felt her shiver.


    ¡°Yeah. It¡¯s time for us to go.¡±


    I ordered Sue to launch one last Fireball, and I dropped another skeleton mage with a Drain spell, but those efforts were like spitting into a waterspout for all the good it did. The horde continued, unfazed, and their leader was growing nearer by the second. If we stayed, we died.


    Without a word, I sent the mental command to Sue and Hope, and we fled north and east, running as fast as skeletal legs could carry us.

 Chapter 84 - Licking Our Wounds

    Chapter 84 - Licking Our Wounds


    I let Sue just run for a good distance, leaving the enemy far behind. Kara and I remained silent during the flight. I couldn¡¯t think of anything useful to say, and I suppose neither could she.


    We¡¯d gotten our asses kicked.


    Worse, we¡¯d jeopardized the ratkin who¡¯d come to us for help. I mean, yeah¡ªintellectually I knew they¡¯d asked us to attack the mall undead. We did as they asked. Emotionally, that still left me holding a bag full of guilt at having failed them this badly.


    I¡¯d never expected the zombies to come after us like that, though. Not in such numbers, not right away, anyway. I figured if we poked the bear a few more times, whatever that monster was leading them might come after us. We¡¯d clearly been far more annoying than I¡¯d thought.


    Once Sue hit the edge of the forest, where it met the highway, we went straight to the road. I wanted to leave the fort well behind us, but I also wanted to throw off pursuit, so I had Sue trot along the congested road for a ways. No footprints on asphalt. The going was slower than I liked, but it would mask which way we went well enough.


    After a bit, I moved Sue back to the grass on the roadside. With no cars or other obstructions, we sprinted north at even greater speed. The wind blew my hair all over the place¡ªwe were going fast! How fast could a T.rex run? I didn¡¯t remember for sure, just that they could push out a decent pace.


    We weren¡¯t going as fast as a car, but Sue could run faster than anything else I¡¯d seen moving since the Event. Best of all? Most mounts would eventually tire. One advantage of being undead was, this dino never ran out of steam.


    Kara and I would, though. I couldn¡¯t speak for her, but I was exhausted. The fighting during the day had been tiring enough, but then we¡¯d woke up in the middle of the night to another fight. Now that the adrenaline was starting to wear off, I was really feeling it.


    The anger I felt was still strong, though, and still simmering. That kept me focused and on task as we moved quickly up the highway toward the bridge over the Winooski River. I¡¯d told Patches to head to the island there. If they¡¯d made it out, I had hopes we¡¯d find them soon.


    When we reached it, the river wasn¡¯t as much of a barrier as I¡¯d hoped. Late summer was pretty dry, and there hadn¡¯t been enough autumn rain to swell the river. It was only a few feet deep in most places. I doubted it would stop a zombie attack, if they came calling.


    It was also a far enough walk that I doubted they¡¯d make it this far before dawn. Whatever that boss monster was, it seemed to be very light-limited. It was going to want to be back inside the mall before the sun rose, which would only be a few hours away.


    It could still send the horde after us, but I wasn¡¯t afraid of the horde. Sitting on Sue, tied down now, so we couldn¡¯t fall off, we could outrun the zombies without difficulty. Sue, Kara, and I could all take them down at range, while they¡¯d struggle to catch up with us. We could blow through hundreds of zombies an hour that way.


    No, it wouldn¡¯t send the horde. It already knew that Sue and I could solo however many zombies it had. Give us enough runway, and we¡¯d ¡®kite¡¯ them all to death. It was only when the leader was around that I was worried enough to flee. Whatever it was, it was still stronger than me, and that alone ought to be frightening. I had multiple tier six stones! But this thing felt so much stronger than me that I knew in my gut I was no match for it.


    There was no easy way down from the bridge to the island, so I had Sue walk down to the river¡¯s edge and wade across. The dinosaur was more than tall enough to keep Kara and I out of the water. Hope dove in too, splashing around in the water like a puppy. That surprised a smile from me, the first genuine one I¡¯d had since I realized we were under attack. It was nice to see her playing.


    Once we were across, we set up a camp on the eastern edge of the island, near the bridge. From there we could see whatever might come our way from almost any direction. Most of the island was covered with forest, and the ratkin could be anywhere in there, hiding out. Or they might not have made it to the island yet at all. Sue was running pretty fast for most of the trip.


    ¡°I¡¯ve got a tent here,¡± Kara said, fishing through the supplies we¡¯d managed to salvage. She¡¯d tied as many of the bags as she could onto Sue before we ran for it.


    ¡°I can¡¯t thank you enough for saving so much gear,¡± I told her. ¡°We still have food, water bottles, purification tubes, and now a tent. You¡¯re a literal lifesaver.¡±


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    She smiled, looking as exhausted as I felt. ¡°You¡¯re welcome. You can make me breakfast later, if you want to say thank you for real.¡±


    ¡°Deal.¡±


    We set up the tent together. It wasn¡¯t much, but it would keep the rain off if it showered. Once it was up, Kara and I both went inside and crashed, leaving Sue and Hope outside, on guard. Anything nasty came calling, Sue was going to launch a Fireball up its tail.


    A few fitful hours of sleep later, I woke. Kara was still snoring, so I let her be and slipped outside the tent. The morning sun was overhead already. I checked my watch¡ªnine in the morning. I gave it a few winds to make sure it didn¡¯t run out. If it did, I had no idea when I¡¯d be able to get an accurate time check again!


    I left Sue on guard over Kara and took Hope on a quick jaunt around the island, looking for any sign of the ratkin. While they might not have made it there before us, a few hours had passed. They ought to have arrived by then.


    A full circuit around the whole island took a while. It was bigger than I¡¯d expected it to be. The Winooski wasn¡¯t that large a river, but this was one heck of an island. I was guessing over half a mile around the outside edge, but under a mile.


    As much as I searched, I saw no sign of the ratkin. By the time I got back to camp, I was wearing a full-on frown from worrying about the little guys.


    ¡°You okay?¡± Kara asked, seeing me come in. She¡¯d started a fire while I was out.


    ¡°Yeah, just went looking for the ratkin. No sign of them. I don¡¯t think they made it to the island.¡±


    ¡°Damn. I hoped they¡¯d be here when we woke up. I hope they¡¯re okay.¡±


    ¡°Me, too,¡± I replied. ¡°There¡¯s a few more islands around. Maybe they went to a different one.¡±


    ¡°Well, the smoke from the fire ought to draw them, if they¡¯re anywhere near. I figured we could risk a small fire, now that it¡¯s daylight?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°Yeah. I don¡¯t think whatever it was is out there anymore. It went back to hide in the mall hours ago.¡±


    ¡°Because daylight.¡±


    ¡°Yes. Also, because the zombies didn¡¯t show up on the riverfront two hours ago.¡± If they had, we¡¯d have mounted up on Sue again and run for it, then kept running for a ways. If that boss undead thing ever stopped fearing the sun, it was time to get the hell out of Dodge. Or Burlington.


    I made a quick breakfast for both of us from our stores¡ªpowdered eggs with some cheese melted into them. Not the fanciest food, but it would do. By the time we¡¯d eaten there was still no sign of the ratkin, and it was cruising on toward eleven in the morning. We only had so many hours of daylight left, and I was loathe to sit here wasting them.


    ¡°What¡¯s next?¡± Kara asked, after we ate.


    ¡°I think we need to go scout the fort. See what happened there after we left.¡±


    She agreed, so we repacked our gear and got ready to move out. I had no idea if the Ratkin could read, so it wasn¡¯t like we could leave them a note. Sue¡¯s footprints were everywhere around the camp site, so if they came, they¡¯d know we had come. Would they wait for us to return? I didn¡¯t know, but there was a limit to what I could control.


    We struck out across the river, backtracking our trail toward the fort. During the daylight, travel was a lot easier, and we rocketed down the greenway alongside the highway at high speed.


    This time, though, the highway wasn¡¯t empty.


    ¡°Holy shit, what is that?¡± The cry came from somewhere ahead, from people tucked down between a few cars out on the road. Someone else in the group made shushing sounds.


    Whoever they were, they were a good distance away. I considered just running on past, but I did want to make connections with people, and running into other humans had mostly worked out well for me so far. I brought Sue to a stop.


    ¡°Hey over there! Don¡¯t worry. The dino only eats things that piss me off<¡° I called out.


    ¡°Well, I¡¯m sure that will reassure them,¡± Kara cracked, rolling her eyes.


    One of the people called out again. ¡°Who are you?¡±


    ¡°Selena. I was a med student at UVM when¡­all of this happened,¡± I replied. ¡°You folks okay? We can spare a little food if you need it.¡±


    ¡°No, we¡¯re good. Heading north to relatives. The city is getting very dangerous, miss. Although with that thing you¡¯re riding, I guess maybe there¡¯s not too much you need to worry about?¡± A man stood up from behind an SUV, gesturing at Sue.


    ¡°Not usually, but there¡¯s something at the mall. Came after us last night, and we ran,¡± I replied. ¡°We didn¡¯t even see it, just knew¡ª¡°


    ¡°That it was bad news,¡± the man finished for me. ¡°Yeah. We know. I¡¯m Jerome. Good to meet you, but if you know about the thing killing folks, you¡¯re headed the wrong direction.¡±


    ¡°No, I¡¯m not,¡± I replied. ¡°Because I¡¯m going to kill that son of a bitch.¡±


    He looked taken aback at that. I wasn¡¯t sure if it was my language or the statement itself, but he had to think about his next words before responding. ¡°You know, dino-girl, maybe you could. Best of luck with it. I¡¯ve got my family to take care of. But that thing has been reaping one neighborhood after another every night for days now. Killing people, making zombies out of them. We tried to help others, but there wasn¡¯t much we could do.¡±


    ¡°So we¡¯re running now,¡± a woman beside him added. ¡°You should too, girls. This isn¡¯t a safe place anymore.¡±


    Where was? I was pretty convinced the entire planet was like this now. Nowhere was going to be safe. Monsters would be everywhere, and while having more humans around made things riskier in some ways, it added value in others as well.


    So I shook my head. ¡°Someone has to stop that thing, or it¡¯ll be everywhere, eventually. Might as well be me.¡±


    ¡°Best of luck,¡± Jerome said again. Then he and his family set off north again. I spotted a bunch of kids and an older couple in the collection, along with Jerome and the woman I assumed was his partner.


    ¡°Dino girl, huh?¡± Kara asked, smirking.


    It was my turn to roll my eyes. ¡°I liked Lady Death better.¡±


    We set off toward the fort again, Sue¡¯s powerful legs eating up the distance.

 Chapter 85 - If Not You, Who?

    Chapter 85 - If Not You, Who?


    I had Sue approach the fort with caution. When we left the place, it was surrounded by enemies. There was no telling what the current state was. The horde had likely withdrawn, but I didn¡¯t know that for certain. They might still be there. They could have laid traps for us. Something else nasty might have moved in. There was no telling what we were going to find, so we slowed way down as we got nearer.


    It turned out there wasn¡¯t much point. As we trotted up the hill toward the fort, it was clear there was no massive army waiting for us there, and nothing to salvage, either. The fort was trashed.


    The zombies had taken the time to upend each and every log that had once been stabbed like spears into the forest soil. They¡¯d scattered the beams that had made up the walls, dumping them in a heap all over the hilltop. The huts and structures inside were all crushed under the weight of the logs.


    It could all be rebuilt, with enough time and effort. But it would take a lot more hours than we had left before nightfall, and I was willing to bet if we did rebuild it, tonight would just be a repeat of last night. Until we beat this thing, nowhere would be truly safe.


    I was on board with stopping it. Killing the horde¡¯s leader, and wiping out the horde, too. I just didn¡¯t see how.


    ¡°The bodies are all gone,¡± Kara said. She slid down from Sue¡¯s back, moving to the east side of where the walls had been, the side where we¡¯d stood our ground briefly to allow the ratkin to flee.


    ¡°Huh?¡±


    ¡°The ones we killed? There¡¯s no bodies. No sign there were ever zombies here,¡± Kara replied. ¡°Yours are gone, too. All the undead you had here? They¡¯re all gone.¡±


    I knew my undead had all been killed. I¡¯d seen most of them go down and felt the others fall through my link to them. But Kara was right¡ªeven their bodies were gone, now. I hadn¡¯t even been left with building blocks to Animate new troops.


    I slid down from Sue¡¯s back to join her in rooting around among the debris. Something else was missing, too. ¡°My shields, spears, even the bows, they¡¯re all gone too.¡±


    Via trades with the Guard base, I¡¯d managed to outfit most of my undead pretty well. All of that was now in enemy hands instead. Not cool.


    Kara sighed and sat herself down on one of the larger logs. ¡°Well, this sucks. What¡¯s next?¡±


    ¡°I don¡¯t know.¡± I wished I had an answer for her, but I didn¡¯t.


    The truth was, we¡¯d had our asses kicked, and it stung. So far, I¡¯d been mostly lucky since the Event. I¡¯d rocked my way through almost every challenge thrown my way, mostly because my spells were a serious force multiplier. This was different.


    There¡¯d been times I had to withdraw before. Moments I¡¯d been forced to retreat, to find a better way to fight. But this time, I didn¡¯t even know how to proceed. Beating this enemy felt bigger than anything else I¡¯d done.


    I couldn¡¯t just run. Well, I could. I could hop on Sue¡¯s back and tear off into the sunrise, heading east toward home, where mom and dad were probably waiting for me, hoping I was still alive. I had faith in their ability to take care of themselves. They were tough¡ªthey¡¯d be fine. But it was ever so tempting to head off that way, leave all of this mess behind.


    Whatever that boss monster was, it was deadly. The magic it gave off was far more powerful than what I had available. It was not something I could beat, not right now, anyway. We needed a way forward, ideally some method of evening the odds a bit. I just didn¡¯t see how.


    Sue¡¯s head shot up in alarm. I was on my feet an instant later, just in time to brace myself as the dinosaur let out a powerful roar. Sue was under my control, and I still wanted to duck; that¡¯s how loud that battle-cry was! There was heavy rustling in the trees just north of us. Something was coming our way. I readied a Drain Life spell against whatever it was.


    Patches stepped out of the brush, and I almost zapped him anyway before I realized who it was.


    He stood there shaking as Sue glared down at him, while Kara had her bow trained his way, and black fire wreathed my hand. I dropped the magic right away. ¡°Patches! You are okay! We thought you must have run into trouble, after you never showed up at the island.¡±


    ¡°No trouble. Better. Found other ratkin. They are friends now, too,¡± Patches said. He gestured to someone behind him.


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    More ratkin spilled out of the underbrush. First it was one. Then more. By the time they stopped coming, there were a dozen of them, and not all of them looked familiar.


    I could easily tell Patches¡¯ people apart from these new ones. The ratkin who¡¯d followed Patches to my fort were mostly white, tan, and black. They looked just like the sort of rats you¡¯d see in a pet store, which made sense, because that¡¯s what they¡¯d been, before the Event.


    The other half dozen ratkin standing before me were cut from another cloth. They were a bit taller than the others, and looked leaner. Their fur was more uniform, too. Each of them was a little different, but they all had the same combination of colors in their fur. I realized these weren¡¯t pet store rats; they were a group of wild rats who¡¯d been turned into ratkin.


    Would they be as friendly as the others? All I could do was hope. At least so far, they seemed helpful.


    ¡°Hi. I¡¯m Selena,¡± I said, waving to the new ratkin.


    The newcomers made chittering noises, and Patches replied to them with the same strange sounds. Was that language? It had to be. Patches mentioned he could speak English because he¡¯d heard it so much before the Event. Living in a pet store, I supposed that made sense. The wild rats must not have had as much contact.


    ¡°They haven¡¯t had as much contact with you people before, so they¡¯re not as sure of humans,¡± Patches explained, putting facts behind my hunch. ¡°But they saw us running and took us into their tunnels. They live that way, near the river.¡±


    He¡¯d pointed north. ¡°When you ran, they found you and took you in?¡±


    Patches nodded.


    ¡°That was lucky. I was worried you and your people were killed by the zombies, when you didn¡¯t reach the island.¡±


    Patches ducked his head. ¡°We are sorry for worry. But it seemed best.¡±


    ¡°Oh, I agree. Smart move. I¡¯m just glad you¡¯re safe! The fort is in tatters, most of my undead are gone, but the enemy seems to have cleared out. I think we need to figure out what to do next.¡± I gestured with my arms, waving them all forward, toward the logs piled like match-sticks. ¡°Come on over, all of you.¡±


    They all sat down, joining Kara, and the lot of them waited, all their gazes looking expectantly at me.


    What the hell? How was I in charge of everything, all the time? Okay, yes¡ªI had a Fireball-breathing dinosaur, still. That gave me a leg up in the power department, and so did my tier six stones. But I was a college student, not a general. This was so far from my wheelhouse I didn¡¯t know where to begin.


    That last wasn¡¯t true. I knew where to start. Maybe that would be enough?


    I glanced at my watch. ¡°We have another seven hours or so before the sun begins setting and that thing is released from the mall. I can¡¯t stand against it. There¡¯s just no way. Even with Sue, even if I had a full complement of undead again, it¡¯s too strong for me.¡±


    ¡°You are strongest. If not you, who can beat it?¡± Patches asked.


    ¡°I¡­¡± I stumbled over my words. God damn it, he wasn¡¯t wrong. I really was the strongest around here, wasn¡¯t I? Even without Sue. Did Colonel Turner have anyone on his base with two tier six crystals? He might, by now, but I wasn¡¯t so sure. He was still spreading most of the stones they gained across a wide number of people, so he had a strong, viable fighting force to defend the base.


    Maybe one of those other leaders? I¡¯d felt three control stones used. I felt confident Turner was the one to the east, but that still left two of them to the west of us. Either of those might be strong enough to serve as allies. On the other hand, they could also easily turn out to be enemies, and then we¡¯d be stuck with multiple fronts.


    There was nobody I could count on but myself.


    Yeah, Kara would help, whatever plan I came up with. I could see that in her eyes. Patches was there to help, too, and maybe he could get these other ratkin to add troops as well. With more bodies in the mix, maybe we¡¯d have more of a chance. I could go to Turner. The mall was close enough to his base that the thing living there would eventually threaten him, too.


    But at the end of the day, when it came to facing that thing, we were going to need at least one person strong enough to take it. That was going to have to be me. There was no one else. If I was going to do that, I needed to get stronger, fast.


    ¡°Patches, can the ratkin gather more troops? I mean, if there¡¯s more like you out there, can we try bringing them together? The more allies we have for this, the stronger we¡¯ll all be,¡± I said.


    Patches spoke in that squeaking language to the other ratkin, then turned back to me. ¡°We should be able to bring in some more. Not as many as the dead. Some. Maybe eight hands? Maybe more?¡±


    He held up a paw, showing four fingers displayed. I did the math¡ªhe was saying he thought they could gather thirty-two ratkin warriors, maybe a bit more. It wasn¡¯t much when compared to a thousand zombies, but I wasn¡¯t planning to fight the zombies toe to toe, so that was fine.


    ¡°Good. That¡¯s a start,¡± I replied. ¡°Kara, I think we can maybe get some help from Turner. This whole mess threatens him, too.¡±


    ¡°Maybe.¡± She sounded dubious. ¡°Selena, I felt the strength of that thing, too. Whatever it is, it¡¯s scary powerful, definitely higher tier than you. Is it a tier seven? Eight? I don¡¯t know, but whatever it is, I think what we need to do is get you stronger.¡±


    She wasn¡¯t wrong. ¡°Yeah, that would make sense. But how?¡±


    ¡°Well, how¡¯d you get to where you are now?¡±


    ¡°I ran into a cemetery full of skeletons. Oh!¡±


    ¡°Yeah,¡± Kara said, grinning again. ¡°I¡¯m betting in a city the size of Burlington, there¡¯s more than a few cemeteries.¡±


    I yanked out my map, unfolding it in front of me. ¡°I¡¯m sure you¡¯re right. There¡¯s got to be more.¡±


    There were rumors of another necromancer out west of here, somewhere in the city center, so odds were he¡¯d already hit a few of the graveyards out that way. I wanted to focus my search on the areas east of here instead. If I could find one that was still infested with tons of undead, it might just give us the leg up we needed to beat this thing.


    Before I could spot any likely prospects, though, a wave of magic rushed over me. I froze in place. The energy wave was strong, which meant it was close, nearby. And I recognized this sort of energy. I¡¯d just felt it the other day, three times over.


    The leader of the horde had managed to acquire and use a control stone. University Mall was the center of the world¡¯s newest Domain!

 Chapter 86 - Bullies

    Chapter 86 - Bullies


    Nobody else felt it, of course. I was the only one who had a control stone, so I was the only one who sensed when one of them was activated. But Kara and Patches both noticed when I froze, then shifted my attention to look south.


    ¡°Selena, what''s wrong?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°It''s another control stone. One of them was just activated, and I''m almost certain it came from the mall.¡±


    ¡°Oh, shit! So now our big bad is even bigger and badder than before, right?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°That''s my best guess, yeah,¡± I replied. I let how totally not thrilled I was about that leak into my voice.


    An already difficult job just became much more so. Two minutes ago, we¡¯d been trying to figure out how to face off against this thing. Now it was even stronger. That wasn''t the news any of us wanted to hear at this point. But Kara had different thoughts.


    ¡°I''m not sure that changes anything,¡± Kara said.


    ¡°How does it not change anything?¡± I asked. ¡°In my mind, this changes a hell of a lot.¡±


    Kara shook her head. ¡°Not really. Think about it. Whatever is running the show over there was already too tough for us to deal with, right?¡±


    ¡°Right. And now it''s even worse.¡±


    ¡°But even before it got a control stone, it was already too much for us to handle,¡± Kara said. ¡°Now it''s still the same as it was before: too much for us to handle by ourselves. That means the game plan hasn''t changed at all. We need to gain allies, grow stronger, or both. We just need to do a little bit more of that now than we had before.¡±


    She had a point. A good one, even if Kara¡¯s optimism was a little annoying. ¡°That makes a surprising amount of sense. What are you thinking for next moves? Same as before, or do we change tactics?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re asking me?¡± She looked surprised.


    I shrugged. ¡°Kara, you¡¯ve kicked ass all over the place in every fight we¡¯ve been in. Yeah, of course I¡¯m asking you.¡±


    Kara shrugged. ¡°I don¡¯t think this changes anything. We still need allies and more crystals. Patches and his new friends can go round up more ratkin to join us, and we should use your map to hit another cemetery or three.¡±


    ¡°And maybe ask Turner for help,¡± I added.


    Kara made a face at that. ¡°Maybe. You know I trust him as far as I can throw him, now.¡±


    ¡°Add a few Strength stones and you¡¯ll be able to toss him pretty far,¡± I said with a grin. I¡¯d filled her in about his Charisma and how he was using it. Kara was about as little a fan as I was.


    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s such a lovely image. Maybe I¡¯ll do that, just for the opportunity.¡±


    I brought the map back out again. It was growing a little tattered, but I¡¯d managed to keep it in mostly good shape. I spread it out enough to see the little Burlington mini-map. It had lots of stuff marked in it¡ªroads, parks, schools, the University, the mall¡ªeven cemeteries, thank goodness.


    They weren¡¯t super easy to spot. The map was small, and the color and icon the mapmakers used wasn¡¯t easy to see. But after a little while, we¡¯d found a couple of likely candidates.


    One of them was right near the airport. It was close; that was the good news. It was also right next to the avians¡¯ nest, which meant even if the undead were still in one piece, we¡¯d have to contend with the avians, too. Since Sue was pretty good at taking them out of the air, we could probably handle that. But it was small, too. Much smaller than the graveyard I cleared early on.


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    We kept looking, and soon spotted another site. This one was southwest of the airport and southeast of the mall. It was far enough from the mall that I had hopes maybe our foes hadn¡¯t already found the place, but it was near enough to where we stood that Sue could still get there before nightfall. Best of all, it was big¡ªmuch larger than the cemetery I¡¯d used to level myself up. Even with the two of us splitting the proceeds, it was still going to push us each up a lot in terms of power.


    I glanced at my watch. It was just past noon. ¡°It shouldn¡¯t take us too long to get there, with Sue doing the running. Want to try for it today?¡±


    ¡°Sooner is better. That horde is only going to get larger.¡±


    I turned to Patches. ¡°Gather every Ratkin you can. We¡¯ll meet back here say¡­ Tomorrow, three hours after sunrise.¡±


    ¡°I will do,¡± Patches said. ¡°We get ratkin. Then we have numbers, too.¡±


    We had a plan. I wasn¡¯t sure it was the best one in the world, but it was a start. With the plan set, Kara and I bade our farewells to the ratkin and mounted up on Sue. Before we set off, I looked back at the pile of broken timber that had once been a fort. I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about that, except for disappointment. For a brief moment, that place had been mine. I¡¯d considered giving it to the ratkin, and that would have felt good, too.


    Now it was ruins. Maybe it could be rebuilt, once all of this was done? I hoped so. It felt like a nice place to have a base, although I personally thought that island where we¡¯d slept the night before was a stronger bet. Whether it was going to be home for the long run or not, though, this fort had briefly been home, and losing it was just another in a long series of blows.


    Something else to add to the tally of reasons why I wanted to take this creature and its minions down.


    I slipped the control stone out of my pocket and had an immediate sense that I couldn¡¯t use it. For the first time, I was actually blocked from using the thing to create my own Domain.


    It was good information to have, because it confirmed information I¡¯d gleaned from the memories the stone gave me. Each Domain had a barrier around it, and new Domains couldn¡¯t be created within the zone of control already established by another domain. Until the mall Domain was shut down, nobody was going to turn this fort into one.


    For a moment, I regretted not doing it sooner, but I pushed those feelings aside. I¡¯d had excellent reasons to hold off for the time being. For all I knew, those other Domains were already in full-on war with one another. Once a Domain was set up, every other nearby Domain leader would get information about its location. Since the easiest way to grow one¡¯s Domain seemed to be to conquer another one and steal its control stone, it was a risky play.


    ¡°Everything all right?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°Yeah,¡± I answered, slipping the stone back into my pouch. ¡°We¡¯re inside the mall¡¯s Domain radius. In their zone of control, basically.¡±


    ¡°Ugh.¡± Kara got it. She understood why that stung. But she also had the right answer for it. ¡°Well, not for long.¡±


    ¡°Better believe it!¡±


    I urged Sue forward, and we shot through the woods, moving south at a steady, loping pace that ate up the ground. Hope ran alongside, quiet as a whisper as she dashed ahead and then came back, constantly scouting the path.


    It didn¡¯t take us long at all to reach Route 2, and once we were there we headed east along the road. We passed the turn off toward Dorset Street, where University Mall lay waiting for us. The huge, stretched out buildings used to feel cosy and welcoming. I¡¯d spent a lot of afternoons there, shopping and hanging out. Now, the place was like a somber fortress, one I knew had a darkness hidden in the center.


    The hotel off to our left was burning, which was a shame. I¡¯d eaten at the restaurant there once¡ªthe Windjammer. It was a nice place. We kept moving past, but before we¡¯d gotten far, a scream shattered the quiet of the street.


    I brought Sue to a halt. ¡°What was that? Where was it from?¡±


    Kara pointed back toward the burning hotel. ¡°Pretty sure it came from there.¡±


    I looked back toward the building. It wasn¡¯t fully engulfed, but it was headed there fast. We didn¡¯t have the time for major rescue operations, but¡­ I didn¡¯t feel great about leaving people in danger if we could help, either.


    Was that part of being stronger than everyone else? I supposed so. If I had the power to help people, did that create the responsibility to do so? I¡¯d read something along those lines once, and I guess it stuck with me or something, because the thought of just riding on by left my stomach feeling queasy.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go check it out, make sure everyone is okay,¡± I said.


    ¡°Works for me,¡± Kara replied.


    I wheeled Sue around, and we headed back up the road, then in toward the parking lot. At first I didn¡¯t see anything but the smoke billowing from the building¡¯s roof and flames jetting out of a few windows. The fire was definitely getting worse. But then I saw it¡ªa mom, with three kids, hunkered down inside one of the cars in the parking lot. The kids were the ones doing the screaming. The mother had a baseball bat in her hand, swinging it desperately at a bird-man who was trying to drag one of her kids through a broken car window.


    Yeah, that wasn¡¯t going to stand. I pushed orders to Sue to bolt ahead at top speed, and my dinosaur responded like a sports car, accelerating so fast I was glad we were both tied in again. We rushed toward the battle like a runaway freight train.


    If there was one thing I could not stand, it was bullies.

 Chapter 87 - Peeps

    Chapter 87 - Peeps


    I dropped a Drain Life on the avian trying to kidnap the kid. I was surprised¡ªit didn¡¯t just drop, which was new. Most monsters just went down with one hit from that spell these days. This one was tougher than the average, it seemed.


    ¡°Kara, try to nail some of the other ones flying around,¡± I shouted as I waited for the spell to reset. ¡°Watch out for the car windows, though!¡±


    ¡°On it.¡± She already had her bow out and was nocking an arrow to her string.


    I sent Sue the mental command to hit the ones fluttering over the car with a Fireball. It was too risky to hit the ones close to the car, but the spell smacked into one of the flyers, knocking it clear out of the air.


    We¡¯d gotten their attention for sure. All six remaining avians whirled toward us and started our way. Kara took one in a wing with her arrow. It let out a cry of pain and then dropped to the ground in a barely controlled crash. I focused on the one I¡¯d already injured, hitting it with a second Drain as soon as my timer was up. This time, it was enough to finish the job. The avian went down, its life energy flowing back and filling me with new vitality.


    Kara sent another arrow into another wing, grounding a second avian. It joined the other in crashing to the ground, then staggering to its feet.


    These creatures looked odd. They weren¡¯t humans with wings; they were birds that had grown somewhat more humanoid. They¡¯d grown arms with hands, in addition to their wings¡ªbut the arms were covered with downy feathers. Their legs were bent backwards from a human¡¯s, and ended in birdlike claws that reminded me more of a velociraptor than a pigeon! Their heads were the most unchanged thing about them, still looking almost the same as a regular bird¡¯s head, just a hell of a lot larger.


    Sue shot a Fireball toward the approaching avians. They dodged, wheeling through the air to let the spell pass between them. It sailed on to smack into the side of the hotel, adding to the flames there. I shrugged. The place was gonna burn down anyway, so it didn¡¯t much matter.


    The enemy seemed like they¡¯d had enough, though. They broke off their approach, sailing back into the air, gaining enough altitude that arrows and spells couldn¡¯t reach them. The two wounded ones had removed their arrows and took off again, fluttering more weakly than before, but still able to take to the sky. They really didn¡¯t care for Sue¡¯s Fireball power.


    One of the wounded ones took off toward the northeast, wingbeats slow but steady. That was the direction the airport was in, which meant it was headed for home base. Was it so wounded it was calling it quits? Or had it gone for help?


    ¡°Kara, keep an eye on them. I¡¯m going to go check on those folks,¡± I said. I passed the same command to Sue, ordering the dinosaur to defend us if the avians came in closer again. ¡°Watch out for any reinforcements, too.¡±


    ¡°You got it,¡± Kara replied. She still had an arrow on her string, although her arm was relaxed. ¡°Be careful. We don¡¯t know these people.¡±


    I tried something new, dismounting from Sue. First I untied myself quickly, then I grabbed the rope in both hands and dove off, using the rope to swing under Sue¡¯s ribs and land solidly on my feet. That was awesome! Not something I could have even thought about doing back in the old days, but I wasn¡¯t the same person as I had been then, and it was useful to remind myself of that.


    I had a tier five Agility crystal. By virtue of that, I was way more dextrous than I¡¯d ever been before. There probably wasn¡¯t a parkour master or gymnast in the old world who could keep up with me now. Of all my powers, though, that was one of the ones I used the least. It was something I needed to change, because at this point I couldn¡¯t afford to be ignoring any of my skills and abilities.


    On the ground again, I strode quickly toward the car, keeping one eye on the birds, who still circled high overhead. I called out as I got nearer. ¡°Ma¡¯am, are you okay? We heard you shouting and came to help.¡±


    She was out of the car now, facing me with the bat between us, held like it was a sword. ¡°Who are you? What is that thing?¡±


    Oh, she was looking at Sue. I flashed her a grin. ¡°I¡¯m Selena. I was a med student at UVM when all of this craziness started. That¡¯s my pet dinosaur, Sue. I get the fear, but it¡¯s okay. You¡¯ve got nothing to fear from us. We came to help.¡±


    She relaxed a little as I spoke, the tip of the bat dropping some. ¡°Thank god. Between the weird creatures and other people, we¡¯ve had a bad week. I just want to get my kids somewhere safe, you know?¡±


    A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.


    ¡°I do. I totally understand. I don¡¯t have kids, but if I did I¡¯m sure I¡¯d be doing the same thing,¡± I told her.


    My thoughts were already moving ahead toward just what we were going to do with her and her kids. Looking at her, I already knew she had some crystals inserted¡ªthe woman was tier three, so she¡¯d been killing some monsters and could defend herself at least somewhat. But from what I was seeing, a tier three was no longer strong enough to wander around alone. That one avian who¡¯d survived my first Drain was tier three, too, and he¡¯d brought friends.


    The only real solution I could think of for them was to bring them to the Guard base. Turner was my port in a storm, and his place was the only one I knew for sure people would be relatively secure and cared for. It¡¯s why I¡¯d sent Alfred and his people there.


    I glanced skyward again. Those avians weren¡¯t going anywhere. They circled just out of attack range, too high to chase off, but low enough I still heard their angry squawking. One of the damned things pooped in mid-air, and the splat barely missed me. Not cool! I glared daggers at them, then returned my attention to the woman.


    ¡°Do you have any idea why they came after you?¡± I asked her. ¡°They seem really determined. Usually they run off if the prey isn¡¯t as easy as they thought.¡±


    She flushed furiously, turning bright red. Okay, clearly she did know, and I had a feeling I was about to hear a whopper of a lie. She looked down, still blushing, and then mumbled something I couldn¡¯t hear.


    ¡°What was that?¡± I pressed. I needed to know what was up. If she¡¯d done something to piss them off bad enough, we could end up facing a lot more avians in a few minutes.


    ¡°My kid. Caught a bird. Thought we could have it for dinner.¡±


    I was confused at first, not sure what she meant. They¡¯d caught some sort of animal to cook, and¡­what? The avians were offended? Did they see all birds as being like them, or something?


    Then I heard peeping from inside the car. I took another step closer. The woman raised her bat another inch, back to a half-guard, but she didn¡¯t seem especially threatened. It was more like an instinctive motion. Once I was a little closer I could see the back seat with the three kids more clearly.


    The woman had clearly shoved them all inside as best she could, in hopes of using the car as cover. In reality, that hadn¡¯t been very effective. The bird people had simply smashed in the windows and then reached into the car. They¡¯d been trying to drag one kid out through a window when we arrived on the scene, and probably would have managed it if we hadn¡¯t stopped them.


    One girl was quite young, maybe pre-school age. There was also an older girl, maybe twelve or so. The third kid was more interesting to me, though. He was maybe ten, and he had something wrapped up in a jacket on his lap. Whatever it was, it was moving. And that¡¯s where the peeping sound was coming from, too.


    ¡°The bird you caught, is that what¡¯s wrapped up in there?¡± I asked the woman. I took a step nearer, and the bat raised a bit more. I held up my hands in front of me, trying to act as unthreatening as I could. ¡°I¡¯m just here to help you all, but I can¡¯t do that unless I know what¡¯s going on.¡±


    ¡°Selena! We¡¯ve got company coming!¡± Kara shouted.


    I looked back her way and saw immediately what she was talking about. A storm of avians was headed this way! There were dozens of them, all still far enough off that they were just dots in the sky, but those dots were getting closer fast. They¡¯d be here in minutes. We could hold our own against a bunch of monsters, but this was a lot, even for us. Unlike the zombies, we couldn¡¯t outrun these guys. They flew faster than Sue ran.


    ¡°Look, you need to help me help you,¡± I told the woman. I pointed at the sky toward the oncoming swarm, making sure she saw. ¡°They¡¯re coming in force. Gonna be here faster than I¡¯d like, and we¡¯re not fast enough to get away. They hit us with all of those numbers, I don¡¯t know if we can keep you and your family safe. We¡¯ll try, but¡­ There¡¯s a lot of them, and only a few of us. I know a safe place I can bring you, but we need to get clear of the avians, first.¡±


    That seemed to wake her from her fear a bit, if only because the avians were a much more obvious threat than I was. ¡°My name¡¯s Jess. You really know someplace we can go? Someplace safe for my kids?¡±


    I sure hoped the Guard base was safe. It was the closest thing to safety I knew about, anyway, so I nodded. ¡°I do. Why are the avians after you? I¡¯ve seen them attack humans before, but they usually back off if we put up a fight. These ones not only stuck around, they went and got help. They really want to take you down. Why?¡±


    My gut told me the answer even before she showed me. I think I¡¯d known from the first ¡®peep¡¯ I heard out of the car, and definitely from the moment Jess said they¡¯d caught a ¡®bird.¡¯


    Jess went around to the back door and opened it, then reached into the car. Her son balked when she tried to pick up the wrapped bundle, though.


    ¡°No! Peeps is mine! I want to keep him!¡± the kid cried.


    ¡°Not now, Evan. We need to let Peeps go,¡± Jess told him.


    He struggled a bit more, and the edge of the jacket came loose, revealing what was wrapped inside.


    As I¡¯d pretty much expected, it was a baby avian.


    The baby was too young to fly. It had the puffy feathers I¡¯d expect to see on a very young bird. How it had gotten out where this kid could catch it in the first place, I had no idea, but now I knew precisely why the avians were so pissed at these people.


    ¡°You kidnapped one of their children!¡± I hissed at the woman. Of all the idiot, stupid, annoying and obnoxious things to do¡­ Of course they saw the cute baby bird and thought it would make a good family pet. Or dinner. I wasn¡¯t sure which the plan was, since the kid seemed to think it was a new member of the family and the mom had mentioned eating it.


    Either way, we had a lot of very angry avians bearing down on us, and frankly? I couldn¡¯t blame them.


    ¡°Peep?¡± the little bird chirped again, raising yet more agitation from the ones circling overhead.


    Oh, this wasn¡¯t going to be much fun at all.

 Chapter 88 - Demonstrating Trust

    Chapter 88 - Demonstrating Trust


    The question of the day seemed to be ¡®should I be more furious with the mom for being stupid, or myself for stopping to help?¡¯ Yeah, okay¡ªthere were kids who probably didn¡¯t know better involved. And none of the kids had crystals, so they were all still basic humans. The avians would cut them to shreds without help.


    Even so, oh my god, people were stupid.


    The coat wrapped around the bird was adult-sized, so clearly Jess was in on the bird-napping. I whirled on her. ¡°You seriously captured one of their young? Holy shit. Are you trying to get yourself and your children killed?¡±


    ¡°I was taking care of my family! We¡¯re almost out of food, and scavenging more was already getting harder,¡± she spat back. ¡°When food falls in your lap, you do what you need to do to feed your children.¡±


    ¡°Peeps isn¡¯t food, mom! She¡¯s family!¡± the kid protested.


    His mom and I both ignored him. I glared daggers at her while she did the same back. With her attitude I was halfway ready to just leave her to her fate, but again¡­kids. I have a soft spot for people too young to know better.


    Idiot adults who ought to know better? Not so much.


    ¡°Selena! They¡¯re coming closer!¡± Kara shouted from atop Sue.


    She was right. The birds were bringing their army, and they¡¯d be here soon. I shot Jess a glare. ¡°Well, you were right about one thing. You need to let ¡®Peeps¡¯ go. Because I am not risking my life to defend you from that.¡± I pointed at the oncoming wave of avian warriors. ¡°At least, not if you¡¯re so heartless you want to keep that baby away from its parents.¡±


    That seemed to finally get through to her. She sagged. ¡°We found the baby not far from a dead bird-person. Something had already partly eaten the adult, and it had been dead a while. But the baby was hidden, had survived. I thought at first we could kill it and I¡¯d feed my kids one more day, but then they thought it was cute, and the next thing I knew we had a pet.


    ¡°It kept making noise, and it wasn¡¯t eating the things we tried to feed it. Then the peeping attracted those other¡­bird things. They attacked the hotel where we were hiding. Set it on fire. I barely got us out in time, and we hid in the car when they swept down at us. If you hadn¡¯t stopped them, we¡¯d be dead now. I¡¯m sorry¡ªI was just trying to do the right thing. I¡­¡±


    She trailed off, and my heart softened just a bit. How messed up would I have been, if I¡¯d spent the past week plus taking care of three fairly helpless kids? Saving Alfred and his band had been hard enough, and most of them weren¡¯t completely helpless.


    ¡°All right. Give me the bird,¡± I said, biting back the harsher words I might have said a few moments before.


    It took a few seconds for Jess to wrestle the baby bird out of her son¡¯s hands, but he finally relented when she explained it had to go back to its family. That, he understood.


    Jess handed me the bundle. The bird was heavier than I¡¯d thought at first, maybe the size of a large chicken or a small turkey. It looked up at me with the biggest, roundest eyes I¡¯d ever seen.


    ¡°Peep?¡±


    I rolled my eyes. I was not falling for this cute critter.


    But I got why the kids had. It was adorable. The cute little yellow beak meshed well with the fluffy brown and gray feathers, and it was soft to the touch when its down brushed my skin.


    I carried the baby bird away from the car while I sent a mental order to Sue to stand down. The dinosaur¡¯s head lowered, eyes down but still alert. If the bird-people attacked, Sue would blow them to kingdom come, but until then? The avians would have spread word about Sue by now. They knew about the Fireballs, so aiming Sue¡¯s mouth down was essentially a peaceful gesture.


    I hoped.


    ¡°Selena, what are you doing?¡± Kara called out.


    ¡°Something stupid,¡± I replied, continuing my slow march away from Sue and the car.


    Once I was about thirty feet from the car, the wave of avians started descending from the sky toward me. All of them stayed at least another few meters away, careful to never approach within what I guessed was their estimate of Sue¡¯s Fireball range. They were pretty accurate, which was concerning in its own way, but something to worry about another day.


    One massive avian landed about ten feet ahead of me, two smaller bird-men dropping to the parking lot pavement right behind him. The followers were both tier three. The leader was tier five. That was the strongest avian I¡¯d seen yet, by a long shot.


    This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.


    His feathers were the same dark brown as this baby. I wondered if that meant something. A lot of the birds were white or grey, but he and the baby were both brown. He was larger than the rest, too, standing over six feet tall even with his legs bent in that funny way all the avians stood.


    He wore light armor, which was new to me. The bird-people I¡¯d seen before were mostly naked, just feathers. This one had what looked like chunks of aircraft aluminum armor attached to his shoulders, forearms, and legs. They were clearly captured from the Air Guard people, and then the avians had bent them to fit their own. He wore a massive sword at his side, and a bandolier of knives across his chest.


    A leader of some sort, for sure. But he didn¡¯t seem interested in rushing me, at least so long as I was holding their kid. Maybe it was his kid? Or hers, since I really couldn¡¯t tell genders apart among these things. They were similar color. If this was daddy, maybe I could make this work out well for everyone.


    I gave him a respectful nod, and held out the baby toward him.


    He cocked his head, just like a bird that was curious about something.


    I brought the baby avian close to the ground and gently unwrapped the coat from it. With a few more peeps, the bird finished the job of freeing itself and stepped lightly onto the pavement. I gave it a gentle nudge in the direction of the grownups.


    It turned back toward me, of course, going ¡°Peep! Peep!¡±


    My eyes rolled so hard I swear I was at risk of them flopping out of my head. Because of course the little rascal was enjoying all the attention. I looked at the tier five avian and shrugged. He looked¡­almost amused? It was hard to read their body language, but that¡¯s what I thought I was getting.


    I leaned down, careful to keep the tier five avian in my peripheral vision. If he so much as twitched wrong, I was sure Sue would nail him, but I wanted to be ready, too. A foe that strong wouldn¡¯t go down to a single Fireball.


    Hope came up alongside me, snuffling my side, sounding worried. ¡°It¡¯s okay, girl,¡± I whispered to her. It was nice to have her with me.


    I leaned in, giving the baby bird a gentle nudge in the direction of its people. It peeped again, then finally turned around and saw the big avian. It squawked and started his way, flapping wings and arms alike as it crossed the short distance on stubby, unsteady legs.


    Damn it, the thing really was that cute too. I smiled in spite of myself as I stood back up, dusting off my knees. The baby bird kept running into it reached the big avian¡¯s legs, then smacked into them, wrapping its arms around one.


    Moment of truth time, now¡­ He had his baby back. Would he order his troops to attack, or would he withdraw? I was hoping for the latter, but I had to be ready for the former. If he made a threatening move, I¡¯d drop a Drain Life on him so fast it would make his head spin, and Sue would Fireball him a moment later.


    His gaze went from me, to the dino, then to the baby at his feet. He reached down, picked the child up, cradling it tenderly in his arms, same as I had been a moment before. He looked the baby over, maybe searching for signs of injury? Whatever he was looking for, he seemed satisfied after a brief survey. He shifted the baby to his left arm and stared straight into my eyes.


    Then he gave a proper military salute with his free right hand.


    I was shocked. I¡¯d never seen that behavior, but they clearly had. They¡¯d been fighting the Guard, which meant they¡¯d been observing the Guard, too. They must have discerned that was a gesture of respect, or that was my best guess, anyway. I needed to respond in kind.


    Carefully, slowly, I bent forward at the waist, bowing until my eyes were aimed down at the ground, and I was no longer staring at him. I¡¯d broken eye contact, but even more than that I¡¯d demonstrated trust by letting him out of my line of sight. That was the original point of a bow, after all¡ªto show you weren¡¯t a threat.


    I was hoping he wouldn¡¯t attack. Instead, he did one better and mimicked my bow. The two avians behind him did the same.


    Then with a flash, they were all airborne again, the leader carrying the baby in his arms as his wings swept him skyward. The rest of the avians, which had been circling overhead, formed up behind him, and they all took off toward the northeast again, flying back toward their home at the airport.


    I sagged with relief as they flew away. Everything had gone as well as I could have possibly hoped. We¡¯d gotten the kid back to its people, Jess and her family were safe, and I hadn¡¯t had to fight my way out of the mess. That could have gone so badly, though. If they hadn¡¯t been willing to work it out. If the baby hadn¡¯t been important enough to them to set aside animosity. If the leader had just flown away and then ordered his people to attack once the kid was safe¡­


    So many ways things could have gone sideways. I turned back toward Kara and flashed her a grin, which she returned.


    ¡°Knew you could do it,¡± Kara said. ¡°You¡¯re gonna get a rep as an ambassador, you keep this up.¡±


    ¡°Yeah? This almost turned into an ¡®aggressive diplomacy¡¯ bit here,¡± I replied. But it did feel good. Sometimes there was no choice but to fight. Sometimes, I had to do what needed doing, and in this world it often meant killing someone.


    Even as well as this one went, there were still fatalities. We¡¯d had to kill two of the avians. One was in the fire, and I couldn¡¯t get to the body. But the other was right next to the car. I reached down and tapped it, taking a tier two air crystal into my palm. It was flight, which could be darned useful.


    I wanted to socket it into myself. Flying sounded fun! But I wasn¡¯t quite sure. Finding a space for it wasn¡¯t difficult¡ªI had plenty of slots free, and I wanted those filled before I faced the thing in the mall. But I wanted to play it cautious and use those slots wisely, so I pocketed the crystal for the time being instead.


    Then I turned to Jess. ¡°Please don¡¯t ever do anything like that again, okay?¡±


    She opened her mouth, and I swore she was about to go full Karen on me. But when her eyes met mine, she must have seen something she didn¡¯t like, because she turned her gaze down toward the ground instead.


    ¡°Yeah. That was dumb. I almost got us all killed.¡±


    I nodded. ¡°You did. But we¡¯re all learning how to survive this world, so I get it. I¡¯ve done a few bone-headed things myself. Now, how about we get you and your kids somewhere safe?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll still do that? Even after¡­?¡±


    ¡°Yup. I¡¯m not leaving you four out here to just die.¡± I had Sue crouch down low, to make it easier to get everyone aboard. ¡°Help me get the kids on Sue¡¯s back. My dinosaur is big enough to carry all of us, since we¡¯re not going too far. We¡¯ll see you safely to the Guard base before we head on our way.¡±

 Chapter 89 - Steel Golems

    Chapter 89 - Steel Golems


    The journey to the Guard base was, thankfully, quick and passed without further incident. The avians watched us from a distance, but they never came anywhere near to spell range. They were curious, not aggressive. I could deal with that.


    I wondered if I was burning some of the goodwill I might have earned from handing back their child by going straight to Turner¡¯s growing fortress. There wasn¡¯t much else I could do. I knew of nowhere else even relatively safe for Jess and her kids, and as foolish as they¡¯d been, I still couldn¡¯t leave them to their own devices.


    My gut said if we¡¯d left the family to cross the open runway area alone, the avians might not have been so hesitant about attacking.


    The Guard didn¡¯t send out a quick reaction force, this time. They waited behind their walls for us to come to them. I wondered about that; did that indicate their battle with the avians had taken a turn for the worse? I hoped not. Getting their help was a key part of my plan to deal with the mall issue, so I hoped that would be possible.


    As we rode up to the gate, it rumbled open. Farnsworth stood there, although his ¡®uniform¡¯ had changed some.


    ¡°I¡¯m impressed!¡± I called out to him. ¡°You¡¯re even shinier than the last time I saw you.¡±


    He¡¯d always had some armor, even the first time we met. But now he was dressed almost head to toe in metal armor, most of it even fairly polished. It was a good look, I had to admit. That level of protection clearly hadn¡¯t trickled all the way down to all their troops, because the other four guards at the gate wore metal breastplates, greaves, and forearm guards, but little beyond that.


    I wondered, seeing all of this, what we were going to look like in a year or two. The more time went on, the closer my world was going to resemble something out of Tolkien, I supposed. I just hoped that eventually we¡¯d reach the point where things calmed, and there was some level of peace, too. The whole magipocalypse thing was exciting and all, but running for your life at all hours of each day wasn¡¯t as much fun in real life as it seemed in the movies.


    Farnsworth strutted, displaying his armor with a pleased look on his face. ¡°Linda¡¯s work. She¡¯s getting crazy good at armor production now that she hit tier three in it.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s tier three? I can¡¯t wait to see what tier five looks like. I¡¯ll earmark any armor crafting crystals I see for her,¡± I replied. Linda, hmm? Last time I saw those two together, she was teasing him, and he was still calling her ¡®Sergeant Bear.¡¯ Seemed like some good was coming out of all of this, maybe. I was glad for them both, if so.


    ¡°She¡¯ll appreciate that. But I am assuming this isn¡¯t a social call.¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°It¡¯s not, no. I picked up Jess here and her three kids. They were under attack by avians. We drove off the attackers and offered to escort them here. I figured you might be able to take in a few more?¡±


    I left out the part about them capturing a baby avian. If she wanted to tell that story, she could, but I figured it would only embarrass her, and it wasn¡¯t especially pertinent.


    ¡°Sure, we can take in more. Tier three, if I read that right?¡± Farnsworth asked.


    Jess nodded. ¡°You can tell by looking at me?¡±


    Farnsworth nodded. ¡°Once you hit tier five, you can. You willing to work for your survival, and your kids¡¯?¡±


    ¡°Absolutely,¡± Jess replied. ¡°It¡¯s all I want.¡±


    ¡°Then you¡¯re more than welcome here.¡± He turned back to me. ¡°Selena, I know we allow one pet to follow someone when they come to the base, but¡­¡±


    I broke out laughing at the look on his face. ¡°But not Sue, right? Yeah, I get it. Hope can come with me. Listen, I need to chat strategy with your boss. Is Colonel Turner available? Some shit is going down out there that we should probably chat about.¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s busy as hell. The avians have been raiding our scouting and scavenging parties, making it harder for us to secure the supplies we¡¯ll need for the winter. But I guarantee he¡¯ll make an exception for you.¡±


    Farnsworth had a pair of armored former-airmen take Jess and her kids to the medical center. From there, they¡¯d be guided through the inprocessing to make them part of the community on the base. I left Sue by the gate, with orders to leave everyone alone unless attacked. If someone was dumb enough to attack the T.rex skeleton, they deserved the Fireball they were gonna eat.


    Kara, Hope and I set off, trailing behind Farnsworth as he escorted us toward the command center.


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    A lot had changed in the three days I¡¯d been gone. Shit, were we really only like ten days since all of this started? The base was full of new development. Off to my right, whole sections of walled-in area had been converted over to housing, with a combination of old military tents and new wood and stone structures popping up. From where we stood I could see some of the lower land east of the base, toward the river. It was outside their wall, but they were already setting up to cultivate a lot of land out there.


    Even the walls were different. When I first got to this place, they were just fences with some reinforcement. Now, the foundations of actual stone walls were growing around those fences. They were using the tall chain-link fences as scaffolding to help support the growing walls. When they finished, the old fences would be invisible, buried inside the medieval-style stonework slowly rising around the base.


    Towers were already roughed out, wooden structures twenty feet tall, each with two or more soldiers on guard. The place was bristling. With good reason, if their local enemy was making life hard for them.


    ¡°You guys are really moving here,¡± I said. ¡°Lot of changes.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re one to talk. Tier six now, huh?¡± Farnsworth replied.


    ¡°Yeah. It¡¯s part of what I want to talk to Turner about. We¡¯ve got a major problem out there, and it¡¯s growing.¡±


    ¡°Undead problem, so I¡¯m guessing you¡¯re talking about the mall monster.¡±


    I quirked an eyebrow at him. ¡°You¡¯re pretty well informed.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s my job.¡±


    ¡°Fair enough.¡±


    Instead of taking us into the sub-level where I¡¯d been last time, Farnsworth escorted me into a ground floor room that had copious windows, letting in tons of light. Given the absence of artificial light, that was a smart move on their part. Everything from the basement room had been brought up to this space: the maps and charts, the big table showing the surrounding area in detail, all of it.


    Turner stood next to that table, looking much as he had the last time I saw him¡ªwith a couple of major changes. For one, he was now tier seven. Was that his Charisma? Or some other spell? I had no way to tell, but even at tier seven his Charisma shouldn¡¯t influence me much, with my Will as high as it was.


    The other change was his control stone. I could literally feel the power flowing off him. I sensed his connection to the base, to this land. He had power over this place in an absolute sense.


    As I entered the room with Farnsworth, two massive metal statues, one on either side of the door, came to life. Each of them was at least eight feet high, armed with a sword as long as I was tall. They reached for those blades, but before things could get ugly, Turner barked out an order.


    ¡°That¡¯s enough. They¡¯re allies.¡±


    The things went back to being statues. I stared at them another moment. Each was full of mana, and the ¡®vibe¡¯ of the power flowing through them matched that of the control stone Turner had used. These were his special troops, like the goblin mage had gained apprentice mages. Turner had these things.


    ¡°Like them?¡± Turner asked. ¡°They¡¯re golems. We¡¯re a Domain now, Selena, and that comes with a few perks. This is one of them.¡±


    I decided to play dumb about the control stones for the time being. The only way I could know anything about them was if I had one myself. Him laying that information out there like he did was a trick, a fishing expedition.


    If I answered with more information than I ought to have, he¡¯d know I had one of the control stones, too. He¡¯d want mine, for certain, and I was disinclined to part with it. Better to play dumb for now.


    ¡°What¡¯s a Domain?¡± I asked, hoping Kara would catch on and play along.


    ¡°Some sort of new magic. A different sort of stone spawned soon after you left. Using it made the base into a ¡®Domain,¡¯ and made me the local leader in official, magical terms,¡± Turner explained. Was he disappointed I¡¯d reacted as I did? Did he believe me? I wasn¡¯t sure. ¡°I see you¡¯ve already grown stronger. Tier six, and more than one, unless I miss my guess.¡±


    That, I was willing to give him. ¡°Two crystals at tier six, so far. Working on a third.¡±


    ¡°Excellent! The more strong allies we have, the better,¡± Turner said. ¡°But I suspect you¡¯re not here to compare notes on advancement. What¡¯s up?¡±


    I quickly explained rescuing Jess and her kids, again skipping details that would only make life harder for her, like the baby bird. Then I went on to explain what was happening at the mall. ¡°They destroyed the goblin fort. Tore it completely down, leaving the logs like a pile of rubble. There¡¯s a horde of zombies, maybe close to a thousand¡ªalthough we¡¯ve killed over a hundred in the past couple of days.¡±


    ¡°Thus the advancement,¡± Turner said.


    I nodded. ¡°Yup. If it was just zombies, I could handle it.¡±


    ¡°A thousand of them?¡± Turner looked skeptical.


    ¡°With Sue? Sure. I just blast them, ride a ways away as they chase me, repeat until all zombies are dead. It would take a while, but I could do it,¡± I told him. He seemed to accept this, so I went on. ¡°But whatever is running the show in there, it¡¯s stronger than me. Stronger than you, too. It¡¯s high enough I couldn¡¯t sense just what tier it was. I don¡¯t know how many tiers above me I can discern, but I could sense you were tier seven, so it¡¯s got to be higher than that.¡±


    ¡°Come with me,¡± Turner said, leading the way to the model table. Kara and I joined him there, Hope following along silently behind me. Turner gestured at the map table. He¡¯d made changes there, too.


    ¡°This is us. This, here, is the mall. I¡¯ve had scouts checking it and the surrounding area every day for the past few days. Our man watched your showdown in the parking lot. Sounds like you hammered them, which was excellent work.¡±


    ¡°Not good enough, though. They came at us in serious numbers that night. And whatever¡¯s leading them, it came at us, too. We had to flee,¡± Kara said.


    Turner grimaced. ¡°That leader there is going to be a problem. You see, it activated a Domain, too. We believe it¡¯s just a monster, not a human, but somehow it was also able to acquire and use one of the control stones to capture a Domain of its own. But these grey areas over here? Those are neighborhoods the horde has swept through, the past couple of nights. Anyone still hiding there was killed and absorbed into the horde.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s going to just keep growing, if we don¡¯t stop it,¡± I said. For the first time, I wished I had Charisma slotted. I was willing to bet that Turner hadn¡¯t built up his Will¡ªhe didn¡¯t need it. And I did need him to take the mall situation seriously.


    It was too big for me to tackle with just Kara and I. Even the addition of a few dozen ratkin wouldn¡¯t be close to enough to even the odds. We needed Turner¡¯s help. The trick was how best to convince him?

 Chapter 90 - Multiple Dilemmas

    Chapter 90 - Multiple Dilemmas


    Turner sighed, and then to my relief, he nodded.


    ¡°I agree. My problem is that the horde isn¡¯t my only problem.¡± He gestured to a pair of red marks closer to the lake. One was a little northwest of the university. Was that a cemetery? The other was down on the lake shore itself, right at the Burlington harbor. ¡°Those are also Domains. One of them is another necromancer, like yourself. He¡¯s mostly been keeping to himself. Our scouts have observed him, but not yet made contact.


    ¡°The other group, down by the lake front, are another matter. They¡¯re calling themselves ¡®pirates¡¯ and dressing up like it¡¯s cosplay season on the Pirates of The Caribbean ride. But from what my scouts have said, they¡¯re bringing back all of the worst parts of historic piracy: murder, theft, slavery, rape, plunder¡­¡±


    ¡°Charming. At least they¡¯re a ways off?¡± I suggested. The mall monster was a hell of a lot closer.


    Turner nodded, accepting the point. ¡°That¡¯s one saving grace, yes. We¡¯ll probably still have to deal with them sooner or later, unless something else gets to them first. But they aren¡¯t my only worry. Since I used the control stone, the avians have intensified their attacks. I suspect they, too, have a control stone, but can¡¯t use it now. There¡¯s a radius around each Domain which is protected from other people setting up shop, and now they¡¯re pissed they can¡¯t use their stone.¡±


    ¡°So if they capture your stone, they get command of your base?¡± I asked, still playing dumb about Domains. ¡°That sucks.¡±


    ¡°Well, to capture it, they have to kill me, which won¡¯t be easy. On the other hand, if we capture their stone, we can merge it with mine and grow even stronger. If they get it, they can be the ones who get a double-strength Domain. We still don¡¯t know what they will do for us, or for them. But they¡¯re clearly interested.¡±


    That wasn¡¯t going to be an easy dilemma to resolve. I¡¯d managed to¡ªmaybe¡ªearn at least a little goodwill from the avians. At the least, they hadn¡¯t tried swarming us after they got their kid back, which felt like something. But this was different. The fight between them and the Guard wasn¡¯t just two powers that happened to be next to each other. Now they were fighting over something real, too¡ªthe control stones, and the ability to use one on their home.


    No matter what I did, the avians and Guard were simply too near to each other. They¡¯d never be able to both have a Domain, not where they were, anyway. One of them would have to leave, and I didn¡¯t think either group was going to relent.


    ¡°These are all serious problems,¡± I said, thinking my words over carefully. ¡°But at the risk of sounding like I¡¯m saying ¡®my problem is bigger than yours,¡¯ I think the mall situation trumps these others. The avians are a clear and present danger to your base¡ªno doubts there. But so are a thousand zombies. They haven¡¯t turned their attention this way, no. But I feel like there¡¯s a ¡®yet¡¯ on the end of that sentence. It¡¯s just a matter of time.¡±


    Turner ran a hand through his thinning hair. ¡°I know. I agree with you, and it¡¯s why I¡¯ve had scouts keeping an eye on the place each day, and examining the area around the mall each morning to see how much damage they¡¯ve done. They¡¯re definitely spreading, moving farther afield each day. Their numbers are growing, too.


    ¡°To be honest, when we saw you taking them on, I was hoping you¡¯d finish them off. One less issue for me to worry about, if you did, and I¡¯d know all of those black crystals were going to an ally. I don¡¯t have the troops to take that horde down. Being honest, even behind our walls here, we might be hard pressed to fend off a thousand zombies. It¡¯s part of why we¡¯ve been reinforcing the walls.¡±


    I¡¯d wondered about that. Why build up the fences into stone walls when your main opponent flew? But thinking about the zombie horde, it made far more sense. Enough zombies would push a chain-link fence right over, even with the metal posts embedded in the pavement. A stone wall, on the other hand, would be much more difficult to topple.


    ¡°What about a team-up?¡± I asked. ¡°I¡¯ve already collected some allies. I¡¯ve made friends with a couple of the local ratkin tribes, and they¡¯re gathering more soldiers to help us take on whatever lurks in the mall.¡±


    ¡°You did? Interesting. That¡¯s the first I¡¯ve heard of the monsters turning friendly,¡± Turner said. ¡°How did that happen?¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re not really monsters,¡± Kara pointed out. ¡°They¡¯re pretty friendly.¡±


    ¡°The ones we met used to be pet store animals,¡± I added. ¡°They understood English from hearing people speak around them, and when the Event changed them, they became something like the goblins. I know we never managed to reach peace with the goblins, but I suspect that dealing with these creatures as if they¡¯re intelligent is the smart way, moving forward. Some of them are always going to be hostile to us. But others? It varies.¡±


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    ¡°That¡¯s good to know. More troops for the assault will help, but can they come up with thousands of ratkin? We¡¯ve seen a good many of them on our scouting runs, but not a thousand.¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°No, we¡¯re talking scores at best, I think. It¡¯s not really the zombies I¡¯m worried about, so much as the boss monster. If it were just the zombies, I think Sue and I could handle them ourselves.¡±


    ¡°You and the dinosaur against a thousand of them?¡± Turner asked. He sounded skeptical, which pissed me off some.


    ¡°It is a lot,¡± Farnsworth added.


    I quirked an eyebrow at Turner. ¡°Surely your scouts told you what happened when I fought them?¡±


    Turner chuckled, looking a little nervous. I realized with a start that he wasn¡¯t used to dealing with people this way anymore! His Charisma turned everyone around him into a yes-man. When he said something, people just agreed. Here I was, barely out of my undergrad degree and I was calling him out on his bullshit. It had to be a weird experience for the man.


    ¡°They did, but it¡¯s one thing to read a report, and another to see it firsthand,¡± Turner said. ¡°You¡¯re that confident though, I¡¯ll believe you. If you can reduce the zombie horde to a manageable level, say a couple hundred left? I¡¯ll commit troops to help you finish whatever is leading them. Fair?¡±


    More than fair, really. He was right that his people weren¡¯t best suited to handling this mess. I had a fast moving Fireball platform, which made me the ideal opponent for the horde. My main issue was in fighting the Big Bad, whatever it was. If he was willing to help with that, I¡¯d take it as a win.


    ¡°Sounds good to me,¡± I replied.


    He reached out a hand, and we shook.


    ¡°Okay, come back here when you¡¯re ready to make your move. I¡¯ll have Farnsworth get a team together, himself, the steel golems, and a few of our higher ranked people. I¡¯ll make sure he has enough firepower to take down a tier eight or whatever this thing is,¡± Turner said. ¡°One condition, though. Your team is going to reap the rewards of the zombie crystal drops. In exchange for our support, I want us to get the control stone held by the enemy.¡±


    Again, not unfair. He was right that Kara and I would get the stones from killing all those zombies. He was offering to commit substantially to the assault, so it was just that the Guard base get something for the risks they were taking. I wanted that stone, but¡­ It was probably worth giving it to someone else, just to ensure the undead didn¡¯t wipe out every human for a hundred miles.


    ¡°That works fine,¡± I said after the briefest pause. ¡°Whatever it takes to end this danger.¡±


    ¡°Excellent. I¡¯ll have Sergeant Farnsworth escort you to wherever else you need to go, then. I have much still to do today,¡± Turner said.


    With that abrupt goodbye, Farnsworth took us back outside. He asked if there was anything else we needed¡ªa trading session, swapping our crystals for Guard credits, or whatever¡ªbut I told him we were in pretty good shape still. It was early enough in the afternoon that I wanted to get a move on toward our next target. That cemetery we¡¯d found on the map was still out there, waiting for us.


    He brought us back to the gate where Sue was still waiting, crouched down on the pavement like she was asleep. To everyone else, the dino looked like a pile of regular fossilized bones, but as soon as I drew near Sue roused and stood, letting out a soft growl.


    ¡°Yeah, we¡¯re back,¡± I told Sue. ¡°Ready for another adventure?¡±


    The dinosaur nodded its head. Interesting.


    We mounted up and set off on our way, the Guard opening their gate for us and Farnsworth himself waving us off.


    ¡°I¡¯ll be ready when you come back,¡± he told me. ¡°We¡¯ll take that thing down together, eh?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯ll be a fight to remember,¡± I replied.


    Then we were off, Sue¡¯s powerful legs pounding the pavement as we ran south. I glanced at my watch. Already three in the afternoon, and we had a long way to go before we got where we were going. I¡¯d been halfway tempted to stay at the Guard base overnight. At least we¡¯d be secure there, behind the walls. Get some good rest and set out the next day.


    But if we did that it would allow whatever was building the zombie horde that much more time to grow its force. Each night, that threat was growing larger, strong, more able to handle whatever we threw at it. If I wasn¡¯t getting stronger at a faster pace than the enemy, things were going to end very badly.


    Once we cleared the airport area, we turned west on Route 2. There was still a good trip ahead of us to get where we were going. The reason I hadn¡¯t tried to hit this cemetery already was precisely because it was so far away. It looked huge on the map, though, so I was hoping it would be worth the trip. Assuming nobody else had cleared the place out, it might have hundreds of undead. That would give us all the new crystals we could ask for plus the materials to Animate a new crop of undead.


    We took a right turn on Kennedy Drive, moving into South Burlington. The road wasn¡¯t as heavily traveled, which meant fewer cars stranded in mid-street when the Event happened. That was easier for Sue, and we made excellent time.


    I almost missed the turn back north onto Hinesburg Road, which ran right past the cemetery, but Kara caught it just in time. She was more familiar with some of the local roads than I was. In the old days, the trip from the Guard base to the cemetery might have taken half an hour. Today, it took us two, which was way longer than I was happy with. We were going to arrive as dusk was starting to set in, only a couple of hours before the sun set.


    That coming darkness made me nervous. The bad things came out at night, after all. And whatever hid in that mall would be out and about again, too. Hopefully it thought I¡¯d fled, but I couldn¡¯t guarantee that. It might easily come looking for me, once the daylight was gone.


    At the same time, as Sue jogged up Hinesburg Road, I was excited. It had been a while since I¡¯d had a chance to just hunt monsters to grow stronger. I¡¯d been good at this sort of thing even without Sue and Kara. Now that I had serious backup, I had a feeling this was gonna be fun!

 Chapter 91 - Training Session

    Chapter 91 - Training Session


    As we got closer, I realized that this was not actually going to be anywhere near as much fun as I¡¯d expected. Nope, not this time. Because the first thing I spotted as we approached the cemetery wasn¡¯t rows of skeletons waiting for me to blast them with Fireballs, but rather¡­a bunch of ants, taking apart a house?


    ¡°What the hell am I looking at?¡± Kara asked, aghast.


    ¡°Your guess is as good as mine.¡±


    We¡¯d come up the road toward the cemetery, arriving from the south. There was a huge open field right next to the graveyard itself; I figured maybe it had been cleared for more graves in the future or something. Now, it was occupied. A massive tower of sand, dirt, and chunks of wood was piled taller than Sue in the middle of the field. Streams of massive black ants flowed from the mound.


    Some of them headed toward a house a little on our right, where they were systematically dismantling the place, breaking it apart and hauling chunks of wood and other materials back to the nest. Other lines of ants stretched across the street to houses there. A couple of the homes had already been completely destroyed, leaving behind only holes in the ground where there¡¯d once been a structure.


    There were a lot of them. None of them were very large¡ªHope was bigger than most of them, so they were each about the size of a small dog. But those lines of ants¡­ There had to be hundreds of them visible above ground. I didn¡¯t even want to think about what was waiting below in the tunnels they must have dug.


    ¡°Where¡¯s the giant spiders when you need them?¡± I quipped, smirking.


    ¡°Bite your tongue! That one we saw in the woods was bad enough,¡± Kara replied, shuddering.


    I had Sue give the house they were dismantling a wide berth, and we slipped up a side road toward the cemetery itself. Even there, nothing could ever be easy. The place had once had a fence around it, but there were big gaps now, holes that had either never been repaired, or never built at all.


    We still saw a good number of undead out there in the graveyard itself, but they were all over the place. A lot of them had clearly wandered off. So not only did we have to worry about the ants and whatever potential threat they represented¡ªthe undead I¡¯d hoped would all be tucked inside an iron fence were not. Nor would we be able to keep them from chasing us if things went bad; I wouldn¡¯t be able to use the fence to take breaks like I had before.


    The good news was, we had Sue. With the dinosaur¡¯s speed, we could easily outrun the undead.


    We slipped past the ants. For whatever reason, they ignored us, and I was pretty willing to take on one foe at a time, just then, so I left them be as well. I dispatched one skeleton that took an interest in us, killing it with a Drain Life spell. We were at the southern end of the cemetery, and it was time to get to work, if we were going to do this today at all.


    The ants, plus the way the undead were spread out all over the place worried me some. This whole thing now carried a lot more risk than I¡¯d planned for when we set off to find this place. I had no idea if the ants would go to sleep with dusk, and the undead certainly wouldn¡¯t. Once the sun went down, it was going to be much harder for us to see enemies, and that could end badly.


    For safety¡¯s sake, we ought to withdraw. Retreat a safe distance and camp out, wait for dawn and hit it then. Thing was, I didn¡¯t want to. My gut said playing it safe wasn¡¯t going to serve me well here. While I was searching for a safe place to camp, other people were out there busting up monsters for crystals.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to get down on the ground when we start fighting,¡± I said. ¡°I want to be close enough to cast Control and Animate, if I get a chance.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re not worried about the ants at all?¡± Kara asked. She certainly looked nervous about them.


    But I wasn¡¯t feeling too bothered. ¡°No, I think we¡¯ll be okay. They¡¯re faster than the undead, but not faster than Sue, I think. Worst case we just mount up and withdraw.¡±


    She still looked pale, her face tight, so I came up with an idea. ¡°Listen¡ªyou¡¯re probably right that they¡¯re worth keeping an eye on. Once we¡¯re in the thick of fighting the undead on those graves, I won¡¯t be able to pay as much attention to what the ants are up to. If they come at us then, they could be a real problem. Can you stay aboard Sue, then use that height advantage to keep an eye on them? Or will that disrupt your archery too much?¡±


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    ¡°No, I can do that,¡± Kara replied. She seemed relieved. I¡¯d made the right call. Some people were bothered by bugs, and I couldn¡¯t say I blamed her. Little ants were one thing, but hundreds of ants the size of corgis was creepy even by my standards.


    I untied myself and slid down from Sue¡¯s back, stretching tight muscles. Then I drew my sword and shield. While I was planning to use more magic than anything else having those in my hand might just keep me in one piece out there.


    My plan was to use this run as a training session in more than one way. Yeah, Kara and I were going to get crystals even if Sue did all the killing. But I didn¡¯t want to rely on that. I¡¯d already seen what could happen if we got overrun and all my undead were gone. What if Sue went down the same way my other undead had?


    At the end of the day, the only person I could truly rely on to always be there¡­was me. Kara was an awesome ally and I loved having her with me. Before her, Alfred had turned out to be a decent friend, too. Hope and Sue were powerful allies, and Hope was already more pet than she was a ¡®minion.¡¯ But at the end of the day, someday I was probably going to find myself without allies and friends around me. I needed to be ready to take care of myself.


    I already had tier five in two physical skills¡ªAgility and Stamina. The Agility made me fast and dextrous. It wasn¡¯t like I was the Flash or something. I didn¡¯t have what you¡¯d call true super-speed, but I was much faster than any human who¡¯d ever lived and died without these magical crystals. I could outrun any sprinter in the pre-Event world, and thanks to the Stamina I could outlast any marathon runner, too.


    The Stamina also made me heal faster and resist damage more easily, too. I could take a lot more hits without bleeding out than I once could. Even without my Drains, I¡¯d heal rapidly. Again, not quite super-healing, but it was fast.


    Which left me thinking about that empty slot I had at the end of the chain of attribute crystals. There was Will, then Agility, then Stamina, and then¡­a blank spot. It was time to fill it, and my other ones, besides.


    One of those slots had to be a clear stone. I didn¡¯t want Charisma. Intellect would help all my spells, and eventually I wanted to build that stat up too. But for now there was only one obvious choice. I pulled the tier three Strength crystal from my pouch and held it in my hand, concentrating and willing it to link with the other crystals in that chain. It was absorbed into my palm quickly, and the next thing I knew, it was embedded.


    That left two slots, and one had to be a black stone. The other could be anything at all. Again, I already knew in my gut which one that black stone had to be. I did want another attack spell; either Curse or Harm would do. But neither of those was my top priority at this point. I was looking for broken, overpowered spell combos, and I was pretty sure I¡¯d found one.


    I slotted the tier two Health to Mana in my black slot. It socketed quickly, flooding my mind with memories about how to cast and use the spell. In short, at this tier, it would take about twenty percent of my health and convert it to mana. From what I could tell, the amount of mana I¡¯d get ought to be just about the same as the casting cost of Drain Life.


    If I was right, that would let me chain cast Drain Life¡­forever. I¡¯d never run out of mana. I could cast Drain, then Health to Mana, then Drain, then¡­repeat until entire enemy force was destroyed. Assuming I had time for the Drain Life to reset that many times, anyway. The twenty-second timer remained my hard limit, there.


    That left one final slot, but this one was a main ring spot, which meant it could be any color. I could insert a black crystal there, or the Flying stone I¡¯d gotten, or the Alchemy crystal, or whatever else I wanted. For the time being, I filled the slot with the tier two Flying spell I¡¯d gotten from the avians when we rescued Jess. That would allow me to escape any truly nasty situations that cropped up.


    With that decision, I was done, and examined the results.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Augment Undead


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 6) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Outer Ring: Black Stone (Tier 4) - Heal Undead


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Drain Life


    Point 3, Outer Ring: (Tier 2) - Health to Mana


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 6) - Will


    Point 4, Outer Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Agility


    Point 4, Third Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Stamina


    Point 4, Fourth Ring: (Tier 3) - Strength


    Point 5: Yellow Stone (Tier 2) - Flight


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead x6, Augment Undead x5, Contagion x2, Control Undead (Tier 3), Control Undead x10, Curse (Tier 2), Curse x2, Drain Life x5, Harm (Tier 2), Harm, Heal Undead x2


    Clear: Intellect (Tier 3), Charisma (Tier 4), Charisma (Tier 3)


    Brown: Alchemy (x2)


    Control Stone (x1)


    I felt worlds stronger than I had a few moments ago. The impact of that Strength stone was immediately obvious. I jumped, and my high jump was insane! Then I activated Flying while in mid-air from the jump, and I found myself rocketing skyward at the pace of a good run.


    ¡°Holy shiiiiiiiiit!¡± I shouted as I went soaring upward.


    The mana drain was intense, so even with my enhanced Will this wasn¡¯t something I could keep up all day, but it was a lot of fun. With an effort of will I stopped in mid-air and then went zipping back toward the ground.


    Landing wasn¡¯t as easy as takeoff; I hit the ground pretty rough, stumbling and jamming my knee. But my Stamina was already at work to reduce the damage, and the soreness faded swiftly.


    ¡°That was amazing, Selena!¡± Kara called out. ¡°So cool! Okay, I totally want Flying, too. But¡­ You did just sorta attract the attention of like every undead for a hundred meters or so. They¡¯re headed this way.¡±


    ¡°From what direction?¡± I called up to her, glad she was staying atop Sue. It sounded like this was about to get intense.


    ¡°All of them!¡± Kara shouted, nocking an arrow to her bow.


    I drew my sword, readied my shield, and prepared myself for battle.

 Chapter 92 - How Strong I鈥檇 Grown

    Chapter 92 - How Strong I¡¯d Grown


    Maybe it was my shocking burst into the air, or maybe they¡¯d just noticed us anyway by that time, but Kara was spot on. It looked like every undead in the area was making tracks toward us as fast as they could shamble. Ready or not, it was go time!


    ¡°You still tied in?¡± I shouted up to Kara.


    ¡°Yup.¡±


    ¡°Good.¡±


    I sent mental commands to Sue, keeping it relatively simple. The dinosaur would use their Fireballs on any larger collections of undead¡ªideally groups of three or more¡ªand chomp any singletons. Also, Sue was to flee the battle area if their health went under a quarter, and I sent the order to keep Kara safe no matter what.


    Would it be enough? I had no idea. Giving standing orders meant I wouldn¡¯t need to continuously monitor the dino during the fight, though. I had a feeling I was going to need all my attention on the battle in front of me, at least most of the time.


    I burst into action, darting to the right, where a large cluster of skeletons approached. A Fireball sailed over my head, slamming into the center of the pack. Two of the skellies blew apart in the blast, and the others were damaged. I cast Health to Mana to recover what I¡¯d spent Flying, then dropped the nearest with a Drain, recovering my health. There wasn¡¯t time for the Drain to cycle before the other three were on top of me, though.


    Hope dashed forward, yanking a tibia out from under one of them. It dropped to one knee, unable to keep its balance, and Hope continued her attack, savaging the skeleton further.


    That left two more for me to fight. The first rushed me, and I braced my shield, then slammed the shield forward into the thing as it came up to me. I¡¯d grossly underestimated my new strength; the skull shattered under my blow, fragmenting like a bomb went off inside it. The skeleton collapsed completely after that.


    The other one was still coming, so I swung my short sword at the thing, first slicing off an arm, then cutting through its neck, severing the head from the rest of it. Holy shit, that Strength stone made one hell of a difference!


    We were seconds into the fight, and five of them were down already, just like that.


    I checked over my shoulder to ensure Kara and Sue were still doing okay. Sue bit the head off a zombie¡ªmust have been a relatively recent burial. Kara crouched on the dinosaur¡¯s back, firing off one arrow after another. She wasn¡¯t missing, either.


    Knowing they were in good shape made me feel better about moving forward, pushing deeper into the cemetery. It was still plenty light enough to see the enemy, and they were bloody everywhere. There had to be at least a couple hundred undead still waiting around the graveyard. Even without fences around the entire exterior, most of them hadn¡¯t wandered far. Now a good chunk of them were headed our way.


    ¡°We have a target rich environment here, Hope,¡± I said. She barked¡ªagreement? I flashed Hope a grin, then started forward at a brisk walk.


    A skeleton came against me and I simply batted it aside with my shield. Fighting it was like swinging at someone moving in slow motion. The shield impacted with the force of a pile driver, breaking its arm and blowing apart its ribs. The skeleton fell. Another took its place. I easily ducked under its grab, then swept both legs out from beneath it with my sword. It crumpled into a heap of bones. I smashed the skull with my boot, just to be sure.


    A thwap sound behind me got my attention. I turned to see a zombie already collapsing, an arrow through its skull. I sketched a salute to Kara with my sword.


    ¡°Thanks!¡±


    ¡°Stay alert!¡± she replied. I gave her a nod.


    The thing was, I wasn¡¯t all that worried about these undead hurting me. The next set of skeletons came at me three at a time. I blocked one with my shield, cut another down with my sword, but the third managed to get claws into my shield arm, scraping lines in my skin. Thanks to the tier five Stamina, though, what would have been massive wounds for a normal person were just mild scratches for me, and they started closing up almost instantly.


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    My linothorax protected my body from really serious injury, and my enhanced body either deflected or healed most of the rest.


    I had no illusions this would work for every monster, but the things I was facing here were all tier one undead. Basic skeletons, for the most part, with a few basic zombies tossed into the mix. It was finally sinking in that it would take an actual army of tier one creatures to be any sort of threat to me.


    Until this moment, I hadn¡¯t quite realized just how strong I¡¯d grown. It was intoxicating.


    The fight carried me further away from Sue and Kara. I glanced back periodically, making sure they were still doing fine. Sue was taking occasional hits, so I tossed a Heal Undead at the T.rex every so often to keep their health up. Kara wasn¡¯t in much danger unless Sue went down. There were no skeleton mages here to fire ranged attacks.


    I¡¯d gotten a little too far away, though. Now I had undead on all sides, closing in fast. Two of them grabbed me from the front and two from the rear, and I panicked for a quick moment as their claw-like bones grabbed hold of my hair, my arms, my shoulders.


    One leaned in to bite at my face. I dropped it with a Drain Life that healed my injuries. I beat another back with my sword, smashing its skull. But there were still more coming at me, flowing around me. My strength was so much that they struggled to hold onto me, but if enough of them grabbed on, they¡¯d literally bury me under their weight.


    That wasn¡¯t going to happen. I engaged my flight, zipping skyward. Two skeletons had a good enough grip to hold on at first, but a slash with my sword cut one in half, and a Drain killed the other. Their broken bodies toppled back to the ground. I cruised fifteen feet through the air before settling back to the dirt again. My landing was a bit better, this time, but I still staggered when I cut off the Flying spell.


    Guess I needed to practice Flying some more. Oh no! What a horrible fate. I grinned to myself, really enjoying all of this. For most of the past week, I¡¯d been running from monsters, fighting evil humans, desperately struggling to stay alive, beating off huge hordes of undead, and all sorts of other wild stuff.


    This fight was one of the first times, maybe even the first time, where I felt like I could cut loose and just have fun smacking these things around.


    Each one that fell represented advancement for Kara and I. We were going to get more powerful with every undead we killed, which was awesome. Just as cool, though, was this sense of raw power I felt as I rushed back in at the enemy.


    My shield was up, sword in front of me, as I sprinted into the edge of the group that had been trying to pin me down, moving faster than the swiftest Olympian could have daydreamed about running. The charge hit with so much force that the skeleton I slammed with my shield blew apart, the pieces flying back into two more skeletons, which also came apart from the force of the debris.


    Then my sword was flashing, each swing so swift that if I didn¡¯t have enhanced Agility I bet I¡¯d barely have seen the motion. My blade became a flickering orange bar as it reflected the fading evening sunlight.


    Less than a minute later I was surrounded by piles of bones. I¡¯d killed a dozen or so skellies in that time. It was nuts, and the sword wasn¡¯t even something I was especially good at!


    What I was good at was casting spells. I concentrated, firing off a Control Undead at the nearest skeleton. It was mine instantly. I had five more points of Control available, so I cycled the spell as quickly as it would cast. Once I had control of six skeletons, I set them to guard me, fighting off any others that attacked, while I looked at those bones to see what I could do with them.


    Now that my Animate Dead spell was tier six, I could control thirty-two points of undead. I¡¯d already seen how strong higher tier undead could get, but unfortunately it looked like tier three was the highest the spell was willing to give me, so far. I really wanted to try building eight tier four skeletons, because that would be a powerhouse. But either my tier wasn¡¯t high enough, or the raw materials I had to work with weren¡¯t strong enough, because it wasn¡¯t gonna let me.


    At tier three, I had a couple of skeleton options. The skeleton mages were only tier two, but at tier three there were ¡®fire skeletons¡¯ and ¡®skeleton juggernauts.¡¯ Curious what they were, I brought up a fire skeleton first.


    It rose from the rubble of broken bones, clambering to its feet, and then the bones themselves burst into flames! I took a step back, surprised, but the fire was magical. It wasn¡¯t actually burning the skeleton, and when I approached it, I discovered it wouldn¡¯t hurt me, either. I sent the fire skeleton to attack an approaching set of enemies. It cackled as it moved toward them, then launched little bursts of fire from its hands. It took a couple of hits before it took down each tier one undead, so the damage was pretty light, but it was at least as strong as the Harm spell the mages used. Maybe more so.


    The juggernaut was cool, too. When I Animated one of those, the bones flowed together and jumbled into a mass, doubling up in most places. The doubled bones then merged with each other, forming one set of much thicker, stronger bones. The finished skeleton was about seven feet tall and was built like a truck. When I sent it plowing into lesser undead, it tore them apart like it was a force of nature.


    In just a few minutes, I had five fire skeletons and five juggernauts formed up in rows in front of me. The juggernauts carved apart any undead they ran into while the fire skellies just blasted them from range. It was a good team effort, and vastly sped up the rate I could carve through the undead.


    Then I heard a sound from behind me, like the earth was tearing itself apart. I whirled, alarmed, as Kara let out a terrified scream. I¡¯d just pivoted enough to see her before she and Sue both dropped out of sight!

 Chapter 93 - Fractured Future

    Chapter 93 - Fractured Future


    I took to the air in a flash, darting skyward so I could get a better view of whatever the hell was happening over there. I¡¯d only gone like twenty meters away from Sue and Kara, figuring they were both fine. Then they¡¯d just vanished from sight.


    Now that I was airborne, I could see why.


    Where Sue had been standing was now a massive sinkhole. The dinosaur¡¯s mass had torn right through the upper soil, taking them both down into a chamber below the ground. As I flew nearer I saw that wasn¡¯t all. Sue¡¯s weight had been too much for the floor of that buried chamber, so they¡¯d punched right through it and fallen down into an even deeper level.


    Ants crawled from the hole, scurrying to and fro as they investigated the damages. That sinkhole wasn¡¯t natural at all; the ground had been weakened by the giant ants tunneling beneath it. I weighed too little to break through, but Sue was another matter entirely.


    ¡°Kara! Are you okay?¡± I shouted down to her. There was no answer, which scared the shit out of me.


    I reached out with my mind toward Sue. The dinosaur was mostly intact, at least. Both of Sue¡¯s legs shattered from the final impact, though. My ride was in rough shape. If Sue took that much damage in the fall, Kara might be in serious trouble.


    There was time to spare a quick glance toward my troops. All the skeletons I¡¯d Controlled had already linked up with the fire skeletons and skeleton juggernauts I¡¯d Animated. They were moving along, slowly churning through the remaining undead up top. I left them to it, ordering the tier one skeletons to perform rear guard duties for the others. With them in place, and a little luck, they ought to be able to take down the remaining undead, as our foes were scattered and only tier one.


    Hope barked from the edge of the pit, clearly unwilling to remain behind. I turned to her before flying downward. ¡°I don¡¯t know if I can carry us both, girl.¡±


    She barked again. I sensed her urgency, that she really wanted to stay with me, and wanted to help Kara. Her loyalty was touching, so I flew over to her and scooped her up in my arms. It was a bit of a struggle¡ªHope wasn¡¯t a small dog! But thankfully she was just bones, so her mass wasn¡¯t as much as it would be otherwise.


    Holding onto her tight, I hoped for the best and took to the sky again.


    We did manage to take off, but the mana drain was intense! I wasn¡¯t going to remain airborne very long with the extra weight. I couldn¡¯t gain altitude, either. In fact, in spite of my best efforts I struggled to keep us aloft at all.


    What I could do was sink, so I concentrated on slowly lowering both of us to the bottom. We descended into the earth, the holes of broken ant passages showing up on the walls around us as we slowly sank into darkness. Every moment that went by, more ants surged from those holes. Some of the passages were tiny, only large enough for the smaller ants. But others were much bigger, a couple large enough for me to stand fully upright if I¡¯d been walking. Ants came out of those, too¡ªmuch larger, more dangerous looking insects.


    I needed to get to Kara now.


    I focused, and we dropped faster. About two thirds of the way down the hole, I had to cast Health to Mana to recover enough power to keep us aloft. The spell hurt; I felt the pain of my life force shifting, some of it being sacrificed to reinforce my pool of magical power. I set down on Sue¡¯s back just in time, as my mana tapped out entirely.


    Kara lay there, not moving. I set down Hope and went to her side, feeling the side of her neck. I had a pulse, thank god. The sun was starting to sink, but it remained high enough in the sky to still cast some light down there. That let me do a quick assessment of Kara¡¯s condition. She was alive, but she had a bleeding gash on one side of her head¡ªI figured there was probably a concussion. One of her legs was also bent in a way that told me she¡¯d fractured it badly. As I checked the injury, it was easy to see how it happened. Kara¡¯s foot must have slipped between two of Sue¡¯s ribs, and then she fell sideways. Both her tibia and fibula were snapped, and a fragment of one of the bones was jutting from her leg.


    That was so not good. With the fracture being compound¡ªthe bone breaking through the skin¡ªthere was no way I could safely reset it myself. I pushed aside my worry and focused on my medical training. Stop the bleeding, first. Thankfully, there wasn¡¯t much. I yanked the first aid kit from our gear, where it was strapped to Sue¡¯s back, and pulled out some gauze pads and wraps, along with a cervical collar.


    I also needed to immobilize the leg. I had something for that, too, a plastic splint. Not perfect, but it would do.


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    Ants scuttled out from small passages, crawling curiously toward us. Then a much larger one arrived on the scene. It was tier two, about twice the size of the smaller ants, and acting a lot more aggressively toward me.


    ¡°Hope, keep them off me while I take care of Kara, okay?¡±


    Hope barked, then turned toward the offending ant and gave out her best howl. The magical attack stunned the ant, knocking it from the wall. Sue¡¯s tail finished it off a moment later.


    First up was the collar. As I fixed it around Kara¡¯s neck, she murmured something. What, I couldn¡¯t tell, but if she was starting to come back around, she was going to be in a lot of pain in a few minutes. There wasn¡¯t much I could do about that. I didn¡¯t have any spells that could heal her. Maybe we needed to get Kara to learn Drain Life, too? She already had a lot of black crystals, and that would allow her to heal herself.


    That was something for another day, though. Wounded and unconscious, she was in no shape to socket new crystals.


    The skull injury was already scabbing over. No major bleeding there, so I didn¡¯t worry about blood loss, and the cervical collar should help if she¡¯d hurt her neck in the fall. That left the leg, which was still bleeding fast, but in a way that told me the bone hadn¡¯t sliced an artery.


    I stabilized the leg as best I could and wrapped gauze around the slow bleeding wound to slow her blood loss. It was obvious Kara needed a healer, badly. The only place I knew for certain I could find one was the damned Guard base, and it was a good half hour away.


    While I was thinking, something cut into my leg, stabbing pain crashing through my concentration. I turned and saw an ant had snuck up Sue¡¯s side, past Hope, and managed to bite my calf. Those pincers hurt! I¡¯d sheathed my sword, but it flowed from my scabbard in a single smooth motion, cutting the ant in half. The bottom half fell into the dirt below, but the top half unfortunately remained attached to my leg.


    I stared at those beady black eyes. I felt sure the damned thing was dead, but it still looked like it was glaring at me. I sheathed the sword again, then reached out with both hands to pry the pincers out of my leg.


    Yeah, it hurt as much as it sounded like. I ground my teeth together, blood pooling around my fingers as it poured from the wound. Ordinarily, removing something from a deep puncture wound was a bad idea, but I didn¡¯t have to worry about that too much. My mana was still near-zero, but I¡¯d had just enough time to recover the power for one more Drain, and I cast it on the next ant I saw. It died, and its life force flowed into me. Watching my leg knit itself back together in real time was almost worth the pain of getting the wound.


    Hope was fending off two more ants, and more were swarming under and around Sue, who bellowed as the ants bit into dinosaur bones. I needed mana, badly. A quick Health to Mana gave me a bit, which I used to Drain another ant. I repeated that cycle a few times, rebuilding my mana as fast as I could.


    Then I dropped a Heal Undead on Sue. It wasn¡¯t enough. The dinosaur was badly damaged. Mostly, it was from the fall, but the ants were also slowly pecking away. I cast a second Heal Undead as soon as the spell allowed me. Sue roared, staggering back onto newly-healed legs, and then sent a Fireball spinning down the passage ahead of us. It exploded, scorching a swarm of ants that had been headed our way.


    Kara and Sue were both stable now, and Sue was even helping in the fight. That gave me the breathing room to work on figuring out what to do next.


    Kara needed help, badly. I had to get her back to the Guard as quick as I could. My issue was that while I could fly out of this place, the experiment with bringing Hope down with me demonstrated that I lacked the capacity to lift other people with me. Maybe once I ranked it more, I could carry someone. But right now, I had no way to lift Kara back out of the deep hole.


    If Kara was almost impossible, Sue was completely so. Even if I¡¯d been able to fly Kara out, I¡¯d have to abandon Sue, which wasn¡¯t ideal.


    No, we needed to find another way out.


    The good news was, I knew there was another way out. It was through the center of the ant nest, yeah. But if I could torch my way through this place, I figured I could eventually find my way to the exit. Some of the tunnels were very small, but others, like the one where Sue stood, were much larger. I had a bad feeling that implied the presence of bigger ants, but maybe they were just main tunnels, designed to carry more ants at the same time?


    Yeah, there was no way I was going to get that lucky.


    The other thing I couldn¡¯t do was ride Sue to get out. As low as the ceiling was, Sue would have to move through the tunnel almost at a crouch. Anyone on the dino¡¯s back would get scraped off by the roof.


    I could walk. It would be risky, but I was fast, strong, and had plenty of magic at my fingertips. Kara, on the other hand, was still unconscious. I needed someplace safe to stash her. But where?


    ¡°The ribcage!¡± I smacked my forehead. That would work. The dinosaur¡¯s ribs were thick and sturdy, and most of the gaps were thin enough that even the smaller ants would struggle to pass between them. I¡¯d even thought about draping something over Sue¡¯s ribs to turn the whole thing into a sort of covered wagon.


    For the time being, it would work as a place to stow Kara while we got out of this deathtrap. I scooped her up in my arms easily enough¡ªthat Strength stone showing its merits again! She moaned and shifted, but didn¡¯t wake. I dropped from Sue¡¯s back to the ground below, using my Flight to slow our descent. Then I carefully maneuvered Kara into the gap between Sue¡¯s ribs and hip bones, essentially laying my friend down on Sue¡¯s sternum.


    A few quick knots later, I had Kara fixed solidly to the bones with rope. It was as good as I was going to get. I turned to Hope. ¡°Keep her safe. Don¡¯t let anything get near Kara, okay?¡±


    Hope yipped. I had to trust she¡¯d do a good job defending our friend, because I needed to lead us out of this mess. I moved up to stand under Sue¡¯s head and gave the T.rex a pat.


    ¡°You ready to bust loose from this mess?¡±


    Sue roared, the sound echoing down the tunnel.

 Chapter 94 - Kingdom of the Ants

    Chapter 94 - Kingdom of the Ants


    To set the tone, I had Sue send a Fireball down the dark passage ahead. It flew a good ten meters before it hit a wall, bursting into a gout of flame and setting several nearby ants alight. The ants burned merrily, which was a good thing, since my NightVision expert was taking a cat nap.


    Those flames gave me enough light to see by, though, which was awesome because there were a LOT of ants headed our way. My mana was still recovering, but I still had enough oomph in me to hit one of them with a Drain Life before they got close.


    After that, they were all over us. Sue crunched one ant after another between her teeth, and I slashed wildly with my sword at the ones near enough, stomping on some of the others. A few moments later, and the rush was gone. For the moment, anyway.


    I tapped a dead ant to see if I¡¯d get crystals from them, and was gratified to have a clear crystal pop into my hand. That was the best news all day. These things went down pretty quickly, most of them being tier one and all. I reached out to each body I could find, tapping each. It was mostly clear stones, but I also got a few green ones and even one that was a sort of grey color, almost like iron or steel.


    There was enough time to take a closer look at that one before popping it into my bag. It wasn¡¯t a spell or a skill, interestingly enough. Instead, it was a passive power called Natural Armor. That definitely bore further investigation, when I had some time.


    For now, though, I needed to press ahead and get us all out of this death trap. ¡°Sue, let¡¯s march.¡±


    I started down the passage, moving slowly at first to make sure Sue would actually fit. It was a tight squeeze, but the dinosaur managed to hunch over enough to make it into the tunnel. We followed it forward as it curved around to the left. Unfortunately, I was pretty sure we were angling downward instead of up. We needed to find another passage up if we were going to get out of there. There was no way to go back, though; I¡¯d already seen the opposite side of the passage was buried in rubble and dirt from the collapse. We¡¯d have to push on and hope we found an upward-moving passage.


    The fires lighting our way were starting to gutter out, and I¡¯d reached the point were I was about to walk past them anyway, so I shifted my shield around to my back and pulled one of my precious chem-lights out of a pack. I snapped the thing against my thigh and held it aloft in my left hand, sword still in my right. It didn¡¯t cast a ton of illumination, but the dim green glow was much better than total darkness.


    Scrabbling sounds came from somewhere up ahead, the sound of many small feet scraping through soil. I readied my weapon, and as soon as the first enemy antennae came into view, I ordered Sue to fire at them again. The Fireball detonated right on the nose of an extra-large ant. Some sort of soldier or warrior bug, I was guessing¡ªbut as tough as he might have been, he wasn¡¯t a match for Sue¡¯s magic. The ant crisped, catching fire, and a couple of the other nearest enemies caught flame as well.


    These ones were tier two. Definitely tougher than the first batch. Sue¡¯s spell killed three outright and injured a couple more, but after that they spread out, taking to the walls and ceiling as well as the floor as they rushed toward us.


    Was I wishing I¡¯d loaded in Contagion instead of one of my other spells? Yes I was. No time to swap it out, though. I¡¯d have to make do with what I had.


    Sue bit one of them off the ceiling while two others came at me along the walls. I ducked back, using Sue¡¯s bulk as cover, and slashed with my sword at the nearest enemy. My sword sliced into it, but didn¡¯t kill it outright. The ant bit angrily at my blade, mandibles clamping down on steel. If I hadn¡¯t added the Strength crystal, it might have been enough to tear the weapon out of my grasp.


    As it was, though? Not a chance. I twisted my grip on the sword, pivoting the blade so I had more wiggle room¡ªthen I leaned in, thrusting forward with the blade to impale the ant along its length.


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    That still cost me time, though, which let another ant get near enough to take a bite out of my left leg. The pain was intense, like fire running up my leg. It was one of the tier two ants¡ªdid they have venom of some sort? Or was it just that the mandibles were that much bigger?


    I wasn¡¯t sure, but I wasn¡¯t messing around, either. I slashed down at the thing with my sword, cutting off a pair of legs. That in turn got the bug to back up, letting go of me in the process.


    Which was exactly what I wanted. I didn¡¯t have time to pry the thing off my leg like I had last time. Better to bleed a little and then¡ªswoosh¡ªchop the bugger in half with another blow from my sword.


    The wound still hurt like hell, though, so I cast Drain Life on another of the ants as it approached. The ant died and my leg healed. That was the last of this batch, too. Sue had dealt with the others, so we were in the clear, at least for the time being. I tapped the dead, collecting another handful of crystals, and peeked back toward Kara.


    She was still unconscious. Hope stood there, guarding her, the bodies of two dead ants in front of her. I slipped back to touch the bodies for their crystals and give Hope a quick pat on the head. ¡°Good job, girl. Keep it up. We¡¯re getting out of here.¡±


    I said the last bit at least as much to convince myself as her. Hope would follow my orders regardless of how foolish they were. I was the only one who could get out of the ant tunnels easily, though. All I had to do was retreat back to the cave in and fly myself out. It would be easy.


    Sure, I¡¯d lose Sue, which would be a blow, and I¡¯d lose Hope. I¡¯d had her with me almost since the beginning, and I¡¯d miss her. But I¡¯d lose Kara, too. As much as I wanted to get out of this place, I couldn¡¯t just abandon my friend. It wasn¡¯t happening. Either we all got out, or none of us would.


    I moved back to my position under Sue¡¯s head, and we got moving again.


    The tunnel kept winding down, though. There were a good number of side tunnels which looked like they might go upward, but none of them were large enough for Sue, and I couldn¡¯t drag Kara out of this place without the dino. We were stuck following the only large passage in sight, even if it was taking us deeper into the ant nest.


    Another wave of ants came at us as we descended. This one was mostly tier one and two ants, a solid mix of both, but there were a few tier three insects in the mix, too. They were throwing everything they had at us, which made sense. The deeper we got into their lair, the closer we had to be to wherever they stored critical things. Stuff like larvae, eggs, food stores, and probably a queen ant were all down in this place somewhere, and we were growing closer to them with each step.


    Sue chomped one of the tier three ants, taking it down. I cast drain on another, weakening it, but a bunch of tier ones swarmed me before I could get another spell off to finish it. I fended them off with my sword, using my speed to dodge their attacks while backpedaling toward Sue. Having the dinosaur at my back just felt more solid, like at least enemies weren¡¯t coming from that direction.


    Oh, and Sue¡¯s Fireball spell was available again. The blast went off close enough to us that the heat scorched my face, but it wiped out most of the remaining ants in this wave. I Drained one of the remaining ones, killed another with my sword, and watched Sue happily crunch another one.


    A few taps of ant corpses, and the crystals were in my pocket. We kept moving, pressing ever onward. And downward! We still couldn¡¯t find a way up.


    There was something up ahead, though. I saw light beyond Sue¡¯s flames or my chem light for the first time since we¡¯d left the area around the cave in. It was dim, but the closer we got, the brighter it grew. We were definitely headed toward some sort of major nexus for the nest. I felt a thrumming vibration through the dirt underfoot, too. It wasn¡¯t quite a noise; it was a little soft for that. But the nearer we came, the more I felt it grow in strength.


    And then we came around a corner and I found myself face to face with the weirdest thing I¡¯d ever seen. Given that I¡¯d been living through a magical apocalypse, that was saying something!


    The tunnel opened up into a massive cavern. I wondered briefly how the ants had managed to tunnel something so large, so fast. But they¡¯d had time, and ants were pretty amazing creatures. The space was huge, like half the size of a football field. The ground was littered with eggs¡ªant eggs, everywhere, as far as the eye could see. Each of the eggs had a faint glow. That was what kicked off the light I¡¯d seen, and it illuminated the whole space enough to see the rest.


    Dozens of small tunnels sprang from the cavern, leading in all directions. But right across the way was one other large tunnel, a match for the one we¡¯d been traveling in¡ªonly this one led upward. With luck, that was our exit!


    Something near the far wall shifted, moving where I hadn¡¯t expected movement. I gasped, whirled to face it, and realized that it was much, much larger than I¡¯d thought. The creature was about the size of two cars parked nose to nose, and as I watched it laid another egg on the cave¡¯s dirt floor.


    Well, shit. I was pretty sure I¡¯d found the queen.

 Chapter 95 - Full Ripley

    Chapter 95 - Full Ripley


    The room had dozens of entrances, and in the dim glow given off by the eggs, I saw twitching antennae sticking out from all of them. Hope gave a soft growl of warning. I looked back¡ªbehind us were more ants, lining the walls and floor of the passage we¡¯d just come through.


    All of those little waves of ants, they¡¯d been to slow us down enough so that once we reached this place, it would be well defended. Now we were surrounded. Ants crawled from some of the smaller holes, taking up positions between us and their queen.


    Ever seen that movie Aliens? That scene at the end where the hero goes down into the alien nest to rescue the girl and comes face to face with the queen alien, in a room full of eggs, with tons of the warrior aliens all over? Yup, that was me.


    I¡¯d gone full Ripley.


    At least she¡¯d had a flamethrower to threaten the aliens with. All I had was¡­ Oh, yeah. I had a fire-breathing undead dinosaur. Pretty sure I actually had Ripley beat, in terms of firepower.


    ¡°Sue, send a warning shot into the ceiling, dead center of the room,¡± I said, keeping my voice soft.


    Sue growled, then aimed and fired. The ants reared back, the queen trying to hide herself, even though there was really no cover there for her. But the Fireball wasn¡¯t aimed at her, or any of them. It blasted harmlessly against the ceiling, knocking down some of the dirt from above to patter among the eggs.


    Now it was time to see how smart these things were. ¡°Sue, aim your mouth at the eggs right in front of the queen, and the queen herself. Don¡¯t fire. Just look scary.¡±


    I didn¡¯t know if the ants could understand English; the ratkin could, so anything was possible in this world now. If they could, saying my commands aloud might help me out here. If not, it wasn¡¯t doing any harm. My hope was, the ants would get the idea that there were two ways this mess could end. One of them involved me torching their queen and every egg in this room.


    Nobody moved for a long moment. The ants held their positions, even the ones behind us. So did we. I let it wait a beat, and then I gave Sue the mental order to begin moving slowly toward the other large tunnel, the one I hoped would bring us back to the surface. The eggs were all over the cave floor in the middle of the room, so I kept Sue marching around the outside edge, where there were no eggs to crush. The last thing I wanted to do was accidentally break this fragile truce we had going on.


    Hope whined, and I turned to look. A horde of ants marched slowly out of the passage we¡¯d just left behind. There were too many of the damned things to count. It wasn¡¯t good at all. If they all came at us, I wasn¡¯t sure we could pull off a win, even with Sue.


    ¡°It¡¯s okay, girl. Keep an eye on them, though,¡± I told her. I hoped that I was right.


    We kept moving, straight on toward the other large tunnel. Ants scuttled clear of our path, moving out of our way as carefully as we steered clear of their eggs. One ant made a move like it would lunge toward me and I held my sword pointed directly at an egg. It froze¡ªthen backed away slowly. Yeah, they got the idea. I¡¯d figured a larger ant with a bigger brain might be smarter than the originals, and this was strong evidence I was right.


    We kept moving, making a steady pace toward the tunnel. Then we were there, and a good dozen tier two and three ants poured out of our escape route, acting at first like they were taking up positions to bar our way.


    ¡°Sue, remind them,¡± I called out, sending mental orders to the dinosaur. Sue turned and roared, the magical attack echoing back and forth inside the chamber. Every ant in the place except the queen froze in place; she did the opposite, practically writhing.


    I had a better look at the ant queen now. She was tier five! Impressive. I wondered how close she was to getting her own Domain, just like the goblin mage? If she ended up with a Domain, how powerful would she eventually become? The queen shuddered, then clacked her mandibles together, the first sign of any sort of audible communication I¡¯d seen from them. If I remembered right, ants communicated mostly via pheromones, but also with visual, auditory, and touch signals.


    They were complex creatures before the Event, and now they were a thousand times bigger and smarter to boot? Suddenly I found myself wishing for more giant spiders, except I had a feeling the ants would tear them apart!


    The ants ahead of us snapped out of their daze and immediately moved off to the left and right. A few of them took up positions among the eggs, like they were protecting them, while others skittered up the cave walls, watching us from higher vantage points.


    We were almost to the cave, and I found myself wondering what happened next. In the movie, the aliens don¡¯t let the hero leave the room, and she had to torch the place¡­ As I thought about it, I realized that as soon as we left this chamber and the queen was safe, they were just going to come after us. It was only fear of what we could do to them that was keeping them at bay for now.


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    ¡°Shit. Well, this is just gonna suck, isn¡¯t it?¡± I said aloud.


    I turned back to the queen ant. She was surrounded by other ants, now. They¡¯d swarmed across her¡ªshielding her, I realized. They were like armor! Sue¡¯s Fireball might not even wound the queen, if they got enough ants protecting her. It was a neat trick, and made me even more certain our detente was about to end.


    ¡°Listen,¡± I told her, calling out as loud as I could. I had no idea if she could understand me, but¡­maybe. It was at least worth a try. ¡°You let us go, I¡¯ll leave you be. I won¡¯t come back. I¡¯ve got no bone to pick with you.


    ¡°But attack me while I¡¯m trying to save my friend, and all bets are off. I will get out of here. I will bring her to safety. And then I swear to you, I will come back and burn every single one of you to a crisp. Not one ant will survive. I¡¯ll bring this entire nest down. I don¡¯t know if you can understand what I¡¯m saying¡ªbut if you can, this is your only warning.¡±


    I held my blade up so that I was sure she could see it, then I sheathed it. Maybe she would understand that gesture, if she didn¡¯t get any meaning from my words?


    Crossing my fingers, we left the cavern behind and slipped into the second large tunnel. It wound counterclockwise, and had an upward angle steep enough that I could feel it under my feet. At least we were moving in the right direction! The darkness was closing in quickly as we left the dim light from the eggs behind, and my chem light was fading, so I dropped it and took out another.


    In the space of time between dropping the fading light, its dim glow then mostly shrouded by soil, and getting a second light ready, I almost died.


    I snapped the new light and held it aloft to see the beady eyes of a tier three ant directly in front of me. It was on the wall, mandibles at my eye level, and about to strike. I snapped my left arm in the way, hoping to take the blow there instead of on my head, and reached for my sword with the other hand.


    But it was Sue who saved my ass. The dinosaur chomped down on the thing, ripping it off the wall and biting it in half.


    It hadn¡¯t been alone. A swarm of ants rushed down the hall toward us from the front, and Hope¡¯s barking told me the same had to be true behind us. There was no time to hesitate¡ªI had Sue drop a Fireball at almost point-blank range in front of us. As the flame shot forward I dove between her legs, getting myself out of the line of fire.


    With my Agility, rolling quickly back to my feet was easy enough. The passage ahead was a mess of burning ants. The Fireball did its work, but Hope was engaging a stack of ants behind us, and she was getting overwhelmed.


    ¡°Sue, bust through!¡± I ordered her to move forward at a steady walk, hitting the ants with more Fireballs each time her timer came up. Then I was back with Hope, who was about five seconds from dying.


    I dropped a Heal Undead on her to bring her back up to strength, and then went after the ants with my sword. Most of these were tier one and two. With my Agility, they might as well have been standing still. I cut through Hope¡¯s assailants like they were nothing. One after another died on my blade, and aside from a few scratches when they got lucky hits on my arms or legs, I wasn¡¯t even getting hurt.


    A Drain Life on the tier three I spotted coming our way recovered the health lost from the small wounds. The ant I¡¯d hit with the spell decided discretion was the better part of valor or something, because it turned around and ran back down the passage toward the queen. Weird. Why run from a fight?


    Maybe it wasn¡¯t running after all, but bringing a message, because shortly after the tier three took off, the ants stopped pressing us so hard. Then they pulled back entirely. I was panting, but unhurt. I wiped huge amounts of ant goop off my blade, then sheathed it. If I had a few moments, I wanted to use them to collect the crystals from the ants I¡¯d slain.


    I did that as fast as I could, then followed behind Sue and grabbed the stones from the ones they¡¯d crisped or bitten.


    We were hit a few more times as we proceeded toward the surface, the spiraling path slowly winding its way up. But each attack was small, with low tier ants. The raids felt almost desultory.


    One of those attacks came rushing out of a side passage, but Sue tossed a Fireball down the tunnel before too many could get out, and we polished off the remainder together. Once the ants were all dead, I ducked into the side passage quickly to tap the Fireball-slain ants for crystals. I¡¯d just started when I realized there was a small room ahead.


    The smell told me what the room was before the dim light of the fire flashed off white bone and red flesh. I only got a glimpse, but what I saw made me want to throw up. I¡¯d found one of the ants¡¯ larders, and it was full of food. Some of that food was formerly human beings.


    Even if I hadn¡¯t sworn to take them down for attacking, I knew I¡¯d have no choice but to come back and finish this place off now. These creatures were hunting and eating people. I couldn¡¯t let that pass.


    It didn¡¯t take us very long to get out, after that. The larder was pretty close to the surface. I was incredibly grateful when I was able to suck in fresh air again. The evening breeze blew away the smell of ant¡ªI hadn¡¯t even realized how sharp and acidic it was until it was gone. I brushed dirt out of my hair while the moon shone down on us from above.


    We came out a short distance from the main anthill, at a smaller hill I guessed was some sort of backup entrance. I led Sue from there over to the nearest house.


    Kara still hadn¡¯t woke up yet, so once I was sure the house didn¡¯t have any people living there¡ªby virtue of the left side being gone, torn away by the ants¡ªI searched inside for some supplies. A mattress and a few blankets later, I had what I needed.


    I needed to get Kara to healers. The fact that she still wasn¡¯t awake told me for sure she had a serious concussion. She was breathing, her pulse was okay, but she needed healing now. I lifted her gently from Sue¡¯s ribs, then laid the mattress inside. I placed Kara on the mattress, wrapping her in blankets to keep her warm, then tied her down so she wouldn¡¯t shift around during what was going to be a very bumpy ride.


    In the distance, I sensed that I still had a couple of skeleton juggernauts out there. Most of my little undead strike force was dead, but it felt like there were no more undead for them to kill, so my survivors were just standing around. There wasn¡¯t time for me to wait for them, so I ordered them to stay put and kill any other undead they found.


    Then I crawled in beside Kara, to make sure she stayed safe.


    ¡°Run, Sue. To the Guard base, fast as we can!¡±


    Sue took off, long, loping strides eating up the ground as we rushed ahead, Hope sprinting at her side. I only hoped we¡¯d get there in time.

 Chapter 96 - Critical Condition

    Chapter 96 - Critical Condition


    The road back to the base was a long one, and I was worried, it being night, that we¡¯d get attacked every step of the way. Thankfully, most nocturnal monsters must have taken one look at a pissed-off T.rex skeleton steaming along at top speed and just decided to go elsewhere for dinner, because we weren¡¯t stopped even once. There was a brief moment when I saw a flight of avians winging their way toward us, but as soon as they were close enough to make out who we were, they turned right around and went back the way they¡¯d come.


    ¡°That¡¯s what I thought,¡± I muttered in their general direction.


    Kara¡¯s condition didn¡¯t deteriorate, but didn¡¯t improve either. I was worried for her nonstop. The bounding strides Sue took weren¡¯t making this an easy, gentle journey, and I had no idea what was happening inside Kara¡¯s skull. The longer she was out, the more certain I was she¡¯d suffered a life-threatening head injury.


    I ordered Sue to kick out a Fireball as we hit the final stretch toward the Guard base, aimed straight into the air like a flare. It ¡®popped¡¯ at about a hundred feet up, making a big fireworks style display that could probably be seen for miles. That was the point¡ªthe last thing I wanted was to sit outside their gate waiting for someone with authority to come open the thing up. Every minute counted.


    They¡¯d know who was coming when they saw the Fireball, and they¡¯d know it was important.


    As I¡¯d hoped, Farnsworth was atop the gatehouse over their southern gate when I arrived. I kept Sue sprinting until we were pretty close, at which point I brought the dino to a trot. He shouted down to me. ¡°Is something after you?¡±


    Made sense. He had to find out if there was danger for the base. I shook my head without thinking about it¡ªhe probably couldn¡¯t see me in the dim lighting, so I shouted back. ¡°No danger. But Kara¡¯s been hurt! She needs a healer, badly.¡±


    The doors were opening before I drew another breath, and I almost started leaking tears in relief. I¡¯d worried they might make some sort of production number over me coming in.


    Instead, Farnsworth was there on the ground as the gates opened, ushering all of us inside before closing the gate again.


    ¡°What happened?¡± Farnsworth asked.


    ¡°Long story. Tell you later. Right now, she needs healing, badly. Compound tibia and fibula fracture, but that¡¯s immobilized and I stopped the bleeding. She hit her head, hard, and she hasn¡¯t woke up since.¡±


    ¡°How long?¡±


    ¡°Over an hour now.¡±


    Farnsworth frowned. He knew as well as I did that wasn¡¯t great news. He barked orders to go get one of the base healers, and a younger man rushed off into the night.


    We carefully pulled Kara and the mattress out from Sue¡¯s ribcage and set them down on the ground. Farnsworth did a quick check of my dressings, but then grinned and glanced at me. ¡°You probably know more about this stuff than I do. You were training to be a doctor when this shit went down, right?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°Yeah, UVM medical school. Guess I still remembered enough.¡±


    Shouts told me more people were on their way. It wasn¡¯t one healer; the airman had gotten an entire team. Two men and two women rushed over, a wheeled stretcher between them, aid bags stuffed under it and slung over shoulders. They took a quick report from me, then got to work.


    Medicine post-Event was a weird combination of old world and new. I watched the medical team go to work. One of the men was older, with officer rank on his shoulders. I figured him for an actual Air Force doctor, which felt good. Our modern medical gear might mostly be trash now, thanks to electricity having vanished. But the skills and knowledge? That stuff was still valuable as ever.


    Two of the younger medics started casting spells, white glows suffusing their hands. I¡¯d seen Healing magic at work before, even had Henry cast heals on me, back when I was still working with Lords and his crew. God, was that just a week ago? It felt like a lifetime.


    They must have gotten Kara stabilized enough to feel safe transporting her, because two of them got a sheet under her and then lifted her into their stretcher before starting to push her away.


    ¡°Hey¡ªhow is she?¡± I asked.


    The doctor turned back toward me, and I caught his name patch. It read ¡®Levinson¡¯. ¡°You were right about the concussion. She took a nasty hit to her skull, and the bone is fractured. She had pressure building up inside the skull. Another hour, and her vitals would have crashed, and then¡­ Well, it was good you got her here so quickly.¡±


    ¡°Can you treat that?¡± I asked, worried. In the old days, the injury he was describing would have almost certainly required surgery to repair. Now, without all our tools, surgery was iffy at best. Was this something magic could heal?¡±


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    His immediate smile said the answer was yes. ¡°Of course. I don¡¯t pretend to understand how all of this stuff works, but we have several people with tier three Heal spells, and mine is tier four. We¡¯ve had to handle some very serious internal injuries, and our patients have come through it okay. We need to get her somewhere safe, where she can rest and be monitored. But your friend should be fine.¡±


    I sagged with relief. That was all I really wanted to hear. ¡°Thanks, Doctor Levinson. I can¡¯t tell you how glad I am to hear that. We raced here as quick as we could.¡±


    He nodded, then followed his team back toward their medical building, while I waited for my heart rate to slowly come back down to normal levels. It had been a near thing, just as I¡¯d thought. If I hadn¡¯t been able to get Kara here so fast, she¡¯d have died.


    I walked over to Sue, who was crouched down low to make it easier to extract Kara, and patted their head. ¡°Thanks. Couldn¡¯t have done any of that without you.¡±


    Sue made a rumbling sound in response.


    ¡°Now that your friend is out of danger, you want to fill me in on what happened out there?¡± Farnsworth asked. ¡°If there¡¯s something out there bad enough to threaten your team, then my team needs to know about it. Most of our scouting groups aren¡¯t half as well set up as you.¡±


    I was willing to bet none of his teams were as powerful as mine, if I was being honest, but there was no point rubbing noses in that sort of thing. ¡°Ants. We went to the cemetery, found lots of undead, and a giant ant nest nearby. We bypassed the ants and went for the undead. I split off from Kara and Sue while I fought a bunch of them. They¡­fell through. Into the ant nest.¡±


    I gave Farnsworth a quick summary of everything that happened after that. He whistled at the description of the egg chamber, but otherwise remained silent while I finished telling my story.


    ¡°That¡¯s crazy. We¡¯ve seen a few giant spiders, but no ants yet. Guess we¡¯ve been lucky. I¡¯ll pass it along to Turner, so our teams can watch out for more,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°We¡¯ll want to wipe out any nests nearby. If they¡¯re hunting and eating people, that makes them an existential threat. What are your plans about the nest you found?¡±


    ¡°Oh, I¡¯m finishing what they started,¡± I told him. ¡°If they¡¯d let us leave without a fight, if they¡¯d been willing to allow us to just walk away in peace, then I¡¯d have followed my promise and let them be. But they didn¡¯t. I said I¡¯d burn their nest to ashes if they attacked. I don¡¯t know if they understood me. Probably didn¡¯t. I have to say, I don¡¯t much care. I intend to go back and finish what they started.¡±


    He nodded, rubbing his chin. ¡°I¡¯m assuming you don¡¯t want backup?¡±


    I flashed him a toothy grin. ¡°Oh, I think I can handle this one.¡±


    Farnsworth laughed. ¡°I¡¯ll bet you can. Come on. I¡¯ll take you over to the medical center. You can check in on Kara, I¡¯ll get you some hot coffee, and then if you want, we can find a bunk for you somewhere so you can get a little rest.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± I replied. I wasn¡¯t sure about the rest, but the coffee sounded good. After practically living on the stuff throughout college, I missed it. Once the stockpiles of coffee beans, grounds, and instant stored locally were gone, we¡¯d probably have to do without forever, so it made coffee a damned valuable commodity. ¡°What about Sue? You want me to send her back outside the walls?¡±


    Farnsworth shook his head. ¡°No. I think we can make an exception for Sue at this point. The dino can stay inside the walls for now. Just order her to stay right near the gate, please?¡±


    ¡°Can do.¡± I sent the order. ¡°There. Sue won¡¯t budge, and any avians coming this way will have a bad night ahead of them.¡±


    ¡°Good enough. Let¡¯s get you that coffee.¡±


    A little while later Farnsworth had me sitting in a chair next to Kara¡¯s bed, sipping a warm mug while I watched her sleep. I¡¯d given the medical team a pair of clear crystals I¡¯d picked up from the ants, one Intellect and one Strength. It wasn¡¯t a lot, but I figured it would work as payment, or at least as a thank-you for their services.


    Kara lay there, not moving, more pale than I¡¯d ever seen her. I hoped she would wake soon, but the Levinson said she might sleep through the night. Healing took a lot from a body, and even though Kara had Stamina stones, there was only so much healing they could perform at any given time, with injuries this severe. Her bones were knitted back together, and they¡¯d removed the swelling from her brain. The brain trauma itself was going to take some time to heal, though. It wasn¡¯t something they could fully rush, or at least, not something the doctor felt comfortable rushing.


    ¡°Damn it, Kara. We need to get you some sort of healing,¡± I murmured. I thought again of the Alchemy crystals in my pouch. Maybe those would let me make healing potions or something? If I had something like that, then I might have been able to better stabilize Kara right away, and she could have avoided a lot of the risk.


    Giving her a few of my Drain Life stones would help, too. She might not be able to socket them yet, but she was going to keep growing, and with all the black crystals she already had, Drain Life would only make her stronger still. I reached into the pouch and slipped two of those out, carefully setting them on her bedside table, so Kara would find them when she woke up.


    Then I stood and turned to go, glancing back over my shoulder one more time to smile in her direction. Kara was a good friend in a time when having those was more precious than just about anything else.


    I met Levinson outside the room and told him I¡¯d left the pair of crystals for Kara. He told me he¡¯d make sure she got them, and they didn¡¯t go missing.


    ¡°Thanks for all your help, doc. I can¡¯t tell you how much I appreciate it.¡±


    ¡°No trouble, really. It¡¯s my job, after all,¡± Levinson said. ¡°And you¡¯ve done more than enough to help us, you know! Between bringing in refugees to help increase our numbers, and fighting the undead and goblins and god only knows what else¡­ You¡¯ve made quite a name for yourself around here. I think you¡¯ll find a lot of folks will go out of their way to help, if you need it.¡±


    That felt weird, but I¡¯d take it. I turned to go.


    ¡°You need a place to get some rest?¡± Levinson asked.


    I shook my head. Between my stamina crystals and the coffee, I was feeling up for round two, and the longer I gave the ants to prepare, the harder the fight was going to be. ¡°No, I¡¯ve got a hot date with a certain queen ant.¡±


    He blinked, then shrugged. ¡°If that¡¯s what you want. Master Sergeant Farnsworth is out by the gate where you came in. You should be able to get back out the same way without any trouble. Good luck¡ªstay safe!¡±


    ¡°Thanks again, Doctor.¡± I flashed him one more smile, then turned and left the building, marching through the cool night air back toward the gate where Sue and Hope waited for me.


    It wasn¡¯t me who needed to worry about being safe. Not tonight.

 Chapter 97 - Evil Men

    Chapter 97 - Evil Men


    Carver slipped from shadow to shadow, silently moving through the darkened city streets. His scouts had investigated the situation at the waterfront extensively over the past few days, but as diligent as they¡¯d been, they had their limits. The so-called pirates infesting the waterfront might dress in an outlandish style, and the entire premise of their group struck him as ludicrous. But they were still dangerous and guarded their Domain jealously.


    Gideon''s people had done their best. But the forces guarding the pirate stronghold were simply too strong. His scouts could observe troop movements, boats coming and going, and report on similar major happenings. No matter what they tried, they couldn''t get past the perimeter, to see what was happening deep inside the pirate camp.


    That was information Carver very much wanted. Were these people threats? Potential allies? From what he''d read in his scouts'' reports, Carver thought the former was more likely than the latter. But with their base so close to his, he desperately needed better intelligence.


    So he''d done the only thing that made sense. He''d gone in himself.


    This wasn''t an expedition taken without forethought, though. Quite the contrary. Gideon spent extensive amounts of time preparing himself before setting out on the operation. He had even gone so far as to remove some of his lower tier crystals, replacing them with specialty spells that were far better suited to the circumstances.


    Now he could create darkness. He could teleport from one pool of shadow to another. And he could move through shadows without being seen. Altogether, it was a skill set any cat burglar or spy would have loved back in the old world. In this new world, it might just be enough to see him through the night in one piece.


    Moving through the city was far simpler at night than during the day, especially with his new powers. Being able to jump from a hiding place within one pool of shadow to another sped his progress up enormously. That was doubly true when he could simply create a region of darkness using magic and then use it either as a hiding place or a Phantom Step target. Gideon snapped a teleport spell, Phantom Stepping to a rooftop. From there he spied another shadow on the roof of a neighboring building. Another quick burst of mana and he jumped across the gap between the two buildings instantly, appearing on the other roof.


    "I could get used to this," Carver murmured softly to himself. Sometimes, the fun of casting magical spells was almost enough to allow him to forget everything he¡¯d lost due to the Event. It didn¡¯t happen often, but he enjoyed it when it did.


    Of course, that was always followed by the crushing memory of those losses. The brief joys never lasted. How could they, with the center of his universe dead?


    He pressed on, continuing his jumps from rooftop to rooftop, each Phantom Step carrying him that much closer to his destination. It was easy enough to see where he was going. The entire waterfront was lit up almost as much as it had been before the Event. How they done it, he didn¡¯t know. The light wasn¡¯t coming from candles or lanterns, so he didn''t know quite what to make of it. More information would be good, because having magical lights would certainly make life easier for the humans living in his fortress. If he could even find out what the spell was, and what creatures might drop it, that would be valuable information.


    Finally, his short teleports brought him near enough that he could see into the heart of the pirate base.


    The streets nearest to the waterfront were awash with glowing globes of magical light. Guards were scattered here and there, each of them walking what looked like well-established paths. Well, even if there was a pattern to the guard movements, there were enough of them that approaching further would be difficult indeed. Instead of delving deeper, Gideon increased the shadows around himself, making it that much more difficult for a lucky guard to spot him. From that perch, he maintained his vigil, continuing to observe and looking for any additional information about the nature of these pirates.


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    The stories had been bad. Refugees fleeing east told stories of slavery, murder, and every other vice humanity had managed to invent. The horrors people talked about were almost too extreme to believe, but it was quite possible those rumors were true.


    If that was the case, Gideon wanted nothing to do with these people. But he felt sure some people were telling scary tales of the evil necromancer and his fortress, so he was hesitant to believe such stories without more evidence. He decided the best way forward was to see the truth himself, rather than relying on secondhand reports.


    He held his position for over an hour before he saw clues about the information he was looking for.


    A large sailboat slipped toward the docks, coming east from the wider lake beyond. It was the first truly interesting thing he had seen since arriving. Gideon waited while the crew began to unload cargo. At first, they were hauling ashore typical scavenged goods. They had boxes of food, clothes, assorted camping gear, and other survival supplies. There was nothing wrong with any of that. Everyone was making their way in the world as best they could, Gideon included. He''d had his people and his undead alike out scavenging for similar supplies. People relied on such things, and for the time being they were available in abundance from abandoned stores and homes.


    But after the supplies were unloaded, the pirates went back into their ship and hauled ashore their other ¡®cargo.¡¯ This time, it was humans. It was obvious from even a casual glance the level of cruelty and evil that was at play here. The ship had ten prisoners aboard, all adults or teens. There was no gray hair among them; Gideon guessed any older people unlucky enough to be caught were simply slain. Seven of them were women. He grimaced at that number, not liking what it implied at all.


    Each of the prisoners was mostly naked and chained, bound both hand and foot. The pirates shoved them roughly across the docks toward the shore.


    One man struggled to protect a younger woman from the pirates¡¯ brutal hands, but these pieces of human trash were having none of it. The man struggled to shield her one too many times, and earned a knife in the back for his efforts. The ship¡¯s crew tossed him, still struggling, over the edge of the dock to splash into the water below. The man didn¡¯t surface again.


    Gideon gnashed his teeth together, wanting nothing so much as to jump down there and free those prisoners. Killing an enemy was something he could understand. Slavery and other cruelty like this? That wasn''t something he could tolerate.


    The only reason he held his position was because in his heart, he knew an assault would be futile at this point. He was one man. With his magic, he was very strong. Even at this distance, Gideon sensed that most of those pirates were tier two or three. Gideon was tier eight. He was stronger than any of the pirates he''d seen so far. Stronger than any half dozen of them, probably.


    But jumping down there to attack this enemy now would likely result in his death, and almost certainly not result in any of the prisoners being freed.


    Even if he managed to defeat the pirates in immediate view, they would certainly sound the alarm. There were just too many of them. He might escape, if he was lucky. But there was no way he could bring the prisoners to freedom with him.


    That hurt more than he wanted to admit. Even after all this time, he was still helpless to defend those in need from brutality, and that was a painful realization. He¡¯d worked tirelessly to expand his strength, plowing through hundreds of monsters to improve his skills and those of his growing population. Even after all of that, though, he wasn¡¯t strong enough to stand against all of these evil men. Not alone, anyway, and he hadn¡¯t brought his undead with him.


    No, it was better to bide his time, to wait a little longer and see where the pirates were storing their prisoners. He might not be able to rescue them today, but he would learn more about their operations. He needed as much intelligence as he could gather, and Gideon was perfectly willing to sit there all night to acquire it, if necessary.


    He settled in to wait, watching as they hauled their prisoners into what appeared to be their main base. It had been a museum once¡ªthe Echo Center, a massive stone structure, which was probably what made it a good choice. Once the pirates brought their prisoners inside, he lost track of their movements, but still he stayed, continuing to watch the site for any other clues or intel.


    He¡¯d stay as long as he could, a cold vigil for those who right now he felt sure were suffering new tortures under the hands of these monsters. Gideon would leave only just before dawn scattered the shadows he relied on to hide himself. But he would absolutely be back, in force.


    While he didn¡¯t have enough information about the pirates yet to launch a full-scale attack, there was one thing he was certain of. Although there was no way he could bring them down tonight by himself, these evil people would fall, and by his hand. Not this night; not now. But soon.

 Chapter 98 - Tier Seven

    Chapter 98 - Tier Seven


    We made much better time heading back to the cemetery than we had on road back to the base. I¡¯d had to keep Sue at a steady but slower than maximum pace, in order to make sure we didn¡¯t jostle Kara too much. Now I was free to just let Sue take the road at top speed. I¡¯d tied myself on the dinosaur¡¯s back, and Hope loped alongside us without any trouble keeping up.


    The ride gave me time to think about how best to approach this. I had every intention of finishing off the ants. That was happening. No question about it. But at the same time, I wanted to play this smart. I was far stronger than any of the ants individually. Even the queen was far weaker. Still, there were a lot of them, and as we¡¯d seen from the zombies, huge numbers of low tier monsters were still a serious threat, even to higher tier people.


    By the time we arrived I had a decent course of action in mind. Surprise wasn¡¯t going to be on the table no matter what I did. The ants would have scouts out and about even at night, and for all I knew they¡¯d feel Sue¡¯s footsteps through the soil even before they could see us. Since a sneak attack was out of the question, it made sense to prepare myself as best I could before launching the assault.


    I was down to just one skeleton juggernaut; I felt it off in the distance, standing by, patrolling the area and looking for more undead to kill. It was too far to send new orders, but the fact that there had been two when I left, and now there was only one, told me they¡¯d run into some more undead¡ªor perhaps ants attacked them? But they¡¯d been doing a lot of killing.


    My first step should be gathering all of the loot from the undead we¡¯d wiped out. I had Sue come in cautiously, skirting the ant hill with as much distance as we could manage. We stopped inside the southern end of the cemetery, and I slid down from Sue. This time, it wasn¡¯t my dino who was coming to the rescue.


    I turned to Hope. ¡°It¡¯s too dark, so I can¡¯t see shit out here, girl. I need your help. Remember when you dragged the skeletons back to me, before? I need you to do that for me again. Go around the whole area and gather all the dead skeletons. At least their heads, but get whole bodies when you can, okay?¡±


    Hope gave a soft woof and took off like a shot. She came back a moment later, an old skull in her mouth. She dropped it in front of me.


    ¡°Good girl! Now go get all the others!¡± I told her. She ran off again, and I tapped the skull. A clear tier one Intellect crystal popped into my hand.


    I ordered the juggernaut to attend me as well. As soon as it lumbered over, I gave it the same order I had given Hope¡ªgo get dead undead bodies. It staggered off and returned a few minutes later carrying most of a skeleton under each arm.


    All of this would have been a hell of a lot easier in daylight, but I wasn¡¯t willing to wait. Time mattered. The mall creature was growing stronger. If I wasn¡¯t doing the same, faster, then it would remain forever ahead of me. I had to keep moving, or catching up would be impossible.


    Once I had a few skeleton bodies to work with, I created another tier three juggernaut and sent it out after more bodies. The good news was, there were a lot of dead enemies around, so not only was I collecting a heaping pile of crystals, I also had a growing pool of bones to work from when it came to rebuilding my fighting force. Soon I had half a dozen juggernauts combing the overgrown grass, looking for skeletons to drag back to me.


    I let them work while I started sorting through the crystals I¡¯d gotten. The grey stone I¡¯d gotten from one of the ants interested me. It was a passive power, not something we had to activate, so in a lot of ways it was more like a stat crystal than a skill or spell. Once socketed, it would be ¡®always on.¡¯ The power was Natural Armor, and it apparently made you harder to injure. Tougher skin, tougher bones. I figured it would synch well with a high Stamina. I wasn¡¯t willing to dump my Flight stone to add it, though, at least not while it was still at tier one.


    There were also a dozen green crystals from the time in the ant nest. I had stones for Entangle, Stoneskin, Charm Animal, and one interesting crystal called Healing Infusion. From what I could tell of the latter one, it was similar to the Alchemy skill, but more limited. With Healing Infusion you could turn something into a healing potion or snack. So a cookie could become a healing cookie, or something like that anyway. To get more details, I¡¯d need to use the thing, and again¡ªFlight just felt more pertinent.


    It might be a good skill for Kara, though. I slipped it back into my pocket.


    On top of the other stones, there were also eighteen clear stones for assorted stats. It wasn¡¯t enough to rank me up¡ªnot yet, anyway. But it was a terrific start.


    Even after having made half a dozen undead to assist Hope in gathering the bodies of the creatures we¡¯d slain, it still took hours to bring them all to me. I checked my watch. It was a little after two in the morning, and by all rights I ought to have been exhausted, but¡­that was Stamina for you. With enough of it, I wondered if I¡¯d still need to sleep at all.


    Of the ants, there was no sign. Soon after I arrived, the few giant ants who¡¯d been out patrolling the area vanished back into their nest, and no more came out to replace them. They were holed up in there, probably getting ready to defend if I went in after them again. Sue loomed over me, an intimidating presence at the best of times, and the ants had already seen how hard the dinosaur¡¯s Fireballs hit. They clearly weren¡¯t going to come after me, which meant I needed to go back down there after them, instead.


    The idea didn¡¯t thrill me. There were a lot of small tunnels through that space. Some of them were probably too small for even Hope to wriggle her way through. Killing every ant in the complex might be out of the question, but I had a sense that wasn¡¯t necessary anyway. The queen was the one laying all of those eggs. Kill her, and the eggs stopped. Torch the eggs too, and the colony would be toast.


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    Easy enough, but I still wanted to be as strong as possible before I went back in there, so I waited while my undead continued gathering all the slain skeletons. To pass the time, I raised four fire skeletons to join the six juggernauts. Once we were in the ant nest, I had a feeling that a wall of heavy tanks would matter more than the ranged attackers. I needed minions with the ability to soak hits and survive waves of attackers more than I needed burst damage.


    I also collected the crystals and began sorting them into piles, so it would be easier to figure out what I wanted to do with them. My hope was that I¡¯d tier up at least one or two skills from all of this, and it looked promising. We¡¯d killed a lot of undead here.


    Finally, the undead were returning to me without carrying anything. They¡¯d scoured the entire cemetery, searching out more bodies, but they weren¡¯t finding anything else. I¡¯d hit the limit at last.


    But what a limit it was! This place was at least twice the size of the graveyard where I¡¯d done my first serious growth spurt, and it showed in the number of undead. I¡¯d killed scores of the things before Kara and Sue crashed into the ant nest, and the fighting force I¡¯d left topside had done for the rest of them, more slowly, but just as sure. All told, I¡¯d gathered two hundred and ten crystals from the undead, to add to the other stones I¡¯d won from the ants.


    It was insane. I stared at the pile of magic crystals. That pile represented wealth and power, in this new world. It was awesome, amazing, and I could hardly wait to bring Kara back her share of the loot. Because that was definitely happening, even if she wasn¡¯t going to be around for the finale.


    I had one hundred and twenty nine black stones. There were twenty-two Control Undead, twenty-seven Animate Dead, sixteen Drain Life, eight Augment Undead, two Health to Mana, three Contagion, four Curse, six Phantom Step, five Darkness, seven Heal Undead, seven Shadow Walk, fourteen Harm, and eight NightVision.


    That left eighty-one clear stones from the undead plus the eighteen from the ants, for a total of ninety-nine clear crystals. The breakdown there was far more even. I had eighteen Strength, seventeen Agility, fourteen Stamina, nineteen Will, nineteen Intellect, and twelve Charisma.


    The counting done, I started slotting stones. I¡¯d save what I could for Kara, but my primary focus right now had to be growing as strong as possible. If I was going to take on the ant nest solo, I needed to bring everything I had to bear.


    Control Undead went up to tier six. Unfortunately, there wasn¡¯t a lot I could do with that skill for the time being. Without undead to Control, it wasn¡¯t that awesome a skill, although it did earn me Hope and Sue, which was a lot. Once I went against the mall horde again, though, it would pay big dividends.


    Augment Undead went up to tier five. Health to Mana progressed to tier three, which ought to be a nice boost. Heal Undead went up to tier five, opening a new slot. Drain Life went up to tier six. I was certain I could do some serious damage with that spell now. I even had a few spare Drain Life stones left, which I planned to give to Kara.


    The biggest deal was Animate Dead, which went up to tier seven¡ªjust barely, but I had enough, with one stone left over. That was an enormous boost in power. Now, I could Animate up to sixty-four tiers worth of undead, and I had a ton of material to work with in the graveyard.


    The other major shift was in my stats. I didn¡¯t have quite enough new crystals to rank up most of my higher stats, but I did have enough to bring Strength up to tier five. That opened up a new slot for a clear stone, and since I really only had two options left¡ªIntellect and Charisma¡ªthe decision of which to use was pretty easy. I slotted Intellect and was delighted to see that I had enough stones to immediately rank Intellect to tier five!


    The rush I felt, implanted that stone, made me regret not doing it sooner. I suddenly understood so much more about my spells and powers. A lot made sense intellectually that I¡¯d been guessing at intuitively until now. Among other things, I realized that my spells were now quite a lot stronger. My Drain would hit harder, and my Heal Undead was more powerful too.


    Ranking Intellect to five of course opened yet another slot. I wondered about what to put there. Should I add Charisma, and begin boosting that, too? The idea still left a bad taste in my mouth. Instead, I decided to see whether I could add a second stone of a type I already had. I combined a bunch of the Will stones together to make another tier five crystal, and tried to socket it.


    It worked.


    My mind felt more clear than it had ever been. My resolve, too, was so strong it almost felt like I was a different person. It took a few minutes for the sensations to settle down, and I sat, meditating, until they did.


    I¡¯d accomplished so much here. I was tier seven now, and had so many tier five and six stones that I was starting to have trouble keeping track of them all. There was still two spots left open for black stones. I waffled over which stones to add, and finally decided on Contagion, to help crush the ants in masses, and NightVision, so I could actually see down in their tunnels. I wanted to save most of the NightVision stones for Kara, but I could afford to take two, merge them, and insert them temporarily. I¡¯d take them out later, so she could have them. For now, being able to see in the dark would be a boon I couldn¡¯t refuse.


    Magical Stones


    Point 1: Black Stone (Tier 6) - Control Undead


    Point 1, Second Ring: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Augment Undead


    Point 1, Third Ring: Black Stone (Tier 3) - Contagion


    +


    Point 2: Black Stone (Tier 7) - Animate Dead


    Point 2, Second Ring: Black Stone (Tier 5) - Heal Undead


    Point 2, Third Ring: Black Stone (Tier 2) - NightVision


    +


    Point 3: Black Stone (Tier 6) - Drain Life


    Point 3, Second Ring: (Tier 3) - Health to Mana


    +


    Point 4: Clear Stone (Tier 6) - Will


    Point 4, Second Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 6) - Agility


    Point 4, Third Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Stamina


    Point 4, Fourth Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Strength


    Point 4, Fifth Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Intellect


    Point 4, Sixth Ring: Clear Stone (Tier 5) - Will


    Point 4, Seventh Ring:


    +


    Point 5: Yellow Stone (Tier 2) - Flight


    Spare Stones


    Black: Animate Dead x1, Augment Undead x5, Contagion, Control Undead x22, Curse (Tier 3), Curse x2, Darkness x5, Drain Life x4, Harm (Tier 2), Harm x15, Heal Undead x2, NightVision x6, Phantom Step x6, Shadow Walk x7


    Clear: Strength x6, Agility x1, Stamina x14, Intellect x7, Will x3, Charisma (Tier 4), Charisma (Tier 3), Charisma x12


    Green: Entangle (Tier 2), Entangle x3, Stoneskin (Tier 2), Stoneskin x4, Charm Animal x2, Healing Infusion (Tier 2)


    Gray: Natural Armor (Tier 2)


    Brown: Alchemy (x2)


    Control Stone (x1)


    It was enough. Really, I thought it was more than enough. There was still one slot open for another stat crystal, and I had enough Charisma stones to rank it up to tier five instantly, but the idea bothered me too much. I¡¯d think about it, but Charisma wasn¡¯t going to help me beat ants, anyway, right?


    I rose as my thoughts calmed and prepared myself for the assault on the ant nest. It was time. That queen was going down!

 Chapter 99 - Not the Scared Girl

    Chapter 99 - Not the Scared Girl


    Before I launched the attack I spent a few more minutes Animating additional troops. If I wanted to make absolutely sure we finished the job, that meant having all the troops necessary to make it happen. I already had six juggernauts and four fire skeletons, but that was only thirty points.


    With Animate Dead now at tier seven, I had sixty-four points to play with! That meant I could bring up another eleven tier three undead, which I quickly did. It tapped out most of the remaining raw materials¡ªthere were only so many undead, and a lot of the bodies my minions had gathered were missing pieces. Hope in particular had mostly grabbed skulls and brought them to me, so I was missing a lot of bones.


    Still, there were enough, and that¡¯s what mattered. By the time I was done, I had fourteen juggernauts and seven fire skeletons. I sent four of the tanks and two fire skeletons to the rear, behind Sue. Their job would be to make sure we didn¡¯t get ambushed. More accurately, they were there so I¡¯d know it when we got ambushed, anyway. I¡¯d feel it when they came under attack, and I could move to support them, or send other troops.


    The remaining skeletons made up a vanguard which I set up in front of Sue. The dinosaur was our mobile artillery platform. Sue could blast Fireballs often enough to be a serious player on the battlefield even without the big, nasty teeth, powerful tail, and stompy feet.


    About as ready as I could get us, I sent the army into the nest, intending to take the same route we¡¯d exited by. I was surprised, though¡ªthe ants had filled in the hole! They¡¯d blocked it off.


    I made sure my undead were out of blast range, then turned to my dino. ¡°Sue, if you¡¯d do the honors?¡±


    Sue roared, then spat a burst of fire at where the hole had been. It exploded against the soil, blasting chunks of dirt in all directions. That made a gap, but it wasn¡¯t enough¡ªthe ants had truly done a number on this entrance. It was almost enough to make me consider using their main tunnel, the one on the top of the big anthill nearby, but I worried. That entrance looked like it had a fairly big vertical drop, and while the ants could cling to the dirt walls, my undead couldn¡¯t.


    I had Sue fire at the hole again, punching a little deeper into the mess. It took five Fireballs before we broke through the feet of packed earth the ants had shoved in there to bar our path.


    The way was clear. I sent the skeletons in ahead, following right behind. Sue and Hope were with me, and then the rear guard last. One after another, we slipped under the dirt, tracking back down into the depths I¡¯d just escaped. Before, I¡¯d been on a timer. Kara¡¯s injuries needed treatment, fast, and there wasn¡¯t time to screw around. I¡¯d made a beeline for the exit.


    This time was the opposite. This time, I went down there intending to stay as long as it took to wipe this mess out, and we took our time, exploring any side passages my skeletons could pass through.


    We met resistance almost right away, but between Sue¡¯s Fireballs and the wave of powerful undead I¡¯d brought along, we repulsed their waves of attack without too much difficulty. I didn¡¯t even lose a single juggernaut, although I spent more time casting Heal Undead than I did anything else.


    Contagion was my other key spell. Once cast, it spread like wildfire among each wave of attackers. I could see the impact as each ant was infected, one after another. They staggered from the initial damage, and then crumpled a little more with each sequential pulse of damage over time.


    The upper caverns were some of the worst. That¡¯s where they stored ¡®recently captured¡¯ food. Some of it was animal, but the most common large animal around these parts was probably still humans, and ants were as happy eating us as they were anything else, apparently, because there were a lot of dead people stored there, pieced up and stacked in chunks. The smell was horrific, and I needed brain bleach for the visuals, but I clenched my jaw and kept going.


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    Every horrible thing I saw was simply more fuel to the fire burning inside me. This place had to be destroyed.


    We pressed deeper into the complex. Either they¡¯d run out of tier one ants, or they were saving them for later, because we were suddenly facing nothing but tier two and three adversaries. My undead were running into trouble now, and I struggled to keep up with the damage they were taking. It was time to push ahead a little bit myself, I realized. Time to see how far I could push myself.


    I darted forward, slipping between two of my juggernauts, and advanced on the ants with sword and shield. My first sword swing blew a tier three ant apart with a single blow¡ªthe raw power I had at tier five Strength shocked me! Another ant dove at me, mandibles clacking, but I sidestepped the blow like it was standing still, my Agility giving me speed the ants simply couldn¡¯t match.


    A dozen tier two ants stood their ground ahead of me. I stepped up to them, a whirlwind of destruction. Two died in seconds. The remainder attacked as a unit, two of them managing to get past my guard and land hits, but I ignored the wounds and cut those down as well. A Drain killed another, restoring my health at the same time.


    By then, the juggernauts had joined the fray as well. They stormed through the remaining ants, shattering the advance and killing them all.


    We pressed on, ever deeper. There were more side tunnels now, and as much as I wanted to clear all of them out, I realized my main focus would be better served driving deeper. The queen and her eggs¡ªthey were the real target. Everything else would probably die without her. That meant getting back to the egg chamber at the bottom.


    Of course, the ants probably knew we were headed that way as well. I¡¯d already seen they were smarter than their tiny brethren. These ants had enough smarts to hold off on attacking me while their queen was in danger, and then to relaunch their attacks once she was safe. They had to know where I was headed, which meant I was walking into a trap.


    Bad news for them. Putting me in a trap was a very good way to get yourself killed at this point.


    Each encounter just made me more certain of my new powers. When the mall undead attacked the fort, I¡¯d given ground immediately. With my new Intellect and the experience of using all these powers, I now saw that had been a mistake. Maybe the zombies would have won through anyway, but the fort would have been a tough nut for them to crack, even with my powers and skills weaker at the time.


    I just wasn¡¯t the scared girl I¡¯d been when all of this started. Even then, I¡¯d fought without hesitation, but I¡¯d been weak, fragile, and vulnerable. Now, though? Nothing short of a tier five monster was even a vague threat for me anymore. Even a dozen tier twos couldn¡¯t frighten me. Hell, if I faced off against a hundred tier one zombies, I had every confidence it¡¯d be me who came out on top.


    It wasn¡¯t like I was invulnerable or anything. I was still mortal, and the ants kept reminding me of that by getting bites past my shield and armor. But my Agility made me almost impossible to hit unless they swarmed me, my Stamina made me hard to kill even when they did get a lucky shot in, and my Drain Life spells healed me faster than they could dish out damage.


    We kept spiraling deeper into the dirt. Once, ants attacked from the rear, and I lost a juggernaut before I could get there to reinforce my rear guard. Once I killed the remainder of the attacking ants, I realized I had four points of Animate Dead handy again, so I used them to raise two of the tier two ants as Zombie Ants.


    I had to laugh out loud at that one.


    The zombie ants joined the rear guard to help keep our backsides secure, and I shifted back to the lead spot in our formation.


    Then all at once, I knew we were getting close. My NightVision had worked brilliantly for me since we entered. It wasn¡¯t a perfect see in the dark spell at this rank, but with the faint light from bursts of Sue¡¯s Fireballs or the flames from the fire skeletons, I had more than enough to see by. The whole trip had been like walking around just before dusk. I could see why Kara liked this skill!


    Now there was a dim light coming from up ahead, though. I knew that light. We¡¯d almost reached the egg chamber. If they were going to plant an ambush somewhere, this would be it, for sure. I had my wall of juggernauts take the lead again, ready to reinforce them with my magic, to Heal or Drain as needed.


    My first rank of undead stepped into the egg chamber, the soft light of the eggs making the cavern seem as bright as daylight with my NightVision active. I hadn¡¯t been wrong¡ªthe place swarmed with ants. There were at least a hundred of the things in there, maybe more, all mixed ranks.


    Past the army of insects, though, was my real target. The heart of this whole place, the being who absolutely needed to die, if I was going to put an end to their attacks on humans¡ªthe ant queen.


    She reared back, clattering her mandibles together. It was a signal. As a single wave, the ants rushed forward.

 Chapter 100 - Battle of the Cavern

    Chapter 100 - Battle of the Cavern


    I had my forces retreat a few feet, falling back a bit into the passage. There, my juggernauts formed a solid wall of bone, barring the ants¡¯ way. By holding them back just inside the tunnel, the ants could only come at us so many at a time.


    That didn¡¯t mean the defense was easy, though. The came at us along the walls and ceiling as well as the floor. The juggernauts weren¡¯t great at spotting the wall-crawlers and were useless against the ants on the ceiling, so I had the fire skeletons focus on those.


    The fighting was brutal. Ants flooded the passage until I could barely see the light leaking through from the eggs in the chamber beyond. They were all over us. Hope¡¯s barking from the rear warned me that this was a two-sided battle. I glanced back¡ªmy rear guard was holding on back there, but barely.


    There weren¡¯t as many ants to our rear, so I was betting that I could still escape if I wanted to. All I¡¯d need to do is shift our focus from most of my forces in the front to most behind, and we¡¯d manage to blast our way out, same way we did last time. That would mean letting this nest of horrors live, though, and that wasn¡¯t happening.


    Was it the right thing to do, wiping them all out? I had no idea if there were other ant nests in the world that had been enlarged by the Event. Maybe these creatures were the only ones of their kind anywhere. If I killed them all, was I making a species extinct? Was I becoming a monster, by fighting monsters? Thoughts like that briefly crossed my mind while I battled.


    I discarded them. If I had a choice, I¡¯d still aim for a peaceful solution, like I had with the avians. I¡¯d offered the same to the ants as well. Either the ant queen hadn¡¯t been willing to make a deal and let me leave with Kara safely, or they hadn¡¯t understood me well enough for the concept to get through. Either way, it made them a danger to any human in the area.


    We reached a detente, where the ants weren¡¯t getting anywhere but neither was I, and then the ants withdrew, pulling back. The ones attacking the rear guard vanished into side tunnels, giving us a clear path out, while the ones ahead of us withdrew into the main egg chamber. There they stood, waiting for us to make the next move.


    ¡°Smart. Too damned smart,¡± I muttered, eying the forces arrayed ahead of me. Over a hundred ants still stood out there, a formidable force. If they pinned me down, they¡¯d tear me apart in seconds. Same for my undead. Even Sue could be defeated by a mass like that.


    In the tunnel, they were limited in how they could come after us, but now they¡¯d pulled back to the large cavern. If we went in there after them, they could surround us, attacking from all sides. We¡¯d be in deep shit if that happened. If I stayed in the tunnel, they couldn¡¯t win, and they were intelligent enough to figure that out.


    I took the breathing room they¡¯d given me and put it to good use, making sure to Heal any of my undead that were injured. I wanted us all in peak condition before we went in there. While I was waiting for the spell¡¯s timer between casts, I tapped each ant corpse in range, collecting all the crystals I could. If for some reason I was forced to withdraw, at least I¡¯d have some more crystals to show for the assault.


    Pulling back might be the smarter move. I could head back to the Guard base and get some more warriors. Heck, maybe they had a few big barrels of jet fuel I could roll in there and blow up with Sue¡¯s Fireballs. That would cook the eggs and the queen, if I dropped them into this cave.


    But there was a part of me that didn¡¯t want to pull in outside help.


    I¡¯d experienced how strong I was outside, the afternoon before, when I¡¯d been blowing apart undead like they were rag dolls in the cemetery above. Then when Kara was injured I¡¯d been forced to push myself even more, to drive myself as hard as I could. Shocking myself as much as anyone else, I¡¯d won through the worst the ants could toss in my path.


    My gut said I could do that again here. After collecting all the crystals from outside, I was far stronger than I¡¯d been before. The last trip down there, I¡¯d pushed myself to the edge, and made it. But now, that edge was already much further along.


    It was time to see what I could do.


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    I passed orders to my undead silently, giving them their battle orders for the fight to come. Then I calmly drew my sword, hefted my shield, and shook out my shoulders as I stepped forward between my juggernauts.


    The cavern ahead was about twenty feet tall, which meant I had some wiggle room if I needed to fly upward to escape. So I did the dumb, illogical thing that my gut said was the right move. I rushed forward, shield ahead of me, barreling my way into the front rank of ants!


    My shield slammed into the first, and it exploded in a shower of ant parts, legs and chunks of chitin flying ahead of me.


    I took down another with a quick slash from my sword that severed its head from the rest of it.


    A stomp killed a third.


    I cast Drain Life to kill a fourth.


    It took them that long to react to my rush. The ants swarmed around me, trying to close in from all sides. The press was intense, so I did the logical thing¡ªI took to the air! With a burst of my Flight power, I went up toward the ceiling, leaving the ants trying to grab me behind. I soared past their front ranks and landed on the cave floor behind them.


    As a mass, the entire swarm turned and rushed me. I had their undivided attention, which was exactly what I had in mind. A quick glance over my shoulder told me that my undead were following their orders. Sue shot a Fireball into the ants¡¯ rear ranks, blasting apart a few, and the rest of my undead rushed in. Since the ants had turned to deal with me, few were still facing toward the other threat, and my undead got scads of free kills in.


    The ants kept after me, but that was fine. I dispatched a pair that got too close, but then I was airborne again, flitting my way through the cave toward the queen. She was the real threat. If I took her down, we¡ª


    BANG! I was knocked out of the air by something enormous slamming into me from above. I fell about ten feet, crashed into the sandy cave floor, and then whatever hit me piled down on top of me, crushing me into the dirt. I lost all my wind, and I was pretty sure I¡¯d broken a few ribs to boot. The pain in my chest, shoulder, and right arm was incredible.


    The pain that followed was even worse. Something tore into my right arm, right where it met my shoulder. I felt scraping along the linothorax I wore as whatever it was tried to tear through my armor, but my arm lacked protection and was savaged.


    I screamed, struggling to see what had attacked me. I was face down in the dirt, so it was hard, but I finally caught a glimpse of my attacker. A massive tier four ant was on top of me, jaws shredding my arm. Blood poured down from the growing wounds as it kept worrying at my shoulder, and I realized through the pain that if I didn¡¯t get the thing off me, it was going to bite right through the bone!


    On top of that, the rest of the swarm was still coming at me. The first one arrived, biting my leg and sending another wave of pain through me. I lashed out with my leg, my Strength enough that the kick shattered the offending bug, but there were so many¡ªwhen that wave hit me, I¡¯d be dead in minutes.


    I managed to reach out with my left arm and aim a Drain at the ant above me. It hit, and I felt almost immediate relief as the ant¡¯s health poured back into me, healing some of my wounds. It was more than the ant wanted to deal with¡ªthe creature backed away from me, clacking its mandibles angrily.


    That was my cue! I took off again, zipping skyward just in time, as scores of ants flooded the area where I¡¯d just been lying. Way, way too close.


    Flying was sapping too much of my mana. I couldn¡¯t keep it up very long, and now I saw more ants scaling the walls, moving toward the ceiling. The little creatures were smart; they¡¯d seen a tactic work, and now more of them were getting ready to try.


    I cast another Drain, killing a tier two ant and stabilizing my wounds. The healing felt so good that I gasped as the wounds in my arm and shoulder knitted themselves back together. I couldn¡¯t remember ever being hurt so badly. That one was closer than I wanted it to be.


    It was a good reminder, that I could still be hurt, even killed. I was strong. I¡¯d grown in power, enormously so. But an ambush could still surprise me, and the right series of attacks could still take me down for good if I wasn¡¯t careful. Once the timer expired on my Drain, I used Health to Mana, then Drained another ant.


    While I¡¯d been tied up on the ground, my undead had been busy. Their initial rush put the ants on the defensive, especially with most of the ants following me toward their queen. It left their rear heavily exposed, and my juggernauts tore into them, breaking apart one ant after another, while the fire skeletons picked off any that tried to circle around.


    But as I watched, Sue entered the fray.


    My dinosaur was big¡ªso big that down in these tunnels, there wasn¡¯t a lot Sue could do besides throw Fireballs as a mobile cannon. But that was in the tunnels. This cavern was more than big enough for Sue to go into action in a big way. The impact as Sue plowed into the rear ranks of the ants was almost comic¡ªI got to watch three ants sail through the air from the crushing blow. The dinosaur¡¯s tail lashed out, smashing another ant, and they grabbed a tier three ant in their jaws, crunching it apart.


    All of a sudden the ants had two targets to worry about again, which took a lot of the pressure off me. That left me free to face off against our primary enemy. Flitting forward, I dodged the places I saw ants trying to crawl along the ceiling above me, flying straight toward the queen ant.


    She screeched, giving off an audible sound again. Of all the ants, she was the only one I heard making vocalizations. She reared up, her front sections above the ground, jaws open as she prepared to meet me in combat.


    ¡°Come on, then!¡± I shouted as I dove from the sky to land on the ground in front of her, sword held between us. ¡°Let¡¯s go!¡±

 Chapter 101 - The Harder They Fall

    Chapter 101 - The Harder They Fall


    A tier two ant tried to get in my way, but a quick blow with my sword sliced it in half. I glanced behind me. Sue and the rest of my undead were keeping the remaining ants occupied. Sue had a way of taking up a lot of space in the room, what with the roars, the Fireballs, and the sheer damned size of the dino.


    I turned back toward the queen, who rushed toward me, hoping to catch me off guard while I was gazing into the distance. That wasn¡¯t going to happen. I met her charge with my shield, slamming her full in the snout with the aluminum circle. The blow stopped her charge cold, but physics still worked, more or less, so I went sailing back about five feet from the impact. I used my Flight power to halt the motion and return.


    ¡°Come on, then,¡± I told her, slicing at a leg with my sword. She darted out of the way, a neat reminder that she was tier five. I might be tier seven, with a stack of other powerful crystals, but this fight wasn¡¯t going to be simple or quick.


    She dodged sideways, trying to circle me. I backed up, until I realized she was working to position me under one of the ants that had taken up a perch on the ceiling. I rolled my eyes. That wasn¡¯t going to happen! A quick Drain Life killed the offending ant, sending it plummeting to the dirt floor with a crunching sound.


    The queen screeched her fury at me and rushed again. She was like a living station wagon with big mandibles on the front, and for a moment I froze, unsure how to respond. My Agility was high enough that the hesitation didn¡¯t cost me too badly, though. I sidestepped, narrowly avoiding her lunge. Her bite hit my shield with a sound like crashing cymbals.


    More ants were taking up stations on the ceiling to ambush me, though, and I couldn¡¯t watch everything at once. I took to the air, winging my way up toward the would-be ambushers. One, I killed with another Drain, but I didn¡¯t want to burn too much of my mana. The Flight was using up a ton of it by itself. I really hoped the mana cost for that spell would go down as I ranked it up, because it was really hard to stay aloft very long.


    I had to use my sword on the other three, which took a little longer, but I dispatched them all swiftly enough. With flagging mana, I dropped down about twenty feet from the queen, casting a quick Health to Mana to restore myself some. With some of that new magical energy, I cast Drain Life on the queen ant to recover my health. She screeched in pain as the spell slammed into her, sucking her vitality away and transferring it to me.


    ¡°You want me? Come and get it,¡± I told her.


    She obliged, rushing at me again. There was a desperation to how she moved now, though. Like she already knew she was beaten.


    And she was right. I simply went aloft, letting her pass beneath me, then dropped down on her back and stabbed my sword into her thorax. The armor was tough, but my Strength was more than a match for it. I had a feeling that the sword almost wasn¡¯t even necessary. That if I wanted, I could literally punch through her armor.


    She shook her back, sending me sailing into the air, but once again my Flight took over, catching me before I collided with the wall. I flitted back her way and landed as she whirled toward me, rearing up to attack.


    All of that weight came crashing down on my shield. This time, although my Strength still held, the shield didn¡¯t. It was just aluminum, so I suppose I shouldn¡¯t have been too surprised, but it just shattered as her mandibles crunched down on the sides. I let go of the handle, backing away and slashing with my sword as I did. One of her antennae was left on the ground from my wild swing¡ªmore luck than skill, that. I needed to practice with the sword if I was going to keep facing serious threats like this.


    She¡¯d almost knocked me to the ground. That would be bad, if it happened. My mobility was key in keeping myself in one piece. Strong as she was, if the queen got a good shot in, she could potentially disable me. She was outmatched, by a long shot. But I wasn¡¯t invulnerable.


    We continued the dance, the ant queen chasing me around while I slowly whittled her down. Each time she rushed too hard, I¡¯d fly clear and then land again. Each time my mana was running low, I¡¯d cast Health to Mana and then Drain her again. Those Drains were adding up. Her Stamina had to be incredible¡ªmaybe that was her tier five stat? I¡¯d already cast four Drains on her, which ought to be enough to kill a tier five foe, but if her Stamina was healing her as we fought, then time was working in her favor a little bit.


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    Even so, she was weakening. As she rushed me again, I didn¡¯t even need to fly clear; I just sidestepped instead, slicing off two of her right legs in the process. She staggered, almost falling over as she struggled to turn and face me again. A little part of me almost felt bad. She was dying slowly, piece by piece, because I just wasn¡¯t strong enough to give her a quick death¡ªand I had the sense she wouldn¡¯t accept that, even if I could offer it. At heart I was still a doctor, and while I¡¯d done a lot of killing since the Event, causing unnecessary pain was still anathema to me.


    But all I had to do was recall what I¡¯d seen in those larder rooms near the entrance, and my fury came back in full force. I¡¯d still rather give any enemy a quick death if I could, but there was no question in my mind that she had to die. Too many human lives were at risk if I let her go.


    I slammed in another Drain, pretty near tapping out my mana, but that was fine¡ªshe was done in, and she knew it. The queen tried to attack me again anyway, but her speed just wasn¡¯t there anymore. When she tried to bite me, I cut off one of her mandibles with my sword. When she staggered back from the blow, I stepped inside her guard and stabbed upward into her head, the sword sliding in all the way to my fist before it stopped.


    The ant queen shivered, then went still. As I withdrew my blade, she slumped to the ground, finally dead.


    I turned then, checking on my other undead. The two zombie ants were both destroyed, and I¡¯d lost eight juggernauts and six fire skeletons. Clearly, it had been a tough fight over there, too. But the remaining ants were scattering now. There were only a couple dozen of them left, so I sent my minions off chasing them down, keeping Sue and Hope in the main chamber.


    ¡°Sue, can you do something about all of these eggs?¡± I asked. There were a ton of the things, and they were everywhere, all over the floor. Some of them had been busted apart in the fighting, but there were still scores of eggs left intact, and I wanted them all destroyed before we left. The last thing I wanted was for one of those eggs to be another queen and start the whole thing rolling all over again.


    Sue went to work chomping one egg after another, which let me turn back to checking on the queen situation. She was definitely dead, which meant it was looting time. I reached out to tap her on the forehead, and got a real surprise when three stones plopped into my hand!


    ¡°Three?¡± I stared at the contents of my hand. I hadn¡¯t been expecting that at all, but maybe I should have. She was clearly a ¡®boss mob¡¯ like the goblin mage had been.


    One of those stones was a tier five Stamina, so I¡¯d called that right. As I held it, there was a tingling in my hand. It wanted to merge with the tier five Stamina I already had socketed. Back when I started doing this, they¡¯d just merged, whether I liked it or not. Somewhere along the way, I¡¯d picked up a little more control, because now I could stop it, if I wanted.


    I didn¡¯t want. It was easy to relax that control and allow the Stamina stone to be absorbed into me, merging with the tier five stone I already had to make a tier six. A new sense of vitality and health flooded me, and small scrapes that my Drains hadn¡¯t quite healed before now started knitting themselves back together.


    The second stone was a tier three Natural Armor power. That was pretty cool. I hoped we¡¯d find more of those, because I had a hunch they¡¯d be useful as hell, down the road. I slipped that one into my pouch with the other stones.


    It was the third stone which required the most attention and thought. It wasn¡¯t a crystal at all¡ªit was a control stone. The stone flickered with green and blue lines of power, but as I watched they were replaced with black lines, and tiny flashes of gold¡ªmy colors.


    I hadn¡¯t expected the ants to have a control stone. It hadn¡¯t even crossed my radar as a possibility, because I could sense when a new Domain was forged. She clearly hadn¡¯t used the stone, hadn¡¯t set up the domain. Why? It was hard to say for sure, but we were pretty close to the mall and the airport, both of which now hosted Domains. My best guess was that she¡¯d either gotten it after the other Domains were founded and couldn¡¯t use it because they were too close, or she¡¯d gotten it earlier and like me, hadn¡¯t used it.


    There was no way to tell which of those things was true, but now I had two of the things. Intrigued, I pulled my first one from my pocket, holding one in each hand. They tugged at each other, almost like they were magnets that wanted to come together. For a minute I wondered whether that was a good idea or not. If I brought them together, I had a feeling they¡¯d merge into a stronger control stone, and that might not be the best option for me. Right now, I could trade one and keep the other, if I wanted. If I merged them, that option was no longer on the table.


    But the only way I could find out what happened when you merged two control stones was to try it and find out, right?


    With deliberate care, I gradually brought my hands together, allowing the control stones to come into contact.

 Chapter 102 - Four Clan War Leader

    Chapter 102 - Four Clan War Leader


    As soon as the two control stones touched, they melded together, their material flowing and interlocking until they¡¯d solidified into a single object. In shape, it looked about the same as the first one I¡¯d acquired. The stone was a small carving of a medieval tower, like a rook chess piece. It was mostly black, shot through with sparkles of clear crystal and small veins of golden yellow.


    The shape was interesting, because that¡¯s what the first one I¡¯d gotten looked like. The stone I¡¯d won from the ant queen had been different, shaped more like the ant mound. That was gone now, wiped away by the merger. All that was left was my stone. It was a bit bigger than it had been before, and heavier too.


    As I thought about the stone, I felt the siren call again to use it, to activate it, same as I had when all of those Domains were created before. The feeling was weak, though, probably because there was no way to use the stone where I stood, not with two other Domains overlapping the area. If I wanted to use the thing, I¡¯d need to get far enough away from the already existing Domains.


    What would having a double strength control stone do, anyway? I really had no way of knowing. I¡¯d have to test and find out, and that wasn¡¯t happening right now. I had too many other things to worry about before I could think about setting up my own Domain.


    Sue and Hope were wiping out the rest of the eggs, and I¡¯d sent my remaining undead wandering through the tunnels to kill the remaining ants wherever they were hiding. I felt one of the fire skeletons die and frowned. They were going to need more help to finish the job, but that was easy enough to resolve.


    I¡¯d lost what, fourteen tier three undead in the fighting, plus a couple of ants. That was a lot of Animate Dead points that I probably ought to use. I quickly went to the piles of dead ants and tapped a bunch of them, looting them for their crystals. Once I¡¯d taken care of that, I started casting Animate Dead to bring back the ants we¡¯d slain. It took me a few minutes, but in short order I had twenty-two tier two zombie ants created. I sent them off into the tunnels as well, moving in two packs of eleven each to scour the rest of the complex for anything living.


    They met resistance almost immediately, but they crushed it and pressed on. I kept a thread of my attention on my minions, mostly so I¡¯d notice if they ran into any major issues, and focused the rest on collecting all of the crystals we¡¯d won by wiping this place out.


    The eggs didn¡¯t drop crystals. I tapped one to find out, but nothing appeared. I felt a little grateful about that, oddly enough. Sure, it would have been nice to get a bunch of extra crystals from them, but if helpless eggs dropped magical stones, then probably other helpless things would, too. The post-Event world was bad enough without adding the nightmares that could come from that sort of thing.


    The giant ants all did, though, and there were a lot of them. We¡¯d killed almost a hundred ants in this room alone, plus there were a good number in the upper tunnels that I hadn¡¯t collected yet. I¡¯d need to snag those on the way out. Gathering all the stones took forever, and by the time I was done, the undead ants were coming back in, each of them bearing a recently slain ant, one of the survivors they¡¯d hunted down.


    Some of them brought back dead ant larvae, too, but like the eggs those didn¡¯t drop crystals. I ordered them to stop bringing those. The ant young still needed to die, or we risked one turning out to be a queen, and it was probably kinder to put them down than to allow them to starve, anyway. But I didn¡¯t need to see each one we¡¯d killed.


    Eventually it was done. I¡¯d lost a few undead ants in the carnage, but I let them be. I¡¯d Animate a few more skeletons once we hit the surface. We took our time going back up, making sure to gather each stone as we climbed our way back through the tunnel.


    I ought to have been elated. I¡¯d just taken down a massive threat, solo! It was worth celebrating, and maybe I would once I was back with friends. For the time being, all I felt was exhausted.


    At the surface I released some of the zombie ants from my control, and instead Animated some more skeleton type undead, using up the last of the ¡®raw materials¡¯ there. I had ten juggernauts, eight fire skeletons, and five tier two zombie ants. The higher tier undead was a bigger investment, meaning I had less troops to play with, but my observation was that a single tier three was stronger than three tier ones. Quality was working for me better than quantity.


    Dawn was brightening the eastern sky by the time we were ready to roll out. That wasn¡¯t my favorite thing to see. I was supposed to meet Patches at the ruined fort three hours after daybreak. That was still an hour or so out, but my time was seriously limited.


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    Should I go back and get Kara first, or meet Patches? Crap. I couldn¡¯t be in both places at the same time, and now that I had a decent undead army again, my speed wasn¡¯t what it had been, either. I could race ahead on Sue, but then I¡¯d be leaving the rest of my undead in the dust.


    Damn it, Kara was going to kill me, but I needed to go meet Patches first. If I went to the Guard base there was no way I was getting out of there in time to meet him, and if I wasn¡¯t there, the ratkin might vanish entirely. We could really use their help against the mall.


    I climbed aboard Sue and we headed out, surrounded by my little army. I stared back into the black hole in the ground before we left, wondering. I¡¯d slain all the ants. One or two might escape, but probably not much more than that. I was confident this threat was done for. But I couldn¡¯t take down the nest itself. That collection of tunnels and caverns would remain there. How long would it be before something else nasty took up residence there?


    There was nothing I could do about that. I shook my head, and set off. We took Route 16 up to Route 2, then went west from there. The sun lifted over the horizon, revealing a city that I barely recognized anymore.


    Burnt buildings were everywhere. There must have been some big fires the night before, because a lot of the ruins still smoldered. Those had been stores, and homes, and hotels. Now they were ashes and blackened stone. Smoke was everywhere on Route 2, as a lot of the burning had been right along that corridor. Had the mall undead been responsible for this? That was my best guess. They were burning the city down as they spread. I wondered how many hapless victims had been turned into zombies last night while I was facing off against the ants.


    This was a no-win scenario. I just couldn¡¯t protect everyone from everything. I killed the ants to stop them from preying on people, but while I was underground taking them down, the zombie horde torched block after block and killed who-knew-how-many others.


    How do you keep going on, when there are so many enemies, and they keep doing everything they can to tear down what little was left of humanity?


    I clenched my jaw and stayed focus on the task at hand. One thing at a time. All I could do was take the next step, do the next right thing.


    I reached the ruined goblin fort about an hour before I was due to meet Patches, and at first I thought I¡¯d beat them there. The ruins were untouched, still a pile of logs scattered across the ground where there¡¯d once been walls, the goblin buildings inside crushed beneath. I¡¯d been gone for almost a full day, so I wanted to make sure nothing else nasty had taken up residence in the meantime. At first I considered sending in my zombie ants. They¡¯d be great for spotting any enemies hidden among the logs.


    But the ratkin wouldn¡¯t recognize them, and I wanted to be sure not to scare them off. If they were around, hiding, they¡¯d probably seen Sue and I, but I wanted to be certain, so I sent Hope in, instead.


    Hope went bounding up the hill the rest of the way, sniffing at the logs. All at once, the area was awash with movement, ratkin coming out of the brush one after another. I heaved a sigh of relief as soon as I recognized them.


    ¡°Patches! Good to see you!¡± I called out. I passed Sue the order to bend over so I could climb down, and then remembered I didn¡¯t need to do that anymore. I untied myself and flew up instead, gliding off her back to set down on the ground not far from my ratkin friend.


    ¡°Selena,¡± Patches said, nodding respectfully toward me. ¡°You fly without wings now?¡±


    I laughed. ¡°Yeah, I guess I do!¡±


    ¡°Was your mission productive? Where is Kara?¡±


    ¡°It was. I gained a full rank. I¡¯m tier seven now,¡± I replied. It was something to celebrate, even if whatever was in charge of the mall was still probably stronger than I was. I had it pegged at tier eight or higher. ¡°Kara got hurt, though. She¡¯s with allies, healing. I¡¯ll go pick her up later, but I didn¡¯t want to be late to meet you.¡±


    ¡°You look exhausted, Lady Death,¡± Patches said, sounding worried. ¡°You are well?¡±


    I nodded, but I could feel the fatigue seeping through my bones with every movement. ¡°I¡¯ll be all right. Pushed myself a little harder, and I need to rest sooner or later here. But there¡¯s still a lot to be done, right? How did it go, gathering more ratkin?¡±


    Patches scuffled at his whiskers with his front paws, and I realized that was like, a grooming behavior or something. He almost looked¡­embarrassed? Then he spoke.


    ¡°We did find more. Two other clans of ratkin.¡± He looked like he wanted to say more, but stopped.


    ¡°And?¡±


    Patches shook his head, looking confused and embarrassed. ¡°They made me war leader! For all four clans! I tried to decline, but they said I was the one who¡¯d found humans that would treat ratkin as allies, so I was the only choice. It feels¡­very strange.¡±


    I laughed. Couldn¡¯t help it. For a moment Patches looked offended, but I flashed him a smile. ¡°I¡¯m laughing in joy. That¡¯s well earned, Patches. You are a leader for your people now, and they certainly need one.¡±


    ¡°As you are a leader for yours?¡±


    ¡°Mmm. I guess so?¡± Was I really a leader? Or just a symbol? I wasn¡¯t sure.


    ¡°Humans need a leader, too,¡± Patches pointed out.


    ¡°There are a couple of humans already doing that work,¡± I told him. ¡°Some necromancer west of here, and Colonel Turner at the Guard base.¡±


    ¡°Are they doing well?¡± Patches asked.


    I wished I knew how to answer that question. ¡°Probably better than I would. But I learned a lot about myself last night, too, sort of like you did when they made you leader. I¡¯m stronger, faster, and more ready to face what¡¯s coming than I¡¯ve ever been before.¡±


    ¡°That is good, because we will need all of your strength,¡± Patches replied. ¡°I have brought fifteen paws of warriors to fight. We counted your army¡ªanother six paws?¡±


    I did the mental math, recalling just in time that the ratkin had four fingers, not five, and nodded. ¡°I have about six paws of troops, yes. You have fifteen paws? That¡¯s like sixty ratkin! That¡¯s awesome news.¡±


    With that many additional troops, our odds of winning this battle were only climbing. Now I just needed to see what the Guard was willing to commit, and we could get this show on the road.

 Chapter 103 - Oh, Rats

    Chapter 103 - Oh, Rats


    Carver stalked through deserted city streets, heading toward his prey. The sun had been up for an hour already¡ªnot the time of day he preferred to be working his way into enemy territory, but the pirates were as active at night as they were during the day, if not more so. He¡¯d still be using the cover of night, if it weren¡¯t for two factors he¡¯d learned from his scouts.


    The pirates had been busy last night, it seemed. They had a large shipment of new people arrive on one of their boats¡ªunwilling guests of the pirate Domain, from the reports he¡¯d gathered. Added to the enslaved people they already had on site, and there were a great many innocent victims being brutalized by this maniacs.


    That alone might have been enough to tip him into attacking immediately, but Gideon would still have preferred to wait until nightfall. The same scouts came back with reports that the pirates had been partying hard after their ship arrived, though. They¡¯d seen it as cause to celebrate, apparently, and had done so with extreme gusto¡ªwell into the wee hours of the morning.


    Now, things were silent from that end of the city. Most of the pirates were sleeping off their night of debauchery, and they¡¯d struggle to rouse quickly. It was the ideal time for a strike, but Carver knew he still had to be cautious.


    There was no need to attack directly, though. Not when he had so many more interesting tools he could use for the job. Gideon and his people had been working on new weapons and tactics for days now, against just such a time. He¡¯d always known the so-called ¡®pirates¡¯ might not be great neighbors, and that he might have to take a firm hand with them. He had a number of contingencies planned which would be useful in such situations.


    While he¡¯d never in a million years admit it to his subordinates, Gideon had a special delight in applying this particular plan. It was poetic in a way that he approved of deeply, and used measures so full of irony that it was a delicious setup, even if the pirates would probably never appreciate it.


    Running along behind Gideon was the rest of his ¡°army.¡± The horde he led consisted of sixty-four zombie rats. These weren¡¯t regular rats, but rather some Event-created mutants his people had run into near the fortress. The things were each the size of a beagle, and when they¡¯d been alive, they¡¯d been hell of a problem. He and his undead had wiped the rats out¡ªthe final blow had been when Carver started Animating the dead rats and sending them back after their living brethren. After that, no hole was so small the rats could escape.


    Gideon had to shut down all his Animated undead back at home, in order to pull this off. He¡¯d hidden stacks of skeletons about half a mile down the waterfront, but those were for later. For the time being, he wanted to maximize the number of rats he had available.


    The scouts had been right. There were few guards out. He ran into one, sound asleep inside a stopped car. It was simple enough to identify the ¡®pirates.¡¯ They all wore the most ridiculous clothing, like they were trying to be Disney¡¯s version of how a pirate ought to look. This one was no different, but sleeping, he was no threat.


    With a wave of his arm Gideon send the rats forward. They swarmed the car. The young man had made one terrible mistake when he¡¯d fallen asleep, you see. He¡¯d left both front windows of the car open, probably to get some cross-ventilation.


    Now the rats rushed in through those gaps, and attacked. There was a muffled cry of surprise as he woke, followed by a very brief scream.


    The rats didn¡¯t take long to finish their job.


    Carver pushed ahead from there. He knew he had to be getting close to the Domain¡¯s inner perimeter. There were two, he¡¯d discovered. There was an outer edge, which was the nearest another Domain could be created. That was the maximum extent of the Domain¡¯s power.


    There was also a smaller circle, a small radius around the core of the Domain. Within that inner perimeter, the person holding the control stone had far more power. They could command whatever defense forces the Domain had spawned for them¡ªin Carver¡¯s case, it was a full dozen tier one skeletons. Not enough to stop a concerted attack from pretty much anyone, but it was enough to give his people a little extra help while Carver and his army were away.


    One fascinating feature of the inner perimeter was that new monsters didn¡¯t appear to spawn within it, at least not that he¡¯d seen. There¡¯d always been the worry in the back of Carver¡¯s mind, that if some of these monsters were simply appearing, rather than being transformed from an already living thing, then one could in theory appear anywhere, any time. A monster could pop up while he was eating dinner, or sleeping in bed.


    But not within the inner perimeter. He could sense that zone was safe, now. Not only would things not magically ¡®appear¡¯ there, but if anyone entered the region with hostile intent, the Domain holder would sense it. Obviously, that wasn¡¯t perfect. If regular mosquitos flew into his Domain intent on sucking people dry, Carver wouldn¡¯t sense their approach. But he did sense the giant mosquitos that raided the citadel the other day.


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    All this meant that once he breached the pirates¡¯ inner perimeter, their leader would absolutely sense his arrival. Even if he was sleeping, the sensation of a massive attack force like the one Carver led would wake him up in an instant. Their leader would alert as many people as possible, so if he timed this right, the rats ought to arrive almost precisely when the bad guys were at their most confused.


    One of the rats¡¯ special packages was starting to slip off. That wouldn¡¯t do. Carver ordered it to come to him, and he retied the flask so it would hold for the remainder of its trip. Only half of the rats had the flasks. There simply hadn¡¯t been enough glassware available to make more, and even though one of his people had taken to Alchemy like a duck to water, there hadn¡¯t been time to make more of the stuff, anyway. What they had would have to do.


    A little tingling told Carver he¡¯d breached the magical inner perimeter. Interesting, that he could sense it. He wondered if that was part of him also owning a Domain, or if anyone could detect the edge. Something to ask his scouts, later.


    He passed final orders to his zombie rats. Since Carver wasn¡¯t following them in, they were basically going to be operating on autopilot for the remainder of this mission. That was fine: he¡¯d created the simplest possible mission, and they seemed to understand what they had to do. In a flash, the entire horde went rushing off to the north, while Carver turned west.


    The pirates were keeping most of their enslaved people in a warehouse near the Echo Center. It was only a short walk away, but it ought to be distant enough that Carver could rescue them while the rats kept the remainder of the pirates busy.


    Some of the enslaved would likely be inside the Center itself. There was nothing he could do for them except avenge them.


    The rats rushed on. They were completely out of sight within a minute, and Carver continued on his way. Now that he was missing the undead, he could move much faster, using pools of early morning shadow as targets for his Phantom Step. Where there wasn¡¯t shadow, he created some with his Darkness spell. In short order, he¡¯d reached the warehouse.


    The door was locked. That was fine; he kicked it, blasting the door off its hinges and sending it flying into the room beyond. Carver didn¡¯t hesitate. He rushed in, drawing a longsword as he moved. He was fast, faster than anyone could have been under the old world¡¯s rules, and the two sleeping guards inside were dead before they opened their eyes.


    He flickered forward, dashing through the space. It was a large open building filled with a bunch of jerry-rigged cages and what looked like they¡¯d been kennels for large dogs. The stink was disgusting, and the whole scene was something out of a horror movie, but Carver set aside his disgust the same way he would have for a particularly disturbing surgery as he dashed through the space, scouting for additional enemies.


    There were two more guards at the opposite side of the building. Just four people to guard what looked like forty enslaved; that explained why they were storing these people in another building. Easier to keep tabs on them all in one place.


    Both guards were dead before they could sound the alarm. None of them were over tier three, and he¡¯d left that behind some time ago.


    There was a middle-aged black man in the nearest cage, watching Carver with eyes that looked hungry instead of terrified. Carver went to the cage and spoke to the man. ¡°I¡¯m here to free you all. If I break you out, are you willing to help me get the rest of these people out of here?¡±


    ¡°They kill anyone who even talks about escaping,¡± the man protested. Carver watched as hope and fear warred in the man¡¯s face.


    He needed to feed that hope. He gestured to the pair of dead guards. ¡°As you can see, I¡¯m not worried about them. I can free you. I can free all of these people. Will you help me?¡±


    Carver added as much intensity as he could muster into those last words. He knew he¡¯d never been the best teacher. His oratory skills were fair, but not flawless. But that was before. In the past week, he¡¯d been forced to rise above his old limitations, to do things he¡¯d never imagined he could, in the old days. Also, he¡¯d added a Charisma stone to his other ones, not long ago. It was only tier three, but he hoped it might help encourage trust.


    Whatever the cause, the man snapped him a nod. ¡°I¡¯ll help. Let¡¯s do this. How are you going to get us out? Did you find the keys?¡±


    Gideon shook his head. ¡°I don¡¯t need keys.¡±


    He grasped the padlock in his hands and twisted hard. It snapped off, and Carver tossed it aside, opening the door. The man stared at him in disbelief, but only for a moment. Once that door was open, he was out of the cage in seconds.


    ¡°That¡¯s amazing. Those crystal things?¡± the man asked.


    Carver nodded, moving to the next cell.


    ¡°What about those assholes who captured us?¡± the man asked. ¡°Won¡¯t they be coming here soon?¡±


    ¡°They¡¯re going to be too busy, any second now,¡± Carver said.


    Alchemy was one hell of a skill. If Carver had known how good it was, he might have taken it himself, but it was fine to have a subordinate handle it instead. Terry had poured himself into the work, learning to create both healing potions and an explosive cocktail.


    By that moment, the rats would be pouring into the Echo Center. They were under orders to spread out, to move through the building, to reach every room they could. The ones without flasks would attack sleepy pirates, killing if they could, but mostly just to keep them all occupied while the flask-carrying zombie rats took up their positions.


    In the near distance, the first thudding explosion went off. It was followed by another, and another, until the sound was like the finale of a fireworks display mixed with the noise of a stone building collapsing.


    ¡°Far too busy to worry about us,¡± Carver finished. He opened another cage and beckoned to the prisoner inside. ¡°We have no time to waste, though, not if we want to rescue everyone. Quickly, now!¡±

 Chapter 104 - Cheering From The Walls

    Chapter 104 - Cheering From The Walls


    It was time to assemble the allied armies and march on the mall. I had a full set of Animated undead, and while my Control Undead wasn¡¯t maxed out, that could be easily solved by taking over a portion of the enemy force and using their own troops against them. On top of that, Patches was in charge of sixty ratkin warriors! Most of them were only tier two, but it was still a sizable fighting force.


    I still hoped Turner would be willing to lend aid as well. He¡¯d seemed open to the idea when we spoke, provided he got the control stone. If he sent enough troops to make it worthwhile, I had no issues with that. I already had two, myself, and it didn¡¯t seem like it was all that big a deal. If he committed enough forces to help us win the day, then it would be worth it.


    Patches assembled his force and we set off through the woods toward the east. We made excellent time; the ratkin were great at moving quickly and seemed tireless. It wasn¡¯t even lunchtime when we exited the forest at the interstate. I turned us north there, following the road until we hit a huge open field to the right side, full of solar panels. The panels themselves were useless now, but according to the map, the tip of the airport runways were just on the other side.


    We pressed on into the field, but the spaces between the panels themselves were too small for Sue, so we skirted them. I was glad we did, because I caught glimpses of movement underneath. Something was living in the shadowed spaces over there. It looked like we were considered too big a force to face directly, but I was willing to bet if we¡¯d actually entered their home, they¡¯d have attacked anyway.


    Just another reminder of how dangerous the world was, these days.


    Like I needed one! Each day that went by was more of the same: combat, violence, death, and an ongoing fight to survive. In spite of it all, I found myself thriving. Never would have seen that coming, but there it was.


    ¡°Trouble ahead,¡± Patches called up to me. I was riding Sue again, which gave me elevation to see potential dangers, but Patches had a few of his ratkin scouting the way ahead, to give us better early warnings.


    ¡°What¡¯s going on?¡± I asked.


    ¡°Birds fighting ahead. Lots of birds. They attack humans.¡±


    Oh, crap. Today of all days, the avians decided to go on the rampage? ¡°How many?¡±


    Patches shook his head. ¡°Too many paws to count.¡±


    Not great. I needed to get in there. The avians and Guard seemed pretty evenly matched. If they were striking in force, it was because they thought they had a chance of winning, and after the ratkin, the Guard were my closest allies. I couldn¡¯t let them fall.


    ¡°Patches, I¡¯m going to ride ahead with Sue and see if I can help. The dinosaur¡¯s Fireballs are powerful, and the avians seem afraid of Sue. We might be able to get them to withdraw,¡± I told him. ¡°I¡¯m having my other undead follow as fast as they can. Stick with them¡ªthey¡¯ll protect you if you¡¯re attacked. We need to nip this battle in the bud.¡±


    ¡°We do,¡± Patches replied. ¡°Go!¡±


    I didn¡¯t need more encouragement. I passed mental orders to my undead, telling them to follow me at top speed and defend the ratkin with their ¡®lives.¡¯ Then I turned back to Sue. ¡°Let¡¯s go. Full rush.¡±


    Sue let out a roar and bounded forward at a rush.


    It was always wild, riding my T.rex at top speed. Sue sped up fast, picking up steam like an undead sports car. Well, maybe not quite that much! I guess we were doing twenty, maybe twenty-five miles an hour. Fast enough to feel damned impressive when you were riding a dinosaur at that pace.


    We burst through a patch of trees at the edge of the runway area and found ourselves out in a massive open space. Ahead were the airport runway and taxiways, the space around them full of overgrown grass. With no mowers, it was starting to grow quickly. Burlington International Airport only had one major runway, but there were two long taxiways running parallel to it, one on either side. The northeast one was for the Guard jets. The southwest one was for civilian craft. Pre-Event, the airport and Guard base shared the single runway.


    Now, the runway was the line marking the barrier between the Guard and the new residents of the airport¡ªthe avians. From what Farnsworth told me, the avians usually didn¡¯t cross the barrier, and neither did the Guard. They each kept to their own side, maybe raiding the other occasionally.


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    No longer. Now, it looked like every avian warrior they had was in the air, diving toward the walls around the Guard base. One tower was fully engulfed in flames, and the main gate was under heavy attack. There were at least a hundred avians in the air. I could understand why the ratkin scouts couldn¡¯t get a good count. Numbers that high were tough for anyone, and they moved around so fast even I couldn¡¯t get a good count.


    ¡°Sue, get their attention,¡± I said, shouting over the wind as we rushed toward our foes. I regretted losing my shield to the ants¡ªI needed a new one as soon as possible. The avians had a lot of long range weapons, and without a shield I didn¡¯t have a lot of defense against arrows or spears.


    Sue roared, the echoes of the sound rebounding off the concrete walls of the base and the wood line around the perimeter of the airfield. The roar was loud enough it actually stopped the fighting, if only for a moment! The avians all but froze in mid-air, and a few actually tumbled in the air, falling a dozen feet before recovering enough to catch themselves.


    From the Guard base, the sound of screaming reached my ears, and I winced at first, thinking the avians must be in there attacking the relatively weak civilians. Turner was focusing combat-related crystals on his combat troops. It made sense¡ªit was the only way he could quickly get a sizable, effective army running. But it left the rest of his people low on crystals, and vulnerable.


    I realized that it wasn¡¯t screaming almost immediately. They were¡­cheering?


    Sue roared a second time as we got nearer to the base, and now I was close enough to see soldiers on the walls, shouting and cheering for us as we rode up. I grinned. It was nice to be the cavalry everyone was rooting for! I could get used to this feeling.


    A wing of avians broke off from their assault and turned to face us as we approached. A glance over my shoulder told me the rest of my force was also on the airfield area and headed this way fast, but the avians were going to reach me before my allies did. That was okay¡ªthere were a lot of them, but this batch clearly hadn¡¯t seen Sue in action before, because they were far more bunched up than was safe.


    ¡°Hit them right¡­there,¡± I told Sue, pointing.


    The dinosaur spat a Fireball spell precisely where I¡¯d aimed. The spell smacked one avian in the chest, exploding and engulfing the two next to him in fire as well. The one hit directly was dead, and plummeted to the ground like a stone. The two nearby were on fire as well, though, their plumage burning as they struggled to stay aloft. Four avians moved to assist, two helping each injured bird-man in a move that looked well-rehearsed, easing them out of the sky. They landed enough to the southwest that I felt that group was no longer going to be a threat.


    One Fireball effectively took out seven enemies. One dead, two wounded, and four more carrying off the injured. The remainder of their force was only another dozen avians, and they looked a whole lot less happy about attacking Sue now.


    I cast Contagion on the nearest, but they were spreading out as quick as they could, so it wasn¡¯t spreading easily to the others. I swore under my breath, then dropped a Drain Life on one which got near enough to hit. The black flames slammed into it, burning up its life force and then delivering it back to me. The avian dropped from the sky, dead before it hit the ground.


    More blasts of flame sprang into the air from around me, and I realized the rest of my force had caught up. The fire skeletons weren¡¯t as effective as Sue¡¯s Fireballs, but they could still hit hard. About half of the ratkin were armed with makeshift bows and arrows, too, and they filled the air with a hail of wooden shafts, far too many for the avians to avoid. The entire attacking force died in seconds.


    That was too much for the rest of them. A horn sounded from over at the civilian airport side of the runway, loud enough to echo across the entire area. It was a signal; all of the avians turned immediately from whatever they were doing and raced back southwest, leaving the battlefield behind. The Guardsmen kept shooting, taking down a few more as they fled, but I ordered my unit to stand down, and asked Patches to have his people do the same.


    I understood why the avians and Guard were at arms with each other. Turner activating his control stone probably meant the avians couldn¡¯t do the same. They were intelligent, organized, and had a permanent base of operations with a large population. In short, they seemed to have all of the prerequisites for getting handed a control stone. My guess was, they had one. But so long as Turner¡¯s Domain was active so close, they couldn¡¯t use it.


    That said, the avians were smart and had already proved to me they were capable of being reasoned with. When I¡¯d returned their baby to them, they could have attacked me again, as soon as it was safe. They¡¯d have been stupid to do so; Sue was a brutal countermeasure for anything flying. The accuracy with which Sue could land those Fireballs was insane. But they could have come after us as soon as the baby was safe.


    They hadn¡¯t. That meant it was possible to work out a peaceful arrangement with them, and I wanted to leave that door as open as possible. Didn¡¯t mean I was willing to let them take down the Guard, obviously. But if I could find a way to get humans and avians to co-exist, that would be best.


    That would be for another day, though. Today, the mall threat was paramount. If we didn¡¯t find a way to put an end to whatever lurked in there soon, we¡¯d be hard pressed to do so at all. That meant kicking the avians off Turner¡¯s doorstep, and hoping he felt grateful enough to send a large fighting force along with me. I rode toward their main gate, keeping my fingers crossed that this avian attack wouldn¡¯t make Turner too nervous to keep up his end of the bargain we¡¯d made.

 Chapter 105 - Lessons in Leadership

    Chapter 105 - Lessons in Leadership


    The cheering picked up as we approached, and I grinned in spite of the circumstances. What can I say? It was nice to be appreciated! And they were cheering really loud. Sue was the belle of the ball around these parts, and least for today.


    The gates were already opening as we approached them, which was nice. I had worried they might be iffy about allowing such a large force to enter, but I guess we¡¯d won serious goodwill with our timely arrival, because they didn¡¯t hesitate to let us in.


    Farnsworth showed up a few moments after I rode Sue through the gates. He strode over to me as I jumped off Sue¡¯s back, my Flight allowing me to glide gently to the ground.


    ¡°Nice timing,¡± he drawled.


    ¡°We aim to please. Your boss around?¡±


    ¡°He¡¯s dealing with a lot of crap right now. I¡¯m sure he¡¯s been informed of your arrival already, but give him a few minutes? He¡¯ll be over to see you soon.¡±


    ¡°No worries. You all okay here? That looked like a serious attack,¡± I said.


    Farnsworth nodded. ¡°We will be, but I¡¯m glad you showed when you did. I know for a fact we had at least ten fatalities, and a lot more than that injured. It could have been much worse. With the avians¡¯ ability to fly right over our walls, they can attack our rear areas. Guarding the walls isn¡¯t enough to stop them when they can just fly over.¡±


    ¡°All the more reason to train up your entire population,¡± I said. ¡°It¡¯s suicide for anyone to be without crystals at this point, and it¡¯s only going to get worse from here.¡±


    ¡°Preaching to the choir,¡± Farnsworth replied. ¡°I¡¯ll go see about getting the colonel over here to meet with you. Keep the ratkin and the undead right near the gate, okay? I don¡¯t want anyone thinking they¡¯re more attackers, and there¡¯s some very frightened civilians out there right now.¡±


    ¡°Will do.¡±


    ¡°Oh!¡± Farnsworth turned, before he left, and ushered someone else over toward me. ¡°Got a friend of yours who wants to see you.¡±


    It was Kara, and judging from the look on her face she wasn¡¯t especially thrilled with me at the moment. She stalked my way, glaring, as Farnsworth headed off to find Turner.


    Kara looked good. She was fully recovered from her injuries. There wasn¡¯t even a splint on her leg, and I knew for certain both of her lower leg bones had been broken. In the old world, she¡¯d have been in a cast for months. There was something to be said for all this magic stuff.


    Her scowl broke, and she smiled. That moment made my heart skip a beat. I¡¯d been so scared when she got hurt, then more trying to get her to safety. I knew I¡¯d left her to go fight solo, but I figured it was for the best. We were on a time limit, right?


    When I saw her looking angry, though, for a moment I thought I¡¯d crossed a line, leaving with her. The smile told me everything was going to be all right.


    ¡°You had me worried sick,¡± Kara said. We stepped away from the crowd to speak semi-privately.


    ¡°Well, ditto. Don¡¯t go diving into holes in the ground, maybe?¡±


    She laughed. ¡°It wasn¡¯t intentional! I take it you went back, got the stones from the undead we killed?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. And more, besides,¡± I said. I filled her in on everything that had passed while she was unconscious. How I¡¯d gotten her and Sue out of the ant hill, fighting our way to freedom, and then raced to get her here for medical care. Then further, about how I¡¯d returned and gathered up the stones, then launched a full-scale assault on the ant nest itself.


    ¡°By the time I was done with the ants, it was close enough to dawn that I didn¡¯t want to miss the meeting with Patches. He kicked ass gathering more ratkin, by the way. There¡¯s about sixty of them, and they made him their war leader!¡±


    ¡°Good pick,¡± Kara replied. ¡°So what tier are you now?¡±


    ¡°Seven,¡± I replied. ¡°Only for Animate Dead. But I have a lot of fives and sixes, and I¡¯ve installed every stat crystal now. Well, all of them except¡­you know.¡±


    ¡°Charisma?¡± Kara asked. When I nodded, she shrugged. ¡°Selena, it¡¯s just another power. If you wanted, you could use Animate Dead to hurt people. Or Drain Life to kill them. Charisma might encourage people to follow your ideas, but it¡¯s not mind control. Trust me, I¡¯ve had like six chats with Turner now, so I¡¯ve had enough experience to feel pretty confident about this.¡±


    ¡°Eh. It¡¯s just¡­ The whole concept feels weird,¡± I muttered.


    ¡°You ever play RPGs?¡± Kara asked.


    ¡°Not much, but I get the concept.¡±


    ¡°Well, in RPGs there¡¯s like, memes about some things. One of them is about high-charisma characters being able to seduce everything in sight, right?¡± Kara said. I rolled my eyes, and she went on. ¡°Players have been using a stat to seduce monsters and stuff since RPGs were invented. I¡¯m not saying you should do that! But this is a power, like all the other powers. I¡¯m wondering if maybe it¡¯s one you shouldn¡¯t be avoiding, especially if you already have all the other stats embedded.¡±


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    I looked at my stone layout. Was she right? I had a space available for slotting something, but it had to be a clear stone. That could be Charisma, or something else.


    ¡°For all we know, Charisma might boost your ability to control things,¡± Kara went on.


    ¡°You think so?¡± If it boosted my Control Undead skill, it could be worth having on that basis alone. I still hesitated, because the idea of forcing others to do my bidding felt flat out wrong. But if I declined power that could help save all of us, then what did that make me?


    ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± Kara replied. ¡°It¡¯s not something we¡¯ve tested. But Selena, if you try it and it¡¯s shitty, you can always take the stone back out.¡±


    She had a good point. I already had a tier four and tier three Charisma stone, plus a stack of singles. More than enough to get me to tier five, so I would still have an open spot to add some other stone. ¡°Maybe we should try.¡±


    I pulled out the stones in question and quickly merged them together in my hand. By the time I was done, I¡¯d created a tier five Charisma stone. I could only imagine what Turner would give for this, but I still didn¡¯t want to hand it over to him. He was doing good work, but I didn¡¯t fully trust the man. Giving him more power over the minds of others wasn¡¯t in my game plan.


    Once they were all merged, I absorbed the stone. Instantly, I felt more confident, more sure of myself. It was like I knew that I¡¯d always have the right words to say right on the tip of my tongue.


    ¡°How¡¯s it feel?¡± Kara asked. ¡°Are you okay?¡±


    ¡°I am, yeah. It doesn¡¯t feel a lot different, but I think I can ace any public speaking classes from here on out.¡±


    She chuckled at that. ¡°I don¡¯t know about classes, but you¡¯re going to almost certainly have some tests.¡±


    A commotion nearby got my attention. It was Turner, escorted by Farnsworth and a few other Guards, making their way through the crowd. ¡°Selena! Nice work out there. You pulled our fat out of the fire in a big way, this time. It won¡¯t be forgotten.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s excellent, Colonel,¡± I told him, shaking his hand when he offered it. ¡°I¡¯ve brought my entire undead force, and a sizable army of ratkin as well. We¡¯re ready to assault the mall. I was hoping we¡¯d meet you here and pick up whatever forces the Guard could commit to the battle.¡±


    He grimaced. That wasn¡¯t a good sign. ¡°Walk with me?¡±


    I nodded, and we stepped away from the crowd. We walked far enough that we wouldn¡¯t be overheard before Turner started talking. ¡°I want to help. I do. But you saw what just happened out there. The avians had us on the ropes until you showed up. If I send even a large fraction of our fighting force away, then the base will be helpless. We¡¯ll be overrun the instant they see our forces departing.¡±


    I¡¯d worried he might try to pull something like this, after seeing the base under attack. ¡°That zombie horde is only getting larger each night. If we don¡¯t take it down soon, we¡¯re all going to be looking for new homes.¡±


    ¡°I know,¡± he replied, sounding serious. ¡°I think I have a way forward that works for all of us. You have a good body of troops here, and Sue of course is a powerhouse. What I propose is you join us and together we attack the avians. Wipe them out, force them to flee¡ªwhatever works. Once they¡¯re no longer a threat, then we can divert our entire force, yours and mine alike, to attacking the mall.¡±


    All through his little speech I felt his Charisma working against me, making his works sound more reasonable, more plausible. Part of me¡ªa very small part, at this point¡ªwanted to just agree with him.


    But I had a tier six Will to match Turner¡¯s tier six Charisma. He¡¯d ranked it since I met him the first time; I could sense the difference when he spoke. I also had my own tier five Charisma, which seemed to inure me to his powers somewhat, too. All of it added up to his words just not having the impact he was used to.


    When I opened my mouth, I tried to be respectful. He was working to keep his people safe¡ªI couldn¡¯t fault him for that. He was just wrong about how. ¡°Colonel, I think you¡¯re underestimating the risk the mall represents. It¡¯s not the zombies I¡¯m worried about, not really. I could probably take them with just my undead.¡±


    He raised an eyebrow at that, but I didn¡¯t waver, so he shrugged, and I went on. ¡°Whatever is behind that horde, though, is strong. I never saw it, but I felt its presence, and whatever it is, it¡¯s much stronger than I am. I don¡¯t think it¡¯s just a tier eight. I¡¯m thinking nine, or maybe ten. And it has to be growing stronger as its minions increase in numbers. If we don¡¯t put a stop to it, this is going to end very badly. Hell, if I thought it would work, I¡¯d invite the avians along, too. We could use every sword, bow, and spell caster we can bring to bear.¡±


    If only I could talk to the avians. Unlike the ratkin, they didn¡¯t appear to understand English. Maybe they could be taught, and then maybe peace would be possible someday. But without communications, it¡¯s difficult to get two groups to stop killing each other.


    ¡°I understand your concerns,¡± Turner said. He paused, then shook his head. ¡°I just don¡¯t see how I can commit any troops to this engagement. Not when the avians are right there, ready to strike again. We lost a dozen people in the attack, and a couple more are touch and go¡ªour healers are working to keep them alive. Selena, if I send even a token force with you, the avians will see it. They¡¯ll attack as soon as Sue is out of sight.


    ¡°Fight with us, though, and I can promise you the full might of the base. I¡¯ll send enough troops with you to ensure victory. Together, we can beat the avians, then clear the mall, and after that? We¡¯ll face whatever additional threats come our way, too.¡±


    Again, his words tugged at my heartstrings some. Part of it had to be the Charisma, but a good chunk was also just nature. I was barely into my twenties, and used to taking orders from older adults. Turner was acting like he was in charge, and that lent a power and weight to his words as well.


    The thing was, he was wrong. I knew that in my gut. What I¡¯d sensed out there, it was bad, and it was coming for all of us. Each day we let that mall horde be, it was growing stronger. Eventually, we wouldn¡¯t be able to beat it at all.


    Beyond that, of course, I didn¡¯t actually have the right to commit the ratkin to any engagement beyond the mall battle. Patches agreed to help fight the evil living there. He¡¯d gathered a good force of his people for that purpose. Now I was, what? Going to tell him we needed to hit another place first? How many ratkin would die fighting the avians? Would they still be willing to join the battle for the mall, after, or would they feel betrayed?


    I would feel betrayed, if I were them. I wasn¡¯t doing that.


    ¡°I don¡¯t command the ratkin, Colonel. They offered to help with the mall, not with the avians.¡±


    ¡°Then bring just your troops. The ratkin, you call them? They can wait here until we¡¯ve defeated this enemy and join us for the next fight. With your undead and Sue, we can win this fight.¡±


    He was still trying to sway me, and I¡¯d finally had enough. ¡°I don¡¯t think that battle will be as easy as you think it is, and frankly, I can¡¯t risk it. Each day we leave the mall unattended, it¡¯s growing as a threat. We need to deal with it, or we¡¯re all done. Avians, humans, and ratkin alike¡ªwe¡¯re all doomed, if that thing continues to grow unabated. If you won¡¯t help, I accept that. But we¡¯re going anyway.¡±

 Chapter 106 - Built On Honesty

    Chapter 106 - Built On Honesty


    Turner¡¯s face went red at my words, and for a moment I had this idea he was just going to throw down with me, right there and then. There was something in his look, a mixture of rage and barely controlled fear, that made me reach for my magic, ready for whatever was coming next.


    Then Sue¡¯s head raised and the dinosaur gave a low-powered roar. Not the magical one that sent enemies fleeing, but still more than enough to make everyone jump, Turner included. When he met my eyes again, the look I¡¯d seen was gone, back under a tight leash of control.


    But I didn¡¯t forget.


    ¡°I would rather you wouldn¡¯t,¡± Turner said, biting out his words. He was back under control, but he was still pissed. ¡°If we work together to defeat one enemy, then the other, we have a much higher chance of success. Surely you can see that? Join me, we take down the avians, and then we move on the mall.¡±


    I felt the magic of his Charisma beating against me like waves against the shore. Part of me just wanted to give in and do what he said. It would be easier, right? Let someone else make the hard decisions, the tough calls. I¡¯d been doing too much of it as it was. I was a kid, barely into grad school, and this man was a senior Air Force officer. Who was I to contradict him?


    Shoving all of that aside with an exercise of Will, I shook my head. ¡°You know, Turner, diplomacy might go a lot better for you if you ditched the Charisma and just tried convincing people without magic. Instead, you just try to brute force your way into getting people to follow your orders. I¡¯m sure it works well here on your base. I doubt anyone has a Will as high as your Charisma. But I do.¡±


    He was instantly red in the face again, but this time I¡¯d thrown him on the defensive. ¡°What¡ªyou¡ªI don¡¯t¡­¡±


    I¡¯d thrown him completely off his game. Nobody had called him out for using his Charisma this way yet? No one? Wow¡ªthat was ridiculous. He¡¯d clearly been getting used to having everything exactly as he wanted it for the past week or so, and dealing with anything less was making him flip his lid. We were far enough away from other people that I hadn¡¯t dumped his secret to everyone, much as I was tempted to do so.


    Frankly, I didn¡¯t have the time for this sort of nonsense. I turned away from him and took to the air, flitting back over to land atop Sue. Kara was already there, looking surprised as I landed.


    ¡°All good?¡± she asked, her voice low.


    I shook my head. ¡°Be ready for trouble.¡±


    She gave me the smallest head tilt of a nod.


    I turned and spotted Patches. ¡°We¡¯re moving out. The Guard isn¡¯t going to be able to lend us support. This recent attack has them too worried about their defenses. Are you still with us for this strike? It will be harder, with just us, but I think we can still do this.¡±


    ¡°We are ready, Lady Death,¡± Patches called out, his squeaky voice louder than he usually spoke. Patches was smart. Was he tossing around that title because he sensed the tension and was adding weight to me? If so, I was grateful for the effort.


    ¡°Master Sergeant Farnsworth, you mind opening the gate for us, please?¡± I asked. As I spoke, I had Sue wheel around so the dinosaur was facing directly toward said gate. If they tried to keep us in here, they were gonna lose their gate. Probably the entire gatehouse. I wasn¡¯t in the mood for this shit.


    Farnsworth glanced at Turner, who was making his way back toward us, still fuming. Then he looked at me, saw Sue, and probably figured out exactly what I was thinking. He barked an order, and an airman bolted to the gate to get it opened up.


    Good. I didn¡¯t actually want to blow their gate up. There were people here I cared about, and I didn¡¯t want to see any of them hurt.


    ¡°Selena!¡± A familiar voice called out from the growing crowd. Speaking of people I cared about!


    ¡°Alfred!¡± I flashed him a genuine smile. ¡°Good to see you. Not the best time to catch up; we¡¯re on our way out. But we¡¯ll be back soon.¡±


    ¡°Eh, I was wondering if you could use a few more swords,¡± Alfred replied. ¡°My little band and I still remember everything you did for us, all that you risked to get us to safety. Some of us have been hunting and growing, these past few days. We¡¯re ready to help you out, if you will take us. It¡¯s not much, but I figure every sword probably helps, right?¡±


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    It would indeed. I saw he was all kitted out, wearing plate armor he¡¯d clearly bought from the locals at the base. He¡¯d swapped his old fire ax for a huge battle axe, too. Behind him, there was Henry, the healer, also dressed in armor with a heavy crossbow and a mace. Samson was there, too, along with a few other people I didn¡¯t recognize.


    ¡°I¡¯d be glad to have you. No promises on whether we¡¯re all making it home, mind,¡± I told them. ¡°But if that menace in the mall isn¡¯t put down, nowhere will be safe.¡±


    The group around Alfred chuckled. Samson spoke. ¡°Like that¡¯s a guarantee anywhere, these days. We could get killed in bed by another avian raid. Or we can get out there and fight for our futures. I know my choice.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve done the math on that horde,¡± Henry added. ¡°Based on the scout reports, they¡¯ve been watching it grow the past few days. I figure we have maybe forty-eight hours at most before there¡¯s so many zombies there that they¡¯re beyond stopping. We¡¯d have to evacuate the area, at that point.¡±


    Two days? ¡°So little time¡­ Why that timeline?¡±


    ¡°Geometric growth,¡± Henry replied. ¡°Each night they¡¯re pushing out much further. They¡¯ll hit the base around that time, tear down the walls, and that¡¯ll be the end of this place.¡±


    Turner arrived then. He turned toward Alfred, Charisma dripping from every word. ¡°Alfred, we need you and your people here. Henry, you especially¡ªwe only have a few healers, and we need everyone to be ready for the next avian assault.¡±


    I watched the magic take root as he spoke. It was uncanny, seeing the doubt creep almost instantly into their faces. Holy crap, this stuff was very close to actual mind control, and the more I saw it in action, the more I hated it. This man was taking away the agency of his people, giving them orders that could potentially get them all killed, and taking away their free will in the process.


    No more.


    It was time for the truth to come out. I spoke one word, in a clear, commanding tone. ¡°Alfred.¡±


    This time I put my Charisma into my voice, and even Turner¡¯s gaze flicked to me instantly. All eyes were on me.


    ¡°Turner has a tier six Charisma stone. That gives him the power to ¡®suggest¡¯ things to people, and people will tend to follow them,¡± I said. My voice was like a ringing bell, tolling loud throughout the area around us. At least a hundred locals had gathered, so everything I was saying would be scuttlebutt in no time.


    ¡°Right now, he¡¯s using that power to convince you to do something you may or may not want to do. Like Turner, I have that power as well, and I¡¯m using it right now,¡± I said. I flicked the Charisma off. ¡°And now I¡¯m not. Because I don¡¯t want you to make this decision based on my will or his. I want you to freely decide on your own, as anyone ought to have the right to do.¡±


    ¡°Wait¡ªis this like mind control?¡± Alfred asked, his face pale. He shook his head like he was trying to clear it. ¡°Colonel? Explain this.¡±


    I did the explaining before Turner could butt in again. ¡°Not mind control, strictly speaking. Just a magical nudge to make people more likely to agree with him. It¡¯s a good power for a leader to have, to help bust up disputes, to help keep order. But not to order men to their deaths.¡±


    I said the last sentence glaring daggers at Turner. He responded in kind.


    This bridge was burning merrily. I wasn¡¯t sure what sort of reaction I was going to get when I returned to this place, but I had a feeling it might not be as hospitable as this time. Turner wasn¡¯t going to roll out the red carpet for me anymore, not after this. I watched as suspicion and worry spread from one face to another as everyone within earshot started second-guessing every interaction they¡¯d ever had with the man.


    ¡°Why doesn¡¯t it work on you?¡± Alfred asked me.


    ¡°My Will is tier six,¡± I replied. ¡°So is his Charisma. One blocks the other.¡±


    ¡°Good to know, thanks. I¡¯ll add it to the list.¡± Alfred said. ¡°I¡¯m with you, Selena.¡±


    Murmurs of agreement came from the small company he¡¯d brought along. Looked like it was Alfred and five other people. It wasn¡¯t what I¡¯d hoped to get from the base, but it was still better than nothing.


    Another voice. Farnsworth. ¡°I¡¯d like to join you as well, if you¡¯ll have me, Lady Death.¡±


    I looked down at him, surprised. ¡°Aren¡¯t you Air Force?¡±


    Turner was standing next to Farnsworth within a second. Alfred, he could maybe tolerate losing. Not his Master Sergeant. Not the man he¡¯d poured so many crystals into building up as a commander. ¡°You absolutely may not risk yourself in such a manner, Master Sergeant. We need you here to help defend this place.¡±


    ¡°Sir, with respect¡ªif the mall isn¡¯t dealt with soon, the avians will be the last of our worries. They can fly away from a horde of zombies when it arrives. We can¡¯t. Everyone within these walls will die if we don¡¯t do this. I¡¯m going.¡±


    It was time to get out of Dodge while we still could. If things kept going my way, I was going to end up with the entire defensive force of the base trailing along behind me, and that wasn¡¯t going to work out well for anyone, especially not the helpless civilians. I turned back toward the gate and gave Sue the mental command to start forward.


    ¡°Good enough, then!¡± I called out. ¡°Let¡¯s move out!¡±


    Turner stared up at me, a mix of fury and fear in his eyes again. ¡°Do you know what you¡¯ve done?¡±


    ¡°Told them the truth?¡± I replied. I shrugged. ¡°It¡¯s what you should have done, day one. Instead you hid what your power was doing to them. When it was small things, I was fine with letting it slide. But now you¡¯re ordering men into battle for you, using your Charisma to influence their decision. That¡¯s crossing a line.¡±


    He was in trouble, and we both knew it. If he ordered his people to attack me, to block our exit, would they even obey now? I wasn¡¯t sure, and I knew damned well Turner wasn¡¯t either. His cushy command with everyone easily following every order he gave was now a thing of the past. What would become of the Guard base now, I didn¡¯t know. But it least it would be built on honesty, instead of lies.


    We rolled forward uncontested. Even Farnsworth was allowed to come along. I was surprised he¡¯d joined us, but grateful. He was one of the strongest warriors on the base, and he was well-armed. Would an extra seven fighters be enough to turn the tide in the battle ahead? Probably not. But I¡¯d take whatever I could get.

 Chapter 107 - Allies

    Chapter 107 - Allies


    We made our way south as rapidly as everyone could move, pushing steadily along the open space of the runways. I had to set Sue¡¯s pace down a few notches from max, because I was mad enough to go racing off and leave everyone behind if I wasn¡¯t careful.


    Holy shit, had that man pissed me off something fierce.


    Turner wasn¡¯t wholly in the wrong, and I knew that. Early on, using his Charisma to keep people calm, get them organized, and make sure everyone was working together just made sense. It was still manipulative, but I could understand it. But he hadn¡¯t told anyone what he was doing, clearly. And trying to use magic to order people into battles where they might well die was a step and a half too far.


    I didn¡¯t know what was going to happen there while we were gone. Would Turner be able to maintain control, now that his people knew what he¡¯d done? Maybe¡ªtier six Charisma had a lot of weight. But I had a feeling the Guard base was about to see something of a ¡®change of command.¡¯


    ¡°Selena?¡± Kara asked, beside me.


    ¡°I don¡¯t really want to talk about it right now. We¡¯ve got bigger fish to fry,¡± I said, assuming she wanted to chat about what had just happened.


    ¡°Um, no, for real¡ªwe¡¯ve got company!¡± Kara said, unlimbering her bow.


    She was looking west, so I figured we had avians inbound, and I wasn¡¯t wrong. An entire flight of them was moving our way fast, maybe fifty or so warriors, all heavily armed. I frowned at that. It wasn¡¯t enough to take us on, so why bother? We¡¯d just frightened off an attack force more than twice that many in number.


    Then I saw the rest of that force, readying themselves near the air traffic control tower on the west side of the runway. I grimaced. Once the second wave arrived, they¡¯d have over a hundred flying attackers. We had a lot of archers with us, and a few spell casters. Sue¡¯s firepower alone was enough to put a serious dent in their numbers. But it was definitely a large enough force to hurt us badly, and we couldn¡¯t afford to lose anyone, not if we wanted to beat the mall horde.


    ¡°I think I need to try diplomacy again,¡± I said.


    ¡°Like you did with Turner just now?¡± Kara quipped, grinning.


    ¡°I said I didn¡¯t want to talk about that,¡± I growled, chuckling anyway. ¡°But no, I was figuring I¡¯d be a little more polite.¡±


    ¡°Be careful.¡±


    ¡°No promises!¡± I said. Then I took off, flying toward the avians.


    They stopped as soon as they saw me flying up to meet them. I guess the Guard didn¡¯t have too many flying humans, or something, because they looked startled. I halted my approach just inside Sue¡¯s firing range. If they came at me, Sue would be able to blast them out of the sky.


    We were just at the edge of speaking distance, so I had to raise my voice a little bit to call out to them. I opened my arms, palms up, showing they were empty. No idea if that meant anything to them or not, but I had to try.


    ¡°We¡¯re passing through. We are not coming to harm you.¡±


    The avians looked angry. They didn¡¯t form ranks like human warriors might have, instead buzzing around the sky in little circles and swirls. They looked like a flock of birds, with all the semi-random movement you¡¯d see from a group of agitated gulls or pigeons.


    Then I spotted a familiar face, or I was fairly sure he was, anyway. An avian flew to the front of their ranks, and I was almost certain it was the same one I¡¯d met when I returned ¡®Peeps¡¯ to them. I¡¯d brought their youngling back to them, and if this was the same avian I¡¯d communicated with then, maybe he remembered me?


    I pointed to myself. ¡°Selena.¡±


    He pointed a feathered hand at his chest and mirrored the motion, then gave a squawk. It sounded like ¡°Rawk.¡±


    ¡°Rawk?¡± I said, trying the sound out. He shook his head, so I tried again, and this time my pronunciation must have been a little better, because Rawk bowed his head. I assumed that meant agreement, anyway.


    ¡°We need to face the monsters in the mall,¡± I told him. He stared at me blankly. My words were clearly not getting through to him. How do I make this work?


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    Pantomime. That would do the trick, maybe. I knew they were smart. We had a language barrier. If I could mime what I was trying to do, that might just work.


    I pointed toward the ground and then descended. Rawk did likewise, landing a short distance from me, two guards on either side of him. I understood his caution; Rawk was tier five, which meant he could sense the tiers of those around him just like I could. He knew I was much stronger than he was. I¡¯d be nervous, too. They held their position, waiting for me to make the next move.


    So I stood there and did my best zombie imitation. Careful not to move toward the avians¡ªI didn¡¯t want them to grow alarmed¡ªI stepped into a staggering walk, making growling noises, arms outstretched in what I¡¯d come to see as ¡®typical zombie style.¡¯ Then I drew my sword and mimed killing the zombie.


    It wasn¡¯t the best acting job, but it was the best I could do with what I had. I sheathed the sword again, and turned back to Rawk. ¡°The zombies,¡± I repeated the ¡®zombie mode¡¯ mimicry again, ¡°They need to be stopped. We¡¯re going after them. We¡¯re not here to fight your people. We want to make this place safe from the undead.¡±


    ¡°Fight,¡± Rawk said. It wasn¡¯t perfect English, but it was darned close, and easy enough to understand. Of course the first word of human language they learned was ¡®fight.¡¯ Damn Turner all to hell, anyway.


    I shook my head and pointed at myself, then at him. ¡°Human and avian no fight.¡±


    Then I mimed zombies again, stopped, and said ¡°We fight zombies.¡±


    Rawk turned and conferred with his fellows for a few moments. I had absolutely no idea what they were saying to one another, but it appeared to be a spirited debate. I glanced back toward the base, but there was no sign of anyone coming out to meet us. That was probably a good thing, if I was being honest. The only thing Guard forces would do if they showed up was torpedo any chance of a peaceful passage.


    Rawk turned back toward me, animated and interested again. He seemed almost excited about something, and said a bunch of complex avian sounds, none of which I understood. I shrugged and shook my head. ¡°I don¡¯t understand.¡±


    He looked frustrated at that, and I couldn¡¯t blame him. The language barrier was hell. It was more obvious to me than ever that the avians, like the ratkin, were intelligent beings that we could reason with and potentially work alongside, if only we could learn to communicate with one another.


    Rawk pointed at himself, then said that one word again: ¡°Fight.¡±


    Then he pointed, but not at me, and not at the Guard base. Instead, his hand was aimed southwest¡ªdirectly toward the mall.


    I couldn¡¯t believe what I was seeing. ¡°You want to fight with us? You want to kill the zombies?¡± I made the zombie motions again.


    He nodded.


    Holy crap, this was actually working! He wanted to send troops along with us? I wasn¡¯t going to say no to that. I mean, it would be a pain in the ass not being able to communicate with them on the battlefield, but any advantage was worth having in the fight ahead of us.


    ¡°We welcome you,¡± I said, nodding firmly. Then I pointed to myself with one hand, to Rawk with the other hand, and then clasped my hands firmly together.


    Rawk nodded and took a few steps toward me. I felt my troops behind me bristle at his approach, but I waved them back with one hand, and he kept coming until we stood face to face.


    The bird-man was taller than me, broad-shouldered, and covered with feathers and light armor. His head was that of a bird, set atop a humanoid body with massive wings. The lower legs were clawed, like a bird. Really, the magic which had changed regular birds into these incredible beings had done amazing work. The smell was funny, not something I¡¯d smelled before, but reminiscent of clean feather bedding.


    Rawk reached out a hand toward me, like he was offering it to shake. He must have seen humans doing this to one another and gleaned the meaning of it. They¡¯d been watching Turner¡¯s camp for a week now, so they¡¯d had plenty of time to learn a lot about humans.


    I reached out and took his hand, shaking it firmly. ¡°Allies,¡± I said.


    ¡°Allies,¡± Rawk squawked back. More or less, anyway¡ªit wasn¡¯t perfect, but I got the idea. Rawk probably had no concept of what that word meant, but¡­baby steps. We had a long way to go if we were going to get true human and avian cooperation going. This was one hell of a start, though! And it was precisely what we needed if we wanted to have a serious chance of taking down the mall monsters.


    Rawk turned away from me, crying out orders to his people. Most of them flew away, unfortunately. I understood why. Turner¡¯s base represented a deadly threat to their people, and so long as those two camps were fighting, neither of them could afford to send too many troops far from home.


    He kept himself and a dozen avian warriors, each tier three, though. It was a sizable addition to our force. Each of those fighters looked ready to kick some ass, armed to the teeth and armored as well.


    I lifted off from the ground, flying back to Sue and landed atop her. Then I drew my sword. I stood tall atop the dinosaur so everyone could see me, sword high in the air, and called out.


    ¡°The avians are joining us¡ªmore warriors against our common enemy! With more fighters, we have an even better chance of ending this threat for good. Let¡¯s move out! We still have a good way to travel, and we want plenty of daylight for this battle. The enemy hates the day, so let¡¯s use that to our advantage.


    ¡°All of us have friends nearby, and many have family, too. If the zombie horde isn¡¯t stopped, it will take over everything nearby. It¡¯ll kill everyone inside the base, turn all of them into zombies, adding them to the horde. We stop this here, today. Together, we end this threat to our home. Together¡ªbecause look at us, friends!


    ¡°Humans. Ratkin. Avians. No one has ever made an alliance like this happen before. Together, we can be far stronger than any of us are alone, and together, we will face whatever is waiting inside that mall and finish it off.¡±


    Okay, it wasn¡¯t the best speech ever made, but apparently I did it well enough. The humans cheered right away, the ratkin joining in enthusiastically a moment later. Even the avian contingent raised their weapons in the air and gave loud battle cries.


    I had my army.


    Now it was time to put it to use.

 Chapter 108 - A Real Strength

    Chapter 108 - A Real Strength


    Now that we had tacit approval from the avians, we were able to cut directly past the old airport where they lived, rather than going all the way south around it. That would shave a good hour off our trip, so it was worth doing. We slipped out through the airport gate and continued on our way, using White Street toward the mall. The road would let us out on Route 2 just a short distance from our final destination.


    It was glaringly obvious when we hit the limit of the zombies¡¯ advance, and equally obvious it wasn¡¯t going to take them seventy-two more hours to reach the airfield. The edge of their destruction was less than a quarter mile from the avians¡¯ home, which explained why they were so interested in helping us defeat them. The zombies would be at their doorstep tonight, and might even attack the Guard base at the same time. They had the numbers. Best case scenario, Turner¡¯s people had until tomorrow evening before they¡¯d be wiped from the map.


    The zombies didn¡¯t leave much behind unturned. House after house was wrecked during their advance. I figured they had to be under orders to clear each building they passed, ensuring there were no humans still hiding inside. They¡¯d been thorough about it, tearing doors from hinges, shattering windows, even ripping a garage door entire off the garage, leaving it broken in the driveway.


    A tattered, bloody stuffed panda in the middle of the street made me look away. Nobody was being spared this horror, not even kids.


    ¡°Hey, Selena?¡± Kara said. ¡°I still have those crystals the ratkin gave us, back when we offered to help them. Twelve clear crystals.¡±


    She held them out to me and I identified them quickly¡ªinterestingly, it was exactly two of each. I wondered if that was luck, or if one of the ratkin had a high enough Intellect to identify stones¡­ Then I remembered that I still had a whole pile of untouched stones myself, most of them slated for Kara.


    ¡°I¡¯ve got a bunch, too. Stuff from the rats, and some from the undead we killed in the graveyard, too,¡± I told her. ¡°I used some, but I figured you could use a bunch of these.¡±


    I handed her the five Darkness stones, six NightVision, six Phantom Step, and seven Shadow Walk crystals that I¡¯d gained from the cemetery. That brought her Shadow Walk to tier four and Phantom Step to tier three. That was the easy part¡ªjust the stones I¡¯d already sorted through from the cemetery.


    After that, I had to dig into the huge sack full I¡¯d gotten from the ants. I hadn¡¯t had time to so much as sort the damned things, and there were a lot of them. We had five more Natural Armor stones, each one tier two, which was enough coupled with my extra tier two to get Kara to tier five in that power.


    ¡°Awesome. I can take hits now, for sure,¡± Kara said. ¡°I can¡¯t believe I¡¯m finally tier five, and it¡¯s in something that we¡¯ve only ever seen one power for. What¡¯s with these grey stones, anyway? Is Natural Armor the only one?¡±


    ¡°Only one I¡¯ve seen so far,¡± I replied. ¡°I doubt it¡¯s the only one, though. My guess is that grey is for crystals that give passive powers, like the brown ones give passive skills. We¡¯ll just have to look around and see what else drops them. I¡¯m sure something will.¡±


    She was still grumbling about not being able to fill the slot right away, but I could tell she was excited to hit tier five. I understood. It was a big deal, almost like a right of passage, post-Event. Once you were tier five you could sense what other folks¡¯ power levels were, which was sort of the new version of being a ¡®grownup,¡¯ I supposed.


    ¡°Still got all of this to go through,¡± I said, shaking the bag.


    The ants had also dropped another thirty green crystals. Since neither of us had green sockets right now, we set those aside for later. Mostly, they were the same spells we¡¯d already seen, although I spotted a neat new one that had to be rare¡ªAnimate Tree! There were two of those, and that was crazy cool. I wondered what my life would have been like if I¡¯d been out in the woods when things went to hell, instead of in anatomy class.


    That still left eighty-seven clear stones. They were a mix, with eleven Strength, seventeen Agility, sixteen Stamina, fifteen Intellect, fourteen Will, and fourteen Charisma. Most of them were tier one stones, with a few tier twos scattered among them. It seemed like the higher ranked ants were more apt to drop grey or green, not clear.


    Eight of those Agility stones cranked Kara right up to tier five Agility, opening another space. Since we had exactly sixteen Stamina stones, I pointed out she could run that up to tier five instantly¡ªso she did. That opened another slot, of course. Kara opted for Strength and loaded up eight of those stones, giving her tier four there.


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    ¡°Holy shit, I feel amazing!¡± Kara said, flexing her arm for me. She grinned. ¡°This is awesome!¡±


    ¡°Big boosts always feel great,¡± I said. I fitted together the two Stamina stones from the ratkin and added them to the other Stamina stones I had, bumping me up to tier seven there. I knew exactly what Kara was talking about. The flow of power was intoxicating as my Stamina tiered up. I felt like I could run six marathons back to back, and for all I knew, maybe I could.


    She handed me eight of the Charisma stones as well, allowing me to rank that stat up to tier six. I was an even match for Turner now, although I wasn¡¯t sure how I felt about that. My connection with Sue and Hope felt much stronger now than it had been before, though. We¡¯d theorized that maybe Charisma could impact control-type spells, but this was the first clear evidence I had to support the idea.


    I passed that tidbit along to Kara, who seemed excited about the prospect. ¡°It just makes sense. Intellect made your attack spells stronger, right?¡±


    I nodded. ¡°Yeah.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not shocked Charisma makes control spells stronger, then. I wonder if maybe Will improves resistance type powers?¡±


    ¡°Could be that, or maybe Stamina. Wish we¡¯d tested your Natural Armor before you ranked up your Stamina!¡±


    ¡°Oof, yeah, that might have been smart. Time is always gonna be a factor, though, and we don¡¯t have that much of it,¡± Kara replied.


    She was right. We were closing on Route 2 already. Another few minutes and the mall would be in sight. I packed up the rest of the clear crystals from the ants and ratkin and handed the pouch to Kara. ¡°Use them, swap them, whatever works.¡±


    ¡°You sure? You earned these while I was sleeping off my fall.¡±


    ¡°Positive,¡± I told her. ¡°Think about it. If you¡¯d had tier five Agility before, maybe you could have jumped from Sue¡¯s back and avoided falling. Or with Natural Armor and Stamina, you might not have broken your leg. It¡¯s just smart to arm you up as well as we can before we go in there.¡±


    ¡°Thanks,¡± she told me, accepting the bundle.


    I was fine with it. I¡¯d already gotten a pile of crystals from last night, and now we were literally going up against a horde of zombies. There¡¯d be hundreds of them waiting for us, maybe a thousand or more. Since black crystals were sort of my thing, I figured a solid chunk of the loot was probably coming my way. That meant I¡¯d be able to rank up a lot of spells.


    Helping Kara grow was just common sense. If she died, I lost my closest friend and ally in this nutty world.


    Then we hit Route 2 and turned onto it, pushing ahead toward the turn-off onto Dorset Street, where the mall waited. I could already see it, hulking in the distance like a stone monster. Most of the buildings around here had been places of business, but few of them still stood. In this area the undead had been even more thorough in their destruction, actually burning many of the structures to the ground.


    It was about three in the afternoon, according to my watch. We passed the old Barnes & Noble, still standing tall. I didn¡¯t know if the undead hadn¡¯t been able to torch it or if they hadn¡¯t bothered for some reason, but unlike most of the other buildings nearby, it was mostly untouched. The glass windows all around the ground floor were shattered, leaving the interior open to the elements, but the structure was still in one piece.


    That was actually good to know, because information still had value, and we might end up having to relearn a lot of shit in the months ahead. I didn¡¯t know how to dig a well, or build a castle, or plant fields of crops. All of those things and more were about to be a lot more important for survival. I made a mental note to swing back through there and check it out when we had some downtime, assuming we ever did, anyway!


    ¡°Want to go grab a book?¡± Kara asked, seeing my stare.


    I chuckled. ¡°Not today, but maybe next time. There¡¯s a lot we need to know if we¡¯re going to keep things together. But not today.¡±


    ¡°No. Today, we kill a whole shit ton of zombies.¡±


    I glanced down at our troops. My undead were fine, of course. They didn¡¯t get tired. But the humans, avians, and ratkin had all been walking for over an hour, and the last thing I wanted was to rush in there and attack when we were anything besides at our peak. I called a halt on Dorset Street just outside the Barnes & Noble. We were basically across the street from the mall.


    ¡°What¡¯s up?¡± Alfred asked, as I flew down from Sue¡¯s back.


    ¡°Figure everyone could use a breather before we go rushing in,¡± I said.


    ¡°Smart. I¡¯ll pass the word to my people.¡±


    I gave him a nod and passed the word to Patches as well, who got his fellows under some shade and resting. Then I spoke with Rawk, who seemed to get the idea. The avians flew up to rest atop the bookstore.


    Farnsworth came over to me then. ¡°Doing okay?¡±


    ¡°Yeah.¡±


    ¡°Good. Not going to be an easy fight.¡±


    ¡°I know.¡± He clearly had something he wanted to say, and I wished he would get around to it.


    ¡°Brought something for you. You mentioned the ants ate your shield. I thought you could use a new one,¡± Farnsworth said. He pulled a round aluminum shield from his backpack, handing it over.


    It looked exactly like the one I¡¯d lost, which was awesome. ¡°Thanks. This will help a lot. And I really appreciate you coming with us. I know you risked a lot by doing this.¡±


    It was his turn to chuckle. ¡°Yeah, I suppose. You were right. Turner was wrong. If we followed his plan, we might have been able to take out the avians, but we¡¯d never have had the forces to win this fight right after, and then the base would fall. Hell, if we¡¯d attacked the avians we wouldn¡¯t have some of their people here with us, fighting alongside us! I¡¯d never have expected that. Turner, either. We both saw them as alien foes to be defeated. Only you thought to make them into allies. The ratkin as well.¡±


    ¡°Someone else would have tried sooner or later.¡±


    ¡°Maybe,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°But you actually did it. It¡¯s a good thing, Selena. You have a real strength when it comes to making unusual allies. Keep it going.¡±


    Then he stepped away, leaving me to my thoughts. I drank some water, glancing around at the disparate groups I¡¯d brought together, thinking about what Farnsworth said. I¡¯d brought all these beings together, and he was right¡ªthat alone was a major victory.


    Now I just had to win the battle, as well.

 Chapter 109 - Beachhead

    Chapter 109 - Beachhead


    Farnsworth had talked me into doing a quick scouting loop around the mall, using Sue to expedite the process. Kara stayed behind to help keep things organized with the ratkin; they liked her almost as much as they liked me, and even the avians seemed to understand she was important to me, and therefore someone to listen to.


    We set off at Sue¡¯s best sprint, racing across the road and into the parking lot at top speed. There was no motion from inside the mall at first, and I was wondering if we were wasting our time.


    ¡°You sure this is necessary?¡± I asked. I was a little annoyed and half wondering if the real purpose of the mission was ¡®Master Sergeant wants a dino ride¡¯


    ¡°Intel never hurts,¡± Farnsworth replied. ¡°We¡¯re short on time, yeah. There¡¯s a deadline, and after dark the monsters will come out and fight us, instead of us going in after them. Is it possible that¡¯s the best case scenario, though? Wouldn¡¯t it be better to fight them in the open?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± I replied, no question in my voice. ¡°You didn¡¯t sense what I did, when they attacked the fort. Whatever is in there is bad news, and it¡¯s stronger at night. Attacking when it¡¯s weaker, relatively speaking anyway, just makes sense.¡±


    The damage we¡¯d done to the Target windows was still the same as it had been, only this time the space inside was full of zombies. That was new, and I told Farnsworth as much. Last time we were there, the place had been empty. Did that mean the enemy had more troops now, or were they just plugging a potential hole through their defenses? No way to tell.


    The door next to the Applebee¡¯s was much the same. It was one of those row of glass doors you see at malls all over. The space on the inside was full of zombies. Same for Kohl¡¯s. Same for JC Penny¡¯s. One store after another, one set of doors after the next, it was the same over and over. Each entryway was now heavily patrolled by zombies.


    Fortunately, they were mostly still the tier one monsters we were used to. I spotted a few tier two skeleton mages in the mix, same as before, but the horde hadn¡¯t been ranking up. If they had, we¡¯d be in way more trouble, so that was some good news.


    We cut through the space between the mall and a Hanford¡¯s grocery store just south of it. I made a mental note to check the grocery store out, if we survived all of this. The front of the store was all broken glass, smashed in and ruined. But I was willing to bet that thanks to its proximity to the mall and its zombies, most of the canned and dry goods were probably still intact.


    Winter was coming, and even if it was still months away, we needed to find supplies if we were going to survive the cold months.


    Once we came around on the western side of the mall, we turned north and followed the paved delivery area, looking for anything interesting. The whole area was closed up, though. Every loading bay was shut. Every door, too. The whole rear side of the mall was locked up tight. We could definitely bust in, but we wouldn¡¯t see what was on the other side of those doors until we were through them.


    About halfway along the rear side, Farnsworth pointed west. ¡°What¡¯s that, over there?¡±


    I squinted, trying to make it out. There were a bunch of fields, and some barn-like buildings. One barn had caught fire and burned to the ground; the ruins were still smoldering. But the rest of the structures looked more or less okay, and even the fields looked mostly untouched.


    ¡°I¡¯m not sure,¡± I replied. ¡°You want a look?¡±


    ¡°Couldn¡¯t hurt,¡± Farnsworth said.


    I shrugged. He was right that we still had some time, and information was power, so we set off in that direction. It was a quick hop, anyway, not far out of our way.


    What we found was interesting: a fully operational farm, more or less. The livestock was mostly dead; the place had once housed a bunch of horses and cows, but they¡¯d been cut to ribbons by zombie claws. Oddly enough, a bunch of chickens had survived. Must have run away when the zombies showed up. They wandered around the yard, pecking at bugs on the ground.


    It wasn¡¯t until I saw the sign near the front gate that I realized what I was looking at. The University of Vermont had a ¡®model farm¡¯ for their agriculture students to study at. This was that place. Before the Event, it had been a full-fledged farm, complete with livestock, crop fields, and even housing. I spotted an old-style well on the premises, too.


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    Whoever had been living here was long gone. There were signs of zombie attacks everywhere, and I felt confident anyone who¡¯d been here when they hit the place was now part of the horde. But they hadn¡¯t burned it to the ground like they had most of the nearby retail buildings. Maybe they¡¯d hit this spot early on, and only started burning things later? Whatever the reason, it would have made for a decent camping spot, if it hadn¡¯t been for the neighbors.


    ¡°Might be a good rally point,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°If things get messy in the battle, people can retreat there. But it probably makes more sense to use the bookstore instead, unless we¡¯re planning to strike toward the rear of the mall.¡±


    ¡°Do you think that makes more sense?¡± I asked.


    He shook his head. ¡°Nah, I think the front is smarter. We ought to be able to draw the zombies out into the parking lot to fight them there. Even if we can¡¯t, we can at least engage them in the entrance areas. With those back doors, we won¡¯t know what¡¯s on the other side until we¡¯re hip deep in whatever sort of trap is waiting for us.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re expecting traps, then,¡± I replied. It wasn¡¯t a question, in my mind, but what good was having a career soldier with me if I didn¡¯t use his experience?


    ¡°Oh, absolutely. Come on, let¡¯s get back to the others.¡±


    We continued our path, cutting around the north end of the mall to finish our loop and return to the bookstore. The troops were still there, waiting for our arrival. If anything they were all formed up now, the ratkin in rows right behind my undead.


    I wished I¡¯d been able to get some weapons and armor from the Guard before we left, but given the tension in the air at the time, asking for something of Turner felt like a bad plan. My undead were tier three. I hoped that would be enough to still make them effective. I mentioned it to Farnsworth and he grunted.


    ¡°Got an idea. Head south to that strip mall there,¡± he said.


    Hopeful, I did as he asked. The place was mostly burned down, but there had been a sporting goods store on the corner, and it was partially intact. The place was mostly wrecked, but there were still stacks of baseball bats and hockey sticks, all of which were viable weapons for my troops. I ordered the undead to march down there and pick up weapons. There weren¡¯t enough for all of them, but it was a good start.


    Finally, there wasn¡¯t anything else to do. There were no more boxes that needed checking. Nothing else we could add that would improve our chances of victory. Nothing I could think of, anyway.


    I turned to Farnsworth. ¡°We ready?¡±


    He nodded. ¡°It¡¯s time.¡±


    My undead formed up on the road, and we marched across. The ratkin forces lined up directly behind my guys. Farnsworth took command of the other humans, guarding our south flank. If we were going to get surprised from somewhere, that would probably be the place. The avians flew above us, seeming excited to be finally on the assault. Kara was beside me on Sue, and Hope was nearby, waiting for the battle to begin.


    ¡°We really doing this?¡± Kara asked. She looked nervous, but determined.


    I had a feeling my face read the same way. ¡°Time to take it to them.¡±


    I raised my voice so it would carry. ¡°Move out!¡±


    We crossed the road and the parking lot beyond, making for the Target again. Why that spot? Well, we already had an opening there that we knew Sue could pass through. It was also toward the north end of the mall, meaning we could start there and work our way south.


    I had Sue spit a Fireball into the Target. It detonated just inside, sending zombies flying in all directions and shattering any nearby windows that we¡¯d somehow missed on the first attack. That was our signal, and I sent my undead in right after, juggernauts leading the way.


    They poured through the opening in the wall, smashing into the still-stunned zombies inside the place. Fire skeletons peppered the enemy with blasts of flame from behind the juggernaut ranks. The attack was lightning-quick, and with the defenders stunned, it didn¡¯t take long before we had a solid beachhead inside the Target.


    But there were a lot of zombies in there! Too many for us to easily just bash our way through. I needed to get in there and help if we were going to win the store as quickly as I wanted to. ¡°Kara, you good?¡±


    ¡°Go. I¡¯ll be fine.¡±


    I took to the air, flying into Target through one of the shattered upper windows. Inside, the battle was far more chaotic than it looked from without. I couldn¡¯t maintain Flight for too long, or I¡¯d drain all my mana, so I dove in, landing just behind my juggernauts. From there it was three quick steps, and I was in the front line, sword in one hand and the new shield Farnsworth gifted me with in the other. I lashed out, cutting down one zombie after another.


    I¡¯d grown faster. None of the tier one enemies could so much as touch me. I dodged each blow like they were standing still, and my sword flickered in and out of zombies like a beam of light. I¡¯d grown stronger. One zombie got too close for the sword, so I fired off a front kick at it instead. The kick sent it sailing back twenty feet! It smashed through six other zombies as it sailed through the air, before finally coming to a crushing stop against the far wall.


    Each of my sword swings chopped zombie parts clean off. A swing to a neck decapitated the zombie. A blow to a leg cut the leg off. I still wasn¡¯t used to this level of raw power, but it was growing on me.


    I¡¯d grown more resistant to damage, too. The skeleton mages on the enemy side figured out fast that I was a serious threat, and they ganged up on me. Three of them dropped Harm spells on me at almost the exact same moment. A few days ago, that might have killed me outright. Now, I felt the pain as those spells hit, and it was even enough to stagger me¡ªbut it didn¡¯t come close to taking me down. I dropped a Drain Life on the nearest of the mages and killed it instantly, restoring most of my lost health.


    Ten minutes later, Target was ours. We¡¯d cleared the place entirely, my juggernauts holding the line just on this side of the doors to the rest of the mall.


    I called Sue into the store, and we gathered up all our troops, making ready for the next step of the operation. Gaining a beachhead was the easy part. From here on out, I was confident things were going to grow much more difficult.

 Chapter 110 - And Now, You Die

    Chapter 110 - And Now, You Die


    It took some doing to get Sue out of the Target and into the main hallways of the mall itself. The doorways were simply too small, so I had my dinosaur blast the metal and glass framing above them, blowing the whole thing out. The resulting passage was big enough to accommodate Sue, just barely.


    As soon as Sue stepped through the gap, that¡¯s when they hit us again. Tons of undead came rushing down the passage like a wave. I sent the mental command to my juggernauts to form up, but it wasn¡¯t going to be enough to blunt the charge, not by itself. So I reached out with my Control Undead power¡ªand found it had changed.


    The first grab gained me six zombies instead of one. That was very new! And more than a little welcome. I swiped control of the front rank, then immediately grabbed the one right after it as well. Twelve zombies were mine in as many seconds, and my new minions turned and swiped at the rest right behind them. The wave of undead smashed into them, bowling them right over, but it caused a massive traffic jam, like a highway pileup that just keeps growing because more cars keep crashing into the rear ends of the others.


    I almost cracked up laughing, watching the mess as it grew. There just wasn¡¯t time, though.


    ¡°Farnsworth, get your guys in there and hold the line!¡± I shouted. Then I ordered Sue to hit them with a Fireball, right in the center of where the zombies were falling all over themselves. The spell impacted, sending zombie parts in all directions. It took out two of the ones I had controlled, too, but that was fine. It would be simple enough to grab more of them.


    Then I launched myself forward into the air, slicing straight toward the enemy. The avians saw me moving and followed close behind, but when I dropped myself down in the middle of the madhouse, they stopped there, preferring to stab zombies safely from the air with their spears, instead.


    Me, I wanted to get in there. I smacked into the tile floor in the middle of the zombie logjam like a comet coming to Earth. The force of the impact send several nearby foes falling backward, and my sword carved that gap larger still. I was surrounded, though, with foes attacking me from all sides. That wouldn¡¯t do, so I Controlled six of them behind me to watch my back, which let me focus on the ones ahead of me.


    One after another, the zombies kept going down. My juggernauts and Farnsworth¡¯s human troops crashed into the horde¡¯s battle line, wiping out a dozen zombies in seconds. Behind them, the ratkin used their bows and spears to take out more foes.


    The battle was going well, but I still felt on edge. I cast Health to Mana to refill myself with magical power, then Drained a nearby skeleton mage to refill my health. I wanted to keep myself in as close to top shape as possible, because my gut said something was coming, something bigger and more dangerous than the undead we¡¯d faced so far.


    Then I felt it, a wave of fear rolling down the hall toward us. Even with all my Will, I almost turned and ran. I had to keep myself focused to remain in place, and stumbled a step. Two zombies used the distraction to grab me, one holding my shield while the other grasped my sword arm. The latter one leaned in, ready to take a chunk out of my shoulder. I didn¡¯t have time for anything fancy, so I let him pull me closer, using the momentum to empower a forehead bash. The zombie flew backward at the blow, its skull split wide open.


    One threat down. The other was still trying to chew on my shield, but my sword finished it off fast. I whirled then, checking on how the rest of our people fared.


    My undead hadn¡¯t been impacted by the fear magic, but the living troops definitely had. The avians had withdrawn; the ratkin as well. Both groups were falling back into Target, giving back twenty feet of hard-won hallway. Some of the humans were with them, although Farnsworth and Kara were still fighting. Kara rode Sue, her bow singing as she fired shaft after shaft into the horde, and Farnsworth was right alongside the juggernauts. His axe cleaved apart two zombies as I watched.


    We were holding, but barely. I needed to wipe out whatever was casting that fear, or we were in deep shit. I took to the air again, hoping that I could see whatever it was from above.


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    At first, there was nothing. But then something rose from the rear ranks of the undead horde, flying up to meet me.


    It was spectral in appearance¡ªthat¡¯s the only way I can describe the thing. It looked vaguely like a man, wearing medieval armor, but he was only semi-visible, translucent, like he was only partly there. He carried a massive sword in both hands, and as he glided through the air toward me I had to wonder if this was the foe I¡¯d felt, back at the fort.


    But no¡ªI didn¡¯t think this was our main enemy. Whatever I¡¯d sensed at the fort before had been terribly strong, frighteningly so. This creature was just a single tier above me, at tier eight. Some sort of lieutenant, then, a sub-commander.


    It made sense. How could one being control a thousand zombies, after all? At tier seven in Animate, I could raise sixty-four undead. I could control thirty-two tier points worth, using my tier six Control Undead. A tier eight monster like this one could maybe control one hundred and twenty-eight tier one undead. But to control a thousand? You¡¯d need to be tier eleven, and I didn¡¯t think we were facing anything that strong, even at the big boss level.


    I dropped a Drain Life on the thing as it approached me, and the spell staggered it. I grinned. That was good information to have. It meant the thing could definitely be hurt. But the last thing I wanted to do was face it airborne. My flight weakened me by draining mana I ought to be using on other spells, so I dove back toward the ground, landing off on one side of the horde with my back to a hallway wall.


    As I¡¯d figured, the thing chased. It landed not far from me, the other undead backing away to give us space. They surged on, attacking my battle lines. I could only hope our troops held, because I had my work cut out for me fighting this thing, whatever it was.


    Then it spoke, and the words chilled me to the core. ¡°You dare much, coming here, necromancer.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m just doing what needs to be done,¡± I said. I cast a quick Health to Mana to refill my pool and followed it up with another Drain on the big bad. He flinched as the spell hit but continued his advance.


    ¡°Why fight the inevitable? You could join us, you know.¡±


    ¡°Oh shit, is this the part where you tell me you¡¯re my dad?¡± I quipped. The creature stepped in and swung his sword downward, aimed at my head. I blocked with my new shield, the impact hitting hard enough it numbed my fingers some. Without the level of Strength and Stamina I had, I doubted I¡¯d have been able to keep holding the shield.


    ¡°No, I am a wraith of times long past, summoned back to this world by my master,¡± the thing said. ¡°He would welcome your service as well, though. Surrender. I will take you to him.¡±


    I ducked under his next swing, taking a slice at his leg with my much shorter blade. My weapon didn¡¯t seem to do a lot of damage, though. In fact, I was pretty sure it mostly went right through him. Wraith, indeed¡ªthis was some sort of ghost-type creature. Killing it wasn¡¯t going to be simple. Shit.


    ¡°Yeah?¡± I asked, trying to keep it talking. ¡°What¡¯s the benefits package look like?¡±


    ¡°You will die,¡± it said.


    ¡°That doesn¡¯t sound appealing.¡±


    ¡°You will die,¡± it went on. ¡°But then live again, as a wraith or lich. And never die again. You will be immortal, serving my master for all eternity.¡±


    ¡°Still not feeling this offer,¡± I retorted, dodging sideways to narrowly avoid his sword again. Holy shit, the wraith was fast! I was swifter, but only just, and my inability to nail it with my sword was making this fight a lot harder.


    Still, I had a plan in mind. I just needed to hang on a little longer. I backpedaled to avoid another swing, then blocked an attack with my shield. The clang that made echoed over the sounds of battle around us.


    ¡°If you will not serve willingly, you will still serve,¡± it told me. ¡°All will. You will simply become a mindless zombie instead of a willing slave. Come now¡ªmy master would much prefer you come of your own accord. Join us.¡±


    ¡°Not gonna happen,¡± I said, firing off another Drain Life. That staggered the wraith again, slowing it down further. I¡¯d done some serious damage with those spells, but it still looked plenty healthy. How much damage was this thing able to take, anyway?


    ¡°As you wish,¡± the wraith replied.


    Then, before I could react, it moved its sword in a fancy, flourishing pattern that I could barely keep up with. Clearly, this creature had far more experience using its weapon than I did. I could barely follow the flashing blade, but I still managed to block the first blow with my sword, and the second with my shield¡­


    The second shot was a feint. I realized it as the greatsword barely made contact with my shield. It had maneuvered me so that my shield blocked my vision. I couldn¡¯t see what it was doing, for just a split second.


    That was enough.


    The next thing I knew, the sword was sticking through my gut, in one end and out the other. I screamed. There was nothing else I could do¡ªthe pain was just too intense for any other reaction.


    I was dying, and I knew it. I reached out for the mana to cast Drain Life, but it was a struggle to concentrate through the agony. I staggered back, the wraith following me, sword still held inside me. It reached out with an armored fist and grabbed me by the throat.


    ¡°And now, you die.¡±

 Chapter 111 - My Turn!

    Chapter 111 - My Turn!


    The wraith¡¯s grip tightened on my neck, but that wasn¡¯t the worst of it. His eyes flashed with brilliant green light, and behind him four zombies turned toward us, mouths open as they approached. I realized that he intended to make good on his promise. He wasn¡¯t going to kill me¡ªhe¡¯d have his zombies finish me off, which would turn me into a zombie.


    My concentration was a wreck, thanks to the steel still sliding around inside me, but I wasn¡¯t going to stand around and be eaten alive without at least putting up a fight. I focused my Will as best I could and readied a spell.


    Before I could cast, though, an arrow sprouted from the wraith¡¯s face. He shrieked, staggering back, dropping me to the ground and taking his sword with him. The sensation of the blade sliding back out of my was the second worst thing I¡¯d ever felt¡ªright after it going in.


    I dropped to the ground, unable to move, stunned by the fall, bleeding. As I lay there, I watched as Hope leaped past me, going for the wraith¡¯s throat. The creature batted my dog aside, sending Hope flying into the wall with a yip. But that still forced the wraith back another step, and that was enough to give me that much more breathing room.


    Bright yellow and orange light flashed by overhead, so intense I ducked and hid my face as it passed. Heat rushed over me as Sue¡¯s Fireball detonated right in the wraith¡¯s face. It screamed as the flames enveloped it.


    Now I was singed on top of bleeding. Blood pooled under me. I needed to fix that, fast. All the mana I¡¯d managed to gather went into a Drain Life spell, staggering the wraith further. Its life force flowed back into me, knitting some of my wounds back together.


    I could think again. The relief as the worst of the pain left took what little breath I still had away, but I knew I had seconds before the wraith and its zombies were all over me. My friends had bought me those moments, but if I didn¡¯t use them, I was dead meat.


    The Fireball killed a couple of the zombies closest to me, but more were closing in around the wraith. That was both a problem and a solution wrapped in a neat package. I cast Control Undead on the ones closest to the wraith¡ªand for the first time, there was resistance!


    These undead weren¡¯t just set loose to wander. They were under the direct control of someone else¡ªsomething else. The wraith here was commanding them, and it was my Will against his.


    The battle felt like it lasted longer than it did; the zombies froze in place, as if trying to decide which of us to listen to. Then they whirled as a single unit and latched onto the wraith, grabbing his arms. He threw one off, then another. I cast Control Undead again, seizing six more of the closest zombies and ordering them to attack their former master. This time, taking them from him was even easier. The third time, it happened so fast I barely noticed the resistance.


    The wraith tried to fly up, but he was burdened by all the undead clinging to him. He tried to break free, but they held him down. He¡¯d smash one zombie skull, but there were others. He¡¯d brought a horde of Controlled undead to face me, but he couldn¡¯t keep them Controlled¡ªnot if I pushed back against his spell.


    I cast another Drain on the bastard, which dropped him to one knee. As his vitality flowed into me I was able to rise at last. I still had a hand over my belly, which felt like it was on fire as the wounds rapidly knit themselves back together. But I just let the pain fuel my fury.


    ¡°My turn,¡± I spat in the wraith¡¯s direction.


    I cast Control Undead, recruiting more of his own troops to fight him. Then I cycled Health to Mana and Drain Life again, with the net result that I was a little more healed. I¡¯d lost the shield somewhere but managed to hang onto my sword, so I marched forward, blade at the ready.


    The wraith fought back even harder. He tossed one zombie away from him; it broke against a column when it hit. He crushed the skull of another with his bare hands.


    Me? I just cast Control Undead again. It wasn¡¯t like there was any shortage of raw materials here for me to Control. He could crush as many of them as he wanted. I had more.


    ¡°You brought undead to battle a necromancer,¡± I told him. ¡°How stupid are you?¡±


    ¡°How? How are you stripping my control?¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t it obvious? I¡¯m stronger than you are,¡± I said.


    I was able to stand up straight again. The wounds were closed, now. The bleeding stopped. I wasn¡¯t back to full strength, but I was getting there fast. As I approached, the wraith swung his sword at me, but with two zombies clutching his arm, there was no power behind the blow. I parried it easily with my blade.


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    ¡°You may defeat me, but my master is a thousand times stronger. You will fall!¡± The wraith¡¯s hissing voice was aiming for haughty defiance¡ªbut all I heard was fear.


    It swung again. I blocked, then dipped my sword inside his guard, stabbing him in the gut, the same blow he¡¯d given me.


    The wraith doubled over around the wound, crumpling as it screamed. I withdrew the blade, then took a step back. My Drain spell had cycled, so I cast it again while simultaneously sending a mental command to Sue, ordering the coup de grace.


    A Fireball streaked past my head, smashing into the wraith with devastating force. It blew the creature apart entirely. One moment the wraith was there, semi-solid and dangerous, if weak. The next, it was nothing but shreds of mist fading away.


    I staggered back against the wall behind me, feeling weak. Casting all of those spells after such a serious wound took everything I had, and I just needed a few minutes to breathe and restore myself. Around me, the front rank of juggernauts rushed in, smashing one zombie after another. The enemy undead were barely putting up any resistance now. If anything, they seemed disorganized, confused. Leaderless.


    With the wraith dead, the enemy force was still fighting, but it was rudderless and incapable of collective action. Our team made short work of what was left of the zombies.


    Before the fight was even done, Kara was there beside me. ¡°Are you okay? I was so worried!¡±


    I flashed her a weak grin. ¡°I will be. It looks a lot worse than it is.¡±


    ¡°It looks like you starred in a slasher film as one of the victims.¡±


    I glanced down at myself. She wasn¡¯t wrong. The greatsword thrust had punched right through my linothorax. The armor had contained the blade, though, keeping it from moving around too much after he struck. That had probably kept me alive.


    My white armor was ruined, though. Between the gaping holes in the front and back, and the bloodstains all over it, I had a feeling I was going to need new armor.


    ¡°Maybe I should have taken the Natural Armor stone,¡± I said.


    ¡°You want it? I¡¯ll pop it out now!¡± Kara replied.


    I shook my head. ¡°No, keep it. I can heal myself. The injury part still sucks, but I¡¯ll be all right.¡±


    ¡°What was that thing?¡±


    ¡°It called itself a wraith,¡± I said. ¡°Besides that, I don¡¯t know much more than you. It was controlling this batch of zombies, though.¡±


    ¡°Was it the boss? Did we win?¡±


    I shook my head. ¡°No, it was definitely talking about taking me to its master. I get the feeling there might be several of these guys. They¡¯re sub-commanders or something. Whatever the big boss is, it¡¯s bigger than the wraith.¡±


    That thought sent a tremor through me. I barely beat the wraith. How the hell was I supposed to take something down that was even stronger?


    Of course, the answer was that I¡¯d need to beat it the same way I beat this one: not by myself. If I¡¯d been solo here today, I¡¯d have lost. It was thanks to Kara¡¯s arrow, Hope¡¯s lunge, and Sue¡¯s Fireball that I was still alive. That was my strength here. I wasn¡¯t alone.


    ¡°You up to walking yet?¡± Kara asked.


    I was still sitting on the cool floor, my back against the wall. I nodded¡ªwhich hurt¡ªand then Kara eased me back to my feet. In spite of the healing, everything still hurt like mad. My throat was sore where the wraith grabbed me, my gut still had lingering bits of the fire which had been blazing through it not long ago, and my shield arm felt battered and bruised. Frankly, more things hurt than didn¡¯t, and I cast another Drain spell on the nearest zombie. The trickle of vitality helped ease my suffering some.


    We made our way back toward Sue, who stood behind the ranks of our warriors, shooting Fireballs into the disorganized mass of enemy undead. Farnsworth met us as we came closer.


    ¡°The rest of this force is breaking apart. Soon as that thing went down, the rest of them got a lot easier to kill,¡± Farnsworth said. ¡°You okay?¡±


    ¡°I will be,¡± I replied.


    ¡°Good. We pressing ahead, or do we retreat for now, hit it again tomorrow?¡±


    I thought that over for a moment. Backing off was tempting. I¡¯d been hurt, badly hurt, for really the first time. As much as I wanted to laugh it off now that I was mostly healed up, it still shook me. Every time my thoughts drifted back to the feel of that sword biting into me, I wanted to do nothing more than run away and hide.


    That wouldn¡¯t solve anything, though, and I knew it. The undead would still be here. They¡¯d continue to amass more forces by slaughtering people too weak to stand a chance against them. Even if we backed off and rested a single additional night, how many people would die as a result?


    There was another good reason to stay the course. ¡°The last time Kara and I hit them and then backed off, they attacked our fort with hundreds of undead. Overwhelmed us completely. We¡¯ve slaughtered a couple hundred of their zombies and killed that wraith. I don¡¯t think they¡¯re going to let it slide. We back off now, my guess is they attack the Guard base tonight. You want to face the boss of this place there, at night, with packs of civilians near enough to be in danger?¡±


    Farnsworth nodded. ¡°I figured as much. Just wanted to be sure.¡±


    ¡°Selena, you need rest,¡± Kara said. ¡°You were just stabbed!¡±


    ¡°I got better,¡± I quipped.


    She rolled her eyes at me. So much for Monte Python quotes saving the day. ¡°At the least, take a little while to check the stones we got from fighting all these zombies. I think even Farnsworth will agree that we focus all the crystals we can on you. You¡¯re the one they¡¯re going to go after, and you¡¯re our strongest fighter. Anything we do that makes you powerful lifts our chances of winning this mess.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s right,¡± Farnsworth chimed in. ¡°I do agree. Let¡¯s gather up those stones and see if we can get you stronger. You¡¯re what, tier seven now?¡±


    ¡°Yeah. With a fair number of sixes and fives in other areas.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s your strength,¡± he replied. ¡°You didn¡¯t go all-in on one thing, like some folks do. You¡¯ve stacked stats and you have some crazy spell power. Let¡¯s get you as strong as we can before we proceed.¡±


    ¡°All right,¡± I replied. ¡°We have a plan. Let¡¯s make it happen.¡±