The ruined town of Duskreach reeked of death. Smoke clung to the stones, and the wind dragged with it the rancid smell of rot. In the center, the crooked tower leaned against the blackened skyline like a broken fang. Its windows flickered faintly green, whispering with the sound of restless spirits.
Inside, twelve necromancers sat in a circle around a cracked table. Candles guttered in skull-shaped holders, shadows stretching long across the damp walls. Their hoods drooped low, hiding gaunt faces carved thin by weeks of hunger and exhaustion.
One of them broke the silence with a shout, slamming his palm against the table so hard the brittle stone chipped.
"Enough of this waiting!" His voice cracked with fury. "If the fucking Virehall wants Deerfell razed to the ground, they should give us more than scraps! We're choking on dust and rotten meat down here."
His words echoed off the chamber walls. Several necromancers looked up, eyes ringed with black, too tired to argue. But one across from him sneered, fingers drumming against his staff.
"You know as well as I do it's impossible for Virehall to send us more." His voice was low, hoarse, but sharp. "Elarion's border guards choke every crossing. Even smugglers vanish before they reach us. And Virehall itself bleeds in war with the Tharvorn Dominion. We are at the bottom of their barrel."
The first necromancer spat on the floor. "So we are left to starve while they dream of empire? Pathetic. They are so fucking dumb to pick two wars at once. Elarion on one side, Tharvorn dominion on the other, fucking idiocy!"
Another, younger, leaned forward nervously, wringing his pale hands. His voice trembled. "Then what do we do? Should we… abandon this? We've raised maybe only four, five thousand corpses at most. Enough to harass a trade road, perhaps but Deerfell? Impossible. We'll be crushed."
The argument rose to a clamor, spitting, snarling, fists striking the table.
Then one elder necromancer slammed the butt of his staff against the stone floor, cracking it. His eyes burned with sickly green light. "Silence."
The room stilled.
But in the silence, something else crept in, the faint, distant clash of steel. A scream. Then another.
The young one stiffened, eyes wide. "Did you hear that?"
The group moved to the broken window. Down the ruined street, faint torchlight flickered. Shadows fought amidst the rubble, steel glinting in the moonlight. The noise of battle grew louder with each passing second.
"They're coming," one hissed. "adventurers or elite soldiers."
"No," another corrected, squinting. "Too few. Not an army. A small group."
"Doesn't matter," said the first, voice rising in panic. "We should retreat before they reach us."
"Retreat?" The iron-haired necromancer snarled, baring yellow teeth. "Better to drown them in the tide of dead than flee like cowards. If we run now, Virehall's hounds will hunt us to the ends of the earth. We fight, or we are nothing."
The circle split at once. Four of them turned and fled, snatching up satchels, bolting down the back stair in frantic silence. The remaining eight tightened their grips on grimoires and staffs, eyes burning with manic fury.
"Then we fight."
They descended.
---
The streets outside were already a slaughterhouse.
Angela's greatsword carved arcs through the swarm, splitting rotten torsos in two. Each swing sent shockwaves across the ground, bones shattering, corpses flying. Golden lightning sparked around her armored boots, Juggernaut's Rush propelling her like a thunderbolt into the next cluster of undead.
Selvara moved like a phantom. Her silver hair whipped behind her as she slipped between corpses, estoc flashing with pinpoint thrusts. Eyes, throats, hearts, every stab efficient, precise, conserving energy. She didn't waste movement, only left trails of collapsing bodies in her wake.
Isolde stood at the rear, golden hair aglow in the torchlight, sparks of electricity dancing across her fingers. She thrust out her hand, her voice clear and commanding. "Shock Current!"
A whip of lightning lashed outward, frying one ghoul, then branching into three more, then six, then 12 and then twenty-four more. Their bodies convulsed, skin peeling, before collapsing into smoking heaps.
Loid swung a rusted short sword, but even as he cut down one zombie, two more staggered forward. Sweat dripped down his face, his heart pounding. His UI shimmered.
[ Mirror Soul: Choose unit. ]
Loid's eyes snapped to Angela. Her raw strength, her unstoppable momentum, if he could borrow it…
"Angela."
The system chimed.
[ Mirror Soul activated: Angela. ]
[ Stats and Passive copied for 1 hour. ]
Loid's body convulsed. His veins burned with power, muscles swelling, vision sharpening until every movement of the undead slowed. Golden lightning coiled around his legs, crackling with each step.
He dropped the rusted sword. His eyes darted to the ruins of a collapsed roof. A massive oak beam lay half-buried in rubble. Loid wrapped his hands around it and lifted it clean, hefting it as if it were nothing.
The first group of undeads lunged. Loid swung. The beam crashed down, crushing their skull to pulp and splitting their body in half. Another group came from the side, Loid spun, the beam smashing the group into paste against a wall.
Angela barked a laugh as she saw him. "Hah! Now you're fighting like a real warrior, commander!"
Loid's blood roared in his ears. "Then let's clear them all!"
Together they carved forward. The streets drowned in gore. Rotten limbs flew, skulls shattered, the stones ran slick with black ichor. Still, the swarm pressed on.
Then the tower door creaked open.
Eight figures strode into the courtyard, black robes swirling. Necromancers. Their eyes gleamed green as they raised their staffs.
"Rank E: Bone Spike!" One slammed his staff to the ground. Jagged lances of bone erupted upward, skewering corpses and hurling them aside.
"Summon Dead!" another howled, and the earth split as clawed hands dragged fresh corpses upward, howling into the night.
Shadow flames erupted, black chains lashed out, skeletal wolves slavered with green fire.
Loid's grip tightened. "Kill them!"
The group surged.
Angela's greatsword smashed through the barrier of the first necromancer, cleaving him in two. Blood sprayed across her armor, but she roared and dashed forward, Juggernaut's Rush turning her into a human thunderclap.
Selvara blinked into motion, estoc piercing a necromancer's throat before he could even finish his spell. She withdrew, cold eyes already searching for the next target.
Isolde's golden eyes blazed as she unleashed a torrent of Shock Current. Bolts chained through many undead then through two necromancers, one convulsing violently before collapsing into ash. The others screamed as their flesh blackened, smoke rising from their robes.
Loid dashed forward, golden lightning sparking at his feet. His oak beam smashed into a necromancer's chest, pulping him into the cobblestones. He swung again, catching another mid-chant, splintering bone and spraying blood across the courtyard.
Three necromancers fell quickly. The survivors screamed in fury, blood pooling at their feet as they began a new chant in unison.
Their leader, iron-haired, raised both arms, voice booming with madness. "Witness our masterpiece! By marrow, by blood, by soul, we call the beast!"
The ground trembled. The corpses littering the courtyard twitched, then dragged themselves together. Flesh ripped, bones snapped, limbs fused in grotesque fashion. A dozen torsos merged into one massive body, wings sprouting from stitched-together arms, heads fused into a snarling mass of jaws.
An undead chimera, taller than a house, lurched upward with a howl that shook the air. Its stitched muscles bulged, its wings dripping rot, its many mouths screaming as one.
Angela's grin sharpened. "Finally… a real fight."
Loid lifted his beam, golden lightning sparking around him, and shouted over the roar.
The chimera stepped forward, the cobblestones cracking under its weight, and the battlefield descended once more into chaos.