Arriving back at the line of buildings they noticed the mist being riled up once more, conflict occurring at the newly established borders as wraiths gave it their all trying to tear the plants apart

"It hasn't even been half a day why are they attacking like this once more?"

​​

"Must have sensed the line of defense getting slightly weaker, shouldn't be a problem however, as long as we finish up the watchtowers within a day that is"

Taking out a few weirdly bent knives he gave one each to Ellis, Ika, the rest he gave to Zero whom he told to fetch Mia as quickly as possible along with any still sentient thrall in order to help out

"Watch and repeat"

Taking out a similar knife as well as a bone he began carving out some sort of eye, or at least it seemed so until it looked like a fruit? Before turning into a big nose…

Taking their minds for a boggling spin he ended up with, well, weird symbols

"Where do we carve that my Lord?"

"Across eighteen towers"

"Where?"

"Clearly I meant every bone"

"...As my Lord wishes"

It was a time of crisis, one of the few things that didn't cause Ika to be discouraged, taking her knife and heading toward the towers, Ellis already ahead of her since she understood him from the first time

A while later Mia came with Dag and a few others, including the very human thrall Jona

"Copy what they are doing"

He ordered, then went toward the creature he believed to be a devolved version of a Witness

"You would have been perfect to keep around, sadly I cannot keep you asleep for long"

Subrina was currently trapped in the mist, an unexpected happening as he thought Ianus would be able to slow them for a little while before he picked the poor fellow and Subrina up and sheltered them in the line of defence until this storm passed over

'Their alright though, wonder what is going on their end'

He speculated, knowing it wasn't really anything too bad since there came no dread or distress from the shared connection

Dismissing the thought he focused back on the creature, more importantly, its tightly closed eyes

Taking out a bunch of equipment, among which were weapons and surgical items, he began the very arduous process of extracting each and every eye with both delicacy and strength, since it was super strong yet everything on the back of the eye was extremely fragile, to the point a slight misshape could blind the eye for good

By the time he was done the others were almost finished as well, and the wraiths were also somewhat finished, having started pushing their way into the forest once more

"Guess there will be no time for a test run huh"

With hurry, he took on eye up each tower and placed them on the circle pre carved by him, inscribing something on the eyes themselves and setting their trajectory before going underground where the chambers were

There he found the carvings on the wall looking dark and gloomy as they flowed from the center room under the forest and into the nine chambers, seeping into the blood before ascending the walls with much lighter darkness, one not as deathly after being baptized by the blood's vitality

Checking all chambers to be in the same state he started activating each of their connecting paths, sending this somewhat purified energy toward the towers before he ascended toward them once more, overlooking the battlefield

For a while nothing happened, the wraiths continued their destruction and humans kept wallowing in despair, his followers the only ones having some hope

Shriieeek!

Suddenly, a hefty sum of the wraiths started shrieking to the top of their lungs, everyone noticed they leaned toward red than black under an intense light, one that could be traced back to the menacing eye opened wide atop the blackened bone watchtowers

Yes, as if the bones weren't creepy enough now the bones were emitting a strange dark energy

The creepy tower combined with the intimidating huge eye showering the mist with crimson light didn't scare the dwelling humans, in fact they cheered with all their might, finally there was a ray of hope once more, evil looking as it may be

That wasn't all they had however, as this was cue for a white robed figure carrying a shining spear to run toward the mist, confidence writing all over her face as she threw the weapon, piercing a few wraiths into nothing on the way toward the black depths

A moment of silence followed, right before light flushed within the black mist like thunder roaring between the clouds, a dreaded sensation caused, and for the first time, it was the humans who were afraid

Shrieking loudly the few wraiths barely managing to live at the edge of the explosion retreated back into their safety zone, no longer attacking with wild abandon

"Wake it up and throw it in there"

That wasn't all there was to their counterattack however, along with the spear of light YuJu ordered the fire creature, now missing exactly forty eyes, to be thrown into the mist after being given a stimulant

One didn't need to guess what would happen to it, only wonder just how many wraiths it could put down before dying

'Sure hope it dies a Witness's death'

Another muffled explosion came some ten minutes later, a rather quick answer to his hopes

'They always go out with style'

It was an annoying thing, probably this would be the only time ever he would want to see that ball explode with every grain of energy it had

Some parts of the poor sod even fell near them, most of which were rocky as it wasn't exactly organic for the most part

These two destructive attacks, as well as the eighteen eyes shining down on the mist caused a great lack of wraiths who dared, or were crazy enough to try and attack the forest

"This should keep them at bay for as long as the status quo remains"

He commented, earning a question from Mia

"How would they be capable of moving forward once more Master?"

"By sending higher level wraiths of course, not that they would, high level troops of their kind is hard to get, only to be used in final battles, much unlike these lowly ones that are born quickly and die just as quickly"

"So these are newborn wraiths…."

"Don't fret, it's not like they will attack any time soon, the way I see it they will be forced to use better troops only when they have the human race cornered and tested, though that also depends on how many weak wraiths they have, something which is supposedly boosted now that they are easily killing off most of humanity"

Feeling that he filled her mind with too many things to worry about he assured her that everything was planned for, then gave out orders to go with what was discussed from the beginning

Thus the vampires along with Ellis took up their own spots while the humans started preparing for the rest of the human race leaving only some thralls to dig up the secret tunnels under the huge buildings so that the remaining twenty two watchtowers would be built

'I should get going too'

Naturally, YuJu had his own part to do as well, vanishing into the wind as he sped toward the land which he believed that guy took up as residence

The journey wasn't a short one which is why he had to postpone it until now, only when a stop was put to the Haunting Mist's advances and the approach of the remaining humans was close would he have to go all the way through a few countries just to deliver information, and ask for payment

A day later he crossed a familiar land, not that it looked anything like it was before, still he could tell it apart from the energy contained within the burning earth, something he had to make a detour around with how dangerously hot it was, not to mention the mist struggling to make way forward, chased off with much ease, like all the human's effort couldn't compare to a nap from this big fellow down there

'Something is strange here'

He felt, but couldn't quite put his finger on it, neither did he want to slow down and try to understand what was happening, time was running thin

Ignoring the nagging feeling he had YuJu quickly made way around the land, spending another good few hours till he reached a valley, nestled between two barren mountains with a dried up river in the middle, the only noticeable thing in it would be a small shack in the middle of a graveyard, one with open air tombs that did nothing to hide the living dead within