Anastacia hadn’t even gotten out of the bed and was already bored by the deer hunting quest. Even though she understood why Gilbert had chosen a quest like that, it still seemed like an enormous waste of time for a necromancer to go out and kill a couple of deer. The one thousand and five hundred gold promised for the deed were pretty much the only thing that finally motivated her to get up and start preparing for the trip. It seemed like a lot for a job of that level, but Anastacia figured that the animals had been messing with the farmer for a good while and he just wanted to get rid of them, no matter the cost.

“Hair: check. Clothes: check.” She muttered while getting ready. “Such a nice day to go out and murder some innocent animals for money.”

Rosie had already prepared the breakfast for the day when Anastacia finally managed to drag herself downstairs and to one of the tables.

“Mornin’, kitten. Big day today, huh?” She asked and poured a cup of fresh coffee for the necromancer. “You know, I was wondering, if you can’t stand blood at all, how were you going to hunt the deer?”

Anastacia’s eyes widened and she turned even paler than usual. “I… didn’t think about that. I guess I’ll just do it while throwing up, a lot.” She had somehow failed to realize that most quests would almost certainly include killing a thing or two. The stupid deer quest had somehow just become even worse.

As Anastacia emptied her second cup of coffee, Gilbert came downstairs already geared up and ready to go. He stretched his back and tapped the necromancer on the shoulder cheerfully. “How’s about we head out right away? It’s only about an hour’s walk so we’ll probably be back by lunch. Have you got everything you need?”

Anastacia just let out an annoyed moan and slowly stood up.

In exchange for promising to bring back as much venison as they could, Rosie gave both of the adventurers their breakfasts to go and sent them on their way.

Anastacia opened up the food parcel as soon as they left the inn and began shoving the apple slices in her mouth. “What’s this?” She asked with her mouth still full and held up a small sausage.

“You’ve never seen a sausage? It’s like you’re trying to make me feel bad for you.” Gilbert asked and opened his parcel as well.

While eating, they passed by a small hut right outside the city gates, used by the guards as a storage for their things while on duty. Next to it was a bench, and on that bench slept a woman with bright red curly hair. Surrounded by empty wine bottles, she seemed like a common drunk, but both the cloak she used as a blanket, and her armor under it, were in immaculate condition.

Anastacia recognized the woman as the one that had accompanied the asshole paladin she had almost killed the day before. “Isn’t that-“ She said but was interrupted.

“Yes, it’s her. How about we don’t bother ourselves with the likes of them and carry on with the quest.” Gilbert suggested and pushed Anastacia forwards by the shoulder.

Having eaten something, the necromancer started to feel a bit better about the quest and figured that she just needed to look at it from a different angle. The sun was just rising, and they were on a nice little walk that just happened to end with a bunch of dead deer, that was simply how life sometimes worked out. The air felt nice and fresh too, nothing like the rotten stench she had breathed for years in Mournvalley.

“Hey Gil, you don’t happen to know of a way to kill a deer without any bloodshed, do you?” She asked to start up a conversation.

The old adventurer scratched his beard. “I once wrestled a cow to death, and it didn’t bleed – externally at least.”

“Yeah, I don’t think I can pull that off, unless these deer are squirrel sized.” Anastacia said and showed the approximate size the animals would have to be.

“Can’t you just snap their spines with a bit of necromancy?” Gilbert suggested jokingly.

“I could, if they stayed still long enough.” The necromancer shrugged. “Living bone and flesh is a lot trickier than dead stuff. In fact, most necromancers simply can’t do it at all, which is probably why it’s called necromancy and not like meatmancy or whatever.”

Suddenly Gilbert looked a bit worried. “Hold up for a second there, kid. Necromancers can control living beings? That sounds like something the world should be extremely worried about.” He asked.

“To a degree. There’s some low percentage of us that have the gift for it, but the methods they use are still brutish and clumsy, so the flesh and bone tend to come off when they try it… But you shouldn’t worry too much, the whole idea behind necromancy is overruling the will of the material, so strong willed creatures have some ability to at least slow it down. From then on, it’s a crapshoot depending on a bunch of things, like whether you’re a necromancer or not.” Anastacia explained. “The one requirement for useable material is that it had to have a will at one point, meaning things like rocks and plants are out, and dead things are useable and easy to overrule because they once had will but don’t anymore.”

Gilbert seemed satisfied with the explanation, he had never really been interested in necromancers, but adventurers never knew what they would run into next and understanding at least the basics of things helped when they needed to be dealt with. “What about things like spriggan or simulacra? Those have wills, so can you control them?” He asked.

“If you’re thinking whether I can shut Xamiliere up or not, I’m afraid that it’s a no.” Anastacia shook her head. “As far as I know, the spriggan are spirits controlling regular plant material, kind of like us actually. As for simulacra, I’ve never seen one, so I wouldn’t know.”

While they chatted about necromancy, its uses and possible roles Anastacia could fill in a party when they eventually would find more members, the open fields around Valor slowly changed into a more wooded kind. Eager to branch out from her current, ill fitting vocation, Anastacia wondered if she could use other ranged combat options, such as archery or maybe even magic.

After about an hour, they spotted a single house in the distance, surrounded by vast fields of root vegetables, such as potatoes and turnips. Some of the fields clearly had signs of animals trampling the crops and eating the sprouts. In some areas the damage was so bad that it clearly warranted getting rid of the culprits.

“These are deer tracks alright.” Gilbert muttered and inspected some of the hoofprints in the mud. “Kind of odd for them to race back and forth from the forest like this though.”

The tracks continued into the nearby tree line, but there was no visible movement among the trees. Going after them in the woods would work both for and against the adventurers, as their movements would be concealed to a degree by the undergrowth and trees but getting a direct line of sight to have a chance at hitting the deer with an arrow would also be harder.

“Let’s just go and meet the guy who hired us. Let me handle the talking, okay?” Gilbert said and gestured for Anastacia to follow him to the house.

As soon as they stepped foot off the road and into the fenced off yard, an old man barged out of the house with a loaded crossbow in his hands. Gilbert instinctively moved into the line of fire between the man and Anastacia and readied his wooden shield.

The old farmer squinted his eyes and peered at the adventurers for a while before lowering his crossbow. “You’re not deer, are you?” He asked and stepped off the porch.

“No sir, we are here on behalf of the guild. Apparently you have some troubles with a herd of deer?” Gilbert greeted the farmer and bowed.

“About damn time! I’d hunt them down myself, but my age has gotten to my sight. Almost shot one of the farmhands the other day.” The farmer laughed. Hearing that his issue was finally going to be dealt with had immediately gotten him into a better mood. “Those pests come out of the woods during nighttime and trample everything I try to grow. I’ve tried to ambush them but somehow they always know not to come out when I’m there.”

“Alright, we’re going to look for them in the forest then. Shouldn’t be long since they clearly like this area and wouldn’t stray too much.” Gilbert explained, grabbed his bow and started warming it up by pulling on the string a few times. “Anna, let’s get this done before dinner.”

They headed into the forest from the same spot that the deer seemed to use the most and began following the trail. Though the sun was already up, the treetops blocked off most of the light and made the tracking harder, but not impossible for the seasoned adventurer. After wandering between the trees for a while, they stopped to listen for a bit.

“Gil, I think I smell rotting flesh, it’s not too bad but there’s definitely something dead nearby.” Anastacia whispered and covered her nose.

Gilbert sniffed the air trying to pick up the scent. “Really? I can’t smell anything. Are all necromancers bloodhounds as well?” He joked. “Animals die in the woods all the time, so there might just be a moose carcass somewhere here.”

Having heard nothing, they continued to follow the tracks deeper into the woods. With every step the smell of rot became stronger and stronger, to a point where even Gilbert started to notice it. Eventually they stopped by a small clearing because the deer tracks had suddenly stopped. There were some older ones here and there, but the animals hadn’t been around there in the last few days.

The old adventurer stared at the ground around them and scratched his beard. “I can’t believe I’ve turned the wrong way at some point. It’s been a while since I had to track one, but I shouldn’t be this rusty.” He murmured quietly.

“Umm… Gil?” Anastacia whispered and tugged on the adventurer’s sleeve. “That’s not a deer?” She asked and pointed at a huge mass of dark fur by the opposite edge of the clearing. Around the mass were the mangled carcasses of maybe seven or eight deer.

Gilbert quickly ducked and moved behind a tree. “No, it is not.”

Anastacia mimicked him and hid herself. “Now what? Do we run?” She asked.

Before Gilbert could answer, the slight breeze among the treetops snapped off a dead branch from one of the trees they were hiding behind. It fell down and rustled slightly as it hit the ferns, though actually barely audible, the situation made it feel like the entire tree had just come crashing down.

The furry creature had heard it as well and turned to look at what had caused the noise. It immediately spotted the adventurers and let out an ear-shattering roar before tossing aside a deer carcass it had been eating and lumbering towards the pair.

“YES, WE RUN!” Gilbert yelled and waited for Anastacia to bolt off before legging it after her.

The necromancer had the advantage of being small enough to effortlessly run among the trees and be able to make sharp turns. Gilbert was less nimble but at least a lot smaller than the creature chasing them so both of them could gain distance from it.

First one to come out of the woods was Anastacia. She stumbled on some roots at the end and rolled over a few times but stuck the landing and made it seem almost intentional for the old man, who was still waiting on his porch for the adventurers to return.

“Did you get them already?” The farmer asked and got up from his chair.

“Get inside, NOW!” Anastacia yelled at him and hopped over the fence.

The old man looked confused at first but once Gilbert and the creature chasing him rushed out of the tree line, he gained a surprising amount of spryness and ran inside.

The creature seemed hesitant to come more than a few meters away from the shade of the trees, but clearly didn’t want to give up on its new prey and slowly stepped into the sun.

Anastacia hadn’t seen a creature like it before. It's stance resembled that of a bear, four legged but able to cover some distance with just its back legs and use the front ones to grab things to a degree. The fur covering the entire creature was thick, and almost black, though the creature didn’t take good care of it and some spots appeared greener because they had a thin layer off moss on them. The face of the creature was mostly covered in fur too, and its eyes seemed like three shiny black stones amongst it. The mouth of the monster was large enough to fit most of Anastacia’s upper body in it and was lined with sharp, needle-like teeth. The whole package towered at roughly five meters when standing on its back legs, no doubt making a lasting impression on anyone facing it.

“What is this thing?” Anastacia asked and prepared to use her craft on the creature.

Gilbert stuck closer to the monster and made noise by hitting his shield with his mace to make sure the necromancer wouldn’t be targeted. “A forest ogre, big one too. Think your magics work on it?” He asked and tossed a stone at the beast to annoy it further.

“For fuck’s sake, I am not a mage!” Anastacia yelled before realizing how little it mattered at the moment. “But yes, if you can stun it for ten seconds or so, I can rip off something it needs.”

Gilbert grasped his mace harder as the ogre stumbled towards him. The first few swipes of its claws were easy enough to avoid and he was even able to punish the creature for them by hitting it a couple of times. But then the ogre made a sudden move he didn’t expect and he barely caught it with his shield, which immediately broke because most shields weren’t designed for hits that big. The claws left a few scrapes on his arms but that wasn’t anything the adventurer couldn’t just shrug off. Instead of falling back, Gilbert seized the opportunity to hit the creature in the face, causing it to rear back and start flailing blindly.

Anastacia had made some progress earlier, but the flailing undid all of it. “You need to keep it still!” She reminded her friend.

“You come here and hold it still!” Gilbert responded and avoided another blow. The flailing itself didn’t cause much problems for a competent fighter such as him, but it did stop him from approaching the ogre. He kept his distance until the creature started to show some signs of fatigue, while also waiting for a more predictable swing he could use to get closer and attack.

Meanwhile the necromancer’s efforts didn’t amount to much, so she started looking for anything else that might help while her partner worked on tiring the beast out. None of the farming tools seemed too useful, but the farmer had left his crossbow on the porch. Anastacia ran over to get it and aimed at the rampaging creature, but she had never used such a weapon before and couldn’t figure out how it worked. “How does this thing go twang?!” She asked and held the bow up.

Gilbert took a quick glance at her. “That’s perfect, just toss it to me!” Gilbert advised.

Anastacia tried throwing the crossbow, but the arc fell horribly short, so she had to go and bring it to Gilbert herself before running off back to safety.

The crossbow wasn’t loaded, which would have been an issue for most people in that situation, since reloading it would require stopping for a while and stepping on the stirrup. But Gilbert was not most people, he grabbed the stirrup with one hand and gave the string a tug with the other, all the while keeping an eye on the ogre and avoiding its swings. After putting the bolt back in its place, he aimed at the ogre’s shoulder and hit it. A single bolt wouldn’t do much after going through the creature’s fur and fat, but it was enough to make the ogre avoid using one of its front legs, making it a lot more predictable.

The ogre wailed in pain and swung at the adventurer one more time, far faster than Gilbert had expected. He didn’t have time to avoid it and had to brace for the impact. The force of the blow was enough to throw him off the ground. Luckily, he was able to grab on to the ogre’s fur and was instead swung over its shoulder. Seeing his opportunity, he clung on to the beast’s neck and started to choke it with his mace.

“Now, Anna!” He yelled.

Anastacia had already realized that the ogre had slowed down, and while rearing back to reach Gilbert, it stayed still enough. She muttered some of the basic teachings of necromancy to herself to hurry up the process. Slowly she could feel the control over the creature’s vertebra shift over to her and as soon as she could, she twisted them, breaking the ogre’s neck.

When the ogre stopped struggling, Gilbert dropped off its back and let it collapse forwards. As it hit the ground, the impact on its chest emptied the creature’s lungs and made it throw up a generous amount blood. The spray carried surprisingly far and covered the celebrating necromancer with a red coating of blood. Before she even had the time to throw up or much less say anything, Anastacia turned pale and passed out on the spot.

The old farmer had been following the fight through a window and stepped out now that it was over. He walked over to the ogre and took a look at it. “That’s not a deer.” He stated and picked up his crossbow from the ground.

“Really, what gave it away?” Gilbert joked while catching his breath. “That ate the deer.”

Both of them walked over to the necromancer, who was laying on the ground, covered in blood and somehow even paler than usual.

“Is the lass gonna be alright?” The farmer asked and poked her with his foot.