"Is that..."

Narcha hesitated once she heard the bloodcurdling screams. Red could promptly tell what she was thinking.

"The noise might attract more bandits to the area." Red pressed her again. "We can't afford to be caught up in a fight."

"I didn't even notice anything waiting in ambush." The warrior replied in a solemn tone. "It could have taken us by surprise at any point."

"And yet it chose not to, which might mean it knows better than to attack you." The boy pointed out. "We need to leave."

The screams and sounds of battle continued to echo from afar. From another direction, though, Red could also hear loud voices approaching the area. Reinforcements, or so the youth thought.

Narcha finally nodded, and the two of them sprinted away. Eventually, Red couldn't hear the sounds of combat anymore. Yet, they only stopped running once the woman gave him a signal. The duo stopped to gather themselves, but Narcha continued to gaze towards the north, from where they had just come from.

"It was that thing." She spoke with certainty. "The tree-hopping monster."

"We don't know that for sure." Red shook his head. "But its behavior would certainly fit."

"It was too damn close." Narcha gritted her teeth. "It might have been following us."

"Maybe."

"And I didn't even notice it... What if it had attacked us?"

"It might have deliberately avoided getting too close to us in fear of being noticed." Red suggested a theory. "If it tried to attack, maybe you could have discovered it."

"But that's not how monsters act." She frowned. "They're not this smart."

The boy couldn't refute her. It always came back to the same issue. Neither the zombie nor this creature seemed to act according to the norm. This made it impossible to accurately predict what they might do next.

"We should hurry, then." Red replied. "We can keep traveling during daytime and try to make it to our goal by tomorrow... That is if you can keep going without sleep."

"I'll be fine." Narcha nodded. "With my Brain Spiritual Vein open, I can go for a while without sleeping. But what about you?"

"I think it should be fine..."

"That doesn't sound very confident, kid." The woman noticed his choice of words.

Of course, Red wasn't confident after all. Although the pressure of the gaze had diminished, it was still there, taxing him mentally. In the end, though, the boy would be more assured in tackling this last leg of the journey during the day.

"It will be fine." Red assured her. "The bulk of our strength relies on you either way."

"Whatever you say, kid." Narcha shrugged. "But tell me if you're too tired to go on. I can't look out for dead-weight if enemies attack us."

The youth nodded. The two kept moving at a brisk pace, but the rest of the trip was destined to be rather turbulent.

For the next few hours, they came across signs of increased bandit activity. Mostly they were fresh tracks, but every now and then, they were able to see the light of lanterns from afar, as well as the sounds of conversation.

Thankfully, though, they weren't too keen on remaining hidden, so Red and Narcha had an easier time sneaking past them. It also helped that the duo's tracks mixed in with the rest, making it harder to be tracked.

The boy lost count of how many bandits they ended up coming across, but he felt they might have numbered a small army. Narcha gradually changed her mind about relying on direct confrontation once she noticed the number of enemies in the area.

"Why the fuck are there so many of them here?" The woman grumbled at one point.

"Is it because of the zombie?" Red suggested.

"Why would they be this concerned about a fucking zombie?" Narcha complained. "It's not like you can get anything valuable out of a rotting corpse."

"So, you're telling me even the bandits are acting abnormally?"

"Well, when you put it that way..." She frowned.

"Do you think all these odd behaviors are connected?" Red asked.

"Fuck if I know." The warrior shrugged. "What could possibly cause humans, an undead, and a monster to act so strangely?"

The youth once again refrained from voicing his guess.

"There's something else." Red continued. "Have you noticed any signs of combat on the way?"

"Not really." Narcha shook her head.

"And yet, we know the zombie was heading in this direction." The youth pointed out. "With so many bandits around, how could they not come across each other eventually?"

"Are you saying the zombie is sneaking by them too?"

"Not necessarily." Red shook his head. "The track of dead plants is easy to follow for anyone with some experience in tracking."

"Then they are deliberately avoiding the zombie?" She stated flatly.

"Probably." The youth nodded. "Perhaps they also noticed its weird behavior and want to follow it, or just make sure it leaves on its own."

"Bandits are too stupid to notice something like that." Narcha scoffed. "Besides, this doesn't explain why so many bandits would move to the region in the first place."

"Maybe they were already here for something else." Red hypothesized.

"What could have possibly caught the attention of so many bandits?" The woman was stumped. "There are no roads to steal from downstream, and no hunters come around this part of the forest."

"We can't tell without scouting the region first, but we're not here for that." The youth replied. "It's likely we will be meeting a lot more bandits on the way, though."

Sure enough, the boy's prophetic words came to pass. What they saw wasn't a patrol, though, but rather a large bandit camp. A bonfire burned from afar, and loud, roaring voices could be heard echoing through the forest. Narcha and Red immediately stopped to examine the place.

"Was this on the map?" The woman asked.

"It wasn't." Red shook his head. "Maybe it's a recent camp... Or maybe we were reading the map wrong in the first place."

"Bah, that doesn't help at all." The warrior squinted while examining the encampment. "There might be over 10 bandits in there."

"Even if there were only two of them, we should still avoid combat." The boy interjected.

"You don't need to tell me that, kid." Narcha grumbled. "There's a lot of movement in there, though."

Even the youth could see that. Bandits came and went every few minutes, indicating a state of agitation and alert.

"If they had this many people, they shouldn't have had a problem killing a normal zombie." The woman complained.

"But we've already established that wasn't a normal zombie." Red replied. "It might be even stronger than we first thought..."

"The only way it could be any stronger than that is if it's..." Narcha trailed off, coming to a grim realization.

"...If it's not a zombie." The boy completed her sentence. "That would certainly explain a lot."

"We can't know for sure." It was Narcha's turn to apply her skepticism. "Either way, we should get a move on."

By the time they had moved past the bandit camp, the first signs of daylight had emerged. Gradually, Red felt the lunar gaze disappearing, and his mind could finally relax. Unfortunately, though, the boy knew the true challenge was just about to begin.

"Even if we wanted to camp, we wouldn't be able to." Narcha spoke up. "Now that it's daytime, bandits will probably be able to spot us from very far."

"It's fine." Red nodded. "I'm surprised we managed to avoid confrontation for this long."

In truth, the boy found that unnaturally weird. Either these bandits were not as competent as Rog thought, or they were too distracted by something else. In any case, the boy had already preemptively nocked an arrow into his shortbow. He was prepared to engage in a fight at any moment.

To their surprise, though, the journey over the next couple of hours was very uneventful. Red continued to find more bandit tracks leading to the south, but for some reason, they saw no more patrols in the region. In fact, the whole forest seemed unnaturally quiet, with almost no sounds of animals.

Only the rushing river and the sound of their own footsteps could be heard in their surroundings.

"What the fuck is going on?" Even Narcha had a hard time hiding her unease.

Her attitude put Red on guard. However, nothing happened over this next leg of the journey. They traveled for a few more hours until they arrived at a place Red could recognize.

"We're getting to the hillside." The woman pointed out. "The area where we camped in shouldn't be too far."

The boy was excited as he received the news. His excitement, though, was short-lived. As they continued walking, the appearance of the forest gradually changed.

It began with a few plants here and there. They were dead and dried up, much like the ones the zombie had come into contact with. At first, they thought this was just another indication of the undead's trails, but they were soon proven wrong.

"What the fuck..." Narcha cursed under her breath.

Another kilometer in, and the death had begun to spread to the trees. Everything around them had taken on a greyish and sickly appearance, and it was as if Red had entered into another world. No sounds of animals could be heard anymore, and even the noise of the rushing river seemed stifled under this deathly atmosphere.

The forest around them was dead.

"This is..." Perhaps for the first time, Red noticed Narcha's voice containing a hint of fear.

He wasn't faring much better, though.

"Is this caused by an undead?" Red asked.

"An undead causing all of this?" The woman tried to collect herself. "Maybe, but it would need to be powerful beyond belief... In which case, I'm afraid we may have already become infected by Death Spiritual Energy, kid."

The boy shuddered.

"I don't feel like I'm dying, though." He replied.

"Same here." Narcha nodded. "Something else must be happening here..."

They kept walking, but soon enough, they started to hear distant sounds. The woman immediately called their progress to a stop.

"It's the sound of fighting." She pointed out. "Right towards the area we first met."

This immediately made Red frown. Now that the forest had changed so much, the boy only had general directions to use as reference. It might take a while to find his stash, and the camp clearing was the best he could go off of.

"We can try checking it from afar." Narcha pointed at one of the hills. "We can get a better view from higher up."

The boy agreed to her idea, and the two of them began taking a detour. The sounds of battle began to become clear to Red, and soon he could even hear bloodcurdling screams of pain. As they got to the top of the hill, the duo could finally see the fight.

"What in the..." The woman was once more dumbfounded.

A sickly and almost entirely naked elder danced amid a dozen bandits, who all desperately tried to bring him down. The old man's skin had a hint of blue to it, and some of its flesh had rotted away. It was clear to Red this was the zombie. And yet, it wasn't what he had expected.

The undead moved with skill and grace befitting an experienced fighter. It avoided the bandits' attacks while countering them with his own sharp fingernails. Already corpses littered the ground around it, and although the zombie had arrows sticking out of its body, it still moved unhindered.

This was not the unthinking beast Red had been expecting.