On the upper floor of the adventurer guild, in the blue themed lavishly decorated room, sat a man behind the desk, reading the report delivered by one of his informants in the criminal organisation operating in the Westbrook. He was the guild leader of the Westbrook branch of the adventurer guild. The man had piercing blue eyes and a blue hair neatly combed behind. “Is this true?” He asked the woman sitting in a chair, across his desk. “Hm? Sorry, I wasn't listening.”

A slight annoyance was showing on his face but he knew better by now than to voice his complaint. “I asked if it was true what was written in the report? That Guntar had connections to the undead army, reported marching toward the capitol?” He repeated his question to the vice-leader of the guild. A young woman wearing chain armor with a silver badge of a guild pinned to her cape, and rapier and the shield by her side.

“Guntar had a what now?? I don't know! I haven't read a report yet!”

“You…haven't read a report yet? What are you doing here Belle?”

She gulped. Guild leader only called her by the nickname when he was angry, irritated, happy, drunk or by mistake.

“Heey, I just realized you're calling me Belle way too often!”

“You're pissing me off way too often! Don't put your legs on my desk. This desk was made of elvier wood and was imported from the elven kingdom so help me god, I WILL CUT YOU!”

“Hmph, I don't have to listen to this. I'm leaving!”

This kind of scene repeated itself at least once a week. Guild leader Rayne sighed as he held a report in his hands. He stood up and left the office. Things were slowly set in motion in the small town of Westbrook. Bones was running through the forest, getting lost. Vol was rehearsing his "crime lord" speech and Trevak and Guntar were nowhere to be found.

In one of the buildings in the alleys, Vol was standing in front of the mirror, deep in thoughts, when someone called out to him from behind. “Hello Vol, looking good.” Trevak said with a mischievous smile plastered on his face. Vol turned around with a frown and seeing who it was, asked Trevak what he was doing here. Getting no response, he assumed the worst. “You… Guntar sent you?”

“Bingo!” Cheerfully answered Trevak. He was a feminine man of an unknown race. Some thought he wasn't a man but a woman and all agreed on how dangerous the man was. Like Vol and Guntar, he was a bronze ranker, but unlike the both of them, Trevak was in his twenties and not far in levels behind Guntar. Vol's situation wasn't looking good but seeing Trevak was alone and not sensing anyone else in the vicinity, his posture relaxed a bit. “The man outside?”

“Dead, of course.” Trevak answered casually.

Vol gnashed his teeth. “Why take me out now? I know what Guntar is getting into! I could be of help!”

“Vol! Let me stop you right there. You are a man of ambition. You want to be at the top but you don't have what it takes! It wouldn't stop you from trying, would it now?”

*scoffs* “Of course not!” Vol replied and with a sudden movement of his hand, he sent a hidden dagger flying towards Trevak's head. Trevak cocked his head, catching a dagger in his hand.

“Really, Vol? A surprise attack on the assassin? Tsk tsk I thought you'd know better!“

Vol had underestimated the gap between the two of them. The fight was one sided from the beginning with an assassin parrying and deflecting attacks with ease. Vol was a hybrid class with both physical and magical attacks but he learned his second class too early, gimping his main class. Trevak, on the other hand, was an assassin thoroughly by advancing his rogue class into an assassin specialized in fighting mages. After a brief exchange, Vol had sustained serious injuries. In the last ditch effort he jumped through the window and onto the ground below where he continued down the alley. When he turned around the corner, he bumped into Horus. Horus' eyes went wide seeing him alive and it didn't escape Vol's notice. The rage evident on his face. He put the pieces together and before Horus could move away, he dipped deep into his remaining mana and used mana blast.

The blast rocked the buildings from both sides of the alley, destroying parts of the wall and blasted Horus arms and a leg away, spreading blood and gore on the cobblestone pavement. His body was sent flying ten meters away, where he laid unmoving. In the aftermath of the blast, a figure could be seen in the dusted alley. Blood was coming out of Vol's mouth and he was left panting and gasping for air. He had overloaded his core, using all the mana he had left, in a blast. He knelt down and waited for Trevak who was slowly approaching from behind.

“Aaah such a shame. Horus was supposed to replace you!”

“Yeah right. *cough cough spits* You were going to kill him after me!”

“Quite so, you really are too smart for your own good. The guild is closing in on Guntar. They won't tolerate his discrepancies any longer.”

“Goodbye Vol, see you in the Netherrealm.”

“Keep your eyes open and stay safe, understand?” Asked the vice-leader her handpicked group of guild operatives. They were crouching on the rooftop of a building overlooking the warehouse district. The guild leader had decided to put an end to Guntar's silly operations going on in Westbrook. To hell with whoever was backing him up! Was what he said, before issuing the order to set up a small infiltration team, move in and apprehend Guntar and his henchman.

They moved from building to building with ease and unseen by the people below on the streets. The night would be preferable time to do the operation but they had no time to waste. Rayne had a hunch Guntar had ears in the guild and somehow already learned of the operation.

Warehouse district was an area all the transport goods went through. A small area within a whole district with a few warehouses was owned by Guntar where, under the guise of the businessman, he led his own smuggling operations. His range of operations included mostly of illegal processing of mana stones along with extortion, gambling and alleged assassinations. The Kingdom of Wezar main source of export were mana stones and they were strictly regulated. All the mines were either operated by the kingdom or a third party in a contract with the kingdom. Only mana stones obtained as a monster drop were excluded from the kingdom's influence. There were slight differences between the two mana stones, making them recognizable.

Infiltration team had infiltrated two out of the three warehouses so far and found only the low level henchman in the organisation. While the rest stayed with the apprehended henchman, the vice leader took off for the remaining and the largest warehouse. She had no qualms about defeating Guntar but one can never be too careful in this kind of a situation. As she was preparing to stealthily infiltrate the warehouse from the rooftop, a guild leader, Rayne, crashed straight through the walls and shouted “FREEZE!” Belle shouted at him to stop, but was too late as a second later the whole warehouse, with everything and everyone in it, was frozen in a giant block of ice.

“RAYNE! Didn’t you hear me shouting to stop!”

“Hm? Belle, you are here too?”

“Are you serious right now?” She raised an eyebrow, sometimes not believing how aloof her guild leader was.

“What?”

“Look at what you’ve done, again! Freeze, doesn’t mean you should use Ice age skill and literally freeze everyone!”

“What? It’s fine! A few hours in the sun and they’ll melt away!”

“That’s not what I meant! Listen..”

As she was about to continue voicing her complaint, a guild scout interrupted with urgency. “Sir! Ma'am! An undead army was spotted in the vicinity of the city!” Both vice leader and the guild leader turned to the scout at the same time, a surprise visible on their faces. “Reports said the army was kilometers away, marching towards the capitol! They shouldn’t be here! The reports said…'' retorted Anabelle but was interrupted by Rayne who just shook his head and told her to come with him. “We’ve been played! The leak was false to lure us here, away from the gates!” Concluded Rayne. “Come, we must hurry!”

The undead had breached the inner walls of Westbrook. From the shadows of the alleys, they came forward into the light. The scream of a woman turned the people’s attention to the skeleton that wrapped its hands around her neck, leaned in and gave her a kiss of death, which meant biting her face off. The scene shocked mute anyone watching and before they gave in to fear and panic, more skeletons marched on the busy streets of the shopping district. Most were normal citizens, their levels between level 3 and level 7 in their respective professions, without any combat related classes. Chaos ensued pretty quickly as the first of the low level adventurers delved into the combat with an undead, but how could the newbie adventurers fare against skeletons above level 20? Most of the undead initiating the attack had once been system users above level 20 and while they were nothing more than a bunch of skeletons of their former self now, the body tempering of their skeleton remained after death. Low level adventurers had no chance and were swiftly killed in a brutal manner. Adventurers that were killed suddenly began twitching and moving their bodies, a rotten smell oozing out of them. Growls could be heard coming out of the newly risen zombies. A foul and rotten aura spreading through the masses, inflicting even more fear among the citizens. They rushed whatever living they perceived near them. At the end of one of the alleys, a hooded necromancer was grinning, his lips cut open and skin on his cheeks cracked. The summoning of an army had left some permanent lingering effects on him.

The shopping district in the south wasn't the only one swarming with the undead. Northern and eastern parts of the town were taken over as well. Undead in the western part were quickly dealt with by the infiltration team but more were coming at every second. The vice leader Belle felt something amiss among the undead.

“Weren't they supposed to be level 20 and above?”

“True, these are around level 5 and without any equipment.” Answered one of the scouts.

“Without equipment…oh no.” It finally dawned on her, these weren't the original summoned skeletons but the villagers killed along the way. There was a report a few days ago stating that a village had been wiped out by the undead.

“Is it a coincidence that they're here fighting us? Rayne…” She turned to say something to Rayne but he was already gone.

Rayne was moving so fast he practically flew over the buildings and streets below. He saw a few streets overrun by the undead but they were spread thin. He fired a few spells along the way, killing them, but he didn't have the time to take care of each and every one. He needed to get back to the guild asap!

Meanwhile at the guild, orders were given left and right by the administration office at the time of emergency. All quests and contracts were halted for time being and a new directive was given to stop the assault of the undead in Westbrook. All adventurers received the prompt via their badge and every available adventurer in the guild was grouped into a party of five and sent to deal with the undead outside. The situation outside was dire, both skeletons and now zombies swarmed the streets and the square was overrun by both the people running and trying to fight back and undead chasing them. Every zombie kill turned a person into another zombie. They weren't strong but they were resilient and very aggressive. They would rush a person and relentlessly try to bite them, spreading the disease that would turn them into zombies once they died.