He reviewed his options again and began to convince himself that eliminating all the zombies at the field right here right now was the best choice. He realized that it seem as a rushed decision, but he believed that delaying won’t do any good. What if the creatures in the mist suddenly ordered all the zombies to move north? If that happened, it would be very dangerous situation for the survivors.

He looked at his surrounding to get a clearer mental view about his fight soon after. He noticed that the ground was firm and devoid of any obstacles like uneven grounds, pot holes, vines or clumped grasses, at least as far as his eyes could see. Unless something unforeseen happen, he could prevent himself from tumbling. He took a mental note not to fall to the ground because of some unnoticed zombies. Once he fell on the ground, things might get ugly. His armour might be able to prevent himself from getting bitten but it couldn’t stop himself from getting dismembered if too many zombies pulling all his four limbs at once.

He took out all his guardians and lined them up at the edge of the field. Luckily, the zombies still didn’t move.

“Alice, have all the guardians encircle the field and then exterminate the zombies while moving in. As for the supreme guardians, have 20 of them wreaking havoc inside-out of the field. The final five will accompany me to the center”

“Yes, Master”

“Once the guardians completed their encirclement, we will begin the operation”

The guardians started to move to their station. However, they didn’t even move 100 metres from Acma when suddenly,

‘SCREEEAAAAAAACHHHHHH’

A high pitch scream could be heard from inside the mist. Looks like there is a creature inside it who gave orders to all the zombies at the field. Acma was safe from been effected by that scream due to his helmet, but normal people without ear protection would surely rendered immobile or might even lost their consciousness.

With that scream, all the zombies in the field moved toward the Acma so he had to gave orders to begin the operation.

He looked to his left and swung down his sword.

“Rest in peace, lady”, he said.

The half-faced ‘young lady’ who was grabbing and biting his left arm instantly disintegrating. Then he noticed that a black smoke were released from the disintegrating zombies and then it flew toward the center of the field. Acma turned his head around and noticed the same phenomenon happened to all the disintegrating zombies which were destroyed by the guardians.

“Alice, lets clear this field” “Yes, Master”

Acma took a normal steps forward while his guardians running into the field.

‘SWOOOSH’

His horizontal slash beheaded four zombies who was running altogether toward him. Acma didn’t used any Wind Blade or Earth Spike yet because a normal slash was enough against these low level zombies. The zombies lunging themselves and tried to grab him whenever they got pass through the guardians. Some of them tried to come from his side or from behind but all of them were prevented by the four supreme guardians who covered his blind spots.

During the battle, never once Acma averted his sight from the dense black mist at the center of the field. It’s already half an hour since the battle started but that mist still didn’t move from its spot. Since the mist haven’t move, Acma also didn’t go all out but he already took out almost one tenth of all the zombies in the field.

“I need to provoke the thing inside that mist further, but how?” Acma questioned.

Meanwhile, further up north, at the gate of a small Buddhist temple, several youths were gathered and looking toward the direction of the center of the town.

“Did you hear that?” said a youth with an attire of a priest and holding a silver wand.

“Yeah. I wonder what kind of monster screech like that”, replied the other youth as he raised his broadsword and leaned it on his shoulder.

“Thanks to that screech, the zombies retreated and headed toward the south”, said another youth with a broadsword.

“Yeah”, agreed the others.

They were part of the survivors who took refuge at the temple after the zombie outbreak. Somehow, the zombies cannot breach into the temple compound like there were a barrier around it. When some survivors noticed this, they gathered a few volunteers to search for the survivors and guided them to the temple. After several successful rescue operations, those volunteers levelled up and got their first job at the Beginner Village. Some of them chose to be an acolyte or priest apprentice while the others chose to be a knight apprentice. The acolyte played a vital role in their fight against the zombies as they were able to cure the person who was bitten as well as supporting the fighters with buffs and healing their injuries.

“What to do now, Hou Feng? Should we pursue them?” asked the acolyte.

“No, it’s too risky because we don’t know their numbers in this darkness. Lets stay here”, replied Hou Feng. He paused a little before turned his head toward a fighter on his right and said, “Kang, please go to the main hall and report this to the leader. Also, asked him what to do”

“Roger”

While Acma was fighting against the horde of zombies, there was a small group of beastmen gathered at the edge of the forest, at the same place where Acma stopped before he entered Boulder Town.

“Squad Leader, the monster entered that place. Should we enter too?” asked a beastmen with a head of a mule.

The Squad Leader who was a werewolf replied, “No, we wait for Captain Arturas. We already determine it’s location and that’s enough for now”

“Okay. But, I have a really bad feeling about this place. That mist look ominous”, said the mule as it looked at the dark mist above the town.

“I think it was a dark mana and most likely there are a walking dead inside that place”, the Squad Leader explained.

“Walking dead?”

“Yeah. Oh, I forgot, you’re new, so you didn’t meet them during the war. Our enemy, the humans, when they died, their bodies will release a dark mana and turn into a walking dead unless they were blessed by any of the Gods before they died. However, during the war, due to the collaboration between the humans and the Dark Lord to fight us, the Church of Light, who is the representative of the God of Light refused to bless the human army. Thus, a lot of humans who died during the battle turned into a walking dead and they were manipulated by the necromancers to continue fighting”

“How evil!” spat the mule.

“Yup, it was extremely evil. Our brethren who got bitten by the walking dead, their bodies were corroded by the dark mana and then they also become a walking dead. We lost a lot of our people to them”

The mule looked at the Squad Leader’s face and tried to say something, but nothing come out of his mouth.

“Don’t worry, we will have our revenge at this place. I heard, the headquarters also sent a team to deal with this problem and we are suppose to help them”, said Squad Leader as he patted the mule’s shoulder.

“Yes, we will”, said the mule.

At the center of the town, Acma had to order the guardians to make a wall around him as more and more zombies swarming him. He had underestimated the zombies too much. When the battle began, he only had four supreme guardians guarding him while the other guardians move individually into the field to eliminate the zombies. That was a mistake.

The zombies ignored the guardians and rushed toward him and only him as a target.

If there were only a few dozens, Acma could manage alone. But, when dozens became hundreds, he felt he needed to change the battle strategy, having some of the stone guardians acted as a wall and surround him while the others continued massacring the zombies unhindered.

“Still not going to move ah? Fine, I’ll make you move. I bet those dark mist are important to you”, muttered Acma as he stared dagger at the unmoving dark mist at the center of the field.

He raised his right hand and pointed it at the dark mist.

“Tier 1” “Black Hole”

A sphere of Black Hole appeared above the dark mist, 500 metres above the ground and began to suck in the dark mist in the surrounding.

‘SCREEEAAAAAAACHHHHHH’

Another high pitch screech was heard followed by the movement of the dark mist. It tried to get away from the Black Hole sphere and moved toward Acma.

“Finally”, thought Acma as he was grinning when the dark mist moved.

The Black Hole disappeared and the dark mist finally freed from the clutches of the Black Hole sucking forces.

Within a few seconds, Acma and his wall were completely engulfed by dark mist. It was so dense that Acma had a trouble to see a few metres in front of him.

‘KA KA KA KLAK KA KA KA KLAK’

He heard a strange noises like a clattering teeth. Then he saw a panel that informed about the thing that made those noises.

Skeleton Soldier LVL 58

Acma was surrounded by a dozen of those panels and they moved with a walking pace toward him. When they were close enough, he saw several skeletons raising a bone sword high above their skull and then strike it down.

“Tsk... Only skeletons? There must be something else”, he thought as his eyes wandering around looking for something.

“Earth Spike”

The striking skeletons were impaled and then disappeared.

The second wave arrived. More skeletons were summoned but the summoner was still nowhere to be seen.

The battle within the enclosed wall continued and Acma already lost count on how many skeletons did he destroyed. But, he still kept his vigilance up.

Until he saw,

Lesser Lich LVL 138

“Now that what we’re talking about”, said Acma excitedly.

He felt the battle was coming to an end. The zombies and the skeletons were just a small fry. The real enemy was this lich who was capable of controlling all the undead in this place.

“Wind Blade”

Several azure wind blades flew in the direction of the panel. He did this when he faced the Blood Lizards in the Death Valley a few days ago and now he did it again. Although he haven’t see the lich yet, but that blue panel uncovered its location.

Acma’s eyes followed the wind blades. He hope to see the lich with the help from the glow of the blades.

But what he saw was an ominous black scythe moving horizontally as fast as lightning toward his neck.

“Huh?” he was alarmed.