Regis listened to his companions’ banter before an idea came into his mind. He rummaged through his knapsack, pulling out a thumb sized earth elemental stone from it. The dark elf closed his left hand’s fingers around the stone, laying his right palm on the wagon. After closing his eyes, he sank into his meditative state where he began to draw up the rune meant to provide blunt damage protection. As the rune turned into a solid grey in his mind, he could feel a slight decrease in the cart’s shaking.

“What did you do?” Osmond asked as soon as the spell weaver opened his eyes. “The difference isn’t too much, but it’s still noticeable.”

“There’s a rune that adds blunt damage resistance to armour and items,” Regis began his explanation. “I remember the side notes mentioning that it works by essentially absorbing kinetic force.”

“So you enchanted the wagon to add shock absorption to it?” Letty looked at him both puzzled and surprised.

“Well,” Amanda cracked her neck. “Whatever you did, it worked. Every little bit counts when it comes to keeping my ass from going numb.”

“How are things outside?” Regis asked from Quentin, patiently waiting for his answer.

“It looks peaceful,” the paladin noted. “Judging by the sound of the birds, the forest around here is teeming with life.”

“That’s good to hear, Letty smiled. “The undead instinctively seek out the living to destroy them. If the animals of the forest feel safe enough to make themselves known, then there shouldn’t be any dangers around.”

“I hope you’re right little sister,” Cruz sighed as she urged the skeletal horses on, but they were completely unresponsive. “Could you order your puppets to move a bit faster Os?”

“Sure thing,” The pale youth agreed and the wagon picked up some speed. “I only ordered them to react to your sideways nudges. Now they’ll go faster or slower according to your nudges. Better?”

“Perfect. Thanks.” She responded as the cart picked up speed.

Roughly two hours later the sight of a reinforced gate with a near four meter tall stonewall on both sides appeared ahead of them on the road. When they got close enough, a loud yell made Cruz pull on the reigns.

“Halt!” an archer aimed his weapon at them from the small post atop the wall beside the gate. “Who goes... what in the saints’ name is that?”

“It’s a skeleton horse puppet created through arcane magic.” Cruz shrugged as she watched the man almost fall off when he noticed the strange creatures.

“What do you want?” The other guard stuttered with his hands shaking, barely able to hold the arrow from shooting forward.

“We are Shardwaker mercenaries heading North East. We need to cross the bridge behind your settlement, so we are seeking passage.”

“You ain’t getting in here,” the guard that nearly fell off yelled. “This is a proper town. There ain’t no place for your ilk here.”

“Are you a follower of the church of the seven paths?” Regis asked as he got off from the wagon, walking closer.

“What’s it to you?”

“We have a paladin of Saintess Elora with us,” he pointed at Quentin. “Are you really going to deny passage for him?”

“You ain’t gonna weasel yourself in here with such lies!”

“Do you have any clergymen,” Cruz sighed. “They should be able to recognise his domain.”

“Oy Fisher,” the guard turned around after hesitating for a moment. “Bring over granny Delcine!”

“What for?” A young voice could be heard from the other side of the gate.

“Just bring her here and be quick about it!”

“I guess we’ll have to wait here then.” Valerie sighed.

“It might be for the best if you two stay inside until we get through those gates,” Quentin noted. “We don’t want them to... freak out.”

After couple of awkward minutes they could see the guard help someone up onto the small rampart.

“Tibor,” the aged woman spoke to the man with a slightly reprimanding tone. “What made you call me out here in such a hurry?”

“Forgive me granny,” the archer apologised. “But we have strangers at our gates seeking passage. They claimed that one of them is a paladin.”

“I see,” the old priestess turn towards the warband, her gaze stopping on the skeleton horses first before noticing Quentin’s armour. “It’s easy to scavenge the armour of the dead.”

“Yet it’s impossible too fake the Saintess’ blessing.” The paladin stated has he called upon his domain.

“I greet you, paladin of Saintess Elora,” old Delcine nodded after seeing the warm light surround Quentin, flowing out toward his companions. “What brings you and your servants to these parts of the kingdom?”

“My companions and I are on a mission,” Quentin started his explanation my punctuating the “companion’ part. “We need to cross the bridge just behind your settlement, so we’re seeking passage.”

“I wish I could give you you what you desire,” the elderly woman sighed. “But the north-eastern gate had to be closed and barricaded due to the large number of fallen that gathered on the other side of it. As for the bridge, it had collapsed near two weeks ago.”

“Neither of those should be a problem for us,” Regis raised his voice. “We helped retaking East Fork and aided Rust-well Keep during its time of need when the demons besieged it.”

“If gaining passage means that will have to to help you get rid of the fallen that troubles your people,” Quentin continued on. “Then we’ll gladly do so. Some of my companions are also capable enough spell casters to repair the bridge.”

“You said you were mercenaries,” the other archer harrumphed. “We ain’t got the coin for your services.”

“Gaining passage will be our payment,” Quentin stated. “And maybe shelter for the night. I doubt that we’ll have much sunlight remaining after the fallen gets cleared and the bridge gets repaired.”

“That we can provide,” granny Delcine nodded. “Open the gate lads!”

The heavy wooden gates open with a loud creek and the wagon slowly rolled through, stopping at the clear area beside a large stone walled building.

“Before your people would get their pitchfork,” Quentin turned towards the old priestess. “We have a pair of infernal siblings in our ranks.”

His words earned a hushed murmur from the gathered villagers, but the priestess seemed to be surprisingly calm.

“I doubt that a paladin would be willing to travel with those touched by corruption. As long as you vouch for your companions and keep them in your sight, there shouldn’t be any problems.”

“I’m glad to hear we won’t get burned to the stake,” Valerie said as she got off the wagon, earning a couple of gasps from the locals. “It’s nice to meet you ma’am.’

“Likewise child,” Delcine nodded at Valerie and her brother. “It’s rare to meet with a well mannered infernal. Especially the kind that has a light elemental affinity.”

“I don’t want to sound rude,” Cruz cut into their chatter. “But the sooner we take out those rotting abominations, the better.”

“On that we can agree,” the grey haired priestess nodded. “Our guards tried their best to repel the ones that came too close to our walls, but there’s just too many of them and my people are not a nobleman’s army. They lack the training and experience to fight such horrors.”

“That’s where we come in,” Fabien patted his sheathed sword. “Let’s see what we’re dealing with, shall we?”

The outlanders followed the elderly priestess and the guards toward the north-eastern gate of the settlement. Regis couldn’t help, but sigh as he looked that his surroundings. This place was little more than a simple village. If not for the large walls and the couple of important looking buildings, he would never call it a town. After a quick rough counting, there were no more than two dozen guards and five times has many villagers. As the trudged on, the sight of a barricaded gate came into view with guards standing in front of it.

“Granny Delcine.” The guards nodded as the old priestess that close enough.

“Ease up lads,” she spoke with a motherly tone. “These folks are here to pass through our town and they agreed to help take care of the fallen.”

“Let’s check their numbers first.” Regis noted as he unceremoniously got on top of the wall, letting out a slight whistle as he looked ahead.

There were indeed quite a lot of undead shambling about not far head the gate. Most of them wearing simple peasant clothes, while some of them had an obvious military style armour.

“That’s quite a lot,” Quentin noted as he looked at their opponents. “How far is the nearest settlement if one follows this road?”

“If you go straight ahead,” the old woman spoke. “It would take you you at least two days of walking. If you cross the bridge, then you can either go along the river for three or so days before you find an outpost, or follow the main road for two days till the next town.”

“Since the bridge collapsed weeks ago,” the dark elf mused aloud. “These must have come from the settlement ahead. Do you recognise any of them? “

“I took a look at the ones that got too close to the gate,” Delcine sighed. “I knew some of them from before. Poor souls. It is quite likely that our neighbouring village has fallen to the plague completely.”

“So how do you guys want to do this?” Fabien asked as he watched the guards remove the barricades from the gate.

“Sophie will kite them using her bow,” Quentin stated his simple strategy. “We’ll take care of the rest while she provides ranged support. Mary, you should stick to the back line and keep practising your spell combinations as much as you can. We’ll lead a few of them towards you so you can get the kill.”

“Okay.” The young woman nodded as she gripped her sceptre.

Sophie traded places with Regis while the rest of the group left through the newly opened gate.

“Are you ready?” The sun elf asked before letting the first arrow loose.

One of the nearest undead collapsed a second later as a glowing arrow drilled itself into its skull. Dozens of fallen reacted to the sudden commotion, turning towards the outlanders. While the abominations began to trod towards the warband, the group read themselves which weapons in hand. Arrow after arrow culled the number of the incoming horde before they reached into spell casting range. A beam of concentrated light mowed down the first line of undead peasants as Regis stepped forward, pointing his staff at them.

“Show off.” Valerie chuckled as she cast several fire arrows in a row.

Spells of different elements pelted the undead before a burning hammer’s head slammed into the nearest fallen soldier. Amanda’s crushing blow wasn’t the only melee attack that was unleashed. Cruz and Fabien both jumped into the fray while Quentin bashed an incoming rotten swordsman with his light covered shield. Osmond summoned his bear and hell hound puppets to sic them on the enemy before turning his cane into a fancy rapier. Dozens of undead fell in minutes, the once sizeable horde dwindling with each incoming wave. A bit over a quarter of an hour later only the outlander warband was still standing amidst the pile of rotting corpses.

“How many did we manage to take down this time?” Cruz panted as she leaned on to her staff.

“A bit over a hundred and fifty.” Amanda stated in a matter of fact style.

“That’s a lot of undead for a simple forest road.” Letty sighed.

“If these really came from the next settlement,” Osmond spoke as he wiped his weapon clean. “Then I doubt we managed to deal with even half of them.”

“Way to lighten the mood Os.” Cruz slapped him on the shoulder.

“What surprised me is that despite their numbers, we pretty much mowed them down like it was nothing.” Sophie expressed her opinion on the recent one-sided massacre.

“Well,” Valerie patted her on the back. “Most of them were low level peasants, while we got good gear and stats. It was a pretty obvious outcome.”

“So what now,” Fabien looked at the corpses scattered all around. “Are we going to loot and sacrifice these, or do you guys want to leave them behind like we did in Rust-well Keep.”

Quentin looked back at the small towns gate and wall that only had a few sentries standing watch at the moment.

“I think we could clear this place up if Regis raises a couple of earth walls.”

“Yes,” Valerie agreed. “We could just tell them that it’s a precaution while we burn the corpses.”

“What are you talking about?” Mary walked closer while wiping the sweat from her forehead.

“Oh yeah,” the infernal woman sighed as she looked at the young earth mage. “I forgot you’re not in the know about these matters. I’ll let Fabien fill you in on the details.”

“In the meantime, I’ll go back to tell the guards we’re burning the corpses.” Quentin stated before turning around and walking away.

Regis began to unceremoniously drag the corpses of his making into a single pile while the others did the same.By the time they were done, Quentin returned as well.

“I filled them in on our supposed corpse burning plan, and they were all too happy to stay clear of the area.”

“I’ll raise the walls.” The dark elf noted before he began shaping condensed earth walls using his innate magic.

When the corpse piles were sufficiently covered, everyone began their round of looting and sacrificial ritual. Since these were all lower ranked fallen, even larger numbers couldn’t be traded in for substantial rewards. Regis was content with trading in his kills for a lesser orb of allure and might. Although he wasn’t the type to care much about his physical looks, but the number of low level undead he took down would only earn him two lesser attribute orbs and his might was at nineteen already, so he could only spend one lesser orb on that.

Not wanting to waste the chance and the resources, he decided to gain a lesser orb of allure as well. Once the light of the ritual circle died down, a reddish and a pink hued orb floated towards him. As he absorbed the power of the orbs, he could feel his body change ever so slightly. ‘Now for the actual burning part.’ He thought as he pointed his staff at the dried out husks that were left behind after the ritual.