Renfry cursed again as we watched five undead come up and over the rise. It was the same party arrangement we had just seen—two warriors, two hell dogs, and a mage. Unlike last time, however, the dogs were engaging.

Kasidy cried out. “The other side too!”

I snapped my head around and saw another undead party running towards us. This one had an archer instead of a mage, which should make it slightly easier. I missed having my bonded companion with me. She could have taken out one of the mages while I focused on the other.

I shook my head; I got to work with what I have. “Renfry, think you can keep the hell dogs and fighters busy?”

He tossed his looted clubs into the wagon, drew his sword, and nodded. “How are we doing this?”

I pointed to the mage. “Let’s take out that side and let the other beat on the shield for a bit. Then we can turn and finish them. Renfry, I’m going to try to engage the mage first thing and then circle back to take out the dogs. Irwin, focus on healing, not attacking. I have a feeling that this will be a longer battle than we wanted. Kasidy, if we start to get overwhelmed, switch from buffing us to scattering them to give us some breathing room.”

I turned to Kasidy and looked at her. “You’re in charge of the standard. I want you to try to turn it on right now. Think ‘activate.’ Then to turn it off, think ‘deactivate.’”

Kasidy nodded and scrunched up her face for just a moment. The standard flared to life, and the dome appeared around us. I smiled, and then she scrunched up her face again, and the dome flickered out.

I looked over at the undead still heading our way. “Renfry, let’s do this. Irwin, watch our health and heal us as you can.” With that, we charged toward the first set of undead.

Renfry yelled and hit the first fighter, which in this case, was a skeleton with an axe. As soon as his blade made contact, he spun to the side and struck out at the second warrior, a human zombie with a studded mace.

As the fighters turned to fight Renfry, they opened a hole which I rushed through toward the mage. This mage carried a large staff with a glowing crystal at the top. This was also a new undead for me. He didn’t seem to be a zombie but was something else. His skin didn’t look unhealed, and there was a slight spark of intelligence behind his eyes. I triggered my visual interface to pull up info on him as I started my swing.

Ghoul (Human)

Undead Mage

HP 126

Mana 130

Weight 160 lbs

Armor rating 2

Weakness: Fire, Holy

Weapons

Draining Bite

Mage’s staff

Ghouls aren’t fully dead nor fully alive. They are a twisted experiment of necromancy where the blood from recently turned zombies is forced into living creatures while their own blood is drained out.

Ghouls’ bodies are broken down and healed through this process, slowly turning their organs into undead parts. This, in turn, lets them heal wounds. However, they must have fresh supplies of living tissue to grow and heal.

Ghouls are some of the smartest undead; however, like all, they can be claimed, and their levels are capped at three above the one who has claimed them.

Ghouls can create more ghouls while working in teams pulling out the blood of their victims.

As I swung, I smiled, knowing that my sword would also trigger fire-based damage. However, right as I thought my blade would cut into the ghoul, my sword bounced off a magical shield.

The ghoul sneered and slammed forward his hand. A snowball fired out of his palm. As it hit me, I felt my stone skin activate, and then my feet left the ground as I was thrown back.

I tumbled back and into a roll. I came up to see another snowball flying at me. This one I had time to dodge as I returned fire with my stone sphere.

I watched as my bowling ball of rock shattered on the ghoul’s shield. Then, as I sprinted forward, I fired a second one. This time there was the sound of breaking ice, and I saw the shield that covered the ghoul’s body fail.

I smiled for only a moment as a sheet of ice appeared between us. My feet started slipping, then my face hit the ice, and I found myself acting like a penguin as I slid toward the ghoul on my belly.

I whipped my knees forward and around so that I was feet first with my small shield up. I cleared the five feet of ice in time to be impaled by a large icicle through my right foot and into the ground.

I screamed and fired my third stone sphere for the day. This one, at point-blank range, caught the ghoul under his head and snapped his jaw closed and head up. I heard the beautifully disgusting sound of his teeth shattering and his jaw flattening.

The icicle vanished as the ghoul fell back. I threw my weight rolling from laying down to mounting the mage. I slammed my left fist into the mess he called a face anchoring his thrashing head. Then I slid my sword through his neck, triggering fire strike again.

As he died, I felt my weighted skirt activate a heal and the hole in my right foot closed up. I spared the glance down at my moccasin and knew that while I loved them, I would likely need to change them out for something new. They just didn’t provide enough armor for the way I fought.

I spun around to see how the battle was going. Renfry was throwing the skeleton fighter one-handed at the hell dogs while batting the club of the zombie away with his sword.

I smiled and charged at the back of the zombie. If it knew I was coming, it didn’t react as I jumped on it, slamming my sword in and down with both hands. Between my blade’s damage and my weight, the zombie’s back ripped out as it went to the ground.

Renfry turned and booted the close by hell dog as it was jumping at him. Then he whipped his sword across the body of the other. I saw the damage of the Lay-To-Rest trigger, and the dog staggered, losing control of one of its legs.

The other dog broke its way through the rib cage of the skeleton that Renfry had tossed at it. As it came through, its fur started to glow green, and it sped up.

Renfry turned to the new one parrying its lunge with his blade. His deflection angled it toward me. So I took the opening and channeled a fire strike through my blade into its side.

My burning blade cut down the edge of its flesh, not going nearly as deeply as it should have. Whatever it had done with the green glow not only sped it up but armored it as well.

The dog landed and snapped its head towards me. Then it jumped at me, trying to bite. I twisted my wrist and angled the point of my sword forward. I smiled as the dog’s own attack turned to its end, as my blade slid into its chest.

I triggered a flame strike of my own and watched fire pour out its mouth as it flopped on the ground. I glanced over at Renfry to see him pull the soul from the dog he was fighting, empowering his later attacks.

This side was down, but the other side had made it to our support and was now attacking my standard. Renfry gave me a smile which looked dark with his black-on-black eyes, and then he charged towards the other side.

I was right behind him. As we came around the stone air dome, Kasidy changed her song from Dancing all night long to Stagger away. The undead all stumbled and turned right as we got to their flank.

Renfry was there first and engaged dog that had just gained two levels of inebriation. His sword slid down across its neck, shattering its spine and dropping its head off the body. The now headless dog turned and jumped at my lancer, trying to body-slam him.

As Renfry engaged with the close ones, I charged toward the archer. Unfortunately, while our arrows didn’t do much to undead, the same couldn’t be said about their arrows.

The zombie archer let loose an arrow past me. I couldn’t be bothered to see who he was aiming at and didn’t need to as I heard Renfry cry out in pain.

Like the skeleton mage I took out before, this one seemed simple. The archer didn’t try to dodge or move. Instead, he just reached for yet another arrow. As it nocked the next arrow, I came through with a rising blow. My sword took out the femur on the left leg, dropping the archer to the ground.

The skeleton dropped the arrow as it hit the ground, causing it to reach for another one. As it did, I finished the spin I started when I took out his leg. I reached out with my left arm and bashed his left with my shield. The archer’s radius and ulna flew out of his magical body.

With the archer disabled, I charged back to the rest of the fight. Renfry had left his sword pinning a trashing zombie to the ground as he used his claws to Rend the last of the hell dogs. Then he drew in the broken souls of the undead, ending their existences.

I grinned at Renfry. “Great job; I think you can take care of this archer back here too. Kasidy, keep an eye out but drop the dome. We need to loot and move. I expect more of these guys if we don’t shift location soon.”

Renfry nodded toward me and advanced on the down archer. As he did that, I went over to the ghoul and started to loot. First, I checked to see if he had any bags then any hidden weapons. I came up empty on both, and he wore no jewelry. His robe was frayed and ratty. I tried to examine it, and it came back as just rags.

I snatched up the dead ghoul’s staff and took a look.

Staff of Ice

Level 6 Ice Control Passive

Ice Sheet Level 1

Cast time 2 seconds

Uses 1/3

Ice Shield Level 6

Cast time 8 seconds

Uses 2/5

I smiled as I ran back to the wagon. Another piece of loot that would turn out great. Once I drop a core into it, I’ll be able to see better what it does. The shield was strong enough to take two direct hits from my stone sphere, which meant that it was something that I would like to hold onto for a while.

I took one last look around the battlefield and tossed the staff into the wagon. Then I pulled myself up and said. “Let’s keep going. I have a feeling that the whole border will shift to this point if we don’t clear out.”

* * *