Hungry Necromancer

A few minutes into the second massacre the army starts breaking off, men tossing their heavy armours and swords to pick up speed as they make their escape. But the Spirit Warriors are having of this, I figured it's time to go on the offensive and where else am I going to find sacrifices for my rituals?

My enemies would serve me just fine.

My Spirit Warriors capture two fleeing mercenaries and cut down the rest, the fools made it easier to pick them off without their armour. The Spirit Warriors descend with my soon to be undead and I order them into the city where Yelenia and a platoon of men break open, searching for the missing party. The Mayor.

I take a deep satisfactory breath watching my ghouls spear down three men and dismember two others before I breath out. It's a resounding victory with few pockets of tiresome resistance.

A dozen or so Hunter-like warriors dance with Shaco, he's striking down them as fast as he can but won't win in the long run. But that's fine, Panda's almost done cleaning up the Mages. I had Wraith and Panda drain and disfigure the trio before anything else, their pesky fireballs would have tied Shaco's attention and those dozen Hunter-likes would be free to cut down the ghouls and zombies that push back against the bulk of the army.

Every piece working brilliantly against the other, and winning. Although I have discovered another piece of weakness in Wraith. He has immunity against conventional weaponry, you can't stab an undead like him and expect to do damage, unless of course, that weapon is magic.

This discovery is the emboldening reason I'm going to raise another Wraith. I've got twenty-nine souls left in the [Soul Gem] so I could exploit this and raise two more, but I'd rather have an excess of souls, just in case something else comes up, something even stronger and better than Wraith.

I'll need the souls then. Of course I could always pluck out the souls of the enemies here, in fact, I could section off about thirty of them and reap their souls with [Soul Invasion]. With margin error I could lose half of the set or even more, but I'm sure I'd get at least five to ten souls out of the thirty.

But I'm not ready for that yet, that intensity.

'Anselm rubbed off on me…' I sigh and walk down the hill and through the battlefield, the sounds of battle long dead, replaced by grunts, gurgling, prayer and begging.

Wraith falls by my side and slips into my shadow, an ability I didn't know it had. But I suppose he's got to hide somewhere with the sun out. Shaco fly's overhead, still munching and gnawing at bits of bone and flesh. He goes out, flying above the village screeching breaths of fire.

The appearance of an Amphiptere over their village terrifies the village into wild panics, but there's nowhere to escape to, right outside their gates is an army of undead cannibalising the remnants of the Marquess' army. Worse yet, there's a single living man escorting two prisoners and a giant corrupted Werebear and a line of ghouls into their village.

'I bet this is the most confusing and terrifying thing anyone of them has seen.' 

I put on a charming smile and start speaking with occasional screeching from Shaco, "Hello! I am Lord Ash, your new Lord and Marquis, do not be afraid! These are my agents, they came to protect you from a desperate woman and her raiders!

"As your new Marquis, I've come here personally to depose the Mayor of this village and install a new one that will act righteously on my behalf."

There are murmurs, people passing down what I've screamed out to the person next door, and the next and the next. Their terror subsides but then what I never expected happens.

"What are these creatures then?" A man, a soldier, steps out, his hand placed on his sword's hilt, ready to draw. He's got a black plain tight fit shirt, tucked into his trousers, from the mana I sense on the weapon I know he's a Hunter-like fighter.

But I shake my head at him and ask, "What do you hope to achieve here by opposing me? These creatures are my agents as I've said."

"You're the Necromage the commander spoke of…" He breaths, the steady grip he once had cracking under my gaze.

'Malevolence.' I smirk and walk closer.

"I am."

Gasps echo around those who can hear us, those who've heard the stories answer the eager questions of those who haven't.

"You're evil." He declares with a crack in his voice, sweat drips down the side of his face as he gulps, "Yo-you'll turn us all into monsters!" As thought to instill bravery in himself he ignites his blade's power and it hums and thrills, vibrating intensely.

He starts a lunge at me, blade poised for my heart but scratches to a halt when I raise my hand.

Close to me he's frozen in place, sweating profusely with haggard breaths. I take the sword out of his hand easily and they drop to his side, "You're a coward, one that's frightened than most. You're a deserter, somehow you slipped away when my undead were hot on your tail and made it in here."

He breaks into heavy sobs instantly and nods.

"Don't worry, I'm a kind and forgiving man, I can tell that you're not brave enough to challenge me or join a challenge against me, you're just a scared man looking to make some tokus. I understand that and in fact…I'll give you an opportunity to do that right now, I'll give you two gold for you to run back to the person that hired you and your commanders, tell them that I'm already there."

He nods his head, chanting, "Yes, yes, I'll do that, I'll do it fast. I'll do it, yes."

A massive boulder bursts out the top of the Mayor's Mansion sitting at the end of the village, a wide building with three pyramid style levels. The boulder lands on the other side of the village crashing into other buildings as it makes its trajectory to the ground.

Shaco is already on it, but before he can transform into something smaller, a geyser of water takes off a part of the roof and I groan, taking off to the scene with [Death Grip] tendrils. 

With the roof blown open I can make out the battle within. Kaylin's fending off an angry buff man with a sword, and a handful of rings. Rings that undoubtedly cast spells for him. Yelenia and several other men try to intervene, gang him up but a blast of air from his belt sends everyone save Kaylin into a wall. Killing or knocking them unconscious.

Having seen enough I drop down between Kaylin and the Mayor, he staggers in his attack at my presence. My hung open in shock, or is it terror? I'm not sure exactly who Malevolence affects just yet.

"Hello, you must be the Mayor of Kerilin."

He grunts, stepping back and wiping a bleeding nose, "And who are you?"

"The new Marquis, I'm your Lord Ash."

He narrows his eyes and shakes his head, "There is no new Marquis, we would have been summoned, to swear loyalty as your vassals and say goodbye to the previous if they are present."

I shrug, "Yeah that's the thing, I skipped all that, I don't need your loyalty, I just need you to get out."

"Asher! He's the Marquess' old lover. He was sent to rule under her to remind them both of their place." Kaylin says, jumping in.

I raise an eyebrow at this new piece of news and turn a new gaze at the man. "I'm going to have to revise my message then."

The man sees in my eyes his fate and foolishly struggles. A thrust of his fists launches a blast of pressurized water but a simple side step from the heavily projected attack is all I need to get out of harm's way.

In return he buckles over, coughing and hacking clots of blood out his mouth, he groans, trembling in pain as he falls to his knees. He struggles to lift his sight and see me, his eyes and nose already pouring out blood.

"Wh..what did you.."

I never get to hear what he wanted to ask as his face bulges, skin turning red and veins ready to burst, his entire body jerks and becomes rigid before he flops onto the floor like a fish out of water.

"Create Undead." I mutter, reanimating the Mayor's fresh corpse into a new viciously contorted beast.

"Wh-what did you do?" Kaylin stammers just as Yelenia and her fallen men stir from the knockout.

"Drowned him in his blood, a little mana and an open wound goes a long way. Too bad he couldn't fight me out of his system, I see why Mages are best for leading."

She huffs, helping Yelenia onto her feet, "Why did you turn him? It's over isn't it?"

I chuckle, "Not until I have Serue. Shaco will escort her lover, the hunter warrior outside and they will give the message. I'm sure she has several Mage guards with her, she can hold Serue until I come pick him up."

"And her? What are you going to do to her? What if she refuses?"

"Her? Well she must have some worth, she held this March, a March is no ordinary County. And she won't refuse, if she does all she'd have to do is look up and find Shaco ready to eviscerate her."

Kaylin takes a deep breath, nods and looks around the mess of a Mansion, "So…we've won the March…we…made it."

"Yes, but there's some unfinished business to take care of, right? Lotar?"

From behind my ghoulish undead a fog the shape of a wolf's head snarls and fades away. But I got the message.. Pray.