---2 Days later---

200? She had to add another zero by this time. As they observed and treated the ones attacked inside the camp, over ten times as many people started showing symptoms, ultimately losing their minds and being beyond help.

She barely left Gamma and had already lost over 1/10 of the imperial soldiers she was entrusted with. It was hard to say whether her achievement would make up for this loss. The priests and researchers found that the incubation time for people with a level in the mid-80s, was about 2 days, depending on their resistance.

The other good news was that magics like superior heal, detox, and cure were able to stop the infection in the early stages. As long as the infected got treatment within a day of the infection, they would be fine.

Everything else was vague as the events didn't quite add up unless the first batch of soldiers was infected even before the battle against the zombie wave. The big batch on the other hand was almost certainly the result of the night battle.

It was only a small consolation that they had a guess of what happened afterward. Natina couldn't go on like this. She had to shine from here on out if this expedition shouldn't turn into a complete catastrophe.

On the third day of staying put, no more people turned. Everyone had a fundamental understanding of how to deal with a turned comrade. Not getting hurt, not touching their blood. not touching them if it was possible.

Although the time was stressful, they were at least able to recover from the bodily fatigue. It was time to use the artifact and get out of here. Natina couldn't give Minas Mar any more time to prepare more traps.

Once they used the artifact they booked it riding Natina's undead beasts once again, until they left the affected area of the barrier breaker. At least this time they were sure to have taken the correct direction, as the landscape quickly changed under the undead feet. The foothills of the central mountains range, they finally entered them for real.

They were finally back on track. Soon many among the army asked to switch back to the flying beasts. Nobody wanted to meet any more zombies and Natina had to agree. So a while after leaving the entrapment, they made a short stop and switched back to the flying undead.

At least, the time spent in the entrapment was not a pure loss. A necromancer grew with death, and she was able to replenish her flock that had taken a hit during the battle in Gamma. The swarm of flying undead once again rose to the sky, bigger and more formidable, like a wave of doom towering over the land.

Over 17,000 Soldiers on over 5000 beasts were soaring through the clouds. Nothing would stop them now. They would not stop for any more occasions, even resting was questionable. And especially not any unknown locations like the Worm Mountain.

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Nothing and nobody would stop them from here on out!

---The next day---

She had jinxed it!

A feathered snake with the colorful wings of a parrot appeared in the skies above them. Its colorful plumage was patchy, stained with black sludge of decay and revealing the ribs at some places. The skeletonized jaws wide opened, and it screeched a cry, despite the lack of vocal cords.

She had already lost a lot of time when a bunch of weaklings attacked their camp, but now this? To make things even more annoying, it wasn’t alone. It was leading a group of beasts made up of Skyrays, monster birds, and other creatures in a similar, half-decayed state.

From an outside perspective, the swarm of doom met its match. Just seeing them frustrated her. She couldn’t even profit from this attack, as fully infected undead could not be controlled by necromancy. Fighting them was just annoying and time-consuming as they would keep regenerating to the state they were in when infected. Over and over until they were exhausted.

Facing them while holding back was simply a loss for her. Natina was fed up.

“Burn them up!” she commanded the ancient dragon to make a move. She would get rid of them in one go, avoiding a complicated battle with a serious outcome. The dragon comparable in size to the Worm Mountain opened its massive maws and a pillar of fire that split the clouds broke forth.

Not even the high-level Skyfeather leading the pack was able to escape the fate of total incineration. They may have great regeneration, but not even these creatures would be able to reconstruct after being completely annihilated by dragon fire.

Having the dragon move before they reached their destination already felt like a loss. One of the reasons she came here with so little support, was that she came to prove that she deserved her standing and didn’t just get it because of her dragon. Yet, she was forced to use the dragon the moment things became tough.

Natina was sure she would get mocked for it, but she couldn't risk any more setbacks. She was sure the people with eyes would understand her actions and approve of them. It was a belief she held onto for the next days, as catastrophe after catastrophe interrupted their journey.

On one day, they flew into a suddenly risen fog bank and were attacked by a horde of flying zombies, made up of regular undead birds, who kamikaze-ed into her swarm of doom, infecting undead and soldiers. Despite acting immediately to block the attack and defend, they were once again forced to sacrifice a number of people and undead, despite their prevention methods.

On another day, the rain became so heavy, that they were forced to land before they could use spells to counter the weather. Smaller entrapment formations that had them lose their way kept haunting her nightmares. It became a true odyssey for the whole army, as they slowly made their way to Delta.

“I'm really starting to hate this whole world,” Natina complained as their travel speed slowed down once again. The number of infected and zombie monsters finally lessened as they entered the actual mountains, but the mountain range was brewing with an inexplicable ice storm.

For the first time something that was probably just a natural phenomenon and not a trap. The swarm of doom, her flying undead faced an unexpected struggle. Many of them were too small to stay stable in the strong winds, while the constant freezing made it hard, even for the bigger and stronger undead to stay airborne. Ultimately, the terrible weather conditions forced them to continue on the ground.

For a full day, there were no entrapment formations, monsters, or anything else that stopped them. Things were finally going better for her. Her mood improved significantly, to the point she decided to give the men a rest. Traveling through the rough terrain, and resisting the cold winds was exhausting, even when they used buff food to raise cold resistance.

“Your Highness!” one of the army commanders approached her in haste, just after they set up the tent. His face was all rosy from the cold, and his heavy breath was visible in the air, as he hurried over. “I-I have to report something.”

“What is it?” she asked, ignoring the lack of manners. She had a bad premonition.

“We are missing several parties,” he broke out and explained the situation. After setting up camp, there was a roll call during which they discovered that several parties and their undead mounts had gone missing during the journey. The eerie part was that nobody had seen anything. He had already questioned everyone

The footing in these windy and icy mountains was treacherous. It wasn't unlikely that people or mounts fell in holes, ice crevices, or the abyss of steep cliffs hidden by snow. Despite being high-level players with epic equipment, a bad fall could still be deadly.

But it was suspicious how many vanished without even a witness of what happened to them. Something was going on.