The castle sat in the middle of a long valley, glowing slightly in the setting sun, the ruins of a large city spread about its base, and from his position Darian could see it encircled the walls. While the ruins at first made his heart sink, the small pinpricks of light that illuminated small windows in the castles walls and towers gave him hope. From the little daylight remaining, Darian could see that the castle seemed to be unaffected by whatever disaster had swept across these lands.

As he looked across the devastation before the castle, something caught his eye, the land about the castle seemed to be in constant movement, almost as if the soil was crawling and heaving about. Frowning, Darian concentrated, wishing the sun had stayed up a little longer, trying to see what was causing this movement before it became too dark.

Suddenly a large ball of fire blossomed on the walls of the castle, illuminating a large space around it, then it shot downwards. The light it emitted allowed Darian to see the cause, and he was horrified. The land before the castle was teeming with milling undead, tiny from this distance, but packed in together like sardines. If the whole area around the castle was like this, then there must be thousands of them, no, tens of thousands.

The ball of fire struck, exploding outwards into a gigantic fiery explosion, sending the living corpses flying, rotting flesh and tattered clothing bursting into flame from the intense heat, bones spinning into the surrounding crowd like pieces of shrapnel. Darian had no idea of how many of the foul beasts lost their unholy life to it, but within the now empty gap among their ranks, burning figures stood back up, and the surrounding crowd surged in to fill the space. Within seconds the only sign the explosion happened was the small fires of burning cloth dotted about.

Stunned by this exhibition, Darian could only stand there, staring, as the echoes of the blast faded away, and no memory of getting up to his feet. Blinking a few times, he thought that there was no way he would be able to make his way through that lot without getting killed, it was just like an anthill that had been disturbed, he needed to find another way to reach the castle.

Another unusual thing he noticed in the fire light was that there was a small clear area along the length of the walls, about a hundred feet wide, none of the undead seemed to approach any nearer than that, which was puzzling. With that many surrounding the castle they should have packed it all the way to the walls. The only reason he could come up with was they had the castle under siege.

Whatever he finally decided he was going to do, for now he would have to wait for daylight to do it, and he had to find somewhere safe to wait out the night. Turning his back to the castle, Darian walked away, down the hill towards the beach, his mind turning over his options, which, he discovered, were few.

Half way down he was taken by surprise when an armed skeleton dashed out at him from behind a large boulder, taking him unprepared. The skeleton slashed out at him, its rusty sword cutting a deep gash across his chest, and pain seared through him. Stumbling back, Darian raised one hand to his chest while the other desperately dug into his bag, seeking his weapon.

You have received four points damage. Health remaining 24 / 27

By the time he had managed to retrieve his mace, the skeleton had followed his retreat and struck out again.

You have received five points damage. Health remaining 19 / 27

In desperation at seeing his health slipping away, Darian swung wildly with his mace, not taking the time to target anything, in hope that it would create some time for him to get better prepared. It didn’t work, as the head of the mace whistled through empty air when the skeleton stepped to one side and thrust forward with the sword. The blade skewered his thigh, and the leg buckled beneath him.

You have received four points damage. Health remaining 15 / 27

Now on his knees in front of the skeleton, his identification skill decided it was time to let him know what he was facing, obscuring his vision of the creature.

Name: Skeleton Scout

The skeleton scout is one of the weakest forms of undead, commonly found in the location of abandoned or cursed graveyards and caves. This form of skeleton is most commonly encountered alone. Undead creatures are susceptible to attacks and spells of a holy nature.

Level: 3

Health: 24/24

Armour: 5

Damage: 1 to 6 (rusty shortsword), 1 to 2 + disease (Bite)

Blinded by the text, Darian swore aloud and once again swung his mace in a wild arc horizontal to the ground. Luck was with him this time, as he heard a loud crack as the mace connected with something. It must have been a good strike, as the message was replaced with another one.

Crushing blow to skeleton.

Damage given : 9 ((7 x 2)-5)

Health remaining: 15 / 24

With his vision now clear of the messages that had obscured it he could see that the blow had removed one of the skeletons legs, toppling it over. In the dark he could see the two glowing red embers that was its eyes, still fixed on him. Grimacing at the shooting pain in his thigh, he used them as something to target and swung the mace. It connected and one side of the skeletons skull crushed inwards, extinguishing one of the embers and removing another seven points of its health.

He realized his mistake when he overbalanced after the swing, landing face down in the dirt, right in front of the skeleton. Quickly Darian rolled to one side to avoid, or at least reduce the efficacy, of the expected return blow from the skeleton. To his surprise, it never came, gifting him with the time he needed to get back up to his knees.

Looking up, he saw why it had not attacked him, and couldn’t help but laugh. His last blow had not only crushed one side of the skull, it had also knocked it around, and the skeleton was blindly trying to turn it back the right way. Darian swung the mace two more times, and put it out of its misery.

You have defeated the Skeleton Scout

You receive 35 experience

You have gained a new level

You are now Level 3

Current Experience 200 / 300

You Receive 1 Character Point

Total Unused Character Points: 8

Looking around to make sure the noise of the battle had not attracted any unwanted attention, Darian dipped his hand down and opened the loot window. This time what he found was a little better than his previous gains, finding some coins, another set of the bones and a rather unusual token. His inspection showed it to something called a Skill Token, and it could be used to increase the experience to one of his skills, whatever they were. Like everything to him, it went into the bag until he found out more about it.

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Back at the beach it didn’t take Darian long to find a comfortable spot among some rocks where he could spend the night. After the fight with the scout he had not encountered any more signs of the undead.

Darian had come to a decision during the night, one where he had to travel the environs of the besieging army and see what the situation was before he worked out a method to gain entry to the castle unscathed. Last night he had only seen a very small portion of the land and had no idea of the numbers of undead. This was not a decision he came to easily, because it increased his chance of being detected, and attacked, but he knew it had to be done.

Peering out between two pillars of stone to check if the coast was clear, he quickly ducked back when he saw two skeleton walking down the beach towards his position. Unlike his previous encounters with these beings, these two seemed to be better armed, both in the weapons they carried as well as the armor they wore. Hoping they wouldn’t detect his hiding spot, he nether less prepared himself for combat, knowing if it came to a battle, his chances of winning were virtually nil.

Darian crouched between the rocks, attempting to keep as silent as possible, and listening for any sounds that would let him know where they were. He found this hard to do because with his position close to the water, the sound of the waves breaking on the shore dominated everything.

Darian gave them about five minutes, thinking this would allow them enough time to pass by his hiding position, but just as he was easing himself up from the crouch he had remained in, he heard the faint squeak of sand being compacted. He had heard about this many times, but had never believed it, but it was unmistakable, the sand was squeaking, and the only cause of this possible was something walking on it.

Instantly Darian froze, not even breathing, knowing it was the skeletons walking past the rocks he hid behind. He remained crouched, following their progress by the constant crunch crunch as they walked past. Slowly, the sound became fainter and fainter as they got further away, then, when the sound of their passing had become inaudible to him, he waited for a few more minutes. He didn’t want to get up if they remained close enough to see him.

Slowly and carefully pushing himself up from his crouch just enough to see over the rocks about him, he looked in the direction he thought the skeletons had gone, but couldn’t see them. From the disturbed sand caused by their passage, he knew they were following the coast, heading north, their footprints… more like bone prints, he thought… disappearing behind a small hill that jutted out into the beach. Thankfully, this was the opposite direction that Darian had chosen to start his circumnavigation of the horde.

…..

Four hours later Darian arrived back at the spot he had started and what he had seen only reinforced his opposition to a direct approach to the castle. The horde, for that is the only word he considered descriptive enough, occupied all the available land outside the castle, standing one hundred deep in some areas. It was comprised mainly of skeletons, but he had also seen numerous other types of undead intermingled with them, like the zombies and other types that he had no knowledge of.

He had managed to find areas that gave him the opportunity to rest in relative safety, and he took these times to examine the milling crowd that filled the land in front of him. He saw creature names, such as Ghoul, Revenant and Lich, names he had heard of before in films and TV shows he had watched, but other than the name, he knew nothing else about them. He even thought he had seen a mummy, swathed in brown stained bandages, tottering about, but it hadn’t come close enough for him to see its description.

He puled the map open in his vision and zoomed it in to display only the area that he had just travelled, seeing that the landscape and its features had filled in, the castle icon now changed to a very good illustration of the outside of the castle, a little text note overlaying it, stating it was called ‘Blood Castle’. Blood castle Darian thought to himself, now that’s a rather ill-omened name.

Something at the side of the map caught his eye, and he move the map to center it. It was a little icon, looking something like the prison bars on a monopoly game board, placed close to the coastline. Frowning, he remembered passing through that area and hadn’t seen anything at that time, other than a small group of skeletons he had hidden from. Pinching absently at his bottom lip, he considered the icon thoughtfully, now almost certain that was the exact spot where the skeletons had been. What is at that spot, Darian wondered, and what the hell were the skeletons doing there ?

The marked spot was about half an hours walk along the beach, and a little ways inland. With nothing better to do with himself until he worked out an action plan, Darian decided he would take a little trip down to this spot and check it out. He should have plenty of time to get there, check it out and get back well before the sun started to set.

He was approaching the location a short while later when a noise like someone tapping sticks together alarmed him, and he quickly moved across to the shelter of a copse of withered trees, their branches bare of any foliage and creaking in the mild sea breeze. Using the tree trunks as cover, he carefully peeked out to see what was making the racket, and saw two skeletons walking around in a circle, the noise being made as their yellow bones clacked together as they moved.

Watching them, he saw that they seemed to be circling one spot in what looked like a dry creek bed, acting like they were patrolling sentries. He also saw that they were one of the weaker forms of undead he had already faced, both of them being Skeleton Walkers. He could see they were poorly armed, one holding a dagger, the other armed with a rusty shortsword. He couldn’t see them being much of a hindrance to him if he attacked.

Darian equipped his trusty mace, still looking as good as when he received it, and waited for the one armed with the sword to be at its closest point to him on its path, and while the other was at a point furthest from him before he acted. He leaped forward, swinging the mace in a horizontal aimed at the back of the skeletons skull.

Successful surprise attack. – Will impart maximum weapon damage, plus 100 % damage bonus.

Surprise Crushing blow to Skeleton Walker.

Damage given : 26 ( ((9 x 2)-5) x 2)

Health remaining: 0

With a loud crack, the skull separated from the skeletons spine and flew off, disappearing into beaches low, rolling sand dunes. Like a marionette that’s had its strings cut, it clattered lifelessly to the ground, loose bones rolling in all directions. Using the momentum that the maces swing had imparted, he spun on his heels to face in the direction of the remaining skeleton, which had only just started to react to his presence.

Breaking into a jerky trot, the skeleton came at him, its dagger raised and Darian smiled to himself. This should be easy, this time I’m going to have a bit of fun. As soon as the skeleton came close enough, Darian lashed out with a clenched fist, smashing it into the skeletons chest, then instantly grimaced as pain shot though his hand.

Punch to the Skeleton Walker

You hit, causing no damage

You received two points of damage

Your Health Remaining: 32 / 34

Almost as if to reinforce his stupidity, the skeleton stuck its dagger into his side, causing another three points of damage to Darian, along with a notification the dagger had caused internal damage and he had a bleeding wound. Lashing out with one foot he kicked the skeleton away from him and staggered back, the wound in his side feeling like it was on fire. He realized he had got a little too cocky and should have known that punching something with his bare hands wasn’t a smart move, and he was sure he had broken at least one finger.

The skeleton recovered from the kick he had given it, and once again advanced at him, only to be forced back again as the mace swung out and smashed into its ribcage, shattering some of its ribs. Ignoring the damage notice, Darian swung again before it could recover and landed a blow on one collarbone, breaking off the arm holding the dagger.

The blow made the skeleton stagger to one side, off balance, allowing him another free strike at it. This one did the job of finishing off the creature, and like its fellow skeleton a few minutes before, it collapsed to the ground. Darian dropped the mace to the ground, then hunched over and clutched at his side where he had been stabbed, grimacing in pain. Fuck, I hope no more show up. I don’t think I would be able to defend myself like this. Now the fight was over, the pain had only seemed to intensify. Unexpectedly, an information box popped into view.

Your tolerance to pain increases.

Pain tolerance: Level 0 (0.25%)

Allowing injuries to heal themselves will speed up Pain Tolerance gains.

The pain had become so severe that Darian was forced to drink from the flask, something he was reluctant to do this early in the day, but he was desperate and needed to be in top form if he was to continue onwards. As the wounds healed, the pain subsided and he relaxed, relief flooding through him. They can go bugger themselves if they think I am going to suffer with pain if I have something that can heal me. He put the flask away, then bent over and retrieved his mace.

A quick search of the deceased skeletons gained him another couple of handfuls of coins, and one more set of those villager remains he kept finding, bringing his total of them up to six out of a hundred. What the hell he needed to gather these for was a mystery to Darian, but at the rate he had been finding them, it would be a long time before he got them all.

His investigation of the area they were patrolling let him know that the icon on the map was a grate that covered a man made tunnel that he would have called a sewer outlet back on Earth. The bars of the grate had been bent outwards, and from the rust free condition of the broken sections, he could see that this must have happened very recently, the undead the only possible option for responsibility.

Peering into the tunnel, he only could see a short distance down it, as the darkness deepened the further it went. I wonder why they are interested in this ? Then it struck him, this must be a sewer outlet from the castle. This could be his way inside. Decision made, he entered the tunnel.