Ray
He stared at the basic undead’s character screen, pissed as all hell that he didn’t think to check earlier. He had been warned that changes would occur regularly. That enemies would get strong, faster, and tougher to kill. That they could even evolve. But this almost seemed like a worst-case scenario.
BASIC UNDEAD
RACE
UNDEAD
CLASS
SUN-KISSED
NEX
1
LEVEL
1
PHYSICAL STATE
DECAYING
MENTAL STATE
HUNGRY
ATTRIBUTE
BASE
CURRENT
NEX TO INCREASE
STRENGTH
5
5
-
AGILITY
2
2
-
POWER
-
-
-
WISDOM
.5
.5
-
LUCK
1
1
-
“Grand. I don’t know exactly what that class does, but I can guess,” Ray groaned. “We really need to close off that entranceway or kill whatever is buffing the undead. I hope the other team has been making as much progress as we have been.”
Gale sighed, “Tis a buff from either a necromancer or an Advanced undead. Either is bad news, although a necromancer would be far more preferable than a Lich.”
Ray was about to respond to that when Josephine pointed to the other side of the long building that cut the island in two. “There they are now,” she said.
Turning his attention to where she was pointing, Ray squinted into the afternoon sun, watching as a line of his people got closer. They were torn up a bit, but he could clearly see Grok had a huge shit-eating grin on his face. That Orkin certainly loved to fight, that was for damn sure. Ray only wished he could get another thirty of him.
Waving as they approached, Grok broke into a light jog and arrived before the rest of them. Stopping in front of Ray he said, “Hey boss, you lookin like youz had fun.”
“Oh yeah, a whole warehouse full of those spear-throwing pasty white ass fuckers,” he grumbled. “Not to mention we may have an Advanced undead issue. You guys look tore up as shit. What happened?”
Grok shrugged with disinterest as Derrick arrived and answered the question himself. “Grok ran us into a big nest of those Bone Spiders you mentioned before. I … I never want to see another spider again,” he said shivering as the big Orkin laughed. “Those things were nasty.”
Gale made a disgusted face, obviously agreeing with the engineer.
“Well then, glad I wasn’t with you guys then,” Ray said, stifling a grin. Then, a bit more serious he continued, “Ok. I want to clear this building in one go. It's two floors, and the pamphlets we found said there are hallways from one end to another. Let's keep our groups and do one floor each. Easy peasy.”
Derrick looked as if he had something to say, so Ray gestured at him to speak up. They didn’t have all day after all.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea Ray,” he said slowly. The others turned their attention to him as he explained. “The building is only two stories, true, but it's huge. There could be a shitload of undead, unique variants, or even that advanced undead you were talking about earlier. I caught the tail end of that conversation.”
Ray agreed with that assessment. “Ok, you seem to have a better idea. Have at it.”
“Well, I wouldn’t say it's better, just different. I say we split into our two groups but start at opposite ends. The hallways are narrow and will restrict how many people we can have in the front anyway. So if we have each group clear the sides then split again, we effectively halve the amount of undead either team would face while being able to clear them twice as fast.”
Ray … couldn’t find any fault in that logic. Taking a deep breath, and mildly peeved that he hadn’t thought about a plan in more depth, he said, “That sounds like a plan then. I'm beginning to think being an engineer is wasted on you. You’re two for two on great plans so far,” he said to Derrick.
“Well, I did minor in military studies. And I love history. I’m no Sun Tzu, but I can puzzle out and provide a few good tactical ideas here and there,” he replied.
“Well then,” Ray said with an acknowledging nod, “if no one has any complaints let's roll with Derrick’s idea. Seems better than mine anyway,” he chuckled.
The two groups separated Grok and Derricks heading back northwest with Verrick, and Ray heading to the southeastern end with Gale and Josephine. He just really, really hoped there was no Advanced undead inside of the building. That would make clearing this a far more arduous task than it should be. Not to mention it would probably push them into fighting after dusk.
And everyone would lose if that happened.
There was just no way to stand up to a horde of undead, empowered at night, moving faster, and being stronger than anyone on his team. Thus, the need for a second, rapidly put-together Outpost. Could they retreat to their first one? Absolutely. But what would inhabit all of the building up to that point? How could they keep an eye on it, or ensure nothing snuck in behind them? Simple answer: they couldn’t.
As Ray’s group checked the outbuildings on the southeastern end, they were pleased to find that each of the three buildings there had already been abandoned. The windows were boarded up and secure, the doors chained shut, and the gates locked. One of the buildings appeared to be some kind of theater, with faded advertisements pasted on the front brick façade.
“I don’t think anyone is home,” he said. “Let's split up from here. Gale, go with the Thymians, Orkin, and Goblins. Josephine, you come with me and the Aelvin. We need to clear this out, so consider it a speed run.”
Gale looked confused at the term but understood the context. More or less. She led her team inside first, taking the stairwell to the second floor. After the last of them had disappeared upstairs, Ray and Josephine continued down the hallway of the first-floor annex.
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Door by door, they checked every single room in that section of the building. They faintly heard fighting from upstairs, but then the noise moved on. They, however, didn’t run into a single undead. As they moved through the mostly silent and dusty building, Ray began to have the hankering feeling they were being watched. Somehow, his senses were telling him that something was wrong. But what it was, he just couldn’t put his finger on it.
Then an Aelvin touched the wrong door.
The entire thing folded in half, slamming down on the unsuspecting Ranger in a shower of gore. The now maw had ripped the poor man clean in two at the waist and was chewing him, almost thoughtfully. Ray shivered even as he drew his blade, the scene bringing back memories from not too long ago of his own arm being gnawed upon.
“Fucking kill it!” he yelled as the remaining Aelvin Rangers drew back and fired glowing arrows into the creature that had mimicked the door so well.
The thing screeched, and spider-like legs sprouted out of the sides of it as it changed shape to a more box-like form. It scuttled forward and was intercepted by Josephine. A swift slash of her weapon had it rearing back to avoid damage. She quickly took advantage of the thing being off balance and kicked it in the chest, tipping it over onto its back.
Two fiery red arrows slammed into it, causing it to burst into flame. It screeched pitifully before the legs curled into it as if they had just killed some kind of demented wooden spider.
Swallowing, Ray looked over as the Alevin examined what remained of their fallen comrade. Looking up, one deadpanned, “He is dead Master.”
Obviously, they didn’t care for any losses. Ray was pissed, he more than likely couldn’t bring the Aelvin back anytime soon. Regardless, he rolled his eyes and turned away. “Let's continue. Before touching anything, poke it with a stick or something. No one else dies to a fucking door that isn’t a door,” he growled.
One of the Aelvin grabbed a long skinny coat rack from a room that had already been cleared and began tapping on everything with it. They immediately found a few dozen of the mimic-like creatures. And they certainly were not limited to just doors. Desks, chairs, a coffee cup, and even two toilets in the upper-level restrooms. Ray shivered a bit, thinking about having to drop a deuce into one of those.
In between the mimics were the occasional undead. Apparently, they weren’t tasty to the copycat creatures and had been mostly left alone. This made clearing out some of the rooms rather complicated, as not only did the group have to avoid anything that wanted to eat them they also had to dance around any hungry and attacking undead.
Thankfully there were no unique or advanced variants within the building. With a tactic in place and a good idea of what to expect within the building now, they very quickly cleared the second floor. Getting to the primary stairwell on the far side of the building, they proceeded down it. As they hit the first-floor landing, the sound of combat because clear. The Aelvin Rangers exploded into action, charging through the door and spreading out to provide the first line of defense for those emerging.
What Ray and the group walked out into could be described as nothing less than chaos.
A slowly widening hole in the floor was disgorging hundreds of giant rodents of unusual size. Unlike your regular giant rats, however, these were obviously not alive. In addition to clearly being undead, Ray noticed that within the missing chunks of fur and flesh were writhing vine-like things. Not unlike tree roots.
“Hit them from behind, pull everyone back into a defensive line!” yelled Ray as his people advanced into the melee with Ranger support. He took immediate note that there had been significant casualties on both sides. “Fuck,” he breathed.
Drawing his blade with his arm, he waded into the melee with the rats. There were plenty of them to go around. As the two groups united and formed a defensive line, their backs were to the wall. Either they would win this fight, or be forced back up into the stairwell. The choke point would be better, but with the rat's numbers, they would no doubt be overwhelmed one at a time.
A shout of rage followed by a wall of wind changed everything, however. Remus was pointing at the mass of giant rats, lightning discharging in a steady stream from his fingers. The bolt had struck one rat and branched out to two others. Each fork continued to break into two and strike additional targets. Rodents fell by the dozens, electrocuted into a crispy snack that no one but possibly a Goblin would be interested in.
Ray took note as he was fighting that as each rat died, the writhing vines under their skin fell still. Where exposed, then shriveled up quickly, as if they had been exposed to the sun without water for long periods of time.
The last rat was blasted apart by Remus, who collapsed to his knees in exhaustion. The other Thymians also seemed to be weak on their feet, telling Ray that they had somehow shared the burden of what their leader had done. But they weren’t done yet.
A roar followed by the hole in the floor collapsing into a twenty-foot diameter opening that descended into what looked to be maintenance hallways below. Rising from the rubble, however, was a disgusting creature that couldn’t be described as anything but a queen rat. At least thirty feet in length, it was standing on its back feet, towering out of the hole and nearly scraping the ceiling in the entrance hallway they were in.
It roared again, displaying rotten, broken teeth as spittle and phlegm sprayed the group. Its mottled green and brown fur was ratty and patchwork as if heavily afflicted by mange. Or, you know, being undead.
Ray appraised it quickly, even as he readied himself for round two. These engagements, he was finding, often followed a pattern. Minions, then boss.
RODENT BROOD QUEEN
“Seriously, that’s it? What a stingy fucking-“ Ray began but was cut off as the Brood Queen opened its maw and spat acid at them all.
There was a mad scramble to get out of the way, even as he heard Grok laughing maniacally. Several balls of fire and green arrows struck the creature, making it hiss in rage and pain. It swiped a claw down, smashing a Goblin into paste.
As it roared again, Josephine darted forward and swept her blade through a paw that was holding it upright, severing one of the talons entirely. The creature roared, either in pain or annoyance, Ray wasn’t sure. But one thing was for certain, it was pissed off now.
Faster than would be expected of such a large, fat creature, it whipped its other clawed paw through the air and struck Josephine, smashing her across the lobby and through one of the walls. Ray yelled out, feeling rage building within him, sprinting forward with a speed he didn’t know he possessed. He leaped into the air, pushing his body to the max, and sank his blade up to the hilt in the Brood Queen’s eye.
Knowing full well what was coming, he pushed off violently enough with both legs to snap the massive rat’s head back. The force threw the creature off balance as well as got him clear of the incoming claw, which missed him entirely.
As soon as he was clear, several much weaker bolts of lightning struck his embedded blade. The Thymians were utilizing it as a lightning rod and were pumping the violent destructive energy into the body of the giant monster. It spasmed violently, smashing the ground around it until it eventually tipped over with a sad groan. It impacted the ground enough to shake the dust from the walls and ceiling around them. And then everything was silent, at least for the moment.
Ray ran over to the hole in the wall, but Josephine was already pulling herself back through it. As he ran up to her, she grunted in annoyance. “Didn’t see the claw. I’m fine. Tougher than I look,” she said simply. Giving her a quick once over, he nodded and was convinced that she wasn’t injured.
“That was way too close,” he said. Looking back at the group he saw they had lost a Thymian Mage, another Ranger, several Orkin, and close to a dozen Goblins. Their forces had been reduced significantly. Any mainline combat unit that faced the number of casualties they had accrued to this point would have been deemed ineffective and disbanded entirely. Unfortunately, that simply wasn’t an option here.
“Well fuck me with a ten-foot pole,” he muttered. No one but a nearby Goblin, who looked at him questioningly, had heard him. “No not literally!” he said, shooing the little green guy away. It walked away, huffing and mimicking him. They were helpful but really fucking annoying.
Clapping his hands, the weary group turned towards him. “Alright everyone, let's head across the way to the small cleared building over there,” he said while gesturing northwest to the much smaller outbuilding. “We can fortify, rest, and wait for morning. Then we clear the fort itself.”
With groans, a few well-placed kicks by the Orkin, and a lot of tired shuffling, the group got going. They had a bit more to do and then they could rest for a bit.
Then it was on to the main event.
***
RAYMOND ‘RAY’ FINNEGAN
RACE
HUMAN
CLASS
NONE
NEX
CALCULATING
LEVEL
1
PHYSICAL STATE
GOOD
MENTAL STATE
ANNOYED
ATTRIBUTE
BASE
CURRENT
NEX TO INCREASE
STRENGTH
5
12
50
AGILITY
3
10
30
POWER
0
4
100
WISDOM
4
10
40
LUCK
2
6
400
JOSEPHINE SANCHEZ
RACE
HUMAN
CLASS
(A) MYRMIDON
NEX
CALCULATING
LEVEL
2
PHYSICAL STATE
GOOD
MENTAL STATE
PROTECTIVE
ATTRIBUTE
BASE
CURRENT
NEX TO INCREASE
STRENGTH
18
19
180
AGILITY
21
22
210
POWER
4
5
400
WISDOM
17
18
170
LUCK
10
11
1000