Vey watches Sera walk off towards the village on the road, with the rising sun behind her. The plan is simple, she goes into the village peacefully, Vey positions the eighteen undead, and when the sun gets above the treeline, the raid begins. He’s spoken with Dragon squad, and split them up into two groups. Woi and the archer trio will stick with Zombie squad, providing ranged support, while Ter and Kai will go with Sheo squad, to provide more competent frontline fighters since Sheo squad seems to be shaping up to be a more stealth-focused team instead of formation fighting focused.
The leaves having fallen off all of the trees is something he hadn’t actually been paying attention to, but it actually serves to help Vey this time, as opposed to hindering it as he thought. The leaves blow around a lot in the light breeze, so he can better disguise the undead with [Sphere of Invisibility] by disguising the movements through the leaves as wind. He’s not sure it’s necessary, it appears that the village is not doing terribly well.
When Sera had initially described it to him all that time ago, she’d used phrases like ‘small but thriving’ and ‘we’d become a full town if we had any major resources’, but now, Vey is sure those days are behind it. For starters, the farms seem to be abandoned, for the most part, probably due to the large number of working individuals killed over the last few months. Sera said the village didn’t have more than a hundred or so people in it, and Vey and Sera personally killed at least thirty between the raid on the soldiers and the village militia. The plot of land the soldiers had made camp on is nothing but charred grass and ruins, and has clearly been combed over by scavengers thoroughly. Vey’s a bit upset he didn’t get first pick of the loot, but supposes first come first served is as fair as it gets.
For actual raid targets, he’s identified seven out of the forty or so buildings as actually being in use, plus what Sera had described as the common grounds, a gathering place for all the villagers and the center of the village. Vey’s job is to raid the abandoned buildings while closing in on the used ones, and Sera’s is to clear out the people she can find and scout for any potential hookups in the plan.
Soon enough, the sun crests the trees, and Vey gives the order for the two groups of undead to move out. Woi will move on the ‘left’ side of the road’s buildings, Ter and Kai will move on the ‘right’ side(Vey doesn’t actually know which way north is, so left and right are his best descriptors). Vey himself dispels the disguising spell and begins jogging towards the furthest abandoned farm from everything. His self appointed task is to secure the wider perimeter first, the abandoned buildings farther away from the village’s heart are proportionally less likely to have people in them, because of how the bandits likely operated, but proportionally more likely to still have more stuff abandoned in them by the same token.
Sure enough, the first abandoned farm has several intact farming tools left about, and Vey has his pick of three new shovels, a new woodcutting axe, and a fresh farming hoe before moving to the next. The second has a few sets of clothes that look like they might fit Sera, and so he takes those as well. Carrying four tools and a bunch of clothes poses a logistical problem though, so he opts to acquire the first cleanish looking wheelbarrow he spots. Wheelbarrow full of clothes and tools in hand, he moves onto the next one.
--
Several Minutes Earlier
The walk after parting with Vey to get to the communal fire pit takes her thirty minutes, but only because she takes her time. No one comes out to greet her, nor does she spot any signs of people living in most of the houses. Even her own house is abandoned, but given that she’s probably the only survivor of her family, that’s less surprising. The first person she sees is a human man whose name she doesn’t remember. Sera does remember that he worked for the tavern, but she never went there, and so doesn’t know. The tavern itself looks dead, with no tavern goers in sight. The place never was busy, but the odd few travelers or caravaneers every week used to at least warrant having the ‘open’ sign up. Now though, the tavernkeep is simply sitting solemnly on a chair at a table brought outside. She waves as she approaches.
“Hail, friend!” Sera does her best to sound friendly and chipper, and also tries to play up the act by closing her eyes slightly as she smiles. “Can I ask why this place is so… lifeless? I’m a traveler from Arenoc to the east, and I was hired to deliver a message to someone here, but this place looks… dead.”
Sera lies as naturally as she breathed, something she didn’t know she could do so convincingly. She’d rehearsed the bit about coming from Arenoc, but she didn’t practice too hard since she honestly didn’t expect the place to be this clear of people. The tavernkeep looks up at her, and sighs.
“You’ve come too late for that, pretty lass. Almost none of us left here. The children are staying with some of the mothers at the chief’s house, but I’m one of only twenty or so working aged men, and there’s no work for us to do with winter on the way. Hell, half of them already set out for any place they had family other than here.” As he speaks in his solemn tone, he stands and begins walking over to Sera, before extending a hand. “Either way, I’m Loeb, I run the tavern here. Used to, anyways.”
“Greetings, Loeb, I’m sorry to hear that things are in such a sorry state, will this place make it through winter?” Sera shakes Loeb’s hand as she asks the question, but immediately decides to answer the question herself when she pulls her hand away afterwards. “Ah, of course not. You’re only still here because you’re waiting for aid to arrive from one of the cities…”
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Loeb nods in response, and then shrugs. Sera watches as his eyes trace her body, from her head to her feet, and she thinks she sees his mind do a double take in real time before he speaks.
“Are you an adventurer? If so, I’d like to hire you to escort however many we can to Arenoc.” Loeb asks far too quickly, and with far more trust than Sera was expecting. She smiles cordially, which has the unintended effect of visibly brightening Loeb’s hopes.
“I’d be happy to. How soon can we leave? I couldn’t stand to let you all suffer a slow death like this.” Sera looks around as she gives her assurance, scanning for anyone who might be nearby to listen to this. Also, she looks at the rising sun, just a few minutes from leaving the treeline by the look of it.
“Probably a few hours, we were already planning on abandoning the place in a few days anyways, what few traveling supplies we have are already packed, it’s just a matter of rounding up the people and horses.” Sera turns back to Loeb as he finishes, and Sera nods to him.
“Alright, gather everyone by the wagons you’re using, and I’ll meet you there.” Sera gives him another smile and a wink to go along with it. She hopes that, with everyone all in one place, she’ll be able to do… something… Even if that something is killing them all as painlessly as possible. As she starts thinking about potential other options, Loeb speaks again.
“Gladly, the wagons are in front of the chapel, where everyone has been sheltering, so we can walk together. The workers have been going through the houses for stuff we can bring to sell or use, so they’ll be a little harder to collect.”
--
Sera knows meeting Loeb first was incredibly lucky. If anyone in the chapel recognizes her, any potential planning goes out the window, and the plan becomes violence. The wagons of what the villagers considered useful being already put together in one place is very lucky, but also moderately annoying, since she knows that means Vey and the others will end up wasting a lot of time searching empty buildings.
Loeb had gone into the chapel first, while Sera had made up the excuse of wanting to check if they have enough supplies for the forty people already or if they need more. Eight wagons, thirty people, almost certainly the wagons can carry all the stuff they want to bring, but she seriously doubts that they actually have enough for everyone, so the excuse was sound. What she actually wanted to do was prepare a little. Vey has begun searching through buildings by now, so she’s more or less out of time to try and do this bloodlessly, but she can still pick and choose who dies and who doesn’t.
For a moment, she enters her own little world, just to herself, just to think over everything.
This is her home village. The only people left are helpless children, elders, mothers, and whatever men and women didn’t have the heart to join a militia and likely had their remaining hearts broken when the militia didn’t come back. The soldiers too likely came and took whatever they decided the villagers didn’t need, and even those soldiers had been slaughtered and burned. A truly tragic tale for her community.
As for herself, she can’t really think of a way she could save any of them, at least, not with things as they are. Forty mouths is too many to feed, even with all of the food between the wagons here and preserved at the dungeon, meaning Vey’s magic would have to provide it over the winter once the preserved stuff runs out. Forty people is too many, the mana cost of Vey’s magic would rapidly outgrow what he actually has, and people would begin starving. That is all, however, what happens if she tries to keep all of them alive.
Because she can think of a way to save some of them. The working ones, she’ll need to kill, they have the potential to fight back, after all. The elders too, for a different reason; it’d be better for them to go peacefully and swiftly than rot in discomfort. But the children and mothers, she’s almost certain she can argue for the survival of. The chapel room of the dungeon is unused, and is near enough to the workshop and entrance chamber for the undead to feasibly guard them.
Children need less food than adults, and the caregivers can still perform that job for the kids, so that angle is fulfilled as well. What actually to do with them is another story. The only way Vey will hear an argument, and the only way Sera would either, when she thinks about it, is if they provide something more than just being a constant drain on resources she and Vey can’t replenish.
She has that answer too, though, and it’s one that oddly enough, she’s starting to like the idea more and more. What if, just hypothetically of course, the ‘Glorious Leader and his Queen’ could take on more subjects than mere undead? In time, children grow, and they could grow to work or fight, and with the joint leadership of a mortal they understand and an undead they don’t, maybe all of them, adults included, can come to understand and tolerate the undead as Sera does. She has several hundred years of her life left, after all, maybe if the undead are going to think of Vey and Sera as King and Queen, she should start acting like it too.
As she makes up her mind, she hears Loeb shout the names of several people, calling them to return, since they’re leaving now. Sera turns and walks out from behind a wagon where she was pretending to check supplies while she thought, and approaches Loeb with a smile on her face.
“Everyone inside ready?” She asks, and Loeb just nods his head. “Alright, we should put the children in the middle wagons in the formation, elders in the back, able-bodies in the front. I’ll go to the very front, alright?”
“Of course, miss Sera, might I ask, how long have you been an adventurer?” Loeb cocks his head to the side as he asks the question, and Sera looks to see the group of six men and two women come down the road towards her from one side, and four women coming towards her from the other, all carrying various objects that the survivors might need, and then turns back to Loeb.
“I never said I was one.” Sera draws her sword as she lets the words fall out of her mouth. “I said I wouldn’t let you suffer a slow death.”
--
System Help
Subject; Dungeon Cores
Information Classification: Accessible only by artificers of level fifteen or higher
Dungeon Core is a term used to describe entities not dissimilar to Golems, artificial constructs designed to perform a specific function. The difference is in how Dungeon Cores are created and in what they do. Golems are created out of a Core implanted into a physical body, an automata controlled by a programed brain, Dungeon Cores are implanted into buildings, to automate certain functionalities of managing a dungeon, such as the collection of souls for the creator of the dungeon core or managing the dungeon's automated defenses should it possess any. Most dungeon cores are created for the purpose of collecting the souls of those who die near them, to what end is not specific and varies from Core to Core.
Fundamentally, Dungeon Cores are no different from any other type of Core, and so it is more correct to refer to them as dungeon Cores outside of system specificity.