The guardsmen were arrayed in two lines, trained men and women of the city’s defence forces. Forty-some, allocated to take down a small criminal contingent that had been terrorising some merchants. Thought to be related to the recent insurgent crackdown.

It had been somewhat easy so far, no guards dead. The prisoners they had been told to take had served some kind of purpose in their sacrifices – perhaps some redemption for their crimes.

Though, the people they had been attacked by up to this point were unusually weak and frail, which didn’t really sit very well with them, their scout evidently having been done in.

One of the surviving prisoners had gone somewhat rogue, the tall business looking one with red hair. Presumably one of those spoiled types who hadn’t seen much violence. If an arrow hit him from either side, nobody would bat an eye. What an idiot.

They continued to cut down the folk running onto their swords. There had only been about a dozen, so presumably more were hiding away. The bandit’s strategy seemed comparable to their own, worryingly. Throwing worthless people at the other side.

What was worrying about it was that they must have enough people to do that.

—

Oliver watched as more people made themselves seen, but these were not the same as the people who had been sent to die. No.

These were more decrepit. Some of them seemed relatively fine, if a bit pale. Others had really begun to decay. A majority of them were not wearing clothing from Earth, but some were.

Oliver took a step back.

The arrivals approached from all sides, outnumbering the guards two to one.

The guards changed their formation accordingly, but didn’t raise much alarm.

Just a short series of directives. “Dead walking! All sides! Form a circle!”

And they did so like a well oiled machine.

Oliver looked into the black eyes of the dead walking. The second time he’d seen necromancy done. Perhaps this is what was meant when the green robed wizard had said to prepare bodies in advance.

Oliver didn’t have much time to take all the information in, as not long after the zombies appeared, they sped up.

Oliver and the remaining sacrificial Earthers were caught between a wall of shields and a horde of zombies, not that the Earthers seemed very able to change what they were doing.

Action. MOVE MOVE MOVE!

Oliver already considered himself as having lost, he was distraught.

But Oliver did not have time to sulk, did not have time to mope about, to berate himself for bad decisions.

Oliver would protect what he could.

He grabbed the wrist of an old lady who hadn’t yet died, and collected a weapon off the ground. The girl he’d tied to a tree was disturbingly close to the zombie perimeter. Oliver had no idea if these undead operated on the same impulses as he might assume, but he was sure as hell they were here for violence.

Oliver pulled the old lady along, against her efforts to go in the other direction.

They arrived at the tree with the girl attached to it, there were zombies mere metres away. Oliver pushed the old lady to the ground, not having the time to feel guilty– hopefully she would stay down and not wander back into the battlefield.

Oliver thought about the people he had left behind, and directed the anger he had for himself outward.

He knew the short spear he had picked up was probably the only weapon he had much of a chance using effectively. Or at least that’s what he had heard, he at least knew that was generally the case for inexperienced people, but it probably depended on the situation.

Stop thinking–

The first zombie came into range, all the ones nearby facing Oliver and his two inebriated charges. Oliver held the spear on his right, with his right hand on the back, and left hand on the front.

He pointed it at the zombie’s head, and hesitated for a moment at committing such violence… But the adrenaline of the situation won over.

He thrust the tip of the spear into the zombie’s head, burying it in the dead person’s skull. A spray of liquids came out as he removed it, but the second and third were already upon them.

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He managed to skewer one of them, but the other was just about touching the girl on the tree, and the old lady had gotten up and started walking away.

Oliver, not having time to adjust the angle of his long weapon, swung it around at the other zombie like a club. He didn’t manage to hurt it, but it fell over, so he was able to finish the job.

Another one touched his back, he elbowed it, feeling the collapsing ribcage through the decaying clothes.

And they kept coming, one after another. They bit with their remaining teeth and clawed with their nails, but they weren’t all that strong. They were simply suffocating in numbers.

Thankfully, the zombies were not so numerous. The majority of them had gone toward the guards, and only the section of the circle near Oliver had really shown him any attention.

The sizeable hole in the circle of zombies had also allowed the old lady some leeway, none were close enough to turn to her.

And when they met the guards, they were swiftly cut down, even more easily than the sacrificial soldiers.

Oliver was looking around at all the bodies afterward. Some of which belonged to those that had been alive not even three minutes ago.

What took Oliver a bit long to notice was that the guards had not eased. They still had their shields up and their swords pointed through the gaps.

Then the ground trembled.

Oliver heard shouting from the guards. “BRAAACE!”

The guards dropped to their knees and locked shields against the ground.

The trembling stopped, and all at once, the zombies came back to life, scrambling forward with unusual speed.

The ten or so Oliver had beaten back came at his ankles as he was still registering what was happening.

Holding his spear in one hand, ill prepared for such a sudden attack, his right arm flooded with mana, and he swept the spear across the ground–cutting three in half.

“AAARRGGHH.” MY ARM FUCKING HURTS!

His eyes went white with pain for a moment, but in the next he was already jumping at two zombies heading for the girl, bulldozing them to the ground.

They went inactive with the impact, already damaged from being taken down once.

The last five were too damaged to do much attacking, so Oliver went ahead and stepped on them.

And then he heard the familiar laughter. The very same he had heard on his first day here. His first time in the forest.

A green cloud emanated from within the guard’s tight shell formation. Oliver heard spluttering, even as far away as he was. And they were breaking up.

If any of them were trying to shout commands, they weren’t having much success.

Oliver noticed a strange light between the trees off to the side, then a few more.

And the flaming arrows flew into the cloud, setting it alight.

Suddenly, the guards who had been put together, who had seemed organised and prepared–were now burning alive in their hot, unwieldy metal armour.

Oliver had a healthy dislike for the guards for obvious reasons, but he didn’t consider himself insane enough to enjoy the shrieking sounds which he could hardly identify as human.

The people were alight, the trees were alight, and the necromancer was laughing. There seemed to be a few people laughing actually, or was it crying?

Oliver couldn’t tell at this stage. In all honesty, Oliver was too tired to be sick, too weak to be righteously furious, a loser in every definition of the word when it mattered. Again. Again and again and again and again and again. The story of his life.

Oliver felt disconnected as he stood, twisted right arm dangling at his side.

He wanted to go home. Everything felt so silly.

Eventually, the only noise left was the crackling coming from the shrinking fire. Oliver just looked into it, entranced.

“Owowowowow”

Oliver snapped out of it,, turning to look at the girl he’d tied up.

He just looked at her.

The girl looked afraid, but she was looking at him. In the real sense of the word. It seemed her controller had released their hold for the moment.

She asked Oliver, in a rasping, unconfident voice. “Can you help me?”

Oliver untied her wrists, and held her by the shoulders. She was a bit taller than Levi had been. “I want you to follow me, alright?”

It seemed it was time again to take responsibility.

The fire, having failed to take proper hold in the strange, low forest, had receded enough that Oliver could walk through the remains.

It’s not like people had disintegrated, but everything was black, and nobody was breathing.

Oliver heard voices in the distance, he hurried up. He did not want to meet the people that did this, whether any of them were from home or not. If there were any to be saved…

He guessed that they had already died by now.

In his rush through burnt trees, going back the way he came, he noticed a dusty blue poncho against a tree. The only thing he’d seen that wasn’t black, perhaps resistant.

Oliver rounded the tree, hope blooming on his face for a strange girl he hadn’t really liked. But alas.

She was very much burnt underneath.

Oliver’s feelings were confusing. A jumbled mess. He didn’t feel particularly strongly about her at this point.

Oliver made a split second judgement, not having the time to spend. Avoiding those murders, sure, but also fearing he’d collapse the moment he stopped.

This girl with him would need entry to the city. He couldn’t really just bring back a strange girl.

And so he took the fireproof blue poncho. He handed it to the girl, who flinched away.

“Your name, if anybody asks, is Paige.”