Necromancer
A Royal Road Fan Fiction
By: Halosty
Chapter 60
Quietus immediately regretted his previous decisions upon logging into Royal Road. He had been a different person when he had made the decisions that brought him into this situation. Alas, he had to suffer the consequences that the person he used to be had wrought upon him. Specifically, the Quietus of yesterday, who didn’t know how much being in a lake of acid hurt.
“Blargleblurg!”
Quietus spewed the vilest of profanities he knew before quickly using his undead mimicry skill. This solved two of the most immediate problems he was facing. Specifically, that of not being able to breathe, and the pain. Now he no longer needed to breathe and didn’t feel pain. However, he still had to rush to shore, since he was still taking significant amounts of damage. Once he reached the shore, he coughed and sputtered in a completely unnecessary and exaggerated manner.
Why would the game designers let someone come back to life in the bottom of a lake of acid? That was ridiculous. Sure, it was admittedly entirely partly his fault, but that wasn’t a good excuse for the developers to allow it. Well, he didn’t exactly have to have the pain settings on full either, but they put the option in, so it was their fault it hurt so much, right?
After bashing his head against some rocks to make himself feel better, which only worked because he didn’t currently feel pain, he checked to see whether it had been worth it.
Undead Mimicry, Forms available:
Ghoul: High physical stats, low mental stats.
Mummy: Increased stats, reduced agility.
Skeleton: Decreased strength; agility and dexterity increased.
If the skeleton hadn’t been in that window, Quietus would probably have quit Royal Road right there. Well, not really, but he would have been extremely annoyed to not have gotten skeleton form after what he’d put himself through been put through.
Quietus realized that none of his undead minions could keep up with him. So, he gave them one final order. “Wander around and kill everything.”
There, now they would at least be useful during their limited lifespan.
Although it would take a few days of sprinting at full speed, he wouldn’t have to stop. It would be somewhat boring, but it was better to be fast in this case. He ran towards the southern end of the continent, and Maratis.
He passed by all of the enemies he saw that didn’t directly get in his way. There was decent variation in the monsters around him, and he would have liked to dissect them for the sake of his anatomy skill, but he kept on heading towards his goal. At least, until he ran into an enemy he couldn’t ignore. He probably could have, if it weren’t so literal.
This enemy looked quite familiar, actually. It was a giant lizard, like those he’d fought on the Plains of Despair. It fit in slightly better here in the desert. It was a slightly different type, but Quietus wasn’t in the mood to waste time. Using all of his skills and his previous practice against giant lizards, he made short work of it. Then, he started his sprint again. After a minute, he stopped and ran back.
He realized that he probably should have chosen a different method to learn to become a skeleton, at a later time. It would have saved him a lot of pain, and he didn’t actually need the speed. Not that he didn’t need to go fast, but there was another option that was more efficient. Quietus sighed, even though he currently had no lungs. Then he turned the lizard into a skeleton.
It would have been the most profoundly uncomfortable ride imaginable, if he’d been able to feel anything. Bones weren’t meant for any kind of comfort, and there was no such thing as a saddle for giant lizards in the first place. However, that didn’t stop him from riding it. Normally, he would have been so uncomfortable that he would have never tried it. Plus, he would have run out of stamina holding on desperately to its neck. Being a skeleton as well, though, meant he didn’t have to deal with the comfort, and also had unlimited stamina. It wasn’t a pretty sight, but it was a very quick way to travel.
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Several days had passed, out of game, and Maratis was nervous. Concerns about level in comparison to the nearby monsters abounded. However, they could be avoided in the cave in which Maratis was hiding. Worse, though, were the players who had managed to find their way here, looking for what Maratis had. They were intentionally looking for Maratis, and had the rangers and other trackers to do so.
Although Maratis had some experience fighting against players, it had always been in a party. Maratis was designed for support, and supporting oneself was mostly a futile effort.
Maratis smashed in the skull of a zombie with a mace covered in holy light. As a cleric, even one made for support, undead could still be defeated. The ones in the area weren’t too powerful, either. However, the players were probably getting closer. Players from the Children of Light were coming, but unfortunately not nearby, since they hadn’t been able to teleport anywhere close. The enemy players had been teleported by the same incident that had caused Maratis to end up here, hiding in a cave.
However, the hiding had to come to an end. Not by choice, of course. However, with this many players, Maratis being found was inevitable. A ranger appeared at the entrance of the cave, and paused. Likely he was sending his location to the others. Then, he attacked.
Maratis put up a struggle, but was no match in physical combat. Eventually, Maratis ran out of mana to heal, and was about to be hit by the final blow. Then, there was a sickening crunch.
Maratis peered out between almost-closed fingers. The crunching continued. Where the ranger had been, there was a ghoul. The ranger was there, as well, but he wasn’t in any condition to participate in combat anymore, with half of his head missing.
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Although the ranger had been injured, the ghoul had managed to finish him in a single strike. Maratis reluctantly prepared to fight the ghoul, but without mana did not even hope to defeat an undead. Especially not one that was stronger than all of the others in the area. However, after it finished eating the ranger, something Maratis avoided watching even though it left a large opening, the ghoul did not attack. Instead, it just stood there for a moment, then moved to the entrance of the cave, as if waiting for something.
Maratis just stared at it for a minute, before noticing something very strange. Below its name “ghoul”, displayed in the red of a murderer, was a guild tag.
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Quietus literally trampled the first enemy he saw. Some kind of monk, it seemed. Their equipment was cloth, but they didn’t appear to be a caster. Therefore, probably a monk. Quietus wasted no time turning them into a ghoul. Skeletons were faster, and didn’t need to eat to stay alive, but that wasn’t an issue now. Quietus was close enough to his destination that he didn’t need the extra speed, and there would be plenty for them to eat.
Maratis had told him there were enemy players nearby, and thus Quietus had been looking. He didn’t know exactly where Maratis was, but hopefully this ghoul, or the next, or the next, would succeed at tracking. They had an amazing sense of smell, after all. If they didn’t find Maratis, they would find more players for Quietus to turn into undead.
Quietus gave orders that he would repeat many times in the next few hours. “Find all players, report their locations, and kill any not in my guild. If you find Maratis, stay there.”
The ghoul nodded, and Quietus knew it would be able to follow the orders. He’d studied the mechanics available to him somewhat, and his undead wouldn’t attack any guildmates or party members, or himself, unless specifically ordered. It didn’t hurt to be clear, though.
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Maratis sat in the back of the cave, even after mana recovery was finished. There didn’t seem to be any point to getting up. The only things that could accomplish would be attracting the attention of this strange ghoul, or the players nearby. Neither was a good option. However, the inevitable conflict didn’t wait too long to happen.
This time, a pair of players showed up at the same time. The ghoul immediately attacked them. It didn’t know anything about tactics, as was obvious by the way it rushed the warrior in front, and not the healer in the back. It was obvious the ghoul would lose. Maratis sat and pondered.
Option one. Do nothing. The ghoul loses, the players kill Maratis, the quest is failed, and the Children of Light are disappointed. That was a pretty unacceptable option.
Option two. Enter the fray. Possibly get killed by the ghoul, or the warrior, or even the other cleric. Same results.
Option three. Support the ghoul. This wasn’t really a sensible option. Healing the ghoul would just make it worse. However… Maratis quickly scanned through a list of spells. “Blessing of Baldr, Strength be given, Bull’s Strength!”
Normally, a cleric’s buffs would just make undead worse. However, the Bull’s Strength spell, unlike Healing Hand, didn’t mention any holy energy. On the small chance that it wasn’t a mistake, Maratis cast the spell. Sometimes, such gambles pay off.
Bull’s Strength gave an increase of about 30% to the strength statistic. To Maratis, this was an almost irrelevant number. To a ghoul, who had approximately double the strength of the base creature, it was massive. It was immediately obvious that it had worked properly. The ghoul, being fond of frontal attacks, landed a blow on the warrior’s shield, not even trying to avoid hitting it. The warrior’s block was successful… to a point. There was the sound of creaking metal, and a snapping sound as well. His shield bent, his arm was broken, and he flew backwards, into the cleric.
Normally, there was no way such a thing could have occurred. However, this particular ghoul had been not some random monster, but a monk, focused on strength. Their unarmed damage was already significant, but upon becoming a ghoul and gaining increased strength, it was at a level the warrior wasn’t prepared to block. If he had been expecting strength of that level, it may have been deflected, but blocking it head on was useless.
After the warrior went down, the cleric was soon to follow. After that, everything was chaos. More players arrived, and more undead as well. It was a chaotic mess, with Maratis buffing the undead, since that seemed like the least unfriendly side. Members of both sides kept dying, but the undead blocked the entrance to the cave, so Maratis was safe, mostly. As the last undead fell, the final enemy player, a barbarian, stepped through the doorway. It had been so close, but Maratis still appeared to be on the losing side.
The barbarian thought the same, until just before his axe swung down to cleave Maratis in half. Then, there was a strange black shape sticking out of his chest. It looked like a spearhead, but it was formed of darkness. That was weird, shouldn’t that end have been sticking in? The barbarian looked at Maratis’s blood splattered face. Oh, that was it. It went all the way through, of course.
The spear lost its form before the barbarian fell down, and Maratis saw a skeleton in a tree, off in the distance, through the hole in the barbarian’s chest. The skeleton relaxed from its throwing position at the same time the barbarian’s body thumped onto the floor.
Maratis wasn’t entirely sure what to do, but standing there staring seemed to be a good enough idea. Then, there was a voice outside the cave. “Cancel skill!”. Quietus walked into the cave. “Yo, Maratis. How ya doin?”
Quietus’ name was blood red, as no doubt Maratis’ own was. “You’re… a necromancer?”
Quietus looked around guiltily. “What gave you that idea? Of course nooooot… Well, okay, yeah. Would you mind… not telling anybody? That’d be great.”
Maratis’ main response was to let blood drip from face to floor.
End Chapter 60