To me the Necroshade was strange. While granted he looked to the world to be an undead spirit it didn’t have much of the look for it. He looked like he was alive, just ethereal green and floating, no rotting flesh or glint of bones. It was like he had been stuck into the tattered rags that made up his robes and painted green to my eyes.

I looked from him to the abomination next to him, a roided up ghoul standing at almost two and a half meters tall with a vicious pair of teeth, fangs and broken dentin with a forward jutting jaw, giving it a rather pronounced underbite. Instead of armour, the creature was clad in either rags or tightened belts with large buckles on which served as mini shields. I surmise that these serve a dual purpose of giving a little protection and to keep its form stable. I think.

With that done I looked over the armoured and armed ghouls and sighed a little as I turned to look at Morice and saw the exhausted young man propping himself up with his sword, axe in the other as it dangled a little.

I grimaced and walked over to him, handing him the ring that served as my sort of phylactery. “Here, keep this safe.” I said as I summoned back Garm and his pack along with the horses and Svadilfara, who somehow looked extremely annoyed not having been allowed to join in the fight.

“What?” Morice said as he looked at the ring and then up at me with near panicking eyes.

“I need you to hunt down the groups that we saw escape through the other tunnels,” I said pointing towards the tunnels some of the less evolved ghouls had run through when they finally grew too scared to continue fighting us. With another gesture, I ordered two of the archers to mount up after they had used bone forging to create their arrows. An ability I had tried to impart during their creation and hadn’t been sure that it would work.

With little mental searching, it turns out they had a skill named [bone arrow making] so they had gotten an extremely limited version of bone forging. I mused a little on the fact that intent, as well as imagination, played quite a role in creating the undead. I’d have to make sure to remember that in the future.

Morice still looked like he was going to protest when I grabbed his shoulder and squeezed. “You are in no condition to deal with that horde. We also can’t allow the ghouls to make it up to the surface either. Please do this for me, Morice.” I said with a near pleading tone.

“You don’t think you’ll come out of this alive do you?” He asked me and I smiled bitterly at him. “I’ll take care of Akasha for you. It’s the least I can do.” He then said solemnly as he moved to mount up Svadilfari.

“That ring…” I began before taking out a spatial ring and handing it up to Morice as well. “It isn’t a spatial ring so use this to store my minions in it once you’ve finished your hunt. After that please do me a favour and if that first ring glows take it up to the roof of a building and hold it up with the second ring.” I said and watched as realization dawned on Morice’s face as he looked at the ring in his hands.

“Is this a?” He began but my stern gaze shut him up. “I will.” He then left the chamber on the back of Svadilfara, flanked by the mounted archers and Garm and his pack leading them onwards.

I sighed as they left and then turned to look at the Necroshade who had surprisingly been cordial enough to allow for all of this to happen. “Are you sure that was a good idea?” Abhorash asked me as he came up next to me, out of all of us he was the least damaged. I guessed full vampirism like he's had some major physical perks.

“Through all of this, I realized something. I can’t be a teacher or father at this juncture. I’ll be travelling for quite a while with no safe place to actually raise the girl properly. While it might help teach Morice I’m afraid that it wouldn’t be any good for Akasha.” I said a little bitterly.

I would have to abandon the girl in Morice’s care if I wanted her to have any semblance of a normal life. Thankfully I had quite a sum of money from all the gang hideouts I’d raided over the past few days so it should work out well for them.

Abhorash simply snorted a little. “That’s only if you aren’t strong enough. Aren’t we heading over to Veta next? It’s a capital city, I’m sure you can keep them with you at least to that city.” He said with an almost matter of fact air about him.

I looked at him and simply let out a slight ‘huh’ sound as I thought that through. Perhaps I shouldn’t jump to such conclusions right off the bat.

With that, I cleared my throat and pointed my sword at the Necroshade. “Thank you for your patience. Now, will you bend the knee and serve me?” I asked him as I stood in front of my small elite army just as he did with his own. The deep frown that came upon his lips made him look uglier than ever.

“I see you are a necromancer with some talent…” He said as he looked me over and then with a gesture, other ghouls came out of the throng. Each looked like it was halfway between the abomination and the other ghouls. Larger with corded muscle covering their bodies and a horrific glint of intelligence in their eyes.

“I do not have any further wish to see the culmination of my work go up in flames so instead shall we have an honourable contest?” The Necroshade said with an almost smug smirk on his ghostly face.

That was when I noticed that if taking the abomination and the Necroshade into account then the new ghouls that had joined him at his side from the throng matched my own remaining numbers. I smiled just a little but that smile then faltered a little as I realized the Necroshade’s game. While mine didn’t need stamina they were still very battered after the hordes we had fought.

I hadn’t gotten out unscathed and I had a deep cut on my side that even though I had covered it up with my defensive carapace was still leaking blood. I growled at the Necroshade, this crafty fucker.

Thankfully I heard a slight whine coming from one of the piles of ghouls we had managed to rack up. With a look to Abhorash, the vampire knight looked towards the pile and walked over to it. Plunging his arm into the pile he pulled out two barely living ghouls, one having lost a leg and was quickly losing his blood.

I grabbed the one closer to death while Abhorash held the flailing ghoul in his hands and snapped his neck. While we did this the Necroshade simply looked on with morbid curiosity shining in his eyes. I then undid the half mangled helmet my carapace created and sand my teeth into the ghoul’s neck and drunk greedily. A few minutes later Abhorahs did the same.

The Necroshade’s eyes went wide at seeing the two of us in our vampiric act. “You… You shouldn’t exist!” He screamed with disbelief as I tore out the ghoul's neck and spat out what little of its foul blood was left in my mouth.

These things were putrid, I felt like I had just drunk a day-old glass of milk mixed in with liquefied puss. I would wretch if it wasn’t for my body's inherent vampiric nature forcing the blood into me and using it to increase the speed of my healing. It was enough to finish off most of the small cuts and bruises I had gotten from hacking at the Necroshade’s horde but the cut at my side barely closed.

With a growl, I had to force my carapace to dig into my flesh to staple the wound closed as best I could. I let out a loud growl like gasp as I tore the ghoul’s neck out and spat out the blood still on my tongue.

“I need a drink.” Abhorash suddenly said as he spat out some of the blood in his mouth as well. “These things taste horrid.” He said with a disgusted look at the drained dead ghoul in his hands. I couldn’t help but begin to laugh as I dropped the twitching corpse of the ghoul I had drained. I made a mental note to get a cask of some good mead for both myself and Abhorash to drink after this.

A shiver ran down my spine at the thought of having to drain another ghoul and I had to force down the bile that tried to rise from my throat.

“You… You’re a vampire?” The Necroshade said as he then began to look rather introspective. While he did that I decided to try and gather a few souls to infuse into my knight, in the hope it might heal them a little. It worked… sort of.

What it did do was fix a few of the dents on their armours but I realized I’d also need to feed them ingots metal to fix the integrity of their armours, that opened up a new line of experiments to do at a later date.

“So now that you know, will you bend the knee?” I asked with a cocky if not a little sickly grin on my lips.

“Hmm, it does change a few things… I will be your opponent and my greatest creation will be your knights opponent. If I win you die and will be subject to my experiments, If you win I’ll become your… minion.” He said that last one with such disapproving vehemence that I felt a sadistic part of me grin in glee at what I’d make out of the Necroshade.

“Think you can win Abhorash?” I asked as I looked towards him, as the plates of metal came together to form his rather intimidating helm once more.

“I can… but I’ll have to use everything I have.” He said slowly as he observed the abomination ghoul. “I suspect that thing isn’t just what it appears to be.” He then nodded towards the abomination that snarled at him menacingly.

I grit my teeth a little at not knowing my enemies better. I searched through my mind for what I had heard of the Necroshade. The talented necromancer who almost brought this city to its knees. Specializing in flesh crafting to create towering monstrosities and unusual zombies. As well as a powerful spell caster but he had been beaten by a paladin stationed at the church in Bedelev. So perhaps melee isn’t his strong suit.

I looked over at Abhorash and spoke so only he could hear. “I suspect the creature has some tricks up its sleeves, don’t take anything it does lightly and go all out.” He nodded to me and moved a few steps forwards.

“So shall this be one on one and one at a time or?” I asked, putting a cocky grin on my face but still feeling ill in the pit of my stomach. Ghoul blood was now forever off the menu for me, another shudder ran through my entire body at the thought of ever consuming more. I was also rather annoyed that a ghoul of all things had been the first thing I fed on.

“No, not… quite.” The Necroshade said before exploding into motion. With a flick of his hand both me and Abhorash felt our bodies stiffen as my knights were thrown backwards. Then as a shimmering glow surrounded myself, Abhorash, the abomination and the Necroshade in a circular arena the other ghouls rushed past and towards my knights who were rising to their feet.

“You bastard.” I growled as I unintentionally activated one of my new vision modes and I was a little surprised. I saw the veins on the abomination, pulse with violet light which led me to believe it was corrupted beyond any hope of consumption, not that I’d want to. Though what surprised me was that the Necroshade himself had veins of soft glowing blue run though him, magic perhaps?

Before I could dwell on it too much the stiffening of my muscles to immobility vanished and I almost stumbled forwards a step or two. Then the Abomination was on me and with a contemptuous backhand, it sent me flying back into the wall.

When my back hit the glowing wall I felt the blow push almost all the air out of my lungs and a sharp pain in my back prevented me from drawing in another breath. The Necroshade hadn’t been idle either as he sent a green bolt of electricity into me and I screamed with what little air I had left in my lungs.

Then I realized my mistake. His magic didn’t target the body but the soul. If I died at his hands, I’d die for real. No respawn, no vengeance, no nothing not any more.

I grew enraged. I snarled like an animal as I picked myself up off the ground and stared nukes at the Necroshade. I poured all my hate, indignation and fury into my gaze and that seemed to cause the spirit to pause. I sprang forth, eating up the almost twenty meters between us in two seconds and bringing my sword down in a diagonal overhead strike.

The blade went through the shade as if through thin water and created a deep cut into the ground beneath the shade. The shade looked a little shocked at the speed I had managed but I knew a certain Jamaican sprinter was slightly faster.

Seeing however that even though my sword had a soulstone infused into its pommel it didn’t give it any ability to affect the shade. Leaving it in the ground I wreathed myself in ethereal fire and readied myself to punch out into the shade’s stomach, only to hit a bubble of hardened air right as I struck.

The shade hadn’t let his momentary surprise stop him and had already managed to put up a shield around him. Another bolt of electricity was sent my way and though I managed to jump to the side it still hit me. Sending me spinning in the air as I was hurled to the side.

I bounced off the stone floor twice and hit the arena wall that the shade had created. I spat up blood as I shakily got to my feet, all this electricity was fucking with my nerves, it was an effort of will just to move as I wished. Before I had steadied myself the shade was before me and with a punch to my gut, he forced me into the wall.

I felt it then, the contents of my stomach came flooding up and the stomach acids burned my throat as it all spewed out.

Much of it simply went through the shade but some seemed to almost do so in slow motion. The Necroshade, of course, recoiled in disgust as the half-digested and putrid blood of his ghoul had been thrown upon him. I felt my vision grow blurry for a second before I shook my head to clear it. Only to be backhanded hard enough to dislocate my jaw through my carapace as I was tossed to the right of the Necroshade from his blow.

I lay there, dazed, confused and feeling like the crumpled up paper of a perfectionist artist, tossed to the side to be discarded later. The Necroshade’s screams of disgust as he tried to get the few globs of vomited blood to leave his ethereal body made me smile a little.

I knew however that I had very little in my repertoire to deal with ghostly enemies if any at all. I’d lose if something didn’t change and judging by the visceral cursing coming from the shade, my end would be slow and painful, never to rise again.

I had to think! I slowly pushed myself up, my muscles were burning in protest after the abuse they had just suffered and the fatigue from fighting the hordes. I had to do something, something to get out of all of this. Something to win.

I looked over to Abhorash and saw he wasn’t doing so hot either. The abomination had both of his writs in its hands and both seemed equal in strength though the slight movements of Abhorash’s arms told me he was just slightly stronger. That in itself would be fine if the abomination hadn’t just opened up its ribcage and used its own intestines as tongues had wrapped some around Abhorash’s neck, waist and chest. It was trying to draw him in closer so it’s open maw of a rib cage could take a bite out of the armoured knight. He was in as much a mess as I was, his greatsword embedded in the ground just behind him.

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Seeing my own sword just a scant ten meters away from me I grit my teeth and forced my rebelling muscles to obey as I dashed on all fours almost to the sword. As my fingers curled around the hilt I felt the chill as the Necroshade’s hand plunged into my back and grabbed my spine.

“Where do you think you are going? I haven’t paid you back for that.” The Necroshade spat, his form no longer looking as human as it had. Half his face seemed to have sloughed off and the eye on the other side was dangling out of its socket as he stared at me with fury.

I activated the death squire ethereal armour ability out of desperation and the shade hissed as his hand came away slightly smoking from my body. I stumbled after the fingers left my back and gasped, the chill of his touch was like my blood had frozen inside my very veins. With a pained groan, I threw the sword over to Abhorash, missing and hitting the open rib cage of the abomination instead.

It was enough to allow Abhorash to free his right hand and with that hand, he grabbed the hilt and began to stab and carve into the abomination to get himself free.

I on the other hand was flung to the side as a mass of green fire hit my side and pinned me against the magical walls once more. This time it pressed against me while burning me at the same time. I let out a scream of agony as I felt the flames burn not only my flesh but my soul as well. I was brought back to the moment I was betrayed, the sheer agony of the sword plunged into my back was worse but not by much. It all came flooding back, those few moments of life and then unlife as an unravelling soul before I was saved.

The feeling of being helpless, at the mercy of a creature with no love or shred of compassion for me and the blend of this soul-wrenching agony broke something I had thought I hadn’t carried fully with me into my rebirth. The madness I had felt build-up through three and a half years of warfare and the last dose my betrayal had caused began to bubble up from that dark corner of my mind I had sentenced it to stay in. I grew utterly enraged and I let it all out loosing myself for a few moments.

With a howl that held my fury, pain and the madness I had unleashed, I let out all of my meagre mana stores in the bellow. Forcing it into my own throat to expel a blast of sound. The change in mana managed to disrupt the spell enough to cancel it but the rest of the fire had still taken hold. With my ethereal armour still active it showed green flames licking at my body along with the blue ones.

I stared at the Necroshade and bellowed again as I charged him, claws extended and trailing fire in my wake. Darting into his guard and slashing in an uppercut at him.

The spell he was casting was luckily disrupted but my claws seemed to do the equivalent of a paper cut of damage to the apparition. With another growl, I continued to hack and slash at the shade, if one slash wasn’t enough then a thousand would do. Every time one slash hit the shade another was ready to be delivered from the other hand. I was near senseless as I just let everything that had happened to me finally pour over me, working out the feelings I had bottled up inside myself. I couldn’t die, not before I had ripped Amelia’s head off and placed it on a pike before the gates of her castle. If I got another chance to meet Ragnar’s and Sigrun’s children again I’d kill them, raise them and have them eat their parents while they still lived.

Mario, I’d burn alive and then force his soul into a lantern to burn there for eternity. Simon, I’d leave for last, I’d let him see me violate Aona before killing his goddess before his very eyes only to then be raised as some ravenous undead to devour the priest who worshipped her in turn.

With thoughts of such acts and worse running through my mind I slashed and clawed at the shade, feeling like that if I let up for even a second he’d gain the advantage. He was now almost crouched on the floor as I ripped into him before a fleshy tube suddenly wrapped around my neck and pulled me back. The snap pushed my mind into focus once more and I pushed what had been let loose back down.

The abomination had somehow managed to push Abhorash far enough away from it that it could help its master. One of its intestines was wrapped around my neck as it pulled me in towards its maw of a rib cage.

I now could understand why Abhorash had barely been able to overpower the thing. It had muscles on its intestines, the small fibres interlaced with the fleshy tube to make it prehensile. Another of the fleshy tubes wrapped around the arm I had raised up to strike the Necroshade and the third wrapped around my waist.

Using my claws on the tubes seemed to make it cry out in pain but in turn, they tightened their grip. Soon my airways had been closed from the crushing force of it’s squeezing tubes around my neck. No matter how much I tried to draw in breath my lungs wouldn’t work properly with my airway closed the way it was and my lungs began to burn with need and effort for air.

The shade stood and looked at me with predatory glee as he began to cast a spell which looked to be composed of white energy intermixed with both blue and green ethereal energies. With my eyes wide I watched as the spell grew complete in the shades hands and took on aspects of fire and water with how it flowed around his hands.

Right as he fired at me I felt a heavyweight slam into my side and the intestines around my limbs slackened. Abhorash had managed to tackle me out of the way of the spell while also severing the intestines holding on to me with both his own and my own sword in his hands. What remained was burned by the shade’s spell.

The shriek of agony that came out of the abominations open throat sent the same shiver down my spine as nails on a chalkboard. Enveloped in the flowing fire of white, blue and green, it’s flesh melting as if from heat yet not burning in the slightest. Its shrieks of agony stopped as it curled up into a ball and the shade dismissed the spell and looked at me with anger.

“You rat! Your knight won’t save you this time!” He called as he raised his hands up into the air and began to weave them in gestures. I thought I saw strands that looked like all the souls that hadn’t been absorbed by either mine or Abhorash’s swords as well as our soulstones that were out in the open. Sufficed to say it was quite a lot we hadn’t managed to get given the flow of souls I now saw forming a maelstrom with the Necroshade in its centre.

I was exhausted and badly beaten. Abhorash didn’t look much better though he wasn’t breathing as hard as I was, which made me want to fully activate my vampiric nature all the more. I was tired of being tired.

Both of us looked up at the sheer power the Necroshade was summoning up before at one another. “Got any ideas?” I asked almost dejectedly, everything I had thrown at the Necroshade had just pissed the ghost off after all.

Abhorash stood and with a growl, he activated one of his new vampiric abilities, along with the blue ethereal fires of his death squire skill another soft red glow began to emanate from the edges of his armour. “Yeah we switch opponents.” He said before charging the Necroshade.

I could have slapped my own face as I remembered he had so much more magical resistance than I ever could achieve. Not only that but death and necromantic spells would only have a positive effect on him.

With a smirk I also noticed he had left me my own sword laying next to me. Picking it up I looked at the abomination as it slowly came out of its fetal position. The bits of intestines flapping around as it snapped its rib cage shut and bone plates around its forearms and legs began to take shape. I almost sighed from annoyance, wondering just how much work and how many abilities the Necroshade had poured into the thing.

Don’t get we wrong I saw quite the potential in this creation, just didn’t want to fight it was all.

With a slight turn of my head I cracked my neck and then as fast as ever I grabbed my sword and dashed towards it. My swords tip trailing a little behind on the stone floor as I brought it into a hard diagonal uppercut slash. The bone plates held onto the sword as it impacted with the abominations raised forearms, I could swear everything on this thing was a mouth as I saw the bones take on the form of teeth biting down on my sword.

I snarled and stabbed my claws deep into its abdomen and ripped out to get some of its intestines. It worked, kinda, as I managed to throw away a good chunk of intestines but the opening I made allowed a few loops of the stuff wrap around my own midsection.

As the abomination raised its arms up while its intestines pushed down to get my sword out of my hands I was reminded when I fought the man that later became Abhorash. It had been my superior speed and agility that had allowed me to win over the brute. I let go of the sword and with my claws, I ripped apart the intestines around my midsection and arms and jumped back from the creature.

The creature roared at me and its skin began to turn from the fleshy red of exposed muscles to an off white of growing bone as it gained its own version of my defensive carapace, just bone instead of whatever it was around my own body. “You’ve got to be joking.” I muttered in annoyance as it roared again and ran towards me.

The idea of me being on train tracks with a locomotive barreling down the track towards me came to mind and I jumped up into the air. I leapfrogged over the creature as it had it’s head facing forwards and leaning forwards as it ran, like a charging bull.

I left four deep cuts down both of its shoulders with my claws but I just managed to get through the bone by maybe a millimetre as I vaulted over it. As I landed I tried to turn quickly to slash at its tendons but it had already taken enough steps to prevent me from reaching. It, however, had enough reach with its oddly lengthened arms to backhand me in a hard uppercut that made me fall back onto my rear.

There’s a joke about pimp hands being strong with it that I could make but I was too dizzy to even make it. What I did have in my mind was a rather hard hatred for being backhanded so often in such a short time. My mind was rattled and what wall I had managed to erect for protection cracked.

I was about to stand and charge the abomination but as my vision finally stopped spinning, it was standing above me. Before I could react it grabbed my arms at the biceps and its chest began to open. The ribs served as sharp fangs as it lowered itself down and tried to take a bite out of my side. I screamed as I felt the fangs sink into the flesh on my right side, just a bit above where my kidney would be.

The scent of blood permeated the air as I heard its maw’s wet chewing and suckling like sounds. A terror began to well up inside my mind. Was I actually going to be eaten alive? As another crunch came to my ears as the abomination took a bite of my lower ribcage, breaking a few bones in the process, I realized something. Despite not knowing the price, I could come back to life. So shouldn’t I fight like that?

My doubts and fears held me back, I needed to discard them if I was to succeed in my aim, that and getting this thing off of me!

I roared as I managed to get one hand free by making the defensive carapace do the exact same thing it was doing to me. As I forced my mind to focus on my carapace to form a spiked version with jagged teeth and claws jutting out at any angle. Focusing on making the spikes aim at the creatures chest maw the growth of my carapace forced the maw off of my side. The bites had left cracks spidering out from the puncture holes that formed the bite marks on my side.

The creature raised its chest back up and let out a roar, a few of the spikes and teeth still inside its maw. Only to then feel my claws ram into the side of its face and rip it’s jaw off. It gargled in pain as it backed away from me, it’s tongue hanging freely from the ruin of its mouth.

Another blow came crashing into my shoulder as it charged me, racking its own claws down my carapace and cutting into my flesh. I, in turn, grabbed and ripped a chunk out of its thigh as revenge. Another exchange left my left shoulder almost dislocated from a heavy hammer blow down upon it while the creature sported a deep gash along its chest after a nasty claw attack from myself.

However I felt it, my strength seeping out from my wounds as I struggled to get a good enough angle on the creature to kill it. Blood covered both myself and the creature as we stood four steps away from one another, panting and staring at one another.

Taking a chance I looked to the side to see Abhorash with his armour cracked, scorched and ripped in places. While it did cover most of his body the damage made me wonder why it hadn’t fallen off already. However, despite his high resistance to spells, he shouldn’t have a skill or ability to actually damage the Necroshade.

Then I thought I realized his plan, he could wear down the Necroshade’s mana reserves therefore denying him his strongest avenue of attack. While if he faced the creature it was like facing off against an amalgamation as strong as himself but with small abilities that could slow him down too much to be able to win or even manoeuvrer properly.

He could whittle the creature down but instead, he went for the shade because I didn’t have Abhorash’s defences against magic when facing the Necroshade. I smiled a little at that, Abhorash was a good warrior and even though he might not be considered as such he was a good man too. Well, that’s how I felt at least.

The creature, taking advantage of my distraction, slammed it’s left forearm into my stomach and sent me stumbling back a few long steps. I glared at the abomination and then at my sword, still grabbed in the teeth on the creature's right forearm. Taking a chance I forced the ethereal armour around me to condense around my carapace. Doing so drained my mana at a prodigious rate but what little I had in the tank was enough for just a few seconds.

Charging forward I showed my claws and the creature took the bait, moving its arms up to defend. Taking a step to the side I slid the blade out of its arm and managed to get behind it. Growling it spun around with its chest open to take a bite out of me before it got my sword up into its skull, through the roof of its mouth and into its brain. Its arms came together on both sides of my head and my mind went blank.

I fell back as the creature slumped down onto its knees. My bell was utterly rung and my wounds mounted to make me so weak. With sheer force of will, I kept myself awake, coughing and writhing in pain as I turned over to look out of the wall the shade had conjured. My knights fought valiantly but I could see they would lose, I had already lost three of them. My own shades fighting and ripping through the Ghoul forces and not being able to be harmed in turn but it wasn’t fast enough to save my knights. We had to deal with the Necroshade or I’d have nothing left to salvage from this ill-advised disaster. The only problem with that was how weak I felt.

My arms were shaking and I felt the part of my mind I had unbottled crawling under my own skull, like millions of centipedes were crawling along my brain. Tearing and biting at my self-control and even sense of self, trying to burrow back in and be faced. I was on all fours straining not only to stay up but to even keep any of my senses alive, my vision blurred in and out. Everything I heard seemed oddly muddled like it was underwater. I raised my eyes to see one of my knights fall before the ghoul horde just outside the magic barrier the Shade had raised.

They fought tooth and nail, one of the spear users was using the piled-up corpses on his spear like a large mace, batting away swaths of the creatures. Then he became overwhelmed as one managed to get inside his guard and jammed a sharp bone into his left knee causing it to buckle. Then they came in swarming with makeshift hatchets of bone and stone, hacking, ripping and chopping. Soon I saw them throw one armoured leg up into the air before a hand-shaped into a spear came through another's head. The knight fought till the bitter end until he was ripped utterly apart by the ghouls around him.

Another dual-wielded axes and with each hack of his axes, he pushed the ghoulish horde back. Using his footwork and swings to make them back off before he dove in to claim yet another life then dart back with a wide swing of his axe to get them to back off. Same with two sword wielders. One with the arming sword and shield and the other with a longsword and heater shield.

The two fought back to back, covering one another’s backs and sides as they hacked up a pile of corpses around the mound they already stood upon.

My knights were islands in a sea of ravenous ghouls. Ghouls that were growing more frustrated and angry and as a result more bestial by the things hurting them without giving them any meat to feast upon once beaten. Three were with their backs against the wall.

One with a Lochaber great axe that he created an arch of death before him, the second on the other side with a halberd that left no corpse intact. Then in the middle stood the last of the spear wielders, ironically the one with the vengeful prick spear style and he was giving that style it’s namesake.

He dashed in and with quick thrusts pierced the foot of most of the ghouls arrayed before him. When they brought their makeshift shields down he took an eye there and an ear there if he didn’t outright kill with the secondary strikes. Then taking another step back he aimed his spear to fend off any ghoul that attempted to advance upon him. He moved fast and tried his best to help cover the other two on either side of him.

Another fast one was the Dual Messer using knight, jumping around and decapitating ghouls left and right, like some mad dancer of war. Then right as he was flipping over one ghoul another stabbed out with its spear tripping him into a waiting, angry group of ghouls.

The first and only sight I saw of the great sword was a raised sword coming down into a pile of ghouls before one jumped over and into the pile, the sounds of metal ripping was enough to know what had happened.

Barrelling through another group came to the knight with a heavy axe and tower shield. The ghoul on his backstabbing down into a hole in the metal spelt his demise soon after. I saw the mangled armour of one with a battle-axe still clutched in its gauntlet even though it was a few meters away from the torso.

Two more axe and shield wielders had the same idea as the sword and board knights but their styles weren’t as complimentary as the other two so they soon became overwhelmed and torn apart.

The last was the one with the bladed mace and heater shield, he stood as an island by himself, much like the dual axe wielder but unlike him, he stood in a sea of ghouls. His heater shield as much a weapon as his bladed mace, if he wasn’t undead he’d have been consumed long ago.

A part of me felt the waste of time and effort with the fall of my knights. The last two archers that hadn’t left with Morice had died almost as soon as battle was joined with this horde. My knights had been the only things actually capable of taking a few hits after the other hordes had been defeated.

I only had seven left, I needed to save what I could of my forces. I had to win. If I could just win then I might not only salvage my last knights and Abhorash but I knew we’d come out of this stronger than ever. My eyes moved to the slumped over corpse of the abomination. A twitch made me look over it again and I realized this thing was still alive. I had just lobotomized the thing in some twisted stroke of luck. I cringed as I realized I needed a second wind and what I’d have to do to get it.

With a sickening feeling in my stomach, I began to crawl towards the abominations corpse. The crawling sensation of what I had suppressed gnawing at my mind. Right as I was leaning over the abomination I looked over and saw Abhorash looking at me. I smiled and then everything went black.