"Change of plan," Mason said, glancing towards the scream. "Everyone but Seamus and Becky on the ground. Roam and find tunnels, deal with anything coming out. If you're getting overwhelmed, fall back to Seamus on the temple."

King Aixa was yelling orders at his men. Mason heard him calling for the flyers to get to the skies, for the 'Great Guard' to fall back to the city. After he'd issued several commands he turned back to Mason.

"I can't abandon the gate. But I'll send my best to help in the city." He shrugged, clearly rattled by the surprise, and angry at himself. "Is there anything else you suggest we do? Anything else we prepare for?"

Mason shook his head. "We have to stop the tunnelers. But you're right, sooner or later, maybe with enough chaos, they're going to launch an attack at the wall. So we stop the chaos. We move and kill quickly. Hopefully we're ready when it comes."

The king nodded. "I'll go with my warriors." He handed Mason a small, silver horn. "If you need me, call with this. I will hear it."

Mason took the horn.

[Temporary item gained: Horn of the Nephalai king. Can be attuned to one individual at a time, who will hear its call when sounded from anywhere in the world.]

Well. That was incredibly useful. Mason hoped the game let him keep it when everything was over.

If they weren't all dead, of course.

But he blocked that line of thinking and buried it deep. They were going to succeed, and if they didn't, there really wasn't any point in worrying. Because you didn't get second chances in this game.

Mason nodded to Seamus and Becky, who started up the hundreds of stairs to the top of the temple. Becky gave a look back, and Mason did his best to give her a comforting smile. Then he turned to the others.

"Stick with Phuong, Alex. Do what you can. If you can't find anything for awhile just come back to the temple. Any questions?"

"See you shortly, Patron," Phuong said with a nod, and Mason clapped his arm.

"You good on your own, Carl? I can give you Streak."

"No need. The lone assassin works best, er, alone. Shit I didn't really think that through before I said it out loud. The lone killer works best in...fuck I don't know. I should really work on some one liners."

Mason shook his head. "You're surprisingly chipper for a man with hardly any defences, a pregnant woman at home, heading into a giant battle."

"And you're the worst inspirational speaker ever," Carl said.

Mason grinned, then he was gone—running with Streak at his side, elven bow in hand, straight towards the sounds of the screams.

It didn't take long to find what he was expecting. And it was definitely one of those times he really wished his paranoia was wrong.

Rotting corpses were climbing out of the ground.

Mason wasn't sure if it was some kind of animating graveyard or if the attackers were coming out of tunnels, but it didn't make much difference for the moment. He loosed a Power Shot, and his first target literally exploded.

Rotting flesh sprayed everywhere as the thing's chest burst apart. Mason stopped and kept loosing, gritting his teeth in annoyance when he realized this city didn't count as 'natural' ground.

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He was using mana on arrows, and he'd be slower and generally just worse at everything. Not an ideal situation for possibly the biggest fight so far.

He kept putting arrows into the heads of walking corpses, mind wandering to the jungle and some kind of running battle on his own.

But that probably wasn't wise. He had allies and a city to defend. He was reminded how much of a weakness it was having ground you couldn't afford to give up. Better to stay mobile, to stay alert and ready to move, to choose when and where.

But they couldn't choose anything now. A foe who hated them and probably all living things was in control, and God knew how many steps ahead of them. As more and more of the corpses rose from the earth, or picked themselves up with arrows stuck halfway into their skulls, Mason felt a creeping sense of doom.

What could the living do against such creatures? How could you kill something that was already dead? And what was the point of life anyway when it always ended in death?

He shook his head and watched Apex Predator flare.

[Dracolich mind effect: Blanket Fear: resisted.]

Mason grit his teeth and glanced at the sky. The son of a bitch had gotten smarter, that was for sure. The damage of dropping bombs on a city was pretty good, but it would never give you a victory. Filling the defenders with terror was a hell of a lot more effective.

He saw the city’s citizens running as if they had somewhere to escape through the streets. He saw men abandoning their wives and children to run. He saw others simply curl up on the ground and weep.

With a growl he vanished his bow and pulled his Claws. The arrows were working well enough, but without Power Shot he had to hit them in the head to kill them. He suspected Claws were going to work rather better.

"Watch yourself," he said to a growling Streak. "We might have to resist some kind of zombie rot. So for once, for me, could you at least occasionally try to actually dodge an attack?"

Streak glanced at him and gave what probably counted as the wolf version of a shrug.

"Thank you," Mason said. "That's all I ask. You take those ones still getting up on the right. I'll work my way around."

Streak growled and charged, loping across the ground with his tongue out, somewhere between terrifying giant war-wolf, and the bestest good boy.

Mason started cutting off limbs and heads. The zombie-like creatures came apart to his swords like their bones were soft, their flesh half liquid. They were slow, too, far too slow to really have a chance of grabbing him. Though they certainly tried.

Mason moved through the 'graveyard', then the surrounding streets, cutting down everything until he'd isolated the main focal point of the creature's entrance. Streak had sorted out his zombies and came to help dig.

In less than a minute they'd dug down to find some kind of mass burial, with a hundred graves lined up in perfect uniformity.

Mason didn't have the time to figure out what the hell he was looking at, but at least it wasn't tunnels. It definitely wasn't a graveyard because it had been placed basically in the middle of a street, and slightly under a few buildings. Did it mean betrayal? Sabotage? Some kind of local necromancer? A serial killer?

There just wasn't time to figure it out. Mason heard more sounds of fighting, more screams, more death.

He turned and ran another block over until he found hunched, huge-clawed creatures chasing citizens. Mason banished his sword and re-summoned his bow, leading his first target with a perfect shot that skewered its neck and took it down.

He launched Power Shot and Crippling Strike on cooldown, slowly walking the street as he loosed arrow after arrow into the strange, growling creatures. Streak soon got impatient and ran ahead, growling to announce himself and sending the smaller creatures into a screeching panic as they fled.

It didn't take long to clear them, though most escaped down other streets or into alleyways. The sounds of fighting and dying were increasing and coming from multiple directions now.

Mason saw birdmen swooping from the sky, at least, dropping down a dozen at a time to take on whatever enemies they found. Mason was about to ask himself where and what the hell the 'great guard' were before he heard thumping steps coming from the east. He turned and grinned when he saw them.

A good thirty armored 'ape' men were coming in loose formation, huge clubs and what looked like picks and hammers resting on their shoulders. King Aixa, it seemed, had taken Mason's advice to heart.

When they saw violence the creatures started showing their teeth and even thumping their chests. A few broke away from the main pack, running with two legs and one arm at rather incredible speed as they charged into the undead without a moment's pause or hesitation.

They smashed and knocked their enemies flying, soon obliterating zombies and the occasional skeleton with deadly efficiency.

If the enemy army didn't attack that gate, Mason expected the floating city was going to deal with this little surprise in record time.

He hoped Phuong and Alex were doing well, and he hoped Seamus and Becky were bored. But for now he had things to do, and turned his attention to his own killing.

'Phase one' of the battle, at least, seemed well in hand. He didn't look forward to phase two.