by Elian Tars
“They have,” Tayon nodded. “Just a couple of days ago the baron of Trikuni sent his troops to the south, but was defeated by Count De Lier. The conventional borders are pretty well guarded, my dear client. And there are two reasons for this. Firstly, if everyone gushes into the inland of the kingdom, there will be hunger and disturbances. And secondly,” he clicked his tongue, “secondly, it’s well-known that after consuming the settlement, the Decay stops spreading for a while. Do you understand? They need sacrifices to buy some time.”
“Ugh!” Mara spat near her feet with disdain. “And what will change in a year? Will the king get a limitless stock of Glozeysk Crystals?”
“The stock will definitely get bigger, my dear Highest Wight,” the caravaneer smiled. “And maybe it will even help the kingdom last longer.”
For a few seconds we were silent, watching the cheerful children that had gathered near the merchant’s wagons. I recalled my talk with Shawn. Most of the villagers were an amorphous crowd. It was easier for them to stay in their homeland and die there than decide to adventurously run into the unknown. That’s why there would always be food for the Decay behind the conventional border drawn by the king of Longoria.
“Still I don’t understand,” Mara spoke, “they don’t let the barons go to these… Heh… Safe lands?”
“They could take them and their knights in,” Tayon replied. “But their position wouldn’t be so high anymore. Of course, some will agree to this life, but some will stay in their ancestral lands to die with honor.”
“There’s only one thing about your story that I don’t understand,” Kane, who had been silent during our whole conversation, suddenly said. “Why are you telling this?”
Tayon chuckled and shrugged.
Chapter 24
Staying Focused
“…external manifestation of the Decay can be different, depending on the region, but its essence is always the same…” It took me about twenty minutes to read the Glozeysk Treatise about the History of Decay. It was a very educational piece of literature. According to it, the Decay appeared a thousand years ago in different parts of the world simultaneously and began consuming everything alive. Gods managed to isolate the contamination and the Decay didn’t spread for a long time. However, four hundred years ago it started growing again. And this time nobody could stop it.
The Treatise dated from last year. The authors claimed that “at the moment of writing the world is 30% consumed by the Decay.”
Yes, the disease had consumed counties, duchies and even whole kingdoms before. But it took tens of years. Now everything was happening much faster.
I breathed out thoughtfully, finished eating the soup that Shawn’s wife had made for me — Shawn had made her responsible for my meals; someone else was assigned to cook for Kane — drank some tea and went outside.
I headed to the eastern gates; the merchants were getting ready to leave.
“Have you been here this entire time?” I asked Mara who, together Kane, was watching the guests load their goods into the wagons. There were as many villagers as there were the morning, but now they were just watching, standing a bit further away. They had bought everything they could long ago.
“Well, it’s not every day that you can see something like this,” she chuckled. “You what, Daerk, your merchant friend is quite a rude fellow. If you only knew how many times he offered Kane to sell him the secret of creating Wights… He calmed down only when Kane hit him in the face. Though, his guards jumped out of the wagons at once, but to your friend’s credit, he didn’t hold a grudge against us. He even apologized, wiping the blood that was running out of his nose.”
Having chuckled, I looked at the necromancer. He stood pretending that Mara’s words didn’t relate to him in any way.
“By the way,” Mara prodded her elbow in my ribs, “your crazy girlfriend… Rira? You know? The princess saved by the knight of Darkness? Well, she bought a phial from them. Be careful that she doesn’t charm you with a love potion or something. Otherwise, you’ll wake up being unable to think about anything else but her. Then you’ll have to live being in love with her like a silly dummy for the rest of your life.”
“Mara, enough,” Kane sighed tiredly. “A lot of women bought phials here today; even you bought a crème with pig fat, though I don’t understand why you need it. My powers maintain your beauty anyway.”
The zombie opened her mouth and a wave of indignation poured out of it. Leaving the lovers to their tiffs, I went to say goodbye to Tayon.
“Good luck on the road. Where are you heading now? Are you leaving these parts?”
“Why would we?” the caravaneer chuckled. “We’ll go to Lenant and then return here. I like the frontier; it’s full of people willing to part with their gold to increase their chances of survival. Of course, there are enough rich men in peaceful places, too, who spend a fortune on themselves, but they are boring.” He fell silent and then added: “And they’re already somebody’s clients. It’s difficult to deal with such persons for a travelling peddler like me.”
We exchanged a couple more words, and the caravan hit the road.
“Senior Disciple,” I winced at the languid voice behind my back. “Senior Disciple, would you like to join me at dinner today? I bought some spices and I’m going to make a rabbit stew. I would be really grateful if you would keep me company.”
“I’m sorry, Rira,” I said, glancing at the girl over my shoulder. “I’m busy. I can’t today.”
“And tomorrow?” she asked readily.
“Tomorrow, too.”
“And the day after…”
“Rira,” I said strictly. “I’ve already told you. Serving the God of Darkness and saving the people of Ilyenta comes first. I don’t have time for anything else.”
She muttered something and hung her head. Mara chuckled in the distance.
The rest of the day we spent training, and had the first people who reached level 15. They began to study their interfaces enthusiastically and share impressions with their friends. Others got jealous and began beating each other with even more frenzy than before to get the desired experience faster.
Of course, Shawn was one of the lucky ones. Using the villager’s as an example, I spent some time figuring out how their system worked. As a result, I came to a conclusion that stat points were spent automatically up to level 14, and skill points — up to level 10. After reaching level 15, the chief had one stat point, three skill points, one personality point, and three everyday points. As for the learnt skills, Shawn had, again without even knowing it, Power Strike for an axe, Swinging Blow, and Path of Strength; all of the skills were level 2.
Of the “Darkness skills” Shawn got only passive ones: Eyes in the Dark and Dark Side of the World. As the main enemies of the villagers were the Decayed, they didn’t need anything else aside from that for now.
“Upgrade Dark Side of the World to level 2, and the God of Darkness will increase your resistance to the Effect of Decay,” I ordered the chief. “Unlock Eyes in the Dark, too; our Patron will give you the ability to see in the dark better. What’s next…? Hmm… Well, as soon as you are appointed chief, spend your personality points on Leadership. Leave the everyday points unspent for now. I’ll find a better use for them.”
“Yes, Senior Disciple. Thank you,” Shawn bowed.
I left before the others to fill the vessels with the water from the Lake of Grace. Getting back home, I got busy with alchemy. A simple process soon ended with success.
I slumped onto the bed. At Shawn’s insistence, the villagers had supper together. It helped to bring them together and, at the same time, motivated them to work on self-improvement. Yesterday, the group that had trained spoke excitedly about their success, and those who worked in the fields listened to them with envy. Today, they had swapped places.
After the talk with Tayon, I wondered again if there was a point for the villagers to work in the fields. Maybe they should all be training? Well, gro
wing food the traditional way was a long process and the Decay could spoil the crops at any moment.
The Lake of Grace wouldn’t let the villagers die from hunger. Though the area where its effect worked wasn’t very big, it compensated for that by needing only twenty-four hours to turn a singular potato into a full-grown potato plant. Planting it daily, we could not only feed the village, but even have a surplus.
But if, for some reason, we get more people, things won’t be as lovely.
And, unfortunately, there were a lot of sluggish people among the villagers. Their desire to train was awoken by the horror they felt the night they were attacked by the Decayed.
However, those horrors would soon be forgotten… Though I wanted to have peaceful days, they might have a bad impact on the flock. A lot of the people would like to return to their daily routine.
So maybe I should do the same, instead of staying at one place. In fact, I should continue looking for parts of the Zurtarn. It would also be great to find out what the Cradle of Gods was needed for. And, of course, I should also figure out who was destroying my resurrection points.
Perhaps, I should… But the Old Man hadn’t contacted me, which meant that my Patron was satisfied with what I was doing right now. It would be stupid to try to simultaneously deal with all of my problems. I had started restoring the energy source and building defenses to protect it; I had to finish what I had started. Though I didn’t see the whole picture, I understood the importance of Ilyenta for the Old Man and all of his Disciples and his Gleam.
If that’s all, I should get up and go eat.
***
There were no incidents during the dinner. Some of the villagers were boasting about their achievements, the others, the “losers”, often those who were defeated at the very beginning, promised to “settle scores” next time though we all knew that the difference in level and skill would hardly let them do it. It looked like the time had come to divide the people into leagues in accordance with their strength, like in sports.
Rira’s pestering became a daily routine. I brushed her off twice during the evening, which amused Mara as usual. Having finished the meal, I decided to leave the villagers and, like yesterday, go into the woods; I needed to get more lives for the Altar.
Maybe I should prepare a test for the villagers? Scare them a bit just to make sure that they don’t grow lazy and stop training.
“Co…me… Ba...ck..,” uttered “Bat No. 2” with an effort. It caught up to me when I was about two hundred yards away from the village.
I nodded, turned around and ran back as fast as I could.
“Those who can’t fight, hide in the temple! Don’t huddle up, dammit!” Shawn commanded, standing on one of the tables that were outside.
“Greiv!” I bumped into the red-bearded man. “Have you seen Kane?”
“The Disciple and Mara went there,” the man waved in the direction of the north-western border of the village. “Golin and Dor led the people after them. Kerr and I will go soon, too,” he nodded at the sturdy, fair-haired guy. The four of them still stood out from the other villagers. They had also reached level 15 today, and it looked like they turned into war commanders somehow. Should I propose to them to upgrade their Leadership, too? Heh, and I had nothing, but Gloominess. What if the “leaders” gathered and rebelled?
Silly thoughts popped into my head.
“Kane, what happened?” I shouted, drawing attention. Some of the armed villagers sighed with relief and smiled; the presence of the Senior Disciple gave them confidence.
“The Decayed,” the necromancer replied briefly. “More than the last time.”
“Can we defeat them?”
“We wouldn’t have been able before,” he said, glancing over the silent forces, then added, “but now we should.”
“Right,” I said, following his gaze. “The Decayed won’t be able to cope with such a number of Followers of the God of Darkness! Together, we’ll destroy the beasts! We’ll make the spawn of Decay regret coming to us!” I shouted at the top of my voice.
“Yes! Let’s tear them apart!!!” shouted Golin, the man with the pock-marked face, beating his chest.
“Everything’s going to be different this time,” Dor added in a grim voice and frowned, looking in the direction of the forest. His burnt face looked solemn.
“Yeah! The God of Darkness is with us!” the people cried.
“The Disciples are with us!”
“Dear Mara is with us,” somebody said in an uncertain voice. I started looking around, wanting to see who had such a specific taste, but Kane’s low whisper made me get everything else out of my head.
“I lied. There are too many creatures. Most likely, the village is doomed. Unless you have more trump cards up your sleeve.”
Glancing askance at the necromancer, I frowned in thought. It was smart of him not to say that aloud as morale was often more important than real skill. Let the people believe in their victory. Who knew, maybe our faith draws it to us; not an abstract demonstration of faith, but real actions in the name of it. To win a lottery, you had to buy a ticket first after all.
I still didn’t understand what Kane had in mind. He knew pretty well what I had in my arsenal, including the Power of Light. Did he really think that I had something else stashed away somewhere?
“I don’t,” I answered calmly. “Do you?”
He rolled his eyes as he did when he connected to one of his Wights.
“Why are you pressing so hard on him, huh?” Mara suddenly appeared between us. “Kane, honey, I want to tell you something before the fight. In private.” She dragged him aside immediately. What was that for? I hoped I don’t get infected with their madness.
I sighed heavily and smiled. It would have been much easier to talk openly, but it was difficult for some people to say unpleasant things to your face. It was funny that Kane felt awkward. At the same time, he made it clear that he had a card up his sleeve. I was sure that it had something to do with the Altar of Death. But it looked like he wasn’t ready to spend the energy accumulated by the Altar on the villagers yet.
Nevertheless, he and Mara were here. He didn’t run, but remained at the front line. Had Kane’s life been in real danger, he would have left us without a pang of guilt… I would’ve probably done the same. I would grab everyone I could and, activating the Elusive Darkness, get to Berg.
With a deep sigh, I cast the useless thoughts away.
“Golin, Dor,” I commanded the two, “divide the people into groups of three. Each group should attack only one monster. Don’t try to get to the front line, we’ll handle it ourselves. Also,” I added after a moment’s thought, “assign ten people as field medics. They won’t participate in the battle, but will drag the wounded away from the fight to restore their HP.”
“Yes, sir!” Golin roared. His burnt friend nodded silently.
“You,” I pointed at Erg, the guy proposed the idea of planting potatoes around the Lake of Grace. “You will be responsible for healing the wounded. Choose a place somewhere a bit further away from here. You’ll take the wounded from the medics and heal them. Were you at the briefing about potions?” Erg nodded in astonishment. “Good. Here, take it. And if you spill it…” handing him the jug with the fresh Potion of Simple Tranquility of Darkness, I wagged my finger at him. “Do you have a mug? Every fighter should have a mug with a portion of it, but just in case…” The guy nodded. “Good. So, your task is to drink the potion and heal. If the effect doesn’t work at the first try, drink again and heal. Clear?” There was another nod.
I didn’t press the guy further. He seemed to be a quick-witted fellow. The fact that he managed reach level 15 just proved his potential.
I looked around. Where the hell was Vella? She used to love being around me, but after we parted she became more freedom-loving. She came and went whenever she wanted. Her teeth and claws would come in so handy to us now.
“Daerk!” Kane interrupted my thoughts. “They are cl
ose.”
“Everybody, get ready!” I roared.
The people became silent, clutching the handles of their axes, scythes, pitchforks and knives. In the silence, I clearly heard the tramping of hundreds of paws.
“Hold the fort!” I said the moment when, trampling low bushes with their heavy paws, the first five Formidable Bears Changed by Decay ran out of the forest.
Chapter 25
The Riders
There was no counting the number of the Decayed. Kane was right; had we fought them with the same team as before, we would have been dead in a couple of minutes or forced to use the Altars almost immediately. But we’ve been to holding the fort for about five minutes now. We haven’t lost anyone either; Erg and the medics were doing their job well. Some of the wounded even returned to the fight after having their HP restored. Shawn and the rest of the fighters joined us soon enough.
Dodging the claws of a Bear, I hit it in the ribs with my Trident of Darkness. Yanking it out, I jumped up into the air and onto the enemy’s back. I immediately materialized at once and threw at the creatures.
Spiders had already started to climb the Bear’s back, so I had to jump down.
Power Strike.
I pierced the neck of the Alpha of the Black Wolves Changed by Decay with the pitchfork but didn’t manage to dodge in time and was hit in the back by another Bear. I grunted, jumped up into the air again and landed onto a Colossal Spider.
The battle was gradually turning into a hassle. I skidded on the acid-green slush that poured out of the wounds of the Decayed, and stumbled over the fallen beasts. We would have to retreat soon; slowly, but steadily we were being pushed back.
Another jump onto a monster’s back, a strike with the pitchfork, minus one enemy, a grenade in my hand, a throw, an explosion…
“How many of them are there?!” I heard behind me.
