Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead
Chapter 834 - 834: Ambush

It was simply ridiculous, for all intents and purposes, the Emerald Realm, for the first time, perhaps ever, was at war, and at that, the people were facing the most dire threat to life and peace of this whole world, yet, nothing was happening, they were simply remaining in place, waiting for the enemy to strike first, knowing that once the gear began turning, that there would be no turning back, that even if both sides preferred to avoid senseless destruction, that it would occur anyways.

Simply put, they were biding their time, trying to make it so the real war would begin as late as possible, in the meantime, they focused on creating countermeasures, and preparing themselves to the best of their capacities.

The very instant the eight week deal came to an end, undeads flooded out from the dark keep, moving around in extreme numbers, and with great proficiency, from afar, the legions of rank and file soldiers looked like flowing rivers of black, invading the natural wonders and beginning to target the closest beasts, capturing them and dragging the creatures back to their fort, clearly, their first objective was to gather intel on their enemy, but since there wasn't much that could be gleaned about the sun and light, they focused on the beasts, source of power for the beast worshippers.

The corpses even uprooted trees and gave them the same treatment.

Still, it would do no good to just remain hidden behind the barrier like rats in a barn, that would only project the idea that they were weak and afraid, which might just make the enemy want to strike earlier, the livings needed to make it clear that they were willing to fight, and even engage in small skirmishes if necessary.

For once however, Milo was not around for the day, he was the father of six young children after all, there were days he just could not leave the household, so the ones who stepped outside of the barrier to make the silent statement to the undead were Hoffnu, Ilona and Defoim'nocle, the three of them had a simple, yet dangerous mission, to be noticed by the undead and make sure that they knew that the livings weren't afraid of them.

It would certainly be safer by sending the likes of the heralds or priestesses, but sending their strongest would just loop back around and make them seem weak overall as they relied on the same individuals that were known to be incredibly powerful, all that would do is paint an even bigger and brighter target on their backs.

And whilst the three women weren't weak, they were definitely not ranked as highly as some others.

"Say, no one has spotted any of those nosferatu vampires, right?" asked Ilona, as the three of them were swiftly moving from one cover to another, Defoim'nocle using a spell to create thin layers of water that reflected sunlight and made them unseen to the naked eye, although the undead had other means of detection, it was preferable to employ all of the means available to conceal their approach at the beginning.

Furthermore, the Emerald Realm was overflowing with life, so their own life force might just go unnoticed amidst it all.

"You ask the same questions as the old hunter, but no, we haven't spotted many vampires at all, in fact, like… Only two, one in multicoloured garbs that hangs out with a huge undead in armour, and a sun-walking vampire, though, the first one is dubious whether it was actually a vampire as she was standing in the sunlight and didn't look like a sun-walking one…" Hoffnu scratched her ear, vampiric blood was nasty stuff, and as such, vampires were amongst the most disliked breeds of the dead, also due to the fact that back in the days, they were the ones that had the easiest time multiplying.

Nowadays, all corpses be they skeletons, ghouls, wraiths or whatever other nightmarish form they could take… All of them seemed to just show up whenever they wanted, but still, vampires remained the most talked about.

"I know why you ask, Ilona, but there is little chance that the gravelord will actually show up in person, and if he did, I am certain we would immediately know anyways" the champion of water readjusted her round glasses, when Loimos had arrived in the realm, everyone had felt it, so it would surely be similar if a gravelord decided to appear.

"You're right" Ilona raise her fist as she noticed movement further ahead inside of a clearing, the trio was hiding behind a hill, and it seemed like they had not been noticed just yet, as a group of rank and file soldier, accompanied by two Loimoisian knights seemed to be just foraging and looking around.

All of the soldiers were carrying the same equipment save for a few crossbowmen, all bearing spears and a shield, although the main threats of this group in terms of individual power were obviously the knights, their stature was stalwart, their armour possessing a dark gleam.

One carried a heavy mace, the other a broadsword.

But it truly was the collective that seemed daunting, everyone had seen the cohesiveness with which the undead troops moved and behaved, that behaviour wouldn't just vanish once they entered combat, anyone facing them unprepared, even if stronger that each individual undead, would most certainly end up swarmed and be torn apart.

"Hey, are you hearing me? What can you tell me about them?" Ilona muttered something to herself, addressing Toby who had given her an item that should allow him to see what she was seeing and also permit them to communicate over a distance.

The bespectacled otherworlder had had plenty of opportunities to try and appraise the undead soldiers since their arrival, doing so from far away, improving this ability of his by pitting it against the anti-analysis the enemy seemed to possess, that of the corpses was even more potent than that of their living soldiers, but he had ran his appraisal countless time as often as was possible by now, and he had gotten better, not to mention that the rank and file at least, were a type of undead he already had much experience analysing.

The black knights were a different matter, but he had spotted a few of them as well, and by focusing, he could get it to work, but if he focused too intently, he also knew that the undeads would realise that they were being watched, so Toby needed to be very careful.

'Aherm, Loimoisian knight, or knight of you-know-who, weird that Loimoisian doesn't count as saying his name…'

"Toby"

'Yes, you can speak inside your head, you know? Anyways, those two are consistent with what I saw before, they have high proficiency in many weapons, and even better at the one they are holding right now… And also, they each have a different ability, the one with the mace has a battle art that allows him to cause an eruption of acidic blood when striking the ground, and the one with the sword can spew some sort of decaying mist'

'Remember, they and the soldiers can also ignite their weapons with fire, you know, fire with that guy's name in front of it? No idea what's the difference with regular fire, but if it has his name, it's nasty and you probably contract the black death if it touches you'

'Alright, thanks Toby'

"Girls, we need to be seen by them, the knight with the sword doesn't seem to have any long range attacks, but the one with the mace is likely to be able to cause acid to emerge from beneath our feet"

"How do we proceed?" Ilona grasped her halberd, Hoffnu and Defoim'nocle looking at one another.

"We are not fighting them, Ilona, they probably have reinforcement nearby" they spoke in unison, and the otherworlder sighed.