Valeria was filthy. To be fair, getting dirty is what normally happens when you rummage through innards of a gigantic, rotten corpse, and she wasn’t even completely caked in blood thanks to clever use of plastic bags, but it didn’t make her want a bath any less.

  ‘I’ll need to rest soon. At least I’m alive, judging by the fact that everything hurts.’

  She picked up her stuff, and checked her weapons. The halberd was completely ruined, so she broke off the wobbling blade, taking just the pole.

  ‘The sooner I find someone who can explain what’s going on, the better. That person being a proud owner of a shower would be even more appreciated.’

  Her priorities changed. If David was able to survive being attacked by a monster like this wyvern, then he would be fine even if she took some time to find him. It was clear she underestimated the kid.

  And if he was unfortunate enough to stumble upon something even more dangerous, then she couldn’t help him anyway. Not while being this exhausted.

  ‘I need rest, information, and to clean myself of this filth. In that order.’

  It was clear she would get none of those things if she were to stay where she was. Even resting would be quite difficult with this stench around her. Sure, she used to doze off in the sewers, but last time she did that, was in the previous century.

  This time supporting herself with both her shepherds’ axe and a makeshift staff, Valeria continued to walk in the direction David drawn with his marks. This time, she didn’t check buildings for signs, and opted for speed. Well, ‘speed’ is relative. Her knees and ankles hurt like they were trying to jump out of her legs, so it was more of a relaxed walk.

  ‘Judging by the state of skeletons and buildings, I might be getting close to the outer part of the city, or suburbs. If a town in any modern country turned into Halloween decorations all of a sudden, it would be sealed off by police and military. With how medieval everything here is, I don’t think any attempt at securing the perimeter will be as organized and methodical as something done by modern armed forces, but there still should be some people keeping watch to prevent this from spreading. The problem is that they might come to hasty conclusions when they see someone as unkempt as me. In order to avoid getting shot with an arrow, I might even need to kidnap someone.’

  She continued walking.

  Her first conjecture was proven correct, the inner city was ending, as she reached a wall right before dusk. Valeria decided to stay on the city side until morning, and quickly found a place to sleep. She ate, drank and fell asleep even faster than before.

  “Oh, fuck all kinds of ducks and other rodents, why are there abominations here!?”

  Abrams’ feelings were mixed. On one hand, involvement of an actual necrotic mage made his mission to hunt a core powered undead way easier, since all abominations had to have something that made them move.

  (Unless their master managed to commit a war crime so horrendous it created a grudge in the very land, allowing nature to run its course.)

  On the other hand, the fact that there was someone commanding undead was concerning. Normally, regular undead, like skeletons, or more skeletons, or… erm… zombies? (Right. Those exist. And they can form naturally, maybe.) are powered by Necrotic mana of the land they walk on. That’s why they can’t just blitz through entire countries. (Unless someone is dumb enough to send armies of peasant fodder to widen their area of operation by giving them more battlefields full of necrotic mana.)

  But a necromancer is perfectly able to slowly build his armies of zombies, abominations, and other such pest, to finally attack the world of the living. As such, if Abram was able to report back to the headquarters of Hermann family, he would be rewarded handsomely.

  But that was a big “If”. Those damn abominations were sometimes able to sense mages by their cores.

  Considering the fact that Abram was a mage, his chances of survival weren’t the best.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  ‘First. I can’t use any magic now. Second, let’s get the fuck out of here.’

  The plan was without holes.

  Or, it would be, if not for the tiny detail of an unnatural creature standing right behind him.

  Or before him, now that he turned around.

  Supporting itself on three legs (Or was it a tail? No matter.) was a creature clearly meant to give nightmares. No limb was of the same shade, quite obviously the result of stitching many ill fitted body parts together. The maw wasn’t even taken from a human corpse. Sharp teeth and a long snout pointed at a dog as a source of most important of sensory organs.

  ‘Oh. My scent. It seems reducing my mana emission was not enough.’

  Abram rarely regretted not rolling around in rotten fish innards, but today, he would have rather done it.

  ‘Well, no use crying over not spilled guts.’

  He readied his spear. It was shorter than what he would want to use against abominations, alas, compromises had to be made. At least it was sharp.

  And then, the creature did the worst thing it could have done, as far as Abram was concerned.

  It bellowed.

  “Fuck again and again!”

  His wife told him to reduce the swearing, but she wasn’t here.

  He wanted to dispatch the abomination and run away before any of its companions arrived, but that was just plain na?ve thinking, or so it seemed.

  But Abram never relied on best case scenario. He closed the distance, and thrusted. The blade sunk into flesh, but to no avail

  The creature jumped aside, and tried kicking him, but Abram intercepted the blow with his spear, hoping it would damage its tendons.

  Sure, it still had two more legs, but even slowing it down was enough. The annoying thing about abominations, was that you never knew where their cores were.

  Sure “Somewhere in the middle” was common knowledge, but where the heck does a creature like that have a “Middle”?

  Abram would find out, with enough poking. Another thrust. And another. And once more.

  The creature jolted.

  “Bingo.”

  After dodging another kick of now shredded leg, Abram readied himself for the last thrust.

  This one had to be perfect.

  And it was.

  The creature stiffened, and fell to the ground. Seeing that the core did not explode, Abram considered digging it out, but his sense of perseverance won over his greed.

  He turned in the direction he came from, and moved.

  His attempt to take a step turned out to be unreasonable painful. Abram looked back, and saw it.

  “I was too late, huh? Screw my luck and fuck my crack.”

  Four abominations readied themselves to write Abrams’ life into past tense.

  The pain in his leg was caused by the whip like tongue of one of the abominations, the one looking like a seven legged frog straight out of a fever dream. A bad fever dream.

  Another had entirely too many eyes.

  The third one was equipped with a comically huge amount of muscles. Abram would laugh if he saw it in a book. Alas, this was no book and Abram was in no mood to laugh.

  The last one had sharp teeth. Everywhere. And huge ears on its lower back.

  Every one of them distorted, every one disgusting, and scary. Abram directed mana to his wounds. As a vitality mage, or as some called them, a growth mage, he could at least prevent any poison this thing carried in its tongue from doing whatever it was supposed to do.

  His leg tingled regardless.

  “Good day. Do you require assistance by any chance?”

  A voice behind him was quiet, but couldn’t be ignored. Whoever its owner was, Abram didn’t sense him… Her. The voice sounded feminine, although rough.

  But it was of no importance who the voice belonged to. Abram needed help, and he needed it desperately.

  “Yes please.” This was no time for playing strong, independent adventurer.

  “Go sit this one out, and get that wound under control. Its bleeding like you wouldn’t believe.”

  The voice behind him advised, and its owner… patted Abrams’ head.

  ‘What the fuck’ He thought inwardly.

  “Language.”

  His savior entered his field of vision. Abram had to struggle not to fall on his ass.

  ‘A huge old lady?’

  He was a bit surprised. No, scratch that, What in the world was he seeing!? Why would an old lady… What?

  As if oblivious to his surprise, The woman raised her cane, and thrusted forward.

  Once. The froglike one stiffened and fell to the ground.

  Twice. The muscle abomination trembled, its abdomen inflated, and cracked like a fish bladder.

  ‘Oh. No core out of that one.’

  The woman didn’t have to move from her place to dispatch the rest. No probing for cores, nothing. Once or twice, he could chalk it up to luck, but four times?

  ‘This woman knows where the abominations’ cores are.’

  She turned around, and revealed her face.

  Previously, Abram thought he was saved by a passing mage. A powerful one, considering the fact that he couldn’t sense her.

  He realized how wrong he was. The ability to locate cores with such precisions was only possible if your own core was of the same affinity, or its opposite.

  But no life mage would ever leave his face with so many horrifying scars. Especially not a woman.

  It could be either a very powerful undead, or there was more than one necromancer. Probably the former, considering the mind reading abilities it demonstrated earlier.

  Either way, he needed to run.

  He grabbed a seed of is favorite movement restraining plant, and prepared to give it an order.

  He would hold this… woman (?) back, and run away.

  “Take this!”

  The thorny veins started growing between him and his foe. He would rather have them grow around his opponent, but the woman (?) stepped back.

  Well, it was the next best thing. He wanted distance, after all. As much as possible, as a matter of fact.

  He turned around to have his back to the growing plant, dropped his spear and…

  Passed out.