[30 Exp]
It was Blue's sub-skeletons that had claimed a life, as the other skeletons were preoccupied.
The swarm of leaves engulfed the two skeletons, Dark and Handy.
They were both still covered in slime and muck from the bottom of the swamp, and the dry leaves quickly absorbed all the darkened swamp water, uncaring that it hurt themselves.
It was hard to tell how much the water would hurt the leaves, but Jay was more worried about the skeletons.
Their entire frames were covered by leaves; every single one of their ribs, their jaws, even the insides of their skulls were not free of them.
The leaf-covered skeletons were still slashing away, but their movements got slower as the leaves clung to their bodies and tried to hold them into place.
Next, the leaves changed tactic and tried to lift them up, attempting to float the skeletons into the air.
They had success with Dark. The leaves coated every part of its bone. They pushed and pulled it into the air.
But before they could take it higher, a skeletal hand grabbed Dark's leg.
Handy had reached out.
Handy was a larger skeleton and its body was covered in swamp slime, weighing it down.
While Handy couldn't see what its hand was grabbing, Blue could. Blue had instructed the skeleton with perfect precision, as if Blue was in control of Handy's body making it easy to save Dark from floating into the sky.
Yet Jay just assumed Handy could still see, even though its glowing eye-sockets were filled with wriggling leaves.
Thankfully, these sentient leaves could not float the skeletons.
So, the leaves do nothing. What else can she do? Jay waited and watched, while the skeletons pinned her down.
They would probably be dangerous if they covered my body and suffocated me, but the skeletons don't need to breathe, making them pretty useless. But it doesn't explain why the fire-lights would fear her or her leaves? Her leaves would burn up in a second.
The swamp woman, under the grip of four slimy skeletons, continued to struggle, panting, her face red and her hands shacking as she feared for her life. To hold her shuddering body down with more weight, the skeletons had each planted a hand into the rotting dirt, digging them into the soil and using their own hands as anchors.
The panicked woman soon ran out of energy, and her fear began to turn back as she realized the skeletons weren't attempting to kill her and eat her flesh, as she thought they would.
They were simply holding her still.
As she stopped struggling, all she could see was dirt, as they had pushed her onto her stomach, the only thing she could her was the sounds of her leaves trying to pull a skeleton away. They sounded like hissing grasses shifting in changing winds.
Hegatha tried to catch her breath and think clearly, and this was when she heard something else drawing near.
The sounds of splashing water approached, as if lots of rocks were being thrown into the swamp waters en masse.
And then, she heard something that was almost as alien to her as the skeletons. Something she had not heard in a very long time. A human voice.
It had been such a long time since she heard a voice, it was something she had almost forgotten, the warm, dangerous sound of another. It seemed like a dream or even her panicked imagination. It felt so uncomfortable to even be observed by someone else as she had kept herself hidden for so long, it was as uncomfortable as the pile of skeletons on top of her back.
But still, it called out, hidden somewhere in the fog.
"Hello? Hegatha? Listen, I'm not here to hurt you. I need your help." Jay said, trying to imagine what he would want to hear if he were in her predicament.
"I'm coming across. I will not harm you if you don't harm me... but be warned, if you try anything, I will have the skeletons drag you into the water and hold you under."
After that, we'll see who suffocates first, Jay thought.
Hegatha grunted, grabbed a handful of dirt tightly, and she grit her teeth, straining her body against the skeletons.
"Well?" Jay called.
"Why?!" a raspy yell came back through the fog.
"Why what?" Jay replied.
"Why should I help you?"
Hmm… yes. Why should she? Jay wondered. He didn't want to jump straight to threatening her. It was the simple solution, but it would leave a bitter taste in his mouth if he did.
Sullivan's flimsy noon blanket doesn't make up for the time I was threatened, though it's funny how he came to try and appease me.
"I'm sure we can arrange something. It looks like you don't have much in the way of shelter? Or I could get you off this island?"
"No. Just leave!" she grunted back.
Ah, this crazy woman, Jay thought, but heard something clinking behind himself.
Suddenly, the sub-skeletons had appeared, and while they were covered in scorch marks, they were not empty-handed.
Delicately gripped in two bone fingers, one of them had a prize for Jay. A tiny amber-colored marble. Slightly misty and see-through. But it wasn't made from amber, sap or glass.
Crystal maybe? Jay wondered, grabbing it from the skeleton.
This is good but I thought I told you guys to bring me a corpse back?
Yet before analysing it, he had to deal with Hegatha; holding the amber sphere in his fingers, Jay called out again.
"What do you know about the floating lights? The un-healing fire? The branchless burnt trees? The children's voices and the amber marbles?"
His voice traveled through the fog, and for a moment, there was silence. As Jay started into the shadowy mist, he scratched his chin, wondering if she heard him.
Maybe she's thinking… all the sounds of the rustling leaves have stopped.
"How did you escape? Who sent you?!"
Escape? What is she talking about…
Seeing Asra in pain, he had enough of this woman's maddened rambling. While he hadn't confirmed it yet, it did seem like she was doing something diabolical with children, and he wouldn't stand for that.
Jay was standing in the middle of the swamp on a half-built bridge of bones. He had released thousands of skeletons so far to make this bridge of the dead, and could only just see the bank of the swamp island under the fog.
To finish the bridge across, he released thousands more of these bones, all of them splashing into the water like a landslide.
He did a quick check of his gauntlet, which held hundreds of thousands, and finally, it went down one percent.
[66%]
He periodically turned back to add some back into his necrotic gauntlet, but it threatened to destabilize his bone foundation so he couldn't salvage them all.
Meanwhile, something below the surface began eating away at the bridge. Because of this, many bones were lost to the swamps dark waters, and soon hundreds of bone-eating creatures gathered as the waters rippled, filling up with bubbling as the abyss consumed this feast.
Red's guardian skeletons stepped off the bridge first, followed by Jay stepping onto the island too, with Red by his side who still carried Asra.
I guess we won't be making too many trips across, Jay thought, glancing back at the turbulent waters and his gauntlet.
I can't keep using these bones so wastefully. He raised his necrotic gauntlet, his necrotic mana pulling as many bones back from the waters as it could.
Now… we'll see if this woman will help, or if I'll need to force her to, he frowned, not really wanting to threaten her into compliance.
