"Who has the highest stats in the commune? Get it wrong and you're dead," Lucius replied, his tail thrashing out to grab Pagan by the neck and lift him into the air. Meanwhile, a solar beam was at the ready in case he tried to pull anything funny.
"W-What's goi-"
"Just answer me," Lucius interrupted, his crux glowing even brighter than before.
"Apart from you... Alpha. But only because he has an abnormal desire for physical pain. If it were up to natural talent, it would've been me," Pagan replied.
"This level of obnoxious can't be replicated," Lucius sighed in relief, before putting Pagan on the ground.
"Sorry about that. The necromancer seems to be able to use something akin to mind magic. I was trapped in a trance, where he had someone that looked just like you following me," he explained, before looking ahead.
The temple was still a ways away, meaning that either the necromancer was somewhere close by, or that the range of his spells was just this much greater than Lucius's.
"Someone that looks like me?" Pagan repeated, the concept of such a thing happening completely foreign to him.
"Yes, so watch out. If I start acting weird, ask me something that only I would know. If I answer it wrong, even by a little bit, kill me... fast," Lucius said, before rushing off toward the temple.
~What's this odd sensation?~ he thought to himself as he dashed from tree to tree. He hadn't felt this sensation in such a long time... the fear of death.
*
"I can hardly breathe," Eleanor croaked in between coughs as she looked on at the massive fires that Pagan and Lucius had started at the outskirts of the necromancer's camp.
Dozens of burnt undead corpses lay on the ground, while most of those that remained standing were heavily damaged.
"Something feels off," Alpha whispered, staring blankly into the flames.
"What do you mean?" Eleanor asked, trying to pinpoint exactly where Alpha was staring.
"We'll split up here. Everyone follow Eleanor and circle around the fire. Gather all of the undead you can find and lead them back here. If I haven't returned by then, you have permission to begin leading them toward the dummy camp," Alpha said, before removing the bulwark from his back.
"You don't think I'm going to let you rush into that fire alone do you?" Eleanor asked, her tone showing that she was ready to completely defy Alpha's orders.
"The fire's too big, if we all go in, there's a chance that all of us will die. Besides, all of you are just going to slow me down anyway. If I go alone, I can go all out without worrying about the rest of you," Alpha said, before moving forward.
"So basically you're saying we're useless?" Eleanor asked, before gesturing for her men to get ready,
"Well then, show me you aren't by not dying. Remember what Pagan said, if any of you die, he'll hunt you down. And trust me, you don't want that idiot nagging on you for however long the dead stay dead," Alpha replied, before taking a few steps toward the fire.
"You know this wasn't part of the plan right? I know I don't have the power or authority to stop you, but I will be reporting this to Lucius," Eleanor warned as she watched Pagan slowly walk into the flames.
"And I'll take full responsibility," Alpha replied, his bulwark in front of him as he walked into the blanket of flames.
"Let's go round them up boys. This is our chance to prove that we are worthy of getting cruxes, and maybe then our Premier will stop treating us like useless sacks of plant," Eleanor hollered, before leading the others around the fire.
*
~Something feels off, I can't put it in words, but it feels like Lucius is about to die,~ Alpha thought to himself as he dashed through the forest at full speed, enhancing himself in a full radiant cowl.
After running for a few minutes he came across a section of the forest covered in purple mist.
"What's going on here-" he was about to say before a sharp object came rushing towards his face. He attempted to lift his bulwark up to block it, but it was already too late, the blade was right in front of his face.
"Alpha?" a voice called out, right as the blade came to a halt.
"Ghost?" Alpha asked recognizing the voice. And as if out of thin air, Ghost emerged.
"How did you- no, when did you learn that?" Alpha asked, for a moment the sensation that had been bothering him was overpowered by his surprise.
"I call it full-blend. I learned it from these creatures," Ghost replied, a smirk on her innard-covered face. It seemed that she had been busy, as her entire body was covered in all shades of creature innards.
"It was pretty simple once I-"
"There's no time, we have to get moving," Alpha interrupted, once again staring blankly deep into the forest. It was as if something was calling to him. No, begging him to come.
"W-what's going on? Isn't our part of the mission complete? Shouldn't we be heading bac- wait. What are you doing here, shouldn't you be at the dummy camp?" Ghost asked, completely confused.
"Something's wrong. I can feel it. Lucius is in danger," Alpha replied vacantly.
"Well, of course he is. This mission is dange-" however before Ghost could finish, Alpha went rushing deeper in.
"Wait, stop. Lucius told us to retreat once we were done," Ghost shouted as she tried catching up, however, Alpha seemed trapped in a trance.
'Lucius is going to die. Lucius is going to die. Lucius is going to die.' It felt like he was going insane. The trees around him began to morph into faces as he ran, and even they chanted the same thing as if in warning.
Soon the feeling turned into something of a certainty.
"Lucius will die if I don't save him. If we don't save him," he said out loud. And though Ghost wanted to follow Lucius's orders, she couldn't deny that even if Alpha sounded crazy, it was a huge possibility.
"What's going on here?" Ghost whispered to herself, noticing the slight shift in the forest, and how the wind seemed to suddenly blow in the same direction as them.
It was as if the forest was alive, as if it was inviting them deeper in.
*
When Pagan and Lucius finally arrived at the temple, they were met with a whole army of undead. However, the creatures that Ghost had described were nowhere to be seen.
"Pagan, you're up," Lucius said before Pagan advanced alone.
The plan was simple; release moon's wrath to take out as many of the guards as possible. And during the initial confusion, Lucius would slip through and release another one right on the temple.
If they were lucky, the necromancer would be killed in the blast, though for some reason Lucius doubted that it would work.
The army of undead shook the ground as they charged Pagan. It was akin to a herd of elephants about to trample over an ant.
Pagan took a deep breath in, and right as the horde was about to reach him, his body began glowing in an intense blue color.
For a moment it seemed like there was complete silence.
"Satellite Beam," he whispered, and the very air around him exploded.
A massive beam of blue light shot out of him, increasing in diameter as it ate at everything around him.
The shockwaves, sent even Lucius flying backward.
The spell was stronger than the first time Lucius had cast it. And just when Lucius thought it was over, the air was sucked back in, causing a secondary implosion.
Once all the debris settled, Pagan's smoking body remained at the center, like a meteorite surrounded by earth. By this time, Lucius had already made it to the temple.
"Interesting creatures," a voice whispered in Lucius's ear as he prepared to cast a moon's wrath of his own.
"Satelite Beam," Lucius chanted quickly.
"Vim extermina," the voice added a moment later.
The energy that had begun collecting to carry out Lucius's spell dispersed. However, the mental toll that the spell would've cost him went through, making him fall down to his knees.
"Wh-what's going on?" he whispered to himself, feeling his mind slowly slipping out of consciousness.
