Chapter 148: Hold The Line Or Die Running
Carrion didn’t look at her.
He was still staring at the walls, at the figures standing above, at the ones who had laughed, who had dismissed the offer so easily.
"I agree," he said.
His voice dropped.
Colder than before.
The moment those words left him, the atmosphere changed.
Completely.
Carrion raised one hand.
And for a fraction of a second, everything seemed to hold its breath.
On the walls, Voss felt it immediately.
His expression hardened.
"...Here it comes," he muttered.
Hal’s throat tightened, his fingers digging into the railing again.
Below, Carrion’s hand fell.
That was all it took, and the undead army moved.
Not in chaos, but in perfect, terrifying unison.
Eight hundred and thirty-three undead warriors stepped forward at the exact same moment, their feet striking the ground in a dull, unified thud that rolled across the field like distant thunder, their hollow eyes fixed on the walls as they advanced without hesitation, without fear, without even the concept of stopping.
Behind them, the body tempering undead followed. And behind them, the summoned ones moved as well.
Each step grounded, each movement calculated, their aura sharper, closer to living cultivators, yet twisted just enough to feel wrong.
On the walls, the guards froze for half a heartbeat.
On the walls, the guards froze for half a heartbeat.
"Positions!" someone shouted.
"Archers ready!"
"Hold the line!"
The brief moment of laughter was gone.
Completely gone.
Panic tried to rise, but discipline forced it down.
Bows were raised, spears steadied.
Hands trembled, but they held.
Voss stepped forward, his voice cutting through the noise.
"Don’t break formation!" he barked. "They’re not die! They die just like anything else when you hit hard enough!"
Below, Vermis began walking.
Not running.
Just walking.
Her pace was light, almost casual, as if she were approaching something she had already decided the outcome of, her eyes fixed on the walls, her fingers twitching slightly as the faint movement beneath her skin grew more active.
"They chose," she murmured.
Then her smile returned.
"Now they die."
The distance between the army and the walls closed.
The distance closed faster than anyone on the walls wanted.
And then the truth became clear.
There were no real walls to hide behind.
What stood between the town and the undead was barely more than a reinforced barrier of wood and stone, broken in places, uneven in height, something meant to slow bandits, not hold back an army that did not feel fear or pain.
The moment the first arrows struck, the illusion shattered.
Some skeletons fell.
Most did not.
Bones cracked, ribs split, skulls chipped apart, yet the ones that remained simply kept moving, their broken frames dragging forward with no hesitation, no pain, no instinct to stop, as if destruction meant nothing unless it was complete.
"Again!" a captain shouted from the line. "Aim for the head!"
Another volley flew.
This time more skulls broke.
Bodies collapsed.
But still, the rest advanced.
Relentless.
Unstoppable.
Voss was already moving.
"Down!" he barked again. "Everyone down! We’re not holding them up here!"
The guards didn’t argue this time.
They scrambled, boots slamming against wood and stone as they rushed down from the broken walls, forming lines in the streets just beyond the gate, shields raised, spears leveled, trying to turn chaos into something that resembled order.
Hal stumbled after them, his breath uneven.
"...Head on..." he muttered. "We’re really doing this..."
Voss stepped into the front line, drawing his saber in one clean motion, the blade catching the torchlight.
"We don’t have a choice," he said. "Hold the line or die running."
The gate didn’t last long.
The first wave of skeletons slammed into it, their bodies piling forward without concern, and within seconds the weakened structure cracked, split, and gave way under sheer pressure.
They poured in.
And the two sides collided.
Steel met bone.
The sound was sharp and chaotic.
Spears thrust forward, punching through ribcages, snapping spines, scattering limbs across the ground, but even then, some of the skeletons kept crawling, fingers clawing forward, jaws snapping uselessly at anything within reach.
"They don’t stop!" a soldier shouted, panic creeping into his voice.
"Break them apart!" another yelled back. "Don’t just stab them, smash them!"
skull into fragments, bone scattering across the dirt.
"That works!" he shouted.
Then another skeleton lunged at him from the side.
He barely raised his shield in time.
All around, the battle spread.
Three thousand human warriors pushed forward, trying to hold formation, trying to keep the tide from swallowing them, but the undead did not fight like anything they had faced before.
They didn’t dodge.
Didn’t retreat.
They simply walked forward and attacked.
Even when they lost limbs.
Even when their bodies were half destroyed.
Voss cut one down with a clean strike, his blade slicing through the neck and sending the skull rolling across the ground.
"Keep your spacing!" he shouted. "Don’t let them surround you!"
Beside him, one of his men drove a spear straight through a skeleton’s chest, then kicked it back to create distance.
"Captain!" the man called. "They just keep coming!"
"I can see that!" Voss snapped.
Then he felt it.
A shift in the battlefield.
The heavier ones had arrived.
The ten body tempering undead stepped into the fight.
Their movements were faster, and stronger.
One of them swung its arm, striking a soldier’s shield with enough force to send him crashing back into two others, the impact knocking all three to the ground.
"Stronger ones!" someone shouted. "Watch out!"
The line wavered, not breaking, but close.
The summons moved.
The ten summoned body tempering undead entered the battlefield.
At first, nothing seemed different.
They fought like the others.
One of them stepped into a group of soldiers, its movements fluid as it struck, breaking a spear, then driving its hand straight through a man’s chest with terrifying accuracy.
"Take it down!" a mercenary shouted.
Three men rushed it at once.
Blades flashed.
One cut through its arm. Another pierced its side. The third drove a sword straight into its neck.
The creature fell.
For a moment, there was relief.
"It’s down!" one of them said.