Defiant Necromancer (Book 2 stubbing July 3)

Edgard dodged a swipe of a steel sword by a hair’s breadth.

The mummy hated to be rude to the master, but he couldn’t afford a moment’s distraction.

The enemy horseman rode past and quickly pivoted, turning back to charge at Edgard again.

Underworld Motion.

Edgard dove underground. Based on what he’d seen so far in this duel, his opponent, Lord Franco, was no different from the ancestor Edgard had fought back in his time.

I shouldn’t have agreed to that duel back then, the mummy thought. I was too proud to refuse. My magic was more specialized in support, but the people could not see their leader turn down a one on one with the enemy commander. But now… it is a matter of prudence.

Only by defeating this man could Edgard obtain what his master would most prize.

The chthonic mage swam up through the sand again, guiding his body toward where he could feel the vibrations of the horse’s hooves. He just needed to reach up and pull them under.

But as his hand reached where the hooves should be, he felt a dense barrier of mana-infused earth between himself and the surface.

All right, that will not work, then.

It was as he’d suspected. He’d had a lot of time to consider how the last fight had gone wrong for him, back when he was the Beastking. The mounted horseman had moved quicker than the mage would have thought possible through the desert sand.

But this confirmed that the class that ran in the Franco family was specialized for fighting from a saddle. He had some sort of skill that hardened the ground where his mount stepped, which naturally lended itself to making forceful attacks from horseback.

I have to separate him from his horse.

Pillars of Earth!

Edgard smashed diagonally up toward where the horseman was. He felt the vibrations in the soil from his own attacks and from the beast’s movements, then felt a single hard impact through the ground - and nothing.

Horse and rider had separated from the ground, and Edgard could feel no indication of them having landed anywhere.

It was a ploy to make him surface. He knew that. He couldn’t be attacked while he was underground, so the human needed him to pop back out.

He couldn’t attack if he didn’t know where his opponent was either.

But he had a few options for locating him.

Bone Puppetry!

With the skill active, Edgard felt the bones of the rider and his horse. They had leaped onto one of Edgard’s Pillars of Earth, and they stood there now, perfectly still, around six feet off ground level.

Well, it was not as if they were going to sprout wings and fly…

He yanked sharply on the horse’s front shinbone and, at the same time, Edgard leaped upward out of the ground.

The rider came tumbling down as the mummy rose to meet him. Lord Franco slashed with his sword, not to be taken off guard despite being thoroughly unbalanced.

Edgard raised an impromptu barrier made of mana and pushed off of it to move backward.

The blade chopped through the mana barrier but missed the mummy’s body.

That had been a problem last time; this class made the swordsman very good at hacking through a mage’s defenses. But now Edgard knew every one of the tricks it came with.

The horse suffered for the rider’s momentary distraction. There was a terrible crunch as it landed badly on the leg Edgard had yanked on. A sprain, or at least a fracture. The beast tried to rise, then made a pained whinny.

The rider stepped out of the saddle, jaw set in an expression of annoyance.

He and Edgard lunged at each other.

Underworld Motion!

The mummy focused on purely dodging around the sword. It slashed deeply down his right side anyway, but far off target to do anything important. He tackled the opponent’s body, and the momentum carried them to the sand.

They struck it and kept going.

Edgard and Lord Franco, carried by the mummy’s force, moved deep underground.

The swordsman flailed, jerking his sword back and trying to attack further. He managed to stab Edgard with the tip of the blade several times, ripping open the mummy’s abdomen. But then he made the mistake of pulling the sword back. It was his reflex, in this moment, to wind up for a killing blow.

Unfortunately for the human, the effect of Underworld Motion was limited to a close area around their bodies. As the man raised his weapon overhead, the sand rushing by ripped it from his hand.

“Shit!”

The swordsman was not quite at a loss for ways to hurt Edgard without his sword. He adapted quickly, throwing heavy punches, elbows, and a headbutt with his helmet that Edgard could tell actually fractured his skull.

Deep enough.

Edgard deactivated Underworld Motion.

The barrage of punches suddenly slowed as sand filled in every open space Edgard had created around them. Lord Franco’s hands swung wildly, still, but the force was a tiny fraction of what it had been.

Not enough to cause any additional damage to the mummy, thankfully. He was already down to half his health from their exchanges.

Just as importantly, it wasn’t enough strength to move the sand that had settled over their heads. Edgard had used the combat potential of his best utility skill, Underworld Motion, to bury himself and his opponent alive.

Only one of them could endure that. It was the one who didn’t need to breathe.

The mummy managed to gently push back, moving slightly through the sand until a few inches separated him from the range of Lord Franco’s flailing grip. It took a few minutes of patient wiggling. He didn’t mind that. He needed the distance, and he had no problem with waiting.

He could feel Lord Franco still alive, still struggling, undoubtedly looking for him now. Edgard was his only possible means of escaping from the tons of sand that had them locked underground. Lord Franco’s superior physical attributes would enable him to survive down here longer than a normal human, but it would not be to his benefit. It just meant a more drawn out death as his body wrung every bit of life it could from the limited oxygen inside it.

I’ll leave you like this, Franco, Edgard thought. Buried alive. Buried like my people’s hopes these past centuries. This is for the master - no, it’s for me… No. Even that is wrong. It’s for what your ancestor did to my people. By defeating me, by breaking our advance and killing the leader of the beastfolk, he reduced my proud people to hiding like rats in the mountains. And I hold a grudge. Pay the cost for his crimes with the end of your bloodline.

The mummy’s lips curled in a grim smile.

He could have ended the fight another way, with Breath of Decay, his strongest offensive skill. But that would have destroyed the body.

I hope you’ll rise as my master’s greatest servant, he thought.

“It’s done,” he sent to Tybalt. “My apologies for keeping you waiting.”

“I could sense it,” the necromancer replied. “Your triumph. I’m up here, waiting. I finished working on the undead back at Humun. They… lost a fight that I thought would be easy. But that’s a matter to deal with some other day. They’ll be waiting for us to lead them against the bandits later. For now, come on out and receive the well deserved appreciation of our army.”

Edgard was surprised - he hadn’t felt Tybalt’s approach - but the necromancer could be subtle and move without giving any sign to his creations when he wished. Clearly, he had not wanted to distract Edgard from the fight.

“Yes, master.”

He would recover the body for Tybalt later.

Edgard reactivated Underworld Motion and swam up through the sand until he emerged just ahead of Tybalt and the Grand Beastfolk Army contingent that had accompanied him.

At the sight of him standing there, alone, victorious, a cheer went up from his side.

And the defenders of Vors let out a wail of despair.

Edgard turned to face the town’s outer wall.

“I have bested your champion!” the mummy declared. He was still not quite used to speaking again, but he had been making much use of his voice on this journey. “Your Lord Mayor sleeps with the worms in the soil!”

More accurately, he was presently slowly asphyxiating, but since no one had any way of rescuing him, it amounted to the same thing as already being dead.

Tybalt’s soldiers cheered again.

The gates swung open, and a single town watchman stepped out, covered in sweat.

He held a small ceremonial pillow out in front of him, with an ornate key on it - and more importantly, beside the key, a crown.

A crown made of twisted antler, gold, steel, gemstones, and bone. It was an ungainly thing, Edgard could not help noticing as he saw it again, but deeply symbolic.

It contained the hollow bone of the harpies, the antlers of the ibex, bones of catfolk and foxfolk, and bones of older beastfolk tribes that had gone extinct or been separated from the rest of their race long ago. Fangs from the wolf tribe and the tiger tribe, a cow horn, a bit of a lamia’s tailbone, and frankly, other things that Edgard couldn’t recognize. He had not lived through the time when all these groups and more had been united under a single ruler. He had only heard about those glory days from his father, who was also passing down something he’d only heard about.

“The town of Vors is yours,” called the human holding the pillow, visibly trembling as he raised his voice so that all around could hear him. “And per our agreement, you have also won back the crown that was… taken from you when you fell in combat against the old Mayor.”

The mummy took that as his cue. He stepped forward and claimed his old crown.

“This is a great day!” Edgard roared, lifting the symbolic piece of jewelry up into the air.

The humans on the town walls paled at the undead declaring his victory. The beastfolk cheered again.

“I present this town and this crown to the new Beastking, the man who made all of this possible, our one absolute leader. All kneel before the necromancer!”

Tybalt dipped his head slightly, and Edgard reached up and placed the crown atop it.

The royal symbol was a perfect fit.

The cheers rose to near deafening.

It was a moment that the beastfolk present would tell their children about. More importantly, they would tell the other absent beastfolk about it who had not been present.

The ancient Beastking had declared Tybalt the new Beastking, and they had obtained the old Crown of the Beastkings too, all while conquering every settlement in the Salt Waste.

Now the Councils would have to recognize Tybalt… or accept their own irrelevance as everyone else did acknowledge him.