Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead

"If I may ask Sir Loimos, the headhunters are even more special than other undeads under your command, they are not just a part of the vanguard, but always the very first to be sent, and I had been wondering what exactly set them apart from dullahans and other headless undeads?"

"The headhunters are all made from living champions and heroes, turned into dust, the head in particular, is to be scattered, to maintain the memories, however, their sense of self is taken away, hidden from all"

"Is this what makes them so resilient?"

"It is what makes ever-lasting"

-Transcript of a conversation with Champion Loimos

The fight did not last long, both knights currently sat on the ground, white cloaks stained by blood, repeated strikes from their enemy's two axes proved capable of shaving off buts of their armours and draw blood, but in the end, the headless had realised that this was not going to work out in his favour, other knights had been alerted and were already on their way, even with an undead's lack of stamina, always striking with maximum strength and many other advantages, the headhunter's movements did not feel correct, facing more than one of those veteran knights was already a tall order, so he eventually summoned his steed and rode off into the night.

The whistling, the cries lingering on for a few more seconds before growing silent, hiding off into the woods, the undead got off his horse, beginning to walk aimlessly, with whirlwinds of purple haze, summoning weapons after weapons.

Something was wrong, something was definitely wrong, this was not right, but why? He did not know.

He did not know if he would ever know.

Whistling rippled in the distance, this was not his.

__________

Day by day, Loimos's vanguard got closer and closer to Belliste, slower by the day, but cease moving they never did, Poitirus secured the oceanic depths, caves and caverns were conquered, flooded mountains became landmarks of death's empire, the ocean guardian moved by himself, only followed by his own followers, there was not a day during which he did not lose a limb or had his head blown off, the monsters and creatures were all terrifyingly powerful, their strength so old and ancient that even the undead's sovereignty over water was challenged by their mere presence, even by using the cover of the miasma and attacking from safety, picking them one by one when possible, it was excessively difficult.

Sometimes, he wished that Loimos would still accompany him, for the champion of the empire, dealing with such creatures would be a breeze, but knowing how he went about things, he would still just make him do things, there was no point to not use the occasion to train his subordinates after all, so far into the ocean, they had even begun to encounter creatures that definitely could be counted as mythical, islands that had developed upon the backs of great beasts, some appearing like patchwork of multiple creatures, like those turtle-like abominations with rows of tentacles as limbs, or those giant fishes with oddly humanoid faces amongst other things, however, the sheer amount of those creatures proved that they had nothing mystical about them.

They were but regular life forms down here, living their lives, reproducing and multiplying, and even with death's advance, they still did just that, thankfully for Poitirus, Ourlst and Horhir were doing work on the surface, luring in and slaying creatures there as well, with the tremendous progress of Loimos's forces, units of great power could work together to bring down monstrous whales and the likes, and when a living passed, they joined the ranks of death, they joined the right side.

The way to Belliste was a relatively typical ocean, much easier to navigate than the burning one they had run into a while back, or even the blood sea, there were actually seas of blood without their interventions, the beasts here were quite resistant to the allure of lord blood.

However, a certain distance from the shores of Belliste, the area was prone to severe storms and to forming vortexes, taming this area was of importance to allow a proper invasion to take place, but the continent was also making progresses, the undeads could sense it from afar, Loimos knew of it thanks to the presence of vanguard within the living territory.

Grand dragons sometimes flew overhead of the ships, Dragonnerie was much further away, but the inhabitants there were definitely not unknowing of death's movements.

"They are erecting a barrier" Horhir, the right hand, remarked, he had not been there to witness the conquest of Tamaris, but had heard plenty of it, the barrier constructed by those people had held strong, it was to be assumed that Belliste's would be on par, or perhaps even greater, the livings far away had much more time to prepare after all, and apparently, they even had the support of dragons from Dragonnerie.

"It is deemed to be a difficult war, but we will prevail, they can only delay the inevitable, death stands with us" Ourlst, the left hand, responded noticing the waters shifting, dozens of segmented, elongated creatures emerged, intertwined with one another.

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The work was never done, both gave the order to attack, hail of projectiles, knights leapt into the water, and within a few hours of struggle, the livings were dispatched, their corpses punctured with bone needles, right in time as yet another shadow passed above them, truest of dragons once again.

They never attacked, merely watching the undead, surveying their movements presumably, and as such, the foremost knights never gave the word to attack, knowing full well that the might of Dragonnerie's inhabitants could very easily destroy ships with their mighty breath, so unless provoked, the undeads left them fly as they wished, trespassing upon the miasma was dangerous even for those great creatures, so they either only make quick trips, or never even got anywhere close to it.

"General Loimos said that the dragons were most likely working alongside Belliste"@@novelbin@@

"Then it should be our very next target, should it not?"

"It's impossible, this continent can float away much faster than we can make any progress"

"When we conquer Belliste, we will be able to use the plentiful life as foundation for a much greater miasma generator, on par with the miasma originating from King Nitok's crypt, this should definitely allow for faster advances in the future, no?"

"That's right, but even even Sir Irmandos foresees that it will take us a long, very long time to reach that goal, not to mention that Dragonnerie is full of dragons and draconic species that could lay waste to us from far away, I spoke of it with Sir Loimos, and even he said that it would be a great challenge to simply face their strength"

"What a shame, if our leader says it, then we better grow stronger…"