We have been watching the castle since that day. The only advantage we have is the surprise; we could watch and plan carefully. The necromancer was level 38, while the creatures were only 15, as the levels decreased the more they rotted.  

It was doable. But with all of them together it could be quite troublesome, especially with that staff. So we studied his routine, mostly to know his abilities, after all if he could control all the undead around his castle at the same time we didn’t stand a chance.

But we discovered that, in one or two weeks max, the two creatures would go out to hunt new subjects for the necromancer, which never left the castle. It would be easy them; we eliminate them, and the necromancer wouldn’t even notice until two or three days had passed.

I licked my lips, feeling the adrenaline pump in my veins; we hunted some undead in the last weeks, not very close to the castle, and learned a few useful things, such as;

Undead bodies burn really nice.

They don’t die quickly.

They smell horrible.

When burning they smell even worst.

And little things like that. As for now, we were tracking the two creatures through one of their hunts. My brother stayed far behind, enough to give me backup without spoiling my position.

Oh, I forgot to mention, we kind of can communicate telepathically now. Apparently it does not work on others yet, been made by that special bond the brothers titles give.

And it was veeeery useful, even more now that my brother couldn’t accompany me sneaking around; we could coordinate our attacks flawlessly, cornering our prey without they even knowing what happened.

I was closing in on the creatures by now, inside my shadow, watching as they fought a minotaur.

Other thing to watch out for is their bite; by poison or acid, an undead bite and claw are always deadly. Our Poison Resistance would do nothing in our favor.

So the best tactic was to burn them from far away, which gave my brother the upper hand.

My thoughts were brought back to the present by a thunderous attack from the minotaur. He wasn’t very big yet, been level 24, but the hammer he was holding could do quite a mess.

The wolf was in front of him, distracting it while the panther sneaked from behind and bit the back of his hull. It started melting, boiling and dripping pus. When it reached the skin the minotaur fell down screaming.

That was the problem, even though they were low level undead, that bite was quite scary, even more when they didn’t die with your first attacks.

The wolf didn’t waste his time and jumped up the minotaur’s throat, chewing and spilling acid until he reached the spine and broke it, making the spasming body of the bull stay still.

This was our chance. Separate to conquer.

‘Go’ I said to my brother through the mind link. Next a Fire Explosion went flying in their direction, exploding right at the minotaur’s body, making a mess. They both jumped out of the explosion rate, to two different sides.

The panther was closer to me, so I sneaked closer to it;  couldn’t use bite or scratch since their goopy blood had the same effect that their saliva, but hell I could give him a good Fire Breath at his face.

And that’s what I did. Using Shadow Veil; which consumed less MP; the creature didn’t even notice where the fire came from, only felt his skin catching on fire.

It would be an effective distraction if the creature felt pain; but no, it only turned my way, searching for the enemy.

I was already hidden, but using Fire Manipulation I made the fire take my shape and growl at him. Now the clock is ticking; how long could I keep two of my Magic at once up. 

My fire form jumped away from the undead panther’s attacks, but it ended up bitten; just how I wanted. I manipulated once more, frowning at the effort, and made the fire go down his throat and all over his body.

Burning him from both sides.

When he became just charcoal, I went to see my brother battle. He wasn’t doing so good himself; the wolf manage to get closer to him, which made him lose some advantage.

But I didn’t interfere. Not yet.

I wouldn’t be there for him all the time; and I know that I promised to protect him; but any unnecessary interference in his fighting would only make him weaker.

And that’s no way of keeping him safe.

As the wolf ate one of his Fire Balls middle air, it jumped up to my brother face, as he stood there petrified. I was close enough to interfere, of course, so I used Shadow Manipulation to grab his ankle and pull him to the ground, making the wolf trip face first.

‘Keep fighting brother!’

As if shake awake, my brother narrowed his eyes in challenge, and used his Tail Whip to push the wolf back to the ground.

And then used his new skill, Lava Breath. It was very costly, he said, but worthy as a pool of lava fell down from his mouth making an instantaneous hole on the wolf’s body, consuming the rest like a hungry element.

Breathing heavily, my brother fell to the ground, looking at the unmoving body of the wolf. I came closer, asking:

“Are you hurt?” He shook his head. “Then let’s go.”

I had a satisfied smirk seen that he level up; I only level up once, after many undead, but he was catching up quickly, and those Magic Fire related always been five levels above the basic level; now level 22; were really scary.

We hunted food for the night, planning what to do the next day, and almost getting to excited to sleep. The Voice of the Night; now able to talk to me all nights, even if I had to sing for it; didn’t say anything, as we already discussed many possible ways beforehand.

Tomorrow, we will hunt a necromancer.

~~~~

The lights were on again, the little fires sparse around the rooms. Using Presence Sense; which worked like a warmth vision of a snake, without the need for temperature; we passed through the hatch again and went upstairs.

It was very cold that day, even making me reconsidered our plan, but the longer it took us to end this, even more after taking care of the others, the less chances we had of succeeding.

One would expect that in a necromancer lair undead would be roaming about, an awful stench would cover all the messy rooms, and yet it was somehow empty; not clean, just abandon.

Beyond the dust only a few smells, however, stood up strong, some suffer and citric stuff. I scratch my nose, following the sense.

It leads to a big room with two floors with a view to the upper floor. That would be a good place for my brother, so I point my nose for him to go upstairs to receive support from above.

The view of the walls was blocked by many tall bookshelves, covered in layers of dust, just some, closer to the middle, seemed well cared for. Many places to hide, I thought as I went from shadow to shadow, and many knowledge to look for later on.

I could hear my brother upstairs, as he got a good advantage point. I approach the middle where a few wooden tables stood, some full of pots and glass, but from below I couldn’t see very well; and didn’t care either.

I was looking around for a good place to ambush him when I hear footsteps and doors opening. He is here, coming this way!

I enter a shadow, as mine would show on the floor, and stay hiding there. He comes in quick footsteps, going directly to the table and putting something on, while the staff stayed beside him.

I narrow my eyes at that.

“Oh Faust, we are so close.” He says. Faust? Who is that? Another creature? That could be troublesome. But nothing happens as he continues, as if someone had answered him.

“Yes, they are late, perhaps a minotaur was too much for them, maybe we will need to make new ones. Even better, they are already too old, I should prepare to change them now.”

“Hm… I think so too, his crystal would work better, earth element, strong build and energy, but we can test with this High Bird crystal first, pity that humans do not have crystals, it would cut in half all my work.”

Curious I look a little up, going to a shadow on the wall, only to see him talking to… a skull? It was placed on a velvet pillow, and was very carefully handle.

The necromancer takes off his hood and cape only to reveal a face full of scars, and a pair; yes, two sets; of arms, one on the normal place and the other coming from the back, but still managing to reach the front.

Is that even human anymore?

He passed his tongue on the base of his pointy teeth, patting slightly the skull, thinking. He starts messing with the things on the table, turning pages from some books, scrambling some notes on other, and in other he took off a rag that was covering a human body on one of the tables, the movement letting the stench of formalin come off.

He starts opening up the body in the middle, passing the scalpel in a Y form. And still we waited, patiently. All this time his staff was on the other table, and as he brought the skull in one hand and a crystal on the other, to the body and away from the staff, we acted.

~~~~

Wow, 24.144 words and 180 pages approximately at this point, and only in a month (27 days to be precise), hehe, writing machine.

It is 6,6 pages and 894 letters per day, cool.

But nobody cares.

Lol.

(º﹃º)

Forgot the extra, shit.

Not counting that again.

And who ran away from the barbecue to write?

Hehe

And I don’t like fireworks, my dogs are scare of them, so nah