Solo Scent of Death

[Luke]

Winter 81, 125

The time was a little past midnight when Galinn walked through a portal into the red aspen forest that made up the eastern part of the country. It was known by many to be a good place to go for a vacation, but that had never really stuck a chord with her. This area was nearly as populated as the country's capital. And yet, she was struck by the awe inspiring beauty. Every time she saw the city in its bioluminescent glory she wished she would finally get around to buying a second home here. It was a different feeling she got when visiting her own home city – there she was washed over by nostalgia instead.

She shook her head to clear her thoughts. She wasn't here to sight see. She was needed for military assistance. Everyone knew that this area had more military than most other parts of the country. They were near the border after all. And unlike the other side of the country there wasn't a barren wasteland full of monsters and elementals preventing sane people from even bothering to invade. But this forest? Galinn could clearly see why someone might want to take this over for themselves.

She walked briskly through the area, not recognizing any faces. She rarely came out this way so it was to be expected, and she was in a different form than usual so she rarely got a passing glance except by the occasional person who thought she was pretty. Was she? She guess she hadn't thought about that.

Galinn continued until she got to the building she was supposed to meet in. It was a fairly simple space where some soldiers were standing at attention and listening to their briefing. Galinn gathered that they were going to go on a patrol based on the snippets she heard.

"There you are," said one of Galinn's coworkers. It was a male who stood to be around seven feet tall. Their size difference was considerable. "You're to accompany these soldiers and provide backup. They're investigating some suspected necromancy activity. Needless to say that caution is advised. We don't think they're very strong yet judging by the quality of their thralls, but you can't be too careful."

He handed her a leatherbound folder with important details inside. He nodded to her, and then left her with the soldiers. She wasn't their leader, just another cog in the machine. This whole group was overkill for a necromancer, but that was how they did things. Hammering down the odd nail with overwhelming force was commonplace.

The group departed immediately, giving Galinn little time to read up on the details. There were sightings of undead shambling around but there was no clear culprit yet. That told them that the necromancer knew that they needed to hide. Maybe they thought they could hide what they were? Not every necromancer wanted to be one. But those who didn't simply stopped raising the dead. Galinn suspected that this one was trying to grow their powers.

Despicable.

 

[Luke]

Galinn and the rest of her group walked vigilantly through the red aspen forest. The sightings hadn't been in the city proper – no necromancer would ever be able to hide there with the stench of dead. No, the only place to hide was out in the forest. Galinn suspected they were in a cave, or had burrowed a little home for themselves in a tree or underground. That life didn't appeal to her, though desperate times called for desperate measures.

They stopped by one location where the remains of a deer slowly decayed. The wounds on its side suggested that it had been attacked. This was had been in the report. A deer that intelligence claimed had been clawed at by a very human looking hand. That wound was barely visible now due to decay.

The group split up to follow different sets of footprints. Galinn went with the east-bound group, thinking that those prints looked a little more convincing. Alas, they found nothing. That was, until someone whistled in the distance. Soldiers rushed towards the area, Galinn included.

A very unartistic mass of bones had been jammed together to create some sort of sculpture. It wasn't moving… it seemed to be some sort of artistic representation of a weeping man and a child. The smell hit the newcomers and made Galinn want to hurl. Disgusting.

Then, the sculpture started to move. Animated by necromantic powers, the bones came to life. The man took its 'child' and used it as a blundgeon to swing at the group. They had kept their distance so there was no real threat, but it made the hairs stand on the back of the necks. It shambled forwards aggressively, yet harmlessly as it tried to kill the living.

The group watched on in silence and mild confusion until someone stepped forward and smashed it with a large hammer that they conjured. The bones went flying everywhere and then they went still.

Galinn pointed – she had seen a glimpse of the tether that bound it to the necromancer's control. She couldn't tell how far away they were, but she knew the direction. It would have been easier to keep the skeleton 'alive' but nobody wanted to carry that thing around.

"Won't be long till I find you," Galinn murmured under her breath.[/I][/I]

 

[Luke]

Galinn would have liked to say that it was easy finding the necromancer, but they technically weren't any closer now than they had been before. The necromancer could be incredibly far away. Or maybe they were playing tricks with their minions to obscure their true location. It was impossible to say. It almost felt like they were walking into some sort of trap.

Sure enough, a myriad of skeletons and risen corpses started to appear in the forest. Galinn assumed that they had been well hidden, to be able to escape detection. Or perhaps there was an especially skilled necromancer who had risen them all in an instant. She had little time to speculate because the undead started to attack.

"Careful," Galinn warned the soldiers, as if seeing undead wouldn't automatically put one on guard.

Galinn fancied herself a long range fighter as of late. She shrugged off the bow she'd brought with her. It almost pulsed with magical energy. It'd been crafted from a legendary tree and shot so fast that it was associated with lightning strikes. It took incredible power to draw such a weapon so when she pulled an arrow back her back muscles flexed and made her grunt with effort. When she finally loosed the arrow, a thunderous boom sounded from her weapon. The arrow streaked through the air and took an undead's head clean off.

The one she hit started flailing around aimlessly as it couldn't do much of anything without the ability to see. Galinn let out an annoyed sigh – bludgeons were the idea way to deal with undead because they could crush and maim them so they couldn't move anymore. A headless undead was still a dangerous undead, even if it couldn't aim.

Another soldier ran up moments later to smash his hammer into it. The arms and legs twitched unsettlingly but ultimately fell still. One down… many more to go. The other soldiers did battle with the undead while Galinn tried to trace their origins. Who was controlling these things?

"Come out and save us all the trouble. I'll make your death quick and clean," Galinn called as she pushed past the wave of undead to try cutting to the back line. She tried to look for more tethers, something to indicate whether they were getting closer or not. That was easier said than done when the undead lunged at her annoyingly. Galin used her bow like a club, smacking them aside one by one.

The quantity of undead hinted that they weren't dealing with a novitiate like they first suspected. A sinking feeling in her gut made her feel like they might not be dealing with a singular necromancer. How could something like this have happened with all their security measures?

She finally pushed her way through the undead and it sounded like the fighting was dying down behind her. Hopefully none of her own had been harmed in the fight. Now, would the necromancer reveal themselves? Or would they have more shenanigans to contend with?

 

[Luke]

Galinn pressed onwards and eventually saw someone that stood out from the other undead. It was hard to even tell whether this was another undead, or a real person. She wanted so desperately for this to be the necromancer behind everything, but there was no guarantee. It didn't make sense. Why would the lead necromancer come out willingly? Had they given up? Or were they so sure of themselves that they wanted to take on an entire group of soldiers?

Questions filled Galinn's mind, but she settled on the safest assumption – she would assume this newcomer was just another pawn. A much more advanced pawn capable of speaking, but a pawn nonetheless. Perhaps she was a Death Knight, or something similar.

Galinn stood alone as her focus shielded her from the noises behind her. She had to tread carefully if she was going to complete her mission. The one commanding the skeletons spoke to her, asking who she really was… and something about making ripples of trouble in the area. She started to believe that this wasn't just some human turned into a rogue necromancer. She got the vibe that this was a foreigner who had come here with the intention of expanding their sphere of control, or to purposefully cause trouble.

"I'm Galinn," she said in a conversation tone. "I've been tasked with finding the necromancer who's been causing trouble in this area. I take it I have found them. Or perhaps I have simply found someone who works directly for them."

She motioned to the forest around her. "Why come here and start trouble? Is there something you desire? I'm not sure if you're aware, but the people you've been terrorizing are the vengeful sort. They would have me hunt you down and kill you."

Galinn looked over her shoulder at the fighting. How had they not wrapped up yet? She shook her head then looked back to the 'necromancer.' "But I don't believe that killing you would be a worthwhile endeavor. It would be difficult and I would rather make friends than enemies. Perhaps you could be convinced to move your undead elsewhere?"

It was a crazy thought, teaming up with a necromancer… that's probably what most would think. Galinn was only speaking in half truths as well. Better to have them think she was friendly so it would be easier to slip a knife in their back if it came to it.

 

[Luke]

The… whatever this was spoke to him. It had a womanly form and it made Kage wonder whether this was just a ploy to throw him off his game. Attractiveness certainly was an important factor when working in the spy game. The honeypot, as it were called. Thankfully he was not so weak minded to fall for such a thing. Though he couldn't help but lower his guard just a little bit.

This woman claimed to know of him. Did she? Or was this just a bluff? Kage's mind was racing trying to make sense of it all. He wanted to talk to her, to find out her motives. This conversation needed to happen quickly as he didn't want to bring others into it until he asked what he wanted to know.

"I have come here to talk to you, and to cause a little bit of trouble. You are Kage, no?" Kage wasn't sure if he believed that… but he had to accept it at face value. This was such a bizarre circumstance that all his years of training hadn't prepared him for. This was one of, if not the boldest foreigners he had ever had the pleasure of meeting.

"Hmph, so you know who I am. Not surprising given my reputation, but it is rare to see a foreigner in these lands to know of me. You have certainly caused a good deal of trouble, and it is especially worrying to me if you're not the one that we've been hunting down."

The woman stepped forward and he started to feel his ironclad will start to weaken. His instincts screamed at him to act, to attack… but he couldn't bring himself to do it. Was she that alluring? He convinced himself that she was not a threat to him and that her being close was not a big deal. It seemed as though she was using the undead to keep the others distracted just so they could have a moment.

He blinked hard and when he opened his eyes he found that he had regained his composure. He took a step back and dropped into a low stance with his bow held at the ready. "That's close enough." He didn't draw an arrow yet, though it would only take him a split second to loose one at her. Not that he expected it would do fuck all.

"What's your game? What will it take you to leave these lands? I'm sure we can come to an agreement that will be beneficial to us both. But these lands explicitly outlaw your brand of undead. Anything we agree to would at a minimum require you to move them to outside of the forests."

 

[Luke]

"My name... Let's not rush things. You may address me as, My Lady, for now."

Kage frowned as the fighting raged on behind him. Why the undead weren't being felled was beyond his comprehension. How could soldiers, green as they were, still struggle this much? These weren't ordinary undead. It seemed that they had been infused with some kind of magic that allowed them to regenerate to some degree, or withstand blows even if they were magical in nature. That was unsettling. That kind of magic wasn't cheap nor easy to obtain. It required much more than he gave an average necromancer credit for.

"It seems like our time is getting thin. Let us meet again somewhere else."

Kage listened to this woman, this… demon. Dare he think that this person was some sort of lich? It was impossible to know at a glance. He didn't know if he could believe her words, but his options were limited. She spoke of being able to get rid of all these undead at a whim, as if they meant nothing to her. Was she that powerful, that well resourced that she could manage to sacrifice so many bodies without even thinking twice about it? These were actual bodies from previously living mortals… not just some wood or stone slapped together to make a golem.

It was a worrying thought for someone like this to end up in these lands. Worrying because it would be difficult to deal with and even more so because he would have to deal with it somehow.

"Well," he started slowly, "it's nice to know that you can command these undead so confidently. And I do understand the need for mages to have their playgrounds. I admit I have caused quite a bit of chaos in my day. We should meet elsewhere. The north of the forest borders a desert which conveniently forms the edge of this country's boundaries. We should meet there, but to the west where the desert meets the mountains."

He frowned as he thought about whether he could make good on his promise, then he nodded, "yes, I can promise you that nobody will follow us there." He still wasn't exactly sure what they were getting into. This person was almost teasing him into some kind of honeypot as he suspected. So long as they didn't have some kind of emotional manipulating magic, he thought he'd be okay… but he couldn't put his finger on exactly what had made him so attracted before.

"As for your undead… this is probably a good time to withdraw. If there's too much of a commotion they'll send for backup and if that happens, there goes our chance to meet."

He couldn't explain why he wanted to see her in private. Was she that pretty? Or was it just so intriguing to meet such a powerful person in a place like this? He had to make sure to tread carefully lest his temptations destroy him.

"So, we have a deal? Withdraw your forces, we will meet again tomorrow night. I'm assuming you'll have scouts to make sure I come alone, and I'll make sure to check to see that you've come alone too."

My Lady nodded and smirked at him, then she turned and walked away into the forests. Kage caught what looked like tethers coming off of her figure leading further towards the desert. So she'd been a thrall all along. Or maybe a Death Knight. Gods he had to figure out what the hell was going on.

"Did you kill him?" asked an aelf as they hurried to catch up to him.

"No, he or she was not the actual necromancer. Their true body is elsewhere. Let us return, I must report what happened here. Have someone collect the undead and dispose of them appropriately."

When he returned to make his report, he didn't withhold any details. He was going to catch this necromancer if it was the last thing he did.

2860 wc

 

[Luke]

Thread Title: Scent of Death

Thread Summary: Kage goes on a mission to hunt a necromancer and got more than he bargained for. This thread is trying to set up a lich Antagonist.

Expected Rewards: +19xp

Thread Link: https://antarok.net/threads/scent-of-death.498/
​

 

[Vicissitude]

꧁══════════•༺༉ { Canonized } ༉༻•══════════꧂​

❀ Rewards ❀

Requested rewards granted!

❀ Comments ❀

It's a neat idea to have Kage not outright hate the potential ANPC, yet be obligated to obliterate them as he's dutybound to Ælheim.

꧁══════════•༺༉ ❁ ❀ ❁ ༉༻•══════════꧂​