Bloody Odyssey

Chapter 82 82: Wraith king I

Days after new year celebrations Anastas sat in a rattling carriage that traveled along a lonely forest road, the carriage wheels cut grooves into earth, still damp from the morning dew.

In his left hand, a cloak of black leather—dark as a starless sky, its fabric seeming to drink the light that touched it. Death energy rolled off its surface in waves, thick and cloying, the kind of cold that settled into bones and stayed there.

In his right hand, a white bone crown.

He sighed.

"Captain is just to much."

The words hung in the dim air of the carriage, unanswered. Outside, the hooves of the rank four scaly horse clattered against stone, its flame affinity leaving faint scorch marks on the path behind them.

Anastas turned the crown over in his fingers. Bone. The craftsmanship was exquisite—each ridge, each curve, each interlocking segment fitted with a precision that spoke of hands that had done this before. Many times.

"He can even forge artifacts." Anastas's voice was thoughtful. "I can't begin to wonder how he turned the wraith and ghoul I gave him into this."

His playful nature was gone. He was somewhere else now.

Wear it.

The voice came from within—Ariel, his ego has no malice in the words.

Anastas hesitated.

Then he placed the crown upon his head.

Crack.

Thorns pierced through his skull—not gently, not gradually, but all at once. Blood ran down his face in dark rivulets, staining the bone, staining his robes, staining the floor of the carriage. The pain was absolute.

His eyes glowed white.

And the world opened up to him.

---

For minutes that felt like centuries, Anastas sat frozen.

Strange information poured into his mind—languages he had never heard, symbols that spoke death, geometries that folded in directions the human mind was never meant to comprehend. The dead whispered to him. Not in words, but in impressions.

Memories of soil and rot and the long, patient waiting beneath the earth.

His eyes remained white. His body did not move.

But the pressure around him changed.

The air grew thick. Heavy. The kind of heavy that pressed against the lungs, that made each breath a conscious effort. The shadows in the corners of the carriage stretched.

And somewhere deep in the forest, the birds fell silent.

---

Outside, the carriage rider felt it first.

A deep chill that ran straight through his leather armour then through his skin and his very bones. His hands tightened on the reins. Before him, the scaly horse snorted—not in alarm, but in confusion. Even its flame affinity could not ward off this cold.

"What is going on back there?"

He turned in his saddle, squinting toward the carriage. The windows were dark. Not dark as in unlit—dark as in absent. As if the space behind the glass had simply ceased to exist.

He turned back to the path.

The horse reared.

It rose high on its hind legs, its flame-affinity mane blazing bright against the gloom of the forest, stopping the carriage dead.

---

"Gyask!"

The laugh was ugly—wet, broken, the sound of a throat that had been cut and had healed wrong. It echoed from the treeline, and from the shadows beneath the trees, figures emerged.

Armed men. Dozens of them. Their robes were ragged, their weapons mismatched, their eyes hungry.

"It's a big one!"

A man with a cutlass in hand stepped forward, his free hand stroking his chin. His smile revealed teeth that had been filed to points.

"These rats are definitely rich."

From the depths of the forest, more shadows followed. The men parted, creating a corridor, and through it came a figure that dwarfed them all.

He was huge—not tall so much as wide, his shoulders straining against the leather straps of his armor. A broadsword rested against his shoulder, its blade black with old blood. His face was a ruin of scars, his eyes small and bright and utterly without mercy.

He pushed one of the men forward.

"Kill all men."

His voice was flat. Bored. As if slaughter was an errand.

"Stupid bastards! Do not touch the women and goods. Let's not waste time on our fish."

Laughter rippled through the bandits.

---

The guard straightened in his saddle.

"You dare block the path of Falls?"

His voice carried pride—the pride of a man who served something greater than himself. He was a rank four aura master. Strong and capable .

I believe I can deal with them.

He thought to himself unsheathing his sword. The blade caught the fractured light of the forest, gleaming with the promise of violence.

"I advise you turn around." His aura burst outward, pressing against the bandits, making some of them stagger. "I can ignore your stupidity, you lowlives."

The massive bandit smiled revealing a demonic expression—all teeth, no warmth, the smile of a man who had stopped seeing people as people.

"Do you think I care where you are from?" His voice was low, rumbling. "After I slaughter you and take your goods, how exactly will your clan find me? Let alone your corpse."

Behind him, the bandits laughed.

The guard's jaw tightened. He glanced back at the carriage—still dark and silent.

Where is going on in there?

He turned back to the bandits.

Fine. I'll handle it myself.

He shifted his weight travelling twenty meters in the span of a heartbeat.

Shifting Step.

His blade traced a wide arc, ruthless and precise, cutting down the nearest bandits like wheat before scythe. They were trash the dregs of the world. Most of them lacked any form cultivation.

But the massive one—

The massive one moved.

His aura erupted revealing the aura of a rank five aura master. A full realm above the guard. The pressure of it slammed down like physical weight, and before the he could react, the bandit leader was behind him.

The guard moved.

Shifting Step.

The ground seemed to squeeze beneath his feet, compressing, launching him backward. When he landed, he was beside the carriage. The earth where he had stood was now smooth, straightened by the force of his retreat.

"An earth master."

The bandit leader licked his bloody blade. His smile had not faded.

The guard looked down at himself in disbelief blood Spreading across his side.

When did he—

---

The bandit leader sent one of his own men flying through the air.

The guard raised his blade, splitting the human projectile in two. Blood sprayed across the forest floor.

A bluff.

The massive bandit was already moving—his burning footprints trailing behind him, each step left scorch marks on the earth. His blade ignited, flames licking along its edge.

Captain is moving that dog will be dead in seconds. His moves can easily kill a rank 4 magic beast.

They clashed.

Steel against steel, aura against aura. The rank four guard fought with everything he had—and somehow, impossibly, he held his own.

"You see?" The guard's voice was strained but steady. "Even a high realmer like you finds it hard to kill me. Just stop your pursuit of power. Become a beggar. Do you know the problem?"

"Shut it."

The bandit leader swung. The guard dodged by a hair's breadth.

"You lack a good foundation."

Neither of them noticed the cold.

It had been creeping across the battlefield for minutes now—subtle at first, then undeniable. The bandits at the edge of the clearing were shivering. Their breath misted in the air.

"Is it because of the intensity of the fight?" one of them muttered. "Or is this place just… cold?"

From the carriage, a scream answered him.

Not a human scream. Something scarier. Something that had been waiting in the dark.

The bandits froze and guard turned.

---

Inside the carriage, Anastas was not alone.

Hundreds of vengeful spirits filled the space—pressed against the walls, the ceiling, the floor. They clawed at him, screamed at him, tried to tear the flesh from his bones.

He sat among them like a king.

Unaffected.

One by one, the spirits fused with his very being. The bone crown on his head glowed brighter with each absorption, its thorns digging deeper into his skull.

Anastas opened his eyes seeing through the carriage walls as if they were glass. He saw the bandits outside and their faces twisted with fear then the guard, caught between duty and confusion finally his gaze turned to massive leader, whose rank five aura seemed very small.

He rose passing through the carriage wall like it wasn't there.

"Bone Spore."

He stretched out his hand. A magic circle bloomed in his palm—complex, ancient, its symbols shifting as he watched. From its center, a spore protruded becoming a spear.

Beneath his breath, he spoke words he did not he wasn't familiar with.

The language was old.

The spear flew.

Runes appeared along its shaft—bright, burning, in a split second it pierced through three bandits in a single shot. They fell where they stood.

Anastas lowered his hand.

He was surprised . He could feel it—the surprise bubbling beneath his skin, the questions forming in his mind. But he pushed them down vowing to remove them entirely before he saw Dax again.

There would be time for questions later.

Now was not that time.

"Necromancer!"

The word passed through the bandits' ranks like a plague. Terror washed across their faces. Some dropped their weapon while others simply ran.

The guards face carried immense shock.

Why is he this strong? The thought raced through his mind as he pressed his forehead to the cold earth. Is everyone in the Wyvern Squad this strong? It was said Master Anastas was a rank six mage… but this pressure goes far deeper.

Before the bandits could flee, the three pierced by the bone spur rose to their feet.

Strange markings appeared on their bodies—etched into skin, into bone. Their eyes glowed with the same white light that had filled Anastas's own and thier blades grew dark with the same runes etched on the bone spur.

They turned on their brothers.

And cut them down like cabbages.

There was no hesitation. No mercy. Their power seemed multiplied, their movements precise, their purpose absolute. Bandit after bandit fell, and those who fell rose again, and those who rose joined the slaughter.

The bandit leader watched his people die.

Within minutes, all of them were gone. All except him.

Anastas's hair—half black, half white since the day the team had first met him turned deep black.

He smiled.

It was a genuine smile, playful and innocent.

"Haha… Captain is too generous."

To the bandit leader, kneeling in the blood of his comrades, that smile was the most terrible thing he had ever seen.

To the guard, still pressed against the earth, that smile was the face of Godfall's future.

Anastas turned away from the carnage.

As the army of dead bandits overpowered their leader adding him to Anastas army of the dead.

Such power? It's like it's is a part of my body."He tried to remove the crown but couldn't so he let it be.

"Let's go jasper we still have a long way." He called the guard playful.

Mother, brother I'll definitely arrive today beneath his smile was perplexity.