Lowlife, Scoundrel, Bandit Queen

Chapter 178 - 178 - Bones to pick

This certainly is an unpleasant development. It's not really a big surprise though. The town obviously isn't a flourishing settlement anymore after all. Something had to have happened and the people had to have disappeared somewhere. The real problem is, that whatever happened, I might be just about to step right into it. Not knowing is not really an option either though, thus I don't simply turn around and leave.

Instead I draw my sword and grab my buckler from my belt. The weight of these should feel reassuring, but for some reason the effect is rather lacking this time around. Will a sword and a shield be good enough to face whatever is waiting at the other end of that bridge? Right now a few comrades to watch my back would be nice. A powerful mage like Ediva, capable of blowing whole hordes of skeletons to smithereens maybe. Oh, who am I kidding, even just Núira, Aila and Rami of the Five Blades would make a difference.

I look over my shoulder. Nope, no one else to be seen. I'll have to face the music on my own. Except, am I really quite on my own? There is someone I can ask for a helping hand of sorts even if they aren't present in person. I take a deep breath and relax my stance a little, to place two fingers of the hand holding the buckler on the flat of my blade as I hold it out in front of me. I may be lacking a temple right now, but I hope my words reach my divine sponsor anyway.

"Fox, divine guardian of many masks! God of making mischief and goddess of having fun! I beg of you, hear my words, imbue this weapon with some of your power, so it may cut not just flesh and bone but spirit and soul as well!"

It's almost like I can hear Fox's childlike laughter at the very edge of my hearing and not just in my mind, as a little of my Karma, representing divine favor dissipates. At the same time I feel my [Prayer] skill and my [Blessing] skill improve ever so slightly.

I don't insult my divine patron by checking with my identification skill. I'm absolutely sure that my sword will do just a little extra damage for the next few hours. It may not be a grand difference, but to me it means the world.

I'm certainly more at ease as I resume my walk across the old bridge. I glance at the remains of the ancient dead in the water from time to time to make sure none of them get any ideas about ambushing me. It seems like I don't need to worry about that though. I smile a wry smile. Not yet anyway. If I were the ambusher I'd only make them crawl out of the water by the time I'm already at the gate of the fortification built onto the small island. A shiver runs down my spine, but a look back reassures me that none are cutting me off there either.

Maybe I'm worrying too much in general. Never mind though. I'd rather worry too much beforehand than have a nasty surprise later. Speaking of constructive worry, what are my escape routes?

The bridge is option umber one. It's the fastest unless it gets blocked. It probably would take more than a few skeletons to really trap me there, unless some of them are considerably more powerful than the one I dealt with last night. If it's just two or three of that caliber I could take them on, especially on the narrow bridge.

Option two would be swimming. Goodness gracious, I'm not looking forward to that. The water is just too cold to make for a pleasant swim. And it's rather shallow in between the island the shoreline too. Not shallow enough for me to wade through, but shallow enough that a giant skeleton might drag me down. Swimming across the lake on the other side? Away from my camp and the prepared firewood and all the extra gear in my pack? Nope, not happening. Well, not unless my life depends on it.

It really would be for the best if I don't have to make a run for it at all. If so though, the bridge is not just option number one but choice number one too. If that doesn't work out? I'll make it up s I go.

The number of giant skeletons in the water to either side of the bridge increases as I approach the rather narrow gate, it's not unlike the doorways in the other much smaller houses. If a battle was fought here as I assume taking this choke point cost a tremendous toll in blood. The obvious evidence makes me wonder about another aspect. The inhabitants of the settlement apparently didn't exactly win at best, but the dead cyclops warriors were never recovered from the water for a proper burial either. Could it have been once of those battles that knows no victor but only survivors, if there even were any at all?

As I catch myself stalling again I step through the stone arch before I can come up with any other excuses to waste even more time. As it turns out the wall is pretty thick, almost three paces in fact. Beyond it, it's almost like I'm back in the alleys in between the houses at the other end of the bridge. Except, there are some subtle and some more obvious differences.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

What looked like more houses from outside the wall is in fact more like a second wall altogether. There is no room in between them to squeeze through to get to the center and none have doorways on this side either. Together they force anyone entering to follow the wall at first. It would be my best guess that this path goes once almost completely around the island before the interior can be accessed, probably through another narrow gate like the one I just passed.

Where the other buildings lacked defensive construction elements, this part goes overboard with them and I don't like it. It feels like I'm being herded directly to my doom. Never mind how exactly said doom might look like. The only way it could be any more obvious would be if there were colorful arrows pointing the way I have to go, accompanied by promises of free food or the likes. And for plenty of people knowing that there is a trap waiting wouldn't make a difference. I'm not most people though.

I look over my shoulder to make sure I'm still alone. I strain my senses to their utmost to make sure I'm unobserved. My [Perception] skill improves another bit. It's one of my best skills and it's about halfway to the next level up now. Still I don't hear or see anything. That has to be good enough for me.

With a grin I take a short running start and jump to push off first of the massive wall on one side and then the secondary wall of the buildings on the inner side on the other. I keep going like that until I finally manage to grab the edge of very top of the building that is part of the inner barrier. I pull myself up just as my [Jumping] and [Climbing] skills make some progress as well.

The rooftop is thankfully intact. A quick glance tells me that all of the buildings constituting this inner wall are very much undamaged. Whatever knocked down the top floors of so many buildings over at the lake shore, it apparently didn't reach or affect this place.

That quick glance tells me something else too. No one else is up here. Most importantly, there is no one making sure that the mice don't cheat while navigating the labyrinth by climbing the walls. Ha! Still, I have to be careful, thus I lower myself down to crawl across the rooftop on my belly.

My first stop is the open hatch leading down into the upper floor of this building. It seems to have been some kind of storage building, a granary of sorts. It's full of large clay pots, lids still in place. Whatever is inside has most certainly gone bad anyway, but the place was well stocked when disaster struck. Either out of habit because the people living here were careful out of principle, or because they knew that something bad was about to happen and they prepared accordingly. Too bad it didn't help them in the end.

This time around, while I continue slithering across the rooftop to the edge on the inner side, my [Stealth] skill makes some progress. At the same time my [Danger Sense] makes itself known as well. The hair at the back of my neck suddenly standing on end, warning me of what may lie ahead. It seems I'm getting to the heart of it!

I can already hear someone talking before I even look. It's a female voice, of that I'm moderately certain, although it sounds a little raspy. More importantly though, after a moment of getting used to the old fashioned way of speaking I have no trouble as recognizing the spoken language as [Arngarm] and puzzling that out apparently is good enough to earn me a little progress for the skill. The speaker seems to be berating someone. Someone who doesn't speak in turn? It's a rather curious one sided argument for sure.

Finally I'm close enough to risk a look and what I get to see is quite the sight. First and foremost, most of the yard below is piled with bleached bones, mostly towards the edges, clumped tightly and almost entirely human or at least human sized. That's the most obvious thing. Almost as eye catching though, by contrast alone, is the woman sitting on a stone throne of extraordinarily fine craftsmanship towards the other end of the yard. Pale skin, short and unruly black hair and an elaborate black wizard's robe of some sort that clearly has seen better days. She is equipped with a staff just as elaborate as her robe, but that staff rests across her lap right now, as she is berating some skeletons, the undead kind, kneeling in front of her.

Oh, and how she is berating them! It's a good thing too that her attention is focused on the undead kneeling in front of her. Otherwise she would be in a prime position over there to notice me despite my best efforts. Well I can do something about that at least. Slowly I crawl away from the edge again until I'm pretty certain that I can't be discovered by chance anymore.

Then I start to circle around at the outer edges of the rooftops until I should be right behind her instead. It takes some time, but it's worth the effort. I decide to listen in some more, even though the strange wizard's voice is not easy on my ears.

"How can there be only five of you? There are supposed to be six! Six! And why don't you know where the last one is? It's not you stupid lugs are hard to miss! You and you, go back out and find that idiot! I swear if he got himself stuck someplace narrow again … ugh … The rest of you, guard the entrance, in case we have some adventurous rats again."

The animated skeletons, all of the cyclops kind, shuffle off without protest to follow their new orders. I can hear them moving about easy enough. This reassures me a little. No way is one of those actually going to sneak up on me.

It seems the woman is not yet done with her rant though.

"Goodness gracious! Some days I wonder why I put up with you boneheads! Get moving! Show a little more enthusiasm!"

Hidden on the rooftop I roll my eyes. The answer is pretty clear to me. You have to put up with undead minions because anyone who can actually rub two brain cells together would have run for the hills long ago instead of putting up with you. And how exactly are reanimated skeletons supposed to show enthusiasm anyway?

It takes some serious effort to refrain from sighing. People like this woman probably are the reason why necromancers are not well liked in most places, despite the fact that I can clearly see skeleton workers being pretty useful in various fields of work. My mind wanders to the stone chair, the throne she is sitting on. Could this be the reason for the frontier's undead problem? A necromancer sitting on a throne? Possibly without even knowing what effects this has?