Unknown Cave...
In an unknown cave, hidden deep beneath the forest, where even the birds refuse to perch.
The air was thick and stale, heavy with the stench of decay and old blood.
Strange runes glowed dimly along the jagged walls,
Pulsating in eerie rhythm as if echoing a heartbeat that didn't belong to the living.
At the centre of the cavern stood Eberius, his face half-concealed beneath a tangled curtain of unwashed hair.
The visible side bore a long, jagged burn mark that twisted his skin and gave him a feral, manic appearance.
Before him lay 50 corpses—
Lined neatly, pale, and stiff.
Their lifeless eyes stared blankly into nothing, awaiting the cruel breath of false life.
A circle had been drawn in blood and bone dust, with grotesque markings that shimmered faintly under the torchlight.
Eberius's Grimoire, floating beside him, fluttered open slowly to a page stained with both age and essence.
Unlike typical magic, his grimoire didn't emit a strong glow or aura—
Instead, it oozed an unsettling presence, as if the book itself were decaying.
Eberius didn't possess conventional magical casting abilities.
His Zombie Magic required a ritual—
A slow, deliberate process using runes, sacrifices, and dead bodies.
Each step was carved into the cavern floor, etched in blood from the criminals he'd sacrificed to gain power.
He stared down at the corpses and spoke in a gravelly, hoarse voice:
"From five to fifty… It's taken me so long."
His burnt hand twitched as he held up a bone knife, still fresh with dark, clotted blood.
"To break each limit… I had to kill twice the number of the dead I wanted to raise. For fifty… I offered up one hundred lives. Criminals, all of them. Thieves, killers… no one will miss them."
The shadowy figure behind him—
Red eyes and a wide, toothy grin—
Slithered closer through the gloom.
Its voice slithered like oil on water:
"Yesss… You've fed the ritual well, Eberius. Just a little more… and your army will walk."
The circle began to glow—
red, then green, then a sickly grey.
The corpses twitched, their muscles spasming.
Slowly, their pale skin began to turn ashen, veins darkening, eyes clouding into a dead white.
Some let out low groans as their bodies reanimated—
Mindless and obedient.
Eberius raised his hand and whispered:
"Rise, my puppets… Show the nobles their graves are closer than they think."
All around him, the undead rose—
Jerky at first, then steady.
Fifty new monsters—
Soulless shells filled with dark intent—
Stood awaiting his next command.
The shadow grinned wider, its whisper crawling into Eberius's mind:
"Soon… let's march them into the cities… into the hearts of the nobles. Let them feel despair."
Eberius's twisted smile stretched.
HAHAHAHA!
"This is only the beginning."
Suddenly, the cave trembled ever so slightly—
Not from any physical quake, but from the surge of dark energy radiating from the shadow figure.
It burst into laughter—
A cruel, high-pitched sound that echoed through the walls like shrieking metal.
"INTERESTING! INTERESTING!"
The malicious glee in its voice was unmistakable,
Its glowing red eyes widening, and its fanged grin stretching to impossible proportions.
Eberius, standing mid-ritual, froze.
"____"
His eyes narrowed, suspicion flashing behind his curtain of hair.
Slowly, he turned to look at his disturbing companion,
Whose laughter still echoed with a kind of unhinged amusement.
"What are you on about?"
Eberius muttered coldly, his voice barely more than a growl.
The shadow spun in place with unsettling grace and then leaned closer toward Eberius, its grin never fading.
"One of our little trap has been triggered… Not one of the deadly ones, mind you. Just a whisper… a whisper that tells me someone is sniffing around our nest."
Eberius's brow twitched.
"Who? A random traveller?"
"Oh no… not random,"
The shadow hissed, its voice dripping with excitement.
"Someone powerful. Someone curious. Someone... getting closer."
The torches in the cave flickered.
Eberius clenched his fists.
"How close?"
The shadow's eyes gleamed.
"Close enough to make you sweat."
A heavy silence followed.
"____"
"They're searching the forest,"
The shadow added.
"Like bloodhounds. They don't know exactly where we are… yet. But they're determined. And if they keep digging…"
Eberius stepped back, his eyes sweeping over the reanimated corpses now fully standing and still.
"Then let them come,"
He said, his voice low and venomous.
"Let them come and see what we've prepared. If they survive, perhaps they're worth watching. If not… they'll serve me better as corpses."
The shadow chuckled again, but this time lower, more controlled.
Chuckle~
"Just don't underestimate them."
Eberius warned.
"If it's who I suspect… then we may be facing something beyond what we've planned."
The shadow simply grinned.
"That's what makes it fun."
Suddenly,
Eberius raised both his hands, dark tendrils of ritual magic crackling around his fingertips as he gave a chilling command in a guttural voice that echoed through the cave:
"GO. HUNT. KILL THE INTRUDERS."
The 50 pale, lifeless figures behind him shuddered to life in unison.
Their heads snapped up, white eyes glowing faintly as if puppets pulled by invisible strings.
Without a sound, they turned and began marching out of the cavern's hidden paths into the forest—
Soulless, relentless, and bound to their master's will.
Meanwhile, outside the Forest...
Fuegoleon stood still, eyes narrowed.
His boot had pressed down on something—
A faint, arcane magic glyph etched into the mossy ground.
But it hadn't triggered anything.
"A detection glyph,"
He muttered, realising what it meant.
"They know we're here."
Fuegoleon crouched and examined the faint magical residue.
It was subtle, but deliberately placed—
Whoever laid this trap wasn't after killing intruders… they wanted to be warned.
"So this was planned…"
He thought grimly.
But his instincts screamed a moment too late.
In a flash, he jumped back,
Flames erupting beneath his feet to launch him away just as several razor-sharp, pale-blue crystals rained down from above like icy spears.
They embedded themselves in the earth with terrifying force, cracking stone and cleaving through trees.
Fuegoleon landed on a branch a few feet away, eyes scanning the canopy above.
But he saw—nothing.
No figure.
No shadow. No source.
"Whoever did this is using long-range projection magic... or worse, they're cloaked."
He activated his flame aura, igniting the air around him with searing heat as a countermeasure.
"COME OUT!"
He shouted into the silent forest, his voice booming.
"I KNOW YOU'RE THERE!"
But there was no answer.
Only the soft sound of twigs breaking… and more than one.
Fuegoleon's eyes sharpened. He turned slowly.
"Multiple footsteps. And they're not hiding their presence anymore."
Emerging from the mist and shadows were the first wave of Eberius's undead—
Their clothes tattered, bodies twisted and discoloured, but eerily intact.
Each bore a different expression in death—
Some screaming, some smiling, all utterly unnatural.
Fuegoleon's expression hardened.
"Undead?,"
He muttered.
"Then it's true… someone is using corpse-ritual magic."
He snapped his fingers.
Instantly, his body was engulfed in a towering vortex of flames.
"LION'S ROARING BARRAGE!"
A wave of searing fire rushed forward, consuming the first row of undead and turning them into ash.
But even as the smoke cleared… more came.
"There are too many. This wasn't a random summon—this was an army."
He tapped his communication crystal.
"This is Fuegoleon. I've made contact. The enemy is using corpse puppets. I repeat—hostiles are undead. And they're coming in numbers. Be on guard."
As the message was sent, he raised both hands, flames swirling around him like a living shield.
"Let's see how many I can turn to ash before I need backup…"
On Captain Charlotte Roselei side...
Flanked by Sol and a few elite Blue Rose knights, moved silently through the fog-draped forest.
Her vines snaked forward, scouting for traps or enemies.
Suddenly, her vines froze in mid-air.
"Stop,"
She ordered softly.
The moment her squad halted, the ground beneath them split open, and dark-purple spikes erupted upward.
Charlotte reacted instantly, summoning a dense wall of enchanted vines to block the attack.
"A trap? No… this magic… it's structured."
From the shadows stepped several undead, but these were different—
They wore what appeared to be tattered robes of fallen mages, and from their dead, emotionless mouths, they chanted spells.
A wave of Dark Binding Chains surged from one of the corpses, aimed straight for Sol.
"What the—!?"
Sol shouted.
Charlotte cut in, slashing through the chains with her own briar thorns.
"These undead… they're using magic from when they were alive."
Another undead cast Ice Prison, nearly freezing one of her knights on the spot.
Yet another raised a crumbling grimoire and muttered a fire spell that exploded in a flaming arc.
"This isn't just necromancy."
Charlotte said with narrowed eyes.
"This is… resurrection of former mages."
Her lips pressed into a tight line.
"These aren't puppets. They're weapons."
On Captain Yami's side...
Yami leaned on his sword, puffing lazily on his cigarette.
"Tch. Something stinks here."
Behind him, Finral was about to complain when suddenly—
The trees exploded in a burst of wind blades.
Yami blocked one with his katana and looked forward.
"Heh… You've gotta be kidding me."
Three undead walked out, one of them wearing the shattered armor of an old magic knight.
It raised a severed arm and fired a compressed ball of wind magic.
Another launched acid mist, while the third raised a shield of stone to block Yami's retaliation.
Yami grinned darkly.
"So these corpses can fight back? Guess I'll get to have some fun after all."
He unsheathed his blade and slashed horizontally:
"DARK CLOAKED—DIMENSION SLASH!"
The terrain split open, cutting through the stone shield and taking two of the undead with it.
"Finral!"
He called.
"Get back and keep your eyes open. These aren't your average creepers."
On Nozel's Team side...
Captain Nozel Silva, with Solid and several Silver Eagle mages, stood surrounded by undead.
But unlike before, the undead launched coordinated elemental spells—
A mix of water lances, wind pressure bursts, and poison fog.
"They're using squad-level tactics…"
Nozel murmured, shocked.
"Are these things… intelligent?"
Solid asked, voice shaking.
Nozel's eyes narrowed.
"No. But someone is controlling them very precisely."
He raised both hands.
"SILVER RAIN: MERCURIAL EXECUTION!"
Streams of liquid mercury turned into razor-sharp rain that pierced through several of the enemy mages, splattering the trees in silver.
But as more undead emerged, and a few showed signs of regenerating magic, even Nozel looked grim.
Meanwhile William's Team Side...
Even William and Langris were pushed back slightly when the undead began using Spatial and Plant-based magic,
Hinting that some of these mages might've been former squad members from long ago.
William gasped as he blocked a vine spear with his own World Tree Magic, muttering:
"They're mimicking my magic style…"
Langris, eyes wide and angry, snarled:
"Tch. How dare you mock our power?"
He fired spatial spheres that erased three undead in a blink.
Each captain realised the same terrifying truth:
"These undead aren't random. They're former mages… and someone has learned to revive them with their old magic."
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(Author's POV)
(A/N)Thanks for reading the chapter!
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