Midnight RPG - Chapter 31.110

It is the evening on the 24th day of Sahaad. Kyuad walks over a large, twisted and dead tree. Behind him Durgaz, Eranon, and Zal'Kazir walk in the opposite direction, into the dark night to the north.

The conversation with Durgaz had went well, but it sapped Kyuad to have held on to who he is for so long. Now walking alone, he relaxes his mind and reopens his third eye, seeing the world around him in all its painful confusion.

The First

Kyuad walks along the forest floor, back toward the site of the worst of the carnage from the days before. As he passes over the bodies, he inspects each one carefully for the spirital markers that tell him a soul is still bound to the flesh. Some of these he deals with by the blade, with mercy, to see the spirit off to the only freedom it can know.

Then, he stops at the body of a large orc, and kneels.

The mouth of the orc is agape, and into it Kyuad rests a handful of small, black gems. He then rests a translucent finger on the throat of the orc and says "Battau chakira."

The body of the orc jerks and convulses, and Kyuad looks into the air just above the orc. His gaze then quickly draws upward and he mumbles, "Even you deserve release."

The body of the orc then shakes and arches back, arms twisted behind it, and a black glow rapidly spreads from the mouth over the rest of the body.

Then, the orc rises to his feet.

With a crack, the jaw slips back open and begins to move, spilling out the gems to the forest floor. "Maaasstteeeerrrr..."

Gathering

The lurching orc corpse, now animated through its consumption of the stuff of life itself, drags another orc body into the pile. Kyuad sets down his book and says in Orcish, "That is enough, Vantic. Stop and wait."

"This should be enough, I believe," Kyuad says to himself. As he stands, he reaches for his scythe. "Vantic, hold very still." With one motion, Kyuad takes the head off of the orc's corpse, leaving it to crumble to the ground. "These shall have to be fit for travel if they are to be of any use to me."

Kyuad moves from one orc to the next, placing gems in the eyes or mouth of each one. Then one by one, he reaches down and touches the foreheads of each corpse, saying the same words in Safati, "Battau chakira."

By the time he has spoken the arcane words to the corpse of the last orc, the first in the line rises, flesh hanging like sea weeds on driftwood, revealing stark, dry bone beneath the remains and armor of the creature. The eyes now hollow in the fleshless face, no sound coming from the quiverring jaw.

"You are now Vantic." Kyuad motions to each, assigning a new moniker to each. "Jabartik, Gekn, Jobobr, Zeker, and Gonor are your new names. Follow me.

"You no longer serve the demons of greed and hate, you now serve us."

Building

The skeletal orcs work hard clearing an area in the woods where Kyuad can work. The trees have been moved back, cut up, or moved to make a barrier around the location. From outside, it appears that the trees have all fallen in a huge pile - but from Gekn's vantage point on the top of a large log, it is clear that this is a tall wall, not a pile.

"Gekn, remove that corpse from the branch and throw it out," Kyuad calls up to the skeleton. Kyuad stands in the center of the clearing, arranging purified food on a makeshift pedistal. Two skeletons in the edge of the clearing have gathered weapons, armor, and arrows from the bodies in the area. Another still toils outside the wall, moving bodies into a pile many yards from the clearing.

"Vantic, stop and come. Find long, thin wood for poles." Kyuad waits as the skeleton walks over the wall, into the woods. "Gekn, I need a large stone. Jobobr, help Gekn carry stone to me." Kyuad continues making notes.

When the skeletons all return with supplies, they construct a scaffold and a stone table in the center.