Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead

"You wouldn't happen to also be in the business of bat hunting, would you?" it was a tall and lean woman, barely any shorter than Loimos, she appeared rather frail but she just casually turned the undead to meet face to face.

She smiled at him, the skeleton did not know her but he could certainly recognise her apparel, dressed mostly in brown, a long mantle seemingly hiding a variety of items and gadgets.

"Bat?" he asked, taking notice of her odd glasses, which lenses were currently flipped up and out of their sockets, allowing one a clear view of her odd, pink eyes, which seemed to be looking straight through Loimos.

"Yes, bats, I am certain that this ahooling thingy is a bat, an undead bat might I add! I have been on a great hunting spree, and all has led me to Dschungelland, to Laba, I thought you would be in the same boat, what brings you here then?" she was awfully quick to start asking questions, getting comfortable with this total stranger with unrivalled swiftness.

"I was hired to hunt the creature, a family member of one of the past victims, who has since moved out of this country, saved up money to get someone to kill the beast, but are you saying that it is undead? I do not see why an undead creature would bother abducting people" calmly pushing her hand away, that had still been firmly stuck to his shoulder, he threw a question right back at her.

Clearly, there was something more to this lone vampire hunter, not just her eyes, but he could sense that her life force was somewhat different than normal, although all death hunters had firmer life within them, they could resist death in greater capacity than others.

Hers however, there was an odd nature to it, but he could not discern what this meant just by sensing it.

The death hunter just stared at him with a smirk, extending her right hand toward him.

"Clearly, you aren't very familiar with the dead, but we both want the same thing, I just want one less undead, and you want your mission completed, what do you say? Let's work together!" she grabbed his hand without waiting for an answer, pretty much saying that it was not an option to deny her.

'That is odd' Loimos was able to make out an odd noise, the subtle sound of something grinding as he shook the huntress's hand, slightly squeezing it harder than necessary, he did not notice anything else that was wrong.

The two began walking through the small town.

"I am Rummy, what is your name? I don't think I ever heard of you before, but you must have some notoriety to be hired as a first choice on such a quest" clicking her glasses on, continuously smiling at Loimos.

"Golpilz, I try to keep a low profile when needed, but that client knew me personally" he lied as easily as he did not breathe, Rummy raising her eyebrows and nodding, making the undead question something.

"Golpilz? Nice name, I have already gathered a team of locals, and here are two of my fellow vampire hunters, who I dragged along using force"

Before them, a group of eight people stood, the locals were comprised of all manners of people, although half of them were beastfolks with canine attributes, and not faint attributes, one of them straight up had a wolf's head, although that was all he had on the beast side, no tails and such.

As for the rest, they had many parts of their bodies like those of dog-like creatures, but none quite as noticeable as that man, it might be a little insulting to some, but they were here to serve as search dogs.

The three others, two demons with long, prehensile monkey-like tails, they seemed to be siblings as they stuck close to one another, their build implied that they could manoeuvre the dense woods with more ease than the rest.

The last was a human, he might not seem like much compared to the rest, but he was instrumental in getting them to Laba, the densest part of Dschungelland was not close-by even still, and as such, they needed to be flown there to avoid having to traverse the treacherous greenery, this man was in charge of that as not just anyone could pilot the hot air balloons.

These vehicles of the sky had rather poor commands, and needed to be kept steady at all times, any inclination of the flying ship could lead to a catastrophe.

Without bothering with presentations, for Rummy herself hadn't asked anyone for their names, she urged everyone to get on the vessel right at this instant, the wood shaking a bit as everyone stepped on, but quickly stabilising on everyone was on.

Twisting a few things, the conductor filled up four balloons, the two other death hunters stayed silent as they looked off into the distance, the locals discussing amongst themselves, seemingly unafraid of what they were getting themselves into.

Expeditions to hunt down the beast had been numerous in the past, and none had been able of catching sign of its existence, as if it only ever existed on the nights it hunted down the people, naturally, the locals only saw this as a good occasion of making some money and riding on hot air balloons free of charge.

Rummy was all smiles, looking down as they were lifted up from the ground, Loimos acted as though he was looking in the distance, but he really was debating something, it was rare but the undead was having a dilemma, both options weighted just as heavily as the other.

Rising up, they soon began moving, headed directly for Laba, which would be a few days of travel away, even when going uninterrupted in a line.

Loimos looked at each of the living around, what he wondered about was simple, should he kill them, or not? To avoid any suspicion to fall on the undead, maintaining his role was favourable, but he suspected that Rummy had already seen through his deception and was just playing along.

Standing just a few steps away from her, if he used the portion of stack he had learned to utilise coupled with everything else he knew, he could tackle right into her back, throwing her right off the ship, then quickly shooting her with multiple piercing drops of blood.

Somehow, he doubted that this would work as well as it might appear at first.

'Ahool could help' he thought, indeed, from the moment he had heard what this feared beast sounded like, he knew that allies could be found here.

Named after its yell, Ahool was one of the beasts changed into a vampire by Vespertillo, The Night Flier. Experience more on empire