The sheer wind of Miina's hurricane blade made it near-impossible for the dragons to stay aloft for long, forcing them to stay grounded and vulnerable for the time being. Galahad and his halberd came screeching down from the sky, the velocity of his dive breaking through the red mage's winds and planting the tip of the halberd straight into the throat of the pack's leader.

Blighted as they were, the dragons still possessed enough animal instinct to understand the death of a packmate, and howled in fury, the two closest rearing back to ready gouts of flame from their mouths. But that was literally cut short as Izayoi blurred into motion, reappearing in front of one dragon to slash its throat open before the collective fire of a half dozen gunshots crashed into the skull of the other, both dragons crumpling to the dirt.

Further incensed, the remaining dragons lunged with flame on the tips of their mouths, unleashing three streams of fire that forced Izayoi to fall back, the flames rushing towards Galahad next, as if attempting to box in him. Two more came lumbering towards Miina, having recognized the source of the wind that was keeping them on foot.

All the while, a figure further up the mountain watched the events below, wisps of sickly green aether at their fingertips.

___



One dog sniffed the air, and began barking incessantly. The rest followed.

"They've got a scent!"

"Must be nearby, I can hardly keep them on the leash-" That particular Valheimr was cut off by the hound he was handling managing to lunge forward with enough force to loosen its master's grip on its leash, letting it free to charge forward. Straight up the hill.

The raid captain swore furiously under her breath, signing for the the rest of her men and the Kirins to ready up. It was evident what she was going to do: engage while they still had the advantage of the high ground, before the Valheimr could make their way up the slope.

With scant few moments before the jig was up regardless, one of the raiders poked his head up over the ridge, sighted the charging hound before the Valheimr could get a handle on what they were seeing, and opened fire.

"AMBUSH!"

"Open fire! For Skael!"

With two dragons now approaching her, there was no way that Miina could keep the suppressing gale up. She'd be forced to keep dodging at best until they could be put down and that would only increase the complexity massively, if she even had the attention to spare. It had served its main purpose; it wasn't three against a swarm of flying blighted hellbeasts free to strafe them constantly with fire or lightning or some strange blighted alternative.

It had to be dropped.

The redhead licked her lips, only having moments to run through some sort of plan. Just abandon it to dissipate and fall back on standard spells? That would be insufficient, her repertoire simply didn't have the immediate firepower to deal with two dragons. It basically needed Izayoi or Galahad to intervene and they had their own problems. Miina couldn't engage in melee in any capacity against people, so dragons were even further out of the question.

Miina could haste herself and dodge, sneaking in spells here and there. Make it a battle of attrition, maybe drop one of them before the others were done. It was simple; it was safe; it was something she'd demonstrated plenty of times before.

Ears folded back and body lowered, Miina prepared to dispel the vortex but—

She was still actively maintaining it. She still controlled it, and it wasn't destabilised entirely of its own accord yet. She could use it instead.

Tighter, tighter, tighter; pull in the spiral and rein it back in, back towards her. Focus the wind as tight as she dared, until it threatened to pull her from her near-crouch and the dragons were upon her. No longer a hurricane, more a shrieking extension of her sword, swung to intersect with the monsters.

A feral grin split her face. Just enough time to swing, then to throw herself aside and watch what it did.

Would this just knock them about? Or was it strong enough to tear into the blighted monsters? How could wings meant to catch the wind fare against against the entire force of a storm?

He had gotten maybe thirty meters into the bush when the first crack of the rifles sounded, and nearly bit his own tongue off when his teeth, naturally, ground against eachother in an a frustrated, helpless seethe against it all. Damned good-for-nothing threadweaver of fate! This was why he never asked Ithar for anything!¹

A small tuft of white powder rose as Rudolf ground his heels into the earth beneath, wrenching his path of egress around to the left, muttering a few other untargeted invectives to those whose will he ostensibly meant to defend— even if the bubble had in the end popped early, there was still a sound use case for the previous idea. The rising voices of the Skaellish outriders engaging the search party were directly behind him still, meaning that the Valheimr were, more or less, going to be entangled in the original net they'd set up— hindsight being what it was, this would be a lot simpler if he'd just held position to begin with. Blunder. Careless.

The shadows of the forest had grown longer still in those tense pair of minutes. True to his evasion plan, now they were deep and broad enough to dive into— and dive he did, flitting between the trees as he drew a long arc around the circumference of the hill, an eventide shade of the woods. Fundamentally, the best thing he could now do would be changing direction in this manner; where he had meant to pop up behind the other Kirins and rejoin the group properly once he'd thrown off any tails, now he would wing around behind the mass of the ill-fated blackhelms, swords drawn, and split their guard if not outright wall off their retreat from the ambush.

Sink through, spring out. Sink through, spring out.

There was a rhythmic element to it, when you tabled the arcane conundrum of melting away into darkness while retaining your sense of self-distinction. Magic was rarely ever considered so physical in Edren², not beyond applications of materia— but as he pulled his arc tighter, faster, changing dozens of meters down into doubles at a time, Rudolf almost felt more a bounding animal, closing in on prey, than any manner of mage as they were known by most of his country. He almost felt he understood Miina a little better, in some uncertain way, tying together the familiar martial conditioning with the esoteric whims and means of magecraft. Something about the unity of opposites? It'd tickle him to keep finding ways to push the alchemy metaphor.

Or maybe the Rakshasa, to speak of man mantling a hunting tiger...³

"For Skael!" a voice sounded out, as he appeared between the ring of pines just beyond the treeline. Even if the swordsman's relationship with the god of fortune had clearly cratered to the point he half-believed this boondoggle was somehow his own doing, at least Ilias's winds still guided him true.

His knife freed itself from the beltline, Anders' greatsword from the back. Bursting forth from the trees, Rudolf's flanking arc had taken him to the far side of the ridge, instantly sighting them all— panicked, under the hail of fire from the raiders, desperately trying to regain their bearing on the situation. It was an honestly very familiar sight; were they not so by necessity at odds, Rudolf figured he and his empathy'd have no great trouble feeling sorry for them.

But by that same measure, if he hated surprises this much, it stood to reason that they would too.

"Solitude! Balmung!" he bellowed, answering the rallying cry and announcing himself as he surged into the back ranks and set his swords loose, a one-man arm of the sudden pincer envelopment.

---

---

• _{1. : )}
• _{2. I'm not kidding when I say it, yov need to retvrn. This is a terrible state of affairs to have let things reduce to. There were Gods walking among you people once, you know that?}
• _{3. Don't let the furries hear about this one. Skirting the line with this upjumped jaguar warrior shit as the Sagramori are, a legend about an actual evil tiger guy eating the weak and the excommunicado is going to be, I ask no forgiveness in saying it, catnip to them.}

---

While Dragoon armor was, in a way made to resist attacks from dragons, he certainly wouldn't be resisting the flaming breaths of three dragons. Blighted or unblighted, he was liable to get cooked alive in his armor if he didn't immediately catch flame. He caught a rapidly closing gap of air as the flames closed in around him and dove through it, flame heating his armor to a temperature a bit more toasty than comfortable, and the edges of his sash burning for good measure. He could feel a few blisters from the heated armor against his body already starting to form, but ignored it for now. He had bigger issues.

Miina had drawn back the vortex to fend off a pair of dragons going for her. He certainly didn't blame her for it- defending oneself was necessary, but that left them with three, unhappy, no longer grounded dragons. He looked at the dragons. The dragons looked back at him. Then at each other. One of them beat its wings. Then a second.

"Oh no you don't." Galahad grunted as he ran forward and leaped, throwing his halberd down into the wing leather of the third dragon still on the ground, to pin it down there. Instead of going straight up, he dove straight at the first dragon, its maw opening up to loose a breath of blighted fire. Galahad's arm found the dragon's neck as he grabbed and vaulted himself onto the back of its neck, grabbing its head horns as he jerked the head to face the second airborn dragon just as the gout of fire loosed from its maw.

---

It seemed nothing ever went right going up against these barbarians, be it by whatever unholy machinations they came up with, or as it was in this case, by fate. Reconnaissance in force it was. The Skaelan fireteam opened up nearly as one at their captain’s command, who was filling the role that Éliane was typically used to. In that regard, she did little else but to reiterate that, and she found herself realizing that she was almost in the position of political officer now, in a spot just a little further back of her force trying to see or root out if any of the good Skaelans on her side were actually enemies of the state.

It was a cheerful thought.

Nonetheless, Éliane’s own rifle joined the fusillade as she worked the bolt, cracking out several shots into the charging Valheimians. From the corner of her eye, she also saw Rudolf maneuvering into place before engaging. Approving of the move, she gave a different command. “Friendly left! Watch your fire!”

Pausing from firing to lob an explosive down the hill, she added to the rallying cry with “Skael never falters!” as she planted another shot center mass into another barbarian invader.

---

He wasn't entirely certain if 'a hunting party trying to find Miina's brother' entirely fit with worse or not, but he was almost insulted that the thing making it all go wrong right at the start wasn't even related to their current mission. He had pulled Chisato along with him off to the side, able to easily observe what was going on without getting caught in any crossfire, purely on the hope that there might be some way to turn it around to their gain. Instead—

Shots rang out as the Skaeller force opened fire on the shocked Valheimer hunting party, one of the hounds dropping to the snow in a heap. As much as he would have preferred that everything stayed completely quiet, as with everything, the best-case scenario was an impossibility—and now they had to make sure the hunting party wouldn't be able to call back in to whichever of the forward bases they were operating from. Furthermore, if he had to guess, it would leave them on a yet-more truncated timetable; even without the assumption of foul play, if a single party like this was confident enough to range so apparently far away from their bases, then either they were absolute fools or the invaders were plenty comfortable with their current surroundings. Assuming the worst, then, it would stand to reason that if there was no contact at all a search party may go out to determine what happened, on higher guard than the first.

Which would, of course, give them plenty of opportunity to cross paths with a small force of Skaeller raiders.

"Chisato, let's help them mop this mess up quickly," he grumbled. "Take down anybody you see with a radio first, we don't want their handlers getting wind of this yet." Pistol drawn, he sprinted towards where Rudolf had just announced himself, before rising over the ridge and firing at whichever of the closest few invaders looked to be carrying the most gear.

"Very well."

This is, after all, what I wanted to do in the first place. There is no reason to hesitate when I was ready to kill Valheim's dogs from the very beginning.

I tilt my body forward, one hand sliding to the hilt of my blade---

And then I throw myself towards the patrol.

It's trivial. It's simple. There's no way that they're prepared enough for another angle of attack when they've already been ambushed. They clearly were not pursuing our patrol, and thus they are not prepared for us as opponents.

I will take full advantage of this.

But first, I need to locate the radio.

As the figures of the Valheim dogs loom closer in the darkness, my eyes rush over their forms. I have to take in their equipment as quickly as possible, to register my target before he can understand what is occurring.

Sword. Rifle. Dagger. None of those weapons are what I am looking for.

---There. The black object gripped in one gloved hand, raising towards the soldier's mouth.

He is within reach. A few paces away.

My legs tighten as I hurl myself forward. I won't allow him to contact any reinforcements.

He opens his mouth as I reach him. His eyes shift, I can see his gaze coming to rest on my form.

He was not likely prepared to be attacked so immediately. Near the center of their formation, even in the chaos of an ambush, he likely believed he had a moment to contact his allies.

My sword descends, and in a stream of crimson his hand is parted from his wrist, carrying his communications device with it.

I do not allow him to scream.

Izayoi's blade tore through the dragons that Galahad distracted, Blighted blood spurting from severed heads and wings. The dragoon's efforts had made them easy meat, and they didn't have much time left. Miina's hurricane blade shredded the remaining dragons' wings, grounding them if not leaving one writhing in pain, completely disabled. The remaining two forced themselves up to their feet, preparing to charge Miina...

...When a beam of lightning tore through the duo, piercing through their chests. The dragons fell silently, dead before they hit the ground. A black blade crashed into the remainder, ripping them to pieces in moments. When the dust settled, General Garland stood alone, planting his great cleaver into the earth as he raised his hands in a gesture of...peace?

"Stay your blades, Warriors of Light. Consider that effort just now to be an effort of good faith on my part."

"Oh? 'Tis hardly been a day since we've fought. And now you wish to parlay?" Izayoi snarled, pacing around the Valheimr general. Who looked to be in much better condition. Either he had a second set of armor, or it was repaired extremely quickly. His helmet tilted in what seemed to be amusement, his tone wry.

"Come, now. It took your entire number to face me on even terms, and here you are at half strength. I hold the cards here, General." The helmet's yellow gaze tilted to regard Miina, and then Galahad.

"I've come to believe we share a common enemy within Solitude. I wish to negotiate with both you and whatever of Skael's leadership they wish to risk. For the time being, I consent to being your prisoner." Which he seemed entirely and likely justifiably unconcerned with. Magic alone meant that it was impossible to disarm him fully. "Land us outside of Falcon's Nest, for the peace of mind of however many of the Seven have survived." He knew, clearly.

Izayoi frowned at the demands disguised as surrender, but held her peace, instead looking to Galahad. Meanwhile, Garland spoke one last time.

"In order to convey how dire this situation is, I will even surrender some of my information freely right now." He looked dead in the eyes of all three Kirins, his tone grave.

___



The ambush was perfect. The Valheimr patrol had been expecting a lone runner, not an entire skirmisher squadron backed by hardened warriors from afar. They fell to a man, Chisato's quick disabling of the commsman halting any ability they had to call for help from long range. As the last of the hounds were felled by a concentrated volley of fire, silence reigned over the snowy expanse for a moment.

And only a moment, as a pair of crimson tufts of fur peeked out from the trees.

"Woah, don't shoot, don't shoot! I'm not one of them!" A voice cried out, tinged with stress and exhaustion. A redhaired and furred mystrel slowly made his way down from the tallest tree in the area. Once he made it to solid ground, the similarities to Miina were more than apparent.

"Skaelers? Oh, thank the gods. As long as you're not Valheimr, I'll take it. Listen, it's been hell for a week now. You've got no idea what it took to get out of that city and past the blackhelms' quarantine. Get me the hell out of here, please. I'll take to whatever superiors you want, they need to know anyway. You've got to tell them:"

___

From miles on miles away, two voices spoke the same words at coincidentally the exact same time.

"Solitude is a city of the dead now."

Oh, that was even better than she expected – perhaps not easily repeatable, but it could disable dragons, and if they were grounded and wounded that left her plenty more options. Even if they were charging her, they had exposed injuries, and suddenly the size and thick hide didn't mean anywhere near as much—

Or someone else could come in and do it for her. With far more force than Miina could quite imagine herself bringing to bear. That was…

"I d-didn't need the help," the mystral sighed, straightening, "Th-There was something… n-nevermind."

What tension remained in Miina's body drained as the general called for peace. Strange tack for one of the invaders to be taking, even if he was telling the truth. The Kirins in general had spent months fighting Valheim at every turn, damaging their hold on the main occupation, thwarting another conquest attempt, and generally running into their turncoat at every corner. The amount of resources wasted on the half dozen of them alone generally demanded retribution, even before counting the cost of their interference.

Garland was right, though; the fight wasn't in their favour. Izayoi and Galahad might be able to keep him busy in combat, if he hadn't healed up just as much as they had, but she would be their only ranged support. There was more versatility in magic than gunfire, but she had much less force than a sudden cannon, and he was a mage too. Fighting for long enough to make an escape was completely doable, but a victory? Well… not one where everyone was alive and whole, she'd predict.

Besides, this wasn't really personal for her. Even the Blight was just something that was… there. Well, she cared a little that Izayoi did find it personal, but…

If Valheim was going to stay out of her way or actually help for the time being, then Miina was perfectly fine with it. Doubly in this case; what he was promising was much more interesting than just another fight to the death against an enemy commander. As was, honestly, being able to work with Garland for any length of time and study what he did; other mages were always so useful. Even ones buried in more armour than she could lift.

"D-Dead? Mmm… all k-killed, or not staying dead?" she asked, tilting her head. Was that even possible? Well, maybe; if it was happening then it had to be possible, and the question was 'how' and also 'can I go see?'.

"You've given a lot of people the runaround, Zeke Malina," A tightly levelled-off voice sounded from the bottom of the ridge, as the departed black iron swordsman marched up to rejoin the group. Rudolf had slammed into the tail end of the search party about as well as he could have hoped— the deep tracks his boots in the snow flanked by flecks of fresh crimson, running down the length of his sword and knife. Within the helm, his furrowed brow had yet to loosen.

Cresting the summit, his coppered gaze flickered off Miina's suddenly-discovered brother to try and meet the gazes of the assembled Skaelers, almost to a man Solitude native. Forget the impulse to hogtie the slippery bastard until they could keep him still long enough to give their long-suffering Red Mage a good reunion; if the guy spoke truly, there was a real chance that their immediate mission here was about to severely reshuffle its set of priorities— if not fly off the rails in totality.

It was hard not to linger on Eliane's face, in particular, as the words "A city of the dead" echoed through all their minds. Each mental refrain was like a flame licking at the back of his skull, branding it— rationally speaking, the immediate presumption to make was that this was the reason Solitude had gone off the record to begin with, all the way back when Kayliss had first shared the information in Edren. The ongoing state of affairs that preceded any intervention on the Kirins' behalf. But was psychology ever rational?

They had been detoured for weeks since crossing the border. The weight of that time, in this new context... Zeke had just said it had been hell for a week, not multiple. If Rudolf thought back to what they were doing a week ago...

The flames at the back of his mind surged a little.¹ Context. They needed more context.

"But that's vague. Vague and a pretty alarming claim. Let's tackle elaborating first." he continued, not moving to restrain the mystrel as he drew to a halt. Truth be told, Zeke was a picture of the man on the run he'd come to expect, once you got past the striking similarity to his little sister. Rudolf was fairly certain he could run the redhead down if he bolted— eyes bloodshot and baggy, thin-boned... and not smiling. Miina said he always smiled. There was room for breaking of mold, given the magnitude of the crisis he was putting forth. As well, it wasn't shocking that the fond memories she had didn't line up with the shady image that day perusing Osprey's seedy underbelly had cobbled together. He could allow for extenuating circumstances like that a half-step, but given everything² that had happened to the group since that day of tailing cold leads...

He did not raise his blades, but he didn't sheathe them either.

"What exactly is Valheim quarantining? They're plying necromancy in there and it got out of control, or..."

...Had the city just up and lost all corporeal form, in a single night, leaving only malevolent shades?³

---

---

• _{1. So is it more or less fucked up if you don't at least commit to the bit in full if that's true?}
• _{2. Loki. I'm with your instincts. I've basically become your instincts. Loki wants you to take her to your superiors. Calling it.}
• _{3. That would be exceedingly difficult for a bunch of reasons, which we do NOT have the fucking time to list out right now. I'm chatty, I'm not long-winded. I would significantly doubt infamously secular southerners Solitudeners would manage to remotely stumble upon a way to accidentally the population across the veil. Let alone pull it off.}

---

"You'll forgive us for being just a touch suspicious." Galahad grunted as he too circled Garland, opposite of Izayoi so they were on either side of him at any one time should things degrade into a fight. He drew his halberd back into his hand and flicked the tip at the ground to remove the ichor and dragonsblood as he eyed the general warily. "Or that we'll just trust you at your word. For some reason- on the tip of my tongue, I couldn't tell you why- every bone in my body tells me to kill you. A common enemy? Very convenient." He growled.

Though, as much as he hated to admit it, as little as he wanted to back down. He doubted Izayoi, Miina and he could do little more to Garland then go down in a blaze of glory- which, while perhaps more morally satisfying, would leave the Kirins, and the continent in a much worse state. The dragoon's helmet looked past Garland and to Izayoi. He sighed, and nodded. Better to find out what Garland knew than to go down fighting and dying, at least today anyway. The halberd tip lowered, just a fraction, still ready to come up at a moment's notice.

"Speak then. What have you to say that would be so dire that you'd be willing to 'surrender'?"

---

The answer to his previous wonderings, as the red-haired Mystrel opened his mouth, was most definitely 'worse' this time. He raised a hand, signalling the team that had been assigned to them to keep back and make a wide circle around the few of them in the center. Harried and exhausted as the continent-traipsing rogue looked, Esben wasn't about to give him the chance to try and run off again.

He came up a step or two behind Rudolf, eyes fixed on Zeke, lowered pistol still in hand. Quarantine. One of the Valheimer patrol had said the same. City of the dead, that was new, and fanciful beyond all but the wildest tales that were often told. Necromancy was rare enough as it was to have slipped more or less into mythical status, at least in Skael. That Valheim had been able to make use of such magic as that when creating Siren was shocking enough, not to mention a massive affront against all that was right in the world.

But that was one person. One small part of a small project. Not an entire city. To convert such a population to undeath, whether or not they were suborned to any necromancer's will, was inconceivable. More likely would be some sort of plague, or a biological weapon gone wrong. Experimenting with the Blight, maybe, trying to weaponize it rather than it just being a side-effect of their conquest—Valheim would almost have to quarantine the area if something went wrong in that way, just to protect all their other interests. If that were the case, however...

"Nobody come closer than eight feet to him unless absolutely necessary," he commanded. Further still would be better, if he'd been exposed to some sort of pathogen, but they needed to be able to move fast enough to keep him from getting away as well. If need be, he trusted in his and Éliane's aim well enough to cripple one of his legs until Miina could put him back together. Assuming it was her brother, after all. That the man who was always skirting the edges of the law was so willing to go and speak to their superiors hinted at either trauma and extreme desperation, or some sort of ulterior motive.

He glanced past Zeke, over to where Éliane stood, and nodded in the direction opposite Rudolf, before stepping off to the right. Chisato would hopefully pick up on it and take position opposite him. Two nets, their Mystrel caught in the middle, with no choice but to play along. "Answer his questions quickly. On top of that, you will explain exactly the route you took in and out of the city, and through the quarantine. Now's not the time to hold anything back."

---

As unexpected as the mystrel’s striking resemblance to Miina was, the words that came out of his mouth made Éliane immediately stop. Her mind momentarily blanked out, her face frozen in a rictus grimace at that simple statement.

A city of the dead.

Impossible.

Her thoughts immediately flashed to her family, at their bakery, and then her own team, both experienced and savvy. If there was any truth in what the man was saying, then of anybody, they should be fine. She shoved the other, rising, dark thoughts down. Hard. Either they escaped, or they were hunkered down somewhere, she reassured herself. That was if this person who was alleging themselves to be Zeke was actually Miina’s brother. It could just as easily be another plot from the traitor. Her grip tightened on her weapon, before she forced herself to relax, glancing at the other Kirins.

She could see that both Rudolf and Esben were taking this very seriously. That they immediately jumped to necromancy or worse came as a surprise to her, though; Éliane had immediately thought disease or chemical disaster, but either way, she approved of Esben’s caution to keep their distance. Whatever the hell it was, if Zeke had been exposed to it none of them yet knew how contagious it was.

“One more question,” she began slowly, racking her brain for trivia from her interactions with Miina. As paranoid as they all were now, they needed to confirm his identity, and this one issue provided a healthy distraction for the pink-haired woman to pursue instead of other, less helpful things in the immediate moment. “If you are Zeke Malina, what was the first magic your sister learned?”

There is a part of me that desired to test my newest acquisition, but the patrol was clearly not prepared enough for this sort of attack. And so, it was not necessary. The Valheim dogs were extinguished plenty fast without it.

I flick the blood from my blade and sheath it.

A... mystrel?

---A mystrel who looks quite familiar.

Is that---

No. The time for assessing him further can wait. For the moment, I must focus on his words.

City of the dead.

I am uncertain how to respond to this. There was no news of such a thing occurring until this very moment. Not even the slightest hint of it.

---No. That's not entirely true. The nature of the Valheim patrol was strange, and they hadn't been looking for us at all. But that still didn't imply anything about the state of the city.

Mathiassen-san has taken the lead, and there is no reason not to follow his intent. As such, I can simply take a position opposite to him, in order to prevent a hasty escape for the mystrel. He needs to answer these questions, and he needs to answer them quickly before anything else can be done.

"It's as I've said, ser knight." Garland's tone was patient, as if he'd expected this sort of verbal resistance. "Events in Solitude have grown far out of hand of what was intended, by a now-rogue element of our forces. More than one, at least. You've run across Miss Sigursdottir by now, as I'm made aware. Suffice to say, I intend to set you against an inconvenience of mine and a threat to both of our interests. Surely, you didn't expect a member of the enemy nation to come to parlay without benefit to himsef? Let's leave any further explanation to a gathering of the rest of your party and those in Skael with the power to do something regarding the matter. I've no intention of repeating myself more than necessary. You understand, of course, that an approach on my lonesome would hardly have been trusted or received."

"...A fair point." Izayoi admitted begrudgingly, looking to Galahad and Miina. "I confess, I'm interested to see Valheimr forces set against each other. Any collaboration on our parts will involve you and yours taking the van." She said flatly, the glint in her eyes hardly hiding her desire to see blackhelms killing each other.

"Hah. I expected nothing less. And to answer your question, girl." He looked to Miina. "The latter. Undead roam the streets now. We came to conquer and hold land, not rend it uninhabitable."

"Get on the damned airship." Izayoi narrowed her eyes, her ire raised by mention of Valheim's imperialistic ambitions.

___



At his name, the man’s expression transformed only momentarily into one of surprise, a practised smile stealing over despite the extreme circumstances. “But not well enough if I can be recognised so quickly. For a singular patrol to recognise me… should I be honoured, or concerned? But, see, I’m unharmed and unarmed—”

He raised his empty hands as indication, only for the smile to freeze entirely at the mention of his sister, eyes opening to stare hard at Éliane, “So, it’s little Miina that has you looking? I’d hoped she would stay home… aaaah, but no matter. It was how to make ice. You never really see that in a jungle, and she was fascinated by it.”

“But, Solitude… I can’t tell you where or how it started. Only that it got out of hand quickly. It only takes one of the dead to get up and start clawing away at the living, and then if there’s enough left they just get up again. By the time I was trying to get out, anyone that didn’t have the sense to hole up somewhere defensible… well, you can imagine what it would be like.”

His hands dropped, indication of being unarmed entirely pointless with Miina as a source of knowledge, and the redhead hummed thoughtfully. “Route in was as just another traveller, I only needed to beat Valheim there. Out was by keeping out of the way of everything until I got to the walls. They always have some sort of hidden passage, and this one was pretty new and well-used. No sign of who needs to sneak in and out so much, but it got me through the main cordon, and after that it’s just a matter of giving Valheim’s men the slip. It wasn’t too hard until they got all the dogs in. So look, please. Just...get this to someone that can do something about all of this, alright?”

The raid captain, having listened to Zeke alongside the Kirins, chose now to pipe up, her brow furrowed.

"Even if what you say is true..." She shook her head, as if trying to deny that possible reality. "We still have our orders to deal with the Valheimr here." The woman looked to the party. "I can send you lot back with the ship. My men can handle themselves out in familiar territory like this. Even still, the Seven would take forever to hem and haw over something like this, especially without the Overseer to break the squabbling up. I'll leave it up to you, but I say we press on. He can stay with the ship. Hardly think he'd know how to fly it, anyway."

---

"He's not going on the ship alone," Esben replied almost before the raid captain had finished. "It's not as difficult as you might think to get them moving and break them. Just ask commander Laruelle, she and I have first hand experience." Mostly in the breaking them part, of course, though he wouldn't add that. At least they'd done alright flying the little skimmer they took first.

That still left the question of just what to do with Zeke, of course, though as quickly as he was talking to try and keep out of trouble, it was clear that he at least believed everything he was saying. Which took them all straight into the territory of myth and legend, beyond even what they'd already been dealing with. "Rudolf, Chisato, Éliane, keep him standing there. The rest of you, strip the bodies and bring me anything legible." He took a few steps away, bending down near the body of the commsman and pulling off the radio. Luckily, it was still in one piece.

The soldiers assigned to them started bringing back what they could find. Tags, mostly, identifying each of the slain patrol in turn. "Their corporal's, sir," one of the raiders said, bringing along another set of tags and some papers, pointing back at the body they'd been pulled from. The one that had been urging the others on and to make sure the higher-ups never heard about it.

Useful, he'd heard the voice clearly enough.

He accepted everything with a nod, flipping open the papers to look through. Some written orders to maintain the perimeter, make sure nothing got in or out. A log book, as well, detailing the unit's recent activities—nothing of note other than a recent entry mentioning when Skaeller scouts nearly broke through the perimeter and a hastily scrawled note about pursuing a Mystrel that did break the perimeter. Even more helpful was the unit breakdown and designation.

He cleared his throat once, pulled out the antenna of the backpack radio the commsman had, lifted the handset to his ear, only to be assaulted by the alarmed voice of the radio operator back at whichever of the perimeter bases had been trying to reach out to them. "Alfa-one-one, come in, Alfa-one-one, come in, now! Heard gunfire on your end. Contact made? Are you in need of assistance? Repeat, Alfa-one-one, come in—"

"Alfa-one-one, copy, Alfa-one-one here, I hear you." Especially for talk over the wind and the radio, Esben was doing what he figured was a passable imitation of the corporal's gruff voice. "Radio check, over." He heard an immediate sigh of relief on the other end, while he quietly reached down to read the commsman's tags.

"Reading you, two. Clear enough to make you out. Radio take a hit? Over."

"Affirmative. Runner got the drop on us and took out Jenkins. Repeat, Jenkins KIA. Over."

"...Copy, Alfa-one-one. The rest of you alright, Traviss?"

"Well as can be expected. Got the runner, we're packing up what we need and returning to base. Any change from the city? Over." Strictly business. Compartmentalization, play up the idea that Corporal J. Traviss clearly wasn't alright but wasn't going to break out in the field, make it more believable...

"No change. Locked up tighter'n a rusty baler. You got any idea why command has us out here? Some folks think it's more of that director Hojo's nonsense, like Siren and Hellfire, but word was all those projects got canceled weeks ago. Over."

"Not for us to worry about," Esben replied, a bit more gruff and forceful than before. "You want to get out of here in one piece, you keep your head down, follow orders, and don't think things like that, you understand? Repeat, we're packing up what we need and returning to base. Have something hot for us when we get there. Out."

"Copy. Out."

He collapsed the antenna back down, flicking the power off and hanging the handset back up. "Change of plans. Everybody back to the ship, we're leaving the Valheimer perimeter for now."

"Huuuuh?" The raid captain replied, shocked (and, if he had to guess, a bit indignant) at the sudden command. "We have orders to destroy—"

"You have new orders. You were placed under our command for this operation, and you know full well whose authority we're working under. Back to the ship, we're returning to the nest and calling out to the others while we do."

Zombies, then. Reanimated corpses with second leases on something that approached life¹, typically propogating further than the initial batch raised through necromancy via salival contact— biting healthy humans to instigate the necrosis. In that way, it was like the wedge point between a disease and a curse— but regardless of categorization, it was a snowball rolled downhill if not quickly dealt with— and given that necromancy was rare enough to crop up only once or twice every century? Nigh-on impossible to insulate against ahead of time. Even in Edren, with his access to one of the more specialized populations of warriors vis a vis dealing with all manner of pages in the grand bestiary of the continent, Rudolf had never heard of undead cropping up outside of old stories. Not until Valheim entered the picture, with Siren and Revenant. He expected Skael, with how neatly they had severed their culture from magic to the point where they could commodify it, to be even less equipped than that.

If anything, their best bet would have been the land itself— the harsh winters of this place, the lifestealing frosts and winds, could render the lifeless interior tissues inert as they froze the shambling corpses, growing ice shredding old muscle and splitting bone. If that were to come to pass, though... Rudolf suspected it'd already be done. The arcane framework granted by necromancy left these corpses unnaturally robust, then. At least against environmental rigors.

He remained silent, keeping his careful gaze pinned on Zeke, as Esben set to work buying the departed Valheimr an alibi— covering their metaphorical tracks as much as one could, given the circumstances. It'd buy a couple hours, but Rduolf didn't see a great many futures where their group were going to need more. Either by that point they'd be set to hitting the outposts, or—

"You're sure?" he inquired, canting his head over to the spy as the call came in. From the armored northerner's posture, it seemed he had a few reservations, even though he was fairly sure what Esben's answer would be. "I know the new plus one would complicate moving forward with the assault, but what about getting eyes on the city, at least in brief? If not yourself or Chisato, what about the fairies?"

Much like their reasoning for shooting down the prospect of leaving Zeke and the aircraft alone together, having any one of them trying to both mind him and a surprise assault against enemy fortifications simultaneously was a recipe for failure at both. Having already had a little wind come out of his raiding sails before this, completely scuttling the whole thing stung, certainly. They only had so much room for scope creep, though, given their equipment and manpower— couldn't really help it, and this was priority intelligence.

And not just for the leadership, either. While they still had some dusk, a flyby could corroborate things a little— and they'd be much less likely to befall the same fate as whatever kept gobbling up the scouts that had gone missing before they were on the scene.

Probably the zombies, on that note. Probably literally.² Again, Lanius and his raven popped into Rudolf's head.

---

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• _{1. Wide umbrella here, too. Pharaohs, Ghasts, Vampyres, Ghouls, all types of Undead, all "zombies". I'm something different, though, but you'd be forgiven for thinking I'm that kind of Shade. Wights, too! We can't forget Wights, many a good barrow has housed many a good Wight or six. Or seven.}
• _{2. It's kinda like a pun, you know? Intelligence gathering specialists, falling victim to things that eat brains?}

"… Her," Miina hissed. Oh, this made things much simpler – it was good that the others were on board with working with Galahad, because she'd be quite happy to do it of her own accord just to get back at Loki. Quite aside from how the woman should be dead as far as she was concerned – Miina still wasn't sure how she had reacted in time to avoid getting frozen on their first meeting – and then shooting Elly, she was responsible for that Behemoth. Well, and Miina having to spend all her attention on medical attention because of the shooting.

It was convenient to have someone more to blame for her situation than Galahad.

… though she wasn't a mage as far as anyone knew, and being a necromancer was even more obscure, so could she really be responsible for all this? Hopefully not, it would be unfortunate for the person she wanted dead immediately to also be the one with the obscure magic that she wanted to take a look at.

Though this definitely fell under the umbrella of things she wasn't supposed to actually use. Like combat magic back when she was with the rest of the tribe and not hunting.