<~> Chapter 127There was a ti of guards stationed by the drawbridge of the castle. Ironically they were statioo keep anything from ing out, rather than stopping people from ing in. Everyone in the group st the castle was cheg on their equipment and doing st minute preparations before we got ready to enter.

  I Silva. "Keep the twins safe, I'm trusting you to protect them."

  "Of course. Take care of yourself Lilith." Most of Silva's sarcastid teasing attitude was gone, she was aware of when it was time to py around and when things were serious.

  I took another look at the castle. I could already tell there was a lot of miasma inside. Rather than being a simple iion, this was instead going to be a demoermination... assuming we kept trol of the situation.

  Jasper was a bit ahead of roup so I decided to pull him aside when he wasn't busy talking with any of the uards. "Jasper, I see the demonic miasma from here. There are definitely demons in there, either a lot of them, or a strong one."

  He grimaced. "I see. Then it's good that I pulled together this many people. Do you have any idea what kind? Anything we should watch out for?"

  "Unfortunately my experienly goes as far as reizing the miasma. As for advice, the only thing I really say is to stay alert. Most of the demons I've dealt with so far try to hide most of the time." I scratched the base of my horn. "I usually tell the general dire of where the miasma is ing from so I should be able to determine when a room is safe. I wouldn't be able to say with certainty however."

  The man tapped his fingers on his sword hilt in thought. "I uand. I'll rey that to the other party leaders. We'll still split into two teams but probably not ahan that until we've cleared a majority of the castle. Your party members' role will be to keep a look out for demons and advise the group leaders of anything you regarding your hunting senses. I would prefer you stay out of bat unless it is unavoidable, protect yourself if required but don't go charging in."

  I nodded. "Uood."

  I reyed our orders and waited with my friends for aen minutes before the guards that had been stationed here started dragging back the barricades to let us through. My party's two groups were with a group of more than thirty guardsmen each, a lot more than I was expeg for this mission. I robably o expely four or so adventuring parties would be clearing su important ndmark but that's what I had been picturing.

  I followed just behind the advance group and got my first sight of the castle courtyard. The stench was awful and it wasn't hard to see why, there were still corpses littering the courtyard and the demonic miasma was thick here. It didn't take me long the source as the first corpse the advance soldier approached leaped up from the ground at him.

  The guard was ready for it and deflected the monster with his shield, a nearby spearman quickly pierced the corpse's skull before it could recover. After the failed surprise attack the rest of the corpses got to their feet and started running at the front line of guards.

  Zombies. A staple of movies, ic books, and video games. Even wheed as suothing does justice to how gross they are in person. The st of rotting flesh was in the air and the disgusting monsters were far from slow despite their shredded muscles and broken bones. My magic sight made it clear how they were still moving, demonic magic that felt revolting to my senses g to these monsters, holding them upright and emp their mangled bodies.

  Sihe frontline guards had these monsters covered I turned my attention to the inner ramparts of the castle. Demons liked to be sneaky so I wao make sure there wouldn't be any nasty surprises dropping on our heads.

  I cast [Light Beam], using my magitrol to make a wide e infused with light magioke out any potential shadow demons. I almost thought it had been unnecessary until it passed over a shadow that started screaming in rage when the light hit it. The beam was unfocused and not particurly high-powerful but the demon was weak to light magic, meaning while it didn't do enough to kill the mo lenty useful for flushing it out.

  Unsurprisingly, it was Torien who reacted to the shadow demon first. An impossibly fast arrow struck the demon, making it lose band fall of the wall into a group of guardsmen. Fortunately, they had been paying enough attention to quickly dodge the falling monster and kill it. I didn't know if they were upset that she had shot at it but I suppose they would pin to her directly if that was the case. While all of that was happening, I tinued sc the shadows and ers of the inner courtyard and ramparts but I didn't find any other demons hiding around us.

  Once all of the zombie demons were killed the guardsmen spread out and begun blog off all of the windows arances, save for the one we were pnning oering. Others built a rge bonfire in the ter of the courtyard and started drag over the bodies to be burhere. I noticed Torien looking at the portcullis and sihe groups have been disbanded for the moment, I wao see what she was looking at.

  "Torien, what's up?"

  She g me before looking back. "The portcullis winch wasn't damaged. Not only was it not destroyed, no one sabotaged it either. Despite everything that happened here, including a demon being summoned in the courtyard, no one was able to throw the castle portcullis."

  "Do you think it means something?" I asked.

  "...not on its own. But it is odd. Leaving aside that the men in bck brigandine were let in without any issue, they didn't even bother to force it to stay open." Her tail flicked bad forth in agitation.

  I shrugged. "Maybe they were more focused on finding the baron and summoning the demon than damaging the portcullis."

  "Perhaps, but they likely had someoay here to make sure they didn't get locked iher. It's just odd, something that's out of pce."

  Jasper's voice carried across the courtyard, "Form up!"

  I nodded. "I agree, something is off about all of this. Keep a for anything else that seems strange."

  I went bay group as we prepared to ehe main building of the castle. Two men ahead of the party opehe doors and trary to what everyone was expeg there weren't any demons waiting oher side of the door. Instead it was eerie and quiet ihe entrance hall.

  roups filed in and I once again checked the ers and ceiling for any shadow demons. I didn't find any. There was a small haze of miasma in the air but nothing trated. The castle had four stories, three above ground and at least one below. I had been told ahead of time we would clear our to the top and then do the ste and dungeons below the castle st. Because of the nature of the area, that's where we expected the most resistance.

  roup was finally breaking into two groups, one headed left and my group headed right.

  I patted Mimi on the shoulder. "How are you doing Mimi?"

  She smiled back at me, "I'm doing okay."

  After a moment she added something through the bond. -- "I'm keeping a for Mimics. This area feels familiar to me." --

  -- "I'm not surprised, we found you in a pce simir to this. Though the area we found you in was a bit more like a mansion." -- I said.

  Our team turned a er and it took a little while before we were able to follow. They had run into more zombies at a choke point so we had to wait for them to be taken care of before we could tinue moving forward. Not long ter some of the guardsmen were dragging old corpses back to the bonfire.

  The area we were clearing out was mainly guest rooms and servant's quarters right now. From what I uood, the other side of the main building had the kits and other facilities. There was a low level of miasma in the area, meaning there were probably demons nearby but not i numbers or ohat were particurly powerful. Bel, Mimi, and I were just standing in the hall and waiting while the guards checked out all of the rooms. They didn't want to put us in too much danger and based on the level of miasma tration they would be fine on their own as long as they were careful.

  There was a few zombies here and there as well as the unmistakable cry of a ba other than that there wasn't any problem. The few guards who had alerted the banshee were brought to Bel for healing, nothing serious but bleeding ears isn't a fun experience. After thirty minutes of waiting around it was time to move on to another part of the castle.

  Mimi had been polite and cheerful with the guards who spoke to us but I could tell that there was something about her that made people wary. She didn't notice at all and was always happy to talk with them, they didn't speak about anything important of course but none of them chatted with her for long, evehere wasn't anythier to do. Maybe it was because when she wasn't talking with anyone, she stood stock still like a statue. I knew she robably freezing to serve her energy but to others it seemed bizarre and off putting for reasons they couldn't directly expin. I wondered if I should mention it to her or if she'll figure that out on her own through observation.

  roup progressed through another part of the castle. I could still see the low levels of ambient miasma aill didn't find any high trations of it in any of the pces we looked so far. Not all that strange sidering we were in the parts of the castle where no one important lived or worked. While the people in brigandine had been brutal with their targets and anyone in their way, they had no reason to track down all of the castle's servants who hid in their quarters. There were only a few bodies left at this point. Anyone who had been here had either escaped out into the town or died and bee one of the zombies we were cutting down.

  It was rather sad to see some of the young servants' animate corpses throwing themselves on the guardsmen's swords.

  While some of the sights were harrowing, there was a level of distance from the tragedy sihe demoniergy was only iing their corpses. These people were already dead. It was sad but I wasn't watg them in their moments of death, they were already go made the awful sights a bit more tolerable.

  It had been about two bells total by the time we had cleared out the entire first floor and both groups regrouped ba the entrance hall he stairs. Now that we were here agaiark differeween the first floor and the sed was eveer. It was obvious the floor would have much more demonic preseha. Whether that would mean even more zombies or fewer but more powerful enemies was yet to be seen. For noere taking a break ba the courtyard. We had blocked off the doors to the different wings of the first floor after we finished up io keep anything from the sed floetting behind us and reiing those areas as we pushed forward. We were making steady progress so far.

  I sat down with Silva and the twins while Bel and Mimi healed and looked after some of the people from the roup.

  "How did it go?" I asked.

  Man gave me a sad smile. "Mostly zombies, dead servants and sves that hadn't escaped. It wasn't hard to clear the area and we didn't get to do much. We mainly stood around and talked about the miasma tration."

  I sighed. "When we came here I was excited by the adventure. Ihis just feels depressing. We're sughtering the undead corpses of the people who didn't escape the attack."

  Silva's face hardened. "Don't worry, it won't be until the third floor that we get most of the answers we're looking for. Most of the nobles and important people were in the keep, as well as their most powerful guards. If there's any more clues about who the people in bck brigandine are, we're most likely to find them on one of their corpses in the keep. Let's just hope the people in bck didn't take all of the clues with them.

  I grimaced. I wasn't looking forward to digging through the pockets of one of those zombies.

  Jasper's voice cut through the crowd's murmuring once again. "Form up teams. is the ballroom. If there are any rge demo in this castle, that's where they're most likely to be. Everyone prepare themselves!"

  I sighed and stood up. Back to work.

  Saine

  Hello! It's a little cliche sure but I think a lot of stories gloss over how actually disgusting and sad the existence of zombies really are. Lots of games and stories just have them as random throw away enemies. More castle raiding ining!

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