The Necromancer of the Mine (3)
"Two went that way!"
"This should be... the last one!"
Smash!
With a sound like a watermelon bursting apart, the zombie's body collapsed.
"Damn, I'm out of breath!"
I wiped the blood from my sword and caught my breath, but in truth, Dunkel had done most of the work.
Twenty zombies had wandered into the village.
Dunkel stepped forward and dealt with fifteen of them, while I handled the remaining five he missed.
"Only five, huh? Real combat really is different."
There were too many eyes watching for me to use necromancy.
So this had been my first battle fought using only a sword.
I hadn't been injured, but there had been several moments that sent chills down my spine.
A field of vision reliant solely on torchlight, unpredictable movements, and the sheer physical effort required to sever bone.
'When I was the one creating and sending them, I never realized it. Berkel and those others weren't called heroes for nothing.'
From the one sending undead to the one stopping them.
The absurd reversal made me feel a strange sense of irony.
After finishing off the remaining zombies, Dunkel approached me.
"You defeated five of them yourself. Soldiers facing undead for the first time usually struggle to kill even one."
Despite saying that, Dunkel himself looked completely unexhausted, as though it hadn't even served as a warm-up.
"There don't seem to be any other movements. As for the villagers..."
"They're already doing what needs to be done. Look over there."
While we had been dealing with the undead that invaded the village, the villagers had formed groups of five or six and were moving from house to house, searching for any remaining zombies.
"Nothing in Dave's house!"
"There's one in the house next door!"
"Drag it outside! Slowly!"
"Kiiieeeeee—!"
The moment a zombie was lured out of a house, long poles hooked around its legs and restrained it.
"Hyaaaah!"
Smash!
The young man who had warned us about the undead swung his axe, crushing the zombie's skull.
"They seem experienced. That's a group tactic used by the soldiers stationed at the Wall..."
"This kind of attack clearly wasn't a one-time thing."
And it also meant nobody had helped them while they adapted to survive like this.
Thinking that, I walked toward the villagers.
"So, the village has been cleared?"
At my words, the village chief nodded and approached me.
"You saved us. There were three times more than usual tonight. If not for you and the knight..."
"Thank him instead. I barely did anything."
After pointing toward Dunkel behind me, I looked down at the sprawled corpses of the zombies.
"As expected... Dan..."
"Again...!"
The villagers grimaced and turned their heads away upon seeing the zombies' faces.
"Someone you know?"
At my question, the young man clenched his teeth.
"My older brother. He said he was leaving for the city a month ago..."
"Haah..."
If I'd known, I shouldn't have smashed their heads.
Thinking that, I looked around at the villagers.
"What about the others?"
At my words, the people checking the bodies spoke one after another.
"This girl is the village chief's daughter from the neighboring village. And this one here..."
The village chief's daughter who went hunting.
The farmer's son who vanished one day.
The old woman who went into the mountains to gather herbs.
Among the twenty-one zombies that attacked the village, there wasn't a single one the villagers didn't recognize.
"The villagers disappeared... and then those missing villagers came back to attack the village..."
Dunkel ground his teeth.
"Did we... do something wrong?"
While everyone silently stared at the pile of corpses stacked at one side of the village, one young man spoke to me.
"In just two months, thirty people disappeared from our village alone. Thirty people! No matter how much we begged for help, nobody even listened—and only now do you finally show up...!"
Unable to control his emotions, the words poured out endlessly.
He had endured all this suffering with nowhere to vent it.
And now, at last, a noble had appeared before him.
I couldn't blame him for directing that hatred toward me.
"Dan, stop!"
"How dare you speak like that before the young master!?"
"Let go of me—!"
Like emotions bursting through a broken dam, the young man shoved aside those trying to restrain him and strode toward me.
"Wait! Don't you dare behave recklessly toward the young master...!"
"Let him through."
When I said that to Dunkel, who had stepped in front of me protectively, he turned back in disbelief.
"Young master. I understand his feelings, but this is...!"
"That's an order. Let him come."
At the cold tone in my voice, Dunkel reluctantly stepped aside.
Meanwhile, the young man called Dain walked right up to me until our faces were nearly touching.
The blood of his brother.
A face stained with tears.
He glared straight at me.
"If you've got a mouth, then say something!"
"...."
"What did we ever do wrong to deserve living like this!?"
Silently, I endured his anguished cry.
The struggle for power between the main family and the branch families.
And the people suffering most from that pathetic political game were people like these.
That was why, bearing the name Leinrant, I said nothing to them.
The corpses of Northerners strewn across the center of the village.
The sight reminded me of scenes forever burned into my memories from my previous life.
Twenty million Northerners who died from the plague.
And the other humans who turned their eyes away from the tragedy.
Even me, who could do nothing but watch.
"Just like back then."
"Pardon?"
Before I could answer Dunkel's question, I approached the corpses.
"Grrrk...!"
"Kiiiii...!"
As expected, they were unable to move, but they weren't truly dead yet.
Zombies were products of necromancy—creations that bound the souls of the dead to their living bodies and controlled them.
Unless the spell was undone, their souls would remain trapped inside those zombie bodies, suffering endlessly.
'At the very least, as long as I'm here, I won't allow that.'
Having made up my mind, I released the demonic energy refined within my body.
Crackle—!
Black smoke spread out instantly in a circle, geometric formulas and runic characters filling the air.
"W-What is that!?"
"Isn't that... a magic circle?!"
The startled villagers stumbled backward.
The spell formation, taking shape as though painted with ink, glowed blue.
—To the innocent souls who died in sorrow, I call upon you.
Stretching my hand toward the gathered corpses, I recited the incantation.
The Voice of the Dead, infused with demonic energy.
As the magic circle shone ever brighter in response to my words, Dunkel's expression twisted.
"Y-Young... master...?"
The flimsy excuses I'd made while preparing the spirit-banishing tools.
The fact that I sensed the zombie invasion in advance.
At this point, even Dunkel would realize it.
'He was going to find out eventually anyway.'
I gave him a faint smile at his stunned expression and continued the chant.
—I light the lantern of the guide, to illuminate the path before you.
Necromancers.
Those who handled the souls of the dead and their corpses.
Their original role had been that of guides who returned the souls of the deceased to where they truly belonged.
—Lay down the resentment and sorrow bound to your hearts, and ascend.
Whoosh—!
The writhing zombie bodies slowly sank still, and blue flames ignited upon the motionless corpses.
Before long, the blue flames gradually took on human shapes, then turned their heads as if looking toward me.
Oooooooo—!
A haunting cry echoed out, sounding both like cheers and lamentations.
Hearing their voices, I traced runic characters through the air with my finger.
Blue light carved itself into empty space.
The rune it formed was the Rune of Engraving.
—I, Klein Leinrant, have inherited your will. Cast down your burdens, and rest in peace.
An engraving that promised vengeance on their behalf.
As the runic letters floating in the air wrapped themselves around my wrist, the flame-shaped spirits all bowed toward me at once.
[Please...]
A voice reached me.
Not the blood-soaked shriek of a monster, but the words of a soul that had regained its sanity.
[The others trapped in there as well...]
Hearing that, I spoke with my eyes closed.
"Do not worry."
And in the next moment, all the flames and demonic energy vanished.
The village fell silent as though nothing had ever happened.
The zombie corpses that had held their souls turned pure white and scattered away in the wind.
"W-What in the world was that...?!"
Faced with the impossible scene unfolding before them, every villager stood frozen with mouths agape.
"It's a soul rite! A soul resonance ritual!"
The first person to speak was the village elder himself.
"When the plague engulfed the North two hundred years ago, this was the exorcism ritual they performed! The ritual of the ancient priests...!"
Leaving behind the old man shouting with trembling brows, I rose to my feet.
Once I had made a promise to the dead, there was no more time to waste.
Step. Step.
From the moment that exchange ended until we reached the narrow trail leading to the mine—
Dunkel and I continued onward without speaking a single word.
"You're not going to ask?"
We couldn't stay silent forever.
When I finally broke the silence first, Dunkel's voice came after a long pause.
"If I ask... will you answer?"
"I have to. Otherwise, you might kill me yourself."
At those words, Dunkel's footsteps behind me came to a halt.
"Then I will ask."
With a grim expression, Dunkel slowly drew his sword.
"Who... are you?"
The tip of his blade pointed directly at me.
Though his face was stiff and expressionless, there was a faint tremor in his voice.
'Honestly, I thought he'd attack immediately.'
I turned toward him with a bitter smile.
Klein Leinrant.
The cursed young master who had called himself the reincarnation of Archimond.
And now I was truly using necromancy.
Of course he was confused.
"You know Berkel Leinrant's saying, don't you?"
As I spoke while meeting his gaze, Dunkel slowly nodded.
"... 'What defines a being is not its origin, but its actions.'"
The words once spoken by Berkel Leinrant left his lips.
If one protected honor and pride, even the lowliest commoner could become a duke.
But one who failed to uphold those things, no matter how noble their bloodline, could never become a duke.
That was the greatest reason Dunkel—a commoner's son—had been able to rise to the position of knight commander.
And at the same time, it was the justification that had allowed me—a cursed young master born of foreign blood—to survive until now.
"You've been my escort for eight years already."
The moment I said that, the sword pointed at me trembled slightly.
"Ever since I left the Holy Church, you've been the one who has known me the longest, Dunkel."
At those words, cracks began to form in Dunkel's hardened expression.
Just as I'd said, Dunkel was the knight who had stayed by my side the longest.
If I couldn't persuade him, then I would never be able to bring anyone else to my side.
"So decide for yourself."
This was inevitable.
A test.
A test to determine whether the reforms I envisioned for Leinrant could ever become reality.
"Whether the person you've watched all these years is truly Klein Leinrant... or Archimond."
At my question, Dunkel's distorted expression looked as though it might shatter apart at any moment.
Ignoring that, I stepped closer to the sword pointed at me and pressed my throat against the blade.
The sharp edge cut into my skin, drawing a thin line of blood.
"If you believe I'm Archimond, then kill me right here."
"...!"
"There's no time. Even now, undead are pouring out of the mine."
The moment my blood slid down Dunkel's blade and touched his gauntlet—
the sword aimed at me slowly lowered toward the ground.
When I quietly called his name, a deep sigh escaped him.
"I have not made my decision yet. And I certainly have not accepted this."
As he sheathed the sword lowered to the ground, Dunkel spoke.
"The one I serve is the second young master of the Leinrant Ducal House. Not some monstrous enemy of the continent."
"...Right. Thank you."
I ignored the harsh insult directed at me and turned away.
"Then there's no reason to delay any longer."
Ahead of us, the entrance to the mine—already transformed into a necromancer's workshop—waited with its maw wide open.