40. War (2)
40. War (2)
Parties of three are formed and deployed to kill the undead arising in the Public Cemetery.
The undead that haven't been around long don't possess much power.
And since undead created from human or animal corpses are fundamentally weak, the people tasked with purifying this place are mostly rookie adventurers, rookie knights, or rookie guards—two of them, with the remaining one being someone skilled just in case.
The personnel formed today consist of a rookie adventurer who hasn't been one for long, a rookie knight, and the Guard Leader leading the two.
In this city, the difference between an adventurer, a knight, and a guard is clear.
If you only consider the combat power of each organization, it's the Knights Order, the Adventurer Guild, and the Guard Unit.
Naturally, if you list them in order of how hard it is to get in, it's the Knights Order, the Adventurer Guild, and the Guard Unit, but since they each do different jobs, the individual combat power within them varies wildly.
The Knights Order is for the country, the Adventurer Guild is for exploration and adventure, and the Guard Unit is for protecting the city or village.
But there is one thing everyone thinks the same way about.
It is the desire to protect the family, friends, or neighbors beside them.
Having visited the Public Cemetery with that mindset, they felt something strange about the undead, which were nowhere to be seen today.
The F-rank adventurer, who hadn't been an adventurer for long, looked around and kicked a stone on the ground.
"It's strange, there are no undead today?"
"I know, right? Ever since the Saint-nim came to this place, the undead occurrence rate has dropped a lot, but it wasn't like there were none at all."
The Guard Leader, who is serving as the team leader for this group, also thinks the current situation is not normal.
Recently, as the Saint-nim settled in this city and established an orphanage, the number of undead has noticeably decreased.
At first, I wondered why she established an orphanage in the slums.
People don't really live near the Public Cemetery.
Because the monster called the undead appears in the Public Cemetery, and an ominous energy that is invisible and hard to describe with words comes out, the area near the Public Cemetery usually becomes a slum.
Vagrants, homeless people, and orphans who have nowhere to stay flock to the only place they can be, near the empty Public Cemetery, and naturally, it becomes a slum.
An orphanage in such a place with poor public order?
But it is the Saint-nim who is purifying even such a Public Cemetery and slums.
She treats even the vagrants without discrimination and greets everyone without losing her smile.
An era of peace since the Saint-nim appeared. In other words, the undead occurrence rate has dropped significantly, like in an era without war where there weren't many corpses.
It was to the point where one might wonder if the undead occurrence rate dropped because there were no corpses.
And the crime rate in the slums has also dropped significantly.
Originally, there would be a corpse in every alleyway in the slums, but now there aren't even those.
Originally, the Knights Order or the Guard Unit would patrol and collect such corpses to bury them in the Public Cemetery because they could become undead.
Recently, the slums have become clean enough that such things rarely happen, and the number of undead has been decreasing accordingly.
But that didn't mean undead didn't appear.
The current situation was clearly an anomaly.
"Could it be that the Saint-nim's power has gotten stronger? Why, there was a problem at the orphanage recently. I heard the Saint-nim was very shocked by that. They say people usually awaken their powers when that happens."
"Watch your mouth."
"I'm sorry. I realized I made a mistake right after I said it."
"Could you please be quiet for a moment?"
The knight who hadn't been in the Knights Order for long raised a hand and said.
At the knight's words, both the adventurer and the Guard Leader closed their mouths and listened.
"Did you hear that sound?"
The knight closed his eyes and opened his ears as much as possible.
"Is it just your imagination? I don't hear anything."
"I don't hear anything either? What kind of mistake— wait a second."
The Guard Leader started to concentrate for a moment, then knelt down and lowered his body as much as possible.
"This isn't a sound... it's a vibration coming from the ground."
A very faint vibration.
"Is it an earthquake?"
While the Guard Leader and the adventurer were focusing on the ground, the adventurer said in a tone of wonder.
"Huh? There's a spider here. Is it a spider undead? It's quite large? This is the first time I've seen a spider this big."
"A spider?"
It's not that there are no spiders in the Public Cemetery.
In the first place, since there are no people and many corpses, it's naturally a place with many bugs. Since there are many bugs, spiders naturally exist to catch those bugs.
However.
The Guard Leader had never seen such a large spider in all his time dealing with undead in the Public Cemetery.
A spider the size of a human palm was crawling shashashak on the ground.
It's not like big spiders don't exist in this world. But red eyes and a black body. And sharp legs, and the ttak-ttak sound of teeth clashing that was heard faintly as the spider approached—the Guard Leader shouted.
"Dodge!!!"
"Yes?"
The adventurer turned his eyes to the spider at the Guard Leader's shout and looked at the Guard Leader.
Feeling that something was wrong when he saw the Guard Leader looking at him with an expression of horror while reaching out his hand, the adventurer turned his head and looked forward.
The moment he saw that the spider, which had been crawling on the ground until just a moment ago, was right in front of his eyes, the spider's body swelled up.
Pueong!
With a small sound, the spider's body burst, and the green blood inside poured onto the adventurer's face.
Chiiiiiiik—!
"Kuaaaaaaaah!!!"
==
The guards guarding the entrance to the Public Cemetery were startled by the scream suddenly heard from inside the Public Cemetery.
"Was that a scream just now?"
"What is it! Did an accident happen!?"
"Hey! Look over there!"
One guard stretched out his hand and pointed inside the Public Cemetery. Everyone's gaze turned in that direction.
The Guard Leader was carrying the adventurer on his back, and beside him, the knight was desperately running toward the gate.
Both of them were gasping for breath, their eyes bloodshot like people being chased by something, running with everything they had, drawing on every ounce of strength they had left.
The guards felt something ominous at the Guard Leader's urgent and desperate appearance, which they had never seen before, and as soon as the condition of the adventurer the Guard Leader was carrying came into view, it confirmed that the ominous feeling was true.
Due to the movement caused by the Guard Leader running, the adventurer's face was clearly visible to the guards.
The terrible state, where the entire surface of his face had melted away, revealing the flesh and bone underneath, made even the guards recoil in horror.
"Quickly tell the Knights Order, the Guild, and the Guard Unit!!! A spider monster has appeared here!!!"
The guards began to panic at the Guard Leader's desperate shouting.
But that panic didn't last long.
A vibration began to ring on the ground, and with a loud noise, an explosion occurred behind the Guard Leader's back.
After that, the guards were speechless at the sight unfolding before their eyes.
A giant spider monster that seemed to easily exceed 3m began to pop out.
"W-what, what is that."
"Kuaaaaaaa!"
Some guards were frozen and couldn't think to move, and some guards ran away in fear as soon as they saw the creature Ners.
[ Kuoooooo! ]
Then, a giant spider that could easily exceed 3m—no, 5m—appeared, making a loud noise.
The Ners, which was so huge that it was on a different level from the other Nerses, was a Ners completely different from the others.
Even if it was Dagos, the basic skeleton itself was no different from a spider, but the Ners over 5m tall was a spider at the bottom, but the top was completely different.
It was a Ners that looked like an Arachne, with an upper body of a human and a lower body of a spider, like something out of a myth.
This Ners was none other than the first fusion creature Ners created by Evolute using the mercenary Heriis.
Even if a Ners follows Dagos's orders, the intelligence level of creatures that are not [ Overlord ] class is merely that of a bug, so even if they fight, they do not show high-level combat skills.
It is just that Nerses overwhelm humans with their bodies, which are incomparably stronger than humans, acidic blood, and poison, as well as their countless numbers.
Evolute fused the brain and body of the mercenary Heriis, who had excellent combat sense and intuition from fighting countless battles while working as a mercenary for a long time, with the body of a Ners.
Heriis's personality had already collapsed into the hive mind where tens of thousands of creatures existed, but his combat sense and intuition from his mercenary days remained.
Heriis exploded the urge to slaughter that he had been suppressing while being encroached upon by the hive mind, and charged at the humans running in front of him.
The guards, who received primal fear at the sight of Heriis, sat down on the spot.
"What are you doing! Quickly tell the Knights Order the current situation—"
Puuk!
The Guard Leader slowly lowered his head and despaired as he saw the sharp leg of Heriis piercing his chest.
He was lifted up while still pierced along with the rookie adventurer he was carrying, and he closed his eyes as Heriis opened its mouth to eat him.
Kwajik.