Bait
Thud.
Rumble, rumble.
Prince's head hit the floor and went rolling. Only then did Simon let out the breath he'd been holding.
[It's not over! Don't let your guard down, boy!]
Ssssaaah.
The headless body of Prince blackened as though a soul were bleeding out of it, then scattered like smoke. What remained behind was nothing more than the corpse of an ordinary zombie, one of the countless bodies littering Deathland's soil.
Don't tell me—!
Simon whipped his head around.
One of the zombies that had descended from the ceiling earlier—the ones standing dumbfounded after losing their commander—was struck without warning by a bolt of black lightning.
Krrrrrumble!
The zombie's body began to turn black. It looked as if a soul were wrapping itself around the flesh.
The blackened corpse shrank and contracted, and in moments its shape transformed completely.
[Impressive. I didn't think you'd lose a life that easily.]
The zombie had become the spitting image of the Prince whose head Simon had just severed. Even the clothes he wore and the crown on his head were identical.
Simon's face tensed as he re-gripped his sword.
[You'd best not come any closer.]
Prince seized the arm of Meilin, still sprawled unconscious on the ground. Simon ground his teeth in frustration.
"Don't you dare touch Meilin!"
[That depends entirely on what you do, doesn't it?]
Prince hoisted Meilin effortlessly over his shoulder and grinned.
[Simon, was it? If you want this girl back, come to that mansion from before. And naturally, you come alone—no Pier. I'll say this up front: hiding him in your subspace won't do you any good.]
Prince stamped his foot. With a single leap, he shot up through the sewer's ceiling and was gone.
[Later, then.]
"Prince!!"
Prince waved a hand and vanished.
Simon tried to give chase, but the zombies shrieked and hurled themselves at the fallen Dick and Camibarez.
"Damn it all!"
Simon rushed over and swung his greatsword, cleaving through the zombies in chunks.
Just as Simon finished cutting down the last of them and turned to pursue Prince—
[Calm yourself, boy!]
Pier's voice rang out.
[Chasing Prince now is pointless! It's obvious he'll cower behind that girl as a hostage!]
"......"
[Gathering information comes first! I've caught some rather interesting humans back at that mansion. Go interrogate them!]
Simon's eyes went wide.
"Humans? In Deathland?"
Prince arrived at the mansion with Meilin slung over his shoulder.
Pier, you really did have yourself a party, didn't you?
Zombie corpses were piled like mountains all across the grounds. Spilled black blood had dyed the garden dark, flowing in rivers.
Still, keeping Pier pinned down at this cost of sacrifices was, he judged, a fair trade.
Prince strolled into the mansion at a leisurely pace.
"Two of them got dragged off? What in the hell were you lot doing?!"
"F-forgive us!"
"It all happened in the blink of an eye...!"
Human voices drifted from inside the mansion. Prince scrunched his face in irritation and kicked the door open.
SLAM!
The door burst open to reveal three humans flinching in unison.
[When did you get here, Javier?]
Javier was a necromancer in his twilight years, his face a network of deep wrinkles. He held a staff in one hand, and, as always, two cigars clamped between his lips.
"Heh heh heh! There you are, Prince!"
Javier broke into an oily, good-natured grin.
"I only just arrived myself. Stopped by in person for our usual trade, you see."
Javier nodded to his subordinates, who brought over a large crate loaded onto a cart.
"Two extra on top of the agreed amount. Check it for yourself."
Prince approached and opened the crate.
Inside were ore chunks that looked like lumps of charcoal—obsidian infused with high-purity Jet-Black.
[The count looks about right.]
"Heh heh. Have I ever shorted you?"
After retiring as a professional necromancer, Javier had gone into the corpse business.
He collected the bodies scattered throughout Deathland that had never become natural zombies and sold them at market for profit. In exchange for Prince—who held de facto dominion over Deathland—tolerating his operation, Javier paid tribute in obsidian.
A kind of symbiosis.
Prince needed to consume obsidian to sustain his own power, after all.
[Good.]
Prince gestured. The waiting zombies came forward, lifted the crates of obsidian, and carried them off somewhere.
"By the way, Prince. What's with the girl?"
[Picked her up.]
Prince dumped Meilin off his shoulder and onto the floor. Javier's clouded eyes swept over her—then his expression turned to shock.
"A K-Kizen student? How does a young lady that precious end up in Deathland of all places...!"
[Those bastards have been holding some kind of class here once a year for the past few years, seems like. Lucky devils, every last one of them.]
Prince flopped down onto the sofa and tilted his head back.
"Then why is this girl...?"
[There's someone I want to kill, and I'm using her as bait. When that bastard comes crawling to this mansion of his own free will, I'll kill him.]
Who does he want to kill?
The question crossed Javier's mind, but he didn't pry. His gaze was fixed solely on the unconscious Meilin.
As he looked her up and down, his tongue flicked out across his lips.
"Sell that one to me."
[I thought corpse-traders only dealt in corpses? Didn't know you dabbled in the slave trade on the side.]
"Now and then, a living body has its uses. I'll offer twenty obsidian for her."
Twenty obsidian was a staggering offer.
It amounted to nearly half the shipment Javier had just received.
[Whatever. Suit yourself. I only need the one she'll lure in.]
"Heh heh heh!"
Javier nodded, and his subordinates carried the fallen Meilin away.
Jolt, jolt!
Inside a swaying carriage, Meilin slowly opened her eyes to a splitting headache. Her mind was foggy, and her throat was so dry it felt about to crack.
What...?
As her senses returned, she blinked and looked around.
Why am I in a carriage?
Did I pass out and get sent back to Kizen?
What happened to the practical assessment?
What about Simon and the others?
She was sitting there, dazed under the weight of a dozen questions, when—
"Awake at last?"
An old man's face, stuffed full of wrinkles and age spots, suddenly lunged right up to hers. Meilin was so startled she tried to scream.
But no sound came out. Even her body refused to obey her.
A rag was stuffed between her teeth, and her hands were bound tightly behind her back. Whatever he'd done to her, she couldn't channel Jet-Black at all.
She scrambled away from the old man at once, drawing her knees up and shrinking into the corner of the carriage.
"Mmph! Mmmmmmph!"
"Afraid I can't make out a word of that."
Javier clicked his tongue.
What—what—what the hell! Who even IS this guy?!
She needed to figure out the situation, fast. She craned her head toward the window.
Dark. Under a black sky hung those unmistakable red clouds.
Unfortunately, this was still Deathland. And the driver hauling the carriage wasn't a man at all, but a skeleton.
It seemed she'd passed out fighting that strange little zombie brat, been found by this man, and hauled off here.
But none of it made sense. He wasn't about to be eaten or bitten to death by zombies—so why was a human in Deathland?
Javier said nothing, simply staring ahead. His face looked like a zombie's, but he was unmistakably human.
Maybe I should try talking to him? He's seen my Kizen uniform—he has to know he can't touch me carelessly.
Just as that thought was forming, a wrinkled hand was creeping toward her thigh.
@%&^$*%@!!!
Meilin let out a horrified shriek and kicked Javier square in the face.
WHACK! His head snapped violently backward.
"Keh heh heh!"
A moment later Javier righted himself, laughing. Blood streamed from his nose, but he flicked his serpentine tongue out and lapped it up.
"Spirited, just as a young lady should be. Excellent!"
Meilin's skin crawled from head to toe.
"Mmph! Mmmmmph! Mmmmphmph!"
"Hm? Still can't understand a word."
"Mmmmmph!"
Javier grinned and leaned in, pulling the gag from her mouth.
"HAAAH!" She exhaled in one great breath, then glared daggers at him and shouted.
"Keep your hands off my body, you disgusting piece-of-shit bastard!"
"Heh heh heh!"
Javier's tongue flicked, entirely without shame. She planted her feet and pushed herself upright.
"I am Meilin Villenne, first-year at Kizen and a member of the Ivory Tower! Do you have any idea what you're doing right now?!"
"Precisely speaking,"
Javier chuckled.
"one corpse that used to belong to Kizen and the Ivory Tower. That's how it looks to these old eyes."
"...!"
"Sad to say, this old man isn't above snatching Kizen students and haggling over their ransom—it takes a certain nerve, you understand. You'll make a very fine undead indeed."
Javier seized Meilin's necktie in a sudden jerk.
She toppled helplessly across his lap, and he caught her by the chin and tilted her face up.
"Ngh...!"
"An Ivory Tower girl? Prime material! Might even make a Skeleton Mage, or a Banshee."
Javier's finger stroked her cheek.
"Of course it's a waste—a crying shame, really. Losing a face and hair this beautiful is truly a pity. But nothing to be done about it. I do hope you'll find a good master once you're undead—"
CHOMP!
Meilin bit down on Javier's finger with everything she had.
"G-GYAAAAAAAAAH!"
Her eyes squeezed shut, she clenched her jaw with the strength of a nursing infant, teeth sinking deep into his finger. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth.
When Javier thrashed in agony, she released the finger, jerked her head back—and then.
SLAM!
She drove her forehead into his with every ounce of force left in her.
The wrinkled old man howled as he rolled across the carriage floor.
Yes!
She'd bought herself time.
Her eyes darted to the carriage window.
With neither Jet-Black nor her hands available, falling from a moving carriage might well kill her—the thought terrified her—but even so, it was better than becoming an undead for a creature like him.
Once the decision was made, there was no more hesitation. She flung herself at the window.
SNATCH!
"...!"
A viselike grip closed around her ankle just as she was halfway out.
"Gwahaha! No use, girl!"
With brutal strength, she was yanked back inside in a single motion.
CRACK!
A violent impact to her abdomen doubled her over, and she crumpled to the carriage floor.
Then Javier seized a fistful of her sky-blue hair, his tongue flicking.
"Magnificent, girl! No hands, no Jet-Black, and still you found the courage to pull off a stunt like that! Kizen truly doesn't take just anyone, I see. But—"
Javier's hand slid toward her uniform jacket.
"that ends now."
She squeezed her eyes shut.
It was so damn unfair. She'd come to Kizen and accomplished nothing, and now it would end like this, just like that, for nothing—
BOOM!
A massive impact slammed into the carriage's roof. The horses shrieked in alarm and swerved, and the carriage lurched violently.
"Hm? What in the—!"
CRUNCH!
A gleaming white greatsword punched down through the ceiling. Meilin was so startled she hiccupped, and even Javier's face drained white.
The greatsword carved a triangle into the roof and tore it open. Through the hole, a man dropped into the carriage.
Wh-who...?
A cloak draped around his shoulders, kakhi workman's clothes underneath. Bones were fastened to his body all over.
When the man turned his head, Meilin gasped and pressed her back against the far end of the carriage, trembling.
I-I can't even breathe...!
The pressure he gave off was enough to drain the life out of a person.
Half of his head and face was covered in bone—a skull—leaving only his mouth exposed. In one of the skull's eye sockets, a blue flame burned like a torch.
The man looked quietly at the rope binding Meilin's hands, and at her loosened, disheveled clothes.
Then he turned his head toward Javier.
"L-let me ask again. Who exactly are you—!"
WHAM!
The man's fist shot out at a speed the eye couldn't follow and buried itself in Javier's stomach. His body folded in half like the letter Z as he coughed up blood.
CRUNCH!
Next, the man stomped down on the back of his head. The carriage floor shattered, and Javier's head plunged through it.
Squelch! Crack! Snap!
The man did not stop.
"Ah—ahhh..."
Meilin, watching, shook with terror.
Soon the man stood Javier's blood-soaked body upright with his foot alone, then drove his other leg into him in a savage kick.
CRASSSSH!
Javier's body smashed straight through the carriage wall and tumbled outside.
Amid his agonized screams rang out the raw, unmistakable sound of bones shattering.