Off to a Good Start

[Reece]

He didn't bother trying to resist. He was beyond exhausted, by this point. Even if the Revenant were to suddenly drop dead this very moment, there was no way he'd have the energy to reach Darkshire. He'd just collapse out here in the open, and likely sleep until past midnight. Hell, it was the middle of the day right now and he'd already been assaulted by no less than three undead in the twenty minutes or so he'd spent in the Moors. There was absolutely no chance that he could possibly escape notice until he'd awoken...

Assuming he could awaken, even if he was left alone. He still had no idea how serious the infections from that saliva would be, after all. Yajima gave one last defeated sigh, as the hoarfrost spread across his scalp. So much for trying to help out the people of Darkshire. He should have known that he'd be useless in a fight without Apparition. So what if he was strong? The Revenant had already displayed two abilities more powerful than anything he could do.

And judging by the fact that it didn't even have a name of its own, the creature was likely no more than a minion. How in hell was he supposed to protect people from the likes of Dracula if he couldn't even stand up to one lousy skeleton?

He had no choice, he supposed, other than to die here and make sure to avoid this verse in future; at the very least until he'd succeeded in summoning his machina. The Pale Moors were way beyond his level. He could only hope that somewhere there was a verse in which he could find some way of earning Omnilium without having to fight; since obviously everyone here had abilities far more impressive than his own.

Hell, even those zombies had had that toxic ichor of theirs in addition to super-strength. He had wanted to believe that he could be useful even without the giant robot he had piloted back home, but that was obviously not the case. There was simply no way that a normal human could contend with such powerful magic.

Thunk!

Surprised by the sudden noise, he looked up. The Revenant now had what looked like a crossbow quarrel rammed into the side of its skull, which was gradually freezing over. Removing its hand from Yajima's head – shattering many frozen hairs in the process – it yanked the bolt free, showing not the slightest discomfort at having taken what likely would have been a fatal blow to one of its zombie minions.

“Get away from that boy, monster!”

Down the waterlogged road, in the direction from which the quarrel had sped, two men in medieval, Western-style armour were splashing their way towards them. The pair were dressed mostly in brown leather, but also wore metal breastplates. Each was carrying a crossbow, and had a sword sheathed upon his hip.

They came to a stop a few meters away, their weapons pointed directly at the Revenant.

“Go ahead, shoot.” it told them calmly, with not the slightest hint of fear in its voice. “If you can, that is.”

“If we can? Of course we can shoot you! Who'd ever hesitate to kill a monster like you!?” shouted the younger of the pair – a blond man who must have been in his early twenties – before utterly failing to do a thing. For a few seconds, the three others watched and waited on him. His partner's patience gave out first.

“Seriously, Recur? I knew you were useless, but this really is impressively pathetic, even for you.” the older of the guards – a tall, thin-faced black man who looked to be in his late thirties or early forties and had a large number of thin, waist-length braids tied back in a ponytail – commented, giving a disappointed sigh.

“Wh-what? Why can't I move...!? And I'm not useless!”

“You do realise that telepaths normally struggle to even transmit their thoughts during combat, much less actually inhibit movement, don't you? To have been completely frozen in place, and while that thing's focus is split between the both of us and probably the kid as well? How little willpower can one man possibly have?”

“... What's a 'telepath'?”

“... Forget it. It doesn't matter.”

“You think you can do any better?” the Revenant inquired in its usual near-whispered, icy tone. This time around, though, there seemed the tiniest smidgeon of genuine curiosity present in its voice … or perhaps that was nothing more than Yajima's imagination. He was certainly curious, at least. Hell, at this point curiosity was pretty much the only thing keeping him from succumbing to the numbing cold and utter exhaustion he felt.

It certainly wasn't hope responsible for that. These two didn't stand a chance, and he knew it. The Revenant was far more powerful than its minions had been, and had already immobilised one of them. As much as he wished it was possible, there was just no way an ordinary, average town guard could hope to face such a creature and live. It may have been just an underling of some greater threat, but that didn't necessarily make it weak, as Yajima had found out to his cost. If he'd had the strength, he would have yelled at the man to flee. He desperately wanted to, but as it was he could barely muster the energy to keep his eyes open. A low murmur was the best he was able to manage, and the wind snatched his words away long before the guards could pick up on them.

“Of course.” The guardsman raised his crossbow and fired without the slightest hesitation.

The bolt took the skeleton in its neck, knocking free one of its vertebrae entirely. For an instant, time seemed to freeze. The dark-skinned man stood there calmly, arm outstretched, now-empty crossbow still precisely aimed at its target. His partner frowned, clearly unhappy as his superior made him look even more incompetent than he actually was by comparison. Yajima's jaw dropped.

And then the Revenant's head fell, landing upside-down in the stream/path with a light plop! A moment thereafter, the magic locking its bones together failed, and the entire skeleton fell apart. The only pieces which remained in place were its radius and ulna; the forearm bones to which the factor's frozen hand still held tightly.

“H-how did you do that?” Yajima stammered, gazing up at the man before him in wide-eyed amazement. Shock temporarily returning some clarity to his muddled thoughts, and granting him the strength to speak. Not much strength beyond that, unfortunately, but speech was better than nothing.

“I shot it, obviously.” he responded simply, before turning to his incompetent partner and instructing him to help the boy stand.

“B-but it was so strong … it shouldn't have taken just a single blow … it couldn't.”

“What're you talking about, kid? That thing was small fry; nothing more than a minor lich; a skeleton with a little bit of magic. Even Recur here could have taken it out if he hadn't been dumb enough to let it get inside its head.” he didn't particularly care if the kid thought that having good aim made him some kind of legendary hero, but he figured it best to keep the conversation going as long as he could; in the state he was in, if the boy fell asleep, he might never awaken … at least, not without spending a few days in the Astral Realm, assuming he was a Prime.

He was fairly certain that the kid was a Prime, since he hadn't failed to spot the remains of those zombies, and doubted a normal teenager could have taken out two undead and held off another, even if he had lost in the end. Not a particularly powerful Prime, if he was one, but still a better fighter than most Secondaries his age.

As he spoke, he and Recur helped the boy to his feet, placing one of his arms over each of their shoulders and beginning to lead him further down the path to Darkshire.

“Yeah, well, it's not like I was expecting the stupid thing to have fucking mind control powers, was I, Sarge?” the blond man huffed. Seriously, that guy was such a failure.

The boy was hanging his head, either he'd finally given in to sleep, or he was just depressed at the thought of being even less competent than Recur. That was understandable. Anyone would have been.

“You still conscious, kid?” the sergeant asked, shaking him lightly. The boy looked up at him, and though he never flinched – both in the Moors and in his home world, he'd seen his fair share of carnage – the guardsman wasn't able to suppress the frown which formed upon his face. Gods, that eye was a mess.

“Uh-huh … 'm awake … why?” the reply was weary and indistinct; already the clarity he'd shown a moment ago was fading. It'd not be a few minutes more before they reached the gates; they were so close he could practically smell the town. To get so near to salvation, only to have the boy die now … well, just because it wouldn't be anything he hadn't experienced before, that didn't mean he was okay with seeing it again. The deaths of children were always the hardest to accept.

“It'd probably be for the best if you didn't sleep.”

“Yeah, try stay awake, kid, you'll be better off for it.” whereas his sergeant's tone had been cool and professional, Recur didn't manage to keep the despondency from his voice. He knew full well how this would likely end, and didn't like it any more than his superior. They had some fairly powerful healers in Darkshire, of course (hell, the town likely would have been wiped off the map long ago if they hadn't), but they all had limits to their powers – as the existence of the Mayor's undead garrison constantly reminded everyone – and, well, the state this boy was in...

The kid glanced over at him and opened his mouth, as though to ask what he meant, before apparently working it out for himself.

“Oh.” he said instead. They waited in silence for him to go on, until half a minute or so had elapsed and he finally spoke up. He asked how they'd known to find him out there. It was obvious from the boy's distant expression that he was barely listening as it was explained to him, but they tried their best to help him retain consciousness.

He'd screamed fairly loudly when those undead had attacked, and the two of them had been returning from a patrol at the time (the farmland which lay outside the comparative safety of the town's walls needed protecting too, after all); they'd heard his cries and come running, it was that simple. If they'd returned even a minute later, or if he'd been attacked just a minute earlier, then there would have been no chance at all for him. It was luck, more than anything, which had saved his life.

They told him much more than just that, but as they reached the town and walked its streets, Yajima's thoughts grew ever duller, and afterwards – other than a vague recollection of entering a building full of sick and injured people, then being handed off to an old woman in a white and red robe – he was able to remember nothing else of his journey.