Chapter 37: Broken Party.
Damien didn’t hesitate.
The black axe rose before falling in a clean, decisive arc.
The blade split through flesh and bone with brutal precision. Leslie’s eyes widened before the light within them faded completely.
Damien wiped the blood clean from the axe’s blade.
"Is it weird that I’m disgusted by my own act of selfless endangerment, but I’m not just doing this for me, but also for you Andrea and everyone in camp if you wait to think about it... We need to find a way to kill Naomi, and if you deserve any amount of the credit I give you in my head, then you should be able to take advantage of this, find an excuse to isolate Naomi from the camp and kill her, because if you don’t... I will".
Damien looked away from Leslie’s lifeless eyes, went to the exit of the tent and looked towards the Eidolons working on hauling wooden crates atop the giant cloaked machine.
He sighed helplessly.
"There are too many of them, and I don’t have enough undead".
Damien decided to stay in the tent till he could think of a better plan, but the moment he turned, his calm expression twisted.
"Uh, Leslie... where did you go?".
Damien hurried over to the bloodstain, but he was already too late. The last pieces of flesh were quietly dissolving into nothingness, disappearing bit by bit until nothing remained, as though Leslie’s body had never existed at all.
"Could this be your dormant ability, this is why it’s basic courtesy to explain what you can do before a mission, Fuccckkkk... I just messed up my own assassination plot".
Damien sat down on a wooden crate.
"Is this why you were probing me before your supposed death? Did I say anything, no I didn’t. But if I had known, I would have said Vincent sent me, but I didn’t".
Damien kicked the ground in frustration.
"Alright, calm down. This can still be fixed. I definitely killed Leslie, not a different person, I dealt enough damage to kill any living thing, so that must mean, this is a high maintenance clone. Tsk, How remarkably inconvenient Leslie".
Damien rose to his feet and clutched his head.
"All is well, let’s assume she can create clones, can she control a clone she can’t see, yes. Just like how I can control undead without looking at them, now how far does she need to be?".
A flash of inspiration hit Damien like a tidal wave, his eyes suddenly went cold as he looked in the direction of Paige and the other member of the scouting party.
"You can control your clone because you are only a few dozen meters away, you stayed close to me from the moment we left camp, never straying too far from me, you deceived me and made me believe you were this outspoken stuck up bitch, and that made me let down my guard...".
Damien’s mind went still for a while.
"Naomi put you up to this. No, the two of you were plotting this from the beginning, in fact. You’ve been expecting me to make a move, if not for my sake, then for Andrea’s".
Damien chuckled lightly.
"So now I am sandwiched between the two of you, how vexing... and what’s worse, Andrea. You knew and you didn’t warn me, at least I believe you did, thinking about it won’t change much, I’m sorry Leslie. But you still have to die".
After giving the inside of the tent one final glance, Damien quietly slipped outside.
He retraced the path he and Leslie had taken, moving until the camp slowly disappeared behind him. Before long, he stepped back into the frozen forest without so much as a single Eidolon noticing his absence.
Damien glanced back at the encampment and clicked his tongue.
"Thank God these simpletons have no concept of patrols."
Damien quietly made his way back through the frozen forest until two familiar figures gradually came into view.
Paige remained exactly where he had left her, leaning casually against a snow covered tree with one hand resting on the hilt of her sword. Beside her, the cloaked party member stood silently, their face still completely hidden beneath the heavy hood.
Paige looked up the moment Damien approached, her eyes briefly swept behind him.
"Where’s Leslie?"
Damien didn’t miss a beat.
"She stayed behind. Said she wanted to gather a little more intelligence before returning."
Paige gave a small nod.
"I see." She replied calmly.
But Damien’s eyes suddenly narrowed.
"Way too calm, I’m lacking in intel, and you’ve noticed that".
Paige’s weight shifted onto her back foot while her fingers tightened around the sword at her waist, her movement was subtle, but Damien still noticed.
He reacted first.
The black axe whistled through the air in a brutal horizontal swing.
Clang!
Paige’s sword was already out. The two weapons colliding with brutal ferocity.
Paige’s calm expression shifted as she shouted without taking her eyes off Damien.
"Leslie, run!"
The cloaked figure instantly turned and sprinted toward the human encampment without the slightest hesitation.
Damien smiled in glee.
"Hey there Leslie... Die now Leslie".
Black mist erupted from Damien’s body, spreading across the snow like living smoke. From within it, seven towering figures slowly materialized, their massive silhouettes taking shape one after another until they stood in complete silence around them.
Six were black-furred Eidolons with dull, dark lifeless eyes, their corpses still bearing the wounds that had claimed them only moments earlier.
One of them had a bloodstained crimson cloth concealing its face, while an ornate ritual staff rested firmly in its hand.
"Priesty, go and kill her for me".
Paige shoved Damien aside and immediately shot toward the nearest undead Eidolon.
The moment she closed the distance, faint afterimages suddenly rippled out from her body. One sword became two, then four, before countless overlapping blades surrounded her in a blur of steel.
The undead barely had time to react.
The storm of blades crashed into it. By the time Paige came to a stop behind it, the massive body had already been reduced to dozens of bloodied pieces.
[Your undead has fallen]
Damien blinked.
"Is everyone in this scouting party broken?".