It was now early September, 382 YV (Year of Victory). The border region of the Kingdom of Valeon and the Ridian Empire was starting to turn colder as a result. Leaves began turning into autumn brown, while farmers began their first harvests for the season.

  Unfortunately, as Marcus and Stella rushed northward, aiming to both chase Archbishop Selena and to reach Sordale, the news was looking quite bad. An ‘Envoy of Death’ apparently appeared ahead, prompting an immediate mobilization of the Order of Saint Monica, under the Holy Church’s Ministry of Faithful Defense.

  As such, the first town they reached at Ridia’s borderlands was especially guarded. Inquisitor [Paladins] in white armor patrolled the settlement, while outside, supporting cavalrymen from the local lords scoured the countryside.

  Marcus lowered his telescope as he finished reconnoitering the area ahead. The two were currently on horseback, with Stella keeping her face hidden using her enchanted cloak.

  “Looks like your friends are finally up and about,” Marcus commented. “Are Envoys of Death usually this big of a deal?”

  “I’ve fought a few of them,” Stella said. “The Holy Church classifies them based on their danger levels. Hod-class envoys are the weakest, and I can usually deal with them. Those classified as Yesod-class are a bit rare but extremely dangerous. They almost always require at least a company of gold-rank [Paladins] to tackle.”

  “And the last?”

  “There hasn’t been a Malkuth-class envoy for more than a century now. I’m not sure how they get that classification, but they’re the strongest. The last one nearly destroyed a kingdom before it was defeated.”

  Why don’t they just call them demons then?

  They’re from hell, aren’t they?

  “Back in the old days, we just called them demons,” Marcus said.

  “While they do originate from hell, and they have death’s essence wafting off them, they are not direct creations of the Death God. They’re more of an amalgamation of the spirits of the damned in the underworld, creating a distorted monster that’s difficult to understand.”

  Marcus frowned. Demonkind were usually humanoid creatures. They were similar to Onis, a race of demihumans with horns. The difference was, demons ate the flesh of both humans and demihumans as food.

  These ‘Envoys of Death’ creatures sounded strange and different to Marcus. Quite frankly, he never met any of them back in hell. Perhaps the Death God’s demise led to their creation?

  Who knows? Best to investigate.

  “Why the name, though?” Marcus asked again.

  “It’s not really known where the name originated. Some say it’s the Death God Cult who created the name because some of these creatures bought ‘gospels’ for them to follow. Another possibility is that they’re named that way because they bring in death magic to this world, and in the process, slowly corrupt people into aberrant undead by their presence alone.”

  “Sounds dangerous then,” Marcus said. “Alright, let’s ride out. I need to get closer to start eavesdropping.”

  “I’m ready, Sir Marcus.”

  The two immediately galloped forward. Fortunately, by the time they arrived, the members of the Order of Saint Monica were already about to leave, and security wasn’t so fully tightened that they weren’t able to enter.

  Marcus employed [Mass Surveillance], all while going to establishment after establishment to listen to the talks and rumors. There wasn’t much information to be gained, as the inquisitors themselves were secretive.

  Still, they did learn that recently, members of the Death God Cult were proselytizing in the countryside to local merchants, sometimes leading to violent encounters. Ever since a monster appeared and destroyed a nearby city, though, that activity ceased.

  Though it was also possible that people simply stopped venturing from their towns and villages, so news about the cult stopped coming in. Danger was heightened after all. Not even the greediest merchants would set out in such conditions.

  “It’s surprising,” Marcus said, eating with Stella. “I don’t think there were a lot of demons around back then who could destroy a city on their own.”

  “They usually don’t kill people directly,” Stella said, lowering her cutlery and wiping her mouth gently. “The last envoy I fought was literally just a shard of black rock in the middle of a remote town. It alone corrupted the entire area around it, turning people into aberrant undead, until I blasted it off easily.”

  “I keep hearing aberrant undead.”

  “It’s…I’m not sure how to explain. You see, normal undead are a product of necromancy. They’re controlled by a [Necromancer]. Or they are naturally occurring mobs inside dungeons.”

  “...”

  “Well, aberrant undead are different. Usually, they appear pitch black, save for a red light coming from their former heads. Sometimes they’re aggressive and quite powerful; most of the time, though, they just wander around the area where they were spawned, spreading the corruption of an active Envoy of Death.”

  Now that was disgusting, Marcus thought. Undead that spread their undeadness? He never heard of that, ever. It was good that he had a [Saint] with him. Even as a level 100 [Hell Ranger], he couldn’t be a hundred percent sure that some broken piece of magic couldn’t turn him dead in the wrong circumstances.

  Back in the old days, that was why they had [Clerics], [Paladins], or [Priests], with [Paladins] being the most useful. They usually had the ability to counter or mitigate the effects of demonic magic using either holy or light magic.

  “...Say, how does it spread? How does it ‘corrupt’ you?” Marcus asked, worried.

  “I don’t know.” Stella shook her head. “Don’t worry about it though. I have a major skill called [Aura of Faith] that’s based on Holy Magic. It defends people around me from an envoy's corrupting effects and even purifies a corrupted area if I pour enough mana into the skill.”

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  “Does it reverse those that are corrupted?”

  “No, they just burn. I can only reverse it if a person isn’t fully converted.”

  “Good to know.”

  At least I have a [Saint] in case of an emergency.

  Learning about all of this was a good reminder to Marcus that not everything could be solved by swinging his rapiers around. At some point, he’d have to rely on his only ally.

  Not that he had a problem with it. Stella too seemed quite eager whenever she managed to help Marcus out, so it was all good.

  …Or, he hoped it would be all good.

  After spending the night at the town’s local inn to sleep, Marcus and Stella set out early in the morning, going straight in the direction taken by the inquisitors, which was incidentally up north.

  With [Blink Step] and [Levitation], as usual, Marcus and Stella didn’t have to use their horse and tire it much in the process, and they only took a few hours to reach the affected city of Hamden. Almost immediately, a shift in the atmosphere began to change.

  First, the skies began to dim, slowly at first, until they started to turn pitch black. It was almost like a fog swallowed the entire region or something. Even the forest and grass around the area also progressively turned worse, with withered trees and dead leaves littered in the fields.

  Marcus and Stella also began seeing corpses that had black pustules on them. Upon closer inspection, their bodies seemed hollow, and poking their sickly skin spilled some kind of dark liquid. It was quite disgusting to look at.

  Their horses soon began turning agitated. Even Marcus started feeling generalized mild discomfort. Scarily, he couldn’t pinpoint which part of his body was affected; he just felt wrong.

  Almost immediately, Stella cast [Aura of Faith] to counteract any possible effects of corruption on them. As an immediate result, a golden glow of light surrounded their immediate vicinity, and the bodies around them began burning rapidly.

  Once Stella finished activating her skill, a semi-permanent glow of light came from Marcus, Stella, and the two horses they rode on. It worked well, as Marcus felt the minor general discomfort being replaced by gentle coolness, and the horses started calming down.

  “Quite frankly,” Marcus frowned. “I haven’t seen this kind of crazy back in the old days.”

  “This is worse than what I’ve encountered too,” Stella worriedly said. “We should be fine though. [Aura of Faith] has never failed me yet.”

  “Appreciate the help.”

  “I’m glad to be useful to you, Sir Marcus.”

  The two continued onward. It seemed that the bodies they found strewn on the road were people trying to flee Hamden. Unfortunately, none of them ran far enough on time. Marcus found himself turning more and more agitated as a result.

  This was definitely the work of the Death God Cult, almost with complete certainty. Did they do this for area denial? Were they planning to delay Marcus by distracting him?

  Who knows?

  What he was sure about was that bastard Selena simply had to be involved in this somehow. It didn’t make sense that someone would drop such a massive piece of crap right in front of Marcus’ route out of nowhere.

  Orchestrated or not, it’s my job to deal with it.

  It's best to clean this up fast so the locals can return to their normal lives.

  As they neared Hamden’s outskirts, the signs of desperate fighting became apparent. There were some uncorrupted bodies, many of them cut in half or stabbed brutally, lying on the ground.

  Most of them wore plate armor, so they were most likely soldiers. The streets of Hamden itself were utterly deserted, silent, and almost completely lifeless. Stella had to use her light magic just to illuminate the areas they were checking. Visibility was so horrendous that unless Stella used a wide-area spell that was sure to expose them to their enemies, Marcus could only see a few dozen meters with his eyes.

  With his high [Perception] stat, this was beyond surprising. Even in hell, his vision was rarely this badly limited, so he had to mostly rely on his hearing after turning on [Mass Surveillance].

  To illustrate how bad that was, Stella complained beside him that she could barely see beyond ten meters ahead without her lights. It seemed to be worrying her enough that she was looking left and right with an elevated sense of paranoia.

  No movement.

  Not even a twitch.

  That’s strange.

  Searching for those ‘aberrant undead’ was hard even with [Mass Surveillance], because while he could hear everything around them, there wasn’t any movement. He hypothesized that the bastards were simply dormant.

  So, he decided to conduct a test. Screw stealth and subtlety; he was going to fix this now.

  “Keep your eyes peeled. I'm going to attract them to us,” Marcus calmly said to Stella, pulling out a small crossbow from his waist holster. Aiming it at the sky with his left hand, he let off a red flare arrow.

  Immediately, there was a response.

  “Movement,” Marcus said, as [Mass Surveillance] finally picked up dozens of contacts, all converging rapidly on them. “Light up the area, Stella. I'd like to see ‘em well.”

  “Roger.”

  Stella summoned her staff before invoking a spell that lit up the blocks around them. Right then, a horde of aberrant undead descended on Marcus and Stella.

  All of them seemed to be at silver rank, with occasional gold rank threats. That meant, for the natives, these bastards would be a tough nut to crack each. All of them resembled nothing but shadowy figures, with even Stella’s light barely able to illuminate them.

  Their bodies were pitch black, so only their clothes were truly visible, alongside a singular red glowing eye in the middle of their heads. While indeed terrifying to the average eye, Marcus didn’t flinch, and even Stella kept herself composed, indicating that even she was used to dealing with this.

  “They’re stronger than normal,” Stella hissed.

  “Cover my rear. I’ll deal with them.”

  “On it, Sir Marcus.”

  Marcus dropped on the ground, pulling out two of his rapiers. The aberrant undead finally closed in, readying to lunge at him, when he activated his signature skills.

  [Blink Step], [Swift Blade].

  Their bodies were quite durable, but it made no difference. He rapidly tore through the small horde, his efficiency at fighting them still unmatched. Within a few dozen seconds, the area around them was clear.

  Marcus observed the fallen aberrant undead around the two, noting that their bodies rapidly began dissolving into blackened particles that disappeared as they rose to the air. Stella’s illumination spell, however, was wearing thin, and the darkness began consuming their immediate vicinity.

  Marcus was about to order Stella to cast another large-area illumination spell when suddenly, a rumbling from the center of the city took his attention. The both of them looked up as a massive red eye appeared on top of the ruins.

  It was seemingly etched on a floating obsidian square. It was cleanly cut, and it was rotating lightly. Marcus was surprised he could even see it with the horrendous visibility conditions around them.

  “That…” Stella gasped, her voice strained. “I think it’s at least a Yesod-class envoy!”

  Marcus didn’t reply, opting to calmly observe the anomaly instead. That was when he heard a familiar voice speaking in his head. It was sarcastic, deep, and distorted.

  “Seems like you're still not tired of all this pointless fighting, buddy.”

  An uncontrollable grin appeared on Marcus’s face as he realized who that voice belonged to.

  “Heh. You crawled out of hell too?”

  He was Marcus’s old partner, his most valuable comrade, and the man Marcus called ‘brother’ before he died in the underworld.

  “No matter, glad to see you again, Simon.”