“H-help! Captain! The worm! Aaaah!”
One of the cavalrymen was caught in the worm’s maw and swallowed whole before anything could be done.
By the time Will had realized what was happening, there was no one left in the camp who was capable of mounting any real resistance. The soldiers could do nothing but wildly swing their weapons in blind panic as they screamed and fled.
“How…how could this…”
“Aaah! Captain! The corpses…the corpses are! Gah!”
Drawn by the new death cries, Will’s eyes were forced to witness what he did not wish to see.
The mangled corpse of his comrades… They had been crushed to pieces only moments ago, but they now lurched to their feet and attacked allies who were standing nearby.
The air was thick with the stench of decay, as well as a clinging mist from which a foul odor emanated.
The miasma was seeping into the bodies of the dead and granted them a false semblance of life.
Like that, the fallen rose once more…driven only by the urge to claim more lives.
“Ah… Aaaah… AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!”
From the very depths of his soul, Will screamed.
Only moments ago, he had been ready to spur his horse onward, staking everything on his pride as a knight.
And before that, beneath the Hero’s banner, he had steeled himself to face the Demon King.
But now…
Everything he had believed in was being trampled beneath the corpses before his eyes, shattered beyond recognition.
“Stop… Please…stop!”
Even as he cried out, one of his men was crushed beneath a giant worm, his body reduced to bloody chunks of flesh.
The risen slaughtered the living, creating yet more corpses to swell their ranks.
“My men…my comrades… What have you done to them?!”
Forcing himself to his feet, Will desperately raised his spear and charged at the enemy before him.
“Huh…?”
A sharp pain tore through his side, and he looked down instinctively.
There stood Razab. Half of his face had been crushed away, yet a crazed grin twisted across what remained as he drove his sword into Will’s side.
“Ah… Aaah… AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!”
As tears streamed down his face, Will rained blow after blow upon the corpse of the man who had once been his comrade.
Until a gigantic worm collapsed on top of them both, grinding everything beneath its immense weight into bloody pulp.
—
The staff in his hand felt strangely heavy.
Panting as he desperately fled the horde of monsters, Vengras shouted to Poro.
“Poro! I will hold them off here! Please take the wounded and go on ahead!”
He turned around to face the enemy, then gestured insistently at Poro and the others, urging them to keep moving.
They had managed to escape the vicinity of the Demon General somehow, but traveling with the wounded meant it was only a matter of time before the monsters caught up with them.
“Then I will go with you.”
Ekbert stepped up beside him, sword in hand.
While the others stared in astonishment at their decision, his partner offered a calm smile and motioned for them to retreat.
“Hurry up and flee. Without the god’s blessings, you will only get yourself crushed by those things.”
“B-but…what about you two?!”
Poro, a former farmer, still wore the same unpolished, rustic look on his face, now clouded with worry.
“Do not insult me. I do not need one or two blessings to deal with the likes of them.”
“Nor do I. Buying enough time for your sake is well within our abilities. Now that you understand, go. Quickly.”
The five of them bowed their heads in gratitude before hurrying away.
Watching them leave, Ekbert merely shrugged.