Looking for corpses is not a pleasant thing to do. Especially when you find more than initially planned. The inside of the room was a lot cleaner than the rest of the building so the footprints were useless past the doorstep. Rose lost a lot of her confidence from earlier and was looking at Anthony for directions.
"Tell me you have an idea what's going on."
"Well, Sarah said there was one corpse so either she was wrong or one of them is still alive. The dry one is more likely to be dead for real so you should check on him. I'll see what I can do with the other one."
Following the advice Rose sat down next to the dead man and began to check his injuries, hoping to find the one that caused his death. Soon after beginning she noticed from the corner of her eye that the nails of the corpse suddenly turned red and began growing rapidly.
She tried to get away but she reacted too late and a swipe from the reanimated man tore off the thumb of her already injured hand. After activating her ability and getting away, she assessed her injury and got ready to fight.
Anthony noticed what happened but couldn't help out because he had a problem of his own. The body he was supposed to deal with also started to move after a significantly more drastic transformation. It had the same red claws as its partner alongside some feathers and a pair of white wings.
The brawl that broke out turned out to be quite hectic as the room would have been too small for two people to fight in, let alone four, and unfortunately the living side was clearly losing out. Between the two of them Rose was in a worse position.
Even though she managed to get a bone shield from Anthony soon after they began fighting and she was facing the weaker of the two opponents, she couldn't fight back properly because she was concentrating on not getting any more injuries.
Anthony was in a better position since he could simply take his enemy's attacks and he also had an infinite supply of weapons. His problem was that both him and his opponent turned out to be more resilient than they were strong so neither of them could cause any serious damage.
After a while, Rose was starting to tire out. Unlike her companion she still had to worry about stamina management. With her concentration further divided she started to accumulate smaller cuts on her body and completely lost control of the fight.
[Stamina: 53%]
She tried to use her shadow leg to kick the insides of her opponent a few times but it didn't seem to achieve much. Without other options she started backing away towards the window, planning to grab the undead man and throw him out into the desert.
However, when she got close she heard the glass break behind her. Suddenly a dried-up hand reached past her and grabbed the monster by the head. As soon as the hand made contact with him the previously bloodthirsty corpse collapsed without resistance.
Rose turned around to look at the new arrival. Only to see Sarah hanging from the windowsill after the earlier stunt made her lose her balance. The feathered monster, seeing what happened to its partner, stopped fighting Anthony and flew out through the broken window, soon disappearing in the desert sand.
Everything was quiet again. Anthony helped Sarah inside to stop her from falling down and to question her.
"I believe you know what happened here?"
"Both of them were dead. Unfortunately, I could only sense the fresh one from outside. Also there are about a dozen more in the basement."
"Okay, we'll get back to that. First tell us what you did to that guy."
"I took his soul. He was already dead so there was nothing to stop me from doing so. Also ..."
Then the doubly dead corpse started standing up. It was a lot more sluggish than before signifying that it was now Sarah's zombie. It still kept the red claws but it's skin was in an even worse condition than before and was also starting to fall off.
"Do we check the rest of them?"
As the three of them made their way down to the basement the sun was already starting to set. Peter finally managed to wake up and found himself buried alive.
[Health: 78%]
[Stamina: 54%]
"How long was I knocked out? Where is everyone?"
"Anthony and Rose went to look at a corpse they found, Sarah sneaked after them and Drake is in one of the mounds of sand near you. By the way it's sunset but you can probably see that yourself."
The dark haired boy got up with some difficulty and started looking around for his still buried friend. Manda was watching him from the top of their van and assessed Peter's condition.
"You could use a few more hours of sleep. We'll probably have to actually contribute something tomorrow."
"Thanks for the advice but I'm fine. I use less stamina than I get back and it's about to be night-time anyway. I'll recover then."
Eventually Drake was dug up from the sand and woken up. He was still a bit dazed but otherwise in good condition. He was given a proper place to sleep and left alone to rest.
The other two boys were relaxing in peace when Peter received the first text message of his life. It was sent by Anthony and said the following.
[There's a feathered monster in the desert. Be careful.]
He didn't really know what to do with the information so he shared the message with the tattooed kid who also didn't have much to say.
"Tell me if you see something like this, just in case."
"You're the one with night vision. I won't see past the tip of my nose in an hour."
The two of them halfheartedly stood watch in silence until Drake spoke up, alarming both of them.
"Hey guys, do any of the locals have wings?"
They turned towards where Drake was looking and sure enough there were two figures standing on one of the distant sand dunes. While Drake and Manda could only see vague silhouettes, one of which appeared to have wings, Peter could see the two of them perfectly.
One of them was a humanoid monster with wings and covered in white feathers. The other was a boy appearing similar to them in age and who also had an intimidating pair of horns sticking out of his head.
With limited information about who were in front of them, the three boys thought it would be better to wait for the other side to act first.
All they knew was that the winged monster could escape from the others and a simple message about its friend.
[Error: Users cannot be identified!]
None of them had to fight one of their own before but based on what they knew about themselves and each other, it wasn't going to be a pleasant experience. Thankfully they could already guess two of his abilities. One of them was the creation of the annoying red substance they've had to deal with recently, the other was probably the monster beside him.
That guess was based on what they knew of the investigation and the fact that the interface was being uncooperative when trying to examine it.
[Entity class 10.]
[Abilities: <Restricted access>]
The only other time it was this secretive with abilities specifically was with Sarah's zombies. However there was a key difference in that, they knew for a fact that their rotting acquaintances didn't have any, not yet anyway.
Peter wanted to make an observation, but then he saw the boy move in the distance and a flash of moonlight being reflected on an object in his hands, so the only thing he ended up saying was ...
"Dodge!"
Suddenly, something red flew past where Drake's head was just a moment ago. A blood red knife embedded itself in the side of the van and it didn't seem like they could remove it without also tearing the door off.
With the possibility of negotiation becoming all but nonexistent, all that could be done was to prepare for a fight and hope for the best. Peter was the first to act. He gathered his shadow and started running toward the horned boy.
His choice of opponent was made with the consideration of his companions. Drake was too weak at that moment to be in a direct confrontation with anyone and Manda, while being the strongest between the three of them, was unarmed making the red blades disproportionately effective against him.
Of course this didn't mean that his own chances were particularly high. He guessed that even with the enhancement of his abilities he was at a disadvantage in terms physical power. Some of his injuries still remained and he didn't have much experience with his only ability that was useful in direct combat.
[Health: 82%]
[Stamina: 68%]
[Heart of night: 50% effective]
When he reached his opponent he used his momentum to swing the Asteri's blunt end forward like a mace. The attack was blocked by a red knife, slightly longer than the one thrown at them, but its wielder did end up momentarily losing his footing on the sand.
The boy staggered back a few steps but, based on his facial expression, wasn't too fazed by being hit with a lamppost. He stood still for a bit, making Peter unsure how to proceed, then started speaking to no one in particular ...
"It's just my luck to have to fight another user."
"We don't necessarily have to fight. You could just give yourself up. If you're doing this for the game, you know you don't have to participate."
While Peter took the opportunity to talk things out, a bunch of white feathers flew by, signifying that Manda also started his own fight, and with a more successful opening attack.
"I don't know what game you're talking about but I can't stop even if I wanted to, you can probably guess why. However, feel free to run away, I won't chase you."
Indeed, he could guess why they had to fight. The observation he wanted to make earlier was related to his adversary's clothing. It was a Muntenian military uniform. He was most likely ordered to fight and didn't want to risk the consequences of disobeying orders.
The two's fight continued. Peter seemed to have the advantage until a second knife was revealed. Defending against two weapons was hard even for an experienced fighter, let alone for Peter whose experience consisted mostly of bare handed brawls and sneak attacks.
Inevitably, a few attacks got through the Asteri, which meant a ghastly tear in the skin every time it happened. Peter was resilient enough to not bleed too much but he was gradually being worn down.
[Health: 73%]
[Stamina: 57%]
Manda also seemed to have gotten into a standstill but thankfully they had a great advantage in the fight. Sheer numbers.
[Shared message:]
[You have consumed 0.3 kg of blood steel.]
[Result: STR +0.18, END +0.06, STA +0.12, MGC +0.06, EXP +60]
[Temporary result: STR +0.9, END +0.3, STA +0.6]
[Time left: 35:55:08]
Drake flew up high into the air and started throwing his hardened feathers around. He wasn't the most accurate and his feathers didn't do much damage to either of the enemies, but they served as the perfect distraction for those still on the ground.
Peter grabbed his weapon by the end and prepared to repeat his opening attack, hoping that his opponent would try to block it the same way as before, allowing Peter to catch him off guard.
[Night Star activated.]
[Heart of night: 75% effective]
He still didn't know how to control the ability properly but he thought "Why should I?". The idea was that if he didn't even attempt to control the flame then it would just spread out all over the place, potentially hurting him as well. But the Asteri was so long for a reason.
The attack was blocked once again but then everything turned dark around the two of them. The increased force of the attack forced the horned boy to his knees then suddenly, the darkness was washed away by an explosion of radiant light.
Predictably the explosion ended up hurting Peter as well, quite badly in fact. His front side was littered with burn marks, his clothes were all ruined and parts of his black hair were still on fire.
[Health: 56%]
[Stamina:51%]
His opponent, however, was barely alive. His entire body was charred as he was lying motionless in the sand. Peter painfully made his way towards him then lifted him up. He didn't want to actually kill him, nor did he want to leave him to die in the desert.
The boy reached towards his face with what little strength he had left. Peter was ready to drop him the moment anything suspicious happened, since he was sure the boy had at least one still unseen ability. And he was right, it was just nothing like he had anticipated.
[You have received a benevolent curse.]
[You gain 1.50 Strength and 1.00 Endurance against enemies related to light. Light based entities are inherently hostile towards you.]
[Time left: 167:59:56]
"That's all I have left. You beat me."
Meanwhile, Manda also won his fight. He grew claws on one of his hands and was holding the feathered monster's heart in it.
They won the fight so the three of them were walking back to the van, that was now missing a door, in silence. They really just wanted to rest and let Anthony figure out what to do with their defeated foe.
Suddenly the quiet night was interrupted by the sound of a gunshot coming from behind them.