While in the heat of battle, my eyes continuously flicked from my opponent up to the wall, where I could spot hundreds of spectating Cultists. Something had been bothering me for some time now, and that was the way all these Undead seemed…well, supercharged.
Not in the sense that they were any stronger than their rank; no, they were very much putting out the level of power expected from certain Grades; however, that was the thing: their power never seemed to diminish.
Coming to a certain revelation, I felt the urge to smack myself in the head with one of my Eskrima for not seeing it earlier; they weren’t getting weaker…they were completely immune to particle suppression.
((Fell, deal with the Cultists, don’t leave a single one standing.))
((Copy, deploying,))
((Nexus what’s going on?)) Not far away from my location, Brenden asked as he had picked up on the oddity with the Undead, too.
((The Cultists are doing some sort of spell or something to reduce the effects of particle suppression on the horde, that’s why even though they should be at the peak of non-rank statistically, they aren’t.)) Stepping back, I manifested several Geo-Spikes and head-shotted a cluster of walking corpses.
((How can that be?)) Emilia, though a few miles away, was still paying attention to the comms and was able to join in on the conversation.
((Workin on that, for now, stick to your assigned tasks. We have plenty of particle water and potions to keep ourselves up and running, but I can’t say the same for the other squads. Luckily, the trenching tactic is working, but even that isn’t necessarily a good thing because it’s increasing the pressure over here.))
Ever since the moment the first howitzer shell rang out, the horde had been funneling toward us, and after falling into the ditches, they only had one way to go…in our direction; thus, while it had reduced the numbers, the other squads were dealing with, it increased ours by several times.
As it stands, they all had to deal with around 7-10,000 undead, whereas we had 40 to 50 constantly flowing in our direction. From the drone feed, I was able to keep tabs on how many were coming, and if we hadn’t been fully prepared ahead of time, it might have been a bit stifling.
Even so, it was well within the capabilities of My family and slave to handle such numbers given enough time, and by adding on Piniki and Sonas, we were in good shape.
The trick was going to be condensing the other squads.
Depending on the flow from the gates, it was entirely plausible that I would have an opportunity to move around the other squads and send aid here and there. Still, with the new information about the Lack of Particle Suppression, that was beginning to seem like a pipe dream.
’How…’ Breaking away from combat, I used Geo-wall at strategic locations, separated myself and several Undead from the horde, and went to work testing theories.
’There is nothing different about them on a surface level…and my perception isn’t picking up anything out of the ordinary…’ rushing forward, I engaged with three of the seven Undead I segregated from the others and took my time dismantling them in combat.
Targeting the joints first, I immobilized the opponent, then smashed off their bottom jaw, leaving them completely helpless.
’Partaevian has to have done something to them, but what is it? I don’t sense anything strange about their particle radiation, nor do I see any foreign devices implanted on their bodies…’ Taking a steadying breath, I retracted my perception to a little under three feet from my body and targeted only the group of crippled undead in my clutches.
Acting like a highly defined and focused MRI machine, I used my perception to scan every inch of their bodies and soon located something that caused me to frown.
Inside the chest cavity, the heart, to be precise, was a small fragment of foreign material, and based on what I was seeing, I could determine exactly what it was: a fragment of Homunculus Jewelry.
’So…that’s how. You’ve come up with quite a plot, Draven. Having your cultists shatter part of their jewelry and plant it inside of the Undead, in that way, they are immune to particle suppression, and given the size of this shard, each cultist must have 50+ Undead feeding off them…no… that’s not all there is to it, there’s more…’ My eyes widened slightly as, for the first time, I truly examined one of the Undead.
’Wow…that’s twisted even for my standards.’ Now that I was looking at them, I noticed something was slightly off. This crippled Undead didn’t resemble the monsters I had become accustomed to seeing, at least not on a surface level.
Undead from the Undead Caverns were…well… monsters. That much was a given, and monsters are generally the by-products of overly particle-rich environments; thus, they have a certain look to them… whereas the one I was now holding up by its neck…looked human; not just that, upon further inspection even its clothing, wasn’t something generated by Arkadia, no…this was someone from Earth.
’Fuck…these are man-made Undead, not Arkadia Born; Draven is using the corpses of those who die in the tower as fodder by planting Homunculus fragments in their chests to reanimate them. The only naturally occurring Undead are those above Knight-Grade.’
Without hesitation, I crushed the skull of the Undead, swiftly dealt with the remaining six, and dropped my Geo-Wall.
’Touche Draven, touche, you needed to bolster your forces to put on a good show, and we walked right into your little play. Unfortunately for you, I am the only one who noticed the truth, so it won’t have the same level of shock factor on the other squads, especially since the faces of each Undead have deteriorated to such a point that they are unrecognizable to anyone watching who may see a loved one.’
New n𝙤vel chapters are published on freeweɓnøvel.com.
(All Squads, be advised that Partaevian has implanted tiny pinky nail-sized Homunculus fragments into the chests of every Undead; due to this, they aren’t subjected to particle suppression.)
(MsCastle will be handing out to everyone a single bottle of Alpha-Grade particle water; use it sparingly to boost yourselves up and cleanly sweep your battlefields before moving to aid the closest squad.)