Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead

"I know you're hiding in here… Come on out! Come out!" wielding his axe by grasping the handle close to the tool's head, the tall man was moving with around awfully quiet steps, if not for the flooring being made from wooden planks that often creaked under his weight, Griar might not be able to hear his footsteps at all, but in any case, the axe-man was a talkative sort anyways.

"Now… Now… You have no business here, little piggy… This is the chief's dwelling, an outsider has no right to walk these halls without her permission!" he clicked his tongue in a bizarre manner, but unfortunately, he refused to move far away from the manor's back entrance, he hovered in between rooms close to it for now, always returning to the door afterward, unless Griar decided to run, he could not get out without running into him.

But if he ran, he might just get himself axed in the leg for even slightly misjudging the man's position, but also, the young man could not afford to stay for too long as the other villagers were going to find their way inside eventually, some might even go around to the back, which would be disastrous for his escape plan.

On the floor above, the heavy step of Isabela and the loud bangs caused by the supposed intruders continued, but the one with the burlap sack upon his head did not seem concerned about this, seemingly fully confident that nothing bad would happen to her.

As Griar debated on what was the best course of action, the fighting above reached the place directly above him, he could heard the tall woman's muffled voice, earlier, she had spoken quite clearly, but it seemed that in the midst of the action, she reverted to a speaking with a thick accent that prevented him from understanding a single she was saying, but for some reason, he felt quite confident that she was spouting insults…

In the next moment, splinters and pieces of wood rained down upon him, as he was greeted by the bloodied face of a complete stranger, his head having been slammed through the ground of the second floor, Griar saw as life left the person's eyes, blood seeping from their open mouth.

Apart from the horror of the scene itself, Griar quickly realised that this had lured the axe-man to come check out the room he was in, the young man quietly breathed in and out as he locked his gaze on the door the man was going to have to pass through the get inside, silently grasping the kitchen knife at his waist, clutching the wooden handle tightly.

"Oh… What do we have here? Yet another interloper has faced the judgement of Chief Isabela's divine powers-" as he focused on the face poking out from the ceiling, Griar did not hesitate and plunge the blade straight through the man's throat at the first occasion, causing the imposing figure to stumble back, gurgling on his own, blackened blood whilst wildly swinging his axe through the air.

Griar ignored the man entirely and ran straight for the back entrance, and the instant he passed through, he realised that quite a few of the villagers had indeed made the decision to go around to behind the manor instead of wait in front of it, but Griar sprinted in a straight line toward the fence, not turning around to see as the axe-man got out of the door a few seconds after him, pulling the knife out of his neck and a spurt of blood, throwing the now thoroughly rusted and gnawed blade to the ground.

Enough time had passed for Griar to cast a spell, and he did so without hesitation, manifesting a burst of wind beneath his feet, launching himself above the fence with precision, but in mid-air, as his body spun around and he got a good look at the manor and villagers, he saw a flash of light, coming from the strange object held by the villager with the straw hat, and nearly immediately after the light flashes, something embedding itself into his shoulder, causing him to hit the ground in a most ungraceful manner, gritting his teeth in pain.

He crawled up to his feet in spite of it, and disappeared behind the trees before the villager could take another shot at him.

Just a few moments after this, Isabela stepped out, holding the corpse of the other intruder by the back of their collar.

"He got away?" she asked the one with the burlap bag.

"Yes" he gurgled back, blood spewing from his stab wound as he did so.

"Get my runner here, this boy is abnormal and potentially dangerous, Countess Ada and the High Priestess need to be made aware"

"Understood… Chief…" the villagers dispersed, going back to what they had been doing without as much as a single whisper.

In the meantime, Griar moved as quickly as he could through the woods, fearing that he might be pursued, only stopping in his track when he reached what looked like an old shack that had been overtaken by tall grasses, he checked the area for bear traps and such, carefully check the inside, but found that it was not occupied.

He would have loved to take a seat, but the only chair and bed inside were visibly rotten, the flooring had since long been broken into pieces by the passage of time and under the assault of the elements, melding with the dirt and grass that was now growing in its place.

So instead, he just picked a corner and took off his shirt to check his injured shoulder, thankfully, he had listened attentively when his mother and Aunty Minli taught him about healing magic.

He himself did not possess outstanding healing capabilities, so he had to be smart about how he went about it- Minli knew all the tricks however, so after the effects of casting a spell subsided, he began to circulate his mana throughout his body, managing to discover a foreign object within his shoulder, which was something he would qualify as some of iron-like, miniature bolt of some sort.

Never would have expected that the object the villager with the straw hat was carrying around was actually a bizarre crossbow, the man had missed his shots before, but had somehow managed to hit him whilst in mid-air.

Griar breathed out and imbued the small bolt with his mana, whilst those with powerful self-healing capabilities would simply heal without thinking about it, the projectiles stuck within them being naturally expelled and reduced to nothing just through their simple will to heal, Griar had to focus and really visualise getting that thing out of his flesh.

The process was lengthy, painful and complicated, taking him a dozen minutes to accomplish, but eventually, the small object fell upon the ground.

'I need to recuperate a bit…'

'...I should just go back to the Peaceful Realm for a little while- Mmh?' he tried to do so, and felt the same thing as when someone personally interfered with a spell of his.

Something was preventing him from going back to the Peaceful Realm.