CHAPTER 81: SPIRIT CORPSES (2).

Nero stopped walking all of a sudden.

The fog had come suddenly. One moment the path along the river was clear, the next it was drowning in the grey fog.

His brows furrowed.

The fog moved strangely, flowing downstream against the current of the river.

’Strange...’

For some reason, a memory he would have loved to forget replayed in his mind.

Back in that cave so many days ago, when the Wretched Maiden of Despair had attacked him.

His eyes widened and his body trembled as he swiftly drew the Silver Blade.

With his eyes, he could see quite far into the fog.

He turned his head rapidly, tension creeping up his spine.

’If this fog was some supernatural phenomenon caused by an evil spirit, then the smarter choice would be to get off the path as quickly as possible.’

Just as he made up his mind to run as fast as he could, Nero’s ears twitched.

His brows shot up.

’What was that...’

He had heard something just now.

He closed his eyes and listened.

It was distant, muffled by the fog and distance. But it was there.

Nero trembled.

The sound of screaming. The clash of steel.

It was unmistakable...

’Humans...’

He was finally close enough to civilization once again.

He had finally encountered other humans.

His body tensed up.

He stood still for a long moment, weighing what to do mentally.

Regardless of how much he wanted to delude himself, the fact remained that he had become something slightly not human anymore.

He sucked in a deep breath and shook his head,

’Now’s not the time to think about such things.’

Indeed. From what he had heard, it wasn’t difficult to discern that the humans he heard were in the midst of a battle.

A rather terrible one from the sounds of it.

If they all died, or worse... he would be missing up on the chance of a lifetime.

Plus, he wasn’t so heartless that he would ignore other humans in peril.

Nero adjusted his grip on the sword and began moving toward the sounds.

Even though he was apprehensive and a bit scared, he didn’t want to let this opportunity go to waste.

His steps were careful and subdued at first as he planned to stay low, using the fog as cover. However, as the screaming grew louder and louder, he promptly broke out into a sprint. And then a full on run.

Nero’s jaw tightened. He’d fought ghosts before.

They were much different from physical Abominations. Much harder to kill and defend against.

But not impossible.

The sounds of combat were close now. Maybe fifty meters ahead. He could hear the sound of bones being crunched up.

He paused.

His Black Body form would terrify any human that saw him. If there were any survivors, regardless of if he rendered aid or not. The moment the waters were clear, their blades would be turned against him without fail...

He gripped freed Gungnir from the makeshift holder he had made. The sound of skin stretching and bones crunching bled into the mist as he made his way forward.

The shouts had intensified alongside the sound of blades clashing.

The scene before him was carnage.

Bodies lay scattered across the muddy ground. Most were of some strange looking Abomination with a large head and a large pair of arms, their blackened blood pooling beneath their corpses.

The living Aberrations were gathered around, the sound of bones being crushed between jaws emanating from the gathered spots.

It was indeed a gruesome scene

But Nero’s attention attention was drawn to something else.

A large man stood at the forefront guarding his large frame from the continuous assault of the Brandors through the misty fog. Beside him was a man with two short swords mowing down the swarm of Abominations.

Behind them, a man in rusty armor laying on his back, hands weakly clutching at his own throat. Above him, another man knelt with hands wrapped around the larger man’s neck.

There was another woman who laid unconscious in the ground. However, her body was already being pulled by a Brandor that had snuck behind the man wielding the shield.

Without even thinking about it, Nero acted.

His muscles clenched as he put one foot before the other.

Gungnir hummed. The next moment, it was set flying.

The spear cut through the fog like an arrow, faster than anything could react to.

The unsuspecting Brandor shot back, stopping only when its body struck a tree.

Its chest had been reduced to a bloody gaping hole as blood spewed from its large mouth and eyes.

It died on impact.

Nero’s gaze turned cold as it cut through the mist. Gungnir hummed as it dislodged itself from the chest of the Abomination, travelling in an arc as it shot right back into his outstretched grip.

Heretic Eyes could see the truth of the world.

It could discern the hidden mysteries, revealing them to the beholder. In this case— him.

His eyes narrowed as he got to see them more clearly than what hallucinations would reveal.

Ethereal shapes that weren’t quite solid. Humanoid but wrong, twisted like reflections in warped glass. They circled the clearing like wolves, their mouths stretched wide in horror and wrath, whispering the profane songs of the damned.

One of them bent down behind the woman with the crossbow. Its skeletal fingers reached toward her head.

Nero grit his teeth and shot forward. The spear in his hand hummed once again.

As a spear touched by the divinity of a god, Gungnir had some mystical properties that made it effective in dealing with ethereal horrors like these evil spirits.

It was also the sole reason he had been able to fight against the souls of the damned on his journey.

Gungnir left his hand in a smooth arc. The spear cut through the air again with a sound like thunder. It struck the spirit dead center.

The reaction was immediate. The spirit shrieked. Its form dispersed like smoke in wind, those ethereal fragments scattering into the fog.

But it wasn’t dead yet. Just one hit was certainly not enough.

Gungnir returned to his hand. He caught it without looking, his eyes scanning the area before him.

His boots hit the mud with wet slaps. Three strides brought him to the man hunched over the other. He grabbed a fistful of the man’s shirt and hauled him backward with all his strength.

The man flew. He hit the ground and rolled and shot right back up in a single motion. Nero got to see the eerie black eyes that instinctually filled him with fear.

The man crouched, his arms and legs bent unnaturally as he crawled backwards cautiously.

Nero ignored him then dropped to one knee beside the larger man, checking for breath.

"Can you hear me?" Nero asked.

The large man’s eyes flew into a coughing fit before sitting up.

"I—I’m fine."

Eyes blood red from the suffocation, Garrick rose to his feet, his glare fixed on Lawson’s crouched form.

Nero couldn’t help but muttered, "Good gods."

He had seen a possessed man once before.

For the most part, depending on the type of spirit that carried out the possession, the outcome differed, of course within a spectrum, with both ends being rather terrible.

In this case, he could tell that whatever had possessed this man was incredibly and inherently violent.

His body had already begun to change. His limbs had shifted in the reverse direction they were supposed to bend.

His face had morphed and steetched into something that was not human anymore and his hairs had begun falling out.

His skin had melted off, with tumors bursting from the raw flesh.

It was absolutely disgusting and grotesque.

"This fucking retard!"

Nero looked up at the large man. His features were twisted in fury.

’Did they know each other?’ he thought.

"Garrick!" someone shouted.

Nero glanced sideways. The slender man with twin short swords had appeared from the fog. His armor was splattered with rancid blood. His face was pale but his eyes were clear.

"Obed," the large man, Garrick spat with venom.

"This fucking idiot, Lawson, is possessed."