Like ghosts, the Elven company moved toward the wall. Adarin scurried after them, Johan and Liora barely keeping up. I need to keep an eye on them. These motherfucking Elves want to run us dry. Arrogant bastards.

  As they reached their destination, the elves dispersed into the shadows of the ruined houses beneath the towering wall. The wall loomed thirty meters high, each pale stone block massive enough to dwarf a man, the surface gleaming faintly under.

  The elves readied their arrows, each glowing with what Adarin had been glibly told was binding magic.

  Nearby, the two young mages—Liora and Johan—leaned forward on their knees, weaving quietly in the shadows. Irelia watched them with visible contempt… until Liora began distributing the distraction pebbles. Her expression brightened slightly.

  Adarin shook his head. Maybe we should’ve done that before we ran off. This fucking brinksmanship. How can this army win anything if it's this divided?

  He kept one eye on the operation, the other on Liora and Johan. A series of quiet, targeted bow-shots picked off guards on the wall—clean, surgical. Then a signal came from the overwatch elves positioned deeper in the ruins.

  In a single motion, the binding arrows loosed.

  Each shot struck the edge of the wall just beneath the crown. Silken thread spooled down from the hooks, connecting to a thicker guide rope, which in turn pulled up proper climbing rope.

  Then it began.

  The elves scaled the wall like gravity was a suggestion. They moved with eerie, practiced ease, as if vertical surfaces were just another walking path.

  Adarin adjusted the friction in his limbs and motioned for Liora and Johan to follow.

  Johan’s eyes widened as he looked up at the impossible height.

  “I… I can’t.”

  He stared upward, then glanced down at the ground—shame clouding his face.

  Adarin groaned internally. Should’ve vetted this back at camp. Rookie mistake.

  He opened his mouth to say something—but surprisingly, Liora stepped in first. She laid a hand on Johan’s shoulder, squeezed it gently, and met his eyes. “Johan. You’re raising zombie hordes and literally fighting armies on your own. This is just a wall.”

  Johan shook his head. “But what if I fall?”

  Adarin glanced up and down the rope. “I have an idea. You’ll go last.”

  With that, he moved off in search of Seishin Irelia.

  Liora began climbing, steady and deliberate. Moments later, Irelia returned, grinning wide as ever. Without asking, she secured both Adarin and Johan to the rope and signaled the elves up on the wall.

  Adarin gripped tight, letting himself be hauled up. As he rose, he took in the battlefield below. The clashes outside the walls had quieted. What he assumed were enemy forces now looked to be in retreat.

  Soon, they reached the crown of the wall. There, a visibly shivering Johan was unbound alongside Adarin and set gently down on the stones.

  Adarin felt the wind wash over him. Liora’s hair whipped into her face, and she scowled as she twisted it into a quick braid.

  Down below, the sounds of battle echoed along the wall—shouts, metal, screams.

  He gestured sharply to his companions. “Let’s go. The elves are clearing the way.”

  They scurried along the inner edge of the white stone wall and quickly came across the first bodies—orc soldiers, arrows buried deep in their skulls.

  Liora and Johan dropped to their knees beside them. Thirty seconds later, the corpses stirred and rose, still shambling but nimble with recent death, trailing behind the trio in loose formation.

  They followed the trail of destruction the elves had left behind: down a covered stairwell, through a guard post whose occupants had been slaughtered, and finally out onto the street—flanked by two dozen undead.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  A pitiful platoon, he thought. Enough to scare peasants, not soldiers. But it would have to do.

  The elves had vanished into the city proper, moving like a tide toward the growing sounds of battle near the gate. A thick pillar of smoke coiled upward into the sky. The clash of steel and screams grew louder by the minute.

  Johan glanced around. “Now we just need to find more of the dead.”

  Adarin sifted through his memory, recalling the aerial surveillance maps the old necromancer had shown him. “There. I know where there’s a mass grave.”

  They moved out, slipping through side streets and narrow alleys, keeping to cover as the sounds of war intensified behind them.

  As they scurried through the ruined citadel—sometimes pausing to avoid patrols and the growing ruckus near the wall they’d climbed—Adarin’s mind wandered.

  Why did Rüdiger just send us over the wall? Three fighters. Barely that. Johan is a junior at best.

  He frowned, pressing his body into a shadowed alcove as orc patrols passed. There’s something I’m missing.

  Up ahead, a group of orcs were dumping corpses from wheelbarrows into a shallow dugout pit. Labor goblins were dragging the bodies, sweat-matted and bored.

  Johan touched Liora’s hand. She flinched slightly, but didn’t pull away.

  He leaned in and whispered. “Wanna see a trick they won’t teach you in school?”

  Mass Raise Undead, Adarin realized a moment before it happened.

  Johan closed his eyes. Purple light bloomed in his hand, swirling between his fingers. He reached out—not physically, but with magic—toward the wagon, toward the pit. Two dozen glowing strands shot out from him like threads of fate.

  Then, the corpses moved.

  Limbs twitched. Bodies jerked upright. Dead eyes snapped open.

  The goblins screamed as the corpses they’d been hauling sprang to life—biting, clawing, flailing in a frenzy. Chaos erupted in an instant.

  Adarin charged, Rootwhips already crackling. As he moved, he assessed the battlefield.

  Ten enemies. Forty half-rotten corpses spilling into them like a flood—frenzied claws and teeth snapping bone. Behind him, the two fledglings trailed, more baggage than backup.

  He leapt.

  The whips ignited with speed, snapping into hypersonic arcs just as he met the backs of two goblins’ heads. Blood sprayed. Both dropped—unconscious, concussed.

  Adarin ran straight over them, heading for the wagon.

  Two of his limbs twisted, reforming into sharp spikes. He stomped hard—one foot on each fallen goblin. The tips punched through their backs near the spine.

  Paralyzed.

  He allowed himself a satisfied grin and kept running.

  Around him, the undead did their work with brutal efficiency.

  Only three enemies still stood—two locked in desperate combat, the last turning to flee.

  No you don’t.

  Adarin lashed the whip forward. It snapped around the goblin’s neck mid-stride. He twisted his limb, tightening the loop. The goblin clawed at his throat, eyes bulging, face turning purple.

  While it flailed, Adarin whipped his second Rootwhip twice more—snapping them across the backs of the thighs of the other two goblins mid-fight. Both crumpled to their knees.

  Then the tide of undead reached them—burying them.

  The fight was over in moments. Finally—something worth a damn.

  He loosened the whip as soon as the goblin passed out.

  Johan was already approaching the pit, breathless. “Liora! This is our chance. Come—we need to raise as many as we can.”

  The two young necromancers scrambled into motion—Liora steady but pale, Johan grinning like a lunatic. They carved sigils into the dirt, blood dripping into the pit while Adarin stood guard.

  He’d studied the patrol pattern beforehand. Fifteen minutes. That’s more than enough time to raise a small army.

  Only then did Adarin glance down at the etched pattern on his wooden leg.

  The eye shifted.

  You have defeated 10 Goblin Warriors. Average normalized strength difference: 37%. Levels gained: 1

  He called over to Johan and Liora, but neither responded with excitement. The skirmish had been too small. No level-ups for them.

  Adarin smiled, content. Finally—progress.

  He opened the interface and checked his attributes.

  Two free points had already gone into Movement, pushing the stat to 127.

  He skimmed the full list, remembering what Rüdiger had told him: once any attribute hit 200, it would unlock another implant.

  Well… whatever weirdness is going on with my implants, it’s still the quickest road to power.

  He assigned his remaining two points to Cognitive, raising it to 194.

  Then he looked up.

  A sharp, cackling laugh knifed through the air—too loud, too practiced. From the shadows of an alley stepped a tall goblin clad in black, wooden, oddly organic armor. Sickly green light glowed from his eyes.

  “Now, now,” the stranger purred, voice thick with mockery. “Desecrating the corpses of my men, are we?”

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