After leaving the clinic, I headed to the location, which the captured assassins told me was their main base of operation.
It was my most likely chance to find out who was putting up these bounties on me. Also, I've noticed that there were no more people following me.
The location was in the red light district, in a rundown bar, and when I got there, Guardian was giving off alerts.
<<
"What's miasma?"
<<
Undead huh? Surely there shouldn't be any monsters within the capital unless someone managed to sneak it in or they have similar teleportation skills as me.
I opened the door to the bar, where the rotting smells punched me in the stomach. I held my breath and headed inside. My radar showed four enemies upstairs; however, as I made my way to the stairs, I found nine dead bodies, all with their throats ripped out.
I grabbed my spear out of my storage, and I tried to peek around the corner. I saw four people, all covered in blood, and the most notable thing was that they had glowing red eyes and their throats ripped out—the undead.
The undead were all walking around senselessly into walls, chairs, and tables. However, the floorboard underneath my foot made a creaking sound as I tried to move, which alerted them to my presence.
The zombies were only level 6 to 8, nothing too hard for me to take on. So I slashed the head of one, teleported behind another, then slashed it in half diagonally.
The final two were lined up, so I used [Spear Throw], which went through their heads, exploding them into bits.
<<
I looked at the radar to see that the nine corpses downstairs had all risen, turning into undead zombies.
"Ah shit, here we go again," I cursed.
After ten minutes of slashing and dodging, all the zombies were dead. Again. Guardian suggested removing the heads or burning the bodies to ensure the corpses don't return as undead.
<<
"Undead summoning magic, what rank?"
<<
"Show me where it is. Just what the hell is happening?"
I ran towards the direction where the summoning magic was detected—the Royal Palace. Standing in front of the gates were two palace guards; however, their uniform was weird.
I went a bit closer to see that both uniforms were dishevelled, one was missing his gloves, and the other one's helmet was too small. And well, the most obvious thing was that they were showing as enemies on my radar.
I walked past them, and then suddenly, I used [Blink] behind them both. I grabbed my spear out of my storage and knocked one out with the butt of my spear.
I then held my spear against the other by his throat. Obviously, he was caught off guard and couldn't pull out his dagger or use his long halberd to retaliate.
"Tell me who are you and what's happening inside the palace," I questioned.
"Never!" he replies, and he bites down on something in his mouth.
His body then collapsed onto the ground, lifelessly. I went over to the dead man, where I opened his mouth to find one of his molars replaced with a silver tooth that had burst open.
I assume it was some poison-filled capsule to prevent themselves from being interrogated. Usually, this sort of thing is used by spies or people part of a dark cult of some sort.
<<
I quickly ripped out the poorly implanted tooth from the unconscious fake guard and tied him with metal gate chains. I then rushed into the palace, where I encountered two more phoney guards.
"Hey, who ar-"
"Get the fu-"
Their sentence was cut off with slashes to their backs. Further, I found two real guards; however, one had a dagger stabbed through his eyes, whilst the other had one in the side of his neck. Both of them had expired for some time.
As I was about to leave, I heard sudden groaning noises coming from the corpses. I had a feeling what was going to happen, so I finished them off by removing their heads from the body.
I moved further in to find several undead zombies roaming the hallways. It seems like the large amount of Miasma in the air is causing the dead to revive as undead rapidly.
I had Guardian calculate how many red markers appeared, which was seventy-nine. There's a group of twenty blue markers with a single green marker, surrounded by thirteen red ones.
The single green marker belonged to our good friend Duke Lucera, and it seems there's a lot of dramatic events happening. I decided to try and rescue him, but even though I was high level, I might have problems against a large group of undead monsters.
So I placed a warp point and teleported back to the forest.
"Kumo, I'm gonna need your help again. Use [Queen's call]; we're going to need quite a few extra hands or legs in this case."
Kumo did as I commanded, and rushing out of nowhere was a large squad of spiders. Most of them were Great Fang Spiders, and another called the Black Slasher Spider. All of them was the size of a medium dog, which would've terrified people back on Earth, and this world as well, I guess.
When I returned to the palace, I had them spread out to kill every undead. We then went absolutely berserk.
Accompanying me was a small squad of five Black Slashers; they were highly efficient at removing the heads off the zombies, with their large sharp front legs.
As we made our way towards the room where the Duke was locked up, I found several people dressed in black covered in blood. However, none of the zombies was attacking them or even noticed that they were there for some reason.
I suspect that the black cloth around their arms and legs with the same symbols kept them from being attacked. So I had the spiders launch a surprise attack on them where the spiders ripped the black cloths off and then retreated to the ceiling.
I watched as they were torn apart by the zombies, proving my hypothesis correct. I wrapped one around my arm and continued on, though I still killed any zombie I saw.
We eventually reached the room where the Duke was held, possibly hostage. I had no idea if the red marker humans were armed or not, so I decided to launch a surprise attack on them.
I had the spiders create a spider web slingshot around two pillars, where we used the dead body belonging to one of those guys dressed in black and launched it through the door.
The body crashes through the door and into a group of red markers. We then rushed into the room, where I spotted the Duke and a group of people who seemed to be nobles.
"Sorry, I'm a bit late for the party. I had a bit of a problem trying to get my friends in here." I said as I threw my spear at a man who was in the middle of groping a women's chest.
The Black Slasher Spiders then finished off the rest of the attackers; I stood by the Duke, and the rest of the nobles, as we watched people get torn apart.
The ones knocked out had their poison capsules removed and tied up in spider webs.
"Masato is that you?!"
"Yeah, it's me. It seems like you're receiving lots of unwanted attention lately."
"Indeed, you're right; thank you for coming here to save us. But, how did you know we needed help?"
"Uh, I noticed a large amount of Miasma coming from the palace. When I got here, I found people poising as fake guards." I then showed him what was happening outside of the room.
"Those bodies were revived as zombies because of the large amounts of Miasma. Speaking of which take these, and wrap them around your body somewhere. The zombies just ignore you when you wear these." I pulled out several black cloths, and the Spiders gave the other nobles clothes from the dead attackers.
The only problem was that the spiders couldn't untie them, so arms and legs were handed to the nobles, who were horrified.
"These spiders are all C-rank. How the hell did you get them in here?"
"I prefer not to say, but you just got to know that these are my subordinates and will not harm anyone unless I say so-."
"Duke Lucera, how can you believe a random commoner! Look at those spider monsters he's controlling; he's definitely with the enemies. I suggest we interrogate him."
A bold old man dressed in a green robe suddenly interrupted me before I could finish my sentence. He and four others came over towards, with their swords pointing at me.
"Earl Noncus put your sword down; I know this man."
"Bu-"
"Earl Noncus, Masato was the one who saved my daughter and me! If you are to even harm or even try to trouble my family's saviour, there will be dire consequences. In any case, he has not only saved me twice but now everyone in this room."
Every noble in the room nodded their heads in agreement, whilst Noncus and his group looked around in defeat as they unsheathed their swords.
"Duke Lucera, I sense that the source of the Miasma is coming from under the palace. It needs to be stopped, or else it will corrode the whole capital."
"The King, and the Queen, were taken by who seems to be their leader, to the Royal Vault. They must have activated one of the sealed cursed artefacts!?"
"Guardian, what are cursed artefacts?"
<<
"I'll head down there and stop whatever they've activated. Duke Lucera, make sure that you all get out of here; some of my spiders are heading over to accompany you." I said as I turned to leave.
"Wait!" I looked behind me to see Duke Lucera and a couple of the nobles had picked up weapons. "We'll go with you; we couldn't protect the king, so it's our responsibility to save him."
"No, whatever's down there is extremely powerful, and you'll all just hold me back." I looked at the radar alerts to see that a giant red marker had appeared, called The Undead Lord. It was only level 87, which was only slightly higher than Kumo.
"Yahahahahaha, I have risen once again!!!!"
All of a sudden, a loud monstrous laugh bellowed throughout the palace, causing our ears to cry in pain. Immediately everyone in the room dropped down to their knees, shaking with fear, but not me.
Whatever that laugh was, it had weakening effects on people who were lower level, but since I was higher, it had no effect. I stood there as if nothing had happened whilst some nobles had pissed themselves.
"See, I told you, it was strong," I said with a smirk before I left the room.