(Warning: Information Dump Inbound! Sorry about that & be ready)

"So, supposedly, there's something in this dark forest that has been creating undead, and they have taken the lives of those who have entered, right Claudia?"

"Yeah Pete, there have been multiple attempts at catching this necromancer, but every time a party tries to go after them, they without fail disappear, never to come back to report whatever is creating the undead, so we have no information on what exactly we're looking for."

"Well, at least we know it IS a necromancer and not some naturally occurring undead, I'd hate to find out that we were looking for plain nothing for the past hour already, how about you Vel?."

"I'm sure the information the guild gave us was right Olivia, the undead started appearing only a few years ago, if they were naturally occurring, they would've been here before the town was even constructed, and it's been well over a few centuries since this town was built."

Everyone turned to blankly stare at her in surprised.

"How the HECK do you know so much, is this your hometown?", Pete asked.

Vel looked at all of them with a hint of condescension, "Unlike you lot, I actually read the papers the guild gave us about this quest and what we should find useful, I'm honestly surprised you all decided to so blatantly ignore such vital information on such a dangerous mission like this where multiple parties like us have failed and most likely perished in the process."

As they walked through the forest and chatted lively, the tall dead pine trees creaked as they shifted with the cold breeze, the muddy, watery ground almost clinging to their boots as multiple sets of splotches sounded out, with the party treading confidently despite all of this.

~Sploch~

~sploch~

~sploch~

Pete ignored the look and replied, "They probably weren't prepared for a necromancer, to encounter one after all, both in the case of someone actually practicing the forbidden art and for a monster to use it, is rare, but we're different, our squad is basically geared towards any type of magic user, even one with a numbers advantage, I'm a swordsman, you're a pugilist, Olivia is our axe-wielding front-line bruiser, and we got our lovely Claudia for back-line support as a druid for offensive and defensive action, she can heal us if things get dicey, so any mage is bound to fail in the face of our group.

Besides, we still have the plan the guild came up with in the first place, right?"

Vel stared at Pete for a solid second before relenting, breathing out the cold air with a deep exhale and responded, "Yeah, you're right... besides, at least I read the paper, and I'm sure at least some of the others did, else we all might've fell for some of the traps."

"The what-now?"

They all spoke at once at the sound of there being traps; it was highly unusual to see any such thing outside a dungeon, as the presence of them being here meant only one thing: whatever it was they were hunting, it was highly intelligent for a monster; they were hoping it was some low tier undead that just so happened to be able to raise fellow undead and managed to kill off its preceding hunters, but now that they knew better, they raised their guard, gripping their weapons a little tighter.

Typically, there was a defined difference between a powerful monster & a smart one.

When an abnormally strong monster was given time to grow, they could become a "BOSS", a unique existence...

A monster that would be put on the highway for growth, and once they would become strong enough, they'd make a new home for themselves, which would result in a new dungeon, but if it was also intelligent, it would be recognized as an even bigger threat.

New mobs would spawn from these newly created dungeons, and the process could restart: a stronger-than-average monster would be born in the dungeon, if not slain and given time, it would eventually become a BOSS, most commonly, they would be banished, leave on their own, etc. from the previous dungeon and wreak havoc on the outside world to grow stronger, increasing their own understanding of the outside world through experience and rise further, they would eventually settle down and make a home, repeating the cycle.

This is why the trend for people to clear dungeons on a frequent basis broke out a long time ago, so a new BOSS monster wouldn't be created and many lives lost as a result, however, as time passed, people had found many pros in doing them besides creating less danger, they would grow from the experience, and reach new levels of power, and if they do it enough, they could even achieve major breakthroughs in their abilities.

Warriors, mages, and the rest of the adventurers began to diversify through their wide experiences and understandings, learning new skills; some became more adept with using their select weapons, others their own fists...

Some managed to manipulate the mystical elements to do their bidding, others to heal wounds new and old, few even learned to bend beasts to their will for convenience, companionship, combat, or all of the above, the list went on and on...

These people were learning new ways to gain power, different classes of abilities and skills started to take shape and form.

Countless people branched out, going down multiple paths, the more talented ones achieved more powerful, unique classes while others could only choose from the straightforward options given to them, never ever losing hope to discover a new branch untreaded by others, one that may not even be there.

As time passed, people developed tools to measure, clarify, and quantify their abilities & powers, along with the ability to assist the user in their growth.

The culmination of all these tools had a name, and it was called...

The Guidance System.

The gods had a hand in the final product, as they have decided to help the people simplify their road towards growth, as the road towards improvement was way too broad without some form of assistance, giving the "Guidance" part of the name meaning.

When someone would desire to grow in strength and become an adventurer, they would go to the Adventurers Guild and apply, and when they are successful, they would be permanently granted this system through a special item, the system would clarify the current strengths, abilities and skills in a numerical fashion, with their current class's "Level" and how close they were to a breakthrough to the next tier, it helped stimulate and control their growth, making things easier for them like helping control the natural process of undergoing their class upgrade, or simply showing them their 'stats' of their hard work, like one training to increase their strength, or one working on their agility; the system would help measure their growth and facilitate it.

This was both off-topic and very old news to the squad, but then they heard something that snapped their minds back to the present.

"Help!!! Help me, please!"

They immediately looked towards the source of the plea ahead of them, and through a dense bog, a human figure was seen, laying on the ground, it looked like the person was struggling to get up; they also noticed the metallic iron of blood in the air.

"We're coming!", Pete instinctively yelled as he started to rush towards him with the group ready to assist & follow, but Vel put her hand in front of him, stopping them.

"Why are you stopping me, he needs help!", Pete was speaking his mind, if he sees someone hurt or in danger, he couldn't care less if he was throwing caution to the wind, he was going to help them.

"Listen to the voice one more time, and more carefully, you should hear it then.", she said with a straight face.

The group was confused for a second, but they naturally listened again, this time, more carefully, and when they did, what they heard this time made them go cold in shock.

"Arhhhg.... Rrhhg."

This time, it was anything but coherent, being nothing but low, unintelligible growls.

As the bog finally moved on, they were able to get a clear view of the figure.

Their body was covered in a thick but flexible brown leather armor, but it was covered with blood stains from head to toe, all visible skin looked as pale as the moon, holes could be seen throughout the armor and body of various shapes & sizes, for their innards to be seen by all, partially dangling while others still where they should be.

Some of the holes were larger, some were smaller, but the biggest one was right through the chest, for all of them to gaze through, and one thought crossed through each of their minds as they saw it.

Undead.

When it saw them just standing there, staring, the undead immediately got up off the ground, not to attack, but just to stare right back at the group, that's when the group noticed its eyes, they were just as pale as the skin, ashen white, with a sort of murkiness, like the bog, with no iris or anything to speak of, they even seemed to be swollen somehow, as if they were too big for the eye sockets that held them, pushing against the rims of the socket.

"Was that..-"

"The trap? Yes... and you almost fell for it, although, I don't know what a single undead would've done to you even if you had fallen for it, at best, it would've caught you by surprise."

While certain monsters' intelligence could match or even surpass that of a regular person, largely BOSS's, monsters could never fully be as intelligent or rather, sentient as a normal person, it was as if their brain were intentionally left incomplete; no matter how strong or smart a monster becomes, it was still a mob, a creature whose mind was inhibited and couldn't be compared to a complete mind and soul that is a regular being.

This was the gap between what was seen as a monster, and everything else that existed in their world.

That's why they were shocked upon hearing there were traps, it was extremely rare for a mob to go so far to defend itself, to have such forethought, usually you would only see those types of things in dungeons, and it is even more unusual to see a wild BOSS do it because they are always on the offensive, not defensive, so to find a wild mob that was defending itself and not be a BOSS was... very weird to say the least.

They didn't realize it, but all of this pointed to two things, both of which were terrifying in their own right...

One, the creature was alarmingly intelligent; to call its mind any short of theirs like the other monsters would be ridiculous, if not ignorant, it was at least as aware as them, if not more somehow...

And second, if not slain, it could become something truly dangerous, it hasn't even reached the BOSS stage yet and has been keeping itself confined to this dead, damp, dark forest, and if it did leave and achieve that peak, it could create mayhem & destruction, leaving nothing behind, not even bodies for their loved ones to hold and weep for.

Unfortunately, the group didn't realize the potential of the creature, all they knew was that this creature was abnormally smart, nothing more, nothing less.

"If the adventurers guild couldn't figure out what was creating the undead, then how did they even find out about the traps?", Pete questioned.

Vel answered, "I don't know..."

Claudia spoke out, interrupting the two, "I don't want to worry anyone, but do any of you realize the undead has not attacked us at all, and that it somehow created the illusion of a person's voice?

Basic undead should NOT be capable of illusion magic, and their armor looks familiar...

…But what's most concerning is... no undead should be able to hold themselves back against the living for this long."

Once they heard this, they realized the true meaning behind it, and promptly refocused on the living dead in front of them.

Undead can't, no matter how much their master wills it, hold back their hatred and resentment towards the living; not once, has there been a 'living' necromancer that has been able to hold back their undead from attacking anything moving & living once spotted, it could be said to be the undead's flaw.

Simply put, no one has gotten that far in the banned practice of necromancy to successfully hold back their undead, either they were hunted and killed, or just plain died in the practice of it before they achieved such a feat.

Even the undead with the ability of necromancy can't hold them back, besides, why would they in the first place?

There hasn't been a single undead, smart or dumb, that has, with or without purpose, successfully held back their own minions…

At best, there's been a lich in the past that withheld its huge army of undead for strategic purpose, but then, the lich, which was one of the strongest & smartest beings of its time, had trouble holding itself back, much less its forces, it felt like a desire, an overwhelming craving, 'want' to kill the living, even with its vast intellect, its handicapped mind was inevitably its downfall; this was the huge con of being an undead for all its upsides, like not needing food, water, unnatural stamina, etc.

As they looked on, they noticed something, the eyes have changed, they were too engrossed in thought before, but now, the eyes were gone...

Two empty black holes were all that was left, yet it still remained exactly where it was, as if it was still watching them...somehow.

This effectively intimidated the party, making them sweat bullets, but Claudia looked even more distressed than the rest, that was because she saw something else, in that darkness.

There was no way she thought the others didn't see it too; it could've been the angle she was looking at the undead, it could have been her imagination, but as she stared into its left eye, she saw something in the furthest reaches of the darkness, which might as well be imperceivable to the naked eye: it was a small, red, reflective, ovular bead.

Once she made direct eye contact with this little orb, it let out a soft, subtle glow-

Before she could even think of what she was seeing, the undead immediately turned around and booked it, speeding off in the opposite direction of the group.

The group were shocked at it running away, an actual undead that fled the opposite direction of the living, they even took it as an insult.

'Do we look worse than death to you?', they simultaneously thought in their minds.

They immediately gave chase, as unbelievable as it was, it might actually work for them.

Olivia took an extra second as she had imbedded her axe into the ground to lean on when they previously stopped so she could rest, but she quickly and effectively with brutal strength pulled it out of the ground and slung it on her back.

"If we can follow it, the undead might take us straight to the target.", Olivia remarked as she rejoined the group.

Vel replied, "We can't disregard the fact this may be a trap though, this is way too suspicious."

"That's why it is time to put the plan into action.", Pete reminded them.

They looked at each other as they were running, and they all nodded.

"Do it.", Olivia smirked and spoke.

Pete took out a small paper with a complex pattern writing on it, forming a magic circle with strange letter-like symbols, he inputted a small amount of his mana, and, as soon as he did, the formation took on a red glow, a low hum emanated from it as the paper immediately closed in on itself to form a red ball of light in his hand, and a moment later, it launched itself into the sky, zooming high into the air, and once it got high enough, it mushroomed into a bright red light in the sky, crackling as it dimmed out just as fast into consecutive flashes.

This was a flare, and as it dazzled in the night sky, red light contrasting well against the dark grey clouds above the flare, the group started to hear many sets of faint rushed footsteps from their surroundings, and then, after a moment, two new people appeared besides them, from the left and right, these were the leaders of the other groups, Bravo and Charlie respectively, they took these as their code names for this job.

They weren't your normal adventurers, they were people who operated in the towns' adventurer guild, some of their enforcers; they decided to help this time around as many people gathered to finish this quest as the pay was high and upfront, it sounded like free money as there was no way the quest wouldn't be completed with these many people working together, and since they were veterans, they were given the roles of commanders to lead all those who had taken up the quest.

However, there was also something uniting them all, besides the money & ease of the quest, both them and the adventurers that call their town home.

That was the will to finally rid their home of this blight, of this necromancer, once and for all; to finally remove that quest from the quest hall.

That cursed, faded paper can finally be taken down, making it disappear along with the necromancer, forever.

With their success, it was finally within their grasp…

...

That is IF they succeed.

"You found something?", Bravo asked.

"Yes, an undead that's actually running away… it should lead us straight back to whoever is controlling it.", Pete answered.

The tall man was stunned upon hearing that, but before he could question it, Charlie pipped in.

"Just look ahead Bravo, it's hard to believe, I know, but the very undead is just ahead, even from here, I can smell its bloodied corpse, I can even see their fleeing body, riddled with holes, just like the one Alpha found."

At this point, too many odd things had happened that Pete couldn't be surprised anymore, but he still was curious and asked, "Wait, Alpha's group found one too?"

"Yeah, but unlike your group, he didn't realize the trick until it was too late; some of his men instantly went over to help the man, but by the time Alpha realized it was the aforementioned trap, it was too late..."

"What happened? Even if Alpha's men were caught off guard, they should've still been able to defend themselves from 1 measly undead.", Vel chimed in, curious as to why a single undead would merit a dangerous trap.

Bravo was also curious, he didn't run into any traps, but even if he did, he knew his group of adventurers would've been able to handle a single undead, even if it was only one of his men.

Charlie went silent, and even while running, his facial expression seemed to contort & shiver for just a second, before responding with a cold voice.

"Me and my group met up with Alpha's group before the signal was cast as we encountered each other, he explained what happened.

He was trembling and shaking pretty badly at the time... let's just say he found out why these undead have holes... firsthand.

As the bog was moving on and he saw the blood & pale skin, he was about to yell at the adventurers to back off, but the words were caught in his throat upon seeing the undead's face; one of the adventurers was hugging the person, comforting them, Alpha said he overheard them saying 'It's going to be alright'.

Nice kid, he was a fresh new adventurer from what Alpha told me, just became old enough to become one a couple of weeks ago; before hugging it, the undead had screamed in pain, and in the bog, they were able to see the figure was missing his foot, so the kid immediately dropped his guard and approached, with some of the adventurers for security, unfortunately, that hug also prevented him from looking at its face, which had no eyes, nothing but pitch black in both sockets, you couldn't even see how deep its eyes were, it was as if its eyes were ready to consume everything it touched, and it's face was just a dead pan, no emotion, but he said the part that really got him was the slightest sight of a glow, it was dead red in color from its left eye, as soon as they met each other's gaze, the glow immediately ballooned to the entire eye, crackling, then it spread across the entire body in less than a second, it was like a vase that was on the verge of shattering, but instead of falling apart like a vase should have, it exploded..."

Everyone's faces were filled with a mix of shock, disgust, and horror.

Before they could comment, Charlie finished, "Flesh flied freely, and the bones were like a shrapnel, THAT'S what created the holes, it killed the entire group who went to help the man, the one hugging him hid the holes from the others good, so nobody noticed till it was too late, he probably had it the worse, poor sap, Alpha wouldn't elaborate what happened after that point, be it the cleanup, or if there was anything left of them, but by the way he said it, even the necromancer wouldn't have a use for them..."

No one spoke for a while, they just silently ran for a while, the undead was still running, further and further into the forest.

Vel slowly said, "So the undead we've seen are..."

"Previous victims.", Bravo finished.

When they accepted this quest, the guild gave them a brief rundown of the quest in question and about the previous attempts, every time no one has ever returned, nor their bodies ever been recovered, but they had confirmed every single undead they have seen had these holes.

They also signed a paper, since this quest involved the undead, they had to sign stating the adventurer guild was not at fault if they were to become an undead, for their families to not come after them for their lack of closure… and a body.

"To think that's what happened to those that failed before us...", Olivia said with no emotion.

"Those that died before would be the catalysts for the next one's demise, and that's all the more reason why we must stop whatever is creating these undead."

Everyone looked behind them, and they saw who spoke… Alpha; he decided to lead the rest of the adventurers on over, while he let Bravo and Charlie go on ahead to confirm the situation.

He sped up a little to catch up to the group with the others following closely behind.

Upon seeing Alpha, Claudia quickly spoke with inconsistency, "We saw the red thing in its eye too!

The group leaders looked at her in surprise, even her own squad as they hadn't known she saw this.

"You saw it too? Then why did it not explode?", Alpha questioned with a look of doubt.

"I think it's because none of us fell for it and came in-range; it would have nothing to spring, also, when I saw it, I saw more than a glow, I saw a spherical, oval bead, I wasn't able to see anything else though because right when I made eye contact, it turned and ran, that's what led us to here."

"Why didn't you tell us?", Pete asked.

She was surprised and said, "I thought you all saw it too, I'm not exactly a mind reader."

Alpha dropped his suspicion and continued, "You are probably right, but I didn't see a 'bead', despite it not moving, and considering this is new information as it wasn't mentioned in the paper the guild handed out, I'm going to assume there was something allowing us to see what we saw.

If I had to take a guess, I'm a bowman, you're a mage, we both value our senses as our abilities depend on them to guide them, so I think our training in those fields helped us perceive what was in its eye, but seeing how you saw it more exact, it means either your simply better with perception than me… or...something about being a mage helped you see it more clearly, I'm leaning on the latter because as we all know, glowing plus blowing up sounds a lot like magic."

Claudia snorted, "There's more to magic than 'explosions' and 'glowing', but yes, mages are trained to sense mana more clearly, and thanks to me being a druid more specifically, I have a stronger sensitivity with mana... wait, now that I think about it..."

She was silent for a bit, thinking, then started half mumbling something, until suddenly, she paled.

"What is it?" Pete asked.

"There was something about that bead, that felt... familiar, it felt like -No! It can't be, the two can't mix! But I know I'm not mistaken..."

"Claudia!"

She was shocked out of her deep thoughts, she took a deep breath, and calmed down.

"I need to look at that bead again to be absolutely sure, but I thought I sensed... life magic."

The nearby mages who were listening in paled even worse than she did, but only Bravo in the group followed suit, the rest were just plain confused.

Charlie, confused, spoke out, "Life magic?... I know it's the magic druids use to heal, manipulate nature and all that, but isn't it good you sensed it in that bead thing? Whatever it is, it seems to drive the undead, and since you-".

He stopped dead in the middle of his sentence, as he just realized what the problem is.

Alpha spoke up for those that didn't understand and asked, "What? Can one of you just spit it out already? Not all of us practice magic, and unlike Charlie & Bravo, who luckily knows about it, we know nothing about this specific kind of magic."

Claudia finally spilled the beans and spoke, "Necromancy naturally manipulates death, while life magic controls life, they directly oppose one another as elements, no matter how proficient you are in the practice of either of them, the usage of both would wreak havoc on one's body; they naturally contradict one another, they'd conflict until ending in mutually assured destruction, as death ends all life, the existence of life quells all death, no one known to history has ever gotten the opportunity to practice both fields; this is a completely theoretical field that has been under study for life magic's unique interaction with the undead.

That's why light and life magic are the bane of the death and dark of necromacy…they naturally oppose what the element of death is!

No matter how you use, splice, control the two, the end result is always the same...

Putting the two together is like mixing all the elements of magic together, but worse! I can't express it enough, they under no circumstance can be associated with one another, else an explosion could ensue and kill the person attempting to use both of them together!"

Everyone who heard that realized what this entailed.

"So the explosion I saw...?", Alpha didn't even know if he could finish his sentence.

"That result CAN'T be delayed, controlled or anything of the like...at least I thought so until now... whatever is controlling these undead, has learned to use both life and death magic, even using their chaotic interaction with each other as a weapon; to be as clear as possible, whatever this thing is, it has managed to control both the elements of life and death, life magic and necromancy, they have learned to blend these magics without creating that nasty kickback, controlling the dissonance and using both sides, of when they clash, or perhaps...when they unite…

If these 'exploding' undead are its first 'baby' steps at creating the basic living dead, I don't want to imagine what it's capable of if it itself grows stronger."

Claudia was finally grasping how big the threat truly was, and how they, no matter what...

Can allow such a thing to continue to exist.