"We're approaching!" Viziliy quietly said after ten minutes. "It will be visible from this hill. Wait here."
He crouched and quickly walked towards the high, gentle hill. As he neared the top, he lay down and crawled swiftly. I wonder if he has a "crawling in the grass" skill or if he learned it himself?
The old man reached his destination, then turned and waved to us.
I let Lynch go ahead and tried to exactly repeat his movements. He, in turn, mimicked Viziliy, and soon we were sprawled on the ground.
Damn! Even this big guy crawls better than me!
Finally, out of breath, I reached the goal, and a very curious sight opened up before me.
About five hundred meters in front of us, on the next hill, stood a fortress, or rather what was left of it. There were three times as many holes in the bush-covered wall as there were intact sections. It had also lost a lot of height. I wonder if this was due to a powerful attack in the past or if the residents of neighboring villages had taken the stones for their own needs?
Stone buildings were visible through the breaches, but they too presented a pitiful sight. Few had even three walls intact.
No undead were visible yet.
"When there's no threat or food, most of them usually just stand... by the altar," Viziliy explained, as if reading my thoughts.
"What altar?" I finally asked after some hesitation.
"You'll see."
This is why I hesitated. What's the point of asking questions if you get an answer to maybe one out of three?
"What's the tactic?"
"We'll see how it goes. The main thing is to listen to me, and if I say run, run. You won't get lucky a second time like you did with the cow."
Actually, that was a calculated risk!
"Alright. But it'll take me until evening to crawl there."
"We'll go on foot," Viziliy reassured me. "We crawled here just in case, you never know if there's already a fifth level and a bone skeleton has spawned."
"Fifth level of what?"
The golden fish, I mean the grumpy old man, didn't answer anything and, jumping to his feet, dashed towards the fortress.
However, this time he didn't ignore my question for no reason. When we were about two hundred meters from the wall, the answer came on its own.
[You have discovered a static cursed place of the 3rd level!]
[Clear it and receive a worthy reward.]
So that's what it is! Apparently, this is that combat quest. The number of topics for tonight's conversation has increased.
My companions showed no sign of receiving the same task. They had already reached the foot of the hill and were obviously heading towards one of the intact sections of the wall. I dismissed the message text and hurried after them.
So far, everything was going well. Unnoticed, we reached our goal and pressed ourselves against the stones. My companions were breathing evenly, but I needed a minute to return to normal. If I had put a skill point into "tireless," it would have been easier. By a whole five percent!
"Ready?" Viziliy whispered.
"Like a pioneer!"
"Like who?"
"Ancient warriors, they helped the weak."
"Ah," the old man looked out from behind the edge of the wall and assessed the situation for about five seconds. "Well, pioneers, so far nothing complicated: four within sight. Ilya, take a look at how they look so you don't shit your pants later."
We switched places, and I cautiously stuck my head out. What's there to shit about? Undead are undead. Incomplete set of clothes, and what's there is torn. Bones stretched with dark gray skin, black voids of eyes on sad faces. Two of them also have no noses. Can't say anything about the teeth yet: mouths are closed.
"If it bites a human, will they become like that?" I asked, turning back to my companions.
"Why would they?" Viziliy was surprised. "These are undead, not vampires. And vampires are fiction anyway. At least they haven't been encountered on our continent... Alright, get ready. I'll try to bring them one by one."
Of course, nothing worked out. As soon as he lit up a little, three of them noticed him at once.
Lynch stayed to cover the rear in case someone came running from the other side of the ten-meter piece of wall, while Viziliy and I dealt with the front three.
Well, how we... The first one ran out from behind the wall, growling and waving its arms, and immediately fell with its knees cut.
"Finish it!"
I could have figured that out myself!
I jumped to the crawling undead and slashed its neck from the side.
[You killed a human-undead of the 6th level.]
As easy as pie!
While I was grinning with satisfaction, the second one flew under my feet, and before I beheaded it, it even managed to grab my boot with its hands and open its mouth in hopes of tasting my flesh.
[You killed a human-undead of the 6th level.]
Not meant to be. And the teeth are not bad. Not like a shark's, of course, but they could easily tear a piece out of a body. Meanwhile, the third came running, grinning and growling, and repeated the fate of the previous ones.
[You killed a human-undead of the 6th level.]
This is the kind of leveling I like!
Before I could come to my senses, Viziliy collected all three dropped boxes.
"For the leg movement," he explained, though I hadn't asked anything. I was fine with everything: they get the loot, I get the experience.
The old man stuck his head out again and attracted another undead. It didn't differ in behavior or level from the previous ones and died just as ineffectively.
"We could venture into the center," Viziliy mused, surveying the inner courtyard of the fortress, "but having one and a half normal fighters, it's risky. So we'd better go around. We won't kill them all today anyway."
To my surprise, Lynch didn't react to the jab, and overall, everyone was okay with the old man's plan. So, with short dashes in open areas, we moved from one intact piece of wall to another, still remaining outside.
We circled about a third of the fortress. During this time, I killed a total of twelve undead, which I was very proud of, and was already ready to ask Viziliy to try taking down singles on my own, when he suddenly froze and pointed somewhere behind us, into the field.
Damn. We missed the elephant. Although it's a matter of skillful camouflage. A trio of familiar dead cows, like experienced traffic cops, was hiding in the bushes. They didn't notice us for the sole reason that they were lying with their backs to us.
"Stay here," Viziliy mouthed, and signaled to Lynch that they needed to go back.
They disappeared around the corner, and I suddenly felt very uncomfortable. Carefully choosing where to place my foot, I stepped back to the wall, pressed my back against it, and held out my sword.
The minutes dragged on, but finally my companions appeared. They had made a solid detour and circled the cows from the other side. The cows noticed them and swiftly attacked.
In general, the fight didn't differ much from the one we had with these same opponents earlier. Viziliy aggroed two undead and dealt with them in the same time it took Lynch to handle one.
When they were almost finished, I detached from the wall and ran towards them.
"Behind you!" Lynch suddenly yelled, and I turned around mid-run.
Mother of God! The fight had attracted two undead from deep inside the fortress, and as soon as I started running, they rushed after me. The nearest one was only five meters behind.
The allies were already running towards me, and there wasn't much of a problem in passing the pursuers to them, but something seemed to click in me.
I won't always be like a lap dog, following the old man. After all, I know what to do. And my strikes are already much more confident.
I turned sharply and almost slipped on the stone chips, but I stood my ground. The undead caught up with me almost immediately, and, repeating Viziliy's dodge, I slashed at its knee. Got it!
The growling opponent rolled down the hill slope, and I was already meeting the next one. Dodge, strike!
Not as clean, and it did scratch my jacket with its claws... But the goal was achieved! The crippled undead is rolling after the first one. And I'm jumping after them.
The allies had already run up and were standing nearby, controlling the process. They didn't cut the second legs of the victims, apparently deciding that since I had started, I should finish.