"So the Guild Leader is a dragon, huh." Isaac said to himself while he rubbed his chin in thought. "What kind?"

"The kind that'll get ril unhappy if'n he knows I let it slip." Cain replied with a look in his eyes that spoke of real worry but no hostility.

Isaac shrugged. "I guess it doesn't really matter." He commented. "If Lady Jikan is fine with him, I'll reserve my judgment until I've seen him personally." Isaac met Cain's now openly pleading eyes. "And I'll keep it quiet."

Cain let out a dramatic sigh. "Thank Halya." He looked even more greasy from sweating out of worry.

The undead creature a few feet from them started trying to flail in the direction of its other parts. Each of the separate parts started doing the same. Magic flared and Shamesh and Nacen both used magic to lock the arms in place, both of which they were attempting to inject platinum coins into. Lenna had already jammed her sword into the top of the severed head, removed it, and then stuffed a coin in the hole she had made.

Nacen fired a few Stars of Doom at the arm that he was working with to create a hole to insert the coin and Shamesh copied him. It only took them another moment to have coins inside of their respective limbs. That only left the leg, main body, and heart. All of which were in front of Isaac and Cain. The issue was, they didn't have magic to lock down the flailing corpse segments.

Isaac pulled out his magically reinforced steel sword and impaled the calf of the severed leg. He then impaled the thigh with his Truth. He drove both blades into the dirt as far as they would go and with as much force as he could. The leg tried to repeatedly kick and get itself free and the main body had gotten itself flipped over so it could use its arm stumps like quadrupedal front legs. It started kicking itself forwards with its one remaining leg towards Isaac and the pinned leg. Isaac's eyes went wide, not from the monster, but what happened to it.

Cain landed gracefully on its back mid leap and drove a push dagger right below its shoulder blades. The magical weapon activated and extended straight through the monster's heart, out its rib cage, and into the ground four feet below it. The blade had seemingly grown to about ten feet, if the monster's sudden stop and the torn up ground was anything to go by, in an instant. Cain left his weapon behind and shoved off of the monster. He then landed gently on the ground a few feet out of reach of the creature. Both he and Isaac watched as it slid down the length of the blade until it reached the ground where it started flailing again.

"Thanks." Isaac told him.

Cain nodded. "Sure." Was his reply.

Isaac turned back to his task and got a coin ready. He positioned himself out of the way of the top half of the leg that was about to start flailing and took a quick breath to focus. In one motion he cancelled the power going to his sword, which caused it to burst into shadows, death flames, and raw dark mana, and shoved the coin in the now empty wound. The death flames then helped heal the wound closed around the coin. Isaac hopped back as it continued flailing but they were now done with all but the final part of the monster.

"Do it again?" Cain asked Isaac and gestured towards the monster that looked like it was about to break free of the ground with a ten foot blade sticking through its chest.

Isaac raised an eyebrow. "Could you?" He asked.

"Do ya wanna split the bounty?" Cain asked.

"I will if I don't have to navigate that… mess." Isaac replied.

Cain looked at the flailing monster and shrugged. He took two lunging steps forwards and then went into a handless cartwheel over the monster. As he did so, his dagger went back to normal, he grabbed it, pulled it out, slipped two platinum coins in the open wound one after the other, and then stuffed them in with his dagger again that he left in place. Cain's hands were almost a blur but the precision of the act was what had really surprised Isaac. His every movement had hairs' breadth worth of extra space to spare. He finished his cartwheel and then took a few quick steps away from the monster as it started thrashing about like it was trying to shake something off of it.

"Ready." He told Isaac with a nod. "Ya should pray quick 'fore it shakes da coins out."

Isaac nodded and looked up at the moon. "Lua," He began out loud but then added in his head: 'or Zei,' He then continued out loud again: "let this soul rest, one way or another. It does not belong here anymore."

Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

It was not Lua or Zei that answered Isaac but a skeleton in a black robe who arrived through a void black circle in the air next to him. "They, are busy." The Reaper explained. "I will do it."

Isaac eyed the Reaper. "Trading favors?" He asked the skeleton that floated over to the main body of the creature that had gone entirely still in the Reaper's presence.

The Reaper reached his hand out towards Isaac and turned to look at Lenna. "Bring the head." He told Lenna and then turned his gaze back to Isaac, who had been entirely silent and waiting his turn throughout the one second per word order he had given Lenna. "You have done this in the ancient way. Give me the lantern."

Isaac pulled the strange lantern Zei had given him out of the shadows under his cloak. He held the still brightly shining lantern out for the Reaper by the handle. The Reaper reached out and took it by the handle right next to Isaac's hand. For the barest moment, their hands touched and Isaac felt two things simultaneously. The first was the bond between his soul and body almost break before it quickly righted itself without any damage whatsoever. The second was every cell in his body pulse with death flames. Isaac instantly felt better than he had since his most recent death. He felt like the strain that he had put on his still very weakened soul during the last battle had been entirely removed as well. The total infusion of death that washed through him had felt so absolute that he almost felt as if he had been given a third body. Isaac sucked in a breath as he let go of the lantern and the Reaper moved to hover over the main body of the undead monster.

While Isaac was still reeling, Cain watched him open mouthed at the fact that Isaac hadn't immediately died or turned to dust, and Lenna arrived with the head between her hands. "Reaper." Lenna greeted the ancient being with a bow. "Thank you for your assistance." She told him, more in reference to the last time than the current one. "I wanted to properly thank you, but I am afraid that I do not know how." She didn't like making the Reaper read between the lines but there were too many people around for her to just straight up ask him what the favor was that Isaac owed him.

"Later." The Reaper replied with the same breathy drawn out speech that he always had. He gestured towards the undead creature's neck. "It does not need to be touching." He explained as Lenna knelt down, sat the head an inch away from the neck of the creature, and placed two platinum coins over its eyes. "Good." He told Lenna as she backed away.

"You don't need the rest of it?" Isaac wondered once he had regained his bearings.

The Reaper shook his head slowly in jerking motions. "No." He replied. He held the lantern over the heart of the monster. "Come with me. Your time has long passed. I accept your payment." He told the soul animating the monster. The was a wave of power that wasn't death mana but something much more primal. The monster's body went limp and the lantern dimmed for a moment before it returned to normal. The platinum coins turned to gold, then electrum, then silver, then copper, and finally into iron that then rusted and turned to dust. The Reaper turned back to Isaac and handed him the lantern back. "It is done."

Isaac took the lantern and the Reaper almost dropped it as Isaac's hand reached the handle. The Reaper pulled his hand back as Isaac's hand quickly clenched around the handle. This time there had not been any physical contact. "Thanks for the assistance." Isaac told the ancient being. "I wasn't expecting to see you when I prayed."

"They are busy." The Reaper said once more and then floated back through his void black circle of a portal. The portal then vanished as if it had never been there.

Isaac shrugged and returned the lantern to his Inventory, using the shadows under his cloak as cover. He turned to regard Cain who was still staring with mouth agape. "What?" Isaac asked the Guild Master.

"Huuuuhhhh?!" Cain eventually exclaimed. "What 'n all nine bloody hells was that?!"

"You told me to pray for assistance." Isaac said defensively. "I did."

"I wasn't expecting the bloody BOAT MAN!" Cain went on. He was clearly in shock. "Are you blessed by the Reaper of Souls or something?"

Isaac shook his head. "No." He replied. "We're just acquainted."

"How many people ya gotta kill ta get 'acquainted' with the motha fuckin' Reaper?!" Cain almost hysterically demanded.

"Cain. Chill out." Isaac told him and then waited for the Guild Master to take a few calming breaths. "I haven't even killed that many people. That's not why we are acquainted. How and why is not important. All that is important is that the monster is gone and we have to find whoever was controlling it."

Cain honed in the final part of what Isaac had said. "That was being controlled by some''in'?" He asked as his face tried to pale but only managed to get mostly back to normal because of how flushed it had been a moment prior.

"Yes." Isaac replied without any hesitation. "It received an order towards the beginning of our fight." He explained. The rest of what he told Cain was speculation but the Guild Master didn't need to know that. "When I was meditating, I drove it and plenty of other dark or dark adjacent creatures into a frenzy or at the very least called them towards me. Most of them were conscious enough to stay away from the city but this one was mostly mindless. Whoever was controlling it didn't get control back until I arrived and started taking it apart."

"So where is the master?" Cain wondered.

Isaac looked back at the destroyed wall and then traced the direction the monster's gaze had momentarily shifted until he was looking out across the hills towards the north. A few dozen miles in that direction was the base of part of the Altian Mountain Range. There were miles upon miles of stone cliff faces that hooked westward. If the necromancer was nearby, then Cain would be able to catch them quickly enough, but if they were hiding out in the mountains, it could take weeks. "That way." Isaac directed him. "I don't know how far, but I'd say it is your job." Isaac told him. "Lenna and I have places to be that do not involve manhunts for a crazy necrophiliac."

"What about the bounty?" Cain asked.

"I don't even know what bounty you are talking about." Isaac replied honestly.

"The one about the missing people." Cain answered.

Isaac waved him off. "Just pay us whatever our contribution was and sort the rest out with another party of adventurers. The King and Queen are waiting for us and then we need to see the Fatebreaker before he dies of old age." Isaac explained. "We don't have time to be playing cat and mouse with your mosquito."

Cain just blinked at him. "But it's a necromancer." He argued fruitlessly. "Aren't you supposed to be the king of them or something?"

Isaac shook his head. "They are a perversion. Necromancers and undead are like the mushrooms of the dark world. They aren't really 'dark' just dark adjacent." He replied and then shrugged. "You seem more than capable of handling the rest of it." Isaac told him and then gestured towards the nearby gate for he and Lenna to leave. "Have fun, Cain." Isaac said and left with Lenna right next to him.

Cain could not believe that he, a Guild Master, had just been so completely blown off by an adventurer. "What's the damned point of bein' da bloody Guild Master then?!" Cain exclaimed more to himself than anyone that was watching.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.