Anastacia glared at the town across the field of chopped up bones in disgust. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t reach all the way to the other side to get an idea where the other necromancer was, and it quickly became apparent that she would need to go through the field first.

“Okay, here’s what we’re going to do: I’ll go into the town, kick some ass there and come to get you when it’s safe.” She decided and started unloading what little camping equipment she carried.

Emilia knew better than to mess with things relating to necromancy, and as much as she hated sending the girl out on her own, there really wasn’t much she could offer. “Fine, but at least take King with you.”

Going against a necromancer alone was always risky, and King was by far the best option she had, so Anastacia agreed. “Yeah, that’s smart. King, let’s go.”

While the simulacrum shed off his far more cumbersome load, the necromancer focused on the first few chips of bone on their way and pushed them away. Initially, there was nothing there to prevent her from taking over, but as soon as they moved, a strong presence flooded in to disrupt her attempts.

Surprised by the amount of pushback she had ran into, Anastacia let the pieces fall back to their places. It wasn’t like she couldn’t have kept them at bay, but the opposition was still formidable to say the least. A few shards weren’t going to be an issue, but she would have to control dozens or hundreds at the same time to push through.

Of course, she could have just destroyed them, but judging by the broken simulacra, the field was needed for more than just keeping out adventurers.

“King, you’re going to need to carry me.” Anastacia declared and suddenly just tossed herself at the simulacrum, who had to drop everything to catch her. “My guess is that I won’t be able to make much room for us in the first place, and it’s going to be easier with my eyes closed, so walking isn’t much of an option.”

“Please be careful…” The priestess pleaded, already seeing a pile of burning rubble where the town was with her mind’s eye.

The necromancer scoffed. “It’s probably just going to be another fu- duckass inquisitor I need to knock into next week before they listen to me - nothing I haven’t done before.”

“’Ass’ still counts, but do take care.” Emilia smirked and pretended to make a note to keep count of Anastacia’s cursing.

“… motherducker.” The rebellious necromancer muttered quietly.

Emilia sighed and pretended to make another note. “I suggest you go while you still have some of your reward left.” She smiled tiredly and tried to hurry her friend along, hoping that whatever was going on could be solved quickly and they could get some rest.

With that, Anastacia told king to step closer to the field of bones before them.

With her eyes closed, she had much easier time only concentrating on the fragments littering the ground. Regardless of the pushback, she could comfortably keep them at a distance where they were harmlessly out of the way.

As soon as they began to cross the obstacle, the necromancer controlling the field retaliated and began constricting the shards around them but was no match to Anastacia in her direct vicinity, though with every step, the force fighting her became stronger and the bones moved slightly closer.

Shaking and rattling together as the two forces wrestled over them, the bones piled up forming a dome around the adventurer and her simulacra. As they moved forwards, the pair left behind a trail of further shattered pieces of bone that had gotten ground up under the immense pressure.

Anastacia asked King to pick up the pace just in case, which turned out to be a good choice as their small bubble of safety became smaller yet when more and more material gathered on top and Anastacia started to have trouble keeping up with their sheer number.

Barely making it in time, they reached the other side of the field and the splintered bones returned to their original places, which meant that whoever was keeping an eye on the town, would rather deal with Anastacia directly, than risk a hole in the town’s defenses – whether this was a good or a bad sign was anyone’s guess. Regardless, the one they were facing was clearly both talented and powerful, and almost certainly an inquisitor.

Jumping back onto the ground from King’s grasp, Anastacia scanned their surroundings. “Three necromancers?” She muttered surprisedly. “One responsible for the field, one that’s probably capable of combat but not even close to being and issue, and one that’s about as much of a necromancer as the water used to clean a tavern’s floor is mead – there’s technically some there, but calling it that is just incorrect.”

However, that wasn’t the strangest thing about the necromancers. “I think the middle one is a baby though… or somehow extremely small, and the inquisitor is… weird. We need to get closer.” She guessed and started to look around.

The defensive boundary ended about ten meters before the first few buildings of the town and a couple of hundred meters from its center, where the necromancers were. The town itself didn’t have much of a wall, but the wooden houses on the edges had been built together so that they limited entrance to dedicated roads. It was a common way for smaller settlements to deter the forest creatures and less ambitious bandits without having to build an actual wall, and something the adventurers frequently saw.

The few small windows aimed outwards from the town had been firmly boarded over, and judging by the noticeable damage done to the walls, for a good reason.

After no more than a couple of steps along the main road through the town, Anastacia could feel a daunting atmosphere that engulfed Ruvenstead, no doubt partly because of the necromancer presence but even then, something was off.

Though it was getting late, there should have been plenty of people still working outside and lights shining through windows should have at least partly lit the streets, but that simply wasn’t the case. There were plenty of people still around, but all of them were hiding in their unlit homes, following the new arrivals from the gaps of their curtains.

As far as Anastacia knew, the new inquisition wasn’t really in the business of holding entire towns in fear for too long, and fancied precise strikes that ended before anyone knew they were there, but her information was months out of date at best, and something may have changed.

Not really wishing to blindly walk into a trap or trouble in general, the adventurer looked for a window that was low enough for her to see inside. Upon finding one, she walked over, pressed her face against it and knocked.

After obviously startling the person inside, she had to knock a few more times before someone peeked from behind the curtain.

A young boy’s face popped up from the bottom of the frame and he pushed open the window.

“Hey. Why is everyone hiding inside?” Anastacia inquired.

Nervously staring at King, the boy of maybe ten years in age took a while to answer. “The bone-people told everyone to stay inside until they left.” He whispered and glanced at the spears on Anastacia’s back. “Who are you?”

“I’m Anna and that’s King, we’re adventurers. Do you know what the bone-people are here for?” The adventurer continued to inquire for more information, hoping that the kid wasn’t smart enough to hold anything back.

“Mom said that they were here to take Gally’s baby away, she says the baby is cursed. I think they were already leaving, but the simi- sima- simularcums attacked us again and the bone-people had to stay.” The boy explained as best he could.

Anastacia was more than aware of the inquisition’s tendency to take away any children that were born necromancers they could, and it certainly explained the oddly small necromancer she could feel in the town – but even then, it certainly seemed like a huge coincidence that they would cross paths like that so soon after she had met Teal, and the one Gilbert had ran into.

However, there was now a more pressing issue that could solve the necromancer problem as well. “You said that the simulacra had attacked you before as well, does that happen often?” She asked.

“No, only a couple of times. Mom says the sky splitting made them angry.” The boy said and pointed in the direction of the machine fortress. “The sky over there had a purple crack on it weeks ago, but it’s gone now.”

It would certainly make sense for an inquisitor to come and have a look at something like the sky splitting apart, especially if one had been spared to go look at a small scuffle outside of Valor as well. Anastacia figured that whatever had caused the sky to split was also related to the problem they were there to fix as well and the ‘hollow’ simulacra it had attracted were the ones that had attacked the town.

The inquisition sticking around to protect the town was odd as well, and Anastacia certainly wasn’t willing to believe any necromancer would do so out of the goodness of their heart.

“Thanks, you’ve been very helpful. We’ll go and see if we can do anything about the bone-people now.” The adventurer nodded and slid a single coin through the window before pushing it shut.

The road towards the center of the city was curved and the necromancers were just barely out of her view. Since the boy had told her that people were only inside because the inquisitor had told them to stay out of the way, she didn’t need to worry about them and could just confront the one behind the town’s protective field in peace.

Interestingly, as soon as they started to head down the street, the weak necromancer appeared to take it upon themselves to come out and meet them – in a great rush too, by the looks of it. Soon enough, a tallish man with black robes appeared from behind the buildings and jogged towards the adventurers.

“Please leave!” He yelled, even before reaching the pair.

The man was wearing a rather traditional set of Mournvalleyan clothes but had an oddly high number of belts and straps on him, all of them full of pouches and straps with glass vials tied on. None of the pockets had anything suspicious in them necromancy wise, nor would the rather pathetically weak necromancer be able to wield anything like that. In fact, had he been there to attack the adventurers, he would have been better off throwing rocks.

“Please, just leave!” He repeated and stopped a safe distance away from Anastacia and King.

“I don’t want to, though? Honestly, not a big fan of what you’re up to here, but I’m sure there’s some kind of an agreement we can get to, where you dipshits duck off peasefully and we get to stay.” Anastacia responded in an unhesitatingly hostile manner. “Now let me speak with the inquisitor.”

The weak necromancer hesitated but, in the end, he stood firmly in place. He no doubt knew who he was facing, so it was actually extremely brave of him, even if Anastacia herself didn’t care. “Please, I beg of you, just leave!” He continued pleading. “We are not harming anyone here, we just need some reinforcements to arrive to wipe out the simu-“ Noticing the huge knight of stone by Anastacia’s side made him stop. “Oh no… nononononono! You two, get out now! For everyone’s sake!”

Just as he said that, his feet were swiped from under him and an invisible force quickly dragged him back to where he had come from. Screaming and flailing, he disappeared behind the buildings as the inquisitor’s presence grew stronger.

“Get ready… The big one is heading our way.” Anastacia warned King and placed her hand on her new daggers.

Slowly, the inquisitor in charge of the town limped towards them, appearing injured and barely able to walk when she finally appeared from behind the same buildings the previous necromancer had disappeared to.

Stopping almost a hundred meters away to stare at Anastacia, the inquisitor appeared nothing like Teal. Instead of a neat outfit suitable for both combat and formal meetings, they wore the torn remains of the blue robes of the new inquisition. Though calling them robes was definitely an act of kindness, as the only pieces that were left were the right sleeve, the hood and some of the fabric connecting the two, the rest appeared to have been forcibly torn apart. Under it was a rather tightly fit but basic leather armor that had been dyed dark enough to appear black in the sunset. However, the most striking part of the tattered uniform were the blood red wraps that had been tightly wound around the left side of the inquisitor’s face, left arm and both legs.

Upon looking at the wobbly necromancer, Anastacia could tell what was so strange about her. “Those legs and the left arm aren’t hers.” She muttered.

The inquisitor was missing most of her limbs but had solved the issue by replacing them with ones stolen from some recently deceased corpse and attached them to herself with the crimson wraps. As far as Anastacia could tell, the stumps remaining from the original limbs were still healing but weren’t recent enough to have happened in the town. It was also clear that the inquisitor was still having some difficulty with accurately controlling the replacement parts she had acquired, which caused the wobbly gait.

“Uhh… Hey, we-“ Was all Anastacia was able to say before all five of the spears on her back tore themselves free, flipped around and shot towards her own back.

Barely able to react in time and regain the control of her weaponry before getting skewered by them, Anastacia glanced behind her for what was only a fraction of a second, but by the time she turned back, the inquisitor had already flung herself most of the way to her and was now barreling towards her in the air.

The necromancer herself wouldn’t have had the time to stop what was happening out of the blue, but luckily, King was more prepared to greet the hostile necromancer with the spike attached to his fist.

Though this did put a stop to her, the inquisitor simply raised her scavenged arm and let the spike go through her palm as she landed.

Spilling plenty of coagulated blood and breaking many of the bones in it, the inquisitor used the already dead arm to tear the spike off King’s wrist before being pushed off by the simulacrum.

With the spike still stuck in her hand, she stumbled a few steps back and locked her one uncovered eye with Anastacia’s.

The cold, bloodshot stare, filled with nothing but hate sent shivers down the adventurer’s spine. She knew that the new inquisition had plenty of reasons to hate her, but attacking her without so much as a cocky greeting was definitely a new development in their relationship, not to mention that the last time she had seen the inquisitors, none of them had been missing parts.

“What on earth do you think you’re doing?!” Anastacia exclaimed and aimed her spears at the one who had tried to turn them on her.

The inquisitor took a couple of ragged breaths before leaving the question unanswered and swiftly lunging towards King.

The simulacra took a swing, which connected with the inquisitor’s shoulder in a painful-sounding crunch but also ended up getting his arm caught by her. In a single, incredibly fast movement, the inquisitor jammed the spike between the armor plates on his elbow and twisted it hard enough to cause the stone to crack and crumble off.

Though she had still clung on to a peaceful resolution after the initial attack, just because she didn’t want to give the inquisition yet another reason to hate her by killing off a second member their troupe, such worries were immediately shed off Anastacia’s mind when she saw a part fly off her precious simulacrum.

Any control the inquisitor had over her body, original or otherwise, was crushed by a wave of pure rage induced necromancy that could be felt by every living being within a few hundred meters.

Forcibly getting torn off King’s arm, the inquisitor was thrown at and through the wooden wall of the empty warehouse next to them.

Still feeling the woman who had made herself her mortal enemy in second be alive, Anastacia screamed and lobbed a few fireballs through the hole she had made until she was fairly sure the building had caught fire.

“Attack me for all I care, I can understand and handle that, BUT TOUCH MY DUCKING FRIENDS AND I WILL END ALL OF YOU!” She furiously shrieked while grasping one of her new daggers.

Though the air around her was already nippy, it quickly became unbearably cold as Anastacia used ice magic to suck out whatever remnants of heat there was to be found and poured it all to the crystalline dagger. The cold became so intense that frost started to appear on King’s armor, her own lips started to turn blue and she began losing the sense of touch in her fingers and toes, the windows of other nearby buildings froze over and the ground around the necromancer’s feet began bulging and cracking as the water deep below its surface froze.

When the dagger began emitting a noticeable hum, Anastacia took her enchanted knife and struck the two together, cracking the overcharged crystalline dagger and making it unstable, just like what had happened to her staff. She then threw it through the hole in the wall and hid behind King as it exploded.

Since the dagger was much smaller than her staff had been, and didn’t contain nearly as much energy, the explosion it caused was much more contained, but it was still more than enough to level that part of the warehouse, take out the fire and shatter a few windows.

Somehow, almost miraculously, the inquisitor inside still lived, though just barely – there was no way she would have been able to carry on.

Anastacia stared at the partly collapsed building for a few moments, still fuming and shaking with anger enough to not even notice how impossibly cold she was. Satisfied with the result, she turned to see if there was anything she could do to the damaged armor plate on King’s arm, but a sudden sound of something flying through the air at a high speed, followed by a piercing pain in her shoulder made her stop and look down.

In her shoulder, barely poking through the violet cloak, but having pierced through everything behind it, was the sharpened diamond tip of the spike that had been torn off King’s arm.

The blood dripping off it caught the adventurer so off guard that she almost passed out from the mere sight of it, like she had in the early days of her career, but the brunt of the pain hitting her kept Anastacia awake.

She turned back around to see the dust settle, and the severely injured inquisitor still standing, though with a few wooden splinters stuck deep in her flesh, burns, wounds from sharp crystal shards and one of her borrowed legs mostly free of flesh. Still staring from under her hood with the same boundless hatred as before, she wiped a bit of blood from the corner of her mouth and stepped out of the rubble.

“HOW?!” Anastacia screamed and began to get more than slightly weakened by blood loss.

Gilbert, Iris and Cobalt raced along the path leading them through the Garden of the Ancients. In the hopes of stopping a clash between Anastacia and the warmaster of the inquisition, they had ridden without a break for the better part of a day.

The two inquisitors had graciously gifted the adventurer an undead corpse of a massive boar to ride with, which would have been a rather hilarious sight if it weren’t for the quite literal life-or-death situation, but it was the first large animal they had found and not much slower than the inquisition’s skeletal horses.

Much to their annoyance, the final part of the road had deteriorated so beyond use that they needed to slow down anyway. While walking, it wouldn’t have been much of an issue, but weaving between the roots and rocks in full gallop was impossible.

“We’re maybe an hour out still, I hope we’re not too late…” Iris lamented and peered into the forest ahead of them.

“Mind telling me what to expect when we get there?” Gilbert asked a bit gruffly. He had just gotten hurried along without any information on the problem, which was the exact opposite of how he wanted to operate.

Cobalt gave a distrusting look at the adventurer. “You’re just here to hold back Anastacia, that’s all you really need to know.”

“Cobalt! Him coming along is incredibly helpful – show some respect!” Iris scolded the scribe. “If you’re not going to tell him, I am.”

“Be my guest then.” Cobalt scoffed.

Iris slowed down her mount to get closer to Gilbert. “Like we’ve already said, we have one of ours working in the area at the moment. Now, there might be an itty-bitty chance that this someone might try and kill Anastacia on sight.” She began explaining the situation. “And when I say itty-bitty chance, I mean they absolutely will, at any cost, in any place, no matter who or what is around them.”

Gilbert stroked his beard and wondered. “I thought it was decided that the inquisition would leave Anna be? Or did Coquelicot go back on that decision?”

“No, her word is just as absolute as always, but the one you need to understand is our warmaster, Maya.” The inquisitorial saint continued with a heavy tone as her wings slumped down once more. “Things have not gone in our Maya’s favor, pretty much ever, really. She used to be an executioner working under Coquelicot and her husband, Alizarin. She was also basically a sister to Alice, and with both Alizarin and Alice dead because of Anastacia – well, I don’t need to explain to you how revenge works.

“However, Maya is… perhaps more ‘red’ than the rest of us, which wasn’t an issue until Coquelicot locked herself away – which is yet another thing Maya blames Anastacia for, by the way – but since then, she has gotten increasingly quiet and extremely angry. But that’s not the end of it, not at all, a few months ago, she volunteered for a mission to save couple of our nerds from a machine fortress. Things didn’t go as planned and… what we got back was about half of her, both physically and mentally. I honestly have no idea how she’s even alive at this point, but my less than medically sound theory is that she can’t die before getting her revenge. It’s a theory she often tests by not really caring about what happens to herself, but so far it really does seem to be the case. I routinely patch her up from things that should make a person very dead, even by our standards, but so far none of it has slowed her down.”

The old adventurer frowned in slight disgust. “Why are you even still sending someone like that out?”

“I don’t enjoy it, if that’s what you’re implying.” Iris hissed, genuinely insulted. “But you need to understand how the inquisition functions. Without the boss-lady present, we are all equal and have no power over each other. Of course, we discuss and vote for what we think is best for Mournvalley, but none of us can command the others and that’s very important to all of us. Instead, every inquisitor was assigned a role and a purpose based on our personalities and abilities and fulfilling that role is priority number one, no ifs or buts.

“For me, the third of the inquisition, or the inquisitorial saint, that duty is speaking, or as Coquelicot put it: ‘When the third speaks, others listen.’ I make sure no inquisitor strays from our common path and we as a whole do the right thing… whatever that means.

“For nerd-master supreme, also know as the inquisitorial scribe, the ninth or the runt of the litter and many other lovingly gifted names, that duty is: ‘The ninth protects what we know, so that mistakes of the past stay as such.’ He takes it a bit too literally and has become a walking party trick who can recite any page of any book he has read.

“For poor Maya, the inquisitorial warmaster, or the fourth, her duty is: ‘The fourth will be where she is needed.’ So I literally can’t stop her from taking missions. There’s also the simple fact that she’s the most formidable of us, and has still gotten to the shape she is now – so maybe being where she was needed instead of us has spared the rest of us from possibly not returning at all.”

Gilbert sighed and pondered what he knew. “So what you’re saying is that we need to step in between two of the three most powerful necromancers in the world, that absolutely hate each other, and tell them to stop trying to kill each other?”

Iris shrugged. “Two of the top five, I’d say. An argument can be made for the second of the inquisition, but he needs equipment and Maya runs on pure hate and sugar cookies, so ranking isn’t as straight forward as you’d like – but other than that, pretty much yeah! You just wrangle with your pocket-sized monstrosity and we’ll talk sense into our sweet and innocent warmaster.”

“And what if one of us fails?” The adventurer raised an entirely fair doubt.

“Then we’ll help Maya kill Anastacia, or die trying, you do what you have to.” The inquisitor smiled happily and picked up speed again.