Year 1, Winter, Third Month, Second Week.

Just when the light was disappearing from the sky, the team arrived at the central square dragging a long scaled body. Other kids pointed excitedly from inside their huts while the parents talked with each other making guesses about the dead beast.

Chief Omero was relieved to see them returning without missing any members. Diana was also relieved, even staying she felt responsible for the team’s safety, but she also felt a little disappointed because they had hunted such a big beast without her.

Karl explained that the beast was a second rank LT water beast. After discussing the beast’s power and their performance with Diana, they left to get their well-deserved rest.

The team was already used to Diana’s habit of accessing their performance on the hunts. They would talk about new tactics, formations, new possible situations and ways to improve.

Grandma Marlen and other villagers started to process the beast as soon as the team arrived. The winter’s night wasn’t a good time to work, but the heating circle kept them warm and the fire offered minimum light conditions.

After they finished processing the body, Marlen announced that they would have enough meat for two feasts. Thankfully, it would last until the end of winter.

The feast would be held the next day, in the meantime, the team decided to take a pause on their training and use the time to heal their wounds.

.........

“I want to discuss how we should move forward... Winter is ending, and soon we’ll start working in the fields again.”

Chief Omero paid special attention to keep his voice down.

Grandma Marlen added, in an aggravated tone:

“The Kingdom should be expecting a lot of deaths in this winter. When they see our numbers, they’d suspect something... If Karl’s abilities are discovered, the best scenario would be they taking him away, but we know what would probably happen...”

“You’re looking at it wrongly, this isn’t a problem, it’s an opportunity...”

Omero and Marlen looked curiously at Bill.

“How?”

“If they think some of us are dead, they’ll ask for less tribute and we can free some people to do other things...”

Countless ideas appeared in Omero’s mind, he could hardly hide his calculating smile.

“Indeed... We can rotate the villagers so they can rest and help here… When they come for this year’s checking we can send some people out with the hunting team...”

Chief Omero was very pleased with this idea. Now, he would have more hands to help with his plans while diminishing the Kingdom’s influence in the village.

.........

At night, in the central square.

“... Spring is coming... When the snow melts, the guards will come to make the annual count on the village numbers. They’re expecting a lot of deaths this year, and if they see that our deaths actually decreased, they’ll get suspicious and discover the magic tools…”

The villagers started to look afraid of the situation, they had grown used to their new lifestyle, eating better and not seeing so much death.

“We can’t let them find out! If they do, they would take everything... But, we could pretend that a lot of villagers died in winter. When they come for the checking, we could send people outside escorted by the hunting team. With fewer villagers, our tributes would be lowered and we could use the extra work to improve our lives here... To be fair, we can rotate groups, each group would rest two weeks in each season. Of course, everyone would have to pretend to be weak and starving when working at the magic fields. The kingdom doesn’t care for us but we should take care of ourselves!”

Everyone cheered. First, they thought that they would lose what they achieved but now they could get even more. Resting for two weeks in each season was a blessing for the tired workers.

At the beginning of spring, the Kingdom’s Guards would come and sweep through all of the homes in the village to look for hiding villagers. Since the tributes were passed according to the villager’s numbers, they needed to check if the villages weren’t lying about their numbers.

Fortunately, they would never think that the villagers would have the courage to hide outside the barrier.

.........

Lew slashed the corpse and kicked it out of his way. Unfortunately, the undead kept coming. The LT undead was weak, but once they moved deeper into the Death Valley their numbers continued to grow.

This type of undead corpse was created when a corpse stayed exposed to death energy for some time. Even though the undead corpses didn’t have combat abilities, once someone got bit or scratched by them, their wound would quickly fester. So, it was better to pay attention and eliminate them fast.

Fire or decapitation were more effective against these creatures. The undead didn't have vitality, so regular attacks could only delay or cripple them. But, once their head was taken or their bodies burned, the soul trapped inside the dead body would leave it.

Slashing through their members wouldn't destroy them but it would keep them from moving and that was what Lew and the other Fighters were doing.

The Mages got sick of the putrid smell and gruesome sight, so they asked the Fighters to deal with them, saying that they had to conserve energy for the high tiered entities.

Soon, the situation got out of hand and they had to intervene anyway. Hundreds of undead started to appear, moving to attack the party following their only impulse, to attack living beings.

The wind Mage circled the group with Breeze, while the fire Mage started to invoke a Flame. Once the Mages combined their elements, the Flame expanded around the undead.

The smell of the burning rotting flesh made the weak life Invoker feel sick and vomit. Her powers were the most effective against death energy, which made her the most affected by it.

“The spell is ready, give me the crystal...”

The Enchanter got the small black crystal from the leading Fighter and placed it on the Ritual Board.

First, he concentrated, pushing all the noise and unpleasant smell to the back of his perception. Then, he moved his spiritual energy to form the Wave Key in the board.

“Requiro.”

The Key shined briefly transmitting its glow to the black crystal. In an instant, the energy circling the black crystal burst, forming a ripple in the air.

The ripple traveled in all directions for hundreds of meters. After moving past the five meters radio the glow became too faint to be seen, but Lew could still sense the energy ripple when it passed him.

When the ripple touched a death crystal, it would transmit back a ripple towards the initial point. So, when the ripple passed the hundreds of crystals that dropped from the nearby undead, it pushed a lot of ripples back.

To complete the spell, the Enchanter had to stay concentrated to receive and interpret the returning ripples. He knew that the several close crystals would create a huge interference, so he ignored the hundreds of small ripples that returned in less than ten seconds.

Soon, the ripples stop coming in the hundreds and he resumed paying attention to the spell feedback carefully. Then, other small ripples returned, but only after he felt a big ripple he was satisfied and ended the spell.

“There are some LQ death crystals near, but only one MQ crystal in that direction...”

The group resumed their journey towards the direction pointed by him. The Seek Spell wasn’t very accurate but it would give them a general direction. Lew only hoped that the MQ death crystal was naturally formed and didn't belong to any creature.

.........

“Holly Origin!”

“What is that?”

The group looked at the human-shaped black shadow floating roughly 150 meters from them. Although it had the shape of a human, the being seemed to be formed by darkness, the extremities of its body weren’t uniform and would constantly change, like liquid or gas.

“I think it's a Wraith... People say that it's an entity formed by death energy and dozens of angry souls mended together...”

Everyone gulped, even the Mages looked scared of it. Lew thought about the crystal in his pouch. He needed to save it for when he separated from the group, but maybe he wouldn’t have a choice.

Before they decided what to do, something happened. The Wraith opened its eyes and look at them. They didn’t know, but the death creature was in slumber until it felt their presence.

The creature’s eyes were completely red, making it look even deadlier. Everyone started to prepare their weapons and spells, yet no one dared to lose sight of the creature, but in an instant, it disappeared.

Lew stepped back and looked around praying to the Origin that the creature wouldn't be at his side.

“Arghhh... Cough... cough... Hel... Help...”

Lew looked towards his back and saw the petit life Invoker being held and chocked in the air. The Wraith had gone straight to her, probably because she emitted the strongest life energy.

The party stared in shock for a couple of seconds while the dark marks spread from the Mage's neck to the rest of her body.

“Motus.”

The Enchanter cast his weakest and fastest spell, pouring a fourth of his spiritual energy to try pushing the Wraith away from the dying Mage.

A huge amount of magic energy moved towards the Wraith, powering a Space Key. The energy burst and pushed the creature ten meters back. It screamed, making everyone sick and dizzy. The high-pitched screech had a short effect of disturbing their vitality channels. Fortunately, the attack also brought them to reality.

The Fighters moved to attack the Wraith, empowering their legs and hands with magic energy, but the creature swung its arms blocking the attacks with death energy.

One of the Fighters got hit directly and started to rot. The others only got pushed back, the dark energy clashing against their swords. The screams of the rotting Fighter were muffled by the burning sound of the Fire Ray traveling towards the Wraith.

The Wraith disappeared again, but this time, the earth Mage moved a lot of earth energy from his ankle crystal to the ground, building an Earth Wall around them.

Fortunately, the Earth Wall blocked the Wraith’s surprise attack, drawing their attention to it when it tried to pass through the Wall.

The obstacle couldn’t block the creature but was enough to hinder its passage. Lew slashed towards what he guessed was the Wraith’s face, it screamed making him miss the target.

The fire and wind Mage exchanged a look, visually agreeing to a plan. They asked if the Enchanter could hold it for a short moment, he nodded and said:

“Lure it here”

This time, he used half of his energy to stir the magic energy around him, drawing a big Space Key. When the Wraith tried to attack again, the earth Mage used another big amount of earth energy to build an Earth Wall that stopped in front of the Enchanter.

The Wraith could have passed the Wall but it couldn't ignore the unprotected target. It moved towards the bait faster than their eyes could follow but halted once its body touched the big invisible Space Key.

“Custodia.”

The magic energy circled the Wraith holding it in place, while it screamed and struggled against the magic bonds. The Enchanter had to move more energy to keep the creature in place.

He started to sweat and look pale. Fortunately, the Mages were ready. A strong gust of wind flowed, forming a Wind Tunnel around the Wraith.

Soon, a powerful Flame burned inside the Wind Tunnel towards the Wraith.

In less than a minute, the sickening screams stopped and the creature was finally destroyed.

.........

“This is it. We got the crystals, let's go back...”

Lew smiled looking towards the path out of the Death Valley, but soon his smile became complicated. Once he was out of this Origin forsaken place, he would have to fight to escape alive...