With the aid of the Polaris, it didn't even take half a day to reach Zulich. Upon arrival they saw adventurers of all kinds mulling about, some helping evacuate those that chose to flee, others just walking about the tent city that was constructed. There were mess tents set up and sprawling food lines, along with opportunistic merchants setting up stalls to sell weapons and trinkets to the army of adventurers. With all the hustle and bustle few paid attention to his vehicle, luckily.

Hisoka found an empty space behind a few tents and staked their claim. He had no intention of renting or purchasing a tent as he and Misumi had grown accustomed to sleeping in the car.

Aki looked on in aw at the sight of a couple of thousand adventurers of all shapes and sizes gathered in one place. Misumi seemed more interested in what Hisoka and stole glances occasionally. Hisoka merely yawned, after all where he came from it wasn't uncommon to find videos of marching armies far larger on the internet, though in person it was a slightly interesting sight.

Hisoka checked his combat load; he had his 6.5 rifle slung over his shoulder resting against his back, the 6.8 rifles resting gently at his front, and his MK23 kept stowed in its place. After distributing the magazines between the girls, Hisoka had 11 mags of 6.8 stored primarily on his chest rig with extras in his bag, 4 mags of .45 on his person with the remaining 13 mags created by producing extra MK23s stored in the bag, 4 mags for the 6.5 counting the one in the magwell currently, and the shotgun in storage with its 6 mags to top it all off. After splitting the loose rounds he believed that the 3 of them, considering the full mags as well, should make it at least through the first day of fighting.

Misumi followed suite and jumped off the Polaris before going to Hisoka's side, staying rather close to him. Aki merely followed behind them basking in the scene. Hisoka had one goal in mind, find the guild representative or whoever is acting in a general or intelligence role to get some further information on the battle and command structure. After asking nearby adventurers he was pointed towards a slightly larger tent.

Hisoka entered without ceremony practically barging into the place. Understandably, the two guards immediately drew their weapons and put their bardiches to Hisoka's throat. Hisoka merely raised an eyebrow and raised his hands in mock surrender, while Misumi drew her weapon and had a look as if she was about to kill everyone in the room.

[Shit when did she become so fierce?] Hisoka thought.

"Misumi..." Hisoka warned in a soft yet stern voice. She gradually lowered and then holstered the pistol, yet kept her rifle at low-ready.

A man sitting at a table with 2 more guards standing poised behind him spoke, "who exactly are you who so rudely burst into my command tent?"

"Oh my apologies sir, forgive my rudeness, my name is Hisoka Iwamoto E-rank adventurer. I would bow but..." he gestured to the blades at his throat.

The man waved his hand and the guards returned to their posts along the door, "Well, what exactly do you want. Make it quick I'm busy."

"I merely wished to gather some information on the distance towards the advancing enemy forces, the commander of this outfit, and any command structure."

The man smirked, "Well, that's surprising. You're the first adventurer to give a damn about such important pieces of information. If it wasn't for the low prices of employing adventurers we would have sent a portion of the army. To answer your question, I am the commander overseeing this, Toshi Suto officer of the Taris Military. There is no command structure; adventurers merely fight as they see fit."

Hisoka's brows furrowed as he took in the fact that the Taris Kingdom had sent an officer to oversee the battle, as well as the fact that there was 0 command structure. This did not seem like a recipe for success, adventurers usually operate on their own or with their parties; without a chain of command as well as unit structure, it would be every man for himself to kill the undead. The bracelets didn't help as the adventurers had one thing in mind; money.

Misumi's eyes were dark, glazed over, with a deep burning rage within. It was understandable, the man before them lead these barbaric soldiers of the Taris kingdom. Hisoka wanted nothing more than to let Misumi wipe the room, but there would be no good ending to such a decision.

Hisoka looked knowingly in Misumi's eyes, and she looked away.

"Something wrong with your slave there?" asked Toshi. Hisoka could feel the air turn cold with intense killing intent coming from Misumi. He felt the limits of his self-control fading with Misumi being called a slave.

With a look so cold it could freeze the villages water storage, he looked at Toshi and gave him a very brief word of leaving. Hisoka felt that if they stayed there too much longer than one or both of them would end up painting that tent red. No matter how mad he was, he could still understand that would NOT end well.

The three of them walked back to the car, Hisoka and Misumi seething with anger. Luckily, it appeared that an outlet for said anger would reveal itself.

Many adventurers were rushing around to gather their party before sprinting to the border of the town. Hisoka squinted off in the distance and saw a wave of corpses in some shape or another push their way steadily to the town.

"Holy shit," Hisoka said as he gazed at the walking corpses trampling the scenery in their path.

They began to hustle over to the front. They each checked the chamber of their guns to be sure they were hot as they ran. Hisoka transitioned from the 6.8 to the 6.5 and they moved, preparing to engage from a distance with the ammo he had, though after seeing the waves of undead he wondered if it'd matter.

As they neared the front they began to watch the battle unfold. Various adventurers rushed towards the undead and began the melee against the entities that refused death. Mages let out bursts of high powered magic scorching the earth the things walked on. Gruesomely the things merely walked through the flames, walking until whatever kept them going burnt to a crisp. The adventurers with swords fiercely battled the armed undead, praying blows and sending forth strikes of their own.

They stopped a good 100 meters from the fighting, before Hisoka said, "Let's get to work," as he activated his skill. The world slowed down and de felt the familiar sense of his emotions being repressed. His brain went on overdrive formulating a proper course of action. When he raised the weapon in his hands to a firing position, he felt a jolt as he instantly understood the principles of marksmanship. He felt the muscle memory be pumped into his body leaving him a fine-tuned shooting machine. He was now on par with any Designated Marksman.

He was vaguely aware of his companions and their actions, Aki beginning to engage at a distance. With slow methodical shots she engaged the targets. Misumi raised her weapon and began to target foes as well. Aki continued to slap high powered rounds downrange as Hisoka lifted his rifle. He felt the skill kick into overdrive as his sight was increased 10 fold. He could even see such fine details as ribs poking through the rotting flesh of the target lined in his sights.

He began the familiar routine of aim and shoot. The rifle kicked into his shoulder, but he was able to readjust the rifle back on course with his targets. At this range he needn't worry about any of the finer aspects of marksmanship; select a target and destroy its vitals. The barrel spat flames with each Depression of the trigger, resulting and an enemy to drop dead.

The zombie-like entities had their skulls blown to pieces and their mushy brains scattered by accurate fire. Hisoka found another target and let out two shots to the thing's chest. Just as the guild employee had said, the zombie-like entities seemed to die in a similar way to a regular human. Finishing one more target he ejected the magazine, and swapped it in the bag of holding for a fresh one. He put it in the mag well till it clicked in place. After a swift pull and release of the bolt, he resumed firing.

The way he used the marksman rifle was how a rifleman would fire an AR, at this range with such enemy density, it was just moving the barrel a slight bit, find the chest, and fire. Well, it would have been in the skeletons didn't come rattling around. He observed adventurers engage in melee with them, they didn't appear strong, yet slicing their bones didn't result in anything. He watched one adventurer who must not have paid attention at the guild announcement get his sword stuck in a skeleton's ribcage. He tried to yank it free, but to his horror the skeleton merely stabbed him in the stomach before pushing him to the ground.

Click, Boom. Hisoka sighted on the skeleton and dropped its ass with one fine blow splintering its skull. He saw an adventurer locked in combat and neatly blew the skull apart of the adversary. The adventurer was bewildered as to how it instantly died, before continuing his battle for life or death.

Hisoka was swift and brutal, executing his enemies. Each shot resulted in a pink mist or a skull blown to pieces. He fired till it ran dry and swapped the mags swiftly. He dropped the last mag and came up empty upon rooting for another mag. He took the rifle sling off his shoulder and shoved it in the bag of holding. Now the work begins.

The rate in which the knocked a target and moved to the next with his AR would make competition shooters blush. He shot his targets without a hint of hesitation, each shot perfectly finding the mark. The rate of fire from the trio swiftly increased as the monsters were within 50 meters. The infantry were being pushed back by the sheer number of enemies; adventurers would kill three only to be tackled by 6. It was clear to see that they ould push the adventurers back to the town.

As mighty and strong as the adventurers were, they were being torn up. Mages let out large scale attacks causing wide holes in the lines of the enemy, only for them to be filled again. Hisoka merely continued to point and click, feel the recoil kick his shoulder before continuing. They wouldn't last through this forever, that was factual.

Hisoka hastened even further before he felt the world start to speed up. His quick flawless shooting became much slower, his shots still landed but the rate of kills drastically decreases. Only when he felt all of the emotions rush back into place; fear, determination amongst other distractions fall back into their places, did he realize the skill had terminated the combat mode. He had no time to think about this as the enemies drew ever closer. They began to simply flood around and trample the adventurers rather than stand and fight.

Hisoka slung the weapon over his shoulder and brought out his 12 gauge. All he had to do was point the weapon in their general direction and let out buckshot. With the hearing protection of the skill gone he began to feel the full effect on his hearing of rapid-fire shooting from the three barrels. He soldiered on and continued to spray. The mages and archers had begun to pull back, but Hisoka remained determined and cut the enemy down sometimes 10 at a time. He blew through 3 magazines like it was nothing, and continued to fire.

Unfortunately, upon loading the 5th mag 3 zombies and a skeleton burst forward from the crown sprinting towards him. He drew the MK23 and shot the two that the girls missed. The bigger problem was that more began to speed up; seeing their prey before their eyes the crazed monsters surged forwards.

"Fucking book it back to the town NOW!!" Hisoka yelled over the sounds of combat. They needed to retreat immediately, the problem being the monsters didn't intend to let them. Hisoka finished reloading the 12 gauge and emptied it into the horde. At most it slowed their advance for a few seconds, however, it did cut the number of sprinters down.

The girls began to run back towards the town with Hisoka covering the retreat. He didn't intend to die fighting here, but he had to hold them off dor a bit. He transitioned to his pistol and emptied 4 rounds at the 5 charging owners, before hearing a terrible sound. Click. The slide locked back with 2 of the monsters still alive just about on top of him. He threw the pistol back in the holster and drew the KA-BAR.

One of them was a zombie with a longsword. Hisoka tried to parry the slashes but his skill wasn't medieval weapon master, not was it CQC master. He received a nasty cut to his arm that may have even gone to the bone. Hisoka roared in pain as adrenaline kicked in. The monster was going for an overhead swing, and Hisoka took the chance to jab the blade into its stomach. It brought the hilt of its blade down on Hisoka, temporarily stunning him. It didn't stun him long enough to keep him from withdrawing the knife and napping it repeatedly in the thin's chest. Hisoka felt the blade bashing the ribs until they broke, and felt the knife step into soft tissues and hopefully vital organs.

He had no time to check as the skeleton as trying to strangle him. He hicked at the thing but its grin was unwavering. His knife was stuck in pieces of the ribs of the zombies, and his weapons were empty. He felt his vision fading as he was starved of oxygen, before hearing a BANG resound throughout the battlefield. The skeleton dropped to the ground like the stack of bones it was.

"Come on we gotta go!" screamed one of the girls.

He was still too out of it to connect the voice to a name, but he went for his knife and yanked it strongly from the zombie's chest. It had died during the fight with the skeleton from organ damage it seemed. With some coaxing he got his blade. Luckily the main horde of slow-moving creatures was still a good 15 meters from them.

Hisoka sprinted towards the girls who were standing near a building at the town's edge. When they saw him heading towards them, they began to continue their retreat. As Hisoka ran he saw various adventurers with varying injuries sprint along with him. His throat ached from being strangled but [resilience] seemed to cover it. As for the deep heavily bleeding slice in his arm, it only dulled the pain. He needed a healing potion immediately, but he had to stop to get it and consume it. The undead wave was still a bit from the town proper, so he quickly dug through his bag and guzzled a healing potion.

He had no time to wait for the effect to hit, he had to GTFO. He dropped the empty bottle and continued his mad dash for the adventurers camp. He soon caught up with the girls who were heading towards the car. They saw the other adventurers rush through the large group of tents, and saw some mount horses that were waiting for them, while others continued to hoof it. A couple of merchants were about to get the hell outa dodge when they let a few adventurers board their carriages.

They finally reached their vehicles and frantically jumped in. They proceeded to gun it and leave the town. Zulich had fallen to the undead wave, and more than 1/4th of the adventurers were lost or had perished.

~~~