I was mad. Mad at the guards for splitting me from the girls. Mad at the guild master for being like this. Mad at the girls for getting captured. But mostly, I was mad at myself. I didn’t have dark vision or anything like that, which would help me see in this tunnel.

When I went dungeon diving, the tunnels were lit. When I was traveling, it was by day, and I had magical lights I could make. However, right now, I was under-armed and under-supplied. I had left my bulker gear with Iris’s dad, Godfrey. I didn’t think walking around with my standard was a great idea as I didn’t think I would be in actual combat in town. I also didn’t have my pack or bow with me.

If I had time, I could have created a magical light to take forward with me. Or I could have run a piece of equipment to help me see at night. However, I didn’t have time, and the tunnel was dark. Which meant that I needed to go forward the best I could.

I drew my short sword and started forward. The girls and Blink were my only friends in this place. Which meant that I was going to count everyone else as an enemy. It might not be accurate, but if I waited to figure it out, then I was asking to get killed.

As I moved forward, my eyes adjusted some. However, the darkness soon became complete as the tunnel curved. I could use fire strike and keep it on my sword, but then I would become a beacon for anyone looking. My only hope was that there weren’t others in here that had dark vision.

After a few minutes, Blink thought to me. “Kasidy locked up. Lots locked up.”

I growled a little. It sounded to me like slave trade of some sort. It wasn’t something that I was happy with. Yeah, I knew that this world wasn’t the same as Earth. I knew that Ash was a slave and seemed kind of okay with it. But I wasn’t Ash, I wasn’t. I also wasn’t okay with Kasidy being taken from me.

I thought back. “Keep them safe and see if you can find the keys to unlock everything.”

I felt my way down the tunnel. My left hand was on the wall, and my right was low with my sword in it. I felt the wall curving to my right, and then there was light on the wall. After another curve, I saw a lit hallway.

The lit part of the hall was about sixty feet long. For the whole length, it appeared to be about ten feet tall and about the same in width. At the far end was another gate with two guards facing my way.

Unlike the town guards, these men looked more like bandits. Their armor didn’t match, but it seemed a cut above what I had seen so far. Their weapons also looked better. Where the bandits and the guards mainly had low-skill weapons. These two had swords on their hips and a spear in their hands.

I paused a little outside of the lit area. My mind started to race as I tried to figure out how I was going to deal with these guys. I had ranged magic, festering wound, and the stone sphere. I could likely kill one with the sphere before they could react. However, if they sounded the alarm, then I might not make it out of here.

Then I thought for a moment. I had a range on this ring of about 40 feet, which meant that I needed to clear at least twenty. At that point, they would already be making the call that someone was here unless they thought they could handle me.

I didn’t look harmless, so I didn’t expect them to let me just wander in. I needed to make them come to me in such a way that they didn’t feel overly worried. So I backed up around the corner and started to walk heavily.

Then I yelled. “Not funny! This place is dark! Just come out and show me where to go!”

Then I fell down to the ground and yelled. “Oh come on! Just come out with the lights already. This isn’t funny any more!”

As I slowly got back up to my feet. I heard the armored footsteps of one of the guards coming. I was back around the bend where the light wouldn’t shine, and so when I saw light moving my way, I knew that he had at least brought a torch with him.

As he came around the bend, he said. “Who’s there? You can’t be here!”

I slid my sword forward with a fire strike added to it. The blade came in right behind his shield. If he hadn’t had it raised a bit, it would have blocked me. But as it was, I hit just behind his breastplate.

If he had been better armored, then the fight would have lasted longer. However, he only had front-facing armor, and my sword went right past that. I must have found his heart with as quickly as he dropped.

I left my sword in him and caught his falling body. Then I triggered my spell of turn zombie. I smiled as I helped my most recent creation to his feet.

Then I pulled my sword back out of his side, sheathed it, and got in front of him. I raised my hands and walked around the curve and into the light. My zombie was right behind me.

I yelled out as I stumbled forward. “No need to rough me up! I didn’t know that I couldn’t be here.”

I kept walking forward with my hands raised. I had the zombie pushing me from behind, which kept the other guard from freaking out. We closed to forty feet and then to thirty.

At about twenty feet, the other guard finally asked. “What’s going on?”

With that, the zombie through the torch, and I fired a stone sphere. The guard didn’t seem to know how to react to the torch and so stuttered for just a moment. Then as he went to raise his spear and ignore the torch, my stone slammed into him.

His whole body slammed back, and his head cracked against the wall. I saw him push himself up, but I could tell he was in a daze, so I pulled my knife and closed on him. The first hit took him on the arm, and he froze in place. The second one went through his neck.

I didn’t even stop to think. I just raised him as a zombie as well. Then I had them open the gate with their key. Beyond the gate, things were lit reasonably well. I had them both take up their spears and head down the hall. I wanted them to act like they were just walking, not looking for a fight.

I followed behind them by about 10 feet. I didn’t know if there were traps or ambushes set up in this place. If there were, then they would get to trigger them for me. Then we could figure out what was going on.

Blink took that time to show me that she had the key. She started with Kasidy and then moved over to Iris. After that, the girls began to unlock the cages and help the people out. Most were humans, but there were dozen of other races that I had never seen, even in my dreams.

My zombies came up to a t in the passage. Which meant that I needed to figure out which way to have them go. Since Blink was still working up above, I had the mess down here to clean out.

I had the zombies keep going forward just past the side passage, and then I had them stop. I took a look around the corner and saw a real door, not a gate like I had been seeing. Which meant that I had no clue what was in this place.

I pulled back a ways where I could see through once the door was opened and sent the zombies in. As the door opened, I noticed that there was a small barracks of some sort on that side. There were six beds, and four of them were occupied.

I didn’t like what I was about to do since it felt wrong. Killing people in their sleep wasn’t what I was raised to do on Earth. However, I already knew that these people were working with kidnappers and likely had some form of mind magic. So I sealed in my emotions and sent the zombies to two of the beds.

I sent them the command at the same time I struck the third. There was a scream from one of the ones the zombies were killing. That scream was enough that the fourth man bolted upright. As he came up, his eyes got wide.

Then the fourth guard threw a fireball. It slammed against my second zombie throwing him back across the room. My first one took two steps only to have a fireball show up and send his burning body to the ground.

I fired my stone sphere at the mage. He wasn’t ready for it and the stone crushed into his body. He wasn’t dead but would be soon. I moved over to him and drove my blade into his heart, ending the fight.

I looked around for a moment. The two zombies that I had brought in were mangled and falling apart now. My zombies were all low-tier and couldn’t be healed. If I could ever level my spells, then they might could handle a blast like that. As it was, neither one of them would be walking out of this place.

I tried to raise the mage, but my magic just didn’t take. I wasn’t sure why but I was guessing it had something to do with the inscriptions that I had seen on the mage skeletons. The other three I pulled out of their beds. I didn’t feel like I had the time to get them armored.

As zombies, they lacked the skills needed to just dress themselves. However, they could attack with weapons given to them, so I had them arm up with the ones in the room. Then I took the time to look at the equipment in the room.

None of it was better than mine. However, I found some money that I would keep, and the mage had three mana potions. I took those and added them to my shield. They could prove to be useful later.

Then I took my three new zombies and moved us down the hall. It was kind of odd to me that with all my fighting, no one knew what was going on. Soon the hallway ended with a set of stairs going up and another door.

There was no one guarding this, so I had us open it. The guards were on the other side, and the oddness of three men in sleeping clothes with shields and spears made them hesitate. It wasn’t much but just enough that the first one died. The second one yelled and ran, which did him no good as I shot him in the back with my third stone sphere.

Then I raised both of these guards and put them at the front. We moved on with my horde getting bigger. I was understanding why people feared necromancers. It wasn’t just the fear of not being released. It was the fear of the speed of their power.

Sadly the element of surprise was no longer on our side. The shout of the guard seemed to be enough to call others that were in a side room not far away. Out of the door about 50 feet away, another 6 guards came running.

I had five zombies verse their six guards. My money was on the guards, but they also weren’t sure what was going on. Since they knew their men who shouted. It was when they called out and didn’t get a response that the fight started.

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