Published at 14th of October 2023 4:58 pm

Chapter 12 – First Divergence

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Eyeing the six kneeling undead, Vanalath allowed himself a small measure of satisfaction, though his distrust had not faded completely.

He growled, commanding them to remain there. Then, he slowly went around to the various corpses, locating spare scraps of cloth he could use to wrap up his gaping wounds. Though his injuries didn’t slow him down overmuch, he didn’t want to wander around looking like a sentient pile of shredded meat. Finally, he grasped his dislocated shoulder with a hand, straining. Eventually, it snapped back into place with a loud pop.

While he rummaged, he also changed out his clothes, most articles of which had seen better days. His mask, sword, sword belt, and leather boots were the only pieces he retained. He donned a pair of thick cloth trousers that provided some small protection and didn’t restrict his movement, as well as a shirt made out of some gray, scratchy fiber that was tight-fitting enough that he didn’t risk getting his sleeves getting in the way of his sword.

He departed the scene of his battle, making sure to keep an eye on the six remaining undead as he moved towards where he’d last seen Kalaki. The ghoul had gone quite a distance.

While walking, he decided to deal with this next issue.

You have qualified for a rank up.

Select a class.

[Warrior], [Squire], [Duelist], [Swordsman]

Four paths opened before Vanalath once again. It was a familiar feeling, one that last occurred after the slaughter in the cave. This time, it was slightly different. Rather than looking through open doors, he now stood at an intersection, the first and most critical point of divergence. He looked behind himself, at the route he’d already taken. He’d advanced somewhat down his path, and was able to see… just how small a distance he’d actually come. The beginning was right behind him. He’d barely taken his first step.

The feeling these paths gave off were similar to the first set of choices, with a few key differences as they all retained some of the familiar characteristics of the [Swordsman].

[Warrior], the first path, felt raw and violent. Fires raged and enemies lay in wait, obstacles to overcome on the road to greatness. There was a great degree of versatility and freedom here, kept in check by a shred of discipline. It was a massive path, with the fewest dead ends of any he’d seen. Anything he wanted to pursue therein felt like it could be a viable choice. It was practically impossible to fail should he choose this one, but… it felt almost like too safe a choice. Like there was some catch. He couldn’t tell what this snag might be with his limited understanding, but his instincts warned against it.

[Squire]

The second route took the opposite approach of the first. Rigid control. Strength. The ground shook here and storm winds buffeted this path, requiring one to have a steady grasp on their own footing lest they falter. There were some dead ends, but it was more likely for one to stop halfway to their goal than to encounter an impasse. There were fewer divergences later on here: less options, but none of them felt weak. Rather, they were all blindingly strong.

[Duelist]

The third path… this one was different. It was dangerous. It walked a fine line between strength and flexibility, requiring the traveler one day to hack his way through thorny vines and the next day to dance across lily pads. To climb a mountain then cross a bottomless chasm. It had more twists and tangles than even the first path, and far more dead ends, some which were easier than others to stumble into. It was risky. One wrong turn, and the traveler was trapped forever. This wasn’t dependent only on one’s will and strength. It required that too, but it was also a test of every other aspect of someone’s character: be it intelligence, courage, or even luck.

[Swordsman]

The fourth option wasn’t worth mentioning. It was a continuation of the lesser path he’d already walked. Every path, however simple or complicated it might be, was given the same number of steps. A lesser path would be handicapping one’s potential. Choosing it was tantamount to failure.

Vanalath ran a tongue over his teeth, wishing for the first time in his unlife that he had something strong to drink.

There was more tied in with these choices than just the vague sensations that the paths gave him. There were emotions that came to his mind as he looked them over, surfacing unbidden in him.

The second path. Vanalath eyed the glowing blue runes that represented it, wishing he could discern their meaning.

[Squire]. That path was deeply familiar to him. So familiar that he felt vestiges of memories returning to him the longer he stared. In the end, though, no concrete images or thoughts surfaced. There was only a deep emotion of regret. But why? This path was the surest path to strength. He could see that much. All one needed to walk it was the requisite tenacity and force of will. Vanalath didn’t doubt his drive for a moment.

Yet it was the third option that truly confounded him.

[Duelist]. Why was the third one always so tempting? This path was rife with obstacles and uncertainty, yet something called him to it. It couldn’t have just been its potential. The second path had that, too. There was yearning in him for this route, and whether it was something from his past life or instinct, Vanalath was unwilling to discount it. It was just… ahead of him was infinity. One wrong turn here, and—

Something hit his shoulder, causing Vanalath to lurch forward. As he did, his arm passed through the runes he’d been staring at so fixedly. The glowing letters disappeared into motes of light, and he blinked as a new set of runes appeared before him.

[Class obtained]: <Duelist> (uncommon)

[Skill increased]: <Poise> (Lv.0) -> (Lv.1)

[Skill obtained]: <Conceptualization> (Lv.0)

A difficult-to-place sensation came over Vanalath, like his field of view had just widened slightly, though his vision remained the same. Following this shifting of his perception, he turned to stare incredulously at the prone figure of the ghoul who had just interfered with his selection. It was Kalaki, who had collapsed and now lay face-down in the dirt, completely motionless.

Vanalath had seen his subordinate working his way towards him, so he’d stopped to debate his choices and rest for a moment without paying the old zombie any more mind. He hadn’t expected him to suddenly fall over, however. Vanalath’s gaze bore into the back of Kalaki’s skull, but the spearman didn’t budge an inch. He was just debating stomping in his skull when he noticed something which gave him pause.

Like him, Kalaki hadn’t escaped the fight unscathed. He’d accumulated his share of injuries, though most weren’t as severe as Vanalath’s. Rather, most of his current injuries were given to him by Vanalath last night, when he killed the old man and turned him. And now, those wounds were healing rapidly. Flesh knitted together and muscles regrew before the duelist’s eyes. Kalaki was evolving.

Vanalath stepped back, curious to witness the process that he’d undergone himself back in the cave.

…

It turned out that other than the regeneration, it wasn’t much to look at. After Kalaki’s wounds healed, he just lay there like a slug. Thoroughly uninteresting. He didn’t even breath, being an undead.

Vanalath rolled him over onto his back, then sat down and waited. His stamina seemed to replenish more rapidly when he didn’t move, so he took the opportunity to rest and renew himself. After a moment of thought, he located one of Kalaki’s victims and dug out her liver. After consuming it, he lost interest in eating any more, despite being hungry enough to. Undead flesh wasn’t quite the same after experiencing the fresh thing. Still, with something in his stomach, he felt his energy levels recovering much faster.

In the distance, the six ghouls remained kneeling. Undead were good at exercising patience so long as there weren’t humans around, evidently. Vanalath allowed his thought processes to slow as he entered a self-induced stupor.

After half an hour, Kalaki stirred. Vanalath blinked, then turned to watch as his companion rose and looked around at his surroundings with some confusion. His appearance was mostly the same as before: white hair, a receding hairline, and a medium-length beard, spattered with blood, that reached to his chest.

The largest difference Vanalath noted between before and after was in the ghoul’s posture, which until now had been hunched over like it had been in life. Kalaki stood straighter now, with the bearing of a soldier. At this moment, Kalaki stopped examining the environment and instead focused on one spot in the air in front of him, more intently than Vanalath had ever seen the old zombie look at anything. Though Vanalath followed his gaze, he couldn’t tell what Kalaki saw.

Kalaki lifted his hand with a motion reminiscent of a man trying to catch an insect with his bare hand. At this, Vanalath suddenly realized what was going on. Had he himself not just experienced the same thing recently he wouldn’t have figured it out. Kalaki had probably just been given a choice of paths.

As if this wasn’t confirmation enough, a glowing blue symbol suddenly brightened on Kalaki’s forehead, the same place where Vanalath’s was located. Kalaki’s symbol took the shape of a circle framed on the top and bottom by two parallel lines. In the center of the circle was a small cross.

Strangely, Vanalath was able to sense something stir in his own Brand when this happened. It felt like Kalaki was drawing something from him. It wasn’t energy, not really. It wasn’t like the power he felt entering him when the runes sometimes appeared before him. It was something he had inside himself that he’d never noticed before, and may never have known he had it if he hadn’t lost some just now. It was such a minor amount of the mysterious substance that it didn’t truly bother Vanalath, but if the amount increased, he could tell it wouldn’t be a good thing.

He had no idea what to make of it. Undoubtedly, this was related to the connection Vanalath forced between him and Kalaki back in the cave, but he hadn’t known anything like this would occur. It was something to investigate when he had the means.

By this point, Vanalath had recovered enough to move without feeling burdened, so he stood and made his way back to the kneeling ghouls. The female lifted her head as he approached, though she kept her eyes lowered subserviently.

The following conversation was entirely carried out in growls between the two evolved commanders.

Are there more ghouls? Vanalath asked.

Some, she replied. Too many here for me to control. I took the best for my army.

Gather them.

It will take time. I chased them away since I couldn’t control them.

Do it, and then bring them to the mistress.

Who?

Your creator. She lives in the hut by the lone rock in the barren fields to the west.

Vanalath pointed to make his directions clear.

I will do as you say, she said.

Orders given, Vanalath decided to leave the female to her task. If she betrayed him, he would hunt her down again.

Vanalath checked the sky, noting that it had begun to dim. It was late in the afternoon.

“Soon,” was all the necromancer had said when she mentioned that hunters were returning. Their window of time, if it hadn’t already closed, was shortening with each moment wasted. Turning, he left the others and returned to Kalaki, ordering him to follow as he departed for the third and final village in the valley.

He’d only seen this settlement a single time, from his perch at the mouth of the cave in the southern wall of the valley. It was miles upstream at the mouth of the river, towards the western edge of the basin. Perhaps nine or ten miles distant. They would have to pass through the first village again to get there. They could take the route by the necromancer’s hut, but it would add another two miles to their journey, so Vanalath decided against it.

After going down the road for some time, Vanalath realized that he may not have taken the best route. Doubling back over covered territory cost him in time. Why hadn’t he considered this?

If an obstacle or problem was placed before him, he was able to navigate around it, but he apparently had trouble forming any sort of long-term plan. His thought processes slowed as he tried and he couldn’t hold a coherent picture in his mind. He felt this sluggishness especially when he was trying to imagine hypotheticals. It bothered him. Hunters were coming, but he didn’t know how strong they were or how many there were. Worse than that, he wanted to ready himself, but he didn’t know how. Hunters… they were people who roamed the wilderness in search of prey, right? How would people like that launch an attack?

…

He didn’t know. His frustration built as he grew increasingly aware of this mental block. It hadn’t bothered him to this extent before, but following his evolution and then his recent choice of paths, he was beginning to realize his weaknesses with a far greater clarity than before.

Drawing his blade, he began a simple set of exercises while walking. After a minute, he realized that he was drawing too heavily on his already depleted energy reserves, and he put the sword away, irritated at himself. The last fight had taken too much out of him.

That fight. It had been the most difficult fight that Vanalath could remember—and he’d nearly lost. If he hadn’t seen Kalaki, he might not have switched strategies in time and been overwhelmed.

He pictured the conflict as they walked. All his movements, and those of his enemies, remained clear to him despite the time that had elapsed since then. The enemy ghouls had been remarkably straightforward in their intentions, which let Vanalath dodge or counter most of their attacks. As he reviewed each altercation, with a heavier focus on the times when he received an injury, he began to notice a trend.

Almost every time he received a blow had been when he was focused on something else. He’d fixated on a foe in front of him, and an attack from behind sent him reeling. He’d been dodging one strike and landing directly in the path of another. Events such as that played out many times over the course of the battle.

He didn’t have eyes in the back of his head, but surely he could do better. Kalaki had overcome this problem by ensuring his enemies were all in front of him where he could see them. By retreating constantly, coupled with the length of his weapon, he’d managed his position relative to his attackers. This was a viable strategy for the old ghoul, but Vanalath couldn’t replicate that with his shorter weapon. He had to be much closer to his enemies, which would inevitably open him up to attacks. The sword had more flexibility, but vulnerability was the price he paid.

How to fix it? Armor? He didn’t have any. Rather than trying to correct something so deeply rooted with a simple solution, he played the fight on repeat in his mind, looking at each instance of failure—and even some instances of success—and thought about how he could have avoided or improved upon them.

For a creature that couldn’t even imagine how a hunter might approach him, Vanalath’s memory of this skirmish was frighteningly clear. For the next two hours, as the sky deepened into night, he played through the fight dozens of times in the mirror of his mind. As the final village came into view, he hadn’t escaped from the imagined battle completely uninjured, but he lessened his imagined injuries by half. His energy expenditure, which he now knew most of which had been put towards wasteful movements, was reduced by over a third. If he had to repeat a similar fight, he sensed that he’d be in a much better position.

[Skill increased]: <Conceptualization> (Lv.0) -> (Lv.1)

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