My Necromancer Class

Chapter 320 Shifting Wounds

Jay sent Sweeper and Red's two guardian skeletons further back so they could keep the lights away while he waited for Dark and Lamp to investigate. He would need to stop for a while to use the host skill on Dark, so it was necessary to keep them back.

Asra was still in pain, unable to walk as her leg wouldn't heal. In Blue's arms, she had locked her eyes shut, focusing on breathing steadily.

Dark and Lamp bolted through the fog, creating whispers in the swamp grasses as they rushed past, and it wasn't long before they made it to the area that Lamp had avoided.

Jay and Asra only walked a little further along the cliff before Red tapped Jay's shoulder and nodded, giving the signal that Dark was in position.

Jay released a loose pile of bones from his gauntlet sat down, not wanting to get wet, dirty clothes from the damp, muddy ground. He was glad he received no death notifications of his undead as he thought of Dark and activated his host skill.

"Alright, now I'll see what Lamp was avoiding…"

He leaned back on his pile of bones and closed his eyes as the world turned black and white.

His dark green eyes glanced at his skeletal hands holding twin daggers. The marsh grasses seemed higher, but it was just because Dark's body was shorter.

The grasses it hid behind were on the edge of a large black swamp filled with stagnant water, silently bubbling away as whatever lurked in the depths slowly rotted.

Some of the dead, limbless, ashen-gray trees were defiantly standing in the water, but even they were not free from the putrid decay slowly creeping up their trunks.

In the middle of this small black lake was a large mound, sticking out like a tiny island or a giant's stepping stone.

And this was when Jay found what the skeletons were avoiding.

An ancient log cabin., Its main beams impossibly remained standing even while its walls were rotted and filled with holes, and it was through these holes that Jay saw another human.

"Ah, so they were avoiding a human… I suppose that's not really necessary anymore, but they could have a communication crystal. Hmm…" he wondered, gazing at them through the eyes of Dark.

They had dirty skin stained from the swamp. Tangled, wiry hair ran down their back in clumps. If not for the tattered dress, it was hard to tell it was a woman and not some sort of troll. She was fat, with a large hunched back and broad shoulders, almost looking like a boulder in a dress. This swamp woman seemed at home here, among the decay and slithering creatures lurking around.

As she meandered around the outside of her decaying cabin, she stopped by the edge of the black waters and pulled up fraying rope from the ground, which traveled into the swamp waters. As she hauled it out, green and black bits of weeds and slime clung to it, and soon, she had her prize. A small cage emerged.

Jay wondered what the cage could be made from, to survive this rotting swamp. It looked like wood, but as she touched it, it seemed to be covered in a sort of fur, or scales of some kind.

"… Leaves?" he wondered, squinting. He noticed some of these scaly leaves also forming part of her crumbling house.

Inside the cage, a few different creatures wiggled around. A shell-rat, a snake reed, and one of those leeches that Jay had been avoiding.

She first pulled the snake reed out and looked a little disappointed, as it was nothing but a squirming plant creature. While it was carnivorous, its body was only fit for a plant eater.

Next, she took out the shell-rat. While it was shaped like a rat, a tough brown shell, an exo-skeleton, covered its body. It had thick stocky limbs and its mouth was more like a grinding hole of a crab than a set of animal jaws, while its bug-like eyes pointed forwards rather than being on the sides of its head. It had a pincer at the end of its centipede-like tail, and with no expression, she cracked its tail pincer off and threw it back into the cage.

She waved her fingers slightly. Jay didn't miss the small action as some leaves shuffled around and bound the pincer to the side of the cage, sticking the new piece of bait in place.

"Leaves." He thought, finding out she had some control over them. He found her form of mana craft, seeing her use a sort of nature-based magic.

"But how strong can her powers be? And why does it seem like these fog lights fear her? Surely they could burn up these leaves and slay her."

Next, she took out the leech, but before it could sink its spiny teeth into her, she covered it with a sheet of leaves, trapping it inside.

After tossing the trap back into the black waters, she took her two wriggling meals inside.

Jay ended the host skill.

He jumped off his bed of bones and added them back to his gauntlet, happy that none of the wet ground could hope to touch his clothes.

"She doesn't seem like the type of person to be carrying a communication crystal… actually, she doesn't even seem like she can communicate, but I'm just making assumptions. It's probably better not to risk it."

He got their party moving again, along the edge of the cliff.

Jay doubted she could see through the fog better than his skeletons, but he moved as quietly as he could.

No more fire balls or blasts assaulted him or his skeletons, and he guessed the harassing lights were too frightened of this woman to get any closer. Even the five sub-skeletons he sent back were not finding any enemies.

"Just what would someone be doing out here that isn't diabolical…" he thought, "And not to mention the whispering voices of children."

Jay and the skeletons walked until the deep body of water stopped them from going further. It stretched all the way from the cliff to where Dark and Lamp were hiding.

"I could just make a bridge of bones and get past," Jay thought, gazing over the swamp, tempting himself with an easy escape.

But Jay glanced at Asra. She was still in pain from her unhealing leg. With no enemies chasing them, he waited a moment. Other than the gentle bubbles of swamp gas, it was silent. Peacefully silent.

He stood closer to her and whispered, "Asra, we have some time. Let me cut away the flesh that won't heal. There's no other way." Jay said.

While he sympathized a little with her pain, he wanted to set Blue free from carrying her.

Asra nodded back, frowning.

Jay made another pile of bones for her to lie down on.

"Hopefully this works." He thought.

Jay took out his old coat for her to bite down on and slowly removed her leather boot, rolling up her black pants.

"I'll be fast."

Asra nodded, putting part of his coat in her mouth as she grabbed his leg, and Jay felt her hand turn to claws as she got ready to drain some of his blood.

"Do it." She muffled through the coat.

Jay started by cutting around the scorched area, going to the bone. He then pulled her burned flesh back and cut away under it, using his knowledge of butchering to expertly remove the tainted flesh without damaging Asra further.

While many would shy away from surgery, he felt nothing as his blade moved across her pristine, pale skin. Perhaps because of being a butcher, or perhaps because of his necromancer class. He wasn't sure. But he didn't care either.

Asra's wound didn't bleed as much as Jay expected, and healed much faster than he himself did. He attributed it to her vampire race. But she was not immune to pain.

She had clutched his leg tight from the pain as he cut away, but after he stopped cutting, she began releasing it slowly, feeling like she could breathe normally again.

The wound healed fast… but Jay found a problem. The operation was not as successful as he thought it was.

Instead of healing back to normal, it healed back with the charred burn marks on it, which started causing her pain again.

"What the fuck…"

His eyes widened in horror as he watched her own skin grow back into blackened, charred flesh.

"Something's wrong. Very wrong…" he thought, trying not to look shocked and alarm her.

"Bob, it still hurts." Asra said, as she looked down.

As she saw her leg, and for a moment she looked as hopeless as she was shocked, and scrunched her eyebrows.

Jay glanced at the piece of flesh he had cut away, still holding it in his hand. The burn marks had gone, but they had not disappeared. They simply moved.

It was like they jumped from the piece of flesh he cut off and transferred back onto her leg.

"What kind of twisted magic is this… the mana crafter who made this should be hunted instead of me." He thought, still looking in disbelief. The flesh he had cut out seemed to be unharmed and pristine.

Of course, he tossed it away. Cannibalism disgusted him, especially after seeing the tribe of them in the savage lands.

"I wonder if swamp woman made this disgusting mana craft?" he scratched his chin, looking toward her swamp island.

"Ah… maybe not. This was from a fireball of the lights, and it seems like the lights don't serve her, but fear her, so perhaps she doesn't control them."

Something about it made him wonder, though. How could these lights which could cause such heinous wounds fear this leaf-wielding woman?

Asra closed her eyes and leaned her head back, trying to get used to the pain once more. Jay couldn't tell what she was thinking, but he didn't want to ask.

He had Blue carry her again and got the skeletons moving, but this time, he headed towards Dark and Lamp, who were still hiding in swamp reeds and grasses, observing that woman through the fog on the swamp island.

"Don't worry Asra, there's another way." Jay whispered, trying to sound like he wasn't lying.

Yet as he walked, he realized that talking to the swamp woman would not be so simple.

"Hmm… how do I make contact without alarming her… she probably wouldn't know I'm a necromancer, but I need the skeletons for protection. If she's hostile and high level, she could probably kill me on the spot, so I need my bodyguards."

"Dammit… how should I get to her without causing a fight and having to execute her? I need her help after all." he glanced at Asra's charred leg, pursing his lips.