The God Of The Undead - Chapter 52

War is something that never changes, no matter what the cause of it is. Before the first two World Wars, wars were always fought over resources or grudges that always ended in one person’s group of people or an entire country either dying off or living through it only to repeat the cycle again. If one were to look at the initial causes for World War Two*, one would learn that one of the many causes of such a war was their grudges for feeling blamed for the war and being made to pay reparations that just about crippled their country economically. (A/N these weren’t the only reasons I just listed these to add more depth to go along with the main topic of this paragraph. So don’t go barking up my tree about it.)

The cause for this war was rather fundamentally different as it wasn’t over such petty thing as resources or grudges, although one could argue the latter, it was mainly for the inescapable truth that humanity’s time has come to an end. An end that has been has they have eluded long enough but can’t outrun anymore.

Humanity was a broken species that were lower than the insect they so often looked at in disgust, yet wasn’t too far from being fixed in the mind of Joselin as she trailed behind Joseph’s massive body. The very thought of how many different kinds of insects she could attempt to make sent thrills down her back. Although it wasn’t many humans they were hunting, she knew that a few “live” toys were make thing a little interesting before they finally went onward to another world.

As she made it a couple of trees behind Joseph, she witnessed his attempt at attacking the giant wall of light that the human fighters had conjured and continued to sustain and smiled at his failed attempt to break the wall. Although they all had the same objective, they had a strong competitive bond that kept them sane while John slept for three long years. She felt joy in seeing Joseph being slowed in completing his task, although she didn’t know they had two completely different tasks to begin with.

She watched on a she saw Joseph slowly fall into his own shadow and not reemerge elsewhere within her visible sight. She wondered for a moment before seeing realizing one out of many of the undead had just ran past the tree she was currently on. It was then that she finally realized that the main bulk of the undead forces had finally caught up but didn’t presume to join them. Although she was an Undead Insect Queen, she still wasn’t suited for prolonged close-ranged fights as her body was certainly stronger than a human; her evolution into an Insect queen made her true potential flourish when it came to long-range to short-range control and assassination on and off of battlefields. She might not be fully capable of going toe to toe with someone or something equivalent in class or rank when it comes to pure strength. Still, when it comes down to speed, dexterity, and magic, she can fair pretty well in all instances as long as she’s capable of remaining in control of the fight like a queen on a chessboard. One would guess correctly that queens were indeed the most important piece on the board.

As Joselin watched the army of slam into the wall of light that held rather well against the torrent of the undead, she began to notice those who were touching the walls were quickly being burned and lit a flame. Some of the undead that were pushed into the wall quickly burned down ash and cinders almost instantly, while others continued to push relentlessly. Quickly, Joselin’s eager face changed to one of annoyance as she realized that just letting the undead loose and run wild quickly to overrun the wall while the humans stuck to their “Bottle Necking” and “Gaurd and Dwindle” tactics would eventually lead to a loss for her and eventually the sense of disappointment waiting for her if she failed to use the army efficiently.

Without waiting for another second to go by, she quickly sent out an order through her mental link with the undead army to cease the senseless loss of undead as it wouldn’t have benefited her and her goals much, and like a bunch of obedient drones, they stopped and stood still before walking backward while still taking varying damage from the battle-ready humans. Seeing her troops still taking damage didn’t sit right with Joselin, so she immediately gave an order to any and all Paladins to move forward and guard the rest of the undead from any more damage.

The Paladins were a new type of undead that came into existence around the same time as Centipedes through the use of evolution and a little experimenting done by Joselin. They were large two-meter tall undead with whose evolution made them rather muscular and grey. Many features about them were different compared to the regular zombie as they were now completely hairless, their noses had fallen off, leaving them with two large nostril holes on their faces, their mouths were now nothing but rows of fangs that were permanently revealed due to the lack of cheeks and lips. Their most distinguishable features were the clearly visible black bone and keratine long shields that grew out of their left outer forearms and the retractable five and a half foot-long scythe blade in their right outer forearm.

Through rigorous secret testing, so that survivors wouldn’t have had the chance to glimpse the new undead, Paladins were seen as a suitable attack and defense alternative to the usual mindless undead. Still, alas, the zombies capable of the evolution were one in ten thousand. Although they had plenty to spare, it was still a much smarter move to keep them on the back burner until they reached a world with more challenging humans.

As the Paladins took up defensive formations, which were simply two lines shielding holding undead, the humans’ look was pure ecstasy to Joselin. They hadn’t expected variants of this type and caliber, nor did they expect for the undead to behave in such a manner. They had all been told about the mind behind them from the moment they all arrived in Allen’s Bunker, but they didn’t think it would be ready to countermeasures for countermeasures. At this point, they could only hope to be able to continue to stall for time as long as they could since they didn’t have any ideas as to what this new variant was capable of.

Joselin enjoyed seeing them panic slightly, but the real fun was just beginning. She observed the layout of the land from the tallest tree above the tree line behind the ensuring battle and realized the Undead Wolves and Dire Wolves they had brought would be useless as long as the edges of the wall made contact with the artificially carved out rock formations of the mountainside, essentially leaving them trapped with only one escape route leading back into the bunker. It was truly a win-win situation either way, yet only an idiot would have believed that they would have chosen a bunker built into a dead-end excavated portion of a mountain. That’s why “coincidentally” encountering a lone girl outside her bunker of safety came into play, revealing her fellow survivors true escape plan.

Now with the undead cavalry out of the picture, it was time to play her trump card and favorite by far. As she commanded the Paladins to march forward with the army of undead behind them, she sent another command for her spiderlings to proceed to climb the mountain and remain out of sight to remain unseen. It was a simple ambush tactic to aid in her attempt to get past the wall, but almost as soon as she sent her spiderlings to commence an ambush, she felt as if something was different. She felt as if something other than humans and undead were present.

Only if she knew how right she was as a face appeared in the bark of the tree she was perched on.

(A/N: *Not downplaying any wrongs just making a suitable reference while staying historically right as possible.)- read author note.