All four of them were frozen, staring at the new monstrosity that had nded on the roof.

  The Shackled King was struggling to untaself from the mass r and its Mischiefs, but it would be free very soon. Even in the chaos the group could feel the aura of fear it exuded. Their budding Talents were tering it to aend, but it was not enough. The fear was seeping into their bones.

  And the presence of the new abomination did not help.

  The bck butterfly exuded dark mist like all Nilgrim, the swirling haze making the haunting visage of a silently howling human face—mirrored on both wings—even more terrifying. Its antewitched as it searched for prey, while its milky-white, human torso-sized eyes stared emotionlessly at everyone in the hall.

  Power and malice exuded from the massive Nilgrim, making the hair on Erik’s arms stand on end.

  “What in the name of the Exalted is that?” the red-haired baboon excimed.

  "Shoot it!" The noble s shouted.

  The archer snapped out of his stupor a an arrow fly. It struck true, slippiween the creature’s long iile metal scales. Surprisingly, the arrow pierced the butterfly’s body with little resistance, and a torrent of blue blood rained down, dreng one of the Mischiefs below.

  The butterfly let out a high-pitched screed took off into the air, but not before scattering rge bck dust fkes from its wings into the grand hall.

  The Undead did not seem affected by it, but most of the Mischiefs colpsed after a few motes nded on them. Only the one covered in the blue blood appeared ued. Even the Shackled King looked less eic, but the rge Nilgrim was a Horror. It would not go down that easily.

  The group were not directly hit by the dust, only a few fkes reached them. However, even that little bit was enough.

  Erik immediately felt drowsy, as if he hadn't slept in days.

  It has an Ability to put others to sleep!

  They all fell to their knees, on the verge of falling asleep.

  Then the noble s cut his forearm with his spear, and stood up with a struggle. The others seeing what he did, imitated it, and Erik felt the pain push some of the drowsiness away.

  "Move!" Yaren shouted.

  They all made a dash for the hole made by the Shackled King, doing their best to avoid the bck dust.

  The Draugr were retively slow and attacked everything in sight. They could afford to ighe few stragglers in their path, as the Undead were weak on their own.

  The only thing in their way was the Mischief that was covered in blood, which seemed torween attag them and c in fear from the abomination above the castle. Then the Shackled Ki out a roar, quickly dispelling its hesitation.

  It charged towards them.

  Thankfully the archer was ready a an arrow fly hitting it right in the eye. It was not dead, but wounded.

  It reeled bad swiped blindly with its cws. Unfortunately, Erik was the one closest oo it, and the moore a wound on his upper right thigh. The gash wasn't too deep, but hurt a lot.

  The noble jumped forward and stabbed it in the shoulder, pushing it back.

  But the Nilgrim twisted its body, getting ready to strike back with its tail when Erik shouted, "get down!"

  The noise distracted the abomination for a moment and the noble s dove to the ground as the tail whipped above him.

  Luckily for the group, a few Undead attacked it as well. This preoccupied the creature long enough for them to flee through the opening with the noble s and the archer leading the way.

  The ruins of the city greeted them outside—and they were theming with Undead. The screeg of Mischiefs echoed from everywhere as well.

  The pce where they exited was at the north-eastern side of the pza that surrouhe castle. There were two main roads from here. Straight ahead was one going north and out of the city, and to their right was anoing towards the ke.

  They all dashed on the northern road and Erik beginning to hope that he might actually survived this.

  He had barely taken a few steps when the noble looked back towards him, and then threw a gowards the red-haired baboon.

  In the moment, Erik felt the butt of an axe sm into the wound on his thigh, making him scream and trip, falling to the ground.

  “Someone has to stay and hold them off! Thank you for your sacrifice!” the bastard shouted, ughing as he ran.

  Erik gritted his teeth, poi him, and shouted back, "Hold him down!"

  The brute threw him a quizzical look—but he should have paid more attention to his surroundings. At that moment, one of the skeletons lying motionless in the dirt sprang to life and lunged for his legs, tag him to the ground.

  Not only that, but its skeletal fingers dug into the wound on his leg, making him shriek.

  What the others didn’t know was that Erik’s earlier shouts weren’t meant for them—but for his minion. And it had performed eveer than he had expected. Pg itself exactly on their path of escape.

  Amid the chaos, he realized he could feel a e to it, always aware of its locatioe the otion. He only o focus slightly on that link to ehe Draugr obeyed his ands.

  He had just a heartbeat to grin, relishing the sight of the wide-eyed, struggling vermin on the ground before he, too, had to run. But he hadn’t even moved when another obstacle appeared.

  The other two had advanced ahead, barely sparing a gnce back. They did not really having much choice, but to leave their panion behind.

  The road north was filling with more Undead, and another Mischief barged onto it, emergiweewo who had pulled ahead and Erik and the red-haired baboon.

  Cut off from the his escape route north he was about to look around when a deafening roar came from the grand hall, drowning all other noises.

  Without thinking about it, Erik dove behind one of the ns that lihe outside of the castle.

  A heartbeat ter, the Shackled King burst through the gaping hole, its wrath shaking the castle walls.

  Thankfully, it passed by Erik without notig him, a straight for the red-haired bastard that was still struggling to extricate himself from the Undead.

  He didn't wait to see what would happen to him and frantically looked around for another way out of this situation.

  The grand hall was choke full of Undead now, while the west side of the pza had a horde r, and multiple Mischiefs fighting each other, and all heading for the north road.

  In the sky, the rge butterfly was h above the castle sending more bck dust down. Its blood had created blue puddles everywhere, even filled up the small fountain iy square. That however, had not slowed it down at all. It was tent to try, and put its preys to sleep before ing them. Although not a direct threat for the moment, he still o be careful of the bck fkes.

  Then his gaze turo the road leading to the ke, and after a moment his eyes widened.

  He hadn't seen it earlier during the otion, but now caught sight of it. There was a small wooden harbor that artially submerged at the shore of the ke.

  Not wasting any time Erik made a run for it.

  He threw a gnce over his shoulder, and actually got a better look at the Shackled King. It was almost identical to the other Mischiefs, but several times their size. Like its minions it wore massive shackles, but it also had a massive scar across its entire right side. Spreading to even its front and back legs.

  He now noticed that it was actually limping. Whatever had caused that scar had left it somewhat crippled.

  That said, he had no delusions and khat even if all of them had faced it, they would have died.

  The monstrosity leaped at the red-haired baboon, who had just mao rise, and tore his right arm off.

  A throat-wreng scream ripped from his lungs, but somehow, he still mao swing his other arm, his red-glowing axe cleaving into the Nilgrim’s fro leg. Bck blood spttered everywhere, and the strike wrenched ah-shaking roar from the creature, making it stumble back as well.

  However, that was it for the brute. He couldn't rea time as two Mischiefs came up from behind him, oing into his leg, while the other into his one remaining arm, immobilizing him.

  Then the Shackled King jump onto of him and ripped his head off. A fountain of blood erupted from the corpse, bathing the monsters in a red shower.

  They all gave off ravenous howls after their kill, and started dev the carcass.

  Erik redoubled his efforts running away, not wanting to meet the same fate.

  Thankfully, the road leading towards the ke was retively empty. There was only a few scattered Undead on it, easy to avoid.

  Luck was on his side as the Horror, and its minions did not pursue him, and instead seem to head on north.

  The howls, and screeches grew distant as he he harbor. To his relief, he saw a small fishing boat still floating on the ke, tied to one of the wooden poles.

  Grinning, he ran faster—he was going to make it.

  But he had let his guard down too soon.

  At that moment a Mischief burst out from one of the alleyways ahead of Erik, standiween him and the salvation.

  With a groan he halted in pce as the abomination saw him and dashed in his dire.

  Looking around he saw that a few yards away from him there was a skeleton on the ground. It was missing its left leg and arm, and part of the skull. For some reason it had not turned into a wild Undead.

  He quickly went towards it and used his Ability, praying that it would work.

  In a heartbeat, teal sparks appeared in its eye sockets.

  Yes!

  Then Erik felt lightheaded. Though this time he wasn't sure if was due to blood loss or essence depletion. Still, he pushed through.

  "Hold this," he said, and gave the Undead his hatched.

  He grabbed a thick wooden pole from the debris of a colpsed house and hurried back to his minion. Wedging one end against the ground with his foot, he ahe other toward the approag Nilgrim.

  It did not slow down as it came closer, directly jumping on him, trying to bite his face. That however, allowed him to skewer it on the wooden pole, and then sm it into the dirt o his minion, pinning it as best as he could.

  "Kill it!" he shouted.

  His Undead immediately moved and started hag away at the struggling Nilgrim. It left several deep wounds, and mao sever one of its legs before the creature broke the wooden pole, throwing Erik on his bad leaving him with a short stake.

  It did not stop or pay further attention to his minion. Limping, it went straight for him.

  His injuries were slowing him down, leaving him uo rea time. Just as he was about to take a fatal blow, a rge shadow loomed over them. It was followed by rge bck dust fkes that fell on the Nilgrim and Erik.

  The monster lost its momentum, and only left a ceration on his right shoulder. Using this opportunity he stabbed the wooden stake right through its remaining front leg—crippling the creature pletely.

  He looked up and saw that the massive butterfly was above them, spreading bck dust everywhere. This abomination had decided to go after him instead of the others.

  "Shit!"

  He got up with a groan and grabbed his hatched before stumbling towards the boat. Bck motes were falling everywhere, and more and more were nding on him. The pain was no longer able to stave off the Ability of the Nilgrim. Between the fkes, exhaustion, and his injuries, his vision was starting to blur.

  Struggling to stay scious he reached the boat and u, then pushed it off and climbed inside.

  It slowly drifted off away from the harbor, and inwards on the calm ke.

  Through his blurred vision, he saw that the butterfly only gave off inhuman screeches, but did not follow him. Instead it flew off towards the northern part of the city.

  Erik colpsed on the floor of the small fishing boat as it drifted off.

  Finally he was safe.