Ozen.

Bondrewd was in a state of mild bewilderment. The man looked at the white-skinned humanoid and pondered its fate. The grey corpse-beast struggled a little more, whimpered and soon lost consciousness. The curse was doing its work. 

The man was torn by doubts about what to do: the safest thing to do was to kill the creature and be done with it, but if he looked at it from the other side he would lose a promising ally and a handy tool in one person. There was too little information, intelligence, aggressiveness, tamability - everything was still very much in question. Lord of Dawn had once had close contact with the fauna of all the floors from the first to the fifth, and could remember the habits and characteristics of every creature that inhabited them, but here he had only the basic concepts of taming, communication and training in his hands - and it was not certain that they worked here just as they did in his homeland.

The man turned to the system, perhaps it would provide answers to his questions, especially since Audita had mentioned its reference capabilities.

- The system can provide information on this creature.

- Yes. The subject belongs to the class of magical beasts:

- Corpse-eater species, 

- subspecies albino corpse-eater, commonly known as the pale ghoul. 

- danger class high, scavenger predator. 

- has magical abilities: explosive howl, spatial swing, tailwind, 

- Additional Information: Often, acts as a leader of common corpse-eaters, can use magic to simulate certain fragments of human speech to lure victims, tamability - low, intelligence - above average species.

Bondrewd was eager for more information and approached the corpse of the grey corpse-eater and asked for information on it as well. He was not impressed by what he saw, in theory the corpse-eater was not inferior to the average wolf in its parameters, but the column - valuable parts - attracted the man's attention.

Valuable parts: in this species are valued large fangs, hearts, and parts of the liver, also have an increased value "blood pearls" (formations originating from the undigested parts of the meal, The curse is a curse that is gradually enveloped by a special stomach enzyme for safe regurgitation). 

The decision had to be made quickly, Bondrewd didn't know how long the curse would last, the man went over all the facts in his head one more time and finally decided to take the risk. A potential living battering ram could bring tangible benefits. Quickly finding a rope in the camp, the man dragged the carcass to a tree and tied it to it. The needles from the Shaker had been removed and the wounds bandaged and stitched up, thanks to the first aid kit in the rucksack.

"All that remained was to wait for it to wake up." In the meantime, Bondrewd didn't waste any time and with a knife he began to cut valuable parts out of the defeated bodies. If ripping out fangs was not bad enough, then digging into the stomachs of corpse-eaters was a lot of fun. But the Lord of Dawn was accustomed to such things and stubbornly endured the horrible stench, which was partly saved by his helmet. 

"Here's someone's tibia..."

"This one must be part of a horse's hoof."

"And here we have" The man wiped the bloody mess with a rag. "Here we have a human skull, and judging by its small size, it's clearly a child's."

There was not an ounce of squeamishness or regret in Bondrud's voice, the man was driven solely by scientific interest and a little, just a little, desire to find more valuable trophies.

The result of the work done was quite good. A small pouch, formerly a purse filled with teeth, internal organs he would not take, they took up too much space and deteriorated too quickly, he knew that better than anyone else.

And the most valuable pearls, there were 17 of them, of different shades and sizes, but all of them were blood-red, translucent, the man didn't know whether it was a lot or not. And while he was thinking about it, the tethered monster began to show signs of life.

"Awake at last." The man approached the tree, the monster silently beaming at him with two yellow eyes. The corpse-eater didn't try to get out or use magic, it just stared at him with a dead stare almost unblinking. Bondrewd, a little versed in taming and training, took a piece of bear meat from his pocket and shoved it in the face of the bound predator. 

The beast sniffed a little, and sticking out his long tongue he swallowed the meat a couple of times, and opened his mouth wide and swallowed the dainty; if Bondrewd had been a little less quick, he would have lost a couple of fingers. Taking advantage of the fact that the beast was fully concentrating on the chewing process Lord of Dawn slowly brought his hand to the corpse's withers and began stroking its mane. The beast rumbled approvingly and, having finished his solid piece, began to whimper pitifully.

When he realised that the beast wanted more, Bondrewd took out a second piece of meat and, waving it a little in front of the "pale ghoul's" nose, shoved it straight into the beast's mouth. As he unravelled the ropes, the beast, noticing their fall, stood on four legs and continued chewing. 

"The first contact is established, we must fix it," the man took the last slash of meat and threw it under the feet of the beast, the beast howled happily and pounced on the food, meanwhile Bondrewd in a couple of movements tied a rope to his hand, and the other end fastened on his arm.

'If he wants to escape, he won't get away so easily, but I have enough strength to tug him down.' The man waited silently for the meal to finish, and when it was over he headed away from the camp, he had one more piece of unfinished business. The monster followed him, the rope prevented him from falling far behind, but the beast was in no hurry to attack either.

"Lord of Dawn" Heading towards the oak tree, from his dream, he roughly remembered the route, as suddenly the beast lurched full speed to the side, but thanks to Bondrewd's quick reaction the escape was stopped. The beast clung desperately to the ground, but was unable to overpower Lord of Dawn. 

Bondrewd gave the ghoul a light smack, the beast growled loudly, grinning, and the man showed him the Sparagmos. The ghoul's fighting spirit was blown away, and he continued to whimper softly.

"It's nice to work with smart corpse." Bondrewd said in a voice and went on the same route, it was not long to go. In a couple of minutes they were there.

The oak stood in its place, its size and grandeur emphasised by the slowly passing stars, and the musical composition was supported by crickets. Going round the oak tree, the man found what he was looking for, a layer of grass was missing from one of the roots. Coming closer Bondrewd without delay, began to dig, and let it be, there was no shovel, in Bondrewd's case with his hands even faster. 

A wooden lid emerged from the ground, and a couple of minutes later a small wooden half-rotten box, assembled from planks, stood in front of Bondrewd. The man opened the lid and began to examine the contents: a sealed envelope and two small sacks. 

Unable to hold back his curiosity the Lord of Dawn tore the thin strings and opened the envelope, in it was written.

'Tarus, if you are reading this, it means that our plans have changed a lot, the capital is in complete chaos, the undead have surrounded the city from three sides and refugees are coming from the eastern gate, so we have nothing to catch, especially since the scouts began to attack the dead, our mutual acquaintance Lex and his brothers were passing suckers on the road and bams from the woods they were attacked by 4 Necrovolfs, they were galloping away like horses, they were fast as a bitch, we got away from them only by swimming along the river, and now Lex didn't have a piece of arse, I got carried away, if you need to ask him yourself... Anyway, that's about it.

So it was decided at the meeting to fuck off. The leader ordered us to gather at the reserve point near the capital, from there we'll head south. You will follow the marks from your camp to the capital, 4 hours straight to the big stone, on which is drawn a dick, after it turn left and go to the stream and follow it downstream and go to the reserve camp. And hurry if possible, when the capital is occupied the undead will start scattering around and we'll be fucked. And remember, you owe me five silver, so don't die, you bastard.'

After reading the letter to the end, Bondrewd's mind was spinning with strange thoughts: firstly, the fact that the one who wrote the letter can write is already a supernatural miracle, and secondly, he has to go there, if he can get there before the capital is taken, he will be able to personally observe the army of necromancers at least, and at most he will be able to help in holding the city.

"Lord of Dawn" is torn with curiosity, necromancy - the ability to raise the dead, sounds extremely intriguing. Which meant there was not a moment to lose.

Bondrewd quickly examined the contents of the two pouches, coins of various denominations and cheap jewellery. Or... one ring was noticeably different from the rest of the junk.

Made of gold, framed in a fancy pattern with a large black stone. The man took the ring in his hand and felt cold, a slight chill coming from the ring itself. Bondrud did not put it on, he had too little information about the rules of this world and business was urgent. The man was about to leave, but from the forest four pairs of heads were looking at him.

"What's the matter with you!" The man shouted angrily, though considering the number of corpses, it was not surprising.

Bondrewd wanted to wait for his opponent, but his new pet was clearly against it and, shouting like a slaughterer, rushed into the battle, dragging his master with him.

"Lord of Dawn" did not resist and ran after him. The attackers clearly did not expect to see dinner accompanied by a "pale ghoul" and whimpered and ran away. 

"Well done." Said Bondrewd, scratching the mane ghoul. 

"And who are you," the man glanced under the tail and not finding anything there, assumed that the girl. 

"So you'll be Ozen. – Bondrewd said, stroking the beast's mane and remembering an old acquaintance.