142 Chapter V: Death Unrelenting
As the trio of Masters entered the fort, the stagnant air of Alftand shifted ever so slightly, drawing the attention of the many Falmer skulking in its halls. They had lost an entire scouting party some days prior and were on high alert for any intruders.
And so the moment that the disparate groups of hunched over elves felt fresh air they took their positions, traps were set, arrows poisoned and ambush points filled to the brim with eager warriors ready to defend their homes.
And yet minutes passed without them feeling a thing, even with their sight ruined beyond repair the senses of the Falmer were as sharp as any blade and many a goblinoid elf felt confused at the lack of enemies. That is until an object levitating in the air sent a shiver of dread down every one of their spines, they all felt as one... death had come.
Phineas floated lazily while the twin embers in his eye sockets scanned the ever-growing force waiting for him, his posture was completely relaxed as he summoned an elegant staff and turned to address his entourage.
The three Dunmer houseguards barely held back flinches while their superiors were less shaken by the hovering lich focusing on them, Reyvin was naturally unmoved by the familiar sight and even waved childishly.
"My preparations are finished Master Reyvin" The lich intones in his usual dry monotone "Kindly burn all the bodies that fall behind, I would rather not deal with the mortals whining."
Reyvin shrugs, ignoring the quiet disgusted scoffs of his guardsmen "Of course, Master Gestor. Do enjoy your walk." He quips cheerfully and signals his followers to back off, soon following after them himself.
Phineas took a deep breath, or well he pretended to at least. Even so many years after he sacrificed his fleshy body he still forced some mortal habits onto himself. Master Tolfdir said something about keeping himself grounded and whatnot but five decades later Phineas could hardly remember such a conversation and did it simply out of habit.
The air seemed to tense in anticipation as his right hand moved in a grasping motion, his movements were staggered and unnatural, his body but a marionette controlled on strings of essence by his soul.
A nearby Falmer warrior, a tall and well-muscled specimen of his kind, suddenly had his very life force yanked out of his body, falling over lifelessly. None of his fellows knew what happened and a couple started kicking him awake, grunting in their primitive language.
One moment another light kick was about to land on his back when suddenly the one doing the kicking felt a lack of weight, that lack of weight turned into agony as the downed Falmer ripped off the offending limb as he rose from the ground, his pale skin turning even more deathly pallid as the sharp nails the Falmer usually sported were extended into bony instruments of death.
And then the screaming started.
Like a wave of death, once started it could not be stopped. One after another fell to an animated corpse of their until then brother in arms, soon raising up as mere puppets.
The reanimated creatures tossed aside the usable corpses while cannibalizing those too damaged to reanimate. As they consumed their brethren their strength grew as bony armor covered their lanky forms, their claws emitting a cursed miasma and their scabbed eye sockets bursting apart, unveiling twin ghostly flames that now occupied them.
Soon dozens upon dozens of ghouls stood at attention before the satisfied lich, his skull contorted into the facsimile of a grin as his hands rapidly scribbled down notes as he muttered to himself about performance and theoretical improvements, completely ignoring the scene of massacre in front of him.
As much as he was curious, Phineas was not stupid enough to give his enemies further time to prepare so moments later he closed the tome and once more swung out his hands, his fingers moving like a conductor leading an orchestra as complex spellwork fell upon his creations.
As his new toys reached further into the old fortification the screaming began once more. The Falmer were slow, idiotic even, Phineas posed, but they were very much sapient of that there was no doubt. So when a wave of their own started ripping them apart, gorging themselves on their brethren it was natural for a wave of panic to spread.
The Falmer started retreating, leading the undead into traps and bringing no small amount of annoyance to Phineas, who was by now consuming white soul gems to keep his reserves topped up. The feedback loop of draining Magicka from lifeforce could only keep him going for a while with the ever-increasing toll his growing army imposed.
Soon his forces started taking casualties, easily replaced of course but when the damned elflings lured them toward still functioning Dwemer automata Phineas was most irritated. Still, he made sure that his puppets did as little damage as possible while disabling the old machines, waste not want not, and all that.
His new necklace was rather handy, and he wouldn't mind preserving some gifts for his new colleague and getting some more of such wonderous artifacts in return.
Dozens soon turned into a hundred, and the hundred into hundreds as his wave of death and flesh rushed over the remaining forces that were failing miserably at killing him. He knew this was not even close to what the Falmer had to offer but flushing out an entire Dwemer fort on his own while the mortals trudged behind was good enough in his books.
(Reyvin's POV)
I burn yet another mound of discarded flesh as we follow behind the lich, the adventurers far behind us facing whatever stragglers were left behind.
"Ugh" Marren twitches in disgust "My Lord, must we truly work with such a creature?"
Nearby Minthara was patting a 'dead inside' looking Marco on the back while looking a bit green herself.
I shrug and move forward "As long as he uses only our enemies to fuel his magic, think of it as simply burning them to death."
"How very pragmatic" I can hear the eye roll in Minthara's voice.
I nod sagely "I am nothing if not wise and pragmatic, you know this."
We continue with our banter, desperately trying to forget the gruesome sights waiting for us, as we follow behind Phineas' wave of destruction. Soon we hear the sounds of battle and everyone tenses up.
Walking through a door we come face to face with a walled Falmer settlement under attack by waves of massive misshapen ghouls. Phineas levitated lazily, overlooking the battle and taking notes, probably already getting ideas to optimize his servants.
"A productive day indeed, Master Gestor" I quip.
He turns his head in my direction, without moving his torso at all, and nods "Indeed Master Reyvin, the filthy things are barely useful for more than fodder but I worked some kinks out." The embers in his eye sockets brighten up "Did you know that Falmer flesh is at least a fifth better for conducting necrotic Magicka than a Nord's?" He asks excitedly.
"I am afraid I must admit my ignorance." I say slowly as I watch a group of half-frozen ghouls rip apart a shrieking shaman "Oh and Phineas" I add "My thanks for the gift." I incline my head.
He looks up from his tome again "Oh, it is no issue of course, I would make little use of such machines myself so I thought it wiser to gift them to you."
I hold back an eye roll "Most gracious of you, but I feel that I cannot take such a gesture without recompense, do expect a return gift after we are back in Winterhold" I say in an overly polite tone. I already knew what he wanted, and honestly getting me some functional specimens of spheres and spiders was good enough as any other payment.
He waves me off and nods absent-mindedly while annoyedly muttering something about overloading leg muscles causing said limb to explode into shrapnel killing everything in a five-metre radius.
After an hour more of screaming and growling the encampment/town turns silent and Phineas suddenly straightens up "It appears I am finished here." He says plainly.
"The Falmer have been eliminated?" I ask, my impression of the necromancer's power increasing exponentially.
"Indeed" He drawls "I have dealt with the fleshy enemies that await us, you will disable the golems guarding the way forward." I feel a wave of magic as he cuts off the connection with his minions and they start rapidly cannibalizing each other.
I shake my head and snap my finger, sending Scorch flying out and mentally telling him to remove the undead.
"An impressive soul-shard" Phineas nods proudly, his glamor once more hiding his bones.
"Well, you did tell us to take good care of our familiars, I just took it to its natural conclusion" I say with equal pride.
He scoffs "You are a fool if you think this is anything near a conclusion to the possibilities of a familiar."
I roll my eyes "There is no end to possibilities when magic is in play, we all know this." He nods and after a moment of silence I ask "What about your familiar Gestor?"
The lich stiffens for a second before sighing "Lichdom is a great power, and a costly one..." He trails off.
"Then why pursue it? There are other ways to prolong your life." I posit.
He cackles, just a tiny bit of emotion in his voice "Easy for an elf to say" He shakes his head "I appreciate the input but I was sick and out of options, so I grasped what I had on hand and pursued undeath."
I notice some uncomfortable shifting among my followers but most of them have a tinge of pity in their eyes as they hear this.
Soon a solar explosion spreads through the settlement and I start walking inside with purpose in my steps. Phineas mutters something along the lines of 'Bloody ridiculous' before he follows suit.
The settlement looks like a complete bloodbath, with limbs strewn everywhere and not a living thing in sight. I immediately get to work clearing it out, better to make sure none of the adventurers got any ideas, or worse they started a riot.
An hour later I was enjoying some mead and chatting with Minthara while the rest were busy searching for loot "So, how do you find the adventurer life?" I smirk.
She rolls her eyes "I think I preferred the slums" She looks up and shivers "At least I could see the sun."
I wave her off "Bah, no sense of adventure." I raise a hand and gesticulate excitedly "We are getting into Blackreach Minthara, Blackreach!"
She nods at me like I was an idiot "That is neat Reyvin, and I understand that your toys are fun but some of us prefer the wind on our skin instead of the smell of burned elf."
I shiver "Please don't call those things elves so casually."
"Aren't they just poor victims?" She asks 'innocently', referring to the tome I had her read on them before we descended.
"Yeah," I nod "Victims of Nords and Dwemer."
That shuts her up.
I feel an aura near us and slowly get up, moments later Minthara lets out a shriek as Tolfdir emerges from the ground with his usual grandfatherly smile.
"Why would you do that?!" She hisses.
Completely unmoved by her tone Tolfdir scratches his beard "Do forgive this old man, I got a bit lost and decided to follow your auras."
"He wanted to fuck with us" I translate helpfully.
Tolfdir gives me a pointed look "Language young man."
I nod "Excuse me Master Tolfdir, it has been a stressful day."
"I have no doubt of that, Phineas' work can be... overwhelming to observe" He admits easily, completely ignoring the fuming young woman giving him a death-stare.
We continue chatting for a while, Tolfdir talking about what the rest encountered while we were on clean-up duty. The old man even summoned all the automata he found on the way, including the ones Phineas saved.
I spent the next ten minutes convincing him to accept some kind of compensation, we settled on a nice ever-warm blanket for his great-great-great-granddaughter. Truly, the old man was like a cooler Dumbledore sometimes.
Soon the adventurers started filtering in, and I got to work on disabling the defenses leading up to the lift that if memory served led straight to Blackreach.
The first few were rather easy to deal with, shadow-walk behind ballista, remove bolts, profit. Some automata had to be smashed apart as I had no way to disable them easily, much to my dismay but after some half an hour of minesweeper-esque work I finally reached the summit of whatever the Falmer tribe was guarding.
And just as I remembered, there stood the elevator... and six massive centurions.
Very functioning, very active massive centurions...
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Spooky scary skeletons
Here to take your stones
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