ONLY a few horses were recovered by purifying the two Boneless Hams. The troops can move only so fast without steeds, which means we still haven’t arrived at our destination after two straight hours of marching. Exhaustion is showing on the soldiers’ faces.
“I feel bad for taking one of the horses.” I’m riding Vianta in front of Lex. Aside from my butt and thighs hurting from bouncing up and down, I’m experiencing little fatigue.
“We don’t know what is lying in wait for us. You are helping us by saving your energy now, Lady Mizuha.”
“I know, but I still feel bad.” It bothers me to be one of the few who can take it easy on the hard trek to our destination.
“Sit with your head held high because you deserve to take a load off during this part,” Pino advises. He’s in the same position as me on Sir Oden’s horse. The difference in size makes them look like father and son.
Sir Oden has his horse trot beside Vianta. “Master Pino is right. You are an exalted person in Grantz Kingdom, Lady Mizuha. No one will complain about you riding in comfort before going into battle.”
“My goddess is the Goddess!” a loud voice bellows behind us after Sir Oden’s remark. “You aren’t just the most important person in Grantz, but in the whole wide world! If anyone dares voice a complaint, your servant Iris shall—”
“Iris, can you shut your trap?”
“Yes’m.”
Sir Oden guffaws when he sees Iris wilt. “You’re loved.”
“Doesn’t what she said count as lèse-majesté?”
“I seem to be hard of hearing lately.” The corners of Sir Oden’s lips curl up. Looks like he’s going to overlook what Iris said. I’m relieved. As insane as she is, Iris is still someone who idolizes me. I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night if she were arrested.
We enter the forest a short while later. Sunlight is blocked by a canopy of branches and leaves, dimming the surrounding area into a gloomy darkness. The area extending ahead of us is so dark there’s almost zero visibility. The thing is, this is no ordinary darkness. I’ve seen it plenty of times to know—it’s the black fog.
“I’ve never seen it this thick before.”
Fear and unrest courses through the soldiers. I can’t shake the bad feeling I have either. This fog is clearly different from the other black fog. Suddenly, a bird the size of a human head lands on a nearby dead tree. Rot oozes from its zombified body. After intensely staring at us with red glowing eyes, it flies into the black fog.
Just as I’m thinking how creepy that was, something human-shaped steps out of the black fog. It has four limbs and walks on two legs. Human it may appear, but human it is not. The body appears to be formed from rotten clay. But now’s not the time to be focusing my attention on figuring out what makes up that thing’s body.
“H-How freakin’ many of them are there?!”
Around fifty clay zombie dolls are trudging our way from the black fog.
“Lex, protect Lady Mizuha!” Sir Oden’s voice becomes the battle signal. Knights and soldiers intercept the clay dolls with their shields.
“AGHHHHHHHH!” one of the soldiers screams. He rapidly begins rotting from the spot on his arm where the clay doll he was fighting touched him. Zombies are going to propagate from our own men if we don’t do something fast.
“Lex!”
“You’ve got it, m’lady!”
Lex navigates Vianta closer to the soldiers for me to touch the rotting men and clay zombie dolls. Soldiers regain their humanity, while the clay dolls crumble into a pile on the ground. Looks like the clay zombies can be purified by my power just like normal zombies. I take a whiff of my hand to be sure.
“Yuck! It reeks to high heaven!”
“Their appearance and base material is different, but it appears they are zombies just the same,” Lex infers, then shouts orders to the troops. “Listen up, men! These clay dolls work the same way as zombies! Whatever you do, don’t touch or be touched!”
Our enemies lack fine motor agility. They don’t pose much of a threat as long as the troops are careful. I purify the clay zombies knocked down and immobilized by the soldiers. Their numbers took me by surprise at first, but we’re down to ten by the time it occurs to me to count again.
“I think we can handle this.” I’m taking a short break to wipe the sweat from my brow, when new clay zombies appear from the black fog. And if that wasn’t bad enough, it’s around the same number as the first time, if not more. My right cheek spasms. “…I hope we can handle this.”
Thereafter, I purify dozens after dozens of zombies without flinching. Problem is, even after I decrease their numbers, more are ejected from the black fog, resulting in their numbers never diminishing. When even more clay zombies pop out, Lex groans in frustration.
“Grah! More?!”
“I can keep going!”
“Yes, but at this rate there will be no end…!”
My stamina definitely won’t keep up if I have to take on a never-ending army of clay zombies. We need to come up with a strategy to break the deadlock. Not that I’m suddenly struck by any such genius idea when I need it. All I can do is survey our surroundings and reconfirm our situation. Meanwhile, another batch of clay zombies is popped out by the black fog.
“I wonder if the zombies will stop showing up if we get rid of that blasted fog.”
“It’s worth trying,” Lex says, responding to my muttered idea.
“But how?”
“By using your powers, of course, Lady Mizuha.”
“Right, that’s how it’s always gotta be, isn’t it?”
I knew it. I knew it was going to come to that before he even said it.
“The main problem is how do we make it to where you can touch the fog—”
“Then you have no problem! I shall cut open a path for you!” Sir Oden’s thundering voice suddenly cuts into our conversation from where he’s fighting nearby. He apparently overheard. He thrusts away the clay zombies he was taking on and holds his shield out in the direction of the black fog.
“Captain of Grantz Kingdom’s Royal Knights, Oden Jaxor, hereby charges!” Sir Oden propels forward while howling, driving his shield through the clay zombies in his way and sending them in different directions. Obviously, he isn’t holding back like he does with former-human zombies. A path to the black fog is being opened before my eyes.
“Here we go, Lady Mizuha!”
“I’m ready!”
Lex kicks Vianta into an all-out run. I’d expect no less of a warhorse—we’re rapidly closing the distance to Sir Oden. However, the closer we get, the narrower our path becomes. The repelled clay zombies have staggered their way back.
“Just a little farther! Hurry, Lex!”
Sir Oden has secured us safe passage to the black fog. Vianta advances, narrowly evading the clay hands reaching for her legs, until we finally reach our destination. Then, out of one of our blind spots, a lone zombie lunges.
It’s going to claw Vianta!
My fears leave just as quickly as they came, for Sir Oden charges the zombie with his ginormous shield. He powerfully slams into the clay zombie, knocking it far away.
“GO!”
“Thanks, Sir Oden!”
Vianta gallops past the rest of the clay zombies until Lex reins her in just alongside the black fog.
“Lady Mizuha, now!”
Even before Lex’s call to action, I was stretching my arm out as far as it could go. My fingers brush along the black fog. It feels like nothingness, except exhaustion washes over me like a tidal wave, a reminder that my power has activated. Several seconds later, the black fog unleashes a blinding light, instantly losing all color until it entirely disappears.
Clay zombies crumble where they stand, returning back to the earth from whence they came. Looks like my theory that the black fog was producing an endless supply of clay zombies was on the money.
“It appears we pulled it off.”
“Yeah.” Reveling in my momentary relief, I turn my attention on the place previously hidden by the black fog. An old log cabin stands there all by its lonesome.