Chapter 2: First Impressions Matter

The bandits lay dead. The two hellish monsters awaited while their master calmly inspected the devastation.

Holly, already with her ass on the ground, backpedaled furiously. It dirtied her beautiful blue dress, but she didn’t have the presence of mind to deal with that at the moment. A far more pressing question loomed in her mind.

What the hell just happened?

“Y-you…” she said, raising a trembling finger. “You’re a necromancer!”

“I am,” the man replied as if it was the most natural thing in the world. His face was a picture of tranquility.

If he stood by himself, he might have seemed good-natured; naive, even. Now, he was surrounded by corpses, blood, and gore, with two skeletal monsters by his side. Their empty eyes stared through her soul, ready to devour her, or whatever it was that skeletons did to humans.

Her eyes darted to the dead bandits. That’s what skeletons did to humans. She was going to die, that much was certain. Things had just gone from bad to worse. What was a necromancer doing here? And why did he seem so damn cheerful?!

Holly was no hero. She was just a terrified village girl. She didn’t want to die. Her hands clasped the stalk of wood nettle hanging from her chest, hoping it would protect her, as the mayor said.

“Please don’t kill me,” she muttered, trembling to her soul.

“Sure,” replied the humanoid incarnation of evil. “Why would I?”

“Why?” Holly gawked. This was so ridiculous that her tongue moved by itself. “Because you’re evil!”

He blinked innocently, then smiled. “No, I’m not.”

“But you’re a necromancer!”

“Not all necromancers are evil.” The devil smiled again, pointing at himself. “Like me!”

Holly’s panicked mind screamed at her to stall. Maybe Murdock or her father would arrive in time. “What about them?” she asked, pointing at the two skeletal monsters. “These boney abominations!”

The boar-looking thing snorted, cold air escaping its nostrils, and Holly shrieked as she crawled backward again. Her back hit another tree, and she cursed; did this forest need to have so many damn trees?

“Hey now, that wasn’t very polite,” the necromancer said, sounding…concerned? He bent down, patting the skull of the dreadful boar-like-thing. “These are no abominations; they are just unusual. This is Boboar, and the smaller one is Foxy. Say hi, guys.”

The fox thing made a soft cry, while the boar thing oinked and charged at her. Holly screamed, shutting her eyes.

“Don’t be afraid.” The evil wizard laughed. “He just wants to play!”

Holly was expecting agony and death, but neither came. “Ah?” Eventually, she opened her eyes just a bit; the boar thing’s terrifying form was close, leaning forward as if to smell her dress. It then hopped a circle around her—and the tree she was backed against—before releasing a happy oink.

“What?” Holly muttered. Her entire body was numb, and her mind felt hazy, completely unable to follow this chain of events. “This is impossible…” she muttered out loud. “I must have died already. I’m dreaming.”

“I told you, it’s okay. I’m a good guy, and these two are my friends. We aren’t going to harm you. What’s your name?”

“Holly…” she whispered, eyes glazed over. Today was simply too much.

“Very nice to meet you, Holly.”

“Are you really not going to kill me?”

“Of course I’m not going to kill you,” Jerry replied, stretching a hand to help her up. She looked at it, shivered, then stood by herself. The necromancer shrugged.

“But… You’re a necromancer,” she said, dusting herself off. By the side, the two skeletal animals awaited, but now she could function. Somewhat. “Aren’t necromancers supposed to kill people?”

“Some do, but I’m a good necromancer. I don’t kill people for no reason.”

“But then you can’t use their bodies.”

“That’s okay. Besides,” he gestured at the dead bandits, “look at how conveniently these three showed up.”

She gave him the side eye. “You’re weird.”

“I get that a lot.” He smiled, tapping his temple. “Something in here’s not right, but that’s okay. Not everyone has to be normal. I like me.”

Holly blinked. “Are you crazy?” she asked.

“I don’t think so, but I could be. It’s hard to tell.”

“How can it be hard?” she asked. Despair gave way to a rush of adrenaline, easily mistaken for excitement, even by herself. “Do you see things that don’t exist? Do you hear voices?”

The boar thing bumped on her leg, and she yelped.

“None of those.” Jerry shook his head. “It’s just, you know… I spent six months in solitude, and before that, I’d gone fifteen years straight with a massive headache. Maybe some part of my brain went bad? The way my mind works now feels odd, as if something in there is wrong, but I don’t mind.”

“Oh,” Holly said, her mind jittery. She was confused. Necromancers weren’t supposed to be like this. She looked at her feet, where the monster called Boboar lay on the ground, unperturbed by the blood and gore on its tusks.

Wait, why am I not affected by the blood? Is it the shock? Am I in shock?

She looked at the dead bodies. One had been stomped through the chest, blood, skin, and entrails spreading out of the man’s body like tree roots. Deep down, some part of her screamed and retched at the sight—but it felt strangely distant, as if there was a different Holly trapped inside her, struggling to escape while this Holly, the one outside, was so, so cold.

In fact, her entire body was so frozen it suddenly felt numb.

“Oh,” she exclaimed, then fainted on the spot.

***

Jerry regarded the unmoving corpses sprawled against the forest floor. He was honestly excited; it was the first time he had human bodies to experiment with.

Idly, he wondered whether these young men were simply joking with Holly before he unleashed an oversized skeletal boar at them. He really hoped that wasn’t the case. He had heard screams, and there were wicked shortswords on the ground.

Perhaps the girl could explain. She looked about sixteen, with blond hair and an oval, freckled face, while a now-dirty, frilly blue dress covered her body. She also wore rough wooden shoes, called clogs, quite to Jerry’s glee; her village might lack a proper shoemaker.

She also wore a string around her neck, from which hung a piece of wood nettle. This plant supposedly repelled undead, though Jerry had discovered no such inclination of them. It was just a widespread superstition. Some people always carried these itchy plants around, just in case the Damn Wall fell, as if they wouldn’t have time to grab a handful from the forest then. It was kind of stupid, really, but understandable, as it gave people the illusion of protection, an imaginary shield against the terror.

The wood nettle did mark the girl as prejudiced against necromancers.

Next to her, an herb-filled basket lay on the ground, its contents spilling out by the soiled ends of her dress. There was no reason to wear such a garment in the forest, but it also wasn’t Jerry’s business.

However, just as he was done answering her questions and about to ask his own, the girl in front of him had simply slumped over, falling to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

Of course, he thought. Resist the shock when it’s your turn but give in when it’s mine.

Scoffing, he looked around. Trees everywhere. No village to be seen. Jerry scratched his head, wondering what he was supposed to do with an unconscious girl. He couldn’t just guess where her village was, so he’d just have to wait until she woke up—and patiently enjoy his lunch in the meantime. After all, if she was in a hurry, she shouldn’t have fainted.

He grabbed Holly and placed her on Boboar’s back, careful not to injure her. “Let’s go, guys. That squirrel won’t eat itself.”

Right then, the bushes behind Jerry shook.

“STOP!” came a voice, and Jerry looked over warily. A middle-aged man leaped out of the bushes with surprising agility. He was skinny and tall, wearing a pair of fine, pointy blue shoes and loose red robes covering his body. Strict lines framed his eyes, while his face was a sharp kind of aged. Most notably, the man had a wicked mustache, thin and stretching from cheek to cheek. Jerry thought it was pretty cool.

He was also unarmed, vaporizing Jerry’s wariness.

The middle-aged man took in Jerry and his undead. “Get away from her, you squanderer of gifts!” he shouted with a judgmental frown. The necromancer, on the other hand, found the older man’s reaction cute; what would he do, scold him? That was, until sparks appeared on the man’s fingers.

“Wait!” Jerry raised his hands. “This isn’t what it looks like.”

Fire flew at him.