While these Dark Orderites haven't completely impressed you, you remember that Serena mentioned you would need allies and they could serve that purpose. From what you can tell, you're a better necromancer than the rest of them and this city would be an excellent beginning of your career especially since you don't have any better ideas in mind. You know that even if this event plays out well for you, you're going to have a whole shit load of trouble ahead of you so you better get a few people on your side now even if they need to be "disposed" of later…

"Alright, I'll help out, but I'm not doing this for you or following your orders, I have my own agenda!" you say flat out to Sebastian.

Before you leave Catalina speaks to you.

"So, come a long way from Enchantment class huh?" she says.
"…I thought I recognized you…and yeah I have. I finally found a branch of magic I'm really good at." You say finally realizing who she is.
"Just remember, as good as you are, you aren't the best."
"We'll see." You retort and leave.

The march towards the university where on the west side of campus you see and hear explosions. That must be where Mr. Demar is. You wonder how you'll have to deal with him after you take care of this Quayle problem.

When you get to the east campus, Sebastian was right, you see a lot of weird things going on, nearby plants are growing older and younger before your eyes, buildings are indeed disappearing and reappearing. It's a mess.

You see a small gray building that doesn't seem to be suffering any effects; you bet that's where Quayle is.

You march over with your horde only to start feeling very ill. You try to shake off the effects so you can keep control, but it doesn't matter as you begin to see your various undead troops go through weird changes. You watch them either accelerate in rot and disintegrate, or even stranger actually turn back into their living selves until they eventually become babies and then nothing.

You're only halfway to the building and you begin to worry that you're going to suffer the same fate, but manage to get in the Gray building which contains a simple auditorium like classroom. You must be back on campus. At the front of the class you see a strange man surrounded by a white glow. This must be Quayle.

"This is not the way…you have lost…you may win…it's all so fascinating…" he says in an echoed voice.

You have no idea what the hell he means, all you know is you need to kill this guy before he fucks everything up. You're having a hard time concentrating still though and once again you begin to feel very sick. That feeling becomes stronger when you see grotesque creatures pop into existence. They have writhing masses of tentacles and give off an aura completely hostile and alien. Not even the demons you've had contact with give off anything like this.

You have no time for spells you'll have to do this the old fashioned way. You run towards the front of the class where he sits and just narrowly dodge another tentacle beast appearing suddenly in front of you.

"…stop…stop it…you must stop…"

You tackle Quayle and something completely unexpected and disgusting happens. His body literally breaks like a fragile glass vase and all manner of insects and maggots come crawling out, mostly on you.

"EEEEYEEECAAAGH!" you yell trying to get them all off of you, completely ignoring anything else. Fortunately for you, whatever you did has stopped the temporal disturbance. The creatures disappear and everything else seems to go back to normal.

After stomping on some centipedes you notice Quayle's head has rolled into a corner. Surprisingly it's still alive.

"You have won nothing…" his head says before it just simply disappears.

You shake your own head at all of this. As much as you've seen during your short time raising the dead, you've never seen anything like this.

You can't hear anymore explosions; you wonder if Mr. Demar has won. You exit the building and begin to walk over to the other side of the campus where the explosions were coming from.

You arrive to burning buildings and ruins of towers. Once again you see Sebastian, he's sitting outside holding his head in his hands. He looks like he's sobbing.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" you ask.
"It's over! It's all over!"
"What are you talking about? It looks like the city is ours."
"But for how long? All our so called demon allies took off! By the time I got here Mr. Demar had already been severely wounded and his second in command Trelik had betrayed him. Catalina and I managed to kill Trelik, but Catalina fell in the battle! The Dark Order is over and I dunno what's coming next, we're all in a lot of fucking trouble! Trouble that I wasn't prepared to handle! I'm not really a leader. Mr. Demar was a leader! Oh man why did I choose this path!?"

Sebastian is having a complete mental break down and it sickens you. It's unbecoming of a necromancer.

"Where's Mr. Demar?" you ask.
"He's dead in the library!"
"Good, saves me the trouble."
"Huh? What's going on?"
"I'm in charge, that's what's going on and I'm not going to tolerate whimpering weaklings like you." and you blast Sebastian with negative energy to his face, killing him.

Yep, you're in charge.



A month passes

The "Nuro Incident" as it came to be known was a shock to the civilized world. Nobody had anticipated such a thing occurring despite all preparations. Certainly not to Nuro given it's near "invincible" reputation. You've renamed the city Aftermath.

The Grand Alliance was immediately formed to retake the city, but fortunately for you, you weren't the only problem they had.

Velzix, a demon lord who the Dark Order summoned to help them, soon left Nuro during its attack, and managed to unite the rest of the demons that felt the need to break their contract with the Dark Order. They turned their attention to the Tulan Kingdom. Right now he's established his own rule, enslaving the population and is most likely planning further conquest assuming he can keep his own troops from fighting each other long enough.

As for you, you've already managed to hold off one Grand Alliance attack quite successfully due to your preparations. The first thing you did was command all the surviving Dark Order members to become necromancers. They're mediocre at best though, they might be better if you took a more direct hand in training them, but you're too impatient and you have so many other things to take care of as well.

You haven't heard anything from your family; you can only wonder what they think of all this and you don't really care.

While things are somewhat quiet now, that's not going to last. The Grand Alliance will keep attacking and they may very well overwhelm you in time. You can't just sit in your throne room and prepare for the next attack and you need to be proactive about this threat, but the big problem though is, you're basically doing all of this yourself. There isn't anyone anywhere near your equal, let alone anyone you can trust to handle important things.

As much as you loathe thinking of it, you could ally with Velzix, granted he's an untrustworthy demon, and not fond of the Dark Order for imprisoning him, you were never a member of the Dark Order and may be receptive. You soon send messages to him asking for an alliance. Eventually you get a response, and it's a positive one. Velzix even says he'll meet you in the city of Aftermath. Apparently he isn't worried about you.

When he arrives he gets right to business.
"Nice decorations…so, you wish to make a deal with me?"
"I've come to propose a pact between us yes. We have a common enemy."
"Yes, but what does this pact entail exactly?"
"Simple, we don't attack one another and we coordinate our attacks to be more effective against the Grand Alliance."
"And I suppose while my attention isn't on you, and I waste my valuable resources, you build up strength and attack me eh? Heh heh, I know you little necromancer. I see the desire to murder the entire world in your eyes. I even respect it, but if you think I'm trusting you, you're as brain dead as those corpses you raise."
"What?! You're a fucking demon and you're accusing ME of being deceitful?"
"Of course. Who better to see treachery than one who is an expert at it? But assuming you genuinely mean for us to be best buddies forever and ever, I still don't see what you can do for me in your current state."
"What are you on about now?"
"I'm saying as a military power you ain't shit that's what! Your necromancers are barely competent enough to hold your defenses of that little necropolis you rule. It's mostly you doing all the work, and while you've got a little power, it still ain't enough to attack anything in a meaningful way."

You hate the fact that Velzix is right, but you hate it even more that he's so damn smug about it. Which makes you wonder why he called you out here…in fact you're starting to prepare yourself for trouble.

"Alright then what the hell are you proposing?" you ask.
"I propose a…merger rather than an alliance."
"You're proposing that I let YOU take over Aftermath and I just become your bitch."
"Not exactly how I worded it, but if you prefer that designation…"
"NO! I don't prefer it!"
"Okay then how about this? I say you'll last maybe another year tops if you stay walled up in this little city of yours just letting the Grand Alliance constantly beat down your gates until they finally succeed. Then assuming you don't die during that final attack, I predict that you live a ragged existence on the run for maybe a couple years afterwards at which point you'll end up getting hunted down and killed hiding in some cave somewhere."
"And that's what you see?"
"Seen it happen to more powerful mortals than you. BUT! It doesn't have to be that way. Joining with me can be more beneficial than you think. You don't think I don't see the power in you? You would be a very valuable asset to my plans. Your ability to control the dead is very strong and quite frankly it would be nice to actually have not just troops that aren't fighting among themselves, but a great general as well. Think about it! You'll gain more power and you could still bring death to thousands and not have to worry about all the bullshit of ruling, because as I'm sure you know, it isn't as fun as it should be most of the time. You will prosper, if you continue to prove yourself worthy and useful."

You decline his offer

Never. You'll never submit to anyone else's rule. You'd rather die first. But if you can help it, maybe you can eliminate one rival right now.

You don't answer Velzix's offer, you immediately attack! You blast Velzix, with a beam of negative energy. Your nearby undead soldiers rush at Velzix, and your necromancers provide some back up.

Velzix somewhat expected your attack though, and he blocks your beam with a magic shield and then flies through the wall of your fortress burning your corpse soldiers in the way.

"Short-sighted little dead wizard! You've sealed your own doom!" you hear him shout as he flies away back to his own realm.

You aren't impressed by his threats however, you order your wall to be fixed, while you plan your next move…

A year passes…
The Kingdom of Tulan has finally put the sword to every last demon infesting the area. You laugh when you hear how easily Velzix was defeated, however this celebration is soon short lived.

The Grand Alliance attempts another siege of the city and this time they succeed. You barely manage to escape. You try to establish some sort of rule elsewhere, but the Grand Alliance isn't letting you get dug in again.

You begin your long road of hardship and keep to rural areas; many times you barely survive attacks from barbaric orc tribes. Fortunately your skills in necromancy protect you (as well as scare the hell out of the orcs)





Two years pass...
You hear them coming for you, there is no more running. This is your fate. To die in this cave. You think bitterly about Velzix's all too correct prediction about your fate. You wonder if you'd been less prideful and accepted his offer, you wouldn't be in this state you are right now.

You shake your head to this however. No point in regrets. You've made your choices and now you make one last one.

You leave the cave to face your enemies and prepare to die for your heinous crimes…

Such is often the fate of a necromancer.