The stench of decay choked Jack as he crawled through collapsed tunnels. His torchlight revealed hundreds of bloated corpses shambling toward the city gates—zombies with glowing purple veins.
"Not again," he groaned.
A sword cleaved through a zombie's skull inches from his face. "Move, idiot!" A knight in tarnished silver armor dragged him backward. Her shield bore the broken sun emblem of the Church's Third Legion.
"Your magic reanimates them!" she snarled.
"Not helping!" Jack yelled back, but she was already slashing through another wave. Her blade sparked against a skeletal abomination's ribs—revealing blackened flesh beneath.
The knight froze. The corpse's chest cavity split open, revealing a pulsating amulet engraved with Jack's watch pattern.
"By the Seven Hells..." She hacked it off, but the corpse grabbed her ankle. Rotting fingers sank into her armor as black tendrils erupted from its eyes.
Jack's fragments ignited. "Stay back!" He hurled a firebolt, but the magic tore through the corpse and seared the knight's armor off her body. She screamed, her skin peeling like parchment—revealing glowing blue veins.
"Run!" she rasped, collapsing as the infection spread. "They're using our dead!"
The ground shook. From the smoldering corpse's ribcage emerged a jagged obsidian shard—the same shape as Jack's watch fragments.