Atop the windswept hill, the air reeked of blood and scorched flesh.
Eleres slumped against a jagged outcrop of stone, his back pressed to the cold, unyielding rock. His body felt hollow, like something vital had been scraped out of him and never returned. Dried blood clung to the cracks in his shattered armor, and his skin had turned a lifeless blue-white, drained of warmth, drained of humanity.
Though the bleeding had stopped, an icy rot spread from within—creeping through his veins, clawing into his bones. His heartbeat was gone, or at least he couldn't feel it anymore. All that remained was a mechanical whisper of breath, shallow and strained, each inhale like rusted air scraping against a collapsing lung.
And then came the whispering.
Not the wind.Not a hallucination.Voices.
They drifted in and out, broken and distant—like words torn from rotting mouths, muttered in a language no living soul should hear. He couldn't understand them, but he felt their meaning: death, hunger, and something watching.
He tried to lift his hand to cover his ears.He couldn't.His arm was stiff, frozen, barely trembling—more corpse than flesh.
Then the system spoke.Clear. Icy. Absolute.
[Necromancer Template Activated.][System Permissions Unlocked: Summonable Undead Entity × 1.][Primary Objective: Retrieve "Flesh Fragments" 10/100 for Body Reconstruction.][Secondary Objective: Remain alive until task completion.]
Eleres forced his eyes shut. His throat burned like dry stone, and his vision blurred. Yet even through the haze, he could see the battlefield in the distance—broken flags, scorched soil, bodies blackened by fire, limbs scattered like discarded tools.
He understood one thing:
If he wanted to live, he had to return to hell.
His fingers twitched. Stiff. Numb. But he pulled up the system's summon interface. With a voice cracked by pain and desperation, he recited the incantation the system had burned into his memory.
Each word echoed unnaturally through the air, like something older than magic itself.
Then, the world shifted.
Thick black smoke surged from his palm. The temperature dropped. Grass wilted. Frost bloomed across the ground. The soil cracked as if eaten by acid, black veins spreading like a curse.
From beneath, something stirred.
A sharp, grinding sound of bone scraping bone.Then—it rose.
A figure clad in tattered royal armor emerged from the smoke, dragging itself free of the earth. It knelt before him in eerie silence.
And that face—That face was his own.
Pale. Lifeless. Hollow-eyed.Yet it knelt as if awaiting command.
The thing before him was his original body.
Eleres froze, breath caught in his throat. His vision swam. His stomach turned.
"I… really did die," he whispered, barely audible.
But he didn't scream.He didn't run.
He had already died once.Now, he would live for himself.
"Go back to the battlefield," he rasped. "Bring me… flesh."
The undead didn't respond. It didn't need to.
It stood. Its movements were slow, stiff—but steady. Armor fragments scraped against its limbs with every step. Its boots crushed bone and gravel alike as it moved toward the deadlands.
Eleres reached for the rock, steadying himself. His legs shook, barely able to hold his weight, but he stood.
One step. Then another.
He wasn't a warrior.He wasn't a mage.
He was a man bound to the edge of death by a system he didn't understand—a living corpse surviving on borrowed time.
But he was still alive.
For now.
Meanwhile, less than three miles from the edge of the battlefield, a six-man squad moved silently across the scorched earth.
What should have been a golden sunset was now swallowed by thick, oppressive clouds. The light had vanished, replaced by a darkness as heavy as iron.
The air reeked of blood and scorched flesh, thick enough to turn one's stomach.Every step they took produced a faint click, as if their boots were treading over a field of brittle bones.
Charred branches lay broken across the ground. Shattered armor and scorched corpses were scattered everywhere like a battlefield report that had never been cleaned up.
Each member of the squad wore the standard gray-blue cloak issued by the Royal Capital, their chests embroidered with the insignia of the Starlight Rose. Their movements were synchronized and precise. At their waists hung identical spirit crystals—devices meant to detect residual energy from life-mark stones—flickering faintly with a pale blue glow.
This was the Capital's Special Retrieval Division, an elite force tasked with assignments too sensitive even for nobles to touch.
Their objective was clear: confirm whether the Third Prince, Ares, was truly dead.
"Report came from the frontline scouts," the captain said quietly as he led the group. His voice was low, but brooked no argument. "The life-mark stone shattered—but the prince's body… is gone."
He spoke slowly, but each word landed like a lead weight in the minds of his team.
The squad fell into a brief silence. They all understood what a life-mark stone signified—it was a royal artifact, worn only by a few at the highest ranks, and it had never failed. If it broke, it meant death, without question.
But now, the body was gone.No blood trail, no signs of scavengers—just emptiness where death should have lingered.That was the part that unsettled them the most.
As they stepped onto a collapsed mountain path, the three members in the rear quietly exchanged a glance.
It lasted no more than a heartbeat before they looked away, continuing as if nothing had happened.
But what passed between their eyes wasn't worry, nor surprise. It was something darker—a suppressed anticipation… and cold calculation.
No one spoke, no one stumbled. Their formation remained flawless, their breathing steady.
But the captain's brow furrowed slightly, his expression darkening for the first time.
He had sensed something.
He wasn't a fool. Especially not now, when the smallest detail could be fatal.
"Switch to recon formation," he suddenly ordered, his tone calm, but carrying an edge of unmistakable command.
Somewhere deep inside, he knew—
This mission wasn't going to be as simple as it seemed.