Necromancer Dreams of Mechs Chapter 62: Chapter 68

Read chapter 62 of Necromancer Dreams of Mechs by Magic on NovelPedia.

Chapter 62: The Theatrics Are Lovely The silence Seraphine left in the wake of her threat was a physical thing—thick, heavy, and suffocating. Lee sat perfectly still, the thin red line on his cheek weeping a slow bead of blood that looked far too crimson against his pale skin. Across from him, Serhii didn’t look frightened; he looked professional. His eyes drifted from the spot where the rapier had been to the door of the Gilded Flagon, already calculating. Without a word, Serhii stood up. He adjusted his basic linen tunic as if he were settling the straps of a heavy ceramic plate carrier, his movements practiced and economical. He reached into a hidden pocket of his inventory and pulled out a small, unlabeled glass bottle. He uncorked it with his teeth, took a sharp, burning pull of vodka, and started toward the door. “Serhii,” I called out, my voice low but carrying a weight that made him pause. He looked back over his shoulder, his face a mask of military stoicism. “Don't go past the street corner. The guards are on a hair-trigger after the purge, and the things that aren't guards are significantly worse. You’re Level 0. To the things in the dark, you’re just a snack that hasn't realized it's dead yet.” Serhii didn’t argue. He didn’t sneer like Lee. He simply gave a sharp, single nod—a soldier acknowledging an intel report—and disappeared into the crowd. “We need to move,” I said, looking at the rest of them. “The city isn’t safe, and the Flagon is too public.” The walk through Oakhaven was a descent into a nightmare none of them were prepared for. As we stepped out of the tavern, the sensory overload hit the group like a tidal wave. “I can feel the wind,” Nathan whispered, his voice cracking. He held his hands out, watching the way the breeze caught the fabric of his sleeves. “And the smell... god, Allen, it doesn’t smell like a game. It smells like garbage, old wood... and blood.” He wasn’t wrong. The metallic tang of the afternoon’s massacre still hung in the stagnant air of the alleys. Katerina was lagging behind, her fingers trailing over the stone walls of the buildings. “The texture mapping is infinite,” she muttered, her eyes wide and darting. “There’s no repeating pattern on the masonry. No tiling on the cobbles. Allen, how is the server handling the draw distance? How is the latency even possible?” “It’s not a server, Kat,” I said, not looking back. Sarah was the worst off. She walked in the center of the group, her arms wrapped around herself, shuddering every time we passed a dark alleyway or a particularly large bloodstain on the stones. To them, it had been seconds since they were in their own world. Now, they were stepping through a slaughterhouse. The transition from the city to the forest was like walking into a wall of cold, wet velvet. The sky wasn't just dark; it was heavy. High above, a jagged celestial tear throbbed with a bruised violet light, making the stars look like shards of broken glass embedded in a ceiling that was slowly sinking toward our heads. "I can't... I can't breathe right," Sarah whispered, her voice barely audible over the crunch of dead leaves. She was clutching her throat, her eyes darting toward the looming, oily-black trees. "The air feels like it's made of lead. Allen, why does it feel so heavy?" "It’s the mana density," I said, my voice sounding flat and hollow even to my own ears. "It's the world acclimating everything, trying to find a balance. Your lungs will get used to it—or they won't." "That is a very comforting thought, Voss. Truly," Serhii muttered from the flank. He was still moving in that low, military crouch, his eyes squinting into the ink-black treeline. He paused, taking a sharp, medicinal pull from his vodka bottle before wiping his mouth. "You talk like a man who has forgotten what it’s like to be afraid of the dark. Or maybe you've just been in it too long." "Maybe both," I replied. Ciara’s grip on my arm was so tight it was beginning to leave marks, though s