***
[Zombie Forest Lizardman]
Level 11
Damage 60-80
HP: 700
Tier: Common
{Status effects} : {Curse of Undeath}[ The power of death moves this body, it knows no fear, no hunger and no exhaustion]
[Skills]: {Aura of Death} All undeads have a unique aura around them. For a Zombie Undead, the aura [Contagion] is applied.
[Contagion]: the Zombie passively emits poisonous and toxic fumes and smells from its body, once enough is stacked onto an enemy, they’ll start losing their HP.
[Zombify]: Extremely rare chance to turn another entity that has been felled into a zombie after death.
[Minor-Zerk]: The Zombies do not stop unless their heads are shattered. Grow stronger the more damage they take.
Lore: a once proud Lizardman now turned to Undeath by an apprentice of the ways of Undeath. Too young to be called a necromancer.
***
“No wonder it won against those two lizardmen. The lower its HP the stronger it becomes, and since those two lizardmen were simply poking it around without actually killing it, they died to its stronger self later on…”
Ludwig spoke out loud, after all he was right.
“That contagion passive though… looks interesting,” Ludwig muttered to himself but decided against staying here. He continued moving, ran around the lake and rushed up to the edge of the cliff he was observing everything from earlier. With the increased strength from his former level up, the almost ninety degree cliff looked like an easy climb. Just as he thought he reached relative safety, the bulldozing Champion Lizardman came out roaring like a dragon this time, rage clear in his voice and power thereof. The whole forest behind Ludwig shook and the birds flew up during the cold night from sheer terror.
Yet, all the Lizardman Champion could see were his former clan members turned to undeath, it screeched once more, agony clear in its voice this time, it had been losing everything. Their rotting forms moved with jerky, unnatural precision, glowing red eyes fixed on their former leader.
The humans today had come, threatened their survival, attacked their members and killed their queen, not only that, that despicable human also turned his members into Undead.
Though the Lizardman’s brain is smaller than his eyeball, it still knows hatred, and knows revenge.
The two Zombie lizardmen rushed up the new ‘life’ that appeared in front of them. And the battle begun, though calling it a battle is nothing but a mockery. It was more like a slugfest.
The first Zombie, its body riddled with decay and broken bones, lunged forward with surprising speed. Its claws raked at the Champion’s chest, but its strike glanced off the beast’s thick, scaly hide. The Champion responded with a brutal counter, its massive claw smashing into the Zombie’s torso and sending it skidding across the dirt.
The hulking champion stabbed with his spear forward, piercing right through the downed Lizardman’s chest, causing a volatile fume cloud to burst out of its rotting innards. A faint, sickly-green aura permeated the area for now.
‘That must be [Contagion] but the Champion seems unbothered by it,’ Ludwig thought as he was looking at the battle unfolding.
The second Zombie capitalized on the first’s distraction, rushing the Champion from behind. It leapt onto the hulking creature’s back, its claws digging into the thick scales near its shoulders. The Champion roared, thrashing wildly to shake the undead off, but the Zombie held firm, its jaws snapping close on the beast’s neck. But as if the boss’s neck was made of steel, the bite didn’t do any relevant damage but drew some small blood drops.
The three went on, fighting amongst each other, while the Champion Lizardman turned to boss was far superior in terms of reach and strength, something gnawed at Ludwig.
Ludwig’s crouched form behind a rocky outcrop, was watching the battle unfold. His glowing blue eyes tracked every movement, his mind racing as he analyzed the fight.
‘Why isn’t he overpowering them?’
The answer came too easily to Ludwig as he saw what happened next.
The Champion was far stronger, faster, and more experienced. It spun in a vicious arc, its spear sweeping low to knock the first Zombie who just got up back down. The creature collapsed in a heap, its legs shattered from the impact.
The champion Lizardman swung a straight fist at the impaled and legless lizardman, but the latter simply grabbed the fist with both arms. Supporting its body with nothing but the strength of its rotting knees.
‘What?’ Ludwig’s eyes almost bulged out, though he had no eyes.
The look was comic enough to be called absurd, as the smaller zombie was easily overpowering the massive creature and pulled it to the ground, the Zombie then snapped the spear that was impaling him using his arm’s strength, and then stabbed the spear blade part right onto the Champion Lizardman’s arm and impaled it onto the ground as if crucifying him.
The champion was unable to stand up since his hand was locked on the ground and could only fight with one arm pinned. He was standing? On his knees as he fought the two off.
The champion roared, in both pain and humiliating rage. It used its other hand to grab at the broken shaft of the spear and swung it at the mutilated zombie.
Before it could strike, the legless Zombie lunged forward again, despite its mangled legs. It grabbed the spear mid-swing, stopping the strike with sheer, unyielding determination. The Champion growled in frustration, its muscles straining as it tried to wrest the weapon free.
The Champion yanked the spear with all its strength, but the Zombie refused to let go. Its grip was unrelenting, its rotten muscles fueled by the passive effects of [Minor-Zerk], which grew stronger the more damage it sustained. The beast’s golden eyes burned with fury as it slammed the Zombie into the ground repeatedly, trying to break its hold.
The more it slammed it onto the ground the more of its bones and flesh would splatter all over the place, causing more {Contagion} to spread. And just as the shaft broke, the Champion finished it off with style. A forceful swing of his tree trunk thick tail, he caught the Zombie that was pinning his arm off guard, slamming his body right against the cave’s wall.
A massive spray of [Contagion] spread around the area of the cave when the Zombie’s entire body splattered all over the cave wall and splashed onto the ground around the cave.
[One of your Summoned Undead has perished]
With one of the two undead gone, only one of them was left, seeing it refusing to remove itself from its back, the champion simply grabbed the spear and ripped it out of his arm, then used his free hand to pull on the legs of the zombie.
He ripped hard enough that both legs of the Zombie tore. But the later was still bighting tightly onto his neck and grabbing hard with his claws.
Ludwig noticed it then, that the bite marks that didn’t seem too relevant at first became bigger and fiercer now. More rage boiled inside the Champion as he grabbed what was left of the zombie latching on to him and ripped it with both arms, though one of his hands was recently penetrated by a spear, it still had enough power it to simply rip the rest of the zombie’s body out of him, and by body, the literal meaning, because the head refused to unlatch.
Ludwig was both amazed and confused. After all, the Zombie that he summoned had nothing but a head remaining and it was stuck and refused to unlatch itself from the Champion’s neck. But no notification of it dying appeared.
Then he remembered a zombie does not die unless its head is crushed.
But with only a head, the Zombie proved to be of little hindrance to the Champion who began looking around for any signs of Ludwig.
“Damn, he looks angry, but without any heat signature on my undead body, I doubt he’ll find me.” Ludwig thought to himself.
But as fate would ordain, whenever someone speaks it…
An explosion happened a few dozen meters behind Ludwig. His heart almost dropped though he had none. Only then did he remember, he had requested Talia to create a distraction earlier… but why did it have to be right behind where Ludwig was.
The Behemoth went on all fours and stormed its way toward Ludwig in a heat of roars and vengeance promises.