Apostles of Doom

That was essentially what he and Rasmeth were doing at the moment. With more troops now engaged, they did not have the mana to spare to do major attacks. Interestingly, as with the battle priests, the emblem on his shield was actually a consecrated symbol of Tiernon that he could use as a normal Holy Symbol, thus giving him a free hand for his mace.

He had cast the Apostolic Ritual of Unlife Aversion upon himself. This provided him and those around him with a region in which Unlife were not only hindered but actively and painfully repelled. He was trying to use it in such a way as to push the zombies off the top of the wall. Preferably the outside wall, but there were people on the ground on the inside prepared to deal with any zombie mush that might try to crawl or ooze away from the impact site.

CRUNCH went his mace in a zombie’s skull. The mace’s pleasant glow would be quite useful once Atun had set. He pulled the mace, dripping with brains, out of the skull. The weapon had the option to raise spikes out of the main ball, similar to a morning star, but without the chain. However, in the case of zombie skulls, a simple round ball mace was more effective, as it was not as easily stuck in broken skull bone crevices.

“Aigh!” wailed a soldier about two feet from him. Somehow a zombie — no, that was a ghoul — had gotten between the segments at the wrist joint of her armor and was gnawing on the woman’s wrist.

“Off with you!” Teragdor yelled, quickly crushing the ghoul’s skull. That would prevent it from being turned to a wight. “Let me see your wrist!” he ordered the soldier, moving to try and surround her with his shield. He allowed his mace to fall on its strap as he reached for the woman’s hand.

Teragdor quickly recited the ritual for curing ghoulism and then followed up with a healing ritual.

The woman looked up gratefully. “Thank you, apostle!”

“Keep up the good work!” Teragdor said with a nod as he pulled back, turning around and flipping his mace back up into his hand.

CRACK went his mace, glancing off a ghoul’s head this time. He shoved with his shield and the ghoul went tumbling over the wall to the inside court. Teragdor winced slightly. He had no problem with making zombie mush, but ghoulash was different. Ghouls were infected, diseased mortals; aside from their horrible hunger, they were actually intelligent people. Falling to one’s death like that was not a particularly honorable way to die. Not how he would normally want to defeat, or kill, his opponent.

He suspected however, that such a sentiment came from his mother’s side. He doubted too many orcs had such moral qualms. Of course, that could be the ingrained racism of the Church in Astlan. Orcs were not held in that high regard in the Astlanian Church of Tiernon, unlike here. Having been raised among humans, he had internalized many of those prejudices. Only here in Nysegard could he stand side by side with half-orcs, humans and orcs and see them all as individuals and not preconceived caricatures.

CRUNCH went his mace into another zombie skull. Zombies, on the other hand, were pretty much exactly what he’d always thought they’d be like. Only the putrid smell had he not counted on. No one had ever told him how truly horrible rotting zombie organs and flesh smelled.

Mount Doom, DCC: Early Fourth Period

“The seventeenth regiment, under Flora, shall be responsible our ground and tunnel defense here at Doom,” Arg-nargoloth noted, gesturing on the map table to the ground entrances to Doom. “Tar Roth Non is reporting that all the hydra hounds that survived Lord Tommus here are fully regenerated and ready to eat anyone entering the tunnels.”

“Sorry about that,” Tom said. He really did feel guilty for the havoc his party had wreaked upon the hydra hounds, who had just been doing their jobs.

Arg-nargoloth chuckled, shaking his head. “Don’t be; I am exaggerating. All of the hounds actually survived. This is the Abyss, after all. The ones you brained so they could not sprout new heads are just taking longer to regenerate. They should be ready for combat in a few more weeks. Anyway, we still have over a thousand hounds ready for combat.”

“The tenth is ready for Doom air support,” Zog Darthelm reported. “We have gotten three new gravity canons online and the plasma infantry are now at their defensive stations.”

Tom shook his head. “I wish we could use those plasma rifles in Nysegard. I suspect they would work quite well on Unlife.”

“They do indeed.” Morok Deathstealer nodded in agreement.

“I prefer gravity rifles for zombies. One-stop pulverization, brains and all,” Zog replied.

“Neither of which work in Nysegard,” Arg-nargoloth interrupted, trying to keep the planning session on topic.