Garath, for his part, didn’t take a single rest break. He spent most of the fourth wave in his House Cat form to take advantage of the -20% Mana costs while in the feline shape. He was getting used to, and even growing quite fond of, the lean and athletic form. Dodging the Ghoul’s scimitars and the projectiles from both Archers and Magi felt almost too easy as he scampered through the pitched battle on the blacktop. He cast Blight each time the cooldown period elapsed, infecting hundreds of undead throughout the two-and-a-half hour onslaught with its deadly poison, racking up Tainted Soul debuffs in his House Cat form like bugs on a windshield. He still didn’t quite understand what that meant but, in his white feline form, he couldn’t care less. The only thing on his mind was growing stronger and the bliss of Experience points flowing into his body from every kill. The fluffy murder machine was almost disappointed when the perfunctary prompt arrived.
Monster respawns will be halted for the next 30 minutes as the next wave is prepared. Rest and hone your skills, human. The Culling continues at 12:00(GST).
The Culling Totals
Global Death Count: 4,978,025,135
Community Death Count: 88,032
The Skeletal Magi, in addition to their Ghoul and Archer comrades, had managed to put down another 1,362,035,233 humans across the planet. As he shifted back into his natural form and made his way back into the building, Garath couldn’t help wondering how many of the undead pig-fuckers he and The Band had put down during that wave. He also thought that the death count prompt would be much more encouraging if it showed that number instead - or at least in addition to - but he guessed that encouragement probably wasn’t its intended function. He dismissed the prompt and moved on to the good stuff.
Congratulations, Garath! For reaching level(s) 12, 13, and 14 you are awarded +9 Attribute Points (3 per level) and +3 Skill Points (1 per level) to distribute at your discretion. As a Necrologist, you receive +3 Wisdom, +3 Vitality, and +1 Regeneration per level. You have one week to distribute the points before they are assigned for you based on your chosen class.
Unused Attribute Points: 9
Unused Skill Points: 4
Garath slumped a bit. He was SO close to Level 15! Between that and the fact that he didn’t receive the notification stating that new Skills were now available, the Necrologist mentally kicked himself for not eeking out just a few more kills over the last few hours. On the brighter side, at least this time he knew exactly where to put his Attribute Points. His Vitality and Regeneration stats seemed to be more than sufficient to keep him alive at that point, especially considering how easy it had been for him to dodge incoming attacks in the Form Size: Tiny body of a House Cat, and decided that he wanted to add a little more firepower to his spells. He dumped all 9 unused AP into Wisdom, confirmed his changes, and reveled in the rejuvenating rush from the increased Attributes.
More groups came to join The Band during the break between the fourth and fifth waves. Most notably, to Garath at least, was a group of five self-proclaimed ‘bad-asses’ that swaggered up to the building - all middle-school aged gamer boys that had probably spent the last five years playing D&D in Mike’s basement. Not that any of them were named Mike, of course. Their names (Stabby, SHONEN, Teerex, TheDM, and AyAyRon) were all quite obviously gamertags and, despite their age, Garath was thrilled to have a group of little gamers in the Raid. Apart from the young boys that Garath had decided to refer to as ‘the hawkies’ in his head, several more families and even a few lone wolves made their way to The Band’s stronghold. Garath spent the majority of the half-hour window between waves meeting with each new person and group, introducing himself and directing them to their respective positions in preparation for the next wave.
With a fresh-ish batch of reinforcements and a defensive strategy that had kept everyone alive through twelve hours of attacks, Garath felt confident going into the fifth wave. Still, with the group size now just over 100, he decided to stay in his human form and remain behind the melee with the other ranged damage dealers for the upcoming wave. From there, he would be in a better position to mark targets and organize the group as a whole.
At 12:58GST (3:58PM PST) the floating monster-balls once again started to swell and shake wildly. Garath’s heart jumped in his chest when he saw that, unlike each of the previous waves, roughly one in twenty-five of the vibrating black orbs were glowing an ominous blood-red.
The closest red orb to The Band of the Hawk’s defensive position was just on the other side of the closest asphalt basketball court, about 20 meters south of the doors. Another of the red orbs hovered a few feet off the ground about 20 meters to either side of the first. The spacing between them and the placement of the new orbs made it pretty clear to Garath that a fourth red orb was almost positively hovering atop the roof of the building.
Chapter 17
If Wishes Were Horses We’d All be Eatin’ Steak
Undead Legionnaire
Undead
Health: 155/155
Level: 14
Station: Commander
Mana: 65/65
Description: Commanders of the Skeletal Legions.
Average Respawn Time: 30 minutes
Level Range: 14-15
*Note: Undead Legionnaires command and bolster the Lich’s Legion.
“Well that’s just fucking great,” Garath said to noone in particular as he read the informational table.
The Legionnaire stood over seven feet tall and, though it had no muscles to speak of, its bulky plate armor and thick bones gave it a bulky appearance to add to its towering presence. It held an impressive lochaber axe with both boney hands. The roar
