[NR] Skeletal Shardling - Chapter 679

That was the most success a flesh amalgamation had for the rest of the night. Each wave arrived with another charging the wall, but all fell after only minor gains. Though this wasn’t entirely a result of the defenders being better at their job.

One of Siegfried’s analysts breaks it down for him as the first bits of light arrive over the horizon. “While none of the amalgamations were anything fancy. After all, a proper corpsecrafter could have put them together without a binding, which I assume was twined sinew. However, that first mass was better put together.

“All of them came from the same, or similar, batch of ‘supplies’. My people were able to match up parts shared between them. However, that first one had the most complete parts.

“The limbs used to make it were all entire segments. I do not believe there was a single broken bone to start with. While all the rest? They had bits and pieces incorporated. Like someone chopped up a bunch of jigsaw puzzles and then used the undamaged pieces to make one thing and the rest got taped together.”

Siegfried really only had one question, “What comes next?”

And no one had an answer. Oh, there was guesses galore! Unlike natural beasts, even those mutated by magic or natural undead, crafted undead have no limits in form. They don’t always work, but there’s nothing to stop someone from gathering a bunch of arms, sewing them together stump to palm, and calling it an armed snake.

Good thing the undead, at least at a low break, were similar enough that they had common weaknesses based on type. A skeletal undead will be weak to being smashed. Only with a higher break will such a weakness end up reduced or removed. That, or a highly divergent base form, but you tend to notice undead like that.

And the next night arrives with little fanfare. The defenders were ready as the undead rose once again. Though no flesh amalgamation. Instead, whoever was behind this had moved onto skeletal remains. This new silent menace seems to have been made from bone fragments.

Not a solid mass of bones, though. Unlike the more commonly known and much more powerful bone golem, this wasn’t some precision construction. The bone pieces were haphazardly melded together. Mismatched joints ground against each other with each twitch of the bone shardling.

Attempts at limbs, clearly misformed on purpose for some expirement or another, push the monster forward. Then the arrows rain down on it, proving to fit the usual mold when it comes to skeletal undead. The piercing arrows slip right through the undead monstrosity.

It is with the thrown stones that damage finally begins to appear, barring the occasional lucky hit. The bigger the stone, the more susceptible the monster is to them. From sling bullets not doing much better than an arrow, up to an occasional head-sized stone being thrown by a small group of Strength focused fighters.

Of course, no matter how resistant the monstrosity is to normal ranges attacks, it melts away under the follow up magical barrage. Somewhat literally as an extra dose of acid splatters over the beings mismatched frame. With that, the wave ends early since the zombies that had matched its pace also vanished under the magic.

Then the next wave reveals another such beings. The bone shards melded together to make it appear like a horse. However, this more defined shape ends up being a detriment. Instead of a proper skeleton, it simply mimics the shape. Joints barely able to bend, fused bones preventing flexibility, and a general lack of care for whether it would work as a creature.

This wave ended even sooner as the bone beast was so slow, it remained within the zombie horde. Splash damage from all the magic being flung at it, clearing out the center of said horde. Though whatever is on the other side proves once again it is getting some information back as the following waves are set up so this doesn’t happen again.

That doesn’t make the shardlings any more effective. The night ends without the undead gaining a single inch. Not that the flesh amalgamations from the night before are stronger. Rather, the flesh monsters simply have more mass and so take more to down. This isn’t even about killing them, but knocking them down in any manner.

This pattern of new monstrosities popping up? It continues over the next four days. The main difference between the nights isn’t the new horror, but how many advanced zombies manage to get squeezed in. On the last day of this pattern, seven green-haired zombies popped up with the last wave.

“This night will be different”, Siegfried shakes his head, “Nothing concrete, but given my skills, expect change. We’re going to deploy the melee tonight.”

This wasn’t a surprise to anyone. If anything, some of the old hands felt they had held off for too long. While they could gather more rock and make more arrows during the day. Going pure ranged for the night wasn’t sustainable.

And they were ready for the switch to melee as well. While the settlement had been set up from the word go to stay behind the walls, that doesn’t mean they weren’t set up with a method to fight outside of them.

All around the side of the wall facing the spawn point, groups of ten to twenty melee fighters are gathering on wooden platforms extended off of the walls and being lowered down. There are, of course still a bunch of ropes to lift people individually, but the hope is that if a retreat is needed, those same platforms will be used to lift people back up.

Jason, of course puts himself out at the front with the tanks. Or rather, he put himself in front of the tanks. No one complained, what with him being a traveller. Besides, for the moment, the settlement is only putting third break fighters down there to handle things, mostly so the other side doesn’t start fielding things to fight fourth breaks.