Pestilence: Rise Of The Pure Undead
Chapter 16: From The Fog

"Yeah, I knew something was off" surrounded by the utter chaos and collective hysteria his tribe had devolved into, Gobstroz felt oddly cold-headed as he stared ahead at the ever growing wall of dark fog.

The smog was high, seemingly expanding in height faster than it spread on the ground.

Its effects were obvious, seeing the plants and trees falling apart, growing strange, tumour-looking fleshy protuberances, oozing a dark and gooey substance, it was clearly something no one would want to touch under any circumstances.

He had no clue whether or not this was related to his previous problem of mysterious creature and he frankly didn't care, at the rate this thing was progressing, it would engulf his tribe in a week, and that was being optimistic.

This deadly smoke wouldn't care for their improved defences and might, it wasn't something he could face in a fight, it was a natural disaster, the first to ever befall the inhabitants of this underground world.

"Chieftain?" a mousy voice called out to him.

"Go on" he gave permission to speak as he turned around, not bothering to identify who was speaking, any ideas, no matter how idiotic was worth listening to at the moment.

'Oh, it's that kid, what was his name again?' he recognised the goblin that had spoken to him about Gobert's disappearance, an unremarkable member of the tribe, easily forgotten about.

Gobstroz still managed to remember this fellow's name.

"Imigob, what is the matter?" he added as he saw that his tribesman was still hesitant about giving his opinion.

"Hurm, chieftain, I, I have an idea to slow down the mist" he looked away as he spoke.

"Then go ahead, explain" Gobstroz nudged him to continue, grabbing him by the shoulder and forcing him to stand up as he brought the smaller goblin next to him, both facing the unstoppable miasma.

"Well, I noticed something about it…" he was still fidgety but kept on nonetheless.

"If you could look over there…" he pointed at the ground in front of the death cloud.

"The grass and flowers die faster than than bushes and trees, and the mist advances faster into those areas as well, so-"

"Oh!" The chieftain slammed his fist into his hand as he understood, he hadn't thought of it like that, but hearing about it from Imigob made him realise this obvious fact.

"So it would seem that the mist progresses at the speed at which it can kill things, growing over the areas it had already grazed…" the young goblin finished his thought.

"I think I see where you are going, but go on Imigob!" the chieftain slapped the goblin's bald head, encouraging him.

"O-Okay! I would suggest that we burn the ground and vegetation in between the mist and the tribe, so as to slow its approach" Imigob stared into the miasma as he spoke.

"That's what I thought, how come I never heard that you had such a good head on your shoulder" the chieftain began to walk away, scooping some of the panicked goblins to go and do some scorched earth tactic.

Imigob remained in place, staring at the approaching smog with a fearful expression, looking from behind the false safety of the fence, he saw something move.

He tensed up, his eyes widening as he stared at the vague shape moving and pushing through the dense mist.

'It's… Getting thicker?' the miasma was turning darker and proliferating faster, it was all happening so fast, he could hardly believe it.

With a thud, a huge, skeletal monster emerged from the fog, covered in a dark, oily liquid, it yelled out toward the tribe.

Before the sound could reach Imigob, his mind had already gone into overdrive, analysing in too much detail every single thing within his sight.

The large beast wasn't alone, smaller beings similar to it were following, all appearing like walking corpses.

Their empty eyes smouldering with dark fires, they didn't rush forward and simply stood there after making their presence known.

Imigob's attention was centered on what filled the largest monster's ribcage, the mass of pure rot was pushing against its ribs, sticking to its body and entangling around its bones.

The miasma was coming from within this creature.

The young goblin opened his mouth as he turned around, ready to shout about the danger when the roar reached him.

Him and all of the other green monsters suddenly grew pale as their muscles tensed up, their heart rates suddenly slowed before growing stronger and harder, this roar had just instilled something into their minds.

They had been forcefully made to realise that they could die at any moment.

The roar wasn't powerful enough to paralyse the strongest members of the tribe and only halted their steps for an instant, still, most of the goblins were left stumped in place.

Unable to do anything as the undead troop got into action, grabbing chunks off of the rotten mass, they began throwing those torn pieces over the fence, at the foot of the fence and nearly everywhere else.

The small bits quickly began to start growing, corrupting the rich life in the air, much richer than anywhere else due to being so close by to the dwelling place of the goblins, a species with more lifeforce than the mundane plants and trees.

The undeads then retreated back into the miasmic cloud, disappearing from sight after leaving the goblins to deal with the rot, which had seen some severe improvement after being nourished so much.

"Burn the crap they threw at us! Don't leave any stone unturned, burn it all!" the chieftain yelled out, dragging the mortified goblins out of their stupors.

'Damn, those things got all the way over there? Then does it mean that The First Seed was taken out?' the mist had since long covered the entirety of the bark dwellers's living space, but Gobstroz had still been hesitant to count the old tree as dead.

It was, by all means, the mightiest being of this miniature world, nothing got close to even matching its power and control.

If it had fallen, there was little hope for them, mere monsters.